Stepbrothers



A rendsz’ world story95250215265Contents TOC \o "1-2" \h \z \u 1.brothers meet PAGEREF _Toc431151136 \h 32.usurper PAGEREF _Toc431151137 \h 63.adjustments PAGEREF _Toc431151138 \h 94.welcome PAGEREF _Toc431151139 \h 125.homecoming PAGEREF _Toc431151140 \h 136.outside his city PAGEREF _Toc431151141 \h 147.prepared PAGEREF _Toc431151142 \h 158.disorienting PAGEREF _Toc431151143 \h 179.escorted PAGEREF _Toc431151144 \h 1810.cheered PAGEREF _Toc431151145 \h 1911.denounced PAGEREF _Toc431151146 \h 2112.punishment PAGEREF _Toc431151147 \h 2213.reaction PAGEREF _Toc431151148 \h 2314.shamed PAGEREF _Toc431151149 \h 2415.cowed PAGEREF _Toc431151150 \h 2516.mad PAGEREF _Toc431151151 \h 2617.housed PAGEREF _Toc431151152 \h 2818.discoveries PAGEREF _Toc431151153 \h 3019.size matters PAGEREF _Toc431151154 \h 3220.exposed PAGEREF _Toc431151155 \h 3421.down to it PAGEREF _Toc431151156 \h 3622.disappointment PAGEREF _Toc431151157 \h 3823.anointed PAGEREF _Toc431151158 \h 4224.a mother’s designs PAGEREF _Toc431151159 \h 4525.keeping a promise PAGEREF _Toc431151160 \h 4826.nailed PAGEREF _Toc431151161 \h 5127.curious PAGEREF _Toc431151162 \h 5428.kindnesses PAGEREF _Toc431151163 \h 5629.murderer PAGEREF _Toc431151164 \h 6030.protocol PAGEREF _Toc431151165 \h 6331.Loss of control PAGEREF _Toc431151166 \h 6532.summons PAGEREF _Toc431151167 \h 67Each chapter features a different model as MacisteChapter 1Realisation dawnsbrothers meetMaciste growled.“Get your arse off that throne.”The sight of his brother lounging on his father’s throne angered him.Maciste’s dead father. Such disrespect.“You have no right.”Kheir sniggered at the vain sight.His older brother .. stepbrother .. in chains.Surrounded by armed soldiers.Ringed by a circle of deadly spears.And posturing.He snorted.“You want to make me? Big brother?” “Get your stinking arse off that throne.”Maciste repeated his fury at his stepbrother. A thwack from the hilt of a sword hit him in the shoulder. “Respect!”In turn the soldier yelled out .. surprised. Raising the weapon for a second threatening blow. But he didn’t expect the speed of the response. Enraged at his brother’s behaviour, Maciste took it out on the soldier. He tore himself around. His bare foot hooked a kick behind the soldier’s leg .. his shoulder barged him in the chest .. sending him staggering .. before Maciste saw he was surrounded by a sea of spears.A clapping from behind made Maciste spin around again. His younger brother clapping Maciste’s efforts. Mockingly. Mocking Maciste’s capture. Taunting Maciste with his inability to do anything about it.“Always the one who acted first and thought second. Big brother. Still the big prick.”Maciste glared in fury at this effrontery. In the last hours it had dawned on him that his step-brother had treacherously taken over. No one would answer his questions .. roughly telling the young prince to keep his trap shut .. or else ….. But Maciste had convinced himself his brother had usurped the throne. And now he was insulting Maciste by lounging disrespectfully on his father’s throne. Like trampling his father’s memory into the dust.“Always the heroic man of action! What a dickhead! "Kheir had thrown his leg over the arm of the throne and was sprawled out there in comfort.Maciste swore at his brother-by-marriage. Today he had had Maciste arrested. Publicly shamed .. thrashed before his people .. Kheir’s artful way of welcoming the rightful king back to his lands.Since being shamefully disgracefully thrown into a filthy stinking dungeon Maciste had spent miserable and fuming hours nursing his anger and frustration. Waiting to see if his worst fears were confirmed. And they were. And Kheir had made no secret of it .. he’d stolen his father’s throne .. appropriated Maciste’s inheritance .. and sprawled over the throne like that, he was rubbing Maciste’s nose in it. And with Maciste brought before him in chains .. Kheir was making one thing abundantly clear .. Maciste was now his stepbrother’s prisoner. Maciste’s face twisted into a contemptuous scorn at his brother’s disrespect of the throne. “Get your arse off my father’s throne. It has no right to be there.”In truth, it was rightfully Maciste’s throne. Since his father’s death ….. Maciste was lawfully king.“OUR father ….” Kheir interrupted. “Remember ….?”Kheir was smirking down from the dais. “He married my mother. MY father too.”By marriage only. Maciste was the dead king’s only son in his father’s bloodline. And the older brother too. The laws were clear. Maciste was now rightfully king.A leg provocatively slung over the arm of the royal throne, Kheir grinned down at his prisoner-brother.“And I’ve decided my stinking arse fits this throne better than yours.” usurperMaciste’s father dead .. the throne passed rightfully to him.News of the king’s death had come as a shock.Fit, healthy, not a day’s illness in his life.Since returning .. from what he’d seen ….Maciste feared the worst.He had been away.Maciste had known his duty.The kingdom would need an heir.A princess had been named.He had been sent away to woo himself a bride.But untoward happenings had taken place .. .. as soon as his back was turned. “On your knees.”The captain gave Maciste a shove. Taking his orders from his master on the throne.Maciste gave his brother a glare. Refusing to kneel before this boy who had stolen his father’s throne.“Make him!”Hands grabbed Maciste from behind. A grip grabbed in the top of his scalp. Pressing him down. A foot kicked in the back of his knee. But Maciste resisted. When his leg had stopped wobbling, he shoved sideways .. losing the grip in his hair. But a sharp jar from the hilt of a sword smacked him in the back of the neck. Hard. Jolting him forward. Before he could find his feet again, the grips of his arms were wrestling him to the ground. Maciste fought back .. jarring his head upwards to dislodge the grips. Without warning a club appeared from nowhere. He took a hard thud in the belly. Losing his breath. The grips on his arms struggled their way back. Another smack with the club robbed Maciste of wind. Collectively, overcome by weight of muscle, his stepbrother’s soldiers wrestled the rightful king to his knees.A hand twisted in Maciste’s hair. Holding his struggling down. But forcing his head up to face his younger brother lounging disrespectful on the throne. “You have no right.”Maciste snarled at the effrontery of his stepbrother.“That throne is rightfully mine.”Kheir smirked.“Want to try and take it back?”Maciste’s arms were tied down in chains. Surrounded by foreign soldiers. Held down on his knees. The leg irons they’d forced him into had a short chain. Kheir had enjoyed watching his slow gait the full length of this great Hall. Maciste had to shuffle humiliatingly into this great Hall. Mincing like some girl .. the heroic young warrior .. his heavy irons clanking in the empty echoing space. Shuffling the whole length of the Hall while Kheir was watching his approach .. gloating from the throne. Down on his knees. .. forced into this act of submission. .. an act he did not mean. .. a submission he had no intention of showing. Maciste wanted to break Kheir’s neck. But no way would he get to his damned brother on the throne before soldiers cut Maciste down. Kheir was shaking his head. Maciste felt his temper rising. .. frustrated.Kheir snorted. In contempt for the stupidity of a brother whose throne he had so easily taken from him. Robbing the rightful king.“It seems my stinking arse is here. And you … well, look at you…. “Kheir snorted his disdain for his stepbrother. “You look every bit the king.”Dressed in peasant’s rages. Surrounded by hostile spears. In chains. Forced to submit to his stepbrother. Robbed of his throne.“Don’t you now? Eh?”Maciste was forced to look up at the usurper lounging on his father’s throne. Himself clad only in the soiled breeches they’d forced him into. "And talking of arses ...."Kheir sniggered."I gather you are complaining of a sore backside ..."He chortled .. deliberately .. to get Maciste's temper up.Maciste glared .. his anger as fiery as the memory of that shameful thrashing.Angry but impotent .. for now. Surrounded by enemies .. In his own palace. In chains in his father’s great Hall. What could he do? What could he say? Except by getting his hands around that traitor's neck, how could he put things right? Since his arrival at the port .. since he’d been jumped and brought here a prisoner .. now dragged into the presence of his own stepbrother .. the only troops he’d seen were from his stepmother’s lands. It was like his own kingdom had been invaded.“Where are my father’s generals?”Maciste still found it hard to grasp his father was dead and he himself had inherited the throne.“Not around.”Kheir sniggered.“Many fell on their own swords. Men who find themselves incapable of taking sound advice .. they tend to meet a bloody end.”Murdered. His stepbrother had had the ruler’s leaders expunged. And only his mother’s kinsmen were in control. Maciste suspected Kheir’s mother’s hand in all of this. Was Maciste the only legitimate one from the ruling class left?“How did my father die?”Maciste refused to acknowledge his stepbrother’s assertion to be his father’s son .. claiming Maciste’s father for his own. His father? Maciste had to ask the question .. but he was already suspecting the worst.Kheir shrugged.“Men. Riddled through with a frailty. All born with a terminal illness. Called death.”In his darkest thoughts in that stinking pit underground Maciste had got increasingly convinced. Kheir .. or his conniving mother .. had had his father murdered. He wouldn’t put such a crime past them.“But that is not the point …”Kheir wriggled in eagerness on his throne.“Point is …. “Kheir was hungrily leaning forward on the throne. His agitated gaze all over his prisoner-brother’s strong body. …. what do we do about this … inconvenience?”His hand gestured at Maciste. His older brother. The warrior prince. Strong and athletic. Hero of the people. Powerful, muscular. But forced to kneel before him. And thrown into chains!