The Handmaiden's Revenge

Chapter Three-1

Chapter Three

The party of travelers began their trek in the earlier morning when the mists of Illusia rise from the damp ground in foggy clouds. They rode on horseback, the four men of Nor’s guard and the three women—Casia, Camilla and Katleen—dressed as simple merchants, in britches and plain shirts and coats—nothing to indicate that they belonged to Nor’s ruling house.

To Casia this was freedom. For bound slaves such exhilarating moments are rare. She had no quarrel with her life—how could she as wife and slave to Illusia’s sovereign ruler? She loved him with her whole heart, with head and hands and groin; yet, it had been some months since she’d been given as the s****l gift she’d been so well trained to be. And given to Sir Sagemore now, she couldn’t have been more giddy with excitement, more aroused by the prospect of bowing to this Illusion Lord and serving his s****l whims.

Casia’s journey to the Southern province was uneventful. What few souls they met on the road were simple travelers, like she pretended to be. The second night, they camped with a troupe of musicians and actors, who entertained them with songs and skits that made Casia and her small band roll on the ground with laughter. One handsome male particularly attracted her attention—a dashing, radiant, feigning gentleman who bowed like an obsequious suitor. Each shot at s****l banter was aimed her way, his eyes winking merrily, his lips drawing into a perverse smile. Oh! How she wished she could bed the man.

“I am sorry, Sir, but I cannot,” she whimpered, when it seemed certain that he’d ask for a night between her thighs.

“I have displeased you?” he asked.

“Why certainly not. I’m just not at liberty to give my body away. I am a slave, and now betrothed.”

“Slave you say? You hardly have the demeanor.”

“Illusia is a land of slaves, Sir; most born to it, the rest of us abducted by fate.”

He sighed despairingly. “Ah! Then I shall pine the hours of the night away without you.”

She laughed. “You have your songs and plays. I think you’ve become them.”

“I’d rather live in fantasy than the reality of this world, madam.” His voice had a lively edge.

“Oh, ma’am, have him, I’ll never tell,” Camilla urged, whispering in her ear.

“Hush,” she wiggled away from her handmaid.

“Hummm. A maid servant for a slave. That seems rare.”

“You ask too many questions, rogue,” Casia waved him off as she stood. “It’s time for a long nap. Cefus, wake us at dawn.”

***

Two guards from Sagemore’s garrison met the travelers three miles out and escorted them through the woods to the doors of the gate. Beyond the entrance, Sir Sagemore waited, looking for an instant like a worried father until the fortress was locked again.

“Sir,” Casia slipped from the saddle into the firm hands of her husband’s honored Lord, then slid as gracefully to the dusty earth at his feet, bowing to kiss the ground in homage.

“Milady, you look particularly attractive at my feet,” Sagemore decided. “You may stay there until I release you.”

She didn’t move, although it seemed a rather abrupt welcome.

“Your hands behind you, slave,” he further ordered, as he circled her humbly posed body. “Humm. But, in those clothes,” he unsheathed his sword, running the sharp tip along her back, pressing it firmly into her flesh beneath her shirt, “I can hardly survey the attributes for which you are so renown.”

“I could change for you, Sir, as I intended to,” she offered. “It has been a long trip.”

“No, no. I rather like you this way.” He nipped the shirt and pulled up, creating a tear along the back of the garment. “Sit up.” Casia answered immediately, settling her rump on the heels of her boots. Looking into Sagemore’s face, surveying his proud and muscled body with her eyes was enough to set her groin on fire, and take her thoughts into perverse places. She could feel the dampness growing in her crotch.

She wondered, had he been as eager for his gift from Nor, as that “gift” was to have him? She relished the devious snicker that curled his lip just lightly.

Running the tip of his blade along the high neck of her blouse, Sagemore clipped it with a sudden upward motion, that just barely grazed the side of her cheek, and had the effect of revealing more of her body for inspection. Casia shivered, fear mingling with her excitement. This man was not one of the usual fawning fellows that Nor often gave her to. He was a bit like Nor himself. Though younger and edgier than his esteemed sovereign, he was nonetheless as mysterious as her husband had been to her in those first months of their shared life.

Slashing at her clothes, he finally had her entire blouse and underclothes ripped away and in shreds, her breasts bare to his eye.

“Stand up,” he ordered.

Casia rose to her feet, aware only then that her handmaids, Nor’s guards and many of Sagemore’s fellows were watching the unveiling of the prize with their attention fully riveted on the pair.

Sagemore sauntered around her, viewing what he couldn’t see and could only imagine. “Hard to believe Lord Nor would have his slave so strangely dressed for a s****l rendezvous. Take off that belt.”

Casia’s fingers quickly undid the buckle, and the leather slipped to the ground at her feet. With his blade again, Sagemore pressed the end into the slave’s crotch where the tip tickled her p***y lips and caused her to gasp. So much pent-up, anxious s****l energy was pouring from her that she could not help but communicate her blooming desire.

The Lord’s eyes shone for he recognized the truth, as did everyone who watched the scene. Pressing the point of his sword deep into her pants, he suddenly sliced to the left, which caught the fabric, tore it as intended and allowed him the advantage of a spot where he could continue. Each s***h came so close to cutting skin that Casia held her breath, unable to relax until there were nothing but the tattered remains of her pants left on her body. She wiggled out of them, stepped from the puddle of brown linen at her feet, and let her body ooze with longing as she appeared naked in this stranger’s possession.

