Chapter 25 The Golden Dagger and the Tortured Thief
Chapter 25 The Golden Dagger and the Tortured Thief
At that very moment Richard Chan was admiring the naked body of the comely
young maidservant who was hanging by her ankles in the dungeon of the Black
Pagoda. The chains holding her suspended led upward through the murky darkness
into the upper recesses of the grim underground chamber. The girl's pretty head
hung down, perhaps a yard off the ground, her youthful pigtails seemingly
reaching for the dark-spotted floor below her. Her slender wrists extended
downward only to be imprisoned by ugly manacles connected by short iron chains
to heavy rings in the dingy floor.
A sinister, silver-robed figure stood a few feet behind her, listening to
the gentle jingle of the chains as her body swayed back and forth. Richard
Chan's forbidding face was twisted into a cruel mask of rage, as he drew the
fearful whip back yet again.
"What have you done with it? Speak now, thief, and I will be merciful!" he
lied.
The naked girl's body struggled hopelessly in her inverted suspension, but
managed only to rattle the impregnable chains that imprisoned her. "I don't
know sire, I swear I d...."
CRACCKK!!! Richard Chan's whip flashed through the heavy air of the dimly
lit dungeon and exploded against the soft flesh of her back with the report of a
gunshot. "Aaaaaahhh!"
"Do not add lies to your larceny, Ci-ci," Richard hissed as he retracted
the terrible thonged whip. Torchlight from flambeaux mounted in sconces in the
great central pillars of the dungeon provided the only light; the torches not
only bathed the nude body of the struggling girl in a warm orange light, they
created strange dark shadows that seemed to hover around her girl like ghostly
birds of prey.
"Well, what do you expect, Richard, from a lying little thief," Mai-Lee
exclaimed as she watched from several feet away, amused by the predicament of
her young rival.
Mai-Lee, Richard Chan's beautiful young Eurasian concubine, had complained
of several items turning up missing in recent weeks -- a silver necklace, a
small topaz ring. Richard had been relatively unconcerned -- he could easily
afford more such trinkets, and he was pre-occupied by his struggles with the
opposition to the Black Scorpions.
But his casual manner had grown serious by several orders of magnitude
this morning when one of his most treasured possessions -- a jewel encrusted
golden dagger that had belonged to Kublai Khan himself -- had disappeared from
his den. It was not so much the dagger's intrinsic value -- although that was
substantial -- but the fact that the dagger was an absolutely unique and
irreplaceable historical relic.
A short time later a quick search had discovered the necklace and the topaz
ring secreted in a headscarf in the tiny sleeping quarters of Ci-ci, the pretty
young maid who was entrusted with cleaning his study, and serving tea to his
guests. Clearly, after the discovery of the stolen jewelry there could be but
little question as to the identity of the thief of the dagger. Ci-ci's frantic
denials were obviously nothing more than a desperate attempt to escape
culpability for her crime. Richard ordered that the dozens of servants of the
Black Pagoda abandon what they were doing and search the great edifice from top
to bottom. If the dagger were still in the building, he was fairly confident
that it would be found.
The finding of the jewels in Ci-ci's room had come as no great surprise to
Mai-Lee, Richard's green-eyed, glossy-haired Number One concubine, who had
spoken of her suspicions of Ci-ci more than once; she had warned Richard that
the young girl had been entrusted with more freedom than most of the servants of
the Black Pagoda, and had unusually free access to many parts of the palatial
residence. The revelation of Ci-ci as the jewel thief seemed to prove that
Mai-Lee had indeed been prescient about the girl's motives.
******
The Lord of the Black Pagoda uncurled the whip and launched it toward the
inverted body of his naked captive again, letting the biting strands of braided
leather rip into Ci-ci's lower back; the tips of the cruel tentacles slid around
her flank to sting the soft skin that protected her ribcage.
