The Long Road

Indeed, I ask you to forgive me. I swore at Dunkeld, on the way to your wedding, that I would never leave your side, and I sought to break that oath. Even then... Even as I sought to leave you, I had no clear idea other than that I wished to wound you as I felt wounded. I am sorry. If you still value my loyalty, I offer it to you once more. My place is with you, not because I have no other, but because that is my choice."

Composure fled Margarete utterly. Finding the release of emotion that she had not known in the pore cottage on the night when Lise had declared her intention to leave her, Margarete now flung herself into Lise's arms and wept with racking sobs. She tried to muffle their sound against Lise's shoulder, but made no effort to stop.

Lise guided her to the bed and they lay down together while Margarete shook and sobbed away the days of panic, fear and grief. When at last she was quiet, they lay together for a long time, their silence now transmuted into one of rediscovery. They lay in a close embrace as they had not done for a long time. The feel of one another was familiar and new at once. They felt shy and careful of one another, but eager for the known solace of being so closely together.

After a long wordless time, they each felt the quality of their touch shift towards sensuality. Margarete knew a deep longing for their former physical intimacy, but was aware of great caution. The events of Lamas night lay between them, and again, she felt that it was for Lise to bridge the void between that night and this.

Lise pressed herself against Margarete with an almost shy eagerness that was disorienting to Margarete. It was as though Lise were inexperienced.

With great tenderness, Margarete kissed her lips, then pulled a little away.

"How is it with you? We have not been together thus since before Lamas. Of course I am a woman, but does it... Is it disturbing for me to touch you in this way?"

"No. I feel fragile, like fine blown glass, as though I do not know myself as I used to, but I have missed lying with you so much more than I knew. I think that if we go slowly, all will be well."

Margarete bent once more and placed her lips again on Lise's lips. At first, it was merely a resting of flesh on flesh, no more. Very very slowly, as though their bodies remembered, a gentle pressure was born, the delicate pull that holds a drop of water to a leaf, the fine tension that keeps a dragonfly from breaking the surface of a still pond.

By instinct, Margarete did not try to touch Lise anywhere else while they kissed. She sensed the fragility of Lise's response, and knew that she must move carefully, deliberately, not giving Lise too many sensations to experience at once.

She pulled her lips slightly apart and stroked Lise's cheek softly, then laid her lips unhurriedly on cheeks, brow, hair, throat. Cautious but committed, she kissed the place above Lise's collar bone which always before had so stimulated Lise. With an immense inner sigh of relief, Margarete heard Lise's breath catch in her throat, felt her body arch slightly in response.

Margarete gave a small sigh of gratification. She was thinking how both Lise and her own husband had each, in their own way, guided her from ignorance into passion. It had never occurred to Margarete that she would ever do the same for another, but, touching Lise with such care and caution, she felt a disorienting sense of being the older and more experienced.

She lay on her side facing Lise, who remained on her back. Margarete ran a slow hand down Lise's body, avoiding the sensitive skin of areole and nipple, caressing instead ribs, belly, flank. She pressed herself against Lise with restrained eagerness. She yearned for their former, uninhibited frolicking, but felt Lise to be a beautiful bird who would take flight at any incautious move.

Lise turned slowly to face Margarete, seeking her lips once more. The kiss was deeper this time, the pulling reaching further into each of them. Margarete gave a breathy moan of longing and pleasure, not shy to show Lise her desire and enjoyment.

With a wholly unprecedented tentativeness, Lise let her hands move on Margarete's skin, wondering anew at the younger woman's beauty, the soft breasts, the graceful legs, and delicious symmetry, the long soft hair.

Emboldened by Lise's actions, Margarete ran her hands more firmly down Lise's back to caress her hips and muscular thighs. Still, she was careful. She made no sudden movements, no rapid changes in her position. Senses at peek receptivity, she was alert to each movement Lise made, each subtle clue to her responses.

"Oh I have missed lying with you!" Margarete exclaimed hoarsely. "You are so beautiful and strong, so exciting to me. I missed your scent, the way your body feels under my hands, the way your hands feel when you touch me."

"I did not know it," Lise replied huskily, "But I missed lying with you also. Your body is so sweet and graceful, and the sounds you make in pleasure are sweeter than any music."

She lifted Margarete's heavy hair and draped it over them like a cloak.

"Sweep your hair across my body as you used to do," she implored.

Margarete knelt over her and took her hair in her hands. Carefully, she spread it over Lise's shoulders, then fanned it out and downwards so that it swept across Lise's breasts, belly, vulva and thighs.

They had been physically intimate for almost the entire span of their friendship. Yet, until this night, they had never approached one another with such tenderness. The passion which had been there from the beginning was still strong, but this night, it was tempered by great care and great emotion.

