Then Travix hesitated and turned her head again. Her coarse blonde hair moved like a solid mat. She still held Niri in her arms. Niri's knees were tucked up tightly. The knotted string dangled down across the bareness between her thighs. Travix glanced down at Niri. The string moved. It was as if it had caught Travix's attention, fascinated her, as it might a cat. Travix came back. She put one foot on the chair and balanced Niri's lower back on her knee. This freed one of Travix's hands. This hand moved nervously. It began to stroke the string, to rearrange it to one side then the other of the bare sex lips, to stretch it lightly, then to open out the looped end which, dangling down, brushed across the small bronze swollen funnel in the groove. As Travix's fingers now began to touch the sex lips, to press the string against them and very gently squeeze, it seemed at long last she remembered what had made her hesitate.
'Kasger,' she said, as Niri softly cooed, 'she must be pouched.' Anya held her breath. The middle finger slipped through the loop and touched the small bronze funnel. Travix now looked at Anya, her jacket drawn back from her breasts, her thighs spread and her open belly pressed about the beam. Anya waited. Travix did not speak further. But the middle finger tensed. Niri moaned; the funnel opened, swallowed; the tension in the string increased and the small ring slipped out, glinting. Niri's arms reached up and fastened round Travix's neck.
Now Travix spoke again: 'I want the Princess pouched - and tight.' The finger bedded deeper. Niri moaned again and Anya's belly shuddered; the deep drawing feeling came within her bottom. Travix offered her lips to Niri. With the middle finger still implanted and the hand cupped between Niri's legs, impressing the string into her bareness, Niri kissed her. Then she was lifted up once more and carried away.
Kasger waited till they had disappeared beyond the end of the corridor. Then he looked at Anya. Immediately she cast her gaze downwards to the beam. Her breathing had not steadied; it would not. Her thighs ached; her flesh felt numb; but what she had witnessed - Travix's cruelty, Niri's response - left a deep disquiet in her belly. And the pouch that Travix had referred to, what was that? Kasger moved. His iron grip upon her arm relaxed. But now she could see that other thing - his maleness - stir between his legs and again she was afraid. He crouched beside her to unfasten her bonds and she watched the thick shiny plait of hair moving between his shoulder blades as he worked; she watched the muscles rippling on his back and upper arms. She could smell his scent, strong from the effort of the smacking and strong from wanting, too, she knew. What would he do with her now that Travix had gone?
When he lifted her by her shoulders and placed her on the floor, her knees buckled. He caught her and propped her hands against the table. Then she heard him fumbling through the drawers. What looked like a small bundle of leather thongs was thrown on to the table. The jar was placed next to it. When he went over to the mast to retrieve the leather strap, Anya felt as if ice water was being sponged between her legs, for she thought that he meant to use the strap on her there and then, while she was bent across the table. But he tucked it into his belt, collected up the other things and led her, staggering, down the corridor and to a door in the middle of the row. He slid aside the heavy bolt and opened it. It was dark in there. 'Your quarters, Princess.' He pushed her forward; she didn't want to go.
In the faint light through the open door, she could see that the cabin was small. It was warm and she could smell straw. Something glistened on the walls. And now she was more afraid. He pushed her in. There was sawdust on the floor. Almost immediately, her shin bumped against a wooden bed, which he pushed her on to. It was covered in straw. He put the things on a small table by the bed. 'Sit down. Take your coat off.' Her hands were shaking as she did it. He took it from her, rolled it up and put it under his arm. And now, completely naked before this man, she felt more vulnerable than at any time since she had been aboard this ship. She knew he was looking at her in the half-darkness. She tried to keep her breathing steady. Her hands clasped together for reassurance and her fingers searched out her one remaining possession, a turquoise ring upon her middle finger. They turned it, tested it, proved that it was still there, then closed about it tightly, hid it in the dark. Kasger left, taking the jacket with him, then returned without the coat but with a lamp, and placed it on the table. Suddenly, he knelt down.
