THE WILLOW SWITCH | rope tied and whipped | bdsm stories

It was pleasant in the sun. Miles Hardwin knew an unusual content. He lay resting on one elbow, looking at the naked girl sleeping on the grass. He found her more beautiful than his memory of her chained to the ring at Broule. Even with her hands tied behind her back she slept graceful y in an innocence of her own.

His amused survey folowed the trailing rope from where it was knotted around the girl's left ankle to the tree a few feet distant where other knots ensured she would not roam while he slept. She had been too weary to complain of bonds. When he had taken the rope from her elbows and laid her down she had fallen instantly asleep. Brother Anselm's punishment through the day and the furious ride through the night into her new captivity had left her exhausted.

Miles knew himself possessed of infinite riches. There was a quality about the girl he had been unable to forget. She had occupied his thoughts to the point where he had determined to take her from Aubyn by stealth. He had been in the act of dealing with the postern door when brother Anselm's gul ibility had delivered her into his hands. To ride with her to this place with the small hut close by, had taken most of the night. But here they would be undisturbed, the girl would be his alone. Perhaps when he tired of her he could deliver her back to Broule and his half-brother's nuptials. But this was with the gods. He would make no plans.

He was sure her nobility would make her a delicious subject. She would oppose him verbally and physically, yielding herself to his whip and to his arms inch by rebellious inch. She would be a joy to tame. She would not accept his pleasures with the plebeian giggles and plaints of the serving wenches with whom he was beginning to feel bored. In the roster of nobility she was his equal, and thus her shame made manifold. Idly he flipped a twig to strike her hip.

To awaken into bondage was no longer a new experience for Aveline D'Almaine. Bonds seemed implicit to her captivities. Yet, in emerging from sleep there were unfailingly those moments of incomprehension that some portions of herself failed to respond to her command.

It was so now. She stretched luxuriantly in the heat of the sun and sought to bring her hands to arrange her hair, but they would not come, disobediently they remained behind her back.

With her eyes stil closed against a new captivity she twisted and pul ed until the cords hurt, then abandoned her arms as lost. It was nothing new. Experimentally, she tried her legs.

When her ankle snubbed against its tether she reluctantly opened her eyes to a fresh captivity and sat up.

“Good afternoon, fair maid.”

It was one more outrageous adjustment to have to make. Brother Anselm was gone, Miles Hardwin had taken his place. That her heart sang in thankfulness for the exchange was something she must not betray. Instinctively her arms heaved against the cords upon her wrists.

“Want to cover your breasts, love?” Miles inquired solicitously.

Aveline blushed. Naked before this man she would have no secrets. He was too well versed in feminine reactions. He would read her mind as he read her muscular responses. She made no answer, let him divulge her fate! She contented herself with an indignant glare.

“An idyll among the trees, poppet. Me thought a pleasant change for thee.”

She kept her silence, but ostentatiously jerked her foot against its tether and wriggled her body against her tied wrists, then roved her gaze across the woodland scent. “Need to pee, love?”

He was impossible and beyond the pale. Why, oh why, were girls never angry with him, even she!

“I might let you loose if you asked me nicely.”

Her interest was instant, as was her unthinking response: “Please, kind sir, release me?” She simulated a winning grin.

“You're up to mischief, y'know.”

Aveline tossed her head haughtily. “It was your offer. I accepted it. I suppose you want me to beg?”

Miles untied her. He contrived it with injured reproach. Then sat back and amusedly watched his captive cope with freedom.

Aveline was aware of the incongruity of feeling strange because she was without restraint. She had been chained or bound for so long that the freedom of her limbs had become an abstract improbability. Keeping a wary eye on Miles Hardwin she massaged her rope burns and inquired:

“I hope you'l have the decency to give me something to wear.”

Miles shrugged. “May be a few pieces in the hut. You'l get 'em by good behaviour.”

“You mean if I crawl?”

“Suit yourself. Don’t you have a job to do?”

She blushed again. He was insufferable. But he was also right. Tartly, she asked: “Am I to be trusted?”

“Run along,” he told her laughingly. “Before I change my mind.”

Aveline went. Her freedom felt like floating on a cloud. Her blood raced with an excitement she could not quench. She chose a bush some forty paces distant and sought its privacy.

