Eliska Read online

  She was about twenty-three, superbly built with well-formed breasts and prominent nipples still engorged from the copulation; her flat belly swept down from the ribs to the thighs and the rich pubic hair from which the labia protruded, sensually soaked. The buttocks were hung high and, despite being clenched now, predicted full and rounded gluteal cheeks.

  It was her face that intrigued me: very soft and lovely with high cheek bones, a wide sensual mouth - the lips still smeared with semen - and dark eyes, the whole framed by short auburn hair.

  She stood with her eyes closed in an attitude of total resignation, or rather submission. Well might she be cowed, I thought, for she lies in the terrible power of Zatoransky. I pitied her with a strange pang in my heart.

  “By order of the gracious Margravine,” Jakub announced through his cowl that lent his voice an ominous, distant note, “this whore is arrested for illicit fornication.”

  The lansquenet broke in, using Plattdeutsch, as he stood awkwardly hiding his genitals and nakedness: “But she is my mistress! You have no right. I have paid for the room.”

  The bailiff waved the protest curtly aside: “The slut is unlicensed and practising as a vagrant whore in an official brothel of the Margravine of Zatoransky! As such, the scum will have to pay for it. Moreover, we have here a witness of the Imperial court who resides as guest of the Margravine.” He pointed to me. “The whore must be taken to the castle.”

  The naked girl’s mouth opened slightly as she sighed and looked at her lover. The man then turned to me.

  “Sir, I ask you to intercede on our behalf. This is outrageous. She is my legal mistress.”

  Before I could consider an answer or suggest an intercession with my hostess, the bailiff intervened and cried: “You paid this whore, did you not?”

  “Surely,” he replied. “She is in sore need and it is natural I should give her money. She has lost both parents and a brother. She has no man, no home. I am her protector and I have taken her as my mistress.” He was furious but prudent also, for his position was indeed unenviable.

  “Then how does this slag of a whore come to be naked in a brothel?” Jakub shouted.

  “She is not a whore!” the officer cried back. “I have the right to fuck my woman where I like. Anyway, we were helped by a girl who works here - and she I have paid to go with my man next door.”

  I winced at his ingenuousness, knowing what awaited the girl, and the innkeeper turned pale, muttering: “I know nothing of all this, your lordships and may it please you both bitches should be arrested and put to the whip.”

  “They will be, don’t you fret, man,” Jakub said. “And you had better watch your mouth.” Then he turned to the lansquenet, as Bohumil began to hustle the girl out. “If this whore means so much to you, she can be collected in three weeks time outside the castle gates, unless she is condemned to work in the brothels. As an officer of the Imperial power, you are free to depart, sir. Those are my orders.”

  I noticed the respectful ‘sir’ and felt the bailiff certainty knew his job. To be discovered in a stew with an unlicensed woman, whore or not, was a delicate matter, and the prospect of recovering his alleged mistress was sufficient to mollify the officer. He did not seem to be prepared to argue further. He kissed the girl and swore he would claim her.

  Pale with terror, the girl was thrown out into the passage while Bohumil carried out the arrest in the adjacent room; it was done rapidly, without discussion. A young prostitute with long fair hair and a pretty figure was roughly dragged from under the lansquenet’s subordinate who was using her fiercely. Both were paralysed with fright at the sight of the masked intruder. The girl was hauled off the bed and pushed down the stairs behind the first prisoner. Both were now to be driven naked up to the castle.

  The other inmates of the house cowered in the corners as the girls were roped for the ascent The crowd outside fell silent and there was no reaction to the arrests.

  At supper not one of my hosts even mentioned these happenings but talked of hunting throughout the meal. I must end here for I have a busy day tomorrow and must prepare.

  My love to you and to your dearest mother.

