Ariana's Scandal, Part Four: The Ceremony

WARNING: Hot male bodies. Lusty women with zero impulse control. Implements that hurt. Adults only.

ADDITIONAL WARNING: S/M. I'm *so* not kidding in this chapter. For real. Be warned. Get out of here if these things make you squeamish.

FINAL WARNING: Caution, filling is HOT.


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Our story so far:
Fictional Foundation
And So It Begins
Ariana's Scandal Part One: The Guidance
Ariana's Scandal Part Two: The Meeting
Ariana's Scandal Part Three: The Preparations

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Nolan's hands were bound over his head. His feet touched the ground, so his arms didn't strain to hold his weight, they just stretched above him, locked securely with chains attached to the leather cuffs upon his wrist. Nolan had been locked this way, in a room full of busy men, for an hour. Weight bearing or not, his arm muscles had begun to ache.

Below him, his legs were spread, held apart by a metal bar decorated with symbols from an ancient past. His ankles were cuffed to the bar, his feet bare, as was the rest of his naked body. Nolan had been cleansed and scrubbed, inside and out. His body hair had been freshly removed, his skin oiled. This left Nolan smooth and silky, glistening in the early afternoon light that filled the room.

Nolan was being prepared.


Having studied every step of the ceremony rituals didn't make Nolan as ready, so far, as he'd imagined it would. Who could mentally prepare for the humiliation of so many hands upon his body, Nolan bound helpless to defend himself even as instinct demanded he resist their touch. Nolan understood, intellectually, the process he was being taken through, but when the man hands spread his ass, inserting oiled digits, before invading his body with a smooth glass cylindrical object meant to fill him for the entire day, Nolan cried out, "Enough!".

Nolan's unedited outburst was met with a sharp crop against his back. Men that he would lead tomorrow, today, were in charge of every part of his body. A voice hissed, "Honor Ariana with your bravery, " and then three more crop strokes bit into Nolan's flesh.

The after sting of the strokes was little, mostly, Nolan felt cold. The early afternoon breeze on his naked flesh was crisp; the glass inside him had been chilled before placement. Nolan gritted his teeth as the glass object was fastened into thin leather straps meant to hold it in place for the rest of the day. Nolan's body temperature warmed the glass and slowly his muscles relaxed and accepted the invader.

Mind, Nolan was no anal virgin. No man his age was unless he had specifically been kept that way to bring a high price. There were markets for such virgin curiosities within the province and also in the city. Many women enjoyed the thought of a man on all fours, head low, ass high, waiting in fear of the unknown. Some women could afford to purchase the first penetration experience over and over again.

Nolan wasn't a curiosity. He had been trained adequately to submit his ass to either a woman's whim or a ceremonial requirement. Nolan had been taken by any number of objects of different materials over the years. He had felt the pain and at times felt the pleasure, pleasure intended or not. All of Nolan's training, though, had been done by women. The sensations weren't unfamiliar to him, the hands of men upon him were. It had never occurred to Nolan how different the feel would be at the rough hands of men. Unconsciously, Nolan tried to push the smooth glass object out of himself, but the object held firm in place, going nowhere.

The hands moved next to Nolan's cock and balls. Nolan no longer attempted to follow the men's movements with his eyes, closing his eyes, preferring to think of Ariana. Nolan tried to imagine Ariana's hands, instead of these men, as his balls were separated, his shaft manipulated to fit inside metal jewelry meant to keep his erections hard and make Nolan visually pleasing to these women who demanded beauty. Nolan had worn cock rings before, but only during certain parts of his training.

Daily, this kind of jewelry was meant only for sex slaves, men designated to fill women's sexual desires and little else. That first males also were required to wear the jewelry spoke to all that was required of the first male position. Brains and beauty, the brokers laughed, these women want brains and beauty in one man, there's a find. His broker had encouraged Nolan to quickly acquire trained sex slaves for Ariana's bed before Ariana caught on, in the broker's words, that Nolan was skewed heavily towards brains and not so much sex. "I don't want to find you on my doorstep as a return and a reject and a big chunk out of my bank account as a result."

A man hand tugged Nolan's cock, encouraging erection so the fit of the jewelry could be checked. The hand stroked roughly, clinically, mechanically. Nolan stopped being able to think of Ariana. He could see only himself, tied, spread and stripped, helpless in a room filled with men. The hand stroked on. Nolan's cock hardened and in a burst, shot out away from his body, fully erect as required. The hand abruptly stopped stroking him, moving into examination mode, turning Nolan's cock gently to one side, then the other, then tilting it slightly upwards. Through closed eyes, Nolan heard murmurs of male approval. The fit of the jewelry was declared perfect, one more check box ticked on the to do list for the day.

The hands of the men next moved up Nolan's body, to his nipples. Nolan willed himself to not so much as flinch, even as his nipples were tweaked and pinched to hardness, all the ready for the clips of the next set of jewelry he was to wear.

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"And now, your Grandmother's necklace."

Ariana gasped. Ariana wasn't one to be taken by stones this way or that, but her Grandmother's necklace, the one her father was presenting to her this moment, had a beauty that left even Ariana speechless. Diamonds, but not any diamonds, the finest grade natural diamonds of each color known -- yellow, red, pink, green, purple, and shades in between, set in a fine platinum design that could have only come from the hands of The Sons, no matter what provenience was claimed.

Ariana reached to hold the necklace. "For the day?" The morning light played the colors of the stones onto the wall.

Evander smiled at Ariana's near childlike wonder. "No, for good. It's your mother's gift to you today. Forever."

Ariana threw herself into her father's arms, squealing. "I can't believe it. It is so beautiful. Thank you!"

Evander hugged his daughter. "Be sure you thank your mother."

"She could have brought the necklace herself."

Evander touched Ariana's hair. "Vera insisted you would enjoy the necklace more, coming from my hands."

In a small voice, Ariana replied, "She's wrong, you know."

"I know, " Evander responded, "but such is the way of women." His voice deep and dramatic, Evander was teasing Ariana with a common male expression of resignation and complaint, not normally intended for female ears.

Ariana laughed, pulling back to look at her father full face. "Not this woman." She stuck her tongue out at her father and together they both laughed.

"Yes, my darling daughter, you have your own way. Now turn around and let me get this necklace on you. The guests are all settled and we're down to minutes before you must appear."

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The weather of the day of Ariana's twenty-first birthday celebration could not have been more perfect. A combination of warm sun and a cool, dry breeze made for complete comfort, no matter the temperature preference of an individual guest. There was music in the air, tables laden with the finest food, good wine and handsome men everywhere. The women were dressed in silk and chiffon, the men dressed just barely. The city guests noted that the best part of ruling class events was the more formal occasion, the fewer clothes the men were allowed to wear.

"I wonder," whispered one slightly drunken city guest to another, "if they have figured out how to get these men less than naked yet." This was said directly after an enormously well endowed sex slave had his loin cloth caught in an upward breeze directly at the guests' eye level.

Her companion responded. "I'm sure they have. We working women just have to figure out how to get invited to that less-than-naked event."

Surreptitiously, some of the city guests scribbled notes. There was a hunger for all things ruling class. Details would have a pay off.

By all accounts, city and other, Ariana was lovely on her day.

When The Sons recounted, they spent an entire chapter on Ariana's dress alone. Her color choice, pink and orange, had given the dressmakers fits. Finding a pink and an orange that blended well together was hard, selecting shades that enhanced Ariana's near alabaster skin was almost, but not quite, impossible. "Orange is a color for women of darker skin please, Ariana, I beg you, " Vera's dressmaker had implored but of course Ariana would have none of it; Ariana would have orange or she would have death. There was seemingly endless drapings in fabric lengths of every hue. At one point, Ariana mock threatened the old dressmaker, she'd known since birth, with a Sunday flogging in the town square if he said "just one more draping", one more time.

In the end, Ariana stood stunning in a pink and orange silk dress with a shirred bodice and full gathered skirt that fell not completely to the ground, allowing for both elegance and comfort of movement. The bodice was fitted past Ariana's waist, defining her maturing hourglass shape.

Ariana had insisted that her hair not be up-swept completely, so the hairdressers had created a design with Ariana's dark hair swept up in parts and hanging long and wavy in other parts. Her near curls danced on this shoulder or that one, depending on which direction she turned her head or how animatedly she moved in conversation. Quietly, artists sat to the side, making sketches to be turned into oil paintings and wood cuts on later days.

The strapless and backless design of Ariana's gown caused some whispers. Seldom were women as uncovered on public occasions as Ariana was on her day. More guests whispered about how beautiful Ariana was, her back turned, than whispered "ought not be", though, so if part of Ariana had been hoping to stir a little scandal with so much skin, that part was disappointed. All agreed Ariana shone.

The Sons spent most of their dress pages on a subtle part of the dress design no guest could appreciate without a closer view of Ariana's body than socially acceptable. Ariana's bodice was covered in tonal embroidery, filled with symbols of the past of the women, symbols of the line of the Queen, symbols of Vera's House, and symbols of Ariana's House.

There were other symbols, The Sons claimed, symbols hidden under symbols, symbols created by combinations of other symbols, which viewed by a critical eye, told the whole story of the events yet to come.

Ariana's Scandal, the Sons said, was plainly foretold within the bodice of the dress Ariana wore on her day.

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In between toasts and speeches, and more toasts and speeches, Ariana moved from table to table, greeting guests as she was required to do. Ariana felt happy and almost compliant as she said one polite thing after another to guests she either didn't know or didn't care about. She'd allowed herself to think of Nolan in only brief moments the entire day, fearing longer thoughts would make each minute until he was completely hers drag impossibly long.

