by
Tacitus
I
The blonde woman, stripped naked, swung languidly from leather thongs attached to two poles set far apart. She was barely conscious, having been dragged behind a goat herd at the end of a long tether, and then beaten and raped by her escorts at infrequent stops along the way. At night she was strung up, left hanging without water, for vultures and camp dogs to peruse, their silent observances broken infrequently by a man or woman striking the defenseless body with a nearby stick or convenient rock. The female prisoner had little time left in this world…and all knew it.
The Parthians had attacked at dawn as the legion camp was stirring. The raid was quick and to the point. The decurio, though quickly turned out in armor, helmet and gladius on sounding of the alarm, was quickly captured at sword point, and along with a female slave that had put up fierce resistance before being overpowered by sheer numbers, quickly bundled away into the trackless sands east of the Euphrates River. As prisoners of Parthian King Mithridates, the Roman military chieftain would be ransomed for gold, the slave sold as worthless chattel to the next eastbound caravan destined for Chin, where dark-haired women fetched premium prices in the slave markets of Kashgar.
Only after riding for half a day, and barely evading a Roman cavalry patrol sent in hot pursuit, did a quick stop at an oasis reveal that the captured decurio was, in fact, a blonde woman masquerading as a Roman commander. Not realizing she was in fact a legion commander of troops of I Legio Parthia, the raiders cursed their bad luck, and knowing how the lightly complexioned, blonde woman would burn to a bright red in the desert sun and become worthless, they elected to have fun with her, and cut their losses rather than defend their stupidity to the King.
The strong, combative, dark complexioned woman turned out to be a Greek, and having severely injured three of her captors in the dawn fight, needed to be taught a lesson before returning to her slave status. Who better to do that than the renowned Assyrian woman wrestler Stateira who was currently taking on all challengers beneath the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon.
Thus, several days after their capture by Parthian raiders, Callisto and Xena found themselves thrown together again. Through bitter irony, both female warriors, once Amazonian competitors for the title “Champion of Rome,” sworn enemies, and then master and commanded, were now bound together as peers, representing the Western world of Greece and Rome against the Eastern world of Parthia and the ancient kingdoms of Assyria, Babylon and Persia. It was to be a clash of civilizations…one victor…and one vanquished.
II
Stateira was stripped to the waist, a loosely held loincloth draped off wide hips being her only clothing. The dark amber skin of her huge torso glinted with sweat. Flat, broad pectoral muscles yielded to a heavily muscled stomach, deeply concave below a great arch of ribs. Her biceps and forearms were thick as thighs. A mouthful of brown-stained teeth formed an oblong grin, in thankful anticipation of hurting a new opponent…and a Greek whore at that!
It promised to be a great day. First, she would face in an individual wrestling match this strong, combative Greek woman who had proven so difficult to subdue in the legion’s camp. Revenge was on Stateira’s mind; revenge for her Assyrian forefathers first subdued by these decadent Babylonians, then subsequently forced to kneel before the golden helmets and fearsome phalanxes of Skander e Aazam whom the Greeks and Romans called Alexander the Great. Now Hellenistic culture had been replaced by the gilded tyranny of the eagles of Rome, with Assyrians now subserviently reduced to goat keepers, shepherds, and in her case…a skilled wrestler carrying into current times the ancient skills first practiced in the wrestling pits of Nineveh two centuries earlier.
After destroying this Greek concubine, Stateira intended to take her time with the ritual beating to death she intended to inflict on the semi-conscious blonde Roman chained to a pillar at one end of the arena floor. These foolish Parthians were afraid of the King’s displeasure at mistaking a woman for the legion’s decurio. But having bedded him on numerous occasions, Stateira despised rather than feared the King, and in his personal chamber tonight, before fucking him, she intended to make quite a festive, sensual show of killing the blonde Roman before the impotent Mithridates.
III
The door was flung open and Xena was dumped unceremoniously into the arena from her squat, filthy prison of a cage perched on its edge. She squinted in the bright sunlight, the sand beneath her hands and knees already hot to the touch. In the distance she saw a naked body she believed to be Callisto shackled to a stone pillar, more dead than alive. Of more immediate interest and concern was a tall, dark-skinned, massively muscled woman, nearly as naked as she, studying her intently from the far side of the arena.
