West Valley High Day 39: Witch Trail

October 24

The girl stood in the center of the open square wearing nothing more than an old burlap sack with holes cut out for her neck and arms. Her hands were bound behind her to a wooden stake and she looked around at the audience staring at her. A man clothed in a black robe stood behind a podium and spoke to her.

"You have been accused by your school mates of practicing the art of witchcraft. What say ye?"

The girl looked at the man with her steely blue eyes and proclaimed her innocence. The crowd booed and a few chants of "witch" rose up from the throng, The man raised his hand to silence them. "The accused shall be given an opportunity to prove she is not a witch through a series of tests," he said. "The first of these shall be the 'prick test'." There were a few snickers from the assembled crowd at the name of this test.

The man left the podium and approached the girl, along the way picking up several sharpened devices from a nearby table. He showed them to the crowd before waving them in front of the girl's face. She squirmed and said softly, "Please sir, do not hurt me. I have done nothing wrong."

The black-robed figure picked up a piece of cloth from a nearby table and tied it over her eyes, blindfolding her. Then he used a pair of scissors and sliced the burlap sack open from her neck to her navel, exposing her tanned breasts. Another slice from the scissors split the sack open in the back and it fell to her feet, leaving her totally naked. The girl pleaded again that she was not a witch. The man raised a finger to the girl's quivering lips to silence her.

"The devil has touched you and it is my job to determine where," the man said. He ran his finger along the girl's bare shoulder and she shivered at his touch. He brought his finger down her arm and then across to her left breast. He ran his hand along her bare flesh, feeling her tit with all five fingers, massaging it in his hand. He lifted it with his palm and felt underneath. "Perhaps here," he said, and brought one of the metal needles against the underside of her breast. The girl gasped as the sharp pin touched her skin, "Hmm, maybe not," he said.

The man repeated the procedure with her other breast, sticking the pin against it in several places, each enough to elicit a yelp of pain, but none deep enough to cause any damage except for drawing a small drop of blood. His hands moved down her torso to the girl's stomach. He ran his fingers along her tight abs and then placed the pricker into her right side. It tickled more than it hurt and the girl squirmed as the man ran the needle up and down her side.

He moved down to her legs, casually kicking her feet apart with his own to expose her inner thighs. He ran the needle down them and she squirmed against him, begging him to free her. He jabbed at her taut thigh muscle with the needle and the girl jumped in pain. He pricked her several more times and each time, she howled as tiny drops of blood broke the skin.

Satisfied with his test on the front of her body, he moved behind the girl and ran his hands across her bare bottom, split by the wooden pole she was bound to. He stuck the needle into her flesh and she pulled away from the post.

"Ok, class," Jerred Rydberger said as he withdrew the needle. "What you saw there was the beginning of the prick test, one of many tests used to detect whether someone was a witch or not. With Halloween coming next week, I thought this would be a good time to discuss the witch trials. Of course, thanks to your classmate Susan for agreeing to help us again with our demonstration."

Susan Mitchell wasn't sure 'agreed' was the right word as she had little choice in determining the manner in which she was punished daily. Mr. Rydberger, one of West Valley High's history teachers had proven to be a caring, if not slightly sadistic torturer of Susan on several previous occasions, so the girl thought she knew what to expect.

The teacher continued, "In a real witch test, the needle I used would have been inserted several inches into the accused's skin, making far deeper marks than the small pin pricks you see here on Susan's body. Now, you may be wondering how a person would ever not respond to the prick test. I will show you."

Rydberger picked up another needle from the table and approached Susan's bound form. He pressed the needle against the girl's left breast. Susan felt pressure against her skin but no sharp pain even though it appeared the needle had pierced her by at least an inch. The teacher explained, "This needle pulls back inside the metal cartridge when pressed against the skin. If I hold it just right, it looks to the crowd as if I have driven it into her breast yet it caused no damage and she experienced no pain." The cries of "witch" came up from the students seated around the courtyard again. "In olden times, professional 'pickers' would be hired who knew just how to use the various needles to get the desired result," Rydberger concluded.

