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Stern met Tom Candler bare naked and on the wrong end of his switch in the pillory.
It was likely he’d seen the lad around town before, and even possible that Stern had switched his hand for childhood wrongdoing. But it wasn’t until Tom was caught spying on a woman in her bath, and was brought up before the town for his first adult punishment, that Stern cared enough to learn his name, and face, and eyes.
These were remorseless eyes, Stern thought. Sullen at being caught in something he didn’t think was wrong. But it was wrong, and Tom would be taught as much, according to the traditions of the land.
Tom kept his bare thighs clamped together and his red face down as Mayor Lea explained the crime and the chastisement. Children watched with deep gravity, or else were nudged by their parents not to make light of the punishment that awaited their future misdeeds. Most people eventually had a turn or two in the pillory under Stern’s switch; it was the nature of being human. The responsibility of the community was to correct their neighbours with gravity and compassion.
Tom Candler was given his chance to express remorse— which he did in a mutter, to general disapproval— and Magistrate Alder ordered five strokes. A very standard first chastisement, even if Stern thought it was too light for violating someone's privacy in the nude.
So Stern went hard on him. The lad was clenching his arse tight in humiliation at his exposure even before Stern lifted the switch. (Good— humiliation was as much a part of chastisement as the strokes.) Without so much as a warning tap, Stern drew back and slashed down on Tom’s arse.
The screaming was terrible. Only the youngest children flinched away, but they were all stricken by it. (Good also. The public example of chastisement went far to keeping Stern idle.)
A scarlet stripe had bloomed on Tom’s arse before he’d finished screaming and jolting against the pillory. Stern finished his mental count to twenty and raised the switch.
Tom shrieked and flung himself uncontrollably against the pillory again.
Despite Tom’s useless twisting against his confines, Stern landed the third and fourth strokes in neat order down the curve of Tom’s arse. The fifth stroke he laid viciously into the tender, tremendously sensitive underside of Tom’s cheeks.
When he finished screaming, Tom almost hung in the pillory, nearly too wracked to support himself. He trembled violently all over.
The mayor unlocked the pillory and Stern helped Tom out. Miller Bolton and Edith Sunner came forward to lead Tom off, compassionate now that their neighbour had been chastised. The crowd quietly watched Tom hobble off, now going white-faced with shock, and then dispersed to their business. Stern got his shoulder patted by a few friends and went back to the jacket he’d been seaming before the interruption.
Hopefully that would be the end of it. Stern didn’t dislike chastisement; he disliked the cause for it. He wanted no more wrongdoing from Tom Candler. So perhaps he’d been harsh, but a hard caning at seventeen ought to make Tom think twice in the future.
It ought to have, but it didn’t.
Not a month later, Tom was back in the pillory for voyeurism again. This time the magistrate gave him ten strokes, and Stern went just as hard. He left Tom’s arse red and quivering without a shred of sympathy this time.
“You listen good, brat,” Stern murmured in Tom’s ear after the ninth stroke. Tom was weeping uncontrollably, all his would-be manhood stripped away. “This is where we start losing patience. Twice in for the same wrong is damn stupid, and we won’t tolerate it. Get yourself right.”
He stepped back and dealt the tenth stroke, leaving an ugly purple welt, and stood away to let others help Tom down.
“Awfully harsh,” commented Weylin with a frown.
“It’s my job for a reason,” Stern said, and Weylin let it drop. Chastisement might be necessary, but few people wanted to be directly responsible for it. Or had the knowing to do it properly.
Life went on in the way of things. Tom had four months of very good behaviour: enough to make people agree he’d been corrected, and to move on. Then he dropped his trousers in front of a milkmaid, showing what she’d not asked for, and wound up in the pillory again.
This time, Stern was furious that Magistrate Alder let him deliver only ten strokes.
It became a pattern. Tom would be brought before the town on some petty lewdness— small but harmful enough— would express his remorse, would take his strokes as hard as Stern could give them, and behave again. For a while.
Oh, how the council argued. What help did Tom need? What were they all doing wrong? Adults counselled the young man, advised him, tried to get him to open up. Over and over they told him of the hurt he was doing, and tried to help him change. Tom was good with a story, Stern soon realized; he had a way of making his crimes seem the fault of ignorance or confusion. So then people came to council arguing that Tom couldn’t be chastised so hard for misunderstanding a girl’s desire, for a misstep without ill intent.
It must be simpler for them, Stern thought. Easier if they could believe that they hadn’t somehow raised a man who insisted on preying and prying at every weakness he could. Easier if they thought they could fix Tom and have no fault in their society.
But Stern had seen enough crime, had punished enough evil, to know that Tom’s crimes were selfish and deliberate and entirely his own responsibility. He was a man who wanted what he wanted— which was women, it seemed— and refused to be denied. And for that he remained remorseless.
It took four years for them all to finally see it.
The ravaging was scheduled for morning, to give people time to prepare. Nearly all of Brighton gathered for the ravaging in shocked silence, staring as Tom was dragged into the high square still protesting his innocence. No children were present; they weren’t allowed to come beyond the wooden gates of the high town, where the bars and fancy houses and one-room prison stood. In the center of the high square stood the low pillory that hadn’t been used since Moll Newel. The hanging tree, so long in disuse that most thought of it as a structure for festive decorations, loomed nearby.
“I didn’t do anything!” Tom protested, even as his neck and wrists were forced into the pillory. “I never hurt her!” His voice was pitchy, full of betrayal at being so accused. Much as Stern wanted to slap him, he stayed his hand and waited to exact justice properly.
"Let all know that Tom Candler has done harm to this town,” announced Mayor Lea, her voice unsteady. “He has committed assault upon a neighbour and friend.”
“She wanted to—”
“I didn’t!” Marian Dyer shouted from between the magistrate and her parents. Her eyes were reddened and there was an ugly bite mark on her throat.
“After all we did for you—”
“How dare—”
“Quiet!” shouted the bailiff.
Stern waited with his arms folded while Lea went through the motions, ensuring that everyone knew the full truth of the crime: that Tom had overstepped Marian’s consent to kissing, nagged and shamed her, touched her after she said no, tried to wrestle her on the ground before she managed to get away. The people’s distraught shock turned to fury. Marian had been the one assaulted, and they raged for her. But her injury had also hurt the whole community. All their trust, all their compassion, all their effort— and Tom had betrayed them.
"You have failed to learn from the chastisement of your peers,” Lea said, rigid with anger. “Now you will face consequences. You will be ravaged according to our judgement until we are certain you will never inflict harm on your community again.”
Tom Candler had never seen a ravaging. He’d been too young when Moll Newel had done her murders, Brighton’s first killings in over twenty years. Too young even when Steeler or Tracy or Mam Lewis had been ravaged a few years back. Now, as the bailiff stripped him naked— cutting his clothes off with furious disregard that had never been demonstrated before— Tom didn’t know what was coming.
