The Butcher's Wife

Lila heard Fenn's voice from Rachel's throat, though she'd barely spoken in a whisper. Within moments she was framed in the window, her red hair tumbling over a white shift. The sight of the young man with his chest naked to the night struck her like an arrow. "Fenn?" she said, quietly, so her husband wouldn't hear. She thought she was in another dream. They felt real, until they ended.

"Come down," said Rachel in a workman's accent. "I've got to talk to you."

Lila was only conflicted for propriety's sake. Her feet had already begun to move. She should have thrown a dress over her shift, since it was close to transparent, but she arrived at the door of the butchery in only linen nonetheless. Rachel waited just beside the door so she wouldn't be seen when Lila opened it. That way, the woman would think Fenn had abandoned her, so that when she stepped outside relief would flood through her. "What are you doing here, Fenn?" she asked. But she knew the answer, or thought she did. The gods had answered the prayers she refused to believe she'd said.

"I couldn't sleep," said Rachel. "I knew I needed to see you."

So much was contained within those words. Rachel wished she could let herself laugh at the awestruck look on Lila's face. "Why did you need to see me?" asked the butcher's wife.

To see you, to touch you, to kiss you, to fuck you, to fuck you, to fuck you! Rachel's thought was a bolt of lightning, and it hammered against Lila's mind. "I just... had to see you. Would you take a walk with me, ma'am?" asked Rachel.

She would've thought that the prince himself had gotten down from his black stallion to offer her his hand, by the way Lila's hand flew to her chest. The very image of grace in so ungraceful a soul. She's lucky for her body, thought Rachel. Otherwise the butcher never would've married her and her parents would still be destitute. "Where?" she said.

"To the forest," said Rachel.

Lila followed her without complaint. Her hand found its way into Rachel's. It was a strange sensation, to feel a hand more like her own grasped between her callused fingers. The gifts of the gods were many and varied. Together they found their way to the ring whose marking stones were hidden from Lila's sight. When she stepped between them, the woman shivered, but didn't hesitate to follow her husband's workman deeper. "What's going on, Fenn?" Lila asked.

Rachel looked deep into her eyes. They were green, lovely and shining. The dull light of the moon made her red hair and blushing skin the only spot of color in a forest of gray and black. "I want you," she said in Fenn's voice.

It shook Lila. "You mean..."

"You know what I mean."

Lila fell against Rachel, the wilting maiden. Rachel held her with the strength of a man's arms, and kissed her. The spirit that had flowed from Fenn into Rachel the night before now flowed from Rachel into Lila. With that, the two lovers were connected, though they had never touched in body. It was enough. She could have gone back to Ughelor that very moment. But having come so far, Rachel thought that she should enjoy the fruits of her labors a little longer. "I need your body, milady," she said, deep, desirous.

"Ah," Lila gasped, but didn't shy away. Rachel guided her down onto the soft grass, kneeling together with her. They kissed again, and then Rachel gently pushed her onto her back. Rather than continue to kiss, she slid down the woman's body, her strong hands pushing up Lila's nightdress. "You..." she began, but didn't dare interrupt. She had to see what the lover of her dreams had in store.

Rachel lifted Lila's legs over her shoulders and bit her thighs with sensual grace. The woman was already squirming. Not only was this a man she'd barely spoken to touching her so intimately, and confidently, but Rachel also knew without needing the aid of a scrying pool that her lump of a husband had never done anything like this. By the time her tongue touched the other woman's clitoris Lila was groaning, grasping the grass, twisting in the wind. Rachel knew how to use her mouth better than any man could: she was gentle, but insistent; determined and passionate; and most of all she was warm, because what the body craved most from sex was the warmth of another living thing.

"I'm not hurting you, am I?" Rachel asked, breaking the dissonance of the evening.

"No!" Lila said, clawing at Fenn's shoulders.