A Gentlemen's Agreement (17 page)

“No. I detest that. And I detest
you. But that is more emotion than I ever felt when I was a lady. As a lady, I
detested my husband’s slaves and his entertainments, but that was from a
distance. It wasn’t up close and personal. There’s nothing quite as personal as
having your tongue jammed into another woman’s cunt as far as you can reach.”

“You’re making me horny with all
this sex talk.”

“Tough. You’re not getting any
relief from me until your punishment is over.”

Nickel sighed. “So you jumped from
the frying pan into the fire. You couldn’t do anything about your husband’s
slaves so you became a slave, yourself, and now you can’t do anything about
anything.”

“You’re premise is wrong. I could
have stopped my husband’s slaving any time I wanted. You think a lady doesn’t have
enough power over her own husband to stop him from owning slaves or
participating in gentlemen’s entertainments? You don’t have a clue about how
powerful ladies are. Not a clue.”

“Then why didn’t you make your
husband get rid of his slaves?”

“Status. What status would my
husband have if he didn’t own slaves and couldn’t entertain other gentlemen?
And if he had no status, then I would have no status. I didn’t spend my life
climbing up to a valued place in the aristocracy to throw it away because I was
jealous of my husband’s property.”

“Well, you sure threw your status
away when you became property.”

“I though that there would be
compensations. There are. Not as many as I hoped, but enough to make it
worthwhile.” Irene’s stomach growled. “I only wish that you hadn’t fucked up my
last entertainment.”

“I didn’t–”

Nickel was
interrupted by the light
. Both slaves shut their eyes against the sudden
glare.

They only heard the door slam open
again and Lord Snow say, “Nickel, grab that bucket and get into your own cell.
Irene, lock her door and then get cleaned up. I’ll see you in the pleasure room
in ten minutes.”

When Irene could open her eyes,
Lord Snow was long gone.

She looked at Nickel and
said,
“He didn’t say to empty the bucket so I guess your
cell is going to stink of my pee. You’ll have something to remember me by. Now
grab that thing and get going. You don’t want to make me have to tell Lord Snow
why I was late getting to the pleasure room. He could give you an extra three
days of fasting for that.”

Nickel grabbed the bucket.

Irene turned Nickel’s lock closed
on her way to the shower. And she didn’t forget to turn out the lights in her
cell.

* * *

Irene was on her knees, waiting, when Lord Snow entered the
pleasure room. “How can I serve you, sir?”

“Give me another entertainment
that was as good as the last one. One week from Friday. That’s in nine days.
Can you do that?”

“I can.”

There was a long pause while Irene
and Lord Snow stared at each other, each wondering what the other was thinking.

Lord Snow broke the silence. “For
God’s sake, get off you knees and sit in the damn chair.”

“Yes, sir.” Irene scrambled to
obey.

After another silence, Irene said,
“You said that you want an entertainment that was as good as the last one. I
don’t understand. The last one failed. Four men voted against me. You were one
of them. I’m still fasting because of my failure.” She was out of her cell, but
Lord Snow’s last order still stood. She didn’t dare eat until breakfast on
Saturday. Irene feared that it would be much harder to starve
herself
when everyone around her was eating. She couldn’t
help but obsess about the food that would be served for dinner in a couple of
hours. The smell alone might be enough to drive her mad. She would be better
off in her cell.

“Don’t pretend to be ignorant. You
know damn well that you weren’t being punished for giving a bad entertainment.
It was marvelous. Striking for its erotic sensuality. Best sex those gentlemen
had ever had. If not for that damned Marquette Kelly, everyone would be raving
about it. He’s only in his early fifties but he’s as crotchety as an old woman.
I think that he was angry because he can’t get it up as easily now as he could
when he was thirty. He takes it out on slaves every chance he gets. And those
other two, Beau Mira and Manuel Swales, the only reason that they went along was
because they were trying to suck up to the
marquette
.”

“And you?”

