Lady Alicia grunted her satisfaction. ‘Yes, he did, didn’t he?’
Kitty quivered at the memory as her mistress leisurely perused the evidence of her thrashing.
‘All right, you can pull them up. Let that be a lesson to you not to spill my tea!’ The maid adjusted her dress with huge relief. By the time she stood upright again, her mistress had returned to her vigil at the window. ‘Tell me Kitty, when Mr Blackstock was belting you, were any of the stable-boys present?’
Kitty blushed a deeper shade of scarlet and the knot in her stomach tightened. If she had dared, she would have refused to answer, but Lady Alicia’s enquiries were not to be ignored. ‘Y-yes, ma’am,’ she whispered, hanging her head in shame as she remembered the boys’ comments… their hands… their things…
‘I see. And what were they doing during – and after – your punishment?’
Kitty sniffed disconsolately but she knew she had to answer; Lady Alicia had an uncanny talent for finding out the truth. ‘They – they touched me… and they – they played with themselves. They made me kiss their… their—’
‘Played with themselves, you say?’ Lady Alicia interrupted. ‘What do you mean? Surely you aren’t accusing them of self-abuse?’
Kitty glanced up to find her mistress’s gaze upon her. Her tone was shocked but her eyes were sparkling and there was a hint of a smile on her lips. ‘Come here!’
Kitty approached her mistress with trepidation, but Lady Alicia merely motioned her to look down into the courtyard. Below, outside the stables, a boy of about nineteen was forking manure into a barrow. As the day was hot and the work hard, he had stripped to the waist. Though slender, his body was wiry and gave the impression of strength. His dark hair had been cropped, giving him something of the air of a convict. His body was nearly hairless, his pale skin glistening with sweat as he laboured in the warm sun. He put down the fork and bent to lift the barrow, the seat of his cord breeches tightening as he did so. Unaware of the women’s gaze, he lifted the barrow and wheeled it out of sight.
Lady Alicia turned to Kitty and her eyes were bright. ‘What about him, the new lad – did he abuse himself?’
Kitty noticed that her mistress had slipped a hand inside her silken drawers. She looked down, remembering the boy laughing and slapping his cock against her tear-streaked face. After the buggering from Mr Blackstock, Kitty had been left desperate with desire. The stupid boy had failed to understand, or had refused, the invitation she offered with her open legs. Instead she had to suck him, which gave her no chance of relief. Kitty had to stop herself from smiling; revenge was going to taste sweet.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ she said, trying to sound reluctant. ‘He – he frigged himself while I was getting whipped.’
Davy followed the blonde maid up the stairs, his eyes fixed on her behind. Below her knickers, above the tops of her stockings, he could see the traces of Mr Blackstock’s belt inscribed in shades of mauve. The sight, together with the memory of Kitty bucking under the belt, her bottom bouncing from the impact of the strap, combined to make his manhood swell inside his tight breeches.
Davy had never been inside the house before and wondered at the size of it as Kitty led him down a long corridor, her perilously high heels click-clacking on the tiles and echoing around the hallway. He had no idea why he had been summoned. A wild hope that yesterday’s delights might be repeated competed with a strange sense of unease. Finally the maid stopped, and turned to look at him haughtily. As she knocked, Davy thought he caught the hint of a smile. The little trollop wasn’t so full of herself yesterday, he thought, but his amusement was short-lived. A husky female voice bid them enter.
Davy was astonished. He had had little experience of women. What he had seen of Kitty with her drawers down for the belt had been something of a revelation to him. Certainly, he had never seen anything like Lady Alicia. She stood resplendent in the sunshine by the window, hands on hips. Her proud breasts were upthrust by the corset, veiled only partly with a film of black lace through which her jutting nipples glowed like rubies against pale cream skin. Davy blushed to see so much of so grand a lady, then blushed deeper as the riot of silk and lace and perfume in the room made him all the more aware of his own coarseness; his stench of sweat, horses and manure, his rough stained breeches and the patched smock he had thrown on when Kitty had come to fetch him.
Lady Alicia regarded the red-faced stable-boy with distaste. ‘You – what is your name, boy?’
‘Davy Falconer, if you please, your ladyship.’
