Chapter 15: Guilt Finally Purged

FRANCESCA AND FRIEDA

It was seven weeks since Joanne had been given the dreadful news that, far from being about to be freed, she was less than halfway through her ordeal. Much had happened since then. Francesca and Frieda had been made Lieutenants and led several successful attacks. They had still hankered after another whipping, though, and decided to provoke one, after both had been a little tipsy one night.

And now here they were, broken down to Private, tied to adjacent wooden frames, their arms and legs stretched wide apart. Their feet were not able to touch the ground. It was obvious to an observer that they had both been there for some time. Both victims' long hair was tied up leaving the two backs, one slim and tapering and the other small and compact, free to receive unprotected the searing flail of the lash. That lash had been making their lives painful for a while now.

As both agony stricken women knew, they were due to be here for much, much longer. They also knew that it would be useless to plead with Annie. Annie was known by this time to mean what she said and never go back on her word. Their long wished for whipping had hardly started and already they were bitterly regretting their stupidity! When they heard Annie pronounce sentence they had half opened their mouths to protest but seeing a merciless look from that heartless young madam had shut them up again.

"Wise of you, for a very welcome change! Any protest and you'd have got much more. Take them away!"

That had been half an hour ago and, already it seemd like for ever. Their first whipping, at Angela's behest, had been fifteen lashes, but this was due to be eight hundred. No one had ever heard of a flogging on this scale. Neither girl could walk to the whipping frame to receive her punishment; their legs had turned to jelly and they had needed to be half dragged and half carried. Those of the battalion who had not been co-opted to wield the whips on the foolish pair stood around expectantly. When the two smooth backs had received their first lash, tiny drops of blood had appeared. Now both girls were shedding blood copiously and their torment had scarcely begun.

"One Hundred and Twenty" sang out Josephine, who was in charge of the punishment.

Two whips hissed angrily through the air yet again, each on to a very sore back. A team of three pairs of strong Amazons were lined up behind tne newly demoted pair. They had allowed their infatuation for each other and the open abandonment of their love-making to offend Annie once too often. As a result they were getting their wish and getting it in spades! The pair who had given them their last twenty lashes handed the whips to the next team. Fran took advantage of the slight intermission to whisper to Frieda.

"OK my sweet?"

"Piece of cake, darling. Love you!"

Annie never missed a trick.

"Stop talking! Aren't you two disgusting perverts in enough trouble as it is? You each get fifty more for that!"

"One hundred and twenty one!" barked Josephine, trying not to look at the bloody backs as they suffered yet more lacerating blows. She had warned and pleaded with that idiot pair not to push their luck, but they took no notice! Maybe this would make them see sense!

"One hundred and twenty two"

Both girls jerked under the impact of the resumed flogging. Each bit her already chewed-up lip and contrived to remain silent. This was far more than either had bargained for and they were beginning to wish they had been more discreet and gone along with the original idea and paid someone in the village to beat them. They had deliberately brought this on themselves but had never imagined the sentence would be so severe. Neither had uttered a sound so far, except for their overheard conversation. Francesca found she could still get some pleasure from the combined thrill of hearing Frieda being flogged beside her and feeling the leather cut deeper into her own back, but the pleasure was wearing off fast and would be replaced shortly by pure pain. She recalled the sight, both back on the Island and later here, of Joanne's tortured young body being sliced by the lash, exposing her ribs. She knew that this was what was happening to her. After today, neither of the two lovers were to step out of line again and none of the other women, seeing how merciless Annie was being to her two best friends, would risk a fate as terrible as this.

Another change-over. Another all too brief respite. This time both girls held their peace. They did not even dare dare turn their heads towards each other to give a bit of encouragement, having been warned to face straight ahead at all times. The whipping went on and on.

"One hundred and forty one."

Frieda heard a gasp from Francesca. She herself, hard as she was after going through this several times before, was beginning to crack and the floggers were not even a quarter of the way done with them yet! Not wishing Fran to be left alone to face the inevitable penalty for making a noise, she uttered a similar gasp herself and both got fifty more from the sharp-eared Annie. The pair fainted three times during the interminable course of their punishment and were revived with cold water. At one point, Annie saw that the teams were tiring and called over some other women to take the place of the most exhausted. These two were going to be taught a lesson they would never forget and she was to make sure that each lash was as merciless as the last, right up to the end.