“How best to dispose of this little wrinkle in our plans?” adjustmentsKheir had known this would come,.. he had anticipated.News of the king’s death would bring Maciste back.Father and only son .. proud king and warrior-prince .. .. they had been close.Maciste would rush back to grieve.And investigate.Kheir had prepared.An escort fit-for-purpose greeted the returning prince.A shameful reception before his people abused the rightful heir.Maciste could be in no doubt .. .. his throne had been lost.He was nothing. A left-over.An inconvenience.And as such .. suitably housed .. suitably treated .. .. the glorious warrior-prince would have to learn his place. Kheir took in the muscular body on his knees in submission before him. The kingdom’s one-time warrior-prince. Honoured and respected. By his own soldiers. By the people. And as such a threat. A figure opposition could rally around.This young man had had it all. From birth on enviously strongly built. Maciste had thrown himself into the military life from boyhood .. relishing the demands and adversities that a soldier’s life put on his muscled body. Glorying in what the hardships did for it. Building a head-turning physique. Catching the girls' eyes .. he’d bedded from an early age. And as warrior-prince winning the respect of his fighting men for his own fearless deeds .. Expecting nothing from them that their prince had not already demanded of himself. Kheir's sharp insights took in this muscular threat to his claim on the throne.Looking down on Maciste kneeling there glowering back. Defiant .. but in chains .. his prisoner. But still those broad shoulders did constitute a serious threat. Those powerful arms could still clutch to that hard-muscled chest Kheir's hold on power and squeeze the life out of his reign. Men could still rally behind that strong broad back and put up a fight. As long as his stepbrother still drew breath, Maciste posed a danger.A real threat. And yet .. also an opportunity. The perfect tool. The means to make this kingdom understand convincingly that things had changed. Permanently. No going back.Kheir had contemplated hard on how to settle Maciste's return. Confounding the musclehead from the moment his boat docked. Arresting him, putting him in bonds. One pace ahead of the famed warrior-prince with every step. Would he ever have expected that? A public shaming in front of the whole city? What Kheir had ordered for his step-brother .. a public thrashing for the rightful king ….. Kheir did not under-estimate his stepbrother. Maciste was not stupid. He had acute intuitions. And that shaming would have got this muscle-head thinking. Hero-of-the-people. Who had earned their love. Beloved first-born son .. destined to become their ruler. The general who led his troops from the front .. heroic in the thick of battle. And what had the muscle-head learned today? This man who had had it all. The girls. The respect. The adulation of his people. And now ….? What had this prick got now? Just how much could this prick rely on that peoples-love? What had this heroic champion seen in the temple square? How much of his people’s love had he felt when his dignity was being publicly abused? Put on show and shamelessly humiliated. Their warrior prince beaten before their eyes. How many shocked citizens had rushed recklessly to his aid? How many frantic voices were raised in his support?None. Not one. This prick-of-a-prince had seen it with his own eyes. How fickle that love was. No one would be rising up to come to his aid.What had this arsehole got now? Chains. A stinking dungeon cell. A peasant’s coarse home-spun breeches. His brother’s prisoner. Abandoned by his people. His generals gone. What exactly had this epitome of the warrior-prince got to his name? FUCK-ALL.Suddenly Kheir snapped out of his pensive mood. “Captain.”The tone of voice betrayed to Maciste that his younger stepbrother had already got a liking for shoving his weight around. He was enjoying the power. Astonishing to Maciste, this wimp of a stepbrother almost sounded like he might one day become a ruler. Unless Maciste stopped him dead in his tracks ….The officer stepped forward, the one who had met the cart they had shamefully transported Maciste on. The same captain who had ordered Maciste stripped and gagged. Not exactly Maciste’s favourite soldier right now. The captain’s head gave a respectful bow. Clearly he knew which side his bread was buttered on .. who was in charge …. Kheir’s authority seemed well established already.“It seems this dog-of-a-brother is having problems adjusting to his new life.”Kheir smirked down at Maciste.“Help him out.”Maciste marvelled at how this young brat had grown so rapidly into the role. “Beat it into this dog’s thick hide.”Kheir had taken to ordering cruelty like a duck to water. Maciste suspected his mother’s coaching. She had always struck him as a scheming ambitious bitch.“Take him down. House him ….. Kheir gloated.“ ….suitably ….”Maciste snarled back into the triumphant look on Kheir’s face. He reckoned the wimp was getting a hard-on from this ….“Food and drink .. suitably prepared .. of course.”That look on Kheir’s face told Maciste everything these words did not. Both understood what was going on.“Assist him.”Cynically Maciste knew Kheir was sitting there nursing a hard-on .. got from dominating over his older stepbrother. Getting off on power.“Help this arsehole-of-a-brother out. Help him see. Get the picture. See things have changed ….”Kheir was grinning. Triumphant.“Beat that message into his thick skull.” Chapter 2Rude awakeningwelcome homeModelled by Christian FattoreMaciste’s boat had docked. He’d been surprised at the guard of honour. Men in his step-mother’s livery. But then, he’d thought .. his own father’s soldiers would be honouring the king at the funeral. But he hadn’t expected his escort to put him under arrest. Forcibly. Take him prisoner.His stepmother had negotiated a marriage for the first-born son. Dutiful Maciste had gone to meet her. But on arrival, it turned out the girl was already betrothed. Should Maciste have suspected something untoward then?Part-way home .. news of his father’s unexpected death. But he could only return as fast as the winds allowed. Impatient to get home. Not expecting the reception that greeted him when his boat docked.As he had docked, the escort had come on board. Without warning his arms were grabbed. Affronted Maciste had shaken them off. But just as quickly his arms had been pulled behind his back. A soldier's mailed glove had hammered into his guts. The shock as much as the force had made him gasp. But to make sure, the grip on his arms tightened. And the soldier smacked at that muscled strength another half-dozen times.The first of numerous tussles Maciste had with his stepmother’s men. homecomingA full morning he’d spent tied down on that farmer’s cart. His transport back to his own city. Swinging from confusion to downright anger. Manhandled .. abused .. bound. Spread-eagled on his back .. jolted around on the flat-bed .. forcibly returned home .. Kheir’s prisoner. He’d struggled against being tied-down, indignant he’d fought back. They’d lashed out .. beating up the unanointed king. He’d hit back too. Fists, kicks, curses. His objections had got ignored, tied him down flat-out on the waggon. They’d answered his curses back in like kind. His anger had earned him only mocking jeers and a few good kicks in his side. Now ordered dumped in this foul-stinking cell by his step-brother. Maciste was freezing. Burning with anger at Kheir’s tricks. And cold. Deep underground Maciste shivered. Dank and dark here. No other signs of human life. Abandoned. Maciste had on only the short breeches he’d been forced into. He shivered. Trying not to let his peril get to him. Sat hunched up, thighs clenched to his chest for warmth, powerful arms wrapped around his muscled lower legs. Keeping in his body heat. But his bare back was exposed. The chill of dismay seeped into his bones. Hard not to feel abandoned. Not to give in to a sense of being beaten. Out-played, tricked. A prisoner. His inheritance lost. Defeated. By his own step-brother. And Kheir’s scheming mother. outside his cityOutside the city .. his father’s capital .. his own city .. the waggon had halted. The sun was high, heading towards noon. His escort withdrew to the shade but Maciste was left out in the sun, spread-eagled on the cart still. Waiting. For what? Sweaty, hot. Angry. Demanding answers. But he’d get nothing out of these morons. They’d got the wrong man. And they’d pay for it when someone with brains turned up. By the gods he’d make these idiots suffer! For what they had done to a king.Eventually he heard the sounds of riders, hoof-beats smacking on the sun-baked earth approaching. Suddenly his escort had rushed back by his cart .. a sign that officers were arriving. They needed to get back in role fast instead of lounging around. A good sign that Maciste would get answers. He got ready to demand an apology from the man-in-charge.An officer on his horse loomed over the side of Maciste’s cart. Maciste didn’t recognise him. Another foreigner. In his step-mother’s colours.“What the hell is this about?”Maciste yelled up at him. Letting out hours of frustration and anger. prepared for receptionMaciste again demanded why a prince of the realm was being manhandled like this. He was their rightful king. He demanded from their officer what his men were up to. He was ignored.“Stick to the plans.”The officer addressed the sergeant who’d been in charge of this journey. Taking no notice of the prince.“Main city gate. Straight to the temple.”Furious at the unanointed king being ignored, Maciste bawled out. To get the man’s attention.“I demand to know what’s going on.”This time the officer did cast a look over Maciste. Stretched out on the back of some peasant’s cart. “What’s he still doing dressed like this?”The captain gave the warrior-prince barely a second glance .. his fighting strength tie down on the back of a farmer’s cart. Just a moment was enough to decide.“And gag the fucker. Shut up this arsehole’s gob.” Duly soldiers jumped up onto the cart .. ordered to shut him up. Maciste refused to be silenced. He jigged his head to the left. He wriggled himself out of the hold on his jaw. He resisted .. even at the punch on his mouth. A hand punched him between his out-splayed thighs. The hand grabbed hold of him there. It kept squeezing .. crushing pain into his nuts. Eventually Maciste let out a reluctant cry. Spluttering and writhing as they managed to force the stick between his jaws.Sneering, the captain observed his prisoner .. stretched out. His eyes shooting back his fury .. but silenced. Humiliated.“And what’s the cocksucker still doing in those fine clothes?”He smirked at Maciste’s anger .. the prisoner understanding the implication of his words.Satisfied he was hitting the mark with his prisoner, the officer kicked his stallion and rode off to take advantage of the shade. To orders, Maciste’s escort set about releasing him. Knives sliced at the cords securing his limbs. Maciste sprang to the need to fight himself free. But a pair of spears at his throat kept into pinned down.Told to get his ass off the cart, Maciste was continuously surrounded by a wall of spears and mean-minded enemy soldiers, swords drawn. They were clearly on edge, alert for any move. His father was dead, he was now king. He was his people’s warrior-prince. Given the slightest chance, he could take these cretins on. But they were not given to offering him that slightest chance.“You heard. Get yourself out of that outfit.”The sergeant’s sword indicated at Maciste to strip.“Get naked, ya cocksucker.”Maciste hesitated. “Got a liking to those myself.”The sergeant was laying claim to Maciste’s princely attire.Angry Maciste was unwilling to be pushed around. Or ordered out of his clothing. He was after all the to-be-anointed king here.“Or you want the guys here to help you out?”Maciste wanted neither. But he knew they’d stop at nothing once he gave them the excuse. Glaring back he stood with nothing on .. sticking out his chest, sucking in his belly .. giving them the warrior-king that he was .. he refused to be intimidated by their mocking stares.