Sol Invictus
The Eighth Tale of the Daphne Boy
Part 1 of 2
by George Gauthier
Author's Note: This is a tale of an eternally youthful young man and those he encounters in the Roman Empire in the early IIIrd century AD.
This is another in a series of tales about an undying youth named Alexander, called Alexandros or Alex in this story. The other stories in this series so far are 'Antebellum', set in the American South just before the Civil War, 'Daphne Boy', set in Roman Syria, 'El Dorado', about the conquistadors, 'The Erythraean Sea', set in Arabia just before the rise of Islam, 'Stupor Mundi', about the Sixth Crusade, 'Ferghana', a tale of the Silk Road in Central Asia, and 'Zulu' set mostly in Southern Africa during the Anglo-Zulu War.
It contains graphic descriptions of the male human body, of consensual and non-consenual sexual activity between adult males, and considerable non-sexual violence including gladiatorial combat. If any of this would offend a reader, read no further. This is not intended for persons younger than an age where they may freely and legally select their reading matter in whatever jurisdiction applies.
It is offered for entertainment. If it manages to both intrigue and to provoke prurient interest, it will have succeeded in its aim.
It is as historically accurate in its setting as I could make it, with only minor poetic license for the sake of the story. This tale, after all, is fiction. It is not a historical monograph. All of the prominent Roman characters in the imperial entourage are actual historical persons; the rest are ones I made up and are not intended to resemble any person living or dead.
For the historical and geographical background you could do worse than to read the novel 'Child of the Sun' by Kyle Onstott and Lance Horner whose prose is explicit though not actually graphic. The web site mentioned in the epilogue, forgotten-ny.com, is not just for nostalgia buffs. Check out the section called "You'd Never Believe You're in NYC."
Readers who like these stories might want to try my 'Jungle Boy' series of tales in a modern setting, posted in the Gay/Authoritarian section of the archive. See also my series 'Naked Prey' in the historical section, my 'Mer Boy' series in Gay/Beginnings, and the 'Track and Field' series in Gay/College. For links to my stories, look on the list of Prolific Authors on the Archive.
Comments and feedback welcome.
Chapter 1. Emessa 218 AD
"Don't be such a showoff, Alexandros." Lucas said scolding me gently for my fancy dive into the swimming pool at the baths and palestra in the city of Emessa, modern day Homs, in Roman Syria.
He was right that my diving was intended to attract the attention of men who like pretty youths. I was at loose ends at the moment, not really looking for a lover, but in the mood for a casual relationship. That was the reason that I was shamelessly calling attention to my trim body. I hoped to catch the eye of men who preferred youths of my sort: short and slender, smooth and hairless, pretty as a girl with delicate almost elfin features.
Climbing out of the pool, I deliberately paused as I lifted myself out of the water, my butt and cleavage on display, letting older males get a good look at my pert rump as the water sluiced off it. My slow walk toward the diving stone gave patrons a chance to ogle my perfectly formed buttocks as they dimpled fetchingly with my deliberate stride across the floor. A moment later, as I waited for another diver, I windmilled my arms and then bent over as if loosening up but really to display the curves of my shapely bum to best advantage.
"Give the rest of us boys a chance to catch a patron's eye, will you Alex." he added, rolling his eyes at my blatant tactics.
"Don't worry, Lucas, a boy as pretty as you does not go unnoticed at the baths."
Indeed Lucas was a classic mediterranean beauty with a slight build much like my own: taut, tanned, and toned, but he was olive skinned with dark curly hair and large brown eyes while I am blond and green-eyed. At fifteen he was quite a catch for anyone who fancied a pretty lad, though still a little too young for me. Not that I did not find him attractive, but I do not take advantage of impressionable or impoverished youths at such a tender age. Give him a year and I would welcome him to my bed.
"You are lucky Alex that with your wealth you can afford to pick and choose lovers who please you. The best that poor lads like me can hope for is to attract the interest of a rich patron."
Lucas was an apprentice scribe who made a modest living copying books for his master. Though a free person, he lived little better than his master's slave and body servant. On his time off, he frequented the baths, not only for hygiene or exercise in the palestra, but also to find a way out of poverty, even if he had to bartar his sexual favors. Romans baths were well known as a place of assignation with good looking youths.
More generally, the public baths or thermae were important institutions in the civic life or Roman towns. They were centers for public bathing, socializing, and exercise. They offered varied services included libraries, light refreshments, and libations, as well as more personal services like massage, plucking of body hair, and even the attentions of pliant boys or whores. Roman males usually went daily and spent several hours there, accompanied by one or more slaves. After paying the fee they would strip naked and put on sandals to protect their feet from the heated floors. The baths included a palaestra, or outdoor gymnasium where men and boys would engage in ball games and exercises such as wrestling, lifting weights, or throwing the discus and especially a big pool for swimming.
I had arrived in Emessa earlier in the year. It was taking me some time to establish myself in the local mercantile trade. As yet few merchants cared to deal with a colleague not out of his teens. I could hardly blame them for their lack of confidence in a beardless boy. Although I claimed I was nineteen, I knew I looked two or even three years younger. I stood only five and one half feet tall (165 cm), and my slight frame carried a mere 122 pounds (56 kg), though I had a fairly strong upper storey and a wiry musculature. So I was quite slender and boyish -- almost skinny, with narrow shoulders and a flat but corrugated chest and belly sporting well-defined abdominals. I had delicate, almost elfin facial features topped by a blond thatch, skin bronzed from the sun, plus a straight nose, large green eyes, and high cheekbones.
It is fair to say that I was the most attractive boy of my type at the baths though no one could have guessed that I was not sixteen as I seemed nor nineteen as I claimed but well over three hundred years old at that time. I was actually born in the late second century BC in Germany. For reasons I have never understood, I had stopped growing and aging before reaching eighteen. Now, more than three centuries years later, I still looked like a boy in his late teens. No, there had been no encounter with a sorcerer nor a pact signed in blood with eldritch powers. It just happened that way for reasons unknown; something genetic, I suppose.
