Katabasis

“Is Ronnie wet or messy? Oh, he does not know. Well, we just have to check Ronnie for messes then. Come to think of it, Ronnie is a too human name for a shitty slave like you, not least with the coming training in mind. We will have to give you a new shorter name, perhaps one that goes better with your new situation. Humm. Now I know! Your name is Ro – it rhymes with poo.”

Draco pointed his wand to the little metal tag that hung on the collar, and the metal tag transformed into a cartoon bone with the name – Ro.

“Say it! Ro!”

Ro looked up, he tried to form the new name. But he was too slow, and he felt pain flood every limb, and he cried out in pain.

“Say it! Ro!”, Draco said in an even sterner voice, showing his teeth.

“Ughh, Ro, my name is Ro. It rhymes with poo.”

“Good, say it again – what is your name.”

This time Ro was faster, “Ro, Ro’s name is Ro, and it rhymes with poo.”

Draco smiled a feral smile and grabbed Ro’s chin hard and said in a silky-smooth voice laden with a softly spoken threat, “Good, and for Ro’s sake I hope Ro do not forget it. Master knows how to punish dogs that misbehaves. But speaking of poo, I do think Ro have soiled himself during the night, master will have to change him before the training can commence.”

As Ro was forced to lay down and being wiped, master continued to chatter in an unusually casual tone.

“I guess you wonder what you are being trained to. Well, I decided that I need a guard dog, and as I have a stupid blood traitor pet at hand, I will make good use of it. Also, I am beginning to fear that you will just turn into a useless babbling fool if I continue to reward your infantile behaviour. Soon you would stop talking just to please me – that would be boring and worse, wasteful.”

Ro did not say anything, just letting master continue talking. Ro felt a fresh wave of embarrassment at the thought of how low he had sunken the preceding weeks, what he had been letting himself be reduced to, and at the feeling that master probably was right. In a flash he could see himself as he must look – a thick nappy, a pair of stiff mittens, a mindless drooly smile around a large pacifier. If he had not been laying down, he perhaps would have done something very stupid. Instead, he forced down his abject shame and let dumb Ronnie…no Ro, Ro, rhyme with poo… take over. He could not afford to remember wrong things, or he might get sent back to the room. He gulped and chided himself over that he had let his discipline slip. He needed to work harder if he wanted to live.

When master was done, he fastned a leash on Ro’s collar and indicated that Ro should follow the guidance of the leash on all four. Ro was not used to crawl on all four – he had spent most of his time on his back or sitting in one place – so it went too slow for master. The padding, even if it now was fresh and crips, also made the crawl more cumbersome than it perhaps would have been otherwise. When Ro lagged behind what master thought was the appropriate tempo Ro felt it like a whip on his back and knew that he had to try to keep up.  The led down to the dungeon where Ro first have woken up. Ro franticly tried not to think that he had any previous life before that. Thinking was nothing that dumb pets did after all, and that was all he was and ever had been. Ro tried not to gulp, so that master did not have any suspicion that anything then the most basic thoughts went through his head. Instead, Ro tried feel the surroundings, something he guessed that stupid animals that he was to be would do. When his hands and knees touched the stone floor the well-known mantra repeated itself in his head:

Live, live, live, live, live …

Simple rules for simple creatures. Like him.

Suddenly Master turned and walked into a small cell, heavy iron bars and a door fashioned in the same manner and led Ro through it. In the middle of the room there stood a large wooden pole, and attached to it, a thick iron chain. With a swift movement of his wand master fastned the chain that was fastned to Ro’s leash to the larger chain. As to show Ro the impossibility of escape – if he had been stupid enough to contemplate such a thing –master janked on the chain.

“See, thick and solid. Now you can begin your training at becoming my little guard dog. You can see the bowls of food and water here; master will not miss to feed and water his little dumb doggo. What do you say about that?”

Ro, looked uncertain for a moment, trying to understand what was expected of him. He did not want to and be punished for doing the right thing.

“Thanks master.”

“You are a dog now – you do not need to use human words. Bark!”

Ro tried to bark.

“Good enough for now. It will take some training getting you to behave. But we have all the time in the world, don’t we Ro?”

“Ye…Ahhh…Bark, Bark, Bark”

” Bark again!”, masters command rang out clear and cold.

” Bark, bark, bark!”

” And again…and again…and again.”

When master was satisfied, Ro felt his throat burn with the exception and cast a quick glance at the water bowl, wanting nothing more than to sooth his throat with a gulp of the water.

“Go on, drink if you want. We have a very long way to go, but master will not hinder Ro from drinking from his bowl like a proper dog.”

Ro walked a pace on his hands and feet, the chain clinking on the stone floor, and then began to drink with clumsy gulps, getting water all over his face and dropping it down on his chest. Master just stood and watched, glee painting his whole face. Ro did not say anything, just drank until he was not thirsty anymore, then waited for what master had in mind.

