The Tournament by Matthew Reilly Read Free Book Online

helplessly over her.
    ‘It must have been . . . the perry . . .’ she groaned. ‘Bad cider . . .’
    Insufferable as she was, I ended up helping her, holding her hair away from her face as she vomited up the contents of her stomach. Then, with Mr Ponsonby, I helped her into her nightgown and put her to bed. She was asleep within minutes, her effete but loving husband mopping the perspiration on her brow.
    I returned to Mr Ascham’s side downstairs, delightfully unchaperoned. The game was still going. I looked around and saw that Elsie had disappeared once again.
    Relieved for once of the presence of my moral guardians, I decided to go in search of Elsie. I knew she wasn’t up in our rooms, so I checked the road out in front of the tavern. She wasn’t there. I inspected the outhouse in the rear yard, but did not find her there either.
    Returning to the tavern, I heard a noise coming from around the corner of the building.
    It was a peculiar grunting, followed by a strange feminine gasping.
    I peered around the corner—
    —and threw my hand to my mouth.
    There, just around the corner of the building, in a small alley between it and the next house, were Elsie and two male youths.
    Elsie stood bent forward over a barrel with her dress hitched up around her waist, while one of the men, a thin boy of perhaps seventeen, stood behind her with his breeches around his ankles, thrusting his manhood into her with vigorous energy.
    I could see Elsie’s face. She was clearly enjoying herself, making a short gasping squeal of delight every time the young fellow thrust himself into her. For his part, the young man grunted each time he pumped her.
    I watched, shocked beyond measure but also entranced and curious.
    Of course, I had heard about this. The other girls of Elsie’s age talked incessantly about the act of consummation, copulation, or being ‘occupied’ by a man, especially as they approached marriageable age. When they spoke to me about it, they put on airs of experience and worldliness but when I overheard them talking amongst themselves, they spoke of it with considerable trepidation. It was a Great Unknown. And possessing skill at it was something they viewed as critical to keeping a husband happy. Elsie was an active participant in those conversations.
    I stared with wide eyes as Elsie experienced something akin to ecstasy, jolting with the young fellow’s every thrust, her squeals becoming faster.
    Then, after a time, the young man reached some sort of climax himself, for he shouted as he gave one final thrust. He then pulled himself away from Elsie. (I confess at this point I tried to glimpse his manhood—I was more curious than anything else—but he pulled up his breeches too quickly for me to get a look at it.)
    At this stage, Elsie nodded to the second youth, who quickly yanked down his own breeches, stepped up behind her, and assuming the place of the first lad, penetrated her with his engorged organ (which I saw clearly this time; it was stiff and long like a baton and surrounded by dense black hair; not small, hairless and shrivelled like my half-brother’s willy-winky).
    And so it began again.
    The thrusting was more vigorous this time, Elsie’s panting more intense, more obviously pleasurable. After a short period of this rutting, she extricated herself from him, turned herself around and sat on top of the barrel so that she was facing him. Then she pulled her cassock over her head, throwing it off completely, so that she sat there in the night-time air, naked as the day she was born. She spread her legs wide, inviting the youth to enter her again, which he did without hesitation.
    His penetrations were faster now and as he gripped Elsie’s waist, he seemed to enrapture her. In between panting gasps, she started to say, ‘Harder, man . . . harder . . .’
    He pumped her with even greater energy, desperate to please. Her breasts jiggled with his every shunt and her eyes closed in sheer delight.
    Then