Chapter Two

The two probationers were left a while, still chained to the slabs, to recover from the piercing and the threading of the metal through the flesh. Although throbbing painfully herself, Joanne found her colleague's whimpering hard to bear. The pause in the operations did not last long before Coursel was clamping the rivets in the ankle and wrist leathers; already in place, the bonds required a final hammering to ensure permanency. Each neck was then encircled with the broad iron throat band, replacing the earlier temporary leather strap; there too the rivets were flattened. Writhing in pain, Joanne guessed each restraint carried the same four rings for chaining and bondage, as on her colleagues in the cellar.

The work was done competently enough. Martine moaned and struggled, only to receive a lash across her vast, freshly ringed breasts. "What are you doing to me?" she shrieked. "Heaven will punish you for this. Take them off! Haven't we suffered enough?"

Surprisingly, Simone answered her. "And how d'yer think we're going to lead you sluts around? And hook your whorish body up for the whip, eh? Keep that mouth shut unless you're wanting a strap round that too." Martine's groans softened but continued.

The piercing and bondage completed, the slaves were driven to the wall for the neck and wrists to be tied to an iron ring. The new fittings proved effective and painful.

Facing each other, neither girl wished or even managed to utter a word; each stared at the other's hardware, stunned rigid. Both had ample pain to contend with in the semi-darkness. After the departure of the servants, the hours passed very slowly.

Unlike her suffering companion, Joanne was not unhappy. Despite the throbbing in her sexual extremities, she felt her nakedness enhanced by the metal, the clit ring already giving her a sensation of strange arousal. In her heart she felt little compassion for the poignant figure opposite her; the youngster was deplorably faint-hearted, devoid of the slightest sense of eroticism and dismally obese. If she were to survive, Joanne thought, the girl would have to bestir herself, accept her predicament and conform. Her pious refusal to yield was not only pointless but dangerous for them both as religious heretics. Unless, of course, Martine was determined to act the martyr. For her part, Joanne was finding a certain sensual pleasure in this sexual slavery and nudity. She pitied Martine's naivety.

The abrupt entry of the Marquise, Anthea, more striking than ever in pale taffeta and azure ribbons, and their staff, startled Joanne as the chamber became suffused with the fragrance of perfumes overriding the stench of sweat. Coursel and Simone were accompanied by two other domestics, if such was their rank, Joanne had not encountered before. The young maid was dark and slender, the man powerfully built.

"So, here they are, our little ducklings, all ringed and ready." Elodie hooked a kid-gloved finger through one of Martine's teat rings and tugged on it playfully, bringing a shrill yelp out of the plump nude. Elodie frowned "Oh, my poor ears, this slut must be cured of shrieking at me, Anthea dear!" As if to hasten that process, Simone raised her service whip and slashed the slave's thigh. "Thank you, Simone. Now, you and Marie-Félice," the Marquise went on, calling the sultry domestic forward, "get them checked for size and plugged up behind. I want their rear entries nicely stretched and taught to slacken without having to be told." She smiled at the two men standing apart. "I'm sure you'll both see to that! And prior to our next celebrations. That gives you a clear fortnight, doesn't it?"

Taken aback by the orders, Joanne hoped Martine had not understood what was implied. Indeed, the girl had not; she was too busy sniffling and trying to conceal her sex rings. Then the bewigged Marquise went on: "So, Marie-Félice, get to work while that man of yours sizes up our two newcomers. I'd like your views, Bouchard, on my new slaves."

Joanne recalled the information she had gleaned in the slave cellar: the dark-haired female called Marie-Félice, prettily dressed in a green robe the colour of sage, had to be a senior servant and wife or mistress or this Bouchard, the Lassignac major-domo, gaoler and slave flogger, who stood beside her. She was quite attractive, despite a slight strabismus that gave her a look of immense cruelty. Her man was handsome, stalwart and terrifying. Marie-Félice strode forward and the fittings proceeded forthwith. First, each slave was reversed against the wall by Coursel as the woman opened a cupboard in the far wall to return with two anal stopples, the size of large pine cones with several lengths of chain dangling from the bases. She dealt with Martine first, parting the huge slabs of rump meat to force the bung inwards, disregarding the girl's useless clenchings. The insertion met with hysterical cries as the sphincter was gouged, the tight circle of muscle fighting the dildo. The slender chains were then tightened round the prodigious buttocks, passed under the perineum and clipped to the new sex rings. Martine screamed to high heaven as her rear hole stretched to accommodate the shaft. Then Joanne received the same therapy but without demur. She thrilled as both slaves were told they would wear the thing until further notice when not on call. Marie-Félice then tried out several leather hoods on the girls until the correct sizes were found for future use; again Joanne found the objects exciting and frightening as the straps were buckled round her head and throat, blocking the eyes and ears; a wooden gag, well-dented by other teeth, nearly dislocating her jaws. Finally, leather breast cones, armed with internal spikes, and a similar crotch triangle were tried on. The very volume of Martine's mammaries made the test imperative, Marie-Félice remarking she had never seen such vast breasts on a serf. "A daily run round the courtyard under the horsewhip would thin her down, your Grace." Elodie told her to hold her tongue, for suddenly the Marquis entered, in from hunting. Silence fell amid genuflections. The fine weather-tanned face gazed at Martine's plugged bottom. "And what do we have here, in the name of all the saints? Just what I needed. Hand me a whip," he ordered curtly.

A frown clouded Elodie's exquisite face. She was piqued by the untimely appearance. It threw her off her balance - and that before the household - but she summoned up a welcoming smile. For who, after all, was the master of Lassignac?

The man stripped off his leather jerkin and the broad-collared silk blouse, throwing the garments to Simone as Coursel handed him a coil of platted horsehair. In a sepulchral silence, the bare-chested Marquis walked over to Martine's wealth of arse flesh shuddering against the masonry and shook out the leather snake. Elodie drew Anthea towards her as if marshalling an ally. "Oh, diantre, the slut's not ready for this," she muttered.

