Impact Event Ch. 02

Chapter 2

Opening

The maiden entered his room, carrying a basket. Now that he was recovered, more or less, the countess had the prisoner placed in the toy room. She called it her toy room but it was more of a dungeon, a prison cell. It was a holding area for her slaves until they learned proper fear of her. Dark and quiet, you couldn't hear the activities in the estate in this room. In this room, all you could do was think.

She had given him a lot to think about.

She had tortured him, for one. He was then made to watch as one of her handmen satisfied the arousal his pain had elicited in her. Then she brought him to the village. She displayed him in the town square and made a speech everybody present knew by heart. Everybody but Evert, the true audience for her performance. She enumerated the rich, luscious rewards that would be bestowed upon anybody who caught him should he escape. He was then place in stocks for three hours while the villagers familiarized themselves with his looks, tried to memorize every feature of his face.

They whispered to him as they studied him. The maiden knew what they said. They told him he needn't worry about them. They would help if he tried to break free. Just come straight to my house. I'll get you out of this situation. I live just there where the mottled horse stands. Come there and I'll get you home, safe and warm in your own bed.

They made these promises every time, drooling at their own fantasies. It usually took a new slave a few such proposals before he figured out their true intention. Each new slave always had hopeful eyes at first, eyes that slowly dimmed with the understanding that each villager was making his own bid for the countess' favors. Come to my house so I can be the one to turn you in.

But Evert gave the first villager the same deeply wary stare he gave the last. It seemed he knew the villagers would tell him these things before they did. Evert did not let his terror turn him into a fool. He seemed to understand without explanation or time to ponder.

Still, the countess wanted him in the toy room, thinking about his situation. He might understand his predicament but she wanted him to stew in that understanding. Not for too long, though. Six hours was long enough. He also needed his sleep.

Once she had lit enough torches, she looked over this new slave. Alone with him, she was the most powerful person in the room. She savored that feeling as it was rare. She hardly had time alone with a slave. The only person at the estate with less power that herself was the cook but the cook barely noticed that the maiden existed. She certainly didn't feel powerful when alone with the cook. She felt powerful standing over Evert.

Rings were welded all over the iron frame of his bed. Tonight, his cuffs where locked to its corners, spreading his arms and legs in an X. She dwelled on the thought that she could do anything she wanted to him and he couldn't stop her. She swirled the idea in her mouth like a single, stolen sip of somebody else's rich drink. Then she brought a stool next to his bed and sat on it.

"Hi," she said. He didn't respond. Digging in the basket, "Welcome to the castle. I don't suppose anyone has welcomed you." She took a jar out of the basket and lay the basket on the floor. He stared at her. She opened the jar, scooped some salve in her fingers and began applying it to his wounds.

She was surprised he spoke. "Who is that woman?"

Circling her fingers delicately over his welts, "She is the Countess Lemuil. She is a powerful woman. Not herself but she has many powerful friends which makes her powerful, too. I suppose. And her husband is powerful."

"Her husband? Where is he? Does he know that she does this with the slaves while he's away?"

"He's staying with a friend for a couple months. He's staying with them 'cause he was gonna be in the county. There to get another slave so, yeah, he knows. You might want to think on that. She never took two slaves together, before. She'll probably pick the one she likes and get rid of the other. And you know she can't set you free, right? If she gets rid of you, that means killing. You might could think on making her happy."

"How would I do that," he asked. His eyes bore into her and she got the sense that he wasn't truly asking the question. Just like with the cook, she lost all sense of her appointed power. He was completely vulnerable to her but she was the one who felt weak and insecure.

She changed the subject. "Do you know where they are? Those papers?" She heard a tink as the loop on his cuffs knocked the iron frame of the bed.

"No," he said and closed his eyes. She understood why. The salve was very effective, a quick healer, it prevented scarring but, best of all, it made the pain go away for a couple of hours.

"You wrote it. Don't you remember what it said?"

"Every word."

"Then why didn't they just make you tell them that?"

"They know. The countess, what does she want from me?" He brought the topic right back to where he wanted it and gazed into her eyes again. Why couldn't she control people the way the countess did? It had so much more to do with the chains and whips. What was that other part? What was she missing?

