During her teenage years, Queen Isis had insisted on what she considered a suitable governess to watch over her potentially wayward child. This governess, a woman probably younger than the queen herself though she looked and behaved as though she were her grandmother, had a prudish and pricklish aspect. A large, frumpy beldam, the sight of her alone was enough to drive away anyone who would have been tempted to try they luck with the princess, and if her looks were not repulsive enough her nagging tongue and unpleasant personality were sufficient to complete the task.
Talia loved Griselda, for that was the governess’s name – but then the princess loved everyone without distinction as to age, status or beauty. Nonetheless, the endless hours of grammar, music and sewing to which she was subjected to by Griselda frequently proved too much for the young woman and she took plenty of opportunities to escape the watchful eye of her chaperon.
So it was that Talia found herself one day in a quiet corner of the palace gardens. She was meant to be learning about the ancient kings and queens of Nysa from carefully prepared text books which had been censored by the king himself to remove all reference to the frequent amorous liaisons conducted by those merry monarchs. The result was that Talia’s history books were a great deal shorter than would be found in any library in Nysa, and she had formed an impression that for most past rulers their reign was summarised as being without incident for a generation or two – with much more information provided on those very few monarchs who had been forced by whatever circumstance to go to war. As such, her ideals of Nysan diplomacy were very much at odds with reality: in practice, those kings and queens had much preferred a marriage (or less legitimate union) to solve quarrels with their neighbours.
She had been left in her study by Griselda who had fallen asleep by the door, but the day was so beautiful – with a bright, clear sky and magnificent sun that was more like the Nysa of olden times – that she could not bear to be with her books any more. Climbing out of the window, she had slipped past the guards and found herself alone in a part of the gardens that were not visited much. Aside from a gardener, a young, stoutly built peasant who doffed his invisible cap to the princess and blushed as she went by, she was alone.
The garden itself was an exquisite testimony to the craft of the Nysans, who enjoyed gardening almost as much as they had previously enjoyed all sensuous pleasures. If anything, the reign of King Magnus and Queen Isis had seen a renaissance of the art as frustrated subjects turned their hands to pruning, weeding and cultivation with a zeal that demonstrated what one wise old scholar had once dubbed “ye return of ye repressed”.
The shrubs and hedges were masterpieces of topiary, their living forms carved into birds and castles and geometric shapes (the previous predilection for busty and well-hung forms having been forbidden), and the beds of the garden were laid out with the most delicious flowers – whose form would have been considered lascivious had the Nysans applied their newfound Puritanism to horticulture as well. In the centre of the garden was a wide pool, not especially deep but brimming with crystal clear water, on top of which floated an array of lilies.
Sitting down by the pool, Talia dipped her fingers into the water, enjoying the way it felt on her hand. Looking up at the sun, she was acutely aware of the heat blazing out onto her head and body, which was causing her neck to itch irritably. It was simply far too hot for all these clothes! she told herself and, after a few moments considering her situation decided that a dip in the pool was exactly what she needed to cool down.
She could hear the gardener behind her, clipping away at one of the shrubs which was in the shape of a tall tower rising up from the green, luscious grass. Turning to smile at him, she acknowledged his awkward nod and then returned her attention to the water which was far too tempting.
So intent was she on the water’s allure that she did not even hear the sound of the gardener’s shears cease as she unbuttoned her bodice, opening the front of her dark grey dress to reveal the swelling orbs of her breasts, her nipples pink and her skin as white as milk because it was never caressed by the sun’s rays. Instead, her ears were filled with birdsong as she peeled the thick fabric from her slender limbs and, bending over, slipped her skirts from her delightful rump and long, slender thighs.
Naked at last, she stood in silence for a moment, regarding the silver mirror of the pool. In that reflection she could see her long, auburn hair and her slight arms lifted up above her head, her breasts bouncing slightly as she moved. Her torso narrowed to a pretty little waist before widening to girlish hips, her pudenda crowned with a lovely tuft of red hair, trim and sweet.
She thought she heard a grown behind her but, turning, could no longer see the gardener. With a shrug, she stepped towards the pool, following the shallow steps into the water. It was cool, much cooler than she had expected and, as she descended even further first her calves and then her thighs began to prickle. When the water reached between her legs, it made her gasp in a very pleasurable way. She had often wondered why nature’s answer to expelling her own water often made her feel this way when something touched it, but the one time she had tried to play with herself to see whether she could stimulate such feelings more vigorously she had been caught by Griselda. The chastisement she had received, as well as the weeping reprimand from her mother who had been informed instantly, made Talia resolve never to try it again. If a simple pleasure could bring so much pain to others, she decided that it was not worth the woe.
As she pushed deeper into the water, its embrace made her nipples become hard and stiff, beads of water dripping from her shoulders as she pushed herself down and then rose up again. This was the life! she told herself. No longer restricted by her stupid clothes, she could enjoy the innocent pleasures of a swim undisturbed.
