XI.
As Vinculus and Symmachus were about to drag the struggling slave girl
out of Balbinus' cabin, Taleena gave her glowering master an imploring look.
"My tunic... please."
The two sailors snorted derisively at the very notion of a slave begging
favours from a master like Balbinus, but paused in the doorway, so that their
captain could rebuke the impertinent wench properly.
The corpulent merchant met Taleena's desperate glance with ill-concealed
glee, amused by the bare-breasted blonde's pathetic attempt to preserve at least
a vestige of her modesty. His gaze lingered lazily for a moment on her creamy
mounds, still blotched and reddened from his rough handling, and then dropped to
the floor, to the tattered remnants of the costly tunic he had ripped from her
luscious body.
He gestured for Symmachus to hand him the white garment, and after
taking it from the sailor's hands, he examined it minutely. Then he held it at
arm's length, like an emperor poised to signal the start of a chariot race.
"Very well, then," he said with an air of Augustan magnanimity as his henchmen
looked on in surprise. "How could I deny such a beauty anything? Well, come and
take it, girl."
At a nod from Balbinus, a visibly disappointed Vinculus released
Taleena, who quickly strode toward Balbinus to retrieve the torn tunic, only for
him to lift his arm high behind his head when she reached for it. "Come on,
take it," he taunted her, "if you want it so badly. I promise on my word as a
Roman that I will remain motionless."
Even though Taleena was taller than the wily merchant, Balbinus' massive
girth prevented her from reaching the tunic with her extended arm. After two
failed attempts to grasp it, Taleena realized that the only way she would be
able to retrieve her garment would be to jump up to snatch the tunic from his
hand. A most distasteful eventuality, since it was clear that such a course of
action would literally slap her bare breasts against his face and chest.
Balbinus smiled a knowing, satyr's smile as his blushing prisoner
tentatively stepped forward and pressed her body against his rotund torso. But
he honoured his promise and allowed her to seize the flimsy garment when she
leapt against him, delighting in the sensation of her opulent breasts sliding
down his massive chest during her descent to terra firma.
As the mortified blonde pulled the garment over her head to shield her
nudity from the evil trio, Balbinus gave Vinculus and Symmachus a conspiratorial
wink. Wicked grins stole over the sailors' faces as they watched Taleena try to
adjust the tunic, and they soon came to understand why their master had granted
the slave girl's wish. Balbinus had ripped the fine fabric from neckline to
navel, and while the tunic's topstitched midsection clung rather snugly to
Taleena's womanly hips, the flimsy panels of its top revealed more than they
hid. Taleena's soft shoulders barely managed to hold the gaping halves in place,
although they provided an attractive frame for her delicious decolletage.
"Take her away!" Balbinus snapped at the sailors, giving Taleena's
curvaceous cleavage a final gluttonous glance. "Neptune is bound to bless our
journey after having been offered such a splendid sight!"
* * *
The smirking sailors' pinioned Taleena's arms to her sides and dragged
their scantily-clad prisoner through the door of the cabin and out onto the deck
of the Thetis. They had taken no more than a step or two from the doorway at
the stern of the vessel, when they were greeted by a brisk morning breeze which
playfully ruffled the flaps of Taleena's once-modest tunic. The flimsy folds of
fabric were at the mercy of the intermittent gusts of wind, and Taleena blushed
furiously as the breeze bared her breasts to the eyes of the entire crew. Why,
she asked herself in frustration, had the Fates allowed her to play along with
Balbinus' perverse game, only to debase her yet again?
Taleena's captors enjoyed their entrance as they marched their
eye-catching captive down the central aisle, between the twin-lines of dirty,
sullen, shaven-headed men who manned the oars, twenty a side, pulling valiantly
in the hope of escaping the sting of the tasker's whip.
Galley slaves made up the lowest stratum of the complex hierarchy of
slaves that was woven through Roman society. Criminals and unfortunates alike,
they were men who had done with life and who spent their waking hours rowing
toward a dismal death that would release them from their endless drudgery. They
were fed, but thin, their faces dark and hollow, and their humdrum toil seemed
to have purged every spark of liveliness from their eyes.
It took these lost souls on the benches some time to realize that the
gorgeous, near-naked girl being paraded before them in such humiliating fashion
wasn't a mere hallucination. But as soon as the more alert among them grasped
the fact that the stunning blonde apparition was indeed real, the sight of
Taleena's luscious young body quickly threw them off their pace.
Even the tall, well-muscled Aethopian tasker who strode back and forth
along the aisle was intrigued by this unexpected erotic vision. He made a swift,
sharp movement with his hand, and at this signal the roll on the pace drum
signifying 'down oars' was sounded, like a nautical flourish in honour of the
breath-taking newcomer.
"Kananga!" Vinculus called to the tasker, in a voice of authority which
left little doubt that the Cretan was the deck officer of the ship, "The
captain says you're to find a place for our new rower!" as he pushed Taleena in
his direction.
The ebony-skinned Aethiopian ran his starkly pink tongue over his dry
lips for a moment as he eyed the lush curves spilling out of the blonde's
wind-whipped bodice. Then the imposing African turned to survey his forlorn
charges before extending his muscular arm toward an old man who sat on the
portside bench in the middle of the hull.
Taleena had no idea of the length of time that the poor wretch had
toiled at his oar, but when he saw the tasker pointing at him he seemed to know
that his hour of salvation had come. Symmachus quickly released him from the
chains which shackled him to the bench, and the miserable creature did not even
make an attempt to resist when the burly Cilician hauled his gaunt body
overboard.
