Under the Thief’s Mane, the Patrician Saw His Lover

Aurelio reclined on his couch with a gesture that was part smugness, part weariness. His servants had woken him in the middle of the night to inform him that a man had broken into his domus. It took some nerve to pull off something like that. They had caught him in the pantry, his head stuck in a jar of candied fruit. He wasn’t after gold or silver, only food. He tried to flee through the same opening he had used to enter, but his escape was cut short and they brought him down by force.

According to his most loyal slave, catching him had been quite a challenge. He was a strong, violent man who resisted every step of the way, claws and teeth bared. What had been a problem for the household staff presented itself to Aurelio as an opportunity. He thought that, if they could break him, that vigor might serve as labor on his estate in Apulia. The villa was crying out for urgent repairs, and one sturdy body was worth more than two skinny arms.

First of all, he had to see whether the unfortunate thief was fit for the task. He settled into his sumptuous triclinium and ordered that the man be brought before him. A few minutes later, two of his burliest men dragged him in, his arms pinned. The prisoner fought every inch of the way. His uneven struggle proved useless. They drove a punch into his stomach that knocked the fight out of him at once and finally threw him at the master’s feet.

They yanked on his head to force him to his knees. Aurelio looked him over with a gesture of disgust. His hair was a lion’s mane, wild and tangled, and it had not seen water in weeks. The same could be said of his beard, which hid much of his face and made him look like a backward beast. His tunic had been reduced to a rag of gray cloth, torn to shreds in his attempt to escape.

Even so, he had good arms and a powerful chest, with a few scars and skin drawn tight by hunger. He might have been a soldier or a gladiator fallen from grace. It mattered little. He would pay for his crime with a life of slavery.

“So you’re the man who had the audacity to break into my home in the middle of the night,” said the patrician.

No answer came, not even the slightest gesture. The thief’s head hung limp, as if he were on the verge of fainting. Aurelio felt insulted.

“Look me in the face when I’m speaking to you, you wretch!”

The slaves yanked his hair to force him to lift his gaze. Then Aurelio drew a sharp breath. Beneath all that tangled mass, his face was almost unrecognizable, but his eyes… Dark, deep, piercing. A sense of recognition struck him like a slap. He knew those eyes. It could not be. He refused to believe it. And yet, something deep inside him screamed otherwise.

“Do you have anything to say in your defense?” he asked, trying to recover his composure.

He prayed under his breath to all the gods that his servants would not notice his wavering. The thief did not open his mouth. He merely let out a guttural growl, more wolf than man.

“Nothing at all? In that case, we’ll see if slavery restores your senses. Tie him up in the storeroom so he can think it over tonight,” he ordered.

As soon as they took him away, Aurelio withdrew to his chambers, doing his best to hide his confusion. His wife was still asleep and noticed nothing. Never in his life had he wanted so badly to be wrong as he did that night. Those eyes. If he was right, that sudden thief was none other than Casio.

***

Casio was a commoner whose family served at his father’s villa, the same estate Aurelio had inherited in Apulia and that now stood on the brink of ruin. They were about the same age and, when he still lived there, they had shared a close relationship. Not only affectionate, but carnal as well. Aurelio developed a fixation on him and took him as his lover. In those days they joined their naked bodies many times, hidden among the bushes of the vast estate.

Keeping a relationship between men with a commoner was not frowned upon, but they kept it secret for a simple reason: Aurelio was the passive one. No one could approve of a patrician lowering himself to the submissive role. He could not help it. Casio was a natural lover, and the gods had blessed him with a virile potency few men could match.

That bond endured until Aurelio was forced to begin his military service. Afterward he settled in Rome, making only sporadic visits to the villa he inherited upon his father’s death. He looked for him on his first return, eager to resume their meetings. The only thing he managed to learn was that, due to the estate’s gradual neglect, Casio had left with his family and no one knew where. The news left him devastated. He went on with his life and eventually buried the memory of Casio… until that night when the past decided to come back.

***

Night gave way to day. Morning brought a great doubt: what to do with the thief. He might not be Casio. He might be an unknown brother, a cousin, some distant relative. Or a complete stranger whose eyes simply resembled his too much. And the weight of expectations was real: he himself had announced his intention to reduce the man to slavery before everyone.

“Bathe him and cut away those tangles he calls ‘hair,’” he decided when his trusted servant asked him. “If he’s going to serve in my house, I want a decent man, not a verminous creature.”

