The Key to Eve
a fantasy
4
The Vagabond
“I DON’T THINK I did anything wrong,” Peri commented to a wolf who happened his way a few days later. “I mean, not too wrong. I would have asked permission if I could have found a way into the grounds. I even offered to work for the privilege of having eaten it.”
“We have to take our food from where we find it,” Br’er Lupus nodded wisely.
“Well, the old witch didn’t need to put a curse on me. And I don’t even know what it means! ‘Wander.’ What else would I do? It is all I’ve ever known. ‘Until I find my Eve.’ Who is that? How am I to find what I do not know? And what is the key to her heart? If there is one thing I do not understand even more than I do not understand curses, it is riddles!”
“Even the animals have riddles,” Br’er Lupus said. “What is the opposite of a kit? Now, if you answer a Sire, you might find you are talking of a female. And if you answer a Bitch, you might find a male. Yet the old ones in the pack howl with laughter when teasing the kits with that riddle.”
“Yes, of course,” Peri answered. “It shows we are not so different, are we?” Peri, of course, understood the joke in the wolf’s tongue. It wouldn’t translate well to the human tongue.
“As long as we sojourn with our own kind, we live in peace. Be careful in whose den you rest your head. Some would welcome you for a meal and you would find you were the main course.”
“Br’er Lupus, I thank you for your warning. I believe there is a village ahead and you should depart from my company. Villagers do not understand the wisdom of the wolves.”
“Peace be with you, Br’er Talker,” the wolf said as he turned off the path into the woods.
It did not take terribly long for the witch’s curse to become clearer. Peregrine was hungry. He reached an inn and asked the innkeeper for work to earn a bowl of soup and a place to sleep. It happened that the inn had lost its stableboy when the innkeeper caught him sleeping with his daughter. There had been a funeral only that day.
Peri was sent to muck out the stables, which had not been done for several days. He bent his back to the work and listened to the conversation of the horses.
“Still a smell of blood over there in the last stall,” snorted an old bay. “No one’s been in to clean since the innkeeper stabbed the stableboy with a pitchfork.”
“I’ll clean that one out first,” Peri answered. He quickly removed the bloody straw and laid a fresh bed in it.
“She’ll like that,” said a strong black stallion as he stood in the aisle watching Peri clean his stall. “She always likes clean straw.”
“Likes? Who likes. I thought that was the stall I was to sleep in.”
“So it is. She’ll visit.”
“Who?”
“The innkeeper’s daughter,” a gray mare commented. “She’s a silly filly in heat. Lifts her tail for whomever will cover her.”
“Oh, she won’t be interested in a boy like me. I’m more comfortable talking to you than to humans.”
“We’ll see,” said the old bay.
And, indeed, Peregrine did see.
After he had eaten the thin soup the innkeeper fed him for his labor, he returned to the stable to sleep for the night. He was very tired after walking all morning and then working hard all afternoon. This was his life. He always slept soundly.
Until the innkeeper’s daughter slipped into his stall.
“What? Who’s that?”
“I’m Alysha. I just want a little time with you.”
“Oh. I was asleep.”
“You were talking in your sleep. To someone who you called Br’er Lupus.”
“Oh, yes. He was helping me earlier this morning to understand the witch’s curse.”
“A wolf was helping you?”
“Yes.”
“You talked to him and he talked back?”
“In our heads.”
“I see. You talk in animals’ heads and they talk in yours?”
“Yes.”
“Can you see what is in my mind?”
“I’m not very good with people.”
“I think you just haven’t explored the right person… in the right way… deeply enough. Understand?”
“No,” Peri squeaked.
“Oh, but you are thinking about it. I can tell,” she said, handling his man meat.
“I don’t know where that came from!”
“I do. And I know where it is going.”
“What…? What…? What are you doing.”
“I’m making a real man of you. Don’t you like it?”
“It’s… amazing!”
“Yes. Young. Strong. Big. Amazing.”
“You must be my Eve.”
“Alysha. Remember?”
“Oh. Yes. Oh!”
“Yes! Buck under me, young stallion. Give me all you have.”
“I don’t have any more!”
“Oh yes, you do. I can feel it coming. Give me. Give me. Give me.”
Peregrine was overwhelmed with his body’s response to Alysha. He shook and his eyes rolled back in his head as he emptied himself into the innkeeper’s daughter.
“Oh, that was good,” she sighed. “Be sure to be gone before dawn in the morning. I packed you a sandwich.”
With that, Alysha abruptly rose from Peri, breaking their connection, and ran back to her room in the inn.
Peregrine lay on his back staring into the darkness wondering what had just happened to him. It took a long time before his heart returned to his chest and he fell asleep.