Her pleasure was not to last, however. A few moments later she heard a terrible cry from the far end of the garden which was followed almost instantly by the sight of her governess striding across the grass, dragging the gardener by his ear. The young man’s face was bright red and he seemed to be struggling to do up his trousers, which made Talia frown: there were plenty of latrines in the castle and she had never heard of anyone relieving themselves in public. That thought, however, did rouse her curiosity as to what lay in those trousers: she wondered whether he was smooth as she, with a pair of lips beneath a tuft of hair that sometimes seemed to open of their own accord.
“Princess Talia!” Griselda bellowed. “What, by the gods, are you doing?”
For one of the only times in her life, Talia felt annoyed by her mistress. Standing up so that the water streamed from her pert breasts and her narrow shoulders, she replied tartly: “Isn’t it obvious? I’m swimming?”
“What? Naked? In public?” The governess’s voice was thick with outrage.
“Of course,” Talia said. “You could hardly expect me to swim with my clothes on, could you? I’d surely drown beneath the weight, unless that was your intention.”
“Princess Talia!” Griselda’s face was so hurt that Talia immediately regretted her choice of words. “I would never desire such a thing, and well you know it – but please, cover yourself!”
With a sigh, Talia reached out with one delicate hand and lifted up a large lily pad which she placed before herself. While the leaf was sizable, it was nowhere near enough to cover her nudity and in fact the effect was to make her appear even more desirable, drawing attention to those parts that it barely concealed. Though she was not to know it, the pose she held had been a favourite of Nysan artists in reference to a local deity who was somewhat naughtier than most of the gods – which was no mean feat in itself.
Unable to look at her ward any more, Griselda turned her attention to the young gardener who was whimpering due to the pressure on his ear. “And you, young man! I’ll see that you’re thoroughly whipped for this! How dare you pollute yourself in such a filthy, disgusting manner!”
“Oh!” Talia cried. “Don’t hurt him. He wasn’t doing anything wrong!” The
n she frowned. “How was he polluting himself?” She grimaced slightly at the thought. There really were private latrines if he found himself short, but perhaps he was one of those unfortunate individuals who was incontinent. Feeling pity for him, she moved to the edge of the water, forgetting her lily pad so that her entire torso was displayed once more.
Griselda looked as though she was turning purple. “Please! Princess!” she hissed through gritted teeth. Talia was so confused that she looked away, yanking the young man around and pushing him away from the pair of them. “You! Get out of here, now! And send the head gardener. I can see what a mess you were making of that topiary!”
As the young man stumbled away, sneakily looking over his shoulder as he did so, Griselda fussed and bustled around Talia’s clothes, picking them up. “You must get dressed, princess!” she muttered. “Come back in now to your studies.”
Talia began to pout at this, looking down at her breasts. A dragonfly had settled above one of her nipples, lying for a moment among the droplets that trickled down the smooth, soft flesh. For a moment she forgot her ire but then recalled what she was being ordered – she! A princess! – to do.
“Shan’t!” she said sulkily.
At this, the governess’s willpower seemed to crumble and she half sank, half sat on the paving stones next to the pool. Her lip trembled as she struggled with herself not to cry.
“It’s no use, no use,” Talia heard her whimper. “What’s bred in the blood comes out in the bone. She doesn’t even realise what she’s doing, and how can I stop her?”
All thoughts of petulance were now dismissed and Talia rushed from the pool, throwing her wet arms around the ugly old woman’s shoulders and kissing her sweetly on the hair. “What’s wrong, dearest Griselda? What have I done wrong?”
The look of pity and sadness on her governess’s face almost broke Talia’s heart. “You… why my dear, you’ve done nothing wrong. I don’t think I’ve ever heard an unkind word from those lips of yours, but…” At this, Griselda finally began to cry, shielding her face from the concerned princess’s gaze.
Eventually, with consolation from Talia, the governess ceased to weep. She attempted to make her face stern once more, but Talia could see that it was an act. However, to keep the peace and not hurt Griselda again she somewhat reluctantly agreed to wear her clothes once more.
“Yes, let’s just sit out here for a while,” Griselda said more calmly now. She looked up at the sun which shone down on her creased face. “Why, I can’t remember the last time I sat like this. It’s because of these clothes we have to wear all the time.” Talia heard the head gardener, a spindly man in his seventies with wiry limbs and white, grizzled hair, taking up the spot where she had last seen the young man tending the shrubbery. Griselda, however, appeared not to notice, lost in her own recollections. In the silence, Talia could hear the clatter of shears as the old man went about his business.
“I can remember when Johnny and I would go out and sit by the river on days like this. There were always days like this, back then – it was before you were born, little princess.” Griselda let out a sigh. “Oh, Johnny and I would frolic like you wouldn’t believe. It seems so long ago now.”
Talia couldn’t believe that her governess had ever frolicked, but she listened politely. Griselda, however, suddenly realised who she was talking to and where her line of memories was leading her. She blushed and then made to stand up but Talia placed a hand on her arm very softly.
“I didn’t know you had a husband,” she said.
“Oh, we weren’t married!” Griselda said and then blushed again. “Anyway, enough of that. You must get on with your studies.”
