Old Fizzy was merciful and let me off with a two-week suspension without pay. It was clear she expected me to be thankful still to have a job afterwards, and I suppose I ought to be – perhaps I have been taking things a bit too much for granted. I did my best to show appropriate contrition after getting her verdict – not that I’ve ever known Hissy Fit to go back on her word after she’s given it, but there’s no point in coming across as ungrateful.

Of course that won’t bring food to the table, so I went straight from Fizzy to my manager at Cafe Neighberry to beg for some extra shifts to tide me over, just for those few weeks. He wasn’t much for it, but I used the beggy pout and managed to get a few afternoon shifts scheduled.

That was then. Today, halfway through the first of those shifts, he came by and told me Azure Beech had returned from vacation earlier than expected, so I had to clock out at five. Strictly speaking I don’t know that the Beech lifts tail for boss stallion – but it sure would explain a whole lot.

I couldn’t really be as bitter about that as I probably should be, though. I attempted to, mostly out of respect for future me, who’s going to have a bit of a tight spot at the end of the month. But all in all, the cafe only pays slightly better than being on call for The Rescue Service and doesn’t leave you any time to write. Oh well, at least I tried. That’s all future me can reasonably demand.

“Bellchaser?”

Somepony came trotting up to me from behind right as I left the cafe. I turned around and saw it was Cressie, the dog-pony Finey and I had rescued last week, down in the Old Mews. She had been eating at one of Dripping Tip’s tables about an hour ago, I remembered. Of course I had dutifully refrained from recognizing her; client privacy is one of the axioms of the Service. Besides, I had basically cheated with her coltfriend in front of her, so I didn’t imagine striking up a conversation would be pleasant.

Yet here she was, impossible to ignore, and still waiting for me to reply.

“It is you, isn’t it? I heard the stallion tell you when you’d get off and I thought . . . Don’t you remember me?” She looked even more lost and uncertain than when we found her chained to the floor in her master’s kitchen.

“You’re Cressie, right?”

Somehow she managed to brighten up and blush all at the same time. “I’m Lavender when I’m a pony,” she said apologetically. “But, um, you can call me Cressie if you want to. I don’t mind.”

I nodded, looking around. Pokey didn’t seem to be nearby. “Er, I’m surprised to see you like this – out and about, I mean.”

“It’s Pokey’s idea. He says I have to keep my pony act practiced because I may need it if something happens to him. I’ve got a job and everything.”

“Really? What do you do?”

“Oh, just office work at the castle. I keep the court calendar posted, issue visitor passes, type out audience summonses, that kind of things.”

“Sounds interesting.”

“It’s not that bad. There are other ponies making all the decisions, so I just have to do what they say.”

We began walking. I didn’t think she had lain in wait for me just to exchange a bit of small talk about her job, but she didn’t seem to be in a hurry to get to the point. Eventually the silence got too awkward for me.

“So, um, what brings you here? Do you –”

“You never came back!” she blurted, sounding almost hurt. “Pokey said he had asked you to, but you didn’t come back.”

That wasn’t what I had expected to hear. “Sorry, I’m confused . . . did you want me to come back?”

“Is it strange? Perhaps it is. But when Pokey brings a mare with him home, sometimes she’ll think she’s supposed to be mean to me. And sometimes she’s afraid even to look at me. And some of them act like it’s some kind of competition they have to win at.”

I looked away, acutely aware how I myself fit into the third category.

“But you’re the only one who asked me how I felt. That meant a lot. Even if you’re not supposed to.”

My heart melted slightly. Damn, this filly needed a hug – but it wouldn’t be from me; I wasn’t sure how she’d take it, and I don’t really like mares, not that way. Better not give her any ideas.

“I never really got an answer, though,” I said. “How can you be okay with him doing that? I’d be – oh, hopping mad, I think.”

“Well, it’s sort of my idea,” she said, blushing again. “You see – or maybe you don’t – I don’t really do sex.”