Then the Marquis saw the summit of the dildo protruding from the anal cleft and the tensed chains denting the buttocks. "Ah, I see we're making headway with this lump of suet. So much the better." Simone took a step forward as it to wrench the sceptre out. "No, woman, she'll do as she is. The sooner she's stretched the better."

The first lash rasped through the already fetid air of the cellar, extending its length across the space separating the man from his victim. The leather ripped across both buttocks with a heavy thud, followed by a sharp hiss as the extremity curled round the slave's haunch to bury itself in the sex rings. Staggering, slamming her belly into the whitewashed wall, Martine's head craned back as the yell tore through the chamber; a pig being slaughtered in the castle farm barely matched the din.

After several more lashes had welted the ponderous lumps of rump steak, the slave crossed her thighs in a futile attempt to protect the splayed sex. But a dozen more had her jerking like a hooked bream. The screams only drove the wench's flogger to whip harder until he felt she was ready. Unbuttoning the lappet of his breeches and gesturing to Simone to reverse the body, the Marquis brought out his huge erection. Breathing heavily, he gazed at the vast breasts rasped scarlet by the stonework and then hauled the thighs up round his hips. The cock yawed a moment before the distended cleft and then drove in with a single thrust, the man still grasping his whip haft. The girl let out a deafening screech as her hymen was ruptured by the monstrous penis... Joanne watched grieving for the poor virgin and yet somehow envying her. Any energy Martine had left in her sobbing, thrashed carcass abandoned her as the Master of Lassignac fucked her. By the time he was ready to empty into her, the head of dark hair had fallen back to thump against the wall. She had passed out.

A moment later, the body was released to slump against the rough wall, the inner fat of the thighs drenched red from the deflowering. Francis-Etienne wiped his cock on the slave's hip. "Well, that's one virgin the less, Elodie dear, for you to play with," he said.

"Indeed," she agreed, again her normal self. "At least you cheated our Dominican out of that! Now, Simone, get them both back to the cellar and medicate them. I don't want any infection blossoming."

As there was still time before the solemn gong would sound for dinner, the Marquise inveigled her Francis to her soft bed upstairs, along with Anthea. Together, the two women writhed like serpents, feeding the man's cock into each other's body in turn, frigging the clitoris as the shaft sank in, emerged and plunged in again. Both were experts at that. After recovering from her orgasm, Elodie managed to put a question.

"But why, beloved, did you use that frigid one? I mean, there was the blonde beauty dazzling us all with her new rings and superb body. Why didn't you take her?"

"Later, Elodie later." He paused, drawing on his silken blouse. "I happened to learn in the stables from a groom that you've decided to consign her - what's her name, yes, Joanne, and what a body indeed - to Anselme for an attempt at conversion in the chapel. I thought that would be ample for her, directly after ringing." Elodie was amazed at how news got around among the servants. "In any event as you saw, the other bitch - the fat whore - seems to lack sexual vigour and needs rigorous whipping if she's to satisfy you."

"Yes, of course." Elodie agreed. "By the way, Francis, I've agreed to lend Anthea to help Anselme with the conversion." Both nobles smiled at the gorgeous minx as she too arranged her dress and peruke. "I'm sure you would have no objection, Francis. Now, let's go down for dinner. I could eat a whole capon after that. You're really a great lover!"

On the way down, the Marquis reverted to the question of Joanne. "I suppose the blonde slave has to be made over to the Dominican." There was reluctance in the voice.

"I'm afraid so precious. We can hardly decline. After all, she is a parpaillote. But as the questioning is to take place in the chapel, it ought to be mild enough. And Anthea will be there to see that the man behaves himself. In any event, whether the shapely wench recants or not, I'm going to keep her here for good. She has begun to satisfy me."

"Very well. But the other one isn't worth much, Elodie, as you gathered from her behaviour just now under the whip. Anselme's going to have a stiff task with her, no?"

The Marquise nodded. "It seems so, alas. We'll just have to see. Meanwhile she can be kept in the cellar. But at least you deflowered the slut and that's a step forward. When her turn comes, our dour Dominican will need to use all his persuasive ingenuity."

Her husband took the beautiful arm as they entered the dining hall, receiving the obsequious bows of the half-naked maids. "Do you honestly believe they will abjure, Elodie?" he inquired. He had his doubts. Moreover, the new blonde attracted him.

"That's not our affair, Francis. We need good whipping flesh, such as we have already down in the cellar. Frankly, that's all that concerns me. To hell with that tonsured Anselme and his hopes of Vatican promotion." Her antipathy ran deep. In her mind's eye she still saw the worthless Martine being flayed, the gross legs capering as if treading the grapes of wrath in the wine cellar. The slag, parpaillote or not, required educating.

The meal, as usual, proved delicious and welcome. Elodie felt exhausted, the unavoidable presence of Dom Anselme at the table annoying her, as he tried to ferret out what had been taking place in the chamber below. The carpe à la juive, jugged hare and rognons de veau flambés, lifted her spirits. And, to her delight, Francis-Etienne had Therèse brought up afterwards from the cellar to the great bedroom for her to thrash.

The following day, Dom Anselme took great care to ensure the chapel presented as sacrosanct an atmosphere for enforced conversion as possible. Thick candles, like white, supplicating arms, had been lit and the nave was thick with holy, aromatic incense. He had placed the prie-dieu centrally in the nave before the wrought iron rood screen, hemp cords ready, if necessary to help the parpaillote bitch towards her abjuration; the short, thick flogging whip lay upon the chair before the prie-dieu. The sight of that instrument, Anselme believed, could persuade any heretic to abjure; but should defiance ensue, a mere dozen lashes of the six-knotted thongs were enough to make a heifer bellow and confess.

It had been agreed with the somewhat awkward Marquise that the young Anthea should attend: in the event of obstinacy on the part of the heretic, it had been further conceded that the girl should carry out such flagellation as might prove necessary. Elodie persuaded herself it would give her lesbian odalisque, despite her already vicious talents, valuable practice. But only if absolutely necessary.

