I was born in the household of General Avidius Cassius, a slave
bred for beauty and male pleasure as horses are bred for speed
or endurance. I was not the only one. We were a group of girls
and young women kept under close surveillance at
the general's country villa, two hours from Rome. It was close
enough to the city for Cassius to easily receive and entertain
his guests and far enough to be away from his wife's eyes. Not
that she was interested: like most high class wives, having done
her duty to her husband and given him the necessary sons, the
lady wasn't in the least concerned about his whereabouts as long
as they didn't bring shame or disgrace to their house and family.
And, as Cassius was rich, powerful and discreet, there was no
danger. Not at least in those days... although in the end things
proved to be far worst than what the lady may have
feared.
Our guardian was Turia, a tall, dark-haired freed woman in
her mid-thirties who had been Cassius' mistress in her youth and
now held absolute power inside the walls of the villa and was
directly in charge of us. We lived a secluded life, especially
the youngsters, who were not ready yet to take their places and
play their roles in Cassius' power games. As we were no common
slaves, hard work and exhaustion were alien to us. We had been
bred to fulfill duties that had nothing to do with cleaning or
cooking or working the land but with pleasuring men: Cassius'
friends, Cassius' political and military allies, Cassius' potential
supporters, Cassius' officers and, of course, Cassius himself.
As I said, Turia was our guardian but also our teacher and we
led a very strict life. In years to come, I'll learn that the
loveless discipline that commanded our existence was not very
differentfrom that which commanded the existence of the Vestal
Virgins.
But all resemblance ended there: our servitude had nothing to
do with Vesta but with Venus, our virginity was valued only by
those who would take it and when and not how long we'd keep it,
and our usefulness a lot shorter than the thirty years of service
promised by the Vestals as they took their vows. At least they
knew from the beginning the date of their release and the reward
they'd receive, some being still young enough when the time came
to find themselves a good husband and a family after three decades
at the goddess' temple. For us, the end of our service meant being
kept in the household for more years if we proved to be good breeders
and give Cassius beautiful girls to replace us... if we didn't
die in childbirth or miscarriage, that is. In the end, all we
could expect was to be relegated to lesser places, forgotten or
sold.
My life was as unnatural as my birth. No love or even lust
brought me from my unknown parents' loins but the will of an unrelenting
man used to commanding others' lives, to be obeyed and satisfied
in his wishes. From a very tender age, I learned how to be an
enchantress, an obedient slave, an accomplished courtesan. Under
Turia's unforgiving tutelage, I learned how to enhance the beauty
the gods have blessed me with, how to dress, how to scent my hair
and my body, how to make up, how to move, how to smile, how to
be graceful and elegant, how to speak and when to remain silent
and, above all, how to please any man's whims, no matter how sophisticated
or unnatural they were. And, of course, I was also taught how
to pretend because we were expected not only to endure the men's
attentions and pleasure them but to pretend that we enjoyed, no
matter how
crude, inept or disgusting they were. As Turia said, it was not
our place to judge but to make them feel as if they were gods
rutting on willing, mortal women.
I grew up listening to people say how beautiful I was and how
more beautiful I would be when I became a woman. The polished
mirrors of the villa's baths showed me a tall, slender girl with
long, wavy red-gold hair, milky skin and big blue eyes. And Cassius'
glance when he visited the villa between his military campaigns,
told me that he thought more about me than was good for my own
peace of mind.
When you are born a slave, you learn from a very tender age that
your life is not yours but what your master wants it to be. You
also learn to deal with your fate the best you can or you get
yourself in trouble. And, for a slave, trouble can be very bad.
So, like all the girls who grew up with me, and those who came
after, I learned to obey, to smile, to be pleasant, to please
and to go ahead, day after day, till I forgot -- or I thought
I had forgotten -- that there were people who lived in a very
different way, people who went where they pleased, who laughed
sincerely and not for fear of being punished, people who loved
and
was loved.
Although I was surrounded by many other girls, I grew up a
lonely child. I liked to be alone, solitude a rare jewel in a
household like that. Whenever possible, I used to hide in a far
corner of the gardens of the villa or, better yet, in the big,
shady library, its walls covered with niches that housed hundreds
of scrolls that I touched reverently, enthralled by the mysterious
power of the written words I could not read. In those secluded
places, I sat down to think and dream. I used to dream about my
mother, trying to imagine the anonymous, beautiful woman who had
carried me in her belly and brought me into the world.
