Orin The Great Ch. 04

"Were you taught how to sew, my sweet Orin?" Sundri asked.

"Yes, I was. It was a part of my training, to mend my clothing if I were caught up far away from a tailor. I can sew as good as any man."

"We will see to that soon enough." Sundri said, as she motioned for Orin to follow her.

Together, they walked over to a huddle of women sitting on mats woven from reeds. In their center was a pile of damaged clothing. Apparently, the women were choosing a garment at random to work on, with their patches and threads and needles all set up to one side. The women were chatting, but they halted upon the arrival of the two fair-skinned visitors.

"We've come to help." Sundri explained. "I don't know how good my friend Orin is at sewing, so I expect we should start him off with something simple. As for myself, I can repair anything I set my hands on. Would you like some candy? It is very good!"

Thanks partly to the sweets, the handful of gypsy women made room for the two. They introduced themselves with all manner of strange names, such as Rica and Nuri and Lulu, short for Luludja. From the moment Orin sat down, he was awestruck by all the new pairs of breasts he had to look at. The women quickly noticed the attention he was giving to them.

"Orin," Sundri prodded. "Tell these women how many females were around in the place you grew up."

"Oh, very few." Orin admitted. "Women were scarce where I come from."

"And tell us the names of the women you've bedded so far in your young life."

"Well, there was Rohanna, and of course you, Sundri." Orin nodded. "If you're going to ask me which was my favorite, I can't choose between either of you. You were both very special to me, in your own ways."

"So you see," Sundri addressed the gypsies. "Orin comes from a place that had very few women, and he's only slept with two of us. He just hasn't been around all that many women, you understand? This is why he will tend to look at us a little longer than most men will. Orin, if you are to stare at these women all day, I think you should remove your tunic and let them stare at you the same. This is agreeable, yes?"

Seeing no problem with his, Orin soon added his garment to the little heap that included his pack, bow and short sword. Apparently, the women hadn't known what to expect from the young man's physique, for they were soon enthralled by his strong, budding muscles and fair complexion. The gypsies were sending sharp whispers to each other in their unknown language.

One of the women leaned closer to Sundri. "He is an angel from Heaven, that one. Did you really bed with him?"

"Oh, yes, many times." Sundri nodded. "We all know how excitable young men can be, don't we? I dare say that Orin is a bit more excitable than most, in that any one of you might be able to, let us say, attract his attention. Of course, I mean any women present that have no husbands that would become jealous."

Orin had been oblivious to the goings-on around him. He held out a needle and a spool. "Sundri, will you thread this for me? I can't seem to thread this stupid needle!"

As the sorceress took the items, she figured out why Orin was having no success. All those breasts were distracting him. As she took care of the minor task, she noticed that the women were taking in Orin's chiseled features and handsome visage, in the same way he was sensually scrutinizing them. In fact, after a few minutes, it was becoming very clear which of the gypsies were single, as they were the ones reaching up to their heads to pull their hair back, while at the same time jutting their breasts out. It did not matter if the breasts were small or large, young or old. Poor Orin was mesmerized by all of them.

Matters worsened a few hours later, when before suppertime the villagers went to bathe in the river. Or perhaps to say whether they worsened or not would depend on the point of view of the observer. On the one side, the villagers were standing in the river nude. This small herd included the old and young, local residents as well as day workers returning from town, and married women who awaited the return of their fishermen or smelter husbands. Many of these committed wives were already seething with jealousy at the unmarried women, who found it so easy to ogle at Orin and to flaunt their bodies at him in seductive ways.

Over on another end of the river was a smaller group. Near its core was Bartram, who was himself getting some attention from the single gypsy women, but in truth not all that much. Standing next to the archer in the water was Sundri, who had thought up an entertaining game to pass away the time. She had Orin stand in the center of the group, while she went around him in a protective circle. Orin's job was to call out the words Go and Stop. If Orin said Stop and a gypsy woman was still moving, and if Sundri caught the motion, she would point out the mover and have her return to the starting point on the riverbank. The purpose of the game was for the gypsy women to get close enough to put their hands on the handsome young man. As accustomed as the village women were to seeing black-haired, skinny and homely men, they were enthralled with Orin's sandy blonde hair, broad, youthful chest and a proud cock that had been at attention ever since he'd shucked his clothing off and walked into the water.

