23/100 The blacksmith's wife [27]

‘What wants the earl with you, do you suppose?’

‘Letters, information.   Another fuck.’

‘Another?’

He had me when I was but fourteen.  Small and ginger as I recall, and an awkward corkscrew twist.’

‘Not again.’

‘Not unless the moon is full.’

I teased;  Gabriel was unappreciative.  

‘He has a wife, currently with child,’ I reassured.

‘Then he is the needier!’

‘Of an heir.   And I can guarantee its health, its sex, even its survival.’

‘You can?’

‘He’ll believe so.   What payment think you I should ask?’

‘Timber, labour, a reduction in the rent?   You’ll give him the letters?’

‘Not yet.’


This is part 27 of 'The blacksmith's wife'.   The whole is a prompt-led serial  which began on the Friday Prediction, in March  and continued, one hundred words at a time, for forty-one episodes.   One of my aims in this 100 days project is to complete the illustrations for each episode and publish the tale in book form.    The  story can be read in its entirety here.