by Smith, Skye
She took up his hand and squeezed it. "You still have the funk of life aboard a small boat about you. Come. The married couples are finished with the sweat lodge. It is our turn." At her offer, he again blushed red. "Have you never used our sweat lodge before. Don't worry. I'll be with you."
"But it is public, and mixed, and is done in the nude,” his words came in a rush. "I am sure to embarrass myself. You know. My ..ugh.. thingy might grow hard."
"No one in this clan would be so rude as to notice. Privacy in this village is a mental curtain, because there are so few physical curtains. I promise you, no one will look. Come with me. You'll feel much better once your pores are cleansed and your skin smells fresh and minty."
* * * * *
The bathhouse and the sweat lodge were on different sides of a hot chimney. The bathhouse was well-vented so that any breeze could dry it. The sweat lodge had only one vent so that it kept the dry heat in. The same fire that heated the water for bathing also heated the stones that produced the dry heat. They bathed first. In truth they stripped bare first, which gave Robert his first embarrassment because Sarah had a lovely, lithe body. True, a mother's body, for her belly was a bit pouty, and her breasts were heavy, but still lovely despite her age.
Once clean, they entered the sweat lodge to sit in the dry heat so that their own sweat would cleanse their pores. They had been alone in the bathhouse, but the sweat lodge was full. He was unable to soften and relax his thingy, no matter how hard he tried to remember Latin verb conjugations. He tried not to blush. He tried to remember that no one in this room would be so rude as to notice.
He looked around at the layers of benches that folk were sitting on and laying on ... the higher the hotter. He knew he was blushing, and so long as he remained standing the hotter his head would become. There were a dozen folk in the room, mostly female. Two dozen eyes, and every one of them were staring at his erect thingy. So much for mental curtains. Sarah pulled him down onto the low bench she had chosen.
"It is impolite to bring live cocks into the sweat lodge,” a lad of no more than eighteen told him.
How could an eighteen-year-old lad not have a cock on while surrounded by all these naked women, Robert wondered. A woman he recognized as one of the nubiles who supposedly wanted his babies in Bridgwater was staring at him and licking her lips.
"Do you want help getting rid of it?" she asked him, while continuing to lick her lips.
She stood and crossed the room towards him and then kneeled in front of him. He was so hot he thought he was going to faint. All he could see was her tongue, and her cleavage, and his cock bouncing up from his lap. And then her arm reached towards it, and, and, and ... poured a cup of icy water over his lap. The entire room erupted in laughter. He had been set up. They probably did this to all the outlander men.
He stood to leave, but Sarah pulled him back down again with a big grin. "Come on, Robert. Laugh at yourself. Let go of your Puritan mustn'ts and laugh at yourself. This lodge is not just about cleansing the skin, but about cleansing your mind as well." She took another cup of icy water from the lip-licking lass and pushed it to his lips. "Drink, it will cool your head."
It did cool his head and he felt much better, but he still did not trust himself to look around. Naked women, comely naked women, were everywhere around him, and close to him. Close enough to touch, to stroke, to squeeze, to hug. He kept his eyes closed to keep his thingy from embarrassing him again.
"It's just skin, Robert,” Sarah whispered to him. "Even all those lovely breasts are just skin. Women tease men best with their clothes on, for it is what men cannot quite see that captures their interest. Open your eyes and stare. They won't mind. I don't mind. Take a good eyeful and it loses its importance."
He opened his eyes and stared at the woman who had tricked him. He told himself it was just skin. He told himself that half the people on earth had breasts. He told himself that she would be far more comely with a drape of silk hiding her nipples. She stared back at him, ever so slightly moistening her top lip with her tongue. "Where will you sleep tonight, Robert?" she asked. All the young women seemed to lean forward to hear his answer. He was about to tell them that all his things were still aboard the Swift, but he was interrupted.
"I am his hostess,” Sarah told them.
"But that's not fair,” the lip-licker complained. "You are as much an outlander as he is. That is a complete waste. It's not fair." The other young women all called out much the same things in various languages, and some of the words were very old and very strange.
