Chapter 12

Heather fought to hold the tray steady as she knelt before her Mistress, her thighs spread wide as Marcie lay between them, gently licking Heather's pussy to the edge of a withheld orgasm. Heather let out another shaky moan as Marcie teased her clit with quick flicks of her tongue until she trembled, rattling the cutlery on the plate.

"Steady now, slave," Laura said in a soft but admonishing voice. She put down the glass of wine next to the plate and picked up the knife and fork. "Don't make me punish you again." With exaggerated care, she cut another piece of baked fish and brought it halfway to her lips when she paused and smiled. "Unless you want me to, that is."

Heather shivered, her fingers curling hard around the edges of the tray. Her ass still glowed pink from the spanking her Mistress had given her almost as soon as she had arrived. She knew not the transgression, only how she gushed in sweet orgasm as the last stinging blow was delivered. The thought of experiencing it again made her nipples tingle in the tight confines of her maid costume.

Laura finished chewing her bite of lunch before she spoke again. "Do you know why I punished you, slave?"

Heather swallowed. "No, Mistress, I... uhng ... oh God ... I-I don't know."

Halfway through her answer, Marcie had plastered her mouth to Heather's mound and sucked hard. Heather let out another quaking sigh, her arms aching from the effort of acting as Laura's lunch table.

Laura lazily cut another piece of fish. "You didn't do what I told you to do over the Thanksgiving holiday."

Heather's head spun. Her hips squirmed as if it would somehow hasten her orgasm, though she knew she would not cum until Mistress decided she could.

"Or at least I assume you didn't, as I could not sense you very well most of yesterday."

Heather pushed a thought through the fog of unrelenting lust. "I-I tried, Mistress. I ... I put on the underwear ... I was so sexy for you ... I wanted you to see it."

Laura nodded once. "Go on."

Marcie thrust her tongue in and out of Heather's pussy until the wine glass rattled and walked itself towards the edge.

Laura sighed and took the wine glass. "Marcie, stop. Come here."

Marcie scrambled out from under Heather. She crawled up to the side of Laura's chair, the heart-shaped tag on her collar tinkling. She remained on her knees and placed her hands on the hand rest of the chair.

"Down," Laura said.

Marcie dropped her hands from the hand rest to the floor.

"Heel."

Marcie settled back on her feet and looked up at her owner in adoration.

Laura smiled. "Good girl. Have a treat."

Marcie shuddered and uttered a gasp as her hips writhed. She let out a whimper not unlike a dog and panted softly, her eyes closing. Her lips curled into a smile of mindless pleasure.

Heather stared, her stomach twisting in revulsion even as some of her enslaved psyche watched with envy. Marcie was like this every moment she was in the house. As soon as she came home from work, she would take off her clothes and curl up in front of Laura's favorite chair. Mistress had claimed she had made Marcie into what she wanted to be all along, keeping her functional during the day for appearances and to bring an additional income into the household.

"Wouldn't you just love to be that way yourself?" Laura said with a sly grin.

Heather's gaze snapped back to her Mistress. The word "no" had formed in her head, but she could not force it past her lips.

"She has not a care in her empty little head. Not that there had been much to begin with." Laura put down the wine glass and took another meticulous bite of lunch. "But you still have not answered my question."

Heather saw the answer she wanted to give. It sat there in her mind as one lonely spark inside a cavern filled with shadow. It was not what Mistress wanted, and that meant Heather did not want it either.

"Yes," Heather breathed. "I want t-to be that way myself."

She knew it to be a lie, yet her pussy ached anyway, and she longed for that one final climax which would destroy her will forever as it had Marcie.

Laura smiled. "I can sense it this time, too, You're starting to come around."

Heather moaned and tried one last desperate attempt to draw upon that burst of blue-white energy which had suffused her mind right before lunch. She wished she had been prepared so she could have tried to save some of it. In that instant before it had drained away, she had felt a sense of self again. She had remained in Mistress' thrall, but she could better distinguish herself from the slave persona. She was Heather Sovert, a teenage girl who happened to be acting the part of a sex slave dressed as a French maid.

"Wouldn't it be wonderful to lose yourself completely like that?"

"Y-yes," Heather breathed, her nipples throbbing.

Laura picked up the wine glass and took a small sip. "Oh, it would give me so much pleasure to make you into my mindless little sex toy," she cooed. "But the joy would not last. I prefer you like this, with enough of a mind to understand what is happening to you. But I'll make sure you desire mindlessness so much you'll ache for it, and you'll hope every orgasm I give is the one in which all your remaining will drains away to nothing."

Heather shivered, the fork sliding off the plate and clattering to the tray. Her hips squirmed as her pussy steamed, her folds desperate to be touched again. Dark desire cast a thickening pall over her mind. If any energy had remained, she would never find it now. All she saw was herself, a pretty dog collar around her neck, curled up at her Mistress' feet.

