There is a Word Usage Key is at the end.
I had always thought of myself as a killer. Putting meat on My Lord Robert Montsleigh’s table has long been my daily duty, which is strange considering the tale I am relating which would seem to indicate that my view of myself is in error, and in fact nothing could be further from the truth despite me being Gervaise, Lord Montsleigh’s huntsman and land agent.
I’ve been having strange dreams of late. My Lord pays a bounty on every proven wolf kill. The right ear is what the Master of his coffers pays two pieces of silver for. In my first such dream I had an arrow nocked and the bow string drawn with a wolf in my sights. That was when I noticed it was a nursing bitch. Now I may be a killer, but I’m no monster. All mothers have the right to rear their offspring, and it’s not in me to leave a litter of pups to die from cold and hunger. There have to be some wolves to maintain the health of the deer herds and ensure they don’t overgraze their range and subsequently starve, and in the process harm many of of the plants and other animals that share their estate. I eased the tension on my bow and put my arrow back in my quiver. I heard a woman’s voice behind me say “Thank you, Gervaise,” but when I turned there was no one there.
I’ve done that sort of thing often. My Lord knows, for I’ve told him of it. He also knows I won’t take a stag in his prime, for I deem it better that he sires more fawns than he graces My Lord’s table. My Lord approves of my management of the game and the land, for unlike some of his neighbours we have never run short of meat, fowl, fish or foods from the fields since he promoted me to my post. Even in the hardest of winters followed by the latest of springs in living memory, which was the year before last, his board(1) was plentiful. Most considered I was over young for the post at just short of fourteen and approved not of my practice deeming it a sentimental boyish fancy and lacking a man’s appreciation of reality. That his board had been lean enough to allow hunger to occur before I took the post and never since he says merely proves his ability to select his retainers, and he will brook no criticism of my practice, for he takes it as a criticism of his Lordship. Any who do that must seek a home elsewhere, and he only had to banish two renowned malcontents before the discord ceased. Tis true the game take some of the field crops, but tis only a small amount, and the birds I encourage with seed more than make up for it with the insects they eat. Too the kale doth attract the doves in the winter when meat is sought and they are easy to take and sweet to the tooth. With My Lord’s approval in hard winters I have hay left for the deer and other game and grain and seeds for the fowl.
I have had tenant cottages rethatched and repaired as the funds at my disposal permitted starting with those in the worst condition. The very worst I had demolished and replaced, for folk that live dry and warm thrive and are not averse to helping maintain the estate even when tis not strictly their trade. They will oblige me, for I treat them well and reward their help. My Lord thinks well of this, for he says it makes the estate of greater value. I won’t permit My Lord’s tenant farmers to use fire to clear the ground afore ploughing, for it kills every creature and seed in its path. The freeholders I have no direct control over, but if their farming practice is what I insist the tenants follow, like the tenants I gift them a brace of geese each moon that the geese are with us. I only permit folk to take what eel they need for their immediate use when they are making their yearly journey cross the land to the rivers, for in other places where folk took all the eel they could they no longer have eel. I likewise limit the haaf netters’(2) salmon catch when they are running to spawn and we have abundant salmon. I understand not how it is not seen that to have next year's harvest this year’s stock must be left in peace to be able to breed the next generation, for tis not a difficult thing to comprehend.
I will allow no clear felling of woodland, for there must be enough cover left for our meat supply to shelter from the weather and nesting sites for the birds. Too, the roots bind the soil tightly and prevent the storms from washing all away leaving bare and barren land that will support neither plant not beast. Gifting the odd coney or a quarter hare, even geese over winter ensures my wishes are complied with. None go gainst my wishes, and My Lord approves of my gifting of the geese and game for tis his belief cooperation is easier on his soldiery than enforcing his will or punishing those who break it. Four years ago the rains were light and the harvest lighter. Before hunger had its bite on the folk, My Lord ordered that flour and else from the castle stores be doled out to all according to their needs, including balm(3) from the kitchens for those who had lost theirs through lack of flour to bake and keep it quick.(4) He ordered me to provide meat for the butchers to apportion to our folk too. He can be no easy man to deal with, and his yoke lies heavy on the idle and the shiftless, but he is a popular Lord, for he is generous with pensions for loyal workers in their eld,(5) and alike with widows and orphans, and those hurt in their labours. The folk appreciate his strength, for in it lies their protection in times good and poor alike.
My mother was a beautiful tirewoman(6) of My Lord’s mother, and I was sired upon her by My Lord afore he married My Lady. He treated her gey(7) well, and till her death from natural causes she was almost a guest in the Castle living in a spacious and well appointed set of chambers with her own maid, and at meals was seated at My Lord’s table well above the salt. I was reared as the son of a senior retainer on the Castle’s staff would have been and when it was realised I had keen eyes and was fair set to become My Lord’s best archer he ordered that I be trained for my present position.
