IN THE SHADOW OF THE PYRAMID, CHAPTER FIVE
By Tommyhawk1@AOL.COM
WWW.TOMMYHAWKSFANTASYWORLD.COM
Four days after I had spoken to Keotin was the day I was to be initiated into the Inner Mysteries of the Great Architect. This was to be the greatest day of my life and it was, a magnificent ritual. I only regret my vows forbid me to tell you of it in any detail, but I and fourteen other students of the Great Architect were inducted into full worship that night.
Instead, at a time when I should have been joining in the celebration, I was running frantically back toward the village, hoping that I hadn't been noticed leaving, hoping that I could make it back without being seen by the two initiates who had been chosen for the duty (praise the All that they hadn't chosen me!) and hoping that the man who was the initiates' target would listen to me!
Panting heavily, I paused outside the man's house. I knew the sigil above the doorway, it was the sigil of Anamaton, the Master Stonecutter. He was one of only six Master Stonecutters working on the Pharaoh's pyramid. One of only two who had refused to listen to and heed the words of the Great Architect.
It had been decided to make an example of him. The initiates were to gain the special blessings of the Great Architect for their work. They were gratified for the chance to serve in this way. Everyone was cheering them on their way.
But I knew Anamaton. He and I had grown up together, though he was some five years older than me, and he had been summoned to the pyramid some seven years before me. He was not quite thirty years old, and yet he was a Master Stonecutter. And he was a man who spoke his mind. I gathered from the words of the Grand Builder, who had worked up a rather vehement lather as he had spoken of Anamaton's insolence, that he had spoken out against this new religion, and in words that made it clear he would not give even a lip-service to the Great Architect, nor allow those of us who were adherents (we now numbered some two out of every ten workers among the builders) the chance to worship according to the dictates of our priests. There were rituals that we were to do five times each day, it would take but a few moments of our time for them to be done, the work on the pyramid would not be affected in any significant way, we would place the symbols upon the stones in places where they would not be intrusive or show after the whitewash was applied...but Anamaton would have none of it, and with his opposition, the unanimity required for such rituals to be permitted was denied.
And so Anamaton was to be beaten until he was unconscious, his bones broken in ways that they could not heal properly, and with him removed, the new Master Stonecutter, the Grand Builder assured us, would be amenable to the words of the Great Architect.
I pounded at his door with the stick hanging from a rope there for such a purpose. Mere fists would not penetrate a wood that thick, wood meant to withstand brigands and burglars.
"Who is there at this hour?" came Anamaton's call from within.
"It is I, Kephrin." I said. "Kephrin, from our home village, do you remember me?"
"I remember Kephrin."
"It is I." I repeated. "And you are in danger. You must hide this night, away from your home. You must hurry, I don't know how soon they will be here."
"Give me the oath, that I may know it is you."
"I swear by the blood of the cypress tree." I said to him. It was the private oath of the families of my home village, based on the legends of our village gods. None but those from our village would know of it.
Anamaton opened the door. "Kephrin." he said. He held his blanket about his body and I felt for the first time how chill the night air had become.
"We have no time. You must get out of here now, hide until morning. In the morning, we can have the guards to protect you. But for now, we must get you out of here."
Anamaton looked at me and at first I thought he would argue with me. He would be leaving a home designed, among other things, to withstand a brief assault from outside. To leave this protection for the outside....
The look on my face must have convinced him where words could not. "I am in your hands."
"This way." I said to him, leading him through the village away from the direction of the House of the All. Beyond the village was only the desert, but if we could get far enough away, put the nearest hill between us and them, it was unlikely that the initiates would come looking in this direction. They would seek Anamaton among the houses, or along the riverbank. Yes, if we could get beyond the hill, we should be safe.
Such a long way to run, we were lucky only in that the moon had not yet risen, the starlight didn't reveal us the way moonlight would have. Had the full moon risen, it would have shown us as two flies crawling on a winejug, as it was, we were able to make it to the crest of the hill and beyond.
