Satyr’s Child

by

Tacitus

The gathering at Byzantium was the largest anyone could remember since the last conquering legions had passed through on returning from the eastern campaign ten years ago. Certainly the issue of a championship being at stake was a draw. But still, the fact that both contestants and spectators came from as far away as Britannia, Dacia and Armenia was a surprise to those who had seen similar fighting tournaments in the past.

The large crowd draw was due to two principal factors. First, with the Empire in increasing disarray on the northeastern frontier many felt that whoever emerged victorious would unite the provinces distant from Rome in their resistance to continued incursions of barbarian hordes from the east. Second, because of the elimination tournaments held throughout the Empire over the past year, only four principals were coming to Byzantium to fight to the finish. Those willing to pay the required sesterces would see only the best of the best in mortal combat.

While Rome itself seldom featured contests pitting woman against woman, and when it did they were amateurish bouts provided as much for comic relief as any serious display of martial prowess, here at the outer reaches of Empire, the idea was increasingly viewed as superb entertainment with a serious aspect. Away from the pleasures and decadence of Rome’s forum, women played a more important role in society, frequently taking up arms to defend home and hearth, fighting alongside their men if required. And because women were not viewed as a threat to the Emperor’s authority, the idea of a female champion uniting the various disparate tribes and societal factions into a cohesive fighting unit to defend the frontier complementing distant and overextended legions was a popular one.

As attendees streamed into the city by boat, horse and on foot, all the talk centered around two principal contestants. The first was the well-known warrior princess Xena, from the nearby, ancient Greek province of Thrace. Her accomplishments were known throughout the Empire, and she was once viewed as a logical successor to the martyred Caesar, who years earlier was her lover, and thought to have wanted her as his queen before assassination deprived the Empire of his leadership. The raven-haired Xena’s strength, cunning and intelligence were legend, and many had benefited from her efforts on their behalf.

But her triumphs, great and as well known as they were, had little in common with the contest she was entered in now. For combat in this specially constructed arena in Byzantium was to be fought with special rules, namely only with fist, feet and teeth. Xena’s armor, sword and chakrum were to be left outside the arena walls. The contestants were to be dressed only in light muslin shifts that normally comprised the undergarment prior to belting on of more substantial leather and metal armor. And few expected those light garments to remain intact longer than initial tests of strength.

Conventional wisdom said Xena would triumph. Certainly her large and fervent following hoped she would win. The odds in the Byzantium marketplaces were heavily in her favor. But there were those, particularly arriving from the northwestern regions of the Empire, who were not certain she would emerge the final victor, and were placing their bets elsewhere.

Their doubts as to Xena’s winning were occasioned by knowledge of who her most likely opponent would be. Her name was Callisto and she had come across the borders of the Empire from the hinterland east of the Rhine River in the northern provinces. Rumors had it that she had met Xena once before in combat, but this occurred in remote regions well outside of the Empire’s knowledge and responsibility, and no one seemed certain as to what the outcome of that contest had been. Callisto had disappeared for several years, but then reappeared at the head of a sizeable tribe, crossed the Rhine, and settled in deep forests seldom frequented by citizens of the Empire.

What was known about her was that while lacking the size and upper body strength of many female contestants, this shortcoming was more than compensated for by an innate understanding of the human body and its vital points, coupled with barely concealed cruelty and delight in crippling an opponent. In numerous contests leading up to the championship, every opposing fighter had outweighed her, and each time the blonde-haired Callisto had left victorious with her competitor on the ground hamstrung, bloodied and unable to move. While disdainful of her public, and content to be guarded by a closely knit band of Goths who permitted little public adulation or viewing of their charge, there were those that felt, even with little knowledge of her character or personal history, that she alone had the required skills needed to represent the might and power of Rome on the frontier.

Events leading up to the climatic match were much as the public expected. Xena, displaying the brute strength and finesse for which she was renowned, dispatched two worthy opponents, a statuesque Celt from Britannia and a swarthy Parthian from the Tigris River region to the east. While the tall, gangly Celt fought to the best of her ability, she was merely a big, but conventional fighter, and was simply outfought, outthought and overpowered by the well-built Thracian at every turn. When Britannia’s best finally collapsed in exhaustion and frustration, her every blow countered, there was nary a mark on the warrior princess.

The Parthian, however, though slighter of build than Xena, had proven a much greater challenge for the warrior princess. Shortly after the contest had begun, with garments quickly torn asunder, the thin, flint-hard, olive-complexioned fighter from the east had adroitly escaped from a test of upright arm strength, which she was clearly destined to lose, by cleverly falling to her knees, tearing one hand away from Xena’s grasp, and repeatedly striking the surprised Greek low in the groin. After a flurry of powerful blows, with the Thracian now prostrate on the hard dirt floor of the arena, the Parthian abandoned any pretense of contesting Xena’s strength, and instead tore at her pubic mound with abandon, employing fists, nails and teeth. Then rising to a half crouch, she began dropping with her full weight on Xena’s groin with her right knee, taking clear delight in hearing the crowd’s favorite cry out in pain as the slight Parthian inflicted as much damage as possible.

Only a desperate kick into the face from a ravaged Xena as the Parthian prepared still another knee-drop earned the Greek some time to gain her feet and composure. Still bent low in pain, she absorbed several additional savage kicks in the ribs and kidneys. Though bleeding from numerous cuts and contusions administered by her treacherous opponent, she was finally able to gain the advantage by employing her superior weight and upper-body strength to bully the Parthian against the arena wall and pummel her into unconsciousness with hammer-like blows to the head, chest and stomach. Raising her right arm weakly in triumph and acknowledgement of the crowd’s cheers, Xena slowly made her way back to her cell beneath the arena floor, clutching herself low, in a great deal of pain. A slow murmur made its way through the crowd at sight of her obvious discomfort. Not a few additional bets were made that night in the bazaar, for the final fight was only a day away.

Not unlike Xena’s battles, those of Callisto leading up to the final contest met the crowd’s expectations. The striking blonde warrior’s first bout was against a Spaniard from Iberia. Rapidly shredding their thin shifts in the first few moments of the contest, the fight raged across the entire expanse of the arena floor, as the dark-haired Iberian vainly tried to corner the crafty blonde. Twice the Germanic woman seemed about to fall under repeated blows and kicks, but each time at the last minute, nimbly scampered away. Finally, growing tired of running, Callisto consented to a traditional test of strength in the arena center. As the Spaniard slowly backed her, arms outstretched, towards the arena wall, the blonde suddenly dropped her arms to her side and buried her head in the Iberian’s ample breasts. A terrified shriek of pain from the dark-haired warrior proved to doubters the wisdom of those that noted Callisto’s cruel ability to inflict sudden, intense damage to vulnerable areas of the body.

The Spanish woman continued to scream in pain as she tried to remove Callisto’s head from her chest. When she finally succeeded, the blonde’s mouth was stained red with her blood, and not a small amount of flesh when she spat out with a cry of haughty disgust. As her victim looked in astonishment at the blood coursing down her torso, Callisto kicked her savagely in the groin, and followed up with a side kick to the head as her victim collapsed in a tangled heap. Rolling the dark haired beauty flat on her stomach, straddling her back, and savagely pulling her head back by the hair, Callisto chopped twice in rapid succession at the vulnerable throat area. Two more quick blows to the neck, followed by two additional strikes to the throat, culminated in a series of knee drops to the small of the back as the gagging Spaniard writhed under the assault of the Teutonic dominatrix.

Callisto was clearly enjoying the torture she was inflicting on her hapless victim, and slowly walked around the prostrate figure gesturing disdainfully to the crowd before once again straddling her opponent. Lacing her fingers tightly under the Iberian’s chin she pulled backed mercilessly, eliciting a deep groan of pain from the tightly clenched jaws of her opponent. Bending her back until the Spanish woman’s breasts were free of the arena floor, Callisto rapidly disengaged her right hand and grasped the right breast of her opponent, digging her nails deep into the tender, but now bloody and dirt-caked flesh. Another groan of anguish was heard, and in response Callisto suddenly let go of the chin with the other hand, driving her hapless victim’s head hard into the dirt.

Quickly standing, the blonde warrior rolled her darker opponent over. It was clear to the arena crowd that the fight was over, the Iberian beauty’s now broken nose bleeding profusely, blending its crimson stain with that of her breasts and flowing in to the dirt beneath her. But Callisto, her smile and delight apparent to all, seemed intent on one final humiliation, and carefully spreading her opponent’s legs wide, delivered two vicious kicks in rapid succession to the pubic region, followed up by a knee drop that impacted just below the navel. The Spanish woman shrieked in anguish, tried to sit up, but was knocked down by a savage fist to the face that further displaced the already broken nose. Not only fight, but now consciousness deserted her opponent, and Callisto languidly picked at the limp body as a lioness would her kill, before sauntering back to her cell beneath the arena floor, hardly the worse for wear.

