late as ever, sorry for that - Eul's story, putting a wee twist in the tale 
I wriggled to get used to my position, spreadeagled on my X-cross, that strangely felt much bigger now I was hanging on it, gripping me with its cruel nails like some mythic monster from the frieze below the church roof, dominating my bowed, tousled head.
I tossed my hair, I was already sweating profusely. My wide-spread legs jerked and pushed helplessly against the nails in my ankles, each jolt torturing me with a new shot of pain as my crunched flesh and bone twisted on the coarse iron. I hung, panting.
Of course, I’ll try, I know Abbess Ailsa’s determined for Scotland to win, I don’t wan to let her down, but I can only do my best, and now I’m nailed there’s little that I can do that will make any difference, just get used to the cruel rhythm of forcing up and sinking down, feeling the pain flow through my body, arms to legs, legs to arms, the current crossing at a node of agony in my womb.
Men were touring the cloister garth, inspecting, appraising, enjoying us writhing girls. My splayed-out pose evidently attracted the interest of a gang of young novice monks, they inspected my female appurtenances with fascinated interest, commenting on how prominent my tits were, how wet my pussy – surprising how innocent these lads are! One of them cautiously put out his finger and started feeling me, up to the top of my open thigh, his companions were sniggering.
‘You can feel inside me,’ I said softly, ‘go on, I won’t bite!’ Gingerly, he slid his finger between my cunt-lips, a shiver ran through my tortured torso I let out a little squeak. The boys were excited now, they all wanted a turn, and began exploring my body with eager enthusiasm, chortling with glee as they discovered how easily they could flick my tits with their fingernails to make me leap with a lusty squeal – as for finger-torturing my girl-parts, they soon picked up the technique.
‘You can lick too, you know,’ I encouraged them, ‘use your tongues.’ The attention of these youngsters was a welcome diversion, but one of them suddenly hissed, ‘Cave! Watch out, Novice Master’s spotted us!’ They hastily withdrew, tucking their juice-damp hands under their scapulars, lowering their eyes, solemn and saintly as if they were processing into Mass.
We girls were hanging on our crosses in a rough ring facing outwards towards the cloister walk, so we could easily be viewed by the busy crowd in the passageways and the more privileged audience out in the garth, but we couldn’t easily look at each other. I could hear the cries and moans of my fellow victims – no, my competitors – and the excited chatter of the touring crowd.
I was frequently looked at, often physically examined, by men more familiar with the female anatomy than those young novices. There was a lot of chat about odds, I heard the word ‘favourite’ quite a few times.
Mid-morning, things quietened down somewhat, the spectators were taking refreshments, I, like the other girls, was hanging already weary, beginning to feel light-headed, becoming desperately thirsty. Suddenly a treble voice piped up below me, ‘Hey, you want a drink?’
‘Y-yes p-p-please!’ I croaked. A little oblate, in a scanty scapular above the knees, was holding a bucket in one hand, a sponge on a stick in the other. I knew, this was the rule, we crux-girls are allowed to suck a spongeful of water every three hours. I sucked mine eagerly, it certainly wasn’t just water, it had a strange, bitter taste, but it was welcomely wet.
The youngster looked up at me, with an engaging grin. ‘Are you Irish?’ ‘No,’ I replied, ‘Scottish – Crosshageul Abbey, just across the water – we can see Ireland from our tower on a clear day.’
I looked down at the welcome young visitor. I’d noticed this boy oblate scuttling around helping the gardener. But now when I could see below the strappy top of his scapular, I got a shock, this oblate had small, but nicely rounded breasts - he was surely a she!
‘Are you from a nunnery?’ I enquired. ‘No,’ she said, with an even wider grin, ‘I stay here.’ I was startled, ‘But this is a men’s monastery.’ ‘Yes, and I’m Brother Tasach!’
The gardener called, she had to scamper away, I hauled my body up for a few moments’ variation in the strain, sank, down, wondering.
The drink had refreshed me, I felt strength coming back into my half-numb arms, my ribs worked more freely, taking in welcome gasps of air. A warmth was beginning to return to my organs. But the sun was high, the day was growing hot.
