Scrimshaw & Zelamir

Tribute Boys

Book One
The Hacienda de los Niños Tributos del Ezzaro

Chapters 13-16

Chapter 13

Maurice describes the choosing of the boys

I walked quietly onto the dais and sat down. I had deliberately arrived some what ahead of the others. In times of high emotion among the Tribute Boys and this was one such, I try by my presence to exert a steadying influence. They are after all children and for all their training and breaking are given to sudden near hysterical outbursts under stress when the consequences of a raised voice or even worse a raised hand can be forgotten. I have seen too many boys in my time die in agony skewered to the compound gates following such incidents.

There had been an air of intense excitement among the boys ever since Don Carlos's secretary had nailed up the list of boys who had been selected to perform at the festival during their siesta that morning. The list had been expected for some days and no sooner had the gelded youth strutted off than a crowd of excited naked brats formed jostling around the notice. There were exceeded shouts, the older boys exclaiming at the selections, the younger ones trying to work out what their chances were of being selected as mignons. Every now and again a boy would step away from the crowd and wander off by himself a serious thoughtful expression on his young face. Then after a minute or two he would return to the crowd, touch a younger boy on the shoulder, speak to him for seriously and then the pair would head off together towards the sties and showers to prepare themselves, Principal and mignon for the evening. Slowly the crowd round the notice dispersed those not selected tried to occupy themselves in play on the beach and elsewhere but even they were strangely quiet. It is strange how the same pattern of behaviour is followed every year at this time.

I looked down at the thirty boys ranged kneeling in the dust at the foot of the dais their oiled bodies gleaming in the evening sun. Silent, tense, alternate final year boy and small supporter waited the arrival of Don Carlos and the beginning of the process that for the older boys would end in the dirt of the arena as the mob screamed it's blood lust. Well behind them squatted the remaining Tribute Boys, over a hundred, crowded together watching also silent, knowing that it was only a question of time until they too were kneeling at the front unless indeed fate brought them an earlier release.

Looking at those young lithe bodies and fresh open faces I felt a moment not only of pity, which was permissible, but of sorrow and worse doubt which was not. Could it be right to destroy such beautiful animals? Was there perhaps an alternative to this annual holocaust of young stock. I shook myself and tried to banish the thoughts from my mind. This was how things were and how they had to be. To show doubt, to suggest to the boys that there was an alternative was cruel, to give them hope would be to condemn them to the agonies of impalement until that hope was crushed.

From around the edge of the compound where clients and guests of Don Carlos were assembled rose a quiet hum of conversation. Here too there was tension though not of the same order as among the boys. Over the next half hour or so those who had submitted sealed bids to obtain sponsorship of named contestants would know if they had been successful. Among the crowd I could see the Duc de Blanquis glancing nervously at his watch. For the past ten years he had succeeded in sponsoring the Hacienda's contestant in the bull jumping contest and on three occasions had seen his boy win the competition and been warded the trophy by the president. Would he succeed again this time and would his boy add a sixth triumph to the tally. He was talking to Sir John Chalmers of the City of London. He would not be bidding against the Duc. Sir John had a weakness for knife fighters. Which of the two contestants would he bid to sponsor I wondered.

Only one contestant I thought might present a problem so far as finding a sponsor was concerned and I had already spoken to Don Carlos about this. I ran my eyes once more along the row of naked boys. There at the very far end knelt Jonathan and beside him looking almost as frightened his mignon, the smallest and youngest of the lot. It looked as though Jonathan had had difficulty in finding a boy to serve him. Jonathan was an imaginative bright young lad but lacking physical confidence and prowess. I had suggested I should take him in hand and do my best to ease his path to the moment of his release.

The boys stirred and Don Carlos strolled onto the platform, followed by the priest, young Christopher and my colleague Anthony.

Don Carlos saw me and smiled. "Thank you Maurice," he said quietly, "I can always rely on your good sense."

He walked past towards the front of the low stage, the priest took up station on his right, Christopher to his left and Anthony further to one side to one side and slightly in advance of him also to his left.

Still my black mood persisted. What distinguished Christopher standing straight and proud beside his father from the Tribute Boys crouching on the ground at his feet. People were fond of saying that Tribute Boys were naturally inferior from those whom the law had set over them, they were nothing but animals, merely sensual beasts which was why they made such good whores. Perhaps their training to an extent made them so, but were they in this very different from young Christopher. I eyed him with speculation noting his strong firm young legs, the curve of his bottom under his loincloth. From what I had picked up from listening to the boys chatter the lad had strong animal passions of his own and had indulged them to the full at Jan's recent testing. No, the Tribute Boys were simply the children of the poor and weak and that condemned them to servitude as naturally and inevitably as any invented mental or sensual failing. Justice or injustice, they were both immaterial in this world. They were weak and therefore they would suffer. The most I could do for them was to ease their passage short as it was from subjection to release and ensure that they were not deluded by any false hopes of amelioration of their lot.

Don Carlos clapped his hands and the chatter from among the spectators fell away to silence.

"Guests," he said, "I would like to welcome you all here to what is the first event in a series which ends in the major social and sporting event of this summer. The great Gallician Tribute Boy Festival. The boys of this Hacienda who have been selected to perform there will be required to pray for their release, they will then be awarded their daggers with which – if they are successful in their contests – they will be required to make the ultimate sacrifice and a purse of 500 obols, that in the period of preparation they may purchase a few small luxuries. Those of them who have not already been put to the test and their assistants or mignons which they have themselves selected will be required to prove their bravery before being allowed to go forward to the final test of all. Each contestant will be required to pierce his body with two six inch [15 cm] skewers like this."

Don Carlos held up a metal needle bedecked with ribbons and there was a sound of indrawn breath and some excited murmurs from the guests.

"He must give no sign of fear or pain and he must retain these in his body for twenty four hours. Each mignon is required to prove his worthiness by satisfying the same test but with a single four-inch [10 cm] skewer."

"As I call the boys forward I will also announce each lad's sponsor. The sponsor has purchased the exclusive right to the boy's body up to the event in the festival in which he is to compete. It is a time of intense physical effort and emotional turmoil for the boys. Those fortunate enough to be sponsors will have the opportunity of enjoying a boy at the highest pitch of sexual need. The boy knows that every day that goes past is a day nearer his ultimate release and he will be ablaze with passion and desire. It will be your task, your pleasant task to satisfy this need and to lead the boy forward to the moment of ultimate truth."

"Boys you have heard me explain to my guests what you are assembled here to do. I have honoured you by choosing you to represent the Hacienda before the assembled crowds from all over the world at the festival this August. I rely on you not to prove yourself unworthy of that honour. I am writing to your guardians and parents telling them that you have been chosen and they will be proud of you. I will write to them again and to the Tribute Officers for their area when the festival is over reporting on the performance of each one of you."

He paused to let the import of this to sink in and then continued.

"Behave yourselves, each and every one of you, in such a way that I can report that you achieved your release in a manner bringing honour to the Hacienda yourselves and honour and profits to your parents. Do not oblige me to write and say that any one of you betrayed the care and love that I have lavished on you and brought dishonour on the Hacienda and ruin and shame on your parents."

"This, my children, is the final test, do not fail it. Failure means disgrace and starvation for your guardians to whom and to myself you owe all. Success will assure them comfort and self respect in their old age."

Don Carlos fell silent and there was a momentary hush.

"Now Mr Anthony," he ordered call forward the boys.

Anthony began to read from his file.

"Tribute Boy Ahmed, aged fourteen years six months, tributed by guardian, a citizen of the State of Algeria at age seven years, requests his Masters indulgence and begs his release. He has freely chosen this to be by the knife in the Tribute Masters Great Boy Fight."

Don Carlos clapped his hands and Ahmed scrambling to his feet mounted the platform and knelt before his Master.

"Ahmed do you freely and willingly request your release?"

"If it pleases you Master. I do Master."

The man's deep confident voice contrasted with the boy's uncertain light tones created a duet which even ignoring the sense of the words used spoke of command and submission.

"When the knifes are unsheathed and the steel blades are slicing boy flesh and the blood is draining into the arena sand will you have the courage to fight."

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If you triumph and you required to achieve your own release will you have the courage to use the knife on yourself?"

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If you are granted your life and your manhood, will you have the courage to offer another's manhood in your place?"

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"Prove to me that you have that courage, child."

Don Carlos took two long steel needles that glinted in the sun and handed then to the kneeling boy. Without hesitation Ahmed plunged them one after the other through the soft flesh just above the elbow on the inside of his left arm pushing them so far in that the points stood out. Small red beads of blood formed where the steel pierced his flesh.

"Well done, young man. You have proved that you are worthy."

I was struck as always at this moment in the ceremony by the cruel irony of calling a fourteen year old a 'young man' when the chances were overwhelmingly that the boy concerned would not survive into manhood.

Don Carlos bent and struck off the slave collar about the boys neck. He handed him his dagger and a small purse.

"Your sponsor Ahmed is Sir John Chalmers."

I glanced over to where Sir John stood to see him smiling broadly at his good fortune and being congratulated by the two men standing on either side of him.

"Have you chosen a boy to assist you achieve your release."

"Yes Master. If it pleases you Master. It is the Tribute Boy Ijal"

"Ijal come forward."

The boy came forward and joined Ahmed kneeling beside him on the platform in front of Don Carlos.

"Ijal do you freely agree to assist Ahmed in achieving his release?"

"Master if it pleases you I do."

"Have you the courage to go to his aid him if he falls in the thick of the fight when the steel is thirsting for blood."

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I have Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If Ahmed triumphs have you the courage to guide the knife and help him attain his own release."

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I have Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If Ahmed is awarded his freedom and his manhood, will you surrender yours in his place?"

"I will Master. If it pleases you Master." For the first time it seemed to me that there was a tremor in the boys clear voice.

"Prove to me that you have the courage my child."

Don Carlos handed the kneeling boy a single needle. Like Ahmed he thrust it through his left arm just above the elbow.

"Well done my child. Now both of you stand."

The two boys rose to their feet and a murmur of admiration for their beauty and courage, one doomed by his own choice to almost certain death, rose from the where Don Carlos's guests lounged at their ease.

Don Carlos spoke to Ahmed while he ran his hands slowly over the boy's naked body. I could not hear what he said but it was clear from the tone of his voice that he was speaking to the boy kindly and gently. It was clear too from the way the lad gazed up in to the man's face as he shyly replied to his questioning how deep was his devotion to his Master. Then Don Carlos placed one hand on Ahmed's bare shoulder and turned him to face Christopher. Ahmed stood still submitting himself willingly to the other boy's examination while Don Carlos turned his attention to Ijal, who accepted his caresses with equal eagerness. It was a striking demonstration of the deep love that the boys felt for their master.

Finally Ahmed and Ijal knelt before the priest who placed his hands on the two dark heads bowed in front of him.

"Pray that through the love you bear your Master and the aid of St Antonius you will bring honour to your Master and your Guardians."

The two boys kissed the feet of the priest. Another murmur of appreciation rose from the guests as the most intimate recesses of the two boy's bodies were so clearly displayed to them all. The boys returned to their places at the foot of the platform.

I noticed that the two boys both had erections, as clearly had Christopher for his cock had pushed his loin cloth to one side so that it's swollen tip was exposed. It appeared from the bulge in the front of his trousers that Don Carlos himself was similarly effected as indeed I was. It was not possible to be certain about the priest with his thick black vestments but knowing the man I was sure he was effected in the same way as the rest of us, just as I knew he had already made his selection from the second year Tribute Boys and that once the ceremony and dinner was over the boy would be summoned to Don Carlos's aya for him to enjoy at his leisure

I had once asked one of the priests that called at the Hacienda to explain how he reconciled his treatment of the Tribute Boys with his oath of chastity. He had said that as the boys had been deprived by law of the power of choice they had ceased to be moral beings. This meant that they were incapable of sinning and being nearer brute nature than human souls were also incapable of being loved and therefore of coming between him and his love of god. I did not find his arguments at all convincing but did not pursue the matter further. Did not it of itself make nonsense of the ceremony in which we were at that moment engaged. But then how much real choice did the boys have?

Any way it is unwise to get a reputation for querying the current orthodoxy's.

Anthony was reading from his file again.

"Tribute Boy Georgio, aged fourteen years six months, tributed by guardian, a citizen of the State of Italy at age seven years, requests his Masters indulgence and begs his Release. He has freely chosen this to be by the knife in the Tribute Masters Great Boy Fight."

Don Carlos clapped his hands and another boy mounted the platform and knelt at his feet.

"Georgio do you freely and willingly request your release?"

"If it pleases you Master. I do."

"When the knifes are unsheathed and the steel blades are slicing boy flesh and the blood is draining into the arena sand will you have the courage to fight."

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"Should Ahmed and you be the last two boys left, will you then fight Ahmed, whom I know you love, to the death for my honour and the pleasure of my guests."

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If you triumph and you are required to achieve your own release, will you have the courage to use the knife on yourself?"

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If you are granted your life and your manhood, will you have the courage to offer another's manhood in your place?"

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"Prove to me that you have that courage, child."

Don Carlos took two long steel needles that glinted in the sun and handed then to the kneeling boy. Without hesitation Georgio plunged into his left arm. It would seem Ahmed had set a precedent in this matter.

"Well done, young man. You have proved that you are worthy."

Don Carlos bent and struck off the slave collar about the boys neck. He handed him his dagger and a small purse.

"Your sponsor is Señor Carrunzio."

"Have you chosen a boy to assist you achieve your release."

"Yes Master. If it pleases you Master. It is the Tribute Boy Nicolo"

"Nicolo come forward."

"Nicolo do you freely agree to assist Georgio in achieving his realise?"

"If it pleases you Master. I do Master."

"Have you the courage to go to his aid him if he falls in the thick of the fight when the steel is thirsting for blood."

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I have Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If Georgio triumphs have you the courage to guide the knife and help him attain his own release."

"Through the strength of the love I bear you Master and with the help of St Antonius I have Master. If it pleases you Master."

"If Georgio is awarded his freedom and his manhood, will you surrender yours in his place?"

"I will Master. If it pleases you Master."

"Prove to me that you have the courage my child."

Don Carlos handed the kneeling boy a single needle. Again he thrust it through his left arm just above the elbow.

"Well done my child. Now both of you stand."

Again the boys were fondled and caressed by Don Carlos and Christopher, the priest give his blessing the boys made their obeisance and accompanied by a smattering of applause from the crowd returned to their places with their fellows.

Don Carlos clapped his hands. The boys who had just been awarded their daggers stood up, bowed deeply to him and went to stand around the table laid for them. They remained standing until Don Carlos had checked that all his party were seated round the table on the platform. Satisfied that they were he nodded to the boys who then sat down.

Serving boys detached themselves from the mass of Tribute Boys huddled on the ground at the far end of the compound and busied themselves bringing us the entree of salmon in a mayonnaise sauce and serving the first wine of the evening a pleasantly chilled and powerful 1978 Haut-Brion. The mignons, their well oiled bodies glistening in the evening sun, brought their principals plates piled high with slices of boiled ham and heaps of steaming rice. Other waiting boys moved around the side of the, compound serving drinks to the spectators. The Tribute Boys made do with cold water. This was in accordance with the law, rigorously enforced, that Tribute Boys should never be given any drug or opiate. Cold water was the only drink permitted them.

I suppose this law was reasonable enough, the idea being that they should experience to the full every sensation that came their way during their short lives. I sometimes wondered however if it was not carried too far. My mind went back to the time a month or so earlier when Don Carlos called the boy vet in to deal with Tommy, a second year boy whose appendix needed removal. The screams of the brat as the vet cut open his stomach disturbed the afternoon siesta and it was a relief when he eventually lost consciousness. Still I suppose the boy was lucky. Many Masters would have regarded the cost of the operation as prohibitive and would have simply had the boy killed. Anyway he seemed to have made a complete recovery. I could see him at the far end of the compound surreptitiously playing some sort of prodding game with the small boy kneeling next to him. I caught his eye and frowned. He tried to look innocent and I shook my head at him. The junior boys were meant to watch this dinner carefully both to prepare them for the time when it was their turn to take part in the feast and to get them accustomed to the idea that the time of their own release would inevitably come.

The boys as they had been trained to do ate in silence. The custom was to arrange for some improving reading or such like to take place while they were eating. I had no doubt that Don Carlos would have something of that sort in mind for the present occasion. I was soon proved to be right.

"Tell me," he said addressing the priest who was gulping down the Chablis with undignified gusto – priests, I notice, always make the best of any free food or drink that come their way, "have you yet selected the boy to be St Sebastian of Tarifa."

"Not yet my dear Sir, not yet," the priest said hastily putting down his glass.

"A quaint custom," Don Carlos remarked, "and the manner of your celebration of the Saint's martyrdom is certainly very striking. I think it might be of advantage if you reminded us all of the story."

The priest looked longingly at his glass that an attentive serving boy had just refilled. His hand stole out towards it but then he caught Don Carlos's eye and sighed.

"I would be delighted," he said resignedly. "It is a history which will entertain your guests and instruct your boys in their duty to serve and obey those whom god in his wisdom has set over them."

The martyrdom of St Sebastian of Tarifa

In 1292 the Christians with the aid of God and the Holy Virgin expelled the Moors from Tarifa that lies on the straights of Gibraltar with but thirteen kilometres of wild and mist shrouded sea dividing it from the coast of Africa. The Moors were desperate to recover this town and the Most Catholic King realised he needed a brave and faithful Governor to hold it for him. Now in his whole realm there was no more courageous nor able captain than Alonso Perez de Guzman known universally as Guzman el Bueno and he was appointed to hold the castle and town for the King.

Now Guzman el Bueno had one son whom he loved dearly, Sebastian, a boy of twelve years as beautiful in body as he was pure in mind. This boy was in the custom, during the heat of the summer, of going with the other young boys of the town to bathe in the sea at a beach that lay near by but outside the town walls. They were so engaged one day when, as often happens in that part of the world, a light mist descended and shrouded the water. It was warm though and a good sea was running sending breakers crashing onto the sand and Sebastian and his young companions, busy and noisy in their games, carried on heedless of any danger as is the way with boys.

Suddenly out of the mist appeared a fleet of twenty Moorish war galleys the sound of the oars striking the water, the drums beating the time for the rowers and the shouts and cracking whip of the overseers obscured until the last moment by the roar of the breakers on the beach. The boys dressed only in the purity of their innocence fled precipitately back to the town leaving their clothes lying on the beach where they had cast them off. The Moorish Admiral, a noted boy lover, reclining in the stern of the lead galley attended by a bevy of luscious catamites saw the children flee. He was immediately enthralled by the beauty of the young Sebastian which far out shone that of the loveliest boy in his harem. He determined he must enjoy the child even if it meant the failure of the mission on which he had been despatched by the Sultan.

He beached his galleys and with a great crowd of warriors proceeded to the city walls. There he demanded to speak to Guzman el Bueno. The latter preceding to the top of the great octagonal tower that looked down on the plain below called out to the Admiral asking him what he desired. The Admiral replied that he wished to have delivered to him for his enjoyment the dark haired boy that had been bathing naked on the beach who had the grace and beauty of a gazelle. If the boy was delivered to him within the half hour he would sail away and spare the town and people of Tarifa, but if he was not he would put the town to the torch, kill all the men and carry such women and children as survived the sack off into slavery. The Moor made this offer for he was fearful if the town was put to the sword the boy he desired might perish before he could enjoy him. Furthermore there seemed to him no reason why having possessed the boy he should not forget his promise and sack the town.

Guzman el Bueno would have defied the Admiral were it not that the greater part of the town's garrison was engaged in god's work some distance away inland where they were burning the villages of the Moors, wasting their crops and slaughtering the inhabitants as the Admiral knew full well from his spies. He was therefore forced to parley while despatching messengers to tell the troops to return immediately to the defence of the town. He realised that the boy the Admiral had seen and lusted after was his own son, for his pre-eminent beauty was universally acknowledged. He knew in his own heart that the welfare of the Kingdom, the preservation of the town and its wealth and the honour and freedom of many noble ladies and men must outweigh the well being of one mere boy, even if that boy was his own son. Being a loving father though he considered how he might preserve his son from the horror of submission to the Admirals vices. He therefore went down to the main square where the boys were huddled naked and trembling on the steps of the church and selected a boy of about his son's age and having placated the boy's father, a humble fisherman with a gold coin, instructed a priest to deliver the frightened child to the Moorish Admiral. The boy was dark haired like Sebastian and of more than ordinary beauty but the Admiral took one look at him and recognised that an attempt was being made to dupe him. Swearing a great oath he struck off the child's head with his scimitar and hurling it to the ground at the priest's feet instructed him to carry it back into the town and to tell Guzman el Bueno that unless the boy he desired was brought to him within the next quarter of an hour he would serve the whole town the same way.

The priest returned trembling and delivered the Admiral's message to the Captain. Guzman weeping bitterly instructed the priest to deliver Sebastian to the Admiral. Before the boy departed though he advised him for the good of his immortal soul neither to enjoy any part of what the Admiral might do to him nor to renounce his faith in his Lord Jesus Christ. The priest then granted the child absolution in advance for any sins he might be obliged to commit in satisfying the desires of the cruel Admiral. Sebastian showing a degree of obedience and submission to authority that should be an example to all Tribute Boys followed the Priest to the main gate of the town. The gate was unlocked the draw bridge lowered and the naked boy stepped out to meet his fate alone. Even as the gate was slammed shut behind him he did not loose his courage but to the admiration of friend and foe alike marched steadily forward, a lone small figure, to meet his fate.

The Admiral moved by the beauty of the boy and his courage held out his arms to him and smiled. Sebastian glanced back to where his father stood watching on the top of the tall octagonal tower, waved and then submitted himself to the admiral's evil embraces while his father powerless watched his rape.

The Moor indeed being much taken with the boy was as gentle as he could be consistent with achieving his purposes and although the man was famed through out the North African littoral for the size of his member and although Sebastian was a virgin the boy, it must be admitted, did not find the experience wholly unenjoyable. At last the Admiral's lusts finally satisfied he rose from the recumbent body of his victim and as the most beautiful of his catamites licked the filth and blood from his now flaccid cock saw the fluttering pennons of the returning troops as they galloped towards the castle. He realised that he had lost his opportunity to take the town by storm. However he had also divined that Sebastian was the son of Guzman from the way the boy had waived to his father as he left the town and by the curses and lamentations with which the Captain had afflicted his ears as he raped the child. He therefore resolved to see if he could use the boy to gain possession of the town.

Raising the boy from the ground he called out to the Captain that unless he surrendered the town to him he would kill the boy. Guzman called out to his son and asked him what he wished him to do. Sebastian in his sweet clear boy's voice called back reminding his father of the oath of loyalty he had sworn to the king counselling him to remain true to that oath.

"If you had not given that reply I would have known you were not my son," Guzman cried. Then taking the dagger from his belt he threw it down to the Admiral saying "Use that if you will to kill my son. I will remain faithful to my Lord the King."

"Your son," the Admiral replied with a sneer, "would be fortunate indeed if he died by a stab wound. He will have a more lingering and painful death then that. One which will give you ample time to reconsider your decision."

"Yet," the Admiral continued turning to Sebastian, "you are a beautiful boy and if I am not mistaken made more for love than the battle field. It would be a shame to destroy something capable of giving such exquisite pleasure. If you would but renounce the Christian faith I will spare your life and you can join my household and be my love."

Sebastian was a young boy with his life ahead of him and he did not wish to die and if the truth be known the thought of joining the harem of this powerful man was also not without it's attractions but his faith remained firm.

"As my father must remain faithful to the Lord his King so I must remain the same to our common lord the Lord Jesus Christ," he fearlessly replied.

The Admiral brushed a tear from his eye, for even in the short time he had known the boy he had come to love and value him, embraced the child kissing him on the mouth.

"Very well," he said disengaging the boy's arms from around his neck for the lad had responded to his embrace enthusiastically, "but for the love I bear you I have devised a death that at first at least you will enjoy and that will give either you or your father ample time for reflection and a change of mind. You will be raped by every member of my fleet starting with the youngest boy of my harem capable of the act and finishing with the most brutal and depraved of the galley slaves."

Then Sebastian was thrown face down onto the ground and there lying in the dirt raped by every member of the Admirals fleet in turn starting with the youngest and finishing with a gigantic Nubian who had spent ten years in the filth of the galleys pulling at an oar. Throughout this ordeal he lifted his sweet clear boy's voice singing the praises of the only true God and his son and the Virgin Mary. The first miracle was that even after the Nubian had emptied his seed into the boy's torn and bleeding bottom the child still lived and sang.

The Admiral angered by the stubbornness of the father and the son then ordered that Sebastian should be tied to a stake and shot with arrows. But so enraged was the cruel Moor that he instructed his Scythian archers to shoot not to kill but to wound. One by one the archers stepped forward and released three arrows each. They pierced the boy's arms and legs, his shoulders and thighs his right breast and his stomach but still he lived and sang until one archer perhaps unnerved by the Sebastian's courage fired a shaft that caught him in the centre of the left breast and he at last fell silent.

The Admiral gathered his catamites, his soldiers, his archers and his galley slaves about him, returned to his fleet and sailed away leaving Sebastian's torn and lifeless body hanging from the steak to which he was bound. The people of the town came out and placed the child's torn corpse on a litter and bore it into the town with much wailing and lamentation.

***

"That is the story of St Sebastian of Tarifa whose feast is celebrated on the third Sunday of every August."

"I have seen the celebration many times," Don Carlos remarked, "but perhaps you could describe it for the benefit of those of our guests who have not witnessed it."

The priest sighed and let the hand with which he was reaching out for his wine glass fall back to his side.

"Before the festival every year at about this time we select a Tribute Boy who becomes Sebastian from the moment of his selection up to his feast day. He must be dark haired and beautiful like the original boy. During this time he is treated as though he is a noble and well born child not a mere slave brat. He is well treated and fed. Then on the morning of the feast day he is placed on a float and this is pulled through the streets of San Diego de Campos by a team of black horses. On the flat also are three black men representing the Admiral and the members of his fleet and six young Tribute Boys each carrying a bow and three arrows. The float is followed by a choir of Tribute Boys who sing incessantly as they progress through the streets to the square outside the Cathedral. The Sebastian too sings in his high piercing child's voice. When they reach the steps of the Cathedral the three black men, they may be Negroes or simply white men blacked up for the occasion, but always they are noted for the monstrous size of their male organs, rape the boy. After that the boy is tied to a stake on the float and the six archers step up one by one and discharge their three arrows each. All the arrows apart from the eighteenth are aimed to wound not to kill. Throughout the boy chants the kyrie eleison until the final arrow brings him release from his suffering."

"I can see that you may well be able to find dark beautiful Tribute Boys," Don Carlos said, "but not ones with the innocence and purity of the original Sebastian and yet on each occasion I have watched the boy seems to have suffered real pain and shed real blood while being raped. How is that? I should have thought any good looking Tribute Boy after five years of service will have had his bottom so well stretched that he could take pretty near any size man. Is it some sort of miracle?"

