Chapter 20: Memories of Sainte Jacqueline

I have successfully passed all the phases of my purification and slave training. As promised, my Master has accepted me back as soon as I was released from the prison beneath the Eglise Sainte Jacqueline. My life is back to normal - as far as a relationship consisting of a Master, a Mistress and a slave can be called normal. It is normal in the sense that my Master has returned to using all three of my orifices and my Mistress allows me to pleasure her with my tongue.

How long was I held captive in the cellar of that strange church, in this dark place which looked sinister enough to be called a dungeon? I can't say for sure. It could have been two, maybe three weeks. One of the most disturbing aspects of my imprisonment was that I lost any notion of time. Being kept below ground, I was unable to observe the cycle of the sun. I never knew whether it was morning or evening, noon or midnight. Only occasionally did I get a chance to see the daylight; not often enough to have an idea of the passing of time.

Life at Sainte Jacqueline did not follow a regular pattern which would allow me to count the days. Yes, there were certain activities which were repeated frequently, like meals, but even there the length of the intervals between meals seemed to vary significantly. The meals, regardless of whether they were given to me in my cell or whether I took them in the refectory with the other women who were held there, consisted of a thick soup and chunky slices of bread. The ingredients and flavour of the soup varied, but there wasn't any meal which could be identified as breakfast, as the start of a new day.

When I spoke of 'my cell' before, this may create the impression that there was one place where I stayed throughout my slave training. That was not the case. The women who came there did not bring any personal belongings with them and there was nothing which would make a particular cell 'my' cell. Whenever the monks took me back to be locked up, they put me into the first unoccupied cell they found. The cells were similar in size and all contained one bed as the only item of furniture, but not all of them were in the same state of preservation.

The further one went along the corridor, the worse the cells got. In the worst cells the ceiling was gradually disintegrating and it was not uncommon for some debris to rain down onto the woman resting on the bed. The people who had been in these cells before had taken advantage of the brittle mortar and removed one or two bricks from the cell walls to allow conversations between adjoining cells. Some women reported that they had seen rats and spiders in those decaying cells, but luckily I was never disturbed by either of those animals.

Apart from meeting the other prisoners at mealtimes, we were also brought together for our bath. There wasn't any fixed time for washing ourselves. It seemed like we were taken to the shower room at the whim of the Marquis or some monk in charge. Sometimes there would be only a few hours between baths, on other occasions it seemed like several days passed before we were given permission to clean ourselves. The explanation one of my fellow prisoners gave me was that, whenever one of us became 'unclean' all of us were herded together to be cleansed.

The large, tiled hall where the bath took place had a number of showers in a row along one wall. Before our bath we were unchained and had to remove our clothes - which wasn't necessary in my case. The showers, however, were only turned on for a short while, just long enough to allow us to wet our bodies. We were allowed a few minutes to lather ourselves with the soap that had been given to us, before one monk hosed us down with a powerful jet of cold water. The first time the full force of the water hit me, I almost lost my balance. Later, I started to enjoy the treatment. I positioned myself to let the full jet hit my breasts, my bottom and my pussy.

Sometimes, when the bath coincided with daytime, we were lead out onto the patio afterwards, with our shackles back in place, to dry in the sunshine. I remembered Arlette and her seamless suntan; how I had envied her for her uniform colour, how I had been waiting for the summer holidays so that I would get an opportunity to achieve the same uninterrupted suntan. Now it seemed that I would spend my summer break in this training camp for would-be slaves. I decided that this was the best opportunity I could hope for and tried to get maximum exposure to the sun. I thought about how surprised Arlette would be when I'd meet her after the holidays and she'd see me all tanned. I only didn't know how I would explain the white patches the iron cuffs were leaving around my ankles and wrists.

Eating, taking a bath and basking in the sun did not take up a great deal of time. A large part of the remainder was taken up by the interrogation and discipline sessions with the Marquis. The rest of the time I spent in my cell, usually lying on the bed trying to get some sleep.

