Jillia's Man, Gone Astray

By Bynum Westmoreland

Jillia’s Man, Gone Astray (1st book of series) tells the story of two people: Jillia, born into a prominent and affluent Montevideo family; and Char, the bastard son of a Baltimore industrialist and a devoted woman from the ghetto.
He - reared in the slums - steals and fights to live and exits school at twelve. At thirteen, he stows away aboard a sailing ship. By thirty, a ploy entraps him for centuries into a ‘prolonged sleep’ program.
She - reared to enjoy wealth - is plunged into poverty after her father’s bankruptcy and suicide. To provide for her family she resorts to prostitution, enduring until ‘Dr. Right’ lures her into the ‘prolonged sleep’ program. How she returns to living on Earth five hundred years later, she never reveals, only that her two earth-born children grew prematurely old, and she watched them reach puberty at seven, menopause at fifteen, and death at twenty, aged and haggard. To escape the pain, she flees into the wilderness and there survives alone for countless years.
Char and Jillia meet in a rural tavern atop an ancient tower. There they watch the sun’s setting, watch the moonrise, and talk until sleep invades, only to stray apart the next day. Without knowing her opinion of him, but dazed by a yearning, he searches a vast wilderness where a friend says she lives. Finally, they are reunited.
After living together for several years, Char grows restless, insisting that they leave their wilderness home and seek the promised village. She resists; he insists; they barely exist through a winter of bitter cold and food shortages.
Three seasons later, their pantry is full. Char begins his venture alone to the promised village and, listening with rapture, hears her parting words: “I stay here for I am woman, and do not stray about with a wanderer. Go find your world, find your purpose in life, plant roots, and gain your fortune. I want this for you! When you have done these things, come back for me.”

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Mar 19, 2016
• ISBN: 9781483564524

Book preview

Left

A VIEW of OMEGA

You say he is dead? It was Jillia’s voice. She had been crying; her face was blotched and streaked. Her breath came in short bursts from running.

We did not say dead. We do not know. Repeating himself, Samish spoke more softly this time. His outward signs showed composure; he was a master of cautious expression.

Tymmie had outrun Jillia; had burst through the door of Priest Mach’s cabin, shouted a barely coherent demand, then stood frozen, staring at the two men, awaiting their answer. Following Samish’s abrupt response, she blurted, You don’t know! Do not know? Why not? You talked to the messenger; well didn’t you? Though now in her mid-twenties, her adolescent persistence still showed, Is he alive or not?

He could still be alive. Priest Mach spoke calmly, He has survived before. You loved him; you lived with him; you can understand his passions. You heard him tell of his life in the wilderness and heard him tell of his life on a spaceship. He was…is a rare man; he can be anyone’s friend or anyone’s foe. Most of all he is a survivor. In an emergency, if I could entrust my life to anyone it would be him. If anyone can survive such an ordeal, he can. Do not worry my dear; he is all right. I am sure.

Priest Mach turned and looked out the small window at the newly sprouted buds on his cherry trees. His facial expression drew tight from his habit of stretching the truth, causing his blind eye to twitch uncontrollably.

The news came by courier, a runner who had traveled for eleven days. Samish struggled to explain, This courier had memorized the message. He said gale force winds struck a sailing ship, crashed it against a lone rock spire. There it floundered for hours in a savage sea and finally vanished into the fog bank. From this description, it must have been his ship. Bright red sails, stained with dye leached from red kelp. Who else would flaunt such a color?

Their friend had followed his obsession over everyone’s objections, especially Jillia’s, pushing the known frontier further each voyage, driving his captains and promising to deck sailors a place amongst the saints. He had become a legend to the townspeople. However, the two women of his life, his two lovers, were terrorized at the thought of losing him but hoped with feminine optimism. In their own way, his friend Samish, the diplomat, and his teacher Priest Mach feared the enviable.

- - -

STICKS and STONES MAY BREAK MY BONES

I lurched from a sleep; sleep filled with turbulence. Flat on my back with my head strained upward, I brawled with a draft of deranged demons while struggling to set slumber aside and bring myself alert to the realities which were so rudely violating my dreams.

The crashing still echoed around the tiny room as the oaken door bounced against the wall and settled itself. Chasing the explosion, stomped six savage men, piercing the room like a dart through darkness. They lined the chamber on three sides, nearly encircling the stack of mats that served as a bed for this primitive hut. Each struck a heroic pose, and make way for their leader. No one spoke.

