Alice In Chains (16 page)

‘But Boardland isn’t quite like the book,’ Suzanne said. ‘What about the Red King becoming Ruddle?’

‘I know. If only he wasn’t so plant crazy he might have been able to concoct something to cure me. Maybe there’s somebody else out there that’s into animal potions, but I haven’t a clue where to look for them. So I’m stuck with the Queen’s offer.’

‘Well, I’m glad you came here,’ Suzanne said, gently kissing Alice. ‘Otherwise I’d still be in Ruddle’s garden with a plant growing out of my bum.’

‘Me too,’ Juliet said. And, shyly, she pecked Alice’s cheek.

They were in their hideaway four days later, before the light faded from the sky, when they totalled their money.

‘I think we’ve just got enough,’ Alice declared, carefully replacing their modest hoard in its hiding place. ‘Right. Tomorrow Julie buys clothes at that cheap shop – not for yourself, remember, but your “master’s daughter” who’s about your size.’

‘I know,’ Juliet assured her.

‘Don’t forget a strip of cloth to bind your tits down. And some flat shoes. You’ve got to look young and innocent. And also buy travelling food for yourself and us. Meanwhile I’ll get the harness items and Sue buys the tickets. We all change in that back alley, then Julie, now looking like a young local girl, takes us to the train and sees us loaded onto the goods van. Remember to write your ticket number on our collar labels. If anybody asks you’re taking us to Brillig to be sold. You ride in a carriage and try not to speak to anybody. Bring us some food at lunchtime because we won’t be able to feed ourselves. In Brillig collect us from the van and Sue will lead the way to her master’s house. All clear?’

‘Yes,’ they said in chorus.

The three snuggled down together.

‘I’m just glad we don’t have to pick any more flowers tomorrow morning,’ Suzanne said sleepily.

The plan went more smoothly than Alice had dared hope.

Just before the train was due to depart at nine thirty, Juliet, now in a bonnet and pinafore dress and looking quite the part as an Underland girl with her long hair spilling out over her collar, led them into the station. Alice and Suzanne now wore leather collars with labels
tied
to them, and their hands were cuffed behind their backs and secured with a waist strap. Once again Alice felt herself succumbing to the helpless reassurance being in harness gave her. All she had to do was accept its constrictions and obey the orders of the person holding her leash. What a wonderfully simple life it could be.

Juliet handed over their leashes to the train guard, who led them through the sliding side door of the goods van. Inside, between the stacks of baggage and parcels, was a barred cage with sawdust on its floor, a metal bowl of fresh water in one corner and a bucket in the other. The guard pushed them inside with a pat on their bottoms, clipped their leashes to hooks set low on the wooden rear wall of the cage, stepped out and bolted the door.

Alice and Suzanne sat down with their backs to the wall and waited patiently as girlings learn to do. A few minutes later they heard the clatter of closing doors and then a whistle blowing. There came a distant hiss and chuff of steam and a jerk as the couplings engaged. They looked at each other and grinned. They were heading for Brillig.

After about an hour of steady travel, Alice felt a slight shiver run through her as a blurred wall passed down the length of the goods van. Suzanne said, ‘That was the barrier. We’re into the next square.’

‘That was easy. What’s in it?’

‘Nothing much that I can remember. Wasteland, a few scattered villages. Just before we reach the far side the railway turns west to avoid the Slithy Woods.’

‘You mentioned them before. Why doesn’t the line go through them?’

‘Apparently it’s because of the Toves and Mome Raths that live there. They make so many burrows it would undermine the rails.’

‘I suppose that would be a problem. Where does the line go then?’

‘It goes west then north again through three squares, stopping at a town called Gimble on the way, then it turns east back into the square beyond the woods. There’s a small station there called Wabe, I think, then the next square is Brillig. We should be there by this evening.’

‘Great. You’re sure your master will put us up?’

‘Oh, he’s very nice. When he knows how you helped me I know he’ll be grateful.’

Alice smiled. ‘You really love him?’

‘I know he’s the only master for me. I belong with him, it’s as simple as that.’

‘I envy you. I still haven’t found where I fit in down here.’

‘What’ll you do after we get to Brillig?’ Suzanne asked.

‘Meet with this Sir Rubin and he’ll call the Red Queen somehow and then we’ll go after the Crown. Have you heard anything about it, or the square north of Brillig?’

