by Celia Kyle
She would need shoes, at the very least.
She’d never owned a pair of shoes, but knew that for a long trek, shod feet were better than bare ones. Funny…she always thought her first pair of shoes would be those left on a dead man when her father made the round for corpses. So far, no shoes had been left on the feet of kingdom’s dearly departed. Even the most bloated, stinking, rotting corpse apparently had good shoes worth keeping.
A peddler of footwear had been doing poor business a few stalls down from hers. His children played listlessly behind him on a dirty blanket. She had not seen them eat all day.
“Say, cobbler, I’ll trade you a bushel of potatoes for a pair of sturdy walking shoes. I believe this shall be a trade of benefit for us both,” Sigyn offered.
The peddler looked at his children, who were nearly salivating at the thought of eating their fill of lovely purple potatoes. “That is a generous offer, and I accept.”
“How long will it take for you to fashion a pair of foot coverings worthy of a long trek?” Sigyn asked.
“I have a pair ready now. Ordered but never picked up. My wife sewed the uppers from leather she softened with her own teeth and the soles have been kiln-dried. Though I think they may be too large for your delicate feet, I can stuff them with wool,” the peddler replied.
“I accept. Send your children to my stall to collect a bushel of potatoes. Have them bring my shoes with them, for I wish to leave immediately. And please, may I ask your oldest son to mind my stall while I am away? Any unsold produce may go home at the end of the day with you. He need only take the cart to the garden corner every evening so that my mother can restock it.”
The peddler nodded. “Yes, of course. But, please…your mother is a witch and I do not wish my son to suffer a misunderstanding with her. He is a simple boy and may offend her with his crude manners.”
“No enchantment shall fall upon your son. You have my word on it.”
“Then it is upon the love for my children I wish you much success, Sigyn, of the garden corner,” the peddler replied.
Sigyn smiled sweetly. She had long grown tired of her society’s polite mannerisms and machinations of civility. What I really want is to dye my hair as blue as wild blackberries and run naked through the corn field. I guess when I exchange the prince for half the kingdom, my half shall be host to those wishing color and nude spectacle.
Convention called for her to seek permission of her parents before passing beyond the boundaries of the city. There was no time for convention.
After instructing the boy on the fine art of selling produce, Sigyn walked to the edge of the city, and took a step beyond the enclave walls with square shoulders and a proud-set chin. So determined was she not to be stopped, and politely questioned by the sentries, that she was certain it was the fire in her eyes that kept them standing in place, mouths agape. She may have been the first woman to cross the boundary unescorted. It just wasn’t done, you see.
Until now.
Chapter Three
Lin had been trained to awaken slowly lest a kidnapper’s blade be poised at his throat. No bolting from his bed in joyful happy princely exuberance. The conditioning had been harsh and more than once he’d felt the bite of a razor against his throat as a child. Never sharp enough to slit him from ear to ear, the training had, nevertheless, been effective. He would not rise nor would he fully open his eyes without first surveying the area by smelling the surrounding air and listening for unfamiliar patterns of breath and body movements to ascertain the level of personal safety dawn had gifted him.
He opened his eyes a slit, peering out behind thick eyelashes. A flickering light told him he was inside. The warm air confirmed it. He could feel the heat and hear the crackle and pop of a nearby fire pit. Something wonderful was cooking. It was not his fowl, he was sure of it. The smell was richer and more pungent than wild pheasant. He swallowed hard—wanting to taste a morsel.
He opened one eye cautiously. Certainly there was no blade at his throat, but neither was there any familiar visage. I am not in the forest. I am, he opened his other eye. I am in a cave.
His hands gripped the softest of down comforters tucked around his body. The inside lining of the blanket felt like an endless ocean against his bare flesh.
I’ve been stripped down to my long underwear! Oh, my…where is my bow? My hunting knife? My boots?
A rustling—a flittering movement in the direction of the fire caught his attention. “Who’s there? I say, where am I?”
*
“He wakes, sister,” Ama whispered.
