Daphne Boy

Delos

The Sixteenth Tale of the Daphne Boy

by George Gauthier

Author's Note:

This is the sixteenth in a series of tales about an undying youth named Alexander, called Alexandros and Ganymede or Gan in this story. The other stories in this series so far are 'Antebellum', set in the American South just before the Civil War, 'Daphne Boy', set in Roman Syria, 'El Dorado', about the conquistadors, 'The Erythraean Sea', set in Arabia just before the rise of Islam, 'Stupor Mundi', about the Sixth Crusade, 'Ferghana', a tale of the Silk Road in Central Asia, 'Zulu' set mostly in Southern Africa during the Anglo-Zulu War, 'Sol Invictus' set in the Roman Empire during the reign of the dissolute androgynous and sexually insatiable gay emperor Elagabalus, 'Reniassance' set in Italy around 1500, 'Gupta' set during the Golden Age in India in the Vth century AD, 'Palmyra' set during the crisis of the IIIrd century that nearly destroyed the Roman Empire, 'Tobago', set in the Caribbean and South America during the middle of the XVIIth century, 'The Apostate' set during the age of the Roman Emperor Julian the Apostate in the mid IVth century, 'Marlowe', set it Elizabethan London, and 'Isfahan' set in XIth century Persia.

These stories can be read in almost any order. The first story has extensive flashbacks detailing the character's origins. The second story explains how he came by his appellation The Daphne Boy, the term for a comely young male enslaved as a prostitute at the temple of Daphne in ancient Antioch.

It is as historically accurate in its setting as I could make it, with only minor poetic license for the sake of the story. This tale, after all, is fiction. It is not a historical monograph. The characters are not intended to resemble any actual person living or dead. If one of the villains in this tale sounds familiar, that is because the brothel keeper named Philotas, son of Miltiades is also a character in another story of mine set a few years after this one: 'Source of the Nile' in my 'Naked Prey' series.

Readers who like these stories might want to try my 'Jungle Boy' series of tales in a modern setting, posted in the Gay/Authoritarian section of the archive. See also my series 'Naked Prey' in the historical section, my 'Mer Boy' series in Gay/Beginnings, and the 'Track and Field' series in Gay/College. For links to my stories, look on the list of Prolific Authors on the Archive.

It contains graphic descriptions of the male human body, of consensual and non-consenual sexual activity between adult males. If any of this would offend a reader, read no further. This is not intended for persons younger than an age where they may freely and legally select their reading matter in whatever jurisdiction applies. It is offered for entertainment. If it manages to both intrigue and to provoke prurient interest, it will have succeeded in its aim.

Comments and feedback welcome at georgegauthierdc@gmail.com. I always write back.

Chapter 1. Crete 54 AD

Olive trees...

There is something appealing about olive trees. They are not tall and majestic like Sequoias or Redwoods. Their trunks are not straight nor their crowns of foliage symmetrical. I like them despite, or maybe because of, their broad gnarly trunks, deeply indented bark, twisted limbs, and untidy tangle of branches. That makes for an perverse aesthetic, true, but I am not alone in my appreciation of ancient olive trees. These days there is a lucrative illicit trade in southern Italy where smugglers dig up centuries-old trees to decorate the gardens of rich clients internationally.

For a near immortal like me, part of the appeal of olive trees must be their longevity. Like Sequoias and bristle cone pines, olive trees are one of the few living things likely to outlive me. Yes, my life span is potentially indefinite, though I am not truly immortal. I do not age, but, like any man, I can die by accident, misadventure, or foul play. The odds will catch up with me sooner or later.

One summer morning, many centuries ago, after my daily run along the beach, I went strolling through some mature olive groves I owned on the island of Crete, where I had settled into a sedentary life after two decades of adventures in Persia and the East. The trees were spaced evenly, quite unlike a forest, lending a tamed and domesticated air to the landscape. Olives were domesticated on Crete and have been grown commercially there as far back as 3000 BC. The location of my grove was perfect for the cultivation of olives both for the table and for oil. It lay just up a gentle slope. close to the southern shore of the island.

One giant of a tree caught my fancy with its broad trunk and its gnarly limbs twisting up and out in the rough shape of a man. On impulse, I leaned into it, pressing my face and nude body to its indented bark. In an act of communion with the ancient tree, I drew its scent into my nostrils and even tongued, chewed, tasted, and swallowed a small bit of its bark. My arms encircled the trunk, embracing the tree, rubbing my chest and belly and hips over its bark, heedless of its abrasion of my tender skin and manly parts.

I turned around to present my bare back and ass to the trunk, spreading my legs to partly encircle it. The rough bark pressed my shoulder blades and rump and limbs. I raised my arms its two main branches, deliberately scraping my skin across the bark, wrapping supple shoots around my wrists, using them like green manacles to bind and shackle myself to the tree, digging my toes into the ground the better to grip the soil, to root myself into it, as it were.

I turned my head upwards, my face partly shaded by the silvery green foliage of the ancient tree, watching the play of light and shadow as the sea breeze blew its branches back and forth. Closing my eyes, I felt as one with the tree. For that instant I was like the tree itself: rooted, planted, permanent, at peace with the natural world. In the euphoria of the moment, it seemed I might merge with the tree, sinking into its heart wood like some latter day male dryad.

And why not? I was as lovely as any tree nymph of lore. My features were delicate with an elfin quality thanks to slightly pointed ears, a chiseled jaw line, and large green eyes set wide apart under finely arched brows, their lashes too long to have ever have been meant for a boy, all of that framed by a head of straight blond hair which almost reached my shoulders.

At that moment, my stomach grumbled.

Recalled to reality, I untangled myself from the tree, chuckling at my momentary lapse. A perpetual wanderer like me could never really root himself in any one spot. In no more than two decades it would become impossible to conceal the fact that I did not age like other men. For that reason, I usually moved from place to place, taking on new identities, earning my living as a merchant rather than a landowner, my wealth portable rather than invested in real estate.

Shaking my head in bemusement, I turned to my left and found a man sitting on the stump of an olive tree, delight dancing in his sky blue eyes, a sly smile on his lightly freckled face. Boyishly handsome and only in his mid twenties, he stood much taller than I, towering nearly six and a half feet. He was lean but well muscled, with a close cropped head of black hair, and dressed in what I recognized as a legionary woolen tunic and hob-nailed sandals, with a cavalry spatha hanging in a scabbard at his waist. Behind him stood two more men, also armed and in legionary tunics. His men then.

"Well boy. Finished making love to yon olive tree, are we?"

I flushed totally embarrassed both by the situation and by the stark contrast between us. There I stood, a short slender small-boned youth, bare feet planted on the earth and bare ass naked, alone, and unarmed. Compared to my slight build, this was a veritable giant of a man, a professional soldier, fully clothed and armed and with backup. Before I could reply, the man continued.

"Do you think your master would approve of such idleness and frivolity, little one? Shouldn't you be about his business, perhaps pruning these olive trees, or pulling weeds from the bare ground between them? To my way of thinking your master would only be within his rights to take a switch to your bare ass, delightfully shaped though it may be."

Drawing myself up straight, and trying my utmost to regain my dignity, I countered with:

"What makes you think I am the servant and not the master here, tribune? And the name is Alexandros."

I had recognized his rank of military tribune by the helmet hung from his belt.

"And I am Gaius Metellus Crassus. Come there, Alexandros. Everything about you says you are no master. Why you cannot be more than fifteen years old, standing, if I am any judge of things, no taller than five foot five (165 cm) and weighing no more than 120 pounds (54 kg)."

