Exiles

"I remember... sunshine."

Laying on the flat of his back, staring at a crude, murky ceiling, a man spoke quietly.

"I... remember when... the smell of iron... was foreign."

He lay in a pool of blood, some of it his own, with tatters of armor and furs all but glued to his body from the blood he'd shed. The blood that covered his skin.

"I... know there is more..."

He closed his eyes. The image did not change.

Iron slammed against iron. Footsteps. Boots. Feet shuffling. A thump and a soft splash and splat as someone else was thrown into the slave cage with him. He barely moved.

"I am... ready. To... die."

Torchlight stung his eyes as the gladiator was dragged from the muck of the slave pen. He had no clue what day, week, month, or even year it was. Whether it was day or night. How long he had been here, he did not know. He did not care. He only knew the cold stones of the pits.

He was brought out of the holding pens and thrust into a basin of water with a splash. Around him was shallow pool of flowing water where a couple of naked, tattooed, and branded slave-girls quickly set to washing his wounds. These were not the first two bath slaves he'd seen here. Merely the latest. They scraped dried blood from his skin and poured cool, soothing ointments into what wounds were still open. They did not speak. They could not. He did not know why. He'd never asked. He'd never spoken to them. The two girls worked quickly to prepare him for another fight as his tired, sore body demanded to be let to rest, to be laid to rest. To be buried and forgotten. He would not be. Not until he drew his last breath. Bandages were dipped in healing oils and wrapped around the wounds that could not be closed and he was gently guided from the pool and made to stand facing away from it, as he always had been, and always nude. His manhood exposed and his wounds ready for inspection, the bandages already staining faintly with red as water dripped down his body. A bailiff came into the chamber as the two slave-girls knelt humbly, unwilling to even look at him as they presented their work; the wound-tending of the gladiator. The man looked over the fighter, prodding at some wounds or smacking others. The gladiator barely winced. Pain was permanent here.

"Good. You fight." He grunts, using a language the gladiator had been forced to understand from his years here. He barely even recalled what language he'd known before this. He had forgotten how long he'd been here. But he knew what that meant. To fight.

He was brought from the washing chamber and through the armor where he was given a few garments and armor plates. At some time or another, he'd fought with every weapon and armor there was here. He took a trident to hand and a helmet was placed over his head, his chest exposed but for a single plate of armor over his heart strapped in place with a leather band. A simple band of fabric was wrapped between his legs to cover his loins and a plating of steel was strapped to his left leg before he took a net in his left hand. He wished to fall... but he knew he would only shame his opponent if he made it easy.

Already, thundering echoes of chants could be heard as he paced through the blood-stained halls of the gladiator pit. The underground arena attracted hundreds to watch the intense blood sport and the unnamed gladiator had fought, bled, and won for them hundreds of times. At least, he believed as much. He had lost track long ago. He sometimes wished he hadn't.

Pain stung his body as wounds from his last fight ached. The bathing slaves had done their best but what else could they do with so little? He regarded them as his only comfort. Regardless of whether they were his.

He stepped up to an iron gate and stared out at the blood-stained sands of the gladiator arena. Already the stands were filled with chanting spectators. Men, some women, slaves, guards... it was a riot of noise and the fighter could see his opponent across the sands. Or... opponents. Standing behind a second iron gate were four gladiators in various styles of armor and weapon. The gladiator stood alone with his net and trident, merely his heart protected from a blade and his body riddled with pain and injuries.

He lets out a low breath. "Today... I die."

The iron gates fall and he charges out, dashing across familiar sands as the four other fighters seemed much less enthused to be fighting, less willing to charge out, cautious.

"Foolish." He thought to himself. There was never time to hesitate here.

Before even one opposing gladiator had time to ready themself, the unnamed man reached them and opened with a thrust, stabbing the barbed trident into the opposing man's gut and earning a shocked scream of pain from the man as the gladiator raised his plated leg and kicked the opposing man in the chest. The trident ripped out of his belly as air rushed from his lungs and he died with only a wretched, choked gurgle of pain as blood welled up in his throat.

