Attis

A Lamb for the Lion

Chapters 16-30

Chapter 16

84534505428 12-27-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

For the first time since Shayne had been kidnapped in Minneapolis, Peter did something other than respond. For the first time, he planned. Driving in pursuit yielded him no advantage. Instead, he examined a map of the eastern region of Egypt. The road from Cairo to Port Said was probably no worse than most of the roads in the country, but from what he'd experienced just getting to Medinet suggested that it would take most if not all of what was left of the day to reach Port Said. Perhaps he was clutching at proverbial straws, but he chose to return to Cairo, reasoning that there had to be regularly scheduled flights to Port Said, and if there were not, then he could charter a plane.

He drove back the way that he had come only a few hours earlier. His hands gripped the steering wheel as he used more than a judicious application of accelerator. The car's speed crept over seventy, then eighty, then a hundred, kilometers per hour of course [45 - 50 - 60 mph], but the road was terrible. As soon as he built up any speed at all, there was always a slow moving truck, of a flock of sheep, or goats that seemed to appear from nowhere. His average speed was close to forty kilometers [25 mph], but there was still time to get to Port Said before Shayne. The shimmering haze scorched his eyes and stole his concentration. He almost collided with a cart full of straw. And always, Peter's thoughts were of Shayne, and the blood that streaked the table top.

Only one time had he seen Shayne's blood and he had nightmares for the next two nights. It had been an accident. A stupid thing to happen really, or for him to have allowed, but boys will be boys and they have to be allowed to take risks. The ravine at the far side of the park beckoned to both boy and dog, offering the perfect place for them to explore together. There were rocks and fallen trees, mossy ledges, and a dribble of a creek. The truly strange thing was that Peter's intuition sensed the injury even before he heard Shayne's cry. The dog hadn't barked either, not like it usually did when something was wrong. Yet, Peter had known that Shayne was hurt long before he saw the actual injury. The two of them had simply appeared from among the trees where they'd been playing. By then, Peter was halfway across the soccer field and running. Shayne limped because he had fallen onto his knee, not badly, but the cut was deep enough that there was blood trickling down his leg. It was bright red against the boy's pale skin, and it stayed vividly in his memory for days. Shayne's mother treated it as the minor scrape that it was.

After dropping off his rental car at Cairo International Airport, Peter rushed to buy a ticket on the next available flight to Port Said. He had a few minutes before it departed, just enough time to visit one of the many coffee shops with Internet access. The first thing he did was to look for more credit card transactions for Dalton. There were none. Then, he checked his email. There was an email from Shayne's mother. He read quickly because the first call for his flight was already on the loudspeakers.

Peter,

Still no word about Shayne? I know you will tell me as soon as you find out something. I pray for the both of you. I met with the police again yesterday. That detective had someone with her from the FBI. They don't believe that you are really pursuing Shayne and not trying to escape. I showed them your emails, the ones that Shayne printed off. I expect you know the ones I am talking about. I found them hidden in his bedroom, although why he went to so much trouble, I can't understand. However, I can see why he is so fond of you. You are a very good friend to him. I didn't know that he was being bullied at school. Thank you for helping him out. I hope that showing them to the police was okay. I want them to know that you would never do something that isn't in Shayne's best interest.

Father Joseph has been very helpful. We talked yesterday evening for several hours. He understands far more than I ever imagined. He gave me a lot to think about.

Your dog has an underpants fetish. Did you know that? I let her sleep in Shayne's bedroom last night because that's where she happiest. This morning I found that she'd emptied the clothes hamper, although the only clothes that she was interested in were Shayne's underpants. I suppose his smell is strongest there. She didn't tear them up or anything. She's carrying them around the house right now, sniffing at them.

I want you to come back with Shayne so badly, but please be careful.

Alicia

Peter typed a quick response, promising to write more later. He omitted to mention the bloodstains he had seen, saying only that he had reason to believe that Shayne had been taken to a small village about an hour from Cairo. From there, it was likely that he was being taken to Port Said.

Peter was the last person to board. After the plane pulled away from the gate, they waited on the tarmac for an hour. Any advantage that he might have gained by flying to Port Said was lost in futile anger.

Port Said lay at the northern end of the Suez Canal overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. The plane circled low over the water as it made its final approach across the bay. Peter gazed out the porthole at palm trees and a rocky foreshore, at the busy grimy seaport that constricted the entrance to the canal, at dozens of ships at anchor, wondering where Shayne was. The plane straightened, grinding beneath him as flaps were adjusted, as wheels were lowered into place. The ground rushed up to meet him. He always closed his eyes at the moment of touching, silently hoping. Then, the bitter screech, the rushing forward, the whine of propellers being adjusted, the jerking grab of brakes. The plane stopped outside the terminal, a low concrete building with a rusty metal roof that could have belonged any airport in that part of the world. Only the faded sign gave any indication of where he was. Someone jabbered instructions about being careful leaving the plane, but Peter was already moving down the aisle. He was the first person off the plane.

He smelled sea air, hot and dry yet invigorating after the cramped smoky flight from Cairo. He rushed into the terminal and after a difficult discussion with an overly prudent clerk, rented the car of his dreams, a 1992 Renault with 230,000 kilometers [140,000 miles]. With car keys and a local map in hand, he set out to find Shayne.

Just about the time that Peter left the airport and headed down the road that led to Suez and Cairo, the car that Shayne was traveling turned off into a parking area and stopped. Abdul turned in his seat and shook the boy's leg.

"Wake up capon!"

Shayne stirred. The sun beat down onto his head. The hand came down hard upon his rump. The rough cotton cloth covered him offered little or no protection. There would be a welt for days, the first of many if he did not behave and do what he was told.

"Wake American brat!"

Again, Shayne moved. His eyes opened wearily. He groaned. He was not even close to being fully conscious, yet he could feel it, an emptiness inside him. It was as if his body had been drained of life. It took all his strength to move even in the slightest way. His eyes closed to blot out the bright light. The man's voice was distant, yet insistent. He knew he had to listen to what was being said to him. He wanted to go back to sleep. The pain would go away then. He shook his bedraggled head. His hair had not been brushed in days. It was matted and tangled.

"Wake!"

"Am-wake," Shayne slurred.

Why did his tongue feel like it had fur on it? And his voice? What was making it sound so raspy? He could never sing like this. He was supposed to sing at the church today. Today? It was Christmas Eve, wasn't it? Where was Peter? Why wasn't he there at practice yesterday? Why did it hurt between his legs? His head spun.

The car door opened next to him. The man's breath was bad. Stale. It smelled like… what was the smell? Licorice? He hated licorice. Shayne looked up. The face… he had seen the face before somewhere. His eyes watered. Hands moved around him, securing something over his face. It was warm. Not very soft. Bristles like a beard, but not that. A cloth? Yes, that was it. The man was wrapping it around his head. His eyes closed, making what was already a dark gloom, completely black.

"Get out of the car." The man's voice was anything but calming or soothing.

The hands dragged at him, pulling him to the side, lifting him out of the seat and onto to his feet. He staggered, finding it almost impossible to stand, let alone stay still. The man left him tottering by himself and went to get something from the car's trunk. Shayne swayed like a reed. His head spun. He shook his head listlessly. There was a monotonous sound. Like metal hitting metal, loud and close. He was hot. Sweating, sticky, prickly heat. It felt as if something was draped over him, all around his body from his fingers to his toes, yet not really touching him, at least other than on his shoulders. The hands pushed at him, pulled at him, made him take a few awkward steps. He stumbled once when his bare feet struck something hard, then again. It was hot and sharp, not like nails, like broken glass, or stones. That was it. He was walking across crushed gravel. The suitcase bounced around and knocked against his leg as it was dragged along.

He couldn't see where he was going. Everything before him was a dim haze when he dared to open his eyes. Hands led him on. He was scared. He murmured 'Peter' before one of the hands gripped his shoulder and squeezed. He wasn't supposed to talk. Words were whispered into his ear with venom that he'd never heard before.

"Not a word, boy. I don't want to hear a sound out of you, not if you want to keep what's left between your legs. Do exactly what I tell you and you'll still have your cock to piss with, although in truth, it's of no other use to you. Speak a single word and I'll cut it off before the sun sets. You'll bleed to death before the sharks eat you."

Then, the boy remembered the voice. Amid the pain between his legs, the pain that seemed to reach right up into his lower abdomen, it all came back. The shame, the shock, the horror of the table they'd made him lie on, and he knew that the man meant every word of it. They started to walk. Each step he took sent a sharp stab through his body. If that was not bad enough, the cloth that rubbed against his exposed cock was like rough sandpaper. What he couldn't understand was why it suddenly hurt so much when it usually felt so nice not to be wearing underpants. The last time he'd done was when Peter took him to see Lord of the Rings, when Peter had given him the ring to rule all rings. Peter's hand had rested on his inner thigh and surreptitiously stroked the swollen bulge between his legs. Only the denim of his jeans separated them. Peter wouldn't let him open the zipper in the movie theater.

Voices jabbered in languages that he'd never heard before. Gruff men's voices, laughing, even an isolated catcall from some remote locale. The sound echoed around him. He felt embarrassed for the was no doubt in his mind that the hoot had been directed at him. Then, he heard a man's voice close by, in heavily accented English that sounded vaguely like the Crocodile Hunter. A few more steps brought the man face to face with Abdul. Shayne cowered behind, accepting that if he dared to utter a single sound, he would not survive the punishment.

"'cuse me mate. Do you speak English by any chance?"

"I know enough to get what I want. What is it?" Abdul answered coldly.

"I'm sorry to bother you, mate, but I'm trying to find out when this ship's leaving."

"Just as soon as we're on board," Abdul replied impatiently.

"Then you're the man I'm supposed to ask. I heard it was going south all the way to Djibouti this trip?"

There was no point in contradicting something that the man had so obviously gleaned from a member of the crew. Did no one understand the importance of security? The CIA and the various British intelligence organizations had spies everywhere. They had become very active following 9/11. Abdul glared at him. The man sounded South African, perhaps Kenyan.

"That's correct."

"I'd like to get to--"

Abdul did not allow him to finish. "There are no passengers on this trip. You're wasting your time."

"Oh, sorry. I just thought, well… with you and the young lady going aboard… see I have to get to Djibouti in a hurry. They told me you were the man to ask. I'll keep out of the way. I won't be a bother to anyone."

"Get out of the way," Abdul said. He pushed past the man, nearly hitting him with the suitcase, and giving Shayne a hard shove in the process that almost knocked him down. He stumbled, groaning, barely able to stop from sobbing as pain ricocheted inside his lower abdomen.

"Hey, take it easy on the girl, mate."

With the man's objection left in silence behind him, Abdul started up the gangway, all but dragging Shayne after him. The rusted metal stairs scorched Shayne's shuffling bare feet until he reached a shaded area. He sighed with relief, but it was only temporary. He sobbed, gasping as he struggled on. Trying to inhale through thick muslin veil was next to impossible. There were many more steps on the clanging, swaying gangway before they reached the ship's deck.

He was taken below to a small cabin without windows, pushed inside, and locked in. He pushed at the veil, forcing it away from his face. At last he could breath. It was noticeably cooler than outside, but the air was stale. It had an oily smell that was a lot like the bus he rode to school.

Shayne could both hear and feel the rumble of the ship. It was beginning to move, but which way it was moving was impossible to tell. He became aware of a constant high-pitched whirring, a multitude of sounds that he could not identify. He shuffled over to a small bunk and eased down. He sat very still, because the slightest movement was agony. He made a fruitless effort to focus his thoughts, trying to stop crying. It seemed as if he'd been crying non-stop for as long as he could remember. He wiped his eyes. His eyes hurt. No, he wasn't crying. His eyes were watering. He closed them tightly. It didn't help.

Finally, he could not stand the pain any longer. Cautiously, he lifted up the frayed hem of the gelaba. He moved his knees further apart.. He didn't want to look. Panic surged up inside him. He had to look. He had to know. How bad could it be? He closed his eyes, silently begging for the pain to go away. He could still smell the filthy hut. The old man's stale breath. His teeth were tobacco stained. How he longed for the throbbing to stop, but it wasn't that easy. It was far worse than any bee sting. Awful pain. Finally, he opened his eyes.

Several seconds passed before he recognized that part of his body. It had become so familiar to him during the last few months, so important to his life because it was the part that gave pleasure to Peter. It wasn't at all the way that he remembered it. His cock was different, very different. There was a collar of pasty-gray skin hanging from the base. The rest of his cock was pink and oily, no not oily. It glistened like someone had polished it. It looked very sore. And the head that Peter loved to kiss and lick, it was just like a little cherry. It had never been so exposed, not even when they'd pulled the skin all the way back. Nervously, and resisting the impulse to itch, he cautiously lifted it up. His cock was pink on the other side as well, except for two red swollen blotches that burned just below the head. Only then did he realize why there wasn't any skin to cover the head of his cock. The skin wasn't loose on the shaft the way it was supposed to be. It was pulled tight even though his penis was hanging down. That was because the excess skin was pulled down to the base. There was no other explanation. He prodded at the small fold of skin that formed at his pubis, but felt nothing. He tugged at it. Again, there was no feeling. He pinched it. It should have stung, but it didn't.

Tentatively and with a growing sense of dread because his memory was beginning to return, his fingers felt beneath him, touching where the pain was worse. His pouch felt surprisingly large and flabby, not loose and silky soft or wrinkled up into a lump the way it usually was when he was with Peter. He winced and uttered a restrained whimper. His fingers felt around carefully, finding two places where it was very sore, burning sore. However, those weren't the places where the pain began. The pain was inside him. His fingers pressed into his pouch with a sudden urgency. He remembered lying on the bed, the old man with the yellow teeth leaning over him, holding the long thin knife. The pain of being cut was followed by another far more awful pain as something was ripped from inside him. His head throbbed. He remembered everything in a rush, the terrible agony, the horrid dark faces laughing at him, the other man and the young boy, both of them leering, masturbating shamelessly, the feelings that he could not stop, feelings that until then he had experienced only with Peter. His body hand been on the very brink, shuddering uncontrollably, then looking up to see the strange little bloodied egg dangling from a white cord. It was his egg, but he really hadn't cared at the time. All he wanted was to reach orgasm.

He felt his pouch again, anxiously, frantically, then in alarm, discovering what was missing. Both eggs were gone forever. He coughed and started to choke as bile rose from his stomach. He groaned and slumped weakly back on the bed. He shuddered as he fought the impulse to empty his stomach. Why had they done this terrible thing to him? He hadn't hurt them. He didn't know them. Where was Peter? He sobbed with his head forced deep into the comfort of a pillow. Within minutes he was sound asleep.

Peter arrived at the dock entirely by accident, or rather by the simple act of avoiding an accident. He barely managed to avoid a truck carrying a container when it swerved into his lane to go around a stopped bus. With his heart pounding frantically, he swerved off the road and into a parking lot. He cut the engine and took a deep breath. Only moments earlier he had come very close, if not to death, then to serious injury. His clammy hands trembled on the wheel. He was suddenly very tired. He closed his eyes and dozed in the afternoon heat, dreaming of Shayne.

Shayne, beautiful Shayne with his every-ready grin and innate need to be constantly on the move that caused Peter to give him nickname of Energizer Bunny, or E-B for short. His Shayne. His boy. His lover-boy. Peter called him 'lover-boy' as well, but it was only when Shayne was at his apartment. It was too dangerous otherwise.

They'd been making love, having sex for two months, in one form or another, so the 'lover-boy' nickname was entirely justified. Meeting Shayne was the best thing that had ever happened to Peter. Until the previous weekend, their favorite activity was sucking each other. Shayne had taken to sucking and getting sucked like a duck takes to water. Together, they'd taken the sixty-nine to a high art. For Peter, the best part of all was sucking on the very end of Shayne's little cock after he'd pulled the skin back. There was no way of describing that wonderful taste, except as the taste of a boy's cock. It was truly unique. It was an aphrodisiac for both of them.

When Peter opened his eyes, he saw the car parked next to a nondescript wall that could have belonged to a warehouse or a factory. Unlike his vehicle with its threadbare seats and touched-up-by-hand paint job, the Mercedes was in excellent shape. Indeed, it was in such good shape it clearly did not belong in the dockside parking lot. Peter stumbled from his Renault, not daring to believe his eyes. He had been told to look for a white two-door Mercedes Benz. The vehicle was white but it wasn't a car. It was a G 320 according to the badge on the rear, a box on wheels of a style that he had never seen before. It had two doors. The doors were unlocked, which made as much sense as leaving the car unattended in the parking lot in the first place. There was nothing inside the car, nothing except a few sheets of stained newspaper on the back seat and a feeling that made Peter cringe. He couldn't tell what the stains were from, but it wasn't blood.

