Riding off and visiting
“Well, my lovely Wife, at last we have some time all our own,” Seth said. He and Hadassah had left last of all and were riding, as Heroiini in Heroiini guise, along the road to the capital. Riding in a light drizzle with occasional downpours… rain which their Farmer memory insisted should be annoying and uncomfortable but which their Heroiini body and skin accepted easily, and even comfortably.
“I always enjoy being with you, my Husband,” Hadassah replied. “We have been rather busy up until now.”
“As we will be again, when we arrive,” Seth said, reluctantly.
“I have no complaints, my Husband. Many Husbands, when they are busy, are busy away from their Wives. But I have spent every night with you, and have seen you frequently during the day. And here we are traveling together.”
“I have enjoyed working together. How far is it,” he asked, changing the subject, “along this road before we get to your Father’s estate?”
“Well, ordinarily I would say it would take two days. But in our guise, well, we should be there about midnight.” She glanced at him, “Are you nervous?”
“Well,” he said, blushing, “I must admit I am. Parents-in-law are, under the best of conditions, difficult. But your Father and I didn’t exactly get off to a great start.”
“He is very impressed with you, you know.”
“What?”
“He told me so. We had a big talk before you came. I was… rather upset when he came back. I found it very awkward to think about being married to a man that my Father had just rebelled against. I wasn’t at all sure what I was supposed to be doing as a Wife.”
“Well, you certainly figured that out!”
“You, you are pleased with me, then, my Husband?” she asked.
Instead of answering, Seth swept his horse over touching hers, and swept her off her horse over in front of him. She gasped and they rode together like that until well past sundown.
“We should perhaps change now, my Husband,” she said, “if you wish us to be in Farmer guise when we come to my house.”
“You would stay in Heroiini form?”
“If you wished it, of course,” she said, “but it would make your meeting with my Father awkward.”
He shook his head in amazement, “You are quite right. I was just surprised you would be willing.”
“You are my Husband,” she said, “my Father would chastise me himself if I were to fail to obey you in any matter − let alone one so trivial as which form, and which clothes, I should appear in with my own family.”
//Well,// he said, beginning to speak Farmer, //Let us tie our horses up to this tree, and then change our clothes.//
//As you wish.//
—
“Father!” Hadassah cried, and the man sitting on the doorstep ran forward in his turn, catching his Daughter from her horse as she leapt into his arms.
“Father,” Seth said, more awkwardly dismounting and holding out his hand.
The word seemed to shake the Duke, but he quickly reached out his own hand, swallowing Seth’s and shaking it firmly before turning back to Hadassah.
“Your Siblings are in bed, but I doubt they are asleep. We received your note saying that you might be arriving today and they were very difficult to put down. Perhaps you might greet them and bring peace unto my house?”
Hadassah ran off, dashing up the stairs. The stairs were dark but she knew them well enough: four flights, and then a corridor, and then the door.
She turned in, and a voice immediately said, “Hadassah?!” and a lad leapt out of his bed and came running up to her, his long shirt flapping around his knees. He looked taller, and ganglier than the last time she had seen him… a maturing lad, or an awkward young man, depending on the day, she was sure.
“Avishai!” said Hadassah, hugging her oldest Brother tightly. He had indeed grown, his chin was now above her shoulder. He would be bigger than her soon. “I have missed you!”
“I missed you too, ‘Dassah’,” Avishai said, grinning.
“Me too,” said another lad, younger and definitely fatter, “missed story time with you.”
“Micah,” Hadassah said, letting Avishai go and hugging Micah. “I hear you lads didn’t want to go to sleep tonight?” she said, trying to make her voice stern.
The lads looked abashed, but didn’t have to say anything as, from the bed, first one head and then another popped up, and then two lasses came over. Twins, with matching long brown hair and what threatened to be gorgeous figures, the lasses blinked sleepily as they hugged their oldest Sister wordlessly. Hadassah looked over at the bed, but her smallest Sister was still sleeping.
“OK, now. Dad asked me to come up and make sure you all get to sleep. Now, get back in bed, and get to sleep, or I will cane you myself.”
