Chastening Day

This story is a work of fiction. Do not copy anything in the story.

CHASTENING DAY    Act III:     RIVAL ELDERS, HALF A RESCUE

© smack magnet

Ch 13: Old priest, young priest

He washed his hands. He got himself settled. He stared at the girl. Then he took half a lemon and squeezed it into the dip around her bumhole. The way she was positioned, that hollow would be acting like a pond, pointing up towards the ceiling.

The girl began to whine, then suck and hiss rapidly through her teeth. He didn’t blame her, he’d have whined himself if that’d been him. But that didn’t stop the priest start up giggling like an eejit.

“It’s all for your own good. You know that, girl, don’t you? You’ll be roight as rain in a couple of days.”

He squeezed in more lemon. Giggled wickedly. Squeezed even more. He’d been given a bag of the fuckers by an orchard owner. What feckin use were lemons? Melchin had thought. The man’s giving them away cause he’s nowhere to sell them. Of all the feckin citrus fruit…

But that was the thing with lemons, eh. They weren’t like your oranges, weren’t like your grapefruit. Them two, both of them were sticky. They left sticky feckin everywhere. You needed a wash after eating a grapefruit or all your feckin sugar would be glued to your hands.

Lemons, though. Roight enough, now he could fathom the use of a lemon. There was no stick after a squeeze with one o’ them. The feckin juice cleaned off every drop of dirt and shite in a hurry. It was better than feckin water and soap.

But it stung like a bastard. You got it rubbed into a graze or a cut, and you feckin well knew about the lemon alright. Mind, the cut… well it stung. But it never seemed to fester. The sting of the lemon was more or less it healing the wound. Because all o’ them nastys, them invisible bugs, like that doctor had showed him, well they couldn’t be liking its acid now, could they? The girl on the table was suckin’ through her teeth. And he couldn’t deny it, he was lapping up the sounds. But she wouldn’t have afters, he was certain of that. He was doing her a favour. He was saving her a barrel of strife. She’d heal, she’d be fine. At least in her body. Where her mind might be wandering, he didn’t like to speculate.

Ah, the lemon! He sucked in its smell, mixed in with the girl’s. She was squirming like a fish out of water, screeching like a banshee on heat. He was loving every minute of it.

Ah, this feckin heath! He hadn’t even heard of the place before they feckin sent him here. Out of the way? He was fuming, incensed. It was halfway down the road to nowhere at all. He’d ambition, back then. The big city in the east with its lights on feckin poles. The call of the arches and avenues of Rome.

Then some trouble with his trousers. And old Bishop Georgi had some turgid objections and decided to send him to coventry. Almost literally. All he’d done was diddle a lay reader’s wife. It happened all the time. He’d met, or been told of, a good hundred priests who’d either got away with, or better, been promoted out of shite that had lasted six times as long, or been far feckin worse. But what happened to him? One feckin wife and his bishop blew up like a firecracker popping.

So Melchin got sent all the way to the heath. From the start, he resented every inch of the place. He was grumpy when the coach dumped him down in mid June. He was grumpy as he sweated in the heat of feckin summer. He was grumpy watching suiciding leaves after Michaelmas. He got wasted at Christmas. He resented feckin spring.

And then it was Easter. “What’s this Chastening shite?”

He knew he’d been dumped and ostracised. Bishop Georgi made it clear, don’t write, don’t ask favours, don’t expect any help. Stay out of my way. Just feck off, that was the gist of it. So he’d had to feck off. And once fecked, he’d stopped caring what impression he made. What difference would it make? He’d be better dropping out of the priesthood altogether.

In the Church itself down the hill, well, alroight. Some folks believed all that twaddle and shite. He’d half try for the believers. What had them poor sods ever done to him, but? It was only half their fault they had cloth between their ears. And the services were Latin, so who’d even know if he swore in the lingo as he trotted out feckin mass after mass? He’d do his job to a minimum. The official feckin minimum. But, out and about, or in his own gaffe, he’d just say what he felt like, he’d act how he wanted. If the powers-that-be had him shorn of the cloth, then so be it. He’d take it on the chin, find some nice squeeze of a widow for a wife. Near a year he’d grumbled and sworn and talked shite. His piss had been generally more alcohol than water.