Sleep did not come easily in this underground world. Just as I rarely saw the daylight, I never experienced the darkness of night in any of the cells I was taken to. A torch was fitted to the wall of each inhabited cell, keeping it lit around the clock. The monks checked frequently and replaced the torch when necessary.

But this was only one obstacle. The heavy chains didn't make it easy either. They did not restrict my movements excessively, but they felt heavy and uncomfortable, particularly when they rested on my body, and any shift of position in bed became difficult. It took me a while to find a reasonably comfortable position for sleeping: lying on my belly with my arms stretched out above my head and my legs slightly spread, almost as if I had been tied spread-eagled to the bed.

Another factor which kept me from sleeping were the noises which resounded through the vaults of the basement. There were the sounds of women being woken up harshly to be taken to the Marquis, the sound of chains dragging along the floor as the victims were lead through the corridor, the sounds of whippings and canings, the screams of the tortured women and later their quiet sobs when they had been returned to their cells. Thinking of these sounds, I trembled in my bones the first few times the monks arrived to take me to the Marquis. Some time later, I found out that these sounds came frequently from a tape which had been recorded and was played on the Marquis' request to keep us living in fear.

On the day of my arrival it was particularly difficult to find sleep. So many things had happened to me in the space of one day! And the fact that I had been locked up in this cell meant that more things would be happening - I just didn't know what they were. To add to my excitement, my Master had declared that he would take me back as soon as I was ready. I was determined to endure whatever necessary to reach the point where I was 'ready' - without really knowing what that meant - as soon as possible.

Amongst the other prisoners I became known as 'the naked girl', because I was the only one who wasn't allowed to wear any clothes. All the others wore the shirt and skirt made of sackcloth, except at bath-time and during interrogation and punishment. It occurred to me that their clothes were much better fitting than mine had ever been.

At times, the Marquis decided to emphasise my nakedness even more by fitting me with a device he called a 'cunt-opener'. This consisted of four padded clamps which could be attached to a butt-plug by thin silver chains. The clamps were put on my pussy lips, two on each side. Two of the chains passed around my hips; the lower two passed between my legs to my rear, where they were pulled taut and hooked to the butt-plug which was pushed into my rear. This left my pussy lips pulled wide open with every intimate detail on display. It also left me highly aroused and, to my embarrassment, dripping wet. Walking with this cunt-opener was extremely difficult. I had to take cautious, small steps to avoid serious pain. Sitting down was out of the question.

The Marquis seemed to get a kick out of fitting the cunt-opener just before we would be called for a meal. I would have to eat my meal standing up, displaying my wide open, dripping wet pussy to my fellow prisoners as I ate. One of them commented, "Your Master must love you very much, if he has you treated like this."

Just like me, the other women had been brought to this place by their male companions in order to be trained as slaves. Some of them declared this fact proudly and stated that they wanted to learn how to be good, obedient slaves. Those were the ones who referred to their partners as 'Master'. Others were reluctant to admit the reason for their presence openly. At times they would wonder aloud whatever had made them agree to undergo this training and they often expressed doubts that they really wanted to submit to their boyfriends or husbands so completely and unconditionally.

The Marquis had quickly recovered his authority after the humiliation he suffered at the hands of my Mistress. He rarely wore the abbot's habit; most of the time he appeared in civilian clothes. But he continued to embellish his orders and pronouncements with references to the devil, evil spirits, the virgin Mary and the need to attain purity. I couldn't understand that the monks didn't see through this mumbo-jumbo. From his actions it was clear that he wasn't in the least interested in purity - on the contrary. Or were his helpers not real monks and just acted the part to create some kind of an illusion? I never reached a conclusion on this question.

The first time the Marquis called for me was still on the day of my arrival - or was it already the morning of the next day? A monk I hadn't met before came to my cell and ordered me to get up. When I didn't follow his order quickly enough, he pulled me up and dragged me behind him along the corridor. My body was still partly covered by the hardened wax the other women had poured on me. Some of it started to flake away as I moved, but the wax was completely incrusted in my pubic hair and it would take some time for the last trace to disappear.

