Brion-the Celtic Slave:

Noises were heard coming from the courtyard.  It barely caused a ripple in the slave, Brion's head.  He had other things to worry about.  His Dominus had been in a foul mood for days, and he wasn't a man to keep his anger to himself.  Everyone in the House of Cassisus did their best to avoid him when he was in such a state, including his own family.  Of course, as his slave, favored or not, Brion had no choice but to be at his master's beck and call.  Brion was one of the fortunate ones, however.  His brilliant head for organization and business matters, along with his extraordinarily fine appearance, made him a man of some rank among the house slaves.  Brion had everything a man could want, except for freedom of choice in all matters pertaining to his own life. 

Brion quickly finished with the household accounts.  The sooner he was done, the sooner he could escape to his own quarters and perhaps avoid whatever the nonsense was that caused such noisy clatter.  But it was not to be.  Just as he was gathering up the last of the papers in front of him and rolling them up for storage, his Dominus rushed in.  His face was flush with either anger or excitement.  It was impossible to tell which.  His next words solved the mystery quickly.

"Brion, pause task.  I have need of something far more urgent.  We are to be honored by visit from the great Crassus...he that may well rid us of that plague, Spartacus and his barbarian hordes.  I intend to seek help in avoiding cursed fate of so many of my friends whose villas have been decimated by the savages.  You must speak to cook first. Have only the best prepared to serve our guests.  Put tongue to use and warn slaves.  If honored house is not immaculate, the whip will be their reward.  He will see that those of us who live beyond walls of Rome have tastes as fine as any in the heart of that fair city."

"Yes, Dominus," Brion responded, without hesitation. 

Brion hurried away to do his master's bidding.   He hated the man, as he had for all ten years of his servitude, but he was careful never to show it.  It was what had kept him alive and prosperous for someone wearing the collar of a slave.  Brion still had memories of his Celtic homeland and the family lost to him during a raid by the Roman armies.  He had just turned nineteen when he was captured and brought to a port to be put up for sale.   He had received an extensive education that included foreign languages, thanks to the patronage of a family friend growing up.  One of those was Latin.  That ability set him apart from many of the others on the auction block.  His price was also upped because he was attractive and well built.  Lucius Cassius was looking for a new house slave with some intelligence to replace the body slave who had died suddenly and unexpectedly not long before.  Brion heard whispers among the other slaves of how the young man had been found with his wrists slit in an apparent suicide, but no one spoke of such things aloud. 

Brion had one other attribute that his new master appreciated.  Cassius was told how the young slave was found in the arms of another man, older by many years, when the soldiers broke into their home.  The older man was cut down when he grabbed for a nearby knife and tried to plunge it into the heart of one of the soldiers.  Brion, being wiser despite his youth, surrendered immediately and was spared the sword.  For Cassius, this meant that Brion would be the perfect body slave.  He obviously knew his place and would have no qualms in servicing his new master in a way that pleased the old merchant.  Later on, he discovered that Brion had even more talents.  His learning was vast and useful, making Cassius doubly happy he had made the purchase.  And thus it had been for ten years.  Cassius was unaware that Brion had saved every coin he could throughout his life in the villa, hoping for the day that the elderly man would die and he could possibly buy his freedom from the widow, known for her more generous nature.  It was all he prayed for. 

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Justinus-the Celtic/Roman Citizen

The young man with pale hair, brilliant blue eyes , and just turned eighteen years of age, sank deeper into the waters of the warm bath.  His name was Justinus.  Although he was a Roman citizen by birth, his father was born a Celt.  As the warm waters caressed his skin, his thoughts turned to his father.  His father, Craigh, had been granted Roman citizenship as reward for betraying his village when the Romans invaded more than twenty years earlier.  While many of his brethren were enslaved, Craigh traveled freely to the great city itself and established himself using the coin he had also been given for his treachery.  Within a year he married the daughter, Ginevra, of a wealthy landowner.  A year later, their son was born and named after his mother's father.  Craigh was respected by most within the city...but one did not feel such affection. 

Justinus was a young man with a heart every bit as tender as his father's was cold.  The older he became, the more he was disturbed by what he witnessed every day of his life.  Justinus was intelligent and had the benefit of an excellent education.  As a result he was more aware than many of his contemporaries as to the scheming for power that seemed so prevalent among the politicians of their city.  Another thing that bothered him a great deal was the inhumane way that slaves were treated by so many of the Romans, especially the aristocrats and wealthy.  He had witnessed it in his own home, although never perpetrated by his mother.  His father was another story.  More than once, Justinus discovered his father forcing himself on one of the house slaves or beating another for a petty offence.  It sickened the young man to the core.