‘No, I don’t think so. Of course we haven’t lived there that long. I’m sure my master can find out, if it’ll help.’

‘Thanks.’ Alice frowned. ‘I wonder what the time is. I hope Julie doesn’t forget to feed us.’

Just then the door leading to the next carriage opened and Juliet appeared.

‘Here she is …’ Suzanne began, then the words died on her lips.

Juliet’s face bore an anguished expression. The front of her dress had been ripped open exposing her breasts, and loose binding tape hung about her waist. She was being pushed forward by an angry-looking conductor. Juliet cast them a helpless aside but said nothing as she was hustled past and into the guard’s van.

Alice and Suzanne hardly had time to exchange horrified glances when Juliet and the conductor reappeared with the guard now in tow.

‘… a lady passenger said she recognised her as a girling she had seen on the street only yesterday,’ the conductor was explaining rapidly. ‘As soon as I challenged her you could see the truth of it, so I brung her through here.’

‘I know her,’ said the guard. ‘She’s travelling with those two.’ He jerked a thumb at Alice and Suzanne, who were looking on helpless silence, knowing there was nothing they could say or do that would save Juliet now.

The conductor frowned at them for a moment. ‘Well, at least they’re wearing collars and you can see they’re girlings,’ he said. ‘We’ll report them all when we get to Gimble.’ He looked back at Juliet, who cringed away from his angry face. ‘But she’s not going any further looking like that and pretending she’s one of us.’

He literally tore the dress off Juliet, who yelped and tried to cover herself in a futile attempt to preserve her temporary return to modesty. The guard laughed at her evident embarrassment, caught hold of her wrists and pulled her arms up high so she could not conceal anything.

‘That’s better,’ said the conductor, looking Juliet up and down appreciatively. ‘A clothed girling’s not natural.’

‘Shall we put her in the cage?’

‘Maybe later. First we should teach her a lesson. Got any rope?’

‘There’s some baggage cord over there.’

They tied Juliet’s wrists over one of the exposed iron frames that supported the van’s curved roof, so that she had to stand almost on tiptoe. Alice swallowed at the sight of her taut young body. She looked beautiful, frightened and vulnerable, dressed only in her girlish white socks and sandals, which for the moment they had left on her.

The two railway officials also appeared to be assessing Juliet. The conductor pinched her left nipple and pulled
it
and her full breast out into a stretched cone, making her whimper.

‘Are you sorry for what you’ve done, girl?’ he asked sternly.

Alice thought Juliet would protest and beg for mercy, but instead she said tremulously: ‘Y … yes, Master.’

‘You know you’ve got to be punished?’

‘Yes, Master.’

The conductor unbuckled his belt and slipped it loose, then doubled the end around his fist.

The smack of leather against flesh echoed round the van, rising above the regular clickety-clack of the wheels on the tracks. Juliet’s shrill cry sounded eerily like a finely modulated train whistle. She twisted wildly under her bound hands, her fingers clawing, her face contorted, tears running down her cheeks, but there was no escape. In numbed silence, Alice and Suzanne watched the conductor methodically apply his improvised strap to her breasts, belly, back, thighs and buttocks, until her torso was shaded in crimson and pink. After a dozen blows Juliet went limp, her head dropped forward so that her chin rested on her chest, her tears dripping onto her trembling scarlet breasts, her softly rounded stomach palpitating, her knees bowed outwards by her boneless collapse.

The conductor pulled her head up by a fistful of her hair and said, ‘Now that’s what you get for boarding my train out of your proper place, girl!’

He let her head drop again, slipped his belt back on and left the van. The guard had watched Juliet’s punishment in appreciative silence and with a growing bulge in his trousers. Now he stepped forward and lifted Juliet’s head again.

‘We’re not quite done with you yet, girl,’ he told her with a smile.

He found two more lengths of baggage cord, tied them round her ankles, then pulled them up and
outwards
. Juliet gasped as the tormented flesh of her bottom and thighs was stretched to its limits. He tied the cords to the iron frame well to each side of her wrists, leaving Juliet hanging doubled over and splayed wide open in midair, her knees almost level with her shoulders, inner thighs taut, her dark pubic triangle split through where her soft pink inner lips gaped wide in enforced invitation. Even the dark little pit of her anus was on display.

