Judgment (2 page)

Judgment

by Denise Hall

crawl in after me and then, as this morning, I knew I would be whipped.

As if on cue, one of the gypsies removed his belt. His dark eyes bored into mine, holding little patience for me and even less pity. He beckoned me to a spot on the cobble-stone ground before him. If I was going to cooperate, then this was the only chance I would be given to do so without pain-filled consequences.

My legs failed me. So did my courage and, after three dry-eyed days, tears of hopelessness filled my eyes. There was no escaping this. Even if by some miracle I did manage to dodge my captor's grasping hands, how could I possibly get past the portcullis. I sank to the bottom of the cage, sobbing in rage and despair.

In the end, it took all four of them to drag me from the back of the van, kicking and screaming as only the doomed can. Nine vicious swipes of that belt struck my shoulders and back, and the courtyard sang with the echoes of each blow.

But not my screams. I bit them back, refusing to give him that satisfaction.

By the time I, too, was led around the van, the fight had all but been whipped from me.

At least until I saw the racks.

All forty women from the vans hung from them, side by side, gagged and blindfolded, their wrists tied high above their heads, their legs splayed wide apart, ankles tied to metal rings hammered into the stones beneath them. Like meat hanging in a butcher's freezer, we were a market of wares set out for buyers as not yet in attendance.

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Judgment

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I began to struggle all over again, sheer panic winning from me the screams that I had denied the belt. I was dragged to the end of that long display line. The gag was forced past my teeth; the blindfold over my eyes. No matter how I twisted or fought to pull away, I was made to take my place among the others. My manacles were removed and abrasive ropes took their place. Impartial hands forced my ankles apart and I was hoisted up by my wrists until my toes barely touched the cold, stone ground.

Then the wait began.

If I concentrated, I could keep on my tiptoes, which lessened the painful strain on my shoulders and welted back.

But when the icy mountain air swept through the courtyard, shivering us in our bonds, I couldn't even do that much.

Not far away, the gypsies talked and laughed. The smell of sweet pipe and cigarette smoke filled the air as they passed the time. I don't know how long I hung there, immobile, with arms aching. I kept trying to shift in my bonds, hoping to find a position that hurt a little less than the rest. By tipping my head between my shoulders and relaxing completely, I found a brief respite from the hurt. But then that position too quickly became excruciating, and I had to shift again.

The pain slowly swallowed me in its embrace, clouding my senses. Not far away, I heard a soft sniffling as another woman sobbed around her gag. Others groaned. I think, by now, that I was one. And then, a sound different from the rest....

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Judgment

by Denise Hall

Somewhere down the display line, I heard footsteps and a low, guttural voice mingling with a familiar gypsy one.

Whatever was going to happen here, was now taking place.

My muscles spasmed. I trembled as the waves of agony rippled through my limbs, washing over and through me, all consuming and hot. The rack vibrated as a girl was taken down and the voices drifted closer.

Did I lose consciousness or did the pain just devour my awareness of all else? The girl next to me whimpered once, then suddenly I felt a gloved hand roving from my belly, to my hip and down the outside of my left leg. By now, the pain had weakened me so that I could barely move as the assessing fingers drifted back up the inside of my thigh and stopped at the slight tuft of curls found there.

"Americano," the gypsy said.

And another voice, low and laughing, came back in English, "Really?"

I lifted my head when I heard it, mewling through my gag.

"A natural red-head," the low voice admired. "Lovely. High cheekbones, full lips. Her face alone should bring a good price. Mm. Firm buttocks."

The gloved hand gripped me there, jostling me in my bonds as he felt the firmness of my hind quarters. Agony exploded up through my arms and down into my legs, radiating from my joints until I thought my limbs would be pulled from their sockets. The voice dimmed as my head lolled.

"Her bonds are too tight," someone else said.

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Judgment

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The low voice said something in another language. When the gypsy answered, he walked around to my back.

"You've damaged the product," he said mildly.

What the gypsy replied, I don't know. But the man behind me leaned closer, the warmth of his breath caressing the shell of my ear as he murmured, "Are you going to be troublesome, Red Hair?"

I jerked my head away from him when he pressed the most unwanted of kisses to the back of my nape. He laughed, the sound of a man indulging a favored but unruly child. Then either he moved on, or I passed out.

In the next instant I fell into the cradle of someone's arms as I was cut down from the rack. Even then there was to be no relief. Neither blindfold nor gag was removed. My throbbing wrists were unbound only to be tethered in a gentler but no less restricting bond behind me. With a supporting hand at each of my elbows, I was slowly led away on legs that shook so badly that every third step buckled my knees; it was a wonder I could walk at all.

The icy stones under my bare feet gave way to an equally chilled tile floor. I was cold all over and shivering from it, but a sudden lack of wind convinced me that I was now within the dark fortress itself. Voices sounded periodically around me, the deep rumbling of masculine tones, all speaking in a language that was guttural and hard and impossible for me to recognize. With a hand at each of my elbows, my knees occasionally failing to hold me upright, I was slowly guided down a flight of stairs into a slightly warmer room.

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Judgment

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"Confine the rest for the night," commanded a deep voice near me. A hand cupped my chin, lifting my blindfolded face.

"This one will stay the evening with me."

It was pure and simple horror that gripped me as I was released into the grasp of the same broad fingers that had examined me upon the rack. I panicked, fighting my gag and the ropes that bound my wrists, stepping back as if I could get away. But his gentle touch was also unyielding and he kept me, blind and fettered, easily in hand.

"Bit of fight still in that one," another man behind me said.

There was amusement in his voice, which only deepened my panic and sparked in my breast a tiny fire of outrage.

