Chapter 2

I tried to convince myself that it was a repeat of the situation when I first showed Sam and Rowan my plan, but the truth is that telling Belle was totally different. My entire future depended on her reactions over the next few minutes.

Instead of telling her to follow me as I had done with the other pair, I took Belle’s hand and led her towards the grove. I had decided to approach the clearing from the rear so that she would be close before she realised that she was looking at.

It was strange. At first, I thought it was because I was approaching from a different angle, but then I realised that it was the absence of sound and movement that was disconcerting. For almost a month, the clearing has been filled with childish voices. Today all I could hear was the birds.

The trampled down grass made it clear that people had been here, but the only signs were the limb we had removed now waiting to be chopped up for firewood and the metre square block of slate that was our current headache. Belle clutched my hand tighter, obviously aware that we were nearing our goal.

One more step and she rounded the trunk within touching distance of our ladder. Two ropes of vines were held apart by sturdy branches woven inro the structure. I was watching Belle closely as her eyes followed the ladder up to where it disappeared into the leafy canopy.

“Welcome to your new home, Sis,” Sam called down, his smiling face appearing through the entrance hole. Belle turned her head to look straight at me with an expression I couldn’t read. “It’s just like mum’s ledge, Belle,” Sam’s voice was a little less assured.

“I’d better come up then,” she replied, although she was still looking at me with the same unreadable expression. As she climbed, Rowan’s face appeared on the opposite side of the hole from Sam. I stood and watched while my supporters began to extoll the virtues of a cave in the sky.

“Mum had a rock canopy to keep off the rain,” was Belle’s first observation. I could hear Rowan explaining but their voices faded as they moved away from the opening. I climbed up after them in time to hear Sam explain that the little walls were temporary to keep the kids from falling.

“Am I expected to climb up and down every time I want to poke the fire,” Belle asked. Sam sounded subdued when he explained that we had a stone ready to bring up and he admitted that we hadn’t yet figured out how to do it. This was not going well.

Rowan interrupted to invite Belle to view the bedroom, a little chamber above the main room. She and Belle climbed the natural ladder of branches while Sam slumped down on the bottom step.

Belle came down a minute or two later. The ambiguous expression had been replaced by anger. “Why am I the last to know?” she ground out through clenched teeth. Without another word, she stepped onto the top of the ladder and climbed down to the ground.

I had not noticed Honey taking the kids out of the house while Belle was being given the grand tour. Now they were crowding round the bottom of the ladder when Belle stepped off. “You must come and see the roof we made you,” one of the tots pleaded clutching Belles’s dress. “Please do,” Honey begged. “They’ve put such a lot of effort into it since we all love you so much.”

Their voices faded into the distance while Rowan, Sam and I sat and shared despairing looks. We had thrown ourselves into this project. We knew better than anyone that there were faults, but we had overcome so many obstacles and achieved so much. “Do you think it will burn?” I asked hardly knowing if I was joking. Rowan grabbed my arm.

“Not that! Never that, Caleb. Sam and I would love to live here. Even without the firestone we could make this our dream home. We were planning to ask for your help in building our own tree house. We’ve even picked the tree.” Sam was nodding vigourously. They left me then.

I don’t know how long I sat in the family room of the house I planned and built for Belle. Sam was the tree climber when we were kids, and I learned from him to look up. When I said that Belle and I didn’t need a cave, I had no idea what else to suggest. Then I remembered this strange oak tree that had stopped growing upwards at about ten metres and spread sideways instead.

Sam and I surveyed it and reckoned we could level the floor, put in walls of woven willow twigs and make a dwelling of sorts. It was Rowan who solved our big problem of keeping the house dry by weaving mats of reeds. There was one particular plant that we used as a cape in wet weather.

If you gently beat the inner stems after they were woven, sap was released which when it hardened left the cloth waterproof. The children were particularly good, treating it as a game. We now had hundreds of tiles drying by the side of the lake where the plant grows. We were confident that we would find a way to raise the slate ten metres – until today. I’m losing all my confidence.

I didn’t hear her coming up the ladder, so I was startled when Belle sat beside me and took me in her arms. “It’s wonderful, Caleb. I was angry that you didn’t talk to me about it, but Honey explained about how you wanted to surprise me and not to worry me until I could see for myself that the idea would work. I shouldn’t take it out on you, but somethings going on with daddy that I don’t understand.”

We climbed down the ladder together and went to find Sam and Rowan to ask their forgiveness. We spent the rest of the afternoon scrambling through the branches of the tree they had selected for themselves with Sam and I busily noting what had to be done and what materials we would need.

There was great excitement when we returned to the caves for dinner. A messenger had arrived to say that the hunt would begin in a day or two. Abel and the dads would leave at first light. Sam and I had been ignoring the preparations as much as possible for our own reasons, but now we were forced to pay attention.

