Walker Ch. 01.10

Chapter 1.10

'Are you happy with the arrangement?' she asked of Walker as they followed the same path from the previous evening.

'I see the sense in it.' his nose flared at the traces of honeysuckle 'You've been paying attention.'

She saw The Rose coming up before them and tugged the tiger's arm to halt him, 'I want to go see to the pillories.'

'Hrmm. Maybe a bad idea.'

'You want to see that woman.' she accused levelly.

He stared down at her 'You want to go see those girls.'

'What does that mean?' she insisted.

'Hrmm. The same thing you meant.'

'You don't understand me.' she said.

'You don't understand me.' he said.

'What does that mean?' she asked.

'It means that we are ascribing intention and desire to each other. Motive and control. I want, you want. I don't want, you don't want. It is a game. But we, neither of us, understand our opponent.'

The hood dipped down, the silence grew. Finally the girl said, 'I don't know.'

'Aye, humans are strange. What woman?'

'That one at the restaurant. I saw how she looked at you.'

'Hrmm. She does arouse me. But that was not my thinking.'

'What are you thinking?' she asked, forlornly.

'The honeysuckle is pleasing. The woman's scent is pleasing.'

'You want to fuck her.' the girl accused again.

The tiger's brow furrowed 'You say it as if it would have negative consequence.'

In the dim lantern light, her face was completely obscured by darkness. Walker sensed the conflict in her but was confused by it completely.

'If I fuck her, then what?' he asked curiously.

'I... don't know.' the girl answered.

'If I were to pay for a room and a woman at the tavern. Would there be negative consequences? What is it about this that upsets you?'

The girl shook now, 'I belong to you.'

'According to human law and culture. What is the significance? Of that and fucking?'

The girl gave no answer.

'This annoys me.' he said.

'I'm sorry. Let's go if you want.'

'The scents are sour in my nose now. Do you want to see the pillories?'

'No.'

'We both lose.'

They came to Edwin's home, Meri opened the door and let them in, she held a lash with many short leather strips sprouting from the handle 'Bath's ready. Food is on the table.'

Walker stopped in the doorway. The sisters, Sina and Trish faced each other, both squatting on their toes over a plank between the sofas and the stairs. Their buttocks hung beneath their knees, sweat stained the wooden floor beneath them and their open breasted dresses were dark with the bodily fluids. The metal cocks Edwin had bought were now affixed to the plank, the heads of which plugged their anuses.

Meri stood beside the pair, 'Three, two, one. Sit.'

The girls complained silently as they used their fingers for support to hurriedly lower their weight to the plank. Trish's anus was the first to be fully engorged, she straightened her legs trying to rest between heaving breathes. Meri whipped her arm back and the lash cracked on Sina's lower back, the girl cried out, her fingers slipped and her weight fell awkwardly on the impaling metal penis.

Meri turned a time glass resting on the small table beside the sofa, 'One minute rest. Five more rounds to go. Sina, that's loss number three.' The older woman's breasts swung as the lash viciously bit the girl's soft flesh three times in a row; the girl's teeth clenched and her lips pulled back, small sounds escaped her as she struggled for silence.

'Is this training?' the tiger asked coming to stand beside her, 'What's the philosophy?'

Meri looked at him, 'Philosophy?'

'Aye. What's the thinking behind the process?'

'Ahh, I see.' she smiled warmly, 'Conditioning of course. Competition. Incentives and punishments. We've just started mind you so they're just learning the game for now.'

'Hrmm. Reminds me of warrior's training.'

'I wouldn't be surprised.' the tiger noticed the smell of lust drifting up from the woman's nethers, 'There's a tome on dog training that's helped me with Edwin.' she giggled 'And one on logger strength training, and another on learning new skills. Of course, I'm using bits and pieces from different texts. You'd be surprised on the many similarities between them '

The girl on Walker's arm had stiffened at the display.

Meri turned the time glass, 'Up bitches!'

Sina again was slower and the lash fell on an unmarked parcel of flesh. In moments both girls squatted again with the heads of the cocks in their rectums. 'Mistress, I'm tired.' the girl complained. The lash licked across her thigh.

'Then it's the lash girl.'

'Incentives?' Walker asked.

The woman answered speaking to the girls 'The winner gets the day off. The loser does this again.'

'I see. Translated from Tigeri it's like Stairs-Training.'

'Stairs?' Meri frowned.

'Hrmm. Steps-Training? Step-Training? If there's a collaborative effort, those who excel at a task are drilled less intensively. Those who excel are trained more intensively. The effort is towards maintaining comparable levels of aptitude.'

'Aye. That's the idea.'

'What's the goal... why do it in this way?'

'Well all Edwin knows is he wants to stick his pecker into an ass. So, I'm giving him two asses to stick his pecker into.'

'That simple?'

'Men are simple. His idea was to stretch them out until it became easy to stick his pecker into them.'

'And your idea is?'

'Teach them what he wants. Make them good at doing it. And then using their imaginations to make it as exciting as his imagination thinks it to be.'

'I don't quite follow.' Walker responded.

Meri looked at the time glass, 'Get ready.' then to Walker 'What would have happened, is that Edwin would have succeeded in stretching their rectums, then he'd bend them over a table a few times until he grew bored of them. Then he'd fuck me in the ass because I know how to make it exciting, keep it fresh and make him feel good about it; real skill. I would embrace the idea.'

'Hrmm. I hear the words but I do not follow the story.'

'It might not have occurred to you but I don't particularly enjoy the feeling of a shit reentering my rectum over and over again, and yet I love my man. He's a good man and if it's an ass he wants ta fuck then he'll have an ass ta fuck. It's just preferable if it's not mine. Now here's two, and by the gods they'll be two pleasing asses.'

