Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience.
 
 {Setting: Just Google Earth Frome.  The river, and the town on it, try to
imagine most of those buildings gone, or not built yet.  The nearby woods
don't have the same borders, IDFK what they looked like in the Middle Ages,
I don't have any satellite imagery of that.
Politically, and ethnically, this is mostly Anglo-Saxon, pre-protestant
(Luther hasn't even been born yet, but his parents are alive.) commoners,
under occupation by Norman nobles of the Lancaster houses at war with the
Yorks, and not far from the front lines.  (War of the Roses, red and white

respectively)

   However, this is a parallel timeline, which among other things involves
pressure from the Burgundy houses, after their victory against the Germans
of the Swiss Confederacy, yadda yadda...  This is mostly the sex, and
violence, because the primary narrator is a cyberdemon picking over the
memories of people as she serially possesses them.

   The "Curse" is from another time, not ours, but closer to it in relative
years to the birth of it's Christ, but this one will end shortly (In a
couple centuries) due to extraterrestrial intervention, eventually to the
extinction of all life on Earth.  But that's outside the scope of this
story.}

   The Rider

   So, we made it to Frome, and I stayed out with my lady, while the
Guardsmen went in.  Since what we heard from the Willowdale farm, we
thought it best to be prudent, and it was confirmed when Gauche came back.
Alive, the guardsMann was shot in the leg as he withdrew, and probably
captured.  Great, so that happened.

   A man down made us faster, except the trees of the wood covered the
ground as well as our escape.  Which ment no sledge, and we couldn't ride
the horse with it loaded with everything.  All our arms, and my shield was
loaded, so I helped Gauche into his shield, and took up mine to block the
path.  "Just to stall them," it would be better if she could ride, and
maybe cash the gear to recover?  No time to saddle it anyway, but he can
mount just fine in the woods.

   Should have thought of that.  THUNK!  Nailed a shield, but they see me,
and sidestep for the trees.  2 Knights, and several men approaching behind
them, but bracing the shield on the side of the boot, I pull the release,
and hook the draw-chord over the string.  "NGHUH!" Shoulder it, still
covered while the knights dismount, and actually send the warhorses back.
That's good, but here come the shields, and spears, and shit.

   "Declare yourselves!"

   "Ritter von Airolo, why the fuck are you attacking me?"

   "Airolo Netherlands?"

   "No, Airolo Switzerland," that's von, not Van, "Uh!  You want to give us
another shot at your eye-slits, or tell me why we're being attacked?"

   "That man you have with you is Fugitive, and trying to flee to the
Yorks."

   I looked around, "Right," red roses.  "Well, I can assure you he doesn't
know any Lancaster secrets."

   "Do you have the lady with you?"

   "Fuck!  I mean, nah, Mann?" Shake my head, "Why don't you throw down
those shields, tell yaboys to lower those longbows, so we can discuss
Ransom.  That's what you're after, right?  Well, you're probably making a
pretty little penny off this venture, and I'm just a Swiss Mercenary out to
make a buck.  Or."

   THUNK!

   "We can see how many men I can kill.  You owe me for that one, we're
even, just carry him back and get that leg patched up, now." I can't hear
what they're whisper-shouting tree-to-tree.  "What say you?"

   2 tanks, flanking 28 mixed infantry.  "Huh!" a squad, rolling my eyes.
"NGH!" Drop another bolt in the slot, and lock the stock back down over the
back.

   "Throw down your shield, and crossbow."

   "No," let me in there, and I'll show you how I throw down.  "Why don't I
just let you shoot me, and go search the woods?  I know where she's going,
so why don't one of you roll all that armor up here to talk to me.  We're
not going anywhere anyway, let's make this quick, and cheap, shall we?  I
think a Comptessa's about 15 gold." Let him talk me down to 7, or 8?  "What
kind of gold pieces you got up ere, Guilders?"

   "Florins."

   "All right, Rozencrantz.  Here, just shake my hand, see?  Now we're
friends," and they can't shoot me without shooting him, I've got just
enough shield to duck back behind, while Gauche goes and checks on the
lady...

   "NH!" I got my shield around his, side-stepping, and pulled his hand
across the steel edge.  Rolled steel heater shield, I just twisted my boss,
and held the stock, horizontally.  Twisting my wrist back to flip my
fingers out flipped the claws off the string, so I could catch it, pull it
in, and release.

   THUNK!

   "Uh!" I turned my shield, sideways, and stacked it on top of his
slumping body, peeking around to grip the tang of my drill, and put the
end-spike through his eye-slit.  The muffled screams rang out louder than
the thud of arrows sprouting all around me, but I swirled it back, and
found the hole in the back of the socket.

   "NGH!" He stopped screaming, and thrashing.

   SCHIK!  I slipped it back out, and shook the muck off the sides.  It's a
handle shield!?  Not a strap shield, instead of a boss, it's a rounded
triangle bent around a bar in between the top corners to brace it like a
bow, and a T bar down to the point.

   "Huh!"

   Well, my shield probably looks like a wooden miniature of a forest with
all the fletching sticking out, but nothing punched through.  Double layer,
cross braced, and stapled together.  Light hunting arrows with broadheads,
sound like.  Reaching back, I picked up my ax, and turned to get my knee
up, under me.  Should have worn more armor, but now they can't shoot with
the shadow of the shield wall starting to set over me.  There's some
helmets.

   Roll back, punching up with the steel heater.  Stopping with my foot
braced, sideways, I came up, lunging with the shield high.  Covering me
from spears coming down, I sucked in before my back leg took a hit, and
hooked the hammer head under the bottom.  Infantry shields, like a Targe
stretched twice as high, but just one boss.  Couldn't see if they're
strapped or handle, but I can bring the head up between, the scallop of the
edges, leather bound, and not even tacked?  "Huh," twisting the head so the
beard of the ax, and the hammerhead are sideways to jerk it out, while they
surround me, they pull back, so I give, turn it back vertical, and push.

   Right between them, oh he's trying to pull our shields out?  Better pull
back against them, so I can slip through, shoulder first, right between
them.  While the rest of the squad moves around, but I had to leave the
shield, and cross guard my ax while I roll out of it to gain some distance.

   "Right," Knight.

   KNG!  Thank god for Langets, I guess, turn, and hook the back edge,
sidestep, and ground it.

   "Claymore?" Look back, and smash the back hammer into his face mask,
stepping out, spinning, brace my back leg, and follow-through with a
stick-ball swing about shoulder height.

   CHK!

   "Right," archers.  I had to let go, the ax head stuck between the top of
his back-plate, and the bottom of his helmet, then the world spun, and
tumbled all around me.

   Arrows, whizzing through the air so I could hear them, then my foot hit
something.  Wood, bark, then my knee, then my other foot, I reached out,
and caught a couple branches.  That's what happened, or all I could
remember of it, somehow I jumped, flipping, and spun through a hailstorm of
arrows, and would up half kneeling on the side of the tree.

   Let go, and kicked off, back-flipping, and coming over seeing the
spears, and shields, turning to face me, catching two, crossing them, then
standing on a couple shields.

   "NH!"

   They buckled from the impact, but I was too low.  For them to pull back
the pikes, and stab at me, with the buts already planted, just pull at
them, and try to spread out from the locked in position that makes them a
fortress on legs.

   So, I let go, backflipped out, kicked the ground, and cartwheeled back
behind some trees, and bent down.  Running, fully tilt, for less wind
resistance, and to make less of a moving target zig-zagging flat out
between trunks and through brush.

