I kept on spanking her, harder and faster until she was undulating madly under the blows, twisting and turning feverishly, her little feet rising, then falling back down to the carpet. I didn’t let up.

I spanked her over and over and over again.

I loved the sound of it, the sight of the broad leather smacking her reddening skin, her sweet tender skin. I smacked the tender underside of her bottom until it was too red and I had to spread the blows.

A great exhilaration came over me, and on and on I worked on her tender high calves, and her soft pale thighs and then back again on the top of her little bottom, spanking her till she was all the color of a red rose garden.

Finally I stopped. My arm was tired. I was in a daze, but it was a different daze from all those through which I’d passed earlier.

I saw my left hand play with her tender red flesh. How hot it was, how delectably hot. I didn’t want the butt plug now. I pulled it out of her and threw it to the side.

Yes, just her red little backside, and her red legs.

For a long moment I stood there looking at her. I could hear the sounds from the square below, the rise and fall of a mass of voices as if they were water. And there came to my ears, Barbara’s soft sobbing cries, so eloquent of total surrender.

The groom made no sound.

I went to her and, gathering up her long brown curls, I lifted her gently off the bed by them, catching her chin with my right hand to make her stand upright. She was limp, utterly without any resistance.

“My first slave,” I whispered. And so she was. She was my very first, and this the very first time I’d possessed a slave utterly. And she could not grasp perhaps what it meant to me.

I covered her face with wet eager kisses. I think I was crying. Our tears were mingling.

“Barbara,” I whispered. “I adore you.” I wanted to say I am you, but I didn’t, because she would not have wanted it. “Barbara.” I sighed against her ear. I caught the heated perfume of her sex, her sweet little sex.

Then she had her trusting arms around my neck again, her silken arms, and I was sliding my cock into her fragrant little cloister and from the square below came a great roar as if of applause or triumph.

i

I would have gone to Bellavalten without Sybil. I had determined to go from the day I’d copied out the Proclamation and read it in the town square. The whole country was talking of King Laurent and Queen Beauty—and that slaves of the new kingdom would be accepted from all ranks, and allowed to offer their vow of allegiance for two or more years to enjoy the pleasures of naked slavery.

My father was secretary to the old duke, and I’d been educated to take his place since I was a small child, to keep the libraries and the archives and to write letters for the family as was required.

Lady Sybil grew up the fifth daughter of the old duke’s eldest son and, with four daughters ahead of her, had little hope of a dowry or even the chance to meet a fine man.

She and I ran in the fields together, and played in the castle gardens and read books together, because nobody much paid attention, with Lady Sybil’s mother dead and my mother busy with three more sons. I taught Sybil to read, and then her father obtained a tutor for her and soon she surpassed me in my Latin.

We remained friends even when her duties as a woman put a great divide between us, with Sybil often coming to the library or archives simply to visit with me. She wouldn’t hear of formal addresses. “I am your Sybil, Brenn,” she whispered to me whenever I bowed or offered her titles.

It was a month after the Proclamation had been posted, and the emissaries of Bellavalten had already left our land with the postulants for pleasure slavery whom they had accepted. I’d seen some of those lovelies with my own eyes as they congregated around the caravan on the edges of town, and they were beautiful creatures indeed and certainly from the lower ranks, as highborn applicants came to the emissaries by night in secret.

I could not get away in time. But soon I was packed and ready to go with everything I possessed—a few changes of clothes, my savings, and my books—in a small bundle that I could carry over my shoulder as I made the long walk to the kingdom.

I was determined to give my life to pleasure slavery. I’d heard all about it years ago from an aunt of Lady Sybil or a cousin, I don’t recall which, who’d told us amazing stories of the kingdom.

“Imagine living naked for three years,” the lady had said without so much as a blush, “and enjoying pleasure every day of one’s life, and sometimes three and four times a day—the sort of pleasure that makes fools of men and women as they pursue it in vain in the shadowy corners of the wide world. Well, there are no shadowy corners in the land of Queen Eleanor.”