“So that’s what a royal dick looks like ….. “Mocking guffaws broke out. All eyes on him there.Maciste stared back at the sergeant’s snigger. Eyes slitted in anger. Surrounded by uncouth morons .. ringed by the belly laughs of his cretinous escort. Promising to himself .. once they got back to the city .. he’d sort this all out. And he’d make each-and-every one of them pay for this indignity. And this sergeant especially.Stuck with the thought …..They had to know who he was .. surely?. Heir to the throne. This the way to treat the uncrowned king? This how they are welcoming the people’s warrior-prince? Returning home to mourn his father’s death? So why were they handling him like this. And .. what happened next? disorientingNot some bad mistake. Not mistaken identity. The officer knew who he was. And he’d ordered the unanointed king out of his clothes. Naked the prince was subjected to soldiers’ mockery .. laughing at “his royal dick.” They knew exactly who he was ….Not just confused at this abuse. Everything was out-of-place. It was unnerving. The city was deserted. Empty. Like the bustle that always seethed around the city gate had had the life sucked out of it. Life abandoned here. Abandoning Maciste. He looked about himself unnerved. Passing under the great arch of the gate .. there was not a soul here. Dead. No traders departing to do their trade. No farmers plying their wares. No peasant women returning home laden with goods from the market. Just a troop of six more armed guards .. who fell in beside Maciste and added to the escort marching the rightful king back into his city. Under guard, in enemy bonds. In rags.After being made to strip, Maciste had been thrown some stinking rags. A pair of baggy breeches. A peasant’s coarse homespun pants full of holes. A bad swap for his leather breeches. The kind peasants wore working the fields in the heat. Too big for him but kept up by a length of coarse rope. Deliberately humiliating him.No mistaken identity. But a nightmare. What the hell was going on? escortWith Maciste’s wrists behind his back, the captain rode his horse back to the city. Taking hold of the noose around Maciste’s neck and yanking him off at a smart walk back through the heat towards Maciste’s own city gate.Not one soldier from his country’s own army had he seen. The troops transporting him on the cart .. and now the soldiers joining in at the gate .. all were dressed in the livery of his stepmother. His country had been invaded! By his father’s own wife.Empty. The streets leading through his capital city were deserted. Maciste was tugged along by the noose around his neck. Pulled tight into his throat. The other end tied to the captain’s saddle .. forcing Maciste to follow at the pace dictated by a horse. The knot dug into his chin and forced his head up. Like a reluctant cow being taken to market.The square before the temple was packed. All human life it seemed had squeezed itself in .. to welcome their “king”. Escorted in by foreign troops. Tied, tugged along by a noose around his neck. As-good-as-naked. Dressed in only the holey rags of a peasant. The whole of humanity was assembled there. Greeting him in silence. Not a word from the people tightly cramped into this space. Not a cheer. Not even a jeer for a fallen prince so shamed before them. Maciste was surrounded. By alien troops. By an unearthly silence. Silence only broken by foul-mouthed soldiers’ curses as troops roughly cut a way through the tight crowd. With clubs and spears these foreigners were forcing a way through Maciste’s own people .. steering their prince through their midst .. close-guarded by foreign troops. Forced in shame up the steps of their temple. Shamed, filthy. Dragged like a beast on a noose. Hands tied like some criminal. The man they should have been acclaiming as king invadersMaciste stood shocked. Taken aback. Hard what to make of this. He’d rushed back because his father had mysteriously died. But his ship had been welcomed by a gang of foreign troops. Taken prisoner. And now dragged like some lamb to the slaughter .. near-naked through the streets of his own city. And he was made to face his own people .. massed together to watch his shame. Standing on the temple steps where rightly they should have been crowning him. Hands-tied. Some common criminal. Hauled before his own people.Once their popular warrior-prince. Once a general enthusiastically followed by his people’s troops. They looked up at him .. in silence. Shamed before them. For what crime? What did they think he had done?Only one thing made sense. All the soldiers he’d seen, they were foreigners .. dressed in his step-mother’s colours. Stood on the temple steps he wondered, Where were his own loyal troops .. men he had led into battle .. leading from the front? Strangers .. everywhere. Not one soldier from his own country. It looked like his own country was occupied by a foreign power. Maciste smelled a rat. He suspected his step-mother. He’d never trusted her. But how could she have manipulated this?Before he could clear his thoughts, soldiers were on him again. Hands grabbed. Maciste lashed out, resisting. He’d not be given a second chance. He didn’t have any plan, he was surrounded, he’d never flee through this densely packed crowd. But confused .. fearing the worst .. he HAD to do something. He had to show he was still the warrior-prince. Not intimidated.A soldier went down .. a nose bleeding from Maciste elbow-punch. Another fell back from a head-butt to his head. Maciste twisted himself out of the hand grabbing for his arms .. his foot kicked back, another stunning blow loaded with his anger.He stopped. A circle of spears surrounded him. One jabbed at his neck. It drew blood. Others covered every bit of his bare chest. He sensed others behind. One false move and they’d happily run him through. Skewered as his people looked on.A moment’s invitation was all they would need. The spear at his neck pressed close .. pricking at his skin. It would take less than a heart-beat to finish him off.His arms were grabbed. Maciste felt strong hands gripped him tight, elbows dragged behind. Already his hands were useless, tied together in his back. Now that the fight-back had been foiled .. he sensed the hundreds of eyes on him .. from beneath him, from below these temple steps. His own people. Those who should be heartily hailing the return of their young heir. Watching him in eerie silence. Men who should have taken up arms on his behalf .. watching their king being overpowered. Witnessing their warrior prince being trussed up. Watching in unnerving silence. They watched as the noose that had dragged him helpless into his city was thrown over a beam. The noose dangling down. Maciste’s heart gave a jump. Were they going to hang him? Here and now?He’d supervised executions. He’d stood here as a criminal was hauled up by the neck. Dragged by the neck off the ground. Strangled. Publicly and slowly throttled.Was that his fate? In front of his people. Watching passively. Hanged. A public execution. The noose around his neck tightening. Throttling him. He’d seen the eye-popping look of shock on a criminal’s face. Face going from red to purple. Mouth gaping wide .. gasping uselessly for air. Legs jerking. Had his people gathered here to watch that? His muscular body helplessly twisting in desperation. As the horror of helplessness crushed on his heart. As the life was cruelly squeezed out of him.Was that why they had crushed into this square? To witness his public hanging? Him? Their prince. Getting hanged before his own people. Here to watch their own uncrowned king being slowly strangled? traitor “You see before you a traitor.”The captain that had led Maciste on a noose through the empty city was addressing the crushed-in crowd. Traitor?He had Maciste held by the scalp, hand gripped tight in the hair in the back of his head. Holding up his face for all to see.Maciste was trying to shake the hand free. No traitor! Shaking his head .. denying the charge to his people. Shaking his head indignant .. determined to free himself of the shaming hold on his head. How could the rightful king be a traitor? But there were also hands going for him from behind. Strong grips on his arms tied in his back. Hands fumbling around his wrists. Maciste was torn between denying these disgusting charges and trying to wriggle himself free of this move on him. Was that something being tied around his wrists? He wriggled, squirmed in the tight grips. His eyes appealed to the people. They knew he was no traitor .. didn’t they? They knew him for what he was. The heir. Their rightful king.Trapped between fighting off an attack from behind and this shameful charge. Clearing his name to the people. “Treachery plotted against your anointed king.” punishmentWhat anointed king? What the hell ….? Maciste was heir. Accused of plotting against himself! Maciste had plotted nothing. He had been away .. sent to woo a betrothed .. in a distant land. Then his father had suddenly died. And if anyone was king here, it was him!Suddenly there was a tug on his hands. Tugging his wrists upwards. A rope tied to his wrists bound behind him were pulling his arms up. Another sharp tug. Quickly Maciste forced a look upwards. The rope was being hauled over a beam above his head. They’d tied the noose to his wrists. Yanking up on his arms. Pulling them up his back. In a few tugs, Maciste was bent forwards. Another few sharp tugs he was bent up double, his arms pointed straight up.“An anointed king brooks no challenge. This is how he deals with traitors.”There was a first sound from the crowd. A shocked gasp. The rope holding up Maciste’s baggy breeches had been sliced through. The heavy homespun peasant’s pants dropped to Maciste’s ankles. The crowd grasped. The sight of their prince naked before them sent a shockwave through the crowd.beaten mad“Begin. Thirty lashes.”Maciste had scarcely taken in the words. Behind a hissing sound cut at the air. Less than a heart-beat later a stinging snap took a bite out of his bare backside. Shocked, Maciste grunted out loud. He was having his arse whipped! His naked backside. He was taking thirty lashes on his bare backside. In front of his own people! For doing what? WHY?A stupid worrying thought rushed to his head. He’d once ordered a truculent soldier publicly beaten like this. Lashed across his bare backside. What had made it worse for him .. the pain had got to him .. the shame had wound him up. The nerves between each stroke had worked on him. He’d got hard. Whipped across his bare arse. And publicly throwing a boner!The shock jerked his head up. The sting of the first strike convulsed his upper torso. Fleetingly Maciste was aware of the faces below him .. watching the heir to the throne being whipped across his bare backside. The indignity momentarily flushed to his head. But quickly replaced by the heat of that lash shimmering down his legs. And the whoosh of the next strike from behind.Pride taught him to control his cries. He tried to hold his stand. He made himself absorb the blows. The force made him jolt. Two hits .. Four .. Seven strikes. The burn twisted his face into sharp grimaces. He buried his head from the crowd. The heat was rushing to his eyes.Two more smarting teeth-clenching hits. Grimaces of pain were clawed unstoppable across his face. The force of a stinging lash hammered into his backside drove him forward onto one foot. A sharp grunt of pain forced its way out .. joined by a stabbing pain in his shoulders as the noose on his wrists yanked him back.Pain snapped at his bare flesh. More bites torn out of his arse. Unmanly he heard his first high-pitched yelp. Angered at his weakness, he swore to fight the pain down. But impossible to hold it in. Pain jerked and spasmed through his upper body. Anger and shame surged through his being .. strong, muscled, in his prime. But having his arse whipped .. thrashed like some street brat! Heat .. pain .. anger. Pulsating .. convulsing as he was thrown forward on his foot. A stinging hit consuming his strength with its heat.Anger turned to rage in his blood. But Maciste had no chance to give it vent. Putting all his strength into fighting back on the pain. A dozen stinging lashes .. Maciste was in no position to play tough. Play the big hero. He was fighting for his pride. His shoulder joints were repeatedly thrown forward in sharp jerks. Pain tore at his joints. Stabbed in sharp tremors of pain. Every burning hit .. every smarting slash bitten out of his bare backside .. heat raged up his back. Roasted over a grill .. waves of intense heat singeing like charred flesh .. shimmering down his thighs. Excruciating heat off his tortured backside. Like the skin-blistering heat off a furnace.No sooner did the surge of severe heat flood over him than another whoosh announced the next fire-laden blow to knock him forward on his legs. Nothing was held back. The enemy was giving Maciste their all. The crippling force of the blows only grew with the maddening heat flaming off his bare arse.Anxious Maciste sensed a buzzing energy in his