“May I ask about the woman who came here with me, who went in before me?”

“No, that you may not do,” he said. “Never ask about another slave, and always address me as ‘sir’ when you speak.” He slapped me hard on my backside as he said this. “It’s not for me to discipline you or punish you,” he explained. “Unless I’m told to do so. You’re for your masters and mistresses, but I’m to whip you hard if you show the slightest disrespect.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” I said. It feel so strange to say it, and yet so simple at the same time.

“That’s better,” he said. His powerful fingers were rubbing my scalp. Ripples of sensation traveled my head and my back and the backs of my arms. I felt drowsy suddenly. And there came a flash of dream as though sleep were suddenly reaching for me.

I was awakened suddenly by his fingers oiling my anus, though it seemed now that he wore a glove. He was not rough but he wasn’t gentle either.

“Nice and tight,” he said in a matter-of-fact voice. “The King will love that.”

“Do you think I’ll be taken directly to the King, sir?” I asked.

“Now that you shouldn’t ask either.”

He smacked me hard several times. I kept my lips tightly closed but I groaned. I couldn’t help it.

“Brenn, don’t you understand what types of questions are not permitted?”

“I’m trying, sir,” I said under my breath.

“Well, since I said I’d answer what I could, I will,” he said. “Yes, Lady Eva is taking you to see the King and the Queen. But that doesn’t mean you’ll ever see either of them again. Many new piglets like you are presented to Their Majesties, all those whom Lady Eva selects, but they may send you off at once to some other part of the Court or the kingdom. So spend your precious time with them wisely. You do not bow to them as if you were a free man. You wait to be commanded as to whether you kneel down or up or stand. But you may kiss their feet when you’re presented. A slave may always drop down and kiss the feet of a master or mistress, including the King and Queen, but don’t do it clumsily or awkwardly. Be completely submissive. You know what that word means? And don’t dare look at your masters or mistresses the way you were glancing at me from that tub. Don’t dare look at anyone that way!”

“I’m sorry, sir,” I said. I hadn’t realized that he had noticed.

“Now turn completely over and keep your eyes half shut,” he said. He set to work on my chest with the same vigor he’d used on my back, rubbing the oil into me as if I were carved of wood.

“You do have the prettiest face,” he said. “Such baby cheeks and lips, like a Cupid.”

I closed my eyes to avoid looking at him because I didn’t know what else to do, and he didn’t reprove me for this, but went to work positively polishing my balls and cock as he’d polished everything else.

I was hard, hopelessly hard, and he was maddeningly careful not to touch the tip of my cock.

“Behave yourself,” he said in a low voice. “You dare come, and I’ll have to report that to Lady Eva. And I can’t say what will happen to you then. That cock belongs to the King and Queen and the Court now, and all the noble and gentlefolk of this kingdom, and even to the common people and the peasants, you understand?”

“Yes, sir, I understand.”

“To even the lowliest people of the kingdom, it belongs, you understand? No longer to you. Your entire body, your eyes, your voice, all belong to the kingdom.”

“Yes, sir.”

His ministrations continued and lulled me again to the edge of a dreamy erotic sleep, my cock being the only substantial thing in my mind as I drifted off.

When he finally pulled me up by my wrists, I woke up from this half slumber with a shiver, and once again he smacked my backside very hard with his hand.

Suddenly, as if he couldn’t stop himself, he put his foot up on a stool and pulled me over his thigh and spanked my backside over and over, hard, in the same way, his naked fingers hard as wood.

I found myself groaning again. I couldn’t help it. But to the walloping with the strap, this was like spice compared to supper. To say that my cock loved it would be an understatement.

I saw the whole room in a bright flash. I saw slaves being very roughly bathed and others soothed, it seemed, and some being smacked over and over by their grooms, in one stage or another of their toilet. I saw some over the knee as I was.

He didn’t spank me all that long, but my cock felt like it was made of stone.

He brought me up straight.

