The Rite of Spring: The Princess

The Rite of Spring: Fragment 32

The Princess
how Aonan seeks to escape her fate, and instead observes it

After Kiara had left, that morning, time passed very slowly. I was aware of great confusion within myself; aware that the conversations we had shared the night before had quite attacked the roots of some of my deepest beliefs, and shaken them badly. Tan and Kiara I liked. They felt like friends, just as Linnain was my friend. Mine, personally; friends to me, not friends to my family. I knew that their objective was to destroy my honour, my self, in their debased rite; I knew that they saw that to be their duty. Furthermore, I knew it was in their power. It was no longer the men in the plain black clothes who held me prisoner. It was Tan; Tan himself, who I wanted to think my friend. I shook these thoughts away. I knew that I must escape, that that was my fundamental duty; I must escape, cross the river, find Gruath, go home. I started.

For the first time in my captivity there, I endeavoured to ascend to the window, and discover whether that might be a feasible means of egress. I was able to clamber up the bars until I was level with the embrasure. It was about a manheight to my left. The masonry of the wall was of high quality, with well fitting joints; nevertheless, I found myself able to insert a fingertip into such a joint. With great care, I transferred my weight to it. So. Now I hung from one hand. I immediately inserted my right hand into the same crack. I tried to keep my elbows bent down by my side, so that my chin was level with the crack from which I hung, but I had not the strength. My arms straightened under my weight. I could feel my sweating finger tips slipping on the grainy stone. I gently raised one foot, and then the other, feeling the wall for any grip. But my skirt, interposing itself between my feet and the wall, defeated me. I dared not move my hands, not even along the tiny crack in which they lay, for I knew that at the least movement I would fall. I reached with a foot back towards the bars, but could find no support. I hung. At last the inevitable happened. I fell among the cushions and rugs on which we'd dined the previous night, so that in truth I was not much hurt; but the injury to my pride was more severe, and I confess I wept.

Late in the morning, the man called Conan came to escort me to the bathing room. This was a pure pleasure. I found the experience of soaking in the deep, hot, scented water most sensuous. I thought about my previous bath, and how I had gone up to my cell unaccompanied on that occasion, simply because I had given my word that I would do so. Well, I thought, I haven't given my word this time; let me see if I can make them rue that. Then, when I had dried myself, I found, folded on a bench, a costume after the pattern of my own people, skirt, sash, tight fitting bodice and loose blouse, in fabrics which, while far more luxurious than anything to which I had been accustomed, soft and pure-coloured, were yet perfectly opaque and suitable for a maiden. The embroidery on the bodice and sash particularly pleased me, being an abstract design of spirals. There was even a veil. The thoughtfulness of all this impressed itself most forcibly upon me. I had seen no-one wear such clothes at any time since I had been in the Place. They must either have been made specially, or else someone had spent considerable time in that wonderful market seeking them.

Well, I would accept a gift, with gratitude. But I would not be bought. Indeed, the clothes increased my confidence. I felt properly garbed for the first time in days; the eyes of men could no longer intimidate me. I dressed myself with care and pride, took a deep breath, and eased open the door. Conan, I saw, was squatting against the far wall of the corridor, slightly towards the stair we should have to climb to return to my place of captivity. He was paring his nails, and seemed quite abstracted. No-one else was about.

I slipped through the doorway, and tiptoed down the corridor away from him; I had not got far when he looked up and shouted. I sprinted down the corridor, looking for an exit, but none was apparent. Knowing that the bathroom was on the river side, I burst into a room on that side, hoping to find a window through which I could climb.

In the room were a number of young women, all more or less naked. They were grouped about a palette upon which one of their number lay face upwards, her legs raised and separated. Her tawny brown hair poured from the palette. She made small mewing noises. Her golden skinned body rolled and surged. Tan, also naked, crouched or lay between her legs, moving his hips in a reciprocating motion.

It took me a moment to appreciate what it was that I saw. I had always supposed that in human generative activity, as with horses or dogs (which I had seen), the male entered the female from the rear. Indeed, I had seen the act performed thus during the Rite in the glade, as you will recall. Overwhelmed with embarrassment, I sought to withdraw, but as I did so, Conan gripped my arms from behind. I cried out, being now very much frightened; and Tan looked up and saw me.

Tan murmured something to the young woman, and kissed her gently. Then he straightened up, and came towards me.

I had not before seen a man quite naked. The men of the glade, with their horse heads, had seemed not human but monsters, or creatures of nightmare. Tan's form, as I have said, was very fair; but my eyes were drawn to that upon which I must not look, and a prickly feeling crawled across my skin. I tried to keep my eyes on his face. He said, quite gently,

"we are just preparing for the Rite, Aonan. Have you come to join us, or just to watch?". I tried hard to control my voice, to be calm.

"I am sorry to intrude", I said. "I lost my way."

He looked at me, and then beyond me at Conan, and I saw a flash of anger in his eyes. The grip upon my arms was loosened at once. Tan looked at me again, and said

"now that you're here, would you like to stay, or will you go back up to your room?"

I held myself as erect as I could, endeavouring to keep my eyes steadily engaged with his. "Tan, I am indeed grateful for the many kindnesses you have shown to me, but I do not feel that it is meet for me to be compliant with your intentions. I do not wish to stay here, and I do not wish to return to my prison. I wish to leave this house now, at once. Please permit me to do so."

Now there was distress in his eyes. I was at once sorry for causing it, and certain that what I was doing was what I must do. He said "nothing would give me greater pleasure than to see you free, Aonan. But I am not free. I have the word of the God upon me. So I must see that you stay in this House, and go to the Rite. If you will not go to your room yourself, then either you must stay here, or allow Conan to escort you."

I suffered Conan to escort me back to my cell. To be honest, I should have much preferred to have stayed, in order that I might have learned more of the nature of my impending fate; but it did not accord with my dignity that I should admit this. Once the door was locked, however, and I was once more alone, I fell to meditating on what I had seen. A mare does not merely submit to a stallion; she actively encourages him. Similarly, the young woman had seemed not simply to suffer Tan's intrusion, but to participate eagerly in it. Why was this, I wondered? The woman might choose to submit to the God, I thought, but a mare is a beast, without reason, answering only to sensation. Perhaps the act of generation was pleasurable not merely for the male, but for the female also? Was this the activity which had been described so lyrically in the tale I that had heard?

I put these thoughts away from me. I knew my duty to my people, and thus knew I must persist with my attempts to regain my liberty and complete my mission. Surely, if Tan, a mere sheep-herders son, could move a woman to groan and writhe with pleasure, so also could a noble warrior. And even if it were not so, a woman of the Noble Blood does not lie with a man for her pleasure, she does it so that the Noble Blood will be passed pure to the next generation, to breed more warriors for the glory of the All-Seeing God and His people. I thought of my dear maiden Fheardhan, who had been my closest friend. She would surely never even consider lying with any other man than the betrothed her father had chosen to master her. I must fortify myself to be as obedient and virtuous as she. Where was she now, I wondered? She and all those others who had ridden with me, where were they now? Had they died in the attack of the dragons, or had they won through to safety somewhere? I wished that I knew.

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