My Lady has no children and there is a lot of speculation as to whether My Lord is prepared to name his natural son as his heir, for tis known to all he has no desire for any of his two brothers’ sons to succeed him, for they all see Lordship as a right to live over well at the expense of the folk and the land. My Lord’s brothers are Lords too with estates adjoining My Lord’s, but their folk are destitute. Many of their folk die of starvation every winter, and their impoverished lands scarce support his brothers’ families. They no longer have an adequate number of folk to farm the land tightly(8) and they are envious of My Lord casting greedy eyes this way. My Lady is kind and gentle and she stood in my mother’s shoes after her death vanya(9) ten years ago. She would mother me yet were I not turned twenty.
But back to my dreams. After several such dreams, ones where the woman spake unto me with gratitude, I realised she sounded like my mother. Whether she gradually came so to do, or whether she had all along and I just hadn’t realised it I know not. She’d explained she was the guardian of the land and all that it nurtured. I’d not had converse with her, for I’d not been able to speak, but she said one who only killed when necessary and looked after the plants and creatures of the land as I had always done was of the land too, but in ways I was not yet ready to understand.
I am not made as others, for though I have the parts of a man they are small and neath all I have the parts of a woman too that have monthly courses.(10) I cannot release my stream as a man for it issues forth from where it does on a woman. None know of this, not even My Lord, and for fear of what may happen should it become known I have never known a woman, nor a man, though strangely from time to time I have greatly desired to take or be taken by one or the other.
A recent dream has disturbed me greatly. I was deep in the forest at a deep and still pool known well to me. I had undressed and was bathing when the urge to be satisfied overtook me. That has happened there before, though I knew it was not a previous happening I was watching. With a hand to each of my parts I relieved the aches I had burning deep in my being. Satisfied and relieved, but not entirely so, for I still yearnt to be taken and bear a child as much as I yearnt to take a woman and father one, I waded out of the pool to dress. There for the first time I saw her. She was naked, and she was my mother. She was built as I, both man and woman, but with substantial hips and breasts too, whereas I have narrow hips and merely have large nipples, a woman’s nipples.
“Come to me, Dearest, and take me as I shall take you. We shall carry the seed of each other’s young till we are ready to nurture them. Your name, Gervaise, is that of both women and men, and when you are ready you will live with me and join me in the dreams of humans. Till then our seed in each other’s wombs will lie dormant whilst you take Lord Robert’s place for half a hundred years or so. You will father sons and daughters and his line will continue. Then you will come to look as I with milk filled breasts to nurture your daughter.” When we joined, our parts enlarged to fill each other, and I knew if that was to be my only such experience in my life it would be enough. I lost consciousness at the sweet ending.
When I returned all was misty and she was gone. I returned to the pool to wash and noticed though my feminine parts had become much smaller my manhood remained as it had been whilst filling her. After dressing and mounting my horse the dream faded.
A few days later I had my courses, but I barely lost any blood at all. Whilst tending to myself I noticed two things. My manhood had become as large as in my dream, and my female parts were now completely hidden though still there. My manhood though larger was no more demanding than before, and my womanhood though smaller was still just as demanding and sensitive enough to require attention from time to time. At supper in front of all My Lord confirmed me as his heir and later in private told me he’d arranged a match for me with a neighbouring lord’s pretty daughter who would be fourteen next month. She’d said she was delighted that she would be a lord’s lady and was keen and ready for her bedding and the getting of young.
That night I dreamt I was watching my child wade into the pool and pleasure both natures, before coupling with myself. It was the same dream in content but a different event, and I was not myself but my mother, and the child was myself.
It has been arranged that my bride will arrive at the castle for the wedding next month. Tis a long journey for a wedding procession, so they will set out the eve before as soon as the full moon arises so as to arrive in the late afternoon. Three days later the wedding will be held. I’m told my bride will be at the appropriate part of her cycle to conceive on our wedding night. It’s ironic but so too shall I, though if already pregnant perhaps not. I wonder if my courses will eventually cease due to being pregnant, for I know some women’s do not.
My Lord says I need to be learning Lordship, so by the time I am thirty I shall be able to take all off his hands, but he being Lord will stay his brothers’ hands till I can deal with them myself. He will appreciate the respite in his eld, and when his passing comes his brothers and nephews will not even consider trying to take what will by then be my lands and folk. He opined we had to do it this way, for it would take either of them no more than two years to reduce our bountiful lands to the state that theirs are in now. He has already started my studies with the Master of his coffers. I had no idea we were so beforehand with the world. My Lord has explained to me that over the years he has been quietly buying freehold land and concerns like mills in his brothers’ estates. It is his intent to buy out their lands when his nephews have reduced them to absolute penury and they are worth little for only then will our lands and folk be safeguarded gainst their rapacity. He doubts soldiery will be required for aught other than escorting his erstwhile family off his newly acquired lands. Given my oversight of the land management and his feeding of the folk when necessary he opines after the first winter our new folk will be so glad of the change that his brothers would get no support from the commons if they tried to return by force.
