Introduction

 

She knew what to expect, they had whipped her before.

Although experience didn't make it any easier. If anything, knowing what to expect increased her tension. She shook off the tremors that were shaking her body...she had no intention of letting the Romans see her fear.

Her fear...

It's okay, she told herself. Any sane person would fear the ferula especially when a strong man wielded it. She could not remember the pain the last time the centurion had whipped her, only the writhing, the loss of control, the shame at showing weakness, but there was nothing she could do to prevent it-when Metella ordered it, she suffered.

The worst part of a whipping was Viper touching her. The despicable Sergeant Vipsanius enjoyed her agony, her shame, her body. He had stripped her and tied her naked between two tall wooden posts...spayed open like a farm animal ready for slaughter. She could see the lust in his eyes as his men tied the ropes on her wrists, as they lifted her feet off the ground and spread her legs, tying her ankles to the uprights.

He was the worst, but this kind of punishment was not unusual. The Romans were all cruel; eschewing reason when it came to captives and relying almost exclusively on the threat of corporal punishment to control those they had subjugated...and it worked. Many of the Briton slaves they had taken, some fierce warriors before their capture, would tremble and piss themselves if they somehow displeased their masters. They were truly defeated, she thought, beaten into submission; now, they were no more than Roman pets and beasts for the romans to work to death. Slavery was at the heart of their "enlightened" civilization.

She would never become the Roman centurion's pet. She had agreed to translate for him, but she had not surrendered...she had never surrendered, and she never would. She hated Rome and all Romans were her enemy; killing them was her raison d'etre, her purpose in life. It was the reason she continued to resist their dominance.

Which was why she was here. Despite their agreement regarding translation, the centurion continued to act as her master, and she continued to resist his domination. The result was frustration for him and the pain of frequent punishment for her like today. She hated the pain and despised him for subjecting her to such suffering, but she also understood the need to maintain the roles their fragile relationship demanded-she could not submit, and he could not allow her opposition to go unpunished.

It didn't matter, she thought, shaking her head. To her, the more punishment he decreed, the more he was admitting his inability to tame her. She was still fighting, still battling the hated invaders who had attacked her village, butchered her father, and crucified her mother in retaliation. She had died slowly, looking at Xara the entire time with a stare that said only one thing-avenge us! What were a few lash strokes compared to that sacred mission...?

A few lash strokes...

Even though he assigned her bondage to Viper, Metella always punished her himself and used his considerable strength to ensure that the whip struck her body with full force and effect. She knew he would not whip her to death as the Romans liked to do with others. He needed her to translate the Briton tongues into Latin and vice versa so that he could win cheap victories for Rome through negotiation. He would not jeopardize that goal. Nor would he scar her with his whip. He enjoyed her long lean body, her high tits and ass, her face too much.

No, she was not concerned for her life or her appearance. Even the pain, the excruciating agony of the leather slapping her raw skin was something she tolerated without complaint. What did bother her was looking weak in front of her enemies. Weakness would bring dishonor to her parents and her tribe. She would rather he slit her throat than shame them.

Then there was the other matter. When he fucked her, the centurion made her come like no one ever had done before. Even Caratacus, the chief of the Catuvellauni and her erstwhile lover, had not made her scream with the pain and pleasure of sexual climax the way the Roman did. Of course, Caratacus had never wanted her to use her mouth fearing the same fate as the Lucius Flaccus, the legate who had tried to rape her in Rumabo.

The centurion, Metella, did not have the same concern of course since he did not know about her private battle with Flaccus. He had only the natural caution of a master to an untamed slave; when he wanted to fuck her in the mouth, he used a slave's ring gag. The ring gag did not lessen the frequency or volume of his ejaculations-he apparently enjoyed the autonomic efforts of her lips and tongue, the soft feel of her throat, the warmth of...

The sound of Roman sandals on stone ended her erotic daydream. She would need to steel herself now, marshal all her Taexali strength, focus all her hatred on her Roman nemesis to cope with the suffering she was about to endure.

