Slave Girl 2: Chapter 95 (Patreon)

As a group we watch the lunch wagon squeak along to the next crew.  The moment I felt they were safely out of earshot I wrap a knuckle off of Lucas’ empty head.

“OW!”  He winces as he cowers and rubs his sore skull.  “What was that for!?”

“That was for your loose lips.”  I say sternly.  Every other man turns to him, looking as displeased as I was.  “Training was your idea.  You went and got us a teacher.  And you’re going to jeopardize it after one session?”

“I…I…”  He looks around at each of us.  “I only told my brother.  That’s it.”

“We agreed to keep this quiet.”

“Lucas!”  Julian groans, the others join in grumbling their discontentment.  “So that’s it?  We’re done?”

I shake my head.  “Horatius has agreed to turn a blind eye as long as we get our work done”  I glare at Lucas.  “And keep our mouths shut.”

“I just thought he might want to join us.”  Lucas says.  “I never thought…”

“You didn’t think.”  I say.  “And besides, we decide as a group who joins and doesn’t join.”

“No.” Toke snaps.  “No more.  Period.”

“What about my sister?”  Lucas protests.  “You let a girl join and not my brother?”

“She is a woman and hers was the last spot.”  He says.  “If the group was any larger I could not give you each the attention you need.”

“Then why let her join at all?”  Lucas grumbles, clearly still not comfortable with his sister’s involvement.

Toke almost smiles.  Almost.  “Because it is forbidden, Roman.”

“Now listen here, slave…”

I step in and push Lucas back before he could get his ass kicked.  “Lucas!  Calm yourself.”  I fix him with a hard stare.  “You wanted this, remember?”  I nod in the direction his father had just left.  “And Horatius is allowing you this.  He’s certainly not doing that for us.  He’s doing it for you.”

Lucas looks off toward the lunch wagon.  “He is?”

“Yes.”  I say.  “So let us seize this moment.  As warriors.  As brothers.”

He sighs and bows his head, then nods.  After a hard swallow he looks around at the group.  “I’m…sorry brothers.  It won’t happen again.”

The others step in to slap his back or shoulder and accept his apology.

“Alright men!”  I bark.  “Horatius said we whooped the other crews this mornin.  Let’s show him that we were just getting warmed up.”

With firm nods my men take up their tools and we set back to work determined to outdo our best.  By the time that the work end bell is ringing we had done just that, and then some.  Walking back to get our hard earned supper we are one again.  There was nothing quite like a shared struggle and accomplishment to bring a group together.  As we’d done last night we collect our dinners then head for the platform, a place we’d been eager to return to all day long.  Along the way we stop by the supply shack to grab some tools we could use as makeshift weaponry.  On the way out we are questioned about it but when they hear about us heading to my place to put in some extra after hours work nobody wants anything to do with us lest they be asked to chip in.  With Toke in the lead the rest of us eat and joke around as we wind our way through the forest.  What we find waiting for us in the training square even makes Toke pause.

It was Cassie, but a Cassie unlike any of us had seen.

Proudly she stood in the dead center of the stone platform with tight linen wrappings around her hands, wrists, ankles and bust.  Those around her joints were meant to buttress them against her stronger opponents while the wrapping around her chest supported her ample bosom by keeping them squeezed tight to her body.  Her privates were covered by a pair of snug fitting shorts kept securely in place by a type of drawstring that she’d sewn into the waist.  Her normally flowing dark brown hair had been bound into a long tight braid that ran straight down the center of her head and down her back.  Our eyes adjusted to the dark of the forest she seemed to glow in the small clearing of the platform, her slightly oiled skin lustrous with a copper like sheen.  The biggest change from last I saw her though was in the eyes.  Fear and trepidation had been replaced with an iron clad confidence that shone from her like midday Sol.  And the source of that inspired confidence, or so I suspected, stood just behind her shoulder with her horned head bowed.  Rosa’s mouth moves as she whispered words of courage into Cassie’s ear, her petiteness and demure posture making Cassie seem all the more grand by comparison.  The simple buxom farm girl I had kissed just this morning now looked the avatar of fearsome Bellona, goddess of bloodlust and battle.

“Woah.”  I mutter under my breath as a couple of the others have similar reactions.

Cassie thumps her fists together.  “Hello boys.  Ready to bang?”

“Bang!?”  Gasps Julian.

“Nobody’s banging anybody!”  Lucas carps as he rushes forward to shield his sister’s body behind his.  “Cassie!  Why are you dressed like that?”

She steps around him, her eyes on me.  “I could have worn just my knickers like you guys.”  She shimmies her chest.  “That would have been quite a sight.”

“We’d be okay with that.”  Quips Quique as we pile the tools we’d brought beside the water and supplies the gals had already set out.