As safe as we would be for the night, and exhausted from my run, I sank onto the ground, gasping and sweaty. Anamaton sat beside me, he was much more rested, though he was also breathing heavy.
"We must...run further..." I said. "We cannot...stop here...."
"You're exhausted." Anamaton said. "We can rest a while."
"Not...too long." I said. "They will...come looking for you."
"Only two initiates." Anamaton pointed out. "They cannot look everywhere."
I considered that. "That is true."
"And if you were them, where would you look?"
"About the village."
"So we are safe."
"But if they find us?" I was getting my breath back, but slowly.
"There are two of them?"
I nodded.
"And there are two of us, and I no longer will be caught unawares." Anamaton pointed out.
"But they only need to come over the hill and they will see us." I protested.
"Look about us." Anamaton said. "What do you see?"
I looked. The desert about us was not as clean as it was a short distance further. All the detritus of the village no longer needed ended up here at the edge of the desert. It was not a garbage dump that we were in...but there were plenty of objects of various sizes about, broken jugs, discarded sledges, chunks of stone.
"Could you find two men sitting still in all of this with only the starlight?"
"The moon will soon be up."
"Then we will cover ourselves with my blanket." Anamaton said.
"I would be grateful for that." I said, for my sweat had cooled on my body and I was getting cold. The desert is so cold at night, there are no plants to hold in the heat of the day. Even so close to the river as we were, the cold was sharp enough to be uncomfortable, if not enough to bring the fever upon me.
Anamaton brought the blanket around me. "I am grateful in my turn for your warning." he said. "What will your Grand Builder think of you giving me this warning."
"I hope that he does not know I have delivered it." I said. "I have heard more than I care to think about at this time. The Great Architect is a marvelous being, but I think the Grand Builder is planning to use the words of the All to increase his power. I worship the All and the Architect who brought sense out of the All, but I am not sure what to think of what I have heard this night."
"So your eyes have opened tonight." Anamaton nodded.
"I don't understand." I said.
"I have heard of this Great Architect and the All." Anamaton informed me. "When I was here before you arrived, the Grand Builder approached me as he did you, to bring me to his religion. He wasn't as smooth in his technique then as he was now. He told me of his new god and that with the help of the Great Architect and the All, we who build would rise to great power among the lands of men. With him as our leader, of course." This was Anamaton unchanged since my days as a youth, he cut to the heart in one smooth blow of the chisel of his mind, to lay bare the inner stone and all its flaws. "I only fear that he has now won enough to his way of thinking that he may now try to seize this power he craves."
"I fear you are right." I agreed, and I shivered when a gust blew on my unprotected side and bit at my flesh.
"You are still cold." Anamaton said. "Take more of the blanket."
"I should not." I demurred. "Your blanket is for one man, it will not cover two."
"Not if we keep sitting up." Anamaton agreed. "The blanket is meant to cover a man lying down. Lie down with me and we will be warmer, I am sure."
I was cold enough, and tired enough, to agree. I lay upon the desert sands, a little warm still beneath the top grains of sand, and the sand shaped itself to my body as sand will do. It was not as comfortable as my bed stuffed with grass, but I could make shift to sleep here this night, if I was able to be warm.
And Anamaton snuggled his body against me and I realized for the first time that he was naked, this blanket was his only covering. His manhood pressed against my thigh.
But of course. He had been undressed for sleep, and my rousing him had been quick. He had simply held the blanket while he found out who was at the door...and then I had brought him out to the edge of the desert to hide just like that.
I myself wore only my loin wrap, my cloak was still back at the House of All. I had not dared to take it, I had slipped away from the others as if only leaving for a moment, to make water outside of the house, and would return. And then I had been running to warn my childhood friend.
"This is not bad." Anamaton said as he cuddled a little closer. "But we could use a cushion of some kind for our heads, and to keep the sand out of our mouths and eyes while we sleep."
I unfastened my wrap and bundled it into a rough roll. Now we were both naked under his blanket. I pushed the wrap under our heads and it made a reasonable cushion. "Is that better?" I asked him.
