When the whilom knight awoke again, it was at full alert; head clear, senses sharp. Immediately, the daunted détenu scoured his body in a scramble for any new effeminacies of the flesh. He breathed a sigh of relief, finding himself as yet unchanged. That was until the knight, at last, ascertained, much to his astonishment, that his wounds were fully healed. The tears in his red-soaked rags revealed skin unspoiled and unbruised, where it was recently rent. So too did he find that the many scars that marred his skin—some years old—had faded. Beyond its sinister intent, the wicked substance the witch had forced upon him seemed to have its salubrious effects as well. Propping himself upright, the knight marvelled at the ease with which he moved, all his agony abated. No longer laden with pains, his limbs, in fact, felt limber, if languorous—though this sensation too was not wholly unwelcome. He did note a gnawing hunger and a touch of tenderness in his chest, both cause for slight concern. 

Altogether, he found his wits still about him. The Lady Nefârtatul seemed to have no lingering influence over his mind. She had not yet slithered, satanic and serpent-like, into the unnamed boy’s brain. Only then, however, did he recall the last words the Lady had spoken to him: that she had taken his name. The boy knew he was a knight, that he was called Sieur, same as Rothilde, but the names which followed were as silt slipping through his hands. He saw through memory the faces of his family, his mother and father, the Baron and Baronne, his brothers, but only their baptismal names remained; the family name faded like ink on ancient parchment. He could recall only his mother’s maiden name. But beyond this blockade, his mind was yet free. 

His body not yet a woman’s, his will not yet bound, the knight found hope. There was still time for him to break free from his dismal cell and the whole horrid castle. Though even restored as he was, the knight knew the threat of the winter’s wind and snow with neither gear nor horse was grave. Moreover, he was not in the modestly appointed apartment typical for housing a ransomed knight, but a hole meant for housing the most contemptible criminals and heretics as they await interrogation, the pillory, or the chopping block. A heavy shackle sealed with lock and key around his right ankle secured him to his cell wall by a length of iron chain. He set about testing its toughness and found it unforgiving. With nothing but his own weight to break the sturdy padlock, and his own strength to tug at the chain driven deep into the coarse stone, he found most of his potential means of escape already precluded. No doubt the Countess and traitorous Rothilde possessed keys, but to depart past either of them was a daunting prospect, outmatched as he was. Their cunning and trickery, too, would prove to be a tremendous trammel.

The Countess had assured him that he would get no aid from her chambermaids, and this too was corroborated when, after some hours alone in the dark, a fair-haired and fresh-faced maiden arrived with his supper: coarse bread, a bowl of broth, already gone cold, and water. The young woman set the items down hastily, hesitating to even glance at him, and when she did, it was with a scornful sneer before departing. She did not even deign to speak to him as the broken boy decried his wrongful imprisonment, pleading with her for his freedom. His only response was the slamming of a distant door.

In his anger, he wanted to reject the meager meal as the insult that it was to a man of his rank. His body, however, was ravenous, and he soon found himself licking the bowl for every last bit of sustenance. Even then, he was still left unsated. Through the passing days, the pernicious pangs of hunger gnawed at his numbles with such constancy that they soon receded from his awareness entirely. In their place, a terrible torpor took hold of his flesh.

In that time, he came to learn that the coldness of the first chambermaid was kindness in comparison to the other maids who had brought him his midday gruel and evening bread and broth. They spat on him, cursed him, and kicked him if he came too close. During his second day, he humbly begged for his chamberpot to be emptied, only to be met with disgust and disbelief: “My Mistress would never deign to demand me deal with the fetid filth of a rank and worthless whelp, such as you.” She commanded him to cast it from the fenestre to the fosse below. In his second week of imprisonment, he received an excoriation so relentless that in a fit of temper, he hurled his porridger at the young woman. The dish clacked uselessly against the far wall, but the maid was suitably spattered with slurry. He received a particularly brutal beating from Rothilde that week, which put an end to such outbursts.

