Her Master's Hand

by Korey Mae Johnson

  Her thoughts had never come in clearly, and sometimes they would even come in late, like someone arriving fashionably to the party. Anwen used to joke that Maili’s brain tended to take ‘the long way around.’

  She had no time this evening for a lazy brain that seemed willing enough to lollygag when it was needed most. She had to spring into action before she was spanked and then raped by an evil wizard.

  Well, this is what comes from asking for some excitement, came one thought bitterly, popping unhelpfully out from her fear. Her brain felt like it was boiling with a million thoughts all at once, which was quite normal, but she had never felt like it was such a handicap. Thoughts came from everywhere when all she wanted to do right now was focus!

  I wonder what sort of wizard he is, another thought interjected, since there are several types, all with different powers.

  If he knew you from before, how did he possibly discover you? Had he known where you were all the time?

  Does he know your name? Your REAL name?

  She had gotten a headache from her own addled brain before she felt him grasp the edge of her underclothes. She couldn’t keep herself from gasping in horror over her situation, and flailed violently at her humiliation of her exposure to this rotten creature. “Stop it!”

  “Stop what?” She suddenly felt his fingers stroke against the bare folds of her most secret parts. “I don’t have to give you a spanking, you know. You can just apologize, admit that I own you, and that you want me to take you like the little slut you are.”

  She shuddered, even felt nauseated. This couldn’t be happening. This couldn’t be how her life turned up. This had to be some bad dream! “Never!” she hissed, fury bellowing from the pit of her stomach like fire. “I will never willingly come to you.”

  “I think you will, or else this spanking won’t ever end. Keep that in mind. When you’re ready to be done with pain, you’ll beg me to take you.” He said this so matter-of-factly, with confidence like one would talk about how the sun was going to rise in the morning and that there wasn’t anything anyone could do about it. It was reality.

  He wanted her to know that this was her reality. She was his whore.

  The fingers left her folds alone, and the hand was quickly replaced with a strong slap of the wooden paddle. The paddle wasn’t thick, it was really quite thin, but it stung like the very devil. Especially the way Damen was using it; she assumed that he wasn’t holding his strength back much from this task, if he was holding himself back at all.

  She set her teeth, attempting to not give him the satisfaction of hearing her cry, but it didn’t last long. The pain was too jarring to ignore, even when she tried her best to think of other things.

  She winced and then eventually grunted from the steady, punishing spanks. She was normally begging Hoel desperately when she’d experienced this much pain from her spanking, assuring her loving papa that she would never do wrong ever again in her entire existence. But that was the difference; she was actually getting punished for something. She had tossed punch on this current man’s head, yet he wasn’t punishing her.

  As Hoel was actually considering how long he should spank his charge to make a point without breaking her spirit, Damen wanted to break her. He was delighting in her pain. He had even twisted her arms out of the way and pinned them to her back in such an uncomfortable manner that her arms had begun to feel numb.

  “This is beginning to look like it really hurts,” Damen simpered, stopping paddling her just long enough to grip one of her welts hard with his palm.

  “Argh!” she groaned, feeling like she was going to tear in half.

  “I’ve always wondered how long one has to paddle a naughty chit before her skin breaks. Would you like me to find out, or are you willing to stop this nonsense and tell me what I want to hear?” he asked slyly, his tone suggesting that he would delight in either choice.

  “Fuck you!” she snapped, not even considering it. She was in pain, her body beginning to shudder and tremble, but she decided she would have to be in a whole new level of agony before she crawled to him and begged for him to use her body.

  “Not exactly the words I want,” he replied thoughtfully. “Shall we try again?”

  “I’m n-n-n-ot g-g-g-getting anywh-where…” she quavered until she realized that even her voice was trembling. She swallowed and continued, “I’m not getting anywhere near your diseased, limp cock, Damen!” she shouted with resolve.

  His arm curled around her waist and he began to spank her even harder, shooting insults right back at her. She was called a cock-sucking whore, a nasty slut, an idiot, even an imposter. She began to sob, not from the insults—she couldn’t care less about him having a good opinion of her—but because her body was beginning to submit to the fact that it was in pain, and the only way to get it to end was to get on her hands and knees and beg. The words were beginning to bubble in her throat, and she could only swallow them back with resolve.

  She hadn’t even known resolve like this in the past. She wasn’t that stubborn. Today, however, was different. She was fighting for something now.

  She was also screaming at this point, and was becoming quite aware that there would be no help for her. She expected that the people downstairs couldn’t hear her. She screamed until her voice cracked from the strain, and she was beginning to realize that all the screaming and fighting in the world wouldn’t stop him from making her beg. It never would.

  He was enjoying this. He wanted to break her, body and soul.

  She wasn’t sure what response he was sure she would make, but she was far from succumbing to him. He could break her skin, he could kill her this way, but she would never yield to him, she wouldn’t beg. There was something in her heart that fought the idea tirelessly.

  She bit his thigh as hard as she possibly could, not holding back. She didn’t care if he ripped her teeth out when he would shove her off; she was going to give it right back to him.

