by Anne Rice
“And haven’t they seen me,” Beauty thought. Could it be worse than the Great Hall, and what if she spilled the wine?
“Beauty, go to the sideboard and take the pitcher. Serve carefully and well, and come back to me,” said the Prince, again without looking at her.
Beauty moved through the shadows to find the gold pitcher on the sideboard. She could smell the fruity aroma of the wine, and she turned, feeling awkward and graceless, and approached the first table. “A common serving girl, slave,” she thought, more keenly than she had thought anything when she had been displayed.
With trembling hands she poured the wine slowly into goblet after goblet, and through her glazed vision saw smiles and heard whispered compliments. Now and then some haughty man or woman was quite indifferent to her. She was shocked once by a pinch on her rear and gasped to a general round of laughter.
As she bent over the tables, she felt the nakedness of her belly, saw the chains shimmering as they connected her pinched nipples. Each common gesture made her feel more hopeless.
She backed away from the last table, from a man who sat back with his elbow on the arm of his chair and smiled at her.
And then she filled Lady Juliana’s goblet and saw those bright round eyes looking up at her.
“Lovely, lovely, O, I do wish you weren’t so possessive of her,” said Lady Juliana. “Put the pitcher down, my dear, and come here to me.”
Beauty obeyed and returned to the Lady’s chair. When she saw the Lady snap her fingers and point to the floor, Beauty blushed. She fell to her knees, and then in a strange impulsive moment, she kissed the Lady’s slippers.
It seemed to happen very slowly. She found herself bending down towards the silver slippers and then she touched them with her lips fervently.
“Ah, what a darling,” said the Lady Juliana. “Give me only an hour with her.”
And Beauty felt the woman’s hand on the back of her neck, caressing her, stroking her, and then gathering her hair back and smoothing it tenderly. Tears came to Beauty’s eyes. “I am nothing,” she thought. And there was that awareness again of some change in her, some quiet despair, except that her heart was racing.
“I would not even have her here,” said the Prince under his breath, “save my mother commands it, that she be treated like any other slave, that she be enjoyed by others. Given my own will, I would chain her to my bedpost. I would beat her. I would watch every tear, every change of color.”
Beauty felt her heart in her throat like a little fist knocking there faster and faster. “I would make her my wife, even ...”
“Ah, but you are in the grip of madness.”
“Yes,” said the Prince, “she has done that to me. Are others blind?”
“No, of course not,” said Juliana, “she is lovely. But each seeks his own love, you know that. Would you have everyone else equally mad for her?”
“No,” he shook his head. And without looking away from the chessboard, he reached out to caress Beauty’s breasts, lifting them, squeezing them, so that she winced.
But suddenly everyone was rising.
Chairs slid back on the stones; the assemblage stood bowing.
Beauty turned.
The Queen had come into the room. Beauty glimpsed her long green gown, the girdle of gold embroidery about her hips and that sheer white veil that hung down her back to her hem, only thinly concealing her black hair.
Beauty went down low on her hands and knees not knowing what she must do. Her forehead touched the stones and she held her breath. Yet she could see the Queen approaching. The Queen stood right before her.
“Be seated everyone,” said the Queen, “and return to your games. But you, my son, how do you fare with this new passion?”
The Prince was obviously at a loss for an answer.
“Pick her up, display her,” said the Queen.
And Beauty realized she was being lifted by her wrists. She rose up quickly, her arms being twisted behind her, her back forced into a painful arc, and suddenly she was standing on her toes moaning. The clamps seemed to tear at her nipples, the jewels between her legs to pull her open. Behind the jewel in her navel, she felt her heart beat, and she felt it too in the lobes of her clamped ears and in her eyelids.
She was looking at the floor but all she could see was that shimmering chain and some great indistinct form that was the Queen standing over her.
Then suddenly the Queen’s hand struck Beauty’s breasts so hard that Beauty cried out, and at once felt the Page’s fingers over her mouth tightly.