After quite a while, there was another quiet spell as the monks chanted sext and the crowds enjoyed their lunchtime drinks in the shade. The warmth was filling my body now in quite a strange, unexpected way, this wasn’t something Abbess Ailsa or Sister Lucilla had told me I should expect – my woman-parts were throbbing, my breasts feeling full and eager to be touched, I wished those naughty boys would come back… But little Tasach returned, and knelt down beside my cross, pretending to do some weeding.
‘I’ll tell you my story,’ she said softly, but in a clear, musical voice. ‘My mum was a busy woman, she kept having kids, lots of us, I think I was number sixteen. Anyway, our dad just parked us in a horrible orphanage, where the nuns beat us and treated us like slaves. And they farmed us out as quick as they could to any abbeys or nunneries that would take us. The sister who was in charge of that was hitting the bottle day and night, she screwed things up and sent me here!’
She chuckled, so did I. ‘But didn’t the monks – er – notice?’
‘Course they did. But the abbot consulted the bishop and they agreed the Church doesn’t want any scandal, so they kept me here. So now I’m Brother Tasach, they call me the Celtic virgin!’
She looked up at me. ‘Eul,’ she asked (I liked the way she was so familiar), ‘are you liking it up there?’ I drew in a breath, ‘Like it? It’s bloody agony…’ ‘Yeah, course it must be. But still…?’ There was a sharp, intelligent look in her dark eyes, like she could see right into me, and a hint of longing too. I lowered my head, spoke softly, like it was a secret even to myself. ‘Yes, I do, Tasach, I do like it… it feels sort of, I don’t know… right…’ She smiled, ‘I know.’
She departed. Through the warm, sultry afternoon, I began to experience more, and ever stranger, pangs, not just in my woman-parts, but all through my naked, sweating body. My lips, my neck, my armpits, my inner thighs, every erogenous zone seemed to be tingling, electrically aroused. The flies crawling on my breasts, which had been maddeningly irritating earlier in the day, now seemed to be pleasuring me. The warm, dusty wind embraced me sensuously, the croak of the greedy crows sent a shiver of eager expectancy through my guts, the lustful eyes of the sex-hungry men, most fiendish of all, those of the Cardinal, melted my girl-flesh like candle-wax.
I was sighing, panting. Suddenly, while the Cardinal was fondling my thighs, I began to orgasm, a violent pumping shook my loins, he drew back, astonished, too late to escape being sprayed with a shower of pungent girl-juice. He looked displeased, wiped is face with his lacy cuff. I glared at him hungrily, ‘Punish me!’ I was hoping, longing to say.
Tasach was nearby, watching closely. One of the Cardinal’s retinue flicked his fingers, ‘Cane!’ She sprinted off to the shed, soon returned with a bundle of rods. The commotion had already attracted a small crowd, the sound of springy stick on sweaty girlskin soon brought more, as I squealed and leapt and squirmed under a rain of blows from a well-muscled monk, laying livid streaks across my abdomen, my breasts, my thighs and around my loins.
While he thrashed me, I leaped about on my cross, hurling my body to and fro, swinging forward and bouncing back against the wood, it should have been excruciating agony, the tearing of the nails my wrists and ankles, the vicious stinging of the canes – he broke two or three on me, Tasach solemnly handed him replacements - yet it was delicious, I was experiencing spasms of acute arousal deep inside me, not just in my sex, but throughout the whole of my writhing body, almost impossible to endure , yet they were of intense pleasure at least as much as pain, I was sobbing, ‘More! More!’
But the Cardinal seemed concerned that my chances of winning should not be compromised, he signalled my chastiser to cease. I continued shuddering, my whole body burning, the audience was gazing, astonished. Abbess Ailsa was standing beside the Cardinal, at last she spoke, in hushed and reverent tones, ‘Surely our sister has been granted the rapture of true mystical ecstasy. How gracious our Lord must be, to the visit this least worthy of his female vessels!’
They left me to hang gasping, yet my body was still racked with these wondrous, never-ending waves of sensuality. I knew I was weak, those who stayed watching must have thought I was approaching death, with my panting breath and shivering flesh, yet I was experiencing the purest bliss. Maybe this is heaven, I thought, maybe I am being seized up in the rapture of the saints?