“You know damn well why I punished
you. If you ever deceive me like that again, I’ll have you caned bloody. You’re
not a lady any more. You’re my property and you better damn well act like it.”

“Sir?”

“What?”

“I beg you to strap me now.”

“Why? Don’t you think that
starving since last Saturday is punishment enough?”

“No, sir. That’s the punishment
that was voted on. That was the punishment for failing to please your honored
guest. He was right to feel shortchanged. I was careless and set Nickel to
service him. I should have known better. She has no talent for servicing men. I
have been corrected and will not make that mistake again.” She didn’t mention
that Lord Snow had ordered her to put Nickel into service. She wondered if he
remembered that. “But the deception that I perpetrated on you was a separate offence
and it deserves a separate discipline. You should cane me bloody but that might
damage your property. I can assure you that the strap alone will be enough to
make me regret with all my heart that I betrayed you.”

“You’ve been caned before.” Lord
Snow cocked his head. “The scars on your ass are still vivid. It looks like you
were caned by your last owner about a month before I acquired you.”

“Yes, sir. I’m not trying to
mitigate my punishment. If you believe that I merit a severe caning, then you
should add your marks to my body as well.” Irene felt lightheaded. Starvation
had taken its toll and now, acute fear of an additional imminent punishment was
draining her energy to the point that she could barely stay conscious. She
tried to calm her treacherous body, stop from shivering in
terror
and slow her racing heart, but she failed. She did not have that kind of
control.

“Very well,” Lord Snow said. “If
you think you need it, you will feel the sting of my strap. Stretch yourself
out on that table.”

Irene crawled up on the table. It
resembled the massage table in a spa that she sometimes frequented but, unlike
that one, this one was fitted with straps for restraint.

Lord Snow buckled the straps about
her waist, upper thighs, and ankles. He crossed her arms above her head and buckled
her wrists in place.

He was an artist with his strap
and used the table to ensure that his canvas would not shift while he was
applying a uniform coat of bruises.

Irene’s buttocks twitched and
quivered with involuntary tics, fueled by her fear of the pain that was coming.

And the pain did come. Lord Snow’s
strap cracked down on her buttocks again and again, each vicious stroke
precisely overlapping with the previous.

Lord Snow’s punishments were not
measured in strokes of the strap, but in square inches of skin painted deep
purple. He progressed in steady rhythm across the width of each cheek from side
to crack and up from the juncture of the thigh to the tip of the tailbone.

Irene wailed in agony, thrashing
her head and twitching her feet. But her buttocks couldn’t retreat from the
brutal strokes, only quake and ripple under the power of the blows.

His bruises penetrated her flesh
almost to the bone.

Executing his masterpiece of overlapping
contusions took more than five minutes, but it felt like five hours to the
poor, tortured slave.

When he finally finished, his arm
was aching and his face was dripping sweat, but he was satisfied that he had
done the best job possible on Irene’s ass.

He loosened the straps and left
her on the table to sob to her heart’s content.

The slave could never cry enough
to wash the pain away.

Somewhere in the back of Irene’s
mind, she was aware that she had not lost consciousness, even for a moment. She
had felt the full intensity of every cruel stroke. It was the bitter victory of
endurance over cowardice.

“Feel better now?”

She only sobbed.

“Feel like you’ve been well and
properly punished?”

She nodded her head, dragging her
tear-soaked hair across the wet sheet that covered the table.

“Good. If you ever deceive me again,
I’ll apply the same treatment from your ankles to your neck, front and back,
and then go over the inside and outside of both legs. I will make you regret
that you were ever born. You understand me?”

She understood that the pain from
a more extensive beating than this would be dire. And she understood that Lord
Snow wouldn’t hesitate to administer such a beating if he thought that she
deserved it.

She would never dare to deceive
him again.

“You may attend dinner,” he said.
“You may stand while you eat if you wish.”

Her fast was over.

“Thank you, so much, my lord,” she
said through her tears. She felt gratitude for his mercy to the depth of her
heart.