She moaned in panic. She felt her tears come, the Page’s fingers biting into her cheek. And without meaning to, she struggled.
“There, there, Beauty,” whispered the Prince. “You do not show my mother your best disposition.”
Beauty tried to calm herself, but the Page forced her forward more harshly.
“She is not so bad,” said the Queen, and Beauty could feel the iron in her voice, her cruelty. No matter what the Prince did to her, she did not sense in him such pure cruelty.
“She is only afraid of me,” said the Queen. “And I wish you were more afraid of me, my son.”
“Mother, be gentle with her, please, I beg you,” said the Prince. “Allow me to keep her in my chambers, and to train her myself. Don’t send her back to the Hall of Slaves tonight.”
Beauty tried to smother her own crying. It seemed the Page’s hand over her mouth only made it more difficult for her.
“My son, when she has proven her humility, we shall see,” said the Queen. “Tomorrow night, the Bridle Path.”
“O, but Mother, it is so soon.”
“Such rigor will be good for her; it will make her malleable,” said the Queen.
And turning with a broad gesture that loosened the train of her gown and made it fall behind her, the Queen left the parlor.
The Page released Beauty.
. And the Prince at once took her wrists in his hand and urged her out into the corridor, Lady Juliana coming beside him.
The Queen was gone, and the Prince moved Beauty angrily along ahead of him, Beauty’s sobs echoing under the dark vaulted ceilings.
“O, dear, poor exquisite dear,” said the Lady Juliana.
At last they reached the Prince’s apartments, and to Beauty’s misery, the Lady Juliana came in as if this were nothing to enter the Prince’s chamber.
“Have they no propriety and restraint among themselves,” Beauty thought, “or are they degraded with each other as we are degraded?”
But she soon realized it was only the Prince’s study, and Pages were about. And the door remained open.
The Lady Juliana took Beauty now from the Prince, her soft cool hands urging Beauty down on her knees before her chair.
Then from somewhere in the folds of her gown, the Lady produced a long narrow silver-handled brush and she commenced to brush Beauty’s hair lovingly. “This will soothe you, my poor precious one,” she said. “Don’t be so frightened.”
Beauty broke into fresh sobs. She hated this lovely Lady. She wanted to destroy her. She felt such savage thoughts, and yet she wanted at the same moment to cling to her, to sob against her breast. She thought of friends she’d had at her father’s Court, her Ladies in waiting, and how many times they had been easily affectionate with one another, and she wanted to abandon herself to the same affection. The brushing of her hair produced a tingling all through her scalp and through the flesh of her arms as well. And when the Lady’s left hand covered her breasts and gently patted them, she felt herself defenseless. Her mouth went slack and she turned towards the Lady Juliana and laid her forehead against her knee, defeated.
“Poor, darling one,” said the Lady. “But the Bridle Path is not so dreadful. You will be grateful afterwards that you were used rigorously in the beginning, for it will all the sooner soften you.”
“Familiar sentiments,” Beauty thought.
“Perhaps,” the Lady Juliana went on with the rhythmic stroking o
f the brush, “I shall ride beside you.”
What could this mean?
And then the Prince said:
“Take her back to the Hall now.”
Without explanations, without farewells, without tenderness!
Beauty turned and rushed to him on her hands and knees and gave his boots fervent kisses. Again and again she kissed them both, hoping for what she did not know, one real embrace from him perhaps, something to allay her fears of the Bridle Path.
The Prince received her kisses for a long time, and then he lifted her and turned her to Lady Juliana who clasped Beauty’s hands behind her back.
“Be obedient, beautiful one,” she said.
“Yes, you ride beside her,” said the Prince. “But you must make a good show of it.”
“Of course, I should very much enjoy making a good show of it,” said the Lady Juliana, “and it is best for you both. She is a slave, and all slaves desire a firm mistress and master. If they cannot be free, then they do not like for there to be ambivalence. I shall be most firm with her, but always loving.”
