- Taking this out of the 'Tales in the Dark' series because this one is going to end up being five chapters or more so I'm making it a multi-chapter fic of its own.

And in the reviews, some of you pointed out that I had written in the date as 1890 when slavery was abolished in 1865. That was a typo. I've corrected the date. -

Chapter One: Take Me To Church

The sun beat down sweltering and hot on the small town square of King's County. It was 1860 and the town was quiet and silent – almost as if no life was there. But that's just because it was Sunday. And on Sunday, everyone gathered at Church for the weekly service.

Rick Grimes was no exception.

He had been brought up as a fine civil gentleman since his baptism as a baby. His mom and dad taught him manners, his teacher taught him two plus two, and his Church taught him right from wrong. Or it was supposed to.

His back ramrod straight, he only lost focus on the preacher when the woman beside him tapped a finger gingerly against his knee. He turned to her and his blue eyes met her hazel ones. She had a sweet face, dimples, and blonde hair. Her name was Jessie Anderson.

Jessie had been sweet on Rick – who had lost his wife about a year ago - for a while. Ever since she moved into town with her husband, Pete Anderson. But Pete hadn't been long for this world. He had fallen ill to a mysterious sickness and died just two months after arriving.

A year had passed and now Jessie and Rick were betrothed. They were both from well-to-do families and Rick had long made a name for himself by forgoing politics (unlike the other men in his family) and electing to be sheriff of King's County instead. And Jessie had inherited her husband's fortune.

Everyone expected the two to get together once Jessie's period of grieving was over. It just made sense for two good looking people such as themselves to move on from their past grievances together.

Rick had at first refused the thought but his mother – who glanced over at Rick and Jessie from the end of her pew and smiled gently at them - soon talked him into courting the younger woman. She was sweet enough. And he did still want children.

His past wife Lori had left him without child or spouse when she had died in childbirth with their first child.

Jessie held out the palm of her hand and Rick placed his hand on top of hers, a small indulgent smile on his face. When she clenched her fingers tight around his hand, he turned to face the front again and shifted in his seat. He wondered for the thousandth time if this was really what he wanted.

The sermon started and Rick listened to all the things that were supposed to make sense. But nothing did.

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Once the Sunday service was over, Rick made his way outside with Jessie and his mom. He stood by and exchanged short greetings while the two women shared long conversations about the weather and the upcoming marriage.

Rick's eyes wandered to the road leading out of town and he was taken aback when he saw one of the dark-skinned priestesses that lived just on the outskirts of town standing there staring at him. Time seemed to stop for a moment and a chill traveled up his spine.

~ My lover's got humor

She's the giggle at a funeral

Knows everybody's disapproval

I should've worshiped her sooner ~

The dark-skinned priestesses were a free Negro family that had lived in King's County as long as anyone could remember. Mystery surrounded them and hardly anyone knew anything about them. They just knew to stay away. Preacher Givens had just used the dark priestesses as examples of sin in the sermon Rick had just come from. But everyone was too scared to do anything about them. The most the citizens of King's County could do was make sure the five women stayed out of the town for the most part. They had been banned after a giant storm had come through destroying crops and buildings in King's County. The people thought the priestesses had somehow conjured the storm as an act of vengeance because their home had been burned the day before.

Of course Rick thought it was all nonsense. He didn't believe in magic. Dark or otherwise. But he had enforced the relocation of the priestesses all the same. He thought it was best for everyone that way. He remembered the looks on the women's faces as they had been kicked out. Mostly because they didn't look surprised or upset at all. They just looked as if it was all to be expected. And that haunted Rick more than if they would have cried or screamed injustice.

Now the women could only be seen every now and again, coming in and out of town for needed supplies. The citizens of King's County still weren't happy but they accepted it. For now.

Rick wondered now why the woman was just standing there. It was the one with the strange dreadlocked hairstyle. It was piled into a bun on the top of her head. He remembered her most of all because there was a quiet strength and grace about her. He had found himself watching her on many occasions. He had never heard her speak and he would wonder what her voice sounded like.

Today, she wore an off-white dress that hung to her ankles. It was nothing special but she somehow looked regal. The breeze of the day blew and Rick could make out her form beneath the fabric.

Rick's stomach gave a strange twist and he took a deep breath.

~ If the heavens ever did speak

She is the last true mouthpiece

Every Sunday's getting more bleak

A fresh poison each week

"We were born sick." You heard them say it ~

Rick felt a tap on his arm and he almost jumped out of his skin.

"Whoa," Jessie said, a playful smile pulling at her lips. "You okay?"

"Yeah...yeah, I'm okay..." Rick said. He turned back to the road leading out of town, but the dark-skinned woman was no longer there.

Jessie peered curiously into the direction he was looking but didn't see anything. "Come on," she said, gently pulling Rick's arm. "We have to get going. The sun will be getting high soon. I don't have my parasol."