   They probably fought over who was left in charge, and how to pursue,
send the archers?  I only killed the Officers, and wounded one in the leg,
it should take a minute for them to regroup, and come up with a plan. 
Until then, I better get back to the sledge before they find it.

   {Arrows are slow, subsonic, and loud.}

   "Oh, it's you."

   {Yeah, you're still alive, aren't you?}

   "There's that."

   {Yeah, sorry about the modern English.  Or, future, tense?  UGH! 
Anyway, sorry, I can barely understand what they're saying half the time.}

   "Can you find Quillon?"

   {Idaknow, I can look, but the air's so still here, and now, it's faster
if you keep running.  I can help you look?}

   "You can't detect her?"

   {No, he's normal.  Or more normal, she wasn't born that way, but.  You
know, the whole transboy thing, but I haven't had long to work on him.}

   "How long have you been working on me?"

   {Off and on for almost a year?  Since the hunting trip, we had to get
rid of Bavard.}

   "You used me for that?"

   {I know how you feel about it, but he had to die.  Don't feel guilty
about it, after he raped you.  I can hold off the flashbacks, but.  You
need to heal, man.  In here, in your heart, I wish I was better at it. 
This, therapy shit, but I'm a killer, not a healer.  Lets get you back to
your boy...}

   ;

   {Just a quick note: Seam is pronounced "Shawm." Like Sean with an M, or
the first part of Seamus.  A variation of the same names.}

   ;

   Dwr

   They call me Tower.  The Giant of Glouchesterchire, and Seam came to ask
my hand in his quest.  To rescue a lady he said, it was not until we set
out on our way that he told me the truth.

   A witch, sorcery.  I know, it sounds like one of those tales you tell
your children, but he had heard of me.  And my family, my mother was the
tallest lady in all the land, and when my father came here, they met, and
were married.  I was not abnormally tall for a child.  The others my age
talked about my family, my parents, and told tales as children are wont to
do.  My brother, the elder did not grow so tall himself, it was not until
my voice cracked, and I grew to this height, people began to call me Dwr.

   The Tower, and I found work with the woodworkers.

   "My father was a woodworker."

   "Oh yeah?"

   "A master craftsman, a Carver."

   "Oh, well I found hire for them.  It got me out of the fields, we are
farmers by trade, but it's not exactly what you would call exciting work."

   "Plant a bulb, move down, plant another hundred..."

   "Yes, exactly.  Now, let me go back to when we set out.  From
Glouchestershire, the reason Why I agreed to the task was the adventure,
yes.  However, as we traveled I began to think on how it's different from
the stories.  Of adventure, Seam is a Knight."

   "So, you hoped for a knighthood, maybe land of your own?"

   "Perhaps, I thought of that as well, though he did not promise.  He
spoke of, the possibility.  Of favor from the Duke Palantine."

   "Of Brixtonshire?"

   "Yes, however, that is not what struck me.  In the tales, the Giant is
never the Hero.  The knight comes to fight the giant, or find him in league
with the Witch.  The sorceress, or the Dragon.  The Wolf, if is that sort
of tale, but in all of those I have heard told, I assure you, all of them
being as my mother was a Giant.  The knight comes to fight the Giant.  To
kill me, and get the treasure I am guarding."

   "I have.  Met a giant, another before you."

   "Where?"

   "The alps, a side-pass between Italia, and Germania.  A holding of the
Swiss Confederacy now, but it was just as you said."

   "He was?"

   "No, the tales they told of him.  In the towns, and valleys around that
pass.  It was not true, he was an orphan, abandoned, and taken in by Monks,
but they said that he was there, guarding a Treasure.  They also said that
he was 10 feet tall, when he wasn't even as tall as you, and he was
hunchbacked.  The said the Monks were dead, too.  Risen from their graves
to haunt the Abby, but it was not true.  They were woodworkers, they gave
me this." A spike, with a hole cut out of it.  "Wood drill, it is the
finest tool I have, but he worked as a Mason."

   "Well, I worked with the woodworkers.  The Gentry, not as apprentice. 
As a brute, in all honesty.  If they had to put up a new roof, they hired
me to lift the ridge pole, and the rafters, because I could reach them
without a ladder."

   "They did not teach you, woodworking?" Sitting in the corner of the
Wheelhouse, he began twisting his drill into a piece of wood.  On the side,
as I had seen the craftsmen do.  With a different drill, to affix a peg,
and hold the beam in place.  I looked up at the beams, the rafters, and the
ridge pole.  The thatching laid over them.

   "I'm not really interested."

   "Fair enough." He nodded, and continued twisting the spike, deeper into
the hole as it made it.  Shavings curling out the top, he grunted.  {Try to
imagine a Pencil Sharpener.  Okay, now turn that inside out, so the blade
shaves wood from the hole, instead of being mounted in the hole to shave
wood off the spike.  Spike drill, it makes conical holes, until the head
cuts through to the cylindrical body.  So it can eventually cut through the
other side, and you can whittle down a peg to go in it.  Nails were
uncommon, compared to wood, and hammered out by hand.  So, most of the
Timbers were cut, fitted, and pegged together, with some sort of drill. 
Probably a spoon-drill, out in the country of rural Glouchestershire, where
they still needed to do Barn Raisings, and the like.  It's a lot easier to
hammer out a Spoon Drill than forge, cut, and shape a hollow Spike Drill.
The sort of thing a Noble craftsman, or mad Trappist woodworker would own.}

   "You did not kill me." The huntsman, I heard so much about him.  On the
way, following the tracks of his sledge, horse, dogs, and party.  The party
of the Witch Lady, which I began to wonder at.

   "Have you ever killed before?"

   "No."

   "Well, it shows.  Huh!" He set down the plank, and put his leg down. 
From his knee, to lean forward.  "Look, I didn't kill the other giant,
neither." He has a strange way of speaking, as a foreigner.  It is just
sometimes difficult to follow.  "Because it's not, like the tales, at all.
Killing a man is something I'd rather not do.  Be forced to do, so I don't
relish it." He did, kill Seam.  Easily, it happened almost too fast to
follow.  He was ahorsed, so I could not follow with his pack, but even from
afar I was amazed at just how fast he seemed to move, afoot.  "I try to
avoid it, actually, but whatever.  The point is, you are special. 
Different, so it would be like killing the last White Stag.  You are a
giant, because your mother and father were."

   "My father was not.  A giant, he was merely a large man."

   "Your mother was larger."

   "Yea, verilly."

   "All right, so the point being is if the only use for Giants is killing
them, like the stories, then eventually there will be no more Giants.  You
are already rare, so I did not want to kill you." He crossed his legs
again, and drew the plank across his lap.  "If Seam had not taken you to
kill me, we wouldn't have met.  That's why he called you his Second.  Not
that he would have taken you as Squire, and made you a knight."

   "He said where would we find a horse to carry you.  Enough steel to
armor you..."

   "Yes, because he is a Liar.  Seam, was an asshole, and a very dishonest
man."

   "What is an asshole?"

   "Never mind, a jerk, a bully and a liar."

   "You are a very honest man."

   "I try, thanks." He nodded, "Huh!  I'm also free.  However, I can't help
but think, talking to you that you have not, lived with and experienced
much Freedom."

   "No."

   "And you need a shield.  A better one, I'll show you how to use it."

