The Brand Ch. 10

"So," sighed Vance, "Fix it. Tell her you're sorry."

Victria too sighed as she changed her position on the sofa, her body now laying sideways, her gaze cast toward the office's tiled floor.

"Vic," Vance continued, "Even if you're both wrong, and she's the sub; you need to tell her you're sorry. Then, see what happens."

Victria continued to stare, in silence, at the floor. Vance took a broader tipped pen from his blotter and continued to work on his sister's likeness. Then, after a few minutes, Victria asked:

"How's mom and Jerry?"

"They're fine."

"What color is her hair nowadays?"

"Actually, she's going with the grey. It matches her eyes, even better than when she was in her platinum phase."

"Really?"

"yep."

Vance regarded his work, and then glanced again at his little sister.

"Vic," he said, "Do you love her?"

"Melody?" said Victria as she laid her head against the inside of her right elbow, "Vance, I'm not sure I know what that word means beyond the abstraction we make it, once settling for one person begins to have its appeal as an option. I mean, I love Mom because she brought me to life and because she took my shit for so long. And I love you because, unlike Ronnie and Nessa, you always got me, you know?"

"Right. And does Melody get you?"

"Sure, Melody gets me. We get each other and we run with it."

"Okay. So you're friends. She's your muse. She does your bidding on a regular basis. She's entirely devoted to you. What more could you ask for?"

Again, Victria looked down at the floor, and shrugged. Seconds later, she raises her eyes once more to meet her brother's.

"Nothing, I guess." She admitted, "So what do you think?"

"I think that you have developed an uncanny ability to sure pick them, and I think she has found her father in you and that she's playing her mother. As for the scar, I can only deduce that she survived somebody or somebody's something and that she's very likely still running away inside her head. But, as much as you make her feel better, needed, wanted inside your brand of love, your humiliation, whipping and domination, might possibly be feeding her pain in a way that, if it persists, won't aid in the growth of a healthy relationship. I think, actually, that her having bit you, was a very good thing for her to do."

"Really. How so?"

"Because it shows that there is an independent, resilient woman living inside the slave."

"You're a fucking quack."

Of course I am. That's why we're sitting here, discussing your emotional baggage in my tattoo and piercing emporium. Which reminds me: I should really go check on my staff. But really Vic; you're only saying that because you realize that I'm right."

Victria suddenly sat up.

"So what if you're fucking right?" she hissed, "It only means you have a flair for reading the obvious, you sheister!

"It's a racket, I know." Said Vance, unperturbed, "But you Vic, you are still the other half of the problem, the product of other people's behavior. You act and react based on what you've been put through. Under normal circumstances, and according to the behaviorist perspective; that's how life works. Accept what you can. Change what you can't. What needs to change, is your understanding of how much control you should have on your world, on others."

Vance leveled his gaze. In Victria's eyes, he suddenly saw his younger sister's pouty face, the face of the demanding little girl he'd fleshed out his love for those twenty years ago.

"How?" she said as she lowered her elbows to her knees.

"Let go, let go of as much as you can. Let Melody be herself, fight or flight, stay or go, whether she wills to continue to serve you under the capacity of slave or if she serves you, is submissive to you out of love, yes love Victria. As abstract as it is, the glue that makes a pair bond is the best means of that bond's longevity. You're only getting older. Get older with a good friend. Now that'll be three hundred bucks."

"Wouldn't paying you be some kind of professional breach?" asked Victria as she wiggled her feet back into her shoes.

"I'm not a professional; therapist anyway. So don't pay me. But, I would like for you to do me and yourself a favor and go pay a visit to Mom."

Victria stepped to the coat rack. Vance watched the contemplation in his sister's face as she draped the coat over her shoulders. Shrugging into it, she stepped around the back of her brother to look down at his drawing. She assessed his portrait of her, and thought about how good it would look, sized down and tattooed over Melody's scar.

"Hmm." She said, stepping around to face him again.

That was it, hmm. That's all there ever was when she looked at anyone else's work; politely aloof in her criticism, conveying neither praise nor disapprobation. Although, as Vance reflected on the tone of his tough and talented little sister's "hmm," he was almost certain it rang of praise. In the next instant, as their stares lingered, Victria reached gentle fingers to trace the length of his jaw line before tugging playfully at his beard. Then, Victria grabbed his head in both hands and planted a small kiss just above the bridge of his nose.