As the gladiator's leg had come up to kick the man off his weapon, a sword swung down to try and cut it only to bounce off the plate protecting the leg. The gladiator looked at the attacker once the speared man fell and saw a woman with dark skin, wild eyes, and simple animal pelts for clothes and armor. The furs were exotic, spotted, colorful. Her hair was long and black, braided with copper rings that jingled as she moved. The gladiator would forget her too. Just like everyone else. She screamed with a wicked voice as she swung a second sword at the gladiator's unprotected neck and he leaned into her attack, causing it to glance off his helmet as he shifted his weight and drove forward, pushing her to the ground where he dropped his trident to punch her in the gut and drive the wind out of her lungs before snatching a sword from her hand and drawing it across her throat.

Rolling off the dying woman as she clutched her neck, for he knew he was not finished with this fight, the gladiator got out of the way just in time for the third of four fighters to drive his javelin into where the gladiator had been, finishing the woman off for certain before pulling the weapon out, turning, and hurling it at the heart-guarded man. He narrowly avoided the flung weapon and clutched his only remaining tool tightly; his net. As he rose to one knee and the javelin-thrower grabbed one of the dead woman's swords, the fourth man, with a large battle axe for a weapon, charged in from the side and swung the axe down at the gladiator. He tried to move but only managed to get his flesh out of the way as the axe caught his helmet and wrenched his head to the side and dropping him down to his knee with the helmet blinding him as the javelin-thrower ran up to stab him with the claimed sword.

Using his right hand, the gladiator tore his helmet off and stared into the eyes of the approaching attacker. He saw the man flinch before he drew the net up from the sand and whirled forward, casting it over the man and catching up his sword as heavy weights on the net's lining held it down and pinned the sword to the man's chest with the tip of the sword to his own neck as the gladiator dashed around him and pulled, forcing the net to tighten and yank the man to the bloodied sands. He stares up at the axe-wielder and goes to stand, stomping on the downed man's head and spearing his neck with his own weapon to let his blood soak into the already mired sand.

The axe-wielder lets out a loud bellow and swings the weapon just for the bloodied and bandaged gladiator to charge into him, underneath the swing of his axe and tackle him to the ground. He mounts the man and starts pummeling him with blows as he catches the haft of the axe and wrenches it away, tossing it into the sand as he bloodies his knuckles on the man's unguarded face while the crowd's cheers deafen him, drowning out sense and sensibility, dulling his pain, and blinding him even as red splatters covered his eyes.

The gladiator is driven into the bathing chamber past a freshly-washed fighter once again and with a shove is sent to his knees in the chamber. Curiously, however, he is left alone in the room. This was... unusual. Often he would be thrown into the pens again and left to rot until it was time to fight and then bathed but now... he was here. Alone. With the bathing slaves. The two girls looked at him with those un-speaking mouths and watched him closely. They knew something he did not. He was sure of it. They must. But blood lust still rang in his ears as the roar of the crowd thundered above them all. He stood slowly, his armor stripped away and his weapons discarded. Much of the blood on his body was not his. He began to move towards them and stepped slowly into the time-worn stones of the basin. The two bathing slaves already submerged to their waists in the water, bare bodies exposed and the endless tattoos running along their skin and the scarred flesh of brands on their shoulder blades visible.

He bore a similar brand. A scarred X carved against his right shoulder blade. A mark of ownership, a mark of death. And he was still alive.

The first of the two girls cautiously moved towards him as his heart thudded in his ears, soaked in blood, naked. He looked down at her. He realized she was so much shorter than himself and as he looked down realized his cock was fully erect. He hadn't even known. She gently moved to him and raised her hands to begin undressing his wounds to wash them and remove the blood from his skin but his left hand caught hers, moving stiffly as unfamiliar actions began to work inside his brain. He had spent his life in the harshness of the pits and the pens... he'd been bathed every time he fought... but...

