Chapter 7

Anita wasn't sure what she thought of being ordered to become a table. She assumed it was another test, another way Marshall was determining if she were worthy of his time, or of seeing just how far she was willing to obey him.

As her body started seriously protesting being stuck in the same position for so long, she started to wonder how much longer she could put up with the testing. If all he was going to do was have her spend time on her knees waiting for him to do something, was he worthy of her time and her body?

When she'd found the hidden door to The Playground, seen all of the things in the room, the implements of ecstatic cruelty all neatly displayed, her heart had skipped a beat and her skin came alive at the thought of those strips of leather slashing across her back, those wooden paddles reddening her ass, struggling against the cuffs and restraints. Her thigh muscles had parted slightly of their own accord in anticipation of taking him in, her body clenched and grew slick at the thought of forced down and penetrated suddenly without preamble or preparation. She saw the room and everything in it, and Marshall in those leather pants and tall boots, and she prepared herself to be assaulted by his lust. She had not prepared herself to sit still and only exchange a few words with him, nibble at some stupidly expensive fruit and drink water from a straw like she was some sort of little caged pet.

Anita had come to Marshall with the intent of serving him in a way that benefitted them both, and he'd been keeping her in a static position, not advancing, not receiving her reward for her service. Much like she'd come to his company with the intent of serving it in a mutually rewarding way, and she ended up with a cold manager to put her into an uncomfortable position where she extracted effort from her, but never gave anything back, didn't let her move or go anywhere, didn't reward her.

She was tempted to chuckle at her comparison of him to the ugly, spiteful Woolever. That would certainly get his attention, get him to engage with her. The little laughter might even shake her back just enough to spill that glass of wine, send the deep, red liquid splattering on the luxurious pale carpet. That would certainly get her punished. Maybe he'd drag her by the hair over to that big X of wood and give her a proper beating.

Just before she gave in to that temptation, as her throat readied to release a scoffing breath, she was reminded of the leather strap around her neck. The collar was the sign of an agreement between them. She'd accepted the collar, promised him complete and unquestioning obedience and compliance to his will. He, for his part, had promised to be hard and cruel to her, but he had not specified how. Just that he was going to use her as he would, and she would do exactly as he'd said.

Her mind turned that agreement over, examining it. He had not promised her sex, had not promised her ecstasy or orgasmic release of tension, had not promised her two days of blissful pain and exhaustion. He had told her he would be demanding, and Anita had accepted that without taking the time to learn what exactly he meant by that. Her mistake.

She closed her eyes and took as deep a breath as she dared. That little brief turn in her internal conversation woke that submissive part of her and gave it an actual voice. It reminded Anita that she had agreed to be his property for two full days, and that as his property her sole duty was to do what he asked of her. It was his right, as a Dominant to use her however he saw fit, to make her miserable, and to deny her any and all pleasure. Her duty as a Submissive to him was to please him and only him, regardless of whether she took any pleasure herself. If her suffering and frustration pleased him, she had to accept that as surely as she had to accept that the sun rose in the east and that gravity existed.

As she became resigned to that reality, Anita felt a thin thread of arousal rise within her again. It came from some part deep within her, not from her body or even any erotic thoughts. It was unrelated to touching herself or being touched, nothing like the turn on of watching porn or reading erotic stories or spinning fantasies about a particularly handsome man she might pass on the sidewalk. This arousal she was feeling while holding a cutting board and glass of wine on her back seemed to come from a sense of deep contentment. Surrendering completely to Marshall's whims and will, relinquishing all responsibility for anything and everything, put her in a place where she felt centered within herself.

