Harvest of Change Read online

  Buck pulled off his shirt. “I don’t know about you, but I’ve been bucking hay for over an hour.”

  “No, Buck. The demonstrations? The revolt.”

  Buck laughed. “This is it.”

  “What?”

  “Were you expecting warfare? Weapons of mass destruction? Nature moves in more fluid, subtle ways.”

  Judah shook his head. “You speak in riddles.”

  “I’m just here to buck hay.”

  Judah ran his fingers across Buck’s glistening shoulder blades. “You’ve been doing that for days.”

  Buck chuckled. “Hard work brings salvation.” He playfully cupped his crotch before pulling another bale off the wagon. “I smell rain.”

  “There’s not a cloud in the sky,” Judah replied.

  “Let’s you and I go up to the loft and push the bales to the back,” Buck ordered. “You others, cover the hay already in the wagons. I tell you, hard rain is coming.”

  Judah climbed up the ladder to the barn loft. “You say rain is coming, and who am I to argue with the only surviving lover of a goddess?”

  “I was never her lover. She mounted me. My body reacted accordingly. The Spirit of the Harvest can rouse even the most crotchety old bugger like me.”

  “You are not old, Buck. You are the embodiment of the seasons.” Judah dropped to his knees, genuflecting. “And I am your servant.”

  Buck entwined his fingers in Judah’s hair. “Are you ready for what comes next?”

  “Your penis, in my mouth?”

  “I hear the distant approach of the elders. The tide shall soon be turned and a more enlightened era shall commence.”

  Judah rubbed his face against Buck’s crotch. “If rituals are performed, it will be with meaning and without fear.”

  “Love shall be without limit. Both the act and the emotion shall be as boundless as the horizon.”

  “And the Spirit of the Harvest will thrive,” Judah said. “And we shall enjoy the fruits of our labors and ride our horses across the land, sharing the abundance and love.”

  Buck slipped his pants down. “I like that.”

  Judah fondled Buck’s cock. “I like this.”

  Chapter 13

  The day of change

  The elder pulled himself up into the loft. He collapsed onto a bale, out of breath and flushed. “What I have seen. By all that is holy. We are lost. Sacred Goddess of Seed and Soil, your bridegroom has shattered the vows of man to crop. We are lost.”

  Hay slipped out of Buck’s embrace. He felt the punch of guilt hit him square in the gut. He turned to vomit. He hung his head in shame. He couldn’t look at the elder—or Buck.

  The elder held a hand to his chest as if in great pain and through fast, shallow breaths, uttered, “You have defiled the groom so grievously he is ill.”

  Buck slipped on his work pants. “Don’t be so dramatic.”

  “Don’t be dramatic? The pure offering for the goddess has been spoiled like our crops shall now spoil in the fields. Who are you, Beck Nazari, to tell me any differently? Why-why do you bugger the Chosen One? What evil has befallen you? Pray with me. We shall make a blood offering upon the rows and ask the spirit to forgive your transgressions.”

  “I am the right hand man of the Spirit of the Harvest, and I tell you, this is a time to rejoice,” Buck replied.

  His head still down, Hay spoke distinctly, clearly. “He speaks the truth. Brothers of the Harvest, show yourselves.” There is strength in numbers. He dressed, keeping a watchful eye on the elder.

  The elder looked around. From out of the shadows of the stacked bales several other workers emerged. “Holy Harvest, you are all involved in this conspiracy?”

  Judah pulled his thin frame upright. “We were celebrating the end of a hard day’s work.”

  The elder scoffed. “By committing unnatural acts?”

  “Love is not unnatural in any form. Sex is normal. The seasons pass without assistance from prayer and ritual. I believe it is so. I am a non-believer, sir, though that does not alter the fact I am the bridegroom of the Spirit of the Harvest.”

  The elder hissed. “You are no longer worthy.”

  “Sir,” Hay began, “I beg you to hear us without the shroud of tradition deafening you. Listen to Beck. Listen. Please.”

  Buck nodded to Judah and then dropped to his knees to stare the elder in the eyes. “Do you recall the electrical storm at the beginning of winter? When the night sky glowed yellow and a ghostly blue light danced across the fence posts?”

  “What of it?” The elder closed the trap door with his foot and reached inside his jacket.