"Let's return to Thanksgiving," Laura said. "Do you know why I couldn't sense you, slave?"

Something in Heather's mind pleaded with her to claim she did not know, but it sounded like a voice yelling from across a crowded, noisy room. "My ... my mother..." Heather breathed.

"Hmm. As I suspected."

That Mistress already knew the answer did not alleviate the sense of betrayal. She felt no sense of irony; any potential ally was worth protecting. Maybe she would have felt differently if the line had not moved.

Line energy! Is that what had entered her head earlier? Where had it come from? The sudden spin of questions helped push back the haze of lust, and her grip on the tray become more steady. Without any answers, they would not sustain her long.

Laura ate the last few bites of lunch with more alacrity and settled back in her chair with the remainder of her wine. "Your mother is playing with fire. But then again, that is what got her into her predicament in the first place."

Heather's eyes widened.

Laura smiled. "So your mother never told you how she got involved with the Darkness, hmm?"

Heather shook her head slowly.

"Would it surprise you to know she submitted to it of her own free will?"

Heather stared, her mind frozen. The memories of the times her mother had claimed she was protecting them were viewed through the delicate panes of ice that were her emotions, ready to shatter at the least blow.

"So she betrays her own daughters, and now she expects she can claim them back." Laura shook her head and clicked her tongue. "I suppose she considers selling you into slavery 'protecting' you from something worse?"

Heather gave a single, weak nod as all rationality fell apart.

"Or perhaps she is preparing you for a role she had intended from the start."

Heather's head spun. She could not tell what reality made more sense. This is just a trick, came the last coherent thought from a rising tide of anguish. Just a way to put a wedge between...

"So you'll have to decide, slave. What's worse? Letting your mother turn you over to the Darkness, where you will surely become mindless, or become my permanent slave, where I will at least let you remember your name?"

Heather trembled until the tray rattled. Laura put down her wine on the end table and took the tray. Mistress gestured, and Heather stood on shaky legs. Heather gasped when her Mistress touched her mound, a single finger dipping into her tight tunnel, then sliding back to tease the tip of her clit. Heather shuddered and whimpered, her pussy straining on the edge.

"Cum, slave," Laura said in a soft voice.

Pleasure exploded inside Heather, and her pussy gushed into Laura's hand and ran down her thighs, dripping to the large bath towel Mistress had placed prior to lunch. For a fleeting moment, she wished her remaining will would drain from her as well, leaving her with no conflict, no worries, no emotional pain. Instead, the bliss which suffused her mind left it intact, and when it faded, she faced the same choice to remain her Mistress' slave forever.

Shortly after leaving Jason's neighborhood, Debby pulled off to the side of the road. The strong mother persona she had managed to project to Jason and Richie had crumbled, and she slumped over the wheel until the flow of tears dried up and her hands stopped shaking.

She felt more angry at herself than anything else. She had dared to believe she could handle herself like the other Harbingers and confront the Darkness head-on. She understood what had come over her. She was the only adult in the group, and thus her duty was to protect children from danger.

Debby flinched when her cell phone rang. She wiped her eyes with annoyed swipes of her hand as she pulled out the phone. "Yes, hello?"

"Mrs. Radson, are you all right?!"

"I'm all right, Cassie, and Jason is okay as well."

"I felt something over the link," said Cassie. "First Diane and then you, but everything was a jumble. I thought I saw energy from the lines."

"Yes, you did. It appears Diane has retained something from that spell. She can channel line energy."

Cassie gasped. "Oh goodness ... I-I don't know if that's bad or good."

Debby gripped the steering wheel with her free hand as if to anchor herself, and her voice cracked slightly as she said, "Today it was good, since it was what stopped Mrs. Sovert from taking her yesterday, and she helped save me from myself today."

"What? I don't understand."

Debby sighed. "Jason was right, Cassie. His mother..." She trailed off when her throat threatened to close up, and her vision blurred with new tears.

"Oh no. This ... this is terrible. This can't be happening."

Debby wiped her eyes again and cleared her throat. "Jason is okay, I saw him and Richie just before I left. I'm also getting the sense his father is helping him."

"His father?" Cassie cried. "But Jason thought he was part of the problem."

"At this point, we need whatever help we can get, if just to hold off the Darkness until we understand what's happening."

"I'm sorry I can't be much help today. I was lucky to get even this little bit of time."

"Please contact me over the weekend," Debby said. "One of Jason's mantras is that we should tell each other everything. You need to explain to me what happened over Thanksgiving."

"I-I will, Mrs. Radson. I'm hoping by then it won't spook me as much. I better get back, or Mother will come looking for me. I was supposed to be going to the bathroom. Oh, and can you call Ned for me, please? Just let him know everything's okay, since he probably sensed something as well."

