Belok's Bride Read online

Take pity on me, she cried out with her eyes when she realized it was a breast cage they were attaching. But the soldiers paid her no heed. Not bothering to strip her bosom, they fit it over the dress, the metal cups and clamps digging into the velvet, the ribbed metal cinching her narrow waist. In the annals of torture, the device was sometimes called a brasserie of pain. It was Belok’s own invention, one of many.

  Unlike the ones she’d read about, however, this one was smooth, lacking the needles and nails that would ordinarily send the prisoner into orbital anguish. The only terrifying part was the built in nipple clamps. These were pinched onto her, again through the dress. The guards tightened them enough to make her wince, but not so much as to draw tears.

  Merritt was grateful for this, and the guards in their turn grinned under their faceplates to see how docile and compliant she was. One of them took his hand and pushed it between her legs, pressing the velvet against her lace covered crotch.

  “Later, we will take the prince’s leftovers,” he smirked.

  “Move,” roared the other, smacking her arse loudly with his metal covered hand.

  Merritt stumbled forward, fighting to keep her balance. She was completely confined now and humiliatingly bound, ready for abuse, for torture, whatever the prince might want. She’d never been more terrified…or more aroused. Her buttocks stinging, sweat collecting on her skin, she made her way forward to the throne itself, to the man she saw seated upon it.

  To both sides, she saw stripped and writhing females. Some under the kiss of the whip, others laboring beneath enormous cocks, the slickly glistening and oiled members of Belok’s burly attendants, dark skinned Nubians, yellow skinned Asiatics and the dreaded, hairy beast-like men of the mountains who comprised his personal guard.

  “Mercy,” begged a girl in Hungarian, a waif-like blonde, her hair wet and straggly, the impassioned plea doused as a penis thrust itself deep into her collared throat.

  The man, a bearded Syrian, snarled, yanking her neck chain painfully so as to impale her mouth on his cock. “Here is your mercy. A fresh nourishing meal for you.”

  This cannot possibly be, Merritt was telling herself. I will awaken and that will be that. I’ll be in the airport where I’m supposed to be.

  “Can you be so sure, though, which is the dream and which is the reality?”

  The man was not speaking out of his lips, but from somewhere out of his mind. The same mind he’d used to read her thoughts. Merritt turned about, desperate for escape as the prince rose from the throne to confront her. Men closed in on all sides, their stiff pricks like spears, keeping her at bay. Merritt shook her head. The drool was running down her chin. Swallowing was impossible in the gag, and she was soaking the front of her dress. The material was doing nothing to protect her breasts from the tight metal binding, the twin cages over each globe, imprisoning and squeezing her helpless mounds. And her poor nipples captured, a few turns of the screws away from a misery all their own.

  “I won’t hurt you little one. As long as you obey me,” said Belok

  The attendants set her on her knees and scampered away. Merritt beheld the figure approaching with the awe one might reserve for a god. Was this how the Dark Prince looked in his lifetime, or was this only a figment of her imagination?

  “Both,” said the silver haired man, “and neither.”

  Merritt felt a flooding between her legs. He was the most coldly beautiful man she’d ever seen. His hair was long and fine and hung down his back like the mane of a lion, composed of stardust. His eyes were a pale blue, lit by some inner energy that seemed to crackle and glow. His nose was regal, long and slender, but not overwhelmingly so. The jaw was perfectly squared, and he had high, noble cheekbones.

  He was wearing a tunic of red velvet, the crest of his principality upon the breast. Muscles surged beneath the material and there was no mistaking the pure masculine power. At his waist, a jewel encrusted dagger hung insolently. The tunic measured to his thighs and was cinched by a massive belt of exquisitely worked metal and jewels in every color of the rainbow. His breeches were of smoothest calf hide, and the boots were soft brown leather, brand new.

  “You have come to study me,” said the prince, looming over her as if he were alive and contemporary and not seven centuries in the dust.

