Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 86167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
And all their friends and family could see it, which made her feel warm and contented deep inside.
When the guests finally left, and the house cleared, Elizabeth drowsed in bed for hours, occasionally accompanied by her husband, who cuddled her as she slept. They took dinner early, since they’d neglected luncheon altogether, and because August promised some “fun evening plans.”
She was never certain what he meant when he used the word “fun.” It was generally enjoyable but sometimes surprising. Or shocking.
She was willing to play along. After dinner, the summer sun still shone through the first floor windows, but August took her down two flights of stairs to a part of the home she hadn’t known existed until now. The windowless cellar contained a warren of narrow and close-feeling hallways, with irregularly spaced rooms.
She was glad for the lamp he carried; these corridors would be frightening in darkness. “What’s behind these doors?” she asked.
“Ghosts and skeletons,” he answered drily. “But mostly storage and supplies.”
“Why are we down here? Where are we going?”
“Are you hemming and hawing at me?” he asked. “Will you become argumentative?”
They were the king’s words, and made her laugh in this context, before she felt a few tendrils of dread.
“Truly, August, where are we going?”
“You’ll shortly see.”
He stopped before a door at the end of the hallway and took a key from his pocket, dramatically turning the heavy steel lock by the lamp’s light. The door opened outward on squeaking hinges. August led her inside, closing the door behind him before he raised the lamp to illuminate the space.
It was a low-ceilinged chamber, larger in area than she would have expected. While August lit four ancient-looking sconces on the wall, Elizabeth took in the room’s unusual furniture. Why, there was a sturdy pole with ropes. A waist-high platform with attached leather restraints. Some chains hanging at fixed intervals from the stone ceiling.
“Welcome, my argumentative lady, to the king’s dungeon,” he said. “Well, it’s not precisely the king’s dungeon. It must have belonged to my father or grandfather, or some past resident.”
“Oh my goodness.” The words came out in a whisper. “It’s a dungeon in truth.”
“I discovered it a few years ago,” he said. “And found one very like it at St. Pierre, though I chose not to show you just yet. We were newly married, and I thought you might find it alarming.”
She gasped. “I do find it alarming. My word, August. Were people tortured here?”
But she could sense they were not. A room like this, a vault really, would have held such traumatic echoes for centuries, but she perceived no evil.
“I did promise the king I would punish you, darling,” he said, as she stood gaping in the center of the chamber. “I haven’t forgotten.”
“You didn’t mean it. You were only trying to keep him from spanking me.”
“Yes, because I’m a jealous husband and would rather do it myself.” He shrugged in the face of her outrage. “I did swear. I’m a man of honor.”
“You’re a man of perversity,” she countered.
“You’re probably right. I came down earlier as you slept, with the exalted royal ginger.” He gestured to a pedestal in the corner, where the far-too-healthy piece of ginger from the royal greenhouse rested on a tray beside one of August’s whittling knives. She noticed too some of the punishment implements hung upon the far wall. Whips, paddles, straps, canes, more rope, and sinister looking cuffs.
The array of items looked suspiciously new for such an old and dusty environment. Almost as if he’d outfitted it recently himself.
“I can’t believe you really mean to punish me on the king’s behalf,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. “He’ll never know if you don’t.”
“He is my sovereign, and yours. If the king should ask me in the future if I kept my word and punished my spirited filly, I would not want to lie.”
“And he probably will ask, that tiresome man.”
“Such disrespect shown to His Majesty, on top of all your hemming and hawing!” He shook his head. “You shall have to be punished severely for these crimes.”
Elizabeth pressed her lips together, feeling the familiar rush of alarm and excitement that accompanied these sessions with her husband, where his gentle civility was replaced, temporarily, with voracious hungers and carnal needs.
“Remove your clothing,” he commanded in that voice. “All of it.”
“Yes, sir,” she answered, meeting his stern tone with exaggerated deference. These sessions were more enjoyable when they properly played their parts. But oh, the ginger… Her part was harder to play.
When she was naked, stripped of gown and petticoats and pantalettes, and he nearly naked, in only low-slung trousers, he laid her clothes out of reach and took her arm.
“Come stand here, my naughty subject. Face the wall.”
She watched, wordless, breathless, as he fixed some leather cuffs to two formidable chains hanging down on either side of her. Then he caught her wrists and buckled them in. She was trapped like a butterfly with her wings spread, and only the stone wall before her to stare at. She could not turn, could not escape.