Sarah recognized curses when she heard them. She was so glad that it was not yet known that she and Venka were going to claim Daniel, for Daniel was the most eligible bachelor in the clan. "Why don't you show him how to use the mint?" she replied. She moved away from Robert and told him to lie on his stomach on the bench.
Two women approached him carrying bunches of green leaves. They sat at each end of him and rubbed the mint leaves into the sweat of his skin. They rubbed him everywhere, and then told him to turn over. He refused, and they laughed, and the whole room laughed, and then two other women came forward and helped the first two to roll him over. He tried to cover himself with a linen towel, but they snatched it away. Then they began to work the mint into his sweat again. He closed his eyes so he wouldn't stare at the wobble of their breasts. Was this heaven or hell?
"You're so tight,” came a whisper into his ear. "Allow yourself to enjoy it. Let go of all of your learned embarrassments . They are stopping you from enjoying it."
He couldn't hold still any more. His body was beginning to spasm. He leaped up and pushed the women away from him and ran outside into the cool air. Behind the bathhouse was a clean pool, the bathing pool, and he ran to it and threw himself into the cold water. It turned green around him as it washed off the mix of sweat and mint juice. And then the reality of how cold the water was hit him and he found his feet and waded ashore.
Sarah was just wading in. "Feeling better now?" she asked. She ducked into the water to rinse herself off wet and then stood and walked with him back to the bathhouse. "Do you want more sweat lodge or have you had enough?"
His skin was tingling. He felt so very alive. So very clean. So very relaxed. "More sweat lodge."
"Oooh, your future wife will be pleased,” she teased.
"Which one?"
"Does it matter? Then the quiet one in the corner. The plain one."
He smiled. A plain woman from this village would be voted queen of the May in Bridgwater.
* * * * *
Someone was pounding on the door of the commander's cabin of the Swift. Robert shook the fuzz from his mind and asked who was there. "Are you going to sleep all day?" It was Daniel's voice. "It's almost seven in the morning."
Robert felt warm skin move beside him on the sleeping mat. Sarah was stirring. She had been at him all night. He had enjoyed her sexual skills, but it meant he'd barely had two hours of sleep all totaled. "Go away. I'm hung over,” he lied. His mind had never been clearer.
"I need my things."
Robert stood up and crossed to the door and pulled back the bolt. Sunlight and Daniel crashed through, and he immediately bumped his head on a beam and cried "ouch!" Only a man as short as Robert could walk about in this room without stooping. "What do you need?"
"My best togs. I'm getting married today." Daniel suddenly noticed that Robert was not alone. He reached over and drew the cloak away from the woman's face. "Sarah! What are you doing here? We are supposed to be getting married this afternoon."
She sat up, naked on the mat, and while ignoring the stares of the two men, or because of them, she stretched her arms up and back and gave her upper body a shake. "So, so ... oh, Daniel. You didn't refuse me. Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!" She leaped up into his arms and he straightened out to brace himself for her weight and cracked his head again. "Ouch!"
Robert couldn't face his friend. He had just spent the night humping his bride-to-be. Lu
ckily, the happy couple were ignoring him.
"You'd better go to Venka,” Daniel told her. "She's got everyone out searching for you so she can tell you the news. Don't let on you already know." He watched as the woman grabbed up her things, and didn't even bother to dress before she raced out into the daylight of the deck, and away.
"Daniel, I'm so sorry,” Robert began, in a humble voice, and still not facing his friend.
"I can't believe that,” Daniel replied. "Sarah is a dream in bed. It was she that taught me how to please women back when I was fourteen. That was about a year after she had given birth. One of the best times I've every had. Anyway, get dressed. You can stand as my witness. That will be a first. A member of parliament standing at a Wellenhay wedding."
"So you still have a wedding ceremony even for a second wife?"
"Of course. There are oaths to be sworn in front of witnesses and promises to be made to the family. I've already sent my new daughter, Teesa, to fetch her sister from Cambridge. The wedding will start as soon as they get here."