  “The goddess took her leave of this realm that very night. She came to me and breathed her spirit into me. She made me promise I would return freedom to the traditionalists and help them understand the nature of unlimited love,” Buck said. “It seems my youthful self-mutilation to escape being her bridegroom failed. Though I burned my flesh to remove my birthmark, she knew me. She claimed me. She made me into her image. At least in my heart and soul.”

  The elder shook his head. “You are telling me you are the goddess? You are the goddess and Judah has seeded you?” His hand remained inside his coat.

  Hay spoke up. “He is infused with divinity. He is blessed. I am his, just as the Spirit of the Harvest would have claimed me. Bounty cometh, elder. By the sweat of our brow and bend of our backs. Not through charms and incantations.”

  A flash of lightning and roll of thunder distracted them. Buck laughed, his eyes closed, chin back, and arms extended. “I welcome you, sweet sister rain.”

  The elder grunted and lunged forward, a blade in his hand. He slashed at Buck. The tip hit home and sliced deeply into Buck’s chest. Buck choked, spat blood, and fell to the floor.

  The elder kicked him. “If you see a bad seed, discard it. If a plant rots in the soil in which it has been sown, pluck it. If a man breaks the laws of the harvest and jeopardizes the crop, remove him. And you, seedpod—you shall pay the ultimate price as your lover bleeds out. Too should I remove his tongue and nail it above the barn door for the lies he has strewn about the feet of the goddess.”

  Judah ran to Buck’s aid. He ripped off his work shirt and used it to staunch the flow of blood oozing from Buck’s chest. “You misquote scripture. You have misinterpreted the harvest prayers and have stabbed that which you cherish so dearly. Beck Nazari is the spirit. He is the eyes and ears of the harvest and you have plowed him under.”

  “If he is the embodiment of the harvest, then let him drive away the storm so the windrows do not spoil and the delicate leaves of sun-loving plants wilt,” the elder replied. “Rain right now—especially a hard rain—would be detrimental to that which has not yet been gathered. Make the rain cease, false spirit.”

  Buck coughed. “I told the forest I would send rain.”

  Judah pressed harder against the wound. “I’m going to get you help.” He gazed into the steel eyes of the elder. “Call for a physician, now!”

  Buck reached up and patted Judah’s cheek. “Do you think it’s rained enough? Has it rained enough, my prize?”

  “It is a downpour, Buck. Even for these few moments of such weather, I’m sure the forest thanks you. Yes, I’m sure it has rained enough. Thunder frightens Hravart. It has rained enough, Buck.”

  Buck smiled with bloodied lips. “Comes now the rainbow as the rays of the sun glint off the rain-kissed ground.”

  “Let him bleed out, Judah Hayaam El-Bara. Let this imposter bleed out, and we shall anoint our dying fields with his blood and re-dedicate ourselves to the Spirit of the Harvest. He can no more stop the rain than I—” The elder paused as a brilliant beam of sunlight fell upon the supine body of Beck Nazari. “The rain…”

  “Has stopped, yes. Now, let one of the workers summon a physician,” Judah said.

  “This does not prove a thing.”

  The trap door burst open, and Barron scrambled into the loft. He pushed the elder aside. “I did not
believe my ears. Holy seed, Elder, you have committed a grievous error. I’m going for help. Whether or not Buck is the goddess incarnate, he is my friend, and I will not see him bleed to death.”

  Judah nodded to Barron. “Thank you. Be quick.”

  Buck touched Barron’s leg as he passed. “Blessings of the harvest upon you, Barron.”

  The elder puffed out his chest and stomped his foot as if a child in tantrum. “I have not given you leave. I am chief elder and you will obey.”

  Buck tried to sit up. “Elder, obedience is for small children and household pets.”

  The elder spat. “Blasphemy.”

  “Change is not blasphemy, sir. Your blade into Beck Nazari’s chest, however—that might be considered blasphemy. Attempted murder at any rate.”

  Buck coughed. “It is time for the seasons to change. I am now in the winter of my life.”

  “No,” Judah wept. “I need you. Don’t leave me. How can I lead a revolution without you?”

  “Winter never fails to turn into spring. And nothing of heaven or earth can stop spring from ushering in summer. Look for me between the rows. Look for me in the tender shoots.”

  “You can’t die, Buck. You can’t leave me. Not now.” He held Buck close.

  “Show them. Teach them. Love has no limits. Do you not feel proud you shall help transform fear into fruitfulness?”

  Judah fought tears. “Hail, Spirit of the Harvest. My Beck.”

  “I am the Aspector. I am the goddess.” Beck’s bloodied lips quivered. His flesh took on a deathly pallor.