'I see.' Walker mumbled.

'Three, two, one. Sit!' this time Sina simply dropped her weight down clenching her teeth, 'Good girl.' Meri praised lashing Trish three times.

Walker left them but the girl remained watching the training. He took both plates of food, handed one to the girl then sank down on his spot by the fire. The training session had completed by the time he finished his meal. Meri had Trish and Sina carry the plank out. The girl brought her untouched food and settled stiffly against him.

Walker smelt the girl's arousal thick and wet. Musky undertones, tangy and raw wafted through the robe. He tugged the hood off her head from behind, letting the unkempt yellow hair fall to the carpet.

'How are your wounds?' he asked.

She bit into a crunching piece of toasted bread turning the swollen left eye towards him, he could see the eye clearly now and the skin seemed less taught on the brow and cheek. Meri's ointments had reversed the freshness of it. The lip too seemed to be settling, she chewed normally.

Their eyes met, 'Batrus will take my sister for marriage.'

'Hrmm. No other females for him?'

'The magic man foretold sons from us.'

Walker nodded 'That's what this man wants?'

'Aye. And my father wants the land and livestock.' she turned away from him and hid her head between her shoulders 'What can I do?' but the words were not meant for him.

The tips of his claws peeked from his fingertips. When he was a cub his mother scratched his head as he slept in her lap, his scalp tingled at the memory as he reached for hers. She shrank away initially then seemed to relax, letting him drag his nails from her temple to the nape of her neck.

'What are your plans for me?'

This question nagged; the uncertainty seemed to instill a sense of urgency for the humans 'No plans.'

She was quiet awhile 'Do I have a say?'

'Say it.'

She seemed to think on it 'There's nothing for a woman. We're animals.'

'Hrmm, humans.' he said as if in explanation.

'Are your women the same?'

'Aside from cub rearing, the females are the same as the males.'

The girl's head shifted up 'How?'

Walker thought about this question contrasting it with a little over three days' worth of experience with humans. 'They teach, fight, study, hunt, grow the crops, lead. It is a matter of ability.'

His whiskers danced as her green eyes intensely drilled into his. He could not read humans well but a desire burned there. But that desire sputtered and died 'At least you haven't eaten me yet.'

'You also haven't a name.' he said missing her tone.

'You haven't chosen one for me yet.' she answered.

'Do you care to choose one? Your old name?'

'I am dead. My name is dead.' she said sorrowfully, 'By law I am your animal.'

'Human law.' he answered dismissively.

There was bitterness in her voice 'Aye, then act accordingly and name it.'

'I name you Shuq.' he said.

Meri came with whiskey then, sat on the sofa and asked them if they'd have any. Walker said he wanted a bath. The girl watched the tiger disappear into the kitchen then followed him.

Walker was out of the ill fitting clothes and stepped into the waters as the girl came in. He watched her get undressed. Her body was red all over from the scraping but he was impressed with the effects. His knowledge of wounds did not extend to humans but he was sure that two days was not normal for the amount of healing her naked skin displayed. Black and blue seemed to have spread and become less intense as it bled with the pink hues. Everywhere signs of swelling and discoloration seemed less intense. The girl inhaled as the hot waters flowed over her tenderness.

Again, she sat draped under his arm in the dim light. No words were exchanged as they soaked in the waters.

The tiger pierced the long silence 'What would you do if you could choose?'

The waters shifted as she pressed herself to him. After an eternity she finally answered 'All I know is chickens.'

'You fought Tullius today.'

'I only said what I heard others say.'

'Aye. But what were you thinking?'

'That we need clothes, the morning seemed a good time for shopping. That I don't want to end up in the pillories. That you've treated me as well as any man I've seen treating a woman. That I hoped you wouldn't mind spending that silver.'

'What else?'

'I don't want you seeing that woman at the restaurant.'

'Why not?'

'You might forget about me. Leave me to... become a Lumberton woman.'

'Do you want to stay with me?'

'I don't know what I want. I will try to be a good woman. Follow your needs. Achieve your goals.'

'My path could lead anywhere.'

They soaked until the heat of the water penetrated deep into their bodies. The girl's hand idly drifted through a thick tuft of white fur that grew beneath his neck 'It's so soft.' she barely whispered.

'Hrmm.' the tiger's chin fell on his neck, watching her fingers.

She raked the fur, twirling and tugging at the lustrous thickness, 'Why did you leave your home?'

'Silver. Learning. Exploration.' he recited.

'That is why you are here.' she murmured, 'Was there not enough to keep you there?'

'Clever.' he put his hand on her head. 'The war was over. I was tired. I am tired.'

'So, you travelled for months over snow laden mountains into unfamiliar human lands?'

'Aye.'

'There's no sense in that.'

The tiger's chest rose with a deep sigh that made the fur in her fingers shiver, 'In my mind I see a coin. It has two sides; one is day, the other night. So too is war and peace. Sometimes one side is visible but the other side does not disappear. Both sides are the same.'

'Day is night?' she asked perplexed.

'They exist together in continual motion. Because the fighting had ended did not mean the fighting was over. The coin had flipped yet that does not affect its nature.'

'I don't understand.'

'The fighting had brought peace. The peace has to be fought for.'

She wanted to ask more but decided against it. 'You fight very well.'

'Aye.'

'What will you do with all the coin?'

'No plans.'

'How can you live like that?'

It was the first time she had heard him laugh, a growling exclamation 'What were your plans?'

The question prompted the last few days of her life to replay in her mind 'They were not mine.' she answered sadly.

'The dream cares for nothing, though it can be shifted by anything.'

'Will you teach me of the dream?'

'Nothing to teach. I will remind you of it, if you like.' they heard Edwin's voice from somewhere in the house, 'Come, let's wash.'