Until it was Easter.

“A festival, father.”

He didn’t have a junior priest. They’d never give him that, not now. So he made do with this eejit called Rab, feckin short for Rabinowicz, what kind o’ feckin name was that? He just seemed to always be there, at the church or turning over Melchin’s cottage borders. It was nigh on nine months before he clocked that the lad was actually the verger. He was digging a grave, that was when it clicked for Melchin. He’d just thought he was an enthusiast.

“Sure, it’s only Easter. Feckin bunnies,” said Melchin.

“Yes, our Easter. For fertility.”

“Oh, fertility, is it? Like, your easter eggs, all that?”

“So our girls may be fertile.”

Melchin pulled a face. “Your women? Not crops and fields and feckin chickens?”

“Not the married women. Girls.”

“Oh…” He’d frowned. “So, chasten, that’s like… chastity, roight? Only, how’s that s’posed to make ’em fertile? By abstaining?” He’d wrinkled his face up as he thought it out.

“Chastening is… chastising, father.”

“Chas… what? Chastising? Like, crackin’ a cane? On your feckin girls?” He was scratching his head. What the feck? Make some sense!

“Young men whip them with switches.”

And that’s when it changed. When the heath stopped being his nag and his burden. He was standing in the vestry. He found himself sitting with a thump down on a bench chest. “You… whip at them with switches? What?”

“On Easter Monday, every year. All the girls of age who are not yet married. And virtuous boys.”

“In the church?”

“A procession. Everyone in their best clothes.”

“And you switch ’em? What’s a switch?”

“They are paired, those of age. The most virtuous boys and most shrewish of girls. A switch is a rod. Made from twisted strands of willow, tied with ribbons, topped with bows.”

“Oh so loike… pretty sorts of canes, then. For tapping, for show?”

Young Rab looked confused. “No, the boys whip the girls.”

Another deep frown. “You mean, proper whipping? Only, over some thick costume dresses or something? Have you done this yourself, son?”

“Of course. Haven’t you?”

“Eh? Well that sort of thing, it didn’t happen. Not a lot. Not where I come from.”

The young man tipped his head. “So how do your girls make sure they are fertile? Before they are married?”

“Eh… round our way, it’s like, suck it and see. So who whips the married lassies?”

“Their husbands, of course! That’s their right because they’re married.”

“Their roight? To whip their women?”

“On Easter Monday. But many do so at other times.”

“Sure. Feck. So, it’s just the young lads who whip the young lasses? Sort of, one on one?”

“And sometimes in a roundel. We played different games in different years.”

“Proper supervised, roight?”

“Of course! There are elders to watch. And you, of course.”

“I’m there?”

“As parish priest, of course!”

He said, “Feck.”

“There are pictures. Paintings. Father Gorman had them taken down. Father Albemard, before him, collected many pictures. Drawings, illustrations. They used to be displayed in the village hall.”

“Old Gorman was a bit of a prude then, was he?”

“He was here two years and died. He had terrible gout. He put the pictures in the seat chest you are sitting on.”

He’d never even bothered to look in the thing. But up he’d got, and in he’d rummaged. And out came the pictures. The younger Melchin had found his hands trembling as he picked through the first, and the next, and the next. Some were illustrations made as inserts to books. Some were framed. Some looked amateur, but an amateur with an eye for a figure.

“Father Albemard drew these himself,” said Rab.

There were piles of notes, and sketches of what were labelled ‘Chastening Games.’ One, a picture of a priest who was wielding a whip. “Did he ever, ah… join in, this old priest? As it were?”

“Father Albemard? Of course. Particularly with the more shrewish of girls. And infertile couples might come to him for blessings.”

“Blessings meaning beatings? Feck,” said Melchin. “And these used to hang…”

“In the village hall. Some in the village were most distressed when Father Gorman removed them.”

“Well,” Melchin tutted. “You can’t mess with tradition, eh? Would you like to see them up again?”

Rab’s face had beamed a healthy smile.

“So these ah… games. These processions. Can you maybe think to describe one to me, Rab?”