I stared at her, remembering how she’d been pretty forward about inviting herself when I started getting intimate with Pokey that night.

“Oh, there’s all kinds of oral, that’s okay. But the real thing, with sticking something into my you-know-what, I can’t have that. Just can’t.” She shuddered. “Pokey’s the only stallion I’ve met who respects that and still wants to be together. He’s very good to me. I think he deserves to have a real mare once in a while. He likes that, you know.”

That made a certain amount of sense. “I see. I think I see.”

“Of course we’ve tried a lot of things to find a way I could do it myself. Everything from training with dildos, to him being really really slow and careful, or even getting tied up so I didn’t have a choice. All that did was I broke a perfectly good gag and then couldn’t breathe for hours.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that.” I wondered where the line between being supportive and prying was. It was her own business, to be sure, but –

She must have read my expression. “Don’t you begin too. Everypony who hears about it thinks I must have been abused as a foal or whatever, but I swear to everything that’s not it. I’m just wired that way. Please, it’s not a big deal. We make it work.”

“With some help from a ‘real mare’ now and then.”

“Oh.” Her face fell. “I hadn’t thought of how it must be from your side. I’m sorry if you feel used or something . . .”

I must have sounded angrier than I felt. “Not your fault. I knew what I was going into, more or less. Look, I’ll think about coming back, okay?”

She let her head drop. “Thanks . . .” she mumbled, not looking at me.

I had expected more enthusiasm. “Okay, what did I do wrong now?”

“It’s just me being stupid.” She kept looking at the ground in front of her. “I was so excited to find you, and I thought if I just told you how it was, you’d want to . . . and you’ve come all this way . . .”

All this way? I looked around and realized we were about to cross Reinwick Square – not anywhere near where I had any plans to be tonight, but right on the way to Pokey’s apartment. I’d just been following her without looking.

Come to think of it, I didn’t really have any plans for the night. Not the worst idea to find a nice stallion to spend it with. And if the package came with Cressie on the side, then what the heck?

I reached a hoof around her shoulders. “Actually I do have tonight free. So if you think I’d be welcome . . .?”

* * *

Cressie had warned me that she would turn back into a doggie as soon as Pokey opened the door, but it was no less spectacular to witness for that. One moment an articulate if soft-spoken young mare was leading me up the stairs, the next she was making little yips and jumping up against him (how did she do that? He wasn’t that much taller), licking his face, tail wagging wildly so I had to step back not to be hit by it.

“There you are! I was almost getting worried. You know I worry about you, don’t you? Yes I do! Now easy there.” He lifted her collar down from a hook by the door with his magic, and clasped it around her neck while he half-hugged, half-ruffled her with his hooves.

Then he noticed me behind her. “Bellchaser!” His face lit up with surprise. “What are you – I mean, that’s wonderful!”

“Um, I followed her home. Can she keep me? I mean, will you –”

“I’m sure we can work something out.” Quickly recovering his suave balance, he sent Cressie off towards the inside with a pat on the croup. “Come in, come in! Have you eaten? I’ve got a pot of beet stroganoff cooking, nothing much, but –”

“That’d be lovely.” We touched muzzles, like old friends. “I hope I’m not intruding.”

“Not at all. Please, make yourself at home.”

While Pokey finished his cooking, I sat down in the couch next to Cressie, brushing her mane with a hoof. She seemed completely at ease with the pet role, none of the undercurrent of awkward there had been on the way home. Strange girl.

Pokey served the stroganoff with a heap of fresh parsley and a nice compact red wine. He had actual candles on the table and a cello concerto playing on the stereo. Cressie got just water in a bowl, and I realized with some alarm that some of the main dish would have been for her – but she nudged me towards the table with an expression that somehow quite clearly said, don’t worry about it. So I didn’t, as best I could.

Swapping stories over dinner, I told of rescuing that mare with the suppressor ring from her own ignorance and stupidity a few days ago. “– And then when we left she insisted we take the ring with us. She refused to have it in her house!”

“Must have been traumatic,” agreed Pokey.

