We finally arrived in Amsterdam and parked the car somewhere far away from the city centre. I was horny beyond belief by now, after edging for so long. My butt was in a wet spot and the whole car reeked of sex. Just before we got out of the car, rain started pouring down. Welcome to the Netherlands. Dutch weather. In some other places, people might pause and take a closer look to make sure of what if they see is real? Not in Amsterdam. A bald woman in her sixties dressed in a black leather miniskirt with white thin legs poking out, and a black leather jacket over a sheer black top with her nipples clearly visible poking out. People didn’t seem to notice. We only had one small umbrella in the car. It was obvious to the both of us who were going to use that. It rained, but it still was a pleasant temperature outside. I was holding the umbrella for my mistress as the rain slowly washed away some of my juices down my legs.
The city centre was busy as always, its atmosphere vibrant with the chatter of tourists and locals alike. The rain made the wet cobblestone streets gleam faintly. A delicious wave of stroopwafel sweetness, robust coffee fragrance, and the subtle, damp musk of the canal water filled the air. We had no trouble finding the tattoo shop.
We walked arm in arm, my arm locked in hers. From the opposite direction, a group of five boys loiters near the tattoo parlour. They range in age from 12 to 16, dressed in an eclectic mix of oversized hoodies, ripped jeans, and sneakers, clearly trying to appear older and tougher than they are. The boys are loud and cocky, taking turns daring each other to go inside and ask for a tattoo. We paused nearby, catching sight of the scene. Jutta quirks an eyebrow, a bit frightened by the boys’ posturing. Having dealt with boys that age, I laughed softly, muttering under my breath, “Well, this should be interesting.” I pulled on Jutta’s arm and walked towards our goal.
As we approached, one of the boys, the apparent ringleader — tall, with a mop of messy hair — decides to put on a show. “Hey, lady!” he calls, his voice dripping with faux bravado. “What do you think? If you’re thinking about putting needles in yourself, I have just the needle for you! Me and the boys would have no problems to mark you a bit before you get home. His eyes were on Jutta, who was wearing a traditional Bavarian dirndl dress. We can even turn an old dyke like you into a cocksucking love machine, don’t we, boys?”
I felt Jutta trembling, totally freaked out. I looked at the guy in charge.
“Boys, I breathed. We are here to get a tattoo. A big one. But you have to be brave to get a tattoo. It hurts. In places that are so tiny and sensitive that are not made for ink. Like your tiny dick.” The old teacher in me was coming out. My tone half-maternal, half-playful. “Boys, a tattoo is a commitment. Start with something smaller. Like finishing your homework.”
Without another glance at the punks, I kind of pushed Jutta into the tattoo-shop, hearing the howling of cat calls outside the shop. The air rushed into Jutta’s lungs. I could feel her body relax.
“Did they bother you, ladies?” A bulky guy asked. His body seemed like an enormous billboard for the company he worked for.
“Nah, just boys, being boys”, I said. He looked at me and walked to the front door. His appearance was enough for the brave guys to find some other entertainment in town.
“What can I do for you ladies?” he asked politely as he returned behind the counter.
“We have an appointment with Alexandra”. Jutta piped up. He looked at his computer. “Ah yes, the ladies from Germany. Follow me, please.”
Like all these canal houses, they seem small from the outside, but they are deep and spacious inside. On the way, Jutta told me that under no circumstance was I to say a word and that she would do the talking. A room on the second floor announced the artist’s name on the door in a curly, highly decorated script. The room was light and bright, with a clean window on one side and crisp white walls. Only a few photos of presumably her work were on the walls. The artist herself was young, somewhere in her thirties, I guess. One of her arms was covered in ink, while the other was as virgin as ours. She had a friendly smile and that put us at ease. Somewhat anyway.
“What can I do for you ladies today?” she asked.
“We both would like to get a tattoo”, Jutta stated the obvious. I could feel she was still very tense. I caressed the upper leg of my mistress to calm her down.
Jutta retrieved some papers from her bag. “We both would like this one on the inside of our thigh, and I want this one covering her entire back. Can you do that for us?” Jutta asked, getting increasingly red from her chest to the roots of her hair.
