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“of all the creatures / that live and breathe and creep on earth, we humans / are weakest. when the gods bestow on us / good fortune, and our legs are spry and limber, / we think that nothing can ever go wrong; but when the gods bring misery and pain, / we have to bear our suffering with calm.”
- homer trans. emily wilson, “the odyssey,” book 18
…
he is a brute. this much laeta knows. still, she urges him on. insists, in so many encouraging little touches, that he undress her with his rough hands. the very hands which killed her husband; but she does not think of ennius now. she will not. he would have no sympathy for her. she knows this, too. he would harbour no pity, not upon learning of the ugly brand burnt forevermore into her skin and her new and savage allies. he would deem her ruined, unworthy, and see her disposed of; and perhaps she expects spartacus to do the very same. perhaps this is an exercise in self-flagellation. he will remember, she thinks, that she is roman, and will discard her as her own people did. leave her cold and bare and used. ruined.
above her, sitting up on his knees, he shrugs out of his tunic. his armour and weapons he removed and set aside with no small care; but his clothes he holds in lower esteem and tosses aside haphazardly. his limbs are long and his flesh scarred badly, as a slave abused. laeta thinks to herself that though ennius was neither perfect husband nor specially kind master, he would never leave a slave under his care so badly injured. it is abuse what sparked this rebellion, she thinks, cruel masters not kept properly in check; and whilst she can nevertheless fault spartacus for his violent ways and determination to destroy civilization itself, she can perhaps understand his wounded heart. she reaches to touch a specially ugly scar, thick and stretched and raised, marring his belly. soothes, feathering strokes, as though she can free him from some distant pain. allows her eyes to wander. takes in the handsome shape of his sinewy form. his collarbones. his broad shoulders. a scabbed cut at his temple. bruises. the faded brand on his forearm. downy hair, blondish and curling, beneath his arms and between his legs. his stiffening cock, of course.
“what think you?” his intense gaze catches on hers. it is neither fragile question nor pathetic plea for affirmation. he asks, in so few words, brusque, if she wishes to proceed. if the sight of so much violence writ in his skin is beyond her tolerance, perhaps; or if she has remembered that she is roman and he is not, he is not, he is not. she has never fancied herself the sort of woman drawn to roguish men, to barbarians, to villains. much has changed. she has been brought low. spartacus has been good to her.
“i do not think,” she returns, coy, though her voice longs to clot in her throat. “i want.” want she does, indeed, and so she swallows her misgivings.
“hm,” he says. shows her his teeth pleasantly. bends to exchange a kiss. touches unshyly. he smells of sweat and smoke and sour wine, thickly masculine. laeta and ennius shared a handful of pretty girls and a slender boy between them, household slaves, and they were shy creatures all. demure. deferential. they did nothing without explicit order. they did not long, did not hunger. they obeyed. thus, laeta has always held pleasure drawn from a slave in low esteem. dull. mechanical. better to go to bed with her husband, oft-selfish though he was, than to urge a slave, dim of eye, to pay fucking attention. it is not so with spartacus. he is eager. sharp. clever. he needs no command, no direction. he is so different to a slave that it is easy to forget the truth.
“oh, fuck,” she mutters, half-moan, when he sheathes himself within her. “oh, jupiter.”
“only me,” he says. nips at her ear. she swats at him and cannot tell if it is a playful thing or if a hint of true malice weighs her hand. he catches her by the wrist regardless, grasp firm, mannish, and draws her arm to himself. bows his head to kiss the fragile lifeblood inside of her wrist. his beard tickles and rasps. then: soft, soft, gentle as a rabbit, nuzzling, he reaches to press an unflinching kiss to the awful letter marking her a slave. lingers, open-mouthed, though the wound is yet scabbed and ugly. laeta gasps.
his eyes does not leave hers. his brow is heavy and his gaze hard and the hollows beneath his eyes are yet dark with fatigue and the filth of battle. she cannot look away. cannot withdraw. cannot protest, either, though she knows not what she might protest. his strange fearless touch is a cruelty and a kindness alike. a sort of kindness which she has never before experienced and cannot fathom. intolerable. inescapable. lovely, or perhaps awful.
she recalls that she was once a virtuous woman. noble. estimated highly. the memory fades swiftly but the longing lingers. that time is gone, she tells herself. there is only this, now. only spartacus’s quick breath, only the lap of water at her heels and fingertips, only the weight of war on the horizon.