A day later, immediately following Xena’s climatic match with the Parthian, Callisto faced off again, this time against a Numidian giantess that hailed from the African regions south of Carthage. Callisto noted the still moist patterns of blood in the arena dirt and wondered if it belonged to the victor or vanquished that preceded her; the former she hoped, for it was always easier to compete against a wounded opponent than one in full health and strength.

But the size of the Numidian, her hair shorn close, rock hard abdominal muscles rippling in her torso, and long, powerful arms flexing as she approached her smaller opponent, immediately brought Callisto’s attention back to the present danger. Again, the thin muslin shifts were gone within minutes of the match’s beginning, and the alabaster skin and bright blonde hair of the Teutonic warrior contrasted sharply with the dark skin and closely cropped hair of her opponent in the early afternoon sun. Here, as in her first match, Callisto sought to avoid the heavy-chested and clearly more powerful Negro woman. Initially, her scampering tactics to tire her rival seemed to work, but then a sudden feint by the African followed by a quick lunge in the opposite direction saw both combatants thigh-to-thigh, breast-to-breast, engaged in a titanic struggle of simultaneous bear hugs.

Callisto cursed, knowing she had been outthought. This Numidian was no dumb black bitch. Contesting bear hugs was a struggle the blonde was certain to lose and she only had moments to reverse the tide of the battle and counter the incredible strength of this woman. Sweat from the strain of the contest dripped off the black woman’s chin and down in to Callisto’s eyes. The fetid breath of garlic was strong in her face, making her nauseous. When the African momentarily relaxed her hold, but then drove both fists low, into the small of Callisto’s back, she cried out in pain as her muscles began to spasm.

Slowly, the blonde’s grip around the Numidian’s muscle-rippled stomach and back weakened, and before long her arms fell uselessly to her side as the black woman sensed victory. Bending her prey further over elicited louder groans of agony from the seemingly helpless Germanic warrior. Suddenly letting the listless body drop, the African raised her foot to deliver a contest-ending stomp to the throat. But Callisto, sensing this was the only opening against this giantess she would have, suddenly rolled on her left side, pushed herself up on her left elbow, and drove her right hand, long-nailed fingers outstretched, deep into the thick black curls of the African woman’s womanhood.

A startled cry of surprise issued from larger woman’s lips, as she quickly sank to her knees in a vain attempt to relieve the pain and pressure of the blonde’s claw-like grip, which had now entered her, ripping and tearing. Callisto gave a shout of triumph and while maintaining her right hand in her opponent’s groin, quickly sat through, spun around on her right hip and wrapped two sun-bronzed sinewy legs around the dark woman’s neck. Locking them together at the ankles, she released her right hand, arched all but her head off the ground, twisted to the left, and focused all her weight and leg strength on putting tremendous pressure and torque on her opponent’s neck. Blows to the blonde’s alabaster thighs and pubic mound by the increasingly desperate African seemed to weaken Callisto’s grip initially, but then she delivered a sudden, powerful jerk to her opponent’s neck by collapsing her entire body to the ground. Her powerful quadriceps muscles suddenly bulging with the additional weight, the blonde twisted sharply to the left, and there was a barely audible cracking sound as the African woman’s neck broke. Still conscious, the Numidian slowly keeled over, firmly ensconced in the grip of her opponent’s powerful lower legs.

The noise of the crowd was suddenly stilled, the thrill of the contest for the moment replaced by the shock of the woman’s critical injury. This was not Rome, and while the audiences of Byzantium enjoyed the spectacle of women engaged in combat, blood, gore, sweat, and broken limbs, maiming and permanent crippling were very unusual occurrences, and were not appreciated. The goals of these contests were to produce heroes and champions for society at large, and male and female victors were expected to lead the people, not descend into sadistic tortures or barbarous conduct. That was a style of combat and entertainment more fit for squalid camps of Goths and Huns to the east, or perhaps the decadent polity of Rome. Byzantium, reflecting its roots as a centuries-old Greek colony before there even was a Rome, appreciated contests for the traditional Greek celebration of strength and beauty in the male and female form aroused in physical and sexual prowess. Paralyzing injuries and lingering death caused by arena contests were not part of the image cosmopolitan Hellenic Byzantium sought to foster in the Mediterranean world.

Callisto unwrapped her legs from around the neck of her victim and slowly arose. Those closest to the arena perimeter could hear a low, almost demonic howl issue from her throat. Former legionnaires thought of timber wolves in dark German forests. Devotees to the ancient cult of Dionysus recalled stories of half-man-half-stag Satyrs celebrating their kills in such a manner before descending into drunken orgiastic rites with lithesome Greek maidens.

The bestial howl got perceptibly louder, but so did an increased stirring of the crowd, uneasy at the brutality and unseemly pagan ritual they were witnessing. Uncertain of how to react, Callisto ceased making any sound and recoiled tactfully from the supine victim at her feet. But then she became increasingly angry at the obvious reaction of disapproval from the crowd. It could have been her, she reasoned, lying there useless and broken in the dirt. It was she, not the Negro woman, who had been within a callused foot-stomp to the throat of being rendered helpless with a crushed windpipe. What would they have thought then? Would they have reacted in the same manner if it had been the black giantess, rather than the blonde warrior, who now stood before them naked and erect, resplendent in total victory?

As the rage built within her, she disdainfully kicked aside an outstretched arm of the Numidian woman. Seeking to celebrate, she started to raise both arms signifying her personal triumph but then realized that tomorrow she would need the crowd, or at least some of it, on her side if the final opponent proved as much of a challenge as had this woman. So choking back the bitter bile in her throat, the desire to shout to the sky a Germanic war cry of victory, she lowered her arms, and walked slowly and respectfully back to her cell. Halfway across the arena floor, the crowd, initially hesitant, broke out in scattered cheering that grew louder as she proceeded. The desired effect was achieved, and only a few observers lingering above the doorway saw the wicked smile of pleasure and satisfaction that spread across Callisto’s face as she exited the arena, to the now thunderous roar of the crowd. In the end, it had all worked out very nicely.

More money changed hands that night in the marketplace. Those putting sesterces on the line seemed evenly split between Xena and Callisto as to who would win. Many still thought the power of Xena, particularly her upper body strength hewn over years of combat in various locales and multiple opponents, male and female, would triumph. Others, particularly spectators who had witnessed the low blows administered to Xena by the Parthian and both of Callisto’s fights, were not so certain. In her performance at the end of the Numidian match, attendees who had observed or participated in these contests over the years sensed both a viciousness and craftiness in the blonde warrior that might prevail over her more powerful, raven-haired opponent.

The morning of the final contest broke bright and hot over the quiet of the city packed with attendees from all corners of the Empire. A sense of anticipation, of final reckoning, was in the air. Though the match was not scheduled to begin until high noon, the wooden seats in the third and fourth zones of the arena, allocated to slaves, foreigners and women, began filling shortly after dawn. Those on the lower rungs of Byzantium’s society sought the best places possible to view the pending contest, aware that superior views, from tiers of marble seats in the first and second zones, were reserved for distinguished private citizens and members of the local middle class. Sailors from ships in port were manning the guy ropes of two large colored awnings that would provide shade for the audience, but the rich and famous, unwilling to associate any longer than necessary with the unwashed masses, timed their arrival to coincide with the commencement of combat.

In separate bathhouses a scant few blocks away from the arena, Xena and Callisto prepared for their fateful encounter. By now, even though they had not witnessed each other’s fights leading up to today’s encounter, both knew who their opponent would be. Tending slaves had told them, and also summarized the previous contests as much as they could remember from their masters’ and mistresses’ stories around banquet tables the previous night.

Xena, slowly stretching her long, thick, muscular arms and legs after a morning swim, felt the continued tenderness of her inner thighs and pubic area where the Parthian bitch had brutalized her. Now lying carefully on the massage table as two slaves kneaded her tight deltoids and pectorals with a viscous cream obtained from lands south of Judea, she carefully shielded her grimace as firm, callused hands massaged between her legs, pressed hard into her quadriceps, and stroked and lathered her pubic area. No sense in starting tongues wagging, for if word of yesterday’s still unhealed damage were to spread to her opponent, it would provide undue advantage in the contest to follow.

