Introspections

He heard her awake in the middle of the night and considered going after her. The doors were alarmed again and he wasn't really concerned she would leave, but remembering his sister's struggles and the apparent depths of the girl's self hatred he was somewhat concerned she would attempt to harm herself.

He forced himself to stay put, reassured by his intentional efforts to keep any potential weapons carefully secured, as well as the realization that his Hannah was strong in a way his sister never had been. Even so, his sleep the remainder of the night was restless.

When he finally left his room the next morning he went looking for her, presuming he would find her in her own bed. Instead he discovered her sleeping on a large cushion in front of the fireplace, covered in nothing but a blanket. The cat was curled against her slender body and he hoped she had drawn at least a small measure of comfort from its presence.

Loath to wake her, he slowly lowered himself into his armchair and simply watched her breathe. Finally she rolled over and sat up, drawing the blanket around herself when she became aware of his presence. She stared at him silently and he offered her a sad smile.

"Today is our dress rehearsal and it's the only one we get. Since I need you on your best behavior I'm not going to push you to bare your soul any further right now. Make no mistake, when our company leaves we will be processing whatever drove you out of my bed last night, but for now I don't want to hear a word out of you unless you need clarification or are responding to a direct question. Today there will be no teasing, no games, and no mercy. Just instant obedience or immediate punishment. Is that clear?"

She nodded her head, finding she was relieved. She had told him more the night before than she had ever shared with anyone, including her parents and multiple therapists. Discussing how her vulnerability made her feel was not high on her "to do" list. Clear cut expectations with predictable consequences was by far less complex and not as frightening.

"A direct question requires a verbal answer Hannah. I believe a 'Yes Master' is what I am after. Slave position please and then let's hear it."

Slipping the blanket off her shoulders she kneeled on the cushion, bottom touching her heels with her back slightly arched, eyes downcast, and hands palms up on her thighs. "Yes Master," she declared in a voice much more confident than she felt.

"Very nice, perfect except for one minor modification. When taking this position in front of the bastard or any of his goons I want your palms face down on your thighs. This signal indicates you are not available for sexual use without express permission from your Master."

That was something she could agree with fully and she made the requested change instantaneously.

"Good, now repeat rules one through four in order, word for word. I hope you've been practicing."

She didn't stumble at the request, despite the fact they hadn't reviewed them for several days. Years of close attention to detail and several courses on study skills had paid off.

"Fine, you have no excuses if you choose to break a rule. Now let's go through each of your positions, then I want you to crawl over and kneel at my feet with your hands clasped behind your back."

Again her responses were both prompt and exact and she soon knelt in front of him as commanded. Unzipping his jeans he took out his cock and stroked it in front of her until it was fully erect, rubbing it against her cheek before ordering her to open her mouth. This was the point at which he feared nervous hesitation would call for punishment, but she didn't fail him and he was soon pleasantly encompassed in her mouth with her lips closed firmly around him.

"This is not meant to be enjoyable for you so I don't care if you pretend to like it, but you sure as hell better take it without any noticeable resistance. I'm going to fuck your face hard and fast this time, if you can't keep up or if I feel any teeth you'd better plan on spending the next hour on your knees sucking on rubber."

With that warning he wrapped one hand around her jaw and entwined the other in her hair, starting slowly to push himself further into her warm cavern. "Use your tongue, lick the tip. When I speed up get it out of the way and let me do the work. Just this once if you feel like you're going to puke you can signal it with a hand on my thigh, but you won't get that luxury tomorrow."

After another minute or so bobbing in and out at a slower pace he increased his tempo, shoving himself further down her throat with each thrust. The first few times when he felt her gag reflex he pulled back a bit to give her a chance to breathe, but as he drew closer to a release he grew less concerned with her tolerance level. He pushed her harder than he had initially planned to but she took it like a champ.

"That's it baby, almost there. I'll be coming soon, don't spill a drop!"

He exploded in her mouth a few moments later and she rose to the challenge, clasping her lips tightly shut and downing each spurt, even keeping him in her mouth until he was soft without being prompted.

"Good girl. If I didn't know better I'd think you've practiced your technique for years. Sorry, no toothbrush this time. Well trained sluts wouldn't even consider washing away their Master's cum. How are you feeling?"

"Fine, thank you Master." He couldn't tell if she was giving him an honest answer or the response she thought he wanted to hear but he didn't press further.

"Obviously I'll be doing all the cooking, but you'll be expected to serve. You will serve your Master first and our company second. When we are both served you may kneel on the rug next to me on my right side between the table and the wall. I would usually put you on the other side so you can slip out easier to fetch us things as needed but I don't want you anywhere near potentially roaming hands. Tomorrow you'll eat after we are both finished before cleaning up. You can stand at the counter while you do, sitting on chairs or furniture without direct permission is traditionally forbidden."

