Castle Keep 2

CASTLE KEEP 2: THE BEAST WITHIN

Leaves cracked and twigs snapped as large paws slowly moved along the forest floor. They suddenly stopped and all fell silent as a hare warily froze. It sensed danger from a predator and instinctively sprinted for cover. As soon as it ran the footfalls of a heavy beast approached from behind. It was a brief and one-sided battle as powerful jaws grasped the furry neck and easily snapped the life from its meal.

It would not fill the beast's belly for long, but it was sufficient for the moment. The beast traveled north, keeping to the dense forest to camouflage its location. Only after it reached a small stream and drank the cool water did it approach the edge of a clearing. It sat and rested in the brush and stared, waiting. Several hours passed. The morning mist cleared as the sun arose. The warming rays cast down on the land and chased away all remnants of the night.

When a distant child's voice sounded the ears of the resting beast stiffened. The eyes narrowed as it searched for the human form. It started as a dot and grew larger as the child approached. A mother closely followed behind as the child led the way. Their voices were louder and laced with playful laughter.

If the beast could smile, it surely would have. Its wolf-like blue eyes watched the boy closely. The mother was married to an older man when the boy was still growing in her womb, but no man was the boy's father. It was the beast's son, his eleventh, and Francesca was the mother. When the boy was grown the beast would return for him.

It rested on the edge of the field until the boy and his mother were gone. The afternoon was spent hunting, and only after the beast's belly was full did it return to the castle. When the sun had set and darkness returned the beast slipped into the castle through a crevice, and when on the other side transformed into a human form.

The time had almost come to sire his twelfth.

* * * * *

Juliette sat on her bed and looked out the window, across the land that her father controlled and protected. It was a lonely place, made lonelier still by Francesca's departure. Francesca had been promised to another Baron's son, but when she was discovered to be with child the agreement was broken.

Her father had been furious. Juliette recalled quite vividly their frequent arguments, particularly the demands for Francesca to reveal the identity of the true father. Her older sister had professed to remember nothing of the event. Even when the sisters were alone, Francesca revealed nothing to Juliette. It was as if her sister had no knowledge of the true father, which seemed somewhat suspect in Juliette's mind.

However another loved Francesca, an older man of wealth, and the two were united. With her older sister gone, the castle seemed lonelier than ever.

She and Francesca shared the same long, flowing black hair and sparkling green eyes of their mother. Her slender form was cloaked in a simple dress, and it kept hidden her virtuous flesh. No man would see her naked flesh except for her husband, and that would be decided by her father. But that could not keep the swell of her perky breasts from showing through her clothing, a sight that continued to attract attention from the men she passed. 

It was a fate that both sisters complained about on many occasions. While they both hoped to find love in such a pre-ordained union, it was doubtful. Politics and love were beasts of a different nature. Juliette often wondered if the pressures placed on them may have been the root cause for her premature and untimely pregnancy.

Bored and lonely, she arose from her bed and stood at the closed heavy wood door that sealed her private chamber. The sun had set several hours ago and the frequent noises of activity had slowly ebbed and faded as people settled in for the night. Hearing nothing, she quietly unlatched and pulled the door partially open, just enough to slip her slender body through the doorway and into the hallway outside.

Juliette knew the castle from top to bottom, and a torch was not necessary to illuminate the way. She descended the circular steps in a tower to the ground floor, passed through an archway into a chamber that led to another hall. She walked carefully and quietly to conceal her journey. When finally she entered the kitchen, she walked to the back of the room and settled behind a large storage barrel.

This was her favorite place to hide when a child. It had been completely by coincidence when she heard the muffled screams that drifted up from the bowels of the castle far below. She had always found the disturbing sounds exciting in some way. So aroused was she by the noises that she frequently returned to the same spot. Although no longer a child, she still often longed for the sounds. On this night, lonely and depressed, she thought that hearing the pained screams might somehow be comforting.

The noises were not consistent. There were periods of days or weeks when absolutely nothing was heard. But when there was activity, it was always at night. Juliette leaned back against the damp stone wall and pushed away cobwebs that had gathered in the dark, unused corner. The longer she sat in the darkness the better she could see. When she spied a rat she gasped and swatted it away. It hesitated, but finally changed course and disappeared. 

"I need to hear the sounds of another's misery," Juliette whispered into the night as she patiently waited. "Please, reveal them to me."

She had almost drifted off to sleep when she heard a frightful scream. Juliette froze, startled, at first uncertain of the source of the noise. But then a muffled ripping sound drifted up from below, followed by another scream; a woman's scream. For some reason she suspected that the guards were having their way with another poor, helpless woman. 

Being a woman herself the screams should have distressed her, but instead had an effect quite to the contrary. Juliette shivered as a cold chill passed through her sitting body, and her nipples swelled and hardened. Without consciously thinking about it her hands unfastened the front of her dress and pulled the garment open. Her warm hands cupped the silky soft breasts now revealed, and she teased the hardened peaks by pinching and twisting on them. Her touching created an arousing warmth in the lower belly that radiated a decidedly pleasant tingling.

A muffled male voice could be heard, but the words couldn't be grasped. The evil laughter that followed, however, was quite clear. There was a sound in the background. She could not be certain, but thought it could have been a woman sobbing. 

There was a period of silence that was broken by a loud crack and a pained cry. Juliette knew it was shameful but as her left hand continued fondling a bare breast her right reached down between her thighs and rubbed on the moist folds of her virtue. Her breathing grew heavier as the fingers lightly stroked the folds of flesh. The warmth in her belly grew hotter when a single finger pressed between the folds and into the hot slit within. It touched the swollen nub of her womanhood and triggered a tingling sensation that was so unexpectedly intense that it stole the breath from her lungs.

