As She's Told

by Anneke Jacob

  Norms, proprieties, choice, autonomy, self-respect, all making their case in the courtroom of my mind, completely rational and utterly false. I was what I was, and I wished like hell to have the hearing over with once and for all, the sentence pronounced, condemnation complete; longed absurdly to have been a slave from birth, who would surely know herself unambiguously as chattel. Stupid, Maia. As if a born slave wouldn't want to be free.

  There was another dread that would hit me hard later, when the arousal seeped away, later when distractions faded: fear for the tight link between me and my master. Could this new element dilute it, perhaps even loosen and dissolve it? No, not now, I couldn't think about that now. The hands were back, rescuing me from reflection, releasing me, pulling gag and hood away from my face, squeezing stinging breasts and buttocks. Then I was on the floor, drawn by the leash between two hard sets of knees, syllables deep and incomprehensible going back and forth above my head. An unaccustomed hand on my leash, conveying no subtle signifiers, no live link, only the obvious command. Hands unrolling a red condom. Cherry flavoured. I did my best, trying to attend to the needs of the man in front of me, tremblingly aware of the man behind my back. Serving two masters and not knowing how.

  There was a moan and a shout and a shudder as I sucked out the last spasms. Then a long arm reached over and plucked the leash from a nerveless grip. I was pulled into a hard, safe harbour, every vein and sensitive nerve in the bare penis familiar and adored, every angle and thrust known and eagerly embraced. A higher pitch and fury tonight, caused by 331

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  what? Jealousy? Or the use of a thing that could in hospitality be shared?

  Down on my knees and elbows on the rug, tasting semen, and a residue of cherryflavoured latex. Leash lying in a limp, snaky curl by my shoulder.

  A snap of fingers, bringing my head up. A flick, and I was crawling for my cage, leash dragging beneath me. Finished with. Cage door clanged. They were gone, through kitchen to basement. Deep voices through the floorboards, rising and falling; laughter shouting up. What's the joke? I wondered wistfully. I turned, brushing my arms painfully against sore nipples. What was I now? All those standard epithets: slut, whore? These had no resonance. Slave, yes. That chorus of middle-aged females in my head that said I had choices; how I hated them. Every time my master locked me down another notch, took us another step in the journey, they were at me again, nagging. Shut up! I'm not like you!

  Again I wished I could be wholly what I was, wholly slave, without the world's righteous chorus in my head for counterpoint. A slave from birth.

  And once again the real, terrible history of the world of exploitation and oppression made me wince away. A willing slave from birth was an oxymoron.

  I touched bars on either side. Perhaps not so. Chorus or no chorus, perhaps I was as close as it came.

  ***

  Anders slid into bed, slipped his arm around the taut little waist beside him, and felt the urgent, anxious tremor in the pressure of her body against his. He kissed eyes and brow, unhurried, and first one, then the other of the tethered hands. Methodically, one by one, he tested locks. She started to settle. But still the apprehensive eyes collected and reflected light. His hands stroked, slow and reassuring, along hip and thigh, breast and belly.

  "My fine piece of property." He kissed up her throat, the side of her face. "My own thing." His voice was a deep, unhurried chant in her ear.

  "You're mine to lend, but you'll always come back to me. You won't belong to anyone else but me." A breath sighed from her, and her eyelids relaxed.

  He continued to stroke and croon: an owner's lullaby. "All mine. I'll use you as I please. I'll use you and lend you and take you back. Mine."

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  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Sweet Mistreater

  Anders swung a broken cupboard door on its remaining hinge.

  "Fixable," he said, picking up a screwdriver, "though it won't be pretty. Girl, empty these cupboards and start scrubbing the shelves." There was more light in the front window; he carried the broken door off, saying, "Svend, would you take your eyes off my slave's ass long enough to bring her the stuff to clean with? She can't reach it." Maia was chained to the oven door, and the chain only went so far. The two men surveyed the grungy living room. Anders scraped at a wall with his thumbnail. "These walls will need a lot of cleaning before they'll take a coat of paint.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I'm on it. The landlord will pay for the paint but not the labour, the bastard." They shifted and covered furniture made ratty by a year of abuse. "Hardly worth it, really," Anders said.

