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CHAPTER 18: Arousal
There was a rhythm to life in the factory that Mariah came to know very well. Food three times a day. Relieving herself three times a day. Exercise time once a day, now fully naked and in a larger courtyard with the other slaves who had been broken in. Five minute cold shower with her exercise cohort. Mariah was diligent about these physical tasks, determined to stay healthy for...she had no idea what came next. But she intended to survive it, whatever it was.
She was no longer tied down, and the chain shackled to her ankle was long enough to allow her to venture several feet. After a while she became familiar with the slaves in the cubicles near to her own, and with the comings and goings of the masters and mistresses. She learned that, just like in the fields, rules could be quietly bent, if you were careful, and she sometimes had conversations with the others. There was an exercise yard master who was lazy, and overlooked small infractions.
Mariah learned that all the slaves were, like her, new from the fields where they had spent their lives. All had been told the same thing by the master or mistress in charge of them in the factory: that if they could refrain from an orgasm for only an hour, they would be human beings and not slaves. Mariah avoided those who were downcast at failing the test; they, she felt, could not be trusted. Of the others, some admitted softly that they had not arrived as virgins, but had been initiated into sex in the fields, by their masters or mistresses or even by members of their cohorts. So they had no hope to start off with.
One day in the exercise yard after Master Jonas had made Mariah come several times by lowering her cunt onto a greased wooden pole attached vertically to a board on the floor and then whipping her bottom while she writhed on it, Mariah voiced the question she had been asking herself over and over again: How was it possible to have so little control over her own body?
"Don't you know?" Jeffers, a dick with whom she was friendly, asked. "It's something they put in our gruel.”
Mariah slowed her jog to a walk and stared at him. She felt her face turn red, then white. Master Jonas had lied to her; she did not come because she was weak, a slave cunt; but because of yet another mindgame. Then she realized that despite herself until this moment she had half-believed, the filthy lies he had told her.
The exercise master whipped Mariah's already welted bottom, startling her. She jumped and began her run again, her anger giving her energy to catch up and then pass Jeffers. She ran the laps quickly until her exercise hour was up and she was herded to the shower.
***
Mariah lay down for her usual afternoon nap, but she found she wasn’t tired. She stared restlessly around the room, listening to Animal rustle around in the living quarters and then open and close the door to the corridor, followed by silence. She sat up and did her breathing exercises. Gabriel had told her that she could not do them too often.
She could feel the breath expand in her body, as Gabriel had taught her to notice. Her chest was hurting less. The rest of her wounds were as good as healed. Her arm hadn’t bothered her for weeks. Her scabs had mostly shrunk into scars, and even they were fading. The mirror in the bathroom told her that her face was no longer bruised and swollen, and her hair had started to grow back where it had been yanked out. She still tired easily, but not as easily as she pretended. And today she felt positively strong.
Restlessly she walked to the door of her sleeping quarters and opened it. She was greeted with silence. Quietly she walked into the living area, and looked around. It was meticulously, almost cloyingly clean. As a houseslave Mariah had always done as poor a job as she possibly could and still escape punishment; and since almost every other slave did the same that was a poor job indeed. She rolled her eyes at the thought of Rose taking such care.
She glanced at Animal’s paintings hanging on the walls. A bowl of peaches, a slave mowing the great lawn, a field of wildflowers. She liked that one. It looked inviting.
A dart of light struck the wildflower painting, startling her. She looked around for its source and realized that sunlight from the courtyard window was bouncing off the gold do not molest bracelet Gabriel had placed on her wrist some time ago. She stared at it for a moment, then glanced quickly around the apartment to reassure herself that she was alone. She crossed to the door to the corridor, opened it, and looked both ways. The hall was empty. She stepped out and closed the door behind her, and began to walk, her heart hammering.
When she came to the busier main corridor, she lowered her eyes, slouched her shoulders, and let her hair fall onto her face. No one paid her any mind. She hesitated only for a moment before turning toward the main entrance hall.
She wondered what she would she do when she got there? Walk outside, all the way to the wall mile after mile away? She was tired already, and the hammering of her heart was making her chest hurt. No, it was not time to run again, not yet. She had just made up her mind to turn back when she heard her name.
“Mariah!” It was Master Gabriel, walking with another master who Mariah did not know. Gabriel acted as though it was the most natural, and happy, event in the world to meet his slave in the corridor, on no errand he had set for her. He hurried toward her, smiling. “It’s good to see you up and about!” he said. “Where are you going?”
While Mariah tried frantically to think of a lie she straightened up, shook the hair off her face, and looked Master Gabriel in the eye. Of course she could have no errand; she had no duties. Keep it simple. “I wanted to find some sorrel, to surprise you,” she said, daring him to challenge her. But Gabriel just looked puzzled.
He turned to his companion, a tall, somewhat chubby man with reddish brown hair cropped short. “This is Roland. He’s a healer. He wants to help me out in my clinic, and see what he can learn.”
“Not a healer, just a vet,” Roland corrected him. He looked at Mariah quizzically. “Is that the runaway?” he asked. “I’ve heard about her . . . and by the looks of it she’s still running.”
“Nonsense,” said Gabriel. “She’s testing her legs.” He smiled at Mariah warmly. Oh, it was good to see that proud, defiant look, even if the girl was acting the fool. There were times when he had despaired that he would ever see it again.
