by Anne Rice
His voice was so gentle that Beauty warmed to him at once. His sleeves were rolled to the elbows and there was golden hair on his arms, and his fingers were very sure as he washed her ears and her face, careful not to get the soap in her eyes.
“And you have been punished very severely, haven’t you?”
Beauty blushed.
He laughed softly.
“Very good, my dear, you are learning already. Never answer such a question as that. It could be taken as a complaint if you did. Any time you are asked if you have been punished too much or suffered too much, or anything of that sort, be clever enough to blush.”
But even as he spoke almost affectionately, he began washing her breasts just as calmly as he had washed the rest of her, and Beauty’s blushes became more painful. She could feel her nipples harden, and she was certain though she could see nothing but the soapy water before her, that he was noticing this, as his hands slowed slightly, and then he pushed at her inner thigh gently. “Spread your legs, dearest,” he said.
She obeyed, kneeling with her legs farther apart, and then farther as he pushed her. He had become still, and now drying his hand on the towel at his waist, he touched her sex and she felt herself shudder.
Her sex was moist and swollen with her desire, and to her horror, his hand touched a small hard knot in which much of her craving was accumulated. She drew back involuntarily.
“Ah.” He withdrew his fingers, and turning called to Lord Gregory.
“A very lovely flower, this,” he said. “Have you observed?”
Beauty was crimson. Her eyes overflowed with tears. It took all her control not to drop her hands to cover her sex as she felt Leon part her legs even wider now and gently touch the moisture there.
Lord Gregory gave a soft laugh.
“Yes, a truly remarkable Princess,” he said. “I should have watched her more carefully.”
Beauty gave a little muffled sob of shame and yet the driving desire between her legs would not stop, and her face was stinging as Lord Gregory spoke to her.
“Most of our little Princesses are too frightened in the first few days to show such willingness to serve, Beauty,” he said in the same cold voice. “They must be awakened and educated. But I see you are very passionate and much enamored of your new masters and all they wish to teach you.”
Beauty struggled against her tears. This was more humiliating surely than anything that had happened to her.
And now Lord Gregory was taking her chin as the Prince had taken Prince Alexi’s chin and forcing her to look at him.
“Beauty, this is a great virtue in you. You have no cause to be ashamed. It only means that you must learn yet another form of discipline. You are awakened to the desires of your master as you should be, but you must learn to control that desire just as you see the male slaves control it.”
“Yes, my Lord,” Beauty whispered.
Leon withdrew and a moment later he returned with a small white tray on which were laid several little objects Beauty could not see.
But to her terror, Lord Gregory parted her legs and affixed to that little hard kernel of tormented flesh a plaster of sorts that covered it and adhered to it. He shaped it quickly with his fingers as if he did not wish to have Beauty enjoy this.
And Beauty was all the more relieved, for had she felt the ultimate pleasure, had she commenced to shudder and to blush with the final release from this torment, she would have been absolutely mortified.
But now the little plaster gave her an added torment. What could it mean?
It seemed Lord Gregory read her thoughts.
“That will prevent you from all too easily satisfying your newfound and undisciplined desire, Beauty. It will not alleviate it. It will merely prevent, shall we say, accidental release, until you have gained the proper control of yourself. I had not thought to commence this detailed instruction so soon, but I shall tell you now that you are never allowed to experience full pleasure save at the whims of your master or mistress. Never, never, must you be caught touching your private parts with your own hands, nor trying more secretly to alleviate your obvious ... misery.”
“Well-chosen words,” Beauty thought, “for all his coldness to me.”
But he was immediately gone, and once more Leon was bathing her.
“Don’t be so frightened and so ashamed,” he said. “You don’t realize what a great advantage it is. To be taught to feel such pleasure is very difficult, and far more humiliating. And your passion gives a bloom to you that cannot be achieved otherwise.”
Beauty cried softly. The little plaster between her legs made her all the more conscious of her feelings there. Yet Leon’s hands and voice were soothing her.
Finally he told her she must lie down in the bath and he must wash her long beautiful hair for her. She let the warm water close over her and thought for a moment that she was covered by it and that felt extremely good to her.
As soon as she had been rinsed and dried, Beauty was put down on one of the beds nearby, and arranged on her face so that Leon could rub an aromatic oil into her skin.
It felt delicious to her.
“Now, surely,” he said as he was massaging her shoulders, “there must be questions that you should like to ask me. You may do that if you like. It is not good for you to be confused about things unnecessarily. There is enough for you to fear without fears that are imaginary.”
“I may ... talk to you then?” Beauty asked.
“Yes,” he said. “I’m your groom. In a way, I belong to you. Each slave, no matter how he or she ranks or pleases or displeases, has a groom, and that groom is devoted to that slave, to that slave’s needs and wishes, as well as preparing the slave for the master. Now, of course, there will be times when I shall have to punish you, not because I take pleasure in it, though I can’t imagine punishing a more beautiful slave than you, but because your master may order it. He may order you punished for disobedience, or merely readied for him with some blows. But I will be doing it only because I have to ...”
“But do you ... do you take pleasure in it?” Beauty asked timidly.
