Chapter 11
"The Cavern of the Outcasts"
By Tommyhawk1@AOL.COM
Pavel found his eyes failing to focus and his steps fumbling as the night drew on. God, he had hardly slept the night before, locked in the petals of the night beacon, and this night had held no sleep for him at all. No wonder he was losing coordination, and found himself muttering to nobody in particular.
Jethro and Commander Sachsen were faring quite well, and even Jassem was handling this climb better than himself, he was the weak link in their escape. He gritted his teeth and kept at it, but he was their slowest member, and he was holding them back. When Sachsen came up to him at one point, he admitted as much. "Sachsen, I am so damned tired, I don't know how much longer I can keep this up."
"We need to get to ground anyway." Sachsen said soothingly. "We're most of the way down the mountainside, but it's nearly dawn." He pointed at a bright star on the horizon. "That star was over the mountains when sunset came. It'll be sunrise in another hour."
Pavel looked, they were still a good ways from the bottom. They might make it there in that hour's time, but beyond it was a nearly flat range, as the mountain's foot splayed out in a long swell down to the hills and plains below. A night-lantern had captured someone, it was blasting the sky with light from time to time, a welcome chance to look about at the cost of some poor souls inside it. "They'll send someone to check that night-lantern come dawn." he judged. "They did with me and Jethro; it's how they caught us."
"Then we cannot go down further." Sachsen decided. "We'll walk right into their patrol."
"Where, then?"
Sachsen looked up. "That outcropping. It seems to have a shelving over and under. We'll scrunch against its underbelly and wait for tomorrow night." Pavel looked and his tired body groaned. It was as far up as the mountain's foot was down.
The climb to that place was miserable. At least with the V-shaped crevice, they had the aid of a double angle, you could brace against one to hold against the other while you moved. While Pavel saw what Sachsen meant by the climb up being easier--he could pick a handhold, and know its location for a foothold later--but that was scant aid in his condition; he was more than once kept from falling only by Sachsen's hand pushing against his back or his rump.
But they made it as the sky was lightening. Pavel was first in line by dint of his need for help, with Sachsen behind him and Jassem and Jethro following. He got up onto the ledge and fell into a seated position, exhausted, looked about.
Sachsen was about to rise up and Pavel held out a hand to stop him. "What is it?" Sachsen hissed. Good training, Pavel thought, he had realized instantly the need for quiet.
"This is a cavern. There's a trail up to it from the other side. People are coming."
"Can they see you?"
"No." Pavel said.
He was right, in terms of the people coming up the trail. But he was shocked by the voice behind him, from the cavern. "Welcome, third husband of the Sultan."
Pavel groaned. Caught! He staggered to his feet, determined to fight them off while Sachsen and the others got away. "I'm not going into the Waters of Life." He said vehemently. "You'll have to fight me to make me do it!"
"You have escaped from his palace." the voice said to him. It had a soothing quality. "And you have come to the place of refuge."
"Refuge?" Pavel said. "I don't understand."
"Those who would flee their husbands need a place to hide away." the man said. He stepped out into the light, and Pavel saw the face, honest, open, welcoming. But that was a poor source of comfort in this land! "In his mercy, Allah gave us this cavern. Won't you come inside and rest after your travel down the mountainside?"
"I...I don't know." Pavel said. "How do I know I'll be safe with you?"
"Because you have entered the grounds of the Mosque of the Blessing of Allah." the voice said, as if astonished. "The other end of this cavern opens into the Mosque. No violence may be done upon this sacred ground."
"Sanctuary?" Pavel asked. He had heard of that.
"Not the way you mean it." the man admitted. He was perhaps thirty, and reminded Pavel of his father, though this man was thinner in the face and his nose was a straight line, unlike Ivan's or Pavel's own near-pug. "Blood would desecrate this sacred soil, and so none will do you harm. Also, our Sultan rules only by the will of Allah, and Allah's will would be withdrawn should he violate this sacred place."
This, Pavel understood. The Sultan had to give the Mosque and its leaders a certain autonomy, defying them at the risk of losing their support. If they had in fact used that autonomy to set up a place where he would not send his soldiers... "I believe you. Come on up!" he said to his comrades. "I have three with me. We all need rest and a chance to get away from the Sultan."
"We cannot protect you beyond these grounds." the man warned him. "But you are safe so long as you are here. We will not reveal your presence to him, nor to anybody you do not wish to know you are here."
"Great!" Sachsen said he made it over the top. The man's eyes widened as he saw the large, blond man in his dirty uniform, but he kept silent, even as Jethro, who looked just like Sachsen save for being in the harem guard's clothing, climbed up to join him. "We need rest, and we need to clean up. And I'm hungry, as well."
"Enter." the man said as Jassem fumbled, and the two Connobarans reached down to haul him over the ledge. "You are all welcome here."