First nothing happened – the master just stood there, eyes glistening with malice and with a slight, almost imperceptible smile touching the master’s features. Suddenly the master pointed his wand to the distance and a silvery mist flowed out and formed itself to a small dog.

“Ro have made some progression since Ro was here last time. Then he was an insubordinate little fucker that did not know his proper place- let’s see how good of a dog you are and can be. When I say ‘sit’, I want Ro to what the dog do right now. Do you understand?”

Ro saw the silvery dog sit with its back straight and with the feet of its hindlegs firmly planted on the floor. Ro nodded. Saw the eyebrows of the master beginning to draw together in disapproval and added a hasty “bark”.

Master seemed satisfied and began demonstrating other poses that Ro should learn about with the help of the silver dog. Suddenly the master stopped and said:

“Let’s see what Ro remember. Sit! Roll over! Four! Pee! Roll over!”

If Ro was not fast enough a jolt of pain shoot thorugh him. How long this progressed Ro had no clue about, but then it was not his place to think about such things. The only things Ro needed to do was to obey. Simple rules for simple creatures.

After a while the master seemed to get bored, and with a simple “Stop!” he commanded Ro to stand still at his pole, panting from the flurry of exercise.

“We need to put Ro through a hard program I see. Ro is slow. Well with some practice that may be helped. Well, we will see tomorrow, so rest while you can.”

And with that the master swung on his heal and left the room leaving Ro alone in the dark.

¨¨¨

The following time – Ro had no idea how much time had actually gone by – was a flurry of harsh training. Not only was Ro punished every time he made the slightest mistake or was a bit slow to obey the command. No, he was also driven by pleasure. Whenever Ro did something that earned the master’s especial approval Ro was overwhelmed with a strong pleasure, almost making his tongue lol out in pure bliss. It was however a pleasure that was as strong as it was brief, and it left Ro with a desperate urge of getting more, however sparingly it was given. So Ro did try – to be the dog that he was commanded to be. He tried so hard that he most nights then not almost was asleep as soon as master had gone for the day, sometimes even forgetting to eat.

Not only was Ro prodded to preform physically – he also learned who Ro was:

“Who is Ro”

“Ro is masters dumb pet.”

“And what is Ro’s purpose?”

“To serve master’s needs.”

“Good. And what happened before Ro came to master?”

“Nothing. Ro was just a dumb beast before. Master saved Ro.”

“Are Ro grateful for being saved by master?”

“Yes, yes Ro are grateful to master.”

“How do we know that Ro belong to master?”

“Ro has the branding and collar; Ro lives in masters house and Ro is getting changed by the master or the masters’ servants.”

“Excellent. Who is Harry Potter?”

“A foul traitor to all wizards. He wants to hurt master.”

“What would Ro do if Potter came here?”

“Warn master by barking.”

The last thing Ro had proven. One day a person that resembled Potter – Ro dared not think how Ro know that – had come through the door. Ro did not hesitate to do what master expected of him. He barked until his throat was horse, he drowned out the voice from the person in the other end of the room. Only when the person turned back into master did Ro stop barking. He had done good it seemed like Ro got some extra treats in his bowl that night and even a pat on the head. Yes, he had done good.

¨¨¨

“You see, I will force the dog to run and fecht the stick, giving him some exercise.”

“Hmmm, I see. Will you teach him such things, or do you use the Imperius curse?”

“No, no imperious, it takes all the fun out of it. It does not take any finesse, or pleasure. And to answer your other question Blaise, yes, I will teach him all the proper dog behaviour. I would lie to say that he will enjoy the discipline. I have been rather lax of late.”

“He seems somewhat humbled at least. None of the cockiness that you talked about and not that dumb smugness I remember that this brat had at school.”

“No, dementors will do that to a person. Make them touch some grass.”

Blaise laughed as he saw Ro running towards the stick that Draco had thrown. Then Blaise turned to Malfoy and with a hushed tone asked,” Do you think I can play a bit with him, later of course. I have a few ideas of discipline that perhaps could come to use and teach him some manners.”

Draco smiled a thin smile and nodded his head, “I can’t see why that would be impossible, but before I need to have to housetrain him some more. I want to be sure that he is mine and not just playacting, we don’t want any accidents.”

Ro let the words stream through his brain and trying to make them leave no trace. He had realised that he needed to develop absolute attentiveness to commands and leave the human talking and thinking to master and the other humans. He was after all just a stupid pet. He could suddenly feel warmth spreading around his groin – he ignored it. It was not his place to do anything about it. After all pets soiled themselves and pets did not care, their masters cared about such things for them.  The summer heat beat down on his body as he was commanded to fecht the stick again. It was in some way better to be outside and feel the warm air instead of the cold clammy air of the cellar. But on the other hand, it also had marked downsides.

