The Smell of Horse and Leather

I sucked hard at once, my hand creeping again over those balls, toying with the skin there as his erection trembled majestically against my flattened tongue. He tasted rich, manly, altogether delicious as he arched his hips more, driving up against the back of my mouth: God, he was thick! I worked my throat, swallowing desperately, hoping he'd feel it against that smooth, tasty head I strained to wedge deeper, my throat bobbing.

I gave him everything I could. Everything I hoped he needed.

"Fuck!" It was a cracked, seething moan this time, the warning even clearer, and I left a sheen of spit along his shaft as I backed off, my lips tightly sealed around his penis just below his head, his flavor filling me as I waited under the blankets until he could hold back no longer.

And when he came, he came with a power and force I never would have imagined. I'd never drank Thurgis' seed, and only once with Edmer, so when he spurted hard into my mouth I struggled to keep up with the sudden cloying thickness of it. He jerked hard against my tongue, his balls dancing between my fingers as I choked down the strongly jetting spurts that filled my mouth again and again, but I was overjoyed to find that once the first crisis passed, I could handle it.

His splendid, taut body relaxed slowly, so slowly, beneath my hands and my tongue, and I felt that wave of giddy pleasure that came whenever I pleased a man. I was exultant. I was what he needed. I was his, for that time.

And so it was that I, Merewyn of Millow, sucked Bernard's cock dry like some dirty little fucking harlot.

* * *

"Father Felix once said it was all right, for a woman to suck a man's penis," I assured him. He paused, his hand drowsy on my back.

"This... Father Felix. He sounds like no priest I've ever met."

"Well. He was answering a question from my brother at the time." I felt so tired now, whispering in the shadows from my cum-scented mouth as the fire burned low and the squire held me against him. "Osgar. He wanted to make sure he wouldn't go to hell if Mildrith sucked him. She was mortified," I giggled, "but they apparently didn't listen, for she's pregnant now."

"Pricked." He was gentle with me now. Affectionate, even. "You said it's never more exciting than when you get pricked."

I felt warmth rise in me, and not the warmth of the blankets, nor even of his body. I took a deep breath before I answered. "As you might find out for yourself, Squire Bernard."

"I'll pray for that," he replied coyly.

"God," I snapped, "won't have anything to do with whether you get my pussy." We both chuckled at the blasphemy, low and comfortable, the chuckle of lovers falling slowly, inexorably, into sleep.

* * *

I ran into Godric as dawn broke the next morning, him walking toward the brook as I returned up the slope with two full buckets of water. "Good morning, Merewyn of Millow," he nodded. "I trust you passed a pleasant night?"

"Of course I did, Master Godric," I nodded courteously. "Your generosity is much appreciated. Are there more pails? I'll fetch more water."

"That's good of you!" he beamed. "My workshop has some, in the nook by the furnace. Only," he grinned, cupping his groin crudely, "mind you get the water from upstream. I've a need to take a rare piss."

I laughed. "Don't let me stop you then." I shivered slightly, tightening my shawl around my hair. I'd left my leggings inside. "I'll make Squire Bernard prepare breakfast for us, and then I suppose we should ride away soon."

He nodded sagely, watching me walk. "You're in agony."

"I am," I smiled, "but such is God's plan, I guess." We shared a secret smile at that. It was the sort of thing you said when you were mad at God, which of course you couldn't say.

"I spoke with Bernard just now," he called over his shoulder. "He might have something to discuss with you."

"Oh, I'm sure he will." I'd woken with a sore body and the taste of Bernard's cum in my mouth. Sometime in the night his hand had found its way beneath my shift, and when I opened my eyes I felt his fingers on my bare ass. I let myself smile now, wondering whether he'd touched anything else as I slept.

The thought thrilled me, darkly. Sinfully.

Up the slope the big church already had lights in the gateway, the whole village bustling awake. It promised to be a warmer day: there'd been no ice in the brook when I'd filled the buckets, anyway. It was Monday, the feast day of St I-Cannot-Remember, certainly nobody important enough for Felix to have taught me. Tomorrow was St Ethelwald, I thought, and then Ermengild, and finally Valentine; I glanced at my unblessed skep as I trudged to the house with my pails, sighing. I set them down and knocked on the door. "Are you decent?" I asked loudly, not bothering to wait for an answer before barging in.

"Not that you'd mind." He grinned up at me from down among the ashes, stoking the fire back up. "Good morning."