"I'll make a point of seeing Mom; soon." Said Victria as she went to the door.

Vance, mutely awed, watched as his little sister left his office. Presently, he regarded the stylized portrait on his lap. Maybe she'd take a ride to Sheila's. Maybe she wouldn't. Either way, Vance would bring his drawing to their mother, and she would be pleased. They were between holidays after all: a time for family, comfort and joy. Victria hadn't come for Thanksgiving. Then again, she never came for Thanksgiving. Who knows? Maybe she and her Melody would join them for Christmas

4

Melody cringed when she heard the key being fit into the front door's lock. Victria gasped and coughed as she entered the house. Melody closed her eyes and drew in a deep, bracing breath, the reek no longer an olfactory issue for her. She heard the house's owner step into the living room, pause, and then double back into the foyer. Totally mortified and still fearful, Melody wept anew as she heard Victria climb the stairs.

After a few minutes, Victria bounded back down the stairs and entered the living room again. Melody listened to the cage's rattle as her keeper disengaged its lock. She felt the woman's eyes upon her, upon the wide puddle of piss and shit near the foot of the cage door, with streaks of it trailing from Melody's ass. She'd tried to hold it. But, between the beer the night before, the late night snack and what she'd eaten of breakfast, nature had insisted. She'd thought to stretch from the far wall to which she'd been chained in order to void herself at least some distance away, affording to release her bowels as far away from herself as possible, without spraying the wall or getting any of it on the rug.

She realized a new smell in the air. It was vapor rub; likely lathered beneath Victria's nostrils. It occurred to her then that her domme, rather than releasing her so that she could tend to it herself, was cleaning up her mess. Shamed, humiliated, horrified, Melody tried to cry as quietly as possible.

Not a word passed between them as Victria patiently worked. With latex gloved hands and a bucket, she scooped up Melody's more wieldy feces. She cleaned in silence, respecting the other woman's dignity. She listened as Melody wept, and thought to console her. But, something told her not to; told her to save the talking for later. Crying was fine, thought Victria. I wouldn't expect any less. Then, as she began to sponge up liquid matter from the cage floor, Victria was pleased that Melody had not cowered or cringed. It was then, with the consideration of that thought, a single tear began to fall from her own right eye. Victria paused, shook her head, breathed in her vapor rub, and then resumed her obligation to her slave.

Once she'd finished cleaning and disinfecting the bottom of the crate, Victria set about wiping Melody clean enough so that she could climb out of the cage. Though she'd initially thought it unwise, Victria avoided actually probing into the woman's nether parts, because that, she decided, Melody should tend to herself. Eventually, Melody had stopped crying and opened her eyes to watch Victria head toward the first floor bathroom with bucket and disinfectant spray in hand. Presently, the woman returned and proceeded to release Melody from her cuffs.

She sighed with relief as she rubbed her wrists. A moment more and she was leaning on her elbows and about to squirm toward the cage's opening. Turning, Melody watched Victria head back to the first floor bath. Seconds later, she heard the tub's faucet being run. She checked the clock in the DVD player's screen. She'd been chained and confined for five hours. It was relative, inconsequential, a walk in the park, just a step below the dull ache she still felt in her face. Melody crawled out from her crate, carefully got to her feet, and then gingerly pressed her fingers against her swollen cheek.

Victria was seated on the closed seat of the toilet, staring down at the tiled floor, and her folded hands between her knees. Deliberating, she tried to get her head around her desire, to find the place along its edge where the threads of emotion were originally anchored or where they had come undone. She wondered whether emotion had become the response to blocked desire. Meaning; if she had removed any and all barriers to the fulfillment of her every desire, had she created in herself no need for emotion?

Perhaps she had. Maybe she was doomed to grow old alone, gaunt with emotional starvation and gnarled with rigid inflexibility. Seeing Melody's bare feet cross the threshold, she abruptly rose, met her naked guest's gaze, cringed at the sight of the huge purple bruise on her face, and then stepped aside. Melody advanced to the side of the tub and stepped in. Once in, Melody dropped beneath the surface, and then rose again to find that Victria had left the room and closed the door behind her.