Dom Anselme had considered using the vestry for the interrogation and, if called for, the ensuing beating, but the room was exiguous and hardly lent itself to serious questioning and less still to efficient bondage and the swing of a whip. Hence, the nave was preferred, in which case the holy friar had reluctantly declined to perform a flogging in full view of the high altar. Again Elodie had consented, although the endeavour to convert a stark naked female with flagellation in the chapel hardly pleased her; after all, there was a magnificently equipped cellar as well as other precincts below ready for use, where massive stone walls stifled screams. But the Dominican had insisted on the nave.

Furthermore, he required that the interrogation be carried out in bondage, using the flesh rings which, if the subject proved recalcitrant, could serve to hold the body for persuasive beating. The arms and legs, he explained, would be roped to the platform of the prie-dieu, cords cinching the waist, others passed through the nipple and outer labial rings to secure the infidel outstretched while the examination proceeded. Elodie felt obliged to consent; in fact, she felt the bondage would provide the girl with a taste of what awaited her at a later date. She had already acquiesced to the slim blonde being examined first, the other, less attractive and more obstreperous sinner being meanwhile chained with the other seven inmates in the cellar, awaiting her call. There at least the stout whore would have the opportunity of learning from the group of more mature slaves; although by no means protestants, the cohort below knew what discipline implied and, should the novice persist in her wrong-headedness, what a lusty six-thong or a session of teat torture could do to a naked slave. Whether this uncouth newcomer could be brought to a series of hysterical orgasms, leave alone recant, Elodie doubted, even if the iron tongs were used directly on the inexperienced clitoris.

For his part, the chaplain contended that neither girl could long resist his methods of proselytism and subsequent conversion. If they did hold out against him, he had other means by which a heretic could be brought to see reason.

Accordingly, on the day following the painful ringing session in the holding cellar, Joanne found herself in a windowless cell where she was flushed out, anally greased, oiled and her areoles, teats and clit brought to full erection by the quiet, sour-faced Simone. Curiously, the preparation gave her a thrill she had not experienced before. Even more unexpected was the need spreading through her loins to be used as Martine had been; her body began to yearn for sex, even at the cost of a flogging. She was ready for both.

"What am I due for now, pray, Madame?" she inquired nervously, as the expansion plug was being extracted from her anus. She risked the query since both slaves had been informed they were free to speak to servants but never to their owners and their guests without express permission - and even there, she was told, speech was restricted to a plea to be thrashed and abused and to an expression of thanks once the session was over.

"Conversion, whore," came the reply. "In the chapel before our most saintly man."

"But I have no intention of being converted..."

"We'll see, filthy infidel. Aren't thou aware of our sublime and mighty Sovereign's dictates?" she pressed on the girl's back. "Lean further over and grasp them ankles so I can grease thy whorish arsehole..." Simone employed what French she had. Having learnt the terms by heart, she used them with assurance; they gave her stature.

In chains, the wrists crossed and linked to the nape, Joanna was led up by the expressionless Coursel to the musty chapel where she was expected to admit to her religious offence and beg to be allowed to embrace the true faith. Her first embracement, however, was that of the prie-dieu under the sullen eyes of Dom Anselme and stink of incense. He sat apart, flanked by the young woman that Joanne had seen in the cellar during Martine's recent beating. If the priest was in his customary white habit, the girl was very different; resplendent in black leather boots reaching to her lissom thighs, flared gauntlets, and a web of straps imprisoning her flat belly and hoisting aloft a pair of incredibly handsome, hard-nippled breasts. The pubic growth was narrow, crowning the neat slot of the pouting vulva. From her sloping belt hung a horrendous bunch of flogging leathers, each of the six strands, Joanne saw with a jolt of excitement, arrayed with knots. Anthea represented cruelty incarnate and seemed to know it. The novice stared at the slim figure and realised how deeply she feared and hated the spoilt bitch. Instinctively, she guessed that conversion was not the sole aim of the chapel session. If she was about to be put before the option of denying her faith - which she would repulse with all her strength - the whip told her what her refusal would entail. If she was to be flagellated, strangely she would prefer to suffer under the hand of a male. And, if possible, by a male in erection, as when the Marquis had whipped the pathetic Martine; a stiff cock implied erotic lust but also a compliment to her famished body. Joanne desired the whip as much as the orgasms that she knew would follow - but not bestowed by a ruthless, lascivious bitch...

Yet it was the complacent, half-naked beauty who gave orders to the valet.

"Rope the apostate belly down over the prie-dieu, Coursel. Breasts hanging free, arms and legs outstretched." The voice seemed to spiral up out of Hell. "Cord the teat and labial rings to the uprights and wrench the head back for her questioning."

Smelling of onions and garlic the valet seemed to know what was wanted, for he went to work unhesitatingly. Slamming Joanne down across the prie-dieu, his hands gripped the dangling breasts to tug the slack flesh downwards. Then like bells, the mammaries were left to swing listlessly, awaiting the tethering. Threading a length of cattle rope through each teat ring, he elongated the udders to their maximum reach, securing the cord to the base of the sculpted uprights. He then did likewise with the labia rings. Joanne whimpered as her ringed folds of vulva flesh, still tender from the piercing, were drawn down and outwards and tied to grommets in the platform. Immediately she realised that a sudden jerk of her body could rip the rings out of the flesh. As ordered, the servile brute then yanked back the head by the hair, passed a further cord over the forehead and fastened it to the neck strap. As a final refinement, the legs were splayed for the ankle straps to be tethered to nearby pillars aligning the aisle; the slave thought her hip joints would dislocate. The chill in the bleak edifice froze her sex and buttock meat. If the whip was to come, her entire cleft was bared and available.

"Now, let us commence." The Dominican's rasping voice reached her as if from another world. "You are a sinner, that you know. And a traitor to our Gracious King and to the Church, you devil-infested whore of a parpaillote, persisting in vile heresy. Recant and all will be well. Resist and you will be chastised to submission. Choose. Do you abjure?"

At first Joanne's throat denied her a voice. Then she managed a hoarse cry: "No. Never! Do what you want with my body. My faith is steadfast. My soul is..."

