Liaison (9 page)

She was abandoned now in her passion, and satisfied, I clutched her thighs firmly. She made a lush, curious sound, but with the gentle kiss I gave her clit, her hips buckled urgently and she closed her eyes.

With a final, deliberate kiss to her clit, I inhaled deeply. I envisioned the lust congested in my loins. I exhaled steadily, forcing the physical lust from my body. It seeped from the pores of my skin, and my will thrust it along with the shielding aura from my body. I shoved her thighs widely apart now and positioned my lips at her fount. Again, I inhaled, and drew to the forefront of my thoughts the bided intention of my goal.

As I exhaled, my breath must have tickled her, for her muscles flinched and she made a surprised little murmur.

But my senses were focused for a single purpose now. The words of the Catullus exorcism departed from my lips and penetrated her vagina. The echo, as I spoke the incantation, pealed softly through her sex, and I felt the resonance shatter her nether muscles and pour into the blood vessels and arteries.

Griselda cried out painfully and tried to rise.

“Release me!”

Her knees pitched against my arms, and she tried to wrestle loose from my grip. Fighting her immortal strength, I had to dig my fingernails into her thighs to retain my grasp of her. Her hips bucked back and she struggled fiercely to kick me off. As the incantation continued to pour into her sex, she clawed at my head. Her long fingernails scraped savagely over my forehead and into my brows. Her back arched forward, and digging her heels into the mattress, her thighs strained up. I was brought off my knees, and as her hips tossed this way and that, I pulled her legs toward me and buried my face as deeply as possible into her bleeding sex.

“Faithless bastard—what have you done?”

Her thighs vised against my face. Just as I felt her twist at the waist and my own balance give, the last syllable of the exorcism passed into her. She screamed, and the next moment her labia quickened violently. Her sticky flesh curled away from my mouth.

I nearly fainted. My hold released and I fell to my knees. Her sandals beat wildly against my head. With a roar, she crawled on her back away from me, the peacock feathers waving under her weight as she retreated to the other side of the bed. I half swooned to the floor, and for several moments lay in a lightless fog with only her screams to keep me company.

When I recovered enough to get to my knees again, Griselda’s furious wails resounded upon the walls. But I did not see her. Staggering around the bed, I found her on the floor. Her long, beautiful fingernails scraped over the tiles of the floor as she stared up at me. Her mouth was agape, her shocked eyes bore into me like two rusty flames.

My eyes moved down and saw that her hips had already imploded into her pelvis; her vagina, nothing more than a tangled mass of tissue now, was sinking into the crushed pelvis. Her belly and spine were pulling together, and looking down at her, I saw that the toes of her feet were nothing now but cavities where the digits had sunk into the sandaled feet. I heard the bones of her legs snap methodically, loudly; and before my unsympathetic eyes, her feet started to recede into her ankles.

“Help me!”

Her plea did not stir compassion. The shock of her humbled vanity gave me only delight. The only regret I had was that Carina could not see the vampire queen’s fitting demise.

I watched a few minutes longer, until her legs had vanished into what gore remained of her torso and her breasts bowled into craters on her chest. I wanted her to suffer the last alone, sans any admirers, without the tears of her devoted, unloved sons to comfort her ego. But I did not depart with uncivilized silence.

“I go now to make love to my own queen—whose beauty of heart and spirit will be stamped upon my memory more surely than even the secrets you strove to pillage.”

She tried to scream, but the sound was faint and raspy, desolate like the peafowl she kept for pets. It did not haunt me, though, and I turned then and left her. Past the drapes of black lace I walked, and through the door I had entered. I ignored the mural face with its glowering hedonist eyes, made my way through the ambulatory, and reentered the apse. My heart beat with confidence as I opened the door and reclaimed the hammer. Two of Griselda’s sons stood talking in the clearing as I walked out. They regarded me reluctantly; obviously, Griselda’s earlier warning had reached them. I smiled benignly. And hoisting the hammer baton-fashion, I ran upon them.

