The Finishing School

He undid the thongs restraining her wrists and, mercifully, her elbows, then chained each of her wrists to draw her body spread eagle on the wall like the other captive girl. She did not have the energy to resist him, and the cool metal on her wrists was a balm to the soreness from the ropes. Her muscles came alive with the unfamiliar sensation of blood returning to them. She ached to move her body freely.

The relief of the cold metal was short-lived because what slack there was in the chains was quickly eliminated. He spun a small wheel, embedded in the wall next to her torso, and as he spun the chains pulled her taught, link by link, until she was as tightly spread as possible. Her toes no longer touched the ground, and her hands could grasp only at the air. As though with every breath she took, her bonds grew tighter.

Finally, he removed the clamps on her nipples and reached up to untie her gag. Removing it, he looked at her sternly.

"No misbehaving from you. You're to sleep here tonight, and every night, until we get to the school. Until then - behave." He wiggled the free clamp in her face, admonishing her. "This just the beginning."

He turned and left, and with it took the torch light with him. The room grew dark. Edwina could still feel the gaze of the other captive on her.

"We can talk now, you know, he's far enough away."

Edwina gasped. She hadn't yet thought to talk.

"O please tell me, how long have you been here? What is happening to us?" She asked, almost feverish. The day she had spun before her. She tried to look at her new companion.

"Are we really expected to sleep like this?" Edwina said.

The brunette smiled kindly at her.

"This is my second night like this. Did your family not tell you what to expect?" She heard kindness in her voice.

"No, no one has told me anything at all," Edwina said, trying not to sob again.

"My parents tried to do the same for me, but my sister was very naughty. She told me what to expect. She went to finishing school too, and came home last year."

"And she's... she's alright?" Said, Edwina. The girl laughed.

"Silly, nothing truly bad will happen to us! There are rules at the school, for the discipline we will receive. No real marks, no blood, no breaking or twisting or burning."

Edwina realized then that most of her pain had come from her humiliation, and from the clamps, but there was no mark she could see but redness. The girl's words comforted her fears and stoked them simultaneously. Discipline. What she had been receiving thus far was discipline, she guessed, what they talked about before she was in the carriage. The discipline of a new, strange kind that brought a heat between her legs even as she felt utterly humiliated.

"My name is Edwina." she said.

"I'm Clara." said the girl.

"This is your second night here, Clara? How can you stand it?" Edwina asked, wondrously.

She couldn't believe she was to spend the entire night chained to the wall. All she had ever known was silk sheets, or on occasion, the rough cotton of the soldier she would misbehave within the town away from the Governess's snooping. Yet always, a bed. The wood was gentle and smooth on her skin, but she felt the weight of her body in the chains, the coolness of the sea breeze, the exposure of her sex, and her breasts. Oh how she wished she could close her legs, hide her secret places!

"Don't try to fight it, Edwina. We must accept it." Clara said.

"Have you accepted it?" Edwina asked, hoping Clara could share some of her knowledge. There must be some key to finding acceptance, something she didn't yet know that could make the humiliation worth it. Clara's face twisted in an odd expression and Edwina realized that she was talking more about what she wanted to do rather than what she'd be able to do.

"Well, no, but I am trying my very best. After yesterday, and everything was explained to me, it just feels the easiest thing to do." Clara said, her dark eyes fixed on Edwina's. "I can't imagine fighting it for long."

CHAPTER 5: CLARA'S STORY

Despite the circumstances, Edwina felt immense gratitude for her new companion. She felt as if she was falling, a long tumultuous fall into a new life, a life she did not understand, that had seen her stripped naked and transported like dry goods and treated like an animal.

"Fighting what? Tell me, please." She begged.

"Shh, we will be punished if they hear us talking," Clara admonished. "I will tell you." Edwina listened intently.

"I arrived on the ship yesterday. My Mother and Father had told my sister to send me off, and I was thrown naked into the carriage as I am sure you were as well. I didn't struggle like you did, though, only because of what my sister had said: that it is no use. That no matter what is going to happen to me I am going to end up doing and obeying my new Masters and Mistresses. They will tell you more tomorrow, I am sure, and use other words perhaps about behavior and being proper. But we are to act as if we are slaves for the next few years, and it begins on this boat. When my sister began to say the word slaves she turned quite red and said she's not allowed to speak of it in detail, but she said it really can be quite nice at times."

