I close the door behind me. It’s wooden, but not even remotely thick enough to stifle the sound of revelry coming from the room beyond. The troupe of musicians long ago gave up their valiant playing, drenched in sweat and arms slack by their sides, and are now receiving grateful drinks from their audience. Instead of the thrumming dulcimer, the singing of the lyre and the trilling of the pipe flute comes the raised chorus of celebrant inn parishioners. Everyone knows the old carols well enough to join in, and even the less confident in their voices can take part, any unsteadiness washed away amidst the roaring of their peers. With the drink flowing and the atmosphere festive, the cold rain keeping everyone from heading home just yet, there is no shortage of enthusiasm to carry the tune.
As such, I can still hear each word of the rousing fifth chorus of Twixt Tree and Stream from this side of the door. I can’t remember the words to the next verse, so it is well that I am not taking part. Instead, a different celebration is beckoning.
“Why are you waiting?”
Her voice is a song I prefer over any Yule carol. I turn from the sealed door and towards the shadowed steps leading down into the cellar of the inn. Her lantern burns away the dark at the bottom of the stairs, and her smile is rosy and mischievous in the warm lamplight. She knows as well as I do that we are not allowed down here. But where I am held back by my familiarity with the scolding fury of our town’s innkeeper, Peony is spurred on. Her soft shoes tap the rhythm of the distant carol on the stone floor of the cellar as if longing to begin the dance again.
“You cannot think anyone minds our being here, surely,” she coaxes with a musical giggle. “They are too enrapt in the Yuletide festivities to mind two youths taking a little time for themselves away from prying eyes. Come.”
She extends her free hand up towards me. Her pale forearm is spotted both with light freckling and beads of sweat where she has pulled up the sleeves of her red, woollen dress. Red to complement the rich ginger of her bouncing curls of hair, tucked up into a bun on the back of her head with a pin made of foreign jade. Her grey-blue eyes glitter like the sky yielding its first flakes of seasonal snowfall. Red cheeks, flushed with wine, just like mine.
“Come, hurry,” she insists. “Before the new year, if you please.”
How could I refuse such an invitation? Grinning foolishly, I descend the steps and follow her deeper into the cellar.
Peony and I are friends, though that is more the median average of our relationship rather than its usual state. We were close as infants, I am told. We played together in the cobbled streets of Bairnby Magna while our mothers caught up on each other’s lives in the market. As we neared our teenage years, we naturally drew apart. I became aware that she was a girl, and I was not the only one. But it felt as if I alone was paralysed by her growing fairness. Peony made new friends, smarter and wittier and more handsome. Catching a dance with her in the summer became increasingly difficult, since there was always some suave smile on the sidelines ready to tempt her out of my arms.
But we do still like to talk, and it seems that destiny wishes to accommodate us. My father can always find a litany of small bureaucracies for me to take to the scrivener’s office where she works as an assistant to her mother, and she is forever coming by the glassworks with a request for a set of mugs or a new pane for her parents’ windows from my master. If I didn’t know better, I would think Peony awfully clumsy to be constantly in need of fresh glass.
And there is always Yuletide. The customary overindulgence of wine annually makes me bold, when I can insist on a few moments of time with Peony. A few dances, some friendly words…
This year, Peony has asked me down into the cellar of the inn where we can be alone. And though earthy chill seeps through the stone walls with their reinforced pillars of wood, I barely feel it. Beneath my cotton shirt and the leather of my breeches, through the soles of my light dancing slippers, I am warm indeed. The atmosphere is sweltering. My skin feels positively aflame.
Peony walks through the cellar with her lantern in hand and the hum of a carol on her lips. Her light strides are in time with the distant music of the revel, and I watch the graceful sway of her hips with rapt fascination. She is an excellent dancer, her light frame much more suited to the movements of our local measures than my taller, broader body. When she is spinning in my arms, I often feel as though my big hands, calloused by the heat of the glass forge, will do her harm. Beside the casking workbench in the centre of the cellar, she demonstrates her grace by spinning about on her shoes and facing me, placing the lantern onto the wood surface of the bench and freeing her hands.
“Thank you, Felix,” she says. “For joining me in misbehaving. I know this was difficult for you.”
Her laughter is intoxicating. I step up alongside, but am upset by the way I loom over her, so I take a step back. Peony pursues me. She holds me in place with her dainty hands on my upper arms.
“You are so frustrating!” she complains with a merry laugh. “Time and again I watch you approach the brink of honesty towards me, and time and again you flinch away from the edge!”
“That’s not-…” A sudden tickle touches at the edges of my throat, and I am forced to clear it before I can continue. The sound echoes uncomfortably against the stone. “That’s not true.”
“Then you hold yourself back from me because you wish it?” Peony’s lips curl into a feline smirk of disbelief.
“Of course not. I followed you down here, didn’t I?”
“After almost half a decade of coaxing and several cups of wine!”
“You would rather I was a brutish womaniser?” my wounded pride inspires me to retort. “Would you rather I took after Gotric and his predatory ways?”
“Hardly!” Peony laughs at this jibe at our mutual friend. Gotric is a decent young man, close in age to the both of us. But he does so lose his head around women. “You are not that, Felix. I know it well. I appreciate that about you. Still…”
She pinches me through my shirt with her slim fingers. “You are yet too shy for my liking!”
Her words make me laugh, and she is kind enough to join me. Too shy, is it? And here I was thinking myself the upstanding gentleman. I have been viewing Peony as a prize worth taking my time over. I had envisioned us as fast friends first, a foundation of camaraderie strong enough to hold what might come after. Strong as the stone beneath our feet. Strong and cold…
But now I look down into her eyes and I see not the chilly snowfall of the season, but rather a heat. Blue and intense, powerful enough to melt glass. Peony glares up at me with a hunger I could not have imagined. A hunger, perhaps, to rival this roiling sensation in my own belly.
The wine has made me foolish tonight, but now I wonder if my waiting for Peony to be ready has been cowardice, as she claims, rather than honour.
