Scotland: 1559
Margarete and Lise had come to Scotland in May, so the shortness of the days approaching midwinter was a somewhat disturbing marvel. Accustom to the light and mildness of the countryside around Bordeaux, They beheld the late sunrise and early sunset with wonder and dismay.
As an active person, Lise was used to tramping around fields and hillsides, ostensibly to search out useful herbs. As attendant to Margarete, her duties were somewhat poorly defined, and the intimacy they shared gave her more latitude in such things than servants usually enjoyed. Since the injuries she had sustained to body and spirit at Lamas, these tramps had been curtailed, but as the days shortened, she felt a growing need for them.
Though used to going about alone, she did not object to the presence of Owen on such rambles. Though she wouldn't admit it to herself, it felt better to have someone with her after the violence that had befallen her at the celebration of the first harvest. Also, it gave them time away from the constraint and constant observation of daily life in the great hall.
After a long and skillful courtship during which each gave as good as they got, they had become lovers, but only for a day. The same license that had lead her to wander away into the woods with him that day, had allowed her to disregard a lifetime of hard lessons, and put herself in the path of the violation that had nearly rubbed her of her will to live. That terrible time had passed, but, confused in her mind about cause and effect, she did not know herself, nor how to return to their former intimacy.
For his part, Owen was a singer of songs and a teller of tales, and had a vast threshold for the range of human behaviour. To regain what they had shared so briefly, he was willing to wait, though perhaps not passively.
She likewise had spent a large part of her life as an entertainer. As a favoured lady's attendant, such skills were rarely called upon, but she and Owen had often traded tales for entertainment, and other more subtle purposes. Sometimes on their walks to absorb as much daylight as they could, they would pass the time by telling each other stories. At first, these were childrens' stories, amusing tales of fabulous animals; fairy encounters; childish exploration; the first venturings into the larger world.
One afternoon when the sun was shining and the wind still, they found themselves in a sheltered open space where the sun warmed them, and heaped dry pine needles offered rest. When they had sat down, one of the awkward silences descended between them. It was one of the times when Lise was disoriented by memories and obscure fears, and conversation was difficult. She regretted having stopped. It was easier to pass off such moments when moving.
Owen broke the silence in his easy, good-natured tones.
"Shall I tell you a story?"
She smiled and nodded with relief. Regardless of the story, the sound of his voice with its Welsh lilt was always soothing to her.
He looked slowly around the small clearing. It was bright. The warmth of the sun was a sensual delight, and it brought out the pungency of pine needles. He considered. It was the sensuous warmth of the sun that made him decide to leave childish stories behind.
"I will tell you a wholesome tale of how a young man discovered his favourite pastime."
Lise raised her eyebrows in enquiry.
"The lesson came not from a school master or craftsman, but from a lively dairy maid with an adventurous spirit and a roving eye."
With one mischievous glance into her eyes, he lay back on the abundant needles and his voice drifted comfortably up to her, while his eyes remained fixed on the treetops.
"This lad had been fostered far away from home, but his fosterage was a fortunate one, and he had a genuine place in the life of the castle where he lived. He had long since begun paying attention to girls and women, so he noted immediately when the younger sister of the chief dairy woman came to bide there.
"She was pretty and brown-haired, and possessed desires too strong to be constrained by convention, though she did achieve a successful show of modesty as a way to leave herself relatively free to make sport with grooms and labourers. She had a special eye for lads who she judged to be unschooled in such pursuits, and took on their education with a will. This lad was far too inexperienced to recognize her pursuit, and she executed it with no little thought and skill.
"The lad was not assigned to any particular guildsman or training, but to all. This meant that he could be ordered about at the need of whatever aspect of castle life required labour. Somehow, the crafty dairy maid managed to be there to show him how to churn butter, chop vegetables in the kitchen, or some other such task which required her to lean close in demonstration or assessment of his work. He would stand rooted, telling himself that she was oblivious of her breast pressing up against his arm, or her forearm brushing his. Her little advances were such that he could never convince himself that she meant what he hoped she meant.