“The kef-symbols are easy. I have done a couple of those.” Alexandra said imperturbable. Leaving no doubt she was familiar with the slave branding from Norman’s GOR books.
“Can you make it look like a branding?” Jutta asked bravely.
Alexandra laughed. “Of course. From a distance, it will look like a brand. But … You want both the slave sign?”
Jutta nodded. “Yes, we do.” Alexandra, confused because I had kept my gaze on the floor most of the time, as Jutta did the talking.
“Oh, Ok. So what is the next one? It looks vaguely like A briar rose?” Alexandra said.
“Not far from it. It’s a variation of that rose. There a trilogy comprises trilogies that describe the life of Phèdre nó Dunaley…”
“Ah, Kushiels Dart, right?”
“You know it?” Jutta asked, surprised.
“I know of it. The woman that earned her mark with performing sado-masochistic stuff with strangers and each time she slept with someone, she earned something and she used that to pay off her artist, right?”
“More or less. It’s a bit more complicated and refined, but that’s the gest of it.”
“Works for me. And you want it on your back?” she asked me.
Jutta answered. “Yes, she does.”
“Ooooo No. No way. I will not put a tat on someone’s back without their explicit permission.” Alexandra firmly said.
Without a word, Jutta grabbed a blank sheet of paper from her bag and a fountain pen. Koen’s fountain pen, by the looks of it. She handed me the paper without instructions. I understood what I needed to do without stupid instructions, thank you. On a flat surface I wrote in my clearest handwriting: ‘I hereby give my express and freely given consent to have a tattoo done on my entire back by Alexandra from Tatooing.’ I handed it over to Alexandra.
She looked at it and sighed. “Weird”, she murmured under her breath. “Listen. Two things about that last tattoo. Yes, I can do it, but it’s a lot of work. I mean. A lot of work. There is no way we can do this now. It’s almost four in the afternoon and a tat like that will take two, perhaps three, days. The second thing you have to know it that’s very expensive. We have to think about something between…” She cited two large sums.
“Money is not the problem.” Jutta foolishly said.
“If you want, we will do the big one tomorrow. Or you can make an appointment for another time.”
Jutta said “We want. We will find a hotel somewhere around here.”
“Good,” said Alexandra. “So we begin with the kef. Who wants to go first?”
“I will.” My mistress said.
“Perhaps you would be so kind to go downstairs to our living room, have a cup of coffee or something. I prefer to be alone with the client when I am working on her body. Down the stairs, second door on the right. It will take half an hour, 45 minutes at the most.”
Like the obedient girl I was, I walked downstairs. If one would expect, the waiting room in a tattoo parlour in the heart of Amsterdam would smell like a weed plantation you are in for disappointment. This store had a zero-tolerance policy for being intoxicated by drugs or alcohol. Only two people were in the room. A bulky guy in his forties, his skin wallpapered with tattoos. And a young girl that seemed much too young to work here. 14,15 perhaps? She was serving coffee and came to sit with me.
“Are you nervous? Don’t worry, Alexandra is one of our best artists we have. The guys are all good, but a woman is different, you know? When I get my first tat, I want Alexandra to be the one that is making it. What kind of cancer do you have?” she rattled on with a mix of rude teenage behaviour and Dutch directness.
“It’s not cancer, fortunately. It’s my master that shaved me bold. I used to have pretty hair like you.”
“Ohhh my Gooooddd,” she said loudly, acting more like her age. “So you are into this kinky shit, right? We got a lot of those here.” Suddenly, she stood as if I stung her like a bee. “Wait here, don’t go away.”
“There is a reason for calling this a waiting room”, I said deadpan. Within minutes she came back holding a tank top with in front of her. In elegant letters it read: Permanent Ink, Temporary Pain, Eternal Cool and in small print, the name of the shop under it.
“Take off that wet shirt and put this one on.” She ordered.
If I had taken part in a wet T-shirt competition, the shirt could have not been more wet. I was still dripping a bit. As if it was the most normal thing in the world, the kid kneeled in front of me and rubbed with a towel my legs dry. Very businesslike, just rubbing them dry and warm. I had not realised I was that cold. Stupid, if I had looked down I would have seen my nipples making holes in my wet shirt.
