Chapter 6: Bread, Water, and a New Humiliation
The footsteps stopped a few feet away.
Gerard kept his eyes closed. The sun was warm on his face now, a cruel parody of comfort after the endless cold. He could hear whoever it was breathing—slow, steady, unhurried. Not the nervous respiration of a stranger stumbling onto something awful. Not the quickened breath of someone getting off on the view.
Just patient.
"Open your eyes."
The voice hit him like cold water. Gerard's lids lifted, heavy and gritty, and there was Adrien. Standing in the sunlight with his hands in his pockets, his silver hair catching the morning gold, his face as smooth and unreadable as ever.
He looked at Gerard the way someone might examine a piece of furniture they were thinking about buying. Not impressed. Not disappointed. Just assessing.
"You didn't sleep much," Adrien said.
Gerard tried to answer. His throat was cracked and raw, and the sound that came out was barely human. He swallowed, tried again. "I slept enough."
"No. You didn't."
Adrien stepped closer. He reached up and his fingers found the rope around Gerard's left wrist. He didn't untie it. He just touched it, traced the fibers, felt the way they'd bitten into the skin. Then he did the same with the right.
Gerard's arms had gone past numb into something worse. The joints felt wrong in their sockets, stretched too far for too long, and he wasn't sure they'd go back to the way they were supposed to be.
"This is going to hurt," Adrien said.
"Ja. I know."
Adrien pulled a knife from his pocket. Small, folding, utilitarian. He opened it with one hand and pressed the blade against the rope.
Sawed.
The fibers parted one by one. Gerard felt each strand give way, felt the pressure on his wrist decrease by degrees, and then the rope fell and his arm dropped and the pain that exploded through his shoulder was so bright and hot he almost screamed.
Almost.
He bit down on his tongue hard enough to taste copper and made no sound at all.
Adrien moved to the other wrist. Same knife. Same slow, deliberate sawing. Gerard's second arm dropped, and this time he couldn't stop the groan that escaped—a low, guttural sound that came from somewhere deep in his chest.
The clamps. He'd forgotten about the clamps. Or maybe he'd stopped remembering they could come off. But the moment his arms were free, the weight of his body shifted, and the chain swung, and the steel teeth reminded him exactly where they were.
Adrien noticed. He always noticed.
"Those too," he said.
He reached up and his fingers found the first clamp. Gerard's breath caught. His nipples were swollen around the steel, the flesh dark and angry, and even the lightest touch sent sparks through his chest.
Adrien didn't touch lightly.
He grabbed the clamp and pulled it open, and the relief was so sudden and so intense that Gerard's vision went white. The blood rushed back into the compressed flesh, and the pain that followed was worse than the clamp itself—a hot, throbbing, overwhelming burn that spread through his entire chest.
Then Adrien did the same to the other one.
Gerard sagged against the oak. His knees buckled, and only the ropes around his ankles kept him upright. He was crying. He didn't realize it until he felt the tears cutting tracks through the dirt on his face.
Adrien let him hang there for a moment. Then he crouched down and cut the ropes at Gerard's ankles, one after the other.
Gerard collapsed.
He hit the ground hard—shoulder first, then hip, then cheek against the frozen mud. His body didn't work. His legs were useless. His arms were dead weight. He lay there, face down in the dirt, and breathed.
Above him, Adrien folded the knife and put it back in his pocket.
"Can you walk?"
Gerard tried to move. Nothing happened.
"No."
"I didn't think so."
Adrien reached down. His hands slid under Gerard's armpits, and then he lifted. Just like that. Like Gerard weighed nothing at all. He hauled him up and over his shoulder in a fireman's carry, Gerard's naked body draped across him like a sack of grain.
Gerard's face pressed against Adrien's back. He could smell wool and leather and something clean and sharp. Soap, maybe. It had been so long since he'd smelled soap.
Adrien walked.
The forest moved past them in a blur. Trees and brambles and sunlight and shadow. Gerard's head bounced against Adrien's shoulder with every step, and each jolt sent a fresh spike of pain through his chest, his arms, his entire ruined body.