“Take her back to the Hall,” said the Prince. “My mother will not allow me to keep her here.”
THE BRIDLE PATH
AS SOON as Beauty opened her eyes from sleep, she could feel a new excitement in the castle.
Torches everywhere brilliantly illuminated the Slaves’ Hall, and all about her Princes and Princesses were receiving elaborate preparation. The hair of the Princesses was being combed and studded with flowers. The Princes were being polished with oil, their stiff curls combed just as carefully as those of the young women.
But Beauty was hastily taken from bed by Leon who seemed uncommonly excited.
“It’s Festival Night, Beauty,” he said, “and I’ve allowed you to sleep a long time. We must hurry.”
“Festival Night,” she whispered.
But she was already being placed on the table for grooming.
At once he parted her hair and started to braid it. She felt the air on her neck and hated it, and she realized he had started the braids very high on her head so she would look even more girlish than Lady Juliana. A long black leather thong was braided into the hair on both sides, and knotted around the ends with a little brass bell affixed to it. When Leon dropped the braids they were heavy against Beauty’s breasts and her neck was exposed as well as all of her face.
“Charming, charming,” Leon mused with his usual air of satisfaction. “But now your boots.”
And slipping her into a pair of high black leather boots he told her to stand in them while he bent to lace them tightly to her knees and then smooth the leather around her ankles until it was cleaving like a glove there.
Not until Beauty lifted her foot did she realize each boot was fitted at toe and heel with a horseshoe. And the tops were hard and strong so that nothing could hurt her toes.
“But what is happening, what is the Bridle Path?” she asked in a great fluster.
“Shhhhh ...” Leon said, pinching and prodding her breasts to give them as he said, “some color.”
He then glossed Beauty’s eyelids and eyelashes with oil and smoothed a little rouge into her lips and into her nipples. Beauty drew back instinctively but his touch was sure and quick and he took no notice of her.
But what bothered her most was that her body felt cool and vulnerable. She could feel the sheathing of leather against her calves, and all the rest of her felt worse than naked. It was more terrible than any of the smaller adornments.
“What is going to take place?” she asked again, but Leon had thrust her over the end of the table and now oiled her buttocks vigorously. “Well healed,” he said. “The Prince must have guessed last night you would run tonight and he spared you.”
Beauty felt his strong fingers plying her flesh and a dread came over her. So they would spank her, but they always did. Only it would be in the presence of many others?
Every humiliating spank she had received before the eyes of others had cost her dearly, though she knew now she would suffer any amount of paddling for the Prince, but she had not really been given a hard, thorough spanking for the pleasure of others since the Inn on the road where the Innkeeper’s daughter had spanked her for the soldiers and the common people at the windows.
“But it must come,” she thought. And a vision of the Court watching it as some ritual caused her to feel an undeniable curiosity that soon enough gave way to panic. “My Lord, please tell me ...”
Amid the crowd about her, she saw other girls with braided hair and boots. So she was not alone. And there were Princes being fitted with boots also.
Through it all there moved a handful of young Princes on their hands and knees polishing boots as quickly as they could, their own buttocks raw, their necks encircled by a little cord of leather to which was attached a sign that Beauty could not read.
But now as Leon brought her up standing again and gave some finishing touches to her lips and eyelashes, one of these Princes was now buffing her boots though he was weeping. His buttocks were as red as it could have been. And she saw the sign about his neck said, “I am in Disgrace,” in small letters.
A Page approached and gave the Prince a sound crack with a belt to hurry him on to another.
But Beauty had no time to think of it. Leon had affixed the accursed little brass bells to her nipples.
She shuddered almost instinctively but they were firmly attached, and he told her to fold her arms behind her back tightly.
“Now forward, only you are to bend your knees slightly and to march, lifting each knee high,” he told her.
