Duchesses: The Humanity Game

A Brief Foreword: I (AlinaX) had an odd idea for a post-apocalyptic Earth bouncing around in my head, but I couldn't quite work out how to turn it into an interesting story. I invited Bazzle to take a look, and very soon the ideas were bouncing back and forth between us. This has proved to be an exciting and fertile collaboration, and there are lots of ideas left to feed into an eventual sequel.

Day 1: Greeting

"Ladies. Gentlemen. How lovely to see so many of you."

Duchess Melissa, standing on a makeshift stage outside Buxton's Grand Pavilion, wore a white shirt decorated with green leaves, and a blue skirt that failed to reach the tops of her black, fishnet stockings. Scarlet ribbons were woven into the clips that fastened the stockings to an unseen garter belt, and her shoes, blue like her skirt, were of course the high, platform stilettos much loved by duchesses. Her long, vividly red hair was ironed straight in places, and fell in tumbling ringlets elsewhere, and she could have been my age, or my mother's, or even my grandmother's. She looked young, but wielded the authority of age.

"To my left here," she said, indicating the pink-haired figure to her left, "is Duchess Nerine, and here to my right is Duchess Bethany." Bethany flicked her dark hair back and waved. She wore a scarlet jacket over a black silk dress, fingernails sharp and polished black. Nerine, in cheerful contrast, wore a pale blue summer dress with a white daisy pattern. In real life, I had only ever seen duchesses from a safe distance. To be facing these three immaculate beauties, to have them sitting in judgement over me, was deeply intimidating.

Of the three, Duchess Melissa was the only one who I thought I recognised. I'd no doubt seen her on television at some point. She was clearly the one in charge too. "Today is the first day of Testing. The first of five, hopefully, for those of you who complete the full course."

There were over two hundred of us standing at attention. An even mix of men and women, all of us adults for less than a week. I was wearing my new silk dress, violet and yellow, cut to just above the knees; a gift from my father for my eighteenth birthday and made by Ida Green herself. My shoes were my mother's, the same shoes she wore all those years ago for her Testing: platform stilettos with black leather straps. I felt taller than I'd ever felt before, but of course I was surrounded by women and men all perched on equally impractical heels.

I had been giggling all through breakfast at the sight of men in skirts and heels. It seemed an absurd requirement for the Testing, especially since I had never seen a male duchess - or any adult man wearing heels and skirt, for that matter. To force them to dress like women for the Testing could be only, I was sure, to humiliate them.

Duchess Melissa strolled back and forth, gliding effortlessly. She was close enough for the amber of her reptilian eyes to be seen clearly. "It's a warm, sunny day," she said. (There was a touch of sibilance to her words - "It'ss a warm, ssunny day" - that reminded me of Princess Caroline on the television.) "You will all be provided with water and snacks, and a map showing which areas of the town you are allowed to explore. Do not leave the marked areas."

There was a rustling of chiffon like a shiver of panic as we all understood our skill at walking in heels was about to be tested. Duchess Melissa put a finger to her lips, asking for quiet. "We have a treasure hunt for you." She held up a small white disc with a black something marked on it. "There are a thousand of these scattered about the town for you to find. We meet back here at the Pavilion at six, and you can show my sisters and I what you have found."

"Sounds easy enough," my cousin Isabel said five minutes later as she rummaged through the backpack and fished out the map. We'd each been issued with a small grey backpack. It was heavy with a large water bottle, but I guessed that as the sun climbed higher into a blue sky with only a few tentative wisps of cloud, we'd soon be grateful for the liquid refreshment. There were sandwiches too; and, importantly, the map.

"Depends how well hidden they are," I pointed out. "And are we supposed to find all of them, or is one each enough? Maybe those who have the most discs get to pass the Test. Although that seems a bit simple."

"At least we have the advantage," Isabel said, tapping her heels together and grinning. "Let's go, Julia." As I glanced around at the men, who almost all were taking slow, cautious, tottering steps, I had to laugh. I was twelve when my mother bought me my first pair of heels to practise with. Isabel got her first pair at ten. Men, if they practised at all, left it until the day before the Testing.

According to the map, we had the whole of the Pavilion Gardens, a large semi-wilderness with streams and a small lake. We had the area all around the Old Hall to explore too. There were so many narrow paths that we could follow away from the gardens. One that we explored took us along an old, cracked, tarmac road between crumbling houses and up to a hilltop with a grand view of the valley - and a rather ominous entrance to some ancient, deep cavern that we were not permitted to enter.

It was, in truth, a lovely day for a walk, but I'm sure we would have enjoyed it a whole lot more if we weren't in heels. Even my mum's expertly crafted shoes were soon rubbing against my feet that were not used to such exercise. What was worse was that the paths were not in good condition, being mostly hard earth laced with tricky roots and troublesome stones - and it was only by leaving these paths that we could find the treasures we were seeking. The little white discs weren't exactly hidden, but they did need to be searched for. Between the growing warmth of the day and the exertion of walking and hunting through undergrowth, we both soon had a sheen of sweat and a frequent need to halt for a rest and a drink.

One thing I was becoming increasingly conscious of was that there were no houses or buildings within the area permitted for the treasure hunt. Even the Pavilion was out of bounds. "I'm beginning to wish I went to the loo before rushing out here," I said. I'd gone before breakfast, but not since.

Isabel chuckled. "We'll just have to hold it in, I guess."

Maybe I could. It wasn't yet urgent, but there was a long day ahead of us. "Until when?"

We came across the trunk of a fallen tree that provided a convenient seat, and we sipped water as we peered between the trees. A quartet of women here, a pair of men there, several by themselves, all making slow progress in their heels and wearing expensive dresses that would have looked spectacular at a dance... but really didn't suit such a countryside treasure hunt. My own dress had been snagged by a number of mischievous brambles during the morning so far, and I was sure my parents would criticise me for not being more careful.

From somewhere close we heard giggling. "Oh, look," Isabel said, pointing.

I followed her outstretched arm to where the three duchesses were strolling alongside the river, down from where we were perched. They turned onto the bridge and paused there. Duchess Melissa's hair blazed like fire in the sunlight, and I wondered if it would burn my fingertips if I were to brush it away from her face in order to kiss her. "She's so pretty," I murmured.

"I guess. She's also an alien," Isabel pointed out.

"Half-alien," I corrected.

As if to prove some sort of point, the duchess interrupted my fantasy of passionately kissing her. In one smooth action, she lifted the hem of her skirt and squatted. We were treated to the sight of her bare bum cheeks, paler than the honey tan of her arms, chest and face. She wore no underwear save for the black garter belt, a fact confirmed by the glittering stream of golden pee that arced down from the bridge into the river.

There was no shyness to it. Duchesses Nerine and Bethany were equally unembarrassed, neither of them turning away to offer privacy, instead laughing together as they did likewise. I was ashamed of myself for not looking away, for staring at the three duchesses as they did what I had never imagined I would ever watch someone do. Ashamed too at the heat of arousal ignited within me.

The Coronation

When I was twelve, the whole of Appleton gathered to watch the Coronation on the big screen in the Hall. Like every television in the village, and there were a few, the big screen had a choice of three channels. News was a mix of national and local news and weather that was no doubt useful for someone but certainly not us as kids. Education had programmes about the natural world and science and, sometimes, history that showed clips of how we humans once nearly destroyed our own home through industrialisation and warfare. Entertainment was music and arts and adventure, and everything else to do with duchesses and royalty.

All three channels covered the Coronation. In honour of the event, the day was one of celebration and much food had been prepared for the evening's festivities - but the event itself was magical. My cousin Isabel, who was born on the same day as me but a hundred miles away, was staying with us for the summer. We sat together in the front row as we watched in awe.

It was rare to see the Queen. England's Princess Caroline was often in the news, and the duchesses of course, but to see the Queen was something quite special. The ceremony was held in Italy's ancient capital Rome, in the Colosseum. We had learned about Rome in history class and had seen pictures of the great theatre where gladiators had once fought for the amusement of emperors, but it had been transformed for the Coronation.

Tens of thousands of people were there, watching. Politicians and celebrities from all around the world filled the seats. Aunty Catherine had somehow managed to get an invite, and we were all hugely jealous. Isabel stared at the screen, studying the audience in the highest seats in the hope of a glimpse, but the camera was far more interested in the spectacle below, because upon the tiled floor of the arena knelt rows and rows of colourfully dressed duchesses, thousands of them.

I remember my father pointing at the crowd of duchesses on the screen and whispering to my mother, "Oh, look, it's you."

"Don't be silly," Mum said, blushing for some reason. He was joking, of course. My mother wasn't a duchess and she certainly wasn't a thousand miles away in Italy.

But for once, the duchesses were not the centre of attention. Closer to the central dais, the princesses sat on chairs arranged in a circle, the silver chair backs making a gleaming tiara about the central throne. They had arrived in a grand procession to a fanfare of trumpets. "There's Princess Caitlin of Scotland!" Isabel had shouted, and then we all cheered as Princess Caroline walked out a few minutes later. The princesses were all wearing white as if they were brides in some fantastic wedding ceremony, and whenever the camera zoomed in you could see the material was studded with pearls and crystals.

Last to arrive was Queen Hikari herself, wearing a deep blue dress with silver detail, with lipstick and nail polish to match, and her long black hair cascaded over her shoulders. She wore a crown of white gold and diamonds that shone with a thousand reflections, and though she had to be at least sixty years of age, there was little sign of it.

Gradually the crowd settled and the camera focussed on the throne. The Queen met the camera's gaze, and in so doing seemed to look into the eyes of the whole planet watching. "When our alien overlords arrived at Earth a century ago," she said, a hidden microphone capturing her calm voice with perfect clarity, "they were merciful."

Her English had an accent and that slight but distinctive sibilance. We had all heard this speech before, or variations on it, but to hear the words spoken by the Queen herself, and as her last words on Earth, gave them a new significance. "They destroyed our military with trivial ease, but spared the lives of all who surrendered. And then they left in peace."

Even as a child of twelve, I knew that for the lie it was. Even in the quiet village of Appleton, there were people who chafed at the bit and resented everything about the aliens and their ambassadors on Earth. It was rarely more than grumblings and mutterings.

"We are free to rule ourselves," the Queen continued, "under three conditions. The first is that Humanity must no longer develop and use weapons." That was only sensible, and I had seen enough old films in history class to know what terrible weapons Humanity had used in the past against themselves.

"The second is that Humanity must revere my sisters and I as your highest royalty." As children, we certainly did. Duchesses and Princesses were magical creatures full of colour and adventure that we saw only on television. As girls, we all wanted to be duchesses when we grew up, so that we would always have fantastic clothes and easy lives and be able to travel to faraway places.

And it wasn't impossible. "The third," the Queen said, "is that every young human, on reaching adulthood, must surrender herself to the Testing."

The Testing. The ultimate rite of passage. That subtle but deliberate gendering was because almost no men passed the Tests. Of course, very few women passed them, either, but it was necessary for all to try.

"Humanity has much to be grateful for," the Queen said. "Our skies are blue, the air is breathable, and our rivers and seas are clean of pollution. No longer do we slaughter millions through war and famine, and we have taken our first steps towards the stars. So let us offer our thanks to our overlords, and let us make the Earth a paradise for our children, and our children's children."

A great cheer went up from the crowd, and from our gathering in the Hall too. We had all seen pictures from before when the Earth was poisoned by Humanity's short-sighted eagerness to strip the soil and crack the bedrock in an unchecked lust for resources. We had seen pictures of terrifying weaponry, urban wastelands and deserts home to starving populations. Life was better now, more in balance with Nature, and people were happy for the most part.

"Today I leave you," Queen Hikari said, "and the crown passes to my successor: Princess Masika of Congo." This was greeted by us in Appleton with a quiet sigh of disappointment. We had hoped she would choose Princess Caroline to be the new Queen.

Princess Masika rose to her feet, approached the dais and knelt before the throne. Queen Hikari lifted the sparkling crown from her own head and positioned it carefully on her successor's. "Rise, Queen Masika," she said.

Even as the new Queen rose, a silvery craft descended from the sky to hover above the dais. It was a spaceship, and so large that it cast a deep shadow across the whole floor of the Colosseum. A bright column of blue light pierced that momentary darkness, and we all watched in amazement as Queen Hikari rose up the light into the belly of the ship.

Just as swiftly as it had arrived, the silver craft ascended again, and was soon lost to sight. The camera shifted back to the dais where Queen Masika now sat on the throne, and the crowd quieted in anticipation. "Queen Hikari has gone to the stars, and one day so will I. Until that day, I will guide you the best I can."

Again the crowd cheered, and this time the princesses leapt to their feet, and behind them the duchesses too, and quickly the arena was a riot of colour and movement and cheerful celebration.

"Wow," Isabel said, and I could only nod in agreement.

Day 1: Searching

"You're blushing," Isabel accused.

"Am not." My eyes continued to follow the duchesses as they adjusted their skirts, or dresses, and strolled away. They were soon hidden from view by the trees.

"You so are." She shook her head in mock disappointment. "I don't know why. My mum says they're all like that, pissing all the time on the streets of London without a care who sees them."

"I don't believe you."

Isabel shrugged. "My mum doesn't wear underwear, and she doesn't care who sees her pee. Sometimes, after a glass or two of wine, she even uses the duchess pot."

Aunt Catherine had a fancy duchess pot. It was a glazed, white ceramic pot on three stubby legs, with well dressed kittens playing inside and out. She kept the duchess pot pride of place in what she called the reception room, because that was the room where she would greet duchesses when they visited. Aunt Catherine was the sort of person important enough to get occasional visits from duchesses and of course she made sure everyone knew whenever one had stopped by.

We had a duchess pot too. It was a simple pot and was kept clean and close at hand, but it had never been used. "What if a duchess should visit?" Aunt Catherine would demand every time she stayed with us. "What if the Princess!"

"I'm sure Princess Caroline would be perfectly satisfied with a simple pot," my mother would reply indifferently.

Of course, duchesses never visited our house, and certainly the Princess did not - although, since my mother had five tattoos and not the three I had always believed, maybe there was a good reason for duchesses to drop by.

But the thought of Aunt Catherine using a duchess pot herself? Ugh, that was just embarrassing. "Have you ever used it?" I asked Isabel.

"Of course not!"

I might have believed her, had she not blushed immediately after. I had to wonder how many people - how many adults - secretly pretended to be duchesses and squatted over pots to pee instead of going to the bathroom.

Not my mother, though. My mother often liked to say, "Human civilisation gave us clean underwear and plumbed bathrooms, and not even our alien masters can take those away from us."

To me, the duchesses were such ethereal creatures it was hard to believe they needed to pee at all - but it was difficult to argue with the evidence of my own eyes. Seeing Duchess Melissa's pert, bare bottom and hearing the others laughing and joking had been quite a sexy show, at least in my mind. I hadn't even considered the possibility that the duchesses had no underwear on - garter belt aside - beneath their short skirts. My mother had drilled it into me from a young age that good girls always wore underwear, and a clean pair every day. In consequence, there was something very naughty in the idea of going without, and something even naughtier in that casual lifting of the skirt to do one's business.

So of course Isabel was right. I was blushing. I had my heart set on passing the Tests and hopefully, thereby, becoming a duchess myself. Would that mean I too would go without underwear and happily squat in public to do my business for all to see? I couldn't believe I ever would, but my imagination was working overtime to picture it, and that in itself was both exciting and shameful.

I also had a building urgency. "I still need the loo," I said quietly to Isabel, looking around in increasingly desperate hope while bouncing a little on the spot.

Isabel rolled her eyes. "Yeah, me too. Let's just keep exploring." Laughing suddenly, she added, "Duchess Irena visited my mother last week on my birthday. She stayed for a cup of tea and used the duchess pot right in front of me, right in the middle of asking me what I would be wearing to the Testing. After Duchess Irena left, my mother said, 'Isabel, you're an adult now. You can have the privilege of cleaning the duchess pot.' Some birthday present that was."

Of all the things to be jealous of... and yet I was. "What did it smell like?"

"Lavendar. My mum always kept lavender in the pot, and that's all I could smell."

As we searched high and low for discs, we kept our eyes open too for a secluded area for such necessities, squeezing our thighs together in an attempt to delay the inevitable. And we did find discs. Isabel spotted three, and I found two. They weren't exactly hidden, but you couldn't see them from the paths.

"The symbols aren't all the same," Isabel noted as we studied them. "These three have balance scales, that one is fish, and I have no idea what this is supposed to be."

"A scorpion, I think." There were no scorpions in England, but I remembered the tale of the scorpion and the frog from a book of illustrated fables I'd had as a child.

It stirred another memory too, one that refused to surface... and anyway, I had a rather more pressing distraction. "Izzy, we need to stop, I really need to pee." Indeed, I needed to pee so badly that when I'd stumbled over a root five paces earlier, a little dribble had escaped and I could feel it slowly trickling down my thighs - something I prayed Isabel would not see.

Isabel glanced around with a furtive smile. "You will be fine, I'll stand guard. No one will see."

We were off the path, no one else was nearby, and there were plenty of trees and bushes for cover. Even so, it was weird. More hot pee tickled as it trickled down my thigh. "I can't!"

"Sure you can. We can do it together, if you like..."

The Twins

Isabel's mother and my mother were twins, identical twins. There was a photo of them together on the day they left for Testing, and I could only tell which was my mother by her leather-strapped shoes. Two tall, attractive blondes who, with a little time in the sun and some expensive styling, could almost be duchesses - except for the human eyes.

Through a quirk of fate, Isabel and I were also born on the same day. We both took after our mothers and, when together, we were often mistaken for sisters. Blonde, blue eyes. Isabel was taller. I was curvier.

When I was twelve, my mother bought me my first pair of high-heeled shoes. They had chunky two-inch heels, were not particularly fashionable and wouldn't have lasted long if worn every day, but that was not their purpose. "One day, Julia," my mother said, "you will present yourself to a duchess, and you will want to do so with confidence and elegance."

"At Testing?" I asked.

"Perhaps even before. For boys it isn't important, but while you may not be an adult yet, you are no longer a child and by the time you come of age you will be expected to be proficient."

That was the year of the Coronation, when Isabel stayed with us for the summer. She and I had great fun dressing up and pretending to be duchesses, swinging our hips as we sashayed about on heels and tried to curtsy without looking silly. Or, more often, playing duchess and maid, where usually I had to be the maid and help Isabel dress up and do her hair. On the rare occasions she let me be a duchess, she would soon get bored and say, "Now I get to be Princess!" We were cousins and we were friends, but there was always an element of competition between us, just as there had always been an uneasy competition between our mothers.

For my eighteenth birthday, my mother gave me a pair of platform stilettos with black leather straps. I recognised them. They had always been in a box carefully packed in the bottom of her wardrobe, perhaps because they were far too impractical to wear about the village. "I wore these for my Testing," she said, "and if I passed the Tests in them, then so can you."

It was fortunate that we wore the same size, and that the quality of the leather was good. The shoes fit me well. The heels were higher than I was accustomed to, and the platforms thicker too, but they were shoes fit for a duchess. "If you passed the Tests," I asked her, confused, "why aren't you a duchess?"

"I could have been," she said, "that's true, but I turned it down - and even now I don't regret it. I wouldn't have married your father, and I wouldn't have had the best thing in my life: you."

She'd never been willing to talk about her Testing before. "But you could have been a duchess! Designer clothes every day, fine wines and exotic foods, adventures all around the world!"

"Those eyes, though," she said quietly. "They terrify me. I would hate to see eyes like that staring back at me from the mirror every day."

I studied my mother's blue eyes and tried to imagine them as amber, the black pupil a slit instead of round. The thought sent a chill up my spine.

"I did want to be a duchess, though. Cat and I both had our hearts set on it." Cat was her sister Catherine, Isabel's mother. "There are five days of Testing," she continued. I knew this, of course, but as my own Testing drew close I was glad to hear any detail that might help me to pass. "You must pass each day to proceed to the next, and each day passed earns you a tattoo."

Every duchess had five tattoos. This was common knowledge. The nature of the tattoos, and their precise location, varied according to the whims of the senior duchesses in charge of the Testing. "But that means you must have five tattoos," I said. "Since you passed all five Tests."

I knew about the red butterfly on her neck; that was never hidden, and was pretty. I had seen, on occasion, the golden dragon chasing its tail about her torso, an elegant design that she nevertheless preferred to keep concealed. And I had glimpsed once the White Rose of York on her left breast that seemed almost a declaration of love. "Where are the other two?"

"Never you mind," she said, blushing furiously.

I laughed and didn't press. "What about Aunt Catherine?"

She sighed heavily. "Only four. She's never really forgiven me for that."

Tattoos were important. I understood that from a young age. Ida Green, the dressmaker, had three tattoos and was always showing them off. Most adults in Appleton only had one or two, but Ida Green was the one the duchesses came to Appleton to see. Four tattoos was something special. With four tattoos, Aunt Catherine had the right to request an audience with Princess Caroline herself.

But five? Those in the highest ranks of society and government had five tattoos and were never shy of showing them off. If it was true my mother had five, she could have lived in London and argued politics with the Princess over high tea, but instead she lived in obscurity in Appleton, far away from England's centre of power.

"I have you," she said to me, "and that has always been enough. You mean the world to me."

Day 1: In the bushes

"Sure you can," Isabel said. "We can do it together, if you like?"

"No!" Squatting together was a little too much for me. "Just stand guard and don't watch." I moved deeper into the bushes, lifted my dress up around my waist with one hand and belatedly tugged my now rather pee-soaked lace underwear to the side with the other. I squatted awkwardly, the uneven ground and high heels making this a precarious balancing act as I tried to relax my bladder.

I didn't have to try hard. I was that desperate, after all, and some had already leaked out earlier. This time the floodgates opened and what I really wasn't prepared for was how loud it was, my pee almost like thunder as it splashed onto the grass and soil between my feet. I was hyperconscious of every sight, sound and sensation of it, and it seemed to go on forever.

When at last it was done, I had nothing to dry myself with. I considered using some leaves or moss, but what was the point? My underwear was already wet, and I wasn't willing to go without. I just hoped they would dry quickly in the afternoon heat.

Isabel had none of my shyness. When it was her turn, she didn't even wait for me to look away. She grinned up at me as she squatted to pee, and I was startled to see she was quite bare. Not only wasn't she wearing underwear, she was entirely without pubic hair. "Just like a duchess," she said with a dirty laugh as she saw where I was looking.

Again, horridly embarrassed, I turned my back to give her some privacy, whether she wanted it or not, and instead focussed on the one good thing to come out of this messy interlude: I'd found another treasure disc under the bush.

The Stars

Ask what the stars mean and people will mostly shrug. To most, the stars represent danger and dominance, because that's where our alien overlords come from.

Before the conquest of Humanity, we looked at the stars with wonder and hope. We fired telescopes into orbit to peer across incomprehensible distances, sent probes hurtling out to the edges of the Solar System, and explored our neighbour Mars with curious robots. Space was exciting and full of magnificence and romantic adventure.

That was not the beginning. For thousands of years, we studied the stars, seeing in them the workings of gods. We mapped out constellations to guide us in our study of the heavens, and to guide us thus in the unfathomable workings of fate.

We divided a year's worth of night sky into twelve, a number still honoured in hours and months, and those twelve had names and symbols with power and meaning. You could map the whole life of a human individual by studying the stars they were born under.

But then the aliens came and everything changed. So much was lost forever.

Day 1: Zodiac

"It's a crab," I said, studying the symbol. Without the fullness of my bladder as a constant distraction, I was able to focus long enough to piece together fragments of half-remembered history lessons. "There should be twelve in all."

"Oh," Isabel said. "So that's the Test. We have to find all twelve symbols."

"Yes... but that's impossible. There are two hundred of us and only a thousand discs." I would be amazed if even one person managed to find all twelve. Between us, Isabel and myself had found six discs but only four distinct symbols. "We need," I said slowly, trying to remember whether Duchess Melissa had said anything about this being an individual challenge. "We need to find people who have the symbols we're missing, and vice versa. Do this as a group."

Feeling a little more comfortable, even in rather cool, wet knickers, we set off on the hunt again, this time seeking fellow hunters to join us as we walked the many paths on the map. We collected David and Andrew, who were both from the City of Bristol and had been friends there. David had a lion and fish, and Andrew had twins and scales. We joined up with Sasha from Scarborough (a coastal town not far from Appleton) who had a bull in her collection of discs; and Fiona, from a small place up near the Scottish border, who had a ram in hers.

The six of us had lunch together, sitting on a crumbling wall with a view across the town. We laughed about the cruelty of there being no toilets we could use - an inconvenience that didn't stop us drinking more water. The sun was high and the day hot, and the hunt for treasure was hard work.

"It's fine for you men," Sasha said. "You just have to lift your skirts and aim into the bushes." We'd certainly seen more than a few men doing exactly that. "You don't have to do a whole balancing act with your skirts up about your waists." We'd glimpsed a lot of that too.

Fiona sniggered. "They're training us to be duchesses. By the end of the week, we'll be squatting in the gutters and not caring that everyone can see."

I squirmed uncomfortably at the image. "I hope not."

"And the dorm bathroom," Fiona continued. "So far, last night and this morning, we've been politely taking turns for the men to use it or the women. How soon before we're all using it together, sitting in a big circle chatting to each other as we pee?"

"I don't mind sharing," Isabel said with a smirk, staring at David's skirt. She adjusted the hem of her skirt as if to straighten the fabric, and in doing so succeeded in drawing his gaze to her subtly parted thighs. David blushed as he tried to conceal an unmistakable bulge.

It was a definite worry. Two hundred of us shared a single bathroom space with showers and even toilets that offered no privacy. It had been embarrassing enough when there were just women in there, but what if Fiona was right? What if we soon stopped caring about privacy and propriety and men and women all used it together?

