It is winter now, the November winds bringing thick white snowflakes from the north, and blanketing the world in white glistening coldness. I feel old and tired. My body aches in places I never knew I had feeling, and I work like a slave from before dawn to after dusk. I am a slave, in fact, if not in legality. Mrs. DeMarcco's power was far greater than my own, and though I knew it to be hopeless, I did seek other employment. I was so desperate I even investigated other occupations, but there was nothing. Every door was slammed in my face, old friends smiling wan, empty expressions and turning away, shaking their heads sadly. There was nothing for me except the torment of the DeMarcco hell, and there I returned, to work under the gaze of the bland, self-satisfied Mistress' face, my every gesture one of pain to me.

I was frequently beaten; don't let me lead you to believe otherwise. But it developed that the beatings were not the worst of it for me. I am a strong woman of independent means and I had always valued my freedom, and I bore the belief that hard and honest work would enrich and prosper me, which, when coupled with my determination to better my condition, all worked against me now. Here at the DeMarcco's I was a slave, not a servant. Here I was not a respected and valued employee, but a drudge, hired for menial tasks that only served to further debase my ego.

At first it was the beatings I feared most. For the few days after my initial meeting with the Mistress I walked with cat paws, silent and swift, my ears and eyes alert for any sign of displeasure from the Mistress. I knew it would come; how could it not, with her attitude? I did not know how I could bear it. But others did, others much more stupid and duller than I, so I should endure it too.

But as the days went on I began to think that perhaps she would be content to torture me mentally, to force me to perform tasks beneath my station, to watch me grovel at her feet. Oh, it is easy to be deceived once, but even easier to be deceived a second time. I fell for her ploy, and after a week began to relax slightly, and actually sleep at nights. I was so unbearably tense and nervous those first few days my body just collapsed with relief, and I spent a day in bed with a fever. I was better the next day, and when I did not even see the Mistress for two whole days I felt like spring had finally arrived after a long, cold, harsh winter. I fell to my work with an enthusiasm that surprised me, and actually found myself whistling one bright afternoon.

It was then announced to me that I would be serving at dinner that evening, to the Master and Mistress and his guests. The Master's guests were a prominent Lord and Lady who had traveled the distance from London, and I knew he intended to offer them the best that could be provided. For two days we had been cleaning the castle from top to bottom in such a fashion as hadn't been done in at least two years, according to one of the older maids, and the Mistress herself had already administered half a dozen whippings to various individuals for crimes of laziness and clumsiness.

Terror shook my bones when I heard I would be required to serve. Surely this was part of the Mistress' plan. She would be alert for any opportunity to punish me. The slightest transgression, no matter how insignificant, would be sufficient cause for her. She would love to thrash me in front of the guests, I knew, as she often did to other girls, and my heart felt monstrous and heavy, as though someone had pierced it with a sharp knife and let out all the joy and hope.

That evening I bravely went forth, determined to make a good show of it. My uniform was spotless, every bit of lace washed three times to make it the brightest white. My hair and face were clean and rosy, and I smelled of soap and fresh water, having bathed in the freezing creek that afternoon. My teeth shined and I smiled and laughed as though delighted when the gentleman visitor, in rather unsubtle fashion, I might add, pinched and patted my bottom beneath my skirt as I placed a bowel of steaming broth before him, working frantically not to spill it, his wife glaring at him and at the same time pretending not to notice his uncouth behavior.

I breathed a deep sigh when I returned to the kitchen unscathed after the first course. "If pinching is all my bottom feels before the night is over I shall be delighted, even if the old brute pinches me black and blue!" I thought grimly, with fierce determination.