It was by these beatings and the Countess Kalina’s feedings that the boy kept time. Late in the evening of every Sabbath day, Rothilde would arrive with a new and terrible form of torment. Flesh bared, the boy would be strapped to the caning bench, strung up upon Saint Andrew’s cross, or propped on the sawhorse with swinging weights dragging his body down on its sharp edge, further maiming his manhood. All this as the maiden, so strong and stern, scorched and slashed, and flayed and flogged his sallow flesh. And yet, through these travails, he took note of how her animosity and rage seemed to abate with each visitation. Her punishments became precise, dispassionate, and methodical. “You are like a small child in need of cultivation, and this chamber is your crèche,” she spoke in an almost solacing manner.

Thus leaving him to his agonies, he would await the arrival of the Mistress at the ringing of midnight. The witch had no need for doors. She could pass through the bars like vapor, or through the window, materializing from the pale moonbeams. Some nights, he would look up to find two eyes reflecting in the dark like some great cat, and she would emerge luminous from the shadows. 

Senses shot, will weakened, and flesh bloodied and bruised, the pet’s eyes would meet his Mistress’s. The whilom knight knew he should dread the arrival of the demoness, but on each unholy Sabbath, she appeared to him as benevolent and radiant as the angel Raphael, who stirred the healing waters of Bethesda. In spite of his initial resistance, her visitations became a necessary balm for his broken spirit; her honeyed words and sweet ministrations provided a singular reprieve from his profound misery. He often had to struggle to remember that she, in her deceptive sweetness, was the ultimate architect of his agony.

Whenever Rothilde finished rending his flesh, the Countess would arrive to mend and re-mend what remained. She would find him, on those wintry nights, with beads of blood and sweat frozen upon his skin, his damp hair hardened into shards of ice. Her frigid skin would feel almost normal against his, and he would find himself yearning for the warmth of her resplendent robes. She would dote upon him, calling him "pet" and often addressing him with feminine endearments. The sweetness in her voice and the tenderness in her eyes seemed eerily earnest. He would invariably protest and spit curses at the Countess, but his objections went unheeded, and he would inevitably succumb to her solacing presence. When his resistance was worn well down, Kalina would descend upon him, her needle-like fangs piercing his neck. The nameless knave could not help but sigh into her sinister embrace. Her feedings had a benumbing and somniferous—almost pleasing—effect on the boy. The pain of her icy, ivory fangs plunging into his flesh was quickly supplanted by a scintillating heat where her lips met his skin, as she supped his warm blood in small, steady gulps.

Once sated, the vampire would relinquish him from her grasp to reveal a new vial of her evirating elixir. And pricking a finger on a fanged tooth, as she had done the first time, she would add a drop of her own ichor into the mixture. The boy would swallow the elixir without even a flicker of defiance; his very being now yearned for the draught. Not until he was alone in the sobering light of morning would he finally feel the full weight of ignominy. Though even before this, he would rise to find his body once again unmarred and alive with sensation. A sickening euphoria, like that of poppy tears, would cradle the recreant knight in its embrace. In this state, his skin tingled to the touch and radiated with such feverish heat that he could scarcely feel the biting breath of Boreas. He would lie languorously across his straw bed, head filled with haze, the early hours slipping away.

But by the time the maidservant came to mete out his meagre pottage, the clouds that hung in his mind would have parted—though he knew with grim certainty that each waning week, the light of consciousness would grow dimmer. While his wounds had healed, the pangs of hunger, the throbs of cold, and the aches that plagued his heart and soul would return in force. He would chastise himself for his weakness and pray to the Lord, to the Virgin, and to the Saints Michel and Jude for strength, but whether or not they answered, the boy could not say, for he felt no difference. His agonies only grew as the week went on.

Come midweek, a terrible torpor would take hold of him; shakes and seizures ravaged his flesh, and a most monstrous craving festered within. Visions of the vampire bedeviled his thoughts. His body would cry out in desperate want of his Mistress’s medicament, while his tongue longed to taste her blood once more. The once-diligent knight was horrified to discover the Countess had made him thrall to the very agent of his demise.