Ariana drank little, with most of the women around her making up for any lack of consumption on Ariana's part. As evening came, the women drank more, and everyone anticipated the ceremony about to begin.

The city guests were mesmerized by the change the combination of hour and alcohol made in the ruling class women, usually so controlled. Night fell. The lanterns and torches were lit. Illuminated by fire, the women one after another, began stripping their men of whatever little clothing the men were wearing to begin with. The music had stopped. The women made the men stand, or in some cases bend, in any one of a number of ritual positions for final clothing removal. Crops and whips appeared from almost nowhere. Men who were considered to have not held a position in just a right way, or having gotten into position quite fast enough on command were immediately punished. The night air was filled with soft or sharp sounds of a crop hitting flesh here, a male grunt there, more hitting, soft male apologies, requests for mercy, and an occasional plaintive cry out.

The hour had come. The women were hungry.

Ariana was escorted to the top of a platform, just a few feet above ground, for her place in the ceremony. Ariana stood flanked by slaves from her mother's house, her stomach suddenly nervous, her eyes alert for the appearance of her man. Other slaves removed a long gold carpet in front of the platform, revealing a dirt pathway that had been cut and smoothed during the preparations. The path was now lined in torches. On invisible cue, the women grabbed some of their slaves, by whatever handle they chose, and together they stood on the side of the long path, forming a wall one hundred women long on each side, with the men to their backs. The city guests were versed enough to know what came next, but not entirely clear on where to stand themselves. The city people hung on the outskirts of the ruling class women and waited.

Everyone waited, heads turned to the beginning of the path, opposite from where Ariana stood at path's end.

Nolan appeared from the darkness, pushed along by several men on either side. Nolan wasn't fully illuminated until he reached his place at the start of the dirt path, drenched in the fire light of the torches.

As prepared, Nolan was naked with his hands bound behind him. Nolan still held the glass object inside him, the fullness over hours becoming part of his own body. Nolan's nipples were clamped and gently weighted, weighted enough to send a shot of pain or two through his body every time he was pushed roughly forward. He'd been gagged for some time in waiting, with a gag that filled his whole mouth the same way the glass object filled him inside.

A slave grabbed Nolan by the hair, yanking Nolan's head backward, turning Nolan's body this way and that for the crowd to approve. The women cheered.

Ariana found the composure to not let her mouth drop open at the sight of Nolan. In the fire, he looked so little like the sweet, soft man she'd claimed her own two weeks before and looked every bit the captured wild man the stories told of. Ariana's mouth was dry, but she had lines to speak, and did so loudly.

"Slaves, make this man crawl to me. My women friends, I implore you, have this man earn every inch of progress so that he may earn the right to be called my first male."

The women cheered again, long and with ferocity. The men behind Nolan shoved Nolan to his knees quickly, also pushing Nolan's face on the dirt path, grinding, until Nolan could taste the earth mixed with his own drool, as the combination seeped through the corners of his gagged mouth. One man unbound Nolan's hands, deftly working each hand to return full blood flow as quickly as possible, while two other men removed the metal spreader bar from between Nolan's ankles. The bar was replaced by not small round weights attached to each ankle, specifically designed to slow Nolan's progress as he crawled toward Ariana.

A hand pulled the gag from Nolan's mouth. Another hand offered Nolan water, which Nolan drank hungrily and quickly. Nolan spat once on the ground to clear his taste of dirt and then drank more.

As Nolan was fully positioned to begin his trek, the slaves drew back. Nolan was on all fours, head facing forward. One man, Nolan couldn't see which, whispered kindly behind Nolan's ear. "It's almost over. You can do this. You are strong." And then Nolan was conscious the men were behind him no more.

Everything lay ahead. There was only the long path of women and Ariana at the end.

The wild men weren't trained before the ceremony, it was said. The men were beaten during capture, beaten during preparations, but never trained or tamed, kept every bit as wild as on capture when their knees and face hit the dirt as Nolan's just had. The ceremony was the first step in changing the free man to slave, subjugated to the entire community of women. The community claimed the man first, as he crawled toward the one woman who would own him.

Not all wild men made the whole path, legend said, some were too willful, some were too weak. The weak ones, who dropped mid path from fatigue were killed as useless. The willful ones who refused to submit to the length of the pathway were castrated for control, eventually soft and docile and all too willing to fetch a whip for anyone's punishment, including their own. The wild men who reached the end of the path, those were the conquered men and the forefathers of all men. They were heroes revered in history, studied by all young people in every part of the land.

The first male ceremony honored the sacrifice of the wild men as precisely as the women of this age were able to create.

Nolan began to crawl. The women cheered more loudly, ringing in his ears. Nolan kept his head low, as ceremony proscribed, and also in some vain hope for aerodynamic progress as quickly as possible. The length of time the trek took was in direct relation to the amount of pain taken along the trip.

The first blows hit Nolan as soon as his body reached the edge of the women. Nolan counted off mentally - crop, strap, whip, two more crop hits, distracting himself from reacting verbally to each strike. Silence was his strategy for crowd appeasement but as a strategy it was just a guess. There was no way of knowing if calling out would incite the women to hit him harder, or if lack of outward pain expression egged the crowd to more.

For many feet, the women didn't seem to care where they hit, as long as they hit the mark of Nolan. Nolan felt every part of him take on stripes, especially his back and his ass because they were such an easy reach from the sidelines.

Nolan didn't cry out until somewhere around the halfway point. Several of the women had drunkenly yelled out that the back of Nolan's legs were too white. Nolan tried not to hear their words but could not miss the woman who commanded, "Stop the man in his path."

Suddenly, male slaves stood in Nolan's path not letting him progress. A handful of women quickly gathered behind Nolan, beating the back of his legs with leather straps. Nolan could feel the fire of each stroke and finally he called out in pain. As Nolan feared, the women liked his cries, hitting him harder to hear more. The men pulled Nolan upright, allowing the women access to Nolan's stomach and chest. Nolan's cries came now with every breath, not every stroke, as there were more strokes on his body than breaths for him to take.

"Beg to pass!" One of the women shouted, hitting him over and over again until, Nolan begged.

"Please."

"Louder!", another woman's voice demanded.

"Please! Please let me pass! I beg you, let me pass", Nolan shouted with the voice that was left in him.

The blows stopped. The men in his path parted and Nolan crawled on.

Nolan was obviously weakened now. The next man who stepped in his path did so to give Nolan water. Nolan felt anger that anything held his progress but drank the water greedily even as light blows hit his back. Another measure of water was poured over him, and then one more, providing Nolan the smallest relief and a clearing of his head.

Nolan allowed himself to look up to see that just a quarter of the path remained. At the end stood Ariana, looking distressed, not happy, pained not pleasured. The expression on Ariana's face hurt Nolan's heart.

Nolan had no crowd management strategy left, just a goal -- get to Ariana as quickly as possible. Back to crawling, Nolan moved his legs and arms faster in the last quarter than they had moved in the first quarter, even though he ached so from the weights he had been dragging and the pain that filled his body.

Whether there were now fewer blows or whether Nolan had become immune to feeling the blows, Nolan not only couldn't say but didn't think to consider. Reaching Ariana was all that mattered.

The last feet were crawled. Nolan had arrived at the bottom of the platform where Ariana stood. Four men surrounded Nolan quickly, gathering him up in their arms, carrying him up the steps and placing him at Ariana's feet.

According to ceremony, Nolan should have been kneeling in front of Ariana, upright with his head bowed, but there was no strength left in his body. Nolan lay crumpled in a pile at Ariana's feet, thinking oddly to himself that the white carpet of the platform was very soft and it was a shame that the carpet would be dirtied by all of the dust and blood from his body.

The crowd cheered raucously at Nolan's platform ascension, roaring on until the cheer turned into a collective gasp at what happened next.

Ariana dropped to her own knees, next to Nolan, and then underneath Nolan, taking his head in her lap.

Vera clutched Evander's arm so hard, she broke skin with her nails. "What is that child doing now?"

Evander was as shaken as Vera, but held out hope. "Give them a minute. This might turn around."

After the collective crowd gasp there was collective silence, waiting for the next moves.

Ariana stayed on her knees, stroking Nolan's head. She whispered in Nolan's ear. "I shall stop it now, we won't go on. I can't go on. My heart is going to break." Ariana turned Nolan's head so she could look directly in his eyes. At first Nolan's eyes were glazed and dazed, but his stare cleared the longer he was locked on Ariana's resolve and compassion.

Nolan smiled up at Ariana from the comfort of her lap. Again Ariana said softly, "I shall stop it now."

The smile didn't leave Nolan's lips as he whispered back to her, "You will do nothing of the kind. We're finishing the ceremony. You will not hold back on me. And," his whisper now urgent, "for god's sake, get off of your knees, woman, what are you thinking?"

Nolan's bossiness in the midst of everything around them made Ariana burst out laughing. She kissed Nolan lightly on the head, to another crowd gasp, and then stood her full height. The male slaves behind him held Nolan upright on his knees.

"My House's apology for the interruption in ceremony, " Ariana addressed the crowd. "It's been a long day. I'm afraid I felt weak in my knees and needed some moments to recover. My slave-to-be here was a great comfort and source of strength for me. We're ready to continue."

The Sons said that this day was the only time in the history of women that the final portion of the first male ceremony was performed with the woman and the slave looking directly in each others eyes with no break, save the breaks necessary due to physical circumstances.

Ariana spoke the ancient words loudly.

"Man, in the community of my fellow women, I claim you as my own."

