Sablesword
TMF Master
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2001
- Messages
- 785
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- 18
The third of my "centaur tickling" series.
Amazon Ambassador
by Sablesword
"This is an outrage! I am Lady Hisolda, the Ambassador from
the court of Queen Penardun. You can't do this to me!"
Adoria turned to look at her stockmate. The Lady Hisolda was
tall and fair, with the long blond braid of an amazon warrior
running down her back. But she also seemed to be as young as
Adoria, a woman who had just entered adulthood. Adoria herself
was short, with dark hair she kept in a pony-tail in emulation
of the centaurs. Adoria thought that the centaurs appreciated
this gesture, although they never mentioned it. But she still
sat on a wide stool with Lady Hisolda on another stool beside
her; both of them with their ankles locked in a common set of
stocks, sandals and boots removed.
The older centaur answered Hisolda: "My lady, you will not be
Ambassador until you formally present your credentials. Until
then, you are a distinguished stranger, and so subject to law
and custom like any other stranger in our Land. And even
afterwards, you would still be a foreigner here."
"But your chieftain of protocol said that I would be received
as a friend," Hisolda said.
"As a friendly stranger," the older centaur corrected her.
"And so you have been."
"But... she can't have meant this. Ask her!"
"Very well," the centaur smiled, "I'll go and ask her." His
smile grew broader. "Stay here." He trotted off.
Adoria kept quiet through this. She had come to the stocks
voluntarily, if not exactly willingly. But the centaurs
practically had to drag Hisolda here, and when they put the two
women into the stocks, they put Hisolda on the side away from
the lock.
The stocks held the women's ankles, but the centaurs had not
yet fastened the women's wrists. Attached to the heavy timbers
behind the stocks was a fixed double-yoke, and the backs of the
women's necks rested in the yoke's semi-circular neck openings.
The smaller openings for the wrists were as yet unoccupied,
however, and the leather wrist-straps still hung loose. The pin-
lock keeping the stocks closed was in easy reach of Adoria's
hands. The younger centaur, Vanko, was fiddling with the
sundial, some distance away. "Undo the latch and get us loose,"
Hisolda whispered to Adoria.
"No, milady," Adoria answered.
"But they're going to torture us. They'll burn our feet with
hot irons and then heal us with their magic so that they can
burn us again!"
"Can you read that, my lady?" Adoria pointed to the prominent
sign written in the centaurs' curlicue script: *Alja Kentaros
mor kental velator velex bartaros mel Uru, nor Kentaros yonvel
morkap i patalos*
" 'If the Kentaros should ever fail to visit merciless torment
on foreigners who enter the Land, then will the Kentaros suffer
betrayal and ruination.' " Hisolda read. "So what? Do you *want*
to be tortured?"
"It's the Prophesy. The one the gods sent to the centaurs."
"The Prophesy of the Centaurs?" Hisolda asked. "But -"
"Anyway, they don't use hot irons," Adoria explained. "They
tickle."
"Tickle? I'd rather they did use hot irons." Hisolda moaned.
"Don't be silly, milady. The centaurs have a gift for healing,
but they're not *that* good. Anyway, you don't want to turn out
to be the Betrayer of the Centaurs, do you?"
"I'm not a spy. I'm an honorable ambassador."
"Well, then, milady. This is your chance to prove it."
"What about you?" Hisolda asked. "Are *you* looking forward to
this?"
"It's - not so bad. Especially once it's over. Anyway, I'm not
a spy either, and this is *my* chance to prove it." Adoria saw
the older centaur returning and quickly added: "Don't cry and
don't beg, milady. They'll respect you for that."
"You've been through this before?"
"Several times." Adoria was not about to admit that it had
only been twice.
The older centaur came up to the two young women. "Well, my
Lady Hisolda," he said. "The Lady Nausica says that we are to
treat you as a friendly stranger. We are to overlook your
struggles in coming to this place. Once our council of
chieftains receives you as the Ambassador from the Amazons, you
will of course continue as a friendly stranger. You will be
expected to return here each month. Without struggle." he added.