flesh. A menacing sound of a swarm of angry hornets ringing through his burning torso. A surreal horde of maddened fiends taking hold of his muscular strength. Sucking away at his manly power. His hold over himself wavering in this blistering heat of pain. Flooding his senses .. draining him of his muscled manliness. Taking cruel control of his senses. Overwhelming him with their vicious evil force.An insane tumult. The force of this skin-blistering inferno off his backside bursting in sheets of pain over his bent muscled back.He yelled out. Bounced off a force like hit with a war-mace. The walls of the furnace exploded on his arse. Red-hot coals pounded at his flesh. Searing mind-crushing pain ripped up his back. Every muscle shrieked. Every nerve screamed. Every fibre in his muscular torso convulsed in agony. Maciste’s throat burst open in a loud tortured cry. imageTears were running free .. tears of anger .. weeping out the pain .. running shameful down his face. The burning on his backside flooded his eyes with unmanly tears. Shamefully made to cry out. Harsh piercing shouts. His pain made public. His sharp cries unstoppable. Tears of pain unwelcome but they could not be stopped. His backside was on fire. Like sitting on hot coals. Each swipe with their whips had been having him yelp. However much he tried, there was no keeping it in .. that breath-taking pain that lit up his backside. Every damned time.He was a stranger in his own skin. Everything that had been real to him had been turned upside-down. The lashings had stopped. Maciste was panting like mad. His arms drawn straight up in the air behind his back, looking down at his bare feet. But beyond his head, where he could not see them, his people had stood and watched him suffer thirty breath-taking swipes across his bare backside. Shamefully he was acutely aware that they were also looking up at his naked crutch. His royal manliness held up for ridicule.Had they laughed? Had the people cheered? Maciste had heard nothing. His whole attention had been focussed on the menacing whoosh of air behind him. His whole efforts had been to contain the cries of pain that had soon been rushing up his twisted body and threatening to break free in a yelp of pain. No thought about why these soldiers were doing this to him. No wondering about these trumped up charges of treason. Every muscular effort had been directed into managing the will-breaking pains that burned off his backside.How did his people see him? Looking up at him from below. Bent over as if bowing in supplication to this invading force. What did they see in that fabled warrior-prince? A peasant’s rags cluttered around his ankles. Looking up at his naked cock. Sent jerking by the violent swipes across his bare arse. Even his most private royal parts slave to the will of this invader. What chance of him hanging on to a shred of their respect? Their beloved heir-to-the-throne. The prized warrior. Stood with his dick out. His bare arse thoroughly thrashed. Tears of pain running off his face.Maciste smelled his stepmother’s hand all over this. Who was it had sent him to woo a bride? Away for months. Sent to win a girl already betrothed. All the soldiers here were in her colours. His back had been turned. SHE had “invaded”. Had her husband murdered? Maciste wouldn’t put that past her, the bitch. Taken over. And now she was having their heir subjected to this ….Beaten. Brought low. Humiliated. The rightful king thrashed thirty times on his burning arse. shamedThe blows had stopped. The stinging lashes to his inflamed backside had come to an end. He’d taken his punishment. Had he endured those thirty unjust strikes? The strikes had stopped. But not the burning. Any movement .. a slight shift with his feet .. like a red-hot spear jabbed into his flesh. The strikes had stopped. But not the indignity. Suddenly his anger flared. Abruptly the searing heat on his backside had become a seething fury. How dare they! What gave them the right! Rightfully he was the unanointed king here. Charged with treason? What? Against himself? Suddenly Maciste was fighting to right himself. Struggling against the rope doubling him up like this. Wriggling, squirming, lifting his head. Putting up a fight.What army had invaded? Which country had conquered his land? Accused of treachery .. him, Maciste? Their heir? What man had conquered and had himself anointed king? When Maciste’s back was turned ….?Unexpectedly the tension on his arms gave way. His arms dropped down. Losing not one second of a chance, Maciste righted himself. He tore himself upright. In an instant he almost wished he hadn’t. His instinct to right himself gave the crowd the full sight of him .. tears of pain streaked in the dirt on his face. His torso glistening in the sun .. the sweat of pain shimmering. His skin blotched-red from the flames alive in his flesh.And what shocked his eyes most ….. If he had been greeted by a jeering mob .. rejoicing at seeing their prince get brought down a peg .. that he might have understood. If he had heard protests at their prince being unjustly abused .. infamously called a traitor .. at that his heart would have jumped for joy.But the sight that met his eyes .. down in the square, crushed-in tight to watch this act of his shaming .. what Maciste saw .. there was nothing. No emotions. No reactions. There was a deadness in the faces looking up at him. No joy, no shock. Like the life had been sucked out of the crowd. Dead. Empty husks.Shocked Maciste saw himself as their dead gaze now saw him. A man in his full-grown muscular prime. Proud warrior’s shoulders on him. Broad manly chest. Legs thick with fighting muscle. And yet they had witnessed him beaten like some unruly brat. Thrashed on his bare backside. Some snotty-nosed kid having his bare arse spanked. The most undignified punishment for a proud fighting man. Done to make him look small .. powerless. The warrior-prince plummeted from his great height. Brought in rags, then stripped of those. Down in the dregs. Beaten. Useless. Worthy of a degrading punishment.Accused of treachery. A crime he did not commit. But from the looks of the dead faces surrounding him, no one was going to jump to his defence. In that vision of dead faces, Maciste grasped the truth. He was on his own. No one would be coming to his rescue. This was all down to him now .. living with this sudden nightmare. And with a backside that burned like hell. Sweat running off him. His proud chest rising and falling as he struggled to catch his breath. A vicious beating. A cruel unjustified thrashing. He shook his head to loosen a tear of pain in his eye. Abandoned, friendless. But not beaten.One woman in the front, he spotted her suddenly, she had her hand to her mouth, eyes wide-open in shock. Suddenly Maciste felt his own nakedness. He flushed at the thought of this indignity. Naked, beaten, shamed. His princely indignity forcibly put on show. His own nakedness had never concerned him .. but this crowd could never have expected to see their prince like this. He felt his blood boil.Pain, anger, confusion -- a heady mixture of powerful emotions raged through his blood. Struggling to cope with this madness. But resolved. Maciste was not done-for yet. cowedWhat struck Maciste was a sense of nothingness. Below him the square full to capacity. Everyone had come to see his shaming. Beneath him .. a sea of dead faces. No sigh of outrage at this abuse of their prince. Not even cheers for Maciste getting his come-uppance. Nothing. Worryingly, no reaction. No, not reacting. Not DARING to react. The empty faces turned on him did not know how to react. Surrounded by an enemy’s armed soldiers. They hadn’t jeered him. Greeting this downfall. Did that mean they hadn’t abandoned him? But they hadn’t protested either. Not understanding how to behave in this most disrespectful of shows. Because .. surrounded .. their children clutched to their legs .. surrounded by the brutal enemy . they didn’t dare.Whoever had conquered his land .. they had made their mark. Terror. A reign of terror had browbeaten the people. That thought rushed through Maciste’s head. His people were too terrified to react. What had been done to them ….?The people had been cowed. Browbeaten. Dared not show how they felt. But as that thought formed in his raging spirit, from behind that hand again grabbed Maciste by the scalp. Yanking him fully up. His muscular body torn upright .. forced up by brute might .. his royal helpless for all to see. Displaying the pain in his naked flesh.“The traitor will be judged.”Maciste realised it was the captain again. Stood by his shoulder. Twisting Maciste upright, controlling him by tugging on his hair.“The king will sentence him. Today.”Disdainful, the captain was holding up his prisoner for shame. Letting this mob of stinking peasants get a good look at what they might have called king. They’d heard his princely bleating with every swipe across his royal arse. They could see the tears coursing down his cheeks. This was the arse they might have had sitting on the throne. But he’d shown himself in his true colours. Naked .. not a bit different from every other man. Got a dick. Had himself a pair of balls. So what was new? And smacked on his arse with a cane a few times .. this sucker howled like another other fucking prick.Anger ranged within Maciste. King? What king dared judge him? Who had that right? If anyone was king now, that was Maciste. But unexpectedly again there was a tugging on his arms. Maciste was being bent forward again. Jerkily his arms were being pulled up his back.“Your king will pronounce judgement.”Maciste was now fully bent over forward again. His arms were pointing straight up behind. Back in punishment position again.“Everyone will assemble here. Tomorrow. At noon.” Maciste was being forced up on to the balls of his feet. Above his head, helpless he heard the captain addressing the bullied crowd. The tugging on his arms had stopped but Maciste was nearly lifted off the ground. It felt like his shoulders might break out of their joints. Suddenly his own bare manhood was filling his own line of sight. Wherever the gods had been these last months .. deserting his people .. selfishly taking their sacrifices and uncaringly abandoning them to these foreigners .. for one thing Maciste was grateful to them. For one favour. That manly appendage before his eyes had not got firm under this abuse. The shame he himself had witnessed that time before .. the soldier’s nerves getting to him and getting him hard .. that humiliation the gods had spared him. It would have been a boner born of the rage pounding in his blood. But what could this enemy have made of it? What would this captain had done with it? The prince-to-be-humiliated stood with his manhood invitingly erect. And what said the men in the crowd below would not think that was a hard-on born of Maciste’s fears? Their once-fabled warrior-prince betraying his nerves? Not such a mighty hero after all. Scared. Nerves turned hard in his dick.Such worries could only have added to Maciste’s struggles to hold his emotions in check.“Return at noon, For the traitor’s execution.”Traitor? His execution? What the hell had happened while Maciste was away?“EVERYONE. Any found missing .. he will share the traitor’s fate.”Terror. Whoever had invaded .. whatever foreign force had invaded .. they had clearly embedded themselves fully here. Taken over and had been ruling with a fist of terrifying iron. Over his people. What evil mind could exercise such power? So quickly, control total. They had Maciste’s people at their mercy .. a reign of fear established. No one was answering back. No one was going to rush to his help.Threatened with execution if anyone failed to turn up. For HIS execution! Maciste’s head began to spin. mad“Thirty more.”Nothing here was making sense. This was his home city .. where he had been born, brought up, where his father had ruled. Where he should now wear the crown.