Focus. Breathe. Think.
Preparation, needle. Grasp the needle. ("No, not at the end boy, it's a needle not a trowel – just far enough from the point to measure the stitch.") Thimble. Stroke the needle. Catch the base. Thimble moves the needle, pivots it to bite the cloth, and back up. Left hand breaks the cloth over the point. ("Don't turn your wrist, boy, if you do that every time it'll wear out before you ever make journeyman.") Thimble does the work. Bite, break, push, grasp, pull. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat . . .
Kurt knelt on the dais, face still pressed into the floor in supplication to no one any more, listening to the lesser lords, ladies, soldiers and hangers-on make their way out of the great hall. In his head he recited his tailor's litany, desperate to pull back the tattered shreds of his self-discipline. Anyone else, in his position, might have prayed, but needle and thread were the only religion Kurt recognized, and Master Tailor Neric the only priest. He wanted to be up and off the dais, but he didn't try to move at all as he chanted. He stayed perfectly still against the cold, hard wood. He didn't have any other choice.
Forestitch, small, straight, even. Basting and light seaming. Hours with the forestitch, days, weeks. Thimble finger tied into position with a soft black ribbon. Bite, break, push, grasp, pull. Pick out his uneven attempts and start all over again. By the time he'd staggered home half asleep at the end of each day, his fingers had been cramped and frozen in the needle hold. He'd cried with the pain as his father massaged them back to usefulness, then cried even harder when Burt suggested that maybe he shouldn't go back. Maybe twelve was too young to apprentice. He could wait another year. But no matter how bad the nights, the rising sun always found him answering the needle's call again.
He didn't move because he couldn't. Before all this, before he'd been taken, Kurt had always thought the idea of being paralyzed by fear was simple hyperbole. He'd used the phrase himself, oh so dramatically, to his father describing a near miss with a clutch of bullies (the village of Pluna was far too backward to ever appreciate someone with Kurt's particular flair), or to Master Neric, as each of his skills examinations loomed. But that had been in another life. A life where, even in his worst nightmares he'd never imagined a fear so intense, so overwhelming, that it could stretch tendons and lock muscles until every breath and heartbeat was a struggle for life against icy, bone-crushing pressure and the insidious voice that whispered inside him that maybe this was the time, maybe it just wasn't worth fighting anymore.
Breathe. Think. Backstitch, the tailor's plowhorse. ("You'll probably take more backstitches in your life than breaths, boy. It's the blood in your veins. You'll be more intimately acquainted with it than with any lover.") Catch the last stitch with absolute precision. Graceful, rhythmic, bite, break, push, grasp, pull. Tension the top layer to make up for the angle and finally he started to feel like he might have a chance, he filled whole squares of cloth with straight, even stitches and when Master Neric looked over his shoulder and harrumphed and nodded, Kurt felt like he'd swallowed the sun and it was trying to burst through his skin in beams of pure joy.
It had never happened to him during what Gavin like to call his training. Then, punishments had always been beatings and Kurt had learned that pain, even the excruciating kind that made you absolutely certain you'd rather die than take one more hit, wasn't at all the same as fear. Paralyzing fear wasn't contingent on pain at all. He never knew when it would hit him. Sometimes it took him completely by surprise. But today he'd seen it coming as soon as that woman had said "punishment." Gavin never beat him. A slave covered in bruises didn't draw the covetous gasps from onlookers that the duke craved. His punishments were on a completely different level. And Kurt had known, standing there with his dick pulsing in the woman's sharp-nailed hand – with everyone watching – he'd know it would be the dog again.
No. Think. What was next? Wavestitch, Master Neric had to explain the name to Kurt, who in landlocked Pluna had never seen a body of water bigger than the millers' pond. The master's nimble hands had undulated through the air until Kurt could see the waves rolling, toward the land, away, and back again. He'd dreamt, as he made his careful double stitches, of standing on the ocean's shore, with the beautiful white towers of Concordia City at his back, watching those waves flow like his stitches across the fabric. He loved the wavestitch. Sometimes he could actually feel himself bob where he sat cross-legged on his broad bench, floating in his imaginary sea. The air seemed cleaner, sharp with the salt tang Master Neric described, when Kurt practiced the wavestitch. It felt like freedom.