It turned her on in some way that was not tied to any part of her body. In fact, it didn't even seem to come from anywhere inside of her. It seemed to emanate from the atmosphere around her, as if she was bathing in it, breathing it in, like it somehow infused the light in the room, or was a component of the sound of her breath and of a knife parting the firm flesh of an apple as Marshall cut it. Experimentally, she tightened her thighs, to see if she could amplify that essence of arousal that imbued the entire world around her by gently stimulating her body. It worked, squeezing her thighs and her internal muscles stimulated the nerves inside of her, put pressure on her clit, made her lips slide ever so slightly against each other. She trembled with the little jolt of pleasure that gave her, with the awareness that she was coming perilously close to upsetting the glass on her back. But as soon as she became aware of the physical pleasure within her body, that other deeper, purer pleasure, winked right out of existence as if it were never there, leaving such an emptiness around her that she felt one of her elbows threaten to buckle and break the posture she'd been carefully holding for so long.

She felt so lost with the complete and instantaneous cessation of that peaceful feeling of pure sensuality that she had to fight to keep a sob from escaping her. A single tear formed in her left eye and ran down her nose where it lingered for a long time until it fell to the floor. She let the miniscule tickle of the droplet of water lingering distract her from the fact that her calves were threatening to cramp up and that her arms were becoming weaker. Anita didn't know how much longer she had before her body would not be able to retain the position she'd been ordered to hold, but it was only a couple more minutes at most. The word 'Warning' came to mind. He'd told her he needed to trust that she would mind her boundaries. He expected her to let him push against them, but to still stop him before he pushed past one into territory that would genuinely harm her. Anita knew she was physically very close to the limits of what her body could take. She decided to give herself thirty seconds. At thirty seconds, she would decide whether she needed to call 'Warning' or if she felt she could hold for another thirty seconds.

Marshall had been holding his hand on her shoulder for some time, she realized. As she focused on the sensation of his skin on hers, counting down the seconds, she realized that he was reading her body. Yes, he slowly stroked along her back, letting his fingers brush ever so lightly across her leaving a tingling trail of pleasure in their wake, but he was also clearly using them to listen to her muscles below the skin. Marshall was not neglecting her. He was not eating and drinking and reading with no care in the world for her situation. Marshall was using multiple senses to monitor how she was doing.

That knowledge kept her going when she finished counting down her thirty seconds. She committed to at least thirty more, and started to count again. She also thought back to the conversation about safe signals and remembered another word he'd given her. Alter.

Was she willing to try 'Alter' if her body became physically incapable of holding the table position? Was she willing to let him continue to try and test her endurance and her willingness to simply put up with slow torture from him for even longer?

'Why should I?' she asked herself. 'Why give this to him? I teased myself for a full day before coming here, denying myself pleasure because I decided it belonged to him, because I'd decided to give him control of my pleasure. But why? Why give him that?'

She reached thirty seconds again. Marshall's hand remained on her back, moving from place to place, still feeling her out. She didn't know why, but she committed to another thirty seconds and started counting down.

'We are in a cage,' a voice inside of her said. 'Sir has us in a cage.'

'I don't want to be caged,' she argued back against that voice. 'I've wasted too many years of my life inside of cages. Including several years in a cage in this very building!'

'This cage is different,' the little voice said.

'How?' Anita asked.

Thirty more seconds had passed. She started counting again.

'All of those other cages were designed to keep us trapped, keep us small and impotent and useless.'

'Yeah? How is this one any different?'

The voice drew Anita's attention to Marshall's hand on her back. He was pulling it back. A second later, she felt the wine glass leave her back, the cutting board, too. 'This cage not only keeps us in, it keeps everything else out. In Sir's cage, we are safe.'

"Stand up, Miss Rhodes."

At first, Anita did not understand. She had been so focused on her conversation within that the sudden arrival of words from outside of her took her aback. She had to stop her thoughts and mentally replay the words she'd just heard. She had to parse each word individually, but they made no sense taken separately. "Stand." "Up." "Miss." "Rhodes." What did they mean?

"Miss Rhodes?"

Marshall. It was Mr. Marshall speaking to her.

'Sir,' the little voice within said, 'There is no Mr. Marshall. Just Sir.'

"Sir?" Anita said, slowly, having a hard time catching her breath against the sudden awareness that a deep agony had formed in her muscles as she'd held herself in the same position for so long. There was a much more acute pain in her knees, from having spent so much time on them. Not only while playing table, but during the ten minutes she'd spent before that kneeling in the living room.