The striking Orin was just as exhilarated as the women. He'd been in a dreamlike state ever since he'd seen their many pairs of breasts. Now that so many women were nude and lively around him, and it was upwards of a dozen, the young man found that he was in a dimension of blissful euphoria worthy of an epic poem. This sort of thing is what the bards should be singing about, he thought to himself, when they sang of exotic ladies. Little matter that most of the women were dark-haired and lean, with some as skinny as their skinny men. They had their breasts exposed to his young, unaccustomed eyes, and their midriffs that tantalized him, and their shapely behinds and their flaring hips that put him into a sensual swoon.

The first woman to win the game by reaching Orin was hesitant. She only reached out to caress his back and chest a few times, not daring any further because of how her ilk might look at her later. The other women squabbled among themselves, having seen the hesitation of their peer. In their language, they egged each other on during the second game. Orin soon got the gist of it; they were single, and he was single. Their sensual frenzy was at a point where nearly every one of them was ready to tussle with him right there in the shallows.

Three gypsies were nearly close enough to touch him, Orin noted. He shut his eyes and lifted his head slightly, and said, "Go!" After only a second, he said, "Stop!"

Orin opened his eyes, just as the sorceress started pointing.

"I saw you move, and you as well." Sundri accused the excited women. "Go on back to the starting point. Go on, now!"

One gypsy woman splashed water at Sundri out of irritation. She said something in her language that caused many of the other women to snigger.

Looking around his person, Orin saw that two gypsies were still close, very close to touching him. He could not say either one was a queenly beauty, but that didn't bother him. Every woman had her own unique look to her, and her own unique body. Even the ones that were homely looked attractive to him. Perhaps it was their dark hair, or their olive skin, or the exotic look of their faces. Perhaps it was because he simply had not been around all that many women to begin with. None of that mattered to Orin. The older women with their saggy breasts and wrinkles, and the younger women with their pert bodies, all of them had their individual beauty to them.

With the closest gypsies being a thin woman and a thicker woman, Orin shut his eyes and said, "Go!"

He heard a yelp, and then the weight of a large body bowled him over and into the water. After a moment of splashing and a quick gasp, Orin got to his feet, with the two closest gypsy women wrestling and the rest of the crowd laughing up a storm.

"What happened?" Orin asked Sundri. "Who won?"

The first action was to disentangle the wrestlers before they tore each other's hair off. The others accomplished this by dunking them both into the water. Once the jealous fighters were separated, the entire flock of gypsy women eagerly waited to see who Sundri would declare the winner.

"It was a close race!" The sorceress announced to the throng. "This is what I saw. You tell me if I am right or wrong about it. This heavier woman had her arm stretched out, ready to claim her prize, when her skinny rival tried to push her into the water. In the end, the big woman shoved the thin one, but she shoved her right into Orin and knocked the poor boy down. What will it be? Was the winner the first woman to touch my dear Orin, who did this by cheating, or was the winner the woman who got within a hair of him, only to be cheated out of it?"

With his strong sense of ethics, Orin expected the answer to be clear cut. He grew surprised when a good debate started up among the gypsy women, both in his language and theirs. Some argued that there was no rule preventing cheating, while others said the only thing that mattered was who touched Orin first. In the end, however, Orin's version of justice prevailed and the thicker woman was declared the winner.

"So you have won my Orin," Sundri teased the excitable gypsy. "Now that he is yours, I wonder what will you do with him?"

The woman, by name of Simza or Simcha, depending on who was speaking to her, went to stand behind Orin. The woman pressed her saucy frame up against the young man, making sure he felt her breasts and hips against his body. Her hands went to grasp at Orin's arms and chest, before they plunged into the water to fondle his rigid cock. It was evident that she was in heat, as she rubbed her flesh on his, and guttural rumbles came from her throat.

"I will take him into the reeds." Simza said, decidedly.