That would buy him time and let him make certain, once and for all, whether it was Casio. He left to attend to his business. When he returned at midday, he was told the prisoner was ready and demanded to see him at once.

After a close shave, a haircut, a bath, and clean clothes, he looked like a different person. And there was no doubt now: it was Casio. Aurelio looked into his eyes with a desire he had kept in check for years, but all he found returned in those eyes he once loved was pure hostility.

“Leave us alone,” he said sharply.

“But, lord…”

“You bound him tightly, did you not? Then go. That’s an order.”

There was a moment of hesitation before the servant bowed humbly and withdrew with the others. As soon as Aurelio confirmed the door was shut tight, he launched himself into the reunion he had dreamed of so many times.

“Oh, Casio!”

He put his arms around his shoulders and tried to join his lips to his, but the other shook him off.

“What’s going on?” Aurelio asked, bewildered.

“What’s going on? You’re trying to enslave me! That’s what’s going on!”

“Oh, Casio, forgive me! I didn’t know it was you. I suspected it, but I wasn’t certain.”

No answer came. Casio avoided his gaze and turned his face aside. Even so, Aurelio recognized the grief that consumed him.

“What happened to you? How did you end up like this?”

“It’s a long story…” he murmured.

“I want to hear it.”

Casio sighed. In a deep, broken voice he told him about the life he had led during all those years apart.

***

After Aurelio left to complete his military career, Casio felt alone. He kept working in Apulia until he found a wife. By then he had lost all hope of ever seeing Aurelio again, and the future did not look any better. He decided to move to Rome. He wanted to give his wife the best life possible and, for quite some time, he managed to do so, despite the dark times they were living through.

His marriage suffered from only one problem: she seemed incapable of conceiving. There were many attempts and many failures until, at last, she became pregnant. The day of the birth arrived and with it, the complications. During three agonizing days, Casio spent the little money he had looking for someone, anyone, who could at least save his wife’s life. The child was born dead, and she finally succumbed to exhaustion.

Casio was left alone, ruined, and with nowhere to go back to. That had been only a few months ago. Since then he was nothing but a vagabond, with no money and no possessions beyond the clothes on his back and the blood running through his veins. No one would give him work because they considered him cursed. He resorted to theft in order to find food and survive. He had no idea at all that that house belonged to Aurelio.

As he spoke, tears welled on Casio’s face. Aurelio, stricken by the tale, could only say in a low voice:

“I’m so sorry… If I had known…”

A heavy silence settled between them. Aurelio wanted to help him. He longed for his affection, his warmth, the moments they had shared. But setting him free was not an option. Otherwise, his credibility would be called into question. His servants would see him as a weak man and might dare to steal from him or, worse yet, rebel. He had only one path left: to go on with what he had planned, however revolting it might be.

“You don’t have to keep wandering the streets. You’ll stay here with me. I’ll give you shelter, food, and work. Only…”

“Only what?”

He struggled to find the words. No, he told himself. He couldn’t sugarcoat the truth with a layer of honey, like some confection. He had to be direct.

“You’ll be one more of my slaves. If your behavior is impeccable, you’ll be allowed into my inner circle. And we can recover what we had before.”

Casio looked him straight in the eye. In his gaze shone the desolation of a man who could sink no lower. Aurelio stroked his chest, that chest that had given him so much pleasure in the past. It had changed a great deal. It had hardened and bore the ravages of a life that had preyed on him.

“Please,” he added. “I don’t want to lose you again.”

Casio sighed. He could only surrender to the fate the goddess Fortuna had imposed on him.

“All right…”

Aurelio rose with contained joy. He promised himself he would never make him regret it.

***

When he opened the door, he had returned to his role as an unyielding patrician. He ordered his men to untie him and put him to work. He warned them not to mistreat him: he didn’t want a crippled slave who couldn’t perform, he said. Casio maintained the pantomime of a defeated man, though perhaps it was not entirely false. Every time he passed before his master or one of his superiors, he lowered his head as a sign of utter humiliation.

Aurelio let a month go by as a precaution. A month in which he could barely contain his desire every time he saw Casio cross the courtyard. His lover’s good conduct made the guard on him slacken. Just what he needed. Once the month was up, he had him summoned to his chambers. Alone.

Casio appeared with his head bowed. Aurelio stood, closed the door, and drew him around the waist. His passion was still there, hidden from prying eyes, waiting for the moment to emerge. Yet the other man’s coolness filled him with hesitation.

“What is it?” he asked.

