Byzantium 7: In The Pens

They were already gagged and their hands were tied behind their backs. Their balls had also been tied a few minutes before. I had stood there watching them as they were each wrestled to the ground in the courtyard next door, and a slave had sat on their chests and grabbed their legs pulling them upwards to expose their underparts, while another slave grabbed their balls, slid the leather thong-noose up them, close to their body and knotted it tight.

Sold yesterday, their new owner wanted them both nutted. I had purged them the night before, making them drink a potion which meant they would vomit and shit for a few hours, until they were totally cleaned out inside. I'd only given them water since. They knew they were to be gelded and now, standing in that holding pen, looking out onto the cutting table, they knew it would be done soon.

In the shadows of the pen, I could see the younger slave's prick was entirely stiff. Hard up against the neat patch of black hair, foreskin pulled back from it's pointed head, it was swollen to it's full length. The older boy was only half-erect, his prick jutting out horizontally in front of him. They could see the table with it's thongs at each corner, and the men and boys that waited to see them done.

They were the usual people who gather to see a slave get cut. The master's pen were open to the slave yards and so any buyer could wander in and watch. There were also the streetboys, the children of beggars, no older than the slaves being clipped, who always seemed to gather. There were less of them than there had been last year, when the Master had seen one of them who was watching four Greek boys being cut. He was a handsome 13 year old. The Master tracked down his father, a drunk, always in need of money, brought the boy, and had him on the gelding-table the next morning, his legs apart, his balls tied. The street-boys stayed away for a while after that, but now they were drifting back.

All we waited upon was the Master and the new owner of the slaves, I continued to stand at the corner of the pen and watched the the two slaves. It was a narrow pen, no more than a corridor really, with a gate at one end where they could be brought in from the next courtyard, and another gate where they could be dragged out to the gelding table. The wall facing the yard was a simple mass of wooden bars, lashed together as they crossed.

The older boy was trying to preserve a stoic arrogance, standing proud and straight, but one look at his scared eyes meant that all his attempt at bravery was fruitless. The younger squirmed against his tied hands as if he could free himself by this method. His erection meant one could easily see the tight leather loop just above his round balls.

By the table, Lucas was readying his knife and checking the thongs tied to each corner. A young slave, around 14 was helping him. This boy had himself been cut three months ago. He was a blond German and he was used to demonstrate Lucas' skill to those who wanted their slaves cut. He would be summoned and his pants lowered and his shirt lifted up so all could see his prick dangling with no nuts behind it, and admire the neatness of Lucas' cutting skills. I had seen it happen a dozen or more times in the last few weeks, but no matter how often it was done, the boy was ashamed to parade his lack of masculinity in front of the scrutinising eyes of men, and he hated the master lifting his prick to show where the knife had so neatly robbed him of his manhood.

We always had one such slave on hand every year and then, at the end of the summer slave season he too would be put on the block and sold to the highest bidder.

The master then entered the yard with the new owner of the slaves who we knew well. He was a Greek merchant who always purchased three or four boys from us a year, which we clipped for him. They were destined for his bed for he had a fondness for gelded boys, especially Slavs. He would keep them until he tired of them and then he'd sell them back to my master. We'd probably see both of the two slaves back within the year.

The Master went to see Lucas and I stood by the slaves' new owner. He was acquainted with me because I looked after slaves after their gelding and each time he had a boy done, he saw me when the boy was healed enough to be taken away.

'Good pair,' he said to me.

I nodded in agreement.

'The younger one is a good pretty boy, but the older one is the best I've seen for some time. Good tight little rear too.'

He laughed.

'By the feel of it, he hasn't been broken in.'

This was probably true. But I knew that the Master had broken in the younger boy the night after the slaves had been delivered from the docks. I had to wash the boy down and ready him for the Master's bed by rubbing oil up his rear. And I had also been summoned later to return him to the pens, and I had taken him as he walked beside me, his head bowed down, half his pride taken by the actions of the master.

The Master returned from Lucas with two slaves behind him.

'We'll take the younger first,' he said to the Greek, who nodded, his eyes bright with anticipation.

As soon as the two slaves opened the pen door, the boys retreated from them, but because of the narrow confines it was a simple matter for the younger boy to be grasped, hauled out across the yard, and stood struggling before the table. Once there his his hand-bonds were cut and he was dragged up onto the table's surface where other slaves took his flailing arms and legs and tied them to the four corners so that he was speadeagled.

When I approached, the boy was wide-eyed above his gag. He was breathing fast. His stiff prick was hard up against his flat stomach. His slim legs were spread as wide as they could have gone. His hairless thigh muscles were tight and their stretch inevitably drew the eye down between them where a small scattering of darker hairs ran down under the roundness of his tied balls and over that hard knot the root of his prick made there because it was stiff.

Lucas was measured and precise in his movements. He reached down and held the boy's balls for a moment, checking the tightness of the thong that tied them. Then he pulled his knife from his belt. He only ever used one knife that he kept honed to a sharpness.

The boy saw the knife and he tensed all at once but his bonds gave him no room to move. His prick did a quick jerk upwards.