“We can’t have you catching a cold”, she smiled. No braces. Not that young. “Put on this one, and you can rub yourself dry with this towel.” She giggled. “Sorry we don’t stock Tanks with Permanent Pain on them, but this will do.” Abruptly, she turned round and talked to the burly guy standing between us and thus effectively blocking his view. She might have been fourteen, but I think she’ll turn forty next year. After I changed into dry clothes, I felt a lot better. One of the tattooists came and took the guy with him, probably wondering if there was a spot on his body left that was big enough for him to work with. With my servant girl gone to the back, I was alone with my thoughts.
Although I had no tattoos, not even a small one like so many women have these days, this was not the first time I had been in a place like this. I vividly remembered going to one in Germany. Helga asked me to come with her for moral support. Master Martin was going to have her labia pierced ‘to lock her cunt up’. In Dutch labia are called lips of shame. Stupid name. There is nothing shameful about my nether lips. We ended up in a tattoo shop, way smaller than this place. The guy that owned the place didn’t look nice at all. He had greasy, unkempt hair, darting eyes that never seemed to blink, and a crooked, unsettling grin that lingered just a moment too long. I remember Helga, who felt the same vibe, holding my hand and insisting I would stay with her. We heard the men discussing how many piercings and the number of holes were needed to effectively lock her up.
Together, Helga and I, followed the guys to the back. It looked more like a BDSM-playroom than a tattoo shop. A rack full of whips, ball gags and the like on the left. On the right, a St. Andrews cross with the cuffs already attached. In the middle was a gynaecological chair. Master Martin lifted Helga up and put her in the chair. With their faces so close their noses touched, he kept talking to her for a few minutes. They sealed their bond with kisses. Helga tried to outdo Master Martin, as if they were in a contest who could kiss the most passionate. I think Helga won on points. Master Martin stripped her of her panties and secured her feet in the stirrups. He ordered me to rub Helga’s clit with one hand, and use the other one on my own clittie. The guys, in the meantime, were talking about several ways to secure the locks. Four symmetric holes in each cunt lip would be ideal, was the unanimous decision. One big padlock vertical or two small ones horizontal. Four tiny ones. A chain through all the rings. As their imagination gone wild, Helga was in a dream world of her own. The guy had to wipe the moisture from her before he pierced her quickly, efficiently, and professionally. He put four big rings on both sides of her labia.
“Does it hurt?” I asked her.
“It hurts so good”, Helga moaned, clearly still horny. She looked so sexy, so submissive. To be denied access to your own vagina. To feel the weight of the locks obstructing her love cave. When the guy explained the rings could be used to make a butterfly with a few hooks to leave the clit open for punishment, I came on the spot. Consumed and ruled by lust, and only lust, I blurted: “I want that as well!” To Martin’s credit, I have to say that he tried to talk me out of it, but this … This was stuff dreams were made of. There was no way I would leave before my lips were sealed with four holes on each side.
“Are you ready?” Alexandra’s voice snapped me out of my daydream. My mistress was one step behind her.
“Have a look”, Mistress Jutta said as she lifted her dirndl skirt.
The kef is about four cm in height, and a one and a quarter centimetre in width. A rather simple, delicate, graceful, almost floral mark in cursive script. Appearing slender, more vertical, more like a stem with floral, cursive curled loops. A rather severe, straight line staff, with two upturned, frond-like curls next to it, joined where they touch the staff on its right. It bears a distant, remote resemblance to the lower case k. The most common brand site, the favourite, is high on her left thigh, under the hip, high enough to be covered by a miniskirt.
It looked like as if it was branded in her soft flesh. I wanted to touch it. It looked like the brand was burned deep in her flesh. Her white flesh around it celebrated her mark with a bit of redness around it.
“It’s a normal body reaction.”, Alexandra said reassuringly. “When it becomes angry red, that is a sign of infection and you should see a doctor. Each skin reacts differently to the ink, and it will reseed in a few days.” She turned to me. “Shall we go upstairs?”
I was shaking a bit in the chair and lifted my miniskirt. Alexandra had by now a clear view of the rings on my lips. “Is it going to hurt?” I asked her with a small voice, all my bravado gone. “I think I’m a little scared right now.”