“I hope I present myself more appropriately to you this way,” she bowed her head respectfully as she spoke, “I am my Lord’s—your grateful Lord’s gift; bestowed upon you for the excellent service you have rendered to Illusia. I stay a fortnight as your personal slave. And with me, my maids Camilla and Katleen,” she turned toward the other two, “are trained to serve you as well.”

“Then I welcome you, wife of Nor. It has been my pleasure to serve my Lord, to drive back the heathen, Titus… and now my pleasure to accept this gift. I have long dreamed of—awaited the time I could have such a noble slave as you under my control, to vent my passions on, to use without restraint…” his voice died off. His body simmered with intent, but he said no more.

Turning on his heel, the welcome over, the party was escorted into the humble stronghold and given their rooms… all but Casia who was taken immediately to Sagemore’s chambers.

“Here.” At Casia’s entrance to his room, the lord threw a garment her way. “It’s drafty in my castle, and there is time enough to display your wares.”

“Yes, Sir,” she answered, as she quickly tossed a dress of cream and gold over her shoulders. The weave was loose, making the fabric almost transparent in the right light—and hardly protection from the cold chill. It was a slave’s garment, worn to entice, to breed more lust, which was already swimming about her body, even clawing at her groin.

The man strode to the window, and sitting in his chair, he motioned Casia his way, “Sit,” he said pointing to the velvet pillow at his side.

Although she would have rather climbed on Sir Sagemore to release her surging passions, Casia obeyed as she’d been trained. Slaves learn early to wait for their pleasure—for they remain at the mercy of their master, lord or owner’s whims. Casia had learned that, too, although now, this slave was more accustomed to the benefits of being wife to a powerful man than she was to the requirements of her slave status.

“The last time I saw you, Milady,” Sagemore started, “you were the centerpiece of Nor’s winter banquet. I was disappointed to find you too exhausted for a tussle in bed that night. It seems you’d already satisfied a half dozen cocks.”

“I’m afraid I don’t recall the time, Sir.”

“No, I don’t suppose you would. You were preoccupied satisfying a rapacious lust.”

“But then, I do remember seeing you once before at a feast sometime ago,” she batted her eyelashes coyly and c****d her head.

“And what do you remember of me?” he asked.

“I think everything, Sir. You cut a powerful presence before my eyes, like nothing I’d ever seen since I first laid eyes on my dear Lord Nor.”

“We’re kinsman and sadists.”

She shriveled at the word sadists, feeling the steady pulse in her groin grow in magnitude, as the implications of sadism filtered through her like gentle rain.

“Nor is easy on you now, is he not?”

She thought a moment. “I don’t know how to reply to that. I know my share of grief at his hands.”

“Surely. But he exercises restraint because he loves you… one would be a fool not to see that. I, on the other hand, do not love you and will show you little compassion. I have looked forward to this day for some time, and I plan to fully exercise my rights.”

She bowed slightly, “I would expect no less.” Her body took another flying leap into the erotic abyss he was suggesting.

“Yes, you mouth the words, Milady, but do you understand what I do?”

“I would not venture a guess.”

“Good.”

There was a metal box beside his chair. “Open it,” he pointed to the lid with the heavy, unlocked hasp.

Casia inched around on her knees and, sitting back on her heels, fiddled with the opening finally releasing the lock. As the lid creaked on its ancient hinges, Casia shuddered.

“I had them especially made for you.”

She stared into the box, into a confusing mass of chains and metal bands.

“You’ll wear them unless I order you otherwise. Put them on.”

The weighty garments reminded of her of the punishment chains used in her early training, or when she was singled out for a particularly cruel humiliation. Strangely, their appearance was like a tonic sweeping her system. She traveled downward into her self, into the places where her life with Nor began, when every move she made was necessarily muted and carefully thought out. She knew this world. And though a return to her early slave days was unexpected now, she understood the implications and would adjust, perhaps even thrive. It was a simple and crude place, its requirements easy to understand. Subservience. Humility. Obedience. Surrender. Thoughtless abdication.

The iron collar was heavy at her throat, thick, wide and tight, while the bands on her wrists and ankles were equally as confining. The chains that joined them were weighty and cumbersome. A thick two-foot chain linked her ankles, another linked her wrists. Reaching under her dress, Sagemore attached a similar, longer chain to the ring at the front of her collar and threaded it through her crotch, bisecting her ass cheeks, fastening it to a second ring at the back of her neck—all the more reason now for the transparent dress, which provided a curious contrast of severity and elegance in one glance.

Sagemore moved from his chair to the velvet-draped wall behind her, while Casia’s eyes followed his every step. Drawing back the drape, he revealed a magnificent, upright, circular rack of polished wood and iron fittings.

Casia gasped, a cry of terror escaping her lips.

“You tremble, Milady,” the man noted.

“I…I,” she stopped unable to think of something to say.

“This answers the question of suspension easily. Come here.”

Walking proved difficult, the chains, the dragging hem of the dress; she nearly stumbled, but then regained her balance even as nervous as she was. By some curious magic, the man had her raging s****l energy tied in knots, snarling like a mad dog in her stomach. Anxious. Scared. Aroused.

His hands were hot against her skin, while she felt cold inside and out. He noticed.

“There are plenty of ways to warm you, Milady.”

Why did he call her Milady? Why not, harlot? Slave? w***e? Any name would do better than a reference to the nobility she borrowed from her husband. This was blatant mockery; yet a fact that registered in her body as increased s****l hunger.