Struggling to gain her feet and adjusting the scant rags she wore around her mid-section, she sensed danger close, but barely had time to get oriented to her new surroundings before the huge woman was upon her.
A savage kick to the stomach drove the Warrior Princess to her knees. A spinning sidekick to the head knocked her backwards. Crying out in satisfaction and lust for a quick kill, her opponent dove on top of the stunned Thracian as she rolled over on her stomach.
Stateira’s chest skidded over the hump of Xena’s buttocks and thudded into the small of the raven-haired warrior’s back. The impact emptied the breath out of the Greek woman with a guttural grunt. The fingers of Stateira’s hands quickly flew around the Warrior Princess’s throat, interlacing across the Adam’s apple, thumbs driving into the windpipe just behind the jawbone. Xena ground her teeth in desperation, sweat coursing off her pain-wracked torso, bright streaks of lightning illuminating dark sockets in her now-closed eyes.
The Assyrian wrestler eased her weight off the Greek woman’s back, removed her fingers from the contorted neck and wrenching both shoulders, flipped the hapless victim over on her back. Xena’s breasts heaved upwards, lungs laboring for breath in strangled gasps. Stateira’s hand came slowly up the firm, muscled right thigh, over the flat hard plain of the stomach to the Thracian’s right breast. In the heat and ecstasy of combat, its point was already hard with desire.
“No wonder Greek woman are so desired as bed partners,” the Assyrian thought, “The Gods, how I’d like to have this woman for a night.” But quarter was neither given nor expected in the arena of Babylon, and the Assyrian rapidly dismissed such thoughts from the contest at hand.
Snapping out of her lustful reverie, Stateira quickly yanked the Greek’s two hands above her head and pinned them with her right hand. Beneath her, the Thracian’s buttocks began to squirm, legs frenetically thrashing. Stateira straddled her opponent’s torso with stomach and thighs, feeling Xena’s strong muscles bunching under her. The Greek’s breath was rasping through her fingers, mouth agape in pain.
Stateira began pulling at Xena’s hair while leaned inward toward her head, at once smothering and grounding her into the hard dirt floor of the arena. Suddenly she released her grip and drove a hard fist deep into the upper chest, forcing the Greek woman backward until her neck and shoulders were hard in the dirt. Now, with upper torso and thighs bent flat at still-pinioned knees, the Warrior Princess lay fully exposed to the punishment to be meted out by her Eastern antagonist.
Stateira shifted her weight to her right knee, and drove the now free left one up hard between the Greek woman’s open thighs, thudding into the dark, sweat-soaked crotch. The blow had an immediate effect as Xena quickly sought to protect her vulnerable pubic area. But brushing aside defending hands, Stateira drove another hard knee into the dark pubic thatch scarcely concealed beneath the soiled, scanty loincloth.
The Greek woman, trembling in agony, half rolled to the left and raised herself slowly and painfully on one arm. In response, the Assyrian dominatrix grabbed her raven tresses, pulled the helpless Thracian toward her again, and now freeing her right hand, drove a clenched fist hard into the Warrior Princess’s abdomen. Xena sagged forward, forehead falling to rest on the Eastern wrestler’s broad, muscular shoulder. But this jaded rest was momentarily interrupted as another skillfully placed knee between her thighs drove the Greek woman’s body backward, head lolling back in a semi-conscious state.
Uttering a shout of savage satisfaction, Stateira rose to a half crouch and bludgeoned Xena’s forehead and nose with a clubbed fist. Blood mixed with spittle spattered down the Greek’s face as she reeled from the Assyrian’s stunning blow. Eyes alight with the blood lust of combat, Stateira barred her teeth as she rocked back on her heels, pulling the stunned Greek woman’s body up with her to a standing position. An overwhelming sense of strength and empowerment surged through the Eastern woman as, dark breasts high and erect, she launched a series of quick, pulverizing hammer blows into the now upright head, chest and abdomen of her smaller, defenseless opponent.
Xena feebly blocked or deflected several of these punches, countering when she could and painfully retreating when their frequency and intensity seemed about to overpower her. She threw some strong punches of her own, desperate for any ploy that would give her time to recover, but the Assyrian woman ignored several solid blows to her face and heavily muscled belly as she moved forward, intent on conquest and victory over this Greek woman serving as a whore to her Roman she-bitch.