"Nineteen, tribune, not fifteen. I am a man grown!" I said emphatically.

"So you say, pretty one."

The man had a good eye. He had called my numbers almost exactly. My slight stature and my small-boned frame gives the impression of a boy rather than a young man. I could pass for fifteen then, as I can even today. The taut and well-defined musculature of my wiry physique was the only clue that I had passed my growth spurt. It does not help that my body is utterly hairless, even at the fork of my legs. In ancient Alexandria, while working in a boy brothel, I took up the Roman habit of having all my body hair, little as it was, plucked with tweezers. After several decades of plucking it stopped sprouting. So I am completely hairless and will stay that way forever. No wonder the man took me for only fifteen.

Actually my birth dates back to tribal Germany during the late second century BC. So by the mid first century AD, I had lived not for a mere decade and a half but for a century and a half. For reasons I never understood, some genetic quirk presumably, I stopped growing and aging not long after my seventeenth birthday. I still look just as I did then, a slender boy in his late teens, prettier than any boy rightly ought to be, my development arrested, my growth stunted, my face still beardless even after all these centuries -- in modern parlance, a cute twink.

"And it is not just your stature, lad," the man continued, "First, you are not only naked but uniformly bronzed from habitual nudity, the mark of a boy who works out of doors in the bright sun, a farm laborer then rather than a landowner or master. Second, your wiry physique and fine-boned features, make your appearance androgynous rather than masculine. You fall far short of normal male standards in height, muscular development, and manly characteristics like beard and body hair. As short as you are, fine-boned, and impossibly comely, no one could take you seriously as a male. You must be some master's catamite or pleasure boy."

"I am no such thing!" I declared, indignant. The man continued, unfazed.

"Well, Alexandros, if you are not already some lucky man's bum boy, then you certainly ought to be. A youth as lovely as you was surely marked out by the gods for that role in life. Fortunately I am in a position to ensure that happens. The way you are running around on the loose and stark naked makes you fair game for capture and taming. As a representative of the imperial government, it falls to me to take you in charge pending verification of your bona fides. I am sure your ludicrous claims to free status will soon prove false. And don't try running away lad. With my long legs, I could easily overtake you. Or Marcus or Lucius could bring you down with a bolo, though your skin would likely get bruised or scraped in the process. That would be a shame. I want to sample your charms, to enjoy your delectable body unmarred. Surrender yourself lad, and I will take it easy with you. After all, a lovely blossom like you should never be crushed nor trodden underfoot."

"No, that's not right! This cannot be happening." I wailed.

I looked around for some means of escape, but the open landscape of an olive grove provides no place to hide. The tribune's men had unslung their bolos, ready to bring me down should I take to my heels.

"Now there," the man said soothingly as he closed with me. "A boy as preternaturally beautiful as you, Alexandros, cannot have remained a virgin so long. You are blessed with a lovely form and a face that cannot but inspire admiration and lust in the heart of any male who appreciates a beautiful lad. You must have been deflowered quite some time ago. You need have no fears that I will tear you up back there. Here let me examine you."

I stood there trembling both from fear and excitement as the man stepped close to me, towering over my slight frame. His hands roamed all over my nude body, exploring and assessing. Nervous sweat made my skin wet and slick, and I shifted my feet uneasily. The man's calloused hand cradled my chin, turning my face upward as he loomed over me then suddenly kissed me, his tongue thrusting into my mouth. Automatically I returned his kiss, pressing my lips to his, my tongue parrying and playing with his. His arms embraced me, pressing my nude body into his. He reached a hand between my legs, finding I was already halfway tumescent.

"Just as I thought. You cannot help but respond to a virile man. It is what you were born for. I can't wait to take you."

"I know what I am, tribune. Maybe I did responded just now to your overwhelming virility, but that does not mean I was offering myself to you. And you have no right to just take me. I am a free man!"

"Not at the moment," he said simply.

One of his men had stepped up behind me. With practiced efficiency, he pulled my wrists behind my back and tied them so tight with a leather thong that I gradually lost sensation in my fingers, leaving me with no hope of undoing the knots. For better access to my ass, he hooked my bound wrists high up, between my shoulder blades, anchoring them to a longer thong run around my neck and shoulders. As his hands grabbed and squeezed my butt cheeks he reported:

"The boy's hands are callused sir," the soldier reported, "About what you would expect of a field slave."

Nodding, Gaius tied another thong around the base of my scrotum, forcing the balls to the bottom of the hairless sac, leaving it red and shaped like a plum. The rest of the thong served as a leash to lead me around and to control me. I was now well and truly caught.

There was little I could have done to stop him. Though I was quite deadly with a blade at that point, it was only in later centuries that I perfected my skills in unarmed combat. Outnumbered, outweighed, unarmed, and naked, I had to submit.

Gaius' hands pawed my lithe physique, squeezing, poking, and prodding. He reached for my deltoids then slid his palms over the flaring pectorals, ran his hands down my corrugated chest and belly to circle the navel with his thumb. His finger tips ran lightly over my prominent hip bones, brushing my flat belly. He cupped and weighed my manhood, his wry face showing he was not very impressed. I thought that rather unfair, given the circumstances. Fear will shrink any man's tackle. I have always felt that I was reasonably well endowed. Maybe I wouldn't be scaring the horses, but it took both my hands to cover my erection when I was aroused.

Turning me around, Gaius squeezed my trapezius muscles then ran his hands between my shoulder blades and along the bumps of my spine. His hands reached the flare of my hips and slid down to the curve of my buttocks, giving them a squeeze that left red marks. He slid the blade of his hand into my cleavage, flashing a quick smile to his men at the sharp intake of breathe I took as Gaius' finger tapped the small hole between the firm globes and slipped very briefly inside. He squatted down to test the firmness of the muscles my slender thighs and calves.

"Hmmmn. You are impressively muscled for such a slim lad, Alexandros. You have one of those physiques that are more about quality than quantity. Such a firm rump too. It is perhaps your best feature."

I suppose I should have been flattered to hear him say that I was a rare treasure for any male who appreciated a lovely lad. To hear him tell it, I was well muscled and healthy, in the very bloom of youth at fifteen, and looking all the more delectable for the way my slender body trembled in its bondage.

It was clear this man meant to fuck me, regardless of my stated wishes. How often that has happened in my long life. I am both blessed and cursed by an androgynous comeliness which inspires dominant males to take me captive and turn me into their sex toy. So many rapes and gang bangs plus the many times I have been sold into sexual slavery.

In all candor, I admit that the man had turned me on with his passionate kiss. Part of me did not want to get away from him. The man's intimate visual and physical scrutiny had stimulated my libido, plumping my cock up a bit, leaving a drop of clear fluid glistening at the tip of the foreskin. The man was perfectly right, I was no virgin, and I could not help but respond to his virility. I took his manly scent into my nostrils, finding it a heady aroma indeed composed of sweat and leather and the olive oil men then used instead of soap for bathing.

My traitorous nether hole twitched in anticipation of penetration while my virile member started to plump up and lift off, the undeniable sign of a boy's arousal. I am, after all, a sexual submissive, indeed an abject bottom boy, if the truth were known. If ever a boy was born to be fucked, I am that lad. Here once again I was to be taken and tamed by a strong man who would have his pleasure of me, regardless of the rights and wrongs of it.

Chapter 2. Raped and Enslaved

With a big smile on his broad face, the tribune grabbed me and laid me belly down over the low branch of an olive tree. One of his men stepped to the other side and pressed his hands to my shoulders, locking me in place.

I could not help but whimper at what I knew came next.