"Where is it?" he demanded through clenched teeth again. "Where is the
Golden Dagger? I paid a king's ransom for it, and will not be cheated of it by
a thieving whore." And Richard Chan lashed the rounded buttocks of the
housemaid with yet another vicious stroke of the ten-tailed whip, and watched
with satisfaction as her body convulsed in chain-rattling ripples of agony.
******
Richard Chan had dismissed Mai-Lee's oft-expressed suspicions about Mai-Lee
until an hour ago; the reason Ci-ci had access to many of the rooms in the the
upper floors of the Black Pagoda was that the Master of the House had come to
enjoy the sweet young body of the teenager. She had come to his household as a
virgin - a condition which rarely persisted long with pretty girls in service at
the Black Pagoda. He had taken her to his bed within a few days of first seeing
her, on a day in which Mai-Lee's monthly curse had caused her to be indisposed.
Richard Chan had deflowered scores of virgins before, but rarely one
blessed with such a delightful body and such a timid nature. When he had first
summoned the new maid to his private bedchamber and commanded her to undress,
she had blushed with a most becoming modesty. It had taken the sinister Lord
of the Scorpions' threat to summon a pair of his henchmen to assist her in
disrobing, to induce the petite moist-eyed beauty to shyly undo the belt of her
housedress. Richard Chan had been seated in a plush chair in his familiar
silver robe; he had watched entranced as the simple white garment had drifted
like a gentle snowfall to the floor around the new girl's pretty feet.
Her chaste undergarments had followed soon after; moments later the
blushing, sloe-eyed adolescent had stood there before him, one arm placed
protectively over her still-maturing but already well-formed breasts; the other
cupped modestly between her slender legs.
"Put your hands down, girl," he had ordered imperiously. "I want to look
at you. Modesty is not a virtue that I prize highly."
When Ci-ci had lowered her hands to her sides in shame, Richard had smiled
sardonically. He had admonished her that there was no reason to be ashamed of
such a lovely body, and ordered her to turn around for him.
"What is your name, girl, and how old are you?" he had asked as she began
to turn, without really caring about either answer. She had the body of a
woman, and that was all that really mattered. The women of the Black Pagoda
were there to satisy his whims; and his whim at that moment was to ravish this
lovely young creature. To strip her of her innocence and corrupt her -- body
and soul -- as he had so many young women before her.
"I am called Ci-ci, sire. I will be sixteen soon." Ci-ci had artlessly
spun around slowly for him letting him savor the ripening beauty of her young
womanhood. Her hair was braided in a schoolgirl's pigtails and her face was a
vision of girlish beauty -- one that a Chinese Botticelli could not have
improved upon.
Her eyes were soft and brown, her nose pleasingly small, and her lips were
of a type that the goddess of nature bestows on only the most seductive of young
women. Her breasts were admirably full for one so young; Richard was reminded
of the soft, sweet, rosy-hued plums that he had enjoyed in his youthful summers
in Fukien province. But the plums of Fukien could not boast of nipples like
those of this young maiden -- small, dark, tapering nubbins of uptilting
loveliness. Her gently rounded stomach yielded to loins only half-veiled by the
scanty pubic hair of mid-adolescence.
Her legs were of a nice length for one who was nearly a foot shorter than
the tall, slender Lord of the Black Scorpions. And her bottom was as nicely
rounded a derriere as one could imagine; her spankable lust-cheeks were deeply
cleft by a buttock groove that the elder's Chan's hands and cock itched to
explore.
Shortly thereafter he had thrown the young girl on his bed and had ruptured
her maidenhead with one violent thrust of his lusty male organ. As he pumped his
virile manhood into her, it struck him that it was not her eyes, nor her
sharp-nippled breasts, nor even the pelvis that writhed frantically beneath his
dominating strength, that most appealed to him. It was her magical skin, which
had not yet lost the delicious softness of youth; the faint peach fuzz on her
arms and legs only emphasized the infant-like softness of her breasts, the
smooth, subtle curves of her belly, the velvety texture of her thighs.
