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.Corsicanthrax (and Forrestal)	By : keithcompany Category: M through R > Monty Python Views: 1912 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Monty Python, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 4
- 5
Maid and Maiden, two skinny blonde youths, led Forrestal upstairs to her room. They showed her the trunk where her effects had been folded and stowed, the rack holding her weapons and the bed.
They also showed her a bath. The tub was full of steaming water. Forrestal saw no buckets, no drops on the floor, no cauldron in the fireplace.
But she saw the steaming water. It was about the only thing she'd add to MacLyss' list of building benefits. Hot water.
She stripped and sank gratefully down. Maid (or maybe Maiden) offered to wash her hair. Maiden (or...) offered to help her soap. She declined and soaked.
And thought.
What exactly had she lost? Height, of course. And...well, she wasn't squashed down like a dwarf. She'd also lost...sideways and frontways, she thought, groping for the term.
Merlin would know. But asking him would begin a two hour lecture on various Greek terms for the traits of an object.
She wanted to know where her big body was and how to get it back.
Strength was less, too. Or was it? She thought about lifting the sword. It was hard to handle, but was that weight or just fecking big?
Her arms looked the same. The upper arm bulged properly when she flexed.
The water started to cool so she got out. There was a towel across the back of a chair. She dried, then wrapped it and left the bathing room.
A dress lay across the foot of the bed. She'd never worn one. There'd been a shift when MacLyss found her. And tunics, leggings and armor since.
Well, none of that would fit her now. And she needed to put something on. She slipped into the dress and buttoned it up.
This wasn't in the same league as what Vicarious was wearing. A simple but tasteful cut. Nothing any of the ladies at Camelot would wear outside of their rooms, but good enough for the servants.
She looked in the mirror, but not to see how feminine she looked. She was checking to see if the dagger strapped to her thigh was revealed by the garment.
It was rather blatant, she judged, so she took it off and placed it under her pillow.
Then she opened the door to try to find Vicky, and some answers.
------
Vicarious was at the top of the stairs, sipping from a goblet. This one seemed to be carved from ivory, and the wine more to her taste.
"You won't need that," she said as she saw Forrestal.
"Need what?" the knight asked, face blank.
Vicky looked surprised. "Oh. I thought you might have secreted a weapon on your person. I was expecting a guilty start, maybe a reflex grab at your armpit or the small of your back." She offered her elbow.
Forrestal stared for a second. She'd been escorting random ladies in waiting a time or two, and trained to do it properly. This was all turned around.
"I... Um. Okay." She put a hand in Vicky's arm and allowed herself to be led down the stairs. "Actually, the knight I've been training with tries the same thing."
"Hiding weapons?"
"No, trying to make me witness against myself in surprise."
"And does he catch you often?"
"Not for some time," Forrestal said with a smile. "If he did, the next time we fought, he'd get a real sword and I'd get a wooden one.
"Tends to focus the mind on the consequences of one's actions quite fiercely."
"I can see that," Vicky said.
They entered a dining room. A full repast was spread across the table, with places set for two on one corner. One was at the high end of the table, the other just at that diner's right.
Vicky held a chair for her guest, then sat down on the end. They began eating.
"So, Vicky? What exactly did you mean, by me losing my masculinity?"
"Just that. The fountain is cursed. It takes away that part of any man... Or woman... that drinks the waters. The part that makes him a man."
"Strength?"
"Strength, size, sometimes beards-" Vicky made a small sound of surprise. Forrestal didn't react, but she did note the apparent mistake.
But she didn't know if it was a mistake or some further manipulation.
"But I'm a woman," she protested.
"Living as a man, riding as a man, fighting as a man. I imagine you train with and test yourself as a man?"
"Yes," Forrestal admitted.
"Then you probably think of yourself as a man, from time to time?"
"Every time I scratch my balls, yeah."
She covered a smile as the other woman choked a bit on her grouse. "Sorry," she lied. "I guess being a homeless Irish knight's squire left me a little indelicate."
"No, no, that's quite alright," Vicky lied. She coughed a bit more. "And it's a good point. You may not, really, think of yourself as a man, but you certainly measure your skills against men?"
Forrestal nodded, then noticed that her first course had moved. The plate had been removed without her even noticing a servant.
It was an effort not to look around desperately to locate the missing individual but she managed. "Well, there aren't too many women at the Round Table to compare myself to."