Ariana drew her arm back, slapping Nolan full across the face as the ceremony required, holding nothing back from her blow. Ariana and Nolan's eyes parted as Nolan's head moved with the impact.

Ariana waited to speak, waited until Nolan's head had been righted and he could hold her gaze again. Imperceptibly to others, Nolan nodded to Ariana for her second line.

"Every part of you belongs to me, to do with as I will."

Again, Ariana drew her arm back, this time striking the other side of Nolan's face with her back hand. And again, Ariana waited to speak until Nolan's head was clear and he could nod to her for her third line.

"Your obedience belongs to me, as does your pain."

Nolan was struck once more, once more Ariana waited for him. This ceremony moved more slowly than any ceremony had before, but no one in the crowd complained. Everyone was mesmerized by seeing something they had never seen before.

After the ten required lines were completed, Nolan's face was marked with the print of Ariana's hand all over. Ariana had caught the corner of Nolan's mouth with one of her blows. His lip had cracked, showing the smallest amount of blood. With her eyes, Ariana promised Nolan that she'd soon kiss away all of the blood and all of the pain, everywhere.

Nolan had but one ancient line, but it was his line to close the ceremony.

"Ariana, I am yours won. I beg your mercy for the rest of the days I may live. Have mercy upon me, your slave, Nolan."

The crowd applauded, softly at first and then haltingly and then they stopped clapping all together. The men gathered Nolan to be taken off and cared for, as proscribed, but instead of standing in victory, as the woman was supposed to do at ceremony's end, Ariana hunched her shoulders, gathered her shawl and left, following directly behind the men who carried off Nolan.

The platform was empty.

The women were silent for a moment. Then, as if a giant ball of crystal was shattered by a single blow, the women's collective voice burst, falling into hundreds of separate high pitched speculations about what on earth they had all just witnessed.

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So, The Sons claimed they found all of Ariana's tale told in hidden symbols on the bodice of the gown Ariana wore that day. They said that when the symbol of Ariana was combined with symbol of Nolan and overlaid with the symbol of the first male ceremony, the three together created a single ancient symbol, a symbol of endless, unsatisfiable hunger or, depending on the interpreter, the symbol of a yawning pit with no bottom.

The Sons' version of the story, of course, relies on the hand embroiderers of Ariana's dress to be both mystics and scholars as well as craftsmen. More likely, the embroidered symbols touched randomly and The Sons read the bodice as they wanted, after the fact.

From that day on, though, tongues wagged about Ariana non-stop. Anyone who attended Ariana's twenty-first birthday had her or his own guess about what might happen next. Some speculators came close to being right on at least a portion of the path Ariana soon took. These women and men weren't mystic; they merely understood that trouble follows closely the affairs of the heart.

Never before had a woman made her love for a slave so clear, no less in the front of the entire company of women, the women's most important slaves, city guests and, of course, the ever present spies of The Sons.

The roots of Ariana's Scandal had taken hold.



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Ariana's Scandal, Part Three: The Preparations

WARNING: Sex! Fear! Pain! Enslavement! And oh,Teh Drama! Adults only.

ADDITIONAL WARNING: S/m. That means people get hurt. Not so much in this episode, to tell the truth, but there's really just tons of it usually.

FINAL WARNING: Objects in the mirror are most definitely closer than they appear.


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Our story so far:
Fictional Foundation
And So It Begins
Ariana's Scandal Part One: The Guidance
Ariana's Scandal Part Two: The Meeting

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The House of Vera
in the line of the Queen
requests your presence
at the Twenty-First Birthday Gala of
Ariana
daughter of Vera
on Saturday, April Twenty-Fifth
at four o'clock in the afternoon

Formal presentation ceremony
of the first male of the
House of Ariana
in the line of the Queen
to follow

The days moved rapidly toward Ariana's twenty-first birthday celebration.

The coming of age gala for any ruling class woman was huge; for Ariana, it would be immense. Every ruling class woman of the province, from the youngest age appropriate to the most elderly, would be present. Each woman would be personally attended by at least five slaves, with the rest of her household staff being lent to the preparations or gala. Carefully selected dignitaries from The Governing City were also invited. They'd be bringing their own entourages and their own special sort of diplomatic baggage, god love them. All told, well over a thousand guests would be need to be fed and entertained, and many fold more slaves accommodated.

Two weeks to go, Evander turned to Nolan to take over final details on a significant portion of the event planning. Nolan's background in food service and management was extensive but Evander was giving Nolan no small task. There wasn't a single kitchen or staff that could handle a feast so large. The preparation had to be made by many chefs, in many households, and then brought to the House of Vera at exactly the right moment. Supplies had been ordered to each cook's specifications, and were in transit.

"Your chance to show your stuff, my boy. And to make your leadership mark with the rest of the men in our province."

Nolan fell into the logistics planning easily. He lived for logistics. Each project was a puzzle with many parts that must be set just so for the whole picture to come together. The ruling class technology stymied Nolan, however. He'd spent many years in The City, using email and cell phones to accomplish complicated tasks efficiently. Now, to get a message from one house to another he had to use runners, men of long legs, endurance and a tolerance for weather no matter the condition. So many messages had been flying regarding the great event, these seasoned runners were exhausted well before nightfall.

At Evander's instruction, Nolan wrote his communications carefully on white parchment letterhead, engraved with the mark of Vera's house. Nolan signed each message with his own name and sealed the envelopes with with his own custom seal that Evander had had made for Nolan right around the time of Nolan's purchase. There was a new symbol for Nolan's name, and the new mark for the new house of Ariana.

The first envelope Nolan sealed, he waited carefully for the hot wax to cool, and then ran his fingertips over the crisp, detailed design. He marvelled for a moment at the intricacies of life with the ruling class -- symbolism in everything. Not much time to marvel, however; too much work to be done. Soon Nolan had runners flying this way and that with his own letters, as he tried to pull together all of the last minute details for the food and drink.

Some problems he had to bring to Evander.

"The cook, excuse me chef, he prefers to be called chef, of the House of Justine is incensed over the shipment of cheese we've received from the master cheese makers in the communities. The chef insists he cannot work with the delivered cheese, that he needs a summer cheese, made when the cows were eating fresh grass not hay, for just the right sharpness. This cheese is too dull. I've tested samples myself and while my palate doesn't know a fall cheese from a spring cheese, it seems quite fine and there's no time to get more. I'm unclear on my boundaries. If this were my staff, I'd insist the cheese be used with no further argument but...." Nolan broke off, looking much like a fish out of water. There was so much he didn't understand here.

Evander broke into a smile. "Every cook, I mean chef, in the entire province will make one quite mad. Why do you think I handed the food preparations off to you? The cooks are impossible. This one, that one, the other one. Every single one, impossible."

"Even here?" Nolan spoke in near wonder. "The chefs I managed in The City were notoriously difficult but I thought here they'd be less, I don't know, prideful."

Now Evander laughed outright, which made Nolan blush. Nolan did not like to be thought naive. Evander clapped Nolan on the back. "My boy, people are people wherever you go. Circumstances, rules and even punishment do not change who a person is at their core. It may modify a person's outward behavior, but modified only when someone is looking. And in the case of our cooks, not even then. Here's what you need to know to solve your problem."

Evander spoke with Nolan at some length about the House of Justine and how to best get the kitchen staff on Nolan's side. "Use your authority with your own staff and don't brook rebellion, but with the houses of others, we must use diplomacy. The very last resort would be to ever involve Vera or Ariana in a conversation with Justine about the behavior of her men. Think ten or even twenty times before you ever involve the women. You will lose respect of the men and, in the case of the women, most likely end up with a whip on your back for not being able to make problems vanish." Evander advised Nolan to seek counsel from Michael, the first male of Justine, asking him not to handle the problem but to give advice as to what Nolan should do. "I know Michael well. He will respond favorably. Your cheese problem will be no more."

Nolan thanked Evander and wondered to himself how he was ever going to learn enough to make his way in this land.

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"Piqued. Yes, I am piqued. I'm most definitely piqued. I am very piqued!" Ariana threw a large sofa pillow across the room, hitting the wall with the softest of thuds. She was in the guest chamber of a neighboring household, where she had been banished (her words) to a await the time of her twenty-first gala.

Ariana had summoned her father to hear her complaint.

Evander spoke. "Ariana, it is barely two more weeks, not even that, and then all the freedom you want is in your hands. Your mother has asked you to stay here so that Nolan may move freely about the home and accomplish what he needs to accomplish in that time. He is a bright boy. He is doing well."

In spite of her dark mood, Ariana brightened. "He is? Doing well?"

"He's doing very well. He's one of the best I've seen, already."

Ariana smiled, or nearly, catching herself before the smile was in full bloom and pulling it back in. "Well, that's a fine affair. The woman is banished so the slave can move freely about. Yes, I am piqued!" She looked about for another pillow.

Evander held out his arms. "Come here." Reluctantly at first and then near gratefully, Ariana accepted her father's hug. She spent a moment in his embrace while Evander murmured soothingly. "It's almost over. Be a good daughter to your mother."

Ariana felt herself tear and sniffled. "I won't. But, I'll be a good daughter to you. Just this one time."

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The first letter arrived to Nolan the next morning.

Nolan was sending and receiving so many communications, he barely looked up when a runner was before him with yet another. He motioned to the runner to throw the envelope on the top of a pile.

"You should take this one in your hand, sir." So odd to be called sir, but a common form of respect shown to first males of any house. Nolan reached for the letter the runner held. As he looked up, he met eyes with the runner, saw the strangest look returned to him, and then Nolan knew. The letter was from her.

Nolan quickly dismissed the runner and tore open the envelope, through Ariana's seal.


