Then she fell asleep lying on me. She was heavy, but eventually I fell asleep too.In the morning she was most of the way back to the old Faye. She fol...owed me down to make coffee, in her thin, short robe, and then to and fro between the cupboards, kettle and fridge. She wasn’t embarrassed at her dependency, and I took care to encourage her with smiles and fondling.“Your hair’s grown,” I admired it. Straight, brown, down to the bottom of her shoulder blades now.“I ought to get it done really.. For me.” Kayla sobbed as she wrapped her arms around me.I put my arms around her and held her for a moment as she buried her head into my chest.I’d never really had a girlfriend, so I really didn’t know what to do. I just held her until her breathing became more normal.“Try not to drink all the blood while I’m gone.” I said for lack of anything smarter.Kayla leaned her head back and then slapped my chest.“Jerk!” She laughed through her tears.“Yeah well. Sorry.” I grinned as I released. Athelstan was elected King with the help of considerable Mercian support. He had been raised in Mercia following an attempt to blind him as a child and his Mercian mother ensured his popularity in that country. Athelstan never married and, as far as we know, remained deliberately celibate to ensure that there was no dispute over the succession after his death. We are told that he only agreed to become King on the understanding that he was seen as holding the Country upon trust for his. We ended with both of us screaming with laughter.The water in the pool was freezing, but we had to get the mud and everything else off and I sure as hell had shrunk by the time we were clean. We had no towels so kind of shook ourselves dry and ran around to get warm. She measured me while I was shivering and shrunken."Don't buy something that tight," I said, "I need a bit of slack, I'm doing this to help remember."I measured her, naked in the forest, wild, primitive and seductive.On the way.