"Oh...okay," Rick said. He glanced one more time at the road and then allowed Jessie to take his elbow and lead him down the road toward Rick's house where Rick had invited her over for tea. They bid Rick's mother goodbye. She would be following behind them in the horse and carriage she had arrived in. A slaveboy was fixing the saddles of the horses as they spoke.

Rick walked with Jessie and listened as she talked. But he couldn't shake the feeling of the dark priestess's eyes from his skin.

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Rick, Jessie, and his mother sat around in the living room drinking afternoon tea.

"You have really beautiful skin," Mrs. Grimes was saying. "You're wise to keep it out of the sun. I had a cousin, poor thing, who ruined her skin by not taking care of it properly."

Rick became lost in his thoughts as the two of them spoke, his mind wandering once again to the mysterious priestess.

"Rick-" He was quickly pulled from his thoughts by his mom's voice. "He doesn't talk much and he doesn't express his feelings well, but he'll be a good husband to you."

Jessie smiled at Rick who attempted to smile back. "I know he will," she said.

"What would make him happiest is to give him a child. His poor deceased wife – we suspect she was sick in the womb – so it took much too long for her to get with child and then she couldn't handle the stress of childbirth. But you...you look healthy so hopefully there will be a different outcome."

"I'm going to excuse myself," Rick said, standing up. It still hurt him to be reminded of his ex-wife. They had trouble in their marriage and there had been a lot of regrets after her death. "I'm going to go stretch my legs. Maybe go down to the pub and talk to Hershel Greene's boy about the Dixons' missing pigs."

"Okay," his mother said. "I'll continue to tell your soon-to-be wife old war stories of you and your brothers. You kids definitely gave your father and me a hard time."

Rick chuckled politely at his mom's joke and went to the foyer to gather his jacket. He paused at the wide open window when once again he saw her.

His brow furrowed.

She was standing in the middle of town just staring in at him. He glanced around and saw that no pedestrians were walking by.

He grabbed his jacket and went to hurry out the front door.

Once he stepped outside, he saw that she was gone. Again. He only saw the hem of her white gown disappearing around the side of Jim's shoe polishing business. He followed after her.

He followed her past the candy shop and the Walsh's plantation. When she glanced over her shoulder and then kept going, he knew that he was supposed to be following her. She was leading him somewhere.

He followed her into the woods and barely kept her in his sights. When he lost her, he called out. "Miss? Miss!"

He stopped in his tracks and wondered if he should go back. His mind was telling him to do so. But something else kept him going forward. He heard the creek running nearby and followed the sounds of the water. It soon came into sight and he walked along the water's edge until he saw a discarded piece of fabric. It was an off-white dress.

He looked up to see the dark-skinned woman bathing farther down the stream. Only her head could be seen. He quickly closed his eyes and stumbled backwards.

"I'm sorry," he called. "I was following you to see what you're doing out here," he explained with his eyes closed. "It's dangerous to come out here alone. You're usually with your sisters. Or your mom."

When he didn't receive a reply, he opened his eyes half expecting her to have disappeared again. But she was still there, treading water. The water was clear and steady so he could somewhat make out her body beneath the surface. He quickly glanced away. "What's your name?" he asked.

When she didn't answer him immediately, he began to wonder if maybe she was mute.

But finally she spoke. And he no longer had to wonder what her voice sounded like.

"Michonne," she answered.

It was slightly deep and smooth. And evoked the image of the honey his grandmother used to make when he was little.

"Michonne," he said, his tongue testing the foreign sounding name.

He remembered her looking at him outside the church. And then outside his home. "Is there something you want to say to me, Michonne?" he ventured to ask.

He dared to glance at her again only to see her shake her head.

"Then why have you come to town looking for me?" he asked. "Because it is me you're looking for, isn't it?"

Once again she didn't answer and Rick looked in her direction.

She stood from the water and Rick's eyes ran down her smooth, naked form. Her breasts were firm bulbs and her stomach was a taut muscle leading to the womanhood that dipped between her thighs. He dropped his eyes to the ground, blushing strongly. She was the first woman whose naked form he had laid his eyes on since his wife died. And she was perfection.

~ My church offers no absolutes

She tells me, "Worship in the bedroom."

The only heaven I'll be sent to

Is when I'm alone with you ~

Michonne hoisted herself out of the creek and took a step toward Rick. He took a step back. This was what his parents and the church warned him about. This was sin personified.

"Stay back," Rick said, his voice deep. But he couldn't keep his voice from shaking. He couldn't keep his eyes from straying. And he couldn't keep his loins from stirring.

Before he knew it, Michonne was upon him and his back was pushing against a tree. He was trapped. He had the urge to reach for his weapon but he knew he hadn't brought it with him. And he knew he wouldn't have used it if he had.

