Chapter 5: The Whores of Badland

“Oh dear,” she sighed, “I did say I would tell you, didn’t I? Well, you now know that I was taken by a large party of about twenty Bandits. They took me on a three-day hard ride north, which I ascertained from the morning and evening sun. Our own ride these last few days reminded me much of it and replaced those old memories with ones a lot more pleasant,” she smiled, “I was taken to that Inner Stronghold, they called it, the one you’ve just taken by force. There, the chieftain took me violently the very first night I arrived and,” Jarolyn spoke very quietly as the children slept in their cots, “although the chieftain had sex with many girls, only very young girls, he did not mark me as his and gradually he became less brutal, so much so I came to accept his overtures, relaxed enough that I fell pregnant...”

“With Tomi?” Tomas asked.

“Aye. I suppose I’ve given my true feelings away by my son’s name. The names of the children of chieftains, who have the pick of the whores—”

“Whores?”

“To Bandits, all girls or women were simply called whores. We were there to be raped at will and shared with other Bandits, sometimes for favours but often because they simply didn’t care for the girls. Many were murdered on a whim, there was no law. There were no organised families, but ... for the first two years that bandit chief refused to share me, although he took his fair share of his men’s girls for his own pleasures. He cared nothing about what name I called my child. My boy’s name, Tomi, made me feel that I might have a hope of freedom, a home one day and family.”

“So the scar came later?”

“Yes, it is ugly and unromantic, isn’t it?”

“It is a badge that was imposed upon you, my lady, to further enslave and control you. You are a slave no longer, Jarolyn, it cannot be taken away, but you are still beautiful, so wear it as a badge of your independence, simply a symbol of what you had to endure to survive as you now are in control of your own destiny.”

“And is my destiny and the children who are with me, part of your destiny, Tomas?”

“My Lady, and I hope you will be my own lady in truth, I have loved you from knowing you as a delightful child back when I was a child myself and from then on I’ve only grown to love you more as you grew into womanhood. Now, you’ve taken responsibility for and love not only your son but three children who had no mothers, because you cared even whilst within that monstrous hell you lived in. You have continually demonstrated that you care for them before caring for yourself these last few days and even now show concern for their futures and wish to ensure that they share your future. I love you even more, I only wish that I was more worthy of you, Your Highness.”

“That title was only a part of me while my adopted mother the Queen loved me and cared for me. When my father died we both missed him terribly and my mother and I grew even closer as I was entering womanhood and needed a mother’s love and advice. Since then I have been ... not even an ordinary woman but a whore—”

“A slave,” I interrupted and continued calmly, “you had no choice in your circumstances and how you were used or treated, you needed to survive; if you hadn’t adapted you wouldn’t be alive for me to love you now, my lady, my Jarolyn, my love.”

“Tomas, you have to understand what I am saying. To start with, yes, rape was painful and demeaning. I hated him and resisted, was severely beaten and I hated everything that was happening to me. I kept asking the chieftain about my ransom but he stalled. saying negotiations were complicated, including pardons for crimes, restoring confiscated estates, trade agreements ... but then I started to endure his impositions and later, with my relative independence in the whorehouse it became a job which I took pride in doing well, mostly. The weakness of man gave me back a little of the strength and power I had lost. As for my scar, you may not want to know what happened shortly after I got this.”

“I assure you I do. No secrets are worth having in any honest relationship.”

“True. Well, Bandit chieftains do not last long, between two and five years, from information I’ve gathered. I belonged to my first chieftain for almost two years and was heavily pregnant when he was challenged, for the third or fourth time that I knew about, and he lost his life, which meant I then belonged to another. The first chieftain never marked me. I think he knew I was the step-daughter of the Queen and might be valuable one day to bargain with.

“The new chieftain decided I was his property and wanted to destroy the baby of the first chieftain inside me, so he beat me until I was unconscious and, while I was out of it, he cut me, left me beaten, half dead and bleeding. I woke in the dead of night. One of my eyes was closed up completely and my hair was drenched in blood from my cut face. I was doubled up in pain from the kicking but I heard the drunken chieftain snoring. By the light of the fireplace embers I could see he was naked abed with two whores asleep beside him. His dagger was on the table where he left it. One of the whores had very long hair; I tied the chieftain’s hands behind his back with her hair. Both were so drunk, so deeply asleep that they didn’t know what was happening. I used the whores’ woollen stockings to tie his feet, the whores’ feet and gag the chieftain. Still he didn’t wake.”

“What about guards?” I asked.

“Probably drunk. This was not the Palace, Tomas, they were a disorganised rabble. The new chieftain and his followers had broken into the treasure house and divvied up the treasure and drank all the old chieftain’s wine.”

“What did you do?”

“I gelded him with his own knife. Ha! That woke him up! He was angry but terrified as I showed him his bleeding ball sack and his blood-stained dagger. His movements to free his hands woke the girl whose hair tied up his hands. She started to scream. I not too gently poked her with the point of the dagger and told her to be quiet or I would cut off her nose. She went very quiet.”