"Good morning, Squire Bernard." I dragged the buckets inside and kicked the door shut. I leaned back against it, looking down at him with a slow, knowing smile. We stayed that way a few moments, remembering, thinking about our new reality. "I trust you passed a pleasant night?" I mocked.

He laughed as he poked at the fuel. "Very interesting." He glanced back up. "Godric had a suggestion. He said we should stay through the morning, that there's no need for us to go all the way to Woolley. That there are priests much closer." He hesitated. "He did not suggest we go back up to that church again."

"Ah." I squatted down, my hips screeching, and poured some of the water into a basin. I started to wash. "He mentioned you might have something to discuss with me. So... how are we supposed to pass the morning?" I looked back at him, spluttering, my eyebrows raised.

"Well, he made the suggestion after I asked him some questions about his shop. The glass, you know." He shrugged as the fire blazed up. "He's invited me to see what he does."

I chuckled. "While I lie about like the lady of the manor?" It had never occurred to me that I could spend a morning lying in bed, ever. "God hates idleness and sloth, Bernard."

"God hates a great many things, I notice." He hopped to his feet, dusting his hands on his pants. I saw his glance shift toward the bed. "Your, um, your plan? It worked."

I peered up from my basin. "What the fuck are you talking about? It's still early. I can't handle hints yet, Bernard."

He winked. "Godric's blankets. I did not make a mess." He looked at me quietly until I got it, at which point I felt myself flush. "Well done, beekeeper."

"Thank you, squire." I once again felt that sense of pride, that awareness that I'd pleased him. "My plans usually work." I held his gaze as I reached beneath my skirts and lifted a palmful of water to my cunt, gasping as the cold liquid hit my skin. He rolled his eyes as I scrubbed with my fingers. "Toss me my leggings, when you get a chance?"

"You went out without them?" He gave a low whistle. "Merewyn, you needn't learn my language to be a pervert. I fear it has already happened."

I giggled. "It's not very cold this morning, and I had to pee anyway." He knelt by the fire to prepare breakfast as I stepped into my pants, pulling them up beneath the skirts.

* * *

By noontime, I was getting apprehensive.

It was a fine day, clear and lovely and not very cold at all, and I was experiencing an unfamiliar sensation: I was bored.

The lot of a manor girl in Millow is that there is always, always something to do. You are mucking out the pigpen. You are gathering eggs. You are repairing bee-skeps. You are tending the kitchen garden. You are spinning, always spinning, forever spinning to make the yarn to weave your clothes, your hats, your bedstead.

But I had not brought my spindle. In my mind, my errand with Bernard would be a dramatic dashing gallop over hill and dale, dawn to dusk, with no time for anything except haste. What I did not expect was to be cooling my heels in the prime of the morning at the quiet holding of an odd little glassmaker.

I did what I could, certainly. I made sure his sheep and our horses weren't wallowing in their own filth, and I scattered grain for Godric's chickens, and I plucked some turnips that looked ready. I tended the fire and I kept fetching water. I sponged off his house, the bed and the chest and the walls. And still, I was bored.

Now I sat on a bench outside Godric's door and gazed out at the afternoon. Men and women passed to and fro along the river lane below. At one point a trio of horsemen rode by, obviously Normans, but they didn't stop and no one seemed interested in them. Other than that, it was a lazy English February morning: the birds continued to search for their mates, the broad river rolled past, and always and forever my thoughts went back to my bees, stirring at Millow, needing St Valentine's blessing.

I sighed. This was not going quite as planned. I stretched my arms high, feeling my hips and thighs un-knot, still not looking forward to riding any further today. Even if Woolley was further off than we needed to go, Godric had mentioned a place called Buckden. "There's another priory there," he shrugged, "or there used to be. Should be crawling with priests." He'd looked up from his bread at breakfast. "If you don't mind my asking, why do you need a priest anyway?" He'd nodded once I explained about the bees. Thurgis. "So. All you need are some prayers? An indulgence?" His face had taken on an odd, faraway look. "Sounds simple enough. You barely need a priest at all," he'd chuckled.

Now I heard that chuckle again, coming closer, so I turned to catch Bernard and Godric coming from the furnace. "We leaving soon?" I asked pointedly.

"Look what your squire made!" Godric held out his arm as he reached me, holding a little palm cup with an uneven shape and an odd bulge on one side. I arched my eyebrow.

"I don't have much to do with glass," I admitted, being more of a horn-and-wood kind of girl, "but from what I've seen? This looks like shit."