Behind him, on the walls, she could see now what had glistened - there were rings, four rings again, like those on the mast. Hanging from the ceiling in the middle of the room were two long chains, with large leather loops at the bottom. The sinking feeling came. She was frightened of what these looped chains might be used for. Then she heard a clink. A chain was drawn across the floor and fastened between her ankles. She almost panicked. She was turned while another chain was secured behind her back, between her wrists. The chains were short, only three or four links each, but they were heavy iron chains. Then something wooden scraped across the floor.
'You wish to use it?' It was a bucket.
'No ...'
'Suit yourself.' With her heart pounding now, she was lifted fully on to the bed. 'On your side.' She struggled to face the wall. 'Move your legs back.' She heard the sound of a chain again, being pulled through a hole in wood. Then she saw it, a long chain this time, with a hook attached, being drawn lengthwise up the bed, from the panelled footboard, between her chained-together ankles, up her back, then between her arms, to fasten to an iron ring in the headboard. She was turned on to her back. 'Bend your knees. No ... Open them.' Again the coldness washed between her thighs as Kasger gazed down at her. The heavy plait had fallen forward over his shoulder to hang alongside the talisman of wrinkled skin. The lamplight reflected as a dull orange glow from his polished head and the sockets of his eyes looked black. 'Keep them apart.' She had tried to lift her knees when the half-gloved hand had reached. He waited until her knees were fully opened and the light reflected in the creases of her thighs. Then, as Anya shuddered, as she turned her head away, the hands, two hands now, not one, and expert hands, massaged her, rubbed the feeling back into the numbness in the bridge between her fleshpot and her bottom, rubbed her aching thighs, rubbed in the creases, stirred the bright red curls, then gathered up the softened open matt black lips and gently closed them. Her hips were lifted. The leather cord he had brought was passed around them. Attached to it at the front by three drawstrings, one at the top and two beneath, was a small pod-shaped leather pouch, slightly shorter, slightly narrower than Anya's little finger. He tested the thin skinned pouch by pressing the tip of his little finger into it from the back. The skin was matt and covered with very fine dense hair; it looked like closely shaved fur. It stretched around the pressing finger. Anya could not swallow her heart. As the small bulge of the fingertip slid up and down the pod, the feeling came between her legs, and now it was not cold.
He pushed her knees out until they almost touched the straw. Then his fingertips teased her sex lips, lifting them upright. As he let them fall and they rolled to the side, she felt them swelling. Again they were lifted; again they fell, but more slowly. The thongs were lowered loosely against her belly; the swelling lips were pressed to the side, though now they seemed reluctant to remain there, and the pod was laid casually upon them. He did not attempt to fit it. The strings below dangled across her bottom, tickling, reminding her of Niri; she was imagining the things that Travix might be doing to Niri now, with the leather cord attached so intimately, knotted to the ring pierced through her nubbin. Such thoughts caused a wave of pleasure deep in Anya's belly. Kasger's fingertips had moved up and closed about Anya's nipples; the fingertips were wet and the nipples were gently worked. Anya's hips moved. The chains between her ankles clinked; the thongs, the soft pod, moved against her like living things. The tips of the fingers brushed the soft hair upwards on her belly. Her belly lifted; her sex lips were erect. 'Push ...' he said. 'Lift ...' The pod was slipped quickly over her, sheathing only her sex lips, and it was as if all her pleasure was constrained now, contained within this thin-skinned bag. The strings were drawn tight; she was turned while they were fastened at the back. The tightness made her sex lips swell; the leather stretched and the fine soft furry coating bristled.
Kasger unhooked the long chain. He made her kneel with her bottom up and her breasts pressed to the straw while he took that warm hard swelling between his fingers. It was neither fruit nor animal, yet like a fruit, it dangled, and like an animal, it was very warm. He held it while he spread her knees, then spread her cheeks and applied the unction to the small black mouth. Then he held the polished wooden stem of the strap there, between the double string. The round stem slowly twirled; the face buried deeper into the straw. But the small pod continued to swell between his fingers and eventually - though very quickly when it happened - the small mouth opened to the slow, persistent twirl. The protest was there - he heard it murmured - but so was the pleasure, he knew, for each application of the unction progressively sensitised that place. The belly began to tremble and the knees tried to move together to trap the pod more tightly between his fingers. But he kept those knees apart, to stave off any deliverance, while the round stem was carefully turned and the unction was worked, against the protests, deeper into the pouted black-lipped funnel. He then removed the stick, reattached the chain and turned the girl on to her side with her knees tucked up and her breasts upon the straw, then took the lamp, the jar, the strap and left and closed the door.