"I will, Cassie, soon as I get home. I don't have his number handy."

"Thanks! Bye, Mrs. Radson."

Cassie hung up before the first syllable of "goodbye" could reach Debby's lips.

Debby snapped the phone closed. She covered her eyes with her hand for a moment and rubbed the bridge of her nose, closing her eyes against the sunlight to see if it would chase away the headache lurking above her eyes.

She thought about Elizabeth's journal and shuddered. The depth of the woman's understanding of the Darkness and how it manipulated the human mind was astounding now that more of the pieces had fallen into place. She still could not recall Elizabeth coming up with a working solution. Debby had once stated she had read the journal herself so many times she had memorized it; now she wondered if that were a valid claim.

For all their sake, she hoped not.

"How do you do it, Richie?" Jason asked as they started down Green Avenue.

"Huh? How I do what?"

"Just all the shit you deal with at home."

Richie shrugged. "I dunno. Guess I just got good at it. Had a lot of practice."

Jason sighed and nodded, looking straight ahead without really focusing on anything. "I guess that's what I need, practice," he said in a toneless voice.

Richie glanced at his friend. "So everything was just peachy and perfect in your house, just like on the old TV shows?"

"Well, no, not perfect. Ever since we moved to Haven, Mom's always been a little upset with Dad about the time he spends at the hospital."

"Huh, yeah. Amazing how much shit started happening after people come here. You just got lucky it wasn't more than that."

"How can I be sure it wasn't?" Jason said. "I have no idea how long my father's been like this. Maybe it went back as far as when we moved."

"Yeah, but did he fuck with you? Did he totally screw up your life?"

"No," Jason said in a small voice.

"So be freaking grateful for that."

Jason said nothing and resumed staring straight ahead.

Richie rolled his eyes. "You still hung up about your Mom? You still think that fucking her would really mess with her?"

"Yes, I do," Jason said in a low voice.

"I dunno what to tell you, dude."

Jason turned to his friend and almost said something he realized at the last moment he would regret. He almost asked Richie if he had ever considered that he may have already caused his mother harm. The question would have been counterproductive and moot, as whatever damage could happen likely had happened.

"You can't take a fucking job," Richie declared. "Even if it's just sweeping the floor at the freaking supermarket. What the hell kinda time are you gonna have?"

Jason stopped and turned towards Richie. "I think it's pretty much a forgone conclusion that whatever job pops up on the board will be at the Inn. We already know the Darkness is based there."

"And what the fuck do you think they're gonna make you do?"

"I don't know, and it's scaring the shit out of me!"

Richie gave him a surprised look.

"You want to know my real reason for wanting to protect my mother's sanity?" said Jason. "Because until now I felt she's been the last bulwark I have against my father."

"Fuck, dude, he was on your side!"

"I know! And I have no clue what to think about it. What if he's on my side only because the Darkness will jeopardize his own plans? It's all about allies of convenience, Richie. Fine, he's on our side now. But eventually, I -- all of us -- will be in his way, and that's when I'm going to need my mother the most."

"What the fuck, you're gonna pit your mother against your father?" said Richie.

"No. I can't explain it, but I feel like I'm going to need her for support. It doesn't make any logical sense, but logic isn't giving me the whole story anymore. Maybe I just want one person close to me to be free of all the shit that's happening in this fucking stupid town."

Jason took a few steps away from Richie. Richie was about to retort when he heard Jason sniffle. Richie averted his eyes and scratched his head. Seeing a girl cry made him sympathize; seeing a guy cry made him uncomfortable.

Jason heaved a sigh and turned around. "Sorry."

"Okay, fine, you want to protect your Mom," Richie said in a more contrite voice. "Then you get fucked over instead. Where the hell is that gonna leave the rest of us, huh?"

"I've told you all before, you can't rely on just--"

"Get over that, man, it's fucking old! You said yourself you were gonna stop griping about being the leader of the Harbingers."

"It's not about being the leader. It's about everyone relying on me for the answers. No one of us can be so indispensable that losing that person will cause everything to fall apart."

"What, you think we even have a whole group anymore? Heather's busy playing miss slutty maid to the freaking school principal, Melinda's been totally fucked over by her mother, and I got my own problems. And you were the one getting all upset when Mrs. Radson almost became your mother's fucking sex slave."

With great effort, Jason stopped himself from retorting, his mouth already open to deliver the next volley. He closed it and forced himself to think. While logic was indeed not telling him the entire story, abandoning it in favor of rampant emotionalism would help even less.

"Look at it this way, Richie," Jason said in a calmer voice. "Say I defy my mother and don't take the job. Now the Darkness has her ... h-has her do stuff with me. Maybe I'll hold out. Then at some point I stop being the ally of convenience for my father or he decides neither of us is worth saving. Then I fall to one or the other, as I'd never be able to defend against both at once.