"Now, if you two will please raise your hands?"
Adoria raised her hands as instructed, followed a moment later
by Hisolda. The two centaurs then fastened the wrist-straps,
fixing two pairs of wrists into place on the double-yoke. Adoria
shivered slightly. Now she couldn't reach the latch to free
herself even if she had wanted to. In an effort to distract
herself, she spoke to the older centaur. "Excuse me," she said.
"I know your partner is Vanko son of Timon, but I don't know
your name?"
"Ho, I am Rodas son of Philipe," came the answer. "And I know
that you are Adoria, the niece of the merchant Zorian. My
daughter Idalia has spoken much of him."
Lady Hisolda twisted her hands in the yoke and tried to keep
from squirming. It was so, so *undignified* to be locked here,
next to this merchant's daughter. She was the Lady Hisolda, of
the Amazons. She could face battle. She could even grit her
teeth and face hot irons and flayers. But this tickling was a
baby-torture. It would humiliate her. It would make her writhe
and scream just as if it were a real torture. But it wasn't a
real torture. Yet at the same time it was. She didn't know how
skilled the centaurs were at it; she didn't know how bad it
would be. So she shivered and feared the worst.
She tried her strength against the stocks and the yoke.
Nothing. They didn't even creak. They were heavily built,
intended to hold warriors even stronger than she was. The
centaurs knew how to keep human prisoners from escaping. She had
learned that when they had tied her with ropes and led her to
this place. She was learning that now in testing herself against
the stocks. And she would soon learn it a third time when the
tickling drove her into hysterics. Already the centaurs were
moving to her feet.
The two centaurs poured water over their victim's feet, and
scrubbed them with stiff-bristled brushes. Adoria screwed up her
face and whimpered while Hisolda squealed and jumped. Both women
twisted their feet in futile efforts to avoid the brush-strokes.
The centaurs allowed this to go on for a time, and then each
grabbed two large toes with one hand while applying the brush
with the other. Hisolda howled at this, and Adoria laughed
helplessly with giggles spilling out of her like water from an
overflowing cup.
Adoria knew that the foot-scrubbing was only a preliminary and
not part of the real torment. But it still tickled. She tried to
hold in her laughter, knowing that it would only tickle worse
once her giggling started. She succeeded, mostly, until she felt
Rodas grab both her large toes with one hand and apply an
especially vigorous scrub with the other. That broke down her
resistance. She tried not to think of the real tickling yet to
come. It wasn't hard. All her attention was on her bare feet,
out of her sight and reach behind the stocks, and on the
tickling they were receiving from the bristles of the scrub-
brush.
Hisolda squirmed on her stool, and twisted her feet in an
effort to avoid the worst of the brush-strokes. Certainly no one
could blame her for trying to struggle while actually being
tickled. Not that it seemed to do much good; the centaur Vanko
knew his business. Worse, he was enjoying it, fiends take him!
But as long as she could move her feet a little bit, it was
still a battle, uneven though it might be, and she knew battles.
As long as he didn't think to... no! Hisolda felt her large toes
grabbed. She could no longer fight; she could no longer do
anything to protect her soles at all. She could only howl at her
ticklish defeat.
Now there came a respite of sorts, as the centaurs applied a
clever arrangement of wooden pegs and strips to hold the young
women's feet in place. Wooden strips across the toes keep the
feet from curling forward, and wooden pegs between the toes kept
the feet from twisting from side to side. This arrangement
clamped the feet in place, and while it gave come protection to
the toes, it left the rest of the soles exceptionally exposed
and vulnerable. The centaurs took their time, getting the
arrangement set up just right and also, not so coincidentally,
letting the tension build in their two prisoners. Then they
began to tickle: Rodas used his bare fingers on Adoria's feet,
combining long strokes with sudden random attacks. Vanko applied
a vos-falcon feather with great gentleness to Hisolda's soles,
for the boot-wearing amazon's feet were much more tender than
those of the sandal-wearing Adoria. But despite this gentleness
- or perhaps because of it - Hisolda laughed wildly until tears
came.