And the lad, his young verger, had set off reminiscing. About how all the unmarried girls of age would line up, and boys the same. The girls in bright spring dresses. The boys carrying home-made whips as they walked alongside. Processing through the town, lined by anyone else who cared to look. Around the village once or twice, then into the field they used for fêtes. Younger children had their own easter games at the other end of the village, with as hunts for painted easter eggs.

When their of-age siblings got to the fête field, the elders would be waiting, including elder females, plus the priest and other helpers. It started with roundels. Six to ten girls would be dancing in circles. There might be several circles, depending on how many girls there were that year. The boys were divided up and stood around in outer circles. It didn’t matter if there were a few too many or a few too few, since in roundels the boys just stood where they were, and whipped at the girls as they danced on by.

“They whipped as they danced?”

“The village band played tunes.”

“Serious? The brass band? Oompah tunes?”

“Traditional tunes. With a beat for the girls to skip to, yes.”

“Ah, roight. On you go.”

The elder women kept an eye out for girls who turned their hips to particular boys. The elder men spotted the same for the boys, such as who whipped at whom with a little added ardour. They also kept a close look for the girls who tried to avoid all blows. Or who sassed at the boys. Or worse, sassed the elders.

Obvious pairings might be singled out. A part of the field was used for short little goes at one-on-one whippings, with the elder ladies supervising, since they often had an eye for who blushed the right way. But they wouldn’t always let the youths stick in just the first pairing that happened, though. They might try them this way, try them that.

But the ones who kept trying to avoid the roundel whips, or got angry or talked back, plus the boys who didn’t end up in any of the pairings, they got sent to the top end for a different set of games. Though it wasn’t completely fixed at that point, as girls from the pairings could get singled out for some little infringement and sent up for the tougher games. And the other way around if a pairing seemed to happen amongst the intransigents and loners.

They were Fecunds and Fallows. Girls at the lower end where pairings were tested were Fecunds. Girls who flinched too much or were cutting with their tongues at the top of the field were Fallows. That was just in Crookmount, Rab told Melchin. In Crothin-Under-Heath, they called those girls Shrews.

“And Crook?”

“Their festival is different as well.”

“Roight. The whole heath, then. Ah… The Fallows. What went on, then? Up the top end?”

Rab told him that that was where the helpers came in. The younger married men, sometimes married young women, stood around the Fallows like fielders in a game of cricket. The Fallows comprised both Flinchers and Tongue-Lashers. If the Flinchers ran, they helpers knew to catch them. If the Tongue-Lashers lashed, they were there to call the girl out for extras.

The girls had to stand out in threes, and three boys, picked at random, had to stand behind them. The girls had to lift their skirts this time. The oompah band played, and the boys were meant to whip in time with the music.

It wasn’t just the girls who got singled out. A weak-whipping boy could be labelled a Dud. Firing blanks, it was called. By tradition, Duds were paired with the worst Tongue-Lashers. The idea was to see if they could get a rise out of the weakest of the whippers. Maybe spur them on to show a bit more spunk.

“Or just basically humiliate the silly feckers. How many games were there, Rab?”

“Oh it went on into the afternoon. There were lots of different games. Or, were for many years under old Father Albemard.”

“Good job that other fecker died quick, am I roight?”

Rab had blinked at Father Melchin.

“It’s tradition, eh? A village needs tradition. Two weeks to Easter, Rab! Tradition feckin rules! Eh… how does it end? This festival of yours?”

And Rab had told him. The best fecund parings were encouraged to flourish. Many hearts found their twins starting out at an Easter Chastening Day. The Duds they tried to shock into action, but sometimes they just kept on firing blanks. It was shameful for a boy.

“And the Tongue-Lash girlies? What of them?”

The girls who talked back had the Devil of Spite. If the Duds couldn’t be fired to try to tame them, they were sent home in shame, and the Elders took over.

“And the priest? By any chance?”

“Father Albemard, yes, he would often whip the spiteful girls.”

Melchin winked. “That’s the ticket. And your flinchers? Your runners?

The Flinchers got it worst of all. It did seem a little bit cruel to Father Melchin. Cruel, but sort of funny as well. The girls who really hated it, they were the ones who ended up getting it worst. In a village where fertility was linked to being willing to bend when for a whip, the girls who shied away had the Devil of Avoidance.

