Lady Francine was flushed. 'That was very ... exciting, my lord.'
'The first time you've seen combat? Well, try not to let it upset you.' I was checking the dead man's pouch. Of course, nobody carried any ID in this age, but there might be something identifiable.
'I am not upset, I am ... excited. Take me, my lord. Please. '
'What? My lady, you don't know what you're saying. Look. Violence excites a lot of people sexually. It doesn't get me that way, but it's not uncommon. It's nothing to be ashamed of, but don't lose your head.' I went over to dispatch the wounded horse, not looking at her.
'I know exactly what I am saying. Take me. Now.'
'Here? Lady, besides the violence, you were just bouncing your butt on Anna's hindquarters * That can get you horny, too, but for physical rather than psychological reasons. Anyway, you're a virgin and--' I was still avoiding looking at her. I took out the wounded horse by cutting its head off. Then I checked its saddlebags. Nothing.
'I am a twenty-six-year old virgin and I know exactly what I am doing. Look at me. Please?'
I looked at her. She had stripped down to her slip, and was naked to the waist. Lord, what a magnificent body. I went over to her.
'You know I'm not the marrying kind. I can't promise-'
She put her arms around me. 'Do not promise any thing, do not say anything, just take me. Do it now.'
Well, the woods were fairly secluded and there is a limit as to how many times a normal man can say 'no' to a beautiful woman. And if the violence and bouncing had turned her on, well, I have my hot buttons, too. One of my major ones involves holding a beautiful, passionate and nearly naked woman in my arms.
If she wasn't totally rational, well, neither was I. I pushed my own future regrets aside and took her, with a dead horse on one side of us and a dead man on the other. But the taking of a virgin is a time-consuming affair, if one is not to be a total klutz about it, and it was over an hour before we sat up on the woodland moss.
I noticed a knight in the duke's colors sitting a hundred yards from us with his back turned.
Embarrassing as hell. Once we were dressed, I shouted, 'Okay! You can turn around now! What are you doing here?'
'My lord, I was sent with others by the duke to see to your safety and come to your aid, though when we found you we thought our assistance might not be welcome. We have reported your safety to the duke, and have your other rewards of combat, that is to say, your booty, packed and ready for transport.' His left arm was bandaged, but it didn't seem to bother him.
'Thank you, I suppose. Did you report what we were doing to the duke?'
'It was needful, my lord, since he asked about the delay.'
Great. The rumormongers would be going for months over this one. Yet Lady Francine didn't look the least bit embarrassed. She looked as if there were canary feathers on her mouth.
'I take it that the duke is at my boat?'
'Yes, my lord.'
'Then we'll be going there now. Clean up the rest of this mess,' I said, gesturing to the dead knight and horse. 'And then bring it all to the boat. The duke will want to examine it.'
'And after that, my lord?'
'After that, you can keep it. Divide the booty up among your fellow guards.'
'Thank you, my lord, you are most generous! But then, you have taken a far greater reward for yourself.'
'Shut your damn mouth!'
At the boat, the duke was smiling. 'Well, Baron Conrad, they tell me that you killed all three would-be assassins, and with a lovely lady at your back, besides I'
'I killed one, your grace. Anna got two, and one of those was an accident. We were trying for a prisoner, but he was killed when his horse went down.'
'A prisoner? But who would ransom an assassin? To do so would be to admit one's guilt!'
'I wasn't worried about a ransom, your grace. But the men who were trying to kill you were probably connected to whoever was behind the death of your father. '
'Yes. of course. Stupid of me. I think my father's death must have affected me more than I had thought. Well, I shall instruct my guards to try to capture assassins in the future, and if we can't identify the men you killed, I'll have their heads set on poles in the marketplace, across from St. Mary's Church, with a reward posted for any information about them. For now, your excellent Sir Tadaos has shown me around the boat during your absence, and I suggest that we take it out for a ride.'
They had the booty on board before Tadaos could get a head of steam up. We went downstream to the limits of the duke's lands, halfway to Sandomierz, and then back past Cracow to East Gate. Lady Francine stayed close to me the whole while, but I stayed close to the duke, so she couldn't speak what was on her mind.
The duke tested all our weaponry himself, and was both impressed and troubled by it. He'd seen the swivel guns before, though this was the first time he'd fired one. The Halman Projectors were essentially steam-powered mortars, of a type that was used on merchant ships during WWII. We fired off a number of dummy rounds and one grenade. The peashooters were turret-mounted steam-powered machine guns. They worked as well on the boat as they had in the shop, with one problem. They drew so much steam that firing a single one of them noticeably slowed the boat. Something would have to be done, but I wasn't sure what.
What troubled the duke was that these weapons could rip up any group of mounted knights, and there wasn't much that conventional forces could do about it. And the duke's power was ultimately based on his knights.
'Good, Baron Conrad. We will need dozens, many dozens of these boats. With them, if the rivers be free of ice, you might stop the Tartars from killing my people. But in so saying, I am chanting the doom of my own kind.'
'Not so, your grace. Poland will always need leaders and the land must have a king.'
He looked at me strangely. 'Yes. But who?'
I got off at East Gate and offered to have Tadaos run the duke back to Cracow. He said he preferred to ride back on his new mounts, and left. One of the guards made quick arrangements with Tadaos with regards to the bodies and booty, and Francine sent a note back with the guard concerning her servants and luggage.
Lady Francine stayed with me and seemed to take it for granted that she would continue to do so.
As soon as we were alone, I said, 'I once asked you if you wanted to join my household. You know that offer still stands.'
'To join your household? To be one among many?'
'Not so many. Actually, you'd be one among two.'
'Two. Do you mean that foreign woman?'
'Cilicia, yes. And you yourself are something of a foreigner here, my lady.'
'I had hoped for something better.'
'It's all that I have to offer, my lady. I couldn't dump Cilicia. She's heavy with my child. And I've told you that I'm not the marrying kind.'
'I must think on it.'
Well, she didn't seem to think much, but continued acting as if she owned me. We got back to Three Walls the next day and I introduced her around.
She'd met Cilicia a few dozen times when she was with the old duke, and always they had been cordial, even friendly with each other. Now all that was changed. You could see little lightning bolts flash between the two women, with plenty of fireworks and the occasional atomic blast!
It was an awkward, unpleasant situation, and I did my best to ignore it. I found myself working late in the shops and hoping that the ladies would come to some sort of an accommodation. I tried to be fair, and took them to bed on alternate nights, but their concept of fairness was different from mine. At last, I tried to sit them down together and get them to talk it out, but they both just sat there radiating hate.
After a month, Lady Francine rather stiffly thanked me for a pleasant visit and said that she was leaving for her estate. She stressed that I would always be welcome there, but that she would not be returning to Three Walls.
We gave her a nice sendoff, and I breathed a vast sigh of relief. Having the two most beautiful women in the country was nice, but it was not worth the total absence of domestic tranquility.
I think I must be growing old.
Yet ever after, I could not help but visit the countess at her manor, once or twice a month. And always I stayed the night.
