The cloistered sisters of the Upper Weston on Mersey abbey were reputed to be seriously dedicated to their vows of silence and humility, but had been a little less circumspect with regard to the demanding vow of chastity. That was the vow that impacted the younger nuns with far more frustration than any of the other affirmations of devotion to the service of God.

When Angela Landsborough took the partially binding vow after her first year in the convent, she didn’t expect she would be overwhelmed with a sense of attachment to any other creature on God’s green earth before it came time to take her “final” vow for a lifetime of abstinence and denial of physical pleasure of the common flesh. Her imagination could not possibly devise any situation of terminal temptation that would prompt her to open her private passageways to the sordid needs of the opposite gender. That was especially true inside the confines of the Abbey that established rules of conduct that precluded any male other than the most elderly of priests to enter for the saying of mass for the dedicated female devotees. True, there were a limited number of immature altar boys on the premises from time to time but they were so smitten with awe and respect that any thought of inappropriate actions never crossed their minds.

The previous violations of the vow of chastity were prominently displayed in written recordings on the main hallway and were required reading for the young sisters as they walked to and fro to recite their prayers of contrition for any sin of thought that might cross their mind in a moment of weakness.

Young mistress Angela had decided to assume the name of Sister Mildred because her Aunt Mildred was exceedingly generous to her family in both funds and provisions after the announcement of Angela’s commitment to her new calling.

Now that the first year was completed, Sister Mildred was assigned a cell of her own so that her prayers and her use of flagellation tools on her sinful flesh did not distract another Sister in training. She preferred to bare her rump and use either her favorite riding crop or the imitation “Cat of Nine Tails” that never failed to bring little whimpers of self-pity to her sinful lips after only a few repetitions of heavy blows on her teenaged skin.

She had modified a set of her mother’s finest clothespins to pinch her immature nipples with just the right amount of pressure to bring her to her knees in proper humbleness in the sight of God. When she did the top half and the bottom half together, her body shook with a fever of contrition and sincere desire to be a better person no matter how much it tested her limits of endurance.

Her private confessor, the shy and withdrawn Father Reilly, found her insistence on self- punishment a bit “over the top” in secular terms, but he allowed her to show him her bruises and marks of penitence even when they were in an embarrassingly private spot usually not displayed for male observation. Her flushed face and rapid breathing concerned him at such times, but he put it down to mortification at her sinful deeds. His flesh was just as weak as some of the younger nuns and his need for release sometimes led him to administer penance in a novel way if the sinner was pretty enough and willing enough to accept his training methods of dispelling the harboring of lustful thinking. Taking one of the sinners over his knee was a perk of great magnitude and he seldom showed mercy when the sin was major enough to require discipline.

He had never chastised Sister Mildred in such a manner because he was a bit cautious about her reaction to his methods. He had to be content with the display of her flanks and breasts flogged with skillful strokes by the young woman determined to chase the devil from her every pore.

This was the season for some major holidays for both the church and for the general populace. The celebrations went far beyond the simple need to honor mother church and often required displays of pre-religious pagan ceremonies that were centered on fertility or the success of annual crops.

It was close to All Hallows Eve now and Sister Mildred felt a change in the air without even pausing to stare out her tiny cell window at the dark forest beyond the protective moat filled with stagnant water from the rainy season. She stripped down with infinite slowness in a trance of expectant fulfillment. She had no mirror to see her gleaming flanks waiting forlornly for the strokes from her measured blows.

In the darkness of the darker than usual corner, a pair of ogling eyes drank in sensuous arousal of her frenzied march to the happy ending of her releasing tingle. The shapeless bulk stirred as she pushed her hindquarters up into the cold night air and let the chill of the coming winter cool her feverish cheeks. They were splotched with redness and even fleck or two of blood where her arm swung a bit too ardently in search of her required penitence.

Sister Mildred peered into the darkness thinking she heard a low growling moan of frustration. All she could see was a void of blackness like the bottomless hole of a well gone dry. She buried her head in her pillow and moved slightly on the hard mattress of straw and muslin used by several other novitiates before her. It was perhaps a bit fortunate that she was somewhat dehydrated because her piss-pot was almost full and the Mother Superior didn’t want any of the nuns in training to be walking the hallways at night for fear they might be easy prey for some disrespectful staff member or guard with an itch for female companionship. It had happened before and was a black stain on the order that gave them an unwanted reputation for nocturnal dalliance.

The contrite and obedient nun was not one of those loose-minded females and she thought of herself as a true believer in the value of the vow of chastity. In fact, Sister Mildred was not much taken with the concept of allowing a male person to “take” her dignity and honor just to satisfy some senseless need for a silly tingle between their legs. She was perfectly able to take care of such matters without any male assistance and it was a blessing to have only her confessor to share the intimate details of her shuddering release.