Cruel Enchantment (Black Lace)

by Janine Ashbless

  ‘Please,’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered, sheathing him in her tight flesh. A sigh escaped her as she realised that nothing she had tried had ever been quite like this. The member penetrating her was for the first time neither cold nor unyielding, and it rose up to meet her through an aura like the clashing of brass cymbals in her head. She smelled the sweat of his lust, felt the slight yielding of his ribs, heard the quick hard breaths he was taking beneath her. His hips thrust and she rolled against them. His belly was hard and ridged with effort. His pubic hair ground against her mound. She pushed her toes against the floor – her legs barely long enough to meet the ground – so that she could rise from him in order to sink again further. He groaned and met her in rhythm, his face twisting with effort. Already burning from her first orgasm and from the titillation of his agony, she began to quicken almost straight away. She dug her fingers into his sides and he breathed a short gasp of pain that aroused her further. Flames seemed to be climbing up the wall of her belly. The wet slapping sounds of their synchronised movements filled her ears. Her stuffed flesh was churning; though he filled her completely she wanted him bigger and bigger inside her. Then quite suddenly she felt her climax within her grasp and she seized it, her whole body opening up into a burning maelstrom of pleasure. She threw back her head and thrust down on to him, drawing his thick cock as deep into her as she could, and she howled with triumph.

  As she came down from her peak, she locked her thighs and raised herself slightly from him. Petrus flailed under her, his hips thrusting wildly. She was surprised by the violence of his need; he seemed ready to tear himself bloodily from the grasp of the two caryatids. His balls slapped against her as he thrust and his jaws were locked into a rictus. Jade placed one sharp fingernail against the skin above his right nipple and began to carve.

  ‘Yes, Petrus,’ she said. ‘Now.’

  That was enough. He spasmed as orgasm punched through his vitals but he kept thrusting. Jade had to hold on tightly as she cut stroke after delicate stroke; instead of trying to separate from him, she had to cling closer as thrust after thrust to her pelvis threatened to knock her off altogether. Then she dropped her entire slight weight on him and rode him in as the last waves ebbed from his racked frame.

  The caryatids let go but Petrus was incapable of movement, gasping like a beached fish. Jade wiped the blood from his chest and surveyed the sigil marked in his flesh with satisfaction. Her sigil, delicate as the footprint of a bird, imprinted in scar-tissue on his skin forever.

  ‘Time to go now, Petrus,’ she told him as she leaned over to kiss his swollen lips. ‘I have finished with you for now. Animus will take you down to the river gate in the gardens. I am sure you can find a boat, and then you are free.’

  ‘Princess,’ he groaned thickly.

  ‘Ssh. It will not be for long,’ she soothed him. ‘When I need you again, you will come back to me. You are mine, Petrus. The first and most loyal subject of the new Empress.’

  White As Any Milk: Black As Any Silk

  AS IF IT had emerged from some child’s tale, the witch’s castle was smothered in the thick, spiny briars of wild rose and black rooks fled cawing from the roof as I approached. Except that it was not a castle; rather a fortified farmhouse with a round tower at one end, stone-built sure enough, but the defences neglected. The tower showed the old scorchmarks of fire on the highest storey, which was jaggedly open to the sky, and the wooden palisade around the building was sagging and rotten. No guard stood at the open gate and no steward came to meet me as I rode in. I slipped from the saddle and looked around me at the deserted yard.

  The farmland around the house had not been empty; I had just ridden through the village of Pedwell at the foot of the slope and there children had been playing and women spinning in the sun. There had been serfs in the fields hoeing the vegetable strips. Every one of them had stopped to watch me pass – I suppose travellers must be few here, where the road ends. There is nowhere for the track to go, for here the long humped spine of the Polden Hills concludes with a drop into the great Sedgemoor Marsh and only the witch’s farm marks the termination of the dry lands. But none of the serfs had spoken to me or challenged my passage; my robes and my horse marked me out as too far above their station. And there was no one up here on the wooded hilltop to receive me, only a few brown hens scratching in the mud.

