But I was only given a second or two to think what all this meant. At once, the Master had his firm hand on the ring of the phallus and was pushing me forward with the command, "March." The hair stroked and tickled the backs of my knees. And the phallus seemed to shift in me as if it had life of its own, poking and prodding me forward.

A SPLENDID EQUIPAGE

Tristan:

No," I Thought, "I can't be driven outdoors, not disfigured with this bestial decoration. Please . . ." And yet I was hurried through a rear corridor and out a back door into a broad paved road enclosed on the other side by the high stone ramparts of the village.

This was a much bigger thoroughfare than the one through which we had come. It was bordered with tall trees, and I could see guards high above walking in leisurely fashion along the battlements. And immediately before me I saw the shocking sight of coaches and market carts rattling past, pulled by slaves instead of horses. As many as eight and ten slaves were harnessed to the large coaches, and here and there a small chariot rolled by pulled only by a couple of pairs, and there were even small market carts without drivers being pulled by lone slaves, the Masters on foot beside them.

But before I could overcome my shock, or perceive how the slaves were turned out, I saw the Master's leather coach before me, and five slaves, the four in pairs, all laced into boots and well harnessed with bits jerking back their heads, and their naked bu**ocks decorated with horsetails. The coach itself was open with two velvet upholstered seats, and the Master handed the Mistress up to take her place as a smartly dressed youth pushed me forward to complete the third and last pair nearest to the vehicle.

"No, please," I thought as I had a thousand times at the castle, "no, I beg you ..." But no real belief in resistance galvanized me. I was in the power of these villagers, who placed the long thick bit firmly back in my mouth and the reins over my shoulders. The thick phallus ground into me as it was shifted up, and I felt a finely made harness coming down over my shoulders with thin straps that went down to a band around my hips, which was buckled at once very securely to the ring of the phallus. I couldn't now push the thing out. In fact, it was rammed hard into me and bound to me, and I felt a firm tugging that almost pulled me off my feet as a pair of reins was obviously fixed to this hook and given to those behind me, who could now control both the bit and the phallus as they drove me.

As I looked ahead I saw that all the slaves were so tethered and that all were Princes, the long reins of those in front passing beside my thighs or above my shoulders. Tight leather rings gathered them together neatly just before me and probably right behind me. But I was startled to feel my arms being folded against my back and laced tight with harsh tugs. Rough, gloved hands quickly clamped small black leather weights to the ni**les of my chest and gave them little pats to make sure they hung securely. Like leather teardrops they were, with no other purpose, it seemed, than to make the unspeakable degradation of the equipage all the more piercing.

And with the same silent quickness, my feet were being laced into thick boots with horseshoes on them, like the boots used at the castle for the devastating runs on the Bridle Path. The leather felt cold against my calves, and the horseshoes felt heavier.

But no wild run on that path, driven by the paddle of a mounted rider, had been as degrading as being tethered with these other human ponies. Even as I grasped that it had been completely done - I was now outfitted exactly like the others and all those I saw clopping past on the busy road - my head was jerked up, and I felt two sharp pulls of the reins, which started the whole team moving.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw the slave next to me lifting his knees in the usual high march, and I did the same, the harness tugging on the shaft in my anus as the Master called out, "Faster, Tristan, better than that. Remember how I taught you to march." And a thick strap licked down with a loud popping noise at the welts on my thighs and bu**ocks as, in a blur, I ran with the others.

We couldn't have been traveling very fast, but it seemed we were racing. Ahead of me I could see the limitless blue sky, the ramparts, and the high-seated drivers and occupants of passing carriages. And again there was that horrid sense of actuality, that we were true naked slaves here, not royal playthings. We were the groaning underbelly of a place so vast and vital and overwhelming it made the castle seem a monstrous confection.

Before me the Princes strained under their harnesses almost as if outdoing one another for speed, reddened bu**ocks jogging the long sleek horsetails back and forth, muscles standing out in their strong calves above the tight leather of the boots, horseshoes ringing on the cobblestones. I groaned as the reins jerked my head higher and the strap walloped the backs of my knees, and the tears flowed more freely than ever down my face so that it was almost a mercy to have the bit to cry against. The weights tugged at my ni**les, knocked against my chest, sending ripples of sensation through me. I felt my nakedness perhaps as I'd never felt it before, as though the harnesses and reins and the horsetail only further revealed me.

The reins were given three jerks. The team slowed to a rhythmic trot as if it knew these commands. And winded and wet with tears, I fell into it gratefully. The strap licked at the Prince beside me now, and I saw him arch his back and lift his knees even higher.

And over the jumble of sounds, the clops of the shoes, the groans and outright cries of the other ponies, I could hear the thin rise and fall of the sound of the Master and Mistress talking together. The words weren't clear, only the unmistakable sound of a conversation.

"Head up, Tristan!" the Master said sharply, and there came that cruel jerk of the bit along with another through the ring in my anus, lifting me right off my feet for a moment, so I cried loudly behind the gag and ran fast when I was let down, the phallus seeming to enlarge inside me as if my body existed for no other purpose than to embrace it.

I sobbed against the gag, trying to catch my breath the better to measure it and weather the pace of the team. And there came the rise and fall of conversation again, and I felt utterly forsaken.

Not even the whippings in the soldiers' camp when I had tried to escape on the journey to the castle had violated me and debased me as this punishment. And the glimpse of those on the battlements above, leaning idly against the stone or pointing now and then to the passing coaches, only made my soul feel all the more frail. Something in me was being absolutely annihilated.

We rounded a turn, the road widening, the rush of horseshoes and rolling wheels growing louder. The phallus seemed to drive me, lift me, propel me forward, the long popping strap lapping my calves almost playfully. I seemed to have caught my breath, to have gotten a merciful second wind, and the tears streaming down my face felt cold in the breeze instead of scalding hot.