Pavel entered, and groaned when he saw the pink mist boiling out along one wall. Not now! He was too tired! He skirted it as well as he could, a narrow space permitting him to do this, and was relieved when only his legs were washed in the mist. It churned his hormones doing this, but his fatigue won out over it.
He was shown to a pallet in a cavern. Others were present, but Pavel saw only the chance to rest. The man was saying something to him about bathing, but Pavel lay down upon the pallet, and was soon fast asleep.
He awoke to hands fumbling on his body, and he groaned. But his cock was erect, his body had rested, and some internal mechanism informed him he had slept for several hours. Those hands were pulled down the preposterous gossamer-like pantaloons, which had been dirtied and torn by the arduous climb, and Pavel let them do this without even looking up to see. At this moment, he didn't much care who was about to make love to him!
The hands that stroked his cock, the lips that wrapped themselves around him and slathered his prong liberally, hastily, eagerly! God, that was great! Was that...was that a beard he felt tickling his thigh?
Pavel tried to open his eyes, one was sealed shut and the other sticky with sleep-matter, but he managed to see who was working over his cock so wonderfully.
"Aram!" Pavel said. "What are you doing here?"
Aram rose up, his face smiling at Pavel. There was friendliness in that smile, but it was, also, the smile of one who has power over you. "Jassem sent for me."
"What time is it?" Pavel asked.
"It is nightfall once again." Aram said as he stood up--he was nude--bringing the blanket with him, and threw a leg over Pavel. "You have slept soundly throughout the entire day. I came with provisions for you and your comrades. I would join you in earnest now if I may. I have brought two sukhusans and provisions enough to travel for a time."
Aram threw the blanket over his back and knelt down over Pavel, straddling him. He leaned forward and the blanket covered them. Pavel realized and reached between Aram's thighs to clutch his now-slimy cock and guide it to Aram's anus.
He was surprised by how easily it slid in. Aram was such an aggressive individual, Pavel had him pegged as being much like Daddy Al. But Aram sighed in undeniable pleasure as Pavel got the head in, and Aram hunched backwards and Pavel felt his cock plunge in to the very base.
Aram rested his head on Pavel's chest. He was shorter than Pavel had remembered, smaller, too. But the body Pavel held was like steel, firm and hard, and Aram was clean and his body gave off a delicate steam of musk. Pavel felt his own body, sullied by his exertions, and wished now he had held off for a bath.
Pavel tried to move, but Aram stopped him. "No, let me do this." He begged softly. Pavel lay still while Aram moved his hips back and forth, and Pavel felt his body exude an warm pool of joy spreading out from his heat-enclosed cock and his balls, that soon covered him with a warmth caught beneath the covers.
Pavel sighed and turned his head to the left. It was soon after nightfall, and the room filled with men was also filled with lovemaking. But what were the two men over to his left and slightly above doing?
They were lying head to toe, except that most of their upper torsos protruded from the concealing blanket. The man on top was face down, the man on bottom was face-up. No way were their cocks matched up in any way here, their cocks must be up...ah. Up around their navels! Now their movements made sense. Both these men had the opening Jassem had obtained after their unwilling dip in the Waters of Life. These men were fucking each other via these new openings at their navels. Impregnating each other?
"Aram?" he sighed.
"Yes, O Sheik?" Aram panted. He was beginning to speed up now. His face was flushed with pleasure, and Pavel had to admit that he was rapidly gaining in desire as well. This cavern was not secure from the mist, it must pervade this room as thoroughly as Pavel's home jungle.
"Aram, what are those two men doing over there?" Pavel threw a hand to point vaguely. "Will they make each other pregnant?"
"No, my Master." Aram said. "They are merely enjoying each other. One must be in a different position to become pregnant when the Waters have changed the body."
"Oh." Pavel said. This was interesting. He wanted to ask more, but Aram's motions and his own passion cut off the opportunity.
Aram's body was moving with a swift rocking motion, Pavel felt the moves like waves upon his stomach, ebbing and rising, as if Aram's body had turned into pliable, liquid form. Aram now was making clutching movements with his ass, milking Pavel's cock.
Pavel looked up into Aram's face, dark, almost cruel in shape, but that was softened by his pleasure, his eyes blazed with some form of mastery over Pavel, but that was tempered by the building climax. Aram's lips were open, his breaths barely audible over the groans permeating this room like the sounds of falling water, and his eyes glazed until they were opaque orbs of white and black on his dark-brown face, framed with the black hair of his head and beard and mustache, white eyes and white teeth encircled in brown which was encircled with black.
Pavel felt Aram's cock, which had been slapping his stomach intermittently, now ground against his belly as Aram lowered himself and moved even more frantically. Pavel slid his hand between their bodies and clutched the hard Arab prong, and gave it the friction it needed.