‘You will address me as “ma’am”, do you understand, boy?’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘How long have you been at Hope Hall, Falconer?’
‘I started last week, ma’am, if you please, ma’am.’ Davy found himself unable to wrench his gaze from her nipples. Visions of chewing them made his mouth go dry and his cheeks flame brighter.
‘Well, Falconer, I have to tell you that reports have come to me of appalling behaviour on your part. I wish to find out if these reports are true.’
Davy felt a sudden dread. What had he done? He tried to think. He thought of Kitty’s smile but, no, it couldn’t be. The other stable-lad had done the same, had egged him on; he had thought it must be normal at Hope Hall – permitted, encouraged even…
‘I have been told that whilst this maidservant was being chastised yesterday, you had the gall to masturbate. Tell me now, boy, and tell me the truth. Did you or did you not abuse yourself yesterday?’
Davy reeled in shock. Lady Alicia was terrible in her anger. For all her flouncing silk and lace there was steel in her voice. He did not know what to say. He had frigged himself while the chit was being whipped, though surely she had been too distracted to see? Did making her suck him count? he wondered. At any event, there had been others present, as guilty as he and yet witnesses, for all that…
‘Yes, ma’am, but I weren’t the only—’
‘Silence, boy!’ she roared. ‘I have no wish to hear excuses from masturbating brats. At Hope Hall self-abuse is punished, and that means you are going to be thrashed.’
Davy was thunderstruck. The thought occurred to tell her ladyship to go hang, to go and get himself another job. Somehow, though, the words would not come. Maybe he was mesmerised by Lady Alicia’s splendour; perhaps the hope of more delights like watching Kitty’s whipping was too intoxicating to forgo. Anyway, as Davy told himself, he was a tough lad who could take a beating from any woman. His only real fear was that he would be ordered to drop his breeches. In front of Lady Alicia and a sniggering Kitty, that would be too humiliating to endure.
To his relief, Lady Alicia indicated a whipping-triangle ready set up in the corner of the room, and coldly ordered him to remove his smock. A birch or cat on the back, he thought, suppressing a smirk. I’ll show these women how Davy Falconer takes that! He allowed Kitty to buckle the restraints around his wrists. He grinned insolently at her, but she seemed disturbingly self-satisfied. He suffered himself to be secured, standing with arms above his head against the triangle. Nor did he struggle when the maid fastened his ankles close together. Only when Lady Alicia came close, close enough for him to smell her intoxicating perfume, so close that her jutting nipples grazed his naked back, did his self-assurance start to waver. She reached around and took his nipples between sharp nails, and for the first time Davy shivered.
‘You stink, boy, do you know that?’ Lady Alicia whispered huskily into his ear. Her overwhelming presence assailed his senses. Her lacy negligee brushed against his bare back, tickling terribly. He could feel her nipples, as hard as unripe strawberries, boring into him. Musk-rose perfume made his head reel as her nails bit hard into his nipples and her teeth nipped at his ear. Davy groaned.
‘Answer me, boy. Do you realise that you stink?’
‘Ow! Yes, ma’am.’ He gasped as she twisted his nipples viciously between her crimso
n talons.
‘Sweat, stale spunk and horse-shit, you dirty masturbating boy – you stink of shit!’
Davy was trembling now, panic growing, but then she released his nipples and reached down around his waist to unbuckle his belt.
‘No!’
‘What’s the matter, boy? Don’t you want Kitty to see?’ Lady Alicia undid his breeches and pulled them down to his knees. ‘I thought she already had. Kitty, look, what a pretty bottom!’
Davy’s face burnt. He was shamefully exposed.
‘What’s this, boy? Don’t tell me you have the gall to entertain impure thoughts even here, in my very bed-chamber?’ Lady Alicia took the stable-lad’s erect cock between her nails, digging in until he moaned with pain. ‘Kitty, fetch me a cane!’ She put her lips to his ear again, gouging his rigid member with her nails as she whispered, ‘I’m going to thrash you now, boy. I’m going to cane you till you cry. I’m going to beat you until you beg for mercy.’