"Ah, the soft whimper of defeat and submission." Gaius intoned. "That means this lad won't be giving us any trouble. Isn't that right, little one?" he asked, patting my rump in approval. "Pretty little thing, isn't he, Marcus? All bent over and submissive, ass in the air. Such a nice trim figure too: good chest, round rump, and taut buns. The best boy flesh I have ever encountered."

Gaius slapped my ass hard, reminding me to stay in place as he prepared himself. He shucked off his tunic and used his sword belt to strap my back and ass and legs. The beating was not severe. The man was not trying to hurt me so much as to redden my butt cheeks and to establish his dominance -- to show me who was boss. Satisfied on that score, he put his big hands to my rump, squeezing my cheeks, digging in rather hard actually, then used his thumbs to stretch my bung hole, lubricating it with the oil squeezed from a couple of unripe olives. I felt his hairy chest scrape my back as he laid his body over me, practically engulfing me, covering me much like a stallion does a filly, using his knees to prod my legs wider apart to give him better access to my boy hole.

His erection poked at my nether whorl, spearing the anal ring, spreading the sphincter, though he did stop a moment with just an inch or so inside me. That gave me time to adjust, to relax my anal ring to facilitate his intrusion. I did not want his huge girth tearing me up back there. Slowly he worked his cock into me and inch or two at a time. When he was all the way in, deeply seated, he sighed.

"Ah, you have no idea how wonderful it feels to be clutched by the velvet warmth of your depths, little Alexandros. Small and tight as you are, yet you can accommodate even a man of my dimensions. Now I am going to pump you steadily. I suspect you will get off on that, but even if you do not, I certainly will."

"Right on sir," Marcus said enthusiastically. "Lay it into him. He is a pretty one, all right. You had the right of it. Running around buck nekkid like that, prettier than any girl, the youngster was fairly begging to be treated like the frisky little filly that he is. He was lucky he run into three lusty cavalrymen who know how to mount a horse or a boy."

"From the way the boy is moaning and shuddering in arousal, he must be some rich man's catamite or boy toy. That's true, isn't it, Blondie? You are a kept boy, aren't you? I'll bet you get passed around a lot at orgies. Well today it is our turn to have fun with you."

The tribune grabbed my shoulders and pulled my whole body back onto his cock, sinking all the way into me. He held it there a moment then withdrew till only the head of his cock was within my anal ring. Then he reversed direction and shoved all the way in again, rhythmically pumping away. My body quivered as the man's cock stroked my prostate setting off waves of arousal. I grew light-heated, carried away by a tide of emotion compounded of sexual arousal, humiliation, my own helplessness, and a deep seated sense of abject subservience to dominant males.

"Tighter than a virgin." grunted the tribune. "Our lucky day. You never just know what you might flush out in the country. Why don't you try his mouth, Marcus, and I will continue pronging this end. Alexandros, get those pouty lips of yours working on my man's cock."

I soon had Marcus' cock down my throat as he face fucked me. The young soldier used my ears to control the pace. He must have been very horny, for he reached his climax much sooner than his officer, pulling out at the late minute and shooting his splooge all over my face. Marcus used his still tumescent cock like an obscene paint brush to spread his gism over my forehead, cheeks, nose, and chin. Meanwhile his officer pumped away at my ass, punctuating his thrusts with a series of slaps to my ass. He felt under me and found my rigid cock and pulled it painfully back between my legs, frigging it up and down as a farmer does a cow's teat, literally trying to milk me. His finger rubbed the sweet spot under the cock head time and again, inducing the most exquisite sensation. Soon I was moving my hips not just to raise my ass meet his own lusty thrusts but also to rub my manhood against his fingers, trying to bring myself off.

"Har! Just as I thought. The little slut is hard. He is just begging for it. Oh, I know, Alexandros, a boy like you can't rightly help himself. Your kind needs cock bad, lots of cock. Your day isn't complete unless you get impaled on the horn of a real man. That is why your little thing is hard now, because I am working away at you."

I wanted to protest that my erection was just the natural reaction of any bottom boy getting pronged and having his cock manipulated. Certainly not an indication of consent to rape, but I knew my words would fall on deaf ears, even if my mouth were not already full of soldier cock. The tribune smiled down at me, saying:

"You just don't realize how exciting it is for us to wrestle you, pretty one, to grab and hold on to your sexy body as you struggle, all slick with sweat, tugging, pulling at your bonds, squirming in our arms, twisting and straining that tight little body of yours. The play of your muscles is intensely erotic."

"Aye, sir," Marcus agreed, "though it's his cute face that really makes me hard. A natural beauty with those pouty lips locked around a man's cock, sucking away."

The tribune's questing fingers found the nubbins of my tiny nipples and tweaked them, pulling them out from my chest, digging in with his finger nails. As I hissed from the pain, he whispered:

"I won't damage you, little one, but I never promised this would be a painless encounter. I like to see my boys squirm a bit, to struggle to accept whatever I want to inflict on their luscious bodies. That was why I strapped your ass to start with. Nothing shows a boy is readier to be penetrated than an ass striped and reddened from a whipping. So pain or not, you'd better not use your teeth on Marcus' cock."

The three men worked me over for a couple of hours, switching places in a round robin, with one of them catching his breath between bouts. Marcus was the easiest to please. His cock was not so big and he came very quickly. Lucius was a plodder, his sexual repertoire utterly unimaginative. Gaius was insatiable, and he had to knack of controlling himself, holding his ejaculation back while he long dicked a boy. When they finally finished I was tired and sore.

I assumed they would let me go afterwards, but that was not to be. Instead I felt Gaius fingering the small blue triangles I had tattooed on left shoulder and right buttock. I hope he did not realize what they meant. The tribune already thought I was some errant slave boy belonging to the local landowner.

Even after they left off using me, the Romans kept me in bondage, the tribune saying he intended to investigate my status, inquiring of my master. He dismissed my protests that I was my own master. I had no choice but to give him directions to my villa. The three cavalrymen mounted the horses they had left tethered nearby and we set off, with me on foot, walking in their dust, lead by the thong tied around my nuts, my wrists still bound behind my back.

My villa was a little over a mile away (2 km). It was built on high ground which afforded a view of both my extensive groves on the Mesara Plain and, beyond them, the Libyan sea to the south. The Minoan ruins at Phaistos and Gortys, familiar to modern tourists and which were ruins even in that century, stood not far away. Spacious and airy, the villa was an old building dating back a century or more which I had recently renovated, repairing the ravages of time and neglect.

My majo domo, Philomenes, greeted the tribune who called loudly for the old man to send for his master at once.

"Why that is my master, Alexandros, tribune, the young man standing there with you," he said pointing to me. "Why have you placed him in bondage? You must set him free at once!"

"Not so fast, old man. Are you saying this mere slip of a lad is your master? He is not just a slave boy?"

"Certainly not. Neither him nor anyone else here. We have no slaves among us. My master Alexandros would not hear of it. All of the staff at the villa are freedmen and women to whom he pays fair wages. The workers who tend the olive trees are tenant farmers."

"Then how do you explain these small blue triangles tattooed on his left shoulder and right buttock. Don't you know that the Greek letter Delta signifies an acolyte or boy prostitute from the temple of Daphne in Antioch? They are famous throughout the East: teenage boys handpicked for their beauty of face and form and well trained in the amatory arts. The priests who run the temple of Daphne wisely replace the boys when they get older to keep their stock young and fresh looking. The boys who become too old to be acolytes are sold into private service."

