In His Arena 1: Slave Eternal (25 page)

Fucking was good enough, wasn’t it?

He met Hektor’s eyes, a challenge rising even as his heart leaped in denial of it. No. He didn’t want this.
No. No!
The cries were locked in his throat. His body a servant to the Ebon and its fell desires.

Anger shot across Hektor’s face. “Fine then. You can have it.” He grabbed Lucan by the shoulder and turned him roughly. Lucan cried out as he was shoved to the table, the Ebon burning hotter pressed to the smooth surface. Its heat radiated out, turning the marble into a sweltering altar upon which Hektor would fuck him.

He felt fingers at his hole, and then Hektor’s cock stretched him wide, almost painfully so. Merciless, Hektor slammed into him, rocking him, rocking the table. Lucan gasped with the force and roughness. Hektor’s fingers bit into his hips as he began to fuck Lucan in long, punishing strokes.

Even as the pleasure burned through Lucan’s body, tears welled in his eyes. He wanted Hektor to take him tenderly, to hold him and love him, to look him in the eyes as they both came. And now…

Hektor grunted, driving in like a beast. Pain turned to pleasure, the pulsing of the Ebon searing Lucan in time with Hektor’s powerful thrusts. A low whine tore from Lucan’s throat. He could not help rocking back, could not help giving up his ass, his ecstasy to the brutal fucking. He needed it; he deserved it. He was only a slave—a slave who had fallen for his mentor.

If this was all Hektor could give, Lucan would take it.

“Take it, bitch-boy.” Hektor’s guttural groans were punctuated by the slapping of his thighs against Lucan’s ass. He reached around and fondled Lucan’s balls.

Captured, impaled on Hektor’s implacable cock, Lucan could only cry out, begging for his own ruination. Hektor’s grip on Lucan’s balls tightened. They were fucking so hard the table pitched and shrieked forward inch by inch. Their cries and groans filling the courtyard, the slapping of sweaty flesh.

The emotionless caryatids lining the quad were not their only witnesses.

Lucan caught glimpses of servants peeking in, watching the famous Hektor Actaeon fuck his student to within an inch of his life. Lucan couldn’t help being the whore. He wanted to be beneath his man. It felt right. It felt good. He shifted, tried to turn, but Hektor grabbed him by the nape and held him down.

Battered, Lucan grunted with the force of his pounding.

Three more hard, unremitting strokes, and Hektor let loose, flooding Lucan’s ass with hot cum. He shouted triumphantly and kept pumping wildly until he softened enough to pull out.

Dazed, Lucan felt the loss of Hektor like the loss of his own limb. Cum ran down his thigh, already cooling. Dimly, he realized he lay in a puddle of his own seed. Wasted. He’d wanted to shoot his wad on Hektor, to brand his skin and claim the man as his own.

Hektor was looking anywhere but at Lucan as he donned his tunic. He’d walk away. Lucan could barely walk. He moaned and collapsed on the table. Spent, spent into. Hektor’s slave and whore.

HEKTOR WATCHED THE slide of semen down Lucan’s leg, and regret festered within him. Now that the lust was fading, satiated, he felt tremendous guilt. He’d held Lucan down and rode him, used him, called him a bitch-boy. Lucan had liked it. But not even that fact assuaged Hektor’s guilt. He should not have lost control. Lucan deserved better than this.
Better than me.

He wanted to lean in, to tongue the cum from the boy’s thigh, to roll him over and take his softened cock into his mouth, to bring him off hard and fast, and then sink down on that shaft and let it burn through his hole in the bawdiest, filthiest fuck he’d ever had.

He wanted to look into Lucan’s eyes when Lucan came inside him.

But if he allowed Lucan to touch him, if he allowed himself to look upon the young gladiator, Hektor knew he would have to face the Ebon. And he knew he could not see it and bear it.

Three days until the Grand Melee.
I should tell him.
Only three days.
Tell him what?
Hektor touched the soft fall of hair at Lucan’s nape.

That I love him.

Roughly, he pushed away from the young novice, leaving Lucan spread out on the table, bereft. He glanced back, saw the youth gather up his robes, wipe his nose with the back of his hand.

Hektor’s heart gave a nasty jolt. Was Lucan crying?

When Lucan turned, Hektor quickly looked away, but not before he saw the tears.