Only as the week waned did his anguish begin to abate. The rankling hunger quieted, and a fragile clarity returned to his weary mind. But this quiet was a deception. In the stillness of his cell, he would look down to witness the true works of the exilir—the softening of his fine features, the blanching of his skin, which bruised easily now, and the sloughing of muscle from his slender frame. The hairs of his scant beard and body were swiftly shed, and his strength was soon sapped. In fits of panic, he would try again to wrench his chains from the wall, to break his bonds, to smash the iron lock against the stone slabs. Yet his efforts were all in vain. He had not the strength to liberate himself when he still possessed his full puissance, and with each day the task was becoming more daunting, more unattainable. Driven by sheer desperation, he kept at it until he collapsed on his coarse bed, hugging his shrinking body and rocking himself on the straw. With the consistency of church bells, the futility of his labours would become apparent yet again. For even if he were to free himself, he would have no clue as to what he would do thereafter. And before the boy could even steel himself with an ounce of resolve, the arrival of a new week would herald the return of his beautiful and ruinous mistresses.

For many interminable weeks, this cycle repeated with rare deviation. Though on one occasion, midway through his second month in the donjon, such a divagation did occur. When midnight came, the Countess did not arrive alone but in the company of her loyal lady knight. They stood over him, each magnificent in their own manner. The once-daring knight shrank under the gaze of his two tormentors. Kalina wore a thin bliaut of Byzantine silk in vibrant vermilion and a hooded, samite mantle which depicted marvellous Amazons on horseback within decorative bands. Her face was shrouded in shadow so that only her red lips, curled into a slight smile, were visible. The eyes he once feared—but now found beautiful and kind—were hidden from view, save for a faint glimmer. Rothilde wore a sideless surcoat of lapis blue brocade with bright cabochons across the bodice and ermine trim, over a carmine chemise of fine Flemish wool. Gall rose within him as he gazed at Rothilde’s garments. She was cloaked in the colors of the Virgin Mary, mocking her purity with her perversion. He held his tongue, however, and waited for them to address him.

Wordlessly, the Countess descended upon him, while stern Rothilde watched on in silence. The only sounds in his cell were those of the wind beyond the walls and the scuffling of the sorry boy’s twitching limbs against the stone. She fed from him with practiced precision, scarcely letting a single drop of sanguis escape her lips. Rothilde revelled in the sight of the disgraced boy struggling against her Mistress, before he surrendered, sighing into her embrace. 

Her feast finished, Kalina stood, leaving her pet to kneel before her, languishing, dazed, and unsteady upon the floor. He could not fully bring his eyes to focus as they followed his Mistress as she drifted in circles around him. With her alabaster hand, she gave his lengthening locks an occasional caress and twirl. 

She began explaining to him that she had not had time to prepare his potion that week. 

The vampiress proceeded to explain that the passing week had provided her no leisure to concoct his customary draught. Upon hearing these tidings, the boy barely stifled a mournful wail—in spite of himself, of course. The Countess, though, was well attuned to the turmoil besieging his soul. In a consoling voice, she spoke, “Fret not, pet. For there is another means through which you may receive your medicine. Though it is not as potent, it is perhaps more …” She paused, searching for a word.

“Enjoyable?” Rothilde proposed.

“For you? Undoubtedly.” She offered her paramour a toothsome grin. “Though, I was thinking something savoring of … ‘edifying.’ This shall teach our little prisoner to know their proper place.”

“Tell me, pet. Do you recall the components of the potion that I so lovingly prepare for you?” she queried.

The boy nodded meekly.

“Then you should surely know the significance when I tell you that my cherished Tilda’s moon is at its most full, her womb its most fertile, her feminine vitality at its zenith.”

An unmistakable blush rose to Rothilde’s cheeks as she began to disrobe. 

When the dumbstruck figure, stooped before her, gave no response, she continued: “What this means, my pet, is that her waters alone will still have some salubrious effect on your body. And so you shall have the privilege to partake of them straight from their wellspring.”

In a flash, the Countess was kneeling beside him once more; one hand wrenched back his head by his hair, while the other squeezed at the side of his mouth, to force it wide.

