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Chapter 28: After the Strappado

Chapter 28: After the Strappado

They were taken out of the Blue Room just before the torment became more than they could take and the screaming would begin. Angus was a good judge of such things.

For the afternoon, they were taken into the Red Room. There they found three small, steel-barred cages, two of a very small size and one a little larger. The large one was about six feet long and just wide enough to fit a woman’s body. It was hanging from the ceiling, and the two women whose shoulders were still aching could easily imagine having to stand in that cage for a long time.

It was not the long cage that they were introduced to, however. It was the two small ones. Each was about three feet long, less in width, and not quite that tall. The lid swung up on stout hinges to allow entrance, then could be locked solidly in place with two hasps and padlocks. There was no question that a woman locked into one of those would be totally unable to escape – not to mention hardly able to move.

Each of them still had their arms bound behind their backs, elbows tightly together, so there was little that Angus had to do to prepare them for the afternoon’s torment. He swung open the door of one cage and bid Melinda to step into the cage. She glared at him and was about to inform him that she could not possibly fit into such a small space, when she saw the riding crop in his hand. Gently he reached it out and tapped the side of one of her breasts as a hint of what would follow should she really wish to refuse the command. Still glaring angrily, she lifted one foot and placed it inside the cage. She used her bound hands on the edge to steady herself as she swung the other foot over.

“Now down on your knees,” he commanded.

Melinda looked down at the bottom of the cage and saw that it was a solid steel plate. She tried to lower herself, but found the maneuver awkward with no hands to help. Angus took hold her one bare

arm and helped her. The space was so small that her feet were up against one end and her knees within a few inches of the other.

“Bend down.”

It was the order she feared would come next. It was logical. Unless she were bent over, there was no way that the lid could be closed. She bent, not liking the position she was being forced into. She felt Angus’ hand on her back as he pushed her down until her breasts were flattened against her thighs. Her head bumped into the bars at the end. She was about to protest when she felt the steel bars pressing against her bound arms. She was forced into a more squashed position. Then she heard the clicking of the padlocks.

The steel bars pressed against her on all sides and the top. It seemed as if the cage been custom designed to her measurements, so snug was the fit. The unfortunate young woman found that this position was uncomfortable for the moment, but she feared what was to come. The protocols of this strange and horrible place dictated that she not be left there only a few minutes to sample the torture. No, she would be left like that until she was screaming to be let out.

With a sinking heart, she watched as Darlene was fitted into the second cage. The fit was not quite as tight, but it was still enough to prevent the older woman moving. The cages were positioned so that the two could see each other quite well.

Angus double checked the locks and was about to leave when Melinda could no longer hold her tongue. “How long?” she asked. For the first time her voice was not tinted with the anger inside her. It was more fearful than defiant.

“Well, now, lassie, that depends,” he began. “If you’re lucky, the Master will have you released for dinner. On the other hand, he might forget about you and you’ll both stay here all night. That’s been known to happen.”

He might have been teasing them, but the prospect of spending the rest of the day and all of the night bent over into that cramped position struck fear into Melinda’s heart. “You can’t mean that!” she said.

“Aye, but I do. Many times a girl has spent the night in a cage. ’Tis not unusual. Best you get used to the idea.”

He seemed quite sincere, which made both of them fall silent and into despair.

The door thudded shut and they were alone in the small room, in the even smaller cages.

“He can’t do that to us!” Melinda protested. “It is just too cruel.” She sounded as if she were about to begin crying.

“Dear, don’t worry. I’m sure that we’ll be let out at dinnertime,” Darlene said. Then she sighed. “Maybe only four hours or so. I’m sure we can take that.”

Melinda twisted her hands around to see if she could work at the ropes. After a few minutes she ceased because the ropes were simply too tight and there were no knots anywhere near her questing fingers. With a grunt of anger, she pushed upward, but the lid only moved a fraction of an inch before the hasps and locks stopped it. She shook her body against the bars but they were quite solid.