And why did the idea of the six of us sitting in a circle, half-naked and having a pee as we chattered like friends, have the heat of arousal stirring within me again?

Day 1: Judgement

At six o'clock, we gathered outside the Pavilion, all two hundred and more of us, men and women both in pretty dresses and high heels. I was far from the only one with mud-caked shoes and a torn dress, hair in a mess, and a faint yet unmistakable, sour aroma of sweat and urine. The day had started clean and bright and full of excitement, but that was nothing but a memory.

The duchesses, on the other hand, exuded effortless perfection. "It has been a lovely day," Duchess Melissa said. "You have done well - very well - but there have been a handful of disappointments. You, you and you" - she pointed at three men - "thought you could do this challenge barefoot. Another fifteen of you came limping back early with sprained ankles."

She shook her head with disappointment. "If you're unable to master the simple task of walking in heels, you don't deserve to pass the Testing. I thank you for coming, but it's time for you to go."

Variously scowling or dripping tears, the group of thirteen men and five women made their way into the Pavilion. Duchess Melissa paid them no further attention. "Raise your hands and show me the treasures you found."

There was a quiet cheer from us all as we raised our hands with our bounties of white discs. "Impressive," Duchess Melissa said, "but I see a few empty hands and that is unacceptable. Those with none will go home with nothing. I thank you for coming, but it's time for you to go."

A woman with long, chestnut hair burst into tears as she hurried towards Duchess Melissa. "Please," she cried. "I had five, but they were stolen from me."

The duchess's expression was sympathetic. "Point out the thief to us."

"I didn't see them."

"That is unfortunate. Go now, and leave justice to us."

The brunette collapsed to her knees. "No! Please, Your Grace! It's not fair!"

Duchesses Nerine and Bethany ignored her protests and showed their strength as they lifted the protesting woman by the arms and dragged her kicking and screaming away into the Pavilion. Her squawking cries cut through me, because what if that had been me? What if someone had stolen my treasure discs?

But with that, another eight men and two women had been eliminated. By my count, there were now fewer than two hundred of us left.

Duchess Melissa sighed. "Such lack of dignity is distasteful." Her lips tightened with anger for a brief moment. "The rest of you - all except one - have passed the first Test, but let us see who is deserving of a dance with me tonight."

A thrill of excitement rippled through the gathering. We had passed the Test! There would be dancing! And maybe even a dance with the duchess herself. "Who found all twelve symbols?" she asked, and my hand shot up, as did Isabel's and Sasha's and Fiona's and Andrew's and David's. And so too did another.

"You," the duchess said, pointing to the other. "Show me."

An attractive woman with black hair in a ponytail stepped forwards to show a handful of white discs. "These twelve," she said, taking a selection and holding them out proudly, "are the complete set of zodiac signs."

"Damn," I whispered. "How did she manage that?"

Duchess Melissa made no move to examine the discs. "And which of these," she asked quietly, "did you steal from the poor woman I just sent home?"

I couldn't see her eyes. I saw only the guilty flinch of her arm as she understood she'd been caught. "I didn't -" she said, but the cold fury in Duchess Melissa's eyes dissuaded her from further denials.

"I thank you for coming," the duchess said, "but it's time for you to go."

With a wail of grief, the thief turned and fled into the Pavilion.

None of the rest of us dared make a sound. There is in the fury of a duchess something truly terrifying... but that fury passed swiftly and Duchess Melissa turned to us with a warm smile, her amber eyes fixing on mine for a long heartbeat that left me quite dizzy. "A group of six," she said. "Well done. I look forward to tonight."

As Duchesses Nerine and Bethany returned to stand beside her, she added, "Well done all of you. You will be called to the tattoo room when it is your turn. The Dance starts at nine. Bar's open the moment you get your tattoo."

Day 1: Tattoo

My father failed his Day One Test after another man tripped and fell against him. The duchess who judged him chose to be lenient. "Though I must send you home," she said, "you did well today and have earned the honour of a tattoo." He came home with a pale blue feather inked into his left thumb, tiny but exquisitely detailed.

We all loved him, but we all knew that he was not the most careful of men, and he often voiced in public his rebellious thoughts, especially after a few drinks down the pub. "Those damned aliens stole everything from us," my father raged one drunken evening. "We used to be able to travel all around the world, and talk to people in all its corners - instantly! We had libraries full of books, and rocket ships that went up into space..."

"Yes, dear," my mother said placatingly, never one to lose her temper. "But we don't need any of that, not really. The only thing civilisation truly needs is good plumbing - and you have to admit our alien overlords have not deprived us of that!"

Rebel at heart though he was, my father dutifully saved up for a year to pay for Ida Green to make me my violet and yellow dress. Beautiful, cut to just above the knees, made of fine silk, I'd managed to ruin it in the space of a day.

Those who had been sent home were gone already when we reached the dorms. Much to the annoyance of the men, the women claimed the bathroom space immediately and refused entrance to them. Isabel and I walked in to find it packed with women, some tidying themselves up in the mirrors, some on the toilet, some in the showers, the rest like us impatiently waiting their turns.

I was again desperate for a pee. I'd held it in for hours, preferring the idea of the sanitary conditions of the bathroom to squatting in the mud between the bushes. I'd also spent most of the afternoon wishing I'd brought a change or two of underwear with me, as I'm sure my mother would have insisted. "What's the point of me packing spare underwear for you, Julia," I could almost hear her saying, "if you're not going to take it with you?"

I was not happy. For such a large area, it was a loud, giggling and shrieking, claustrophobic swirl of naked and semi-naked bodies. I pressed my thighs together and gritted my teeth - which worked until Isabel tickled my sides. "Don't!" I shouted, flinching away, but the damage was done and I scowled at her as a gush of warm pee trickled through my panties and down my legs. Isabel giggled at this, causing herself to squeal as she also peed a little, and suddenly we were both laughing hysterically and forcing our legs together, trying not to pee all over the floor.

"Girls, do you mind?" Sasha asked, pointing at the growing puddle and at the same time trying to keep a straight face.

"What do you think the tattoo will be?" Isabel asked, once we managed to control our laughter. I shrugged - it was pointless to speculate - and to my horror, before I could answer, I heard my name being called over the tannoy. Isabel grinned at my predicament. "You'd better hurry..."

Scowling at Isabel, I left and made my way along the hallway to the tattoo room. My dress was torn, my shoes muddy, my hair in a state, and my panties and inner thighs were again wet with pee. I felt dirty all over, the smell of sweat emanating from my skin. I was entirely unprepared for whatever was about to happen.

Duchess Nerine was there, in her pale blue summer dress with its white daisy pattern, standing in the middle of the room, and behind her a long, segmented snake with polished metal skin, its movements sinuous and terrifying, black at the end like an eye or a mouth or a poison sac. "Clothes off," the pink-haired duchess ordered. "All of them. Put them in this." She handed me a cardboard box with my name printed on it.

Reluctantly, but obediently, I did as asked, burning with embarrassment as I removed my dress and bra, and set about peeling off my visibly wet underwear. Throughout, I felt her stare penetrating my soul. Duchess Nerine watched me intently with her alien eyes as I undressed and dropped my dirty, damaged dress and soaked underwear into the box. The contrast between us couldn't be greater. She was clean and confident, standing up straight, and was everything a beautiful woman should be, while I was a mess, naked and scrunched over, pressing my thighs together to try to quell the need to pee.

She placed the box with others against the wall. "Stand there," she said, pointing to the middle of the room.

I shuffled over and tried to keep my back as straight as possible as I stood naked and nervous, the serpent twining and twisting around me, the eye tracing every inch of my body with laser-like green light. This was a technology far more sophisticated than anything I had ever seen before. An alien robot, I guessed, something I had read about in stories but never really believed could be real.

"Part your legs," Duchess Nerine requested, "and stand completely still."

I did as told and parted my legs, fighting against every instinct. I stood still, or at least tried to. I fought every urge to bend over and wedge my hands protectively between my thighs. I held my breath in fear as the snake pressed against the bare skin of my thigh... Surprisingly, it was as soft as a kiss, and slowly circled the limb, sending electrifying tingles all through me as it moved.

Duchess Nerine touched the fingertips of her right hand against my neck, her mesmerising amber, slitted eyes looking into mine as her sharp, almost claw-like fingernails traced a path across my bare chest to my heart and circling around my breast. "Be still," she instructed again, her voice the purr of a pussycat, as her nails teased their way down to my ticklish side, ignoring my whimper of protest. "Be very still."

But it was impossible. Between the serpent kissing a swirling path about my thigh and the duchess's tormenting fingertips, I could hold it in no longer. I gave a soft cry of dismay as my pee leaked out - and this time there was no holding it in. The floodgates opened and urine burst out, splashing against my legs, against my feet, splashing loudly onto the floor - and all the while her gaze held mine.

It should have been a humiliating experience, but there was something magical about it, a perverse yet intimate moment shared with this beautiful duchess, coupled with the profound relief afterwards at having emptied my bladder. "All done?" the duchess asked with an enigmatic smile, bringing her fingertips to my left nipple for a brief, teasing squeeze.

Was I done? I could really have used some paper or a cloth to dry myself, and I was standing in a puddle of my own pee, but I was done. I was also profoundly conscious of everywhere she had just touched me and yearned for her to continue. Not trusting myself to speak, I nodded.

The metal monster retreated into a corner of the room. Duchess Nerine handed me a white dress and a pair of matching white ankle boots. "Wear these - just these - to the Dance," she said, and ushered me out of the door.

Naked, wet from the crotch down, and carrying the gift of clothing, I made my way back towards the dorm. I could still feel the echo of her touch, and whether it was that or what had happened, or whether it was being without clothes for everyone to see in the cool air of the passageway, but my nipples were visibly swollen.

Before joining everyone, I paused to examine the tattoo around my thigh. Twelve little black symbols in procession. The same twelve from the treasure hunt. I had been marked with the zodiac.

Day 1: The Dance

The bar was well stocked, the band was lively, there was a table with sandwiches and snacks, and everyone was dressed in white.

I was relieved but unsurprised to discover the boots fit me. The dress, however, barely stretched an inch below my bum, and the material hugged my curves in a way that left little to the imagination. Had I been wearing underwear, the lines of the fabric would have been visible. There was one thing almost proudly on display, and I could not hide it. My tattoo was visible, as was everyone else's. Little processions of black zodiac symbols, though for most people the chain was incomplete.

The huge octagonal hall filled and became a sea of white - people in improbably short dresses, and all without underwear. Such short dresses and the visible prominence of nipples would have been scandalous in Appleton, probably everywhere in human society, and it gave the atmosphere of the dance hall an erotic charge. The men were again dressed the same as the women, and with the extra height of their heels too, and I kept catching glimpses of their dangling genitals, something I could have lived without.

Being without underwear myself was also a new experience. Isabel, of course, had no anxiety over this predicament; for her it was relatively normal, I guessed, but I felt very exposed. And that was despite my earlier shock at realising I was naked in the hallway, that I was carrying clothes that could salvage my modesty, and that I was unwilling to risk dirtying them. The dress and boots were not merely white, they were a gleaming, pure white that any slight mistreatment might ruin. In the end, I chose to return with my head held high, as if it were perfectly normal for a woman to walk stark naked into a shared dorm - but that didn't stop me blushing bright red as I did so. To my relief, I was not the only person to make that choice.

Night was falling outside and the tall glass windows reflected the hall's interior. It was not yet nine but the band was playing something modern with a nice beat and people were venturing out. "Let's dance," Isabel said, taking David by the hand and leading him out onto the dance floor.

Andrew barely hesitated before turning to Fiona. The two of them had been increasingly friendly during the afternoon. "Shall we?" he asked, and she took his outstretched hand with a bright smile.

Both couples were quickly lost in the swirling crowd. With everyone dressed the same, it was only by searching the dizzying array of bobbing heads, a mix of blondes and brunettes and the occasional bright redhead, that you could catch a glimpse of a familiar face.

The mood generally was good. We had all survived the first day and had tattoos to prove it. Even if we failed the next Test, we could go home with pride. Those who failed to earn a tattoo faced a life of menial labour. For men, that might mean a life of cleaning sewers. For women, a life of hanging around bus and train stations.

The day before, Sunday, seemed a lifetime ago. The morning bus that took me from Appleton was almost empty, and I stared out of the window at the woods and hills as it wound its way slowly through village after village on its way to the City of York.

York was the furthest from home I had ever been, and the only city I had ever seen. Back in the old times, before the Conquest of Earth, the city was ten times as big, but it had shrunk back to its ancient walls - except for the large bus and railway terminal just outside. York is where I met up with Isabel, and where we awaited the much busier bus that would take us and a dozen other nervous young men and women across the hills to the place of Testing.

Here and there were echoes of the foundations of the old city, a half-imagined pattern in the soil and undergrowth. I tried to imagine a world with such overpopulation, where everyone had their own vehicles and everyone around the world was in instant and constant communication with each other.

I looked at the women who, like a gaggle of geese, strutted about around the bus station making lewd gestures and inviting intimacy. They were dressed like duchesses in bright and revealing clothing, but their faces lacked that ageless perfection, and there was no elegant grace in their movements.

Did the old world have such women too? I was sure it did. Perhaps, one day, the treasure disc thief and her innocent victim would be working some city terminal together, dressed like duchesses and charging a fee for something no real duchess would ever do.

I watched as Sasha again tugged her hem down a little. The dresses were precariously short and kept riding up with every step we made. I was sure this was a deliberate mischief by the duchesses. As much as I loved the sight of a woman's bare skin, it was irritating to have to keep adjusting my own dress to not reveal any more of mine. In Sasha's case, the white dress added a vivid note of contrast to her strawberry blonde hair. "Come on," she said, taking my hand, and I was glad to take it and follow.

I was not the only woman in Appleton to prefer women, but growing up I was often the only girl in the class to prefer girls, and that meant reluctantly pairing up with a boy during formal dance class. About the only girl I had ever danced with was Isabel, and she didn't count. She was my cousin, and I knew from her conversations about boys, she definitely wasn't into girls the way I was.

Sasha... was into me. Maybe. I couldn't tell. I was certainly into Sasha with her blue eyes and dusting of freckles, and she was only a little taller than me. She had an impish, teasing smile, and her Yorkshire accent was familiar and down-to-earth (unlike the Londoners, whose accents were posh or abrasive, sometimes both). We swivelled our hips and spun our shoulders and stamped our feet to the beat, and for the first time in my life I understood just how powerful the fusion of dance, music and company could be. I caught a glimpse of Isabel and David, their arms around each other, their hips grinding so firmly together, and it occurred to me abruptly that they might even be actually fucking each other - but surely not?

Surely not.

Suddenly dizzy, I turned away from the sight, away from Sasha, and found myself staring at a dress that was blood red instead of white. It was Duchess Nerine, her pink hair tied up, her lips blood red to match the dress. Duchess Nerine who had earlier looked so deeply, so intensely, into my eyes as I did the most unladylike thing possible.

She stepped close, and held me closer, her hands on my thighs and teasing higher. Our breasts pressed together through thin fabric and her lips hovered tantalisingly close to mine. I could feel the tickling warmth of her breath, but she didn't kiss me, she merely held me close as she swayed to the music, her cheek against mine, her hands holding me with the intimacy of a lover. "Where did you get those shoes?" she murmured, her lips by my ear.

Her perfume was delicate but it made me want to drown in her. "My mother," I said, wondering if there were any laws against kissing duchesses.

"She was a twin, yes?"

I pulled back, startled. "How -?"

Duchess Nerine laughed, but there was sadness to it. "We were Tested together. We could have been duchesses together, but -" She sighed, and pulled me close again.

Had I tried to guess from her appearance, I would have said Duchess Nerine was no more than twenty-five. If she was really the same age as my mother, that made her forty years old. It was one thing to know the duchesses stayed looking young, quite something else to be confronted with that knowledge.

Ida Green

There were three men in Ida Green's life. She called them her husbands, and perhaps they were. Most often she lived alone, working late into the night with her apprentices on some commission or other. She was a famous dressmaker and the one person in Appleton who received frequent visits from duchesses.

Michel DuPont, a French man who lived in Paris, was one of the three. He would come once a season with a trunk full of dyes in glass jars, and he would stay a week or more, delighting all who would listen with tales of life in France and gossip about Parisian duchesses - who, to be fair, sounded a lot like English duchesses but did seem to enjoy a degree of notoriety. "Duchess Céline," he told us once, "has stolen the President's wife away from him. It seems the woman has a penchant for being spanked, and the duchess, naturally, never hesitates to oblige."

Bryn Davies was another, a Welsh man who would spend months at sea, travelling as far as St Petersburg one year and Cairo the next, returning home with a chest of rare and precious gemstones that Ida would sew into her grandest dresses. Bryn would spend the winter in Appleton, and if Michel visited the two were inseparable, laughing and drinking at all hours.

Far quieter, ironically, was John Bellows, a Londoner who traded in silks and cottons and visited one a month or so bringing bales of fabric. We did not see much of him, for he would stay only a day or two and spend most of that time with Ida Green in her bed.

This unusual marriage was a delicious source of gossip for us Appleton, but it wasn't scandalous the way it might have been once. While there were still those who insisted that a true marriage could only be between a man and a woman, for reasons that ranged from reproduction to God, the duchesses regarded such views as borderline heretical - and few dared to argue with them.

"You can talk about the duchesses," my mother would say to me, "you can tell tales about them, and even dress up like them, but it is important to stay respectful. Remember always that you are not a duchess, but one day you could be."

No, we weren't duchesses, and if there was one clear manifestation of our simmering resentment against them, of Humanity as a whole against its alien overlords, it was in our modesty. Let the duchesses have their extravagance but humans knew how to dress and behave properly.

We normal humans certainly didn't pee in public or wear dresses that hid nothing. There was no rule against fucking, so long as you were consenting adults, but you did it in private (and saw the doctor about contraceptives, if needed). That was the natural order. The correct way. As my dad would often say (with a whispered 'don't let the aliens hear' aside and an answering glare of disapproval from my mum): the superior human way.

The duchesses, by this measure, were unnatural. You didn't dare say it, but in time, you would believe it.

As children, we loved the duchesses. Or us girls did, at least. We wanted to be them, to wear their bright clothes and be effortlessly beautiful, and get to see the whole world. Ida Green would sometimes give us scraps of brightly coloured material to make dresses for our wooden dolls.

Appleton was far from the city and it was rare that any duchess might pass through. Duchess Annabelle was the most frequent visitor, coming to Ida Green's shop to buy shirts and dresses. "Thanks to Her Grace's patronage," Ida was often heard to say with great pride, "I can afford the finest fabrics, and the most fashionable colours too!"

I never needed to present myself to Duchess Annabelle, but did spy on her from a safe distance a few times. She was very pretty, with long, dark hair in tumbling ringlets, and seemed to glide effortlessly on her platform stilettos. The colours she wore were bright and different with each visit, and after her visits all the girls and young women in the village would plead with Ida to make them similar clothes.

So it was a gift beyond measure for my father to buy me a dress from Ida Green. The violet and yellow silk garment was simple in comparison to the works of art she made for the duchesses, but it meant the world to me.

And I had managed to ruin my most treasured possession in the space of a day.

Day 2: Betrayal

On Tuesday, the second day of Testing, I awoke to discover a box by my bed. We all had boxes. I opened mine to find my mother's shoes, clean of mud, and my beautiful dress, cleaned and mended carefully. There were scars, of course, a memento of the previous day's activities, but the dress could be worn and I was grateful to the unknown seamstress. There had to be a small army of people working in the background, washing and mending, providing food and drink, setting up the next day's Test.

My bra and panties had not been returned. I wasn't concerned about that - my mother had made absolutely sure to pack me a month's supply of clean underwear and I had plenty to choose from - but there was a note in my box also, handwritten with flawless calligraphy, and it read, "No need for underwear, fair Julia. It will only get wet. N."

No sooner had I read it than Sasha snatched the note out of my hand. Her bed was on the other side of the hall from mine, but she'd solved that problem by sleeping in mine - for a while, anyway. The bed was barely big enough for one person, and with the heat and humidity we were soon uncomfortably warm. I doubt I'd have got much sleep either. The smell of her, the heat of her, the way her hair kept tickling my nose...

"Let's see who's making you blush," she said, and held the note out of my reach as she read it. "Duchess Nerine, of course." With a grin, she returned the note and I held it protectively. "Her hands were all over you last night."

It had only been the one dance together, but it had left me completely flustered. So much so, indeed, that it had taken me a good few pounding heartbeats to notice she had left me with my dress up around my waist.

The Dance had gone on late into the night. The duchesses had been there only a short while, long enough for a formal dance of advancing partners and I found myself being spun by Duchess Melissa for a turn. "Did you enjoy the show today?" she murmured in my ear, and was onto her next partner before I could string two coherent thoughts together.

The next time I saw her, she was standing on the bar. "Ladies, Gentlemen," she called out, bringing the music and dancing to an abrupt halt. "Tonight is for celebration. Tomorrow will be the second day of Testing, so be sure to get some sleep. My sisters and I look forward to seeing how you perform. Goodnight!"

She jumped down, adjusted her dress, and as the three duchesses linked arms and made their way out, the band launched into a popular new song. The crowd sang along, and Duchess Nerine winked as she passed me. I half turned, wishing I could follow her out.

Before I could summon the courage to do that, however, Sasha's arms circled me from behind. "Jules, the stars are bright tonight," she said. "Let's go for a walk."

All around me, it seemed, women were kissing men and men were undressing women. There was more naked flesh than dresses on show. What had been subtle before was now growing feverish. I was witnessing the sexual frisson of two hundred new adults - powered by alcohol, and unsupervised - who had just passed their first and most essential Test. I understood, and felt the same euphoria myself, but also I wanted no part of this hedonistic indulgence.

"Yes, let's," I said, and followed Sasha out of the Pavilion, out under the night sky. As we walked, the sound of the band diminished, giving way to the rustling of trees and the babbling of the stream. We found ourselves on the same bridge the three duchesses had stopped on, and I turned to look at Sasha, the red of her hair just discernible in the moonlight.

There was a definite chill to the air, but I didn't care. "Look," I said, pointing up at the stars. "The centaur. Sagittarius, I think." The last of the twelve that we'd found that day.

Sasha's hands found my hips and pulled me close - she wasn't that interested in the sky, she had other ideas - and under those stars, we kissed. Somehow, amazingly, after a lifetime of wondering whether I would ever find someone to hold me with the warmth of a lover, I'd found myself both the focus of Duchess Nerine's mischievous intent and in the tender embrace of Sasha, a mere human - and all the more precious for that. There was no comparing the two women, but if I had to...

If I had to, then I would say: If Sasha was a stroll in a flowery meadow on a summer's day, then Duchess Nerine would be a walk along the edge of a cliff in a gale-force wind: thrilling and terrifying in equal measure.

Sasha's lips were calm and heavenly, and I wanted nothing more in that moment than to keep kissing her. Nothing more. Just a long, delicious, increasingly passionate kiss. We stayed out there alone together as the sky turned above us.

Isabel avoided Sasha and me at breakfast and then ignored us in the dorm. She had one focus. She and David were laughing and kissing, and I wondered just how far they had gone the night before. I didn't want to know the answer.

There were a lot of hungover expressions, and many, men particularly, were stumbling on their heels as we gathered in front of the stage by the Pavilion. The three duchesses were bright and beautiful without a hair out of place in the morning sunlight. Duchess Melissa wore a green dress, Duchess Nerine wore a dress inspired by an old-world sailor's uniform, blue with white trim and a bright, red tie. Duchess Bethany, by contrast, was in black and scarlet again.

"Good morning," Duchess Melissa said cheerfully. "Today will be more competitive. It's a lovely sunny day, so you'll be outdoors again. Same map and areas as yesterday, but this time the treasure you're seeking is materials for making a raft."

The only thing I could remember about rafts was drawings of logs tied together with rope, and that sounded like a lot of hard, dangerous work for someone wearing high heels.

"You will be working in teams of four, gathering materials in the morning, making the rafts after lunch. And there will be a final competition, and that means all but fifty of you will be going home tonight."

There was a collective intake of breath as we all absorbed that terrifying statement. Fifty left out of two hundred! So few!

"You now have fifteen minutes to form groups," Duchess Melissa said, and the three duchesses turned and strutted off towards the river.

Immediately I turned to look for Isabel, sure that she would wish to team up again, but she and David were hand-in-hand and talking to Fiona and Andrew.

Sasha pulled me to the side. "Forget her. You and me, okay?" She squeezed my waist comfortingly.

I nodded, relieved. "Who else?"

Sasha chuckled. "Trust me. Wait here." She darted into the crowd and I quickly lost sight of her. I looked across at Isabel, who glanced back at me with an icy expression. It hurt. It cut me like a betrayal - but if so, who had betrayed whom, and how?

The seconds ticked by as I stood there alone, people all around me forming into quartets. The level of chatter increased as I searched the crowd anxiously for Sasha, choosing to trust her when every instinct told me to hurry and find a team, any team, to join. I paced back and forth, unable to stand still, and for a brief moment considered running to the bathroom to use it one last time. I had a feeling this second treasure hunt would be a lot more competitive than the first.

I gave an audible cry of relief at seeing Sasha again. She had two men following her. "This is Adam," she said, indicating the taller, "and this is Rose."

I stared at Rose in confusion. I had noticed him - her? - the day before, startled by how slender and effeminate he was, and by his confidence in heels. I shook my head to try and adjust my thoughts. I had heard there were people like this, who looked like one but - inside, where it mattered - were the other. "Hi, Adam," I said, shaking his hand. "Hi, Rose," I said, shaking hers.

