'No, master,' the blonde said, cowering away as the man turned on her.
'How dare you contradict me!'
'I didn't, master.'
'I know what you did.'
'Please, master...' The blonde sounded genuinely frightened.
'Brutus, Agrippa,' the master shouted. Two naked men immediately disentangled themselves from intimate liaisons with other slaves.
'Please, master,' the girl whimpered.
The two men stepped up on to the rostrum, their cocks erect and glistening. They grabbed the blonde and pulled her to her feet.
'Over there. You're going to regret biting me.'
At the back of the rostrum on the wall was a large lion's head, its mouth holding a golden ring rather like a latter-day door knocker. A white rope hung from the ring. In a matter of seconds the two men had pulled the girl's toga off her body and lashed her hands together with the rope, and she was tied to the ring, her arms stretched up above her head until she was on tiptoe. They turned her round so she faced out into the room.
'Please...'
The master stared into her face. 'To prove how kind and considerate I am, I'm going to let you choose your punishment.'
'Please...'
'You can have the pins or the cream.'
'Please, master...'
'Which is it to be, the pins or the cream?'
Clearly the girl knew precisely what these alternatives meant, having seen them used before. 'Please, master, it was an accident. I didn't mean—'
'You don't have much time to choose. In ten seconds Brutus is going to gag you. If you don't choose by then, I'll use them both.'
'Both?'
'Both. So which is it to be?'
Brutus advanced with a braided leather strap, into which had been woven a wooden oval block.
'Seven, eight, nine...' the master counted.
'The cream!' the blonde blurted out, just before the wooden oval was forced into her mouth and tied fast behind her head, trapping her long blonde hair.
'Good. Octavia, bring the cream.'
The other blonde had already gone to a small cupboard at the side of the rostrum. From it she took a small earthenware pot, decorated with Roman figures and highly glazed, and carried it over to the master. She then took a wooden bowl and filled it from a large stone water butt at the far end of the room, before bringing it back up to the rostrum with a small towel. As soon as this was accomplished the master dabbed a finger into the jar. It emerged with a gob of green cream, which he immediately smeared on the unfortunate blonde's very erect nipples. A second gob was plastered between her labia. Satisfied, he washed his hand in the wooden bowl and dried it on the towel.
'Now,' he said, turning back to the others. 'Continue.' He clapped his hands and the orgy began again, the men and women resuming the encounters they had interrupted to watch the girl's bondage. Mouths, hands, cocks, penetrating, sucking, caressing, kissing: every conceivable sexual act was openly performed.
The blonde put the bowl down and sank to her knees again. While she slipped the master's cock between her lips, another slave came up from the floor to replace the errant blonde behind him, and pushed her tongue between his buttocks to penetrate the mouth of his anus and make him moan. But this time he didn't face out into the room. He stood facing the captive blonde. The others, too, whatever their activities, arranged themselves to watch the girl.
The cream did not take long to work. The blonde began to moan, a long continuous moan, shaking her head from side to side, as if trying to get rid of the gag. At the same time she was raising one foot off the floor, bringing her knee right up to see if she could rub it against her breast. Her nipples and labia were prickling with a hot, itching sensation, like being stung by a nettle over and over again, except the feeling was totally rooted in sex. Within minutes the sensation had completely engulfed her. She had never wanted to touch herself more. She would have given anything, done anything to be able to pinch and caress her nipples, to scratch and knead her clitoris, to use her hands to bring herself off. The cream was creating her need, making her body heave, filling her with a desperate desire: to scratch the enormous, throbbing, pounding itch that had grown in the tender flesh of her erogenous zones. All she could do was move her legs, try to force her knees against her breasts, try to rub her thighs together against her labia. But it wasn't enough. She needed more. Much more.