The maiden began putting the salve on his scrotum. Tink, tink, tink. His legs twitched. "She just wants to keep you, play with you." His pelvis was beginning to grind slowly. She could tell he was trying not to do it. He probably hadn't even masturbated in over a year. When she took him in her mouth in the countess' room, it gave forth a bit of sweet liquid immediately. "There will be a lot of pleasure. She will always want to hurt you but it will be better for you if you submit." His penis had become erect. It lay on his belly, jumping just a bit as she swirled his testicles in her hand. "If you don't, she'll hurt you more, she'll keep you in bonds all the time, she'll subject you to cruelties you can't imagine." The tinks were getting louder and more frequent as she spoke. She had been focused on how aroused his penis was and had been ignoring that he was also getting nervous. She lay the salve in the basket and stroked his penis with her other hand as she gently played with his testicles. "Shhh. It's okay. Tell me. How did you learn letters?" She changed the subject to something less likely to produce anxiety.

He voice was far steadier than she expected it to be. "My mother's employer. She was a cook for a Marquis. There was a crawlspace that led to the library, where the children were taught. I used to sneak back there to watch their lessons. I did that until my mother was dismissed. I learned a lot of useless stuff but some of it was useful. Like letters."

"Why was she dismissed," the maiden asked.

"She became pregnant. My father was five years dead so it was rather a scandal. The Marquis did it. He was the father. He knew that. I knew that. The staff knew that. I think that even the Marquess knew that. All the more reason to get rid of my mother."

She stroked his penis, not knowing how to respond. The poor man's whole life was tyrannized by royalty. It was best to change the subject again. "You like that? Scribing?"

"Yes. You mostly help people read letters from their family and friends. Or write them. That's nice. It's nice to do that." His voice was getting softer. A drop of liquid sat on the tip of his penis. "When loved ones are far away, people only want to tell them good things. So you hear all the best parts of people's lives. I enjoy it immensely. Enjoyed it." She wiped her hands on her skirt.

"That does sound nice," she stroked his penis lightly, pet it like a little animal. He watched her cautiously but she could see the need in his eyes. She felt power now, but this was an easy power that would be gone once he was spent. It wasn't the kind she wanted.

"How did you come to be here?" he asked, clearly not caring, his pelvis moving slightly.

"I was working as a prostitute." His penis bobbed up. "Her husband brought me here one night. When he was done with me, I left him in his room and made my way out." She took his penis in her hand and squeezed it lightly. "She was waiting for me. She asked me to talk with her. I thought she'd try to have me arrested or it'd be a huge row with yelling and hitting. But she was real nice. We drank wine together. She asked me a lot of questions." The maiden lifted her skirt as she spoke and climbed onto him, straddling him on her knees. "She asked me to work here. She said the work may be a bit harder but the pay was better. It is. I get to live in a nice house. I like the work, too." She rubbed herself of the shaft of his penis. "I like this. I like it a lot. Do you like it?"

He made no response except to shake and form an O with his mouth.

She guided him inside her and lowered onto him. He pushed his head back and groaned. Grinding him, working her hips in small circles, reversing direction occasionally, she heard the tink, tink, tink of his cuffs against the frame as he threw his head forward, looking shocked. It was the look of somebody seeing a rainbow for the first time and she thought he might be a virgin. She leaned down, bending her back forward, and took his nipples into her mouth. Each one she licked delicately, bit lightly, sucked hard. She rose, took the nipples between her fingers, pinched and pulled so they rose as though he had tiny breasts. He lifted his head off of the bed, his mouth was now wide like his eyes. He made small choking sounds, shut his eyes tight and let out a loud moan as he came inside her.

He looked at her, perplexed. "I...I...don't..." She put her finger on his mouth.

She stopped herself from mentioning how quickly he had finished. "Why do they want the papers if they know what's in 'em?"

"A signature. At the bottom. Two of them. They make the papers special." He was shivering and swallowing a lot.

"Maybe that's where they are. Maybe one of them who signed it has got the papers."

"They're dead," he said.

"You sure? Maybe they just had people say they was dead, so they wouldn't end up..." She was going to say 'like you' but decided against it.

He shook his head quickly. He spoke quickly, too, like he was trying to finish the conversation as soon as possible. "I watched them die."

