“Your Grandfather’s.” Uncle Garrick slid his chair aside to make room for me between him and Treise. “He made some kind of contract with whoever—or whatever creatures—that live in the caves in the far side of the stone circle in the woods. In exchange for the privilege of keeping our love-captives all year, we must…”
“Uncle!”
“Sorry, Treise, I almost gave it away.”
I wandered around the empty, silent house the rest of the morning. Chalmers and Shawe were gone, taking a wagon load of something out to the stone circle. More mysteries. I went outside and walked aimlessly, realizing how accustomed I had become to the sexual entertainments of our pretty maids.
I saw my cousin Lamont and sister Addy standing by the edge of the cliff descending to the bay. Addy had made a remarkable adjustment after recovering from the ordeal of her initiation. Many times during the last two weeks I caught sight of her slipping through the oaken door and flying down the stairs to the dungeon in the cellar. When I asked, Broc wouldn’t say if she begged him for punishment to intensify her insatiable sexual appetite. But occasionally, I was sure I heard her shrieks and cries as one of the male staff whipped her before fucking her. She was a Cailean family member, all right!
I sauntered over beside them. “The place feels deserted to me.”
“Not quite,” Lamont said with a grim smile, “look out in the bay, just where the water comes in from the sea.”
Addy pointed to a white sail. “Look! A boat; sailing straight for us.” She looked up at Lamont’s face. “Are we going to have visitors?”
“Yes,” he answered without smiling. “Another family. Friends of ours, who own an estate in the Highlands. They buy and train love-captives like we do.” He looked at me, a dark shadow like anxiety flickering behind his eyes. They’re bringing their maids to Blackthorne. Their maids and ours will join forces to participate in the ceremony. Those family members will serve as governors to make sure we comply with the strict terms of the contract.” He shuddered, “especially the fine print. They also make certain that…”
“That what?” Addy asked, her soft blue eyes gazing mischievously into his.
“Addy, I really advise you to find someplace to hide until tomorrow morning. Richard and I will say you became ill and had to be taken to the doctor in the village.”
Addy stamped her slippered foot. “I will do no such thing! How dare you cheat me out of a marvelous evening. If there is to be a party, then I am going to be here to enjoy it.” She pulled up the hem of her dress almost to the top of her creamy thighs and danced away on the grass, twirling and singing to herself.
The boat made its way to the small dock and the girls and men disappeared into the cave below.
“Want to go for a gallop over the moor?” I asked.
“Can’t do that,” Lamont said. “We are forbidden to leave. We can’t go more than a hundred paces from the house until they come for us.”
“Who comes for us?”
“I don’t want to talk about it. I’m going to get a drink and take a nap so I don’t have to even think about it.”
I spent the rest of the day exploring the house, looking through old picture albums in the attic, and lying in my bed, missing the girls terribly as I toyed with my erection.
I must have slept long. The sun was already low in the west, almost kissing the surface of the bay. I heard voices in the hall outside my door. There was a knock, and Chalmers opened the door.
“Come and get a bite to eat with us, Sir Richard. We will need all the strength we can muster to get through this night.”
We walked into the kitchen and joined the rest of the family and staff. Fortunately the table was quite long, so there was room for all of us. There was a clatter of pans on the stove as Aunt Caroline and Aunt Willa struggled to heat some left-over roast without burning it.
Miss Ballard sat hunched forward, staring into space. Her expression was a mating of anger and fear. She wasn’t eating. A glass and a bottle of Scotch sat in front of her, one-fourth already gone.
“I’ll keep that safe for you.” An imperious man, whom I supposed to be one of the governors, snatched up the bottle and emptied it into the sink. “You know the law of Midyear’s Night,” he said in a scolding tone. “No alcohol or other sedatives. You have to be wide awake and not anesthetized when they get you.”
There were three other men, and four women. All were dressed in black. They wore a military style belt, with a truncheon and handcuffs dangling from it. Their arms were crossed over their chests, and their steely eyes watched everything we did.
