My Wicked Gladiators

by Hawkeye, Lauren

  It was not enough. It would never be enough.

  Leaning back on the chaise, I placed my weight on my hands, splayed on the softness of the cushion behind me. Sitting like this thrust forward the breasts that he was kissing, suckling. It also allowed me to open my legs wider, to twine them around Caius’ hips, his hard thighs, the only part of him that I could reach from this vantage point.

  “Mmm,” Caius murmured against my skin. Letting my breast slip from his mouth, he slid his hands down to roam over my hips, to cup me underneath my bottom. Angling me up, he positioned himself between my thighs, right at the center of my heat, and slid inside me in one long thrust.

  Reaching up, I grasped at his neck, pulled his head down toward me. I bit at the cords of muscle in his shoulder, licked my way up to his ear, and suckled the lobe into my mouth. I felt a shiver pass through him, and I nipped at that tender bit of flesh, one of the only soft parts about him.

  Seeming as impatient as I, he drew back and then thrust deep, drew back and thrust again, tunneling in and out in a slow, steady rhythm. I writhed against him, wanting more, more touch, more sensation, more everything.

  “More.” I could barely speak. “I want more.”

  “Everything.” He drew back until we could stare into each other’s eyes. “You can have everything.”

  I buried my face against his neck at the sudden rush of emotion. He grasped my ass more firmly in his hands, pulling me to him and driving in deeper still. A series of shock waves set off, deep inside of me, and I let my head fall back, my mouth open in bliss. As soon as the all-encompassing sensation had passed, I found that I was not satisfied.

  I wanted still more.

  Pulling back, I slid my hands in between our flesh. Caius looked down at me quizzically and with lust hazing his eyes, but obliged when I pushed him away.

  Rising to my feet, I pushed on his shoulders until he lay down on the floor, his back on the cool marble. Dropping to my knees at his feet, I laid a trail of quick, open-mouthed kisses from his ankles up to his inner thighs, moving up his body as my mouth moved higher.

  I spared one glance at his face before returning my attention to the task at hand. His lips were pressed tightly together with tension, the skin gone nearly white and bloodless. His fists were tightly clenched as well, the skin of his knuckles matching the pale hue of his mouth. Closing my eyes, I sucked the head of his cock into my mouth without warning, felt his body jerk at the sudden onslaught of sensation.

  He had had his cock in Marcus’ mouth just the night before. How, I wondered, did I compare?

  Deciding that I could not compete—did not even want to—I would contrast. I would be soft, I would be yielding. I would give. I pulled the fat head deep into my mouth, tasting myself on my tongue. I ran the rasp of my tongue under the ridge that divided the head from the shaft, then lightly scraped my teeth there, marveling at the slight starts that he made when I was able to sneak past his defenses and overwhelm him with pleasure.

  “Domina!” He sounded like a man about to lose control. I felt the intense need to see that he did.

  As I worked on his cock with my mouth, I reached a hand between my legs and worked my fingers over the hard bud of my clitoris. It was still sensitive from the release that I had been granted, but I ignored the nearly overwhelming urge to stop the pressure, concentrating on the keen edge of sensation that it was paired with, until I felt the little tremors again begin to build in my inner thighs.

  It was still not enough.

  When I released Caius’ cock from my mouth there was a noise that sounded like a wet kiss in the still air. Placing both hands on his chest, I shimmied my way up his large frame until I was centered right on top of him, his erection pressing against the weeping wetness of my slit. I rubbed back and forth over him for a moment, enjoying the feel of his coarse hair on my inner thighs, my sensitive labia. Then I took a hand to the base of his hard shaft and positioned him so that in one quick move I could fill myself. Pistoning my hips downward, I paused for one long moment when he filled me. Then I began to move, forgoing any kind of slow, sweet loving for fast and hard. Squeezing his hips with my knees, I set a fast, nearly frantic pace, searching for pleasure that would wipe my mind of any other thoughts. I could still think, even with the jolt that passed through me every time my clitoris hit the taut skin and lean muscle of his pelvis. Still, I fisted my hands in the long coils of my hair and rode him, my hips moving as fast as bolts of lightning during a storm.

