He snapped the reigns from Rosebud's bridle and led me to a low-hanging tree limb. I followed willingly, passive from his intoxicating touch, and I longed to drink my fill of him until I became senseless.
He bound my wrists together and both to the limb; I was able to grasp the thick branch and did so, feeling a need to grip onto something. Arms above my head, my body tingled with desire. The notion of being a woman engulfed me for the first time in my life, a woman in the presence of a potent man who wanted her.
He snapped the remaining leather in two with his bare hands and lifted one of my feet. He secured my ankle so that the toe of my boot held me in place, then tied my other ankle in the same manner.
My body pulsed, on fire with a peculiar hunger new to me. I hung from the tree, a ripe, swollen fruit gently swinging, already leaking its sweet juices, about to burst and release all, about to be plucked.
Count Dracula crouched beneath me. His large mouth covered most of my womanly opening. I felt his cool rough tongue lick me from rear to front and back again. He lapped at the blood and other liquid flowing from me like a man dying of thirst.
I moaned in ecstasy. Never had I felt such need, such urgency. He sucked at my opening, pulling the fluids from me and I cried out as my small hardened button tingled under his incessant ministrations.
We stayed like this, I dangling over his eager mouth while the moon ate its way across the sky. My cries mingled with those of the night creatures. It was not until the sky began to lighten that he gave me relief.
I felt weak. Exhausted. Tender. My swollen nipples throbbed. My plump womanly slit pulsed. The skin over my entire body vibrated, open in his direction.
He released my bonds and pulled me to him. His lips zealously clamped onto my throat. I felt a piercing that burned and I melted into the arms of my demon lover, who enfolded me in his dark cape. His voice swirled through my mind with a command.
I knew not how I understood what I must do, and yet I did understand. And more, I would not see him again until I had obeyed.
I also know not when he left me but suddenly I stood alone naked in the clearing. I felt abandoned. Lonely. Chilled by the cool dew. Dawn was approaching rapidly. I dressed quickly and mounted Rosebud, who was now as calm as could be. Before the sun rose, I arrived at the manor and dressed for a visit to the asylum.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Just after sunrise, Mina Harker barged into John Steward's office demanding, "I wish to visit Lucy. Now!"
"I'm afraid that may not be wise, Mrs. Harker. As you know, Professor Van Helsing is treating her condition..."
"I don't care about that. I insist you show me to Lucy at once, and I will not take 'No!' for an answer."
The woman looked determined. He thought for a moment about the professor's orders. If Van Helsing should learn that he had disobeyed him, John would have a good caning to look forward to. On the other hand, how would the professor find out? And even if he did, with Lucy out of commission, John was a practical enough man that he reconciled to the idea of taking his pleasures where he could find them. His ass was healing nicely and eager for further attention. Before Van Helsing returned to Amsterdam, John intended to obtain another taste of that remarkable holed paddle, a taste that might linger.
"All right, Mrs. Harker, but you may not stay long. Lucy needs her rest, such as it is, so that her therapy may be effective."
He escorted Mina to Renfield's cell. Lucy, chained as on the previous occasion, would tonight be removed to the hidden sleeping quarters the professor had insisted upon in the bowels of the asylum. John expected from what Van Helsing said that the professor would soon be dealing with Lucy alone. He had plans for Miss Westenra, that was clear, none of which John could fathom.
Lucy opened her eyes, swollen shut from crying, and looked through the slits at her friend. "Mina," she whispered. "I see you understand his power."
John assumed they were discussing Van Helsing. Lucy certainly understood and Mina perhaps so, although she had not tasted his puissance directly.
"May I have a word alone with her?" Mina asked.
"Certainly," John said, and stepped outside the cell.