  I tethered the mare to the slumped remains of a handcart and walked around the perimeter of the building. The tower, partially ruined as it was, had clearly been built to keep watch over the marshlands to the east, and a gap had been cleared through the trees on that side which was not yet entirely overgrown. Light glinted off distant pools on the Levels beneath me. The rose-bushes that scrambled up the stones were in full bloom, a mass of open white blossoms with pink and gold hearts. Bees questing among the flowers made the whole area a thrumming stir of sound. I pulled a flower from the thicket, careful not to prick my fingers on the thorns, and tucked it into the pouch at my belt.

  There was no door at the foot of the tower and only one in the length of the house-face, a heavy oak barrier that was firmly closed and secured with a bronze barrel-lock. Clearly the witch was not within. I made my way around the outbuildings and then into the orchard – the walls had slumped almost to the foundations in places – at the back.

  She was there. She lay on a blanket in the dappled shade of an apple tree with one arm curled under her head, fast asleep. Her small feet were bare, the soles stained green by grass. A layman might have wondered that the Baron saw such menace in that slight figure, but I knew differently. She was asleep in the middle of the day, which meant that she had been up last night at her work. Scratchy tiredness prickled at the back of my own eyes, but I had ridden out ten miles to confront her today, under the sun where we would both be unarmed.

  That deep curve of a woman’s waist and hip when she reclines on her side has always seemed to me to be one of the most beautiful things under the heavens.

  I squatted down carefully with my back to another trunk and then coughed. She stirred, flexed her legs and then sat up, brushing the hair back from her face. As soon as she saw me, she froze, and we faced each other across the long orchard grass. What I saw was a young woman with a wide face, pointy little chin and dark eyes narrowed now with apprehension. Her waist-length hair was the flecked grey of moth-wings, despite the youth of her features. She wore no jewellery, which I had anticipated but yet made my heart sink.

  ‘Galiena Pedwell?’ said I. ‘Peace to you, Sister.’

  What she saw when she looked at me was unambiguous, I suppose. A man in white robes with a black over-mantle; no peasant. Rather pale skin, slender build; no warrior. Very black hair worn to the shoulder and a small black beard that framed the mouth in the latest fashion; a courtier of some kind, priest or scholar. Silver ring on my finger, silver collar about my neck, silver clasp about my left wrist. A mage. A Moon-mage.

  ‘Who are you?’ she demanded.

  ‘Julian of Oxford,’ I said. ‘Magus to Baron Chedzoy.’

  She stood up. She was, I judged, a little shorter than average and her slenderness – visible through the simplest of homespun linen dresses – made her look weaker. I didn’t fear her in daylight; she wasn’t even carrying a knife, the only thing at her belt being a bronze key.

  ‘What does he want now?’ she said, her gaze sliding sideways from me. She was seriously considering flight. She had allowed herself to be caught unawares and now she was in a very vulnerable position.

  I spread my hands and tried to look as unthreatening as a strange man can look to a woman. ‘He wants me to talk to you,’ I said, not entirely accurately. ‘He wants me to uncover the truth. There have been accusations, and he is bound by law to protect his dependants.’

  ‘Accusations?’ She fixed me with a hard, appraising stare.

  ‘There are those who say you have been dealing with Darkness magics.’

  Her lips moved in a little humourless
smile. ‘Really? How so?’

  I had no written list, but I could remember the litany of blame well enough: ‘That you cursed Chedzoy’s bailiff with a madness that caused him to drown himself. That you have caused good wives to fall in love with men other than their husbands. The Sheriff’s wife in Chedzoy has had fits and miscarried. The Baron himself says that you walk in his dreams.’

  She folded her hands over her waist and grimaced. ‘People kill themselves, and they lose their children, and they fall in love. Every day. It does not need witchcraft to cause that. And many women walk in the Baron’s dreams,’ she added offhandedly. ‘He must see witches in half the kingdom.’

  I could believe that. I could also believe that Galiena, once met, would be easy to dream of. ‘There are stories of you summoning creatures from Hell,’ I said softly.

  ‘Have you witnesses?’ she demanded.