I remembered I still had the ring and fetched it out of my bag to show him. He held it up to the light and eyed it critically.

“Well well, this is a fancy one indeed. Looks like the lining here is silk. Mind if I try it on?”

Before I could react, he floated the ring onto his own horn and activated it, causing the line of indicator gems along the upper edge to glow faintly. He tossed his head from side to side, testing how tightly the ring clung to his horn.

“Careful, it’s not –”

Bzzzt! Of course he had to try using magic with the ring on. The punishment function kicked in and flooded his face with a cascade of small sputtering stars. Immediately he brought both forehooves up to the ring and pushed off, launching it across the room. I managed to catch it in my own field and set it down on the coffee table.

“Ba wow,” muttered Pokey breathlessly, “that’s heavy stuff.” He was rubbing his head with his forehooves, and Cressie had rushed to his side and was clutching him tightly.

“Sorry. I tried to warn you.”

“Yes yes, own damn fault . . . ouch . . . nothing you could have done.” He turned to Cressie and hugged her back. “Sssh, I’m all right, just reckless.” He looked back at me. “And you just carry it around when you go out?”

I shrugged. I had intended to give the ring to Hissy Fit, after Finey told her his story, but that ended up much more dramatic than I’d expected, and then the right moment never came before I found myself suspended and Hissy gone. And I didn’t want to leave it at home; that would feel too much like stealing. It hadn’t escaped my imagination that my money woes would be solved if I could just be enough of a crook to keep it for myself and find a way to liquidate it. But that would be wrong.

“Looking for somepony to use it on you?” Pokey continued.

In fact, when I did have the ring out yesterday evening, I put it on and posed in front of the mirror, trying to imagine how it would be if someone put it on me and prevented me from taking it off. How would it feel to try to use your horn and then it just didn’t work and there was nothing you could do? Too bad this ring wouldn’t let me find out, what with its punishment fireworks. There was that monster attack the other year where all the unicorn magic in Canterlot had been drained for hours until the princesses got things sorted out, but that just left everypony in a daze, and I couldn’t remember much of it.

Perhaps the pony I imagined forcing the ring on me had been a steel blue stallion with a smartly permed mane. Just perhaps – –

“Yes? No? Are you there?” Pokey and Cressie were both staring at me, looking concerned.

“Yes I’m here. I mean no, never crossed my mind. That’s not even, I mean, nothing could be further. Making sure it’s safe is all.”

He grinned. “Just messing with you anyway.” And then he went out to the kitchen and came back with two glasses of icebrand to finish off with.

* * *

All in all it has been a nice evening.

After dinner we moved to the couch for random snuggles, and also eventually beer and rosemary sticks. The beer is gone now, and I’m lying on my back with my left hind wedged in between Pokey and the couch back, contemplating whether it will be worth the trouble to try to extract it while there’s still some circulation left.

Cressie lies on his other side; I’ve tried to be a bit more inclusive of her than last time. She was the one who invited, after all.

The suppressor ring still sits there on the coffee table. I pick it up with my magic and let it float in front of me. “I have to admit, it is kind of a fascinating item.”

Pokey chuckles. “One would think so, the way you’ve been stealing glances towards it all night.”

“What? I haven’t.”

“Did too.”

“Did not!” I look to Cressie for support, but she just grins and nods. Whatever became of mare solidarity?

Pokey sits up straighter, and I grab the opportunity to pull back my trapped leg.

“There’s nothing wrong with being curious,” he says. “Ever gone further with it than curiosity?”

“Not really,” I admit. “Actually not at all.” I’ve got an inkling this is not a matter to feign experience with.

He takes the ring from me and puts it down on the table. “You oughta try it sometime. Find somepony you really, really trust with it, and then just take it slow.”

“Are you saying I shouldn’t trust you?”

He stays serious. “I’m not saying you should. Look, I’d love to give a hot mare such as yourself a taste of the old yoke, as it were, but it’s not something you should go into lightly. You’d be completely in my power, and there won’t be a lot of opportunities to back out if it’s not what you expected.”