The two women whispered and giggled together while John and the lunatic Renfield looked on. Renfield stood at the door's barred window grinning up at him and licked his lips with his fat tongue. "The ways of women are mysterious, are they not Dr. Steward? What rational man can hope to understand them and yet a rational man is drawn to them as is a moth to a flame. Or a human mouth." He popped a brown-winged moth between his lips. The insect's antenna fluttered wildly before its entire body was sucked to its horrid fate. The man was revolting and John dreaded leaving Lucy alone with him, but it was on Van Helsing's orders and the Professor knew best about in these matters. Obviously the treatment was effective for had John not seen the once willful Lucy Westenra bend willingly to every demand?
When Mina finished, he escorted her to a waiting carriage.
"Will she spend the night there, then?" she asked.
"The Professor has made arrangements. Don't concern yourself, Mina, they are for her own good and careful attention is being paid her."
"And you believe she is coming along nicely?"
"That is my perception, although we must wait to see what further treatment the Professor prescribes."
A strange smile crossed her face. John helped her board the carriage by guiding her arm. She nearly fell backwards and instinctively his free hand flew to prop up her bottom. She seemed to linger a moment then continue on into the coach. He had the impression that this 'fall' was planned, although he could not imagine the staid Mrs. Harker doing so. Once the door had closed, she peered out the window and down at him, giving an almost lecherous grin, one he found himself responding to. Perhaps it was his imagination, but he could have sworn her hair was not as tightly coiled nor her features as set as before. She looked infinitely more attractive, playful, and he wondered at her potential.
"I shall hold you personally responsible to see that Lucy is well cared for. You will see to that, won't you Dr. Steward? John?"
His name on her lips sent a message to his cock, which sprang up. The effect she was having on him amazed him, as though she had somehow opened to a dark corner of her nature.
The carriage sped away, leaving John staring off after it, imagining Mrs. Harker devoid of clothing holding a cricket bat in her hands.
Chapter Twenty-Four
I slept until the sun gave itself up to the horizon and the sky drained of color. I awoke in my bed renewed. I threw the covers from my burning body and lay sprawled, my nightdress tangled about my waist and off one shoulder. The window was open and cool air rippled across my exposed flesh.
I watched the sky darken until I could no longer make out the line of the horizon. Even before I saw him, I felt his presence. The air became dense, as before a storm. The wind cooled further and blew the curtains about. I had difficulty breathing and I felt chilled. My body trembled violently with hot longing yet goose bumps riddled my flesh.
When he appeared at my second story window, I did not questions how that was possible. I simply threw open my arms and he entered them.
Within moments my body was liberated of my nightdress. His kisses were rough and passionate. I felt painful bites inflicted all over my torso, especially my waiting nipples. I could do nothing to stop him and did not want to. All I managed were moans that expressed both my delight and discomfort.
We tumbled and writhed on the bed until eventually I hung over the edge, my head nearly touching the floor. His teeth clamped onto one of my jutting breasts. I could only moan and gasp my pleasure as he punished my nipples with his determined mouth, sucking, biting, whipping the willing flesh with his tongue. Blood rushed to my head. I felt dizzy. I no longer knew where or who I was.
He tormented my breasts until I believed I would faint from the sensations, then pulled me up by the hair and captured my lips with his.
My body bla
zed with longing. I panted, unable to breathe deeply because of the passion engulfing me. His lips found the wound in my throat and he pierced me again, sending shock waves through me, causing my womanly parts to contract violently and blood to gush from that slit.
His hungry mouth followed the fleshy path to that red fountain and again he drank until his thirst was quenched.
Such illicit pleasure embarrassed me greatly and yet I wanted nothing more than to satisfy him in this way. His tongue explored all of my openings, sliding into me deeply, his hot breath stimulating me.
By the light of the moon, he pulled me to a seated position so that I sat atop his legs, his enormous member between us. Power emanated from his face and his voice was commanding. "Whilst they played wits against me—against me who commanded nations, and intrigued for them, and fought for them, hundreds of years before they were born—I was countermining them. And you are now flesh of my flesh; blood of my blood; kin of my kin; my bountiful wine-press and shall be later on my companion and helper." He cut his breast with a fingernail and ordered, "Drink, Mina."