The glassmaker chuckled again, leaving a prim Bernard to sniff down his nose at me. "I don't claim to be any good, Merewyn," he muttered.

"Mmhm." I took the cup, still warm from the fire. "That's just as well," I told him at last, "because you're not."

"See?" Godric winked. "English women are honest."

"We leaving?" I asked again. "I didn't like riding yesterday; I suspect I'll like riding in the dark even less."

"See, I think he has a certain talent," Godric burbled on, ignoring me. He took the cup back. "You should have seen my first piece of work. It came out all scorched, and my hair caught fire." He sighed and took a seat beside me. "It's going to be a good time to make glass," he observed, squinting down at the river lane. "I've been in Normandy, long ago. As your Bernard will tell you, they build a lot of churches."

"A lot of churches." The squire took an unceremonious seat on the ground on the other side of me, his back to Godric's house. "They sin a lot, so they build churches to pretend the sins don't matter."

"Maybe they don't," I muttered, glancing down at him in mute appeal. I wanted to get going. This place was nice enough, but it wasn't where we were going to find what we sought.

"Oh, they do, you little heretic," Godric assured me. "God sees everything. He weighs every sin. But his churches also use a lot of glass, so... Normans? Churches? Glass?" He clicked his tongue. "Good business ahead. A man could do worse than to become a glassmaker, especially if he's all done with other things." He leaned down to glance across me at Bernard. "Soldiering, say."

The squire laughed. "I don't think my lord of Eu is going to build a cathedral in Millow." He yawned. "And I might be too old to take up a new trade."

"Nonsense." Godric stretched out his short legs. "I was almost fifty when I took this up. Just a few years ago now, no more than ten." He laid a finger alongside his nose. "This isn't my first trade, either."

Curious, I looked over at him. "You don't say." I wagged my head back to glance at Bernard, who simply returned a smug smile. "What else have you done, Godric?"

"You've not wondered why I'm so happy to take money from those assholes up the hill?" the little man replied, jerking his head back toward the church. "Or why I know Latin? Or why your Squire Bernard here is not really in a rush to leave?" I felt my pulse quicken, my throat go dry. "There was a time when I was Brother Godric, of St Neot's." He patted my hand as I felt my mouth fall open. "You don't need to go find a priest any longer, Merewyn of Millow. You already have, you see."

* * *

In the end, we needed to force him to take our silver. "This is why I didn't make a good monk," he sighed. "The important thing is the prayer, not the silver. Priests, not God, sell indulgences."

"But it's not God I need," I told him, pressing one of Sir Geoffrey's pennies into the man's palm, "it's St Valentine. And I'm sure he could use the money for something?"

He'd laughed at that, saying he'd use our silver as alms for the poor. "At the chapel by the river," he'd added firmly, "not up at St Neot's. They'd just keep it."

"They didn't want it yesterday," Bernard said sourly.

"No, not from the likes of you." Godric shrugged. "That's the thing with the priests there: they've developed some queer ideas about God. They owe allegiance to the Bishop of Ely, and he's a very long way away. And some people do better when their thegns are nearby. You know?" He studied my skep, frowning. "Fascinating. You made this?"

"Yes." I handled myself less casually around Godric now that I knew who he'd been: hands clasped chastely at my waist, shawl pulled tight. Head bowed. "It's my humble offering to God."

"It's nothing of the kind. It's a way for your family to survive," he shot back, "and that's honorable enough." He stroked it, running his fingers over my wickerwork. "I'd dare say, Merewyn, that if the bees in here do well, it will be thanks to your hands, and not my prayers."

I flushed. "Thank you."

"Still. You asked for a prayer, and a prayer you shall get." He eyed us both shrewdly. "This other matter, of the murdered boy... Well. It's less simple, you understand." He shook his head sadly. "Many priests will tell you that an indulgence would buy the lad's way to the side of God, but I don't believe it. The best I can do, and will do, is pray for the peace of his soul." He smiled. "And I will take his uncle's silver for that too, though not as an indulgence. I'll give that as alms, too, and then his spirit will know some good came of his death."

I felt tears start, and fell at once to my knees. I had no way to thank this man. "Father..."

"No," he said gently, "just Godric." He nodded up at Bernard. "And you shall both stay the night here too, then be on your way tomorrow with a lighter heart and all your prayers said. And in good Latin, too, though it's been awhile."