With the hammer’s head I bludgeoned the one to the left. He staggered back, screaming as I then swung to the right and rammed the stake through the chest of his brother. I pulled the hammer out just in time to pivot upon the first who was lumbering toward me with his lower jaw extended like a snake. The sheen of two barbed canines and a flicker of a long tongue were my last impressions before lancing the stake through his midriff. I broke through the grove and entered the courtyard, pumped and heedless of everything except the desire to punish those who had harmed Carina. Three more of Griselda’s sons I encountered in the courtyard, and two assailed me from the air upon exiting the archway. They seethed reproaches as I battled them, something about their mother, charges of treachery. But I was like a berserker out of a fairy tale, at one with my impetus and blind to fear, hesitance, mercy, even that sympathy the pitiful creatures deserved.

I slaughtered the ones that pursued, and there were at least a dozen of them. But at length I knew Griselda’s vindicators were all dead. I walked freely toward the path that led down into the valley. It was in the distance across the pasture I saw the son that Griselda had dismissed lurking behind the trailing ground mist. He alone I challenged before advancing.

I charged forward then, ready to destroy him as his brothers. But by the time I reached the spot where he had stood, he had vanished, leaving no trace or even sense of his presence behind. I caught the single melancholy note of a peacock. A moment later, I heard the awkward rustle of its wings. I ran over the landscape in the effort to catch sight of it. I searched until dawn, until the cocks were crowing from the farmyards and my throat was parched and constricted from the night’s exertion. He had eluded me, and to which direction I had no guess. My only consolation was that I knew somehow he was the only one who had.

 

The cabin had never felt more welcoming as I walked in that morning. I laid the hammer on my desk and stepped to the bed. Carina lay there with the sheet pulled over her head like a shroud. I turned it down gently and found her asleep on her stomach with her head cradled against her folded arms. It must not have been too long since she had cried herself to sleep, for her eyelids were swollen and red, her long auburn lashes damp.

The poker I removed from beside her and laid it on the floor under the bed. I was fatigued, but upon lying down, I could not help but look at her for a time. I drew back the heavy lock of hair that shielded her face. She was perfect to my eyes: radiant complexion and supple skin. Her hips were wide but firm, and it was all I could do to refrain from stroking her back or massaging her taut buttocks. At length I closed my eyes and let her enticing smell lull me asleep.

Later that morning, I awakened while she busied herself in the kitchen. I rose and came upon her as she stood peeking into the pantry. She gasped when she realized I was beside her. The blush that suffused her cheeks was adorable.

“You are hungry, Carina?”

“Yes.”

I told her to sit on the bed while I filled a plate with what I could scrounge together—bread and honey, a lovely quince from one of my pupils, a smoked sausage that I cut into slivers. I could see how delicately she tried to eat in front of me, but her hunger was ravenous, and it was no time before every bit of food had disappeared.

“Are you not going to eat, monsieur?”

I smiled but said nothing, and brought her a cup of water from the pitcher. She blushed again as I sat down beside her, and began to weep softly.

“Hush, sweet, I will have you home soon enough.”

She smiled brightly, but the tears still flowed. And handing me back the cup, she suddenly gathered the sheet up around her.

“I—I apologize,” she whispered. “Please find me a suitable garment.”

“Is that it?” I laughed, not meaning to, and she blushed even harder and turned her face away. “Now, you are again the timid little teaser?”

Her eyes widened as if wounded, and I cupped her chin. “I would have you no other way,” I admitted. “But the time has arrived for me to right a great wrong I have done you.”

I leaned close into her and kissed her mouth. Sweeter than Egyptian honey was her trembling mouth! I peeled the sheet away, took her by both wrists, and raised her to her knees.

“Monsieur—”

With a swift but gentle tug, I pulled her across my lap. I let go of her wrists, but cautioned her at once, “You will not struggle, Carina.”

She whimpered loudly, but I ignored it and laid my right hand upon her smooth back. Her dangling legs had clasped tightly together, but now I parted them and stroked the soft flesh between her thighs. I felt her body tense, and as I drew the fingertips of my roving hand over her buttocks, she whimpered again. Without another word, I raised my palm and dealt her one smart spank.

