Arena Shifters (A Paranormal Romance Novel) (3 page)

Suddenly the stallion let out
a deafening bray and he began shooting white hot jets of cum down Petronia’s
throat. The scent and flavor of this new release made Petronia gag, sputter and
cough, expelling showers of foamy animal semen onto the hay covered floor.
After the spasms subsided she took the stallions and, closing her eyes she
began to force it into her mouth. To her utter astonishment she found she
could. Before exhaustion claimed her, she opened her eyes just in time to the
huge black stallion melted away leaving Dominus standing in front of her, his
cock firmly implanted in her mouth.

When exhaustion took her,
Domita threw her slave aside and prostrated herself in front of her husband
Gaius’s cock and proceeded to give him the royal treatment. Before Petronia
lost consciousness she saw the strangest thing. While they were fucking, they
seemed to fade in and of different animal and creature forms. She knew that
couldn’t really be happening, but she’d never been so exhausted that she’d had
such vivid hallucinations. The last thing she saw before going under was a pair
of grey wolves rutting like wild animals.

* * * * *

CHAPTER THREE:

A Day in the Life of a Gladiator

* * * * *

Doctore strode the length of
the Ludis, his sandaled feet kicking up dust as he passed by. Even the dust had
a reddish hue to it; a testament to how much blood had been spilled over the
years in the training of some of Rome’s finest fighting men.

He studied the men, twelve
pairs, squaring off with wooden training swords. The sound of wood striking
wood was carried out over the walls of the Ludis and across the lands and into
the very woods where the trees were harvested to build the Lanista’s villa.

If there’s one thing the
Doctore loved, it was the sound of fighting men, they’re weapons were deafening
within the confines of the Ludis. The smell of sweat and blood made his cock
hard as steel. It was so large that some of the men began to wonder if it was
the men who caused the reaction or the fighting. Doctore reached down with his
left hand adjusting his cock so it wouldn’t chafe while he strutted around the
Ludis.

Suddenly he saw something
that demanded immediate attention. He yelled at the top of his voice;

“Stop!”

At the same time, as if to
punctuate his command he cracked his whip over their heads. The sound
reverberated around the walls making the whip sound far bigger than it was.

“You cunts! You fight like
women today, and only the woman here fights like a man!”

He lashed out with his whip
again to make his point. The hardened leather tip came a hairs width from
taking out the eye of a fighting man nearly ten feet away. The skill of such a
strike not lost on the men who all hope they would never be on the business end
of a weapon used with such power and skill. Though he had paid the only woman
training there, he still didn’t think it was the place for a woman. On more
than one occasion he said he’d rather sit around picking the corn out of his
shit than train a woman. Over time he had grudgingly accepted the task but he
didn’t have to like it.

“You fight like women today!
All of you; except for Pet (Pet was the Doctore’s insulting nickname for
Petronia), that’s right, you all fight like a women except for Pet, she fights
like a man. Today you train to lose. In the arena you have no time to think. It’s
all about reflexes and muscle memory. How you train here will be how you will
fight in the arena. You train half- heartedly and with a total disregard for
your opponent’s capabilities. Your defense is like that of a flaccid cock;
useless. Come stiffen your cocks you useless creatures and mount a defense.”

As he stalked the Ludis he
looked for signs of a lack of commitment; men whose hearts weren’t in it.
Anything less than total commitment meant a sure death and a loss of revenue
for the Domina. He would not be responsible for losing money for the House of
Gaius Gracchus Tiberius; not while he still cracked the whip. He looked for
people conserving energy instead of going all out. He stopped at the end of the
line to watch the only two Moors sparring with each other. He saw bad footwork,
poor stances, lazy strikes, and an even more pathetic attempts at blocking
those strikes. The two Moors were the exact reason he despised using wooden
swords in the Ludis. When his father was Doctore under Dominus’ father, they
used steel swords, granted they dulled the edges, but you reacted one way when
a man came at you with a wooden practice sword, and a completely different way
when faced with steel. These men were lazy, safe in the knowledge that neither
of them would be hurt. Laziness brought you death in the arena. These men were
about to learn a lesson.