He was up before dawn, said goodbye to the horses, and ran from the stable, the inn, and the town. He did grab the sandwich that girl had left for him. She was the innkeeper’s daughter, he supposed, but he couldn’t remember her name. He felt empty inside and eating the sandwich didn’t help.
He lived off fruits, berries, and vegetables he could scavenge along the path for several days. His encounter with the innkeeper’s daughter—what was her name?—left him with a hunger he had never had before. It started deep in his groin. He traveled several days before deciding to trust a farmhouse to approach for work, a meal, and a place to sleep.
“I’ve cattle on the slopes yet,” the farmer said. “My daughter is up there, but I expect it is too big a job for her to bring the herd down by herself. Go up and help her. Beware of the bull. He can get mean if you prod him. When you are back with the herd and my daughter, there will be food and a place in the barn for you.”
The farmer pointed up the slope and gave Peri a couple of landmarks to guide him. Then Peri was off up the hills to find the cattle and the farmer’s daughter.
The herd was right where he’d been told it would be and the daughter was watching them, but not attempting to hurry them downhill.
“Hi. I’m Peregrine. Your father sent me to help you get the herd down to the barnyard,” he announced when she saw him. She looked back at the herd.
“Could have done it alone,” she said, looking him over. “But you might be useful.”
“Well, we can start them moving now.”
“Can’t,” she said with a heaving breath.
“Why?”
“Well, look!”
In the middle of the herd, the bull was mounted on one of the cows and was plowing away in her. Peri noticed the young woman was shifting her weight back and forth, and rubbing her legs together.
“Hmm. Well, when he’s finished, then.”
“He’ll just go to another one. They’ve come in season.”
“Br’er Bull,” Peri called to the cattle. “When you’re finished with that one, we need to move your herd down to the barnyard before the weather closes in. You can smell the snow in the air.”
“Don’t bother me, Talker,” the bull said. “And stay away from my cows.”
“I’ve nothing to do with your cows but to see you’re all safe and secure before the snow flies.”
“Ohhh!” the bull bellowed as his haunches thrust forward one more time. He dropped off the cow and bellowed again. All the cattle started moving toward the farm.
“You talked to him? He listened?”
“They’re quite reasonable when you point out the obvious,” Peri laughed. “He wants them all safe and sheltered so he can continue when he gets them home.”
“There’s more to be serviced than cows tonight,” the girl said.
They were back to the barnyard in time for dinner. The bull wasted little time selecting his next mate. The two young people went into the house to eat as the sun set.
After dinner, the farmer—Peri thought he could have gone up the slopes himself if he’d had a mind to—drank new beer from a barrel and was soon snoring in front of the fire.
“Bella, take the young man to the barn and show him where he can sleep for the night,” the farmer’s wife said to their daughter.
“Yes, Ma-Ma.”
Bella grabbed Peri’s hand and led him to the hayloft in the barn.
“That old bull makes me randy!” Bella said as she stripped off her clothes in a hurry.
“What? What are you doing?”
“Getting ready for you to mount me. Undress!”
Peri got out of his clothes hurriedly, his stiffening man meat sticking out in front of him. Bella sucked it into her mouth to coat it thoroughly with her saliva, then dropped to her hands and knees in front of him. She guided his cock into her waiting sex and began humping back furiously.
“Yes, Br’er Bull! Mount your cow. Plant your seed deeply in her. Yes!” Bella called.
Peri was caught up in the sensations, her encouragement, and the hunger he had recently acquired. He thrust into her again and again, finally allowing his own eruption to claim him as the girl moaned her pleasure.
“Are you my Eve?” he asked.
“No. I’m your cow. Come back here and do it again!”
Peri leaned over her back and squeezed her swinging udders as he mounted her again, just as the bull bellowed from below. After three times, Peri discovered he did not have the stamina of the bull, who was now dozing in a corner of the shelter, a dozen cows with their noses to him.
Bella collapsed on top of him and fell asleep there.
In the morning, Bella looked around for her dress and tossed Peri his pants and shirt.
“I’ll gather the eggs for breakfast. Toss down hay for the cows and try not to be distracted by the bull’s antics. We’re done now.”
She left the loft and Peri did as he was told. It had been an interesting night. He’d worked hard, earned his food, and fucked the farmer’s daughter. What was her name? He couldn’t remember. He felt empty and hungrier inside, even after he’d eaten the egg the farmer’s wife cooked before he started wandering again.
Days turned to weeks and weeks to years. Peri wandered the countryside, working, talking to animals, and servicing whatever woman found him desirable at the time. But he could never remember their names—only the emptiness they left inside him.