He didn't complain. He didn't have the strength.
The sound of water came first.
A stream, narrow and quick, cutting through the forest like a silver thread. The banks were mossy and soft, and the water was so clear Gerard could see the stones at the bottom, smooth and brown and ancient.
Adrien set him down on the bank.
"Stay."
Gerard stayed. He wasn't sure he could have moved if he'd wanted to.
Adrien crouched beside the stream and wet a cloth he'd pulled from somewhere. Then he turned back to Gerard and began to wash him.
The cloth was cold. The first touch made Gerard flinch, but Adrien didn't stop. He worked methodically—arms first, lifting each one and running the cloth from shoulder to wrist, cleaning away the dirt and sweat and the marks the ropes had left behind.
Then his chest. The cloth moved over Gerard's nipples, which were still swollen and raw, and Gerard hissed through his teeth.
"I know," Adrien said. "Almost done."
He wasn't gentle. But he wasn't cruel either. Just thorough. He cleaned Gerard's stomach, his neck, his face. He cleaned the dried precum from Gerard's thighs and cock, which twitched at the touch despite itself. He cleaned Gerard's ass, which burned with a deep, internal ache that no amount of washing would fix.
When he was done, he tossed the cloth into the stream and watched it float away.
Gerard lay on the bank. The sun was fully up now, and the light filtering through the trees was warm and golden. He could feel it on his skin, and for the first time since the previous night, the cold started to recede.
Adrien pulled something from his jacket. Dried meat, cut into strips. He held one to Gerard's lips.
"Eat."
Gerard opened his mouth. The meat was tough and salty, and chewing hurt his cracked lips, but he ate it. Adrien fed him another strip, and another, until his stomach stopped feeling like a pit and started feeling like a stomach again.
Then a canteen. Adrien uncapped it and held it to Gerard's mouth. Water. Cold and clean, and Gerard drank until his throat stopped burning, until the water spilled down his chin and soaked into his beard.
"Enough," Adrien said. He pulled the canteen away. "You'll make yourself sick."
Gerard nodded. Or tried to. His neck was stiff and uncooperative.
Adrien produced a blanket—rough, woven wool, the kind that scratched no matter how soft it looked. He wrapped it around Gerard's shoulders, pulling it tight. Then he sat down on the bank beside him.
They didn't speak.
The stream ran. The cicadas hummed. The sun climbed higher, and Gerard's shivering gradually stopped, and he sat there wrapped in wool and warmth and tried to remember what it felt like to be a person.
He wasn't sure he did.
Adrien sat with him for a long time. Minutes, maybe. Hours. Time was still broken, still sliding around him in ways he couldn't track. But eventually Adrien stood, and Gerard looked up at him, and the peace of the moment evaporated.
Adrien pointed.
Deeper into the forest. Past the stream, past the ferns, into a part of the woods Gerard hadn't seen before. There was a gap in the trees, a path that led to something—a clearing.
Gerard squinted. His eyes were still blurry, still struggling to focus. But he could see it. The shape of it. The purpose of it.
A platform. Low and wooden, raised maybe two feet off the ground. There was a post at its center—thick, sturdy, the kind of post that could hold a man without bending. And behind the post, hanging from a branch, a sign.
Hand-painted. White letters on black wood.
BEG OR BE PUNISHED.
Gerard stared at it for a long moment. Then he looked at Adrien.
Adrien looked back at him.
"You know what it says," Adrien said.
"Ja."
"Then you know what you have to do."
Gerard pulled the blanket tighter around his shoulders. His body still ached. His arms still screamed. His nipples still throbbed every time the wool brushed against them.
He didn't care.
"A bet is a bet," he said. The words came out steady, despite everything. Despite the cracked lips, the raw throat, the exhaustion that was still dragging at his bones.
Adrien's mouth curved. Not quite a smile. Something colder than that.
"This isn't a bet," he said. "This is a task."
"Then I will do the task."
"Will you?"
