wine.
“So, Marcus,” he began expansively, “how do you find our little corner of the empire? Dull, no doubt, after the fun of Rome?”
As the slave girl bent over to pour the wine, she offered me a splendid view of her taut, conical breasts, hanging within the billowing neckline of her tunic. I tried to respond to my magnanimous host as best as I could. Although somewhat distracted, I heard myself assuring him that the present company, at least, was the equal of any to be found in Rome. He beamed in appreciation of the compliment It was true, he admitted with a thoughtful nod, that in some ways we had been able to retain “a bit of old Rome” here in the hinterlands. He paused, and then brightened up. For example, there were the games!
“When was the last time you saw a couple of famous gladiators going at it?” He grinned with amusement.
I’ll admit I was a bit bewildered, but I couldn’t help smiling at his obvious enthusiasm. It had been a while, I allowed, remembering those disastrous games where I had lost a more than a few denarii betting on the blue team. But there were no games in Bernesium. Surely, my host didn’t maintain a stable of gladiators! Now I discovered he had a different contest in mind. For, after a teasing pause, he enlightened me, grinning broadly. He had arranged to have a special entertainment staged in my honor. As a man who appreciated the ladies, he leered, he felt sure I would enjoy his very special “gladiators.”
Now the master of the house clapped his hands and shouted triumphantly:
“Let the games begin!”
Intrigued, I watched as two hooded figures appeared from between the circle of columns surrounding the room. They were barefoot, their bodies shrouded in long wine-red cloaks with cowls that turned up to cover their heads. The mysterious figures came to a stop just in front of their seated master. They stood side by side, awaiting his orders.
At an imperious gesture from him, they threw back their cowls dramatically. I found myself staring at two slave girls, young women whose heads were all but shorn, their hair clipped to a short stubble, as was sometimes done to slaves in Rome. They stood at attention, their eyes fixed somewhere over our heads. Gratius nodded when their hands went immediately to unclasp the collars of their cloaks. The two garments slithered down to the floor, revealing two naked female bodies, young and taut-muscled, glistening with a fine sheen of oil. As I watched awestruck, they bowed low, saluting their master.
Gratius said not a word, but kept them standing there, knowing that I would want to be able to compare these female wrestlers who would be entertaining us. As Gratius appreciated, one likes to size up the contestants. We sat in silence for a moment, evaluating the healthy young females who stood motionless before us.
Then Gratius leaned over to me.
“The girl on the left is Leia.” He called my attention to the rather stocky curvaceous girl. Her features, like her body, had a softly rounded girlish quality. I could only guess from the light brown stubble that had been left to her what she might have looked like with a full head of hair. I next studied her hefty tits. Generous though not excessive, they drooped slightly to swell into two sloping pendants crested with wide, thick nipples. Not only was the hair on their heads shorn, no doubt useful for wrestlers, but for some more obscure reason, the girls’ pubic hair had also been shaved clean. Totally bereft of its natural fuzz, Leia’s plump little pubis was pale and shaved clean, so that it stood out boldly from between the full curves of her powerful thighs.
“And this,” my host continued expansively, “is Uta.” He pointed to the other girl. A bit taller than her more muscular rival, Uta had a lean, tightly knit body, slim-hipped and more angular than curved. Her breasts were narrow and pointy, capped with small dusky nipples. Her features were crisp and neat. With her nearly bald head, she had a clean-cut look enhanced by her trim lines and her denuded sex, a narrow triangle of shiny white flesh tucked between her sinewy legs. Though she would have been outweighed by her more substantial sister, she had the hard, wiry build of an athlete. She would be a very tough opponent, I surmised.
“Well, what do you think?” Gratius asked at last, breaking my reverie. A note of eagerness crept into his voice.
“About evenly matched, I should say.”
He agreed. Both were strong, determined young women. It was his idea to take advantage of their intense rivalry by pairing them off. The winner would be allowed to complete her triumph over her adversary in a very unique way, he assured me with a mysterious wink.
“But come, you must be a betting man,” he hinted.
“I would give the edge to Leia.” I took the safer bet.
He smiled. “A modest wager, perhaps?”
I had the sinking feeling that I was being taken, but there seemed no gentlemanly way out. I accepted his hand and the bet was made.
With a flourish of his hand, Gratius dismissed the wrestlers, who bowed in acknowledgment, and turned to go to take their places on the field of combat The room we sat in had three wide tiers, with a sunken circular pit in the middle of the room. Gratius and I were seated on the topmost level. Now the girls turned their backs to us, and I watched the rare view they presented as they descended the three levels to the sunken arena. Leia had the more generous ass, plump and voluptuous, while Uta sported a pair of narrow hard-muscled buttocks. A set of pillows had been placed in the center circle. Stuffed with down and covered with hard, smooth linen, they made the ideal surface for a slippery wrestling match, my host assured me proudly.
Now the two naked women separated and stood across the arena from each other, eyeing each other intently, poised and alert, like gladiators sizing up their opponent for the point of weakness. At a word from their master, they crouched and began circling each other warily.
I watched my favorite with interest Leia’s feet were planted firmly. The sturdy girl moved slowly, with extreme caution, always sideways, her eyes locked on her opponent, searching for the right opening. Her full breasts fell forward and hung temptingly as she widened her stance and crouched, her hands extended, the gleaming muscles of her arms and shoulders moving liquidly as she circled her opponent grimly. Meanwhile, Uta was also moving slowly, her lean body poised like a cobra about to strike. Her slight breasts swung from side to side when she crouched and began to move with slow menace. My eyes studied her face: the narrowed eyes and the determined set of her tightly drawn lips. The girl was ready to spring! Her tense body coiled tightly, sleek calves straining, as she rose up tiptoe, one hand beckoning, taunting her rival.
But Leia would not be drawn to make the first move, and the two continued to circle till I wondered if they would ever close.
Suddenly it happened! With a savage shout, Uta bounded forward, her head lowered, aimed right at her opponent’s belly. Leia reacted just in time to deflect the shorn head, although she took a glancing body blow that propelled her backward, so that she staggered and almost lost her balance. But she recovered in a flash and instantly the two women were locked together in a death grip, arms grabbing each other’s slippery body, grappling and twisting, straining desperately to keep their balance.
Leia managed to get a leg between Uta’s and pressed forward. She used her strength to slowly bend the slender girl back under her superior weight But somehow Uta managed to slip away with a quick slashing move that brought her slithering out of the bearlike grasp. Both girls were finding that getting a purchase on a writhing oil- slicked body was obviously very difficult. Now the action became hot and heavy as the two combatants closed again, twisting in a brief but furious blur of limbs. Once again, the embrace could not be sustained and the two obviously excited wrestlers, sweating and panting from their exertions, fell apart once more, to begin once again their slow, cautious circling.
I shot a quick glance at my host to find him leaning forward, his eyes keen with excitement. His gaze was riveted on the sweaty scene, fascinated by the slow, deadly dance. My own excitement was rising at the sight of these naked girls squirming hotly in the heat of combat, and now my need was making itself felt by pressing against the front of my tunic with alarming urgency.
A warrior’s yell drew my attention back to the struggling combatants. Uta had somehow managed to get herself behind her opponent and had her arms wrapped around her from the back As Leia struggled to shake her off, Uta fumbled for a better grip, groping wildly till her clutching fingers closed on a handful of her opponent’s tit. Her fingers tightened, clenching the slick mound of flesh in a fist. Leia cried out in pain and shook even more furiously to dislodge her attacker. Leia managed to bend forward and reach between her legs to grab Uta’s outthrust leg, pulling it to topple her foe, who fell with a resounding thud.
