Bone.
“Tell your mistress she’d better guard her reputation. Rumor will spread that she’s soft. In the head.”
I heard a thwack, and the man cried out. I guess Bone had socked him.
“I meant no offense,” the man whined, suddenly obsequious. “I have my orders.”
“Bone.” Domitia Tertia appeared in the entryway. “That was the agreement. No clothes. No belongings. Bonia, strip her and put everything back in the safe.”
I kept my eyes fixed on Domitia Tertia as Bonia lifted the tunic over my head. I wanted to communicate something, though I didn’t know what—gratitude, defiance? But she would not meet my gaze. She was willing me out of existence.
“There was one more condition, domina,” said the man, who was still behind me.
She made an impatient, dismissive gesture. I was no longer her concern. But she couldn’t quite sustain her indifference. For just an instant, she caught my eye. What was she saying? I know you. You will haunt me. Then the blindfold blotted out everything.
I could hear the other whores sobbing, and I fancied I could also detect the faint brush of old Nona’s scalpel. Then my hands were bound behind me, my feet shackled so that I could only just walk. A scratchy rope was fastened round my waist. With a vicious jerk that made me stumble to my knees, the man began to drag me away from the Vine and the Fig Tree, from my sisters, from a place, I realized too late, where I had belonged.
I have been publicly naked before. I am not particularly distressed by it. But being chained to a wall, blind-folded, with my bare ass exposed to a room full of people, gave nakedness a whole new dimension. To distract myself from my condition, I focused on sound and smell. Yes, smell. Food was being served, scents wafting past me as slaves carried meats and pastries. There was a cacophony of voices, male and female, becoming louder as wine flowed. Clearly I was on display—perhaps the centerpiece of some midday banquet? The dessert? The entertainment?
“Does Claudius always put new slaves on view to his guests?”
Some man had come closer, and I could smell his breath. He must have eaten a raw onion for breakfast. I wished he wouldn’t breathe on my neck.
“Never seen him do it before,” replied his companion, whose voice I recognized from the Vine and Fig Tree. A senator. What else. One of Berta’s regulars. “Not a bad idea, what? Teach them their place right away. This one looks rather fat and sassy. Maybe she needs a lesson.”
“I can think of other methods.”
“So can I. And if there weren’t ladies present, I’d demonstrate. Wouldn’t I just love to spread those luscious cheeks and take a plunge.”
They both sniggered like the overgrown schoolboys they were.
“Damn,” said the first man. “You can’t hide anything under these togas.”
“I know. I’ve got one, too. Nothing to be ashamed of. Give the ladies something to talk about.”
“I hear the lady of the house talks of little else.”
They both laughed in absurd appreciation of each other’s puerile wit as they moved away, presumably to recline at table. The feasting began in earnest and went on interminably. Still weak from my illness, I was also hungry. I’d had nothing to eat since the bread and wine I’d barely touched that morning. Added to all my other discomforts was a bladder near bursting. I gave my mind to a serious question. Would it be more humiliating to me or more insulting to the banqueters if I made a puddle on the floor? This dilemma distracted me from graver questions such as: where the hell was I and what was to become of me?
The answers came all too soon.
“May I have your attention please,” commanded a male voice.
An excited hush fell. How did I know it was excited? My senses and extra senses were heightened. Let’s say I could smell it.
“My very dear friends,” the man continued, jovial and pompous in equal measure, “I’m pleased to inform you that we have arranged an entertainment for you today. Like all the best entertainments, it is also designed to be morally instructive and uplifting.”
Morally instructive. Not a good sign. That meant I couldn’t get by with tap-dancing—or lap-dancing, either.
“We are all only too aware of the dangers posed to decent society by rebellious slaves. If you let a slave get away with one transgression, it leads to another and another, until you find yourself one day with a blade between your ribs, a cup of poison at your lips, or a full scale insurrection in your kitchen and stables.”
His listeners were getting worked up. Shouts of “Well said!” and “Hear! Hear!” punctuated his stagey pauses.
“Masters who do not chastise slaves endanger us all in our very homes, in our very beds. This insolent vixen insulted a lady, a very important lady: my wife. And this outrage went unpunished by the vicious slut’s former mistress. As for me and my house, we now accept the full burden of responsibility for this depraved creature’s moral rehabilitation. So great is my wife’s concern for the safety of honest Roman citizens that she herself will administer the first lashes.”
Cheers and applause greeted this announcement. A typical wanker’s fantasy, I thought dismissively, forgetting for a moment that here—unlike at the Vine and Fig Tree—I had no control over how to play it out.
Then someone breathed damply in my ear.
“It’s me.”
Oh shit. Oh no. Oh yes. Of course. The bitch.
She pressed herself against my back, her breasts filling the hollows under my shoulder blades. Her nipples were hard enough to prick me.
“Do you know what I’m going to whip you with,” she whispered throatily. “A bull’s pizzle. A big, long, thick bull’s pizzle.”
How could Domitia Tertia do this to me? How could she? She called this saving me? When I could have died in a salt mine—a swift, simple end.
The crowd was getting restless. “Have at her, domina. Go on. Teach her a lesson she’ll carry with her on her back.”
“But take care not to scar that delectable rump,” someone shouted.
All the men brayed like the asses they were.
I narrowed my focus. Bladder control. The question was now settled. “Never piss yourself in front of the enemy,” Queen Maeve of Connacht had advised me long ago. I called upon her memory for strength. The first lash tore into my back to the cheers and applause of the crowd. I sucked in my breath and
