Note: You can change font size, font face, and turn on dark mode by clicking the "A" icon tab in the Story Info Box.
You can temporarily switch back to a Classic Literotica® experience during our ongoing public Beta testing. Please consider leaving feedback on issues you experience or suggest improvements.
Click here
"But of course, dearest Viola," he assured her softly. "Emotions through song can never lie."
Emmanuel took a seat next to the excitable Viola, and the pair spoke alone for a good twenty minutes before Nadja called the house to supper.
-=-=-
The fireplace blazed lazily this summer's eve, warming the farmhouse unnecessarily as Nadja served the table. It would be vegetable stew and ale this night, likely a common occurrence for the family. Nadja's breasts pushed against Emmanuel's back as he was served, and he wondered if she had done it on purpose. A sultry smile across the table a moment later confirmed his suspicions, and fortunately her husband did not notice the glance.
The four conversed on much of nothing as they ate and drank, until Roger offhandedly asked his wife what had transpired when he and Viola were away in town.
Nadja cleared her throat before speaking, casting a sly glance in the bard's direction.
"Oh, I was just beating the laundry down by the stream while Emmanuel practiced his ballads. They're really quite pleasant. I was truly surprised by their breadth of emotion."
Emmanuel almost choked on the watery stew, and waved his hand to reject the startled glance from Viola to his side.
"Mmm," Roger mumbled in reply to his wife's statement. Nadja, seemingly toying with the man, the men, continued her story undeterred.
"The emotions of those poems tore straight into my core," Nadja said with a smile.
"Interestin'," Roger replied idiotically, taking another spoon-full of his stew.
"Their fervor erupted so very deeply into-"
"Well!" Emmanuel interjected with a worried grin. "I'm certainly glad you appreciate my tunes, Nadja. That gives me hope they'll be taken well in Catriona."
"And I so very much did," Nadja replied slyly. "If only all men were capable of expressing their passions as you do, Emmanuel."
Emmanuel grimaced and glanced towards Roger, who, remarkably, continued eating the stew before him as if the conversation wasn't happening. Or perhaps he didn't understand his own wife's innuendos, the more likely explanation. How simple a man.
The bard quickly drank down his stew, deciding to leave the family's company before Nadja could torment him further. He bowed his farewells, and skipped towards the guest house to rest until the morning.
-=-=-
Emmanuel undressed and laid in bed restless that night, being unable to sleep. Chances missed would always sour his mood, and tonight was no exception to that rule. He could write a song of bedding some... farmer's wife instead, surely? That could work for a ballad...
The bard sighed. It certainly didn't have the same ring as farmer's daughter, although he supposed it was easier to rhyme with. Strife, rife, life. Knife, if he was feeling particularly depressed the day he wrote it. He could always sing that one in the smaller taverns across the land, betwixt his travels from one major city to another. The song would never please the grandiose Imperials in the capital of mankind, but surely it would cater to the simple peasants of Harvath.
Another sigh, and another toss to the side. Perhaps he could continue his work on Alanna's ballad while he waited for slumber to arrive. Now that was a song.
He almost left the warmth of the of bed before he heard the front door to the guesthouse creak open, and knew Nadja had snuck away from her husband to find a second crescendo in Emmanuel's arms. He would most certainly agree to her advances, of course.
"Emmanuel," a soft, young voice said in a whisper, "are you awake?"
Really?! What glorious luck. What a fantastic day!
"I am, I am," he whispered in turn, prompting a farmer's daughter to gently shut the door behind her. Emmanuel turned towards the maiden, who was illuminated only by a gentle beam of moonlight coming from the small window behind her.
She swayed towards the bed nervously in only a thin white nightgown, her long brown hair now laid freely on her back. The white of her dress brought out the gentle fairness of her smooth skin, and her moon-shaped brown eyes were the cutest addition to her dazzling smile. Her nightgown, falling only to her knees, still hid many of her curves from view, but the maid most certainly looked thin, fit, and fertile. Her hips were only the gentlest arcs, her busom just a delicate handful.
Emmanuel noticed her anxiety, and sought to remedy that before all else. He would not miss this gods-given opportunity.
"I'm so very pleased you're here, Viola," he reassured those trembling hands. "But why ever are you?"
Viola swayed closer towards the bed, her hands falling down her form and hiding themselves behind her back, as if she were the purest soul. And perhaps she was that virtuous, the bard reasoned. She sat at the edge of the bed, Emmanuel still hidden under the sheets.