My Obedient Nolan,

I shouldn't be writing you so of course I am. They have me locked away in this horrible House of Penelope and I promised my father I would stay here. I don't know what got into me to make such a promise but I did, so, here I am.

I am piqued! The walls of this guest chamber are beige. I hate beige. Will you write that down that no room of my house will ever be beige? I like lots of color. I like orange, orange is a color. Beige is not a color. Beige is horrid. Write down, no beige, ever!

My father says you are doing good work. He says it is important work and that you are busy in all hours but the most wee. I confess I asked about you because I had to know how you were doing, if you were pleasing. Evander told me a story about cheese. I found the story confusing, but he thought you had done well, that you had saved the cheese and he was proud. Making my father proud is not easily accomplished. It is wise and will serve you well.

Listen to my words carefully now, I have something I require of you.

Before you go to sleep tonight, alone in your room, under the covers, I want you to draw out your cock. I command you to make your cock hard for me, as if I were in the very room with you, over you, demanding it hard. And then you will stroke your cock. You must think only about me when you stroke, up and down. Start slowly, up and down slowly. Imagine at first I am there, teasing your body, going more slowly than your body would call out for, drawing out your desire.

And then, I want you to stroke faster.

As you stroke faster, you must think of the night when you will hold your legs open for me and I mark your thighs with my crop. Think of the sting. Think of how hard it will be for you, untied, to hold your legs open as I hit your thighs time, after time, after time.

Do not stop. You must continue to stroke yourself. Imagine then that I make you ask for each mark of the crop. Understand that I now own your thighs, they are bought and paid for. They belong to me, as do you, wholly and completely. I will delight in making you open your legs for me so I may do what I will. Think how how wet this will make me. I will mark your thighs in red welts and then draw myself across the stripes, marking them again with my wetness.

Keep stroking and thinking as long as need be, up until the point you would, if I were there, beg me to let you come.

But do not come. I say "no".

Then go to sleep, thinking only of me.

(I am doing the same, in this house, thinking the same thought in my bed, touching myself. Only it is true, I am letting myself come many times at the thought of you with your legs held open wide. I am very wet right now as I write and shall make myself come again momentarily.)

Your Ariana

p.s. Don't fear for our secrecy. The runner has a debt to me, a great secret of his I have never told. I didn't hold his secret because I am kind, you know that I am not kind, I held it because I knew one day I could need his secrecy in return. Write a hasty reply, seal it, and send back to me. The runner waits for you outside.


Nolan wrote back quickly in return:



My Ariana,

There will never be beige in your house.

Everything else will be done as you require, exactly as you say.

Your Obedient Nolan

p.s. Your father is too generous. He saved the cheese, not me.


Nolan folded and sealed the envelope quickly, giving the reply to the runner who was indeed waiting outside. Then Nolan sat and stared at the stacks of paper on his desk, wondering how many hours until he could retire.


**************************************


The work was endless. There were moments of the day Nolan wondered if he had finally met more than he could handle.

A wine crisis developed to match the cheese crisis which would have been pleasingly ironic if Nolan had not had to clean up the mess. The entire last minute shipment from the wine country community had been ruined when the horse drawn cart transporting it was overturned. "Have these people not heard of motor trucks with proper cargo packaging?", Nolan muttered to himself, trying to figure how he would get enough wine in such a limited time frame. "Perhaps I should send runners to bring it bottle by bottle by bottle. That would fit here." After a few long hours of having no answer, a brainstorm struck. Nolan wrote messages furiously and was able to, in a day's time, coordinate a very elaborate trade and borrowing of wine from and between more than two dozen households. After acquiring enough bottles to fill the hole the lost shipment had created, Nolan enjoyed the rush of small victory that came along.

Each day, a fresh message from Ariana arrived.


My Obedient Nolan,

....It is not just the walls that are beige in the House of Penelope, it is the people, too. My god, they are unbearable. Write down that no members of the House of Penelope will ever be invited to dinner or parties in my house, lest they turn both you and me beige as well. Write it twice, to be sure, no Penelope, no Penelope, and remember, I beg you, no beige anywhere.....

....When you touch your cock tonight, you will think of my whip. I won't whip you often, but one day I will whip you either because you have displeased me or because I feel the strong urge to see you struggle. Your hands will be tied above your head with leather straps, your back exposed to me. I have felt how strong your back is and I hunger to see it naked, open, waiting for me. I won't have anyone else whip you. I will only whip you myself, each stroke will come from my hands. I will feel the strokes come from me and touch you as if I strike you with fire. You will call out but I will be merciless...


And every day, Nolan replied.


My Ariana,

I have made the notes you ordered. Never will your house have seafood stew as was served at Penelope's house last night, never shall your ears have to sit through a dreadful harp concert again, and your butter will always be sweetened properly, not with a heavy hand that makes you queasy.

....Also, I have touched myself as you require, following each command. I thought of you whipping me, with my hands stretched above my head, bound in leather. It has been hard. Not just my cock, which has been very hard because you told it so, but hard for me to come so close to orgasm and not let myself go. It is painful, my testicles strain. I write that because I think it will please you there has been pain. I feel the pain right now....


Letters continued back and forth every day and Nolan's torment continued every night.

The days were closing. The food and drink was well assembled. Many tents were erected on the grounds, covered in greens and flowers, each flower more exotic than the last. There were flowers everywhere, breathtaking arrangements by the most skilled in the province, exploding in height and breadth, filling the air for households around with their aroma.

Floors and carpets were laid. Tables and chairs were set out. Lighting was strung, endless numbers of paper lanterns, intricately crafted by artisans of the communities in the most vivid of colors. There was noise, confusion, problems, solutions.

More of this, less of that, too much of this, take it all away!

And then, the last hammer fell on the last nail. Construction was complete. Linens of gold, purple and red covered the tables for the guests. The silver was polished, the fine china stacked openly, waiting to be laid. At the end of the chaos, there fell a pleasant, breezy evening and an eerie calm.

Tomorrow would be Ariana's party, tomorrow Nolan would be presented to her.

For a steady man, Nolan suddenly found himself quite terrified.


**************************************

As Nolan sat in his temporary office, too late on the eve of the gala, it occurred to him to run.

It wasn't unheard of slaves to run, although close to physically impossible to run from the ruling class. Still, for a good ten minutes, Nolan played the logistics of running. He decided that if he hadn't waited until the eve of the ceremony, he might have had a chance, concealing himself in outward transport. There were so many carts coming and going in and out of the province, there had been dozens of opportunities, right under his nose. He'd missed them all, so caught up in waiting for the next message from Ariana to arrive. Why had he spent so much time thinking about her messages when he should have been planning to run. How obvious was it now!

"You should be off to bed, boy." Evander's voice broke though Nolan's thoughts. Nolan started and blushed, fearful for a moment that he had spoken any of his treacherous escape thoughts aloud.

Evander had entered the room carrying a bottle of amber liquor and two glasses, managed deftly in one hand. He sat instead of giving Nolan an opportunity to rise. "How about one drink before you do?"

Nolan nodded and Evander poured. In silence, Nolan took a long, long drink, until the glass was drained. The alcohol burned Nolan's throat. The burn felt good.

Evander quietly filled Nolan's glass again. Evander began to speak.

"It's a big day tomorrow, yes it is. The details are well in hand, congratulations." Evander coughed. "I imagine you've not given yourself much chance to think about the other details of tomorrow. They can be overwhelming to consider."

Nolan's stomach turned, afraid that Evander could see him a coward. Nolan's answer was brusque as he took another big drink from his glass. "It's a day like any other day. A day where I do my duty."

Evander drank from his own glass. "The ceremony is ancient. When you study the symbolism, it is beautiful. But, when you are on the eve of being the object of the ceremony, it is best case uncomfortable and worst case terrifying. Myself, I was scared out of my ever lovin' mind."

In spite of himself, Nolan smiled. "It's hard to imagine you terrified of anything."

"Have you seen Vera when she's mad?"

The men chuckled together. Nolan felt himself relax.

"Me as the object. That's one way of putting it. " Nolan shrugged. "The ceremony is what it is. It is one day. Does it intimidate me, yes. Does it scare me, no. I've been afraid of little in my life. Life also is what it is." Nolan's glass was empty again. "If you pour me one more drink, perhaps I will tell you what does scare me. If you really want to hear."

Evander poured in silence and waited for Nolan to speak. A few minutes passed, and then Nolan began.

"I have never been owned before. I've been a slave my adult life, but I've never been really owned. My broker, who held my title before Vera, she didn't care for me. I mean, she never cared what I was doing. She demanded my sexual service on occasion, but she had many men and there was never focus on me. Rarely she would cuff me about when she was drunk, saying that I was nothing but a money pit who would never bring her profit, but mostly she left me alone to study and took her amusements elsewhere.

"Mind, I have studied how to be owned. I have practiced how to be owned. I have been trained under a whip and a crop, by women paid to train me. But own me? No one has ever owned me. It never occurred to me, and here you must laugh at me, never occurred to me it was possible. I knew that this, " And here Nolan made a slightly drunken motion to the world directly around them, "would be a challenge to my abilities, and I craved the challenge but I . . . " Nolan smiled into the bottom of his again empty glass, "missed that it came with being owned." Nolan emphasized the word "owned" a mite too loudly, in accordance with the amount of alcohol which was making its way through his body.

"Are you reluctant to be owned by anyone or is it Ariana you fear?"