“Mmm mmm!  Gods have mercy!”  Smiles Oeneus as he imagines a topless Cassie.  “I would have surrendered on the spot.”

“Guys!  Shut up!”  Lucas waves his arms at the chuckling Hispanians.  “Stop looking.”

Cassie, hands on her hips, says.  “You expected me in a gown Lucas?”

“No but…but…”  He looks to Toke.  “This isn’t right!”

Toke steps up onto the platform his cold eyes focused not on the luscious flesh but the linen wraps.  He takes her hand and inspects them closer.

“This is good.  Excellent.”  He looks at Cassie curiously.  “Too good for a farmer.”

Rosa steps in behind Cassie and places her hand on her shoulder.  “My Mama was a warrior.”  She says.  “Some of my earliest memories of her was helping her with her wrappings.”  Knowing my Lady’s deftness with the rope it did not surprise me at all that she could tie wraps just as well.  With a very ‘slavish’ bow of her head she says.  “Miss Cassie asked if I could help.”

With a slow nod Toke looks at my little slave with a new found respect.  “Scythian?”

“Amazon.”  Rosa says back without hesitation.

“What?”  Lucas gasps as every eye snaps toward Rosa.

Sensing this shift in mood I quickly move to my slave to put a protective arm around her and stare back at those who stared at her.  “Is there a problem?”

“Sh-She means adoptive mother.”  Lucas says.  “She’s a demon.”

“Half demon.”  Cassie says as she comes to stand on Rosa’s other side.  “Her mother was an Amazon.”

“No!  No way.”  Lucas shakes his head, unable to accept the truth when he heard it.  “Amazon’s are like…seven feet tall!”

“Are they?”  I say.

“I heard they only had one breast.”  Julian says.

“Do they?”

“She’s not…she can’t be…”  Lucas says in exasperation.  “Here?  Impossible.”

“Perhaps you might not know as much as you think you know Lucas.”  His sister replies.

“Is it true they…that she…”  His eyes roam downward.

“None of your damn business.”  Cassie cuts him off.

“Mom and Dad will never let you…marry him.”  He says.  “Not with her.”

“Lucas.”  I say.  “They already know.”

“What?”

“And soon everyone will know.”  I say as I look around.  “If any of you cannot accept this tell me now.  Let’s have it.”

“No problems here.”  Oeneus smiles.  “I like Miss Rosa.  She’s a real classy lady.”

“Aww, thank you Master Oeneus.”  Rosa says, which sets him to smiling harder.

“Same!”  Quique nods as he thumbs in the road’s direction.  “They give you any trouble Miss Rosa…”  He slaps his chest.  “…you let me know.  Okay?”

Rosa giggles.  “Thank you Master Quique.”  He rolls his eyes and swoons in that dramatic way of his.

“But…but…”  Lucas stammers.

“Amazons have never done wrong by me or my people.”  Gyasi cuts in, already peeling out of his tunic for training.  “Can’t say the same for the Romans.”

Lucas looks to Julian, his last possible ally.  Julian shrugs.  “I trust Quin.  If he trusts her enough to own her, I trust her too.”

Julian’s unexpected words of faith in me and my judgment takes me off guard.

Lucas at last looks to Toke but the northman had nothing but admiration in his eyes for the petite demon.  She was a fellow slave, a fellow outsider, a fellow survivor inside of a conquering empire.  Lucas sighs as he finds nothing but a united front standing against his prejudice.  Despite everything I actually felt bad for the guy.  Ever since I’d met him Lucas had continually found himself looking foolish and on the losing side of things.  On the bright side though, this time he wasn’t ending it with a sore noggin.

“Alright.”  He says at last.  “Alright!”  He claps his hands and pulls his belt loose.  “Are we training or what?”

Out of the corner of my eye I catch Cassie’s grin.  Despite all of their bickering she was proud of her big brother.  Cassie and I lead Rosa off the platform to a blanket beneath they already had laid out a short distance away at the base of a tall oak.  When we get there Rosa turns and reaches up to touch my face.  “It is good to feel you again Master.”  She smiles.  “Train hard my boy.  Your Lady is listening.”

“Yes my Lady.”  I whisper and give a very subtle bow of my head.

She turns to Cassie.  “Remember my dear.  Be strong.  Be fearless.  Be clever.”  She lays a hand over her heart.  “They will be stronger of body, you must be stronger of spirit.”

“I will remember Lady Rosa.”  She gives a similar bow of the head.  “Thank you.”

Rosa settles down on the blanket and makes herself comfortable and waves us to join the others.  “Go ahead.  And don’t beat each other up too badly, hm?”

Cassie and I peek over at each other a flicker of competitive fire already burning between us.  “Yes my Lady.”  I say as she echos.  “Yes Lady Rosa.”

Chapter 96