He and I would be the senior men in the valley, which was what we expected. The surprise was that the hunt was likely to last six weeks. We have a joint hunt with Willow’s family almost every year but nothing on this scale in my memory.

In all, there will be ten or twelve families taking part this year. Hurdles made from willow would be placed to form funnels, wide at one end and narrowing to a corridor ending in a stoutly built holding pen.

Hunters would coax animals to enter the funnels, driving them into the pen. The hurdles were ready, and the pen complete so now the hunt could begin. The first two weeks would be used to place the hurdles. They were not strong enough to prevent an animal escaping, but wild animals prefer to avoid obstacles rather than breach them.

After a week of driving the beasts into the pen, there would be another two weeks or more when selected animals would be removed from the pen and butchered. The plan would involve over a hundred hunters. It was anticipated that there would be enough meat in the end to keep all the families through the winter.

Perhaps it was just envy since I could not take part, but it sounded more like a job for herdsmen than hunters. Sam begged to be allowed to take part, but his father simply told him ‘No’ without explanation or apology. The children were wildly excited, but the adults seemed strangely indifferent whether they were going or staying behind.

At first light a caravan snaked down the valley led by the three men who were taking part and all the children. Sam and I were in attendance to bring the youngsters home safely. Daisy made a bit of a scene at her final parting from Abel, but otherwise there was a holiday atmosphere.

It was still early when we got back to the caves, but the kids were exhausted as much by the excitement as from walking five kilometres or so. Belle and I took the opportunity to slip away and climb into our unfinished future home. We climbed to what will be our bedroom where we sat facing each other, our knees touching.

“I didn’t mean to upset you by not telling you,” I began. Belle waved her hand to dismiss my concern. “Honey explained it. You didn’t want to build my hopes until you were sure you could present me with this magnificent gift.”

I didn’t think I deserved that much credit and told her so. “Daisy told me what you were planning but she said that Abel told her it wouldn’t work. I think I expected to discover that you had been wasting your time. I should have had more faith in you.”

We leaned forward to close the gap between us until our lips met and our bodies melded together. The tingling in my groin began at once and seemed to spread to every part of my body. My prick was like a sapling, hard and strong.

When we broke the kiss, we moved just far enough apart to look at each other. I wondered if Belle was having the same sensations. Then I noticed that her nipples were showing through the material of her dress. That encouraged me to kiss her again.

My level of excitement went soaring like an eagle when her tongue touched my lip and slid into my mouth. I had never before thought of such a thing, but it was like a physical connection to match the sharing of our spirits. My hands rose to gently grasp her breasts. I felt her gasp as a breath in my mouth.

I don’t know what would have happened if Sam’s voice hadn’t reached us from the main room below us. “Are you there Caleb? I wondered if you wanted to check the traps with me.” Belle gave me a sympathetic smile and shrugged. Duty called so we reluctantly parted.

Sam chattered about the design of his house for the rest of the day. It took me some time to clear my head sufficiently to listen to what he was saying. I really wanted to go somewhere entirely alone to think about my few minutes of bliss with Belle. All I knew for sure was that our relationship had moved onto an entirely different plane.

In the evening, I snatched every moment when I wasn’t engaged in talking with others to wonder what would happen next. A part of me longed for a repeat but without an interruption at the vital moment. What would have happened if Sam hadn’t appeared when he did?

After dinner, when Belle and I were sitting in our usual secluded spot on the edge of the gathering, I began to calm down. Belle smiled at me, and we held each other just as if nothing momentous had happened. Perhaps it was all in my mind.

The meeting broke up a little earlier than usual after our start a first light. Belle and I sat on as the others moved into the caves in ones and twos. We knew that there would be a moment of grace after they had all gone but before her father would return to see her safely settled. That was when we did our kissing.

Tonight, I turned towards Belle as the last adult disappeared from view, but she sat unmoving. I kissed her cheek, but she didn’t turn her head. I was beginning to think my behaviour in our bedroom had offended her, when she rose, grasped my hand and pulled me to my feet. She started pulling me towards the grove.

“Don’t you have to go in?” I whispered. “Daddy left this morning and no one else will bother,” she whispered back. By now we were running in the light of the rising moon, both giggling like two-year-olds. We had to slow a bit in the poor light amongst the trees, but it took less than a minute to reach our tree house.

I would have headed for the bedroom, but Belle stopped me, pushed me on the chest, and stood at my feet when I sat down. I could see her teeth gleaming in the moonlight for a moment before she bent, grasped the hem of her dress and pulled it over her head, throwing it behind her. I followed the flight of the garment and when I looked back her loin cloth joined it on the floor.

There was total silence for ages, neither of us breathing. I was mesmerised by the beauty of her naked body. When she moved, it was to put her hands on her hips and slowly rotate so I could admire every part of her.

