Slave Girl: Chapter 3 (Patreon)

Just like that…I was alone with her!  

I look around as if somebody might step in and tell me what to do but with the screaming over the people go back about their business.  Just leaving the square I see the man in the yellow robes and his group.  As much as I disliked them I felt like I ought to call out to them, to ask them questions or have them give me direction, but after a few seconds they disappear from sight.  I’d never been responsible for anybody but myself before.  What was I supposed to do with a slave!?

I look back at the girl kneeling and leaned up against the platform she had been displayed upon.  Long violet hair covers her face but I can see that her eyes are closed.  Her breathing rapid and shallow as she collects herself from the torturous branding she had just endured.  I stand frozen for a time.  I had very little experience with either slaves or women in general beyond my family, especially ones as pretty as her.  Strangely, her small horns and pointed ears only added to her allure, on her these demonic features did not look out of place.  Though they were a visual reminder of her exotic nature.  This was not the type of woman a common man like me ought to be messing around with.   The fact she bore the curse of the Amazons set me on edge most of all.  She looked harmless enough but, if the stories were true, ill fortune clung to this woman like pine pitch.  Gods, what had I gotten myself into here?

Sensing me hovering nearby she swallows and says softly.  “It’s…v-very beautiful.”  Opening her eyes she looks down at the nasty red mark seared into the back of her hand.  “The symbol.  It’s beautiful Master.  Thank you for giving it to me.  Thank you for choosing me.”

“Uh…yeah.”  I say awkwardly.  Her nudity made a difficult situation even more uncomfortable.  Stepping forward I set my pack down and pull out my thick wool paenula.  I offer her the traveling cloak.  She takes it and gratefully slips into the over sized garment.  On her my cloak looked like a billowing tent.

“Thank you again Master.”

“You’re…welcome.”  I say hesitantly.  This was so surreal.  Suddenly I was linked with this woman, this stranger, this demon blooded Amazon girl I’d only seen for the first time this very afternoon.  I hadn’t a clue as to how to act, what to say, or what to do.  I blurt out.  “I’m leaving the city.  I don’t live here.”

“Very well.”  She stands and reaches to take my pack.  “I will carry.”

“No.”  I pull it back from her as if she were trying to steal it.  “I’ve got it.”

She nods with an impressive calm given the ordeal she’d just been through.  I stand up and sling the pack over my shoulder.  She looks up at me, on even ground she didn’t even come up to my chin, and she says with just the hint of an accent that I did not recognize.  “You are tall and built well.”

I feel a blush warm my cheeks at the compliment.  “M-my family is not wealthy but I’ve never wanted for food.”  The words felt foolish to say but I was at a loss.  “Um…I…need to go now.”  

Turning from her I start back the way I came.  Just behind me I hear her bare feet pad along the stones of the street.  I wished she didn’t follow but of course she had no choice.  I walk in long swift strides, her shorter legs had to move twice as fast to keep up but she manages it.  Secretly I hoped she’d either try to escape or simply just fall behind and get lost in the crowd.  This grand city was an endless warren of narrow alleys packed with countless citizens and slaves.  If there was anywhere an escaped slave could blend in and be anonymous this was the place.  No such luck though.  Once she catches up she stays directly behind me, following in my wake so that she could not be separated from me.  Around us the masses pass by, some trying to hawk their wares but most hurrying along about their own business.  It is all a blur to me, as I walk my mind races.

I’d signed a contract.  It would soon be in the Empire records.  Why hadn’t I thought about that beforehand?  Curse my slow and simple mind!  And I had used my real name.  Those men did not know me or my family.  I was a first time visitor here in the capital.  Only now do I realize that I could have signed anything on those documents and they would have been none the wiser.  It would have been a crime but one unlikely to catch up to me.  As it was I was now the legal owner of a slave that I didn’t want and there was documentation to prove it.  She was mine as fairly and legally as my deceased uncle’s land.

“Master.”  Her dulcet voice interrupts my thoughts.

I reluctantly come to a stop and turn to look her direction, though my eyes carefully avoided hers.  My worry and annoyance must have been evident on my face because she instinctively takes a half a step back from me as if she expected I might strike her.  

“What?”  I ask in a short clipped tone.

“I am sorry Master.”  She says.  “You…appear vexed.  I can see the tension you are holding in your shoulders.”  She motions off to the right.  “There is a public bath just down there.  It might ease your mind and body before the journey ahead.  I can wash and massage…”

“A bath?”  I cut her off.  “Didn’t you hear me back at the market?  I spent all I had on you.  I have nothing left for luxuries.”