"No, no not a miracle although the blood and the pain is real enough," the priest said laughing. "The good Sisters of Mercy arrange it for us through their skill as seamstresses. The night before the feast day five of them four noted for their strength and one for their skill with the needle, attend upon the Sebastian. They take him to a cell deep below the bishop's palace where none will hear his screams. The four strong Nuns hold him face down by his wrists and ankles on the floor the seamstress sows up his bottom till his hole is only wide enough to admit her little finger."

"We can give the boy the appearance but not the reality," the man continued, "of the first Sebastian's innocence. But even hear there is some similarity. The first Sebastian was without sin because he was innocent. Tribute Boys are not as we all know pure but they are incapable of sin having no freedom to choose. Lacking the ability to sin they lack one of the attributes of the human soul and lacking a soul they are but animals and cannot be sinned against."

This was an argument that priests are always keen to parade but which I find of doubtful validity. I stirred uneasily. Don Carlos caught my eye and shook his head at me. He set about gently reminding me that I should keep my doubts to myself, not for my own sake to whom the recently revived laws against heresy did not apply but for the sake of the Tribute Boys to whom they most certainly did.

"That is the doctrine of the Catholic Church?" he enquired of the priest gently.

"Indeed it is Sir," the man replied eagerly.

"And I think I have heard talk of some success by the Commission for the Suppression of Heterodoxy?"

"Yes you are quite correct Sir. Five Tribute Boys have been found guilty of holding heretical opinions in the Diocese of Burgos. Three were burnt there and our Bishop who attended the event was so impressed by the good effect that this had upon all who witnessed their agony that he has arranged for the two remaining boys to be brought here and burnt in the Cathedral Square at San Diego de Campos during the festival."

"What Father," enquired Christopher speaking for the first time, "was the nature of the opinions that they held?"

"You will hardly believe it my son," the priest said laughing, "but one of them was heard to say that he thought that all were equal in the eyes of god."

"What?" Christopher shouted, "a filthy little slave brat equal to me. Something like this," he grabbed hold of a passing serving boy and slid his hand up the back of the lad's thighs as he spoke, "equal to us."

The boy stood still as he had been trained to do as his young master fondled him in front of us all. Christopher jabbed his hand upwards thrusting his dry thumb into the boy. The brat gasped and his cock hardened. Christopher worked his thumb in the boy's bottom for a moment or two and then pulled it out.

"Lick it clean," he ordered harshly. The boy dropped to his knees and began to suck hard on Christopher's thumb. Looking at the naked lad kneeling there sucking his own filth from his master's thumb I had to accept that any claim for equality was ridiculous.

Don Carlos looked at his son and laughed indulgently.

"I don't think it is possible to refute the heresy more convincingly that that," he remarked and then turning back to the priest asked. "Which of my little tarts have you chosen to entertain you tonight Father."

"A little dark haired brat Sir. Alfonso he told me his name was."

"Alfonso … Let me see I thrashed him yesterday for something. Now what was it."

"Yes I saw he had been caned. I do find the fresh welts cutting across the otherwise smooth curve of a boy's bottom very exciting."

"My dear Padre I hope you didn't choose the boy for his welts," Don Carlos said laughing. "Choose a boy you really fancy and I'll decorate his bottom with the cane for you. It will be no trouble."

"That's very kind of you Don Carlos," the priest rejoined, "but I'll stick with the little whore now. He is a pretty little animal and just what I want."

"Very well Padre if you're sure. Let's call the brat up here and he can remind me of why I beat him. Alfonso," Don Carlos called down to the crowd of junior Tribute Boys, "come up here you hot little whore the good Father wants you and remind me why beat you yesterday."

Alfonso jumped to his feet and came trotting forward grinning with pleasure at being noticed by his Master. I sensing that the formal part of the evening was drawing to a close and knowing I still had to cope with young Jonathan caught Don Carlos eye. He nodded and I slipped away from the dining table.

I slipped quietly away from the high table and strolled down towards the cluster of junior Tribute Boys at the far end of the compound. I could feel their eyes on me as I approached. I pointed at Jonathan and Guy where they knelt side by side and clicked my fingers indicating to the ground at my feet. As I walked away I heard the sound of their bare feet padding behind me as they hurried to catch me up.

"Jonathan," I said without looking round and lightly slapped my right thigh. Obediently he drew up beside me.

I put my arm over his right shoulder and pinched his nipple firmly to make sure I had his full attention. As we walked along the path through the pine forest I explained to him as kindly as I could that we all had weaknesses and strengths, some were good at one thing, some at another, he was good at singing and drawing but not so good at running and physical exercise. That did not make him a better or a worse boy. A Tribute Boy should want to serve his Master in the best way he could. One boy could do that in the bull ring or the coursing field another like him in the choir. What was important was not how a Tribute Boy served his Master but that he served his Master to the best of his ability. I thought therefore it was best that he should reconcile himself to a future as a singing boy and not seek his release through competing on the coursing field.

While I talked to him I kept on rolling his nipple between my finger and thumb, pulling and pinching it so that I felt it harden under my touch. Glancing down at him I could see his little cock was hard and upright. Every now and again he would press up against my side as he trotted along beside me. I was aware that I had a considerable bulge in the front of my trousers.

It was almost dark when we reached my bungalow.

"Right," I said once we were inside, "that's all decided then. Lecture over for tonight. Now into the shower the pair of you. I'll be along in a minute and you can show me how good you are at something else." Laughing I landed two good open handed smacks, one with each hand on the two firm boys' bottoms. Guy squealed happily and headed for the bathroom but to my amazement Jonathan darted off towards the kitchen. Before I had time to shout at him he reappeared holding a carving knife in his hand. He was clearly in a state bordering on hysteria and I thought for the moment that nice quiet docile Jonathan was about to attack me.

"I may as well chop them off now," he screamed, putting my mind at rest about my own immediate safety, waving the knife close above his testicles which he held cupped ready for the cut in his left hand. "I will … I will … I'm as good as any other boy … I could do the coursing if I was let… Nobody lets me try anything… I'm always pushed off to go singing …. All right I'll finish the thing now … Once and for all."

I was very angry. It was not only that the boy had disobeyed me and apparently had taken no notice at all of my carefully reasoned arguments. Gelding was a serious business. Not something to be done on his own initiative by a hysterical little slave brat. Apart from anything else there was money involved. People paid to watch geldings. If Jonathan hacked off his own balls in my bungalow he would apart from making an awful mess on the floor be depriving his Master of a good deal of money. Don Carlos had not kept the boy for almost seven years to loose his profit from cutting the little brute. He would be understandably angry and Jonathan would find himself skewered to the compound gates to punish him for what Don Carlos would see as thieving from his Master and to act as a warning to any other boy who might be tempted to follow the same course of action.

I did not hesitate.

"Don't be silly Jonathan," I said calmly fastening my eyes on his face, "if you want to take part in the coursing of cause you can."

I can never understand why Tribute Boys are so ready to believe us. There is no obligation on us to tell the truth to them. It is not as thought we are dealing with free boys.

The silly boy's mouth dropped open in surprise. I swung my left hand across smashing the edge of my hand across his right wrist. I grabbed the side of his slave collar with my right hand and slammed him head first into the wall. I pulled his head back and repeated the process. I saw blood on the wall. There would be a good deal more blood I told myself grimly before too long.

Keeping a firm grip on his collar I dragged him across to the wall by the front door where the two leather straps hung from a hook. The top strap was the one I usually used, a simple length of thick leather designed to hurt but not to tear the tightly drawn skin of a bent over boy's bum. I unhooked it and dropped it on the floor. It was the second one that I wanted on this occasion. A metre and a half long, split at it's end with each tongue tipped with metal I doubt if I have used it on more than three occasions in my whole time at Don Carlos's Hacienda. It rips the skin from a boy quickly reducing his bottom to a raw lump of bleeding flesh.

Swinging the strap back over my shoulder I brought it cracking down across Jonathan's squirming rump with all the strength I could muster. The first cut drew blood, beads of red welling from the boy's smooth brown skin where the two metal studs had bitten into his flesh. Again and again I brought the belt singing down on the boy's defenceless body as the child screamed and scampered under the lash. Soon his whole bottom was covered with cuts from which blood seeped, trickling down the backs of his legs and dripping onto the floor. His screams fell away and were replaced by a constant shrill keening.

I pulled his head back and looked down into his face. His forehead had been cut where I had slammed him into the wall and he appeared to have bitten though his lip. His face was wet with tears and mucus mixed with blood trickled from his nose and down his chin.

For a moment I thought he could not see me then with a great effort he fought back his whimpers.

"I could do it Sir … I could," he mumbled.

I did not immediately grasp the significance of what he had said. I am afraid that thrashing a boy invariably excites me. I know that I am not alone in this but I still feel a little uneasy about it. Somehow it seems wrong that the infliction of pain on a boy should have this effect although I notice that the boy himself is often similarly effected. In the present case the punishment had been too severe and if Jonathan in the earlier stages of his thrashing had been aroused that condition had long passed by the time I laid the strap across his bleeding bum for the last time. My cock however was as hard as iron.

I swung Jonathan round and kicking his feet from under him sent him tumbling face down to the floor. I prodded his legs apart with my toe and pulled my trousers down. I spat on the palm of my hand and used my saliva to lubricate my cock. As I dropped to my knees between his legs the boy, showing how well schooled he was, lifted his bottom, torn and bleeding though it was, to receive me. I hammered my cock into him, driving it's full length into his bottom, feeling the blood that welled from his ravaged bum damp and warm against my crutch. Regardless of the boy's whimpering I thrust savagely down. Slowly at first then with increasing force and rapidity I pumped the sobbing boy's behind. Unbelievably despite his obvious agony he began to respond. I felt my cock surge and then I came, jetting sperm deep inside the boy.

I lay still for a moment and then rolled on to my back. Jonathan lay beside me crying quietly. Looking up I could see Guy's pale faced and frightened, standing just inside the bathroom door watching. I saw that his tiny boy's cock was erect.

Just at that moment the front door opened and Vass's flaxen head appeared.

"What are you doing here boy?" I asked.

"Oh Sir. Monsieur Durcet sent me away after he'd fucked me and when I went back to my sty there was no room for me because Mishear and Jan and Inu and Itu were there so I thought perhaps I could sleep here Sir? Please Sir?"

I beckoned him in. He moved quickly forward and dropped to his knees beside me obviously intending to clean the blood and filth from my cock with his tongue. Jonathan intent on not being cheated of this task pulled himself painfully to his knees.

"All right boys," I said laughing. "No fighting. Vass you take the right hand side. Jonathan you have the left."

Two heads one dark one fair bent down over my crutch. Two tongues eager tongues began to lick the dirt from me.

"Guy," I said casually, "you get busy cleaning out Jonathan's bottom. You'll have to get used to grooming him as his mignon."

Jonathan looked up quickly. A broad smile spread across his tear and snot stained face and then he bent back to his task licking and sucking with redoubled eagerness. "Well", I thought, " if he's so intent on performing in the coursing field that he can remember to ask even after a beating as hard as that he won't disgrace us."

***

I walked over to Don Carlos's early next morning. Jonathan and Guy, the former with his bottom heavily bruised and ribbed with welts and cuts and walking rather stiffly accompanied me. I knew Don Carlos was off to the Balkans that day and I wanted to be sure to catch him before he went. He was breakfasting on the terrace together with Christopher, Juan and Hassan all of whom were accompanying him on his trip.

"Señor Maurice," he called out as soon as he saw me. "You are just in time for breakfast. Join us. Please do."

"Thank you sir," I said taking a free seat, "Just a coffee, if I may, Sir, I must not delay you and I have things to do as well."

"You are always conscientious, Señor Maurice. But tell me have you persuaded our young songster that his future lies in the choir and not on the coursing field."

"No Sir, I have not. I reasoned with him strongly. But he has convinced me of the reverse."

"Jonathan," I continued, "show your Master your bottom."

Jonathan turned round and Don Carlos whistled softly as he saw the boy's tortured rump.

"And you are convinced, Señor Maurice."

"I am sure, Sir, that Jonathan will not disgrace the Hacienda on the coursing field."

"Very well, so be it. Ah, and here is our good Padre. Come here Padre and enjoy your breakfast. I trust that Alfonso performed satisfactorily last night?"

"Thank you Don Carlos," the priest said seating himself, "Alfonso was magnificent. Indeed, if you will permit it, he will be our Sebastian this year."

I glanced quickly at Alfonso and saw a look of fear and horror etched on the poor boy's face. Clearly this was the first indication he had had of what the priest intended for him and he was remembering the priest's all too vivid description of the fate that awaited the Sebastian.

"It will be a great honour for the Hacienda," Don Carlos remarked pleasantly. "There is however one formality. Alfonso must as a Tribute Boy request his release and state that he wishes it to be by being the Sebastian and that he makes this request freely and willingly."

"Come on boy."

Alfonso opened and closed his mouth gulping and mumbling in terror. I was certain that the last thing he wanted to be was the Sebastian but he feared to say so.

"Come on, Alfonso, quickly," Don Carlos snapped. "I haven't got all day and I particularly want you to be the Sebastian."

Hassan turned and fixed the miserable boy with a cold ferocious stare.

"Alfonso, an end of this nonsense. Say after me now," Don Carlos spoke firmly, "I request my Master's indulgence. Come on boy."

"I request my Master's indulgence," the boy quavered miserably

"And beg my release."

"And beg my release."

"I have freely chosen this."

"I have freely chosen this."

"To be by being the Sebastian."

"To be by being the Sebastian." Alfonso began to cry uncontrollably.

"Alfonso, do you freely and willingly request your release?" Don Carlos continued inexorably …

"Do come on Alfonso you're beginning to irritate me all you've got to say is 'if it pleases you Master I do'. Now say it."

"If it pleases you master I do," the boy stammered though his tears.

"There you are Padre. He's all yours now," Don Carlos said contentedly.

Alfonso was still sobbing quietly when I finished my coffee and excused myself some ten minutes later.

Chapter 14a
A Balkan Interlude

Christopher, the son of Don Carlos, describes his visit to the Balkan slave market

The intercom on the plane clicked into life.

"Captain Pucci welcomes you aboard Corleone Airlines Flight 235 to Antavari, Monte Negro. Visibility is good and winds moderate. We will be arriving at Antavari at approximately 16.15 hour local time. Below you to the South you will see the town of Orenses. Cabin staff will shortly be serving coffee and soft drinks. Corleone enterprises exists to serve it's customers as does it's cabin staff. If you find any part of the service provided unsatisfactory please immediately report the matter to the supervisor of Cabin Staff Señor Guzik."

I settled back into my seat and stared out of the cabin window at the barren landscape of the Sierra del Faco below. The feel of the fabric of the seat against my bottom felt odd. I had become used to wearing the shorts of a privileged boy and to be back wearing a loincloth took some getting used to. It was also a reminder that my initiation test was about to begin and I felt a tightness in my chest as I thought about this. I wanted to succeed and make Dad proud of me so much. The thought of failing him frightened me.

I had hoped to sit next to him on the plane but he had told me he had to discuss business with Hassan and that I should sit with Juan. I always felt a bit uneasy with him. He had been a Tribute Boy of my fathers, one of his sons was even now a slave on the Hacienda and another was shortly to join him yet Juan was treated by my father almost as an equal. Not that I didn't like him. He was a big cheerful at least to me kindly man, although he stood no nonsense from the Tribute Boys on his own small hacienda, who always seemed to have time for me.

Dad must have told him that I would be siting with him because he had kept the outside seat free for me. I had had to slip past him to get to it and his hand had brushed against my bottom as I did so. I seemed to get excited very easily recently and feeling very embarrassed I settled my self in my seat leaning forward looking out of the window to try to hide the swelling under my loincloth. One disadvantage of that form of dress is that if you get a hard on your cock can push the cloth away from your body showing everything. Perhaps that's why they put privileged boys into shorts when they get bigger. It was going down now and I lent back.

"Coffee Sir," a nervous young voice enquire.

A pretty little twelve year old boy, naked except for a small pill box hat balanced on the top of a mass of black curls on the side of his head, was standing in the gangway holding a tray out to me. I noticed he was trembling slightly. I hesitated my eyes fastened on his tiny hairless balls and uncut prick. I realised with dismay that it was happening again.

"You'd prefer Coke wouldn't you Christopher," Juan said I could tell from the tone of his voice that he was amused.

I nodded.

"Coke quickly," he snapped at the child.

"A stupid brat," he continued speaking to me as the boy hurried obediently off, "you would have thought he would have the sense to know that a boy your age wouldn't be wanting coffee. Although it would seem," he said glancing down at the bulge in my crutch, "you want something else. Have him on your knee if you want when he comes back. There's plenty of them to go round and plenty of space too. Great improvement on the usual arrangements where there's three hostesses for seventy odd passengers and you can't straighten your legs."

"I'll just have the coke Juan I think," I said blushing even more deeply.

"Good I wanted to have a chat with you anyway and look don't so embarrassed about that thing," he rested his hand on my loincloth and squeezed the hardness below, "why when I was your age I was always getting hards on. Especially when I was in the presence of your father."

I grinned and wriggled in my chair. I rather liked the feel of his hand pressing against my swollen cock.

"You've got a busy time ahead of you, Christopher, now haven't you?"

"Yes I replied. I've got to choose a boy form the slave mart at Antavari, break him and then with him and just my dagger get a trophy on the Picos."

"How do you feel about that?"

"Well nervous," I replied. "I don't know about breaking a boy. Dad is so good with them. They all seem to want to serve him."

"That's his secret, Christopher. I remember when I was on the hacienda I was frightened of him, we all were, he knew what he wanted and if he didn't get it you paid for it with the lash but it would make my heart leap when he called me to him. We all loved him as well you see."

"But how did he do it, Juan? I mean he 's pretty good to his boys compared to some Masters but their lives are pretty tough, you know."

"Well you've got to think what it's like to be a Tribute Boy. At seven years old taken from your family stripped, branded, humiliated and handed over to some stranger to do what he likes with you. Up to then you've lived with your mother and father and poor as they were they probably loved you and fussed over you. Suddenly your torn away from all that. A boy needs someone to love and look up to. The only person a Tribute Boy has is his Master. Every Tribute Boy wants to love his Master. It's just that most Masters don't care a bit about their boys. Think of the ones on the farms round us. They're just driven as hard as they can be. The farmers don't care a damn about them. They're worked to exhaustion everyday and when their time comes they're given their release in some brutal thoughtless way just to amuse the farmer and his stupid friends."

"You know Señor Tormes at that small holding on the road to Muros he always has just two boys, God help them. If one of them lasts for to fourteen, mind you he would have to be tough to do that the way the old sod drives them. Do you know how he grants him his release?"

"No Juan."

"Well he works the boy as usual on the day of his release, but he doesn't feed him because he doesn't see the point of wasting money like that. Then at the end of the day when the boy's exhausted and starving he asks all his mates round. They get drunk and fuck the boy and then they send him into the pig sty and they stand round and watch. He's generally all right for a bit, while he's on his feet, but once he goes down the pigs have him. They have bets on how long he'll last. Señor Tormes says the great advantage of his method is there's no waste. He's been doing it for years."

"Now your Father wouldn't act like that. He whipped us if we were lazy or disobedient or stupid but we always knew some how that he cared about us. He took an interest in us. He knows every one of the boys on his hacienda. I knew almost from the first moment I arrived there that he wanted to train me be as good a Tribute Boy as I could be."

"Dad's had almost a life time at training boys. I'm only just beginning and I've only got a few days to get it done."

"Now look Christopher. It's not going to be as difficult as you think it. The boy will be living in terror that nobody buys him and he's sent down to the barracks for the para-militaries to enjoy. He'll be grateful to you for buying him and saving him from that. Then Hassan will help you. He's a great breaker of boys. You show a bit of kindness to the lad after Hassan has been schooling him and he'll love you. Work him hard, keep him hungry, whip him often and show him a little bit of affection and you'll have no problem with the brat. You take my word for it.
What about the Picos test. How do you feel about that?"

"Well I want to do something that would really make Dad proud of me. And you know there's that feral that survived from the end of last hunting season. I thought if I could get him that would be really something."

"He'll be about the same age as yourself now and he's pretty big. Do you think you can manage him."

"I'm sure if I can get to him I'll be all right. I'll have a dagger and he won't and I'll be better fed than him. The difficulty will be getting near him in the first place. I'll only be out there a few days and he could be anywhere."

"Well not anywhere. I was talking to Karl about where you might be able to pick up a trophy. There's a party of Germans coming to hunt as you no doubt know and he said he thought their arrival will move all this years stock up into the higher ground. But it's very dry up there this time of year so they'll have to come down at night to the stream to water. I've no doubt the feral will come down after them hoping to catch one of the smaller boys whose wandered off from the herd and got lost. Take a boy up there for bate, leave him by the water hole, wait until the brute has killed him and is busy tearing the carcass up and then move in."

"Do you think Dad would let me have a boy? You know the problems there are with pension funds."

"He could let you have Pedro. There's no pension fund involved there because he's the price I had to pay to keep one of my balls. His brother's coming on seven now and I could let your father have him a month or two early to replace Pedro if he wants."

"Would you Juan. Thanks."

"Glad to be able to help the son of my old Master. What you do you take Pedro up into the Picos without telling him what your plan is. He might try to run away if he knew, though where he'd run to I don't know. He'd know if he came to me I'd just whip him and bring him straight back to your father. Get him to carry something or other. When you're at the watering hole have your own boy hold him down while you slash his ham strings with your dagger. Then leave him there and hide near by. The feral will be attracted by his screams. See what looks like easy meat, a small boy unable even to crawl properly, and move in for the kill."

"You won't be upset having your son treated like that?" I asked uneasily. It always puzzled me how Juan could come to our house, chat with my father and apparently be quite at ease, when his own boy was working about the place, even serving Dad naked and more than often or not with marks of a recent beating on his body.

"Mind? Of course not. It was an honour to serve your father and it was an honour to have him accept one of my sons into his household. Now the boy's his to do what he likes with. What have I or the boy got to be upset about."

"You could do one thing though Christopher. Before you slash his legs give him a good hard fucking. I'd like him to experience that before he dies and having his young Master's seed inside him will give him more strength to face his ordeal."

"Yes I'll do that Juan," I promised and then with a rush for all the time I had been sitting beside him I had wanted to tell him but was embarrassed to do so. "Actually Juan I fucked him last night. Dad gave him to me. He said having a my prick inside him would hurt less than a man's and it would be better experience for him than one of the wooden plugs that he uses to widen the boys when they first arrive."

"That's typical of my old Master," Juan exclaimed delightedly. "It just show how true it is. He does really care. I hope Pedro performed well."

I remembered how the boy's small body had been wracked by multiple dry orgasms as I rode him and grinned while my cock began to harden again.

"He cried a bit when I first entered him Juan but he was very lively afterwards."

"Yes I can tell that was so," Juan replied squeezing the bulge in the front of my loin cloth again.

I turned in my seat and looked up into the eyes of this strong quiet friendly man. Suddenly I occurred to me that perhaps it was not pure chance that had led my Father to give me Pedro to fuck last night and then sat me next to the boy's father in the plane next morning. Despite the vast gulf that separated me, a privileged boy, from the depraved animals that served us as slaves, perhaps only a man who had served my father as a Tribute Boy would understand the deep terror of failing and the wish to please him that now gripped me as the time of my test drew near. I did not have a formal sponsor as I would have if I were a Tribute Boy. Perhaps my father had planned that Juan should informally play that role. Certainly by talking through my worries, suggesting tactics to counter them and then using sex to distract me from my fears.

Just then there was the unmistakable sounds of a boy being flogged, the crack of leather striking bare flesh and the shrill howls of a brat having his bum warmed. It was coming from the front on the plane. I stood up to see what was happening. One of the serving boys was catching it from the cabin supervisor for some misdemeanour. The man had horsed the boy on the back of another child and was vigorously laying into the brat's round little bottom with a thick leather strap. The boy howled and his legs thrashed wildly as the man thrashed him. My prick already hard felt as if it was going to burst.

Juan ran his had up the back of my thighs and slipping it beneath my loin cloth pushed gently into the crack of my bottom with his finger tips. A serving boy appeared as if by magic beside him holding tube of jelly. I felt coolness inside me as Juan lubricated the lips of my anus then his hand were on my hips drawing me down onto him. I could feel the boy's nimble fingers guiding his swollen cock into me. I caught my breath at the pain of the initial invasion of my body. Drawing me firmly downwards he impaled me on his iron hard prick. The initial pain gave way to overwhelming excitement. The serving boy crouched beside us and bent over my crutch. I felt his lips close about my penis. Putting my hand on the back of his head I forced him to take the whole length of my cock into his mouth. Aided by Juan's hands on my hips I rode his throbbing rod as the boy gagged and sucked on my prick. I felt Juan surge deep inside me and at the same moment I shot gobbets of cum into the brat's throat.

I rested for a moment on Juan's lap and then pulled myself clear. As I did so the serving boy bent forward to clean the man's cock of the mixture of blood shit and cum that soiled it. I cuffed the brat on the side of the head. I knew what I owed to my sponsor. I knelt beside Juan and did my duty while the boy's tongue explored and cleaned my hole.

After that I slept for a time my head resting on Juan's chest. Then I was shaken awake.

"We're landing now," Juan said gently, "If you look down you can see Antavari straight below you. The slave pens are those square areas of earth just North of the town.".

The plane banked steeply and began it's descent. I quickly recovered my loin cloth from the floor and slipped it between my legs passing the ends under the fine leather belt with the heavy silver buckle that circled my waste. The cabin boys and girls scuttled to the rear of the plane where they knelt together on the floor in the position required of Tribute Children, knees spread wide, hands down by their sides, backs straight and heads bowed, a pose that simultaneously offered and submitted themselves to their betters.

I wonder what it is like to be a Tribute Boy. I would hate to have to kneel like that showing my balls and cock anybody who cared to look. But then I am not a Tribute Boy. They don't feel things in the same way that I do. Sluts the lot of them, no doubt they enjoy showing themselves off, no sense of pride or shame. I wonder too what people see in girls. Some like them but I can't see it. Still I'll have to do my duty in time and breed a son to follow me in the business I suppose.

The plane lurched as the wheels touched the runway and the engines roared as the pilot reversed their thrust. The green light came on telling us that we could undo our seat belts.

"We don't have to bother about our hand baggage," Juan said as he stood up. "It'll be delivered to our hotel with the rest of the luggage."

As I was leaving the plane a man I did not know, not one of our party, who was in front of me, turned and threw a handful of obols, the universal currency of the Tribute Child, among the naked brats huddled at the back of the plane. I turned to watch as, discipline forgotten, they fought among themselves, boys and girls alike, squealing biting and kicking in a jumble of flailing bare limbs. Senior cabin staff moved in to restore order striking out vigorously with their thick wooden truncheons. Howls of pain and the thud of wood striking bare flesh showed they were going about their work with vigour and enthusiasm. Dad called me impatiently and I turned away feeling a little guilty for keeping him waiting. She was only a Tribute brat and there were plenty more where she came from.

The heat outside the air conditioned confines of the plane was stifling. It took a second or two for me to accustom myself to the glare of the sun then I saw two long black Mercedes cars standing on the runway and beside them my father speaking to a heavy set dark haired man wearing a light suit and sun glasses. I hurried down the steps to join them.