"You killed 'em?!" She said, dismounting. He waited for her to sit on the stool before he answered.

He didn't look at her, only at the ceiling. "No. Another man did. That woman called him Moonday." The maiden smiled inwardly when he called the countess 'that woman'. She'd never heard her called anything so irreverent. It was almost exciting.

"You saw them die," she said.

"Yes."

"He made you watch."

"He did," he said.

She stroked his penis again, sticky from the salve and her own lubricant. "How horrible for you."

"It was worse for them." He continued to look at the ceiling, as though ashamed of what they had done.

"I guess that's right." She took another jar from the basket and opened it. "It won't be so bad all the time for you. Like it was today. She just wanted to hurt you bad because she hasn't done anything in a while. And she gets excited when she gets a new toy."

"Toy? You mean me?"

"Sorry." She lifted his head to the jar, pressing it to his lips.

Between sips, which she forced by turning the jar up repeatedly, he spoke. "No, don't be...I didn't mean...I didn't know what this...was. I thought...it was like that...I just wasn't sure...you say toy...now I think...yeah, that's...that's good...I don't need...please...I've had enough..." He closed his mouth and turned away. She pinched his nose shut hard and pulled it until he was facing the ceiling. There was a bit of struggle as he held his breath, eyes darting about frantically but he soon opened his mouth for air. She let him snatch a bit of breath before pouring the fluid into his open mouth. She couldn't tell how much of it she'd actually gotten down his throat. There was a lot on the bed. That was okay. She didn't have to sleep in it.

She extinguished all the torches while he coughed and choked, keeping one torch to take out with her. She went to him, kissed his lips softly and said, "Sleep. You need your sleep."

He cleared his throat, swallowed hard and said, "What did you just make me drink?"

"Shhh. Just try to sleep," She stroked his forehead.

"I feel strange." He furrowed his brow deeply.

"Shhh." He looked fearful. Finally, he looked fearful and she felt truly powerful. The sound of the cuffs against the bed was like a glorious song celebrating her victory. Tink. Tink tink. Tink. Tink tink tink. She stood over him and slapped him hard across the face, relishing the sting she felt in her own palm. "Log off!" Then she left, shutting the door behind her, leaving him in an impossible blackness again.

The maiden undressed immediately upon entering the Countess' chambers and crawled onto her bed. The countess loosed her breasts which the maiden took in her hands and mouth, paying homage. "So, what did you learn?"

Releasing a nipple in order to speak, she said, "He told me about the papers. They were signed by somebody and that's what makes them important. Says he doesn't know where they are." The maiden kept her hands on the countess' breasts as she spoke, stroking them.

"Of course he did. What else did he say?"

"The gargle man...."

"Moonday."

"Yeah, him. He killed people and made Evert watch."

"What else?"

"He asked about your husband."

"And what did you tell him," the countess asked, scraping the maiden's scalp with her nails.

"That he's gone to get that other slave. I said he better be good 'cuz you'll only want one."

"That's good. Did he seem bothered by that?"

"No. He seemed specially not bothered by it."

"Oh," there was only a soupçon of disappointment in her voice but that was a great deal more emotion than usual for her. "What else?"

"He told his past. His mother was a cook for a Marquis. It's how he learned letters. He hid in a crawlspace and saw the lessons being taught the Marquis' children." The nails dug into the maiden's scalp. She looked up to see the corner of the countess' mouth stretched and lifted into something that managed to be a smile and a snarl at the same time. It stopped the maiden from speaking.

"A widow. She became pregnant and was dismissed in disgrace."

The maiden sat up. "How'd you know that?"

She took the book from the table beside her bed and gave it to the maiden. "It's the plot of this novel."

"That book's about him?" The maiden was enthralled.

"No, the book is not about him. It's just a book, one he has clearly read before." The countess took a deep breath. She lifted her skirt and knees, spreading the latter. "He told you a lie he knew I wouldn't believe." The maiden could have sworn that what she saw on the countess' face was excitement. "I think I insulted him by sending you in there." It was more than excitement; the countess was actually giddy. She grabbed the maiden's hair and pulled her head into the curly hair between the soft slopes of her thighs. "Help me think."