The Alliance - 8. Chapter 8

Luca was trying to escape drawing attention in the streets of the capitol, but was having a tough time due to the fact that his companion kept sobbing every so often. Glaring at Luca and his young companion, an older gentlemen in military garb passed grumpily by the pair with an exaggerated huff near the church of the assassin St. Melvin. Luca thought he heard the man mumble something derogatory about whores, but steeled his gaze and walked on.

“Jack, please be quiet. Meko will not be happy if he hears that one of his can’t keep it together.” Almost pleadingly, he looked at the boy and tried to give him a smile. Jack weakly tried to imitate Luca’s face, but his eyes welled and he turned to face the ground. Jack was a new recruit of Meko’s, taken from some village in eastern Ironia. Luca could tell by the clothes that he had arrived in that he had come from near his own region, and was surprised that such a fresh catch had been placed in the main brothel with him. Jack had received the room next to Luca’s, so the blonde boy did everything he could to comfort him until he would receive his first assignment. Unfortunately, that had come sooner than Luca had anticipated.

Three years Luca’s junior at age thirteen, Jack had a small build, caramel brown hair, emerald eyes, and freckles that seemed to cover his entire face. Admitting that Jack was actually very cute, Luca understood why Meko had placed him in the main establishment. His features were rare in Nabius, and he would be popular with many of the patrons. The main whorehouse was filled with people with exceptional or rare traits, and Jack fit that category aptly. But he was also timid and prone to crying, which Luca had been trying to cover up since the moment he had arrived. When Luca was taken at the age of eleven or twelve, he knew that he had cried as well the first few times. An older boy had sheltered him from Meko’s fists, and Luca had been eternally grateful. Trying his best to repay the favor, Luca had stayed with Jack for a few nights and helped to stifle his tears the first week he was there. The tears came unrestricted, however, when Meko informed Jack that he was to pleasure his first patron that day. Jack had been eating there for a week, and Meko felt it was time he started paying his dues. Luca was relieved when he had found out that it would be Count Gorget, the bear of a man that he had stolen from three weeks earlier. Gorget was certainly not pleasant, but he wasn’t prone to beating or choking his boys during sex. That couldn’t be said of all the men in the city. Gorget was also small under the underclothes, and he wouldn’t be too terrible to handle for Jack’s first time.

Luca had been incredibly nervous when he was called back to the count’s home, afraid that the man had discovered his missing knife. But the amount of treasure he owned was obscene, and one knife missing out of a mountain of jewels and coins was nothing. Gorget had simply taken to Luca, and had been requesting him often ever since. When Meko informed the count that Luca would be coming with a second boy for free, Gorget had been more than eager. He requested the boys come two days ahead of when scheduled, and thus Luca was walking Jack towards a very expensive mansion.

It was fairly common that whores were rented out in pairs or groups for patrons who had the coin. It was certainly not Luca’s first session with another, and he was slightly glad that Jack had been paired with him for his very first job. Luca remembered his first job, which he had done with another boy named Seth and a woman whose name escaped him. It was the custom of Meko’s for a whore to have his or her first time with others of his, so they might teach the newbie how to should act to please the patrons. Luca found the tradition a small mercy, in that the first timers always had a hand to hold while they faced the horrors of prostitution.

“You know Jack, Count Gorget really isn’t that bad. He wont hit or purposefully hurt you, and sometimes he gives hard candy afterwards.” Luca suspected that the last part was just so he could watch the young whores lick the phallic sweets, but he decided to leave that part out. Between sniffles, the boy replied.

“I know, I just…” Luca understood. His life was about to very different from the one he had known in Ironia, with a loving family and chances at a happy future. “Will it hurt?” Luca furrowed his eyebrows, and thought about what he would say.

“At first, yes. It will hurt badly. Eventually, the pain will fade into darkness and you wont feel much at all. Just try to push out the entire time instead of clamping down.” The boy looked downcast at that, but Luca didn’t want to mislead him. “You know, I have been with the count many times. If you make noises and appear to enjoy what he is doing, it’s over quicker.” The boy looked at him, dead and expressionless. Luca had thought this would be good news, but their location had brought on Jack’s depression. They had arrived at the door to the vast mansion, and Jack began shaking violently at the prospect of what he was about to do. “Come on. I wont let anything happen to you.” Luca squeezed the younger boy’s hand, and they stepped through the door.

***

Later that evening, Luca walked into the dining room and looked around. Things with Jack had gone relatively well, considering the boy only started crying once. Luca had been able to bear most of the thrusts, and Jack was used only at the very end. The count had seemed pleased, and gave Jack a candy. Luca thought he was waiting to watch the tear-streaked boy go to work on it when a handmaid knocked on the count’s door, yelling something about a Madame Ysabel preparing to stop by. With that, the two young prostitutes were shoved quickly out of the door. When they were in the street, Jack threw his candy into a nearby puddle. Back at the brothel, Luca had helped Jack clean himself afterwards. The boy was feeling a compulsion to wash that Luca knew all too well, and he had experienced a bit of bleeding. An hour after helping the boy clean, Luca looked around to find his young companion, and eventually found him sitting at one of the long tables near a huge man called Jamie.