"Señor Gotti," my father said, "my son Christopher."

"Hello Christopher," the man said speaking with a strong Italian accent offering me his hand. "Welcome to Antavari. I hope you enjoy your stay here. You have come to help your father purchase boys?"

"Yes Sir," I said returning his hand shake. I noticed the palm of his hand felt wet and cold, "but I think I have more to learn than to offer."

"You show a degree of modesty unusual in the young nowadays," Señor Gotti remarked laughing. "You must come and meet my son Maurizio. We have a barbecue tonight Don Carlos where we would be honoured to entertain you both. But now to business. If the rest of your party care to travel in the second Mercedes it will take them direct to the hotel. I have a new business venture in which I hope to interest you Don Carlos so perhaps you and your delightful son would like to accompany me."

A uniformed chauffeur held open the door of the car. As I waited for the two men to get in a trolley hauled by six sweating Tribute Boys passed heaped high with our luggage from the plain.

"Things seem to have improved since I was here last, Señor," my Father remarked as the car moved off.

"I am pleased you notice it, Don Carlos."

"You can hardly fail to miss the stench of the slave pens. It used to strike you the instant you came off the plane."

"Well that and the rest only took a little organisation and that is what we have provided. The first thing we did was to move the pens away from the airport and put them down wind of the down wind of the town."

The car swept along a broad straight road leaving a cloud of dust behind it. The land on either side was flat and in the fields of maize and tobacco I could see occasional gangs of slave boys labouring under the blazing sun. To the East a range of barren mountains stretched into the distance.

Soon we on the outskirts of the town, a poor area where children not yet old enough for Tribute dressed only in their skimpy loin cloths played in the dirt. Then suddenly we were driving along a tree lined avenue lined with tall modern buildings rising on either side.. The Mercedes swung off the road and through a gateway guarded by two soldiers who saluted as we passed. The car drew up, on one side was a fountain sending silver jets of water high into the air and green lawns, on the other a gleaming white modern building with over it's great marble portico the words Antavari New Life Clinic.

"A new venture, Señor Gotti?" My Father enquired as the chauffeur held the car door open for us.

"Yes indeed and a most profitable one. Not one I think you would wish to be directly involved in Don Carlos but one of which, if they knew of the service provided, certain of your clients would most certainly wish to avail themselves and your recommendation would be appreciated and indeed rewarded."

As he spoke Señor Gotti lead the way down a series of marble floored corridors. He held a door open for us and I found myself in a large comfortably furnished room three men lounged in arm chairs chatting while a handsome slave boy of about thirteen sat on the floor beside one of them his head resting on his master's thigh.

The three men rose as we entered the room. There was a quick round of introductions. Mr R.H.Quinlan was the oldest of the three a heavily built American about fifty years old. It was against his fat thigh that the Tribute Boy had rested his head. The other two were in their early forties, a Mr Tomlinson an Englishman and Dr Bernstein another American.

"And this is Petre?" Señor Gotti asked nodding at the naked boy kneeling on the floor.

"Yes indeed," Mr Quinlan drawled. "Come on Petre up on your feet and let the gentlemen look at you," he commanded prodding the boy with his foot.

The lad clambered quickly to his feet. He was a pretty boy, fair haired, pretty face, nicely proportioned body with round firm limbs. He was well nourished for a Tribute Boy and looked generally in remarkably good condition. There was fear in his eyes though, the terror of an animal who sensed something awful was about to be done to it but did not know what.

"You are pleased with the boy?" Enquired Señor Gotti.

"Very pleased."

"He has requested his release?" Señor Gotti asked.

"Yes," Mr Tomlinson said, "but perhaps as there are additional people here we can hear it again. Come on Petre."

The boy hesitated. Mr Tomlinson lifted slightly a small stainless steel tube he was carrying in his right hand and the boy began to speak in a shrill, sing song voice, his words tumbling over each other in his eagerness to blurt them out.

"If it please you Master I humbly request my release and I beg that it should be by helping you Master. If it please you Master. Thank you Master."

"Excellent ," Mr Tomlinson said cheerfully now perhaps we can begin. Come along Petre, Gentlemen."

He crossed the room and held open a door in the opposite wall. Through the open door I could see a bare floored windowless chamber bathed in white fluorescent light. It's only furniture a bed set in the centre of the floor. It was an sort of bed, though more perhaps a table than a bed, with a hump in it's middle that would surely make it uncomfortable for any person lying on it. Petre balked at the door way and Mr Tomlinson touched him on his bottom with his stainless steel rod. The boy yelped and shot forward.

"A handy little persuader you have there," my father remarked to Mr Tomlinson as he followed the boy into the room.

"Yes just a an electric prod really in an elegant package. Has quite a punch though and I find it an invaluable aid in this aspect of my professional work."

"Now up on the table Petre. Quickly boy. On your back and stretch your hands up above your head. Don't keep us waiting."

The boy lay on the bed his body stretched taught by it's convex shape. Two burly men appeared and with quick brutal efficiency secures the boy's ankles and wrists to stainless steel bars at the foot and head of the bench.

"Mr Quinlan perhaps it is time now for you to return to your room for your pre-med. Your physician Dr Bernstien is here to look after your interests. You may say good bye to Petre if you wish."

Mr Quinlan stepped forward and bending down quickly kissed Peter on the lips then ruffling the boy's fair hair he hurried from the room tears streaming down his face.

"We always give our clients the opportunity to leave at this stage." Señor Gotti said indulgently. "Some of them, as indeed old Quinlan obviously has get quite attached to their boys and what comes next they would find distressing. Others though quite frankly enjoy it."

"You see what we offer here is a sort of bespoke spare part operation. It's Petre's heart we're using in this case I believe is it not Mr Tomlinson."

"Yes a straight forward enough operation with the facilities we have available here."

"It was possible before we set this operation up to get what ever organs you wanted," Señor Gotti continued. "You can obtain anything at a price in this world. But you had no assurance as to the quality of the product you were buying. It was as likely as not to come from some mentally deficient child in an Egyptian orphanage or a drug addicted, half starved, street child in South America."

"What we do is sort out from our slave pens three young healthy boys who are medically compatible as donors. Allow our client with the assistance of his own medical advisers to choose which he wishes to use. He then buys the boy from us and pays us to perform the operation."

"Another service we offer is the selection of suitable boys in advance of any specific need. The client then purchases them from us and adds them to his household holding them, as it were, in reserve until the need for them arises. Rather as General de Gaulle used to travel round with a stock of blood in case of an assassination attempt. There are a number of rulers and millionaire businessmen now out there with two or three young boys who pray with particular sincerity for the continued health of their Masters."

"It is a premium service and of course we charge a premium sum. But then what is it worth to an individual to know that the heart he is receiving comes from a healthy and indeed in Petre's case obviously well bred child for he is excellently educated, speaking English almost fluently rather than some degenerate disease ridden brat."

Señor Gotti stopped talking and for the moment there was silence in the room except for the sound of Petre's wild sobbing.

"Sir please Sir," the boy whimpered, "please don't do it to me. My Daddy is rich Sir. He'll pay you more than anybody to get me back. Please Sir."

Señor Gotti ignored the boy's wild pleading remarking only to my father.

"The boy's father is dead. We explored the possibility of ransom of course, before we offered him to Mr Quinlan."

Petre began to cry noisily. Presumably this was the first time he had learnt of his father's death.

"Do be quiet you stupid little brat," Mr Tomlinson snapped angrily. "You should be grateful that you are being given this opportunity to serve your Master in so useful a way. Ungrateful brute that you are."

"Mamma… Mamma" the boy began to scream.

"She's dead as well," Señor Gotti shouted brutally. "For God's sake some one gag the turd and then we can have some quiet."

Mr Tomlinson said something to one of his assistants and a gag was forced into Petre's mouth and comparative silence fell although I could still hear the boy's muffled sobbing.

"They always want their Mummy's," Mr Tomlinson remarked with a smile.

He held out his arms and one assistant wrapped a green plastic apron around him while another pulled rubber gloves onto his hands.

"Now I'll begin."

A few minutes later he was holding the boy's still pulsing heart in his blood covered gloved hands. An assistant held out a container. The heart was placed in it and Mr Tomlinson followed by the assistant hurried from the room leaving Petre's lifeless body lying on the table with a great gaping gash across the left side of his rib cage.

"I would offer you an introduction fee of seven thousand five hundred euros for every client you recommend here," Señor Gotti said as we left the room.

"What is the price of a rich man's life?" my father asked quietly. "Double that figure and you will have a deal."

"Done," said Señor Gotti. "Now I'll take you to your hotel. No doubt you will want to bath and change after your journey. I'll send a car along in say two hours time to fetch you to my house."

I followed the two men.

The car came to fetch us from the hotel just as dusk was beginning to fall. We had both showered and father was dressed in a light weight tropical suit while I was wearing my loin cloth together with the jerkin that he had given me at the beginning of the summer made of the lightest most supple boy's hide. I could see he thought I looked good from the way he eyed me, the white of the loin cloth contrasting with my golden brown skin. I reminded myself to look out for a boy with just the right coloured pelt for my new waistcoat when we eventually visited the slave mart.

It was cooler now outside and dad opened the window of the car as soon as we were clear of the town. The air was strangely scented smelling of pine trees together with wild flowers and herbs. We swept through the darkening countryside the road climbing steeply up a hill lying to the South of the town. Looking back I could see the lights in the houses and along the streets flickering in the gathering dusk. To the West the sea was a dark unlit plain while to the North geometric lines of flood lights marked the perimeters of the slave pens where the merchandise we had come to inspect huddled in filth and misery.

I realised how fortunate I was to be sitting in that powerful car next to my strong proud father whom the whole world seemed to know and admire. I slid along the back set of the car until I was pressed up close against him. He put his arm round my shoulder and hugged me. I rested my hand on his crutch feeling his hardness.

"No," he said, moving my hand gently away, "Not now Christopher, later perhaps. I don't want to stain my trousers."

The car turned a bend and in front of us the road was blocked by a red and white striped bar. Two men in uniform with automatic rifles slung over their shoulders stood beside it. One saluted while the other lifted the bar to let us pass. Ahead I could see through the trees the glow of flood lights and the upper part of a large villa. A few minutes later we deposited at the foot of a broad flight of steps leading up to a terrace at the front of the house. On either side of the steps stood a line of naked Tribute Boys still as statues holding blazing torches.

We walked up between the double row of young torch bearers and were effusively greeted by Señor Gotti behind him a crowd of expensively dressed men and woman lounged and chattered while among them moved small serving boys constantly replenishing their glasses with champagne. The terrace was flood lit and spaced at frequent intervals around its edge were further boy torch holders.

Señor Gotti took hold of my father by his elbow and launched into what looked likely to be a long and rather florid speech of welcome to my father while I stood beside them pleasantly conscious that I was the subject of appreciative inspection by a number of the adults present. I felt a touch on my arm and turning saw standing beside me a thick set dark youth perhaps a couple of years older than me.

"Hi," he said white teeth flashing in the middle of his dark face, "I'm Maurizio. I guess you must be Christopher. I've been looking out for you. Come on down to the pool nothing's going to happen here for hours."

I caught Dad's eye and he smiled and nodded.

I followed Maurizio through the crowd. Men turned to look at us as we passed and a couple of time I felt a hand brush against my bottom. Maurizio snatched a bottle of champagne from a passing serving boy. The brat opened his mouth to protest but then saw who had taken it and simply went back to the house to fetch a fresh bottle.

Once we were clear of the terrace Maurizio paused to let me catch him up.

"It'll liven up a bit when they've all had more to drink and the entertainment begins, but till then it's Dullsville." He spoke English with an American accent.

We walked on side by side along a flag stoned path that ran through trees in whose branches fairy lights were draped. He lifted the bottle of champagne to his lips and drank deeply.

"You like this?" he asked offering the bottle to me.

I had never had champagne before. Dad only allowed me a half glass of wine mixed with water very occasionally at dinner time as a special treat. I gingerly tipped he bottle to my lips. It tasted great. Less sweet than lemonade and with tiny little bubbles that pricked the back of my throat it made me feel as if as I heard Dad say once "everything was for the best in the best of all possible worlds." I took another drink from the bottle.

"I can see you do?" Maurizio exclaimed recovering the bottle from me. He took another swig and passed it back to me.

"Which do you prefer," he asked, "boys or girls."

"Boys," I said unhesitatingly.

"Me too. I can see we're going to get on well here's the pool down this flight of steps."

It was a massive rectangular pool with under water lighting. At one end a fountain sent jets of water high into the air which fell in sprays of brightly coloured water lit by concealed spotlights. At the other was a tall tower with diving boards set at various heights.

A marble flagged patio with a pillared arcade surrounded the pool along one side of which were a row of changing rooms. All was flood lit but despite this torches guttered from holders fastened to the walls of the arcade. Outside each changing room a naked twelve year old boy knelt his knees spread, bum pressed to the floor, hands down by his side and head bowed.

"They're waiting for people to come down here from the party," Maurizio confided to me. "They will too, later, but not yet. Now how about a bit of fun. You swim?"

"Yes."

"Well?"

"Pretty good."

"OK we'll have a bit of a competition."

As Maurizio spoke he was stripping off.

"Come on get undressed."

"Shouldn't we use the changing rooms?" I was used enough to running around naked at the hacienda but the existence of changing rooms suggested that different conventions applied here.

"No everybody'll be skinny dipping here later. Get a move on."

Maurizio was wearing trainers long trousers and a T-shirt. So despite starting after him I was stripped a little before him. I stood watching him as he slipped off his underpants. I saw he was a strongly built youth. A fuzz of dark hair had already begun to darken his chest. His prick and balls were almost man sized and were surrounded by a thick forest of pubic hair.

He straightened and his prick flicked upright against his tummy. He saw my eyes on it and grinned.

"Not bad is it ?" He said with a laugh pressing it down slightly with the palm of his hand and then releasing it so that it snapped back to attention.

"Now let's see which of these little boys will be the lucky one we decide to play with."

He walked over towards the changing rooms. I thought I sensed a tremor run down the line of naked boys as he approached. We strolled down the line of boys pausing to look at each one in turn. They must all have known where we were for with their heads bowed they could see our feet as we passed down the line. Not one though looked up at us. They had been, I recognised, well schooled. We came to the end of the line. Maurizio paused and then began to walk slowly back. He stopped in front of a fair haired brat and waited … and waited. The boy began to shake. Maurizio still stood there unmoving and silent suddenly the boy peed himself. Maurizio laughed and then catching hold of the brat by his hair wrenched his head back and slapped him hard across the face.

"Dirty little brute," he said coldly hitting him back and open handed alternately so that his head rocked to and fro. "Can't you control yourself. Lick your filth up turd."

He released his grip of the boy's hair and the tyke bent to his task his tongue licking his urine from the marble pavement his bare rump pushed high in the air.

"Like to give this a fuck Christopher?" Maurizio said prodding the boy's exposed bottom with his foot. "About all the little tarts good for I suppose," he continued before I could reply, "but before he's in a state that any decent human being would want to touch for any purpose we'd better clean the little sod up."

"He's called Illya, you know and he's afraid of heights. Aren't you boy?"

The brat 's lips moved but he was so frightened that he could not speak.

"Well he is anyway," Maurizio said with a sneer and we'll cure him of that as well."

"You," he said hauling the boy to his feet and pulling his head back so that he could look down into it, "go right to the very highest diving board and jump. If you can get out of the pool before my friend here catches you, you go up to the top and jump again and you go on doing that till we tell you to stop. If you get caught, well maybe he'll drown you or maybe he'll let you go. If he lets you go, you jump again. Now move."

The boy began to blub. I looked up at the high board. It was very high indeed. I would have needed to screw up my courage to jump from it and I was two years older and I had done a fair bit of diving, which I doubt if the brat would have done any. After all, he was only a slave and from the age of seven he would have spent his life serving his betters with no opportunity to play. That didn't stop me from feeling contemptuous of the brat. It was hard, but a slave's life was hard. There was no point in blubbing. He had been given an order by his Master. He had to obey him.

Maurizio's patience cracked. He grabbed a torch from it's holder and thrust it at the little tyke whose blubbing rose to a shrill scream as the flames scorched his bare flesh.

"Move," Maurizzo shouted jabbing the torch forward again. "Quick … Move you miserable lump of dog's shit."

Wielding the torch Maurizio drove the wailing boy to the foot of the diving tower.

"Master …. Please Master …. No Master," the brat pleaded but all his pleadings were in vain as Maurizio forced him up the steps to the top board.

I stood at the edge of the pool looking upwards. The brat was now on the board itself backing down towards it's end with Maurizio moving inexorably after him. The boy was on the very edge of the board. Maurizio pushed the torch into the boy's face. The boy screamed shrilly stepped backwards and began to fall.

He hit the water of the pool with a loud splash. I dived into the water as he went under. When I surfaced his arms and legs were thrashing the water desperately as he struggled to reach the side before I could reach him. I was only a metre away from him and he must have known he would never make it. I let him hope however, keeping within reach but not for the moment grabbing him. He reached the edge of the pool. He reached upwards and began to lever himself onto the patio. Still I did not interfere.

It was only when he was lying on his stomach all but clear of the water that I caught hold of his ankle. Even then I did not immediately pull him back. He tried to kick loose but I was much too strong for him. When he had given up and was lying still I drew him back into the water. I gripped him by the shoulders and forced his head under the water. I felt the silky smoothness of his skin against my naked body as he struggled desperately. I was much the stronger and he had no chance. Soon he began to weaken. I let him up for air, his head broke the surface and he gasped oxygen into his lungs then I pushed him under again. This time his struggles were weaker and shorter.

"Let me have him Christopher," Maurizio shouted from the side of the pool.

I looked at him and grinned. I released my hold on the boy. Wearily he splashed away from me. It took him some time to drag himself from the pool. It was clear that his strength had been drained from him. At last he was out of the water lying on his belly prone at Maurizio's feet. I could see his flanks heaving as he fought for breath. After a time he began to try to get to is feet. Maurizio waited until he was half way up the he place his foot on his chest and tipped him back into the pool. I caught hold of him again and once more the brat experienced the terror of drowning. For sometime Maurizio and I played with the little brute. I half drowning him and then letting him go, Maurizio kicking him back into the pool when ever he managed to scramble out. It was good fun and very amusing and we both our cocks were rock hard.

Then Maurizio decided it was time for a change. He allowed the boy to haul himself from the pool.

"Get on your feet you lazy lump of dog's shit," he yelled at the exhausted boy kicking him savagely in the ribs.

"Now up to the high board again, filth."

"Master …" the boy moaned hardly able to stand.

Maurizio thrust the blazing torch at him and the brat was galvanised into action. The boy was now so tired that he could hardly drag himself up the steps of the ladder. Maurizio kept him moving by frequent application of the torch to his bare bottom. At last the boy was on the top board. He made his way unsteadily along it. Maurizio driving him forward with sweeps of the flaming torch. Perhaps the boy was so tired that he lost his balance, perhaps he was so terrified by Maurizio that he no longer knew where he was, perhaps he just wished to bring his misery to an end.

It seemed to take a very long time for his body to hit the marble flagged patio. It did so with a soft heavy thud. I scrambled out of the pool and ran over to where he lay. He was still alive but there was blood on his nose and mouth. As he lay there his muscles of his left thigh moved convulsively and the fractured end of his thigh bone forced it's way out through the smooth brown skin.

"Is he dead?" Maurizio called down to me.

"Not yet," I replied, "but I don't think he'll be any use to anyone again."

Maurizio scrambled down the ladder and came to stand beside me.

"He never was much use for anything but he certainly no us at all now," he said prodding the boy with his bare toe.

"Well," he continued with a laugh, "I was going to fuck the brat but now I suppose I'll have to make do with you Christopher."

Laughing he made a grab at me. Twisting I evaded his grasp and dived into the pool. I heard his body hit the water behind me. I reached the shallow end and looked back. As I expected Maurizio was far behind me. I guessed he would not be as at home in the water as I was. I caught his eye and smiled at him. I half lifted myself out of the pool with my hands on each side of my body, leaning forward with my bottom sticking out behind me I waited for him. Soon he was on me his hands held my hips steady as he drove into me. Once in he reached one hand round me and caught hold of my cock.

After I had showered I walked over to look again at the Tribute Boy's broken body. I felt strangely dizzy and a little sick as I stood gazing down at him. His eyes stared blankly into space and he no longer seemed to be breathing. I heard Maurizio's bare feet on the marble slabs behind me. He rested an arm across my shoulders.

"I think he's dead," I said uncertainly.

Maurizio put his bare foot on the fractured bone projecting from the boy's brown thigh and pushed. There was no reaction.

"Yes he's gone," he said. "Doesn't matter there are a hundred more like him down in the slave pens and they are cheap enough. Any way I could do with a piss."

Removing his arm from about me he took hold of his cock and shot a stream of amber liquid over the lifeless carcass.

"Come on Christopher," he said giggling, "you must need one too with all that champagne you've been drinking … Or are you too scared."

"I'm not scared," I replied indignantly, but never the less I turned away and walked back to where my clothes lay jumbled on the patio. I didn't know why but it just seemed bad somehow. Stupid really because he had only been a Tribute Boy and no doubt had experienced worse things when he was alive.

"Oh all right Christopher don't take it to heart," Maurizio said as I moved off.

He started to follow, me calling over his shoulder to one of the boy's kneeling by the changing rooms, "Metsa get over there you idle little tyke. There'll be guests down here soon and I don't want them having to paddle in pee."

One of the brats scuttled from his place and dropping on all fours began to lick the gently steaming fluid from the ground his little upturned bottom wiggling as he lapped.

"There's no need to dress you know," Maurizio remarked as I fastened my belt around my waste. "Just about now a lot of the guests will be beginning to shed clothes not put them on."

"I need to keep track of my clothes," I replied with a smile. "I want to take them with me when we go back to the hotel."

"Oh well suite yourself," Maurizio said, "you might give some of the old men a treat and let them have a sight of that nice boy's rump of yours. Its very pretty you know," he added pinching it.

"I know you think so," I replied turning away up pick up my jerkin.

"Can I have a look at that," Maurizio asked taking it from my hands. "Wow that's wicked. Boy's skin isn't it?"

"Yes it was a present from Dad for my last birthday."

"Cool and the toggles they're bone aren't they?"

"Yes bones from the brat's toes Dad said. What I want," I went on taking the waistcoat back from him and shrugging it on, "is another one like this only lighter so it shows up my tan. Dad said if we could find a boy with a suitable hide he'd have it made up for me."

"Well perhaps you'll find one in the mart here. Now come on let's go and see how the barbecue is going. I'm hungry."

Maurizio lead the way back towards the terrace. He had not bothered to dress. As we walked he lifted the champagne bottle to his lips.

"Flat," he said hefting it into the bushes that grew along the side of the path, "we'll have to get a fresh one."

Before we even reached the terrace we were met with a blast of noise. It seemed everybody was talking a great deal louder than when we had last been there. I glanced round, certainly some of the guests did seem to have begun to shed their clothes. A fat middle aged man lurched towards me and tried to slip his hand under my loincloth. My Dad appeared beside me and the man faded quickly away.

"Señor Gotti has very kindly suggested you might like to stay the night here and go with Maurizio for a trip into the interior tomorrow morning. A slave hunting expedition I understand. Would you like that Christopher?"

"Yes Dad please," I said eagerly.

"Great," Maurizio, who had obtained another bottle of champagne from somewhere, exclaimed. "You'll enjoy it Christopher."

Dad looked closely at him and frowned.

"Well it's an early start for you both tomorrow so I suggest you both go and get something to eat and the get to bed. This party looks as though it is going to become rather lively soon."

"Sure, sure," Maurizio said and I saw my father glance at him again. It did seem to me he was talking a little oddly slurring his words. I could not understand why. "We'll do that Sir. Come on Christopher I'll show you the where the food is."

"We won't got to bed just yet," he said as soon as we were out of ear shot of my father. "Not before we've seen some of the entertainment anyway."

"But my Dad said…." I began.

"Oh come on Christopher you a baby or something. Do you always do what your Dad says?

I did not reply. I wasn't happy planning to disobey my father but I didn't want my new friend to think me a sissy.

We were among the first to arrive at the barbecue proper. Tables groaned under bowls of salad and olives and rice, beyond them spits turned slowly over three great pits of charcoal filling the air with a delicious smell of cooking meat, and beside the pits a long table on which had been set out the meats already cooked with men in white aprons and tall white hats standing ready, with long knifes, to carve the joints. Maurizio handed me a plate.

"Don't take too much rice and stuff," he advised me. " Leave room for some meat."

I crossed to the table where the men waited to serve us. I was just going to ask for some chicken when Maurizio grabbed hold of me by the elbow.

"Not that," he said urgently, "there's something much better down here."

He led me great plates containing whole fish and pigs to the end of the table.

"You take it Christopher," Maurizio said, "I'll look after the champagne. Come on we'll find somewhere a bit out of the way where your Dad can't find you and tell you to go to bed."

We found a flat rock just inside the sedge of the woods. We sat on it with the plate of meat and the bottle of champagne between us. Just enough light reached us from the barbecue for us to be able to see what we were doing.

"Help yourself Christopher," Maurizio said, "You've hardly had any champagne."

To show that I was quite as grown up as he was I tilted the bottle to my lips and took a large gulp of the cold prickly fluid. Then I picked up a slice of meat and bit into it. I could feel the warm juices trickling down my chin. I wiped my mouth on the back of my hand and Maurizio offered me the bottle of champagne again.

We sat side by side on the rock munching our food contentedly and taking alternate swigs from the bottle. Then suddenly there was a loud shut and the sound of people laughing and clapping.

"Come on Christopher," Maurizio cried jumping to his feet, "the show has started we don't want to miss any of it. We can leave the food here and come back to it. I'll take the bottle." He shook it and said. "It looks as though we'll need another one soon anyway."

I scrambled up and stumbled. The ground seemed to be moving about under my feet. Maurizio grabbed me and after a moment the feeling passed.

"You all right Christopher?" He asked.

"Yes of course," I said. "Just lost my balance." My tongue seemed somehow large and swollen in my mouth.

Maurizio didn't seem to notice though. He set off in a half run back towards the house. There was a blaze of light ahead of us. People were standing crowded round the edge of a shallow rectangular pit. I would say it was about one and a half metres deep and perhaps five metres long by three metres wide with rough stone wall sides and sandy floor. A low steel rail ran round the edge of the pit and scores of excited people were crowded up against this. A white shirted man stood in the pit firmly holding a leather leash which was clipped to the collar of a shaven haired sturdy boy of thirteen year or so who crouched at his feet. The boy's hands had been shackled behind his back and his eyes stared wildly about him as he shifted uneasily on his feet. A broad red stripe had been painted across his chest and back.

There was another shout and I saw a second boy being lead with a leash towards the pit by another white shirted man. This boy too had had his head shaved and his wrists secured behind his back. He had a blue stripe painted diagonally across his chest. Men and woman jostled to look at him and one woman held out a roll of bread to him. The boy lunged towards it the man jerked sharply on his lead and the woman stepped quickly back laughing.