Stern wasn’t happy that he’d had so long to think of exactly how Tom would be ravaged. But he was savagely pleased to finally be doing it.
“Stern,” Magistrate Alder said, looking to him. He was white-faced— confronted, perhaps, with the knowledge of what his lax judgements had led to. “In this we defer to you.”
Stern nodded absently. A long-held tension uncoiled in his gut as he stepped forward and unhooked the whip from his belt.
“I didn’t do anything wrong!” Tom whined.
Then he shut his mouth as Stern stepped in close. Stern tapped the folded leather whip against Tom’s mouth and leaned down to speak in his ear.
“I made this for you, you piece of shit,” he murmured. “I knew you were never sorry. I could see you never learned.”
“I am sorry. I never—”
Stern pressed the whip harder against Tom’s lips. “This isn’t about making you apologise. We’re done teaching. This is about making you hurt like you hurt Marian and everyone else. And then making you hurt so bad you’ll never lift a finger against anyone ever again. You couldn’t be taught right, scummer. Now I’m going to teach you fear.”
Thereafter Tom protested, but Stern was done listening. He circled around the pillory, letting the whip uncoil. Sick, angry, uncertain, the crowd murmured.
“Whipping,” Stern declared, “and public use. One full day. Bring the horse and spreader.”
Obedient to Stern’s unfortunate expertise, the mayor shakily found the key to the disused prison cell and brought out the stand and spreader. Miller Bolton held Tom in place as the wooden stand was bolted into the stones beneath him. The pillory held Tom bent over low— lower than usual— and the stand prevented him from ducking his hips. He was unable now to move forward or back. Then Stern forced Tom into the spreader, an iron bar that held his feet far apart. With it bolted to the base of the stand, Tom was bound like a horse to be ridden.
He’d become attractive enough at twenty-one, had Tom. Fighting against the bondage made his muscles flex, thick in his arms and sinewy down his back to the curve of his soft little arse, held bare and high. There was something painfully good about the exposure of his forcibly spread legs, his balls dangling and hole winking as he tried to close his thighs. Behind the board of the pillory, he panted like a trapped animal. He must have felt the premonition of what was coming.
“Ordinarily, you wouldn’t be allowed to watch a ravaging,” Lea was telling Marian. Stern’s stomach lurched with deeper anger as he realized Marian wasn’t even of age yet. “But as the victim, you can stay or leave as you like.”
“I want to see it,” Marian said, though she sounded uncertain.
“As long as you remember you can’t tell anyone until they’re of age.”
“I won’t.” Her red eyes burned. “I just want to see him pay.”
Flicking the whip experimentally, Stern scanned the crowd. Hungry, angry faces stared back, fixated on Tom’s suffering. No one seemed unhappy. They’d had enough of him. They’d bent too far for too long, and they were glad to finally give Tom what he deserved.
Tom’s first scream of pain brought an answering roar of approval from the crowd.
Stern let the hot pulse of arousal feed the violence of his next lash. And the next.
He whipped Tom without mercy, driven ever harder by the man’s thrashing. After ten lashes there was no more attempted stoicism, just screaming. His struggles became frantic, his body arching and writhing on the horse in a pathetic bid for freedom.
Stern striped his back, then skipped down to whip the sole of Tom’s curling foot. Tom’s shriek was ear-piercing, like he was riven by the unexpected agony. Stern returned to Tom’s back, then cut across his tender arse with four brutal strikes, and then returned to lash the feet that kicked and curled in agony. Back and forth he went, brutalizing every tender inch of exposed flesh.
"Stop! Stop! I can’t— STOP! PLEASE!”
Breathing deep, Stern adjusted his stance and struck so that the whip snapped across Tom’s soft inner thighs. Tom shrieked like he was dying. He spasmed madly on the horse.
Marian Dyer’s wrathful face burned in the crowd. Stern’s cock throbbed.
Stern didn’t stop until every inch of skin from Tom’s shoulders to his feet was striped scarlet. Behind the pillory, Tom was bawling. He lay limp on the horse now, exhausted, only jolting when the whip fell. His welted arse trembled like jelly.
Stern took a deep breath and coiled the whip.
At his nod, the herbalist came forward and began to smear Tom with salve. It wouldn’t ease the pain, but it would keep him from permanent damage. Stern had done well, though: the welts were purple in a few places where they crossed, but no skin was broken or bloody.
The herbalist left the pot of salve on the side of the wooden stand beneath Tom’s hips. The crowd hissed and hushed as Stern stepped forward again.
“No more,” Tom bawled, hearing his steps. “Please, no more, please don’t. Please no…”
Stern laid his hand on Tom’s arse. His flesh was burning hot, swollen in raw stripes that felt good to stroke. The way it made Tom squirm was even sweeter.
“Remember this,” Stern said, dipping his fingers into the pot of salve. “We no longer trust you. You’ve forfeited the right to chastisement. From now on, we’ll make you pay for every wrong you do. And every time, it’ll be worse.”
“Please…”
Tom’s whine escalated into a high squeal as Stern smeared the salve thickly up his crack. His hole had escaped the whipping. It clenched painfully tight.
“Ever been rammed here?” Stern murmured.
“What the fuck are you doing? Stop it! Stop!”
“Aye, no. You’re for women only.”
Good. Not that Stern would admit it aloud, because he knew this was wrong, but he took particular pleasure in the fact that Tom would hate the ravaging even beyond the fact that it happened against his will. He’d be degraded by every single cock forced inside him. Some people could take a ravaging as just physical pain, like a caning. But not Tom. And Stern was glad of it.
The difference between Stern and Tom, who both took pleasure in the violation of others, was that Stern knew how to control himself. He could chanel his inclinations into chastisement when necessary, and bottle himself up when not. He had found a way to put his nature to use in service of the community.
It made him very good at his job. That, at least, he could be proud of.
“One full day of public use,” Stern repeated, forcing two fingers into Tom’s tight hole and pushing the salve deep. Tom squealed. His sphincter clenched painfully around Stern's knuckles. “The community may have use in kind for the damage done. For the next day, this man has forfeited his right to be among us. You’ve no responsibility to show mercy or consideration. Take your retribution freely.”
The crowd murmured and edged closer, stirred by the traditional words. It was only natural that they’d be hesitant at first, as it had been so long since the last ravaging. But they were ready to make Tom Candler pay.
Stern freed his staining erection and stroked salve down the hard length of it with a groan. He lined the broad, shiny head up with Tom’s arsehole. It was a sweet pink, untouched, clenched and tiny and virginal. The sight made his balls throb.
“No, no, don’t...”
Slowly, he began to drive in. Tom yelled in panic at the pressure, going wild against his bonds. The pillory rattled.