This whipping will be good for me, she told herself. It is exactly what I need to burn away any affection she might have for this Roman. She was only allying herself with him to save others from his cruelty; she enjoyed his cock and felt ecstasy climaxing with him because she was a woman, and he was a man. She would feel the same with any man. There was nothing personal in it, and one day, she would take her revenge on him.

"LEAVE US...!" Metella screamed at the leering Viper.

He waited until the sergeant was gone then put his hand on her cunt and put his mouth close to her ear.

"You have brought this on yourself, Xara. I cannot have a slave ignore my orders. It undermines my authority with my men. You must obey and respect me! If not, I have no choice but to...to hurt you."

"I will do as I have promised, Ignavus," she hissed, her labia throbbing in his hand, "but as long as you wear that uniform, I cannot obey or respect you."

"This is not a uniform, Xara. This is who I am."

He stepped back and laid a vicious stroke on her back then continued the merciless attack until she groaned. But it was not from the pain, it was from the dilemma of simultaneously despising and admiring someone with such intensity.

 

 

Chapter One - Negotiari

 

The centurion sat tall on his horse. Xara ran behind tethered to his saddle's pommel. Behind them, a mounted adjutant pulled a naked gift-slave named Yoanie, whom he had also tethered to his saddle. From a distance, the slaves looked like sleek greyhounds running alongside the imposing backdrop of huge Roman war horses. Marcus hoped that the Atrebates would view two riders leading two beautiful slaves as peaceful.

Metella's eyes were locked on the trail ahead, drilling into the darkness as if he could see what lay beyond. From overheard camp gossip, she had learned that this was the farthest north that any Roman soldier had ever ventured in Briton. She believed it; the Roman's had focused their conquests on the south, but with the demand for slaves rising throughout the empire, they had to expand. She kept glancing at Metella, wondering if he saw what she saw in the trees.

Her father had told her about the Great Northern Forest, about the fierce Atrebates Tribe that claimed exclusive ownership of the forest and everything it contained, about how the Atrebates enforced this claim by murdering anyone who ventured into their domain and by hanging their dissected body parts from tree limbs. This gruesome warning had become their signature.

He also spoke about other tribes that lived beyond the forest-the Carvetii, the Selgovae, the Votadini, and the Picts-but he never lingered long on the Picts. She had always had the feeling that talking about them made him uncomfortable...even afraid...which was astonishing to her. This man had faced wolves with only a knife, he had killed eleven of the Romans who attacked their village, he had even managed to kill the spearman who had run him through. Her irrational, inherited fear of the Picts stemmed from his.

There were no Picts in the forest though, only Atrebates, who were nearly as terrifying.

The forest itself was intimidating-dark, full of tall and dense pine trees that hid the sky and the trail. It was as if they were traveling inside a small bubble of light. She found her inability to see the sky or the horizon especially disorienting-there was no way to navigate, no reference points to latch onto, no shadows, only the black tunnel-like hole that distinguished the forest trail from the trees. Xara remembered that she had been trying to reach this labyrinth after escaping from the Romans at Rumabo Imperium. She was fortunate that Caratacus had rescued her before she got to the forest; she would have been helpless in here. The Atrebates would have killed her.

She looked up at Metella again trying to shake off the dread she felt. The forest was like a great bear swallowing them alive. The thought made her stand still for a moment until the tether around her wrists jerked her forward. She ran forward until the rope was slack, and the centurion's horse swung his tail into her face as if annoyed with her.

Xara quickly advanced another two paces until she was beside Metella's stirrup, out of range of the animal's tail. She was sweating from the day's run, and the errant streaks of light that made it through the trees were glistening off her nearly naked body. The Romans had replaced her loin cloth with three leather belts-one around her neck, a collar, one around her breasts, and a third around her waist. A long and thin strip of leather extended from the front of her collar, between her legs, and up to the back of her collar in the nape of her neck. It rubbed against her clit as she ran and occasionally precipitated a minor orgasmic shudder. It wasn't an orgasm, more like a release of pent-up arousal, but it amused the mastiff running free at her side. On Metella's orders, the Romans had left the gift-slave Yoanie naked except for her wrist binding. Romans didn't waste cloth on their dogs or horses, why would they waste it on their slaves?