Another sharp crack sounded, and an immediate cry followed. Juliette thought of herself in the dungeon, strapped to some mechanism, as leather sharply struck her round buttocks. Her imagination was vivid, and she easily envisioned such a thing. When the next crack sounded the fingers of her left hand roughly pinched on a swollen nipple. She gasped as the female voice cried, and they both shared in the sharp jolt of pain. 

The next time it sounded her fingers pinched and twisted simultaneously. The pain was much more intense, and Juliette softly cried as did the woman below. The fingers of her right hand rubbed on her juicy virtue harder and faster, so that the stinging pain mingled with the pleasure and both became as one, indistinguishable separately. The breath caught in her throat and she moaned louder, realizing such a noise could reveal her presence but unable to keep from doing so.

William, two levels below, looked up at the ceiling and smiled. He knew that his Juliette was huddled in the dark kitchen above, shamelessly rubbing on her aroused flesh. He knew the thoughts in her mind, of how she wanted to feel the sting of leather upon her bare skin. She was just like her older sister in that regard, and it pleased him. Soon she would fulfill that fantasy, very soon indeed. A full moon, unbroken by clouds, was all that he waited for.

A single torch danced beside the smoke-blackened stone where the holder was mounted. It created an eerie light that was most fitting for the occasion. Torn clothing rested on the floor at his feet, and a young naked virgin woman dangled from the same shackles that had held so many others. 

He felt no remorse for having led her here. Initially it was she that lured her to him with her flirtations; a sly smile, the batting of her eyelids, and the tempting licking of her full lips. The woman was of age and had many suitors, but William was a mystery to her that she wanted to discover. 

Once tempted, he charmed her, and she willing followed him into the deepest chamber of the castle. She had giggled all the way down at the prospect of stealing a moment alone with the handsome, cloaked figure. She had never envisioned what that moment alone would become. 

What the woman could not possibly know was the reason for her torture. It was not to please William, but the huddled figure in the kitchen. Juliette, who would be the mother of his twelfth son, was lonely and sad, and he wanted to ease her suffering through the misery of another as she had asked.

The leather stung the soft flesh of her buttocks again and again, ten times in all. The first two had merely garnered Juliette's attention, as well as that of the woman that dangled from the shackles. But the successive cracks and cries that drifted up to her ears slowly aroused his precious Juliette, and her fingers introduced forbidden pleasure in her beautiful, lithe form that erased the loneliness that weighed heavy on her heart.

After ten lashes with the strap he sensed that although Juliette was close to orgasm, she was not near enough to satisfy her with continued whipping. William knew it would take a much different sound to please his intended.

He pulled the iron pins from the shackles and the crying woman fell to the dirty stone floor on her knees. He grabbed a handful of hair and dragged her past horrendous torture devices as she struggled to keep up. The fear rose up in her heart and her weak voice begged for him to stop. Her pleas fell on deaf ears, for he was no man and his heart had no compassion for her.

The further they walked the weaker the light provided by the only torch became. When they approached what appeared to be a table he lifted the young woman and roughly placed her on top. Tiny slivers of wood that projected from the rough timber bit into her burning buttocks and added to her misery. 

The leather strap had taken the strength from her body, and she made little effort to resist when he grasped her wrists and shackled them to the frame. She kicked helplessly when he reached for a leg, and all he had to do was press his full weight on her thighs. As the legs were depressed the dozens of wood slivers stabbed into her bare skin and created a new, different kind of stinging pain that took her breath away. 

Momentarily stunned, there was nothing she could do to prevent him from locking a shackle around one knee and ankle, and then the other. She struggled against the iron shackles as many did before her, and found them unrelenting in their purpose. Her sobs echoed in the chamber and she looked at him with hatred and betrayal in her otherwise attractive brown eyes.

"Why?" she questioned in a whisper, realizing that nothing would stop his abuse and she was helpless to resist any torture that he could conceive. "Please, answer me that. Just tell me why."

"To relieve the loneliness and depression of another much like yourself," he answered.

Physically and emotionally exhausted, all hope now lost, she leaned back and found a narrow board was in place to support her back. Her eyes watched as his right hand reached for a lever and pulled it. When she felt the table shifting she looked down and watched as it separated beneath her legs, forcing her thighs far apart. Not until she was fully spread and her virtue bared did the motion halt.

It was very dark where they were, and shadows cloaked her naked form from the light of the torch. Although he felt no particular attraction to the woman he wanted to see her, and for her to see herself. He stepped away, retrieved the torch, and placed it in a holder closer by. She watched his every move for the slightest hint of what would next have to be endured.

When he gazed down at her virtue her own eyes followed his. Dark curls flanked the pink center, which glistened with moisture. There was no denying the warmth in her belly, for despite the pain it had also been strangely arousing. She willed it not to be true, but it could no longer be denied when her eyes viewed evidence of her flowing essence.

A hand reached down, and the tip of a single finger touched the gentle folds. The breath caught in her throat and her body tensed. Her eyes closed as she tried to control her body, but it had a mind of its own. Nothing she could do could prevent the tingling warmth from rippling through her flesh. She didn't look but the woman sensed her captor was smiling.

William pulled his clothing open and revealed his erection. The woman looked down and saw him. Her head moved back and forth, and her whispered voice begged him not to take her innocence. She looked at him for the slightest spark of compassion, but when his soft blue eyes glowed red her blood curdled and she screamed in terror. He wanted her to scream, for Juliette's sake.