The desire increased, swelled, mounted in her, got so great she thought she would faint. It was worsened by the fact that, in every corner of the room, she could see women getting what she needed so desperately, cocks and tongues and fingers working labia and nipples. She knew she would come the instant she felt the slightest touch; she could come from a fingertip poised against her nipple. But she knew that touch would never come. All around her men and women came, watching her, watching her body writhing against the white rope, watching her helpless frustration.
'Yes...' the master said, pulling the other blonde's head back just as his spunk jetted from his cock. He aimed it all at the helplessly bound girl, and the hot white semen splashed her thighs, adding to her maddening desire to feel the release he had just felt.
The woman on the stone slab had remained quiet, glad that, temporarily at least, attention had turned from her. But now the master picked up the little jar of green cream and advanced on her.
'Did you think we'd forgotten about you? Poor thing. So neglected...' He started to smear the cream on the prostrate woman's nipples. 'This should warm you up.' His finger applied it to the lips of her sex. Almost instantly the candle on her belly began to oscillate as the stinging sensation ate its way into her body.
'Shall we move on?' the Baron said.
'Oh, yes...' Stephanie had been so fascinated by the spectacle that the Baron's voice came as something of a shock.
'Interesting, don't you think?'
'I, ah...' Stephanie found it hard to say anything. She was watching the hot wax spray on to the woman's body, and the way she reacted. She made herself tear her eyes away and look at Devlin. He appeared cool and unmoved by what they had seen.
'Not your scene,' she said and stroked his arm.
'Not tonight, anyway,' he said.
'This way.'
The Baron led the way across the gantry to another metal door. He punched the same combination of numbers into its computer lock and it swung open with a hiss.
'I take it you wish to proceed?' the Baron asked solicitously.
'Oh yes.'
'Then, please...' he said, indicating that they should go first.
Chapter Six
The Perspex corridor leading into the next pavilion was no more than a few strides long and the door at its end was already swinging open as the one behind them closed. Again Stephanie could see the lake through the transparent panels, and at that moment the moon emerged from behind a cloud, lighting the water in a ghostly silver.
Once again they found themselves on a metal gantry running the whole length of the building, screened off from the view of those underneath by the same one-way ceiling. But whereas the Roman pavilion had been bright, with a feeling of openness, the interior of this space was dark and enclosed. As Stephanie's eyes adjusted to the light she saw they were in a reproduction of a cavernous, vaulted cellar. The meagre illumination came from big candles mounted on black iron candelabras and from a central chandelier, also in black iron. This took the shape of a huge wheel of iron spikes, into which candles had been stuck. In one corner, under a black canopy of metal, a forge burnt with red-hot coals, bars of metal sticking out from its depths, occasionally shooting sparks into the air.
Hanging on the stone walls were pairs of metal rings from which several men and women were chained, their wrists stretched apart above their heads. All were dressed in various medieval costumes, the women in tight bodices and full skirts, the men in tights and tunics. Some were fully dressed while others had had their clothing torn away to reveal a breast, a buttock, a cock or a tuft of pu
bic hair.
The ringmaster of this particular circus appeared to be a large, muscular man dressed in black tights, a massive black codpiece around his loins and a leather top. This amounted to no more than a broad band of black leather on his chest, held by two wide straps over his shoulders. His navel and arms were naked and glistened with sweat.
'Confess,' Stephanie heard him shout as the Baron adjusted the volume on the speaker system.
The reason for his perspiration was obvious. He stood in front of an accurate copy of a medieval rack and his big muscular arms were turning the spokes of its rope drum at the top of the frame. Tied into the rack was a strikingly beautiful brunette, her face finely featured, her eyes a brandy brown. The tight bodice of her dress had been pulled off her breasts, which were big and meaty, and the skirt ripped away so that her legs and belly were bare. Several men and women stood around the rack watching eagerly.
'No,' the woman gasped.
'Confess!' the Inquisitor yelled again, turning the spokes of the drum a further notch.
'Never,' the woman cried defiantly.