With my fellow merchants reluctant to do business with a mere stripling, I had plenty of leisure to enjoy the baths, though unlike Lucas, on my own terms. I neither had to sell my charms nor buy those of others, not with my attractive looks. Even after three centuries, I retained the strong teenage sex drive of my true youth partnered with centuries of sexual indulgence and experience. Lucas was a little too young as yet for me, but I was hoping to meet someone a year or two older.
I would like that, to make a special friend, a cute boy or young man, someone to spend time with for fun and frolic. I wanted a good looker of course and hopefully a guy who wasn't vacant upstairs. Dull minds in pretty bodies soon turned me off. Mind you, I don't restrict myself to bookish lads. A carpenter or solider or clerk with a quick mind was fine. In those days, in contrast to the knowledge economy of today, society simply did not have places for all the bright young minds in the population. Many a farmer or peasant or even slave for that matter had just as many smarts as one of the well educated. They just never got to realize that potential.
As I swam the length of the pool back and forth I saw that young Lucas had indeed attracted the attention of one of the richer merchants in town, a man well known for his love of pretty boys. Lucas waved to me as he and the older man repaired to a discreet alcove to get better acquainted. I continued with my swim. I was not just trolling for an assignation. I always try to keep myself at a peak of physical fitness, training in in sports like the javelin, the long jump, and the pankration, a form of unarmed combat, which combines wrestling and boxing, though my small size left me at a disadvantage there. I focussed on sports that might help me survive.
I particularly liked foot races, the longer the better. More than once I had simply outrun my foes or gotten enough of a head start to double back or hide successfully. Part of my gift is greater stamina than most. For my daily training run, I ran from the palestra to the nearby city gate then loped along the bank of the river out of the city and into the flat desert beyond before turning around and running back. Although nude runners were hardly unusual in those days, I always drew notice from those of both genders for my striking good looks, something I had come to expect over the years. It was obvious from the even color of my tan, which reached all the way to my ankles, that I must be one of those Greek inspired youths who seldom bothers with clothing, content to parade around in the nude as the gods had made me, reveling in the chance to display myself to one and all.
The truth is that all my life I have been both blessed and cursed by a lovely form and face that inspire admiration and lust in the eart of any male who appreciates a beautiful boy. I am small and pretty and uniformly bronzed from habitual nudity looking entirely too obviously like someone's catamite or pleasure boy. With an almost fawn-like physique and a total lack of body hair, even at the fork of my legs, I often wasn't taken seriously as a male, sometimes with the most dire of consequences.
Although I was prosperous at that moment and a free man, I have had much experience of rape and sexual servitude over the centuries. Enslaved at fourteen by a Roman tribune as a spoil of war, I became my captor's catamite and body slave until sold on to a merchant in Massalia, modern Marseille. My new master used me as a pleasure boy but later put me to work as a scribe as well. Set free by his will when he died suddenly of a fall from a horse, I traveled to the East and made my first fortune in Alexandria, working in a boy brothel while investing in mercantile ventures on the side. That is where I took up the Roman habit of having all my body hair, little as it was, plucked with tweezers. After several decades of plucking it stopped sprouting. Now I was completely hairless and would stay that way forever.
In the early first century AD I spent a few years in ancient Antioch as a Daphne Boy, enslaved for debt as a temple prostitute. The cult of the nymph Daphne is allied to that of Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Male acolytes, for that is what they called us, offered themselves to boy lovers. We were very popular because we were scrupulous about personal hygiene, trim and fit, and hand picked for our beauty of face and form. Although we could not chose our clients, the life was pleasant enough, with bright airy accommodations, good food, and decent treatment. The priests let us keep tips from our clients so we would have a bit of coin to spend on our two days off per month.
I made friends among the other boys and even some of my clients, though I was glad enough when circumstances freed me before my unchanging youth could be noticed. In some ways I still have fond memories of my time as a Daphne Boy, slave though I then was. Other periods of slavery before and since were not so pleasant. Then there were the recurrent gang rapes by bullies, soldiers, sailors, or bandits -- at least till I mastered the arts of unarmed and armed combat. Even in today's enlightened times, bigoted straight males sometimes try to beat me up on general principles, though I always surprise them with the new twist I can give to the phrase 'gay bashing.' And no I do not kill or even cripple them, at least not permanently.
Emessa was then a town of 11,000 located on the River Orontes, in those days the chief river of the Levant, the central link between the interior cities and the Mediterranean Sea coast. Running south to north, it is largely unnavigable and of little use for irrigation. Though enough rain falls around the city to support dry land agriculture, the city's importance really derives from trade. Roads from Damascus a hundred miles south (160 km) follow the course of the stream up to Emessa then on a further twenty-five miles (40 km) to Antioch, the capitol of Roman Syria and second city of the East (after Alexandria). Other roads from the north and east join the main road at Emessa. The town was also important as the site of the main temple of the Syrian sun god Elah-ga-baal ('mountain of god' in Syriac) or Elagabalus in Latin, though I had no use myself for cults or creeds of any kind.
After taking a comfortable town house and hiring servants, I had set myself up in trade, with mixed results thus far, but I could afford to let things build slowly. Money was not a problem. I lived pleasantly though unostentatiously making new friends, keeping fit, attending the theater, and reading omnivorously. My servants were all free persons drawing fair wages. All were well fed and clean and neatly dressed. Having been enslaved myself I early on determined that I would never own another human being or coerce anyone who was in my service. Whatever the laws of the day said, slavery is wrong.
I used the garden of my home to practice sword fighting and archery, practicing nearly every day but in private, to keep my full capabilities from being known, the better to be underestimated by potential foes. After three centuries of training, practice, and combat experience against bandits, pirates, thugs, and enemy soldiers, I had achieved a mastery of the blade and the bow that few could match. My small size made me quick and nimble. As long as I had room to maneuver I could hold my own against any foe. My stamina gave me another edge as well. It would take a few centuries more of training, practice, and experience before I was confident of outclassing anyone else in a fair fight.