When its purpose had been served she leaped into the trees and ran.

Her flight was instinctive. She knew that if she stopped to weigh pros and cons she might meekly walk back to her new master. But she was intoxicated by her freedom. Hope and a longing for Plinlymon overrode judgement. Using such shelter as she found she could remain out of Miles' sight for long enough to gain a lead, somewhere she might find a hiding place for time enough that he would lose contact. The naked fugitive put every ounce of her courage and her strength into her speeding feet. It was heaven to be free. Her heart soared.

By the time Aveline's breathing was becoming laboured and her alert ear had failed to detect sound of pursuit, she was forced to recognize an unexpected and aggravating disappointment.

That Miles should simply let her escape piqued her feminine sense of what was proper. She wanted to best him in a battle of wits and flying feet, not be carelessly relinquished without concern. It was borne upon her also that she had no idea in which direction she fled.

The little path was a relief. Faint as it was, it would double speed and render it noiseless.

Thankful y, she took fresh heart. It was not until she had run fifty paces that she became aware of footsteps other than her own. From out of nowhere they were suddenly close.

“Been waiting for you on the path,” Miles said comfortably. “Guessed you'd come this way.”

She longed to beat and strike at his cocksure masculinity, but instead redoubled her efforts.

She had nothing to lose now.

“The exercise wil do you good. I hear old Gabelot kept you in a cage.” Miles' voice betrayed no breathlessness. He spoke as though they were standing stil .

“Nothing like a good run to get the blood going.” Aveline could have screamed in frustration.

He was playing with her, keeping a few paces to the rear with effortless ease.

“Of course, I wouldn’t cal this being a really good girl, y'know.”

It was useless, humiliating, demeaning. She was being made a fool of. Furiously she stopped running and turned to face the man she could not best. She was close to tears.

“Here, have a good cry, love.” Miles handed her a slip of cambric.

Aveline stamped in fury, but her bare foot landed on a pebble so that the effect was less than she desired. She threw the small square of fabric back at his smile.

“You're a brute.” She flung the words at him between sobs, then wept in earnest. He returned the handkerchief to her and sat against a tree while she expended her surfeit of emotions.

When the storm had subsided into indignant and accusing sniffs he offered casually, “There'll be a penalty, y'know.”

“I'm sure there wil be.” She made her voice frosty. “Wouldn’t be right to encourage escapes, would it now!”

“I suppose not.”

Aveline did her best to sound distant and unconcerned. “A good flogging, or do you have a dungeon around somewhere?”

“Sorry, love, you'l have to be content with the flogging. Bit short of dungeons out here.”

She caught his eye and had to stifle an impulse to laugh - not because she felt freed of the threat of punishment, but because he had that effect upon a girl. She felt certain that innumerable maidens had approached the first stroke of his whip in merriment.

“Well?” Aveline looked at Miles and then up the path. “What am I supposed to do now? Run again so you can catch me?”

“Let's walk slowly back to the hut.”

“Where, no doubt, I'l get my flogging?”

Miles grinned at her spirit. “We'l do that after you've broken your fast.”

“I'm not hungry.”

“You wil be by the time we get there.”

She was hungry now, but would not say so. She sniffed disdainfuly and asked coldly, “Do I ...

just walk? Or do you want to hold on to a bit of me --- so I can’t run?”

“Damned unchivalrous not to hold on to something, eh!”

Miles languidly got to his feet and grasped her arm above the elbow. “How's that, poppet?

Feel safe?”

She could not tell him she was melting inside, that her world had vanished save for his hand that scorched her with a flame she wanted never to be extinguished. She tugged fretful y at her prisoned member and, with her cheeks mounting a rising pink, marched beside him back to whatever fate he planned for her.

“I suppose it's useless to ask you to take me back to Plinlymon?”

“Quite useless, love. I know a good thing when I've got her.”

“After you've ... you've ... done what you want with me, wil you take me then?”

“I don’t know. And stop nagging. Females always want something.”

“ ‘Tis no fault of ours men govern us.”

“You love it. You little darlings are all hypocrites.”

“You actually suppose I'l love being flogged when we get back?”