“I love these arms,” says Peony, gazing down my shoulders with a dreamlike smile. Her hands knead at my skin through the thin cotton of my shirt. “The boys working the blacksmith’s forge like to boast of their bodies, but yours is just as fine. Moreso. Your strength is born of care for the fragile crafts that you work. Mighty, yet delicate. There is much to admire in such a man.”
She runs her fingers down the muscles of my arms, past my elbows and along to my wrists. She takes my hands gently in hers.
“But I am not glass, Felix. I will not break if you touch me. You can be bold with me, and I will rather enjoy it.”
Her smile is sharp when she returns her gaze to my face. She squeezes my fingers with hers.
“Now, I have been honest with you,” she says. “Would you be honest with me?”
“Peony, I-…”
“If you like,” she interrupts with a keen whisper, “you do not even have to talk. You can be honest without saying anything at all. I bid you to try it. You may find it a little easier, my shy boy.”
Her lips are gently parted, and she is close indeed. My fear of losing a friend to impulsive behaviour is mercifully quiet as I reach out and take her in my arms. Peony gazes up at me as I encircle her with my body. Her scent is fruity, and I know already that her lips will taste of the wine we have shared tonight. For all my care and patience, I find that I cannot wait any longer.
And just before my lips reach hers, Peony whispers. “Oh, yes…”
We come together in warmth and sweetness. Our first kiss is deep and full. We are made one with the whole length of our bodies. My lips on hers, my arms around her slender shoulders. Peony holds my waist as she receives me. I breathe in her breath, and she breathes in mine. We are made one. Up above us, Twixt Tree comes to an end, and there is a great cheer from the congregation of revellers.
I pull away from Peony with a foolish smile on my lips. “You are so lovely,” I sigh gently.
But Peony’s expression is sharp. “I said,” she hisses, “that I am not glass!”
Then, suddenly, we are kissing again. I can feel teeth behind Peony’s lips and heat in the exhalation that she casts against my face. Her hands become claws, taking handfuls of my shirt at my waist. And her tongue enters my mouth, further embedding our bodies together. The new carol in the inn-hall above is, fittingly, a rousing dance, and a rhythmic clattering of pounding feet begins to shake the ceiling.
My heart is racing. I have never kissed a girl like this before, all primal and aggressive. She is clearly more experienced than I, for she handles me with an insistent confidence. She thinks me childish, no doubt. Shame and lust burn as twin, dancing flames in my gut, and I take her shoulders in hand with a grunt of bestial force, born of these warring, savage energies. I turn about and push Peony’s rear back against the workbench, and she moans encouragingly into my mouth. We kiss with the sensation of flame running across our skin.
Emboldened by the ferocity of my partner, I cup her cheeks in my hands and hold her. I squeeze at the round shape of her face and commit its softness to memory. Then I touch at her lovely, curled locks. I run my fingers along the back of her neck. And Peony responds, reaching up to my hands and brushing them with her fingertips. Then, she pulls at the jade hairpin holding her bun in place. Her hair cascades in a shower of thick ringlets that tickles the backs of my palms. I rake my hands through her long hair gently, careful not to tug. But Peony tightens her grip around my fingers and forces me to pull on her. She groans with desire as I apply pressure to her hair, and when her lips move across mine in another movement of our frantic kiss, I hear her gasping voice once more.
“Oh, yes…!”
I am overwhelmed. Peony, the first girl I have ever known. A dear friend. To embrace her like this feels like heresy. To defile her body with my touch feels like pushing my fingers onto unset glass. I will mar her forever with my clumsiness, I know it. But how I want her! I long to leave my fingerprints upon Peony, the girl I adore! I long to forever be a part of her, a piece of her, an element of the woman she will soon become. My thoughts are spinning as we continue to kiss in the flickering lanternlight, in the shuddering percussion of the dance above us. Peony has let me taste her. Now, I fear that I shall consume her.
And then, her hand falls to the waistband of my breeches, and she begins pulling them open. I gasp, leaning away from her as my heart slams against my ribs.
“Wait…!” I protest in a harsh whisper.
But Peony shakes her head and pushes a new kiss against my mouth. “Mm-mm,” she denies as she yanks at the clasps of my clothing. “No. I’ve waited enough.”
Her touch on my erect manhood is a shock. Her hands are warm from the wine in her blood and the exertion of our dancing. But to my surprise, she flinches back as soon as she makes contact with me. Her fingertips brush tentatively along the sensitive skin of my rod, leaving trails of sweet pleasure in their wake. Her kiss, so passionate. But she is hesitant, I realise, to touch me this intimately. She believes that she will harm me. Peony strokes me tenderly, and I feel the harsh bite of her lips begin to soften as she is distracted from her kiss.
So, she has never done this before either. For all of her ferocity and the luminous hunger burning in her lovely eyes, she is nervous, just as I am.
My desire for her takes me over. Peony yelps as I push my body up against hers and thrust my erection into her hands. I shove my tip against the soft cotton of her dress, feeling the shape of her thighs beneath her clothing. A growl escapes my lips, and Peony laughs into my mouth. Her next grip on me is much more powerful, and I love it. I love the feel of her encircling me with her fingers. I pump my hips into the brace she has made for me with her hands, and Peony’s hissing, nasal breathing begins to match my tempo. The tempo, I realise, of the hearty song taking place upstairs.
She releases me to grip her dress with her hands and pull the long hem upwards. Curious, I reach down. I find the intimate, secret skin of her bare thighs beneath my fingers. Curling my hands around her legs, I then find the plumpness of her rear. Her dress is caught against the workbench at her back, limiting my exploration. So, I take hold of her, placing myself between her thighs, and lift. Peony’s lips slip from mine as she laughs gaily at my strength. Once she is seated on the edge of the bench, her dress bunched up and out of the way between our bodies, she encircles my shoulders with her slender arms.
“Oh, Felix!” she sings, pushing her cheek up against mine. We are about the same height now. “Oh, yes! How long I have waited!”
What comes next is out of my control. I can scarcely recall my earlier misgivings about desecrating my friend with a sensual touch. She has sparked my hunger, my boldness, and I am now enslaved to it. I have never lain with a girl before, but I know the stories. I know the concept of sex. My friend Gotric has attempted to teach me plenty from his own accolades. Clumsily, I grab my cock in one hand and push forwards into the warmth between her thighs. Peony laughs as she shifts her body back and up to accommodate me, as if we are playing a wrestling game from our childhood. One that both of us seem to be winning. I touch at wetness, and my heart leaps with recognition. This is it.