“It going to hurt a lot less than those rings you have over there. Don’t worry about the pain, a woman like you will hardly feel it, even might enjoy it.” I doubted that. The reason my skin was virgin was for a big part because of my irrational fear of needles.
“If you are truly scared, then now is the chance to change your mind and cancel it.” Alexandra said patiently.
Suddenly I realised my mistress was brave enough to show to the world she was not only a mistress but a slave in her heart. If she could bear this, there was simply no option to back out on this. I smiled. Bravely, I hoped.
“Make me feel it.” I said.
We found a cheap, big hotel on the outskirts of Amsterdam close to where we parked our car. “Mistress, permission to speak?” I asked when we were sitting at the dinner table. The size of the restaurant was about 20 times bigger than her own in Feuerburg. High protocol demanded I could not speak before I got permission.
“Feeling better now, slut?” Jutta asked. “What happened in there?”
“I freaked out for a moment, mistress.” I kept my eyes on the menu.
“When Alexandra came rushing down to get me, that became quite clear to me, thank you. Why did you freak out all of the sudden?”
“I am afraid of needles,” I said, not louder than a whisper.
“Speak up, girl,” Jutta said out loud. A few heads turned our way. They were looking at this old broad in black leather. An outfit more suitable for a girl than an old slut.
“I am afraid of needles, OK!” I nearly shouted. The waitress came our way, to nip the scene in the bud.
“We are truly sorry. We will keep our voices down from now on,” Jutta said quickly, a warning in her tone, before the harried server could complain. She took our orders and left.
“Tell me all about it?” That didn’t sound like a question.
“Since I was young, I am terrified of needles. Our hospital has special trained nurses who are fantastic at taking blood samples. If those nurses don’t work on the day I’m giving blood, I reschedule my appointment. Lots of these nurses say: ‘ I’m good as well. You won’t feel a thing.’ I don’t trust them. There are two or three that are great, the rest is … Not good enough.”
“Why on earth did you agree to have a huge tattoo if you were that scared?”
I just looked at Jutta. She knew the answer to her question. She refused to admit that master Koen knew very well how I felt before he ordered me to have this tattoo. I put my hand over hers. “I can take a beating of my clit without being scared and even get a little orgasm from it. This is facing one of my biggest fears. I have to do it. Not for him. For me.”
On impulse I said: “What is your biggest fear, Mistress?”
Before I could apologise for asking such an impolite question, Jutta had already answered: “You.”
“I am your biggest fear? Why on earth would you be afraid of me?”
Jutta looked at the ceiling. A modern system ceiling, simple, boring and bland. She had stopped eating and so did I. Should I withdraw my question and forever guess the answer to that? Hell no. Now I want to know.
“I am scared to death that after a very intimate moment between master Koen and me, I will look for you and find you hanging somewhere, quitting on us.”
I had expected any answer, except for this one. We ate the rest of the dinner in silence. After the waitress took away our plates and we waited for dessert, I look Jutta’s hands in mine.
“In Holland, we have the same word for suicide. We added a diaeresis to ‘suïcide’ for the correct Dutch pronunciation, but the word is the same. But before we adopted the English word into our language, we used the word self-murder. And you have to know I am the most pacifistic woman in the Netherlands, and not capable of murder. Even murdering myself. I am not afraid of seeing you both happy. I hope you will be. You both deserve each other. You both deserve happiness.” I said.
“What about your happiness? You obviously still have feelings for him.” Jutta asked.
“It’s impossible for me not to have feelings for him,” I said, my voice rising with intensity. “But I screwed up one time too many.”
Jutta was quiet for a while. “Let’s go upstairs,” she said suddenly and rose from her chair. Lemon Meringue Pie forgotten. Instinctively, I copied her movements. Jutta signed the bill to our room, and I thought could see a certain amount of relief in the server’s eyes. Two weird customers less. Jutta gave me the keys to her car.
“Get the special bag from the car and come to our room in ten minutes,” she said and headed for the elevator. She might have swayed her hips a bit more than usual. Is there a need for me to explain what is special about this bag in her trunk? Ten minutes. Wearing a watch is against the rules for me. I don’t mind, because there are clocks everywhere and when I’m allowed to have my I-phone, like now for security reasons, I can use a 10 minute timer. I had a feeling this was going to be a rough night.