He opines in ten to fifteen years it will be all over, and is of the belief that he has three fifths of the gold in his coffers needed to complete the matter. Not even the Master of his coffers knows of his intent, and he said he only told me because it is as a result of my management that half of that gold is there. “You deserve to be my heir and you deserve to know what we are doing, for much of our day to day prosperity too is as a result of your dealings. I admit I was a little doubtful to begin with, but I understood your intent and believed not that you could make things worse. The folk work more willingly, better and harder for being better fed and housed and all think well enough of you to tell me so. I am proud of you, Gervaise, my son.” He had never acknowledged me like that before, and I was overcome when he gave me the father’s kiss of blessing.
He said I needed to be giving some thought to appointing a huntsman and land agent in my stead. He has heard good things of a cousin of my bride, and said he has views similar to mine as to the pregnant game, the males in their prime and the husbandry of the land, but he is being ignored as a dreamer by his Lord, so I’ve invited him to attend the wedding mentioning my need for a man such as he. If he is as My Lord has heard, and his reply to my invitation indicates he is and more, as his first task I would have him oversee the replanting of the woodland that suffered the lightning blast fire three years ago, with a view to providing cover for the game whilst the trees grow. I have heard of a channel built by the side of the mill pool at Long Grangely, which is four counties over, that enables the salmon to pass upriver without having to leap the pool dam. Tis said to be of cunning construction and I would like him to visit and learn of it’s function with a view to creating similar on our salmon rivers, for I have not the time for such travel.
When I was a child I enjoyed the spring well dressing, the summer turning, the autumn harvest and the winter Yule, as well as the other holidays too, which My Lord has always insisted all folk take time from working to celebrate, for he said folk needed the respite from toil to celebrate life. He maintained if folk had a day to look forward to their work was less onerous, and he enjoyed his time drinking and eating with the folk too, for he was not so high in the instep as to shun rubbing shoulders with them. However, I’ve never been one for superstition or religion, which is just another name for superstition, but I’m very open minded now and wonder what the future will bring. I haven’t had a dream since the one in which I was my mother looking at myself, but I have every reason to believe I shall be Lord Montsleigh one day which the dream predicted. I also believe I’m pregnant with a daughter and shan’t give birth for at least half a century, but time alone will tell, and in the meanwhile pregnant or no I have a family to engender to ensure our lands and folk, which will be far more extensive in the future, continue to be properly cared to. My Lord is already seeking tutors for my sons to be, and My Lady similar for my daughters, but I’m hoping for some guidance from my dreams as to how to live as a man and then subsequently as a woman.
Word Usage Key
1 Board, table.
2 Haaf netting is an ancient type of salmon and sea trout fishing. The technique involves fishermen standing chest-deep in the sea and using large submerged framed nets to scoop up fish that swim towards them.
2 Balm, yeast.
3 Quick, alive.
4 Eld, age.
5 Tirewoman, lady in waiting.
6 Gey, very or exceedingly.
7 Tightly, properly, adequately.
8 Vanya, nearly or almost.
9 Monthly courses, menstruation.
Eleanor was a bonnie young woman, and I could see envy in many a man’s eyes when she was seen by them. Her breasts were scarce contained, perhaps constrained would be a better word, by her bliaut,(1) the sleeves of which were lined with costly silks. As was befitting the only daughter of a wealthy and powerful lord on her wedding procession to the heir of an even more wealthy and powerful lord she was dressed in costly fabrics and gems and was in the care of a dozen finely dressed women and girls. Her escort was nigh to three hundred well horsed and accoutred men at arms all brightly arrayed in the colours of their lord.
She was tall for a girl and had child bearing hips that drew the eyes of men and women alike as she walked. As was befitting a bride she had a blush to her face that rarely left her and it went down as far as the eye could see when she had sight of me. My Lord had said her father had tried to arrange a number of marriages for her, but once seen by prospective matches for her they withdrew due to her height, for they had not wished a bride of greater height than themselves. I would not have been bothered, even had I been of lesser height than she, but I am tall and Eleanor reached no higher than my shoulder, and was as I said a girl of surpassing beauty.
Cloistered and mewed mongst her women and guarded by her father’s soldiery till our wedding she was not available to me for aught but the most commonplace of pleasantries in the hearing of others till after our wedding. Her family and their folk I knew held to the old ways, and her father had sent his chief Brehon and three women skilled in the womens’ mysteries to ensure his daughter was properly married in the eyes of the Goddess and to ensure her birthings were easy and frequent. My Lord who did not encourage the new ways, though he did not forbid them, said it would be for the best if our chief Brehon accompanied by three of our own such women conducted proceedings with those of my bride. My Lady was the most highly respected of our women of the mysteries.
The two Brehons conducted the ceremony and my bride and I were for the first time allowed private discourse though of course we would remain within sight of the six women till they had witnessed the consumation. We only had an hour with each other before we had to dress for the feast.