"I got to thinking," she answered softly, "of what you said in the eve. Of not missin' a chance when it's presented to you. Not letting that rose fall free from your grasp... if only for a night."
The bard had placed the rose on the bed's side table earlier, conveniently the only item of his in view, as if he held it sacred. He instantly, wholeheartedly felt pity for the girl, and how he had led her on. Some roses were simply too fair to be deflowered for a story.
He shifted himself to sit beside the maiden, covering his lower body with the bedsheets.
"My sorrow, Viola, it runs too deep. For this night or forever, your love I shant keep," he sang, shaking his head. Viola frowned, bringing a trembling hand to her heart.
"But why, Emmanuel? What of all you sang? Of loving me dearly?"
Emmanuel grimaced. "Ah, my sweet, if only love were that easy... but I'm afraid I must tell you it doesn't generate so simply."
Viola's brows rose in misunderstanding, and she shook her head. "But that can't be true. What I feel of you-"
"Is temporary, my dear Viola," Emmanuel interjected, as kindly as he could. "It's a blind wish, a worry of predestined worry. You think that I came about the farmhouse by some sort of fate, or perhaps by the grace of the gods themselves. But I swear to you, it's as simple as me being here just because. Nothing more."
Viola brought the hand not placed on her chest to her cheek. She pouted, turning her visage from him.
"Is that what you think, Emmanuel?" she asked softly, her words now brittle. "That I'm just some youth, believin' you're some golden knight of my dreams?"
He sighed, bringing a gentle hand to Viola's shoulder. "No, perhaps not. But I do know that I led you on, with my words on the eve. You see..." Emmanuel trailed off, sighing again. How ever could he bring this up without destroying such a shining soul?
"Go on, sir. I'm not a child," she declared, childishly.
Emmanuel cleared his throat, and stroked Viola's hair. An aroma of thyme filled the air, and he realized she had obviously prepared for this night with all she could.
"You see, Viola, I sing of loves and desires as if they're the most straightforward subjects. As if, in the short rhymes of my ballads, I can express all their expansive material, all their limitless emotions."
Viola shifted her gaze back to Emmanuel, the girl's eyes now wettened through her abject failure of understanding.
"But I can't, and fear I will never be able to, for it's not something so easily described. Viola, believe me when I say I've spent my whole life trying to. I've mastered the languages of both Elves and Kings, I've traveled the world from sea to sea, all to perfect that imperfect message. A message that... well, that not many can resist, if I can be frank."
"But Emmanuel..." Viola whispered through a falling tear.
"My most beautiful maid, my dearest Viola. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that love is far too beautiful to express in song. It can only be... shown. It can only be felt."
"But Emmanuel," Viola repeated brittly, "do you not feel it now? Do you not feel it here, between us?"
It was then, at that moment, when a man had his arm wrapped around a maid beside him, and a gentle moonlight shined on that pair, that he actually agreed with her. No, it wasn't the love, of course. But it was love nonetheless.
He didn't answer the girl's ask with words. He leaned into her, wiping away the tear on her cheek, then kissed her deeply on the lips. Viola's arms wrapped around Emmanuel's back, and Emmanuel's back fell to the bed.
"Take me, Emmanuel," she whispered to him in a moment of unlocked lips, "take me, and let us see if it's love."
Emmanuel's hands slid under her dress, sliding it up her smooth, fair form slowly and purposefully. They kissed passionately for several minutes before the bard pushed her away, to banish her clothing permanently.
Viola frowned, perhaps in realization that with the absence of her nightgown that all her modesty would be banished as well. That one article of clothing was perhaps the one barrier between her becoming an adult in full, and her being blissfully unawares. She parted her lips to speak.
"May I keep it on?" she asked him nervously.
"You may, of course, but it will be utterly ruined if it remains," he warned her seriously. Her brows rose in fright, and Emmanuel decided to elucidate as to why. "You know your moon bloods?" he asked, garnering a worried nod from the girl. "Well, your maidenhead is likely a world more absurd than that."
"Truly, Emmanuel?" she asked with modulated voice. He nodded, and Viola arched her back straight and lifted her arms above her head. Her dress was promptly removed from her supple form, forgotten with a gentle flick of her wrist at the end. "And the bed?" she asked with a less-nervous smile.
"Your parents will know, I fear."
"And you?" the girl asked, not giving his warning more than a second of thought.