The lasses trooped off, Micah kissed her, and Avishai did too, after giving her a grin. She had caned him, over the years, but − his look questioned her statement that she would do so now. Then the lads went and climbed back into their bed. Hadassah gave one more look at the tableau and then started back downstairs.
She walked into the library a few minutes later, and saw her Father grinning, and her Husband blushing furiously.
“So here you two are! I have been looking all over for you.” She sat down next to Seth and said, “Father, are you embarrassing my Husband?”
“I was just asking him if he enjoyed seeing you in Aviovamimo garb.”
“Well, he certainly does. And he should, shouldn’t he? He is my Husband.”
//Your Father was also expressing a desire to see you as an Aviovamimo,// Seth put in.
//Well, with your permission, my Husband// she said.
//Certainly, my Wife,// he answered and she left the room.
“What was that? What did she ask?” she heard her Father say.
“She went to change clothes,” Seth answered. “She will be back in a minute.”
—Father is never going to forgive me, Hadassah thought to herself, but he did ask for it. She got to her room, and stripped off her clothes, mumbling to herself in Kelii. Luckily the servants had left food out. Ignoring her Maid’s shocked look she went over to the table and stuffed herself, feeling the change finishing. Then she pulled on her Heroiini garb and went back downstairs.
“Well, here I am, Father,” she said, coming back in. Her Father, startled out of countenance, jumped to his feet.
“Hadassah?!” he exclaimed, staring at her, and blushing.
“Certainly, Father, do you like it?” she asked, turning this way and that, and letting her skirt flare out. She kind of enjoyed this, getting to tease her Father in this wholly legitimate way.
“You, you can change that fast?” he asked her.
“Oh, I have plenty of practice. I could have changed right here, but I wanted to give you the full effect and show you that my Husband enjoyed me in these clothes.”
Seth was blushing furiously but the Duke spared him barely a glance.
“How, how does it feel?” he asked her.
“Well, rather uncomfortable right now, since I am not on my horse. But when I am on my horse, and with my Husband, it feels just wonderful − very 49 freeing and very − intimate,” she added, putting her hand on Seth’s shoulder and grinning impishly at her Father.
Her Father was rendered speechless by her last remark, and after a long silence Seth said, “Perhaps you should change back, my love. I think you are making our host uncomfortable.”
“Very well, my Lord,” Hadassah answered, and her Father stared at her as her features and form changed. Finally she was finished, and she sat down next to her Husband. “There! Satisfied, Daddy?” she asked, taking Seth’s arm and leaning on his shoulder.
“I − I have never seen anything like it. If you tell your Brothers that you can do that, I am afraid you will have no peace.”
“Well, they will find out soon enough. Seth and I go for a ride every evening, and we do it as Heroiini.”
“They will be wanting to change, themselves, if you are not careful,” her Father muttered.
“Well, to do that they will need to learn Kelii,” Seth said, answering him seriously.
The Duke stared off into the distance, lost in thought and then said, “Well, my Son, can you now tell me about this plan of yours?” Hadassah glowed at the word, ‘Son’, knowing how hard that must have been for her Father to say. She was so excited she almost didn’t listen to her Husband’s answer.
“Yes, Sir, now that the first part is finished, I can tell you or anyone of the entire plan − at least the plan as we have laid it out so far. Much must wait upon what we find…”
“…So, why the rush?” the Duke asked, an hour later, when Seth had finished.
“The winds, Father. While on board Schip I learned much about the winds, and the tides, and other issues. And the winds for the mainland will begin to be favorable to sail to and from the mainland in about a month, and will remain so for the next few months. If we had waited longer, then we would have missed the beginning of the season and risked running into a season where the winds blew steadily from the mainland to us.”
“Ah, very wise. That way you will keep the maximum flexibility for your plan.” He sat back. “Well, I may disagree with the whole idea of going to the mainland, but I can’t disagree with the way you have gone about the plan.”
“The General has been doing much of the planning, Sir.”
