Leah's Punishment

by Aran Ashe

  'It is only that I am fearful for your good men as much as for the sheets,' the mistress wheedled, eyeing the handsome younger master until the lady's stare upbraided her.

  The lady turned to the second master. 'Kapler – pay the mistress her premium.' Then she arose, veiled her face and, taking the girl softly by the arm, led her back to the middle of the room. The two masters followed. When the girl became aware of the many boatmen now staring at her, she moved closer to her new guardians. They seemed to respond in kind: indeed any heart would have gone out to that vulnerable, anxious, nubile girl. The lady put her gloved hand gently about the girl's head, drawing her against the folds of her heavy cloak. She then nodded to the younger master who, after a moment's hesitation, took the girl's slender hand – almost timidly – and gently kissed the livid blotches on her arm. The girl's lovely saucer-eyes then looked up expectantly at the second master, the one called Kapler, seeking reassurance about the final link in her protection from the crowd.

  She looked beautifully vulnerable in her open shirt. She had closed her thighs to try to conceal her naked sex and its broken chain from the gaze of the onlookers but this stance served only to accent the taut profile of her buttocks. When Kapler turned her to face away from the throng, her shirt rucked up under his hand and the brief vision was delicious, of those female dimples and that lovely, smoothly sculpted hollow above the base of her spine. Every tongue-tip in the room surely craved to lick that girlish hollow and delve lower and deeper, between those tight smooth cheeks, probing the dusky velvet secret mouth and slipping up the fertile female pinkness nestling beneath. Every pair of hands craved to clasp that narrow warm ribcage from the front – for the simple pleasure of feeling it. Then, perhaps with the thumbs slipped under those deliciously puffy breasts, those hands might lift her small body high in the air, with the tongue-tip up between her dangling legs, slowly milking precious musk from her female pinkness, testing her restless rapture through the quavering of her breathing, until that tight nude belly was racked by iniquitous shivers.

  The lady's expression remained impenetrable beneath her veil as she surveyed the room and held the nearly naked girl gently close to her breast. Then she turned to the younger master, who seemed suddenly ill at ease as she nodded towards the stairs.

  The three patrons kept tactile contact with the young girl – at her neck and wrist and against the hollow of her back – as they directed her up the stairs to the highest landing and the quiet seclusion of the room under the rafters.

  Over the course of the night, the requirements of the lady were exacting; and, to the chagrin of the lodgemistress, the first of these requirements was an immaculate damask sheet.

  Leah, manoeuvred forward by her guardians, crept up into the secret bedroom: whatever trial Merek had arranged, she would do her utmost to endure in compliance with his will.

  Bare-boarded and windowless, the room extended the length of the building. Its walls sloped to make a ceiling, buttressed by heavy beams. The newly lit lamps smelt smoky. When the door was closed behind her, the sounds from below were deadened: no one would hear her. The lady intercepted her anxious gaze. The veil had been completely removed; the lady was handsome and her gaze was determined. Her heavy cloak was now cast aside to reveal a sylph-like figure in a slender gown. Purposefully she removed her gloves. The younger man appeared very nervous as her gaze returned to her hireling girl.

  Leah already felt naked – more naked than simply in front of men, for women were more knowing and were harder to please. She put her arms behind her and tried to stand correctly for inspection, exactly as she had been trained to do. Her shirt was already unbuttoned; its soft, creased flaps were now drawn back by her arms; she wore no trousers – in fact no other clothes of any kind; her sex was sheltered only by the shadow from the nearest lamp. She was acutely conscious of the itchy blemishes made by the horsehair all over her skin; nevertheless she remained true to her training, eyes downcast, exposing herself, submitting her flesh to whatever scrutiny her new guardians might employ.

  However many times it happened, the initial dread was always with her when she was put to new men. In the Abbey she had confessed this to the nuns, who had told her that such dread was meet, since it kept the fleshly feelings keen. The presence of the lady only compounded this fear, for she seemed to be the architect of this encounter, and a person of such elegance would probably be disparaging of a girl of Leah's station. Sure enough, the lady continued to stare without even approaching to test Leah's nudity. Leah's breathing was uneven and shallow; her tongue clung to the roof of her mouth; under that critical gaze her flesh shivered as if a thousand spiders were crawling over it; and her belly felt as if it were filling up with squirming snakes. The ugly raised blotches tingle-tightened across her skin; her upper lip felt horribly swollen on one side.