But it was not to be. I served the food elegantly, gracefully, never forgetting an item or spilling a drop of anything. I wanted nothing for the Mistress to criticize, and she appeared frustrated and annoyed with me when I placed a thick slice a roast pork on her plate. I could feel her eyes on me as I worked, watching, waiting, lurking. I forced myself to ignore her, and concentrate on pleasing the guests, and the Master, both of whom complimented me several times on my excellent service, the Master once even commenting to his wife that she had picked an excellent maid for the evening, and that I should be well rewarded. I saw a look of disgust cross the Mistress' face, but it was only for a second, and only in my direction, and immediately she smiled and nodded at her husband pleasantly, but her eyes told me that she had other rewards in mind for me.

It was late in the evening when it happened. The guests had retired from the main table to the lounge, where it was comfortable and warm before the fire, and there munched on cheeses and sweets and drank hot mulled wine. Tea was ordered, and I rushed to bring it in, my legs aching from all my scurrying, my arms and back exhausted. The teacups and saucers were waiting for me in the kitchen, and, like a fool, I rushed back to the guests carrying the tray. I saw the Mistress watching me from the corridor that passes by the kitchen, a haughty look of triumph on her face. It unnerved me, and I wondered what she was scheming now, but I had no time to waste. God wish I had, though it would have made little difference in the long run. I had just placed the last saucer and was carefully lifting the steaming teapot to begin pouring when there was a scream of outrage and a horrified Mistress DeMarcco leapt to her feet.

I paused and turned, blood draining from my face. After everything I had done, it was now happening anyway, despite my best efforts to prevent it. The Mistress was furious, eyes filled with tears and her pale cheeks crimson. "Oh, Madam," she exclaimed, wringing her hands with agitation, "I am so very, very sorry! I cannot express my shame and horror at this blunder. Please, please, do not think this is any disrespect on the part of the DeMarccos! I beg your forgiveness for this unforgivable act of rudeness!"

There was more of this, much more, an astonishingly convincing act of the injured hostess, while the dignified lady, still seated and too surprised to react, was visibly at a loss to know why she should be offended at all. Suddenly the Mistress leapt forward and grasped the Lady's cup and saucer and thrust them in my astonished face.

"How _dare_ you insult our guests in this manner! Do you have no shame, no pride in your work? I ought to flog you right here and now in front of our guests!"

Tears sprang to my eyes, blurring the cup, but I could now see quite plainly the there was a tiny, almost imperceptible chip in the delicate china. "But ma'am!" I gasped, vainly attempting to defend myself.

"Shut your mouth, you worthless wench!" growled the Mistress angrily. "There is no excuse for such a mistake. You could have seriously injured a delicate, innocent Lady with your carelessness! A guest in this house! And after performing you duties so well, all evening, you have to embarrass the entire estate by your thoughtlessness! You may certainly forget any promotion, stupid girl! I have half a mind to throw you out into the cold, except you'd surely die, a worthless, unskilled slut like yourself. At the best you can expect to be in charge of cleaning the fireplaces and disposing of the refuse. Why, I am so ashamed and embarrassed! I cannot think why _you_ still have the arrogance to remain standing in front of us! Have you no shame?"

Tears poured down my face and I sank to the floor sobbing, my face flushed deep crimson. How could I have not checked the china before bringing it to the table? It _was_ indeed a serious breech of duty. "I'm sorry, Mistress," I begged through my tears.

"Sorry? You aren't sorry in the least! If you value your employment at all, young wench, you will rush to the kitchen and fetch me the leather strap at once. And don't you dare dawdle unless you wish to receive a double portion!"

I raced out eagerly, terrified, my tears blurring the spinning world around me. I past unfocused faces in the kitchen, hands guiding me until someone thrust the strap into my trembling hand, and soft, feminine lips kissed my cheek with a whisper of "Good luck, Janey!" I didn't even know who it was, but I was infinitely grateful for the gesture. Sobbing, I came back into the parlor room where the small group stood before the blazing fire, Mistress DeMarcco still apologizing and shaking off the lady guest's assurances that no harm had been done.

"We must make an example of her," said the Mistress as I trotted up. "We cannot allow such gross behavior to go unpunished." She silently took the strap from me and ordered me to bend forward across the side of the settee. This was a slight distance from the others, for which I was grateful, but the position was still humiliating, my face and breasts pressed against cushions. Still silent, her expression stern, the Mistress lifted my skirt and bade me to hold it in place, awkward as this was, my arms reaching behind me to press it against my back.