He cooked breakfast and she served it satisfactorily and kneeled next to him as directed. When finished he arose, giving her permission to eat and then to clean up. He ordered her to join him downstairs when the cleaning was finished. As she entered the playroom he instructed her to lay on the table facedown.

"How much pain do you think you can take? I need to get a better idea of your pain threshold." He was somewhat apologetic as he explained his intentions.

"I'm sure more than you'd care to give Master, presuming you really are not a sadist." With her face turned away he couldn't read her facial expressions, but he thought her response sounded almost amused.

"We'll see how it goes. I'm going to start with a few strokes from a variety of implements and will then ask you to rank your pain level on a standard one to ten scale. It is vitally important you don't hold back your automatic responses or underestimate your level of pain. I suspect you disassociate to manage intense pain and I need to know exactly how far I can take you without that happening. I'm going to need you alert and totally responsive tomorrow."

He started with a suede flogger similar to the one they had experimented with earlier, giving her ten moderate strokes on the buttocks. She took them without noticeable response.

"Give me your rating. Don't overthink it, just tell me the first number that comes to mind."

"Two." He thought he heard a hint of teasing in her voice, as if she was dating him to do more, so he did. Moving to a riding crop he gave her half a dozen heavier strokes.

Still, this drew only a rating of three.

He switched to a wooden paddle, starting with five moderate strokes and when that drew another three rating he followed up with an additional five heavier strokes, finally drawing some whimpering and shifting on the table before she gave him a pain rating of five.

Confident he had found the middle of her pain threshold he progressed to a split tawse, giving her an even half dozen strokes. The heavier implement left slight welts even when applied at moderate strength and he heard her first actual cry of pain and a solid rating of seven.

Somewhat reluctantly he picked up a cane, reasoning a few well placed lasting marks would imply ongoing punishment during tomorrow's initial inspection. "This is the last implement, I guarantee this will hurt. I want you to give me a rating instantly after each stroke."

The first stroke, though mildly applied, drew an immediate four and left a thin red mark along her ass. The second resulted in a hissing breath and shot her pain level up to a solid six. He was tempted to stop there, but decided a few more marks were called for.

"I'm giving you three more strokes, you don't need to rate them. I promise I'm not beating you needlessly, I'm intentionally marking you. Go ahead and cry if you feel like it, no need to hold it in. As soon as I finish with the cane we'll get to the aftercare."

He moved to the side of the table, placing a hand firmly on the small of her back and administering the final three strokes in quick succession. She tensed with each blow but did not cry out, making him suspect he had reached her limit and caused her to disassociate to some extent. Now the trick was figuring out what would draw her out of that state the fastest.

He slipped a finger into her and found her barely damp, indicating she had been neither dishonest nor uninformed when she told him she was not masochistic. She obviously was not in the least bit aroused by pain. Inwardly he cursed at himself, questioning if he had pushed her tolerance too far. Crossing the room to the cupboards he pulled out a bottle of unscented lotion and retrieved a soft blanket from the closet. Cautiously massaging the lotion into her buttocks, he carefully ran his fingers over the marks from the cane relieved to find only mild bruising that would probably last a day or two at most.

He thought about giving her a deeper massage, but decided he wanted clear boundaries between the pain and pleasure. Instead he wrapped her tightly in a blanket and lay her down gently on the couch, heading to the kitchen to grab her a glass of orange juice and some crackers. She took both the glass and the crackers without comment. When she was finished he knelt down next to her and ran a finger down her cheek, "Come on back to me Hannah, let me see your eyes."

After a couple minutes more she took a deep breath and finally met his gaze. "I thought you said no mercy."

"Fuck what I said, I need to know if you are okay." The anger in his response surprised her.

"Relax, I'm fine. I've taken much worse, it's no big deal."

He shook his head. "That's where you are wrong, sweetheart. It's an incredibly big deal. Just because you can tolerate abuse doesn't mean you should. You deserve far better."

She found herself psychoanalyzing him, an act that surprised her as it seemed it had always been the other way around. It didn't take a psychology degree to figure out he was feeling guilty.

"We are both acting out roles here James, you know that. Unfortunately both roles are vital at the moment. You don't have to enjoy your role any more than I enjoy mine, but if you're not mistaken we don't have another choice. I'm the one with the most to loose here and I would much rather put up with some play acting to keep the bastard at bay than end up pissing him off and getting my ass shipped to some brothel. So pull yourself together and figure out what else we need to get ready for a visit."