"I was hoping you would think of that." Anamaton said and his hand came over and caught my prong. His hand was quite soft, a Master Stonecutter spends most of his time supervising and training others, he does not have the callouses brought on by the endless blow of hammer upon chisel into stone, which jars the bones and thickens the palms. His palm was as soft as a kiss as he enclosed my cock and gently stroked it into life. "I was hoping you would think of that." he purred into my ear. "Now I can repay you for your warning this night."
"You..." I gasped. "You need not feel obligated to me." I said. My cock was betrayed my demurrer, it was loving this touch. "I would have given it to any who were to be misused such."
"But if you had not been from my own village, I would not have listened." Anamaton pointed out. His hand now had me at full rigidity and now he was pumping me not to awaken my passion, but to bring it to fruition. "Tell me truthfully if you would have warned, say, Zephekaten as you warned me."
"I...I am not sure." Zephekaten was another Master Stonecutter, and a rude, arrogant man full of his own mastery. "I am not sure." He was the other Master Stonecutter who disdained the Great Architect, but he disdained everything that didn't lead directly to his own gain or prestige.
"You wouldn't love to see him shipped back to his home village as an invalid?" Anamaton pressed me.
"I would not shed very many tears."I agreed. "Ah, ahh!" My first twinkles of desire sparkled like the first stars of nightfall. But full night was around us and the night was full of stars, and in the east, the full moon was peering over the edge of the hill. I could just see a triangular top that would be the one finished pyramid. The one I worked on would be the second, and larger, but it was as yet perhaps only two-thirds done in terms of its size and there was much more to be done to it after the last stone had been cut and put into place.
Anamaton slid his head under the covers and I did not protest as this action moved the blanket down my body, for while my shoulders and upper chest were now exposed to the chill air, my prick was now covered by the warmth of Anamaton's mouth and he sent my dong deep into his throat and held it there, and that warmth echoed up my body.
I thought for a time that he would never release me, and I groaned and my hips thrust up to try to move myself inside Anamaton's mouth, but I accomplished little. Only when I surrendered and fell back in defeat did Anamaton begin to move, and his little motions did more for me than all my thrusts upwards with my hips.
As I writhed under Anamaton's ministrations, Anamaton moved to bring his lower body up to beside me, and I understood easily enough what he wanted. My first taste of his cock was unpleasant, for he had unwittingly doused it with sand, and I spit and licked my mouth's insides and spit again, while I wiped at him with my hand until I could try once again. There was still a taste of sand upon him, but not that much more than any human body endured here in our land, I could accept it as the cost of taking Anamaton into myself and I worked my lips up and down that sturdy shaft while Anamaton's diligent care sent shudders of pleasure through my body.
But I was gaining ground, I took him deeper and faster, and Anamaton let go of my dick for a moment and gasped, "Yes, Kephrin, yes! Why did we not do this back at the village?"
"Because I was too young still when you left." I pointed out. "I was only eleven when you came here, I was still a boy." Like myself, Anamaton had been taken at the age of sixteen, to carry the water for those who labored while he learned the ways of the pyramid builders.
"Ah!" Anamaton dove back onto me, and I hastened to return. I was content to simply suckle Anamaton like this, and would have done it the entire night if I could have, for as that boy back in the village, I had stared at Anamaton's marvelously clean and shapely body and lusted for it as only a boy in the infancy of his puberty can lust, without reason and without hope. He had only grown stronger and better looking over the years, his title had gained him leisure, not for him was the lines that pulled themselves into a laborer's body from the many days of physical exertion, Anamaton was now in his prime and could hope to retain his good looks well into and beyond his middle years.
So I was content to suck on his cock while he sucked mine, but Anamaton stopped after a time, and pulled his cock out of my mouth. It made a noisy slurping sound when he did, for I had lavished my saliva upon him, first to clean him and then to lubricate him. Anamaton threw the covers off both of us as he did this, and panted, "Now, upon the blanket for the sand cannot come between us now."
I obeyed, knowing what he wanted, I went on all fours upon the blanket, it cushioned my knees and hands from the sand, and buoyed me up somewhat, and Anamaton crouched behind me and I felt his pud slither between my cheeks and slimily knock upon my nether entrance.
