‘How many times did you have her in her mouth yesterday?’ he asked his twin.
Dee frowned. ‘Once, like you.’
‘There are two ticks in the “mouth” row here under your name.’
‘There can’t be.’
‘Contrariwise, there can be. Look!’
Dee blinked at the chart, then shrugged. ‘Must be a mistake,’ he said, and scribbled over the tick. His brother looked at him suspiciously, but said no more.
They didn’t bother to ask Alice if she had been keeping count so she remained silent and concentrated on looking as innocent as possible. Why should they dream she could be responsible, with her hands tied behind her back and obviously without access to writing materials? Though ignorant of their domestic arrangements, she had gambled on the likelihood that each knew it was possible for the other to sneak out to her at night. How long before they realised what a tick in the column actually implied depended on how smart they really were? Then it would be time for her to speak up.
Deciding that Alice was in need of a bath, they took her on her leash to the stream running close by and washed her down, enjoying soaping and squeezing her slippery breasts and working the lather into those folds and crevices they had become so familiar with over the last couple of days. She wondered if they would free her hands for the process but they didn’t. The ropes got wet of course and it would mean she would have some deep marks on her when she finally got free, but it did allow her to start the second phase of her plan.
They locked her in her cage over lunchtime while they went back to their house to eat, so she took the opportunity to add another tick to the chart, this time under Dum’s column. Then she began working on the rope about her waist.
Once again they did not notice the addition to the chart on their return, because they had decided to rebuild the pit Alice had fallen into in the hope of catching something else. Carrying ropes and chains they led her off into the woods to find sticks of the right length to help cover the pit. They roamed some way before finding what they were after in a coppiced hazel. They set about it with an axe and handsaw and soon had a pile of long sticks to bridge over the pit. These they tied together and then harnessed Alice to the bundle to drag back to the pit.
A thick rope was tied about her waist and the end passed between her legs, through a loop in the bundle’s binding, then back up and over her head, where it was passed between her teeth and tied off in a loop behind her neck. With flicks of their canes, Alice was urged to start hauling, clenching the rope between her teeth and wincing as its other end dug deep into her cleft, spreading her labia and rubbing against her clitoris.
By the time she had dragged her load back to the pit her feet were muddy and she was dripping with sweat. Saliva had run down her cheeks from between her clenched teeth and the section of rope passing through her nether lips was stained dark. This of course undid the effects of her wash that morning, but it scarcely bothered the boys. While they worked on rebuilding the pit cover they tethered Alice to the trunk of the holly tree, so she had to force herself to stand still amid the prickly sprigs.
That evening Dee noticed that apparently Dum had, unknown to him, used Alice’s bottom once more than he remembered. There was another argument and the boys stomped off home early glowering at each other, much to Alice’s private satisfaction. Before going to sleep she adjusted the chart to show that Dee had now used her bottom more than his brother.
Next day they seemed reconciled, however. Even the discovery of the anomalous entry on the tally did not cause them to argue for very long. They were more eager to try out the latest torment they had contrived for Alice.
For the first time they took her into their shack and sat her on the battered table. They had a three-foot length of two-by-four timber into the ends of which they had screwed two large ringbolts, while a third bolt ran through its centre. With many loops of rope they tied Alice’s ankles to the ends of the timber, then lifted her legs high so that only her head and shoulders rested on the table and tied the middle ring to one of the shack’s exposed beams. They pulled the table out from under her and Alice hung upside down, twirling in mid-air.
They admired this novel new view of her for a minute, spinning her round and pinching and slapping her breasts, which hung heavily inverted almost level with her chin. They tied string nooses round the trembling globes close to her chest and drew them tight, making her breasts stand out like pink balloons. Then they pulled on the ends, setting her swinging to and fro and causing the cords to bite deep into her tender flesh.
‘Does that hurt, girl?’ they asked, grinning at her discomfort.