He wandered around the car, trying to put the pieces into some semblance of order that could answer the most important question of all. Where was Shayne? He was certain that this was the car that Dalton, or whoever he really was, had rented from Cairo. He opened the trunk, not really expecting to find anything. The trunk was empty. He smiled vaguely when he realized that he had been able to do that because he held the car keys in his hand. Dalton had been in such a hurry to leave that he'd left the keys in the trunk. Either that, or he'd intended that the car be stolen.

Still trying to figure out which one it was, Peter walked across the parking lot to the wood planked wharf. He came to the edge, resting one foot on an over-sized cast iron cleat. The mooring line that went around it must have been as thick as his leg. The water swirled around the wood pilings far below. It was oily and dark. Plastic bottles bobbed back and forth. There was a dead sea gull. His depression began to build. Where was Shayne? He asked himself that question again and again.

He stared out to deeper water. There had to be a reason why Shayne had been brought here. Perhaps Dalton had met someone and left in another car. Finally, his mind reached the obvious conclusion. There had been a ship docked at the wharf when Shayne arrived. It was equally obvious where it had gone. The problem was that there were ships scattered across the horizon. It could be any one of them. How long ago had it been at the dock? An hour ago? It was two hours at the most. How far could it have gone? He had to find the harbormaster's office. He started back to the Renault.

"Hey!"

Peter turned quickly. The voice seemed disembodied, until the man stood up. He'd been sitting or lying behind a pile of ropes.

"Yes?"

"You're American."

Peter nodded. From the accent, the other man was foreign, but he couldn't be sure where he had come from. In fact, he wondered for a few seconds whether the man's name might even be Dalton. After all, there was sufficient similarity given that Father Joseph had described the man at St. Paul's Cathedral as being an Arab, of about the same age at Peter, and without a beard. And the woman at the upholstery store had implied much the same thing, that he was suntanned with dark hair. However, she'd also said that he was well dressed, which certainly didn't apply to this man in old cut-off jeans and a tee shirt that had seen better days.

"If you're looking for the Equator Express, you're about an hour too late," the man remarked flippantly, "she left on time for once."

"The what?"

The man laughed. "The ship that was just docked here. I'm told they call it the Equator Express, around here. It runs down the east coast, stopping off at towns along the way. It's supposed to go all the way to the Red Sea before it turns back, but I figure it depends on what's being traded."

Peter's heart rate picked up immediately. The timing was about right even if he didn't understand why Shayne would be taken aboard a coastal trader. The problem was that he remembered very little geography from school. He wished Shayne was with him. Shayne destroyed him in that category whenever they played Trivial Pursuit. All he remembered about the eastern region of Africa was that next to Egypt, there was Sudan, and somewhere to the east was Etrieia, and then it was only because one evening about a week earlier he and Shayne had watched a pre-Christmas television special about ancient forms of Christianity and Christian relics.

"Are you from around here?" he asked suspiciously.

"Me, around here?" the man laughed. Hell no. I'm up from Cape Town. I hitched up here to set some parts for my yacht. She's back in Djibouti."

Peter nodded. He had no idea what or where Djibouti was. "Tell, me have you been here for a while?"

"Too damned long. I finally found the parts I needed late yesterday. Talk about living a nightmare. No one gives a shit if things break. I've spent the last eight hours trying to get a ride back to Djibouti. I was hoping to go on the Express, but it turns out they weren't taking passengers this trip. It doesn't make a damned bit of sense, but that's the way these people are. Fucking inconsistent, and lazy? Christ, they make my ex-wife look like a coolie."

Peter smiled weakly and wondered what a coolie was. However, based on his experience so far in Egypt, he had to agree with the man's sentiments.

"Did you happen to see a man with a young boy? They came here in that car, say about hour before the ship left?" Peter asked. He gestured towards the Mercedes.

His excitement flared as the man seemed to consider his question in a positive manner.

"Well now. I don't know about that. There was a man who got out of the Merc."

"There wasn't a boy with him?" Peter asked anxiously. "About this high?" he added hopefully.

He held his hand on his chest, about where Shayne's head came up to when they stood face to face. When they kissed, Shayne had to stand on tiptoes and he had to bend low down. It had taken him quite by surprise that Shayne liked to be kissed, even more that he liked kissing back. Sometimes it seemed as if that was all they did.

He pushed the thought away with a sinking awareness that it was entirely possible that Shayne had been left somewhere between Medinet and Port Said. Or even in Port Said itself? He could be anywhere. Anywhere at all.

"There was girl," the man said confidently. "She was about that height. I suppose it might have been a boy. I didn't get much of a look at her. She had one of those thick veils on, like what those Bedouins wear. I didn't really see much of her face. Just her red eyes, like she'd been bawling for a while. She had dark hair, I do know that, because some was sticking out the side, but it looked like it was full of knots. She was a real mess."

"But it could have been a boy?" Peter asked eagerly.

"Hell, it could have been a boy, I suppose. She, well maybe it was a he, anyway whatever it was, the kid was in pretty bad shape," the man added.

"How?"

"Limping, you know, like your feet are too heavy to move. She was dragging along behind the man like she was too tired to walk. It's the way I am after a hard day at work. Exhausted. Sometimes I'm so exhausted I can't lift my beer."

Anxiously, Peter waited for him to finish. "And they didn't come off the ship before it left?"

"Not while I was here. And I was here all the time, fuming because the bastards wouldn't take me aboard. I didn't see the kid again. Now that man, I did see him again." He pointed towards the right. "Right down there, he was, when she left the dock. He was looking out for someone I expect."

"So they both left on this Equator Express then?" Peter thought aloud.

"That isn't it's real name, but yes. I pity that poor kid. The man was a cruel bastard."

Peter was becoming increasingly worried. There would be no reason for Dalton to use his credit card on board a coastal trader. It seemed as if the search for Shayne had run into a blockade, and if not that, then finding him had become much more difficult. He quickly explained the situation. The man didn't ask very many questions. He listened attentively, not disbelieving because he had lived long enough to know better. The story was too far fetched not to be true.

"And the ship is headed to God only knows where…" Peter finished. It was futile. He shook his head.

"Well, she'll go to Suez. That'll take a day or two because she has to transit with a dozen other ships. After that…" the man took a moment to think, "… unless she stops to trade, she'll run down the coast all the way to Djibouti."

Peter did the right thing and offered Stan a lift. With his advice and encouragement, they took the Mercedes since there seemed to be no point in leaving it there to be stolen. Peter returned the Renault to the rental agency. They headed due south along a road that had been constructed more than a century earlier as part of the Suez Canal project.

Chapter 17

84534505428 12-27-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

It was late in the night when the steel door to the cabin was finally unlocked and thrust open. Abdul stepped through the narrow opening and slammed the door closed behind him. Shayne turned face up groggily, awaken abruptly from sleep. He rubbed at his eyes. They were still red and sore, but they were not hurting as much. The agony in his abdomen had also faded to a gnawing ache that was almost bearable. He blinked and started to sit up. The man carried a tray which he set down with a loud bang on the small metal table. They glared at each other just as they had when Abdul had left him earlier.

"Take it off," Abdul ordered brusquely.

"Huh?"

"The gelaba! The robe, brat! Take it off!"

Abdul smirked at the boy's obvious embarrassment. Shayne's head moved slightly in denial. The man smiled, enjoying the boy's fear, the last remnant of resistance. His spirit was all but broken. He wasn't surprised. It was another reason why a boy's owner wanted to castrate him.

"Now you're a eunuch, there's nothing left down there for you to hide. Besides, with what your future holds, you might as well start getting used to being naked," he snickered. "Take if off!"

"I… I don't want to," Shayne said meekly. He cowered before the man. He almost said that he wanted his mother, but he could not get the words out. He also wanted Peter.

"What you want isn't important," Abdul said gruffly. "From now on you have a single task. A eunuch's role is to serve the man who owns him, and for you, that means a very important man. You have been chosen for a great honor, my capon. Do it properly and you will live longer. You never know, you might even enjoy being fucked after you're used to it. You wouldn't be the first boy to like a man's cock in his ass," he added with mirth at the boy's sudden change of expression. He was obviously shocked, but not the way that Abdul expected.

Shayne shook his head slowly, not really believing what he'd heard, yet appreciating the truth of at least part of it. He knew of one boy who liked having 'a man's cock in his ass' more than anything else. That was what he had done with Peter only the week before, and he had enjoyed every wonderful second of it. However, he couldn't imagine doing that with anyone else. It was how Peter made love to him and how he showed his love in return. They had joined their bodies together only one time, but it was enough. Peter said it was really two times, although it was hard to tell when the first time ended and the second began. They hadn't stopped moving. Peter's cock had merely slowed down for a while as if taking a much-needed rest. From then on it felt loose and slippery and hot inside him, eventually becoming slushy as Peter's cock churned back and forth through the fluids inside him. He wasn't sure how long it stayed in after the second time. They had both fallen asleep and Peter's cock pulled out sometime during the night. In the morning they discovered just how messy sex could be. A lot of what Peter had put inside him leaked onto the sheets. There were yellow spots and smears all over the middle of the bed.

"I'm not serving you or anyone else. Not now! Not ever. I want to go home," Shayne managed to say it without crying. He breathed out in a rush.

"You don't know what's going to happen to you once you leave here, do you?" Abdul teased. "Don't worry, my pretty little capon, I'm perfectly willing to teach you everything you need to know before you meet him. It's entirely up to you."

Shayne shook his head defiantly. "I'm not doing anything, not with you or him, whoever he is."

Abdul shrugged. Perhaps his first assessment was incorrect. Some boys resisted even after their scrotums were sheared off. Sometimes it even made them angrier and harder to handle as a result. However, he knew how to fully break a boy's spirit without resorting to violence. It took skill and patience, but he had almost a week. Without saying a word, he unfastened his belt buckle. With one pull, he pulled his belt free of his trousers and wound the buckle end around his hand. Shayne cringed, waiting for him to strike. He had never been whipped before and the thought of what was about to happen sent a cold chill through him.

"Like all Americans, you're weak, boy. You have no spine. You'll do what you're told or you'll be even sorrier than you are now. Now, take off your clothes."

Shayne glared at him, yet he realized the battle was over even before it started. He would do whatever he was told. It was impossible not to. Being disobedient was pointless, especially knowing what his punishment would be. His determination faltered. He nodded imperceptibly. If the man wanted him naked, then he would be naked. His arms lifted up feebly, trying to pull the rough cloth over his head. Abdul reached down and gave a hard yank, ripping the gelaba from underneath the boy. Shayne was suddenly left bare and his hands automatically moved to cover his groin. His sullen eyes met Abdul's, felt them looking over his bare body, studying him with the same intense appreciation that Peter showed whenever he was naked. Awkwardly, he turned away, not willing to look up at the man. Peter wasn't at all like this man, yet for some reason they had something in common. They were both attracted to him. The man smiled knowingly.

"You know what a eunuch is, don't you?"

Shayne nodded in response. His eyes dropped down. It was only a quick glance, but it was enough. His cock looked very strange with its reddened head and pinkish shaft. It was almost as if it didn't belong to him. He didn't want it to belong to him. He didn't like the look of it at all. And the worst thing of all was that he hadn't seen anything beneath his cock. He remembered why a second or two later. It was because there was nothing left to see. His balls had been placed in a little jar.

"That's right. You don't have balls any more, do you?" Abdul said flatly, observing the boy's shock. "I had them cut off. You remember Abu doing that to you, don't you?"

Shayne nodded awkwardly, blinking to stop himself from crying. It was all there, temporarily hidden in the recesses of his mind. Some of it came rushing back. The other man had a knife that was very similar to the knife that Peter used when they went fishing. He felt nauseous. The knife had been used on him. He had watched it coming closer and closer to his groin. He swallowed bile, recoiling at the thought.

"Yes, that's right, brat? You remember him cutting off your balls. Now, all you're good for is to be fucked by a man."

Shayne tried to block out the man's voice. "Why?" he managed to ask in a squeak that might well have heralded the change to come, or rather the change that would never come.

"Why? Because you're American! Because you're an infidel! Because it's what your kind deserves," Abdul snarled.

He turned to leave. However, instead of going to the door, he walked over to the television that was hinged from the wall. He stabbed at the 'on' button and waited for the blue screen to appear.

"In a few minutes a video will start playing, so eat your dinner quickly, boy. If you know what's good for you, you'll watch it and pay attention. With Allah's help and some practice you might even be able to do what's required of you without screaming your pretty head off," he said sarcastically. He didn't wait for Shayne to respond before he left the room. He needed to get back to his computer.

Again the door slammed and locked, leaving Shayne alone and afraid. He didn't look up at the television for several minutes. It buzzed relentlessly. He stared at his groin, at the pitiful reddened thing that had once been his cock. Peter said it was beautiful, but it wasn't any more. It was ugly, and horrible, and he wanted to die. It wasn't his. It didn't belong to him. Still, curiosity won over disinclination and he touched the shaft tenderly. It felt different, somehow more sensitive, almost too sensitive to touch. It felt moist, not dry and soft the way it used to feel.

Chapter 18

84534505444 12-28-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

They drove through most of the next day, taking turns at the wheel. Whenever the road came close to the coast, Peter scanned the horizon. There had been only a single glimpse of the rust-colored hull and that was as the ship cleared the southern end of the canal at Suez. They had arrived at Suez, hoping to convince the authorities to stop the ship. They were only thirty minutes late, but by then the ship was seven nautical miles [13 km] away. After leaving Suez, the road quickly deteriorated. At times the road had been washed out, or it had been nearly obliterated by going for years without maintenance. They had to crawl along in four wheel drive.

"So what's he like?"

Peter looked up quickly. He had been dreaming of Shayne, imagining spending his life together with the boy he loved. It was one of his favorite fantasies. He couldn't be Shayne's father, but he enjoyed thinking about the possibility of being with him all the time instead of occasional dates and sleepovers that were limited to the weekends.

"Who?"

"This Sean, you're always talking about."

"It's not Sean," Peter explained. "It's Shayne. It's spelled S-H-A-Y-N-E. He's one cool kid," he said wistfully. "His nickname is Energizer Bunny. I call him E-B sometimes." When Stan didn't respond, Peter continued. "He's very active."

"I figured he might be," Stan remarked. "With a name like that, he's probably on that drug, what's it called?"

"Ritalin?" Peter suggested. Stan nodded. "He's not. It's a silly name I suppose, but he likes me calling him that. He's not hyperactive or anything like that. Actually, his attention span is better than mine. He just has a lot of energy to burn, but once he wears himself out," Peter smiled, reflecting yet again on what had happened during the previous weekend, "then he sleeps like a log."

Stan laughed. "He sounds a bit like me. I slept though a earthquake once. It was 5.6 on the Richter scale."

He slowed the car down at the crest of a hill, letting Peter scan the horizon. As he expected, there was no sighting. More than likely the ship was well out to sea, following a direct line from Suez to its next port of call. The next largest town on the map, with anything even remotely the size of the dock needed for a coastal freighter was Ras Gharib. They still had a long way to go.

"I just hope he's okay," Peter lamented. "It's really my fault. I should have been there to pick him up."

"You can't be everywhere," Stan said.

"You know these people… you live in Africa, so you'd know them better than I do," Peter began. "Why would they kidnap him and bring him all the way here?"

Stan shrugged ambivalently. "I don't know. There could be any number of reasons. They're strange fellows, these A-rabs. They were the brain behind much of our civilization. Their culture goes back for thousands of years."

"To the ancient Egyptians?" Peter asked, doubting that what he had observed so far of modern Egypt could have anything to do with civilization in any constructive sense of the word.

"Partly. Actually it goes back even further, mostly to the Semitic civilizations in Mesopotamia of 4,000 BC. A lot of the Arab culture comes from Persia, the Abyssinians and Sumerians. The Tigres and Euphrates region was a very interesting part of the world back then," Stan explained.

"How come you know so much?" Peter asked jokingly. "You must be awesome at Trivial Pursuit."

"I spent most of my adult life teaching history to high school students in South Africa. Once control passed from white to black, there wasn't much of a need for people like me, so I left."