“Open thy chaule, mon chien.” She commanded, and he obeyed. “And taste this rare treat.” ^[1]

Rothilde, fully bare, crossed the cell. Her body was supple and shapely, and the play of shadow and lantern light drew attention to the lean muscles of her legs and arms. She stood over the whimpering wretch, her womanhood aligned above his awaiting mouth. The boy’s fear and disgust were forced out of mind by the intoxicating aroma of her cunt, his eyes fixed upon her delicate folds and the darkly golden hairs that crown them.

She loosed a stream of topaz effluent, warm and shimmering, which soon filled the former knight’s open mouth. Unwilling to let it slip down his gullet, he stopped his throat. He intended to resist this newest debasement, but he was merely left with a mouthful of piss lingering on his tongue—its taste bright and briny with the ever-so-familiar taste of ammonia that he knew from his precious potion.

“Swallow, pet,” Kalina whispered in his ear, “And waste not a single drop.” 

And he did, greedily and in large gulps, his body powerless against her command. He felt sick in both body and spirit. And yet, the pleasure of obedience, mixed with disgust and humiliation, produced an overwhelming intensity against which he could do nothing but surrender.

His Mistress stood once more, stepping back to admire the tableau before her. Rothilde, too, stepped back, but did not stop her flow. Instead, she pressed two fingers to the sides of her pearl, pulling back to arch her stream to drench the whelp at a distance. Kalina watched with an almost girlish glee as her Tilda tested the reach of her spray. They giggled together, making a game of the boy’s debasement, though he could scarcely notice in his frenzied state. His mind was too much focused on scouring every last bead of Rothilde’s amber liquid from the borders of his mouth, greedily lapping at each stray splash that had doused his features, licking his fingers and face clean with desperate diligence.

When her stream at last ran dry, the knave was left kneeling on the wet stone, his hair dripping, and his tunic drenched. His tormentors' revelry came to an end, and their attention returned to him.

“Now, thank your Mistress Rothilde for her generosity, pet,” Kalina spoke as she slipped the pin from her brooch and removed her mantle.

The whelp answered exactly as instructed. The words sent a shiver through his body.

Kalina wrapped Rothilde, still nude with gown and undergarments gathered in her arms, in her cloak. Rothilde then spoke in an almost approving manner, “She’s already become so much more well behaved, hasn’t she?”

“Yes,” Kalina answered, “Though she remains but a kale worm and it is many months until the spring that brings the butterfly.”

And it would be many months until the whelp would see his Mistresses together once again, when the Countess came to observe Rothilde as she meted out painful penance upon the piteous wretch in her chamber of horrors. Though in the intervening months, much had changed. 

Time and terror took their toll on the whelp. The unceasing transmogrification of his flesh, the terrible dread that only the demoniacs who enslaved him knew what he would eventually become, all of this frayed the fabric of his mind. He entered a protracted period of silence, speaking only when compelled. His captors' previous visitation had come to figure as a kind of cursed christening in his memory. The knight-no-longer had been baptized anew in Rothilde’s golden waters, baptized as neuter, as mongrel, as hermaphrodite. And bereft of any proper name, they became nothing more than ‘pet’—for it was all that remained. It became both a name and a function for the former knight, a simple word that expanded to fill that lacuna left by their lost identity. Soon, it was the only term in which they could conceive of themselves.

Their sense of themselves was slowly merging with their Mistress’s vision for them, conforming to the Countess’s every desire. And as it did, so too did the pet find that the boundaries between the sacred and the sacrilegious began to blur inside their fragile, eggshell mind. Oft, they would gaze through their unshuttered window and see their Mistress roaming her demesne in the dimming light of day, dressed lightly in the wintry clime. If she so desired, she could have walked across the surface of the snow, barefoot yet unchilled, without sinking into the soft powder. The firs and bare larches swaying in the biting wind betrayed their reverence to her, bowing in submission again and again. And all the sylvan creatures of the land would flock to her, not only the wolves, the ravens, the long-eared screeching bats, and the vultures. Snowfinches would perch on her outstretched finger, and stark white ptarmigans would approach without fear, until they were chased away by foxes in their winter coats, who wished only to warm her feet even though there was no need. Any man who espied her in this state would assume himself witness to the holy spectre of a saint. She appeared utterly angelic, in absolute harmony with nature.