The other thing unusual about Rose was her dress. Most of the men wore dresses that were cheap, simple and ill-fitting. Almost all wore black or some shade of blue. Most hated to wear them at all, complained constantly about having to, and hated their shoes even more. Rose's dress, in contrast, was a bright fuchsia with ruffles, and the straps of her shoes matched in colour. It was a flirty little dress and I had to admire her confidence in wearing it.

"Adam and Rose are cousins," Sasha explained. "From Oxford."

I could see the resemblance. Both had dark hair, although Rose wore hers longer, and they had blue eyes and similar facial features. "I've heard it's beautiful there," I said. "All those old college buildings."

Adam shrugged. "It's beautiful, yes, but a lot of it is falling into ruin. The university trades on former glory, but it is a shadow of what it used to be."

"Almost like a ghost town," Rose added, "and you can still see the destruction from the Conquest. Most of the newer, industrial parts of the city have been demolished and the duchesses have turned the land about the rivers into parks and orchards, so it is beautiful, but it's also a reminder of what we lost."

I shifted uncomfortably on my feet. This was dangerously close to rebel talk. There had always been rebels, of course, and likely always would be. There were always rumours of underground laboratories and workshops where rebels developed weapons. Perhaps such places were real, or perhaps they were fantasies dreamt up by the discontented.

Rose laughed sadly. "Don't worry. I'm not a rebel. It's just that the beauty of Oxford is bittersweet."

The three duchesses returned to the stage, Duchess Melissa cradling a strange, long tube or instrument in her arms - a horn, I realised, as she positioned it in front of her. "I will blow this alphorn to start the hunt, and I will blow it again when it is time to gather at the lake. There's a pack for each of you over there." She pointed to the long table laid out with supplies for us. "Are you ready?"

Duchesses Nerine and Bethany punched the air and shouted, "Ready!"

Duchess Melissa put her lips to the mouthpiece and, after a deep breath in, blew...

... filling the air with a deep, sonorous sound.

Day 2: Searching

We agreed to split up, Sasha and I heading out in one direction, Adam and Rose in another. The mission was to find things that could float, and stuff that we could use to bind what we found securely together. We would work out if it was of any use at the end. The sense of urgency had all the groups hurrying and searching, plucking bamboo canes excitedly out of bushes.

The canes came in various lengths and thicknesses, some only as long as our forearms, some taller than me. Here and there, if you looked carefully, were stretches of cord wound about the branch of a tree; some bits were almost uselessly short, but there were a few real treasures too. Sasha and I tied them together into two long cords that we used to bind our growing collection of canes together.

Far harder to spot were the black, rubber tubes, about the length of an arm. The first that I found I mistook for some waste from the old world that had escaped the gardeners' notice. It was half buried in the mud, after all, and I was almost scared to touch it in case it was alive.

"Yuck, what is that?" Sasha asked as I slowly lifted the slimy black thing from the earth and cleaned it with leaves.

"I think it's rubber," I said, opening the tube carefully. "Like bus and tractor tyres, but softer." The more I thought about it, the more unlikely it seemed that the tube was here by accident. "If we tie the ends and fill it with air, it should float on water."

It had rained in the early hours of the morning and the ground was often slippery away from the paths, and treacherous beneath our heels. We had a lot of reaching up to do, and a lot of bending over, and I was conscious every time of how exposed I was. Conscious too of how exposed Sasha was, and as we clambered around, her green dress kept lifting to offer me glimpses of her bare buttocks and her trimmed, strawberry blonde pubes. Her cheeky grins and brief, unsubtle glances down at me were proof that my own blonde pubes were all too visible.

The sun was out and the day warmed quickly, and the wonderful freshness of the early morning developed into an unwelcome humidity. Together with the searching and carrying, we quickly built up a sweat. Knowing what to look for, I succeeded in finding three more of the rubber tubes by the time we met up again, mid-morning, with Adam and Rose.

As proud as I was of my discoveries, they had done even better. Adam and Rose returned to the agreed rendezvous point (that same bridge where I had kissed Sasha the night before) carrying between them a log as thick as my leg. Had it been placed upright, it would have been easily twice my height. "Where did you find that?" I asked.

Rose laughed. "It was pretending to be a real tree. Fell over as soon as I pushed it."

We rested for a while, ate sandwiches and drank water. I had made sure to go to the bathroom before we gathered outside the Pavilion, and could probably hold on until the afternoon if necessary, but I certainly wouldn't survive until the evening. With every sip of water I took, I considered the inevitable moment that I would have to go do the other.

Sasha giggled. "I know exactly what you're thinking. Do you pee here in the bushes, or wait until later and everyone will see you squatting over the lake or running to the bushes?"

"Or just do it wherever," Adam said. "If the duchesses don't care who sees them do it, why should we?"

I could feel my cheeks burning from all this talk of peeing. Apart from anything else, I still wasn't comfortable with the lack of underwear. Sasha and I teasing each other with glimpses of our intimates was fun, but the idea of revealing myself to Adam or any of the men made me cringe inside.

Rose laughed awkwardly. "I've never liked anyone seeing me do it," she said.

"Exactly," I said, but couldn't stop thinking of how Duchess Nerine had looked into my eyes and how excited I was as I 'did it' right in front of her.

Sasha offered to stay and guard our pile of treasure and I joined Adam and Rose. We really wanted more of those logs, but luck was against us there. I scowled at the sight of Isabel and David carrying one back to their cache.

We did find more rubber tubes, though, and had a laugh at a team of four men shoving and rolling a huge section of a fallen, half rotten tree trunk - an impressive sight, but made comical by the short dresses and sharp heels.

Adam was the first of us to lift his dress for a pee. He barely bothered to hide it either; without warning, he halted, grabbed his limp cock, and aimed it into the bushes. Rose was more circumspect, squatting behind a bush to relieve herself.

"Why do you do that?" I asked, thinking that if I had a cock I wouldn't bother with squatting.

"Because I'm not a man," Rose said, "and it makes me uncomfortable to act like one."

"It must be difficult," I said after a minute of thought-filled silence.

"Yes," she agreed. "But if I pass the first three Tests, I can apply for surgery. The duchesses can remake me the way I should be."

I hadn't known that. People's motivations in the Testing were various. For many it was just to get that first tattoo and be recognised as full members of society. For some it was political ambition, knowing that the more tattoos you had, the more favours the duchesses were willing to bestow.

I was in it for the chance to become a duchess myself, and not just for the pretty dresses and adventures that came with it. As exciting as we all, as girls, found duchesses to be, the reality was that duchesses were not human. You had to give up your human life to become one. You had to leave behind friends and family and even the chance to ever have a human family. Faced with that sacrifice, most chose to remain human.

But Rose wanted something profoundly different. She wanted the chance to become who she truly was, a transformation beyond the scope of human medicine. "We'll get you there," I said. "But first..."

I took my turn behind the bush and, after checking the coast was clear, squatted down. I was rather glad this time not to have to worry about underwear.

Day 2: Raftwork

The clear and unmistakable sound of an alphorn brought our increasingly futile hunt to an end. Carrying our large collection of rubber, strings, cane and one log as best as we could between us, we made our way to the lake and battled with the fifty or so other teams for space at the bank.

Duchess Melissa stood on a high podium with her alphorn. "Ladies, Gentleman," she called out, "you have three hours to build a raft with space for all four members of your team."

Her red hair was like flames in the bright sun, and the temptation to try and peek up her green dress, to see if she was as fiery a red there too, was irresistible. I couldn't tell, though. "At four o'clock," she continued, "the challenge will begin. You must be able to circle the lake, and you will be timed. The twenty-five fastest teams will then compete again."

I looked at our team, and at our gathered treasure. Was it enough? The pressure was on.

Duchess Melissa wasn't finished yet. "No one is to leave the lakeside until the Challenge is complete, but you are permitted to remove your shoes and, if you wish, all your clothes. Are you ready?"

From somewhere behind me, I heard Duchess Bethany shout, "Ready!" and Duchess Melissa lifted the horn to her lips and blew.

Adam and Rose knew far more than us, and Sasha and I were happy to delegate the engineering to them. "We'll use the log as a keel," Adam said, "and we'll need to lay the longest canes crosswise on top." He picked out half a dozen of the longest canes. "You three use the short cords to bind the rest into a mat big enough for us all to sit."

It was nice to have someone to tell us what to do. Some teams were taking it less seriously than ours. The four-man team with the tree trunk had only a few canes and bits of string, which they were using to fashion paddles. Others were taking it very seriously. One team even put up a mast and, I presumed, would make a sail out of their dresses. Which didn't make a lot of sense to me, because while there was a gentle breeze, that would only help in one direction.

While Adam cleaned the rubber tubes and experimented with ways to seal air inside, we three women sat together untangling, tying and braiding cord. Rose taught us some new knots. "This is a bowline," she said, demonstrating the big, looping knot several times, "and this is a clove hitch for the canes in the middle," which was a little easier to get the hang of, "and, most important, the stopper knot."

As the afternoon progressed, and the mat slowly took shape, I felt more and more confident. Sasha and I sat close, our knees touching, both of us pretending not to notice that our dresses had ridden so high up our thighs that we were not hiding anything from sight. We shared smiles as we continued our work, sure that we would not be the reason for failure.

Back before the Conquest of Humanity, runaway industrialisation had damaged the atmosphere to such an extent that people had to use special creams to protect them from the sun. That was one reason amongst many to be grateful to our alien overlords. I could, if I wished, strip out of my clothes and bathe in the sun's revitalising heat without fear for my health. I could, but of course I didn't. Society frowned on casual nudity, and I was still wincing internally from having walked naked into the shared dorm the evening before.

Isabel, however, was not so shy. Nor Fiona either. Nor David and Andrew either, and their cocks were entirely too much on display for my liking. "Nice to see them working hard," Sasha said with a giggle.

They were not the only ones to undress. It made sense, in a way, especially once we started assembling the raft at the edge of the lake. "Watch out!" I cried as Sasha bumped into me and I fell into the water.

"Oops," she said with a huge grin, and helped me back onto solid ground. My dress was soaked through and clung so tightly to my skin it left nothing to the imagination. I scowled at her, but it was impossible to stay angry.

Sasha and I had only just met, and yet I felt almost a kinship with her, one that was strangely lacking with Isabel. My cousin's sudden coldness towards me was baffling and frustrating, but so was her willingness to cast aside the strictures of society. In a way, I understood it. This week of Testing was not merely a week away from home, it was a week away from society itself. The Tests themselves forced us to behave in ways that would never be acceptable in the human world. It was, perhaps, the one chance in our lives to be truly wild.

But still, watching her clamber across their half-built raft, it upset me to see her fingertips brush against David's cock, seemingly by accident... but of course it wasn't. I did, on the other hand, get a secret, guilty pleasure from the thought that my breasts were much larger than hers - even if I was far more reluctant to show them off for all to see.

I tried not to keep staring at Isabel. There was plenty to hold my attention while trying to help my own team build the raft. I also tried not to stare at Duchess Nerine, but my eyes kept being drawn to her blue sailor dress and braided pink hair. She was sitting on her own, out on a chair on a well constructed raft in the middle of the lake, watching us all. At one point, I found myself transfixed by the sight of her with her legs spread wide, holding the hem of her dress up as she casually sent a glittering arc of pee gushing into the lake. After she was finished, she adjusted her dress and, I am convinced, turned to wink at me - making me jump with the shock of my observing her being discovered.

The afternoon sun was fierce and the heat and the work had us all drinking a lot of water. Duchess Nerine was not the only person I'd seen doing their business into the lake - there was nowhere else to do it, after all. But it was while watching the pink-haired duchess that I decided I would not be relieving myself again that afternoon, no matter how desperate I might get. The discomfort of that sacrifice would, I hoped, be worth it.

Day 2: The Race

Again the alphorn blew, and we all turned to look at Duchess Melissa. "When I call your number," she said, "you will have two minutes to get your raft to the black and white pole."

Duchess Bethany had given each of the teams a number, drawn randomly from a bag. We were Team Six. The black and white pole was in the water close to Duchess Melissa's podium. There were red poles and blue poles sticking out of the water all around the lake. "When I call your number a second time, you must make your way around the lake as fast as possible," she explained. "Stay inside the blue poles, and outside the red."

With my eyes I traced the path we would have to follow. It seemed simple enough. "If you fall off the raft into the water," she continued, "don't bother to climb back on. I thank you for coming, but it's time for you to go."

For the second time that day, she had managed to shock us. A lot of smiles were abruptly wiped off faces. "Once everyone has had their turn," she said, "we do it again in the other direction. You have ten minutes to prepare, and then the first number will be called."

We were ready, except for Rose who was using our last bits of string to strengthen our makeshift paddles. Adam had decided to cut up one of the rubber tubes and tie the pieces to meshed canes to make more effective paddles. The other six he had managed to inflate and seal, and these were tied beneath the edges of the raft. We'd tested it too, and we could all squeeze onto it and stay afloat - which was a definite relief after seeing three other rafts tear apart under the weight of their whole team.

"We're in with a chance," Sasha said.

"Maybe." I was looking at the square and very solid-looking raft that Isabel was perched on. She was sitting there naked, seemingly without a care in the world, Fiona beside her, while their two men worked on some finishing touches.

Seeing where I was looking, Rose snorted. "Ours will be faster."

"If it stays together."

"It will."

If I was startled by how many of us were now naked, Sasha found it liberating. "I'm hot and uncomfortable in this dress," she said, tugging it off over her head and tossing it over onto the grass. Sasha's gorgeous body was the perfect thing to take my mind off Isabel, and I stared up admiringly at her. Had we been alone, my hands would have been all over her. My lips would have tasted every part of her. "Beautiful," I said.

"She certainly is," Adam agreed, stripping out of his dress too with a sigh of relief. Men weren't my thing, but it was a good body, toned and muscular, and his cock was, in my very limited experience, a respectable size. "I didn't want to be the only one."

I glanced at Rose, but she shook her head, and I was relieved - but Sasha was too determined for me. "Come on, Julia. Let everyone see those tits." And she tugged on my dress until I relented and allowed her to pull it up. "There," she said after. "What do you think, Adam?"

"Ah, very nice," he muttered, his face turning red. I tried to ignore the way his cock twitched, but I could feel my cheeks burning too.

I was saved by the distraction of Duchess Melissa calling out, "Number Three!" The Challenge had begun.

Number Three turned out to be the four-man team with the tree trunk. They had built a framework around it to balance it, but getting it to the starting position by the black-white pole within the two minutes allowed required all four of them to climb off and push it. A minute into this struggle, Duchess Melissa called out, "Number Six!"

"That's us!" I shouted, and we all shuffled into position. Rose handed out the paddles and Adam used a long cane to push against the lake bed. And we were off, thrusting at the water with our paddles.

"Nice and slow," Rose warned. "The last thing we want to do is break the paddles, and you want to save your strength too."

Sasha and I were at the front, sitting cross-legged; Rose and Adam behind. It felt like everyone was staring at our breasts as we propelled the raft forwards, as if we were the ship's figureheads, but it was too late to worry about that, and I was too busy to do anything anyway. I looked across at Duchess Nerine, who gave a little wave with her fingers.

"Number Three: Go!" Duchess Melissa called. "Number Seven: Ready!"

The men had climbed aboard their trunk, and they gave a great cheer as they launched into action, pushing at the water with paddles made of bark and cord. They made it maybe ten metres before the stabilising framework broke apart, and with cries of sudden panic they rolled sideways into the lake.

"That's four teams gone already," Adam noted.

Behind us, Isabel's team was manoeuvring their square raft into position behind us. Our eyes met briefly, and she scowled at me. "Why?" I wanted to ask. "Why do you suddenly hate me so much?" But the question would have to wait.

"Number Six: Go!" Duchess Melissa called. "Number Twenty: Ready!"

"Keep it calm," Rose said with authority. "Keep it steady."

It was good advice too. I could feel my paddle protesting in my hands, and concentrated on sweeping it through the water in a slow, steady motion. I was glad too that I had removed the dress, because once I stopped caring about people staring at me, I felt a profound freedom in being naked. Having Sasha naked beside me was wonderful too, and we kept glancing at each other and grinning.

Slowly, surely, we made our way around the lake, keeping inside the blue poles, outside the red. With every stroke of my paddle, I could hear or feel the canes creak and the cords strain. I cast nervous glances at the knots, half expecting to see them unravelling before my eyes. We were uncoordinated with our paddling, the raft lurching sometimes to the left, sometimes to the right, the platform we sat on often dipping below the surface so that water washed around our hips. At first that made me panic, but I soon began to enjoy the delightfully cooling waves that would swirl around my bare thighs, before flowing off.

Thankfully it stayed afloat, but the circling of the lake seemed to take forever, and my arms were aching. I kept expecting to see Isabel's raft catching up with us. Rose had been correct, however. We were faster, and returned to the starting pole a good three minutes ahead of them.

"Well done, Team Six," Duchess Bethany said. "Take a breather, but do keep out of the way of the others."

Duchess Melissa was still periodically calling numbers to bring new teams into position and set them off. Out on the water behind us, Team Twenty had lost one of their number - a naked brunette, pretty if rather bedraggled, was hoisting herself out of the water onto the grass - and Team Seventeen's raft had broken in two, although surprisingly no one yet had fallen into the water.

By the time the last raft completed its circuit of the lake, six teams had been lost entirely to the water, leaving wreckage in their wake, four more hadn't made it even to the starting pole, and three other teams had lost a member but had made it to the finish. The Challenge was only half complete, and already over forty of us had failed the second Test and could be seen gathering their clothes and making their way disconsolately through the trees in the direction of the Pavilion. "At this rate," Sasha said, "we'll all end up going home tonight."

I grabbed her hand and squeezed it, as much to reassure myself as her. "We'll be fine."

"Teams Nine, Thirteen, Fifteen," Duchess Melissa called out, continuing her deadly count up to fourteen teams in all, "I thank you for coming, but it's time for you to go."

We were through to the next round! Either side of us were cries and quiet, grumbling complaints and even tears as another fifty or so young men and women reluctantly grabbed their shoes and clothes and began their journeys home, leaving abandoned rafts and paddles in their wake.

There was something cruelly arbitrary about the Testing. The number of tattoos we achieved during this first week of adulthood would impact the rest of our lives. But in the first Test we had been judged essentially on an ability to walk in heels, and the second Test seemed to be about teamwork and determination but with a huge element of luck. Many of the people who had been sent home would probably have thrived in business or excelled at university, but a scholarship was only ever granted to those with four or more tattoos, and it was difficult to succeed in the marketplace without at least three.

So far, however, we'd been very lucky.

We'd all been drinking water as we sat panting from the exertion of the first row around the lake, and as we gradually recovered our breath and strength, and as we bathed in the hot sunshine... but I could feel the slow building of pressure within and tried to limit my intake. Sasha, keeping herself cool, had her legs dangling in the water and had no such concerns. Laughing quietly, she parted her thighs and let it burst out like a miniature waterfall. I was close enough to hear that distinctive hiss, and close enough too that I could have run my fingers through the warm stream - but I didn't.

Just as I didn't look to see if Duchess Nerine was watching - but I was sure she was.

Day 2: Overboard

"Ten minutes," Duchess Melissa called out, "then you go again, this time in the opposite direction. Clockwise."

Rose was busy mending the paddles, tutting and muttering to herself as she did her best to strengthen them. She was the only one on the lake wearing a dress - apart from the duchesses, of course. "Four teams have lost a member," she said, "which may actually make them faster. One less person to paddle, of course, but they will be lighter in the water too."

"Quite a few of the teams have been working on better paddles too," Adam noted. "We were one of the fastest in the first round, but we can't take it easy now."

I was worrying about something else. "I think these tubes have lost some air. We're lower in the water than I remember."

And I was right too. We all worked together to detach them from the raft so that Adam could blow them up and reknot them. That took time, though, and Duchess Melissa was soon calling out numbers again - not ours, thankfully.

In the end, we were the last raft to be called. "She's reversed the order," Sasha said.

"Good," Adam said, struggling with the last tube.

I shook my head. "Not so good. That will put Isabel in front of us."

Rose frowned. "We can get past them."

"Maybe," I said.

"Team Seven: Ready!" Duchess Melissa called.

"Almost done," Adam said. "Almost."

"Team Twenty: Go! Team Six: Ready!"

"Adam!"

"Ready," he said.

Quickly we all scrambled back onto the raft and Rose handed out the paddles. Trying to remain calm, we propelled ourselves towards the black-white starting pole where Team Seven was already in place. Isabel gave me a dark look, but I was concentrating on working my paddle in rhythm with Sasha.

"Team Seven: Go!"

We drifted into position with seconds to spare. Most of the other teams had already completed their second circuit. Only one had failed at the second attempt, the same that had split in two the first time; this time the two half-rafts had been too damaged to save their crew.

"Team Six: Go!"

And we were off, paddling much more smoothly together this time, and with greater determination. We had a goal, not merely to finish, but to finish fast, and that meant catching up with the raft ahead, and overtaking.

"Keep it steady," Rose chanted. "Keep it calm."

I was too aware of Isabel, however, and she was too aware of me. The red poles and blue poles that we had to navigate between made getting past Team Seven a challenge, made more difficult by Isabel's clear desire to stop us. "Go right!" she shouted at her teammates as we aimed that way.

"Do we go left?" I asked.

"No," Rose said quickly. "Trust me. We'll pass them on the inside, but the moment I say 'Left' I want you to go left as fast as you can."

That made no sense to me, but I chose to trust her. We were close behind Team Seven as we passed between the second set of poles. "Left!" Rose shouted, and Sasha and I immediately tried to steer the raft to go past on the outside.

"Left!" Isabel shouted in a panic, and the raft in front of us swung to block our passage there.

"Right! Now!" Rose shouted, and Sasha and I reversed what we had done before - but this time the two rafts bumped together and spun round each other, bringing us past on the inside.

A paddle smacked into my face and I screamed, dizzy with the sensation of falling into the lake - but a hand grabbed my arm and pulled me upright again. Rose's strong hand. There was a scream and splash from behind me, and I turned to see Fiona in the water. And my paddle was lost too, drifting away from us.

It was up to Sasha now to paddle for both of us. My face stung from being hit - I still didn't understand what had happened, but we had overtaken Isabel's raft and there wasn't any immediate danger they would catch up.

Day 2: Judgement

"History," Duchess Nerine said as she dabbed at my face with cotton wool soaked with some clear liquid, "has a habit of repeating itself."

"My dad always says that," I agreed. Then again, he also insisted that aliens invaded Earth every five thousand years. "Who built the pyramids if not aliens? And before that, it was Antarctica!" My mother, on the other hand, insisted that history was written by the victors, and victors were very selective with the truth.

For the second time that afternoon, everyone was staring at me, this time because a duchess was cleaning blood off my cheek while I stood there naked and dripping wet. And more than a little in need of a pee, but I hoped she wouldn't make me lose control of that while everyone watched.

"Cat and Lizzie came to the Testing full of excitement, both enthusiastic about passing all the Tests and becoming duchesses together." She was talking about my mother, I realised, and Aunt Catherine. "They were identical twins, as close as two sisters could be, but Duchess Caroline took a liking to one and not the other."

"Duchess... Caroline?"

"She is Princess Caroline now, of course, but then she was still a duchess and it was her turn to run the Testing. There was a subtle difference between the twins. One was a little shy where the other was daring, and there is a particular joy to be found in teasing the shy ones."

"The way you tease me?" I dared to ask.

She ignored the question, and instead waved some instrument across my cheek that made my skin tingle. "Cat was not happy that Lizzie received so much attention. Lizzie had no choice in the matter, of course, but Cat accused her of cheating, of working her way into the duchess's affections as a way to pass the Tests more easily."

"That wasn't fair," I protested, standing up for my mother over an accusation that was a generation old.

"No," Duchess Nerine agreed. "But when Lizzie passed the fifth Test and Cat didn't, there was such a screaming fight between them it echoed from the hills."

That seemed like an exaggeration, but it did get me thinking about Isabel and myself. We had been cousins and friends, close almost as sisters, until abruptly we weren't. Why?

"Because you danced with me." Was that it? Had Isabel seen this strange flirtation between Duchess Nerine and me, and seen it as history repeating itself? Was Isabel angry because she thought I was flirting and cheating my way through the Tests? If so, this momentary intimacy with Duchess Nerine would only solidify that belief.

"You should be more careful, Julia," the duchess said, packing up the first aid kit. "Were it not for Rose's quick reaction, you would be on your way home right now."

And that was frighteningly true. My thoughts kept circling back to that moment of terror. The harsh whip of the paddle against my face. My helplessness as I fell towards the water, out of balance, nothing to grab onto. Rose's strong grip was like an anchor holding me steady.

Fiona had not been so fortunate. No one had reached out in time to save her. We were friends the day before, and despite whatever was going on between Isabel and me, my instinct had been to go and rescue her - which was absurd, of course. It was already too late for Fiona. She had failed the Test, and no amount of tears or pleading could undo that.

But I still couldn't quite work out what happened in that brief collision of rafts that had caused Fiona to fall, and had very nearly ended my chance of ever becoming a duchess.

"Well," Sasha said as we watched Duchess Nerine climb onto the podium with Duchess Melissa. "Something's going on between you two."

"She was friends with my mother," I said evasively.

"That would explain why your nipples are so hard," she replied dryly, and I glanced down guiltily. My nipples were indeed swollen, but my arousal went far deeper and lower than that.

Sasha laughed. "I'm just glad you're okay. Otherwise I might just have killed Isabel tonight." There was a note of fury in her eyes that said this was no joke.

I frowned in confusion. "Isabel?"