"For teachers?" Peter asked curiously.

"No, for whites. Damned blacks are a lot like the A-rabs. They can be well educated, but sometimes you wouldn't know them from animals. Some of the things they do, well it's part of the traditional culture, but it doesn't make it acceptable."

"Like what?"

"Like raping children. My niece was raped when she was four. They think it's a cure for AIDS."

"My God!" Peter exclaimed.

The implication was too horrifying for him to say more. The obvious question loomed in his mind. Stan breathed out heavily.

"It gets worse. They'll do thing like cutting off a little girl's clit so she'll never feel sexual pleasure, or making their women wear chadors. The excuse is that they would be defiled if they were seen by another man, but I think it's really an excuse. A-rabs treat their women like garbage. I swear most of them are latent queers, but Allah forbids men from fucking each other, so they're frustrated as hell."

Stan accelerated down a less-damaged section of road. Only a few hundred yards went by before he had to brake and engage low gear.

"Fucking roads!" he cursed. "Where was I?"

"The A-rabs," Peter answered with more than a touch of scorn. Given his experience since arriving in Egypt, his usually very open mind was becoming very biased.

"A-rabs! They're God's curse on the world. Like I said, the men have a real problem with women. They'd disagree vehemently, of course, but I'm sure most of the men would rather screw a boy in the ass than fuck one of their women. Do you know what they do to their girls in this part of Africa? In the Middle East too. I'm not talking about the educated ones, although I've met a few of them who are so into maintaining their traditions that they'll do things that would sicken you. They stitch the vagina up so it's tighter, probably so it's more like a boy's ass. Bastards! It must be hell giving birth. They claim to have invented civilization and they do things like that!"

"I suppose they think the same of America," Peter said thoughtfully.

"You don't know how bad it can get. Wait until one of them offers you lamb balls to eat."

"Lamb balls?" Peter ascertained.

"Yeah, lamb balls. They're considered a delicacy in this part of the world. Lamb balls, minced up with pine nuts and herbs for an appetizer, or they'll cook them with figs and dates and serve them for dessert. I guess we ought to be glad they're not still eating boy balls."

"Boy balls?" Peter asked in shock.

"Gelded slave boys used to be a major export from this part of the world," Stan said with disdain, "Sudanese and Ethiopian eunuchs were particularly popular. The Caliph of Baghdad alone had a collection of around 7,000 of them. Every one of them was nipped in the bud."

"Seven thousand guys with nothing to do but stand around," Peter quipped. It wasn't funny.

"That's one way of putting it, but it's the tip of the iceberg. At the height of the trade there were probably a couple of hundred thousand boys done each year. They'd castrate men too, but prepubescent boys were always in hot demand. You have to remember that the price of a slave boy who was castrated before he reached puberty was six or seven times that of other slaves."

"A couple of hundred thousand a year? That's an awful lot of balls."

"Yes, it was. The balls were soaked in salt and vinegar until they were eaten."

"You're not joking, are you?"

"I've seen the jars they used to store them in," Stan answered. "It turns your stomach once you know what they were used for. Rows and rows of them. They used to put lead seals on them once they were full, you know, to stop people from substituting lamb balls for the real thing."

"They were valuable?"

"More so for boys before puberty. They were probably more tender, or less size made for more taste," Stan laughed abruptly. "I don't know what a pair was worth in the market in Baghdad, but they probably paid for the cost of cutting them off in the first place."

"It always comes down to demand and supply," Peter said cynically.

"That's true, even with government intervention. It must have gotten out of hand at some time. When it became against Islamic law to castrate someone in Islam, the boys were done elsewhere. There are rumors it's still going on."

"Really?"

"Actually, we'll see some fortresses further down the coast in Ethiopia where the boys were taken to have it done. The A-rabs probably had it down to a fine art by the time those were built. Had to, I supposed, given how many they were doing each day. Each fortress was probably doing twenty or thirty boys an hour, I figured once. It has to be one of the first examples of a production line."

Peter found it impossible not to smile at the thought of that many boys standing in line, waiting their turn. It wasn't that the idea excited him. It was almost too far fetched to be believable. He was curious at a time when he should have been disgusted.

"That many. How on earth did they manage?" he asked, thinking of doctors and nurses around operating tables.

"It wasn't that difficult to do."

"But they'd still need a lot of doctors?" Peter asked.

"Not at all. Probably none were even around in area I'm talking about in fact. Well, they might have used the occasional doctor for the valuable boys, but the rest wouldn't have needed much skill, especially for young boys."

"Why's that?"

"For them, as far as I can find out anyway, it's the pretty much the same method that farmers in this part of the world still use for sheep and goats. I used to do it on my parent's farm in Jo'burg. All you do is nick the back of the lamb's scrotum and yank the balls out by the roots. If the cut is small enough you don't even have to sew it up. The hardest part is keeping the animal's legs out of the way and so they're can't move around."

"Gross," Peter muttered. "When was this? The Arabs, I mean."

"Oh, around AD 900 for the Caliph I'm talking about, but it's been going on for thousands of years. It wasn't just black boys either."

"Huh?" Peter asked. His curiosity had not abated. If anything it was becoming worse.

"White eunuchs have always been particularly popular with A-rabs. They used to fill ships with them. A lot came through Constantinople or Port Said."

Stan slowed down at an unmarked road, hoping to check his bearings. They had been driving for more than an hour without seeing more than farms.

"Most of them were slaves captured from Christian villages in western Europe, mostly from Yugoslavia, or Greece, but the A-rabs would also send people out to kidnap boys from further afield. Sometimes their ships would go all the way to Spain and Italy. Only a few came from northern Europe so blonds were very rare. They were the lucky ones."

"How so?" Peter asked.

It was getting stuffy in the car and he wound his window down a few inches. The sun had barely risen and already it was becoming hot again.

"Well, for one thing, white boys were treated differently because they were worth a lot more. They were mostly used for sex needless to say. Black boys, well they were the slaves and guards. Often both their cocks and balls were cut off. Supposedly, they were more lustful than whites, but more likely it was envy," Stan winked at Peter, "Sudanese and Ethiopians are rather well hung."

"I've never seen one to know."

"Anyway, the most extreme version was called Sandati. It means 'clean shaven'. Mostly it was done to Christian boys who were captured after the Crusades, which gives you an idea of how much they hated us. Everything gone with a single stroke of a curved knife. It's called a jambiyah, by the way. Very decorative," he explained.

"Wouldn't they die from loss of blood?"

"Not the way the A-rabs did it. They inserted a wooden tube into the kid's urethra and used boiling oil to cauterize around it. I suppose skin eventually grew to cover the wound, but what a way to live, having to look like a woman so some damned A-rab can fuck you in the ass and not feel bad about it."

Peter shook his head in mute disbelief. And the same people who invented this barbaric practice also claimed to have invented civilization? It made no sense. No sense at all.

"You say it still goes on?"

"Of course it does. The A-rabs haven't stopped liking little boys that's for sure," Stan replied. He glanced at Peter awkwardly. He should have realized sooner. "I'm really sorry," he said apologetically.

"You don't really think…" Peter couldn't say it.

"Hell, I don't know. Who knows what goes on in this part of the world? What happened in the past doesn't mean that much. They probably haven't done anything to him."

Peter didn't answer. He was thinking of the blood on the table, and the two ropes that had been lying on the floor. He hadn't thought much about it before. In fact, he had all but forgotten the ropes that that had been lying next to the table legs. It made more sense than he wanted to think about.

Chapter 19

84534505489 12-29-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 6.50D

Shayne watched the video again while he picked at the food on the tray. He wasn't very hungry. Tired. Sore. He was not interested in the food or the video. There were thin slices of bread that tasted like the bread from the Lebanese restaurant that Peter took him to a month ago. The tastes were familiar, if not something that he enjoyed. The same humus, even the same yogurt sauce, to put on the wedges of bread. There was no knife. He had to use a fork to spread it around. He had to watch while he ate. There was nothing else to do.

The video took Shayne's knowledge of sex to an even higher level, yet he wasn't at all surprised by what he saw. Parts of it were disgusting, yet there was also a kind of inevitability about it too that was vaguely reassuring. In a detached way, it was just another step in learning how to enjoy his own body, a process that had up to then been both ongoing and enlightening. He had done a lot of growing up during the few months since meeting Peter. Once he had realized that he was attracted to Peter, and Peter to him, his life changed quickly.

It began pragmatically rather than being driven by emotion, with Peter answering his questions about his body, but mostly about his feelings for his own sex. Once it was out in the open why Peter had never married, it became very easy for them to talk. He clearly remembered the first time they had talked openly about sex, not 'birds and the bees' sex, gay sex. He was frightened, but Peter was very reassuring, providing information that his mother was incapable of simply because she was a woman.

They were lying on the couch in the usual position with Peter behind him, one arm around his chest so he wouldn't fall off. His head was nestled under Peter's chin. He liked to feel Peter's breath in his hair, his reassuring embrace, the warmth of his arm, and another much more interesting warmth that always seemed to be molded into his buttocks as if it belonged there. He got an erection. Of course, it wasn't his first one. It happened in the bathtub all the time, going from limp to erect in seconds whenever he played with his little boy-cock. It happened even more frequently when he was with Peter. Usually, all it took was a friendly hug, or for Peter to be holding his hand, or as was sometimes the case, at the most inopportune moments like when they were washing the dog. His cock didn't care whether he was eating dinner, or playing chess, or watching television like he was at that moment. However, this was the first time that he had the courage to ask about it. Peter said it happened by itself, but he knew there was more to it than that. He kept asking and Peter kept avoiding. Finally, he asked Peter if the reason why he wasn't married was because he was 'gay'.

Peter didn't answer, not for a long while. They lay side by side in silence. Shayne was scared. He worried whether Peter hated him, even though a part of him was insistent in its rejection of that possibility. His feelings for Peter were becoming increasingly confusing. He wanted to spend every moment of every day with Peter, and if he wasn't with Peter, all he did was think about Peter. He went so far as to sketch Peter's face in his schoolbooks, a caricature really, but there was enough likeness that Shayne quickly scribbled through the drawings to obliterate the evidence. He wrote his name and Peter's name entwined together using a make-believe alphabet, added hearts and squiggles that were supposed to be plants but which looked vaguely like long penises. He created daydreams that featured Peter as his hero, his companion, his best friend, as someone who he would spend his life.

"Yes, I'm gay," Peter finally muttered. He eased away from Shayne's back, lessening the pressure of his arm around Shayne's slim frame, taking away the bulging mass that was trying to get between the boy's buttocks. "I'm sorry I should have told you already. I guess I thought you knew."

And Shayne thought about it again. Already, he had thought about it a lot, but he didn't understand more than he enjoyed Peter's company more than any other person's, even his mother. Still, he didn't say anything. He was afraid of what Peter might think of him if he knew how he felt. He became tense and he inched further away from Peter's warmth.

"You don't have to worry."

"Why?"

"Because you can trust me. I won't do anything to you," Peter said bitterly.

"Why not?"

"Because I love you, if you must know."

How easy it had been after that. They laughed about it later. It wasn't more than a minute after that when Peter kissed him for the first time. Then, they made out on the couch. It seemed as if they had known each other for a lot longer than a few weeks. Peter groped him, and he groped Peter in return. Before the hour was gone, they held each other's cocks and jerked off. Later on, Peter sucked his cock. Then, he sucked Peter's cock, well the top part of it anyway, and Peter warned him at the end otherwise it would have been in his mouth. He didn't know what 'it' was. The next time, not much more than an hour later, 'it' went in his mouth and he discovered that the slimy taste was awful, but also intensely satisfying in its own way.

After the first day, things settled down quickly. Peter answered all of his questions properly after that. They played with each other's cocks a lot, for hours at time when there was time. They always ended up sucking. Sometimes he swallowed so much that they joked about the nutritional value of Peter's cum and the likelihood of him getting fat on it.

Their relationship changed a lot when they became lovers, but then it stayed relatively constant for the next two months. He accepted his relationship with Peter as something that was so special that it had to be kept secret. Of course, he knew that they were breaking the law, that Peter could have been sent to jail because of what they did together, yet it was all so natural that it was easily put aside. Up to that point the worst thing he had done was to look at pictures of naked boys and the occasional man on the computer with Peter, both of them excited by what they saw and talking about what was happening in some of the images. Peter jokingly said he was getting 'hands-on sex education', because they always masturbated while they were doing it. He enjoyed those times as much as anything else they did. They sat side by side, both rubbing, taking turns, and learning. Both Peter and Shayne were barely able to restrain the urge to try out the things they saw in graphic detail on the monitor of Peter's laptop. Then, everything changed the day they read a story about a man and a boy having anal sex. The very next weekend they discovered what it really meant for a man and boy to be lovers.

The actors on the video, if they could be called that, consisted of a man and a boy. The man was as old as Peter and fairly dark skinned, not negro dark, but dark enough that he was obviously not white. He looked a lot like the man who had come so cruelly into Shayne's life. The boy was very pale, blond-headed and blue-eyed. He didn't say much and when he did, Shayne could not understand more than every other word even though he spoke English. It was obvious that he wasn't happy from the outset. He was red-cheeked and he never smiled, at least not in the way that someone smiled when he was enjoying himself. Through most of the video, the boy's eyes were teary, although there was only one time when he cried. That was when the man's large cock was finally forced into him. Perhaps it was his first time, there was no way of telling, but it was so very different to Shayne's first experience that he didn't understand the other boy's terror.

Unlike the boy in the video, Shayne had been eager to try anal sex. His boyish enthusiasm compensated for Peter's qualms. Eagerness finally won over reluctance. However, as willing as he was at the time, he was very glad that Peter had been patient and had not done to him was being done to the boy in the video.

The boy's face contorted, all but screaming in agony when the man's cock finally penetrated his sphincter. There had been a momentary discomfort, but mostly Shayne had been shocked when he felt Peter's cock reach the point where it was more in than out, when it was buried far enough inside his bowels that there was no doubt that they were joined together. He was shocked because they had finally done it, gotten it far enough inside him that he could feel the huge head displacing his insides. Making love to Peter, or being made love to, definitely had its serious side, but he was also incredibly happy. He couldn't help giggling as Peter began the task of putting even more of his cock inside him.

Despite his own sorry state Shayne watched the video with interest. Perhaps he was curious about what it was like for someone else, or because he wanted the boy to be as happy as he had been when Peter's cock slid so easily back and forth inside him. There were a few times during the next few minutes when the boy seemed to push back the way that Shayne had pushed back in order to get more of Peter's cock inside him. At those times, he felt a wave of relief. He focused on the close-ups of the boy's buttocks spread wide by the man's thick cock and he imagined that was how it looked when Peter's cock was inside him. Then, even though it ached inside his lower abdomen, he couldn't help but move his pelvis with undulating thrusts, imagining, pretending that Peter's cock was back inside him once again.

After a while, he ignored the lingering pain. It didn't get any worse. It was just there, like a reminder that he was no longer the same boy he had been. The discomfort was centered in his body, yet it seemed to move around, from his lower abdomen to between his thighs, to right below his penis. It almost felt as if everything was still there, even if it wasn't. It felt as if he'd been kicked hard. If he tried not to think about it, it was impossible. There was simply no way that he put aside hatred, fear, shame, and sadness, because by then he knew well and truly what had been taken from his body.

Chapter 20

84534505524 12-30-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

"So why the big interest in Arabs and eunuchs?" Peter asked. He still could not bring himself to say 'A-rab' again even after they had been traveling together for many hours by then. If the ship had stopped at Ras Gharib, it had been before they arrived, which was very unlikely.

"Ah, that! Well, I've been researching a book, you see," Stan explained. He glanced out the window, studying endless miles of rocky desert. "Are you sure you want to talk about this?"

Peter thought about it. "I don't know that I do or don't want to talk about it." He closed his eyes. Why did he want to talk about it? "I think I have to, that's all. What's the book about?"

"It's tentatively titled The Eunuch in History: From Caveman to Italian Castrato."

"It sounds like a best seller."

Stan laughed. "I wish. I could use the money. Actually, I got the idea when I was sailing up the coast a few years ago. I stopped off at one of the fortresses I told you about."

"Where the slaves were castrated?"