‘Are you sure?’ my mind forms, ready to speak. But when I draw in the air to make these words known, Peony slams her lips against my mouth and drinks in my exhalation, rendering me mute. I cannot express my fear that I will create a baby inside her. I cannot ask for assurance that she is committed to what this criminal, pre-marital act of desire means for our futures. There is in fact nothing left for me to do, save plough my rod into her.
Sex is a curious sensation, it turns out. Peony is a wet, hot pressure around my cock. Despite the tightness of her embrace, I slide right in. I expect an overwhelming flood of pleasure, like how Gotric described it. Instead, there is merely touch. Intimate beyond measure. It is my heart, not my body, that feels the thrill first. I am inside Peony! I am having my way with Peony! It is that thought that spurs the juddering breath of desire from between my lips. I squeeze her bare thighs, pushing myself deeper, and I moan.
Peony’s lips are tight against mine, so I open my eyes. I see her brow taut with a scowl, and I am instantly afraid. Have I hurt her? Did I do something wrong? But when she opens her own eyes to see me, perhaps sensing my attention, she smiles against my skin.
“This feels interesting,” she remarks once she has withdrawn from our kiss. “I like it.”
“Really?” I whisper.
“I will like it more if you do something other than just hold it in there, my sweet boy,” Peony says with a giggle. “Hurry and ravish me!”
Her eyes are creased with uncertainty. But she has decreed I take her. As if I could hold myself back now.
I pull back my hips, then push forward again. Peony makes a grating little sigh from between her lips as I work my cock inside her. It’s good. The same sensation as when I make use of my hand, but with the added thrill of Peony seated before me. Her scent fills my nostrils as I hold to her body and search over and over for the sweet spot inside her. Peony shuffles herself back and forth as I explore her. And eventually, we fall into place. I discover that I am deep, deep inside her. And it’s good. It’s very good indeed.
“Ahh!” exclaims Peony, tipping back her head and holding herself up with tight hands on my shoulders. Her parted lips are wet with our shared salvia. “Ah, that’s it! That’s it, Felix!”
Groaning with proud pleasure, I penetrate her at pace. I can feel Peony’s slim legs around my waist as I judder out a rapid delve of her body. I stare down at our hips, rubbing together with glorious, lightning energy. Enough to throw up sparks, surely! And when I look back up, she is gazing at me. Her smile is the rising of the sun.
“Felix!”
I tug her head forward and kiss her again, and she responds by embracing my shoulders. I wriggle my hips forward to return to my previous depth, then plough into her afresh. Peony is moaning into my mouth. Her wailing is muted by my lips. And a good thing too, else we would surely be heard upstairs. We wrestle together, clawing and tearing at each other. Devouring each other. Until I feel as though I might explode.
My climax takes me wholly by surprise. My lower body shakes as I expel a thick load into Peony. I bend forward under the force of the detonation in my belly, and I lay my partner back on the bench in the process. Pushing my cock deep, I let it all out. Peony has wide eyes and a beaming, jovial smile as she regards my conclusion. She strokes my cheek with her hand.
But then she slips her fingers between us and touches at herself. That frown of concentration returns as she rubs at her sex with vigour. I can’t tell what she’s doing, not blinded by climax as I am, but she seems to be enjoying it. She huffs out rapid breaths as she pleasures herself around my cock. And my name is on her lips when she experiences a painful-looking climax of her own.
“F-F-Felix!”
Her body is a tight ball against mine. Her remaining hand on my shoulder is a vice that stings through my shirt. She looks a little like she is choking. But then, with a great gasp, she is done. Peony pushes some of her locks of curled, red hair out of her eyes as she fights for breath. But when she recovers with a sleepy smile, there is quiet. The song has concluded. If I strain my hearing, I believe I can hear the sound of Mayor Ansel giving a slurring speech to end the celebration.
“How did you enjoy that?” Peony’s eyes are only on me, however. Her smile is lopsided and fatigued. I am still inside her, though less so with every moment.
“Very good,” I say, but it comes out as a croak. I lick my lips, then try again. “Very good.”
“I thought so, as well.” Peony embraces me, resting her head forward on my shoulder. “I thought that was very good.”
Before long, someone from upstairs will come down here to tidy up all the empty wine casks. We will be discovered if we linger. We will need to hurry on out of here if we wish to preserve our dignities. And then? A second meeting would be nice. A formal courtship. Eventually, a proposal of marriage. A life together. One wide and grand enough that I feel suddenly dizzy when I so much as imagine it. Does she see the same wonderful sight that I do?
I kiss Peony’s cheek, then hold my lips against her.
“What happens now?” I ask as I give in to insecurity.
And she laughs. Peony places her hands on my shoulders and leans back, stares into me with a vulnerable shimmering in her lovely blue-grey eyes.
“How could I possibly know that?” she asks me.
—
The forecastle portcullis slams shut behind me. The metallic ringing fades from in my ears and under my feet. Only silence remains. Silence, broken intermittently by the desolate whoosh of the wind across the palace courtyard. The grey stone below matches the dour sky above. I feel the chill all the more acutely for the cold hues and natural music of this horrible place.
There is nothing behind me save the iron cage of the palace main gate. Before me lie the long, stone steps that lead up to the rich mahogany of the ostentatious building’s main entrance. The duke’s sigil is writ large across the varnished wood. A shield, protective and unyielding. A ram, forceful and hardy. And a stoat, inventive and resourceful. I can agree with one of those symbols, at least.
On either side of my upward path are groups of soldiers in chilly clusters of gilded metal armour and greased spearheads. With the tall stone of the palace walls boxing me in with these enemy combatants, I feel a little like a mouse dropped into a den of cats. My kinsmen back in Bairnby Magna sent me on my way with a plea that I disregard the jeering and the yowling of the enemy, for my own sanity. I am surprised, then, when I see none of the expected mockery on their faces, which are shadowed by the long brims of their helmets. Instead, I see grim scowls. I see resentment and anger. I see fear. Or at least, it looks a little like fear. I don’t know what else it could be.
