First story in Night Sorceries by Tanith Lee

It was pretty good. But what I want to say is that it was the most Clarke Ashton Smith -y story I've read that wasn't by him. Smith always wrote about monasteries and greedy priests and sorcerers and forest demons, and gold and gems...inevitably they'd be bitter tales involving retribution . Plus, not exactly sex, but what can only be called ... ribaldry. Anyway. This was exactly that. The story is about a boy who gets abandoned to the temple to be a servant. He has to steal candles to eat and is called Beetle. Him and the other temple boys are all scrawny waifs with humble names like Ant, and the priests eat candied berries . Except for one temple boy is named Precious, he gets all the good chores because he's probably their catamite. Then the priest sends Beetle to go pay a visit to a couple of nobles in the forest and tell them of the temple. Its dangerous , and beetle is sent because he is expendable. He goes and is met one night by a black hare with a gold collar. He follows it and he sees a beautiful couple in threadbare robes, with a makeshift lyre. They leave their food out and he steals it. In the morning , he wakes up and he's in silk robes , etc, you get the idea. He even is beautiful now, and not all scrawny. He returns and then the priests don't recognize him. He doesn't share the rubies with them. The priests all go and bring precious. The priests however succumb to the glamour and they find a mansion etc . Precious however is there to recount what really happens. The priests all drink swamp water and blaspheme and fuck monkeys. Upon their return, the priests find they actually are naked and covered in birdshit etc, Precious recounts the tale, and when the populace doesn't believe she says " you think they are incapable of such an act ? " and removes her bindings , revealing herself to be female and says , " they bought me as little more than a child and reared me in secret to be a courtesan to the high priest and his favorites " ... Then Beetle , who actually has a bag full of rubies and silk robes, rides away and is intercepted by Precious, who says how she always left candles where he could steal them to eat, after covering them in mutton gravy , " and now I have a dowry " ( a stolen silver plate ) and that she always liked him. Anyway, right down to the " evil lives in the forest " this is an Ashton smith story. Reminds me of " The black abbot of puthuum " or " the witchcraft of ulalala " and so many other Averoigne and Zothique stories. Its good shit. It's not common for me to be able to find something that gives me the same experience of reading for the first time a story with a specific flavor to it ... You know how it is. Once you run out of stories by a unique author , usually that's it. So this is very cool.