At the end of the day, those who still flinched and cringed and were not yet in a pairing, were made to strip bare, or were stripped by the helpers. Some years there were just one or two, some years more. (And for some girls, the torture ran on and on, for each year, those not married were required to return, till at length they reached an age to be declared old maids.)

Many pairings might have gone off a-courting, some might stay. But most girls tried to get their boys to leave, since there were tales of girls who got dropped by their beaus and pulled in late as Flinchers, or labelled Tongue-Lashers.

All the elders stayed, all the helpers and catchers. Quite a number from the village might drift in to watch. There was always a crowd for the final act, when the Lashers got taken and whipped by the Elders. That drew its own crowd, especially if a certain girl was resented.

The rest of the crowd wrapped round tight as the unpaired boys, who were surely not duds, and the boys who’d tricked their pairing partner to come up and watch, just to dump her in the middle, had their way with the screaming, naked flinchers.

Each year it would be different. Father Albemard thought variety the spice of life. There was one dry year when the girls were told to run the gauntlet. He lined up the crowd in an avenue, left and right. The Flinchers had to run to the end with the the crowd all having a go at them. Whipping and spanking, sometimes holding them back and giving them extras. The last one through that year was tied to a whipping stool and thrashed by the priest. Then crowned with donkey ears and made to bray.

Another year there were five girls and a heaving crowd, despite a week of rain. Albemard had the helpers make a circuit, around which the girls had to race against each other. There was more than one round. The winner of each round was let off, but the losers had to go again, only this time it was two laps, instead of just one. And so it went on, with the girls getting fewer and the laps getting greater.

Rab was staring into the distance. “I was one with a whip. There were six of us for five flinching girls. We chased them around. If they slipped in the mud, we whipped them on their bottoms and thighs till a helper helped them stand. When each winner was reprieved, us six boys could still stay on the circuit to chase.”

Rab licked his lips.

“The very last girl was Mariam Cherrer. She had to run five circuits, with all of us still chasing. The priest had decided it. Mariam always tried to run, but she covered her bum and her breasts with her hands. Her bum because we whipped it, her breasts because they wobbled. She was worst of the flinchers, which always slowed her down. So when she was last, she was turned into the donkey. The priest made the helpers tie her forearms to her upper arms.”

Rab showed Melchin what the girl’s arms had looked like. Tied tight to the sides of her body, with her hands flapping loose up just above to her shoulders.

“She’d have pulled ’em around to cover up her tits though.”

“They were also tied together with a strap around her back.” The boy blushed, looked embarrassed. “Her breasts stuck right out!”

“Feck off,” said Melchin.

“She had big, heavy breasts. They bounced when she ran!”

“Was she big at the back too?”

“Oh, yes!” said Rab. “She was big at the back, but bigger at the front! But she wasn’t really fat. Her waist was there for all to see, she had curves and curves again!”

“And she ran her five circuits?”

“She tried. It was muddy. Some villagers protested, but the crowd bood them down. They said she’d had enough, but everyone else wished to see her be the donkey.”

“They’d put ears on her head, then?”

Rab nodded. “So she ran. Only now she couldn’t cover her parts. We all chased. Pushed each other out the way to get shots in. It got quite rough. I was pushed into her by another boy, I knocked her over.”

He looked into the distance.

“She fell flat on her breasts and she couldn’t stop her fall with her arms… The filed was full of mud then. She was winded, but we pulled her up. She slipped in the mud on her bottom quite often.”

“It went on a while, then?”

“Yes, the crowd were excited. So we carried on chasing and carried on whipping. She was the donkey, she must bray like an ass!”

“Jaisis,” said Melchin. “Has she got any kids? Is she fertile, or what?”

The lad said, in all seriousness, “Oh, yes, it worked!”

“Something feckin worked. Your elders. I thought they was a bunch o’ feckin prunes. You know, wrinkly. Slightly sweaty. Are they into this stuff?”

“I’m sure they would be happy if Father Gorman’s restrictions were… put away.”

“Roight. Jaisus. I can half imagine that happening, Rab. Old Gorman sounds like a right feckin prick, you’ll be glad he shuffled off. Did she get to the end then? Of your five feckin circuits?”