Gerard pushed himself up. His legs shook. His arms shook. Everything shook. But he stood, and he let the blanket fall, and he looked Adrien in the eye.
"Tell me the rules."
Adrien told him.
The platform. The post. The sign. Gerard would stand on it. He would be bound to the post—not so tight that he couldn't breathe, but tight enough that he couldn't leave. He would be naked. The sign would hang behind him, visible to anyone who approached.
He would wait for people to come. And when they did, he would beg.
"You ask them to use you," Adrien said. "You make it convincing. You make it worth their time. You secure at least twenty customers. Twenty men who use you, any way they want, for as long as they want. You don't resist. You don't complain. You say 'yes sir' to whatever they ask for. And you thank them when they're done. You thank every single one."
Gerard listened. His face was blank. Behind his eyes, he was doing math. Twenty men. At least three hours of daylight left. Maybe four. That was a new man every ten minutes, if he was efficient. If they came at all.
"And if I fail?"
Adrien's expression didn't change. "If you fail, the next punishment will make the oak tree feel like a holiday."
Gerard didn't flinch. He met Adrien's eye and held it.
"Understood."
Adrien nodded once. Then he turned and walked toward the platform. Gerard followed.
The clearing was small and sunlit. The ferns around the edges swayed in a breeze Gerard couldn't feel. The cicadas were loud here, louder than by the oak, filling the air with their electric hum.
The platform was simple—planks of wood nailed together, raised on short posts. The post in the center was tall, reaching almost to Gerard's chest, and there were leather cuffs attached to it at the base and the top. The sign was already hanging, already waiting, the words stark and unmissable.
Gerard stepped onto the platform.
The wood was warm under his bare feet. He walked to the post and turned, facing the path. The ferns whispered. The cicadas sang.
Adrien came up behind him.
The leather cuffs went around his ankles first, then his wrists. He held his arms behind the post—not stretched, not suspended, just bound. There was room to move, but not to escape.
Adrien checked the cuffs one by one. Then he stepped back.
"Twenty," he said.
Gerard nodded.
Adrien walked away.
The path was empty. The clearing was silent except for the insects and the wind. Gerard stood on the platform, naked and bound, the sign hanging above him like a dare.
He took a breath.
Then he waited.
The first person came twenty minutes later.
A woman. Middle-aged, hiking boots, a backpack. She saw the sign and stopped. Her mouth opened. Then closed. Then she looked at Gerard—at his body, at the marks on his skin, at the expression on his face.
"What is this?" she asked.
Gerard met her eyes.
"Please," he said. His accent was thick, the vowels scraping at the edges of the word. "I am here for you. Use me. I am begging."
She stared at him.
"You're serious."
"Yes. I am serious. Please. I am begging you." He paused. Swallowed. "Use me."
She looked around, as if checking for cameras. Then she stepped closer. Her hand touched his chest—just a touch, fingers brushing over the raw flesh where the clamps had been.
He shivered. Not from cold.
"Yes," he said. "Please. Yes."
She pulled her hand back. "No. I can't. This is—no."
She walked away fast, boots crunching on the path, and disappeared into the trees.
Gerard closed his eyes.
The cicadas kept humming.
A man came next. Young, fit, earbuds in. He saw the sign and took the earbuds out and looked at Gerard for a long time.
"Beg," he said.
"Please," Gerard said. "Please use me. Any way you want. I am here for you."
The man crossed his arms. "You're really going to do whatever I say?"
"Yes."
"Prove it. Say you're worthless."
Gerard didn't blink. "I am worthless. I am nothing. I am here for you to use."
The man smiled. He stepped onto the platform and grabbed Gerard by the hair—the short, rough stubble on his scalp—and shoved his face down. Gerard's chin hit his own shoulder. His neck twisted. He didn't resist.
"Yes sir," he said.
The man held him there for a long moment. Then he let go and stepped back.
"Not today," he said. "But you're fun."
He put his earbuds back in and walked away.
Gerard straightened up. His neck ached. His scalp stung. He said nothing.
