Beyond the Black Curtain

by Hayley White

  “No?” He sounded surprised.

  “Yes,” she said quickly.

  “Which is it?”

  “Yes,” she admitted.

  “With regularity?”

  “I wouldn’t say so.”

  “How severe were the whippings?”

  “Not severe,” was her estimate.

  “Were you marked by them?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long did the marks last?”

  “One or two may have lasted three or four days,” she said.

  Ever tried to concentrate on the conversation, but she was aching to know if Stroud was watching her. In fact, he wasn’t. He was studying the reflections of the cut crystal glass in his hand.

  “Well, please be advised I intend to impose my mark on you,” he said, then added in a different tone, “but you expected that, didn’t you?”

  “Yes,” Ever replied, her voice a near whisper.

  Stroud leaned forward and ashed his cigarette. “If you commit to me, you can expect to be whipped with regularity, according to the dictates of my mood and your behavior. And I will insure that the marks last, at least long enough to sustain your memory of their meaning between visits. None will scar indelibly but you will suffer. I’m sure the severity of my stroke will exceed any you may have experienced before. We’ll see how you endure.” He extinguished the cigarette, set his glass on the table and rose.

  He brought three whips over from a lower drawer in the service table and showed them to her.

  The first was a thick crop of light brown, plaited leather, over a hard leather core. The tip of it finished in two broad, thick flaps of leather that was cut in a broad diamond shape and lay side by side. It looked like a camel whip which, in fact, it was.

  The second was a longer, more flexible whip of soft black leather. It had a short, leather wrapped stock of wood that tapered into a shaft of flexible, plaited leather which split off into two thinner plaited shafts that ended in four, supple, five inch lashes apiece. Including the plaited wrist loop, this whip was about four feet long.

  The third whip he showed her was more of a quirt. This was made of coarser leather, although not as coarse as the camel crop, and was a dark cherry rose color. The thick, flexible shaft was about eighteen inches in length and plaited down into two long, smooth, pointed lashes that measured about three quarters of an inch in width.

  Although basically a quirt, this whip was at least three feet long. This, like the black whip, was a whip specifically made for use on human beings. It was a slave whip.

  They were really the most beautiful whips she had ever seen. They looked well used and well cared for. The polished leather shone warmly in the soft, diffused light.

  “Although there are others, these are the whips I favor,” Stroud said. “You’ll taste all three tonight but perhaps you’d like to choose the one I begin with.”

  Ever, too choked to speak, pursed her lips and shook her head.

  “Pick one,” Stroud insisted.

  So Ever said, “The camel crop.”

  She picked it because it looked the least dangerous of the three and because she had seen these whips on sale in import stores and she had since wondered...

  He first released the chain from the collar and turned her to face the expanse of wall enclosing the stairs. He then removed the chain between the manacles. There was a slight resistance in her movement as he simultaneously raised her arms and pressed her, face first, into the wall just beneath the hanging chain. Ever tried to retain some slack in her elbows as he locked the manacles onto the chain above her head.

  As the weight of his body lifted away, she gulped a breath, trying to restrain the panic swelling inside her. The moment of truth was at hand and she knew, whatever he decided now, it could not be controlled. Not by her.

  The moment thrilled her, terrified her. She felt heroic and cowardly, proud and ashamed. Impatient to be started and yet, if she’d been free to do so, she would have made a sincere effort to leave the room then.

  But that was what the restraints were there to prevent and, of course, she asked herself what psychic disability had brought her to this permissive, uncompromising and inescapable position. The arena was his, the rules and, with little doubt, the game. An impossible situation and more so, in view of her unfamiliarity with Stroud’s character, policies or practices – and she would not have had it any other way.

  “You look beautiful in that position,” he remarked, before he raised the whip to her for the first time.