"This is wrong," he said, trying to keep his body from responding. Trying to remind himself about everything he had been taught.

"Why?" she asked, her breath hot against his neck.

She unbuttoned his vest.

"I'm engaged to be married," Rick choked out.

Michonne paused. She then ran her hand along his chest and settled it on his heart. Rick tensed and waited. "No, you're not," Michonne finally said. She ran her hand down to the front of his trousers and grasped his bulge. Rick knew he was lost.

~ I was born sick. But I love it.

Command me to be well

Amen. Amen. Amen. ~

Rick's head fell back against the bark of the tree as Michonne, on her knees, took him into her mouth. He was conscious of the way the sunlight filtered through the leaves of the surrounding trees. He was conscious of how the warmth from that light touched his skin and felt like instant comfort. But more than anything else, he was conscious of her.

In all of his years of living on the Earth and hearing different people interpret the Lord's word, he had never in all of his life felt closer to God than in that moment.

He marveled at that. The irony. Because he knew what he did was sinful. What she did was sinful.

Rick trembled as Michonne engulfed him with her tongue and lips. Taking him in passionately then drawing back slowly and gently. His breathing would go away with each bob of her head then be given back to him each time she drew away. It frightened him how she could control him with such a simple and unholy act. His wife had never pleased him in such a way before. He figured maybe he had been wrong all along. Maybe dark magic did exist.

She drew away from him completely and Rick's mind told him to take that chance to pull his pants up and run. But instead he stepped out of them, his erect manhood swaying slightly with the movement.

Rick then took his off his jacket, vest, and white button up tunic. He maintained eye contact with Michonne all the while. If she was using will of mind over him, let her. He was submitting to her control.

Michonne took Rick's discarded clothing and laid out the jacket, then the vest below it, then the tunic on a lush of grass. She then laid herself on top of them, slowly opened her legs for Rick, and then waited for him to come to her. For she knew he would.

Rick's heart pounded in his chest and he made his way toward the devilish woman. For she must be the devil to tempt him in this way. He took to his knees in front of her and he kissed her foot. Then her shin. He reverently made his way slowly up her thigh. When he seemed to make his way toward her womanhood, Michonne's hands suddenly blocked him.

He looked up with a question in his eyes.

"You don't have to," she said.

"I want to," Rick replied huskily. And it was the truth. He had never wanted to taste anyone as much as he wanted to taste the mysterious stranger beneath him. Her thick scent was calling to him.

A hint of perplexion flashed across Michonne's features before she moved her hands.

Rick kissed the inside of her thigh again, marveling at the smoothness of her skin and the scent of her arousal one last time before he placed his lips against her center and indulged.

~ Take me to church

I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies

I'll tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife

Offer me that deathless death

Good God, let me give you my life ~

His tongue found her center through the soft hairs that grew around her womanly folds and he lapped at her as a starving man would lap at water in a desert.

Michonne's back arched up off of the ground and Rick knew he was succeeding in giving her just as much pleasure as she had given him.

He sucked at her center and heard her gasp for air as she rolled her hips against him. And that was all he needed. He no longer cared how uncivil this was. How unclean. He no longer felt any shame. Unlike with his wife, who gave him endless restrictions because pleasure wasn't holy or classy, he found complete freedom between this woman's thighs. Be she angel or devil. He longed to make a moan fall from her lips.

He held his hand against her stomach and moved his thumb against her center until he heard her gasp again. He had found the most sensitive part of her. And he rejoiced.

He moved his thumb against her fast and gentle as he pushed his tongue in and out of her and she increasingly began to roll her hips with wanton desire. Then it came. The sound that might as well had been a thousand angels singing. "Ohh," she moaned.

Rick increased pressure and speed on her sensitive bud and she sucked air between her teeth before releasing another moan and bucking more wildly against him. She grasped at the grass beside her and Rick knew she was close. He reached out with his hand that wasn't pleasuring her and grasped his hand over hers just as she began to pulse with a climax. He wanted to be connected to her in every way possible.

Her juices spilled out over his tongue and he drank every drop.

~ If I'm a pagan of the good times

My lover is the sunlight

To keep the Goddess on my side

She demands a sacrifice

To drain the whole sea

Get something shiny ~

Rick stared up in awe as Michonne rode atop him, her breasts bouncing with each roll of her hips. He reached up and grabbed one of her smooth mounds as his he lost himself in pleasure between her walls. She engulfed him warm and wet. He felt like he was being baptized all over again.

Rick marveled at the unhindered pleasure that played across Michonne's face as she moved up and down on his manhood and pushed her pelvis against his pelvis. He grasped both of her breasts and tweaked the nipples with his thumbs. She bit her lip between her teeth and rode him harder.

