Thyme II Thyme (7 page)

I was allowed to lie on the grass for a while when he had finally finished with me while he sat nearby, leaning against a tree and regarding me with what I realised was fondness. I crawled nearer to him and would have repeated my ministrations of earlier in the day, except that now my arm ended in a piece of wood and not even a mitten of leather.

He understood and patted my head. 'Sleeping now a short time should you be,' he murmured. 'Wanting you walked the afternoon altogether she was, but good girl you are for Erik, so resting you shall be, but for long not, for searching for us she will otherwise be.'

'Woof,' I mumbled, and laying my head on his thigh, closed my eyes. I drifted into a shallow sleep, a sleep filled with dream images of me and Erik, Meg and Greg and Anne-Marie and Andrea, all of us romping through woods and all of us naked with our unnaturally white flesh covered in big black spots. All of us, that is, except Meg, who wore a full-length coat with a high fur collar and smoked a cigarette through a long holder as she sneered at us through darkly made-up eyes.

All too soon it was time to be on the move again. This time Erik made me walk ahead of him and I shivered at the thought of the picture he was now getting, my bare arse and my still wet quim jutting out behind me framed by the dark leather. When he reached forward and patted my damp pussy, I knew he was not entirely unappreciative of the spectacle.

By now I was beginning to get some idea of the size of the Hacklebury estate. Even allowing for my slow progress in the all-fours mode, we had been walking, following the perimeter fence, for maybe four or five miles in all, and the curve of the boundary was so slight that I calculated it would take us several more hours at the very least before we had covered even one quadrant. History was my strong subject, much more so than maths, but even I was able to work out that, unless there were some sharper corners in the fence, the woods within the wall had to cover a good few square miles.

As I plodded on, I was thinking.

If Gregory Hacklebury had owned such a large-sized plot of England as recently as the eighteen thirties, he and his family must have been pretty powerful, or at least well known, and yet I had been unable to unearth any record of the bastard in my research. How, or why, should that be? Had something happened that prompted local historians to expunge all trace of him from their histories?

It seemed unlikely, not so far forward in time, relatively speaking. By the nineteenth century, records were being kept in something approaching a modern form and often with a zeal that would otherwise only be found in train spotters, and it would have required more than just a local conspiracy to bury all traces of a man and a family who must have ranked pretty high in the league of landowners.

I felt another pat on my bottom, but it barely interrupted my latest train of thought. I considered other possibilities, some of them promising, others falling more under the category of idle speculation.

Perhaps Hacklebury himself did not actually own the land. Perhaps he was some sort of minor relative, a nephew or a second cousin, something like that, and the real owner was away helping to conquer the growing empire. Maybe he was nothing more than an employee, a steward keeping the place going for a travelling master. Maybe Hacklebury wasn't his real name at all... but no, that would never do, and besides, most of these possibilities made his determination to marry Angelina somewhat strange and improbable. An heiress would not be permitted to marry a mere steward, and neither was it so likely that her guardian would permit a wedding with a minor relative. And besides, I knew he was a Sir, or at least all the staff I had met so far seemed to believe he was.

It was all very curious, I thought as the hard-baked ground with its smattering of browning grass continued to pass beneath me. Could he have won this estate in some game of chance? That may have sounded ludicrous at first, but I knew that sort of thing went on between young men in this century. The modern day equivalent of millions of pounds changed hands on the turn of a single card. If Hacklebury had won the estate by gambling, and then perhaps was to lose it again within the next few years, perhaps that might explain why his name did not appear in connection with any large acreage by the time I was searching for information on him in the nineteen seventies. It would take time for deeds of ownership to be registered with the appropriate authorities and, whilst these early Victorians were noted bookkeepers, things moved very slowly by comparison with my own era.

A jerk of the lead to one side indicated we were to turn off the perimeter pathway now and head straight down another path we had come to that headed back, I presumed, in the general direction of my little compound. A mile or so on, we reached an area where the trees thinned to either side for a hundred yards or so and the cleared ground was covered with a far thicker carpet of grass that was actually green rather than the fading colour it was elsewhere.

Erik tugged backwards on my leash and issued a single command for me to halt. My continued display of swaying feminine bits must have had its inevitable effect on him; without further ceremony or warning, he grasped me by the hips and entered me again. Immediately I felt myself responding to his thrusts from deep within the uncontrollable centre of my flesh, which had been my nemesis from the first moment I was transported back in time into this body. But even as the tide began to rise, I could not help wondering if this was now to be my lot for whatever was left of my life here - to be treated as something less than human and to be used at the whim of whoever happened to be on the other end of the chain clipped to my collar.

This time, my body's strength was found wanting and despite Erik's solid support my knees soon buckled. Sensing I could no longer hold myself up, he allowed me to sink slowly to my knees, following me down without ever slipping out of my cloying pussy. Then, as I knelt with my head touching the ground, he continued to pump in and out of me until I was once again moaning and writhing in the throes of an overpowering climax.

To my surprise, Erik's latest assault did not last anywhere near as long as the earlier ones. After what could have been no more than five minutes at most, he withdrew from me without coming himself. He allowed me a few moments to recover something resembling composure, and then lifted me back into my earlier proscribed position.

'Every hour or so, say she,' he informed me with yet another pat of my bottom followed by a sly stroke across my slippery nether lips. 'Wet she says to be kept you must and wet are you for sure.' He chuckled. 'Wet think I you always are anyways,' he added, 'but hurt it does not sure to be.'