Then the Mistress began to disrobe me, pulling down my bloomers and knickers until only my bare flesh was exposed. My face smarted with shame and tears as I heard the Master approach, quietly asking, "Is this really necessary, my dear?" I held my breath. Could he save me? Would he save me?

"It is absolutely necessary," responded my Mistress. "We cannot allow such recklessness to go unpunished, and she shall be all the better for it, you will see. Having it in front of our guests will only enhance the punishment," she added coyly, "and besides, they might find it amusing."

Her husband shrugged. "Well, you know I leave household affairs for you to run as you see fit," he said, and then returned to the others, conferring with them with soft tones. All three soon sat back down and waited, watching. I could feel their eyes on me, though I dared not turn my head. I could see the Lord most clearly, and he did not appear the least put out by my predicament; he appeared almost jovial, in fact, and rather pleased.

Meantime I lay sprawled in shame across the sofa arm, my naked buttocks and legs exposed for everyone, the Mistress standing tall and dark and fearsome beside me, the deadly leather strap in her hand as she smiled at me, caressing my cheek with it softly, and then she leaned forward and whispered, "Are you ready naughty one? This is going to hurt, I can assure you. You deserve every stroke ten times over, little bitch! I will see that you are thoroughly punished on a regular basis after this. Do not let this be your first and last whipping by any means. You've got a fine bottom and it will look lovely covered with thick, red stripes!"

With that, I knew I was doomed. There was no way I was going to get away with a few token strokes to appease her guests or her own evil desires. No, I would be taken the full distance, given a long, thorough whipping that I would not fail to remember for days. And most likely there would be more tomorrow, and the next day and the next. I knew now the Mistress was finished playing with me. She meant to hurt me now, really hurt me, and in the future she would leap at any excuse to do so again.

My face was turned away from the fire, and so partially concealed in the gloomy room, and I licked my dry lips and waited. The first stroke took my breath away. It was so sharp, such a fine, thin pain, that I was surprised. The strap appeared to be quite wide and thick, and yet the pain was very focused, precise. Again came the strap, this time causing me to suck air into my mouth with a sharp hiss. I could feel the twin bands of heat across my buttocks, both cheeks vibrating slightly with the impact of the blows. The pain made me suddenly very conscious of my bottom: the delicate curves of plump flesh, the slender crack between my cheeks, and dark secrets buried beneath. I could feel the air between my legs, cool against the lips of my privates, and I knew with deep shame that surely the men could see everything.

I quivered with the next few blows, amazed at the sting. Tears filled my eyes and I could not help crying. The strokes seemed to get harder now, and faster, and my whole bottom seemed to be burning with pain. I wiggled and writhed as the whipping continued, no longer caring much what the men saw between my legs. So they would watch me dance. Would they see anything they had not seen already?

Thinking of the men watching produced a strange reaction in me. I was horrified and ashamed, of course, but a naughty part of me felt rather evilly delighted. I could feel a dampness growing between my legs as I thought of them watching, and when the strap struck me either in a particularly tender spot or very close to my crotch I could almost feel myself bursting with excitement and orgasm. I felt the strap was my scourge, punishing me for my dirty thoughts and desires, and I accepted it almost gratefully, rolling my hips and arching my bottom even higher into the air to receive the blows.

The strap was caressing me in dangerous places now. The Mistress had carefully laid parallel stripes full across both cheeks, so now she concentrated on unpunished areas, actually bringing the strap upward to strike at the base of my rump, and bringing it down into my crack, bringing stinging fire to the tender insides of my cheeks.

After a long time of this she began working on my legs, striping my thighs all around, especially the insides, right up to my crotch. This only served to intensify my emotions, and though I wept miserably, I felt glad I was being punished. I thought of all the naughty thoughts I'd had in my life, especially those involving men I had known, and I relished the sting of the strap. It felt good and warm to me, and my bottom throbbed with a passion I had not known I possessed.