He laughed out loud. "I keep underestimating you Hannah. You're much too stubborn to go down without a fight. You know how to play your role like an expert, but apparently I'm struggling with mine. Tell me what you can about the bastard and your handler. Help me understand what makes them tick."

She swallowed nervously, he was asking her to go back to a very dark place and she honestly would prefer another beating. She hesitated for just a moment, wondering if asking for what she really wanted was worth the risk of making herself more vulnerable, quickly deciding she didn't want to go back there alone.

"Hold me, please?"

He responded unquestioningly, grasping out and drawing her into his arms, allowing her to rest her head on his shoulder. He missed the magnitude of the request, but she didn't. It was literally the first time in her life she had asked someone to hold her, and the fact that she had done so willingly left her both reassured and terrified. However she had both the personal experience and the professional background to give him exactly what he needed.

"Shawn is easy to figure out. He is an idiot who gets off on power. I suspect he is a narcissist, without question he is a control freak completely focused on getting his own way. I'm rather surprised he managed to engage me online for the length of time he did. I'm certain he wouldn't have pulled it off successfully in person. I'm can't be sure but from what he said I think I was his first take and his first chance to attempt training a slave.

He's not particularly intelligent, uses his fists as his only real tool. If he wants something he'll attempt to beat it out of you, if you resist he will simply beat you harder. His hair trigger makes him dangerous, but also very predictable and thus easy to manipulate. I don't think I'm overconfident when I say I'd find it easier to break him than he would to break me. That may be one reason the bastard let me go as early as he did, he probably correctly presumed Shawn doesn't have what it would take to do the job.

The bastard himself is an entirely different matter. He is a true psychopath. Brilliant, chillingly so, and a master at mind games. I didn't spend a lot of time with him, but both times it took him only minutes to identify my weaknesses and use them against me. The second time we met I think he'd grown tired of watching Shawn attempt to gain my cooperation and wanted to prove it could be done with ease. He certainly managed to do so.

He had them bring me from my cell and hang me in cuffs in front of his fireplace and he ignored me completely for several hours. When he finally did address me he sat at his desk without making eye contact and laid out the rules for his game. He told me I was choose an implement from his selection on the wall and ask him politely to beat me with it.

Of course I ignored him and he continued to act as if I wasn't there until without warning he grabbed a crop from his desk and began striking me with it. He didn't make eye contact or say anything at all. After a minute he went back to what he was doing as if he'd stopped only long enough to swat an annoying fly. The next time around it was a feather, drawing it across my skin in sensitive places, again without a word or a glance and continuing only a few minutes before he went back to ignoring me completely.

They brought dinner to him and when he was finished he poured himself a glass of wine and stood in front of me like he was viewing a piece of art rather than a person. When he was nearly finished he drizzled a bit onto each of my breasts and carefully licked the drops off. No words, no eye contact, just using me as he would a cup.

It didn't take long for me to break after that. I just wanted to get the beating over with and go back to being alone. I begged him to beat me, even brought him the tool, presented myself and thanked him for every stroke. I was relieved when it was over, thought he would call them to get me, but he simply chained me up again and went back to work.

After awhile he told me again to make my choice, then back to alternating between ignoring me and taunting me until I gave in and again begged to be punished, chose the tool, thanked him for each stroke. I thought for sure he was done with me then, but he simply hung me back over the fireplace and proceeded to get ready for bed as if he was completely alone.

He turned the lights down and took a book to bed with him and read for awhile before again giving me permission to ask to be beaten. Believe it or not, I think I would have offered him anything in that moment if he would only do something to indicate he viewed me as a person and not simply a possession to be used when it amused him.

He didn't make me choose that time, didn't ask me to count. He simply whipped me as if he didn't have a care in the world, until I couldn't support myself any more and I collapsed, held up only by chains. I thanked him without prompting when he finished but he didn't even acknowledge me, just turned off the lights and went to bed. The pain was bad, but nothing unbearable. The guilt of begging for him to beat me was far worse, and the feeling of being nearly invisible and completely without value was soul crushing.

I can tolerate pain, embrace it even. It reminds me I'm alive. The thought of simply ceasing to exist, being so insignificant that nobody would even notice you were gone, that terrifies me. Somehow he knew that and figured out how to use it against me. I was relieved when they came for me the next morning to take me back to Shawn for more beatings. I'm afraid if they had left me with the bastard any longer he would have broken me completely, seemingly without effort. That's the kind of man he is."

Hearing the emptiness in her voice made his blood boil and he vowed then and there to take down the bastard or die trying. In fact death wasn't an option, he would never leave his Hannah to fend against her worst nightmare alone. No, the bastard was going to burn, the sooner the better. They would see to that together.