“I chased her to the end! We were pushing each other to get to her bum! Everyone was cheering, laughing. We were cracking her buttocks and cracking her thighs! One chaser twisted his ankle though, another got an elbow in his eye. We were being quite rough, pushing and jostling to get to Mariam Cherrer. There were five of us, then four. My friend made us talk as Mariam Cherrer ran on through the mud. ‘Let’s stop pushing and shoving each other!’ he said. One boy was left-handed. Another right-handed. They should chase her from behind, said my friend, one whipping from her left, one whipping from her right.”

“But there’s only two buttocks.”

“Yes, but Gerd and me were to walk in front.”

“Doing what?” Melchin asked.

“We’d heard shouts. Some men calling. ’Spank her front as well!’ they’d called.

“You could… spank her feckin breasts?”

“The priest had not said. But the men were calling.”

“So you manned a tit each.”

Rab nodded. Licked his lips.

“For how many circuits?”

“I’m not very sure if anyone was counting. The way they bounced… they were very firm. They came to points which stuck out in front. Great fat cones, says Gerd. They were covered in mud from when she had fallen. We played games to slap the mud off. When it all came off, the lads behind tripped her. I felt sorry for her sometimes, but her squealing was so funny!”

“And the elders? The priests? Did they not say to stop?”

“Oh no,” said Rab. “They were busy whipping Lashers.”

“Ah. Roight.” His eyebrows lifted. “Got you.”

“We kept pulling her up and starting her running, even though she squealed and squealed. The brass band were still playing. Gerd and I slapped at her breasts from above as the tuba notes went up and down. He took the up note, I took the down note. Our friends with the whips made her run and run.”

“You kept her running?”

“She believed she would get to the end of her circuits.” Rab fell silent.

“Go on. Spill the beans. I’m only your priest.”

“The dusk was growing. We were chasing on and on, most had seen all they wanted. Some had drifted away. Many were talking. Or laughing. Many drunk. And she was the donkey, the loser. Nobody cared what happened to the donkey. The boys behind started slapping up between her legs. Gerd and I saw it. She tried to hold her legs together. Gerd and I held her knees wide, made her carry on going. Then someone from the crowd brought a short pole with straps attached to its ends. It was from a past game, in another year. We tied her knees apart with it so she could still run, but couldn’t close her legs. Now the boys could spank between them and spank her cheeks apart as well. Sometimes both together so her bum was opened with each twin slap.”

“Sounds lovely,” said the priest.

Rab carried on his tale. “Gerd and I, we started pulling Mariam Cherrer around the circuit by her breasts. We each took a tip, and marched her along. The band marched behind. The slappers behind slapped in time with the beat, taking turns, or together. And Gerd and I pulled her breasts, left and right.” The lad’s face looked entranced. “We’d pull, then push back. We came off the circuit and nobody minded. We marched her up to the top of the hill, then we marched her down again.”

“How long were you at it?”

Young Rab sighed. “Till the sun had gone down and the band could not blow.”

Melchin tipped his head. “Is she still in your village?

Rab blinked his eyes. “She is married to my friend. To Gerd.” He half smiled. “She still flinches when I come to their house, and hugs her breasts.”

“Feck, he married her. Why?”

Rab grinned his odd grin. “He wanted to. Because no-one else would have her.” He hid his face, then looked shyly up. “I think, because he can do what he wants. He sometimes ask me to supper.”

“Ah… roight?”

Rab looked embarrassed, turned his head, as if to see if anyone else was listening.

“I’m your feckin priest. Have you noticed?” said Melchin. “If you’re planning to confess, you’re with the roight man.”

“Sometimes after supper, we both spank her breasts.”

“For old time’s sake, eh?”

“Yes. One to each side. He can make her do nearly anything.”

“After all that feckin marchin’ about, I’m not feckin surprised. Is she turning to fat? Has she kept her figure?”

“Oh, yes! He makes her exercise!”

“And the baby?”

“There are two. Two boys. They’re very happy little boys. I take them for walks. Gerd asks me. So he can spend a little time with Mariam.”

The younger Melchin had laughed. “I bet she looks forward to you comin’ around! Get the kids out of her skirts for a bit!”