“Don’t hurt yourself, dear,” Darlene advised. “These cages are just too… What’s the word?”

“Beastly,” said Melinda. “Crappy. Shitty.”

“Secure,” Darlene said.

“Shit!

For a long time after that, neither said a word. It was not very warm in the Red Room, so the cold added to their misery. Each tried to shift positions to ease the strain and aches, but found that

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Occasionally Melinda uttered a foul curse and shook her cage as violently as she could. But no matter how much she strained, the cage did not move. Half way through the long afternoon, Melinda heard Darlene crying softly. She felt like crying herself. It was just too horrible being treated like this: caged and left alone for hours on end. He probably treated his dogs better than this, Melinda thought. Then she began making up punishments that she would one day inflict upon that bastard Reggie and Angus. And that bitch Susan, too.

As if summoned by the thought of her, Susan visited them after a few hours of suffering.

“What have we here,” she cheerfully said. “Two caged women! How delightful!”

She walked round them, poked her finger into bare flesh were it was pressed against the bars and smiled. “Too bad I can’t whip you,” she finally told them as she sat on Darlene’s cage and crossed her leather-clad legs. “But I don’t have the key, and whipping you through the bars is not very practical. But I do have an idea…”

Melinda did not want to know what Susan’s idea was, but she found out.

“When Angus, that sweet guy, told me he had you in the cages, I came prepared to torture you. Look here!”

Melinda looked up and wanted to curse. Susan was holding a large feather in her hand. She got off the cage and knelt next to Melinda. “I’ll just bet that you’re ticklish,” she purred. Melinda clamped her mouth shut.

It would have been nice for Susan had she been able to stroke most of the naked body before her, but being folded up as she was, Melinda offered only her flanks. Still, Susan found a lot of bare skin to

tease with the feather. There are many nerves along the sides of the thighs, and on the side of the body. She explored them all.

At first Melinda held her reaction in. But the truth was that she was ticklish – very ticklish – and the laughter burst out, mingled with cries and pleas for the torment to stop.

Susan well knew that being tickled while totally helpless could be a real torture. She had enjoyed many long sessions of that form of torment on tied down girls before. She especially enjoyed tickling the bottom of the feet, but she was denied that pleasure because of the high heel shoes locked on their feet. Still, there were plenty of other targets; nerves so sensitive that the slightest touch of that feather set them to tingling. She soon had Melinda crying, a not unusual reaction when the tickling proceeds beyond the laughing stage. Susan remembered one girl who was so sensitive that ten minutes of tickling reduced her to a crying, begging state, then caused her to lose control and wet herself.

Melinda proved to be not quite that sensitive, but still a fun subject for Susan’s attentions. The mixture of laughing and crying was music to Susan’s ears, and the frantic wiggling of those fingers and the tossing of the head from side to side was wonderful. She found that she could just insert her hand between the bars and tickle Melinda’s bare bottom. Very nice reaction to that.

Eventually, the feather could no longer evoke the frantic struggles it had at the beginning, and Susan tired of the game. She looked at Darlene, but apparently had had enough of this torment because she did not inflict it on her.

Instead, she rose, stretched like a cat, and told them, “You won’t always be in these cages. I’ll get to whip you again.”

Then she was gone, leaving a weeping and worn out Melinda.

Angus came for them a few hours later. Melinda again cried as her body unfolded from that tortuous bent-over position. Darlene looked so grateful that she might kiss Angus’ feet.

As per their Master’s orders, they were fed a meal slightly better than cold oatmeal and allowed a hot water shower, a luxury they appreciated greatly after a day of suffering. Their arms were untied from the elbows-together manner and retied is something even stricter. Each had their hands pulled up behind them until they were between the shoulder blades. The wrists were tied together there and then the arms lashed to the bodies with very tight ropes. This manner of bondage totally removed their hands from any possibility of using them.

Then they were taken to their Master’s bedroom.