F Campbell - Golden Wrists

A few hours later Juanita tells me it is time for change and I follow, her hand grasping my hair. Once more it is to the smithy and I am devastated by what the fact portends. “But I haven’t done anything!” I cry aloud. “I don’t deserve to be punished any more, or have to wear more chains. Juanita ... Please!”

“You are not to worry. Missy.” Juanita assures with an easy confidence because she knows it is not she who will be hurt. “It is believed what you suffer now will make you very good girl.”

“But I’m already a very good girl. I haven’t given you any trouble!”

“That is true. Please do not complain. I will punish you. It is something I am allowed to do.” She thrusts me towards the anvil and Jacob’s waiting smile.

The bondage now grasping my middle and hands would have defeated me for a hundred years but swiftly falls victim to Jacob’s hammer and cold steel punch. My chains are taken off, but my freedom is short-lived as Jacob places on the anvil some heavy, rusted shackles. I am invited to kneel and place my wrists within the awaiting jaws. Juanita grasps my arm and I kneel. But I ask plaintively, “Do you have to use this miserable rusty iron on me? Haven’t you anything that isn’t a couple of centuries old?”

No one answers. Since my wrists are now where they belong and I kneel humbly to await the hammer, Jacob closes the tiny but wickedly solid shackles around my wrists, and pounds happily away while I wince with ever blow and long to cry. When my second wrist joined to my first by only a couple links of ancient iron, I know myself well constrained. It is only a beginning.

Since I already kneel, it is convenient to deal with my neck next.

The collar is the right size for my neck, although snug. I am now even more frightened of the hammer blows which rivet this circlet. It seems so permanent to have cold iron hammered on, knowing that there is no way I can ever free myself from it. I notice a ring is firmly attached to the collar at the back and my spine goes cold at the possibilities inherent in that. My ankles are treated in the same manner as my wrists. I am given a box to sit on while my feet go up to the anvil. I see everything and hate it all. To make sure I don’t get too far up the wall, my ankles and wrists are joined by other chains that keep my hands from raising above my waist. The sheer weight of what I must now carry is daunting.

It is now difficult to walk and I am terribly helpless. Chain seems everywhere upon my nakedness and I make a frightful clatter as Juanita leads me to what comes next. I have already guessed what that is.

Juanita did not call it a dungeon. But it was a stone chamber beneath the surface of the land and it’s small amount of light came from a couple of tiny windows high on the wall. [ was led in to where a heavy ring was set into the wall with heavy chain trailing from it on the floor. The end was now padlocked to the ring at the back of my neck. I was now so ridiculously constrained that it might have been laughable. To an observer, perhaps, certainly not to me.

The door would have held me safe. The rest of the metal was pure punishment.

“Maybe not for many days,” Juanita encouraged before she left. The weight of links I was forced to carry caused me to sit against the wall where I could hold them. The iron was a real drag, particularly that on my neck, the collar with its chain falling to the floor was heavy enough to compel me to grab whatever of it I could to ease the stress. Comfort was not possible but I finally arranged my array of irons to make them bearable. With nothing else to do I counted the links as a nun counts her beads. Uncle Andrew was being a real ripe bastard!

I was left alone and even while it was still day the ghosts crowded the hateful place to make me realize I could be left there forever. I tried to think of cheerful things and to assure myself of early release but the chains and rivets and appalling weight of iron mocked optimism. I cried a bit and forced myself to get up and walk whatever steps the chain to my collar permitted. It was generous in its length but what good was that? Always I was back there to my seat by the wall, wondering why the hell I’d been such an utter fool. I countered this dismal reflection with the knowledge Uncle Andrew would have had me kidnapped anyway and I’d still be right here, secured as I was. I hope my shockingly marked skin would absolve me from the whip for at least a week.

I had a strong suspicion Uncle Andrew phoned daily to have Juanita tell him of my ordeals and the way I behaved. I knew there were a lot of men who would get a big charge out of that but wondered if Uncle Andrew was too much of a senior citizen to be one of those. But you never know, even with men possessing a lot of gray hair. And Uncle Andrew would not have surprised me had he taken me to bed and proved himself as potent as the rest. I was infuriated by the thought of my providing one of the richest men in the world with a little sexual titillation at long distance.

There’s something truly frightening about irons when they are riveted on your ankles and wrists. The knowledge that only a smith can free you from them gives you a cold feeling in the pit of your stomach. As the beastly dungeon grew darker as the day faded, I remembered all those tales of men and women imprisoned for life in a place like this, and weighed down with chains. But I was positive I couldn’t handle it. I would die or go crazy. Already I longed to scream against the ghosts hiding in the shadows. I was the saddest and most frightened girl in the world.

Juanita came just before it became pitch black. I could tell by her manner she was anxious as to how I was handling my frightful solitary confinement. Anxiously she asked, “You okay. Miss Durrant’!”

“I suppose I’m okay, but I wish I was dead.”

“You like to get out of here?” There was mischief in her voice.

“You know damned well I would like to.” I retorted. “Juanita, these chains and this place will kill me in short order.”

“If you ask me nicely to whip your bare, skin. I’ll take you to Jacob right now and get rid of all this iron. Would you like that?” There it was again, the same old theme! But even if the whip killed me, it would be better than remaining where I was. I wasn’t sure about Juanita’s humor, so said unhappily, “I’ve been whipped almost to bits. I’m covered in whip marks. I shouldn’t be whipped again so soon.”

“There’s always room for a few more marks on a girl’s skin,” Juanita suggested cheerfully. “And, anyway, there’s most of your front that hasn’t been touched yet. And there’s always the soles of your feet. Cheer up, Miss Durrant, if you ask me nicely I’ll have you out of here in no time.”

I refused to think about the screams and scorched skin, and dutifully in shame, came out with. “Please whip me, Juanita, whip me anywhere you wish if it will buy my release from these chains and this prison ... Please?”

My shameful begging for something I did not want evidently was considered ‘nice.’ I was helped to stand up and my jailer kindly carried a part of the weight of my chains as I was led back to the magic anvil. I forgot all about the whip, and where it might be used on me as I watched the striking hammer and punch. In disbelief I soon stood totally free with Jacob admiring my nakedness and Juanita telling me how brave I was to keep so still. I could have run away but what was the use!

What happened then was one more surprise. The lovely chains now produced had modern locks and sheen of bronze. They weighed far, far less than the awful irons Jacob had just struck from my nakedness, and the collar that went with them was not hard to bear. The shinning links at wrists, and ankles made me feel like floating on a cloud even though they held me as securely.