"What do we learn here?" Edwina cried, forgetting herself.

"Shh, Edwina, we must not be discovered talking like this. But I will continue if you promise to keep quiet."

Edwina nodded, biting down her many questions.

"We are learning to control ourselves and to be of use, of any and all ways our masters and mistresses to think of us. I don't really know more than that," she said. She paused, and Edwina said nothing.

"But now that you have stopped interrupting me I can continue." She smiled at her, and Edwina felt again so utterly grateful for her new companion.

"When my carriage got to the ship, I was marched onto the deck and made to kneel with my hands still behind my back. It was quite uncomfortable and quite hot, but no one paid attention to me for a long while, except to drip some water down my throat. So intimate, to be fed water in that way. It seemed like everyone was waiting for something, and they were. The Captain and his wife, the Lady, had been in the town. They are our master and mistress on the boat. You will meet them tomorrow I am sure since they always inspect new slaves. And don't be afraid, dear Edwina, they are both very beautiful and strong and have a firm command of themselves.

They both circled me, brushing my breasts and my buttocks with a hand, trailing their fingers inside my thighs and commenting on my short hair. The Lady then conferred with the Captain, and suddenly she was walking away, and I was being pulled on my leash behind her. I do not know why she chose me, but I heard the men talking and I think they take turns with each new slave.

I somehow stumbled my way up without falling and was led by one of my liverymen behind the Lady into her chamber. It was much bigger than I thought a room on a ship could be. To the left of the door here was a fine four-poster bed with many portcullises in the wall let in the light, and many silks draped this way and that. A broad table with food and drink was set against the far wall.

She took my leash and led me to sit down on a wooden bench that ran along the foot of her bed.

"Do not speak," she said, "Would you like to know what is expected of you? So that you can please me?"

I nodded.

"One is that you are now a slave here. My slave. While you are on the ship, I will summon you and you will do what I ask. Others, of course, may command you, but I am your Mistress. That will change when we arrive at the school. But until then, you are mine. Two, you must never speak unless I, the Captain, or one of the crewmen invite you to do so. And when you do, you must address everyone, even the lowliest cabin boy, as master or mistress. Everyone on this ship is above you.'

She paused to stroke my cheek.

"Three, you will be punished or allowed pleasure as I will it. Your time here and at the School is a trial of will and mind, as well as body. You will learn to have control over yourself by having every aspect of control stripped from you. This is why you will be punished if only for the delight of others, or given pleasure despite you want it."

I could feel my heart beating in my chest. She smiled at my confusion.

"You will be taught to always crave both -- pleasure and punishment."

Her hand left my cheek and grasped my nipple, imprisoning it in her fingers. She stroked it, and I felt my body begin to stir with her touch. I felt my face get hot and red with my embarrassment over my body's response, and she laughed.

"So shy," she said. "That will change."

The Lady unclipped my collar and I felt even more shame, to be so fully naked in her presence. She knelt and bound my feet to iron rings in the legs of the bench. But this was not enough for her. She bound my knees to the bench, fastening straps around them and to the small rings hidden in the seat of the bench. My legs were forced wide apart, my hips forward, and my sex utterly exposed to her. My arms were still bound behind me, and I trembled. I was at her mercy.

She turned away from me, and I could hear her rustling through some chest of some sort but saw nothing. My heart raced. However, I was able to observe her for the first time. Her long black hair was piled neatly on her head and I could tell from her clothes she was wealthy and must be of a noble family, and my cheeks burned even more at this knowledge. She could know someone from my own family, and she had seen me naked. But my sex only grew wetter at the humiliation. She turned back around and lifted my chin with her finger, pushing my head high.

"Hold it there, and don't move."