Xara's theory about the belts she wore was that the centurion wanted to expose her body, thereby marking her as a slave, but he also wanted to give her some stature over Yoanie, the gift slave. In his mind, Xara would be able to function with more credibility as his official translator if he elevated her some.

It was clever, she thought, another indication that he was a more sophisticated thinker than his rank implied. The Atrebates chief would probably feel insulted if the Roman used a common sex slave to translate. According to the gossip she had overheard, Metella was now officially the legion's chief negotiator. A soldier as chief negotiator..., she thought? Somehow the idea of it didn't sit right with her. Still, he was an imposing figure on his high horse with her tethered behind and his dogs at this side.

Their dogs...

Metella owned a pair of magnificent mastiffs that ran untethered behind and alongside his horse. Xara had already formed a bond with them; they reminded her of the fierce dogs she lived with under Sextus the torturer at Rumabo. They could rip out an enemy's throat or snap his neck with a ferocity that struck fear into the hearts of all who faced them. For her though, they were in a way her people; now that the Taexali were gone, and even the Catuvellauni, whom did she have left to call family? The other slaves, the Romans...? She would never be one of them, never!

One of the dogs running at her side bumped his large skull into her bare thigh and she pushed him away with her hip. He was an ugly beast for sure, with a short coat, a long low-set tail, and drooping pendant-shaped ears. Even if he and his brother were not family, they were the closest she had to friends. Metella turned his head quickly to the side and looked down to watch them running together. His stern expression didn't change.

Metella...

Ever since the incident in the horse pen when Metella had coerced her into agreeing to translate, she had been wary of him. He was not just strong, skilled, and ruthless, he was clever. He had made her a coconspirator in his battle against Princess Ailios, Caratacus's daughter. That had been his goal all along; he didn't care about Ailios or the seven other slaves he crucified. It was all about aligning her with him.

Her anger over his manipulation boiled up suddenly and she pulled on the rope holding her wrists to the saddle. Metella glanced down again then turned back to the front unbothered by her sudden unexplained pique. Roman masters didn't concern themselves with the feelings of their slaves unless those feelings affected them in some way.

Xara fumed at the memory of the horse pen for another minute then glanced back at Yoanie. The girl was pretty-soft, short, and well-built, with exaggerated tits and a jutting ass-just the kind of woman the Romans would assume a savage like Verica, the chief of the Atrebates, would enjoy owning...and fucking. Metella had not shared any of the details of their mission with her, but she had filled in the details from the bits and pieces she overheard.

The Romans typically spoke freely around Briton slaves whom the assumed did not understand Latin. It was something they did around her as well out of habit even though most now knew she spoke their language

She glanced at the centurion again, wondering if he knew the Atrebates were watching, following them invisibly from the depths of the forest. Xara could smell them; she hoped after years of fighting that his sixth sense for danger was equally sharp. In a bow to Roman tradition rather than any conviction that it would protect them, he held a tregua vexillum (flag of truce) in his stirrup. She was not sure that the Atrebates even knew what the flag meant or if they even had any concept of a truce, but it was the proper "Roman thing to do" when requesting a parlay.

It was important for the romans that the savages learned their ways, she thought. For them, negotiation was a fundamental part of the war of conquest; it accounted for at least half of the empire's subjects. It would be ironic if the Atrebates denied Metella the opportunity to negotiate because they were too savage to know any better. The legion had lost too many negotiari (negotiators) in Briton because the savages didn't know their customs...or was it because they chose not to honor the Roman custom of surrender?

Metella was having the same thoughts. He was gambling their lives that the Atrebates would have heard about the battle with the Catuvellauni at Wolf's Glen, that they would want to talk, to engage in negotiation before fighting. He was also betting their lives that Xara would make a difference. Such efforts at negotiation, especially in the north, had been spectacularly unsuccessful in the past. He had seen the savages return many negotiari with their heads cut off, their intestines trailing behind, or with other gruesome mutilations.