  "You think it needs paint stains on top of everything else?" Svend peeked into the kitchen where Maia knelt, her torso halfway into a cupboard.

  The muscles of her naked buttocks and thighs tense as she scrubbed. She turned back to rinse her brush in the bucket by her side, exposing more harnessed flesh, including a swollen tit that his hands tingled for.

  "Come back here," Anders called. "No freelancing."

  Svend started on the walls with trisodium phosphate while his brother fixed the cupboard door. "You know, this is all very well for you, you're used to it. I'm not accustomed to having to ignore naked female flesh parading itself in my kitchen."

  "It's called delayed gratification. One of those developmental stages that signal adulthood. You'll come to it in time." Anders ducked and a wet cloth hit his elbow.

  The kitchen doorway got far more attention from Svend than it required.

  At last, exasperated, Anders set the repaired door aside, unlocked the chain from the handle of the oven, yanked off the small rubber gloves, and pulled his slave crawling into the living room.

  "Here, for Christ's sake unload yourself so you can get some work done.

  Don't forget the condom." Svend speedily dug one out and sat on the sheeted couch, Maia's chain in hand. Both he and the girl glanced at Anders' irritated 333

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  form, sweeping his sponge in big arcs over the upper part of the wall. Svend toyed with a harnessed breast. "Well, Anders' little muffin, I'd like a bit more time to play, but your – um – owner's in one of his moods." He ripped open the little package, and unzipped. "Get this on. Ah. Very good. Open wide, now."

  Ten minutes later Maia was back at her scrubbing, and Svend with leisurely movements was looking after some different woodwork. Then he went out to bring back takeout for lunch. Maia knelt in a practiced crouch over a bowl of Singapore noodles, and he watched, bemused.

  "Wow. You don't leave anything out, do you? Is she that shade of pink because of the position or because I'm here?"

  "Because you're here. Look, I'll have her finish the stove and the fridge.

  I'll fill some of those holes and sand them, then you're on your own."

  "Oh, come on. All work and no play?"

  "No, you've had enough for now."

  Svend sighed. "Well, brother, sharing toys is a developmental stage.

  You'll come to it in time." He raised his shoulder against the punch, grinning.

  ***

  >We will visit quite soon, for a few days in last week of April if that is okay, and then go on to Halifax .

  >Terrific!

  >We are indeed very happy to be touching in real time. This woman is, believe me, more fine than ever. Though the apartment is quickly becoming too small for two.

  >Running out of wardrobe space? I'm not surprised. Will the university let you have a larger apartment now that there are two of you?

  >A work permit takes years, I hear; does she have a tourist visa or what?

  >Ria managed to get documentation from Henningsen for journalist's visa, and so there will be no problem for her to stay, though she cannot be paid by an American company.

  >So that documentary is going to be funded after all?

  >I hope the scene wasn't too much of a letdown.

  >Ria
is not very disappointed as she was forewarned. She is already planning demos of her own; they will love her.

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  >Those Midwesterners won't know what hit them. Dreadful pun absolutely intended.

  ***

  "Try D minor."

  Strings twanged. I crouched and listened to the guitar and harmonica jockeying around for a blend. The fiddle bow sawed.

  From a deeply quiet and private household, we had gone to something more like Grand Central Station.

  I had just been thinking that I was getting accustomed to Svend's visits, to new waters in the harbour. With a lot of help from the harbourmaster.

  The two brothers had been sitting over empty plates, arguing in Danish about something or other. I'd watched them from my corner, still tethered over my empty bowl. Then the doorbell rang. And here was Val, walking in on solid boots, meeting Svend, eying Anders' hardwood and joinery. Giving his slave and her bowl the once-over. The one as red as the other. "Looking good, Thygesen. Nice work.”

  “Thanks."

  "All right, make with the tour. Starting with that installation piece over there."

  My ears were buzzing. Locked-back hands writhed behind me, seeking a way out.

