"See how it flexes, my child. Is it not a beautiful instrument? Not too thick that it bruises too easily, and not too thin that it cuts too quickly."
Father Thomas lifted it slowly then brought it down with another terrible smack on the white cloth. The candles wavered as the air swirled in turmoil around them.
"Spread out your arms!"
She reached her arms forward and stretched them as far as she could. She turned her head so that her cheek was pressed against the altar cloth. She could see Father Thomas smiling down at her, twitching and flexing the cane in his long bony hand.
"White panties! White panties! White panties!"
"Yes, my little servant, it is time now."
Caleb bounded up behind her and pressed his face against her bottom, sniffing at her white panties and pressing his stubby nose into the soft crease they formed across the crack of her buttocks.
"Naughty, naughty, panties stained and yellow. Not white for Caleb. Stained and dirty. Naughty! Naughty! Naughty!"
"Oh dear," said Father Thomas, "already you are in need of punishment. You have not even started to get rid of your existing sins before you commit more."
"Naughty, naughty, naughty! Dirty little panties. Should be white. Should be clean. Caleb likes white panties, not dirty ones, stained by naughty, naughty girls."
"Get them off!"
Caleb drew his face away from her bottom and grabbed each side of her panties. He wrenched them down in one go. They ripped and pulled down to halfway down her thighs and she tightened her buttocks so that he could not see in between them.
Smack!
She tightened her buttocks even more as Caleb's hand smacked across them.
"I want to see!" he chanted. "I want to see!"
Smack!
"Stand back Caleb, she needs a taste of the cane. She needs to learn how to be its servant. She needs much training but the cane will soon become her master." He drew the cane up behind her. "This will be your introduction to the delights of your new master, the cane. Are you ready my child?"
Maria felt so exhausted, but she knew he was offering her salvation, a chance of forgiveness, and she wanted to be freed of her evil so could only assent.
"Yes," she murmured.
"Yes? I cannot hear you, speak up! Speak up you fucking bitch!"
"Yes," she said, trying to clear her throat at the same time.
"Good!"
She heard the cane starting to move upwards through the air. Then a pause, then she saw the candles starting to flicker as the draught caused their flames to bend and break, she felt the silence of a moment's anticipation.
Thwack!
She screamed louder than she thought was possible. It filled her with terror as she listened to her own shrieking filling the church and echoing around its ponderous columns. Tears flooded her eyes instantly and she stretched her hands forward in agony, her bottom felt aflame, she felt as if she had been sliced with a dagger.
Then she heard the sound of it moving through the air again, she saw the flames flicker and bend, then there was the moment of stillness, then she braced herself against the altar and started to scream even before it hit her.
Thwack!
Her scream rent the church and she howled like an animal. She could not bear it again, she could not stand the cutting pain across her bottom, he could not do it again, she would die, she knew she would. Then the noise again, the sound of the air being rent by the flailing of the cane, then the candles flickering in fear as it came down towards them, then the silence, this time longer, this time more deathly, this time filled with an eternity of fear and degradation.
Thwack!
This time she could not even scream, she did not have the strength, she just gasped in a noisy, throaty roar. The air was torn from her lungs and spit shot out with her exploding breath. She collapsed in agony and the church fell silent as her eyes misted over with a red haze.
She could not see anything even though her eyes were wide open. Then she felt Caleb tugging at her arms, she could not stir, she could not resist, then he was slapping her face but still she could not react, then he slapped her face very hard and she returned from her faint.
"No…"
"No? No? What do you fucking mean 'No'? 'Yes', that is the answer, 'yes'. You will say 'yes' until your master is exhausted, and even then you will beg him for more. 'Yes', that is all there is to say."
"No… Please… No…"
"You will beg him for more. 'Yes, please punish me more, do not stop," you will plead."
"Please… No…"
A cool waft of air breathed against her hot cheeks. She felt the skin on her face tingle as the draft from the rising cane heralded the pain that it held. She winced against it and tightened her muscles as she reached forward and grabbed the candlesticks. She watched their flames flickering and stretched out as tight as she could. Then the silence again; that dreadful moment of anticipation and terror. She waited in fear and gripped the cold metal of the candlesticks. Then she felt it coming again, the cane was splitting the air as it whipped down towards her inflamed buttocks. The flames bent sideways, trembling and shrinking away in fear, as it flew down towards her.
Thwack!
Again she could not cry out. Instead, a gasp burst from her mouth as her lungs emptied their breath in one heavy, bursting eruption. Her stomach flattened against the top of the altar and the candlesticks rocked in her hands, their flickering flames spilling hot wax down their shiny stems.
"Yes?"
"Please… No… Please… No…"
"Again then. The cane will be your master but he must know that you want him. He must know that you demand him and then he will stop. Only then will he draw back from the punishment."
She felt her body shaking. The candlesticks flickered in her trembling grip as hot wax spilled down and ran eagerly towards her hands. She wanted saving, but the pain was too great. She could not imagine how she could plead for more, it was impossible, she could only resist, she could only deny and she would never be saved. She wept loudly.
"Please… No more. Please… No more. I can't stand it. Please… No…"
She felt Caleb pulling at her legs, opening them wide and exposing her cunt. Cool air passed across her outer labia and she felt a dribble of sweat trickling down the inside of her legs. Then the candles flickered again and she buried her face against the altar cloth, gripping it between her teeth.
Her legs were wide apart and she knew she could not stand any more. Her buttocks were stinging from the lashing of the cane and she could feel hot candle wax running down onto her hands. It burned her and she wanted to let go of the candlesticks, but she could not, she needed to grip them, she needed their safety and she tightened her grip as the hot wax poured down onto the tops of her hands then down their back and onto her wrists. She sensed the cane lifting, she felt the moment of silence as it paused at the top of its stroke.
She felt a scream brewing up inside her. It was so intense and deliberate. It was not born of the moment of pain but of the intensity of pain inside her. It came from her bottom and crept across the stinging red skin of her buttocks, it travelled up inside her, through her nerve racked stomach then into her gagging throat. It tightened her neck and for a moment she could not breathe at all. Her face reddened with the tension as it forced its way into her mouth and built up behind the material of the altar cloth that was filling her mouth. Her cheeks were puffed out with it, her mouth was plugged by it, but still the scream built up. Then the explosion broke through.
She spit the cloth from her mouth and the scream burst from her. She screamed enough to rock the columns of the empty church, so loud her body vibrated with its energy, so violently that she felt herself transported on its renting echoes. She screamed like a beast into the silence of the cavernous church and still the cane had not started its downward journey.
She squeezed the candlesticks and shook them. She shook the hot wax from them and ran it across her flesh. She stretched her buttocks higher and opened her legs, exposing her cunt to the gaping eyes of Caleb. She thrust it at him and a wetness of joy ran across the fleshy rim of her glistening cunt. She lifted her bottom higher as if the meet the cane, squirmed herself, lifted her buttocks more.