Her large pendulous breasts, unblemished in contests to date, were firm and erect in stimulation, her engorged nipples responding to the sensuous full-body massage, as firm hands squeezed, rubbed and manipulated her limbs and thick muscular frame. As the slaves diligently dug in to her rigid abdominals, how she would like to have taken these two to bed now, she thought. Male…female…she could care less, and like the legendary Greek hero Alexander, she had enjoyed the company of both sexes for years, seeking nothing but pure pleasure in the classic Hellenistic sense.

But enough…there would be plenty of time to celebrate after today’s fight was over. She again brought focus to the issue at hand, how to defeat Callisto, whom she vaguely remembered from an encounter in the forests of Germany over a decade ago. That contest had been decided by sword and chariot, but Xena recalled several desperate moments in the struggle. She had won out in the end, and thought Callisto long-since dead, but obviously she was alive, and more powerful and dangerous than ever, if the slaves’ stories were to be believed. Though only generally aware of the details of the blonde warrior’s two matches that had gotten her to the final contest, Xena reasoned that confined to hands, feet and teeth, she would need all her strength, stamina and cunning to win out over her vicious opponent.

Several streets away, the object of her attention was herself just completing a similar stretching routine. Her ploy at the end of the Numidian match had paid off much better than expected. A Greek courtesan, tired of her corpulent husband’s flaccid sexual appetite, had come to her before midnight. Slowly massaging and fingering the naked beauty of the Teutonic warrior sprawled across the settee, she related that she had watched Xena’s match intently, for she derived sexual stimulation from watching two powerful women fight. The courtesan related that the celebrated warrior princess had been dealt repeated blows in the lower abdomen, inner thighs and pubic area that doubtless would remain tender and sore for the pending contest. Callisto, suddenly alert with interest, rolled over on one elbow and asked her to describe the nature of the blows, where they had landed, and Xena’s reaction. The courtesan’s hand movements over her own pubic area in self-demonstration both intrigued and excited the blonde. After ascertaining that Xena had seemed to retire from the arena floor in considerable pain, Callisto assisted the now thoroughly aroused woman in shedding her robe and the two embraced and quickly ran their hands over each other’s nubile body.

Callisto, like her opponent, had long enjoyed the company of both men and women, though her desire to dominate and inflict pain led her to favor the young male warriors and mercenary Greek hoplites that oftentimes populated her camps looking for employment. There was nothing like dominating the body of a sun-bronzed Greek warrior descendant from Alexander’s great army of earlier centuries to arouse in Callisto the most animalistic of sexual instincts. She was a voracious predator in bed on such occasions, and her sharp-as-knives flashing nails and exuberant thrashing and bucking had rudely intimidated more than one man used to only pliant Roman widows and adolescent barbarian women seeking only a warm bed on a cold winter’s night.

Now, with breasts engorged and nipples hard, she allowed herself to be entered by the Greek courtesan, who clearly knew her business of providing pleasure to both males and females. Callisto’s climax, accompanied shortly thereafter by that of her able accomplice, ended the night’s entertainment.

For there was work to be done, and Callisto needed a clear head tomorrow. She remembered her last encounter with Xena, the whirl of her chakrum in flight, the cut of her sword, the chariot race that ended with both tumbling down a sharp ravine fighting for survival. A numbing blow to the head when she struck a rock, a clubbing Greek fist to the chin that rendered her unconscious, then being marched in chains at the end of a long line of prisoners going back to Tarsus was all she remembered, until the night she strangled her jailer and escaped, swearing eternal revenge on the female warrior who had done this to her.

Now it was her toned and hardened body against that of the Thracian whore. Though small of breast and thigh, Callisto had campaigned hard for the prior two years against the Hun, and won all singular encounters with these barbarians from the east. She knew how to hurt an opponent. She gloried in the hunt, and celebrated the kill. There would be no special implements of war or oft-rumored gifts from the Gods like the last time she met Xena. This time, just fists and feet, nails and teeth. It was Callisto’s kind of fight. Tomorrow would be her day.

The blonde’s last thoughts were of her clever stratagem at the end of her last match. The false gesture of remorse had deceived these fools. The crowd would at least be neutral, and some would doubtless be on her side. Stroking her womanhood, she envisioned where, how and when she would strike and destroy Xena’s body. Morning came all too soon.

As high noon approached, messengers arrived at both bathhouses to find the contestants anxious to proceed to the arena. Escorted through the streets by separate byways, and threading the maze of passages adjoining the arena pit by different routes, they both arrived at their small, unventilated cells to be attended one final time by a pair of slave women, who extracted more thick viscous oil from two-handled jars, and applied it in copious amounts to the warriors’ arms, shoulders, thighs, calves and breasts. Both Xena and Callisto lay still and silent under the final manipulations of their attendants, focusing on the struggle that was moments away from starting. The heat and air in the cells were stifling.

Above them, the distant stirring of the crowd promised the arena would be full. The nauseous smell of dead animals, excrement and gladiators mixed with the fermenting odors of adjacent moors and the heat of the Mediterranean summer to produce an almost stupefying stench. The packed dirt comprising the arena floor was hot to the touch and would soon mix with the oil being liberally applied to the contestants. While in theory it was thought to provide protection from the merciless sun and searing heat, as well as prolong struggles by increasing the difficulty of grapplers in firmly grasping and holding a twisting opponent, arena veterans knew that it also served to blind if it got into the eyes of a contestant.

As the patricians filed quietly into the best seats the sailor-drawn awnings were slowly pulled across the arena until only the pit itself was brightly lit. The long guy ropes dangled down inside the arena perimeter. Xena and Callisto stretched and flexed below, aided by pliant slave hands that massaged their inner thighs, groins and lower backs with the last dregs of the oil. If either contestant was the least bit sexually aroused, those feelings were dismissed for the moment. There would be time enough for celebration with willing lovers afterwards. Neither warrior considered that they might not emerge victorious from this final struggle for supremacy.

Finally they were alerted, rose, and slipped on the standard muslin undergarment. At the sound of a single-note trumpet, attendants threw open the cell doors and escorted their occupants up the stairs, across respective landings, and through opposite entrance doors into the harsh light of the arena, accompanied by the thunderous cheers of the crowd, now on its feet to closely study the combatants. As both contestants momentarily paused to adjust to the searing heat and harsh light, only the continuous cheers of the crowd drowned out the metallic clinking of sesterces, as final bets were made, changed and doubled, with ubiquitous moneychangers taking careful notes.

Now with eyes adjusted to the surroundings, both women looked at one another closely. Adversaries a decade ago, both could see that the ensuing years had not been particularly kind to either. Wounds, both old and recent, were clearly evident, witness to too many fights to the death and cold, lonely winter months spent beyond the civilized splendor of Rome, Alexandria or Byzantium. Still there was a haughty, regal splendor to these women, and the crowd sensed that all that made the Roman Empire great was captured by these two female Amazons about to struggle for martial supremacy in the arena.

Xena was the first to speak. “Callisto,” she sneered, “So we meet again. I should have known.”

“Yes, you Thracian slut, we meet again. Only this time it will be you that leaves in chains, if you are even able to walk…or even still alive,” Callisto retorted.

“Then so be it. Let the Gods decide,” replied Xena, all the while carefully watching her opponent’s every move. The Teutonic warrior seemed taller, more heavily endowed than their last encounter. She definitely weighed more than before, but the addition was well-developed muscle, not fat. And look at those legs. Lithe, powerful, and as Xena admitted to herself, still sensuous after all these years. How she would like to bed this bitch…but that would come later.

What was clear now was that Callisto was in superb fighting form. This contest was going to be a dangerous one, Xena thought. It was the blonde’s fiendish mind, and her knowledge of how to really hurt an opponent, that posed the real danger, she recalled. And as the Thracian continued to saunter to the left, in an ever-decreasing circle, the twinge in her groin reminded her that she was fighting hurt. Did Callisto have any knowledge of yesterday’s match?

For her part, Callisto thought Xena looked much as she had a decade earlier. Perhaps a bit heavier, but those thickly muscled thighs and upper arms looked every bit as strong and capable as she remembered, and as the raven-haired warrior’s subsequent record in combat in various arenas suggested. And beneath these useless muslin shifts, the breadth of her shoulders, the powerful muscles rippling across her back and abdomen, and her full, ripe breasts were evident. God she was beautiful, Callisto thought. If only I did not loathe her, I might love her. She would certainly be as suitable a bed partner as any Greek hoplite I ever fucked. And if this Thracian’s cunt was hurt yesterday, it certainly was not evident today.