  Your trusting uncle, Huldrych

  Letter The Fourth

  (This letter begins with a number of personal and family concerns after which the text continues:)

  ...reverting to the happenings of yesterday, I should add that the lansquenet’s woman was thrown over one of the bailiffs’ horses and bound obscenely, belly up, thighs parted and roped securely by arms and legs; the other girl was made to walk up at the end of a leather rein, receiving a stroke of the whip to hasten her on; and thus we arrived at the drawbridge over the slimy moat.

  Hans greeted me and took charge of my mare Zenon; she had enjoyed the outing more than I, for she had remained outside the dismal stew as behoves the noble lady that she is. Hans stared at the naked women being led across the courtyard but the castle servants did not seem to take much notice except for an occasional glance of trepidation. The bailiffs thrust their charges down some steps on the far side of the yard and with an unsavoury degree of curiosity I followed them.

  They had been taken into a vaulted chamber, the roof being supported by stout columns of stone - not unlike the crypt in the Dom at Bamberg, the one above which stand the carved horseman and the tomb of the Emperor and his Cunigunde, that unfortunate woman, unjustly accused of adultery only to prove her innocence by walking the white-hot coals. The vault here is lit by several tallow candles, for little or no light filters down.

  Both girls were made to kneel, wrists tied behind them, each facing a pair of columns. The bailiffs first positioned the longhaired whore: arms out-flung and manacled with tough leather straps linked to chains reaching to the summit of each column. The girl, totally nude, stood teetering on the tips of her toes before the legs were likewise pulled apart and chained. Then she hung.

  The same procedure applied to the lansquenet’s girl until the two pale bodies were spread and drawn to the full reach of their limbs; they looked frail and vulnerable but immensely beautiful as the muscles tightened, the breasts began to rear in search of breath. The only sound was a short gasp as the body responded to the traction and the sexes were exposed. I was able to compare the bodies: the legitimate whore (if you allow the term) with her long corn-coloured hair, was more slender, with smaller breasts and buttocks. The lansquenet’s mistress (if you agree with that term too) is of stronger build, with heavier breasts, large ripe nipples and longer limbs. At the loins the sex-labia protrude proudly through the matted auburn triangle of thick hair. Both sexes were still wet from copulation.

  The bailiffs went about their work efficiently, almost indifferently, as they hauled and bound, ensuring that each female was fully stretched and exposed. The two nudes were crucified as if floating aloft.

  While the men were refreshing themselves with small beer taken from an alcove, they were the first to catch the sound of high heels. Rapidly they regained their places beside their charges as the Margravine entered. Her gown swirling about her riding boots, her breasts and cheeks powered white, she looked more menacing than ever. She did not seem to notice my presence, perhaps because I was in a sombre corner, but more likely because her entire attention was devoted to the naked bodies before her.

  She inspected each thoroughly, weighing the buttocks as if to gauge the elasticity, chafing the nipples into erection and splaying each of the sexes with the fingers of her kid gloves. She spent a greater time on the lansquenet’s female than on the whore, pulling on the sex labia here, probing into the body there.

  Then her order came.

  “Flush the sperm out them and wash down the flesh. Then oil it well.”

  To Jakub’s question, in his local accent, whether the armpits should be scraped clean, her answer was curt. “I would order it if I required it, man. Just obe
y! I need all the hair these sluts have on them - in the state in which they fuck.”

  She pointed to the longhaired whore.

  “This slut will be flagellated tonight where she hangs, during Vespers. Order Sebastian to scourge her properly, front and back and especially the buttock-meat, after which she will be exposed in the slave stalls below, chained open for general use through the night. Any castle males deserving merit and recompense may use her. And in any manner they wish. Thereafter, she will be returned to her brothel to work, chained to her bed by the neck for a week. Further, you will see to it that she receives thirty lashes at the close of the week, tied naked over the whipping frame in the brothel in front of all inmates.”

  The bailiffs bowed low as they accompanied their Mistress to the other prisoner.

  Eliska contemplated the hanging body for a long moment, turning round it to view each portion of flesh. She was evidently highly satisfied with what she saw. Bohumil had begun to wash down the body and had brought forward a bowl of scented oil for the subsequent anointment, oil that enhanced the body erotically and facilitated flagellation.

