
1666 Ring around the rosies, A pocketful of posies


1668 06-79 Beltaine! Beltaine! I think I’m in twubble

PREVIOUSLY: Penny’s and Chas’s wrists are restrained, and they have been completely deprived of vision, hearing, smell, and taste. Penny is still trying to fully comprehend what the spelled panties have done to her. NOW:
And it wasn’t just her sense of smell that had been taken from her: she couldn’t taste anything! She’d never even been aware her own mouth had a flavor until that was taken away. Indeed, she could hardly even feel her mouth properly, her tongue insisting that it could sense the shapes of her teeth and lips, but the total absence of any taste insisted equally to her tongue that anything it imagined it felt was a lie, because her tongue was clearly not working at all.
Thus left without sensation except the nerves in her skin, Penny was left to consider the true and full meaning of being “senseless,” and wrestle with the idea that having her last remaining feeling taken away would be… unbearable.
And then she felt a pair of hands on her shoulders, urging her counterclockwise, insisting she turn where she stood. And after she had turned, the hands continued to urge her to turn more, until she understood she was meant to spin like a whirling dervish, around and around, faster and faster, prodded and finally, even lightly slapped, every time she was too slow or stupid to please her master, wishing she could still taste the salt of her own tear dripping down over her lip to confirm she was still alive. Her master kept spinning and spinning her until she started feeling so dizzy she couldn’t even keep her balance.
And at that instant, that very moment when her nerves were so jangled and confused she started to fall over, the hands were gone and she was on her own.
She careened, stumbled on her own high heel, and fell onto the hard stone, barely having the presence of mind to keep her head from cracking on the unforgiving, unyielding surface, even as her shoulder and back slammed into it. She had no idea where she was or how she was oriented except her memory’s and body’s insistence she was still on the same platform where she had been bound. But she couldn’t say whether she was facing the jungle gym, the bed, the glass platform, or the pool. She didn’t even know if she was facing the edge of the platform, or the stairwell in the center.
She wasn’t even sure she could get to her feet if she tried, certainly not in high heels with her hands cuffed behind her back. Not that she did try. What was the point? The very best thing she could hope for was to walk straight into the side of the pool or the crib or the jungle gym, and fall back onto her bottom again without cracking her skull. If she was unlucky, she would walk off one of the edges of the platform and fall two stories to a likely death upon impact. But supposing she survived the fall, she would be shredded or eaten or—whatever the hell devils and demons did to victims who fell into their midst. The only way she could get off the platform without such a gruesome fate would be if she managed to find her way to the stairway in the middle of the platform. But it was three flights—50 or 60 hard, steep stone stairs—down to the basement passageway, and she couldn’t even use her hands to steady herself. She reckoned her chances of making it to the bottom without breaking her own neck at close to zero.
Slowly, glacially, the absolute certainty swept over her that she daren’t do anything at all except to keep breathing (and even that was at her masters’ pleasure!) and wait for her Esmeray’s mercy. Hanim Qahramanah’s mercy, she corrected herself, mindful of how important it had suddenly become for her to keep the disturbing woman happy. Penny didn’t even have the wherewithal to find her and beg her for guidance; she couldn’t sense her, she certainly couldn’t catch her if she dodged or fled, and she couldn’t even risk moving to search for her.
So she half-sat, half-lay there, on the stone, elbow throbbing where it had slammed into the hard rock, contemplating the depth of her plight.
Hanim Qahramanah left her there for what seemed like forever…
So she lay where and as she had fallen, shaking and weeping, unable to even hear herself beyond the gasping in her own throat and the humming vibrations of her cries through her own flesh. She was pining and desperate for her qahramanah to come and touch her, perhaps even help her to her feet, or even use her as a footstool. Or an ashtray—she would take anything! She really needed Esmeray or Channah to touch her, pretty please with sugar on top! To reassure her she wasn’t all alone and abandoned on what surely, must literally be, this godforsaken platform.
But all she could feel were the stones beneath her and the hot, moist, still air around her. All she could hear were the half-crying, half-gargling sounds she made in her own throat and strangled to death before they could escape from around her gag. She smelled nothing, tasted nothing, saw nothing.
She’d never felt so helpless in her life. Hanim Qahramanah let Penny contemplate how very, very deeply she needed and craved being mastered.
Literature Section “06-79 The Disorientation and Abandonment of Penny”—Part 79 of Chapter Six, “Le Saccage de la Sale Bête Rouge” (“Rampage of the Dirty Red Beast”)—879 words—Accompanying Images: 1666-1669—Published 2025-05-01—©2025 The Remainderman. This is a work of fiction, not a book of suggestions. It’s filled with fantasies, idiots, and criminals. Don’t believe them or imitate them.