I look away from him, trying to imagine that. I probably shouldn’t be making this decision after drinking, but hey, what can go wrong? And where would I find a guy who does that sort of thing whom I have reason to trust more than him? I’d keep wondering forever.

“It’s only for tonight, right?”

“Of course,” he says warmly. “Remember, you’re also welcome just to stay the night the old-fashioned way, and I won’t think less of you for that.”

I look down at Cressie, lazing on the couch with her head in Pokey’s lap, listening to us. She raises an eyebrow at me, a content little smile playing on her muzzle.

“I’ll take my chances,” I say.

“Here, put this on.” Pokey comes back into the living room and tosses something to me, a bundle of interconnected straps and buckles that I can’t really make up and down of until he comes over to help me. It turns out to be a bridle with special ambitions, right out of somepony’s Nightmare Night fantasy. Soon I have straps and girdles everywhere: across my forehead, behind the ears, between them, around my muzzle, and down and around my neck where they terminate in a snug collar with a metal ring dangling from the front.

“This is a head harness,” Pokey explains while he adjusts the various buckles and latches. “It’s supposed to restrict, not to hurt. If it chafes anywhere, let me know.”

I’ve worn a bridle once before, back at my junior prom when a bunch of us rented fancy gowns that came with matching tack. I remember being impressed with how something that looked so constricting in the mirror could be so lightweight and comfortable to actually wear. This thing has no such pretenses – as Pokey promised, there’s nothing that chafes or chokes, but it’s certainly not going to let me forget it’s there.

Pokey disappears out of view, and I have to turn around to see him picking up the ring again; the blinkers on the harness block all of my vision to the sides, and I can’t turn my head much. He slides it down onto my horn.

“Don’t turn it on just yet,” he says. “I may need you to lift something later.”

“Okay.” The harness lets me use my mouth almost normally, short of yawning.

He starts threading the ring into the web of straps around my head. “There are some rules that come with wearing this,” he says. “You will not speak unless I tell you to, and when you do, you will address me as, hmm . . .”

“Master?” I guess.

He scrunches up his face. “No. Not unless you truly mean it – and you don’t know me, or yourself, well enough to do that yet.” He sighs. “Just call me ‘sir’, I suppose.”

“Yes, sir,” I say, trying the word out to get into character with it. “Thank you, kind sir.”

He chuckles. “‘Kind sir’? I like that; stick to it – but only when I tell you to speak.”

I almost speak up again to confirm that, but catch myself and nod instead, as far as the harness allows.

He reaches out and scratches my ear approvingly. “Right. You’re a smart little hopeful – quick learner. I think we’ll get along just fine. Now hold out your foreleg.”

He ties long cords around each of my forelegs, around the pastern and knee. They trail after me when he leads me towards the bedroom, and I have to be careful not to trip on them. What did he have to do that for? Or is it part of the game?

Pokey tells me to lie down on his bed with my hind legs still on the floor. He grabs the foreleg cords with his magic as I lie down, somehow arranging them such that it takes him only a few pulls afterwards to bind the legs to my sides so I can’t move them.

Now he’s down on the floor, pushing my hind hooves apart. There’s a sound of something heavy scraping across the floor, and I feel stocks close around my fetlocks, pinning them down. Then he ties rope around my gaskins and pulls them out towards the sides, and now I literally can’t wiggle a limb. Unless the tail counts – no, he’s grabbing hold of that too, forcing it up and along my back, and he ties it down with the same cords my forelegs are bound with.

For a moment nothing more happens. I realize I’ve let him do all this without having agreed on what happens next. Was that really smart? For yak’s sake, this is someone who keeps stocks ready under his bed just in case! What the donkey’s dock am I doing here?