I sometimes used my majordomo, Drusus for a sparring partner. We used blunted swords which could leave bruises but would not cut flesh. A vigorous man in his late forties, he wore light padded armor over his torso while I trained entirely nude. Any slip ups would not really hurt him, while I ran the risk of bruises at least if he connected. My staff was used to seeing me naked since I seldom wore clothing at home when in private. What was the point given how much of every day I spent at the baths plus the one-third of our existence that we all must spend in bed asleep, though in my case, that was more like a quarter, a reflection of my strange vitality. Besides, I liked being naked; I am a bit of an exhibitionist if the truth were known.
"I don't see why you practice so often, master Alexandros. I have never seen better blade work, and I speak as one who served twenty years with the Legio XII Fulminata ('Lightning') on our Parthian frontier."
"As a veteran and a former centurion, Drusus, surely you know better than most that the reason my blade work is so good is precisely because I practice often. Men who rely too much on their natural gifts of strength or speed or reach may find themselves on the losing side for want of that sharp edge that only training and practice can maintain."
"And experience too, sir, combat experience."
"Granted my friend, but let us rest now and ease our thirst with a cup of well watered wine."
"And may I suggest raisins and dates with that, sir?"
I laughed, assenting readily, knowing the man had a sweet tooth, as did I for that matter.
We sat down and refreshed ourselves. We talked about managing the household, capital improvements I wanted to make including a decorative fountain in the garden, and problems with the servants, mostly silly spats soon set aright. Neither of us had any use for troublemakers. Most of the efforts of the servants actually went for the benefit of the household as a whole, that is for my guards and for themselves, as my own wants were quite simple. I did keep the cook busy devising or borrowing new recipes, since I like variety. The pages and messengers and gardener's assistants were all pretty youths, chosen for their eye appeal, and usually went about scantily dressed, though I never took any of them to my bed. My hands-off policy rather disappointed some of the lads. Well, they had each other for company, or the neighbors' servant girls, depending on their tastes.
Drusus and I also spoke of my guards and the training we both had given them. I maintained a small force of eleven both to protect my establishment and to provide a rotating cadre of three for when I joined a trading caravan. I encouraged Drusus to recount more of his experiences in the legions. He was knowledgeable about the foes Rome faced in the East, and I was interested in learning what I could about the potential threat from Parthia, humbled though she now was. In Emessa we were not particularly close to the border of the empire. A generation earlier Septimius Severus, father of the current emperor Caracalla, had extended it two hundred miles east to the towns of Nisibis and Singara in northern Mesopotamia (in modern Iraq).
That evening I saw Lucas with his new patron at a symposium held at the home of Quintus Maximus a rich builder of my acquaintance. Quintus and I shared an interest in the works of the architect and engineer Vitruvius. A man of culture and wide experience, Quintus had long since grown tired of the tedious conversation of the provincials that surrounded him. Not that he was a snob, but he had little patience with the incessant talk of inconsequential matters that usually passed for conversation in a provincial town. He thought a man was not well rounded if he did not devote at least some of his energies to the life of the mind. Not that he spurned the pleasures of the table or of the bed either, nor did I for that matter. Such things were also part of a well rounded life. I have never accepted the claims by some of moral superiority for the ascetic way of life. I like my comforts and make no apology for them.
The evenings of the well-off classes were often devoted to symposia or drinking parties. The symposium was a forum for males to talk, to debate, to brag, to introduce youths into aristocratic society, or simply to party. Symposia might be held to celebrate victories in athletic and poetic contests. Alone or in pairs, the men would recline on couches arrayed against the three walls of the room facing the door. A youth like Lucas would attend as the companion and eromenos (lover) of an adult male with whom he was involved. Unaccompanied boys could participate too but sat instead of reclined on a couch.
My status was a bit of an anomaly. Although a personal friend of the host, I was not his eromenos, attending in my own right rather than as an older man's lover. I was known to be nineteen (or so I claimed) though due to my small stature and slight build and lack of body hair I looked as young as any eromenos there. I attended as a free boy, sitting rather than reclining. I was nude like the other boys rather than dressed like the men. I sometimes performed acrobatics or danced suggestively as part of the entertainment, drawing on my old skills as a joy boy.
I was popular at symposia not only for my looks and willingness to please but because I was a lively conversationalist. I could hold my own with philosophers and literary men, surprised that one so young was so well read in the Greek and Latin classics. I could also speak knowledgeably of far-off lands and peoples, though I often had to attribute my knowledge to reports from travelers and books instead of personal experience many decades ago. I could hardly admit to residence in Damascus and Antioch two centuries earlier or in Alexandria a full century before that.
Food was served with the wine, which was usually well mixed with water, drawn from a large jar called a krater into pitchers and served by nude servant boys, their skins lightly oiled to make them shine. A symposiarch oversaw the symposium and decided how much to dilute the wine depending on whether serious discussions were intended or merely sensual indulgence. Inebriation was not the object, in keeping with Greek notions of restraint and propriety. Also the food helped absorb the alcohol, so matters seldom got out of hand. Of course participants were always careful to offer libations to the gods.
I accepted invitations to join men who sat on a couch by themeselves. This allowed me to widen my circle of acquaintance, though that cut both ways. Yes, I could show that I was convivial, intelligent, articulate, and possessed of a good sense of humor. My nudity itself was unremarkable among an elite who frequented the baths. Almost all of the guests had seen me and each other naked there.
"You know Alexandros," Quintus ventured to say, "as a student of Vitruvius I cannot overlook the unusual proportions of your physique. With most slightly built youths, the legs are disproportionately short, accounting for the deficit in height. Your body is smaller in proportion, retaining the classic ratios which artists have discovered please the eye and excite concupiscence."
As I talked or drank or sang together with first Quintus and then his other guests, their hands would explore my small body, touching me familiarly and even intimately. In that context, it would have seemed churlish to object to the implicit compliment they were making me. It is not vanity for me to acknowledge that I had and have a lovely form that inspires admiration and lust in the hearts of any male who appreciates a beautiful youth.