“Hold nothing back.”Nothing made sense. Except .. his head woke up .. he was about to get another thirty lashes. On a backside already smarting like hell. On a bare backside on fire. Where already he’d failed to contain the shouts of pain. Thirty more .. on his burning backside .. before his own people .. terrorised out of their wits.“And don’t spare his tears.”That brought a rush of anger to Maciste. Drawing attention to his unmanly tears. Tears of burning pain. But ….. the air behind whooshed. A smarting menace was cutting through the air. Maciste gritted his teeth. Clenched tight his jaw. In readiness. Determined as hell not to give them that satisfaction. Gonna get no more tears out of him.One stroke. One first swipe across his princely backside. Agonisingly sensitive. Burning. Pain rushed from his stinging skin the full length of his body. Clawing at the gates of his tight-clenched throat. Battering down the tortured gates.Fury murdered an agonised cry. Maddened anger burst free. Not in that howl of searing pain. In a raging bawl of tortured madness. Vowing to put this right. A manly bellow that flooded the temple square. Drenched the watching crowd in a flood of rage. Pain-turned-fury. Man-made-mad. Chapter 3Dungeon gamesFeaturing Freddy Navas as MacisteKheir had revealed his hand. And could he have made it clearer? Kheir had taken over. And to emphasise his point, he’d had Maciste whipped across the arse. Had him stood on the temple steps and pulled his pants down. Sixty stinging lashes on his arse. No human flesh could handle that .. not without showing the pain. That stepmother was all over this, the scheming bitch. Kheir was an arsehole. He’d never have come up with this ….. Someone else was pulling his strings.Maciste had had his “audience” with his younger step-brother. And all his worst fears were confirmed. His father dead, probably murdered. Kheir had had himself anointed king. The old regime had been decimated. All that remained to do .. to deal with an inconvenience. The warrior prince. Maciste For starters Kheir had ordered Maciste’s hide “suitably housed.” Stuck him and his burning arse in a dank cold cell deep underground. The cellars cleared-out, Maciste was down here totally alone. Silence reigned. Abandoned by humankind. Barely any light. And cold. And invited the soldiers to help Maciste adjust. Appreciate his new situation. See that things had changed.But this was no permanent tomb for Maciste. The crowd before the temple had been ordered to return. The next day. To witness a traitor’s execution. Maciste.suitably housedThe guards hadn’t been easy on him. No sooner they had Maciste out of their king’s presence, a hard slap across the back of his head set the tone. “Move it, motherfucker.”Maciste shoulder-barged the nearest soldier. Shoving him against the wall. In response, a hand grabbed his scalp, bent him over and slammed a pair of knee-kicks up into him.Maciste had expected no less. And they were ready for him again when they were undoing his ties. Maciste took his chance. Not wise. But something had to come out. His punch toppled a pair of guards into each other. The other fist caught a chin. The soldier’s head cracked back. Maciste heard his curse. But he was already fighting off the hands shoving his chest .. backing him into the wall.He took a beating. They were too many .. and some whipped their clubs out. Arms held out sideways, back to the cold wall. A club smacking the wind out of him. His guts took the pounding .. repeatedly .. good and hard till his knee buckled and he fell. Under their stomping boots.Not worried about reprisals. They’d heard their king. Ordered to put him in his place. This has-been. This has-been warrior prince. And come noon tomorrow .. no Maciste any more.“Suitably housed.” Thrown into a freezing underground hole. Left to rot? “Food and drink. Of course …” Kheir had ordered it so. Their king had ordered it. The guard dutifully obeyed. The days-old bread was flung through the rusting bars of the cell. It hit Maciste like a rock. With gusto the soldier opened his breeches and pissed in the bowl. A strong stream of piss he had been saving up. Slid through the bars with a sneer.“You get thirsty .. just give a shout. Plenty more where that came from ….”It was chilly down in these dungeons. But no one was going to give that much thought .. leaving their prisoner in just his threadbare breeches. Maciste had gnawed on the solid bread .. he needed to keep his strength up. He had slurped down the piss .. he’d suffered worse indignities during military campaigns. And he sat there in the near-darkness .. huddled with his knees up to his chest for warmth. But still the cold and damp settled like a chilled blanket down his back. He’d not get much rest down here.Kheir in charge. His dumbass stepbrother had grabbed the throne. But Maciste suspected Kheir was fooling himself if he thought he’d have any say. Kheir’s mother was behind all this. He wouldn’t be surprised if she had had his father murdered .. as soon as Maciste’s back was turned.A flush of hot anger raged through his blood at the thought. That a wife could be capable of such a deed. But Maciste had never trusted the bitch. And if Kheir thought he was boss .. he didn’t know his mother. A woman on the throne? Impossible. But a mother jerking her son by his strings? That bitch had Kheir by the balls. He’d dance to her tune .. or else. Probably finish up like Maciste, son-of-the-bitch or not.So where did that leave Maciste? Shivering in the dark. Deserted by the gods. Left to rot in a cell?Since they’d got the jump on him at docking, Maciste had seen no other troops but soldiers from Kheir’s mother’s homeland. Like his country had been invaded. Correction, it HAD been invaded. Maciste doubted all his father’s generals had “fallen on their swords”. There must have been a mass killing. A blood-bath. Probably why the people were cowed, they’d seen the killings. Was there any way out of this mess?Should he have been suspicious, the moment his ship was docking? Should he have reacted quicker when they strode onto the ship? Walked straight up to him. And a sword was drawn and stuck at his throat. Should he have responded with more than surprise and indignation?Too damned late to ask himself that.Left to rot here? No way! Not what Kheir had planned for him. Just a single night to shiver here. What had that captain announced? Maciste shamefully displayed naked on the temple steps? The people had been ordered to return. For Maciste’s execution the next day. Kheir would pass judgement, that arsehole. Lounging contemptuous on the throne. Decide how best to dispense of the heir to the throne. How to execute “this inconvenience …..” discoveries“Boys!”The sergeant was addressing his men.“Let’s face it. Life has not been too bad.”The soldiers were gathered around their prisoner .. in a circle .. so close that their muscular shoulders touched.“In the service of the empire, we’ve seen a few things.”From his position .. strung-up off a bar above his head that spread his arms .. Maciste felt hemmed-in by a solid wall of military muscle. Brought from his cell .. fighting –back but still forced into this helpless stretch. Punched and thumped .. giving it him back for daring to try.It was clear they were out for some fun. From the way they guffawed at nothing, Maciste suspected they had tanked themselves up. Put some booze away already. In anticipation of some fun. Orders of their king .. what Kheir had meant .. that Maciste was struggling to take in his new reality. Stupidly Maciste couldn’t appreciate how things had changed. Kheir had given them orders to help him out.Strung-up like this .. no way to defend himself. What better way to start?“Elephants.”The sergeant cheered out.“We’ve fucking-seen elephants. Fought some of the fuckers. Brought a few of the bastards down.”Maciste looked up at the ring of nodding heads that loomed around him.“Yeah, we’ve seen a thing or two ….”The smell of booze off their breath clung to the cold air.“Women! By the gods we’ve had a few of them. In the service of the empire.”There was a ripple of chuckling surrounding Maciste as he stood strung-out.“Every fucking colour under the sun. FUCK! We’ve had our women. Fucked every colour going.”The memory raised a drunken cheer from the sergeant’s men. And no shortage of obscene gestures. Maciste eyes them suspiciously back. Waiting for where this was going.“Made ourselves plenty on the side, too. The plunder’s not been bad. In the service of the empire.”Maciste saw the sergeant eye the men in his troop.“Let’s face it. With the booty .. we can’t complain. Not such a bad life.”Maciste was wondering where this trip into nostalgia was going. Fairly sure they were going to collide on the way.“Plunder. Women. We’ve seen the lot.”The sergeant was smiling at his men. And getting lots of nodding back, agreeing.“BUT …”The sergeant emphasised the word. And then he put in a long dramatic pause. Instinctively Maciste knew this was now coming down on him.“Tell me, boys .. honestly .. can any one of you tell me …?”Maciste saw the sergeant’s eyes drilling into his. Maciste returned the look. Glaring look-for-look. Like-for-like. Unintimidated.“C’mon, lads .. let’s hear it if you have ….”The sergeant was smirking into Maciste’s face. “Has any one of you got his hands on a royal cock?”Maciste saw the sergeant’s eyes light up.“Ever?” threatsMaciste was surrounded by drunken cheers.“You damn-well dare,” he snarledThe sight of Maciste naked in the square had put ideas in the sergeant’s head. In the mood for it. And they’d all had more than a bit to drink.. Earlier he had fought them back .. to make his point that he wasn’t to be taken lightly. But they’d taken it as some feeble gesture. Still they had got his arms tied to an iron pole above his head. He’d not been able to stop them then either.“I’ll have your guts.” Maciste’s glare warned he was not joking. And neither were they ...The sergeant feigned surprise. Then he slammed an iron bar across Maciste’s midriff. Wind shot noisily out of his chest.“And you’re gonna do fucking-what about it ….?”The sergeant had Maciste grabbed by the jawbone. Squeezing hard.“Have my guts? You and whose fucking army? Dickhead?”“What you say, boys? We get a handful of royal cock?”The suggestion went down with raucous cheers. “How big you reckon, lads? Monstrous? Or teeny-weeny?”Whooping into the chill air, a couple of troopers rushed forward, grabbing at the homespun breeches .. ripping them off, throwing the rags to the ground. Cheers rang out. Their royal captive again stood naked before them. They’d thrashed his royal bare arse. Now they were after his royal limp cock.Naked and helpless. Helpless, vulnerable. And a hopeless case. exposed “Don’t know about you, guys .. Anyone else feel .. how can I put it?”The sergeant was sniggering.“Without insulting this little royal dignity there …..”All eyes were on Maciste stood there stripped. Eying his naked crutch.“Anyone else feel …. Well, disappointed?”The sergeant was enjoying himself. They had ripped the homespun breeches off Maciste. Stripping him royally naked. He had hold of Maciste’s limp cock. Waggling it up and down.“Imagined it .. somehow I dunno .. More royal.”One of the enemy troopers guffawed.