Liaison (2 page)

Giggling merrily, these four pupils fell now as one to the grass. Catya, one of the brunettes, sat up on her knees and threw her hair behind her shoulders. The breeze snatched her voice to me, though her silken words were uttered in the native dialect with which I had trouble. Her tongue lolled lazily over her plump lips, and with a shriek of laughter, she fell upon the redhead, Sascha. The latter was thrown to her back, and the brunette kissed her mouth and throat, drew her mouth over the other’s breasts. Sascha sighed wantonly, and her legs parted a little as the brunette’s hand massaged the dark patch of hair between her own thighs. Carina and the second brunette, named Dagmar, lay on their bellies side by side, chewing on daisy stems as they watched the other two embrace fervently.

Sascha whispered something soft and urgent. Her pelvis rose pleadingly toward Catya. The brunette smiled and turned toward Sascha’s legs and drew them apart. A thatch of red hair glistened between Sascha’s thighs. With a husky sigh, Catya forced her legs widely apart. Her face dove over the thatch, eliciting a loud moan from Sascha. Her hips undulated immodestly under her companion’s ministrations. Catya’s long legs widened and she lowered her pelvis to Sascha’s face. Gingerly, Sascha unfolded her sex and licked the crimson labia close to her mouth. The brunette’s buttocks clinched ever so tellingly, and as I watched, their naughty tongues flicked hungrily over each other’s founts. Soon their heads were bobbing up and down as they feasted in mutual abandon.

An abrupt shriek from Sascha told me she had climaxed first. Catya’s frenzied mouth worked almost brutally now upon her, for Sascha’s hips began to twist this way and that as she pleaded it was enough, she could bear no more. At this moment, Carina and Dagmar crawled over to them. They pulled Catya off and pressed her onto her back on the ground. Catya struggled, but quickly Carina caught her arms and pinned them on the grass over her head. Dagmar, holding her ankles, pried her knees apart. The blushing Sascha sat up, and now, grinning languidly, crawled up beside Dagmar and draped herself over Catya’s left leg. Both of these girls’ tempting derrieres danced toward me as Sascha’s face dove forward and she began to feast on Catya’s exposed nether mouth. Catya’s pelvis arched forward, and she moaned wantonly against the sweet flesh that constrained her. Soon the shriek of her orgasm filled the valley.

My mouth watered and I glanced away a moment. When again I looked, the girls were helping each other to their feet. Standing, they gathered hands and began to sing and slowly sway on their feet. As their voices rose, they pranced widdershins in a circle. The prance escalated into a wild jog; their song a cheery, paganish hymn.

Suddenly, their hands released and off they went spiraling across the grass. Their song was now an angelic chant that ascended into the air and rose from the valley. I soon realized the whole eastern wall of the gorge was vibrating. The four nymphs ran toward the gorge, and facing it, they fell simultaneously to their knees. At once a breeze lifted as if from the very ground itself. My pupils’ hair was tousled every which way. Carina’s hair caught the rays of the sun, and I was enraptured by her supple, shapely, naked form!

Their faces lifted, and in unison they clasped their hands over their chests. Their song transformed into a commanding chant. The breeze pitched into a violent wind that tossed grass and flower across the landscape. It battered the shrub I hid behind, so that a hard limb thrashed my face. Pushing it aside, I saw the four staring upward as one. I looked to find what their wide, sober eyes contemplated. It was the monastery, and their chant, I sensed, was directed toward it.

They continued to chant steadily. I watched as the scrub and stone of the gorge quivered in root and gulley, and above the desolate monastery, the clouds darkened and gathered together. To my astonishment, these clouds cut over the entire fortress, concealing it almost instantly from sight. The four continued their monotone for perhaps five minutes. A hostile lilt rang in their voices; their faces turned scarlet, enraged. Their pretty hands balled into shaking fists as the sound escalated into a shrill, synchronized scream.

Abruptly, the chant ended. The valley echoed with an unnatural silence, and the wind died just as suddenly as it had come.

My spine tingled, and I crept a little ways back into my retreat. But I could see the women as they returned to the tree and reclaimed their garments. Although instilled morals cautioned this was best and proper, my heart sank with disappointment to see Carina dressed again. With their little frocks back on, the young women took hands and headed toward the village. Not a word was spoken between the four as they returned from whence they had come.