Despite Tom’s resistance, his slippery arsehole parted. Stern’s cock breached him with slow, agonizing force. Stern could do nothing but stare as Tom’s shiny pink hole was stretched and pierced by every thick inch of cock.
“Take it out!” Tom shrieked. “Take it out! Stop! Don’t, don’t, stop, it hurts, it hurts—”
Just to show him what hurt was, Stern grabbed Tom’s hips and mercilessly drove the remainder of his cock in. He had his eyes clenched tight, imagining Tom’s rectum stretching wide around a cock for the very first time. Each new inch of his cock split Tom deeper than he’d ever been touched before.
Beneath him, Tom thrashed and screamed as if he’d been impaled with a red-hot poker. It was mental as well as physical, his whole soul rejecting the violation.
To Stern, the desperate clenching and straining of Tom’s tight channel trying to expel him only made his cock throb harder. He had to dig his nails in to maintain control through the wave of arousal.
Eyes still closed in concentration, Stern withdrew and slammed back in, beginning a quick rhythm. He wasn’t going to last long and he wanted to break Tom’s arse in properly before his balls exploded. There was only one chance to make a memory of Tom Candler’s first ravaging.
At the sudden, merciless pistoning of cock through his stretched hole, Tom howled anew. Unbelievably, he started blubbering almost immediately, so violated was he by the penetration. Or perhaps the public humiliation. Aroused, Stern rammed him faster.
Soon Tom's voice barely sounded human any longer, choked by mucus as it was. He begged for mercy. He screamed and gurgled snot, his misery accompanied by the greasy slap of cock reaming his arse open.
He was tight. And the way he squirmed— the way he clenched— bound, spread wide open and pinned down on the stand for Stern to core out, his cock plunging that tight little hole over and over again—
Too soon, Stern’s balls drew up. He redoubled his pace, thumping Tom heavily against the pillory with gut-churning thrusts meant to drive his pleasure as high as possible before he peaked. He rammed in deep and came explosively, roaring his release along with Tom’s final shriek. His balls emptied in hard pulses, filling Tom’s hole with seed.
After a long moment, Stern stepped back. A touch shakily, he re-settled into his composure, his professionalism. As he tucked his cock away, Tom lay weeping. His hole was as red as his welted flesh, and leaked stickily.
“My turn,” muttered Hal Dyer, shouldering past Stern with his cock already out.
His teeth bared, Marian’s father slammed his cock into Tom’s raw arse and set to fucking like he meant to punch a hole through Tom, who screamed with fresh agony. The crowd roared its approval back.
“Shame,” muttered Weylin over the noise, frowning at Tom. “Shame it ended up like this.”
“It didn’t have to,” Stern grunted.
“It’s not your fault,” Weylin said. “We all know that.”
Stern only shrugged. He was unhappy about the cause for them being here, but, well. They all were.
Behind Stern, Hal did something that made Tom squeal like a piglet.
It had been long enough since the last sentence of ravaging that the gentlemen of Brighton had to have a conversation about the order of the proceedings. With a bit of comparison and not too much sheepishness, they figured themselves out into a rough order. Nobody was arguing that Stern and Hal Dyer shouldn’t go first, but having Bailiff Lessen take a turn early on would ruin it for the rest. Might even do more damage to Tom’s arse than they meant to, which… well, Stern wouldn’t weep, but there were rules about reasonable limits for a reason.
Hal finished eventually and stepped back still looking furious, exhausted but not the least bit mollified. He left vicious nail marks all over Tom’s hips, red crescents already turning purple from the violence with which he’d yanked Tom back and forth on his cock. He spat on Tom’s back before turning away. Then he limped to his family and buried Marian in a shaky hug, and finally started to weep.
She clung to him— but watched over his shoulder, eyes narrowed, as Magistrate Alder lined up and fed his cock into Tom.
“No please, no please, please no more I can’t no PLEASE—”
The crowd shouted its approval back in Tom’s face.
Stern took up his place beside the pillory, leaning on a nearby post to keep watch. When Tom made eye contact, he met the man’s desperate pleas with a jaundiced stare. Tom’s face crumpling in misery moved Stern nowhere except his cock, which twitched a bit.
After the excitement of the first few reamings, the crowd settled into it. Tom had been sentenced to a full day’s use; he wasn’t going anywhere soon. A small handful of folks left directly, without taking part. There were always a few who were too disgusted to touch the guilty, not even once to do their share of the retribution. About half of the crowd wandered over to the bars around the high square and settled in with an ale. The folks at the fancy house obviously weren’t working that day, no more than anyone else was, but they opened the second story balcony and let people come up for drinks.
The rest of Brighton stuck around the pillory, either to wait their turn soon in line or to watch, but their jeering turned to calmer conversation with their neighbours. Wouldn’t hurt Tom any to hear people muttering about how he’d always been a pain to them, Stern thought.
“Always had a bad feeling about him,” commented Jeannie nearby, arms crossed as she watched Lot Taylor taking Tom in slow, measured thrusts. “Didn’t look forward to the days he’d come by the fancy house.”
“He ever do anything to you?” Stern asked, his attention piqued.
“Not me. Well… no, not as I can say. I mean… I don’t know. I’d have said something if he ever broke a rule, but he has a way of… just pushing on you a little bit. I was never sure if I was really— if he’d done anything wrong, you know, or if I was being sensitive. I just didn’t like it.”
She scowled at Tom, like she was remembering he could hear her. “I didn’t like any of your shite, you hear? That why you stopped asking for me?”
“I’m sorry,” Tom wept, “I’m s-sorry, please, make him stop. Make him stop...”
“No chance,” Lot said, not breaking his easy pace. The fat head of his cock popped out the raw ring of Tom’s arse almost completely before he started sliding back in.
Tom thrashed in protest, giving a frustrated scream, before going slack with exhaustion again.
“Sorry he’s not well set up for you,” Stern said to Jeannie. “It’s easier to whip him this way. But I can move him if you like. Give you women a chance at him, too.”
“Nah,” Jeannie said. “I don’t want him.” A few of the other women nearby shrugged or murmured. For the time being, their spite seemed satisfied by watching him get ravaged.
“Let me know if you change your mind,” Stern said. “It is public use.”
“No, no, no no nooo…”
After a while, Weylin brought Stern a mug of ale. The morning was starting to get warm, bringing out sweat beyond that from the effort of whoever was currently ramming Tom. It’d be a hot one.
“Not a bad day for everyone to have off, eh?” Weylin said, drawing a laugh.
Stern sipped the foam and eyed Tom, who was braying every time Steeler slammed the breath out of him. Tom, of course, was a lathered mess, but he wasn’t in danger of dehydration just yet. He’d get water when he needed it. That was part of Stern’s duties.
“Hurts, don’t it?” Steeler said. He was leaning in close to the back of the pillory and talking to Tom, not unkindly.