“Oh!” She tried to get up off my lap, and when my hold proved more determined than she expected, she looked back and cast me a most impertinent frown. Her mouth opened, but before she could speak I clamped my right hand over her mouth.

“You will not speak and you will keep your eyes straight ahead, young lady,” I instructed. “If you dare try to wrestle away again, it will be much worse for you, I promise.”

I released her mouth and grasped the bundle of her hair firmly by the roots. My left hand raised again, and this time I punished her thoroughly. She cried out in stunned little gasps, and her hips twisted fitfully, but she did not protest. And when at length I deemed she had had enough, her buttocks glowed a pleasing shade of pink.

Letting go of her hair, I helped her to her feet. Her face was aglow with proper humiliation, and when she dared to stomp her feet, I flung her over my lap again. I spanked her much harder this time, so that her buttocks moved this way and that, and she was sobbing loudly. This time when it was finished, I did not let her up, but raised her chin with my hand and addressed her firmly.

“You will obey me, Carina, and be well-behaved from this day on,” I said, “or know the swiftest reprimand.”

I felt her heart pound wildly as I raised her to her feet. This time she stood before me unquestioningly. Her humbled eyes lowered, and she shielded the triangle of soft curls between her thighs with her clasped hands. My need for her was wild, consuming. But for some several moments, I just savored the chastened, absolutely frustrated look on her face that came with her full realization that, indeed, I had changed. Under my stern regard, her tears began to spill again. They rolled down her chin and splattered softly to her breasts.

Satisfied at last, I stood and scooped her up into my arms.

My mouth draped over her lips. They were heated, welcoming, and as I lowered her to the bed, her eyes shone with the same bashful wantonness that had first enamored me. I disrobed, and grasped her legs and drew her toward me so that her buttocks dangled over the edge of the bed. She moaned as I spread her thighs and lifted her hips. Her sex was fiery against my urgent cock. I looked down at her lithe and rosy body, adoring the way she sucked on one finger and undulated her hips in such a way that told me she fretted if I approved of her demonstrating her passion.

I touched her pussy and found it drenched. I rubbed her little clit until it was hard as a pearl. Her hips arched against her will as I incited her and she moaned helplessly. She was a sublime image of the abandoned love slave, against which I could no longer hold my own passion. I plunged into her and stroked hard. She was as taut as I remembered, and sweeter now was the feel of her—for I was the possessor and not the possessed.

She climaxed with a squeal, and my own orgasm burst into her, so powerful that the strength almost abandoned my legs. I crawled atop her then and swathed her face with kisses. She cupped my face in turn and kissed me deeply.

“My dearest, Marcel,” she whispered.

I kissed her hardened nipples and lay my head against her chest. For a time, we rested, until finally I knew I had to get her home. Into one of my shirts I dressed her, and covered her head and shoulders with a large linen towel. And thus with her safely concealed so as not to frighten those we met, I walked her to Irmhild’s house. Carina fell into new tears in her grandmother’s arms. Irmhild beamed at me silently as she comforted her. Soon Weistreim was summoned, and he went with me to the house of Carina’s father.

The man’s reaction to my news was almost violent joy. He embraced me so fiercely I nearly lost consciousness. I bided my time the rest of the day before giving him any more startling news. I accompanied him to see his daughter, and watched in the background as he gathered her up in his bear arms and smothered her with kisses.

A great feast of celebration was given at Irmhild’s house that night. I must have been toasted by every man at the table, and kissed by all their women folk and children. Carina, bathed and sitting dressed in a pretty green dress at her father’s side, endured the questions of these relatives with soft-spoken grace and her friends ogling over the shining collar at her throat. And when it became apparent she had had enough of relating the details of her ordeal, her father thoughtfully, but firmly, changed the topic of discussion.

When the feast was over and most everyone had left the house, Carina’s friends drew her away to the parlor. Irmhild drove the younger cousins into the kitchen to wash the dishes, while she persuaded the aunts and uncles onto the lawn to open a keg of ale.