Tales of the Huntsman

by M Palmeri

  Watching—and at close enough range to feel the sodomized sisters breath on them—Marie could feel Leanna shivering next to her, stifling a whimper of her own. Finally, it was Juli that collapsed first, letting out a cry and releasing her grip on the table. This was Rose’s signal to stop, and she eased carefully out of the girl. Richard slowed his pace in Sofi, who was almost giggling with glee despite her own winded grunting, relishing her victory. She was still grinning as Richard withdrew to let her collapse as well.

  “That was only a demonstration,” Rose clarified. “I expect better performances from each of you, and I will provide incentives: Releasing your grip on the table will signal your concession, and your current ordeal will cease. The last one with her hands still in place is the victor, and I have something special in mind for her. The losers, on the other hand, will each be expected to perform orally on their riders, and be otherwise at their command for the rest of the evening.”

  And with that, the four women were guided into position, and stretched obediently to grab hold of the table’s far edge. Sofi and Juli recovered themselves enough to attend to providing oil, while Claire—the only one abstaining without question or invitation from the night’s games—sat before them to play judge.

  On some unheard signal, four women gasped as one as they were penetrated, and their riders attacked without mercy. Leanna keened like a banshee and immediately almost let go, but quickly corrected herself. Marie could hear Rose giggle in wicked satisfaction at that, but her attentions were mostly on Marie. The ivory was warm and it almost vibrated as the texture of the carvings pumped in an out of her so fast she could barely delineate between the inward and outward thrusts. It ached right through the core of her and threatened to tear her apart, but more: it seemed to rend her completely, overwhelmingly—it was all Marie could do to breathe, to keep her grip and endure. And underneath it, she could feel the power of the thrusting begin to have a secondary effect on her sex, stretching and tugging and pressing with each impact. She tried to turn her head far enough around to see Richard, to see if he was watching her endure this for him, but could not manage. She bit her lip hard to keep from swooning under the intensity of the abuse (and the rising pleasure competing with the pain), and found herself looking over at Leanne (who bit herself similarly and kept her eyes tight shut), as if trying to feel what Richard was doing to her.

  Marie felt like she would explode or faint or both when she heard (and felt) Harriet let go with a shuddering cry and go limp across the table. Ruth followed almost immediately after, but her cry was more like rage and she hammered her fists on the wood in obvious frustration at her failure. Marie waited for Leanna to go next, but she held tight, only glancing briefly at Marie with a look in her eyes that begged for mercy.

  Then Marie felt Rose shift position to lean down over her. She felt Roses’ nails rake her back, heard her hum appreciatively, then heard her whisper close:

  “You expect her to fail, don’t you? So delicate… But don’t you see, my beauty? You endure this to prove yourself, and perhaps to avoid doing to me what I have so delightfully done to you. To you, taking cock in your mouth is far more agreeable than tonguing another woman, which is why I did not pair you with Richard. This young flower, who has not yet developed a taste for fellatio, must now be considering that she will be taking something in her mouth that has been not only up her own ass, but recently another woman’s as well.”

  Rose renewed her attack then, and though Marie could not see her face, knew the grin she had on it. She tried again to twist her head far enough around to see Richard, to see what he had in his eyes for her, but could not. But she could see Leanna’s pale expression: the poor girl was banging her head against the table in time with her abuse, her face slick with tears. Marie lifted her head and locked eyes with Claire: the redhead was eyeing her with something that looked like honest appreciation and respect. And so, forcing a grin of her own, Marie threw up her hands and immediately collapsed against the wood.

  Richard slowed and released Leanna.

  It took Marie a long time to get her breath back. She was drenched in sweat and shuddering, feeling like she’d been opened enough to reach an arm up through her bowels. She couldn’t make her legs work. Leanna was in apparently worse condition next to her, totally limp and unresponsive, as if unconscious with her eyes open. Harriet and Ruth had already recovered themselves enough to get to work paying their penalties: each was on her knees before her respective rider, who lounged spread-legged in their chairs and let their charges minister to them, praising their efforts with the occasional gasp or squeal.