Davy took a deep breath when she released him to take the rod, swearing to himself that she would never hear him beg. He was no coward, nor was he unacquainted with the rod. Yet as she slashed the long cane through the air with an ominous whoosh, his whole body tensed. His cock and balls had felt so vulnerable to her talons, he wondered if there was any limit to what this terrifying creature might decide to do.
Finally the cane fell, slicing across his bottom with a sickening thwack. A hiss of pure pain escaped from between Davy’s gritted teeth. As the waves of pain slowly subsided he tensed himself for the next stroke. But Lady Alicia was in no hurry, content to let the agony from the first cut slowly fade.
‘Stop sniggering Kitty, unless you want the same! Go and fetch the harness, then get that uniform off.’ He heard the cane whoosh through the air again, the sound making his stomach clench so hard it hurt, but no impact followed. Only after several preparatory swishes, each one ratcheting his nerves to screaming pitch, did she finally lash into him again.
Afterward, Davy could not have said how long the thrashing lasted, nor how many strokes his bottom and thighs received. Lady Alicia beat him leisurely, with long pauses between each stroke, but she was pitiless and her arm was strong. She whipped his bottom and the backs of his thighs, working down until the cane cracked across his legs a little above the knees. Then she worked up again, taking no pains to avoid striking the crimson marks of previous strokes.
When she reached the tops of his buttocks, Davy waited in apprehension as his tormentor took a break to refresh herself with tea and cake. Then the strokes started again, over cheeks already beaten to redness. Soon after she resumed the torment, Davy heard himself beg. Begging quickly turned to pleading for mercy, and pleading to howling helplessly as the cane came down again and again.
Lady Alicia released him herself, cooing insincere condolences to the sobbing boy. Davy slumped to his knees and found his face pulled into the black silk of his mistress’s drawers. The sweet sensations of warm silk and perfume vied with the dreadful throbbing in his hindquarters, creating a state of mind close to delirium. Lady Alicia stroked his neck firmly, pulling his face into her crotch.
‘There now, boy, your whipping’s over. You can stop crying now.’ She caressed him as the pain slowly subsided. Davy felt foolish yet wildly excited. Trembling with anticipation, he nuzzled her warm flesh through the warm silk which blotted out his vision.
‘We have another treat before you go, my lad.’
Something in her tone made him suddenly fearful. She grabbed an ear and pulled his face out of her crotch, forcing his head round. Kitty was behind him. The maid had taken off her uniform and wore only a long black satin corset and stockings. The gorgeous sight of her full breasts and creamy thighs caused Davy’s stiff cock to twitch.
Then he saw it and his blood ran cold.
Kitty had buckled a harness of leather straps around her midriff. She was smiling down at him, fondling an obscene black strap-on cock.
Icy fingers of pure terror gripped Davy’s heart. Lady Alicia’s talons closed vice-tight in his hair as Kitty moved towards him.
‘Oh… please no…’ The rubber cock slapped hard against his face as the women’s laughter pealed around the bed-chamber.
‘I do not permit self-abuse, my boy, for I feel it is such a waste!’ Lady Alicia yanked his head back until he had to look into her pitiless eyes. She bent and he felt her finger run down the furrow between his bottom-cheeks, then probe. Davy’s sphincter clamped convulsively around the penetrating digit. He heard her throaty chuckle once again.
‘Hm, he’s very tight. I think we had better send to the stables for some saddle-soap.’ Davy whimpered despairingly as his mistress smiled down at him. ‘Don’t worry, boy, I’ll see to it that the other grooms know what we intend to use it for.’
‘I say, aren’t the meadows looking splendid!’ Jamie slashed his whip through the air, neatly decapitating a buttercup. Amelia’s bottom tensed in automatic response to the hiss of the crop, and she sensed Clara flinch beside her.
There was certainly truth in his observation. The meadows on the far side of the ornamental lake were ablaze with wild flowers. Golden buttercups vied for attention with crimson poppies, while mauve vetchlings and the creamy froth of meadowsweet provided a palette of subtler colours. Not that Amelia was in any mood to appreciate the scene.
For one thing, the soft sward was difficult to walk across in the precariously high heels of her button-boots. For another, the little smock and frilly knickers, so humiliating in the nursery, were even more mortifying out here in the open air. Anyone might see her here: gardeners, estate workers, and stable-boys.