The guardsmen in the forecastle demanded that I relinquish all weapons before proceeding, which was a simple task, as I didn’t bring any with me. I should be safe in the house of the duke, if he truly means to uphold the code of honourable conduct that his kind like to promote. But the guards still wished to rid me of something I own so that I know my place. I am relieved that I decided to wear woollen socks under my boots, as these are now all that protect me from the stone’s chill. My scuffed breeches and torn jacket, replete with a stained yellow-and-black patch from the civil militia I represent, are no defence against the terrestrial cold making its way up my legs. But I am also wearing our flag around my shoulders like a cape. Since Bairnby doesn’t have the sort of loom needed to craft such a thing all in one piece, our flag is a patchwork of mismatching fabrics that roughly depicts the bumblebee cross with which we have chosen to mark ourselves. It warms my body rather well.
Wriggling my toes, I set my feet into motion. I shake off my learned awe of rich grandeur with effort, then I begin my climb. The clustered soldiers in their blue and red livery follow my advance with tired eyes. I can hear the creaking of gloves as they tighten their grips around the shafts of their spears.
At the top of the steps, I wait for the soldiers posted on either side of the door to open it up for me, like in the old stories when a ruler’s attendants would greet a foreign noble. Instead, they fix me with a pair of stubborn glares and remain statuesque at their posts. When long moments of stillness pass us by, I swallow my pride and take hold of the door’s handles for myself. I pull them open.
The hall inside is warm. Twin fireplaces burn in the walls on either side of the resplendent chamber. I see tight weaves in the upholstery of the furnishings, and I can smell festive spice and wine in the air. My nose is filled with the saccharine richness of the odour. My feet immediately thaw when they step onto the rich carpet that coats the stone. Red and blue, of course.
Ahead of me are wooden steps leading to a mezzanine floor above. But the scowling, balding man who receives me, his layered blue/red cape revealing him as the Duke’s General, doesn’t take me upwards. Instead, I am led around and beneath the steps to a second set of double doors hidden behind them. These he does open for me, though with a caustic sneer that suggests he feels demeaned in doing so.
The long chamber of the duke’s reception room. Another lush carpet leads the way along the stone to where a raised platform sits at the far end of the chamber. A ceremonial altar against the back wall is adorned with lace and an empty silver bowl. Above, a dramatic painting of a man I assume to be my duke, a black-haired hero riding high on a white horse, holding a sabre aloft to catch the sun against its gleaming metal blade. Windows on the western wall let in the meagre winter sunlight through their metal braces, and ironwork chandeliers suspended from the ceiling make up the difference with valiant candlelight.
A wave of insecurity washes over me when I try to take in the three figures arrayed at the far end of the reception hall. I catch a glimpse of rich, red silk, wide shoulders, the fur of foxes and the feathers of peacocks. Then, my eyes shoot down to my feet. It is a natural instinct in the presence of such fine people. People far above my station. Slowly, shamefully, I look up again in the wake of the duke’s general, who strides past me to take his place alongside his peers. I follow the trail of his layered cape with my eyes in a bid to train my rube mind to meet the gazes of the great and good. I swallow. And I begin to stride forward once more.
“The household of the honourable Duke Ravensburgh-DeChavois recognises the representative from the rebellious contingent,” comes a loud voice from the platform as I approach. I force myself to make out the man on the far edge of the group, a round fellow with a fine doublet of blue fabric.
The general spins at the base of the platform and waves his hand in a sharp signal. A moment later, I realise that the gesture is for my benefit. I immediately come to a halt.
“The rebellion’s representative will bow in the presence of the duke’s household,” bellows the speaker.
This feels wrong. I have allowed the pressure of this fanciful palace to work its magic on me so far, and in doing so, I have made it deep into the duke’s abode unimpeded. But I am no servant of this duke that I have never met, not after our declaration all those months ago. That is the whole point of our conflict. But will a lack of respect deny me the chance to speak for my kin? Indecision flares within me. I raise my eyes to finally take in the faces of my accusers, to properly judge whether they are worthy of my humility.
The woman standing in the centre of the group is Peony, and I suddenly lose the ability to breathe. It is only a small comfort when I see her eyes widen in return.
Peony is glorious. She stands tall and proud, a noble lady in every respect. Her red dress, braced with heavier wool in chestnut brown and with a fur-lined half cape around her shoulders, is magnificent. I am sure it is very warm under those layers, yet her slender curves are none the less apparent for the garment’s insulation. She wears a silver band around her temple to mark her status, as if every inch of her didn’t do that plenty already, and her lips and cheeks are rosy with lady’s paint. Her paleness on having seen me mars the work of the makeup not a bit, and her shocked, parted lips are only made more full, more luscious, for her being so startled. Her wide, blue-grey eyes are achingly familiar, even in the face of an adult woman.
Her hair is straight now. I don’t know why I find that so disappointing, but I do. The red locks fall like a sleek waterfall into the fur of her cape, solid and obedient. Not a strand is out of place. Her stance is stiff, though that may just be from the shock of seeing me. And most alarming of all, the great lump of her belly. The swollen roundedness of pregnancy. For an eye-watering, mind-splitting moment, I fancy that I did that to her back in the cellar of the inn of Bairnby Magna, that I am the father of this child of hers. But that is just my mind being foolish. After all, Peony and I have not seen one another for nine years.
For a while, a very short while, it was wonderful. Following our tryst at the inn, when the new year arrived, Peony and I made plans to meet for a stroll at the market. She took my arm, and we talked about nothing at all as we wove our way between the stalls. And not three days after, on a night of supper with my parents and over a meal of roast potatoes with fresh butter and green beans, my doting mother began discussing my wedding as if it was a matter of course. My father worked out the cost of the dowry with a silly grin on his wrinkled face between swigs of mead. All without my needing to tell them a thing. I should not have enjoyed being led along that matrimonial path, but I did. I would have enjoyed walking any path that led to calling Peony my wife.