"There's only one way those brutes will get fed tonight," Maurizio breathed in my ear.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Wait and see," he giggled, "mind you they are both hungry enough they haven't been fed today at all.".

The man got to the edge of the pit and keeping a firm grip on the boy's leash slid under the steel rail onto the floor of the pit. He turned to ease the blue striped boy down. The other boy pulled forward on the leash securing him straining towards the new arrival.

The two men glanced towards each other and then as at a prearranged signal they bent and unclipped the leashes from the boys' collars. The crowd howled in excitement as the two boys moved forward and began to circle cautiously round each other. The excited shouting of the crowd died down and I heard some groans and cat calls.

One of the men lashed the red boy across the shoulders with the buckle end of his lead. The boy roared and goaded on by the blow kicked out at his opponent. He dodged the kick and turning away launched himself in a sideways charge catching the red boy while still off balance and knocking him back hard so that his head struck the stone wall. Blood gushed from a cut on the boy's head and the blue boy yelling fiercely hurled himself forward his teeth bared. The red boy rolled desperately away and the other boy missing the front of his throat sank his teeth in the side of his neck. Frantically the red boy tried to shake the other brat loose. The blue boy held on grimly his jaw clamped tight the other boy's blood welling from his mouth. The wounded boy screamed shrilly and dragged himself on his knees to the side of the pit pulling the other boy with him. He began to throw himself against the stone wall battering his tormentors head against the rocks. At last the blue boy's grip weakened and with one last lunge the red boy freed himself.

The red boy went back on his knees and as the other brat tried to pull himself away saw his chance. He lowered his head and went straight for the other boy's crutch. I could hear the blue boys shrill scream of agony over the excited roar of the crowd. The red boy had his face buried in the other boys crutch tearing at him. He jerked back and a great flood of blood gushed from the blue boy's torn body. I saw the red boy was holding a bloody torn piece of flesh in his mouth. I saw what it was. The world revolved about me and I was sick.

I could hear the shrill screams of the stricken boy, the howls of the excited mob and then my father's voice stern and cold.

"Christopher, I advised you to go to bed after you had eaten. Clearly not only did you choose to ignore me you also have made a pig of yourself with the food and wine. This is a matter I will discuss with you again when you are in a better state to understand what is said to you."

"Maurizio, perhaps you will be kind enough to show me where my son is meant to be sleeping tonight and I will put him to bed."

"I'll look after him Sir. I'm very sorry this happened… I think really it's my fault Sir. I got him to drink and suggested he should stay up to watch this show."

Even as I puked I could tell that Maurizio was feeling very chastened by father's cold fury

"Show…," my Father stopped himself. "I will see you both up to the house and my son into bed. I am afraid you have not shown yourself worthy of my trust or for that matter anyone else's."

My father lifted me in his arms and the last thing I remember that night was being dumped unceremoniously on a bed and a blanket being thrown over me.

The Illya's shrill screams echoed in my head as Maurizio drove him out onto the high board. Looking up from the side of the pool at the tower rising high above me I could see them clearly outlined against the night sky. Everything seemed to be happening so slowly. Maurizio's thrusts at the boy with the blazing torch, the naked child's stumbling retreat. Illya now was balanced unsteadily on the very edge of the board. I could hear myself crying out to Maurizio to stop. Why was I doing that? I wondered hazily, the little brute was of no importance. Then very, very, slowly the boy fell twisting and howling as he tumbled towards the marble slabs that surrounded the pool.. I tried to close my eyes to shut out the awful image of the falling boy, I wanted to cover my ears to cut out his screams but I seemed to be paralysed.

Suddenly I was awake. Maurizio was sitting up on the bed opposite mine his bedside lamp on looking across at me.

"Whatever are you screaming about Christopher?" he demanded crossly.

I began to try to answer him but then nausea gripped me. I rolled over on the bed and began to wretch into a white china basin that someone had thoughtfully placed on the floor beside me. Nothing came except green bile. Hazily I could see I had already been sick at least once in the course of the night. I seemed to have got most of the vomit into the bowl. My stomach churned and the room seemed to move about me.

"Well I suppose," Maurizio said swinging his feet to the floor and padding over to me on bare feet, "I suppose it is almost time to get up."

"You may as well have a suck on this," he continued. Through my watering eyes I could see he had an erection on his almost man's sized prick wobbling in front of him as he approached.

"Not now Maurizio please," I moaned weakly.

"Yes now. Come on don't be such a wimp. A good swallow of cum will settle your stomach."

He placed his hand an my shoulder and tried to roll me onto my back as I weakly resisted.

"That's all right," Juan said walking into the room. "I'll look after Christopher."

Either he had not understood what Maurizio was up to or he was deliberately ignoring it. He picked up my clothes from where they lay jumbled on the floor and holding me by my right arm just above the elbow helped me out of bed.

"Hell, I've stepped in a bit of his puke," I heard Maurizio explain in disgust as Juan led me out of the room.

He half walked half carried me down a long corridor and into a bathroom. He flicked the shower doors open and turned the cold tap full on.

"In you go," he said.

I howled as the icy water hit my clammy sweating body. I tried to scramble out but Juan pushed me firmly back. Then just as I was becoming used to the cold water he reached in and turned the controls to hot.

"Wash yourself down now," he said handing me a cake of soap. When he was satisfied that I had done the job properly he pulled me out of the shower and dried me down vigorously with a rough towel. Then he watched me as I dressed myself.

"Feeling better?" He asked.

"A bit I think," I said. I noticed that my voice was very hoarse.

"Can you walk by yourself now?"

I nodded and then wished I hadn't. I did manage to walk though.

"Where's Dad?" I asked anxiously as I followed Juan down stairs.

"He went back to the hotel last night. He asked me to keep an eye on you today. On your form last night, Christopher, you need someone to look after you."

I started to ask him if Dad had been very angry with me and then thought better of it. I knew he had been and I knew too what that meant when we got back to the Hacienda.

We went into what was obviously the dining room. Señor Gotti was already sitting at the table sipping a cup of coffee. Opposite him sat Maurizio with a plate of doughnuts in and a bowl of hot chocolate.

"Excellent news," Señor Gotti said cheerfully to Juan, "the deputy governor has declared the whole region in default under Articles 3,4 and 5 paras b and c.ii. of the International Convention Governing the Management of Male Resource Units. We have a free hand now to take what we want. Cost us 100,000 Euros but we'll get our money back many times over."

"And how," he added turning to me, "are you feeling this morning young man?"

"A bit better thank you Sir." I replied very shamefacedly "I… I… I am afraid I didn't behave very well Sir … And I've made a bit of a mess in the bedroom. I am very sorry Sir."

"Don't worry," he said waving has hand dismissively, "we all make mistakes some times. That's how we learn and as for the mess, we have plenty of slave brats whose job it is to clean up after their betters. They should consider it an honour to have to clean up your puke. Some of them are such greedy little brutes that they'll probably try to eat it."

I put my hand to my mouth trying to fight back a fresh wave of nausea. Juan crossed to the side board where he poured me a large cup of coffee. Before he brought it to me he picked up a square bottle and tipped a generous measure of whatever it contained into the drink.

"Try and keep that down," he said handing it to me.

The coffee smelt funny and when I drank it, it made the back of my throat burn. I gagged but encouraged by the two men I swallowed it down. A warm glow spread over me and I felt considerably better.

"A shot of Brandy is a wonderful hang over cure," Señor Gotti remarked looking at me quizzically.

"Like a doughnut and some hot chocolate now. They're really very good together. A bit rich and greasy perhaps for you," Maurizio said grinning.

"No… No…Thank you," I said hastily. "I think I'll just wait out side in the hall if you don't mind."

I heard Maurizio laugh as I left the room.

A few minutes later Juan joined me. He was carrying a flack jacket and an automatic in a webbing holster.

He sat down beside me and pulled the automatic from it's holster.

"I know your father has shown you how to use these things," he said. "It's a Browning 9 mm Automatic Pistol and fires 13 rounds. Just to remind you that's the safety catch and it's on. Don't put it off until we're off the helicopter and not even then unless it looks likely you're going to have to use it. There are two magazines in the pockets of the flak jacket. So far as I am concerned I will be best pleased if you hand this back to me at the end of the day without a shot fired. I will expect you to account for me for each and every shot you do fire. Do you understand."

Juan spoke slowly and clearly and very seriously, quite unlike his usual friendly way of speaking to me. Mind you, I recognised that that was quite right. Dad had told me often enough that guns were serious things not toys and never to be used lightly.

"Now put the belt and jacket on we're off."

A large helicopter stood on a broad patch of concrete at the back of the house it's twin rotor blades turning slowly. I noticed the muzzles of two canon protruding from it's front. We all scrambled abroad helped by a man wearing khaki fatigues and a flack jacket. There was a heavy machine gun mounted on a stand just inside the door in the fuselage. We seated ourselves in a double row of steel chairs bolted to the floor just behind the pilots seat. Both the pilot and co-pilot were also wearing uniforms and flak jackets.

The noise from helicopter's engines rose to an ear splitting roar. The machine shuddered and we rose into the air. A slight lightning on the eastern horizon could be seen as we swung inland. We all sat quiet and tense except for Maurizio who kept on pulling his automatic from his holster, clicking the safety catch on and off and giggling excitedly. I saw Juan, who was sitting next to me, glaring at him angrily.

Suddenly below us we saw the glow of flames and occasional sudden scattered vivid flashes of light.

Señor Gotti pointed down.

"There it is," he shouted over the noise of the motors, "Urosevac. It's started."

The helicopter banked and then began a slow descent. There was a blast of cold air as the paramilitary kicked open the fuselage door and eased the heavy machine gun forward ready to fire. In the first grey light of dawn I could see we were descending towards a bare field surrounded by forest. The radio crackled into life. The pilot turned and spoke briefly to Señor Gotti who lent back with in his seat with a smile. There was a sharp bump as the helicopter touched down. Señor Gotti rose to his feet and followed by the rest of us made his way to the open door in the fuselage.

Three men stood far enough away from the helicopter to be clear of the down draught from it's rotors. They all wore some sort of uniform and two of them carried automatic rifles. The one standing in the centre had a pistol in a holster at his belt and was holding a loudhailer.. All three saluted as Señor Gotti approached. Beyond them a mass of human forms sat or crouched on the bare ground. Glancing back at the helicopter I saw the man was still standing at the rear door covering us with the machine gun as the it's motors continued to roar.

"All ready?" Señor Gotti demanded.

"Yes Sir we've sent a few shells in to start fires and to get the opposition heads down. We'll launch the first wave now."

"Get the bastards moving then and keep them moving. If any hesitate shoot them down. We'll recruit replacements from what we capture today."

The man turning lifted the loud hailer to his mouth and shouted a series of commands in a language I did not understand at the silent figures crouched on the ground away from us. Individuals began to scramble to their feet among the dark hoard of humanity, shouting in their turn and kicking and belabouring those about them to get them moving. I could see they were all boys of about my age. Most of them were dressed in some fragments of military uniform but ragged, dirty, and ill fitting. Many were shoeless and only a minority had fire arms, the rest had what looked like steel tipped pikes. Hollow eyed from hunger and fatigue, filthy dirty, shivering with cold, they hardly looked capable of walking let alone fighting.

They moved slowly into the woods beyond which I could see the glow of the burning town.

"Let them go forward to draw the fire and we will follow behind," Señor Gotti said.

"They don't look in too good shape," Juan remarked.

"What can you expect," Señor Gotti shrugged. "They've marched fifty miles in a day and a half and slept out two nights in the mountain without shelter and had only what they could forage to eat."

"Will they be able to do the job?"

"Of course. All they've got to do is keep moving forward until they're in the town and then kill any fighters they come across. They'll keep going. They know that once they've taken the town they can have whatever they want - food and sex. Those that survive."

There was a blast of gunfire ahead.

"Everyone got their flak jackets on? Come on we'll go forward then and don't forget if you see any of those brutes running back shoot them down."

We came to the edge of the wood and here we saw the first casualties. Twisted figures lying on the ground blood seeping from jagged tares in their clothing. One boy had half of his head blown, off grey brains leaking into the mud, another boy lay on his back his stomach ripped open flies even this early in the morning beginning to buzz and cluster on the fresh offal spilling from the wound. There were wounded too some silent their eyes seeming to staring unseeingly at us as we passed, others moaning or whimpering. Señor Gotti strode on ignoring them. None I noticed called for help presumably because they knew none would be given.

Suddenly Señor Gotti stopped by one boy who lay half propped up against a tree trunk blood welling from a wound in his shoulder. He began to kick the boy, short hard kicks into his rump and ribs. The boy howled. Señor Gotti stooped and grabbing him by his shirt hauled him to his feet. He slapped him about his face with his free hand then spun him so that he was facing towards the burning town and placing a boot on his arse sent him staggering forward.

He pulled out a handkerchief and fastidiously wiped the blood from his hands.

"Filthy little malingering coward," he said. "I suppose I should have shot him."

"He was wounded," Juan remarked.

"He could still move forward and draw fire. We'll take the place by weight of numbers. If we allow the brutes to lie down just because they're hurt we'll soon have problems."

Suddenly we found ourselves crouching behind a bank with a crowd of the ragged boy shoulders. Peering over the top I could see behind a jumble of barbed wire entanglements the first houses of the little town only a hundred metres or so away. The ground in front of the bank was scattered with broken bodies. It was clear that for the moment at least the attack had stalled.

The man with the loudhailer began to yell orders. The other two men dashed along the bank driving the boys out from cover with blows from their rifle butts. As the boys scrambled over the top of the bank a withering blast of automatic fire caught them. Still the men drove them forward. I saw one pick up a boy and throw him bodily over the bank. The ground in front of us now was covered with fallen bodies but the boys had reached the barbed wire. Some seized wounded or dead comrades and threw them onto the wire to form a bridge others in their desperation simply hurled themselves at it. The screams of the wounded and the crackle of machine gun fire together with the occasional heavier thud of a mortar filled the air. It seemed most, if not all, of the fire was incoming.

The man with the loud hailer bellowed another order and another waive went over the top trampling on the bodies of the dead and wounded in their desperate determination to reach the town. Now some at least were through the wire. I saw them reach the first house. A window was broken. A boy rose to his feet and threw a bottle with a burning rag smouldering in it's neck. He was immediately cut down with machine gun fire but the bottle went through the window. There was a crash and a burst of flames. The door of the house burst open and three or four men dashed out. The boys were on them with their pikes. Smoke started to bellow from the neighbouring house. I could see flames rising further on n the town.

"We're coming in from the other side as well," Señor Gotti said, "I think it's safe to move forward a bit further now."

Casualties were so thick on the ground that it was impossible not to avoid the fallen bodies. When we came to the wire we had to step on bodies to get over it, some dead, some wounded, all horribly lacerated by the razor sharp spikes. Now we were in the town itself a screen of boys preceding us down the street another ten or so grouped round us to provide a further shield. Juan walked close beside me with his automatic drawn. I put my hand down to the but of my Browning but he saw me and shook his head.

"Leave it where it is, Christopher," he said quietly. "We're all safer if we keep the number of firearms down."

"Keep back," Señor Gotti shouted, "let the boys stay well in front. That way they'll explode any mines before we reach them."

At that moment there was a loud bang and the end of the street where the boys were was momentarily obscured in dust. I felt something warm and wet slap against my cheek. I put a hand up to my face and saw it was covered in blood. Glancing down at the ground I saw a fragment of bleeding flesh lying at my feet. A part of a boy, but what part? I could not tell. There was a crash of gunfire to our left and one of the men slumped too the ground . Juan bent down, grabbed the fallen man's automatic rifle and holding me by the arm dashed across the street and into one of the houses whose door had already been kicked in.

Juan knocked the glass from a window with the rifle butt and stood there looking out into the street his rifle at the ready. We were quickly joined by Señor Gotti and the rest. He pointed his automatic at one of the boys and jerked his head towards the open door. The boy hesitated and Señor Gotti shot him in the crutch. The brat creamed shrilly and a red stain spread out across the front of the brats ragged shorts as he slowly fell first to his knees and then onto his side on the floor. Señor Gotti pointed at another boy. White faced the lad scuttled to the door and out into the street. There was a burst of fire from the house opposite and the boy was knocked backwards his chest blow open. Juan aimed carefully and fired a burst from his automatic rifle. There was a crash of shattered glass and then silence. Señor Gotti gestured at a third boy. This time there was no burst of gun fire as he dodged out onto the street.

One by one we emerged cautiously from the house. I could see our surviving boys scattered by the explosion of the mine being driven back towards us by a massed of charge of similar aged youths. The occasional shot rang out but mostly it was a case of cold steel, bayonet and pike being, driven into unprotected human flesh. Without hesitating Juan and the other man armed with an automatic rifle dropped to their knees and raked the end of the street with fire regardless of friend and foe. The advance wavered. The man with the loud hailer roared out another order and from behind us came a ragged shrill cheer as yet another wave of boys hurled themselves into the fray. I stepped back into the house to let them get past me and then there was a moment of total confusion and terror. There was a great crash, the world went black and my mouth and nostrils were filled with choking dust.

After the noise a sudden eerie silence. The dust settled and I realised the whole of the side of the building had collapsed inwards blocking me off from the street. There was a sinister creaking sound and some individual bricks clattered to the ground beside me. It seemed the house was about to collapse. I could not stay where I was. My way back to the street was blocked. I could only try and get out of the back of the house. I was not too frightened. It seemed to me from what I had seen that the defence of the town was on the point of collapse.

The back door was locked so I scrambled out through the kitchen window. I found myself in a small back yard ringed by a high wooden fence. There was no gate but I could reach the top of the fence if I jumped and I was soon sitting on top of it looking down into a large but somewhat overgrown garden. I dropped down into this. At the far end stood a comfortable sized detached house. I noticed a rather battered boy's bike propped up against the wall near the back door which stood ajar. Everywhere now there seemed to be a smell of burning. I tried to make my way round the side of the house to the road beyond but found my way blocked by a tall brick wall. I returned to the back door and slipping my automatic from it's holster stepped cautiously inside the house. I found myself in the kitchen. The door leading to the body of the house stood open. The smell of burning was much stronger and there was a confused noise of screaming.

I flipped off the safety catch and holding the automatic down by my thigh moved as quietly as I could across to the open door. Beyond the door was a passageway, at the far end the front door had been smashed down and I could see the street beyond. Between me and the street were five or six of what I took from the fragments of military clothing they were wearing of Señor Gotti's boy soldiers. They were laughing and shouting while they held a struggling boy a few years younger than them facing an open door way half way down the passage. Through that door came a series of ear splitting screams. The smell of burning was stronger than ever before.

I hesitated, I had to get past the boys to get out of the house. I recognised them as belonging to the same side as I did, but would they recognise me and if they did, would that prevent them from attacking me when they discovered I was alone. I was hesitating wondering what to do when a gust of wind blowing down the open passageway caught the back door and slammed it. The boys startled, swung round and saw me. Speaking in a language I could not understand they beckoned to me and pointed through the door by which they stood. Clearly at least they recognised me and were friendly.

I walked forward and looked through the door. The floor and indeed part of the roof above a had collapsed and lying on the floor pinned by a great beam across her legs was a middle aged woman. At the far end of the room flames from a fire that seemed to have it's roots in the basement roared upwards drawn by the draught from the hole in the roof. I could not tell if the flames had reached the woman's legs but the heat was intense and little curls of smoke rose from between the floor boards where they survived.

A wildly grinning brat pointed at the screaming woman and the desperately struggling boy they held captive.

"Mother, son," he said in a foreign accent and giggled excitedly.

I cannot explain what I did next. I had seen plenty of pain in my time. It is an unavoidable if the Tribute Boy system is to be maintained and as they tell us at school without that society would collapse and we would all starve as population grew out of control. I had heard Dad talk sometimes about unnecessary pain and perhaps that influenced me. Perhaps it was just that I could not stand the sound of the woman's screaming. But then I could surely have shot her from where I stood. I didn't have to go into the room and kneel beside her feeling the heat of the fire on my naked legs, hearing the floor timbers creak as the flames weakened them, not knowing when the floor would collapse and into the basement where the fire raged. Perhaps I might have failed to kill her with the first shot but the magazine had thirteen shots and I would surely have finished her off before I emptied it into her. I put my left hand over her eyes, pressed the muzzle of the automatic to her head and pulled the trigger. Blood and brains splashed over my chest staining my jerkin.

There was a sudden silence apart from the roaring of the flames. There was a sound of running feet and by the time I regained the corridor only the woman's son remained there. He was kneeling on the floor his hands pressed to his face sobbing wildly. I stood looking down at him his thin shoulders heaving as he cried. About twelve years old I thought, a mop of brown hair flecked with gold, clear light brown skin. He was wearing shorts and there was no collar round his neck so he was a privileged child although now that would change.

I wondered what to do with him. I could leave him where he was and simply take care of myself. If I did that it seemed likely he would just stay there until the flames had him which seemed a waste. I decided to take him along with me. After all the purpose of the raid was to capture boys like him. I suppose I could simply have kicked him to his feet and dragged him out of the house. He was small enough for me to have been able to do that with no difficulty. Instead I knelt down beside me put an arm round his shoulder.

"I did the best I could for her," I said, wondering if he understood English at all. "She's not feeling anything anymore. I couldn't have got her out. The beams were too heavy."

The boy turned his face to me bruised, a trickle of blood running from a corner of his mouth, tear stained and red eyed he had clearly been roughed up by the brats.

"Sir please … Please," and then lapsed back into uncontrollable sobbing. 'At least he has some English,' I thought.

I put my hand under his arm and guided him to his feet. Docilely he allowed me to lead him from the house. Once out in the street I paused. I had no idea of which way to go. Looking about me it was clear that our forces had been busy. Houses blazed on each side of the road. A few bodies lay scattered on the ground, either adults or very young children. Further away a party of our boys was systematically clearing the road by collecting corpses and throwing them into the burning buildings. When they got nearer I saw that it was not only dead bodies that they were disposing of in this way.

As I hesitated there was a sound of shouting and a crowd of naked children, boys and girls mixed together, were herded down the street towards us. The naked brats wailing and crying driven on by blows and kicks from their guards. I decided the best thing I could do was to follow them.

My little captive followed me along quietly enough. The only time he baulked was when rounding a corner we were faced with a church that had just been torched. From the screams coming from it, it seemed that people had been driven inside it before it had been set alight. I spoke to him quietly calming him with the tone of my voice in the same way as you reassure a frightened pony.

Shortly afterwards we came to a large square. There was a great noise of shouting and screaming and crying as the livestock were sorted and processed. Girls and boys were branded, divided into groups according to sex, age and size. As fresh brats were brought into the square columns of ten or twelve, chained together by their necks to form single coffles, were being moved out, starting no doubt the long and painful trek to the coast. So far as I could see these coffles did not contain any stock under about eight or over say fourteen. Brats in those age groups were being retained in two separate groups at either end of the square.

As I stood there wondering what to do slightly dazed by the noise and bustle about me a hand fell on my shoulder. It was Juan.

"Thank God you're all right Christopher," he said. "I wasn't looking forward to telling your father you had gone missing I can tell you."

"I'm glad to see you too Juan and what should I do with this?" I asked giving the boy a little shake.

Juan looked the brat up and down.

"Not bad," he said, "not bad at all. Quite a good looking little animal and in good condition by the look of him. Well he was free, wasn't he, so he's got to be taken over there, where the fire is, for branding. I'll get one of the boys to take him off you now."

"No it's all right Juan thank you," I said hastily, "I'll take him over myself he's a bit scared of fire at the moment and it'll be easier for him if I'm with him I think."

"And Juan," I blurted out, "I've used one shot from the automatic. I'm sorry."

"How was that?" He asked. He didn't seem too bothered and that reassured me, for I was already in trouble with my father and I certainly did not want to add to that.

"They were burning his mother Juan and making him watch it … And … and why do they do things like that Juan?" I began to shake and turned away from him so he could not see how upset I was.

"I am sure your father will not be angry with you for doing that, Christopher," Juan said quietly. "Now you take that boy of yours over to be branded and then I'll find some one to take you back to the helicopter. I think you've seen and done quite enough for today. We'll all be along soon."

I was very proud of the boy. He stripped off his shorts and stood quietly in line waiting for his turn to be branded, not fighting or struggling or screaming as most of the others did, and when the time came he stepped forward with just my holding him by the arm and lay down over the bench with out any fuss. He did empty himself when the hot iron was pressed against his rump but they all do that. The only time he started to struggle was when I handed him over to be lead off to be entered in a coffle. I walked off to avoid watching him being subdued.

I saw Maurizio and while I had decided that I did not very much like him, he was the only other privileged boy there and I was at a loose end so I walked over to speak to him. He was watching Señor Gotti who was busy among the very young boys.

"What's your Father doing?" I asked Maurizio.

"Oh hello, Christopher. Sorting these little ones out. They'll never survive the march to the coast so he sorts out fifteen or so of the very best of them for the market. We'll cram them into the back of the helicopter. The rest he'll give to our brutes to enjoy. That's what they fight for, that and food."

"What's going to happen to the older ones? The ones near fourteen years old."

"Oh those'll be recruited into our forces. They're not worth taking to the market. They're so near release they just have no value. They won't last long with us either."

"But will they fight for you?"

"They've no choice. Their homes are destroyed, their parents killed. What else can they do?"

At that moment one of the adult para-militaries came up to me.

"Señor Juan asked me to escort you back to the helicopter," he said.

"I'll come too," Maurizio said, "there's nothing much here to watch now. They won't start raping the little boys till my Fathers sorted out the one's he wants to bring back with us and we'll be off straight after that. Pity really, although I think it takes them all the night and much of the day after before they're through with them. I expect they'll chuck them into the burning buildings to finish them off. The screaming then must be horrible. I wish I could be about to listen to it."

On the open ground on the edge of the town I saw a deep trench had been dug. Teams of boys were busy carrying bodies to it and throwing them in. A man stood at it's edge holding a sledge hammer. Every now and again a body would be laid at his feet, he would lift the hammer up and bring it smashing down on the body's head. As we got closer I saw his trouser legs were splashed with blood and brains.

"What's he doing?" I asked.

"Killing our wounded before they are buried. He doesn't bother about the other sides but Dad's very fussy about not burying ours alive. I expect quite a few are though. What does it matter anyway," Maurizio explained.

I was glad to get back to the helicopter. I clambered inside tired and sick with the horror of the place.

It was not long before the rest of our party began to join us there. Soon only Señor Gotti and Juan were missing. Then Señor Gotti arrived and stood just inside the fuselage doorway as fifteen or so naked seven to eight year olds with their thumbs secured by plastic ties behind their backs were bodily thrown into the craft. He drove them into the back of the fuselage with savage kicks with his heavy boots on their bare bums.

"And they're the lucky ones," Maurizio confided to me with a cruel grin.

Juan appeared at the doorway pulling after him the boy I had taken from the burning house. He hustled him to the back of the craft and came to sit beside me grinning broadly.

"I thought you might like that one as your own boy, Christopher," he said, "so I got Señor Gotti to agree to bring him along on the helicopter. We leave after the sale tomorrow and he wouldn't make it to the coast for at least three days, if at all, if he had to march it with the rest of the captured stock."