  ‘So I’m assured. I haven’t yet questioned them all.’

  Her eyes gazed steadily into mine and she seemed to consider her answer carefully. ‘Julian of Oxford,’ she said at length, ‘have you been in the Baron’s employ for long?’

  ‘A month.’

  ‘Did you know he is a cousin of mine?’

  I didn’t, but I nodded.

  ‘Oh, it is only a weak relation. My forefathers were the bastard branch of the family and not favoured by Fortune. I hold only a few fields, and a towered house, and Pedwell village. It’s not much to be envied, and I’m the last of my family. That’s the only reason I came back here. But –’ she raised one hand ‘– those few acres are the only ones on the Poldens that don’t belong to Chedzoy. And he wants my lands. Can you not see that he has a motive to lie about me?’

  I shook my head then. ‘I’m not stupid,’ I said, ‘nor any man’s lapdog. Why do you think I came to talk to you? There’s more than one reason for accusing a mage of witchcraft. And believe me, Sister, it’s not something I want to hear or want to be true of any one of us.’

  ‘Then what do you want to hear?’ She took a couple of paces towards me and lifted her chin. ‘I am not a witch. Does that satisfy you? My art is of the Moon; I am not aligned to Darkness.’

  ‘I might believe you –’ oh, no, her word alone was far from sufficient ‘– but the Baron I think will not. Particularly if it is your land he wants.’

  She rolled her shoulders in an angry shrug. I had hardly ever met such an intense gaze as hers; it pinned me where I sat. ‘He knows nothing about these things.’

  ‘He is my liege-lord,’ I warned her. ‘He might send me against you, whatever my convictions. He might hire in a Sun-mage. Or call for the Witch-hunters.’

  She flinched then, though she tried to hide it. ‘They will not find me,’ she muttered.

  ‘No? I think they would, eventually. They might prove you innocent, in the end. But … you know what it would be like for you.’

  She turned her face away.

  ‘Listen,’ said I, getting slowly to my feet. ‘He wants rid of you. I think you would be wise to leave. Let him have your lands.’

  ‘I don’t cave in to threats.’

  ‘This,’ I said, suddenly weary, ‘is a warning, not a threat. Do you think I want to fight you?’

  ‘You had better not, Brother. I would break you.’ Her voice was colder than midwinter.

  I could only sigh and turn away. She was not going to listen to me. ‘The moon shine on you,’ I said, but the words stuck in my throat. I strode back through the lush grass to the wall, and rode off without glancing at her or her holdings again.

  But she would not get out of my head. The mare skittered under me, feeling my agitation. Galiena’s dark gaze, the defiant tilt of her head, the little pale hands clenched at her small waist – these things stayed with me even as I left her demesne and rode the long way along the hill’s flank into Chedzoy’s fields. The thought of her kept dragging my concentration down to my groin. She made the blood beat hard under my skin – and she made the hair prickle at my nape. I have never been one to relish confrontation, neither in victory nor defeat, and this business seemed a bad one to me.

  Even her belt-buckle had been of bronze. No steel. No silver. I did not like this one bit.

  Chedzoy’s serfs stood respectfully by the side of the road as I passed, doffing their caps. Even after only a brief time in his service, I was known to them, more so because my first task had been to walk all the boundaries under a waxing moon, sealing the fertility of the land. I will have to visit each village in turn over the rest of the summer and bless them for a safe winter free of sickness, and in the spring work the weather for the benefit of their crops. Most of my duties will be of that nature, domestic and unobtrusive. Had the Baron planned to go to war soon, he would have sent to Oxford for a Sun-mage instead.

  She might have been an ally to him, had he chosen so. I thought about her pride and her feral watchfulness, but I could not imagine her small figure dressed demurely in robes of office, or patiently acceding to Chedzoy’s commands.

  There was a new occupant swinging from the crossbar of the gallows at Chedzoy bridge, but any crowd had dispersed. The mare shied from the sight and I had to rein her in hard.