   "It was not my shield."

   "Yeah, it was his." He admitted, "He had you carry it."

   "He said that he had to ride light, in case you ran like the snow-hare
you are."

   "Hahaha!  Right, well actually, he's right.  I am a coward, but he's a
killer, and a liar.  That's what he called Brave, but he told you.  If he
fell to kill me.  Yes?"

   "How did you know that?"

   He shrugged, "I know Seam.  He told tales of witchcraft, and a noble
quest to talk you into it.  It worked, and I'm glad.  To've met you." For
one thing, how he smashes words together, so sounds dissappear between
them, and you have to listen carefully to tell which words he smashed
together.  {Contractions.  He's not used to modern English, like "Yall."}

   "So, there is no witch."

   "She's not a witch.  She's not even a Lady, she's a free man."

   "How can a lady be a man?"

   "Exactly.  They had expectations of her, as a lady.  Just like they will
come to kill you, as a giant.  That's what men do, kill giants to prove
what a badass they are.  That's what men call Courage, why there's no
Dragons left.  It's a Lie.  Bravery is a myth, it's something to tell Tales
about, and pretend to be a badass."

   "What is a badass?" Why would someone want to be a poor donkey, or
pretend to be?

   "Never of mind, just a figure of speech."

   {Mythical Notes: There are no races of Giants, any more than the Dragons
were hunted to Extinction, it's a random mutation like Albinism, or
Hemophilia.  Giantism, but you know, people tell stories.  Always did, long
before they started writing them down.  Likewise, the Dragons weren't
hunted to extinction, probably just some old bones somebody dug up, and
made stories about them.  Flying and breathing fire, because that's what
men do, make up stories about killing dragons, and giants.}

   ;

   Airolo

   "All right," I held up my shield, "Like this, you want to hold the
shield at the middle." I turned it, side-to-side.  "So, it has to move
less, to block, or parry to either side." He is a tower, with the giant
Skutum.  Split, and banded from the outside of a log.  "Higher, like this.
It is also quicker to drop, then to lift, and may force them to strike low,
for your ankles." I poked, with the staff.  Rounded off, the heavy end of a
sapling with a cross bar on it.  "So, just drop the shield, to ground their
point so you can retaliate.  Stab down, over the shield." I pulled the
butt, out from under the shield, and stepped back.  Bringing it up Ox, and
swinging it out, to catch his haft with the crossbar.

   "Good," out of reach, I stepped back, and left my shield.  Standing, on
it's curved edge, right in front of him, I gripped the heavy end.  As an
Estoc, though of course only a straight sappling, carved down to a bluntish
tip.  Just don't stab him, he can take a few welts, fighting all his adult
life.  Living with men, that is what men do.  See a man, the biggest one in
the County, and they want to test themselves.  Be the man who bested the
Giant.

   "You have good reflexes, but poor training."

   "I have no training."

   "Seam wouldn't train you." Of course not.  "Now, hold up your shield. 
You can hold the spear, behind it.  Like a cloak," I held up my arm, rested
the 'blade' over it, "Behind it I can not see it.  Your arm, your spear, or
how you hold it.  Move it, this is an advantage of the shield's size."

   "It is, so light."

   "Well, I had a lot of steel." Sean left his armor.  Or brought it,
didn't wear it for the duel, nor use his shield.  I shook it out of my
head, wrong fight.

   "Good." I parried it.  The size of a small door, I would have to duck
under it, if it were, but I can stand my full height under his arm,
straight out.  "Now, you are not a Tower.  Those can not move, merely stand
atop their Motte, and overlook the wall.  You are almost the height of a
mounted knight, and your legs almost as long as his horses'."

   "I only have 2 of them."

   I had to kill it, but I imagine it's life wasn't all that great, having
to carry that asshole around the country.  For all his talk about honor,
and fairness, he tried to ride me down, with a spear, on horseback, and
brought a fucking Giant along to kill me if he failed.  Honor, they call
it. Right.  A duel, he would have said, he bested and killed me in a fair
fight, because that is how he tells the tale.  Changes it so that I could
fly, and breathe fire, but against all odds he fought through, only his
courage to carry him on.  Leave out the part about the maille shirt, and
gambeson it took so long to cut through.

   "Huh!" Shake my head.  "So, use that, to your advantage." I showed him
some footwork, "Move, so that you can hit me, and I can't hit you." I
tapped his shield, and parried on my way back out.

   "You are fast, too fast to hit."

   "Well, I don't want to be killed, either, but you are fast.  Too fast
for me to catch, and get past your shield before your spear strikes.  If we
both strike, we both may die, which is not a win.  We both lose, so
fighting is not about killing.  It's about not being killed, or too badly
hurt.  Then you can take care of killing them, to end it."

   "Or run."

   "Yes, I run, but so you will chase me." I stopped, "Ngh!" Lunged, and
blunted my tip further on the steel face of his shield.  Like the steel
back, wood in between so the wood makes the steel stronger, and the steel
makes the wood harder.  Laminate, composite, those are the words.  Not
Sandwitch, whatever that is?

   {Historically, the Earl of Sandwitch that took credit for eating meat in
a roll from his cook, as if nobody thought of that before, hasn't even been
born yet.  Incidentally, he's not talking to himself, he just doesn't
always differentiate between his thoughts, and the voices in his head's.}

   "Haha, you Are too fast."

   "Yes," I crossed it in front of me, stood up.  "Catch your breath." That
is my defense, but also my strategy.  Let me have." I took the dipper, and
sipped from it too.  "Kah!  Thanks.  So anyway, if they chase you, that
forces them to play your game.  It's a Rabbit Trap.  'No, mister fox, don't
chase me into the Hedge!  Until the fox feels the thorns, hidden in the
hedge, and is trapped."

   "That is why you wear the white rabbit.  On your coat of arms?"

   I nodded, "Why it's rampant." I held up my fingers, "Rearing, like
this."

   "And the deer?"

   "Stag.  The stag is strength, but the secret is, the rabbit is too. 
People see it, in the field, and they think weakness.  Like the wolf is
strong, they fear it.  The giant is big, therefore I must prove myself, but
that is my strength, their weakness.  The nobles, the knights grew up with
tales of their superiority.  By birth, their right to win a princess, and
tell their bros about the time they slew a dragon, with no shield because
he bit my arm off." I tucked it behind me, to hide it.  "Well, I got
better!"

   "Hahah!  You're a great storyteller."

   "I know," I've heard, "That is how these tales get told, where they came
from, but the strength of the rabbit is their confidence.  Their so-called
Bravery, it causes them to do stupid things.  Like an animal, the wolf sees
something moving, running, and barely thinks: 'Squirrel!' before he gives
chase.  'Huhl huhl huhl!' Well, Briar Rabbit."

   "I heard this one."

   "Of course, you're a Welshman."

   He shrugged.  "So anyways, he's not big, and strong.  He's fast, but so
is the fox.  However, in the briar, he has the advantage, Because he is
small.  Out here, you have the advantage, you can hit me, and just move
before I get to you.  With a shield, that's all I can ever reach.  However,
I get you in a house, where you can not even stand up, and the beams are in
your eyes, I can hamstring your with a knife, hiding under a table.  That
is a Rabbit Trap.  The Noble Trap is to say it is dishonorable to stab a
man in the back, so the commoners don't stab them in the back, because they
have no defense against it.  They fear it, so they say it is dishonorable.
Riding down a man on foot with a lance, that's not dishonorable, because I
was born with a war horse, a whole armory full of swords, a suit of armor,
and raised since my first furs started sprouting to be a knight.  A knight
can kill a peasant.  That's fair, and honorable, but a peasant can not face
a knight.  That's what Honor means."