  Rose removed her harness and took her seat, but did not press Marie to deliver. Marie, in turn, looked for Richard, who had gone to wash himself. She was frustrated to discover that Sofi had ambushed him in-process and was on her own knees hungrily fellating him, apparently having no aversion—perhaps even attraction—to the taste of another woman’s ass.

  “And now, for the winner…” Rose panted, evidencing her own breathlessness. Without further command, the serving maids returned. As Juli helped Marie up off the table, the maids were positioning the still-barely-conscious Leanna across it. They spread-eagled her face-up and tied her wrists and ankles to the corners of the table. Then the girl was blindfolded. The serving staff gathered around her, caressing her body, then as one descended upon it with gentle mouths. Leanna was far too exhausted to offer any resistance other than a slight cry.

  “She will be tended with silky yet anonymous tongues until dawn,” Rose confirmed. Then, to the Countess’ astonishment, Marie came before her and knelt between her legs. Firm but trembling hands parted her thighs, but Rose caught her face in her hands before she could lower it. She turned it up to look into her eyes.

  “Brave and honorable girl,” Rose praised. “Such a prize you are. You may pay your debt if you so insist, but I have something else in mind for you first.”

  She got up and took Marie by the hand tenderly, led her to fetch Richard from Sofi (who was frustrated to see him go so soon), and then Rose pulled the two of them up to her own bedchamber.

  The rectangular frame was positioned close to the bedside, and Marie did not resist being tied to it. Her feet were parted and her arms secured horizontally. Then Rose set the modified Judas’ Cradle between her thighs and raised the prism up slowly, teasingly guiding its tip into Marie’s sex, rocking her hips to rub against it, and then finally impaling her on it. Marie felt it fill and stretch her, felt her weight bear down on it, found that her arms could do little more than steady her—there was no leverage to lift herself off of it. But Rose’s firm hands showed her how she could gently rock and grind herself against its cool, rounded edges.

  Rose placed a gentle kiss on the hood of Marie’s clit and then took her husband to bed. Rose got on her back with her head toward Marie, and kept her eyes on her as Richard went to work: He started at the neck and worked his way down Rose’s body to her breasts, kneading them as he suckled and bit them. Then his hand found her sex and began to massage it, to probe it, to ready it for his mouth. And Rose watched Marie all the while Richard licked her to orgasm. Marie kept her eyes on Rose just as diligently, grinding herself into the prism as Richard mounted her and began to fuck her roughly, hooking one leg up over her hip for better leverage, pinning her wrists over her head with his hands. And then both husband and wife had their eyes on Marie, who masturbated herself slowly on the pyramid all the while they made love.

  It was only after Richard had spent himself in Rose’s hungry mouth that the lovers untied Marie and let her join them in their bed.

  Chapter Sixteen: The Apprentice

  The following weeks brought both a settling in and an amazing blossoming.

  Marie was allowed to stay in Richard’s bed—whether he was in it or not—which set her apart from the other castle maids. And she continued to be invited to share in Rose’s encounters with her husband. In fact, it appeared the Countess was quite happy to be offering M
arie her husband. (Marie began to wonder if whatever plan they had enacted to manipulate her from her home had been instigated more by Richard or by Rose, but the topic of Marie’s own “story” never came up.)

  Beyond that, Marie began to work, and to learn.

  She began in the kitchens, as that had been her best skill while in her father’s service. But Ella—whom had continued to show an almost maternal interest in Marie—encouraged her to go beyond what she had considered her lot in life. And over the weeks Marie made rounds of the estate’s various industries, trying her hand at candle making, blacksmithing, tanning, woodcraft and brewing.