  His hand was on her chin and she felt the arcing of electricity as he bent back her head. She dared not look in those eyes, and yet she could not avoid them either. Like a tiny bird, he held her will. “Behold, your first lesson,” he cooed, again without opening the pale, bloodless lips.

  With a sweep of the black cloak broached about his thick neck, he turned to the open area beside her, striding imperiously. “Bring her here,” commanded the prince out loud, his voice reverberating to the high, gold domed ceiling, shaking the dozens of marble columns lining the throne room.

  The soldiers had a girl, naked and squirming. She was a red head, with thick curly hair, nineteen, maybe twenty. Judging by the fight in her, she’d not yet been subdued by the prince or his minions. The girl was a perfect specimen, her smooth convex belly a perfect compliment to proportioned meaty breasts. The flanks made the mouth water, while her bush was a fine sheen of red, soft and silky, the kind a man could lose himself in.

  The lust of the hall full of men, the sheer predatory desire rose in waves, rippling about the girl’s flesh. Merritt trembled for her, but as the same time, she felt something strangely akin to jealousy.

  “Leave me go,” she cried, her voice coming to Merritt’s ears as a form of old English, which she translated internally with minimal effort. “Or you shall all pay with your lives. My father is a mighty man and verily shall raise a great army against you!”

  The laughter was diabolical begun at a gesture from Belok and just as quickly ended with another. In the court of the Dark Prince, a man’s life depended upon his ability to read the most subtle of gestures and inflections.

  Belok turned back to the prisoner, his gaze mocking. “My dear, you frighten me so. I do not know whether to quake in my boots or piss my pants. Come here, little one and comfort me.” He snapped his fingers, and the slender girl was put easily to her knees at his feet.

  There was more laughter and then silence as the moment of truth arrived.

  “Little bird,” said the prince to his prisoner, continuing to lampoon her attempts to frighten him. “Will you not give bolster to my fading courage by delivering a kiss from your most worthy lips to my humble feet?”

  The girl spit at them instead, barely missing the tips of the leather boots. There was a collected drawing of breath. The guards' swords were drawn from their sheaths, and it was clear that at a word the haughty English virgin would find herself bereft of her head.

  Belok stayed them with his hand. “You disappoint me, Little Bird.” His voice was chillingly melodic, giving only the barest hint of the mayhem of which he was capable. “You may appease me, on your belly, cleaning with your tongue the stain you have made.”

  “To the bowels of hell with you. You and your infernal minions with you!” She hissed.

  Belok signaled for one of the attendants. The man was a giant, nearly seven feet tall, hairless, with dark brown skin. His body was oiled and he was thoroughly muscled. He was nude, save for a leather belt from which depended a hooked knife, a coil of rope and a whip.

  It was this last device that he withdrew. The soldiers stepped back, amused at what they were about to witness. The whip had a thick black handle and was multi stranded. At the end of each cord, was a knot. The girl tried to get away from the giant, but it was child’s play for him to grab her hair and force her face down onto the marble.

  She was still on her knees, her arse pushed high now into the air. Keeping one hand on the back of her neck, he left her no choice but to remain this way, her cheek to the floor.

  Turning over his shoulder, he called out for the bucket of water.

  It was fetched by a naked, collared brunette. The girl had criss-crossed scars on her
belly, breasts and backside, indicating she was no stranger to the whip herself. Running quickly, chest heaving, she set the bucket down and put her forehead to the floor beside it, waiting. Grinning, the giant pushed her aside with his foot, moving her out of his way. Still on her belly, she began to crawl backwards, her head lowered respectfully.

  After several feet she was stopped, an attendant having to take advantage of the wriggling, inviting, abused buttocks. The girl lifted herself to him obediently as he took her by the narrower channel.

  Merritt blocked out the moans, focusing instead on the girl about to be whipped. The big man was dipping the cat-o-nine tails into the water, soaking it so that it would do more damage. The helpless girl trembled and gave little cries as he dribbled the water from the whip down her spine and over her buttocks. Judging by the reaction, it must have been icy cold.

