Yours, Loving and Lost

My dearest Theo,

I pray this letter reaches you, that you may know I still live- but for how much longer, I cannot say. Nor, if I survive, can I say in what state I may be if you find me. Oh, my love, how can I tell you what misfortunes have befallen me since I was dragged from the coach by the seeming highwaymen, slung across a horse and carried off, away from all that is good and pure? The shots the coachman fired after us were a valiant effort, but alas, he could not have known that my abductors were at their most vital and invulnerable beneath the light of the full moon! Perhaps you have been waiting all this time for a letter of ransom- instead, if you have received this at all, it will be because I convinced my captor's servant to take it to you in exchange for a bit of jewelry given to me as a mocking gift by fiends. If you are reading this, whatever punishment I am currently receiving shall be well worth it!

I must record my ordeal of captivity in full, no matter how indelicate the details may be. I do this in order that you understand the urgency of my situation, and that you may know the extent of my forced ruination from my own words and no one else's.

When my abductors, laughing and mocking all the while, finally were assured that they were safe from discovery, I was seized by the hair and pulled off the horse, then thrown unceremoniously to the ground. As I tried to rise to my hands and knees, I looked up at the highwaymen who had carried me off, and to my horror, recognized their faces- they were the strange gentlemen from your father's ball, who had so irritated us by continually whisking me off for another dance whenever you and I tried to be alone! What I had at the time attributed to boorishness, I now saw was something far more sinister. The younger, dark-haired one (Branwell, I would later learn to call him, when I was not forced to say "Master") stood above me and grinned to see my distress.

"Apologies, my lord," he said, "but I was getting too stiff to ride, seeing her squirm and kick!"

I blanched at his words, but the older, fair-haired one (Korbin, as I would learn similarly) chuckled indulgently.

"My advice, child, for your first hunt- take a sip of virgin blood now, while it lasts!"

With that, Branwell fell upon me, flipping me onto my back and yanking down the neck of my gown. My screams went unheaded in the lonely night, and to my horror, the blackguard sank his teeth in the exposed flesh of my breast. I fell into a swoon- half from pain, and half from a surprising fire beneath my skin. When I was able to open my eyes again, he was in the process of mounting me! I wept and begged for mercy, but my pleas went unheeded, and he stole away my honor there upon the ground beneath the cold moonlight.

How can I describe such an outrage? He used me as a beast in the wild uses its mate, rough and fast and to the fullest of his own satisfaction. Even when he spoke words of endearment to me, they were wicked ones about my "fine fit," how "tight" he found me, and what a good "ride" I had provided! He gripped me close when at last he found his selfish goal, but it was not a lover's embrace. It was the harsh grip a prisoner must feel when chained.

When his weight lifted from me, I tried to pull myself forward and crawl- where, I did not know, but anywhere away from these monsters. Alas, I knew my efforts were in vain when I was pushed back down to the sounds of a warm, mocking voice.

"Not so fast, darling," said my ravisher's companion, "not until I've taken a turn!"

Korbin lifted my trembling leg, and sank his teeth into my thigh. Although I tried to kick him away, what strength I once had was utterly depleted. It continued to sink away with the insistent sucking upon my flesh, for which the only mercy was that the pain was lesser this time. If only the whole night had been a terrible dream, I might have remembered it as a kiss! When he at last ceased his feeding (for what else am I to call it?) he proceeded to have his way with me, and although he was gentler than his "child" (a strange word for a man far too old to have been his son), he was no less insistent upon his lust. It was in this unholy congress that I learned the reason for the phrase "little death"- when my body could no longer fight, it fell into a kind of fit which perhaps might have brought me joy if only it had been with you, but which instead left me so exhausted I could hardly stir as he took pleasure with me.

When at last I was left to weep upon the ground and my ravishers had put their clothes to rights, I thought the meant to leave me there. I had already begun to think, searching my memory for the way back to the road and praying to all the angels that I did not carry a bastard, when Korbin seized me by the waist and pulled me back onto a horse with him.

"Barbarian!" I cried. "Fiend! Devil from the pits of hell!"