“That's not until we've broken bread,” he chided. “And don’t call it flogging. I'm only going to whip your bottom.” Aveline knew relief, and was again angry with her own responses. To have to be thankful that it was only her bottom to be whipped! Her world was upside down. The only reality was the wonderful y strong male hand upon her arm.

“Are you going to keep me tied all the time?” she asked with a genuine curiosity. Being constantly bound was something to be concerned about.

“Sil y question, eh?” Miles shook her arm and grinned down at her earnest face. “I mean, after this little escapade?”

“That was your fault. You wanted me to run so you'd have the fun of catching me. I should have had more sense. You won’t tempt me again.”

“Al right, no more temptation,” he agreed equably. “I'l keep you tied tight. Any particular way you favour?”

She gave him another feminine sniff of disapproval. “Well, if you have to tie me, I suppose the most practical way is my hands behind my back,” she acknowledged slowly. “But please, oh please, don’t tie my elbows. Everybody ties my elbows and it's awful.”

“Damned effective.”

“I suppose so - if you want a girl in tears.”

“Makes your tits stick out.”

“That's all men think about, isn’t it? A girl's breasts and down between her legs.”

“Nice bits and pieces, love. But I do have other interests, y'know. How about whipping your bottom and that other little exercise we've both been politely silent about?”

Aveline knew what he meant. It had been in the back of' her mind from the moment she had awakened to find herself his captive. The hated word was now hovering. “I suppose I can’t stop you doing it to me,” she admitted. “But do you have to?”

“That's a sily question. And what are you talking about anyway?”

“You know.”

“Mayhap I don’t. Tel me.”

“Don’t be unkind. I don’t want to say it - or talk about it.”

“You must, love. It's an order.”

“Very well then.” Aveline braced herself as though for shock. “Please don’t fuck me.”

Miles was vastly amused by her distaste for the graphic word. “You don’t expect me not to?”

“I suppose not.” Her admission was grudging. “You're actually longing for me to do it to you.”

His male conceit and the fact he spoke the truth was more than she could bear. She turned into a fury of arms and legs and teeth seeking escape from masculine complacency. She managed a few trifling wounds before being subdued by overwhelming strength. When she pantingly surrendered he shook her admonishingly by her captive arm and threatened, “I'd fuck you now, you haughty little snippet, but remember: the whip comes first. And what's more, you're going to ask me for it.”

Aveline made the rest of their journey in a haughty silence aided by the fact she was sadly out of breath. Her mind was ful of visions. She wished they did not excite her, but they did. The hand on her arm was warmly comforting.

They ate outside the hut, but within it were the things Miles had thoughtfuly provided for their planned idyl . Some of them his captive eyed with joy, others with a trembling distaste. Seated with her master on the grass she ate hungrily, disproving her denial of appetite. She could well believe that with Miles she would always be in the wrong.

He had once again knotted the rope upon her ankle. She dared not touch the knots. He had warned her of punishment if she did. It was a strange and tantalizing bond.

About twenty feet of rope trailed away across the grass, a tether tied to nothing.

“Next time you run I'l pul on the rope and you'l have the finest tumble of your life,” Miles promised genially.

It was as demeaning and demoralizing as it was meant to be. Wherever Aveline went or whatever she did the rope fol owed her like a snake slithering in the grass, its small weight on her ankle magnified into a hundredweight of shame. It made her feel like a slave. With the last mouthfuls of their meal Miles approached the inevitable in his own insouciant way.

“Nice wilow bush over there.”

Aveline could see the bush, but no significance. “Wilow's much the best. You can have the job of cutting and trimming them.”

She guessed! The time had come, and it was to be done to her in ways most shameful. She looked at Miles and pleaded, “Please don’t make me do that.”

“Why not, love? It's you they'l be used on.”

“I know that,” she squirmed unhappily. “But please don’t make me cut the switches with which I'm to be beaten. It's ... it's ... oh, it's too ... too - I don’t want to.”

“Too proud? Naughty, naughty!”

“You've only thought of it to humiliate me.”

“Methinks there's naught wrong with that. Ye need a little.”

“I'm naked ... and tethered. Isn’t that enough?”

“You're so used to being naked ye scarce notice it, love. As for the tether, ‘tis a mere nothing for the nonce.”

