Bondmaiden (17 page)

She sucked as best she could, desperate to get it over with, but she suspected he was holding back to prolong her suffering, and then at last he began to quicken his pace.

‘Suck hard now,’ he muttered, his voice thick with lust. ‘Suck the spunk out of me and drink it down.’

Faster and faster he shunted with his hips, giving her no chance to catch a breath. She panicked and tried desperately to pull back, but still he held her fast and then his seed erupted into her throat, making her cough and heave.

‘Swallow it!’ he snarled, and she dutifully obeyed. He spasmed, emptying his balls into her, and she miserably accepted every drop. At last his wilting cock withdrew and she gulped precious air, gratefully filling her lungs.

He went to the bed and flopped down on his back. He stayed like that for many minutes while Lia remained kneeling, not daring to move without his permission or make so much as a sound. Eventually he sat up and looked about the room. He saw the food on the table and went over, tearing off a chunk of bread and washing it down with wine.

‘You hungry?’ he asked without looking at her.

‘Yes, sir.’ She wasn’t, but hoped it would give her respite; whilst eating she could hardly be doing anything else for him.

‘Get yourself downstairs then,’ he said. ‘Ask them for the gruel.’

She knew it was a trick, she even thought she could guess what the gruel was, but she stood up and went anyway, her hands still bound behind her, having no other option. The stairs were steep and she went slowly, knowing she wouldn’t be able to save herself if she slipped.

A heart-rending sight met her eyes as she entered the parlour. Elfrida lay on her back on a table in the middle of the room, her legs in the air. One of the soldiers was fucking her, holding her ankles and thrusting rapidly, and to Lia’s dismay he was using Elfrida’s rear passage. Elfrida was moaning pitifully, rolling her head from side to side as though that might somehow ease the shame and discomfort. The rest of the men stood or slouched on stools, watching the show. Two of them, to judge from their disarranged clothing, had already taken their turn, while the rest still awaited theirs.

‘What’s this?’ someone said as Lia made her entrance. ‘Osric can’t have finished already, surely?’

‘Poor old bastard can’t keep it up,’ another jeered.

‘What is it girl?’ a third asked.

‘I want… I’m to ask for the gruel,’ she said quietly. Laughter erupted and she dropped her eyes in shame. One stood up and put his arm around her shoulder.

‘And you shall have it, sweetling,’ he drawled, ‘as much as you can sup. We like to see a girl with a full belly, don’t we lads?’

A chorus of yells and cheers went up. The man steered her back to his chair, unfastened his hose and took out his cock. He sat down, grinning at her, then took hold of his semi-hard cock and waggled it by way of invitation.

‘Here,’ he said, ‘take all the gruel I’ve got, and welcome. We’ll fill you up, me and the lads, never fear. We’ll fill you and Uli both, or chop up our longbows for firewood and join a company of men-at-arms. Archers aren’t the sort to baulk at a challenge. Kneel down, sweetling, and take the spout.’

Lia knelt awkwardly, hampered as she was by her bound arms, but seeing her difficulty the man took a knife from his boot and cut the cords. Her hands had grown numb from the tight bindings, and as the blood flowed once more they hurt with a vengeance. She rubbed her wrists, but there was no time for self-pity for the man was waiting, so she leaned forward and took him in her mouth.

As she sucked him the one using Elfrida finished, whereupon another immediately took his place. Lia thrust away the despair that threatened to overwhelm her; she would not give in to it, or to the men. They would survive, her and Elfrida, and escape and be free of the lot of them. They would show these Osburg pigs what Attland women were made of.

When the men were done with Elfrida they shoved her into a corner where she lay curled up in a ball. Lia was sent to join her not long after, and she crawled over fearing the worst.

‘Uli?’ she said, for the men were close and she was worried about being overheard. She feared to see madness in Elfrida’s eyes, for surely the treatment she’d received must topple so fragile and vulnerable a mind; but a very strange thing happened. Elfrida reached out and hugged Lia tight, pressing her lips close to her bondmaiden’s ear.

‘Lia,’ she whispered, ‘are you all right?’