“Seen bigger on my dog.”Everyone was laughing. Indicating. Mocking the state of Maciste’s regal limpness. Nodding its regal head floppily. Maciste was torn. Between showing his anger for being mauled and mocked. And knowing better .. better to rise above their moronic stupidity. So tempting .. to let his temper fly at this indignity! After all he was their king’s brother. No, HE was the rightful king. They’d never dare in normal circumstances …..Show his anger? The pricks would only laugh. This was deliberate. They were out to get him riled. All part of their stupid game .. get him to burst out in anger. And then slap him around a bit. Play him up. Just to prove to him there was not a damned thing he could do about it. Put up, fuck up, shut up.“Thing is, sarge ….”Maciste tracked a voice to one of the troopers nearby. The sounds sounded thick .. talking slow and stupid as if each word was hard to get out. When Maciste spotted the trooper, he did look like a moron.“Are ya bein’ hard on the prick?”Suddenly he was slapped around the shoulders. His mates were all laughing. Enjoying the joke. The trooper looked confused.“Hard!” The others guffawed.“Prick! Ya get it?”Clearly the soldier didn’t get his own joke. He frowned. Looking muddled about what he said. Trying to clarify himself, he gestured. His hand pointing at Maciste’s naked crutch.“He ain’t hard. See, sarge?”Maciste felt every eye around him focussed on his limp dick. He made himself ignore the sniggers. But a prickle in his guts warned him to beware.“Yarn’t a man. Are ya?”The soldier was struggle to justify his remarks. But the others were all sniggering at his expense. And thumbing a gesture at Maciste stood flaccid, exposed. And helpless.The soldier began to sound desperate. Infuriated with himself. Exasperated at the others laughing. Struggling to get his point across.“Ya ain’t you really a man .. Not when you’re not hard-like …? Are ya?”The others were making obscene mock-gestures. Maciste was surrounded by enemy soldiers acting badly. Showing off what men indeed they were when they’d got it up.“Maybe …..?”The soldier was beginning to look annoyed. Suspected it was HIM that had become the butt-end of the joke for his mates here. Abruptly he glared at the others. He shoved his neighbour’s groping hand away. He growled back at them. At last, he’d got to what he meant.“ .. I bet ya a beer .. when it’s hard …”Maciste saw the trooper nod at Maciste’s crutch. His eyes lit up as he spoke. He’d got his own point.“Bet he’s REALLY royal then.”Maciste had already guessed where this was going. Now he spotted the enemy was also seeing the light. They had been given the go-ahead. Make this royal asshole look like a right-royal prick. The soldiers either side of the trooper were slapping their moronic buddy across the shoulders. For making this possible. Congratulating him on his big idea. “That’s it …,” one of them guffawed. “He ain’t royal …..”His crooked finger imitating a limp dick.“ .. not …” he stuck his finger out .. he waggled it weakly up and down.“.. .. not like that ….”The sergeant was grinning.“Reckon you might have a point there, lad. Can’t really call yaself a man .. a REAL man .. when you aren’t hard.”Buddy-like the sergeant’s arms went around Maciste’s shoulder. He grinned dominant into his prisoner’s scowl.“Royally hard. Now that must be the thing ….”His fingers were back at the root of Maciste’s limp manhood. His hand flicked the cock up and down. “Royally hard.”The sergeant grinned at his men. His hand kept tauntingly flicking his prize up and down. Liking the idea. Musing on the thought.“Hard. HAAAARD.”His clenched fist shook to imitate the sight. Mighty. Manly.“KINGLY hard.”His hands were glorying on their grip on a royal cock .. waggling it limply up and down.“Now THAT would be a thing to see.” down to itIt wasn’t like these morons hadn’t got their rocks off like this before. They had stuff ready .. just in case. And they didn’t need asking twice. Out of a clay jar had come a thin strip of leather. Dripping. Sodden. These soldiers had come well-prepared.These arseholes went for it. One down on a knee, yanking Maciste’s balls forward. Another behind .. to keep the prick steady .. lock-hold on Maciste’s throat .. crushing his windpipe. Just in case …..“You know who I am?”Maciste’s only chance was to intimidate the sergeant. Angry at the thought of them fumbling around his cock and ballsack. He knew their tricks. Wet cord looped around the root of his shaft .. trapping his blood. Keeping him up and hard.Maciste snarled at the sergeant. Knowing there was little to help him out here. Except bravado.He scowled back at the man. In return the sergeant sneered into Maciste’s futile anger. He shrugged back in reply.“Know who you WERE. Dickhead.” Maciste kicked out and struggled when he saw what they were up to. The trooper down on his knees ready to lace up Maciste’s cock in dripping rawhide got a knee in the face. Instead of getting angry, the troopers hooted. It was all part of their drunken game. One single prisoner against them .. both sides equally determined to have their way. But THIS prick hadn’t got the numbers on his side. In time the laughter ran thin. Tired of the arsehole making it hard, a fist unloaded its force into his gut .. well down. Soldiers yanked at Maciste by the ankles, a rusty iron bar tied behind was keeping his legs wide-spread. No novices .. they’d come prepared for trouble.The soldier who’d got kicked in the face was back .. giving Maciste’s ballsack a goading tickle. All good-natured .. on their side .. but Maciste suspected it would take little for that tickling to twist into a knuckled jab .. flattening his balls.Drunken giggles surrounded Maciste. Strung up helpless. He felt the cold water off the cord dripping down his thighs. A chill ran down the skin of his bare back. It was taking no time for that tightness on him to have its effect.“You’ll answer for this.”Maciste snarled at the sergeant. He was deliberately ignoring the indignity being performed at the tops of his legs. Already he was feeling the blood there thickening him. The beginnings of a rush to his thighs as his blood got trapped. But he chose to rise above it.“Last thing I heard …”The sergeant’s gaze was stuck on Maciste’s roped-up cock. Watching it every moment as the flesh thickened out.“ .. our king .. he was saying as you hadn’t caught on ….”Maciste saw him jab the soldier next to him. Nodding in the direction of Maciste’s crutch. “You needed to learn, he reckoned. Someone had to teach you .. the king said.”Both were sniggering. They were glued to the sight of seeing Maciste’s firmness beginning to rise.“Said someone had to put you in your place.”The sergeant’s head pointed at the erection lifting as Maciste thickened.“Knock it into your thick skull ….”Maciste did not need to look for himself. His anger .. his nerves .. the tightness of the leather pinching around him .. he could feel the reaction strong at the tops of his legs.“SHOW the motherfucker .. that was what the king said …..”Annoyingly Maciste knew they had him. He couldn’t stop this. Nothing could stop him reacting for them like this.“Show the dog where he belongs. Down in the shit.”The sergeant wasn’t bothering to raise his eyes to Maciste’s as he spoke. Watching every little bit of movement as Maciste’s will was forced to rise for them. “Let this dumb arsehole see that things had changed here ….”Maciste was hard. Unstoppable the rise as his cock rose straight out. Maciste saw the gloating sneer on the sergeant’s face. NOW .. now the deed was done .. now he and his enemy were eye-to-eye. Glare-to-glare.“That was what he ordered .. the king.”The sergeant snorted. His eyes had dropped to the imprisoned manhood. Made to do their bidding.“Or kingly words to that effect.” disappointments“Don’t get it.”The sergeant didn’t stop in his ministrations. But he had turned to his troopers .. looking perplexed.“Something’s not right here ….”.He had called for a tub of pig-fat. He had been greasing his palm up and down the solid projection of Maciste’s raging hard-on. Glorying at the feel of an unwanted twitch as his grease-laded palm rubbed repeatedly over the prick’s hot spot underneath.“Can’t seem to get it bigger.”His grip seized the prisoner by the root. Irritated he waggled the solid member jutting off his front. “C’mon, dickhead. Try harder.”Another couple of frustrated shakes of the straight-out boner rod up and down. Getting the prisoner’s attention. “This the fucking-best ya can do?” He slapped the solid cock up against the prisoner’s belly.“Call this royal? Ya stunted or what….?”Maciste was seething. At these morons having a joke at his expense. At the fact he couldn’t get his hands on this sergeant’s throat. He told himself to rise above it. He knew these troopers were idiots .. the lowest of the low. Probably the best thing that ‘d happen to them for the whole of their cretinous lives. Get themselves bought drinks for telling the tale again in their watering holes. The night they’d had a king’s cock in their grip. Messing with his royal pride. Fucking around with his royal dick.They were doing this foul deed .. mauling his erection .. sliding their greasy paws up and down him .. coaxing unwanted twitches out of his purple-coloured cockhead .. because they knew no better. Because they were the shit of the earth and this was what they got off on.Morons. Doing it just for a laugh. Because they could. Because he couldn’t stop them. A chance to get their own back. Get one over on their betters. Payback for all the shit they had taken through their moronic lives. They were getting off on this thrill, he told himself. When else had they dared tamper with nobility like this?Get him riled? Deliberately getting him worked up. Needing to get him bawling back at them in anger. So they could show him .. they had him in the palms of their hands. Literally. And taunting him because there was not a fucking thing he could do to them.Damn it. He was not going to let them . He was going to stay calm. He was king, after all. He was born to rise above such scum.But the stroking HAD worked. All that mauling over his solid cockhead had his nerves twitching. Maciste felt those tell-tale tremors tingling down his thighs. His ballsack was pulled upwards, tight. He could feel that churning in his balls. Damn-it. He was not going to fool them much longer.“At last!”Maciste took a slap across the back of his shoulders. The sergeant. As if they were good buddies. Congratulating Maciste. Feeling good about himself.“Got the fucker drooling. At last! Look!”Annoyed Maciste looked down at himself. A good thick stream of his seed was dangling off the end of him. FUCK IT! . Fuck them!“Took your fucking-time, Dickhead!”Maciste had his head twisted around. Glaring into the sergeant’s smirking face. He knew he should rise above this. But he was angry. With himself. For having to let himself go.“But .. who would have thought?”The sergeant was sounding like he was talking to his men. But his face was right in Maciste’s. Trying to wind him up.“Who would have ever thought?”The sergeant let off stroking Maciste to orgasm for a moment. Gripping the cock tight by the root. Holding it up in mock wonder.“This princely fucker is no bigger than me.”The laughter rang out.“Smaller, sarge.”“Not a patch …..”“Could beat this fucker any time, sarge.”Maciste felt his temper snap. This ritual humiliation had gone too far. Maciste was seething .. stupidly. He shouldn’t let himself, he knew. But he was furious. At being held up for ridicule like this. No man had ever handled him like this. No man would ever have dared.His thinking self told him to get a grip. But the power in his blood boiled. At having his manliness questioned. Frustrated at his inability to make these damned troopers pay for their idiotic bit of fun. Knowing all this was sanctioned. This was what Maciste’s own half-brother had commanded to be done.“Know what, sarge?”It was the moron again. Slow-speaking, dim-witted.“We being fair?”Maciste switched his attention to the soldier. In scorn. Fair? When had anything been fair since they’d snatched him on the ship?