She flashed at him apprehensively: “You mean you're going to tie me again?”

“I doubt you'd stand stil while I wear out the switches on that pretty hide.”

Aveline had a vision of herself writhing and contorting on the grass, and knew defeat. A girl actually needed to be tied if she was to be whipped. Perhaps she would wish to be. “How wil you tie me?” she asked dismally.

“To a tree. Handy things, trees.”

“Aren’t you ashamed? I'm only a girl. You're so strong, there's no victory in subduing me.”

“I can’t be shamed, poppet. Other damsels, at about this same juncture, have tried. I'm heartlessly immune to chivalry.”

“This business of whipping girls,” she eyed him, puzzled. “Do you always contrive a justification the way you've done with me - I mean letting me try to escape?”

“I think you're just delaying the evil moment, love, but I don’t mind, you're too delicious. The answer's ‘no'. If there's a good reason, I'm grateful. I feel a glow of virtue in striping a guilty rump. But if there's no motive beyond mine own pleasure I enjoy it just as much.”

“You enjoy inflicting pain.”

“Only on pretty girls, poppet. It warms us both for joys to come.”

Aveline was lost. It was one more maze of feeling she would no doubt be forced to explore.

Miles' boyish enthusiasm was infectious; there was excitement in her fear. “Are you going to whip your wife when you get one?”

“Of course, love. Shame to deny the poor girl. And now, the matter of those switches?”

“What happens to me if I refuse?”

“I intend to wear out five of them on thy pert rump. If I have to cut them myself I'l make it ten.”

Aveline sighed hopelessly. She was trapped. There was no escape from this happy man or what he intended to do to her. Again she glimpsed how easily a girl could become reconciled to his erotic cruelty and casual captivity. When there was no escape what else was there but 6

acceptance! Yet to meekly go and prepare the withes for her own whipping was something from which she shrank with all her pride.

“I know little of the whip, save that once with the Abbot,” she said hesitantly. “He hurt me too terribly to speak of.” She looked at Miles pleadingly. “This first time ... with us. For this once, please don’t make me cut the wil ow switches?”

“Cut them, Aveline. Now!”

Aveline knew herself grateful for the sharp command. She needed it. Unconsciously she had provoked it to absolve herself from the shame of servility. Beneath its compulsion she would be no kitchen wench cutting the switches with which her bottom would be flayed - some smal pride might survive the shameful task. The realisation was one more complexity she barely understood. She wondered if Miles understood. She had little doubt he did. Cheeks burning, she picked up the knife he had provided and went to the wil ow he had chosen. Behind her the rope tether trailed upon the grass.

The naked girl deemed it the strangest work she had ever done. She selected and cut withes of the size and length he had described. She peeled and trimmed them with much care. Wryly she conceded that each imperfection she left upon their surface would likely leave a corresponding mark upon herself. It was unbelievable but it was true.

“I hope they please thee, Miles Hardwin.”

She knew her voice not without bitterness as she proffered the five examples of her work and threw the knife back where she had found it. Looking at the switches, she shivered. They were cruel.

“Ye do good work, girl. I'l have you cut more another time,” Miles approved jovially. “Now, tell me their use.”

“For you to whip my bottom.”

“Well-l-l-l-l!” His long drawn out exclamation was in genuine surprise. “We are coming along nicely, aren’t we! I thought I'd have to drag that out of you by force.”

“It's what you wanted!” she flung at him. “So I gave it.” She glared her humiliation.

“Anything else I can do for you?”

He was enraptured by her angry shame. “Why, yes indeed, love. Ask me nicely to switch your bottom.”

How good it would be to turn and run! Or to strike him. Or to spit in his face. To, in some way, touch that adorable grin! Aveline's breasts heaved with more emotions than she could comfortably contain, but she had already voiced acceptance of what was about to be done to her. Why invite anything worse because of pique! She tried hard to keep her voice steady.

“Please, Miles, use these five switches to whip my bottom.”

She was tense, alert for signs. His face was inscrutable. He wanted more, more, more! She gave it!

“I want you to whip me.”

His sigh encompassed al the beneficence in the world. He looked at the anxious nudity in adoration of its excellence. “You did that remarkably well, poppet,” he conceded, restraining his praise.