For a time, Melody stared at the closed door, and, in rationalizing her gift of privacy, felt strange, as if she'd been placed into yet another cage. She scanned the room and listened to the bulb in the light fixture buzzing gradually more and more loudly. Her gaze crossed to the vanity's mirror and she thought she saw Dean glimpsing, smirking, at her from inside the glass. Then, there was a sudden knock at the door, startling Melody.

"Come in." she invited, clearing her throat.

Victria entered, carrying a bowl of something in her hand.

"Is the water warm enough?" she asked as she kneeled on the bath mat.

"Yes, thank you; Mistress." Answered Melody as she began to shampoo her hair, "What's that you have there?"

"It's a home remedy for your bruise: crushed pineapple." Said Victria, "I guess it has bromelain in it and it works pretty good for after, you know, you didn't get a chance to ice it down."

Melody looked away.

"Oh." She said.

"I put it in one of those mesh bags." Victria said uncertainly, "Maybe you can lie there with it on your face; for a while, maybe?"

Melody met Victria's gaze and searched her eyes until her domme guiltily looked away. She was stunned by the woman's obvious remorse. She wasn't sure what to make of it. She knew to take it for what it was, what it ought to be, but still: there was something not right in her heart about it. Eventually, she too looked away and resumed washing her hair. That done, Melody rinsed, lied back, and then put the bag of crushed pineapple against her swollen cheek.

Meanwhile, Victria went about draining and then refilling the tub, adding salts and lavender foaming soap. Melody luxuriated, though some degree of discomfort remained in her core. It dismayed her to be served. She'd never really liked it, but she was finding it even more frustrating to be served by her domme. Of course she knew she deserved it, but that didn't mean she liked it. Who knows, she thought, maybe I'll learn to like it.

"When you're finished," said Victria, "I'll do your hair for you."

"Oh no Mistress. You really don't have to go to all that trouble-"

"No, really. I want to. Please. Then, we'll take a walk outside."

"Oh, okay then." Melody agreed, brightening with the prospect of being taken out for a pee and a quick game of fetch.

Once out of the tub, Melody stood passively by, her eyes closed, as Victria applied moisturizing lotion over most of her body. As promised, Victria tended to Melody's hair. She'd taken a chair from the kitchen and set it before the vanity. Reluctantly, Melody put on her robe and sat down. Victria then gently brushed out her long golden brown locks and scrunched them up into a high pony. From there, they'd gone upstairs to the master bedroom where Victria dressed Melody in warm clothes.

The mistress of the house then began to change into more suitable clothes and kindly requested that her guest meet her down in the basement, at the patio exit to the back yard. Melody did as she was asked. As Victria changed into jeans and a sweat shirt, she reflected on Melody's tenseness and obvious discomfort at being touched. She wanted her tact to work, but couldn't begrudge Melody's reluctance and apparent mistrust. Sighing, she withdrew her winter jacket from the closet and tucked her keys into its inside pocket. Presently, she followed Melody down to the patio door in her studio, and was astonished to find her standing there by the door, with the lead chain in hand, naked but for a pair of flip flops and her collar, her smile wide and hopeful.

"You're right." Admitted Victria as they came to a stop nearly half a mile into her wooded back lot, "We do need to revise the contract. I don't know, maybe we should just tear it up or burn it."

Once Victria had helped Melody back into her clothes, they'd left the house and walked in silence, Melody untethered, deep into the woods. As the two women made their trek through the snow, they heard the sharp songs of blue jays in the distance and caught sight of one brilliant red cardinal or another. Crows cawed now and again in the distance, and sent a chill in Victria's heart as she scanned the sky for their approach. As she walked side by side with Melody, she recalled the funeral of that morning, of Duffy's closed, empty casket, his devastated wife and three young sons and the hundreds of his friends and associates gathered there to mourn his passing. Tomorrow would be Ricchio's service and the next days, Rancourt's.

"But first," she continued, "I want to take the time to explain why I'm so fucked up and stupid."