Nolan laughed. "Fear Ariana? Fear Ariana. I'm afraid not to be owned by Ariana. And I'm afraid to be owned by Ariana. And I'm afraid that I will be owned by Ariana and she'll bore with me quickly with fifty men to choose for her bed. I'm afraid she wants too much from me and equally afraid that she soon might want too little. I'm afraid that she needs too much for me to guide her and afraid that she'll never listen to me at all. I'm afraid to be an object to her and afraid to look up, too closely, and find that I'm not an object at all.

"I'm afraid that I am far emptier and colder and less able than I had ever imagined because I am afraid." His voice nearly broke. "These women, this woman, requires everything and yet needs nothing."

Evander examined an imaginary spot on the wall. "The ways of the women are not our own. It is better to be above them or below them than to ever be beside them."

"You quote The Sons."

Now Evander laughed as he drank. "Yes, I quote The Sons. Everybody quotes The Sons. Some quote more discreetly than others."

More silence, eventually broken by Evander.

"What can one woman really do to you, even Ariana? The woman controls your body. Your body is bought and paid for. No part belongs to you. You hold it forth for labor, for pleasure, for punishment. All that is their due. The mind, though -- who can buy a mind? You can win a mind, but you cannot buy one. As with a heart, a heart is won, not bought." Evander put his head low, as if to tell a secret. "They all know it, too. Every one of them knows that only the body they can own."

"And what if Ariana has already won my heart?"

"Then you, my boy, are truly fucked." Evander smiled. "But not necessarily in a bad way. Time will tell. Give your body over willingly, it is her due. And see what happens next." Evander stood, gathering his bottle with him. "Now off to bed with you. I won't be delivering my daughter's first male full of black circles around his eyes. This is the last evening I can boss you around. Obey me tonight and tomorrow, we will be colleagues." Evander clapped Nolan's back sharply, standing next to him until Nolan rose.

Nolan went to bed. Willfully, with a stubborness that came from who knows where, Nolan disobeyed the nighttime ritual orders Ariana had commanded him and didn't touch himself at all.

His sleep came fitfully.

**************************************

The rites of the presentation ceremony are rooted in either history or legend, not too fine a point being placed on the difference between the two in the land.

It is said that before the time of voluntary service, before the time of communities and The City and brokers and commerce, the men were captured wild by the women and subdued. The Sons laughed openly at capture as a fact. "A fanciful tale," they called it. The driest of The Sons wrote long essays, "proving" that the enslavement of men had always been social and economic and never by force. Few read the dry Sons, however, even few of the other Sons. "Legend has more power and truth than truth alone will ever have," was a saying of The Sons to which all, except the driest Sons, nodded in agreement. So even The Sons wrote tales of the wild men and the women who subdued them, back in the days of yore.

The wild men were on Nolan's mind as the ceremony preparations for his person began. He imagined that he was one of the wild men, having spent his entire life free, hunting, killing, living by skill, only to be caught up and captured at a moment unexpected and forced into slavery. Forced into kneeling before women and accepting their will, a man owning everything and then, owning nothing, not even his own cock or his own ass.

The modern day presentation ceremony for first males was harsh. In the days of the wild men, each man was beaten and used, bound and subjugated until finally, finally his enslavement was complete. The harshness of the first male ceremony drove home that, despite the polite veneer of current times, there was only one way, now and forever. And that way belonged to the women.

In the dawn's light, Nolan settled into the ritual preparation bath with no outward complaints or struggle, unlike the mythical wild men before him. As the waters washed around Nolan he wondered if, inside, he was any less tormented than the freshly captured wild men had been long ago.

Slaves stood to the left and right of the bath, holding the brushes and cloths that would scrub Nolan roughly, cleansing every part of him to be ready to be received by Ariana.

Nolan nodded his head that he was ready for them to begin.


**************************************

I break here because the hour is late and my eyes are tired. This part of Ariana's story is only halfway done. There is much to tell regarding her twenty-first birthday, and Nolan's presentation to her.

No one but Ariana, Nolan, and the mysterious runner ever knew of the forbidden communication in the weeks before Ariana held the title to Nolan. Ariana never spoke of the runner's own secret and never, to her credit, used his secret against him again. Both secrets would have been terrible scandals had they been brought to light.

Neither, of course, could hold a candle to the scandal to come, Ariana's Scandal, illuminated in the bright noon sun for all to see.

Continue Reading This Post

Ariana's Scandal, Part Two: The Meeting

WARNING: This story is for amusement purposes only. Do not attempt at home or in your local community. Performed by stunt drivers on a closed track. Also, additional charges and penalties may apply for early withdrawal. Always keep your tires properly inflated for best mileage ... or else.

ADDITIONAL WARNING: There's sex and s/m content here. S/m means "sado masochistic" which means, oh, look it up at Wikipedia. If you don't want to read about women who like hurting men, you don't belong here.

FINAL WARNING: These stories read like a twisted Harlequin romance, with pretty much the same level of writing. If you want craft, buy a real book. If you want some smutty, twisted love, keep reading.


**************************************

Our story so far:
Fictional Foundation
And So It Begins
Ariana's Scandal Part One

**************************************


Directly as Ariana finished her guidance with William, it came time for Ariana's first male to be selected and purchased. No single event in a woman's life was as important. The first male was the cornerstone, the linchpin, the foundation to every household. For a wealthy woman, another fifty males may be added, but none would hold a candle to the power and importance of the man chosen first. He was the leader of her household, the father of her children, and her solace in times of trouble. He was also, of greatest importance to a young woman, the first man with whom she had real sexual interaction.

The ruling class were a funny lot. They didn't demand so much purity from their young women as they demanded restraint. A time for everything, the older women would say, a time for everything. An underage woman feeling flush while strapping a man to be covered in red welts and gasping in pain was fine; subsequently pushing him to the ground and impaling oneself upon him was not.

As we've said, the magic age of full womanhood was twenty-one, when "everything" came to be. The months between sixteen and twenty-one crawled at a snail's pace, full of punishment guidance, naked male bodies, lust unrequited and promises of "not that much longer, not that much longer, dear, it will be worth the wait". As twenty-one neared, the pace of customary events roared from glacial to frantic, an entire new household and life to be made, decisions and choices everywhere.

Ariana, and this whisper is true, was near incorrigible on the topic of selecting her first male.

Usually Ariana complained solely with her girlfriends, but one day she made her mind to bring her case to her mother. A formal meeting was arranged. Ariana soon lost any cogent argument to emotion. "It ridiculous. It is crazy. It is patently absurd," Ariana paused with her dramatic pause "that I should not be part of the selection of the first man I will fuck! Finally fuck! Do you know how long I have been waiting to fuck? I am starving! I nearly took William the other week, poor man, who knows what could have happened to him."

Ariana's mother, Vera, known for her grace, spoke calmly. "I have told you before about coarse language. Not in my presence. You girls will say what you will say to each other, but I don't have to hear it." Her eyes met Ariana's eyes and as was usually the case in their test of wills, Ariana backed down, momentarily.

Ariana flopped herself in a nearby chair. "Oh fine. I'm sorry. But you see my point." Unsure that her point was seen at all, she continued. "You and my father are all out and about choosing between this one and that one, having these hushed discussions and even sharp words, don't think I didn't hear the arguing the other night, he wants one, you want another, there is all of this going on and it's all about me but, nobody is asking me what I want!" Ariana finished loudly.

Vera tried to keep her own voice even in reply. "You can't know what you want in your first male. I don't know why you girls think you are somehow an exception. Your generation is no different from any generation before. Ariana, you will get to choose your next fifty men, completely on your own. Buy them how you like, fuck them how you like, discard them if you like. " Ariana jumped at her mother's use of the word "fuck" but Vera seemed not to notice. "Your first male is my choice. My mother chose your father for me. She chose well. I will do no less than that well for you."

By bringing to mention Ariana's father, Evander, Vera was playing her trump card. Ariana adored and admired her father. Obviously, the choice of Evander was impeccable, and "proof" of the wisdom of others. Left no logical comeback, Ariana stood and quite nearly stamped her feet in the process.

"I don't care what you say. I will hate him. No matter whom you present to me, I will hate him. He will not be mine. I will treat him unkindly, harshly, cruelly until he begs for release on his knees, until he cries and begs. Then I will release him and choose my own. This is all within my right." True that a man could beg release and be granted same, although unheard of in modern times. The embarrassment to the woman's family name would be unbearable.

Vera had more than enough. "Ariana, you thinking only of your rights, you are spoiled and willful. You speak against our ways. Our ways are all that holds everything around you together. A brick building crumbles without the mortar. We crumble without our ways."

"I have heard this before, Mother, and I say, I am not a brick so I see nothing in this expression for me. I care for what is right for me first, as every sane woman should."

Grown exasperated, Ariana's mother dismissed Ariana. Vera went to seek the counsel and solace of her own first male, Evander.

**************************************

"This is your gene pool causing the problem." Vera spat her anger at Evander. "I should strip you and whip you every night for a month for all of this ruckus she has started. Your genes, your genes!"

The notion that Evander's genes were troublesome was absurd. Ariana was much like, not unlike, the women in the Queen's line before her, including her mother -- though true that Ariana brought her own special magnification to the given genetic traits of pride, singleness of vision and willful stubbornness. The notion her rebellion was Evander's fault was absurd and also funny, tickling Evander's funny bone at this inappropriate time. He was able to keep the corners of his mouth from turning up in a smile, but couldn't quite keep a twinkle from his eyes.

Vera saw the twinkle and her response was quick. She landed the palm of her hand across his left cheek with a sharp slap, followed quickly by a backhand to his right cheek. She pulled at the back of his hair until he tilted his head backwards, releasing her grip only when pain crossed his face, and only after grabbing for his nipple rings and twisting not lightly. She made Evander gasp, slapped him yet again fiercely and then...