“Yes!” Tom choked back his snot to speak. “It hurts! It hurts so bad. Take it out, please take it out...”
“Naw,” Steeler said, continuing to ram Tom in rough, unsteady strokes. He panted for breath. “I just wanted to tell you. I know it hurts. You gotta— learn from it. You gotta accept— you did this. Nobody’s fault but you. And you gotta learn. Never again.”
“You're hurting me!”
“Never. Okay? You gotta.”
Was it three years ago? Stern wondered. Four? Steeler had always had a bad temper, and never put much effort into minding it. When he’d beaten his fiancee, Stern had sentenced him to two days of public use.
For what little credit he was due, Steeler had taken his ravaging very well. Within an hour he’d been meek and obedient: he’d stopped complaining about being reamed, tears trickling silently down his face, and he’d licked and sucked everything put before him. He’d not even protested when his throat was used violently, beyond the instinctive jolting of gag reflex and suffocation. He’d come out of the ravaging withdrawn, and he’d finally listened to the elders trying to counsel him about controlling his temper. Not a problem since.
It was the best possible outcome of a ravaging. He’d paid the price for his crime, learned better, and now it was over.
“I hate you!” Tom screamed, tears streaming down his blotchy face. Steeler jolted back, whatever he’d been saying lost. “I didn’t— do— anything! Stop it! Stop it! STOP IT!”
“Let’s shut that stupid mouth up,” Branson said, stepping forward with his cock out and grabbing a rough handful of Tom’s hair. “Open up.”
“No,” Tom gritted out, teeth clenched. He turned his face away from Branson’s cock as much as possible.
Scowling, Stern stepped up. “The community may have use in kind, however they like,” he reminded Tom. “You’ve forfeited the right to refuse. Do as you’re told.”
"Go hang,” Tom growled. His eyes burned with hate.
Stern had always despised Tom’s eyes. But now he finally had the chance to break that sullen defiance.
He unhooked the light wooden switch hanging from his belt beside the coiled whip. He crouched down, grabbed hold of Tom’s left foot to bare its sole, and told Steeler, “Use him harder.”
As Steeler put his back into pounding violently, Stern brought the switch down on Tom’s bare sole. Tom’s cursing broke into a shriek.
It wasn’t a good set-up for hitting the feet, but it would do. The spreader limited Tom’s movement enough.
Stern held his foot tight and beat it without mercy. Every stroke was a frustration that he hadn't been allowed to give Tom in earlier years. Over the noise of the Tom’s high-pitched screaming and Steeler’s cock reaming out his sloppy hole, Stern beat out a brutal rhythm.
At last, Tom’s tender sole was bruising red and Stern could no longer hear words in Tom’s noise. He stood and came around the other side of the pillory. He lifted Tom’s head by the hair to find him scarlet-faced and crying again. Tom's mouth hung open to breathe in broken wheezes.
“Are you going to do as you’re told?”
In response, Tom just shut his eyes and continued bawling open-mouthed, in too much agony to resist any longer.
Branson took over Tom’s hair and guided his cock in. As it slid over Tom’s quivering lower lip, Tom visibly gagged in revulsion. He didn’t fight, though, just held his mouth slack and let Branson put his cock in.
Trying to ignore it, Stern thought in disgust. Still no acceptance that this was his due for the crimes he’d committed.
There was time. They’d break Tom yet.
Branson didn’t seem to mind that Tom’s mouth was slack and lifeless. He was in it to humiliate Tom, it seemed. He just held Tom’s face in place and slid his cock in and out, making him cough and cringe, pushing it into Tom’s cheek now and again.
Behind the board, Steeler was making more and more noise as he got close to finishing. He started slamming Tom harder and harder against the pillory. One hard thrust jolted Tom farther onto Branson’s cock, poking it into the back of his mouth. Tom gagged and heaved. Branson held his head tight and kept his cock in. Saliva dribbled everywhere.
“Don’t bite, don’t you dare bite,” Branson growled. “That’s it, ram him harder, ram him onto my prick, come on—”
Steeler came with a shout, driving in deep and bearing down heavily. Tom gagged loudly around Branson’s cock. The two men held him there as long as possible, writhing and spitted deep from both ends, before Steeler finally softened too much to stay.
“His mouth any good?” asked Weylin, unbuckling and pulling out his half-hard cock. He rubbed it up and down Tom’s arsecrack, catching the head on the sloppy rim of Tom’s hole.
“No,” said Branson. “Never fear, I’ll teach him right.”
“You’d think he’d have a talented tongue,” Weylin said. “All those years he spent giving us fancy excuses. How many of those times were things you say you didn’t do either, eh?”
Tom gurgled his misery as Weylin’s cock, the next biggest in line, slowly began to stretch him open another bit wider.
Some time around the third or fourth man using Tom’s mouth, a hand tapped Stern on the arm.
“I want to hit him.”
Stern glanced up from his ale. Marian Dyer stood there, her mouth like iron.
“Aye,” Stern said slowly. “You can do that.”
He glanced at Tom. The man was mostly limp on the horse right now, eyes squeezed shut, hands flapping occasionally when his gag reflex was prodded. Seed glazed his hair, his chin, his red and swollen hole.
“I’m sorry you have to see this,” Stern told Marian.
She blinked hard. “I‘ve had sex,” she said. “I’m not a child. He deserves it. I’m not the only one he hurt, you know. He just— he pushes at everyone. Until you think, okay, fine, I’ll just— and then he keeps going—”
Marian broke off as her lip wobbled. Then she firmed it back into iron. “I want to hurt him,” she repeated.
Stern handed her the light wooden switch. Marian looked in frustration at the whip on Stern’s belt.
“You can hit him harder and longer with this,” Stern said. “I’ll stop you if you’re about to do damage. Have at him.”
“Where do I…?”
“Upper back is safest,” Stern advised. “Or arse. Thighs— the whole leg, really. Not the joints. Chest and belly if you want to aim underneath, though you won’t get as much power in the swing.”
The men reaming Tom out had noticed Marian’s presence, and were hesitating now. Looking embarrassed, Marshal Hand pulled out of Tom’s arse. A glob of semen and liquified salve oozed from Tom’s hole.
“Keep fucking him,” Marian said, gripping the switch harder.
Stern raised his eyebrows at the profanity, but nobody protested. Hand popped the bulbous head of his cock back into Tom’s hole, drawing a groan of protest from the man.
“Marian?” Tom said weakly, trying to see around the board of the pillory. “Is that…?”
Marian took a sharp, shuddery breath. She blinked hard. Stern stepped closer in case he had to help.
Tom pulled more urgently against the man trying to force a cock back into his mouth. “Marian, please, I’m sorry. Make them stop. I didn’t mean anything by it, I didn’t mean to—”
Fury transformed Marian’s face. Emptied of mercy, she brought the switch down on Tom’s back as hard as she could.