"Thanks Juan," I said. There was something about the boy that made me fond of him. I didn't know what it was. He wasn't particularly pretty; not a bad bit of boy's flesh but nothing exceptional. Perhaps it was just that he seemed to have trusted me a bit.

"He'll have to go through the market tomorrow and you'll have to bid for him there or your ownership of him will be open to challenge. So there's just a slight danger that you will be outbid. I don't see why though. He's nice enough looking but not the sort some Arab will pay a fortune to add to his collection."

I glanced back at the boy. He was hunkered down on the floor shivering with fear.

"Can I …?" I began.

"Sure if you want to. But don't tell him you're planning to buy him tomorrow. It'll do the brat good to keep him in suspense."

I grinned and getting up from my seat walked back to where the boy crouched. I said nothing but bending down began to gently squeeze the back of his neck. After a time his trembling subsided.

"Do you speak English," I asked him when I was satisfied he was calm.

"A little Sir," His words were so heavily accented as to be difficult to understand.

"You were a free boy, weren't you?"

"Yes Sir."

"Well you're not any longer. You're a Tribute Boy now. It's no good struggling against it. You must learn to accept it."

"Yes Sir. Thank you Sir."

I wondered how much of what I had said he had understood.

"What's your name boy?" I asked.

"Mir, Sir." Then after a pause he added in a small voice, "if it please you Master."

"Good boy," I said ruffling his hair. I was pleased with him. He clearly understand quite a bit of English and he was not going to be difficult to break.

Mir wriggled closer to me so that he was pressed up against my legs. He stayed like that for the rest of the flight. He only started screaming when they pulled him away from me when we landed at Señor Gotti's mansion.

Chapter 14b
A Balkan Interlude, part 2

The hotel dining room was almost deserted. Outside the sun was already blazing down but inside the hotel, with the air conditioning, the place was pleasantly cool. I wondered what it would be like for Mir confined with hundreds of other brats in one of the bare shade less holding pens.

I helped myself to corn flakes and milk and walked over to the table where my father and the others were already sitting. It was the first time I had been with Dad since he had found me drunk and still up after he had told me to go to bed at Señor Gotti's villa. I felt uncomfortable although I knew him well enough to be sure that he would not discuss my misbehaviour in front of the others.

"Sorry I'm a bit late Dad," I said pulling out a chair and sitting down.

"That's all right, Christopher, the preliminary viewing is not till ten and you had quite a day yesterday from what Juan was telling me.." He didn't sound as if he was too displeased with me.

"It looks as though the boy could do with some more sleep," Juan remarked looking at me closely. "You bothered about some of the things you saw yesterday Christopher."

"No, well yes a bit, but it wasn't that Juan," I replied.

"Then it was something else," my father said quickly. "Well you and I will have to have a chat later, Christopher, and we can sort it out then" and he turned back to discussing with Juan and Hassan the boys that they were to bid for that morning.

I had had little sleep the previous night despite being very tired after my experiences the sacking of Urosevac. Every time I began to drift off to sleep I was back by the swimming pool at Señor Gotti's hearing poor Illya's shrill screams, watching Maurizio driving him on with the burning torch and then witnessing the last awful remorseless tumble to his death. However hard I tried to think of something else those memories would come flooding vividly back as soon as I began to lapse into unconsciousness. It was stupid. Illya was only a Tribute brat of no importance and sure to die soon so why did he keep on bothering me – but he did.

I wrenched my mind back to the present. The men were busy discussing the arrangements for the auction. Hassan had obtained a catalogue of the boys to be sold that morning and they were selecting the stock for which they would bid and agreeing on the maximum price to which they should go. The catalogue was simply a list of lot numbers and a brief note stating the age of the boy, racial type and colouring. Dad was planning to buy four boys, two for the Hacienda, one for Hassan and one for me. At the moment they were discussing the two for the Hacienda.

"This catalogue's not much use," Juan remarked.

"Well they only sell prime stock by auction and they usually put the ones they expect to get the best prices on at the beginning so I think for the Hacienda we'd better look at the first few boys, sort say four, out from them for which we are prepared to bid and stop bidding once we've got two of them," Dad said. "We wont have much time anyway. There's only half an hour for viewing. Now Hassan, you'll want something a bit tougher and durable than they're likely to be auctioning. So we'll have to go into the pens and look at the working stock. Where's the brat that Christopher is interested in."

"Lot 83," Juan said, "that's where I arranged he would be entered."

"That's pretty far down the scale. You sure you want him, Christopher?"

"Yes please Dad. He's all right Dad really."

"Well' let's see. It doesn't tell us much '12 year old European brown haired slim build.' Hardly an enthusiastic description. I'll look at him. But if he's no good I'm not buying him, you understand."

Half an hour or so later Señor Gotti's driver arrived to take us to the slave market. Auctions were held in a large open sided building. There was a platform at one end with the auctioneers desk and beside it a low block on which the boy being sold would stand. In front of the platform was an oval sanded area with the ground all round it sloping very slightly upwards.

Although the building was outside the holding pens the smell and flies were appalling. Juan caught my eye as I got out of the car and caught the first full blast of the stench.

"Pretty rich isn't it," he said with a grin, "they cram upwards of a thousand boys or more sometimes in those pens. No sanitation and the shortage of water means they have to move the stock through pretty quick or they start loosing brats from disease and things.

"Shortage of water?" I queried remembering the fountains outside the clinic and the Gotti's swimming poll.

"Well there's enough for the free population but there soon wouldn't be if they let the brats here have as much as they wanted. It's rationed pretty tight and food too. Mind you hunger and thirst keeps them docile."

The boys were lined up for the preliminary viewing squatting in the shade to one side of the raised stage. There were already a few prospective purchasers wandering around, staring at the brats and occasionally kicking one to his feet in order to subject him to a more thorough inspection. The boys were arranged in lot number order and each brat had a metal disk hanging from his collar showing his number. Most purchasers were crowding around the boys nearest the platform, those with the lowest numbers. Three or four guards carrying short heavy batons lounged to one side watching.

Dad was soon busy. Lots 1 and 2 were already being examined by prospective purchasers so he began with Lot No. 3. He was a short haired blond lad of about eleven. He was pretty and knew it. Dad worked away methodically starting at the top of the boys head and leaving no nook or cranny of his body unexamined. His pulling, slapping, twisting and probing were interspersed with orders and comments.

"Open your mouth now whore. Nice teeth. Quick little tongue. I bet you've had your Master's cock down your throat a few times. Firm little nipple too. Hurt did it boy? Lift your arms. No sign of worm. Pretty little cock and balls. No hair there yet… Keeps himself clean. Nice strong thighs. Now turn round. Lovely little bum don't you think. Legs apart. Come on boy open yourself for me. Your Master has been in there a few times I can see. I don't blame him either. Now then in I go. Yes your a hot little tart aren't you. Liked that didn't you. Now suck my finger clean. Promising little whore."

The boy simpered and wriggled under his inspection obviously not at all concerned by being handled in front of a crowd of men. Indeed he seemed judging from his erect little cock to have enjoyed the experience

Dad repeated the process with Lots 1,2,4,5, and 6.

"Well we'd better look at the boy Christopher's so keen for me to buy."

There was no where near the same crush of men around the higher number lots. As soon as I saw Mir my heart sank. He was siting on the floor with his knees drawn up to his body, his head buried between them oblivious of all that was going on around him. Flies bussed round him and crawled over his bare skin. He had a good few more bruises on his body than when I had last seen him and his hands were secured behind his back with a plastic tie around his thumbs. It was clear that he had been given a rough time in the pens.

Dad wasted no time with him. He kicked him sharply in the bum and as he struggled to get to his feet grabbed him roughly by the arm and jerked him upright. Mir stared around with wide panic stricken eyes. Dad slapped him hard across the face.

"Keep your head down boy," he rapped.

One of the guards sensing trouble began to move towards us swinging his club in anticipation. Dad's inspection was rough and brutal. There was none of the good humoured comments and half jokes that had accompanied his examination of the earlier brats. Every order was reinforced with a blow or slap and his comments were harsh and cruel. At last the moment in his examination came that I dreaded the most.

"Turn round, you useless lump of shit," Dad ordered.

Mir confused hesitated and the guard who had now joined us hit him hard across the shoulders. I could see the boy was totally panic stricken. Before the guard could hit him again I sprang forward and catching him by the shoulders turned him round so that his back was to Dad.

"Just do as he says, Mir," I said urgently. "Try and relax. What's coming next will hurt, but it'll hurt more if you tense up."

Dad forced his head forward and I stepped back still keeping a grip of his shoulders. Mir gasped and bucked as Dad parted the lips of his anus and then after a brief glance jabbed his index finger into the brat. Mir whimpered. Dad reached round the front of his crutch with his free hand and for the first time since he had begun his inspection of the boy a slight smile flickered across his lips. He glanced towards Juan and nodded.

"Right stand up straight and face me. Quickly whore," he ordered extracting his finger from the boy's hole and landing a hard open handed slap on his rump.

I turned Mir round but there was nothing I could do to make him understand that he had to lick his shit off my father's finger. Dad thrust the soiled finger in his face and the boy stared at it uncomprehendingly.

"God alive," Dad exclaimed. He gripped the side of boy's jaw with his left hand forcing his mouth open and thrust the filth covered finger into his mouth. He pulled it out wiped it on the brat's face and then releasing his grip on his jaw hit him hard in the pit of his stomach. As Mir doubled up in pain he kicked his feet away from under him sending him tumbling to the floor. He drew back his foot to kick the defenceless boy.

Before I could stop myself I stepped forward between the prone brat and my furious father. Dad stared coldly at me. Juan seized me by the arm and pulled me to one side. I heard my father's foot thud into the boy's body twice. I tried to pull away from Juan but he held me firm.

"Christopher," he said quietly, "I have never known your father hit a boy without a good reason and I've known him since I was seven. He will have one now I know."

Father walked over to us apparently totally unaffected by what he had done.

"The auction will be starting in a moment," he said evenly, "we'd better get ready."

We walked round to the front of the platform. The auctioneer stepped up to his desk. At the edge of the sanded floor a guard stood holding by the arm the first boy to be auctioned.

"Gentlemen," the auctioneer began rapping his gavel for silence, "time is getting on and we have a hundred lots to clear. We must be getting on. Now we're offering you today a hundred of the choicest boys that we have in our pens at the moment. They have all been there just two days at the most so they're fresh and disease free. They are all seized from the districts of Ivanjica and Novakrasca which have been declared by the relevant provincial governor as being in breach of the International Convention Governing the Management of Male Resource Units. There is no doubt as to the legitimacy of this sale. I would further remind you that if you purchase an asset by auction in an open market no one can challenge your title to that asset and that rule applies to boys as it does to any other item. The terms are cash down on the day of sale. No refunds can be made or returns of boys claimed to be defective accepted. The reserve price on all lots is 1000 euros."

We have a hundred lots to get through. You've all had an opportunity to inspect the goods on offer. What I am going to do is to have my assistant walk each lot in turn around the ring. I will then put the brat up on the block and start the bidding.."

"Very well Lot No 1."

"The guard lead the first boy out into the ring. Holding him by the arm he walked the brat slowly round it so that everybody standing round had an opportunity of looking at him.

"There you are Gentlemen," the auctioneer said. "A beautiful boy. As good a looking brat as I have seen for a long time… Come on boy up on the block now… Turn round so the Gentlemen can see that lovely little bum of yours … Give it a wriggle boy … come on… There you are Gentlemen think of fucking that eh?… … Turn and face then again now boy… Look Gentlemen before you've even touched him his cock is hard as iron. As lively a little tart as you can wish for."

"Well then we start at one thousand, one thousand one hundred, two, three, four, five, six, seven…"

Dad dropped out at two thousand but he got Lots number two and four. He gave instructions for them to be air freighted to the Hacienda and then turned back to us.

"It'll be some time before they get to Lot 83," he remarked. "We need to get Hassan's bonus. Juan would you stay here and if they do get to it before we come back bid on my behalf. I've written my top price on the program. Christopher you can come with us. A view inside the pens will widen your education."

He passed his programme to Juan who looked at it, half raised his eyebrows and smiled.

"We'll find what Hassan wants in the hard labour pen," Dad explained. "They keep the older bigger boys that are just too hefty to be much good for anything else but heavy labour. There's a good demand for them in such places as the South American coal mines and various plantations around the world. They're selected for their strength and endurance and that's what Hassan wants. They're not auctioned they're just sold at so much per head with a discount for quantity."

We reached the double gates at the entry to the slave pens. The guards swung them open and we passed through. We were standing on a long broad track of beaten earth which was bordered on either side by high barbed wire topped fences. On the far side of the fences were the pens; six on each side. Simple squares of beaten earth on which sat or lay dozens of naked boys who watched us with listless hopeless eyes as we passed.

The smell was worse then ever.

"Dad," I asked, "if they're just selling a hundred boys at auction this morning how will they get rid of all of these in just two days."

"Well this mornings auction is of prime stock. They've got two days to shift the whole lot. They'll have three auctions each day and they'll be even quicker with the less valuable boys so that'll shift almost a thousand. If there's a real glut they'll have two auctions running simultaneously and then they have contracts for specific sorts of boys. They get most of them through in the two days."

"I wouldn't put it past Señor Gotti to stretch a point occasionally and extend the two day limit as well. Any they don't manage to get rid of one way or another they send down to the paramilitary barracks. They don't last long down there. Here we are. Now Hassan take your pick."

We had arrived at the last pen on the left hand side. A guard unlocked the gate for us and we walked in. Hassan's selection of his bonus was brutal. Where Dad had probed Hassan wrenched and thrust. He did not seem to believe he had done the job properly unless he drew blood and made his victims scream. In the end he settled on a sturdy blond youth, coarse featured to my mind, but Hassan seemed to be pleased with him.

After Dad had paid for the youth and arranged for his air freight we returned to the auction. Mir was just being walked round the ring. He did not show well. The auctioneer hardly tried with him, contenting himself with a brusque order to get up on the block and a comment that he had potential and a nice bottom. Dad offered a thousand euros and nobody bid against him.

A guard led him to where we stood. Mir seemed hardly able to walk stumbling and shivering as the man half dragged him over to us.

"Well Sir," the guard said, "here he is. You bought him and I wish you luck with him. Pretty miserable specimen he seems to me. Do you want him air freighted like the others. Hardly seems worth the bother I would have thought."

"No we'll keep him here, he's for my son," Dad said carelessly. "Give the little tyke to him."

Mir dropped to his knees at my feet and pressed his lips against my feet. I looked down at his poor bruised tight little bottom thrust in the air and my cock jumped to attention. Juan laughed and bending down cut the plastic ties binding the boy's thumbs behind his back.

"Come on," Dad said, "It's time we went back to the hotel. Our business here is finished and we have a flight to catch."

We walked out to the car. Mir kept close to me as though he was fearful he would be sent back to the pens.

"That boy is crowding too close to you Christopher," Hassan remarked, "I've got something at the hotel that'll cure him of that."

I nodded. I had seen the thing that Hassan was referring to in use at the Hacienda. It was cruel but effective. Mir was walking too close to me and he had to be trained.

"Let me fit it to him then Hassan," I said. "He is my boy."

Dad glanced over his shoulder at me and nodded approvingly.

When we reached the hotel Dad was the first one out of the car. I saw that he had left his program on the seat behind him. I picked it up to give to him. I noticed that by Lot 83 he had written "Pay whatever is necessary to get this one."

Twice going up the stairs to our rooms Mir got so close behind me that he bumped into me. Although I ordered him to keep back he did exactly the same thing when I stopped outside my bedroom door to unlock it. I had to accept that Hassan was right and the brat had to be given a lesson.

Dad and Juan came into my room while Hassan went to fetch the slim long case covered in the finest leather that he carried everywhere with him. I led Mir out the through the double windows out onto the balcony that looked out towards the Adriatic sea, a brilliant glittering blue under the fierce midday sun. When Hassan returned I ordered Mir to lie on his back on the tiled floor and to draw his knees up so that they were on each side of his head. The three men stood looking down at the naked brat as he lay open to their gaze. I unlatched Hassan's case. From the array of whips, needles, canes, plugs and other instruments that lay within it, all neatly arranged in their own proper places on the purple silk lining, I selected what I required. I turned back to Mir. He was gazing at me his eyes wide with apprehension. I held up the stainless steel hook fiercely barbed at it's tip that I held in my hand so that he could see it.

"Now Mir," I said softly, "this is going to hurt you. It's going to hurt you a lot, but it is going to teach you to be a better boy. You want that don't you."

Mir nodded his eyes fixed on the gleaming metal hook, rather larger than the hooks you use for Mackerel fishing, considerably smaller than the hooks from which butchers hang their meat, although it's use was nearer to the latter than the former.

"You've walking much too close to me, Mir, and it is irritating. You must learn not to do it. This will teach you."

I knelt down beside him and began to run the tip of my left index finger along the length of his perineum while still holding the fearsome hook in my right hand so that he could see it. I was amused to see that despite his obvious terror my stroking the delicate length of skin that ran from the back of his tiny hairless ball sack to the edge of his hole had excited him and his little brat's cock stood up stiff and straight. I saw the three men had also noticed this and were smiling to themselves.

"I am going to drive this hook into you there." I prodded him just behind his balls.

"But before I do that … You see the end of the hook is like a bolt," I reached out and took a tiny universal joint from Hassan's case.

Holding it up so the boy could see I continued, "and you see the ends of the joint here and here are like nuts."

"Before I sink the hook in you I'll screw the universal joint on it's end like that. Then once it's in you and we are walking about I'll take this metal rod."

I reached a slim stainless steel metal rod just over a metre in length from Hassan's case, "and screw it into the other end of the universal joint like this and I'll hold it by the far end."

"It'll hurt all the time," I explained to him speaking slowly to make sure he would understand, "but it'll hurt most if the hook tears you and that will happen if you try to get closer to me than the length of the rod or lag behind me more than it's length. I'll think you'll soon learn to keep just the right distance behind me don't you?"

He nodded dumbly.

"When you have learnt that we'll unscrew the joint from the hook and get the hook out of you by pushing it's barb out of your flesh and drawing the rest of the hook after it. That's the only way it will come out." I sensed Juan moving round me to where he could catch hold of the boy's ankles.

"No Juan," I said quietly but firmly, "there'll be no need to hold Mir."

I looked straight into Mir's panic stricken eyes.

"Mir listen to me. You want to please me don't you?"

Once more the boy nodded.

"You want to make me proud of you?"

Again he nodded..

"Then show these men what a brave obedient little Tribute Boy you are. I want you to stay still will I drive this hook into you. Will you do that for me?"

He took a deep breath, his lips mod but no sound came.

"Say it … come on Mir."

"If it please you Master," he whispered hoarsely

I glanced up at Dad and saw him smiling approvingly.

"So catch tight hold of your ankles."

I sank the barbed point of the hook into the brat's flesh. His body jerked as the pain hit him. A flood of amber liquid gushed from his penis over his stomach and chest. He moaned as he fought the pain. I placed the flat of my hand gently on his chest to hold him in place feeling the warm wetness of his pee under my palm. Slowly the convulsions passed until he was lying quiet again, whimpering, but still in position, with his knees pressed to the floor on either side of his head and with his hands gripping his ankles.

"Well done," I heard Dad say.

I held out my hand so that it was almost pressed up against Mir's face. I felt his breath against my palm. Then his firm little tongue began to lick at it, washing away his urine which had dampened it when I held it against his chest. I smiled. Mir was a quick learner. Only an hour or so ago he did not know what to do when Dad had held out to him the shit stained finger with which he had been exploring his bottom.

"There's one more thing, Mir," I said as his tongue worked it's way between my fingers. I touched the lips of his anus gently with the fingers of my free hand. He caught his breath and wriggle slightly. "It doesn't look to me as if you've had a cock up there. Have you?"

"If it please you Master, no Master," he interrupted his licking just long enough to reply to me.

"It does please me a great deal, Mir," I assured him gently.

"Did your Dad have a Tribute Boy?"

"He had two, Master."

"Did he ever let you watch him fucking them?"

"Yes Master. He said I should see how it was done for when I was big enough to do it to them."

"Well you'll never do that Mir. You're a Tribute Boy now and it will be you that will be fucked and I'll be the first one to do it to you. Now that little hole of yours looks rather tight. I'm going to put a plug in you to loosen you up a bit. Not too much because my cocks not all that big yet and I like it tight, but just a little."

Actually the point of plugging him was not so much to loosen him but rather to impress on him that he belonged wholly to me and that when it suited me I would bugger him.

I selected a small expandable plug from Hassan's case. I lubricated it by spitting on it and smearing my saliva over it with my finger and thumb. I pressed it firmly into him. There was a moments resistance and then his anus opened to accept it. I turned the key at it's top expanding the plastic section inside him locking it into place.

"Now," I said standing up, "you won't be able to get that out by yourself. If you want to have it out for a shit you'll have to ask me. But don't you go bothering me too often. A Tribute Boy exists to serve his Master not to make a nuisance of himself. You understand?"

"Yes Master."

"Good. Get up on your hands and knees now and clear up the mess you've made. While I take a shower and pack."

We all stood for a moment looking down on the brat as he licked his pee from the tiles his bottom raised in the air, the shank of the hook glittering in the sunlight and the black top of the plug protruding from his hole. I bent over and patted him on his bare bum and then followed the three men back into my room.

Two hours later we were boarding the plane. I ordered Mir to part his legs and I unscrewed the metal bar from the hook buried in the tender flesh behind his balls. The apparatus had proofed effective. At first Mir seemed to be constantly jerking on the rod and our progress was marked by his whimpers as the hook tore him but after fifteen minutes or so he began to learn his lesson and the jerks and cries became steadily less frequent.

Dad beckoned to me and I went to sit beside him my heart sinking. Clearly the moment had come for our heart to heart chat. I pointed the floor at my feet and Mir settle himself there. Absently I played with his hair waiting for Dad to start his lecture. He did not do so until we were air borne and the noise of the motors had died away to a reasonable level.

"Christopher," he said at last, "I was very disappointed with your behaviour at Señor Gotti's. You disobeyed a direct order of mine."

"I know Dad," I said, "I am sorry."

"I told you to go to bed, but you chose to get drunk with that deplorable Maurizio boy. You know what would happen to you if you were a Tribute Boy and disobeyed an order I gave?"

"Yes Dad," I said humbly.

"What? Tell me," he demanded.

"I would be nailed alive to the compound gate and left to die," I swallowed desperately. It had only happened once that I could remember and I had been kept away from the compound most of the time that Dominic was nailed there. Dad had taken me to see him on the last day of his agony. He said I had to see how in the end order was maintained. The horror lived with me still.

"Yes Christopher. Well you are not a Tribute Boy but I am very very angry and even more disappointed with you. It is true that Maurizio was older than you and may have influenced you but you should have known better than to have allowed yourself to be influenced. Drunkenness and disobedience Christopher," and he shook his head.

Nothing seemed to be called for from me at the moment so I remained silent.

"I am glad to say though your conduct has not been wholly bad. You behaved well during the slave raid. I am pleased you had the courage of your own convictions to put Mir's mother out of her agony and I am pleased by the way you are managing Mir himself. In view of that I am going to ignore the scene in the slave market when you choose to try to stop me kicking the brat but don't ever do that again. Do you understand?"

"Yes Dad."

"Now it is quite clear to me that something else is bothering you. Lets have that out in the open now please."

The story of our hounding poor Illya to his death came tumbling out. I told him of Maurizio and I forcing the brat to jump from the high dive despite his fear of heights, Maurizio driving him up the ladder with the flaming torch, the boy's crunching fall onto the marble slabs bellow, Maurizio fucking me while the boy was in his death agony and the recurring nightmares that I had had since. Dad listened with a face of rock.

"I am not surprised," he said when I had finished, "that it bothers you. It was wasteful and stupid behaviour. What did you gain by being so cruel to the poor boy. Have you thought how much that boy cost? Yet you kill him for no purpose. Just a moment of drunken folly. How can you expect to get the best out of the boys if you treat them like that. My boys strain their hearts out serving me because they both love and fear me. If you treat them as you treated Illya there will be no love only fear and that last final effort, the one that makes our boys win over other Hacienda's at the carnival, will be missing."

"And the reputation of the Hacienda," he went on, "have you thought of that. Men write to me begging me to take their sons because they know that I value my boys. Will they write any longer if they know the sort of thing you and Maurizio got up to when drunk. Unnecessary cruelty. That's what it was. How often have I warned you against that."

I hung my head and said nothing.

"Well you know what's going to happen, don't you?"

"Yes Dad, you're going to beat me."

"Yes Christopher, tomorrow evening at the boy's evening meal."

"Now Christopher, I hope very soon you will be playing a greater part in helping me manage the Hacienda. Among other things you will have sometimes to decide punishments for the Tribute Boys. I think it would be good practice for you to decide on your own punishment."

"I have a very good idea of what I think is appropriate. If you fix on a number of strokes less than mine you will get my figure plus three further strokes as you clearly do not understand the enormity of what you have done."

"If you fix on a higher figure than I have in mind you will get the figure you have fixed on as there must be factors you know that I do not that made you fix on the higher figure. I will now write down on this bit of paper the figure I think is appropriate and you have five minutes to decide on your figure and then we will compare the two."

I sat hunched in my seat my mind racing. Six strokes was the maximum that Dad ever gave a Tribute Boy with the cane. But I had committed two very serious offences and Dad was always saying he expected more from me than any Tribute Boy. Twelve strokes I told myself. It had to be twelve. But Dad would use the heaviest cane on me, the one the Tribute Boys called 'the bum ripper'. He always had since I was twelve and he wouldn't pull his strokes either. He wouldn't dishonour either himself or me or the Tribute Boys by doing that.

"I know what it's got to be Dad," I said in a small voice. "I don't need five minutes to think about it."

"And what's your figure Christopher?" He asked quietly.

"Twelve, Dad."

He smiled slightly. He passed the folded paper to me. I opened it and read the figure twelve.

"Dad there are two things please."

"Well Christopher, what are they?" He sounded much less stern now.

"Could I have some one hold me please. I know usually you say I've got to show the Tribute Boys I can take it better than them but twelve is a lot. It's more then you ever give them."

"All right, Christopher. That's not unreasonable. I'll have one of the boys horse you. It'll have to be one of the final year ones because you're big now. Too. Any one you would particularly like."

"Xavier Dad. If it's all right with you."

"Xavier. You get on with him, don't you. A penal referral, a constant problem, as tough as they come and you choose him. You're helping him training with the quarter staff aren't you?" The tone of my father's voice did not suggest, despite the words he used, that he was at all angry or indeed surprised by my choice.

"Yes Dad," I said.

"And what's the other thing, Christopher."

"Well Dad," I swallowed slightly for I realised I was on delicate ground, "you're against unnecessary cruelty but why were you so rough on Mir at the auction. He hadn't done anything wrong."

"You are quite right to ask, Christopher," he reassured me. "If there's something you don't understand I would prefer if you ask me. That way you learn. I am against unnecessary cruelty. What I did to Mir was necessary. I did it so as to make sure he went into the ring looking as miserable and frightened as possible in the hope that it would put other buyers off. And it worked."