Stan nodded. "The one I went to was not in use of course, but a lot of it was still intact. Apparently, they've even turned one or two of them into private hotels further along the coast. God only knows why someone would want to stay at one. The area is picturesque though. I suppose that's the reason. Anyway, the one I visited was pretty run down. The funny thing was that there were still rows and rows of the jars stored there."

It was Peter's turn to drive. He concentrated on the road, slowing the car to a crawl when the road threatened to diminish to a track in the sand. He worried about the Equator Express getting so far ahead of them that they would never catch up. They had to catch up before it docked otherwise they would never know if Shayne had been taken off short of going aboard and search from bow to stern.

"Once I found out what they were used for, it was so hard to believe that I started doing some research on the Internet. I read some of the history and decided it was worth spending some time on. It's still going on, you know. I told you that already, didn't I? They were still using the fortresses up to a century ago. That's stopped of course, but there are still people who make their living doing the same thing. For example, there are parts of India where boys are castrated so they can be used for sex."

"I guess I don't get it," Peter remarked. "Why would you want to do something like that to a boy? You can still have sex with him if he has his balls."

"I wouldn't know about that," Stan jibed. "Of course, one of the reasons why it was done to boys was so they kept their good looks."

"There's that, I suppose," Peter agreed.

"It was the main reason why the A-rabs did it, at least for white boys," Stan continued. "The motivation was different for blacks needless to say. They were almost always slaves. They didn't want them fucking their women, plus they wanted their slaves not to be aggressive."

"Cutting off a boy's nuts is guaranteed to keep him docile?" Peter asked.

"You got it! It's a bit like comparing a stallion with a gelding, I expect. They don't misbehave very much," Stan replied. "You getting hungry yet?"

"Me? I'm starving."

"We should have bought some food with us. No more stopping at roadside stalls. Sooner or later one of us will get sick if we're not careful," Stan lamented. He examined the map in his lap. "Oh well! There'll be another town in about 20 kilometers [13 miles]. Maybe there will be a supermarket," he said with cynicism.

"An hour, huh? I think I can wait that long."

Chapter 21

84534505535 12-31-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

The video was most definitely X-rated, or would have been if it was rated by one of those few countries in the world that still allowed such things as child pornography. However, only a few dozen people had ever seen the video that Shayne watched again and again over the next few days, and none of them cared whether it was legal, rated or not. It was sexually explicit, both in terms of what was seen and what was heard. It left nothing to the imagination. There were close-ups at every opportunity. There were so many views of the man's thick cock sliding back and forth through the boy's well-stretched anus, that it became repetitive after a while. There was only one camera being used, and it recorded the entire one hour and forty-seven minutes of the boy's supposed deflowering and the activity that followed. It was anything but boring to Shayne, because while he had done much the same thing with Peter, he had never actually seen it happen. After a while, it wasn't even disgusting. It was simply what happened when a boy had sex with a man.

By the end of the first half-hour, the boy's hole had become noticeably larger, so much larger that the man's cock moved in and out of him with ease. The increasing depth and the force that was used was familiar if slightly disturbing.

It had happened to Shayne too once his body had loosened up inside. His anus, which had once been so tiny, became big enough that Peter's cock could slip and slid around inside him. Then, he discovered that he could use the muscles inside him to squeeze down or tighten up on it to increase Peter's pleasure. Together they made squishy sounds and it was enough to make Peter ecstatic. Having first clamped down on Peter's cock because he thought he was going to fart, Shayne made certain to do it as often as possible because it felt wonderful for him as well.

Indeed, it was the process of compressing his body against Peter's cock that finally brought on Shayne's first anal orgasm. Squeezing down and pushing himself against Peter's cock not only increased the pressure inside him, but also encouraged Peter to lunge against him. Then, almost as if they couldn't control what they were doing, Peter's cock went deeper, harder and faster than either of them imagined possible. It was exactly what Shayne desired the most although he had not realized it until it happened. Hard and fast and so deep that Peter's cock pounded up against the thing inside his body that made him quake and shudder. Mere rubbing wasn't enough. It needed to be bruised.

Once started, the onward rush could not be interrupted. They had to keep going. It was inevitable. It was what both of them had always needed, but never experienced. For a while, Shayne wondered whether he would ever be the same. At the time, he was nearly delirious with pleasure, saying 'Peter, oh Peter' over and over again. It felt as if he was about to explode, as if all that was required was just one more of Peter's powerful thrusts and he would be finally, fully sated. But it wasn't one more thrust, or two more thrusts. It just kept on getting better and better and his squeezing became almost impossible to do even though Peter wanted him to keep doing it. It brought Shayne to the very brink of sanity and it kept him there, teetering at the edge until it seemed his body could take no more punishment. Neither Shayne nor Peter imagined making love would be so overwhelming, that they would lose control. They became oblivious to everything except the flesh they shared. His entire body was concentrated in a single place, a tender node that was deep inside his body where Peter's cock was stabbing.

Shayne could not remember much of his own orgasm except that it seemed as if he exploded. Had he really cried out? Peter said he did. When Peter orgasmed inside him, all Shayne had felt was the throbbing jerks of his huge cock, straining and thrusting, and pulverizing him. It hurt, but in a good way. He felt what might have been squirts. There was a sudden heat rushing through him that coincided with Peter's loud groans. Perhaps the best thing of all was that Peter didn't pull his cock out like the man in the video. He left it where it belonged, buried as deep as possible inside Shayne's exhausted body. It wasn't long before it became hard again.

The man in the video withdrew his cock as soon as he was finished. Shayne had not seen that part of his lovemaking with Peter either. He had felt it, of course, and heard it too after they did it for the second time. It sounded sloppy in a succulent slippery sort of way, not in a messy way. Peter's cock came out once. It was clean, but slimy-wet. They both laughed with relief when they saw it. Peter immediately slipped it back inside Shayne's body because that was what they both wanted.

Shayne stared at the television screen with his mouth open and his eyes wide. There was a gaping bloodied hole where the boy's anus should have been. Had his body been like that afterwards? He didn't know. There certainly wasn't any blood. Peter would have told if there was, and he hadn't seen any, although he had fallen asleep shortly after it was finished. He felt weak and sloppy inside, and sore too, but it was a nice feeling rather than hurting. The worst thing was that he felt so empty. It was like that for nearly two days.

The boy's pricklet looked more like a shriveled-up worm than a cock, Shayne thought. It was very similar in appearance to his own, certainly no larger. The main difference was that the collar of gray skin at the base of the boy's cock was gone. Instead, there was a thin brown band where the boy's cock was attached to his body. Was that how his would look after skin was gone? He examined himself nervously, even pulling the fold of skin back to discover the metal ring underneath. He wanted it removed, yet the knotted fishing line resisted his efforts.

Like Shayne's body, there wasn't much to be seen underneath the boy's penis, just a small crumpled remnant of skin to indicate an emptied scrotum. The boy was a eunuch too. Even as Shayne watched and realized that his body, at least that part of his body would end up looking very similar to the boy in the video, a trickle of yellow liquid dribbled out of the boy's anus. It ran down between his buttocks to join a large wet spot on the sheet beneath him. Shayne appreciated that it had it been like that underneath him. The next morning Peter changed the sheets on the bed because there were stains. Something had leaked out of Shayne's body during the night while they were asleep. Maybe they ought to use a towel under them the next time. He felt sleepy and rested his eyes on and off, dozing, only to be started awake for no reason.

However, sleep wasn't going to happen for the boy in the video. After the man's cock was removed from his bottom, the boy was shoved away with hard push. He got the message in broken English as well, although it took several attempts before he understood. He reluctantly crawled down the man's body. There were more close-ups of the boy's bottom, even of his cheeks being pulled apart by someone else on order to reveal the dilated opening for the camera. Shayne heard men speaking in a foreign language. The laughter wasn't foreign. It wasn't hard to guess what they were laughing about. He felt sorry for the boy. He was soon to feel even sorrier.

Yet, as Shayne watched the boy take hold of the man's glistening wet cock and bend down to bring his lips closer to it, he wondered for the third or fourth time that day whether he would be able to do the same to Peter's cock after it had been inside him. He had sucked Peter's cock many times over the last few months, mostly doing it in a mutual satisfying manner that Peter called a sixty-nine. He enjoyed doing it that way as much as Peter enjoyed doing it to him. He also enjoyed it when Peter sucked on his boy-cock and made him whimper and twitch until he could barely stand it. However, it was a nice feeling that Peter gave him. It was all about having fun. He wasn't so convinced about sucking Peter's cock after it had been in his butt. That was an entirely different question.

The boy wrinkled his nose and stopped short of actually putting the man's cock in his mouth. There were some angry words spoken followed by a command that should have brooked no hesitation on his part. The boy shook his head again. Shayne saw the blur of a hand and heard the boy's wail. The camera zoomed in and recorded the boy's lips touching the head of the man's cock. In the background, more instructions were given. The boy licked along the shaft hesitantly. After the next set of instructions he opened his mouth and took the head of the dark-skinned cock between his lips. It was shocking in its depravity. It was also exciting, so exciting that Shayne licked his lips and tried to imagine doing it himself.

When he became bored with the endlessly replaying video, Shayne engaged in a secret fantasy. It was a fantasy that he often entertained. He would spend the rest of his life with Peter. He pretended that the video showed them making love, not two people who were strangers to him. Unfortunately, it did not last very long. The boy's expression became pained as the man pushed the small blond head down on his erect cock. Shayne's incipient urge was squelched by a fear that, when all was said and done, would not go away. He tried to convince himself that he would be with Peter again, that he had to survive for Peter, but he was constantly nagged by the feeling that now, there was no Peter. There was no reason for him to live.

Chapter 22

84534505544 12-31-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

The Equator Express was not the ship's real name. That name was written in Arabic letters on the stern. There was another name below the Arabic, but Peter and Stan couldn't make it out from where they were. The paint was too faded. The profile of the ship gave little indication that it was the vessel they were looking for. There was a superstructure bridge in the center of the vessel, fore and aft cranes, a single funnel and a high bow. It could have been any one of a hundred coastal traders that plied the coasts of Africa and the Middle East. However, even before the ship passed the breakwater and entered the harbor, Stan was adamant that the rust-colored ship docked at the wharf in Hurghada was the one they sought. Loading and unloading took less than two hours. Crates came off and bags went on, loaded a dozen at a time in rope nets that swung precariously back and forth.

"That doesn't make much sense," Stan said absently.

"What doesn't make sense?" Peter's eyes were tired from staring, examining everything that moved on or off the ship, hoping to get just a single glimpse of Shayne.

"What they're doing."

"How so?"

"They're unloading crates of UN supplies and taking on fertilizer."

"What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing… except… why would you ship fertilizer from here. It sure isn't made in these parts. The soil's so poor that they need fertilizer by the ton to grow anything at all. Most of it comes from Turkey."

"I don't know. I guess they need it somewhere else."

"Yeah, that must be it."

The last cargo net swung aboard and disappeared into the forward hold. About ten minutes later the bow of the ship swung away from the dock as the forward lines were let go. With the engines astern, the gap widened until the bow was pointing to the channel. The stern line was released and the vessel slowly pulled away.

"Well, that's that, I guess," Peter said morosely. "It's a waste of time. There's no sign of him."

"At least he's still on board," Stan said confidently.

"How can you be so sure?" Peter asked.

Stan smiled. "You didn't notice, huh? Usually, the locals swarm over these ships when they come in to dock, even when there aren't any passengers."

Peter looked up suddenly. "There weren't. I didn't see any other people going on board besides the crew."

"That's right. You saw the burly dude at the gangway, didn't you? He kept sending them away. I figure there's a reason why they don't want people on board."

Peter nodded. It was like clutching at straws.

Chapter 23

84534505576 12-31-03
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

The next time that Shayne awoke was when the vessel had been underway again for many hours. He could tell from the constant vibration under his bare feet when they touched the metal wall of the cabin, the persistent low humming sound. In the confined windowless cabin, he had no way of knowing whether it was dusk or dawn, or even if they were within sight of land. Time had lost all meaning for him. His stomach grumbled and he sat up. His lips were parched. There was still some water left in the glass. He drank it quickly. He was hungry. He ate the last two slices of bread before he realized that the pain in his lower abdomen had faded to a dull ache.

The video was still playing on the wall above his head, droning on as the images shifted, repeating again and again. Eventually, he glanced up at it. The scene was familiar. It was one of the few scenes where the boy seemed to be enjoying himself. The man was sucking on the small inflamed cock while pushing his forefinger back and forth inside the boy's anus. Not surprisingly, Shayne had really enjoyed it when Peter did that to him.

The first time they had done it was in the front seat of Peter's car after they returned from seeing the Lord of the Rings. They had gone on a date, as they called it when no one else could hear them. It was hardly their first. Even Shayne's mother made a joking reference to a 'date' when Peter arrived to take her son to dinner and a movie at the multiplex in St Paul. Had she know that her son was no wearing underpants under his jeans she might have not been so willing to bid them farewell.

There, parked outside the apartment building where Shayne lived, they sat in the darkness. The engine was idling, the heater pumping out barely enough heat to hold back the coldness of a Minnesota night. They both agreed that the movie was the best of the three. Then, Peter said jokingly that Shayne was lord of the ring as well. His comment, perhaps pretending that he was joking, provoked a somewhat interested response because Tolkien's trilogy was Shayne's favorite reading material. However, it was only when Peter explained that he was talking about 'Shayne's ring' that they both laughed for a long time. It was funny after all. Then, from his jacket pocket, Peter brought out a gold ring to celebrate the occasion, or so he said because there really wasn't an occasion to be celebrated except going to see the movie that Shayne most wanted to see on the day after it was released. There was another reason, that both Peter and Shayne were in love, and that the ring was a token of that love.

Shayne recognized the ring immediately because it had the same elaborate carving that was on the ring that Frodo carried. They tried it on, with Shayne giggling as he pretended that the ring was a symbol of their love rather than the 'one ring' that Frodo carried on a cord around his neck. The inscription on the outside of the ring said "One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them". After a few bashful blushes, his fantasy even went so far as to convince Peter that he should be the one who placed it on Shayne's finger. It was almost as if they were being married.

The problem was that it didn't fit on Shayne's finger. The ring was a size or two too big. Perhaps it had never been intended for his finger, because it was supplied with a leather cord which was supposed to go around the wearer's neck. Shayne was ready to have Peter put it around his neck when, Peter, in a moment of nervous excitement, suggested another ridiculous location where it could be worn. It would be their secret, as secret as the love they shared. With Shayne's zipper open, and without his underpants getting in the way, Peter tried putting it on the giggling boy's cock. It fit snugly once it was pushed down to where Shayne's cock was attached to his pubis. Then, Shayne got an erection and both of them realized that it was exactly where it was supposed to be. It made Shayne's penis stiffen even more than usual. It became much larger, or seemed to, and stiff enough that the veins became visibly swollen. The skin was definitely darker as was the head, which turned plum-purple. It was both disturbing and exciting.

Without thinking, Peter leaned between the seats, bending down. There were no preliminaries, even though he fully intended to take his time. However, the closer he came to Shayne's cock the greater was the urge to take it into his mouth. So instead of working up to it the way that he usually did, he opened his mouth and took it in. He always relished sucking on Shayne's cock, but that night would be different to the other times. Perhaps it was being in the car, the cloak of darkness and the cold night providing privacy from prying eyes. Perhaps it was imply the right time for their love to advance to the next stage. The boy's thin stalk was hot and as hard as it could be, a bursting stiffness, that apogee of hardness that could be attained only with something to constrain the blood flow. While Peter sucked hungrily on the little cock and balls, his index finger ventured underneath. The virgin opening was easily found. There was just enough moisture for his finger to penetrate inside until the fingernail was embedded in Shayne's luscious warmth.

Shayne wanted him to do it just as much as Peter did even though they had never really talked about it. The desire had been there for days, weeks, perhaps since the first time they met. He trembled, clinging to Peter's head while trying to acclimatize himself to the sensation of something going into his anus instead of coming out. Around and around, Peter's finger went, teasing the puckered rim, arousing desires in both of them that had been ready to surface for some time. Peter had never done anything like that before, yet his instinct was right. A boy needed to be relaxed in order to enjoy it. Shayne's tight anus burned with delight, grabbing onto the tip of Peter's finger whenever it ventured into the opening. Finally, Peter took the unprecedented step of licking his finger.