His first scream was clear and deafening. Then the cock was shoved back into his mouth, and his following screams as Marian rained blows down on him came out as nothing more than agonised noise.
When Tom’s back was freshly red, Marian switched to beating his chest and stomach, exposed between the horse and the pillory. Tom squealed and tried to arch away from the brand new pain. Soon his nipples were crossed by dozens of red lashes, cruelly swollen. Tortured, Tom fought as he hadn’t in a long time.
The two men used him all the while, spurred on to greater efforts by the effort Marian was putting in. Hand’s cock was curved and long, stabbing deep inside with every stroke. Stern knew from experience that Tom's arse would be clenched like a fist from the agony of the beating. The man using Tom’s mouth was going red, his eyes nearly rolling up every time Tom screamed around his cock.
For Marian’s sake, they managed to hold out until she finally lowered the switch, clearly exhausted. She was panting hard and shaking all over. Something in her eyes was finally avenged.
Gently, Stern came up and took the switch.
“Thank you,” Marian said, swallowing and gathering her dignity.
She took one last look at Tom, now nearly suffocating as he was reamed madly on both ends, the two men finally letting loose and preparing to blow their balls in him. Then she turned her back, went to her parents, and walked out of the high square.
Marshal Hand roared and grunted like a bull in heat when he finished, jizzing for so long that he had time to pull out and spurt a last few stripes across Tom’s back. The other man had forced his cock in as deep as possible and was tearing at Tom’s hair to hold him in place until he spilled his load down Tom’s convulsing throat. Tom retched it out moments later in a flood of semen and drool and watery vomit.
Stern waited until the production had died down, then turned to the onlookers with the switch offered handle out.
“Now that the young miss is gone,” he said, “who else wants to have some fun?”
Tom passed out around noon, just before everyone had finished having a first turn on him. Stern called a short break, then woke Tom and washed him and cooled him with a couple buckets of water. When he stuck a finger in Tom’s rectum to check for bleeding, Tom only whimpered.
Inside, Tom’s once painfully tight hole was slack and wet, the furled tissues swollen and soft as petals. Stern stroked the hot, tender channel for a bit, pleased, and briefly petted Tom’s neglected prostate in consideration before deciding to leave it alone.
"Not too fast,” Stern warned Tom, holding a bucket of water to his mouth. “Or you’ll chuck it back up.”
Tom simply drank like an obedient dog, sniffling between gulps. Then he jerked against the pillory. “Please,” he whimpered, looking up at Stern, “please no more.”
Stern glanced over the board to see a husband and wife standing there, heads together in conspiratorial pleasure, both running their hands over Tom’s bruised arse, testing, teasing. The wife had one finger in his hole and the other hand massaging the bulge in her husband’s trousers.
“Please don’t,” Tom begged, chin wobbling. “Please. Please…”
Deciding that Tom had clearly finished drinking, Stern took the bucket away and nodded to the couple. “Enjoy.”
Tom begged and whined until the wife stuffed all four fingers in his mouth. Soon he had drooled a river down his chin. The couple leaned over the board toward each other, whispering breathlessly, the husband moaning softly every time the wife tickled Tom’s throat to make him choke and clench.
“You want use of him too?” Stern asked the wife eventually.
She was flushed and short of breath, standing with her legs clamped together, obviously desperate herself. Nonetheless, she said, “No. Not him.” She laughed shortly. “Can’t imagine he knows what to do for a woman. Eh?” She forced her fingers down Tom’s throat to make him heave, paying direct attention to him for the first time. Tears of strain squeezed from his eyes.
Her husband would no doubt give her satisfaction later at home, Stern thought. Repeatedly and devotedly, if the look on his face as she manipulated Tom for him was any evidence.
After that, the hot afternoon was far from slow. Most of Tom’s other visitors were men his own age, young and vigorous and determined to separate themselves from their peer’s behaviour. Tom had been too aberrant to have any real friends, but he’d grown up alongside others. Now they felt tainted by association, and wanted to publicly demonstrate their condemnation.
Stern had to watch that they didn't do Tom undue violence. It was the first ravaging any of them had ever experienced, and they postured and overcompensated all the way through.
They came in a group, edgy and angry. Once the first lad got bold enough to actually get his erection out and shove it in— provoking no remonstration from Stern, who was usually the arbiter of misbehaviour— the rest were emboldened. They traded off reaming Tom in turns. They discovered special satisfaction in stuffing him from both ends, as it made Tom blubber and beg for mercy because he couldn’t breathe. When they couldn’t abuse one of his holes, they rubbed their cocks on his face, slapped him, spat on him, muttered angry invective. They egged each other on and congratulated whoever made Tom squeal. Clinging as a group bonded ever more tightly together, they all edged near to completion at the same time, then gathered round and pumped Tom’s arsehole full of seed one after the other.
Finished, the lads gathered round and one held his arsecheeks open to examine their work. It quivered and winked, squeezing out a trickle of cum. They cheered and took turns spitting inside of him, filling his abused rectum.
“Please,” Tom whimpered, cringing at a mis-aimed gob of spit. “Please… no more…”
One of the lads slapped him. “Shut your mouth, you piece of shit. Or I’ll stuff my cock in it again.”
“I’ll get my dog to stuff it in, how about that?” one exceptionally daring man said. The group groaned, sick and titillated. “Fuck you like a proper bitch. You ever seen Hurley’s knot?”
“That’s not his sentence,” Stern said, before the group could get too worked up. “He’s for your use only.”
The man spat into Tom’s hole one last time and slapped his cheek. “Pity. He deserves it.”
As they left, Tom began to weep. Stern left him leaking from the arse, knowing another pack would show up soon.
Close to evening, a large group of farm boys was sloping off from the square when Bailiff Lessen arrived.
Stern tipped his head at Tom, who was much worse for the wear from that morning. He had gobs of semen drooling down his face. Snot bubbled in his nostrils. His tormentors had gone but he was still dry heaving, violated to the point of nausea, his body trying to expel the ocean of cum he’d been forced to swallow all afternoon.
“He’s all yours.”
Lessen regarded Tom like a dog who’d rolled in dung. “Reckon I need to clean him up for the evening crowd? Probably, aye. Disgusting.”
Much as Stern wanted to personally oversee every moment of Tom’s punishment, it wasn’t realistic. He couldn’t be properly responsible for Tom’s welfare if he was falling asleep. The bailiff would take over his duty until he’d had a spell of rest.
He’d seen most of it, including Tom’s first experience with almost every conceivable violation. That would have to be enough.
Not wanting to go far, Stern got dinner and a room at the fancy house. Strange though it felt to go to bed so early in the evening, Stern lay quietly as Brighton’s people returned for another round of public use in the square below. He fell asleep to the sounds of Tom's muffled screaming.