"Isabel hit you on purpose," she said with exaggerated patience. "There is no way that was an accident. She did it with so much force that she lost her balance and fell against Fiona. It was like watching tumbling dominoes. Poor Fiona ended up in the lake."

"Ohh," I said, finally able to piece together the scene. Isabel had tried to push me into the water. I wouldn't have believed it but for Duchess Nerine's tale of our mothers. That was why she had told me to be careful. Be careful of Isabel.

I looked across at my cousin, hoping to look into her eyes and see something that disproved this conjecture, but she was nestled against David's chest with his arms securely around her, facing away from me.

"Ladies, Gentlemen," Duchess Melissa called, and I tried to dismiss Isabel from my thoughts. If she had tried to get me sent home, she had failed. My dream was still alive. "We are impressed with all of you here who have built and raced rafts today, but this was a race and sadly some of you will be going home."

Sasha took my hand and clasped it tightly as we waited to see where the axe would fall. "Teams Two, Three, Twelve, Eighteen, Twenty-Nine," the duchess announced, and listed several more. "I thank you for coming, but it's time for you to go."

I breathed a sigh of relief. We were through. "Yes!" Sasha shouted, and grabbed me for a long, deep kiss.

But we were too full of energy to stand still. I grabbed Rose and caught her in an embrace. "Thank you for saving me," I said, and then the three of us were jumping and laughing while Adam watched us dancing and bouncing together with an amused smile.

Around us, another fifty people were glumly collecting their clothes from amidst the wreckage of hastily built and well used rafts, and heading toward the Pavilion. Many of them were men and women I had spoken to in the dorm or at breakfast. All did at least have one tattoo, but all no doubt had hoped for more. A few of the women, like me, had dreamed of being duchesses and left distraught in tears. It was Fiona I genuinely felt sorry for. Just as happened to my dad in his Testing, Fiona had fallen through no fault of her own, and yet the rest of her team had made it.

"You are free now to leave the lakeside," Duchess Melissa finished. "We will begin calling you to the tattoo rooms one hour from now. After that, the night is yours. The bar will be open, and we will see you all again tomorrow."

What a sight we must have made, forty-nine naked youths barely into adulthood, and one not so naked, all jumping up and down in excitement, catching each other in embraces. As the tension of the competition transformed into the euphoria of victory, all that naked flesh, all those bouncing breasts, became a visual feast of sexual possibility. I was not alone in having such thoughts, I could tell by the jutting vigour of swelling cocks. Almost as one, by silent agreement, we all snatched up our clothes and shoes and ran to the trees, abandoning the rafts we had worked so hard to create. Out of sight of the duchesses, there was freedom to give vent to the euphoria of another Test passed. David and Isabel were not the only couple I glimpsed in a tight embrace.

Sasha and I found our way to the bridge again, kissing, caressing. "Don't," I whispered.

Her fingers continued their teasing quest higher up my thigh. "Don't what?"

"Don't..." Her eyes showed the hurt as I reluctantly pushed her hand away. I was genuinely enjoying her touch, and her intent. "Keep doing that and I won't be able to hold it in."

Sasha frowned in obvious confusion. "So don't. I don't mind - or go first, there are plenty of bushes, if you're still too shy."

That wasn't what I was shy about. I hadn't told her about my embarrassing moment with Duchess Nerine the evening before, and I certainly wasn't about to tell her that I was hoping for a repeat. I had to hold it in, even if I could feel the echo of Sasha's touch like imprints in my skin, but it was Duchess Nerine's fingers I was thinking of, slowly teasing their way higher, and higher, up my inner thigh, not Sasha's...

Day 2: Tattoo

I was relieved to see it was Duchess Nerine again who would be supervising my tattoo. I'd heard from the others that there were three tattoo rooms. Duchess Melissa had given Adam his zodiac tattoo, and Duchess Bethany had given Rose and Sasha theirs. None, as far as I could guess, had had quite the experience I had had with Duchess Nerine.

"It's mending nicely," she said, examining the scars on my cheek that still stung a little, but there was a smirk playing about her lips as she had me remove my clothes yet again and place my dress and shoes into a box. It was a smirk that said, "I know why your hips are so agitated. I know you had plenty of time to go to the bathroom. I know you want me to do what I did before."

She positioned me in the centre of the room and the great snake began its examination. This time I was not afraid of that mechanical instrument. I was, if anything, afraid that I had overdone it. My bladder was on the point of bursting, and nothing would be worse than losing control that way. I craved a moment of connection with her again, no matter that it was utterly perverse.

And I knew she could see. There was a playful cruelty in the way she studied me. The cold mouth of the serpent kissed my belly, the tickling electricity made me whimper with the effort to keep the floodgates closed, and at last the duchess took pity on me. She pressed a finger against my lips. "Be still," she warned.

The robot was slowly describing a circle on my belly, but I was lost again deep in Duchess Nerine's alien eyes. Keeping her finger pressed against my lips, the fingertips of her other hand followed a delicate, teasing path from my hip to my waist, and down, down to the most intimate part of me, brushing through my trimmed pubes to those other lips. I murmured a word of complaint, but her one finger against my lips made my words unintelligible, and her other fingers below pressed deeply into me.

The circle on my belly was almost complete, but I hardly noticed. I felt utterly in the power of the duchess's fingers. "Be very still," she said, but how was I supposed to be still when she was describing circles about my clit with a very precise fingertip. My whole world collapsed down to her eyes and that point of pleasure. I was a clockwork doll with a spring inside, and she was winding me tighter, and tighter.

The metal snake whipped away, but Duchess Nerine continued that methodical winding. Had she stopped, I think it would have broken me. I needed her to continue. I needed her to break me with some fatal ecstasy. I needed her...

"Is this what you wanted?" she asked, and I dared to nod. "Then what are you waiting for, Julia?"

Oh, she was cruel! And I was at the point where I literally couldn't hold it any longer. With a helpless wail, I let go. My pee gushed out, splashing through her fingers, splattering against my legs and tinkling on the tiled floor around my feet. More and more poured out, a seemingly endless stream, flowing out of me as I looked deeply into her eyes and she into mine, her fingertip maintaining its determined pressure continuously circling my clit, oblivious to what I was doing, pushing me mercilessly, swiftly, to the point of oblivion.

My knees wanted to give way. I nearly fell as convulsions swept through my body, and instinctively I reached out and clutched at her for support, my arms grabbing her upper arms, my forehead pressed against her shoulder as I panted for breath. Waves of radiating ecstasy tingled throughout my body, coupled with the euphoric relief of a finally emptied bladder. The lingering shame of this shared, perverse pleasure. With my head resting on her shoulder, I was so close to her that the exquisite scent of her perfume on her neck filled my senses.

"Good girl, Julia," she murmured, and kissed my scarred cheek. "But you really should be more careful. Duchess Melissa would have bent you over her knee and spanked you for making such a mess. Do it a third time, and I may just have to spank you myself..."

If she hoped to dissuade me with that, she would be disappointed. That 'good girl' was like electricity racing along my nerves. I stood up straight and focused on her, looking once more into her mesmerising amber eyes. "At the very least," she added, "you should get down on your knees and lick my shoes clean." She pointed down, and my eyes followed. Duchess Nerine's shoes had blue straps and white platforms and heels, matching her sailor dress, and her toenails were painted white with little blue anchors.

Her words made it sound like a suggestion, but when I looked up into her eyes again, there wasn't a trace of humour. "Yes, Your Grace," I said, and lowered myself down onto my knees, in the middle of the great cooling lake of my own urine. As I knelt there, feeling dirty and a little absurd, my fingertips absently traced a circle on my belly, and I finally remembered to see what the new tattoo was: a green water serpent, chasing its own tail.

Duchess Nerine's foot tapped impatiently in the puddle at me, and with a not unhappy sigh I bent down to kiss her wet toes and lick her shoes and feet clean of every trace of my pee.

Day 3: An Inside Game

One advantage of so many being sent home was all the empty beds. Sasha and I chose two beds next to each other and pushed them close together so we could talk, and touch, and kiss, and spend the night together but also separately.

We awoke to a steady fall of rain and kissed each other good morning, kissed some more as we showered together, then went to breakfast and ate accompanied by the gentle thunder of constant rain. One moment it might be a light drizzle with hints of sunshine in the distance, and the next it would be torrential, almost a deluge that turned the ground outside the Pavilion into a river, but never once did it stop. When we gathered in front of the three duchesses to learn the day's Test, they were on a stage inside the Pavilion, the curtain of rain behind them. Fifty of us had survived the first two Tests: thirty-two women and eighteen men.

Three whole days had passed since I climbed aboard the little bus that began this adventure. In three days, I had earned two tattoos, fallen out with Isabel, fallen in with Sasha, discovered I could be naked in front of other people without the world ending, and found myself playing a very dirty game with a beautiful duchess. I hardly recognised the person I was becoming.

Duchess Nerine was wearing a teal dress made from some glossy material, her pink hair ironed straight, her glossy high-heeled boots the same shade of pink. Duchess Bethany was again in black and scarlet, although this time the scarlet dominated. Duchess Melissa's dress was a cascade of silver sequins that dazzled like a thousand stars. "Ladies, Gentlemen," she said. "Good morning. Luckily for you, today... is an inside day. Follow me."

We followed the duchesses through to the large, octagonal hall where the dance had been on the first night - and stared in open-mouthed silence at the structure we found there. A small army must have been busy during the night. There were tubes everywhere, interconnecting, some vertical, some horizontal, some at angles. Most were transparent in places, although there was nothing inside to be seen.

My heart sank. "Oh, no," I whispered. This was the same Test that my friend Tessa failed on, although failure was not quite the word.

"Scattered throughout this structure," Duchess Melissa explained, "are exactly one hundred rings. To pass the Test you must find four rings. If at the end of the day you have three rings or less, then I thank you for coming, but it's time for you to go." There were fifty of us and only one hundred rings. At most, only twenty-five would pass the Test. At least twenty-five would be going home. On the face of it, it was a game of chance. The reality was far crueller.

"You have two minutes to prepare yourselves," the duchess said. "Shoes off. Everyone for themselves. The record is eighteen minutes; see if you can beat that."

I pulled Sasha aside, and we were quickly joined by Adam and Rose. "Listen," I said quickly. "We split up. Get as many as we can. Don't stop at four. We meet up at the bottom again in an hour. The goal is to get sixteen between us, understood?"

Adam and Sasha nodded slowly. "What if we don't?" Rose asked.

"Then one or more of us is going home tonight." Inevitably, the rings would all be found and those who were left inside would have one or two rings each, maybe three. Tessa had had two rings at the end, and had chosen to give them to a friend so that one of them at least would pass. That, ultimately, was the true nature of the Test.

"Ready?" Duchess Melissa called.

"Ready!" shouted Duchesses Nerine and Bethany.

"Go!"

Day 3: Snakes and Ladders

I found the first ring within five minutes. I raced up a ladder, its flat, rubbery steps gripping my bare feet securely, crawled along through a glass tube to another junction and another ladder, and climbed to nearly the top of the structure. Tubes branched off in four directions and I picked one at random. This was a tighter tube, and increasingly twisty too, and if it had been a dead end I would have struggled to work my way back out again.

I almost didn't see the ring itself. Tessa had said the rings were golden bands that fit easily about her wrist, so I wasn't looking for tiny, polished steel rings that wouldn't fit a finger. Had it been a little bigger, it might have fit on my pinkie, but even so it would have been an ugly ring, with a steel ball in place of a jewel. Shrugging, I clasped it in my hand, and continued to squirm along through the tight tube.

Suddenly the tube angled down and I found myself slipping, faster and faster, screaming as I slid down past other tubes and ladders, until the chute levelled off and I skidded through a wide basin with a shallow depth of water. I screamed again, expecting the water to be freezing, but it was neither warm nor cool.

With the ring still clutched protectively in my hand, I climbed up into the nearest tube - and immediately climbed out again. My hair and dress were soaked through, and climbing and crawling in a wet dress just wasn't clever. Cursing again, I rolled the clinging dress up and off over my head, and gently wrung some of the water out before placing the folded dress out of the way on a convenient ledge.

'Snakes and Ladders', Tessa had called it, and I had just met my first snake. If Tessa too had ended up crawling through this maze naked, she certainly hadn't mentioned that part to me. Wet and bare, I had no pocket to keep the ring in, so I braided it into my hair for safekeeping, and with a sigh, climbed back into the tube and crawled along it in search of another ladder to climb.

I'd had a much more pleasant bathing experience the night before. Sasha and I had gone out to the lake, stripped, and waded in. We were alone out there, at least as far as we could see. It was getting dark and there could have been a dozen lusty young couples doing whatever in the bushes, for all we knew. The air was still warm despite the hour, and the water too was still warm from the heat of the day, and there was hardly a breath of air.

Amidst the rafts, and the wreckage of rafts, we swam and we kissed and we talked. "My sister's a duchess," she said. "Two years ago she left for her Testing, and that was the last time I saw her. A week later we received a letter from her, informing us that she had passed all five Tests and accepted the offer to become a duchess. 'My heart breaks that I will never see you again,' she wrote, 'but it is an honour to be chosen, and this is now my destiny.'"

"An honour to be chosen," I echoed. Perhaps soon, very soon, I too would be writing those words.

"That's why I want to be a duchess," Sasha said. "To see her again. To be with her. Even though it means our parents will have lost two daughters to this honourable destiny."

I heard the bitterness in her words, and understood. "We talk of surrendering our humanity as if it is an honour. We talk of destiny as if it is inevitable. Perhaps the rebels are right and we are allowing pretty dresses to seduce us into betraying our own species."

We were silent for a long time, looking up at the stars as we floated quietly on our backs. "Do you really believe that?" she asked eventually.

"No," I said. "But Isabel does. I think."

She rolled over and her feet found the lake bed, the water rippling beneath her breasts as she caught hold of me. "Please Julia, no more talk of Isabel, or of duchesses." Her hand found its way between my thighs as she kissed me, her fingers teasing me beneath the surface. "We came here to finish what we started earlier."

I was still feeling guilty about that: on the bridge with Sasha after the raft race, kissing, her hand delving between my thighs, her fingers pressing into me. I'd wanted her to continue, but my bladder was achingly full and it was Duchess Nerine I was saving that for. But that was the past and I was with Sasha again, just the two of us, a simple, human romance beneath the stars.

But again, with Sasha, I could not escape my obsession with the duchess. The memory of being on my knees, licking my own pee from Duchess Nerine's feet, was vivid in my thoughts. The smell of her feet, the texture of the leather straps of her shoes, the lingering ache of need. I loved being with Sasha, but the heat that had been kindled within me was a hunger for my tormenting duchess. Sasha wanted me, and I wanted to give myself to her, but a part of me belonged to someone else.

In the cold light of day, that all seemed overly dramatic. Sasha was now my friend and a lover, a human lover. To Duchess Nerine I was nothing but a dalliance, a naive young woman to tease for a few days. There was nothing real between us, just a fantasy of an impossible connection. It was time for me to stop playing the fool. What mattered was passing the Tests, and with that in mind, I looked up, took a deep breath and climbed ladder after ladder, crawled along one tube and wriggled through another, and with a cry of triumph found a second shiny ring.

Day 3: Rats in a Maze

Scattered here and there in the maze of tubes were bottles of water, for which I was profoundly grateful. Even naked, climbing ladders and crawling through pipes was hot, hard work. I was sweating and my arms were aching. Judging that an hour had passed, I slid down a chute to land in the pool there, and sipped water as I rested and waited for the others to appear.

I knew they would, eventually. I had caught glimpses of them all through the glass walls of the tubes. Sasha and Adam had been naked, her breasts bouncing beneath her as she crawled, his cock swinging as he climbed. Only Rose was still dressed, despite being soaked through, and she'd looked utterly miserable. One by one we gathered in the pool, first Adam, then Rose, and finally Sasha - who caught me in an embrace, laughing as she kissed me.

"How many did you find?" she demanded.

"Three," I said, showing her the rings braided into my hair.

"Same," she said, opening her hand to show me. "That's clever. Can you do my hair like that?"

Rose and Adam had each found one. Rose looked on the edge of tears. I took her hand in mine. "We keep looking. There are still rings to be found." There was no certainty of that, but I wasn't ready to give up yet.

I spent a minute braiding Sasha's hair, binding her rings securely, and was rewarded with a soft, warm kiss and a playful squeeze of my bottom. "Thank you," she said.

We'd wasted enough time. I pointed upwards. "Let's climb."

Again we split up. My hope was that we had all been making the same choices and searching the same tubes. The number of times I had found myself stuck behind someone crawling frustratingly slowly, with an entirely too intimate view of their exposed genitals, was as disturbing as it was occasionally erotic. While my large breasts and bum sometimes made squirming along the narrower tubes something of a challenge, almost everyone else was taller than me and struggled in other ways.

On one occasion later, I found myself staring at a very familiar sight. "Would it help you to go faster if I spanked you?" I asked.

"It might," Sasha called back with a laugh.

I didn't spank her, but I did take the opportunity to kiss her bare, round cheeks and breathe in the raw, gorgeous aroma of her wet pussy.

The night before, we had made love by the lake. I did what I had only ever dreamed of before, kissing her breasts and sucking on her nipples, gradually working my way lower. I was tired of sneaking peeks at her pussy with its corona of red hair. I wanted to bury my face in it. I wanted to smell her, and taste her, as I had never tasted anyone before. That traitorous part of my mind wondered what Duchess Nerine's pussy looked like, and whether the alien in her gave her a different taste and smell entirely.

But Sasha's was exquisite, the smell of her arousal driving me wild as my tongue explored her delicate folds and swirled teasingly about her swollen clit. She tasted delicious. She was also very wet, and not just from the lake. I knelt there and drank mouthfuls of her as she sighed and shook beneath me, and only the cramping of my tongue persuaded me at last to stop.

In the confinement of the tubes, and with the clock against us, it just wasn't possible to do that again - though with my mouth just inches from her pussy, I was sorely tempted. At the next junction, I kissed her thighs a fond farewell, and we went separate ways.

This was a full week of exercise so far, something that I had not had to endure for years. I was getting tired, and I was drinking a lot of water. I wasn't the only one. In that maze of mostly transparent tubes, there were no bushes to hide behind, there was no concealment at all, and I wasn't the only one struggling to hold it in. Even so, I'm sure it was deliberate. I'm sure Isabel knew it was me on the ladder beneath her, trying not to stare at her shaven pussy each time I looked up. Her only warning was a quiet 'Sorry!' but I doubt she was sorry at all as she opened the tap and drenched me in a fragrant, golden shower. I clung to the ladder, cursing quietly, and prayed I would soon get the chance to return the favour.

At the top, she went one way, I went another, doing my best to remember which tubes I'd explored before and thus to avoid her again if possible. My hand chanced upon a ring that somehow no one else had spotted, bringing my count to four, and moments later I crawled into another tube and I spied a fifth glinting in the corner.

Quite exhausted by this point, I took the next chute down and landed with a squeal and a splash in the shallow pool at the bottom. I rested at the side and drank half a bottle of water, and - not caring who might see me - parted my thighs and just let my pee gush out. Part of me wished Sasha had been there to watch, as I was sure she would have been proud of me. I was sure, also, that I wasn't the first to do so. Every time we splashed into the water, we were soaking ourselves in each other's pee.

Adam joined me a few minutes later, looking frustrated. "I've looked everywhere," he grumbled. He looked hot and flustered, so I gave him my water to finish off.

Another few minutes passed, and Rose and Sasha appeared together. Sasha was grinning. Rose looked as exhausted as I felt. "Four for me," Sasha said, clearly torn between a desire to celebrate her success and anxiety over whether anyone else had passed.

"Two," Rose said, opening her hand, dejection in her voice.

Adam sighed wearily. "Still only one."

"Well," I said, "I have five." I gave one to Adam. "Now you have two each. We can all keep searching -"

"No," Adam said, shaking his head as he handed both rings to Rose. "I have two tattoos, and that's good enough for me. Rose needs three."

Rose burst into tears and threw her arms about Adam, kissing him on the cheek and saying, "Thank you! Thank you!"

Sasha chuckled. "Well, I guess this counts as a happy ending."

And maybe it was.

Day 3: Judgement

The four of us found our way to an exit. We were not the first to leave, and certainly not the last. It was late morning, and as we looked back at the maze of tubes from the outside, we could see at least a dozen naked men and women still climbing ladders and crawling wearily in search of a last elusive ring or two.

Duchess Bethany was standing watch, hands on hips and looking a little intimidating in her scarlet dress and her black tie, fingernails and ankle boots. Especially since we were standing there naked, our dresses still wet from their earlier soaking. (I was glad I took it off before that shallow pool became a bath of urine - a fate Rose's dress had not escaped.) "Do you have four rings?" she asked.

Sasha and I showed her the rings braided into our hair. Rose's four rings were clutched nervously in her hand, and her arm trembled as she held them out. Duchess Bethany nodded. "You may keep the rings. The rest of the morning is yours. Duchess Melissa will make an announcement during lunch."

"Sadly, I have no rings," Adam said.

Duchess Bethany studied him thoughtfully, looking him down and up, her eyes lingering momentarily on his exposed member, before looking into his eyes. "But you did have rings - how many?"

Adam hesitated. "Two."

"And you gave them to this unhappy one?" The duchess placed her fingers under Rose's chin and gently lifted her head until their eyes met. "Is it a woman you want to be," she asked, "or a duchess? In the end, you cannot be both."

Rose was trembling all over, or perhaps she was just shivering. The air was cool, and her dress was soaked through. "A woman."

Duchess Bethany released her with a sigh. "You will get your wish, and you will get your third tattoo - you too, Adam - but for both of you the Testing is finished."

And with a wave of her hand, she dismissed us. Sasha grabbed my hand and squeezed it tightly as we walked back to the dorms in silence with Rose and Adam. Our mood was solemn, and a little bittersweet. The morning had been a triumph: all four of us would get our third tattoo, and Rose had earned the physical transformation she craved. But also, this was the end of our quartet and we had worked so well together on the last two Tests.

"I'm really going to miss you two," I said, catching them in an embrace that quickly became a group hug. "I hate that I may never see you again."

Rose laughed through her tears. "I know I am going to see you again. I'm going to name my daughters after you, and point you out in the news to them. 'There's Duchess Sasha,' I'll say, 'and there's Duchess Julia. Aren't they beautiful?'"

I laughed too at the thought of it. "I think you will make a wonderful mother."

Day 3: Some Debate

Twenty-two of us gathered for lunch, mostly wearing spare dresses only to be handed a long T-shirt to wear. As Sasha and I entered the canteen, Duchess Bethany gave her a black shirt, and Duchess Nerine gave me a pink shirt. The shirts were a thin, stretchy material that reached down to just below the bum, and fitted tightly as the fabric moulded itself to the skin. They certainly showed off the men's muscles to good effect, but my breasts felt very exaggerated.

The food was good and the mood was lively. We were all fresh from the showers and relieved to have passed the day's Test. Even if we failed the final two Tests, we would still have three tattoos, and there was privilege in that. There would be plenty of jobs in the cities, because with three tattoos you could be part of the industry that supplied the duchesses with their daily needs. A chef preparing gourmet foods, for example, or a dressmaker like Ida Green, or a hair stylist or a theatrical entertainer. There were hundreds of possibilities.

But we didn't have that third tattoo yet. Duchess Nerine had barely glanced at me earlier, but I couldn't stop thinking about her. It was an effort to stop myself from staring at her and breathing in her delightful perfume whenever she walked past the table where Sasha and I sat.

The tapping of sharp stilettos on the tiled floor announced the arrival of Duchess Melissa. Outside, the rain had finally eased off into occasional showers interspersed with bright sunshine, and the sun was in Duchess Melissa's fiery curls and reflecting from her shimmering dress as she hopped up easily onto a table and stood to address us.

"Ladies, Gentlemen, congratulations. You have passed the third Test and will receive your tattoos this evening. After that, I suggest you get a good night's sleep, because tomorrow will be a long, hard day."

That answered one question. I had a few hours still to let the pressure build within. I wanted to be alone with Duchess Nerine again. No doubt she would find some new way to torment me and to humiliate me, and no doubt I would love it. The more I tried to deny these thoughts, the more insistent they became.

"This afternoon," Duchess Melissa continued, "we're going to pass the time with some friendly debate. Duchesses Bethany and Nerine will suggest some topics for you to talk about, and I will judge the winners. This is not part of a Test, and I encourage you to be honest and passionate. At the end of the afternoon, however, we duchesses will each choose one of you to receive a special prize - a prize you will treasure forever."

There was an almost sinister amusement in the smile she gave us, suggesting to me that the prize would not be a welcome treasure. There was dark amusement too in Duchess Nerine's eyes as she finally graced me with a brief glance. "Uh oh," I murmured.

"Hmm," Sasha murmured in agreement, placing her hand on my thigh for support. "I have a bad feeling about this."

After lunch, we gathered in a small theatre. Bottles of water were provided for us all. I'd drank sparingly during lunch, not wanting to be forced to go before my appointment with Duchess Nerine, but the afternoon was turning warm and humid, and the thought of having to stand in front of everyone and speak... Well, my throat was dry, and I was soon sipping the water.

It was not long before the duchesses arrived and took their places. "Henry," Duchess Bethany said, pointing to a man in a black shirt.

I'd never really spoken with Henry. Of the eight men remaining, he was the tallest of the three Londoners, and fairly handsome. Fairly well endowed too, since I could see his bits dangling below the hem of his T-shirt. It was funny how we'd all given up wearing underwear at all, to the point it was starting to feel normal. Almost. I kept expecting to see shocked expressions and hear mutterings of disapproval. In my bag under the bed in my dorm, there was still a collection of clean, fresh, neatly folded panties that my mother packed specially.