‘Yes, a bit, Masters,’ Alice said. She felt dizzy and her head seemed thick and full of blood.
‘But you know we like to see you wriggle and cry,’ they said.
‘Yes, Masters.’
‘And do you like new things?’
‘Yes, Masters.’
‘And you do want to please us?’
Alice gulped. Where was this leading? But she had to act the part a little while longer. ‘Yes, Masters,’ she agreed apprehensively.
They tied the ends of the breast strings to a small hook. As Dum pulled the strings tight, Dee parted her labia to expose the small dark well of her pee hole nestling in its secret pink valley. Carefully, Dum slid the tip of the hook into the hole and let the weight of her breasts pull it downward, turning the hole into a dark slot as it stretched. Alice gasped. She had never felt anything like that before. It was not hugely painful but horribly intimate.
‘How do you like that?’ they asked.
‘Very … clever, Masters. I hope I please you now.’
The pair exchanged a glance and shook their heads. ‘You’re not making enough noise,’ they told her.
Alice began to groan loudly and wriggle about, but it failed to impress her audience.
‘You’re just putting it on,’ they said. ‘We don’t believe you. We thought you wanted to please us.’
‘I do, Masters,’ Alice insisted.
They grinned again, and suddenly Alice felt a trap closing. ‘Then see how many of these you can fit inside you,’ they said, bringing out a box of white candles. ‘Show us some proper tears …’
Alice whimpered. ‘No, please don’t do that …’
But of course they took no notice.
With one standing on each side of her they pried open her vagina and anus and began stuffing them with candles. Alice sobbed as each wax cylinder was slotted into her and her orifices began to bulge. Three, then four in her rear. Six … no, seven in her vulva.
The boys stepped back, satisfied that both her holes were well filled. Alice hung there; numbed, shivering, fearful, perversely excited. She had been turned into a novelty living candle-holder. But would they …? They did. A match flared into life and they lit the candles.
She felt the heat of the flames from eleven candles on her inner thighs. The boys cheered, the flames reflected in their eyes. How far would they let them burn down? How hot would she get?
The tightly clustered candles melted far more quickly than if they had been burning separately. In a minute Alice felt the first rivulets of hot wax touch the narrow tight-stretched bridge of flesh between her two stuffed orifices. Then it seemed to pour down her. It ran between her thighs and into her pubic down and into the cleft of her buttocks. The hook and string held open the upper folds of her cleft, allowing it to flow into its sensitive depths and even plug the mouth of her urethra. What was worse, the wax trickled down the spaces between the candles into the tender depths of her gaping passages and set in those moist hollows after they had passed on their stinging heat.
Alice shrieked and wailed and twisted in her bonds, to the delight of the twins. To add to her torment they brought out their bamboos and began caning her trussed and bouncing globes. Jerking away from the blows by reflex she arched her back, drawing the strings taut, pulling the nooses tighter about her breasts and dragging the hook deeper in
to her urethra. Her contortions splattered wax more widely, droplets decorating the insides of her thighs. Rivulets overflowed her groin and began to run down her stomach. Drips fell on the exposed undersides of her bound breasts.
Then came the final humiliation. Through her tears Alice saw the twins pull out their stiff cocks and begin masturbating vigorously, aroused by the picture of suffering she presented. As she sobbed and moaned they came over her red face, adding their splattered ejaculate to the wax that was already dripping down upon it. They found it more fun to watch her suffer than to come inside her, Alice thought miserably. She would not even get the reward of a proper climax for all her pain!
The twins let the candles burn down until her inner thighs and buttocks felt as though they were scorching and the wicks were flickering in tiny ponds of hot wax rimmed by her stretched orifices before blowing them out. Unhooking the spreader bar they carried her outside and laid her on the ground, her legs still tied wide. They left the plugs of wax in her for the rest of the day, so she lay soiled and shamed and horribly excited but unable to bring herself off. When they finally pulled them out she lost a few feathers embedded in the wax and yelped loudly. That final indignity convinced her. She dare not wait any longer. Tomorrow she was escaping!