I exited my retreat and looked to the crest of the gorge. The dark clouds still hung low. In a moment or two they had drifted a little, just enough that I made out the silhouette of a dark figure emerging from the structure. Only the slightest breeze wound through the valley, but my skin tightened with apprehension as his tiny eyes narrowed and scaled the valley. Some unfamiliar repulsion urged me to move out of the retreat altogether and run for the bridge. Only as I reached it did I look back. The figure I could not see now, but the clouds were rising with sluggish steadiness from the monastery.

2

I slept fretfully that night. My dreams were intruded upon by a recurring image of my class interrupted by the pounding of a hammer. Time and again, I went to the window of the school, to see a man, in the garb of a cowled monk, crouching on the ground outside. His back was to me, so I saw only the rise of the hammer in his hand before it swung down. I called for him to stop, to wait to finish his work at least until my class was over. He either didn’t hear me or simply ignored me. With each new dream, the hammering grew louder, and I grew less patient. It wasn’t until I turned from the chalkboard and found that the rhythmic hammering was putting my class to sleep at their desks that I went outside to confront the man. Jogging up behind him, I tapped his shoulder.

“Monsieur,” I said politely. When he did not acknowledge me I strode around to face him. And there, I saw the task he had been working on: a short cross of wooden bars, and upon the eye of the cross section he had nailed a mass of gelatinous viscera. The blood that had seeped from it already stained the standing beam. Disgusted, my mouth opened to ask what in the name of hell he was doing. But my eyes raised to the fearsome sight of my own face glowering back at me from under the cowl.

After awaking from this last dream I could not return to sleep. So I sat up until dawn arrived, then dressed and ate some of the rye loaf and butter left over from the dinner Weistreim had brought the evening before. I was not hungry, but it seemed wise to eat and to ground myself, and hopefully, lay to rest the residual disgust imparted by the malignant dreams.

It was only later, when Carina made her timid way into the schoolroom, that I was able to discard it wholly. With the memory of seeing her lovely body dancing over the grass, I was more uneasy than ever. She sat behind two of the other girls who had danced, while the fourth sat behind her. It pained me not to look at her, but I could not dare, lest I found myself unable to fight the urge to order her to my desk and strip her out of the confining little dress. This dilemma strained my focus so that I grew brusque with them all. And when several of the women began to fidget and whisper anxiously between themselves, my constraint snapped. The book I was carrying I slammed on my desk, bringing at once a resounding hush to the room.

“Have you no manners?” I said coldly. “Is this the etiquette your fathers and husbands expect?”

The mass of dismayed eyes and becoming blushes only added to my frustration. I looked squarely at Carina. She sat with her face bowed as usual, and the apples of her cheeks were rosier than ever.

My palms dewed with perspiration as I fought the urge to order her out of her seat and to come forward. I eyed my desk drawer where was kept my old stiff-leather flog. Upon discovery my pupils were women grown instead of children, I had put it away. But now I felt like taking it out. I wanted this innocuous girl—this arousing girl—humbled for disquieting my composure. She deserved chastisement for the frustration she had wrought, a chastisement thorough and sound.

But in that moment, something quite unexpected happened. Carina raised her face and met my eyes without hesitation.

Her composure was distraught, but in a way different from the chagrin of moments before. Her brow was crumpled with the distress of one stunned. I blinked, thoughtless but for the desire to kiss that distress away, and the softest of smiles turned up the corners of her mouth, bashful as a butterfly’s caress. My frustration fled, and my blood ran pure and heedless of social expectation.

I excused the class, then watched as Carina’s cousins and sister-in-law tried to coax her from her seat. She sent them on with reassurance she would be along soon, and they all gave me a parting look unknown in the society from which I came—a mix of emotions that would have confused polite society beyond this village. I did not think of its source at the moment, I was enraptured. Later, I would have time to consider, to appreciate it. And when the other women were all gone, Carina stood and approached my desk.

“Would you care to accompany me outside, schoolmaster?”

I nodded, and led her outside and locked the schoolhouse door. Indeed, it was an unusual situation; but I did not feel so much under the spell of surrealism as having suddenly awakened from a delusion to the crisp hold of a reality that had eluded me a lifetime. I had known this young woman for only a few weeks, yet in those moments I realized I could not bear the thought of letting her slip from my life. Her fluttering eyes held the beckoning light to eternity; her elusive smile the single link between banal existence and living.