"Ask Orin if he is willing." Sundri told her.

Not wanting to give the young man a chance to refuse her, the gypsy took Orin from the wrist and pulled him away from the gaggle. "He must be willing, and even if he is not, I won the game!"

Orin was taken ten strides away. When Simza observed a few of her peers following, she led him even further towards the bank. A second time she looked back, before taking Orin entirely out of the water and into the trees.

"Some will come because they are like fleas on a dog." Simza huffed. Finally, they halted on a flat patch full of grass and leaves. "Here is a good place for us. Maybe only one or two will come this far to see us."

The woman swept leaves away with her foot, before crouching down to further scatter them with her hands. As Simza cleared a space for them, Orin stared at the way her body leaned and wiggled, and at the way her backside curved. She glanced over her shoulder, as if making sure he was still there, before she lay down on her back.

"Lie down on me, Orin." She said, hurriedly.

"Let me study your body first."

"There is nothing wrong with my body!"

Orin didn't understand what she meant by that. It only dawned on him a few seconds later that Simza thought he was going to refuse to sleep with her. "I only want to see what you look like. You are only the third woman who has lain nude before me."

"Well, you must be quick, because a man is prone to be fickle and to change his mind on a whim!"

That was so unlike what Orin was used to hearing that it didn't make any sense to him. Surely, the hardness of his cock was not going away. He took a broad look at the woman offering her body to him, gazing at her handsome features, her full breasts and the swell of her stomach. Between her legs was a full bush of hair that he hadn't seen on his previous two lovers. Her body was so very different from what he'd experienced before.

"Do you think you are ugly?" He asked, as he went down on his knees beside her.

"In town, the women there are so much prettier than I am. Out here, I am one of the pretty ones."

"I don't think you're ugly." Orin shrugged. "I think you and the other women are all very unique."

"You must be blind." Simza laughed. "Get on with it, will you?"

She spread her arms and legs, as if she were a snare for men. When Orin lay his strong form on her, the trap was sprung and her limbs snapped shut on him. He liked her look, and also her scent, but her demeanor was bothering him. Remember what he'd been taught by his friends, Orin reached between their bodies and found her blossom. As he probed about it with his finger, he discovered Simza to be mostly dry inside. What was it he'd been told? A dry woman did not truly want him, but was perhaps using him to raise her status among the other women of her clan.

Orin didn't like this thought, not at all. It made him feel like a piece of wood or a new pair of shoes. He didn't feel wanted or loved, simply fancied. Sundri would be wet for him, so wet her womanly nectar would drip out of her and onto her thighs. In comparison, this big gypsy woman was as dry as the desert.

"I won't go through with it." Orin decided. He pulled away from her and got to his feet. "Perhaps you are correct. Perhaps I am one of these men with fickle natures. I did not know this about myself until now."

"Lie with me, Orin!" Simza demanded. "You won't go back to the village and leave me here! I won the game!"

"I am no game." He replied, walking away, back toward the river.

"It doesn't matter! I will tell the others how well you bedded me here! They will believe it! Everyone will think it truly happened between us!"

With every step that Orin took, Simza's voice rose up higher. She was screeching by the time he reached the river. Other gypsy women were standing there on the bank, still nude. These were the women that had followed him from the bathing area. Orin wished he could see into their heads, or into their hearts, to understand what sort of women they were inside. This Simza, she was nothing like Sundri, he compared, and nothing like Rohanna.

Orin was fully clothed and sitting on the riverbank, as the sun was dying out that evening. Bartram walked over with a wooden bowl full of fried fish and boiled lentils. He passed the bowl over.

"That woman you nearly bedded is raising up a fuss with the rest of them." The archer told him. "She's got half the village turned against you. All of the fishermen are jealous, because they think you're after all of their wives."

"Is this a lesson I must learn, Bartram?" Orin asked, taking the bowl and pulling out morsels with his fingers. "It this telling me that I am to trust no woman at all, besides Sundri?"