He had plundered that softness well that night, and a dozen times or more
in the the eight or ten months since. He had even sensed that Mai-Lee, the
Number One concubine, had come to resent his occasional preference for Ci-ci's
naive, artless innocence over her own well-practiced technique.
******
Indeed Mai-Lee was at his side now as he drew the whip back again, pleased
that her suspicions had proven correct. "Do not spare her, Richard,' she hissed
venomously. "She must learn not to steal from her betters."
"But I stole nothing, madam," Ci-ci pleaded just before the whip ripped
into her ripe young buttocks for the first time. Mai-Lee smiled at the
designation -- she was only in her mid-twenties herself.
CRACCKK!! "Aaaaghhh! You must belie..."
"You have disappointed me greatly, Ci-ci. Have I not treated you well?"
"Yes, sire." CRACKKK!!! "Eeearghhhh!!" The stinging thongs visited her
plump derriere again. As he had many times before, Richard marveled at the
softness of her skin; he smiled cruelly at the realization that her delicate
skin would not serve her well in shielding her from the dreadful attack of the
ten-thonged whip!
"Have I not given you easier duties than many of the other female
servants?"
" I...I... don't know, sire." CRACCKK!! The stinging strands of the whip
bit at her buttflesh. "Aaiiiieaahh!"
"Well, I have, thief. And yet you have betrayed my trust." CRACK!!
Richard broke the skin of Ci-ci's compact bottom with that stroke, opening a
thin gash that straddled her deep, dark buttock cleft. He could feel his
manhood swelling proudly beneath the silver robe as he took his pleasure from
this naked nubile body.
"Please, sire. It must be some terrible mist..."
"It is you who have made the mistake, girl! Where is the dagger? Have you
sold it? Passed it to a confederate? Hidden it?"
The elder Chan tightened his grip on the sturdy whipstock and then lashed
her again, igniting the backs of her lovely thighs with the flaming kiss of the
whip.
CRACCKK!! "Aagghhhh!! I didn't ta.."
CRACCKKK!! The whip-thongs lacerated her thigh-flesh again.
"Eaaaghh! Please... stop... it hurts..."
CRACCKK!! Back to her plump, crimson-streaked bottom ovals.
"Ouwwww... have mercy... sire... no more!" the servant groaned in
misery.
But there would be no mercy for Ci-ci on this day.
******
Richard had not needed Mai-Lee to tell him, as he prepared Ci-ci for her
punishment, that mercy was a virtue reserved for fools; despite his past
fondness for the girl, she had betrayed his trust, and that of his lover. And
now she would pay. And the price would have to be of such magnitude that no
servant would ever dare again to risk his wrath.
After confronting Ci-ci with the recovered jewelry, he and Mai-Lee had
scorned her protestations of innocence and had escorted the terrified girl down
the grim, torch-lit staircase that led to the subterranean cellars of the Black
Pagoda. Each downward step toward an unknown fate added to the rising panic
that was overtaking the pretty young housemaid. Her heart was pounding in her
chest and her legs were weak with trepidaton when the threesome finally reached
the bottom of the dingy stairwell and unlocked the creaking staircase door that
opened into the sinister dungeon...
******
THWUKK!! "Aaiiiiii!!" Ci-ci heard a new sound and felt a new, burning,
pain. Mai-Lee had lashed the nicely-contoured fronts of Cici's thighs with an
inch-thick length of coarse, tightly-braided rope. The Number One Concubine had
donned a pair of gloves to protect her pretty hands from the abrasive texture of
the rope, but there was nothing to protect the youthful softness of her victim's
body.
CRACKK!! "AAAGHHH!!" Another buttock-cutter, the hardest yet.
"Where is the dagger, girl?" Richard's impatience was mounting. There was
little time to waste. Shortly before they had brought the housemaid to the
dungeon, a messenger had arrived with a note from his brother saying that he had
momentous news about Li Chang. Tonight could well prove to be a pivotal night
in their plans to expose the traitor within the Black Scorpions.
