Seven - The Fear

Awareness returned slowly. Solana stirred, opened her eyes into blackness. H er first awarenes s w as burning pain in her rectum, though less intense than she might have thought. The spike had done no permanent damage, her burn s w ere superficial.

Gradually, Solana realised that she lay on her back, on wood: arm s w ide above her head, thick ropes about her wrists. H er leg s w ere uncomfortably spread, so wide she could feel the cool air on her labia. It was pitch dark. The air was cold, gooseflesh covering her naked skin, her nipples jutting into the blackness. Water dripped: from the lack of echo, she judged herself to be in a small cell.

She was stretched taut, spreadeagled and tightly bound: she tried to move, and managed a little leverage, hearing the ropes creak, but there was no way she could bring her wrists together and free herself, nor tug her feet from their wide confinement.

Long hours crawled by.

Lying on her back, stretched out, Solana had never felt so exposed, so vulnerable, so absolutely helpless. H er limbs, for all their strength, were useless. H er torso ached from the slow strain of muscles unused to such restraint.

After eight hours, the shuk of a bolt being drawn snapped her from her dazed state. A door swung open, the light of an oil lantern spilling inside. Solana's stomach tightened. Two figures entered: the graceful, muscular form of Luisa Consuela, and the slighter figure of Maria. The latter carried a basket in one hand, a lantern in the other.

Luisa's deep voice reverberated in the cell. “Ah. You are awake. Good.”

“Where am I?” Solana's voice wa s w eak, shaky with exhaustion and fear.

“Take a look.” By the lantern, Solana saw that she lay in a cell, twenty feet square. It was more roughly hewn than her former prison, the stones ragged. Water dripped from fissures in the walls. In a corner, by a niche in which a single unlit candle stood, was an ancient pulpit, a Bible open upon its stand.

Solana lifted her head to look along her own spreadeagled body. She saw at once that she lay upon a great wooden bed, her ankles roped to iron rings at the bed's base. Tipping her head back, she saw that the ropes from her wrists ran to a sturdy winch with a single four-handled ratchet.

Luisa Consuela was smiling. “You lie upon the rack. Thi s w ill break you. One way or another.”

Solana was terrified. From where she lay, she fixed her eyes to the beautiful torturer. “Please, have mercy – I cannot confess!”

Luisa laughed. “I love to see you so afraid! Girl, give her water.”

Maria obediently stepped forward. Solana accepted the carafe offered to her lips, drinking deeply to quench the agony of thirst. A little food followed, bread, interspersed with sips of the water. Solana's shrunken stomach could accept little though, and Maria stepped away. Luisa now idled to the wooden lever that would turn the roller.

H er hands closed around the lever, and she cranked it over. The roller turned. By her bound wrists, Solana's arm s w ere drawn an inch tauter. Strain spread down her sides, through her hips, down her legs. A second notch. Unexpectedly, pain flared. Solana tipped her head, her mouth opening as a muffled pop came from deep inside her shoulders, and the pain spread hotly, along her arms, deep in her hip-joints, down the muscles of her back. H er ribcage jutted starkly, breasts drawn flat and gleaming in the orange light, nipples stiff in defiance of her pain. Sweat began to bead on her skin, adding to the shine of her coffee skin. H er belly shifted rapidly with fearful breath.

Luisa released the lever, looked over the woman on the rack. Solana's hands, squeezed beyond the ropes, feet moored firmly; her legs long and taut, her stomach hard. “You are now prepared for torture.”

Prepared? The question was plain on Solana's face.

“When I next speak to you,” Luisa explained slowly, “it will be to ask for your confession. If you do not give it, I will begin torture. You will be stretched to the tenth turn of the rack.” There were tears, now, in Solana's eyes. H er breasts quivered with each fearful breath. Luisa went on. “I warn you, nobody has ever survived the eleventh turn: some have died even on the seventh. So think carefully.”

“I am no witch,” Solana said quietly. “You need not make me suffer so, to know it.”

Luisa reached out, put a cool hand to Solana's ear, fingers stroking through thick hair. “You are a beautiful woman. It shall be a pleasure to work on you.”

The door was slammed shut, locked and barred.

 

W

 

Luisa Consuela sighed. Perhaps she had been doing this for too long?