Melody stood motionless as she listened, her expression disconsolate, her lovely green eyes alert and intent. She'd taken every last word of Victria's relating her past to her; from the details she'd avoided telling her before about her father and his death, to her first time reporting of the incident with Samantha and her minions, to her running away to New York when she was thirteen to photograph her staged bound and bloodied hooker and to how difficult it was to go back home after she'd been such a shit, for years, to her mother. She'd also decided to bring up Simon's death, Though she only mentioned guns only in as much as they were Simon's guns that she'd fired at the range. Then, as she thought that she may as well tell her about New Orleans, Francisca and the Voodoo dolls, she restricted that retelling to what she'd told the irksome Mangiafico. After all, Victria had surmised, even if the world had its scrutinous eye trained on you didn't mean you had to go entertaining the possibility of curses. Sure, she hadn't made any doll that represented Melody, but that didn't mean that someone else somewhere else hadn't. Why tempt fate or at least why tempt it now, after you've spent the better part of the last four months doing it? The less Melody knew about all that bad juju Victria had brought on herself, the better. Vance had been right, just as he'd always been right when she'd tested him with her pain as kids. So, as the weight of Victria's tales settled into Melody's perception, the woman had one last thing to do.

"And finally," said Victria as she looked into Melody's troubled expression and the swollen puffy purple skin on the left side of her face, "I need to tell you that I'm so sorry for taking my warped sense of play to such an extreme that it allowed for what happened; to happen."

With that, Victria unzipped her jacket and withdrew the keys from her pocket. Struck silent, her mind still processing all that she'd heard, Melody hadn't been paying attention as Victria stepped behind her. Presently, she'd become aware that her collar had been unlocked and then removed. Speechless, numb, Melody touched her throat and felt its naked warmth. She turned then and watched Victria tuck the collar into her jacket's pocket.

"I release you from any and all obligation to me." Announced Victria, "You are free, free to come and go as you please, free to quit your education and go to work at some, I don't know, funky tattoo parlor coffee house somewhere or maybe you can go work for Pam, be a prep cook or something in one of her restaurants until you decide what you really want to do."

Low in the trees, cardinals called to one another. Melody looked away, her fingers still pressed against the spot where her collar had been. Suddenly, the gentle breeze that played at the end of her pony became a little less gentle. A few seconds more and she heard snow being crunched underfoot. Turning, she watched Victria begin her walk back toward the house. Melody remained where she stood, confounded, informed, stung, unrestricted, unrestrained, free, and free to; free to what?

Go you idiot! Run. Go and kneel at her feet. Show her. Kiss her boots. I'm free. Mel; you will never be free, no matter how far you go or what you do. Your past is always at your back, just over your shoulder, ready to give you a friendly tap or pop up in any mirror you might be looking at. No. She's still playing with me. No; its not playing. Its, its how it is, how we are. She knows I'll kneel at her feet in the snow. She knows I'll drink myself to death with her if that's what she wants. Then why'd you bite her? Because; because- Because I was afraid. No Mel; you want to be free. Inside your heart, you want truly to be free. No, that's not true. Yes; it is, it is Mel. Fine then; I'm free, I'm just as free as she is. And together, we'll suffer for how fucking free we are.

Losing sight of Victria, Melody made a mad dash through the snow. After a time, her rapid breath, steaming before her eyes, obscured her view. Melody feared that she'd lost the trail. But, she soon caught sight of Victria's back and kept pace behind her, walking leisurely at a distance of forty or more feet.

Back at the house, Melody followed Victria inside. Without a word, they advanced together through the stair cases, through the halls and from room to room, their time now divided, allotted, each unto herself. Victria gave the crate one last antiseptic wipe down, dismantled it and then boxed it back up. Melody took four books from the living room shelves, stopped by the kitchen to concoct a salve of pineapple juice, crushed cayenne pepper and petroleum jelly, and then walked it upstairs into the guest bedroom.

There, she laid back, applied her antienflamatory goop and dove into a book. A few moments in, she quickly became unimpressed with the first book and tossed it aside. The same happened with the second. The third had sustained her interest a bit longer until the story began to drag. Then, finally, Melody's forth choice put her to sleep. It was perhaps an hour later when she'd woken up to find a small, sealed envelope set upon the hem of her sweater. Opening it, Melody learned that an invitation to dinner was enclosed. It stated that Victria would be cooking Lord knew what, and that she was to arrive in the dining room, dressed formally, promptly at eight o'clock.