"Stand up, Miss Rhodes."

Anita could hear that it was a very definite order, but there was also a gentleness to it, a little hint of concern for her.

"Yes, Sir," she said.

"Take your time," Marshall said, offering her a hand. She and used it to steady herself as she stood. She had to also put her hand on the back of his chair to keep her balance as blood started to move freely around her body again, making her light headed.

"Do you need to use the restroom, Miss Rhodes?"

"May I please, Sir?"

Sir pointed to the side table beside his armchair, opposite of the side where she was. "You may, but first take all this back to the kitchen. Cork the wine bottle, cheese into the refrigerator, dishes rinsed then placed in the dishwasher." Sir pointed to a spot on the floor right in front of him. "When all of that is finished, you may tend to yourself briefly, then return to me. No need to crawl in this time, you may walk, and you will present yourself to me, right here."

"Yes, Sir," Anita said, clearing the dishes from the side table. She had to walk out of the room very carefully, because she was still slightly dizzy from her recent exertion. The break was very good for her. Not only did it allow her time to physically re-center and get feeling back into all of her limbs, get the lightness out of her head and the queasiness out of her stomach, but it also gave her a few minutes to absorb the conversation she'd been having inside of herself at the end of the table ordeal. She wondered at the little voice that she'd started conversing with. She tried to summon it, but there was no reply, no other presence or entity within her. There was no indication of where that voice had come from, what it represented. As much as the loss of that strangely external arousal, the sudden lack of that voice disturbed her in a way she couldn't fully understand or describe.

She wasn't sure it was a bad thing that she couldn't pull it back up on demand, though. She had found that voice, and the strange erotic space, both in times of duress. Maybe they only existed in those times. The idea of being pushed back into that space again to continue the conversation fascinated Anita, drew her on, left her with a renewed drive to go to Sir and see what more he had in store for her. She did have to admit that she hoped it was something more active and assertive than playing furniture again, but if that was what he had in mind, if it would push her hard enough to give the hidden, small voice a chance to speak again, she'd do it.

The last thing Anita did in the restroom before returning to Sir was to run a warm washcloth over her body, to freshen everything up for him. The hot arousal on the bus ride over, the thrill of completing the dance of flirtation that lead to Sir bringing her inside, the explanation of the rules, the time spent making sure she wanted everything he offered for the weekend, the collaring, the testing he'd put her through. Anita had been through a wild ride of emotions and her body had turned on and off. Hoping that Sir was about to get much more personal, Anita wanted to make sure she was clean and sweet for him.

Every step of the walk back to The Playground was with a renewed sense of purpose. She kept her eyes to the floor as she approached him, but kept her back straight and her stride steady. Anita planted herself in front of him, feet just a bit apart, arms at her sides, but this time, they were relaxed instead of tense, her hands loose and still, whereas before, her fingers had flexed and fidgeted.

"What would you have of me next, Sir?"

He shifted a bit in his armchair and let his right leg open, tightening the leather pants against his crotch. For the first time, she noticed they did not have a typical zipper or button fly, but were laced. This observation was incidental to her noticing with pleasure the size and shape of the bulge inside. Anita knew what a nice half-erection looked like in tight pants, and early indications were that Sir was quite nicely proportioned. It was also the first tangible sign she'd seen that his body wanted hers, and that forced her to keep her thoughts on listening for her next instruction instead of letting her desires for what she'd like him to do with that body run away with her.

"You impress me, Miss Rhodes," he told her.

"I am here to serve and please you, Sir."

"Most Submissives I've seen hold that position as long as you had were trained to it. Your ability to endure it speaks well of your dedication."

"I am yours, Sir."

"I know, Miss Rhodes. You don't need to remind me of that fact."

"Of course, Sir."

"Out of curiosity, how close were you to giving up when we stopped?"

"I was checking in on myself every thirty seconds. I was close to calling 'Warning', then decided to offer 'Alter' instead when the time came, Sir."