“Thank you, Miles.” She was now only waiting.

“Undo the rope on your ankle. Then fetch me the shorter lengths. You know where they are.”

Aveline knew. She obeyed as in a dream. Unable to believe in what she had become, or in what she did. Handing him the ropes with which she would be bound, their eyes met and held.

There passed between them an understanding terrible and frightening, yet to be treasured.

Miles pointed to a tree. “That one.”

She walked to it and looked at him inquiringly. Absurdly the thought crossed her mind that she had never been thus tied or thus whipped or been subject to the purpose gripping them now.

“A hand on each side of the trunk - shoulder level.” Aveline obeyed. The trunk was slender enough, but no struggle she could exert would bend it. It would hold her as securely as a century old monarch of the forest. She watched with a strangely detached interest as Miles tied her wrists with band after band of rope so that she would have no choice but to stand as she now was, at arm's length exposed and positioned wel for what was to be done to her.

“Want your feet tied too, love?”

Only Miles would ask a girl such a question. She sensed his enjoyment of her quandary to answer it, and if so what to say. “Why ask me that?” she demanded. “I don’t know enough of these things to tel what I want.”

“If I tie your ankles you can’t kick,” he explained helpful y. “Some girls like to kick, it eases their feelings and gives the little dears something to do while they're being whipped. On the other hand, it's damned undignified, and if you kick wide enough the wil ow's apt to sneak in where you least want it. Matter of temperament, I suppose.”

“I'm tied enough,” Aveline said primly. “No more, thanks.”

Miles was in his element. She was a perfect subject. “‘There's also the matter of a gag,” he said blandly.

Aveline tensed. Thought of a gag in her mouth terrified. She looked at her smiling tormentor in mute question. “Much the same proposition, real y,” he continued kindly. “Most girls like to scream. They tel me it helps. On the other hand, the pretty maidens do have a tendency to say and ask things they're a bit embarrassed about afterwards.”

“Like what?”

“Usual y they ask me to fuck them quick and stop the whip.”

Aveline flushed. She should have known better than to ask the question. She made her voice severe, “And what do you do?”

“Keep right on whipping them, of course.” He sounded surprised at her obtuseness. “I've already explained: your fuck comes after.”

“I don’t want to be gagged. I think it's horrible.”

“Ever been gagged?”

“Of course not! Don’t be sil y.”

“Whoa, love! Who's sily?”

More shame. She would have to apologize. Aveline twisted uselessly at the wrist ropes. “I'm sorry, Miles,” she said quietly, striving to keep the loathing from her voice. She had never felt more abject.

“So you're going to scream?”

“How do I know! I expect I wil . What you're doing to me is al new. I've no experience. But I'm frightened of being gagged. I don’t know why, I just am.”

“Want me to start now, poppet?”

“Oh, Miles!” Her exclamation was one she could not control. He was deliberately taxing her patience and compelling her to recognize what she was to him. “Must you! Must you shame me?”

“Of course! We both enjoy the suspense. Come now, I'm waiting for your answer. Don’t be backward.”

The helpless girl took a deep breath. She needed it. She was helpless and already deep in shame. What mattered a bit more! As casual y as she could contrive, she requested: “Please start whipping my bottom.”

“Good girl! Stick it out a bit. You can.”

She discovered that she could. It surprised her. It meant that tied as she was, she would probably contort shameful y under pain. She protruded her bottom as far as she was able.”

The wil ow had a pain all its own, a very personal agony upon her flesh as though the fact she had cut and trimmed it herself gave it a special right. It scalded her horribly, but she stood stil and she did not scream while each of her nerves picked up the awful message. She saw it as a sil y pride, but she longed to make a stoic stand before this man who was like no other she had known. She would scream and stamp her feet beneath the Abbot's lash, but not here. Oh, please, she prayed, not here! She looked back across a captive shoulder, her eyes wide in supplication. But she said no word. Miles smiled and bestowed an approving nod. He then struck her again.