Until Jutta was ready, I remained in the hotel lobby. Both of us were wearing the Gorean slave mark now. The chasm between Jutta and me was immense, despite our shared circumstances as slaves; our temperaments, hopes, and dreams were worlds apart. Perhaps my masochism placed me in the highest caste of slavery. The idea that a man could do whatever the fuck he wanted with me is for a lot of men the ultimate form of relationship. But it’s the idea. The fantasy. Most of them, like Koen, wouldn’t know how to handle that. Me. It is not like I need to feel pain all day, just to be happy. It’s not that I come from being humiliated. I am a human being with feelings. I like a normal conversation like any other human being. Being treated with respect adds to my self-respect. It is so difficult to explain. Although we are in a 24/7 polyamory relationship, I am not the masochist with no will of her own 24 hours in a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks of the year. I am not ON all the time, but just a word or a gesture can switch my mindset from OFF to ON in a moment. It’s the best way I can explain it to you. One thing was sure. Sitting here, looking at the timer on my phone with the ‘special bag’ on my lap, switched my button quite effectively to ON.
I knocked on the door of our room, 608. No answer. I waited. I was not sure she wanted me to undress in the hotel hallway. Better to be safe than sorry. I undressed quickly and was just about to knock again when the door opened. In the distance I heard shrill childish voices. My mistress was nude as well. Her hair was still damp from the shower.
“Put the bag on the bed and stand at attention in front of the bed.” I placed the bag on her bed, the one closest to the door, opened the zipper and stood with my buttocks towards the window, my arms folded behind my back. Jutta came strutting towards me, seducing me with her hips that sway so tempting from one side to the other. She looked at me straight in the eyes and stopped so close into my private space that our nipples nearly touched. Without a word, she grabbed my neck and tilted my head a bit so she could kiss me more easily. Ever so slowly, her lips sought mine. I think she had to travel a trillion miles before her lips touched mine, before I could feel the softness of her lips. My mouth opened naturally, and I felt the tip of her tongue touch my lips and then continue exploring my mouth. It was the most tender and loving kiss I ever had, of both men and women. There was perhaps more tenderness than passion in those kisses. I suppose for ten minutes or so, we kissed. They passed quicker than those in the lobby. She moved my head in the position she liked, as my hands were still locked behind my back. Not tied down, but bound by willpower. The strongest power of all. At last, passion took over. Her tongue became more forceful and finally my tongue engaged in the battle of saliva as well. What had started as tenderness had now transformed into a sloppy kiss.
“Lick my face clean, slut.” Jutta said, panting.
I licked all of her face. Fortunately, she had already cleaned the make-up from her face. So my tongue swiped over her nose, spent some time at her eyelids. I could feel her eyes underneath and imagined them darting quickly from left to right, up and down. I licked her ears, making her giggle when the point of my tongue was trying to touch her inner ear. A slap on my face was enough to retreat to her chin and finally returning to her lips. She kept them closed, and I kept on licking the thin line of her lips over and over again. Continuously. Time and time again, my lips made figures around her closed lips until she pushed me away. Finally. For the first time, I noticed she had her arms folded behind her back as well.
Two women, one old, one not so old, stood there panting in that room, facing each other, both in the nude. Both their arms locked away for further use. I looked at her face, glowing a bit in the night’s light lights beside the bed. It was at that moment. That second I knew. I had fallen in love with this woman. She had already said today she loved me. I did not know if that was true or not. I could only be sure of my own emotions. And I loved her suddenly with an intensity that scared the living daylights out of me. She took a step back and rummaged around in the bag.
Do you have any idea what clover clamps are? Lucky you if you don’t. Clover clamps or butterfly clamps are among the most painful nipple clamps. Some nipple clamps look painful, but that pain is only palpable when you put them on and off again. Our clover clamps, with the compliments of Kink Paradise, were of the best quality and could get quite tight. The tension increases even more when Jutta pulls the chain that connects them. I had to bite my lip from screaming. My nipples were already hard from the kiss and the textured rubber pads on the tips of the clamps helped them to stay on better. Even when she was pulling the chain. To my surprise, she attached the second clamp on her own breast. Dominants never go for one nipple, they love symmetry. So the second set of clamps crushed my other nipple and five seconds later, her pretty nipple as well.