"I must admit that I find myself in a bit of a quandary right now, Miss Rhodes. I had intended a certain progression of events today, but your exemplary service to me thus far, and the simple and unadorned beauty of your body have got me, if I may be a bit crude, hornier than a drunk goat. There's simply no way I will be able to give the next event the concentration required unless I take the edge off." Sir pulled a free end of the lacing on his pants and the knot collapsed. He loosened the laces, but did not reveal what was behind them quite yet.

Anita did not know what to say. If she told Sir she was free for him to use, he would remind her that he knew that. Asking what he desired did not seem like the proper thing to do, either. She settled for watching his hands and keeping silent.

Sir ran one single finger up and down the bulge in his pants several times while she stood there. One by one, he loosened the laces even more, and then slipped just the tip out over the waistband. "I will remind you that you consented to give me full access to every part of your body, Miss Rhodes."

"I still consent, Sir." She tried, but she could not keep the desperation from her voice. She wanted nothing more than to have him stop teasing and make use of her. She didn't care how he took his use of her, she just wanted to touch him, to feel that marvelous piece of flesh that was barely peeking out at her.

"Thank you for reaffirming that, Miss Rhodes. Take a step back, please."

Anita stepped away.

Sir got out of his chair and walked toward the door of The Playground. "Follow me, Miss Rhodes." He led her to the bedroom, and pointed to the bed, and said, "On your side, head here."

"Yes, Sir." Anita crawled onto the bed and rolled over onto her right side, wriggling a bit to put her head exactly in front of him. The position put the laces of his pants directly in front of her. He was so well aligned with her mouth as he stood at ease that she wondered if the bed had been built to the exact height necessary for him to stand beside it and make use of a woman laying on it.

"Under different circumstances, you'd be providing this service while kneeling tall for me, but your knees need a break." He ran his hand through her hair, but made no move toward his pants.

Anita did not think it was on her to remove or reposition any of his clothing, so she held still. "If it would please you, Sir, I will go back to my knees for you. I will kneel for you all day long if you command."

"No, Miss Rhodes. Your legs still need time to recover. I don't want you distracted by discomfort, I want you focused completely on only one thing."

"Yes, Sir."

"This will help," Sir said, opening the drawer on the nightstand. He took out an eye mask. Not one of the simple little sleep masks made of a piece of fabric, but one of leather with a padded edge and a buckle strap. Anita lifted her head so he could put it on her, then settled it back down.

Sir stroked her hair a few more times, then touched a finger to her lips. Anita gently kissed it, and when he pushed it forward, she opened her mouth for him and let her slip it inside. She ran her tongue over his finger, sucking gently, letting her eyes fall closed in the darkness of the mask, bringing her attention fully onto the part of him in her mouth. She got herself so consumed by what she was doing that she never noticed what his other hand had been up to until he pulled his finger out of her mouth and touched the head of his cock to her lips.

Anita did her best to not open wide and greedily take the whole thing in all at once. This was the first time Sir was letting her touch him. She needed to bring the best she had. An old ad slogan went through her mind. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. Apparently, she'd impressed Sir so far with her self-discipline and ability to be still and steady. Now it was time to let him know how she could actively please him. She'd never felt more pressure on herself when it came to sucking cock - not even the very first time she'd given a blowjob and had no idea what she was doing. But the pressure entranced her. She felt like she had never before needed to suck a dick so perfectly as she did at that moment, and she relished the challenge. The first challenges of the day seemed to have put her in a mood to challenge herself and see just what she was capable of.

And if the challenge at hand was now to suck Sir like he'd never been sucked before, she was going to give it everything she had.

She started by holding him delicately with her fingertips and darting her tongue over the tip of the head, feeling him out, listening carefully for any reaction on his part. Concentrated attention on the head itself got little shivers and quivers out of him that she appreciated. Her next stop was the little spot on the underside of the penis, where the shaft and head met. She loved to play right there, finding that was the spot on most of her prior partners where the sensitivity was perfect for her to play. Licking there, kissing, sometimes pursing her lips to suck on the skin right at the spot changed Sir's breathing a lot. It was deep and content. Yes, that was indeed the spot for him, the one she needed to keep in mind.