“It is a public bath.  Only a few copper coins would get us both…”  Her voice fades as she reads my cross expression.  “You were being honest back there.  You spent your last coin on me.”

“I have no money.  I have nothing.  Nothing but my land and what I carry.”

She steps closer and gently places her hand on mine.  “And me.”

I pull my hand away.  “I am leaving the city.”  I say firmly, then after a tense pause add.  “You don’t have to follow.  I won’t pursue you.”  I spin and start on my way once more.  Only a moment later I hear her bare feet hurry to catch up then follow behind.

By the time we reach the outskirts and I can at last see the green farms and hills stretching off to the South the sun is touching the horizon.  Gone are the crowds and the noise and the smell and the claustrophobic streets.  For the first time since the morning I am able to take a full deep breath.  If I never saw Rome again I would consider it a great blessing.

“It is late.”  The slave says.  By the tenor of her voice I sensed an unease rising in her.  As my anxiety was easing with leaving the city, hers was growing.  “Perhaps we could go back and find a place to rest.  A fresh start in the morning would be good.”

My gaze focuses out over the vast landscape.  There was nothing in the world that could make me go back now.  “The sky is clear.  The moon will be bright tonight.  I will continue well into the night.”

“Yes Master.”  She replies uneasily.  “I will follow.”

I turn back to her.  Looking down at her I say.  “Run.”

“Master?”

“Go.”  I motion back toward the city.  “Escape.  I won’t stop you.”

“Master…they’ll kill me.”

I sigh.  “Then to the North.  To the East.  Disappear where they will never find you again.  Go somewhere you where you can hide your curse.  Just go.”

She studies me a moment, trying to look into my eyes though I did not meet her gaze.  Direct eye contact with attractive women was something I was never comfortable with.  “Master, you say you have nothing but land and what you carry.  I don’t even have that.  Even this cloak is not my own.  This is all I have now.”  She shows me the rose shaped brand that I had designed on the back of her hand.  “Master, I have nowhere to go.”

“Friends?  Family?  A home?”

She shakes her head.

“Well…find a place!”  I exclaim.  “You cannot come with me.”

“I am yours now.  I belong with you.  There is no other place for me.”  

“Belong with me?”  I grab her hands, she grimaces as I inadvertently touch her burn.  I quickly shift my grip to her fine fingers instead.  Flipping her hands palms up I look at them and rub my calloused thumbs across them.  They were as supple and tender as a fresh apple blossom.  “How many weeds have you pulled?  How many sheep have you milked?  How much dough have you kneaded?  Have these hands even worked one honest day?  I am a farmer.  Ceres is my goddess.  I have no use for a soft city slave.”

Her ears tilt down expressing her sadness as she looks at her smooth pale palms then slowly up to me.  “Please.”

“I am doing you a favor.”

I go to argue more but she falls to her knees at my feet and beseeches me.  “Please don’t throw me away Master.  I will learn.  I will work.  Please!”

“I’m not…throwing you away.  I am freeing you.”

“I do not wish be free.”

“But I do.”  I state.  “This was never supposed to happen.  Now listen to your Master…and go!”  I step back and wave her away as if she were a pesky insect.  “Go!  Now!”

There is a long quiet moment as I stand and she kneels, facing each other, on the darkening road.  The crickets had begun their evening chorus.

“You are sentencing me to death.”  She says flatly.  

“Not if you’re clever.”

“And you to fines, a lashing, and possibly even exile.”

“Me?”  I say.  “Well…just don’t tell them about me.  You don’t even know my name anyway.”

“I know what you look like.  I know you are a land owning farmer from the South who was in Rome on a specific day at a specific time.  I know you had exactly one hundred and sixty pieces of silver and that you were not accustomed to having it, an inheritance perhaps?  And, of course, I know where you purchased me and who from.”

“Fuck!”  I say.  “Don’t say those things then.  Don’t say anything.  It’s the least you can do for me.”

She sighs at my naivete.  “I won’t have a choice Master.  Besides…”  She holds her branded hand up.  “…this was made with magic.  Those things you signed were possibly magical as well.”

“Magic?”  I whisper.  Out in the country we had little beyond common hedge witches and herbalists, but in the cities true practitioners of magic were not uncommon.

“This mark I bear is more than skin deep.  Eventually I will be discovered.  They will find me and then they will torture and kill me.”  She says.  “And then they will find you.”

I stare at her as the words slowly sink in.  Covering my face with my hands I moan.  “Gods.  What have I done?”

Her forehead touches my feet as she bows deeply.  “You saved my life.”

Chapter 4