To my surprise Eleanor addressed me as Sacred One. “Sacred One,” she began with fear and other emotions I could not interpret shewing on her face, “I have met you and your mother before in my dreams, and mostly my dreams were of our wedding night. I recognised you from the drawing My Lord Montsleigh sent to My Lord Father. It was My Lady the Goddess, not my own mother who is chiefest of our wise women, who explained to me the woman’s rôle in the proceedings of the marriage bed and how that begets young. She told me how to prepare a salve to minimise any initial discomfort which would pass and that she would see to it that I enjoyed becoming a woman. She also said that you would have me in child the first time of our lying together. My Lady the Goddess, also told me of and shewed me your secret. I am honoured and consider myself blessèd to be chosen to bear your children. I shall never speak of it to any, but the wise women will know as part of the bedding ceremonies. They will be as proud as myself to serve a manifestation of the Goddess and silent concerning it too. I am, however, concerned as to how to refer to you.”
I was stunned, but her question had to be answered. “In private Gervaise is my name. It is a name used by both women and men. I take it you are unwilling to refer to me as My Lord?”
“It is lacking in respect to refer to a manifestation of the Goddess so.”
“It is not usual here, though it accords with all protocol, but since I am the heir apparent to a Duchy you could refer to me as Your Grace. It is a lesser title as we understand things, but acceptable. Would it so be to you and the wise women.”
“Yes, to both questions Your Grace. Gervaise.”
It is not appropriate to talk much of the bedding ceremonies with the women, nor think I that it would be respectful of Eleanor. Let it suffice to say we were both examined by the women as the prayers and invocations were said. Explanations were given by the women as to what we were about to do and how to do it to achieve pregnancy and pleasure. The women were embarrassed and fearful of giving offence by explaining to me. My Lady said, “Sacred One, I have loved you as mine own son. If that has caused any offence I do crave your pardon. We have traditional obligations to tell you of things we know we need not, but none have ever been in this situation before. We know you know more of these matters than we. What would you have us do?”
“Let us all fulfil the requirements of tradition, My Lady. I submit myself and my bride to your care. I would not have you thinking that you have not met the obligations placed upon you by your service to the Goddess.” It was a relieved looking group of women who smiled at us and the night passed as it was supposed to. Eleanor was pleased to become a woman, a wife and a mother, and both my natures were deeply satisfied with the assistance of the women. Eleanor was indeed pregnant from that night and our son was the first of twenty-four children. She was almost perpetually pregnant for thirty years and none of our children was ought but of one nature. My Lord Montsleigh was delighted that his heir had an heir and more so as his descendants increased in number. Eleanor was a good mother and enjoyed her pregnancies, nursing and the rearing of her children, and in time became the most senior of our women of the mysteries. But I am getting in front of myself.
Eleanor’s cousin Gareth was everything I’d hoped for. Not quite as good as myself with a bow, but more than good enough and better by far with a sword than myself, he fitted into the life of the castle quickly and easily. He was popular with our folk and his word was accepted as mine had been, for his rule did not replace mine it merely extended it. We spent months together so I could introduce him to the tenantry and free holders alike. That he was blood kin of Eleanor’s meant he was noble in his own right, but he became the brother I had never had. My Lord Montsleigh and his Lady treated him thusly, as family, and his counsel was valuable to My Lord and myself.
Gareth had been with us a little more that a year and we had been discussing the new fish runs that by passed the obstructions on our waterways. He had done excellent work and we were talking with a view to providing another two. When we had finished our discussion, he asked My Lord, “Sire, I have no desire to pry and only have the weal of this land as my care, so pray take not amiss what I would have converse of.”
My Lord looked him in the eye and said, “I think I know what it is you would tell me of, but even if I have misread you fear not for your dedication to this land and its folk is clear to me. Speak freely, Gareth, for I would have no leal and true man afeared to lay his concerns before me.”
“My Lord, I have heard rumours from the commons concerning your brothers and their sons.” My Lord nodded for him to continue. “Their lands are ill managed and hunger stalks their lands and their folk both. They cast covetous eyes upon the crops of the field and the game. I am told their harvest is going to fail to feed their folk through the next year for lack of sufficient tenants to manage the land well enough to prevent the weeds over taking the crops. There have been strangers seen spying the lay of your lands and where the crops are growing this year. Some of our folk have been questioned and roughly too. Earlier this morn I was apprised that but two days since three garbed as itinerants but with the bearing of men at arms abducted one of the daughters of the miller at Long Sorely Wood. The Miller and his kin rescued the maid and captured the three. I would have put them to the question, but alas they were no longer able to answer. I suspect invasion and would have your commands in the matter, My Lord.”
My Lord smiled and said, “Gareth, Gervaise and I have been planning for this for some time. Fear not. I do believe we need to include you in our plans for you have become as a younger son to me. Pray do tell, why were the three in no case to be put to the question?”
Gareth looked sheepish, but was steadfast in his reply. “The blame is to be laid at my door, My Lord, for some few weeks since I had suspicions all was not well and I authorised the folk in the out lying parts of the estate to take what measures they considered necessary for the weal of the land and the folk, rather than wait to get word here and then for instruction.”
“And?”
“As punishment the miller’s sons tied the three to the mill wheel, My Lord. The men were forgotten for they were busy milling the barley they had not milled due to having stopped work to rescue their sister. I believe they worked through the night to catch up for fear of disappointing you lest you thought they had been idle, and at some point the men must have died of it.”
My Lord had tears in his eyes and was choking with laughter, “Is that truly what they thought, Gareth?”