For a long time, Craigh was unaware of his son's animosity.  He was far too busy building his name and fortune to worry about what his son was thinking.  As long as the boy was learning what was needed to inherit his father's businesses someday, Craigh was content.  He left his son in the care of his mother and nursemaids when young, and expensive educators when he was older.  Because of his frequent absences from their villa, his son had grown up a stranger to the avaricious man he called father.  But his son's attitude towards him was not the only thing that Craigh had not recognized in his only child.  Justinus had a secret...one known only to his mother and a single slave. 

The slave was a young man called Ethan, a Jewish lad who had been born into slavery and eventually sold to Craigh.  The boy's mother angered her former Domina when he was only three years old, and had been sent away to a workhouse where she spent the rest of her short life grinding corn in a millhouse under deplorable conditions.  Ethan would not have even known her fate if Justinus had not paid someone to search her out.  Justinus used some of the coin he received when he was given the 'toga varilis' to wear, a sign that he was no longer a child and had now been declared a man and full citizen of Rome.  He was fourteen at the time.  Ethan was only a year older than him.  Craigh had only bought the scrawny dark-haired child to serve as body slave to his young son, and as often happened with a master and slave who spent all their time together, the two children became fast friends. 

Their relationship had remained thus until shortly following an unfortunate event that changed everything.  It was only a fortnight after Justinus was declared a man that his father returned home from a short business trip and ordered his son to dress in his finest and attend him on a visit to the inner city.  Justinus was puzzled.  His father seldom asked him to tag along on any adventures in or out of the city.   Even more worrying was the look on his mother's face just before they left.  The young man had no clue as to where they were going, but it didn't take long to find out. 

The two men, with two accompanying slaves who served as guards for their wealthy masters, wended their way through parts of the city that the young Justinus had never seen before.  The busier sections of the city that were often clogged by merchants selling their wares and buyers of all ages looking for a bargain, had gradually faded from view as his father led him into a quieter section of the great city.  Here one could see only men, many gathered around various doorways leading into houses that appeared to be of some quality, although far from that of a patrician.  The streets were clean and lacking the squalor of the poorer parts of the city.  Finally his father came to a halt.  Ordering his slaves to wait outside for his return, Craigh pulled Justinus into the doorway of one of the nondescript houses.

They were met at the entrance by a huge man of dark color, appearing to be a Nubian by the looks of him.  He wore a traditional slave collar around his neck, but was dressed in finer fabric than that worn by the average slave.  The man seemed familiar with Craigh, greeting him with deference and bidding him follow into an inner room.  Justinus was confused and more than a little curious.  Before he could ask any questions, his father pulled him forward to meet the woman who occupied the long couch in the center of the heavily decorated room.  She wore her hair high on her head in tight curls of a brassy red color that was the fashion of late.  The young man felt almost sick to his stomach the closer he got to her.  She was of indeterminate age and smelled strongly of the perfume she wore.  Craigh greeted her warmly by name.

"Lusinia, it is good to see you again," he began.  "I bring you my son, as promised.  Now it is your turn.  He wears the toga of manhood...you must show him the ways of a man."

"A fine specimen," she responded in a cloying voice, eyeing the nervous lad from head to foot.  "I will bring my best to bear in deflowering young Master.  If he holds to father's talents, he will earn his title quickly." 

Justinus felt even sicker.  There was something lurid about the way she spoke to his father and her eyes seemed to strip him naked right in front of her.  He had never felt so uncomfortable in his life.  Even though Justinus had been sheltered by his mother from much of the crassness of their world, he was rapidly getting the picture as to why his father had brought him to this place.  His father had brought him to a brothel, albeit a higher class one from the looks of it.  It was also becoming clear that this wasn't his father's first visit to the place.  And now he apparently wanted one of the residents to initiate him into the ways of sex with a woman.  The thought made Justinus's stomach turn once more.  There was one thing that the young man had known about himself for several years now...he had no desire to lay with any woman.  The only one he had felt any attraction to up to this moment was his body slave, Ethan, even though nothing had happened between them...not yet.

When Craigh turned to look at his son, he was disappointed to see that the boy had turned almost pale.  He turned back to the woman, Lusinia.

"You warm heart with your generosity, Madam.  I leave honored son in your capable hands."  Craigh turned to his son.  "I will return shortly.  This good woman will guide you.  She is long in years of creating men from boys.  Follow wise guidance and see this day a new beginning."