   "Or kill the giant, unless there is someone he had to kill, but did not
know that he could kill."

   "That's right, but you are Cavalry.  That's what I'm saying, even if you
do not have the mass, and speed, and height of a knight, and horse, you
have more than any man alone.  Other than another Giant, but for the time
being we'll assume you'll mostly be fighting men."

   "So, you were born, with these things?"

   "No, just the son of a carpenter.  I had to make my own." Made some for
him to.  "But, I better show you how to use them." Break over, I took up my
shield again.  "Now," gripped tha sapling below the guard, "Your best
strikes are going to be overhand.  like these." I demonstrated.  "You have
the weight of it, for more power, and stabbing over the shield you do not
have to move it out of the way, for blocking." He parried my feint to one
side, so I withdrew, "Goot," grunted, and reposted to poke his exposed
thigh on the other side.  He parried a little late.

   "I have never seen a man move so fast!" He exclaimed.

   "Well, keep practicing, and you will get faster.  However, do not get
stuck in a predictable pattern.  Like always stabbing over, just because it
is the best strike does not make it always the Only strike, and it forces
me to guard high, like this." I side-stepped, "Come around the side, no. 
Sorry, the other side, and move your shield to block.  Yes, then cover your
counter strike as it comes around.  Good, see this." I stabbed overhand,
backed out of reach again, "Is good but predictable.  This," I covered, and
struck the air between us "Is surprise, and a surprise hit can end the
fight."

   "There was another carpenter's son."

   "Yes, there were Millions of Carpenters, and they had sons." I would
know, "Jesus wasn't the only one that ever did anything in the last century
and a half, AH!"

   He moved to catch my sidestep, snuck a thrust in behind it, "Good." I
held my arm.  Over where he twisted the edge, out of the quillon, and
slashed me through the sleeve of the doublet.

   "Sorry."

   "Nh, no.  Good.  Let me just bandage it real quick." Just like I taught
him, I laughed it off.  "I am not teaching you to spar, I am teaching you
to fight, wound and kill.  We practice in the practice yard." I wiggled in
my fingers, "Ngh.  If we had one, but we train for real fights, to the
death.  Can you tear this open, further?" Thick leather, "Use a knife, cut
it.  I have to hold in the blood." He got it open, enough to get my hand in
there.  Pinch it shut with my fingers.  A long cut, but not very deep. 
"Ngh, good.  Now get me a handful of snow."

   "What for?"

   "Roll it up, like this." I used my fingers, careful not to flex my arm.
"Good, now when I move my hand, press it in, quickly, to cover the wound.
Nghah!" I shivered, despite myself.  "Huh!  Good.  In answer to your
question, it cleans it, melting, but also makes the blood shrink.  The
cold, why we turn whiter when we're cold, the body shrinks back the blood
from it, to stay warm.  Now, can you fetch me my stitching roll?  Yes, the
needle, I will have to sew this up."

   Suture self.  He got me monologing.

   What?

   He made you talk, to distract you, and sneak in that shot.  You should
be proud of him.

   I am.

   ;

   Betram

   "My name is Bertram," I nodded.

   "Works for me," we returned to the wheelhouse.  On the river from
fighting in the yard.  He started a fire, and burned himself with the tip
of a brand, before taking up his needle, and starting to sew.  "So, how did
he find me?"

   "Well, first we followed your tracks.  From the sledge, they left a path
through the snow that was easy enough to follow."

   "He was no Tracker." He nodded.

   "He said to stay back, that you're not to be underestimated, nor the
witche's magic."

   "Yeah yeah, I heard all about that."

   "Then he came in, and asked.  Took off his maille, and gambeson." I
stayed behind with his horse, and armor, he even left his swords."

   I looked over, at the corner.  The greatknife, stood up behind the door.
"When he came back, he said that the common folk said you were here.  A
stranger in town, that you started to appear about the same time as the
lady."

   "She's here?"

   "She is in the castle.  She is overseeing the land, as ranking noble."
From what I heard, from a liar.  "After the lord was killed, she took
over."

   "Oh," he nodded, "That explains it."

   I nodded, "Seam said that she had enchanted the town, put them under her
spell to do her bidding."

   "Well, I don't know about that." He held up his arm.  "How's it look?"

   I swallowed, nodded.  "I truly am sorry."

   "It happens.  Better me than you, I'll heal, and now I can tell the
lasses in the tavern about the giant that gave me this scar.  The friendly
giant.  The good one?" He nodded.

   "Oh, that would be a great story." I agreed.

   "Well, you can help me tell it."

   "Oh, I am not the story teller you are."

   "Don't sell yourself short!" I laughed with him, "You are, a good enough
storyteller, and that is another good defense."

   "Tales?"

   "Well, what they say about you.  They will see you, and naturally make
something up.  We've already established that it'll probably involve the
treasure you're guarding, but let's write a new tale, where the Giant can
be the protagonist."

   "What's that?"

   "Oh, sorry.  Greek, in ye olde Tragedies, and Comedies, they had 2
priciples.  The Hero, the Protagonist is the one you're supposed to dream
of being.  The courageous knight, whereas the Antagonist was the villian.
The witch, the wolf, or the Dragon, guarding the treasure, or the princess
who's practically a treasure as little lines as she gets.  If she's even
conscious by the end of it, but I digress.  You are a free man now.  Do you
have any responsibilites, at home?"

   "I always wanted to leave, my family will get by without me, and the
carpenters can make ladders."

   "Haha, true enough!  But speaking of which, I don't tell stories. 
Tales, and lies, I try to tell the truth, of what really happened, as well
as I know and understand it.  So, you can write your own tale now."

   "I do not know how, but you could teach me?"

   "I don't either.  Know how to write, by some miracle I learned to read,
but I am not lettered."

   "Excuse me, I keep forgetting you're not Noble." Strange, that I find
myself, apologizing to a commoner I mistook for a lord, but he is that sort
of man.  I have met no other, who would be insulted.

   "No offense taken." He stirred horsemeat into the pot.  Hanging over the
forge, as a crucible, or the one standing in the corner.  Heavy, I could
not lift it, nor begin to guess how he could alone.  A story for another
time, mayhap, but I wonder.  At all his mysteries, but he can only tell one
at a time.

   "So, you're saying I can adventure, and you offer.  To tell the tales of
it?"

   "I assumed that's what you're talking about doing?"

   "I was not, but it sounds like a good idea."

   "Well, I got to go see milady, anyway.  See how she's doing, and get
something off my chest." He pounded it, and coughed, "Ahem, so anyway.  If
you'd rather stay here, and hold down the fort, it's up to you.  I don't
need you to come with me, into town, nor would I mind it?"

   "I'll think about it, why would I not want to go into Frome?"

   "Well, the attention?  I don't know if you mind it, but I know how I
feel, when people look at me, and talk about me.  So, I thought I'd ask."

   "I appreciate it," but it doesn't really sound like an adventure.  To go
see a Lady, some call a witch, he is so obviously smitten with.  I am a
little curious about that, but I can ask him later.  I suppose that's what
he is for, and others like him.  To make it sound good, so I am something
other than the Giant.  To kill, and prove your bravery, but I don't invite
it.  "I believe I would, rather stay out of it.  Here, hold down the fort,
as you said."

