by Van ©2014
		Chapter 3

Naked—her wrists and elbows cuffed behind her back and locked to a curved, rigid rod that followed the curve of her spine and was locked to her steel collar—her ankles hobbled by a trio of chains that also were linked to the bottom of the rod—and a distressingly large ball-gag plugging her grimacing mouth—Jodi padded down the hallway, with mincing steps, behind Mistress Eleanor.  She focused on Eleanor's strong, bare shoulders, leather-clad back, and buttocks.  The seat portion of the corset/bustier/bodysuit was more or less a black leather thong cleaving said buttocks from the back.  But for the smoky black pantyhose clinging to the firm, dimpled globes, Jodi's view was unobstructed.

Jodi was led past the guest room where she'd divested herself of her sopping wet clothes, then on to the back of the house, where Eleanor opened the door of what turned out to be a large walk-in linen closet.  It seemed like a lot of room to waste on the storage of folded sheets, spare blankets, cleaning supplies, and the like, and everything was stacked on built in shelving along one wall.  Eleanor closed the closet door behind them, Jodi heard a click, and turned to find the back wall swinging open.  Secret door! she realized.  This was very cool, of course, but Jodi's appreciation of the feature was lessened by her current situation.

The wall/door was thick and appeared to be solid.  Eleanor led her across the camouflaged threshold and Jodi found herself on the landing of a set of wooden stairs leading down.  The wall closed behind Jodi's back with a solid thud and another click, her leash snapped taut, and she carefully followed Eleanor down the stairs.

"The house has a full basement, of course," Eleanor lectured, "as do most of the outbuildings, but these stairs are hidden behind a solid concrete wall.  From the basement, it appears to be part of the foundation.  One would never suspect anything was on the other side."  She smiled back at Jodi over her shoulder.  "Terry used a number of different discrete contractors to do the work, but I myself did some of the more menial tasks, naked and in chains, of course."

Of course, Jodi thought.  What could be more normal that a husband using his beautiful, naked wife for slave labor?  It would make a great reality series on the D.I.Y. network.

"Anyway," Eleanor continued, "there are a great many square feet of 'utility space' down here the county assessor's office knows nothing about.  I assume there are modest savings on my property taxes, but I've never done the calculations."

The stairs brought them to a long corridor with concrete block walls, a semi-smooth concrete floor, and wooden timber ceiling.  Periodic compact, dimly glowing industrial fixtures provided barely adequate but highly dramatic lighting.

"I confess I've been neglecting the housekeeping down here," Eleanor sighed, "but the occasional cobweb rather adds to the ambiance, don't you think?"

There was noticeable dust, dirt, and the aforementioned cobwebs, but the corridor wasn't that dirty.  That said, Jodi could tell the bottoms of her feet were probably black, and would need a good washing when Eleanor finally decided to set her free... which she hoped would be soon.

They began passing gray steel doors studded with bolts and set in steel frames.  All had substantial hinges and deadbolt locks, and some had small viewing ports with sliding steel covers set at eye level.

The overall effect evoked an old prison or insane asylum, and did nothing to lighten Jodi's mood.

"Our first stop on the tour," Eleanor announced as she paused at a door, produced a key from somewhere, turned the key in the lock, and opened the door.  She led Jodi across the threshold, and the naked prisoner's eyes popped wide.

The chamber was thirty or forty feet on a side.  It was difficult to be sure as all the lighting was focused on the center of the space, leaving the background in relative darkness.  And directly under the lights was a rectangular table of heavy wooden timbers, but it wasn't a simple table.  Winch mechanisms of wood and steel were mounted at either end, and in the middle was some sort of rounded wooden hump.

Jodi knew instantly that she was looking at a rack, a torture device for stretching a victim by the wrists and ankles!

"This is our rack, of course," Eleanor lectured as she led Jodi into the room, "and as you can see, rather than commissioning a medieval replica, we decided to go with clean, modern lines, easy maintenance, and enhanced functionality.  The mechanical elements are precision machined, and the wood carefully sanded and finished."

Jodi examined the device.  It was true.  The thing was like the furniture upstairs, no ornate decoration or unnecessary detailing, but with elegant lines and fine craftsmanship.  A pair of black leather suspension cuffs rested on the hard wooden surface, attached to a pair of ropes wound around the wooden drum of the winch at one end.  A similar pair and identical winch were at the other end.