Hadassah again felt the weight of her Father’s eyes on her. “I don’t think our world will ever be the same,” he said, shaking his head. “But it is late,”
he added. “Perhaps we can talk more tomorrow.”
“Dassah! Dassah!” The small lass had pushed past the room’s curtain and stood by the bed, bouncing up and down, looking at Hadassah with joyful eyes and casting shy glances at Seth.
“Ruth!” Hadassah said, hugging her Sister, “I came by to see you last night, but you were asleep.”
Ruth’s reply was lost in the noise of two other lasses and two lads, who had waited for their youngest Sister to break the privacy of the married couple before barging in themselves. They all came to Hadassah’s side of the bed but Seth, watching for his opportunity, suddenly reached out and seized Avishai, dragging him on top of the bed (and Hadassah), throwing him down, and climbing on top of him and tickling him. In seconds all of the other children had leapt into the wrestle in support of their Brother and the bed was awash in children and the walls echoed with their shrieks, and the growls and threatenings of Seth, and the protestations of Hadassah at being used as a playing field.
“Well,” Hadassah said a few minutes later after the children’s nurse had discovered them and dragged them, protesting vigorously, back to their nursery to wash, dress, and get ready for breakfast, “I think you started well with my siblings.”
“Hold still, my love, I must inspect you for bruises,” Seth said, turning her round and round as she tried in vain to dress.
“A transparent excuse,” she said, “for your lecherous advances.”
“I need no excuse for my lecherous advances,” he replied, kissing her roundly. “But I am glad that you think I have done well with your siblings. I must confess, however,” he said, pulling his shirt over his head, “that that was not my motive. I always enjoyed playing thus with my siblings, and, since their death, have greatly missed that intimacy.”
“Oh, my Husband, I grieve your loss,” she said, as the Maid worked on her back pulling and tying the strings on her shift, “I had not thought of how they would strike your heart.”
“The pain is deep, my love, but they relieve it, not increase it. Soon, hopefully, they will call me ‘Brother’,” he answered, watching her. “Truly it takes you women much time and effort to dress. And yet you look best without it.”
“My Husband,” she replied, curtseying and grinning at him, “you would have me a laughing stock of all my friends and relations. But if you command it I will indeed go to breakfast naked.”
Seth laughed, “I would not be responsible for the death of your Father, after having kept him once from execution. After the shock he had last night, I am afraid that that dress code on your part would complete his apoplexy and leave your siblings orphans.”
As they greeted the Duke and Hadassah’s Aunt, Seth worried that he might need to be social, but his worries were immediately put to rest by her Aunt, who asked Hadassah, “So, dear, tell us what you have been doing for the last few weeks. Tell us all about it.”
‘All of it’ took all of the breakfast time, and more, as the servants had long ago cleared away the plates by the time she finished.
“You became a Horsegirl? Can you do it again? Will you show us?”
Ariela asked.
“Perhaps later, we can go riding together,” Hadassah said, “and I will change then.”
The lasses looked excited and looked as if they would have said more, but the Duke said, “Well, this was very interesting, but I am afraid I need to do some work myself,” and got up.
Seth turned to Avishai, “Do you have fish in the river here?”
“Oh, yes Sir,” he said.
“Do you like to fish?” Seth said.
“Yes, Sir.”
“If you have an extra pole, how about you and I go off and go fishing?”
The boy grinned, ran off, and a few minutes later the two were standing side by side on the dock while Micah, who had followed them out of the dining room but who was not so impressed by fishing, was swimming nearby, glancing over at the fishermen every few minutes; and Hadassah was sitting on the edge of the dock staring out over the water.
“Was it fun, becoming a Horseman?” Avishai asked.
“Oh, yes. They are all fun, but in different ways.”
“All?”
“Horseman, Elf, Dwarf − Visser. Visser is especially fun.”
“You, you have been a Visser!?” Avishai asked, his eyes round.
“Yes. I took a whole trip on a boat, a big boat, and I was a Visser pretty much the whole time.”
“Wow. I would like to do that.”
“Well, you have to learn the language first.”
“Oh. I only speak Human.”