Okay, don’t panic. Pokey isn’t a complete stranger. You know him, just a bit, but enough to be reasonably sure he’s not a psycho. Cressie wouldn’t act the way she does if he were. Really, the worst thing that can happen is that he rapes me, right? Wouldn’t even really be rape; I’ve had sex with him before, and the plan all along was to let him fuck me again tonight anyway. See? Consent.

I wish he would get to it.

Suddenly there’s a sharp searing pain in my right flank, just in front of the cutie mark. “Ow!” I shout.

“No talking, my hopeful,” says Pokey calmly. The pain comes again with a slap, a bit further up my back.

“Hey!”

Pokey sighs and sits down on the bed next to me. I can’t see him very well because of the blinkers. He scratches my withers with some kind of instrument.

“This is a crop,” he says. “The first strike was just to introduce you to it. The second was because you spoke without permission. And now you’ve gone and done that again.”

Slap. It smarts again, this time above my left shoulder. I manage not to cry out immediately.

“But –”

Slap. “Seriously?”

This time I really do stay quiet. It’s not like it actually hurts that much, more the surprise of it.

“Good. You’re learning,” says Pokey. “I knew you were a smart one. Here comes midterms, then.”

Slap, right thigh. I keep my mouth shut again. Somehow it’s beginning to feel like an achievement. I’m actually feeling proud of being whipped without complaining. What gives?

“Congratulations, you pass. So, the next module of your education is about the paddle. It goes like this.”

Something hits my ass, making it erupt in throbbing pain, and it knocks the air out of me so I can’t help letting an “oof!” escape.

“Yes, that takes a bit more practice. Let’s try it again, shall we?”

I grit my teeth and force myself not to make a sound when he hits me with the paddle again. He gives me a few minutes to catch my breath, while he nuzzles tenderly at my side.

“At this point I suppose you’re wondering why I don’t just gag you instead,” he says eventually. “The thing is, a gag is a tool. It is there to make it easier for you to do something you want to do, namely not speaking without permission. But you shouldn’t depend on a tool all the time. And if you use it right from the beginning, you won’t really appreciate what it does for you. So it’s something you need to earn first, understand?”

I’m not sure I do, but I’m not really in a position to discuss bondage philosophy, so I nod anyway. Nodding while tied to a bed and wearing a head harness consists of trying to lift my head a few times and making the bedsprings bounce.

“So now that you know which kind of punishment is in store if you’re bad, do you still want to proceed?”

It takes me a few moments to understand that he’s offering me a way out. Do I want to take it? It would be easy: If only I say the word, he will untie me, so I can use my legs again and get rid of the harness, and . . . then what? All I feel when I imagine that is disappointment.

As crazy as it sounds, I suppose I do want this to continue. I make another attempt at nodding.

“Speak up and answer me,” he says, not unkindly.

“Um, I’m good.”

Slap. “I’m good, what?”

Oh, right. There are still rules. “I’m good, kind sir. Please go on, kind sir.”

“Better. If you’re sure of that, activate your ring now. But then it will be the last decision you make until it runs out.”

I squeeze my eyes shut and concentrate on pouring magic into the ring. You don’t need to learn a spell, just make like you’re trying to pull the ring apart, and it takes care of the rest. A sheet of dull numbness envelops my horn, and then it’s done. Point of no return.

Is it rape time yet? My hind end is pulsing with readiness and pain from the paddling. A stray little breeze in the room grazes it with a cool reminder of how bare and unprotected I am with my tail tied back. Oh please, let rape time be now.

But instead Pokey pats the bedding in front of me loudly. “Come on, Cressie, up here!”

She must have been watching it all from that basket of hers. In seconds she’s up on the bed and lies down before me, with her rump so close I have to pull back my head slightly.

“Now, my little hopeful, you’ve been depriving Cressie here of a lot of the attention she would otherwise get from me,” he says. “It’s only fair that your first task should be to show her a good time in return, don’t you agree?” Slap – he’s still using that crop, just with a lighter touch now. “So get licking.”