Gareth grinned and replied, “No, My Lord, but it’s what I said I would tell you. I gave them promise of a good man for their sister despite her ordeal, even if I have to dower her myself.”
“You did well, Gareth, very well. Save your coin, for I shall provide the girl’s dowry in gold. However, to make the most of this unfortunate mistake make sure that word of it returns to my brothers’ men at arms. And add that I laught so much when I was told of it I nearly was carried away by apoplexy. Now we have things to tell you of our plans.”
As My Lord and Gareth had thought the attempt came just before harvest time when there would be food to reward any his brothers hired, but the assassination attempt on My Lord caught us by surprise. I had heard and seen the plot in a dream, but they must have changed their plans at the last moment. My Lord took a poisoned arrow to his shoulder, but knowing who we were looking for we caught the assassin. My Lord was failing fast, but that night as I slept my mother shewed me where the herbs grew, how to prepare them and how to use them to heal My Lord who recovered consciousness within the day though his shoulder was a moon and a half in the healing. He kept to his chambers, and none were permitted to tend to him other than Eleanor, My Lady and their most trusted tire women.
We held our meeting in My Lord and My Lady’s solar(2) which was separate from their bedchamber, and decided to put it about that he died of his wound to provoke reactions from his brothers before they were properly ready. In return for information the assassin was promised a quick and painless death. He confirmed it was My Lord’s brother Richard who had ordered the attack, but he knew no more. We sent one of My Lord’s spies to the assassin posing as servant of Richard’s to help him escape from the dungeon. He was told a prisoner had died and would be taken out in a sacking bag for burial and he would be substituted for the dead man. He was led to believe that several of Richard’s men had infiltrated the castle staff and they would carry the corpse out.
Of the three brothers only My Lord Montsleigh has a castle, for Richard and William had never managed to amass the monies required for such an undertaking. The monies that proper care of their lands and folk would have enabled. The assassin was released outside Richard’s fortified manor house, and we heard when he went for his reward he did indeed receive the quick and painless death he’d been promissed. My Lord closed the mills and recalled all his tenants from his brothers lands. They fired such barley crops as there were and the brothers had a great deal of civil unrest to deal with, for those who have nothing to lose will risk aught. Lord Richard came to claim our lands thinking his brother dead. Believing he would face no opposition from me he sought to over face me. I had him manacled, but even that did not abate his arrogance. “You won’t risk the blood of kin on your hands, bastard boy,” he said contemptuously.
“True,” I told him. “Gareth, would you be interested in managing this and Richard’s estate from my uncle’s manor house after we have put all in order? As Lord I mean. Richard has but the one daughter, and I would offer you my cousin Constance to make the title right in the eyes of the folk.”
“There can’t be two lords of an estate, My Lord Gervaise.”
“True. But you can not be counted as my blood kin since you are related to My Lady not me, so if you do war upon my uncle there would be no blood killing. Of course I am not able offer you my cousin to wife whilst Richard and I are enemies for then you would have to chose sides and either way would be at war with family. However, with her father in my dungeon I have to find a husband for my cousin who would manage my uncle’s estate with competence. A husband who would not then become my enemy. That could not be you, for you would then be kin as well as my land agent. With your father in law in my gaol that could make matters difficult between us, so you see my dilemma?”
“Indeed My Lord, I understand your situation entirely. Tis a thorny problem, but one easy to solve.” Gareth solved the matter with a single dagger thrust seen by none other than my self. Richard’s men were a goodly way away under guard and saw naught. Gareth held him upright and said to his men, “Lord Richard appears ill let us assist him to his chamber.” Richard was taken out of the hall as though he were being assisted to walk. When Gareth returned, he asked, “A hunting accident think you, My Lord?”
“Indeed. Can you manage it with no suspicion, or would it be better to just bury him and say naught?”
“I used the dagger exactly how he would look if gored by a boar. I’ll even have the boar there with his dagger having killed it for his own men to find. He was slowing down, My Lord. It comes to all men in time, but he was too proud to let a younger man take the beast, and you did offer did you not? There must have been twenty men who heard you I dare say. Leave it to me.”
I left Gareth to his machinations and went to have speech with My Lord in his chambers. I told him of what had transpired and he said, “Gareth is a good man wouldn’t you say, Gervaise?”
“Indeed, My Lord. A true brother to me, but it was convenient that he has no blood tie to us was it not? He has need of lands and a wife too, and all will be in good hands. He told me Richard had put a price on his head because he believed if Gareth were dead our eyes and ears about the estate would be gone. As long as Richard was alive to pay for his head he was in danger, so Richard brought about his own death, for dead men pay no debts. Gareth says Richard is now in debt to him for that he has saved him the gold.”
My Lord started to chuckle, them I saw the tears rolling off his face as he sat down unable to stand for his laughter. Eventually he asked, “What was the price Richard put on Gareth’s head?”
“Five gold pieces, which I seriously doubt he would have been able to pay. I suspect the payment would have been a length of steel like his other assassin received. Gareth said he felt insulted, for it should have been at least ten preferably twelve gold pieces.”