Without waiting for Justinus to absorb all that his father wanted, the man disappeared through the doorway, leaving his bewildered and miserable son behind.  Lusinia rose from her couch, striding over to the young man.  She circled him as he stood there stiffly, barely able to breathe from the stench of her perfume.  He felt like a slave at auction, with no control over his fate.  Finally she stopped and returned to her couch.  He was grateful that she was no longer standing so close, but seconds later she tinkled a small bell on the table next to the couch.  Almost instantly, a thin attractive woman with next to no clothing on her body entered the room. 

"Yes, Dominus?" she inquired, with her head lowered and eyes to the ground.

"Find Abelia, and bring her here."

As the girl hurried away, Lusinia addressed her young guest.

"She will be to your liking, or I carry cock between these thighs," she laughed, pointing to her crotch.  The sound of her voice grated on Justinus's ears, and she spoke in a crude way that was totally unfamiliar to him.  His mother never allowed such bold language in her household and only his father dared to break those rules. 

Justinus was not a stupid boy.  He was now fairly certain what his father had in mind bringing him to this strange place.  He had heard from some of his peers that their own father's initiated them into manhood with the services of paid prostitutes.  It was something he had prayed to the gods his father would not choose to do to him.  The problem lay in the fact that the young man had never felt an attraction to any female, not even any of the attractive slave girls who were all around him in their villa.  His father never bought any but the best.  No, he had only found one slave attractive, even though he had never pursued his interest.  That slave was Ethan.  He was still trying to decide what he should do next when a very pretty and youthful girl entered the room.  She was barely clothed with only a thin draping covering one breast and her womanhood.  Unlike Justinus, she looked totally at ease, as if she had been a part of such a meeting with a stranger countless times before.

"Ah, there you are, Abelia.  Our young master has need of your soft touch.  I give you the boy.  Return me the man."

"Yes, Mistress," the young girl answered, taking Justinus by the hand and leading him from the room.

Justinus did not know what to do next.  If he failed to please his father, he feared the reaction.  But as she led him up stairs at the back of the hallway and into a small room fitted with nothing but a small table and large bed, he also feared that all he could do was fail at what was expected of him.  Abelia could see how nervous the handsome youth was.  She put it down to his inexperience.  She quickly let her sparse covering drop to the floor and reached for his toga and tunic in order to remove them.  Justinus stood before her in nothing but his loincloth and sandals.  It was obvious that her nakedness did not incite the reaction she was accustomed to in his crotch.

"Do I not please you?" she asked.

Justinus took a deep breath.  "It is not that you are displeasing.  My eye is for another.  Apologies."

The young lady was surprised.  More than one of her clients had someone special in their lives, but it did not stop them from partaking of her gifts too.  She was impressed. 

"Your father brings you here as virgin.  Have you lain with your love without his knowledge?  Your secret lies safe within these walls."

"Father is not wrong.  I stand before you virgin, but my heart wishes another to end such title.  Yet I fear his anger if he learned of such thoughts."

Abelia was a romantic at heart, despite her vocation. 

"Then he shall not know the deed between us was never done.  We shall linger here a while to give truth to our lie.  I shall return you to your lover untouched.  She may yet have the honor of being your first."

Justinus felt no need to correct Abelia's assumption as to the sex of his desire.  He was too grateful to the girl.  He quickly dressed and the two sat for an hour discussing the world around them, including the state of affairs in the city and its provinces.  Abelia turned out to be far smarter than Justinus expected.  She was even aware of the wars throughout the Roman territories, including the more recent uprising among the slaves and gladiators of the provinces.  Surprisingly, Justinus found himself enjoying his visit.  But the one thing he hated...the one thing he felt only anger over, was his father's treatment of him.  It may have been a common custom, but he only felt betrayal by the man who barely knew him.

It was on this night, when Justinus returned home with his proud father, that life changed forever for the young man.  All the way home Craigh spoke of his pride in his son and his future plans for him.  Abelia had reported that Justinus was an excellent lover for one unskilled.  'Like Father, like Son', Craigh had bragged.  After a celebratory dinner, Craigh left their home again, as he did most evenings.  When Ethan came to help Justinus prepare his bath, he found a sullen boy in place of the friendly lad he was used to.  It was in his attempts to soothe Justinus that the two teens found themselves within inches of each other.  Then, without warning, Justinus kissed Ethan.  It was on that night that Justinus did lose his virginity, just as his father had wanted...almost.  And it was only the first of many nights to come for almost four years, including the one night when he was seventeen that his mother paid a surprise visit at just the wrong moment and learned her son's secret...a secret she would not share with her husband. 

To be continued......