Stern had gone to sleep with his cock half hard, and wasn’t surprised to wake with a pounding erection. He thanked the woman who’d knocked on his door— Jeannie, it sounded like— and sat up in the dark, adjusting his trousers.
Outside it was full dark, past midnight. Stern stepped into the empty square. The only sound was Tom groaning like a cow in labour, exhausted but agonized, as Bailiff Lessen slowly reamed him.
Stern came up and leaned on the pillory to watch. Lessen didn’t pause in methodically forcing another fraction of his cock into Tom’s hole.
Tom might as well have been giving birth, with how wide his arse was being split. Lessen’s cock was obscene in its size, as thick as his wrist. It stretched Tom’s slack hole tight all over again. The head of it would have stuffed Tom’s mouth, with no chance of fitting into his throat. Instead, that cockhead now made Tom’s arsehole bulge outwards as Lessen withdrew. He pulled until Tom's rim clung raw and red around his fat, flared cockhead, threatening to pop free with a last painful stretch like a dog pulling its knot free from a bitch. But rather than withdrawing to allow Tom any moment of mercy, Lessen stroked another gob of slick salve down his shaft and slowly began to impale Tom again.
Tom screamed like he was dying, long and guttural— but there was nearly no volume to it. He barely had a voice left.
How defiant had Tom been, Stern wondered, to make the crowd abuse his throat so violently? By and large, they weren't people given to unnecessary cruelty.
Except that Tom had been cruel to them for years. Had it yet sunk in that he was responsible for his own punishment?
“Gods,” Lessen whispered, pausing in his stroke. Tom’s arsehole squeezed the middle of his fat shaft, trying desperately to prevent entry. Groaning, Lessen gripped Tom’s hips and forced his cock another bit deeper.
“Stop,” Tom wept, his whole body spasming. Every inch of him trembled in agony. “Stop. Hurts. Please. Sto—!” Then another wave of agony tore through him and his voice broke into an airless scream as Lessen impaled him again.
Stern’s cock pulsed so hard that he had to grab it through his trousers, his knees weakening. All he could see was Tom’s arse being split open on Lessen’s bottle-thick cock, unable to escape being violated until it took every inch. Tom had been ravaged all day long, but nobody in Brighton had a cock to match Bailiff Lessen. Lessen’s shaft was stretching Tom’s hole wider than ever. It was also beginning to reach untouched depths: with every deepening stroke, that obscenely thick cockhead broke in virgin channel. From the sweat on Lessen’s brow, and the guttural screams Tom was giving, it was obvious how much effort it took to force his monstrous cock through even a few millimeters of tight rectum.
“You want his mouth?” Lessen asked.
“No,” Stern replied, with effort. “I’ll wait.”
Stroke by stroke, Lessen broke in Tom’s arse. Neither of them paid any heed to Tom’s begging. Lessen, obviously, had waited all day for his turn, and now nothing would stop him. He only cared for his throbbing cock and the tight, spasming sphincter he was splitting open, deeper and deeper, every stroke a rapturous grip. Until, finally, his balls hit Tom’s arse at the end of a thrust that seemed have impaled Tom all the way up to his stomach.
Lessen put his huge hands on Tom’s buttocks and pushed them apart, revealing the distended hole straining around the immensity of his cock. He grunted in satisfaction. Then he adjusted his grip on Tom’s hips and began, slowly, to ream Tom apart.
The noise was obscene. Tom’s agony was intoxicating. Lessen’s cock squelched and sucked with every stroke, dripping from the liquified salve and cum forced out of Tom’s overstuffed hole. Every stroke punched Tom’s guts in, then cleared them out. Slow, brutal, Lessen thrust, relentless as a dog humping into a bitch strapped to a rack with complete disregard for her pain, driven solely by the need to shoot his seed.
And wasn’t that what the subject of a ravaging was? An animal without rights. A creature that had forfeited its humanity. A bitch.
By Tom’s gurgling shrieks, the pain never ceased. There was no accommodating such massive violation. Lubricant made it possible for Lessen’s cock to slide through his channel, but did nothing to dull the agony of tissues being stretched and nerves being stimulated again and again and again. In such a thorough reaming, his prostate must have been stroked with every thrust, but it could only have felt like blinding overstimulation on top of everything else.
“Yeah,” Lessen grunted. “That’s it. Go ahead. Scream. Always like this, isn’t it. In the pillory. Screaming. Piece of... You never learn.” He leaned down and bore in all the way, using his bodyweight to stuff Tom until he shrieked. “Learn now, won’t you. On my cock. Teach you… On my cock. Just like that.”
“He doesn’t take it so well, does he,” rasped Stern. “Men like him, you’ve got to make them take it.”
“Yeah. Sometimes.” Lessen groaned, starting to thrust faster. “Shit, he’s good. Piece of shit. Good for fucking. Watch him take that cock.”
“Aye. Ah, gods. Make him take it. Make him take it hard.”
“Please—”
“Piece of shit. All these years— watching you get whipped— never listened, never learned. Now you'll learn, won't you, now you'll learn—”
“Fuck him harder. Fuck him. Break him in. Fuck him like a bitch, make him take it, make him, fuck him open, just like that—”
“No, please—”
“Gods, yes. Fuck him like that, just like that, that's it. Give it to him. Make him scream— just like that— yes, fuck, come on, hard, fuck, break him open, make him scream, yes, yes, yes, yes—”
Now ramming into Tom with violent speed, Lessen gave a guttural roar as he finally began to cum. He fucked Tom through it, brutalizing his arse in pursuit of orgasm. And over the sounds of skin slapping and the pillory banging, Stern heard something else.
It took him a moment to process the sound, then locate it. He looked beneath Tom, and sure enough, the scummer was pissing himself. Urine spurted from his limp cock, forced out by the relentless internal hammering on his bladder. He'd probably been holding his piss all day: he'd had limited water and hadn't urinated under Stern’s supervision, obviously too humiliated. His prostate was no doubt swollen from the ravaging, making it doubly hard to release. But now he had lost control. Every brutal thrust of Lessen's cock made Tom leak another uncontrollable spray of piss and scream in anguish both physical and mental.
Tom's screaming and spasming only drew out Lessen’s pleasure. The bailiff came in waves, seed oozing out around the massive cock still churning Tom's guts. His jizz seemed endless, pent up from an entire day of waiting his turn.
At last, Lessen pulled his softening cock free. The head popped out Tom's hole one last time with a squelch, followed by a flood of thick seed.
Tom’s wet red hole clutched at nothing, now brutalized to the point that it gaped open when not stretched. Cum dripped down his balls. Between his spread thighs, his cock leaked a last pathetic dribble of piss that Tom, weeping, was clearly too broken to hold.
“Gods,” Lessen sighed, wiping his cock clean. “That’s good. That’s a nice tight hole.”
