Chapter 15

The Sodomite pilgrims couldn't be described as great conversational company. In fact, as they had all had their tongues removed, they weren't able to converse at all. The conversation they had with each other was conducted in sign language and mouthing, but this was enough for them to organise themselves pretty well. Despite their various mutilations, they were astonishingly self-sufficient and capable. They knew exactly which roots, fruits and berries could be safely eaten. They were expert at catching and killing rabbits, birds and other animals to provide meat. Their various cooking utensils were eminently practical for the task of living off the land. They were, however, very kind and helpful to Sharon and Sweetness. After the girls' abject failure in fending for themselves in the Buggery countryside, the Sodomite pilgrims were the perfect companions.

Nevertheless, association with the pilgrims came with a price, but not, thankfully, one which involved self-mutilation: at least not on the gross level that the Sodomite pilgrims had undergone. All the pilgrims had had their tongues removed, and the third finger of the left hand mostly removed or cut off. One girl had her left hand cut off at the wrist, but the others had clearly drawn the line at a less extreme point. The girls had their vaginas sewn together, whilst the man had a bolt all the way through the end of his penis, the other end of which was attached to his nipples. All the pilgrims had their head shaved. Indeed, all their hair except the eyebrows was removed: a daily ritual which the pilgrims accompanied with prayers and even song, although as none of them had tongues it was impossible to determine what these songs might be about.

It was made clear to Sharon that although the girls were welcome to accompany the Sodomite pilgrims on their wandering through Buggery, they should at least conform to the same appearance as their mentors. Both Sharon and Sweetness were far too disorientated and distressed to object, after their ordeal in the camp and their near starvation in the countryside. Indeed, Sharon was living in a constant unfocused haze: a kind of continuing nightmare darkened by her present fears and past traumas. Would she ever see Tracey again? Would she ever see home again? Had she, in fact, already died and was now in some kind of hell? She just allowed the Sodomites to shave and decorate her as they so desired: not complaining and really not caring.

Sweetness and she were both treated the same, so although she had no mirror to see her reflection, she knew from looking at Sweetness exactly what she now looked like. Her head, arms, vagina, legs and armpits were all shaved by some lethal looking razor blades which skimmed over the fairly basic creamy soap which was applied to lubricate the skin and facilitate the shaving. This ritual was almost pleasant. The girl whose face Sharon had first glimpsed in some strange sense had adopted the pair, and she was the one who administered the shave. As each part was shaved clean, she then kissed the whole of the shaven area with her lips, as if to be sure it was sufficiently smooth. Sharon might normally have objected to this degree of intimacy, but she had seen that the pilgrims adopted the exact same routine when shaving each other. And it was undeniably quite pleasant to feel the brush of this girl's nose and lips against the bare skin of her vagina. The most intimate and unthreatening sensuality those lips had probably ever experienced. At home, her labia was normally nothing but an open door, or one, when not open, was pushed ajar with as much haste as was required for a prick to get inside. Soon, she and Sweetness lay back on the grass under the morning sun, their skin fresh and clean after the application of the blade, glistening in the shine of the soap and saliva that had accompanied the shave.

Sharon ran her hand over her shaven head, and looked sadly at the strands of her bleached hair where it lay on the grass. It certainly felt weird. And from looking at Sweetness, she could see how weird it also appeared. The pate was significantly paler than the rest of the skin which had otherwise been mostly tanned by the sun. Sharon was dismayed by how strangely nobbly Sweetness' shaved head looked, and, of course, how it must be correspondingly so on her own head. The bump at the nape of the neck where it joined the skull. The ears looking so much smaller on a bare background. The sweep of forehead which went up without interruption of any kind at all. In fact, the loss of hair must have been more considerable for Sweetness than for her. Sweetness' hair had previously been quite long, often obscuring most of her face and much of her neck and shoulders. Sharon's hair, by contrast, had not obscured very much at all, and after the haircut administered by Primrose had been relatively short already. But short was not at all the same as bald.