  The lady finally moved, walking self-assuredly to the bed and seating herself there, still staring at Leah, whose heart continued to sink into the pit of squirming snakes. The younger master hovered anxiously near the lady while the elder master began single-mindedly checking the contents of the secret bedroom, his shadow looming ominously across the rafters.

  'Do you know why you are here?' the lady suddenly asked softly. The elder master stopped moving and everyone's attention fixed on Leah. She tried to take a breath but could not; her belly tightened, forcing her heart to her throat, slowly choking her as the apprehension mounted. She sank to her knees.

  'Ma'am, please . . . She is frightened,' the young master whispered unexpectedly.

  'Thank you, Ean,' the lady replied without looking at him.

  'It is fitting that he shows some interest, Lady Lauren,' the other master said.

  The lady pursed her lips then nodded. 'Come a little closer, girl. Head up, so we can see you.' Leah, still on her knees, edged forward, keeping her arms behind her as she knew she must. 'Your name is Leah? Good. Now, Leah – there is nothing to be afraid of.' Lady Lauren looked up. 'Kapler – I had expected a more experienced one; she is shaking. Evidently your boatman was economical with the truth.'

  'Not my boatman, my lady – I only met him on your –' But her sharp glance cut him short, so he changed tack, stepping forward and touching Leah's forehead. 'I can feel no fever. A little nervousness on the girl's part can be good.'

  'Leah?' Lady Lauren said. 'You are well? No sickness is upon you? Good – a healthy, loving young girl; I could see it from the start – in the eyes, lovely eyes. Raise your chin – let me look again. Now, these marks . . .' Her long finger traced the blotch extending down the side of Leah's breast and Leah shivered. 'Does it hurt as I touch?' The lady's eyes shone.

  'It's like . . . an itching, mistress,' Leah murmured.

  Lady Lauren's attention now turned to the place where a cruel blotch traversed Leah's lower belly and intersected her sex-lip. 'Beautifully hairless pubes. The perfect adjunct to learning . . . Ean, feel here,' she said simply and the younger man jumped as if stung. 'Come here and do as I say.'

  Under her coaxing, the shy younger master hesitantly but gently pulled Leah's fragment of chain and the lip slowly unfurled. The very nervousness of this touching accelerated the arousal in so sensitive a place. Leah could feel her flesh responding to the intimate contact and she was afraid the lady, more than the men, would recognise its significance. Ean began to touch the blotchy swelling itself and the lady watched, taut-lipped as Leah gently squirmed. Leah's eyes, seeking escape, only met the elder master's interested gaze. 'Keep your arms back, Leah,' Lady Lauren reminded her, for her arms were becoming restive. 'Kneel up straight – and continue to offer.' The lady surely understood the sensations that Leah was now experiencing.

  'Her nipples are nicely puffy,' the elder master, Kapler, said. 'As if there is a fresh surge of growth.' He began to touch the surrounds of her nipples as the lady continued.

  'You will get to know our little group: Master Ean, getting gently acquainted down here, is my newest groom; Master Kapler is his senior; a
nd you may call me Mistress Lauren. And you, my dear Leah, are here to teach young Master Ean all he needs to know about girls. Master Kapler and myself are here to give assistance where needed.'

  There was a knock at the door, then the lodgemistress entered bearing a folded white sheet. Ean's fingers immediately faltered and Leah tried to twist aside to shield what was being done between her legs. Lauren quickly got up from the bed and made the kneeling Leah face the woman. She deliberately drew down the chained lip that Ean had been touching, making blatant the extent of Leah's arousal. The mistress glowered at Leah as she laid the sheet over everything – pillows and cushions – that lay on the bed then smoothed it down as best she could. Leah now felt like a leper. She turned to Lauren, who put her hand in mock reassurance about Leah's head. Kapler began arranging some of the lamps ominously closer to the bed.

  'Thank you, mistress,' Lauren said.

  'Maria will bring refreshments directly, my lady,' the mistress said.

  'She need not knock: I want no distractions.'

  'I understand, my lady.' The mistress curtsied and departed.

  Lauren looked down into Leah's upturned face. 'Well, my dear – on the bed . . .'

  Leah gasped when Kapler's strong arms gripped her under her breasts and swung her on her knees into the middle of the hummocked sheet. Ean now sat tentatively facing her at one corner of the bed; Lauren sat on the opposite edge, a little nearer. Kapler, still standing behind Leah, leant forward with one hand slung over a beam. Then Lauren said gently to Leah: 'You are used to men?'