  No. No! At the folk festival he said… Shit, she's not working for him any more! Oh, god!…

  She was standing over me; I could just see her boots out of the corner of my eye, through the black haze. Voices above my head. A damp cloth, cold against burning skin, swabbing the food from my face, my nose ring. Big hands were at the back of my neck, unlocking, and there was the little tug at the ring that signalled me up. Limbs obeyed. Eyes stared at the floor, till a big hand under my chin forced my head up. Obediently it remained up through the examination of each restraint and visible piercing. But I couldn't meet that derisive eye.

  Again I followed the tour on my leash. We passed Svend on the couch, hands folded around his harmonica, foot tapping. The conversation in front of me was in English for a change, and was all shop talk. What kinds of jobs Val was getting, what equipment she'd acquired, where Anders had routed the plumbing. I walked at the lead's signals, stood the way I was trained to 335

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  stand, with my round naked flesh displayed and presented, and did not think.

  Couldn't bear to.

  Back down the stairs to the living room, pausing before the fireplace, Val ran a hand over the mantelpiece, and gave me a hazel glint that slid vertically from face down to feet and back again.

  "Fine piece." She looked around. "How's that soundproofing working out?"

  "No complaints yet."

  "We should test it some time."

  "Sure."

  No. Not that. No!

  Down to the basement. Cold floor, leashed beneath the bench while they went over the workshop item by item. Val spotted the door with two round holes in its panels, laughed, and leaned it out to look from both sides.

  "You dirty pervert. Does it work?"

  "Uh-huh."

  She ran her hand round the two lined holes, and leaned the thing back in its place.

  "All these webcams. Are you spreading her over the net, by any chance?"

  "No. Strictly private monitoring system. Making sure she does what she's told."

  "That's a relief. All these lenses are making me nervous."

  "They're off when I'm home, don't fret. Your privacy guaranteed."

  "All right. Well," she said, looking around, "great workshop."

  "Want to use it some time? You're welcome."

  She hesitated. "Well…just till I get my own together. Maybe."

  "C'mon, Val. It would be good to work together again."

  "Miss me, huh?"

  "Sure."

  Pulled out from under the bench now, standing. Val, arms folded, staring at me. "Okay, now that I know I'm not on camera, is your display piece interactive at all?"

  He stepped behind me. A hand beneath my jaw tipped my head back firmly against him. The other hand squeezed a breast, stroked my belly.

  "She's here to be enjoyed," he said. "Feel this skin." Small hard fingers 336

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  slid and pinched. "And this." I was turned around by the head, which he trapped beneath his arm, and two disparate hands explored my ass. No, please! No!

  A low voice rumbling, direct from his chest to my ear: "You can use her mouth, if you have protection. I'll give you a condom to cut open if you want. But her belt stays on."

  Behind me, Val's voice, muffled. "Fair enough. Got my own equipment.

  Can I spank her?"

  I squeezed my eyes shut and shuddered against my master's side. God almighty! Please, not that!

  He released my head, turned me. "Sure. But Svend's going to want to watch. That okay?”

  “The spanking, yeah. Then both of you skedaddle. That okay?”

  “No problem. Hey, Svend!"

  The harmonica stopped. Feet on the stairs. Into the smaller room, the one with the table and wooden chair. Val sat down, and I started to cry.

  "Aw," she mocked, "so cute. What's the matter, little girl, don't want a spanking? Think you don't deserve one?" I leaned against Anders, turned my head into his chest and held my breath to stifle the sobs. "Or don't want to be spanked by me? Too bad. Get your butt over here; I'll give you something to cry about."

  My eyes went up to my master's face. He nodded me toward Val with a look that meant business. I squeezed my eyes shut for a long moment, unable to move. Terrifyingly, the moment extended. Dammit, girl, obedience!

  I could do this. Turning, I took a deep breath. Four steps over to the woman in the chair. A small hand dragging down on my leash. I was arranged over thighs barely longer than my own. A smell of motor oil, heated metal, female sweat. Anders and Svend standing, parallel skyscrapers, watching. A knee pushing up under my pelvis, raising my ass.