“He wakes. Yes,” Angr replied. “And I have the dice.”
Ama grabbed the dice from her sister’s hand. “I call it. Highest number takes first crack.”
Angr clenched her empty fist shut. “Grabby, eager sister. Were you not my own flesh and blood I would run my skinning knife through your belly and set your entrails on fire as they spill at my feet.”
Ama cast the dice. “Another time, perhaps.” The dice landed on double sixes. “Ah, ha! You cannot best twelve!”
“I can tie, and cause a draw. Then we shall have to move on to the best two out of three,” Angr replied. She tossed the dice.
The ogress sisters hovered over the rolling bones like vultures over something sweet and dying.
Angr quivered with delight as she, too, rolled a twelve. “Let us not waste time drawing lots, sister. Let us go to him together wearing our masks and remember that he is but a puny human.”
Ama nodded. “If he dies before I am satisfied I shall be harsh with you, sister. But I agree. Let’s don our masks and approach him. Comfort him. Seduce him.” She reached into a basket woven from cedar bark and withdrew two masks. One silver. One gold. She offered her sister the golden mask and fitted the silver one over her own horrid ogre face.
As the silver mask touched her blemished, pox-marked flesh, its magic began to work and an illusion took form. An illusion of smooth, supple skin, full lips, round breasts and the odor of woman—not decaying, rotting carrion feeder enveloped her.
Too, did the golden mask transform Angr into a ravishing beauty.
Lin heard their approach.
Though he was not strapped down, he could not move his arms or legs. He strained to turn his head in the direction of the gentle footfalls and delectable perfume emanating from the shadows. “I say there…why am I in this bed obviously deep within a cave? Am I injured? Have I been kidnapped?”
Gold masked Angr sauntered out of the shadows, her hands caressing her own bare breasts. “You are uninjured, sir.”
Lin swallowed hard. Such a body this woman possessed. Such a body he had never seen. Not an inch of her looked malnourished or ill-used. The roundness of her breasts and belly, and her wide hips and fleshy thighs made him tight in the groin. If only he could move! Even if she was his enemy, he would have her. By force, if necessary. “Then why, dear lady, can I not move my limbs?” he asked.
“Because you rest upon an enchanted bed,” Silver masked Ama said, following her sister out of the shadows.
Lin wasn’t sure if he should bless his luck or pray for protection from the succubae hovering over him. He couldn’t see their eyes. They were but small glowing orbs hidden behind the slits of the mask’s eyes. He could see their mouths, however. Hungry lips, smacking and wet. It was the lips of the silver masked demoness he felt first. She tugged away the comforter and kissed his knees. She nibbled her way up to his thighs and long fingers encircled his member.
He gasped as the lips of the golden mask found his nipples.
He was helpless to stop his attackers, or if they were not attackers, to return their caresses. His legs and arms continued to be pinioned to the magic bed. Only one extremity—his thickening penis, seemed to be able to rise to the occasion.
Gold mask climbed atop him, her rear going into his face. It was far from unpleasant to have the nether regions of his mysterious captor at his lips. He extended his tongue and tasted her glist
ening mound. She smothered his face, allowing him to feast.
“Oh, dear sister, I can tell by your shallow breaths that satisfaction shall be yours,” Silver mask remarked. She lolled her tongue along the shaft of Lin’s member. “He has a goodly shape which will fill us well, does he not?”
“He will serve us well, sister. Very well,” Gold mask replied.
Neither noticed Lin’s tears as they took unfair advantage of his body.
Chapter Four
Sigyn walked for two days before picking up the prince’s trail. His horse wore unique shoes and being a heavy horse, it had left deep imprints. Why the hunting party had failed to notice and follow the trail was beyond her. Unless they had deliberately tried to lose the prince, which would certainly be an act agreeable to many. The prince was boorish and spoiled. And wasteful. Good Lord, the man was wasteful. Sigyn had seen him toss unfinished fruit aside and leave purchased meals at the pub uneaten whilst he played dice with his captains.