Taleena flinched at the old man's faint outcry when his body hit the
sea, and she shivered as she heard him cry out twice more before his flailing
figure disappeared into the vessel's wake. She was badly shaken by the casual
way the sailors had disposed of the slave, but her indignation at that ruthless
scene was quickly cut short, as her captors pushed her roughly toward the
freshly-vacated place on the bench.
Each of the Thetis' two rowing benches was a rough-hewn, massive timber,
the width of a tall man's foot, which ran the length of the ship. The sailors
forced Taleena to straddle the crude bench whose topside came to the hem of her
tunic, and then Symmachus grabbed her by the nape of the neck and pulled her
roughly down onto it. The topside of the beam had been smoothed to a polished
surface by years of contact with the buttocks of its countless occupants, but it
was highly uncomfortable to sit on nonetheless.
Taleena's bare feet were quickly forced onto a footrest which was
attached to the underside of the beam, so that her legs were slightly bent at
the knees. She heard Vinculus close the hasp of the rusty manacles around her
ankles with an ominous click of finality, thus securing her dainty feet to the
footrest which would hold her fast until Balbinus' wrath was satisfied.
As she sat there in misery, wondering for how long the wicked merchant
intended to leave her chained to the bench, Taleena could almost feel the heat
radiating from the ravenous stares of her fellow-rowers, some of whom had not
touched a woman in years. The sound of clanking chains and creaking timbers
accompanied their awkward efforts to contort their bodies and crane their necks
so as to catch a glimpse of naked flesh.
Vinculus gave the blonde apprentice a knowing grin as he compelled her
to seize the handles she would use to operate the heavy oar, before encasing her
slender wrists in another pair of shackles. When she was chained in place, it
became fully evident that she was too lightly built for this pursuit, for the
shackles, which had hung loosely on the bony limbs of the old man, almost
slipped off her slim wrists. The looseness of the manacles allowed Taleena a
little freedom with her hands, however, enabling her to make clumsy attempts to
keep her tunic closed in front.
The beetle-browed Cretan watched Taleena's pathetic efforts to keep the
top of her shredded bodice in place with a bemused air. "Look at her,
Symmachus," he scoffed to his crony, "trying to hold that rag together as if she
were a Vestal Virgin!"
Vinculus cast his gaze skyward at the bright sun and sniffed at the sea
air. "You'd do better to pray to Aeolus, the god of the fickle winds to cease
blowing. But I'm afraid it's too late; he seems to be answering the prayers of
your benchmates at the moment," he said in a mocking voice, as another gust of
wind lifted the hem of her tunic high on her thighs. "In a day or two, those
lovely blonde tresses will be all you'll have left to cover your body anyway,"
he continued as he stroked her hair, curling a golden ringlet around a callused
finger. "Kananga will see to that," he added with a lecherous smirk, "even if
the sea air doesn't!"
The grim-faced Aethiopian did not reply, but the tightening of his grip
on the stock of his whip spoke volumes. Taleena felt herself growing faint as
the true horror of her plight began to sink in on her. She could not take her
eyes off the frightful whip, which had been fashioned from a thick length of
nautical rope which had been unravelled into nine single strands, each of them
as long as her arm. At least the strands had not been twisted into knots as
might have the case with a punishment whip, she thought as she swallowed
apprehensively; the purpose of this dreadful instrument was to spur the rowers
on through pain, not to cut or maim them.
The fearsome Kananga stationed himself behind her and gestured to the
pot-bellied pace drummer at the stern to continue the beat on his kettledrum at
the slowest of three possible paces. As the rowers resumed the rhythm of the
drive, Taleena gripped her oar tightly and strove to copy the motions of the man
in front of her, bending forward from the waist as she put her back into the
first stroke. As she strained against the croaking oar, she found that due to
its leverage it was not quite as heavy to handle as she had expected. Even so
she was unable to split the water cleanly on her first attempt and the towering
tasker rewarded her clumsy, splashing stroke with a swift downward slash of his
whip - the first lash she had ever known!
Taleena grimaced in pain, and her sudden shriek of agony rent the air,
scattering the seagulls that still followed the vessel. The nine tails of the
tasker's whip had raked across her shoulders, shredding the finely woven tunic
in places, leaving fiery trails in their wake, and Taleena could hardly bear to
contemplate the thought of this hydra-like whip stinging her bare skin.
Balbinus had taken his vantage point on the poop deck, his beady eyes
blinking against the light of the sun as he surveyed the twin columns of rowers
that stretched before him. The entire scene appealed to his voyeur's eye as he
relished the enticing contrast between the voluptuous body of the flaxen-haired
beauty and the emaciated frames of the shaven-headed men, between the flawless
parchment of the young girl's creamy skin and the weathered hide of the seasoned
slaves. The long-dead emperor Tiberius, who had been said to have filled his
villa on Capri with all manner of erotic images, ranging from the sensual to the
unspeakable, could hardly have improved upon this tantalizing tableau - and he,
Balbinus, was master of it all.
Taleena returned his gaze with furious anger when she looked in his
direction, but her lovely face became twisted by another cry of anguish as the
tasker meted out further encouragement to the desperate girl. This time the
nine-tailed lash had found skin left bare by old rents in the fabric, even as it
opened fresh ones. Balbinus watched intently as she strained against the oar to
save herself from a third lash, and when she bent forward again, trying not to
lose the rhythm of the stroke, the billowing scraps of white fabric slipped
further down her shoulders, affording him another glimpse of the magnificent
breasts that Venus herself would have envied.