He went on to say:

"This Alexandros is far too young for that. They would never have let him go so soon, since, with his youth and beauty, he would be in demand for years to come. If he is here on Crete, he must be a runaway. If he maintains that he is not, then let him produce his manumission papers."

The tribune had me there. Neither my staff nor my advocate from nearby Gortyn, the capital of Roman Crete, could overcome the legal presumption created by my tattoos that I was a runaway slave. The irony of it was that I did have manumission papers hidden away, but I could not produce them. Yes, the papers would show that the Roman governor of Syria had freed an acolyte named Alexandros for saving the garrison commander's children from a fiery death following an earthquake. And I fit the description provided for that Alexandros: short, slender, blonde, green eyed, and comely.

Unfortunately those papers were dated a quarter century ago and described the Daphne boy as a young man of twenty-one. No way I could ever convince the tribune, who had already taken me for a boy of fifteen, that I was actually a man in my mid-forties.

The upshot of it all was that the Roman governor of Crete legally stripped me of my liberty, "returning" me to servile status and confiscated all my wealth and property including my clothing. As the law provided, the tribune, as the informant, got one fourth of my property namely the villa and the best groves. The state got all the rest. (The temple in Antioch had no advocate on Crete who might have put in a claim for my property.) So I was condemned to the slave markets on the island of Delos for whatever price I would bring, the money to be turned over to the temple in Antioch. My only piece of good luck was, that to preserve my market value, I was not branded on the face with the letter "F" for "fugitivus".

The economies of the ancient world depended on the muscle power and skills of slaves. Household slaves served the wealthy and the artisans in cities. Slaves in rural areas worked the land. Neither the Greeks nor Romans maintained their slave populations by breeding new slaves. Instead, they replenished the ranks of their slaves from four sources: imports, prisoners of war, criminals, and those sold into slavery to satisfy debts. A flourishing international trade in slaves centered on the otherwise barren island of Delos, which lies in the the Cyclades Islands, a circular archipelago in the Aegean Sea.

I arrived in chains by ship from Crete, nude and rather the worse for wear from bad food, lack of sleep, foul conditions below decks, and continual sexual abuse from fellow slaves, guards, and sailors alike. Small as I was, outnumbered, shackled hand and foot, confined, and naked, I was in no position to resist whatever use these men made of me. I was their sex toy.

It wasn't the forced sex on the voyage that bothered me as much as living in filth. I have always set great store by personal hygiene as the first step in maintaining good health. Honest dirt from farming or hard work was one thing. Stinking filth from too much unwashed humanity and close contact with bodily wastes was something else.

After the ship tied up in the port at Delos, guards prodded the new slaves down the gangway and onto the dock. From there a paved footpath led through an archway into the main slave market. There we would undergo a preliminary screening.

As we shuffled forward, prospective buyers and curiosity seekers alike ogled our nude bodies. Eager hands reached out to touch and fondle the better looking among us. As each man reached the head of the line he was asked a few simple questions like name, country of origin, and trade or occupation before enslavement. Most answered that they were farmers or soldiers or blacksmiths and the like and their replies noted by a jaded guard, his bored look saying he had seen it all and heard it all before. When I stepped to the head of the line, he perked up, a twinkle in his eye, then signaled for me to turn around to display my back and my bum.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here if not young Ganymede come down from Olympus to grace our humble establishment. Tell me, immortal one, what earthly name do you go by these days?"

His remarks and my own stunning looks drew the attention of guards, onlookers, and fellow slaves. Frowning at his heavy sarcasm, I answered with my name. For my origins, I gave the island of Crete.

"Occupation?"

"Olive grower."

"Olive grower? Really? Then what do those tattoos on your shoulder and rump signify? Look boy. You cannot keep secrets here. Why don't you just come right out and say what you really used to do for a living. Mind you, speak up so everyone can hear you."

Blushing furiously I had no choice but to call it out in my light tenor voice:

"All right then ... I was a Daphne Boy!"

My admission provoked general hilarity. Many guffawed aloud and even slapped their knees. Others merely tittered or chuckled. A big bruiser let out a wolf whistle as he eyed me up and down. More than one man smirked scornfully at my patent lack of masculinity. Two men, a guard and a grizzled slave, in a rare moment of fellowship, shook their heads in sympathy, rueful smiles on their faces. I heard them mutter.

"Poor devil. They will eat him alive, now."

"Aye, what a shame. He's such a nice looking kid too, so fresh and innocent."

"Indeed, but that pert ass of his just begs to be fucked."

"That much is true."

I could only stand there mute, feeling terribly small, eyes downcast as their laughter rolled over me. Two of the guards stepped forward and bent me over at the waist, the better to display my bum, the deep cleavage between my butt cheeks, and the brown whorl lying in between. One of them even stuck his thumb into my orifice. Tears of shame rolled down my cheeks.

This was so unfair. I did not deserve to be enslaved, dragged from my pleasant life on Crete, and put on public display on Delos stark naked, giving the boy lovers among them a prurient preview of my charms. Everyone there now knew I had been a prostitute in the temple of Daphne, a pretty boy who took it up the ass for coin.

In Antioch too I had been kept naked the better to attract trade. Even on my two days off a month I had to go around the city in the nude, the small deltas tattooed on shoulder and rump a kind of advertising for the temple. Yes, I am a bit of an exhibitionist. I do like showing off my trim little body, but I like it to be my own idea. Yes I have a strong sex drive, and I crave sex with men and boys, but I very much prefer to choose my partners. On Delos I was a slave and faced a future of endless mountings.

Realizing my commercial potential in the luxury market and not wanting to mar my skin, the slave traders closeted me in a private cell to protect me from molestation though they did let potential purchasers inside to look over the merchandise. I had to suffer their hands on my body, rubbing and prodding, and poking into my orifices. Men examined my teeth, as if I were a pony. That was what I had been reduced to: a kind of bipedal livestock, property rather than a person.

My quarters were reasonably clean and the food was nutritious and fairly tasty. The best part was that they let me get cleaned up, indeed they insisted upon it, though for their benefit, not mine, in order to look perky for the slave auction. The morning I was to go on the block, two attendants bathed, shampooed, oiled, and scented my body and set a floral crown of white and yellow oleander blossoms atop my head. As I stepped up to the auction block, my skin shining in the morning sunlight, I looked absolutely scrumptious, which was the whole idea.

Speaking common Greek, the lingua franca of the East, the auctioneer praised my virtues to the rich clientele who pressed close, the better to see me.

"Gentlemen, today we have a real find, a boy lovely enough for the most discriminating of palates. This fresh faced lad of only fourteen summers (!) is the very epitome of youthful male concupiscence. Here is stands before you: small of stature yet firmly muscled and with a face any dryad would envy. Let it be known that young Aleksandros is a former Daphne Boy, a runaway from the temple in Antioch so he is well versed in the amatory arts."

The bidding was lively. My exquisite looks, totally on display, aroused cupidity and lust in the heart of every boy lover at the market. Also, my status as a runaway Daphne Boy, one of the notorious temples prostitutes of Antioch, was a big attraction. True, former Daphne Boys had been brought to market before, but those youths were strictly second hand merchandise, sold by the priests after the bloom of their youth had faded.

Ideally I hoped to be bought by a rich man with a mild disposition, one who would provide me with a pleasant existence in a comfortable environment, in exchange for daily access to my charms. It did not matter much what he looked like. As long as he treated me decently I would give him the best sex of his life, though all the while planning for eventual escape and freedom.

I went to the highest bidder, a tall man in his thirties though graying now at the temples but still ruggedly handsome. With him stood a giant of a man, almost seven feet tall (210 cm), a Nubian or so I judged him by his black skin and aquiline features.

