Priam's Belt

* * *

Magnus's eyes lit up with joy when he saw the gleaming Belt of Priam lying on the velvet cloth on the green room table. It was magnificent. And there was no doubt that it was the genuine article. He took up the pen and the authentication document lying beside it.

"No, you can't," Andreas exclaimed in a shocked voice. "You can't sign that. That will be your death sentence. They won't need you anymore."

"I doubt whether we can leave this place if I don't sign it," Magnus answered with a sigh. "The house seems deserted, but you and I both know that we're being watched—that our only hope is to make the bandits think their plan is being carried out."

"But, but—"

"And it is the honest thing to do. This, indeed is the genuine Priam's Belt. And authentication is what I do."

Andreas trembled in fear as Magnus signed the document with a flourish.

"Go check the corridor, Andreas," Magnus then said. "This is the most dangerous moment for us—finding out if they will keep with the plan they gave you. I'll follow along behind you."

Andreas moved to the door and looked back at Magnus. The Norwegian was holding the gleaming artifact in his hands, lovingly stroking it and feeling the heft of the solid gold. Andreas stole through the door and looked both ways down the corridor. Everything looked clear. A quick shuffle down the nearby staircase and they could be out the door in a twinkle of the eye. Once in the souk, Andreas was confident they could melt into the crowd. He hadn't been fully honest with the Russian and the Turk. They thought they denied him mobility in the neighboring streets enough that he was at their mercy in the Egyptian Bazaar. But Andreas knew the bazaar well. He'd been here long before he ever was bought in the slave auction by the Russian. All he needed to do was to have five steps advance on anyone the Russian sent to track them down.

Andreas looked back into the room. Magnus was drawing away from the gleaming Belt of Priam on the velvet-topped table and was already half way across the room. Then he was at the young Greek's elbow, and they moved for the door in a flash. Wherever the Turk had been hiding in wait, he miscalculated how long Magnus would spend with the golden artifact. He heard—or spied—the two leaving the green room, but by the time he got to the entrance to the house, Andreas had managed to win his five-step lead, and the two had vanished.

It was one panicked Turk who realized by the next dawn that Andreas was not coming back. Hanci's only solace was that the authentication document had been signed, with Magnus's authoritative signature clearly discernible, and lay beside the gleaming gold Belt of Priam. He'd decide later whether the Russian need be told that the Greek hadn't been disposed of.

* * *

The sailing vessel was well out into the Mediterranean, en route to Famagusta, Cyprus, following the same route that the victors of the Trojan War had taken after sacking the city, before Magnus left the railing and went below to be greeted by a grateful—and naked in his readiness to express his gratefulness—Andreas.

Magnus stood over his diminutive lover and started to disrobe. Andreas's eyes opened wide in wonder as they caught the gleam of the golden ram's head belt buckle that Magnus produced from the folds of his cloak.

"What? But I saw it. It was still there when we left." Andreas was so surprised that he could hardly form the words.

"Something was there, of course," Magnus answered with a smile, as he stepped out of his clothes and gently spread his new lover's legs as Andreas laid back on the ship's bunk on his back. "Your masters fell into Schliemann's plans beautifully. I can't wait to see how our Russian friend will fare at the court of St. Petersburg when the tsar finds that the replica of Priam's Belt they buy from him at a premium cost is a fake, with just a thin veneer of gold over brass."

"But, but—I don't—" Andreas was saying as Magnus moved between his legs and the Greek took the strong, hard phallus in his hands and guided it to his hole.

"I could authenticate the belt because I was there when it was first found," Magnus continued in a lust-filled hoarse voice. The knob of his member was at the Greek's gate, and Andreas was covering it with his saliva to ease the entry. "Schliemann had a duplicate made. You thought you were pulling me into the Russian's plan on the Orient Express, when I actually was ensnaring you, pushing my way into access to the real belt."

Magnus was pushing his way into his diminutive lover's channel now, gaining access to his own treasurer trove. Andreas arched his back and widening his legs as much as possible to take Magnus in. He groaned and moaned, and Magnus sighed his pleasure at the taking, as the swaying of the boat helped set a gentle rhythm for the fuck. They spoke no more as waves and waves of lust and ecstasy, enhanced by their sense of freedom and victory, covered them.

Much later, as Andreas lay safe in the Norwegian's arms, he asked the question that had been on his mind for some time.

"Why Cyprus? Why are we sailing for Cyprus instead of returning straight to Vienna on the Orient Express?"

Magnus laughed and ran his fingers lightly around Andreas's nipples for several minutes and leaned over and kissed him lightly there before he answered. "Schliemann indeed expects me straightaway back to Vienna on the Orient Express. But I haven't quite decided yet whether I and Priam's Belt—and you—will ever be making that trip. No one would ever suspect we were in Cyprus."