"Oh, I'm not saying it's your fault, dear," Vicky said. "But you should comport yourself like a lady, not as one trying to impress men."
"Then why did you say the wine didn't travel for shit?"
"Shit is lady-like if the wine tastes like something dripping off an outhouse roof."
Forrestal shook her head. "I'm sure Guinevere could express her disappointment in the vintage without bringing up outhouses or shit in polite company."
"And what makes Her Majesty the expert on feminine behavior?"
The knight shrugged. "She's the only woman I've ever seen make the King say 'Yes, Ma'am.'"
Vicarious laughed, a deep and throaty chortle. "And there you have it. It's not about gender, it's about power."
"What's about power?"
"Everything. You lost power at the fountain. The power you lost is the ability to compete with men, as a man."
Forrestal thought about that for a second. She looked down to see that another dish was gone. There was no replacement.
"What-?"
"Over here." Vicarious had a trencher before her, slivers of beef laid across it. "Come here."
"I am here."
"Come here and sit in my lap, little knight. I'll feed you."
"Why the hell would I want to do that?"
"I wasn't asking." Vicky scooted her chair a half-turn and slapped her thigh. "Come here. Or you will not enjoy the evening."
The younger woman stood and stepped from her chair. "I already don't like the evening."
Forrestal went to sit on Vicky's thigh. At the last second, though, a hand was inserted between her and her hostess, and between her cheeks.
She yipped and popped upright.
"Stop that!"
"I've only sworn not to undress you," Vicarious said. "Surely a comely maid like you as been goosed a time or two?"
"No one but my knight has known I was a maiden," she replied.
"Then surely, a likely lad of a squire has been goosed?" Vicarious smiled.
"The ladies tend to ignore squires," Forrestal said. All those shiny knights in wonderful armor."
"Ladies?" Vicky said, surprised. "I meant the squires or the...Oh, wait. Camelot. No, there's probably not a lot of festive goosing in Camelot. Not of the men."
She shook her head sadly as she carefully took Forrestal's hand. Then she yanked the young woman onto her lap.
"There." Vicky picked up a sliver and fed it to her captive.
Forrestal ate the beef, hoping to build up strength to... She realized Vicarious was holding her in place one-handed. If she didn't have the strength to get a wrist out of another's grip, she'd never overpower the woman.
She slumped, relaxing. And she ate because it was expected of her.
"That's the girl," Vicky said as her muscles relaxed. She watched as her 'hostess' ate a sliver, then fed her another one.
Forrestal never really noticed the taste. She was too aware of how her feet dangled between Vicky's legs, not touching the floor. Of how wide the thigh beneath her ass felt. Of the strength in the grip.
Of the size of those melons before her...
She was a little lost in the cleavage when Vicarious released her. The woman wrapped the restraining arm around her little guest's shoulders to break off pieces of the trencher.
Forrestal opened her mouth as one came near, but Vicky didn't feed it to her. Instead, the grease-soaked bread was squeezed, drippings falling to her skirt.
"Oh, no!" Vicky pretended outrage. "Your dress is ruined!"
The knight reached out for Vicky's wine. "Not my dress," she said, tipping the contents onto her lap.
"You are quite the little barbarian, aren't you?" Vicky said cheerfully. "Don't care if your clothes are stained?"
"I was thinking more of when the wine soaks through mine to-"
Vicarious shot upright, tossing the diminished knight to the floor. Forrestal rolled easily with the movement, coming to rest on hands and knees, ready to jump out of the way.
But Vicky wasn't pressing any attack, just examining her dress for any stain. "Naught, wicked, chauvinistic man-child!" She shook her skirt in Forrestal's direction. "Do you know how much this cost?"
"Why would I care?"
"If only to respect fine things!"
"I respect a good sword and a fast horse," Forrestal replied, coming to her feet and staring defiantly up at her captor. "Armor that'll turn the point of a sword or hold up to a mace." She brushed at the stains she wore. "Not frilly frou-frou rags."
Vicky seethed. "Ahem," she said. In the distance, somewhere, Forrestal heard a bell ring. Vicky's fury seemed to chill.
She didn't calm, though. It was like the changes in Morgana's moods. She was angry until she figured out how to screw her opponent. Then she became cold and methodical.
Vicky swept her dress aside and returned to her seat, picking up a newly filled goblet. It was classic Morgana, though spoiled by the disheveled hair. Arthur's sister was always as well-presented as Guinevere. Vicky was, in the knight's view, a wannabe.