She started, awkwardly, reluctant to obey, but then she saw all about her other Princesses marching in an almost sprightly manner, their breasts bouncing gracefully as they moved into the corridor.
She hurried, the heavy boots difficult for her to lift with any decorum, but soon she had fallen into a rhythm and Leon was walking beside her.
“Now, darling,” he said, “the first time is always difficult. Festival Night is frightening. I had thought some easier duty would be yours this first time, but the Queen has ordered you especially for the Bridle Path, and the Lady Juliana will drive you.”
“Ah, but what ...”
“Shhhh, or I shall have to gag you and that will very much displease the Queen as well as make your mouth quite ugly.”
All the girls were now in a long room, and through narrow windows on one wall, Beauty could see the garden.
Torches flared in the dark trees, throwing an uneven glare on the leafy boughs above them. The line of girls formed right beside these windows, and Beauty was now able to see more of what lay beyond them.
There was a great roar as of many people conversing, laughing. And then to her shock Beauty saw slaves all through the garden positioned in various ways for their torment.
On high stakes here and there were strapped Princes and Princesses painfully contorted, their ankles bound to the stakes, their shoulders bent over the tops of them. They seemed no more than ornaments, the torchlight causing their twisted limbs to glow, the hair of the Princesses falling free in the air behind them. Surely they could see only the sky above, though all could see their miserable contortions.
And everywhere beneath were the Lords and Ladies, the light falling upon a long embroidered cloak here, a pointed hat there with a veil trailing airily from it. There were hundreds in the garden, these tables placed far back into the trees, as far as Beauty could see in all directions.
Beautifully adorned slaves moved about, pitchers in hand, little gold chains fixed to their breasts, the Princes adorned with gold rings on their erect organs. They hurried to fill the goblets, pass the platters of food, and as in the great hall there was music.
The line of girls before Beauty grew restless. Beauty could hear one girl crying as her groom tried to comfort her, but most of the others were obedient. Here and there a groom rubbed more oil into plump buttocks or whispered in a Princess’s ear, and Beauty’s sense
of apprehension deepened.
She did not want to look into the yard; it frightened her too much, but she could not prevent herself. And each time she saw some new horror. A great wall to the left, was adorned with spread-eagled slaves, and on a huge serving cart she saw slaves fixed to the giant wheels, turned upside down over and over as the cart was moved forward.
“But what will happen to us?” Beauty whispered. The girl in line before her who could not be quieted was now hanging by her ankle from the hand of a strong Page who punished her swiftly. Beauty gasped to see her spanked, her braids falling to the floor beneath her.
“Shh, it is best for her,” Leon said, “it will exhaust her fear and drain her slightly. And she will be all the more free on the Bridle Path.”
“But tell me ...”
“You must be still. You will see the others first and understand, and as we draw nearer to your turn I shall instruct you. Remember this is a special night of high festivity, but the Queen will be watching. And the Prince will be furious if you fail him.”
Beauty’s eyes returned to the garden. The great cart of steaming food had moved along, and for the first time she saw the distant fountain. Here too were bound slaves, their arms linked as they stood knee deep in the water, surrounding the central pillar, its sparkling flow pouring down over them. Their bodies glistened under the water.
The groom beside the girl in front of Beauty laughed softly and said that someone was miserable to be missing Festival Night but it was her own fault.
“Surely,” Leon agreed when the groom glanced back to him. “They are talking about Princess Lizetta,” he told Beauty, “who is still in the Hall of Punishments, and cursing no doubt to miss the excitement.”
To miss the excitement! But in spite of her fear, Beauty nodded at this as if it were perfectly natural. A calm descended upon her in which she heard her own heart and felt her body as if there were limitless time in which to know it. She felt the sheathing of the leather boots, the click of her horseshoes on the stones, the air on her neck, her belly. And she thought, “Yes, this is what I am, so I should not wish to miss it either. Yet I rebel in my soul; why do I rebel?”