Cressie’s filly bits are right in front of my muzzle. I’ve never done this with a mare before, and never thought I would – but pretty clearly what I want is of no particular importance now. Of course it isn’t. Still, I don’t know quite what to do here; she said she doesn’t like anything going into that hole, didn’t she? I stick out my tongue and begin carefully wetting her outer labia, like a green colt with his first marefriend.

She settles that by pushing backwards onto me, almost wrapping herself around my muzzle. Okay, then. It does makes sense – I know well enough how a tongue in the antechamber is something entirely different from a cock all the way in. (Oh, to have a cock all the way in! Dare I hope Pokey will get on with it and take me while I service her? No, he’s up at her other end, hugging or kissing her. Darn.)

At first I keep up the awkward-colt act, just waving my tongue around in between the folds. It doesn’t taste as sour as giving a stallion a sheathjob; not bad. And I won’t suddenly get my mouth shot full of cum either. Seems the lithe side does have its advantages.

Enough fooling around now; I have a job to do. Her clit must be down this way – ah, there it is, I think. It is larger than I thought it would be, and warmer. But it must be right because her tail, draped across my face and horn, starts twitching as soon as I reach it. I can feel every hair of it against my horn, even if it’s numbed by the ring.

I settle into a rhythm, teasing and squeezing and tugging at her knob. There’s only me, bound up tight like an overstuffed pancake roll, and Cressie’s marehood, and I’m here to get her off. Her tail jitters erratically, as if she’s trying to hold back, and if she can hold back I’m not doing good enough. What do stallions do that works for me? There was this guy – wosshisname, he was an art student and had a – I think he used his lip for my clit so his tongue was free. Worth a try . . .

Hey, I think that made her moan! She’s squirting a bit too, a warm fluid with a soapy taste. So this is marecum. I swirl it around in my mouth before I swallow it, trying to decide if it’s worse than a stallion’s. She squirts again, and I suck it up, and now the squirts merge together in a steady gush –

Wait a minute. That’s not cum, it’s pee! She’s pissing. In my mouth. Why am I drinking it? Why do I keep drinking it? Because I can’t move my head is why; it would just get into my face instead, my nostrils, my eyes. And it would soak the bed, and then I think Pokey would punish me, or at least he’d know I backed down. No choice.

I remember my training; bladder accidents are common enough among the clients we rescue that we need to have a bit of background knowledge. A healthy pony’s urine is effectively sterile. So this shouldn’t make me sick. Hooray?

After an eternity the revolting stream lets up. Should I get back to licking? No, she’s getting up now, and down on the floor. Before she moves out of sight she glances back at me with a small smile, but then for a split second she looks shocked and afraid and quickly looks away.

Pokey sits down in front of me where Cressie lay. “She missed her evening walk too,” he says, “but I see you’ve taken care of that.” He runs a hoof down my cheek, lifting my chin. “So, my hopeful, I promised I would have you completely in my power. Was I right?”

I nod.

“Tell me how you’re in my power,” he says. “In words.”

I swallow. “You can – thank you, kind sir – you can make your marefriend piss on me.” It’s like the full force of the degradation only hits once I say it aloud.

“That I can,” he agrees. “What more can I do?”

“You can . . . you can hit me and spank me.”

“Very good!” His horn lights up for a second, and I feel the slap of the crop across my back, by way of example. “When can I do this?”

“Wh-whenever you want to, kind sir?”

He lowers his head right down next to mine. “And how does that make you feel?” he asks, voice silky smooth.

“Horny. It makes me feel . . . very horny, kind sir.” And the worst thing is that even after everything, that’s true. I need a cock inside me like I’ve ever needed anything.

He chuckles. “It won’t be long now. But first you’ve earned a privilege.”

The gag is a big intruding lump in my mouth, with straps around my muzzle to keep my jaws locked around it. They’re keeping my lips apart too, and I’m already drooling uncontrollably on the bedsheets.

Apparently I’ve also earned an upgrade from blinkers to a blindfold, so all in all I’m pretty completely wrapped up.