  'Yes, mistress,' Leah whispered.

  'How many have you had inside you?' Lauren's eyes dilated with arousal as she put the question.

  Confounded, Leah shook her head. If the lady meant at the front, Leah might be able to guess the number, but if she meant inside her bottom, or in her mouth . . . 'You are young – surely you must know?' Lauren insisted insidiously.

  'Her eyes look hunted,' Kapler said.

  'Show your chains properly,' Lauren said abruptly. Still on her knees on the bed, Leah leant back, spreading her thighs for the masters and the mistress. Kapler brought a lamp close. 'She's still shivering. My, but she is lovely, there – and not too opened, I'd say.'

  But the first testing fingers that actually entered her body were Lauren's. They took Leah by surprise and made her gasp. 'Lean back. Lie still: let me show him.' Leah kept glimpsing Ean's face, daunted yet fascinated as his mistress used Leah to explain clinically to him how girls were broken in. 'Her virgin's chain has been cut – or snapped, it would appear. And see, in here, the hymen – the tissue inside her – ruptured, beautifully ragged, yet if I open her wider, each tattered attachment still has life.' Leah murmured as the female fingers probed and exposed it. 'Her first lover was too keen . . . Push out, Leah. Push it all out.' Lauren's eyes glistened with perverse excitement. 'All must come to light, here. We need to see it. I can feel the lovely warmth rising out of it – all hot and moist and shiny and pink . . . Now touch it, Ean.'

  There was a pause. Then Ean touched it; Leah thought he wouldn't but he did and, after that first fear, his fingers did not recoil and Leah experienced little pulsing shivers, because her ragged inner flesh was pushed out and these strangers – all three now – were touching it and discussing what might be done.

  Kapler took her trembling torso in his arms while she was still kneeling open, kissed her lips and face – sucking the very blemishes – and tongued her puffy nipples while his fingers rejoined the others between her legs – three people's fingers again – opening her like a living love-flower and drawing out her silken nectar. Kapler kept her arms pinned back; her nipples and their surrounds stood out further with each sucking that he gave them. A long, slow finger slid inside her sex as Lauren urged her protégé to touch the entrance to Leah's womb and to describe exactly what he could feel.

  'She's so hot in here, mistress,' Ean murmured reverently. 'There's a little bump, like a nose, right up at the back.'

  'Press it – gently. Harder . . .'

  Leah moaned into Kapler's mouth. He drew back to look at her with her arms still pinned behind her and Ean's fully extended middle finger deep inside her. 'These blemishes, Lauren,' Kapler said. 'They look darker and more raised now. She looks as if she's been splashed all down her front, with every splash inducing swelling; they're on her neck and lip and even on her cunt.' He sucked Leah's swollen upper lip then asked: 'How did you get such blotches?'

  'This afternoon, on the boat-horse, after I fell asleep . . .'

  'Her skin must react to horsehair,' Lauren said, running her fingertips over the itchy marks and gritting her teeth as Leah winced. Lauren then stared knowingly at Kapler, whose eyes suddenly widened with understanding. He stroked the marks very lightly, until Leah's shudders came strongly, whereupon he sucked her swollen upper lip again before getting up and heading for the door.

  'Mane-hair or tail-hair will be best, I think,' Lauren shouted after him. Leah started to whimper. Lauren protectively stroked her hair. 'Don't cry, Leah. Not yet, at least. We've a long way yet to go.'

  Ean's finger slid gently out of Leah's body. He seemed mesmerised as he murmured: 'She's like a beautiful flower, her petals fully opened.' Lauren surreptitiously laid her hand on Ean's thigh but he continued to look at Leah whilst asking his mistress whether the petals would cool if they remained pushed out like that. Lauren said: 'Discover by testing.' While he did so, Lauren kept her hand upon his thigh and whispered to him about kissing girls between the legs and about the female climax.

  Ean was gently teasing out the small inner sepal-like remains of Leah's plundered virginity when the door opened and a serving girl entered with refreshments. Lauren intercepted the girl's gaze but kept her hand on Ean's thigh and made the girl witness the testing of the coolness of Leah's pushed-out petals with the tip of Ean's tongue. 'Well, Ean?'

