Perhaps only to stifle the muffled cries behind him, the torturer increases the strength of the lash, he hits Melissa so hard that she lets out an agonizing scream that scares even him.

Melissa feels faint for the first time since her ordeal began. But she stays awake, the lash keeps her mind aware of everything around her. The pain is becoming unbearable.

She feels a sensation in her neck. A warm liquid begins to flow down it. A sharp pain accompanies the warm ooze. Melissa realizes the liquid is blood.

A wound has opened under her chin. It is not very deep, but deep enough to bleed. The blood trickles down, drop by drop, onto her chest.

Melissa feels the blood, she imagines her wound. Is it as large as her neck, perhaps this is the end?

The pain is not what she thinks it should be. Her entire body is in pain, she cannot distinguish one location from another. The fall of the whip on her face takes her away from the cut of the tourniquet.

The whip's sting on her mouth and face ripples across her skin as the lash bounces off her breasts and belly. She feels like letting her body drop, but the metal grill on her neck holds her upright.

Her body is weakening. Her legs shake, her wrists are numb. She hopes the end will be near, she wishes the blood to run out of her body, she prays for a merciful God to hear her.

But Melissa's prayers seem to fall on deaf ears. The whip is on her before she can finish her prayer.

Red Feline hears the cries mixed with prayers. Melissa's neck, held as it is, prevents her from screaming more. What Red Feline hears is a raspy, thick, moan. Red Feline does not believe in God, but she hopes there is one. She wishes it for the poor, suffering nun whose hands move with every stroke of the whip.

Red Feline cannot see her face, she cannot see the pain in her eyes, but she feels it every tiime the nun's body shakes and contorts from the lash.

It was customary, some long time before, that blood was not to be drawn during torture. The man had been trained to torture without leaving marks on a body. But the rules have changed. Still, the sight of blood makes him fear God. He worries when he sees the blood running down her neck. He does not stop the flogging.

He has feelings, he wants to be compassionate at times, and perhaps he is not lashing her with all his strength. But still, he is hard on her and knows that if she does not confess, it will be worse for the poor woman.

He does not mind having her under his power...but he does pity her. He tries to supress his desires to help her...to touch her.