It was different from the pil ory. There the blows had come without warning, and from a hand unseen. But here tied to the tree she could, if she so desired, look back and see the arm and the wil ow that would wound her. Only the sight of impact itself was denied. She beheld it now in fascinated disbelief until the stroke was slicing the air in its swift passage to her flesh. But then unable to bear more she turned back to the tree to which she was bound as though she found in the slender trunk a friend and comforter in stress.

Aveline was not stoic. True, the wil ows were actually less awful than the Abbot's thong, but there were more of them. To wear out five of them upon her skin meant an eventual agony she viewed with dread. As the second and third cuts found her she whimpered and began to twist her hips in motions she could not control.

When the first switch shredded and was cast aside there came a brief pause while number two was selected. The whipped girl watched the exchange over a bare shoulder; she was panting and wondering, terribly bewildered by this punishment from a man she longed most ardently to like. Miles' voice took her back into reality.

“You're quite superb, y'know. You should be whipped daily.”

The tribute was smal solace to a naked girl with a bottom that seemed on fire. Aveline dealt with it with what she hoped was sweet reason.

“But how can I be whipped daily! To be punished like this each day would kil me.”

“It wouldn’t, love, even though it may feel like it. Ismay cut me thirty switches in a week once.”

Tied to the tree as she was, it was difficult to twist to look at the man whose pleasure was her pain. She used his name with a deeper feeling than she had used yet. “Miles, please don’t whip me any more. I beg of you.”

He was quite unpredictable. Carrying the switch, he, moved close and ordered: “Open your legs.”

Her terrified exclamation was involuntary. “Oh, Miles! Oh, no ... no, don’t whip me there. Oh, please ... Isn’t there enough other - “

His amused chuckle cut her short. “Don’t be sil y, love. Open those pretty legs.”

Crestfallen and hesitant, Aveline obeyed. She was like a child in his hands, totally at his mercy, uncertain that mercy was a part of him. The ropes on her wrists made her his plaything. She gasped and bit her lip as he cupped her sex and played with it. When he lifted his hand she saw it was wet with her secretions. She longed to die of shame.

“And you talk of dying, poppet. That sweet little slit of yours adores the whip.”

“It's not the whip, it's you!”

Aveline had no sooner uttered the words than she would have given everything to recall them.

She flamed scarlet at his delighted laughter. Tugging at her bound hands in mortification, she exclaimed in deep chagrin, “I didn’t mean what you're thinking.”

“What am I thinking, love?”

“That I get wet like that because you've whipped me - like Ismay.”

“Al girls are like Ismay, sweets.”

“I think it's awful. I mean, it's all your fault.”

“What's my fault?”

“Everything! Look at me tied like this - and whipped. If I get the way ... the way you discovered ... it has to be your fault. It's certainly not mine.”

“Who's talking about faults, poppet! You're perfect.”

“You didn’t need to do that - with your hands!”

“It's hard to find out - the other way, when you're tied to a tree.”

“You don’t have to find out at all.”

“Oh, but I do, sweets! Bakers open oven doors to make sure the bread's on the rise.”

Aveline sniffed in dudgeon and dismay. Whatever the cause of her moist sex she was betrayed

- betrayed by her own plight in being female. Miles would read whatever conclusion he desired from the condition between her legs. Her real dismay came from her realisation she herself 10

was unsure of what or whom to blame. She feared herself wanton. “Well, I hope you're enjoying yourself,” she said in indignant hauteur.

“Oh, I am indeed, poppet. Ready for the next switch?”

“Miles, I asked you not to whip me any more. I ask you again ... Please!”

“You're really enjoying this whole adventure, y'know!”

“I'm not! Oh, you're ... you're - !”

“Adorable, lovable, sweet, kind?” Miles offered helpfuly.

“Words like that when you're torturing me!” Aveline was aghast with feminine fury, a fury she was finding it hard to sustain against an undeniably erotic fire within her loins and a wish that Miles would kiss her and stop talking nonsense. By some strange magic the acute agonies the frayed switch had worked upon her bottom had disappeared.

Miles pul ed her head back hard by tugging at her hair, then bent and kissed her ready mouth with a fine, masculine competence. It was as though he had read her mind - perhaps he had!

His lips left her breathless and disorganised. “A small tribute to a red, round rump,” he explained happily.