  A hard little hand pushing my locked wrists up my back. Another hand squeezing and stroking me, and my skin writhing, wanting to throw it off. A hard slap. A harder one. It hurt, it raised heat, but it wasn't my master's hand.

  Another.

  "Got to stay away from all this hardware so I don't injure myself," said an amused voice above me. "But I must admit it's a nice display." Slow and 337

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  steady blows, making the fire build until tears started again, until my mouth opened and sounds were forced from me. I craned my neck to see my master, through tears only a blur at three paces.

  The last few blows made me twist and scream. "All right," Val told the men, "Out." When the door closed, she stretched her legs and pushed me to the floor. "So how's your cunt-eating résumé, slavegirl? You'd better have done this before."

  I shook my head, wincing at the contact of my ass against the cold boards.

  "What, never? Oh, fuck. A virgin. Fine. Just think about what you wish was being done to your own locked-up snatch. I guess you don't get much of that yourself, do you?" she sneered. I shook my head again. "What, aren't you allowed to speak? Even a bratty bitch knows to say 'No, Val.'

  I gritted my teeth, whispered, "I'm sorry. No, Val."

  She pushed down her jeans, and I stared into brown curls, wanting to pull away. Wanting to run away. Feeling the yank of the leash in her fist.

  Something plastic, spread and glistening. Leash taken up short, my face pulled between her legs, the smell of female despite the plastic; hair and a long wet slit beneath my lips, just on the other side. Swollen labia pressing, hot. A smell like Anders' fingers when I sucked them clean, but heavier.

  The leash yanked. I opened my mouth, and gave a tentative lick. Then another. Explored for the clit and sucked. Hard fingers pulling my ear. "Not yet. All around it first. Come on, girl, do it." Could hardly get my breath, the leash was held so short.

  I really did do my best, tried to obey all her directions, attempted to do what I would l
ike if it was me. Got my ear yanked and little patience when I messed up. But before too long I was sucking her wholesale into my mouth while I flicked her with my tongue, and she was jerking her hips hard. It wasn't all that awful. I wouldn't have minded, if only my master had been there and in charge.

  At last Val relaxed and loosened her grip. "Huh," she sighed. "Not so bad. We'll get you trained up." She pulled the film away and gave me a sharp look. "Anders know you're not bi?"

  "Yes, Val."

  She crooked a smile. "Oh, well. You wanted to be a slave."

  Upstairs Anders released my arms, and Svend made me upend myself 338

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  so he could examine my red ass.

  "How come I never get to spank her?" he complained.

  "You never asked," said Anders. "Here, let me have a look." A stroke over scorched flesh, and a hard pinch. I cried out. "She can take more than that." A pathetic whimper escaped me. "Use that chair; it's better."

  Svend's hand was nowhere near as calloused as either of the others, but it was big and enthusiastic. When my voice and limbs became frantic he paused, and Anders suggested shifting the target down my thighs. Soon I was frantic again, and Svend was obviously close to coming, because suddenly I was on the floor and he had his cock covered and down my throat. Knees and elbows, staring at the carpet. Ass and thighs swollen and hot. A familiar hand pulling on my leash. I crawled to my master, ready to bury myself in his arms. Instead he turned me round.

  "Pretty enough as shades go," he said, thumbing me painfully, "but it needs a few stripes to liven it up." I looked back at him, incredulous. "Fetch the crop, slave," he said, his voice grim. "A little extra to sharpen up your response time." Hurriedly I crawled, trying not to whine as each leg's advance stretched scorched skin, trying not to see the extra eyes watching me. Anders took the crop from my mouth. "And the bridle with the ball gag.

  I'm tired of listening to you." I caught back the clamour that was rising from my chest. Back I went, feeling little flicks along my forearms that were tears dripping, and brought the bridle, dangling from my mouth by the thick ball gag. Oh, this was it. How much more could he humiliate me in front of these people? I tried not to look at them from my shameful animal face.