When they came for her the next morning the first thing she did when they released her from her cage was to say, with evident eagerness, ‘Thank you, Masters, to whichever one of you had me in the night. It made up for all the pain of yesterday.’
They exchanged frowns, and Dum said, ‘Silly girl. We didn’t come here last night.’
‘But one of you must,’ Alice insisted. ‘It was too dark for me to tell which it was, but I know what happened.’ She made a show of suddenly being struck by a new thought. ‘Oh, sorry, Masters. I didn’t know it was meant to be a secret.’
Suspiciously, Dee checked the tally sheet. It appeared to show that he had used Alice twice more than he could recall, once orally and once vaginally.
‘I didn’t make these ticks,’ Dee protested.
‘Of course you wouldn’t put it down if you wanted it kept secret, Master,’ Alice said helpfully, before Dum could respond. ‘Nobody would do that if they wanted it to be a secret. There would only be a tick there if they were trying to make it look as though somebody else wasn’t playing fair …’ She let her eyes go wide and bit her lip. ‘Oh, dear …’
The twins were standing face to face, their cheeks flushed and fists balled.
‘I knew it was you!’ Dum said.
‘I knew it was you!’ Dee retorted.
Struggling to keep her voice sympathetic, Alice said, ‘Brothers shouldn’t fight over a silly girling. Why don’t you simply release me so I don’t come between you again?’
‘No!’ they said together, still eyeball to eyeball.
It was worth a try, Alice thought. ‘Or you can fight a duel for me, like cavaliers and knights used to,’ she suggested. ‘And whoever wins has me all to himself. That’s the only way. Unless you want to be fighting each other for the rest of your lives.’
They looked at her, they looked back at each other, glowered then nodded slowly. ‘We’ll do it!’
‘You’d better fight in the woods where you’ve got room,’ Alice continued helpfully. ‘And why not do it properly and dress up? Have you got swords and something that would do as armour?’ If the story still had any meaning here they would improvise costumes. It would give her a little more time.
‘Like knights?’ Dum asked.
‘Like knights,’ Dee agreed.
They hooked her leash to the ring on the shack door and set off determinedly, marching side by side in step, but not looking at each other.
As soon as they had disappeared Alice began rubbing the nail she had clenched in her right hand against the rope that circled her waist. Every day she had been working at the spot where the rope was hidden by her crossed hands. She had chosen it because it was only one strand, whereas there were several confining each of her wrists. Even so it had been agonisingly slow going. After seemingly sawing away for most of last night she thought she was more than halfway through and hoped it would be weak enough when the time came to make her move.
The twins returned looking even larger than before with an assortment of blankets and bolsters tied about them to serve as armour. On their heads a coalscuttle and cooking pot respectively served as improvised helmets. They carried painted wooden toy swords and shields that looked absurdly small in their pudgy hands. Had they ever grown out of them? Alice wondered. Perhaps not. Nobody ever seemed to grow old here, so why should they?
‘You both look wonderful,’ Alice lied. ‘Please may I start the battle? That would be proper. I mean I am the prize you’re fighting for.’
She was worried they might put her back in her cage while they fought, which would be no use. She had to be in the open so she could make her break.
They led her out into the woods and tied her leash to a tree, then they squared up to each other. Alice realised she had to say something appropriate, but she had never refereed a duel before.
‘Right, I, er, want a good sporting fight, no low blows, best of, er, three falls or one submission. No time limit. Winner takes all … that’s me. Are you both ready?’
‘We are!’ they said.
‘Then … go!’
The twins charged at each other, swinging their wooden swords. There was a thump as their shields clashed, then they danced around each other hacking and stabbing with their swords. Alice winced at the ferocity of the blows, feeling a little guilty at being the cause of such animosity and the trick she had played on them. Then she remembered everything she had suffered at their hands and decided the pair would soon get over it.