   "All right," he shrugged into a cloak, and buckled it down with a
brooch. "If I'm not back by dusk, I'm probably dead or captured.  I don't
plan to spend the night, but it almost never goes as planned..."

   ;

   Airolo (MG NS)

   Oh.  "What?" My eyes followed a girl.  Which is natural, for a man to
notice.  I was looking for a specific one, but kept my head down.  My eyes
open, but I am a foreigner here.  Something behind my eyes saw something
more.

   Look at her.  'She is pretty.' I noted, under my breath.  Young, and
cheaply dressed in wool, carrying it which seems to be the trade around
here.

   The way she avoids people, eye contact, and seems to start at
everything. 'She looks afraid.' I judged.

   "Excuse me." She looked up.  Short, and practically swaddled against the
morning chill.  The fog steamed off of the river by the light of dawn, but
it too longer for it to warm up the streets.  "I am a traveler." Explains
why she didn't recognize me, "And I was separated from my, apprentice.  We
agreed to meet here, but I do not know Frome.  I wonder, if you have seen
any other new faces around."

   "In the manor." She dropped the wool off at a stall.  A tailor by the
look of it, must be something special, requiring just 1 bolt, in a shoppe
filled with it.  In a town devoted to wool, weaving, and high fashion,
though nobody appeared to be armed beyond a belt knife, or dagger.  "Men
came to see the Duke, and the word is that he was killed."

   "The duke?"

   "Yes, lord Clarence." That takes care of the local ranking Noble.  "They
say he rode out with another Knight, and was ambushed by a highwayman."

   "Ah." I nodded, "Yes, I heard about that."

   "The deputies told of 2 men.  Captured, questioned, tried and hanged,
but in the courtyard." A commoner, she would not have access.  "And a
youth, brought swaddled, like a." She sniffed, and her eyes closed.

   "What is it?" A flashback.

   "Like a baby."

   Ooh, a mystery!  Press that point, she saw something.  To do with
babies? "There there," Interesting, "If anyone would know, who could it
be?"

   "The midwife." She broke down even further, "She.  She went.  Huh huh
huh huh!  She was dispatched, to the Manor."

   Hold her shoulders.  Press that point.  "This midwife, can you take me
to her?" I pulled open my cloak, to unwind the lace from my purse, pull it
from my belt, and untye the binding about it's mouth.  "Do you make much
coin, delivering wool to the tailor?"

   She wiped her eyes, and shook her head.  Silently, and cried quietly. 
Holding back her sobs, until they stuck in her throat, and hiccoughed.

   "Igh?  Thank you," she saw my coat.  "That is very fine wool." She
didn't touch it, but I pulled the leather laces through the belt, and wound
them back under the heavy weighted leather.  She looked around, "You have
gold, sire."

   "Good eye, is it this way?" Not a large town, 1 bridge, though in places
the water was frozen over enough for children to play on it.  Boys, with
sticks, and rocks.  Throwing the latter, to attempt hitting the former, and
raising crude shields, though it doubtfully would be safe for me, strong
enough to support my weight.

   "Yes," she pointed, but wouldn't look.  "There." Up a hill, a small
house.  By itself, they don't have suburbs, but the slopes pushed back the
buildings around it, and there were stones set into the slope.  For stairs,
climbing to a switchback, and winding up to the top.  From the street it
appeared to be merely a cottage, but with the window open bye the door, and
smoke rising from the chimney.

   "Will that be all, lord?"

   "Stick around, kiddo.  You like this?" I flashed my embroidered brocade
again.  "It is cotton, not wool."

   She looks like she's going into fight, or flight.

   "It is very fine." She nodded.

   "Here," I sat on the steps of another landing.  "Let's take a break."

   Not that high, about roof level with the single storey houses, and
shoppes, windows swinging open for chamber pots to be dumped.  Into an
alley, "Below!" the woman called, pulled her loose knitted shall about her
shoulders, and the shutters closed behind her.  Still in her morning shift,
I suppose women need to vent when they wake as well, so her busom was
exposed as she bent over the sill, and checked the alley below.  We could
not see from our vantage, but for a trickle rolling out to the street.

   "Is there something, you aren't telling me," I guessed, "About the
midwife?" There!  Mystery solved, I guess.  "What is it?"

   "It is." She squeezed her eyes, tight.  "Not something, we may discuss."

   "Woman problems?" Not I asked, "It is all right, I am a doctor."

   "What is that?"

   "A man of medicine.  Where I come from, doctors treat men, and women. 
Equally," yeah, right!  "I understand that midwifery is different here. 
The women deal with the woman things, and the men the men?"

   "Nhm?"

   "Did she touch you, in any way that made you feel uncomfortable?" Just
her shoulders, and back.  I merely held her, to comfort her, she'd
apparently been traumatized enough.

   "Nh hn hn hn hn!" Sobbing against the home-spun wool of my cloak, warm
but cheap to cover my brocade.  Would that I had another oat, but asking
around in full leather armor, it's less suspicious to cover my coat of
arms, belted tight without any bulky pieces to show underneath, nor large
weapons.  "Huh!" she managed a deep breath, and sigh.

   ;

   Laine' Carder (FG Mole)

   "Huh!  I'm sorry.  Snh?  I do not know what came over me."

   "It's all right.  I won't hurt you, and there is nobody else to be
afraid of.  I know the way, if the midwife scares you so, but I do not wish
to leave you sad, and hurt.  Would you like to tell me what is the matter?
I cannot help you if I do not know what is wrong."

   "I do not know why, she is a good woman, kind and gentle.  When I was
sent to see her, I have no reason for this.  Feeling, I have a terrible
feeling about her, do you believe she could be a witch?"

   "Takes one to know one, but I haven't met her yet.  Go on."

   "It was, late in my tenth year.  I began bleeding, and my father sent me
to see what was the matter."

   "Bleeding from the inside." He nodded, "Between your legs?"

   He is knowlegable, I suppose it is just different in Amsterdam.  There
they have doktors for this sort of thing.  Why a Ritter would be hiding,
his nobility in with the commoners, must have something to do with the
other knight.  Who came, and died with the Duke in the ambush.

   "What did she do?"

   "She told me, it is normal."

   "And what it means, that you were to become a young lady?"

   "Yes, and she put on some water."

   "Hot water."

   "Yes, to clean it.  She said it is, precious.  The first blood of a
maiden, and made a broth.  Wringing the cloth in the water, and my
underclothes, as she washed me.  It did not hurt, or scald, it was not that
hot."

   "What else did she tell you?"

   "She asked me, if I felt better.  I did not hurt, which only made the
bleeding all the more confusing.  My father accused me, of fraternizing
with Tailorson, though I had not.  She told me, a way to make it feel
better.  If I get cramps, I did not, but I have, since.  I know that tells
me I will have another.  Wound, or bleed as if a wound, but it did not
ache, that first time."

   "Did she make you drink it?"

   "The blood of Mary?"

   "The blood broth, that she wrung out of the cloth."

   "No, she tasted it it, and put things in it.  Powders, and herbs, do you
think it was a witch's brew?"