Kurt's breathing was slowing, thank the gods, and the whirlwind in his head starting to calm. Wavestitch always helped. His awareness spread out, beyond his own body and the wood he knelt on. He could hear the clatter of dishes, which meant that the room had cleared of guests. Servants would be moving among the tables, he knew, scraping food scraps into heavy baskets to be carted away for pigslop, and stacking plates to be carried back to the washroom. Kurt very much wanted to be out of the hall before any of them made their way up to the dais.
Most of the duke's servants regarded Kurt as a kind of troublesome, pampered pet. He did no work that they could see and because his movements were limited by his nudity, he created plenty of extra work for them. His meals had to be brought to him, his bed linens collected, his chamber pot emptied. Kurt was polite to the point of deference when he encountered them, but even the few who might be disposed to pity him lowered their gazes in his presence and shied away whenever they passed him in a corridor. He reminded them, uncomfortably, he was sure, of how far it was possible to fall. For others, the temptation of having someone lower than themselves to abuse was irresistible. Usually he simply paid no attention. Their attacks were always verbal – they feared the duke too much to attempt anything more – and gods knew Kurt had a lifetime's experience ignoring taunts and jeers. But at the moment his grip on himself was still too tenuous. He wasn't sure it could withstand the humiliation of being mocked by a bunch of kitchen wenches because he was groveling on the floor, too scared to move.
Have to move. Keep breathing. Prickstitch, gods how he'd hated the prickstitch. As soon as he'd managed a little bit of facility, some measure of ease, suddenly everything changed. It was a tiny change, slide the needle between the layers, pick up just the fewest possible threads, but it left his hands fumbling as if they'd never sewn a stitch before. He had wanted to scream and rant at his traitorous fingers. It got worse when Master Neric's useless son Cale and his idiot friends figured out how much they loved playing tease-the-apprentice. "How's that prick stitch coming Kurt?" "Is that prick still giving you trouble, Kurt?" "Oh, I think he's got the prick well in hand, don't you Kurt? I'm pretty sure the prick's his favorite . . ." They'd run away the moment the master appeared, and Kurt would just continue to work in silence, his face burning with humiliation. They didn't know, they couldn't know, they were just stupid boys making the most obvious stupid joke. But Kurt knew. He was old enough then to know that he was different. Different in a way that wasn't decent.
He despised the prickstitch. But then halfway through Kurt's battle with it, Master Neric decided he no longer needed the black ribbon holding his thimble finger in place, and then there wasn't room inside of Kurt to hate anything. Removing the ribbon meant he'd passed the first test. It was the symbolic expression of Master Neric's belief in his ability to make this journey. There was no doubt, then, that he was on a path that would take him to mastery himself, and away from Pluna and her small-minded inhabitants forever. As long as he lived, Kurt would never forget the fierce triumph he'd felt in that moment. His entire future, everything he'd ever dreamed of, was in his grasp, worked in perfect white prickstitches on rough black wool.
His body began to tremble against the wood of the dais. That was good. It was normal for his muscles to tremble with fatigue before they finally gave up and unlocked. Just in time, too, because the sounds of clearing were making their way closer to the dais and Kurt was still stuck on the floor. He was breathing more easily, and his heart had slowed down enough that he could actually tell one beat from another, but he wasn't moving yet.
It was the woman who'd done it. The horrible woman with her pale blue skirts that reflected the light like knife blades and her careful, questioning eyes that had seen right through him, effortlessly.
Kurt's survival depended on never being seen. At some point during his training, lying on the thin mattress in the cell they'd kept him in, every muscle throbbing after being beaten for some indiscretion or another, Kurt had realized that he was going to lose his mind. That was the entire point. Gavin had told the woman that a slut was meant to have no will or thought beyond pleasing his master, and on that random day it had become clear to Kurt that the more he fought, the harder they'd punish him, until eventually his mind snapped. They would push him with torture and humiliation until there was nothing left of him but an empty vessel. And then if his slavery ever came to an end, there wouldn't be a Kurt Hummel left to notice.
