Thread: Stories, A Story

We spent the winter at one of the imperial estates, paid to make the time pass a little quicker. I played the fiddle for the the great lord, and they used to say that I must have struck a deal with a demon somewhere. They were right, I did, but that is another story entirely. I didn't really want to steal his heart at all... I just wished to make him smile. He used to kneel at the great lord's feet, mostly staring at the floor. He was probably sixteen or so, very pretty, with long black hair. I wanted to tear all the pins out of it and wrap it around my hands, but it was not worth my life to touch another man's property. His ears were pierced more times than I ever thought possible and we used to bet what else was too. I never found out his name. His lord just called him 'boy', and he wouldn't tell me. On midwinter, we played the sword dances. I wore black so the red of my hair and the shine of my fiddle stood out all the better. Her back was inlaid with patterns of trees, the fingerboard with ivory, a landscape of ice. When I really tried, I could make the wind stop and dance for me. My brothers and sisters always used to tell me that in some places, they still burn men like me at the stake. They would tease me like that, tell me not to outshine them too much. I do not play like that any more. That is for younger men. The slave boy watched me all night from the corner where he knelt. I gave him a smile or two and felt like I was playing just for him, and by the end of the night, my fingers were so sore I was convinced they would bleed if I played any longer. I put in more flourishes than necessary, my improvisations in true gypsy style. For how we played, they should have paid us at least twice the amount! But never mind, it was only money. When I took a break his lord was distracted, so he followed me into the garden. What made him risk punishment, I do not know. He was incredibly beautiful in thin silks, loosened his hair for me, without fear. He offered himself to me, not because he wanted me, I think, but because he thought he had nothing else to give. Or maybe he did it to spite his master. I do not know. Oh, I played him. My fingers over his spine, around his cock, tracing his ribs, in the icy cold, our breath steam. It felt like our sweat froze against the skin, and every touch was like fire. We were amazed that we were not covered in burns afterwards, just shivering in the cold. He would have let me do anything, I think, because no one had ever bothered to give him the same pleasure back. He knew what it was to be taken, but not what it was to be kissed. He knew how to please, but not how to make love. I taught him, and we made such beautiful music together, under those stars. After that, he came to watch me practice whenever he could, and sneaked to my bedroom whenever his lord did not demand his presence. I should have realised what I was doing to him. He could be so charming, asking me for stories, then listening, rapt, as I recounted songs, tales, legends. He was perfectly illiterate, but his memory was perfect. He loved to hear stories, and I thought that no one else had appreciated so well what I was telling, committing them immediately to memory. Quietly, he would sing back my words, every note in the right place, laughing. We would make love after. He would muffle his cries with the corner of the sheet. He was the finest instrument I ever played. He would arch in response to every touch, kiss me back, touch me, pull me back to him. I was exactly what was forbidden to him, and he knew it. Every time he was risking his life, knowingly. We used to talk late into the night. When I asked him his name, he told me that he did not need a name to know who he was. He told me that I could call him whatever I liked, so I made up little nicknames for him, calling him those in the quiet of my room. Some would make him laugh, some frown, but I think he appreciated them. Of course I was not in love, I simply desired him for that moment, that year. When spring was coming, I realised that he did not know those distinctions. I began to tell him hardships of my life, that was the wrong man to love, that the road always called to me, that my cloak would not cover him from the rain, that all he was thinking of was romance. He did not watch us leave, in the end. He was back to kneeling at his master's feet, putting out again the fire in his soul. I never saw him again. I avoided that land, maybe because I didn't want to see him again, maybe because I knew he would be no longer there. When I finally visited again, many years later, after the war, the new lord was from a distant land and the old house had been razed to the ground. My memories matched none of what was there. However, over the years, stories reached me of a man who, when asked his name, would always say that no one needed his name to know who he was. It was said that when he murdered the great general, that the troops rose up to follow him, that there was such fire in his eyes. Throughout the war, there were tales about him, but there was no way of of knowing which were true. I wondered if my words during those winter nights inspired him, or was he always one of those who would have stories told about him?