Balbinus felt a pleasurable pressure in his loins as his lascivious gaze
locked onto the sight of her pendulous breasts as they heaved and swayed in
rhythm to the pace-setting drum. The creamy globes, tipped with the pouting
nipples that he had teased to an unwilling semi-erectness in his cabin, bobbled
deliciously each time she tugged at her oar. The touch and feel of her breasts
still lingered vividly in his mind, sublimely soft and yet youthfully firm, and
he could not tear his gaze from the pink-crested mounds which were constantly in
motion as Taleena struggled to maintain the demanding pace.
The wily merchant's lip twisted upward in a wicked smile as he
congratulated himself on his inventive decision to send the lovely slave girl to
the oars. The trip to Alexandria promised to be one he would long remember, and
he almost hoped that the headstrong maiden would prolong her defiance and defer
her surrender. For even the inevitable final conquest could hardly be more
gratifying to him or more humiliating to her, than this exciting spectacle.
Taleena sensed that she was on the verge of losing the unrelenting
rhythm, and she redoubled her efforts, pulling with desperate strength. Each
stroke had to be completed to the time set by the mercilessly monotone pace-drum
- an almost unbearable cycle of dip, pull, clear, bend forward, dip and pull
again, with one stroke following another so quickly that there was never a
moment to relax. But she was robust and healthy, her arms and shoulders strong,
and although her bare breasts were beginning to suffer under the rowing stress,
her pectoral muscles were fit as a result of raking the fields and hauling
sheaves of wheat through her teenage years at her father's farm.
Although she was conscious of the men's searing gaze, the ceaseless toil
of the unending oarstrokes at least kept her from dwelling on the skimpiness of
her attire and the salaciousness of her pose. She was sweating so profusely now
that the largely intact back of her tunic soon clung to her torso like a second
skin, and even the occasional gusts of wind did little to cool her heated body.
Unmoved by the girl's suffering, the tasker laid a third set of fiery
lines across her back, even though her oar had begun to split the water cleanly
enough now, but this time she managed to stifle her scream, merely uttering a
strangled groan as she put her back into the next stroke. She flinched when the
whip spoke a fourth time, only to realize that it was not upon her flesh that it
had fallen, but on the back of her neighbour. Her starboard counterpart had
paid a painful price for being so distracted by the eye-catching sight of his
bare-breasted benchmate that he had lost the rhythm of the drive.
As the hours passed, Taleena gradually became acclimated to the
gruelling grind of first pace, and when the onset of twilight finally forced the
tasker to call an end to the day's toil, she became painfully aware of what her
efforts had cost her: the palms of her hands were covered with blisters, her
buttocks sore, her feet deeply bruised from the pressure of the pull, her body
laved with sweat and vibrating with a depth of exhaustion she had never before
experienced.
Every muscle in her arms, shoulders, back and legs seemed to scream with
pain and fatigue, but if Taleena thought that the sadistic merchant would relent
now that she had paid a price for her recalcitrance, she was soon proved
horribly wrong. The tasker made no move to release her from her bonds, leaving
her where she sat, crumpled over her oar. Like her fellow rowers, she was given
only a bowl of lumpy porridge, after being watered from a goatskin bag.
Taleena had eaten nothing since the morning of the prior day, and
hurried to scrape the stale mush from her bowl with her fingers. She was
oblivious of the ogling crewmen, but conscious of the fact that she, like the
other slaves, was devouring her meagre meal like an animal being fed by its
master. Yet she eyed the empty bowl of porridge wistfully for a moment or two,
hoping against hope that it might be refilled, until the tasker came around to
collect the bowls.
Her strength having been somewhat restored by the meager meal, Taleena
managed to use her manacled wrists to pull the flimsy panels of the tunic
together in order to shield her breasts from the leers of the sailors. But to
her dismay, Taleena soon realized that every time she took the trouble to adjust
her tunic, her hunched-forward posture caused the scraps of fabric to slip back
down her shoulders. She longed to cradle her pendulous breasts in her hands,
not only to shield them from the stares of the men, but merely to touch them
gently to ease the soreness resulting from long hours of unsupported labour. But
the shackles on her wrists permitted no such soothing caress; each time the
delicate fingers that would have soothed her suffering reached for her breasts,
the remorseless chains pulled her up short an inch from the envisaged recipients
of her caresses. Growing more and more frustrated with her futile attempts,
Taleena felt like the unfortunate Tantalus whom the gods had doomed to suffer
for all eternity in the orchards of Tartarus, to reach for the twigs of the
trees laden with juicy fruits that would nourish him, only to have them jerked
away just when they seemed within his reach.
So all Taleena could do was to nudge her breasts a little closer
together with her elbows, but she sensed that her predicament had caught the
attention of the crewmen and indeed it had. Symmachus, the ship's carpenter,
looked up from the broken oar on which he had been working, and elbowed the
Roper and they huddled together whispering conspiratorially.
Vinculus leaned against the ship's rail, watching her through vulpine
eyes while he manipulated his ever-present rope into one unusual configuration
after another. "What do you think, Kananga?" he addressed the tall, Aethiopian
tasker. "Will you be able to make a rower out of her?"