Adoria saw the odd leather implement in Rodas' hands and
suppressed a groan. She knew what a bullfeather was: A
demonically effective tickle-instrument invented by the
centaurs. She had seen it - and felt it - before. She knew what
it could do in the hands of an expert, and she feared that Rodas
was an expert. She was right. Rodas did not rush, but worked
slowly and methodically up the sole of Adoria's right foot. He
manipulated the bullfeather with the skill of long practice,
seeking out the most ticklish spots as he ranged up from the
heel to toward the toes. Then he repeated the process on
Adoria's left foot. Adoria could only laugh helplessly, as the
expertly methodical tickling left her too weak to even squirm to
the extent that her restraints allowed. Rodas kept up the
bullfeather attack for some time, alternating between one foot
and the other, as Adoria laughed until tears ran down her
cheeks.
In the meantime, Vanko had abandoned the vos-hawk feather in
favor of his fingers. But unlike Rodas, he had first dipped his
fingers in oil. Now his fingertips skated slickly over Hisolda's
soles as she howled and screamed. Vanko recognized what was
happening, and grinned. The amazon was thrashing, fighting
desperately to keep from dissolving into helpless laughter.
Hisolda's feet were tender, but they weren't as ticklish as they
might be and Vanko wasn't the expert with the bullfeather that
Rodas was. Still, the younger centaur was confident that with a
little work he could push Hisolda over the edge. He began to
vary his tempo, and watched as Hisolda's eyes widened and her
struggles became more desperate. Just a little bit more, a
little more, slow strokes and fast ones, and watch Hisolda's
face to judge your fingerflicks as she loses her fight not to
giggle. Now apply all ten oil-slick fingers at once to a pair of
oil-slick soles, and see his victim explode with laughter.
Adoria felt only mixed relief when she saw Rodas set aside the
bullfeather. The Prophesy called for *merciless* torment, and
the tickling couldn't be over yet, no matter how much she might
wish otherwise. She cursed herself for a fool: If she weren't so
greedy for the riches to be made trading with the centaurs, she
wouldn't be suffering this tickle-torture every month. Then she
saw what the older centaur had picked up in place of the
bullfeather. No! Not both a wooden spoon *and* the knobby
roller. Either one would have been bad enough, but both of them
together...! Then thought stopped as Rodas began to vigorously
apply the two implements, the wooden roller in his left hand,
and the spoon in his right. Laughter poured out of Adoria like
wine from an amphora held upside down.
One part of Hisolda's mind wanted to beg for the tickling to
stop, if only she could catch her breath to speak. Another part
insisted that she refuse to beg, mostly out of pride, but partly
from fear that begging to stop would only bring her additional
tickling. And, to her horror, a third small corner whispered
that it did not want this tickling to stop. The vos-hawk feather
had been an aching tickle, but this oily finger-tickle was pure
and sweet. It was too sweet to endure. If Hisolda weren't held
helpless by the stocks and yoke, she would leap into the air and
run all the way back to her home country like the goddess of
speed, with her feet not ever touching the ground. But as it
was, she could squirm and giggle and slowly go mad as the
younger centaur continued tickling in a way that was at once
both gentle and vigorous.
Vanko glanced aside at the sundial and saw that the shadow had
reached the gnomon. "It's time," he said. The two centaurs
stopped their tickling, although it took a few moments for their
victims to realize this. At last, however, the giggling and
laughter ran down, and the two young women gasped for breath.
Rodas released the wrist straps and the foot restraints while
Vanko offered dippers of water. Both Adoria and Hisolda drank
greedily; tickle-torment is thirsty work. Then they sat back,
seemingly too exhausted to move, their ankles still in the
bottom half-circles of the opened stocks.
The silence grew, until Rodas finally said "You're free to go
- unless you'd like a second session right now?" At that, Adoria
and Hisolda squealed and dove for their footgear.