   "Well, I know she's a child molester." he nodded, "Pretty sure, but it
wouldn't surprise me if she had a fetish for witchcraft, too." I am
unfamiliar with some of these words, he uses.  I do not know any Dutch, I
have never met a Dutchman before, nor heard them speak.  Though in fairer
weather traders pole down the river in barges, they are all Angles.  The
Normans do not lower themselves to poleing on Barges, they hide behind fine
curtains in the windows of their carriages, though it is strange to be
traveling at all in such foul weather.

   "She touched you."

   "Nh!" He held my shoulders.  Tight, but the nitemares came back, in the
light of day, even the sun could not banish them from my mind's eye. 
"Inside me." I nodded.  "She said it was good.  That I was intact, but it
keeps the blood in.  So that it might rot inside me, make me sick, and
barren.  I could even die."

   "She broke it."

   "Ngh!" That hurt.  "She twisted wool, to soak out the rest, and turned
it inside me.  Felt my face, and kissed it.  I was already feverish, she
could feel it.  She had a technique, to break the fever, with her fingers,
not inside me, but.  I can not say."

   "It is private.  I understand, you mean the skin in the top.  Where the
pages come together, like the leaves of a book."

   "I do not know." I do not have any, "I could ask the bookbinder's
daughter."

   "Never mind, you continued, this technique?  When you feel hot, and
possibly wet inside?"

   "Yes.  It does not hurt."

   "It feels good." He nodded, "That's okay, for you to do.  I'm sure some
may try to tell you that it isn't, but you can play with yourself.  Most
people do, but what she did to you is not all right.  That is something for
you, and you alone, until you fall in love with someone, and then something
you can share with them.  Before you make love, it helps with the
lovemaking, and your pleasure.  She took her pleasure from you, and your
innocence.  It sounds like she may be a bit of a sadist."

   "Which is?"

   "A word, they will coin to describe someone who likes to hurt people. 
When a certain lord writes certain stories, about hurting women to get his
jollies."

   "You are a prophet?"

   "I know someone, who knows someone." He nodded.  "A seer, who communes
with the God of Time.  So, in a way, yes.  I am Herald of an Oracle." He
left me, with some advice, and only asked me one question more.  "Does she
live alone?"

   "No, she is unmarried, however she takes in orphans.  The eldest is her
apprentice, to learn the craft of midwivery." And possibly witchery, I am
still not convinced she is not, though I have no evidence.  She is
secretive, and as he said, some of the things she did made me feel
uncomfortable.  What other sort of woman brews the blood of a girl, a
virgin into a soup, and what vile purposes does she have for it?

   And some advice, before he climbed the steps he said "When the fear, and
hurt comes back, try to think of something else.  Anything but repeat it,
over and over in your mind.  It does not help, and it may drive you mad."

   My tears were cold, but dried on my hood, I stopped crying.  My wool was
warm, and here, I was all but alone.  It was flat, and even the stone under
me was warmed by him.  Holding me, telling it would be all right, and I did
feel better.  Warmer, with the fever of love.  He is a lovely man, caring,
and a healer.  My heart felt renewed, the hurt, and fear it held washed
away, just closing my eyes.

   Remembering but a moment, his cloak swaying over his shoulders.  About
his feet, one disappearing up a step, resuming his climb.  The lone hill,
there are others, I can see the buildings on from here, but I remember him,
the rough dark brown hood, turning to look back as he went around a
sandstone rock.  Still concerned, for me, but for the first time I tried
it.

   Opening my clothes, in the warmth trapped under my finer felt.  His
cotton was finer still, and woven in a pattern.  En Brocade, the back, and
sides merely a jagged pattern of peaks and valleys.  Rising, and falling in
a regular line, almost like flame, without the random wildness of nature.
Rising and falling in time, like the beat of a drum, behind the harp, and
leading the fife.

   My heart, beating the bone against my palm, as I tap out a counterpoint
with my fingers.  The tips hard, and rough from pulling threads, and the
spindle, spinning on the spike.  Plucking out a theme as he said like the
leaves of a book.  I had seen them, carried under the arm of the Vicar,
that book.  I do not know, only the stories from my father, of my mother.
Her dimly remembered face, before the cold came in and took her.  In the
winter, like a thief in the night.

   The stranger, I had heard he was holed up in the Millhouse.  Shuttered
till spring, at the earliest, last year we did not get a summer.  It was
overcast most days, and it ranied, but this morning is fresh, and dry, and
crisp as newfallen snow.  He is dark, his face hooded in his hair, with the
cloak down, and thrown over his shoulders.

   The dyed thread, colors I had not seen, a deep violet, like the flowers,
but deeper, darker, and more mysterious.  {Nautilus Purple, imported from
Snails around Nautilus Island, Pori, and ante/Kythera, Greece. 
Incidentally in a Flame Bargello pattern.} The peeks, and valleys, rising
and falling around his hips, belted down to the Arms.  Over other arms, as
far as I could tell.  Why someone would embroider arms over other arms, I
could make out the understitch in pattern if not color.  All I could make
out was a white rabbit, rampant like a lion.

   What I don't know about coats of arms, but high dexter, by the shoulder.
Over a bar, sinister, I heard that means a Bastard, which would explain his
mix of noble, and common qualities.  Few of the latter, his hair is a deep
lusterous brown, with lighter strands at the crown, and sweeping over the
underlayer about his neck and shoulders.  Broad shoulders, yet thick arms,
bare to the elbows, and cuffs of velvet ribbons, to match the leggings, to
the knee, and boots pulled up over his knees.  In a flare, the lining
betwixt the ribbons a bushleaf green.

   His codpeice between them, just velvet, finer than the swede lining the
tops of his boot cuffs.  Pulled up for some reason, under his cloak, but
his hair hanging over his brow.  His eyes, looking down, blue as if the sky
shining through, and his beard moving.  Neetly trimmed mustache, and even
his lips, smiling.

   "NGH!" Yes, that is love welling up inside me.

   ;

   The Horror (D/M/F Magi NS)

   "Yup!" She's a witch.  "Skuzzi, my Englifzi is." I let the cloak out
with my hand.  "How you say, poor?" Set it on the windowsill, didn't turn
the eyes, but just mapped it inside from peripheral visual cells.

   [A real witch?] Mind if I switch your thoughts to Text?  Need the
processing speed, you don't understand, but this is a 1 room cottage.  With
1 bed, and the apprentice doing her Cinderella duties like an Au Paire
while watching the girls.  Takes in orphans, right.  Teaches her midwifery.
Roll my yes.

   "How may I help you, M'lord?" Real witchcraft?  Let me tell you, magic
is like science you don't understand.  Since you barely even grasp science
since your first boyfriend is the son of the boy Leonardo da Vinxes
philated while on the lam for pedorasto she's a child molester.  Pedophile,
preferential to girls, I'm pretty sure.  Not old, fat in that rolly poly
middle class/ages way women who can eat well do, and probably an
undiagnosed Lesbian.

   I'll tell you the story later.  "Yes, I was wondering if you happened to
see a young lady.  Norman."

   "The countess deLasci?"

   "Yes, that's the one."

   "All that we have to offer is porrage, but do come in, and take some of
the chill out of your bones."

   "The climb, and the morning sun were enough to warm me." I threw my
cloak over the sill, and stuck the broachpin in it.  Wool town.  [I know.]

   "Well!  I do not know about where you are from?"

   "Airolo." Shake my head, "The alps.  That glass?" I pointed to the
shelf. A bottle, an actual glass bottle.  "We made finer glass."

   "You are a merchant by trade?"

   "I will taste some of that porridge.  You have any honey?"