  'She's seeping warmth from inside. It's fragrant – like honeydew but not sweet.'

  'Good – then she's ready,' Lauren answered. 'Sit her up – on the sheet. Keep her open – thighs wide and this part nicely open. Always . . .' Then Lauren quietly reached across and kissed Leah, gently, with warm soft lips and a tongue that languidly probed inside her mouth but with the strained, held breathing of deep excitement. All the while, Ean was helping keep Leah's body open as Leah, her belly softly rippling, was obediently pushing out, exposing her inner self to the sweet attentions that would come there.

  When the long kiss from the mistress was completed, Leah saw that the serving girl had retreated, ruddy-cheeked and wide-eyed from the headiness of such a scene. With no hint of embarrassment, Lauren gave her leave to go. Then her attention returned to her young groom and Leah. She began by pulling Leah's shirt off her. 'No blemishes on this beautiful back . . .' Lauren kissed it, lightly and lovingly – making Leah shiver into the hands that were helping her stay open at the front. Lauren, teasing, contrasted Leah's small breasts with the serving girl's. Ean said he liked Leah's exactly as they were and that they were not that small in proportion to her frame. Then he took a nipple and its puffy surround very gently into his mouth and sucked it. Lauren simultaneously held Leah's head back and stretched her arms out behind her until she began to go dizzy. 'Is she still making wetness?' Lauren asked.

  They held the white sheet against her body – Ean put his hand under it and Lauren urged Leah's sex forwards against the cloth. 'I can see my fingers through the sheet,' Ean said after a short while.

  Lauren released Leah's arms. 'Leah, show my groom where your pleasure comes keenest.'

  Leah obediently turned over on to her belly and spread her bottom cheeks.

  'It comes keenest here?' Lauren whispered, suddenly unsure. Leah nodded uncertainly, wondering if she had done wrong by telling the truth. Lauren's fingers faltered. 'No,' she whispered in renewed excitement, nervously stroking Leah's lower back. 'So be it. Hold your cheeks open. It is good – especially good – when a girl likes it here.'

  Leah clo
sed her eyes, waiting for the singular pleasure of being touched there. When it came, it made her shudder – a sweet lovely pleasure, deep and strong. 'Ean – now you touch it – in the middle, the very rude middle, where it wrinkles. Gently poke that pushed-out little wrinkle up inside her.' Leah shuddered before the touch even came. Lauren turned Leah's face towards her. 'Open your eyes, my love. Let me look at you as he does it.' The moan came and then the female kiss, softly, urgently and continuously while Leah's trembling fingers held her buttocks open and Ean's nervous fingertips centred themselves in that special place then gently pushed those sensitive wrinkles of velvet very surely up inside her.

  His fingers gently withdrew, leaving intense arousal still swelling inside her. 'Mistress – see, she has stripes across her bottom, like bruises.'

  Lauren answered: 'Move the lamp closer . . . I had thought them shadows. Ah, now I see – marks from a whipping. Even better. But see how she tightened in there when that word was uttered?' Lauren's face came very close to Leah's. She laid her hand against her throat. 'You must not tighten that lovely place while we still explore. Understand?' Leah nodded, swallowing gently. Lauren's eyes suddenly narrowed wickedly. She deliberately took hold of Leah's swollen, blemished upper lip between her finger and thumb and slowly increased the pressure of squeezing. Arousal squirmed in Leah's belly; her mouth lay open but her breathing became shallow. 'Relax. Spread your arms above you on the bed. Relax your hands, each finger too. Now spread your legs more – more – with this knee bent a little . . . Good. For Ean needs to see both of these lovely places from behind.' She still gripped Leah's upper lip tightly. 'There . . . Stillness is a virtue at times such as this.' She lowered her voice. 'If pleasure comes while you remain quite still – absolutely motionless – then you are blessed.'

  Lauren's other hand continued to stroke Leah's throat as if the girl were a distraught creature she was quelling. 'Look at me, Leah, with those generous eyes. I mean to hold this upper lip, squeezing very hard until the blemish on it spreads into your cheek and still keep squeezing until the pleasure comes. And you shall stay still for it and I shall feel it only through the pulsing of the bruise within this lip. Open her bottom again, Ean. Stretch that muscle nice and wide – be very firm in your fingering.' Leah moaned and shuddered. 'Good . . . Now hold it so it cannot close. We really need Kapler here to give her a whipping.'