Chapter 3. Ganymede

So once again, and not for the last time in my long life, I found myself the pleasure slave of a rich man, in this case one Philotas, son of Miltiades, who ran an upscale boy brothel in Alexandria.

"It is well, young Aleksandros, that you are already broken in to sexual service. It is so tiresome to have to train virgins. Listen to me boy. I take no pleasure in punishing recalcitrant boys, but I run my business with a firm hand. Obey me and pleasure my customers, and yours will be a tolerable enough existence. Cross me and Goran here will make your life miserable. There are many ways to punish a boy that do not leave marks on his body. Do we understand each other?"

"Yes, master." I said, quite sincerely.

I knew the type. Philotas was a no nonsense slave owner, maybe never deliberately cruel to his boys, not for the sake of being mean, but without much kindness nor sympathy in him either. Very likely a sharp businessman too, the sort that if you shake hands with him on a deal, you had better count your fingers afterwards. I knew better than to cross him.

"Another thing. Half the boys in Alexandria are named Aleksandros. From now on you will go by the name that guard used. You shall be called Ganymede, after the paramour of Zeus. Do you know the tale?"

Indeed I did. Ganymede was originally a prince of Troy a thousand years before the events of the Iliad. His comeliness and youthful physique, displayed as he disported naked in the fields, caught Zeus's roving eye. Taking the form of an eagle, the Thunderer literally swooped down on the lad, carried him off to a mountain top, transformed back to human form, and ravished him. The king of the gods, realizing he must have this delightful boy with him always, granted him the boon of eternal youth, appointing him to be cupbearer to the gods. I also knew that like me Ganymede was no Greek at all and famously blond.

That first afternoon and evening, Philotas took me for a test ride. With me on my back, he and Goran double teamed me, pronging both orifices, though not at once. First Goran penetrated my ass. Only after he was seated did Philotas thrust his cock into my mouth. It was fortunate the brothel keeper waited to go second, for Goran was so formidably endowed that he made me grind my teeth with the effort to accept him. My anal whorl can stretch only so far. I am after all, slight in build, the size of a fifteen year old kid really, in all departments. The man's invasion caused me real pain, the kind that takes your breath away and makes your eyes water. I felt on fire down there as he slid the head of his cock into me, then paused to say:

"The first few times I fuck you, little one, I will take it slow. We don't want to absolutely ruin you. Still, with your experience as a Daphne Boy you should be able to adjust to me. I know it must hurt, maybe even feel like I am tearing you apart, but you can take me. You will take me. Bear down, squeeze, don't tighten up your hole. Don't fight it. Here I will stop for now to let you get used to the initial penetration."

I nodded and used all my control to help him slide in without inflicting permanent injury. I took quick shallow breaths, gasping and tossing my head side to side. The man was enormous both in girth and length. His cock very likely would frighten horses. It certainly frightened me as I lay there on my back, my slender legs hooked over his wide shoulders, looking down at the enormous fleshy truncheon he had started to shove into me. It must have been over a foot long, maybe a fourteen inches (or one-third of a meter). Pain washed over me as more and more of him slid inside till our groins touched. His cock was poking out my belly from the inside. It was a wonder it did not puncture my entrails. I passed out when he started to pump into me and twice more later on. After what seemed an eternity, my body managed to adjust, to accept the impalement. I did not take any pleasure from that fucking, not that day nor for a long time to come. Eventually I was able to derive some sexual pleasure from his fucking, but it always hurt too.

Philotas himself was much less of a problem though he was no slouch in the cock department either. He straddled my head and slid his cock into my upturned face. He slid all the way into me, past my mouth and down my throat. It felt like he and Goran were trying to get their cocks to meet inside my hapless body. It was an ordeal though neither man was trying to hurt me. They could be callous towards those weaker or less fortunate than themselves, but they were not true sadists. It was just that, brothel keepers though they were, I excited them so very much. Philotas spoke for the both of them.

"Ah, little Ganymede, you are a walking wet dream: a blond, green eyed, androgynous boy with an elfin face. And this tight body of yours, so well muscled but round in just the right places."

They both appreciated that I was not just any boy. I was a top of the line professional, supremely practiced in the amorous arts, a genuine Daphne Boy from the temple at Antioch. So they delighted in fucking me, putting me on my back or all fours, clutching my sweaty body to their chests, as I tugged, pulled, and squirmed beneath them, pleasuring them better than any boy had ever done before, as they readily admitted.

The next day we sailed for Alexandria, fabled first city of the East, named after its founder, King Alexander III of Makedon, known to the world as Alexander the Great.

I knew the city well. Alexandria was geographically separate from Egypt proper, lying just west of the Nile Delta. Its founder thought of his new city as being 'next to' Egypt rather than a part of that ancient country. Hence its name of Alexandria by Egypt. Here it all was once again: the port area and the canals that linked the city to the Nile proper, the old royal palace of the Potlemies, the Moon Gate, the Pharos or lighthouse, and the Great Library and Museum.

As a young man, I had spent fifteen happy years in the city, at first working in a boy brothel, but even then I was free, not a slave. With my earnings from whoring myself out, I had invested in shipping ventures and later started trading on my own account as a merchant and shipowner. It was in Alexandria that I made my first fortune, buying the very first of the many homes I would own over the centuries. After some fifteen years, I transferred almost all my assets to a "cousin" in Antioch, the first of many false identities I would assume over the centuries. So in a sense, the journey to Alexandria was a homecoming.

The assets I had not transferred to Antioch I secreted in a treasure cache buried in the desert west of the city. In the centuries to come I would create other caches in Persia, Greece, Italy, and elswhere. These were my insurance against financial disaster, a way to get a new stake if I lost everything. In case of enslavement, the hoard would fiance my escape and give me a new start in a different country. I had every hope of eventually escaping from servitude in Alexandria, but first I had to lull suspicions and find allies.

So I settled in at the boy brothel, working cheerfully. I was never sullen, always leaving my clients sated and happy. I rapidly become Philotas' top draw, one of the few boys who got to keep all his tips instead of sharing with the slave master. That let me to purchase minor luxuries like books and sweets. I had my mornings entirely to myself and worked afternoons and early evening. Customers never cared to stay very late in the evening. The streets of ancient cities were dark mazes at night, entirely without artificial lighting. It was far too easy to get lost there or to run into dangerous criminals.

I drew more custom than I could handle myself. Many customers had to settle for other lads but they still got good value for their money. Say what you will about the man, but Philotas could pick them. All his boys were truly lovely and well trained. If you behaved yourself, the life there was tolerable enough. But he was a bad man to cross.

Philotas had effective ways to punish rebels and to break the resistance of reluctant virgins, especially those boys who were basically straight. He made sure never to leave a permanent mark on a boy that would decrease his commercial value. Boys who did not do as they were told were put into suspension, hung up by their arms or legs. Now suspension with ropes in contorted positions soon leads to agonizing pain as cramps wrack the stretched and immobilized limbs. A few hours a day like that over a week reduces even the most rebellious boy to abject servility, agreeable to anything to stop the pain.

And that does not count all the things a man with patience and a nasty mind could think to do with a boy's asshole. There are many objects or substances that can be inserted into that orifice, not all of them intended for pleasure. Usually though the intimidation factor from Garon alone was enough to keep the boys in line.

So I was always on my best behavior. Yes there was some jealousy and cliquishness among the boys, at least at first, but I soon won them over. I am even tempered and slow to anger, so I was not easily provoked. I would overlook insults and slights in hope of an eventual change of heart. I have a well developed sense of humor, and I am a great talker, an incessant chatterbox to hear some tell it. Having lived the life before, both slave and free, I fit right in, though I always hoped for some chance to regain my lost freedom.