   She's immune to your charms.  [I know.  ;) ]

   "Argyle?"

   She nodded, and brought some.  With a ball on a stick to dip it out.

   "Here, money talks." [Is that what she said?] Close enough.  "I may have
seen her."

   "Is she injured?"

   "The condition of a lady is a very valuable thing, indeed."

   "You did examine her."

   "Yes."

   "5." A stack of gold fell heavy on the wood between my cupped fingers.
"Ducats?" I set my palm down on them, fingers splayed flat.

   "Take out the girls."

   Argyle nodded, silent.  None of them made a sound, even the baby.  Well,
older baby, 2, or 3, but runs that kind of tight ship.  If you make noise,
you attract attention.  [This is your science?] Of a sort, or magic, if you
don't understand it, but in a word: Profiling.

   She doesn't understand it, but if she has any use for the menarchal
blood of virgins, then she probably believes in magical power.  [Are you
having fun?] I'm going to enjoy this immensely!

   "She's well." She leaned up against the sill.  Not reaching for, but her
fingers resting as close as she dared to the stack of gold.  "Her purity is
intact." Eyes locked on the top of my hand.  Nails resting on the wood like
an arachnid missing a leg.

   "Glad to hear that, I do not need to hear about her bleeding, and. 
Female things."

   "You're charged with preserving her womanhood?"

   "Oh no.  We're lovers, it is just not any of your business.  She is
treated well?"

   "Of course," she laughed, "In her own House.  She's the Lady in
Possession of Frome.  As the ranking noble here when the Duke died, she's
holding it, until his relatives send someone to receive it, in their
stead."

   "Yeah?" Well!  This is a peasant surprise.  "Well, they tried to take
her by force." They set their trap for a princess, and lo, they catch a
prince!  [Whom?] Sorry, paraphrasing Maleficent again, never mind.

   "I could use one, a virgin, however." I looked around, back at the
girls, playing at the edge of the hill.  Sitting in grass, over the stone
wall that was beside me, climbing the steps to the vantage point, over the
nearby rooves to the hills around it so you couldn't see the river.  Nor
any road out of it.

   "How are you lovers?"

   "Well, you know." Back over the horizontal surfaces of her shop/home. 
"There are other things, you can do.  Rather than pound the pestle in the
mortar." Back at her from the corner of the table.  "It just gives me a
hunger.  For cherry pies?" Grin and wink.  [I know.]

   Roll his eyes, nope!  Non preferrential, just got a good gig here. 
Access to little girls to teach, mothers, infants, but not immune to the
charms of a man.  A tall dark handsome foreigner with a spellbook full of
accents, and centuries of experience with sexual predators.  Girls are
easy, always knew how they felt, and how to touch them.  Teach them, at
least one, she does have a favorite?

   "That Argyle, isn't she getting old enough for a man?"

   "That'll cost you more than a pretty penny, my dear."

   "Of course," I grinned, "He didn't say how much, but." Madame mom?  "He
did mention, your girls.  Would work for it."

   "Well, I don't know who you've been talking to, but I would never
consider such a thing."

   "Maybe not for her." Over my shoulder, standing and talking to the
girls. Like, well a preacher, or prophet, really.  No book, none anywhere
on the premisis.  Secret society, when the men don't even want to know,
even the one practicing medicine, not for centuries.  Jealous, "But I've
been on the road for long, and the nights have been cold.  In the fields,
and the bush the last few nights, I haven't had ample." My eyes took the
scenic route down the front of her dress, "Opportunities since I got back.
In search of my lady, I can only hope this." 7, gold Ducats.  Had them left
over from Callais anyway, might as well get rid of them, "Can show some of
my appreciation, for how much you've helped me."

   I think I'll put some music on.

   [?]

   Yeah, Red Hot Chili Peppers - Blood Sugar Sex Magic.  "Um," Mother's
(Milk.) "Yeah." She let me in, "That's it." I pushed the door shut behind
me.

   {Musical/Continuity Note: That's not Molly, but she knew her.  In life,
as much as they're capable of understanding eachother.  Sexual, once in the
Mourning Star, but to a different tune.  The immortal narcissist sings it
to him, in his head, about Herself.}

   ;

   Argyle (M/F Pseu Saph.  f/G mole.)

   I held the baby up, on my hip.  So she could see through the window, the
other girls stood around, or climbed up to see.

   "Truly, you watched?"

   "Mother Superior does not hide such things for us, to know when we are
women."

   "Oh." She nodded, "Do go on, he.  Huh!" She sighed, "Made love to her?"

   "Like a woman.  Not like a man makes love to a woman, but as a woman
does, to a girl."

   "How?"

   "Let me show you.  He took off her clothes, I can at the least help you
with this, but he wore his.  Everything except the cloak, even his
overcoat, belt, and purse.  He moved the dagger he wore to behind, his
back, and bent over her.  On our bed, why don't you lie down.  Like this,
relax."

   "She did this to me."

   "I know, your arms are cold, and your chest, let me just rub some warmth
into it."

   "Your hands are warm."

   "I remember, when you came to her."

   "You watched us?"

   "No, of course not, but we know what to do.  For eachother, when the
moon is right.  Mother Superior."

   "She's not a nun?"

   "No, we are a much older order.  A motherhood, who keeps the old ways of
Arianrhod, and the secrets of Life."

   "Tell me how he made love to her?"

   "With his hands, and mouth.  You know how, to touch yourself?"

   "She showed me."

   "It's all right, dear.  Relax, did you not like it?  Does this not feel
better?"

   "You are not so old, nor fat."

   "Do I not please you, your eyes, in the way I look?"

   "No, I mean yes.  You are lovely to behold."

   "Ah, but you are lovelier.  Far so, if that mean old witch scared you."

   "So, she is a witch?"

   "No?  Of course not, it is only what I have heard.  Talked about her,
from those who do not know her as I do.  You don't understand how she loves
me.  More than any mother loved her own, but she is not jealous for me."

   "Mhn, you're good at this?"

   "Yes, it is something you learn by doing, like anything else I suppose.
You will learn, if you're willing."

   "How?"

   "Just let go, of everything.  Give yourself into it, and feel, the
pleasure to be had, by being free.  Free from your father, and the men who
would only hurt you.  They don't understand, can not possibly understand
your pleasure, much less give it to you."

   "Yes, give it to me!"

   "You want what I have, but I can not give it to you.  There is a price,
to learn this, so I must be sure you want it."

   "Yes, I want it."

   "You must want it, more than anything, at any cost?"

   "Yes, please!  Give it to me!"

   "It's coming, but what if the price could jeapordize your soul?"

   "Yes, oh yes!  God, I don't care!"

   "Can you feel it?  Is it coming, closer?"

   "Yes."

   "You must chase it, faster."

   "Yes faster!"

   "You're gaining on it, faster?"

   "Yes, faster!"

   "More?"

   "Yes, deeper and harder!"

   "There it is, almost there..."

   "NGAUGH!"

   "There."

   "Ngh!"

   "Snh.  Yeah, there.  Doesn't that feel better?"

   "Nhm?"

   "Now, the first thing you have to learn is silence.  Shhh, shhh.  I'll
start to teach you in a moment."

   "HhHhH!"