  “This one will hang here,” she commanded, “to enjoy the scourging of her slut of an ally. After Vespers you will deliver her to Sebastian below to be prepared for the ritual of the Three Sessions. I require her in perfect condition. Is this clear?”

  She suddenly turned to me in the shadows. Her eyes were bright with excitement.

  “Come, my dear friend.” Her long graceful arms were stretched out to me in their dark crimson gloves. “Let us go up together.”

  As we mounted a stairway leading to the main hall, she confided in me: “As you see, my lord, I have to administer justice at all hours. At least, once cleaned and oiled - almost a waste of fragrances - these sluts will present an immaculate exterior despite the filth in their souls. And that, I shall see to it, will be whipped out of them.”

  To avoid having to comment on her metaphysics, I remarked that the whip seemed to constitute the main remedy for offences here.

  “Indeed,” she concurred, “there is nothing as conclusive as the scourge applied to a naked female body. I do not, my lord, countenance torture of any kind here - no ugly racks, iron brodequins, strappado or the wheel. They are simply repulsive and permanently damaging and, above all, ungratifying to the spectator. And I refuse to have blood drawn from my girls. What, I ask you, is more erotic than a stark naked female receiving the lash? And there is no girl who cannot recover quickly from a flagellation.” She paused before adding: “I would remind you, sir, that these females have been brought up on the whip from childhood. They are inured to it. Some, if not most, accept it willingly and even react to the erotic - or should one not say sexual? - stimulus it arouses.”

  “Are you victims always females?” I asked, despite Milan’s earlier explanations.

  “They are not victims but common sluts whose flesh has been or may be misled by lust and the Devil. But you are right. I take it upon myself, as a woman, to purge the most obdurate devil out of a woman’s body; it never fails. I know how to deal with the female body. Now, as to males - I have of course dealt with them too, naked and excited - if there is need for correction, I prefer to delegate this to the authorities in the town or to the Bishop. No, it is the female that I set out to save and purify. And it follows that in so doing, I and my companions deserve compensation. And this we receive in the act itself. For whipping a nude female is indeed pleasurable.”

  I felt she was utterly sincere and meant what she said.

  As we drew near to the chapel, she added softly: “I am sure you will enjoy the preparation of this illicit whore tonight, and thus you will see my loyal flagellator at work. And of course I trust you will honour me at the sessions themselves.”

  She descended the silken kerchief over her magnificent breasts and led me into the dismal chapel before I could answer.

  The service was officiated by an aged priest, confessor to the deceased Margrave and now to his widow; he droned through the office in atrocious Latin and yet there was something human about the man as he blessed the congregation. This consisted mainly of women with very few men. I took them to be handmaidens, overseers, seamstresses, kitchen maids, scullery slaves and other menials; I caught sight of the young girls who served at table, their breasts now demurely covered. The Margravine sat alone in front on the south of the aisle, her three lovers behind her.

  After the muttered blessing - which I felt we all sorely needed - we filed out behind the Margravine while the servants dropped to their knees, bowing to her. Ladislav apologized to me for the quality of the service.

  “This elderly monk is all the Margravine requires, you know, sir. He does his duty, does not frequent brothels nor use the serving wenches as so many local priests do. The Bishop, whom you will soon meet, I trust, permits the castle to live as the Margravine wishes and decrees. He is most cooperative in granting full absolution and in selling indulgences very cheaply. He fully supports our crusade to salvage sinful and lusting females and sometimes honours us by coming to watch them being whipped naked in our ceremonies.”

  I admit to being really confused, Nephew, by the relations these people have with the Church, but I hold my tongue.

  During the supper, excellent as usual, an incident took place that is worth recounting if only to stress the strange reactions of these noble hosts of mine.