"Yes. Michonne. Please." He wasn't sure what he was begging for but the words tumbled from his lips all the same.

Michonne slowed her pace but began to circle her hips, giving him an intense pleasure that he had never felt before. His eyes fluttered closed just as much as he fought to keep them open. He wanted to see the sunlight dancing across her mahogany skin. To see her face expressing the moment his hardness gave her the most pleasure inside. To see her hands coming up to grasp at her hair which was now loose from their passion.

It came tumbling down around her shoulders.

He groaned and felt himself close to coming inside of her. He found her bud of nerves with his thumb again and began to stimulate her as she undulated on top of him. He wanted to reach climax with her. "I'm close," he ground out. "I'm close."

"Yes," Michonne encouraged as she rode him faster still, her hands now pushing against his chest while he grabbed her hips helping her come against him. "Give it to me," she whispered. "Give it all to me."

Her fevered words brought Rick over the edge. His muscles tensed at the peak of pleasure and Michonne felt his warm seed fill her. The spasm of his hips brought her own orgasm shattering from her body.

Rick felt intense happiness and then crushing disappointment when he realized it was over. Michonne collapsed against his chest, her dreads brushing against his chest. And he realized that he hadn't just had a heavenly experience with a Goddess. He had fucked a Negro woman in the middle of a forest. That's how anyone looking from the outside in would see it. He sighed.

"I don't want this to end," he whispered.

~ Something meaty for the main course

That's a fine looking high horse

What you got in the stable?

We've a lot of starving faithful

That looks tasty

That looks plenty

This is hungry work ~

He kissed her lips and tasted her skin until he was ready again.

Hovering over her, he poised himself at her entrance. Waiting for him to enter her again, she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. He stroked her cheek. "Are you bewitching me?" he asked.

"No," she replied.

Rick slowly pushed into her and he was in heaven once again. "Liar," he whispered.

~ No masters or kings when the ritual begins

There is no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin ~

He slowly pushed in and out of her, letting her soft sighs and moans dictate his next moves. When she began to move her hips with him, meeting him thrust for thrust, he raised himself up onto his arms so that he could stare into her face.

She showed no shame at her obvious desire.

Rick's eyes darkened with unadulterated desire of his own and he leaned down to give her another passionate kiss. His tongue danced with hers as he began to push into her more urgently. Michonne moaned and continued to push her hips against his.

"Yes, Rick," Michonne whispered into his ear when he broke the kiss. "Fill me."

His name coming from her lips sent Rick into another heated passion. He ground out his need of her in hard, slow thrusts.

He was surprised when she stopped him in the middle of their coital dance but her intentions soon became clear when she turned over onto her hands and knees.

Having seen nothing but dogs mate in that position, he placed his hand on her waist to turn her back over onto her back, but Michonne swiped his hand away and gave him the gentle command, "Like this."

She reached between them and guided his manhood into her wet center once again. Once he was inside, she began to roll her hips, her ample bottom making contact with his pelvis and in full view of his eyes. Rick rested his hand on her moving hips and his eyes hooded with desire. He had never seen such an enticing sight. There was nothing disgraceful about it. It was pure beauty.

He held Michonne's hips and pushed into her. She moaned and pushed back into him.

They soon maintained a steady rhythm with an increasing pace. Their breaths and the sound of skin on skin broke up the silence of the afternoon forest.

"Michonne," Rick breathed. Her foreign name now felt familiar on his lips. "Michonne," he said again. "Michonne." A mantra on the evening air.

He fell forward and embraced her from behind. First caressing her swinging breasts and then moving his hand down to fondle her bundle of nerves. She pounded into him faster. He rubbed the pads of his fingers against her center, knowing she was close when she began to moan.

Rick felt his own climax coming once again. He held off on releasing his seed until he felt the priestess's walls begin to clench around him and a scream of fulfillment left her lips. Her clenching walls coaxed an orgasm from Rick and he rode out the last waves of it with her.

Spent, Michonne collapsed onto her stomach. Rick fell beside her and stared up at the sky. He felt like he was in a fairy tale.

He closed his eyes, listening to the satiated breathing of the woman beside him, and before he knew it he had fallen asleep.

~ In the madness and soil of that sad earthly scene

Only then I am human

Only then I am clean

Amen. Amen. Amen. ~

When Rick awoke, he woke with a jerk and immediately turned here and there, searching for the dark-skinned priestess. But of course she was gone.

Rick would have thought he had dreamed it all if it wasn't for the fact that he was lying completely naked on a bed of his clothing and he still had her scent all over him.

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Michonne kept walking until her home came into view. Only then did she look back.

She hadn't quite expected the amount of pleasure she had gotten from that experience but, all the same, she had achieved what she had gone to do.

She ran her hand over her stomach and she knew instinctively...she would be carrying the Sheriff's child soon.