A welcome from the provincial governor broke into both warriors’ trains of thought. The crowd noise was such that no one really heard what he said, but the celebration today was one of strength of arms, not the machinations of politicians, so no one cared.

But as he droned on, suddenly on impulse, Callisto shouted at her opponent, “Xena, you fat sow. Let’s remove these worthless shifts before we begin. Let’s give these fools a look at what they paid to see, especially before your body is broken.” And with that, in one quick movement Callisto raised her muslin undergarment over her head and threw it up into the patrician benches.

The resultant roar of the crowd, gazing at Callisto’s splendidly naked body, her well-oiled, sinewy limbs and small, high-thrusting breasts glistening in the bright sun, made it all but certain that Xena would have to reciprocate. As the governor sat down, ignored by the crowd’s lustful cheers, Xena quickly removed her own muslin garment, although only after carefully checking to ensure sufficient distance remained between her and Callisto, and likewise threw it into the crowd. Again, the reaction of the masses to both naked warriors was overpowering in its fervor and intensity. Xena’s well-oiled and anointed body also glistened in the sun, her raven hair and darker complexion giving a deep, lustrous glow to her entire body. She was clearly the more heavily muscled of the two, with torso, thighs, deltoids and triceps almost sculpted in their intense relief. Acute abdominal muscles that rippled in their strength and intensity crowned her narrow waist. Those that had seen Xena over the years thought she never looked better…or stronger. Surely, such a body would be impervious to the guile and treachery of Callisto.

The provincial governor was pleased, and intended to send a detailed account of this struggle to the Emperor himself. The view of these two splendid naked Amazons, each intent on total victory, each confident in her own cunning and desire to win, was the very epitome of what these games, and their ancient Greek antecedents, were all about. The human form, in all its strength and ferocity, pushed to the limit…and beyond. This was going to be a match for the ages, a subject worthy of bards’ songs and scribes’ tales. The official stood again, holding the purple sash signifying the power and glory of Rome. Gesturing to the crowd for effect, he released it. As it fluttered to the ground, thousands of voices rose in a deafening roar. The final game had begun.

Almost as if by mutual consent, both combatants rushed at one another as soon as the imperial artifice struck the ground. The crowd ceased its shouting almost immediately, intent on hearing every sound of two determined women engaged in a struggle for physical supremacy. The crowd gazed intently at the two combatants, seeking to discern every nuance of gain and loss that might foretell the ultimate victor.

Both naked bodies collided in the center of the ring, reaching out for one another, seeking initial advantage in a purchase of hair, the nipple of a breast, or the flesh of an inner thigh. A brief flailing of arms and legs, and both were rolling on the dirt-packed floor of the arena. Xena was the first to regain her feet, just missing Callisto’s head with a side kick as the blonde moved to stand up. Her foot sailed high, or Callisto tucked her head at the last possible moment. The avid spectators were unsure, but they did not fail to see Callisto respond by raking Xena’s right inner thigh with her razor-sharp nails. First blood went to Callisto, as her opponent glanced down at three deep cuts just below her crotch, extending almost to mid-thigh. Yes, this she-bitch was dangerous.

Shaking off the initial pain, Xena raised both arms in the traditional wrestling test of strength. Callisto smiled. Xena was displaying her knowledge of skills and holds taught to her years ago at the Olympian wrestling school in her hometown of Amphipolis. So be it. Callisto would play her game...for a while.

Xena’s approach to combat was always the same, thought the Germanic warrior. One-on-one, calculating brute strength, little long-term strategy, but rather always trying to out-think her opponent’s next move. Well, let her try and out-think me. She has no idea what I have learned, or what I intend to do to her. There would be time enough to fight my way, after searing sun, baking heat, torn muscles and blood loss has exhausted this cunt. For now, let’s do it her way.

And so with a guttural grunt of acceptance, Callisto advanced, arms outstretched, and locked up with her adversary. The initial handclasp was followed almost immediately by a moist smacking sound as well-oiled breasts, groins and thighs slammed together. The crowd was eerily silent, listening to the grunts and groans of struggle as two evenly matched Amazon warriors sought to gain dominance.

Xena, rising to her full height, deltoids, pectorals and biceps standing out in bold relief from her glistening, oil-lathered body, slowly began forcing Callisto back towards the wall. The warrior princess was surprised at the resistance being offered by her blonde opponent. Clearly this bitch’s upper body strength was greater than the last time they had met.

For her part, Callisto had forgotten just how strong Xena was, far greater than those filthy, stupid Huns she had fought against on the frontier for the past several summers. Arms uplifted, large pendular breasts and nipples erect with sensuous stimulation that always accompanied female-on-female combat, the Thracian’s expansive chest and layered abdominal muscles tapering to a narrow waist, followed by massive thighs with quadriceps in bold relief suggested to the Teutonic woman from the north nothing less than the very picture of a legendary Amazonian warrior triumphant.

For a brief moment, a sense of doubt flickered across Callisto’s countenance. Could she actually beat this raven-haired warrior princess in a fair fight? Certainly the power being brought to bear on her extended arms, shoulders and back was greater than anything she had experienced since she last met Xena in combat—and she had lost that encounter!

But just as quickly Callisto put such fears out of her mind, for their continued consideration could only become a self-fulfilling prophecy. And Callisto didn’t believe in prophecies…or in the Gods for that matter. You were what you fought for and won, what you took and kept for yourself, fair or foul. Delphic oracles and animal entrails, Zeus and Apollo, Athena and Diana, indeed all the Gods…were just jackals honored and worshipped by jackasses. And so with a resounding Germanic war cry, Callisto surged upward, reversing all of Xena’s gains and actually forcing her backward several steps.

But then the Thracian warrior dug the balls of her feet deep into the arena dirt. With upper thighs and arms trembling under the tension and brute downward force being exerted, she reasserted herself, muscles in the small of her back bulging with power and resolution, and Callisto’s advance was halted and her slow retreat across the arena floor resumed. The blonde continued to struggle, but conscious she could not hope to win a standup contest of strength, attempted to disengage, but to no avail. Xena remembered the Parthian’s trick, and gripping both of Callisto’s hands with knuckle-crushing ferocity, eliminated any hope of separation that her smaller adversary sought.

Eventually the Germanic warrior sensed she was nearing the arena wall, and as she brushed against it, was surprised to see the awning guy ropes dangling down within a short distance of the ground. But then Xena brought her right knee up, driving it into Callisto’s belly. As the air was driven from the blonde’s lungs, she staggered backwards. This was a move she hadn’t expected this early in the contest. So Xena didn’t intend to play by the classic rules and stratagems of wrestling. Fine…neither did she…and Xena’s early ploy would make the crowd more willing to accept Callisto’s actions later in the contest.

But her attempt to block another knee lift was only partially successful, and the Greek woman’s knee, callused and chafed from near continual wear of body armor, drove hard into Callisto’s inner left thigh in a pulverizing blow. A third numbing knee lift again struck the winded blonde’s groin. She would have fallen to the ground were Xena to have relaxed her grip, but the Thracian had no intention of letting her escape.

Instead, slamming her head against the arena wall, Xena pinned the German woman’s left hand and forearm above her head, quickly broke her right hand grip, and drove her fist straight into Callisto’s face. The crowd saw the resultant spray of spittle and blood and registered this as the first telling blow of the fight.

Another fist to the face was followed by a brutal open-hand chop to the throat and another knee lift to the groin. Callisto sagged against the wall, hurt and disoriented, as Xena relaxed her left hand’s grip and quickly connected with three more hammer blows to the blonde’s small breasts and sternum. These were strikes with brutal power behind them, the dull resonance of hard fist striking soft flesh on and below the blonde’s rib cage audible to nearby spectators. Callisto’s body lifted and rocked with each telling blow, fell and sagged with each following retraction. The raven-haired Thracian appeared totally dominant, the Germanic blonde surprisingly defenseless. As Xena backed away from her quarry slightly, Callisto slumped over, remaining on her feet only by the back support offered by the hot walls of the arena. Blood flowed from her nose and a cut above her left eye; her breasts, ribs, abdominals and left thigh screamed in pain. Blood, oil and dirt were coagulating in a sticky mass near her mouth, threatening to gag or blind her.

Xena smiled at her opponent’s obvious predicament, but had no intention of allowing her time to recover. The warrior princess’ early attacks to the groin, so uncharacteristic of her normal fighting methods, had clearly caught this blonde bitch off guard. So she thought she knew how I would fight!