Still, she was the wannabe on the scene, with all the power of Dunfort-Schloss. Forrestal stood on the balls of her feet, ready to run at the first sign.
"Darling," Vicky cooed. "You look ready to fight. That's unladylike."
"Not a big concern for me," she replied.
"Well. We'll see how bluff and manly you can be." A door opened and a man stepped into the room. And what a man.
If MacLyss had been a courser, this man was a destrier. Tall as a siege tower, he lumbered into view. He actually unfolded as he came out of the doorway, unable to walk through it erect.
Then she glanced down and realized her error. The man was in armor, breastplate and greaves covering him from neck to waist. Metal plate also covered him from knee to toe. A chainmail shirt depended from his waist to his knees. With a hole cut in the lap.
But both of his heads were in clear view. He was walking quite erect and was hung like a centaur.
The young woman couldn't make herself stop watching his approach. He wobbled hypnotically, a cock head the size of her fist quivering with each step. The shaft reminded her of a mace. It rose from the chain hole and her only thought was 'Don't his hairs get caught in the links?'
"Bors," Vicky purred. "I want you to come on our guest's dress."
"Rape?" he asked, voice low, guttural. Teutonic, or possibly Gothic.
"No," Vicky laughed. "She isn't to be undressed against her will. But, if she's coated with your manly seed, she might have a reason to strip the filthy thing off.
"Ah," Bors grunted. He stepped closer and started to stroke himself. Forrestal started to back up, but her feet wouldn't move. She nearly fell over but regained her balance at the last second.
Bors smiled and stepped closer. He pulled and grunted, aiming himself down at her skirts.
She raised her hands. "Strike him, and all bets are off," Vicky said.
"Why do you keep changing the rules?" the smaller woman asked.
"No change. This is a battle of wills between thee and I. Bors here is just a servant, doing as bid.
"And I bid him make your dress so...soggy, that you can hardly stand it. But it'll still be your choice to take it off."
"Right...." Forrestal thought furiously. Her mind kept going back to the squires. Most of them virgins, all with a 'she let me' story. She figured their imaginations ran towards things men found appealing. She grabbed her breasts and pushed them together. "Come on my teats, Bors."
The giant smiled and pumped furiously. Vicky laughed. "You think you'll finish him off quickly? Nice strategy, except my man is not a typical human. He can come all night long, never pausing for any recovery. His lance is ever at the ready."
"Uh huh," he grunted. He leaned back, pushing his hips forward. As his eyes rolled up into his head, Forrestal cupped her hands and caught the first bolus of hot, creamy come. The second, the third.
"That's not-" Vicky started to say. Not fair? Not going to work? Forrestal didn't care. Whatever Vicky thought she was doing she was likely wrong.
The fourth spurt was a dribble. She had as much as she was going to get, at least this time.
"WOW!" she said. Bors opened his eyes and looked down, his mouth spread in a gaping smile. Forrestal flung the sperm up into his face.
"Nooooaaaaaaaaargh!" he protested. He spat and wiped, moaned and cried.... And staggered back through the door he'd appeared in.
Forrestal wiped her hands on her dress, staring Vicky in the eyes. "Got any others?"
Vicky stormed out. Forrestal found her feet could move. She scavenged a sip of wine and went up to bed.
She'd sleep in the dress. The way stuff appeared and disappeared around her, she couldn't trust that the dress would remain or be replaced.
There was a towel and a pitcher of water. She wicked off as much of Bors as she could, then lay back on the bed to think.
So the fountain took away manhood.
Why did Vicarious regret saying it took beards away, too?
Forrestal drifted off to sleep, her arms wrapped around her chest. She wasn't cold, she just had a death grip on the dress.
She was sure there was a loophole somewhere. Vicky would have her naked one way or another. Forrestal was struck with her hostess as a woman unfamiliar with losing.
The knight was still in the same position when she woke. It wasn't sunrise that woke her, nor was it one of the maids tugging at her clothing.
Rather, there was a tapping at the window. And a giggle. Once she recognized that, she rolled out of the bed and sprung to the curtains.
But when she swept them aside, nothing was at the window. The light of the moon revealed an empty sill.
Which she half expected. Like the night before her knighting, she never saw the Little People. But she'd known they were there.