"I'll wash in the stream, dearest Viola."
"Shouldn't you be above me?"
"It's better for you this way. You can control the... pleasure," he explained through many vicarious experiences of others, almost replacing 'pleasure' with 'pain'. He spat in his own hand and brought it down to his own hardness, holding his manhood aloft for the maid to slide down upon. Viola brought her hands to the bed, lowering herself slowly atop his bell.
"Hmm," she whimpered, clenching her eyes shut and holding herself still, barely enveloping his cockhead within her parted folds. Viola breathed deep, then continued after a needed moment of self-reflection. She pushed through the pain, pushed through her maidenhead, bringing herself another two inches down his shaft in the course of a brutally delightful minute.
"Ahh... it hurts, Emmanuel," she cried ever so softly.
"I know, dearest Viola," he said truthfully, feeling his cock swallowed by the tightest, warmest passage. "Take your time, my beautiful maid."
She groaned as she slid further, stopping herself when another inch of his cock had entered her. "Emmanuel," she sighed, keeping her eyes shut. "Emmanuel, can I get pregnant the first time?"
He thought on the ask for a moment, then ultimately decided he was far too deep in this now for the truth to have a wanted effect.
"Of course not, my most desirable Viola."
-=-=-
As soon as Viola had departed from his bed, Emmanuel realized he must do the same of the farm. He had lost his courage after his crescendo, and conversation on the 'morrow would be most delicate if he stayed. Perhaps Viola would embarass him completely in front of her father. Perhaps he would be intimidated to even wed the maid, and what a frightening ideation that was.
The bard was no stranger to leaving a lover's bed in the middle of the night. He could not be blamed, surely, for not wanting to be around for the morning conversation of a maid deflowered? Emmanuel only had twenty-seven years of age, after all, and no one should expect such a trifle from him.
He wrote a letter to the ones he fled from, just as he had done so many times in the past. He thought on the words only briefly before he put quill to paper, deciding to throw in some innuendo which the women would understand, but would leave the father unawares.
-
To Roger, Nadja, and Viola,
I thank each of you for the kind hospitality you have shown me this day, and wish that you will receive greater blessings in turn. I leave your home knowing that the greatest gifts in life are not those of gold or silver, but in the kind words and deeds of others. Memories of your bountiful generosity will embolden my ballads for many weeks to come.
All the best,
Emmanuel
-
Perfect. Emmanuel blew on the paper, drying the ink to the page. He hoped that at least one member of the family could read, but knew it didn't matter in the end. He set the note on the bed's side table, and gathered his clothes and equipment. He stopped himself at the door, backtracking to pick up Viola's rose from the table. Best not to leave that momento here, he figured. What a terrible message that would send to such a perfect soul.
Emmanuel would pitch his tent elsewhere this night, off in the countryside where he wouldn't be found. From there he would travel to Catriona, in hopes of finding Talos to retrieve his missing coin. Love would just have to be found again, at another time.
-=-=-
Emmanuel's short jaunt from Athel Hall to the capital city of Catriona the following day was as uninspiring as it was uneventful, but fortunately inspiration was yet on his mind from the night before. He worked on his ballads of Alanna and Viola as he traveled through the countryside, nary giving the other travelers any mind as he rode.
He arrived in the city of mages near suppertime, the merchants of the market squares already packing up for the day. Emmanuel sang boisterously as he sauntered down the walkways of the city, following street signs and directions from confused townspeople who he asked in tune.
124 Collegeview Avenue. Perfect! Emmanuel praised himself for the simple stroll to Talos' abode, only getting turned around twice in the bustling city of Catriona, all while sharing his art with the gentlefolk. He spied the illuminated island of the College off his left shoulder, the massive tower at its center projecting a ghostly pillar of blue light into the clouds above.
He skipped up the steps towards the townhouse, knocking on the front door, once, twice, thrice. It opened after a minute, Emmanuel's arms already outstreched in anticipation of seeing Talos or Alanna.
A beautiful maid in a long white dress opened the door instead, and Emmanuel did not recognize her. Her gorgeous green eyes delighted him, and he found her tanned skin positively exotic. He figured she must be the housekeeper.
"Hello?" she greeted questioningly, her thin eyes darting over the bard's obnoxious bright-gold clothes.
"Greetings, hello! Salutations, galore!" the bard exclaimed, bowing lowly and pompously as he tended to do. "Emmanuel, at your service."
