Igrayne - Part 1

Part One

The Duke of Tyntigayll was dead to begin with.

Well -- actually -- to begin with, the world was created, Adam sinned, and his descendants did likewise. The Duke was born, and I, and Igrayne. I became High King, and Igrayne wed the Duke. The Duke was inimical, but came to visit me to patch things over. He and his lovely Duchess decided that I had asked them to court to court her. This was true, but not proven, and their departure was abrupt enough to pass for casus belli. The Duchess held one castle, Tyntigayll, and the Duke the other, Terrabyl. We besieged his; I left the camp; he sallied and died. But one must begin somewhere.

So the Duke was dead when Merlyn, Sir Ulfius, and I rode up to Castle Tyntigayll in disguise. We, possibly excepting Merlyn, did not know that; and the castle occupants had no idea. Ensorcelled by Merlyn, they took me to be the whoreson Duke, Merlyn to be Sir Jordanus, and Sir Ulfius to be Sir Brastias. When I pled illness and went early to bed, the only doubts in their minds were whether the illness were real or an excuse to get alone with Igrayne the sooner. As hostess, of course, she could not leave the table immediately. However, when the food was gone and the ale was passing, she was de trop. She came up to the chamber carrying a lamp.

"Milord, art thou seriously ill? Is there a medicine which I can fetch thee."

"Thyself is all the balm that I need."

She laughed at that and blew out the lamp. This was to my displeasure, but once done, relighting would cause an unwanted delay. Besides, however glamoured she was to see me as the Duke, unwonted behavior must disturb her. If the Duke was ass enough to have her undress in the dark, I must lose that sight as well.

Here was where the chance of discovery resided. Merlyn was mage indeed, but I was only an inch under six feet, one of the tallest men in my kingdom. The Duke was five inches shorter, and Igrayne a magnificent five foot four. When a man is stretched out above a woman, it is hard for her to avoid noticing that his beard reaches where she is used to finding his eyebrows.

Soon she came to bed. I was in the center, and she slipped under the covers to my left. I reached over with my right hand. There was neither surprise nor reluctance in her response.

I held her face until I could bring our mouths together. Then I stroked down her side to her magnificent flank and then up her soft belly to her breast. There I found, even while she was lying on her back, a firm, smooth hillock. I smoothed my hand upward to find a nipple which firmed to a height of two fingerbreadths. I brushed this with my fingers as gently as calluses from sword and lance can brush.

Meanwhile, we kissed. She met my lips with closed lips, as befits a modest woman. She opened them to my tongue as befits an obedient wife. Beyond those chaste lips, however, there awaited a hot and hungry welcome. Her tongue met mine immediately. I slid mine under hers and tasted a sweetness to exceed honey. She withdrew hers to just touch mine tip-to-tip and then flicked hers back and forth. I was unaware that tongues could be tickled. She brought hers to a stop and touched mine gently, then withdrew a bit. I extended mine to touch it again, and she repeated. When I was pressing her lips against her teeth and extending as far as possible, she closed her lips over my tongue and sucked it. My blood, which by all logic should have followed the suction, instead rushed to my lance which was already full. When she relented from her suction, I withdrew my tongue. Hers followed mine, licked its underside, then explored the insides of my lips. I had to enter somewhere, and I intended this tryst to last. Without breaking the kiss, I turned so my head was above hers. I hardened my tongue and stabbed as far forward as I could. While I explored the roof of her mouth, she lapped at the underside of my tongue. I chased hers and trapped it against the top of her mouth. Again, it was flowing with sweetness. The extension was tiring, and I retreated. She followed all the way into my mouth and played tag there. I sucked her tongue more gently than she had sucked mine. She waggled it yet trying to reach mine, and I touched it and withdrew in a game. She pulled back slowly, and I followed continuing the tag of touches. She made it feel more like she was licking my lips than that she was escaping their clutches. When, for the first time since my tongue broached her lips, both tongues were behind their own teeth, she moved her face so that her lips were slightly upward from mine. She gripped the hairless part of my upper lip between her two and sucked on it. She began to lick it, and I, new to this play, saw a possibility. With only a little effort, I was able to suck on her lower lip in turn. This stood in stead for the breast that I was feeling with my hand. The firmness of the nipple there called to my mouth. I was torn, but with reluctance broke the kiss.