As a conductor waiting for the fanfare to quiet before approaching the orchestra and mounting the rostrum, their leader entered and paused, blocking the open doorway with his massive body; the ridges delineating each muscle segment affirmed most clearly his massive strength. He looked around like a general reviewing his troops. A brightly dyed vest made of leather, leaving his arms bare, covered his chest. Rawhide trousers covered his legs.

He carried no weapon except the hooked knife in his waist belt. He held himself as a leader. His face was heavily tanned and broad with square jaw and high cheeks. The eyebrows were nearly missing; he looked more Asian than the others did. His beard was close cut, but his head hair, what there was of it, hung to his shoulders. He was partly bald, a fur hat covered his head, and so only graying showed. I noticed each of the old wounds, scars upon scar along his arms.

He pointed at the bedding, grunted and gestured. The youngest of the six lunged for the girl at my side, dragging her from under the blankets. She screamed. He jerked her to standing, purely naked drama in the midst of the wintry room. She faced the leader, little more than a hand span separating them. He growled, Go you girl to home with you. Make ready for fate of you. He thrust her outside; she fled, sobbing.

The leader returned his eyes to mine. I caught them, held for a moment, pressed disgust across my mouth, and then returned to looking at the group like a spectator at a garden party. They were motionless. I peered into each man’s eyes, one at a time, lingering to grasp any common attitude bred from instructions, received before beginning their trip to my hut. No insight came to me!

A streak of morning sun flashed. My stare tore from their eyes by the glint of long knives stuck under their waist belts. The blades were broad, slightly hooked at the tip and gleamed from honing. An artisan had wrapped the hilts with finely braided leather, studded them with brass nodules, and now tarnished from sweating hands. Each man gripped a staff, polished wood with a throwing strap tied to the balance point. At the end was affixed a double-edged spike. An aura of death danced upon its tip.

A blanket covered me; my legs had crossed themselves, instinctively in an inept effort to protect my genitals. I rose to my elbows, roughly cleared my throat, and spat its contents into a corner. Then slowly, I returned my head to glare once again at the leader. In a chronic way, I said, And what the hell do you want!?

He braced frozen. Apparently, he had expected an inept response. His followers stood as fine statuary carefully placed on a shelf. Though they stood silent, I felt their tension. Their knuckles gripped white around the spears and muscles coiled ready to vault. Keeping my eyes fixed on his, I eluded the temptation to glance at them now. All remained hushed; an absence of human sounds circled our stage. Even the gallery outside which had trailed the welcoming committee ceased their shuffling. Their mummers died. All froze, even the many flying insects.

Their leader had ignored my question; he just stood blank. So trying to project a disgust of superiority, knowing all the while that I led from weakness, I again growled. Well!

He began, Call me Egor. Actually, he had spoken of himself by another name. Slumber so dominated my interest that I forgot it immediately, so nicknamed him, Egor. It seemed to fit. He said, Know me as lead hunter for our tribe. Saved you our child.

Right. A second impression stabbed me like a rose being pinned to a bare chest. His voice tone clashed with his stance; any arena would judge him formidable. His voice was not soft, not sweet, and certainly not effeminate. It was a bit gruff, yet warmed with the overtones of interest and concern for others.

Saved you child, my eldest son’s son from Hermits. Brutal men. Capture children. Disappear them forever. Hurt us, a loss always.

So why don’t you catch them and kick their ass?

They, holy men! Showed daring did you and bravery in fight with two Hermits. Thank you from council. From village, and from me, he added, a grin cracking his solemn expression.

I uttered some moderately intelligent words like, Glad I could help. God, my head hurt, I needed to whizz. I needed a drink and food and a bath and quietness. Most of all, I needed sleep. The woman had refused to let me sleep. During the day, she appeared the model citizen, poised, intelligent, industrious, and quite proper. With the sun’s hidden face, her Jekyll emerged and formed the woman into a perpetual motion climaxing Hyde, pausing only occasionally and then only long enough to heed my crying plead for rest. She filled this with chatter about her next-emerging fantasy. Reminding me of the first automatic weapon, the Gatlin gun, thus I had named her Gatlin, for like Egor, her name failed to register on my confused mind. Besides I like nicknames, they divulge more.

Egor continued without acknowledging my words. Know all and me, lived you in tower and stole food at night. Showed like a crazy man, much of the time. Thought by all you were a Hermit. So…

Wait! I yelled, Me, a hermit! Why?

Dress strange. Dress different strange like Hermit, be one. Granted I was not dressed like these people. They wore animal furs or tanned skins. Or were clothed in a woven matting made from bagasse gathered fresh, stripped of its hull, then soaked in a weak lye solution and woven while still wet. After formed, women washed it clean of the lye, and then rubbed it with melted fat. Soon evaporation of the water drew in the oil, giving the fabric softness and flexibility.