So although part of him had wanted, still wanted, to fight, he knew with absolute certainty that he would lose. The only way to make sure Kurt Hummel survived was to build a wall between his body and his mind. They could have his body. He would let them do to it whatever they wanted. He would go where they wanted him to go, say what they wanted him to say, suck what they wanted him to suck. He let them teach his flesh to respond in whatever way they required. And when he was deemed ready to be turned over to the duke, he did exactly as he was told in perfect submission. On the outside. He wore the mask of the slut, inhabited it, so that Kurt, dramatic, fierce, free Kurt, had a hope of surviving.
And it worked. It was almost easy. His trainers were so invested in imprinting him with the persona of slut that they never even asked his name. They knew nothing at all about him, and without that knowledge they couldn't touch the essence of who he was. Underneath the performance that he gave every day, Kurt was untouchable. As long as nobody suspected him lurking there just below all the yes masters. And for half a year nobody ever did. Because Gavin was a bully, but he was no sadist. He loved power, and as long as he believed he had complete power over Kurt, it never occurred to him that his slut wasn't exactly what he appeared to be. He punished misbehavior, because misbehavior threatened his power. He enjoyed Kurt's begging or screaming because it meant that his power had been unquestionably restored. But he never really saw the way his punishments broke Kurt open, drove into all the secret places where he thought he was safe and pushed him to the verge of losing himself all over again. Kurt had been punished three times during his half year at the castle, and each time it had been harder to pull himself back together. Each time his grip on Kurt felt more tenuous.
Gavin had never noticed, but that woman – she was different. She'd looked at him for mere moments and seen. Like a bloodhound she'd sniffed out his secret rebellion and zeroed in on the exact thing that terrified him most. And he'd been saved, this time, by the steward, but she was still here. She was spending the night in the castle and at any point, just a word in Gavin's ear and Kurt's entire carefully-crafted façade would be destroyed.
And that kind of thinking Kurt scolded himself, would never get his frozen limbs to unlock. He needed to stop worrying about things he couldn't control and keep concentrating on what he could.
Knifestitch, tiny and straight, for tacking lining or casting edges. Bite and break, sideways step, bite and break.
Padstitch, little side stitches placed just so to form beautiful chevron patterns for thickening and strengthening. He loved to experiment with placement, finding new designs.
Briarstitch, the hardest of all to keep even, moving side to side, needle passing over the thread, painstaking but perfect for easing pleats and tucks, for decorating a detail, pocket or collar . . .
Briarstitch worked in a border of blood red on shining leather, framing the dog's name . . .
No, gods, fuck he wasn't supposed to do briarstitch anymore, he forgot, and the flash of the collar behind his eyes was all it took. Kurt was right back, kneeling in the center of the hall, frozen, like now, but upright, exposed to all those eyes, to the dog's hot tongue, paralyzed with fear as hot juices ran over his body and the tongue like a rasp on his flesh, mindlessly, mindlessly licking, vicious white teeth flashing and don't move slut, if you move he'll bite and then you'll be pissing through a stump, if you don't bleed to death first. He'd cried, cried and begged but his body did as it was bid and after the orgasm was forced from him by the stinking tongue and the juice kept pouring and the dog kept licking, he'd screamed, screamed for what felt like hours until his body began to respond again, and all the while the horrible briarstitch traced in ugly, amateur lines like thorns on the collar . . .
"No!" The force of his shout was like bursting awake from a nightmare. Kurt pulled his hands into fists and miraculously they went, and in a chain reaction the rest of his body fell heavily sideways as his muscles finally collapsed.
The room went silent as his cry drew everyone's attention to the dais. Floppy and shaking, Kurt shoved himself backward, away from approaching servants and the image of the dog in his head. Back through the tapestry that curtained off the duke's secret entrance alcove. It fell heavily behind him, cutting off his view of the high table and leaving him in near-darkness, still pressed to the floor.