One fine morning, the boy sharing my bed shook my shoulder to wake me up and asked:

"So, Ganymede, are you up for a run and a swim?"

"You bet, Kass. It's another beautiful morning. Let's go."

So we took off with the rest of the boys, my fellow sex slaves, on our daily constitutional. We slave boys were wont to get up early for exercise before breakfast, typically a six mile (10 km) run along a canal and then a swim in an artificial stone lined pool which was fed by the canal but with a wall and grates to keep the crocodiles out. Naturally we always exercised in the nude. After our run and swim, we ate a substantial breakfast, in preference to a more substantial lunch later on in the heat of the day. We took only a light lunch, for who knew what substances might join those nutrients in our bellies when we serviced our clients later on?

Kass and I were never front runners. We preferred to hang back a bit, running just behind the leaders of the strung out pack, pacing each other. My boyfriend's full name was Kassandros but everyone just called him Kass. He was a slender red head from far off Emporion in Hither Spain, seventeen years old, a hand taller than me, preciously cute and with sky blue eyes you could lose yourself in. He gave me real competition in the looks department, more that any other of Pholotas' hand picked boys. Nevertheless we had hit it right off and, after three months were great friends.

With my slow twitch musculature and slender upper storey, I am a natural long distance runner though not so good in a sprint. The stamina conferred by my uncanny vitality adds to my advantage. By training regularly, I can maintain Olympic standards of cardiovascular fitness with less time and effort than required of mortals.

I have always enjoyed running for its own sake, for the sheer pleasure I get from it. I start off slowly, walking for a bit, a spring in my stride, letting my bare feet get the feel of the ground. I like to feel the wind tousle my hair. When I start actually running, my center of gravity rises and falls in a sine wave as I cycle through the three phases of each stride: the support phase, the drive phrase, and the recovery phase. My strides soon take up the hypnotic rhythm of the long distance runner, scissoring metronomically, accompanied by the steady beat of my feet as they slap the earth, eventually inducing that state of day dreaming and euphoria that moderns call the runners' high.

So Kassandros and I ran along cheerily, the early morning sunlight kissing our backs and butts, taking in great lungfuls of air, pumping our arms to maintain rotational balance. We both were light on our feet, our footfalls making only a slight slapping sound as they virtually kissed the ground. With barefoot running you tend to land on the front or middle of your foot rather than on your heel, the way you do with modern running shoes. This is actually more efficient and puts less pressure on the feet and limbs.

The satisfaction people get from running must go back to the primitive days of our species when we had to be fleet of foot to run down game or to escape predators. Runner's high is nature's way of coping with fatigue. A side benefit is that a run by yourself is a good time to think problems through, free from distractions. If you run with a friend, you can share confidences despite being out in public. No one stays near you long enough to make sense of your conversation.

Of course maintaining one's stamina is also eminently practical. There is survival value of being fleet of foot -- more than once I had simply outrun my foes or gained enough of a lead to double back, either to hide or to spring an ambush.

And yes, I admit to a degree of vanity and even exhibitionism. Running nude is a good excuse for me to show off every part of my trim athletic body. I can display the clean lines of my physique from ankle to shoulder without the visual interruption of garments. True, I am slightly built. If you like muscles, then look elsewhere. For my part, I have always thought that wiry physiques like mine were more about quality than about quantity. Kass's body was a bit more slender but quite scrumptious really. I liked watching him run and sometimes dropped back for a time to ogle his well formed buns, as I did that morning. When I rejoined him, he rolled his eyes.

"Did you enjoy that Gan?"

"You know it, Kass! I never tire of the sight."

I should explain that for purely practical reasons, Philotas never minded liaisons among the boys. If it made them more content with their lot and hence more cooperative and manageable, then fine. He used the boys rather sparingly himself on the principle that too much rich food or drink would jade the palate.

Garon was just the opposite, a man of insatiable lusts. He took a different boy to his bed every night and kept him there for the whole night. He loved to wake up with a boy in his bed, spooned into his lap. With more than a dozen boys to choose from, you could expect to spend the night with him once every fortnight or so. It turned out that he was no longer a slave, but a freedman, a willing collaborator with his former master in the brothel business. He trained the boys and kept them in line, protected the customers and the strong box from outsiders, and acted as bouncer with unruly customers.

Sex with him was never easy. Once past the break in period, the man did not bother to take it slow with me as he had done at first. So he always hurt me. Size really does matter. I am quite small and he was huge, endowed with a cock more than in proportion. I have seen men executed by impalement and if my experience was not that bad, it felt like it. Sometimes he had me stand in front of him while he lowered his hips enough to line the head of his cock with my hole. Then, with a sudden thrust he penetrated me all the way, straightening his knees to lift me right off the ground, all my weight on his cock. It drove the breath out of me. I could only kick spastically as he held me tight to his chest, my arms by my sides, trapped within his grasp. Sometimes he walked us over to a horizontal bar installed overhead and had me to grab it and raise my torso in a pull up, lifting myself partly off his cock till he told me to relax and let my ass slide down all the way.

When he took me to his bed, his huge frame virtually engulfed my small body. I really had to brace myself there on all fours to support his tremendous weight. He thought that was the boy's job to raise his rump to meet his downward thrusts. When he finally did come, he wanted the boy to squeeze that cock with his internal ass muscles to help milk his rider of his juices. Even after he shot in my ass the first time he stayed hard and kept his member lodged inside my hole. There I lay, exhausted, well and truly fucked, his cum squishing in my rectum, my ass impaled on his pole.

He liked to taunt me too, always going on about my small size, girlish looks, and my submissive libido. He was a racist too.

"Ah, that's better with my big black cock sunk to the hilt in your skinny white ass. That is the natural order of things: pretty little white boys on the bottom, rump in the air, strong black men on top, plugging their quims. You must have noticed that men of darker hue are much better hung than you pallid whites. All of you are positively puny by comparison, even those among you who couple with women. How much more so in the case of unmanly lads like you who are trained to take it up the ass and even grow to like it."

"You should listen to yourself, Ganymede, carrying on, moaning like a girl when a customer thrusts into you, squealing with delight, even coming purely from getting fucked in the ass. And you suck cock as enthusiastically as a hungry baby with his lips locked to his mother's tit. That's what you were born for, where you belong, down there on your knees, humbling yourself in front of a proud black man, your pouty lips encircling his dark cock, looking up at him worshipfully as your lips and tongue pleasure his cock head."

He smiled as the shame of it showed on my face, my eyes squeezing shut, my brow scrunched up, a blush turning my face red. His hand cupped my jaw, his thumb tracing the join of my lips to his cock. Why did he always belittle me. All right, I am a sexual submissive, a bottom boy. I take it up the ass, and I suck cock. Not very manly, I'll admit, but surely that is how nature made me. Not to mention my captors and owners. It was not a choice. My first real sexual experience was at the age of fourteen, as the catamite of a Roman tribune who had taken me captive in the wars. That set the mold, though I never had had any interest in females, truth to tell.

Chapter 4. Sallust

"Stop fidgeting, Kass. You know I have to pluck you once a week. No body hair. The Romans abhor it as animalistic and the Greeks prefer their boys smooth because it makes us look even younger than our years."

"All right, but it stings when you pluck from around my bung hole."

"Don't be such a baby. It's only one or two a month back here."

"Really Gan, you don't know how lucky you are to be naturally hairless all over, even at the fork of your legs."