Twins have been born of futterings less sensuous than that kiss.

Before I could proceed downward, she caught my beard and used it as a handle to move my face around as she sprinkled kisses wherever she could reach. Quite forgetting that she kissed another, I forbore my lust for the sake of her love. When she went higher on my face, however, I kissed lower on hers. My first kiss landed on her cheek, my second on her chin. She forwent kissing to be kissed, and I trailed a string along her jaw line to her ear. There were folds and tastes there to keep me, and giggles and wiggles and thrashing to push me off. It was, however, resistance to the kiss and not the lover. I captured her lobe and, sucking it, was again reminded of the waiting nipple. The path down her throat, delectable in itself, now seemed an unbearable delay.

I was holding the left breast in my hand, and I simply moved my mouth to where the right one must be. I met smooth skin and kissed it, then trailed upward to pebbly skin, and thence to upstanding smoothness. One suck and this nipple stood up. It felt as though I had a twig in my mouth, but a blunt twig with infinitely smooth bark. I was beyond teasing her. I merely clung there and suckled like a lusty babe. Nothing came out, of course, but there was still a taste of sweetness. I slowly grew up and changed my suckling to licking and playing with lips and tongue.

I had been hard since my entrance to the room, much less hers. Deeply desiring this tryst to last forever, I came to want its inevitable conclusion more. As I love a wet ride, I moved my hand down her breast, across her belly to the nest at the top of her thighs. She parted her legs for my hand, and my scarred and callused fingers parted her soft smooth lips where I intended to play until she was flowing and stretched to receive my thrust. I found her drenched, which was luck indeed. She misconstrued my gesture out of the private conventions of her marriage. She reached for me as soon as I had touched her center.

I am thought a strong-willed man, but there are temptations St. Lawrence could not resist. I followed her touch perforce and struggled to restrain from spending. Led by the reins, I scrambled between her legs. I managed to bring the magnificent breast back to my mouth while she lifted her legs and rested her feet on my calves. Her soft hand slid my blunt sword home as if into a sheath formed for it alone.

The sheathing of a sword, however, betokens the end of a struggle, and this began one. No sooner had her hand acted my squire, seeing me well mounted and my lance firmly couched, than her hips and lower belly acted my opponent in the lists. They thrust at me with enough force to unseat a rider less surely placed. I thrust back, perforce, although there wasn't much motion that I could make in that direction, being already firmly seated. As she fell back, I withdrew until I was caught at the tighter ring of her portal, then was first in the lists for the next passage. Nor was this the last of her divided councils. While her hips thrust against me as if to unseat me, the inner flesh clung to me so as to hold me the firmer.

A realm so divided must certainly lose, but this combat ended otherwise. I thrust, and she bucked. We met with an audible smacking of flesh. My lance pierced her without doing her injury, being instead set afire by the rubbing. All her wetness could not extinguish the fire, but barely eased the feeling of sweet friction. I made many passages in those lists, before being overcome by the ache rising through me that betokened that I must:

SPEND!

SPEND!

Spend!

Spend.

Spend...

Spent, I fell on her glorious flesh. I treated those breasts as pillows and that destrier mare as a mere palfrey. She bore the treatment with equanimity and me with her softness and slowing breath.

---

Indeed, I awoke minutes -- I hope -- later to her soft caresses down my back. I was wilted and without; but her hands passed from my back to my haunches, and I stirred already.

I moved off her to a mattress more seemly, if less soft. Our activities had moved us perilously close to the edge, so I moved far away. I heard a sniff.

"Come," I said, "I came all this distance to join thee. Thou canst move over a foot to meet me."