Doctore cracked his whip over
the two Moors heads, shouting above the noise of battle.

“Stop!”

Instant silence.

“All of you, drop your
swords.”

The men were confused but
complied. He motioned his weapon’s master to come over.

The man ran up. “Yes
Doctore.”

“Bring me a gladius for each
man. Not our finest ones, but serviceable weapons will do. They don’t have to
be razor sharp, but they should have an edge.”

“Yes Doctore.”

The man ran off as the
Doctore addressed his gladiators. “I see before me 12 pairs of average men who
wish to be called gladiator. Two months ago we were 18 pairs. Before the next
man…or woman…steps into the arena he will be prepared! From now on you practice
with real swords; steel ones.”

There was much stirring among
the men. No one wanted to use steel in the Ludis; it was just too risky.
Moments later the weapons master returned with 24 average quality gladius and
began passing them out. The warriors took them silently and began testing them
for heft and balance. After a couple minutes Doctore had them all line up
against the wall. Next he pulled the two Moors out into the center of the
grounds, giving them each a steel gladius. The men hefted the weapons, testing
for weight and balance, or lack thereof. The gladius was the workhorse of the
Roman’s soldier’s weaponry. It was short which made if perfect for close
quarters fighting, and very strong; not likely to break under the strain of
combat. Doctore allowed them another minute to examine the blades before making
his next announcement. He walked over to the Moor from Morocco, and spoke,
while pointing his whip at his brother from Algeria. You spill his blood, but
do not kill him, or you will receive 40 lashes tonight.”

The words had only just left
his mouth before the Moor from Algeria launched a clumsy attack at his brother,
causing the other gladiators to fall away with alacrity, not wanting to become
the victim of an errant strike. The threat of the lashes was a real one. Both
the Dominus’ and the Doctore were known for the practice of whipping slaves
close to the death before senses returned and they stopped. In fact the risk of
taking a mortal hit in training was far less than receiving a death blow from
Doctore’s whip.

This time the men attacked
with aggression born from a desire to avoid being brought to their knees by the
Doctore. The Algerian was systematically unravelling the Moroccan’s defenses and
the Doctore would soon have his blood. As the Algerian was rained down blows on
the other’s upturned wooden shield it split asunder, unused to the abuse doled
out upon it from the other gladiator’s steel blade. Even after it became clear
the man had just suffered a broken arm, the Algerian Moor kept at his attack
with renewed vigor. Just like a lion, weary from the chase but sensing imminent
victory, was spurred on with a rush of adrenaline. Leaping on his Moroccan
brother who had fallen to one knee out of exhaustion, the Algerian made a vicious
thrust with his gladius. His brother, out of instinct, raised his shield arm
again, but there was no shield to deflect or repel the blow, just a badly
broken limb. The tip of the steel blade past through muscle and sinew
effortlessly before slipping between the man’s ribs and piercing his heart. The
Algerian yanked back his sword and was rewarded with a geyser of bright red
blood.

The Moroccan’s gladius
slipped from his lifeless fingers and dropped to the sand signaling the end of
the demonstration. The Gladiators rushed over to their fallen brother, but were
stopped short by the Doctore, with a crack of his whip. The closest gladiator,
thinking his Doctore was going to honor their fallen comrade, remained in place
watching. To his great surprise the Doctore leaned over the body and spat in
his face before stepping away from the stunned gladiators. He stood for a
moment, watching his men. They were clearly unsure of what to do next. Normally
a fallen brother would be placed on a pyre of wood and burned in honor. By
spitting on their fallen brother, the Doctore had just sent a clear message.
You make a mistake in my Ludis and life is worth less than the feral dogs that
roamed the nearby town at night. Nearly every morning several wounded or dead
dogs could be found lying in the streets where they had become target practice
for the town’s security forces. The beasts were just pushed off into the
gutters of the streets where their bones would be picked clean from a variety
of scavenger as well as the occasional street beggar.