My Lord laughter abated and he said, “Richard’s two sons are just as dangerous as their father, but they’ll be wanting to kill each other now for the estate. Which means I suspect shortly there will only be one of them to deal with. I want all the soldiery on duty, cancel all leave. Tell any who have family at any distance to bring them into the castle. A man can’t be alert when he is worried for the safety of his family. To keep them occupied all children above six shall be taught to read and write. Their fathers will be grateful for such an opportunity for their children. Have our women see to it, Gervaise, we need the men in good heart, and gratitude for care makes a man a stouter warrior.”
“Certainly, My Lord. What think you Richard’s sons will do when they hear of his death under what they will always believe were suspicious circumstances no matter what Gareth arranges?”
“They’ll join William, for most of their men are here under guard. What do you plan for Richard’s men? And when do you think it best to start bringing order to his lands?”
“I think it not right to kill them, for they had sworn to your brother and were fulfilling that oath. I want them under lock and key, but treated well till William is dealt with. Then like William’s men they may either leave or take oath with you and join our soldiery. Their rations here are a considerable improvement of what they had before so most will take oath with you. As to bringing Richard’s lands into order, again not till William is dealt with, but I’ll have a dozen of our most experienced sergeants take a score men each and deliver food for the folk. I’ll have the millers return with a waggon of barley apiece with the sergeants. There has been famine there for so long if we don’t feed the folk we won’t have any folk to feed. I’ll make sure Richard’s men are aware their families will be fed. What think you William will essay My Lord? Assassination like Richard?”
“No he has not the stomach for it. Or the neck to try to out face you. I suspect he’ll recruit soldiery to try to do it by force. He has no gold, but he’ll promise them loot and rapine when they win. He’ll only manage to recruit riff raff and those of stupidity, for any seeing his burnt out lands and hearing of his poor board will realise our men will be better armed and of greater heart. Even men at arms seeking a position will not sign to a battle they know they can not win, and my recruiters are abroad with coin picking up any men at arms seeking a position. We don’t need them, but I would deny them to William. We’ll face a rabble of two hundred men, three at most, poorly accoutred and ill led with a few thousand well trained and accoutred men to our side. Have Gareth have look outs for any movements of armed men round William’s manor house and as soon as we know of any coming this way I want four hundred archers at the neck of High Tor pass. They’ll march that way, for due to his parsimoniousness William will not wish to feed them for the time any other route would take. He won’t allow them to subsist off his own lands, so he’ll want them ravaging my lands as soon as possible. Have word got to William’s own sworn men that any who sue for clemency shall have it and a place with us if they so will which will just leave the rabble to deal with. Think you that Gareth knows I should not be unhappy to bury William and my nephews too, for they will have broken blood oath in facing us in battle?”
“I’m sure of it My Lord. He’ll not wish to have to call any of them brother or even cousin, but I’ll have a word concerning his intent. William has two daughters does he not? What comes to them? Twould be best were they to marry of two of our senior retainers’ eldest sons think you?”
“Indeed. You are becoming shrewd, my son. His eldest was married, but died in childbed. My Lady was told they had no women of the mysteries or of midwifery skills to attend her. I’ll begin making enquiries as to who on the staff would like a blood connection to us on the understanding that I’ll want those brides with child as soon as possible to prevent rancour. I want no old men looking for a pretty girl to while away their twilight years with failing offerings to kinship blaming a barren wife. Far better a young man with his sap rising willing to listen and keep his bride pregnant. What say you, Gervaise?”
“You said I was becoming shrewd, My Lord, yet the old dog, can still teach the young one a few tricks.”
It was not so much a battle as a slaughter. None of William’s rabble reached the pass, and his sworn men making up the rearguard did not enter the final ravine leading up to it. Gareth had the four hundred men at the neck of the pass and another four hundred, his best archers including all his huntsmen, hidden down the sides of the route. The men at the neck waited till the enemy were past the men lining the trail before their first volley. It was all over in minutes and not a man used a sword. They all died by arrow. William with his sons, nephews and rabble were left for the kites, ravens, wolves and foxes to clean up. After having been fed their first adequate meal in months of as much meat and fresh baked bread as they could hold William’s sworn men gladly took oath with My Lord. Many told us the bread tasted strange for that it had no mould on it. Straightforth we started investing William’s and Richard’s lands with our own soldiery to prevent any other laying claim to what we had already taken by right of battle, and our new men were trained in our ways back at the castle under My Lord’s officers, for their skills were poor by our standards. Their weapons and protection were poor too, and our smiths used their weapons to reforge better, and they were accoutered with better protection.
There was no opposition and My Lord’s recruiters went about the lands of others seeking craftsmen and men willing to become freeholders or tenants. My Lord’s open handed dealings with those beholden to him brought us enough of the kind of folk we desired and by the end of the second spring when hunger is at its worst the three estates were little different from each other. As a result of his brothers’ acts My Lord’s gold had been saved. Not needed to buy the lands we had taken it was spent first ensuring all lived dry and warm and later on improving the estates. Gareth and his bride moved into William’s Manor house and we demolished what was left of Richard’s for twas in fearful poor condition. That was the site we selected to raise the new castle upon. The three estates were divided into two and managed as one.