Aveline was lost! She knew herself lost and added to the long list of this male creature's triumphs. She did not care. But she wanted her hands, a compelling urgency demanded she clasp them around his neck. “Untie me,” she gasped. “Oh, Miles, set me free!”

“You wish to be fucked, poppet?”

Aveline absorbed his solicitous query without being too badly disil usioned. It was typical Miles Hardwin and she'd have to put up with it. But as to replying in the affirmative she was too bewildered by the demands of her body and the countering dictates of her mind to do more than cling to the safety of integrity. “Of course I don’t,” she said with fine vexation. “And I wish you'd stop using that beastly word.”

“What word would you like, sweets?”

“We don’t need a word. Leave it alone! Oh, Miles! Please let me loose?”

“Well, beloved, if we don’t fuck, we whip.”

Only Miles could have made the outrageous premise sound undeniable. Only he could have made it seems as though the choice was hers. Aveline feared to answer him with sulky silence, but could devise no devastating retort. She chose martyrdom.

“I am not your beloved, and we don’t do that horrible thing you said. Since it gives you so much pleasure and you don’t even care about my feelings, you might as well continue whipping me.” To give emphasis to her disdain she stuck out her bottom at him in petulant provocation.

Miles struck it with cruelty and precision. His naked victim yelped and writhed. Aveline was certain this second switch was worse than the first - or did a girl so easily forget! The pain was quite unbearable although she was quite obviously bearing it. When the next stroke lapped the first it was only feminine logic that since Miles would fuck her at the end of the fifth switch whether she liked it or not, she might as well accept the inevitable now with good grace and save the remaining switches for another day. She whimpered in the desolation of decision when another shrewd cut found her twisting tenderness. “Oh, stop!” she pleaded desperately.

“Miles, stop it!”

“Something on your mind, poppet?”

How could she tel him! How does a girl say such a thing! Al the precepts of her childhood fought for purity. “You're doing nicely, y'know. Pity you can’t see yourself.”

“Oh, Miles, it's awful. I can’t stand it.”

“Is that al you stopped me for? We discussed it before. I'l work up on your back for a change if you'd like me to.” He sounded genuinely concerned for her preference. “But I do believe your bottom's much the best place for these wil ows. Resilient, y'know.”

“Please untie me. I ... I want you to.”

“Trying to tell me something?”

“I suppose so ... Oh, yes! You don’t help me. Oh why _ !”

“You'd like to be fucked now, poppet. I can tell the signs.”

“You're outrageous! I ... I - oh, I just won’t!” She tried to turn and face him. “You may as well go on whipping me.”

As the second switch wore down her courage and itself, Aveline stood helplessly and fumed, both at what was being done to her tied nudity and her inability to stop it. Rectitude born of early guidance seemed likely to provide her with a flayed bottom without profit. To be ravished also because of her failure to speak a word was an injustice that caused her to twist angrily at the ropes binding her wrists to the tree even though she knew the effort painful and useless.

When Miles cast aside number two and picked up number three the smarting girl could bear her plight no longer.

“Please, Miles, not any more. I'l behave.”

Toying with the new wil ow withe, he moved to where she could more easily see him.

“Behave?” He cocked an enquiring eye. “How?”

Ashamed, she twisted irritably at her confinement. She knew he was teasing. “You know. I'l do what you want. You don’t have to keep hitting me with those beastly switches.”

He pretended to study her proposition. “But, sweetheart, I'm switching your bottom for the good of your soul and my own enjoyment. Can’t very well bargain about it, can we?”

Aveline stamped a bare foot in exasperation. “You're trying to make me say that awful word, and I won’t say it, I won’t! Oh, why must you be so ... “

“Helpful, considerate, affectionate ... “ Miles allowed the outrageous questions to hover around the naked girl tugging in vexation at her bound wrists. His smile was beneficent. “Or do you just want to ask me to fuck you?”

“Yes.”

For the tied girl, her single uncompromising word was enough. Surely Miles could be satisfied with such a surrender! But supposing he was not! Supposing he intended to extract every ounce of shame she could provide! She bleakly considered the remaining three wil ow switches to be shredded on her person. Having already borne the infliction of two of them she grudgingly conceded their innocence as compared to the Abbot Gabelot's whip. They inflamed 12

scaldingly and imparted a momentary hurt most hard to bear; but bear them she could and would rather than demean herself beyond conscience. She gazed at her tormentor appealingly.