When she was facing me again, she whispered: “Now you.” My trews were already falling before I was fully upright, and my loin cloth followed. Without a pause, I took the step to close the distance between us and we stood touching from neck to knee while our hands moved restlessly exploring our backs.

When Belle pulled me to the floor, her legs spreading so my knees were between her thighs, I panicked. I had watched my parents coupling often enough but the fitful light of a dying fire left me somewhat hazy about the details. I had also watched animals mating so I knew that my prick should enter her pussy.

The problem was that her slit was almost eight cetimetres long and I had no idea where exactly the entry point was situated. Belle knew enough to grasp my dick and place it where it was needed. I felt the wetness under the tip but then I froze. Belle was not to be denied. She grabbed my bum cheeks and pulled while thrusting her pelvis up.

Before I could react, I was inside her and my seed had spurted into the hole. I had used my hand before, so the spurt was not unfamiliar, but it happened before either of us was ready. I was about to apologise when I realised that I was still hard.

When I pleasured myself, my prick deflated as soon as the milky white spurt was over. Inside Belles’s pussy, it remained hard and stiff like a strong young sapling. She relaxed her hips back onto the floor and I followed her down, going deeper. Still not entirely sure what I was doing, I began to withdraw and then thrust back in. Belle also began to move, and we soon established a rhythm.

I was being overwhelmed with sensations, each more thrilling than the last. Belle began to make little contented moans while still moving her body in harmony. I became aware that there was also movement about my prick where it was deeply buried. It was a bit like a hand squeezing gently but every part seemed to be massaged at the same time.

Eventually, I spurted again and this time my prick did deflate. Belle gave me a little nudge, so I rolled off her. We lay, our bodies touching and held each other. There was no coherent thought, just an overwhelming feeling of wellbeing and relaxation.

Next thing I knew, I woke to find the moon had set and the only light came from the stars. It was just enough to show from the reflected glint that Belle’s eyes were open. We had not spoken a word since she told me to undress. Still without a word, our bodies united again. This time, she was on top, and we rediscovered our rhythm immediately.

There was less urgency this time, so I was able to savour the sensations. Her breasts were above me and I could take a nipple in my mouth as Belle leaned over me. She reacted at once to this additional stimulation, moaning loudly. Seconds later, her body went rigid, and her pussy clamped down on my prick almost painfully.

I spurted again shortly afterwards, and we fell asleep again, still coupled this time. It was daylight when we awoke, my prick hard again and still lodged inside Belle. This bout was short but intense. We were both conscious of the fact that our absence from the caves would have been noted.

When we were done, we climbed down, still naked, and ran hand in hand to the lake to wash off the sweat and other fluids that covered us. We were standing waist deep playfully washing each other when we were discovered. Honey and Rowan were the first to arrive, but their shouts soon brought both families to the water’s edge.

Sam and Rowan were blushing but had moved close to each other. The kids were giggling and pointing. The two mums were clutching each other, wearing unreadable expressions. We remained frozen in place until grandmother hobbled up and they all parted to let her through to stand with her toes in the water.

“It’s about time,” she said, smiling fondly at us still standing with our top halves out of the water. Then she turned to the kids and announced that breakfast was ready. After they left, Belle and I emerged and returned to our tree house to get dressed. We touched each other frequently but neither of us spoke.

My mood was strange. Nudity is common, living as we do so close together. Everyone has seen my prick, not always as limp as it is now. I didn’t want anyone to see it this morning, I think because it had been given a new purpose, a new importance, since yesterday. I did not regret for an instant what had happened since, but I wanted my family to approve my actions.

I would not stop fucking Belle whatever anyone said but I still wanted mum to tell me it was all right. The closer we got to the caves, the more I appreciated grandmother saying that it was about time. If she gave her blessing, none of the people now present would shun us. As I thought that, I knew that was not necessarily true about the three men who were not in the valley at present.

Breakfast was served outside, so our return to the fold was witnessed by the whole family. We could see that the kids had already accepted the situation. It was also clear that Sam, Honey and Rowan wanted to get Belle and I alone to ask questions. Daisy looked smug – she had been doing the same thing for weeks, after all.

My concern was with mum and Willow. The expressions on their faces when they realised what Belle and I had been up to suggested disapproval. I waited all day for mum to say something, but she never did, nor the next day or the day after that. Sam took me away before I had chewed my last mouthful of breakfast.

We went off together to inspect the traps. These were wicker cages scattered along the edges of the valley to trap rabbits and other small animals. Someone had to check them, once a day in summer and usually twice a day in winter when we baited them with leaves.

“What was it like, Caleb,” Sam wanted to know. “Wonderful but beyond my power to describe.” That satisfied him and all the kids who wanted to know if I had really done it. Of course, they were not altogether sure what ‘it’ was, so they accepted the same imprecise reply.