“Was,” Stern pointed out.
Out of breath, Lessen laughed. “Figured you’d all had a turn.”
“Oh, we did. He was all yours. Glad you got a chance.”
“You want a go?”
Though his cock was so hard it hurt, Stern waved noncommittally. “I’ll clean him up a bit.”
“Aye. Been through a wringer.”
The two men contemplated Tom for a moment: beaten, bound, brutalized, leaking cum, dripping piss, crying so hard that his breathing shuddered, abused to incoherence. They’d both been there through the years, taken part in every fruitless chastisement, watched as Tom committed crime after crime and they were prevented from intervening. But finally, they were satisfied.
“Thanks for the spell,” Stern said at last, clapping Lessen’s arm. “I’ve got it from here.”
“Sure. Have a good night, Stern.”
Lessen left, and Stern drew a bucket of water from the well. He sloshed some over Tom’s buttocks, his back, then went to his head.
Tom was still in a crying jag, gasping uncontrollably for air between sobs. He flinched, but all Stern did was sluice water from a cupped hand across his blotchy face.
“Breathe,” Stern told him, not unkindly. “Deep breaths. Come on now.”
“Pluh— uh— ease…”
“Deep breaths. Don’t want you to pass out.”
Stern held Tom by the chin and washed his face, ignoring Tom’s abortive attempts to pull away. The man had been conditioned to react with terror, but was trying to submit precisely because of that terror. It made Stern’s cock throb even harder.
“Been a rough day, hasn’t it,” Stern said, still speaking like he was soothing a hurt animal. “Awfully hard on you. Have a drink. That’s it.”
Sniffling, Tom drank from the bucket.
“Go on,” Stern said, and held the bucket in place even when Tom tried to lift his head away. “Drink up. That many cocks down your throat, can’t imagine you’ve kept much down.”
Tom dry retched at the memory. Stern kept the bucket held to his mouth. Tom choked, struggled, and continued drinking in a desperate attempt to keep his airways clear.
“They used you something fierce, didn’t they. Split you right open. You’re gaping like a mare back there, boy.”
Tom uttered a wail of misery, which was drowned when Stern sloshed water up over his nostrils.
“Shush-ush. Shh. No more protests from you. You’ve learned better by now, eh? No more lying that it’s not your fault. You only got what you tried to do to others. What you wanted to do. Ravagings are suited to the crime. You wanted rape, you got it.”
Deep in the bucket, which was now tipped to make him drink despite serious attempts to get away, Tom made a desperate noise.
“Not that it’s really rape, though,” Stern said thoughtfully, watching Tom’s trapped hands flap. “Rape is unlawful. Ravaging— that’s for scum. Pieces of shit that can’t act like people. It’s justice, and consequences, and retribution.” He leaned down to Tom’s ear and lowered his voice. “Though I imagine to you it still feels very much like getting the soul raped out of you.”
Tom choked violently. The bucket was nearly empty. Satisfied by the reaction he’d gotten, Stern took it away at last. Tom coughed and wheezed for air. His first full breath came out in an involuntary howl as he began to leak tears again.
“Poor baby,” Stern said, smearing the tears across Tom’s face. “Can’t take it when it’s you getting violated. Did you care when it was women you wanted to hurt?”
He glanced around the board of the pillory. Between the horse and the pillory, Tom’s belly hung low, heavy with water. After having nothing to eat and little to drink for a full day, he was now bloated.
Stern unbuckled his belt. “That’s right,” he said, no longer making the slightest pretense at comfort. “Cry. Cry on my cock. Go on, get it all wet.”
He rubbed his straining length across Tom’s face, pushing the foreskin back and smearing precum across Tom’s lips. Even after a full day of abuse, Tom was visibly revolted. Perhaps he’d thought he was done. Safe.
“Open up,” Stern panted.
“Please,” Tom whispered, hoarse, his voice nearly nothing. “Please don’t.”
“Open your mouth and suck my cock, you piece of shit, or I’ll put it so far up your arse you’ll taste my seed for the rest of your worthless life.”
Breaking down into outright sobs, Tom let Stern slide his cock in.
His mouth was hot, wet rapture. Stern thrust back and forth gently for a few moments, admiring the sight of his cock violating Tom’s lying mouth. He withdrew, wiped a bubble of snot from Tom’s nose, and pushed it into his mouth. Tom’s wail came out gurgling.
“Now you’ll learn,” Stern murmured, gathering a fistful of Tom’s hair. With his other hand, he cupped Tom’s chin to prevent him from turning away, and to lift his mouth and throat into a straight line. He began to thrust with deliberate, merciless intent.
The back of Tom’s throat was hot and slick, and it clenched like a satin glove. Despite having been used by countless men that day, Tom still gagged every time Stern’s cockhead pushed deep into his soft palate. He clearly knew better than to bite, though. It was perfect.
“That’s good,” Stern groaned, as he methodically tortured Tom’s gag reflex. Below him Tom clucked and choked. Thick drool ran down Stern’s shaft and balls. “That’s what you’re good for. Cocksucking. A cock-hating cocksucker.”
At last, Tom’s whole body convulsed, his throat opening up to retch. Stern seized the moment he’d been waiting for and slammed his cock past the uvula, directly down Tom’s gullet.
“Fuck!” The pressure was immense, making his vision flash. The tight ring of Tom’s throat clutched his cock, and it spasmed. Tom thrashed violently, hurting, panicked, violated—
Stern’s cock popped out in a wave of watery vomit. Tom wasted his breath on howling misery. He heaved again, still wracked by revulsion, though nothing came up; Stern simply got to admire his sweet pink mouth straining open, his eyes popping.
“Please— please, don—”
He choked on Stern’s cock again. His mouth was hotter now, sloppy, full of drool. Stern had to hold his head forcibly in place to thrust again. Again. Again, battering that soft, plush palate.
“That’s it,” he hissed, as Tom tried to keep control. “Take it.”
Tom convulsed. Watery vomit gushed out around Stern’s cock. Despite Tom’s struggles, Stern continued to fuck his face, groaning as hot liquid streamed out and Tom’s throat fluttered. Then it opened, and Stern plugged the channel with his cock.
Water burst from Tom’s nostrils. Then another wave from his stuffed throat, around Stern’s girth. Stern held Tom down, suffocating, until the third gush forced his cock back out.
Dripping puke, snot, and tears, Tom didn’t even try to get away from Stern’s cock, just wheezed for breath around the head in his mouth. Without any stimulation at all, just his stomach still heaving with aftershocks, he vomited another weak splash over Stern’s cock. Then he continued to gasp around it, too desensitized to fight, vomit dribbling from his lips, eyes glazed.
Everyone could be broken. Even remorseless Tom Candler.