It was a startling question from someone who had never thought of anyone but herself in her whole life, and it took Lia a second or two to compose herself. ‘Yes,’ she whispered back. ‘How about you?’

‘I’m a bit sore,’ Elfrida confessed, smiling bravely. ‘But I’ll be fine.’

One of the men threw a musty old cloak at them, which they gratefully huddled beneath, and another, with a more kindly demeanour than the others, rolled up his own cloak and gave it to them for a pillow. Lia was exhausted, and she guessed Elfrida was too, but before they dozed off she put her lips to Elfrida’s ear and secretively told her of her plan.

The problem, she knew, was that the men would be wary of letting them both out at the same time. But they did seem to be letting their collective guard down slightly, and Lia anticipated that for one of them to get away might just be possible, using the pretext of offering to fetch the men their water from the well. It would be the girl who went second who would have the difficult escape to make.

Lia sent Elfrida first. It wasn’t long after cockcrow, and most of the men were still snoring. Elfrida fastened one of the cloaks around her shoulders, then picked up a bucket and surreptitiously poured what little water remained onto the floor. Then, with a final anxious glance at Lia, who gave her mistress a tight smile for luck, Elfrida went to the door.

‘I have to fetch water,’ she said to the man there. ‘Do you want your bottle filling too?’ He was still groggy from sleep and the previous night’s heavy revelry, yawned, nodded, and with his judgement clouded, handed it to her. This was a last minute addition to Lia’s plan, ensuring that if they did manage to get away at least they would have some water to sustain them in their flight.

Elfrida went out. Lia counted to a hundred slowly, then stood up and put on the other cloak, the one they’d been given for a pillow. Her heart thumping and knees shaking, she took a deep breath and stepped forward – just as Osric came clumping down the stairs.

Lia froze. Osric scowled at her, then looked around the room. ‘Where’s the other one?’ he asked suspiciously.

‘Gone to fetch water,’ someone said.

Osric looked at the man who’d answered, then at Lia once more, and in that instant she saw his expression change. Whether it was the fact she was wearing a cloak that tipped him off, or the fear and tension that must surely show in her face, she didn’t know. But something did, for he let out an enraged bellow and ran to the door. ‘Keep an eye on that one!’ he yelled, pointing at Lia, then at two of his bleary comrades. ‘You two, come with me!’

The three scrambled outside, and the rest just stared after them looking baffled. One, no less puzzled than the rest, closed the door and leaned against it with his arms folded, looking across at Lia. Her only exit was well and truly blocked. Or was it?

She turned and walked slowly up the stairs, hanging her head dejectedly. She expected someone to stop her at any moment, but no one did. She went into the bedchamber and closed the door. The key was still there on the table where Osric had dropped it, so she picked it up and locked the door. She quickly took off the cloak and dragged the covers from the bed, then tied them together corner to corner. She carried them to the window and jammed the end of the quilt between the bottom of the shutter and the windowsill. A hard tug convinced her it was held fast, so she hastily tipped the rest of her makeshift rope out of the window. It reached barely halfway to the ground, but it was the best she could do. She climbed out and slithered down, letting the cloak slide through her hands, and when there was no more to hold on to she hung for a moment, said a quick prayer to Saint Ivar, then let go.

She landed with a thump and fell on her bottom, but she jumped up straight away, her prayer for a safe landing having been heard. She looked up longingly at the cloak, but there was no way to get it down, so she turned and ran, begging the good saint not to abandon her just yet.

Soon shouts followed her as she rounded a hut, and there was Elfrida, waiting where they’d agreed under the eaves of a deserted blacksmith’s forge.

‘What happened?’ Elfrida asked in dismay. ‘Where’s your cloak?’

‘Osric came,’ she panted. ‘I lost it.’

‘Osric?’ Elfrida wailed, peering back fearfully. ‘Where?’

‘He went the other way, to the well.’

‘So what do we do now?’ Elfrida asked. ‘We won’t get far with you naked, will we?’