Closing her hapless adversary again, Xena quickly rained two thundering rights to the ribs, a left to the upper chest, and another left, knuckles first, into the face. A fine spray of blood, sweat and spittle again flew into the air as the seemingly helpless blonde abruptly sat down, remaining upright only by bracing her arms on the arena floor, struggling to remain conscious.

Xena stepped back, surveyed her handiwork, then approached and bent down to grab the legs of her opponent, intent on dragging her away from the wall’s support and back to the middle of the arena where the day’s work could be quickly concluded. But as she reached for Callisto’s ankles, the blonde suddenly rocked forward and with the nails of her left hand slashed at Xena’s right eye, while her right hand, containing a congealed mixture of oil, dirt and blood, jammed into the Greek woman’s left eye. The impact of the heel of the hand striking the unprotected cornea was clearly evident to the arena crowd.

Xena recoiled in shock and acute pain, realizing it was now she who had underestimated her opponent. Scrambling to clear her left eye as her right eye filled with blood from slashing cuts to her eyebrow and eyelid, the warrior princess was unable to make out the movement of her enemy as Callisto rolled away in the dirt. By instinct, Xena moved in the general direction of the wall, intent on closing and destroying her unseen rival while she still had some vision from one eye. Instead, she sensed rather than saw someone behind her and a savage double forearm chop to the back of the neck drove her head hard against the hot brick surface of the arena wall.

Callisto, standing immediately behind her, began throwing measured fists into the Greek’s kidney area and lower back, striking places she knew could do real damage to the whore’s body. Occasionally she delivered a powerful kick to Xena’s right thigh with the clear intent of hamstringing her. An attempt by the warrior princess to turn around was countered with another nail gouge to the right eye.

Xena was now the one in trouble; she knew it, the crowd knew it, and so did Callisto, who continued to throw punches and savage kicks with demonic passion, laughing and howling in delight through the thick mucus of blood, oil and sweat that continued to drain into her mouth. At last she grew tired of her deliberate body work. Xena had now sunk to her knees, her legs flat on the arena floor while her upper body and arms still clung desperately to the side wall. Her chest heaved in response to giant gasps for air as she attempted to regain her breath, composure…and sight.

Callisto closed in for the kill, and after a side kick to the head, grabbed Xena’s outstretched right arm, her sword arm if Callisto remembered correctly, and wrenched it savagely behind her back. Xena cried out in pain and attempted to stand to ease the brutal pressure on her shoulder and elbow, but Callisto drove her right foot down hard on the lower calf muscle of the Greek woman’s right leg. Xena was going nowhere.

“Now you Thracian cunt! How do you like this?” Callisto shouted, and wrenched the warrior princess’ right arm again, so high that her wrist nearly touched her neck. In such a position, Xena was helpless, and cried out in excruciating pain as the blonde dominatrix took advantage of her predicament by driving a right knee savagely into her victim’s lower back. The feeling of something giving way, breaking, either an arm, shoulder or rib, excited the German warrior to even greater ecstasy. Now almost half-animal-half human, she dropped Xena’s right arm, seized two handfuls of raven hair, and drove the Thracian’s head forcefully into the wall.

Xena’s cry of pain as her nose broke was clearly audible in the arena. The crowd appeared uncertain of the spectacle being played out below them. It was an outcome not many had expected, hoped for, or gambled on.

Callisto again pulled back Xena’s head and chopped down twice on her throat, resulting in a half-choking gurgle of blood and spittle issued from the dark-haired beauty’s mouth. The Germanic warrior responded by again jerking the Greek’s head back, only this time she let her victim continue falling backwards, pinning her lower legs beneath her thighs and upper body.

The view that Xena now presented to the crowd, large pendent breasts splayed flat, the dark thatch of her womanhood and massive thighs visible to all, fulfilled wild fantasies for many men and women in the galleries above. It was a view equally shared by Callisto, but while as sexually aroused as any spectator, her intent was to destroy, rather than enjoy, the plentiful riches now spread eagle before her.

A sharp kick to the right side elicited a cry of pain from the hapless Greek that confirmed Callisto’s suspicion that at least one rib, if not more, was broken. The ascendant blonde straddled her fallen foe, laughing out loud at the once beautiful face now sheathed in blood, oil and dirt, one eye already swollen shut and the other a mere slit. Xena could barely make out the towering presence above her. The merciless sun, combined with the cumulative effects of her wounds, made any sort of counter impossible at present.

Shadow movement was followed by searing pain in her groin as Callisto drove her flinty right knee hard into the Greek woman’s sexual mound. A repeat blow was followed by a flurry of nails attacking her large breasts, cutting and slashing. Xena shrieked in pain at the unseen attack, but the blood from her broken nose nearly choked her, and she shut her mouth, trembling in pain. Callisto, now sitting astride her stomach laughed maliciously, rubbing a fistful of dirt into the Thracian’s forehead and lips with her right hand while tearing at her right breast and nipple with her left. Then both hands joined and crushed and tore at her breasts, sharp nails penetrating deep into soft flesh before being extracted. Delighted at her handiwork, Callisto cackled, “This is the last time anyone will want to suck these tits, whore!”

Xena’s resistance seeming to ebb, Callisto tired of the game and stood up and to one side. She wanted to finish this bitch off slowly, inflicting agonizing pain over a long time, making the crowd admit to her own strength and dominance, while humiliating this so-called warrior princess that had such a large group of admiring followers throughout the Empire.

She walked around to the raven beauty’s head, bent down and grabbed two full hands of hair, dragging her quarry back towards the center of the arena. When there, she dropped her listless prey, walked to the Greek woman’s feet, and drove a deeply callused heel deep into Xena’s groin.

The shock of the blow saw the Thracian raise her knees in defense. Callisto laughed disdainfully, struck both legs apart, and fell to her own knees, burying her head in Xena’s crotch, her teeth biting and tearing at her victim’s womanhood.

The resultant pain inflicted by her unseen adversary was greater than any Xena could recall. She shrieked loudly before choking on her own blood again. Callisto looked up malevolently, her mouth stained with blood and dark pubic hair, laughing at the evident shock her opponent was suffering.

But her voice told Xena where her tormentress was, and as Callisto lowered her head to re-attack, the Greek warrior quickly raised her legs and again locked her ankles, trapping Callisto’s head between her muscular thighs

Xena squeezed her quadriceps together as hard as she could, while simultaneously tearing at her adversary’s hair with one hand while trying to clear her eyes with the other. For her part, Callisto was surprised at the Greek warrior’s rejuvenated strength after the brutal beating to which she had been subjected. But Callisto quickly realized that she was now the one in real danger of losing this contest. The strength of Xena’s thigh muscles were driving her head suffocatingly into the Greek woman’s snatch. Soon the Teutonic warrior would be unconscious.

Feeling herself steadily weakening, Callisto opened her mouth as far as she could manage, took as much of Xena as possible inside, and bit down. The shriek of pain and immediate release of the head crushing grasp of her massive thighs told Callisto she had badly wounded her adversary, and she had not even fully closed her mouth to tear out any flesh. So the Greek courtesan was right!

But as Callisto rose on all fours, gasping for breath and trying to clear her head, it was evident that Xena had overcome the shocking pain and regained enough of her sight in one eye to once again become the aggressor. A quick spin on her back, a snapping side kick to Callisto’s ribs that flipped her over, and Xena grabbed both of the blonde’s arms, wrenched her into a sitting position, dropped down so her firm buttocks were against Callisto’s lower back, pulled both arms back, closed her thighs around the blonde’s elbows, and drove her interlaced ankles into the base of the woman’s skull.

The crowd recognized the classic Olympian wrestling submission hold. It bespoke years of training and experience. In her physical condition, the fact that Xena could administer this punishing hold for which there was no known counter, rekindled the hopes of those in the arena who had bet on the raven-haired Greek beauty. Yes, the bards would sing about this epic battle through the ages.

But such thoughts were far from both combatants’ minds. For Xena it was a chance to regroup, all the while putting tremendous pressure on Callisto’s arms, shoulders and neck. The rising and falling of her chest and large breasts bespoke a veteran who recognized the struggle was still far from over. At best she could see out of one eye; the nail-raked one was swollen completely shut. Xena breathed deep to replenish the blood in her muscles, all the time forcing Callisto’s arms closer together.

