Prologue

 

It had been nearly dawn when they had come to take her. She distinctly remembered the coolness of the early morning air as it rasped her throat, fighting back the acute fear that welled up inside her with paralysing intensity. Curiously she also remembered how heavy the wet dew seemed to be that morning, each drop of water kissing the blades of grass as they slowly swayed in the breeze. The chill wind was blowing across the meadow from under a dark sky with hints of promised sunlight breaking over the wooded horizon. And she could still remember the distinctive smell of the wood smoke as it curled up from the village below.

There had been a methodical stamp to the soldiers' footsteps that had idly reminded her of the pounding of the rye, prior to baking unleavened black bread. Time became attenuated and so very very slow as the footsteps approached and she seemed to be able to hear the short swords set deep within their leather scabbards slap against the Imperial Roman soldiers' tunics with every purposeful step they took. Her sisters and mother huddled against each other in the corner of their wooden house, weeping quietly in tearful anticipation. They pressed their bodies against the wattle and daub walls hoping that the inevitable would somehow become merely the probable and if that miracle were granted, then surely the Gods would be kind and turn the probable into only the possible. Her father and her two older brothers were already dead, along with all the other men folk of this small and strategically unimportant little town in Germanica; their blood futilely spent against the superior technology and tactics of the Imperial Roman army, as it swept, with historical inevitability, towards the Baltic coast.

Roman soldiers had always fought for booty rather than the high political ideals of their masters or the detached judgements of future archaeologists. And now it was time for their pay. In battle it was the youngest soldiers that the Romans put into the fray first to blunt the advances of their enemies, while the more experienced veterans were held back to create an efficient and effective culling machine. Natural selection in action - as only the strongest and fittest of the young fighters survived, to become veterans in their own turn. In keeping with this natural order, however, it was the veterans that had the first pick of gold and the vanquished women folk after the battle was won. And now the local townstead lay prostrate and undefended below them.

All night she had heard the cries of their friends rise up from the valley as they were raped and violated by the victorious troops and now it was their turn - she was certain of it. She could still hear her mother's cry of anguish and despair as the little wooden door was unceremoniously kicked open to be replaced by the guttering torch lit face of a leering legionnaire. Her heart pounded loud in her chest and the blood seemed to roar in her ears. She and her two sisters were too frightened to scream and seemed incapable of even breathing as they took a series of short staccato breaths. She wondered why she felt warm and wet and realised that she had pissed herself in fear as the door crashed open and hung limp and broken on one damaged hinge.

But their fate was not to be ravished that early spring morning. Even the lust of a conquering army is eventually sated and the troops were now in search of gold and booty and the slaves that could be sold for them.

Two more legionnaires now entered the little one roomed house, their leather sandals silent on the dried earth floor. The women didn't need to speak Latin to understand what the soldiers wanted but only the threat of a sword and a fierce slap to her mother's upturned face allowed one of the Romans to roughly pull first one sister and then the other from their mother's weeping clutches. With seeming effortless expertise a short leather rope was wound around their wrists and they were pulled from their home. Slaves of the mightiest empire the world had ever known. She never did find out what became of her mother and sisters and she never would.

And now, just three months later, under the hot eastern Mediterranean sun in the agora or market of Ephesus, tied like a common animal between two rough wooden posts, she stood displayed for sale in the middle of two other slave girls, in an inadvertent triptych of young female flesh. For sale to the highest bidder.

Ephesus -one of the five great cities of the Roman Empire - was a bustling metropolis of 200,000 people and the regional capital of the entire Asian province. Some eleven years previously an earthquake had destroyed all the buildings in Ephesus and a subsequent fire had levelled that which remained. They had now been almost completely restored and, with new temples, fountains and other buildings the city had become even more opulent than ever. For its citizens no luxury was barred, the streets were literally paved with marble, the stone having had little grooves cut in them to allow better grip for the people and horses that thronged the shops, theatres and tavernas. At night the long straight boulevard -Arcadian Way- was lit by a series of tar-burning torches suspended high on poles, their yellow light playing festively onto the phalanx of beautiful stone pillars that flanked each side of the street from the theatre to the Harbour. Every house had running water, a feat not repeated by any city in the so-called civilised west until the middle of the nineteenth century. Ephesus: the major centre of commerce for the whole of the Asian province and the permanent residence of the Governor of Rome. A proud and pivotal city.

The journey from her home land to Ephesus had been degrading, brutal and ugly for the girl as she had passed through a series of merchants, each one of whom had had her stripped naked and displayed for their examination. Only her status as "virginia intacta" had prevented her from being sampled by each merchant as in turn they had appreciated that remaining virginal enhanced her value. It was only a matter of time before her final owner would buy her and then that transient protection would be gone. She'd lost count of the number of men who had pulled, slapped and tweaked her body as they had made business judgements about her female attributes and although she didn't know it she was approaching her last auction before she found her final owner.

The hold of the sailing ship that had transported her from the south coast of Spain to this far eastern edge of the Mediterranean had been hot and cramped, as she had shared a small cage with two other young females, neither of whom spoke her language.