But alone. Thank the gods. His breath dragged in and out of his body in shuddering rasps that hurt his lungs and his heart was racing again, but at least he was mobile. He pushed himself up to sit, leaning heavily against the wall of the alcove, and tried to slow his panicked breaths. He counted,inhale, one, two three, exhale . . . until the air was moving quietly, if not exactly slowly, quiet enough that he could feel reasonably sure none of the servants cleaning the hall would hear him and realize he hadn't gone straight out the door at the far end of the alcove.
He needed to make his way back to the duke's apartments eventually. Loitering here was a risk, especially after the amount of time he'd spent wrestling with his body on the dais, but it was a risk Kurt had to take. Going back in this state was out of the question. He needed to find his equilibrium; get the mask of the slut firmly back in place. And as long as Gavin really was meeting with his steward all afternoon, no one would know that he'd lingered.
Besides, his dick was still hard, of course. Abject terror was never enough to make him lose his erection. On the contrary, fear only ever seemed to make him harder, as if the more intense things got, the more his cock struggled to appease its tormentors through perfect obedience. It was one of the many things all those beatings had trained him for. Here in the alcove the wood parquet of the dais gave way to bare, cold stone and Kurt spread his legs in front of him as wide as the small space would allow, rolling forward to give his balls more contact with the icy surface. It hurt, enough to make him wince and stifle a groan, but the tears that sprang to his eyes were from humiliation, not pain. Unacceptable, he told himself firmly, blinking them back. Kurt Hummel did what he had to do. Kurt Hummel didn't cry, not anymore, not unless they forced him to. And there was no shame in surviving. He focused on the pain. The pain was familiar. His balls always hurt. He'd grown as used to the deep ache as he had to the sexual need that had taken up permanent residence in the pit of his stomach.
Need. Not desire. Never desire. Gavin could force him to feel things – to need things – but no one could make him want them. He hated the times that the duke made him come only slightly less than he hated punishments. Because no matter how hard a grip he tried to keep on himself, there was always a moment, that split-second point of no return, when Kurt knew he was finally going to be allowed to fall over the edge of inevitability, that he wanted it. He craved it. He would do anything to be allowed to have it. A tiny fraction of time when, mixed with the intense, overwhelming pleasure, he was automatically and instinctively grateful. A moment, fleeting, but there, when he belonged to Gavin, body and soul. In that moment of orgasm, he truly was the duke's slut.
Kurt held his breath and pushed down even harder against the floor, letting the pain wash his thoughts away as the chill from the stones finally began to seep past the heat of his flesh. Mercifully, the pressure in his cock started to loosen and he let out his breath in relief. It was bad enough having to walk around the castle naked. Waddling along with his stiff cock bouncing in front of him was too ridiculous to be borne.
His hands were still clenched into fists, and he forced them to relax as well, until his fingers lay flat against the stone floor. A fist was rebellion and rebellion was always swiftly punished. Kurt had never realized, until he'd been taken, how much frustration he'd vented all his life through clenched fists, carefully hidden in pockets or the folds of a tunic. Of course there were no pockets or folds now, not for him, and he had to be constantly aware of his hands, more even than his face. When he put on the mask of blank indifference it tended to stay in place. But his hands were always ready to betray him.
With breathing, cock and hands under control, Kurt closed his eyes and reached inside himself to find the core of stillness, the focal point of the part he had to play. The clink and clank of dishes being stacked on the other side of the tapestry helped him. Like the kitchen wenches, he was just part of the machinery of the castle. He had a job to do and he was ready to do it. He reached for the handle of the door and started to pull himself to his feet.
"Psst!"
Kurt's heart slammed into his throat and he froze in a half-crouch. Being caught was the last thing he needed. He turned slowly, like a man facing execution, to look behind him.
No one was there.
"Psst! Mary!"
The voice was coming from the other side of the tapestry, in the hall. Kurt sagged back against the wall in relief, then glared down at his penis, which of course had gone rigid again from the sudden scare. He would have beat his head against the wall if he wasn't afraid of being heard. Was one iota of control to much to ask?