  I shattered moments later, the pent-up tension in my muscles surging and then ebbing. He grunted after I had finished, pushing up into me while pulling me down with hands clasped tightly around my waist at the same time.

  We remained like that for what could have been minutes or even hours, until finally I lifted myself off of him and slid down to snuggle up close beside him. Lying there after, held tight in his arms, I realized that I did not feel as I had wanted to.

  Caius had made every effort to please me, had let me set the frenetic pace, and physically I was satisfied, my bones liquefied, my muscles lax. Mentally, I had many things swirling into an ever-thickening morass, and it kept me from the oblivion that I had been seeking. Even held close in Caius’ impossibly large arms, I could not stop the flow of thoughts.

  I could not move past the scene that I had observed the night before, in Marcus’ chamber. There had been such obvious caring between the two men that I could not see where I fit into the puzzle. Though I obviously fulfilled some need for both of them, I could not see what it was.

  I lay in Caius’ arms, contemplating what to say, if anything, and how to say it. We had finished rather more quickly than usual, and were enjoying the sensation of lying pressed together, skin to skin.

  At least, I was enjoying it. I really could not have said what the man was thinking. In the end it was Caius who broke the silence, not me.

  “Why were you in the gladiators’ quarters last night?”

  I hesitated, the sensation of guilt causing a clutch in my gut. Lucius was away from our home again that night, and while Justinus had given his word that he would not hover outside the curtain, I was not certain what his word was worth.

  “How do you know that I was?” I stroked a hand over a hard forearm that was furred with hair.

  “Appius saw you.” I did not respond for a long moment. Was that the only reason that Caius had known? Had he seen me in the moment before I had closed the curtain?

  “Drusilla was meant to bring Christus back downstairs after . . . after.” I was not certain that Christus had told the other men of the service that he had been made to perform for Hilaria. If he had not, I would not humiliate the man. It was not my information to divulge, not even to Caius or Marcus. I continued, “She was ill. Marina was busy. Justinus and Lucius were not home. Therefore I had no choice.”

  I had indeed had a choice, and I suspected that Caius knew it. I could easily have summoned one of our lesser slave girls to perform the task. But he did not comment, at least not on my flimsy rationale.

  “Is Drusilla all right?” There was genuine concern in his voice, and though I too cared deeply about her welfare, I felt the ugly demon named jealousy clambering in my gut. I did not like what not knowing about Marcus and Caius did to me. I wanted, needed to ask what the relationship between the two men was. How I factored into it.

  I could not force the words from my mouth.

  “She was sleeping when I checked on her last night.” I did not mention that there had been blood on her sheets that had caused me momentary concern. I had finally concluded that her monthly courses had started, but it had worried me. I did not share this with Caius. He did not need to hear about my slave girl’s monthly bleeding.

  He did not ask more about Drusilla, and I felt the jealousy begin to fade away. I was ashamed, and felt certain that my thoughts had been obvious. I stared at the floor, at the smoot
hness of the worn marble, biting my lip until I drew blood, unable to think of what next to say.

  “Do you know that Marcus and I met before being purchased for the ludus?” Caius ran a hand down my arm, coming to rest on the swell of my belly. It was both comforting and a reminder that that belly was empty of child.

  I knew that the touch had not been intended to bring me pain, but the emptiness never quite left.

  “No.” I had wondered, though. Neither man had been at the ludus for that long, only long enough for Marcus to establish himself as champion. The depth of their relationship seemed far too intense to have developed in such a short amount of time.

  Caius’ arm tightened around me and relaxed very slowly, as if he were willing it to do so. Not until it was again no more than firm against me did he speak again.

