(FOREWORD: Although this story is entirely fictitious, aspects of the story nevertheless have basis in historical fact that has been documented in books and anthropological journals.)

Serfs were arriving. They could be seen huddled along the length of the ship's bow and beyond.

Masters congregating at the market-square, collectively jingled their coin bags. Their keen eyes were peeled on the distant boat. Already sizing the slaves for clues to their attitude, age and angst, the masters made comparisons of the extent of their investment risks.

Among them was Master Bacchus, a man in his late thirties, a third-generation squire of noble birth, who was endowed with handsome good looks and landed wealth and property. He was not new to the slave trade, but his mission was somewhat different from that of the other masters. He had no surplus workers in his current employ, so he was not in any earnest desire to buy a _s_e_x_ slave for want of something to do in his leisure. He truly needed and wanted someone who could manage his inventory of farm bounty in exchange for food and lodging.

Bacchus's eyes were affixed on a brown-skinned young man crouched in back nearest the stern. In contrast to the other slaves, this youth was far from hunkering in fear and uncertainty. In fact, he seemed in defiance.

If anything the young slave's demeanor ought to belie an unattractive prospect but Master Bacchus couldn't resist wondering if he ought to take a chance with him. It was going to be a challenge to break in a wild stallion like this one, he felt. But on the other hand, he could also fail. Master Bacchus dithered about casting his net elsewhere.

In the meantime, the boat was anchoring ashore. The passengers made up of middlemen and the serfs were disgorged. A long and heavy chain was linked to the shackles that bound the serfs' ankles together so that any attempt at an escape was impossible without the cooperation of everyone. Pushed and prodded along, the serfs stumbled to the center of the market-square and made their way up the wooden platform. Upon this platform would the monthly slave auction take place. The frequency of the slave trade supplied a much-needed commodity to the village's powerful gentry of squires and merchants, who needed good help mostly to work on the farms and in the shops.

However, the trend in these uneasy times, ever since the recession had stagnated the mobility of the people up the social class, was for the rich landowners to buy slaves and make pets out of them. The former had nothing much else to do with their time for they had an adequate number of slaves working for them.

Particularly well served by the many slaves were the needs of the village's young men during their coming of age. It was the custom of the land that these young men would enter their tents on the eve of the celebration of their manhood, to learn and practice the tricks of penile intercourse. Since the virgin girls of the village were kept chaste to improve their marital prospects and keeping a female slave was abominable to the tenets of their religion, it became a ritual for male slaves to be the patriarchs' choice to consort carnally with their sons. _s_e_x_ between men had been an accepted custom for generations.

Where poor families were unable to afford male slaves, their sons on the brink of manhood were taught the art of making love by their own fathers, older brothers or uncles, who penetrated them anally and received from them penetration. Theirs was ostensibly not a culture that understood incest as the anathema of western civilizations.

Now while the chains remained to bind the slaves together, the band of middlemen broke apart and their leader, assuming the role of auctioneer, took his place on the foreground of the raised platform. As soon as he gave his nod, the other middlemen descended upon the serfs. Hands quickly reaching for the slaves, there were twenty-six of them, they removed first the buck-skinned shirts on their backs and then the loincloths around their groins. These were all the garments that clothed the slaves that they had arrived wearing.

Swiftly made completely naked, the male slaves stood for a time in the cold while the middlemen hung a small card around their necks. On these cards were written, in the indigenous script of their language, the youths' names. Now the slaves were ready to be prospected further by the potential masters who stood meters below them on the steppe.

The auction would be commencing not too much longer. A slave auction was sometimes accompanied, if so required by the buyer, by a test of the slave's desirability, ability and adaptability before the master consummated the transaction. For in this village, the slave trade was conducted on a no-return policy. So a rash and impetuous decision might land a master a bad investment.

As legislative and moral considerations seldom proceeded in tandem, there were no legal borders surrounding the testing of a slave as long as the test stayed within the ethical bounds in which the youth was not fatally harmed. Typical tests sought to cull the strongest, fastest, most agile and persevering ones from among the brood. Among the indicators of strength and perseverance required the slaves to race, joust, wrestle to the ground and run a gauntlet of fists and legs striking against one another.