The next cage held a large brown bear being transported to Ephesus on orders of the amphitheatre owners who intended to put on a staged hunting scene for the entertainment of the citizens. Its cage was too small and it had howled and roared throughout the journey, quiet only when it was thrown some rotting meat that it subsequently ate with relish. The girls, on the other hand, had to work for their food, meagre though it was, for they had quickly realised that the only way they could persuade the bored sailors to give them their cast-offs and leftovers was to grant them sexual favours. A severe beating awaited any crew member that took the slave's maidenhood and so they had used the girls' mouths, fucking them hard through the bars of the cages, their erect members pressing open the lips of the captives, forcing the helpless slaves onto themselves. They had used the girls' ears as handy anchorage points, pulling their faces onto the cold iron bars of their cages and making the girls gag as the sailors pushed hard down their throats as they came deep within them. The tang of their cum mixed with the saltiness of her own tears brought on by her gagging and her anguish combined in equal measure.

The leather collar, wrist and ankle straps that she had worn constantly for three months were now cracked and weather beaten from the sun and salt water and stood in marked contrast to her lightly tanned body while her hair was tangled and dirty with bits of dry straw from the ship's hold twisted into it.

The merchant who had shipped her in from Spain was called Zenobius and was a fat cruel and lazy man.

"Come on, you stupid bitch!" he had yelled to the uncomprehending girl. He had yanked her metal chain as he led her out of the hold, blinking and frightened into the early morning light. She cowered from his raised hand that held a small and vicious little cane and weakly resisted the insistent pull from her collar. Zenobius was not the most successful slave dealer in Ephesus

"Bad luck seems to dog me at the moment," he complained to himself, giving the chain a nasty but ineffectual tug; "what with Octavia pulling off that deal behind my back and this bloody toothache, I'd better get a good price for these three bitches or there's going to be trouble."

Looping the chain around a convenient wooden stanchion from the boat with the casual unconscious expertise gained from long practice, he descended twice more into the stinking hold, cursing and whining to himself, wincing as he worried and sucked on the bad tooth, each time returning with one of the remaining young females that he was to sell in the agora that afternoon. A better businessman than Zenobius would have prepared his stock for sale with great care,

"After all, you only sell something once," Octavia had said when they were discussing auctioning slaves whilst frequenting one of the many bathhouses that Ephesus was famous for throughout the Empire. His voice had echoed and boomed inside the great marbled dome in which they sat languidly splashing cool water onto themselves as a temporary relief from the heat. He continued "and you need to prepare them to get the best possible price!"

Zenobius had agreed, but good business, like so many things in life, is in doing the simple things right time and time again and although he had agreed, he was lazy and poorly organised. As a consequence, while Octavia prospered, he continued to have bad luck and blamed it on the gods.

When the three girls were on deck he unceremoniously cut off their remaining rags with a few deft cuts with his hunting knife, snarling his disapproval as the girls instinctively tried to feebly resist. They stood naked, shivering despite the warmth of the sun's early rays as he threw a wooden bucket over the side of the craft into the filthy waters that lapped at the quayside. He laboriously pulled it up, cursing as it caught on the side of the boat, losing some of its contents and then turned and brusquely wiped the accumulated grime and filth that had stuck to the girls during their passage from Spain. He did most of this quickly with short ineffective swipes, only lingering as his hands swept over the flanks of each girl, savouring her womanly curves and then around to the dark folds of flesh nestling between her quivering thighs, entertaining himself with the heat that his palm seemed to draw from the sensitive membranes and their fulsome body lips.

Satisfying himself that they were clean enough, he unhitched them from the stanchion and pulled them naked along the busy street to the Agora. Never had the girls been so humiliated and they blushed as they were led like stock animals through the thronging crowd to his patch in the busy market.

"Is this possible?" she thought to herself, inwardly screaming, "that this is even more humiliating than having sailors use my mouth and being sold as a common animal?" She tried to pull away as the deep cherry glow of embarrassment spread from her face and down her neck where it bloomed across her exposed and vulnerable tits, which danced unrestrained and free from clothing in the morning air, but resistance was pointless. Zenobius was a poor businessman but not completely stupid and he held a good grip on the three chains in his sweaty hands.

Fastened by heavy iron chains to her wrists and ankles, she had stood on the block, wanton and exposed as a variety of men stroked and mauled her tits and ass and laughed and joked about her suitability. One licked a short stubby finger and was inserting it up her tight anus, calling and laughing with his friends as he pushed it up the resisting orifice, the muscles contracting tighter and tighter the more insistently he pushed and wriggled the prying digit into the resisting orifice. Through her haze of tears and humiliation, she saw a small crowd of well-dressed men began to draw near. They stopped in front of her and looked up. Even in her predicament she noticed that the other shoppers and merchants had fallen strangely silent and had started to drift away. Even the offending finger was quickly withdrawn.

From the middle of the phalanx of these smart men, one stood out and with strong but quiet words inquired of Zenobius,

"Where is she from?

