Mercy (22 page)

She smiled at me though, kindly and sweetly. I took my cues from her even though we didn’t talk. We were submissive sisters, that was the feeling I got from her, and I had a strong sense that later we’d be beaten side by side.

Matthew and the other men ordered dinner, and as I expected, Matthew ordered on my behalf. Over the course of time I gathered the men’s names were Byron and Frank. I was shocked, however, to hear them refer to the woman as Slave. That was all they called her the entire time we dined, and I was terrified that Matthew would begin to do the same to me. I realized that I couldn’t bear the loss of my name. But no, he referred to me many times as Lucy over the course of their conversations about me.

And yes, for the most part, that’s what the men did, they discussed the sexual lives of their slaves. As in, the sexual life of me and “Slave” who was next to me, while we sat with our heads down and picked at the food on our plates. I didn’t eat much although the food was delicious, but I listened, and wow, the things I learned. I remembered when Matthew had scoffed, “I’m ridiculously soft on you!” and by the end of dinner, I realized he had been, as Byron and Frank discussed their relationship with Slave.

Slave was apparently “full time,” she didn’t work or have her own domicile. She lived with Byron and Frank, who shared her every night. If one was tired or busy, the other one used her alone. They did a lot of the same things Matthew and I did, and then quite a bit more.

Slave wore a thick black padlocked collar, which she was ordered to display to Matthew from beneath the high neckline of her dress. Apparently she was also pierced and branded. I tried to keep the emotion out of my face, the way I felt about their arrangement, about the things she let them do to her. And of course, I wondered what exactly had been Matthew’s point in this little meeting. Maybe these were things he wanted to do to me.

Did he want to take things further between us? Was he unhappy, or bored? Did he want me to be more like Slave? Did he just want one night of watching me worked over by Byron and Frank? Because I knew that was what was in store for me. I could tell by the lingering looks they gave me. I saw in their eyes the promise of pain to come. I was so scared. I wanted to take Matthew’s hand and beg him,
please don’t make me. I’m not that good
.

But I didn’t do that. I stayed silent, because a part of me was curious too. A part of me was horny and reckless, and wanted to see if I could endure just one night of Slave’s hell. I was pretty sure that Matthew would protect me from anything that broke his promises to me. He wouldn’t let me get scars, or bleed, or get injured. He wouldn’t let any of these men inside me without a sheath. So aside from that, what could I not bear?

I met Matthew’s eyes from time to time, even though Slave kept hers down the entire time.
Yes, I’m allowed to look at my dominant. Aren’t I a mess?
I met his eyes mostly to assuage my panic, to reassure myself that I was his and not Frank and Byron’s, who seemed to regard their submissive as nothing much more than a dog.

Soon after we met, he had told me emphatically,
I’ll never put you in a collar. I’ll never treat you like a dog. I don’t like to have sex with animals.
But Slave, apparently, ate off the floor. Slave was collared around the clock. She was walked sometimes on a leash in the garden in the walled backyard. She pissed and shat out in the yard too, and sometimes, her masters pissed and shat on her. Slave was punished in a dungeon. Slave competed in pony races and exhibitions. Slave didn’t even have a bedroom. Slave slept on the floor next to one of her masters’ beds.

I can’t say myself what drove Slave to do this, even being submissive as I was. I wondered how long she had lived a life like this, how much longer she would keep at it, and what the adjustment would be like when she re-entered the world. The idea of what she had done completely terrified me…to give up everything, every inkling of dignity and will. My eyes strayed to her again and again. When she met my eyes, hauntingly, there was intelligence and irony there.

I suppose it’s possible that it was all an act, that Byron and Frank bragged about things that weren’t true. Matthew didn’t brag a great amount about me, just spoke of my lithe dancer’s body, of how my muscles strained under his hands. He spoke of the way I lost myself, the way I came continuously and uncontrollably for him like a mindless slut. He spoke of the way I loved to be doubly penetrated, and the way I had never yet used our safe word, even when an outsider had beaten me and drawn blood.

He said that word,
outsider
, with an air of repugnance. I think he reminded his friends too, in a subtle way, that they were not to draw my blood. He was unapologetic for his “softness” towards me.

“I like to see her dance,” he explained. “I won’t take her away from that.”

Byron and Frank nodded, although I knew they scorned his kindness. “Of course,” said Byron, “that’s a choice you’re free to make.”

After dinner, we went to the car. We were going to Frank and Byron’s house, to use the dungeon there. I sat beside Matthew half in shock, and he knew I had to ask the questions in my mind.

“Okay, you have until we get there. Ask your questions, whatever you want.”

They poured out in a rush.

“How long have you known them? Have you done this before?”

“I’ve known them for years, Lucy, and I’ve played with them many times. It’s perfectly safe.”

“You’ve slept with her? Slave?” I felt unreasonably jealous.

“I’ve fucked her, yes,” he said. “And I will tonight.”

“They’ll have sex with me?”

“Yes. They’ll wear condoms every time.” He looked over at me with a faint frown. “Of course, you trust me to keep you safe.”

“Yes, I do...” I said, and I truly did.

“But you’re scared.”

“Yes.” I looked back at him, troubled. “Do you want me to be like her?”

“No, not really. But I do think you could learn some things from her. She’s been doing this for years.”

“She’s prettier than me,” I said mournfully.

“No, just different. If I thought she was more beautiful than you, she would be mine now, instead of you.”