“You’re a good boy,” he said approvingly. “A very good boy. I have this feeling, ah, but what do I know? If the Queen or the King don’t take you, you’ll still be at Court at table or stable.”

There it was again, that phrase. But I was weeping at his praise and reassurance. Then realizing I’d said nothing I answered frantically under my breath:

“Yes, sir.”

“Not required.” He laughed. “I didn’t ask you a question.” Another hard squeeze on my sore bottom. “But you’ll learn. You might be gagged for a while, but that’s to be avoided. Your betters can’t see your pretty mouth when you’re gagged. And the Queen especially does not care for gags on her slaves unless they’re being corrected for impertinence. See that you’re not corrected for impertinence.”

We passed many others as we moved towards the far wall. I scanned the countless niches in vain for my precious Sybil. But she might have been one of many sleeping dark-haired beauties, with her head turned away.

There were small stools and stepladders by the wall of beds.

Suddenly, I was being lifted by Fane and another groom to a niche just above my head. I was slipped into it and onto the softest silken mattress I ever felt.

“Over on your back,” said Fane, mounting a little ladder. He reached in and tethered my hands by means of leather thongs to a hook just above my head. My arms weren’t pulled tight, and it wasn’t painful, but there was no way I could touch my cock.

“Now, you go to sleep, Brenn,” he said. “Of course you’ll twist your neck trying to see all that’s going on here. Well, do that and be done with it, and then let sleep come. You’ll be surprised how easy it will be for you to sleep. And don’t dare to try to turn over, or get your hands free, or pleasure yourself, or you’ll be punished in ways you haven’t foreseen. Never touch your own cock or your privates, Brenn. Never. They don’t belong to you. Remember.”

Then he was gone.

I was in the soft silken-lined niche and I was staring up at the low painted ceiling, and at my own hands tethered to the hook.

Of course I turned my head and looked out on the vast room. So much to see, but then sleep came down over me like a veil.

Sometime much later, I was turned over and my hands were tethered loosely at my sides. My cock and balls had been placed on an opening so that they got no friction. I dozed off again with a groom rubbing unguents into my skin all over. There came the prickling delicious pain when his hands found the raw abraded skin but the sensations melted into sleep.

v

It was dusk when I awoke. A soft golden light filled the tented room, and a young naked slave was lighting the candles in the many standing candelabra.

I blinked. The figure of a tall, slender elegant lady was coming towards me, and gradually I realized it was the red-haired Lady Eva.

Two young men walked beside her and she directed them towards me.

I was taken out of the niche carefully and gently and planted on my feet, then turned around so that she might inspect me.

Her cool hands prodded and felt of me all over. I wondered if this would be worse, more shaming, if she were not so beautiful.

“Excellent skin. Very fine skin,” she said. “Feed him the apples.”

One of the grooms put a small slice of apple into my mouth and told me to chew it up thoroughly.

“You’ll always be given apples when you waken, and several times a day, to clean your teeth and freshen your mouth,” Lady Eva said. “Never go before your masters and mistresses without this little ritual, Brenn. Do wake up and answer me.”

“Yes, my lady. I mean, yes, madam,” I said.

“You may use that form of address if you like. I’m taking you to the Queen.”

The two attendants were rubbing me down with oil again, and one blotting the excess with a clean linen towel. As I stood there, one did a skilled job of again shaving my beard very close.

“Ah, your cock is sensitive, attentive, and beautiful,” Lady Eva said.

With a shock, I felt her fingers on my balls. She fondled them and patted them very lightly.

“Now, you may address the Queen as ‘my queen’ or ‘Your Majesty.’ Same for the King of course, ‘my king,’ and so forth.”

“Yes, madam,” I said.

Another man approached. He was taller than the two grooms, and very powerfully built. I had no idea why he was there.

My hair was brushed, my fingernails inspected, my toenails, my pubic hair combed, which amazed me, and then the lady pinched my nipples and said they were bright pink, which she liked.

Then she told the man we were going to the Queen’s parlor.