  Although not a whip to make one feel cut to the bone, the camel crop was a hard, unyielding instrument that landed with a broad, heavy stroke. Ever was certain that this whip, in Stroud’s firm hand, would leave not only thick, red welts but, these welts, once the swelling abated, would give way to dark purple bruises.

  There was no necessity to scream, but eventually, Ever succumbed to grunts in release of her suppressed gasps. It was not her way to give in to blatant displays of hysteria at the first sharp bite of the leather. It had always been more her part to withstand for as long as possible and withhold all reaction. Her part, that is, the part she chose. A prideful stance, perhaps, and certainly so in the face of Stroud’s ministrations.

  Ever was not sure of the duration of the beating, but only of the effort of getting through it, moment by moment, proving, somehow, that she was worthy to stand against this man’s wall. This man who had a mind to master her.

  It was not until he put aside the camel crop and commenced with the black whip that Ever began to labor. The black whip was a ticklish beast, possessing not only subtlety and grace, but sleek hard core cruelty. With very little effort, Stroud was able to elicit from her the first cries of distress.

  The whip attacked in perverse variety and, no matter how well she was braced, the strike was never the one anticipated. Unlike the steady camel crop, this whip could be neither out maneuvered nor out guessed by its victim. There was no defense against the thin strips of slicing pain issued by the tight braided secondary shafts, or the nip of the nimble end lashes that wrapped around like stinging tentacles.

  This whip made her squirm and whimper, so much so that, ultimately, having broken concentration, she interrupted with a cry. “Please! Can’t we pause for a minute!” she begged, by now wrenched up high on the unyielding chain, as though to climb out of range of the lash.

  Her body was a symphony of stresses and sweat had dampened the hairs at her temples. Her tension was beautiful and rewarding and perfectly understandable, since she had already absorbed seventy blows; thirty-five from each whip. There were marks there already that were good for at least four days.

  Stroud put aside the black whip. The quirt was gripped in his hand and he was already in position by the time the pause had alerted Ever to the exchange of whips.

  “What did you say?” he asked.

  “I need to rest,” Ever said more evenly.

  “I guess you want forty with this whip,” Stroud said with easy reserve.

  Ever sagged with a discouraged whine.

  “Keep count,” Stroud ordered and struck.

  Ever arched into instantaneous rigidity. The first kiss of the quirt was a rude awakening and she gasped quite loudly but no word did she utter.

  “Count,” Stroud repeated and struck again.

  Air hissed between her teeth, but Ever’s jaw was locked and Stroud noted the fierce rebellion which solidified the features of her face. He struck a third time, then a fourth, but not one word did she speak. He lashed her again.

  “I’ll continue to strike until I hear you say ‘One’,” he said and followed with a lash delivered across the small of her back.

  “One!” she yelped, almost despite herself.

  He swung again.

  “Two!”

  And again.

  “Three—”

  Her voice was strained, like her body, and the numbers were called on varying notes, each with its own distinct emphasis.

  �
�Ten.”

  “Louder,” Stroud encouraged and struck.

  “Eleven!”

  He was a little surprised by her tolerance. She had seemed so timid, so fragile, yet here she was, stubbornly bulling her way through the moment when another woman might have resorted to tears. Perhaps Ever was not as unprepared for him as either of them might have feared. Or, perhaps she had only finally alighted on the plane for which she was intended.

  “Nineteen...”

  Strike.

  “Twenty.”

  Again he cut his stroke to her lower back.

  “Please!!” she shrieked.

  He passed another, only an inch higher.

  “PLEASE! Oh please! Don’t hit me there!”

  He struck in the same area.

  “PLEASE!!”

  “Count.”

  Yet again.

  “Count!”

  “Twenty-four.”

  He took one more from the tender spot.

  “Twenty-five!”

  The small of her back was finished for the night. Not an area he would choose or recommend for over abuse. Across Ever’s slim waist, the impact of continued blows would be agony. Her buttocks were a raw patchwork of reddening blotches, the tender skin of the rising welts ready to open with little added provocation.