The gorgeous woman pursed her lips and furrowed her brow. "Uh... okay?"
Emmanuel instantly found her quite challenging to talk to. He decided to get straight to the point, but in a roundabout manner.
"It's more than acceptable, satisfactory, or okay, as your wondrous visage makes this the best of days! May I ask if Talos is around, my fine maid?"
The housekeep's brows furrowed further, by the grace of the gods. "Uhhh... no. He's away at the moment. What is this about?"
"Drats! I met him on the road, you see, and I require his assistance most hastily."
"Oh. You're a friend of Talos?" she asked with a slight smile. Emmanuel found most of the woman's body language and words seemed tired, as if she hadn't had a proper rest in days.
"Naturally! I'm a friend, a confidant, a joyous ally! But that's enough of me, who might you be?" Emmanuel asked with a grin. She opened the door wider, stepping to the side.
"My name's Cass. Talos has been away for quite a while, but he should be returning shortly. You're welcome to drink, of course," Cass offered warmly. The invitation was not all what Emmanuel was expecting, judging from her delirious condition.
"Your offer is... most generous, comely keeper of this house."
"Just mind the babe. He's sleeping," she warned him happily with a tilt of her head.
Emmanuel brought a finger to his lips as he skipped inside, Cass shutting the door behind him. "I'll be quiet as a fawn, to avoid waking the Talos spawn. Tell me, housekeep, when did Talos say he would return?"
"Uh... we didn't exactly set a date. And I'm not the housekeeper, I'm his..." Cass sighed, clearly realizing she'd fallen into his rhythmic trap. "Mate."
Emmanuel raised an eyebrow, but his smile never waivered. "But there I saw him with another, and their love was ever so true."
Cass nodded with a frown. "Yeah, that was Alanna. She and I share him."
"Truly?!" the bard exclaimed.
"Shh!" Cass shushed him instantly, bringing a finger to her own lips.
"Right, right. The Talos spawn," Emmanuel whispered. Cass nodded, then led him towards the kitchen on the side of the house, two rooms away from the babe. There she fetched the bard an ale and a water for herself, then sat at the small table in the room.
"So, how are they?" she asked softly.
"They're fine, my lady. We parted ways after visiting the glorious Horseshoe falls, and defeating the wicked witch of Featherton as well."
"Wicked witch?"
"Some bringer of life to those already dead. It was all so ruinous, and filled me with dread."
"Oh, that's... uh," Cass said, before she sighed exasperatedly once again. "I'm really sorry, Emmanuel. I'm afraid I don't understand your... dialect?"
"My tune?"
"Your everything, really," she shrugged with an anxious smile.
"Oh," Emmanuel frowned, glancing away dejectedly for a moment. "Shall I start from the beginning?" he offered.
The beautiful wench chuckled at his ask. "Spare me, Emmanuel," she said, bringing her glass of water to her lips for a quick swig. Emmanuel brought his own drink to his mouth, finding it an adequate time to do so, and the maid spoke as the bard gulped his ale.
"Tell me why you've come. Of what trouble Talos must help you with."
Emmanuel brought his mug to the table, then outstreched his arms. "With my problems I wouldn't trouble such a delicate lass, as I'm sure they'd be so very tedious to you Cass."
She raised a brow once more. "Uh, Emmanuel?"
"Yes?"
"Your... tune?" she reminded him with a frown.
"Drats. My sincerest apologies. Talos wasn't much fond of it either, you should know."
"I could only imagine," Cass giggled into a balled fist. "He and I are so very much alike." She brushed her hair behind her pointed ears without thinking of it, and Emmanuel's eyes widened with fright.
He shot up from the table instantly. The only elves he'd ever seen in his life had wanted to kill him, either before or soon after he'd introduced himself. He knew he had to retreat from the situation post haste, and had forgotten about not waking Talos' child.
"Well what do you know, I forgot I had a show! Yes, a show! A show... over yonder!" Emmanuel exclaimed wildly, pointing over the elf's head. "I'm afraid I must part!"
"Emmanuel, what are..."
Cass shot up from the table as well, realizing her mistake too late. She grabbed a kitchen knife from the counter, and gripped the man's shoulder as he fled from the table. Emmanuel felt it's tip at the small of his back.
"Oh no, you will not flee. I'll be killed if the guard finds me here," Cass whispered in his ear, her words now filled with a terrifying gravity. Emmanuel raised his hands skyward, realizing this elf wanted to kill him as well.