Of course the lady had rebelled at first. That was expected of one, she’d admitted with much laughter. “But those were the most vibrant days of my life,” she’d told us.

Over the years I’d heard plenty from others, tales sometimes second- and thirdhand, but all on the same theme.

I knew I was going. And in truth I had little interest in thinking it over. I’d been teased, as soon as the emissaries had arrived to receive slaves, that I was beautiful enough. My older brother had said, “Why don’t you go, Brenn, and then we’d never have to listen to your poetry at dinner again ever!” to which my uncle had added, “As a matter of fact, pretty as you are, you might pass for a boy or a girl slave—a girl slave with a beard, that is!” Roaring laughter.

I’d said nothing.

I left a letter that would be found only after I was well on my way, in an account book that would not be opened for a fortnight.

And on the first morning, Lady Sybil found me walking, already miles from home, my bundle over my back, my face and body pretty much covered by the dark hooded cloak I wore, ignoring her as she rode up, as I had every other rider on the road so far, and she called out:

“Brenn, how could you leave without me?”

I knew her voice instantly, though what I saw on the horse’s back appeared to be a young man under a bright green hooded cloak as concealing as my own, with only some of her curling dark hair revealed by it.

But this was Sybil all right, and I rushed up to her when I realized it.

“Precious, what are you doing here?” I demanded.

“I’m riding to Bellavalten, same as you, to see if I will be accepted.”

“But Sybil—”

“But Sybil what? Get on behind me. How long do you think it will take you to walk the entire way?”

She was right and I was too excited to argue with her, protect her, offer her inducements not to be reckless, all that nonsense. Besides, I knew why I wanted to be a naked slave. Should I insult her with reasons why she shouldn’t?

She was riding a big old horse, a strong mount who could easily carry both of us, and our baggage.

“Brenn, to tell you the truth, I was hoping I would find you. I don’t relish the dangers of the road on my own, though I don’t have a particle of fear when it comes to Beauty’s Kingdom.”

That’s what they were calling it now, more often than Bellavalten. I’d heard that more than once.

“I know, darling. Well, we’re together now and I can handle our arrangements at the inns and pass you off as my servant. No one needs to have a good look at you.”

“I went searching for you to tell you early this morning. And that’s when I was told you’d been seen slipping out while it was still dark with a bundle over your shoulder. I thought to myself: Could this be true? I was ecstatic. I knew where you were headed, and now I’ve no guilt for luring you away with me.”

We laughed together, because we were of the same mind on all of this.

Beauty’s Kingdom.

It was said that Bellavalten meant “beautiful woods” or “beautiful land.” But it was the legend of the Sleeping Beauty that fired the thoughts of those who heard the Proclamation of the new king and queen. All knew she’d been waked by Queen Eleanor’s son from her legendary sleep, and brought to Bellavalten as a naked slave decades ago. If she, the fabled princess of the old tale, would dare to revive the ways of Queen Eleanor and take them to greater heights of renown, well, people were in awe of that. As for King Laurent, he was the most feared monarch in all the world, as far as I knew. And that such a mighty conqueror had claimed the scepter of Bellavalten drew only utterances of awe and admiration.

At the first inn, Sybil’s gold bought far finer accommodations than I’d ever have arranged for myself, and we fell on each other in the big bed with its crackling straw mattress. We’d been sometime lovers all these years, always fearful of discovery. And it was a great treat to us to moan and cry out as we wished now without worry, and I drank too much, and Sybil ate too much, and we finally slept, tumbled against each other like puppies.

We slept that night under her green cloak with its soft lining of miniver. But after that, we chose to save ourselves for Bellavalten.

The day before we reached the gates, we encountered many a traveler headed in the same direction, and many another returning, blaming his rejection on the fact that the kingdom “must not need any more slaves,” but we went on hoping desperately that when we were seen and examined, we’d be accepted.

My main worry was that I was not the pretty boy my uncles always teased me about being. I was a strange combination of a pretty girlish face and overmuscular arms and legs, and though I was tall enough, I was not a giant like the great King Laurent, or even Prince Tristan and other legends of the kingdom.