The thickly knotted muscles in the Greek’s forearms momentarily bulged, as she struck a low blow below the waist of her opponent, following up immediately with a glancing blow beneath the chin. But as Stateira’s head snapped to the side, three counterattacking rigid fingers jabbed forward, catching the Warrior Princess in the throat.
Now both Amazons were clearly hurt, both falling to one knee, shaking out the pain, and gathering strength to continue the struggle. But while the Assyrian was merely clearing her head and restoring her vision, Xena’s brutalized chest heaved frantically as she attempted to restore some sense of normalcy to her battered head, chest, stomach and the dark region between her thighs. She was in acute pain, seemingly unable to mount a comeback or muster the strength to deal with this giantess. Sensing inevitable defeat but unwilling to quit, she raised hands to her face for protection, uncertain through vision blurred by sweat, dirt and blood just where her opponent actually was.
She did not have to wait long to find out. Sensing an opening in her staggering opponent’s futile gestures and tortured gasps for air, the huge Assyrian woman rose to her feet, closed her Greek adversary, and launched another brutal right sidekick to her head. As Xena swayed to one side in reaction to the callused foot’s staggering impact, Stateira shifted weight, raised a thickly muscled long limb nearly above her head, and drove the heel of her left foot down into the Greek’s forehead, reopening the recently clotted wound, and literally pounding her down into the arena dirt. Arms askew, vulnerable chest opened to attack, the Thracian warrior was again helpless as her larger opponent leaped atop her prostrate form and repeatedly drove thudding blows into her neck and chest area.
But as Stateira raised clasped hands above her head to deliver what was to be the final blow in this brutal struggle, the Greek’s right fist lashed out in desperation, striking hard in the lower abdominals. Shocked at the ferocity of a blow from one she thought badly beaten and defeated, Stateira grunted and doubled over in pain. Xena reached up, grabbed her head and pulled her over and beneath the right armpit, simultaneously wrapping up both the Assyrian woman’s arms with her arms interlaced. The crude bear hug, applied from an equally crude position.
With sweat sheathed bodies tightly entwined, Xena tried to roll Stateira over, while the stronger Assyrian woman successfully countered each maneuver, sensing rather than actually seeing her opponent’s movements, breath now coming only in wheezing gasps from a mouth firmly encased in the meaty flesh of the Greek woman’s underarm.
Finally, the air deficit resulted in a momentary weakening of the Assyrian woman’s resolve and Xena was able to roll out from under, and then atop, her writhing enemy, precariously riding her pitching back, all the while maintaining the air-strangling headlock. But the Greek wrestler was too spent to overcome the brute strength of the Assyrian, who on gaining her hands and knees, took a tortured breath, then jerked herself upward, lifting Xena’s entire body with her. A quick spin accompanied by two well placed blows to the kidneys easily broke the headlock.
Xena momentarily fell to her knees but quickly regained her feet, as both fighters separated and began circling one another. Each had their left hand up in a defensive mode while feigning and reaching forward with the other. Xena’s pain-wracked body , clearly showing the effects of her capture as well as the struggle at hand, glistened with blood and sweat, while Stateira moved more carefully than at the onset, wary of an opponent she had once dismissed as easily beaten. She would not underestimate her adversary again, and would be particularly careful not to fall prey to another suffocating headlock. If the Greek had been better rested and prepared, Stateira knew she would not have broken the hold as easily as she did.
Xena sensed the Assyrian’s careful deliberations and elected to assume a more aggressive posture. Trying to initiate ill-considered actions by her opponent, she began hinting through shouts and mimicking her opponent’s movements, that this descendent of a people the great Alexander had defeated, was now, in turn, also afraid of falling prey to the glory that was Greece.
Stateira initially ignored her deliberative teasing, but as the crowd grew increasingly restive and began shouting their displeasure at the lack of body contact, she finally took the bait and moved in close, slapping hard rights at her opponent’s head. In response, Xena bobbed and weaved, attempting to get inside the long reach of the giantess without allowing herself to suffer too greatly. Round and round they circled in an awkward minuet of strength, temptation and physicality, until finally, grunting in contempt at her opponent’s fear of closing, the Thracian woman charged forward, grabbing for the upper torso of her larger adversary. But Stateira was expecting such a move, and neatly sidestepping the charge, sent a sharp right fist deep and low into the groin area.