"Why the hurry?" Robert had to ask. "Surely any day would do. Are you afraid you will change your mind and back out of it?"
"Not a chance. This works in so many ways. With Venka at my side, I am sure to be elected the captain of the Swift."
"But, the Swift was given to you by Tromp. You earned it."
"As did every man with me on the Freisburn, and every mother that bore them. It's the clan's ship, and therefore the clan elects the captain. Who ever is elected captain of the Swift is almost certainly to be elected the warlord of the clan. I will become one of the youngest elders ever. I'm not yet thirty."
"Sarah thinks you are doing this to save her from a sordid Christian widowhood."
"Aye, that is another way it works. And I will get her son back for her. My son now, remember. And this village needs all the men it can get."
"The Cambridge court will never accept you as Sarah's husband. They won't recognize your customary law of second wives. They are more likely to charge you with bigamy."
"I can in good faith swear to the court that Sarah is my legal wife, and claim her son as mine. It is all true."
"But if the truth outs?"
"Why, who's to tell them? Besides, how much longer is my clan going to be living in Wellenhay? With a ship as large as the Swift, and with me as warlord, we can press forward with plans to move to a warmer place, far away from the coming hard winters."
Robert nodded thoughtfully. Daniel had often told him of the predictions by the clan's seer that there were hard and cold and violent times ahead because the North Sea was facing yet another era of shorter growing seasons. It didn't matter if the climate turned warmer because that helped crops to grow in the north, but if it turned colder, then starvation would drive the northerners south again.
"Oye, grab some of my stuff. I am moving in with Venka and Sarah."
Robert reached down and lifted Daniel's sea chest. Not very heavy for being most of his personal effects, but then Daniel was not a great one for reading, whereas books weighed down his own chest. He shrugged in disbelief that only moments ago he had woken up beside the divine Sarah, and now he was to be witness to her marrying his best friend.
As they walked out into the daylight Daniel told him, "Don't be surprised if Venka invites you to stay in one of her huts. Once we are married she will be expecting to play the hostess to my friends. That goes for Sarah, too."
Robert just shrugged. This was all so surreal. From a Puritan point of view this was all so wrong, and yet it all felt so right. It was all so immoral, and yet it was all so fresh and innocent.
Like his experience in the sweat lodge last night. He had felt so cleansed, mentally and physically. If cleanliness is next to godliness, then should all Puritans be building sweat lodges? He smiled. What had the women called it. The Zweethut. How sweet it was. Should he ask Sarah to take him again tonight? Sarah? Take him? He moaned. No, this was her wedding day. He would ask some other woman to take him.
* * * * *
A few mornings after the men had come home to Wellenhay, Oliver arrived poling his own punt. He was in a foul mood and wanting to speak with Robert immediately. The adults of the village were still asleep when he arrived, or at least, still in bed. The women, after all, had been without their men for some months.
Some children showed Oliver to the hut where Robert was sleeping. He knocked and then at Robert's answering voice, walked in. He backed out again in a hurry and in much embarrassment. He gave the couple a moment to cover themselves and then went back in and studiously ignored the comely, naked woman half-draped in the bed linen as he told his bad news to Robert.
"It turns out that while the king was playing silly word games with us in London, his man Strafford had the Irish Parliament meet and grant him subsidies to raise an Irish army. An army that has now been sent to invade Scotland." Oliver punched the air in anger. "That accursed Charlie will stop at nothing to achieve absolute power. He is a king in four kingdoms and he would use the armies of each to subdue the folk of the others. He is not a king so much as a demon."
"Why are you surprised?" Robert asked while looking around the hut for his clothes. "Last year, didn't his fleet try to invade Scotland? Wasn't that why Alex Leslie was so undermanned on the border? The rest of the army was busy protecting the coastlines." Listening to such sour news from an angry politician was the furthest thing from how he had expected to spend this morning. He looked over at the divine Sarah and mouthed an apology. She smiled back at him and mouthed the word 'later'. He grabbed enough of his clothing to be decent and ushered Oliver outside.
