Chapter 19 - Bedroom of Filth

The following morning dawned bright and cold, and the castle’s residents chattered away inquisitively, their breath steaming in the draughty Grand Hall.

Will glanced around him at the motley crew of females and old men that were the decimated remains of the household. It was unusual to be summoned like this, especially so early in the morning. Mortimer held forth knowingly on what he expected was the cause of the meeting.

“I imagine the King and Lord Geoffrey have overcome the heathens and they want to let us know that they’re on their way home.”

Plump Humphrey shook his head. “Old Daniel in the blacksmith’s forge reckons he heard a commotion near the dungeons late last night. Whatever it is, I don’t think it’s good news…”

A hush fell over the assembled throng as the large doors creaked open, and Ulfgar and Odin took up threatening positions either side of the entrance.

“Kneel, peasants!” rumbled the shaven-headed ogre.

“Kneel before your illustrious prince,” added the bearded brute.

Along with all the other servants, Will did as he was bidden, but he sneaked a sideways glance to see the slim figure of Prince Felix sweep into the Hall. He was dressed in a jewel encrusted robe that fastened at his throat with a vast emerald. The gown split from the waist to reveal bright green tights that showed off the contours of his muscular thighs and beautiful backside. A black, feathered cap perched jauntily atop his flowing blond locks. But the expression Felix wore across his chiselled features was grim and humourless.

He took his seat in the throne at the far end of the Hall, flanked by his hulking, black-clad protectors.

“Servants,” he began. “It brings me no pleasure to give you this news. But you must accept it with good grace and in the knowledge that all happens for the best. There are to be some changes at Castle de Montford. I have discovered that your master, the former Chief Steward, Alexander Courcey, is a traitor.”

A shocked gasp ran around the Hall.

“He has, for many years, been fleecing Lord Geoffrey, who due to his over-trusting nature, allowed this scoundrel to please himself. Courcey has run my godfather’s lands entirely for his own benefit and enrichment. And so now I find that Lord Geoffrey is deeply in debt and that dire actions must be taken in order to save the de Montford estates.”

His audience remained kneeling in stunned silence.

“I personally shall oversee the running of my godfather’s lands. And this will involve stringent measures. I am forced to dismiss about half of the current staff, who will need to return to whatever family or dependents they have living. The rest of you will find your life much harder than previously. Your food will be rationed and you will have to survive on mere bread and gruel. This is all I have to say to you for the moment. My devoted servants, Ulfgar and Odin, will issue my instructions to you all, and I expect them to be obeyed in all matters. Also, I order you that the name of the traitor, Alexander Courcey, no longer be spoken in this castle. Any who dare to do so will be treated as sympathetic to him and will be shown no mercy. Do I make myself clear?”

Mumbled assent issued from the stunned castlefolk.

“Good. Now, go about your business. I’m sure you all have plenty to do.”

The staff began to shuffle out of the Hall.

“What’s going on?” whispered Will to his fellow pages. But the other two lads could only return his bewildered gaze.

Odin and Ulfgar swept through the castle like a tornado. The brutish thugs thought nothing of shoving or kicking anyone or anything out of their way as they fulfilled the Prince’s wish for a thorough “inventory” of everything in the place.

Everything that possessed even the meagrest of possible value was confiscated as a contribution to the vast financial deficit which Felix claimed threatened all their existences: jewellery, clothing, weapons, furniture: all were hoarded for the Prince to view at his personal leisure. And no nook or cranny of the castle was sacred.

“Open this bloody door!” bellowed Ulfgar at the unyielding timber barrier that stood before him. “Or so help me I will break it down!”

“Be off with you!” commanded a querulous voice from within. “I’m master of my own quarters and I’ll answer to no one!”

“Is that so?” grunted the Viking. And with all the force he could muster, he charged at the door.

Nothing could have resisted that onslaught, and with a splintering crack, the door gave way and shattered into the room beyond it. The bewhiskered giant gagged almost instantly as he was assailed by a powerful and incredibly vile smell. Covering his mouth and nose with his sleeve, he ventured a look into the room.

A shrivelled, little old man sat in the centre of a bed. The sheets were filthy and stained with unidentifiable blotches. The room was littered with fragments of clothing, bits of food, plates, along with a whole host of bizarre and Byzantine objects, the likes of which Ulfgar had never before seen. Some looked like weapons or instruments of torture, with peculiar protuberances, spikes or balls emerging from them. Most were made of iron or steel, although some had leather straps or wooden handles attached to them. In addition, a couple of evil-looking whips and cat o’nine tails lay discarded in the corner.

Along one wall of the tapestry-covered room hung manacles, chains and other restraining devices: ratchets and cogs, tables and platforms that could be adjusted by means of a kind of control panel which lay at the old man’s side.