For her part, Callisto was in intense pain, her rage at being foolishly trapped between Xena’s massive thighs now replaced by fear that her arms would be broken and shoulders dislocated before this Thracian warrior was done with her. Callisto recognized the submission hold for what it was, a potentially crippling maneuver that provided little opportunity for escape. Between shrill cries of anguish and gasping breaths to keep some blood flowing to her extremities, she raked her mind for possible movements to provide relief and escape from the terrible pain now centered in the middle of her back.

Xena continued to increase the pressure of the hold on Callisto’s arms and neck, feeling the German woman’s resistance progressively growing weaker between the Greek’s thighs and biceps. The torrid sun shown down mercilessly on both combatants, seated in the middle of the ring, their bodies increasingly slick with sweat, oil and blood.

Xena increased the pressure to the point where both Callisto’s wrists were only a hand’s width away from touching and her shrieks of pain and anguish made it apparent that her submission was nearing. Finally, in desperation and unable to come up with any counter, Callisto rocked to-and-fro to her sides. Though momentarily increasing the pain almost to the breaking point, an additional roll to the left created slight maneuvering room, at which point she drove her right elbow weakly into Xena’s womanhood. It wasn’t a hard blow, but prior injuries to Xena’s crotch had rendered this area particularly sensitive. The dark-haired woman gasped in pain and momentarily relaxed her grip on Callisto’s wrists and neck. This was all the Teutonic warrior needed and she wrenched both arms away and rolled from between those thickly muscled, always punishing, thighs.

Xena shouted in frustration at her victim’s escape, but rolled to her right and regained her feet on unsteady legs, closing her blonde adversary who was desperately trying to restore some strength and sensation to her upper arms and shoulder. It was to the right shoulder that Xena applied both hands in a fierce claw hold that seized the trapezius muscle and attempted to tear it away from the collarbone. Callisto screamed in anguish from the severe pain and thrashed wildly about, trying to escape, but to no avail. When her movements had stilled, and her screams replaced by a dull whimpering as the muscle spasmed, Xena stepped over her left shoulder, shifted both hands to Callisto’s sweat and blood stained head, quickly dropped to the ground and put the blonde in a suffocating headlock. Again Callisto’s lithe body thrashed momentarily, until she managed to gain a position that eased the choking pressure on her throat. Then she grew still, intent on conserving her strength in the searing afternoon heat.

For her part, with biceps and pectorals bulging, Xena continued to apply as much pressure as possible, given the damaged inflicted on her right shoulder and arm. She momentarily bridged up to increase the pressure and angle of attack on Callisto’s neck, but her abdominals were only able to maintain this extended position for a few moments before she had to lower her buttocks back to the arena floor.

Sensing limited utility in continuing such a regimen, Xena quickly broke the hold, pivoted around and behind the now disoriented German woman trying to regain her sense of balance, straddled her back and ran both her arms under Callisto’s armpits, lacing her hands firmly at the base of the German’s neck. The crowd again recognized a classic submission hold—the Gods, this Xena was good!—as the raven-haired warrior jerked to her full height, back and arm muscles standing in bold relief as she hauled Callisto up to a standing position. Then, applying a downward thrust from her biceps, she bent the blonde’s neck down at almost a right angle to the rest of her body.

Callisto’s full weight, though suspended in Xena’s arms, was now pressing down hard on the base of her neck in numbing pain. The rest of her body literally hung in the air from Xena’s forearms, the German’s ribs showing clearly through the thinness of her sides with her torso stretched to its limits. Her small breasts quivered under the power and pressure of Xena’s arms. Callisto cried out weakly in agony, barely able to breath with her throat constricted and blood still flowing into her mouth.

Again, Xena elected to maintain this hold for some time under the blazing sun, as sweat dripped off both opponents, turning a small amount of dirt beneath to thick, oozing mud. When it seemed that Callisto was all but unconscious, her arms dangling uselessly at her sides, her neck angled dangerously below the plane of her shoulders, her breathing labored and spasmodic, Xena released the hold and dropped her seemingly lifeless body into the mud below.

But the warrior princess was taking no chances with this dangerous bitch. The blonde must pay for the hurt and pain she had inflicted on the Thracian’s body. Xena moved slightly away from the prostrate figure below, then leaped into the air and brought a massive right thigh down across the small chest of the Teutonic warrior. Even in the pliant mud, the crowd could see Callisto’s body shudder with the shock of the impact. Xena stood again and repeated the maneuver, this time shifting the thigh from the breasts to the throat. A choking gasp from Callisto, still seemingly unable to muster any defense, was the response Xena was looking for. So the cunt still had some life in her after all, Xena thought.

She maneuvered in the dirt and mud above Callisto’s shoulders, and then slid her left leg under, and right leg over, the alabaster throat of her opponent. With ankles locked firmly, Xena leaned back and applied all the strength that remained in her massive thighs to the neck, shoulders and throat of her opponent. The resultant pressure elicited a gurgling, choking sound from the blonde, while her small breasts, fully compressed by the Greek’s thighs immediately above them, were firm with passion, nipples distended, visible jutting out from beneath the dark complexioned limbs of her adversary.

Xena lowered herself back further on her elbows to gain additional leverage and pressure on Callisto’s neck. As she arched her back to maximize the applied pressure, her breasts, rib cage and abdominals, swelling up beyond the curve of her body, gave evidence of the strength still resident in her hold. This was an enraged, embattled and desperate female warrior in the best Olympian tradition, and was a memory and vision of the legendary Thracian that many would cherish forever.

Xena continued to maintain acute pressure on her victim’s neck and shoulders, her straining grunts complemented by the half-whimper-half-cry emanating from the compressed lips of her opponent. But then suddenly it was Xena who was screaming in abject pain, as a barely conscious Callisto had slowly turned her face towards the inner thigh of the warrior princess. When contact with her lips was achieved, she quickly opening her mouth and again buried her teeth in Xena, only this time it was her inner thigh, and this time Callisto slammed her jaws shut, slicing in to the quadriceps muscle. From the Greek woman’s shriek of anguish and terror and the rapid breaking of the hold, it was clear that the Teutonic warrior had administered a blow from which recovery was doubtful, at least while the match was ongoing. This time, as she rolled out from between the dark, bloody thighs of her opponent, Callisto spit out a section of flesh and muscle that sickened some in the arena.

In terrible pain, Xena thrashed agonizingly in the dirt and mud, grasping her mangled thigh with both hands, tears streaming from the narrow slit of her one remaining eye. The blood from her wound flowed crimson into the moist mud, sparking another demonic laugh from Callisto as she regained her voice while restoring circulation by massaging her neck and shoulders. “Well cunt, I win!” the blonde proclaimed, and from the look on Xena’s face, it was apparent that she feared her new wound would mean final defeat in the arena.

Her neck and arms restored, Callisto maneuvered behind Xena, jerked her up by the roots of her raven hair, and forced her into a sitting position. A savage kick to the lower back straightened the slumping Greek woman still holding on to her thigh. Then Callisto quickly dropped to her knees, placed her left arm over the warrior princess’s left shoulder, across her throat and around her neck. The blonde then snaked her right arm under Xena’s right armpit and around to the back of her neck. Both hands locked, Callisto then worked her way to a half crouch and then fully erect, dragging the taller Greek woman now under her total dominance with her.

Though Xena’s height made it impossible for Callisto to stand her straight up, she elected to keep the woman now in her clutches off balance at an angle, as the Greek’s full weight was transmitted into tremendous pressure applied at the base of her neck and across her throat by Callisto’s sinewy arms. The added force pressing down on Xena resulted in an intense and sustained pain throughout her badly damaged right shoulder continuing down through her arm. Her twitching responses to a tightening of Callisto’s grip told the Teutonic dominatrix that her opponent was basically fighting only with one leg and arm; the rest had been rendered useless. She laughed!

The crowd watching intently could clearly see the choke hold that had their favorite in the clutches of a woman who showed neither mercy nor concern for the life of her opponent. As the blonde’s grip tightened and Xena’s angled body began to shudder, a bloody froth issued from the Greek woman’s compressed lips. Her belabored gasps for air became less frequent. Not only was she going to lose this match, but also her life.

Callisto maintained this painful predicament until she felt certain that Xena was unconscious but still alive. Satisfied her quarry would offer only feeble, if any resistance, she abruptly broke the chokehold and as her victim fell listlessly to the ground, she followed her into the crimson mud and quickly maneuvered the Greek’s body into a sitting position again. Callisto pivoted on her buttocks and wrapped her sinewy thighs around the warrior princess’ expansive chest just below her large breasts. Savagely biting Xena’s ear to snap her from a semi-conscious state, Callisto quickly ran her arms beneath Xena’s armpits and clasped them again behind the Greek woman’s neck.