I was wearing cloths made from an odd fabric, not fur that was obvious, not wool for there was no itching, not cotton for there were no wrinkles. It was more like glass, spun glass, but it was not glass!

The malicious Hermits wore mock-regal robes, appearing generations old, faded and dirty and which misfit their wearers.

Hell, I dress like no hermit that I ever saw. I blasted at him. I sounded defensive, and felt it, so immediately curbed this approach least it lessen my earned credibility that was little enough as it was.

He continued, Act strange by you all the time like near crazy. Thought all you a Hermit and holy. Allow stay you for that reason.

I’m pleased to hear that you spared me. He was right. When I first landed in this village, I was most delirious. Memory of the last trek before arriving had faded from my mind. My first recall after leaving the ship had been of standing on a balcony at the top of a tower feeling like Muslin priests stationed to chant the evening prayer while observing a vow of silence. For weeks, fever plagued me, so I remembered only portions and those distorted. During the day, I had burned from the baking sun. At night, the impelling chill of the dampness had caused me to shake for hours. Only from exhaustion, did I sleep; even then, sleep was cruel.

Egor talked on, delivering a series of niceties that grew tiresome. He told of their recent hunts for wild pigs and deer and duck and fish, returning with enough meat for a feast and for smoking. These people depended on wild game for their survival, killing all animals that they could find and still being hungry much of the year. They were similar to other primitive tribes in that respect.

The other men in the room became impatient, though they tried not to show it, with one exception. The youngest, who had snatched the girl from my ardent bed and hurled her naked for all to view, glared with hatred leaping forth at me, like a villain’s stare in a second-rate melodrama. Now impatience myself, I blurted, Egor! You’re telling me about the events of the world like I cared a damn. I was not a morning person, especially not today. And your charming friends…from their looks, I circled my pointing finger around the room, would rather spit my carcass over a roasting fire than the half-ton wild hog that you boast of wrestling to the submission, using its erection-length tusks as handles. I paused, thinking that Egor would leap to speak. He stood silent. The youngest shifted to interrupt, but Egor’s gesture checked his hostile action.

After a prolonged silence, I calmed my voice and said, You invaded my room to talk about more than just hunting and fishing, and more than thanking me for saving the child. Is that right? It was easy to understand why Egor was the lead hunter. For throughout my affront, he had stood like a bird dog on the point, absorbing every word, letting his eyes smoothly follow my gestures and subtle motions, forming a total picture in his mind of his target.

Understand me right. Tell you reason for my visit when ready by you.

Up to now, I had been leaning back and resting on my elbows. Now I abruptly pulled myself to sit erect and cross-legged, Hindu style with a tattered blanket covering my naked lower half. Instinctively, I struck my forehead with the base of my right palm in a self-correcting gesture and then pointed forward with my palm motioning toward a circular floor mat and said, Sit your bones in front of me, talk you me. Make like at home. Be my guest you now! God, he had hypnotized my tongue to wag like his.

He sat. I reached for the wine skin, tipped it to my lips, took a short draw, sloshed my mouth free of the night’s haunts, spat this into the opposite corner, swilled another long drink, swallowed gingerly, and extended the flask for him to accept. He grunted at the same youngster who leaped forward, snatched the wine skin from my grip, and politely handed it to Egor, bowing slightly to him as he backed away, and then glanced at me with scorn. Egor drank heartily from the skin, placed it on the mat between us and smiled, his second, a muffled smile keeping his lips nearly shut, like trying to hide his teeth. From the black spots along his gums line, it was obvious that the local dentist was in seclusion.

I spoke, Now we’ve drunk together, tell me what the hell you want with me. Have I…

Earlier, he had spoken with the polished voice of a diplomat. Now he interrupted, spoke as a challenger, Insulted of our women by you.

I chased a myriad of thoughts that might explain his accusation. I defiled the exposed woman? I thought but hesitated to say aloud. Gatlin was twenty plus with stretch marks on her belly. A wild pig had killed her husband. She missed his maturity and love. Worst, an ‘annoying’ fool, as she had defiantly expressed, was pursuing her. Having given the room time to ease, I said, Insulted your women! What the hell are you talking about? I had always believed that the best defense was a strong offence.

Insult our tribal council! Owe them by you most big apology. He snapped back.

The tribal council, I thought. That was who the old women were. They had taken me into their private chamber. There they thanked me for saving the child, huddled me in their midst, and with smoked herring and pickled mushrooms fed me like fattening a duck; plied me with mull wine, smothering me with their complements and hugs and offers for pleasure, ‘Never before known.’ I had refused, thinking I was being setup for a jealous husband to catch in the act.