“Now that you can’t simply cry out,” he whispers into my ear, and I try to keep it still so he won’t decide my ears also need to be restrained somehow, “here’s a signal for you: If you’re completely dying and need to stop everything, make the ring do the fireworks two times in a row, okay? Once is just a mistake, twice for the real thing.”

There’s a lot of bouncing around on the bedsprings, and then somepony – I can’t see who, but my imagination settles on Cressie – begins licking my horn. She’s running her tongue sloppily along the groove and there’s a shiver tickling down and all the way through me when she pauses and starts over in a different place. Once I was with a guy who was into this, and that felt kind of meh, but – now she takes the entire horn into her mouth and sucks on it like a lollipop – damn that’s intense, wonder if it’s the ring that does it – if only I could kick my legs or something; I’m going to explode if I don’t –

And now there are hooves on my rump and a cock sliding into me YES never has being filled out felt this good I needed that, wait no he’s pulling out again but only to thrust back in and my horn is warm and wet and amazing, he’s still thrusting it’s all I ever wanted and I ought to hold back and stretch the moment but it’s no good trying and

oh

my

celestia that’s good please let it go on and on and on and

Um. I think I lost myself a bit there. Pokey is still thrusting, he comes inside me, and then he’s spent and flumps down on my back. Cressie lets go of my horn and begins kissing him again, I think, somewhere behind my neck. He just keeps lying there, and he ought to know I hate that, but somehow it feels appropriate anyway. Hay, I can’t even move and Pokey and Cressie are lying on top of me making out, and I feel used and discarded and yet, for some reason, strangely happy about all of it.

It can’t last forever, of course. Without moving he pulls out of me with a flaccid little plop. He sighs and goes down to the floor to open the stocks and free my hind legs, and he unties my fores too and lets me stand up, mobile again.

I still can’t see, but he’s pulling me somewhere with a chain attached to the harness collar. I let him. What comes next?

When the blindfold comes off we’re in the kitchen, and he’s chaining me down to the ring in the floor where we found Cressie, back when I first came here. He takes the gag out of my mouth too but puts a hoof to my lips. “Shh. Goodnight, my hopeful.”

And then he just leaves, closing the door behind him.

What am I supposed to do now? Pokey turned out the light when he left, but there’s a streetlight down there, illuminating a window-shaped patch of the ceiling. Do I just lie down and go to sleep here on the floor? That’s not exciting at all.

For a while I toy with the idea of bailing out now. If I yell loud enough he will hear me, won’t he? I don’t think he would really refuse to let me free – why, he even gave me a kind of safeword with that ‘fireworks’ signal. On the other hoof, he might insist that I use it first. I suppose it’s only meant for if what he’s doing is worse than setting off the ring.

And dammit, if Cressie can be chained here for entire days, then I can endure a night. Never got to ask her how that fits with having a job. Perhaps last week was her day off . . .

Suddenly the door opens again. I look up, half expecting it to be Finey. Good evening, ma’am, I’m from the Rescue Service, do you need a hoof here? But it’s just Pokey, peering in. How much time has passed – half an hour? It is still dark.

“Good, you’re awake,” he says, switching on the light.

He comes over to me and quickly unties a lot of the straps on the harness and then pulls the entire thing off over my head, ring and all. Now I can feel my horn again. I had gotten used to the numbness.

“Well, that’s it,” he says.

I blink in confusion and start saying something, but discover I don’t know what.

“It’s alright, you can speak now. You’re free to go, too, if you want.”

“Um, what happened to ‘the last decision I’ll make before morning’?”

“Well, if I gave you the whole ride now, how’d I keep you coming back for more?” He winks at me, and then stands tinkering with the harness for a second or two. “Besides, Cressie insisted.”

That’s nice of her. “What, she insisted? I thought bitches don’t talk.”

“In aftercare they do. Care to join us? There’ll be hugs and apologies and perhaps some talk about feelings.”

He holds a hoof out to me, smiling.

I take it.

Author's Note

Thanks to Taialin for proofreading and light editing.