"Oh and Christopher talking of necessary cruelty. That boy of yours, I am sure he loves you. I am not so sure if he fears you. We need to look after that. We'll have supper privately in the house, Juan, Hassan you and I. After we've eaten you'll thrash him. Six strokes of the cane. The medium one, not the heavy one I'll be using on you tomorrow."

"But Dad he hasn't done anything wrong."

"If you thrash him hard when he hasn't done anything wrong, he'll know you'll give him far worse when he has."

We got back to the hacienda a in the early evening. As the word spread that we had returned the boys came running up to the house to welcome my father home. When the car drew up it was quickly surrounded by a crowd of grinning naked brats who dropped to their knees as he stepped out with shrill cries of "welcome master." Sky appeared at the door of the pazos and started to run excitedly down the flight of double steps to his master. Then he remembered himself and like the other brats threw himself to the ground.

Dad laughed and saying his name held out his arms to the boy. Sky leapt to his feet and ran forward again shyly lifting his face to be kissed. Father took the child's face between his two hands and kissed him hard on the mouth . The boy put his arms round my Dad's neck and with a small jump locked his naked legs about his waste. Father straightened and with one hand supporting the boy's bare bum walked up the steps and into the house while the Tribute Boys laughed and cheered.

I released Mir from the wire boy cage in the boot of the car. I saw him glance round quickly, no doubt taking in the crowd of choice boys, the big imposing house, and it's setting between the sea and the mountains, before remembering that now he too was a Tribute Boy and bowing his head in the appropriate gesture of submission and acceptance.

I fastened the steel rod to the hook buried in his flesh and led him through the crowd of kneeling boys who stared at this new addition to their numbers with unconcealed curiosity.

Not once in our passage from the car into the hallway of the house and up the broad staircase did I feel him pull on the rod. It was clear that Hassan's cruel invention had served it's purpose. Mir was my boy and furthermore I had driven the hook into him. I knew I had to remove it myself. I knew too how annoyed my father became if one of the Tribute Boys peed himself inside the house especially if he messed the carpet.

I steered Mir into the bath room down the corridor from my bedroom.

"I'm going to take that hook out of you Mir," I told him. "You seem to have learnt your lesson but you start crowding me again when I'm walking and I'll warm your bottom with the cane and put the thing back in you straight away. Do you understand?"

"Master Yes Master."

"Now you wet yourself when I put it in you and I expect you'll do the same again when I take it out. It'll hurt quite as much or perhaps even more. So to keep the mess down have a pee before I begin."

Unthinkingly Mir stepped over to the loo. I hit him hard across his rump with the flat of my hand. He squealed in surprise and started back. I pushed the pot that stood beside the lavatory forward with my foot.

"Tribute Boys use the pot, Mir," I said sternly, "Kneel and use it quickly. Don't keep me waiting boy."

I looked down at Mir as he crouched at my feet directing a stream of amber fluid into the china pot. I had often seen boys obliged to empty themselves in this way. I wondered what it felt like to be made to squat like that. I could think of nothing more humiliating but then of course I was not a brat and they no doubt did not feel it at all. They were without pride. I prodded Mir impatiently with my foot.

"Come on boy," I demanded.

Hastily Mir shook the last drop of liquid from his prick.

"I think the best thing you can do is to lie down on the floor of the shower cubicle and put your legs right back over your head. That way if you pee yourself it'll go down the waste pipe. Now grab hold of your knees and keep as still as you can."

I knelt down beside him. It was time the hook came out, the flesh around it was sore and inflamed. I gripped the shank and pushed the hook upwards forcing it's barbed end out of the boy's body. Mir screamed and I felt his body shudder with pain. A jet of urine spouted pungent liquid over his tummy and chest. It was not however on the same scale as the great flood he had produced when I had set the hook in him in the first place.

I waited till he was calm again and then taking the barb between my finger and thumb I drew the whole hook clear of his body. Blood began to trickle from the two holes left by the hook along his perineum and down the back of his hairless balls.

"Get to your feet," I ordered, "INSIDE the shower cubicle."

He was shuddering and his face was wet with tears. I switched the shower on, first cold and then hot, swilling off the pungent smelling liquid with which he had soiled himself. I pushed him forward and slackened the nut on the lockable plug before pulling it out of him.. I threw it in the basin for him to lick clean later and then stripping off myself joined him in the shower. I soaped him thoroughly, enjoying the feel of his smooth silky but firm body. Both of us were very excited and he seemed frightened but eager. I knew though that the time was not right for him yet and I pushed him away.

I noticed the water flowing down the inside of his legs was running red so I pulled him from the shower and dried him between the legs before pushing a wad of loo paper against the two wounds. I told him to hold the paper in place with one hand and then gave him the plug to clean. He stood there sucking the plug and pressing the paper to his bleeding wounds while I dried myself.

It was pleasant to be back in my old bedroom after all my adventures. It was always a great moment at the beginning of every holiday when I walked into it and saw all the familiar objects that I had missed so much at school. The twin barrelled four ten which I used to pot rabbits and pigeons and the occasional hare on the lower slopes of the mountains, the fly and sea fishing rods, the books, many well thumbed favourites, Arthur Ransome, Treasure Island, Robinson Crusoe, Two Years Before the Mast, Napier's Battles and Sieges of the Peninsula War, C.S. Forrester, the Hornblower Books and Death to the French and The Gun and pushed to one side but still sometimes dipped into The Wind in the Willows. Older toys too, which I was meant to have grown out of but which on wet days I would still surreptitiously look at, well play with. Toy soldiers, a model aeroplane, a remote control tank and a model boat which was so good that it was to be looked and wondered at rather than actually played with.

Some times, not very often, I would wonder what it would be like to be one of the Tribute Boys on the Hacienda, sleeping three to a sty, with no possessions to speak of, no toys, no books, and no future. A mere animal, a play thing existing simply to serve and entertain your my Father or his clients.

Mir held out the butt plug to me. He had licked it spotlessly clean. I ruffled his hair to show my approval and began to pad round the room collecting fresh clothes to wear for dinner. I had not bothered to dress after my shower. It was quite usual for me to walk round naked but it would show a lack of respect to my father and his guests if I was to appear at dinner like that.

"You know what my father told me I had to do to you after supper Mir?" I asked.

"Yes Master."

"You've been beaten by your Dad before I suppose?"

"No Master. I've seen him beat our Tribute Boys but he never did it to me." There was a quaver in his voice and I realised he was very frightened.

I was surprised. Being beaten was a fairly regular feature of my life both at home and at school and it seemed very natural. Dad was not deliberately cruel to me but if I did something wrong that he considered deserved the cane he would give it to me at the same time as he beat the Tribute Boys and in the same way except that he said that as his son I had to show I could take it better than they could. This mean that I was beaten rather harder than they were, that I was expected to take it in silence and to say "Thank you Dad," before making my escape to somewhere private where I could cry. Hardest of the lot, that while they were horsed and could thrash about under correction I had to bend over and stay down to take my stripes. I just couldn't imagine what it would be like to grow up in a household where you were not liable to get the cane.

"Well," I said trying to reassure him, "it won't be too difficult you'll be held down and you can scream and shout and throw yourself about as much as you like," all luxuries denied me. "It's only six strokes with the medium cane too. Imagine what it's like for me," I said in a rush, "twelve strokes… Twice as many."

Suddenly I felt Mir's naked body pressed against mine his bare arms rapped around my shoulders. I realised with surprise that despite his own fear he was trying to comfort me. I hugged him back.

There was a knock at the door and Juan walked in.

"I hope I'm not disturbing anything, Christopher," Juan said with a smile, "but it's just half an hour before supper and I thought I would see how you were getting on.."

"Thank you, Juan," I said gently disengaging Mir's arms from about my shoulder.

"This'll be the first time you've actually used the cane on a boy, Christopher, won't it?"

I nodded. This was true. I had seen many Tribute Boys thrashed and I had been beaten quite a few times myself but it was an unwritten law that I was not entitled to beat the boys. My father said I was too near to being one myself and lacked the experience and judgement to be trusted to do so. I could hit or kick a boy but if I did so I had to be able to justify it and if I could not I would get a great deal worse from my father than I had given. Otherwise I could report any brat to my father and he would sort the matter out. I hadn't done so for years. Generally I had been able to resolve the occasional problem between myself and them quite satisfactorily without involving my Father at all. I remembered with a smile how Xavier and I had fought each other to a standstill. I do not think either of us could by the end of the fight have explained exactly what the reason for it was. We were both badly bruised and cut about and my Father could not but have noticed and drawn the obvious conclusions as to how it had come about. He never asked me and I never told him. Two days later when I suppose Xavier realised I had not told on him he sought me out as I was going off for a days rabbit shooting. He had not mentioned the fight but he had carried my rucksack for me all day and the rabbits I had shot and though I would never tell my father that, had shot two of them himself.

"Beating a boy is quite easy," Juan said reassuringly, "bring the cane right back over your shoulder, put all your weight behind the blow and aim about a quarter of a metre beyond the brat's bum. I'd have brought Sky for you to practice on but he's with your Father."

"There's one thing though that really annoys your Father and that's brats peeing themselves in the house. I don't know how often Mir's been beaten?"

"This is his first time Juan. He was just telling me."

"Right…. Well make sure he has a piss before he comes downstairs and then if I may suggest it put this on his cock as tight as he can bear and then a little tighter." He held up a small foam lined metal loop. "You tighten this with the small screw there," He continued and the foam prevents it from cutting his flesh. Is that clear?"

"Yes thanks, Juan."

"Well good luck, Christopher."

***

My Father pushed his chair back from the table poured himself a second glass of the 84 (2084) port and passed the bottle to Hassan sitting on his left.

The meal was over. I stirred nervously. I felt Mir sitting at my feet with his head resting against my thigh move slightly. His lips brushed my bare flesh in a fleeting kiss. He knew to the moment was at hand. I glanced at the cane lying on the table by my right hand. Just under a metre long, a tapered length of dark mallaca the size of a man's thumb at it's thickest it tapered till it was no thicker than his little finger.

"Before Christopher you show us how good you are with the cane," Dad said easily, "perhaps we should all have an opportunity of inspecting the raw material on which you are going to work."

"Yes Dad," I replied. I reached down and caught hold of Mir by his ear and pulled him to his feet.

"Go and show your bottom to my father and the other gentlemen," I ordered sending him on his way with a light slap on his bum. I realised that nervous though I was I had an erection.

"He looks a good deal better now," Dad said running his hand over the brats bum and squeezing it, "than he did in that slave mart. I'll say that for him. What do you think, Hassan."

Hassan pulled Mir to him and turned him so his rump was to the light.

"I think his skin is light enough to show the cuts well if Christopher lays them on really hard." Hassan replied with a grin.

"And he hasn't been beaten before," Juan remarked appreciatively.

"Then I'm glad to see you've taken action to stop him peeing himself," Dad said, "I don't want the floor messed up."

I stood up and moved my chair far enough away from the table for the men to be able to see the performance comfortably. I tapped the seat with my cane and Mir trotted obediently over. He glanced at me questioningly. I saw that his lips were quivering. I felt very nervous myself. I knew my work was going to be observed and judged by three experts in the field. I nodded my head at the seat of the chair and Mir lay down across it. He pushed his bottom up as high and as tight as he could. I felt a rush of warmth towards the child. Despite his own fear he was trying to help me as much as he could.

At a word from Juan Sky slipped out from behind the table and kneeling down took hold of Mir's hands in his own.

I stationed myself to the left of the chair just about opposite Mir's, so invitingly raised, bum, my left foot slightly advanced. I laid the rod across Mir's bottom judging my distance. His buttocks clenched nervously making the dimples at their sides even more pronounced.

I lifted the rod as far back over my right shoulder as I could and then pivoting from my waste and shoulders and bringing my right foot forward brought it down with all my strength and weight across the boys defenceless body. There was a sharp crack as wood impacted on bare boy's flesh. His body jerked convulsively. There was a split seconds silence and then a shrill piercing scream wrenched from his body by the pain echoed round the room. I paused until he was still and bent to examine the damage I had done. A single rapidly deepening crimson weal was drawn ruler straight across the two halves of his bottom just above the crease, exactly where I had intended for I wished to concentrate any damage to his skin there so that when the time came there should be sufficient unmarked hide for my leather jerkin. I noticed that the bruising was deepest where the tip of the cane had curled around the side of his bottom. Taking careful aim I raised the cane again and with equal force brought it hissing down for a second time. The boy was screaming even before the cane struck home . His feet drummed loudly on the floor. I could see Sky's slim body straining to hold the boy down across the seat. A second weal joined the first across the boys previously smooth unmarked bottom. I brought the cane down a third time and then a fourth. He was screaming all the time now, a thin constant screech of pain and suffering. I noticed that my last cut had overlapped the previous one to a slight extent and from the place where the two welts crossed deep red blood had begun to well.

Two strokes to go. I was sorry for Mir whose tortured body writhed and twisted before me but I knew I was being was being tested and I was determined I would not fail that test. I shifted my position slightly. Now my last two strokes would cut across the stripes I had already delivered. Hassan would certainly be able to see that I had thrashed the poor child thoroughly.

I pitied Mir but I also felt a fierce cruel excitement as I brought the cane back once more for the penultimate stroke. Grunting with exertion I struck again. The cane sliced a bloody line across the boys deeply bruised bottom raising beads of blood wherever the most recent stroke intersected with those already delivered. This time I did not pause but delivered the sixth and final cut parallel to the last one. I stepped back and gazed down at my handiwork. I did not think that my Father would be disappointed in me.

I realised that my stiff cock had slipped out from behind my loin cloth. I quickly pushed it back.

I bent down and catching hold of Mir by one thin arm I pulled him upright. His face was wet with tears, snot flowed from his nostrils and mixed with blood from where he had bitten into his lower lip. He looked at me with pain crazed eyes his lips parted. His shoulders and chest heaved as he simultaneously sobbed and fought for breath. I kissed him fiercely on his lips and amazingly felt him respond. I pushed him away. He sobbed one single word "Master."

Hassan clapped his hands. Grinning I pushed the boy over to where my Father sat and turned him so that he could admire the poor brat's ravaged bum.

"I think you have passed that test, Christopher," he said and then, "Sky take this brat through to the kitchens and have them clean up his bum and dress it I don't want him bleeding in here and then go and find Mishear and Jan and tell them to report here straight away."

"That performance of yours with the cane, Christopher," he remarked as Sky left the room leading the still sobbing Mir by the hand, "was excellent and very arousing. I think I need to relief the excitement and those two bitches are on permanent heat."

Suddenly, inexplicably, my legs began to shake and the floor seemed to shift under my feet. I gripped the table for support.

"Dad," I said unsteadily, "I'm glad your pleased but if you don't mind but may I leave the room please."

"You must be tired, Christopher. You've had a busy few days what with one thing and another. Off you go now and I suggest you go straight to bed."

"Thank you Dad. Goodnight everybody." I let the room followed by a chorus of goodnights.

It needed all my strength to drag my self up the stairs. I knew though I had to keep going. I must not let myself and my father down. I must show that I was better and tougher than any Tribute Boy. The walk along the corridor to my room seemed never ending and I had to stop every now and again and lean against the wall. Fortunately nobody saw me. At last I was safe in my bedroom. I slumped on the bed and buried my face in my hands.

Self doubt assailed me. Would I survive tomorrow's flogging without disgracing myself and Dad. Twelve strokes, the most Dad ever gave to a Tribute Boy was six and they could yell and shout and throw themselves about under correction. I was going to get twice as many and would have to take it more or less in silence, no screams, no pleas for mercy, no thrashing about with my legs, at the most a grunt as father used all his strength to hurt me. It was another test to show I was better than the other boys. But was I. I was a boy like them. My bottom was as tender as theirs, my skin as fragile what made me different?

Why couldn't I just stay shut in my room, stay as a boy and not grow up to be like my father or Juan or Hassan. And beyond my beating there was the test on the Picos pitting me naked against the feral. Ferals were fierce cruel beasts who preyed on boys, fed on their flesh after raping them. The brute toughened by a year out in the wild would be tough and desperate. How would I manage against that?

Why me I wondered? Why do I have to endure these things? But then suddenly a much worse and greater doubt assailed me. Dad said I had to face these tests to show I was worthy to succeed him running the Hacienda. But what was the Hacienda? It was just a means of exploiting the weak powerless Tribute Boys and to turn their sufferings into cash for his and my benefit. In what way was I different from the brats in their sties, to Jan and Mishear summoned by my father so contemptuously to satisfy his lust. I thought of Illya whom Maurizio and I had so casually to his death, of poor gentle Mir who for some reason loved me even after I had thrashed him till the blood flowed to amuse my father and his friends, of Xavier a penal referral condemned to certain death, of little Pedro whose own father proposed I should slash his ham cords and leave him as life bate for the feral and I wept. I wept for the boys, for myself and for my father, all ensnared in a world of cruelty and exploitation.

Before I had always been confident in my superiority. I was a privileged boy, son of the famous trainer Don Carlos, different in kind from the Tribute brats who were destined to serve and die. Now that confidence was gone. I could see there was nod difference between me and them.

I didn't hear Juan enter my room. The first I knew of his presence was the mattress sinking under his wit as he seated himself beside me and the feel of his arm across my bare shoulders. I turned to him and pressed my face into his chest and sobbed. He hugged me.

"Christopher," he murmured, "what is it child?"

"Juan I can't do it … I can't …"

"Now boy you've done well so far. Your Dad's pleased with you. He's proud of you. WE all are Christopher."

"It isn't that Juan… It's so cruel Juan … I've hurt so many people … I don't want to hurt any more …"

There was a silence. One of Juan's hands travelled down my back pulled gently at my loincloth so that it fell away from my body and began to stroke my bottom. Even in my misery I felt my excitement rise and I wriggled tighter up against him taking comfort from his solidity and strength.

"So that's it, Christopher," he said eventually. "It is cruel. You're right but it is the way things are and the alternative is much much worse. It's a choice between a world where at least some people enjoy a decent life and where even the meanest Tribute Boy has a chance of some happiness and one where all are condemned to starvation and misery."

"But it's cruel … I know it's cruel and I don't want to be cruel… Please Juan go and tell my Father…"

I broke off for Juan had moved his arm from around my shoulders and tipping back my chin he kissed me hard on the lips. I felt his tongue in my mouth. I pressed upwards and his hand on my bum slid down to the junction of my legs. I felt him press a finger against the lips of my anus.

He pulled his head away from mine and looked down into my face half smiling, half serious.

"You don't mean that Christopher… You have a duty and it's not just to your father or to yourself it's to the boys as well… What ever you do Christopher… If you just walk away … The boys will be there in their sties serving, requesting their releases, suffering. Nothing you can do will change that. There is one thing that makes a Tribute Boy's life worth while his love for his Master and he loves his Master because he believes in him, in his superiority. Think what it would be like for them to be bound to someone, as they are bound to your father and to you, who they think of as no better than themselves. It would be misery for them. They must believe that their master is better than they are to be reconciled to their fate. I know this Christopher I was a Tribute Boy myself once."

He kissed me again and again pulled back.

"Tell me Christopher you will go on if not for your father and yourself then for the boys…"

I saw myself for what I was weak and selfish. I was ashamed.

"Juan I will," I whispered.

His lips fastened on mine. His finger pressed into me. A little later I twisted away from him and turned offering myself to him. A split second of pain was followed by an all consuming ecstasy as I rode his swollen cock into a series of deep mutual orgasms.

Chapter 15a
The Training of the Whale Boat Crew

Rodolfo's father speaks

I am Rodolfo Nuñez, only a poor fisherman from Islas Cies off the city of Vigo. But in Spain every man even a poor man is a caballero, no matter that my only way to survive was to sail to the mainland with my beautiful son who bears my name. Naked and torn between the excitement of sailing and the terror of being given in Tribute, he stood in the boat with all the balance of a fisherman.

Two years later I made the same trip with Alberto his brother. Poor fisher boys usually end up pulling their miserable hearts out in one of the big boats belonging to the fish farms from the city, boys are so much cheaper than motors and fuel. Their end equally ignominious, their Masters have no time for fancy festivals, just give them their release, have a bit of fun at their expense and get on with earning money. I am as proud as any caballero that my sons were beautiful enough to be chosen not for this, but to serve the famous Don Carlos up North. With God's grace we will survive with what they will earn.

The morning I received Rodolfo's letter I felt my heart swelled with pride, no matter that it was badly written in English, rather than poetic Castilian. He had been granted his Release, he could demonstrate the depth of his love for his Master, and would be rewarded for all those years of service. My joy new no bounds when I received Don Carlos's letter, a very proper letter as from one caballero to another. He was pleased with my son and hoped that his pleasure would be well founded in the boys performance. Not only that but Don Carlos himself was sponsoring him, with Alberto as his mignon. And I was invited to attend the Festival and watch his performance, along with all the big people. No poor man can afford the tickets for the afternoon events of the Festival. Finally the Don graciously allowed me to speak with my beautiful Rodolfo before his big day. What happened that afternoon was so terrible and so noble, and his father so very proud, that I must write what he told me about the start of his training. before I tell you what happened then. Of course as a Tribute Boy knowing no different he told me things a boy does not normally tell his father, but his delight in his duties should also be told. Don Carlos even more graciously has suggested that I give him a copy of my sons account, as well as my own, to be include in his book.

Rodolfo recounts the story of the Training of the Whale Boat crew to his father

I am Rodolfo, Niño Rodolfo, my Papa says that my hair is the colour of octopus ink and my eyes of mercury at a very high temperature. I am pleased to be able to tell of my short life in my own Castillian not in that clumsy English that has no soul.

When Don Carlos came back from his trip he looked very pleased, and he had some new boys with him. We four, well eight because our mignons do everything with us now, were called to attend him that night. At first he questioned us about our training, and about the boats, was everything going well? We all chorused together "Yes Master". He inspected our daggers and said he thought that mine might be the finest when I had finished all the knot work on it! Then he talked about serious things, the duties of released boys, of mignons, and of him our sponsor, and how important it was for our boat, his boat, to be the one to finish.

"Tomorrow, young men, and boys…", this to the mignons, Alberto looks very happy, "…we go to Muros for three days. We will sleep on Isla Salvore, where you will be the only boat to finish…, for two nights. On Sunday morning we will go to church and Rodolfo and Alberto can sing for us. You will row your hearts out over the course until you know every turn and how the sea runs there."

We forgot ourselves and jumped up and hugged him, three days with just us and our Master!

"Down brats!" He commanded, but he was not angry, and we got back on our knees. "But tonight I think we will start the other part of your training."

With that he stood and let his sarong fall, I had seen him naked many times of course, he had even fucked me a couple of times outside the kitchen door as a reward for my fish, but this was going to be different and I felt my cock grow hard and press against my belly, and inside I churned with excitement! He led us through the house, I noticed Kumu, Christian and Miguel were as hard as I was, even Alberto who nervously held my hand sported a stiff little one! He took us into the huge bathroom with its Jacuzzi inset into the tiled floor. It felt marvellous, hot and bubbling, as I slid in on the right hand side of my Master, Alberto next to me and then Christian and his mignon; On the other side were Miguel and Kumu.

My Master had a water pipe on the side and took a couple of puffs and passed it to me, it made me feel so strange but even more sexy. When we all had had a puff my Master spoke.

"You know that it is strictly forbidden for Tribute Boys to give each other pleasure, when you are a boy you only exist to give others pleasure. Now you four have been granted your release I as your Sponsor and Master can change the rules a little. You still may do nothing outside my presence, and mignons may not give each other pleasure. When we are together I may give my permission for the young men to do things together, or with your own or the others mignons. I of course will make sure each of you is well fucked both in your mouths and up your arses and receive my sperm to give you the courage you are going to need. To night however I am rather tired and I want to see how creative you are with each other. You only have one month together before four of you leave us, unless of course the President decides otherwise…, so let us see how much sex you can put into your time. First I want to see how good your mignons are at giving you your first orgasm of a long night."

He took me on his knees, back towards him, legs spread wide and directed Alberto to sit on mine facing me. My brother is well trained and went down on my cock immediately and started thrusting on to me. It was fantastic! I begin to see what the men see in us! Soon I was getting near shooting, and Alberto was going frantic, eyes all glazed.

My Master said "Push his head back under the water!"

Alberto struggled a bit but still kept up his wild fucking.

"Do you think you could drown him?"

"If you wish it Master."

"Hold him under until I say then."

I did as he wished, but had to start fucking him when he started to go limp. Soon my sperm shot into him and I started shouting out my joy.

"Good lad, let him up!"

I pulled my brother up he was a bit blue and spluttering weakly so I pulled him on to the edge to recover. While I was getting my breath back I watched Christian bent backwards over the edge of the pool, he was thrashing about and groaning as his mignon sucked his long hard penis. I started to get hard gain and my Masters felt me.

"Ready again so soon, you are a quick one! Lets see if you can fuck Christian while I look after Kumu and his mignon."

Miguel was already fucking his little boy hard in the water. I got Christian to suck his mignon in return as I fucked his golden arse. It is so very good that way too. I will not tell my father any more of that night as I am not sure if it makes him happy, but it made me very happy. I think I managed to do something with every boy and mignon, All the time my Master was suggesting new and exciting things! Alberto soon felt better and joined in as well! It will be even more wonderful when our Master fucks us too!

Next morning I woke in my Master big bed, we were all still together. I could see him begin to wake and stretch, his penis hard. I knew he would need to piss so I squirmed between his thighs and took him in my mouth. He groaned and relaxed as his salt liquid flowed into my belly.

"You are a good lad, as well as a handsome one." he told me as he ruffled my hair.

But my Master does not lie in bed in the mornings like some men I have been with, he quickly turned us out to get ready for departure and he called his house boy for the week to wash and dress him, I wish I could do this for him to show him my love.

With the boats on the trailers, and us sitting in the back of the two trucks Hassan and Karl drove us down to the harbour at Muros. My Master watched whilst we got them off the trailers and into the sea. I think he likes watching boys working hard and straining their muscles to please him, that's why he like to see us row hard! With the boats safely anchored away from the quay with Alberto and his friends looking out for them my Master took us up to his favourite bar. We squatted outside in the dust as he drank wine and talked to the fishermen there. The talk was all about the chances of various boys in the Festival. Soon it turned to us.

"Well Don Carlos do you think those four can win the cup for you this year?"

"Yes I am sure they have a very good chance, provided they can keep their heads when it starts getting bloody, but judge for yourself!! Here!"

We came and stood by the men and they ran their hard hands over us, needless to say we started to get hard.

"Good bodies all of them, do they funk and suck as well as they row?"

My master just laughed.

"Good enough for me, I'm going to put two hundred Euros on your boat Lorca, but they will need some real experience. I am going to give my biggest crew their Release at low tide, we'll ask for a volunteer for your boys to practice on."

"Very good of you, I am sure my boys will find watching you release yours educational, and a live practice will make sure they do win your wager!"