He drew her hand forward, around his waist, and felt the tender skin of her hip slide against his erect member, making her flinch and shift slightly but with no way to speak she merely looked up with pleading eyes. Beside her, the other slave moved forward and went to press her hands on his chest, shaking her head and trying to stop him but he merely stared back at her.

What more did he have to live for? Why should he deny any urges his body enacts?

He uses his right hand to grab the second girl's throat, his strong muscles making short work of her resistance as he forces her down, making her wince as he presses her cheek to his penis. A silent demand. Fitting for two mute girls. The first girl sees her partner driven down and goes to stop him but only gets as far as looking at him before his left hand releases her arm and goes for her neck, gripping the side of it and pulling her forward as he brings his lips to hers. His body was moving on instinct, on desire, and when her soft, oil-kissed lips press to his he realizes why his body demanded this. These slaves spent their time with the healing ointments and oils to restore and every inch of their skin was soft and tender to prove it.

His mouth tasted hers as he kissed, sucked, and bit on her lip, exploring his urges as his tongue pushed into her empty mouth. She stiffened, squirming against him as her fists went to pound on his chest, pressing her fingers into wounds to try and stop him but he barely felt it. As he pulled back, panting softly, he no longer wondered why they could not speak.

Instead, he turned his attention to the girl down by his waist, her eyes looking up at him as he rubbed her cheek against his penis and his breath drew in and out in ragged patterns. He tightened his grip on her neck and she turned, moving her lips to his member and giving it a delicate kiss to try and placate him. He only gripped tighter and urged her on as she pressed her hands to his leg and rubbed, kissing along his prick as the standing girl's heartbeat thudded against his gripping palm as her resistance subsided, no longer trying to injure him as she seemed to realize it wasn't going to help. Instead, she saw the winces of pain as the brutish gladiator held her neck tightly and seemed to decide she had to do something.

Instead of trying to injure him, the girl pressed forward and opened her leg, curling it around his and rubbing her hands on his chest. This got his attention as her bare breasts pressed to his ribs and she rubbed her lips against his pectoral muscles. And, lower, he felt something soft and tender rubbing on his thigh.

He releases the girl in his right hand and moves it to the first girl's leg, drawing it further open and turning his body to face hers as instinct overwhelms him and he releases her neck to grab her other leg, lifting her out of the water and peering down to her groin. Where he had a dangling piece of meat she had... something else. The gladiator looks into her eyes and sees them wide, her mouth opening wordlessly and her hands pressing to his chest as he draws her hips into his, his penis finding and spreading her delicate, oil-saturated folds and glides inside. A warmth unlike anything he'd ever felt in this cold, ruthless place envelops his erection and he lets out a low, satisfied groan as the girl's mouth opens and closes as her head rocks back, hands clenching onto his chest and fingernails starting to dig into his skin. Beside them, her slave-twin watches with some level of fascination, horror, and helplessness as the gladiator begins to lift and drop his held slave up and down his cock, fucking her with a clumsy, instinctual pace as blood begins to trickle out of the girl's forbidden folds and soaks away into the gently-flowing water, mixing in with his own blood as his movements open old wounds and agitate fresh ones.

As he starts to lift-fuck his claimed bath slave, he looks to the other one and utters the first word he'd ever spoken to this pair.

"Wash."

He didn't know if she would even understand his language, that crude, stolen tongue of the people who'd kept him captive but she immediately did as she was told and began unbinding the bandages they had applied and started to scrape blood off his body and soak it away. All while his hard erection pierced into her partner, his grunts and groans starting to echo off the quietly-burbling water while her hands worked to clean him off.

A welling of sensation built up in the gladiator as he fucked the bath slave and suddenly a jolt of pleasure ran through him. His legs felt weak for the first time since he'd stepped into the water and his cock throbbed, pumping the seed of the first orgasm he knew into the bath slave as she clenched her hands on his chest and bowed her head forward, eyes casting over her tattooed flesh as his semen seeped out of her folds and dripped into the water beneath her.