It was as though this were their first such experience together, although much more tentative and cautious than their true first time together had been. Margarete experienced Lise as far more passive and sensitive. Lise experienced Margarete as far more poised and restrained.

Up and down Margarete swept the gleaming mass of her hair until Lise sighed deeply, reaching her hands to run them through the fine strands.

Less cautious now, Margarete began to replace the mass of hair with her face and lips. She brushed her cheek across Lise's full breasts, not yet allowing herself to touch the dark nipples. She brushed her lips across Lise's warm belly, but would not yet allow herself to kiss the beloved flesh. Brushing her hair once more over Lise's vulva, she let her hand follow it, cushioned by the heavy mass of hair, but pressing gently. Lise sighed again, but more longingly.

Margarete moved upward to kiss Lise's lips. This time, the kiss was far less restrained. Their lips demanded and entreated, their tongues met and played.

Margarete rolled onto her side again and pulled Lise gently to face her. Despite Lise's obvious response, Margarete was highly sensitized to subtleties, and did not wish for Lise to be too passive, supine only to the acts of another.

Their lips met and clung again, barely moving, but intensely together. Lise's hand moved down Margarete's side, thrilling to the familiar but infinitely exciting shape of her waist, her hip, her soft thigh. She gently urged Margarete's legs apart and sought the centre of Margarete's pleasure, finding a hot moisture that somehow surprised her.

In the past months, Lise had become so strange to herself that it was startling to find that Margarete could still respond to her as she always had. Moving her fingers with practiced skill, she knew a bone deep satisfaction that this thing between them was still as real and compelling as it had been since their meeting.

Her own caution and uncertainty momentarily forgotten in the remembered and anticipated thrill of bringing the peek of pleasure to Margarete, Lise moved with increasing confidence. She pushed Margarete gently onto her back, found Margarete's soft breast with her lips, and moved her fingers inexorably between Margarete's legs. Margarete's soft cries of delight brought more healing to Lise's spirit than any words spoken between them. She moved with an inexorable rhythm to which Margarete had always responded. She knew how to bring the younger woman to ecstasy, and she did so with wonder and a unique kind of fulfillment.

When the spasms had subsided and she would have drawn her hand slowly away, Margarete grasped her wrist to hold her there.

"Again please," she begged hoarsely, and Lise obliged.

After two more peeks rocked her, Margarete fell back replete, but almost at once, she rolled towards Lise, saying through panting breaths, "I am sorry! I meant to be so careful, to look only to your ease and pleasure. I... I forgot myself and wanted... Oh Lise, I did not mean to..."

Lise laughed softly, stopping Margarete's words with a kiss.

"Do not worry, for I forgot myself also. It was well. In your pleasure, I forgot my... my caution and uncertainty."

Margarete began once more to caress Lise, eager to bring her to release also. Lise enjoyed the touch deeply, but felt little impulse towards the peeks of pleasure that Margarete had experienced. She was well accustomed to sharing these with Margarete, but felt that she had experienced enough strong sensation. She invited Margarete to touch her softly between her legs, but gave no signs of urgency or immediacy.

After a time, the caress became more and more languorous, and Lise sighed with contentment. It was not the contentment she was used to feeling after roused passion, but it was right.

Even so, Margarete was troubled, but Lise reassured her and counseled patience.

"All cannot happen at once," she said with unexpected contentment. "It is like recovering from a wound. You must walk slowly and carefully at the beginning."

Margarete laid her head on Lise's shoulder, inexpressibly comforted to hear Lise speak so. That tone of calm confidence was one she had not heard since Lamas.

After along comfortable silence, Lise said, "I must speak with Owen. He risked as much as you in order to accompany us. I owe him my gratitude also. Will you help see to it that we are provided some privacy in the next days?"

"I will." There was another silence. "Your gratitude will be welcome I'm certain, but there's more he wishes from you. Difficult as these months have been for you and I, they have been hard for him also."

"I know. Do you know what he said to me? He told me that if I found myself with child, he would not think to question whether he was the father, but that he would wed me gladly."

Margarete caught her breath. "Oh Lise! What did you say to him?"

"I told him that such a thing was vanishingly unlikely, and that he should look elsewhere for a proper bride. Like you, he has offered me not but patience and care, and I have rewarded him no better than I have you. Somehow, all the events of Lamas got tumbled together in my mind. The freedom I knew with him that day somehow became linked with the carelessness that allowed me to be caught off my guard. I am slowly becoming able to separate events into their proper places, but I fear that it may take me longer to... to rediscover myself with Owen than it will take me with you."

"All cannot happen at once," Margarete said softly, giving Lise back her words with gentleness, "Be patient."