The vault where the Marquis was waiting was similar to the other compartments in this basement, except that it was much larger and contained a number of contraptions along with a massive desk. I did not understand how many of these gadgets worked, but there was no doubt about their ultimate purpose: to help in disciplining the trainee slaves. Together with the large number of ropes, chains and other implements attached to the walls and hanging from the ceiling, these devices gave the whole vault the air of a torture chamber.

Meeting this man so soon after he had been humiliated by my Mistress made me wonder whether he would take revenge on me. As I checked his face to see what mood he was in, he became visibly angry.

"How dare you look at me? Don't you know that slaves are not allowed to look at their superior's face. Look down at the floor at once!"

"I'm sorry," I said, realizing that I had been guilty of a gross offence.

"I'm sorry, what?" the Marquis barked.

"I'm sorry, Sir," I said, recognizing a second offence in less than two minutes.

"Fetch Yolande," the Marquis ordered the monk who had brought me.

While he was waiting for Yolande to be summoned, the Marquis made me kneel on a low, padded bench; he unlocked the chain which linked my wrists in front of me, refastened it behind my back and attached it to my collar.

When the monk returned, followed by a woman whom I assumed to be Yolande, the two men removed her chains, made her strip naked and then tied her to one of the contraptions I had seen but not quite understood. It looked like a large tree trunk, inclined at an angle of 45 degrees. The woman had to place her knees on a wooden board at either side of the trunk and spread her legs wide to straddle the large wooden pole. As her upper body was tied to the trunk her ample breasts were squashed against the wood.

Without any prior warning, the Marquis took a cane and hit the woman's bottom repeatedly with fierce energy. The woman cried out as the cane hit her backside, but did not seem to suffer a lot. Her ordeal wasn't over when the caning stopped. The Marquis took a short whip and hit her back until it was covered with red stripes. The cane marks on the woman's bottom also started to swell.

I had watched the scene with astonishment. As the Marquis turned towards me I quickly lowered my eyes and concentrated on a spot on the floor right in front of me.

"Your Master has put restrictions on the punishment you may receive. I'm not permitted to spank you or use the cane or whip to discipline you. However, letting your offences go unpunished would undermine my authority. I have therefore decided to punish this wench in your place. Whenever you step out of line, she'll be castigated. I have already punished her for your first two offences. If you disobey the rules again, she'll suffer the consequences."

This declaration upset me more than any threat to punish me severely for any offence I'd commit. I didn't want anybody else to suffer because I did something wrong. I thought of arguing, discussing, pleading with the Marquis to punish me in spite of my Master's prohibition, but that would constitute another break of the rules - slaves only speak when they're given permission - and would result in even more punishment for poor Yolande. Instead I took great care to answer all the Marquis' questions to his satisfaction, obey all rules and demonstrate complete obedience. But even so, my whipping girl had to endure another caning and a further round of lashes with the whip. Yolande didn't hide her pain, but didn't utter any sound apart from her involuntary cries and sobs.

When my first session with the Marquis was over, he ordered me to watch as he brutally fucked Yolande's ass. Yolande screamed as her attacker's cock pierced her unprepared ass, but took the abuse without further complaints. He explained that this wasn't a punishment for anything I had done wrong, but, as she had already been brought from her cell, he had decided to give her a special treat. At the time, I considered this an expression of his cynical character, but later I found out that Yolande did in fact consider it a special favour to have her ass fucked.

After Yolande had been lead away, sobbing, with the Marquis' cum dribbling from her rear hole, I considered the moment right to broach the subject of my punishment with the Marquis.

"I don't want to be different from the other slaves. It won't help me learn to be obedient if I don't get punished when I don't live up to your expectations. If I cannot be spanked, whipped or caned, I'm sure you can think of other ways of disciplining me."