Her ritual imbibitions came to feel like the sacred sacrament, holy communion. Kalina used her pet’s corpus as Christ used the chalice at the Last Supper. Their blood became hers, shed in loving sacrifice. So too did the battering the pet received at Rothilde’s hand become more bearable. At first, they rejoiced as though the Lord had at last answered their plenteous prayers. But soon, the creature in the cachot discovered that they were beginning to take some portion of pleasure from them. It was then that they knew that this blessing had been no gift from God, but the works of devils poisoning their mind with sin, turning them towards perverse pleasure. But by that point, it barely seemed to matter; they had resigned themselves to their fate. Thereafter, Rothilde’s thrashings came to feel as though they were subtly changing the contours of their form. Their body was hot steel on an anvil; Rothilde’s whips and chains, a blacksmith’s hammer pounding them into their proper form. 

And their form did change. As Pet became meek and mild, their flesh became weak and willowy, their figure made sylphlike. Their once straight torso now sunk in at the waist, and tender buds sprouted in their breast. Beneath the dirt and grime was a visage almost cute and comely, with large, sorrowful eyes and a small, pouting mouth. Skin, once rough and scarred, had turned soft and pale, and hairless save for the soft tufts of ashy brown hair in the hollow of their underarms and above the spot where their manhood had been. It had been reduced to a mere trinket. What remained was wholly vestigial and scarcely half their thumb in length. This was the state that Pet was in when they were once again in the company of both their Mistresses.

They were led by Rothilde to the chamber of castigation by a length of chain that connected to a heavy collar around their neck. Completely cowed, they entered with small steps, and their head hung low in a show of deference. The Countess was waiting beside an unfamiliar contraption that stood in the center of the room. The saltire cross, the stocks, and pillories had all been pushed aside to give this new furnishing a place of preeminence. The device resembled a vaulting horse, of the kind that knights in full kit used to practice mounting and dismounting, though much greater in length. The top bar was cushioned and upholstered in black leather. From its legs there extended sets of leather stirrups at the device's top and tail, as well as a cradle for its occupant’s head. Pet was stripped bare, revealing their gamine figure, much to the satisfaction of their two Mistresses. They mounted the beam and were, by their Countess’s caresses, directed to drape themselves down its full length, ass up, arms stretched above their head, and legs slightly spread. The bracelets at their wrists and ankles were swiftly sealed with silver locks, and the mewling creature was rendered immotile. The beam was narrow enough that their budding breasts, barely more than a set of swollen areolae, were still visible on either side. Goose pimples formed across their flesh as they trembled with anticipation. Pet began mewling and twisting their body against the beam.

“Close your eyes, mon chiot,” Kalina ordered as she placed a velvet sleeping shade over her pet’s eyes. She drew a cold hand down the creature’s spine before slipping away to a dim corner.

The helpless wretch was left bound and blindfolded for a matter of moments. They knew not what to expect from the coming torment. They heard Rothilde approaching. It could not have been their Countess, for her footfalls were near silent. 

It began with a series of light switches across Pet’s shoulders and backside with a riding crop. Their body did not flinch but flutter at its every kiss. Pet was almost shocked by Rothilde’s soft hand as it came to stroke along the length of the little red lines left on their skin. Though they had come to relish Rothilde’s rough treatment somewhat, their body welcomed this new gentleness with desperate need. The sordid mixture of pain and pleasure was scintillating. The swats became sharper, stinging more deeply. Rothilde flicked at their swollen nipples and slapped their shriveled loins. She then produced a currycomb—both crop and comb had been taken from the panniers of the former knight’s steed,  Carbonel—and with it lightly abraded the creature’s skin, ensuring it was properly sensitised before she proceeded with her next implement.