'You are a witch,' the Inquisitor said and bent over her until his face was inches from hers, his sweat dripping down on to her cheeks. 'Confess.'
'No.'
The woman struggled, her wrists and ankles tied into leather cuffs. These were in turn attached to the rope that wound around the drum at the top of the machinery. There was a definite excitement blazing in her eyes.
'Very well,' the Inquisitor said, reversing the spokes on the drum. The woman's body relaxed and she gasped. 'We have tried the rack. Now we will introduce you to the iron maiden. Get her up.'
Four of the spectators, two men and two women, untied the woman's wrists and ankles and hauled her to her feet.
'Bring her over here,' the Inquisitor ordered. As he walked the length of the cellar he took a short leather whip from a selection of many hanging from the walls. Each of the slaves tethered to the metal rings he stroked hard with the whip as he passed: one man across his thigh, almost catching his cock; a woman across her breast; another, whose face had been turned to the wall, and whose skirt was tucked up around her waist, twice on the buttocks, which he then stopped to fondle briefly. She moaned with pleasure.
The brunette was frogmarched over to the side of the room next to the forge, struggling and fighting every inch of the way.
Standing against the wall was what looked like a coffin, made from sheet metal and hinged at the front. A small barred window in the shape of a diamond was set in the door at head height. The Inquisitor strode over to it, and with a creaking of hinges pulled the door open.
'May I introduce you to my friend the Iron Maiden,' he said, smiling broadly. 'You will remember, no doubt, that it used to be equipped with rather unpleasant iron spikes. We have made some changes, but the principle remains the same...'
The woman stared into the narrow and cramped interior, empty except for some odd black padding, cut out in a human shape.
'Strip her, quickly.' The assembled crowd, who had all moved to this end of the cellar, obliged readily, pulling away the woman's already torn skirt and blouse.
A female stepped forward holding a carefully shaped leather mask, designed to fit over the contours of the eyes and nose to exclude even the faintest hint of light. While the others held the brunette tightly the woman pressed the mask over her eyes and strapped it tightly at the back of her head.
'Bind her hands.'
The woman's hands were dragged behind her back and bound with a single leather thong.
'Do you confess to being a witch?'
'I am not a witch,' the woman said firmly.
'Put her in then. And may God have mercy on your soul.'
Not struggling now, the brunette was pushed into the metal casket, facing outward, her figure encased in the padded shape. Slowly the Inquisitor closed the door. There was a simple but strong hasp which he locked by means of a metal pinion.
He stood back and took a thin, narrow candle from a small rack on the wall, spiked it on an empty candle holder and lit it with a taper from the forge. The candle burnt rapidly.
'No woman has ever lasted longer than half a candle,' he said to the crowd.
The Inquisitor peered through the diamond shaped window and could see the woman's eyes blazing in the dark interior. He picked up a bulbous wooden rod, curved like a scimitar, and inserted it in a hole that had been made dead in the centre of the casket door. There was no doubt from its shape and breadth that it was intended to be a crude dildo. From his movement it was clear that the Inquisitor was making no effort to penetrate the woman with this device; he was merely inserting it until it rested at the apex of her thighs, so that she was fully aware of its presence.
Inside the casket the brunette was hot. The heat from the forge had warmed the metal, but it was not unbearable. Like the interior, the door was padded, lined with a strange, fleecy, spongy material that pressed into the front of her naked body. The blindfold was effective. She couldn't see the slightest hint of light. She heard and felt the wooden rod being inserted and thought for a moment this was the beginning of her torture, but it merely nudged between her thighs.
The padding moulded every curve of her body. Apart from the inside of her thighs, which were tightly pressed together, and the underside of her arms, bound against her back, there was not a single part of her body that was not touched by it. Even the undersides of her breasts and the sides of her face and neck pressed against it.