I took her arm in mine and escorted her through the village. We conversed for many hours, forgetting all else save the thirst to drink our fill of one another’s experiences. She was fascinated with my travels, though she said she dared not think of leaving the valley. And then I laughed and told her I should just roll her up in a carpet. “As Cleopatra had ordered her servants that she might be presented to her lovers.”

She squeezed my arm and laughed. No silvery bell ever rang so precious.

At length we crossed the bridge into the wild part of the valley that spread out to the eastern border of the gorge. I took off my waistcoat and spread it across the grass that she might sit. As I helped her down, I looked up at the monastery and noticed the clouds had departed completely. No figures walked about its estate now, and I perceived the oddest standoffish feeling from the forlorn place. Ridiculous, I knew, and I forgot about it at once and sat down beside Carina. Her hand was small without frailty, the skin and bone delicate in my clasp. She looked up at me, and the kittenish fire that glowed in her demure eyes compelled me to kiss her.

She murmured faintly, pressing her bosom against me. My loins swelled, and I embraced her, kissing her throat and face, and enduring the honeyed torture of her scent and timidly roaming hands. I wanted her fiercely and contemplated taking her to the retreat I had found the day before. But for all her body and desirous sighs, I feared the consequence of such an act.

“You had the most forbidding look in the classroom,” she whispered, caressing my stiffening cock as I nibbled the cleft of her throat.

Her fingertips slowly stroked the length of me through my trousers. I drowsed in the sensuous torment of desire and confided against her ear, “I wished to chasten you, Carina. And I am not so certain I have changed my mind!”

She pulled away suddenly, and with her head cocked adorably to one side, she regarded me with much seriousness. “There is none to stop you, monsieur.”

I smiled with all the affection she had so guilelessly inspired. “You are impudent, and yes, it would be an honest expression . . . but not wise.”

This brought a little frown to her brow. “No? Why do you say that?”

“Would you have me lose all civil restraint, Carina?”

She smiled winsomely. “Yes, that is exactly what I expect, if you intend to court me.”

I laughed tenderly. “I do wish to court you, sweet Carina. But with discretion, of course. To do otherwise would lose me the confidence of your father, and all the village councilmen. Then we should lose what opportunity the future offers.”

She shook her head. And truly, she seemed perplexed. “This is ridiculous, Marcel Rolant. Are you so educated you have allowed yourself to become dense?”

Her question and tone both seemed bent to goad me. I had to grin. I could not be angry, though her displeasure intrigued me. “I do not know how to answer such a charge.”

She blinked and crushed her lips softly against my mouth. “You feign ignorance well, monsieur,” she sighed, and parted my lips with her tongue. I accepted her kiss, and lacing my hands about her small waist, pulled her to me. Her bosom heaved hotly against my chest, and with her fingers, she traced my manhood again. It took all my resolve to take her pretty hands away, but I did, and pressed my lips chivalrously over her hand.

“How simple I wish it could be,” I sighed at last. “But I am a professional, a man of manners and breeding. I shan’t allow my desire to disgrace either of us.”

This brought a sharp, vexed sound from her. Suddenly, she cast herself away and got to her feet. She was shaking, and my heart sank to see tears brimming in her eyes.

“You dare condemn my confessions as disgraceful!” She was breathless as she wrapped her arms snugly about herself. “We have enemies, my people—evil and eternal and ancient enemies. And we are shunned by your proper society. But between the two, I would bow to the forces of the unholy before disgracing myself again with the touch of such a coward as you!”

I was confused, distressed by her evident anger. Before I could summon the words to speak, she turned and sped off. I chased after her, nearly catching the ends of her flying tresses as she rounded the field of beehives. But as she flew over the bridge, I could hear her sobbing and stopped. I watched as she ran up the path and into the village, and cursed myself for what I had done. An image of her father paying a visit to my door and demanding an explanation for her tears complicated my regret.

But no one came that night, and the next day Carina did not attend class. On questioning her cousin, Avelina, I was informed that she had seen Carina come out of her father’s house that morning with a breakfast tray for her brothers who worked in the blacksmith’s shop. Avelina confided that the two of them had spoken briefly. Yet, the relief for Carina’s health was plagued by remorse. I vowed to myself that if she returned, I would mantle myself in a wholly new directness. In retrospect of our last encounter, I felt inarticulate and stupid. I could have tried better to convince Carina of reason. And there was now no honest denial of my feelings toward her. My professional career mattered nothing to the need to have her close to me.