And move she did handsomely, measuring herself against my side in a way that awoke both desire and fear that she must surely notice my height. She was on her side with her front pressed against my side. A magnificent front it was, too. But my arm was not what I wanted there.

"Stay right here," I directed.

I moved an inch away and a cubit toward the foot of the bed. That put both her magnificent teats within range of my mouth. I began to kiss the sides of the nearer and circled it slowly towards the peak. Occasionally, my beard brushed over my target as I circled. She wiggled but did not seem displeased. When I reached the peak, I licked the nipple all over before taking it between my lips. I dropped back a little to the bed and pulled at her shoulder. She got the idea and turned so that I could lie in comfort and suck. I stroked her side with my hand running from the very outside of her left breast to a point a little above her knee. Occasionally, I paused at the top to stroke her arm.

She began to move under that caress, not the undulations of deep heat, but the acquiescent moving against the stroke that means that it is appreciated. I changed breasts and tilted her a little more to accommodate. The nipple was firm and smooth in my mouth when I first drew it in. I stroked up from her hip in a new direction, ending with my hand cupping the base of that breast. Such was the generous size that my thumb touched naught of my face but my beard when it extended along that length.

I fondled there for the nonce and then stroked back down over her belly rather than her side. This was soft and smooth and gently rounded. The navel was deep, and my index finger could just fit within. That brought on a fit of shaking there which even reached her breast. The nipple barely moved in my mouth, but that slight motion was a great pleasure. My finger left its private lodging and rejoined the rest of the hand as it stroked a circle around that navel. All was smooth, soft, and still shaking. The second circle went wider and found a feathery fluffery at the furthest reaches. I broke off the circle and rested my hand against her there. The pad where my thumb met my wrist was just below her navel, and the third and fourth fingers were displacing curls. Her flesh warmed my hand, and I hope that it warmed her back. As the heel of my hand moved down, I left my finger tips where they were until they were curled under, and the backs of the fingers were pressed into her curls. I brought my fingers together catching some hairs between each pair. I lifted them enough to pull the sweet pad, but not enough to cause pain. Then I parted the fingers and slowly, carefully, extended them again. Doing so combed her hair and gauged the soft, firm targe which guarded both bone and softest flesh. The hair extended downward to cover a softer pout and then followed the lips back further than I was going on this survey. I patted the tiniest forward perimeter of those lips and reluctantly left to visit her thighs. There was no need for reluctance, the inner thighs were silken warmth and responded to my foray by parting slightly more and turning out. I stopped at the limit of my comfortable reach and started back up. There were very fine hairs, undetectable to my touch going in their direction, that I felt when going against them. I tried to keep my fingers as light as possible in this direction and to let the these hairs provide the contact. At a point I judged half way to my ultimate goal, I reversed direction and brushed down again. I repeated the process coming up a fingerbreadth further on one leg and then going back down. Then I switched legs and did it again. She stirred under these caresses, and I was well content to be both surveying and exciting my bedmate. Finally, my fingers brushed thicker hairs at the top of her thigh.

Meanwhile, having laved and lipped her left nipple, I was afraid of overstaying my welcome. She had evinced no pain, nor any response but pleasure. The first wince, however, is not a sign to leave off, but a sign that you have stayed far too long. So I reluctantly loosed my lips and let the nipple slip. Then I moved from mount to vale. I licked and kissed her pebbly flesh beside the nipple and thence to the smooth skin further away. I kissed downward towards the base, feeling -- all the while -- the smoothness of the other breast brush the left side of my face. In the valley, conscious that this was less tender flesh though delicate and smooth to the touch, I kissed her more forcefully, the narrowest line of lip protecting her flesh from my teeth. I sucked wildly here, as well. A little adjustment allowed each ear to rub a breast while I kissed the center of the valley between.