"Flog the bitch!" was all she heard. The knotted whip hissed and fell. Her whole body burst in an explosion of white pain, the buttocks clenching under the knots. Lash after lash from the half-naked Anthea lacerated the curved rump. She felt the welts swelling but steadfastly dared not risk her sexual extremities by intensifying the murderous drag on them. Each lash cut her breath until the tenth stroke fell and she screamed as never before in her life. The bitch sliced harder into the shuddering rump, ensuring the knotted thongs curled into the open crotch. The cords securing the ringed flesh seemed to tighten frighteningly, inexorably.

Fifteen, twenty and then more slashes catapulted shock waves into her brain, her howls shrilling down the nave. Dom Anselme, cock in hand, watched through slitted eyes. Though inexperienced, the infidel's naked body was responding well.

Again came the grindstone of a voice. "Do you repent? Do you abjure, whore?" The interrogation developed into a frightening torrent of abuse. "Foul she-devil incarnate! Anathema on you! Abjure, vile sow! Does not your strumpet's brain tell you that you are stark naked, spread for blooding? I shall have you flayed raw until you howl out your plea of repentance. Abjure and you will be spared and comforted. Speak!"

"Never!" Through veils of agony Joanne heard her own frantic voice yelling out again the only word she had the force to dredge up out of her lungs.

The Dominican's eyes narrowed further as he nodded to Anthea. The girl moved to the victim's reared head, noticing with pleasure the tears and sweat pouring down the cheeks, the artery in the distended neck pulsing behind the studded collar. With all her might Anthea brought the leathers down along the length of the spine. The blow made the loose circles of slave metal in the cunt jounce as the body heaved, sending fresh wails up into the chapel's clerestory. Somewhere in the crescendo of pain, Joanne sensed she was about to faint. Behind slavering lips, she gritted her teeth.

"It's your last chance, infidel. Do you abjure?" the Dominican yelled. In reply the nude body slumped, inert, no longer conscious of the continued thuddings over her flesh.

"Sc be it," the voice announced resignedly. "Give her ten more, Anthea. In the position we have her, forty lashes will suffice. I shall now give her unction that is neither holy nor extreme and you shall reap your reward. Ram your pretty cunt into her maw."

As the thrashing came to an end the victim found herself reviving, only to feel several things: just able to sense what was happening, she knew the prelate was close to her rear, the coarse habit grazing her thighs as he freed his cock. She even felt the thread of liquid trailing over her scorched buttocks and then the head being lowered as the man mounted the prie-dieu. At the same moment, her tear-dazzled eyes saw Anthea's golden triangle nearing her mouth. But more mortifying was the state of her own vagina - swollen and flooded, bloated from the whipping, the clit unsheathed and pulsing. Instinctively she knew the whipping had aroused her to that summit of readiness only penetration and clogging semen could satisfy. Her body was trembling, ready for orgasm.

No sooner aware of her condition, for which she feared she would probably be further punished, Joanne suddenly tensed. The man's shaft was not seeking her vulva; the huge piston was butting at the puckered anus. With a savage jab, the rod was driven home, the slave uttering a sharp cry as the sphincter stretched and yielded. For once she was grateful for the enlarging the plug had brought about. The erection was like the pestle she used at home for crushing olives and just as firm. As the shaft bored in up to its root, for the first time in her uneventful sexual existence, Joanne realised she was at last being sodomised, a pleasure her Jean-Jacques had denied her. As her mouth, like her anus, opened with amazement, she found her face smothered against Anthea's crotch.

"Tongue me, bitch!" the whip mistress hissed, but all Joanne could do was to grit her teeth again to counter the gouging of her rear. Furious at not being instantly obeyed, the woman reversed her grasp on the scourge and, sideways with the haft, struck the nearer of the extended breasts. The blow made the slave gasp as the nipple stretched, the anal thrusts jerking her forward. Quickly, she licked into the steaming slot, perfunctorily at first and then, driven by further slams across the taut udder, vigorously, lapping up the flood of liquid oozing over the labia and then flicking and sucking the stub of gristle as best she could. Surprised at its dimension, modest compared with her own, she curled her inexperienced tongue round the thing, drawing it out now and then with her teeth when Anthea yelled at her to bite. The odour and slime of the young sex, despite her hatred of its owner, excited Joanne, somehow heightening the new sensation in her anus as the sphincter muscle rippled in and out along the Dominican's penis. Even her whipped sex thrilled as the heavy ball sac slapped against it.

A dozen thrusts into the behind sufficed to bring out of the priest the vilest oaths Joanne had yet heard. A moment later she heard herself being ordered to recite twenty Ave Maria's which, quite apart from being smothered by Anthea's grinding cunt, she had no earthly intention of doing. The refusal brought further retaliation as Anselme urged his partner: "Lash the heretic's udders, Anthea, both of them!" and the young girl used the whip haft again below the roped body. Joanne prayed chaotically and somehow managed to remain whole.

Suddenly the man withdrew, only to lower his cock and plunge in between the vulva fronds, stretched to a prodigious length by the rope. With a groan of relief, the slave, at long last, felt the rod slither sumptuously into her to hammer the cervix; again she almost fainted but with lust this time, as the shaft became aggressive. Joanne let out a muffled cry of despair when the prelate pulled out to ram again into the anus, his preferred site for depositing his sacred seed. Joanne's groans, stifled in the golden fleece flattened on her face, diminished as excitement obliterated the aching residues of the flogging. The cock's return to impale her backside left the clit jerking with need, the impending orgasm fluttering like a kestrel hovering above her, about to swoop out of the skies of the Cevennes into her entrails. But the Dominican continued to ream the butt in silence, admiring the way his partner was wrenching clumps of the slave's hair to keep her head working, threatening her with further lashes if she did not tongue harder than she was pretending to do. Joanne licked and suctioned desperately, not anxious for a renewed onslaught of leather. What, she anguished, was to prevent them turning her over and thrashing her breasts and pubis? What stopped them twisting her nipples until they bled? Nothing. They had her stark naked, at their mercy.

Abruptly, Anselme's fingers groped below the whipped thighs to seize the stiff clit. "Cap de Diou, as I thought," he grunted, "whipping excites our wanton slut!"