Damn me to the Abyss!
He strode from the courtyard and to the stair. Climbing quickly, he took the shortest path to his quarters. He pushed the curtains aside violently and entered his chambers. The sun was bright through the far draperies, casting shadows in the deep parts of the room. In the dimness, he could only make out the outline of a man.

Stratos’s voice made the rest of him unmistakable. “You seem…fond of him.”

“I’m fond of his ass,” Hektor lied, hating himself.

Stratos’s look was shrewd. He cocked his head, like a snake regarding a bird. “Truly?” he asked, toying with the cord to the curtains. “Because just now… That seemed like more than fondness for his ass. Though…” He slid the curtain aside an inch. “I can see why you would be fond of it.”

Hektor glimpsed Lucan through the curtain. At that moment, the boy turned and they locked gazes.

Resolve darkened on Lucan’s face. He headed Hektor’s way.

Panic burst bright within Hektor.
If he sees me with Stratos, he’ll think
… What? Lucan’s footsteps were light on the stairs. Hektor froze.
That I am conspiring with him. Perhaps that the Ebon is my fault. That I—

“Hektor?” Lucan called from behind the curtain. His voice wavered, and from the thickness of it, it was evident he was still crying. A sniffle, and then Lucan cleared his throat and tried again. “Hektor. I know you’re in there.”

Stratos’s smile was wide and cruel. He held a finger to his lips and stepped back.

Hektor would not have thought the scant shadow in a sunlit room would hide the councilor, but it seemed the shadows pulled themselves from the corners to cloak him.

Hektor only hoped he stayed hidden.

Lucan brushed the curtain aside. The look on his face nearly made Hektor’s heart stop. The blotchy cheeks, the tear tracks, the red-rimmed eyes. Despite the ugly black mark that glowed upon his chest—a circle with two slashes through it—Hektor wanted to sweep Lucan up in his arms and whisk him away. The temptation grew strong, but Stratos was hidden in the shadows, lurking, watching.

Hektor could feel his presence like a stain on their encounter, a dirty voyeur. “Lucan, you shouldn’t—”

“I love you.”

The words hung in the air between them, and Hektor backed away, as though he could outrun them, outrun the sentiment attached to them. But Lucan would not have it. He stepped forward, taking Hektor’s hand in both of his. His fingers felt fragile as tiny bird’s wings. Hektor had seen Lucan develop from a gangly boy to a young man, and he knew the strength in him, but here and now, he seemed so small, so vulnerable.

A breeze from the window seemed to bring a dark chuckle.

Hektor tried gently to pull his hands away—“Lucan, this isn’t the time or the place”—but the younger gladiator held them tightly.

“Then when?” Lucan’s voice was thick with desperation, anger. “In three days, when I go into the Grand Melee?”

Hektor jolted. It was as though Lucan had read his mind, his emotions. He wanted nothing more than to seize him in a kiss, to carry him to his bed, but Stratos… the Ebon…

He dropped Lucan’s hands. “Lucan, I—”

Lucan kissed him, threw himself into Hektor’s arms and kissed him with wild abandon. His tongue probed, and Hektor could not help opening for him. He moaned into Lucan’s mouth. The younger gladiator felt so good against him, their skin touching, the feel of strong arms, warm abs.

Hektor lost his mind for a moment and gathered Lucan to him, crushing him into a smoldering kiss. He could feel the young gladiator getting hard. Hektor ground against him, his own cock rising. His excitement rose.

And then curdled as a breeze touched his nape.

No.
He would not make a spectacle of their love before Stratos. He would not tell Lucan he loved him with that man watching, waiting to use it against them like a weapon.

“Tell me,” Lucan begged. Looking up at Hektor. His golden eyes beautiful and pleading. “Tell me you love me.”

Hektor could only look at him, that breeze on the back of his neck seeming to clamp down like a vise. He gazed down into Lucan’s eyes.
I love you. I love you.

Of course, the boy could not understand.

Frustrated, Hektor thrust him away. “Go.”

“What?”

“You should go. The Grand Melee is only three days away. You’ll need your rest.”

“But…” Lucan went to reach out and then stopped himself. “Hektor…”

Hektor turned his back. “Go! Leave. I don’t want you here.”

A sob came from Lucan, and he fairly fled. All Hektor heard was the curtain brush open and then the fluttering of fabric, strangely frivolous in contrast to the stark notion that he might never see Lucan again.

A part of him wished it were true.