The outside training was relentless, and the smallest slip-ups was severely punished, and good behaviour seldom if at all rewarded. At the end of the day Ro’s mouth hurt from gripping the sticks, balls and sundry other objects that he was instructed to fecht. His back hurt from the merciless whips from master’s steady hand and he was dirty from head to foot in mud, and his nappy reeked, promising more dirt to be exposed. But dog did not complain – Ro had to remind himself of not slipping up or the master would punish him. He needed to push on and not getting to give the master a reason to punish him.

Live, live, live, live …

“He seems to be on the edge of collapsing,” it was not masters cool voice, but the other man – he who had been called Blaise. A faint memory – supressed with the speed of light, had resurfaced in connection with the name when the fist had heard it, so now Ro only tried to see it as, yet another one-off master’s friends.

“Yes, he needs to be driven hard. Do you mind obeying me Ro?”

“Bark, bark, bark.”

“See, he does not mind. Look at his stupid face, Ro loves every second of this. Don’t you.”

“Bark”

Blaise did not look convinced, but it was not this man that Ro needed to convince. He only needed to please the master. If he did not do that Ro knew that he would be punished. Ro would sometimes wake screaming in the cellar and for one brief second being gripped by despair, seeing a glimpse of how he must be seen if someone else came down to his cellar, or worse he would remember a time before the manor and being something other. After such nights he tried to do his training extra well as to dispel the horror, all the while the words live echoed thorugh his head. If Ro was good enough, he would perhaps not be troubled again. Hopefully.

When master finally fastned the leash on Ro’s collar and signalled the end of play, Ro could hardly stand on all four and walk. He needed two lashes to be able to force his body to move and then some when Ro’s limbs would not move fast enough. Well inside the dungeon the master took of Ro’s soiled garment and sprayed Ro down with a jet of ice-cold water. Before the master left, he remarked that he had asked one of his friends to beat out a certain stubborn strain of resistance that seemed to block the way for Ro to be a fully functional guard dog.

“Ro need to be careful to obey as this man will search of a reason to hurt you. He likes to pain a lot. But remember it is for Ro’s own best. Do you believe that?”

“Bark, bark, bark.”

“Well, that is good. See you in a while. If Nott don’t happen to kill you.”

The laugher that came from the mouth of the master did not contain much mirth in it.

During the follow day Ro many times would have welcomed death with happiness. It was not until now that Ro understood that master was in fact a kind master that did not punish him if it was not necessary. The time with Nott seemed like a dark tunnel of pain, that only very seldom was interrupted. If Ro as much had a toe or finger out of the line of the desired position he was punished, if he was a split second to late the lash came merciless. And if Ro screamed that was greeted by even more pain.

Only the most extreme debasement seemed to satisfy Nott, and though Ro tried to block out the memories he still could remember the stink of his soiled nappy against his face, the inability to breath as something foul was forced into his mouth as a gag, and clamps to various parts of his bruised body. Nott’s cackling laughter ran like a hideous soundtrack to these proceedings.

 The training such as it was continued with no end in sight and Ro tried to improve so as to avoid the flurry of strokes that disappointment from his side would incur. When he vomited in pure pain after a particularly egregious error Nott forced his head down in the puddle while his back was pounded. Ro’s brain switched off, and he crumpled in a heap as blackness enveloped him.

Ro awoke, but he squeezed his eyes shut. Uncounted time passed while the pain still surged in his body. Ro could hardly see through the pain. It lay as a thick throbbing blanket all around him. He could hear a door open, he involuntarily squeezed his body into a foetus position, even though some part of his pain addled brain knew that it might well earn him more punishment – and that he would deserve it.  He had disobeyed and he must be punished.

A voice spoke – angry, yes – but also full of concern:

“What the fuck. What the fuck have that clown Nott done. I said that he should train the dog, not kill it. Fuck. Ro, can you hear me?”

Ro felt the scent of his master envelop him, and he relaxed. Master was stern and had punished Ro for disobeying – but Master was just. He uncurled slowly and nodded – tried to obey the instructions and bark, but his voice cracked, and he began coughing violently instead, a taste of metal in his mouth.

Instead of beating him, Master began patting his hair – saying soothing words. When the worst of the choughs had subsided Master began examining Ro’s bruised body. He gently poked and prodded to ascertain how deep the damage was and were Nott’s beatings had been the most severe. He also cleaned the vomit from Ro’s face and gave Ro some water with something in it to lessen the pain.

While he drifted off to sleep, head in master’s lap, Earlier Ro had followed The master out of fear of punishment and hope for reward, but he finally realised that knew that it was no longer an act, that  he loved Master and would be a faithful servant and dog – whatever Master wanted.