I don’t know how long it was before I was brought out of my dreaming state by Tasach’s voice once more. I blinked, the sun was low, not many folk around, perhaps it’s time for Vespers? She offered me another spongeful, I sucked it gratefully, my heightened activity had made me fiercely thirsty once more – again, the taste was bitter, yet it had a mysterious richness that I liked very much.
‘Are ya feelin sexy up there, Eul?’ she asked brightly, I sighed, moving my hips in an instinctive affirmative, ‘Amazing, just amazing, Tas!’ ‘I know,’ she nodded. ‘What do you mean, you know? How do you know?’
She glanced around, nobody was near. Softly she whispered, ‘There’ve been all sorts of shenanigans going on Eul, I haven’t time to tell you half of it. But of course, there’s betting going on…’ I sighed, naturally, there would be. ‘Well, the gardener – I’m his servant, of course – he’s also the monastery herbalist, in his shed there’s a cabinet full of secret simples.’ I was listening, intently.
‘He’s been under pressure, of course, all sorts of bribery and bullying. He’s got a herb that can make sure whichever of you girl gets it, will live longest. And others that will speed up your death.’ I put two and two together, ‘So our drinking water was spiked? I thought it tasted weird.’ Tasach nodded, ‘Mm.’ ‘But that’s cheating, I don’t want to win that way!’
‘Well, you’re the favourite to win, Euly, you have been all along.’ Yes, I thought, I’d guessed so, I’d wished I wasn’t it only made me feel all the more under pressure. ‘There were lots of hints that he’d better make sure you win. But of course there are cannier folk, too, and the gardener’s one of them. He’s in cahoots with the novice-master, Paul the Silent – he’s got a lot to be silent about, but he’s good friend to me, I like him. Anyway, they’ve put a big bet on the outsider, Barbaria.’
‘So Barb’s had the long-life herb?’ ‘Uh-huh,’ nodded Tash, it was in the little red bucket. The drinks for all the rest of you was in the big green one.’ I sighed, I felt happy with that, feeling the way I did, I was ready to die in this strange state of bliss. Fuck the competition. ‘Hey, they’re coming out from the church now, I’d better be off,’ said Tasach, ‘There’s a bit more I’ve got to tell you, I’ll find a chance if I can.’
The evening wore on, there was quite a party atmosphere in the cloisters, and I was still full of the amazing warmth and wetness that kept me drifting between times of blissful semi-consciousness and periods of vigorous, wildly sensuous orgasmic striving, when my body was seized again and again with rushes of insatiable desire, only heightened by the excitement the outward signs of these aroused in the onlookers.
It was long after compline, time for the midnight vigil, before the garth grew quiet. I could hear some sighs, some moaning, but I thought some of the girls may be already dead, or deeply unconscious. But Barbaria’s cross, not far away from mine, was still creaking with her vigorous motion, I could hear her panting, plenty of life in her yet.
Through the shadows crept the diminutive figure of Tasach. ‘How’re ya feelin now, Eul?’ she asked softly from the foot of my cross. ‘Still lovely, Tas – but why am I still alive? Shouldn’t that herb have worked by now?’ ‘Ah, well…’ I looked down, her eyes sparkled in the moonlight, ‘I hit a bit of a problem.’ ‘Well, two or three more girls turned up to be crucified than we were expecting, and when I’d given all of them their drink with the die-quick herb in, you were the last and there wasn’t any left.’
‘So, what did you do?’ I enquired, a little suspicious now. ‘Well, I went back to the shed and told the gardener, and he just said, fill another bucket and put a pinch more herb in it.’ ‘And?’ ‘When I went to his cabinet, the die-quick herb jar was empty, he’d used the whole stock. But there was another jar next to it on the shelf.’ ‘And what was in that?’ ‘Um, er – well, I thought, Euly’s a nice girl, I’d like her to enjoy her last few hours…’
I peered down through the darkness, the moonlight shone on her wide-grinning face, she reminded me so much of the carving above the night-door at Crosshageul. ‘You little imp!’ I called, as she scuttled away into the night.
THAT DID IT !!!!!!! SCOTLAND WINS 