While exploring one valley, I had reached another, as you might remember. Just outside, my fingers toyed with locks trapped between her smooth thighs. I played there a minute, without touching skin. Then her own movement brought her lips within range of my finger. I stroked a finger between the thigh and the far edges of each lip. She parted her legs a bit more to accommodate this, but I thought her position probably difficult. I nuzzled my way upward and then pressed her back with my mouth, using my arm as a lever at the same time. When she took the idea, she rolled on her back, and I was able to pull her right leg toward me.

With this improved entree, I gently pressed the two lips and slid them slowly against each other. I was no longer worried about the dryness of my road, my own contribution being more than was needed to ease any passage. I wanted to play there, however, before any serious resumption of action. She, however, reached for me again. I stiffened completely in her fingers, but my mouth, at least, was able to resist this time.

"Nay, my lady, givest me a few more minutes."

"I was but inquisitive, my lord, I don't believe that I have ever felt thee so thick."

"I have stored up a long absence. Let me, however, remind myself of the territory before I possess it again."

She dropped back, but replied, "I had not thought that thou wouldst ever forget that territory."

"I said not 'forget,' but 'remind.' I have thought too much about it this whole siege through." And that, in this whole feigned trip, was God's own truth.

Her legs were more spread now, and I divided the thicket to find the meadow within. Her inner lips were lush and thick, even if they stayed within her bounteous outer ones. They were together, and I first kept them that way, holding them between thumb and first finger and rubbing them back and forth as gently as possible. I pulled them out slightly and let them go to feel the hairbreadth return through my fingers. I traced the minute ridge of their meeting, glad to find it splendidly slippery. I parted them with my fingers and felt one between finger and thumb. The position was not best for kissing her breasts, so I bent a little and rested my head on her belly. I dipped a finger into her nursery to test the size. It seemed dubious that my member had fit, let alone having room for a son. My fingers were damp enough to fare anywhere without hurting her, and I brought them forward to the peak of her furrow. There, well above the nursery, I found the tiny nurse standing watch. I spread it with the juice that I carried with me and then returned for more. When the nurse was well wetted, Igrayne had begun to breathe more quickly. Thankful that the nurse had carried the message, I stroked her more; and Igrayne rolled her up to me with a rolling of her sweet hips. I again checked the nursery, this time with two fingers. It was as tight as before, but accepted two as easily as one. I returned with more of the liquid and damped down the nurse again. Igrayne began to gasp. I abandoned all pretense of covering the entire furrow and stayed there playing with the nurse and plying the immediate area with the moisture. In ingratitude, the nurse abandoned her post. But a knight once sworn returns not indifference to indifference. I walked my post and hers. Meanwhile Igrayne was holding my hair in one hand and my shoulder in the other. She was panting as from a race. My fingers continued to pace their beats while the soft belly under me firmed. There was still sweet padding, but it felt like it covered not flesh but iron. Then she started. Her hips swung sweetly into my hand. One hand pulled my hair, and the other clawed my shoulder. She tightened still more under me and brought her head and her shoulders off the mattress. Then she fell back, and waves passed down her body. The flesh under my face quivered like a very slow bow string. Then she shuddered and closed her legs with a snap like a portcullis falling. Her hips rose and fell once more, and then she was still and softer than ever under my head. Her thighs, too, relaxed. I moved my hand to clasp her delicate curls without trespassing into more sensitive areas.

She broke out in a sweat, and I found the blanket to cover her. When I again lay down it was beside her with my arm just above her breasts and my mouth inches from her ear.

"Igrayne, Igrayne," I whispered. "Lovely, Lady Igrayne. Loved by my heart, laved by my tongue, lady of strength and grace. Beauty and boldness, brightness beloved. Igrayne, Igrayne, Igrayne."

Skald, I am not. Those lines will testify to that. But my observation is that women occasionally prefer poor chants that they are loved to wondrous renditions of the love of Leander for Hero. This seemed such an occasion.

"Oh my lord." She answered. I presume she meant the Duke, she may have meant Our Lord. The High King, she did not mean.

