The Jezebel of India Ch. 11

Chapter Eleven.

The siege was terrible, one of the worst that had been set down in history, for both sides.

The English opened fire upon the palace and fort, only to be shocked by the intensity of the reply. The explosive mortar rounds were a huge surprise to the massed infantry ranks, but mercifully the rounds were exhausted, depleted by the attack only six months before but the cannon fire was maintained.

The Jhansi damage was greater, the calibre of the artillery was higher and the damage soon showed, with a section of the place wall being smashed and one dawn's light revealed a massed column marching to the breach and the defenders doing whatever they could to repel them. The fort had its own columns to defend against, so little support could be offered.

While the siege was lowered against the Jhansi people, the town was the scene of bitter and brutal street-by-street fighting. House by house, and street by street no one was spared.

No man, woman, or child.

In outlying villages, men and women were pressed into service, labourers, washerwomen and other services.

One fine morning, a squadron of dragoons rode in the village and gathered up twenty men and women, at the point of a bayonet. One such couple was Mara and Ghadnar Labbi Singh, simple farmers and potters enjoying their peaceful moment of happiness.

Now grime visaged war came to them again, only as victims of the armed. Being put into a cart, they were driven into the English camp and set to tasks. Ghadnar, being strong was to a work gang and Mara being pretty was found to work as a laundress.

Sergeant Mulal had spotted her quickly and had ensured that she was assigned to tend to his patron officers' laundry needs. The brothers were in desperate need of some diversion as the siege had been costly in manpower and the mess was in poor spirits. The junior officers had faired worse, with all but Carstairs still alive. Morale was at an all-time low, and then the news that a large army had been sighted to their rear brought further dismay.

"Gentlemen, an army under the command of Tatya Tope, the Indian mutiny leader has been seen some thirty miles away, that will give us only a day to meet him in the open field. Tomorrow, one-third of the army will intercept Tope, and prevent him from raising the siege. The remaining two-thirds will assault the palace and the fort, in turn. I will appoint officers by the evening mess, and issue written orders of engagement." The Governor did not brook comment, question or cheer. He marched out, amid a flurry of his staff with maps, lists and more administration of war.

The dawn would bring the upset of many a career, as they would be assigned and the mess buzzed with heady excitement and utter gloomy resolution of death. The juniors, especially fretted and spent their money on wine and heavy spirits to blot out what they expected to be their last days. Some more experienced officers sought other pleasures, to fill their time before climbing into the saddle and face a very uncertain future.

The Grey Brothers were already in dire need of distraction, and Mulal lining his pockets informed them of the laundress, with an excellent figure and a full bosom. The Greys were naturally intrigued, but unlike whores; wives had husbands and husbands were a problem. Mulal had guessed Ghadnar would refuse gold and so would need to be coerced in some other way or simply killed. In a land torn by war, one more death would go unnoticed.

Mulal nodded when the Greys suggested the casual murder; Mulal didn't care. He would have the pretty wife after the English and perhaps use her as his own whore and make more gold by selling to other men. He bowed and then made his way off into the camp, there was at least an hour of daylight, and despite the roar of cannon at the front line, his mission was set. The laundress would be at the village well and her husband still being forced on the escarpment ramp, filling in the stone and gravel ramp that would used by the column to storm the expected breach. The cannon fire split the air around the workers, sometimes they would need to duck out of the way from stone fragments, or stray musket balls fired from the defenders. Ghadnar, knowing the fort as he did, knew the ramp was being assembled in the wrong place but to say something would risk questions and questions might lead to the English finding out about his role in the fort's mutiny. The ghosts of his past were haunting him. He dare not risk Mara, or his newfound happiness away from the guns. As he sweated in the last hours of daylight, he found himself back in the Commander's house, abusing the white women he had tied up.

If Mara found out, she would leave him in a heartbeat. As he shovelled the gravel and stone fragments into useful-sized piles, he fought to ignore the wailing of the white woman, as he cut away the nubile daughter's dress and forced her onto the bed. His memory was raw now, being as close as he was to his crime, the flood of it was sickening to him now. He shovelled harder and harder, trying to scratch away the look of fear on the young woman's face as he forced her to open her mouth and accept his new erect prick. He had already despoiled her mother, now tied and gagged to the bedpost at the bottom of the bed, he was free to do what he wanted to the daughter, and what he wanted was to humiliate the young virgin. She had been so shocked at her mother's treatment but also how she had accommodated the dark prick in her mouth and her private parts. Ghadnar had delighted in ensuring that Lucy, the eighteen-year-old had had a good view of how his prick as split her mother open and saw that her mother was used to such treatment. Lucy had heard his father mount his mother in the quiet of the Indian night and had heard him grunt and she responded with whispers of equal intensity. She had even seen a man's prick, when a young soldier and her father's 'bat-man' had been washing her father's prize stallion down and decided to wash off the soap, thinking he was alone. She had marvelled at the shape and the length and pondered how such a thing would fit inside her. She also noted, how the look of the prick made her legs tremble, and her cunny grew tingly and wet. She had once plucked up the courage to ask her mother, just before her coming-out party at eighteen, when her father was away.

"Mother, as I am soon to be eighteen, I think I must also think of marrying as well, will I not?" She asked coyly.

"Soon, Lucy. Your father and I will talk about this soon enough," She replied, sipping tea from the fine China cup on the table on the veranda. Lucy pressed on,

"Will you talk to him in bed?" She asked, her face flushed.