“Well, … “ the trooper struggled with the idea in his head. “it’s not like he’s one of us. Is it?”The soldier should have shut up when his sergeant glared at him. But dim-witted .. not understanding the sergeant’s look of exasperation at him talking rubbish again .. he carried on.“He’s one of THEM ….. Ya know, these weedy yellow-belly motherfuckers.”He grinned foolish-like into the frowning face of his sergeant.“Like ya said before, sarge ….. What arsehole country is gonna let an invasion happen without even putting up a fight?” Maciste stared back at the trooper. Hearing the sad truth for the first time. His country beaten without a fight. Without their general to lead.“We walked right over them. Chicken all of ‘em. All of ‘em .. pricks .. like him .. hardly put up a fight.”The other soldiers had been frowning first at the soldier’s words. But now they were nodding, smiling, remembering how easy it had been. What their thick mate was saying was true.“Let us walk right in. Walk right over ‘em.”Struggling to put his vague thoughts into words, the soldier hesitated. Looking for the words.“Sooooo .. how we expect a pathetic chicken like him ….?”His head nodded in the direction of Maciste. Stood naked. A full-blown erection .. forced on him .. sticking straight out .. purple-headed with strain .. a thick string of cum drooling off him ….“How we expect a weedy prick like that …? How we expect a yellow-belly to match a real man …?”He grinned. The dim-wit had got to his idea at last.“Look like one of US ….?”The philosopher-soldier earned himself a cheer. weedy“How’s a yellow-belly gonna know how a real man feels?”The dim-wit looked pleased with his logic. So did his sergeant .. seeing the chance ….“Maybe you’ve got yourself a point there, lad.”The sergeant still had Maciste gripped by his solid shaft. As if crushing him there could squeeze more drool of out the prisoner.Maciste too was dismayed how easily his realm had been overwhelmed. But it had been fortuitously planned. He had been sent away. And why suspect a grieving widow? Why give a second thought to her countrymen arriving to honour the dead king. Come to grieve. Come to conquer. Headed-up by the dead king’s wife .. Maciste’s father’s murderer. Why should people think they were being invaded? At the time of their king’s funeral.“Weedy arseholes like this.”The moronic soldier was into his ponderous stride.“Not a fucking-good hard-on between the lot of them. What’s this prick gonna know?He sniggered.“Wouldn’t know a real man’s boner if ya stuck it in his gob.”The other soldiers laughed out. The sergeant chortled.“You’re on to something there. Lad.”Cheered by the appreciation of his idea, the trooper made his final point.“Unfair, then. How we expect a weedy motherfucker like him ….? How’s he supposed to know what a proper hard-on is?”Maciste felt every gaze rush to his groin. His cock, bound tight in leather cord .. bitingly tight .. sticking straight out .. his seed drooling out of the end. Every bit the manly cock .. in full virile glory. His macho pride took the affront. Stupid of him. But he felt his temper rise.Then equally fast he saw he was being played. This was just mockery. This was their game. Following his step-brother’s orders. Bringing down his sense of worth. No longer the revered warrior-prince. Not the rightful king. Treating him, the rightful heir, like a piece of shit. Teaching Maciste that things had changed. But damn-it. They hadn’t .. not for good .. and they wouldn’t. Maciste wasn’t done-for yet. He was still the lawful king. It was HIS arse should be occupying his father’s throne. And there was nothing wrong with the forceful man-power jutting outwards off his groin.Maciste saw the twist in the sergeant’s head .. looking sneering into Maciste’s face. The pair of them locked in antagonistic looks. Maciste saw a leer spread over the sergeant’s lips. And he felt a shiver warning him tingle down his back. Then the sergeant’s gaze took a downward slide. Over Maciste’s out-spread chest. Slowly taking in the power locked in Maciste’s solid muscled belly. Coming to rest on the thrust of power forced on Maciste in his crutch.The sergeant’s eyes flashed upwards. Sadistically he grinned into Maciste's stern gaze.“Reckon you might have a point there, lad.”The sergeant’s look had quickly flashed over at the moronic soldier .. as if showing his appreciation for some brilliant insight. An excuse .. but a useful one. The dim-wit had said it. Maciste was not like one of them. Quickly the sergeant’s taunting smirk was back in Maciste’s face.“This asshole .. poor prick like he is .. how can he know? Coming where he comes from? This country full of arseholes.”Maciste scowled. A prickle in his balls warned. Not happy where this might be heading.“Where’s a weedy cocksucker like this prick gonna know what a real man looks like?”Quickly the sergeant picked up the tub of pig’s lard. He passed it to the soldier next to him.“C’mon, lads … what you say ….?”His gloating sneer was all over Maciste’s face. Ignoring the prisoner’s glare. A prisoner who had already read the signs. He saw Maciste knew where this was headed.“What say, let’s show this asshole?”His gaze .. full of malicious light flashed back at Maciste .. trapped in his X-shape by iron bars.“What’s a REAL man look like?”Maciste gritted his teeth. The anger boiling in his blood. Knowing what stupid trick they were going to try.“Let’s open his princely eyes.”Maciste felt a prickling of nervousness down the insides of his thighs. This was about to go sour on him.“Show this weedy asshole .. what a real man’s cock can do?”The sergeant laughed out loud. Watching the tub of pig-grease of pig-grease getting passed from man-to-man.“Work yourselves up, lads. Get a handful of this.”His hand waggled Maciste up and down. He laughed out loud. His eyes on Maciste .. gloating .. mocking delight.“Let’s give it to the motherfucker. From a real man’s cock.” Chapter 4Brotherly chatsModelled by Alex AtanasovGrown brothers thrown together by each parent marrying. The older brother popular .. strutting his stuff. Local hero. Kheir, the newcomer, the also-ran. Never got a look in.Champion of the people. Beloved general. And first-rate arsehole! Quickly resenting Maciste’s fame. His popularity. His success with the girls. All that strutting. All that shagging. Showing off that muscled torso .. that chiselled physique constantly on display. Turning every girl’s head.Who was going to put a good word in for the younger brother? Not that Maciste. Too busy getting his own end off. Not even passing on his hand-me-downs.What girl was going to give the runt a second glance? Tits were out to catch the stud and heir.When his mother had shown her hand .. when Kheir was told her plan .. secretly .. it was all Kheir could do not to punch the air with joy. Sock it to that over-muscled prick. He could hardly wait. That first-rate pain-in-the-arse was going to get what he deserved. Nights in his bed .. for weeks Kheir had planned. Hard at the thought of that power. The idea of that muscle-head in his grip. That cut physique made to payback. He couldn’t wait to see the look on the arsehole’s face!Going mad for that prick to return. Arrested. Publicly humiliated. Had his bare arse whipped. That muscle-head swinging his dick. In pain.Kheir had enjoyed his previous trips down into the chill of the dungeons. Having a laugh at one of Maciste’s studly friends who had given him some lip. Refusing to acknowledge the newly anointed king. Kheir was passed wanting their loyalty. He wanted their screams. A kind of foretaste of what his hated brother was to endure.And now it was the real thing stuck down in the dungeons .. The muscle-prick, the bloated arsehole, Maciste down in the stinking dungeons .. prisoner to his step-brother’s will. The thought of his shredded hide down there .. fuming. It was all Kheir could do not to get down there and rub his conceited nose in the shit he was in. He'd pulled it off! Kheir had that over-muscled arsehole in the clenched fist of his hand. Awaiting judgement. Waiting for fate to strike. And Kheir had no plans on making it easy for the arrogant muscle-head. He had years of resentment to get off his chest. anointed princeUnobserved Kheir had slipped down into the dungeons. Couldn’t stop himself. Just had to creep up on him before Maciste could put on any act. Wanting to catch the sucker unawares. Secretly get a peek at the arrogant muscle-head in his degradation and filth.Abandoned, lost, beaten. A peek before the arsehole started acting out the macho-warrior. In some pretence to himself that his muscular hide could ever be out-manoeuvred. By his also-ran stepbrother. And playing like he was not done-for. Stealthily entering the dungeons .. all escort abandoned. Moving quietly to remain unnoticed. Itching to find his fallen stepbrother-stud .. stuck in his misery down in the dank darkness. But what he found far exceeded any hopes. He heard raucous laughter .. sniggers .. the grunts. Treading lightly in order not to be heard, he was curious what the soldiers were up to down here. . He had forgotten his order to put his brother in his place. Kheir was pleasantly surprised. His men had found just the right place for Maciste. Kheir clung to the shadows .. wanting to surprise the muscle-head in his defeat. Flickering torches lighting up the dungeon scene. His view was first blocked. Blocked by a wall of naked arses. The soldiers had discarded their kilts. And from the arm movements he could see several of them were pumping themselves up. Working their cocks.Somewhat amused at what they were getting up to, Kheir silently glided to one side. Lurking in the shadows still. Curious. Moving till he could see through a gap. A smile now lighting his face. At the sight of Maciste .. surrounding by the half-naked men.On his knees, naked .. his arms tied above his head. Maciste’s front splattered with men’s seed. Splodges of cum on his cheek. Streaks of jizm matted in his hair.Kheir could not stop himself. Wanting Maciste to know he’d been spotted like this. Kheir’s heart in his mouth. Thrilled at Maciste’s shame for Kheir catching him like this. On the point of leaping out of the shadows .. elated at this humiliation. Bursting for a shocked Maciste seeing his step-brother triumphant. Rubbing Maciste’s nose in his jizm-splattered shame. His cum-smeared disgrace. But a sudden movement in the circle held Kheir back .. pinned him lurking in the shadows. Watching. Open-eyed.“Quick! Hold him, sarge.”. One of the bare-arsed soldiers stumbled awkwardly forward .. his hand working away on himself.“Cuming …..”Kheir withdrew quickly, unseen back into the gloom. His heart racing in anticipation. Peering around the soldier’s bare hairy arse, Kheir could see the soldier’s hand movements going wild.“Can’t ya get his gob open?”Kheir bit on his bottom lip. He couldn’t believe his luck. Behind Maciste on his knees stood the sergeant of the troop. He had Maciste by the hair .. keeping his face up. The sergeant tugged the head back. Yanking hard .. repeatedly tugging back on the head. To force Maciste to yell out. So the soldier could cum in his mouth.“Fuck it! Too late!”The soldier could not hold it back. He shot his first load. It sprayed onto Maciste’s face. Kheir saw his brother try to avert his face. But the sergeant’s grip from behind was murderously tight. Again and again, the soldier shot free. Pumping away until he was spent. Laughing .. shooting his scorn across the prisoner’s face. Maciste was forced to shut his eyes as the enemy’s hatred splattered his disgusted gaze. Squirted with his enemy’s jizm in his face.