Page 20 of Bottoms Up (Mythic Beast #4)

Julian

The first three days were absolute hell. I wasn’t surprised. It’s exactly what I would have done, in Silver’s place.

On the fourth day, I was allowed to walk instead of crawl. Still paraded around naked on the leash, but walking felt like a reward after three days on my hands and knees.

Every evening upon rising, as soon as my hidey-hole was unlocked so I could exit, I was whipped. No warmup, no ceremony — just ordered to hold the top of the doorframe, expected to remain in place while the horsewhip lashed my back.

Day after day, the cruel braided leather, knotted throughout, tore into me, opened me, and I bled more than I was fed, but that’s the life of those who are owned. Property, rather than person.

Slaves accept what we are given, no matter how pleasant or unpleasant, so I drank the six ounces of bagged deer-shifter blood I was given each day.

Docile blood. Submissive blood. It’s my least favorite shifter to drink from, but it wasn’t about preference.

It was about obedience. It kept me on my feet, barely , and that was enough to do my job for Marco and serve my Master, despite the fact I was always hungry.

Marco never treated me any differently. For him, nothing had changed.

I still managed his schedule, answered emails, intercepted calls I could likely handle, ran meetings when necessary.

Now I did it naked except for the ever-present cock cage, my body marked up something awful from the whip and the cane, but my duties were the same as always.

I was allowed a shirt and tie while at my desk so I could handle video calls, but never pants, shoes, or even socks.

And the ever-present pepper-lubed plug lodged in my ass, stretching me painfully wide, meant I never forgot my place.

On the third day, my new Master replaced my cock cage with a much smaller one, with sharp prongs that poked into my dick if I dared get hard, and a fat penis plug that probed deep into my urethra, so I was reminded of it with every movement, every fucking twitch.

It was impossible to stay soft, but there was pain when I couldn’t manage it — and as it grew sore from the spikes, the pain intensified, hurting more every day than it had the day before.

It would’ve had to come off a human due to the risk of infection, but that isn’t a concern with vampires, so it stayed on despite the irritation, the open wounds.

With so little blood, my body had no spare energy to heal my wounds. My poor destroyed balls hurt worse every day — sharper pain, deeper throbbing, and an unfathomable ache. The damage was thorough.

The ball spreader built into the cock cage only made it worse, but I didn’t complain.

Silver had a plan. I trusted the plan.

Two weeks in, the leash came off. That same night, Silver gave me ten ounces of his blood in wine. Rich and dense and heady. It was decadent, and I went to my knees to thank him for his gift. I mean, I always did that, but this time it was more than protocol. I meant it.

The next day, Silver came to me as a woman — halter top, micro-mini skirt, super-long hair flowing around her face, sky- high wedge heels that made her six inches taller, and makeup that made her cheeks look sharp enough to draw blood.

She’d been a man for weeks, since the night we validated the contract, and my dick tried to swell in its cruel steel prison the moment I saw her.

And more blood surged into it when she ordered me to my knees.

The spikes didn’t pierce, but they pressed deep, unforgiving. The urethral plug shifted inside me with every pulse, every twitch, and it felt like fire being stoked under my skin. I stayed still and silent, though. It wasn’t my place to cry out. To complain.

My cock jerked again as she circled me, all confidence and authority. The way she placed those amazing heels — like they were extensions of her will. Unshakable. Deadly. Beautiful.

“Tonight is Girls’ Night Out,” she said, voice smooth as sin, “and it will please me to know you’re in pain while I’m out having fun with my friends. Crawl to the dungeon, slaveboy.”

No leash today. Just me, crawling naked in front of her like the thing I was.

I knew she could see the damage — my balls still pitiful and horribly discolored.

They were a little better, but they still hurt and ached something awful since they’d been so restrictive with my blood allowance.

My asshole had finally healed, thankfully.

When we arrived, she locked the door, shackled my wrists behind my back, and had me stand beneath the winch.

Two minutes later, I hung by my right ankle from the ceiling, high enough that my left foot barely touched the floor, and I could just manage to stand on tiptoe. She chained the supporting ankle to an O-ring embedded in the concrete floor, so I’d be stuck in what amounted to the splits.

The pain bloomed fast. Ankles stretched far apart, hips twisted, back screaming. But I stayed silent.

I hadn’t understood just how much she wanted me to hurt until she drove the first bamboo skewer through my right ball.

I screamed. I thrashed. I begged without words — grunts, howls, gasps.

She didn’t flinch. Didn’t slow. Didn’t acknowledge my screams at all. She moved to the next testicle, piercing more skewers through the tender, brutalized flesh, methodical and precise.

Then came the ghost pepper oil.

I could smell it before I saw the plug — thick, flared, monstrous. She applied the oil with gloved hands, coating every inch.

I didn’t beg her not to do what I was certain came next. That wasn’t my role. I remained silent while she walked behind me — and when she shoved the giant plug up my ass with a force that split the world open, I bit my tongue and grunted into the pain. My body bucked. The chains held.

She settled a stepstool in front of me and stepped up to wipe her gloved fingers on my lips — tender, affectionate — but the fire ignited instantly, echoing the inferno she’d already set burning in my ass.