And then, Vera sat in a chair and began to cry.

Evander knelt at his woman's side and caressed her in his arms, stroking her hair, making Vera feel small within his large frame. Evander whispered, "Please stop crying. I'll fetch the whip right now, if you will please stop crying. Please."

Vera thought that it had been far too long since Evander was whipped. Would do them both good, him especially, his liberties were great. But at this moment Vera was selfish, calmed by the gentleness of Evander's touch, not now enthralled with the thought of his body stretched out naked, waiting for her will and her pain. Perhaps tomorrow. Vera leaned into his body, absentmindedly kissing Evander's tender nipples softly, and let him dry her tears.

**************************************

A grand truce was made, with Evander as the power broker. Evander convinced Vera that some ground must be ceded to Ariana or the child would continue to make the entire family, and herself, miserable. Evander convinced Ariana that a little ceding of ground was all she was going to get. Forget winning the war; take spoils from a single battle won and be done with it. Arrangements were made for Ariana to meet her intended first male, discreetly, before the formal presentation ceremony, and to have some loose "right of refusal" should she find him completely unsuited to her needs. The word "right" made Vera angry, but was used at Evander's insistence, and at some penalty to him. Keeping peace between Vera and Ariana was important enough to risk Vera's wrath. Welts heal.

**************************************

It was left to Evander, also, to deal with Ariana's intended, a young but not-so-young male named Nolan. Nolan had to come them in the customary fashion, through a man broker in The City, but what was customary left off there.

Purchasing, training and reselling potential first males for the ruling class was a small, highly risky and highly lucrative cottage industry among only the most well heeled brokerages. As the brokers would like to tell you over drinks, the ruling women were far too fickle when it came to first males. A broker could spend years and bags of money on a certain man's price and training, only to have him rejected by these women for a nose too crooked, or, this was particularly maddening, a nose too straight. Sour investments could eventually be re-cooped, but never on resale to a lesser station. That was a flat loss. The only way to re-coop cash laid out on a bad man bet was on the floors of the brothels, throughout many years of subsequent service. To be sure, these well trained men brought a high hourly price, but both the man and the broker were old and gray by the time the books were cleared.

Nolan was a risky bet on outset. His family lineage was poor. First males traditionally came from a long line of service, raised in homes of comfort and prestige. These young men were, even before they reached The City, groomed for the inevitability of their service, and urged to reach for the highest goal, first male in a ruling class household. But Nolan came from none of this. He was born to a poor community, where few men gave service. His own family had the smallest handful of men who had served, reaching back hundreds of years, and so had little money accumulated and no power. It was the same in nearly every rabble house in his town. Somehow, in a town devoid of goals for its men, devoid of true achievements to which young men could aspire, Nolan latched onto the highest achievement he could conceive. He would be a first male.

He was a smart boy, but it was a lonely goal. Nolan came of age surrounded by men who not only had no goals, but didn't understand the concept of goals. That education was sparse for men left his friends untroubled. Nolan made the mistake of complaining one day that he couldn't get his hands on a decent accounting book and his friends, such as they were, laughed him nearly out of the pub. When the laughter died down, one of the companions rose to make a toast. "To you, Nolan. A man makes his way with the strength of his back and the motion of his cock. Our advice -- find yourself a good wife, keep her well fucked, and she'll always find money for your beer. 'Sal the accounting you'll need."

Eventually Nolan made an alliance with a lonely and smart girl. The girl agreed to find him books and teach him what she knew in exchange for the use of his tongue whenever she required. Not an unpleasant bargain, but a secret one. Even a few sexual encounters with these lowest of class women would deem Nolan soiled for any of the women of status to whom he aspired.

When it was Nolan's time to sign for service, he stated he would agree only to sign with a broker who would sponsor him for first male training. Most brokers laughed at the notion, as did the one who finally paid his price, still laughing as she drew up his papers. "I've just had a big sale, so I am feeling generous today. You are handsome and smart, sweetie, but how your family line is overcome to sell you to the ruling class in any form, much less as a first male, I can't imagine."

But all of these years later, Evander could imagine Nolan a first male. Evander prevailed over Vera to choose Nolan for his beloved daughter. All of the men were equally qualified; in Nolan, Evander sensed a hunger that would spark his restless daughter. Spark well, Evander said out loud, Nolan will spark Ariana well. Privately Evander worried what errant timber particles of that spark might catch. Predicting Ariana to surety was not possible.

The purchase thrilled Nolan, the line of the Queen no less! Be sure, the girl's reputation gave him pause, but it was to Nolan to steady her, they all said. He had worked so hard and so long, there was no budget he couldn't balance, no staff he couldn't manage and no woman he couldn't please in every part of her body.

But the good news also left him feeling hollow as he looked to celebrate. In all of his years marching toward his goal, he'd never acquired companions nor lovers to cheer him on. There was no one to rejoice with, other than his broker, and she so busy counting all her profit, was less inclined to praise Nolan than to pat herself on the back for betting such a dark horse so well.

So now Nolan stood proud, feeling strong and impossibly lifelong lonely, listening to Evander tell him there was yet one more hurdle to Nolan's goal. Nolan must have a conversation with the girl Ariana and come through that with her approval.

Nolan was sure, surely, having come so far, a twenty year old girl was not much of an obstacle.

**************************************

The room where the two young ones met was secluded and quiet, off the main traffic of the house. While the staff could generally be trusted for discretion, there was no point in requiring silence from more lips than necessary so the only people who knew of Ariana's and Nolan's meeting were those in the closest circle of secrecy. Ariana and Nolan were left to themselves. They both stood, facing each other, both surprisingly relaxed given the import of the moment.

Ariana looked Nolan up and down. His face was handsome, chiseled and cool. His brown eyes looked both kind and intelligent. Unfortunately, there was a combination of warmth and confidence about Nolan's bearing that bugged Ariana, and made her want to nettle him a bit.

Ariana's first words: "They've dressed you like a virgin."

Nolan colored slightly. True, he was wearing uncustomary clothing for a fully grown and experienced man of his stature. Flax linen, both top and bottom, his pants were long and loose, with drawstring tie, and his shirt, also loose, was open with a slit at the collar, nothing else. Agreeing was the only course. He threw his arms open while dropping his head. "Yes, awhile since I've been required to wear so many clothes."

"Not since your former life?" Ariana was not surprised to see Nolan become instantly uncomfortable with her question. While slaves sometimes spoke of their former lives in talk with each other, such talk was actually forbidden. There was no life before a man joined himself to the ruling class, hence no former life of which to speak.

Nolan eyes dropped in polite deference. "I don't know how to answer your question, Ariana and still bring honor to Vera, who holds my title until transferred to you on ceremony. Perhaps you could ask me again, at such a time you can require my answer?"

Ariana laughed as Nolan colored more. "Well, I think you look silly and old fashioned in so many clothes. Strip them off for me and let me see what you really offer." She seated herself and left Nolan standing. She motioned with her hand for him to begin.

This was an impossible situation. Nolan couldn't believe that he had been given such a long list of "dos and don'ts" and Ariana had been given none. This woman was every bit as difficult as he had been told. Feeling exasperation rise already, he chose his words carefully. "I've been ordered to keep my clothes on. Again, Vera holds my title. The expectation is that you will inspect me upon presentation ceremony, when title is transferred. I thought you would have questions for me, questions" Nolan stumbled, "about my experience or qualifications. I've studied household finance, management, cultures and traditions for many years. I'm certified in......"

Ariana stood, breaking his speech with the movement of her body. "I am sure you are well qualified in these boring things, or my mother and father would not have selected you." She emphasized the word "boring" with a roll of the "r". "The qualifications I'm looking for are different, like how big is your cock and can you keep it hard through pain." She had moved now to stand just inches from Nolan, brushing his dark hair lightly with her fingers. His hair was soft and wavy, thick in spots, slightly thinner in others. Seeing an opportunity, Ariana came close to Nolan's ear and said, "My god, your hair is receding. How old are you anyway?"

And so the "conversation" continued for many minutes, Ariana asking the most impertinent questions she could think of, in the rudest way possible. Women were expected to show some level of respect to the experience of their first males; Ariana made it clear she would have none of that tradition. As to Nolan's age, thirty-two, Ariana recoiled in mock horror that such an old man could be foisted upon her.

Having finished playing with Nolan verbally, Ariana turned her hands to his body, placing them squarely upon his shoulders. "I shall inspect you now and you won't stop me. I'll leave my hands above your clothes, but you will get in position and you will submit."

Queerly, even knowing that Vera held his title and not Ariana, Nolan obeyed Ariana's words. He moved into the ascribed position for inspection, with both hands locked behind his head, and legs spread full apart. "I hope you find me pleasing, " said Nolan, wondering now if anything of the kind would happen. Ariana had picked, mercilessly, at all else about him.

The next minutes were a wonder. Ariana closed her eyes and moved her hands as blind woman might, pressing them against the rough fabric to feel the man underneath. Nolan blushed as his body responded to her touch almost immediately. The vulnerability of naked inspection seemed nothing to the vulnerability he felt now being judged through dense fabric by a young woman who held the fate of all of his next years in her fingertips. His back was strong, he suddenly wished it stronger. His shoulders broad, but, he thought, they could be broader. His thighs thick and cut, surely pleasing to any woman, but to this woman, who knew. Comport and self-confidence were vital to a first male. Nolan felt that even as his clothes had been left on, his most important accouterments were being stripped away.

Ariana's fingertips stopped at Nolan's chest, sweeping several times and then settling to caress and gently tweak his nipples. He moaned involuntarily.