  So he turned his attention to her shoulders and upper back, evidently where Ever particular strength lay is, and he added the lashes of this whip to the colorful collection left there by the other two. And Ever continued to count.

  That was how she endured Stroud’s first whipping and, although Ever counted only forty strokes aloud, they both knew she had taken forty-nine. One hundred and nineteen, in total.

  It was by now well past midnight. Stroud laid aside the whip and turned Ever to face him. She gasped as her throbbing back contacted the cool, hard wall.

  “Hurt?” he asked softly but Ever only moaned.

  She was wrung. Strands of her hair were entrapped in the perspiration on her brow.

  “Open your legs,” he said, nudging his foot between her ankles and stepping one of her feet aside.

  Ever was still trying to regulate her breathing from the whipping, but her eyes were bright and cognizant as she looked at him. He sank two fingers deeply into the furrow of her parted legs and made a comprehensive exploration of the width and depth of the hidden passage. Ever moaned. She was extremely wet and just as well, since he was ready to plow her with an erection the dimensions of which might surprise her.

  He unhanded her, but she still panted softly as he released the manacles from the hanging chain. She required some support as he directed her over to the couch. He made her sit at the corner junction where the two branches of the couch met. A white towel had been laid out there and the back pillows had been arranged out of the way, leaving a surprisingly large space.

  He made Ever recline, her arms above her head, and lifted her feet, placing them so her legs were spread to the right angles of the corner where the edge of the seat dropped away. The inclination was to draw her knees into a more concealing pose, but he kept her legs wedged apart as he knelt on the floor between them.

  Ever was a riot of conflicting sensations, but she was very aware the next confrontation was at hand. Aware that, now he had subdued the outer woman; he would deal with the inner one.

  His erection was a surprise but not an unwelcome one. She cried out at first but he didn’t rush, and Ever was quickly able to adjust and taste a little of the fruit of her patience.

  He was a sensuous man; driving firm and steady with his penis, as he had with the whip, and drawing back with equally as much power and consciousness. Rather than a collection of mechanical thrusts that would culminate in an explosion of pleasure enjoyed in complete isolation, Stroud plowed with slow, assured vigor, that every stroke should count as an affirmation of his dominance. Ever thought: for a man like this, a woman might do anything.

  Afterwards, he dismissed her temporarily to take relief. As soon as she switched on the light in the small bathroom, Ever became startlingly aware of the large mirror over the sink. She was immediately confronted by an almost full length reflection of herself – stripped, shackled, flushed and thoroughly disheveled. She quickly shut the door behind her.

  Despite her humiliation and the urgent need to relieve herself, she had to stop and view herself. This new self. She appraised the look of the collar and cuffs, the shock of her nudity in view of their presence. She turned slowly to see her back and her breath caught.

  It was true. She had never been marked like this by any man. What Stroud had accomplished with one hundred nineteen strokes had never been matched by even three hundred. Yet, she’d survived it, although she was quite sore, and the dense overlaying of red welts crisscrossing her back and buttocks enwrapped her in warmth that could be compared to nothing she knew of.

  When she felt ready, Ever left the privacy of the bathroom and returned to the sitting room where Stroud awaited her. He was seated in his original position on the short end of the couch, his drink refreshed, a cigarette lit. The pillows had been replaced, the white cloth removed. The whips and hanging chain had also been stored away and the room had once more taken on the character of just an ordinary, if austere, sitting room.

  “Come in,” Stroud invited. “Kneel on the floor, there,” he directed, indicating a spot next to the coffee table near him.

  Ever entered and knelt, keeping her self-conscious gaze averted from Stroud’s face.

  “Would you care for a drink?” he asked.

  “Yes, please.”

  “Wine? Juice?”

  “Juice, please.”

  Stroud got up immediately but, before he could make the kitchen, Ever uttered an indecisive sound.