She must had been beautiful for all of us came from beauty and
strength, our mothers no more than breeding mares, our fathers
but ready stallions.
How I craved for her!
Sometimes, we were taken to Rome as Turia thought that visiting
the markets and baths in the great city befitted our education
in the arts of pleasure and perfection. When this happened, I
looked avidly around me, drinking in as much as I could about
others' lives. And my eyes were always attracted by mothers carrying
their children. In those days, when we returned to the villa,
I used to lie awake in my bed for hours. I closed my eyes and
hugged myself tight as I tried to imagine it was she who hugged
me to her bosom. How ironic it is that so many years have passed
and I still do the same, lying sleepless in my cold bed night
after night, hugging myself and pretending that it is another
one who embraces me! But the one I dream about nowadays is no
longer my poor, unknown mother but a ruggedly handsome Roman General
with beautiful, and somehow sad,
blue eyes.
As time passed, I got fewer and fewer possibilities to isolate myself. My body blossomed and became that of a young woman and Turia and the household physician pronounced me ready to fulfill my duties. The physician was a Greek from Alexandria who was paid to keep us in good health and free of the consequences of our duties... and also to get rid of them when precautions failed, something that happened now and then. His name was Andreas and he discovered me once hiding in the library when I was but a little girl, standing aghast in front of the written treasure it harbored. He asked me if I was interested in the scrolls and was surprised when I told him that for sure I was but couldn't read or write. Education is not encouraged among slaves, lest they be male and show exceptional aptitudes that can be useful for their masters. Andreas asked me if I wanted to learn and I said, "Yes!" with an enthusiasm that made him laugh. He started immediately, using a piece of papyrus he had in his medicine box, and whenever he came to the villa, continued to teach me the little reading and writing and ciphering that was the only formal education I received while I was a slave. Since I mastered the first notions, I escaped to the library every time I could and bowed over the scrolls avidly trying to decipher their secrets, failing more often than not. But now and then I could master a line here and an idea there and I beamed in triumph, feeling as if I had attained a wonderful prize.
I kept my scarce education secret, anxious not to taint its
wonders with the crude reality of my daily life. My virginity
was the price Cassius paid for a senator's favor. The man was
in his fifties and preferred very young girls. And very young
I was, for it had been less than six months since I had started
my womanly bleeding so I was around twelve. Up to this moment,
my duties had been to learn the arts of seduction and to serve
wine to Cassius' male guests when he entertained at the villa.
When I did so, I felt their eyes following me avidly and more
often than not they asked questions about me to Cassius, and made
crude
remarks about my maidenhood and his plans for my future. But time
and again Cassius denied their requests that I'd be deflowered
in one of those parties, the only decent thing he did on my behalf.
But he was not moved by decency but only for his interests and
kept my virginity as a priced jewel, even refraining from taking
it himself and giving it instead to a man whose favor he badly
needed at the moment.
After the senator came more and more men: young, middle aged, old, tall, short, thin, plump, blond, dark, gray or reddish haired, sophisticated, coarse, smart, arrogant, stupid, educated, talkative, cold, well-mannered, brutish -- so different and so similar, all of them ready to take advantage of the flesh given them for free, all of them ready to enjoy the pleasures and discard the vessel. And, above all them, was Avidius Cassius, who expected every one of his whims to be obeyed without hesitation and claimed me regularly as he did with his special slaves and preferred me among all the others.
I pleasured all of them and then vacated their beds, as they didn't want to find me there when they woke up and I was grateful for that small mercy, retiring to my own bed after washing their memories from my flesh to struggle with a piece of papyrus and my own ignorance. It was this nearly hopeless struggle that kept me sane and helped me to erase their faces from my mind in the same way warm water and soap erased the evidence of coupling.
During the next six years, my life was an endless round of parties and men and duties fulfilled in senatorial beds and military cots. I was old enough to travel with my master and he took me -- and over a dozen other women -- to his military posts. Avidius Cassius was a well-respected army commander, who had successfully warred in the East side by side with the late emperor Lucius Verus and was highly regarded by the Roman senate.
What was going to be his last military campaign took him -- and me -- to Moesia, near the Black Sea. And it was in that post so far from Rome that my life changed forever. It started the night when my steps crossed with that of General Maximus Decimus Meridius, the man I pretend is embracing me when I hug myself night after night in my cold, lonely bed.