"Very nearly, my sweet," he said. "Now, pet, it's time to take you deeper into Inferno!"

He sat me on his lap, and spent the rest of the ride to a forlorn mansion house with one hand groping me obscenely. My last memory of abduction was when he carried me in his arms as if I were a bride through the dark doorway, and when I could no longer keep my eyes open, I thought they might close for the final time.

In the morning, whether by blessing or by curse, I was still alive.

If I described every cruelty inflicted upon me at the hands of my enslavers, I could not have found enough paper to write them upon! Nevertheless, I shall attempt to give summaries of my tormented nights. The first day I spent trying and failing to escape, and sadly my efforts were discovered when the sun fell. To punish me, I was stripped, bound with my hands above my head, and thrashed with a cane until my skin was red and raw. These cruelties so enflamed the lusts of these wicked men that when at last they let me down, both pressed upon me at once. Branwell violated me as he had before, but at the same time, Korbin dishonored me in a way I have only heard of ancient Greeks performing! Though the pain made me shudder, they alternated cruel thrusts with even crueler caresses, forcing me towards a climax of pleasure even as they reached their own.

When at last they completed the act, Korbin took a blade to my flesh. I did not know whether to wish for my own murder, but he only made a small cut, then caught the resulting blood in a goblet and shared it with his fellow as if it were a fine vintage. They toasted their cruelty with their lips stained crimson!

"The fiercer a maid resists," said Korbin, "the sweeter she is when broken. I have learned this over more than a century, and must speed you on your education, child!"

Needless to say, I made no such attempts to rebel on the second day.

On that next evening, the villains expressed surprise and delight to find me still alive enough to respond to their touch. Korbin took the lead and pulled me alongside him by my hair as he sat down upon a divan, then placed his heels upon my back as if I were a mere footstool! I can remember only bits and pieces of conversation, but I recall the men gloating first over press reports of my abduction, then of murders they had performed upon a band of poachers on their land. I wept to hear of this, but I did not move from my place beneath Korbin's feet for fear of brutal punishment. This earned me a reprieve from another night of beatings, but not from further debasement. When Korbin freed me from my position, it was only to unfasten his breeches and pull me so that my mouth was upon his phallus. He forced himself between my lips, using me without shame now that I feared to bite down upon him from dread of another beating.

"Such a lovely mouth you have, my dear," he sighed with contentment.

When he had spent himself down my throat, Branwell had been so excited by the sight that he pulled me to him and forced me to perform the same demeaning labor for his pleasure. I was only granted the reprieve of oblivion when he finished, and Korbin knelt down over me- not to take further pleasures, but to sink his teeth into the flesh of my neck. I fainted at this, and the next day I could do little but sleep and cry.

On the third night, when I was utterly robbed of strength, they play-acted at kindness toward me. I was given a bath, a silk gown and even fine jewelry- and then all but the jewels were stripped off of me again, as the men spent the night with me in a bedchamber, passing me back and forth between them. Branwell remarked flatteringly upon the welts on my back from their previous punishment, while Korbin complimented the size of my bosom (which he hefted and squeezed as if he were a merchant appraising fruit) and the taste of my blood.

"If she survives to tomorrow evening, we'll turn her," he said mysteriously. "I should like to keep our little slave longer!"

Though I did not know what he meant, I shuddered to hear him, and was more terrified than ever when they ended the evening with Branwell's teeth upon my wrist and Korbin's in the flesh between my neck and shoulder. Even as they feasted upon me, they stroked me until once more I was wracked by a series of little deaths- more so when they deemed my responsiveness quite promising for "an eternity" of future enjoyment.

I write this in the morning, and fret at each minute that the clock ticks towards evening. What did Korbin mean by the word "turn"? All I know is that if you do not save me before the sunset, it shall surely be too late. I know deep within me that whatever they plan, it will not be something I may recover from. I shall pray for nothing else but that my letter reaches you- even if you find it when all hope is lost, know that I loved you until the end, and that none of my many ravishments have changed that!

Yours, loving and lost,

Irena