Nude as I was and pressed together on a narrow couch, it was only natural for them to take what might otherwise have been viewed as considerable liberties: stroking my rump, slipping the blade of a hand into my cleavage, running their hands over my ribs, tweaking my tiny red nipples even fondling my manhood and stealing sweet kisses. After all I had twice spent years in a boy brothel. Nothing new then in such attentions. Indeed I welcomed them. I rather liked being complimented and fussed over and petted.
As the evening wore on I might allow myself to be led to an alcove for a tumble with a man who had taken a fancy to me. The truth is that I was and am a sexual submissive, however assertive I can be in other spheres. Although I enjoy sex with pretty boys like myself, I also crave sex with powerful older males. The difference is that sex with another youth is having fun with an equal and an absolute delight. Sex with an older male, especially one taller and powerfully built, is a need or, a craving. With a boy, I feel energized when we fall into bed and roll around kissing and laughing and touching. With a man I go all weak and submissive, ready to drop to my knees and worship as a supplicant or to bend over and let him take me.
My role as a bottom boy did make it harder to convince older merchants that the youth they had seen with his heels or rump in the air at a symposium would make a reliable business partner.
Chapter 2. Varius
Encountering Lucas at the baths again a few days later, I congratulated him on his conquest adding:
"I hope you make the most of it too, not forgetting to keep up your skills and making contacts for the day he tires of you, as he will. Hard as it is to believe now at your age, you won't always be young and cute."
"I know that Alex. Just because I have a pretty face and sexy body, don't think I am empty headed. All I need is a few years with Lucius and I can start my own business as a scrivener. Lucius had already asked me to help with his business correspondence, copying letters and contracts and such. Sure I am going to have fun too and eat and dress well and go to parties like the other night. But I know I cannot depend on a patron forever."
"Well spoken, Lucas."
I was encouraged by his level-headed, some might say cold-blooded, assessment of his situation and his prospects. The boy had a plan and that did not include lounging around as an idler. I have little use for persons who think the world owes them a living, whether persons vain of their physical beauty or aristocrats proud of their bloodlines. But don't get me started.
"There he is again, Alex!" Lucas said in a soft voice, almost a whisper, glancing at a strikingly good looking youth lounging on one of the benches. About fourteen, he was dark and very slender with well formed limbs and an epicene beauty that must turn heads. Plucked of all body hair in the Roman fashion, like me he was evenly tanned all over, though I suspect it was more from lounging in the sun than from athletics or weapons training. He especially did not seem the sort to enjoy getting his hands dirty in the garden the way I did.
"That's the nephew or really the grandnephew of the emperor himself, Varius Avitus Bassianus. His grandmother and Caracalla's mother are sisters. The emperor exiled his remaining family here in Emessa after killing his brother and co-emperor Geta. They say Geta fled to their mother's arms for protection, but Caracalla had him killed anyway."
Lucas was a good kid and my friend, but he was also a dreadful gossip. He wasn't malicious about it, not at all, but he did like to show off what he had picked up at the baths or from his circle of aquaintance. I had little use for gossip as such, but information about the politically powerful or influential always attracted my interest, if only for defensive purposes, so I would not cross or run afoul of the powers that be.
"They also say he has bedded nearly every soldier in the Third Legion under the age of thirty, winning them over to his side with his charms. He sometimes sells himself here in the baths too, like a cheap whore. That is why he is over there now."
I had heard something of the boy myself even in my short time in the city. Report had it that his mother Julia Soaemias and grandmother, Julia Maesa were grooming him for the purple, should something happen to Caracalla. They had spent much of their fortune on donatives to align the legion stationed at Emessa, the III Gallica, with their schemes. They also set the boy to winning the affections of the legionnaires with his physical charms, welcoming new soldiers nightly to his bed. By all accounts the boy was willing enough, indeed sexually insatiable, what moderns might call a nymphomaniac in a male body. The soldiers for their part were glad to sport with a pretty clean boy after the drab trulls they usually frequented. They gladly dallied with the young prince, said these days to be the natural son of Caracalla, ever the soldiers' favorite.
Still I found it repugnant that his own family encouraged him in a life of open licentiousness, the better to control him and keep him too preoccupied with the pleasuring of his young body to take an active interest in wielding power or in affairs of state. Did Rome need a pleasure-seeking figurehead of a boy on the throne? Would that keep invading Persians or barbarians from the gate? Would taxes have to be raised to insupportable levels to support the kind of extravagances that had marred the rule of earlier emperors like Nero, the man who rebuilt central Rome as his private preserve after the great fire of 64 AD? It was just like aristocrats to see to only their own personal interests rather than those of the vast commonwealth that was the Roman Empire where 60 millions vied to survive and get some joy out of their often difficult lives.
Whatever its shortcomings, the old republic at least held to an ideal of the common good and the interests of all citizens, plebians as well as patricians, what they called the public interest or the 'public thing', which is what 'respublica' means in Latin. The old senatorial oligarchy had its faults but advancement in public office often depended on merit and accomplishment. Of course birth did help one get started on the bottom rung of the cursus honorum (the 'course of honors' or 'honors race'), which was the sequential order of public offices held by aspiring politicians. They had to be men of senatorial rank.
"You are the young merchant Alexandros, are you not?"
I turned to find myself addressed by the boy I had been thinking about.
"I saw you looking at me, but not the way other men usually do. You seemed lost in thought and not about taking me to your bed."
"I am afraid that my thoughts had better remain my own, young Bassianus." I replied.
"Varius. Just called me Varius. Please."
"Very well. Varius."
He chatted me up, asking about my background, the lands I had traveled, particularly about the land of Egypt, already ancient in those days, which he had never visited but wanted to . We also spoke of the four remaining wonders of the ancient world: the Pharos of Alexandria, the Pyramids of Egypt, the statue of Zeus at Olympia, and the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. I found him to be intelligent though not intellectually inclined by any means. He spoke Syriac, Latin, and Greek fluently but had little interest in the classics. I saw someone whose personality was basically shallow but not vicious, at least not then. Even later on, after all his excesses, I blamed his upbringing and his entourage for what ensued over the next four years in Rome.