"She is young and strong," the African replied, "but her timing is not
yet good." While the tasker's sonorous voice was threatening if only because of
its cavernous resonance, it was free of the malice that seemed to cling to
Vinculus' every word. "But I promise you she will learn. My... instructions have
never failed to produce good rowers," he added as he stroked the well-worn
handle of his nine-tailed whip affectionately.
"Well, the captain will want you to teach her thoroughly," Vinculus
observed dryly, before continuing in a cunning voice. "It's not for me to tell
you your business, my friend," he said ingratiatingly, "but she seemed so
concerned with her attire that it hampered her stroke. Your instructions might
be more easily remembered if you ... inscribed them on her bare back."
"That may be so," responded the Aethiopian pensively, as if the
independence of his draconian office hung in the balance and prevented him from
consenting too readily to the diminutive deck officer's sleazy suggestion.
"Besides," Vinculus continued slyly, "Why should there be two styles of
dress among the rowers?" He looked at his cronies for approval, but while the
pot-bellied pacemaker grunted his consent, twirling his drum sticks between his
fingers in anxious anticipation, the tasker met Vinculus' glance with a level
stare.
"Aye," Symmanchus chimed in, sensing the tension between the two men.
"Bare backs for one, bare backs for all!" he shouted theatrically, and his mock
slogan was met with ribald cheers from the other sailors.
The tasker still pretended not to be convinced, but then his stern face
brightened up as his lips parted in a broad smile, revealing two rows of
sparkling teeth. "Then a bare back she shall have!" he decided finally, walking
a few steps down the aisle and planting himself behind Taleena.
"You wouldn't want any special treatment, now, would you, wench?"
Vinculus snarled angrily.
Even her own dire situation could not keep Taleena from noticing that
Vinculus was furious with the imposing tasker for challenging his authority.
But she had no time to think how she might profit from the tension between the
two men, since the glowering Aethiopian had drawn his dreadful whip from his
belt. The African draped the thongs over the whip over her right shoulder so
that the frayed strands of rope fell portentously across her half-exposed
breast, then he gripped her golden tresses firmly with his other hand and pulled
her head back, so that she was staring into this blazing eyes.
When Taleena, trembling and too frightened to speak, remained silent,
the glowering Aethiopian drew his whip out of his belt and draped the tails over
her right shoulder, so that the frayed strands of rope fell portentously across
a half-exposed breast. Then he grabbed her blonde tresses with his other hand
and pulled her head back so that she was staring into his blazing black eyes.
"The deck officer has asked you a question, wench!" Kananga growled in a
voice so deep that it seemed to rumble up from the depths of the sea, but the
attentive observer could detect the acidic drop of disparagement in the
African's tone when he referred to the Cretan's rank. "Do you think you deserve
special treatment?"
"N-no," Taleena murmured in a voice that was no more than a whisper.
"Good! Then you shall be dressed like the others," the Aethiopian
snarled, as he re-holstered the whip and then gripped the top of her tunic in
his powerful hands.
Taleena closed her eyes as Kananga ripped the back of the garment to
shreds with one mighty jerk. But hers were the only closed eyes on the Thetis
as the frontless and now backless tunic slithered off of her shoulders, and slid
down her well-toned flanks before coming to rest around her hips. Although she
could shut out the sight of the lecherous crewmen, Taleena could not shut out
their lurid cheers and crude catcalls as they eyeballed her milky-white breasts
which Eos, the goddess of dawn and dusk, bathed in the warm colours of the
setting sun.
Taleena thought she would die of shame as some of the sniggering sailors
sauntered down the aisle to get a better look at her nakedness. Smirking
broadly at her plight, and making no attempt to hide their arousal, a few of
them even crudely offered to show her a good time - whenever Balbinus gave the
word. Taleena could not meet their gaze and bent forward on her oar,
crestfallen, trying to cover her tear-filled eyes with her forearms.
Fortunately, it was not long before merciful Somnus redeemed the
sorely-tried rowing apprentice from her misery; but Taleena slept only fitfully,
waking time and again to the imagined sounds of nightmarish whips whizzing
through the air and cracking viciously against bare skin.
* * *
A golden-red rim marked the eastern horizon as the sun rose, auguring
the dawn of the proud Avernian's second day of discipline.
Prodded to wakefulness by the tasker, it took Taleena some moments until
the heave and sway of the ship made her realize that this was not just a rude
awakening from a nightmare, but that she was actually cowering on the rowing
bench of Balbinus' galley. The brisk morning breeze which swept the deck
reminded her immediately of the absence of her tunic, and when she tried to
cross her hands in front of her pink-blushing breasts, the shackles at her
wrists reminded her of the full extent of her dire predicament.
The tasker continued his walk down the aisle, untethering the straps
which had secured the oars inboard over night, and when he reached the prow, he
raised his arm, indicating to the rowers to thrust the oars outward. Taleena
hurried to follow the motions of her front man, poising her oar above the water,
keeping it as level and as steady as she could, until the tasker saw that all
were ready. He lowered his hand, and forty oars struck the water together while
the pot-bellied pace drummer resumed the unrelenting rhythm of the drive.
Taleena's heart sank at the thought that she was bound to spend another
day on the bench, and when she saw Balbinus' portly frame emerge from his cabin
shortly after sunrise, her heart leaped up, hoping that her punishment was at an
end. But it was not to be. The vindictive merchant merely stood on the poop
deck and watched her with a gleeful delight, enjoying the magnificent sight of
his slave girl, now stripped to the waist, trying to keep pace with the taxing
stroke set by the pacer.