"It operates completely by hand," Eleanor continued, smiling at Jodi.  "We agreed that electric motors would be an unnecessary complication."  She went to the head of the rack and turned the winch's steering wheel-type handle.  Gears turned, a pawl lifted and clicked, and the drum slowly drew in the ropes and wrist cuffs.  "As you can see, the ropes can be tightened a fraction of an inch at a time."  She gestured to the hump in the middle.  "A similar mechanism allows the 'backrest' to be raised and lowered."

Jodi was still staring at the rack.  Her heart was pounding, and she was panting through her gag and her breasts were heaving, just a little.  She flinched, suddenly, as Eleanor embraced her from the side and held her close.  Her left side was now pressed against the right side of her captor's leather and nylon-clad body and Eleanor's gloved right hand was resting on her lower tummy.

"Imagine, Jodi," Eleanor purred, "being stretched on that thing... the ropes already so tight you can't move... gagged so you can't scream or beg for mercy.  And slowly... ever so slowly... one click at a time, the ropes tighten, and the smooth, hard wood under your back pushes you upwards."  She gestured towards the ceiling.  "And look."

Jodi lifted her chin, looked up, and beheld a set of eye-bolts with dangling pulleys mounted in the ceiling.  Thin steel cables, even thinner than the cable that had tethered her by the collar in the sitting room upstairs, stretched across the ceiling and down to a row of hand-cranked winches mounted on the wall far.

"Nipple-clamps can be attached to one winch," Eleanor explained, "and a crotch-rope with strategically tied knots to another."  Her hand began to slowly massage Jodi's stomach.  "Imagine... stretched taut by your wrists and ankles, with the backrest raised... nipple-clamp and crotch-rope cables taut as fiddle-strings...  Then, slowly... very slowly... the backrest is lowered... and you're left like that for hours and hours."

Jodi stared at the rack and shivered in her bonds.

"Poor thing," Eleanor chuckled, and kissed Jodi's forehead.  "I exaggerate.  Terry would only leave me like that for a few minutes... then clamp a vibrator to the crotch-rope and make me cum.  The experience is... exhilarating."

Jodi was still shivering.  Eleanor kissed her forehead, again, then released her embrace and stepped towards the door.  Jodi's leash snapped taut—"Nrrk!—and she tore her gaze from the rack and followed.

Their next destination was another steel door and another room, this one slightly smaller than the rack chamber.  The lighting was concentrated over the center, as before, and this time was shining down on a pair of thick, square, vertical wooden posts supporting a horizontal beam.  The posts were about five feet apart and three feet in height.  The beam was comprised of several planks that had been sandwiched together, then sawed into a rounded wedge with the triangular side up.  Like the rack and the furniture upstairs, it had an elegant, well-crafted look.  The posts were stained a warm maple color, and the individual planks of the wedge stained alternately dark and light.

There were gaps in Jodi's education—areas that could bear improvement, to be charitable—but she knew the exact purpose of the sinister thing before her.  It was a horse, another torture device!  It punished any victim straddling the beam by forcing her to carry her full weight on the narrow top ridge!

Jodi's heart was pounding again, if it had ever stopped.  Mounted over the horse was another eye-bolt, pulley, and cable arrangement, with the required hand-cranked winch mounted on the far wall.  The top ridge of the horse was rounded and smooth, like all the edges of the piece of "furniture," but it didn't look like anything even remotely approaching a saddle or seat.

"I can tell you recognize this device," Eleanor purred.  She embraced Jodi from the side, again.  This time, Jodi didn't flinch.  She did flinch, however, when Eleanor's gloved fingers slid down her tummy, through her pubic bush, and cupped her pussy.  "Your little feline friend is more resilient than you might think, Jodi," she whispered in the shivering prisoner's ear.  "After being forced to ride that thing, even for a substantial period of time, you'd be surprised how quickly your pussy would return to normal."  Her gloved hand began a slow, gentle massage of the "little feline friend" in question.