  He made a rude remark, splashing a wet handful over the crack of her arse. Merritt could see the red and swollen lips of her sex peeking out, the telltale glistening. The prisoner was aroused.

  He struck her without mercy, delivering a slashing blow across her back. She cowered, at once yielding to the reality of her situation. The attendant took his time, working her twitching buttocks and also the back of her legs. The marks were angry red and Merritt could feel them as if the skin were hers. How could she not? Bound as she was, forced to drool on herself, her tits out on display, barely concealed and cruelly imprisoned, she felt like a slave herself for all her finery.

  The little English prisoner was begging for mercy. She was a delight to behold, and every cock in the room was stiff for her. It was Belok, however, to whom she belonged. Body and soul.

  “Enough,” commanded the prince, he who held the absolute obedience of every man, woman and child in his realm. “Let her see what she has learned.”

  Merritt shivered at the word learned, it having been meant for her ears as well.

  The English girl required no fresh instructions. Without a word, she put herself to her belly on the cool marble and began to wriggle towards her master. Lapping with her tiny little tongue, she removed the offensive spittle from his floor and long after that, continued to pay homage.

  Belok allowed her to degrade herself further by licking his boots. This she did eagerly and without reservation.

  “You will drink now,” he told her.

  A shudder passed through her tiny, whipped body, but she knew what was expected. Rising to her knees, her amber eyes lowered, she waited, with parted lips. Belok worked at the fastening of his trousers. Merritt felt her insides churning, her belly burning with lust. He was going to force-feed her his cock. He was going to make her take it deep.

  With horror and fascination, she saw the tiny female open her jaws wider to receive him. Her once feisty spirit broken, she was readying herself to be his vessel, her mouth an extension of her cunt. Merritt cried out, wanting to stop her from going too far, but the girl was already putting her hand between her own legs, signaling that her humiliation was also her pleasure. That she was truly ready to be Belok’s slave.

  “No!” Merritt screamed out.

  She woke up then, just missing the opportunity to see the unsheathed penis of the Dark Prince.

  ***

  Merritt sputtered, old-fashioned smelling salts under her nose.

  “Sit up slowly,” advised her interrogator.

  She was still at the wooden table. The coin was gone.

  “It is time for you to go to your hotel, doctor. I imagine you are quite fatigued.”

  Merritt reached instinctively to touch her own face, searching for the cruel gag. It was gone and the breast cage as well. So, too, the velvet dress, the marble castle and the scene of exquisite torture she’d just witnessed. It had seemed so real. The prince, Belok, in the flesh had been everything she’d ever imagined and more, much more.

  But what about the others? Who were they? The English girl, her mouth open, her knees spread apart as she prepared to take her master in her mouth. Like the little Italian girl and like Merritt herself in her own secret dreams, dreams too dark to admit, too terrifying to examine in the light of day.

  The man rose to his feet, bowing crisply. “The soldiers will come to escort you momentarily. Good day, Doctor Fisher.”

  “But I still don’t know who you are,” she croaked, amazed at her own boldness.

  “I am Colonel Ladislak. Of the Zuravian Intelligence Service.”

  “The women,” she stopped him at the door. “I want to know what happened to them.”

  He pursed his lips. “It isn’t so much. They were taken from here in trucks to the Central Prison. En route they were raped by the transport officers. Upon arrival at the prison, depending on their offense and how desirable they were, they were either given to the male prisoners or reserved for the guards. The most lovely were kept by the warden for his private brothel.”

  Merritt remained expressionless, determined to cheat him of any possible reaction. “As you said, it was long ago.”

  “Indeed, doctor. Indeed.”

  Chapter Two

  The soldiers took Merritt to a black sedan. She was put in the back seat alone. The door was slammed shut and they were on the move, a police car in front of them clearing the way through the busy traffic of Vistya, the capital city of this small Eastern European country that had once been part of the Soviet empire.

  Merritt, still in a daze, stared at the architecture. The buildings were stately, high columned and made of ornately carved stone. The walls were broken be long slivered windows and the roofs topped by rows of gargoyles, grinning down on scads of marvelous statues and glistening fountains in the various plazas. One could easily imagine being back in some earlier century such as the nineteenth or even the medieval period, when castles rose to the sky and peasants labored over the black, crusty earth, their lives nasty, brutish and short.

