[Editor’s Note: not work safe.]

 

She walks, Maiden of the Spring, across the sweet smelling grass on May Day. A hint of dew still glitters at this early hour, but the rising sun will soon dispel it. A blackbird chants its pleasure at the new day, and she looks up and smiles: they share the same joy. A Spring Maiden, soon to be a Summer Bride. She stands in the sunlight and waits.

The Lord of the Greenwood strolls to meet her, his movements lazy but powerful. This morning the fires of Beltane will be lit in their bodies, in their coming together. He is not handsome, but his raw masculinity electrifies the atmosphere. As if drawn by a compulsion she cannot prevent, she moves towards him, her hands held out to take his. His hands dwarf hers: he clasps both of hers between his own.

“It is time?” he asks.

“It is time.”

She raises her face for a kiss, and a leaf flutters from a tree, landing in her hair. With gentle fingers, he plucks it out and lets it go again, to drift in the breeze until it reaches the warm, wakening earth. Then, only then, he dips his head and puts his mouth against hers. It is as if the world hums its approval, the energy flowing through them and out, out, into every corner of the earth. For a moment, even the trees themselves stop their whispering and gossiping and hold still.

“I’ve been waiting,” she murmurs.

He lifts her in his arms and carries her to the oak tree, her legs fastening around his waist, her head on his shoulder. The familiarity comes naturally: they were made for this, the oldest, most powerful magic in the world. He leans her back against the gnarled trunk of the tree and kisses her again. She thrusts her hips forward, pressing intimately against his erection, rubbing herself against him in a rhythmic motion.

“Yes,” he says.

She hitches her legs higher so that she can unzip his trousers and push them to the ground. He laughs, and lifts up the skirt of her dress so that she is exposed to his eyes, to his touch. He strokes the insides of her thighs, then moves in, his fingers dipping inside her, the pad of his thumb rubbing against her. She bucks and moans, the cry piercing the early morning sounds of nature. A third time he kisses her, and she runs one hand down his back, the pressure of her fingers demanding what she knows he will give.

“Yes,” she says.

She puts her hand on his erection, taking pleasure in the feel of it in her grasp. Then she guides him inside her, arching back against the oak tree as he fills her. His gentle motion becomes firmer, his eyes fixed on hers as they celebrate new life. He chants her names: “Persephone, Gwenhwayvar, Asherah, Ishtar, Mawu, Aphrodite…” and she responds as she always has throughout the many thousand years of the world, encouraging him in, meeting him thrust for thrust. Orgasm overtakes them with sparkling joy. When the tremors finish, he lowers her to the ground, the primeval sexual energy dissipating to fertilise the very earth itself.

“My Lord,” she says.

“My Lady.”

The fires of Beltane are lit once more.

 

[Penelope Friday has been a practising pagan for a number of years and has been running an online coven for two years. When not witchifying, she writes erotic fiction and articles on disability (amongst other things), details of which can be found at her website.]