Xena winced as the air escaped from her lungs, bringing hands down to protect her pubic region. Stateira quickly followed with an overhand right that landed solidly on the exposed flesh of the Greek’s right breast, what little clothes the Warrior Princess had once wore now being in shards on the arena floor. Callused hand smacking against soft flesh resounded loudly in the arena, as Xena again grimaced in pain and backed slowly away from the wily Assyrian woman.
Stateira, regaining her momentum and bloodlust, now elected on her own to press the advantage and moved in for some closer combat. But as she drew closer, Xena reached out and grabbed two fists full of the Assyrian’s short, well-oiled black hair. Impervious to the sudden pain, and ducking under the Greek’s outstretched arms, Stateira began directing hard right hands into the Thracian wrestler’s belly. Though Stateira would grunt in pain with each hair jerk she was subjected to, all the while she continued pummeling her opponent’s rib cage, stomach and lower abdomen with rocketing blows digging deeper and deeper into the tawny, heaving flesh before her.
Recognizing her peril, Xena pulled her opponent closer and suddenly releasing the hair and grasping both hands behind the Assyrian’s neck, jerked down hard, ramming Stateira’s head into the pit of her right arm. Xena spread her legs, arched her back, and sank the hold into place, tightly pressing the slick head and gasping mouth of her adversary hard against the side of her chest while putting upward pressure on the neck while pushing down hard on the crown. Under the weight of the Greek warrior, Stateira was bent forward, looking down towards the arena floor, acutely feeling the intense pressure being placed on her skull and neck vertebrae by the still-powerful Warrior Princess. In defense she swung and landed several blows into the lower back and upper thigh areas of her naked opponent, but they lacked power and were shrugged off with a grunt by the Greek Amazon.
Xena began pumping her right biceps up and down, putting acute strain on the Assyrian woman’s neck, all the while driving the trapped head hard against her rock solid rib cage. The pressure was becoming almost more than Stateira could stand, and as she twisted her head vainly for air, she pressed her throat hard against Xena’s pelvic bone, and began to cough and gag as the encircling biceps of the Greek woman shifted from her head to throat.
Recognizing her flagging strength required a quick end to the match, Xena increased the effects of the hold by slowly twisting her body to the left while maintain pressure on the entrapped woman, until the Assyrian woman’s head was athwart her belly. Then she bent over, attempting to smother the Eastern woman in the folds of her stomach, compressing the head beneath the thrust of her rib cage.
Stateira’s gagging was now muffled in the expanse of the Greek woman’s torso but the frantic jerking of her legs and spasmodic waving of her hands as they sought any purchase to gain air for her tortured lungs and alleviate the pain drumming in her ears, spoke to the effectiveness of this classic Greek wrestling hold. At last, the Assyrian’s hands found the hips of her opponent now athwart her, and using them as guideposts, Stateira drove two hard right fists between the thighs of her unseen tormentress. In response Xena let out a slight murmur of pain and briefly eased the hold. Seeking an end to her predicament, Stateira drove two additional uppercuts into the darkened thatch of the Greek woman’s pubic region, this time tearing at the sensitive skin with sharpened fingernails. Again Xena cried out in pain and after a third series of similar attacks, dropped her encircling arm in an attempt to block any further excruciatingly painful blows to her privates.
Stateira quickly rose and backed away to the other side of the arena, clearing her head and blowing the blood from her noise and mouth. But again sensing that her wounded prey was desperately trying to recoup her strength the Assyrian wrestler lowered her head, raced across the arena circle, and drove hard into the Greek’s mid-section, slamming her into the wall behind her. While Stateira leaned into the Greek with all her bodyweight pressing against her chest, the Assyrian, recognizing her opponent’s little tolerance for pain in her groin, reached down and with her right hand grabbed a fistful of Xena’s pubic hair. The Greek shrieked in anguish as she felt the flesh of her mound being stretched outward from her body. Instinctively, she swung her right leg open, increasing the area between her thighs and threw back her head in pain, arms and hands fruitlessly scrambling at the Assyrian’s broad back.