"Don't get me wrong," Eleanor continued.  "While you ride the horse, it hurts.  It hurts like the devil, and it doesn't stop."  Her hand continued to glide.  "There are many variations, all on the theme of being naked, gagged, and bound in a manner making it impossible to support your weight other than by resting your pussy on the ridge.  In one case, your ankles might be lashed to the rings you see set in the floor to either side.  In another, your legs might be folded and bound in a frog-tie, and your knees bound to the rings.  Your arms might be folded behind your back in a box-tie, or your wrists bound behind your back and lifted towards the ceiling.  I found that particular position, the strappado, to be particularly challenging and unpleasant, as it forces you to lean forward and concentrates your weight over your clitoris, rather than distributing it through your entire crotch.  It's most painful."

Jodi continued panting through her gag and shivering in her bonds.  Under different circumstances, and especially in light of what Eleanor's hand was doing between her legs, she might have found herself growing increasingly aroused, but at the moment, her brain and pussy were now largely in agreement.  Neither wanted to have anything to do with Eleanor's horse.

"The wrists can also be bound in front with the arms raised and attached to the cable."  She allowed her middle finger to gently part Jodi's labia as she continued the massage.  "Terry found a setting that allowed me to straddle the horse with my feet resting on a pair of wooden blocks, up on tiptoe with my arms raised.  I could support my weight with my feet, my arm muscles, or both.  Or... I could ride the horse.  He attached weighted clamps to my nipples, then left me for the night."  The pace of the intimate caress increased.  "Oh, Jodi.  It was horrible.  Eventually, my feet and calf muscles would cramp... and my arm muscles would succumb to exhaustion... and I'd have no choice but to ride."

Jodi stared at the rounded ridge of the horse, imagining she was in such a predicament, and a whine of distress escaped her gagged mouth.

"Yes, it's horrible," Eleanor purred, then leaned close, kissed Jodi's forehead, then released her embrace.  "On with the tour," she announced, turned, and walked towards the open door.  Again, Jodi had no choice but to follow.

The third stop on Eleanor's tour was another smallish room about the size of the horse chamber, and centered under the lights was—"Urrk?"—an iron maiden!

The rounded, iron cabinet was something like a giant chess pawn sculpted in the general form of a medieval maiden, and it did indeed appear to be made entirely of iron, with a rough finish and rust-red patina.  It was a few inches over six feet in height, with a set of heavy-duty hinges on its left side and an equally heavy-duty bolt with an integrated locking mechanism on its right.

With the loop of Jodi's leash around her left wrist, Eleanor turned the key in the bolt's lock, slid back the bolt, then pulled the front of the maiden open.

As expected, the inside of the cabinet was lined with spikes!  Her eyes wide, Jodi couldn't help but whine through her gag.  "Mrrrf!"

"Now, now," Eleanor chuckled.  She was using the key to turn a lock set in the side of the sculpted maiden's head atop the cabinet.  "My maiden is not a means of slow execution, like the Maiden of Nuremberg or other historical examples."  The lock released and the front of the head sculpture swung open, revealing a void in the rounded shape and only slightly larger than a human head.  It was without spikes, but two tiny round holes pierced the maiden mask's eyes on the front.  The range of vision granted a hypothetical victim of the device would be severely limited, but at least they wouldn't be in total darkness.

"The spikes are numerous, but quite short and not particularly sharp," Eleanor continued.  "They function to encourage the occupant to remain centered inside the encasement, rather than to impale her body and cause death by slow exsanguination.  You couldn't harm yourself on those things if you tried, but just to be sure..."

As Jodi watched, Eleanor placed the flat of her palm against the point of one of the spikes and pressed.  The spike shortened as she applied pressure, retracting into the thick wall of the cabinet.  Obviously, it was spring loaded, like one of those prop knives used in the movies.

"Quite harmless," Eleanor purred.  "However, the tips are electrified, as is the plate in the floor, and the more pressure that is applied, the greater the... stimulation."  She smiled at Jodi.  "The electricity involved is also harmless, of course, but quite motivating.  As tiresome as it might be to stand perfectly still inside the limited range of motion allowed by the maiden, it's far better than being repeatedly zapped, I assure you."

Jodi's heart was still hammering.  The maiden was terrifying, with or without "harmless" spikes and "harmless" electrical motivation.  The thought of being locked in the thing for anything more than a few minutes was horrific.  In fact, given a choice, she'd pass on the entire experience, regardless of the duration.

Suddenly, Jodi's leash snapped taut and she was being led from the chamber and out into the passageway.