In three short days, he’d have to watch his lover fight for his life in the Empress’s Theatre. Hektor cursed himself.
I could have given him something to fight for. His spirit is crushed, he’ll never be able to—

“Fond of his ass?” Stratos emerged. “I think there is something more going on here.”

For three years, Hektor had never felt a hatred so hot. Not since the Ebon had taken him, taken control of his body, leaving his mind free to witness his horrible acts. Now, that burning hatred drove him to envision his hands around Stratos’s throat.

He stepped in, the rage contorting inside him.

Stratos only smiled. “Touch me, and I’ll command him to throw himself on the sword of the first gladiator he sees. The mighty Lucan of House Vulpinius, dead and of no use to anyone.”

Horror rose within Hektor. He clenched his teeth and kept his distance. One hand went to his nape, to the blotch that rode there, a dirty brand, both accusation and proof of what he’d done.

And now Lucan bore that same mark. Hektor could not keep the worry from his mind, his heart. “What are you going to command him to do?”

“I have my plans.”

“Are you going to have him fall in the arena?” Hektor’s body was strung tight with nerves. That couldn’t be Stratos’s plan. The winner of the Grand Melee brought both accolades and riches to his house.

“No.” Stratos waved that off. “Of course not.” He looked at Hektor, leveling him with a shrewd gaze. “Why? Are you ready to admit you love him?”

“No.” Hektor knew he had answered too quickly. He could not take the word back, or its true meaning.

Stratos’s smile curdled. “True love. Very rare.” He seemed to consider. “It is something our Empress would be very interested in. I am certain she would be very interested in the two of you…and your plight.”

The mere mention of the Empress sent a bolt of panic through Hektor. The woman was dangerous—an immortal mind trapped in eternal darkness. Rumor said she held the fell power of the Doomsayer behind those blind eyes. Rumor said a lot of things.

All of them dark. All of them evil.

Hektor wanted her nowhere near his Lucan. His innocent, golden Lucan.

He clenched his fists and gazed back at Stratos. The man would never tell him his true plan. No. Stratos was a sadist. His plan would unfold as he willed it.

And I
… Hektor raised his chin.
I will be ready. Empress or no.

Stratos seemed to read the defiance in his eyes. “You will fail.”

“I won’t.”

“Prepare yourself, primus palus.” Stratos’s voice dripped sarcasm. “You pit true love against the power of ages.” His smile was cutting. He went to the curtains to make his exit. “Fight or fuck—that is her one rule of two men who come before her. I wonder what your fate will be?”

Chapter Fourteen

IN THE HOUSE OF ZAERUS

The House of Zaerus

The highest house in all Arena

Brighter than day

Darker than night

—Zalera Zaerus, House Zaerus, the Rulers

The summons came at predawn, written in the Empress’s own hand—an elegant, sprawling script that meandered across the parchment. The intent was clearly sinister, but the words were nothing if not innocuous.

You will bring your slave and yourself before me at noontide.

Hektor’s hands shook as he read it again and again, turning it over in his hand, crushing the bull’s-head seal of House Zaerus.
Stratos.
Hektor stepped onto the balcony of House Actaeon and looked at the few domiciles laid out on the tiers beneath.

Yet, even as he looked at what lay below, he felt the weight of the two houses above—opulent House Vulpinius and the brilliance of House Zaerus, the House of Rulers. Seated on the highest tier, it was closest to the sun, perhaps a foolish plan in a land where being close to the daystar so often meant death. But the Priassin architects had devised a masterful layout, an enclave with gables and angles that diverted the sun away from the living quarters and kept them cool and comfortable, even in the hottest part of the day. Bright pennons and awnings embossed with the bull’s head had been erected as proof against the sun, making the entire enclave appear swathed in pennons and pageantry.

Even the dying moonlight deflected, casting silvery rays on the tiers below.

Hektor stared long at that house. For up there, nestled in the center of the Zaerus stronghold, was the Empress’s chambers. The place where she looked down from on high at the men and women who labored and died for her enjoyment.

The place where she brought men to fight or to fuck.

His hand trembled on the parchment. Yes, Her Imperial Majesty loved Spectacles. Would she force Hektor and Lucan to make one for her today? He gritted his teeth and crumpled the summons. Was the Grand Melee not enough for her? Not enough that Hektor would have to face his lover on the field of battle. What more could she want?

But if he refused, he would be forced to fight Lucan directly.