Gabriel’s practiced eyes also saw the slight tremor in Mariah’s legs. She was tired. “If you don’t mind,” he said to her, “I’ll come with you. I need some air.” He turned to Roland. “Join us?” he said.
Roland shook his head emphatically no, raised up his hands, and backed away. “I don’t socialize with slaves,” he said.
“You can’t heal them if you don’t talk to them,” said Gabriel, but Roland was already walking away. “There’s another one that won’t show up at the clinic,” he said a little ruefully to Mariah. He took her hand and started towards the entrance hall. “Would you mind if we sit for a minute before we go herb hunting?” he asked. “I’ve been on my feet for hours and I’m tired.”
“I am yours to command, my lord,” said Mariah.
Gabriel snorted and placed her hand in the crook of his elbow. “And if I commanded you to stop taking foolish risks?”
“My lord?” said Mariah, all deliberate innocence, although her hand grasped his arm ever so slightly tighter.
Gabriel led her to a recessed window about three feet above the floor. He turned so he was facing her, picked her up gently, and sat her down on the sill. He put one hand on each side of her legs and looked at her gravely.
“You’re not up to full strength yet, Mariah. Far from it. And even I know a beautiful slave girl wandering the corridors alone is not safe.”
“Then it’s lucky I’m ugly,” Mariah said.
Gabriel laughed, and then gave a double take, realizing she was serious. “You think that?” He took half a step closer, so that his toes were up against the wall and he was standing between her knees. “With those green blazing eyes?” He leaned in and put his hands on her thighs. “And that perfect chin?”
Mariah was transfixed by his eyes, by his voice, by his hands on her. She suddenly understood what Rose has said in the bathtub, about not being dried up. She stared at him and he stared back. Entranced, she leaned towards him, to taste him.
But Gabriel stepped back abruptly, taking his hands off her. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice a little shaky. What was he doing? He knew better.
“I’m fully trained, Master,” Mariah was saying stiffly. “And my cunt is healed. You needn’t fear using me.”
Now Gabriel colored. “You may be trained to be raped,” he said, “but I’m not trained to be a rapist. I would never touch a slave in that way.”
Mariah pushed herself off the windowsill so she was standing directly in front of him. “I thought you didn’t believe in slavery,” she said, and her voice was angry and mocking. She pushed passed him and walked back in the direction of his apartment.
***
Mariah came to learn that the factory was not permanent. After a while the slaves left there, but no one knew where they went. Some who had arrived after her had already gone. Jeffers thought they were put to death but Mariah did not believe that. Her master spent too much time training her, or at least her body, to plan to annihilate her.
Mariah no longer fought her orgasms. After all, the struggle was futile and the end predetermined by the very food she ate. Perhaps because of this, or maybe it was just coincidence, Master Jonas' interest in her waned. Sometimes several days might go by without Mariah seeing him, although other masters and sometimes mistresses would use her body at least daily.
One day after her exercise time Shinelle roughly strapped Mariah spread-eagle on her shelf, as when she had first arrived at the factory. Master Jonas came to her a few minutes later. He smiled at her almost wistfully. Mariah groaned silently. It was worst when Master Jonas treated her kindly, or pretended to. Although in her mind she knew he was an evil son of a bitch, her body reacted to his presence immediately, her clitoris tingling and the juices beginning to form in her vagina. “You will look me in the eye, and you will not look away,” Master Jonas said. Mariah obeyed.
Master Jonas moved between her spread legs and placed his fingers on her inner thighs, tickling them, running his fingers down to her knees and back up to the edge of her sex, his fingers waggling quickly but his hands moving slowly. He moved down and up her legs again, and again, and again, but always stopping, and always holding her gaze. As he approached her sex again, Mariah whimpered, and her hips moved.
Master Jonas moved one hand to just above her pubic hair, the other hand on her butt cheeks, his fingers still drumming. His lower hand came closer and closer to her sex, until he was tapping on her labia but not touching the center. The pleasure in Mariah's womb was like pain. She couldn’t help it; she raised her hips until her sex was pointing at him.
Slowly, teasingly, Master Jonas dipped his finger into Mariah's soaking vagina and moved the moisture up to her clit, still holding her eye. She groaned, low and guttural, but he didn't linger there. Instead, he unzipped his pants. “Keep looking at me while you come,” he commanded her, and slowly he pushed his penis into her, rubbing her clitoris as he did so. Mariah came almost immediately. She fought to keep her eyes open while the waves crashed over her. Master Jonas smiled while he continued to look at her. He pushed in and pulled almost all the way out, slowly, slowly, slowly. Mariah had several more orgasms before he looked away and rammed himself into her, crying out as he came. As he often did, he fell asleep on top of her. Mariah dozed too.
They awoke about a half hour later. The wistful look in Master Jonas' eyes remained as he whispered in her ear, his breath tickling her, "That was to show you how it could have been." Then he rolled off of her and almost nonchalantly unbuckled her restraints. Mariah knew better than to move without his permission. He left her so for a minute, until her thighs began to ache from being spread widely without the help of the leather ties. At last Master Jonas gave a thrust of his chin, indicating to Mariah to get up. She did so as quickly as her aching muscles would allow.
"Down on your hands and knees," Master Jonas commanded. Mariah obeyed without thought, her thighs still aching and her cunt still dripping. When Master Jonas ordered her to crawl she did so, ignoring the almost immediate ache in her shoulders and knees.
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