  It was in this last craft that Marie got a rather unsettling demonstration of ale-testing. The sisters—Lili and Iris—would call upon Richard to “assist” them. A cask was then tapped and a stein of its contents poured out upon a heavy and well-worn table top. The sisters would then strip and lie in the ale, either face up or face down by their mood, long enough for Richard to service them both alternately. When they were finished, if the sisters found that the ale stuck them to the table, they knew that the sugar had not sufficiently finished brewing out, and the cask was resealed for a future test. Marie noted that the sisters did not seem disappointed when a sample failed—perhaps because it gave them excuse to repeat the experiment more frequently than should the batch simply pass on the first try.

  But the display helped prove something far more personal: Marie found that she was more consistently and readily becoming aroused by watching Richard ravage other women, especially if he did so in a particularly rough and domineering way. It took great effort not to respond physically during his performance with the alewives. And it was more than just the taboo thrill of the shameless display of sex, it was something in the quality if it: for while he showed apparent passion and tenderness for the women in the castle—no matter how sadistic some of the scenes he acted out with them became—he seemed to reserve something special for his attentions to her, something she only otherwise saw him invest in Rose, and that thrilled her. In fact, Marie was soon looking forward to the next “performance”, almost as if starving for more (and more extreme).

  Mayleen stayed for another day after the night of Rose’s contest of sodomy-endurance, during which time she took Harriet up to the tower roof herself for her promised ordeal on the cross. The tavern maid’s screams disturbed the routine of the estate for the better part of an hour, the servants finding themselves unable to concentrate on their work over Harriet’s echoing “song”. (Except for Marie, and that seemed to prove something to her: she was uninterested—barely amused now that she was no longer shocked—unless Richard was involved.)

  And when Mayleen left the next morning, the Purple Duchess took Ruth and also Harriet with her, “exchanging” her for Leanna—partly because Mayleen had developed a certain fondness for the buxom maid, and partly out of a desire to leave poor Leanna at the mercy of Rose for her further “education”.

  While Mayleen freely admitted her motives for not returning the indiscreet young courtesan to her husband’s company, she also toyed with the idea of presenting Harriet to him as a lady of some refinement. She wondered if she could be successful in coaching an uneducated inn-whore to pass herself off as nobility, and considered it a project worthy of the challenge. Marie even caught hint of some sort of wager made between the Duchess and Rose regarding her chances for success. Rose joked that the Duke would not bother to notice whether or not a lady was of a refined background once he had her bound, bent over and buggered, while Mayleen coyly insisted that it was under such duress that true nobility most strongly showed itself.

  Rose did beg Mayleen stay longer, even offering to send the Duke fresh girls to distract him during her absence. Mayleen admitted that she had more pressing concerns for returning: the Duke’s son and heir was coming of age, and she felt obliged to ensure that the youth was properly educated in egalitarian politics in the bedroom. The Duke had kept the lad insulated from the escapades of his father, and wondered what tastes and temperaments the boy would develop. She also commented that it would be on her mind to find him a suitable (and suitably skilled) bride in due time.

  Marie found it pointed that Mayleen brought this last matter up in her presence, as the Duchess had not bothered to conceal her continued appraisals of Marie’s beauty and “character”. Marie found herself unusually disturbed by this possibility. Though she could see that Rose and Mayleen might be grooming her for some sort of introduction to the Duke’s heir—just as Rose had brought Mayleen to Charles—the thought of leaving Richard for another seemed unthinkable, even if it meant marriage and title that Richard surely could not give her. It did not seem to matter to her that Richard not only had a wife that he apparently still loved quite dearly, but also more than a dozen other women that he bedded regularly. She did not want to be parted from him. She could not imagine being parted from him.