"Hush. Lie here and be hugged."

So she did, and a marvelous armful I had. Now, I love spending, but there are things that you don't notice in the midst of your own passion. Holding a lovely woman in your arms while she visits her passion is a blessing of its own. Igrayne had been on that journey, and she returned slowly. While she did, I left off clipping and played with her hair. It was held in some formal winding by a hair clasp. I undid the clasp and pulled the strands out into a lush curtain. It was enough to cover her breasts, or cover my chest, or to spread over the head of the bed. And I did all these things with it.

When her breathing eased, I essayed a kiss. Her tongue met mine with all the passion of our first kiss. After some time dealing with only that delight, I began to explore her whole mouth. The roof of her mouth had its own taste, which I can't describe except as a slightly sweet spice. Meanwhile, her tongue -- finding itself no longer the main interest of mine -- responded like an ignored puppy. It lay in wait and then jumped up when my attention was elsewhere. I must admit that I found these licks much more pleasant. I pinned her down to the floor of her mouth, and she wagged her tongue so as to tickle me. I withdrew to my own mouth, and she chased me. Trapping her, I sucked as she had sucked me. Rather than fighting it, she pressed her mouth to mine and held my hair.

My ardor, bred up over those months of wanting, had been but partially quenched by our first encounter. The long rest and the clipping had quite restored it. Her ardor, once the short rest was over, was whetted -- not abated -- by her recent solitary vigil. I was stroking her body from neck to thigh, but the breasts received more than their share of attention. It was time to reenter the lists. Thinking of tilting gave me the idea that a bolster under her hips canting them up might sweeten the angle between her softness and my hardness. I broke the kiss to speak.

"Milady, can we have the bolster below," I asked.

"I have not sewn it to the mattress during the last months," she replied. There was playfulness in her tone and alacrity in her action.

She pushed the blanket aside and swung the bolster down to our waist level. Then she raised herself up, slid the bolster under her, and swung herself down on it kneeling and facing the head of the bed. I had been trapped again into a marital habit. She reached over and took me. (I was beginning to know why we call them "reins.") I clambered into position over her legs. Her hand clasped it tight, once, and then placed me against her.

"It *is* larger than I had remembered."

I smiled but replied not. I was investing the castle this time, not storming it. I paused just at the foregate while I passed my hands around those marvelous haunches onto her narrow girdle and upward to rest on her ribs with fingers just touching the sides of her breasts. My thumbs touched her shoulder blades, and I held her absolutely still as I parted the leaves of the gate and entered the outer bailey. I brushed my hands down her plenteous, now pendulous, breasts until I reached the borders of the areolae. Then I paced the outer bailey, back and forth as there was no room to go side to side, gathering the wealth that had been stored there as precious mead. I rolled the tips of her breasts on my fingers as you might drum your fingers on the table when the benediction is too long, but at a third of the speed. She stirred at that and backed a fingerbreadth toward me. With the placement of my member, that removed me from the gatehouse rather than driving me within. I moved my hips back until I was properly situated and stopped there just at the gatehouse. I bent forward slightly and passed my hands downward until the tips of my middle fingers met the sides of her two nipples. These I stroked up and down. She was still, as if concentrating on her mammary sensations. I moved my hips forward and just nudged into the gatehouse. I stretched no gate, merely taking what space was there. I judged that the entry I was using would pass only my least digit and that merely to the first knuckle. I spread my hands lower until I could press upward on the tips of the hanging nipples. She pulled herself upward, which moved her castle away, but I moved with her, neither displaced nor advancing. Then I did advance, pressing inward in the gatehouse, widening the entrance until it would admit most of my force, only the breadth of the van barring my passage. Here, I was feeling her warmth and grasp for the first time, and restraint was becoming a task. A true knight, I held my post. I paused there and moved my left hand to her downthrust belly. There I delved in her navel with my last finger. She lifted away, the gatehouse retreated, and I moved in perfect pace with it. The most perfect pace, however, can not overcome a change of angle.