Taleena had heard the sailors mention on several occasions that the
Thetis' first port-of-call was Alexandria, which indicated a journey of some
nine days duration. But she continued to hope that she'd be freed long before
they reached that distant port. It was not until the afternoon of the third day
that she began to suspect that Balbinus intended for her to row the entire
distance. It was impossible to know whether Balbinus had planned her punishment
that way from the beginning or whether she was being made to suffer due to the
simple reality that the ship carried no spare slaves to man the oars.
Nevertheless she silently cursed the disgusting man for her misery with a
fervour that matched her agony.
The days dragged on slowly, days filled with dreadful drudgery and
mindless monotony, punctuated only by skin-searing slashes of Kananga's venomous
nine-tailed hydra whenever her attention wandered or her strength slackened.
It was late in the afternoon of the ninth day that the North African
coast was sighted, and after another hour at first pace the mighty lighthouse of
Alexandria's harbour grew visible in the distance across the water. The sun
shone high in an azure sky, across which white clouds drifted lazily by like
ragged sails in a soft breeze.
The sea had been troubled for the past few days, with choppy,
white-crested waves snatching at the oars, and rollers racing past the hull as
the Thetis continued her southward journey. But now the water lay calm, and the
streamlined bow of the galley produced only a fine spray as it parted the placid
surface of the Roman Sea. The climate had also changed while they approached the
North African coast, growing warmer and warmer, and by the ninth day the
temperature had climbed to a point at which the sun's heat added considerably to
the rigors of the bench.
Their destination now in sight, Balbinus ordered the drummer to raise
his beat to second pace and strolled down the poop deck and along the aisle to
the prow, ostensibly to search the horizon for the coastline. But in actuality
his walk toward the bow was a mere pretext to necessitate a return toward the
stern, so that he might have the opportunity of savouring the Gaul's nudity at
close range.
Her body had stood up well under the rigours of the past few days, he
mused as he marvelled at her slender, tapering back, the soft indentations of
her spine - and the darkening weals the tasker's nine-tailed whip had left on
the smooth expanse of her creamy skin.
He would have wagered a talent of silver that the girl would have begun
to beg for mercy on her second day on the bench at the latest; but she had not,
and at first he had been more than a little annoyed at her stubbornness, feeling
that her defiance had cast him as the loser at his own cruel game. But upon
further consideration he had come to relish her rebelliousness. A premature
surrender would have cheated him of nine days' pleasure, nine days of observing
that vision of defiant loveliness striving to maintain her poise. Nine days of
watching her blushing face set into grim lines of endurance while she struggled
with her heavy oar. Nine days of enjoying the rippling muscles of her slender
arms and legs as she toiled to spare herself the kiss of the tasker's whip.
Nine days of watching her bend forward from the waist with every stroke, thus
keeping her luscious, sweat-sheened breasts in almost perpetual motion, swaying
enticingly to the unrelenting rhythm of the drum.
Taleena returned Balbinus' lewd stare with eyes bright with azure fury.
They grew still brighter with tears of pain when the tasker laid another lash
across her bare back, but she gritted her teeth to withhold the scream that
welled up inside her throat, if only to deprive her tormentor the satisfaction
of hearing it.
Balbinus' lips curled into a cruel smile as he watched the naked wench's
efforts to keep her silence. She had never been pushed to second pace before,
but bore it well, he thought, and with a hint of fiendish glee in his eyes, he
turned to the tasker who stood directly behind Taleena.
"Third pace," he ordered, "and make sure that she stays in sweep with
the others!"
The tall Aethiopian passed the captain's order on to the pacer, and the
drum burst into the terrible ram-rate beat, as it was called on the war galleys
of the Roman Fleet, and gasping and groaning in their torment, Taleena and the
other galley slaves had to increase their striking rate to a backbreaking level.
For half an hour and more they rowed at ramming speed, forty oars
creaking in unison while the tasker's whip spoke mightily, flailing left and
right, driving the half-fainting slaves to the edge of total breakdown. Five,
six, seven times, Taleena herself felt the scalding pain of the whip setting her
bare back ablaze, while Balbinus stood a few feet away, watching her writhe in
agony. Then, when they had at last passed the harbour's entrance, 'haul in
oars' was sounded by the drummer, and losing momentum, the Thetis covered the
final yards to the busy quay, where the helmsman brought the vessel round with
consummate skill, hitting the mooring with no more than a tiny bump.
The slaves collapsed where they sat, many retching in their exhaustion,
and when the gangway had been brought out, Balbinus watched the poor wretches
being led away, half carried, half dragged to be fed and quartered for the
night.
XII.
When Taleena came round, doused by a bucket of water, she was not sure
how long she had slept on the filthy cellar floor of the house to which the
rowers had been brought. Chained to a wall, she lay in the same suffocating room
with the other slaves, but at a safe distance from them, since Balbinus had
given strict orders to his men to keep her away from the dull and mindless
beasts that manned the oars alongside her - at least until he had possessed her
body himself.
A single torch illuminated the fearful cellar, and once Taleena had
begun to acclimate herself to the dim light of her surroundings, she felt as if
she were reliving her capture on the night of her abortive escape from the
Thetis.