"A sign of life", Ariana whispered, eyes still shut tight. Her hands moved directly to the front of his linen pants, where she found the hardened cock, straining the fabric. She grabbed on, gently but with feeling, more as a lover than an inspector. Or so Nolan imagined as he wished her now to force down his pants and take hold for both of their pleasure.

As Ariana felt his cock, up and down its length, she spoke softly. "Let me tell you how it will be in my household, Nolan. I will punish you every night. I have been well guided. Every night, you will spread your legs for me and I will mark your thighs with my crop." Now she touched his thighs, through cloth, tracing imaginary stripes with her fingers. "I will beat them until you call out and then I will catch your cries in my mouth and swallow them whole. I will stripe your back. I will stripe your chest. You will wear jewelry on your nipples, not for beauty, but for my pleasure. Some days I will be kind and other days cruel, weighting the jewelry and teasing you as you try to move about with the weights, concentrating on your business at hand. If I like you, I will tease you lightly. If I am angry with you, there will be no part of your body you can hide from what I have learned to be able to do to you. Some days I will be angry, some days I will be happy, but always you will be punished. Always you will offer yourself to me and always I will enjoy it."

Nolan felt himself dissolve inside. His mind's eye could see him stripped and kneeling before her. Before she had ever laid a hand or an implement on him, Nolan could feel Ariana's sting. He feared her sting. He needed her sting.

Inside himself, something unnamed sprang to life.

Ariana's hands returned to Nolan's cock. "You are wet already". Nolan's pre-come had well made its way through the linen.

"Give me your hand." Ariana opened her eyes and grabbed one hand from behind Nolan's head, lifting her skirt, and bringing his hand to touch her own wetness which now dripped far down her legs. "I have been like this from the first minutes I saw you, when I first thought of all the things I would do to you. I release you now to put your fingers inside me. Use your hands on me. Make me come."

Against all training, all rules and all admonishments, mesmerized by Ariana's voice, Nolan moved from inspection position to the position of a man hungry to please the woman before him. He lifted Ariana's skirt with one hand while caressing and pleasing her pussy with the other, Mindful of her virginity, his fingers moved slowly in and out of her, settling mostly on her clit, teasing her body easily into an orgasm which thrust her forward against him.

"My god", he said softly, "what have I done." Impossible to calculate how wrong Nolan's actions were or what might happen to him because of them.

But Ariana wasn't finished. She pulled Nolan to her as she lay them both on the floor. "You will fuck me now." Nolan protested that the time had not yet come. Ariana placed one hand over his mouth, and caught his right nipple ring with the other, tugging for emphasis. "You will fuck me now. You either belong to them or you belong to me, you decide. Do you belong to me?"

Belong. Nolan gently removed her hand from his mouth. He and Ariana held eyes for several moments, him perched above her, neither of them moving. "I belong to you, " said Nolan finally, "I do as you will. I give myself to you." Ariana released his nipple ring from her hand. Nolan spread her legs with his own, murmuring words of gentleness as he drew his cock to her.

No matter her station, a woman's first intercourse is never without discomfort. Brave and hungry girl that she was, Ariana didn't cry out on Nolan's entry, nor during his thrusting. She urged him harder, taking the pain and turning it inside out to imagine that she was the one causing the pain, having made Nolan fuck her when he did not want to. She did cry out, in another fashion, as Nolan was able to provide her two more orgasms, one with his fingers while fucking, and one from fucking by itself.

Nolan's normal control was lost in this situation, him forgetting to even ask leave to come before the come was well out of him and inside Ariana. In the instant afterward, Nolan was genuinely afraid of what the girl/woman would do to him for such a sin, what part of his body, heretofore untouched would know new pain. Nolan apologized profusely and begged forgiveness. Unexpectedly, Ariana took his face in her hands and kissed him deeply and sweetly, long enough for his fear to subside and his passion to return again.

"You are, I think, " said Ariana, "the perfect man."

Nolan was dizzy. "You mix your messages, Ariana"

"That I do. You might as well be used to it. You've no idea what you've gotten yourself into. Now let's hurry and clean up for we are sure to be caught."

Caught. Nolan's senses started to return and he froze as he took in all that had just occurred. "I think, I think this is the death penalty, execution, death, I'm pretty sure of it. Taking a woman's virginity before her time, death." Nolan covered his eyes with his hands.

"Nonsense, " Ariana declared, "I will always protect you. I will say that I raped you. I think that is only one of those family disgrace things for me, raping a man before my time. Women get forgiven all kinds of things men get executed for." She shrugged. "But they might not let me keep you, and I haven't begun to do all of the things I want to do to you, so let's be quick about this. And, are you smiling? Stop that! You have to look miserable. I really am just the worst bitch. No one will believe a thing if you don't look utterly miserable to be with me."

**************************************

Vera waited for word from Evander. As soon as he entered the room, she knew.

"Ariana fucked him, didn't she?"

Evander held up his hands. "Within the hour."

Vera sighed. "Did he make her happy?"

"I'm told she's quite smitten."

"You were right then, he is the one."

"He's a good man. Hopefully, in short order, he'll pick up the pieces she left him in."

"Ariana, " Vera said.

"Ariana, " Evander echoed.

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The Sons of Class had a fondness for Ariana and told her story as gently as they could. It is said that, in the company of a legion of stubborn and willful women, Ariana was the most stubborn and willful young woman ever, but the whispers are often unkind. The kind interpretation of events is that Ariana was a woman who knew what she wanted and would accept nothing less.

You might ask yourself, if you were she, what would you have done?

Meanwhile, as scandalous as all these events were, they aren't the scandal that I've promised to tell. We'll get to Ariana's Scandal, the famous one, in due course.


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Ariana's Scandal, Part One: The Guidance

I just got finished assuring you that everything in the Ruling Class province was neat and orderly, and now the first story I tell you will be anything but. Apologies. Ariana is a special case, a special disorderly case. Scandal didn't visit the Province very often, but Ariana had her way. It will take me a few parts to get to the scandal, but when it comes, my.

Ariana was one of the smartest and most beautiful women of her time, a direct descendant in the line of the Queen,which would have made Ariana queen, if there still was a monarchy instead of a ruling council. She was also kind, and sweet and hot tempered, terribly dramatic and positively regal, all wrapped up together.

Our story starts one average morning when Ariana was twenty, approaching twenty-one.


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There were several important age milestones in every ruling class woman's life. The woman prepared for her first (and perhaps only) pregnancy at thirty. At forty she took her mother's voting place on the ruling council, unless she had been needed earlier than that, but no later than forty.

Twenty-one, though, was the magic milestone, the age where a young woman took her first male slave, and began to build her own household.

Ariana was nearly twenty-one and could not wait. None of the young women found the maturing years easy, but they had been particularly unbearable for Ariana. There came a point where the barely clothed or naked men who filled the province, and her mother's house, were no longer just so much expected scenery but the object of desire, or rather, unbridled, unadulterated, unedited lust. Her body demanded to be let loose on men of her own. The society demanded she spend years learning how to treat and own a man, before she could actually own one.

Heading off to her semi-weekly guidance with William, Ariana was in mood. There's a special foul temper that visits only the young, fueled by exasperation at hearing the words "when you are older, not yet" too many times, and that temper clouded all over Ariana today. She walked unescorted, having lost her mother's escorts when she was eighteen, left adrift for the three long years between then and twenty-one when she could claim her own men.

Reaching her destination, Ariana practically stormed into the marbled lobby of the guidance center, neglecting the pleasantries she usually exchanged with the men who fronted the greeter's desk. Taken slightly aback, the men pointed her toward the room she would find William. Again she stormed through that door, calling out dramatically as she did, "I'm in no mood today, William, this is all so much futility."

And then, not fully through the door, she stopped. Look what William had done.



He'd presented himself, already trussed and secured, on one of the most elaborate ritual punishment contrivances in the province. It took two men at least an hour to set one man in it properly, and the apparatus itself many, many hours to move. Ariana blushed that she hadn't been her normal pleasant self to the men at the desk, who must have been the ones to labor so carefully.

The beauty of the design of this particular apparatus has been written about numerous times by the Sons of Class, who also claim it was one of their own artists who drew the plans generations ago, (but it is so like the Sons to take credit for every thing of beauty, who knows.)

The Uniter, as it was called, was crafted of each type of strong wood found in the land, accented with cherry and burled walnut, adorned with gorgeous carvings. The ropes were handwoven, and the metal parts forged by hand as well -- careful craftsmanship, no automatic assembly on any piece. The materials were drawn from the speciality shops in the Communities, traded through the business women of the City, and the final work assembled in the Province. If the Sons were right about an artist of theirs being the designer, then the name "the Uniter" was particularly poetic. Every part of the land contributed its best. Tall and impossibly strong, the Uniter could hold the largest man immobilized and helpless, spreading him open from every angle to a woman's least whim.

And there was William, her guide for the last two years, trussed and strapped into the magnificent Uniter, held open for her. Ariana entered the room fully, shut the door, and stood to look. Her heart skipped at his beauty.

Some days she forgot how handsome William was, as she was often too irritated with his insistence on perfection to appreciate. Ariana would make fun of him under her breath as she left the center, "Another set of ten with the crop, Ariana, please. A man can feel when you are not emotionally committed to the swing. The last ten felt uncommitted." After such an admonishment, she would deliberately over-commit on ten terribly harsh strokes that hit the wrong spots, and William would say patiently,after catching his breath, "Another set of ten with crop, Ariana, please. A man beaten from anger in your heart will never serve you as well as you deserve. Again, please." This gave her another line to make fun of on the walk home, but with a light smile on her lips. William had taught her most everything she knew, even if she'd been exasperated at the length of the process, she appreciated him.