Luca knew Jamie, and rather enjoyed him. The man was enormously muscled, mustached, and all the hair from his head and seemed to disappear to coat his thick muscles. Jamie was rented out by more submissive men, and even by some of the women. A patron who simply wanted to watch two men once paired Jamie with Luca, and the hirsute giant had been gentle. “Hello, Jamie. Hello, Jack.” The two acknowledged him when he sat across from them at the table and began to eat.

“How’s that?” Luca asked, pointing to a bowl of soup. With a grumbled answer from Jamie that it was pretty good, Luca went and got a bowl of his own. One thing that Meko did not skip out on was food. He always liked to say that he was in the business of bodies, so he kept the bodies that he owned healthy. Additionally, when the money coming in was good, the food was good. The income from work was proportional to the quality of food, and that gave the workers of the whorehouse some motivation. Tonight was a celebration feast that came as a result of the war game month ending, and relatively good profits. Thus, every worker from the house had been summoned down to the dining room to eat together.

Looking around the room, Luca noticed that there were several whores he had never seen before. There was a set of twin girls that he didn’t recognize sitting with an enormously fat woman. How did she fit through the door? All ages of whores were represented in the dining hall, from six up to about fifty. The oldest whore in the place’s name was Rosalynn, and she was apparently popular with the young boys belonging to wealthy families. Though she was just across the hall from Jack and Luca, she had never made an effort to speak to him. Thus, he never spoke to her. She’s pretty, even in her age.

Off to her left sat a girl with two different color eyes, and a boy that wore the clothes of women at all times. Specialties and rarities, Luca thought. After he had shoved prodigious quantities of soup in his mouth and had finished gazing at all assortments of bizarre and – more so – beautiful workers, Luca was surprised to see Yonin Meko walk into his whores’ dining room. The din of cutlery and chatter died down quickly once people began to notice, and Luca frowned when the whoremaster began to speak.

“Greetings, my loyal and lovely workers,” he said with a flair. “It is so lovely to see you all here, no? Each and every one of my best whores in the city, under one roof.” His gold tooth gleamed, and he lifted a glass goblet as if to make a toast. The whores followed, raising their own glasses and waiting for the celebratory remarks. That smile is false, Luca thought. Yonin crushed the wine glass that was in his hand, and let bloody shards of glass and fall slowly to the floor. The thin red liquid had splattered quickly, and the whores in the room remained frozen with their drinks in the air. The atmosphere became thick and dangerous, and Luca felt Meko’s anger releasing in pulses throughout the room. “Unfortunately, we do not have cause to celebrate this evening,” he hissed. “Profits dropped substantially from last year’s war month, and it is all your faults. Thus, I have decided that a new rule will go into effect, immediately. The whore in this establishment that brings in the worst profits each weak will be removed from the main house, to be replaced by a promising member in one of my other establishments.” The whores looked around, nervously whispering but not too terribly frightened. The other establishments were slightly worse off than the main brothel, but none were by any means bad. This isn’t so bad, Luca thought. Maybe I could get away from Meko. As if the man could sense what he was thinking, he added one last part before leaving the dining room. “The transition might be a little hard on your bodies, no?”

By the time Meko had gotten through the door, every whore in the house knew what that meant. Each week, after the totals had been logged, one whore would be ranked as the least useful member in the top house. They would be beaten within inches of their lives for failing to produce before being shipped off. Yonin also had a tendency of going too far when it came to beatings, and Luca knew that every whore in the house was thinking the same thing. The loser of each weak is as likely to survive as not. Starting, Luca looked around the table at his companions. Oh no, he thought. Jack.

***

Carlin had been training with Alex for a few weeks now, and could feel himself beginning to understand the finer parts of Nabian swordplay. There was an art to battle, which meant one didn’t rely on wielding the biggest sword or landing the hardest swings to win. At least, that’s how it was with Alexandre, and Carlin assumed that even men as big as the general with his huge war axe were finessed to the point that they struck with accuracy over power. There were undoubtedly some Nabians who fought with sheer strength, but Carlin had yet to run into any of them.

“Getting tired, Alex?” he asked cheekily. Over the weeks of constant combat, Alex had seemed to be growing accustomed to the man’s japes, and even had retorted with some of his own on one or two occasions. Carlin was coming to find that Alexandre’s aura of cold malice was something he seemed to have naturally adapted from being feared and avoided by everyone save his family and servants, and that he probably wasn’t even aware that he’d etched a permanent scowl into his face.

