The Coupling

Something dark from the past must stay imprisoned

This story is part of the link between The Novice’s Story, which began centuries ago and the series The Invitation set in the 1920s. This part and the concluding part of this, which will follow are free to read.

Each story, or group of stories are standalone tales. There is a full list of the related stories at the bottom of the page.

The Coupling

There was something ominous, something foreboding about the land, but cattle that grazed there grew fat, sheep introduced to the ram gave birth to multiple lambs, game was abundant in the woods, and the crops in the fields grew strong and tall. Men had settled there, hoping to reap this bounty.

The lord who claimed the estate as his, used the profits to build an imposing manor house in its centre and cottages for his tenants grouped in a small village a mile from the house.

Despite the fertility of the land, there was still a darkness that came and went over it like passing storms. The estate passed down the male line, but a strong woman always appeared, a distant cousin, a stranger to the area and they were married to the heir. The men inherited, but the women ruled.

The male line always seemed fragile, sickly; they survived long enough to produce a son before they succumbed. That is why the chapel was built.

The priests had said something evil pervaded the land; they talked of demons, of witchcraft and said that only a shrine to Saint Michael could ward against the unchristian supernatural. It had little effect, but the Lords of the manor knelt inside it in prayer. Some were buried beneath its floors, but most preferred the sanctity of the churchyard. The women dutifully followed their coffins, but they worshiped elsewhere.

The farrier hammered in the last nail and let the horse’s hoof down. “She’s a witch,” he said as he stood up.

“Don’t let you be heard calling the master’s wife a witch,” the steward frowned.

“What, jus cus she’s from somewhere in the East.”

“No, it don’t mean nothin’ whether she is or she isn’t. Them’s higher than us an’ they can do what they like. Now be on your way before you gets me into trouble.”

Zunaira smiled as she heard the men talking in the stable yard below. A witch, no, she wasn’t a witch - she was far more powerful than that.

The evening shadows were spreading remorselessly across the land. The chapel stood in the darkness, only its thatched roof catching the last rays of the setting sun. Built centuries before in an attempt to contain what her line had overpowered, it was still used occasionally by her husband, but cracks were already showing in its walls and the roof was in need of repair.

The three maids were waiting for her in the kitchen. When she entered they picked up baskets of fruit, cooked meats and a flagon of wine.

“Make sure you feed him well, Joan,” Zunaira said.

The maids giggled and curtsied. “Yes, Mistress.

She looked at the skinny girl behind Joan. “This is your first time?”

“Yes, Mistress,” the girl curtsied.

“You know what will happen?”

“Oh yes, Mistress,” the girl’s smile widened.”

The girls carried the baskets across the field outside the manor house until they came to a copse of trees close to the chapel. The ground sloped down steeply by a stone outcrop, the wall of which was covered by ivy and hanging vegetation.

Two of the maids looked around. The night was dark, no sound came from the surrounding field. Joan drew the creepers to one side to reveal the mouth of a cave and all three stepped inside.

Joan took a tinderbox from her pocket and, striking metal on flint, created a faint blue flame which she transferred to a rush torch. The light flickered off the walls of the cave. She slid the torch into the metal rings hammered into the rock.

When she turned around, one of the girls had already lifted the front of her dress and her fingers were pushing aside the dark, matted hairs that covered her quim to expose her pink lips.

“Margery, can you not wait?”

“I want to be wet when he comes,” she giggled. “Especially as his cockerel fills me so well.”

Joan placed her basket at the back of the cave at the edge of the light. The darkness beyond tunnelled deep into the earth.

She turned back to Margery. “We will make each other wet.” Joan untied her kirtle and slipped it off. Wearing just her cotton smock she stepped closer to Margery and pressed her fingers on top of hers. Margery’s fingers released her own quim and she pulled at the front of Joan’s smock, lifting it up so her hand could slide between the long, slender legs.