"Lisa," Duchess Nerine decided, looking at a woman in a pink shirt.

Lisa was another Londoner, and I had often seen her in Henry's company. I hadn't spoken to her much at all, since the Londoners were a clique and clearly considered themselves superior to the rest of us. Which was a shame, really, because she was very attractive. Curvy like me, but taller and with long, auburn hair.

Henry and Lisa made their way to the stage and stood facing the three duchesses, who were positioned at a table close to the stage. The rest of us watched nervously from further back.

"David," Duchess Bethany said, "you have two minutes to tell us why duchesses should stay out of human politics."

There was a sharp intake of breath from all assembled, and David flinched as if he'd received an electric shock. This was a topic much discussed in secluded corners, but never within earshot of a duchess. "Ah, um," he said.

Duchess Melissa tapped her sharp fingernails on the table. "Cowardice is never rewarded," she said.

Nor, indeed, was heresy - except, perhaps, on this occasion. "Humans resent interference," he said carefully. "It doesn't matter if a duchess's influence is wise and just, it matters only that she is not human, and it serves as a reminder therefore that we are a conquered people. When the duchesses get involved in politics, it angers people and makes them sympathise with the rebels who demand we reclaim the Earth."

David's cheeks were flushed with embarrassment, perhaps because of the heretical words, but perhaps because he was visibly aroused by saying them. His cock, which had been quiescent before, was jutting out and up.

"I can't fault you for bravery," Duchess Melissa said, "or for passion."

"Lisa," Duchess Nerine murmured. "Two minutes to tell us why duchesses should get involved in human politics."

"Yes, Your Grace," she said, and took a deep breath. "We humans can be very selfish. We're very good at making rules and not thinking past them to the consequences. We proved that by nearly destroying our own planet."

I could tell she didn't believe a word of it. This was trite propaganda, the sort of nonsense told to children. Not that there wasn't truth in it.

"Duchesses have an outside viewpoint," she continued, "and thus are better able to see when we allow ourselves to be trapped by rules. Besides, it's good for us to be reminded of our place in the world. Our alien overlords saved us from ourselves, and we continue to be grateful."

Duchess Melissa was silent for a moment. "How old were you when your father first taught you those words?"

Lisa, who had been cool as a cucumber throughout, blushed brightly. "Seven, I think, Your Grace."

"Well, tell him from me that he taught you well."

"Yes, Your Grace." There was a flicker of fear in her eyes as she said it, perhaps sensing, as I did, the implication that she would certainly be going home. That she was not destined to be a duchess.

"That was cruel," Sasha whispered beside me.

And so it went, a series of dangerous or confusing topics to be 'debated' between pink and black: Why humans should be grateful to their alien overlords. Why duchesses should not waste time and money on pretty dresses and expensive holidays. Why becoming a parent was more responsible than choosing the life of a duchess.

I sat there listening in a quiet panic, sipping my water, until everyone had had a chance to speak, except me and -

"Isabel," Duchess Bethany said.

I winced. I still had scars on my cheek from Isabel's paddle, and she had showered me in her pee on the ladder that morning. I did not want to be standing on the stage beside her.

"Julia," Duchess Nerine confirmed, and I scowled at her - prompting a flicker of amusement in her amber, alien eyes.

Isabel and I studiously ignored each other as we walked onto the stage from opposite directions. "I guess we already know who's winning a prize," she muttered quietly.

I turned and glared at her. "Prizes!" I hissed. "Are you really that stupid?"

The bitterness in her expression gave way to confusion - but before either of us could say anything more, Duchess Bethany spoke. "Isabel. Two minutes on why you want to be a duchess."

Isabel threw me another quick glance, this time with panic in her eyes. "I," she started, and faltered.

Abruptly it was clear to me, as perhaps it had already been clear to the duchesses, that Isabel had no wish to be one of them. As cousins and friends we had spent hours if not whole days talking about the expensive dresses and exquisite holidays and grand palaces and parties, but all that was a fantasy for children.

The reality of being a duchess was authority. It was having the power to boss humans about and even to humiliate them in various situations. Being a duchess meant never having a human family or human children. It meant no longer being human. Isabel didn't want that. Isabel was a rebel at heart. I'd sensed it for years but hadn't wanted it to be true.

I reached out and took her hand in mine. She turned to me again, startled, but did not pull away. "You remember," I said calmly. "Tell them."

She nodded, and smiled tentatively. Facing Duchess Melissa, her words gaining confidence, she said, "My cousin wanted to be a duchess. I thought I understood why, but I didn't. I still don't. But I didn't want to lose her ever, so if Julia was going to fight to become a duchess, then so would I."

Her hand clasped mine tightly as she added quietly, "I think I forgot that along the way."

Duchess Melissa applauded. "I guess we already know who's winning a prize," she said, repeating Isabel's earlier words exactly. Isabel flinched guiltily.

"Julia," Duchess Nerine said. "Two minutes on why you don't want to be a duchess."

I'd been prepared for the question, but still didn't have a good answer. "Because I want to have children one day," would have been an appropriate thing to say. It was a common reason for rejecting the honour, but it would have been a lie. I had no special wish to have children. Perhaps because I had no wish to have sex with a man, and artificial insemination was a complicated life choice that still required a man to be involved.

But there were compelling reasons for me to give up on my dream. I had a long talk with my mother the night before I left. "To become a duchess means sacrificing something," she reminded me. "It isn't just leaving home and family behind, it's surrendering the idea of being human and becoming, in part, something alien. If you are one of those who believes our alien overlords are Humanity's enemy, then there is no greater treason than that surrender."

Such resentment is more common in older people. As a teenager, I longed to be one of those bright butterflies with carefree lives and exciting adventures. It was only as the Testing drew near that I began to question whether I would make the choice, if given, to leave home and family.

"I think it would break my heart to never see you or Dad again," I told her. The other side of it, the biological changes, did not trouble me greatly. The reptilian eyes did not terrify me the way they did my mother, and to be blessed with a youthful appearance into old age seemed like no great burden.

"No, Julia," my mother said. "Don't make the mistake I made."

I frowned. "What mistake?"

She sighed sadly. "I've always regretted it. The Queen talks of paradise, but the truth is our lives are not easy. There are crops to be tended, clothes to be made and mended and washed, food and drink to be prepared, children to educate, people in need of care. Our community is good and we all help one another, but every time I watch the news and see duchesses in beautiful clothes and having great adventures, or I see Princess Caroline holding court as politicians and celebrities vie for her attention, I wish I had had the courage to choose differently."

She clasped my hands in hers and said earnestly, "If you pass the Tests, don't throw away the opportunity. Even if it means you'll never see me or your father again, choose the adventure. I'll look for you in the media, and cherish every glimpse."

It eased a knot in my chest to hear her say that. I didn't have any expectation of passing the Tests, but I (like many other girls) had often enjoyed fantasies of becoming a duchess, perhaps even a Princess, and perhaps... Perhaps, one day, being the Queen - although what exactly the Queen did was very unclear.

"Thanks, Mum," I whispered.

Duchess Melissa was tapping her fingernails impatiently on the table. My two minutes were running out and I had said nothing. There was only one thing I could think to say.

"I want to go home."

Day 3: Tattoo

Again I stood naked before Duchess Nerine, and again I hoped she would tease and torment me until I had no choice but to 'accidently' spill my pee on the floor about our feet. I was the last to be summoned to the tattoo room, as if she had wanted to ensure I was close to desperation.

This urge of mine to be degraded in this manner confused me, contrasting with the fun I had with Sasha, but I could not deny the thrill of it. I should have been appalled by how dirty it was, this unnatural playing with pee like some intimate, sexual game. I still hadn't told Sasha about these deviant sessions with Duchess Nerine, because the secrecy was part of the thrill. It was something profound between the duchess and myself, and to share the experience would diminish its significance.

This time, however, Duchess Nerine kept her distance. She had to know each moment of hesitation was a torment for me with my bladder achingly full. I was sure she was enjoying watching my struggle to keep it in, and I was sure too that she was planning exactly how she would punish me after my humiliating loss of control - but she surprised me.

"Do you want to be a duchess, Julia?"

Duchess Nerine had asked me earlier to say why I did not wish to be a duchess, but despite my misgivings I was sure. "Yes, Your Grace," I said.

She stepped close and brushed her fingers through my carefully trimmed blonde pubes, a tickling excitement that had me pressing back against her. I needed those fingers a little lower, and a lot deeper. "Prove it, Julia. Ask me to remove this delicate bush so that I may see all of you entirely."

I blinked, startled. There were women, like Isabel, who dared to go entirely bare, but I was uncomfortable with the idea. When I was preparing to leave for the Testing, my friend Tessa, who had just returned from Testing and was proudly showing off her two tattoos to me (a grey rabbit on her arm below her shoulder and a yellow rope like an anklet), advised, "Best to have it neat and trimmed. Only the false duchesses shave it off entirely."

'False duchesses' was what people called the women selling sex at places like York's bus station. Isabel might not have minded that association, but for Duchess Nerine to ask me to go bare was upsetting. Worse, she was asking me to ask for it. Had she just done it to me without asking, I would have had some consolation in there being no choice. I had two tattoos, and was about to get my third, and I would never be one of those poor, desperate women, so why would I want to look like them?

"Or perhaps," Duchess Nerine murmured, her amber eyes devoid of warmth, "you are your mother's daughter, excited by the glamour of being a duchess but unwilling to make sacrifices."

"No!" I cried, stung by the accusation. "No. I am willing. I -" No. I was willing, but this was no easy sacrifice. I took a deep breath. "Please, Duchess Nerine. Remove my pubic hair."

She adopted an exaggerated air of innocence. "Why?"

So cruel! "So that you can see me entirely, Your Grace."

"Very well," she said, and circled round behind me. "We'll start with the tattoo. A labyrinth." Her fingers touched my back beneath my right shoulder. "In memory of this morning's entertainment."

The duchess summoned the snake, which swirled around me in its familiar examination of my body, before focusing in on the point she had touched. "Be still," she instructed, and I felt the electricity of its cold, methodical touch.

"Are you full for me?" she murmured by my ear, her hand pressing gently against my belly. "Are you bursting?" I gave a whine of complaint as I felt some escape. Urine dripped onto the tiles between my feet, and more trickled down the insides of my legs. "Be very still." She pressed against my belly, more firmly, and again I leaked a little, but the floodgates held. I wanted more from her than this crude torment.

The mechanical serpent completed its design and retreated. Duchess Nerine's lips brushed delicately across my neck, then down to my shoulder. She kissed my back, her lips caressing the sensitive skin of my third tattoo. Her hand, likewise, drifted lower, her fingertips running through my pubes and pressing deeper. I knew I was very wet there, and not just from my leaking bladder. I moaned with lustful delight as her fingers swept lovingly across my clit.

"Spread your legs," she said. "Wide."

I did so, unable to deny her anything in that moment - but she lifted her hand away, the abandonment forcing a plaintive cry from my lips. Up, up she teased, until her hand cupped my breast, until both her hands were cupping my breasts as she stood behind me, kissing my neck, my cheek. "I think you'll enjoy this," she said.

The snake was between my thighs, vibrating gently as it pressed against me. Those vibrations seemed to soar up inside the very core of me, making my hips dance as if they had a will of their own. Her fingers pinched and twisted my nipples, sending jolts of pure pleasure through my chest. With each charge powering through my body, I could feel myself slowly losing control. I whimpered as I tried to hold it in. I tried wordlessly to escape from her arms, but I was too lost in my hunger for her touch. I wanted all the stimulation to stop. I needed it to continue forever.

More and more pee leaked out as I stood there, and with every squeeze of my nipple my inner thighs grew wetter and wetter, until there was no holding it in. With a cry of pure pleasure I let go, and my pee gushed out around the tireless and uncaring robot that continued to torment me with vibrations as it consumed every trace of public hair.

"Good girl," Duchess Nerine whispered. "Now come for me. Let me hear you."

It was all too much. The vibrations. Her plucking at my nipples. The exhilarating relief of an overfull bladder emptied at long last, coupled with the deep, dirty sensation of the urine bursting out of me. The words 'good girl' echoing inside my thoughts. I screamed as I surrendered to an orgasmic ecstasy stronger than anything I had yet experienced. My body convulsed within Duchess Nerine's strong grip while the vibrations sustained my climax. Waves of blissful, aching release rippled out from deep within me...

... until there was nothing more to give. The serpent slithered away and I collapsed to my knees. Duchess Nerine dropped too, kneeling with me as she hugged me tightly from behind, aftershocks of the intense pleasure still working their way through my flesh.

How long we rested like that, I don't know, but gradually I became consciously aware that I was kneeling in a cooling puddle of my own pee, and so was Duchess Nerine. "Would you like to see," she asked suddenly, "what prize you won?"

Of course Duchess Nerine had chosen me. Isabel had predicted it, and I would have been hurt if the duchess had chosen anyone else. Even knowing the prize would be some fresh cruelty, I had wanted it. Duchess Melissa had taken a very anxious Isabel away with her, while Duchess Bethany had claimed Pepper for herself. Pepper was a shy, elfin creature from somewhere in the north of England, thin as a rake and with the smallest breasts of any woman I'd ever met. Her dark hair was cut short, and she almost looked more like a boy than a grown woman, but she was pretty and had an infectious grin.

But I'd forgotten about the prize until Duchess Nerine mentioned it. "Yes, Your Grace," I replied dutifully, without excitement.

She lifted her hand to show me. Held lightly between her thumb and index finger was a pink sphere, a gemstone, cut and polished, dozens of tiny facets catching the light. "Pink sapphire," she said, "from the other side of the world. Beautiful, isn't it?"

I could not deny its beauty. I had never seen anything like it in my life. It was the kind of jewel a fairytale princess might wear about her neck, or set in a fabulous, gold wedding ring. I didn't dare even touch it - but I wasn't given the chance either.

Duchess Nerine pressed the crystal into the mouth of the robot snake. "Spread your legs," she instructed, encouraging me with her hand between my thighs, her fingertips examining the newly smooth, hairless skin surrounding my labia. "This may hurt a little," she warned as the serpent pressed its metal head against my most intimate parts, "but the pain will pass swiftly."

I screamed in surprise as I was pinched - inside me, in places I had never felt before. Only her arm securely about my waist gave me the strength to endure it - although, as promised, the pain diminished gradually into a dull, confused ache of violation. "Almost done," she murmured, kissing my shoulder, my neck. "Almost done."

And then it was done, the snake retreating, leaving the two of us sitting there still in the mess I'd made earlier. "Let's have a look," she said, and positioned a mirror between my legs.

With reluctant fascination, I stared down at my reflected self, and suddenly I understood what those little rings were that we had been hunting for in the maze that morning. Those had been steel, of course, but the principle was the same. A little gold ring was embedded in my flesh, just below my clit, looping in through the urethra and out again through my vagina. The two ends met to hold the pink sapphire between them.

"It's called a Princess Albertina," Duchess Nerine said. "The piercing may sting a little at first, but will heal quickly and you will soon learn to love it."

I wasn't convinced. I wasn't sure I would ever get used to the idea of being without hair - would it grow back eventually? - and I really wasn't sure it would ever stop hurting down there inside me. I didn't even dare touch the ring for fear of damaging myself somehow. Would I still be able to pee? Would it hurt? I didn't even know how I felt about having such expensive jewellery in such an intimate part of me.

And pink too. Pink like Duchess Nerine's hair. Was that deliberate?

She kissed me one last time on the shoulder and whispered, "Off you go."

Day 4: Brunch

There was, strangely, no breakfast on the morning of the fourth Test. Instead, after a while, and a bit of consternation and confusion, we received a letter telling us to congregate for 'high tea', which turned out to be a rather bizarre brunch. Three tables had been arranged, with one duchess at each along with seven or eight of us. There was no choice of where to sit. We were selected one-by-one by the duchesses, much like we would pick a sports team as children.

As per the written instructions delivered that morning, we were all in high heels and dresses. My Ida Green dress had again been washed and dried carefully and delivered to my bed during the night. Sasha and Isabel both ended up at Duchess Nerine's table, while I was chosen by Duchess Bethany. I struggled to keep myself from staring anxiously across at the other table, at the cruel, demanding duchess and the sweet, sexy, human woman I found myself increasingly torn between.

Each table had a waiter in uniform, who quietly refilled our fine china cups with hot, fragrant tea. I am not sure if it was because I was hungry, but the food was delicious. We were served dainty little sandwiches and an astonishing array of delicately sweet cakes made with an artistry I had certainly never seen in Appleton. I wanted to try everything, but of course I didn't dare stuff myself in front of a duchess. I didn't want anyone to think my eyes were bigger than my belly. None of us did. We resisted temptation and stared wistfully at each other's plates.

Duchess Bethany was in a scarlet dress with large, black buttons down the front, and between polite sips of tea she asked each of us what our hopes were for our lives.

Henry and Lisa, the two Londoners who had spoken first at the debate, were both at my table. "I'm determined to get four tattoos," Henry said. "With four, I can get a good job in government. Of course, I hope I'm lucky enough to get five tattoos, because that really opens up opportunities. My father has five tattoos, and meets regularly with the Princess."

"You have no wish to become a duchess?"

Henry laughed. "I mean no offence, but I do not enjoy wearing a dress, and will be glad when this week is finally over."

"I always wanted to be a duchess," Lisa said, looking forlorn. "If I don't get at least four tattoos... Well, with four I can at least marry well, and there will be more opportunities in business."

"Even with three tattoos there are many worthwhile opportunities in business," Duchess Bethany said, and I nodded my head dutifully in agreement.

Having been raised in the country, far from the wealth and privilege of London folk, I was used to people being proud to show off two tattoos, and even just one was satisfactory. Ida Green, the dressmaker, had been something of a celebrity in Appleton with her three tattoos. My mother had had five, of course, but that was a secret shared only with my father and my aunt - and eventually me, on becoming an adult.

For Lisa, a Londoner born and bred, three tattoos was clearly considered a failure in life. Her lips curled with a momentary distaste. "Yes, Your Grace."

Sitting opposite me was Pepper, who sat blushing throughout. Her tight-fitting dress did little to hide the prize that Duchess Bethany had chosen to give her the day before. I'd seen it earlier. We all had. We'd all been in and out of the bathroom that morning while Pepper was showering, and perhaps out of pride, perhaps resignation, she made no attempt to hide what could not really be hidden. Her nipples were threaded with gold rings, and a gold chain connected the two rings to a black heart pendant. Her small breasts by themselves might go almost unnoticed, but that chain provoked desire. I wanted to reach out and tug on it gently and hear her gasp...

My own prize was far better concealed, although the communal nature of the bathroom had had me squirming when I'd dared at last to try to pee. It had been late at night, almost everyone else was fast asleep. Even Sasha, who I'd been keeping at arm's length all evening. For all that I loved her, I hadn't wanted her fingers touching me down there. Deep down, I didn't even want her to know what Duchess Nerine had done to me.

There had been a continual dull ache within, where the piercing was. I was able to pee, despite having a gold ring seemingly blocking the exit, but on my first attempt, peeing did sting a little. The following morning, however, I was relieved to find that the tenderness was gone, the ache forgotten and, as I did my morning pee, there was no sting at all. My body had quickly accepted the intruder. Curiosity getting the better of me, I even dared myself to touch the crystal, and surprised myself as I let out a quiet moan at the sensation of the ring moving within.

My moment of solitary exploration was interrupted by Isabel charging into the bathroom. "Jules, what prize did you get?" she demanded, glowering at me where I sat with my dress bunched up around my hips. She marched over to stand in front of me. "I'll show you mine if you show me yours."

Not waiting for a response from me, she shifted her legs apart and lifted her skirt. I stared in astonishment. Her outer labia had been pierced by gold rings, and a ruby was suspended by a gold chain from the labial rings. It was beautiful to look at, but I couldn't help thinking the jewellery would add a complication when having sex with a man.

I was relieved, though. I was not the only one 'rewarded' with this cruel perversity. Seeing her piercing gave me the courage finally to show mine to someone else. I spread my legs wide, letting her see my smooth, hairless skin - that was something else we both now shared. I studied her expression, watching her eyes as I used my fingers to part my labia to let her glimpse the pink crystal snugly nestled there.

Her eyebrows shot up, the anger in her expression gone in an instant. With a mirthless laugh, she sat on the loo next to me. "Thanks, Jules," she said. "I needed that."

"Me too," I said. "Me too."

Day 4: Bus Ride

On Day Four, in our boxes beside the bed, rather than our cleaned dresses, we were issued with pink coveralls made from some light, breathable, waterproof fabric, and a pair of rugged walking boots. What a sight we made when we gathered inside the Pavilion, nervous but ready to begin the fourth Test. Duchesses Bethany and Nerine handed out heavy backpacks to each of us. "Think of me tonight," Duchess Nerine whispered to me.

It was raining hard outside. Duchess Melissa took the stage with a cheerful, "Good morning, young humans. I hope you all slept well, and ate well too. Test Four is an overnight Test. You will be sleeping under the stars tonight, out in the wilds with no comforts of home. But don't worry, it's not just about survival, there is a quest too." She held up a map. "X marks the spot. Find a token - just one - and get back to the bus before it leaves."

The bus collected the twenty-two of us in our pink coveralls from the back of the Pavilion. Duchess Melissa came in the bus with us. Her dress was midnight blue with silver stars, and Isabel blushed bright crimson as she shuffled past the duchess and climbed into the bus.

We all looked out the windows as the bus followed a winding route through the town and out into the woods. There wasn't much to see, though. The rain continued to hit the glass, and streak down the side. Not far outside of town, the bus deposited us beneath an ancient viaduct. I vaguely recalled passing the same spot on the bus journey into Buxton on the Sunday.

I had been looking forward to walking through the countryside with Sasha, but I didn't like the look of the rain. The weather had a whimsical nature, however, and even as the bus drew to a halt, the rain diminished to a light drizzle.

"Ladies, Gentlemen, it's twelve o'clock precisely," Duchess Melissa announced. "The bus will be here again tomorrow at noon to return you to the Pavilion. Do not be late. Remember, you must bring a token from the destination that you yourself collect. Good luck!" And with that, the door closed and the bus departed along with the waving duchess.

There were twenty-two of us, and there was nothing to stop us all working together - but of course we didn't. The Londoners broke away in their usual clique, and set off immediately following the road east.

The rest of us were soon forming groups too. "Can I join you?" Isabel asked a little nervously.

"After you ditched us so quickly on Tuesday?" Sasha demanded.

Isabel's own little clique was no more. Both David and Andrew had failed in the tubes, and before that Fiona had gone into the lake after Isabel swiped me. I loved how protective of me Sasha was, but Isabel was still my cousin and we had both suffered a similar and confusingly intimate piercing.

"It's okay," I said to Sasha. "Let her join us."

Sasha scowled as Isabel. "Fine, but if she tries anything, I'm pushing her off the first cliff we come to."

Fear flickered across Isabel's face and she held her hands up for peace. "I won't. I promise."

There was one other person who was standing alone, seemingly without friends. "Pepper," I called out. "Come join us."

The play of emotions on her face was not hard to read: confusion that I should suggest an alliance when we had barely spoken before; suspicion over whether I intended to sabotage her chances somehow; a desperate hope that she would not have to face the day alone; and, finally, a dawning recognition that I, like her, had received a prize the night before.

Sasha sighed audibly. "You know," she said to me, quietly but loud enough for Isabel at least to hear, "I was really looking forward to just you and me doing this."

I pulled her close to me and kissed her tenderly. "Don't worry, Sasha," I murmured. "There will be plenty of kisses along the way."

Pepper approached hesitantly. "Do you mean it?"

The shape of her nipple rings could be seen in the thin fabric of the coverall, and it was difficult to resist staring. "I mean it," I said confidently. "The four of us are going to get there together, and get back in time for the bus."

Pepper's uncertainty gave way to a warm, infectious grin that had me grinning too.

"Oh, fine," Sasha said with a laugh. "Which way do we go, then?"

Day 4: Nice Day for a Walk

In addition to the pink coveralls and boots, we'd each been given a backpack containing the map, a compass, a full water bottle and some fruit and sandwiches, and a light sleeping bag rolled up tight. The only extras we were permitted were underwear and a shirt, since the material of the coverall was a little rough. And I was grateful for that. Apart from anything else, a long walk with large breasts is no fun without support.

My father had an old map, faded and much torn, that showed the region north of the City of York in astonishing detail. There was a dense spider's web of roads connecting the city with dozens of towns and villages. There were lines too that mapped the contours of the hills and valleys, and although many of the roads that still existed at all had decayed until they were little more than dirt tracks, and although the areas that were once dense with human habitation had been demolished by chompers or reclaimed by Nature, the hills and valleys were much the same as they had always been.

The map given to us by the duchesses was far simpler than that. It was a sketch, hand-drawn by some artist with a whimsical flair. There were contours highlighting peaks, and vales with blue rivers running through. A majestic viaduct here, a wooden bridge there. There were no obvious paths marked, and the only road was that running east from Buxton. A cartoonish drawing of a bus indicated our starting point in the lower left of the map; a large, red X marked our destination near the right.

"Looks simple enough," Sasha said. "We could just follow the river."

Only about one person in ten made it through to the fourth Test, but always it was some sort of expedition. My mother had to hike through hills to a graveyard of old - and often extremely rusty - human battle machinery.

"There was moss growing out of the burned out carcasses of tanks," she told us, "and triangular wings of aircraft thrusting up out of the earth like giant sails. Strangest of all was the hull of a great ship that we mistook at first for a hill. This was miles from the sea, and yet some alien machine had plucked that ship from the water as if it were a toy and carried or thrown it inland."