She was gratified to know that whatever magic there was at Dunfort-Schloss didn't frighten the fae. But it was disappointing that they only taunted her, then ran away.
She turned away from the window and considered the room. After a moment she noticed that her fingers were playing with her sleeves. Tugging, twisting, feeling. And she noticed it didn't feel dirty.
"Ah," she murmured. "There's a reason Mac calls you the 'wee gifties.' Thanks."
------------
Vicky sat at the banquet table that was set for breakfast. She looked a little smug. Until Forrestal arrived.
The young woman skipped down the stairs. Her dress seemed to float around her. There were no stains from the day before, and no wrinkles from her night's sleep.
"I shall kill Maid," Vicarious said icily. "Or was it Maiden?"
Forrestal climbed up into her chair, standing on the seat to survey the dishes. "Neither. The serene mind is well-provisioned against the vicissitudes of an uncaring fate."
Vicarious thought about that while her guest helped herself to breakfast. "What does that even mean?"
"Dunno," Forrestal shrugged. "Merlin always likes to say that before pulling some plan out of his arse. So when he pulls out a bale of hay, two coconuts and a sparrow, it looks like he planned ahead for just such an occasion." She knelt down and started eating with a fierce appetite.
"So what's on the schedule?" she asked around her food. Vicky showed distaste at such unseemly behavior. "Seduction? Assault? Facial hair removal? Emasculation? Morris dancing?"
"Perhaps, defloration," Vicky said with an evil grin. Her eyes were alight and she leaned forward ever so slightly. Clearly she was hoping for a reaction of some sort.
"None for me, thanks, I lost my hymen on horseback. Jousting. My horse chickened out at the last second and I was thrown over a rail. Well. Halfway over the rail. When all was said and done, my opponent's eyes weren't the only thing that popped." She reached for her wine to wash down the omelet.
"Poor dear," Vicarious said, with apparently sincere sympathy. "But have you never…"
"Fucked?" Forrestal asked, watching Vicky's eyes pop. "No, not really."
Just then there was some sort of fuss sounding in the paddock.
For a second, Forrestal thought Vicky looked like she was going to speak. And she looked like she'd be smug, too. Then she realized there was a good chance Morridgan wasn't going to be predictable today, either.
She remained silent and stood, turning towards the window.
"You're learning," Forrestal couldn’t help but add. Vicky fumed, still silent.
Out on the grass, the horses had been lead out, one at a time. Morridgan must have been first. She'd leapt onto the only stallion in the corral with her.
Literally. She'd mounted him from behind. He was trying to buck her off. And she was already unnaturally extended just to reach his back, but her teeth were dug into the skin of his back and she wasn't going anywhere.
"What does she even THINK she's doing?" Vicarious shrieked. She lost all decorum as the accumulated frustration poured out. "She's a SHE! They don't goddamned fuck from behind!"
Being who she was, of course, she couldn't help adding a small disclaimer. "Not without a certain amount of specialized accessories, that is. I suppose one could train a mare to use them…"
"She's showing dominance," Forrestal said.
"Of course she is," Vicky said dismissively. "And I suppose she's forced to pretend she's male because horses don't have other means of showing who's the man in charge."
"Beards," Forrestal said quietly. Then repeated herself louder. Vicky stood quietly. "Men have BEARDS!" She looked around the room, hands at her hips.
"Men have beards because they're men, not because they're heroic." She started pacing, thinking aloud. "They have muscles because they practice with heavy weights, not because they're men. I practice with heavy weights and I have muscles, but not because I think I'm a man.
"The fountain removes masculinity… But that's not entirely true, is it?" There was no response because Lady Vicarious had picked up the hem of her skirt and started to run for the exit.
"The fountain only removes things the men THINK OF as masculine. Beard and body hair, fine, but the dumber ones think their strength, their size, their powerful backhand swing…
"I'll bet I could fight with my sword, right now, at this size, just as if I were fighting with Mac's claymore. Because I trained in it!"
A clatter of porcelain got her attention. The banquet table was shaking. So, she realized, were the walls.
"Well, fuck," she said. And ran for the stairs.
The dress she wore tore as she mounted the first floor. She ignored it and ran into her room.
There was shrieking from under her bed, where Maid and Maiden cowered.
"MY CLOTHES!" Forrestal shouted. They shrieked and pointed to a cabinet. The castle rumbled and groaned as she dressed herself. She started collecting her arms when the two women threw themselves at her legs.