"What do you want girl?" a second voice, full of exasperation, whispered back. "There's work to be done."
Kurt slid silently down the wall to sit back on the floor. He had to wait for his erection again, but that wasn't the only reason he didn't slip out the door. Eavesdropping on servants was something he rarely had a chance to do, and information of any kind was worth the risk of discovery. His father had used to say that knowledge was power, but Kurt had learned that, at least for him now, knowledge was often safety.
"Who was that man?" the first voice murmured with breathless curiosity. "The handsome on who was lurking in the doorway while that lady played with the slut?"
The second woman, Mary, laughed. Kurt recognized the derisive tone immediately. There were several Marys among the castle staff, but this was Mary the kitchen-keeper, who managed the serving staff with an iron fist and who never made any attempt to hide her distaste for Kurt, or for anything else. Nasty as she was, though, Kurt was thrilled to hear her voice. She was someone who was actually in a position to know things.
"Oh, that one," Mary said, her voice dripping with her usual disdain. "That was Mister Sebastian Smythe."
"Who?" the girl asked, echoing Kurt's thought exactly.
"He's the under-steward at His Grace's estate at Greenway, in the north."
"Greenway? What's he doing down here then?"
"Not that it's your business, but he comes twice a year to bring the estate accounts for His Grace to review. Now if it pleases you milady," Mary said, deceptively sweet, "would you care to do the job His Grace pays you for?"
"He's so beautiful," the first maid said, a dreamy lilt in her voice and apparently no intention of obeying. The steward from Greenway must be beautiful indeed if just the thought of him was worth her risking the wrath of kitchen-keeper Mary.
There was silence for a moment, then, surprisingly, another huffing laugh from Mary. "I see how it is. Well take my advice girl. Don't go setting your cap for that one. He's not for you."
"An under-steward isn't too high for a kitchen maid to reach," the girl protested.
"That particular under-steward is out of the reach of any maid, kitchen or otherwise."
The girl groaned. "He's married?"
"No." Mary drew out the word, teasingly, and Kurt could hear the relish in her voice. She was starting to enjoy having a bit of juicy gossip to share.
"Well if he's not married then I don't see why I shouldn't have a go at him."
There was shuffling on the other side of the tapestry, as if Mary was pulling her listener deeper into a private corner, and when she spoke again her voice was so quiet that, close as they were, Kurt had to strain to hear it. "That one will never be married." She paused dramatically, then finally, "He doesn't like women."
If the serving girl was half as stunned as Kurt was by the revelation, Mary must be very pleased with herself indeed. If Mary meant what he thought she did . . . Kurt had never in his whole life heard anyone even reference the idea out loud, much less attribute it to a specific person. Nothing in the world could have made him move now. He held his breath, desperate not to miss a word, and willed the girl to keep asking questions.
"What do you mean he doesn't like women?" she obliged, loud enough that Mary hissed a warning.
"He prefers men," Mary whispered, somehow managing to make the words sound titillating and disgusting at the same time.
Kurt inched silently closer to the tapestry that separated them. How in the world could she know such a thing? Was it just a rumor? Spiteful speculation borne of dislike?
"Prefers them for what?"
Silence, then Mary must have found some non-verbal way to communicate her meaning because the maid gasped out loud and Mary had to shush her again.
"You mean to lie with?!" she finally said, in a tiny, shocked voice.
Kurt's heart was racing and his hands had clenched into fists again. He didn't even bother trying to loosen them. It would have been unthinkable, back in Pluna, to even speak about such things. But to attribute them to the duke's own steward? How did she dare? And what if it were true? Kurt knew he wasn't the only one, he couldn't be, but to be open enough about it that you inspired servants' gossip – who would take such a risk?
"That doesn't make any sense." The girl seemed to still be struggling with the whole idea. "Two men together like . . . like a man and a woman? It's not possible."
"By the Render, girl, what do you think His Grace does with the slut?"
"I'm not stupid," the girl protested. "I know the slut sucks His Grace's cock. But anyone can suck a cock. And it's not like he wants to do it, is it? And didn't His Grace just say one mouth is as good as another?"