Miss Ballard bowed her head down on her folded arms on the table and wept silently.
“Don’t feel sorry for her,” Treise said as she slid aside so I could sit next to her. “She just can’t live with the fact that she has no power or control over what will happen tonight.”
“None of us do,” Aunt Caroline said. “We have no rights at all.”
Addy came skipping into the kitchen, all smiles and wide blue eyes. “Golly, it’s almost sunset. When does the party begin?” No one spoke. She scurried over to the cupboard and rummaged. “We’re the maids and servants today, aren’t we?”
Miss Ballard groaned in reply.
Addy ran a finger around the inside of a pan and licked the gravy from it. She sidled up next to me, sucking her finger and deliberately letting a drool of pale gravy escape from her lips and run down her chin. “What does this remind you of?” She giggled and skittered away.
We all made the best meal we could for ourselves, eating mostly in silence.
The evening darkened toward twilight and inky shadows crept from the corners of the room. The governor pulled a watch from his waistcoat pocket and studied it. “It’s time. If you will all please assemble in the stables, we shall begin.” The men and women took hold of their truncheons and prodded those of us who hesitated or lingered.
Miss Ballard clamped her eyes shut and gripped the table edge until her knuckles turned white. “No! Please, don’t make me go! They hate me!” Her lower lip trembled violently. Two of the male governors, one on each side, gripped her arms and dragged her away from the table, pushing her out the door. A female governor seized my arm with a hand like an iron claw and shoved me forward. I felt the tip of her truncheon pressed into the small of my back. “Step lively, or I’ll teach you respect.”
I stepped lively.
The stalls were empty, no horses. We were herded into them, one of us to each stall. A thickset, middle-aged female governor came in behind me. The iron barred door slammed shut and the lock clicked. The tips of her shiny black pageboy hair brushed her ears and her muscles rippled as she pointed at me. “Arms straight out—now!”
I obeyed. I raised my outstretched arms level with my shoulders and waited.
She tilted her head slightly and scowled. “That’s better. You may be Sir Richard, Laird of Blackthorne every other day of the year, but now, tonight, you are no better than the animals you keep in here.” She grinned, deliberately waiting until my arms grew tired and drooped. She jabbed her truncheon into my stomach. “Get those arms back where you were told to put them.” She folded her arms and scowled. “How does it feel, Sir high-and-mighty, to be treated the way you treat your girls?”
She strode over to the side wall and took the chain hanging from a ringbolt. The steel manacle at the end clamped around my wrist and bit down, locking shut. Then she took the chain from the opposite wall and locked the manacle around my other wrist, adjusting the chain so my arms were stretched taut. Then two more chains bolted to the floor locked around my ankles and pulled my legs uncomfortably far apart.
She jammed a gag of rough fabric and leather straps in my mouth and buckled it unmercifully tight. “No one cares about what you want to say, and we don’t want to be annoyed by the—noises—you will make all night.”
She admired my helpless body, stroking my hair. “Such a fine stallion,” she said. “Don’t worry, you won’t
be gelded—not this time, anyway.” She laughed and turned to leave. When she unlocked and opened the door, she looked back at me, savoring the expression on my face. “Wait here, your owner will come to get you when she pleases.” The door snicked shut.
Across the aisle, a male governor was chaining and gagging Treise the same way I was. Treise drooped her head and slumped, a posture of subjugation and humiliation.
The darkness deepened as I waited. I heard the breathing of the others. No one spoke, not even irrepressible Addy. We must all be gagged.
It must have been an hour before I heard footsteps approaching. The sky outside the tiny barred window in Treise’s stall was black, with the brightest stars mocking us with their freedom. The stall door opened, and I heard youthful voices, both female and male. They were laughing and giggling as they approached. Then I saw two of them. My heart almost stopped.
A heavily muscled young man who might have been a Greek god looked into Treise’s stall and made a savage noise like a crazed bull. I recognized him as one of Aunt’s love-tongue slaves. He was naked, wearing only a black leather mask, heavy boots, and wide belt hung with sadistic things that made me shut my eyes and wish I hadn’t seen them. Pulling a large iron key from his belt, he thrust it into the lock on Treise’s iron-barred door and hurled it open with such force it swung completely around and banged into the wall.