William’s daughters were happy to marry young men of rank, wealth and power who spent more on them in a week than their father ever had in a year. Their days of poverty, and hunger too, were over, and they were no longer fearful of dying from pregnancy like their sister. William had told them they were to marry old men like their sister had, for he’d had promises of gold for them, and given no assurances regarding midwives and the like. Constance, now Gareth’s wife, proved to be a mine of information concerning Richard and William’s activities. She was intelligent and knew every last man, woman and child on the estates. She knew who was leal and who was shiftless and was already a woman of the mysteries, despite her lack of years. The family became prodigious wealthy and our way of dealing with our folk and lands were adopted by our neighbours and spread wider afield with time.
My Lord lived to be seventy, and it was a sorry day for all when he breathed his last, for he was a well loved Lord. I had been Lord effective for a number of years by then, and determined to turn matters over to Simon my eldest and heir before I became too agèd to assist. My Lady had followed My Lord within the year. I think she had no will for life without him, for he had been a devoted and loving husband to her.
I gave Simon Lordship when I was fifty-eight, for Eleanor died suddenly over young, and I knew my time here was drawing to a close.
Simon had been Lord for nearly ten years when I had the dream of my passing. I had not had a dream for a few years, but that night I dreamt I was with my mother looking down on myself laid out in my bed with grieving kin all about me. When I awoke I was with my mother who said, “Your time as my son is over. It is time to be your other self, Daughter Gervaise. Come, let us have speech of the future.”
1 Bliaut, a dress tight under the breasts and allowing their display under a blouse like its descendant the Bavarian Dirndl. A bliaut is characterised by its long open drooping sleeves often reaching down to the floor it often features an embroidered bodice and pleated skirts.
2 Solar, a room in many English and French mediaeval manor houses, great houses and castles, mostly on an upper storey, designed as the family’s private living and sleeping quarters. Within castles they are often called the ‘Lords’ and ‘Ladies Chamber’, or the ‘Great Chamber’.
Patience, that it what it takes, patience. For the next eighty years I learned about herbs, not just herbs on one world but on hundreds of worlds. What I considered to be the huge amount of information Mother had placed in my mind concerning every aspect of womanhood, monthly courses, pains, relief from pains, the skills of the bed chamber, dealing with the pregnant, with child birth, with stitching where necessary, giving the mind surcease from grief, bringing in a woman’s milk, how to enable a babe to suckle, was in fact nothing compared with what I was about to learn. I learnt vastly more under her gentle tutelage. I learnt about the healing of sick bodies, including the breaking of fevers and the setting of bones, and then of sick minds. I learnt to look inward till I could feel and see the tiny speck that was my just fertilised daughter to be. I could tell even small and unformed as she was that she would be like myself and Mother: a being of two natures.
All this time my man’s parts were not so much shrinking as being absorbed ready to be called upon when needed. I had to focus my eyes and my mind on them to be able to see and be aware of them. The mound of my womanhood became more pronounced and visible. Mother said my courses were light due to my pregnancy. My body was changing, but very slowly. I had never been hairy, but such hair as I had became softer, and every few years when I thought to look there was less of it. Mother had no hair on her womanhood, nor under her arms, and her body was completely hairless. Her glorious head of hair and tiny arched eyebrows along with her sweeping lashes were what she had. She said I would look like that eventually.
From time to time my bones ached as they changed, particularly deep in my womanhood. Mother said my changing pelvis was necessary for me to be able to give birth. I lost no height, but Mother is tall too, the same as myself. My shoulders seemed to be narrowing a bit and beginning to slope.
I’d always had a woman’s nipples, and they’d always been sensitive enough to provide me with relief, far much more so than my male parts when I was a child, but now there’s a deep throbbing behind them, and their encircling penumbras that show against the paleness of my chest are expanding. Mother says I’m undergoing what all girls do on their way to becoming women. I can’t stop touching my breasts and my womanhood, not for relief, but in wonder. I asked Mother why it was going to take me longer than most folk lived for to undergo what a girl does in a handful of years. I should have thought of the answer myself. A girl only has to undergo it; she doesn’t have to understand it. It will be likewise with my pregnancy. I’ve been pregnant for so long in order that I can think about it which I have been doing for decades.
I can see that I will be a deep bosomed woman with substantial hips like Mother, and our daughters will start their arrested development together. I asked her whether we would have other children, and was told that is why we have a male nature and it will reassert itself every thousand years or so to enable us to give each other a child. It will take a thousand years to rear our children to the point where they can manage populations on their own. I have so much to learn. I asked Mother if Lord Montsleigh was really my father. She smiled and said she lay with him so there was a reason for her pregnancy that would protect me, for he was a good man and had asked her to marry him. I was about to ask who was my father when she told me she was the first of our kind and she was both mother and father to me and had carried me for hundreds of years before she found a home with My Lord that enabled her to allow me to develop in safety. I was surprised it was not just physical safety she meant. It takes specially educated women to learn the mysteries, and there has to be a large number of them in close proximity to each other to provide that community of female protection all women need to thrive as well as they can. She spent centuries teaching and training hundreds of women in the county I grew up in and the surrounding ones too before there were enough women to educate the others as they passed from birth to womanhood. Mother said there was a minimum number of such women necessary before that way of thinking became accepted as simply the way women viewed things.