Two hours passed.
Seven men stopped. Four listened. One touched—a quick grope, a squeeze of his ass, a thumb dragged over his nipple—but didn't stay. Three walked away without a word. His count was zero.
The sun was past its peak. The shadows were getting longer. The cicadas kept humming, indifferent.
Another man came. Older, gray beard, kind eyes. He looked at Gerard like he was looking at a wounded animal.
"You okay, son?"
"I am fine. Please. Use me."
"You don't look fine."
"I am fine. Please. I am begging you."
The man shook his head. "No. This isn't right."
He walked away.
Gerard's hands clenched behind the post. The leather cuffs were tight. His shoulders were starting to ache again, the muscles protesting the position.
"Please," he said. But the man was already gone.
Three hours.
The count was two. A man who'd stroked him until he was hard and then walked away. A man who'd slapped his ass and called him a good boy and left without doing anything else.
Two.
Gerard's throat was raw. His lips were cracked again, split at the corners, and every word he spoke made them bleed a little more. His body was a collection of aches—shoulders, wrists, nipples, ass—and none of them were getting better.
The sun was low now. Maybe an hour of daylight left.
Another man.
Tall, dark-skinned, built like he worked for a living. He stopped at the edge of the platform and read the sign. Then he looked at Gerard.
"Twenty men."
Gerard blinked. "What?"
"That's what this is, isn't it? You're trying to get twenty men to use you. Some kind of bet."
"Yes."
The man nodded slowly. He stepped onto the platform. His hand found Gerard's chin, tilted his face up. He studied him—the cracked lips, the tired eyes, the beard that was matted with mud and sweat.
"How many so far?"
"Two."
The man laughed. Not cruel. Just surprised.
"You're not going to make it."
"I will."
"No. You won't." He let go of Gerard's chin. "But I'll help you."
He walked around behind Gerard. Gerard heard his zipper. Felt hands on his hips. Then pressure—steady, insistent, at his entrance.
"Say it," the man said.
"Please," Gerard said. "Please use me. I am begging. Yes sir. Please."
The man pushed.
It hurt. Gerard was still raw from the night before, still torn and tender, and the man wasn't gentle. But Gerard didn't resist. He didn't complain. He closed his eyes and breathed through his nose and said "yes sir" when the man told him to.
It lasted fifteen minutes. When it was done, the man zipped up and stepped back.
"That's three," he said. "Good luck."
He left.
Gerard sagged against the post. His legs were shaking. His ass burned. But he was still standing.
Three.
The sun dipped lower.
More men. Two together, looking for a laugh. One of them fucked him while the other watched and jeered. Four.
A man who just wanted a blowjob. Gerard's knees cracked against the wood of the platform, but he didn't stop until his jaw ached and the man finished down his throat. Five.
A quiet man who didn't speak, just touched. Hands everywhere, exploring, taking—nipples, cock, ass. He didn't fuck. He just felt. Then he nodded and left. Six.
The sun touched the treeline.
Gerard was shaking. Not from cold. Not from pain. From exhaustion. His body had been pushed past its limits, then past them again. He didn't know how many men had used him. He didn't know how many were left.
Dusk.
A man came running up the path, out of breath. Young—early twenties, scruffy beard, familiar face.
The man who'd laughed. The first one. The one who'd jogged away.
He stopped at the platform. He looked at Gerard.
"Holy shit," he said. "You're still doing this."
"Yes."
"I saw the sign. I thought it was a joke."
"It is not a joke."
The man looked at the sign. Looked at Gerard. Looked around the clearing.
"How many?"
Gerard tried to count. His brain was slow, sluggish. "Seventeen. Maybe eighteen."
"You need more?"
"Yes."
The man climbed onto the platform. He didn't ask for anything. He just crouched in front of Gerard and took Gerard's cock in his hand.
"I'm sorry I laughed," he said. "At the oak. I should have cut you down."
"Yes. You should have."