  His reaction she somehow hadn’t predicted. He stood up with an angry cry and she tumbled off his lap onto the floor. He looked down and noticed his blood-stained trousers as she tried to rub the taste of his blood from her lips. “You… little…”

  The paddle was forgotten, now, resting on the bed. Now, he planned to use fists; she could tell by the way he clenched his fingers into his palm until they were white. “Whore!” he shouted, batting the side of her face, and then came back with the other hand, slapping her face the other way.

  She felt like her cheek was going to explode, but her lungs gasped with injustice and she scrambled quickly onto her feet, just in time for Damen to charge toward her, pinning her up against a nearby wall by pressing his hand under her neck.

  Just let him kill you, a dark voice in the back of her mind told her wearily. It’s the best way to hurt him; he needs you for something you don’t want any part in.

  “Do it,” she rasped, unable to even swallow because of his hand. She felt lightheaded already, but was unable to look anywhere except his steely eyes.

  “You were always a pain in my ass,” he told her, and she began to fret, since he looked suddenly so controlled. “Did Hoel repair your hymen along with the rest of you? I’m only asking because I want your blood on my cock by the end of the hour. There’s something so arousing about the thought. I’ve been thinking of it for years.” He stroked her cheek with his free hand in a way that made her shiver. “I’d put your blood mixed with my seed in a handkerchief… And then I’d send it to your love… I’d even let him know it was me.” He grinned a devilish white grin at her. “You know he still thinks he killed me?” He gave a singular laugh. “He can be so darling. I think the only reason I haven’t killed him yet is because he still amuses me, even after a thousand years.”

  The image of Damen was beginning to darken as she began to lose consciousness.

  She reached her hand out behind her, desperate to clasp something; anything would do! She knew if she lost consciousness even for a moment he wo
uld molest her; she would wake up to him shoving himself violently into her.

  She felt smooth, tiny edges under her fingertips.

  It couldn’t be her hairpins; she wasn’t that lucky. Or was she?

  “Good job in breaking him, by the way. And you did. You got under his skin, you changed things, you made him weak,” he hissed with his catlike smile still on his lips. “…a little slut like you changed the fate of the universe, and you can’t even remember any of it. That’s the delicious part!” he laughed and his spittle flew in her face.

  She was tired of listening to his inane babbling. Enough was enough.

  With a swift movement, she whipped her arm forward, leaned in with her thigh, and stabbed the hairpin in her hand right into the side of the bastard’s neck.

  He stilled, startled, as his hand dropped from her throat and he stared at her. She gritted her teeth, grabbed a second pin, and did it again.

  He dropped, sputtering with pain and from the blood.

  She slumped wearily down on the wall. In the mirror across the room, she saw her reflection.

  Her reflection, much to her disgust, was perfect. She had been beaten; she could feel her face pound and swell, yet her skin didn’t show it. There was no evidence to bring to Hoel; she was doomed to repeat nights like these, only next time Damen wouldn’t let himself be waylaid by a couple of hairpins.

  Sputtering and grasping her hand under her bruised neck, she raced toward her wardrobe and flung her things in a bag. She looked over at Damen, who was still writhing on the floor, then went over and kicked him hard in the stomach. He wouldn’t die, she knew. He was a wizard; he was immortal, and he had said himself that he was over a thousand years old. Since immortals empowered with age, she knew that the wizard couldn’t be killed by conventional means.

  She turned back toward her dresser and continued quickly packing, her clothes flying every which way in her haste. She put on a coat and then tiptoed to the doorway. After cracking it open, she realized that two of Damen’s guards were stationed outside.

  Frowning, she turned back around and stepped over Damen, then kicked him again. He’d ruined her life, and supposedly he’d ruined the last one. “Never again,” she hissed at him, and then walked toward the window.

  Of course she knew how to sneak out of her own room—if she hadn’t learned that much, her life’s greatest excitements would have to do with tea and sewing. She climbed down the vines that trailed all the way up to her window, and then jumped the last few feet to the ground before she took off as fast as she could.

  She knew she couldn’t ride a horse; that would be far too easy to track, and she would be forced to the roadways. She knew that she’d be no easier caught if she was dragging a canister of yellow paint behind her to point the way. She didn’t doubt Hoel would look for her, but Hoel wasn’t the best of trackers. His nose had been broken many times as a youth so that now he could barely smell, and his eyesight wasn’t particularly good enough to discover a trail, so if she headed off-road and into the nearby forest, her chances would be much greater.

  Her bottom ached and felt swollen, but the pain didn’t slow her down. Every bit of energy she had was easily harnessed into getting as far away from possible in as short amount of time as she could. The forest was thick with foliage both above and below. She was small enough to be able to manage through, since she could merely duck or crawl through the thickest parts of the foliage and the spider webs.

  She was pleased to find that years of running up and down the bay and swimming in the ocean had given her a lot of energy for this moment. It took quite a while for her to tire, and she slowed only to trudge through the darkest parts of the wood, brushing her feet out in front of her, weary of stepping on any furry or scaly creatures that would be wont to bite her. The parts of the forest that had canopies so thick she couldn’t even traverse by starlight were the most dangerous, but by daybreak, she found herself still trudging through it in one piece.