Amelia’s cheeks burned anew as she remembered the cat-calls that had followed the cousins as they tottered across the cobbles of the courtyard. The knowledge that she would have to return, probably passing the stable-block again, squatted like a stone in her stomach.
Then there was the fact that the mission they were on was far from cheering. Betsy bustled along behind Jamie and the cousins, laden down with trugs and secateurs. One glance at the maid’s burden reminded Amelia of the task they were intent on.
Jamie had announced the expedition after luncheon. ‘We need to put up some birches for you girls. It’s not the best time, as they are in leaf, but that cannot be helped. It looks like a lovely afternoon. What do you say, girls – shall we go up to the groves and cut some switches?’
‘Yes, sir,’ Clara had said softly, after a moment’s hesitation. Amelia had nearly slapped the silly little bitch.
‘Amelia, you don’t seem keen. Have you another plan, perhaps? Were you hoping to pay a visit to the Reverend Dawes, for instance?’
The very mention of the name had made her face go red. The jovial suggestion filled Amelia with utter dismay.
‘No… please,’ she had said quickly, terrified now that he would send her, on some pretext or other, to the rector.
‘So you would rather come with Clara and me to cut birches?’
‘Oh, very well, I suppose.’
‘Amelia!’ Jamie’s expression had decided her to re-phrase.
‘Yes… please… sir,’ she had said, forcing the words out one by one.
‘Jolly good.’ Jamie had given her bottom a friendly squeeze. ‘I’m sure we will have a lovely afternoon.’
The little party strolled on in the warm afternoon sun, through the meadow, and then to the park beyond. Herds of graceful fallow deer moved off as they approached, disappearing into the dappled shade of the oaks that fringed the pasture.
‘I say, look,’ Jamie pointed with his switch, ‘there’s Lord Alex, exercising his new filly!’
Amelia stared, astonished. A well-maintained drive cut through the deer park, some way from their party. Along this a tall girl was running, pulling a little sulky in which Amelia could just make out the well-built frame of Lord Alex, enthusiastically waving a w
hip.
‘But—’ Amelia blurted, ‘—she’s completely naked!’
Jamie put his head back and laughed heartily. ‘What would you have a pony wear, you silly girl? Anyway, she’s hardly naked; she’s in harness.’
Lord Alex must have spotted them, for he raised his carriage-whip in greeting before returning to his work. Jamie returned the salute with his own whip.
‘Great heavens,’ Jamie murmured as they stood and watched. ‘Well, he did say he had found himself a thoroughbred filly.’
The naked girl ran a hundred yards or so, her long legs seemingly eating up the pathway, despite the fact that she was hauling Lord Alex’s weight. Then she was pulled up and made to turn before being galloped back in the other direction. This time, they could hear Lord Alex urging her on.
‘Gee up, go on! That’s it, faster! Faster!’ His voice could be heard clearly across the park, despite the distance. Amelia could also hear his whip crack as he used it to urge his mount to greater efforts. It seemed to be mostly for show; cracking to either side of the straining girl in warning.
Not all the lashes were so benign, however. There was a crack that could only have been the sound of leather upon flesh, and the girl gave a cry of pain which her bit could not completely muffle. The stroke made her stumble and sway between the shafts and, for a moment, it looked as if the sulky might go over.
‘Tsk, tsk – now she’ll get it,’ murmured Jamie. ‘She will have to learn to take those encouraging kisses in her stride, if I know Lord Alex.’
The driver pulled his mount up. Amelia could not hear the words, only the sharp tone of Lord Alex’s voice, but she understood the language of the whip well enough. Three stinging strokes were laid across the pony-girl’s naked back and Amelia flinched in sympathy. Lord Alex gave his mount no respite, but turned her, and once again the tall girl cantered off along the drive.
‘Well, girls,’ Jamie said as he followed the sulky’s progress, ‘pleasant as this is to watch, we do have work to do.’
The young man led the girls on through a gate which gave onto a pretty woodland ride. Almost at once, the pathway began to climb steeply through the woods. The trees lining the woodland ride on
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