That night, I considered the options thoroughly and came to the decision that if she did not return to school the following day, I would pay a call to her father. I would announce my intention—no, my decision—to court his daughter. He could upbraid me for the audacity of inciting her emotions and for dallying with her beyond the scrutiny of a chaperone. Even if my confession cost me my position as schoolmaster, it was a consequence I was prepared to accept.

My new-found assertion ushered in a sound night’s sleep, and I was whistling as I got up the next morning and shaved.

A thunderous knock at my front door so addled the atmosphere that I cut my chin. I had not yet put on my shirt, but the knocking grew frantic. I dropped the razor into the brass dish beside the bowl of water on my dresser and with a linen dabbed the stream of blood inking down my throat. I opened the door to find Weistreim standing there. His arm was around the shoulders of a trembling and weeping Avelina.

Her reddened eyes sought mine, and my heart was touched by a dreadful augury even before the words slipped from her mouth.

“Oh, Monsieur Rolant! Carina is dead!”

I felt faint and had to steady myself against the solid door. My desolate eyes raised to the sky beyond the two young people. It was then I saw the unnatural, mocking hint of blackness that swirled amidst the scattering tangerine clouds of sunrise.

What malady had stricken my precious Carina I was not told that day. I followed her cousin to the household of her father. A crowd had gathered on the lawn. None of this grieving crowd spoke, though some of the women were red-eyed, and all seemed reluctant to answer my inquiries if it were true, indeed, that Carina was dead. One of my pupils noticed me and called over the heads of those clustered through the front door. I did not understand her vocabulary, though it rang of some Germanic dialect. A minute or so later, the crowd there parted and Carina’s father appeared. He was at least a foot taller than myself, a hardy tailor I knew, with hands huge and callused. Remembering Carina’s flight home, I feared I might have intruded on unwanted ground. But the giant’s solemn countenance gave way the next instant. He fell to his knees, sobbing pitifully.

An old woman, with a mane of startling white hair, emerged from the house and went to stand beside him. Her thin arms enfolded his head and drew it to her bosom.

And so I knew the news was true. My head reeled, and I felt sickened at the thought of how I had mocked Carina. Unintentionally, and with the most scrupulous of intentions. Yet, I had, and shut out the first breath of life beyond routine that I had dared to think of inhaling in years. I stared at the old woman as if she might comfort my own disbelief.

“Carina,” I whispered.

The woman’s small blue-green eyes bore into me, and the intimidation she exuded vied to slam me back into the crowd.

What had befallen Carina, I was allowed only to surmise from the few words secured from some of my pupils. A sudden sickness, some malady that once had been common, but which the village healers supposedly had kept in check for years by the use of certain precautions. When I asked what these precautions were, and the symptoms of the malady, the young women shrugged unconvincingly and excused themselves.

Carina’s funeral was two days later. The procession followed her father and the young men who carried her casket to a grove near the western wall of the gorge. It was a casket of impressive craftsmanship, of dark-stained rosewood and silver pall handles. The bedding and pillow were white-laced silk. A great section of the gorge’s natural wall was used as catacombs; caskets were slid into deep shelves in the soil, and the shelves, once the dead were placed inside, were covered over by cedar panels. These panels were carved with the name of the respective deceased, as well as images of animals and flowers, tools, and various other icons. A shelf had already been created for Carina’s remains by the time the mourners gathered in the grove, and nearby stood a rough oak table. I stood to the sidelines and watched the pallbearers set her casket upon this table. They stood at their positions like wary warriors, and I heard a voice from behind the bier. It droned solemnly in the native language, and peering about the heads in front of me, I saw that the voice came not from a priest of the cloth, but the same old woman with the streaming white hair I had seen before. She wore a shapeless leather dress, so thoroughly beaten that the whole of it retained a tawny sheen. From her neck hung stringed flowers, beads, freshwater shells, runes, and countless other things. Circlets of gold clasped her forearms; her ankles were cuffed with bands of meshed silver. As she lifted a staff of twisted oak over Carina’s body, a reverent and expectant hush fell over the crowd of mourners.