Behind her back she was frantically sawing away at the rope with the nail. Crash! bang! Dum and Dee reeled about in furious motion. Alice felt the rope parting, gritted her teeth and jerked her arms sharply. The rope about her waist snapped and hung loose. She froze but, as she had hoped, the twins were too engrossed in their battle to notice.
Her elbows protested after having been twisted behind her for so long, but she forced her arms to stretch, sliding her bound wrists down over her hips and stepping through them with a gasp of relief. It was an agony to raise her arms in front of her and she whimpered in pain. Somehow she reached her collar, fumbled for the spring clip and unsnapped her leash.
She was free!
Slowly she edged round the tree until it was between her and the battle, then set off along the path she had been following almost a week earlier. She walked briskly, trying not to call attention to herself with any sudden movement. Just slip away, she told herself …
From behind her the clatter of combat suddenly ceased and was replaced with angry shouts. Then she began to run.
Alice raced though the forest, holding her still bound wrists awkwardly in front of her. She snatched a rearward glance. The pair were pounding along in her wake panting and puffing like steam trains, shedding blankets and ironware as they came. Despite their bulk they were gaining on her.
Ahead the path ran between a holly bush and a large rhododendron. A child’s rattle lay on the ground. She hoped Dum and Dee were too angry to realise where she was leading them.
With the twins almost at her heels Alice jumped with all her strength, landing on the far side of the pit, stumbling but staying on her feet. From behind her came a crash and snap of breaking branches mingled with yells of surprise, then the thump of two heavy bodies hitting the ground.
Alice did not look back but ran on towards the barrier. The two of them should be able to get themselves out all right – eventually. And when they did she wanted to be long gone.
The woods began to thin. Ahead it seemed as though the forest had been cut through with a giant knife right across her path.
Suddenly the trees ended and there was a misty, blurred barrier before her, running down the middle of a brook a few feet wide. Alice did not break stride but sprang
across the narrow channel. She felt a momentary tingling, twisting sensation as she passed through the insubstantial curtain, then she landed on a soft grassy bank, rolled onto her back and lay there panting heavily.
She had made it through the first square, she thought as she regained her breath, and it had only taken five days!
Five
AFTER ALLOWING HERSELF a minute to recover, Alice sat up and took in her surroundings.
Beyond the grassy verge a tall redbrick wall ran along the length of the dividing barrier. A little way to her left the wall was pierced by an arched gateway. In the other direction Alice could see where the wall ended and the corners of four squares met, the misty barriers rising up into the sky forming a perfect right angle. For the moment at least she seemed to have the narrow strip of land to herself.
Alice got to her feet and backed up against the wall, using her teeth to loosen the knotted ropes binding her wrists while she kept a keen watch all round her. But nothing had changed five minutes later when she threw the ropes into the ditch and gratefully massaged her bruised and sore wrists. Even in Underland the marks would take a couple of days to heal. She hoped Dum and Dee had hit the bottom of their pit good and hard!
But which way now?
The gateway was so obvious she felt wary of it. If, however, she went along to the end of the wall, perhaps she could see what was round the other side first.
It did not take long to walk to the corner, but when she got there she found the wall extended into a tall thick hedge which ran at right angles to the brook, cutting right across it. The barrier marking the file boundary ran down the middle of the hedge. Alice tried to push her way through the hedge around the end of the wall, but it was just too thick. She supposed she could jump the brook back into the first square, find a way through the hedge into the square beside it, then across the continuation of the brook to the square above that, then through the hedge again to the other side of the wall. But was it worth all that trouble to spy out the land or would she run even more risk by passing through those equally unknown extra squares? What was worse, would she be permitted to make the detour? If she really was the Red Queen’s pawn, was she limited only to moving forward in a straight line, as was her counterpart chessman? How closely was she bound by the rules of the game? She was not sure she wanted to find out.
Alice In Chains Page 8