Suddenly, Ulfgar started at a movement beneath the sheets. Thinking it to be a rat, attracted by the room’s stinking detritus, he raised his dagger to pierce the creature.

“No, you fool!” shrieked the old man. “This one’s got spirit. He has months left in him yet!”

And with that, he pulled back the bedclothes to reveal a young man of about twenty or so, with dark, curly hair. The youth was lying on his front, his hands shackled behind his back and his legs securely bound at the knees and the ankles. He was bare-chested, and his back was criss-crossed with red, angry looking weals. His lower half was naked save for some coarse grey fabric which had been wrapped tightly and fastened around his nether regions to make a kind of loincloth. The nappy was stained, soiled, and stinking, and Ulfgar grimaced in disgust at the realisation that it did not appear to have been emptied of its contents for some time. The nappy and the sheets the slave lay in were spotted with brown and grey greasy marks, as was everything that resided in the hellish bedchamber.

The youth was squirming slightly in his bondage, but unable to move very much due to the fact that on his head was what appeared to be a kind of leather harness. The harness fastened round the back of his skull and then attached to a leather undergarment worn by the old man. Although Ulfgar could not see clearly, the laboured way in which the young man was breathing made him sure that the youth’s head was buried deep in the old man’s crotch, and upon hearing a gagging, wretching sound, he realised that the old man’s penis was clearly lodged deep in the young man’s throat.

It was not a pleasant sight.

“Get out of here, you oaf!” cried the withered old man. “If you have food, leave it outside the door as usual. Don’t you know I have given strict orders not to be disturbed?”

“I only follow Prince Felix’s orders,” grunted the giant. “I’m to report back to him.”

“Well report this: I’m to be left alone with my boy, you understand?” The old man chuckled to himself. “Now, slave – my arse wants some attention. Let’s have you service that for a while…”

He unbuckled his slave from the contraption at his crotch. The dark haired boy slithered backwards down the grimy sheets, coughing and spluttering as the old man withdrew his withered cock from the slave’s swollen lips. Ulfgar caught a glimpse of the boy’s dark eyes – haunted yet still defiant – as he struggled on his stomach to take up his new position at the old man’s anus. Ulfgar’s lip curled in disgust as the old man gleefully clipped the boy’s face harness to the back of his leather undergarment.

The Viking backed out of the room.

“And send someone to fix my damned door!”

Meanwhile, in the near-deserted dormitory, the three remaining page boys huddled together confidentially.

“What do you think Alexander did?” asked Mortimer.

“I don’t know and I don’t care,” replied Humphrey. “And if you’re wise, you’ll do what the Prince told you and forget he ever existed.”

“I think it’s an excuse for the Prince to take over running the castle and to do whatever he likes,” ventured Will.

Mortimer appraised his blond room-mate with an amused grin. “I might have known you’d stick up for Alexander. He must have quite a cock. Every lad who gets fucked by him ends up as his willing pet.”

“No, I” – Will began to protest.

“I’m more worried about what’s going to happen now,” said Humphrey. “I just hope I have a roof over my head tonight.”

Will said nothing. He looked down and ran his hand along the silken sheen of his blue hose. He offered up a silent prayer that the new regime would not mean that he would be returned to his previous home: the stinking hovel in his meagre little village.

Prince Felix fondled the treasures that had been deposited in front of him in the Great Hall. The latest chest to be emptied was from the workshop of Master Yorick and contained a vast array of male hosiery – of every colour, fabric and design imaginable.

“The old man said what?” he cried, incredulous at what he had just been told.

Ulfgar repeated Sir Wilfrid’s vituperative command.

The Prince’s eyes narrowed in contemplation. “Go back to his stinking den. Take his toilet slave from him, and have the boy cleaned up and delivered to Mistress Olwen in the kitchen. In these straitened times, I cannot allow the luxury of a servant waiting on only one person. Then tell the uncouth old fool that he has twenty four hours to gather whatever belongings he can carry and be gone from here.”

Ulfgar looked at Prince Felix with some apprehension.

“You can take that look off your face, man,” snapped the Prince. “I will not be mocked by anyone. What care I that the old fool is the uncle of my godfather? He must learn his place. And by God, learn it he will. Or are you telling me you fear a scrawny old pervert like him?”

“Your wish is my command, your highness. It will be done.”

“Good.”

Ulfgar’s long strides soon carried him from the Hall to see to his unwelcome task.

Prince Felix shook his head. “I had no idea that my uncle had allowed those around him to sink into such sexual depravity. Father will be most displeased when he returns.”

He smiled his cat-like grin and stretched his muscular, green-hosed legs out in front of him, admiring their shape and beauty.

Suddenly he sighed theatrically. “Oh, God, Odin. I’m still so bored! How are we to amuse ourselves in this backwater?”