“It is difficult to resist beauty such as yours,” he said, rubbing the oil into the backs of her arms and into the crevices of her elbows. “But I should much rather groom you and care for you.” He put down the oil and gave her hair another brisk rub with the towel, adjusting the pillow under her face.
It felt so good to be lying here, with his hands working on her.
“But as I was saying before, you may ask me questions when I give you leave. Remember, when I give you leave, and I have just given it.”
“I don’t know what to ask,” she whispered. “There is so much to ask ...”
“Well, surely you must know already that all punishments here are for the pleasure of your masters and mistresses ...”
“Yes.”
“And that nothing shall ever be done which truly harms you. You will never be burned, nor cut, nor injured,” he said.
“Ah, that is a great relief,” Beauty said, but in truth she had understood these limits without being told. “But the other slaves,” she asked. “Are they here for various reasons?”
“Sent as Tributes mostly,” Leon answered. “Our Queen is very powerful and commands many allies. And of course, all Tributes are well fed, well guarded, well treated just as you are well treated.”
“And ... what happens to them?” Beauty asked tentatively. “I mean, they are all young and ...”
“They’re returned to their Kingdoms when the Queen so wishes, and obviously very much better off for their service here. They’re not so vain any longer, they have great self-control, and often a different view of the world, one which enables them to achieve great understanding.”
Beauty could scarcely guess what this meant. Leon massaged the oil into her sore calves and the tender flesh behind her knees. She felt drowsy. The sensation was growing ever more delicious, and she resisted it slightly, unwilling to let that cravi
ng between her legs torment her. Leon’s fingers were strong, almost a little too strong, and they moved to her thighs which the Prince had reddened with his strap as much as her calves and buttocks. She shifted slightly against the soft, firm bedding. Her thoughts slowly cleared.
“Then I might be sent home,” she asked, but it had no meaning for her.
“Yes, but you must never mention it, and certainly never ask for it. You are the property of your Prince. You are his slave entirely.”
“Yes ...” she whispered.
“And to beg to be released would be a terrible thing,” Leon continued. “However in time you will be sent home. There are different agreements for different slaves. Do you see that Princess there?”
In a great hollow in the wall, on a shelf-like bed, lay a dark-haired girl whom Beauty had noticed. She had olive skin, richer in tone than that of Prince Alexi who was also dark, and her hair was so long it lay in rippling strands over her buttocks. She slept with her face to the room, her mouth slightly open on the flat pillow.
“Now, she is Princess Eugenia,” said Leon, “and she must be returned in two years by agreement. Her time is almost up and she is broken-hearted. She wants to remain on the condition that her continued slavery will save two slaves from having to come here. Her Kingdom might agree to these terms to keep back two other Princesses.”
“You mean she wants to stay?”
“O yes,” Leon said. “She is mad for Lord William, the Queen’s eldest cousin, and can’t bear the thought of being sent home. But there are others who are ever rebellious.”
“Who are they?” Beauty asked, but before he could answer, she added quickly, though trying to sound indifferent, “Is Prince Alexi one of those who is rebellious?”
She could feel Leon’s hand moving towards her buttocks, and now suddenly all those welts and sore places were brought to life as his fingers touched them. The oil burned slightly as Leon added droplets of it generously, and then those strong fingers commenced to work the flesh, with no regard for its redness. Beauty winced, but even this pain had its pleasure. She felt her buttocks shaped by his hands, lifted, separated, and then smoothed again. She blushed to think that it was Leon doing this who had been talking to her in such a civilized manner, and when his voice went on, she felt a new variant of agitation. “There is no end to it,” she thought, “the ways of being humiliated.”
“Prince Alexi is the Queen’s favorite,” said Leon. “The Queen cannot bear to be separated from him for very long, and though he is a model of good behavior and devotion, he is, in his own way, relentlessly rebellious.”
“But how can that be?” Beauty asked.
“Ah, you must put your mind on the pleasing of your Lords and Ladies,” Leon said, “but I shall say this: Prince Alexi appears to have surrendered his will as a fine slave must, but there is a core in Prince Alexi that no one touches.”
Beauty was enthralled by this answer. She thought of Prince Alexi on his hands and knees, his strong back and the curve of his buttocks as he had been driven back and forth across the Prince’s bedroom; she thought of the beauty of his face. “A core in him no one touches,” she mused.
But Leon had turned her over now, and when she saw him bending down, so close to her, she felt bashful and closed her eyes. He was rubbing the oil into her belly and into her legs, and she pressed her legs together and tried to turn to the side.
“You’ll become very accustomed to my ministrations, Princess,” he said. “You will think nothing of being groomed in time.” And firmly he pressed her shoulders to the pallet. His swift fingers smoothed the oil into her throat and into her arms.
Beauty opened her eyes cautiously to see him intent on his work. His pale eyes moved over her without passion but with an obvious absorption.
“Do you ... derive pleasure from it?” she whispered, and was shocked to hear herself speak these words.