The guard grinned at the sight and unbuttoned his flies. Juliet watched him with curious, misty-eyed resignation.

His prong of hard flesh bobbed free and erect, its slot-eye seeking its haven. He cupped his large hands under the tight curves of her buttocks to raise her slightly, then slid himself slowly into her, savouring the spreading of Juliet’s lovemouth by his cockhead, the filling of her sheath, the widening of her eyes. He began pumping in and out of her, setting her body swinging from the iron beam like a bell.

Alice gulped, hypnotised, her masochistic side aroused and fascinated by Juliet’s ravishment even as she ached for her friend’s suffering. It had been her idea – she should be there now, not Juliet. God, she was perverse! She wanted to be there. But like Suzanne, she could only watch helplessly.

The guard was grunting though gritted teeth, his thrusts setting Juliet’s heavy breasts jigging. Her eyelids were fluttering and she was making little throaty gasping noises. Suddenly she tensed, for a moment seeming to ride the impaling shaft, using her bonds to lift herself and bear down upon it. Then she convulsed wildly, yelling aloud and throwing her head back.

‘Good girl!’ Suzanne said under her breath. ‘You enjoy yourself!’

Slowly Juliet subsided, oblivious to the pistoning cock which still reamed her insides, shivering and twitching and going limp. The guard spent himself in her with
desperate
urgency, his breath sounding harsh. After a moment he withdrew his glistening shaft and rebuttoned himself. Brushing down his jacket he grinned at Alice and Suzanne.

‘Maybe I’ll have you two before we reach Brillig,’ he warned them. Then he left through the other door back to his van.

Juliet dangled from the roof frame, her head lolling on her slowly heaving chest, sweat glistening between her breasts. The guard’s sperm and her lubrication began to drip from her flushed and pouting labia to the scuffed wooden boards beneath.

‘Julie, love, are you all right?’ Suzanne called out anxiously.

Flushed, confused, her eyes glazed and dreamy, she raised her head. She blinked and focused on them, slowly returning to reality. Then she gave a little sob.

‘Did he hurt you?’ Alice asked fearfully.

‘No … it’s not that. I didn’t do anything wrong … pretending to be a girl, I mean. She knew who I was all along.’

‘Who?’

‘The one who told on me to the conductor. A woman in white.’

‘In white … Oh shit!’ Alice swore.

‘Do you know who she is?’ Suzanne asked.

‘Yes, it’s the –’

Just then he door opened and a large man came in. He had flaxen hair and wore a frock coat that strained across his massive shoulders. He looked about the interior of the van with suspicious eyes, then stood aside. The dumpy woman orchid fancier came in, still carrying her umbrella and hatbox. She smiled serenely at Alice and Suzanne and raised an amused eyebrow at Juliet’s suspended body.

The big man turned a crate on its side and she seated herself primly upon it. Before they could speak she raised a warning hand.

‘If all you are going to do is protest at my actions, then spare your breath. It must be a disappointment after all your strenuous efforts at raising the funds for your tickets I know, but I really could not allow you to proceed further. That would conflict with my plans.’

‘I was going to ask,’ said Alice trying to keep her voice level, ‘if you keep your crown in that hatbox?’

The woman hesitated, then the smile returned to her lips. ‘You are more perceptive than I thought, Alice Brown. Yes, I am Lilian Argentia Canescence Pearl Alabastrine, and I do keep my crown in the box.’

‘The White Queen,’ Alice said.

‘I am also known by that name,’ she acknowledged. ‘When I realised I could only travel about the Boardland by acting the part of a native, by feeling as they do towards the barriers, I found I could remove my crown. Nonetheless I like to have it close by. Such things are more nearly parts of us than you can imagine. To remove it is almost a denial of what we are, but in war one must make sacrifices.’

‘I suppose your spy insects put you onto me.’

‘Yes. Magenta was not as successful in eliminating them as she supposed. I knew the route you would take so moved to intercept you.’

‘And your bugs also told you where the Crown of Auria is?’

‘Naturally. After all these years it will finally be over. I suppose I should thank Magenta for that piece of intelligence.’

Alice looked at Suzanne and Juliet. ‘Don’t hurt them. I’m the one you want to keep out of the way. They’re only with me by chance.’