I knew that if I ever had the chance I could easily throttle Meg even given the diminished strength of this body of Angelina's, for real hatred can generate miraculous feats and now I knew I truly did hate that mad woman. I felt utterly helpless and totally abased by the simple way in which she could order me to be screwed at regular intervals simply to make sure I stayed wet and presumably ready for whatever it was she was planning for my next ordeal. To be shagged without having any say in the matter was one thing, but to be so merely as a form of self-lubrication...

Images of black-clad maids swinging from nooses with their tongues lolling from bloated purple lips swam before my eyes. It was an automatic response that made me move forward again at Erik's command, for my thoughts were no longer on the path we were following. Meg would pay for this one day, of that I was now determined. Whatever she tried to inflict upon Angelina, I would keep the poor girl's body alive until we were both avenged. Justice, I swore, would come to both Meg and the man behind her madness, even if it were to be a justice never recorded for posterity, as neither of them had apparently passed into the annals of history. I grimaced as I considered a picture of Erik ramming into Meg as she lay across a rock with her legs clad in black stockings kicking in the air, her cruel lips gaping open around cries of agonised protest...

No
, I told myself firmly as I let the tableau fade, that punishment was far too good for her. When the time came I would find both the strength and ingenuity of purpose to repay mine, and Angelina's, debts to her in a full and appropriate fashion.

By the time we finally came back within sight of my little prison complex, I realised the afternoon was growing quite late for the shadows from the trees were stretching across the little clearing and the sun was low enough that I could no longer see it above the trees. I calculated that our walk must have occupied a total of six or seven hours, if Erik's timekeeping accuracy was to be relied upon; he had stopped to have his way with me no less than three more times and it had been the better part of another hour since the last session.

By now my earlier mood of grim determination had by and large given way to a mood that was approaching a black depression brought on partly by sheer fatigue and by the aching in my back and shoulders, and partly by the growing realisation that whatever contest might transpire between Meg and myself, I was playing under the severe handicap that was the warm and seemingly ever hungry little slot between my legs. It was like being fitted with a button that anyone could press to instantly deprive me of my normal logical senses. And the more times it was pressed, the more radical were the changes it wrought in me.

I knew I should not dismiss the thought that Meg had already become aware of this fact. Despite her supposedly low station in life, the woman was as cunning as she was inhuman and probably a whole lot cleverer than her supposed betters, to boot. Hacklebury might consider himself master, but it was Meg who was truly mistress here, even if only she and I were as yet aware of this.

I expected Erik to continue his regular cycle as soon as we were once again under the roof of my prison, but instead he simply hitched my leash to a wall ring and moved outside to open the door of another small cell which I had not yet seen the inside of. I heard a rattling of metal and a sloshing of water followed by the scraping sound of something being dragged across the ground. Then he returned and, to my surprise, began unlacing the back of my bodysuit and peeling the damp leather off me. My corset was next, followed by my gloves, and then, for the first time in what seemed like days, I stood naked. Despite the fact that my giant keeper had seen just about everything there was to see, my hands went protectively to my crotch.

Erik smiled and reached out to grasp me by the top of my left arm. 'Come,' he said. 'Smell it is you do and bathing time is now.'

For one foolish moment I conjured up thoughts of a nice warm bath all soapy suds and sweet- smelling oils. It was a ridiculous hope that was dashed the moment I was thrust forward into the last stall. Smaller than the other two, the centre of the space was dominated by a small platform of wooden slats nailed across two cross-timbers with narrow gaps between them. From the ceiling above them dangled two lengths of chain, each terminating in a broad leather manacle into which Erik quickly buckled my wrists so that I was forced to stand with my arms held high and wide.

As he secured me, my eyes fell upon the row of four metal buckets that lined one wall and were each filled almost to the brim with what was obviously water. Then, without further ceremony, the first bucket was used to douse me completely, drenching me from head to toe in an icy shower that had me dancing on the spot wailing and shivering in protest.

I was washed down thoroughly with a rag cloth and something that might well have passed for soap in a stable; it smelled terrible and made my eyes water. Then Erik produced a cutthroat razor, which he used to hack off my hair and shave the stubble until my skull was as smooth as my bottom. I stood helpless while he did this, a combination of shock and the realisation that nothing I could say would stop this latest desecration, keeping me dumb throughout, but I did give a little yelp when he began to lather the blonde triangle between my thighs.

'Still you must be keeping,' he admonished me firmly.

My eyes flickered fearfully towards the gleaming blade in his hand.

'Cutting you will I not be if moving about you are not.' He sounded confident but it was a confidence I did not share. However, I managed to close my eyes and hold myself rigid while he worked away at removing my sparse and fair pubic growth.

'Done we now are,' he announced shortly.

I let out a long breath I had been holding, and staring glumly down I was just able to see the very top of my pussy lips now that they had been deprived of their little curtain. I had not seen a sight like that between my legs for a good few years now and I felt a tear well up as I thought of the warm safety of the bathroom and bedroom back home at my parents' house.

'Miss Meg coming soon will be,' Erik said, picking up the second bucket of water. This time, he poured it over me with a little more care but the chill was no less and I found I was now shivering continuously. I tried to divorce my mind from my body again, concentrating on Meg and how I might yet be able to outwit her. It would not be easy, even if it were at all possible.

She had called me Buttercup when I was first laced into the bodysuit, telling me that I was now no better than a calf or a deer and worthy of even less consideration, but earlier today she had apparently forgotten that and referred to me as Angelina, albeit only to say that such a name was unsuitable for a bitch and that she would have to come up with a replacement. I already had a rough idea of what she was planning as the next stage in my humiliating enslavement, but I suspected she would probably be a little more inventive than Rover.