The Prince’s other bodyguard had his head buried in one of the leather-bound books that had been removed from Alexander’s chambers. He looked up with a golden-toothed grin. “I think I may have found a way for us to have some sport, your highness.”

Felix’s beautiful face lit up with anticipation. “Tell me more.”

“The traitor’s books are undoubtedly illicit but they do have some interesting ideas.” The shaven-headed brute knelt down to examine the pile of tights that had been dumped in front of the Prince. He selected a scrap of bright pink material. “And these costumes will prove very useful, I think…”

Sir Wilfrid’s howls of rage echoed around the castle as he was robbed of his male plaything. Had he been able to walk, he would surely have confronted the imperious young Prince. As it was, all he could do was scream impotently from his detritus-strewn pit.

Will went about out his usual duties, painfully aware that various servants were being issued with the unwelcome information that their service at the castle was to be terminated and they would soon have to make their own way in the cold, cruel world beyond.

He was in the middle of fetching some firewood from the logpile into the kitchen, when a commotion at the door made him turn. Olwen the Cook also looked up to see who had entered. A little nervously, she curtseyed as the towering form of Ulfgar strode into her domain.

The giant was carrying a bundle which he was attempting to hold as far away from him as possible. When he reached the centre of the room, he dropped the dirty grey blanket on the floor.

“See to this,” he snarled at the Cook. “Clean it up and then send it to the Great Hall along with the other three page boys. And do it quick. His highness doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

Having abandoned his malodorous burden, Ulfgar was in no hurry to linger.

“What on earth can it be?” enquired Mistress Olwen, wrinkling her nose, and covering her face with a sprig of lavender as she approached the blanket. She peeled back its layers and peered inside.

Will crept up behind her to sneak a look. Inside lay the near naked form of Raymond, his erstwhile nemesis. His face looked grey and gaunt, and his curly dark locks hung damp and limp against his cheeks. His bruised, thin body was naked aside from a full and dirty nappy. Raymond looked Will straight in the eye with an expression of utter loathing. Will’s heart sank. He knew that, whilst things had been bad before, this would only make his relationship with Raymond worse than ever. Raymond would never forgive him for having seen him in this ultimately degraded and humiliated state.

Mistress Olwen had sent Will to fetch a bath and some water, and then shooed him out of the kitchen as she set about cleaning up the broken youth. A mere half hour later, Will found himself anxiously standing outside the Great Hall along with his three fellow pages. Mortimer, Humphrey and he himself wore their usual pageboy livery: orange, green and blue respectively: tunic, tights and pumps.

When it came to Raymond, Olwen had had to improvise. After all, Master Yorick’s vast clothing store had been confiscated by the Prince’s looting session. For this reason, the recently liberated toilet slave was barefoot and dressed in a hessian sack. The sack had been hastily emptied of its contents (muddy potatoes), and holes cut in it for Raymond’s head and arms. The crude smock reached just below his hips and scarcely covered his peeking genitalia, whilst at the back, the hem skimmed his red and sore-looking bottom.

It was plain to see that his time spent in the company of the insatiable Sir Wilfrid had not dimmed Raymond’s spirit. And as the four youths stood in silence, patiently awaiting their fates, Raymond turned a look of utter loathing upon young Will, that made the latter take an involuntarily step backwards.

The doors opened and Ulfgar ushered the four page boys into the Grand Hall.

“Approach the royal throne!” bellowed Odin from the far end of the room.

Tentatively, the youths did so. Will was struck anew by the beauty of the heir to the kingdom: the pale, flawless skin; the perfectly chiselled bone structure; the lithe and muscular body. Helpless, his jaw dropped and he gawped at this vision of beauty before him.

The Prince calmly surveyed the nervous young men, and raised an amused eyebrow at Raymond’s scratchy, uncomfortable, and frankly indecent, garment.

“You are most fortunate, my subjects,” declared Prince Felix. “Your services have been deemed necessary here at Castle de Montford, and, provided you fulfil your duties satisfactorily, you will continue to be given employment and a roof over your heads.”

Will noticed that Humphrey, standing on his right, nearly fell to his knees with relief.

“However, I have been disappointed,” he went on, “with the paucity of entertainment in these parts. And so I am grateful to my loyal and faithful servant, Odin, who has devised a new kind of sport for me. Odin – bring forward the new uniforms for our little page boys…”

The shaven-headed Odin stepped forward, carrying a bundle of pink clothing. Purposefully, he walked along the line of anxious page boys, and deposited one bundle of pink in front of each of them.

“These costumes will better befit your new station in life.”

Humphrey shot Will an apprehensive glance.

“Well, what are you waiting for? It is time for you to get dressed. Strip, boys! Strip!”