Before I could see more, my pounding heart skipped a beat. A beautiful naked girl, one of our love slaves, peered through her mask into my stall. She wore the same kind of things and menacing equipment the young man wore. Closing my eyes didn’t help. I could hear the swish of leather and metallic clatter of things invented to torture a male’s fleshly jewels, dangling from her belt. She unlocked my door and swaggered in.
“So this is the magnificent and imperial Sir Richard Cailean who rules and commands.” She walked around me, ducking under my outstretched arm. “You don’t look so important.” She moved back around in front of me. “Here you are, chained up like an animal in a filthy stall.” She pulled the gleaming knife from her scabbard and lay the flat of the blade against my throat. “Since you are an animal—MY animal—tonight, how dare you insult me by wearing clothes?” The knife sliced down, ripping through the front of my shirt. She ripped open my sleeves and tore the shirt from my body. She dragged her hand over my chest, digging in her fingernails. “I’ll make good use of you tonight.”
In spite of my fear and embarrassment, I could hear the scuffle in Treise’s stall. She was struggling, thrashing in her chains as the young man stripped off her blouse and bodice. He stood in front of her, so I couldn’t see what he was doing to her breasts as she snorted wildly through her gag.
My owner’s knife slid against my belly, the cutting edge against my belt. A swift jab, and it fell open. “Now,” she said, “let’s see if you have enough of what men brag about.” She lanced open my trousers and sliced open the legs. I was left with only my underwear. From the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of Treise’s skirt dropping to the floor. Her owner had one hand on her thigh, and the other held close in front of his groin. I could guess what it was holding for Treise’s inspection.
She fingered the last scrap of fabric on my body. “Shall I be quick, or slow, with your underwear,” she asked me. All I could do was shake my head in a pleading request. “If I cut slow, it will prolong your humiliation,” she said. “But, then, if I cut fast, I might slip, and cut something else off.” I crushed my eyes shut, holding my breath and trying to pretend this was all just a horrible dream.
The icy touch of the blade pressed against my manhood as she slid it underneath the cloth. I heard a ripping noise and a chill air caressed my cock and balls. I exhaled with thanksgiving.
I heard a crack of leather against defenseless flesh, and Treise jerked and yelped through her gag.
“I told you to stand motionless!” her owner’s voice said with a growl. He resumed his rough and defiling examination of her intimate graces.
“I forbid you to look at her!” my owner barked. “I am the only person that matters in your life tonight!” She unhooked her leather strap and swatted my belly with all her strength. The pain and force knocked the wind from my lungs. There was a long pause before I could draw my next breath. “Keep your attention on me, or there will be lots more,” she snarled.
She unclipped the wide leather collar from her belt and locked it tightly around my neck. There was a six-foot length of chain attached to the front, with a leather loop at the end. She took a web of leather straps off a peg on the wall. “This was custom made just for you.” She grinned mischievously. “We got the measurements from your tailor.” She began strapping it on my naked body. It was like a harness for a plow horse, but had some fiendish extras devised by a cunning and heartless artisan. There were blunt conical studs under the leather straps running down from the sides of the belt, circling around my thighs and pulled tight up against my groin. They rubbed and chafed the tender skin next to my balls. Walking would be extremely uncomfortable.
The most fiendish implement of the harness was the stiff, horizontal leather cradle extending forward of my crotch. My owner lifted my cock and lay it in the shallow leather platform. I winced and snorted. The bed of this cradle was adorned with tiny, sharp needles, all pointing upward. They were a cruel and constant message that this night was not dedicated to pleasing my manhood. The women must have one strapped between their legs, the pins rasping against their pussies.
The straps that circled over my shoulders and under my armpits had leather cuffs riveted where they came behind me, high up on my back.