  “Years ago, I was arrested by the Romans for refusal to join their army.” My eyes narrowed; this cowardly act did not seem characteristic of the man that I knew. I could, however, see that he would have made a poor soldier—he was too impetuous, lived too much in the moment. “I lived in Thrace, and supported my two sisters and their children. Their husbands had both been killed by the Romans, and without me, they would have no means to survive.”

  My throat constricted; I had a suspicion that this was not going to be an easy story to hear. “Continue.” I felt Caius shake his head from behind me, not as a negation, but to clear thoughts.

  “In the end my actions caused more harm than good. In the army I could have sent money home, could have visited from time to time, though I could not see past the good living that I already made. I was very nearly killed on sight for refusing to join the army, and then where would they have been? But I have always been more likely to act before thinking.”

  His voice was self-deprecating, meant to make me smile, but I could not. After a long moment of my silence, he continued.

  “So I was arrested, taken forcibly from my home in the middle of the night. Sold into slavery. I did not get to say goodbye, and did not know if the army left my family safe or not. I was taken to work in the pits.” His voice became as hard as the rocks that lined those quarries, those rocks from which our own home was built. “You have no idea what life was like there. I have never been able to find words to describe it. It is hot, unrelentingly so, and you are not given much food or even water, for that matter, to counteract the thirst from the heat. You work all day, every day, so long as there is light.”

  His voice cracked, as if it had been baked for too long in the heat of which he spoke. “The people around you die, one by one, groups of them, and you wonder when your turn will come.”

  I could not think of anything to say that would comfort. I settled for a slight squeeze on the arm that held me, an urging to continue his story. I could not imagine the anger that this passionate warrior had felt, not being able to help those around him.

  “The only comfort that I had was a man who called himself Marcus. He was from Gaul, a Celt who had been arrested for deserting the army. He had served as a soldier, but they had promised him that he would be released after two years. They changed their minds but still he left. He had a wife and a baby that he had yet to see.”

  Sickness began to paint itself over my skin.

  “He returned home to find that both had been killed in a village raid. Then he was arrested for abandonment. He had been in the pits for two years when I arrived, an eternity given the average life expectancy there. He taught me to survive, to ration my water and food. His will was a formidable thing. He watched my back. We watched each other’s backs. And we . . . found that we could provide other comforts to each other, as well.”

  This explained much of the affection, the closeness. Instead of satisfying me with the knowledge, however, I felt like a stone sinking in the sea. How could I ever compete with such a deep bond? They surely thought of me as vain and silly, pampered and naive.

  “How did you meet him? I mean . . . the pits are huge, are they not?” I shivered as I nuzzled in closer.

  “The night that I arrived in the pits I tried to escape. I was so angry at the captivity, I was nearly crazed.” I could easily imagine what emotions a newly imposed slavery would bring to Caius. “I very nearly killed a guard. The guards as a whole were about to stone me to death, as an example to the others.”

  I anticipated the next words before Caius spoke them.

  “Marcus saved my life. He had made an impression as a good worker, and he convinced them that he would be responsible for me. He convinced them that I would be a benefit, that I was strong and would be a good worker.” He paused for a moment, and I could hear the ghosts of the past in his voice. “I still don’t know why they listened to him, but they did. Marcus saved me.”

  I listened with wide eyes. The hardships that I had endured in my life, while very real to me, were nothing, absolutely nothing, compared with this.

  “Often men who are owners of a ludus will visit the pits, searching for men that they think can prove themselves in the arena.” Caius’ voice was detached, as if he was telling a story that had happened to someone else, not to him. “It is every man’s dream to be noticed on these visits. The life of a gladiator may not be easy, but it is luxury itself compared to life in the pits.”

  My heart ached. I could not bear that these two men, my two men, had endured such hardship when I, who had done nothing to deserve it, nothing save being born, had lived a life of comfort.

