Courtesan of Rome Ch. 02

'My fondest memories are of you Marcus...did I ever tell? I am a Courtesan of Rome and yet...that never troubled you as it did with so many other suitors. What's that you ask? Oh yes, my initiation into all things men desire... You always keep me focus, never let me reminisce the sweeter aspects of life do you...

Well you have that in common with my mother, who was a freeborn woman descended from a long line of courtesans. In truth, our lives never really suffered hardships as the common whores did who could be found at the Sacra Via in the Circus Maximus. Their lives were filled with diseased sex and common dirt...at least this life has given me some of the finer things in life...you included Marcus, my poet...

My song last night was of my induction to the sultry world that my station in life has led me to. Do not smile at me so Marcus for you will distract me. Now where did I leave our journey...

Oh yes...that's right, breaking my bond with the Goddess Vesta.

The morning my private auction was to take place, my mother Lavinia took me to register with the aediles. Immediately I saw how they viewed us. Openly, we were no better than animal excrement yet their eyes and lips roamed over our bodies...lingering on the sweetness of my nipples that pressed against the fabric that held them close.

That evening, Lavinia accompanied me to the villa of a patrician who was holding a dinner party. She had ensured that I was immaculately dressed for the occasion in a sheer rose coloured tunica recta, that allowed in the right oil lit light, the perfect scene of my breasts. While not large like my mother, their appearance was pleasing...even to my own eyes; skin soften by countless hours of Lavinia rubbing plant juice into them, nipples no bigger than the area of my smallest finger's nail yet firm and erect when my senses were heighten by the scent of a hot sultry night, the columns of Rome awake with sexual energy. Servants of the rich...slaves wandered the streets with their erect members, talking to the whores of the local taverns. Hands roaming through folds of material to taste the succulent nectar of a tavern owner's daughter who giggled at the clumsy attempts to steal her favours.

Others in secret, away from prying eyes would indulge in the sweetness of other men made to look like boys, a guilty pleasure that was not necessarily frowned upon, yet really only meant for the right occasion. I looked down at the tunica recta, which had been slightly modified by my mother. She had torn the material on one side to reveal the full length of my firm, shapely left leg. It exposed a chain around my ankle with charms that hung down of small phallic images; Lavinia explaining it was to entice Eros to come and watch the evening's festivities.

*****

'Welcome gentlemen! Tonight, I bring you my daughter. A maiden unspoilt yet seeking entrance into our world...to the highest bidder of course.' My mother was always to the point.

'While pleasing to the eye,' a brutish man begun, ' Surely you have trained her to offer us some guarantee of...,' he struggled to find the word, ' pleasure?'

The rest of the party agreed in chorus as they feasted on fruits, meats and drank Dionysus's lifeblood in celebration. Lavinia raised a solitary eyebrow in contemplation. ' Gentleman, please. She is my daughter, would I offer up something inferior to my own talents?' The men smirked, knowing Lavinia's ego.

' A demonstration then?' the brutish men suggested.

I closed my eyes, sighing inwardly, preparing myself for what I was about to do. With a snap of Lavinia's fingers, a girl of eighteen entered the room. I held my breath in surprise. It was my childhood friend Tamarisk who had been taken from me, sold into slavery early in her youth and here she was before me, reunited...completely naked except for the slave bracelets she wore.

A hush came over the room as Tamarisk stood in front of me. She was a small-framed young woman, her breasts raised slightly from her chest. Her skin was almost alabaster, a startling contrast to my own darken skin. I hesitated slightly...Lavinia the only one who noticed. Her green eyes were aflame with anger, as she motioned for me to start.

And so it begins...

Slightly taller than Tamarisk, I leaned into her body, tilting her chin upwards, exposing her neck. With the tip of my tongue, I grazed the tighten area where her blood pulsated throughout her body. As my lips travelled back over the area my tongue had touched, my teeth gently bit her flesh that caused her to exhale quickly. I placed my right hand on her right breast, cupping it softly, my thumb and forefinger moving to squeeze the nipple. I left my hand on her breast, allowing her to know that she in this moment was mine, and no one else's as I walked around behind her. As I stood directly behind her, I cupped her other breast embracing her. She lent back into me, relaxing slightly. I caught a swift hand movement from my mother that motioned 'No! Take control...show the men whose leading who!' I obeyed...pushing Tamarisk to her feet. I allowed my hands to run down her sides, across her belly, over her hips. I bade her to widen her stance, her scent overpoweringly sweet.

From above a heavy-handed groan caught my attention...Eros was here! While everyone's attention was drawn to the serpent dance my tongue inflicted upon Tamarisk's skin, my eyes locked with Eros, who chose the form of Adonis in all his masterly glory. As plain as sunlight is to day, one could not help but see that Eros was swept up in his own aroma of lust. He sat, floating above the room filled with aroused men, his erect member emblazoned with a fiery shroud...he proud to have it stand so tall. As yet, Eros had not noticed that I had discovered his entrance, and with a mischievous grin, I set about to drive him wild...to drive them all wild.

I stood up against Tamarisk, pressing my cunt into her arse, our bodies melding perfectly into one. Drawing my breath close to her left ear I whispered the writings of Sappho of Mitylene,

"He seems to me, that one, equal to the gods,

The man fixed there, who sits opposite you

And hears close by your sweet voice

And delightful laugh, which once

Shook the soul in my breast.

For as I look on you,

My voice yields no sound,

Gasping, my silent tongue shivers,

A thin fire runs in under my skin,

In my eyes there is no sight,

My ears pound and throb,

A chill sweat runs over me,

Trembling seizes me all over,

Paler than the reeds am I,

And, weakened, I seem little short of dying.

But all must be endured...."

A moan escaped Tamarisk's pink lips at the recited lyric poetry.