I held my chin up as far as I could to the ceiling without falling over -- I was so very afraid to fall -- and she buckled a high wooden collar around my neck. "You may look down," she commanded, and when I tried, I found my chin only dropped a few inches. The wicked collar forced me to keep my gaze straight ahead, and I couldn't see what she was doing elsewhere in the room behind me or to the side of me. I whimpered.

"Ah ah, little slave," she said, "Your mouth displeases me. Perhaps... I will bind you everywhere that I can."

I bit my lips to keep them closed, but I could not evade the device she had for me next. The Lady bade me open my mouth, and I did, fearing what would happen if I did not.

She forced a large leather ring inside my mouth. The width of it pushed my lips open even wider. It sat between my teeth and I felt my whole mouth become stretched over it, smarting with pain in the corners of my mouth as it was stretched over the horrid ring. She had made another soft opening in my body exposed.

She then bound the ring tightly tight behind my head. I couldn't utter anything but the grunt or moan of a farm animal.

Her cool fingers stroked my hair, and my cheek again. They traced my lips and I trembled trying not to make noise at her touch.

She stroked my lips, felt my teeth, and forced her fingers on my tongue. Edwina, I cannot tell you, to have her fingers inside my mouth felt like the deepest violation of all, but I could not tell you why. But it was not over.

She produced a length of waxed rope, and to my amazement, began to thread it around my torso and my breasts.

"Breasts this beautiful also must be bound, I have discovered. It brings out their most sensitive qualities," she said, like a sommelier discussing the wine to serve with supper.

Her knots were small and intricate, and she bound my breasts tightly. With each cruel tug of her hand, my breasts were more constricted, more swollen. I could feel my nipples harden even more. The last rope she ran through yet another iron ring in the back of the wooden a collar. She strung it up to the ceiling of the cabin, saving me from falling but yet forcing me to surrender even that last act of control my ability to sit up. I hung there, bewildered and flustered, my breasts throbbing and my sex burning. Why was this strange torment happening this to me? I thought perhaps this would be the end, but again, she was not satisfied.

"Your struggle to please is so exquisite, Clara. I wish I could paint this picture." She smiled at me and I moaned, although I hoped she didn't hear it.

"You may tell me thank you, Mistress." She said, I tried to speak through the gag, to say what she wanted, but all that came out was an incomprehensible babble. I could feel my face flush hot with the shame of not being able to speak properly, of sounding like a fool. It seemed to be what she wanted, because my distress seemed to charm her greatly.

"Now it is time for another trial," she said, and she pulled up a stool to sit in front of me. "Don't take your eyes off of me, Clara, not even when you feel embarrassed, do you understand? I know you will feel like you want to look away, but you should not." I tried to nod through the restrictions of the wooden collar.

"Very good," she said, smiling.

I felt both her hands on my nipples this time, teasing them and twisting them in between her fingers. The additional pressure from the ropes was almost unbearable to me. It was as if she was touching me at my very core through my nipples alone. They became hard instantly, and I felt every groove of her fingertips upon them. I also felt the wetness growing between my legs, leaking onto the bench. My dampness was unbearably shameful to me.

But she did not stop tormenting them, and her ministrations only made the bondage of my breasts more effective as they became more swollen with desire.

She then moved her hands to my naked sex soaking the bench and I shivered.

"So wet, so wet, already," she crooned. "And so easy. What a well suited little whore you will be for the Finishing School."

I could not resist the feelings the humiliation and her hands had given to me. I wanted more, I felt like I would do anything to please her already -- I couldn't deny her. Was I truly the whore she had called me? My own body was telling me the truth.

She roughly clamped her hands on the lips of my sex, capturing my clitoris between them both. I moaned through the ring gag, the sensation of pleasure was so strong. I couldn't control it, and I saw her smile. She twisted and rolled my flesh between her fingers, stroking my clit all the same. I rocked my hips forward to meet her hands as best I could, but I felt her release me so her fingers could enter me instead.

"Yes, yes, that is very good. Open yourself to me and do not hold back," she said, her eyes not leaving mine.

Her fingers slid deeper into me, and I felt a ripple of pleasure move through my body from the inside. But I forgot to keep my gaze on her, and I tried to look down despite the collar to see her touch me. She saw it and withdrew her hand. She stroked my lips, spreading my own juices over them.