“One other thing,” he said before
he left. “Twice you’ve lost these bullshit votes that you hold at the end of
your entertainments. Don’t do that again. I own you. I alone decide if you succeed
or fail and I alone will decide on your punishment for failure. It was an
entertaining bit of drama before, but I’m tired of it. No more votes.”

* * *

“Gentlemen, welcome to Lord Snow’s sex games.”

Every gentleman’s eye was drawn to
Irene’s crotch. The stainless steel chastity belt sparkled in the spotlight.

It was shocking to see a slave
wearing such a device. Slaves were the polar opposite of chaste. They were always
freely available to for sexual use. Always.

To emphasize her unavailability,
stainless steel cups were locked over her generous breasts as well.

Prominent padlocks secured both halves
of the stainless steel bikini. Solid steel bodies with thick,
case-hardened
shackles – ostentatiously functional,
not decorative. Nobody was going to remove them unless they either had the key
or employed serious cutting equipment.

Not one of the thirty-three
gentlemen in this room had set foot in a machine shop. They could no more cut
steel than fly to the stars.

Some thought about who might have
the key; some considered that the only orifice that was available was Irene’s
mouth; all could think about nothing but how to get access to her sex.

She tapped the steel plate that
was secured across her crotch. “As you can see, I’m not able to participate. I
am a referee. You and the slave of your choosing are the competitors.”

As she spoke, eight nude slaves
filed into the room and lined up under spotlights along the wall next to her.
Each slave held a placard with a number from one to eight over her head.

“You have been divided into eight
teams,” Irene said to the gentlemen. “Your armbands indicate your team. I
suggest that you find your team mates and stand together so that you can
discuss choosing your slave.”

The men shuffled about, looking
for armbands that had the same colors, logo, and team name as their own. The gentlemen
had been assigned to teams such that each team had about the same variation in
age and social status. Lord Snow had not assigned himself to a team. His
armband was black and white striped to indicate that he, too, was a referee.

Irene gave the gentlemen a couple
of minutes to organize themselves, and then said, “If you are ready, we will begin
choosing your slaves. You are advised to choose the slave that you believe will
be the most proficient at a variety of sexual competitions. The order of
choosing will be determined by lot.” She reached into an opaque vase that was
sitting on the table next to her and, without looking, drew a black and gold
silk pennant from it. “Gentlemen, Team Buccaneer
has
the
first pick of their slave.”

The four gentlemen who were
wearing black armbands
with a
golden skull and crossbones
embroidered on them, chatted with each other for a minute, and then said, “We
choose Slave Four.”

Irene tied the pennant about
Cherry’s neck like a bandana and sent her out to join the Buccaneers.

Following the same procedure, Team
Paladin – white helm on a red field – chose one of the two borrowed
slaves; Team Stallion – black horse rearing on a green field –
chose Tamarind; and so forth.

Nickel was the last slave chosen
and was assigned by default to Team Hawk – red hawk on a blue field.

Irene could tell that Nickel was
trying to look enthusiastic, but she couldn’t feign the sincerity that infused
the other slaves. They were genuinely excited about the impending competition,
even though they had no idea what events might be planned.

“I wish you all the best of luck,”
Irene said. “Without further delay, let the games begin. The first three events
will be tests of physical prowess. We begin with the cunt pull.”

The two borrowed slaves looked
puzzled. Lord Snow’s slaves grinned at each other.

“Teams, if you will retire to the
walls to clear the center of the room, please.”

Two pennants were hanging from
each wall. Though not instructed and not required, the teams automatically
migrated to stand under their own pennants.

The billiard table had been
removed from the room, again, but tonight, the floor was not padded.

A white circle, six feet in
diameter, had been painted on the center of the floor. Irene carried a bundle
of ropes to the center of that circle and began laying it out. When she was
finished, eight ropes were lying like a large, skinny octopus. They were all
connected in the center. A double plastic cone and anchor, identical to the
cunt weights, was attached to the other end of each rope.