"Take my word for it girl. Men can lie with men. It's a perversion and an insult to the Maker and I wouldn't dirty myself by explaining the details of it to you, and if we weren't all living under corrupt western rule it'd certainly be illegal. That Sebastian is as deviant as they come. But don't let that stop you from waving your tits in his face and finding out for yourself. After these tables are cleared."
Mary must have started to walk away because when the girl spoke again it was louder, as if calling her back. "I don't believe it!" she protested, pout heavy in her voice. "And I think it's very wrong of you to spread rumors like that about respectable men. What would His Grace say if he knew?"
There was movement then, the serving girl yelped, and jerked as if she'd been pulled, almost knocking into Kurt, who was standing so close to the tapestry that her movement made it brush against his skin. For a moment the only sound was heavy breathing from both women, and when Mary spoke again her voice was tight and harsh. "That rumor was started by Sebastian himself," she said, "the last time he was here. When another stupid wench decided to take a run at him. He came right out and told her, bold as brass. Said the only way he'd be interested in her was if she was hiding a cock under her skirts. So unless you've got a cock under your skirt . . ."
There was a rustle of fabric and another stifled yelp from the girl. Kurt suspected Mary was checking for a cock herself. He wouldn't put it past her.
"And I'm quite sure you weren't just threatening me. Because a smart girl would know that blackmail is grounds for dismissal without a letter. And that the right words in the right ears would ensure that no household in the eastern realm would ever take her on again."
"No, no I didn't mean to . . ." The girl's voice was soft and contrite. "I just – it's hard to believe anyone would come out and tell people something like that. It's so wrong, like you said. Evil."
Kurt was inclined to agree with her. Not about the evil part, of course, but the idea that someone would just announce what to him was the greatest secret he'd ever had – what kind of person would do that? What kind of person could?
"Yes, well, that Sebastian has always had conceit to spare," Mary answered. "Above his station, if you ask me. And apparently they're more liberal about such things in the north, just like the west. They even have a name for it. Reversed." The way she spat the word left no doubt as to what Mary thought about the liberality of foreign people and their names for things. "Like it's nothing at all. Just another way to be. And since Mister Smythe is so determinedly reversed, I suggest you forget about spreading your legs for under-stewards and turn your attention to your job. While it still is your job."
"Reversed," the maid repeated, drawing out the word, her distaste obvious. Then the tapestry fluttered again and the sound of dishes being stacked resumed.
Kurt pushed himself up the wall on shaking legs. He wrapped his hand around the knob of the hidden door, desperate for something to anchor him. His breath stuttered in and out of his chest.
"Reversed," he whispered, daringly, but he had to say it out loud. It had a name. And somewhere there was a place where people had given it a name. A nice name, not "perverted" or "deviant" or any of a dozen other ugly words that had been flung at him on a regular basis back in Pluna. Just a simple opposite. Other. Reversed.
And even more, right here in the castle, meeting with the duke at this moment, was someone who embraced that name, and that part of himself, who wasn't afraid to announce it to anyone who asked. Kurt couldn't understand how such a person could exist. He'd never imagined, not even in his most cherished dreams of freedom in Concordia City, being able to openly express that part of himself.
And he wouldn't, he told himself firmly, because he was trapped here, the duke's slut. He couldn't, he mustn't forget that for a moment. Nothing had changed for him. It didn't matter what happened in the north or the west because he would never see those places. What he would see was that damn dog and his briar-stitched collar if he didn't get his head back together and pay attention to the things that his life and sanity depended on. The façade was the only thing that kept him safe. Distracted, he would make mistakes. And mistakes would lead to punishment. He took a breath, straightened his shoulders, arranged his features into the slut's mask and turned the doorknob. The only important thing about the whole conversation was that it had taken his mind of his fear long enough to give his dick time to fall limp again. He could only hope his brain would soon follow its example.
But as he slipped into the mercifully deserted corridor, he couldn't help imagining a beautiful man asking an incredulous serving wench if she had a cock under her skirt. And he couldn't quite manage to squash the warm, golden glow the thought ignited in his chest.