The burning sensation disappeared in an instant. Peter's wet and slippery finger glided through Shayne's anus. It stopped only when Peter had second thoughts. His finger was inside so far that the boy's anus was clamped around the second joint. It felt like his finger was buried inside Shayne. The heat was overwhelming, as was the firm pressure that gripped his finger. Of course, Peter knew something of the theory of anal sex. It certainly wasn't possible to do something like that with a boy of Shayne's age.

They conversed in muted whispers, sitting in near pitch darkness. Yes, it was tight but it didn't bother Shayne like it bothered Peter, who was very afraid of hurting the boy he loved. Minutes passed. They exchanged furtive kisses, not really 'making out', but still letting each other know that love was felt. 'Making out' was something they saved for the safety of Peter's apartment.

They took turns in putting saliva on Peter's finger, although Shayne was initially quite squeamish about putting his lips on something that had been inside his butt, as he put it. His anus gradually loosened the way that nature intended. Peter's finger inched deeper, finally reaching the point where knuckles prevented further penetration. It was just deep enough for Shayne to sense the possibilities. The finger wriggled around, probing, prodding, making him twitch erratically. Almost by accident, Peter's finger rotated inside the boy's rectum and began to rub at a small hard node. The delight was instantaneous. Within seconds, Shayne's body was straining down to increase the pressure that wanted to form there. His breathing changed to quick gasps. His eyes closed, his lips pressed together, only to break with breathy groans. Peter was more than happy to massage the tender spot. The joy he felt in seeing Shayne shuddering and writhing against his finger was enough to overcome any reluctance he might have had.

Peter brought Shayne right to very edge of orgasm before Shayne became frightened by the sheer intensity of it and begged Peter to stop. Only a few moments passed before Shayne pleaded once again, this time for Peter not to stop, to do it even harder, faster, if he could. They were confusing messages to say the least. They came even closer to that ultimate pleasure for a boy when the door to Shayne's apartment building opened. They saw the silhouette of Shayne's mother on the door step. The fun was ended for the night but not before both of man and boy had become addicted. Shayne was so tired that it was all he could do to walk up the path and climb the stairs. He slept in the next morning.

Chapter 24

"Finally, you're awake."

Shayne rubbed sleep from his eyes and sat up woozily. The man was in his cabin again, standing a few feet from the bed. He remembered glimpses, like snapshots. He shook his head to clear the fog. He remembered falling. It was dark. Cold. The cloth under him had a strange smell. Water splashing over his body. Being sick. Again and again. The table. Lying on the table and not being able to move. The knife in the old man's hand. Something, something important, bloody, handing from the man's withered fingers. What was it?

"How long have I been asleep?" he murmured.

"Nearly two days," the man answered simply.

"That long? I missed Christmas?" Shayne asked fearfully. He had a special present for Peter.

"Christmas? The American brat wants to know about his precious Christmas. There's no Santa Claus for you this year. Today is January 2nd, boy."

Shayne looked up, startled. Not two days, but more than a week was gone from his memory.

"Where am I?" he mumbled.

Abdul Al Ghiran shrugged. "Not that it makes much difference to you, but you're on a ship."

"I know that," Shayne grumped. "Where is it going?"

The boy's antagonism took him by surprise. "We left Halaib a few hours ago. After Port Sudan, he next stop is Mits'iwa."

"Where's that?"

"Halaib and Port Sudan are in Northern Sudan. We're going to Ethiopia."

Shayne nodded. "I want to get off when we get there," he said nervously.

Abdul Al Ghiran laughed. He leaned over the boy and swatted his head. Shayne was slammed back against the wall on the other side of the bed. The sheet, half covering his legs was ripped back.

"Eunuch!" Abdul Al Ghiran shouted. "You are a fuck toy, boy."

Shayne shook his head slowly. There was still some fight left in him. The man ignored him.

"Good, the skin's finally come free."

Shayne risked looking down to where the man was staring. Nothing had changed. That part of his body was still disfigured. A few moments passed before he realized what the man was talking about. The withered fold of skin that had been around the base of his penis was now hanging loose at the head of his cock. It was caught behind the very pronounced glans. Even as Shayne looked, Abdul Al Ghiran reached down and plucked the useless flap of skin away.

There was a ring at the base of his penis, not unlike the ring that Peter had placed there except this ring was made of brass instead of gold. Instead of lettering incised in minute detail around the rim, the ring was hollowed in the center.

Shayne continued to stare as the man's fingers took hold of the ring and rotating slightly, began to lift the ring higher and higher. Had the boy's cock been erect, the ring would not have come off. As it was, the prominent if small acorn head had to be pushed through from the other side.

"It appears that Abubakar has done a good job on you," Abdul Al Ghiran said admiringly.

The little penis was completely sheathed in foreskin turned back upon itself. The almost-never-touched skin was very delicate, translucent pink with a network of tiny blue veins just below the surface. It merged into narrow band of pale skin that had previously been the very tip of the boy's foreskin. Where the ring had been was a thin brown ridge. There was no sign of the minimal scar that Abubakar had promised four days earlier. It had healed to form a perfect Ring of Allah.

Abdul Al Ghiran shoved Shayne to one side and sat down on the side of the bed. He took hold of the boy's small cock and moved his fingers up and down. There was very little movement in the skin.

"It's tight. Just the way it's supposed to be for a boy who serves the Lion of Allah," he observed with relief.

Even the slightest degree of stiffness would stretch the remaining skin completely. Fully erect, the skin would be impossibly tight. Painless rubbing of the cock could only be achieved using a liberal application of oil, and even then the boy would derive more discomfort than delight. He examined the underside, noting that the cauterizing wounds were still scabbed but would only be so for another day or two. The head was shaped like a barb, the two sides flaring out beyond the shaft before coming together in a well-defined groove.

The boy's pouch that had once cushioned his cock was reduced to a few folds of silky skin. In time, a few weeks usually, there would be a noticeable change. For most boys, the pouch would contract to a remnant, a small useless flap of skin. Some of Abdul Al Ghiran's clients required that the boy's pouch be cut away as well, the 'clean' look being preferred. Others appreciated that the skin retained its sensitivity and served to remind a boy of what he no longer had. He smoothed the skin out, checking on either side. On the left side, the scab was ready to fall away. On the other side, there was little to see beyond a pale thin line.

"It will please the Lion, indeed," Abdul Al Ghiran observed. He glanced up at the boy's face. He was envious, yet he was so hardened to inequity that he showed no sign of it. "Such a pretty thing you are. Sing for me."

Shayne shook his head resolutely.

"You will sing, if not now, then soon enough my pretty capon."

Chapter 25

84534505574 01-01-04
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 3.50D

Peter and Stan arrived at Port Sudan in time to see the ship arrive. Again, it unloaded crates and boxes and took on sacks of fertilizer stacked high on wooden pallets. Again, Stan reflected on the strange cargo. It made no sense at all. After driving though so much territory that was in dire need of fertilizer and irrigation, Peter was beginning to agree with him. Leaving Stan to watch over the ship, Peter hurried to a nearby coffee shop whose sign advertised 'Internet Access'. It was frequented by sailors of a dozen nationalities. After buying a cup of thick black coffee and two honey cakes that he didn't want, he managed to plug his laptop into one of the four telephone ports, a 19.2K modem. He began the time consuming process of retrieving his email, mostly from Shayne's mother, and Dalton's credit card transactions. At least there were English and French language options. The Arabic script was meaningless to him

Much as he expected, there were few transactions recorded for Dalton's account. However, the list of ship-to-shore charges for Internet access, was particularly interesting. He had not expected those. Acting on impulse, Peter disconnected from the coffee shop's ISP provider and entered the telephone number that Dalton had been using from the ship. He added Dalton's credit card number to pay for the call. He hit return and waited for the call to go through, not knowing what to expect. As he expected, the computer wanted a username and password. He was prepared to the extent of having the window and drop down menus ready to go. The program was called 'Hotdog' and it was only supposed to be used for system administration. On his 3.0 gigahertz machine it usually took three minutes to find a username-password combination that worked. It took two minutes that day. There were some advantages to working for C.A.

"Jackpot," Peter mused quietly. His enthusiasm was tempered by his constant worrying about Shayne.

The home page that appeared on his screen could have been anyone of a hundred small Internet service providers in that part of the world. It was entirely in Arabic, not a single word of English. However, Peter was good, very good. He moved his mouse over the text, even as the home page continued to load. The background image began to appear. He was looking for html addresses to appear at the bottom of his browser while he waited. It was one of the things he liked about Netscape. Links. News. Future Plans. Chat. Email. No surprises. The background finished loading. He stared at the screen before him. There was no doubt what it was. The World Trade Center at the moment of impact. He couldn't tell which of the two buildings it was. It was a photograph that he had never seen before.

He tested the links. They all worked, but the language was still Arabic and the hieroglyphs meant nothing to him. Then, again, he acted on impulse. He used the mouse to grab a few lines of script from one of the windows and he copied it, saved it as a file, dum-1. Even as he hit the return key, a chat window popped up out of nowhere. He jerked the telephone jack out of the modem to sever the connection. He left the coffee shop in a hurry, leaving his food untouched. There would be time to read the emails from Shayne's mother when he was in the car again.

The road that followed the Ethiopian coast was almost impassable in places. Yet, just a few kilometers after Peter and Stan had to dig the car out for the fourth, or was it the fifth time, the gravel and sand track turned to a modern road of concrete and bitumen. The contrast was stark. On the surfaced road, they drove quickly to make up for lost time, but almost as soon as they gained on the ship, the road deteriorated again and they were back to crawling along in four-wheel drive. Fortunately, the ship was traveling within sight of the shore as if came closer to Mits'iwa. One glance at the map revealed why. Islands were scattered across the gulf, a fractured chain of rocky outcrops stretching to Saudia Arabia and Yemen.

While Stan drove, Peter used his laptop to read the email he had downloaded at the coffee ship in Port Sudan.

Peter,

The FBI has finally been called in to investigate Shayne's disappearance. There were six detectives here yesterday. They fingerprinted the apartment and wanted to know why your prints were all over it. I told them you were Shayne's best friend. They wanted to know if you had a sexual relationship with him. You are the prime suspect despite what was found in the motel room.

Anyway, I told them everything I know again. Well, not quite everything, but more on that later. They are not convinced that they are looking for someone else although they did mention an Arab. They won't tell me his name. They might not know themselves, I suppose. Apparently this man may have kidnapped other boys. They won't ell me very much, but I think its five or six boys who are missing, and that's this year alone. There's been no sign of them. It's like they disappear off the face of the earth. God, I am so worried about Shayne.

I have to go. I'll write again from work when there's a free moment.

Please, please find Shayne and bring him back home.

Alicia.

The second email was sent the following day. It was much shorter.

Dear Lord of the Ring,

At first I didn't understand why Shayne would call you that. Then I read his email I don't know why I missed it among the others. You should die in Hell. How could you? I trusted you with him.

Peter sweated. He remembered every word of Shayne's email. It had been written the morning after they had made love, when Shayne had returned to his apartment. He was supposed to be getting ready to go to Sunday school.

Dear Lord of the Ring,

I think I'll call u that from now on. U are the Lord of my Ring, that's 4 sure : ) U rule! Oh Peter, I feel so empty without u. I want u inside me again so bad I can't stand it. I had to poop major when I got home. Yuk-oh smell too. I think it's all out now. It's a bit sore, but it's a nice feeling cos it makes me think about u doing it. When can we do it again? Mom's got the late shift again this Friday and Saturday : ) My butt wants to be your best friend.

Your sexy lover boy, energizer bunny,

Shayne

The third email from Shayne's mother was long, but to the point.

Peter,

I don't know what to think any more. You are Shayne's only hope, I think. I met with the local FBI people today. I was going to tell them about you. They talked about the missing boys. One of them turned up a few months ago in a garbage dump in Turkey. He had been tortured before he died. They wouldn't say how except that it was sexual. He was only ten. They have no idea where to look. They've been trying to get access to the computer records that you used to find the credit card information.

Peter, I'm frantic. My Shayne is with that man. Pete, you have to get him back for me. For us, if need be.

I was angry yesterday. Now, I don't know what to think. You did a terrible thing, yet I think I've known that from the outset that something like that might happen because Shayne's gay. Maybe it's normal for him to seek out someone like yourself. Peter, I need time to think this through. Whatever happens, I want you to know that you made him happy. I guess that's what it all comes down to in the end. I could see it every time he was came home from being with you. It was like he was walking a foot off the ground.

Alicia

The fourth email was written only a few hours later.

Peter,

He's in love with you. I know he is. I expect you know it as well. He must have tried to tell me that a hundred times in his own way. After you left on Thanksgiving, he talked about how nice it would be if you could be his father. However, it's not a father that he wants from you, is it? I don't think I'm jealous because I know that he's always been lonely for a man's company. Then, you came along and his life was turned upside down. He needs you. Peter, I've been thinking a lot about everything the last few days, mostly about you and Shayne, needless to say.

You talked about saving for a house when we were trying to track down those credit card bills. I've been saving as well, which is next to impossible being a single parent. Maybe I'm clutching at straws, but I thought that we could do it together. Buy a house. That way you'd be around Shayne. I don't know about the sex thing. At least you'd be together and he would be happy.

Please find him.

Alicia.

The fifth and final email was sent only minutes later.

Peter,

I won't stand in the way. If you are what he wants, then so be it. Not for one moment do I think he's old enough to make his own choices in things like sex. That's up to us. Yes, I said us. Just know that I will take great pleasure in your death if you ever hurt him. Seriously, the house idea might work out. If not, he can visit you on weekends. Oh, Peter, am I really writing this? I don't know what to think. I want him home. I want him to be happy.

I keep telling myself it isn't that bad despite everything in the news about pedophiles. His father is Greek and the Greeks did invent pederasty. It used to be an honor for a boy to have a man friend. I don't see why that can't continue so long as no one else knows.

More later,

Alicia.

Peter smiled and closed his laptop. While he had been reading, the road had turned eastward and became even worse. It had changed from a dry line in the sand to a twisting track that zigzagged through rocky outcroppings. They passed the first of Stan's fortresses, but there was no time to stop. Yet Peter stared at the castle long and hard and tried to imagine the cruelty that had been performed within the rough stone walls. How many boys had passed through its gateway only to emerge again with scars to show where manhood once belonged. Again and again, he thought about Shayne, the blood spots on the table, the pieces of rope on the floor. It was all he could do not to cry.

"Where are we?" he asked.

He was trying hard to keep his mind from dwelling on what he had seen in the hut outside Cairo. Stan jerked his hand behind him to startle the flies away. With the car windows down the flies descended in hordes.

"So much for docking at Mits'iwa. She kept going. She's off the coast."

"Hmm… so the next port of call is Djibouti?"

"More than likely," Stan rubbed his nose, "and that's as far as the ship goes."

"So… either we've missed something, or they get off there?"

"That's my thinking. I was wondering for a while whether it might head over to Yemen or Saudi Arabia. If he's been kidnapped by an Arab that's where he'll probably end up. Only that's not on the cards."

"Why not?"

"For a couple of reasons, but the main one is that your navy has been keeping a close watch on the area," Stan sighed, "there's a chance the ship might be boarded. They'd… well they'd dump him overboard before that happened."

Peter shook his head sadly. The facts were unrelenting in their implication, but the last thing he would do was to entertain the possibility that Shayne was dead. He closed his eyes and hammered his head against his wrist in anger and frustration.

"What's up?"

"Nothing. I'm worried. The blood I told you about seeing in the hut… mostly I'm worried sick about him. I have this terrible feeling he's been hurt."

"Okay, I've been quiet, trying to be supportive, but I think you have to know. Peter. He probably has been hurt, but not the way you think. I shouldn't have told you all that stuff about castration."

"What should I know?" Peter asked anxiously.

Stan was quiet.

"For God's sake tell me."

"Okay. Look, I really don't want to say this. I don't know for certain, but I think you've already figured it out for yourself anyway. They're probably going to use him for sex." Stan glanced at Peter to see his response. Peter stared back. "They wouldn't have brought him all the way here otherwise. The thing is, you're right. They wouldn't need to castrate him for that. This isn't the fifteenth century."

Peter nodded, hopeful that his nightmare was just that. "What then? Why was the blood on the table."

"Because they circumcised him," Stan answered. "There's no way an Arab would have sex with an uncircumcised boy, particularly an Arab who would kidnap a boy."

"Why?"

"Because he'd be unclean," Stan explained. "He would defile himself by it."

"So you think they circumcised Shayne?" Peter asked nervously. "That would account for the blood and the knife I saw, I suppose."