"One day, when he had gone down to the lakeside to bathe, he found a woman's garments on the shore. Looking out, he saw that the dairy maid was before him in the water, not knowing that she had hurried down on hearing that he was headed that way himself soon.
"She made a mild show of surprise and concern upon seeing him, but she did not shriek or warn him away. On the contrary, she lingered, her shoulders chastely below the water's surface, but her body not entirely invisible. He tried and failed not to stair.
"Far from reproving him, she said coolly, 'I fear I have placed my garments too near the water's edge. Will you move them further back for me lest they get wet?'
"She stayed where she was while he did so, shifting languidly in the water.
"'Did you come here to bathe?' she asked.
"'Y... Yes,' he got out, but panicked at the very idea. He longed for her to climb out of the water for he had never seen a woman naked before. At the same time, he was so nervous that he found himself stammering an apology and stumbling off back to the castle, so he didn't see her smug smile.
"One day in late summer, many folk were occupied with the first harvest, and in the morning, she asked him quietly to meet her in the stable after the noon meal so that he could see something she had found in the hay loft. At last, he began to hope that his weeks of trailing after her like a dog with its tongue hanging out might finally avail him.
"He was there before her, and fidgeted horribly with nerves until she came. Putting a finger to her lips, she went before him up the ladder to the loft, offering him a tantalizing glimpse into the mysteries of feminine undergarments, and no small portion of her well-turned leg. He was up after her in a trice.
"She put her finger to her lips once more, and all that then passed, passed in silence.
"She pressed herself against him and kissed him. At first he didn't trust her not to be teasing him for her amusement, but the genuine flavour of her own enjoyment was so apparent that he no longer doubted.
"She guided him silently in undressing her, but when he would have moved with more initiative, she gently but firmly placed his hands away from her, making it clear that he was to do her bidding, which suited him better than he would have liked to admit, since he had almost no idea what to do.
"When they had both undressed, she pushed him on to his back and introduced him to pleasures more subtle than he had dreamed. She kissed him in a place and manner that left him powerless. A woman of experience, she liked to please men in this way first for several reasons. Primarily, she wished to prolong matters later on, and knew that this caress, while endearing herself to any young man's fancy, would also ensure that she got as much of what she wanted most as possible. She was aroused by the power gained by rousing another. In this young man, she had found one who expressed his appreciation of her attentions in just the right way to inflame her desire further.
"She engulfed him fully in her mouth. He watched this with awe, and felt it with a dizzying pleasure that made him want to do many things at once, but most of all to stay as still as possible lest he break the spell of her tongue. When her skilled movements caused the explosion of pleasure he had only ever experienced at his own hands, he lay dazed, motionless and silent for a time. One hand gripped her shoulder lest she dissolve into fantasy.
"She smiled up at him knowingly, then moved to lie beside him. He turned toward her, touching her wonderingly. Her touch on him was less ethereal. She kissed him, overcoming his initial discomfort considering what had just happened. She pressed herself against him and drew his hand between her legs to show him the effects of him on her. He explored, fascinated.
"It wasn't long before he was ready for her. Eventually she would introduce him to many positions from which they enjoyed feeling his strong thrusts inside her, but that first time she straddled his hips and thought mostly of pleasing herself. Accomplished from wide and eager experience, she used his hard penis and enthusiasm to satisfy weeks of accumulated lust. He learned, to his amazement, that women too could reach a peak of pleasure, but when he looked covertly for the result, he found only the pervasive slippery moisture that made it so much more pleasurable than he could have imagined to thrust in and out of her.
"She was a kind lass, as well as a lusty one, and she made it clear that she'd welcome his attentions whenever discretion and opportunity offered. Of course he fancied himself in love with her, but this illusion did not survive his discovery of her in the hay loft with the senior groom some months later. She was gentle to him, but firm in her assertion that there was no understanding between them, and that he was as free as she to seek other companionship.
"After some time, and some ruthless ribbing by more experienced lads, he came to see that she spoke wisely, and he became somewhat widely known among the maidens, and even some of the matrons of the castle."
Owen sat up slowly to find Lise gazing peacefully at the surrounding trees, her lips curved in a small smile, her body no longer speaking of constraint. Slowly she turned her eyes to him.