"Stay," the low voice softly whispered, but it was a command nonetheless. Unable to do aught else, but for my trembling, I stilled my struggles. To the other, my captor answered, "I believe I can manage."

As the second man walked away, laughing, I heard him call, "Let me know if you need help. For a turn, I'd be happy to hold her for you."

I was to be raped. I moaned my horror through the cloth bindings.

"Relax," my captor told me. He must have removed his gloves, for in the next instant I felt the heat of his bare palm close over my naked breast. My nipples, already peaked from fear and the chilly air, were easy targets. He teased and rolled them between thumb and forefinger, feeling the weight of my breast in his warm hand. Again, his low voice rumbled,

"Lovely."

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Judgment

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Helpless to protest, I could do nothing but move in the direction to which he led me. I felt the minute breeze of an opening door, and the cold tile floor was replaced by the feel of plush carpeting beneath me. Oh, and the warmth. I heard the familiar pop and snap of a well-started fire before me and the soft latching of the door as it was closed somewhere behind. I lifted my head, listening hard, but his footsteps were no more than bare whispers as he came back to me. I jumped his caress, the warmth of his hand gently parted my unbrushed hair from off my back, sweeping the carrot-colored mass until it all hung over my shoulder, the feathered tips tickling my naked breast.

"What mischief did you cause to merit such treatment, I wonder."

As I remained gagged, I know he was not concerned with receiving an answer.

Careful not to touch the welts—now beginning to burn as I gradually heated in the warmth of the room—those unseen hands explored me, caressing down my arms, lingering at my bound wrists, then continuing on to the very tips of my fingers. He circled me, his touch smoothing over my shoulders, down between my breasts to my belly. It was my exhaustion, I told myself, that made his touch seem so soothing, and that was almost frightening in and of itself. I trembled as he circled my waist, my hips, caressing my bottom, my thighs and then between.

My shivers now had absolutely nothing to do with cold. No part of me was left untouched. His hands even drifted down 18

Judgment

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to stroke my feet. It wasn't until I felt the pain there that I realized the gypsy's bonds had cut into my ankles.

"Shh," he said when I stiffened in reflex. "It's just a small abrasion where the ropes were too tight."

When he stood again, his hands wandered again, up my shivering body to my face and around to the back of my head. As the gag was removed, my teeth began to chatter. I shook all over.

"P-please," I stammered and his hands upon me paused.

What gypsy brutality had failed to do, his gentleness accomplished within mere minutes. I could not keep my mouth from quivering or the desperate sobs from choking their way out of my chest. The blindfold soaked up my tears.

"Please, I want to go home." My knees failed. I sank into a heap on the carpet at his feet, rocking myself as I wept. "I want to go home!"

"I am your home," he said above me. "You belong to me now. You just don't know it yet."

There was victory in his voice and absolutely nothing I could do about it. I was nothing. An object that had been bartered and sold, and would now be used to another's satisfaction with no regard for my own.

I bowed in my misery, pressing my forehead to his booted foot as I wept. "Please ... please..."

"You have a lot to learn, Red-hair."

My new life, which I personally believed for the next three years to be an unspeakable Hell, began in a night born of torment.

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19

Judgment

by Denise Hall

Panic welled inside me. Hugging the robe to my chest, I
stood in the detention cell exactly as the Detective left me.

My room for the night was ice cold and no bigger than the
space required for a small cot to fill. Lights Out had been
given over an hour ago when the caged door behind me was
slammed shut and locked from the outside. And though I
knew it was wrong, I still held the robe the female detention
officer had given me. That it should be in my arms at all was
a crime that I knew my Master would not painlessly forgive.

And I trembled because this had been a day full of crimes on
my part. I feared the retaliation I knew I deserved.

Why, even the Matron officer was angry with me. Though
it boggled my mind to believe it, she had all the airs and
authorities of any master at Judgment. Perhaps, female
though she may be, perhaps she was a master of the Outside.

In which case, she must know me for the disobedient
Personal that I was. Maybe she even thought me a runaway.

Maybe that was why she punished me now. Forcing me to
stand at attention for so long, with me all but swaying on my
feet with exhaustion, and still she did not return to undress
me for bed or to lay me down so I could sleep.

My stomach rumbled and clenched; I was so painfully
hungry! Tears spilled over my cheeks but I, a model Personal,
did not move to wipe them away. Oh how angry Tane would
be were he to witness this lack of self-composure. I forced
the sobs within me to still, smoothing my features back into
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Judgment

by Denise Hall

an expressionless mask. But now and then my shoulders still
shook, making it impossible to retain my stance of perfect
posture unbrokenly.

I hated this place. They were so cruel here. Even during
the worst at Judgment, even the lowest female among us was
never starved. When we did wrong, when the masters were
angry, they punished us, then forgave and let our
misbehaviors be forgotten. Bed time was always a constant.

They never left us standing at attention for hours on end. My
legs shook, the muscles panging with fatigue and still I
remained as I had been left. I knew better than to disobey.

"Hey!" A female officer with a voice I did not recognize
rapped upon my cage door with a club-like stick.

For one brief, glorious moment, I felt a surge of relief.

Another female master. Surely she must be here to put me to
bed. Finally now I would be allowed to rest. I stood perfectly
straight, as still as could be on such wobbly knees, and waited
for her to assume command of me.

"Lights Out was an hour ago, Miss High-N-Mighty. Get your
pajamas on and get in that bed!"

My relief died hard within me, slaughtered by shock. Get in
bed? I almost forgot myself and turned around to stare at
her.

"Did you hear me?" the woman demanded, rapping again
upon the bars of my cell. "I said get in that bed. Go on! Right
now! If I gotta come in there, you're gonna be in a world of
hurt, girl!"