  Maybe she was actually going to be able to escape, to get away… She was used to walking through forests, since one settled so close to her home. She mentally began to plan what she would do once she was out. Or would she ever leave? Maybe she could scrape together a cottage in the middle of the wood and live off of berries… Anything was better than going right back into Damen’s clutches.

  By the afternoon, she was trying to use the sun’s position to navigate her way into the heart of the woods despite the heavy tree canopy overhead. Her mind was numb from trying to remember maps of the woods that Hoel had hung around his study’s walls.

  She stumbled out of a thicket and found a wide-open woodland clearing ahead of her feet, and for the first time today she was able to see the sun clearly in the sky above her. She took a deep breath, letting her body rest a bit, and slowed down her walk to a stroll.

  Just as she was letting her face bask in the warm heat of the run, she heard a strange crunching noise, and then a deep, crackling sound as if someone nearby snapped a taut rope. As fast as the words ‘taut rope’ moved into her head, the ground came up all around her and she was slung into a net at least twenty feet from the ground. She closed her eyes and caught her breath for a moment, letting the net swing her back and forth until she was able to get her mind around what had happened.

  She was in some sort of hunters’ trap, and unfortunately, it hadn’t even been a very devious one. She was certain that most people could have been savvy enough to either have seen it or heard it before it was about to close up on them, but as it was, she was quite ensnared.

  She rubbed her palm across the back of her neck, which was aching from whiplash, and that pain came with a whopping headache. Through the pain in her head, she peered at the netting before tugging her bag to her front and accessing its contents. Surely, she could cut a few cords and be able to climb out and down the branch and tree and onto the ground. Or at least she could get out of the net and hope that she fell on something squishy enough to break her fall.

  To her surprise, even when she pulled a small knife out of her satchel and start sawing on the ropey sinews holding the net together, it didn’t seem to do her any good. She used all her strength on the rope, and not even a fiber of it would tear. Eventually she became frustrated and ran her thumb up the blade to check how dull it was. Even that gentle motion caused a slit of blood to ooze from her thumb pad.

  Confused, she sat back and listened to the rope scratch across the tree branch as it swung her back and forth. Apparently, this net was going to win. Whoever had made it knew what they were about. The only hope she seemed to have was to sit and wait for the trapper to return and cut her down. Hopefully he wouldn’t care about her enough to ask too many questions that she wouldn’t want to answer.

  The hours ticked by. One, and then two. Her slippers had fallen off her feet, which were dangling from the net, and she had to pee. Those discomforts, mixed with the idea that maybe the trapper wasn’t coming back for days, if at all, made her began to panic a little bit. It was time to take matters into her own hands. There had to be a solution to get out of the net besides to try to cut herself down.

  She tested the loose-fitting loops of the net. Some were big enough to get her whole leg through, even her head. She wondered if she could just squeeze herself through the netting. The thing that seemed to get caught the most was the bulk from her dress’s fabric.

  And so, after a moment where she congratulated her own supposed genius, she undressed.

  Undoubtedly thinking he was wise, Hoel used to brandish his lecturing to sound like universal laws. One of those laws was that the things one was least prepared for were the things that were going to come about.

  Maili would often forget about this particular line of wisdom, resulting in every embarrassing moment she could remember. This was no different than the rest, because as she was in her small clothes, trying to squeeze through the largest of the netting loops, the trapper returned.

  He announced himself annoyingly by hu
ffing angrily, “Well, you’re not a cyrannos!”

  She gasped and shot right back into the visual protection of the netting, hoping that he didn’t have the eyes enough to see when her right breast was popping loose from her bodice in the struggle to escape, and she tightly held her shucked-off clothing to her body as she looked around from the owner of the voice.

  “Damn it all, girl. You should watch where you’re going!” he continued to gripe. “Any idiot could have stayed clear!”

  She pressed her lips firmly together before she could tell what direction she should even turn her head toward. Eventually she did see the speaker, standing amongst the trees.

  She wasn’t sure if he was human at first; she thought he was a demon of sorts. In moments, she decided that it was a man, probably a dragon tamer. No other beings in the whole Otherworld sported facial scars as deep as the ones the trapper had mangling the right side of his face.

  Except for a deep gash across his nose, the left side of his face was untouched, showing that once he had been a very handsome man, with a scraped-clean chin and striking features, including dark brows and a firm jawline.

  But at the moment, he looked dirty, like a man who hadn’t bathed in quite a while, and his hair looked like it hadn’t been cut for an age because it was falling into his eyes.

  He was staring back at her, and the longer she stared down at him, the darker his expression became. He looked like he was growing angry, even defensive, with his jaw locked tightly and his lips pressed into a flat line. She found his irritation quite annoying, since she certainly hadn’t been the one to trap him for hours twenty feet from the ground!

  “What are you doing laying traps in the middle of nowhere? And cut me down!” she demanded.

  His shoulders rose and fell as he heaved a heavy sigh and then he trudged his knee-high boots over the foliage, muttering to her, “I certainly was not going to trap a cyrannos by the road, was I?”