I learnt, and as I did my hips widened, my buttocks filled out, my shoulders sloped more and my breasts grew. My hands and my feet became smaller, slimmer and my skin became softer and more sensitive. I’d always had a somewhat androgynous face, but it was now beautiful and feminine just like Mother’s, and my hair had grown to reach below my waist. I could now focus my gaze on anything within me or without, and I could assist the necessary changes to take place. I lost muscle yet gained strength. I’d no idea Mother was so strong.
Directing the dreams of others was easy whether man or woman, and whether two, ten or many thousands at one time. What was not easy to learn was how to throw the net of my mind abroad to find those whose dreams needed direction. That took me centuries to learn, but Mother was a patient teacher, and now I can do it effortlessly.
Eventually Mother said I now knew as much as she and I could do all that she could encompass. She added that there was much learning to do, but that we should learn it together.
Perhaps I should explain why this has all come to be. There is a self destructive element in the make up of all life forms, and it runs particularly strongly in males, and most especially so in human males. Mother realised it as a girl. She was born of two natures, and her male nature was as that of other males: powerful and desirous of bringing all under control. She told me unchecked eventually that would result in the death of all living things, both plant and animal, on a world. She shewed me several such worlds that had been completely used up in that way due to a lack of understanding that all must be kept in balance. The predator to prevent the grazer from turning the land into a desert. The grazer to prevent any particular plant achieving dominance which in the face of blight would lead all to starve, and all in their time to provide the soil which nourishes all with nourishment.
Her female nature was that of other females: nurturing, caring, and as she came to realise, ultimately far more powerful than any male’s capabilities. As she grew up her thoughts became more powerful. She was surprised to realise one day she was more than twice over three score years and ten and still little more than a girl. Her influence on the women about her had grown. Her dual nature had been known to the then long gone woman who delivered her, and though it was occasionally talked of by women none were then alive who had seen her, so it had become a myth that women accepted without belief like unicorns and dragons. Desirous of a child, but not of exposing herself to any, it eventually occurred to her that she could father a child upon herself.
Once pregnant she became aware she would be pregnant for many centuries till her mind had developed sufficiently to allow her to manage and control her pregnancy. Control she said meant influencing every aspect of my being. She not only fathered and bore me she created me in her own likeness for the task that was ahead of both of us. The first part of her task being the rearing of myself.
Males compete, but females cooperate, so to facilitate her aims she created the concept of ‘the mysteries’ that women would learn of the deeper necessities and start to teach their daughters from birth. Only that way could the necessarily bold and venturesome aspects of males be guided and their self destructive natures be channelled into positive directions. She shewed me how she had rejuvenated and repopulated some of the worlds that had been lost long before her birth. That we are referred to as manifestations of ‘The Goddess’ amuses her, but she says it sounds more impressive than being manifestations of ‘The Guardian’ and means her wishes and directions are more speedily implemented.
Eventually we looked like sisters and we each knew what the other knew. For us both it was a new beginning. Mother had never had a companion before, and I had never been a long lived adult woman before. I have no idea how long our pregnancies lasted once the barely discernable specks of our daughters started to develop, but I was aware of every second. Being with child was the ultimate expression of my womanhood, and it filled me with joy. Guiding the development of my daughter was wonderful, and I was glad it took so long. As my belly swelled and my breasts filled my life concentrated on the life I bore, and Mother said it was thus with her too and had been when she bore me.
My body was the perfect size and shape to facilitate the quick, easy and pain free delivery of my daughter, and I was in the perfect physical, mental and emotional condition to assist. Mother delivered my daughter, and as she had told me would be the case I have little memory of events, though I can clearly remember my euphoria when she first took my nipple into her mouth. Three days later Mother gave birth and I delivered her daughter. We examined ourselves and restored our bodies to their pre pregnancy states and focussed our attentions on our babies.
Once our girls had started to develop Mother had insisted we withdrew our attentions from the worlds we had been guiding. She said there would come a day when we could do both, but we were too new to pregnancy to manage both and our pregnancies and daughters were of more significance to the universe than the fate of a few dozen worlds. Once our daughters were weaned, walking and talking we cast our minds abroad again for the first time in many years.
Most worlds were continuing along the path she had set their feet on, but some few had self destructed. Many were diverging from her path, but were salvageable. Saddest of all were the ones that had gone too far. All we could do was watch as habitat and bio destruction turned them into deserts, resource depletion and poisoned oceans took them into famine and anarchy and war finally took them all the way down the path to planetary extinction. The world I had grown up on was one such, but one day a few thousands of years in the future when we have both born numerous daughters and there are enough of us to never have to withdraw our attentions from those we would care for we shall rejuvenate and repopulate Earth.