The next day, a man arrived in Bairnby Magna. I never saw him, but I received many a description. Cocksure and coated in the fanciful regalia of the ruling class, a high administrator or low nobleman from the duke’s estate. He visited the scrivener’s office for a matter of local paperwork, I never learned what. He saw Peony. And she left my life entirely barely a week later. Thanks to a miscommunication between friends and fellows, I missed her parting, and I never got to say goodbye. Peony’s mother, her pale face sorrowful even as she counted out the gargantuan sum of gold paid for her daughter, told me that she was to work as a chambermaid of the duke’s frail wife. But we all knew the truth of it. When the duke’s wife passed not long after, news of his remarriage was quick to follow. He didn’t have an heir, after all. And a man of his age did not have long left to secure one.
I had never considered the duke who ruled our county before the day I lost Peony. I’ve thought about him often, since. And adding a yellow and black cross to my clothing on the day my generation decided to push back against our distant, uncaring rulers was an easy decision to make.
“The representative will bow!” The voice is laced with indignation, but I don’t turn to view the speaker with the blue doublet. My eyes are only on her. I hear the sound of ruffled feathers. “Now, cur!”
I couldn’t possibly. Not to her. Not with a memory of boldness and flame at the very forefront of my mind. I shake my head. “No.”
I see Peony swallow. Her pale throat shivers. And then, movement at my side. The duke’s general is approaching with heavy strides and a thundercloud across his countenance. He tugs off one of his leather gloves with a sharp yank of his hand. Then he raises the glove up over his head and brings it down towards my cheek.
In an instant, I am returned to two nights earlier. My ears ring from the shouting of dying men and the merciless beat of horses’ hooves. My side of the formation is nearing collapse, and I am left mostly alone on the front line. A duchy spearman, also separated from his pack, charges me with a cloud of spittle at his lips. I must act quickly, or I will be skewered and trampled. So I fling out my tired arm…
I catch the general’s wrist in my hand easily. My palm on his skin makes a sharp snapping sound like the cracking of a whip. The general is aghast. He pulls, making to strike at me again. But he can’t remove himself from my grip. I tear my eyes from Peony and stare him down. His cape, his waistcoat, his hairless chin… I had thought this leader of soldiers would have to be awfully strong to command the duke’s army. But he isn’t strong, no more so than I am. He has a fat face, I realise. I’d thought it was muscle. No. It’s just fat.
The general’s gritted teeth and narrowed eyes speak his shame at having been discovered an imposter. I allow his retreat to the platform, and he says nothing, his cheeks glowing red with embarrassment.
“Rebel dog,” growls the speaker with a well-concealed stutter, “if you wish us to accept your peaceful surrender, you would do well to show proper respect.”
“I am not here to surrender,” I explain plainly. It’s true. That word hadn’t ever been used in the rebellion’s missives with the duke’s commanders. But my defiant words feel quiet compared to the bellowing of the speaker, as if they are being drawn into the thick stone of the palace and silently consumed. “This is a diplomatic discussion. If you want my respect, you must earn it fairly.”
I turn my attention back on Peony, and I am taken aback. Her painted lips are set with anger, and her lovely eyes crease with restrained, ladylike rage. But only for a moment. When we are once more in one another’s regard, her expression falters.
“Where is the duke?” I ask into the silence. “It doesn’t show much respect if my enemy is unwilling to meet me face to face.”
Peony’s hand tightens at her side.
“The duke will not be joining this discussion,” says a new man, an older fellow in a black robe off to Peony’s left. His dour expression holds little of the frustration of his peers. Just weariness. “You will be satisfied with the surpassing wisdom of his trusted regent, the Duchess Rasamala Ravensburgh-DeChavois. Provided she deigns to speak with a rude young man such as yourself.”
What did he call her? For a moment, I am stunned to stillness. Maybe this isn’t Peony after all. That would make sense, given that Peony is not this. This gemstone statue of stoic nobility. But my stammering thoughts fall silent in the following moment, as she is speaking to me.
“I am surprised to see the rebellion’s rabid maw capable of speech at all,” she says. She may as well be speaking another language for all that I can recognise her prim tone. Like shards of glass, clear and sharp. “Your attacks on duchy property are the work of beasts, rebel. What have you done to earn a conversation as equals?”
I swallow. This is awful. This is Peony! But fortunately, I have been coached. Our mayor and the older folk who recall the wars of antiquity all shared with me their lessons in how to stand your ground and talk back to supposed authority. I draw their teaching to the forefront of my memory.
“What we have done is remain silent for too long,” I reply, tensing my brow and making my shoulders rigid like the palace stone. “We allowed the duke to steal the hard work of our hands. The question, my lady Duchess, is what you intend to pay us for that sacrifice.”
“You walked a road to arrive here, yes?” Peony, Rasamala, retorts. “That road was paid for and constructed using resource shared by your towns and villages. You are welcome.”
“Stone and manpower we might understand. But why does the duke feel the need to take our gold, too? He has plenty,” I say, extending my arms wide and gesturing to the audience chamber in its richness. “Why take ours? It rings to me of simple envy.”
“Your ilk will not appreciate this,” the Duchess sneers, “but the duke has responsibilities on a national scale. Whatever you may think, this abode is of an austere standard compared to his contemporaries. Your gold is put to good use ensuring stability across the entire duchy. Nay, the entire nation.”
“When will we see any of that stability?”
“You would see it now, were you to simply cease this childish tantrum of a rebellion.”
“Strange,” I say. “I would have thought that the duke of a stable realm would not need to burn our granaries.”
“That was in reaction to your aggression, dog,” Peony snarls.
“Or the holding of hostages in his scullery.”
“Those women are there for their own protection.”
“Or-…!”
‘Or the theft of our wives!’ I almost shout. It is well I don’t, since it would surely be the end of my tether. Fortunately, Peony waves a hand as if slapping at a passing fly. I fall to silence.
“This is getting us nowhere,” she says with a grating sigh. I watch as she chews her red lower lip. Her slim fingers rub together on her raised right hand. Then, she turns to her fellows. “Leave us.”