"Please... I swear... I didn't..."
THWUKK!!! Mai-Lee had directed a ripping, back-handed rope-stroke across
both of Ci-ci's tempting young breasts. "Unnnnghhhh...I give you my w...."
THWUCKK!! "Eaaaahh!!" The rope burned her love-globes again.
"Do not lie to us, whore. Do you think we are fools?" Richard Chan had
never known Mai-Lee's voice to be so intense.
CRACCKK!! The long, slender fingers of the thonged whip curled around
Ci-ci's mid-back and reached like the legs of a venomous spider for the soft
flesh of her right breast. "We found the necklace and the ring, foolish girl.
Do not pretend that you did not purloin the Golden Dagger as well." CRAACKK!!
The thin leather tails raked her bottomcheeks again.
******
Ci-ci had heard cryptic whispers among the servants of a secret underground
chamber of horrors far beneath the residential floors of the Black Pagoda, but
the rumors had not prepared her for the macabre atmosphere of the dungeon that
confronted her when Richard Chan had pushed her through the doorway leading to
what seemed to her a chamber of horrors
Two forbidding pillars lined with a variety of iron rings, hooks and
manacles dominated the central part of the room; various wooden structures, --
benches, barrels, X-shaped and T-shaped crosses, and a peculiar horizontal
table with a windlass at one end. She could almost hear the sound of some
ghoulish cut-throat cranking the groaning windlass. In one corner of the
stygian room she thought for a moment that she had seen a strange nightmarish
beast; but as her eyes grew accustomed to the darkness she realized that the
beast was actually made from wood - for what purpose she could not imagine.
In another corner of the room she espied a large device that resembled a
bird-cage -- but was much too big for any bird known in China, and yet it was
far too small for an adult human being. Wasn't it?
To her right there was a device that looked for all the world like a
primitive cooking grill. Above her, in the dimness, she could make out what
appeared to be a network of ghostly pulleys, ropes, and chains mounted in
moorings buried deeply in the heavy oaken rafters of the ceiling.
One wall was bedecked - like the pillars - with fetters and chains of every
size and description -- enough to imprison a bevy of subjugated beauties; the
opposing wall carried a terrifying array of implements. There were whips and
rods and canes and clubs hangly neatly from rusty hooks; and there were also
peculiar tools and devices, some sharp and pointed, others heavy and blunt, and
others with strange hinges whose exact purpose she could not possibly have
fathomed.
On the opposite wall was a long mirror which only served to magnify the
dimness and despair which confronted the victims of this dark dungeon, by giving
the viewer a second, darker, image of it. There was also a divan, a piece of
furniture that seemed out of place to her; but it was actually fitting that
there be a place for dalliance in this demonic chamber, a place to satisfy in
comfort the dark and dangerous lusts aroused here.
Richard Chan had let Ci-ci look around for half a minute or so; his unholy
cellar never failed to produce the type of psychological effect that it was
having on Ci-ci, who was palpably trembling with fear.
"W-what is this place?" Ci-ci had stammered, her face ghostly pale in the
darkness of the torture chamber.
Richard had thought for a moment, amused by the question. "It is," he said
in his dry, emotionless voice, "a place where lies come to die. You might call
it the Citadel of Truth."
Just then a terrifying crackling of lightening exploded outside, seemingly
directly above the Black Pagoda, followed by a deafening peal of thunder that
rumbled through the heavens for ten long seconds as Ci-ci stood there quaking
with fright.
Richard Chan chuckled softly at the ominous portents of the tempest
outside. Then he turned to his paramour with a wolf-like smile.
"Mai-Lee. How should we begin?"
******
"The Golden Dagger, girl! What have you done with it?"
"Nothing, sire ... I swear I ..." Pain and fear had raised Ci-ci's oprano
voice half an octave.