Zenobius, unusually reticent and nervous, told of her acquisition from merchants in Spain and for good measure spiced the journey home with a totally fictitious tale of marauding pirates from the North African coast.

"Is she still a virgin?" the man asked Zenobius absentmindedly as he probed her gaping pussy with a splendidly bejewelled finger. She twitched instinctively as two more fingers joined their brother to touch her hymen. The chains tightened as she tried to pull away.

"Yes, oh yes!" Zenobius fawned, "indeed she is, sir! You have my word, sir!"

Having satisfied that she was indeed a 'Virginia intacta' the man wiped her womanly juices on to his toga, the white of her juices staining the deep purple of his robes as they quickly dried in the heat,

"Have her sent to my residence for this evening's entertainment. I have guests and the deflowering of a fresh slave girl will be a very welcome addition, to the diversions I have already planned." And with that they walked away into the milling throng of the market, the crowd magically melting in front of them wherever they went.

Zenobius was beside himself.

"A sale to the Governor himself and his slave girl to be sent to his Official Residence this very afternoon!" he crowed to anyone and everyone who would listen for several weeks after the event. "Maybe my luck is turning after all!" he thought to himself.

 

The party was in full swing when she made her reluctant grand entrance, helplessly hogtied with her wrists fastened with short chains to her ankles. Her ass was in the air, eyes blindfolded while a small peach was jammed into her mouth as she knelt on a small trolley. The trolley was wheeled in by two other naked young slave girls and taken to the centre of the room while the party goers lounged on long sofas arranged in a large semicircle around the central atrium which made up the main dining area of the Governor's Palace. Each was attended by at least two slaves trained to anticipate their charge's every need and whim, picking succulent sweetmeats from an astonishing array of foods and drinks for their delectation. Her ankles in turn were chained to the very corners of the trolley and nestling between her distended pussy lips, another peach lodged invitingly. The alcohol had been flowing freely for several hours as the two slave girls pushing the trolley arrived in the centre of the room and applied a small but effective brake to the trolley's wheels. They them retreated backwards from the room, grateful that they had escaped the unwanted attentions of any of the guests for the moment.

"Ah, the little slave girl!" announced the Governor as he heaved his frame from the sofa and made his way across the room to the offering of helpless female flesh.

"I do so enjoy a wild one, they seem so much tighter and firmer than the ones from my slave breeding farms." The trolley had been especially constructed and adjusted to meet the governor's height and other physical requirements and as his rapidly hardening prick poked out from amongst the folds of his toga, the girl's restrained pussy was at exactly the right height and orientation to facilitate a quick and hassle-free entrance. To remove the peach that was lodged firmly in her sex he needed to work his finger and thumb around the fruit and between it and the girl's defenceless pussy lips. She moaned in anguish and pain from behind the other peach that had created such an effective gag.

With this impediment out of the way and with a single imperious thrust he entered the pinioned girl with such force that she bit hard on the fruit in her mouth, juices flowing from around her lips and onto her chin.

One of the guests regaled the Governor by shouting across the atrium,

"For God's sake Sula, she's coming from both fucking ends!!"

"I do so enjoy being one of the Illuminati," the Governor slurred back through an alcoholic fug as he rode the girl hard from behind, driving his prick hard into her twitching pussy, savouring the moment when her hymen broke and he plunged his organ to the hilt, his balls banging against her tight fresh arse, whilst he slapped her thighs and ass cheeks as though he were riding a pony. The other guests cheered him on, one shouting out to him as he approached his climax

"Come on, make those chains fucking rattle!!"

He adjusted his stance, gripping her hips to increase his leverage as he powered into her with his short strokes and as he came triumphantly within her, held her impaled as the orgasm coursed through his body.

When he had finished he took his deflating manhood from her sex and graciously made way for the next guest. He turned to Octavia, one of the most commercially successful merchants in the whole of known Asia. Octavia was renowned as an individual who had started with nothing but whose business interests now included slave sales, several olive orchards and vineyards and even one or two gold and silver mines that had recently been opened up in the far eastern reaches of the province.

"You know, Octavia, dear and trusted friend," for the Governor had known him for over eighty years and in a land where life expectancy was less than fifty this wasn't just abnormally unusual, this was literally impossible for the mere mortals who thought they had an equal share in the glory that was Rome. At the height of her imperial power, the vast majority of citizens were not just completely misguided but ignorant even of the true state of their ignorance.

"This whole empire is ours for us to enjoy and delight in its many fruits and diversions and when we have finished with it we shall destroy it and create a new one somewhere else!"

"Yes," said Octavia, somewhat distracted as he took a star fruit from a small Nubian boy slave. "I believe that some of our colleagues are working on a nascent civilisation to the very Far East, China or something similar, I believe. They say it's very promising."

This meant nothing to the little slave girl as she was about to entertain many men that evening. Once they had tired of her she would be sent to one of the Governor's many slave breeding farms that he had dotted about the province, where she would be expected to drop ten or twelve foals before being sold on cheaply as a cleaning slave.