CHAPTER NINE
I leave Shiloh with Kerri while I go run errands. I gather as much as I can fit into my car, excited about the possibilities of what can be done. When I’m finished, I don’t go home. I go straight to the boy.
I collect my supplies, and in three short trips I’ve taken everything to my room. There’s going to be a lot added to my repertoire, but I don’t mind the cost.
Anything to enhance the boy’s experience.
I set my purse and coat down and go over to him, giving him some much-needed water. He’s defecated on the bed, but the smell doesn’t bother me. It’s a natural part of life.
Besides, there will be nothing left for him to shit out soon enough.
I gather the branches of the tree I bought, and I loop some thread around it. His ribs are bruised, but that won’t stop me. I wind the twine around the branches until I make them into one secure branch.
“It’s called Birching,” I explain as I step up to him. His eyes widen. “A torture for those who didn’t behave. This is on the lighter scale of what I have planned for you, my little devil.”
“Please, I’m begging you. It’s not too late.”
“It is too late, I’m afraid. You entered. Of your own free will, remember?”
I raise the branches above my head and bring them swinging down on his broken ribs. He coughs and cries out, whimpering through his pain. I do it again and again, and then I pause. “I should let you recover after each one. It’ll be more intense that way.”
“No… please…”
I smile and trace the branches down his middle. “Maybe if you survive what I have in store for you, maybe you will walk away to see the light again.”
I don’t mean it. I just want to give him hope. It’s a game. A part of the service. Let them believe they will live through it, and they’ll put up with a lot more. I raise the branch and bring it swinging down on his ribs again. He coughs and some blood spurts out of his mouth.
I raise it again and bring it down, and he coughs some more.
“Could it be that your lung is punctured?” I muse. “That would be a shame.”
I raise the branch and bring it down on his lower stomach and he cries out. I continue doing this at intervals until he is panting for air.
Then I sit the birch rod down in the corner, smiling.
“What should we do next?”
“Please, can I have some water?” he gasps.
I go to him with the bottle and hold it out to his lips. He drinks down greedily, and I pull it away after a moment so he doesn’t choke on it.
I rustle through the pharmacy bags and pull out what I need to administer the enema.
“We should get you all cleared out before we proceed.”
I set the enema on top of the chest of drawers before I pull out some chili pepper and turpentine. “I was going to give you a normal one, but in Argentina, this is used on political dissenters, especially post-independence.” I combine the turpentine and the chili powder in a bowl and suck it up with the rectal bulb syringe. “It might sting a little bit.”
“What is in it?” he asks, unable to see what I’m doing. “What are you doing to me?”
“This might pinch a little.”
I lift his cock and slide the syringe between his buttocks, probing for his anal entrance. He tries to clench down, but he’s weak and it only holds it for a moment before I find what I’m looking for, and I insert the syringe as much as it will go in. I squeeze the bulb and then withdraw the syringe, stepping away quickly.
His screams fill the room again and he shits blood. “It burns!” he shrieks. “Oh my God, it burns!”
“Oh, it will burn,” I say fondly, reaching to stroke his hair out of his face. It’s plastered to his face from his sweat, and I brush the strands out of his eyes. I go back to my supplies and bring out two huge lamps. While he screams, I set them up on either side of his face. I plug them into a mobile battery I’ve brought, and turn them on. The blinding lights force him to close his eyes, and he moans.
He is still shitting blood, just not as much now. The smell has permeated the room, and it is disgusting. As what he did was disgusting.
Reckless.
Irresponsible.
Punishable by death.
I light a cigarette. A filthy habit if there ever was one, and one I don’t like to partake in, but I drag on the smoke once and then twice, and then I put it out on the inside flesh of his arm. He cries out, trying to open his eyes but is once again blinded by the bright lights.
“Please, no, shut the lights off. I can’t take it.”
“You wanted this,” I remind him. “This is your penance.”
“I just want to go home to my family,” he sobs. “I’ll apologize. I’ll beg them for forgiveness. Please, just let me go.”
“We’ll see.”
I walk back to my supplies and hum a little tune, a nursery rhyme I taught Shiloh many years ago.
I hum it more clearly, the sweet sound mingling with the boy’s groans. There’s so much to choose from, I don’t even know where to begin. It makes me giddy.
I could, of course, end this quickly and go home to Shiloh and make sure she does as she’s told, but that would go against the contract the boy and I have made. I don’t break the contract.
I don’t break promises.
As I said, there is no turning back once you have entered.