Lord Gregory made some approving sound. "Lovely," he said so that Beauty could hear him. "And three months ago she was as wild and untamed as a nymph from the forest. The transformation is quite exquisite."

Lord Gregory turned sharply to his left and when Beauty did not at once realize it, he gave her a sound spank and then another.

"Now, Beauty," Lord Gregory said, as they passed through a doorway into a long room, "do you wonder how others are trained to show the passion you exhibit with such abandon?"

Beauty knew her cheeks were crimson. She could not bring herself to answer.

The room was dimly lit by a nearby fire, but its doors were open to the garden. And here Beauty saw that many captives were positioned on tables as she had been in the Great Hall, each with a Page in attendance. And all the Pages worked diligently taking no note of cries or commotion at any other table.

Several young men knelt with their hands strapped behind them. They were paddled steadily while at the same time their penises were also being given pleasure. Here a Page stroked the engorged penis as he worked the paddle. Here two Pages attended the same Prince mercilessly.

Beauty could understand what was happening even when Lord Gregory did not explain it to her. She saw the confusion and misery of the young Princes, their faces caught between struggle and surrender. The Prince nearest her was on all fours, his penis tormented slowly. As soon as the paddling commenced, he went soft. So the paddling ceased, and the hands attended to him again, hardening him.

Along the walls were other Princes, spread-eagled, their ankles and wrists bound to the bricks, their organs being taught obedience with touching and kisses and suckling.

"O, it is worse for them, much worse," Beauty thought, but her eyes and here mind were too filled with their exquisite endowments. She looked at the rounded bu**ocks of those made to kneel; she loved their polished chests, the lean muscularity of their limbs, and above all, perhaps, the nobility of suffering in their handsome faces. She thought of Prince Alexi again and she wanted to shower him with kisses. She wanted to kiss his eyelids and the ni**les of his chest; she wanted to suckle his organ.

Now she saw a young Prince brought over on his hands and knees to suck the penis of another. And as he performed the act with great enthusiasm, he in turn was paddled by the Page who seemed, as all others, to take delight in inflicting torment. The Prince's eyes were closed, he drew on the powerful sex of the other with long caresses of his lips, his own bu**ocks flinching with each blow, and as the poor Prince whom he suckled seemed on the edge of culminating passion, the suckler was pulled back by the Page who took his obedient slave to yet another erect penis.

"Here, as you can see, the young slave Princes are taught their manners," Lord Gregory said, "to be ever in readiness for their masters and mistresses. A hard lesson to learn and one, which you are, in general, spared. It is not that readiness isn't required of you; it is that you are spared having to make such a display of it."

He led her on closer to the female slaves who were being worked in a different manner. Here Beauty saw a lovely red-haired Princess with her legs held apart by two Pages who with their hands massaged that little nodule between her legs. Her hips rose and fell; it was clear she could not control her own movement. She begged to be allowed peace, and just as her face flushed and it seemed she could not control herself, she was let alone, legs held apart so that she groaned miserably.

Another very lovely girl was being spanked and stroked at the same time by a Page who used his left hand between her legs to work her.

And to Beauty's horror several were mounted on phalluses against the wall on which they worked themselves with wild contortions while the Pages in attendance wielded merciless paddles.

"You see each slave receives simple instructions. She is to work herself on the phallus until she achieves satisfaction. Only then will the paddling cease, no matter how sore she is. She soon learns to think of the paddle and pleasure as one in the same, and soon learns to achieve her pleasure in spite of the paddle. Or on command, I should say. Of course she shall seldom be allowed such satisfaction by her masters and mistresses."

Beauty gazed at the row of struggling bodies. The girls' hands were bound over their heads, their feet below. They had little room for moving on the leather phalluses. They twisted, trying to undulate as best they could, the inevitable tears spilling down their faces. Beauty felt pity for them, yet she so craved the phallus. She knew with deep shame it would not have taken her long to please the Page paddling her. As she watched the nearest Princess, a girl with red ringlets, she saw her finally achieve her goal, her face blood red, her whole body gone to violent quivering. The Page spanked her all the harder. She went limp finally as though too weary to feel shame, and the Page gave her a gentle approving pat and left her.

Everywhere Beauty looked she saw some form of training.

Here a young girl with hands clasped above her head was being taught to kneel still while her private parts were stroked and not to put her hands down to cover herself. Another was being forced to feed her br**sts to the Page who suckled them, holding them for him while yet another examined her. Lessons in control, lessons in pain and pleasure.

The voices of the Pages were some of them stern, some of them tender, the dull whacking of the paddle everywhere. And there were the inevitable spread-eagled girls being now and then tormented to awaken them and teach them what they could feel if they did not know it.

"But for our little Beauty such lessons are not necessary," Lord Gregory said. "She is too accomplished as it is. And perhaps she should see the Hall of Punishments, how those disobedient slaves are chastised using the very pleasure they have learned to feel here."

Chapter 11

THE HALL OF PUNISHMENTS

AT THE door of the new hall, Lord Gregory signaled one of the busy Pages.

"Bring Princess Lizetta here," he said raising his voice slightly. "Sit back on your heels, Beauty, with your hands behind your neck and observe all that's presented for your benefit."

The unfortunate Princess Lizetta was apparently just being brought in, and Beauty saw at once that she was gagged but rather simply so. A small cylinder covered with leather and shaped like a dog's bone was forced into her mouth and back so far between her teeth that it was rather like a bit, and apparently she could not have dislodged it with her tongue if she had wanted to.

She was crying angrily and kicking, as the Page who held her hands behind her back gestured for yet another Page to take her about the waist and carry her to Lord Gregory.