  One of the serving-girls - a very pretty serf, naked to the waist as usual - suddenly tripped, her bare feet catching in the carpets. She spilt the whole contents of a beaker of wine over the young Milan whom she was serving; it ran over the table and down into his lap. Milan sprang to his feet and turned on the petrified culprit with a torrent of abuse in local dialect. The girl, whose name I gathered is Tereza, turned white with fear.

  “You foul, slovenly bitch of a whore!” he shouted. “You dirty strumpet.” And a few more insults I had difficulty in following.

  I was taken aback at the man’s fury and the Margravine seemed to share his anger but her voice was controlled as her eyes narrowed. I started to help to mop up the wine as the second servant was called to the scene. The Margravine waved me back.

  She addressed the wretched girl. “I have been watching you for some time,” she hissed. “You are given the honour of waiting at my high table merely because the bailiffs selected you from among the rabble downstairs, because they think you have attractive breasts, you little scum! But you are lazy, careless and provocative - you have even the effrontery to look me in the eyes.”

  The wench immediately dropped her terrified gaze to the carpets where the wine continued to trickle. Like the wine, my heart bled for her.

  “You will pay dearly for this,” Eliska said coldly. “Drop your skirt girl!”

  To my consternation - for, after all, the scene was being enacted before an emissary of His Imperial Majesty - Tereza undid the cord that held her only garment to her hips (I have noticed that females never wear drawers here) and let it fall. She stood completely naked before us, trying to shield the narrow triangle of fair hair over her sex from our view.

  “Stand straight, scullion!” It was Milan who shouted, at which Tereza joined her hands behind her back, jutting out her sharp breasts. She was trembling but looked so lovely.

  “Send for Jakub!” Eliska turned to the second serving girl who stood quivering in a corner, as far away as possible from her companion, and now fled at once.

  Eliska then addressed the table. “As you see, the bailiffs do their best to provide handsome girls with good firm breasts to serve here, but what do we get in return? I have had my eye on this bitch and her pert habits. This is the way she chooses to repay me for my generosity. I have taken her in as an orphan, fed her, clothed her and sheltered her ungrateful body. Well, her naked body you see before you will now pay for the favours she owes. it will taste the whip as few sluts
have tasted it recently.”

  She spoke with venom as Jakub in his cowl hurried into the hall, obviously fully alerted to the situation. He seized the girl by the arms, bending her backwards viciously.

  “Has this slut been pierced?” Eliska enquired brusquely. Her man nodded, squeezing a nipple to show the small insertion hole in the umber flesh.

  “Yes, gracious lady, a month ago, along with the other slaves from the six villages,” the reply came, precise with intimate knowledge of the bodies that fell to the man’s charge. “She can be ringed again for bondage and flogging immediately, if that is your wish, gracious lady.” The man took an evident delight in his duties.

  “I shall decide later,” the gracious lady replied. “Meanwhile take her to the slave stalls below and suspend her by the legs next to the whore.”

  Jakub bowed ceremoniously. Grasping the fallen skirt, he hurried the girl out towards whatever the slave stalls might be. After this extraordinary scene, Nephew, I was at a loss how to continue the discussion. Milan continued to wipe down his breeches and seemed content with the culprit’s dismissal. It was Ladislav who sensed my embarrassment

  “Ah, our sweet Gräfin,” he aid with a smile, “she can be harsh. But a serf is a serf, a slut is a slut, and this one has been running risks for some time.”

  “Perhaps,” I replied, twisting some bread between my fingers, “but an accident is an accident.” As he did not respond, I asked what was implied by piercing and ringing.

  “Let me explain,” Ladislav volunteered. “The Margravine has made it a rule that any serf or servant - I speak of females, of course - who commits an offence here in the castle is usually, but not always, handed over to Sebastian to have her nipples, clitoris hood and the folds of the sex, and sometimes the navel, pierced for the insertion of rings. It is then by these rings, apart from the wrists, ankles and throat, that the woman is attached for whipping. If no further condemnation occurs during the month that follows, the rings are removed, as is the case of this slut. To be honest, I do not recall why this particular girl was ringed.”