"Let's try another test," the teacher said. "It was believed that since a real witch had been touched by the Devil himself, that he or she would be unable to stand having ice pressed against their flesh." The teacher pulled on a glove and picked up a large chunk of ice from a cooler on the table. "Miss Daniels, could you come forward please?" Brittany stood up and approached the teacher. "Hold this in your hand for as long as you can." She grabbed the piece of cold ice in her palm and stood with it in her hand for several minutes before the teacher grabbed it back and put it back into the cooler.

"As you can see, a normal person can stand ice for a fairly long period of time." Rydberger reached into the cooler again and pulled out the block of ice. He moved towards Susan and placed it against her right breast. The girl screamed and squirmed away from the cold object. The cries of 'witch' grew louder as the teacher put the ice back into the cooler. "Yes, it would seem we have found ourselves a witch," he said. "Why else would Susan react so strongly to the ice when Brittany could hold it for minutes?" Rydberger reached into the cooler and pulled out a canister. "This is a common substance. Can anyone guess what it is?" One of the students shouted out "it looks like salt." The teacher nodded in agreement. "Correct. Salt lowers the lowers the freezing/melting point of ice. If I had left the ice on Susan's body long enough, her skin would blister as if she had been burned - something witch hunters would do to prove a person was indeed touched by the Devil."

"Now that we have identified a witch, what would we do with her?", the teacher said. Someone shouted 'burn her at the stake' while another said 'hang her'. Rydberger replied that both of those would be considered valid final punishments for a convicted witch, but there were often less severe punishments, which largely depended on the victim themselves, whether they confessed their crimes and what the other townspeople thought of the accused witch.

"We've already seem some of these tortures in our previous lessons, such as the wooden horse or the scold's bridle," the teacher said. "We won't repeat any of those. But what we will do is show you a very common witch punishment, which was public humiliation. For that we will need the stockade again."

Rydberger motioned to a pair of students in the back of the courtyard of the Seniors` building and they rolled up the wooden stockade with its three holes for Susan's head and arms. This stockade also had a lower perpendicular bar with two holes. Susan was untied from the post and led to the wooden device. She was seated on the ground and her feet were placed through the lower holes and her wrists and head through their upper ones. She was relieved that this position left her less vulnerable than before, when she was left on her knees with her ass and pussy on display.

"A real witch might be tortured using red hot fireplace pokers, kept heated by the town's blacksmith," Rydberger said. "We have these instead." He picked up a long metal rod and placed the tip against Susan's hand. She felt a small tingle of electricity from the rod. "It's a very low voltage shock. Really not much at all, but enough to be annoying, which is the point of this torture. We are going to practice something knows as "Tormentum Insomniae".

The teacher explained this meant 'torture by sleeplessness', where the accused was required to stay awake, sometimes for days at a time. As the Prince of Darkness worked his evil at night, it was believed that by keeping witches awake, it would drive the evil spirits from their bodies, although the real effect was to drive them insane.

"So, for the rest of the day and night, it is your duty to keep Miss Mitchell awake. You may use the electric rods, tickle her feet, pour water over her head, etc. You are not permitted to mark or scar her in any way, nor should she be sexually assaulted in any manner." While Susan knew she was not going to enjoy the next 24 hours, she was glad to hear the teacher's restrictions.

The students did as they were told, taking turns throughout the day. Susan's bare feet, exposed in the stocks were a popular target, both for tickling and as a target for the electric prod. The prod also found its way to her back and neck quite often, the tiny electric charges making her jump each time they struck her flesh. One of the students had read a story of a woman in a pillory having garbage dumped on her, so several students chose to re-enact that with bits and pieces of their lunch. A banana peel was placed on Susan's head and someone poured a sticky cola down her back.

The air started turning colder around sunset and Rydberger brought out a small heater and placed it behind her, explaining to the students serving the evening watch that small fires would be placed around an accused witch to remind her of the fate which could befall her if she failed to confess. Susan's punishment went on into the night, with students taking turns tickling her, poking her with the electric sticks and pouring cold water over her head and body to keep her awake through the night.