“Take a step back until the chains between us are taut. Good girl. I have a box here of 50 sterile injection needles. These are really thin, 0,70 mm and 3 cm long. In turn I will insert a needle in your chest and you put one in mine. When each of us has 25 needles in our tits, we can take these bloody clamps off, so I suggest we do this quickly and painlessly. I will go first.”
Without saying another word, she tore open the package of a pack of 10 and took a needle from its protective plastic casing. Without ceremony, she plunged the needle deep into my right breast in one go, an inch above the nipple. The protective sleeve fell to the floor, and she gave the next one. I took the needle by the plastic cap on the end of the long needle that didn’t look all that thin up close. The cap’s purpose was syringe attachment, not for me to hold. She quickly folded her arms behind her back, making her breasts a better target. My hands were shaking. I couldn’t do it.
“Mistress, I can’t. Please put them all in me, because I simply cannot do this.” I pleaded.
“You can, and you will,” Jutta said grimly. With one hand, the other remained on her butt, she aimed the point of the needle in the middle of her breast. She placed my finger on top of the black plastic cap. She pushed my finger down so the needle sunk into her breast until only the cap was visible. I had rammed that long needle into my Mistress tit!
“That was not so hard, now was it?” Jutta smiled. A thing you would say to your child after you had put a band-aid on it. She almost gave it a kiss. I put my hands behind my back and Jutta jabbed another needle into my tit. For the second one, I didn’t need her hand to push the needle into her breast. I pushed it in halfway, like she had done with me.
Jutta was very businesslike in putting all those needles in. At the speed she was doing this, she didn’t give me a chance to think properly. One after the other disappeared into my tiny titties. It didn’t hurt as much as I feared.
“Don’t forget the other one, slut,” Jutta said. I had been putting most of them into her left breast and only one in the right one. My brain had simply stopped working. Emotion overload. My titties looked like a porcupine. One with black spikes against white skin. Evenly distributed. When all 25 needles had found their spot on each of us, Jutta smiled at me and said again, “That was not so bad, was it?”
It had not been bad; it had been terrible. Well, perhaps it wasn’t so bad. Perhaps. “When we take these out, I will bleed to death from 25 holes,” I wailed.
Jutta’s belly moved as she laughed hard. My poor titties felt her body shake. I had the distinct notion she was not taking my impending death seriously. “Ah well, you will have to take mine first out, so you can mop out all the blood from the floor.” Some needles caused a drop of blood, most of them came out without. Perhaps it would not be a bloodbath after all.
“Now all the needles are out, you can put off my clamps as well. Yours stay on until all your needles are in this container here.” She pointed at the small plastic container that had already a bunch of needles with specks of blood on them. I removed her clamps, and then it was my turn to laugh. Jutta was jumping up and down, running in the hotel room up and down, holding her breasts in her hands. She was making the strangest sounds to express the pain she felt in her nipples. Perhaps I do have a bigger pain tolerance.
With the sharpest pain gone and only a constant throbbing remained, she felt well enough to remove the needles from my tits. It hurt. Don’t think that everything that hurts makes a maso-girl come. When we stub our toe, there is nothing sexy to our pain. And this was only sheer agony. On the bright side, I didn’t bleed to death. And the bloody nipple clamps hurt me as well when she took them off. I didn’t make jungle sounds or Winnetou dances, but I felt it all the same. After we washed ourselves with disinfectant soap, we jumped into bed. We were so tired of all what happened today; I was asleep in minutes and I woke up spooning my mistress.