Despite his elaborate preparation, despite Xara's promise to cooperate, he knew this attempt to negotiate was a gamble. The Atrebates were even more savage, more primitive than the Catuvellauni...and they had the strategic advantage of the forest, which made it impossible for the Romans to use the well-disciplined, mass formations that had worked so well in open ground. The Praefectus Castrorum (military advisor and third in command of the legion), Prefect Gaius Lepidi had even gone on record his opinion that one legion would not be enough to create a foothold in the north. This opinion, documented by the legion's scribe, was the action that finally convinced the Legatus Legionis (the legion's commander) Legate Senatorus Plecio, to let him try negotiation. Still, it was a huge risk.

The girl, Xara, he thought, was still the biggest question. Despite her promise after the ugly business with Princess Ailios and during the torture of the slave Vela, to cooperate, would she keep her word, or would she revert to her savage ways? His instinct had told him that he had pushed her as far as she was going to go; that there were no guarantees. His instinct was that she needed to develop her own rationale for cooperating. She needed to work it out that Rome was here to stay and that the Britons had no choice but to cooperate.

He had seen this work before with animals, especially horses, but never with a slave. Slaves, even Britons, had the free will to defy their training. There came a time when they either accepted the conditions of their captivity or they rejected them. No amount of added pain or intimidation could force them to make an immutable choice.

He looked down at Xara then back along the forest trail. It was small comfort to remember that the entire Second Legion waited just at the edge of the forest for them to return, and if they did not, or if they returned in pieces, the legion would avenge them.

Yes, small comfort...

He had made sure that Xara had seen the legion preparing for battle before they left. He wanted her to understand that if their negotiations failed, the Second legion along with all the other legions that Rome would send would annihilate the Atrebates Tribe just as they had annihilated the Catuvellauni.

Of course, this assumed that she cared what happened to the Atrebates, which was an enormous leap of faith. Most Britons hated the other tribes almost as much as they hated Romans. Still, Xara, a Taexali, had joined with the Catuvellauni and fought with them. He was hoping that this experience would give her some sense of affiliation with other Britons.

He looked down at her again running beside at the end of his tether, her long chestnut hair streaming out behind, her skin gleaming with sweat. She was an incredibly beautiful creature, he thought, shaped like a curvaceous woman but tall and hard, harder than any Roman lady or any slave. She had lived her early life in primitive circumstances, and it showed. Fucking her had been an incredible experience and he was looking forward to doing it again.

He remember the night Viper had delivered her to him in the arcus-atrox (metal bow). His cock had nearly burst out of his pants. Whipping her, fucking her, playing with her hard body all the next day had been one of the greatest pleasures he had ever had in the legion. Not that he had had many pleasures. He had joined as a veles (a skirmisher) when he was fourteen, more than twenty years ago. He was lucky to have survived; the velites were the first to encounter the enemy and the first to die.

He remembered how she had fought him that first night, how he needed to tie her hands behind her back and tie her ankles to the far ends of the arcus-atrox before he could get to her cunt. Even then she had snapped at him with her teeth like a wild animal. A slave gag had stopped that, but she still resisted with her vaginal muscles, closing them as tightly as she could to prevent his penetration. It was no use, in fact, it was marvelous to feel her cervix gripping his cock so tightly.

She had been resisting him so furiously that she ignored her own feelings of arousal. She had suddenly lost it and began to move like a minx in heat once he had created a fucking rhythm. The result was inevitable. The incredible orgasm they both experienced was a terrible surprise to her, a shock to her system. He had seen it in her eyes when her massive contractions finally stopped. They had fucked like rabbits after that...for a full day.

But not since...

He had other uses for her now-important, lifesaving uses. He could not risk his plan, his promise to the prefect by continuing to fuck her. There were always plenty of other slaves to fuck if he needed release. None of them, however, could squeeze him as hard as she had done or provide so much other stimulation, but she was now destined for other things.