  He paused. “Yes?”

  “I think I’d prefer wine,” Ever amended.

  Stroud nodded and returned shortly after with a glass of bright, enlivening rose.

  “Thank you,” Ever said gratefully.

  Stroud resumed his seat, picked up his own glass and sat back. “Cigarette?” he invited.

  “Yes, thank you,” Ever said and helped herself.

  There was a pause. Ever tasted the rose.

  “Alright?” he inquired.

  “Delicious,” Ever replied, still careful to keep her eyes to herself.

  He paused again, but Ever did not feel pressured by it as she had before the whipping. She knew his judgment of her would not be fully formulated until the end of the week-end and if, at this point, he had not satisfied himself, he had at least succeeded in quelling some of the emotional turmoil she’d endured over the past weeks. She knew by now that Stroud was far less the initiate than she in these matters and, although she was relieved by this, she was already anxious to know his first impressions of her.

  “You see what’s been done?” Stroud said, alluding, perhaps cryptically, to the havoc he’d wrought over Ever’s white flesh.

  Ever was in no confusion as to his meaning. “Yes,” she said in a moderate, if somewhat uneven tone.

  “Did it frighten you?”

  “A little.”

  “Some of those imprints will last a week, whether you care for it or not. And you’ll be sore.”

  “I don’t mind,” Ever said softly.

  “You endured well,” he commended.

  Words such as ‘Good’, ‘I’m glad’ and ‘Thank you’ crowded Ever’s thoughts, but she couldn’t speak, remembering the pain she’d tolerated to earn the award now inscribed on her back.

  “I’m partial to the whip,” he confessed. “There are others I’m anxious to introduce you to and, although I promised to place you under frequent duress, you needn’t expect you must be prepared for hardship like that all the time.”

  “I’m grateful,” Ever murmured, and she was.

  “We’re still unfamiliar,” Stroud said. “This being our first encounter, I thought it appropriate to make a strong impression, and I wanted to see how you respond to leather.”r />
  He was remembering the picture of her against the wall, yes, at times cowed, pale and whimpering, but then always stretching back up into proud arches. The delightful contortions of the wild wars between pleasure and pain. He couldn’t wait until she healed.

  “You tempt it,” he said and Ever could not control the urge to glance up into Stroud’s eyes. The hazel pools were darkened and deep, and they beckoned her into dimensions she did not know.

  “I’m adequate?” she asked, not meaning to.

  A slow smile curved Stroud’s lips. “Oh yes.”

  Ever’s flush of elation was quickly dampened by the fact that knowledge of all Stroud’s desires and practices was not yet in hand. She was already concerned about inadequacies that may be revealed later on.

  “I’m very strict about certain matters,” Stroud informed her. “Certain formalities. These will be made clear to you in due course. If I set a rule, I expect to see it observed. If you breach, I think you know what will happen. In this way, you will partially control the amount of punishment accorded. I expect my orders to be obeyed, promptly, without question. You may think this is assumed but I’m telling you now so there will be no misunderstandings later. I don’t expect perfection but I do demand respect and a willingness to cooperate.”

  “Of course,” Ever replied.

  He shifted position and his mood altered subtly. “If you resign yourself to me, you’ll become as much my slave as my mistress. I can already see this,” he said to her lifting face. “You’re ripe for the freedoms of servitude and, if you accept me as your master, I will make you my slave. You will yield to me as a slave, but you will not be my servant. Sometimes you will serve me but, in the main, I will attend to the cooking and household matters.

  “After sundown, you do not go into the kitchen at all, unless expressly invited. If you need something, you must ask. In the morning, you’re free to help yourself to juice, coffee, and toast. Occasionally cook breakfast. During the night, since you’ll be confined to the bedroom, if you need something, you’ll have to ask me. Everything you need will be provided and you need only bring a small bag when you come. Do you have any questions?”

  “How often?”

  “For the present, every week-end.”