I took her slender hand in my own, kissing her fingers individually, lingering a little more on each one and guided her closer to the men...just out of arms reach, I helped her to the floor where she was almost swallowed by large multi-coloured pillows. I took my finger, eyeing each gentleman as I did so, placing it in my mouth, wetting it as I sucked the finger tenderly.

I could see each man hold his breath, waiting to see what I was going to do. I moved Tamarisk's legs apart, bending them so that her ankles almost touched the curve of her bottom. Laying on my side, my head resting on Tamarisk's belly, I ran my fingers down into the coarse hair, threading it between my fingers before coming to the petite rise that caused Tamarisk's entire body to quiver at my touch.

I could not believe I was doing this! This was my childhood friend. I understood my position in life was to serve, to entertain...to be a pleasure palace. This would not feel so strange had this young woman been unfamiliar to my eyes. And yet she was familiar...and I was enjoying the moment as my fingers found her fiery entrance. Tamarisk certainly had no qualms in receiving intimate pleasure from me, for her left arm snaked around to reveal my breast from it's clothed confines whereby she massaged the nipple in small, soft circles.

From above Eros' cock seemed to have life all on its own as he rubbed and pulled at the thick member. The entire male audience could also not refrain from touching themselves as my fingers danced inside of Tamarisk, my thumb driving her to loose momentarily her breath in stilted waves of bliss.

Out of the lightness of the built up excitement came a voice to halt the entire proceedings.

'Gentleman! Gentleman...! If I could have your undivided attention,' Had Lavinia not be a highly praised courtesan of her time, I believe the guests of the patrician would surely have had her beaten, raped and tossed to the slums like a common prostitute for breaking the artistry of the moment. It was luck that Eros had finished himself off before my mother broke the mood, otherwise she may still have been suffering the wrath of his frustrations.

' You wanted a guarantee,' Lavinia continued, ' and my daughter has provided it, has she not?' The men looked at Tamarisk who appeared as though she had truly been in the throes of divine rapture and nodded in agreement. 'Well then...let the bidding begin.'

*****

To my mother's delight, the bidding was fierce as each call from the crowd raised the stakes that little bit higher. In the end, the patrician who owned the villa in which we revelled in bought my agreement to the Goddess Vesta for a sum beyond my mother's expectations. As soon as the auction had concluded I was spirited away to the patrician's private rooms by his two servants Rufus and Lelia. Lelia fluttered around me as she guided me to the mass of pillows that lay in the middle of the room. A cool breeze floated in on the wings of the Goddess Vesta who cried softly at her lost. I had little time to pity her or myself and the circumstances into which I was placed.

This was my destiny was it not? ... Lavinia had said as such.

Without my even noticing, Rufus and Lelia had disappeared from the room, with the patrician whose name was Creiatius appearing in the doorway. He asked if I was thirsty. I replied I was not. He asked if I was comfortable and I replied that I was. He seemed to take two steps towards me, then one back as if admiring my beauty not wanting to break the moment as it were.

' I am yours to command, yours and yours alone this night. Come...come to me and together we shall journey to the starlit skies and meet the gods where they partake of each other's flesh.'

He faltered. ' I ....shouldn't I be saying that to you as I am to be your first man.'

I disrobed my clothing as I walked towards him. He stood a little taller than I. When I took his hand and placed it over my beating heart I said, ' This is all you need to know...that the beating of my heart is the rhythm of love that will sweep you up in glorious waves of gold and silver as first light dawns upon my breast. You will be the light to my day and I thank you now for bringing me into the world in which pleasure has no end.'

My pretty words had their desire effect to have him take control of the night and not worry about who should be in what role. This was to be my first time and while I would truly be the one in control, he needed to think that he was for his own sense of pride.

As his cock became harden, he went from small and flaccid to proudly standing erect and ready to mount. I pushed my breasts together with the sides of my arms before straddling him, taking the base of his cock in my hand and positioning it in front of the entrance to my cunt.. I relaxed slightly and then impaled myself on his cock. A wall of confrontation greeting me. Before he had time to ask if I was alright I raised myself again plunging back down, I felt him inside of me and could feel the resistance being fiercely abated. Lavinia had said the quicker I got over the pain, the easier it would be. With each upward movement, the pain became less. His hands moved up to my breasts, and like a child who had just found a toy to play with, he became mesmerised by the fullness his perspective brought him.

I grinded my groin into his, swinging back and forth, using my thigh and inner muscles to squeeze him. He moaned out loud, as did I. He took me by the waist, lifting me off of his cock and throwing me on to all fours, entering me swiftly from behind. For the first time, his demeanour changed and I became the submissive one who became filled entirely of his flesh in hard...rhythmic... thrusts that seem to come again and again and again.

Before I knew what was happening, his seed was inside me and I was left feeling disappointed by the failure to match his grunts of ecstasy. Yet as Lavinia had instructed me, I feigned bliss, for a man truly feels like a man if he knows he can satisfy the one he was with.

As part of my role as courtesan, I had to ensure that every person I was with, felt that this had been achieved.

Oh Marcus, how could you even ask such a thing. With you my sweet poet, I was always and still am always yours....and never have I misled you into any waves of bliss that I have felt. You inspire me to reach heights even the gods could not possibly image. Regrettably, she says with a wicked smile, all this talk has me enamoured by you. Take my hand, pull me close so that I may feel the strength of your writing tool. No more musings this eve, next time, I will share more...I promise, but for now come... and leave me breathless...

*

Courtesans of Rome were very intelligent women. Not only could they discuss politics, war & philosophy, they read any Greek or Roman writer available. In this story, Illaria recites 'Fragment 31 - "He seems to me..."' Written by the ancient writer Sappho.