  In some ways, Vistya was a dark place belonging to a world that had seen so much more pain than the modern era could comprehend. And yet, in the kindly glow of the late afternoon sun, there were pockets of color as well: decorated churches, inlaid in mosaic, gaily painted umbrellas and banners for the merchants in the marketplaces, arguing the virtues of their lusty fruits, pink and green and yellow. Edible treasures gathered from the fields of Europe and beyond to Africa and even Asia.

  The Zuravians were a ruddy people. Old women in scarves, apple-like cheeks, toothless grins, but also young lovers, strong of limb, flirting in the open air of newly found western democracy. It was a freedom Merritt grew up taking for granted and often did not appreciate. Personally, she’d despised the fact that people were able to speak as they wished in her home state of California, ridiculing her late father, hounding him for his interest in old legends and supernatural tales of horror like that of Belok. Roger Fisher had been a complex, lonely man, widowed at such a young age. Could anyone fault him his peradventures, his mysterious relationships with young women, affairs the authorities called sadistic and perverted?

  As a little girl, she’d heard the sounds, whispers of pleasure and strife from behind the fortress-like walls of her father’s bedroom. And she’d looked at the books, too. Particularly the illustrated picture books about Belok. Late at night, in her nightgown, she would often tip toe in her bare feet to the library and pull one from the shelf. Sitting cross-legged in her father’s favorite chair, the smell of leather and tobacco filling her nostrils with delicious safety and familiarity, she would read about the infamous ruler, the prince whose habits and terrors had become the stuff of legend.

  The real life Dracula he was called, although there was no evidence of his drinking blood or rising from the dead or any of the things that made for good Hollywood movies. He was a brutal dictator, nothing more. A human through and through. Rough even for his time, but also capable of incredibly wise leadership. Single-handedly, he kept the empires of both East and West at bay and, had he not died so young, he might have forged an empire of his own.

  But
growing old was not his fate. Nor was it her father’s. Like Merritt’s mother, Roger had died in a car crash before his time. Leaving her alone to pick up the pieces. So many ghosts, she thought, watching the passing museums and libraries. So many visions of strong men in her life and never once the reality. In truth, she feared men and didn’t trust herself even to date any.

  Perhaps they stemmed from the desires in her that were too strong to ignore. Were a man to tap into them, there was no telling what betrayals her body might yield. Colonel Ladislak, despicable as he was, seemed to have grasped this about her. He was a dangerous man, no doubt about it. She had her suspicions that it wasn’t only under the defunct communist regime that he’d played his little games with females. He might only have been trying to frighten her, but she suspected he wasn’t bluffing.

  Should it prove to his advantage, and should she cross him in any way, she knew he would not hesitate to bring her back to the dismal little room or some similar one where her rights, her citizenship and her virginity itself would mean nothing. Had he sensed that, she wondered. Did he comprehend that she had never known the intimate caress of a man?

  Again, these were not thoughts she dared entertain. What she needed to do as soon as she got to the hotel was to speak to Dr. Karisvan, the head of the Institute and her sponsor for the trip. Surely he’d be able to make sense of the strange events befalling her. No doubt he would be forthcoming with the apology she deserved, as well, on his Institute’s behalf as well as that of his government.

  The Hotel Vistya was one of the finest in the city. A proud, nineteenth century structure of weathered stone and brick, it had the look of the Plaza in New York, only with a more European flair. The doormen wore red uniforms with brass buttons and high top hats. They were bone thin men with somber expressions more fitting for a morgue than a modern hotel.

  Merritt declined to stay in her room, opting for a quick shower and change of clothes after which she went down to take a meal in the dining room. She had to leave a message for Dr. Karizvan with his secretary, a young woman with an English accent whose voice, for some reason, seemed hauntingly familiar. Merritt was beginning to doubt her own sanity.