Other men had been woken by Oliver's tone and were standing in various doorways of various homes scratching various parts of their bodies and giving themselves a morning stretch. It had been a fine homecoming for all of them, especially since the women of the village outnumbered the men three to two. Oliver recognized some of them as the archers who had stood beside him at Lambeth Palace, so he greeted them and told them some other news.
"Remember the lad with the drum in Southwark and Lambeth when we rescued Pym and the others from Lollards tower? His name was uh, Benstead, yes, Tom Benstead, remember? Effing Charlie and his demon archbishop have judged that he was the leader of that mob, and have forced the courts to judge him guilty of treason. They have hung, drawn and quartered him. He was just a lad with a drum earning some coppers."
"What's that you say?" a very large man with a near naked woman in each arm called back. "Charlie has drawn and quartered the little drummer boy? Aye, well, John Pym warned them palace guards what would happen if any of the mob were harmed. Tom Drummer will be avenged, if not by Pym, then perhaps by a strong hand on the throat of that archbishop, or perhaps by a few fire arrows into the roof of his palace." With a nod to punctuate the threat, he turned and gently pushed the two women ahead of him back into the hut.
"Did you bring us any good news?" Robert asked.
"Well, the mayor and aldermen of London have refused to loan Charlie any money. They are afraid of the apprentices. There were riots after poor Tom was executed."
"Well, that is something."
"So instead Charlie has sent diplomats in search of loans from Spain and the Vatican. It means that Papists will have an even stronger hold on him. In return, he is offering the services of the English Navy to protect Spanish and Dunkirker ships from the Dutch fleet."
"You and I both know that the English Navy is no match for Tromp's fleet,” Robert replied, "and if Spanish ships are allowed to use English ports, well, let's just say that a mob of five hundred apprentices in London will be nothing compared to the mobs that will rise in the ports."
"They may rise in any case,” Oliver told him. "A letter was waiting for me from Henry Marten. John Pym and John Hampden and a dozen other members have been criss-crossing the kingdom making speeches to rouse the folk against Charlie's new war on the Scots. After all, it is an easy argument. Why fight a war over something a
s stupid as how many bishops are appointed?"
"Has there been any reaction to their rabble rousing? From the king, I mean."
"The king is not amused. He begins to fear the mob. His levy to raise men for his army is not going well. Last time he marched on Scotland, his cavalry was made up of the sons of his aristocracy. This time those same sons are sending yeomen in their place. It seems that they well remember Alex Leslie and his cannons."
"I don't blame them,” Daniel spoke as he came up to the two Puritan gentlemen. "Did Henry send any word about what is happening in Scotland?"
"Umm,” Oliver pulled a letter from his pocket and read from it. "Lord Argyll has raised an army of four thousand Campbells and is marching north along the eastern coast to capture the ports from the hands of the royalist highlanders."
"You see,” Daniel pointed out, "the same thing they did the last time that Charlie raised an army to invade Scotland."
"Ah, but this time they are arresting every Stewart along the way, and that means Charlie's kin in the Highlands." Oliver read down further. "The Scottish parliament is in session despite being prorogued by Charlie, and they have ordered the Royalists to quit Edinburgh Castle." He read a few other things out about other members of parliament before he finished with, "That is all."
Daniel pulled on Oliver's sleeve and said softly, "Then why don't you join me for breakfast and let Robert go back to bed. The poor man didn't get much sleep last night." By this time Venka slipped in between Oliver and Daniel, took their arms and motioned them towards the kitchen shed.
As Ely Abbey's tithe collector, Oliver had occasional official business with this village, and when the men were away on the ships, it was Venka who spoke for the village, much to his joy. Venka was a tall woman with square shoulders like a man. She would have made a very handsome man with her bright eyes shining out from her tanned face. Her long yellow braids and the short night dress that clung to her body made him very aware that she was very much not a man.