Amazon Ambassador
by Sablesword
"This is an outrage! I am Lady Hisolda, the Ambassador from
the court of Queen Penardun. You can't do this to me!"
Adoria turned to look at her stockmate. The Lady Hisolda was
tall and fair, with the long blond braid of an amazon warrior
running down her back. But she also seemed to be as young as
Adoria, a woman who had just entered adulthood. Adoria herself
was short, with dark hair she kept in a pony-tail in emulation
of the centaurs. Adoria thought that the centaurs appreciated
this gesture, although they never mentioned it. But she still
sat on a wide stool with Lady Hisolda on another stool beside
her; both of them with their ankles locked in a common set of
stocks, sandals and boots removed.
The older centaur answered Hisolda: "My lady, you will not be
Ambassador until you formally present your credentials. Until
then, you are a distinguished stranger, and so subject to law
and custom like any other stranger in our Land. And even
afterwards, you would still be a foreigner here."
"But your chieftain of protocol said that I would be received
as a friend," Hisolda said.
"As a friendly stranger," the older centaur corrected her.
"And so you have been."
"But... she can't have meant this. Ask her!"
"Very well," the centaur smiled, "I'll go and ask her." His
smile grew broader. "Stay here." He trotted off.
Adoria kept quiet through this. She had come to the stocks
voluntarily, if not exactly willingly. But the centaurs
practically had to drag Hisolda here, and when they put the two
women into the stocks, they put Hisolda on the side away from
the lock.
The stocks held the women's ankles, but the centaurs had not
yet fastened the women's wrists. Attached to the heavy timbers
behind the stocks was a fixed double-yoke, and the backs of the
women's necks rested in the yoke's semi-circular neck openings.
The smaller openings for the wrists were as yet unoccupied,
however, and the leather wrist-straps still hung loose. The pin-
lock keeping the stocks closed was in easy reach of Adoria's
hands. The younger centaur, Vanko, was fiddling with the
sundial, some distance away. "Undo the latch and get us loose,"
Hisolda whispered to Adoria.
"No, milady," Adoria answered.
"But they're going to torture us. They'll burn our feet with
hot irons and then heal us with their magic so that they can
burn us again!"
"Can you read that, my lady?" Adoria pointed to the prominent
sign written in the centaurs' curlicue script: *Alja Kentaros
mor kental velator velex bartaros mel Uru, nor Kentaros yonvel
morkap i patalos*
" 'If the Kentaros should ever fail to visit merciless torment
on foreigners who enter the Land, then will the Kentaros suffer
betrayal and ruination.' " Hisolda read. "So what? Do you *want*
to be tortured?"
"It's the Prophesy. The one the gods sent to the centaurs."
"The Prophesy of the Centaurs?" Hisolda asked. "But -"
"Anyway, they don't use hot irons," Adoria explained. "They
tickle."
"Tickle? I'd rather they did use hot irons." Hisolda moaned.
"Don't be silly, milady. The centaurs have a gift for healing,
but they're not *that* good. Anyway, you don't want to turn out
to be the Betrayer of the Centaurs, do you?"
"I'm not a spy. I'm an honorable ambassador."
"Well, then, milady. This is your chance to prove it."
"What about you?" Hisolda asked. "Are *you* looking forward to
this?"
"It's - not so bad. Especially once it's over. Anyway, I'm not
a spy either, and this is *my* chance to prove it." Adoria saw
the older centaur returning and quickly added: "Don't cry and
don't beg, milady. They'll respect you for that."
"You've been through this before?"
"Several times." Adoria was not about to admit that it had
only been twice.
The older centaur came up to the two young women. "Well, my
Lady Hisolda," he said. "The Lady Nausica says that we are to
treat you as a friendly stranger. We are to overlook your
struggles in coming to this place. Once our council of
chieftains receives you as the Ambassador from the Amazons, you
will of course continue as a friendly stranger. You will be
expected to return here each month. Without struggle." he added.