"And the disinfectant," Stan added. "The last thing they would want if for him to get an infection."

Peter nodded, increasingly relieved. Circumcision wouldn't be as bad as the other thing. In fact, with his foreskin still intact, more than likely Shayne was a minority in his class at school.

"How about the screwdriver I told you about?" he asked.

Stan shrugged and slowed the car to a crawl as they approached a high promontory. He was getting very tired of driving on the narrow road.

"I don't know. Maybe it was used for something else."

"The leather cord?"

"I don't know, Peter. I wish I did. Usually all they do is pull the skin out from the boy's cock and snip it off. For most Muslims, there's a ceremony that goes along with it. It's done by the 'khitoum'. At least that's what they call the man who does the actual cutting in this part of the world. He's a sort of barber-surgeon."

"It doesn't sound that bad."

"It's no different to what the Jews or anyone else, except they do it when the boy is older. The worst thing that could happen to him is what the Bedouins do. What they call, 'es-selkh'. It translates as 'the flaying'. I'm sure they wouldn't do that, at least not in Egypt. In Saudi Arabia it's still done to boys, but not in Egypt I would think, at least not in the cities."

Chapter 26

84534505574 01-03-04
—Telecom Ship-shore 2032-28292 to 010-292-23-2499 4.50D

For the last few days there had been nothing for Shayne to do except eat, sleep, and watch the video. The video was boring. He had watched it so many times that he knew exactly what would happen at any given moment. He fancied that he even understood some of what the men were saying. The words were different but the meaning stayed the same.

He felt prickly dirty all over, constantly itching and uncomfortable, but when he asked his captor for some water and soap to wash with, he was greeted with a sarcastic comment about 'filthy Americans'. Instead, he used some of his drinking water to wipe his face and the places where the itching was worse. He tried to eat and drink as little as possible, because defecating and urinating was so unpleasant. Sometimes the mess stayed in the bucket for hours afterwards, until the small cabin stank. At least he had the benefit of a toothbrush. When boredom became unbearable he amused himself by biting his fingernails. He picked at the small scabs under his cock until they came away. The residual swelling in his scrotal pouch disappeared. At last relief, when the sharp stabs of pain were finally gone, even the soreness where his flesh had been scorched faded to a dim memory. There was freedom in that alone. In truth, he was beginning to adjust to what remained of his genitals. For hours at a time, he thought about his mother, and about the man he loved, and he cried.

Despite a steel door, Shayne heard footsteps in the corridor outside the cabin where he had been kept a prisoner for the best part of a week. He sat up, waiting for the door to be unlocked. It seemed that food was brought regularly, although not having a watch made it impossible for him to know that it occurred every eight hours to coincide with the three deck watches on board the ship. The door swung open and the man stepped inside. Shayne had taken to calling the man 'ass-hole', even if he didn't say it aloud. This time, unlike the other times, the door was left ajar.

"Come!" he gestured abruptly, in dictating that Shayne was to go in front and he would follow.

"I don't have clothes," Shayne said simply. It was a statement of fact. He had worn nothing since his gelaba had been ripped away. The words, quiet, nervous, anxious words, had come from the recesses of his mind. It was to be his final act of resistance.

The man's response was to grab his arm and jerk him to his feet. He shoved Shayne towards, then though the door, then hurried him along the narrow corridor until they reached the next door. He pushed Shayne inside and closed the door behind him. For a few seconds, he stood there, looking the boy's body up and down.

"You need a bath. You stink, you filthy American."

"Sir, I can't help it," Shayne whimpered.

"You smell worse than a dog, boy."

Shayne tried to take a deep breath. His hands trembled. He couldn't help it, let alone stop it. He couldn't even look at his tormenter. Forget meeting his eyes. His head lowered submissively. His spirits low, sinking lower as he tried to find the words.

"I've been trying to tell you that, Sir," he managed to say without sobbing. He swallowed. The man glared angrily at him. He was close to tears and nothing bad had happened. "I need… I know I need to shower, sir. Please… I'm sorry… I've been good for a couple of days now, haven't I?"

"In there," Abdul said. He ignored the boy's whining, pointing to the washroom. "Be quick. We will be docking soon."

Shayne hesitated. The man raised his hand. Instead of slapping the boy's face, which might have caused an unsightly bruise, he brought his hand down on the boy's head. Shayne grunted from the impact. He sniveled, fighting back the tears that threatened to burst out.

"I'm sorry… please… don't… Sir… I promise…"

"Then cease your wailing, you stupid boy or I'll really give you something to cry about," Abdul sneered. "Wash yourself properly or you'll be sorry you didn't."

Shayne hurried into the bathroom. For a instant, he almost closed the door behind him. He stopped. He had no right to expect privacy. He had learned that painful lesson during one of the man's frequent visits to his room. His body was to be seen by anyone who cared to look, even shown off. Other men, the ship's captain and a few of the seamen had come into his room as well at Abdul's invitation. They weren't allowed to touch, but they looked at him. They made comments too, speaking in another language, but whose intent was all too obvious. The men admired his little supposedly virgin bottom and made crude jokes about what would soon happen to it. The front of his body was ridiculed, for a boy without balls was not a boy at all. A eunuch boy was good for only one thing and Arab men knew it better than anyone else.

Shayne washed quickly and thoroughly, soaping every part of his body several times, not only because it felt good to be clean at last, but Abdul had made it perfectly clear what would happen to him if he was not clean. Finally, when Abdul called out for him to hurry, Shayne rinsed off the water. He dried. He went into the adjoining room. Abdul looked at him and smiled.

"Even if you don't have balls that must feel better. It does, doesn't it?"

He smiled, enjoying his torment of the pretty boy. His manner was constantly changing from anger to sinister solicitude so that the boy would not know what to expect.

"You want to look the best for the Lion, don't you my little capon?"

"Yes sir," Shayne muttered.

Nothing mattered. There was no reason for him to live, except to please the Lion. There was no love any more, just what he had to do to stay alive and he wasn't even certain of that. There had been times when he prayed to God that he might die in his sleep. He blinked rapidly, feeling tears building behind his eyes. He shuffled his feet, still standing fresh and clean and very naked before the man.

"You're a very pretty little thing now that you've been gelded. With such a tiny zabb you could easily be a girl," Abdul taunted.

His eyes lowered to Shayne's middle. The boy's cock dangled limply, its color that of a shy, blushing virgin. The thin tube of delicate burnished flesh was topped by a prominent yet tiny bluish head. The vacant pouch below was barely visible, just as it was supposed to be, although the little ridged ring that separated the cock from the scrotum tended to emphasize the changing skin texture. He reached down and lifted the tender pink morsel out of the way. He was pleased to see a single fold of skin that went from the base of the boy's cock down between his legs before it disappeared. For some boys, there were several folds that remained after the balls were taken out, a rather unsightly result, Abdul thought. Unity was as important as the concept of symmetry in the Muslim view of aesthetics.

The good news was that the boy had recovered completely. There were no unsightly scars to be seen. The only mark on the boy's body was the one mark that was supposed to be there. The brown, slightly raised line of Allah's Ring was surely the thinnest and highest that he had ever seen. It was the ultimate symbol of purity. And even better, the skin was tight even when the prick was soft and limp. He could not have asked for a better result. He smiled appreciatively. If Abubakar's handiwork was not enough, the boy was undeniably the most beautiful boy that he'd seen.

Suddenly, he turned away, unable to look upon such perfection. He held out a pair of flimsy white shorts.

"Put these on, boy."

Shayne took them nervously. Abdul seldom called him 'boy' or anything else except for 'capon'. Indeed, his name had never been used. It was as if Shayne Santorini no longer existed.

The shorts were almost transparently thin, glossy, delicate. He bent at the waist, putting his feet through the small openings hesitantly because the material seemed as if it could be very easily damaged. His coordination was also lacking. His strength was gone. He almost stumbled. He was scared. He drew the shorts up slowly, relishing the cool silk-like fabric against his inner thighs. It was like wearing nothing, nothing at all. The material clung to his body, even pulling into his crack to show off the two melon-halves of his behind.

"Turn around."

Shayne turned around completely, slowly, letting the man look at his bottom, because that was what men liked to look at. What he hadn't already known, the video had made perfectly clear.

"Now this," Abdul said, holding out the second and final piece of clothing.

It was a small very-short-sleeved shirt, like a blouse that a girl might wear in the middle of summer. It was of the same material as the shorts. There was a single button in the front. Nervously, Shayne slipped his arms through the sleeves. Again, the thin cool material clung to his body. It barely came down to his waist. Abdul nodded approvingly. Shayne fumbled with the tiny mother-of-pearl button until the man shook his head.

"It's better left undone, my little capon. You have a nice body and you must show it off when you meet the Lion. There is no reason why you should not whet his appetite before tonight"

Before they left the cabin, the boy was robed in a cotton gelaba and the veil was placed over his head once again. He was given a pair of leather sandals to wear, but it would not be long before the sandals would be exchanged for the soft satin slippers that eunuch boys traditionally wore.

The ride from the wharf where the ship was docked to the fortress took a few minutes in a golf cart up a twisting path made of scalloped squared flagstones. Tens of thousands of feet a year, millions of feet over the years, had made that pilgrimage to the Seventh Citadel of the Eunuchs.

Chapter 27

From their vantagepoint on an adjacent hill, Peter and Stan watched the small red vehicle wind up towards the huge wooden doors. The man and girl did not escape notice.

"That's him," Stan declared. "The kid is the same one I saw at Port Said I think."

"The other person could be Shayne, I suppose." Peter surveyed the fortress again.

"That's one of the fortresses I was you telling you about on the way down here," Stan explained. "The one they turned into a private hotel," he added.

"Where the castrations were done?" Peter asked absently. He had almost forgotten.

At the time, he was watching a figure on the top wall of the parapet. It was a gaunt man in a long white flowing robe. The man appeared to be focused on the activity on the dock. Peter held out his hand and Stan handed the binoculars back to Peter.

"Yes. Actually, I seem to remember hearing that the renovation was paid for by the U.S., from one of those third world support funds," Stan added.

Peter didn't answer. He held the 10x50 binoculars to his eyes, adjusting the focus for the range, then scanning until he located the man again. Even with binoculars, the face was familiar. What little could be seen of his face, at least, because the man wore a traditional Arab headdress and he had a long black beard. With the binoculars, there was no doubt.

"Jesus!"

"What's wrong?"

Peter's hands were trembling to much to hold the binoculars. "It's him," he said simply.

"You can see his face."

"Yes."

Peter turned away, still not believing the evidence of his own eyes. He blinked in the bright sunshine, resisting the urge to take another look. He wasn't sure he believed anything any more. It was impossible, utterly incomprehensible. It could not be happening.

"All you need to do is go down there and have a chat to the guards," Stan said sarcastically. "I'm sure they'll hand him over right away."

"Guards?" Peter looked up.

"Well they aren't hotel staff, that's for sure," Stan said dryly.

Peter hadn't noticed them until Stan drew his attention to them. There were at least a dozen guards alone that were gathered on the wharf where the ship had backed up to dock. There were even more, many more near the fortress. He could see them without using the binoculars. They wore the loose white robes that Muslims always seemed to be wearing in that part of the world. They carried what appeared to be stubby rifles. Peter had never seen a fully automatic Uzi xxxx.

"Jesus," Peter said again. "I can't believe it. This has got to be a nightmare."

"You better believe it," Stan chuckled. "I think you have your work cut out for you."

"Yeah. I'd say that was the understatement of the year."

"I think the best way would be to drive back to the last town we passed and tell the authorities he's here."

"What?" Peter exclaimed.

"The Ethiopians have a military force that could do the job, I expect."

Suddenly, Peter realized that they were talking at cross-purposes. He was too frightened to think rationally. He shook his head abruptly. It wasn't that hard to understand. He had to have a plan of action. Then, he remembered Stan's comment about the US naval force that was patrolling off the coast. Perhaps they weren't that far away.

"No! There's a better way. Besides, I bet they already know he's here," he said thoughtfully.

"Hardly. He only just arrived. There's no way."

Peter held the binoculars out for Stan to take. "I'm talking about someone else, Stan. Take a look at the man on the wall," he directed.

"What man?"

Peter glanced at the fortress. The man was gone from sight even as the huge wooden door closed behind the golf cart. His decision came quickly.

"Stan, I'm going to stay here in case there's some way of getting Shayne out. I need you to do something for me."

"Sure. What is it?"

"I need you to get a message to the nearest American consulate."

"Djibouti's probably the closest. It's a long way back to Port Sudan."

"I don't care where you go. I need you to take a message as quickly as possible,"

"I don't see why you just don't go to the authorities in that last town. You could be there and back and a few hours at most."

"Because…" Peter took a deep breath, "… because there's a lot more at stake than getting Shayne back. The man I just saw, I swear to God, it was him."

"Who?"

Peter leaned closer and whispered.

"You're joking. He's supposed to be in Pakistan."

"I'm not joking, Stan. I'm certain that's who it was. I've seen his ugly face on TV again and again over the last few years."

"Why would he be here?" Stan asked. "I mean of all the places for him to go, why would he be here?" He glanced around him, trying to make a point. "This is hardly the sort of place where you'd want to go to if you wanted to train terrorists. What with the road so close and all. You do that sort of thing in the desert."

It was several seconds later when Stan stopped turning. He ended up staring at the ship. Again, pallets of sacks were being loaded into both the fore and aft holds. Neither man needed to look at the loading manifest or see the signs stenciled on the bags to know that it was fertilizer.

"Man! Why didn't I think of it before?"

"Think of what before?"

"The damned fertilizer. We used to use it on the farm when I was a kid."

"So?"

"I know why they're collecting it, Peter. We used to use it to blow up rocks in the fields. You mix it with diesel fuel and it makes one hell of an explosive."

"Really?"

"Yeah, really. It's not in the same league as dynamite, but it's cheap and easy to get. Hell, it's was what they used to blow up that building in Arkansas or wherever it was."

Peter stared at Stan. "So?" he asked simply. "So what?"

"Don't you get it? The ship's engines run on diesel fuel. There's probably thousands of gallons aboard. All you'd have to do is pump the fuel into the holds and ka-boom."

"I don't see what good it would do," Peter argued. "They'd never let a ship like that get close to a city like New York or London."

"True." Stan reflected for a few moments. "But they wouldn't need to. All they have to do is get it into the Suez Canal at the same time as the US is moving some of its ships through. You saw how crowded parts of it were when we were driving down from Port Said. A ship like that could carry thousands of tons of fertilizer. Hell, you could wipe out an entire fleet if you timed it right."

Peter thought that was probably an exaggeration. "The question is what do we do from here. We're miles from anywhere. I haven't seen a public telephone since we left Port Sudan."

"Well, I figure it this way, Peter. See, you're a Yank, so your consulate people would listen to you before they listened to me. You take the car and go to Djibouti. I'll stay here and keep an eye on things. If I get a chance to grab your kid, I will."

Peter shook his head. "No. I stay. You go. I'll write a letter or something."

"There's no way they'll take action without some sort of proof," Stan said quietly.

"Maybe."

Peter walked back to the car, opened the passenger door and picked up his laptop. He placed it on the hood of the car and booted it up. He typed quickly, speaking to Stan at the same time.

"Okay, where are we?"

"Rasa was the last village we passed through. Back there a few kilometers," Stan answered.

"What do you thing this place is called?" Peter asked thinking aloud. He described it as best he could. "What I really need is a digital camera. Okay, now, there were about a dozen guards on the dock." He kept typing, describing, entering the basic facts of his pursuit from the U.S. to Italy, to Cairo, and the car trip south as they pursued the ship. He added their speculations about the cargo of fertilizer.

"I don't know what else to say," Peter mused. "There's really no evidence except the credit card records."

He linked them to the document. Then, as a last resort, he linked the data that he had captured from the web page. It was in Arabic and he had no idea what it said. It turned out to be the one piece of information he should have included. Without it, his report would have been considered speculation. He watched Stan drive back the way they had come until the car was out of sight. Then, he walked back to where he could look over the fortress.

Chapter 28

Shayne was kept in a small windowless room until late afternoon. There was nothing for him to do except sit in the sole chair and wait. Wait and wait, and worry endlessly about why he was there. Inside, he knew why he was there. He was there to meet the Lion. The Lion would have sex with him. He tried not to think about it. Time passed very slowly. He was almost glad when the door opened and Abdul Al Ghiran entered. He grinned at the boy.