He nodded, beaming. I felt his firm hand on my shoulder. "We're very grateful, Godric," he murmured. "His family will be pleased."

"If not blessed." Godric smiled ruefully. "Well. Why don't we get this overwith. What did you want me to say to St Valentine?"

* * *

Bernard, predictably, needed no convincing to join me in Godric's bed that night.

He stretched his arm out toward me, this time naturally, taking it for granted that I would curl back up into the crook of his armpit. And, to be fair to him, he wasn't wrong: I moved smoothly against him, breathing him in. Feeling his warmth. My own hand found his chest, bare tonight: he'd come to bed naked. "Your hand was on my butt when I woke up this morning."

"Well. It's a nice butt, young and pert." His chest hair in the low, flickering firelight enthralled me as my fingers toyed with it. "Surely, you can't blame me."

I giggled. "The woman you had. Down south, before the battle? The one who came with you from Normandy?" Shyly, I pressed my cheek against his ribs. "Was her ass young and pert? Or was she an elderly, worn-out bag of bones like you are?"

"She was young. But not like you." He leaned across and kissed my forehead, sighing. "I enjoyed this morning. With the glass. I... would like you to have been there. Sharing it."

"Really?" I perched myself up on my elbow, grinning down at him. "What's this? A brave, scarred warrior from Brittany, thinking about settling down by the river and messing around with glass?" I tweaked his nipple. "Raising little glassmakers?"

"Or?" He raised an eyebrow. "Little beekeepers, perhaps..." and a surge seemed to lift my whole body, warm, even euphoric. It felt better than the pride I'd taken as he'd cum last night, better than poor Thurgis' mouth on my pussy. Even better than Edmer, fingering my asshole that one time... I felt my lips purse into a new kind of smile, a sharp possessive little smirk.

"My," I winked, "you're saying all sorts of interesting things these days," and then my smirk was melting softly onto his mouth. Our lips opened and, without warning, his insistent tongue invaded my mouth. I sucked it eagerly in, tasting him, loving the closeness I'd found with him.

It was, I realized suddenly, a closeness I didn't want to lose.

His arm pulled me close, crushing my body against his as his other hand found my shift, pulling it up. He caught a faint look of surprise on my face as I pulled back, my chin coated with his spit. "What is it?" he whispered, working on my shift.

"It's just... I've never kissed a man without a mustache before," I confessed. "It feels odd." He kept pulling and I let him, wanting him to have me, longing to give myself to him. "Good, though."

"Well. I should hope so," he muttered as I raised my arms. It felt like the most natural thing in the world to be naked with this man, my body preening along his as I surrendered to a powerful urge to make every part of me touch every part of him. I was still feeling the giddiness of my flesh touching his when he turned toward me and kissed me again, passionately, deeply, with his legs touching mine and his hand grappling my bare breast, his cock a solid, hard bar against my belly as we met and folded our arms around each other.

From the start, he was different: snoother, gentler, calmer than the starving Edmer or the enthusiastic Thurgis. He was confident, with a sense of control I'd never known before, a sense brought by his age and his obvious desire for me; the fire swam in eyes that looked hard at me, penetrating me as his tongue had penetrated my mouth. Looking into my heart and wanting what he found there.

I trembled. Like a virgin maiden, I shook in his arms, violently, overwhelmed by my need as he clasped me to him, my face buried in his neck. He was muttering to me in French, words meant to soothe, to calm me, and I smiled without even knowing what he was saying. I raised my leg onto his, my foot slithering up past his calf, over his knee, to hook behind his thigh with our bodies tightly woven.

And all the while, we breathed together. His eyes were waiting for mine when I looked up at him at last, our fingers caressing each other. I felt scars along his back, his sides, and I know he felt none of that on my own skin. I was struck, suddenly, that all the wisdom and experience I thought I'd collected was nothing compared to his.

I kissed him again, my lips darting up, and then his fingers were curving around my thigh, up to my butt, digging underneath.

He plunged so easily inside me, my cunt wet and swollen for him, his fingers reaching deep. We shared a gasp, my hips already swinging along his body as my foot clamped his ass. He backed away slightly, angling out away from me for an instant, and then there it was.

That thick, hot penis of his was suddenly dipping low between my legs, his smooth head nudging inside my cunt already. I giggled into his mouth. "You aren't wasting time, Bernard," I cooed, that ragged huskiness around my throat yet again. I shifted slightly, hiking myself up his body, seeking him, that ultimate contact. I wanted his cock inside me.