Joanne knew he was right. The two of them had brought a sex-starved victim to a point of no return. She was teetering on the verge of crisis. She was about to come. As the man's fingers mauled her clitoris, the gladiators' Morituri te salutant her old pastor had mentioned in a sermon echoed in her. She was about to die. Not by the sword. By orgasm. She felt panic rising in her. Had she the right to spend? And if so, what would they do to her? Torture her? Make her run, jangling, behind a horse as on that ghastly night of capture, but in a circle with the major-domo, valets, servants lashing her?

Cursing her two persecutors and her own lust, she strove to delay the explosion. The exertion proved fatal. The hawk swooped with distended talons on to her and bore her screaming into the cloudy heights. Her yells intermingled with groans: "Yes, yes... whip me... I'm coming! Now...Yes... Oh, yes! Now!" Careering into wild orgasm, the nude body wrenched recklessly on the corded nipple rings. The orgasm tore so suddenly, so utterly through her that the howls of ecstasy and release transpierced the drab walls of the chapel, invading the passages, bedrooms, cellars, stairwells, vaultings... Then Anthea followed suit, spewing her discharge over the slave's face. The females' cries drove the man to lengthen his rectal plunges and, just as abruptly, the thick sperm pumped into the heretic's bowels, Joanne continuing to spasm. Slowly he freed his penis from the grip of the anus and lowered his cassock.

"Comes like a veritable prostitute, Anthea. Yes, as I thought, a sister of sin. As she seems to relish the whip, we must apply other, more appropriate instruments to instigate conversion. But for now, we shall leave her to wallow in the slough of her despicable heresy. I have done my best with the slag. At least for the moment."

"You certainly have, Brother Anselme!" his partner remarked breathlessly. "She came with a vengeance. Where did your fine piston deposit its offering? Front or Back?"

"Always in the dark realms of the bowels, sweet daughter. As a man of principle, I do not wish to trouble this noble castle with my offspring. Now, dear Anthea, kindly call the valet and have the filthy strumpet bound to the rood screen to consider her plight."

Thrilled at having been offered the chance to flagellate a fine pair of whore buttocks and breasts (although she would have preferred a better presentation of the latter), Anthea had enjoyed the pious session. Like the gracious Elodie, she felt no dismay over Dom Anselme's failure to convert the heretic; the object was there to be whipped and used. That was what naked slaves were for at Lassignac. To provide pleasure.

Wiping off her faithful six-thong, she summoned Coursel. The valet, nettled to have been, as usual, left out of the session, had contented himself by solemnly frigging off in the nearby transept, leaving the clots to harden on the paving; it was dirty enough already and the chapel was not in his purview of duties; but flogging was. Yet he had to admit that this spoilt lesbian, Anthea, did wield a whip with force and style. She needed no tuition.

"Chain this stubborn pagan trash to the rood screen, man," Anselme ordered, "while I pray for continued spiritual strength to perform my mission. I shall try again with her anon." The priest's eyes glinted as he observed his cum oozing from the slave's anal bud. Converted or not, the newly arrived blonde at least showed promise in one direction: she took whip and penis admirably enough. As he straightened out his garb, he wondered how, should she persist in refusing conversion, the pretty bitch would react to the Marquise's sessions of sex torture, the breast quirt, pincers, prongs, needles and the rest. Although he was never invited to such ceremonies, it was common knowledge that the other slaves currently domiciled at the château responded well, but then they had been toughened and trained through incessant use by their eminent proprietress and guests. This well-built blonde, he thought, might well outstrip them in competence. In any event, whether she abjured, attended Mass and confession or not, Anselme knew she would remain a prisoner and available to the house for routine use. Thus, his work to achieve abjuration could continue. Like the Marquise, the saintly man felt that conversion lay still some way off but he would strive for it. As to the other parpaillote, the plump newcomer with her enormous breasts and broad arse, he felt fairly certain she would not be tempted by abjuration, whatever was done to her at the outset; hence, she could be counted on to provide him, as well as the rest of the household and visitors, with ready flogging flesh until ultimately she weakened and gave in. Once she had been whipped into grovelling submission, conversion would be merely a matter of sequential steps, for had he not when seconded earlier to accompany the dragoons, made scores of scourged women abjure? Fifty lashes had usually sufficed. Thirty, if hung by the legs to be crotch or breast whipped.

As he watched the flogged, groaning slave being detached from the prie-dieu, Dom Anselme smiled to himself as he thought of the cunning Marquise's preoccupation over the possibility that he, her chaplain, would request the release of the girls, if conversion were achieved. Under no circumstances would he suggest such a thing. The slaves would remain slaves, precisely where they were, imprisoned nipple-naked in the dungeon, like the others, for sexual use. Meanwhile, and Anselme smiled again, the parpaillote bitches would hold out to the limit of what they thought their flesh could stand and then abjure on the promise of release, only to find themselves condemned to permanent slavery within the dark womb of Lassignac.

Again observing how the valet handled the blonde beauty, who had collapsed at the man's feet, Anselme knew he could break the bitch sooner or later and trusted the unpredictable Marquise would act in a spirit of cooperation and not commandeer the new whores completely. One never knew with her. Sometimes he suspected that lust took precedence over her wish to bring about conversion.

Having kicked the wilting nude to her feet, Coursel bowed to the Dominican whom he admired for his faith and for the patience he exhibited in dealing with headstrong transgressors. He would give a finger of his hand to fuck with Anthea but that was beyond imagining; he would have to make do as usual with the cellar slaves during their daily whippings - 'to keep them conditioned' was Elodie's phrase - and, alas, with his appallingly unappetising spouse; his Simone required a great deal of cock to keep her quiet.

As she was dragged towards the high rood screen, Joanne also cast a covert look through her tears at the sanctimonious Dominican fingering his rosary beads as if still rolling her clitoris. How she hated him! But even more virulent was her loathing for the young bitch, Anthea - if that was indeed her name. Legs apart, the beauty stood there imperiously, mopping up on her gauntlet the saliva and come beginning to encrust her sex. She was a heinous invention of nature, even if highly responsive to cunnilingus...