“It’s been so long since what we had… I don’t know whether I’m still the same man…”

Aurelio cupped his face in both hands. He lifted his gaze to look once more into those eyes he had longed for so long.

“You’re not. Nor am I. But that doesn’t mean my feelings have changed.”

He brought his lips close to Casio’s. A timid kiss, a light brush charged with nostalgia. The brief contact was the spark that ignited the flame long extinguished, a flame that quickly grew in intensity.

“I’ve missed you so much…” Aurelio muttered in the small spaces between their lips.

They tangled in a lustful dance without music. Casio’s hands roamed his belly and hips with the same skill as before. This was the Casio he remembered, the male who did not fear exercising his dominance over a man so far above him on the social ladder. Familiar tingles ran through his body and anticipated the next movement. A tug at the fabric, and he was bare. That was how they always did it: they took each other’s clothes off.

Then it was his turn. The cloth Casio wore was rough and poor, as befitted a man who, to the world, was nothing but a tool with a mind. A sad and necessary deception. What was underneath was worth a thousand times more.

Aurelio hoped his lover still found him beautiful. Time had not been kind to him. The years and a comfortable life had altered his body with wrinkles and a band of fat that rounded his belly. Casio, by contrast, had become a thoroughly masculine man, chest hairy and broad. Work had shaped his body, and the guaranteed food of the last month had restored his vigor. And, most importantly, his virile strength remained intact. Aurelio took it in his hand and looked at it with desire and longing.

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to… No man has visited my bed since the last time we saw each other…”

“You are my master,” Casio replied. “I only obey your orders.”

The hierarchy of master and slave saddened him somewhat. But it was the only way to keep him at his side and make sure he would never leave.

“Just be careful.”

A strange sensation, like traveling through time, seized him. Casio had said the very same thing the first time they lay together.

***

Aurelio lay face down on his bed. Casio settled over him, in the hollow between his parted legs. The patrician writhed with the first thrust. So much time had passed… The entrance was not forced, but slow, letting the body recover its old habit and open at its own pace. He clenched his teeth so that no sound would escape his throat and betray their intimacy. A couple of minutes later, Casio was inside him, his hips pressed against his buttocks as when they were young.

A pleasant feeling of recovery flooded them both, as if this were the missing piece needed to put their lives back together. Casio moved within him slowly, in and out, without pause and without hurry. His skilled hands filled him with delight, caressing every precise place that made him tremble. At the same time, he left light kisses on his cheek.

“How do you feel?” he whispered in his ear.

“As if Venus herself had granted me my most cherished wish: Jupiter sharing my bed.”

“So be it.”

Aurelio did not understand. Casio lifted him by the shoulders and forced him to sit up. With slow movements he had knelt and seated him on his legs and, above all, on his member. He was a slave, his master’s tool; on this occasion, also his throne. Aurelio let out a choked cry. So much flesh pushing from below was overwhelming and, at the same time, glorious. Casio’s strong, hairy chest pressed against his back, bound in a firm embrace that refused to let go. The hair scraped his skin.

Mischievous rays of sunlight slipped through the window and fell across their shared nakedness. They barely warmed them, for the heat of their bodies far surpassed the power of the sun. Aurelio felt every movement of that fused union. He twisted his head so their lips would meet again and form a complete bond, a chain whose links were welded so that no force could separate them. The thrusts came from below, like waves of the sea washing over that iron bond without enough force to destroy it.

The pleasurable pressure on his belly proved too much for Aurelio, with his skill and resistance lost after so many years. One exact touch and his seed flew like a geyser. He pressed his lips against Casio’s so his groan would not ring out or reach unwanted ears. Only after he had emptied himself did he dare look at the trail that had stained the bedclothes.

“This is new…” he murmured.

Before, he spilled it into the dust, never while Casio was still inside him. The sight brought to mind the possibility that they might be discovered. They were no longer boys, nor were they in some secluded corner where no one could find them. He pulled away from Casio only to feel empty at once. He knelt beside him on the bed, took his member in hand, and stroked him until his own essence also shot out. Some of it clung to his hand, warm and sticky, and returned to him with happy memories.

“I’m so glad I found you again,” Aurelio whispered in his ear. “I never thought we’d lie together again. I had lost all hope…”

“I’m here now. And if you don’t want it, I won’t leave your side again.”

The patrician rested his head on his shoulder. This would carry him down a dangerous road. If anyone found out, if it reached the ears of his political rivals… Or his wife…

He was willing to take the risk. He wanted Casio at his side, and this time he did not intend to let him get away.