From time to time that spring I saw him at the baths where he looked his best, at least for me. At the baths the prince could not affect female makeup or garments as he so often did at the palace. I saw a clean if somewhat soft boy not the made up cross dresser so many knew him to be. I cannot say we became good friends, but I did come to know him better than many others in the city. He was quite casual about touching me, even intimately, and once suggested we repair to an alcove to get better acquainted, but that was just good natured teasing. He knew that neither of us was the other's type, though his talented hands (and briefly his mouth) did get me erect.
Ours was an easy relationship for that season. Clearly neither of us was trying to manipulate the other. We were just acquaintances from the bath engaged in light conversation, enjoying pleasant company. Unlike almost everyone else he came in contact with, I did not want anything from him. I did not want his body, luscious though it was. I did not want access to wealth and power through him. I did not seek public office or social advancement or lucrative contracts to supply the army or for public works. Even though we disagreed about many things, he seemed gratified that I took his point of view seriously enough to actually engage his arguments and to counter his points. I think he found it all a refreshing change from the hot house atmosphere he was raised in surrounded by females and eunuchs.
Sometimes we talked of his religious calling and the sacrifice of his foreskin during his recent induction as the hereditary high priest of the sun god Elah-ga-baal. He had wished he could take on the female role entirely and sacrifice all of his manhood, but his god wanted a whole male for his chief priest. The priesthood was hereditary, after all.
All the priests of the god practiced sacred prostitution. Indeed worshipers were never turned away, no matter how mean their offering, though a small copper would get a man a brief session with an older priest, not an assignation with a pretty novice or younger priest. Many men just offered their seed directly to a large stone phallus erected in the courtyard of the temple.
"Things are quite different with the better known Daphne boys of Antioch," I remarked. "With the cult of Daphne the roles of priests and sacred prostitutes were entirely separate. The priests simply run the operation and instruct inexperienced boys in their duties, replacing them as they get older. Yes the priests indulge themselves with the boys but do not prostitute themselves for coin. Patrons can be turned away if they could not afford a boy, but for their coin they get a lively lad, not some dried up old priest."
"Daphne boys are hand picked for their beauty of face and form and kept trim and fit with regular exercise. Clients want boyish but male bodies -- flat where a boy should be that way: in chest and belly, and the sides of the buttocks, but round at the shoulders and the curve of the rump."
"Like you Alexandros," Varius said shrewdly.
Varius himself had too much of the roundness and softness of the female about him to make a good Daphne boy.
Varius was truly devoted to his deity. In his creed, the daily couplings and sacrifice of the male seed were necessary to assure the rising of the sun the next day. I could only shake my head at the foolishness of mankind, ascribing cosmic significance to their own orgasms. How could anyone really think that the great ball of fire in the sky cared one whit about what silly humans did with their plumbing down here in one tiny spot on the face of the planet! In historical perspective, at least the devotees of Elah-ga-baal did not tear the hearts out of their living victims in a bid to ensure the next day's sunrise the way the Aztecs later did for their god Huitzilopochtli, the personification of the sun and of war.
Being in his company so much gave some older patrons the idea that, like Varius, I was there to sell myself. I refused all such suitors but did accept some who offered a real massage in an alcove. I enjoyed the physical stimulation of strong male hands all over my body working the kinks out and spreading scented oils over me afterwards. And my partners were men who preferred an athletic physique on a lad rather than the softness that Varius exemplified.
Late that spring I was at home one day puttering in my garden. My only company was the calico cat, a mischievous young feline stretched out in the sun. In a sense she had come with the garden. She had been living in the ruins of the two decrepit houses out back which I had had demolished but for their outer walls, which now enclosed a much larger garden. Deeming it her territory by priority of occupation, she moved right in to my home and quickly became a welcome member of the household.
Indeed my home was bright with light from the atrium in front, the original peristyle garden in the middle, and now the enlarged garden out back on the south side of my home. That orientation was not only good for my plantings, it allowed sunlight to reach the windows cut in the south side, though with awnings to shade the openings during the hottest months.
I heard a commotion toward the front, evidently from unexpected visitors. I had invited no one. Indeed I was hardly prepared to receive callers being entirely naked, on my hands and knees, smudged with earth, planting, pruning, and checking for infestations of bugs. I dare say I did not look much like the master of the house on that occasion, more like the gardener's slave boy, bare and bronzed, at work kneeling on the ground, brown cheeks resting on bare feet, my lithe torso bent over, genitals dangling between slender thighs, ribs and spinal bumps prominent as, trowel or knife or short handled hoe in hand, I bent to my mundane tasks.
I looked up as Drusus rushed into the back garden to explain that two neighbors, Euneus and Oppius, had showed up at the door to complain about a prowler in the area. He had installed them in the peristyle garden before coming back to inform me. Indeed I could just hear them chattering away. The prowler they complained of was known to be a member of my household, and they wanted something done about it. He was described as a lithe blonde boy dressed in a short sleeveless white tunic and sandals. He had been seen scaling walls and scrambling along along the tops like a cat on all fours. I smiled at the calico cat who at that moment gave me a supercilious look as if to say that Drusus' words were nonsense. No human could ever scramble atop a wall as sure-footedly as a true feline could.
Drusus just shook his head since he knew they were talking about me. I was no prowler, though I could understand why the neighbors must have thought so. One of my favorite pastimes in those days (and to this day) was an acrobatic game similar to the modern sport of parkour. The name of the modern sport derives from the French word for obstacle course. In effect I treated the whole city as an obstacle course, a training ground for a form of applied acrobatics. It was actually the part of my survival training that concentrated on escape and evasion. The idea was to move from point to point as quickly and efficiently as one could, using the unaided abilities of the human body to run, climb, jump, fall, swing, slide, and tumble. All without ropes, hooks, or grapnels.
That spring in Emessa I had spent much time criss-crossing the city, scaling walls, running across rooftops, jumping across alleys, scrambling up the facades of buildings, mostly for the pure fun of it. I reveled in the chance to test my nimbleness and strength not against others but against the limits of my own body as I overcame obstacles like walls, fences, buildings, towers, trees, and ditches. No wonder my neighbors thought I was a prowler and knocked on my door demanding to see the master of the house.