The top entered more, the bottom retreated, and the very slow friction of each was sensuous torture. I held my finger there and her belly raised perforce, while my right hand played with her nipple. I moved that hand up the breast to her back. My left stroked across her belly to her left breast. She eased down a bit, and again there was the exquisite sensation of shifting within sans any forward movement. I flexed the fingers of my right hand into claws and directed the knuckles toward me. Then scratching with the backs of my nails I stroked her back from right shoulder blade to left buttock. She, predictably, dropped her belly to escape the tickle -- for I was careful that there was no actual pain -- and drove herself back toward me. I rode partly with this swing of hers, but still ended completely in the gatehouse.

Enveloped rather than invading, I felt the sweet friction of her clasping flesh as my vanguard was admitted -- or captured. She was holding herself up on her raised arms, and I dropped my left hand to the bolster to do likewise. This allowed me to bend over far enough to kiss her on her upper back. She wiggled at this, and her rump shifted sideways, and my half-inserted self was shifted reciprocally to this. I felt every tug and slide of the sideways shifts, but was not conscious until later that the net result was inward.

Meanwhile, I kissed her back from left shoulder to right, licking every spot that I had sucked, and sucking again to make sure. I had but one hand for breasts, so I stroked them alternatively, sometimes gliding my hand over the smooth skin, sometimes tickling the nipples with my fingers. Meanwhile, she dodged either kiss or tickle, her hips swayed, my member was the swivel on which our connection turned, and I felt the always-varying motions there as one extreme tease. I was easing through her gatehouse in a sort of dance, back a little forth a little, round, round, round. The travel back was littler than the travel forth, however. I suddenly sensed that the friction was on the widest part, not on the tip. At that, I stopped peppering her with kisses and rose back to kneeling erect. That, in itself, provided forward impulse. With an exquisite slip through the gate, I was in the inner bailey. My body pulled back a bit, but it scarcely moved my invading force. The gatehouse kept tight around the main force, and the van was held within the bailey by the width of the vanguard more effectively than it had been kept out. I was pulling back the merest bit while I returned to the soft teasing scratching that I had done earlier. I used both hands this time, being careful that the nails were always turned in and going away from their points. I covered her lower back with these teases and then the backs of her thighs. I then gripped both hips and eased myself forward again. The van now started to occupy the inner bailey, widening it as it advanced. The defenses were only soft, frictional resistance. Meanwhile, the gatehouse held tight to the main force of the invaders, yielding them passage but only under resistance. I pressed forward until the van was deeply into the castle, and only the last inch of the invaders were completely outside. The resistance, incapable of stopping the invasion was now a threat to the cohesion of the invader. The force, which could not be stopped as it was, faced the possibility of firing its missiles futilely and collapsing while still in possession.

I stopped the advance for a moment, then, and explored the neighborhood of the castle with my hand. One finger found that, though the castle was invested, one watchtower below it was still manned. The hider had returned from hiding. Dipping my finger in the honey of the outer bailey, I stroked the watchman until a gasp from the mistress of the castle told me that the message was received. In its pause, the invasion force had recovered, for the nonce, from its danger. I whispered "elbows." Igrayne dropped herself onto hers. I pulled myself fully forward, and the entire force had entered the castle. As well, the entire inner bailey was occupied, and the tip of the van tenderly touched the innermost keep.

Here, my metaphor, as well as my entry, was ended. The keep, soon to be Arthur's keep, was not to be entered by the invading force, but only by its missiles. And those would be fired somewhat later.

She knelt with her knees on the bolster, very wide apart. My knees were on the mattress proper, between her legs, almost together. Her ankles rested on my calves, with her feet touching each other. I was, from knees to crown, rigidly erect and bent slightly backward. Her elbows were resting on the mattress, and -- I presume -- her head was as well. Her back was arched downward, so that our loins were pressed against each other's as firmly as possible. My hands, at that time, were pulling her hips into me and, by the same token, pulling myself into her.