"So now consider the alternative. I take the job and try to hold out against the Darkness' influence. At least then I can give you all some hint of what's going on at the Inn. Then if any of you try to rescue me, you're fighting only one enemy, not both the Darkness and whatever forces are behind my father."

Richie frowned. "Shit, you're really paranoid about your Dad. You're starting to sound like a conspiracy nut. Gonna start looking for grassy knolls now?"

Jason took a deep breath, but impatience edged his voice. "The hospital is adding a new wing when it already has about, on average, a twenty percent vacancy rate, and he's overseeing the project. Data about said project is located nowhere on the hospital's computer network, but there is a section of their intranet which is intensely firewalled, and what little data I've captured from it is using military-strength encryption. A few weeks ago, I overheard Brad bragging to his friends that his father, a career army officer, is part of some hush-hush project on the military base just northwest of town. He let slip that his father was showing around some important staff member from the hospital."

Jason uttered a tired sigh. "Okay, fine, call it circumstantial evidence. It probably is. But too many times, things which we thought were coincidences turned out to have major significance. So you tell me, Richie: in any potential rescue scenario, do you want to fight just the Darkness, or the Darkness and the United States military?"

Richie paused, face creased into a slight frown. "Fuck, I wish you'd stop assuming everyone has as big a freaking IQ as you do," he grumbled.

"Richie, your own words: this isn't rocket science," said Jason. "And you yourself said you were of the opinion that the only way to totally fuck something up beyond recognition was to get the government involved."

"Yeah, yeah, I know what I said!" Richie snapped. "Look, why can't we help you hold out? Did your giant nerd-brain think about that?"

"Yes, I did. But we don't have the right tools yet."

"Huh?"

"Elizabeth made some sort of breakthrough. The part of the journal I'm reading now describes techniques to keep the Darkness out of one's mind. I think I can get through the journal far enough to find out what she did, but there won't be enough time for me to learn it. But the rest of you can, and then you can help me."

Richie frowned. "Something don't seem right, dude."

"Why?" Jason demanded in an exasperated voice. "It's the only plan which makes sense given the alternatives."

"If she had such a fucking great weapon against the Darkness, why the hell didn't she use it herself? Why is the fucker still here?"

"First off, it's not a weapon, it's a defense. Second, she's almost sixty years old at this point in the journal. She may not have had the stamina, either physically or sexually, to continue much longer."

Richie wrinkled his nose. "Pushing sixty and still ... ugh, where's the brain bleach?"

Jason cast an annoyed look at his friend and was about to retort when a car approached from up the road. The driver waved as he passed. "That was my father," Jason said. "He just got back from taking Aunt Betty to the city. I better get home. I'll try to contact you over the weekend. Maybe you can tell me how the call with your father went."

Richie scratched his head. "Um ... I might ... I gotta wait a bit, you know? Kinda a lot to take in, being able to talk to my Dad after all this time and all that."

Jason uttered a barely audible sigh and nodded, turning away without another word. Richie waved, even though Jason would not see the gesture.

Diane looked up from where she sat on the front steps of Debby's house when she saw a familiar car approach from up the street. She let out a relieved sigh and stood when the car pulled into the driveway. "Mrs. Radson, I'm sorry I camped out on your doorstep like this," she began barely seconds after Debby had killed the engine. "I just had to see that you're okay."

Debby got out of the car and drew Diane into a tight hug, much to Diane's surprise. "Yes, I'm okay," Debby said in a choked whisper. "I'm okay thanks to you."

Diane returned the hug and tried to draw comfort from it, but she was too agitated. "I didn't really know what I was doing. I'm not even sure why I did it."

Debby broke off the hug and smiled. "I believe you did it because you sensed someone was going to need it."

Diane swallowed. "O-or I was controlled into it," she said in a tiny voice.

"No, Diane, you weren't. This has nothing to do with control. It likely has to do with the shared link between you and your fellow Harbingers. Hasn't this happened before, when one has sensed when another was in trouble?"

"Yes, but never to me, or at least never for anyone other than Heather."

"Now, are you okay?" Debby asked. "From the amount of energy I felt come over the link, you must have had a very powerful orgasm. I have salves you can apply if your vagina is sore."

Diane's cheeks grew warm. "Mrs. Radson, please ... c-can we talk about that sort of stuff inside? I feel like I've already done more out in the open than I wanted."

Debby's eyes widened. "Oh, great Goddess, it never occurred to me you would have to ... yes, yes, of course, how foolish of me." She unlocked the front door and ushered Diane inside. "Would you like some tea or hot chocolate, dear?"

Diane shook her head and sank into the sofa. She sighed and dropped her face into her hands for a moment. "This is insane. I can't believe what I just did."

Debby sat down next to her and placed a hand on Diane's shoulder. "Did you really have to do it outside?"