Talia sighed. Her time of pleasure seemed to be coming to an end, but it had been fun while it lasted. There was, however, one thing that she wanted to talk to someone about and Griselda seemed as good a person as any.
“Griselda,” she said slowly. “You know last week, when you fell asleep and I went for a walk.”
Behind them came the regular snip, snip, snip of the gardener’s shears. He had climbed onto a ladder and was tending the tower-shaped privet.
The governess frowned but, before she could reprimand the princess Talia hurriedly continued. “I didn’t do anything bad. Honest. I was just walking by the gates, you know, that lead from the palace into town, and there was a man there, selling stuff.”
Griselda opened her mouth in horror. “What was he selling?” she asked, while the gardener continued his work behind them.
“Just food!” Talia said quickly. “Fruit and vegetables, really. I’ve seen him before, but he’s never sold these things before, and I wondered why.”
“What kind of things?” Griselda asked carefully.
“Really delicious stuff,” Talia replied innocently. “And he let me try them all for nothing. He said that all these things used to grow in Nysa, but not any more and he was trying to make a living.”
“Well, they’re probably very bad for you,” Griselda answered. “I’m surprised he wasn’t arrested.” Neither of them were aware that the gardener’s pruning was becoming somewhat more erratic.
“Oh, he was, which surprised me. I mean, all the things he had tasted so lovely. I had my hands on a big pair of melons, and when I gave them a squeeze it made him laugh.”
“By the gods!” muttered Griselda under her breath. There was a particularly loud snip behind them, and then concerted efforts to work more regularly.
“Yes, they felt lovely in my fingers, and when I popped a cherry in my mouth it was the sweetest thing I’d ever had. I couldn’t believe how it felt on my tongue. Then he handed me a banana, and after I peeled it back I gave it a good suck before swallowing it all down. I don’t think I’ve ever had something so big in my hands before.”
Griselda was speechless at this, her eyes bulging, but Talia smiled at her with clear, innocent eyes, her face as lovely as the summer’s day.
“But the best bit,” she continued, “was when I got his plums in my mouth. I rolled them around before I bit down hard. They were so sweet and juicy! You wouldn’t believe all the stuff I had trickling down my lips and chin – it was all wet and sticky! It made such a mess all over me – you wouldn’t believe the trouble I had cleaning up afterwards.”
Before Griselda could think of any sort of response, there was a groan followed by a loud crash from behind them. Both women immediately jumped up and turned to see that the gardener had disappeared – but not before lopping off the top of the tower-shaped bush so that it hung limply toward the ground. Rushing forward, they found the old man collapsed in a tangle with his ladder, a strange, stupid smile on his face.
“By the gods,” he muttered. “Now I can die happy.”
Chapter Seven
Talia had no idea what the gardener was talking about, but then that was a situation she was used to. In recent years, plenty of the courtiers and servants at the palace had taken to speaking in hushed tones when she was around, and more than a few of them were embarrassed when she came upon them in the middle of a conversation.
For her part, however, Princess Talia was so innocent and happy that she did not mind the fact that the whole world seemed to share in certain kinds of knowledge that she was not party to. She trusted that her parents had organised things with her best interests at heart, her only disappointment being the suspicion that she was the cause of some discomfort among some of the younger men of the court in particular. Whenever the princess attempted to console such difficulties among those young men, in every case they would make their excuses and leave. She had even begun to suspect that she was the cause of some physical ailment among them, in that the vast majority of them appeared to develop some terrible swelling in their trousers that they would attempt to hide from her as - groaning in evident pain - they scuttled away from her.
Banishing such thoughts, however, Talia took every opportunity to find time to be on her own away from the watchful but (in her opinion) over-protective eye
s of Griselda. And so it came to pass one day that the young princess was exploring a part of the castle that she had never visited before.
It was something of a surprise that the area she found herself in seemed not to have been visited by anyone recently. That it was new to Talia herself was not such a cause of concern: the castle was vast and rambling, and even in eighteen years of exploring she was very aware that she had not uncovered every nook and cranny. Nonetheless, when she opened a door she had never seen before the amount of dust on the stairwell that led up into a tower seemed undisturbed by any footsteps.
Filled with excitement, Talia placed foot after dainty foot on each of the steps that led onwards and upwards. She was dressed in a long skirt of dark-green, crushed velvet, and had anyone been on the steps beneath her they would have seen her delicate ankles and her slender feet, each one encased in a slipper of soft satin. The anticipation of exploring the unknown made her cheeks flush a gentle pink and her chest heaved as her breathing deepened.
At the top of the stairs lay another door, its heavy wooden surface carved with strange figures of what appeared to be naked men and women arranged in the most exotic postures. The sight of this made Talia blush even more - it was certain that the people depicted there must have been hurting each other from the strange acts they were committing, yet the expressions on their faces appeared to show anything but pain. For her part, Talia wondered why her nipples became harder beneath her dress and an odd throbbing began in her lower parts, and for a moment she considered turning back and leaving that strange door and its strange carvings behind.
Fifty Shades of Sleeping Beauty Page 6