Horrified, fascinated, I moved towards his breast like a infant to a nipple. Blood flowed from the wound and I lapped at it. His hand on the back of my neck held me tight against him. I could not breathe through my nose and was forced to gulp air and blood with my mouth. Initially I found this act repulsive, but my lover's free hand slid down my back and penetrated both of my holes and I sucked furiously as his fingers thrust into me, causing me spasms of delight.
My inner walls tighten around him. His rubbing felt like matches striking a flint, each attempt heating all surfaces until a spark threatened to erupt. With every strike the spark came closer to being actualized.
When I felt one strike away from ignition, suddenly he removed his fingers. I screamed in frustration. He grabbed my shoulders and pushed me from him, forcing me to meet his dark eyes.
"I will not fulfill you this night," he said.
Hurt, I burst into tears.
"Lie on your stomach, Mina," he ordered. Overwhelmed with hopelessness, I obeyed.
He inserted two pillows under my hips, raising my pulsing openings shamefully into the air. Then he took my hand and moved it between my legs. "Pleasure yourself!" he commanded.
"I cannot!" I cried. I had never done so and had been taught all my life that it was not right. But he insisted with his eyes and I felt powerless to disobey.
He guided my fingers over my slippery nub. Each touch sent a wave of pleasure rippling through me. I rubbed myself in a circular manner that caused my bottom to rise and fall. But soon the Count moved my fingers inside me. I had never felt this delicious area, the skin so slick and yet ribbed, so receptive to my own touch.
He led my hand in a rhythmic thrusting. My finger tips stroked the sensitive hot flesh swollen with desire in much the way he had stroked me. My breathing became rapid, my heart raced. I experienced a tingling and twitching throughout my body. My legs spread of their own volition and my breasts jutted forward, demanding to be touched. I used my free hand to reach beneath me and satisfy one of them.
I played with my nipple in the manner I had learned from the Count. It felt as though my nipple and the opening between my legs were directly linked. How had I not known this?
The heat built to a dangerous level. Incineration seemed eminent, and yet I could no stop what I had begun.
Instinctively I rubbed harder and faster, my body straining and jerking towards something. The work grew labored and yet easier, as it was more pleasurable the faster I went. My inner sanctum clutched my fingers in a plump hug and squeezed hard.
Suddenly the room around me spun then disappeared. I lost my breath completely and hurtled into a chasm of boiling air. I cried out in a delirium of delight. My body convulsed wildly as if I were throwing a fit. I could neither halt my cries nor my buckling, nor did I wish to.
But it came to a natural conclusion and soon I lay on the sheets drenched in sweat cooled by the night air. Spent. The Count was somewhere in the room, although I could not see him, just shadows with piercing points of red light. His voice filled me with power.
"When my brain says 'Come!' to you, you shall cross land or sea to do my bidding; and to that end this!"
And I knew it was true. He had given me a wondrous knowledge that freed me. What the others would not provide, I could now offer myself. And in future I knew he would guide me to further hedonistic delights. I would do anything for him.
I writhed and twisted and curled and stretched like a feline in heat. My universe had expanded and I discovered a secret that everyone, it seemed, knew but me. And now I knew also. Whatever occurred from that moment on, I would never be the same, thanks to Count Dracula.
Chapter Twenty-Five
"Stand between the posts where Dr. Steward will chain you." Van Helsing sounded level, controlled, and John Steward felt he needed the certainty that voice provided for what was to come.
Lucy, naked, crossed the room of her own volition. "Yes, my Master," she said, her tone silky, not in the least aware of what awaited her. Still, she was different, softer, and John marveled at how she had changed.
The posts she had been directed to were in the bathhouse of the asylum. It was here where lunatics like Renfield were secured to the sooty cement walls for their weekly scrubbing, for without such the stench of sweat, vomit, urine and feces became impossible for the staff to bear.