The third girl placed her basket next to Joan’s and unlaced her outer garments. She joined the other two wearing just her smock. Fingers pressed between moistening lips, hands slid up beneath the rough cotton shrouds to caress breasts and pull at hardening nipples. Tongues snaked across soft flesh and entwined as lips met lips.

The three girls became one flowing mass, like an underwater plant swaying in a gentle current. Then there was the sound of footfalls from the darkness. The girls froze and then turned toward the back of the cave.

A naked young man stood on the edge of the darkness, tall, muscular with a handsome but solemn face framed by a dark head of hair.

“He’s a man,” the new girl whispered to Joan.

“He will change,” Joan hissed. “The Mistress says he is a cambion, born of a union between a human and something more powerful. The offerings will feed his human side,” she paused. “And we will feed the other, as the women of this house have done for centuries.” She looked at the girl. “Do not be afraid, his lusts are most satisfying.”

“I am not.” The girl whispered back. She stood and pulled her smock over her head. Naked, she approached the figure and knelt before him. “I have come, my Lord,” she said as she took his organ into her mouth.

“What is she doing?” Margery whispered.

“Have you never seen that done to a man?” Joan hissed back.

The girl’s head began to move back and forth.

“She is drawing out his seed,” Joan said. “It is a way of pleasing a man without the risk of becoming with child.”

The figure began to buck, thrusting deep into the girl’s mouth. His muscles tensed and rippled into solid ropes beneath skin that darkened and acquired a greenish hue. The girls knew from experience that his body was not the only thing that swelled.

“She’ll never swallow that,” Margery giggled quietly.

But she did. The girl’s lips remained locked around the tumescent column of flesh as the changing figure’s hips jerked. His muscles strained and his body tensed as he poured into her. The girl clung to him as she held almost the full length of his shaft in her mouth and throat, then, just as the others thought she would choke, she slid from him and threw back her head as if savouring a fine wine.

The figure rested his hand on her forehead and Joan and Margery saw her body jerk as if she was possessed. Her skin darkened to become the same shade as his and her muscles rippled as if snakes were writhing beneath her skin.

“We are reunited as one,” a deep, resonant but still female voice poured from the girl’s mouth.

Margery shrieked. The girl swung around towards them, her eyes blazing in her dark face. She snarled like an angry she-wolf.

The maids gathered up their skirts and ran from the cave. Fleeing barefoot across the field until they fell through the door of the hall.

“Mistress, Mistress,” Joan shouted.

She appeared at the top of the stairs holding a single candle.

“The new girl, she… she is possessed,” Joan babbled.

“Calm yourself, girl.” Zunaira descended the staircase, slowly and elegantly as if she was floating rather than taking steps. “Tell me exactly what happened.”

She took him in her mouth, swallowed his emission.” Joan took a deep breath. “And then she changed, as if she was possessed.”

“Describe her.” The Mistress stared at Joan.

“Her skin became almost black, her body grew, seemed to become more solid, and when she turned,” Joan gulped. “Her eyes, they glowed red.”

“Ah,” the Mistress lifted her chin as if thinking. “Did she say anything?” She looked back at Joan.

“At first she said, I have come, my Lord, and then, when she had changed she said, We are reunited as one. And her voice, it was… different.” Joan sobbed and looked at the floor.

“Go clean yourselves up and retire to your room,” Zunaria said quietly. “You will speak of this to no one, do you understand?”

The girls nodded.

“If you do, you will be dismissed from my service and face the judgment of the local courts. Keep quiet, stay here and I will protect you. Now retire. I will deal with this.”

The maids curtsied and turned to leave.

“What was the girl’s name? Zunaria called after them.

“Mary,” Joan said over her shoulder.

Read Part 2 Banished

Medieval

Be warned: many of my supernatural stories are intensely erotic, but in the Medieval period of these stories it is blood more than other bodily fluids, that flows.

The 1920s

The Invitation expanded into an erotic supernatural serial. I have released this first episode as free to read. Still being a little devilish myself, the rest of the series has been published for paid subscribers.

To see all episodes published Contents Page