“And a whore,” Succula added.
“And a hardnosed, tight-assed bitch,” said the black woman.
“You got that right, Dido.” Everyone chimed in; this description was apparently a compliment to the domina.
“As you say, Red,” Dido added, addressing me directly for the first time. “She makes them pay. Does she ever. Nobody fools with her, and you won’t either, Hot Twat, if you know what’s good for you.”
Apparently these women identified with Domitia Tertia. I found their admiration perplexing.
“So,” said Dido, who shared a name with the fabled Queen of Carthage. “Are you really a novica? Never been a slave? Never done it for money?”
“I did it for passage on a ship.”
Applause greeted this admission.
“But it didn’t exactly work out,” I understated.
In fact, that was when everything had gone wrong. Maybe I was being punished—an unfamiliar and disconcerting line of thought for me.
“Don’t tell us.” Dido held up her hand. “The bastard drugged your drink and you woke trussed up and on your way to market.”
“And on the way he sticks you every time he feels like it,” added Berta. “Don’t feel bad, liebling. It’s not your fault. There is nothing you could have done to stop it.”
Yet that’s where the shame was, that it had happened to me at all. How could I have allowed it? How could I have been so stupid?
“Hey, none of us know until it’s too late: you gotta drug their drink first,” Dido answered my thoughts.
“That’s right, liebling,” Berta patted me and made comforting clucking noises.
Suddenly I was undone. Their unexpected kindness loosed my tears. I covered my face, expecting my weakness to be met with contempt. Instead I found myself surrounded by female bodies. Breasts brushed against my cheeks, bellies against my breasts. I breathed in the sweet, salty scent of women, the scent of home and I cried even harder.
“I was born,” I said when I could speak again, “on an island of women.”
“Only women!”
“I had eight mothers.”
“Sweet Isis!”
“And one old, old woman.”
“My granny used to take care of me,” someone sighed.
“And then the Romans came?” prompted Berta.
“No. No, Romans. The Romans will never find my mothers’ island. It is not in the same world.”
“Then why did you leave there? Why would you ever leave?” Dido sounded angry and wistful at once.
Why? I knew, but I could not begin to say.
“It’s all right,” soothed Berta. “You will tell us your story when you’re ready, yes? Listen now, liebling. Let me tell you how we do things here. You stick by us, we stick by you.”
“Don’t try to act like you’re better than everybody else,” Dido explained.
“Don’t steal anyone’s regulars,” added Succula.
“And then we teach you everything we know. All the little tricks.”
“How to spit it out without him knowing.”
“The sure fire hand job.”
“How to keep your womb locked up tight.”
I was a long way from druid school.
“Don’t worry,” said Succula. “Tonight everyone’s gonna know you’re new. Novelty will make up for lack of technique. You’ll catch on.”
“So, are you with us, Red?” Dido fixed me with a deep black gaze; she was gorgeous. “We’re all foreigners here, except for Succula. She was raised in the house. What matters is we’re all whores. You can be out for yourself or you can be one of us. How do you want to play it?”
I looked at the women surrounding me, their impulsive kindness now replaced with wariness. If I got close to them, would they hold me back or would they help me? Part of me wanted to say, I am not one of you; I will never be one of you. You are slaves to the Romans, and you accept it. Then I remembered my beloved, prophesying in a druid grove. “Rome is not a place,” he had said. “Rome is cruelty.” And here, among these women, I had, for a moment, been back home on Tir na mBan.
“I’m with you,” I said.
“Good. Now let’s show her how we seal a deal.”
As one the women rose to their knees and dipped their forefingers into their vulvas. They waited until I did the same; then we all pressed our hands together, and each woman gave me a smacking kiss on the mouth.
“Now you’re a whore, liebling!” exulted Berta.
I felt like nothing so much as a pig ready to be roasted for a banquet. I lacked only an apple crammed into my mouth. (Though I did have wool and honey stuffed up my twat in case coitus interruptus failed.) Celts like jewelry well enough, being excellent metal workers and lovers of gold, silver, and bronze. And, yes, they do lime their hair and paint their bodies with woad for battle. But decoration is not the same as artifice. I had always taken my attractions for granted and done little more than run a comb through my hair now and then to keep the birds from nesting there. I’d never worn anything more elaborate than a tunic, and had a tendency to toss my bracelets and torques into votive wells as I found them cumbersome.
Now I was wearing very little—a filmy hot pink whore’s toga, a sexy imitation of what senators wore—but all the simplicity was gone. My breasts were jammed together and thrust up towards my chin. My hair had been wound into a beehive on my head, and it’s a wonder I wasn’t followed by a swarm of bees, I was so heavily scented. My freckles had been painted over, my eyes outlined with kohl; my lips and cheeks were almost as bright a red as my hair. All this binding and dabbing and fluffing had been accomplished by the horde of ornatrices who descended on us after the bath.
By the ninth hour—that’s three in the afternoon your time—we were all assembled in the receiving rooms, reclining on couches, striking poses as we leaned against erotic statuary, doing our best to look as languid yet alert, as soft yet potentially dangerous as the cats who rubbed against our legs or nestled against our breasts. As I gazed around the room I was struck again by the women’s variety—a small united colonized peoples with Domitia Tertia representing Rome as an equal opportunity exploiter. The rainbow display must be good for business. Bored Romans could fuck ethnic, and nostalgic foreigners could get a taste of home.
Clients began to trickle in, mostly regulars, it seemed. Bone played the genial host, but stayed near the door. No one could go in or out without encountering him. Bonia directed the little girls who fetched and carried trays of food and drink and she kept a sharp eye on the whores who did the actual serving—a form of foreplay. Figs and olives nestled in cleavage; grapes were held suggestively between lips. Frequent signals passed between Bonia, and the cashier. I later learned that dalliance in the lobby was not on the house. There was a charge for everything.
According to Bonia’s orders, I was to stay on the sidelines and observe as much as possible my first night on the job. If someone wanted a twosome, she would send me along to learn under another whore’s tutelage. If anyone insisted on having me or if there was a shortage, I’d be on my own to sink or swim. (Sinking meant back to the slave block.) Meanwhile Bonia was constitutionally incapable of tolerating idleness.
“Here.” She came around to my hideout behind a potted palm. “You might as well learn how to pit and peel. You’ve noticed how the