They agreed to meet at the rocks just off the harbour at noon and parted. We spent the morning rowing out to Isla Salvore with food and water for our camp, our Master's big bed roll and box, and a small box with our sarongs and bowls. Then round the course and practising turns, chasing the mignons boats which towed a float for Kumu to aim his harpoon and lance at. Then we waited by the uncovered rocks. I could plainly see six big iron eyes just on the edge of the water, there also seemed to be a lot of white bones.

After a while some more boats from the town came and joined us. Then the man we had talked to in the bar was rowed out in a big heavy work boat from the fish farm. Six boys, big, rough and brown, bodies quite scarred pulled at the oars. In the back were six smaller boys. The big boys had no collars like us, but a rough fish gutting knife tied round their necks. They looked scared and miserable. When the man asked for a volunteer for us to practice on all six put there hands up and the man chose a medium sized one gave him mask fins and snorkel, as well as a chain and padlocks, and told him to swim over to our mignons boat and wait.

"He's the best swimmer, should give you a good run, but one ham each mind!"

"Deal!" said our Master.

Then he addressed the other five. "Now you miserable lot, I'm not a fine gentleman like the Don here, I've no time to mess about with festivals and training, you are all granted your Release."

He got out short lengths of chain and locked one round each boy's balls and cock, they squealed as he made sure it was tight.

"Padlock yourself to a ring, if you want to live without balls cut them off and swim ashore. If you make it the Vet will dress your wound. If you don't want to… you drown as the tide comes up. Till then you can fuck the little ones as many times as you can!"

Obediently the boys locked themselves in place, the rising tide already round their ankles. the little boys went to them and either sucked or were fucked. With sick horror I realised what was going to happen, and that if it was not for my Master this would be happening to me. The crowd cheered and jeered every time a boy came, but soon the water was up to their bellies and the little boys swam back to their boat. Now the big boys started to get frantic pulling at their chains and whimpering in fear, the crowed cheered even more. When the water got to their chins they started screaming, but quickly they shut their mouths as the water rose, I could see their struggles as the water covered their heads, and one by one they were still.

Suddenly one broke surface and started gasping for air and screaming again. He struggled to swim towards the shore, from between his scissoring legs ran a heavy slick of red. He nearly made it when his strength gave out and with one last cry of despair sunk from view. A couple of small boys donned mask and snorkel and swam to where he went down, and soon reappeared with his limp body which was bundled in the boat.

"Do you know five years ago one actually made it?" was all that the man said except for a parting. "Do make sure you win boys!"

We rowed over to our other boat, Cervantes. The boy was looking scared again, he had put on his fins and had mask and snorkel ready.

"Well young man, do you agree to swim for us?"

"Si Señor."

"Well then you stay in this boat and they row you towards Isla Salvore. We give you a lead on us . When I shout jump in and start swimming. If you make it to the island before we get you, you have another day. Understand?"

"Si Señor!" the boy replied.

Our Master said "Go!" and both boats started off at speed. I could not see anything because we were letting Cervantes get ahead of us.

"Swim for it boy!" our Master shouted, and I heard a splash.

Then my mind was filled with rowing hard and I could feel the strain in my legs and back as Miguel and I made Lorca leap forward. Christian started shouting "Pull … Pull", his voice going high with excitement. All I could see was Christian standing with splayed braced legs at the big steering oar in the back of the boat. He looks beautiful, smooth golden oiled body, developing muscles rippling as he strains to follow the swimmer's turns. The fresh breeze ruffles his blond hair, blond boys are so very pale here because the sun bleaches them, and kicks up the sea. I feel the wave tops break and splash against my naked back.

Don Carlos says "Oh this is a very good one, he is going to give excellent sport! Use your whip boy lets see how fast Rodolfo and Miguel can go with some help!"

Christian flicks me across the belly and I squeal, I hear Miguel squeal as well. I lift my body clear of the seat with every stroke, toes gripping the bar in the bottom of the boat. Christian flicks me again catching my cock. I have no breath left to squeal but I am very hard, I look down and the tip is wet like before you come. I hear Miguel groan and so he must be experiencing the same as he keeps perfect time with me. Christian is beginning to squeak with excitement, I see that he too is beginning to get hard. So is our Master, naked like us I can see his arousal. We pass Cervantes, Alberto is steering and screams his encouragement at the other three rowing.

Now Kumu starts shouting "Faster… Faster… I can nearly stick him!… Merde!… He's dived! Turn right!"

I do not need to be told, we four think as one now. I dug my oar into the water and saw it bend as the handle is forced back against my chest. Miguel was grunting as he heaved on his oar and the boat spins round.

"Now pull!" Screams Christian, slashes me across the shoulders, and we are off again after the swimming boy.

Several times we got close enough for Kumu to throw the harpoon, once he shouted that he had nicked his thigh and could see some blood, but the other times he missed. I do no know how long we pursued the boy but slowly we got closer to the island and could not turn him. The sweat was streaming off my body in the hot sun, my breath was coming in painful gasps, I longed for water but neither Christian nor Kumu could reach the water skins. The boy is only just ahead of us according to Kumu as we pull into the sandy horse shoe bay.

I am scared that Don Carlos will be angry with us, but he seems in high spirits as he says "That was well rowed and manoeuvred, you will do, God willing."

He ruffles my hair.

"Tomorrow without my weight in the boat I think you will get him!"

The boats keel scrunches on the sand and before I collapse I see the boy weakly pulling himself up the beach, his breath coming in great sobs and blood running from a wound in one thigh.

The sun is well down when I wake, Alberto is giving me water and telling me food is ready. We all sit in a circle, the mignons have done a good job of making camp and lighting a fire. The only one outside the circle is the swimming boy who has one ankle chained to a log some meters away. Even our Master sits with us.

Kiri, Kumu's very black little mignon hands round our bowls, we have nothing but our fingers to eat with, just like so long ago when I was in my first year. As well as our rice we have ham and salami, and fresh raw vegetables. After there is a big sack of oranges. But the best came last our marvellous Master hands us each a bar of chocolate! He tells Alberto to give the same food to the chained boy, but no chocolate for him I am pleased to see!

Don Carlos takes Kumu off down the beach and has him demonstrate how he throws the harpoon. Several times he stops him and alters his stance a little. Miguel, Alberto and I go to our beautiful boats and clean and tidy them. They have long narrow white hulls with a blue stripe, each has an eye to see their quarry, names Lorca and Cervantes on each bow. Inside they are painted blood red, just the seats and bottom boards bare wood so we can grip. We row them away from the beach as the tide will soon be falling and anchor them, then dive over and swim in.

As dark falls and the moon comes up, we all sit round the fire and Don Carlos has each of us sing for him. Then he tells Alberto to go and make the swimming boy happy as it may be his last night. The little tyke eagerly goes and starts sucking him. Soon the boy is hard and groaning and I see my brother squat over him, but I only have eyes for my Master as beckons me to him and caresses me.

"What do you wish for Rodolfo?"

"To please you Master!"

"So far you please me well, is there more,?"

He ruffles my hair and strokes my flanks, I know what I want more than anything. I am painfully hard and begin to squirm under his touch. His hand moves across my belly, touches my cock and balls and I groan, spreading my legs wide. His hand moves between them and the finger pushes at my hole. I try to pull him into me.

He laughs, "Go on tell me!"

I grip his hard penis with my hand. "Please Master, put your cock inside me and fuck me, fill me with your sperm so that I have the courage to die for you as bravely as St Antonio!"

"Fine words little one, so be it! Go and check your brother is giving the boy what he wants, get your pot of ointment and come back to me when I have spoken to your friends."

He kisses me forcing his tongue deep inside. Then swats my bum and I scamper off to do his bidding. He is talking with the other three in turn, other nights they will lie with him, but tonight he is all mine!

Alberto lies on the boys belly, I ask him if he has been good.

"Your brother fucks well, much better than my Master's boys!"

Then he grips my hand and whispers urgently to me. "Listen friend you are going to die here just like me, we have a chance. After your Master has fucked you he will be deep asleep. Take the key from around his neck and unlock me. I will kill him with the harpoon and we can escape in the boats! What do you say?"

I am sick with horror at the boys obscene suggestion, I can not answer him. I just say "Maybe" and pull Alberto away from him, little ones should not hear such obscenities, nor will he realise what happens to such boys, he was too little to remember the runaway Dominic, but I remember every detail of his last days. To runaway would be unthinkable, but to kill your Master? It makes me sick to think about it.

When Kumu and Christian have finished Don Carlos and he is cuddling and speaking to Miguel, I tell them what the boy had said, they gasped with shock. Kumu said "We must kill him tomorrow, another night would be dangerous, I will sleep on my harpoon to keep it safe. You go and get your fucking Rodolfo and don't worry I will keep an eye on him!"

We all hugged each other and Miguel as well when he came and said "He wants you now Rodolfo, I think he's really randy so you are going to get it good!"

I get my pot and work the ointment into me, I used some of my money for the best hoping this would happen. I go to him lying naked and hard on his spread bed roll. He opens his arms and I squirm on to his massive chest. His hands are all over me and I squeak with the building pleasure. He rolls me on my back and pushes my knees to my shoulders, I wrap my ankles round his neck as he ever so slowly enters me. He thrusts slowly, gazing into my eyes. His cock pushes past the special place inside me and soon I am delirious with lust, shouting out for him to take me harder and faster. All to soon my sperm jets out over my belly and on to my face, and with a great shout my Master, Don Carlos, fills my guts with pulse after pulse of his sperm. But that was only the first time in the long night till dawn, Miguel was right he was very randy, and all for me!

Chapter 15b
The Training of the Whale Boat Crew, part 2

Rodolfo's father speaks

It is difficult for a father to listen to his son tell of his sex with his master but Rodolfo's black eyes shone with joy as he told me of these things and that made it good for me too. Difficult to hear the fate of the fisher boys, though that is the custom in my village as well. I thank god that Rodolfo will not share their miserable fate, but something more noble. The talk of murder – how could a boy be so ungrateful? – frightened me. If either of my sons had not been loyal and listened, the consequences would have been appalling. Everybody knows the fate of Tribute Boys who rebel in this way and murder a Master. Not just the one boy of course but every boy he owns down to the youngest. I needed to collect my thoughts so I just caressed my son and he snuggled against me, so beautiful a boy. I felt myself stiffen against his naked flesh. But I must hear the rest of his tale before it is too late.

"Rodolfo, my son, you tell your tale well with fine words. Continue and tell me what happened with the dawn."

Rodolfo continues

I woke next morning when it was scarcely light. My Master snores! He looks very happy as I snuggle against his chest. I see the swimming boy's key on a leather thong round his neck and in one sickening moment realise he is right it would be so easy to take it and release him. But what shame such an action would bring on me and my family, you Papa would not remember your son with love but only contempt. Even if this had no consequence how could I watch the Master I love so much being harpooned like a common Tribute Boy. The thought fills me with shame that it should even have crossed my mind. I look over to the swimming boy, he watches me eagerly mouthing encouragement. This is awful I turn to my Master and must show him my love and loyalty and my kisses wake him.

"Awake so early little one after so much fucking? You are a randy little bugger aren't you? Well I am ready to come again so you see how well you can ride me."

We had not done it this way yet, but of course it's part of my training. I squatted across him and lowered myself onto him. When I feel his pubic hair against me I use my thigh muscles to raise and lower myself and my sphincter muscle to squeeze him when I thrust down. I try something new and pinch his nipples and he starts groaning and twisting under me, this is wonderful that I can make my Master feel so good!

He seizes my nipples and twists them hard and I cant help letting out a squeal but I want him to take me hard and show the miserable swimming boy the depth of my love. My Master seems to know what I want moving one hand to my testicles and squeezing hard on my thrusts.

I can't restrain my self but shout out over and over again "Oh fuck that hurts, oh please harder, harder, harder, oh god please let me die for my Master and please him with my agony!"

The last phrase is of course the litany of St Antonius, but I could not sing it only gasp it. All to soon I felt my sperm spurting out over my Master's chest and seconds later he gave a great cry and went rigid lifting himself and me off his blanket. I squeezed him in rhythmic pulses to make the pleasure last and last, I think I am very good at doing this! I could not help steeling a glance at the swimming boy, who gazed back with hate, envy, betrayal but mostly terror.

"Bastard!" he mouthed silently. Soon my Master collapsed panting.

He looked into my eyes and just said "Oh! yes! what a whore you are boy!"

I was so proud. We went to swim and I cleaned him and helped him dress for church, the others had prepared breakfast for us all and hot coffee for our Master.

While he was drinking Kumu, Christian and Miguel came and hugged me they all said that they were very proud of me that I could make him so happy! Christian said "How many times?"

"Four last night and once this morning!"

"I bet I can get him to fuck me six!" And we all rolled about laughing.

"Shut up brats!" I know when my Master calls us like this, it is because he loves us and is not angry. Angry is different and very frightening even if you are not the unlucky one!

"Unlock him, he can come to church with us, good for the soul!, but of course I forget he has not got one. Mignons get the boats in and ready to leave immediately!"

He held the key out to me and I felt my guts turn to water, I knew what would happen if the boy got into the boats with the harpoons and lances lying about. I knew what happened to a boy who refused a direct order. I also knew that if I told him why Alberto if not me would have that fate. I could not help myself but felt the piss dribbling down my legs in my terror. Now he was beginning to get angry.

"Well what is your problem boy! Ready for release and can't carry out an order?"

I had no time to think, I just knew I had to protect him even if I was taken back in chains and skewered to the compound gates for my disobedience. I fell at his feet sobbing uncontrollably in terror.

"Please Master, I want to die for you, but please please leave him chained here, please!!"

He was growing thoughtful but still held the key out to me. I knew I had gone to far to back down.

"I am sorry Master, I can not! Please leave him here. I know you must send me to the gate for disobedience!"

So very slowly he retracted the key, "So be it boy, I see your terror and think you have your reasons. So you will not go to the gate, yet… You would without question if you had disobeyed me at home, so you better make sure that none of your friends breaths a word that I have spared you… Understand?"

"Thank you Master thank you" was all I could sob.

So we left him chained there with a bowl of water and rowed off for church, I tried to get near to kick the water over before we left but my Master watches me very closely now. He knows something is wrong.

The row across the bay, no breeze and sparkling water, was good and made me feel happier. This time Kumu rowed a single oar in the bow, Miguel a pair in the middle, and I a single one in the stern. The mignons rowed in the same fashion close alongside. My Master seemed quiet and thoughtful. I found my courage.

"Master, Kumu taught us a whale boat song from long ago in his islands, may we sing it for you?"

"You may, but swap with Christian so you have more breath to sing!"

I stood braced in the stern of the boat and sung until my heat would break from love of my Master, the others sung the chorus, pulling in perfect time to the rhythm of the song. When the final notes faded across the still sea my Master was very quiet, almost sad, at first he said nothing just stoked my thigh, then, "I would like very much for you to sing that again for me sometime, and certainly when you win."

I think he might just be beginning to forgive me.. In the little harbour Alberto and Sven rowed the boats off and anchored then and we file behind our Master through the narrow old streets to the church, I have heard people say that many more people now come to church and it seemed very crowded. At the steps me and Alberto were handed over to an altar boy. He was a free boy about my age and wasted no time getting his thumb up my arse as well as Alberto as soon we were out of sight.

He whispered in my ear "Pretty boy and little brother are going to be fucked by all of us after the service. You will love that won't you, you little whore?"

"Please, young Sir, we would both like that very much!" I knew what I had to say and hated it, but I suspect even my Master has to be careful with the church.

The service was long a boring as always except in the parts Alberto and I got to sing, naked on the altar steps in front of hundreds of people. I could feel them watching us and a sigh whenever I tried for a high note and pulled my belly and thigh muscles in tight, this also made me half hard and they seemed to sigh harder. As I sung I looked as the great painting of St Antonius over the door, writhing in continuous agony from his five self inflicted wounds. He was made out to be a golden boy perhaps a little younger than I, you could see every tortured muscle, steams of dark blood flowing and mouth open in an everlasting song of praise to his beloved Master. When we were not singing we had to go and kneel at the feet of the priest obediently kissing his feet.

He hissed at us and kicked me "Spread your knees wider, whores, so that they can see you are!" I knew every body could see our gaping and reddened arse holes, even a Tribute Boy can feel shame and I felt I wanted to die, don't be angry Papa! Then the priest got up to give his address, he was an older and crueller looking one than the one that had spoken at our dinner.

"Well my flock, in something a little over a month we will have our great Summer Festival, this is no concern of the church, of course we are concerned not with earthly pursuits. But as you have chosen to hold it in the week before the great saints' feast days of St Sebastian and St Antonius it marks very important event for the church as well. Even now we have chosen the lucky Tribute Boy who is Sebastian and are rigorously training him to give a convincing and long drawn out performance…"

Alfonso from our Hacienda was called to the front, he looked terrified and strange in his altar boy's clothes.

"Show them what will edify their souls boy!"

Alfonso slipped the cassock off his shoulders and it fell round his ankles.

"You see a good sturdy boy responding to fattening up! We have every hope that he should be able to improve your minds even longer than last year's effort! You all know of course that Tribute Boys have no souls, to think otherwise is heresy, and you know what happens to such Merciful god has allowed them two ways to redemption. Praise be! The first is that any boy that is granted his conditional freedom after an exceptional Final Performance can petition for acceptance into the church. The second is that each year the boys chosen to play St Sebastian and St Antonius are accepted into the church before they portray their namesakes. Thus their newly acquired souls go to paradise the same as a free man's, though their miserable bodies perish in prolonged agonies for your enlightenment! As today we have permitted some Tribute Boys into our service for your enjoyment, I thought I would briefly retell the edifying tale of St Antonius."

"This happened many centuries ago when the boy Antonio was given in Tribute by his father to a pagan Emperor of Rome when he was seven years old. Now it was customary in those days to release a boy after his Tribute, they did not understand the danger to Christian society that the lumpen mass of degenerate humanity posed. Now Antonio was a Christian and prayed all the time during his Tribute that grow to please his Master in every way and his Master grew fond of him and well pleased with everything about the boy, after all he was especially beautiful as well as having a gentle and loving nature. In his twelfth summer a terrible famine fell on the land, by his thirteenth summer everybody was starving, even in the Palace. Antonio knew that his time of Tribute was soon to be over, and that unless his beloved Master could feed his subjects he would soon be over thrown and murdered. He prayed and it was revealed what he must do! He chose a boy two years younger than him also in his Masters favour and shared his terrible plan with him. He then waited until his Master rode out of the city to see the stricken countryside. He instructed some of the Palace Eunuchs to make him a large diagonal cross and stand it outside his chamber, a vertical one would of course be heretical! He also asked for five large nails, a file and a hammer. He spent all next night filing the points of four of the nails very sharp. For the fifth he measured very carefully and drove it firmly into the arm of the cross where his right wrist would fall, then filed off the head and sharpened that too. In the few hours of dark left he prayed and in the still hours before dawn when in silent procession to a small square, in front of the tiny church and carried out his plan. With the dawn people drawn by singing as if from heaven punctuated by screams that tore the soul flocked to the square and found Antonio had nailed himself to his cross, one nail through each foot, one into the join of the cross through his genitals, and one through his left wrist. His right wrist he had forced onto the spike of the fifth nail. Then he had ordered the Eunuchs to set the cross upright. Appalled by the agony of their Emperors favourite people rushed to release him, but he commanded them to leave him, saying only my Master can give me my Release! His whole body writhed in agony as you can see there!"

He pointed to the painting and everybody turned, he kicked me hard when nobody was looking and hissed "When I tell you sing St Antonius' litany!"

When he had their attention again he continued. "When god granted him respite from the agonies he had so freely chosen, to demonstrate the greater glory of god, the boy sang his litany, which should be a reminder to every Tribute Boy of his duties! Now brat!"

I sang clear and sharp. "Oh god let me die for my Master! Let me enlighten him with my agonies! Let my suffering be long to show my love!"

This I sang three times over, my heart bursting with emotion I had only eyes for my Master in his special pew, the others prostrate at his feet. I saw him smile at me. My heart leapt perhaps it was going to be all right and he would forgive me! When I finished the last line I prostrated myself at his feet, they smelt badly.

"The boy endured for three days, though on the last both his song and his screams were faint. That afternoon the Emperor returned, asked for his boy and hurried to the square. He embraced the dying boy and said 'Why have you done this my child?' With his last breaths Antonio gasped, 'To show my Love for you my Master, and to show you the way to save your people by confessing to the true faith!' He gave one last faint shriek of agony and died in his arms. The Emperor realising what his boy had done by his sacrifice entered the small building and with great pride and sorrow confessed his new faith. Outside a bolt of light ascended to heaven, this was the boys new soul. That night it rained and the famine was broken, god be praised!"

There was not much more service to go, I was dreading the next bit and I squeezed Alberto's thigh to give him courage. We filed out after the altar boys and the other priests into the vestry.

"Have some fun with them, but don't fuck them till I get back from saying goodbye to the flock!" He ordered.

When he had gone they lost no time both the boys and the men stripped off and started pulling us about and screaming at us. I could see they were all hard and knew we were not going to get off easily! One boy about twelve was slapping Alberto's head from side to side as he was forced to suck him. He was soon crying. I do not want to tell Papa any more as I see he is getting angry.

The priest came back and said "Me first boys! Spread him for me!"

I was dragged across to a table and held open for him even though I bucked in terror. "I do like the little brats to show some terror of their betters!"

But before he could rape me the door crashed open and there was my Master.

"That will be quite enough of that I think father!" His voice was very quiet and I have never heard him so angry! "The boy has been granted his Release and is technically free…" The priest started to say something… "do not say he asked for it, I know otherwise! Release them both immediately!"

I could see the priest was white with rage, god help the next poor boy he had in his mercy! But our Master had saved us and protected us.

We were all very quiet at first as we rowed back, my Master kept on saying "Godless hypocrites the lot of them!" But a Tribute Boy learns not to hear comments about his betters! About half way the black mood seemed to leave him, he stood in the boat and stripped off, he always seems more comfortable naked like we are. "Come on lads cheer up! Lunch and then some sport with that swimming brat! That do you?"

"Yes please Master" we all chorused, I could not wait until the bastard who had caused Alberto and I such anguish should get his just end…

Rodolfo's father speaks

Yes I was angry with the priests for their hypocrisy, but so proud of my beautiful Rodolfo who had been prepared to die in shame to protect his Master.

That Don Carlos protected the boy even when he was under suspicion of disobedience shows the nobility of a gentleman, my Rodolfo gives his love and loyalty. But something else is happening to me, all these images have made me painfully hard, or perhaps it is the beautiful naked and wanton boy in my lap.

But he is my son! I see he is hard too and run my hand across his belly and on to his cock, fondle his balls. He moans with lust I know I could take him now, but we have so little time left together. Neither should a gentleman offend his host by making free with his property so I say

"Your actions were noble my son, continue with your tale!"

Rodolfo continues

In this new mood my Master ordered us to stop rowing, raise the mast and set the sails. You know Papa that I have always loved to sail. The wind was fresh against us and my Master ordered me to take the tiller. I am much better at sailing a boat than the others, but Alberto is nearly as good and we raced each other tack for tack all the way back to our camp, both crews clinging to the windward rail of their boats squealing with excitement and drenched with spray. I got to the beach just three boat lengths ahead.

"Well done you two, you are both very good at sailing a boat, but Rodolfo wins!"

And he gave me a hug! Am I forgiven? In this mood we had a good lunch, he had even bought an extra sack of melons, I ate mine greedily the juice running down my chest. When we had finished Miguel's mignon Alphonse cleared and washed up.

"Right you four, funs over and we have hard training after your siesta. First, did you all have an orgasm last night?"

We nodded.

"No more sex till I say, Christian you will come to my bed tonight."

I felt jealous that it was not me but pleased for my friend.

"Next you will chase that boy swimming, as training. If you do not manage to catch him after two hours I will replace one of you with him!"

This was awful we had to kill him quickly now, he might kill my Master yet if he got in the boat, even persuade the others to help him!

"Alphonse and Sven you are to give our friend over there a good massage to make sure he is ready to swim well, but no talking to him!"

"Yes Master!"

The boy was listening.

"You boy! you heard me? I give you a chance, I think perhaps you do not deserve!"

"Si Señor!"

Thank god my Master knows something is wrong!

"Kiri and Alberto you will massage me before I sleep!"

"Yes Master!"

"Right that sorts out your lusts for a while. You Kumu bring the leather roll over and I need to give you four something serious to dream about, and you boy as well I think?" The last to the swimming boy.

We all sat round in a circle which included him though he was still chained by one ankle to the log.

My Master untied the roll and flicked it so that it rolled open. Inside were a row of gleaming harpoons, two lances and two whips that seemed like the one that Christian used on us.

"Up till now you have only used practice weapons without barbs. You could have taken the boy with these but he was too quick and agile for you. Now you use the real things."

He held up one of the gleaming steel harpoons, not as big as a whale harpoon he explained this was because boys are not as big as whale! It was like a larger version of the spear from a gun for snorkelling, a steel shaft about 12 mm diameter and 1m long. In this it was just the same as the practice harpoons fitting into a wooden detachable shaft and having a fine plastic coated wire trace about 3m long attached to it so the line could not be cut when it lodged in a boat or one of its crew. The harpoon lines were the same in tubs in the boats of fine nylon line, difficult to hold and to pull as it had to be light enough to follow the thrown harpoon. We knew this could cut a boys hand badly handled carelessly. The awful difference was that each head had a twin hinged barbs that would go to ninety degrees if the harpoon was attempted to be pulled out. We did not need our Master to explain what this meant for us he just demonstrated the sharpness and how it hinged and looked at us hard each in turn, but longest at the swimming boy. For the first time my guts churned in fear, the swimming boy groaned and pissed himself and I felt better. Then he showed the lance, not like a Coursing or Hunting lances but with a cutting edge about 15 cm long, it too fitted on to the same wooden handles as those for the harpoon but locked in place. There were four harpoons and one lance for each boat, we would have to take three or four boats to win he explained but we could capture weapons from a boat we had taken. Mignons may only act in self defence he ordered.

Last he showed us the whip.

"The one Christian uses now on you to train you will hurt you, this has steel tips on each lash. It will cut the skin open. He should not use it on you at the start of the race, nor during your training. He should use it to wound an opponent crew if he can. He may use it on you to make you row faster when you are getting exhausted. Christian remember how important the television rights to a winning crew are, for you pension funds. If the camera is on you in the final contest use it well!, the audience will love it!"

A long pause.

"Remember young men your race is against Death, but you do have just one chance in one hundred of winning it!"

The awful fear churned my guts again.

"Now sleep!"

But I could not, I just watched Alberto and Kiri, one brown one black using every part of their bodies to massage my Master with his special oil. Eventually I dozed… to be wakened by a shake from Alberto.

The other mignons already were in their boat with the swimming boy and my Master.

"You four can get into your boat and start hunting him when I push the brat in the water, and you have two hours start!"

Alberto swam out and climbed aboard, the swimming boy sat on the rail in mask snorkel and flippers back to the sea. they rowed slowly away from us. Oh god he was giving him an awfully big lead, then a splash as he went over backwards into the sea… We did not wait to see him come up he would now be swimming frantically away from us. We frantically plunged into the water and swam out to Lorca and clambered aboard.

"Row with three of us until we get close!" I ordered the others and we started in our long pursuit.