  “The guards in the pits liked to rape their slaves. Men, women, children—they were not particular. The rapes were bloody, violent. On the day that your husband had come to the pit looking for new men, Marcus and I happened across one of the guards, one that we all hated, forcing himself on a young woman. She was new to the pits and terrified.”

  His voice lowered, and I shivered, sensing what was to come next, and not certain that I wanted to hear it. “Marcus and I tried to pull him off of her, but we were not as we are now—not as strong, you see. We were not well-fed, we did not have much water, and we were weak. So though we almost succeeded, attacking the guard by surprise, together, the brute struck the woman a blow that we could not protect her from. She fell, hit her head on a rock and died.”

  I was horrified. Not that they had not been able to save the poor woman, but that people died of fates like this. And I was mourning my life because my husband did not treat me well? Certainly I was permitted to feel as I felt, but this did put things into perspective.

  “She looked rather like you.” He reached up and threaded his hands through my long, long hair, turning my head so that he could kiss me softly on the cheek. “Dominus saw our fight with the guard and thought that we had the spirit he was looking for. He purchased us from the head of the pits, and we were taken to the ludus for training.”

  Another kiss, another pass of fingers through my hair. “Once at the ludus, your fate is still not certain. You must train impossibly hard, and you must pass a strenuous and demanding test before you are permitted to take the oath, to join the brotherhood. It is nearly as grueling as being in the pits. The other men, the ones who will become your brothers, are cruel, cunning. They steal your food, they piss in your water. And you must endure it, for only through their rites of passage will you be truly accepted.” His voice was quiet at this part, but held a tone that spoke well of the experience.

  After the hell of the pits, perhaps it had been easy.

  “Marcus and I were a comfort to each other here, as well as the pits. The bond between us is strong, stronger than any I have ever had in my life.” His words were quiet, final, and caused dread to surge through me.

  It sounded as if he was telling me something very specific, without saying the words. It sounded as if he was telling me that there was no room in their relationship for me.

  Suddenly angry, and containing crushed hopes and dreams, I sat straight up, trying to pull his arms away from
me, off of my skin. He held tight, sitting with me, and pulled me back against him, into his lap. His arms were like bands of unyielding stone. I had to go where he pulled me.

  “We always felt that something was missing.” He spoke softly, whispering into my ear. I reached up a hand, tucked a mussed dark lock behind my ear so that I could hear better. I did not dare to hope.

  I needed him to say it before I dared to do that.

  “After Marcus was first with you, he was . . . content. More content than I had been able to make him in a long time. I was jealous, but I did not understand. After I was with you the first time, I experienced that same contentment, that sense of fullness.”

  I could not help it. Anticipation began to blossom inside of me and twined with it was fear, fear that I was wrong.

  “You contain a pureness that appeals to men who have lived the lives that we have. Your soul is kind, and you see the person, not their class.”

  Caius turned me so that I straddled his lap, so that my face was pressed against his and the thick curtain of my long hair sheltered us, rather as if we were in our own little world.

  “But, Domina, do you not understand?” He kissed my cheeks, my forehead, my nose, and my lips before drawing back to look me in the eye. “We can never be more than this. There will never be more than stolen moments for you and me, for you and Marcus.”

  Ice began to form on my skin, tiny, multi-faceted crystals grown from my perspiration.

  “A domina and her slaves cannot have a happy ending. You know this.”

  I reared back, trying to extricate myself from his arms. This time he let me go. Awkwardly I scrambled from hands and knees to my feet, crossing my hands over my breasts, though I knew that it was silly.

  He had seen every part of me. Touched, tasted every part.

  Regardless, I was upset, and I felt exposed. I clambered for the lacy sleep tunic that had been hastily tossed to the floor, and pulled it over my suddenly chilled skin. It did not cover much, sheer as it was, but I felt better for it. Thus armored, I turned again to face him where he still lay, on the hard floor, his eyes watching my every move with resignation. I planted my feet, angry.