From the wall, she fetched a paddle of fine ash. She brought it swiftly down on her pet’s hindquarters, spacing her smacks in neat and even rows across their bottom and thighs, from tailbone to knee. Each stripe stung fiercely. Rothilde alternated her strikes between each thigh so that they would mirror one another perfectly. Every swat was supervened by the lady knight running her hand across the fresh red band. Rothilde felt each raised welt forming and savored the heat radiating from her plaything’s hot skin.

“Pray tell, pet, why do you writhe like a weasel in a snare? Are you trying to wriggle free from your restraints?” Rothilde’s voice was measured like a reproving mother's. Pet shook their head in confutation, groaning through gritted teeth.

“Indeed, it is as I say. Your frame is far too frail and your will so weak, so bent to my bidding, that the very thought of defiance is anathema to you. Is that not so, my piteous one?” 

“Yes, Mistress!” They cried, voice cracking as the paddle came down on their scarlet cheeks.

“Then, for sake of obedience, hold still, pet, or you shall make messy the marks upon your backsides.” 

At her words, the squirming whelp was struck still.

Rothilde continued her assault until her ravishing face was flushed and tawny hair stuck to the tiny beads of sweat that bespeckled her brow. The poor, abused thing strapped tight to the horse wailed in splendid agony. Tears flooded their troughs, soaking through their sleep shade, and slaver slipped past their lips, their face flat in a pool of spittle. 

The domina gave her slave’s raw flesh a moment’s rest. And in that pitch black pause, Pet heard the unsheathing of a sword. Their heart beat frantically in their chest as they heard Rothilde return to their side. Cold fear filled their form as they awaited fresh torment—a most pleasurable terror. And yet, yielding to their Mistress’s words, pet remained motionless. At last, they felt the flat steel come to their flesh, thudding and stinging simultaneously. The pain penetrated deeply, and frissons reverberated through their form in rapturous ecstasy. The blade left fresh weals with pristine borders—a barry of twelve gules on argent skin—and nasty nicks that trickled with brilliant blood. Pet’s cries rang out high and feminine and professed their whimpering need.

“Speak now, pet,” Rothilde commanded. “And tell thy Mistresses what thou art!”

“I am nothing,” pet called back in a clarion voice, “I am nought but your willing slave, your devoted thrall, your adoring pet. I deserve nothing but the harshest punishment.”

“Entreat thy Countess and thy Lady for their forgiveness, that we should pardon the profound iniquity of thy mannish birth.”

“I beg you, my glorious Mistresses, grant me your grace, your clemency, and correction. Forgive my myriad masculine faults: my arrogance, hateful speech and rough voice, my ill-formed figure, my revolting appendage. Please allow me the chance to assuage my guilt and redress my failings, I beg you. Oh—I am sorry, sorry, sorry!”

“And thank thy Mistresses for their mercy, making you anew.”

“All my gramercies, Mistresses, for these gifts I do not deserve. Thank you!” Pet sounded as though they were on the very verge of climax. Never had they received such beautiful discipline. They desired nothing more than to spill over the edge into wanton abandon.

Between strikes, Rothilde espied the long, thin strand of seedless semen glimmering in the torchlight, dripping from their pet’s diminutive glans down to the stone floor. She cocked an eyebrow.

“Someone before me seems to delight in penance, does she not?”

Drowning in sublime bliss, Pet bayed without a trace of bashfulness, “Yes, yes, yes!” 

Then suddenly, Rothilde halted her assault, leaving pet suspended in hopeless arousal. Strapped to the horse in desperate need, Pet bucked their hips up and down upon the beam like a lusty mare.

“My love,” Rothilde beckoned to her Countess, “Please come observe your creature more closely.”

With neither sight nor sound, the trembling wretch knew the vampiress now hovered over them. The Countess Nefârtatul raked her sharp nails over their sensitive skin. Her slave seized at her slightest touch.

“She is like a bitch in heat,” Rothilde said. 

Kalina smiled at her paramour, admiring her handiwork. Rothilde removed the blindfold from their pet to present their face, soaked in sweat, tears, and spittle. She met their glazed and unfocused eyes and held her sword aloft. 