In preparation for the Day Four Test, she taught me the basics of map reading. Our map did not indicate North, but the road gave us a rough orientation. Most of the others were walking down towards the river, and maybe they were right to do so. The map suggested that the river curved around eventually to our destination, but rivers could be slow-going and treacherous underfoot.

Maybe the London clique were right to stick to the road. The road headed in the right direction at first, but disappeared off the bottom of the map about halfway there. "Let's follow the road until we get up out of this valley," I said. "We need a proper view of the land."

I was raised in the countryside and had had much practice with climbing hills and watching out for nettles and snakes. "It's much wilder there," my mother had warned. "Walk with someone you trust. Watch out for each other. It's easy to lose your way, and some even have lost their lives. Don't trust ancient bridges to support your weight, and if you end up in the ghost city, stay out of the buildings."

The ghost city... Not all human cities had survived. London was still England's capital, but was greatly reduced. As, of course, was York. Manchester had suffered a worse fate.

My grandfather often told us of the Conquest. His grandfather had been a boy when the aliens came. "The first we knew," he would say, "is when the satellites failed. Humankind had taken its daring first steps into Space. We left footprints on the Moon, where there is no wind or rain and those footprints can still be seen."

I had often looked up at the Moon, wondering if I would ever get to see those footprints. "We had put satellites all around the Earth, and those satellites told us exactly where we were and how to get where we wanted. Imagine it! Billions of people all moving around, in cars, in planes, and those satellites made it possible. Suddenly no more."

During my life in Appleton, I had not needed magical satellites to direct me from one end of the village to the other. "That was chaos enough," he continued, "but then we lost our connection to other people around the world. The cables beneath the sea that carried our voices to other countries were severed. Imagine if you woke up one morning and discovered a wall had been built all along the middle of the high street. You would no longer have a school to go to, or any apples to eat, and you wouldn't be able to talk to your best friend Claire."

It would have to be a very high wall, but I understood his point. "England was suddenly a small and lonely country," he said. "We soon ran out of food and oil. There were riots, death, disease. That's what defeated Humanity, not their weapons of war."

Disease had destroyed Manchester. The buildings still stood, although much reclaimed by Nature, but no one lived there now. A ghost city.

The rain gave way quickly to sporadic sunshine. The air had that wonderful freshness, the petrichor of the aftermath of summer rain, and after the heat of the past couple of days, the coolness was welcome. All this recent rain was another reason to avoid the river. The flow would be swift and the banks would be dangerously muddy.

The road, on the other hand, had sure, hard footing, despite deep puddles here and there. Either side of the road, the trees made a dark barrier, and although the uphill gradient was mild, it was relentless. And the day was hot, too. There was no shade from the sun, and fewer and fewer clouds as the air grew humid. The Londoners were making better time, getting further and further ahead.

"Where are we on the map?" Isabel demanded. We'd been walking for at least an hour.

But after looking at the map once again, there were no obvious landmarks that matched and, as such, none of us was entirely sure.

Day 4: Barrels

"Is that a chomper?"

Isabel was pointing into the darkness between the trees to the north of the road. We'd stopped again to argue over where we were and what to do next. The London clique were now so far ahead we'd lost sight of them, and our view of the valley was still blocked by the thick forest surrounding the road. "Maybe we should keep going along the road," I said, a quaver in my voice betraying my utter lack of conviction.

"I hate this road," Sasha said, taking a swig of water. That was another concern. We were all drinking far too much water. One little sip at a time, but a lot of sips added up and we were yet to find a stream where we could top up our bottles. Those who had chosen to follow the river would not have this problem.

As the threat of rain diminished and the afternoon sun's heat made us sweat inside the coveralls, we'd also reached a mutual, unspoken decision to strip down to boots, shirts and panties - I hadn't liked the idea of the coarse fabric of the coverall rubbing against my newly hairless crotch. And I had, after all, packed a month's worth of clean underwear; my mother would appreciate some of it being used. It was funny how quickly we'd all grown used to walking about half-dressed. Back home, we would have been shocked to see anyone exposing quite so much skin below the waist.

And, really, we were taking a dangerous liberty. We weren't within the relative privacy of the Pavilion; we were on a public road where a bus might come along at any moment, carrying passengers who were not part of the duchesses' perverted games. Not that we'd seen any buses yet.

"I think we should head North," Isabel said, checking her compass and following its needle. Her eyes narrowed and she frowned. "Is that a chomper?"

I was ten the first time I saw a chomper. My mother had brought me along with her, and Farmer James and his son Alan brought their noisy, trundling tractor and trailer. About an hour's journey across the fields from Appleton, we came to an old road, its surface much cracked and sprouting vegetation. Working its way along the road was a chomper, a great steel beast with a dozen robotic arms wielding circular saws, drills and lasers. Step by step, the chomper was dicing up the thick roadbed and devouring it, filling its swollen, rumbling belly.

In its wake it left a deep scar across the land, filled with barrels with strange markings on them. "See that one with the yellow rectangle?" she said, pointing. "That is fuel for the tractor. Over there is one with a green triangle. That is fertiliser for the fields. The barrels themselves are steel, which we can fashion into tools of many kinds."

She taught me many symbols that day. Calcium and magnesium were common types of metal content, and carbon and silicon were common non-metals. "What's that one?" I asked, seeing a barrel with a white star.

"Salt," my mother said. "We use that for cooking. And see that one with the red circle?" I nodded. "Very dangerous. Never try to open a barrel with a red circle."

Farmer James and Alan were loading the trailer with fuel and fertiliser, and the salt I had spotted. "Get that one too," she told them, pointing to a barrel with a red circle.

I grabbed her hand in alarm. "I thought you said not to open those."

"I'm not going to open it," she said calmly. "What is the number inside the circle?"

"Fifty-six," I read.

"Fifty-six is the element barium. It's rare and valuable. At the processing centre in York, we can use the barrel to pay for new equipment for the village, perhaps even a new tractor."

We did get a new tractor for the village, and meanwhile the chomper continued on its long, slow journey, consuming, digesting and defecating while we humans picked over its valuable waste like insects.

I peered between the trees where Isabel was pointing. There was something there too bulky and solid to be mere vegetation. "Let's have a look."

The ground away from the road was muddy and uneven, but enough light penetrated through the canopy for us to see and our eyes adjusted quickly. We approached the ominous shape with caution - but there was no need. The chomper was cold and silent, weeds growing from its ancient joints, moss coating its steel hide. Only its huge circular saw had a polished gleam, and I didn't doubt the blade's edge would be wickedly sharp.

"I once watched a dozen chompers eat a whole village," Pepper said. "Nobody lived there, of course, and afterwards there were hundreds of barrels."

A dozen or so barrels poked up out of the earth behind this one. I scraped the mud off one to expose an orange square with the number twenty-four inside. "Chromium. Good salvage, this."

Sasha laughed. "You can carry it."

"Come look at this," Isabel called from around the front.

The road that the chomper had been eating when it died was still there. The surface was cracked and warped and sprouting grass and bushes, but it was definitely a road running north through the trees. "Downhill," I noted.

Sasha shrugged. "I say we follow it."

Isabel agreed, and Pepper too. "Okay," I said, a little relieved that the decision was out of my hands.

Day 4: Into the Wilds

The edge of the dark forest was a lot closer than any of us had imagined. Beyond the chomper, the road curved to the right and the trees thinned out, giving way to wheat, grasses, yellow wildflowers, purple thistles and far too many nettles - together a dense growth almost as tall as we were. The road continued on for only a hundred metres or so before coming to an abrupt end.

We halted. "You got your wish," Sasha noted, which was true enough. Ahead of us was a small but pronounced hill, one that promised finally to let us see the terrain around us.

"We're going to need to put on the coveralls," I said, eyeing the nettles anxiously. I retrieved the pink garment from my backpack, but hesitated.

Isabel said what I was thinking. "This may be our last chance to pee easily."

Doing it here, there would be no privacy, not without going back to the trees or hiding in the grass, but we'd had little privacy for days. I still hadn't quite forgiven Isabel for showering me in pee the day before.

Isabel, of course, was not shy to show herself off. "Hey, Pepper," she said. "Would you like to see what Duchess Melissa gave me?" Not waiting for an answer, she slipped her white, lace panties down to her ankles.

Pepper's eyes went wide at the sight of the ruby and the gold chain linking Isabel's labia. "Oh, wow," she said.

"Wow indeed," Sasha murmured. "Please tell me you got a piercing too." Her lips were by my ear, but her voice carried.

Isabel laughed. "She did indeed. Show them, Julia."

I glared at her for yet another betrayal. Peeing in front of other people was bad enough; I was not ready to be inviting everyone to stare at my most intimate, private self...

... but the secret was out, and how was I to ignore the entreaty in Pepper's eyes, or the puzzled demand in Sasha's? I would have had to reveal the piercing to Sasha soon anyway. "Fine," I hissed through gritted teeth, planning a hundred different deaths for Isabel.

Like Isabel, I pushed my white cotton panties down to my ankles. Biting my lip and blushing furiously, I teased my labia apart with my fingertips so that the pink sapphire could be glimpsed.

Pepper gasped, and covered her mouth. Sasha... frowned. "Let me see," she said, dropped to her knees, and with her fingers spread my lips wider. She examined me the way a midwife might, humming thoughtfully as she prodded and poked. "How does it go in there and come out there?" She teased the jewel with a fingertip, sending a ripple of excitement along my nerves, and all through my body.

I gave a startled cry and flinched away from her, nearly losing balance as I did. "Don't do that," I pleaded.

Sasha's expression was troubled as she examined me, but then a wicked smile crossed her face. "Don't do that ever?" she asked. "Or just not now?"

If my cheeks had been red before, they were burning now.

Sasha gave me a cheeky smile. "Okay. Later, then."

Mustering my last shred of dignity, I turned my back to the others before squatting to pee at the edge of the road - and, feeling awkwardly self-conscious for the first time in days, plucked a large leaf to properly dry myself after.

Dressed once more in pink, we threaded a path slowly through the grass, making steady progress towards the low peak. Once up there, it was exactly what I had hoped for. We were on the edge of a high, undulating plateau, the river valley working its way from the west to the north. Behind us, the edge of the forest marked the line of the road we had followed for so long.

Pepper and Isabel had their maps and compasses out and were arguing over some slight difference in interpretation. "That way," Isabel said, pointing due east.

My attention was elsewhere. Up in the sky. "What is it?" Sasha asked.

I was asking myself the same question, with a very different meaning. There was something up there, seen and yet not. Transparent like the clearest water, perceivable only through occasional glimmers of reflected light. "Can you see it?" I demanded, and followed the arc with my hand, from its tip above the forest to the north-east, to its base more-or-less exactly where Isabel had just pointed.

"Maybe it's just a trick of the light," Sasha said, but I could tell she didn't believe it.

"No," I said. "That's what we were sent here to see."

Pepper snorted with amusement. "To see what cannot be seen."

There was no amusement in Isabel's voice. "It's a war machine."

Civilisation may have come to a crashing halt when the aliens came to conquer the Earth, but the human military fought hard and valiantly with machines and weaponry that we could scarcely conceive of these days. I remembered watching videos in history class showing the terrible destructive capability of atomic bombs, and ships the size of a city with terrifying guns, and thousands and thousands of soldiers.

There were no videos of the Conquest, but it was still spoken of in whispers. "Their war machines were invisible," my grandfather would say, "their great, monstrous tentacles seen only as silhouettes against the light of destruction. They could snatch the fastest planes out of the sky and reach deep into the sea to dredge up the sneakiest of submarines."

His descriptions were too extraordinary. I never believed him. But what else could that ghostly arch be?

The Conquest was something we talked about in the safety of our homes. It was history the same way Humanity's industrial brutality was history. It was far easier to stare in wonderment at the excesses of the duchesses than it was to contemplate the truth that our new civilisation had been born from the embers of the old, and that our alien masters had fanned the flames.

"Five," Sasha murmured. "Just five. That was how many war machines they sent, and it was all over within a week. We didn't stand a chance."

Day 4: Poolside

We knew where we were. We knew where we were going. Getting there was slow, however, a continual struggle against tall grass and troublesome weeds. Part of me yearned for the simplicity of the tarmac road, but there was an intimacy and sense of adventure in being surrounded by Nature gone wild.

The sun was getting low in the sky when we came to the edge of the river valley. To the right, below us, was the ancient viaduct that was marked on the map. To the left, a long, shimmering lake, edged by an overgrown echo of a path that had once been a railway line.

A group of five in obtrusively pink coveralls had laboriously worked their way along the path, but had found their way blocked by the gleaming metallic base of the war machine whose three giant limbs soared up into invisibility.

Why the war machine had chosen this spot to rest, I had no way of knowing, but in doing so it had dammed the river and created the lake whose water now escaped through the two channels between the three limbs, and cascaded down into a pool below. If that wasn't what the X on the map indicated, it was as good a place as any to start searching.

Right at that moment, I didn't care. I was tired and thirsty, my water bottle having been empty for at least half an hour. Inside my coverall, my shirt was damp with sweat, as much from exertion as the heat of the afternoon. The attraction of a shady pool beneath a pair of tumbling waterfalls outweighed my fear of the monstrous machine casting the shade.

I stumbled and skidded my way down the steep slope at an unsafe speed, thinking only of the cool embrace of the water below. Sasha was hot on my heels, the others not far behind. At the water's edge, I paused only to discard my backpack and strip out of my clothes and boots, before wading into the cool, rippling pond and bending to fill my cupped hands.

"Never has water tasted so good," I said.

Sasha, laughing, embraced me from behind, her arms capturing me. "I want you," she said. "I want you now." One hand lifted to cup my breast, her thumb brushing my nipple. The other delved between my thighs, her fingers pressing into me, finding the jewel, teasing me.

"Don't," I said, too aware that we weren't alone, yet at the same time wanting more. Her touch against my skin was electrifying. Her lips pressed against my shoulder, tickling as they moved and rested against my neck, and I moaned as she flicked my nipple. Her teeth bit my earlobe...

"Ugh," Pepper said loudly. "It's like they're duchesses already."

Isabelle laughed and splashed the cold lake water at us.

I ignored them. I had more urgent things on my mind. My own hands sought behind me for Sasha, the nails of one hand digging into the soft cheek of her bare bum, the fingers of the other thrusting between my own rear and her soft body before diving wetly into her heavenly warmth.

"Why did she do this to you?" Sasha demanded. "This is far too intimate a piercing to be the mere whim of a duchess."

Her playful fingers were making it far too difficult for me to think, and I was caught! Caught between the desire to keep my humiliating secret a secret, and the desire to be truthful to my lover, my beautiful Sasha, and confess this guilty weakness. Would the truth damn me or set me free? More importantly, would her fingers cease their delicious excitation?

Her index finger swirled ever quicker. I knew if I lied this time, there would be no second chance. I understood that. I sensed too that she would see through any lie I attempted. I was so tense with uncertainty, with shame, that my hands retreated from her body.

I had to tell her. I took a deep breath. "She -"

Ahh! I wanted to run, but her arms held me tight. Her warm breath against my neck demanded that I continue. "She likes to watch me pee," I whispered, the words barely audible to myself.

Sasha's fingers recoiled - but lingered close to their former targets. "She what?"

"She likes to watch me pee," I repeated, louder, fearful that Isabel and Pepper might hear me.

For five, long, painful heartbeats, neither of us moved a muscle... and then Sasha burst into laughter. Uncertain how to react to this, I remained still - relaxing only a little as her fingers resumed their earlier activity, forcing the little gold ring to rotate in and out of my urethra and sending splinters of pleasure through me. "Do you want to pee now?" she whispered in my ear.

Of course I did. It had been hours since we all squatted at the edge of the road. "Yes."

"Then do it for me."

It wasn't the same. Of course it wasn't. For one thing, I wasn't looking into her eyes. Duchess Nerine tapped into something far deeper and dirtier, far more humiliating. Far more satisfying. But I could not deny Sasha this. Not if she was so willing to forgive me my perverse infidelity. It took an effort of will, but I spread my legs a little, cracked open the floodgate and let nature take its course.

Day 4: Campfire

There was something very freeing about being out in the wilderness. After three days of being watched and judged by the duchesses, it was a relief to escape their gaze for a while. "Do you suppose they're still watching us somehow?" I asked.

"If they are," Sasha said, "it's only to make sure we're obeying their rules. I don't think they care much otherwise."

The sun had set, but the sky was still bright and the air warm. Tired though I was after the long walk from the bus, I was not yet sleepy. "Maybe they're up there in one of those invisible limbs." I waved at a spot high above us, imagining the three duchesses in their high heels. My perverse imagination took it a step further, however, and had Duchess Melissa lift her skirt, her pee falling on us like golden rain, and I was trying to drink every drop.

It was Day Four of the Testing, but there would be no visit to the tattoo room. I would not get to be tormented by Duchess Nerine. "Be still," I imagined her saying. "Be very still..." What would she do to me that she had not already done? Would she be as cruel to me as Duchess Caroline had been to my mother?

"Look who's decided to join us," Pepper said, pointing.

It was the London clique, their pink coveralls coated in dry mud. They had scowls to match too. "Doesn't look like they've found any tokens either," Isabel noted.

None of us had, and not for lack of trying. For the past two hours, the four of us, and eventually both the groups of five who had followed the river, had scoured the valley and slopes all the way from the war machine to the old viaduct. Gradually we'd all gathered back by the pool, and soon had a trio of campfires - for comfort as much as warmth. Sasha had found a box of matches in one pocket of her backpack, and had been happy to share them with the other groups.

There had been no matches in my backpack, but there had been a letter. "Lizzie was always leaking, poor thing. C would muffle her screams with the evidence and punish her mercilessly. I loved her rosy cheeks... Sweet adventures, fair moon-bathed Julia. N."

Sasha, of course, had snatched the letter from my hands. "Proof!" she cried melodramatically, even before reading it. "Proof of your infidelity to me."

I tried to snatch it back, but she held it away from me, laughing. "Lizzie? Who the hell is Lizzie? And C! Just how many lovers do you have, fair Julia?"

I scowled at her. "Lizzie's my mum. C is - was - Duchess Caroline."

"Ohh, so this pee fetish of yours runs in the family?"

"It's not a fetish," I said sullenly - although maybe now having peed for both Nerine and Sasha, it was. "My mother has a... problem. She can't help it. That's why she packed a month's worth of underwear for me."

Who started it, I'm not sure, but soon we were all naked, all splashing in the pool and showering beneath the edges of the twin waterfalls. Some, like Sasha and I, were kissing, others were splashing and chasing each other, one or two just enjoying the water.

We had no towels to dry ourselves after, so sat around the fires for warmth. The seductive gold chain that connected Pepper's nipples gleamed lustrously in the firelight, and the ruby dangling from Isabel's labia kept snagging at my attention. I had to wonder how often the others caught a glimpse of the pink sapphire glittering between mine.

We were all beautiful, in a way. Twenty-two young adults, three tattoos each. Zodiac, water serpent, labyrinth. Even when we went our separate ways after Testing, even if decades passed and age stripped us of all youth, we would be able to recognise each other by these tattoos and remember we once shared the night in the shadow of a war machine.

"There will never be another night like this for us," I said a little sadly. "We will return to our homes and be sure to always be dressed properly. We will tell our children always to dress properly, even as we wish to be this free again."

"No, no, no," Isabel said. "I will be showing my daughter pictures of her aunty Julia the duchess and saying, 'I peed on her head.'"

I glowered at her, but Sasha was laughing hysterically and Pepper's grin was infectious.

Later, much later, having finished the last of our cheese sandwiches and crispy apples, there was nothing to do but bathe in moonlight. Across the fire from Sasha and me, Isabel and Pepper sat side by side, not as lovers but as two young women united by the whimsical choices of duchesses. Their gold chains gleamed, and I wondered what their lives would be like as humans if we failed this Test and returned to our village homes. What would my life be like? Would Sasha and I be lovers still, forever remembering this moment by the fire, our lazy, lingering kisses.

Sasha chuckled, her thoughts elsewhere. "You know," she said, "from this angle, those tentacles look almost like a woman's legs."

I glanced round at the war machine. Indeed, from where we sat, only two of the three limbs were visible, and I could imagine them almost to be the legs of a sleeping giant - or perhaps not sleeping, because the gush of water between them suggested an intense, sustained pleasure. Or, more appropriately, given the reservoir beyond, an uncontrolled bladder.

The image provoked a thought, a resolution to the problem I had been working over in my mind for hours, and I tugged Sasha after me, back into the pool. Naked, and visible in the moonlight to twenty pairs of eyes and perhaps more, I kissed her tenderly, and led her deeper, until we stood between the twin waterfalls. I put my lips by her ear and said, my words almost drowned by the turbulent cascade, "There's one obvious place where no one's looked yet."

I let myself slip beneath the surface of the cool, crystal clear water, and anchored myself with Sasha's legs as I studied the dark bed of the pond. Here and there were indistinct glimmers of luminescence. I grabbed at one and surfaced again. In my hand I held a flat stone, the sort that would be perfect for skimming across the surface of a pond. On the stone was inscribed, in dimly glowing ink, three tiny tentacles.

Sasha laughed and kissed me, deep and hungrily. "Wait here," she said, and dropped into the water.

Day 5: Stars Above

"I have a confession," Sasha said quietly as we lay looking up at the stars.

The war machine's huge limbs were oddly more visible at night. Whenever the moon emerged from behind the drifting clouds, a faint luminescence outlined the three great tentacles. "Almost as if it's alive," I'd said to her earlier.

"I think it is," she'd replied. "When I touched it earlier, I was sure I could feel a slow, deep pulse. It gave me gooseflesh."

Alive, then, but sleeping - hopefully never to awaken again.

Sasha and I were like two caterpillars, cocooned in our individual wind- and waterproof sleeping bags and snuggled up together. Fortunately, though it was cool through the night, the breeze was gentle and the rain held off.

Sleeping outside was a new experience - for us all, I think. I kept waking up, startled by a stray drop of water against my cheek, or by the unfamiliar noise of an animal in the darkness. Or by Sasha starting a conversation.

"Confession?" I prompted.

Sasha sighed, but said nothing, and for a while I wondered if she had fallen asleep. "On Monday, getting my first tattoo," she whispered suddenly, "I was afraid of that metal snake."

"Me too," I whispered back.

Sasha shook her head. "I mean, really afraid. I couldn't keep still. Duchess Bethany forced me into steel restraints to hold me still."

I shivered, not liking that image at all. "That's horrible!"

"I thought it would be too." She gave an embarrassed laugh. "But actually, the firm grip of the steel helped me to relax. There was nothing I could do except surrender to the moment."

I rolled over to study the silhouette of her face. "Nothing of this is deserving of a confession."

"No," agreed Sasha. "But there was a moment after, once the snake had completed its work and retreated, when I was still in restraints, still helpless, and Duchess Bethany was studying me, looking into my eyes as her fingertips traced the symbols on my thigh. My skin was so sensitive there..."

"I remember."

"'You like this,' she said to me. 'Don't you?' And when I tried to deny it, she pressed her fingers between my labia - and I could feel how wet I was. I was so ashamed. I was on the edge of tears. But then she released me, handed me the white dress and boots, and sent me away. I'd never been so confused in my life. Or so aroused."

"Ahh," I breathed, understanding dawning. "And on Tuesday she bound you in steel again?"

The answer took its time, but came. "She did. And Wednesday too."

"And?"

"And nothing. She just watched me as I surrendered to the snake again. She didn't need to touch me to know I was aroused."

I honestly did not know what to make of Sasha's confession, but I was glad at least that I was not alone in being caught up in some strange sexual game with a duchess. Wiggling an arm free from my sleeping bag into the cool air, I curled it around Sasha to bring her close, to keep her close. I buried my nose in her hair and kissed her neck.

The great wheel of stars continued to turn, and gradually the eastern sky lightened with impending dawn. Despite a night of broken sleep, I was too awake to lie still. I was reluctant to leave the warmth of the sleeping bag, but nature was calling.

I wriggled out of the bag and into my shirt, and padded softly towards the pool. "Wait for me," Sasha called out quietly as she extracted herself from her sleeping bag and hurried after me. We took a few tentative steps into the water, but the cold dissuaded us from going deeper.

She caught me in an embrace, perhaps as much for warmth as out of affection. Her hands on my bum pulled me tight against her as we kissed. "As much as I love kissing you," I murmured, "I do really need to pee."

"Go on then," she said, still holding me tight. A sudden, wetness against my thighs confused me - but then Sasha giggled and I realised it was her pee, not mine, and growing in volume as she relaxed into it.

We kissed again as her warm pee flowed down my legs into the water. I tried to do likewise, but was distracted by her hand pressing between my thighs. "I've just had a very wicked thought," she said with a laugh. "A way for you to get a little revenge on Isabel..."

Whether it was the plan she whispered next, or the way her fingers brushed against my little gold ring, but I let go at last, and moaned with blissful relief as I kissed her fiercely, my pee gushing out messily past her teasing hand, splashing against both of us.

The sky was brightening during this moment of playful perversity. As we used the pool water to wash ourselves and returned to the little dell where we'd spent the night, I could see other wakeful faces. Pepper was sitting up, enthusiastically poking the embers of our campfire, and Isabel's eyes were half open.

Sasha and I rolled up our sleeping bags and packed our backpacks. There was no food left, but we'd refilled the water bottles the night before. We dressed once more in our bright pink coveralls, over shirts and underwear - I'd rinsed mine in the pool the evening before and dried it by the fire - but it was only as we laced up our boots that Isabel awoke fully.

"Where are you going?" she demanded.

"Back to the bus," I said with an indifferent shrug.

"Without a token?"