Aram looked up at Pavel and Pavel kissed his forehead (all he could reach) and Aram grinned, then stiffened, rose up to reveal their bodies to all and sundry, and groaned amazingly loud, like a wail. Pavel felt Aram's cock burn his hand like a brand, and then it was squirting all over his chest. Aram's ass clamped onto Pavel's cock and Aram was still bucking and thrusting himself back-and-forth, to fuck Pavel's hand but that moved his ass on Pavel's cock as well, and gave himself to the joy of the moment, his cock, permission granted, rose up in passionate, rock-hard, blazing glory and then erupted into Aram's squeezing butthole. Pavel felt his cock spraying the jism in discrete bursts, felt each spray due to the tight clamp Aram's ass had on it, and that only gave each load added momentum, it was like he was spraying deeply into Aram, for he felt none of the backfall of come on his cock as he pumped, as if his cock was falling into a void inside Aram, and then Aram was lying on Pavel's chest, heaving loudly as he gasped for new life once more and only then did Pavel feel the hot seed he had jetted into Aram come back to moisten his cockhead.
Pavel ran his hand through Aram's sweaty hair, stroking his scalp while Aram lay nearly insensible atop him. Aram was resting totally on him, but his slight weight was no burden at all, it felt good there, solid, comforting.
Aram raised his head again to look at Pavel, and Pavel grinned back into the smiling Arab face. The look of mastery was gone now, what remained was a gentle companion.
"You were terrific." Pavel said to that softened face.
"I am glad I pleased you." Aram said, and now the wall was falling once more, a curtain drawing over the face Aram had shown, and Pavel missed it already. "We must try to slip away before sunrise."
"A good thing I slept all day, then." Pavel said. Groans nearby, Pavel looked over to see the two men he had noticed before now rocking in their orgasms. They had turned to lie on their sides though still in their same position, and Pavel saw the man facing him look him in the eyes as his passion clutched him, and he grinned back at Pavel and then gave himself to his passion, moving as if he was fucking an invisible lover, for the blankets still hid everything below it. Pavel thought that a liability of this position, no way to kiss or caress the man who you were loving. Only the feet, at shoulder height, were visible or reachable. And apparently Muslims didn't believe in kissing feet, or at least this one didn't!
Done, the man nearest Pavel (not the one facing him) turned and Pavel saw the cock firmly imbedded in the man's navel. Watched the cock, still hard, spring out like a cork from a bottle, slide moistly down the man's cock as he moved, to reveal the man's cock also shining from the experience. He must ask Aram now about how this didn't make them pregnant....
"Pavel?" came a voice nearby. It was Jethro's.
"Over here!" Pavel called.
Jethro came over, and the look on his face was that of urgency. He had his gray uniform on once again, by some maneuverings. It was clean and Jethro looked rested and well. Except for that look on his face.
"What's wrong?" Pavel asked.
"Jassem's sick." Jethro said, biting his lip quickly. "They say he's losing the baby. Pavel, they don't have any doctors here. To get him a doctor...we have to take him back up through the Mosque and into Medina Jadeed. Mahmoud's troops are just outside the mosque. They say that either you come with us, or nobody gets to leave."
Pavel saw it then. Another plot, and it ended the sanctuary so precariously obtained. Mahmoud would use Jassem's pain to regain him. "All right." Pavel said. "Let's go!"
"No, Master!" Aram said. "Your servant is not worth your own life. If you return into the Mosque, he will be waiting there with the Waters of Life!"
"If that's the price I have to pay, then so be it." Pavel said. "And he's not my servant, he's my friend. Are you also my friend, Aram?"
"I obey you." Aram bobbed his head in lieu of a bow. A neat dodge to the question, Pavel thought.
Sachsen arrived. "You know?" he asked quickly.
"Yes." Pavel said.
"I've just learned there's a death warrant out for Jethro and me." Sachsen said. "It stands until you return to Mahmoud's harem. So we can't join you."
"I'll take Jassem up myself, then." Pavel said.
"I will go with you." Aram said. "You will need my help. None of these present will dare to stand before Mahmoud while he is in this sort of mood. And...and I will be your friend, if you will let me. It is better than servant. Death cannot be more painful than dishonor."
"You and me, then." Pavel said, and smiled. "And it's good to have you as my friend. Let's go."
They had rigged up a carrier stretcher for Jassem. Pavel looked at that gentle face contorted in agony, clutching his stomach.
"Hang in there, Jassem." He said. "We're getting you help."
"No, Master." Jassem said. "Do not do this for me. It is not worth it."
"Your life is worth everything to me." Pavel raised the stretcher. "Don't say any more. Rest. We'll get you to the doctor."
And so Pavel marched up to the Mosque, to the Waters of Life, and to his husband. He had run out of options and out of hope. He had better like being pregnant!
THE END OF CHAPTER 11
TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT WEEK!!!