“Tell me, mon chiot, do you recognize this?” 

Pet thought hard for a moment, straining to pierce the thick fog of thralldom, before nodding. It was their own trusted sidearm, so long since purloined, they scarcely recognized it. It had been handed down to a foolhardy knight by his father in another lifetime. Pet scoured their heart for a trace of indignation but came up wanting. They felt nothing for the blade and nothing for the man from whom it had been gifted. Their loyalty, warped by time and torment, lay only with the fair ladies before them.

 “But of course, a creature such as you has no need for such things,” the valiant lady explained, “You wield nothing; you yield to all. And so this shall be its only purpose from henceforth.” She punctuated her words with another swift spank of their bottom. 

Pet now wore some two dozen weals, most of which were bleeding. Kalina stooped to watch their face as Rothilde continued her work. She pushed their long cinnamon hair from their face and caressed their cheek. She was perfection before her dazed and bedraggled creature.

In angelic tones, she spoke. “I am well apaied with thee, my precious pet.” ^[2]

Kalina placed a kiss upon their brow and another on their lips. Pet accepted the latter too greedily, however. The moment their Countess’s plump red lips met their own, a wild impulse rose within them to snap at her lips with their teeth. It could not be said whether it was the last vestige of their manhood lashing out at her or their own overeagerness and desperate craving for her. Maybe it was mere mimesis; they had learned to love with their teeth. Whatever its cause, it displeased the Countess. She pressed a singular talon to her slave’s forehead, tilting their head up toward her own. A thin trickle of blood trailed down Pet’s nose. Their dull eyes went wide with fear.

“Perhaps I have praised you too much too soon,” she said as she took the sword from Rothilde’s hand. Her voice was cold and deadly.

Then she struck out like a lioness with strength enough to shatter their pelvis into splinters. The pet’s body withstood, but their mind broke; the pain so wondrous, the penance so sweet. A strangled scream tore from their throat. Semen leaked from their withered cocklet. The Countess’s strikes felt almost like a reward. Perhaps it had pleased her, they thought, to see her pet reduced to a mere animal, and this was their treat. The unmaskable glee they witnessed on their Mistress’s face all but confirmed it.

Kalina went over their two dozen welts, deepening the rose-red bands to deep burgundy. When finished, she and Rothilde released their pet’s bindings. Rothilde raised them up in a bridal carry—their arms draped weakly around her neck, their head nestled into her bosom—and returned the creature to their cell. There they lay, fully nude on their belly, displaying their markings proudly, until their Mistress returned that night.

Upon her arrival, she bade them rise and pirouette, seeking to admire the exquisite arrangement of bruises on their behind before they faded. And when the time came for their Countess to take her fill, Pet bared their throat without instruction or hesitation. They then partook of their elixir, consuming it with insatiable zeal.

As a trace of the emerald draught escaped the corner of the pet’s mouth, the Countess’s delicate finger swept it away. She brought that slender digit to their lips, and they began to suckle and lap at her finger with the raw instinct of a newborn kitten. Kalina ran her hand through their long hair.

“There, mon chouchou. One must not let even a single drop go to waste, must one, pet?" she murmured.

They gave a submissive nod.

"Then do endeavor to be less slovenly, pet; it is hardly becoming of a lady," Kalina remarked. She briefly withdrew her hand, only to guide her finger back to their expectant mouth after drawing a fresh bead of blood with her sharp fang. She watched as her yielding creature relished the taste of vampire’s vitae. She stroked their head again and cooed, “You have already become so very pretty.”

The following week heralded at last the arrival of spring, the rebirth of the green and good. The Countess came to call on her pet on the eve of the equinox. She drank deeply from them that night. Pet surrendered wholly to her embrace, moaning in ecstasy, a small patch of wetness forming on the fringe of their loose tunic. The vampire’s hand rested softly on their thigh, and Pet brought their own to lay on top of it, clutching it gently. The next morning, when they awoke, it was to unfamiliar scenery.