For it was none other than Symmachus who held that lonely torch, and it
was evil-eyed Vinculus who had cast aside the wooden bucket, which made a dull
sound as it careened across the warehouse floor. The Cretan stood over her,
his beetle-browed eyes sweeping across the pearls of moisture on Taleena's nude
body which glimmered in the orange torchlight like the surface of a sheltered
cove at sunset. "No need for you to sleep alone today," the diminutive Cretan
rasped, as a sly smile curled over his lips. "The boss wants to see you."
Symacchus placed the torch in an elevated sconce and then unhooked the
rusted chain which imprisoned her against a nearby wall, the very chain that had
fettered to her oar since the first day of her hellish voyage. "On your feet,
wench!" he snapped.
But as soon as Taleena had staggered to her feet, it was Vinculus giving
the orders. "Bend down and step across your wrist chain," the Cretan barked. We
can't have you covering those beauties with your arms, now, can we?"
Symmachus guffawed derisively as he watched Taleena bend her lithe body
to comply with Vinculus' order. When she rose from her stooped-over position,
the chain that linked her wrist manacles was placed behind her, dangling just
beneath her brief, bedraggled loincloth, leaving her hands at her sides, her
shoulders square and thrusting her chest forward invitingly.
The sound of the bouncing bucket coupled with the continuous clinking of
her chains had begun to waken the other galley slaves, and Taleena could hear
the one closest to her emitting a rampant snarl, as though he were a drooling
dog straining at his leash. The other males began to stir as well as they became
aware of the sight of their female benchmate's nakedness, and while the
torchlight bathed her nude body most alluringly in a flickering light, it also
created strange shadows that seemed to hover on the bottom of the wall like
ghostly lemures, the spirits of the dead. Taleena tried to move away from the
aroused men, but Symmachus seemed to be completely unaware of the ravenous
rowers' cravings.
With her wrists chained behind her back, Taleena was helpless to prevent
the carpenter's rough, callused hands from sliding up her flanks and then
curling around to cup the fullness of her still-moist breasts. The burly
Cilician revelled in the softness of her flesh for a long moment, using his
thick thumbs to prod her protruding nipples before Vinculus stopped him with a
nervous glance. "There'll be plenty of time for that once we get her out of
here," the Roper muttered, inclining his head in the direction of the frenzied
slaves.
Taleena glanced anxiously at her half-crazed benchmates who rattled
their chains like hobbled beasts. She saw a frenzied, frightening sparkle in
eyes which had heretofore seemed to belong to shadows in Hades. She shuddered
in revulsion as one or two filthy hands dipped inside dingy loincloths to
satisfy long-dormant urges, and Symmachus had to kick at the most excited ones
as they tried to move closer.
Taleena felt relieved as the sailors dragged through the door of the
cellar, out of sight of the lust-crazed rowers, but her relief didn't last long.
As soon as Vinculus had slammed the door shut, the two men forced Taleena
against the wall of the staircase which led up to the ground level. Symmachus
quickly covered her mouth with one hand, while he used the other to fondle her
breasts with aggressive delight.
As Taleena tried to spin away from Symmachus, Vinculus planted a knee
between her smooth thighs, and slapped his gnarled hand against her bare belly
before sliding it down inside her loincloth. Taleena grunted in shock at the
suddenness of their assault, and squirmed around in a futile attempt to avoid
the questing hands.
But Symmachus merely chuckled throatily and muttered, "No more of your
teasing now, wench!" as he manhandled each of her breasts in turn. Meanwhile
Vinculus's fingers had plowed downward, through the fine tangles of pubic hair,
to latch onto her clitoris, and he proceeded to squeeze the sensitive bud, until
Taleena screamed into Symmachus' stifling paw.
Taleena struggled valiantly, trying to use her knees and shoulders to
fend her attackers off, but with her wrists in chains she stood little chance.
She had almost resigned herself to the pillaging fingers, when she managed to
slide her mouth free of Symmachus' gagging grip, just long enough to gasp,
"Balbinus will have your heads, if you rape me!"
Taleena couldn't believe that she had used the disgusting merchant's
name in her own defence, but for the moment the violence of their attack
subsided.
"Aye, that he might," Vinculus growled, as he momentarily relaxed the
pressure of his fingers. "But who's to know if a couple of sailors have a
little fun with a wench like you!"
The Cretan was just about to force his prying fingers inside her when
the threesome heard voices on the floor above them. Balbinus kept a storehouse
on the first floor of the building, as well as a personal residence, and his
workers had apparently arrived earlier than usual to put away cargo from the
Thetis. But one of the doors of the warehouse opened onto this same
staircase...
Alarmed by the prospect of unexpected witnesses, Vinculus ardour
dampened quickly, and he relieved himself of a litany of curses that was
extraordinary even for a sailor. His face was a mask of fury and frustration as
he withdrew his hand from between Taleena's legs. "One day, slut!" he warned
her with a venomous snarl as he seized her face with a hand that was shaking
with rage. "One day the Fates will be with me and I'll make you rue the day you
dared to threaten me! Balbinus or no!"
* * *
The two sailors hurriedly dragged Taleena up the flight of steps and
then they marched her down another long corridor before passing through a door
which opened into a bright, opulently furnished room. Thick oriental rugs
covered the floor, exquisitely patterned carpets lined the walls, and cushions
in dazzling materials and varying sizes were arranged halfway around a small,
low table on which rested a large bowl of fruit.
There she found herself standing before Balbinus, who sat formally and
pompously enthroned on a pile of cushions, as if he were a Ptolemaean potentate.