Neither of us had any beard either. I stopped aging before mine grew in and Kassandros was still too young for more than a hint of peach fuzz. Kassandros had never had very much body hair to begin with, mere tufts in the usual three places and a very light dusting on lower arms and legs, and not for long, thanks to weekly plucking with tweezers over the last couple of years. I had had regular treatments too during my first stay in Alexandria more than a century earlier and for several decades afterwards too. In my case, I very much liked having my body bare and smooth. It makes me feel even more naked, shameless exhibitionist that I am. Eventually my abnormal vitality told body hair to just stop growing back. So I was smooth and hairless and would stay that way forever.

We boys went naked almost all the time, not just during exercise or when we took the customers to bed. On our time off, around Philotas' brothel we never bothered with clothing taking our meals and our leisure in the buff. What was the point of covering up? We were all male whores. Also we danced or performed acrobatics for our customers in the nude. Actually I liked dancing for an audience. To me the dance is celebration of youth, health, and sexuality.

If we did circulate in the city, we would wrap a light linen kilt around our hips. We wore the kilt sagger fashion -- slung low on the hips not up around the waist. So it dipped down in front to display the Adam's girdle and uncovered a couple fingers of cleavage in the rear. For that matter the cloth was translucent and nearly transparent when wet.

One morning after breakfast, Kassandros and I were walking past the Great Museum when we noticed smoke coming from one of the windows. The door next to it was barred on the inside, and no one answered when we pounded on the wood and shouted. So I asked Kassandros to give me a boost to the window ledge. From there I could see several people lying on the floor, overcome by the smoke.

"Kass, run for help. I'll see what I can do here."

I did not wait for a reply but took a deep breath and dropped into the room. I heard my friend let out a frustrated wail at my disappearance then I heard his footsteps pounding on the pavement as he ran for help.

Alexandria was the second city of the empire. Like Rome itself it had a real fire fighting force, one of Augustus' innovations which replaced the corrupt private forces of earlier years. The men of the fire guard were full time professionals, recruited and trained for the purpose and paid and equipped by the state. Known as the Vigiles, they were organised into cohorts and also served as a night watch and the city police force. (Even today firefighters in Italy are known as the Vigili del Fuoco or Fire Guards. The municipal police are the Vigili Urbani.)

On my own for the moment and empty handed, I did not waste time trying to put out the fire or to revive the people strewn on the ground. Simpler to just get them outside into the fresh air and let the professionals attend to the fire itself and the injured. So I unbarred the door and propped it open. Yes the oxygen did feed the fire, but it kept me going too. I grabbed a graybeard by the arm and dragged him outside a ways then ran back inside for the next one. I had to use my kilt to beat out the flames on one man's tunic. Kassandros joined me inside. He had lost his own kilt running back as fast as he could, well ahead of the fire guards who had to drag their heavy gear behind them. Together we two boys got all five people out of the room before we had to retreat from the intense heat of the flames and the thick black smoke.

With the fire guards on the scene attacking the fire and succoring the victims, we just slumped down against a wall and leaned into each other, arms over each other's shoulders, happy that we were both safe. We were sooty and a bit singed but basically fine.

We scrambled to our feet when several men in uniforms and hobnailed sandals walked over to us. For once our nudity was an embarrassment. Our hands moved to cover ourselves. Irrational yes, but that is what happened. Kassandros nodded to the captain of the fire guard who pointed to us, saying.

"Here they are, Prefect. This boy gave the alarm and both of them braved the flames to rescue five people, all by themselves. Real heroes they are."

"Five lives saved, including those of my uncle and my youngest son," the older man replied. Looking gratefully at us, he asked.

"Do you know who I am lads? My name is Sixtus Sallust; I am the Prefect of Egypt. I rule this entire province for the divine Nero, newly installed as emperor. I am deeply in your debt, the both of you. What are your names?"

"I am Ganymede. Well the name is really Alexandros, but that is what my master Philotas insists I go by. Kassandros and I work in his boy brothel. We are his slaves."

"Not any longer, you're not. Not if I have anything to say about it, and I do. If there is one thing we Romans respect it is courage. I will set you free at once for exemplary public service. You saved five people and gave the alarm early enough that the fire was contained before it could spread."

Kasandros and I hugged each other, hardly believing our ears. There we were suddenly on friendly terms with the most powerful man in the whole of Egypt. And what were we but two naked boys with dirty faces. A pair of sex slaves. And he promised to set us free. None cherish freedom quite like those who have lost it: slaves, prisoners of war, criminals locked up in a jail. So it was with me. Kassandros himself had been born free, the son of a food vendor, but sold into slavery at age twelve.

The Prefect was as good as his word, formally manumitting us that very afternoon. We stood before the court cleaned up and dressed in fresh kilts and stout sandals. Philotas attended as a witness, looking disgruntled, as the Prefect made it official with the formulaic intonation:

"So let it be written. So let it be done."

The sour look on Philotas' face showed the man knew that he had no recourse. We were well and truly beyond his grasp and Garon's too. Sallust was just then starting his term as Prefect of Egypt. We would be under his personal protection for years to come and under the protection of Roman law indefinitely.

Some years later, Philotas had another run in with the Prefect when he laid a fraudulent claim to an exquisite pleasure boy named Xenophon, recently returned from an expedition to the far south in search of the source of the Nile. He had won fame as the Lion Boy for single handedly slaying a huge man-eating lion. I was there in court myself when Sallust neatly turned the tables on the brothel keeper, saving brave little Xeno from a life of sex slavery. We struck up an acquaintance with the young man, and Kassandros and I even took him to bed a few times. He was beyond delight though totally devoted to his two soldier lovers.

[For Xeno's story read 'Source of the Nile' in my 'Naked Prey' series.]

The Prefect assigned us temporary quarters in the barracks and gave us a fat purse of silver coins to help us get started in life. A week later, after outfitting ourselves with weapons and horses, we went into the desert to retrieve my buried treasure, which was just where I had left it. It was more than enough for a stake in business. I became a merchant and ship owner once again. I taught Kassandros to read and write. He developed an excellent hand, taking over the correspondence and record keeping for me.

Our life together was a happy one. Maybe he was not one of my great loves, but Kassandros was a sweet lad, bright and plucky. We spend sixteen years together before Kassandros announced that he longed to return to his roots in Emporion at the other end of the Mediterranean Sea. Just as well, as otherwise, I would have had to move on myself, for the usual reasons. At least this way I did not have to fake my death. That would have been a blow to this fine man whom I had grown to love and respect. We exchanged very occasional letters for the next ten years till they stopped. I later heard that he had fallen overboard while crossing the narrow sea between the Pillars of Hercules (the Strait of Gibraltar).

I still miss him. Alas the hardest thing about immortality is that eventually you must lose everyone you ever cared for. The pain of loss is largely gone now, while the happy memories remain. We made each other happy for a time. That is about all we can expect in this world, I suppose.

Epilogue

Looking back, it still seems strange that Garon had such contradictory feelings about sex with bottom boys. His libido drove him to frequent couplings with comely youths. He had no use at all for women. His strong preference was for short slender pretty boys with trim taut physiques. He was completely self-centered about sex with young males. His own pleasure was all the only thing that counted. Indeed he utterly despised the boys he fucked for being girlish and unmanly. He had no empathy whatsoever with males who were sexually submissive. He never understand how we could derive erotic pleasure from the passive role in sex -- what he called the womanly role. In this he was a man ahead of his time. His attitude anticipated modern day condemnation of homosexuals, which is often rationalized by citations to the Old Testament, but really springs from visceral feelings.