"There he is!" My neighbors exclaimed, bustling into the back garden. Alas one of them accidentally stepped on the cat's tail. Poor kitty ran off squalling. Ignoring the minor mishap, the older one named Oppius pointed to me and told Drusus:
"Seize that slave before he can get away, then call your master."
My majordomo fairly chortled replying.
"I am afraid that naked slave boy working in the garden IS my master, Alexandros. I had better let him explain about your prowler."
Actually it was not too difficult to mollify my two neighbors, Euneus and Oppiusm, strangers whom I had never met socially. They realized that they had displayed bad manners by intruding on me, invading the sanctuary of my home, calling me a slave, and scaring my inoffensive cat. That put them on the defensive. I passed my avocation off as a harmless recreation, though technically it was a form of trespass. I convinced my neighbors I had no desire to invade their privacy. Indeed the speed with which I scampered along showed I was no lurker, with a perverse curiosity about their lives or their women. I did send them away with an apology for any inconvenience and an amphora of fine Falernian wine each as compensation for any disruption my activities might have caused.
I continued to engage in my unusual pastime whenever the mood moved me. I really enjoyed scrambling over the rooftops for its own sake but it was also a fine way to prepare to cope with danger. The varied techniques are aimed at escape, not at confrontation and demand a great deal of agility, balance, stamina, and wiry strength. A large frame and big muscles are an actual hindrance. The acrobatic techniques I developed or learned from others depended on fast redistribution of body weight and the use of momentum to perform impossible or difficult maneuvers at top speed. It was vital to absorb and to redistribute the energy of falls and jumps with body rolls which reduce the impact on the legs and spine. I could jump from a window against a facing wall and let my feet scrape part way down slowing my fall before tucking into a roll at the bottom. The right technique lets a man jump from greater heights than otherwise sensible or even possible without risking serious injury. Typically you try to land on soft ground rather than on paved streets.
In any new town, I always walked the streets and alleys till I had committed them to memory and could find my way about, even in the dark. Over the years I have used these techniques many times to get away from the street gangs of ancient Rome, highwaymen, thugs and cut purses, and assassins who were set on my trail. Their own size and strength told against them. No way they could ever keep up with a small, agile, acrobatic fellow like me. These techniques were another reason I generally liked to wear my sword on my back with the hilt protruding over the shoulder. It could not slap against my legs nor trip me up as I scrambled to safety.
After three centuries, I had learned one of life's most important lessons -- that there were basically four ways of coping with trouble, the very best of which is to avoid it in the first place. In other words, don't be there when it happens. That is where life experience comes in, allowing me to anticipate conflict, to gauge the motivations of those I encountered, to sense enmities building against me, to recognize signals like body language and facial expressions, tone of the voice, and so forth.
I count security precautions as part of avoidance. I would much rather spend my wealth on locks, high walls, cisterns, and trained guards than on ostentation or social climbing. I count those of little worth regardless, valuing peace of mind far higher. I always train my guards myself to ensure their proficiency and loyalty and I include fire fighting in their duties. More than once my guards have helped neighbors put out fires before they could spread to my own home.
Failing avoidance, the next best way to cope with trouble is by negotiation. Sometimes conflict arises from misunderstanding or can be tempered by a well thought out compromise that leaves all parties with their vital interests intact. I don't know how many times I just talked my way out of a dicey situation. The commotion with the neighbors is a minor example of that. It helps that I am not particularly confrontational and am slow to anger, though fools soon test my patience.
If that does not work, I resort to flight. I have no false pride about taking to my heels. I have nothing to prove either to myself or others about my physical courage. I can and have faced enemies squarely enough when I had to, but why take the chance if you do not have to? It is not like I was a soldier with a duty to hold the line shoulder to shoulder with comrades at arms, where turning to run opened a gap that would leave your friends in the lurch. Whenever I take up residence in a new area, it is not long before I set up an escape route or even several, caching funds, weapons, documents for new identities, equipment, and clothing with trusted agents, even those on the wrong side of the law.
The final way of coping with troublemakers is combat, which for me is definitely the last resort. Even though I am very good in a fight and am not squeamish about killing, I am never belligerent or quick to anger. Some take this the wrong wrong way, seeing my reluctance to fight as evidence of cowardice. Such men always underestimate me, thinking I cannot or will not fight not matter how hard I am pressed. I have always proved them wrong, at least so far. I am a dangerous man to back into a corner, and I never give second chances. If I am forced into a fight, I settle the issue once and for all, by any means necessary, even pre-emptively and by stealth (the dagger, the garotte, or poison). Yes, sometimes that leads to what the law might call murder, but my conscience is clear. I never start anything or resort to deadly force first.
Chapter 3. Rome 221 AD
I lost touch with Varius or rather Antoninus as he started to call himself even before he was raised to the purple. They say he actually fought at the head of his troops at Antioch in the final confrontation with the usurper emperor Macrinus, formerly head of the Pretorian Guard who had had Varius' supposed father Carcalla murdered by an agent. Legions that Macrinus thought were loyal to him deserted to the boy's cause, disgusted with the man's incompetence and stupidity. First he lost a war with Parthia he should have won easily, then he agreed to a humiliating peace, handing over a huge indemnity. He funded that by cutting both the pay and the rations of his soliders in half.
No wonder the army turned to a epicene fourteen year old boy said to be the son of their old favorite Caracalla, who, whatever his failings as an emperor, was a good soldier and was always good to his soldiers. So the boy Varius/Antoninus became emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. He and his family and their entourage left sunny Emessa for Antioch then Nicomedia in Bithynia and later for Rome itself.
Once on the throne, he cared little for the Roman state as a going concern, letting his favorites do as they please. His focus was on the palace and Rome the city, not the empire. Elagabalus, as he was known after his god, showed an utter disregard for Roman religious traditions and sexual taboos. He married the formidably endowed Aurelius Zoticus, presenting himself at the wedding as the wrestler's bride. Later he took up with his chariot driver, a blond slave from Caria (in Anatolia) named Hierocles whom he called his husband. He was unfaithful to both spouses with a constant stream of soldiers and others. Married five times to women, he reportedly prostituted himself in the imperial palace itself.