"In bed," her mother asked absently mindedly.

"When you want something from father, you often go to bed afterwards," Lucy pressed.

"Ah, you will learn Lucy that men are often more sensible when you they are satisfied," her mother replied.

"How do you satisfy father, in bed?" Lucy looked sheepish.

"Well, when you are married, your husband will show you,"

Now being held down, her legs spread and the sweaty sepoy licking at her cunny, she knew that no husband would show her. She would be used like her mother, and she shuddered. Ghadnar satisfied enough with the musky taste of the white girl, levelled his prick at her opening and inched himself into her. Lucy screwed her eyes shut and felt the first stab of pain as he split her hymen, she felt a suffusion of warm blood, and then his thickness filled up her untouched cunny. Nothing could have prepared her for the odd, raw sensations.

As Ghadnar began his remarkably slow penetration, Lucy thought nothing of the loss of her virginity but more of the feeling of the shape of the member inside her; its movement, its fullness, and the build-up of the sensations that the unwelcome penetration brought her. It was not like her mother's coupling with her father, it was oddly detached. Soon, Ghadnar's pace sped up and she panted as he used her lubricated cunny hole. Lucy, with no yardstick of experience, stopped resisting and Ghadnar could caress and grab at her budding breasts, and she lay there his prick using her freshly blood-red cunny. Now the black-bearded sepoy soldier had her on her back, pushing her legs open and his eyes feasting on the unkempt hair of her cunny. Ghadnar, still aroused took time with the inexperienced girl, enjoying her unused cunny and savouring his virginal wetness and the very tight hole before him. Ghadnar was not that man now, he was a penitent man; each shovel he heaved echoed in his mind, as each shove he made into that poor young girl. Every shovel was a sin cast upon him and he shovelled harder. The back-breaking shovelling is as a penance now; his true penance that would make him worthy of his Mara.

In the other part of the camp, the sergeant Mulal hurried, in his mind creating an excuse that would allow him to escort the women to the Grey brothers and passing fresh troops moving to the front line and injured men retreating. There was hustle and bustle and Mulal peered through the streets and then clapped eyes on her, slender figure with a bundle of washing balanced on her head, along with two other washerwomen in his employ.

"Mara!" He shouted, "Mara Patni!" Mara turned and saw Mulal approach, she stopped and set down her bundle. She watched him approach. He smiled, which put her on edge,

"Sergeant Mulal, is there a problem?" She enquired.

"Well, yes. Please follow me Mara Patni and leave the bundle," Mulal looked over at another laundress, and indicted for her to pick up the washing, "Lalli Patni, please take the bundle to the tent of Mara Panti!" The round-faced laundress, another recruit of Mulal's nodded and gathered the bundle. Mara followed the sergeant, keeping up with his strident pace. She didn't like being away from the tent, and with Ghadnar still at the ramp, she had little choice. The pair crossed the camp and Mulal hurried her to the tent of English brother's and deposited her through the flap with enough force to make her fall to the ground sheet. The two brothers looked down at the woman, relishing the feast that lay before them.

Suddenly, Ghadnar's mind fixed on Mara, through his exhaustion and physical weariness he now became aware of the camp, it now was teeming with ravenous, foul soldiers who would wish nothing more but to feast on her loveliness. He looked up, the dust of the workers would obscure him and so he slipped away to find her and be with her. He took his tool and made his way home, to an empty tent. His heart sank, but he bolted off into the direction of the English encampment, knowing full well the fate that would face his beloved Mara. As he weaved his way through the camp, he caught sight of Mulal, obediently guarding the tent of the brothers and he ran to him.

The sergeant pulled his sword from his belt and pointed it at him, "Stay back! It is too late for your woman, the English brothers go to battle tomorrow, and they have need this night. She will be returned to you!" Mulal's eyes were steady and his sword arm still and straight,

"No, they must not hurt her, use her. She is my wife," Ghadnar pleaded, but he knew that he had to have something for them, a bargain for the brothers, "The wall of the fort, the ramp is in the wrong place. I know the weaknesses, I have worked on the walls before. The attack will fail, I can show the English, they will be honoured by the Governor," The sergeant stopped, the attack on the fort was important and if the Greys could change the attack, it succeed. The brothers would be grateful.

"Wait here!" The sergeant ordered and opened the tent flap, "Captain Grey, the husband has important words for you," He waited, and Harry Grey appeared,

"Oh, you are the husband? We will only use your lovely woman and compensate you in gold," The air of his impatience was heavy, he did not wish to be aware of the woman, as their fun was about to begin,

"Sahib, do not do this. If you let my wife go, I can tell where to fire your cannon at the fort's weakest point. I know the walls, if you stop; I will tell you where to set the ramp!" Ghadnar now understood the pain of having a woman taken for the pleasure of others.

"Wait here," Harry turned on his heels. In the tent. A brief discussion was overheard and then Mara was thrown from the tent. Mercifully, still mostly clothed. Harry and Charles questioned Ghadnar, as Mara threaded her way back to her tent on the far side of the camp. Ghadnar told them of the fort building in its inception, as he had been a gang leader in its construction. He omitted his role in the mutiny, fearful of being hung as a traitor. The brothers believed his words and then both marched off to the Governor. In the next days, the enemy fire was intensified on a new section of the fort wall, and the work gangs repositioned the ramp and the Greys were given dual majorities and excused from the rear guard attack against Tatya Tope.

End of Chapter Eleven.