Sasha and I had kept our discovery secret. I'd fully intended on sharing the location with Isabel and Pepper at least, but Sasha had suggested waiting until the morning. "This?" I asked, taking the flat stone from my backpack and holding it up for her to see the three glowing tentacles.

Isabel grunted as she struggled to her feet, still clutching the sleeping bag up around her chest - for warmth as much as modesty. "Where are they?"

I looked at Sasha. "Should we tell them?"

"I really think they're supposed to find the tokens themselves," Sasha replied with a troubled frown.

I nodded thoughtfully.

Pepper was watching all this with a bemused expression. Isabel's face was full of concern, her voice a frantic whine as she begged, "Please, Jules!" She grabbed my arm to hold me still.

I sighed. "Why should I, Izzy? You were so mean to me on Tuesday, and you deliberately peed on my head when we were in the pipes."

"I know, Jules, I'm really sorry! I just saw the way Duchess Nerine was treating you as her own special princess and was sure you were cheating the Tests like your mother did."

I growled. "My mother didn't cheat!"

"I'm sorry!" she wailed. "I didn't mean that. Please, Jules!"

Sasha wrapped her arm firmly around me and leaned in close to say in my ear, "Maybe we should tell her."

Hope flared in Isabel's eyes - and I dashed it. The thrill of power was like an aphrodisiac. "No, Sasha. She's been a very naughty girl and deserves to be spanked like one."

Isabel recoiled, releasing my arm and flinching away. "What?"

"Hmm," I said, letting the moment linger as I pretended to consider my cousin's fate. "Yes. I will tell you where the tokens are, but first you must bend over and let Pepper spank you."

"Me?" a startled Pepper said.

I held up the token as a reminder, and she nodded quickly. There may even have been a trace of a smile.

Isabel's fear gave way to a glare. "No one's spanking me."

I shrugged. "Let's go," I said. "The bus won't wait forever."

"Uh huh," Sasha said.

Most ordinary village folk had one or maybe two tattoos. Ultimately, there was no need for more, if your life revolved around farm work and family life. A third tattoo was only important if your business brought you into contact with the duchesses. A fourth tattoo was something special, however. It conferred a measure of power and privilege, and was a necessary stepping stone to the ultimate prize of five tattoos.

Revealing the location to others was a not insignificant gift. This bit of theatre that Sasha and I had cooked up was drawing a lot of attention. A lot of anxious eavesdroppers were preparing for a mad scramble. The real question was how determined Isabel was to get that fourth tattoo. Her mother, my Aunt Catherine, was very proud of her four tattoos, and Isabel could be very competitive. Aunt Catherine was one of Yorkshire's regional mayors and had offices in York and in London, and she was always telling us what the duchesses were doing and what they were wearing at the parties she went to.

It was cruel of me to play with Isabel like this, but also I still had scars on my cheek from her paddle. She had tried to push me into the water, to make me fail during the raft race on Day Two, to leave the Testing with only one tattoo! So this revenge was well justified.

Sasha and I took all of five steps away from Isabel and Pepper (and all the watchers), back vaguely in the direction of the bus, before Isabel cried out, "Wait! Okay!"

I paused and turned to examine her. There was still anger in her eyes, but there was the frustration of desperation too - and her cheeks were flushed with embarrassment. Poor Isabel, still holding her sleeping bag tight about her, no doubt naked within. Agreeing in front of a dozen and more witnesses to be spanked like a naughty child.

"Ten spanks," I said sternly.

"On each cheek," Sasha added.

Pepper hid a laugh behind her hand. Her eyes gave her delight away.

Isabel glared at Sasha. "On each bare cheek," I confirmed. "And quickly. We have a bus to catch."

For the longest moment, I was sure she wouldn't do it, which would have left me in a quandary. But then she let the sleeping bag fall and stepped out onto the grass, and with a quiet sob of defeat bent over, presenting a bare bum to a wide-eyed, hesitant Pepper.

No one spoke a word. There was only the faint breeze rustling the grass, and the nearby fall of water into the pool. Pepper made a quizzical expression to ask silently if I was sure I wanted this. I nodded.

With a shrug, Pepper moved close to Isabel, and spanked her. A tentative and likely painless smack against Isabel's proffered rear, but the sharp clap of flesh against flesh was shocking in the otherwise quiet air, startling a song thrush and a brace of pipits into flight.

"One," Sasha said, pointedly.

If Isabel's first cry had been one of surprise, her second was one of complaint, the third was protest, the fourth was misery. Pepper did not hurry, but her confidence grew, and though there was no cruelty in her punishment, there was determination.

Smack! "Eleven." Smack! "Twelve." The slaps echoed within the valley.

Tears fell from Isabel's cheeks and her knees wobbled. I nearly took pity on her, but Sasha's firm grip on my arm dissuaded me. "She's a big girl," Sasha murmured. "She can take it."

The way Pepper clenched and unclenched her fist, as if she was in as much pain as Isabel seemed to be, and the increasingly rosy hue to Isabel's cheeks, did make me doubt Sasha's assurance, but I stood quietly and watched until the end.

Smack! "Twenty."

There was an excited cheer from the assembled watchers. Isabel stood and faced me, humiliated... and yet, she was strangely aroused? Was I imagining that? The gold chain and ruby dangling from her labia were gleaming wet, and her nipples were swollen as if to demand attention from a hungry mouth. "Okay," I said. "I'll tell you."

I stepped close and whispered in her ear, "There's a white boulder beneath the middle arch of the viaduct. Look there..."

Day 5: To the Bus

With a last brief glance at me, a bitter resentment in her eyes that promised future payback for this humiliation, Isabel snatched up her coverall and boots and marched off in the direction of the old viaduct. Surreptitiously - at first - the others all followed her.

Only Pepper remained with Sasha and me. "That was mean," Pepper said, blowing cool air against her palm, although there was no sense of reproach in her tone. "The tokens aren't there, are they?"

"No," I admitted and turned to face the water. "They're in the pool, between the waterfalls."

Pepper nodded. "I thought so. I saw you diving there last night."

Isabel was confidently striding alongside the river, a small crowd following hot on her heels. "Will you make sure she gets back to the bus on time?" I asked.

"I will."

And with that, we were on our way, Sasha and I alone together, retracing our steps up to the plateau and through the high grass, coming out at long last onto the road. The hot sun was behind us, the slope mostly downhill, and there was no sense of urgency or effort.

We paused by the roadside for water and a break, and to remove the pink coveralls that had served their purpose. Sasha's shirt came off, then so did mine, then so did everything else, and we made love in the shade of the trees - and still made it all the way back to the bus before anyone else.

The bus driver, a young man in a dark uniform, was sitting on a boulder nearby reading a book. In response to our questions, he pointed in the direction of the river, and we heard the faint but unmistakable sound of laughter. We followed the sound through the trees to its source: the three duchesses.

Duchess Melissa was midstream, and entirely naked. Her immaculately styled hair blazed like fire in the sunlight as, hands on hips and legs parted, she peed into the water coursing about her ankles. Catching sight of us, she laughed again, and gave a cheerful wave that made her breasts bounce hypnotically and added a seductive sway to the spray of urine. "Come and join us!" she called out.

The duchesses were having a picnic on a blanket by the river. Duchess Nerine was wearing a pale blue dress, and bright pink, high-heeled shoes entirely unsuited to the terrain. "Have some tea," she insisted, pouring the hot, fragrant drink into dainty china cups.

Duchess Bethany's dress was black with scarlet laces. "And scones, of course," she added, layering butter, jam and thick cream onto the crumbly treats.

Sasha and I sighed with happiness at the promise of this delightful brunch, having not eaten anything since the night before, but it was difficult not to stare at Duchess Melissa. I had never seen a naked duchess. I had, of course, seen pictures of duchesses in swimwear, but there was an intimacy to this exposure. Perhaps, even, it was a privilege reserved for those of us who passed the fourth Test.

Her body was as flawlessly perfect as everything else about her. If I had one disappointment, it was that she was hairless between the legs, where I would have loved to see curls as fiery as those on her head. All five tattoos could be seen clearly too: the serpent winding about her calf, the fish swimming across her belly, the yellow rose growing up between her breasts, musical notes dancing around her upper arm, and the paired pentacles on her inner thighs that seemed designed to guide a curious eye upwards. Most astonishing, however, was the diamond just above her pussy, and the matching gleam of gold between the lips - some kind of genital piercing, for sure.

Sasha and I settled down onto the picnic blanket, accepting the offered cups of tea and the rich, indulgent explosions of taste that were nothing like the scones we baked at home. "That was a very naughty game you played this morning," Duchess Nerine commented.

I flinched guiltily. The duchesses had been watching - I knew it!

"If I was there, I would have spanked her twice as hard," Duchess Melissa said, her voice loud enough to carry.

"Speak of the devil," Duchess Bethany said mysteriously. "Oh!" said a startled Sasha, looking past me, and I turned to see Isabel and Pepper approaching through the trees, the upper halves of their pink coveralls tied about their waists. Isabel was scowling sullenly at me, but Pepper's grin was joyous.

"You made good time," I noted.

"I'm betting they didn't stop to make sweet love," Sasha pointed out, and squeezed my hand as my cheeks went bright red.

"No," Pepper agreed.

The seven of us sat around the edges of the picnic blanket, quietly enjoying tea, scones and sunshine, as the sun itself climbed high into the sky. I was thirsty after the morning's exercise, but no matter how much I drank, Duchess Nerine was always quick to pour more. Others' cups were soon empty, but mine never. By Sasha's smile, I knew this subtle mischief had not escaped her notice.

"Time to go," Duchess Melissa said eventually, as she worked herself into a beautiful emerald dress with Duchess Bethany's help. "Let's see who else has made it back in time."

There was no one waiting for us there - except the driver, who took the picnic hamper and blanket from Duchess Nerine and stowed it away securely, before slipping into the driver's seat and starting the motor with its quiet electrical whine - but as we climbed aboard, there was a cry in the distance. One of the groups of five had made it back just in time. Three women and two men, gasping and cheering as they boarded the bus and collapsed breathlessly into seats.

"One last check," Duchess Melissa called out. "Hold up your tokens."

We held them up proudly, all except Isabel who searched frantically in her bag. "Pepper, where is it?"

"It's there," Pepper said calmly, and tugged the sleeping bag out of the backpack. Isabel gave a cry of relief as she finally spotted the errant token, and held it up triumphantly.

The duchess applauded us with a warm smile. "I'll see you all later," she said, and joined Duchesses Nerine and Bethany outside. Duchess Nerine's eyes met mine for a brief moment, but what thoughts or intentions she might have, I had no idea.

And with that, the doors closed, and the bus started into motion. I watched through the back window, looking for any sign of the Londoners or the other group of five, but it would have made no difference. Only the nine of us on the bus had passed the fourth Test.

Isabel was still scowling at me. "Don't expect me to be grateful," she growled, but I was in too good a mood to care what dark vengeance she might be plotting.

Day 5: The Penultimate Tattoo

Was it really two days since I had last stood before Duchess Nerine? It felt longer.

After passing the third Test, the duchess had made me beg her to remove my pubic hair. I hadn't wanted that at all, but nor could I deny Duchess Nerine anything. Not so long as I had any hope of one day becoming a duchess myself - that 'one day' being this very day.

And it wasn't that bad. The lack of hair was confusing, more than anything. I was so used to having hair down there, and its absence was most noticeable when I was trying to pee - but the piercing was a far greater distraction. I had a loop of gold penetrating me now where my pee came out, making it impossible for me to empty my bladder without thinking of Duchess Nerine.

And yet... I could hardly complain about having a piercing when Duchess Melissa wore one with such pride. Maybe, in a twisted way, it had been a real prize, and not just a whimsical cruelty.

But I wasn't a duchess yet. I was still getting used to the idea of not wearing underwear beneath an indecently short dress. That in itself would be shocking, out in polite human society - as was shaving completely, which Isabel had dared to do and I was struggling to come to terms with. What the folk in Appleton would say if they ever saw my piercing, I shuddered to think.

I wasn't a duchess yet... but I was one step closer. Already I had equalled Ida Green's three tattoos; a fourth would make me equal to Aunt Catherine. Perhaps one day I too would be a regional mayor, with an office in the capital, regaling friends and family with tales of the duchesses and how I once met the Princess herself! Perhaps one day Duchess Nerine would be Princess Nerine, and I would reveal to my astonished lovers the piercing that Princess Nerine of England herself gave to me as a prize.

Or perhaps, like my mother, I would keep my tattoos to myself and live a simple life. Sasha and I together, picking apples in the orchards, making pies and cider and dancing and kissing and growing old together.

This was Day Five. All would be decided in the next few hours. Nine of us had made it back to the bus with a token, and we would each of us have to stand before the duchesses for a final judgement.

But first: the fourth tattoo.

Duchess Nerine looked like confectionery with her pink hair and matching shoes, and her pale blue dress. The nails and lipstick were pink as well, but her eyes were amber and alien. I was beginning to understand my mother's dislike of those reptilian, slitted irises. With eyes like those, there would be no returning to an ordinary, peaceful village life.

To become a duchess was to leave Humanity itself behind in some essential way. For all that the duchesses looked like beautiful, human women, they were something other as well. They played silly games that had the power to make and break people. They wore fabulous dresses that a whole village couldn't afford to buy. They held quaint little tea parties and brunches and picnics, but it was all a distraction from the essential truth that a handful of invisible war machines had once destroyed Earth's terrifying military as easily as swatting a fly.

I slowly and purposely undressed from my dress and shoes (clean, for once; no need for a box) and, knowing the routine, stood patiently while the robot snake examined me. As Duchess Nerine studied me, her eyes drinking in my body and lingering particularly on my breasts, so I too studied her, trying to penetrate her flesh to see how deep the alien transformation went.

My father, once, returning drunk from the village pub, had snarled that a duchess, if gutted, would bleed green...

My mother had smacked him so hard across the face that he fell over backwards and burned his hand on the fire grate. "That fool will get us all killed one day," she'd growled as she escorted me to my room. I was in tears, confused, but she held me through the night, telling me exciting tales of duchesses and princesses until sleep finally claimed me.

"Ask your question," Duchess Nerine said suddenly.

I blinked, instinctively shying away from the truth - but my mind went blank and I could think of no other question I might ask. With a chill like ice racing up my spine, I dared to ask, in a whisper, "What colour is your blood?"

There wasn't even a flicker of emotion in her eyes. "You shouldn't believe everything you hear," she said, and snorted gently. "Perhaps you'll get to find out for yourself."

These were no idle words; they were heavy with a question. "I hope so," I said carefully in return.

After a moment, she nodded, and the tension between us eased. The edges of her lips curled into a smile as she murmured, "Be still. Be very still."

Once again I felt the sharp tickle of electric sensation as the serpent burned its design into the soft skin of my bum, but it was Duchess Nerine's fingertips that I was most conscious of as they traced a winding path around and between my breasts, and slowly down across my belly to where my skin was freshly smooth. "Such beautiful lips," she murmured. "I love to see the sapphire between them. My colour suits you, don't you think?"

I had suspected, and this was confirmation. The pink sapphire had been chosen to match Duchess Nerine's hair, as if she were claiming ownership of me and marking her territory. But there was only one answer to the question. "Yes, Your Grace."

I gave an involuntary jump as a fingertip pressed between my lips and flicked the jewel - but, fortunately, the serpent had finished its design and was retreating. I twisted round to peer down at my bum: three blue-silver tentacles, matching the token from the fourth Test. I had been etched with the war machine, a design both sinister and elegant.

"We're done for now," the duchess said. "Go get ready for the final Test."

Done? I peered at her in some confusion. I had anticipated some new, degrading intimacy - although I'd dreaded it a little too.

We'd arrived back at the Pavilion two hours earlier. Between all the tea at the picnic and the bumpy bus ride, my bladder was fit to bursting - and I had no idea how long it would be until I next saw Duchess Nerine. I tried my best to hold it in, squeezing my thighs tightly together, but with so much tea sloshing around in me, I failed. To my shame, some leaked into my panties as I sat in the bus, and I waited to be the last to leave, knowing that when I stood the seat would be visibly wet.

I was not alone, however, in heading straight for the bathroom. All nine of us were soon there, sitting in a circle, relieving ourselves. Even the two men - Ed and Tim - chose to sit. Ed and Tim had been with me on Duchess Bethany's table for brunch the morning before. Both hailed from the south coast, and both had been in agreement that the fishing had been very good that year.

"It will be another hundred years at least," Duchess Bethany had said, "before the oceans recover fully from all the poisons and plastics of Humanity's past."

The three women I knew only by name: Eve, Helen and Katy. All from villages in the south of England. They seemed nice enough, but kept to themselves, much like Sasha and I did.

The nine of us sat in contemplative silence, dressed only in shirts, as if going to the toilet together was a perfectly normal activity for a mixed group of relative strangers. But strangers or not, we alone - out of the two hundred young men and women who had arrived so innocent on Sunday evening - had made it through to the final day of Testing. We had passed the fourth Test, and would very soon face the fifth and final Test.

By the end of the day, each of us would have four tattoos, maybe five. We would be able to pursue careers in government, and have daily dealings with duchesses, and perhaps also the Princess. We had earned - through this bizarre, arbitrary and often humiliating Testing - a life of privilege, but no matter how well respected we might become, we would always remember how we were once willing to crawl naked through tubes and pee in full public view, all for the entertainment of the duchesses.

Because they, the 'human' ambassadors of our alien overlords, were the ones with the real power.

Mostly lost in our own thoughts, we showered and dressed and made our way to the canteen for lunch. While we ate, the bus arrived with the three duchesses, and our thirteen former companions, several of them scowling in my direction.

"I thank you for coming," I heard Duchess Melissa say to them in that formal yet dismissive way of hers, "but it's time for you to go."

But it wasn't time for me to go. When, after lunch, Duchess Nerine summoned me for my fourth tattoo, I could have managed another little pee if necessary, but where would have been the fun in that?

Day 5: Interview

I sat before the three duchesses on a tall wooden stool, wearing only my Ida Green dress and my mother's shoes. I had thought long and hard about whether to wear underwear, and had decided against it. Twice on the way to my interview, I had stopped and nearly turned back. What, I worried the first time, if this was the one Test where it mattered to be dressed respectfully? Was my mother right with her mantra of always wearing clean underwear? After all, to pass the fifth Test and have five tattoos was a rare achievement and almost a guarantee of gaining, eventually, a senior position in England's government. Surely a life of such responsibility demanded that I wear underwear to such an important moment as this.

So my head told me, anyway. My instincts and my heart suggested otherwise, and I wished I could ask my mother whether she had worn underwear to her interview - although I could not imagine her doing otherwise. My mother's near obsession with always having clean, fresh underwear would not allow her to go without. What, I worried the second time, if that were the sole reason my mother had passed the fifth Test and Aunt Catherine had not? Had Aunt Catherine, like her daughter, been daring enough to go without underwear, and been judged unworthy of a fifth tattoo?

Surely the fifth Test was not as capricious as that. I chose to trust my instincts over my rational mind. I sat with my thighs pressed together in a perhaps futile show of modesty, and I straightened my dress as best I could.

The Ida Green dress had been badly mistreated during the week. Unknown hands had cleaned it and mended it, but the scars were visible. As were mine.

Duchess Melissa stood facing me, hands on her hips, her lips pursed with displeasure. Duchess Bethany paced back and forth behind her, casting occasional, withering looks in my direction. Duchess Nerine was lying on her back on a table, looking up at the ceiling, a stalk of grass between her teeth. "You must answer three questions," Duchess Melissa said. "One from each of us. If your answers satisfy, you will have earned a fifth tattoo."

"Yes, Your Grace." I knew this. Everyone knew this. The final Test was always the same. The questions could be anything, though.

"The machine," she continued, and by 'machine' I assumed she meant the robot snake in the tattoo room since the only other machine I had encountered was the slumbering war machine, "has studied you in detail over the past four days. It has now finished its analysis and the results are here." She held up an envelope with a J on the front. "If your answers satisfy, and if the results are positive, only then will you be granted the opportunity to become a duchess."

This beautiful woman, who I had watched pee into two different rivers, and who had been casually naked in front of me just hours before, was suddenly a frightening alien figure. It was impossible to look away from those amber, slitted eyes that sought to pierce my soul like a sharpened blade. "Tell me, Julia," she demanded, "why should we give Isabel a fifth tattoo?"

Why -

Of all the questions! Certainly, it had never occurred to me that they might ask me about someone else. And Isabel! My cousin. Who had smacked me with a paddle and nearly had me sent home with a single tattoo. Who had laughed about peeing on me. Who I had had spanked in public out of cruel revenge.

And did any of that matter? To me, yes, but to the duchesses? Would my answer sway their decision on Isabel, or was it only my fate hanging by a thread? There was no clue in the cold depths of Duchess Melissa's eyes. There was only impatience with my failure to answer.

I closed my eyes and tried to clear away the chaos of my thoughts, and to consider Isabel as if I were a duchess instead of her cousin...

With four tattoos, Isabel was already the equal of her mother, and Aunt Catherine had proved to be a capable regional mayor. Would Aunt Catherine have made a good Minister in the English government? I had no idea. Perhaps? Although I could imagine Princess Caroline finding her rather tedious at times. I had even less idea about how Isabel would cope. She was only eighteen, after all, and she would have decades to learn the system.

A system that I myself knew next to nothing about. Then again, I had no more desire to be in government than my own mother had. I wanted the fifth tattoo because I wanted the chance to be a duchess. Isabel, I was sure, had no real desire to be a duchess.

I whined quietly and rubbed my forehead. What had the question been? Exactly?

With a sigh of painful resignation, I braved an answer: "Because she's my cousin."

Duchess Melissa raised a critical eyebrow. "No other reason?"

"No, Your Grace."

She glowered at me for a few anxious heartbeats, then whirled around and marched over to sit on the table next to Duchess Nerine. With a wave of her hand, she indicated that Duchess Bethany should ask the next question.

"Why should I bother?" Duchess Bethany snarled. "This one only cares about becoming a duchess. We should send her home in an iron corset."

A whimper of fear escaped my lips. An iron corset! The cruelest of chastity devices. My insides went cold just at the thought. I had heard stories of such, and wouldn't even wish one on Isabel.

"Ask your question," Duchess Nerine said calmly, the grass stalk dancing between her teeth.

"So be it." Duchess Bethany scowled at me. "Do you care? Do you care that in becoming a duchess, you are betraying your family, your friends, the whole of Humanity, just for the chance to wear pretty dresses?"

I stared at her in horror. For anyone other than a duchess to ask such a question would have been heresy. For me to answer it would be heresy. The one absolute rule that had been drummed into me since I was old enough to speak was to never question the right to rule of the duchesses and the whole hierarchy up to our alien overlords themselves.

"I don't care about the dresses," I said through gritted teeth. Which was an obvious lie. I absolutely did care about the dresses. I'd loved the duchesses and their dresses since I was a young girl, and as recently as a year ago I would have said the dresses and the adventures were why I wanted to be a duchess - but I wasn't about to admit that.

"I'm not betraying anyone," I continued. "You duchesses... You saved Humanity. You saved us from our own excesses." Duchess Bethany snorted her disbelief of this regurgitated propaganda, and I held up a hand to plead patience from her. "I do believe that - but I also see that you have made the Earth a gilded cage. You allow us our governments and encourage our science, but only up to a point. Our lives are comfortable, but you restrict our travel, and you control our ability even to communicate. You have domesticated us, the same way we keep cows in the fields."

I took a deep breath and tried to calm down. I was pretty sure I'd already blown any chance of becoming a duchess. Such heretical talk never ended well. "There is no betrayal in choosing not to remain a cow."

Duchess Nerine cackled with laughter, and took the grass from her mouth. "Is it my turn now?" she asked. She was still looking at the ceiling, but at some point during my confrontation with Duchess Bethany, Duchess Nerine had tugged the front of her dress down enough that her nipples were free of the fabric.

"I still say she needs a corset," Duchess Bethany muttered darkly, and turned her back on me.

"Fair Julia," Duchess Nerine said, the fingers of one hand idly teasing a swollen nipple. "Tell us: Why aren't you wearing underwear?"

She hadn't looked at me once - how did she know! Had she spied on me earlier as I dressed in preparation? Or was I just so predictable for her? And of all the questions she could have asked, why that?

I could feel the heat of embarrassment in my cheeks. All that second-guessing myself on the way to the interview. I hadn't understood then what was plainly obvious to me now. "For you, Your Grace," I said, my voice scarcely a whisper. "To see all of me clearly." A sudden stirring of heat within had me squirming uncomfortably on the high wooden stool. Duchess Nerine's engorged nipples were a wicked distraction.

"Hmm," was all Duchess Melissa said. "Please wait through there." She pointed to a door at the side.

As I eased down from the high stool and walked to the door, Duchess Melissa opened the envelope she held, pulled out a sheet of paper and studied the printed details.

Day 5: Final Judgement

I was the third to be interviewed, and the third therefore to enter the soundproof room where we would await the final judgement. Eve and Katy were there before me. "What did they ask you?" Eve demanded. Both women looked as tense and awkward as I felt.

"Ah, just why I wanted to be a duchess," I lied. "What the tattoos mean. What would I do if I were Prime Minister of England."

These were all questions that people had supposedly been asked in the past - I had had answers ready for all of them - and I had no wish now to share the questions I had actually been asked. "What about you?"

"Oh," she said airily. "The same."

Helen was next, then Ed, the interviews spaced fifteen minutes apart. Both chose seats beside Eve and Katy, and I caught only the occasional word from the quartet's subdued murmurs.