‘No further than this,’ a voice growled right behind them. They both screamed and tried to run, but it was too late. Hands clamped around their wrists and they were dragged into the gloom of the forge.

It turned out not to be an Osburg soldier, as Lia had feared, but the blacksmith. Apparently the forge wasn’t as deserted as it first appeared.

‘Now then,’ he said as they struggled in his vicelike grip, ‘and who might you two be, I wonder?’

Lia stopped struggling and told him they were cousins from Three Elms who’d been captured by the enemy while visiting their sick aunt. He tutted and shook his head in sympathy as she described their barbarous treatment at the hands of the archers, but didn’t offer to let them go.

‘Fucked you, did they?’ he mused. ‘Can’t say I blame ’em, fresh and juicy as the pair of you are. Still, it’s not right, them Osburg bastards helping themselves to our women without so much as a thank-you-kindly. Not right at all.’ He let go of them, so unexpectedly and abruptly they both stumbled and nearly fell. He sat down on an upturned barrel and regarded them from beneath shaggy eyebrows. ‘So then,’ he said, looking from one to the other, ‘what is it you’ll be wanting, eh?’

‘Something to wear,’ Lia said quickly. ‘Even a sack would do.’

‘And something to eat,’ Elfrida added. ‘We haven’t had anything since yesterday.’

Looking around, Lia wasn’t hopeful on either count. Iron there was aplenty, and half-finished tools and implements, and horseshoes, and objects she couldn’t identify, but no sign of the things they needed.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘let’s see what we can do.’ He went to the back of the forge and opened a chest, and to her amazement he brought out a blue woollen gown with faded flowers embroidered around the scooped neckline. ‘This belonged to my Winifride, God rest her soul,’ he said. ‘Here, try it on.’

It was too big for her, but he tied a piece of string around her waist for a belt, which gathered it in nicely. Next he lifted down a bag that was hanging by a hook from the rafters, and from inside produced bread and cheese, together with a small bottle of mead to wash it down.

‘My dinner,’ he said, ‘but you’re welcome to it.’

Lia didn’t know what to say to such kindness, but though she felt guilty about taking his food she knew they had to keep up their strength if they were to escape. Osric and his motley crew wouldn’t give up the search easily, and there were countless others to avoid too, so they’d need food inside them to sustain their flight.

Whilst eating, the blacksmith made them each a pair of peasant boots, just leather pouches, in effect, gathered up and tied around the ankle with a thong.

‘All done,’ he said. ‘So, which one of you wants to pay?’

‘Pay?’ Lia said stupidly.

‘Aye,’ he said. ‘You surely didn’t think a gown, food and boots would come free, did you?’

She had, but realised the folly of that assumption, especially as he’d hinted right at the start that he wanted them.

‘Either one of us can pay,’ Elfrida said. ‘You pick.’

Lia stared at her, speechless, wondering whatever had happened to the frightened girl she’d held in her arms just a day before? Surely it couldn’t be the same person who was now offering her services to a lecherous old blacksmith?

‘I will that,’ he said with a leer. ‘And I pick you.’

To Lia’s shock she wasn’t the one he was looking at, but Elfrida looked remarkably relaxed about the situation, and there was even a glint in her eye that Lia might think was triumph if she didn’t know better.

‘What do you want from me?’ Elfrida asked the blacksmith. ‘But don’t dally, mind; the archers will be searching for us as we speak.’

‘Bugger the archers,’ he drooled. ‘Come sit on my lap.’

He patted his thigh, and with no more ado Elfrida perched upon it, opened her cloak, and parted her knees. The blacksmith’s calloused hand sank between her legs, and in no time at all he was rubbing her sex and murmuring what a sweet little thing she was. And as if the sight of a princess being groped by a blacksmith wasn’t astonishing enough, Elfrida’s reaction left Lia dumfounded. She leaned her head on his shoulder and was soon moaning and grinding her hips. Her climax, when it came, was spectacular to judge from the amount of noise she made, and afterwards the old man cradled her in his arms and held her until her breathing slowed. She opened her eyes finally and bestowed on him a contented smile.

‘Did I please you?’ he asked gruffly.