I had a serious run in with anti-gay thugs the other day. I had not sought the confrontation but neither did I back down from it, not this time. Instead I indulged myself and beat them up rather badly. This was one time I threw away my rule book. I did not try to talk myself out of trouble or try to run away. Yes, I know I have written time and again that the best way to deal with any kind of trouble is avoidance, Don't be there when it happens. Next best is to talk your way out of trouble or to negotiate a settlement and failing that to simply take to your heels. Fighting for me is very much a last resort.

These people really got under my skin. I was walking near the U.N. headquarters on Manhattan's East Side. Some fundamentalist Christian denomination was demonstrating in front of the General Assembly building, purely for the publicity value. They carried signs and chanted slogans claiming that the deaths of American soldiers fighting abroad was God's chastisement of the United States for tolerating gays in its society. Their complaint wasn't about gays in the military but about gays in the US of A. If they had their way, we would all be rounded up and thrown into concentration camps (which they called re-education camps.)

I did not actually walk by their demonstration. Instead I ran into five of these zealots on a nearby cross street standing in front of a deli, likely on a sandwich run. One looked over at me and scowled, pointing me out to the others. They immediately had me pegged for a queer. Given the way I was dressed, it did not take a great leap of logic. There I stood a short fine boned pretty boy, blond locks nearly to my shoulders and next thing to naked. It was a hot day and I wore the outfit I favored for the sport of parkour: skintight, tan through, low rise shorts and running shoes with no socks. Nothing else.

So they started in on me.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here but one of the minions of Satan himself. Prettier than any godly boy ought to be and practically naked on a public street. Shameless!"

Not the least bit phased by their size or numbers, I gave as good as I got.

"If anyone is doing Satan's work it is your sort who spread hatred, blame scapegoats, and push the blasphemous notion that a beneficent and all powerful god would be wicked enough to punish the innocent along with the guilty. The shame is on bigots like you."

I said that over my shoulder, as a sort of Parthian shot, fully expecting them to let me walk past, contenting themselves with shouting imprecations after me. Instead I heard a collective growl as they launched themselves at me.

"Fuck you, faggot. We're gonna pound that pretty face of yours to a pulp. Then we're gonna break your bones and bust your candy ass. No doctors will ever put you right again."

Well that made it a clear case of self defense, even if my own remarks had been intemperate. They came after me, spreading out, trying to pin me against the parked cars. Not for nothing have I trained and practiced the sort of acrobatics that allows me to scale fences and building facades, to scramble up over and through obstacles, to use the terrain and structures to go where those larger of frame, slower of foot, and less nimble could not follow. I could never be pinned against a line of cars or against most building facades either. There was always a drainpipe, fire escape, grate, awning, or architectural decoration to serve as handholds to enable me to climb up nimble as a squirrel.

Not that I really intended to get away. My blood was up. My lover Jeffrey had been set upon not long while walking alone in Brooklyn. A pair of gay bashers, the ordinary sort, reacted violently to his T-shirt with the logo "I'm not gay, but my boyfriend is." Luckily Jeffrey was not badly hurt but it had made me angry. Here was my chance for payback. Call it Revenge of the Boyfriend.

With my centuries of training, practice, and experience in multiple disciplines of the martial arts, I was just about the deadliest hand to hand fighter on the planet. My technique combines such disciplines such as the Greek pankration, Brazilian capoeira, and East Asian aikido and karate in an eclectic system that suited my wiry physique and capabilities. My small size makes me fast and agile and acrobatic. I am far stronger than I look and I have unusual stamina. These bigots were all much taller, hefty men really, but that just meant they were slower and apt to get in each other's way.

So I charged the man on my left, kicking his knee joint hard. It made a horrible crunch as the bones broke and the man went down with a howl. Freed from the encirclement I was in control of the fight, if you can even call it that, one sided as it was. They never managed to land a solid blow on me. Nor could they grab me and hold on to me, practically nude as I was and with my skin all slick and sweaty. Instead I cut them out of the herd one by one, distracting two of them by pulling an ear off and tossing it in their faces. Their astonishment gave me the chance to take them out of the action. I was like a whirlwind, always spinning or darting out of reach when they tried to pile on, In short order, I left all five moaning and groaning and sobbing on the sidewalk. For their leader I had something special: a kick to the face that broke the jawbone and knocked out a couple of teeth. Pound my face to a pulp, would they? Bust me up? No way.

I made sure they stayed conscious, with their bloody noses, ears torn off to distract them, or the abrasions where their faces had scraped the sidewalk. If you have to fight, always leave your enemy bloody and with undeniable damage. You don't want to leave him in denial thinking that it was a close thing, that it might easily have gone the other way but for bad luck or some slip-up or unfair advantage the other guy had. That was just inviting a rematch. I am not interested in rematches. No, you better make sure your enemy could never delude himself or themselves with ruminations of the "woulda, coulda, shoulda" sort. Leave them certain that they had lost and lost badly and would lose worse if they tried again.

At no time did I come close to killing them. My self-control held. If I had wanted them dead, the fight would have been over much sooner and with considerably less effort on my part than it took to just beat them up. The truth is, that if you know how to fight, really fight, it is so terribly easy to kill a man. Often all it takes is a single blow to a vulnerable point such as a fist to the larynx or the heel of the hand thrust upwards to drive the nasal bone into the brain.

I did not wait around for the law, even though I had been the one attacked, as a couple of witnesses would testify. A close scrutiny by law enforcement might unmask the false identity I live under these days. That would certainly draw the attention of the counter-terrorist bureaucracy. I could hardly tell them the truth. Imagine the conversation:

"You are correct, Mr. FBI man. The reason I look too young for twenty three is that my papers are false and do not show my real age. Actually I am seventeen going on eighteen and have been that age for the past two millennia. I was born in the late second century BC in Germany, when it was just a collection of wild pagan tribes. And no, before you ask, I did not witness the Crucifixion or the Resurrection. I was working in a boy brothel I owned in Ctesiphon at the time."

Even if they accepted my sincerity, I would likely be held as an enemy combatant or more likely consigned to an insane asylum. True I am an accomplished escape artist, able to get out of dungeons and prisons and asylums, but I have to worry about the psychoactive drugs they might force on me to keep me docile in such a setting. Either way, I would have to give up my comfortable life in New York City.

So I slipped away, employing my skills at escape and evasion. I have to thank the witnesses for covering for me. I read later on that one was a father, a Gulf War Veteran, whose son had been killed by the Taliban in Afghanistan. The other was a young Army sergeant who had lost a leg in Iraq to an I.E.D. They hated the anti-American and unpatriotic vitriol these bastards were spewing. Thinking fast, they put their heads together and concerted their story, telling the police that these men had jumped me, which made me the victim and them the perps. The two veterans also gave the cops a completely misleading description. To hear the two of them tell it, I was six foot two and two hundred twenty pounds of body builder. They did mention my long blond hair. Bless them.

My attackers were too ashamed to admit that they had been beaten so badly by a mere slip of a gay guy like me, so they went along with the gag, maintaining that I must have been a gay enforcer or provocateur. In the end, lacking a complainant willing to come forward, the district attorney declined to press charges. Once they got out of the hospital, stitched up, limbs in casts and ears reattached, all five men returned to the Midwest, so I did not have to worry about running into them again on the street.

Only recently could I write of these things, choosing, from caution, to cast them as fiction, a series of fanciful tales of an immortal youth written under a pseudonym. My secret is safe for no one in these days of modern science will believe it. In this tale, all of the names are real. The events described really did happen just as I have written