CRAACKK!! The thonged whip fell heavily across Ci-ci's downy thighs.
"Eaaghhh!"
Richard approached the inverted beauty. "I need a place to put this for a
moment," he said, holding up the ten-thonged whip. "Ah, this should do," he
smiled sadistically, as he screwed the thick whip-handle between the inviting
folds of the maid's pussy-lips. He wedged several inches of the bark-colored
whipstock into her upside-down vagina before moving toward a rotary crank on the
wall that was attached to a complicated network of chains.
THWUCKK!! "AAAAGHHHH!!" Mai-Lee had scored a direct hit with the
rope-tip on the pebbly areola of Ci-ci's left breast, searing its tender nipple.
Ci-ci was still groaning from this blow when the Lord of the Scorpions gave the
crank a full turn, before locking it into place. That turn caused the chains
which held her ankles aloft to lift the pretty maid's body even higher in the
air. Unfortunately for Ci-ci, there was no slack in the chains which connected
her wrist manacles to the massive iron rings in the floor. As a result her
entire body was pulled into the unbearable tension of what was, in effect, a
vertical rack.
"Unnggggghhh," Ci-ci groaned in agony, as the muscles in her limbs and
torso were stretched impossibly taut. The long quadriceps muscles in her
thighs, her well-toned abdominal muscles, the triceps in her upper arms, the
rounded deltoids in her shoulders were all forced into straining elongation
under the unremitting tension.
"Very clever, Master," Mai-Lee approved. "The little thief is sweating
now!"
Indeed, rivulets of perspiration were flowing in unaccustomed paths down
the body of the beauty who was imprisoned in her painful inverted suspension.
Mai-Lee took aim at a tiny puddle that had formed in Ci-ci's deep set navel
and THWUCKK'ed the little button savagely with the scalding rope-end, turning
the pool of perspiration into a fine mist.
"Where is the dagger, whore?"
CRACKK!!
THWUCKK!!
CRACCKK!!
THWUCCKK!!
A cascade of punishing blows continued to rain down on the blood-streak
buttocks and the rope-burned breasts of the suspended serving girl, each one
drawing a fresh, plaintive cry of anguish.
The beating stopped when only a bell sounded in the underground chamber, a
bell that signalled that an important guest had arrived at the Black Pagoda.
"That will be George," Richard announced. "We shall return to deal with
you later," he said as he gave Ci-ci's quivering bottom a final vicious slash
with the whip. Then he and Mai-Lee made their way toward the door leading to
the staircase.
******
They had only just sat down with George in the den when Yian, the graying,
shrewish maid who had tormented Erika Weiss with the broom handle, tapped at
the door.
"Master! Master! It is very important!
Annoyed at being interrupted, Richard growled, "Come in then. What is it?"
"The Golden Dagger, sire -- I found it hidden behind a book in the bookcase
in the drawing room! The girl must have hidden it there! I was afraid to move
it. Hsien is watching it. Go quickly!"
"Splendid! Come with me George" And the Brothers Chan hurried off to
reclaim their antique dagger.
When the Chans were safely out of the room, Yian sidled over to Mai-Lee
expectantly.
"Not here," Mai-Lee said, her green-black eyes flashing conspiratorially.
"Come with me."
The skinny maid followed Mai-Lee to her boudoir, where she watched greedily
as her mistress counted out ten shiny golden coins. "You hid the jewels and the
sword well, Yian. Everything went exactly according to plan."
The maid bit down on a coin to test its authenticity. Satisifed, she
muttered. "I never liked that young one anyway -- the Master let her dust his
paintings while I had to clean the carpets and wash the walls. All because of
her pretty face!" she snapped venomously
Mai-Lee, who had even more reason to be jealous of Ci-ci's pretty face, and
fearful for her own place in George's affections, than Yian, nodded her assent.
"Yes, well, he'll be hiring a new maid, now. And I'll see that she is put under
your charge."