But oblivious to the punches raining down on her back and neck, the Eastern wrestler continued to thrust forward with her powerful legs, all the while working her hand at a furious pace, pulling, twisting and tearing at the Western woman’s pubic bush. Xena cried and groaned in pain, as her right leg moved rhythmically in and out, seeking to assuage the ravenous animal cutting into her insides.
At last Stateira removed her hand from its terrible purchase, and Xena’s leg movement ceased as she gazed at her tormentor through tear-filled eyes. She knew what was coming and steeled herself for the expected follow-up attack. Indeed, were she in the Assyrian warrior’s place, what followed was what she would have done.
Stateira momentarily stepped back from her victim, then rammed her knee upward crushing the area between the smaller woman’s thighs. Even expecting the location and manner of the attack, Xena was still surprised by the ferocity of the Assyrian’s pulverizing blow, screaming in anguish as the thick, hard kneecap jammed in to her privates. But the Assyrian woman was not done. Reaching down and using the smaller shoulders of the Greek for leverage and support, she lifted her knee again, driving it deep between the still quivering thighs of her opponent.
Again, Xena cried out, but her voice was now a raspy whisper as she threw her head back in agony, arms falling limply to her side. Stateira’s biceps bulged with power as she again pulled forward with her upper arms, leaned back, and drove a third blow hard against the Greek’s pelvic bone. Quickly and repeatedly the Assyrian woman mounted an almost unbeatable offensive, relentlessly pounding her victim’s pubic mound. Xena dazed and nearly unconscious, though remaining on her feet, could mount little defense. She grunted and cried out with each shot driven between her quaking thighs, a thin stream of blood and spittle now oozing out of the corner of her mouth, melding with that pouring down from the gash in her forehead. The Warrior Princess’s entire body, sheathed in sweat and dirt, shuttered in agony with each blow administered by the dominant Assyrian warrior.
Shifting the focus of her attacks, Stateira abruptly sent a right fist into the Greek’s chest, flattening the left breast against a body still writhing in agony from the assault below. Xena cried out in renewed agony and vainly sought to parlay the next strike, which again crushed her tit against her body.
In a final act of defiance, the Greek warrior swung wildly at Stateira’s head, but the Assyrian ducked under the blow and sank two more fists deep into the stomach and lower abdominal region. Xena, exhaling in a final anguished sigh, sank slowly to her knees. The giant Assyrian woman quickly moved to the side, and spinning on her left heel, drove a vicious kick into the Warrior Princess’s head. The Greek woman pitched forward, face down in the arena dirt. Only the spasmodic rising and falling of her chest give any hint that life remained in the prostrate form, now straddled by the naked Assyrian warrior raising her arms over her head in the traditional Greek Olympian pronouncement of victory. “At least some of Sikander’s conquering Hellenistic culture had been good for something,” she thought. And now her physical revenge on a descendant of the conqueror in the shadow of the remains of her great civilization was something to be cherished for years hence in the stories and memories of her people!
IV
The blonde cradled the naked body of the battered slave in her arms, gently stroking the bruised and bloody forehead of her staunch defender with a strip of cloth and water provided by an admiring arena bodyguard. She was under no illusions that her release, ordered by the King despite the victorious woman warrior’s strong protests, was due to Xena’s desperate, doomed struggle with the Assyrian giantess. Admiration for the Greek woman’s courage in the face of certain defeat had earned the Roman decurio a reprieve from death, and the alternative, being sold into bondage, was something Callisto would deal with, all in good time. For now, cooing softly as she rocked back and forth, the blonde bathed and dressed as well as she could Xena’s wounds.
Once when the Warrior Princess briefly regained consciousness, she had started at presence of her mortal enemy looming just above her. But soothing kisses on eyes and lips, the gentle caress of callused hands over ravaged face, chest and thighs, lulled the Thracian Amazon back into a blissful sleep, free of the pain of her encounter with Stateira in Babylon’s arena.
But all too soon it was dawn and as fires were extinguished, tents quietly folded and put away, their new captors came to gather up what they had bought. Soon the procession stole away, two women in castoff rags, one blonde and one raven-haired, tightly tethered by neck nooses to one of the supply wagons, painfully shuffling eastward.
Dogs barked…but the caravan moved on…into the unknown…beyond the outermost reaches of the Empire of Rome.