Marketplace (11 page)

He struggled to put himself
in that position, his chest expanding outward, his groin area
shamelessly exposed. His breath came in short gasps.

“We’re going to work you
hard if you stay,” Alexandra said softly, stroking the length of
the crop. “That body of yours needs schooling. Your attitude and
behavior needs shaping. But I’m inclined to believe that you have
some real potential. The first step in realizing it is to
understand that the training you have had before coming here is not
relevant. To hammer this home, you will not be permitted to wear
the garments you brought with you, the teddies and the costumes and
bows.”

To her dismay, his cock
began to lower. Was it so deeply ingrained, this fetish? Well, she
might as well find out this week, before he was
accepted.

“You will wear
male-identified work clothes. You will do real, meaningful
work.”

The cock drooped and
lowered further. What a shame.

“You will remember to
address me as ma’am, and never as mistress, and you will serve an
equal time with Grendel and with Chris as your studies
increase.”

Robert whimpered as his
erection faded away. Alexandra sighed.

“Very disappointing. By the
end of the week, I want you able to hold onto that for longer
than,” she checked her watch, “two minutes.” She jotted down a
note. “You may dress and go now, Robert.”

He practically crawled out
of the room. He felt like he was in hell.

* * * *

After spending an hour in
silent study in the library, far across the room from Robert,
Claudia was almost grateful to find herself in Chris’s company
again. The silence, after that wretched luncheon, was unbearable.
She found that she couldn’t concentrate on anything, and ended up
aimlessly turning the pages of a randomly selected book, never
really reading what was printed there. To be assigned a household
task was so wonderfully familiar! She followed the little majordomo
back through the formal dining room and kitchen, and he showed her
where the cleaning supplies were.

“Your records show that you
have limited housekeeping skills,” Chris noted, taking her to a
sunny alcove off the west side of the kitchen. “However, polishing
silver seemed to be one of your strong points.”

Claudia nodded eagerly.
“Mistress has some fine silver,” she said proudly.

“I didn’t ask for that
information, Claudia.” Chris’s eyes bored into her and she shrunk
back. “It’s not like you to volunteer such useless information.
Control your anxiety in silence, please.” He continued as though he
hadn’t just scolded her and humiliated her to the core of her
being.

“Without making judgments
on the quality of the silver you’re going to be given, you will
proceed to clean and polish it. The time you have is just over
three hours. If you don’t finish it all today, you’ll be
disciplined, and then you will continue the task tomorrow, and the
next day until you are finished. Place the cleaned pieces on towels
on that shelf. Ah, here’s the first box.”

Claudia looked up to see
Brian enter the alcove, a large box cradled in his arms. As he
lowered it carefully to the floor, it made a loud clanking
sound.

“Ms. Rachel says there’s
two more like this, Chris. Should I get them now?” Brian asked. His
shirt was gone, and the nipple rings glinted in the afternoon
sun.

“Yes. Better to let Claudia
know what she’s in for, so she can pace herself properly. Deliver
them here, you can fit them under the table.” Chris pointed, Brian
nodded. Then Chris turned back to Claudia, who was eying the box
with a growing sense of trepidation.

“Are your instructions
clear, Claudia?”

“Um. Yes, I mean yes,
Chris.”

“Then go to it,
girl.”

Claudia waited until Chris
had actually left to open the box. Silver polishing in the home of
her Mistress was a task utilizing pristine beige polishing cloths,
small amounts of creamy pink fluid and loving gentle wipes. The
silver was never allowed to become truly tarnished.

The box was full of ancient
looking, heavy pieces of silver blackened with old tarnish, stained
and scratched. It looked like a box of burnt junk salvaged from
some basement of family castoffs. And it was full to the top, with
goblets, trays, serving pieces, and a tangle of eating
utensils.

Claudia sat down heavily.
She looked at the box and felt a touch of nausea. She could never
finish all this work in one day. She couldn’t finish it all in a
year! And it was so, so dirty! Filthy! Despite Alexandra’s warning,
tears sprang to her eyes. How could she do such work?

And what had Brian said?
There were two more boxes of this... this mess. She was in
hell.

* * * *

As Brian went hunting for
the second box of old silver pieces, his mind was on the walk he
had shared with the majordomo.

He had originally decided
to take the walk in order to get to know the mysterious little man
better. It was also, he reflected, a good chance to get away from
his fellow slaves. He had gone to the store room and found his own
clothing neatly on a shelf marked with his name. Pulling his boots
on, after only half a day of wearing these soft, loose garments,
had been a startlingly pleasurable experience. It had also given
him his second thorough beating of the day.

Chris had been waiting for
him at the paddock adjoining the stable. The strap on his belt was
missing, but he held a short riding crop, a style Brian knew was
called a bat. As Brian stepped forward, a smile on his face,
Chris’s expression went from acknowledgement to disgust.

“What? What did I do?”
Brian asked, pausing.

“What did I tell you to do,
Brian?” Chris questioned.

“Meet you here in my
boots,” Brian said, puzzled.

“No. I told you to meet me
here and to fetch a pair of boots. You have to learn to listen when
someone speaks to you, Brian.” Chris turned as a young man with
long blond hair led a chestnut mare out of the stable. The mare was
saddled with an English-style cross country saddle, stirrups run
up.

“Jack, would you please
bring me a dressage whip?” Chris asked, taking the
reins.

“Yessir, Mr. Parker.” His
voice rolled and dipped, a slight accent emphasizing a tone of
amusement.

Chris looped the horse’s
reins around the top rail of the paddock and pointed toward a sunny
spot some 20 feet away. “Trousers down, shirt off and bent so that
your arms are braced on the top rail, Brian.”