Bull shit. I insulted no one. I owe no apologies.

Insulted our Chieftess, says this by her and directly.

And how am I supposed to have insulted her?

His composure cracked, his face turned a shade darker. He appeared uncomfortable, but tried not to show it. He shifted forward, almost whispering, Thanked you by her for saving our child, and invited you to her person to share the evening with her. Refused her by you.

Sure, I refused. So what?

Missed the point made by me. Share her bed by custom; accept always when visiting male or unmarried tribal youth when asked by councilwoman. Refuse her by you is blasphemy, the highest of all insults. I had just stumbled into the strangest set of social customs that my memory would recall, then or even now, forty years later. Their society was the flipside of earlier slave cultures, which used captive women for unlimited pleasures, their bodies returned for menial labor once when no longer exciting.

So I didn’t want to her tail that day. What’s wrong with not wanting sex once in a while? I started to tell him more of why I had refused, but I pinched the words to stillness. If being an emissary to a bordering tribe meant having to sleep with the women who were old, ugly, and fat, I understood why these tribes remained remote and clannish. Only the perverted would make the trip. Of course, there is beauty in everything, I suppose. The only thing beautiful about her was her shoes. They appeared as stockings with semi-hard soles. She sat ever on her fat buttock with her stubby legs stretched straight out, displaying the bottoms of both slippers on which was stitched fine needlepoint designs.

I now understood why the neophyte men were seldom home; these old women had their pick. It also explained why the young women departed the village frequently just before high noon to be gone for a few hours to gather wild vegetables and herbal roots. Usually they came home with little to show for their venture, except a shy smile and a livened bounce in their walk. None of the other women criticized them, at least not openly. The old ones withheld their aversion, but got even another way. The young women, especially the sensual ones, who broke favor with their elders, received extra chores, the more menial and difficult ones.

I had watched the younger women laugh openly as lots were drawn amongst the young men to select a messenger to a neighboring village. Each young buck seemingly battled to be the winner. Once selected, he became humble, often seeming disappointed. His friends would slap his back, shout crude congratulation mixed with rude laughter, wishing him conquest and pleasure during his journey, let their gestures give full meaning to their thoughts. Poor bastard, it seemed; he would share a bed that night with an elderly chieftess of the host tribe.

Egor said, Insulted her by not accepting her request. Demand formal apology from you. Now! Recognize custom and know yourself as man of village. The younger man scuffed his feet, nearly falling forward to speak, but choked down his words.

I committed no sin. I owe no one an apology. I again stretched for the wine sack, took another drink, swallowed it and extended the sack to him. He bluntly refused. Well, he seemed less a drinking-buddy type than I had at first thought.

The young buck became even more impatient. From the corner of my eye, I saw him thumbing his knife. Not able to control himself further, he blurted, Tell him! Tell him what do him by you. Tell him of pain by (Egor) to him. I still did not catch the name.

Egor glared at the young man, his eyes piercing and commanded, Quiet! He then turned to me, his poise firm, saying, Excuse his manners. Forget self often is the way by the young, and feels anger the most of all is by him. He whispered these words as if no one else was to hear him.

He hurts the most? I looked at the young man; he greeted me with distaste. I mimicked. I had an enemy but still failed to grasp what I had done to raise his hatred.

Egor changed his approach. He became consoling and fatherly. Realize all know that you know little of our customs. Do as asked and learn ways of us. Live here now by you and learn our customs. Give by you formal apology for our Chieftess.

So I’ve got no quarrel with custom. Customs exist everywhere that you go. Everywhere that I have been and that is further and stranger than you would want to imagine, but I decide who I take to bed and who not.

I urged to tell him about the ship that had brought me to his remote land. The memories bewildered my mind of living in a perpetual sterile environment without real plants except in the green houses, the never-ending silence, the spherical view of endless space dotted by a zillion stars and an occasional planet, the auroras’ spectacle as we approached for landing. I wanted sorely to talk of these memories. Even to the primitive, as I saw these people, but an inner voice commanded control, so I held my tongue.

I continued, You live with your customs. I shall keep mine to myself. My mind is fucked up enough as it is without confusing it now with anything else. I paused. Egor remained silent. You understand what I’m saying? I spat.

Breached the custom, know them not, understand that by me and by Chieftess, but keep custom while in village now by you anymore. He was pleading. Why!? Because saved our child by you. Accept by Chieftess your apology and forget the insult this time. Give your apology, remove the charge by her. The empathy that his eyes showed bore into my heart. He hurt. I wondered if he felt the same empathy and hurt for an innocent animal or fish before each kill: one he must kill so the tribe might eat, and live.