Feeling increasingly alone, and increasingly conscious of the fullness of my bladder, and increasingly conscious too that I would not be seeing Duchess Nerine for an hour yet, and then only if I satisfied the duchesses with my answers, which I was far from certain of, it was with a sigh of relief that I greeted Pepper.

Her smile on seeing me was full of irrepressible warmth, and it was impossible not to return it. "Such strange questions," she whispered, taking a seat next to me.

I raised an inquisitive eyebrow, wondering whether she would dare to tell me. "Duchess Melissa," she said quietly, "gave the third question. 'Was twenty spanks enough,' she asked, 'and what lesson do you think Isabel learned?' - which, if you ask me, was two questions, not one."

They were certainly interesting questions. "Not as innocent as they seem," I noted.

"No," Pepper agreed, and laughed. "I said, 'I don't know what Isabel learned, but I learned that a spanking hurts both ways, and twenty was quite enough for my hand.'" She laughed again and flexed her hand in memory of that morning's punishment.

Just how truthful she was being about that answer, I couldn't tell, but I dared to share what they had asked me about Isabel: "They asked me why they should give Isabel a fifth tattoo."

Pepper winced. "What did you say?"

"I said she was my cousin."

Pepper said nothing, and nodded thoughtfully.

Tim was next out, then Sasha. If the former was cheerful and unconcerned, the latter was tense and seemed almost on the point of tears. "What is it?" I demanded quietly.

For a long time I was sure she would not say. Sasha seemed reluctant even to look at me. "Duchess Bethany," she whispered with ragged breath, "said you and I were inseparable, that we would both be sent home with four tattoos."

A quiet cry of dismay escaped my lips - but Sasha wasn't finished. "She asked... She asked if she should make us truly inseparable and tie us together with a chain!"

A chain? Binding Sasha and me together for the rest of our lives? That seemed... complicated. Even just getting dressed in the morning would be complicated. "And you said?"

"I said no," Sasha said, "but I... very nearly didn't." Her face was etched with guilt, and a tear escaped one eye.

I watched the tear roll down her cheek, and leaned in to kiss it away. "I can think of worse fates."

She twisted round to look at me, doubt in her eyes. I reassured her with a soft kiss on her lips, and murmured, "She threatened me with an iron corset."

Sasha's eyes went wide, and she leaned back to examine me, perhaps expecting to see such a corset already in place. "Okay," she said, "that would be worse."

By the subtle curling of her lips, however, I had to wonder if she really meant that.

The last interview was Isabel's, and her expression was a frown of confusion as she joined us. "Duchess Melissa asked if I would want to be Prime Minister if it meant a public spanking once a week."

I laughed. "You said yes."

Isabel's cheeks turned bright red as she shook her head. "Of course not!"

I didn't believe her - or, if she had said that, I was sure the duchesses hadn't believed her. Her indignation was feigned, and she never was a great actor. "I don't think that was the answer they wanted, Izzy."

We were not kept in suspense for much longer - which was good, because my bladder was aching and I was struggling to hold it in. We were summoned back to the hall to stand in a row in front of the three duchesses. Their earlier animosity had seemingly evaporated, and they examined us as a school teacher might examine a promising but troublesome pupil.

"Well done all of you for making it to the end," Duchess Melissa said. "Sadly, not all of you have passed this last Test. Eve, Tim, Helen: I thank you for coming, but it's time for you to go."

Tim shrugged, clearly unsurprised; Eve scowled at the rest of us; Helen gave a soft cry of dismay. I barely noticed, though. Sasha and I drowned it out with a cry of victory and shared relief. Despite Duchess Bethany's threats and predictions, we had passed the final Test and would get our fifth tattoos.

I glanced at Duchess Nerine, who was watching me with a promise of something in her eyes, and that was all it took to light a fierce fire of arousal in my core.

Duchess Melissa was not finished. "Congratulations all," she said, as soon as Tim, Eve and Helen were out of sight. "I have three invitations to hand out." She held up three white envelopes. "Sasha."

The look Sasha shared with me was full of surprise, and she almost leapt forward to take the envelope from Duchess Melissa's outstretched hand. "Thank you, Your Grace."

This was the moment! This was the moment I'd been yearning for for months. In passing all the Tests, I would have five tattoos, but the only thing that truly mattered to me was receiving an invitation to be a duchess.

"Pepper," Duchess Melissa said, holding out the second envelope as Pepper hurried forward to take it.

How cruel that it was all on the whims of a machine! It no longer mattered what the duchesses thought of me. It didn't matter that Duchess Nerine had this strange, perverse connection with me that I still didn't quite understand. No, it only mattered what some alien machine decided about the esoteric nature of my human flesh.

Four of us left. Only one invitation. It took all my strength merely to stand still.

"And Julia."

"Breathe," Isabel whispered, nudging me with her elbow. "Before you pass out..."

Day 5: Tattoo

And again I had to wait, if only for the fifteen minutes it took for Ed, Katy and Isabel to get their fifth tattoos. Pepper, Sasha and I were alone, together, sitting in stunned silence as we contemplated the envelopes in our hands. All our lives we had dreamed of one day becoming duchesses, but the envelopes presented that dream as a tangible possibility. Just the touch of paper against our fingertips was like electricity.

I opened the envelope. Inside was the report from the machine, an analysis of genetic markers that I did not even try to understand. The only thing that mattered, however, was the conclusion: 'Compatible'. Also inside the envelope was a rectangle of card, and written there in familiar calligraphy was, "Fair Julia, The last bus back to a human life leaves at five o'clock precisely. Will you abandon me as your mother did? Or are you ready to embrace a whole new existence as a duchess? I will ask you only once. Be ready to answer. N."

Sasha and I peered at each other's cards. On hers was written, in far simpler lettering, "Trust me. B."

On Pepper's card there were no words, only a clever and detailed sketch of Isabel bent over with Pepper standing behind her, hand raised in anticipation; and, in the lower right corner, the initial M.

Sasha chuckled. "That's a memory to treasure."

It was indeed. I glanced up at the clock on the wall. Twenty minutes until the bus departed. Twenty minutes in which to get my fifth tattoo and make a decision that would take me away from my family and everyone I knew in Appleton. Away from Isabel too, and despite the tensions between us she was still my cousin and my closest childhood friend. Away from my very humanity! My mother had faced this choice too. She could have chosen to be a duchess, and then I would never have been born. If I chose to be a duchess, I would never have a daughter of my own. I would have pretty dresses and exciting adventures and every time I looked in the mirror I would see alien eyes looking back at me. And why?

None of it made any sense.

And there wasn't enough time!

I ran to the corridor with the tattoo rooms, just in time to see Isabel emerging from one. Not stopping to think, I caught her in an embrace and refused to let go. "Please forgive me," I said.

Isabel laughed and hugged me tightly. "For leaving me to become a duchess? It's what you always wanted. Of course I forgive you."

"I always thought we would be duchesses together."

"That was your dream, Jules. Never really mine. I just wanted five tattoos - and I don't think I would have got them without you."

I disentangled myself from her, too aware of how little time was left. "Bye, Izzy," I said, tears in my eyes. "Tell Mum and Dad I love them."

She nodded, and turned reluctantly to go. "I'm still telling everyone I peed on your head," she called back with a wicked grin.

Duchess Nerine was waiting for me. I wasn't ready. I needed to speak to Sasha. I needed to make sure that Sasha would make the same choice that I did - but Sasha wasn't there yet and I didn't dare ask Duchess Nerine to wait.

Anxiously, I entered the tattoo room, flinching as the door closed behind me. "Clothes off and lie down," she said, indicating the glossy, padded bench that I hadn't needed to use before. A rather ominous looking bench with stirrups to hold one's ankles in the air. I knew what such benches were used for.

I removed my dress and boots as instructed, but hesitated to approach the bench. "If you're in a hurry to get to the bus," Duchess Nerine said, "we can do this quickly - while standing up."

There it was. The demand for a decision. Whether to accept a life of simple humanity, knowing that ultimately my choices meant very little, or to surrender myself to a fate I could only begin to guess at. In this terrible moment, Duchess Nerine had never looked more alien to me. Her amber, reptilian eyes were cold and analytical. The slight sibilance in her words - "sstanding up" - seemed to echo in my ears.

One day, it might be me standing there, asking some young human woman if she was ready to give up her humanity, whatever that meant. I could almost picture it: my hair platinum blonde and styled into eye-catching curls; a deep blue dress studded with glittering jewels that flashed like stars in the night sky; matching platform stilettos that I had mastered walking in, so that I seemed to glide effortlessly above the floor; and amber, alien eyes that saw...

What did they see, I wondered. Did the Earth look different through those alien eyes? I wanted to ask her - but what was the point when I would know soon enough, if I dared to find out.

What if Sasha was, at this very moment, choosing to remain human, and I did not? I might never see her again.

I might never see my family again. Duchesses never returned home. That was the rule. If I ever saw my parents again, it would be through purest chance.

Ahh, a cruel choice! A selfish choice.

I forced myself to move, to take a half step towards the bench, and gradually found the strength to complete that journey, until I was lying naked on the soft, smooth material.

Duchess Nerine lifted one ankle into its stirrup, and buckled it securely; then the other. I was trapped. Helpless. My legs splayed in the most inelegant manner possible. "Do you accept the honour of being a duchess?" she asked me, and I knew my next word would determine my fate.

"Yes," I said, the finality of that word binding me more securely than the restraints about my ankles.

And with that, the tension slowly eased. I had chosen. What would be, would be.

Duchess Nerine summoned the robot snake, which lined up between my parted thighs. "I have to warn you," she said, "that this one's going to hurt a little."

A little? I wanted to scream as the serpent pressed its cool, metallic mouth against my labia. The duchess distracted me, however, bending to kiss me, a long kiss of soft, sweet exploration. A lover's kiss. And I couldn't get enough of it. Of her.

The robot worked swiftly, almost too swiftly, and the pain diminished quickly once it was done. "Take a look," the duchess said, handing me a mirror.

Reluctantly, I used it to examine myself. Looking at my own genitals was something I had always shied away from doing, but I needed to see what she had done to me: a blue butterfly, its wings either side of the parting. Very pretty, but it was a tattoo that I would only ever show to lovers.

"Would you like to see what your mother has on hers?" Duchess Nerine asked, looking at me expectantly. She did not wait for an answer, and instead slowly lifted her dress, and removed it entirely.

Perhaps she waxed regularly, or perhaps it was her alien nature, but her skin was smooth, entirely without hair. I had imagined her pubes as being a wild tangle of vivid pink, but she was hairless there too. Most astonishing, though, was the tattoo of a flower, its bright pink petals fanning out around where I guessed her clitoris was.

She climbed onto the bench, her knees straddling my head, that flower almost pressing against my mouth. Intoxicating. Musky. Wonderful. She dropped down onto me, her breasts against my belly, her breath warm against my skin, her cheeks caressing my inner thighs - and how could I not take equal advantage of her, my tongue sweeping between her labia, seeking the heart of that floral tattoo.

She was wet. She tasted exquisite. I writhed within my restraints as her tongue teased my piercing, shooting pleasure like electricity along my nerves. It was strange to think that I had arrived in Buxton an innocent virgin, and now, in the space of a few hours, I had made love to a human woman by the roadside and now had my tongue deep in an alien pussy. Either of which would make for a topic of scandalous gossip back home in Appleton.

And I was so full, so desperately in need of the loo. For hours I had denied the growing impulse, anticipating this very moment, but I had not imagined I would be gorging on her pussy, and she on mine. I whined a warning - too late. I was losing control, and slightly horrified at the thought of it...

... but Duchess Nerine's tongue did not pause for a second, sweeping across my clit, flicking gently at the jewelled ring, exciting me with every touch as my urine gushed out into her mouth.

It was all too much for me: the gorgeousness of her cunt, the blissful release of my bladder, the relentless excitation of her lustful, skilful tongue, my helplessness within the restraints, and the sheer dirtiness of it all. I screamed in ecstasy as I was swept up into a climax of unparalleled intensity, waves of blissful pleasure coursing through my flesh as I convulsed beneath her -

- and just as I thought I was done, Duchess Nerine sat up, her face dripping. She stood, turned, and dropped back down to straddle my head again, this time looking down between her breasts into my eyes as she again lowered her pussy to my mouth. "My turn," she said.

Her hot pee flooded into my mouth suddenly, too much spit out, too much to drink. It poured out across my cheeks and soaked into my hair as she played with her nipples, pinching them rhythmically, her thighs clamped about my head tight like a vise as I nearly drowned beneath her. All the while, her eyes were looking deep into mine...

I gasped for breath as the torrent ended and she climbed off me. My whole face was wet from her gushing release of pee - as indeed was hers - and I could feel the cooling liquid against my skin as it pooled in the depression my body made in the bench surface. I was exhausted, and I was euphoric too, thrilled that we had shared this perverse, delicious pleasure.

Smiling happily up at her, I reached out for her hand, needing to feel her warm touch again.

In the distance, a bell rang out for five o'clock. "It's time," Duchess Nerine said, summoning the robot snake once more with a flick of her wrist - or no, a different one, a more slender tentacle that she guided between my thighs until it nudged against that entrance where no cock had ever penetrated, and none ever would, if I could help it.

Again she distracted me with kissing. "Relax, I know you're wet enough," she murmured. "Just let it happen. It will be over soon." With pulsing vibrations that made me want to melt inside, the phallic tentacle pushed slowly into me.

The duchess straddled me again, her knees either side of my waist, her swollen nipples pressing against my chest, her breasts soft against mine, her lips demanding my attention. Lying there, my hands on her body, our thighs almost locked together, it was almost possible to believe that Duchess Nerine was the one penetrating me, and not some alien machine doing I-knew-not-what between my legs.

I expected it to hurt, and to feel the sharp pain of a torn hymen, but there was merely an initial discomfort as it pressed and retreated, pressed and retreated, stretching me slowly, filling me in a way that was confusingly good. It was an unwanted invader and I would have hated it utterly if Duchess Nerine hadn't held me throughout, kissing me and whispering encouragement.

It pressed deeper into me than I thought was possible! I whimpered as it nudged against the entrance to my womb - but even that discomfort passed. "This next bit will hurt," Duchess Nerine said, "but then it will be all over."

Sitting up, she took two clips from her hair, causing the perfectly styled top knot to tumble down in waves of pink, and fastened the clips to my nipples. I screamed from the shock of it, but her hands snared my wrists, forcing me to endure the intense pain - and almost completely distracting me from the slow swelling of the tentacle in my vagina, stretching me to the point I was sure I would tear open -

- and then, abruptly, it was over, the invader diminishing, departing, leaving behind only a dull ache and cruel emptiness between my thighs...

Duchess Nerine released my wrists and set my nipples free, and guided my hand to my belly. "Can you feel it?"

I could. There was a hardness within me, a swelling, something in my womb. And I understood. The alien tentacle hadn't merely fucked me. It had impregnated me.

After bending down for one last kiss, which did nothing to ease my confusion, Nerine stroked my face and murmured, "Now you are one of us, Duchess Julia."

Day 5: Duchess

Five o'clock was gone. The bus was gone. Sasha was... I had no idea. I sat on the bench, my bum in a puddle of cooling pee, Nerine's urine still dripping from my nose and hair. Dirty. The smell of sex and deviance filled the air. The taste lingered in my mouth.

And I hurt. Physically a little, but the hurt ran deeper. I did not feel like a duchess. I felt like I had been invaded. Conquered. I glowered sullenly at Nerine. "What have you done to me?"

Nerine was dried and dressed again, fixing her vibrant pink curls. "I opened the gate, and set you free," she said. "You're no longer a cow, Julia."

I jumped down from the bench and approached the tall mirror, half expecting to see alien eyes staring back at me - but no. I was in a bedraggled state, like a rat escaped from a sewer. Nothing about me, not even my eyes that were as human as ever, suggested that I was transforming into an alien hybrid - or whatever it was the duchesses were.

The only evidence, aside from a silent scream of protest from deep inside my soul, was the hardness within my womb. "Am I to be a mother?" I asked, imagining some tentacled monstrosity emerging into the world from between my thighs.

Nerine laughed. "Nothing like that. Rather, you have gained another parent. They are somewhere up there," she said, pointing up through the ceiling, through the sky, into the depths of space, "and it may be you never actually meet them, but they sent their one and only egg to Earth to have somewhere safe to grow, and someone healthy to grow within." She stood behind me, her eyes meeting mine in the mirror. "You will always be Julia from Earth, but you will be someone more than that too."

She bent to kiss my shoulder, and wrinkled her nose at the smell. "You need a shower. Go - but hurry. There is so much to do before we leave." She slapped me affectionately on the bum to hurry me up.

I had never needed to see a human face more - a cruel irony, because the one face I wanted to see more than anything was Sasha's, and the only way I would see her now was if she too had chosen to be a duchess. I half walked, half ran, all of the way back to the dorm - which was eerily quiet compared to the hubbub at the start of the week, and very empty.

My heart breaking, I ran down the echoing hallway to the bathroom -

Sasha was there. Pepper too. Beneath the showers, their mood sombre. With a cry of relief, I ran in and embraced them both, and finally surrendered to the tears that had been bubbling up inside ever since -

Ever since that tentacle. "Did -" I said. "Did -" But I couldn't bring myself to say it.

"Do we have alien eggs in our wombs?" Sasha supplied, her expression tight with displeasure. "Yes."

"Really not the way I planned on losing my virginity," Pepper said, her tone a little too dark for it to be a joke.

I studied Sasha's eyes for any minute trace of difference. They were as blue as ever, but was it possible the pupils were no longer perfectly round? Had they ever been? I couldn't be sure.

"Are you regretting it already?" Sasha asked with a wry smile.

"No," I said. "I don't know. Maybe." Either way, I was so much calmer just knowing that Sasha was on this adventure with me. "I love you," I said, and kissed her -

It shocked us both. Her lips had the taste of something... Something nameless. Something I'd been missing all my life, and I could see the same startled recognition in Sasha's eyes. "Oh, wow," she said, and turned to Pepper. "Taste this," she said, and kissed her - a brief kiss, but long enough, and effective enough, to have Pepper raising her eyebrows in surprise.

Pepper touched her fingertips to her lips, eyes wide in wonder. "What is that?"

Epilogue

The bus that took us away from Buxton followed a familiar route, past the place where we had had a picnic with the duchesses, past the place where Sasha and I had made love, past the place where we had spotted the chomper and turned off the road. It was the same road that the bus from York had come along, in the other direction, and the road therefore that would have taken me home, had that been my destination.

But home was no longer an option. I had missed the last bus that could take me home. This bus turned left onto a narrow road that threaded through forested countryside.

There were just six passengers. Melissa, Nerine and Bethany, all dressed in black. Pepper, Sasha and me, all in white, almost like brides. These were not the tight dresses of the Day One dance; they were elegant dresses of a quality a duchess might wear, with lace detail and the glitter of crystals.

Nerine had styled my hair too. "By the time you leave our school," she said, "you must choose a hair colour. Every duchess has a signature style, and hair colour is part of that."

Isabel and I had often talked about duchesses and their styles. "I'd love blue," she would say, "but not just one blue. I want sapphire blue mixed with locks of sky blue." We had seen duchesses several times on the television with such hair and it was certainly a dramatic style.

It wasn't what I had my own heart set on, however. "Platinum blonde," I said to Nerine, "but not if I have to wear white."

She laughed. "White for tonight's festivities only, and I think platinum will suit you well."

I frowned as her words caught up with me. "School?"

"Yes, Julia. School. Being a duchess isn't all just parties and games. You chose to leave a life of blissful ignorance. You chose to become the farmer instead of the livestock. With such choices comes responsibility."

"Is it too late to change my mind?" I mumbled. My mouth felt dry.

"Far too late," she replied. "Already the changes have begun, and with every passing year you will feel the tug of your new nature grow, urging you to leave the Earth behind. It's not just the Queen, Julia, who is taken to the stars. They are the destiny of every duchess. I will go there one day, and so will you."

There had been one last thing to do before leaving the Pavilion, and that was the Ritual of Letters. I, and indeed all of us, had brought from home a letter, sealed in an envelope, to be opened only after the Testing. Scrawled hastily on the back of the envelope was a note from Isabel. "Dear Julia," it read, "I know we can no longer be cousins, but still I hope that our paths will cross from time to time. I wish you love, happiness and lots of adventures. For myself, I'm thinking Oxford. Five tattoos gets me a scholarship, and that will make my mother green with envy. Love and kisses, Isabel."

That was a bittersweet message that made me laugh, but also made it harder still to open the envelope. It contained the last words my parents would ever say to me, and to read them might break me.

The duchesses had thoughtfully provided a letter opener. The slender knife was like an assassin's blade, and just as deadly as it cut neatly through paper leaving a sharp edge. I eased the note out. "Dear Julia," it read, "We love you and will miss you terribly, but what matters to us more than anything is your happiness. Think of us from time to time, and know that we are thinking of you. Your loving parents, &c."

A brief postscript followed: "Ida Green says she will be most offended if you do not return to Appleton regularly to demand a new dress or two."

I was in tears reading these words, and tears fell on the page as I wrote the brutal reply: "My heart breaks that I will never see you again, but it is an honour to be chosen, and this is now my destiny. Love, Julia." What else is there to say when your heart is breaking and words seem to lose all meaning?

Sasha was in tears too. "I chose this because my sister chose this, but if it were not already too late, I would choose differently."

I hugged her tightly. "I'm happy you're with me. We'll get through this. Somehow. Together." Which was an excuse, though none was needed, for a kiss that began as a simple promise of love but quickly developed into an urgent hunger. That taste was on her lips, and no doubt on mine too, an unsubtle reminder that the days of innocence were behind us.

The first stars were visible in the darkening sky as we came in sight of our destination. Pepper, Sasha and I gaped out of the bus window at the brightly lit mansion before us. "My whole village could fit in one small corner of that," I said.

Sasha nodded. "There's probably a whole village of people here just keeping the rooms clean and the gardens tidy."

Melissa stood as the bus drew to a halt at the grand entrance to the mansion. "Welcome to the Chatsworth School for Duchesses," she said. "You will spend the first year of your new life here. During that time, we will live here with you as your guides and sponsors. We are responsible for rewarding your successes, and punishing you for your failures." By the glint in Melissa's eyes, I had little doubt that she would enjoy spanking Pepper for every real and imagined error.

Taking Pepper by the hand, Melissa led her from the bus and up the grand steps into the mansion. Bethany likewise led an obedient Sasha away from me, leaving me alone with my pink-haired duchess, the one who had taught me to love a very dirty pleasure. What else would she teach me in the coming months?

"Come, Julia," she said, holding out her hand.

I took it, interlocking fingers and holding tight. I let her lead me, like a puppy following its mistress. Perhaps that was all I was to her. I didn't love her, not in the way I loved Sasha, but I was drawn to Nerine like iron to a magnet, or a compass to North. Which I guess is the same thing.

She stopped on the steps and turned to look at the night-shrouded hills and woods. "Do you see?" she said, pointing.

I turned and followed her outstretched hand aimed at the horizon, and as my eyes adjusted gradually I did see, and more clearly than ever before. A trio of tentacles, huge, glowing. Was it really only that morning that I had stood beneath them and watched as Pepper spanked Isabel? So much had happened to me since then.

"The war machine," I said.

"It has slept for a hundred years, and may sleep for a thousand more. Its purpose is not mere destruction. It stands guard to protect this world and those who are born here."

She lifted the hem of my dress and her fingertips traced the war machine tattoo on my bum. My skin was so sensitive there, and her touch stirred a deep arousal in me. After that brutal, mechanical tentacle laid its egg in my womb, I had been sure I would never want to be touched again, but Nerine's fingers brushed all that away.

I was suddenly, acutely aware that I wore no underwear beneath my white dress. There was nothing to hinder Nerine should she seek to explore further. "Our senses are much more acute," she murmured. "We heal fast. We do not age visibly. But there are downsides too."

She moved behind me, sensually kissing my neck as her hand slowly and purposely worked its way around to the front, beneath my dress, until her loving fingers caressed my hairless labia. "Such as?" I asked with a whimper. Was it my imagination, or could I smell my own arousal? Certainly she had to be able to feel it.

"How about... If I can make you pee in the next five minutes, you dance only with me tonight. If you can hold it in, I'll let you have one dance with Sasha."

That was a cruel bargain! And yet... I hadn't been to the loo, not since peeing with Nerine in the tattoo room, but I felt no great urgency. Resisting Nerine's manipulation should be simple, and I did hope for some time with Sasha. "Okay."

I couldn't help but moan as she pressed two fingers between my labia, one brushing against my clit, the other toying with the pink sapphire and its little gold ring. The sensation was almost too intense, at first, but the heat of arousal built swiftly into a fire of need.

As if with a mind of their own, my hips pressed rhythmically against her fingers, and my hands massaged my breasts through the white dress. I imagined Sasha's cute grin as she sucked enthusiastically on my still tender nipples. I forgot about everything except the climax I was chasing, driving myself against Nerine's skilful fingertips, exulting in the building tension.

Only at the last moment, as I teetered exquisitely at the precipice itself, did I perceive a double need. "No!" I cried.

But it was too late! Perhaps I could have denied the orgasm, but I could do nothing to halt the flood of pee gushing out of me past Nerine's strumming fingers, and that extra sensation was enough to push me over. With a wail of helpless grief and ached-for pleasure, I yielded to ecstatic convulsions and blissful relief, my pee running down my legs and splashing over my white ankle boots and splattering on the limestone steps beneath.

Afterwards, as I trembled within her embrace, Nerine chuckled. "We can't hold it in," she murmured. "Not like humans can." As if to prove the point, she sighed softly into my ear as she too relieved herself, and I enjoyed the sensation of her pee, warm against the backs of my legs.

T' End