He emptied some oil into the palm of his left hand, and putting the bottle down beside him, he rubbed the oil into her breasts, lifting them and squeezing them as he had done her buttocks. She closed her eyes again, biting her lip. She felt him roughly massaging her nipples. She almost let out a little cry.
“Be still, my dear,” he said matter-of-factly. “Your nipples are tender and must be slightly toughened. You’ve been subjected to very little sport so far from your love-stricken master.”
Beauty was frightened by this. Her nipples felt painfully hard to her; she knew her face had colored darkly. It seemed all the feeling in her breasts swelled and pumped towards those tiny hard nipples.
Mercifully, Leon let go of her breasts with a hard squeeze. But then he parted her legs and rubbed the oil into her inner thighs, and this was even worse for her. She could feel her sex throbbing. She wondered if it gave off heat that he could feel with his hands.
She hoped he would be quick.
Yet even as she lay, red faced and trembling, he pushed her legs farther apart, and to her horror, parted the lips of her sex with his fingers as though inspecting her.
“O, please ...” she whispered, turning her head from side to side, her eyes stinging.
“Now Beauty,” he scolded gently, “you must never never plead for anything from anyone, not even from your loyal and devoted groom. I must inspect you to see if you are sore, and as I thought, you are. Your Prince has been rather ... devoted.”
Beauty bit her lip and closed her eyes as he widened the orifice and now oiled it. She felt as if she were being pulled apart, and even under the plaster that tiny knot of feeling throbbed above the opening Leon’s fingers had broadened. “If he touches it, I shall die,” she thought, but he was quite careful not to do that, though she felt his fingers entering her, and massaging the lips of her vagina.
“Poor darling slave,” he whispered to her with feeling. “Now sit up. If I were to have my way, you would rest. But Lord Gregory wants you to see the rest of the Training Hall and the Hall of Punishments. Let me finish your hair quickly.”
He began to brush Beauty’s hair and arrange it in coils on the back of her head as she sat, still trembling, her knees drawn up, and her head bowed.
THE TRAINING HALL
BEAUTY WASN’T certain that she hated Lord Gregory. Perhaps there was something comforting in his air of command. What would it be like to be here without someone who directed her so completely? But he appeared obsessed with his duties.
As soon as he took her out of Leon’s hands, he gave her two gratuitous blows with the paddle before ordering her to her knees and to follow him. She was to keep close to the heel of his right boot, and she was to observe all that was around her.
“But you must never look at the faces of your masters and mistresses, you must never try to meet their eyes, and there is not to be a sound out of you,” he directed, “save your answers to me.”
“Yes, Lord Gregory,” she whispered. The stone floor beneath her was swept very clean and polished, but it hurt her knees nevertheless because it was stone. Yet she followed him at once past the other beds on which slaves were being groomed, and the baths in which two young men were being bathed, just as she had been bathed, their eyes flashing over her with mild curiosity as she risked a glance at each of them.
“All handsome,” she mused.
But when a stunningly beautiful young woman was driven across her path, she felt a hot flush of jealousy. This was a girl with a mane of silvery hair much fuller and curlier than Beauty’s, and as she was on her knees, her huge and magnificent breasts hung down showing their large pink nipples to great advantage. The Page who drove her with the paddle seemed very engaged with her, laughing at her little cries, and forcing her to move faster with the force of his blows as well as the mocking and cheerful commands he gave her.
Lord Gregory paused as if he, too, enjoyed the sight of this girl as she was brought up, and into the bath, her legs forced apart as Beauty’s had been. Beauty could not help but notice her breasts again, and how large were the pink nipples. The g
irl’s hips were ample for her size, and to Beauty’s amazement, she was not really crying as she was lowered into the water. Her moans were more complaints as the paddle still smacked her.
Lord Gregory made some approving sound. “Lovely,” he said so that Beauty could hear him. “And three months ago she was as wild and untamed as a nymph from the forest. The transformation is quite exquisite.”
Lord Gregory turned sharply to his left and when Beauty did not at once realize it, he gave her a sound spank and then another.
“Now, Beauty,” Lord Gregory said, as they passed through a doorway into a long room, “do you wonder how others are trained to show the passion you exhibit with such abandon?”
Beauty knew her cheeks were crimson. She could not bring herself to answer.
The room was dimly lit by a nearby fire, but its doors were open to the garden. And here Beauty saw that many captives were positioned on tables as she had been in the Great Hall, each with a Page in attendance. And all the Pages worked diligently taking no note of cries or commotion at any other table.
Several young men knelt with their hands strapped behind them. They were paddled steadily while at the same time their penises were also being given pleasure. Here a Page stroked the engorged penis as he worked the paddle. Here two Pages attended the same Prince mercilessly.
Beauty could understand what was happening even when Lord Gregory did not explain it to her. She saw the confusion and misery of the young Princes, their faces caught between struggle and surrender. The Prince nearest her was on all fours, his penis tormented slowly. As soon as the paddling commenced, he went soft. So the paddling ceased, and the hands attended to him again, hardening him.
Along the walls were other Princes, spread-eagled, their ankles and wrists bound to the bricks, their organs being taught obedience with touching and kisses and suckling.