"Now, if you two will please raise your hands?"
Adoria raised her hands as instructed, followed a moment later
by Hisolda. The two centaurs then fastened the wrist-straps,
fixing two pairs of wrists into place on the double-yoke. Adoria
shivered slightly. Now she couldn't reach the latch to free
herself even if she had wanted to. In an effort to distract
herself, she spoke to the older centaur. "Excuse me," she said.
"I know your partner is Vanko son of Timon, but I don't know
your name?"
"Ho, I am Rodas son of Philipe," came the answer. "And I know
that you are Adoria, the niece of the merchant Zorian. My
daughter Idalia has spoken much of him."
Lady Hisolda twisted her hands in the yoke and tried to keep
from squirming. It was so, so *undignified* to be locked here,
next to this merchant's daughter. She was the Lady Hisolda, of
the Amazons. She could face battle. She could even grit her
teeth and face hot irons and flayers. But this tickling was a
baby-torture. It would humiliate her. It would make her writhe
and scream just as if it were a real torture. But it wasn't a
real torture. Yet at the same time it was. She didn't know how
skilled the centaurs were at it; she didn't know how bad it
would be. So she shivered and feared the worst.
She tried her strength against the stocks and the yoke.
Nothing. They didn't even creak. They were heavily built,
intended to hold warriors even stronger than she was. The
centaurs knew how to keep human prisoners from escaping. She had
learned that when they had tied her with ropes and led her to
this place. She was learning that now in testing herself against
the stocks. And she would soon learn it a third time when the
tickling drove her into hysterics. Already the centaurs were
moving to her feet.
The two centaurs poured water over their victim's feet, and
scrubbed them with stiff-bristled brushes. Adoria screwed up her
face and whimpered while Hisolda squealed and jumped. Both women
twisted their feet in futile efforts to avoid the brush-strokes.
The centaurs allowed this to go on for a time, and then each
grabbed two large toes with one hand while applying the brush
with the other. Hisolda howled at this, and Adoria laughed
helplessly with giggles spilling out of her like water from an
overflowing cup.
Adoria knew that the foot-scrubbing was only a preliminary and
not part of the real torment. But it still tickled. She tried to
hold in her laughter, knowing that it would only tickle worse
once her giggling started. She succeeded, mostly, until she felt
Rodas grab both her large toes with one hand and apply an
especially vigorous scrub with the other. That broke down her
resistance. She tried not to think of the real tickling yet to
come. It wasn't hard. All her attention was on her bare feet,
out of her sight and reach behind the stocks, and on the
tickling they were receiving from the bristles of the scrub-
brush.
Hisolda squirmed on her stool, and twisted her feet in an
effort to avoid the worst of the brush-strokes. Certainly no one
could blame her for trying to struggle while actually being
tickled. Not that it seemed to do much good; the centaur Vanko
knew his business. Worse, he was enjoying it, fiends take him!
But as long as she could move her feet a little bit, it was
still a battle, uneven though it might be, and she knew battles.
As long as he didn't think to... no! Hisolda felt her large toes
grabbed. She could no longer fight; she could no longer do
anything to protect her soles at all. She could only howl at her
ticklish defeat.
Now there came a respite of sorts, as the centaurs applied a
clever arrangement of wooden pegs and strips to hold the young
women's feet in place. Wooden strips across the toes keep the
feet from curling forward, and wooden pegs between the toes kept
the feet from twisting from side to side. This arrangement
clamped the feet in place, and while it gave come protection to
the toes, it left the rest of the soles exceptionally exposed
and vulnerable. The centaurs took their time, getting the
arrangement set up just right and also, not so coincidentally,
letting the tension build in their two prisoners. Then they
began to tickle: Rodas used his bare fingers on Adoria's feet,
combining long strokes with sudden random attacks. Vanko applied
a vos-falcon feather with great gentleness to Hisolda's soles,
for the boot-wearing amazon's feet were much more tender than
those of the sandal-wearing Adoria. But despite this gentleness
- or perhaps because of it - Hisolda laughed wildly until tears
came.