I know for a fact that my master thinks some books are better than real life. Mostly, I disagree with his book choices. For example, I think Histoire d’O is at best a mediocre book. It might have been thrilling six decades ago, but not by today’s standards. His GOR books: read one, you have read them all. I do, however, love one book. To be precise, it’s actually a trilogy of trilogies, a collection of nine books, though I still consider it one book, in essence. The book features a masochistic protagonist; however, this is not the sole focus, as a rich and engaging background is artfully woven into the narrative, making it much more than simply a stroke story. A sci-fi story, but a story nonetheless. In Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey, the protagonist has a remarkable tattoo on her back. Upon the completion of her tattoo, she will be released from her owner’s control, thus purchasing her freedom. Her tattoo is a complex design, inspired by a rose, symbolising her role as an anguissette—a person marked by Kushiel’s dart and destined to find pleasure in pain. The tattoo begins at the base of her spine and climbs upward as an intricate, curling pattern resembling thorned vines and blooming roses. Intertwining briars and roses elegantly spiral: From the small of her back to her nape. Thorns of the briars curl delicately around the stems, and the roses bloom vibrantly in this highly detailed tattoo. Over time, the tattoo grows, extending higher up her back, marking her progress toward freedom. Once the last payment is made, the marque is completed, covering her back in its entirety as a stunning, living work of art, reflecting both her servitude and liberation.
The artistry of the tattoo mirrors the rich and symbolic world of Terre d’Ange, blending beauty and sensuality. It is a complex and very long story. Nine books in total. 6,387 pages. And I have read all of them. Multiple times. Koen has read the book at least once. I loved it. He liked it. The old Koen would never ask me to get this tattoo on my back. He knew how I feared needles. But he’s not the old Koen any longer. If he wants his wife decorated like a whore, he gives Jutta the order. A servant of Naamah is indeed a very flowery title, but in plain English, she’s just a whore. An Anguisette is not just a pretty word an Anglo American cannot pronounce properly, but it’s nothing more than a pain slut. So Koen is marking me as his whore with a tattoo that will take two days to mark my back. Two days of pain. Just because he wants it.
“Don’t you whine about it, slut. You want it just as bad,” Jutta said on the way to the city centre, adequately stopping my rant about it. After I confirmed my consent to get my back covered with ink, Alexandra, the queen of the needle, went to work. I had to be naked for her to start just above my buttocks. Alexandra was nice enough to cover the most of my back with a big towel. Although she did not like it, Jutta insisted she would be there all the time Alexandra was hurting me. It was a long day and a boring one. It took me two hours to relax a bit. After eight hours, not including an hour lunch break, Alexandra called it a day. The second day was even longer. I became an expert at lying perfectly still by the time she finished.
“Did you see the results yesterday?” Alexandra said.
“No, I put bath towels over the mirrors so she couldn’t see,” Jutta said. Alexandra still was not used to the fact that Jutta would answer her questions for me.
“Do you want to see it?” Alexandra was still looking at me. Jutta gave permission to answer with a nod.
“Yes, please. I can’t wait to see it.” I said eagerly. Alexandra took me to a full-length mirror and gave me one so I could see my back. The rose stem ascended my spine from my hips, its branches reaching out to span my back. A stylised rose at shoulder level was strikingly similar to the cover art of Jacqueline Carey’s novel. The thorns, dark and sharp as needles, were so realistic I almost felt them prick in my pale skin, a stark contrast against my flesh. Their menacing points seemed to vibrate with wicked intent.
On impulse, I turned around and hugged Alexandra. “Thank you so much. You possess the qualities of a true artist; your talent and creativity are very real. I love, love, love it.” I gushed.
Alexandra smiled gently. “I’m glad you like it. I lacked the time to properly attend to every detail. If you want, we can detail the tat later some more. That’s up to you.”
Oh, I wanted that. Definitely. It was so pretty. And after two days of skin prickling, I got rid of my fears. Almost. I did not have the courage to tell this lovely lady that the decision was not up to me at all. If my master and mistress thought it was worth spending money on, I would be back. Otherwise … Well, this one is nice as well. I kept looking in the mirror to see my back from different points of view.
Alexandra was talking to Jutta now, giving her detailed instructions on how to take care of the tattoo, what to do and avoid, what medicine to take against pain, and warning signs when to visit our GP. This time she was not talking to me. She might have grasped the situation better than I’d given her credit for.
Jutta made a few photos from her phone and sent them to master Koen. He seemed pleased with the result. We took his advice and extended our stay in Amsterdam for one more night before heading back.
“No coddling you,” Jutta said as I settled into her car for the ride home. She sat next to the passenger seat of her car and tied me several times to my car seat with a huge piece of rope. I felt my marque pressed against the chair. It still was sensitive, but apparently I needed to feel my tattoo all the way home. And I did. Without complaining, as I was still proud of my marque.
I am an anguisette.
