The Slave (31 page)

He turned the heat down, so
much that her teeth chattered in the early morning, and lectured
her long and hard, a multi-tressed, stinging whip in one
h
and.

“
Discomfort is meaningless. Your
comfort comes from?”

“
Service, sir―”

Slash!
The narrow tresses caught her upper
arm with a flick that stung like a wasp and made her gasp. Chris’s
eyes were flat and angry behind his shaded lenses. “Too automatic,
too dull. Believe it, or you’ll sound like an idiot. If you don’t
believe it, this is all for nothing, and you might as well join a
secretarial pool to get your required doses of humiliating labor.
Tell me again.”

Robin clenched her teeth, tried
to ignore the chills running over her arms and belly and the heat
where the tips of the whip landed.
I am not cold. I am patience. I will wait
patiently for the opportunity to serve. I will be warmed by my
devotion.

Somehow, the words that seemed so patently
false when said aloud worked again. She drew her breath in and felt
the stiffness in her limbs fade into a distant dull annoyance and
looked up at Chris again. “Comfort comes in service, sir.”

“
Better, but still awkward.” Another
flick of his wrist, and the same spot, only on the other arm, got a
touch of fire. “And I want to see more artfulness in your
reactions. Don’t be stoic, but don’t be showy.” With maddening
calm, he flicked the whip up twice more, now touching each
shoulder, and she winced, hissing a sharp breath inward.

“
Too melodramatic. Fetch the cane, I
think you need a few stripes to remind you what pain is
like.”

* * * *

On her knees again, her head cradled in her
arms and pressed against the floor, her ass raised, her legs spread
wide. Open and exposed, she inched forward to draw herself more
correctly in place and waited for Chris’s painful correction. But
she didn’t exactly know what she was being corrected for! She had
been cleaning up the dinner dishes when suddenly, Chris marched
into the kitchen, seized her by the hair and dragged her into the
living room, where she was thrown to the floor with a barked
command to assume the proper position. She trembled, waiting for
the feel of the cane he had been carrying or the strap, which was
on the chair. Instead, she felt his fingers trail lightly along the
lips of her cunt, brushing the bare skin there with a tenderness
she had almost forgotten.

“
Oh God,” she murmured, relief
flooding through her and the words slipping from her lips before
she could stop them.

“
You would do better to call upon your
master than God,” Chris drawled, taking his hand away. When he
pulled her up by her hair and pushed a gag into her mouth, she was
red with shame and anger at herself. She assumed the position
again, and he idly caressed her, opening her and stroking her and
teasing her until she writhed and cried like an injured kitten. And
then he beat her mercilessly, using his strap, ignoring her muffled
screams.

I hate you
, she sobbed to herself,
wrapped up again at the foot of his bed.
I don’t understand you! I don’t know
what you want!
Spilling tears onto the pallet, she kept the edge of her
blanket wedged tightly in her mouth. If he heard her, he might send
her back to her bed in the next room.
I am so confused
, she thought, staring into the
darkness.
I
don’t want to spend one more day with him, but I can’t stand the
idea of not having the fucking honor of sleeping like a dog on the
floor next to him.

I’m not going to
break
, she
swore.
I
worked damn hard to get this far. I am not going to fuck this up,
no matter what he does!

The constant burn and ache of the beatings,
plus her own anxiety and confusion, kept her awake most of the
night. In the morning, when Chris examined her, noting the reddened
eyes and the dark circles beneath them, he slapped her, hard, and
she touched her mouth in amazement. His occasional cuffs and light
slaps had almost become expected and tolerable. But her mouth was
filled with the copper taste of her own blood and she could feel
the pounding in her lip already.

“
You may not indulge in any behavior
that makes you unavailable to me,” he snapped. “Your self-pity has
exhausted you, and made you unattractive. Perhaps you need a
reminder that your body is not yours to abuse. No hot water for
you, today or tomorrow.”

Robin blinked in semi-comprehension,
fighting not to burst into even more tears.

“
Yes,” Chris said, his lips parting in
an insincere smile, “that includes the water for your internal
cleansings. I will have my coffee after you have finished grooming
yourself. And don’t bother to make more than two cups. No hot water
means no hot water, period.”

Later, Robin began to wonder if she would
ever feel warm again. The chill of her shower and the biting cold
sensation of douching herself with cold water was terrible. Feeling
the heat on the sides of a coffee cup, the slight steam coming from
hot food, all sent her into shivers and made little bumps rise all
over her body. When she stuttered out an improper phrase, Chris
beat her again, and the pain and heat from her assaulted buttocks
made the chill in the rest of her body even more terrible.

Late that evening she spent twenty minutes
eagerly, entreatingly washing his boots with the flat of her tongue
with her wrists held behind her back, her body arched correctly,
until he relented and tossed her blanket back onto the pallet.

And then he opened the window, just a crack,
and turned out the light. As she heard him toss his robe aside and
climb between the soft cotton sheets and under the thick comforter,
she felt the slight wavering touch of cold cross the room to where
she was curled up.

“
Sir, I may get sick,” she whispered
the next morning, stiff, sore, and still cold. Her legs were still
shaking after the morning cleaning ritual, and she hated the way
her hair felt when all she had to rinse the shampoo out with was
cold water. “Please, sir, I beg you to reconsider my
punishment.”

“
More formal,” Chris
snapped.

“
Sir, this slave begs for mercy, sir.
This slave fears that illness may... make this slave less able to
serve.” It was so hard to speak that way! Already, alternatives
were occurring to her, and she struggled to ignore them as she
listened to his response.

“
People don’t fall ill because they
are cold,” Chris said, his voice neutral. “It is true that it
weakens your natural ability to fight off various illnesses, but I
am not overly concerned about that.”