Elagabalus placed his sun god above even Jupiter in the Roman pantheon, calling the new god, Deus Sol Invictus (God the Unconquered Sun). The emperor forced prominent Romans to participate in religious rites celebrating this deity, over which he officiated as both Pontifex Maximus and hereditary high priest. From the vehemence of later denunciations, I suspect that his decadence, madness, and religious zealotry were exaggerated by the political rivals, including his grandmother, to justify his later murder.
Be that as it may, I did not see Elagabalus till three years later when he summoned me to Rome. Though it was politely worded as an invitation, any request to present oneself at the palace must be taken as a summons that cannot be ingnored. At least I got to travel on on government galley carrying messages and officials from the East to Rome.
It turned out that Antoninus' first favorite, the wrestler Aurelius Zoticus, was behind the summons. Greeting me in the emperor's name, he housed me in a modest apartment overlooking the training grounds, promising to present me to the emperor in a few weeks. Meanwhile he asked me to remain nude the whole time I was at the palace to humor the emperor who preferred that all the pretty boys in the palace emulate him in his own habitual or a least frequent nudity.
So aside from an occasional flower in my hair, I went about the palace and gardens entirely naked. Many palace denizens assumed I was a mere slave boy, perhaps some high official's catamite. Others wondered if I were a young priest of the Unconquered Sun and inquired if I were available as a sacred prostitute. My intact foreskin was my earnest that I was not. The palace guards were matter of fact, seeing only a small naked youth who could not possibly conceal a weapon about his person, so of little concern to them. If asked, I simply said I had known the emperor in Emessa before his accession and was now his guest. That made them careful of my person. Oh I did draw my share of stares and caresses, but I did not mind any of that, not in the least. I have always liked to show off my sexy body. In normal men, the mind retains the yearnings of youth even into old age. How much more so then in my own case, eternally youthful as I was and am.
Meanwhile I spent my time on the training grounds wrestling or practicing sword play or running around the track of the Circus Maximus when the horses weren't about. I even wrestled with Zoticus though he was well out of my weight class at more than twice my size, but he insisted. I soon realized it was not about competition. He wanted to dominate me physically and psychologically before turning me to his own purposes and designs. Of course he lusted for my trim body but he wanted more than just to fuck me. He wanted to teach me a lesson in dominance and submission by getting complete control of my body, rendering me helpless, resigned to penetration of my ass with that truncheon of a cock of his.
I wanted to avoid a physical relationship. For one thing I was not sure what Antoninus would make of such a relationship with one of his own favorites, but Zoticus was not to be denied. Actually he was a very good wrestler and much stronger than I was. The only way I might have broken his hold would have permanently injured him (by taking an eye or tearing an ear off). So I had to let the triumphant wrestler subdue me, twisting my arm painfully behind my back then fuck me right in front of the others. Both of us were all sweaty and sandy right down there on the training ground so it was no wonder that grit got onto his oversized shaft and rubbed my small hole raw. Zoticus just laughed the result off calling it my 'virgin's blood'.
The others on the training ground had mostly been in my position themselves at one time or another. I drew some sympathy from Caius Ruffo, a young red-headed palace guard barely out of his teens.
"He always fucks the good looking ones on the training grounds, Alexandros. From then on, as the victor he can summon them to his bed whenever he wishes. He is close to the emperor so no one dares say him no, even when he takes up that whip of his. Sorry I couldn't warn you."
Zoticus liked to use a cat of nine tails in foreplay. True the lashes lacked the usual bits of lead sewn into their tips so they did not tear the flesh. Also the nine lashes spread the force of the blow over a considerable expanse of back or rump, but it still hurt plenty. It was all part of his dominance games. Zoticus liked his victim to beg for his giant cock beforehand then to plead for release from bondage as he worked the whip over back and ass and front. I understood from him that the boy emperor also had a taste for the whip -- in both roles, as the bound victim as well as the wielder. That was Zoticus' way of saying that it would be pointless to complain to the emperor about the whippings. He would probably just insist on laying the cat on me himself the next time.
Afterwards Caius applied a soothing unguent over my welts, which were not serious. That is how I met him. He and I became friends and spent some fun evenings in my rooms, not only for sex but getting to know one another.
"And the emperor does not mind that his favorite seeks out other boys and young men?"
"No, not since he took up with his charioteer, Hierocles. He is very blond like you but is tall, and strong, very masculine and muscular whereas..."
"Whereas I am ... what?"
"Boyish, wiry, incredibly cute, and lots of fun." Caius declared enthusiastically.
"Good answer!" I said chuckling, spreading myself wide to give him access to every part of my body.
I gradually came to understand that Zoticus had wanted me in Rome for political reasons. Possessing my body was only a side benefit. Antoninus had not really summoned me. He had only spoken idly of our past friendship Emessa. I was the one friend he had had who had never asked anything from him. But he had spoken of it a something entirely in his past, before he took the throne. Zoticus wanted to throw us together, to renew our acquaintance and enlist me in his intrigues to weaken the influence of the boy's new favorite, the charioteer Hierocles.
Already Zoticus had asserted his authority over me, coercing me into sexual servitude and keeping me naked like any catamite. I also had to let him win our wrestling matches. He was a better technical wrestler than I was and much stronger, but in a real fight -- one without rules -- I could have taken him. The bad part was that I not only had to let Zoticus win our bouts, but to let him lord it over me afterwards. He was a bad winner, using pain and humiliation to drive home the lesson of defeat. I typically had to kneel with my hands back resting on my heels as he clubbed my face with his monster cock, sticking it in from time to time to get it wet till it was time to spin me around and bend me over for a good fuck. He liked to squeeze a boy's ballsac too, just to show who was boss, who had whom by the balls.
It is not that I objected to the receptive role in male sex or to public nudity, not when it was my own idea, but it was his idea. Formally I was a guest but I could not choose to leave, nor could I wear clothing or freely choose my sex partners. And he got to have sex with me whenever he wanted. All it would take were shackles on my limbs and a change of quarters to reduce me to slavery once again. Zoticus must have known such thoughts were on my mind.