  When I asked at the gate as I entered the castle, I was pleased to find that the Baron was out hunting. I passed the mare into the hands of a stable-boy and ascended to my own chambers, where I flung myself fully clothed upon the bed and tried to snatch a few hours sleep for what was left of the day. Sleep did not come easily; I found myself picturing Galiena’s contemptuous eyes and strange, dappled hair. I was forced to turn my mind to listing each of the summer stars in turn before I could sink down the spiral well into unconsciousness.

  Sunset woke me with a start. If I am asleep I am rarely disturbed by sunrise, but the end of the day always shocks me to wakefulness. I felt the tide of empowerment filling me like a cold wave, my fingers tingling as strongly as if I had slept upon them. I rose from my bed and kneeled before the small shrine to Gwydion in the centre of the room, offering the nocturnal prayer of dedication and thanks. When my mind was stilled and focused I began my preparations for the ritual planned.

  My chambers consist of two large rooms, one for my everyday use and the other, the inner, for thaumaturgical purposes only. The Baron has been generous, or at least fully aware of the value of his investment in me.

  I needed to check on Galiena.

  Still in my sleeping quarters I stripped my travelling-clothes from me and washed thoroughly in the bowl of chill water collected from the rooftops, pouring out the waste down the garderobe where it would mix harmlessly with the collective effluent of the castle. I stood naked in the dusk air, meditating on my own breath until the water had dried from my skin, then I donned the clean linen vestment of the Church and my silver.

  Within the inner chamber all was as I had left it. The single open window looked out over a darkening landscape. Clouds covered the stars; I could not see the moon, if it had risen yet, but I could feel the tides of power at the flood within me. There were two bare tables against one wall; I laid out the tools with which I would be working. All this was very familiar to me. Years of training and practice smoothed the path of my art and I hardly had to think about the detail of the rite, my concentration instead on my goal. Fluently I spoke the words of consecration that made the room a holy place; smoothly blessed the salt, the flame, the incense and the chalice; confidently constructed my ritual circle upon the lines I had inscribed on the bare slate floor. I asked the blessing of Gwydion using the longer form of supplication – it might be difficult work ahead of me – and invoked the power of the moon, drawing it down into the circle. Only then, when all the preparations were made and the power buzzed in my ears like racing blood, could I embark upon the core of my rite.

  I used the flower I had plucked that noon from Galiena’s tower. It had wilted a little but I laid it within the silver chalice of moon-water and, when it had sunk, focused my gaze upon the surface of the liquid. The work would have bee
n far easier had I been able to use something closer to Galiena’s person – her hair, her blood, her tears – but there would have been no way to steal such precious items from her on our brief acquaintance. I had to make do, and compensate for my poor tools with my own skill and the power of my will. The words of the rite slipped, almost unheard, from my lips. The surface of the water took on a silvery sheen. I felt the metal at my throat and hand and wrist grow cold.

  Though there was no moon visible through my window, and only the light of a little white candle at my right side, the image of a waxing moon appeared slowly in the mirror of the water. I focused my search upon her tower, the rose-clad stones at the base, the crumbling walls open at the top to the sky. That would be where she worked, if she was active now – and that I did not doubt for a moment. I sought her own chalice, the reflecting pool of water that she must surely have among her tools.

  I saw her. The image in the pool suddenly became one of movement. I was gazing into my own basin, but up out of another miles away. There was no sound, and my view was restricted. I could see the edge of a wall, and the clouds beyond, and Galiena when she moved into my field of vision. She was walking around her own circle, her lips moving inaudibly, and she wore only a silver girdle.

  For a moment I allowed myself a very small taste of relief. It is actually easier to slay with Moon-magics than with Darkness, but at least I had the resources to counter that mode of attack, should she be trying it. Then the distraction of her form swept over my every other emotion. She was a small woman; I could easily imagine circling her waist with my hands, or enfolding her in my arms – but there was nothing childlike about her body. My flesh responded instantly and insistently to the sight; the image in the chalice quivered for a moment. I felt the skin tighten not just across my scrotum but all over my groin and up over my rear to the base of my spine. Blood ran thick into my member and my stones felt as heavy as lead slingshot.