“My Lady?” The speaker in blue is visibly taken aback. His eyes are wide and his shoulders tense. And he is not the only one. The general and the man in black, a priest perhaps, are staring at her with unrestrained anxiety.
“Even a mouse may bite if forced into a corner,” Peony explains with a sneering smile. “It behoves me to lower myself to his level if I am to get through to him. He is unarmed, yes? He is no threat to me.”
“M-My Lady Duchess…” The general, his voice higher than I had imagined, is stammering and rubbing his right wrist. “This beast will surely-…!”
“If he does, then you have my permission to raze his home to ash,” she replies. “Please. Trust me.”
All three attendants fix their baleful eyes on me. Slowly, reluctantly, they take their leave through the small side entrance of the chamber. It is a slow, funereal procession. The man in black looks back once from the hallway. Then the door thuds shut. I turn to look over my shoulder at the door I entered from. Closed and unguarded. We are truly alone. I am amazed. To think, Peony commanding the great and good, and them scurrying to obey!
Peony hisses out another sigh. When I look back, I see her rubbing her eyes with a thumb and forefinger. Her slender shoulders are slack beneath the thick fabric of her cloak. The urge to comfort her is nigh overwhelming.
“They told me that the leader of the rebellion was a man named Gotric of Bairnby,” she says softly, smiling with self-deprecating humour. “Gotric, my old friend, so far from the petulant youth I used to know. I was ready to deal with his blunt aggression and stubbornness, his sabre-like charm… I was not ready for you, Felix…”
“Peony!” I take a step up the platform towards her, but she raises a hand against me.
“Not Peony,” she says firmly. “No longer. I am the Lady Rasamala, wife of the duke. This is my home. Why are you here, Felix?” she asks me, her hand shaking. “Why did it have to be you?”
I lick my lips before answering. “Gotric died on the battlefield two nights ago. Run through with a lance.”
“Shit.” The sound is merely a hiss of noise, I can barely make out the word it is meant to be. Peony pales. “So then, you rose to take his place as leader of the rebellion?”
“I…” I have to swallow. The sensation of saliva travelling down my gullet is shockingly uncomfortable, as though my throat is raw. The leader of the rebellion… I had believed myself their speaker, their representative. But yes, a leader was what they wanted. I wore the flag on my shoulder. I stood before the duke’s household. I was their leader, as Gotric had been before me. It would be foolish of me to deny it. I should have fought harder before I became this entrenched.
“Nobody else was willing,” I explain, and it sounds pathetic in my ears.
“I see…” Curiously, Peony is smiling. It is a frail and fragile thing. Her hands drop gently down to the mound of her belly, and she presses them against herself.
In the quiet between us, I am forced to hear the torrent of questions making a maelstrom in my skull. However, my tongue feels thick and bloated in my mouth. I cannot form the words. Fortunately, Peony sees the angle of my eyes.
“The duke’s child,” she confirms. This time, her smile is warm. “A miracle, given his age. Two seasons since conception, so they will be a late spring baby.”
“You… don’t seem disappointed,” I say bluntly.
“No. This baby protects me, you see. If it is a boy, he will be Duke apparent, and the succession will be simple. However, if it is a girl, then neither of us will have any power. The duke’s brother, currently campaigning in San Seratorio, will have to come and take his place here. And we will begin this whole dance again, if he will have me…”
Peony’s fingers twitch against her pregnancy. “I hope that will not come to pass. I have heard stories of the duke’s brother, and they bode ill for me and my baby…”
“Peony-…” Her eyes harden at my naming of her, but I push through. “You speak as though the duke…”
“Is dead?” She laughs once, bitterly, like the cracking of ice in a stream. “That is because he is. My husband Duke Raoul perished of natural causes three months ago. I am the regent in his place until one more fitting comes along.”
“In that case…” I have to shake my head to stop the room from spinning. “In that case, you have no need to plan for that future. You are the duchess now! You can make those decisions for yourself! You can end the war!”
“I cannot,” she replies, eyes hard as stone.
“Surely you have that power!”
“Yes, I have it. I could open up our vaults to the rebellion and surrender to the whims of… of you, Felix, I suppose. You and your kinsmen. But I will not.”
“Peony!”
“I was not lying, Felix,” she explains with a bitter twist of her painted lips. “This war of ours is more complicated that you could understand! Once I was standing beside the duke, I began to learn what rulership entails. And I cannot allow leniency when so much hangs in the balance!”
I draw in a breath through my nose as that dizziness reasserts itself. If the duke died three months ago…
“Peony, you sent those soldiers to burn our granaries?!”
She says nothing, scowling down at the stone slabs of the floor.
“How could you do that?!” I yell. “How could you kill your own people like that?!”
“The alternative would be much worse, I assure you,” she replies sharply.
“I don’t believe you!”
“Showing weakness here would invite foreign nations to assert their claims on this land!” Peony shouts. “Our duchy will turn into a bloody battlefield on a scale that you cannot comprehend! I cannot win that war. But Felix, I will not have to if I can win this one.”
I shake my head, disbelieving. Who is this?
“I cannot explain myself to you properly,” whispers Peony, the love of my life. “I cannot make you understand in the time that we have. Evidently, there will be no peace between us. Go home, Felix. I promise that I will treat the people of Bairnby Magna with respect when they surrender.”
I still have her scent in my nose, the scent of wine and sweat from the dance. I can still feel the rough wool of her red dress under my fingers. We completed one another in the chill dark of the cellar. But now I look upon Peony, and I realise that I can’t understand the words she is using. Somewhere in the last nine years, I have lost the ability to speak to her, just as she says. My words enrage her. My ideas frustrate her.
But I cannot turn my back on her. And gazing into her gorgeous grey eyes, the one part of her that has truly remained the same all this time, I remember the shape of her lips as she coaxed me out of apprehension and into her arms.
‘I am not glass. I will not break if you touch me.’
I will have to summon my Peony out of history, I realise. And there is but one way I know to do that.
We come together clumsily on the steps of the platform. My lips on hers are rough and forceful, and I feel the shape of her teeth against my mouth. When I push in against her, my stomach is held back by the swell of her pregnancy. Peony hisses with shock, raising her hands up between us, but I grab her wrists and hold her still. I kiss her with vigour and, I must admit it to myself, anger. I love her. I kiss her.