I realized that I was giving him carte blanche, permission to do with me whatever he wanted. But then, the fact I was here meant that my Master had already given him that permission.

The Marquis did not react. I had expected an outburst of anger about my insolence, but he just seemed to ignore my plea. When the monk returned to take me back to my cell, the Marquis finally reacted. "Wait," he said to the monk, "Bring back Yolande."

I didn't know whether that was a good or a bad sign. My fears were confirmed when my fellow prisoner was strapped once more onto the punishment device and subjected to another caning.

"This was the punishment for your presumptuousness, for talking without permission," the Marquis told me. "Here is your chance to redeem some of the pain you have caused her: Lick her feet clean."

I was eager to follow his order and to show that woman how sorry I was for being the cause of her suffering. Perhaps too eager. As I moved forward to touch Yolande's feet with my mouth, I fell over. With my hands chained behind my back, I wasn't able to break my fall. I fell flat on my face, or rather it was my breasts which took most of the impact. I moaned as I hit the ground, but I quickly struggled back onto my knees and started to clean Yolande's feet with my tongue. Like all prisoners, she wasn't allowed any footwear and as a consequence a crust of dirt had formed on her feet. I didn't mind. I had come here to learn to be a slave and this was my first chance. Maybe in future my Mistress or my Master would order me to perform this service for them.

I bathed Yolande's feet with my saliva and removed the wet dirt with my tongue.

"I have considered your plea and I will think of ways to punish you," the Marquis informed me as I was licking. "But this won't change my decision as far as Yolande is concerned. Whenever you disobey the rules, she'll pay for it."

The Marquis probably knew very well that seeing someone else suffer as a result of my actions would have a much bigger impact on me than if I were simply punished myself. I would try to be a perfect slave so that poor Yolande wouldn't be castigated through my fault.

I met Yolande again when I joined the other women for a meal some time later. They were sitting around the large wooden table in the refectory. As it happened, a place next to Yolande was free and I promptly occupied it. At first I didn't know whether it was okay to speak to her, but when I saw the other women engaging freely in conversation, I told her how much it had upset me to see her punished for my offences.

"Don't worry 'bout it," she said, "That's what I'm here for. I want to learn to accept rough treatment without complaint. But compared to my husband the Marquis is a gentleman."

Her statement surprised me. A far as I was concerned, the Marquis was the most sadistic human being I had ever come across. If she called him a gentleman, then her husband had to be a real monster. I asked her what her husband had done to her to deserve such a judgement.

"I'm not allowed to talk about it. Not to anybody. Let's just say, I didn't mind what the Marquis did to me and it wouldn't bother me if he did it again right now. It all helps me to accept pain as part of my life."

"But if your husband is such an animal, why don't you just ditch him."

This time it was her turn to be surprised. "Well, I don't know what exactly your arrangement is, but I assume there is someone who brought you here for a purpose. Would you just ditch him because you don't like the way he treats you or how they treat you here? I guess the answer is no. I guess you'd say you love him too much. In any case, that's my reason."

When I told her that I had a Mistress as well as a Master and that, yes, I loved them too much to object to my treatment, Yolande became very compassionate. "That must be terrible," she said. "I guess they try to outdo each other, each one abusing you more than the next."

"So far, I have only very little experience," I admitted. "I don't know what it's going to be like when I'm finished here, but I wouldn't call it terrible, not in the least. I think it's going to be wonderful. I don't mind what they'll do to me or if they're going to compete with each other. All I know is that I love it when I get punished and abused."

After this conversation, Yolande and I became close friends, as far as friendship was possible in this kind of place.

The other women treated me with suspicion. It had somehow become known that I wouldn't be subjected to the same punishment they received. They didn't think that the fact I had to stay naked at all times compensated for this privilege. They considered me a bibelot, a pet slave, someone whose Master wasn't really serious about discipline. The more sceptical ones assumed that I had struck a deal with the Marquis, that I was spying on them and would report their trespasses to him in exchange for lenient treatment.