Anamaton did not wait for me to try to open myself for him, he guided it a bit more true with his hand, and then his cockhead was pushing into me, and I pushed myself back against him, my sphincter screamed and then opened for him and he delved into me and my body thrilled at the shaft of raw delight that slid through and into me, and when it was fully buried, I clenched my butt muscles tight, this time I was the one who held it prisoner within me, not wanting it to move.
Anamaton groaned after a time and I knew I was driving him to distraction with his need dismayed by my clutch, and I relaxed and when I did, he pulled back and then drove it into me again fiercely, as if to make up for his motion and send it as much into me as he could.
I was lost in my own rapture in no time, Anamaton had already driven me more than halfway to my own climax, and when his body fell into a rhythm and his hand reached under and grabbed my dong once again, it was a lost cause for me to attempt to hold back much longer.
"Ah, ah, I am close." I warned my lover and Anamaton fucked at me the faster. I dropped my head onto the blanket and I grunted my delight into the woolen covering, and then I grunted louder, to warn Anamaton of my progress into the height of desire.
Anamaton's hips slapped my buttocks as he rammed his cock into me, and I felt how hard he was, how close he was, and I fought desperately against my need to ejaculate, but I was too far gone, and I could only groan helplessly as my passion hit its peak and I squirted my seed into his blanket and wriggled in my ecstasy beneath him.
And when I was done, and limp and exhausted, Anamaton lay me down full body upon the blanket, and in that position, he finished me with slower, but diligent thrusts of his lips that wriggled more than plunged my ass with his cock, and after a short time of this, his own orgasm caught him and I felt his sperm gush into me with the ease of the cattle entering their stall, gravid with their milk and ready to give it to their owner, grateful for release, and I was surfeited with his jism and took it greedily into myself, to burn and cool itself within my bowels. Anamaton pulled the blanket about us again, and a portion of my wrap was still under my head, enough to keep the sand out of my ear and lower eye.
I listened in the silence broken only by our still somewhat labored breaths in the time that followed, wondering what the initiates would do when they could not find Anamaton. Would they return to the House and would then the entire congregation of the Great Architect set out to find him, and with him, me? Had my absence been noted? I didn't care, I did not intend to return to the House and face the Grand Builder, knowing now what he was. I still craved the blessings of the Great Architect, but comforted myself that I now knew all that a worshiper needed to know about his rituals, I could build a small altar for myself in my home and pray that my words would be heard there as easily as at the larger house of the Grand Builder.
In that comforting thought, I surprised myself by falling asleep despite the danger we were in and indeed, we were not disturbed. I was awakened only by daybreak and with it, the sound of the morning horn.
I sat up, surprised. I was alone. I had Anamaton's blanket about me, but my wrap was gone. I looked about, and with nothing else I could do, I held the blanket about myself and I returned to the village, wondering if I would be grabbed by the Grand Builder's minions at any moment. Had he noticed the lack of one initiate among the fifteen of us who had joined his congregation last night? Or had I simply vanished.
My father greeted me as I re-entered our home. "Where have you been?" he asked me. "Some of your fellows of the Great Architect were looking for you this morning."
"I...chose to sleep elsewhere." I would not burden my father with this, not until I knew how much trouble, if any, I was in. "What did they want?"
"There was trouble last night." my father said. "A grave incident has occurred. There is to be an assembly after the morning meal."
"What has happened?" I asked. This did not sound like personal trouble for me.
And it wasn't. "Zephekaten was attacked last night. Two men broke into his home despite the strong door. They have broken both his arms and both his legs. He said that they called their work the vengeance of the Great Architect."
I was dismayed. I had spared Anamaton by my warning...and the initiates had simply taken on the other reluctant Master Stonecutter in his place. Despite my attempt, the warning had been delivered.
The Great Architect's followers were now a force to be reckoned with within the area around the pyramids. What this would come to mean remained to be seen. A lot would ride on what happened in the next few hours.
THE END OF CHAPTER FIVE
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