While she kept her mouth busy, her hand started to work more, keeping a light grip on his shaft while simultaneously keeping up a slow and steady stroke. He rapidly became fully erect under her ministrations, which got her started on the next step, which would be to finally stop with the preliminaries and take him in. She backed off a bit, kissed the tip and opened her mouth, ready to welcome him when Sir sidestepped toward her feet. He had done so carefully, not pulling himself out of her hand, so she chose to follow, chasing him with a darting tongue until he stopped moving and she was able to get her lips around him.

At the same time, she felt him lift her legs and slide something under them. Rope. He snugged it up and while she began to suck on him, she felt him tie a knot, binding her thighs shut. She worked him with her hand and mouth, all the while feeling an erotic thrill she had not felt for years as he continued to wrap and knot the rope around her legs.

Anita was certain she was pleasing him as his hips started to rock in rhythm with her attentions. She adored the feeling of him, rock hard, inside of her mouth, as she worked him as deep as she could handle. Sir pushed against the back of her throat gently, enough to encourage her to try and relax as much as she could to keep from gagging on him. She let her breathing slow, gently in and out as she worked his entire length. It did not take long for her to start feeling the preliminary tension in his body that let her know she was leading him well down the path to orgasm.

Sir put a finger on her left elbow and slid it up toward her hand. He slipped his fingers around her wrist and pulled it away from his cock, and before she knew it, he slipped a loop of rope around it. He gave the rope a firm tug, and it closed around her wrist. A second tug, and her hand was pulled down to the rope around her thighs, and secured there.

Anita did not let that stop her. She had two hands, even if it was harder to user her right one while laying on that side. Naturally, Sir wasted no time in capturing that wrist as well and pulling it down to her thigh. She could tell that taking the use of her hands away distracted him a bit from his pleasure, so she started to suck harder and twist her neck to increase the sensation she was giving him with her mouth. Her reward was a resurgence of his stiffness and more insistence in the gentle thrusts of his hips. Sir grabbed her hair, but did not immediately use it to control the pace and depth of her attentions. Gradually, though, he shifted their dynamic to where he was the one clearly in charge. The hand in her hair had taken on an iron grip, holding her very still. No matter how hard she tried to relax, he started to gag her as he repeatedly tested just how deep he could go in her. Sir did not jam himself down her throat, but he was very clearly enjoying the sensation of her muscles spasming around the head of his cock whenever he got too deep.

"Ready for a little game?" Sir asked, suddenly pulling out of her so fast she was sure her jaw was going to slam shut.

"Anything you wish, Sir," Anita choked out, swallowing hard since the semi-rough treatment had her drooling heavily.

Sir grabbed the side of her chest, digging in with his fingers. He had an amazingly strong grip that set her immediately to writhing in pain as he squeezed the skin and twisted it, just for a couple of seconds. Anita gritted her teeth to keep from crying out.

"Finish me before you call 'Warning'," Sir said, grasping the back of her head and pulling her mouth back to his erect and pulsing cock.

Anita nodded her head and tried to make some sort of an affirmative grunt. He renewed his torturous grip on the side of her rib cage, while keeping a firm grip on her hair to keep her mouth where he wanted it.

She wasn't exactly sure where the game part of the exercise came in. She was no longer servicing him, he was straight up fucking her mouth while she tried to wriggle or twist away from the hand on her side. There was no room for her to use any of her oral skills on him. All she could do was endure his cruelty, again.

At least this new test was active instead of passive. No kneeling very still anymore, waiting for him to decide she'd proven herself a useful piece of furniture. This test was intense and aggressive, and him demonstrating in no uncertain terms how much power he had over her. The ropes around her thighs limited the motion of her legs just enough that she wasn't able to use them to get proper leverage and get away from him. Having her wrists bound to her thighs as well didn't seem like that much of a restriction at first, but that was also amazingly effective at letting him control her. The hand Sir was gripping her chest with not only pulled and jerked her from side to side, it also pressed her into the bed, another bar in the cage he'd built around her to keep her right where he wanted her.