The welted slave girl stumbled up the three chancel steps for whatever was to follow, Coursel crossing himself devoutly as he slammed the debilitated, slaked body against the wrought iron. After stretching the arms aloft and splaying the legs the man chained the four limb straps to the screen. Satisfied with the bondage he then crammed the mammaries through the bars, three rods apart, as Dom Anselme had ordained. Entering the sanctuary with renewed genuflections, he joined the nipple rings and went about the throttling of the breast roots with lengths of wet cord he had brought in a pail. Again in line with the holy instructions received and with an unspeakable viciousness Joanne had begun to recognise as the mark of Lassignac, he wrenched the swollen masses together to join them over the bars. The strangled protuberances, still blazing from what Anthea had inflicted and now pulsing with blue veins, bulged from the tight hemp, the areoles and teats turning into dark magenta lumps. Joanne moaned as the mounds were roped together with a further length of damp rope, the flesh beginning to darken under the stricture. But more was to come. Similarly but using a pair of blacksmith's pincers, the valet seized the outer fronds of the vulva by the rings to stretch the flesh through the bars until the labia met round the central rod of iron. Passing a further length of soaked hemp through each ring he knotted it tightly. The slavegirl felt her slippery discharge gluing her to the bar.

Although assuaged by her orgasms, Joanne began to tremble, wondering in dread how long her corded flesh could endure the bondage. Her terror made her risk uttering a pathetic plea as she waited to learn her further fate.

"I beg of you, noble friar, sweet mistress, spare me... please! Have I not had enough to satisfy your needs? My breasts are aching, my lower lips..."

Her implorings were drowned by Anselme's fury. From halfway down the nave, he seemed to address the rood screen rather than the bound slave girl.

"A heathen whore in the process of conversion remains silent, unless it wishes to be hung head down, instead of its present position. It is against this sanctified screen that a flogged infidel must hang until well after Vespers, so that the miserable heretical body can be viewed by the entire company of our virtuous castle. We shall pray for your soul, misguided sister."

Her face crushed against the bars, Joanne suddenly sensed Anthea close behind her, the strands of the whip straying over the welted buttocks that immediately clenched with alarm.

"By Vespers," the hiss was close to her ear, "your cords will have dried and tightened. Then you can scream with some justification to have your evil body freed. It will be for your distinguished owner, the Marquise Elodie alone, to decide whether to release you or to have you further flagellated."

The whip parted the rear cheeks to drift terrifyingly down the anal furrow.

"As a slave you must inure yourself to suffering. After all, slut, we let you enjoy your foul lust, didn't we?"

Joanne attempted a grateful nod, still trembling at the whip's journey over her.

"Unless," Anthea went on, this time startling Joanne rigid, "the Marquise summons you to the great bed chamber, to discharge special duties."

The prospect and the word 'discharge' were enough to bring a frigid sweat out from the prisoner's brow and armpits; she goosefleshed from head to heels. The phrase discharge special duties, she feared, probably inferred a great deal more than a few mind-splitting orgasms; she could almost see a flogging column, probably sheathed in velvet, and the gleaming instruments. And, worse still, her owner disrobing and strapping on a studded dildo to stimulate her body.

It was by sheer chance that Elodie met her chaplain and Anthea in the long, antler-adorned corridor that led from the chapel to the main building and the drawing room.

"Well, what was the result, dear friends?" Elodie asked pleasantly, her hand upon Anthea's bottom. "I trust it was not too tiresome for you."

"Gracious lady." Anselme reported with a shrug. "A lost cause, at least so far. The profligate requires extremely strenuous whipping and, if I may suggest, a modicum of inquisitional torture, of a sexual nature, of course," - he knew his Marquise well - "to convince the slut of her crass stupidity. And at the same time of the dangers she runs, should she continue in heresy. She does not appear to understand her predicament and the distress she is causing us all. Do not hesitate to call on me noble lady, when further convincing is required. I am at your Grace's service at all times. Night and day." He bowed stiffly with grave obeisance. Although he trusted the beautiful woman no further than he could spit, he admired her and had no wish to be assigned elsewhere by the bishop.

The Marquise guessed what had occurred and what had been applied to the newcomer. In her heart, she was delighted the bigot remained stubborn and recalcitrant; it implied that, as an unrepentant infidel, the slave girl could continue to be used without mercy, which was not quite the case of the others sprawling in the dungeon below who had no treason to expiate. And there was darling Anthea, standing there sweating, to consider; at the dawn of this new, propitious eighteenth century under Louis le Grand, such gifted girls needed practice, just as freshly inducted slaves needed tuition.

"Well, I'm sure you did your best," Elodie purred. "Thank you both. Where, by the way, is the attractive creature now?"

Astonished by the adjective, Anthea told her. "Sexually bound with the soaked cords and chained to the rood screen for further beating - if that's what we have in mind."

"We?" Elodie queried. "Beloved, it is I who decide here. And anyway, I'm not so sure how best to proceed with this one. I'm mulling over certain other ideas. But thank you both for your trouble. I trust it was not too tedious."

"Not at all, dearest Elodie," Anthea assured her. "In fact, it was quite interesting. If you're going to torture her, could I participate? I'd hate to miss that, you know."

"Your attendance at such sessions rather depends on Francis, angel. We'll have to consult him. I promise to bear it in mind. Anyway, I'm so pleased you did well in the chapel. You must have looked delightful, arrayed like that. Now go and tell Simone to heat you a nice hot bath. You're covered with sweat and," she glanced down, "something else."

She gave her slender, almost naked bedmate a congenial smile of complicity.

Without acknowledging the couple's bow and curtsy, Elodie sauntered off to see to the arrangements for the ceremonies three weeks ahead, a particularly important occasion since, among others, the Vicomte de Challens and his mistress had accepted the invitation. Both Xavier de Challens and the obese Christine were demanding guests when it came to nocturnal sessions in the cellar or the drawing room. The woman had, in fact, recently written to Elodie and had even had the Vicomte's major-domo deliver the letter. 'I hear you have two new little redbreasts nesting with you,' the quilled scrawl said, 'Keep them fresh for us, dearest Elodie. You know how partial Xavier and I are to enjoying relatively untrained and unsullied flesh.' A trifle vexed at having her little flock of old-timers considered as tainted amateurs, Elodie nevertheless found the missive challenging. Anyway, she was extremely fond of Christine; she was someone who really enjoyed flogging young slaves; in her residence she wore out three or four peasant girls a year.