"Our tour has just begun," Eleanor said as she paused to close and lock the maiden chamber's door, "but I think you need a chance to think about what you've seen."

This is it! Jodi thought, she's gonna let me go!

"Also," Eleanor continued with a smile, "I confess it's been a while since I've worn these boots.  They would benefit from a little neatsfoot oil or saddle-soap.  Terry used to force me to wear 'cruel shoes' on occasion, but I feel disinclined to wear them by choice."

'Cruel shoes?' Jodi wondered as she padded in Eleanor's wake.  I wonder if they'll be on the tour... and where is she taking me now?

A fourth steel door was unlocked and opened, and Jodi found herself staring at a cage.

It was a cube, about four feet on all sides, with closely spaced vertical steel bars braced by periodic horizontal bars.  The top and bottom were uniform steel grids, the individual elements as hefty and closely placed as the bars of the sides.  A door set in the front was hinged on the left and secured on the right by a pair of levers, one above and the other below a heavy hasp.  The top lever pivoted down, the bottom up, and together they clamped the door into its frame and formed a single attachment point for a hi-security padlock.

Eleanor released the clip of Jodi's leash, dropped it to the floor, then entered the cage chamber.

Alone in the corridor, Jodi watched Mistress Eleanor unlock the padlock, release the levers, and swing the cage door open.  She then turned to Jodi and smiled.  Jodi looked to her left and right, but she knew there was no point in trying to flee.  Even if Eleanor's boots slowed her down, Jodi's hobbling fetters would slow her down even more.  And even if Eleanor decided not to pursue, to simply stand and watch her "run" away, Jodi wasn't entirely sure she could find her way out of this subterranean maze.  Jodi heaved a sigh—a gagged gulp, actually—then minced across the threshold and into the chamber.

Eleanor stepped to the side and picked up a large pad covered in burlap.  She placed it inside the cage, then, still smiling, walked towards Jodi.  "Sitting on the bars without a pad is very uncomfortable.  I know."

"Nrrf!"  Jodi took a hobbled step back—she couldn't help herself—but Eleanor was too quick for her.

"Silly girl," Eleanor chuckled as she stepped behind the naked little captive and led her to the cage.  "You know you're not in control, of either the situation or yourself."

Jodi resisted, in a hopeless, halfhearted manner, as Eleanor forced her to stoop and enter the cage.  Kneeling on the burlap cushion, she shuffled in a half-circle to face the cage door, but by this time it was closed.  She watched in dismay as Eleanor secured the latches and closed the padlock on the hasp.

"Now..."  Eleanor stood, turned, and stepped to the threshold of the chamber.  "Why don't you take a nice nap, Jodi, and I think I might do the same."

Jodi mewled through her gag—"Nrrrrrf!"—tugged on her steel bonds, and shoved her right shoulder against the cage door.  It didn't even rattle in its frame.  The chamber door closed and she heard Eleanor turn her key in the lock.  Then, the small viewing hatch in the steel portal slid open and she beheld Eleanor's smiling face.

"I wonder, Jodi," Eleanor purred, "if the weather hadn't cooperated and made it so very easy for me to get you out of your clothes, how much difficulty do you think I would have had otherwise?  I think I still could have talked you into trying on the pretty bracelets binding your wrists.  It would have made no difference whether you were fully clothed, or not.  And once I had the collar on your pretty neck and you were tethered to the ceiling, how difficult would it have been to peel you out of your wrapping and lock you in the rest of my chains?  And if all else failed, how difficult would it have been to slip a little something into your tea that would make you more cooperative?"

Her heart pounding, again, Jodi panted through her gag and stared at her captor's beautiful face.  She's right.  She's right about all of it.

"Sweet dreams, Jodi," Eleanor said, then the hatch cover snapped closed.

Seconds later, the overhead lights winked out, all but a single fixture directly overhead.  As her eyes adjusted to the dark, Jodi could still see the locked door, concrete block walls, and solid steel bars of her small cage by its single dimly glowing, blue-green bulb.

If nothing else, Eleanor's tour had accomplished one thing: Jodi's mind and pussy were unequivocally in total agreement.  She was of one mind.  Anatomical solidarity forever!  Jodi wanted out of the cage, out of Eleanor's dungeon, out of her steel bonds, and most definitely, she wanted her clothes back.

Most of all, Jodi wanted to go home.