"Little bird, I told you to not look away. Now, you will also learn about the punishment," she said, and I was confused, because I had thought the binding had been the punishment. I realize now she wanted to test me and my resolve, and it was simply a way for her to amuse herself with me more than anything.

She brought out a soft leather crop, and began to stroke my inner thigh with the head. I could feel myself begin to tremble.

She began to work my whole body over with the thong, first lashing my inner thighs. The heavy strokes left pink marks and smarted quite terribly. I couldn't stop the tears from coming then, Edwina, my face from turning red at the pain and my humiliation. She did not stay long in my thighs, and soon the crop was on my breasts, so tender at this point from the bondage that each lick of the thong felt like agony. I felt myself moaning in distress through the leather ring and my humiliation doubled at the sound of my own voice, my own discomfort. I could not stay strong enough to resist making noise.

Finally, she returned the thong between my legs and my body was no longer mine. She stroked my sex with the leather, sending jolts of pleasure through me as she teased my clit with it. Then, she began to deliver the same strokes she had before. With each slap of the crop on my clitoris, the pain and the pleasure ran through me, and to my shame I could hear the slaps getting wetter and wetter with my own juices. I was moaning and squealing through my gag, humiliated that I could not keep myself still, hating it and wanting it to stop while also trying desperately to find my release through it. Without being so tied up, I would have surely collapsed.

Finally, she stopped. I was panting and sobbing through my gag. I wanted to beg her for mercy, for release, for anything. She walked over to me and put down the thong. She stroked my hair, kissed the tears away my eyes.

"There, there, little one." She said, and I trembled even more at her voice.

"You were magnificent, unfortunately for you, for only more whippings will be coming your way." She laughed.

Her cool hands once again stroked my tender breasts and I felt like this time I would truly explode. They were red now, much redder than from just the crop as the blood was trapped in them from the ropes. I felt as though they were as sensitive as my clit has ever been.

"Are you going to keep looking at me?" She said, looking down into my eyes again. I nodded. I was so utterly desperate for release I couldn't imagine doing anything else but what she wanted from me. She sat down on the stool.

"Watch me, Clara, be a good girl and do not look away again. I will know," she warned. She again began to torment my nipples again, trapping them between her fingers and twisting them quite lightly, then hard. She alternated the pressure and the motion, snapping my nipples and slapping my breasts then teasing them with a light touch. They grew tighter than I knew possible with her rough administration.

She had found what she was looking for in my reaction then, I suppose, because she kept her hand on my left breast while the right one returned to my sex, toying again with my clitoris, hot from the touch of the crop and my own excitement. She worked her hands in between the lips of my sex, her fingers finding the base of my clitoris. She began stroking it and working it over and over in her hands. I felt the pleasure build higher inside of me, a hot heat moving through me like a wave. My sore thighs and breasts were engorged with heat from the whipping. Finally, she slid her fingers in and out of me while her thumb remained on my clit, and I felt the wave crest inside and I came, crying out through the wicked ring gag like an animal in heat.

Then, she left me. Two men from the ship came to untie me and wash me off, and they laughed the whole time and gave me a few rude spanks on my buttocks, mentioning that it was the only place the lady hadn't touched, so why not make it red all the same? Then, they took me here and strung me up again, and said this was how I will spend the night, tonight."

Clara ended her story, but she didn't look at Edwina, her eyes taking a faraway look in them. Edwina felt a flicker of jealousy of the pleasure and excitement that she felt.Will I feel this too? She wondered.

"Clara, what a trial. Do you not despise the lady now?" Edwina asked, curiously. What strange magic had been wrought over her new friend?

Clara laughed.

"No, Edwina, I cannot. I think I love her, oddly. She was quite wicked, and yet all I want to do is please her again. Do you think I'm sick? I am sure that you will feel this way soon enough, with whoever your master or mistress will be while we are on this ship."

"No... I do not think you are sick. I think I felt a little of what you describe on the way here, when they put those horrible weights upon my nipples. I felt... something like you describe."