Adoria saw the odd leather implement in Rodas' hands and
suppressed a groan. She knew what a bullfeather was: A
demonically effective tickle-instrument invented by the
centaurs. She had seen it - and felt it - before. She knew what
it could do in the hands of an expert, and she feared that Rodas
was an expert. She was right. Rodas did not rush, but worked
slowly and methodically up the sole of Adoria's right foot. He
manipulated the bullfeather with the skill of long practice,
seeking out the most ticklish spots as he ranged up from the
heel to toward the toes. Then he repeated the process on
Adoria's left foot. Adoria could only laugh helplessly, as the
expertly methodical tickling left her too weak to even squirm to
the extent that her restraints allowed. Rodas kept up the
bullfeather attack for some time, alternating between one foot
and the other, as Adoria laughed until tears ran down her
cheeks.
In the meantime, Vanko had abandoned the vos-hawk feather in
favor of his fingers. But unlike Rodas, he had first dipped his
fingers in oil. Now his fingertips skated slickly over Hisolda's
soles as she howled and screamed. Vanko recognized what was
happening, and grinned. The amazon was thrashing, fighting
desperately to keep from dissolving into helpless laughter.
Hisolda's feet were tender, but they weren't as ticklish as they
might be and Vanko wasn't the expert with the bullfeather that
Rodas was. Still, the younger centaur was confident that with a
little work he could push Hisolda over the edge. He began to
vary his tempo, and watched as Hisolda's eyes widened and her
struggles became more desperate. Just a little bit more, a
little more, slow strokes and fast ones, and watch Hisolda's
face to judge your fingerflicks as she loses her fight not to
giggle. Now apply all ten oil-slick fingers at once to a pair of
oil-slick soles, and see his victim explode with laughter.
Adoria felt only mixed relief when she saw Rodas set aside the
bullfeather. The Prophesy called for *merciless* torment, and
the tickling couldn't be over yet, no matter how much she might
wish otherwise. She cursed herself for a fool: If she weren't so
greedy for the riches to be made trading with the centaurs, she
wouldn't be suffering this tickle-torture every month. Then she
saw what the older centaur had picked up in place of the
bullfeather. No! Not both a wooden spoon *and* the knobby
roller. Either one would have been bad enough, but both of them
together...! Then thought stopped as Rodas began to vigorously
apply the two implements, the wooden roller in his left hand,
and the spoon in his right. Laughter poured out of Adoria like
wine from an amphora held upside down.
One part of Hisolda's mind wanted to beg for the tickling to
stop, if only she could catch her breath to speak. Another part
insisted that she refuse to beg, mostly out of pride, but partly
from fear that begging to stop would only bring her additional
tickling. And, to her horror, a third small corner whispered
that it did not want this tickling to stop. The vos-hawk feather
had been an aching tickle, but this oily finger-tickle was pure
and sweet. It was too sweet to endure. If Hisolda weren't held
helpless by the stocks and yoke, she would leap into the air and
run all the way back to her home country like the goddess of
speed, with her feet not ever touching the ground. But as it
was, she could squirm and giggle and slowly go mad as the
younger centaur continued tickling in a way that was at once
both gentle and vigorous.
Vanko glanced aside at the sundial and saw that the shadow had
reached the gnomon. "It's time," he said. The two centaurs
stopped their tickling, although it took a few moments for their
victims to realize this. At last, however, the giggling and
laughter ran down, and the two young women gasped for breath.
Rodas released the wrist straps and the foot restraints while
Vanko offered dippers of water. Both Adoria and Hisolda drank
greedily; tickle-torment is thirsty work. Then they sat back,
seemingly too exhausted to move, their ankles still in the
bottom half-circles of the opened stocks.
The silence grew, until Rodas finally said "You're free to go
- unless you'd like a second session right now?" At that, Adoria
and Hisolda squealed and dove for their footgear.