The crowd was surprised. Based on what they had witnessed to date, few suspected Callisto had knowledge of such holds and maneuvers. Just another thing she had learned over the past years, the blonde thought, and now her helpless adversary was paying a fearsome price for her knowledge.

The tearing of her ear lobe had aroused Xena out of her painful reverie, but now she felt not only renewed pressure on her neck, but a crushing pain in her sides as Callisto’s lithe, rock hard thighs, quadriceps resurgent in expected victory, squeezed the breath from her and further damaged already battered and broken ribs. It was clear that Callisto’s strategy was to destroy all the physical attributes that had been part of the Xena legend. Broken arms, dislocated shoulders, hamstrung thighs; now it was the turn for her pectorals and expansive chest to be embarrassed, humiliated and rendered useless.

Sensing her tormentress’ intent, Xena flexed her arms and shoulders as much as possible in an attempt to break Callisto’s classic wrestling hold. But she lacked the required strength. The searing heat and injuries sustained since the beginning of the contest had taken their toll. The warrior princess grew increasingly frantic as her available strength repeatedly failed to overcome the power resident in the arms and thighs of the Teutonic dominatrix. Callisto sensed a resignation of defeat in her enemy that seemed to hamper Xena’s every move. She laughed!

The grunts and groans, cries of pain and exultation of these two striking warriors were now replaced by muffled sobs of defeat from one, and a recurring inhuman howl of triumph from the other. But when it seemed as if Xena must submit, Callisto again suddenly broke the hold, gained her footing, and as a choking Xena filled her crushed lungs with air and vainly tried to struggle up on her hands and knees, a well placed kick into the Greek woman’s stomach brought her immediately to a half standing position on her knees.

Callisto quickly knelt down beside her and delivered an upper arm blow to the head that knocked Xena backwards, and over the now outstretched upper leg of the Teutonic warrior. The small of Xena’s back bowed painfully over the muscular lower thigh of Callisto. With her right hand crushing the Thracian’s left breast, Callisto’s left hand found ample purchase in Xena’s pubic mound and the German warrior’s entire upper body swelled in exertion as she pushed relentlessly on either extremity of the helpless Greek warrior. Xena’s body, draped over Callisto’s hard upper thigh, was listless, her head and knees almost touching the ground. It was a backbreaking hold, and neither the audience nor either contestant knew of any escape.

Periodically, Callisto stopped the brutal pressure on loins and breast, and switched to delivering double-fisted clubbing blows to Xena’s outstretched abdomen. The Greek woman’s muscles, once so bold in their relief below her rib cage, now began to soften under the relentless pounding of the Teutonic warrior. Callisto could soon feel the abdominals splitting apart as her hammering fists began to penetrate to the softer tissue and organs beneath. With each blow, Xena’s head and upper thighs reacted to the impact by quickly snapping upward, then settling back down to the ground to await the next strike.

The crowd grew quiet, sensing the end was near. Only the gasps of pain coming from the defeated Greek warrior, frequently drowned out by the cackling and howling of the blonde dominatrix now in full voice, could be heard.

For what seemed a very long time, Callisto maintained the backbreaking pressure and stomach splitting hammering on the Greek Amazon. It was clear she was enjoying her defeated adversary’s predicament. But finally, when it appeared certain that her opponent was unconscious, Callisto abruptly dumped her in the dirt and mud, a slab of soiled and worthless meat to be thrown out with the day’s garbage for the wild dogs that prowled Byzantium’s streets.

Callisto rose and slowly walked around her defeated adversary. The warrior princess had once loomed large in fact and fiction, but in her current fetal position, suffering from multiple wounds, torn muscles, broken bones, and labored breathing marked by a bloody froth coming from her mouth, she didn’t look much like anything at all.

Callisto laughed, and then howled in celebration. She was hardly unmarked by the contest, but she strangely reveled in her cuts, strained neck, sore arms and tortured shoulders. Blood still flowed into her mouth from her broken nose, but no matter. Over the years she had grown accustomed to the taste of her own blood, and now began licking it off her fingers and lips. Trouble was, whose was it? Her’s…or Xena’s? Yes, the muscles of her lower back and thighs were screaming out for relief and cool menstruations in a pool from servile masseuses, but such was the price to be paid for destroying the warrior princess. All in good time…all in good time!

The crowd clearly sensed the finality of the most recent submission hold. All were now standing, some in admiration, and others in revulsion, at the sight below them. But regardless of their respective feelings towards the winner or loser, it was clear to all that Xena was defeated. Time to award the laurel wreath of victory, and leave the arena, to tell of this epic battle again over the banquet or gaming table tonight.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the crowd began to applaud and wanly cheer their new champion. The provincial governor beckoned to her to come to the victor’s circle to accept her prize. But enroute, Callisto, spying the awning ropes hanging down into the arena, paused, then smiled, and gesturing to the Roman official to keep his wreath, turned back to the prostrate Xena. “Now I’ll make them forget this Thracian harlot ever existed,” she muttered to herself. “I’ll embarrass and humiliate her before her own people. She’ll be finished in the Empire…and wish she had died.”

Dragging Xena’s limp body over beneath the guy ropes, she hoisted the dead weight on her left shoulder, Xena’s head and arms drooping forward to her waist. Tying a guy rope securely above each of the fallen warrior’s elbows, she then dipped her left shoulder and the Greek’s flaccid body slid off.

Xena was now suspended slightly above the ground, arms askew, head slumped forward. Her outstretched naked body, displayed so that all might see the suffering sustained at the brutal hands of Callisto, faced the patrician class, many of who had just lost considerable sesterces betting on the bitch now trussed up like a castrated bull before them. But Callisto’s intent was more than just to further humiliate their fallen hero. Walking between the swaying body and its once adoring public, she shouted, “Romans look now at your champion! Who thought this Greek whore would ever beat me in a fair fight? Who among you is man enough to stand up for this bitch? Anyone?”

The stunned crowd remained silent…and seated.

“Well mighty Rome, look at this slut, your former champion whom you now despise!” And with that, Callisto drove her right fist deep into Xena’s separated abdominals. The shock of the blow, penetrating through what once were rigidly firm and compacted muscles, now reduced to quivering flesh, shattered the Greek woman’s unconscious state as a mournful groan escaped from her lips.

“Romans, I, Callisto, am now your champion!” she shouted, and drove another right fist into the hamstrung Greek’s left side. This time a louder cry of pain issued from her victim’s lips. Callisto smiled, walked to Xena’s rear, caressed her still-firm buttocks, ran her hand up between the Greek’s legs to fondle her scarred womanhood, and then drove two sharp uppercuts into her kidneys. Still smiling, she slapped the dangling body twice on the ass as if a mule, and returned to face the patricians, taking Xena’s right breast in her hand.

“Here Rome, look at these fine breasts! Which of you fat pigs have yearned to feel their tenderness in your mouth, to see them lingering above your moist lips, as this whore mounts you?” Callisto hefted and squeezed Xena’s breast as if it were a ripe melon in the marketplace, and then drove her other fist into the soft area beneath it. The Greek’s body recoiled from the impact, and her head stirred in pain again—another well-chosen, vulnerable and vital point of attack—and several patricians who had known the pleasure of Xena’s warm touch and soft caresses squirmed uncomfortably on their marble benches.

Callisto was only getting started, and the audience soon realized that not only did the victor intend, for public consumption, to brutalize the one-time idol of the Empire over every part of her body, but the Teutonic warrior also sought to convey her contempt and disgust for her patrons’ own softness, depraved manners and sexual inadequacies. As a result, some spectators immediately left, repulsed and embarrassed by this wanton display of lust and brutality, their thirst for blood and gore sated, their desire for further humiliation non-existent. Others departed to collect their winnings and find women and wine to celebrate. But surprisingly, most stayed to watch the blonde bitch continue to humiliate her helpless opponent.

For these games were what made Rome the great empire she was. Without these games, carried on at hundreds of sites throughout the Mediterranean world and beyond, Rome would be just another passing civilization, like the Greeks and Persians…like Alexander himself. Although there was something almost bestial in the way Callisto went about destroying the last vestiges of physical pride Xena possessed, it was still the way of the warrior, the way of the gladiator, and the way of the greatest empire the world had ever seen. It was…the Roman way!

Callisto understood this, and knew her every move was being carefully scrutinized to see if she was worthy of leading an army of the Empire in battle. Thus, she spared no effort in exercising the skills of her warrior craft, her knowledge of single-handed combat, and her understanding of how to destroy a person’s will to resist, in both mind and body.

