Fall Revolution 4: The Sky Road

soldering gear and bits of wire and tools. Rough,
unpolished seer-stones of various sizes lay among them. The main
table of the house was a huge oaken piece about a metre and a
half square, with carved and castered legs. A crocheted cotton
throw covered it, weighted at the centre by a seer-stone
hemisphere at least thirty centimetres in diameter, so finely
finished that it looked like a dome of glass. Within it, hills
and clouds drifted by.
    Menial stood by the table for a moment, reached up behind her
head and removed a clasp from her hair, so that the two narrow
braids fell forward and framed her face. Then she lifted the
chain with the talisman, and the other, finer silver chain, from
around her neck and deposited them on the table.
    The place smelt of woodsmoke and pot-pourri and the bunches of
flowering plants stuffed into carelessly chosen containers in
every available corner. The wooden walls were varnished, and hung
with an incongruous variety of old prints and paintings –
landscapes, ladies, foxes, cats, that sort ofthing – and
tacked-up picture-posters related to the project. An open door
led to a tiny scullery; a curtained alcove beside it took up the
rest of that end of the room. I presumed it contained the
bed.
    But it was to a big old leather couch in front of the stove
that she drew me first. She half-leaned, half-sat on the back of
it, and began unbuttoning my shirt, then explored my chest with
her lips and tongue – and teeth – as I applied myself
to undoing the fastenings down the back of her dress, and working
my boots off. As I kicked away the right boot the sgean
dhu clattered to the floor. By this time she had unbuckled my
belt, and with a shrug and a step we both shed our outer clothes,
which fell to the floor in a promiscuous coupling of their own.
Mer-rial stood for a moment in nothing but her long silk
underskirt. I clasped her in my arms, her nipples hard, her
breasts warm and soft against my chest; and we kissed again.
    We moved, we danced, Menial leading, towards the curtained
alcove. She pulled away the curtain to reveal a large and
reassuringly solid-looking bed. I knelt in front of her and
pulled down her slip and knickers, and kissed her between the
legs until she pulled me gently to my feet. I managed to leave my
own briefs on the floor.
    We faced each other naked, like the Man and the Woman in the
Garden in the story. Menial half-turned, threw back the bedcovers
and picked up from the bed a long white cotton nightgown, which
she shook out and held at arm’s length for a moment.
    ‘I won’t be needing that tonight,’
she grinned, and cast it to the floor, and me to the bed.
    I woke in daylight, and lay for a minute or so basking in the
warm afterglow, and hot after-images, of love and sex. Rolling
over and reaching out my arm, I found that I was alone in the
bed. It was still warm where Menial had slept. The air was filled
with the aroma of coffee and the steady ticking of the clock
-
    The time! I sat up in a hurry and leaned forward to see the
big timepiece, and discovered with relief that it was only five
o’clock. Thank Providence, we’d only slept an hour
and a half. With the same movement I discovered a host of minor
pains: bites on my shoulder and neck, scratches on my back and
buttocks, aching muscles, raw skin…
    The animal whose attacks had caused all this damage padded out
of the scullery.
    ‘Good morning,’ she said.
    I made some sort of croaking noise. Menial smiled and handed
me one of the two steaming mugs she’d carried in. She sat
down on the foot of the bed, drawing her knees up to her chin to
huddle inside her sark, its high neck and long sleeves and
intricate whitework giving her an incongruous appearance of
modesty.
    I sipped the coffee gratefully, unable to take my eyes off
her. She looked calmly back at me, with the smile of a contented
cat.
    ‘Good morning,’ I said, finding my voice at last.
‘And thank you.’
    ‘Not just for the coffee, I hope,’ said
Menial.
    I was grinning so much that my cheeks, too, were aching.
    ‘No, not just for the coffee. God, Menial, I’ve
never…’
    I didn’t know how to put it.
    ‘Done it before?’ she inquired innocently.
    Coffee went up the back of my nose as I spluttered a
laugh.
    ‘ Compared with last night, I might as well not
have,’ I ruefully admitted. ‘You are –
you’re amaz-ing!’
    Her level gaze held me. She showed not