“I’m going to release your arms, one at a time, and lock your wrists in the cuffs,” My owner said. “If you struggle or resist in the slightest way, the Governors will debase you.”
I didn’t know what debasement might be, and I didn’t want to find out. I forced my arm to go limp as water when she unlocked the manacle. My joints protested as she forced my arm high up and tight against my back. When the leather cuff embraced my wrist, and I sensed a feeling in my belly, like a lover’s caress. When my other arm was imprisoned, the feeling increased fourfold. I was discovering something I had never guessed about myself. I was enjoying the bondage that made me helpless, and thrilled with the dread of being defenseless in the fiendish hands of a pitiless female stranger.
“What’s this?” She asked. She cradled my cock in one hand, my balls in another. “This fellow is waking up and stretching!” She swatted my cock with a stinging blow. “You naughty boy, you’ve been playing with your toy, and mommie didn’t give you permission!”
My owner unlocked my ankles, then manacled them together with a chain hardly sixteen inches long. “This will keep you from running away,” She said with a smirk. “But you will really have to trot to keep up with me. Time to go!” She opened the stall door and led me out like a broken stallion saddled and bridled for a gallop.
Treise was naked and harnessed like me. She struggled against her diabolical leg chain, almost stumbling, trying to keep from being jerked off her feet by the brawny young male tugging her leash. Her soft brown eyes locked on mine for one forbidden instant, sad and full of grief. My heart sank, guessing her message that this would not be some game or pastime, and our owners were not just pretending to be…
“Hurry up!” my owner growled. “I won’t tolerate laziness.”
A bloated moon hung low in the ebony sky behind us. Its milky light was a magical cloak, revealing rather than concealing, transforming our jeopardy into an alarming fantasy. The whole family and staff were herded in front of the stables. Chalmers was here, in his nakedness, Shawe, bowed and humble. Even Selby, our butler, was included in this collection of bound flesh. I was amazed at the stamina and healthy tone of his flesh. The wine and endless sex had preserved him well.
Standing head and shoulders above all of us was Gregor, an imposing mountain of black male flesh rendered harmless by his bondage. His straps were thicker, wider, and dou
ble as many as the rest of us men. His harness was carefully and shrewdly designed to neutralize and restrain his great strength. His cock cradle extended twice as far as ours, his manhood’s heavy length chafing against the bed of vertical barbs. He was rendered as helpless and paralyzed as the weakest of us men and women. There was a momentary argument among our female owners who would use him first. The governors took charge of the decision, and the girls drew straws. A slim, petite wisp of a lass won him. She was hardly more than four feet, eight inches tall, less than a hundred pounds, a frail and weak bit of fragile feminine charm. And yet, Gregor, that powerful, muscular, giant of brute strength and mass standing cowed in front of her, was rendered helpless and powerless in his leather harness and chains, a toy in her feeble grip, for her sadistic amusement.
Her tiny, delicate hand towed away her male mountain with her noisy delight. Many days and nights of the cruel punishments we inflicted on our captives would be paid back in kind tonight.
The mystery of the missing horses was solved. They had been taken out behind the stables, saddled and waiting for their riders. They were led out in front of us by the governors. Our owners jerked our leashes, and we followed, staggering behind them, as they marched to the horses and mounted. My owner looked so regal and commanding as she sat above me, glancing around with a proud bearing. She tied the leather thong of my leash to her saddle and every owner turned their horse to the north.
The pace was difficult. All the horses walked abreast, while our owners chatted about plans and ideas we really didn’t want to hear. We all were panting and snorting through our noses, trying to get enough air to satisfy our burning lungs as we trotted within the short span of those damned ankle chains. One of the governors walked behind Miss Ballard, swatting her buttocks every time she faltered. I dared not look behind to see what might be ready to strike mine.
The studs on my harness scraped the inside of my thighs with each step. Every jolt, every sway to regain my balance, every attempt to catch up when my leash pulled taut, reminded me of those hellish stabbing pins under my jiggling cock.
Bound For Pleasure at Blackthorne Page 13