  The elder held out his bloodied knife. “I will cut out your lying tongue.” He waved his blood-stained knife menacingly.

  “Oh, do stop posturing so,” Buck said. The elder’s knife turned to rust in his hand and as the flakes fell to the floor, fireflies rose up.

  The loft floor became a swirl of sunrise colored-lights. The elder backed into a corner, whimpering like a frightened puppy as the twinkling lights shifted into a spirituous form of Beck, though his body lay dying. The elder rubbed his eyes. “I have seen the harvest lights before. I have beheld the glory of the goddess in spirituous form. By all that is sacred—you are her. I see the harvest lights. I see her spirit in you.” The elder sobbed. “I have offended thee most grievously, great one. What must we do to honor the harvest?” Then he added with strained voice, “Goddess.”

  “Listen closely,” Buck began, his voice swirling like leaves on a breeze.

  The elder moved closer, his eyes lowered before the magnificence of the goddess. “Yes? Yes?”

  “Trust in the natural rhythm of life. Love without boundaries, do not exalt one person above another, and do not allow superstition to run your lives. Teach others to pray because their heart wishes to give thanks, not out of fear or tradition. And apply further pressure to the wound you inflicted before I bleed out.”

  Chapter 14

  The physician arrived and sutured Beck’s wound in the loft. Judah cringed at each pass of the needle through flesh. Buck continued to give commands as if he were enjoying a cup of tea, not having a knife wound closed. “I will see the council of elders tomorrow morning. I want as many farmhands and townsfolk as possible in attendance. Official scribes must attend, and I want riders ready to run the new directions across the land. This is the true harvest, for all people. Make sure the cooks have sufficient food and beverage on hand to feed the multitude I would address.”

  “I should have stayed my hand and my rage,” the assaulting elder said. “There will be many like me, nevertheless. And not all shall have the benefit of seeing harvest lights as have I. Do you have a plan for discord?”

  Buck held his ribs and laughed. “There will be little, if any. The people will not revolt against the harvest, for I do not seek to end traditions; I wish only to have the ways of the people become inclusive of all methods and modalities of prayer and worship. There is nothing greater under the sun than the sacred blessings of the Holy Harvest and like nature, the people must embrace every aspect, not shun that which is new or different. Some shall naturally fall into a state of apoplectic shock. Change is uncomfortable. Change is necessary, nevertheless.”

  “Would you please hold still while I finish wrapping your wound?” the doctor asked.

  “There’s no stopping the tide, good physician. Beck Nazari cannot be slowed. Our forward momentum is unstoppable.”

  “Yes, well, the juggernaut of Master Nazari will need to rest so he doesn’t pull his stitches. Did someone send for the magistrate?”

  The elder gasped.

  “I will not press charges upon you, sir. You reacted poorly, but within the scope of my expectations.”

  “How can I further make amends?”

  Beck reached out for the elder. “Believe in the new growth and help others do the same.”

  Chapter 15

  Three months later

  Hravart responded to Judah’s click like a bolt of lightning. The pale late autumn morning, with its dew-kissed aroma and chilly tendrils of impending winter, enveloped him as he rode. Judah neck reined his horse, and she flew back in the opposite direction.

  Buck dismounted and patted his horse off to graze. “We can’t ride all morning, Judah. The pumpkins and squash will not harvest themselves.”

  Judah leaped off Hravart before she came to a full stop. He embraced Buck, running his fingers through his hair. “We have a few minutes, don’t we?” He kissed Buck’s throat.

  Buck laughed and pulled Judah down into the tall grass. “Ah, the concept of leisure time is catching on, I see.”

  Judah unfastened his belt. “You need to finish the job here before we go to the fields.”

  Buck reached inside Judah’s pants. “And what job would that be?”

  Judah wrapped his legs around Buck’s. “You need to finish bucking hay.”

  Buck flipped Judah and stripped off his pants. He aimed his cock. “Hard work brings salvation,” he said as he plunged home.

  The End

  Publisher’s Note

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  About Darragha Foster

  Darragha Foster is an award-winning paranormal romance novelist. She loves her iPhone—she claims it changed her life—and adores her miniature dachshund. She’s married to a patient man who doesn’t mind being her crash-test dummy for love scenes. Her favorite quote is from the writings of Nichiren Daishonin: many raging fires are quenched by a single shower of rain. Darragha is all about joy and hopes to share it with you at every turn of the electronic page.