This is folly, I know. This is the product of my exhausted mind, drained by days of battle and insufficient nutrition. I lost a lot of blood in that last engagement. This is grief, madness. And the men outside are going to cut me apart when they discover what I am doing. Then they will surely come for the others of the rebellion. I know all of that. But still, I hold Peony tightly, and I kiss her.
She moans against my devouring lips, and I cannot tell whether it is pleasure or pain that she is feeling. It seems as though she is trying to speak through the kiss. Not that her words will be familiar to me, of course, we have already determined that. Still, a breath escapes her between the rolls of my body against hers, and with it comes a word.
“Wait…!”
My word. The one I used on that saccharine Yule night. Peony’s weak protestation merely cements in my feverish mind that she is not herself. When I fought her love then, she pulled me out of myself. I will do the same for her now.
Releasing Peony’s right wrist, I sink my fingers into her hair and hold her face against mine. Her hand lands against my chest, a futile thump against my greater mass. But then, her fingers open. She takes a handful of my shirt in her grip. And when I part my lips for a breath, she kisses me anew.
I have been with other women in my days since Peony. I would not consider myself the sort of womaniser that Gotric represented. But I know what I am doing. I know how to bring my partner pleasure. Still, this is my first time embracing a pregnant woman. Her awkward, lumpy shape foils my attempts to manipulate her in my arms. When I try to reach around her waist to the small of her back with my hand, I can scarcely reach it.
Fortunately, Peony is there. She takes my flailing hand and places my palm instead upon the swell of her breast. It is much larger than I recall from our youth. I feel her body shiver beneath her dress as I squeeze her, feeling her nipple rising under the silk. Electric, ecstatic. She moans and takes my tongue between her lips, sucking on it with vigorous enthusiasm.
When I finally find the courage to lean away from her and take her in with my eyes, I have to laugh. I have mussed up her sleek, red locks into rough curls around her shoulders, and her makeup is smudged across her face. Red smears from her lips mark her cheeks like the bloody countenance of a cannibal, and I can see her freckles appearing from where my nose has wiped away her powder below her eyes. It’s a little like watching the stars come out in the twilight.
Peony laughs with me. She reaches up with one hand and rubs at my cheek with her thumb. I must have some of her paint on my face, too. She parts her lips, a word in her throat. But she knows that words will fail us, as we are now. Changed as we are now. Aged and burdened with responsibility. She closes her mouth again, and I feel her body relaxing in my arms. She silently surrenders to the strength of my hands.
I bring Peony over to the long wooden table against the back wall of the reception hall. I release the luxurious softness of her chest and grab instead at the underside of her thighs. I lift her up. Naturally, she is heavier than I remember. But I have become stronger than I was back in my youth. I deposit her on the lace-laden altar with ease. Peony parts her legs, gripping at my hair with both hands. She drags me into a kiss as I manoeuvre her long skirt up the sleek fabric of her hose. I bunch the red silk up at her rounded tummy, then reach inside. I grip the edge of her tights and tug them down. There is the sound of tearing, but I do not mind it. In fact, Peony gasps into my mouth a shuddering breath of pleasure.
With her thighs exposed, I slip my fingers against her. Peony is wet, just as I recall. Her sex feels tight. But then I realise that this just because of the great mass of her pregnant belly pushing down on her lower body. I cannot reach beneath it in our current positions.
Giggling, Peony releases me. She plants her hands behind her on the long table and leans herself backward. I regard the sensuous raising of her hips with a hungry eye, and I see her, pink and fresh in the chill winter sunlight. Then, I handle her. I seek out the little nub of her most sensitive of flesh, and I find it engorged and soaked in slick fluid. Peony shudders with joy at my touch. She moans quietly behind pressed lips in case she is heard by the men outside. Swelling with pride, I rub at her with my trained fingertips. With my other hand, I begin to tear off my own battle-stained breeches.
I am hard. Of course I am. Peony is lovely, and the noises she is making drive my blood to wildness. The excitement and fear that I felt all those years ago in Bairnby echoes back to me. And she does look wonderful in her fancy clothing, her silk dress and her fur-lined cloak. And beneath that initial attraction, there is a perverse, dangerous fascination brewing in the shadows of my mind. She is nobility. Peony is a lady, prim and ethereal, like glass. And I, a common soldier, am touching her. I am taking the arrogant, uptight woman who called me a dog, and I am dragging her down to my level. I cannot deny such a thought in my lust-addled mind. As I step forward, cock in hand, I try to use the beast’s vitality as my own without succumbing to its thrall.
But it is so hard. When she is staring at me with such vulnerable, needy desire, her breath shuddering as I run my hands up her bare, hairless legs, I feel the need to ravage her. So close the red-tinted rage of battle that I have become accustomed to and the pinkish throbbing of sensual greed. When I place myself between her parted knees, it is a weapon that I level against her. Its tip slides against her soft skin, making her gasp. Then, I plunge it into her.
Peony immediately slaps a hand over her mouth to keep from crying out. Not from pain, since she accommodates me so well. But as I press against her very zenith, feeling at her edges with familiar curiosity, I cannot help but wonder. Was the duke, frail and aged as he was, a lover to match my Peony? Surely not. So unless Peony found her satisfaction in the arms of some other man away from the eyes of her husband, she must have been starved indeed for a good fuck. A good, hard, vigorous fuck.
Bracing my hips against hers, I begin to thrust my member into her with a steady pace. The wooden table thuds against the stone wall with each push of my cock inside her, and the silver bowl wobbles beside her with the force of my entry. I will shake the very foundations of this place, if it will give my Peony joy.
As I seem to be doing. Peony’s brow is twisted and taut with distracted strain. Her smudged, red lips are parted wide to reveal the pink of her tongue and the wet walls of her mouth. Her eyelids flutter. I feel hot air from her lungs battering against my face
“Ah, ah, ahh!!” she sighs, as quietly as possible.