'A beautiful cage,' the small voice inside of Anita said.

"Watch the teeth, bitch," Sir said.

Anita forced her mouth to open wide.

'The cage keeps us safe,' Anita's tiny companion told her. 'Sir is completely in control. Feel...'

She followed where the voice drew her attention. Below the neck, Anita was bucking and struggling fiercely, yet her head was almost completely still. Sir was using her hair to keep her from accidentally jamming his cock all the way down her throat as she struggled. In fact, he was pumping himself in and out of her mouth in a remarkably calm manner, in contrast to the way she was flailing all over the bed.

'Follow me...'

Anita lost herself in the soft and quiet brush of the inner voice against her consciousness. It took a tremendous amount of effort and concentration for her to hear the voice over the sound of her gagging on Sir, the pounding of blood in her ears, her raspy breath, the sound of her body flopping all over the bed. But once the voice captured her, all of that melted away.

The last thing Anita remembered was a triumphant shout from Sir, and a blast of hot semen flooding her mouth, and then everything faded to black.

There was no way for her to know how long she'd been out, but it was long enough for Sir to remove the blackout mask and ropes, and carry her to the big, plush beanbag chair in The Playground. She was nestled under a fluffy, warm blanket. Sir was still completely dressed, and had even tucked himself back into his pants and laced them up tight again.

"Drink," Sir said, brushing the hair from her temple and offering her a glass of something sweet smelling and cold. Her mouth was still thick with the taste of him, her jaw and throat sore from the rough treatment he'd given her, and her side, where he'd gripped her, still throbbed. Despite that, Anita felt content. She shook her head and leaned away from the glass, not wanting to wash away Sir's gift quite yet. The taste of him was strong, but not bitter or unpleasant. She wondered if his silly overpriced Japanese fruit had anything to do with that.

"Drink," he repeated, letting a little of his dominant edge into his voice. "You need it."

"Yes, Sir," Anita said and opened her mouth so he could pour a little of the liquid in. Once it hit, she became aware of just how thirsty she was, and took the glass from him, draining it. When he took it from her, she looked at him questioningly.

"Let that settle for a second, and I'll give you more. Here." Speaking of his fancy fruit, he offered her a couple slices of apple, before turning to refill the glass from a pitcher on the floor on the other side of him.

"What is this?"

"How should you address me, Miss Rhodes?"

"Sorry. What is this, Sir?"

"That's better," he said. "It's spring water with honey, and a light infusion of spices."

Anita took another long drink from the glass, and accepted another slice of apple. "I'm sorry that I passed out on you, Sir."

"You didn't pass out. You found deep subspace."

"What, Sir?" Anita asked. She'd heard the term before, but had never known exactly what it was.

"I pushed you out of your conscious mind. You were in an altered state of consciousness, like a deep trance." He nudged her sideways, and joined her on the beanbag, wrapping an arm around her and pulling her close.

Anita threw an arm across him and buried her head into his shoulder. She took one deep breath, and several massive sobs wracked her body. Sir embraced her, wrapping his arms around her and holding her tight. He softly stroked her hair and planted small kisses on the top of her head until she settled and looked up at him.

"I'm sorry, Sir. You're supposed to be punishing me this weekend, not babying me."

"No, Miss Rhodes. If I push you down into subspace, it is my responsibility to bring you back. Food and water will center you, emotionally, and help you cope with the physiological effects of the endorphins and adrenaline and their withdrawal. Close contact and gentleness helps with the emotional effects."

"Does this happen a lot?"

"Sir..."

"Does this happen a lot, Sir?" Anita asked.

"It varies from person to person. Some go into it easier or deeper than others. Some never experience it."

"Did I go into it easy, Sir?"

"Don't compare yourself to others, Miss Rhodes. There is no right or wrong, no easy or hard with this. How you respond to me is all that matters. You went down because it was the right thing for you to do then. That is the only thing that is important."

"Yes, Sir."

He poured her one more glass of sweetened water and set the plate of sliced apple on her lap. "When you finish this, we will move on. Take your time."