"Stand up, little capon. It's time to go. Put on the slippers. Now, take off the robe," he ordered brusquely.

Shayne did as he was ordered. The air-conditioning made him shiver as he stood there in thin silk shorts and chemise, his feet in the delicate satin slippers, feeling strangely exotic in the clothes of a eunuch. Abdul Al Ghiran took the plain cotton robe from him and folded it. He assessed the boy with discriminating eyes. He was ideal, a boy for whom only the great poets of Arabia could find words to describe. He thought of verses by Abu Nawas, the greatest of all the boy-lovers of ancient times. He had described boys of equal beauty, boys with sultry eyes and ebony hair, and skin the color of goat's milk. The boy's beauty would not be lost on the Lion even if his passion was not for boys.

From a deep pocket in the side of his gelaba, he took a hairbrush. Roughly, he pulled Shayne to him. He made a few quick passes, not caring if the hard plastic bristles scraped the boy's scalp. Satisfied, he pushed the boy ahead of him.

They hurried through the hallway, down a set of stairs, along a wider corridor, across a courtyard and into a small room. There, Shayne came face to face with the Lion for the first time. The man was not unappealing. His face had the ascetic look of a deeply religious man, haggard features, thin lips, somber eyes. Shayne stared. He recognized the man almost immediately. It was impossible not to. The face was unforgettable. After all, the man's photograph was on CNN every other day it seemed. Usually, he wore a simple Afghani robe, but not this time. The gaunt figure was attired in the traditional clothes of Saudi Arabia, the bisht or loose black robe, dishdasha, a white cotton shirt-dress underneath and a headdress, complete with tagiyah, ghutra, and agal.

The man studied the boy quietly. His eyes narrowed. His lips tightened, becoming cruel pale, very thin, barely visible behind the dark beard.

"How old is the child?" he demanded.

Abdul Al Ghiran moved from behind Shayne to beside him. "The boy is ten, Oh Blessed Master of the Desert."

"We will forgo the formalities, old friend, but know that there is no one who has that privilege." It was not true, but Abdul Al Ghiran felt special none the less.

"He's very pretty," the Lion mused as much to himself as to amuse Abdul Al Ghiran. "Even more so than the other boys you've brought for me to enjoy."

"Indeed he is. I thought his beauty would compensate for other things. Few blond boys would have his pretty face."

"It does indeed compensate. He can sing, can he not?"

"Yes. He sings like a nightingale. I heard him in a church. He's nothing less than the lead singer of the choir. I expect he's a good Catholic boy as well."

The Lion chuckled. "He is, I'm sure. It's a wonder the priests haven't been at him. Have they had you in confession, my little gelded boy?" he asked sarcastically, using the language of his birth.

Abdul Al Ghiran smiled and shook his head, although he realized suddenly, that he had never bothered to check the condition of the boy's anus. He remembered only then that it had not been difficult to insert the rectal tube. Usually, it had to be worked into the anus. Instead, it slipped in easily. He should have looked to see if there was bruising, just to be sure. It was the only way to be certain if a boy had indulged in anal pleasures.

"Take off your clothes, child," the Lion instructed softly.

When he spoke, it was more like the whisper of the wind across the sand. Harsh, yet quiet, and very threatening. Shayne obeyed, but only after he hesitated for a few seconds. His fingers fumbled nervously at the single button even though it was already undone. Abdul Al Ghiran pushed him from behind. Awkwardly, he slid the shirt back from his shoulders. Abdul Al Ghiran took it from him, leaving him dressed only in the insubstantial shorts. The thin cloth clung to him, revealing everything but bare skin.

"Very nice indeed," the Lion murmured in Arabic. "You've outdone yourself this time, Abdul."

Abdul Al Ghiran smiled. "Show him the rest," he said to Shayne.

"Have you named him yet?"

"No. I thought you should be the one."

"Ah… we'll call him Nightingale, then," the Lion suggested cheerfully. "A very pretty nightingale he is too, with a voice to match I hope."

"A good choice," Abdul Al Ghiran agreed wholeheartedly, although he would have shown the same enthusiasm for any name.

Shayne hesitated again, not feeling embarrassed, but a fear unlike anything else.

"Show yourself to your master, eunuch," Abdul Al Ghiran said impatiently.

Again, Shayne obeyed. There was no choice in the matter. If he didn't do it, one of the men would. His hands crept to his sides, took hold of the loose elastic waist and began to inch it down. Had he planned for a strip-show he could not have chosen a better way to expose himself. A frightened fearful boy revealing himself to men who despised his kind. The first thing to come into view was the thin ridge that marked the start of his cock. Indeed, it served to emphasize where it was attached to his body.

"The Ring of Allah is nicely made," the Lion said admiringly. He continued to watch the terrified boy as the flimsy shorts came hesitantly down.

Abdul Al Ghiran nodded in response. He had hoped that the Lion would comment favorably. It was good that he was appreciative. He would make sure to tell Abubakar. Finally, all of Shayne's small cock was revealed in its unnatural pink luster.

"The child's zabb will be tight I hope?"

"Yes. My uncle showed me the result before the gelding was done. I made certain that there's no movement left. Nothing at all. He'll have no interest in touching it. None at all, not unless he wants to hurt himself."

The Lion didn't answer. By then the remnant of Shayne's pouch was revealed and his interest was elsewhere. The boy's hands stopped pushing down when the shorts reached the middle of his slim pale thighs. Shayne's eyes widened, flickering nervously as he observed the man before him licking his lips.

"I see the pouch has been emptied as before."

"A week ago. But it's healed very nicely."

"As I can see. An excellent job. You should reward the man who held the knife."

"I will."

"You brought them with you as I requested?" the Lion asked.

Hurriedly, Abdul Al Ghiran delved into his pocket to bring forth the small glass jar. He held out what had once contained four ounces of baby food. It now held a milky fluid, a mixture of brine and vinegar. The Lion swilled the jar around, tilting it to one side so that he could see the contents. Shayne watched nervously, not realizing what it was that held the man's interest, not understanding a word of what was being said, but realizing that the conversation was about him.

"Such tiny balls," the Lion remarked with amusement. "All Americans are the same, Abdul. They have nothing between their legs worthy of a man."

From Abdul Al Ghiran's experience that wasn't true, but he did not comment. It was unwise to correct statements made the Lion.

"There is nothing left of your manhood except your pitiful prick. You are my eunuch now, Nightingale," the Lion said in well-educated English. "I shall have your two little eggs prepared in the manner that such a beautiful boy deserves. In honey with the oil of almonds to accentuate the taste." He ended with a smile, his tongue toying with his lips. "And after tonight, even those will be gone."

Shayne stared at him, not understanding more than the reference to his cock. Yet, his gaze was unwavering, his spirit still not completely broken despite his mental state. However much he wished for vengeance, he held his tongue. He knew better than to arouse the man's anger. Instead, he bowed submissively. The Lion snickered, again choosing the language of the boy.

"Take off the shorts, my Nightingale, so that we may see the site of Allah's most sacred treasure," he said sarcastically. Unlike Abdul, boys were but another option to give him satisfaction.

Shayne's hands pushed down slowly. Once freed from his hips, the silken shorts dropped to the floor, leaving him naked except for the white slippers he'd been told to wear. A slight push from the man beside him, and he turned around slowly. He stopped when his back was to the Lion.

"Like a melon ready to be split apart by the sword of my lust," the Lion commented with restrained amusement. "He's not been touched, I hope?"

Abdul Al Ghiran hesitated in his answer. He wasn't certain, not at all, not when he contemplated all he knew about the boy. It was said that the Lion could detect a lie from a hundred paces simply by smelling the air.

"Is he virgin?" the Lion demanded.

Abdul Al Ghiran tried to speak. No words came out. He gulped. Finally, he shrugged. "I think so."

"You didn't find out?"

The tone of impatience was already strong. The silence lingered while Abdul Al Ghiran tried to decide what he should say. It was unacceptable to lie to the Master of the Desert. It would be no different to lying to the Prophet, or to Allah himself.

"I… I forgot."

"You forgot?" the Lion roared.

Abdul Al Ghiran shrank back. He had seen other men cringe when the Lion's fury erupted. Shayne trembled with fear.

"I should have looked, I know, but there wasn't time," Abdul Al Ghiran apologized.

Suddenly, he remembered the ring that he had taken from the boy's cock in the motel bedroom. It was in the pocket of his trousers and they were in the hard-shelled suitcase in the adjoining room. He took a deep breath and steeled himself for what would follow. With luck, he might survive, but the boy's fate was sealed as soon as he opened his mouth.

"There was a ring I found on him. I thought nothing of it at the time. Perhaps…"

"A ring?" The voice was soft, almost mellow.

"A gold ring with strange marks. Almost like Arabic calligraphy, but they weren't. I didn't know what to think of it."

"And where was this ring?"

"On the boy's zabb. I didn't think it was important at the time. These American boys, they do strange things sometimes. I've seen some with diamonds in their ears, even with rings in their lips and noses."

"Where is this ring now?" the Lion inquired calmly.

"I have it with me. Let me fetch it," Abdul Al Ghiran explained. He hurried from the room, leaving the Lion glaring at the frightened boy.

In less than a minute, Abdul returned and handed the ring to rule all rings to the man who ruled the zealots of Islam. The Lion inspected it.

"You found this on his cock and you thought nothing of it, fool?"

Abdul nodded slightly. The Lion's gaze turned on the boy. He held out the ring.

"This was on your cock. Why was it there?" he asked in precise Oxford English.

"Because," Shayne squeaked.

His eyes teared up at seeing the ring that Peter had given to him. In a way it was the most important symbol of what had been taken from him. It meant love. His love. Peter's love. Peter was his entire life. Without Peter there was no reason for him to live.

"I'm sure it's very valuable. Why would you put it there of all places, where no one could see it?" The Lion's tone of voice brooked no hesitation, no lies.

Shayne shook his head. He tried to back away, but he was held firmly in place by the claw-like fingers that clamped around his wrist.

"Don't be afraid. Who gave this special ring to you?"

"Peter. His name is Peter. He's a friend of mine." And lover too, but Shayne held that back despite how much he wanted to tell the truth.

"A man?"

Shayne nodded slightly. The Lion didn't seem to be angry with him the way he was with the other man. His tone was almost reassuring. It sounded as if he was merely interested in where the ring had come from.

"Has someone fucked you, boy? This man perhaps. This man who thought you should have a ring?"

Shayne blinked once, just an instant before he looked away, down to his feet.

"Is that why he gave you the ring to wear?"

"No. He loves me and I love him. He gave me the ring before we did that," Shayne blurted out.

"Ah," the Lion deliberated. "And this man who gave you the ring to show how much he loves you? How many times has he fucked you, boy?"

Shayne held up one finger. Then, thinking he might as well tell the truth, added the second finger.

"Twice?"

Shayne nodded.

"You fool," the Lion said to Abdul Al Ghiran. "I should cut your throat with the same knife you used to cut the balls from him."

"Please Master, not that, although surely it's no less than I deserve for my stupidity," Abdul Al Ghiran said humbly.

He bowed his head. He had looked death in the face before. The suggestion before him was no worse.

"The boy has no interest for me now," the Lion said bitterly. "There is nothing left of Allah's treasure, not if another man has had him between his legs."

"I'm sorry," Abdul Al Ghiran mumbled. "I can easily find you another boy. It won't take long. Two weeks, or even less, and I will have him back here, gelded and ready to serve you. A Jewish boy perhaps?"

"Two weeks?" The Lion snorted and turned to the boy. His eyes were dark with hatred. "You have defiled yourself before Allah, boy. You want to wear this ring so badly, then you will wear it until you die, but not around your prick. Only Allah's Ring can be there."

He turned to Abdul Al Ghiran. "There is a metalworker in the workshop. Bring him here. Tell him that he'll need his tools to work with gold."

Abdul Al Ghiran hurried off, wondering what the Lion had in mind. The Lion left Shayne standing alone as he went over to a small brass brazier that sat on a stone ledge jutting out from the wall. He took a jeweled jambiyah from the sheath on his side. He stirred the embers with the thick curved metal blade, thoughtfully pushing the tip into the hottest part. He was all but oblivious to the beautiful naked boy. His fury had no bounds. The boy would die, not now but later on. He considered the possibilities. There were many men among those who served him who would take great pleasure in plundering the American boy's backside. That would do for a start. It might even kill the boy, especially if some of the Ethiopian soldiers were given the opportunity to use their massive cocks. Or white hot coals? One after the other, pushed inside his anus with a poker. Or the boy could bleed to death holding his severed prick between his hands? So many ways to inflict punishment on the beautiful American boy.

He turned back to Shayne, his decision made. It would not be pretty. All three, in the order his mind had come upon them.

"This man who gave you the ring, you really think he loves you?"

Shayne nodded uncertainly, although he was absolutely certain that Peter loved him.

"He'll come to get me," he answered boldly. "You'll see."

The Lion laughed, or uttered what passed for a laugh. He turned back to the brazier, to heating the metal blade. A few minutes passed before Abdul Al Ghiran returned with the shriveled metalworker in tow.

"Hold him," the Lion commanded. His eyes narrowed as he walked forward to stand before the boy. He smiled ingenuously. Shayne glared at him. The man did the last thing he expected. His hand extended and took hold of the boy's gleaming cock. He didn't rub, but caressed. His fingers were like feathers, tickling the tender morsel in a way that had never been done before, because it had always been too sensitive with the foreskin retracted back. He smiled as the boy struggled to hold back his body's natural response to such intense delight. It was useless. Shayne realized that even as his little cock began to thicken and grow longer. The blood rushed into it, quickly extending the limp cock into erection. The veins, already constricted at the very base because of the relocation of the opening in his foreskin, bulged out and became darker. Shayne closed his eyes, not believing what he was feeling. Within moments, his entire body had become concentrated in the few short hard inches that jutted out from his smooth groin. The man's fingers squeezed lightly on the bulbous pulpy tip and Shayne quivered from the thrill. His body had never felt so wonderful. It felt as he would achieve orgasm any second.

Yet, even as Shayne's hips began to tremble the Lion's hand released his cock. Shayne waited, hoping, eager for more, despite all that he had been through since being kidnapped. Finally, he opened his eyes again. Before him, he saw the man that everyone called the Lion. He was holding out the curved thick knife that had been in the brazier. The sight of it chilled him to his very core. Only at the end did the curve blade come to a sharp point. The tip glowed red. He stared into Shayne's eyes. There was nothing but hatred to be seen from both of them.

"This is for Israel, boy. This is for the American pigs who have destroyed Afghanistan. This is for that filthy Zionist-loving president of yours." He lifted the rod higher, pointing it at Shayne's face. For a few moments he considered driving it into one or both the boy's eyes.

Abdul Al Ghiran and the metal worker took a firm grip of Shayne's body, one holding the boy's thin pale arms, the other pulling his head and shoulders back so the small body was arched. They readied themselves for the boy's struggle to escape. Then, the Lion knelt down before Shayne almost as if paying homage. His fingers closed on the loose flap of skin that dangled uselessly beneath Shayne's small hard cock.

"W-w-what are y-you g-going to d-go?" Shayne stammered fearfully.

He could feel the man's fingers on his cock, stroking it, restoring his hardness. Then, satisfied, the fingers moved onto his scrotum, pulling on the empty folds, dragging the delicate skin down until it hurt. His cock ached to be rubbed, fondled, brought to fulfillment again, even if it meant being hurt. He was close, so awfully close to the climax that he so desperately needed to prove he was still a boy.

A second passed. He felt the heat emanating from the knife.

Chapter 29

Shayne's agonizing scream was clearly heard outside the thick stone walls of the room, yet it did not reach the place where Peter had chosen to hide himself until night time. Then, under the cloak of darkness he planned to approach the fortress and try to find a way inside. It was a long wait. Hours.

Shayne remained alert through the entire ordeal. It was only at the very end when he feigned losing consciousness. He waited then, his eyes closed tightly, not moving, containing his pain somewhere in the recesses of his mind. Only when the men left him alone did he dare to open his eyes again and look at what had been done to him. He gagged and vomited over himself and onto the floor. He cried. However, despite the terrible pain, even he realized that his punishment for loving Peter could have been far worse. At least he was still alive. Finally, he closed his eyes and blotted out the golden sunset that pierced the window slits. It was only a momentary respite, yet he dreamed of Peter. Of being Peter's lover. Of playing with their dog. Of sharing their lives. Of living in a house together. There was hope, not much but enough that he stopped crying. He had a single purpose, and if Shayne Santorini was anything it was single-minded. When he made up his mind to do something, he did it.

