stripped off, seeming not to mind at all that Lia was watching. She was a very pretty girl with a slender figure. Her breasts were smooth and firm, slightly smaller than Lia’s, and tipped with pale pink nipples. She sponged herself all over with a washcloth, shivering as she did so, then dried and dressed hurriedly.
‘We have to be quick,’ she explained. ‘Holmann will beat us if we’re late.’
As Lia bathed it occurred to her that Dagna wasn’t there, and hadn’t been in the dormitory all night. She asked Tilda about it and was told that Dagna usually slept with Holmann. Six nights a week, in fact, though not on Thursdays.
‘Thursday night he takes one of us others to bed,’ she said. ‘That’s how Jensine got pregnant. It’ll be you this week, for sure; you must have seen the way he looks at you. He can’t poke you, of course, you being a virgin and all, so he’ll probably make you suck him. Have you ever sucked a cock before?’
Lia shook her head and felt herself blushing. She dried herself and slipped on her smock, thinking of Helma on her knees, her head moving back and forth as she serviced the soldiers.
‘It’s not so bad,’ Tilda said. ‘True, Holmann’s old and ugly, but at least he keeps himself clean, which is more than you can say for some.’
They hurried along to the kitchen. The overseer scowled at them, and Lia was sure he would beat them for tardiness, but fortunately the old woman asked him a question and distracted him.
‘That’s Berta,’ Tilda whispered. ‘She does most of the actual cooking. For some reason Holmann never seems to pick her for his bedmate on a Thursday. I wonder why…’
She giggled, and Lia looked at Holmann fearfully, sure he would hear. But the overseer was busy delegating tasks. Jarold was sent off for fresh eggs, and Lia was ordered to go with him to learn the routine.
‘Pay attention to what Jarold tells you,’ Holmann warned her sternly. ‘He knows what’s what.’
Lia followed the ginger young man to the ward. They didn’t go out through the front gate but used a small postern door in the castle’s back wall instead.
‘I always go this way,’ Jarold said. ‘It’s quicker than using the main gate. They used to have hens here in the castle, but the cockerel’s crowing disturbed the queen’s sleep, so now we have to go to the town. Keep up or you’ll get lost, then you’ll be in real trouble.’
Beyond the gate a narrow footbridge spanned the defensive ditch. They crossed and walked down into the lower part of the town, with Lia trying to remember all the twists and turns. They went into the yard of a house somewhat bigger than the rest, and Jarold introduced her to the man who kept the hens. His name was Watt and he offered to get the eggs, but Jarold shook his head. ‘We’ll do it. That way we know they’re fresh.’
The man shrugged, and Lia and Jarold went off to the coop; a long low shack with two rows of laying boxes and a barrel of grain in the corner for feed. They collected two score eggs and put them in the sack Jarold had brought along.
‘That’s that, then,’ he said. ‘Just one more thing before we leave.’ He unfastened his hose and took out his cock, which Lia saw was stiff. Alarmed, she stepped back. ‘Don’t be shy,’ he said with a sickly leer. ‘All I want is a wank. Nothing to fret about.’
Lia shook her head, too horrified to speak, but Jarold just laughed. ‘Oh yes you will, or I’ll tell Holmann what you and Durwin got up to last night.’
Lia stared at him, stunned and aghast. He stood there, stooping a little under the low roof, leering at her as he played with his cock.
‘Thought I was asleep, didn’t you?’ he said. He made a snoring noise, and she realised he was the one she’d heard as she lay there in the dark. Presumably he’d done it to fool Durwin – and it had worked.
‘You’ll get a thrashing a lot worse than the last one,’ he promised her. ‘There’s nothing our