An exquisite, scantily-clad Egyptian, little more than a girl, knelt close to
his feet, apparently ready to respond to his slightest wish, as he watched his
henchmen lead the beautiful blonde galley slave into his presence. The sight of
the intimidated girl only increased Taleena's disdain for the complacent
merchant and her determination to oppose his will increased.
There was no need to force Taleena to her knees, but the sailors holding
her by the elbows shoved her forward anyway, sending her sprawling onto the
tiled floor. There she lay for a moment, breathing heavily, until she found the
strength to straighten up, glaring at Balbinus, her white teeth bared like those
of an injured lioness.
His fleshy face cocked to one side, the merchant listened to the
metallic clinking of her chains and watched with an amused expression as his
blonde galley-slave painfully pulled herself up to her knees. Then he made an
imperious gesture with his right hand and Vinculus stepped forward, and snarled,
"Bow to your betters, wench!" as he pressed Taleena's blonde head to the floor.
Balbinus leaned back among his plush pillows, eyeing the random pattern
of welts the tasker's whip had left on Taleena's bare back with some interest.
The corners of his mouth turned upward into an obscene smirk. "Vinculus, there
is no reason to be so rough with our guest. Release her, if you please."
As Taleena sat up on her haunches, Balbinus' jowls seemed to fill with
air as he eyed her long legs, bare beneath the rag that she wore around her
waist, before transferring his gaze to her majestic breasts. Balbinus ogled his
chained prisoner for some time, enjoying the stimulating contrast between the
warm softness of her luscious body and the cold hardness of the rusted iron
which encased her wrists and ankles.
After dismissing a disappointed Symmachus and Vinculus and reminding
them to wait upon him in the outer corridor, Balbinus addressed Taleena
scornfully. "Well, judging from the marks on your back, your short rowing
career has already begun to take its toll. So tell me, slave, has nine days of
sea air restored you to your senses, or do you intend to continue resisting the
will of Balbinus?"
Even if Taleena had not been repulsed by the mere sight of the man, his
use of the word 'slave' would have summoned up every ounce of defiance in her
body, and she stared at him with the fury of a goddess scorned.
"You may scowl at me for as long as you wish, slave," said Balbinus as
he returned her wrathful glare, "but it will do you no good. Tell me," he said
as he saw Taleena's eyes stray toward the overflowing bowl of fruit. "Are you
so pleased with your present lot that you do not wish to improve it?" Plucking
a handful of luscious-looking cherries from the bowl, he took one by the stem
and pointed it toward her. "There is much that I could offer you..."
Taleena ran her tongue over her dry but enticing lips as she watched the
gluttonous merchant roll a cherry around in his mouth, sucking the juicy pulp
from its pit. She had eaten nothing since her bowl of thin porridge the prior
evening, nor had she taken any water, and she felt utterly parched and famished.
Noticing the way Taleena's eager eyes followed the cherries from the
bowl to his mouth, Balbinus spoke to the raven-haired nymphet at his feet.
"Pour me another glass of wine, Nilea."
As the dusky, dark-eyed girl rose to her knees, Taleena noticed that she
wore only a skimpy, diaphanous halter, held together in front by a single lace,
that clung to her lovely, half-ripened breasts, and an exotic floor-length
skirt, slit at the hip, through which her slim, nut-brown legs peeked with her
every movement.
A dry-mouthed Taleena could only watch enviously as the budding
Cleopatra picked up a pitcher from the table and poured its liquid rubies into
Balbinus' waiting glass, while the merchant's pudgy fingers slid beneath the
panels of her skirt and squeezed the supple flesh of her nearer thigh.
After taking a sip of wine and smacking his lips with pleasure for
Taleena's benefit, Balbinus addressed Nilea again. "And now, perhaps, a
spoonful of honey, my sweet," Balbinus said in a coaxing voice, removing his
hand from between her legs, thus allowing the exquisite young girl to slide
over to the table and pick up the nearer of two cylindrical jars. "No, the
acacia, today, I think. The other was a little tart yesterday."
Nilea replaced the first jar and picked up its neighbour. She glided
back over to Balbinus, her bare thighs flashing, and twirled a small wooden
spoon in the amber liquid until it was thick with honey. She held the spoon up
to Balbinus' mouth, but the merchant's eyes had narrowed into a frown.
"Have you forgotten how to please me already?" he demanded sternly. "I
do not like to repeat myself," he added as he glanced meaningfully toward the
edge of the table, on which rested a slender wooden cane. "You have polished
the cane with such care, girl; it would be a shame to spoil its finish so
quickly."
"M-mea culpa, Master," Nilea stammered in broken Latin. "Forgive me. I
will do my best to please you."
Taleena watched in disgust as the trembling, dark-eyed nymphet undid the
lace that held her bodice together, allowing two beautiful, plum-shaped breasts
to spill out of her sheer top. Nilea slowly circumscribed one with the wooden
spoon, drawing little swirls and spirals on it with the viscous honey, before
leaning forward to offer her youthful breast to the greedy lips of her master.
"Yes, yes, that's better, much better." Balbinus extended his thick
tongue toward the outer curve of Nilea's honey-sweet breast and licked a portion
of it clean. Then he tucked his tongue inside his mouth and savoured the taste
with sensual pleasure. "Like Midas, you have the golden touch, little one," he
said with a lascivious smile. "But this time, do not neglect the beautiful bud,"
Balbinus purred as Nilea dutifully anointed her pert, pointed nipple with the
golden liquid. "Delicious," Balbinus muttered blissfully, as his lips formed an
'O' around Nilea's honey-drenched nipple, before slowly sucking the sticky
sweetness from the delectable nubbin. Lifting his honeyed lips from her breast,
he slid an arm around the tawny Egyptian beauty's bare belly and pulled her
closer, before turning to address Taleena once again.