Seven years he’d had, after that enlightening talk. Seven glorious years with no interference from man nor priest. Those feckin Crookmount peasants! And their girls were all gorgeous. Buxom, pretty, rosy. Curvy like they’d all been bred for it. The festival had gone back to how old Albemard had had it, quick-snap. Melchin had a few other sweeties as well, on the side as it were, more all-year-round. He often had the buttocks of the girls beneath his rod. Melchin found he had a quite a taste for the likes of all that. The years rolled by…

Then Father feckin Peter, the Crothin killjoy and his orders from the new feckin bishop. Fernandino, same as now. This all has to stop, the orders said. That prune-faced little pillock stuck his oar in everywhere it wasn’t wanted. He found an ally in Doddery old Michael from Crook, down the road a ways from Crookmount. In Crothin, his parish, he stopped everything but a handful of tiny taps on a trilogy of shrews. Why he didn’t stop that vestige as well, Melchin never worked out. But Peter gave Michael in Crook leave mothball Chastening Day entire. And came down like a feckin ton of bricks on Melchin.

Letters to the Bishop. Melchin came within an inch of being ousted to a monastery. He’d clung to his job by his fingernails. Had to shrink the village parade to a few sorry girls and a few scrawny lads. Stopped the games, stopped all of that lovely fun and feckin games. It was the culture of the thing, that was what he was trying to stamp out.

He even stopped Melchin whipping in private. Though a few girls were still snuck in on the quiet by childless husbands or vindictive mothers. Peter couldn’t see everything, and he couldn’t stop what he couldn’t see.

Fifteen feckin long years though, that’s how long that arsehole had ruled. More than twice as long as them lovely fun and games, back there at the start.

Melchin grinned down at the squirming Anja Salidef. Naked, on her back, knees bent under shoulders, wrists tied to ankles.

“Are them candles getting a bit too low, I wonder?”

He’d dripped wax on her short blonde hairs, stuck three candles upright on her pubic mound. The extra light let him see her pussy, bright and pink, apart from where dribbles of wax had run down. Still, all in the cause of cleaning her up. Getting every last needle of gorse out, roight! The candles were down to the stub now though. She must be pretty warm under there. She was moving her hips oddly, that was for sure. Making interesting groans, producing fascinating shivers.

“So, that Dominic? Your priest? How’s that new man working out?”

Feckin Father Peter had been retired himself now. Just like he’d nearly had done to Melchin. The sod was locked behind monastery walls. But this new man, he’d sounded like a Fernandino special. Posh, he’d heard. Feckin educated, erudite. An insider at the Bishop’s Palace, no less. More feckin dullness and misery, Melchin has predicted. Only… here was the shrewest of all lovely Shrews. Melchin saw it straight now. Dominic, feck, that man must be clever if he’d gone and sneaked right in here under the wire! If your man knew what the heath was, or what it had been, and he’d got himself assigned to it. Pulled the necessary strings. Made the palace puppets dance.

Melchin hadn’t met him, though that fart of a fool Father Michael had. He’d not approved, Melchin heard that much. He’d expected one thing, Michael said, found another instead. Said he’d written a letter to the bishop in protest. Good luck with that, thought Melchin. Dominic was Fernandino’s man, and Fernandino had always left the running of the heath to Father Peter. So he’d likely leave the lot to Dominic as well.

Melchin smiled at Anja’s twitching bumhole and blew out the candles perched on top of her mound. He let the wax solidify. Reached forward. Worked a finger under a corner of the stuff. Smiled down at the girl. Said, “Alroight, now?” Pulled up.

She screamed. He looked at the half inch of wax in his hand. Oh yeah, there were a few of her short and curlies. He started teasing more hardened dribbles away. Got them half way up. Saw the skin pulled at points where the hairs were engulfed. The girl’s eyes were watering. He’d propped her head up back there on a pillow. He could easily see her tweak-twitching face.

He pulled sharp. A nice reaction! Ah, feck, this was wicked. He’d not had this much fun for more than fifteen years!

Rip! Oh look at her face, at them tears rolling down. She’s blinking and squeezing.

Rip! Jaisis, that was a loud groan there. Now she’s looking. Trying to smile, get some sympathy from me.

“Please?” she says, her inflection all up-rising. Feckin wicked, she’s begging.

“Eh… No?”