I resolved to thwart Zoticus and to get out of Rome at the earliest opportunity. He had made a serious mistake thinking he could establish control over me by what amounted to physical and sexual browbeating and promises of great wealth. I was rich enough for my needs already. More important, I have always avoided court or palace intrigues as pointless and likely dangerous. I have no interest in power for its own sake or for unearned wealth conferred by the powerful with strings attached. I did not care to gamble for control of the state or be used by others in such schemes.
Nevertheless, at least for a while I would have to play along till I saw my opportunity. I had few resources in Rome. My wealth was elsewhere along with my allies and planned escape routes and access to new identities. I had not planned to come to Rome, and all of my effects had been taken away from me upon arrival and put in storage. I had no money, weapons, clothing, or friends in Rome.
One day I wandered into the palace library. Only the Great Library at Alexandria was larger. For an omnivorous reader like me it was the next thing to heaven. They had the classics of both Greek and Latin literature including many books now lost -- books like the later volumes of Livy's history of Rome, the emperor Claudius' Etruscan history and his dictionary of that language, and the complete works of authors now known only by allusions in other works or by epitomes. Even today I keep hoping for a major find in the Egyptian desert of old scrolls with these lost works. So much of our intellectual heritage from the ancients has been lost.
The chief librarian was an old aristocrat who disdained converse with a naked boy like myself, but his deputy Kleomenes was very helpful and friendly. Not quite thirty, he was bookish but athletic. We often went to the baths and palestra together and I wound up in his bed when Zoticus had other plans, as he often did. He and Caius were well known to each other, so sometimes we made it a threesome. My new friends were vigorous in their lovemaking but never too rough, unlike Zoticus who like to physically dominate and to inflict pain. This was more like it, relating to people because I liked them, not because I had to.
The unlikely pair, the scholar and the soldier, were interesting people in their own right. Caius had been to the wars and had few illusions about war and mortal combat. He simply saw it as a well-paid career, especially remunerative since the time of Septimius Severus, Caracalla's father. A very level headed young man then. Kleomenes had been a soldier for a few years till the loss of his far vision forced a change in careers. I myself was a merchant with a wealth of stories about the East, many of which I attributed to others of course, but they were no less vivid for that.
I even spoke fondly of the cult of the Daphne boys in Antioch, though I did not admit I had been one. Kleomenes had served in Antioch and had availed himself of the services of the temple. It was there that he had heard the tale of the Daphne Boy named Alexandros who had been set free two centuries earlier for rescuing the two young sons of the garrison commander from a terrible fire. Of course the tattoos from my days as a Daphne Boy had long since faded away. They did not suspect that I was that Daphne Boy of long ago.
Then came the day of my re-introduction to Antoninus or Elagabalus as he called himself after his sun god. Zoticus took my to a symposium as his new eromenos. Varius, that is Antoninus, was visibly taller and more mature than back in Emessa, dressed in a diaphanous silk robe, wearing too much make up, but he still had the round limbs and soft body of a pampered youth. For my part, my slight build, though as slender as his, was muscular and toned from all my training. At first Antoninus just glanced at me with a puzzled look trying to place my face among so many that he had met in the last few years (including thousands of sex partners).
"I know you." the emperor squealed in delight. "You were at the baths in Emessa and your name is ... Alexandros. There I have it."
"Yes sire. I have traveled from the East to visit Rome. You look well. I am surprised you remember me."
"Oh, I never forget a pretty face or bum." he replied with a slap to the rump of the big blond lying with him on his couch.
"You are the one man who never asked anything of me, as I remarked to Zoticus not so many weeks ago. So why have you brought him before me Zoticus? You know I don't fancy pretty boys. I like big men. Maybe you are trying to prove me wrong about the boy I once knew. Is that it, young Alexandros? Do you have some request to make of me after all"
"Not at all, your majesty, I only ask your permission to leave Rome by the end of the month now that I have complied with your imperial summons."
Zoticus glared at me for revealing the reason for my presence in Rome. This was not going to plan. I was supposed to pretend that my trip to the capital was my idea and that I was staying on indefinitely.
"So Zoticus, you did not simply invite the young man, you summoned him into our presence in our name. I suppose I should be cross with you, but the boy is delightfully candid. I like that. Yes Alexandros you may depart for Emessa with my permission, but not till the end of summer. Meanwhile, your loveliness will be an ornament in itself around my palace. Zoticus is right in keeping you naked. That is the way I remember you best from Syria, Alex, a naughty boy trolling the baths for company."
"Fit as you look, I supposed Zoticus has you training daily, wrestling with him and running? I tried that for a while but found it tiresome: boring, sweaty, and dirty. The worse was that I started to develop the body of an athlete like yours Alexandros. That physique suits you, my friend, slender yet muscular, but I do not like being so firm and hard and taut. That is for athletes, soldiers, and slaves, not for princes.
I settled back into my place on Zoticus' couch next to that of the emperor and we conversed and enjoyed the evening's entertainment. He drank moderately that evening and seemed pleasant enough, but I sensed deep waters and conflicting currents all around him. True I had made a step forward. I had an assurance that I could leave Rome at the end of the summer, but a lot could happen in a court filled with intriguers in that time. I had crossed Zoticus badly, thwarting his plans. He would not soon forget it.
Nor did he that night. He fucked me especially hard, over and over again, poking and prodding into me from all angles, punishing me with his huge cock. The man was hugely endowed. It felt like he might rip my rectum open or maybe tear it loose from its attachment. At one point, I fought back and threw him off me. His guards rushed in at his call and bound me to the bed frame while he alternated between fucking and whipping me till near dawn.
Afterwards Caius protected me from possible further abuse by the guards, and tended my injuries. I wanted to kill Zoticus and could have done so, but then what? The truth is I dared not lift a hand against a favorite of the emperor. That was sure suicide. Nor could I easily escape the slave catchers if I took off, not when the highest personages of the state commanded my presence in Rome. I had to accept for the moment my painful degradation at the hands of this monster Zoticus.
[Concluded in Part 2]