“I can teach you some Visser, if you would like.”
“Me, too?” Micah asked, having come up to stand dripping beside them, “Will you teach me, too?”
“Yes, you too. ‘Swimming’ for example, is called ‘wheeta’ when a young boy like you does it. And the Visserknappen love to swim.”
“’Wheeta’,” the lads said. Then Avishai asked, “Only Fisher lads swim?”
“Oh, no. Everyone swims. But the word is different. ‘Wheeta’ is what your Brother was doing; a young Knappen, not yet changed, having fun swimming in the water. For a Meisje doing the same thing it would be ‘Wheeti’.
Now, if you were a Visserknaap, and you were swimming in order to catch fish in your hands, then that would be ‘Wheeata’ for young boys. If I did it, since I have changed and especially since I have a Wife, it would be ‘Wheeoto’.”
“You can catch fish with your hands?”
“I can when I am a Visserknaap − Visser.” They were silent for a time.
“Do you like Hadassah?” Avishai suddenly asked.
“Avishai?!” Hadassah protested, but, “Oh, yes. I love Hadassah,” Seth replied, grinning at her discomfiture, and reaching out to squeeze her arm.
“Good,” he said. “She was afraid you wouldn’t because you don’t like Father.” Hadassah blushed, and Seth, with a glance at her, looked back to Avishai and said.
“I like your Father. He just − he disagrees with my Father about some things. But I love Hadassah, and I would even if I didn’t like your Father.”
“Good,” Avishai said, and cast his line back in the water.
Hadassah turned back and looked out over the water, enjoying the quiet ripples. Suddenly there was a yell, a grunt, and Micah came flying over her head to splash down in front of her. She squealed, and leapt back; to the laughter of Seth and Avishai. She turned to glare at them, but saw that they were laughing at Micah, who did look funny, all spluttering and spitting.
Their mirth was interrupted by a growing noise from the direction of the castle. They all turned to look, and saw a group of boys and young men galloping out toward them, some of them stripping their shirts off as they ran.
“What’s up?” Avishai called, as the crowd reached them.
“Your Father, he declared a holiday,” Joshua, Hadassah’s cousin, said.
“In honor of His Highness.”
“Well, let’s celebrate then,” Seth said, stripping off.
Hadassah was appalled that Seth would so forget himself as to join in with such a crowd. It was bad enough that her own cousins were there with all of the servants, but her husband! But then, to her chagrin, not content with merely getting in the water, he grabbed one of the younger servants and, holding him over his head, kicking and yelling, walked to the edge of the dock and threw him in.
Then she had to skip out of the way as a gang of lads rushed toward Seth, grabbing him and forcing him into the water, where they all fell together with a tremendous splash. She didn’t know whether to feel proud of his strength or even more embarrassed when they ganged up on him in the water, attempting to pull him under, and he fought off several times his weight in lads.
They fought so hard, too! She was sure that several of them, not the least Seth, would have bruises tonight.
After Seth had thrown one particularly active lad, there seemed to be a pause. He looked up, saw her, grinned, splashed at her, and said, “Come on in, love, the water’s fine!”
“No thank you,” she said, in what she hoped was a respectful tone. He didn’t seem offended, but his grin deepened, “I think the Princess needs a bath, lads,” he said. “Let’s go get her.”
Her husband moved slowly to get out of the water, but Hadassah saw Avishai, with a crowd of his cousins, coming up faster. “Avishai!” she said.
“Avishai?!” She gathered up her skirts and took off for the house, Avishai in close pursuit, with a dozen boys. Egged on by her husband, she was not at all sure that they were kidding, but she arrived at the house mere feet in front of them, tearing up the stairs as they stopped laughing at the doorway. Dozens of other servants had watched her flight, and heard her shouts as she ran.
Her Aunt must have heard them too, for she came out of a door at the top of the stairs, “Hadassah? Whatever is the matter?”
“Avishai,” she panted out, “Avishai and Joshua and them, they were going to throw me in the river.”