In addition to these conventional tests, the masters were also permitted to pit the slaves against one another in contests that determined some specific talent or skill possessed by a slave. These contests prevailed upon slaves who were acquired for _s_e_x_ual purposes. Ascertaining a slave's penile skills, sphincter flexibility, seminal propulsion and oral talents were just a few of the aims of these contests.

It was therefore in anticipation of these contests that slaves must be stripped naked during the auction.

Sometimes the course of a test would consume so much time that a sale went on through the night. It was not improbable that the trade resumed into the week, particularly when there were weak or fragile slaves present, until every slave had been found a home.

Slaves stood on the identity of their masters and were distinguished by the rings they wore pierced into the prepuce of their penis or the skin of their scrotum. The piercing ceremony took place immediately after a sale was consummated, as witnesses must be present. These witnesses were useful in a future litigation of a runaway or kidnapped slave.

The auctioning of the first batch of slaves this morning was rabid and competitive for those were the best slaves in the collection. On outer appearance, they were feisty, strong, handsome and sprightly. There was no need for tests to be conducted because no one doubted that the serfs were able to live up to the traits implied to parallel their outward representation.

The day rolled into evening before the people knew it, six hours having elapsed since the auction first commenced. There were now only five naked youths left to be placed with an owner. One of them was the youth named Gwinn, the defiant one that had first caught Master Bacchus's attention, long before the boat had docked.

The long and lonely wait in the cold, while he watched the rest happily locate a loving master and owner, had not shaken Gwinn's convictions. Nor did the feeling that he was undesirable and might be the last slave to find a good master who would take him home, maybe not even this day itself but in the following days to come. For Gwinn was still wearing that veil of defiance.

Master Bacchus felt that it was not going to stand the boy in good stead with the remaining group of masters below the stage to maintain that ill-placed indolence. But then of course, it was quite possible that that was no veil put on to camouflage what could be an insecure and frightened boy. Perhaps Gwinn simply possessed a hostile streak and if this were true, then he could prove to be a future source of trouble for any master and his large menagerie.

Master Bacchus couldn't really be sure about Gwinn. This one had to be put to the test. And the test would have to break Gwinn.

"I'll take the youth Gwinn," Master Bacchus rose his hand and exclaimed, "but he must first endure a test."

Gwinn was separated from the remaining four, and the name card around his neck removed. The spectators, mainly masters, were awakened from their ennui and some of the men were seen cheering and clapping.

A long session of negotiation between Bacchus and the auctioneer took place next.

Master Bacchus and the auctioneer eventually nodded to each other and then Bacchus took possession of a stool between the curtains.

Gwinn's test was one that pitted him against the auctioneer himself. The latter moved toward Gwinn to release him from the iron fetters.

But Gwinn's freedom was only temporary. For now he was forcibly put down on a makeshift wooden bench, his legs and arms spread-eagled and tied with ropes to the legs of the bench. One of the other middlemen came to pick up Gwinn's penis and held it upright. Gwinn was soon to sight a jack-knife above his exposed penis. Gwinn gritted his teeth together and heard them grind against each other as he tried to surmount the pain of his forced circumcision. The ten seconds' long operation performed crudely by the auctioneer left Gwinn in a swoon, the pain in his groin sublime and excruciating.

Gwinn was however still conscious of his surroundings. Allowed a one-minute rest, Gwinn let out a quiet curse on Master Bacchus and the auctioneer. But he swore he would just as soon die as let any of these people break him down and force him into a situation that was hourly going to remind him of his inferiority. It was the stigma rather than the labor of serfdom that repelled Gwinn. Gwinn would prove that he was going to be a rebel, a restless, impertinent, insolent and immoral rascal. He was determined to be sent back to his family and then he would exact revenge on his uncle who had outraged him by selling him to the slave trade.

Opening his eyes, Gwinn stole a peek at his tool. None the worse for wear, the top of his penis was a red and tender helmet where it had been cut.