It was the soles of her feet that she noticed first, perhaps because they were pushed into the padding the hardest. They began to prickle as though the fleecy lining was made of a thousand tiny pins. She lifted one foot off the floor as far as she could - which wasn't very far in the confines of the casket - but this only made the feeling in the other foot worse. The fibres seemed to be working their way under her skin.
Almost before she had had time to register the discomfort, her breasts began to experience the same sensation, like tiny needles sticking into her tender flesh, making her squirm. If her hands hadn't been tied behind her back she would have scratched the incredible itch the material created, but she couldn't; that made it worse. Squirming against the padding only increased the feeling, driving the needles of the fabric deeper.
She gasped. The feelings from her breasts intensified, and were joined now by a prickling on her rump, on her outer thighs, on the cheeks of her face, on her waist and belly. Soon every bit of her body touched by the fleecy padding was alive, every inch of her flesh crawling. She could not help but squirm and writhe. If she managed temporary relief for one small part of her body, it was only at the cost of increasing the irritation in most of the rest of her.
'Oh no, no...' she said aloud. The fibres on her belly seemed to have worked down into her pubic hair and on to her labia. That was the worst of all. She felt the wooden shaft in front of her and used it to scratch at her sex, but as she pushed against it, the wood slipped away.
The Inquisitor saw the wood move. He'd heard the gasps. He looked at the candle. It was a quarter burnt down. At halfway he would put the question again.
Suddenly the sensation in the woman's body changed. The feeling of being pricked by a thousand pins and needles turned to a slow, sensuous heat. The fibres of the padding seemed now not to be sharp at all, but soft, incredibly soft. They seemed to be caressing her, caressing every part of her with a touch so delicate it made her swoon. Waves of pleasure flooded over her, not just from her nipples and breasts and labia, but from every part of her body. Her arms, her thighs, her feet, the back of her neck, her waist and her buttocks seemed to be just as sensitive as her sex. Her whole body was heaving. It was as though the fibre had created a thousand clits, centres of sensitivity spread right across her body, all equally capable of delivering exquisite sensation, all throbbing with pleasure.
'Please, please,' she moaned, not really knowing what she was saying.
As quickly as it had come that phase en
ded and a new feeling began. The fibres seemed to be drumming against her now, in exact time to her own thick, racing pulse, stroking her body up and down. It was impossible, she knew; nothing had changed. But in the blackness behind the blindfold it felt like the fibre was moving, swaying, like seaweed in the swell of a wave, to and fro against her body.
That feeling created another need. Suddenly, instead of being spread out everywhere, the sensation became concentrated. It homed in on the thrumming centre of her sex, the lozenge of her clitoris squeezed between her labia. Almost unconsciously she pushed her belly forward against the wooden shaft but, once again, it was unsecured, and slid away. She was desperate for contact, desperate to feel something hard against her sex, something she could push into her labia, against her clit, that would free it, open it, fulfil it.
'Please...'
The Inquisitor heard her plea and saw the wooden shaft move out again. He looked at the candle and smiled. It was exactly half burnt down.
'Do you confess to being a witch?'
'No!' she screamed, half hoping that noise, a lot of noise, would distract her from her torment. It didn't. Her whole body was screaming instead, screaming with sensation that built and built, that fuelled her need and increased her frustration. The wooden shaft was there, right in front of her, in exactly the right place for her to use it. If only she could squirm against it, push it right up into her soaking wet sex. She knew she was wet. She could feel her juices running over her labia and down her thighs. All she wanted was the hardness of the shaft. It would only take a second - not a second even. Was that too much to ask?
'Please...' she begged, her whole body quivering. As the fibre continued to tease her, her breasts and nipples, her buttocks, her thighs, all joined together, pumping more and more need into her pounding sex.
'Do you confess?'
'No...'
'You want the shaft?'
'Yes...'
'Confess.'
'No.'
The Inquisitor held the shaft and eased it forward until he could feel the resistance of her body.
Stephanie's Pleasure Page 10