The shifty-eyed maid nodded in agreement. Thank you, miss. And don't
worry. I'll keep our little secret to myself!"
As the maid slinked away, Mai-Lee, the Number One Concubine, now rid of
her number one rival, mumbled under her breath, "You had better, old woman.
You had better."
******
Meanwhile the Brothers Chan had gone to the drawing room and found Hsien -
Yian's chubby fellow parlormaid - watching over the Golden Dagger. "Our
housemaid -- I believe you met her once, George -- stole this and hid it here.
Probably with the idea of taking it to a dealer in stolen goods when she felt it
was safe."
George shook his head, "The dishonesty of the servant class these days is
shameful, is it not? Did she make good her escape?"
"No, in fact ... but that can wait." George would appreciate, he was sure,
the sentence being imposed upon the lovely Ci-ci in the deepest recesses of the
Black Pagoda. "What news have you concerning our young lieutenant?"
"Well, I am still not absolutely certain -- Li Chang seemed like such a
capable fellow, and Ming-tsu has reported to me that he has quite
enthusiastically taken part in the mistreatment of young women, which we have
always considered a fairly reliable test. He even..." George's thoughts
returned to the marks that Li Chang had left on Ming-tsu's honey-gold breasts,
but then demurred, saying "but that's not really here nor there."
"What IS important, Richard, is that Li Chang seems to have been raised by
Wen-chi."
The elder Chan's eyes were intense with concentration as he regarded his
brother questioningly.
George, ever-beaming, raced on, "Yes, I am quite certain it is the same
Wen-chi who plagued us with his public criticism some years ago. He had the
citizenry all stirred up for quite a while, you'll recall."
The Lord of the Black Scorpions muttered, "I should have done away with the
self-righteous old fool years ago. But he was much loved by the people so...."
Richard Chan scratched his angular bearded jaw with a silver-robed sleeve
thoughtfully. "But few remember him now -- and no such love attaches to this Li
Chang. I don't think we need fear the repercussions overmuch."
Richard turned the Golden Dagger over in his hands. "I told Li Chang, and
only Li Chang, this morning, that after sundown this evening, a squadron of
our men were going to destroy the print shop of that troublemaker south of the
river. The honorable Mr Zhong, who has been stirring up the populace against us
with his accursed handbills," he spat out bitterly.
"But, my brother, there will be no attack this evening. We will station two
of our men nearby to watch the proceedings. And if those who oppose us show up
to defend the printer, we shall know that Li Chang is the traitor. We will need
to reward Ming-tsu, of course, for her efforts."
"I have already done so, Richard," George replied with a smile, thinking
more of the bone-jarring ben wa fucking that he had given his beautiful paramour
earlier that afternoon, than the jade pendant he had bestowed upon her. "But
now I must get back; I have a conclave with the leaders of the cells of the old
quarter scheduled in a little while."
"Ah, I see. I know that you don't have much time, but if you have just a
moment, I have something to show you downstairs."
Two minutes later, George Chan was admiring the sweat-soaked girl-woman who
hung by her heels from the hellish dungeon of the Black Pagoda.
"So this is the thief. Very, very nice, Richard," George murmured
approvingly as he studied Ci-ci's nude body stretched painfully taut by her
cruel suspension. "Who would have thought that there would be such curves hidden
under her maid's dresses? May I?" he asked, indicating the wall of weaponry.
"Of course," Richard assented with the graciousness of a good host.
George quickly made his selection and returned to stand in front of the
inverted beauty.
"Please ... sir...no more... for pity's sake... they have alr..."
WHAPPPP!! A two-inch wide leather strap blazed a swath across Ci-ci's bare
belly. "AAAGHHHHH!!"
"Perhaps, Richard," George grinned as his dark eager eyes focused on the
tight, dark nipples that so perfectly capped Ci-ci's ripe young breasts, "the
cell-leaders can begin the meeting without me."
And with that the younger Chan lifted the menacing length of leather
high over his head...
