THIS STORY IS INTENDED FOR ADULT READING ONLY
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Some mornings you wake up and think you've gone to heaven -- on a broomstick.
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As always, it was the dawn chorus of the birds in the trees behind the hut which woke Hal. Without having to open his eyes he knew that the very first colors of dawn were beginning to stain the blackness of the eastern wall through the chinks in the planks. Yet, even though he knew where he was, Hal's head was still full of the most incredible dream of any night of his life. A beautiful witch, a shape changing familiar, the same beautiful woman kneeling at his feet calling herself his slave -- and that was the least part of his imaginings! Gregory beaten down in a sorcerers' duel, the King's hands burnt off, Hal standing under the eyes of the collected nobility as Gregory's robe had fallen upon him! What fever must he have been in to have culled up such madness?
Indeed, it seemed he had not yet entirely broken through out of night fevers for his body seemed to be clad in some garment of impossible smoothness whilst underneath him was a bed so deep and soft that only a god or goddess lying on a cloud could ever have known its equal.
Hal's sleep glued eyelids suddenly broke open. Complete darkness still enveloped the interior of the hut. He stretched out a hand and felt around him. A pillow underneath his head almost as big as himself, a pillow of a softness and depth to match the bed he was resting in. His fingers touched a thin wooden post rising high above the bed, with whorls and twists cut into the surface.
He must be still dreaming, still far away in another world, for how else could he be waking up in a noble's canopied bed whilst still inside the dragon hut? Perhaps he could no longer tell the difference between real and false. But mad or bewitched, Hal knew he needed a piss with a desperation that made his groin ache with pain.
He didn't so much get out of the bed as slide over the side, like an otter slithering down a steep river bank, into the loose straw on his hands and knees. The stabbing ends of the stalks and the beaten earth beneath them were reminders of every other day he could remember since he'd begun sleeping in the hut -- reminders that at least something in his life was still the same. He stood up and shook his head in bewilderment. Whatever he was wearing, it felt as fine spun as a spider's web and was hanging like a monk's cowl around his rock hard cock. He moaned again -- he needed to break his locked flesh quickly before his bladder burst.
Something else was moving behind him in the shed, something between a shadow and a sinuous presence, something which padded more lightly than a stalking lynx over and around the piles of straw. Hal strained his arms to lift one of the sagging doors and swing it open. Josephine's head nudged against his back as the gap widened, and then she was brushing past him, her wings stretching out as soon as there was room enough. As the dragon launched herself into a sky littered with slowly fading stars Hal seized the bucket on the side of the well, dropped it down the shaft and quickly hauled it up again after hearing a splash below. The chill water inside the bucket he slopped over his prick, the sudden shock making him gasp and softening his stiffness. Within seconds he was standing against the hut, resting his forehead on the planks, sighing with relief as he let out a stream of sharp smelling piss.
Then he looked down and saw a blur of white patterns on the black material ruffed up around his wrists. A silky black gown with white markings on it? A bed inside the hut? Why couldn't his mind wake up with the rest of him and simply admit that he'd spend yesterday emptying shit pots, in just the same way as he was going to spend this day and all the other days of his life?
A drop of piss splashed back from the wall and landed in the deep scratches at the top of his right leg. Hal gasped at the burning sensation in his red raw flesh, cursing Morgana's familiar and its claws. Fully awakened now yet frozen with shock, Hal stood like a statute, his cock still held between his fingers, working through a chain of logic he couldn't break. He had the pain, so he must have the wound, so everything he remembered about that fucking big cat trying to claw off his balls must have happened. And if that had happened, then every other impossible thing he was remembering must also have happened. Either that or he completely barking mad, madder than a March hare.
Hal looked up at the mountain peaks looming clear and sharp against the dawn's advancing red banner. No, if madness it was, it was still lodged inside his head refusing to go away. Especially the madness that was Morgana le Fay. With sudden decision Hal pulled the robe up over his body, over his head. He walked back to the well, laid the robe gently on the surrounding wall, then dropped the bucket and hauled it up again, brimming to the top. Nearby was a crude table, made of trimmed branches split in half and lashed together with strips of leather.
Hal put the bucket down on the table, leaned forward, pushed his face deep into the icy water, letting it claw at his cheeks and eyes. Air bubbled out from his mouth, out of his nose. His body tingled from the shock. He stood up, eyes still closed, lifted up the bucket and sluiced half of the contents over his naked body, gasping and grunting as shivers spread out from his spine.
Hal reached inside the leather bag hanging from the side of the table and took out a scrap of soap and a rag. As he soaped himself he decided he wasn't mad after all -- so why was he suddenly smelling hot bacon and freshly baked bread?
He picked up a wooden mug hanging beside the bag and sluiced the last traces of lather from his skin, then began to rub himself dry with a piece of sheepskin. A gentle breeze curled cold fingers around his balls as he wiped them. The wind didn't bother Hal, but the aroma of freshly prepared food mixed in with the moving air continued to tease and puzzle him. Wherever it was coming from, the source was very close. Hal's eyes moved downwards, onto the washing table. Next to the bucket a square shape had appeared, square and white at the top. It was still too dark to see exactly what it was but there seemed to be a arch above the square shape. Hal touched the shape with gently exploring fingers -- wickerwork. A wickerwork basket with a carrying handle and a pure white cloth tucked over the appetite arousing contents of the basket. So who had carried it here?
"A good morning to you, Master."
Morgana! Standing with a few paces of him, yet still cloaked in the darkness so that he could only see her outline. As tall and wide as a Icelandic warrior and yet reminding Hal of a swan, somehow graceful even when not moving.
"Your dragon, Master. Does she dance every morning?"
Hal looked up, far up into the sky, where the rays of the sun were fanning out above the peaks. Alone in the shining heavens was a tiny shape, twisting and turning on silver wings set on a silver body. Morgana's word was well chosen. Josephine did seem to be dancing, although he'd never thought of that of it that way before.
"No, not every morning, though more often of late. But only in the last few months. She never did it before. She would flap her wings like a cock when the sun rose, but not fly. And 'tis only when she flies so high and so early that she takes that look of polished steel on her skin. I know not why, though I've tried to find out."
"Eat, Master, before your food cools. Unless you would have it served at a breakfast table in the castle by servants."
"No need for that."
No need at all for anything but the food -- he was ravenous. Hal's hand moved towards his robe to dress his nakedness, then checked itself. What might happen if he should accidentally soil it with grease? A robe woven with magic was clothing which might take revenge for such disrespectful treatment. So Hal stayed in his state of nature as he seized meat in one hand and bread in the other, one and the other hand raised alternatively to his mouth as he reveled in the quality of the food. Meat and the best of rich wheat ground bread! A whole basketful of it. The King himself wouldn't be eating any better.
Morgana suddenly laughed and Hal felt a shiver that owed nothing to damp skin stroked by a cold breeze. It was unlikely that Argud was eating anything at all this morning. And there was nothing at all about Morgana which promised anything good from any laugh of hers. He looked warily at her with shreds of bacon fat hanging from his lips.
"Well, Duke Merlin, there is much work to do before I can present you to foreign courts as a diplomat and a courtier. Especially in improving your table manners."