Let me tell you this, Egor: first, I don’t understand the charge and frankly I don’t care. My patience was also wearing and my head still ached. So let me make it clear to you. I ain’t apologizing to her or to nobody for being myself. Try to understand what I mean, and tell her!

It was obvious that the women controlled their tribe. They held the positions like a Lord Mayor with an esteemed council. I had heard sailors tell of Amazon women who ruled their men like slaves. Here the men seemed more like drones in a colony with a queen bee and her selected few for mating. I wondered what the role of the younger women was. Did they pick a husband or did the older women select mates for them?

Egor issued his final plea, Wait by me at mid-morning and tell of you to Chieftess. Stop by here and ask of you then on my way to her. Think you clearly! Forgiveness and wealth and pleasure again get by you. He arose, turned and left without further fanfare. His six warriors trailed him.

The young buck departed last. The rage in him lived still. He looked down at the wine sack, looked up at me, sneered and stomped the sack, its sides splitting and spewing the purple contents across the matting. I muttered, It takes little to satisfy a fool’s anger.

He glared into my face and spat, Steal my woman for bed, bastard. Watch you crawl on belly like whipped dog. Hurt bastard is you by Egor. He then left quickly and quietly like a ferret fleeing a hen house.

I withheld any retort to his words, but thought long of his warning for now I understood his anger and rightly, perhaps.

I tried to exit for a bladder relief, and to find a bite of breakfast but found the door bolted shut. I was a prisoner. So used the corner, dirt floors are forgiving.

I thought of Gatlin. During the past day and two nights, she had given me an insight into their society. I learned the likes and dislikes of each council member, and their power and history and of the Chieftess, and knew about the hunters and the cooks and the skinners and the gathers and the hermits who wandered about town as if shadows cast but never touched the ground. However, she withheld telling of their mating customs. I thought of her standing naked in the middle of this drab room. Such a contrast with the invading men folk, I thought. Her body still glistened from the sweat of passion.

Many times during this past night, I awoke at the single striking of the midnight gong. Each time I found this nymph of a woman rampantly astride my loins. I could but hear this scene told to crowds of children as an ancient fairy tale: ‘And the beautiful princess with flowing hair rode breezily astride the magnificent stallion with jeweled saddle, studded gold, and jewels.’ With each leap and toss, stride and canter, jog and sway she shrilled with excitement, knowing that the promises of paradise lay just beyond yonder hill. Only there was no stallion and no hill, just me with a near perpetual erection from a secret ointment that had burned like the fires of hell when Gatlin had just as secretly applied it. No crowds, just me listening to her squeals and intermittent demand, Damn it, keep your fist against me!

She would clutch my sleep-limp hand, clamp it into a fist, then amongst curses grasp my wrist in both her hands and force my knuckles against her pubic. This seemed to work well for her, letting me doze, until her incessant orgasms threw her arms above and behind her head to grasp her curls while thrusting her entire frame at a near forty rhythms per second or until my unattended arms flopped.

Egor stopped at mid-morning. As before, I refused his invitation - now seeming more a demand - to apologize to his ‘esteemed’ female Chieftess. Wondering if I had written my epithet with self-righteous ink, I leaned against the crumbling wall, pushed my memory back to recall, and shuttered at the scenes, which came as if an iridescent mist rising from a primordial swamp.

- - -

A TIME TO HAUL ASS

At noon the gong again sounded, announcing the sun’s journey past its apex for this day.

Again, the crashing echoed around the tiny room as the oaken door bounced against the wall and settled itself. Again, chasing the explosion, stomped six savage men, piercing the room like a dart through darkness. Again, they lined the chamber on three sides, each striking a heroic pose. Again, they made way for their leader. Again, no one spoke. My thoughts focused on a foolish old phrase, ‘Second verse, same as the first.’ Only my bed was empty of the only bright spot in several fortnights, a woman in her prime, seeking an ultimate of passion and returning the overflow of love from her heart. I was clothed and standing but not ready for Egor and team.

Egor delayed his appearance by five minutes or so.

Now awake and alert, I took the time to look around at the six again. The youngest was not so young; he had reached mid-twenties. The others were over thirty and Egor about forty. Seemingly, not many men lived beyond forty. This helped explain why women of fifty plus were the ruling group, the women outlived, and so they ruled. At the time I would have disputed any claim that women could rule as effectively as men, so macho was I then.

These were peaceful people. These were hard people, plain people of the forest, not warriors but hunters and gatherers. They were survivors not