The shave wasn't the last treatment meted out on the two girls by the Sodomite pilgrims. Sharon's nipples were already pierced, as was her clitoris. This was not true of Sweetness who had never been pierced before, either voluntarily, like Sharon, or by law, like most women in Buggery. The pilgrims found little difficulty in threading chains and rings through Sharon's nipple and crotch. She soon had weighty jangling ornamentation hanging from her front. This seemed to represent some kind of clothing to the Sodomites, although unlike any clothing Sharon had ever worn before, even in Buggery, this provided neither warmth nor modesty. A wreath of thin chains dangled from the rings through her nipples, and were somehow held in check by those threaded through the ring in her crotch

Applying the same ornamentation to Sweetness was more difficult. Sharon had to explain to Sweetness what was happening to her as the Sodomite pilgrims pierced her small puffy nipples and her tender clitoris with their sharp pins. They were clearly skilled at what they were doing, because although they didn't administer any painkillers, the operation in the three points was done extremely quickly and inflicted remarkably little pain on the young girl. Her yelps of pain were tempered by the kisses administered to her by the Sodomite girl who had taken responsibility for the two. She rested Sweetness' head on her lap, and squeezed her hand tightly and affectionately as she winced and cried out. And then after all the piercing was done, she cuddled Sweetness to her chest as the rings which had been inserted into her nipples and clitoris kept the piercings open. And only after a quarter an hour or more of such voiceless comforting were the chains threaded through the rings, weighing her front down, and bringing her to fresh cries of pain, as they tugged at her tender wounds. And, there she stood, in front of Sharon who lay on the grass, gradually getting used to her own new appearance: her head shaven, bare legs and vagina, and a front obscured by chains. She stared ahead, sightlessly and confused, unable perhaps to be sure whether she alone had been singled out for this painful ceremony. Her eyes were still moist from the tears she had shed during the piercing ceremony, her breasts slightly bruised and even more puffy from the weight of the chains, and the bruises and scratches she'd gained after the two girls perambulations in the woods even more distinct against her hairless bare frame lit by the unforgiving glare of the Buggery morning sun.

Sharon looked at the Sodomite pilgrims gathered around them and observed the indulgent smiles on their faces. She was suddenly struck by a bolt of lucidity and was just as suddenly frightened. She stood up and rushed over to Sweetness. She put an arm around the blind girl, and pulled her bare body against her own.

"You're not fucking cutting our tongues out! Or sewing our fucking cunts together!" She shouted at them.

The girl who'd comforted them smiled more broadly. She then made some strange hand signals to her companions while mouthing something while her voice made a sound her tongue couldn't articulate. The other pilgrims laughed in a good-humoured way: a way which seemed incongruous in such bizarre looking people. She then walked up to Sharon, placed a forefinger to her lips, and placed her hand on her crotch in a tender, non-threatening way.

"Are you gonna fucking sew me up, you bastards?" Sharon asked aggressively.

The girl shook her shaved head with a frown and a smile. She then pulled Sharon and Sweetness to her chest and kissed the two of them affectionately. Her mouth moved, and her throat voiced a response, but Sharon could make no sense of any of the guttural vowels. She smiled again, and returned to her companions. She immediately returned with a plate full of some more of the very tasty vegetables that she had prepared earlier, and made another growling sound which appeared to say "Eat up!"

The Sodomite pilgrims violated the two girls no further, and indeed in their inarticulate way made their best efforts to make them feel at ease. In fact, as Sharon came to realise, as they followed the pilgrims through the countryside of Buggery, their newly shaved heads and chains of Sodomite bondage were actually something to be grateful for. None of the many police who they passed in their wanderings paid them any attention at all. As a result of whatever terms in which cross-border treaties had been phrased, the Sodomite pilgrims were actually the most free people in the Kingdom of Buggery. Indeed, the police appeared to be just as much disgusted by the Sodomites' appearance as Sharon herself had been initially. Even when the Sodomites prostrated themselves in front of the police, arse to the air, gesturing invitingly at their anuses, this provocation seemed to serve the purpose of actually dissuading the police of doing anything. They left the Sodomites to their own business, strutting off with their massive dildos strapped to their waists, and protruding incongruously in front of them, more willing to cause harm to their own citizens than to these shaven, pierced and mutilated pilgrims. When they disappeared, the pilgrims would smile amongst themselves, and kiss Sharon reassuringly, aware of the terror that inevitably caused her body to tremble. Sweetness as always knew only as much as Sharon ever told her, which was normally just to keep quiet and pretend that her tongue had also been torn out.