I can not remember Papa all that happened. I only tried to row hard and keep good time for the other two ahead of me. Christian followed his every turn, but still we could not close him. Gradually he got weaker and slower, but so were we, my breath came in sobs my body slicked with sweat and my hands blistered, I was desperate for water. Kumu now balanced in the bow, he must not get too exhausted to throw. Twice we got close enough and the boy evaded the throw with uncanny skill. Kumu was cursing in his native French like he always does when he is getting scared. The mess of line took some time to clear each time and we had to row even harder to catch up. Suddenly our luck turned I hear Kumu scream with fury, and then with joy. Christian ordered us to stow the oars and Miguel and I turned to face the bow, to control the line. The boy had surfaced close to the bow and Kumu had driven the harpoon into him just below the right shoulder blade. Now he was swimming frantically away from us taking the line with him but we had him fast. Every now and again he puffed blood and water out of his snorkel. It did not take long to get him alongside us, still frantically trying to swim. Kumu raised the lance to finish him but my Master now close in the mignon's boat, shouted for him to stop.

"You must often kill your opponents in their boat or yours, so haul him in and practice!"

We did and we hauled the thrashing boy into the boat, Kumu had done well the harpoon had gone right through him and projected just above the nipple, barbs pulled back flat against the flesh. Blood ran from both wounds into the bottom of the boat, and trickled out of the corner of his mouth. There was no way such a weapon could be pulled out once it had been driven into a boy! We held him down and pulled off his mask and snorkel and Kumu raised his lance again.

He screamed at me, "You Bastard why did not you and you shit little brother help me to kill him last night! Now you are all going to die!"

Kumu had started down to silence him and only halted at my Master's roars "Stop! What has been going on you should tell me about."

I started to stammer in fear.

"Shut up Rodolfo, we will sort this out ashore."

I felt awful, sick with terror as we rowed back, I could see the anguish on Alberto's face as they rowed along close to us. The boy writhed, bled, and screamed from time to time.

At our Master's order we beached the whale boat and then jumping out ran it up onto the beach. We lifted the wounded swimming boy ashore and laid him on the sand at his fee.

Then with that cold calm voice that he only uses when he is truly angry he addressed us as we knelt in a semi-circle facing him.

"There has been something going on that I do not know of. Rodolfo and Alberto it is clear that you two sluts are in the middle of it. Rodolfo stand up and come here."

I rose to my feet and fighting back the tears walked unsteadily towards where my Master stood, his face cold and hard with anger.

"Now Rodolfo," he said looking me hard in the face, "what has been going on? Tell me."

I struggled to speak but words would not come.

"I'll tell you," the swimming brat suddenly screamed out, "I'll tell you… First I asked that one… The one too frightened to speak to set me free and help me kill you and then when he wouldn't I asked the other one the young one… his brother… to try to persuade him to do it… they neither of them told you… fine loyal Tribute Boys they are…" A fit of coughing ended the boy’s rant and blood mixed with saliva trickled down his chin.

Then Alberto was on his knees beside me stammering out his confession. It was while he was riding the boy he started coaxing him with ideas of freedom if only he could persuade me to unlock him. Being a foolish boy, not yet 12 years old, he had listened. Perhaps he forgot the law or did not know it, such talk would be unthinkable to one of our boys and we do not speak to boys from Masters so unjust as to encourage such thoughts. I knew the law. It is simple he who talks, however briefly, of mutiny is guilty of mutiny, Alberto had talked so had I.

I sobbed at my Masters feet, clutching him round the ankles.

"I could not tell you Master because then you would have had to have had all three of us executed… I wanted so badly to win the race for you and it would have spoilt your crew… I knew we had to practice with him to be good enough … Tribute Boys may not tell tales… But I had to protect you from him, if you had made me unlock him he would have tried to kill you in the boat… Oh please I did not know what to do… Forgive me… I know you must now execute me and Alberto… Let us die for you…"

The reasons all jumbled out and made nonsense, but how could I know how to make a good choice we are always told what to do.

"Enough boy!" I could see his anger and it was terrible, I knew I deserved. But he turned to the swimming boy and I began to realise that he was the object of my Masters wroth

"So you miserable little shit I spare you from your drowning, give you a slim chance, and you are so ungrateful as to scheme my murder and corrupt my boys! Without that wound you would go on my compound gate, but you won't last that long and I am not going to get the vet to you just for that!"

The boy was kneeling sobbing and clutching his wounded chest. My Master kicked him hard in the balls and he collapsed screaming.

"You Alberto have been very foolish, by rights you should go to the gate, but I do not think you are wicked and it would be unjust for you to die alone when the cause has escaped retribution. Neither do I want to mess up the training by the commotion it would cause. I shall punish you most severely but you will not be killed or marked to harm your performance. "

Alberto was sobbing out his thanks when he turned to me. "You Rodolfo have been foolish too but I can see it was out of love and honour, so I pardon you…"

Before I could speak he added

"But… you must prove your loyalty by killing this brat for me!"

I just sobbed and nodded my head. The boy had stopped writhing and lay on his side moaning.

"And you are going to give them very good training before he does, but as I am a merciful man I will not have your pension fund cancelled."

The next couple of hours were terrible, even though we knew he deserved every minute. First we were ordered to haul him belly down spread wide over the log he had been chained too. Christian was shown how to use the fighting whip on him and soon he was making a continuous high scream only interspersed with gasps for breath. The three lashes did terrible damage and soon every space on the back of his body was cut and running blood. Christian was getting very carried away with his job grunting with pleasure every time the whip struck, his penis so hard it pressed against his belly, the tip leaking. My Master ordered us to halt and turn him over. The boy was loosing consciousness and he went and got a syringe out his box and drove it into the boys thigh. He snapped back again; eyes wide with terror, the screams started again. Next he instructed Christian to use the lash across his eyes.

"Very effective to dispose of an opponent boat steerer."

He said in a cold voice. I could see Christian was getting a blood lust like I have seen at a couple of festivals and he screamed as he did so. The boys eye sockets now a bloody mess and a bloody froth of terror drooling from his jaws. Kumu was then instructed to cut free and pull through the harpoon, then use the lance to sever the tendons of his elbows, a good way to immobilise a harpooner. Still the boy screamed and screamed. Miguel then, to sever the tendons behind the knees, that way that he can no longer row. The boy could no longer see but he could hear as my Master said

"Now Rodolfo, but very slowly."

The boy knew what he meant and his upper body convulsed. I did what I was instructed. First I slit off both nipples as trophies for my Master. Then I made him hard, Tribute Boys seem able to get hard and shoot their sperm even in the few moments before death, will it be like this for me? I too am very hard at the boys agony and perhaps with anticipating my own in just a few weeks.

I see why my Master insists that we have no hair here it makes the cut difficult and the trophy not so fine. At the moment that the first gobbet shot out I sliced upwards with my dagger, who could think he could scream more?, and presented my Master with his principle trophy.

I placed one hand on his smooth belly sucked in taught with agony and slimed with his last ever sperm, oh god I was hard and aching now as I felt him move under me. With my other hand I slit his throat with my beautiful dagger.

The mignons took the the carcass away and left it on the beach, just meat to be eaten by crabs and gulls. We were all now very quiet and thoughtful. Christian and Miguel were sobbing, Kumu shaking, I felt dizzy and sick, but somehow elated. "In hunting terms young men you have been well and truly blooded, you will hunt well on your big day!"

He laughed, "We have one last matter to attend to. Alberto!"

My brother approached him shaking and starting to snuffle. My Master seized his jaw and forced him to gaze into his eyes.

"Do you love me boy?"

"Yes Master, unto death!" Noble words stammered fearfully.

"Then prove it, give me the lower joint of your left little finger!"

Alberto held his hand out, my Master ruffled his hair.

"Silly boy, you will need Rodolfo's dagger to cut it off first! Give it him!"

I did seeing the comprehension bring terror to his face.

"Use the log, and chop down, a brave boy like you need nobody to hold him, does he?"

Alberto shakily obeyed trying to gather his courage. He still screamed very shrill. He presented my Master with his penance, blood streaming from the stump. My Master took a brand out of the fire and blew on it and pressed it onto the wound to cauterise it. Alberto dropped to his knees moaning and clutching his hand.

"Well done Alberto, I accept your love and loyalty you are pardoned."

I could see pride shine through the tears in his eyes, your Alberto is a fine son too Papa. Then my Master chased us all into the sea and there catching and throwing us, even Alberto joining in until we were all laughing until we ached.

That night I watched my Master drive into Christian, my friend screaming with lust as he did so. I was still a bit jealous though! I wished I could have sex but No! my Master had ordered. I thought that maybe the best sex is like with the boy and the cut follows the orgasm. Then to slit one's own belly open to show your love what a noble end! These thought made me very hard and wet again, but eventually I slept.

Next morning Christian was being fucked again and still having a very good time! He did say he had only managed five times same as me so I am not jealous. After breakfast everything was cleared and packed into the mignons boat which was send back to unload and give the boy back to his master. Then my Master sat with us clustered round him.

"The next time you come to this place it will be as the winning whale boat team, if it is gods will, some of you will be wounded, some maybe dead, but you will all have the glory of winning! I love you all and am very proud of you now, but even more so then! He said he loved us! We all embraced him and kissed him until he hushed us.

"Also remember that there is a chance of a pardon if your performance is spectacular, though this has never been given in this event, but there is always a first time!"

We sat still and quiet for a time, we had a lot to think about!

"When I get back from the Picos I will coach you for two hours each day, and you will all come to me alternate nights, in the meantime I think you know how to train?"

On the row home our Master had a surprise for us. He had had the boat seats altered so the wooden butt plug we use on the eating benches screwed in in the same way.

We sat on it to row and every time I pulled back it pressed against my prostrate gland and made me very hard. One after another we groaned and shot under this stimulation, my Master keeping count. My chest and belly was soon slicked with my loads. We were exhausted when we made it back to the town!

Rodolfo's father continues

I could feel my son squirming with lust and could see his beautiful cock pressed hard against his belly, leaving a damp patch. I played with him gently, but was dreaming of taking him hard and bloodily. My thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door and one on Don Carlos' staff came in, a Spaniard of about my own age.

"Forgive me Señor Rodolfo but the boy has other duties to prepare himself."

Rodolfo kissed me hard and deep, not as a son does and scampered off smiling. The man continued, "I think you might appreciate an outlet over the next few days, if you will accompany me to your room there is a gift waiting for you from Don Carlos."

When we got there a naked boy sat cross legged on the bed, laid out in front of him where a whip and other things I did not know. The man said "Buenos noches Señor!" and closed the door. The boy sprang to his feet and stood before me.

"I think Señor will want to fuck me very hard, but first he will want give me much pain, this I like. He does not know the best ways to do this so I will have to be his teacher!"

He guided my hand to his balls and told me to squeeze him hard, his screech and squirm was very satisfying. He was a very good teacher, but the writing screaming boy that I took so many times that night was always in my imagination my son Rodolfo. I think I will enjoy his race, what a fine gentleman Don Carlos is to give a poor man such a gift.

Chapter 16
Don Carlos Thinks Of The Past And Plans For The Future

Don Carlos speaks

I sit on my veranda naked in the hot morning sun, across the table sits my son, and I hope, my heir, we sip coffee and take croissants. We discus how his training is going. I am very gratified that he seems to be taking everything so seriously working as hard as any boy for his release. It is touching how he still thinks he is different and superior to them, but perhaps with just a little less certainty now? I wonder how he will take to his grandfather when he comes, he was only twelve the last time he saw him. We agreed it best he should not see him again until just before the ceremony, the old man had chuckled, "You know me, boys can't resist them, and we do want to give him a good test and a nice surprise before his big day don't we?"

He seems to have taken to Juan, several times requesting permission to ride over to his farm, it is fitting that my first pardoned boy should be fucking my son, and I was touched by Juan's request to help my son in his ordeal, and of course I agreed. His boy Mir seems to be making progress, he no longer screams every night even before he is beaten, its amazing what love, security and firmness will do to a broken life.

He kneels, blond head against my son's naked thigh, blue eyes full of love. But even as I watch something slips, the eyes cloud with remembrance, "Mama" he sobs, then stifles it. "Forgive me master, I keep seeing the blood and the flames inside my head!"

My son is learning as he says, "What shall I do boy?" and strokes his back.

"Please drive the thoughts away Master, please!" He throws himself back arms spread wide.

My son takes the special small whip with the padded lead weights, "Would you excuse me one moment Papa?" I nod.

He stands and starts to lash him across the spread thighs, then the ribs, adding to the bruises but not cutting the delicate hide he is so taken by. Mir starts screaming with the pain and I notice with satisfaction that his penis is pushing up into his long foreskin.

"That's your morning ration of six, Mir!"

The boy looks at him with love shinning out of his cleared blue eyes, the memories gone, for a while. He is almost broken now and Christopher is quietly confident of his new found ability as he sits back at the table. I think I have no worries on this score. Good too that Christopher has chosen Xavier, tough partly broken slum penal boy, as a sparing partner. He seems to be bending him to his will as well, I saw the fierce animal pride of his young Master in the lout's eyes as they cracked each at others ribs, naked and filthy with dust in the practice yard when I drove back yesterday. His bruise are fading and he moves less stiffly so the arnica cream has worked its magic.

I think back to the night, it seems long ago but is less than a week ago, when we arrived from the Balkans. I was pleased that Juan went to my son and comforted him where his father could not. If he is to lead he must not only display courage, but learn the inner courage to fight his own growing self doubts and terrors. Only that way will he succeed, only that way will he withstand his Grandfather. withstand he must, there has been so much blood spilt, so much agony, to give him his chance, his future, for him to fail.

After he left the table I talked business with Hassan, making sure everything was running smoothly and would be ready for the busiest part of the season, clients have to book two years in advance to find a place here at the end of July and in August. They pay highly for the privilege and expect every conceivable delight to be available for them, for their children, sometimes even to amuse their wives! Then I asked if he was pleased with his 'bonus', did he have a name? "No Señor, I did not bother to ask the brat! He needs no name to please me!"

He is a hard but loyal man, he would not dream of treating one of the Hacienda boys like he will treat this miserable brat. I am not sure if I approve of such brutality, but the brat would have only lasted a couple of months in a Bolivian copper mine or wherever. It is just a price the brat will have to pay to reward my friends loyalty.

"Buenos Noches amigo, dream of the pleasure he will give you when you feel he is ready!"

"Gracias Señor!" and he left me alone with my thoughts.

Mir's suffering has made me excited, I had nothing in the Balkans though some of Señor Gotti's entertainment's were excellent. He sent me a delightful ten year old, raven haired with blue grey eyes, after the party. The boy was very practised but when I looked into his eyes only terror and despair were there. Without love and lust there is no fun, so I gave him a 50 obol coin and let him sleep with me till morning and sent him on his way with praise. So tonight I am ready for hard sex.

I clap my hands and to the sound of the tinkling bells of their ankles Jan and Mishear dance in to kneel before me. They have taken much care with their preparations and are looking radiant, skin, gleaming with health and vitality. They have ribbons braided in their hair and are wearing the cock and ball harness's I ordered. Jan's black against his gold pubis, and Mishear's white against his dark brown. Ito and Ino, also looking splendid, black skins glistening with oil, kneel behind them.

I had them dance for me, now Jan's fear has left him they are very good indeed, maybe even good enough to have just a chance of the President sparing them, so I will have to consider the implications of that. One is that my guests will be expecting two agonising deaths and will not be disappointed. Of course in the long chance of a pardon Ino and Ito will have to die in their place and I think I know a way that this can be done that is particularly spectacular, but they too must be trained for the eventuality. Later I took all four boys to bed and worked them hard, it was deeply satisfying. Jan and Mishear are now both highly sensitive to pain and desperate to find release in orgasm. I find a boy writhing in pain as it drives him to jet his sperm over his belly without, even touching his penis, highly erotic….

The next day Christopher was quite and tense. I rode around the Hacienda noting the Release Boys training with pleasure, Sky loping alongside the horse tirelessly. Garcia somersaults over the wheeled practice bull pushed by his mignon, long dark curls flying. Tueng spars with his aiming viscous kicks at the boys balls. Jonathan seems to be faster and more certain of himself now. Chueng at Señor Anthony's does chin ups thighs gripping the bar between his legs. Richie sulks and does nothing. Manuel rolls on and off his horse at full gallop effortlessly. Nico and Ahmed, knives flickering in the sun, slash at each others bellies.

My clients seem happy too, even the children. The sons of the Davis' family, twelve years old and ten years old, look guilty, holding switches, as I ride by, a second year is sobbing in the dust at their feet. I bid them good morning and hear a swish and a scream behind me as I ride on; obviously learning young! Another repeating client, the Rev. Baker, walks hand in hand with a fifth year, talking earnestly to him as would an adult lover, the boy gazes at back him with love. Yet two years ago I watched him screaming in lust as he watched his previous lover's death spasms. Yet others are kind to their boys for the holiday, but most quickly forget when home.

I spent the afternoon after siesta writing letters. Soon it was time for the evening meal, I dressed in leather chaps and loin cloth, leather jerkin, and I walked over to the Stock Yard with a very quiet Christopher and a very sore and stiff Mir. I told Mir what he must do. The meal seemed unusually quiet and after a hush spread over the yard. I signalled to Mir who came and stood before his Young Master.

"Yes boy?"

"If it pleases my Master I would like to request my Release. If it pleases you I would like to guard you on your ordeal, to help you with your circumcision and then to prove my love for you by gelding myself and slitting my belly," the last with a sob.

"Are you sure Mir? If you wish you can spend two more years here before you ask this?"

"But then you would think I did not love you enough Master! Let me do it this time! Please!"

"Very well so be it, I accept your love and your Release!"

There was a quiet cheer as my son cut off the iron collar that the boy had only worn for a few days and presented him with his dagger. Mir then kissed his feet and knelt beside him. Now was the difficult bit. I stood up and said so all could hear.

"Christopher, I believe you want to ask me something, and that you will need an assistant?"

"Yes Father, can Xavier come up?" I nodded and the boy came to the dais, I waited, Christopher swallowed hard, doing well to contain his fear.

"Please Father would you punish me because I disobeyed you, and I did not behave as your son should whilst we were away?"

The silence was intense,

"How shall I punish you for this my son?"

"Please Father, I deserve twelve lashes and please can Xavier horse me?"

There was a sharp intake of breath form the kneeling massed boys.

"Very well boy, prepare your self!"

Too late to back off now I watched him strip his loincloth off, naked, frightened and vulnerable as any Tribute Boy he grips Xavier's neck and the other boy leans forward presenting the whole of my sons body for punishment.

I pick up the heavy tawse, take off my jerkin and measure my distance for the first stroke, he is expecting this to be across his buttocks but instead I drive the leather down with all my strength across the boys back. The shock drives the breath out of him and he gasps, the vivid red weal turns slowly purple. The next lash is a little lower, his ribs show as he pants struggling for breath, brown body slicked with sweat. The next lash is across his thighs just above the knee joint, and involuntarily his legs spasm with the pain, even more so with the fourth stroke just below the crease of his buttocks. Now I see his buttocks clenched in pain or is it with an orgasm? I drive four more, spacing them out so that he appreciates every ounce of pain, on to his buttocks leaving them lividly bruised but no bleeding as there would have been if I used the heavy cane. His head is thrown back mouth open in silent agony.

I am becoming very aroused, I wish I could take him hard now, but I must carry on. One more stroke across his back. Now I stand by his right shoulder and aim two lashes in quick succession, length wise down the buttocks and backs of the thighs crossing the other strokes. He is beginning to loose control legs spasming wildly in spite of his efforts at self control. But there must be no doubt amongst the boys of the completeness of his punishment, and waiting my chance till the legs are spread wide I drive the final stroke into the cleft of his buttocks, the end of the leather curling in to strike across the anus. There is a gasp of horror and admiration from the boys. Xavier straightens up and there is wet sucking as their sweat soaked bodies separate, but not only sweat as I see my son has coated his friend with his sperm. Christopher stands swaying groggily, eyes welling with tears.

"Thank you Father, may I leave and go to my room now?"

"You may Christopher, but next time I might not be so lenient on you!"

"Yes Father, Buenos Noches!"

He has not even the strength to dress but walks pained and stiffly across the yard, too proud to go the easy way through the Games Complex, Mir looking frightened and concerned scoops up his loin cloth and pads after him. But now I must have relief and I dismiss the boys and take Xavier into one of the Games Rooms and thrust into him without mercy my body against his soft flesh slicked with my sons sperm. At the finish he says.

"Thank you Master ! Now I know I will have the courage to win the quarter staff competition for you!"

Exhausted, and needing more gentle pleasures, I send him to summon the Whale Boat crew to attend me back at the house, and that night I took Kumu to my bed and fully explored and used his lean, long limbed velvet body. His legs go rigid and his toes curl and uncurl in building lust on the silken sheets. He relay does have a very big cock for his age, and watching it spurting sparking white semen on to his heaving black belly deeply satisfying, especially as I am ejaculating deep into his throat simultaneously. Three down and three to go I must not forget the rest of the team. Variety is the spice of life.

The training trip with the whale boat was excellent, far better than I had hoped. One must seize the opportunity to train boys well. All the team are good as are the mignons, but Miguel only follows Rodolfo's lead, where as I think he prefers Kumu or Christian. Also his mignon Alphonse lacks fire I fear. Christian was an excellent fuck the night before last, why did he keep begging for me to make it six times? Vincent and Vasco I will take tonight, I do like sex with twins. Ah but Rodolfo was really special, showing the magic mixture of lust, devotion, and initiative along with the courage to live by his actions, and his little brother is quite something too. I will make sure their Papa gets a special invitation. What a pity that one must die even if they win.

Back in the present of a sunny summer morning, I dismiss Christopher to his practice and summon Sky with the pony. He stand there panting, long limbed and trembling with anticipation. His copper oiled skin is glistening and long raven black hair hangs over his shoulders. I slept alone last night tiered after the island, but now I feel the lust building; I think this is time for the final part of his breaking, just after the 9th birthday is good. If you start them right away as some do they are loose and useless before they are 13 and you miss much good fucking them into orgasm, besides they have much to learn about how to give pleasure in other ways and learn the necessary muscle control while you wait.

"Tie the pony to the rail Sky, can you ride a horse boy?"

"Oh yes Master!" He is very eager.

"Mount him then!"

He joyfully springs on the ponies back, I use no saddle, so he sits thighs spread wide to accommodate and grip his large mount. I go to him and move his hands behind him onto the ponies rump, then start moving my hands over his taught stretched body. He throws his head back and moans. I work him harder, see his little prick hard against his belly, move my finger under him, into him. Yes a virgin but ready! I feel the pony getting restive and glance down, he is fully hard too, boy sex always turns them on. I pinch his little nipples and he squirms and starts thrusting his hips. I bite at his ear and he squeaks.

"Well little boy are you big enough to ride your Master?"

"Oh please I don't think so, but I want to… make me like the big boys then I can run faster for you!"

I lifted him feather light and trembling into my arms and back up on to the warm flags of the veranda, I like their feel against my naked body as I lie back and he stands there uncertain.

"Get the butter, and the jam boy."

This is a tip my father taught me for the first penetration, the red masks all the other red as they clean up after, its such an anticlimax if they go into hysterics because they suddenly realise its them that's bleeding. He coats my member with the butter and a little jam too, then obedient to my instructions squats over me. He does try, finding the right place and pushing down hard but he is delightfully tight. Now the pain begins, with it the panic that he will fail me and himself, I find this very stimulating; as he struggles and cries out. I let him struggle for awhile, pinching his nipples hard to stimulate him even more, he is getting more desperate in his thrusts, but he is still hard, full of lust and determination. Then I have mercy on the poor little brute and seize his hips and very slowly pull him down, he was not quite big enough and I feel him tear a little and I am in all the way. When the scream died triumph began to light his eyes

"Is it in?" I nodded and he gave a little whoop of satisfaction.

"Come show me how well you can ride Sky!"

Now I got full advantage of his training, a virgin boy with perfect control over his sphincter, despite the obvious pain, is using his thigh and calf muscles to drive my adequate penis into his hot guts. He grunts in a mixture of pain, effort, and lust every time he goes right down. His copper skin slicked with sweat, dark eyes glazed, he starts shuddering with his first dry orgasm and I feel him contract almost painfully around me. Feeling my self ready I reach down and press myself painfully to stop the orgasm, he must work hard before he gets my sperm in him. While he works me back up I remember my first time, I was his age too. When he orgasms again I stop my self but when he does it a third time I let myself go and half hear my cry as pulse after pulse fills him. He drops shuddering on my belly and I stroke him a few moments before reminding him with a swat across the bum of his duties. He cleans me lapping greedily oblivious of his blood and shit mixed with my sperm.

When he is done I kiss him on the cheek and tell him he's now a full Tribute Boy, not just a little one, his eyes shine with pride though he is obviously very sore. I then go back to my chair and order him to kneel in front of me. I notice there is a lot of blood on his thighs.

"Sky, I have something very serious to ask you, now you are a full Tribute Boy will you do something for me, even though you will die if you fail?"

"I will Master."

"I want you to run for a wager against a boy from Miss M's stable at the big special event where Jan and Mishear dance, are you willing?"

"Oh please Master I will run and run." He even looks excited not perhaps appreciating the protracted agonies that he is agreeing to win or loose.

"Miss M is a cruel an hard woman and her boys know what she does when they loose. If you win I get 1000 € and choose an entertaining fate for her boy, I know you will win out of love for me?" He nods furiously

"But if you loose, she chooses your fate, and be sure that it will be very unusual, and very very painful. I think for instance she might like to show my guests how to make knot work patterns with that pretty skin of yours… first! Understand Boy?"

Good, I see the terror in his eyes, a little does help the love along to achieve a really splendid performance.

"Yes Master I will win for you or die!"

"Good boy!" I see the confidence come back, my timing just right.

"Well you are going to be useless to run for me today after giving me such a good ride, so get along with you to the vet for a check up of your sphincter, and get him to confirm that you can run for a couple of hours without passing out on us too? Oh and send the first boy you see to attend me unless he is with a guest."

"Oh! Thank you Master!"

We both know he would not run 100m in his present state and he is relieved at my mercy and understanding.

"Off with you then don't dawdle or it will all run out!"

He walks away giggling, but painfully splayed legged, and I recover from an excellent fuck while awaiting his replacement.

This is going to be an excellent day, if only it wasn't for those bloody Germans coming next week, they are sure to cause trouble, probably kill a couple of wretched brats in addition to all the hunt quarry they want. Bloody great Mercedes full of trophies groaning all the way back to Frankfurt or wherever. No taste, a boys life should be savoured individually not in great heaps of corpses, almost as bad as the Serbs or whoever they were. Thank god they are filthy rich and will pay through the nose for every one they take. My only other worry is that arrogant little fucker Richie, what surprise is he going to have in store for us? Well I have one for him and will warn The President of the Coursing Event…

The Narrator writes:-

This is the end of the first part of the Tribute Boys story, Book I. What will happen to our heroes small and big in Book II? It is now the start of the second week of July 2099. The German Party arrives in one week, and the Summer Release Festival is the last week of August.