“Yes, what, beloved?”

“That thing you said. I'l do it. Oh, Miles, don’t tease me so!”

“You are offering me your virtue, dear girl?”

“I ... I suppose so ... yes.”

“But I’m going to take it after the fifth switch anyway.”

“I know that, and I don’t mind.” She wished she could suppress the rising tide of pink to her cheeks. “If we're going to do that together, must you ... must you - Oh, please, don’t whip me any more! It hurts terribly ... terribly!”

“You're loving every stroke.”

“I'm not! I'm not!”

Even as she made the fervid declaration she doubted its truth. Ismay and the girls had been right. Miles and his wil ows possessed a magic a girl was powerless against. It was shaming and humbling, but it was also wicked and exciting. Aveline wondered what her feelings would be at this moment if she had not been raped by the first men who had taken from her far more than a pierced hymen. She supposed it wrong to feel so little fear of Miles, but she could not help it.

Miles kissed her. It was a long kiss during which his roving fingers reduced her utterly. She longed for her tied hands but compensated for them with wil ing lips. If she was wanton then she was wanton. She did not care. “One more switch; love?”

“Yes, oh yes!” She would have agreed to anything. “Stick your bottom out and writhe nicely.”

“Of course. Oh, Miles!”

Aveline wantonly protruded her rear. The act had become on a par with offering her lips to be kissed. The switch licked at her instantly, but it was not until it had bit into her bottom several times that the ful bitterness of its pain competed with the panting eroticism of her awareness of Miles the Male. Even when the stinging waves of smarting distress went on and on beyond an easy tolerance, she continued to hold her provocative pose in which her pert cheeks seemed to invite the blows they wanted not at al . Nor did she forget her Master's demand that she writhe. It was an easy command to obey. In a palpitating welter of emotions she contrived to chafe her tied wrists with her lascivious motions for the delectation of he who whipped her.

When the third wil ow was split and thrown away Aveline's heart was thumping in a paean of triumph.

She watched him strip. He was magnificent! Here was strength and maleness enough for a dozen girls! As he cast aside his clothes in leisurely motions of assured purpose he met her eyes and smiled his promise, mocking her eagerness and her longing that she must await his pleasure. When the moment came it was in no ways such as she had supposed.

It was typical of him, of course, that he should cast away her moorings and embark her on a journey that, at first, fil ed her with nothing but dismay. She was very innocent and little versed in love. When Miles inserted his muscularity beneath her tied arm and between herself and the tree she failed to comprehend.

“My hands, Miles? My hands are tied to the tree.”

It was as though she supposed he had forgotten the manner in which she was bound. It was imperative he be reminded. How could she love him without her hands! She was about to utter other gentle hints of her helplessness when she saw the quiet smile upon his face and felt his arms tighten as he lifted her effortlessly. When she was impaled and held secure she forgot her bonds, forgot al else save wonderment and worship. Her legs needed but smal guidance to their appointed place, her breasts were crushed against his chest, her lips glued to his. That his fingers were splayed out across the burning flesh of her buttocks, a hand beneath each cheek, seemed the most natural clasp of all. The agony of her whipped skin transmuted to a flame of bliss. Aveline D'Almaine found her Master and her love in explosion after explosion of ardent fire. The five men of long ago were forgotten as was al else.

When he took his clothes and went away, Aveline knew it right that she be left limp and breathless and stil tied to her tree. Miles was her lord, she was but a girl who had thought to best him, she must be taught her lesson. Her Master might seek the slumber of repletion while she stood out a lonely vigil in helpless homage to her strictured wrists. She eyed the bands of rope longingly but had long since proved her inability to free herself. Wryly, she conceded she no longer wanted to. If Miles wanted his latest conquest safely tied to a tree she was content enough to be so held.

In happy wonderment she relived the heat and wonder of their coupling. She felt certain no other girl had ever known such glory. She was stil in this maze of fervid re-enactment when a hand clasped her mouth and a familiar voice commanded: “Quiet, M'Lady, not a sound.”

It was Adam Godsoule.

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