I bowed over her back while smoothing my hands forward over her belly to her breasts. She responded to the caress by straightening her back. We both moved slowly, and the two motions eased me slowly out of her. I could feel the close clasp of the gateway pass over my shaft and the subtler, silkier, friction of her inner bailey slide over the more sensitive head of my organ. For the last half of the motion, the lower lips gave a fleeting caress to the base of my shaft. Once over her, I kissed her spine. Then I drew both my hands down her hanging breasts to the sensitive tips. There they toyed awhile. Her breath was ragged, but I could not tell if it were the position or the sensation.

An easing of the position seemed the best assay of which, so I gently grasped her right shoulder and straightened myself somewhat. She got the message and raised herself on her arms. Each motion withdrew me slightly, and each hairbreadth withdrawal was a sensual delight. I put both hands on her shoulders and stroked back evenly along her sides. Where her waist flared out from its narrowest part, I put on gentle pressure. Simultaneously, I straightened slightly at waist and knees. My motion within her was reversed, but the sensations remained as delightful. I pulled her tightly to me and then bent over again. The withdrawal was less and even slower. The pleasure, if anything greater.

I took her breasts in my two hands and pulled back very gently. She followed the lead and pressed into me as I pressed forward. A minor motion forward on the breasts moved her as easily, and I backed out. She needed merely to get the message for her to cooperate. Soon we were moving against one another at moderate rate, and the motion tightened my loins and threatened my culmination. She, also, was panting more in the easier position. Then she began to move more vigorously. This drove my pleasure to the peak with my tension following amain. The bridle that I was using was too delicate for this new ride, so I abandoned her breasts. My left hand caught her shoulder to guide and restrain her, my right sought below her belly to find her center.

There was no need in this position to spread the nectar which flowed down between her lips. I merely pressed the meeting of those lips rhythmically with her motions. At this, her motions speeded, as did mine. I backed when she went forward, using my hand on her shoulder only to see that our partings excluded the primary juncture. I advanced when she returned, thrusting hard and joying in the rapid friction. I could hear her breathing two notes above my own and could feel the shoulder muscles tense in my hand and her thighs tense against my arm. Our pace kept increasing until, suddenly, her knees slipped from their lodging.

I couldn't let this interfere at that point. I grabbed her left hipbone with my right hand and held her against me. I dropped her shoulder and supported myself on my left arm. I had to pull back for this position to balance, but I took her with me. She spread her legs wide, and I pulled her over me until I was buried deep. When I moved forward, she was ready to push back with her hands. She straightened. Every muscle I could feel tightened. Her belly rested on my arm bone, and I could not have told which was harder. I withdrew, she pulled herself forward. I pressed forward, she pushed back, and I drew her to me with my supporting arm. In violation of all the logic of sieges, the castle assaulted the invading force. The walls of the gatehouse constricted rhythmically on the main body, and then the inner bailey itself was squeezing the vanguard and the furthest advanced forces. My invading force firmed to its uttermost and fired flight after flight of shafts toward the keep. I held her up and pressed her against me. My hips were moving in thrusting motions but her purchase on the mattress was not enough to press back. Most of my motions brought her with me. Nevertheless, the castle attacked the invaders, and the invaders fired on the donjon.

Both actions stopped together. My muscles, which could have pulled us both to the ceiling a moment earlier given a purchase, were now hard pressed to hold myself up. Igrayne would have overstrained my arm if she had not, herself, collapsed so that legs on one end and head and torso on the other were on the mattress. I had only the center to support. This I did an instant longer as I felt her last pulses around me; and the invading force, having lost all firmness, dropped -- rather than fired -- its last volley. I batted the bolster out of the way and eased Igrayne, slick with perspiration, down to the bed. My last effort was to tumble to the side so that I did not fall on her.

Igrayne and I had striven mightily. Sleep was the victor.

Continued in Part Two

---