The question of whether these dear friends would insist on trying out the hysterical parpaillote Martine, quite apart from the blonde, stalwart Joanne, troubled Elodie. She was quite aware that both the Vicomte and Christine relished bulk and well-fleshed breasts that swung well and responded sensually to the leathers and quirts but, should they ask for Martine to be put to the whip, it could well raise problems. What if the slut began to rant, blaspheme and recite Genevan psalms? Elodie decided the plump novice would just have to be gagged; there was nothing more disconcerting and less erotic than a slave cursing when being beaten. Groans and screams and orgasms were acceptable but not curses.

She decided to discuss the matter with Francis-Etienne in bed that very night. After all, it was he who had chosen the slut out there in the woods and had already, if unexpectedly, flogged and used her in the holding cellar, with adverse results. It could then be decided whether to take the risk of offering her to guests. If he agreed to throw her like an early Christian to the lions, all well and good. But it would be wise to reserve one of the private punishment cells for that. There, without risking a disgrace to the house, they could turn the slut into boiled beetroot, as far as Elodie was concerned; she blessed her stars there were the others and this new Joanne. The obese, sluggish heretic simply did not seem to possess, at least so far, the requisite qualities of a satisfactory sex slave and, after all, the Château de Lassignac prided itself on its reputation for providing reliable, highly potent flesh that took the whip and torture devices well, performed fellatio and cunnilingus competently and orgasmed promptly - when given permission. Such were to her mind the intrinsic qualities of a slave. An overt lack of cooperation on the part of inmates could only lead to disappointment among guests who would then tend to seek satisfaction elsewhere. And there were many abodes, even in the Cevennes and the Vivarais, where responsive slaves could be found. Of course, Elodie reminded herself, persistent shortcomings on the part of a slave could result in terrifying penalties, levelled each Monday on condemned culprits hung naked from the correction gallows in the courtyard, and every Lassignac prisoner knew what that entailed. Yet even that might not necessarily prove conclusive in Martine's case. Perhaps her time with her colleagues was warning her of the penalties and probably the over-fleshed bitch had understood; a session with Xavier de Challens and his paramour, if it was something of an honour, could be rigorous. This parpaillote's breasts, flapping around like over-stuffed saddle-bags, might well attract some or the guests. If not, then there was only one solution - to consign the feckless slut to the conveniently nearby Convent of the Annunciation where strict training, for which Elodie had no time, tamed a tongue and reduced any slave to docile meat.

The Marquise reclined in her high-backed chair in the library and thought.

She found the preparations for a guest weekend always worrying and, above all, demanding, from the point of view of introducing enchanting novelties likely to please her guests as well as Francis-Etienne and herself - and, of course, Anthea, who had produced innovations of her own, some of which Elodie had had to veto.

The same old cellar, the same bodies and the same contrivances tended, she had noticed, to bore some of her more aesthetic and demanding guests. Even if Lassignac lay in the heart of the strife-ridden, parpaillote-infested Cevennes, the guests seemed prepared to run the risk of attending her weekend frivolities, and the austere château had to live up to its renown. Elodie had no wish for her home to be considered merely as a whorehouse or, as one rumour had it, a slave farm; it had to provide what the provincial nobility merited, being deprived of the lascivious extravagances of the capital. Her dear friends deserved good food and wine, comfortable beds and, above all, tempting slave flesh (without dark rings of stress under the eyes) to enjoy. If the remote Cevennes could not pretend to match the debauchery of the specialised salons of Paris and, at another level, the splendour of the new Versailles, at least the local nobility could enjoy themselves in much the same way. It was only natural and kept boredom at bay. But this wretched rising among the unruly Protestants was causing trouble. The more men, Elodie maintained, sent to the galleys, the gallows, the wheel, and females to the Tour de Constance, the better - except her two new girls.

Musing in her chair, Elodie recalled one improvement with pleasure. Some months back, Francis had returned from a visit to Claude-Eugène, their friend and neighbour - although a good half-day's ride away - with an idea gleaned from his whipping rooms (in fact he lodged his slaves, tethered like mares, in his stables for his grooms to use and whip, pending the nude bodies being summoned for use by their owner).

"I noticed, Elodie sweet," her husband reported, "that he has all his females wearing high-heeled mules of sorts. Not slippers but delicately fashioned shoes of white doeskin. They added, I must say, to the length and shape of a leg. Why don't you adopt the same footwear for ours? The girls will still be nude, even it they're shod. But, believe me darling, heels do make a difference. Erotically, I mean."

Elodie knew what he implied. Indeed, on an earlier visit to the Tournelle's castle near Mondragon, where there was a slave for sale, she herself had seen their stark naked serving wenches, all pierced and chained, stepping delicately about on similarly lofty heels. Francis-Etienne's remark encouraged her to adopt the idea and, summoning the same cobbler she had her girls fitted with the same. After riding up from Nîmes and somewhat surprised to be confronted by a bunch of naked females with purple stripes across their bottoms and breasts, the man measured all the girls for the required mules and delivered them promptly enough; he had quite a store of them already in stock, since the style seemed to be all the rage in the more sophisticated, if still parochial, local centres of fashion. Claude-Eugène claimed that very similar models were to be seen in almost any brothel worth its name in Paris, particularly those establishments where slave flagellation and what was euphemistically called 'erotic torture' were practised. "And Claude-Eugène should know," Francis had added, having himself, Elodie suspected, participated.

On the two newcomers joining the throng, the shoemaker had again called to fit them out. Although Martine sulked, Joanne was thrilled, having rarely seen, leave alone worn, anything approaching a heeled shoe before; she saw how admirably they enhanced her and her colleagues' allure and added to their height and swagger. The inmates were disappointed when informed the footwear would only be worn during the ceremonial weekends or when summoned to the bedchamber for whipping and sex.