"The duration of your stint at the oars in entirely in your hands,"
Balbinus continued in a voice reeking with insincerity. "As you can see," he
smiled lewdly, before pausing to tongue another sip of honey from the underside
of Nilea's quivering breast, "your duties as my companion would not be arduous.
You have only to show me a little... affection, as this petite flower of the
Nile has done."
"Now the other one, my sweet," Balbinus whispered to his adolescent
concubine, and Nilea proceeded to decorate her other nipple with the rich acacia
honey, using the edge of the spoon to tease the stiffening bud even as she
painted it until it was thick with the sweet amber nectar.
When her nipple was drenched with honey, Balbinus pulled her closer
until the Egyptian nymphet's nipple was only half a finger's length from his
mouth. The round-bellied merchant reminded Taleena of a grossly swollen toad as
his long, obscenely wet tongue flicked out at Nilea's tempting breast-tip,
polishing the brown nugget carefully, before pulling her closer still and giving
her nipple a playful, but not painless nip that caused the girl to wince in
discomfort.
When Balbinus frowned at this insolent response, the Egyptian beauty
smiled bravely and did not resist when his thick fingers reached for her raven
tresses and then softly but firmly guided her pretty head downward across his
capacious lap. Then the flesh-trader turned back to Taleena. "Well? What do
you say, slave?"
Once again Taleena flinched at the disparaging form of address. Had
Balbinus made this same offer to her after her first dreadful day at the oars,
she might have relented and submitted to his will. But each succeeding day on
the bench, each burning lash across her back, each insulting jibe from his
sailors had only fed the flames of her fury. And the scene that had just
unfolded before her had only added to her contempt for this pot-bellied would-be
potentate.
Still leaning back on her haunches, Taleena tried to rise from her
humiliating position, so as to address the perpetrator of her ordeal from a
position of dignity. But Balbinus forestalled her by extending a fat finger in
her direction. "Remain on your knees, wench, or I'll have Vinculus chain your
pretty neck to the leg of that table until you learn your place!"
Taleena seethed with rage. She felt the heat of her indignation suffuse
her upper body with feverish warmth. Had it not been for the chains that
imprisoned her wrists she would have thrown herself at this petty tyrant and
fought him even if it had cost her her life.
But there was no third choice. She would have to choose either servile
submission to the despicable merchant or the cruel subjugation of the tasker's
whip... An icy shiver ran through her body as she thought of the desperate souls
chained like animals in the cellar. Vinculus' dire threat still echoed in her
ears as well, and she fought to master the panic that rose within her at the
thought of what might betide her if she refused Balbinus' will.
"Well?" Balbinus roared. "Will you serve me or your foolish pride?"
In days to come Taleena would always wonder why her thoughts had turned
at that moment to old Eudocles, and the models of courage whose praises he had
sung. Of gallant Odysseus, the hero of Troy, whose arduous journey homeward
to his beloved Ithaca had taken ten years; and of his brave and patient wife,
Penelope, who, through all that time, had resisted the advances of suitors as
insistent, if not more detestable, than Balbinus.
Once, upon listening to Eudocles' oft-repeated tales of warriors and
heroes, Taleena had lamented that Lugdunum, and the placid world in which she
lived, offered little chance for courage, little scope for valour. Eudocles had
merely shaken his head sadly at her naivete and whispered the words of his
long-dead mentor, Socrates. "Life contains but two tragedies. One is not to get
your heart's desire; the other is to get it."
Taleena pulled herself upright squaring her shoulders, kneeling but
proud, defeated yet defiant. Her bright blue eyes shot bolts of Gallic
lightning at Balbinus as she spat at him fearlessly. "I would rather spend a
lifetime on the rowing bench than an hour in your embrace!"
But if Taleena thought that her insult would shake Balbinus'
complacency, she was wrong. If the acquisitive merchant felt insulted, he kept
his emotions well under control this time.
"Very well," he replied, with a sly smile, chuckling at the paradox that
Taleena's very pride had caused her lush breasts to thrust forward for his
delectation. Power was indeed the greatest aphrodisiac, he thought to himself
as he felt his passion rise. "It seems that you need just a little more time to
consider the terms of my offer," he added calmly, as if he were talking to a
headstrong child. But then his voice hardened. "And you shall have it! Do you
imagine that death will deliver you from my hands? I assure you that very few
die on the bench although many wish to do so. And if you do not come to your
senses, you shall soon join their ranks!"
With those words Balbinus clapped his hands and Vinculus and Symmachus
re-entered the room and seized the rebellious blonde prisoner. Balbinus watched
as his henchmen dragged the shackled beauty roughly to the door, savouring, for
a few seconds longer, the graceful lines of her tapering back and the well-toned
curves of her thighs. His ardour had risen with his temper and he turned his
attentions to Nilea, his 'Flower of the Nile'. He pressed the young girl's
pretty face more firmly again his lap, and she, having seen the fate of a woman
who defied such a ruthless master, responded to his unspoken wishes with an
enthusiasm which did not fail to bring the contemptible merchant to the pinnacle
of pleasure.