Such an amazing experience,
being so naked in the sun. The boots seemed to emphasize his
vulnerability. Brian had waited, his arms braced, for several
interminable minutes, reveling in the sensations. The sun was hot
against his back, the wind sensuous against his thighs and belly.
His cock rose and trembled. By the time Chris came to him with the
whip, a drop of moisture had formed at the tip, and sweat had
appeared at the back of his neck. It all felt so good, so
right!

Until the whipping started.
The dressage whip stung, a sharp, annoying, cutting pain that made
him yelp. Chris laid it on with steadily increasing force and
rhythm, from the backs of Brian’s thighs to his
shoulders.

This was not like a beating
with a strap, or a belt or a heavy flogger. Those were manly
instruments, meant to cause impact and bruising. In the right
hands, whips and straps had coaxed monstrously pleasurable orgasms
from Brian’s body.

But this whip hurt in an
entirely different way. Without causing the thudding repercussive
effect that made his cock stand at attention, it hurt him lighting
fast, with terrible accuracy.

Brian tried to control
himself after the first surprising bite of the whip. But the
swiftly flying single tress kept catching him in one sensitive spot
after another, until all the discipline he could muster just faded
away to nothing. Clenching his hands tightly around the smooth wood
of the fence, he lowered his head and tried to keep as quiet as
possible. Whimpers and gasps soon began to break through. Sharp,
whistling breaths between clenched teeth gave way to actual cries
as his body began to accumulate long reddish lines of stinging
intensity.

And then, it stopped. Brian
gasped and shook, but did not break his position.

“Good,” Chris said. “Now,
put your clothing back on and wait for me.”

And that was it. When Chris
returned, he was leading the mare. Chris mounted and rode, and
signaled Brian to walk beside him, and Brian did. His trousers and
shirt felt hot, confining and irritating against the marks on his
skin. The sun seemed glaringly hot all of a sudden, and if Brian
had ever intended to start a conversation with Chris, the intent
fled with his confidence. The mental gag he felt was as efficient
as the physical one Chris had pushed into his mouth the day before.
He kept his pace with the horse and took deep breaths and tried to
figure out what the hell he had to do to make it here.

This was nothing like he
had expected. Ruefully remembering Sharon’s outburst of the
morning, he found that he was in agreement with her. This was not
what he signed up for. He figured that the house was going to be
heaven.

The fiery condition of the
back of his body was a testament to his error.

When they got back to the
house, Chris examined him and told him to leave the shirt off for
the rest of the afternoon. Ms. Rachel was brisk and efficient and
very cold, and there was amusement in her eyes as she ordered him
about. Although Brian felt a moment of sympathy for little Claudia,
stuck rubbing smelly chemicals over the most disgusting pieces of
silverware he had ever seen in his life, he spent most of the
afternoon feeling enormously sorry for himself.

* * * *

Sharon waited. And waited.
And waited. Spending an hour dozing on that sorry excuse for a bed
was hard enough. Being stuck in this totally boring library without
even a radio to listen to was excruciating! How could people have
so many books that were so totally boring? Back home, she had three
shelves of books, famous ones and cheap, dirty ones, all about
slaves and masters and kinky sex. She even had some books of
photos, and one really hot version of
The
Story of O
done up in drawings. These
people, supposedly ‘real’ masters, didn’t even have one hot book in
their entire stupid library.

She looked at the binder
containing the stuff she was supposed to be studying, flipped
through it again, and put it back. She had seen all that shit this
morning! How many times did they expect her to read it? Or maybe
they thought she was slow or something.

She tried to sleep again,
but was too tense. First, I get awakened like I’m in the army or
something. Then, some bitch of a
maid
, for crying out loud, gets her
jollies stuffing soap in my mouth while I crawl around doing
her
job. Then, they
leave me all alone in this stupid boring so-called library, feed me
dull, boring food for lunch with no coffee, and then wham, I’m back
in this room. Maybe they’re gonna train me to be a slave by boring
me to death.

She did manage to doze,
thinking of a beautiful castle full of gorgeous, California-blond,
deeply tanned and muscular young masters who wore soft, tight
leather pants. And I would wear a jeweled thong, dipping low and
arching high, with a sparkling collar around my neck, and maybe
gold rings on my nipples, and everyone would just die when I walked
by, but they couldn’t touch because they know I belong to the king,
who loves only me, and they’re all jealous...

“Are you ill,
Sharon?”

She came out of her reverie
with a snap. Grendel was standing by the couch she had been dozing
on, his hands in his pockets, a thoughtfully concerned look on his
face.

“Huh? No, no, I’m all
right, I’m awake.” She sat up, trying not to yawn, forcing a small,
slightly embarrassed, slightly shy smile. “I’m sorry, ma— sir. I
guess I didn’t get enough sleep last night.”

He nodded. “And you’re not
used to studying this much?” he offered.

Her smile broadened, and
she bowed her head in the way that all the men she’d ever played
with found so charming and submissive. She knew what would come
next. He’d smile back and stroke her hair. She arched her neck to
give him a better angle.

“We can begin with you
explaining to me how to present yourself for examination,” Grendel
said. She looked up and found that instead of moving closer to
caress her, he had actually turned away. He took a seat in a large,
comfortable armchair and crossed his legs.

She looked at him in utter
confusion. “How to present yourself for examination, Sharon,“ he
repeated patiently. “For example, by a prospective
buyer.”

Oh! Shit, how was she
supposed to know that? Wait, it was in that binder, wasn’t it?
Something about kneeling? She tried to remember, but the very
concept was vague. But there was something about it in one of her
books, wasn’t there? Stalling for time, she stood and smoothed that
shapeless jumper over her legs. An image came to her from the book
she had at home, and she gracefully sank to her knees and placed
her hands on her thighs with the palms turned up. She tilted her
head down in humility.