The man worked him slowly—not rough, not demanding. Just a hand, steady and patient. Gerard's body responded. His cock hardened despite everything. His hips moved. His breath came faster.
"Say it," the man said.
"Please," Gerard said. "Please use me. I am begging. Yes sir."
The man didn't stop until Gerard came—a dry, painful orgasm that left him gasping and shaking. Then he let go and stood up.
"Eighteen," he said. "Nineteen. Whatever. You're close."
He walked away.
Gerard hung there. The sky was purple now. The shadows had swallowed the clearing.
Then a sound. Footsteps. Familiar.
Adrien emerged from the trees.
He walked to the platform and stopped. He looked at Gerard—at the sweat, the cum dripping down his chin, the bruises, the marks, the exhaustion. Then he looked at the sign.
"Twenty," he said.
Gerard lifted his head. "Yes."
"You're sure?"
"Yes."
Adrien was quiet for a moment. Then he pulled out his phone. He typed something. He waited.
A minute passed. Two. Then footsteps again—multiple, coming from the path. Three men emerged from the trees. They were all shapes and sizes, all ages, all types. They stopped at the platform and looked at Gerard.
One of them spoke. "We got the text. This the guy?"
"This is him," Adrien said.
"Twenty?"
"Twenty."
They climbed onto the platform.
Gerard looked at them. Looked at Adrien. His cracked lips split into something that might have been a smile.
"Please," he said. "Please use me. I am begging. Yes sir."
The first man stepped forward.
Gerard closed his eyes.
The first man was already moving before Gerard finished the sentence.
He was shorter than Gerard, stocky, with hands that felt like sandpaper when they landed on Gerard's hips. No preamble. No questions. Just pressure, blunt and immediate, and Gerard's body opened for him because there was nothing left to do but that.
"Ja," Gerard breathed. "Yes. Use me."
The man didn't answer. He just worked, fast and mechanical, his breath coming in short grunts that smelled like coffee and cigarettes. Gerard kept his eyes closed and let his mind drift somewhere else—past the platform, past the clearing, into the dark spaces between the trees where nothing could reach him.
The second man waited his turn.
He was younger, nervous, his hands shaking when he touched Gerard's chest. He fumbled with his belt, fumbled with the condom, fumbled with everything until the first man laughed and told him to hurry up.
"Sorry," the kid mumbled. "Sorry, I just—"
"Don't apologize to him," the first man said. "He's the one begging."
The kid nodded. Then he pushed inside, and Gerard made a sound that wasn't quite pain and wasn't quite anything else. His cracked lips parted. His breath fogged in the cooling air.
"Yes sir," he said. "Thank you. Thank you for using me."
The kid finished fast. Too fast, probably, because he pulled out and looked almost ashamed. He didn't say anything. Just zipped up and stepped back and let the third man take his place.
The third man was older. Patient. He took his time, touching Gerard everywhere before he did anything else—fingers in his beard, on his nipples, tracing the welts on his back. He found the places that still hurt and pressed on them, watching Gerard's face the whole time.
"You feel that?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Good."
When he finally fucked him, it was slow. Deliberate. He wanted Gerard to feel every inch, every thrust, every second of it. And Gerard did. He felt all of it. The stretch, the burn, the way his body had stopped resisting hours ago and just accepted whatever was given.
"Beg," the man said.
"Please. Please, yes sir. Please use me. I am begging you. I am nothing. I am here for you."
The man smiled. He finished inside the condom and pulled out and patted Gerard's ass like he was a dog who'd done a trick.
"Good boy," he said.
Gerard's knees buckled. Only the cuffs around his wrists kept him upright. The leather bit into his skin, and he hung there, arms stretched behind the post, chest heaving.
Then the three men were gone.
The clearing was quiet again. The cicadas had stopped. Even the wind had died, leaving the ferns still and waiting.
Adrien stepped onto the platform.
He didn't speak. He just walked around Gerard, slow and deliberate, examining the evidence. The fresh bruises. The cum drying on Gerard's thighs. The way his legs trembled, barely holding him up.
"Twenty-one," Adrien said.