He made himself stand up. He winced when his thighs came together. It hurt almost as much as a week before. He made himself take slow deep breaths. He clenched and unclenched his hands. His clothes were gone. He walked to the window and looked into the darkness of light. He smelled the hot salty air, dry like the desert. He heard the sounds of the night. Somewhere out there was Peter. Close, or far away, he didn't know, but Peter would come to get him as soon as possible.

"Peter, I love you. I love you so much," he whispered to the breeze. Maybe his words would be carried to wherever Peter was. He wiped his tears away and stepped back from the window.

There was an open doorway that beckoned to the nude boy and Shayne walked forward cautiously. Any sound his feet might have made was cushioned by the soft slippers of a eunuch. He looked through the opening into another room. There was no one there. He continued to walk, sometimes shaking when the pain welled up from between his thighs, moving from one empty room to another. By the fourth room he was becoming very nervous. Was it possible that the fortress was deserted? He realized that it wasn't likely because he heard occasional sounds to the contrary.

The next room was not unlike the four other rooms that he'd just passed through except that most of the room was occupied by a high wooden table. At the nearest end, two bent posts were splayed out like legs braced against the fury of a storm. Each post was equipped with a sort of metal stirrup complete with buckles and straps. There were straps secured to the table as well. The center and one end of the table were blackened. The discoloration appeared to surround a small hole placed to the side. Even though the table hadn't been used in well over a hundred years, someone had still placed a large ceramic jug underneath the hole.

Shayne thought that it looked like something from an old-fashioned doctor's surgery, or it might have been used for some sort of torture. Indeed, as he paused to evaluate its use, he went so far as to approach the table and examine it more closely. His curiosity was fathomless. Without thinking why, he placed his forearm along the side of the table where there were two small straps. He realized only then what would have been even more obvious had he laid down on the table. He held his breath, not believing that although table was high off the ground, the placement of the straps meant that only a child of about his size would be accommodated on it. Given the position of those forearm straps, if he did lie down upon it, his bottom would be very close to the edge of the table. The purpose of the small hole began to dawn on him. Suddenly, he gulped. The purpose of the table became very evident once one realized that the feet were to be strapped into the stirrups. The effect would be to force the legs wide apart and completely expose the genitals.

He shuddered, remembering his own horrible experience on a wooden table only a week earlier. The only difference was that his legs had been forced down instead of being lifted above the table. His legs had been bent back at the knees and tied to the legs of the table. It was one of the reasons why there was so little blood from his emasculation. There was no way for a boy to escape castration in either position.

With stomach bile swirling and threatening to rise into his throat, he hurried on. The next room appeared at first glance to be as empty as the rooms before, yet something brought him to a sudden stop. He saw the hard-shelled suitcase that had carried him from Minneapolis to Cairo. Again, he shuddered. He could barely see as tears formed in his eyes, and his mind shrank back from the memory. He remembered very little of that part of his ordeal, yet he was conscious of far more. The darkness. The terrible darkness. Unable to move. Not knowing. Being alive, but thinking he was dead.

He did not dare open the suitcase, yet he could not go on and leave it there. He approached cautiously, stopping only when he was within reach of it. Fearfully, he pushed against the suitcase with his right foot. It didn't move. It seemed very heavy, far heavier than could be explained by clothes alone. Only then did he see the blood oozing from the bottom of the suitcase. His hands clenched, his palms clammy. Again, he shoved the suitcase with his foot. This time it toppled over and crashed onto the hard stone floor. He jumped back. He had not expected it to be so loud, but no one came to investigate. With shaking hands, he squatted down and unsnapped the locks, wincing when his groin area was even slightly disturbed. He lifted back the lid, not certain of anything except that he had to see what was inside. A pallid face stared back at him. He choked as his stomach heaved, as he realized that Abdul Al Ghiran's dismembered body was neatly stacked inside.

It took several minutes for Shayne to regain enough control to think. He slumped against the wall, trying not to vomit, trying not to think about what he'd seen. The suitcase was still lying where he left it, the lid thrown back. He put his hands in front of his face when he had to walk past it. Then, once in the next room, he began to shiver uncontrollably. He wilted, toppling down onto the floor with his back pushed up against the wall. He hugged his arms around his legs, trying to make the image go away. The man's head had been severed completely from his body. So had his arms and legs. All chopped up and packed into the suitcase. He vomited, emptying his stomach.

It was some time later when Shayne regained his feet and started off again. The next room was the last room in the row. He opened a door and peered out into a corridor. He began to walk, his footsteps muffled by the soft slippers. Eunuchs were supposed to come and go without a single sound. A corner. Another hallway. A flight of steps. At least he as going down, even if he was moving around a square. There was a bright light illuminating the corridor beyond the next corner. He approached carefully, moving along the corridor like a ghost in the night. He stopped. He couldn't see anyone, but he could hear them. The men were speaking Arabic. Another few paces and he pressed back against the wall. His eye crept closer to the rough stone. He moved very slowly, ready to dart away if anyone saw him. There were four guards, all of them armed with short-barreled automatic pistols. He would have to return the way he'd just come even though he was positive that the way out lay directly ahead.

However, instead of moving away, Shayne stayed there. His heart pounded. He thought about Peter and tried to decide what Peter would do. Peter would use his brains. What he needed was a diversion, something to make the guards go away. He crept back along the corridor. He had only gone a few yards before he came to a door. It was closed, but he tried the antique handle. It wasn't locked. It was dark inside. He entered through a narrow gap, holding his breath until he was inside. He blinked, trying to adjust to the gloom. There was a bed. A table. An acrid smell, like cigarette smoke, but wasn't. Someone stirred in the bed. He crept closer, resisting the urge to turn and leave. Whatever it was that drove him on, it was enough to compensate for his fear. There were clothes folded neatly and lying on the table. A belt with a fancy silver buckle. A decorated knife still inside its scabbard. He picked it up, recognized it immediately, felt its sharp point, burning, slicing into his empty scrotum. He was filled with rage, a desire for vengeance that was so strong that it denied reason.

Holding the knife in his hand, he approached the man asleep in the bed. His hand trembled. His intuition screamed a warning. He took a few steps back, his heart pounding. There was a distant roar that echoed through the 13th century fortress. A high pitched scream, a whine that grew louder and louder. And then, the walls shook and the floor vibrated. The man in the bed woke up, saw Shayne standing there, bellowed something, began to rush forward. There was a flash of light that lit the room up. The a dozen flashes that were brighter than the light of day. Shayne say the man's black eyes, felt the man's hands grasping him, punching, tossing him back. Then thunder, blasting through his eardrums until he screamed in agony. Still, Shayne lashed out with the knife. Something hurt his face. A moment later there was an awful pain in his belly. He screamed as hands tightened on his throat, throttling him. He gripped the knife tighter and brought it up from below. It slowed, almost stopped, but he kept lifting it up. He disemboweled the Lion. A strange warmth burst over him. The man collapsed, releasing Shayne's neck. He jumped back so fast that he scraped his bare flank against the rock wall. There bursting pain in his eardrums became worse and worse. His stomach was cramping. Then, more shaking, tumbling, crashing, falling, tearing, screaming, roaring, thundering, flashing, burning. Shayne Santorini lost consciousness.

Chapter 30

It would be wonderful to write a triumphant scene that had a combat formation of USAF Super F-18's acquiring their target and releasing the 2000 lb. j-dam bombs they were carrying. However, the nearest F-18 base was too far away in Saudi Arabia to make the trip without refueling. Neither was there an aircraft carrier in the area, which would have been convenient. The nearest aircraft carrier was cruising the Persian Gulf, and again refueling was required to make the trip to Ethiopia. There simply wasn't the time to get refueling arranged. Instead, the attacking force came from the amphibious marine unit deployed off the coast Yemen. Two formations of Harriers came in under the fortress' radar, approaching on a tangent to the coast. The first group of fighters rose suddenly to gain bombing altitude, giving only a few seconds of warning to the terrorists. By then their GPS-guided bombs were already on the way to the target.

Peter watched from the hill in disbelief as the jets screamed overhead. His spirits, already low, sank to a dismal low. Two of the jets went into a steep climb and initiated a patrol at a higher altitude in case the Ethiopian air force was scrambled. The other jets rolled, breaking away, then circling and preparing to come back for a second attack even as the fortress began to light up. However, instead of over-flying the target they came to an abrupt stop, like guardians poised at each of the four walls. The planes hovered, their GE jet engines wailing into the night. The air shuddered as explosion followed explosion. It was an incredible sight.

Only then, Peter started down the hill, frantically running towards the fortress because Shayne had to be dead after the massive explosions. Only then did he hear the air rumbling behind him. He stopped, then realizing what it was, he fell flat on his face as a helicopter rushed towards him. Somehow, it missed him. There were at least a half a dozen other helicopters strung out behind it. As the helicopter passed over him, black faced soldiers in sand-colored camouflage suits jumped out. One of them grabbed Peter, held him down.

"You're Hamilton?" the voice demanded gruffly.

Peter nodded in panic. "Yes, I'm Peter Hamilton."

"Cap'n Wilson gonna be right along, Sir." The voice was a reassuringly southern drawl.

"Who are you?" Peter gasped.

"Master Sergeant Cale, Sir. Unit seven, US Marines offa Am-fib three, Sir"

"Marines?" Peter asked. "You said Marines?" For some reason a force of US Marines was the last thing he expected.

"Yes, Sir." Cale's head lifted up. He checked the terrain. He had a confident, kick-butt expression. "Bit of a rush getting here, Sir."

"Where from?"

"We're from the Davidson, Sir. She's off the coast about twenty miles [30 km], Sir."

"Who's got him?" someone shouted.

"I have him secured, Sir," Cale called out. He grinned at Peter. He had a mouth full of huge white teeth. "Is he really here, Sir?"

"I saw him earlier today," Peter answered.

"Sweet Jesus! We're taking the fucker out this time. Sorry, Sir. Okay on the count of three, we get up and run like hell, Sir. You stay right next to me, right Sir."

"Where are we going?"

"To get your kid, Sir."

"But the castle? Your planes just fucking bombed the shit out of it."

"'Fraid not, Sir. Those were all shock bombs. They make a hell of bang, Sir, but the place is mostly in tact. There's probably no plaster on the walls, though. We have another formation scheduled in ten minutes, Sir. They aren't carry shocks. We have to get moving, Sir."

"I don't--"

Peter didn't have a chance to finish what he was going to say. He was dragged up by the arm and he had to run. Down the rocky slop, slipping and sliding on the loose stones. He fell down once and grazed his hands. The door to the fortress was thrown open when they arrived. The marines were going in blind, but one would never have known it. The mission was almost unplanned, but every man knew what he had to do. They moved quickly, using headsets to exchange information. Peter had no idea what was going on, but he followed on Cale's heels.

"We've secured the fortress, Sir," Cale shouted over his shoulder as they rushed through the courtyard."

It didn't make a lot of sense to Peter. He could hear continuous rifle fire, the crack-crack-crack of automatic weapons. He ran past a group of men lying face down on the ground with their arms outspread. One of them was screaming. There was blood all over him. Cale entered the building, still running, stopping, running again. Peter heard a loud burst of gunfire. Cale jerked him on. They ran along a corridor. Peter was beginning to gasp for air.

"We've got him," Cale shouted back. "Next floor up."

They climbed the stairs two or three at a time. Down another corridor. There were three marines huddled around Shayne, wiping him off with a black robe.

"The little dude cut him down to size, Sir," one of the marines said. "Poor little guy is covered in blood and shit."

"He's okay?" Peter demanded.

"He's coming too, Sir. He's in bad shape, but he'll pull through. Fucking bastard tried to strangle him, Sir. You can see where his hands were on his neck. Would have too, but the kid used his knife on him, Sir."

"Let's get him out of here," Cale ordered. "The Harriers will be coming through here again in a few minutes. We can clean him up on the chopper."

Peter leaned over, trembling, afraid of what he would see. Shayne was red, not pale skinned the way he was supposed to be. That was the first thing he noticed. He was covered in blood. He was naked too. He was still holding the knife that he'd killed the Lion with, clenched in his fist. It would have to be pried loose from his fingers.

The helicopter was less than a mile away from the fortress when the next formation of Harriers arrived from where they'd been waiting offshore. They weren't carrying shock bombs. Later, Peter would remember the explosions as giant balls of fire that blasted up into the night sky. As the bombs exploded, he felt the flashes of intense heat on his face through the open door of the helicopter. All he could do was to hold Shayne's hand under the blanket and hope. Pray that Shayne was going to make it. The medic seemed convinced that Shayne was semi-conscious, just not responding to stimuli. Shock could do that, he said. It usually wore off after a while.

Master Sergeant Cale called out the damage reports as they came in over the radio. There were ten marines killed or missing. A few of them might have been separated from the rest of the unit and would be picked up later. The Harriers reported complete destruction of the fortress. What was left was nothing more than a pile of rubble. The ship was on fire and sinking fast, its cargo of fertilizer no longer of use. The Ethiopian Air Force scrambled two MIGs. The Harriers were moving in to block their approach. The Davidson was coming up on the port side. Peter began to shake with exhaustion. Shayne's eyes opened, saw him, fluttered weakly, closed again. Peter knew he was going to make it. That was all he ever cared about.

Shayne Santorini received the sort of attention on the USS Davidson that befitted a ten-year-old boy who was destined to become a national hero. The Captain of the USS Davidson appeared almost as soon as the helicopter landed. Peter stumbled out after the stretcher that Shayne was lying was carried away. Everything had happened so quickly that very little of it made sense. He was led below. He wanted to see Shayne, to stay with him. That wasn't possible despite his arguments to the contrary. They gave him a shot of something in the arm to calm him down.

It was the next morning when he awoke. He demanded to see Shayne immediately. His request was conveyed to the ship's captain. His request was denied. He didn't understand what was going on. The door to his cabin was kept locked. It was just after midday when Peter's door was opened and he was led into the adjoining room to see Shayne. By then, Shayne was conscious. He'd been asking for Peter ever since he woke up an hour earlier. Peter sat on the narrow bed and held his hand. The doctor told them the extent of Shayne's injuries and then left them alone.

Only the ship's captain, the doctor and two orderlies knew the full nature of what had happened to Shayne Santorini. And Peter too, of course. He had the evidence of his own eyes when Shayne lifted away the sheet. He saw the Ring of Allah at the base of Shayne's small pink-skinned penis, and another ring, the ring to rule all rings. It was the ring that he'd given to Shayne as a token of his love. It was embedded through the fold of skin that was Shayne's empty scrotum. He cried.

Epilogue

The $25 million dollar reward, without tax, made a big difference in Shayne Santorini's life. It was not enough to compensate for what had been done to him by the Lion and Abdul Al Ghiran, but it certainly helped. Being reunited with Peter and his mother and living together as a family was all he cared really about.

It would be in early April when Shayne sang before the President. The song was the National Anthem. The venue, a Little League game between the Wildcats and the Eagles, was in a small, somewhat weary town in the Texas Panhandle. It was a quiet place where they settled down. Off the beaten track. Lots of room. Private. Away from prying eyes. It was safer that way, and not just from Moslem terrorists. A few thousand acres of mesquite that provided ample space for a Brittany Spaniel to run all day, and for a man and a boy to discover the joy of being gay.

The President would attend that less than stellar game played by scruffy ranch kids only because Shayne was there to sing. It was the least he could do for an unrecognized national hero. It was decided by the end of February that what had happened in Ethiopia was never to be disclosed, not even to the man who followed in the White House. There were too many risks involved, too many sleeper cells who were riled and waiting for revenge to reveal the truth. The Lion appeared to have disappeared in Pakistan. That was enough.

So Shayne sang, proudly, triumphantly, putting aside his excitement about the game he was about to play, reaching out to a listening audience that was much larger than any church. Shayne's team was the Eagles, and they were ready to win. His soprano-pure treble notes floated across the dusty baseball field. Haunting, ethereal notes from a boy whose voice would never change. And Peter watched and listened from the front row of seats, spellbound like the man beside him. Only then, did he realize that while the boy who sang would never again be the boy who he loved in Minnesota, he loved him just the same.

The End