Finally.

"Nine Hundred! Punishment complete, Ma'am."

Annie strode up to them, her hard bare feet squelching through the blood on the ground. She looked sternly at the two barely conscious (barely alive) women.

"Next time you two perverts think of using me to gratify some pathetic kinky fantasy, maybe you'll think again! Do you think I'm stupid or something. DO YOU?? ANSWER ME UNLESS YOU WANT SOME MORE!!"

"No, Ma'am." said Francesca in a voice so faint as to be almost inaudible. "We were the stupid ones!"

Frieda nodded her assent to this. She was consumed with guilt to think that it had been her crazy idea in the first place and she had brought this on her beloved Francesca. There was a fear in her heart that she might have lost her love.

When they were cut down they folded into a motionless heap, lying in a pool of their mingled blood. As they were taken away to recover, Frieda opened her eyes for a second and saw Fran grin weakly at her. "Love you for ever, my darling." she whispered before passing out. Frieda knew Fran was still hers and shed a tear of gratitude.

They were in the makeshift infirmary for seven weeks after that, lying side by side on their stomachs and delirious for much of the time. With use of the remaining supply of ointment witheld for this pair by the unrelenting Annie as part of the punishment, they healed very, very slowly and suffered many more agonies before they were better. Both would bear the marks for years. Although their love had only been deepened by passing together through such horror, from then on they were to remember that they were soldiers first and lovers a very distant second. They would both hate Annie for the rest of their days. Annie knew this but did not care.

As far as Annie was concerned, Frieda was a real soldier who had been led astray by that spoiled rich kid Francesca. They had richly deserved what had happened to them. She was forced to admit, though, that both had been incredibly brave and this was something she set great store by - hence her growing contempt for Joanne. In due course both were reinstated as officers.

"How is she today, Lieutenant Moroni?"

Joanne had finally served her time in the cage.

"Improving, Commander. She's still a bit bent over, but she's getting the stiffness out of her joints. We had a lady from the village up here to look at her, yesterday, when you were away. She worked on her for hours, rubbing all kinds of foul smelling things into her and going up and down her spine, bashing away at her. Jo said she felt miles better afterwards, although it looked pretty painful to me!"

"Bring her to see me, please."

Joanne, under guard, was marched in to Annie's tent. She was still very weak after more than ten month's confinement. Thirty more days had been added to her sentence. Rosie had seen her crying one morning a few days after being told she had much longer still to serve. Annie had been summoned and given her the extra time for being a coward. After fifty long terrible days of living in fear of committing further offences, Joanne had found dull resignation take overbefore finally coming to accept her position. By the time she was released it was all the same to her whether they let her out or not.

"Any better, Prisoner Esterhazy?"

"A lot better, thank you Commander. I guess I'll be fine and straightened up to get my last three hundred lashes nine days from now!"

"That's what I like to hear, Prisoner. That will be all. Dismissed!"

"Two Hundred and Ninety"

Joanne was almost through the final stage of her long and painful expiation. Once more, her back was raw and bleeding and a pool of blood was forming at her feet. This time she had avoided making a sound until well into the third hundred, but after the two hundred and fiftieth lash had descended, wielded by a fresh and strong girl who had been longing for this chance to punish the woman who had defeated Angela, for whom she still felt great loyalty, she could contain herself no longer and began to scream. Now there only ten more to come.

"The prisoner will stop that noise! I am getting sick of it. Start again at two hundred and fifty when that cowardly whining started." shouted Annie. "This time I do not expect to hear a sound."

Joanne controlled herself after that and received three hundred and forty lashes that day. When the ordeal was over, Annie addressed the women.

"For her cowardice in crying out, I award the prisoner two hundred more days in the cage, to be followed by five hundred lashes. The cage will be brought down from the mountain and placed in the middle of the encampment for all to see how cowardice is punished. Take her up the hill and put her inside. She will be brought down in the morning."

Francesca and Frieda saw this and wandered away from the rest of the women.

"We still hold the record for the biggest single whipping then." whispered Frieda. "And we didn't scream like she did. You let out a gasp of course and I joined you, but we never screamed like that. I'm so proud of us both!"