An anchorite lives in a hovel by the beach on the peninsula. Every day she walks barefoot on the harsh shingle to prove her faith. She wets her body in the waters and lies on the stones. She lets them dig into her back. To ensure her chastity she vowed not to touch herself below the waist, nor to fondle her breasts. Even though her dick aches and dribbles she keeps her hands in the air. Even when she itches terribly, she twists and turns but does not relent in her vow.

One day a woman comes out of the sea and up to her hovel. She is tall with a long neck, long hair, a bright face, ample breasts, an ample stomach. Around her neck is a red-gold collar, ivory necklaces over her breast, frosty glass armlets, garnet and sapphire belts and sandals laced with silver-thread. As soon as the anchorite sees her she falls to her knees, throws herself before the beautiful woman, and says:

“I renounce my God! From now on I can only serve you, for I am overcome with lust! I know I will never recover from my longing. It makes its way into my bowels and there plants its seed. Even now I feel it grow in me, a fine old oak. Let me be deaf to the birdsong that has nightly comforted me, that I might better focus my gaze on you.”

The tall sea-woman laughs and pats the anchorite’s head. “Don’t worry for a moment. I will soon satisfy your every desire and tend to your body as a knight tends her most beloved mare. But I am tired and I must rest.”

“My bed is open to you! Oh, had I lived as a Queen and not a hermit, I might offer you the softest bed on this channel. But take my bed, I will lie on the hard stones.”

“You must promise not to tell a soul of my being here, no matter who knocks.”

The anchorite promises. She lies on the hard shingles. They dig into her flesh, they tear at her soft skin, the irritation. The cold wind raises bumps all over her flesh. She shivers. The frosty breeze tickles her side. She shudders. She cannot take her thoughts from the tall sea-woman and her breasts, her belly and her long legs, the water on her skin and her wet hair. But she endures and doesn’t touch her dick or fondle her breasts, biting her lip and enduring for that sea-woman’s promise to tend her like a mare. She grabs the shingle, she bunches her hands up tight, the stones digging her skin.

She returns to the hovel to sit. Unable to calm herself she hopes to be satisfied by watching the sea-woman’s sleeping, her breast’s rise and fall. But the door is flung open, fierce footsteps on the stone. A fierce woman has entered. She wears even more rings, more belts. She wears a tunic and a mantle of bronze scales. She wears a silvery tiara. She wears a sword in a snarling scabbard.

“Hermit,” she says. “I apologize to intrude on your hovel. Do you keep a woman here?”

“No. I live alone in this hovel, I have seen no one for many years.”

The warrior-woman pulls back the curtain and reveals the sea-woman. “You might be killed for lying to a Queen, hermit. But this sea-witch has put a spell on you. My magicians revealed her. Come now, you will let me take her to my palace. For your trouble I will reward you handsomely.”

The anchorite is black with despair. She wants to thrash. She wants to lunge at that fierce warrior. She wants to recite some evil chant and turn back time. But she can do no other but let the Queen have her way. She kneels, she prostrates herself.

“I can serve only you, my Queen,” she says.

“Come then, sea-witch, to my palace.”

The sea-witch rubs her eyes and stands up.

“Thankyou for your bed, blessed hermit. Generosity is loved by the Lord and you have pleased Him.”

The anchorite looks on the sea-woman’s body. Her wet flesh, her breast, her belly, her long legs. The long arms she thought would hold her. She presses herself into the ground, pushes her bones into the slabs, her longing. The sea-woman places her arm around the fierce Queen and lets her carry her. As they leave the anchorite’s hovel she hears their giggles, their laughter, eager hands and ticklish sides.

For days after their departing she cannot rid her thoughts of that sea-woman’s body. She lies on the hard shingle. Her dick sops and dribbles. She shivers, thrashes, but does not bother her dick or her breasts. Then a herald appears at her cottage with immense treasures. She recieves two rings for every finger, a thick red-gold collar, ivory beads, belts and buckles, armlets and anklestraps laid with amber and glass. She receives a samite cloak, beautiful women’s faces embroided in silverthread. She thanks the herald but when she leaves sighs, groans, grumbles, agonizes, and charges out to the sea with her booty.

“I would give it all to have you back! To whichever pagan sea-god lives here, take the treasure that I despise and return that bright sea-woman to me!”

She throws the rings hard. She throws the collar hard. The beads, the belts and buckles, the armlets and anklestraps, the cloak all crash into the sea. They are all carried by the waves and cannot be retrieved. She lies on the shingle, her soft skin flayed by the stones, red, irritated, dribbling, sopping. She is agonized by the memory of that sea-woman’s promise. But she does not touch her dick, nor fondle her breasts.

Hours and hours pass and now she can pull herself up. Feet drag laboriously to the hovel. She pulls back the curtain, lurches toward her bed of furs. Yet the sea-woman is there in her bed.

“Blessed be that pagan sea-god which listened to my petition! You have been returned to me!”

The bright sea-woman laughs. Her breasts shake, her belly trembles. “Yes, little hermit, I have been returned to you. But stupid hermit, lazy hermit, you lay on the beach, didn’t seek my comfort. The Queen is furious and even now she and her magicians gallop toward your hovel on horseback. Here, here, lie with me quickly or not at all. What was it I promised you? That I’d treat you like a fine mare?”

The anchorite obeys and quickly lies beside her. Her whole body trembles, her hands shake riotously, she cannot be calmed. But the sea-woman only produces a little comb and begins to comb her hair.

“There you are, now,” says the sea-woman, laughing, her breasts shaking and her belly trembling. “Isn’t it just as I said? Don’t I treat you like a fine mare? Look, come here, I missed a little there…”

The anchorite can barely breathe in her bewilderment. But then the galloping hooves, the door slamming open, the fierce footsteps on the stone slabs. The Queen draws the sword on the anchorite, forces her out of bed, forces her up against the wall. She kicks her, knocks her to the ground, her fury. The anchorite screams, she begs and pleads, the Queen’s kicks. She bargains and wagers, she gives up every last shred of her honour. She clings onto her boot and debases herself. She whinneys like a horse, brays like a loyal donkey. The Queen grabs her hair and forces her up onto her knees.

“If you so desperately wish to be this sea-witch’s mare, then you shall be one. Come on then, on your hands and knees. You’ll carry her back to my palace yourself, slovenly ass.”

So the anchorite gets down on her hands and knees and the tall sea-woman sits on her back. She drags her knees over the shingle, over the stony road, all the way to the Queen’s palace, over the hard tiles. She escorts her up the stairs, all the way to the Queen’s chambers.

“Go on, up and over - finish the job!”

She climbs, she pulls, she heaves up onto the bed, her heavy breaths. She lies down prone on the bed. The sea-woman lies down on her back. She spreads her legs and receives the mighty Queen. The anchorite feels that fierce woman’s every thrust as the sea-woman is pressed down on her body.

Though she is there in the Queen’s bed, though she is just beneath the lovers, feeling each of the Queen’s lovely presses, she is so pinned down into the bed that she cannot reach her dick, or fondle her breasts.