Utterly without mercy, Stern fucked his face like it was nothing but a hole. He popped that tight throat open over and over, breaching it every time Tom gagged open. It took effort to force surrender, like Tom’s throat was the world’s most resilient hymen. But soon Stern could force his cock past Tom’s uvula on every thrust. It turned Tom into a puppet, every stroke of his gag reflex provoking an involuntary dance.
Triumphant, Stern stuffed his cock in to the root, cutting off Tom’s air entirely. As Tom strangled, he reamed Tom’s throat in short strokes, staying deep within that tight channel but still sawing back and forth over his gag reflex. Tom vomited in gushes and dribbles, fluids spurting out as Stern’s cock permitted, or else forcing escape through his nose. His eyes bulged; his tongue strained. He was nothing but a frothing, gurgling animal, used for its hot guts and its clutching throat.
When Stern finally jerked his cock back out, its swollen crown popped Tom’s throat like a trigger. Tom puked a flood of water, his hyper-primed gag reflex overloaded. He was pissing again too, cock jumping and dribbling from the force of the whole-body heaves that made every sphincter release.
Stern wished he could have seen Tom from behind, just to watch his brutalized arsehole straining open too. It would have been a close second-best rapture to stand back there and have Tom impaled on his cock repeatedly by the force of another man’s throat-fucking.
Pity. It was a good fantasy for a cold night, though.
Stern’s balls were drawing up tight, ready to explode. As soon as Tom had gotten a few breaths, he jammed his cock back in. He didn’t intend to let Tom breathe until he was finished.
With a thrust, Tom’s throat gave way; Stern’s cock slid deep, snaking down his esophagus. Stern thrust quickly, delighting in the wet smack of Tom’s mouth, the slap of his balls on Tom’s drooling chin, the involuntary clucking from his abused throat. When he slid one hand down, he could even feel Tom’s neck bulging out as his own cockhead rammed deep over and over.
Ecstasy shot up his spine. He groaned loudly, humping Tom’s face faster. He felt Tom struggling but held him more tightly, keeping his head in place, his mouth open. Vomit surged up, hot and thick as mucous. He was in Tom’s throat, plunging his esophagus, torturing his gag reflex, suffocating him, violating him, using him like an object— and he was close, so close, balls drawing up, cock getting harder with every thrust down that tight little gullet—
Roaring, Stern buried his cock in Tom’s throat and orgasmed. His cock throbbed as he came. The tight ring of Tom’s throat spasmed and he came even harder. His seed pumped directly down Tom’s throat— into his stomach— filling him up just like he’d been emptied out.
At last, Stern withdrew, his cock popping out of Tom’s throat for the last time. It made Tom heave a little. A thick string of drool connected his swollen lips and Stern’s arcing cock.
Tom simply hung there, hair in Stern’s fists, mouth open, eyes blank. He was red-faced, covered in drool and snot, his slack mouth dripping. Even as Stern watched, satisfied, Tom belched a dribble of puke— just a mouthful, from what little was left in his stomach.
Nothing in his dead eyes changed as the vomit dripped down his chin.
Sighing in satisfaction, Stern let Tom go. He took his time righting his clothing, enjoying the last fading pulses of orgasm. There was drool and watery puke everywhere, so he washed his cock and then poured a bucket of water over his trousers until they’d been rinsed. He had all night for them to dry. He hummed as he wiped sweat from his face and neck.
He didn’t offer Tom water or clean him. There’d be time to do that before dawn broke. For now, Tom could keep the puke in his mouth and the cum leaking from his arse. Let him dwell on it a little longer.
Not that he’d ever forget, though. Not for the rest of his life.
In the morning, the people of Brighton returned to confirm that Tom Chandler was a changed man. He lay unmoving on the horse, dull-eyed. The only signs of his ravaging, aside from the deep purple whip welts, were his puffy scarlet arsehole and a little redness around the eyes. And his silence.
Both Tom and the paving stones had been washed and dried. Stern’s trousers were barely damp as he solemnly shook hands with Mayor Lea, Magistrate Alder, and Bailiff Lessen. The town listened, though their eyes were mostly on Tom, as Lea said the traditional words to end a ravaging: that the sentence had been fulfilled, the guilty ravaged, and his crime paid for. He was now to return to society, and society was to take him back.
“We will not hold the past against you,” Lea reminded everyone. “Our community has been returned to its balance. Now we move forward.”
“Although,” she added, as she gestured Stern and the herbalist forward, “given the severity of your crimes, we take one precaution until we are certain we can trust in your repentance.”
Stern knelt behind Tom. From a folded leather case, the herbalist gave him an expensive steel needle: long and thick, very much like the needles he used to sew leather, except that it was hollow.
Tom jerked for the first time all morning when Stern took hold of his penis, lifting it backward to better grip. Stern adjusted Tom’s foreskin, ensuring it covered his cockhead evenly. Tom whimpered softly. In the crowd, Steeler winced.
With immense precision, Stern lined the needle up and pierced swiftly through the head of Tom’s cock, pinning his foreskin in place.
Tom gave a blood-curdling scream. Stern let him jolt and struggle on the horse, trying to escape the agony: impossible, with the needle still embedded in his cock. It took a long time for Tom’s screaming to die down. The crowd watched in silence, some grimacing, some fixated in cold satisfaction.
Tom began to grunt and bray again as Stern threaded the steel piercing through, replacing the needle. His thighs trembled violently from pain. With the piercing in and the hook-and-eye clasp latched, Stern accepted a pair of pliers from the herbalist. He clamped the hook hard. Then the herbalist smeared a little healing salve around the piercing, wiping away the few beads of blood.
When it was done, Tom’s flaccid cock was trapped in a steel D-ring. The straight bar of the piercing ran through the head of his cock, holding his foreskin in place around it. This posed no difficulty when he was soft, but it would pull painfully if he became erect— and certainly if he attempted to use his erection. The piercing’s hook clasp had been crushed together so tightly that fingers couldn’t pry it open. It would need to be cut off for removal, and few people in Brighton had the tools to cut steel cleanly. None would lend them to Tom. And if anyone saw his cock without its cage before its appointed day of removal, the evidence of his guilt would be clear.
“Tom Candler, your ravaging is over.”
Lea unlocked the spreader bar and pillory. Alder and Lessen lifted Tom out. He flinched from Lessen, but needed the support of both to stand on legs shaking like a foal’s. Stern’s cock twinged pleasantly as he remembered how Lessen had ultimately been the one to core Tom out and leave him thus: stretched, wrecked, guts still in agony.
The silent crowd parted to let Alder and Lessen lead Tom home. His face was a white mask of agony. He whimpered with every mincing step. His cock swung between his legs, its new steel adornment glinting. And his eyes remained downcast, darting, terrified.
He did not look at Stern, not even for a moment. But he knew Stern was watching him, and would always be watching him. And waiting.