With the sight of the knife those men and the streetboys gathered round the table or as close to it as they could. Any conversation stopped.

Lucas grasped the boy's balls again and pulled them as hard as he could, then slid the curved knife around behind them. Pulling on the balls meant that the stiff length of the by's prick stood up vertically. It is was still a boy's prick, smooth, tender-skinned, but nearly a man's length, if not thickness.

One of the slave's reached down and put his hands beneath the boy's chin and pulled his head backwards which arced the boy's back a little and somehow presented his groin up towards Lucas.

Lucas always let the knife rest there under the balls for a long moment so the slave had time to get used to the idea that he was about to be cut. I could feel the tension in the men and the boy's waiting to see it down.

He adjusted his grip on the sac, pulling harder, curved the knife precisely and it was at that moment that the boy suddenly spurted his seed. There was a quiver in his body and the white sperm pulsed out from his prick and Lucas seeing it, simultaneously started cutting through the balls. It is harder than you'd think, cutting through, and he always sawed the knife back and forth.

The muffled shout in the slave's throat was contained by his gag. The boy's body burst out into a sweat as it clenched tight and shuddered as Lucas finally severed the balls. His hand and his fingers were bloody, but not so much. The tightness of the cord prevented more.

As he dropped the balls into a bowl at his feet, I could see the sense of satisfaction in the watchers. A few of the younger boys were grinning, their teeth exposed. One of them had a hard length in his ragged trousers. The older men murmured amongst themaselves and one laughed and shook his head.

The boy was untied and as soon as his legs were free, he tried to draw them together to hide his loss, but the pain stopped him halfway. Then he was helped down and, supported by two slaves, made to slowly walk to the cell where he and the other boy would heal.

When the two slaves came back, it was as if everyone turned to look at the older boy in the pen. He was completely stiff now, his prick rising out of the dark curls of his belly. He was now struggling against the ropes that tied his hands and pressed right to the back of the holding pen. Again it was a simple matter for the slaves to grab him and he was hauled out of the pen, kicking and flailing. As he was dragged across the yard I could see his well-curved pale rear which within a week or two would be parted waiting for the prick of his new master to enter there.

They had to bend him over the table to cut the ropes that tied his hands. When they flipped him, he began to kick out his legs wide as he tried to evade the slave's grip. Between his jerking thighs I could see his tied balls and that dark hair under them.

Then he too was spread-eagled on the table. He was still twisting and turning his head and his biceps and thighs tightened and relaxed as he still tried his bonds. From where I stood I could see his ankles with their streaking of dark hair bound to the table by the thong

His prick was average length, well-shaped, his foreskin not completely clearing it's head, and it too throbbed there against his belly, pulsing up slightly with each of his attempted movements. The curls of his belly-hair glistened in the sunlight. His arms tied above his head exposed his white armpits with their black tufts of hair.

Lucas felt his balls, hairier and fuller than the younger boy's, pulling at them a little so the youth's prick rose a little. Then he pulled the knife from his belt. The boy's eyes closed and he tried all his bonds. I could see the bite of the thongs around his ankles cut deeper. Lucas reached down and grasped the boy's balls in one hand and pulled tight so the boy's prick rose stiff into the air. It's head was red and I knew that it was as stiff and full as it ever was.

Sweat suddenly moistened the slave's smooth chest with its flat wide nipples. His eyes were still squeezed shut. The youth, I thought, had probably already been with girls. He was at that age. He was now about to lose his manhood and his own desire and for the rest of his life he would find only his satisfaction in serving the desires of others.

The slave standing behind him reached down and pulled his head hard back, exposing his smooth throat.

Lucas pulled his knife out from his belt again and in a neat gesture, slipped it around the boy's balls and held it pressed there, the sharp blade just against the skin. The youth tried to buck and twist. I could see the 14 year old German eunuch beside Lucas watching fixedly. Once cut, slaves always have an interest in other slave's being gelded. One of the Master's best customers for young eunuchs is a eunuch himself who had served the Emperor until he was made a free man.. Once he purchased ten young Greek boys for servants at the new sumer estate he had just acquired and I can remember him as he watched as they were gelded one after another.

The men and the boys watching fell silent again. Lucas waited a long moment as if to see if the youth would spurt from this anticipation or not. I could see a glistening point of fluid at the tip of the boy's prick.

He wasn't going to spurt at that moment like the younger. I could almost see Lucas shrug as he gave up and he started cutting the boy's just haired balls. I could see the first slit the knife made just beneath the thong, cutting into the soft skin. As soon as he felt the knife, as his penis shook back and forth with Lucas's cutting motion, the young slave came. The full amount of thick white seed splattered across the his chest as Lucas continued to take his balls off. As soon as the cut was complete the youth's still stiff prick slapped down against his stomach with a sound we all could hear in the breath-taking silence.

When Lucas took his hand away with the boy's balls in it, I could see that neat flap of skin remaining there, tightly tied and only just bleeding.

The Greek merchant next to me breathed out in a snort. He shook his head in mock exasperation at me.

'Smetimes,' he said in a measured and satisfied way,' you just wish you could watch them get gelded again.'