The strap was furious now, lashing down again and again at lightning speed, my bottom churning in the air as I groveled with my face in the cushions and begged for mercy. I finally began to cry out loud, weeping and begging the Mistress to stop. This seemed to please her, and after a few more cruel lashes, she stopped. I collapsed on the couch for a moment, but then she ordered me to my feet. I was to go to the corner and stand with my legs apart, and my hands holding my skirt so everyone could see me. I would stay like that until bedtime. That is, unless I wanted another whipping. It would be my choice.

I chose the corner, naturally, and spent the rest of the night in that position. When the guests retired, the Mistress escorting them to their chambers, the Master approached me. I had not really met him, and I was afraid and uncertain what to think.

He is a tall man, and towers above his wife. He is dark, like her, and beautiful, too, but his beauty is hard and real, not soft and dreamy. When you look at the Mistress you think, "Can anyone really be so beautiful?" but when you look at the Master you think, "Ah, there, in truth, is beauty, strong and rugged and secure."

He seemed like a nice man, as he approached me. His expression was one of curiosity and concern, not anger or meanness. He knelt and studied my bottom for a few moments, my face flushed and ashamed. "She certainly did a thorough job," he said slowly, rising to his feet and looking me in the eye. I nodded, not sure what to say.

"I wonder where she learned to whip like that," he mused, and I did not have an answer. His hand reached out and palmed my bottom, my heart leaping at both the pain and the masculine touch. "Still warm," he whispered. "Hot, in fact. Feels rather nice. You have a nice figure."

"T-thank you, sir," I whispered, terrified of his unknown intentions.

"She seems to have a particular aversion to you," he said suddenly, after a moment of quiet, his palm still pressed against my bottom. "Did you do something to displease her?"

"I called her a bitch," I thought grimly, but I did not say that. Instead I whispered, "She is very strict with all the servants, Master."

He nodded. "Too strict, if you ask me," he said casually, but I caught an expression of concern and puzzlement on his face as he spoke. "But it is none of my affair. She doesn't interfere with the business and I will not interfere with the household staff." He removed his hand now, and carefully helped me pull my skirt over my bottom. "Go ahead and go to sleep, now. You need your rest. A flogging takes a lot out of one." I wondered if he knew what he was talking about from experience, but I had to admit I was more exhausted than I'd ever been in my life. I felt like I should collapse at any moment, and indeed, I only just barely made it to my bed.

I slept the sleep of the dead that night, and awoke late the next morning. I lay on my stomach as I realized the sun was already shining, but I didn't care. What was the worst she could do to me, whip me? I no longer feared her whippings. The pain I could handle, it was her I could not. I felt I hated her with every fibre of my being, more than I hated sin. She was evil, pure evil, and I wished it had been I who had flogged her, even if it meant that I had to receive twice as much, it would still be worth it just to see her crying and writhing under the smack of the leather strap.

Indeed, as time went on her whippings became almost routine. It became a habit for me to look at my buttocks in the mirror at night before bed and in the morning when I got up to see how well I was healing. I daresay there was no time my bottom wasn't striped from one whipping to the next, or at least blistered from the paddle.

This was another of her little tricks. She had discovered long ago the benefits of having at her disposal several implements of punishment. For severe, quick discipline the cane was the best. Just a few strokes, no more than a couple dozen. For more prolonged punishment, the strap worked wonders, as it was thick and did not break the skin, and thus the whipping could last much longer. But by far the most thorough chastisement was the paddle.