H er father had grown ill when she was just seven. An accomplished torturer for almost forty years, he had been a compassionate man outside the dungeons in which he practised his craft, and had taken pride in hi s w ork. H e rarely spilled blood, never maimed, and almost always gained confession, driven by a pious heart, and the patience of a monk. Though hi s w ife died having never borne him a son, he loved his only daughter deeply. Upon learning of his own poor health, he had started teaching her how to torture; taking her to see how the machines of the dungeon worked, how to gain the most effect with the least effort. She had exceeded all his expectations, learning quickly, growing into a strong and wise young woman. On her sixteenth birthday, he had taken her before the Inquisitor, asking that she be chosen as his replacement. Loath to break with tradition and place a woman in such a role, the Clergy had been hesitant: but upon demonstration of her skills in the torture chamber, they agreed to let her work as an apprentice.

That was twenty five years ago. For the last eighteen, she had been Torturer In Chief, and her work was second nature. She barely heard the frantic pleas of Esmerelda, as she turned the screw of first one breast-vice, then the other. The scream s w ere shrill, frantic, the woman twisting from her wrist-manacles like a fish on a hook as her blue-black breast s w ere crushed by the fierce metal teeth.

“Mercy, mercy, mercy, mercy, ohhhhhhh!”

Twenty-four hours after first being hoisted from the floor, Esmerelda still hung by her wrists in the torture chamber. H er brown skin shone, her petite toe s w ere just inches from the floor as she kicked in desperation and pain.

Luisa Consuela could not stop thinking about Solana Degas.

She had tortured many beautiful women in her time, and many strong ones. But never had she come across a prisoner with such a mix of all that was good in people. Beauty, intelligence, spirit, integrity. Solana did not try to hide her fear, nor her screams, as some did. Nor did she make desperate promises in a bid to escape the pain. She suffered as any human would, letting go of her dignity, but never doubting her own innocence.

Luisa returned to the brazier, pulled on a heavy gauntlet. With one hand, she pumped the bellows, making the coals roar. She turned the branding iron, giving it a final burst of heat. It was ready, shimmering, white hot.

Luisa returned to the twisting, moaning Esmerelda, steadied the woman with a hand on one slick hip, and pressed the white-hot tip of iron to the base of Esmerelda's spine, just above her gleaming buttocks. There was a soft popping sound, a puff of steam, the squealing and spitting of flesh burning. Esmerelda jolted violently, then roared in agony, throwing her head about, her feet thrashing.

Luisa lifted the iron away, taking burnt flesh with it. Esmerelda still screamed, steam and smoke rising from the angry red wound above her buttocks. Tears streamed down her face, the torture of her breasts forgotten in this new excruciating agony.

“Confess!” Luisa pressed the iron's fiery bar a second time to Esmerelda's flesh. The young woman bucked in her fetters, kicking her feet, screaming and screaming as her skin crawled back beneath the hot metal.

What were these feelings? Luisa wanted to break Solana, to control her - and yet, part of her hated inflicting such pain on the beautiful mulatto. Nor did she want to hear a false confession from those lips: that would only mean Solana would be taken away to the flames. She wanted to keep Solana here, in the dungeon. But even that would soon rob her of sanity, age that perfect body, wear lines of misery into her beautiful face.

Luisa returned the iron to the brazier, while Esmerelda hung, sobbing uncontrollably. H er whole body was running with sweat, drenched as if she had been submerged in water. Nearby, the scribe wrote, the Bailiff stood with arms folded. Luisa was sweating too, her tunic clinging to her wet body as she drew another smoking iron from the fire. She approached the limp Esmerelda, paused, then pressed the shimmering metal into her armpit.

Steam exploded from Esmerelda's flesh, tiny flames erupted around the brand, and Esmerelda gave a hideous scream, jerking about in the manacles. She screamed for the full fifteen seconds that the brand burned into her, and, when it was finally pulled free of her damaged flesh, her wail was full of misery.

“I confess!”

The scribe stepped forward. “Say again!”

“I confess,” Esmerelda sobbed. “I confess to witchcraft. I am a witch, please, just stop the torture, I will sign anything you want ...”

Esmerelda's tongue was finally loosened. Luisa's job was done, and the torturer returned the iron to the brazier.