Gerard lifted his head. His eyes were glassy, unfocused. "What?"
"That was twenty-one. Twenty-two. Twenty-three." Adrien stopped in front of him. "You exceeded the requirement."
"I did not count."
"No. I did."
Gerard tried to process that. Twenty-three. He'd begged for twenty-three men. He'd let them use him, all of them, any way they wanted. And he was still standing. Barely.
"Does that mean I pass?"
Adrien's expression didn't change. "It means you completed the task."
"Then—"
"You can come down."
Adrien reached behind the post and unclipped the cuffs. Gerard's arms fell forward, dead weight, and he collapsed onto his knees on the wooden platform. The impact sent a shock through his whole body, and he doubled over, forehead pressed to the warm wood.
He stayed there. Breathing. Existing.
Adrien crouched beside him. He didn't touch him. Didn't offer comfort. Just waited.
Eventually, Gerard lifted his head. His beard was crusted with spit and dirt. His eyes were red-rimmed, exhausted. But there was something else there too—something steady.
"I did not fail," he said.
"No."
"I did what you asked."
"You did."
Gerard nodded. Then, slowly, painfully, he pushed himself up. He stood on shaking legs, naked and wrecked, and looked Adrien in the eye.
"What now?"
Adrien stood too. He pulled something from his pocket—a small key, silver and unremarkable. He held it up between them.
"There's a cabin half a mile east," he said. "You can sleep there tonight. Shower. Eat. Rest."
"And tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow we discuss the next task."
Gerard's jaw tightened. "Another task."
"Always another task." Adrien pocketed the key and turned toward the path. "That's how this works. You know that."
He started walking.
Gerard didn't follow immediately. He stood on the platform, naked and alone, the sign creaking softly above him. BEG OR BE PUNISHED. The words were just words. They didn't mean anything anymore.
He touched his chest. His nipples were raw and swollen, still tender from the clamps. His ass ached. His shoulders screamed. His lips were split in three places and his throat felt like he'd swallowed glass.
But he was standing.
He stepped off the platform. The moss was cold and soft under his feet. The path stretched ahead, barely visible in the deepening dark, and Adrien's silhouette was already fading into the trees.
Gerard followed.
The cabin was small. One room, a bed, a wood stove, a sink with a hand pump. There was a stack of blankets in the corner and a first-aid kit on the shelf. No windows. No clock. Just four walls and silence.
Adrien was already there when Gerard arrived. He'd started a fire in the stove, and the small space was warm and orange. He gestured at the bed.
"Sit."
Gerard sat. The mattress was thin and lumpy, but it was a mattress, and that was more than he'd had in days. He closed his eyes and let the warmth wash over him.
Adrien opened the first-aid kit. He cleaned Gerard's wrists first, wrapping them in gauze. Then his ankles. Then he inspected the damage to Gerard's nipples—the swelling, the bruising, the small cuts where the clamps had bitten too deep.
"This will sting," he said.
He applied something that smelled like antiseptic. Gerard hissed through his teeth but didn't pull away. Adrien worked in silence, methodical and precise.
When he was done, he handed Gerard a bottle of water and a protein bar.
"Eat. Drink. Sleep."
Gerard took the bar. His hands were shaking so badly he could barely open the wrapper. Adrien watched him struggle for a moment, then reached over and opened it for him.
"I can do it," Gerard said.
"I know."
Adrien stood. He walked to the door and paused with his hand on the handle.
"Tomorrow," he said. "Sunrise."
Gerard nodded. His mouth was full of protein bar.
Adrien opened the door. Cold air rushed in, sharp and clean. Then the door closed, and Gerard was alone.
He finished the bar. Drank the water. Lay back on the bed, and pulled the blankets over himself, and stared at the ceiling.
His body hurt everywhere. His mind was quiet for the first time in days. And somewhere in the back of his head, a small voice was already asking the question he knew would come tomorrow.
What next?
He closed his eyes. The fire crackled. The wind whispered against the walls.
Sleep came fast.