It was thin wooden paddle, small, just barely wide enough to cover a decent-sized bottom. It stung like the devil but did very little damage to the flesh, and indeed, with judicious use could be made to last an hour or more. This was far worse than the cane, which though intense, was over quickly, or the strap, which soon left your bottom covered with thick, pulsing stripes. The paddle, however, especially a light thin one like the Mistress employed, stung terribly and seemed to last forever. On and on and on until you thought "Surely I've got no bottom left!" but still it would pound down again and again and then the Mistress would shift you across her lap to a different position and spank you with her other arm, paddling your buttocks black and blue with welts and blisters until just her hot breath against the skin of your bottom would reduce you to screams of agony.

She always has you strip completely naked for paddlings, rather than just baring the buttocks the way she does for the cane or strap. While I found both humiliating, there was something much worse about standing naked before her, your heart trembling as you wait patiently and nervously as she readies herself--always a big production where she sits daintily and fidgets for a bit, smoothing her skirt across her lap, and fussing a great deal, and then stands up and recommences the entire process again while you keep swallowing your heart with tension--and only after she finally tests the paddle out on her hand a few times does she give you that curt gesture that you are ordered across her lap. You lower yourself, palms sweating with terror, your naked body making you feel as vulnerable as a child, and you press your hands against the floor to support yourself, your bare thighs rubbing against her skirt as you wiggle yourself into position. She scolds you then, just like you are a disobedient child who cannot understand language well and therefore everything must be repeated half a dozen times. When she finishes the scolding, the whole time rubbing and squeezing your buttocks until you are ready to scream, your face is flushed with shame. You cannot help it. Even if your crime seems minor in your own eyes, something about the way she looks at you, and the pure, rich, unadulterated scorn in her voice makes you feel lower than an ant, of less value than a disease.

Then, finally, after an agony of anticipation, she begins to spank you. Not hard, of course, just light slaps with the paddle. The entire purpose of the paddling, in her eyes, is to make it last a long time. The punishment is not in the degree of pain but the duration. She does not spank lightly out of concern for you--she cares nothing if you are blistered and raw--she is pacing herself, really. She wants to have plenty of energy left when she begins the real punishment.

As for you, your task is one of endurance. It is a hopeless one. Valiantly you set your teeth and resolve to bear the pain. Vainly you hold your breath and struggle with yourself to remain calm and cooperate, to let her punish your bottom as she wills. But always, at some delicate, undetermined point, you break. It is too much for you, and you begin to wiggle in spite of yourself. Your hands ache to reach back and rub your blazing rump, and you begin to open and close your legs, arch your back, tense and relax your buttocks, kick your legs, tremble, groan, moan, scream and cry out loud, weep, sob, beg and plead, shudder and implore, gasp and pant, and finally, after a paroxysm of emotions, you collapse as though your body has no skeleton, no structure or foundation, and you lie there across her lap quivering as though you are only a puddle of gelatin.

Then she begins the real spanking.

My first paddling lasted a half hour to the breaking point, and the Mistress continued the punishment for what I calculated was another fifteen minutes beyond that. I've never wept so profoundly in all my life, never felt so drained and exhausted, as after one of her extended paddlings. My second was even worse, for she spanked just my left bum-cheek for a good half hour, and then my right. I thought we were finished, and I was infinitely relieved, but then she paddled both my cheeks for another half hour. I have no idea what she has in store for my third paddling, but I will do everything in my power to avoid it, though I seriously doubt I shall be able to do so.

Fortunately, paddlings are rare. The Mistress selects only two or three of us per week for this punishment, and never more than once a month for the same person. We all receive our fair share of routine canings and whippings, some more than others, but at least paddlings are reserved for serious, personal offenses.

I should also point out that the Mistress does not neglect the male servants in her technique, but treats them in the same manner as the women. Many times I have crossed the main dining room in the course of my duties and paused to stare at the half-naked servant standing along one side, breeches completely removed, buttocks red with angry blisters from the thin cane or leather strap. It would seem to me that it must be even worse for the men than for the women, both because the men are in the minority here, making the few who are punished feel more select and embarrassed, and because I have yet to see a single whipped man who's organ isn't stretched out proud and tall as he stands blushing and fidgeting under my examination, hands locked at his sides or behind his head according to the Mistress' instructions.