  Months passed. Marie made love with Richard less and less frequently, though he still maintained his passion for her when he took her, and he allowed her to remain in his bed. His attentiveness and passion for her continued to help her to mind his trysts with the others far less than she would have expected, even when he brought them to bed with her in it. In fact, she found she very much preferred him to have them in her presence, to bring them to her or to bring her as audience or participant: it left nothing to eat at her imagination, and she continued to find herself aroused by her own budding voyeurism. It wasn’t long before she was willing to openly masturbate while she watched, and took great delight when this behavior distracted Richard’s attention. And she took even greater delight at demonstrating her skill at bringing Richard to orgasm in the event that his lover-of-the-moment failed to do so, not even minding the smell and taste of another woman on him—in fact this seemed to make it all the sweeter for her.

  The only one that did still unsettle her was Claire.

  Though the redhead huntress had begun to temper her jealous glares with something very much like respect, it was her passion for Richard that most upset Marie: both in the forms it took and in its animal intensity. On more than one occasion, Marie awoke to Claire’s distinct raging roar, only to find her down on hands and knees with Richard slamming into her from behind like he was trying to shatter her bones, with her yelling at him all the while to do it even harder.

  She would claw him, too, and he would grab her arms and twist them behind her to the point of breaking. Or he would yank her flaming hair or choke her or shove his fingers down her throat enough to gag her. But all this only seemed to enflame Claire more. And as she roared obscene commands at him and thrash like a wild beast, he would purr at her about how beautiful she was.

  Claire also left a particularly strong and distinctive scent on him, a tangy musk that clung for hours. And sometimes he even returned from her arms stained with her blood (Sofi told Marie that Claire actually got even more aroused during her moon days, as some women do, but that Claire had no shame at all about her bleeding).

  And it was just as Marie was getting particularly uncomfortable about Claire that Ella took her to her newest apprenticeship.

  Claire was in archery practice—she preferred the long bow to the crossbow—and was sinking arrow after arrow true into a straw target in the courtyard when Ella brought Marie—whom she had dressed in her blue velvet “lady’s gown”—to watch. Claire barely took note of the intrusion—just enough that Marie caught her snarl-like smile—though she seemed to shoot with greater vigor. When Claire had expended her quiver, Ella led Marie forward.

  “You have shown a certain character, my dear,” Ella encouraged. “Strength. Independence. Bravery. And a tolerance for pain. Don’t you agree, Lady Claire?”

  Claire raised an eyebrow, cocked her head and nodded very slightly.

  “In a man’s world, a woman should know how to fend for herself,” Ella continued.

  “More than that,” Claire growled. “She should know how to fight.”

  She drew
her sword, flipped it to catch it by the blade, and offered it to Marie. It wasn’t a delicate rapier, but an edged “transitional” weapon, equally capable of cutting and thrusting. It was also heavier than Marie expected.

  “Hold it tight, girl,” Claire warned. “You wouldn’t want to drop it.”

  But just as she said so, Claire moved like a blur of crimson and had the sword out of Marie’s hand. She was behind her, free hand caressing Marie’s throat while she brushed the blade across her breasts.

  “Perhaps giving her a fairer chance would yield a better result?” Ella defended. Claire released Marie and followed Ella back into the Great Hall, where Ella had waiting a pair of practice foils. Claire grunted her disapproval and instead selected a pair of blunted parrying daggers that matched the foils. She unceremoniously tossed one at Marie, who impressed herself by managing to catch it.

  “A knife is far more visceral,” Claire appraised. “Far more likely to bring out the true nature of a ‘lady’.” And without further preamble, began slashing at Marie, who jumped back but did not retreat. Claire grinned. “Just a game, little girl. Let’s see what you can do.”

  Claire was fast and fluid, almost dancing with the weapon, but clearly holding back to let Marie go on the offensive. And that she did. Only to have Claire scratch her arm with steel. Then her left breast, above the neckline of her gown. Marie tried to match Claire, slashing and jabbing and circling her like a wild animal. Claire scored another nick on Marie’s blade-arm, but Marie surprised her by taking it and cutting Claire back simultaneously, drawing a fine line of blood across to back of Claire’s hand. Without hesitation, Claire repeated her attack. And without hesitation, Marie grazed her again, this time more forcefully.