Lucy spread her legs wide and stretched her arms out and up. Her curvaceous body was luscious, plump in the right places, slim where appropriate. Her long blonde hair draped down her back, stopping just short of her bright red buttocks.
While John tied her wrists and Arthur and Quincey her ankles to the posts, Lucy writhed and thrust her body forward. Her tongue darted from her mouth and flicked in John's direction; he felt his balls tighten.
"Am I to be whipped again?" she asked avidly, her nipples hard. John could smell her tart female scent fill the room.
"Not just yet," the professor said. "Your treatment now becomes prophylactic in nature. Bend as best you can so that I may examine your rump."
This was not said in the clinical tone Van Helsing was famous for, but with a deep and guttural quality to his voice that caused John to stare at him in wonder. The man seemed to have changed. Over the last few days his mind vacillated from its usual mental precision to emotional lassitude. It was clear now to John that the professor was obsessed with Lucy, more obsessed than any man he had known.
Lucy bent at the waist so that her bottom thrust out behind her like the lewd French photographs of bordello women. Van Helsing's hands slid over her crimson cheeks and she writhed against him, her eyes closed, torso gracefully arched, head thrown back in rapture. But whereas John expected the professor to examine her anus and vaginal openings, the man merely continued fondling her bottom in a lurid manner.
Finally he finished amusing himself and walked to a small cauldron on the table. Within it lay burning coals and a poker, heating to red hot. Quincey had been consulted on this treatment but apparently Van Helsing had learned all he needed to know fairly quickly. The professor removed the iron. He licked his finger and touched the end. Moisture caused the hot rod to sizzle. A small cross bar had been fashioned there, each bar no longer than half an inch.
"Hold her legs," Van Helsing instructed Arthur and Quincey with a nod. "You will secure her hips, and they must not move," he told John, who immediately placed himself in front of Lucy. He pressed her hips back as far as the restraints would permit and held them there with the pressure of his body. John and Quincey each grabbed a thigh and securely locked arms around them.
"Do you agree to this treatment, Lucy, because if you do not you are lost?"
"All that you ask and more, my Master," she panted.
"Do not close yourself to the pain," Van Helsing warned, "else the results will be less effective on the important invisible levels. We must prevent further infestation by that lowest of life forms, the vampi
re, and save you for the man who is able to tame your promiscuous nature."
"That is you, my Master," she said, her face glowing with pride and desire.
But that looked soon turned to one of horror. Van Helsing burned the image of the cross into her behind. Her scream pierced the air. Her hips quaked and John held them as steady as he could, the professor ordering, "Keep her rigid!" John and Quincey both did their best as well. But Lucy's agony brought out superior strength and it took the three of them to hold her.
Urine sprayed from between her legs and watery feces from her rectum. Her unholy shrieks caused John to wish he could clasp his hands over his ears.
The professor nodded and the three released Lucy, who fainted dead away. They were instructed to throw cold water from waiting buckets onto her, both to revive her and to cleanse her body of the foul, unladylike emissions. As they did so, John, who had been at the front, could not at first locate the branded area to cool it.
Suddenly, he was startled to see the black cross poised a hair above her anus. The sight stunned him momentarily, but he regained himself enough to toss water onto that singed spot. He could imagine no place more vulnerable.
Van Helsing noticed his face and pointed his metal cane. "No demon of the night may enter by that passage now. Only lesser demons," he said wryly. "Wash and revive her and bring her to my bed chamber at once."
Van Helsing's old correctional tone had returned and yet John knew that no matter what he did, he would not be the recipient of any of that painstaking attention this night. All of the professor's time was reserved for Lucy.
John traced the burned tissue with his finger tip and Lucy moaned. He considered all the years spent in service to the professor, and then the last two submitting to Lucy's whims. None of it had the lasting impact, none of it the magnitude of this brand. He envied her this.
Darker Passions: Dracula Page 14