“What do you want me to learn from this exactly?”

He didn’t answer right away. “I would like you to see how somebody else asserts dominance, and how it compares to the way that I dominate you.”

“Why? So you’ll look better? You want me to realize that you’re soft on me? I know that already. We don’t have to go through all this just to show me that.”

“No, it’s not that at all. What I want you to learn is if what I’m doing for you is enough. If it’s all you want.”
Oh God, he thinks I’m not happy. He thinks he’s not enough for me.
It boggled my brain. “I guess all I want from tonight, Lucy, is to show you that what we have is only part of what’s available to you. I don’t want you to be mad at me later that I never showed you.”

I looked out the window crossly. Did he think I was that naive? “I read
The Story of O
, and
Carrie’s Story
too.”

“Even so, Lucy Merritt, you’re my submissive. If I want to educate you further, you’re obliged to obey.”

“I know I am, Matthew Norris,” I answered, and that earned me an excruciating pinch on the inside of my leg.

* * *

When we arrived in Byron and Frank’s “dungeon,” I really had to try hard not to laugh. It was such the epitome of an actual sex dungeon, it was really almost too over the top. It made Matthew’s stark, neutral basement room and armoire of toys look like a honeymoon suite. Slave was already naked and on her knees, with huge weights hanging down from her pierced nipples and her hands bound to a chain over her head.

I’ll try to tell you everything that happened in that dungeon, but things moved so fast, it was almost a blur. They moved fast, and yet we were there for nearly three hours. I did lose myself a little bit. More than I’d expected to.

To begin with, Matthew ordered me to strip, and Byron and Frank immediately mocked my worthless body, my skinny legs and non-existent boobs. They tied my arms over my head and took turns beating and marking my ass while I watched Matthew fuck Slave in the mouth. After that, they asked Matthew if they could both fuck me at once. He agreed that they could, that I would love that, and the truth was that I actually did. They put clips on my nipples first that hurt like hellfire, then Frank lay down on a bench and pulled me onto his cock. Byron straddled the bench behind me and thrust into my ass and they both fucked me slowly in a very smooth and practiced way. And yes, it felt great, I got turned on from it, turned on enough to really come hard. Matthew just sat in a chair across the room and watched with an unfathomable look on his face. Byron and Frank said nothing about the fact that I’d come, and then Slave and I were made to kneel and were both beaten at the same time.

As I cowered beside Slave with my arms cuffed behind my back, I thought that the way she took beatings was amazing. She writhed and moaned like she loved every blow. It was like the pain didn’t touch her, or if it did, it was something she craved. While she moaned in my ear, I screamed and begged pitifully. When they were done striping both our bottoms, they made Slave lie down and told me to eat her out. I did, even though I’d never gone down on a woman. I tried some of the things Matthew often did on me. She moaned and twisted under me and seemed to find pleasure, but since she seemed to find pleasure in everything, I couldn’t really tell if it was true. Then she was ordered to go down on me, which she did while Matthew fucked her in the ass, watching my face the whole time. I let myself drift, as Slave’s
cunnelingus
talents put my own to sorry shame. She had me climaxing haplessly in minutes, and I stared into Matthew’s eyes as I came. Up to this point, I actually found great pleasure in that dungeon, but then, after that, things took a nasty turn.

Byron commented to Matthew that I was undisciplined, childish, and self-absorbed, that I came too frequently and with too much pleasure of my own. Matthew laughed and said that was true, and Byron asked if he could gag me and punish me as he saw fit. What he actually said was,
Can I take her into my hands?
I hated that idea, because his hands would not be Matthew’s, but Matthew said that he could if he wanted to, and things got totally crazy after that.

Byron began by gagging me with great pleasure. I had never worn a gag, and I’m sure that turned him on, to be the first one to gag my mouth. The one he produced was invasive. He thrust the wide phallic shape into my mouth and buckled it against my face with the straps, so I was unable to breathe deeply or swallow with any success. Matthew asked to check it, and I thought there was no way he would make me endure it, but he nodded, to my dismay, and said I was okay. Then I was blindfolded and bound to a leather-covered, X-shaped cross, bound at every point, wrists, ankles, neck, and waist. Byron, Frank, and Matthew all fucked me in the ass at that point, and I could tell from the feel of it that Matthew went last. I also didn’t enjoy it at all. I was far too traumatized by the helplessness I felt.

Next, Byron lectured me a long time about how worthless I was, about how much Matthew loved Slave. He said that their slave was lower than shit but that I was even more worthless than she, because at least she was beautiful and womanly while I was unattractive and poorly trained. I could hear Slave’s moans in the background, that someone was fucking her. The idea that it was Matthew brought tears to my eyes. Was this truly what Matthew wanted? The fertile beauty and utter submission of Slave? Instead he had me, coltish and pale, and more likely to cry and scream than moan with pleasure under his blows.

Byron started to beat me painfully then with a cane, and that in itself hurt like hell, but aside from that, he hit my thighs and my back. I screamed behind the gag and writhed in a panic, because those marks would show. Matthew asked sharply for him to restrict his blows to my ass, and Byron began to argue with him about the place of a slave. Matthew insisted I could not be marked as Byron wanted, and then Byron asked to beat the bottom of my soles instead. I shook my head violently, made a desperate sound of alarm, as much as I could behind the gag in my mouth, but Matthew was already voicing his denial.
Lucy is a dancer
, he said.