Her Aunt grinned. “Well, I am surprised at his boldness, being willing to throw your ‘Royal Highness’ in the river.”
Hadassah grinned ruefully back. “They probably would not have been so bold had it not been for the fact that his Royal Highness put them up to it!”
Her Aunt laughed, “Oh, well then, it is a shame they did not succeed. It is a fine day for a swim.”
Hadassah agreed with her there. She was pouring in sweat from her run. “Aunt, would you mind if I took the girls out swimming?”
“No, Dear, a good idea. Perhaps I will come with you. The girls are down in the sewing room.”
Hadassah dashed off before her Aunt. “Girls,” she said, poking her head into the room, “Come on, we are going to go swimming!”
The girls in the room, her Sisters, cousins, and some neighbors, gratefully put down their sewing and, screaming and giggling, rushed to the door and toward the stairs − slowing considerably when they saw Hadassah’s Aunt.
When the girls came out of the house, Hadassah at their head, several of the boys started out from the river toward them; but stopped quickly when they saw Hadassah’s Aunt bringing up the rear of the procession.
--
“Well, my love, did you all have a nice swim?”
Hadassah paused in the middle of drying her hair and looked at him.
“Oh, yes, it was wonderful. You all seemed to be having fun.”
“I have always loved swimming,” he said.
As she resumed drying, she tried to decide if there was any way that she could address, respectfully, with her new Husband, who was also a Prince, the fact that, really, his behavior was, well, rather childish. But she finished her hair without a solution.
--
“Oh, my Husband,” Hadassah said, as the two waved from the back of their horses at her family, her Aunt still looking askance at her dress code, “that was wonderful! Thank you so much.”
“You thank me? For what?”
“You were so wonderful to my Brothers, and so polite and respectful to my Father.”
“Well, he is my Father-in-law!”
“Yes, and you are his Prince − a title he failed to give you.”
“The titles that I wished to be given, I was given. He called me, very deliberately called me, ‘Son’, and your ‘Husband’. And your Brother called me ‘Brother’.”
“Oh, I am so glad. I hoped he would.”
Seth looked at her, “And you ensured that he would, no?”
She blushed. “I talked to him, and said you would like it. But I told him that it had to be his decision, and he was overjoyed not only to call you that, but that it would please you if he did.”
“Well, you are a wonderful Wife.”
“And your wonderful Wife is now very nervous.”
“Whyever?”
“Now it is time for me to go to your house − your house which happens to be the castle of the entire kingdom − and live for a few days with your family − who happen to be the King and the Queen.”
“I thought you told me you got along well with my Mother?”
“Oh, I did − while we carried trays back and forth from my kitchen. I was never so embarrassed in my life − asking the Queen of all Eilish to help me carry trays.”
“She enjoyed it. She told me you were lovely and gracious. And didn’t you get to know her better during your talk?”
“My Husband, do you realize that the best place to get to know one’s Mother-in-law is not a room full of women all telling you how to please your Husband in bed?”
They rode on in silence for a few more minutes and then, suddenly, she asked, “Do you lads have ‘The Talk’?”
“Oh, no,” he said. “My Father talked to me about the marriage bed when I was, I don’t know, five years old for the first time, and often after that.
He told me it was fun, and that I needed to go slow the first time, and that men and women looked at it differently − lots of things.”
“And of course my buddies and I talked about it a lot, what they had learned from their married Brothers, what they had heard and seen…”
“Well, that sounds easier than what I had to do.”
They had, for some time, been approaching a wagon with a burly trader and his family sitting on the seat. As they came alongside of them Seth said, in Farmer, “Good evening!”
The trader looked startled, “Good evening.”
“Traveling to the capital?”
“Why, yes. Rutabagas,” he said, waving at the rear of the wagon which was piled high and covered. “Getting them to market. Price is a little low right now down the river, and I thought I might do better there.”
“Well, good luck. Maybe we will see you there. We are going to visit my parents.”
“Well, have a nice trip,” the trader said, as they pulled past.
- When well past them, Hadassah giggled, “Oh, my Husband,” she said, switching back to Kelii (which was much easier to speak).