Hence, no part of Xena’s body was spared gnarled fists, slashing nails, or the tearing and rending of teeth. Callisto focused carefully calculated blows on the Greek woman’s breasts, abdomen, loins and thighs. No move was not carefully considered, no desired effect not achieved. Xena’s right shoulder was easily dislocated by the brutal wrenching of the previously broken right arm at almost right angles to the rest of her body. A pool of blood slowly accumulated beneath the Greek warrior’s spread eagled form, mixed with dark red wine now offered the victor that coursed down her throat, breasts, torso and loins as she wantonly drank in celebration of her victory.

The crowd was silent, by now accustomed to the animal-like howling of Callisto, and the mournful sobs of the brutalized victim. A few sesterces, profitable fruits of the Teutonic warrior’s victory, were thrown her way by grateful patrons who had returned to the arena from the gaming houses to see if the Thracian bitch was still trussed up like an animal. And not a few pieces of garbage, rotting food and animal entrails, were thrown at Xena’s dangling body. The remaining crowd would not soon forgive…or forget…her failure in the arena.

And yes, this new blonde champion would do well leading the provinces against the Hun. She seemed possessed by a demonic, animal-like fury to destroy her enemies and all she touched. Yes, she would work well in the pay of the Emperor--glad she is on our side, reasoned her new admirers.

And so it continued until the sun set and a circle of torches now dimly lit the arena floor. At last only five people remained. Callisto, the vanquished warrior princess, and three final attendants. One of the these was to escort the victor back to the bathhouse, scene of last night’s pleasures. After bathing and cleansing the dirt, blood and oil from her sleek body, applying healing and concealing salve and cooling lotion to cuts and bruises on her face, shoulders, arms and thighs, Callisto planned on a night of celebration with many partners. To the victor belonged the spoils.

The remaining two attendants would join her shortly to provide whatever services she desired. But first they were to cut the nearly lifeless form of Xena down and throw the body out the postern gate to lie with the rest of the town’s refuse and flotsam. As they moved toward the inert form, Callisto grabbed their knife and motioned all three of them away. Fearing the Teutonic warrior intended now to kill Xena, which would not set well with the provincial governor, they hesitated, until Callisto brandished the knife, cursing and threatening them. Meekly, all three retired to the other side of the arena, unwilling to challenge the strength and ferocity of this woman.

It was clear these fools did not understand her at all, Callisto thought, as she threw a goblet of wine in Xena’s swollen face to revive her…and then cut the guy ropes from which she was suspended. With Xena’s body lying prostrate in a pool of her own blood, Callisto’s wine and Byzantium’s mud, the blonde warrior straightened her defeated rival’s legs, caressed her breasts, and then kneeled by her head and spoke slowly and forcefully into her ear: “Listen you Greek slut, I let you live today…for my tomorrow. I hate you, but at the same time find you appealing in a way. Perhaps it is because we are more alike than I would care to admit. If you survive the next several days, and I expect you will with a body such as yours, you will one day return to the arena. And when you do, we will meet again. I enjoy battling and defeating a worthy opponent, not like these filthy Huns and fat Greek and Roman swine that call themselves men. I can have any hoplite I want for a night, or a month…but there is only one Xena…and I want to break…humiliate…violate…and make love to your body again…and again.”

Savagely twisting her left nipple to ensure the Thracian remained conscious, Callisto lowered her voice to a bare whisper and continued: “I depart for Pannonia at the head of an army in a fortnight. I have the Emperor’s leave to break my journey at Carnuntum. How would a march up the Danube suit you, my love? You might find something to amuse you on the frontier!”

And with that, she arose, summoned her escort from the distant shadows, and was gone.

The remaining attendants quickly ran to Xena’s body and were relieved to hear her labored breathing. Not understanding why Callisto had done what she did, they shrugged in ignorance, and knelt down by the once revered warrior princess. She was clearly alive, but also clearly unable to offer any resistance to their adolescent lusts. Not wanting to miss an opportunity of a lifetime, or at least a week’s worth of free wine at the local inn, they fondled her breasts, ran their hands over her sweat and blood soaked womanhood, and stroked the long shanks of a body unlike any available in town. Oh, but only if she were well enough to respond to their desires. But there was too much blood and mud, and both had to quickly return to Callisto’s bathhouse.

Cursing their ill timing…and in their minds, at least, Xena’s bad fortune…one picked up the limp naked Thracian woman and slung her over his shoulder, while the other ran ahead to raise the iron bar and open the heavy postern gate. “There you go, bitch. You cost me a week’s pay,” muttered the burdened attendant as he cast Xena’s body off into the darkness below. The heavy gate slammed shut. The arena was quiet, the torches extinguished. The day of Callisto was over.

The following morning the waterfront moors were still wreathed in yellow mist as the slavers went amongst their human cargo, separating the dead and dieing from those fit enough to make the journey to Tartus or Rome. No sense taking something to sea that would not earn a profit in the Empire’s slave markets. Amongst the collection of human detritus gathered from the whorehouses, squalid inns and marketplace dumps, swept off narrow streets and alley ways in the ghetto by mercenary press gangs, was the body of a once beautiful and powerful woman, now battered, bloody, shorn of all dignity, and abandoned by a no longer adoring public.

It would have taken a very close examination of her nude form for anyone to recognize that this was once the renowned Xena, the fabled warrior princess, now reduced to near blindness, crawling on hands and knees, searching for a muddy puddle from the overnight rain from which she might drink and wash her wounds.

But time for scrutiny of this morning’s human cargo could come later reasoned the slaver as he struggled to separate the living from the dead and chain those prostrate, semi-conscious, filthy, but still-living bodies together and get them aboard his ship to sail with the morning tide. Cursing at his labors, and in the early morning light not recognizing the statuesque body of the Thracian warrior, he brutally snapped manacles on her right wrist and ankle, kicking her aside to reach the next hapless body lying face down in a pool of water fetid with flies and human waste. And to think he had left a profitable trade in spices and grain for this!

But as additional stevedores sauntered drunkenly down the gangplank to herd, kick and drag the bedraggled human cargo aboard, the sailing master supervising did note the magnificent body of the torn, bloody and mud-flecked Greek woman herded aboard with the other flotsam. And he made a quick mental note of which hold she was to be cast into. She would do for tonight, much better than these other whores who would keep her company in the stinking confines of this filthy scow for several days.

The object of his attention, even with one eye swelled shut and the other a mere narrow slit, also noted his gaze and struggled to stand as upright as possible, given her injuries and the weight of her chains. Though reeking and stained with the sweat, dirt and blood of the arena, hallmarks of her defeat and brutalization at the hands of Callisto, she turned painfully to her left side so that the master would not see the right eye swollen shut, the broken arm and dislocated shoulder. Xena knew it was her full breasts and loins, not her shattered abdominals and ribs that interested him, and so carried herself as upright and provocatively as possible to the edge of the dark, dank forward hold in which she would be imprisoned until sold on the auction block to the highest bidder.

But there was hope, for even given the vicious beating administered by Callisto, in the wan, fog-shrouded light of an early Mediterranean morning, Xena still looked enticing, dusky fruit ripe for picking, a tarnished pearl in the midst of swine. As she dropped into the hold, biting back an anguished cry as pain shot through her tortured legs, arm and shoulder, her last glimpse before the hatch slammed shut was of the leering countenance of the sailor, eagerly licking his lips, rubbing his crotch, and thinking of tonight’s pleasures.

Yes, she was certain she would have company after dark, and it was not the thought of this filthy pig of a man laying with her that was of concern, but how to gain possession, given her injuries, of the ring of keys she had spied on his tunic belt. Hopefully he would come to her already reeking of too much wine and garlic, for she would have to work quickly while this pigsty of a boat was still hugging the Thracian coast before standing further out to sea.

Yes, it would require a supreme effort not to grimace at his touch, to recoil as he squeezed and suckled her scarred breasts, to cry out in pain and disgust as he stroked her inner thighs, fondled her bruised womanhood, and savagely entered her in a final act of satiated lust. But Xena had left her pride and reputation in the dirt and blood of the arena, destroyed by a blonde she-bitch, and now she would do whatever it took to be free of these chains. She knew a good surgeon near her family’s home in Amphipolis who could set her arm and administer to her shoulder and thigh.

The healing would doubtless be long and painful. But she would begin training and conditioning as soon as the pain of her wounds permitted, for she had a distant rendezvous to keep…with Satyr’s child north of the Danube.