Gazing out at the clouds drifting over the Cevenol woods, Elodie remembered how pleased she had felt to think she was keeping abreast of Paris. Only Laurent, her male slave (reserved mainly for certain women guests), had to content himself with a pair of cross-gartered sandals. As compensation, Elodie had had Simone pierce his foreskin and clamp in a special ring, embedded firmly enough for the aging Comtesse Evelyn de la Burre-sage - another eager visitor invited for the coming weekend - to use as an anchor when a cock chain was hooked through it and tightened to the opposite wall. Being parallel with the cellar floor, it greatly enhanced Evelyn's enjoyment in whipping the youth's superb rod of stiff meat and, thereafter, having herself fucked, time and again, by the purple-veined, ringed phallus - the main object of her visiting Lassignac. The dangling adjunct chafed and delighted the old trout's vagina, numbed from constant use of a ribbed dildo in the lonely bed amid her sumptuous surroundings up there in the chestnut-dense hills.

Nervous at first, Elodie had had Simone try the novelty out right away in the fitting cellar once the ring had been clamped in place. Spread against the masonry by the four limb straps, his loins arching out to have the harnessed erection chained to the opposite wall, just as the de la Burre woman would want it, the youth jerked magnificently against the haul of the ring-and-chain while the sullen maid brought the cane down on the shaft. Elodie saw that her handsome youth of a slave needed no other stimulation than the successive tugs on the ringed prepuce and a dozen cuts of the slender Malacca rod to bring him off. His glutinous sperm had jetted out in thick ropes across the cell. The demonstration had won over Elodie completely. The appurtenance even seemed to intensify the ejaculation which was, in any event, always potent, especially after a whipping.

"Excellent, Simone. Thank you for helping," she remembered saying and asking the breathless, one and only male prisoner: "Are you pleased, slave?"

The peasant lad had given his owner a broad grin of contentment as Simone freed the shrinking shank. Surrounded by so many metal-encumbered females on stilts, the penis ring clearly endowed him with a new and special status. Moreover, the females loved it.

Still sprawled in her library chair. Elodie also recalled warning her servant. "That will do for now, woman. I don't want him spurting more than necessary. Let him recharge his balls until the Comtesse arrives. And see to it with Coursel that the girls don't play around with him in the cellar, and particularly that ravenous Bette. So chain him well away from them, next, say, to our psalm-reciting parpaillote. She won't dare touch him or let herself be touched. If there's any nonsense between them, use the whip. And talking of her, I don't expect the bitch will be with us much longer. I'm thinking of the convent."

Simone had nodded sagely. "Aye, Madame, that would help. She's stone lazy."

Having done her duty, the faithful servant had bowed her owner out of the holding and fitting cellar, admiring the gait, perfume and the rustle of the brocaded silks.

As now there were only three weeks before the next ceremony, Elodie had scores of preparations to attend to: advance orders had to be issued through Anthea to different levels and areas of the sprawling château. As the date approached the guests' quarters needed to be checked, passages swept, the kitchen fare verified ahead of time and the cellars freshly strewn with straw, the paraphernalia and whips greased. The cells would all need to be wiped clean of sweat, sperm and blood, freshly white-washed and perfumed with stimulating aromas. Candles had to be renewed. Pails of water were needed to revive slaves momentarily overwhelmed by the floggings, bouts of flesh torture and orgasms.

Yet, the Marquise dallied, relishing a further precious moment of peace. There was still time and before stirring herself, Elodie treated herself to one more recollection that had given her pleasure.

Although Francis-Etienne's proposals towards improving procedures were few, one had certainly invigorated life in the second courtyard. Just after New Year, he had instituted the 'punitive whippings'; these were carried out early on the Monday following a ceremonial weekend, when delinquent slaves - and sometimes servants and the castle's serfs - were led out, following condemnation, to be publicly flagellated naked. Sexual lethargy, disobedience, attempts to suborn servants, failure to report menstruation in time were among the crimes expiated at the so-called 'whipping gibbet'. The post stood on a broad timber platform in the centre of the desolate walled yard; it consisted of an iron brace projecting from its summit to which the culprit's arms were extended and chained, the ankles being wrenched back and bound behind the stake from which a thick rod bolted, midway on the upright, thrust deep into the anus, arching the body outwards, the pendant breasts dangling free. Elodie found the posture pleased her more discerning guests who made a point of staying over to watch the ordeals. In addition, the gibbet served also to mete out special punishment for slaves who had failed to satisfy a guest fully during a weekend; in such cases it was left to the visitor to decide on the type of scourge and number of lashes the miscreant merited. It was always Bouchard, the castle major-domo and flogger, who carried out the flagellations. Such cases were relatively rare but the fleshy, rump-branded Bette knew the place well; she had an unfortunate way of vexing guests with her brash look and crude behaviour. The guests had the post used regularly despite Elodie's fear that a slave might develop the ague while hanging naked for hours in the raw morning air. Slaves were becoming hard to replace in these days of revolt and military investment of the Cevennes. Moreover, an increasing number of females were seeking refuge abroad.

Thinking of Protestants, Elodie found herself again reminded of the problematic Martine, this psalm-singing parpaillote sluggard, and wondered if she should not spend an hour or two on the gibbet and be given, say, fifty lashes with the bull's pizzle by Bouchard over those hulking dugs. No, preferably the convent. With that constructive thought, the Marquise roused herself from the cobwebs of reverie. But the slut irritated her with her refusal to cooperate, her wailing to high heaven and fighting like one of those wild cats that roamed the Cevennes. As she was, the slag would hardly tempt a guest. If only Francis-Etienne would take more interest in running the place instead of just hunting, fucking and suddenly deciding, of all things, to whip the useless newcomer.

Languidly, Elodie roused herself from her ponderings and went to discuss with her faithful Bouchard how best to transport the slut to the holy Convent of the Annunciation, should the Mother Superior agree to take her in for training. Bouchard would also know what was happening out in the world at large and how the royal answer to this disturbing Protestant revolt in the Cevennes was progressing. That worried her more than Martine.