But then our new Lord and Master, Lexius, appeared, and I felt a little shock when I saw him in the doorway.

Fear. When had anyone at the castle ever made me feel the wallop of it like this? It was maddening. He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, surveying us as they finished with the towels, and his face had a cold cheerfulness to it, as if he was proud of his selections.

When I looked right at him, he didn't show the slightest disapproval. And looking up into his eyes, I thought of that glove going up into my rear--the sensation of being widened and impaled on his arm, and the others watching.

And that, mixed with the shame of having been purged, was almost too much for me.

It wasn't just fear, fear that he would put on the glove again and do that; it was damnable pride that he had done it only to me, and that only I had been tethered to his slipper.

I wanted to please the devil, that was the horror of it. And it made it worse that he had worked the same spell on the others. Elena he had made into a trembling virgin at his command. Beauty he had reduced to obvious adoration.

Now, if the grooms told him that Tristan and I had touched.... But they didn't. They dried us off. They brushed our hair. The Master gave some little command, and we were put down on our hands and knees and made to follow him into the main bath again. He gestured for us to kneel up in front of him.

I could feel his eyes moving over me, see him looking over Tristan. Then came another command--his voice like a whip itself stroking my flesh--and the grooms quickly brought out the leather and gold ornaments. They lifted my balls and buckled a broad jeweled ring around my cock, keeping my balls pushed forward.

It had been done before at the castle, but never had I been so hungry.

And then the clamps for the ni**les again, only this time they didn't have leashes attached. They were small and tight, and little weights dangled from them.

I couldn't help but wince when they were put on. And Lexius saw it, heard it. I didn't dare look up, but I saw him turn towards me and I felt his hand suddenly on my head. He stroked my hair. Then he tapped the weight dangling from my left nipple and made it swing on its hook, and I winced again, and blushed again, remembering what he had said about silently showing our passion.

It wasn't hard to do. I felt clean and polished inside and out and with no means of combating his power over me. The passion gnawed in my loins and the tears rolled down my face, suddenly.

He pressed the back of his hand against my lips, and I kissed it immediately. Then he did the same to Tristan, and it seemed Tristan made a more graceful art of the kiss, his whole body yielding to it. I felt my tears get thicker, come faster and hotter.

What was happening to me in this strange palace? Why in these simple preliminaries was I reduced to this? After all, I was the runaway, the rebel.

But here I was, dropping on silent command to my hands and knees beside Tristan, our foreheads to the floor, and we were both following Lexius out of the bath into the corridor.

We came to a large garden full of low fig trees and flower beds, and I saw immediately what was going to happen to us. But to make certain we understood, Lexius touched us under our chins with the thong to make us raise our heads and look in front of us, and then he took us, still on our hands and knees, on a little journey along the path so that we could study more thoroughly the slaves who decorated the garden.

They were male slaves, at least twenty of them, their natural skin color unchanged, each mounted on a smooth wooden cross that was planted in the earth amid the flowers and the grass, under the low tree branches.

But the crosses weren't like the village Punishment Cross. They had high crossbars that went under the arms of the slaves which were tied behind them. Wide, curved hooks of polished brass held the weight of the spread-apart thighs, and the soles of the feet of each slave were pressed together, ankles tethered.

Their heads hung forward so that they could see their own erect cocks, and their wrists were bound to the cross in back by chains connected to the large gilded phalluses protruding from their backsides. Not a one looked up or dared to move as we made our little walk in the garden.

And I saw that silent servants, heavily robed and moving with obsequious speed, were spreading brightly colored carpets on the grass and setting low tables upon them, as if for a banquet. Brass lamps were being hung in the trees and torches placed along the walls that enclosed the place.

Cushions were laid all about. And silver and gold jugs of wine were already set in place, and on the tables were trays of goblets. It was clear a meal would be served here at nightfall.

I could imagine the feel of the crossbar under my arms, imagine the smooth cold brass of the hooks curving around my legs, the penetration of the phallus. In the lamplight the vision of the mounted slaves would be stunning. And here the Lords would dine with these sculptures to delight them if they chanced to look up--and what might follow? Would we be taken down, raped?

But it was a very long time before nightfall. I didn't want to be on this cross, suffering, waiting--seeing the gleaming torsos of the others, their primed cocks--no, this was too much, I thought. I can't bear this.

Our tall, elegantly haughty Master led us to the very center of the garden. The air was warm and sweet, just a little breeze. There was Dmitri, already mounted; and another, fair-skinned European slave with dark red hair, probably a Prince taken from our benevolent Queen; and two empty crosses waiting for Tristan and me.

The grooms appeared and lifted Tristan as I watched, and mounted him efficiently and quickly. They didn't insert the phallus until they had his thighs comfortably fitted into the curve of the brass hooks, and when I saw the size of the phallus I winced. In an instant, his wrists were chained to the end of the thing, with the upright wood of the cross between them.

His c**k couldn't have been any harder.

As the grooms went to combing his hair and binding his feet in place, I realized I had only seconds to do something rash if I was going to do it. I looked up at the Master's still face. His lips were parted as he studied Tristan. His cheeks were slightly red.

I was still on all fours. I moved closer to him until I was against his robe, and then slowly, deliberately, I sat back on my ankles and looked up at him. A strange expression crossed his face, a prelude to rage that I had dared to do this. I whispered without moving my lips so that the grooms couldn't hear me.

"What have you got under that robe," I said, "that you torment us like this? You're a eunuch, aren't you? I don't see any hair on your pretty face. That's what you are, aren't you?"

I thought I could see the hair of his head stand on end. The grooms were polishing Tristan's muscles with clear oil and carefully wiping away what the skin did not absorb. But that was just a little blaze in the corner of my eye. I was staring up at the Master.