“What?” he asked, looking at her.
“That poor man and his family!”
“What do you mean?”
“Whatever must he think? A Horseman and an Aviovamimo traveling right along the main road, addressing him in Farmer, and talking about your parents in the capital city?”
“Oh. We must have seemed odd, at that.”
--
“Dear,” the Queen said, hugging Seth, “and my wonderful new Daughter,” she continued, hugging and kissing Hadassah. “Come with me, my Daughter, while my handsome Son goes and talks to his Father. I am sure they have business to talk about.”
“Are you hungry?” asked the Queen, as she led Hadassah into a small sitting room, “of course you are, all that travel − Something to eat for the Princess, please,” she said to one of the servants standing nearby. “How was your trip?”
“It was wonderful. Traveling with Seth was wonderful; and he was great when we visited my family.”
“Oh? My Seth? My shy Seth?”
“Well, he wasn’t shy with my siblings, especially my Brothers. He was just great! You should have seen him: wrestling with them, fishing with them − he even took my Brothers hunting on horseback − he was just great.”
“Well, that is quite different. He has always been good − Put it down right there, that’s right. I love these little pieces of chicken, please have some − He has always been good with children. He so enjoyed his own Brothers and Sisters, and was devastated when they died.”
“Yes. He told me. It must have been hard on you.”
“Well, yes Dear. I hope and pray that you never face such a thing when you have children.”
Hadassah must have blushed, for the Queen’s voice suddenly changed, and she leaned forward, “Dear?”
Hadassah said nothing, but the Queen didn’t need any words, leaping forward and hugging her, “My first grandchild! Oh, how I have longed for this day. I am so excited. Why didn’t you tell us? Why didn’t you write? When did you find out?”
“Seth thought we should wait until we were more certain, when the child was well along.”
“I shall kill him, my child or not. Did you tell your mo − your Aunt?”
“No, Seth said…”
“The lad, I will have him executed. Sit down right now and right her a letter apologizing. I will deal with my Son.”
“Get the Princess a pen and paper!”
Hadassah obediently took the pen and paper and began to write…
My Dearest Aunt, I am writing this letter at the direct command of the Queen, although I will not send it unless my Husband approves.
I am expecting. There, I said it. I became pregnant during my weeks as an Aviovamimo. Apparently it is the regular thing for Aviovamen to get pregnant when they first are joined to their Husbands.
I wished to tell you when we were there, but my Husband asked me to wait. I believe that he was slightly embarrassed, but the reason he gave was that he wished to not raise any hopes until my pregnancy was further along and less likely to end unfortunately, as you told me they sometimes do.
The Queen insists that I apologize, yet I am sure that you will agree that I needed to obey my Husband. However I am very sorry that I could not tell you and discuss it with you.
My trip to the capital went well, and the Queen is being very gracious.
Your loving Niece, Hadassah, Princess of Eilish
‘There,’ she said to herself, and “There,” said the Queen, coming back in the room. “I didn’t let him get a word in edgewise and of course you can send the letter if I advise it. If I advise it indeed! Have you written the letter?”
“Yes,” Hadassah said, applying her personal seal over the wax on the letter, and addressing it.
“Good,” the Queen said, “you there, Gillian, take this letter down − yes, finish addressing it Dear − take this letter down to the Master of Post and tell him to have it sent off soonest. The very idea!”
Turning back to Hadassah she sat down, composed herself, and said, “So, how is your family doing…?”
Thank you for reading Von’s Substack. I would love it if you commented! I love hearing from readers, especially critical comments. I would love to start more letter exchanges, so if there’s a subject you’re interested in, get writing and tag me!
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Thanks again, God Bless, Soli Deo gloria,
Von
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Island People
Island People is a young adult fantasy book centring on a young prince. The book starts with his kidnapping and follows his adventures as he not only escapes from his kidnapper but gains critical allies and friends.
The entire book is scheduled on Substack, and there are several sequels. This is a book I wrote years ago, so it is in a bit of a rough form. Critiques and comments are more than welcome, they are requested.