   {On Sexual Technique: LFI Know what's in the Norman/Anglo Woman/Girl
Love Association (NAWGLA) Child Molester's Handbook.  Late 15th century
edition, couldn't get my hands on a copy, because they didn't write it
down. They would have passed it down through generations the old fashioned
way.  I can imagine how small town English women molested their charges,
and taught her how to molest other girls, but it may take me a while. 
Needless to say, she really knows how to touch a girl, and make her feel
better, having learned from arguably the worst in town.  Until worse showed
up...}

   ;

   "Lady" du LacSee

   My, "Heart!" I tackled him at the waist.  Wearing his Bern Livery, the
Alberich crest, the stitches pulled off of it.

   "Bernard, but a lowly little tailor." The girl winked, and grinned.  "He
heard that there was a lady, in need of some better clothes."

   "Maggie?"

   "Yeah, I figured if we have to fight our way out of here, the only way
to give her the reflexes." A young girl, I don't know, in her teens?

   "Nice dress?"

   "Thanks, but you really need to quit getting captured like this."

   "I like it, this time."

   "Yeah," she rolled her eyes, "Power?"

   "Hold your arm up, like this." Pretending to measure me, pulling string,
then marking both ends of it, across the side of a bolt of fabric.

   Shake my head, "What's with the Greek?"

   "Nobody speaks it here?  Try and keep up, so you don't need rescuing?"

   "I'm taking the town.  Here, it's Mine.  The Lancasters don't really
need the Wool, but the taxes from it will be nice, and the waterline when
it thaws might be nice for sending reports down to Bristol.  It ain't war
yet, but even the Yorks are starting to be pressured by the Burgundoire,
and the channel is probably opening up for a season of naval warfare.  Yay!
I'll stay back here, and watch a mildly logistic waypoint in the supply
line, thank you very much.  I'm not cut out for war, so if I have to act
the lady, I can do that, as I always have.  And who the fuck are you, as
point of fact?"

   "Sorry, deLaine' Carder, at your service.  So, if you're good, I can
just leave you alone.  You too, Hartmann?"

   "I'm fine, but it'll be easier to get off these islands in court.  You
staying with the Coven?"

   "What coven?"

   "You heard about the woman, from the hill?"

   "The old spinster, set herself on fire?"

   "Yeah, well, I might have had something to do with that." The curse,
obviously, "Nhiehehuhahah!  You should have seen her, screaming and tearing
at her hair, falling to roll down the steps.  Ablaze, and the terror on the
faces as she came down the slope.  Thrashing, and shreiking like a
banshee."

   "Yeah, sounds like your style.  For what?"

   "Well, you know.  The usual, witchcraft, rape, harlotry, sodomy, child
abuse, drug dealing, and tax evasion." She giggled, then laughed, evily
again.  Or it did, honestly I was glad to be rid of it.

   "Yes, of course." I turned to my "Tailor.  You're free to go, yet I'm
sure I can find a ship for you to fill up with wares, for your travels.  As
a token of my appreciation, and perhaps a letter to the lady Milne
Alberich, on the way?"

   "Oh no.  That's not on my way.  I'm going by see, and she's still up in
the mountains, I'm not climbing back up there just to play mailMann.  I'm
thinking Arms is going to be more lucrative, soon.  Especially innovative
arms from a clever inventor."

   "I helped him out, or Allojer did."

   "Good, I am glad to hear it."

   "Like this."

   He showed me his dagger.

   ;

   Evan Smithson (M/Mm NS CraftWork)

   All the boys were talking about him.  The dark foreigner, some said he
was Roman, others a Spaniard, even other that he was from Greece.

   Just walked into the shop, and argued with my father.

   My father fought him, but the man called him a "Common farrier," threw
the strap stock back in the bin, "I need to use your forge."

   Shewed him how to make an ax, and I a spike.  Like his dagger, holding
it on the fuller as he beat another around the blade, taking shape. 
Curved, inside and out so that the edges are on the front.  Steel welded
around iron, I had never heard of anyone doing this.  My father said it was
impossible, until he shewed us how to do it.

   "It is a drill." His, stuck in the stump, to look at, as father worked
the straps for a hammer head.  With a spike on the back, these he showed me
to make for the butt end.

   "For the Militia," also shields, and parts for crossbows.

   "It is a drill," he showed me.  Bending over the stump, and driving it
in by the pommel.  Like the head of a mushroom, "Hold it, here."

   My thumb over the spike, sticking out of the front, "And brace it in
your palm." The spike, to twist it, so the pommel turned in my hand.

   "Ngh!"

   "Do not push in, as you turn it, now push, and cut it deeper."

   "Like this?" Wood curled, almost as thin as paper out the deep grove in
the top.  Of the hole, cutting deeper with each twist, then relaxing to
turn it back.

   "Now," he pulled it out, and set the hammer in by the spike.  On the
back, "You can use the head as a fuller." Like a ball peen, "It is a tool,
yet can be used as weapon.  Now, you can do this, make more cores, like
this." He stuck the dagger next to it by the long flat spike sticking out
of the front.

   The blade, curved around the trough in the middle.  "You know an
apprentice woodcutter, carpenter in town?"

   "The Cooperson." I nodded.

   "I will talk to heme," as he says it, "There will be war.  Here
eventually, there is always.  We must prepare for it, I doubt they will
send many.  At first, but the men must be ready, so the boys." He patted my
shoulder, "Like you must help.  Yes?"

   I nodded.

   "I will talk to your father, about money." I nodded, "Keep working at
it, I will weld the steel, and temper it when you get it."

   He took off his coat, and the tunic under it.  He is strong, he looked
like the strongest man I have ever seen, but tended the fire.  And to us,
telling us how to shape what we were working on.

   And split wood with his knife.  Larger than the dagger, I was to copy
the blade from.  Long as his arm, larger than any seax I had seen, and beat
it through wood carefully to split it.  Then turning it over, to pull it
against the faces, cutting the sides down flat, and smooth for my father to
band the sides of with straps.

   He turned around, and I stopped.  Drawing out the bar, thinner, and
wrapping it around the fuller.  I held up his, to look at it, while he
looked at my iron spike, starting to take shape.

   "Good," he gave it back, by the bar I hadn't even heated, and picking up
another fuller by the handle.  "Hold it, here." I held my hands where they
left him, while he beat it in with the mallet.

   "Like that." He turned back to the Anvil, and pulled the lump out by the
strap wrapped around it.  For my father to hold, while he beat out the
spike end.

   Left his wood knife, the strange butt sticking up, from the tip stuck in
the end.  Bent down, and flattened out, under his smallest finger when he
gripped it.  Then I saw him, hold it by the blade, and hammer it into wood.
The chisel head, by the pommel.  Digging out a trench like a fuller grove,
as the one I was supposed to working, but I looked at it.  Held it out to
the fire, and set it in the coals.

   "What are you making?"

   "A stock, for the crossbolt arms." Resting in the tempering trough. 
"The handle will be cut in, for the fingers when it is mounted to a shield.
Have you ever shot a crossbow?"

   "No?" I looked back at the spike, in the forge.

   "It is easy."

   "I have played with a shield."

   "I will put this, in a shield.  So, you can carry them, together.  Also
load and fire from behind it, but you do not have to be strong as a man,
with the pulley."

   "Yeah?" I pulled it back out of the forge, and turned to the stump.  Set
it on the fuller, and grabbed it to beat the blade around, and draw it out
with the hammer side of the other.

   "I will show you, when it is finished."

   ;

   {Working on it.  I know, I have a lot of irons in the fire.  Bare with
me...}