I begin to run my hands over Peony’s womanly body. Over the shivering points of her nipples, up the pale thickness of her thighs. My hands soften against her belly. This child is not mine, but I am not so jealous as to wish a baby ill. Instead, my pace slackens as I fear that I am doing the child damage with the ramming of my cock.
Peony, sensing my uncertainty, reaches forward with one hand and grabs my shirt in her fingers. She yanks me forward with force, and I slip deep inside her once again. I stumble against her, planting my hands on either side and looming over her. She stares up at me.
Again, no words. We are too distant from one another to communicate with our speech. But she nods her head with a snarl on her lips, and I understand. She is not glass, not even when full with pregnancy. I was right, clearly. She has been starved for the firm touch of a young man.
I place one hand on her shoulder for balance, another on her waist, and I fuck her. Peony’s hissing sighs become cracked with plaintive, desirous moans, dangerous if we are to keep what we are doing a secret. The tight muscles in my rear begin to ache with the rigorous pounding I am providing her. The thumping rhythm of the table against the wall, the staccato of Peony’s lusty breaths. And my own growling, I realise, undercutting it all. The bassline beneath the music. A repetitive, monosyllabic lyric.
I am dancing with her again. I am sweating with her again. And all else is stripped away. The rebellion, the battlefield, my responsibility to the downtrodden people of my home. Her duty, her noble family and the ducal crown’s reputation across the nation. All of it falls away under the steady thumping of our lovemaking. My mind goes blank of what brought me here and what will have to follow. It fills instead with her. Just Peony, writhing and gasping. Just Peony, smiling and laughing. Nothing else matters.
She climaxes first, this time. Peony uses her hand on my shirt to pull herself forward into a tight curl, her face a rictus snarl of tense emotion. Her other hand shoots up and grabs my hair. I can feel her slit juddering around my cock. And from between her lips, a breathy sigh.
“Felix…!”
I fall into her, taking her in my arms and kissing her. I share in Peony’s climax as she sighs and moans into my mouth. I lay her back against the table as her muscles slowly relax. But I continue to rut. I am so close. I am so very close.
She was here the whole time! I just couldn’t see her, wrapped up in this disguise! And she couldn’t see me either beneath the muck and the blood. But now we do see. Stripped bare like this, we see each other clearly.
Peony’s kiss is full and wet. Once more, she pulls me out of myself. She makes me vulnerable with the allure of her tongue. And with my grip on her thigh shaking, I rub myself inside her. Caring only for my own pleasure now. It is very easy, inside Peony. She is sensational. A handful of deep, desperate thrusts of my member into her lovely pussy, and I reach my limit. I pour myself out inside her. My cock throbs as I unleash my load into her. Her hand on the back of my head is tight and approving. A little whimper echoes between us, our ecstatic chorus, before being absorbed by the chill stone of the palace.
I am no representative for an ideology. Peony is no duchess of the realm. I am a glassworker’s apprentice, and she is a scrivener’s assistant. She was meant to be my wife. It is a miracle that we can still be together, despite everything.
As I come down from the high of my climax, I can feel the heavy responsibility of our positions hanging over us like winter clouds, full and black with snow. Soon to fall, and then we will not be able to ignore it. We will have to live our lives again. For a scant moment longer, we are innocent.
Peony smiles. She kisses my cheek. “Thank you,” she whispers. “I had almost forgotten…”
Just like that, summoned by her words, reality reasserts itself. Winter’s snow arrives. I pull myself out of her and take a mournful step away. Peony rearranges her clothing with downcast eyes. We brush ourselves down, saying nothing to one another.
Peony’s attendants cautiously return once she knocks her knuckles on the wooden side door, and I watch their spiteful eyes with worry. Can they see that my hair is tousled? Can they tell that her makeup is smudged? They make no comment if they can.
“My Lady,” bows the blue-garbed speaker. “Your verdict on this wretched dog?”
I meet her eyes. Peony is ice, glaring down at me from her platform. I make ready to sever my own heart and be done with her. It will hurt, but battle has taught me to hurt with dignity.
“We have underestimated our rustic cousins in the towns and villages, I fear,” intones Peony. “There is yet wisdom that we have overlooked. We must engage with them on a deeper level if we are to mutually benefit from this sordid situation.”
I stare, and I am not the only one. The speaker is pale, his eyes bulging. The black-robed priest is wringing his hands. And the general looks ready to explode.
“These people are beneath us, my Lady!” he snaps. “They are servants, and they will do as we say!”
“Nay, I think not.” Peony shakes her head, and her gentle curls of once-straight hair bounce playfully along her shoulders. “We shall need them in the years to come. A dialogue will suit us much better.”
“My Lady…” The speaker inches closer and hides his mouth from me with one hand, but in his indignation, he whispers a little too loudly. “The Marakene will see this compromise as a sign of weakness.”
“The Marakene should respect the wisdom of making use of every man and woman in the realm,” Peony counters with a wry smile. “Collaboration across the whole duchy and the production of mutual wealth is a sign of greater strength. It will take effort, but if this man is as worthy a representative of his people as he appears, then I believe we have every chance of achieving greatness.”
The three attendants are aghast. Their eyes rove about the room, incapable of settling on any one place.
And I am rejoicing. My weary, blood-starved body will not allow me to dance, thankfully. But my spirit is alive. Even the thought of going back to the people of Bairnby Magna with a plea for cooperation with the duke’s household, which won’t be popular, doesn’t dampen my mood.
Peony and I were close once. Through the ages and our respective growing and changing, the bitter responsibilities that we have inherited, we can become close again. We just proved that. Maybe we can drag our two cultures together when we do.
I catch Peony’s shining eye. This cannot be the only meeting we have, since true peace between our people will take time and effort. I will need to see her again. And again and again and again. Her red smile is coy, and I try hard not to share in it. That would make my feelings far too obvious.
“S-So then, my Lady…” asks the speaker. “What is our next step?”
Peony says nothing. She looks pointedly and expectantly at me. In obedience to her attention, the attention of each of the three attendants also comes to settle upon me. It is heavy, but I still find the strength to shrug my shoulders as words echo back to me from the past.
“How… could I possibly know that?” I say.
shortstory
Ewan Stone 
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