But he was not done.

As he drew himself from her folds, covered in the remnants of her virginity and his own fluids, he turned to the other bath slave as she looked at him with dismay. He released the first girl and let her fall into the water with a splash before grabbing up the second bath slave by the waist even as she turned to wade away. The deep water hindered her more than enough for the brutish, instinct-driven gladiator to catch her, spread her legs, and search between them for those same folds he had found on her partner. He lifts her hips and collides them with his own, narrowly missing her pussy as her upper body dips into the water, her arms scrambling for anything to grip on to as he realigns himself and spears into her slit, her back arching as he grabs her hair and pulls her up, one hand on the waist to keep her lifted as he begins to thrust into her as well.

Water thrashed and flowed around them as his body began to move in a pleasure-seeking rhythm, the seeded bath slave having resurfaced and found a spot away from him to try and soothe the pain of his penetration and deflowering while she looked on in silent dismay of her partner suffering the same fate. She could do nothing. Neither could. The man was too trained by combat, too deprived of sense, too broken to understand.

He came into the second girl's vagina and held her up for a moment before collapsing back himself, sitting on the steps into the basin as the slave crawled from his piercing member, shuddering as his warmth spread throughout her core and blood seeped out into the washing basin as the crowd of the gladiator pits roared even louder above them, thundering into his ears and making him feel as though they were cheering, applauding, for him.

Boots. Iron. Footsteps. There was not an accompanying shuffle.

He turned slowly as the two slaves tried to cover themselves, ashamed and huddling together as the bailiff arrived with four more men. He looked at the trio and sneered.

"You. Gladiator. Bought. Come." He turned to one of the other soldiers with him. "Replace them."

The three men and the bailiff came for the gladiator, dragging him from the water as the fourth stood by and looked at the two deflowered slaves. The gladiator was dragged naked with half-tended wounds through the armory, where he had been hundreds of times before, but this time he was not armored nor armed. He was not dressed. He was shackled with a collar and cuffs and driven from the gladiator pits and into a foul-smelling stable where a steel cage waited for him and rough-looking men watched on. A dozen other men and women, gladiators most like, were already shackled in the cage and the gladiator, last to arrive, was quickly forced inside and the cart began to move almost immediately after the iron cage was locked.

The gladiator's eyes were stung by sunlight but he did not blink. He stared up, out, side to side, and breathed in salty sea air. He was on a ship, alongside his other sold gladiators, and could see in the distance a port city made of hewn stone and dour cut slabs. Tattered ships, galleons, pirates, and slavers of all kinds hauled ships into port and started unloading immediately. The man looked every which way, taking it all in. The world was immense compared to the tiny chambers and bloody sands of the pits where he had been made. Where he had been broken. Where he had been reforged. Where he had bled, and cried, and died.

For truly, he had been dead. He merely had not realized. And as salty water sprayed over his face from a wave, he breathed it in and let out a low breath. His body had healed during the voyage here. He had been fed enough to survive. He was certain his captors believed it to be a punishment but it was more than he'd had at the fighting pits. He thought they believed him being naked would shame him, would break him. It only let him feel the warmth of the sun as he worked on the deck or felt the salty air through portholes on the slaver galleon. He suspected the filth and muck of the slave deck was to ruin their wills. He'd experienced worse.

It no longer smelled like iron.

As the ship pulled in to port and the gladiators and other slaves were forced into the city, only one man held a wide-eyed gaze. He stepped into a massive courtyard where hundreds of slaves were kept, where buyers and sellers bargained for coins over living flesh. He was forced past a large wooden stage with a hanging sign with a mix of languages on it. He did not know what any of the words meant. He had no idea how to read.

But even as he was forced into a small fenced off arena, as his bare feet felt sun-baked sands, and as his hands were bound and raised above his head and tied to a wooden post in this mock gladiator arena, he merely looked around and took another breath.

"I am... ready to live."