The fallen Moroccan was
simply moved over to the edge of the training grounds where gladiators with
renewed commitment to their craft were now practicing with the steel blades the
Doctore had procured. The training went well on into the night. Normally the torches
would be lit after the sun had fallen below the horizon, but tonight they
remained unlit. As the gladiator’s eyes failed in the growing darkness, the
injuries began to rack up. All through the night groans of fighting men, the
clash of steel and crack of whip could be heard far beyond the walls
surrounding the villa.

When the sun came up in the
morning the Doctore’s anger was finally appeased, and his warriors, those still
standing were the benefactors of yet another of his valuable lessons. The
Gladiators were given 3 hours to wash up, eat, rest and fuck, before the day’s
training would begin. As usual, even with the abundance of female slaves among
their ranks, most of the gladiators preferred Petronia’s company, even if it
did come with a price; as her latest suitor was about to discover.

* * *

Petronia

* * *

Few slaves, even among the
gladiators which enjoyed the most creature comforts of any slave in the House
of Gaius Tiberius, except for maybe the Lanista’s and Domita’s body slaves,
were given private chambers of their own. In the case of Petronia, she was
given her cell the moment the male slaves began to notice her; around eleven or
twelve years of age. Now at 18 she still enjoyed private quarters, a luxury
many gladiators were none too happy about.

Exhausted from a day and a
night of training, Petronia turned her attentions to her bath. She stood in a
wooden makeshift tub of clean water and began to strip off her tunic. As she
did so, she was completely unaware of a two pairs of eyes that were following
her every move. As she undid the shoulder clasp and let fall her filthy tunic
and audible gasp went up from the two slaves watching her. The men stared at
her perfect breasts, tanned beautifully under the hot Roman sun, and her
darkened nipples. Their eyes lovingly traced the curve of her belly as it gave
way to the delicate wisps of black hair that defined her sex. When Petronia
bent over to retrieve a cloth from the water, the watching slaves lost all
control and burst into her cell.

Petronia spun around and
stood up in one fluid motion; dagger in hand. She had long since learned the
value of always having a weapon within reach, even when she was taking her
bath. The dagger she now clutched in her hand had been lying at the bottom of
the shallow basin that was her makeshift tub.

The sight of the dagger and
murder in the eyes of the Gladiatrix was too much for the slaves who dropped
the missive on the floor and fled her cell. Petronia dried off her hands and
retrieved the note. It was a summons to go to the Lanista immediately.

Idiots,
she thought to herself. How much time had they wasted
watching her instead of delivering her the summons? How many lashes would her
tardiness cost her? She vowed to track down the two house slaves at a later
time and extract her revenge.

* * *

An Unnatural Encounter

* * *

Petronia was exhausted from
nearly twenty hours on non-stop training in the Ludis. The only thing she
wanted to do was sleep, but she knew from experience that she should eat first.
Going back to training on an empty stomach would be a disaster. She was in
desperate need of the energy the simple gruel would provide. Without it she
would find it nearly impossible to concentrate as was bound to make mistakes
that would end with her blood being spilled on the sands of their training
grounds. But what could she do.

When she reached the Dominus’
chambers she found them strangely empty. Knowing it was a bad idea, she walked
in and began to look around. There were very few creature comforts there, in
fact it didn’t looked lived in. What she thought odd was the silver and black
hairs that covered the silks on the bed. She knew the Dominus’ servants weren’t
careless or inattentive, so why all the hair? On further inspection she noticed
a bowl partially hidden beneath the bed. Bending down for a closer look, she
saw something that chilled her to the bone. There were bones in the dish.
Completely picked clean bones, and the worse thing was, they did not look like
animal bones. In fact, she was no physician but she could have sworn that she
was looking at the remains of a very small child. Without thinking, she picked
up one of the bones. It looked like a partial skeleton of a hand; a very small hand.