She hated arrogant, wasteful men.
Unfortunately, her only suitors had been dirt-poor or covetous braggarts. This trek was to ensure she would never need a man’s strength, wealth or prowess. Rather to live alone than be subjugated by a man.
The trail led deep into the forest. She knew what waited for her, hiding behind tree trunks and blending in with leaves and twigs. Disagreeable, treacherous fairy folk loved to torment the lost or those using the forest to hide their sins.
Sigyn scanned the edge of the forest for an oak tree. There was one, though it was not the greatest or tallest of the sentinels at the forest edge. She dropped to her knees and using a stick and her hands, dug into the rich brown soil. A few inches down the soil grew damp and she took the mud and slathered it on her face and arms. She removed her shoes and covered her legs and feet with the mud, as well. With nimble fingers she crafted a wreath of oak leaves and wove it into her hair.
Looking very much like a wild child and not the apple of the prince’s eye, she entered the forest, carrying her shoes over her shoulder with her rucksack. She was stronger barefoot than shod. A daughter of the earth, she drew her strength from the blanket of soil upon which all life sprang forth. That, and the spells taught her by her mother.
Stepping lightly in a bizarre dance to make her invisible to spying eyes, hands forming intricate mudras with her hands and lips softly intoning powerful old charms, Sigyn followed the trail in the forest.
A thousand glimmers of light swooped over her head. High in the trees the squirrels chattered and laughed at her attempts to hide in plain sight. They could see her—but the spirits of the forest could not. To them, she was as ordinary as the dirt under their ethereal feet.
Sigyn cast an aura of invincibility before her, shielding her from predators of less than mundane characteristics. Still, she could fall prey to bears...big cats…or woodsmen who hadn’t touched a human woman in years—having found little lasting satisfaction with forest nymphs.
She’d seen a wood-wife once while collecting roots and herbs with her mother. She appeared before a tree as lovely and lush as a bride. From the front. At her reverse, she was hollow and without form. It was only the love and attention of a woodsman ensnared in her sexual charms that kept her, and her tree, from being hacked to bits and run through a carpenter’s lathe.
It was as she mulled over the thoughts of the lovely wood-wife, that she spied the very tree that grew the succulent, magical roots her mother had taught her how to harvest. Such roots were potent, valuable and worth stopping for. These roots lasted for years and could be cooked and eaten, used as medicine or bartered for goods in the marketplace.
Sigyn felt unwary of going off-task and off the beaten pathway to dig a few tuberous roots from the soil. Even with her shield of invisibility, if she took her mind away from her mission for too long, she might slip up and be recognized as something foreign to the forest.
Keeping the proverbial eyes-on-the-back-of-her-head wide open, Sigyn dashed to the great tree whose bare roots attracted her so dearly and began to scrape away the dirt and debris to expose and cut them. She stuck the tree trunk with her small lady-knife so that it would be ready for her to trim off a root.
She then realized she was not alone. Far from alone. She had not yet been perceived, but she was now interloping at the base of a sacred tree of a wood-wife.
It must have been my memories of her forest sister that triggered her appearance, for the gathering of exposed roots is not enough to warrant…oh…perhaps it was the assault on the tree trunk. Sigyn said a silent prayer. Mea culpa, mea culpa. My bad!
Remaining motionless she glanced up at the wood-wife who stood comfortably against her tree, scanning the area. The tree nymph removed the knife from the trunk and dropped it to the ground. She knelt and kissed the very slight cut in the bark. “Heal,” she whispered.
Her hair was black as coal and her skin the color of autumn leaves. Her eyes burned with an emerald green fire and she was clothed in a dress of moss and twigs.
Sigyn held her breath as a Daddy Long Legs spider crept in ticklish motions up her arm. It reached her shoulder, then her throat. When at last it crawled over her chin and to her lips, she let loose with an outward breath that blew the poor creature back onto the forest floor.