The cabin turned soot black. Suddenly, it seemed very much smaller than before.
Anya listened. Gradually, her breathing slowed. Above her, she could hear muffled sounds of chairs being moved across the floor, faint sounds of merriment, but there were no other noises. All seemed quiet in the corridor. She tried to make herself more comfortable, but the straw was hard. It tugged her hair and rubbed against her skin whenever she moved. With her hands behind her back, she could not protect her breasts from all the nips and scratches. The chains lay against her buttocks. She opened her thighs, but the swollen feeling there would not recede. In her bottom was a throb of pleasure, as if she were still being touched. And the visions of what she had witnessed conjured themselves up again: Travix - so cruelly calm - and Niri, being smacked on Anya's behalf. Watching that had caused a strange feeling deep in Anya's belly, and when the girl's buttocks had been spread apart and they had smacked her there ... Anya shivered. She arched her belly; she wanted to be touched now. She tried to squeeze her legs about her bursting fleshpot. The lips felt hot and hard, distended, sheathed in this fine soft leather pouch.
And in the dark, though all was silent, Anya was reliving Niri's punishment over and over again - the belly lifted on the hand, the whimpers and the rhythmic smack of leather against naked skin. When she pressed her thighs together, it was as if Travix were still there, pressing the soft brushed velvet gently about her flesh lips, coaxing them cruelly to the edge of pleasure while that deep dark tender mouth was smacked.
[5]
The Captain's Table
That evening, when the sun balanced a claw's-breadth above the horizon at the end of an outstretched arm, two men in leather shirts were dispatched. They found the girl - the Princess - chained and asleep, but not still. The straw was matted in her tousled hair; her breathing was staccato, as if she were dreaming, perhaps running in her dreams, for the muscles of her thighs tightened and relaxed and the slender ankles lifted and tried to brush across the straw. Between those thighs, as she faced half downwards with her ankles shackled together and her wrists behind her back, was the long chain, its iron harshness softened by the smooth curve where it draped across her buttock and lay against the bulging leather pouch. The pouch looked thick and swollen; it was moist. The men approached in silence. They took one knee and crooked it so the pouch projected. One of them laid a palm against each inner thigh, which felt hot, while the other squeezed the pouch. She murmured; her thigh muscles tightened against the palms and her buttocks tried to clench about the double thong between them.
When the men unfastened the long chain, she awoke. And though it was not bright in that small cabin, she hunched as if to shade her eyes from the light, though she could not, for her hands were shackled. The deep red locks - like dense ruby soaking up the light - fell away from a visage that was perfect, kissed with freckles, smooth, a soft warm glow upon the cheeks and a long wavy wisp of clear red hair beside the delicate ear. The full lips moved apart; she frowned; the eyes widened in realisation, reflecting the lamplight like two black onyx stones. Yet though her fear was there, she neither murmured nor complained.
They lifted her and made her walk shackled, though they had the keys to free her. One man walked on each side, towering above her. And it seemed, despite the fact that the linkage between her feet was short and her steps were thereby stilted by the chains, she was able to accommodate their inconvenience. And when they took her up into the crewdeck, catching her as she toppled forwards on the stairs, then rearranging her hair, drawing it back, away from her breasts, it seemed that, though she faltered at first, she could walk before them, through that throng, with her shoulders back, her breasts lifted and, between her legs, the pouch quite visible, full, a clear sign of her sexual excitement - not at this treatment perhaps, not at this display, but not lessened by it either. But of course, they were here on the crewdeck for a deeper purpose - to prepare her, 'to make her young blood course through her veins ... She must hear it, like the roar of the storm wind through the sails.'