"Don't worry!" she said, louder than the background noises or the youths' screams. "It never collapses until the hero makes it to safety. So help me grab my stuff!"
The knight made a point of walking calmly out the front door while the servants ran past her. She would just as soon have run, but Mac would never forgive her if he heard about it. One must keep up the reputation of Camelot.
The inevitable collapse started just as she placed her foot on the first of the courtyard cobblestones. Dunfort-Schloss shed a dust cloud that filled the courtyard. When it cleared, she was standing by the fountain.
The fountain itself had collapsed. It appeared to have happened a long time ago. What little water remained was a muddy muck on one edge of the bottom. Moss and lichen covered the stone.
The dust cloud slowly settled as she waited. Figures became apparent, or staggered out of the dust. Forrestal recognized several of the bandits she'd rescued Lady Vicarious from.
The bandits she and Morridgan had slain.
The men lurched over and threw themselves on the dirt at her feet. They gasped and pawed at her legs. They bore wounds. Some she recognized from the attack, some were new to her.
Like the fountain, the damage appeared to have been inflicted quite a while before. She watched the men totter, wobble and die.
One corpse wore the burlap of the stable girl. Two wore Maid and Maiden's uniforms. Bors was missing. She wondered if Bors' armor had been too heavy to move in his natural form.
Blood leaked out of the figures at her feet, slow and coagulated. She wondered if there was anything natural about any of their forms.
A whinny got her attention. Four plucky male onagers staggered towards her from the paddock side of the castle. One bore a bright red bite-mark on his back.
Morridgan trailed them, lipping out to randomly bite an ass as they walked. Morridgan was back to her normal, original size and loomed over them.
"At least they're not zombies," Forrestal muttered. Morridgan glanced down at the rapidly rotting forms of the human tormentors. The mare glanced at Forrestal, her eyes wide.
The knight could practically read the horse's mind. She thought she'd beaten her tormentors into a whole different species, and found the human had beaten hers to long-dead corpses.
Even MacLyss had never beaten people into revenants! Fought a few, but never made them.
"Now, if only we knew where Prissy Miss Vicky were," MacLyss said. She stroked her mount's muzzle while both of them looked around the rubble.
A dust devil twisted through the cloud, a tiny spiral in the settling dirt. Forrestal had seen them before, but usually on much hotter days.
She was surprised, though, when three other devils spun into view, circling the first. They jinked and twirled, pushing the one in the center off into a clear direction.
As they passed where the knight stood, she thought she heard tiny little giggles like those of the Wee Ones.
And just as they passed, she heard Vicarious' voice. "No, no! You'll never take me back! I was here! I was in charge! Did you see the BOOBS? Let me go! Let me stay!"
Then all four were gone.
"That's our cue," she told the horse. "Let's get your tack-" she started to say. Morridgan blocked her path and nudged her away. Either the tack was gone or there was something wrong over that way.
So, she started loading what she could with the gear that had been stored in her room. The saddle was missing but she'd ride on a sword to get out of The Damned Castle at this point.
The gatehouse had collapsed into a pile of stone debris, but the walls had completely disappeared. Morridgan negotiated the dilapidated moat and cantered down to the road.
"Home," was all Forrestal said when they reached the road. Morridgan snorted to point out that she had already figured THAT much out. But she never paused.
"So, it was all about appearances," Forrestal said. She had started practicing her report to His Majesty, or at least sounding out the rationale in her head.
"Being fae, Vicarious probably got her greatest pleasure in taking away things that weren't really part of the curse."
MacLyss had made a habit of explaining his adventures on the way home, or on the way to the next adventures. He'd sum it up into a moral, or boil it down to an anecdote, something for future use.
Morridgan was quite aware that when her rider's voice got to a certain tone, she was to whinny an interrogative, then go back to thinking of grassy meadows and rub downs.
She whinnied.
"Well, other than having a dick and a beard," Forrestal said, "none of what the knights lost was really part of their masculinity.
"A woman can be muscular, or large, or good with sword, lance and spear." She pat Morridgan on the neck. "Or the best warhorse in the paddock.
"But idiot men have their idiot beliefs, which made them idiot prey for a fae with a suggestive spell." She leaned down to whisper in her mount's ear. "We kicked ASS, Morridgan. Mac's going to be proud of both of us."
Morridgan raised her head a little higher, trotted with her step a little livelier.