The wood-wife glanced down. “I hear you, human. I cannot see you, for your disguise is clever, but I smell you, and I hear you. Show yourself.”
Sigyn rose to her feet and brushed the dried mud from her face and arms. “I am here, lady.”
The wood-wife smiled sweetly—as was the nature of such fairies. “Your disguise is intelligent. Using the rich earth from under an old oak. Clever girl. Now, tell me, why are you alone in the forest?”
“I’m on a quest,” Sigyn replied.
“Ah! A quest! Help you I can. What is it you seek?” the wood-wife asked.
“What service must I perform to have a truthful answer from you?” Sigyn said.
“I am a lover, not a creature of evil. It has been a very long time since my special talents were well-used. You make love to me—and allow me to make love to you in return—and I shall tell you where you shall find your treasure,” the wood-wife replied.
Sigyn wiped her hands on her skirt. “I said nothing of treasure.”
“For a young woman to trek this forest alone it must be for love or treasure. Since you do not have the addled look of a girl in love about you, I can only assume it is treasure you seek,” the wood-wife replied.
“Do I have your word that you will be truthful to me in reply to my question and that I shall not be harmed or bewitched in any way? My mother is a skilled white witch and it would not bode well for you or your tree if I return to my home in a less than pristine state.”
“You may feel confident that I wish only to share myself with a forest traveler and wish you no ill.”
Sigyn leaned forward to look around the wood-wife. As suspected, she was an empty shell. A hollow woman. Beautiful to behold, but without true substance. “I seek Prince Hlini, lost in these woods a week ago.”
“Is he your lover?” the wood-wife asked.
Sigyn shook her head. “I want nothing from him save the reward his father offers for his safe return.”
“Then kiss me, girl. Kiss me and let me love you and I shall tell you where your prince is, for I do know of his whereabouts, and I know well his captors,” the wood-wife stated.
“What is your name?” Sigyn asked.
“Asparas Cedarwitch. Yours?”
“I am Sigyn of the garden corner,” Sigyn replied.
“Would you like to step into my home that we can make love in comfort?” Asparas asked.
“Inside the cedar?” Sigyn asked.
Asparas took Sigyn’s hand. “Deeper than that. My cedar is but the doorway to my world.”
What lay beyond was more magical a place than in any fairy story ever told her by her mother. A realm of light and music lay beyond the bark of the tree and there it was that Asparas
made her home.
Something wonderful bubbled away on her hearth and fresh-baked nut breads sat cooling on the table. In the corner a squirrel and rabbit lay together, entwined in a little nest of cloth.
“What a brilliant home you have,” Sigyn remarked. “I have met wood-wives before, but never have I entered the fairy realm. This is a rare treat.”
“Will you have a cup of my cider or a biscuit?” Asparas asked.
She was hungry and thirsty and a bit of fermentation would no doubt calm her nerves—but she knew better. Never eat or drink in the fairy realm, or you will become a part of it for all time. “Thank you, no. I think we should seal our bargain so that I can resume my quest post-haste.”
Asparas turned and poured herself a cup of cider. She had a very shapely backside in her realm. All womanly features accounted for. “Let me wash the road from you, Sigyn, of the garden corner. Your disguise will soil my bed linens.”
Sigyn took a deep breath of resolve and stripped from her clothing to reveal her mud-caked body. “Where is your bath?”
“Through that door. It is unique as its water trickles forth from the deepest well in the forest,” Asparas said before draining the contents of her cup.
Sigyn strolled, nude and feeling rather vulnerable through the portal and into the bathroom—a crystal clear pool with a slow-trickling waterfall keeping it continually full. “This is fantastic!”
Asparas stepped up behind Sigyn, pressing her warm, soft nude body against Sigyn’s backside. “It is purifying and warm. Step in. Do step in. I’ll wash away that which you hide behind and reveal the true Sigyn.”
Sigyn stepped into the pool, immediately sensing thousands of effervescent bubbles surrounding her, caressing her. “Is the water alive? I feel as though little hands are massaging my legs.”