"It is a lesson, of course, because all of life is full of such things. First you gauge the woman, and then you gauge what she is after. At their hearts, no matter where people live or what their station in life, people are all the same. Do you remember before we reached Sleepy Glenn, at the advice Sundri and I were giving you? Here in this place, you're seeing that very same idea playing out."

"You haven't answered my question."

"I don't have an answer for you. You have to come up with that for yourself."

"Do you have an answer for yourself? Tell me what it is."

"Here is what I say." Bartram admitted. "Trust your heart. Every woman, and every man for that matter, must be seen for their goodness. If they carry more bad than good, I would steer away from them."

"Are beautiful people as full of selfishness as the ugly?"

"Oh, beautiful people can be a hundred times worse, because they lord it over the rest of us by boasting of their beauty, or their power or wealth, or whatever else they might have amassed for themselves. Not all of them, mind you, but certainly enough."

"I am only a humble man from a humble village." Orin lamented.

"But your intent is set on finding adventure." Bartram reminded him. "This fame and fortune you are seeking, who is it meant for? Certainly not the people of your village, who are far away from here and forgotten. You could say you want the fame for yourself, but in the eyes of whom? In the eyes of your father who has passed, or in the eyes of the beautiful people or the commoners like us? Who are you trying to impress?"

"You have me wrong, Bartram. I am like those men who climb mountains and come back to boast of the deed. I don't wish fame for the sake of others, but only for myself. I want to climb a mountain, not to brag about it, but because the mountain is standing there waiting for me to climb it. Once I have conquered that peak, then yes, I want others to know what I have done. There is a difference, I think."

"Other people are too narrow-minded to see that difference. Remember that as well. Not everyone thinks the same way you do. A liar thinks that everyone is a liar like him, and a boaster will think everyone boasts like he does."

Sundri came by, taking a seat between both men. "The clamor in the village has died down finally. Everyone knows Simza did not cockle with Orin, despite that she keeps on insisting that she did. I tell you, Orin, you caused more upset heads here by not sleeping with that woman than if you would have."

"Have you seen enough of this place, young man?" Bartram kidded. "Are all those wild rumors about gypsies put to rest?"

"They are." Orin nodded. "I am ready to move on from here."

The young man was perturbed enough that he wanted to leave right away, but his friends conspired to prevent it. It was Sundri who accepted an offer for them to stay and share in the gypsies' supper, and to sleep in a cozy, unclaimed hut. Bertram also made matters worse when he challenged the local hunters to an archery contest the following morning.

"One thing you should not do," The archer told him, while they ate fish fried in oil and a tasty broth of diced vegetables and spices. "Is to run away from a problem. If you can sort the problem out first, you must do it. What hero have you ever heard of that leaves his quest unfinished?"

"I know this, Bertram. I don't know why you and Sundri are so adamant about us staying the night. This is not the big problem you are making it out to be. Do you see a quest before me, because I certainly don't!"

"Not a quest, you stubborn badger." Sundri explained. "A lesson, such as those that Bertram and I are so keen on teaching you. The predicament is that a gypsy woman only wanted to cockle you because she could flaunt it to her rivals."

"And not because she cared a lick about you." Bertram nodded.

"The answer is simple." Orin assumed. "I won't cockle a gypsy and that is that."

"Think, Orin, you thick block of wood." Bertram urged.

Orin shrugged when nothing else came to mind.

The three adventurers were sitting to one corner of a large campfire. Several of the local people were seated in an arc on the opposite end, while other fires had been lit in other spots to accommodate the rest of the gypsies. It was clear to the young man that the unmarried women had chosen to come and torment Orin with their bare chests and their furtive looks, and their frequent walks either around him or before him. It was also evident that several of the unmarried men were jealous of the attention the youth was receiving.

Apparently, the gypsies had hard arses, Orin figured, as they sat on logs with little padding between the wood and their backsides. Even with a few items of cloth set in between, Orin was still shifting about often. Only the knowledge that the ground was packed even harder than that kept him from sitting there instead. It was while he was busy adjusting his padding that one of the gypsy women came striding by for the umpteenth time. She'd been near Orin so much that he already knew her name was Kizzy, which meant cinnamon bark or some such strange thing.