Rrrip! Feck! That was half of her pubes that are left there, at least! Her screeching’s atrocious! Now she’s blubbering, heaving, her whole body’s in it. Can I get this last lot ripped out in one go?

“Are ya ready?” he asked. “One last big one! Can you maybe keep the noise down, though? The neighbours…”

He pulled up the wax. Watched her skin pulled about as she shuddered and sobbed. Teased the girl, pretended, half-way yanked, made the holes between her legs flinch.

“It’s got to come off, now. Hasn’t it, lovely?”

Slow and steady. Look at her skin come. Look at her shudder. Little jerk… Now she’s squealing, I’ve got her.

Rrrrip!

She screeched the house down. Screeched again and again.

“Didn’t I say to be quiet for the neighbours?”

Her fat, bald mound with its row upon row of pert little goose bumps where all but ten seconds past hairs had poked out. Bright red, shiny, glowing. He couldn’t resist! He spanked her fat mound with a wicked abandon.

“I said quiet, and you weren’t! You directly disobeyed me!”

His big hand rained down smack after smack. He could feel the heat building, right there where her nerves were. He smacked and smacked again till her mound was bright red, then he smacked where her mound met her legs to either side.

“Now. How’s about a wee drop of lemon on that?”

He cut open a fresh one. Went at her pudenda with both halves at once, squeezing and rubbing till the girl’s screams made a glass fall of the mantle piece. Then he rubbed around her bum hole again. All them nasty little feckers, the thorn stubs, time to get the last of ’em out!

Pulled the tray up. Got his implements, the tongs and the tweezers, and went at her arsehole. All the little stubs of thorn that Fatren had avoided, surrounding her hole, stabbed in by that evil Chastener boy.

“You’ll be wanting it finished now quick-snap, roight? Best go fast as I can then, shall I?”

He pinched, poked and pulled, he twisted and squeezed. Used a needle tip to poke when the feckers were stubborn. Used his fingernails. Used his teeth whenever he could get them to reach. If he saw some clean skin with no thorn, he’d still give a bite with his tongs, or nip it with his tweezers, just to see her bumhole spasm and cringe.

The girl was a mess. She was snuffling, crying, squeezing her eyes tight. More than just the once, he wiped away her snot with a cloth.

He was coming to the end. He couldn’t find a single thorn left. But the girl didn’t know it. So he happily pinched her and poked her some more. Fr the fun of it, really. Then he knew it was time for his last feckin lemons. He’d do her all over. Make sure she was clean as the day she was born.

He cut three. Used the lot. Squeezed one around her arse. Another all around her pussy lips. The third one for every last thorn-prick on her skin. Rubbed them in, rubbed them hard, so the rind got distorted. Tears streamed from her eyes. Her throat sounded raw. And her pussy and bumhole, they danced for their supper.

Three days later, Pavel Panchun was still in terror for his cock and balls. The local apothecary tutted and sniffed. He boiled up some stinking concoction, daubed it on hot and made the boy screech. Served the little shit right. Got ready to lance with a lancing needle. The pus smelled atrocious. His cock looked quite ghastly. The man wondered if the boy would survive it at all.

Three days later, Anja Salidef sat quiet as a mouse. She jumped every time she heard the tiniest of noises. She was using some speech, just yeses and no’s, but sometimes longer sentences. Her mother said, “Well really it serves you right. I always said, you can’t talk the way you used to talk. Around Crothin, that’ll get you a very sorry come-uppance, Anja. Didn’t I say so?”

The girl had to nod. She sat in a window seat, watching the spring. She was sore still… a little. But the scratches were healing. She’d picked away at the odd tiny scab, though her mother told her not to. But her mum had been careful to inspect her daughter thoroughly. The girl was hardly saying much. Her mother had heard some of what those beastly boys had done.

You could hardly see it now, though. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to tweeze out all the thorns and clean her daughter’s skin to a shine. A priest. She’d heard that information had come from an elder. A priest up on Crookmount, far side of the heath. She must bake him a pie as a thank you present, Mrs Salidef thought. Maybe send her daughter to carry it, so the girl could thank the old fellow in person.

Oh yes, she’d be fine now, right as rain, would pretty Anja. With her shrewing put to bed, with her brought down a peg or two, or even three, she might even make some lucky lad a halfway decent wife.