"We probably wouldn't have lost ANYTHING in that curse, if we lived in a world that didn't judge accomplishments through gender."
Morridgan whinnied.
An hour down the road, the pair still felt pretty good about themselves, though Forrestal's hand was cramping from trying to hold all her gear.
So when the knight rode out to block their path, the first think she noted was just how nicely designed his saddle was.
"I am the Ink Knight!" he shouted.
"Squid ink or lampblack?" she replied.
"I… That doesn't matter! Are you a Knight of Camelot? A man of Arthur's?"
"Yes," she agreed. Her features were hidden, along with her gender. It was easier to wear her armor than carry it, so she still presented a masculine profile. She didn't bother to correct the impression. She just wanted to be on her way.
"I am the Ink Knight!" he repeated. She looked him over. His armor was lacquered ink black. His horse was ink black. His arms were blazoned black rampant upon a black field, with black highlights and black chevrons, vertical.
And his weapons were all the inky black of darkest inkdom.
"Yep," she nodded. "You sure are."
He seemed surprised by her lack of reaction. He drew his sword. Even the edge was black. She wondered if that meant he'd never sharpened it, fearing to ruin the image.
"I have sent a challenge to Arthur, alleged King of the Britons!"
"Oh?" She shifted her grip to hold her sword ready. "Wait a minute. Are YOU the damned quest?"
"I am no quest!" he roared. "I am your DOOM!"
"Uh-huh. Have you registered with Camelot as my doom?"
"Arthur is well aware that I've been defeating the Knights of the Round Table in honorable, single combat, all through this summer!" he bragged. "For it has been vouchsafed to me, no man born of woman can defeat me, be he Knight, Knave or Knotling!"
Morrigdan nickered, just a bit, then turned away.
"Is that so?" Forrestal asked. It was getting difficult to keep her seat. Her horse was trembling beneath her. She managed to slide over the side and down to the road.
Things clattered in all directions, but she kept a hold of her sword. A shoulder to the side pushed Morridgan off the roadway. The giggling thing was going to be no help in the battle.
Then she walked to the middle of the road, set her sword nonchalantly on her shoulder and waved Sir Ink Knight over. "Come at me, sir!"
"None can defeat me!" he shouted. He glanced to the side. Morridgan was nickering fiercely, stomping the dirt with one hoof.
"Never mind her," Forrestal shouted. "A bag of…bad oats moils her stomach. Come face a knight of Camelot. If you dare!" She slid the sword three inches out of the scabbard.
"Have at thee, sirrah!" He touched spurs to his horse. It charged.
Camelot's champion swung her sword, slinging the scabbard straight at the horse's eye. It flinched. She watched closely and saw it flinch to the right. So she ducked to its left.
MacLyss tried to drill into her that mounts are fair targets, in combat you hit the biggest target that aids you. But she wanted that saddle, and wasn't in the mood to wrestle it off a wounded horse.
Rather, she swung her sword up at Sir Inky. He'd expected to ride past her on his sword side, and had to clumsily attempt a cross-body block.
She had all the time in the world to see the gap in his armor and poke her sword up into his ribs.
Pain and shock went through his form, but the expression of betrayal on his face was downright amusing.
The horse, well trained for melee, spun on the instant with almost no instruction. It came back, passing her correctly. Inky swung down with his sword, his considerable mass behind the attack.
She ducked down and out. The sword swung through thin air, the knight spun out of his saddle and fell to the ground at her feet.
"How?" he gasped as she put sword point to his throat.
"I have tits," she said with a smile, then stapled his spine to the road.
--------------
"So," she said as she loaded her gear, "THAT idiot was the quest." She stood on tip-toe to whisper in Morridgan's ear. "My dooooooooooooom." The mare nickered.
There was no sheath for her bow, but there was a nicely placed tie-off for the quiver. She'd have the armorer fix it when they got home.
"So, we can either report BOTH adventures to Mac and Arthur and Guinevere," she went on. "And be known for getting into trouble whenever we go out.
"Or we just say it took a while to find Sir Boot Polish and leave it at that."
She liked the idea of staying silent about Castle Castle-Castle. Arthur liked efficient quests. You went, you did, you came back. None of this riding around, a knight errant, poking your lance in where it didn't belong.
She wasn't sure if Morridgan would keep the secret, though. "Tell you what?" she said. The horse looked at her with one eye. "If Merlin asks, you can tell him I wore a dress. If I can tell him that YOU spent time as a pony."