“Open your mouth for me, slaveboy.” Her voice was smooth, casual. Not icy, nor full of sympathy. She was relaxed. Nonchalant. Master of the room, Master of me , but she did it effortlessly, and my cock futilely tried to swell in its cruel prison yet again.

She ran her hands all inside my mouth — cheeks, tongue, palate, and down my fucking throat deep enough to make me gag twice before she peeled the gloves off, turning them inside out with methodical ease.

I whimpered when her hand headed toward my cock, but I would not beg, would not try to control my Master. She was in charge. She knew what I needed.

It’s my job to accept it with grace.

She slid one of the gloves over the cock cage and proceeded to tuck pieces of it inside, through the bars, under the edges, ensuring contact in all the worst places.

The fire lit my cock like electricity, white-hot agony. My cock surged inside the cage despite the spikes. The plug in my urethra twisted with the movement, and the pain bloomed sharper than before — punishment layered on punishment.

I couldn’t stop the blood from rushing in, despite the fire, despite the steel. My dick fought the cage and lost — again and again.

Tears came to my eyes, spilled over the edges and slid down my cheeks, the last insult too much to handle.

The skewers through my balls, the stretch of being forced into the splits, the too-fat plug holding me wide open and lodged so deep I felt it all the way in my abdomen, the pepper burning my asshole, mouth, and dick.

More skewers, piercing the meat of my chest well behind my nipples. Then the clamps — industrial, serrated, cruel. My breath came ragged. My head hung low.

And still, I didn’t speak, I merely fought to accept what she gave me. She wanted me to hurt, so I would suffer.

My Master stood in front of me, taking me in from floor to ceiling, then looked into my eyes.

“Women can be so much more cruel than men, sometimes, don’t you think?”

Then she was gone.

And I was alone — hanging, skewered, caged, and burning. There was no clock. No promise. No voice. Just the echo of her heels and the long night stretching ahead.

My torso was free, with nothing binding it. Nothing supporting it.

I let it hang for a while, bending over at the hips, my head dangling toward my supporting knee. When the strain in my spine grew too sharp, I shifted upright, my head near the other knee for a while, pressing against the pain in my shoulders, my thighs, my calves.

I tried holding my torso out to the side, horizontal, but that was the worst, so I ended up going back and forth from upright to dangling.

With my arms bound behind me, skewers through my balls and chest, my legs in the splits, ghost pepper oil burning my asshole, cock, lips, tongue, into my gullet — everything hurt, no matter what.

There was no comfort to be found. Only choices about which pain hurt the least in that moment.

Trading one unbearable ordeal for another.

I believe she put me into that position around seven in the evening, and I had no choice but to endure it until near four in the morning.

The pain had long since blurred into itself by then, a constant churn of fire, muscle tremble, and a bone-deep ache.

My throat was raw. My legs shook. My cock burned in its prison.

My tears had long since dried up. My whimpers and moans had gone silent. I just breathed.

She returned wearing the same clothes, but barefoot.

She smelled of whiskey, secondhand smoke, and hundreds of bodies.

Not from sex, but from contact — probably on the dance floor.

She was happy and exhausted, but she focused on me completely, looked me up and down, and then released my wrist shackles from each other.

“Free yourself the rest of the way, remove all the skewers, get a fast shower, and report to your hidey-hole. The plug stays where it is. You can brush your teeth tomorrow.”

I obeyed. That’s what slaves do.

She was patiently waiting for me when I reported to my hidey-hole, and she locked me in without comment. There was no explanation for my evening, but there didn’t have to be. She wanted my pain, and I gave it to her.

I lay in the dark for at least an hour — my tongue, throat, and asshole still on fire — before the sun took me.

Flat on my back, every inch of my body aching from use and denial and restraint.

And when I, from my perspective, came back to life a moment later, pain still echoing through every cell, I waited in the coffin-cool dark of my compartment for Silver to let me out.

I couldn’t sit up in the space, couldn’t shift or stretch.

I simply waited, supine, until the lock disengaged and light spilled in.

Silver was there, a man today, and I scented the deer shifter. I stood outside the compartment and heard a heartbeat in the outer room.

I’m usually whipped or caned immediately upon being let out, but I was allowed to feed — and to drink directly from the tap for the first time since my new Master had taken official ownership of me.

The blood was from a docile prey animal, but it flowed full of energy and sunshine, and I drank until Silver touched my arm, a silent order to stop.

So I did.

The deer shifter left, and then came morning discipline — the cane today, harsh and sure, splitting the skin. I never know whether I’ll get a half-dozen strokes or four dozen. It’s usually one or two dozen, but she split the difference at eighteen on this evening.

I gasped and fought to breathe when she finished, but I didn’t move because she hadn’t told me to.

I remained as she’d ordered me, leaned over, holding the back of the sofa with my head between my arms, feet planted shoulder-width apart.

Blood seeped down my legs, but I kept my feet in place.

Untrained slaves shift and move around when in pain.

Well-trained slaves handle what they’re given with grace.

Silver set the cane to the side for me to clean, and told me, “Shower and dress in the clothing provided. Your boss needs to take you offsite. You’ll be on your best behavior, or you’ll pay for it.”

But as always, I went to my knees and thanked her, before I followed her orders. Thanked her for caring. For training me.

For loving me , but I left the last part unsaid.