“You wish, Tomacian.” Alex had intended the reference to the slave’s heritage to sound derogatory, but the gesture only made Carlin grin.

In a quick flurry of black and red, Alex had launched an assault. He was fast and dangerous, and it was all Carlin could do to keep up with the curved blades. Over the course of the past few weeks, the two men had also discovered that the hook swords could be used to reposition an opponents hands, feet, weapon, or head to the advantage. Using the hooked end, Alex could get the blade behind whatever limb – or if he so desired, the neck – and pull it towards him, throwing off the balance and stance of his opponent with relative ease. In an effort to do just that, Alex had gotten the curve of one of his blades behind Carlin’s left calf. When he pulled, Carlin simply kicked his leg upwards and Alex dragged the blade down the back of Carlin’s calf, over the heel, and back to himself. The sound of the metal blades on metal armor was unpleasant, and the two both winced.

“You almost got me with that one, Alex. Interesting strategy. I didn’t know you were trying to take me out using unpleasant noises.” Carlin wore a cocky half smile, mainly for the reason that he had found it often annoyed his opponent. Alex frowned, and Carlin was disappointed that he didn’t say whatever witty comeback had come to mind. The younger gentleman was still very quiet, and didn’t always offer the taunts back to his training slave. He preferred actions to words, and Carlin realized that Alex apparently had a lot to say by the way he shifted stance and his black eyes began to smolder. Here it comes.

Alexandre fought with a ferocity that reminded Carlin of a wounded animal, and he was absolutely no different today. Steel on steel sang the song of battle, and the two men were chasing each other all throughout the courtyard. Carlin was beginning to get the hang of dodging a Nabian’s surprise slashes and stabs, and Alex had begun to understand how to tire out the tall Tomacian in battle. The two fought at an incredible pace, each relentless not to give in to the other. Only once Carlin had jumped over the grey marble fountain in the yard did Alex surprise him and take the upper hand.

Carlin had jumped, turning in mid-air to throw a bone-breaking horizontal slash backwards at Alex, who had already planned the moment out. Stepping on a grumpy cherub’s head, Alex pushed off into the air and had let one of his blades go, watching it soar in tandem with his body. Clearing the blow from Carlin, Alex rotated in the air, spinning parallel to the ground. As he turned, the hooked end of the sword he still held caught the hooked end of the second sword. The weapon had extended its range doubly while in the air, and Alex lashed it out at his opponent before he had landed. It cut directly between the helm and the top of the breastplate, opening a neat line on Carlin’s throat.

“I win,” Alex said, not yet having looked to see that he had actually injured his slave and training partner. In reality, the cut was shallow and completely harmless, but Carlin knew that there was more than one way to win a battle. When he threw his helm onto the ground with a loud, guttural noise, Alex turned to see Carlin on his knees, clutching his throat and gagging. The Tomacian fell onto his back, and pulled a bloodstained glove away in a dramatic move that made it look like the injury had been severe.

“Carlin? Carlin!” Alex rushed over to his friend, horrified at what he might have just done. “Are you alright?! Remove your hands, I’ll call for the medic and we can get – “ Carlin had removed his hands to reveal a cut that could hardly be called an injury, and grinned up at the boy who was now crouched over him.

“That’s not even a cut you big baby. I thought you – CARLIN!” Carlin laughed, loving the changes that came over Alexandre’s face as he went from concerned, to relieved, to incredibly angry. “That isn’t funny,” Alex shouted. It only made Carlin laugh harder. Alex gave him a thump on the chest, and turned to stand before Carlin had grabbed ahold of his forearm. The two both stilled, and looked into each other’s eyes for a prolonged few seconds. Carlin knew he would never be closer to Alexandre’s face than now – unless he was currently putting him in a chokehold during hand-to-hand training, of course – and took his chance.

Carlin gripped the back of the younger man’s neck, and pulled a startled Alex down onto his lips. Alex froze, paused, reach for the knife at his back, and then paused again. Giving in to the most private and deepest of his desires, Alex kissed Carlin back with all the passion he could muster.

The two remained that way for a while, feeling each other’s faces and the touch of warm, soft lips interspersed with quick darts of tongue. The blue-green grass framing Carlin’s face would have brought out the deep color of his eyes, but they were closed as he relished the man of his recent desires. The wind moved soft pieces of grass and stray strands of hair, and the Nabian sun illuminated the two in their most vulnerable moment to date. Though neither knew it, they had both released a series of weak moans and whimpers throughout the kiss, and the younger man was trembling. Alex pulled back, and both were left panting. After looking Carlin in the eyes, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and briskly walked out of the training courtyard, even leaving his precious weapons behind. Carlin watched him go, and threw his head back down into the soft earth when he could no longer see his master. What did I just do?