The horse considered her words as she finished tying up the bedroll. Then they were off. Inky's head bounced in an inky black bag carried by the inky black horse behind them. And behind it, four wild asses struggled to keep up, hoping the knight would protect them through the wolf-ridden woods.
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"And then," Forrestal finished, "I said, 'I have tits.' And I stabbed through his Adam's Apple, all the way down to the road."
She pantomimed a flourish and sat back down. MacLyss roared approval and poured her more ale.
Arthur gave a smile while Guinevere pounded the table. She shouted Forrestal's name and the other ladies in the room cheered.
The knights, however, looked uncomfortable.
Forrestal drank her ale and waited for one of them to speak aloud.
Galahad squirmed and spoke first. "So, that, uh, that wasn't really a fair fight."
She glanced at MacLyss. He was carefully examining the bottom of his stein. So it was entirely up to her.
"No, Sir Galahad," she said. "I was afoot, he was ahorse. But I prevailed."
"Yay!" Guinevere toasted with her wine goblet.
"Yes, yes," Bedevere acknowledged. "But you didn't reveal that you were a, uh, not a man, as per his prophecy."
"Who's to say I'm not?" she replied. "Everyone tends to assume that knight means man. Maybe the term can be used as one of office, not gender?"
"That's…hardly what he understood when he received the prophecy," Galahad said.
"That's kind of the point of the prophecy, isn't it?" she returned. "Obviously, he assumed that he'd be forever protected against Arthur's knights. Whoops."
"To the tits!" Guinevere toasted with another drink. None dared refuse.
Lancelot wasn't squirming. He had his arms crossed and stared. "You were a damned fool to get down off your horse," he finally said.
"I had no saddle and my hose was laughing."
"Horses don't laugh!" he snapped.
"She was riding Morridgan," MacLyss said evenly.
"Oh." Lancelot thought about that for a second, then relaxed his arms and reached for his wine. "Then that was probably a better tactical choice than it might have appeared."
"Chactical Toice!" Guinevere toasted. Forrestal had noticed she was toasting a lot, and bringing the goblet to her lips a lot. But she wasn't asking for many refills.
And once more she concluded that in the art of intrigue, Lady Vicarious had been a talented amateur.
"I just don't think it should count," Robyn said.
"Count?" Arthur asked.
"Well, when the bards honor the new knight of the Round Table, I hardly think that his first… Um, her first lay should be A Tale Of Two Titties."
"Though they are impressive titties," Bedevere said. "Now that they're no longer hidden."
"Exactly," Robyn said. "I just don't think it would reflect well upon the Round Table for one of its members to be best known for tit-based heroism."
"Speaking of members," Guinevere said. Her voice was loud, clear and perfectly sober.
"Members," a lady near Lancelot tittered.
"You did not face Sir Inky, did you Sir Robyn?" Guinevere asked.
"Um, no, milady, I did not have that opportunity."
"Nor you, Sir Lancelot?"
"I had intended to face him, milady," he replied, "but I was rescuing Galahad from unspeakable peril."
"Fop," Galahad muttered. He was beside MacLyss and spoke into his goblet. Few heard him and no one responded.
"And the rest of you DID face him?" There were grunts and nods around as Guinevere's gaze passed them. "So, anyone trying to second-guess Sir Forrestal's performance either doesn't know what the fuck they're talking about, or might merely be jealous because she won where they didn't.
"I do believe that jealousy ill befalls a knight of our order." She sat down. "And I do hope it's jealously. Because misogyny would be an even worse crime in our eyes."
Three knights tapped Bedevere's elbows. He leaned over to whisper a definition of the 'misogyny' to them.
One tapped a second time. Bedevere looked over and said, "The opposite would be misandry." The knight thanked him and leaned back.
When the murmurs had quieted down, Guinevere spoke again. "In the meantime, Sir Robyn, you may have a point. The less cultured among our people may concentrate upon her gender over and above her accomplishments.
"Perhaps we can discover another quest worthy of her talents?" she asked Arthur.
"Well, there does appear to be a cursed Castle south of here. Castle Dunfort-Schloss, I hear-"
"Oh!" Forrestal couldn't help saying in surprise. Everyone stared. "I, uh, I fixed that."
"Thanks be to GOD!" Lancelot said heartily.
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.Corsicanthrax (and Forrestal)