Today, there would be no gentle admonishments from William, as William couldn't speak. The front part of the Uniter included a long strap with a large leather gag, fit into the man's mouth as the last step during ceremony. It muffled a man's cries and mercifully gave him something to bite down against the pain.

Ariana moved to William's side, the closest she had ever been to a man in the Uniter, although she had spent many hours studying pictures and instructions in her classroom work. His ass was held up high, his head held down low, the traditional starting position in a device that allowed for innumerable position changes with little effort on a woman's part. William's legs were spread sharply apart, fastened at the ankles to a complex metalwork bar, steel at the core, adorned with the copper and brass on the exterior.

Ariana touched William's presented ass gently. While she could feel the electricity of her touch go through his body, she couldn't see his body move at all. That's how securely the Uniter brought the man into its mechanism, making him one with the wood and rope frame. There would be no verbal or non-verbal admonishments from William today.

What to start with, where even to begin? William always told Ariana what the implement or implements of the day were, what she needed to practice. Her eyes flicked to try to catch his eyes for a clue, but she couldn't see them. Not only did the Uniter hold his head so very low, it held it down, and secured tightly. To read his eyes, Ariana would have had to kneel on the ground, nearly flat, and look up. She was on her own.

No other idea, she started with her favorite, the thick leather strap. It felt good and solid in her hand and made most satisfying noises. Her first couple of swings were off, she heard William saying in her head, but the next few were on, and after that she caught her rhythm in delivery. She covered his ass in red welts and then moved down to his legs, skipping the sweet spot of the top back of his thighs to build up his mental anticipation of when the strap might meet them.

So much of it is mental, William told her, so much of it. The magic is in the connection of the actions of the body to the thoughts of the mind, flowing back and forth between woman and slave. Too few people grasp the magic, Ariana, but you can. You have a gift. You will see men's souls.

Too many flowery words, it had seemed to Ariana, whenever William had spoken like that to her, when all she really wanted to know was how much longer until she could have her own men to have sex with. But in this moment as she paused, leather strap in the air, to strike the first blow to the top of William's thighs, his words came back to her. Hitting that sweet spot the right way would connect directly to his core. She knew it. And she understood. Though William was incapacitated from any kind of communication, though Ariana hadn't spoken a word since her first entry outburst, communication flowed between them through the connection of her strap on his skin, and they were mentally united.

Her strap hit the top of his right thigh hard, and lightening fast the left thigh, and just as fast again the right one. Despite the tight bonds, she could see his body jump at least micrometers, which encouraged her speed and the power behind her strokes even more. She could hear his muffled cries against the gag, as each thigh was hit in rapid succession, an erratic, unpredictable pattern, throwing him continually off balance as to what to expect. Ariana lost herself for some minutes in the flow between her and William and back again, lost to time and space, lost to reality and logic.

She switched from strap to crop, to vary the pain sensations being sent from her to William. She switched again to flogger, having forgotten to think through any taught techniques, just flowing, flowing, flowing.

Finally, the aching of her arm and own labored breathing broke Ariana from her trance. As she stopped to catch her breath, she tuned into the physical effects of the afternoon on William. The bottom half of his body was covered, double covered, multiply covered in angry welts and stripes, his whole body dripping in sweat.

God she was thirsty, how thirsty must he be.

Hoping she remembered how the front mechanism of the Uniter worked, Ariana moved forward to raise William's head, luckily hitting the right combination of buttons and levers on the first try. Still secured, his bottom half moved down and his torso raised. Ariana could finally look him in the eyes. William returned a loving look, filled with such pride in her, that again, Ariana's heart skipped. She fumbled as she tried to remove his gag. William was so patient as she fumbled, and finally his mouth was free, although he didn't speak.

Ariana impulsively kissed him square on the mouth, completely forbidden, but the only gift she could think to give him, other than the water he clearly needed. His mouth was so dry.

"Water on the way, " she said softly. She was back at his side in less than a minute with water, which she fed to him gently and he drank eagerly.

She touched his face. "You are so beautiful. I will buy you, no matter what the price, just as soon as I have my own household."

William smiled and shook his head lightly. "Ariana, you know that I've been used by many, many women. A used man is not a slave for your house, that's just so much talk. It's nice talk, though. I would love to listen to it all day."

She touched his strong chest, and ran her fingers across his nipples, watching for his cock to supply the proper reaction. Tentatively, it did, in spite of the pain in the rest of his body. She kissed him again, lightly and then with more force, compelling him to respond stronger. She whispered hoarsely in his ear, "If the penalty would fall on me and not you, you know what I would do to you next." William whispered "thank you" in return, his cock showing visible appreciation for either the original idea or the reprieve given from terrible consequences.

Ariana moved back from William and the Uniter to survey the new position and its possibilities. She took a long drink of water.

"I think the crop on the chest is next, William. You hate the chest, you know I know it. That's next."

William's mouth free, he said softly but clearly, "As you wish, Ariana. I offer myself up to you."

Flattered beyond words, Ariana said nothing. She selected the largest, stingiest crop from the assortment and confidently pulled her arm back for the first strike.

There were hours yet before it was time for her to leave.


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And there you go. That was the afternoon of Ariana's informal graduation from William's guidance. I told you this part of her story first because the guidance William gave her is so enmeshed in who Ariana became, you can't understand her fully, or what happened, without him. The two continued to meet semi-weekly until Ariana's time was up, but there was never another admonishment that passed William's lips, only submission. She gave and he took, which was of course, the final lesson William had to offer Ariana -- what it felt like for her to conquer her first man.

I hope you're not too attached to William, though, because he isn't in much of the rest of the story about Ariana. She never did give a thought to trying to buy him when it came time to make her household; his place in her life was past. Ariana had much more pressing present matters falling on her when household construction began.

William never lost his attachment to Ariana, who often filled his thoughts. Perhaps we will meet him again when he intersects with another story I have to tell. His guidance affected so many of the women of the land for so long.

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And so it begins

I like to tell love stories. There are so many different stories I could tell out of the land, but when I sit to write down my stories, or transcribe the stories of others, I always end up back at love. Every good story has love or hate at the heart.

Of course, love gets messy. In the Ruling Class Province, the nice thing about relationships between women and men was that everything was at least surface neat. Neat because the women did the picking and choosing and the men didn't have the least thing to say about whom they were taken by. Usually they couldn't say because the men were often gagged during any slave trading rituals, gagged and bound with arms stretched backwards.

The symbolism of taking away the traded males' language with gags wasn't lost on the ruling women, because no visual symbolism was lost on them, having been taught through the generations the prize of beauty, symmetry and visual expressiveness in everything they did.

Of all of the women's possessions, the men were the most beautiful. Their beauty was in hard bodies, in forced labor, in tight bondage, in whipped torsos, in helpless fuck positions, in submission against and by will. Nothing in that society recognized the concept of love between women and men, but love was ever present. As was hate. The men could either love or hate the women who ruled their lives and punished them for pleasure, ritual and lust; it sometimes came to love, or hate, or both woven together in the same unnamed emotion, all controlled to be very beautiful, orderly and neat in outward, lovely visuals.

Relationships in The Communities, well, there was nothing neat about those, at least in the choosing stage. Forced marriage had gone out several generations ago, and men freely chose which woman to be married by. Even though, by society design, the men had few economic or educational opportunities apart from what their eventual wives afforded them, the men were free to make all kinds of wise or stupid choices in agreeing to marriage. Spy on the conversation of a group of unmarried women in a bar one evening, and an outsider would hear an earful of complaints about love lost from stupid male choices. The complaints would be choosing beauty over intelligence, money and status over integrity, flattery over sincerity, and the like.

Eventually, the women would turn to whispering tales written by The Sons of Class, dirty underground Ruling Class tales of how men had no choices, whipped and used by the ruling class women, taken and beaten and fucked, no choices. And the drunken women would inevitably conclude that this was the way things should be, all throughout the land, no choices for men, just taken, beaten and fucked in all kinds of ways.

In the morning light, the women of The Communities meant none of it, but the sordid tales made them hot and felt good to trade drunkenly when scorned by love.

The Governing City, now there was a hot bed of messy love intrigue. The social structure was designed carefully enough to encourage order, hard working women with a small handful of owned males each, but there was too much of everything to keep actual order for very long. There were too many people packed in too small quarters. Too much traffic and stress and high stakes commerce. Men who were owned, in reality, had more freedom than could possibly be good for them, or for the women. There was at least one high profile scandal a year, where a woman committed illicit acts with the owned male of another woman....and many, many more scandals than that, shoved under rugs, quieted up by exchanges of money or power.

The Sons of Class loved writing stories about the Governing City, more than the Ruling Class, because avarice and treachery made for better reading than beauty and order. They wrote about women losing position all for the supposed love, or was it lust, of another woman's man, of social climbing men, seducing their way up to the most powerful woman. They wrote murder stories, women killing women, or killing their own man, consumed with betrayal, white hot with broken hearts. Many of the stories were pure fiction, but some were quite true, and how the Sons of Class came to know the details was its own mystery, sequestered as they were, well outside the City or the Ruling Province.

I have a lot of their stories, not all of them as many of the stories were lost, but I do have a lot of them to share with you. I also have some stories of my own. I'm attracted to the beauty and order of the Ruling Class, more than the messiness and heartbreak outside the province that compelled the Sons so. Also, my stories are true and the stories of the Sons a blurry mix of fact and fiction, not to take away from them; God, can they weave a tale.

So, I'll try to tell all the stories, theirs and mine, in due time.

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