She couldn’t see his face because she had
assumed a posture that was appropriate for such an impertinent
request, kneeling in abject submission, her head down, her body
curled into a posture that would be perfect for a footstool.
Indeed, Chris had placed his booted foot on her bowed back several
times this week, all in order to press a particular point home.
Now, he nudged her, touching her arm with one swing of his foot.
She raised her head a little.

“
So, is your concern regarding your
health, or your comfort?” he asked.

“
It truly concerns my health,
sir.”

“
I will consider it.” And he nudged
her away to tend to her morning duties. Then, he returned to her
training as though nothing had occurred, asking her questions and
drilling her endlessly in movements and gestures.

In the early afternoon, he told her to close
the window in the bedroom and turn the heat up. “You will still be
slightly uncomfortable, I think,” he told her when she returned to
his side. “But now you will always remember that punishments may be
difficult and unpleasant without leaving you with a single
comforting thought or sensation. You may scream at a beating or
moan at restrictions, but your body will throb with pleasure as you
recover. However, your owners may choose to deny you even that much
comfort, by utilizing methods of control and discipline that afford
you no luxury of fetish. Your acceptance of that is vital to your
ability to be a good slave.”

And that evening, when Leon brought over a
steaming pot of vegetable soup, Chris startled Robin by placing a
bowl on the floor next to her, where she sat chewing on a piece of
the crusty brown bread that had accompanied the dinner. When he
didn’t also give her a spoon, she nodded, just a little bending of
her chin, and said, softly, “Thank you, sir,” before lowering her
head to lap from the bowl.

“
Good girl,” he said, letting one hand
drop down to pat her head.

I don’t believe I’m doing
this
, Robin
thought, embarrassment and pleasure welling up together.
And I don’t believe
that I love him again.

* * * *

On Thursday night, Chris examined her again,
carefully, and pronounced her fit for display.

“
I shall not cane you again,” he
added, tracing the faint lines of her previous canings. “Although I
think the marks are an enhancement, there are those who prefer the
all-over rosiness of a paddle or a hand or a strap to the lines and
bruises that canes and cutting instruments may leave. I wouldn’t
want that to prejudice a buyer against you.”

“
Thank you for your thoughtfulness,
sir,” Robin answered, a touch of color coming to her face. For all
of his cruelty, each hour of each day, Chris never failed to remind
her that she was scheduled for the sale on Saturday night. He no
longer spoke of “if,“ only “when.”

“
You mean, ‘thank God he’s not going
to use that blasted thing on me again,’” Chris shot back. “But
that’s all right. I will be making a note of your reaction to it in
my report. Your new master or mistress will, no doubt, find it to
be valuable information.”

He continued to stroke her ass cheeks, and
pushed her forward a little more. “Although I personally dislike
shaved pubics on women, we shall leave them bare, as the look seems
to suit you. When you are aroused, your labia spread in a
delightful fashion, and are very pretty―a clear asset. Also, the
shaven look does seem to remain in fashion.” He sighed and stroked
her there, pulling gently on her labia to bring them open and
engorged, as though to illustrate his statement.

Robin moaned and gently allowed a little of
her weight to fill his hand, as he had taught her. She would not be
so bold as to actually push back, but she would allow herself to be
opened more, to be touched and probed at the slightest hint of
interest.

“
Very good,” he said, sliding two
fingers into her. “You would like to be fucked again.”

“
Sir, if that would please you, yes,
sir.” The phrase came out with ease, and her reward was a tapping
on the hood of her clitoris, a sliding of a wet finger to press
over that sensitive and hungry spot until she whimpered with
pleasure.

“
It would please me to see you fucking
yourself,” Chris said, sliding his fingers in and out of her,
pressing forward and up with every stroke. “When I let you go, you
will go to your room and bring back the largest dildo you can
comfortably take. Without using your hands, you will cover it with
a condom, and then position it on the floor and mount it, for my
amusement. And if you please me sufficiently, I will allow you to
guide it with your hands until such a sight fails to interest me.”
He drew his fingers from her and stepped away. “Go.”

And despite her acute embarrassment and the
difficulty of the task, she managed to amuse him for quite a long
time before he allowed her to stop her self-inflicted torment and
crawl off to bed. Without orgasm, of course.

“
You will be so sensitive that the
slightest gaze will make you wet,” he promised, before turning out
the light. “Any touch will make your entire body reverberate with
need. It will be very attractive. It should more than make up for
your lack of exceptional beauty.”

Robin couldn’t deny the truth
of his words; after all, he was the expert. But the aching between
her legs and the constant ache in the pit of her stomach were bound
together in her anxiety over the sale and her anxiety over what she
could only see as his rejection.
I may not be a model out of the pages of a
fashion magazine
, she sulked
, but I’m nice-looking. I guess. But maybe not nice enough
for him to turn on to me.

I want him to fuck me. Like I’ve never
wanted it before, more than Troy, more than anyone. I want him to
wrap me in his arms and just throw his body against me, make it
hurt, just take me, goddammit, until I scream. Why doesn’t he? Is
it part of the training? Why let others do it, but not try me
himself?

Doesn’t he want to?

Shouldn’t he? So that he can say something
about it in his report?

And aren’t I trying to make up any reason
for him to just roll me over and fuck me blind?

Luckily, the blanket corner was still
available to muffle the little whimpers of hurt and confusion and
worry that came before sleep finally took her.

* * * *

Robin read the pages that Chris had left for
her several times while she waited for him to return. After a
rushed cup of coffee, he had left the apartment, with no
instructions other than to consider what the pages meant.