Gwinn's fingernails clawed against the wood as he spied a whip curled around the fingers of the auctioneer. Horror-struck, Gwinn wiggled vainly against the ropes restraining him.

And then the whip assaulted the air before it rained down upon Gwinn's naked crotch. For almost three minutes the whip was applied with tyrannical force to his exposed private parts. The whip terrorized his sore penis and testicles; yet, in spite of the terror of the moment, Gwinn managed to summon his will to fortify his threshold of pain.

The end had to come soon, Gwinn consoled himself. Surely they could not keep up the torture before it had to cross the ethical limit. And so consuming his mind with this consolatory thought, to try to forget the whipping that was taking place, Gwinn would soon feel himself being released and then stood up.

Gwinn's impudent courage appeared to cross the crowd of masters watching below the stage. A chant started to rise among the men. "Rape him, rape him, rape him!" The chant crescendoed to pervade Master Bacchus's ears.

Master Bacchus rose from his seat and ordered the slave to be returned to the bench. Gwinn was re-tied to the bench, lain on his stomach, his sore penis crushed against the hard wood and his buttock cheeks spread apart and raised to the crowd.

Master Bacchus inserted his forefinger into Gwinn's exposed anus, pistoning the hole in and out, while his other hand reached into his fly to release his own penis.

"Yes," someone below him applauded, "rape him good, Bacchus."

But changing his mind, Bacchus snatched the whip from the auctioneer. He commenced the young man's whipping of all his buttocks and thighs, keeping up the torment until he heard a choking sob no longer able to be constricted within Gwinn's stubborn lungs. It was so quiet and tiny that it was nearly inaudible. But it was there. Bacchus had been waiting far too long already to hear the boy's admission of defeat to miss even the most miniscule of cries.

Master Bacchus threw down the whip and ordered Gwinn's release. As soon as this was done, he went to pick up Gwinn himself. Gwinn lay across Bacchus's arms, his hands and legs dangling downward and lifeless. Everywhere on his groin and backside were ugly red stripes and lashes. Gwinn looked frightful.

Master Bacchus knew Gwinn was close to breaking point. He knew also that he could continue the flogging until it broke Gwinn completely. Bacchus had no doubt of his ability. He had broken in a stallion tougher than even a Don Juan of slaves like Gwinn. But he didn't want to kill the young man that lay now in a deep swoon in his arms.

On the other hand, Master Bacchus wanted, neither, to spare Gwinn anymore whipping to break him down. For sparing Gwinn meant giving him up, and Bacchus had arrived at the point of realizing that he could never dismiss his desire to possess Gwinn. Gwinn was simply perfect for the job of store foreman.

Besides, throughout the contest, Master Bacchus had felt something going on in his groin. It was possible that he could fall in love with a stubborn but valiant boy like Gwinn.

Gwinn slowly forced open his eyes. Just slightly watery, the dark brown eyes, that had of late been mistress to that fearless defiance, were softening.

"Rape him! Rape him! Rape! Rape! Rape!" The chanting continued below the stage.

"Say it, boy," Master Bacchus suddenly growled, mindful of what the crowd wanted to see. There was now a sincere concern he was feeling that giving Gwinn up would set the crowd against Gwinn all the more. There had been a longstanding conspiracy among masters to protect one another's reputation. For this reason, Bacchus knew that Gwinn would never be able to return to the boat safely. For Gwinn would be seen as a hero among slaves that had mortally offended a master, and one as respected as Bacchus.

Master Bacchus started to shake the youth in his arms. "Say it, _d_a_m_n_ you," Bacchus urged, his mouth in the youth's ear. "You're broken, boy. You know it. Don't be a fool."

Of course Gwinn was no fool. Of course Gwinn knew he could not keep fighting. How did one fight against one's destiny? Gwinn knew Bacchus wanted him, and Bacchus did not humbly surrender to plain obstinacy.

Besides, was not this noble man, even a master, holding him in his arms? No master held a slave in his arms but had agreed on a relationship of mutual dignity, compassionate respect and selective egalitarianism toward the slave.

"Master," Gwinn whispered, cranking up his tired arms to find Bacchus's waist.

(Copyright, JRK, December, '99.)