“Excellent!”Kheir couldn’t stop himself. And why bother? He wanted Maciste to know he’d been seen .. desperately. Kheir needed to display this triumph. At precisely this moment of degradation. The studly prince .. the macho warrior-prince .. anointed on his brow with his enemy’s cum.Kheir could not hold back his triumph. Rushing out .. bursting out his glee. Maciste’s shaming calling him out from the darkness where he had been lurking. Clapping. Clenched fists by his shoulders punching at the air. Triumph. Clapping .. applauding the men’s ingenuity. Drawing Maciste’s attention to himself. Catching the flash of the arsehole’s anger! The streaks of hot jizm splodged across his face. Kheir got a strong rush of power in his own breeches .. at this humiliation Kheir he watched. The shaming indignity. His prick of a step-brother anointed with enemy spunk.“Incredible!”The soldiers froze. All faces shot around at the voice surprising them. “Ingenious!”Some hands shot to their groins when they recognised their king. Embarrassed. Some clearly fearful at being caught out. Fearing reprisals for this act.Quickly Kheir put them at their ease. Showing his deep-felt thanks to his troops. For this triumph.“I could not have come up with anything better myself!” a mother’s designsHer hand was all over this. Kheir was a first-rate prick. He’d never have come up with this idea. Sending Maciste off on a futile journey. Murdering his father. Crushing all opposition. Terrorising the land.An evil plan. One that suited her mind. And it had worked. Not one a dickhead like Kheir could pull off. His mother was pulling his strings. And the prick as good as confessed as much ….“Our mother fancies sending you in chains back home.”Before the guards had departed for their king’s reward of cheese and beer, Kheir had had them shove Maciste back in the caged cell. Where his step-brother could do him no harm. From outside Kheir gloated over a naked Maciste sat hunched down on the bare floor, his back to the dank wall. He’d been thrown a chunk of bread by the sergeant. A bowl of water. Leaving the brothers. To celebrate the news.Kheir stayed safely the other side of the bars. Gloating. Grinning at a disgusted Maciste scraping his fingers through his sweat-matted hair .. clearing the enemy’s man-seed out of his scalp. A good reminder of the depths to which Maciste had fallen. And a foretaste of worse to come. “Our mother fancies sending you back home.”Kheir gloated safely from the other side of the bars.“YOUR mother.”Maciste snapped back as his jaws ripped at the rock-solid bread.Kheir shrugged. Mothers, fathers -- it made no difference now. He had been anointed king.“Back home .. we have a quarry …,” he continued unabashed.“… . mines for iron ore .. in the middle of absolute nowhere. Fine place for someone to disappear.”He was pleased by the frown that creased Maciste’s face.“Good place for my enemy to pay off his crime. Paying a hefty price.Kheir explained.“Lifelong slavery. Back-breaking labour.”Maciste scowled back .. anything else was a waste of time. He’d committed no crime .. but no point in arguing. It was Kheir who had. But who was listening?“Just the place for a studly man like you .. fit, strong, a fighter to the core. Even if I didn’t order it .. you’d get the heaviest duties.”Kheir smirked to himself at the thought of all that warrior-muscle being put to useless back-breaking work. How that waste would get right up Maciste’s nose!“The toughest regime .. for a tough-guy like you. Goes without saying, doesn’t it? Looking like you, gonna have to earn your keep. Slogging it out from first light to sunset. Back-breaking. Spirit-crushing. Hard labour as hard as it comes”He grinned triumphant. “Punishment fit for a traitor to the king.”Maciste started to protest but Kheir rattled on.“If the cap fits, wear it.”Kheir sniggered.“Not that you’ll be getting a cap to wear.”He enjoyed the glare as Maciste anticipated his next remark.“Or anything else, I think.”Kheir looked pleased at his novel idea. That big arrogant big-brother of his .. naked as the day he was born. For the rest of his miserable degrading life.“After all, they’re all men around. Who’s gonna care?”Kheir grinned. Warming to the idea.“Not even the smallest stitch.”Kheir looked through the bars at his stepbrother .. here also stripped of any covering. Lording it, Kheir pronounced judgement.“Lifelong slavery .. heavy labour .. naked as the day he was born .. worked into the filth and the dirt.”Kheir sneered through the bars. Safely staying clear of his stepbrother’s anger.“THAT is our mother’s wish for you. Neat, don’t you think?”Without even stopping as he gnawed on the stale bread, Maciste swore.“That bitch is no mother of mine.”Kheir smirked.“I’d be careful how you refer to her. After all .. look at where she is .. mother to a king.”Kheir ignored Maciste shaking his head .. denying his right to that title.“And look where you are right now …..brother-dear ….”The threat was clear but Maciste was not impressed. He sat gnawing away at stale bread .. staring back through iron bars at the usurper … washing the food down with stale water. But refusing to show any sign of being beaten. Or intimidated by threats of slavery. Looking relaxed. He knew that would get right under Kheir’s skin.It did. He torqued up the threat.“Of course .. it can’t be hidden .. the guards are going to know. A new slave .. special delivery from their prince. Can hardly hide the fact .. who this naked muscle-head is. Impossible. Isn’t it?”Maciste saw Kheir grab at the bars. As if eager to get through to his prisoner. Determined to make him scared. Give Maciste something to worry about.“A ROYAL prince. Orders to treat him like SHIT. Work the BASTARD into ground. Because their own king has ordered it so. Because this muscled fuckhead is a PAIN-IN-THE-ARSE.”Maciste looked up. He smirked, he’d done it, got under Kheir’s skin. Kheir had lost it. He had started raising his voice.“Gonna know, aren’t they?”Frustrated, Kheir’s tone had got harsher, louder.“Whatever they do .. however much they pile it on .. No come-back. Royal protection from their king. Fuck this prisoner over .. as much as they want. Can do WHATEVER they want.”Kheir growled his last words through the bars. But the sight of his prisoner looking unperturbed only got him more wound up.“Maybe even earn themselves a reward. Doing the RIGHT THING.”Maciste was not going to let it show in his face. But he suspected Kheir had something specific in mind. He was not wrong.Kheir gripped on the bars. His face half penetrated into the cage between the bars.“Tell me, brother-dear .. what do you reckon ….?”Kheir’s eyes were alight.“Those guards. How many of those fucking savages have ever had their cock up a ROYAL arse?”Maciste did not flicker. His face did not register any reaction. But a shiver of anger involuntarily passed down his spine. Appreciating why his brother was planning to condemn Maciste to the squalor of a quarry-slave. A lifetime of degradation.“And how many guards do you reckon there are? How many are needed to mind a quarry-ful of slaves?”Kheir sniggered.“DOZENS. Needy. Needing to get their rocks off.”To Maciste, Kheir looked like he was drooling like some mad cow. But Kheir had got the idea stuck in his head. Maciste prey to dozens of guards. He snorted suggestively.“And what’s the betting those animals will not be satisfied with just one go?”A lifetime of degradation. a king’s promiseMaciste saw his stepbrother glowering at him through the bars. Safely out of harm's way. Gripping tight on rusty iron. Crushing the bars tight in his frustration. Kheir wanted Maciste scared. He had come meaning to see the warrior-prince cowering before him. Hoping Maciste would beg, plead for his life. A request he'd contemptuously deny. Crawl. Cringe. Beg. But Kheir would settle for his brother looking scared.What he got was scorn. The sight of a stepbrother looking far from beaten. Stripped of clothes. Robbed of dignity. But eyeing him back with disdain. Muscular defiance as sharp as the cut physique. Not intimidated. Not cowed .. huddling chilled in his dungeon. A powereful brother standing up to him .. defying him with fully-muscled manly might. Who'd break his neck if his hands could reach through these bars.Kheir gripped their protection in anger. He'd promised himself much better. Frustrated by the sneer on Maciste's face. A scene as if their positions were reversed. It was Maciste looking down on him. Maciste was playing the winner. It was Kheir's face being brutally backhanded with the victor's scorn. Like Kheir was an enemy beaten, broken and scared. “Trouble is ….”Kheir was still bristling. He wanted to see defeat seated in the darkness beyond the bars. But he was getting back confidence. Scorn.“ .. I have something else in mind ….” Maciste had shifted himself. He sat on the cell damp floor, facing his step-brother beyond the bars. Deliberately looking like he couldn’t give a shit what Kheir had jerked off about in his bed. Maciste was still the rightful king. And he wasn’t taking serious the likes of his wimpish step-brother.“Our mother will have to be disappointed.”Maciste snorted. To show he knew who was pulling the strings here. However important Kheir thought he was.“ It’s not the mines for the likes of you.”Kheir was playing the big man. The anointed king. Exercising that power. Maciste’s snort of scorn only made him more annoyed.Deliberately Maciste had his knees up. Deliberately he had his legs splayed. Giving that cowardly brat the full view of a man. A man in his prime. Unintimidated by all these dramatic gestures. Giving Kheir a warrior-prince undaunted by such threats.“I made a promise. To that rabble out there .. when they greeted you on the temple steps. They were promised an execution.”Kheir was rubbing his hands slowly together .. like the stereotype he was .. a prick satisfied with the semblance of power.“And a ruler should always keep his promise to his people.”He smirked.“Don’t you agree?”Maciste was not willing to die. He had not settled himself to accept any such fate. But at the threat of death he was not going to shirk. If it came to that .. the people would see their warrior prince die bravely. If unjustly“Told to assemble tomorrow at noon. Promised an execution. A traitor’s death.”Maciste snorted back.“That ‘d be you, then.”Maciste laughed in the face of his stepbrother’s threats. If Kheir was looking for signs of fear or submission, he’d have to look somewhere else. Maciste was persisting in insisting .. his brother had no right to claim his father’s throne.Kheir paused. Staring through the bars at his prisoner’s defiant posture.“Tomorrow .. at noon .. you’ll depart the palace. My soldiers will whip your sorry arse through the streets. Passed the people lined up to watch. Seeing the traitor dragging his leg irons through their streets .. getting his naked arse lashed for dragging his heels. Unwilling to face his execution.”Kheir raised his head. He scoffed.“Notice today .. in the temple square .. did you notice? How many greeted back their prince? How many protested at your shaming?”He knew .. Maciste had heard not a single shout on his behalf. Kheir sneered.“They won’t fucking dare. Any who raises a voice in protest .. a soldier will run him through with his spear.”It hadn’t taken Kheir long to stamp his style of ruling on the people, Maciste thought.“Forced to follow in your wake. No one’s missing this show. Soldiers herding the rabble behind .. in the steps of the traitor having his bare arse whipped.”Kheir was enjoying this. Maciste could see how he’d thought this all through. How he’d jerked off on this fantasy. Since the moment it was reported back that the true claimant to the throne had returned Kheir had been bursting to see his perverted plan put in practice. He thought he had it all worked out.“And you lot .. this country of yours .. Tel me ….”Kheir was smirking through the bars. Maciste could believe he was getting a hard-on .. the power overwhelming his senses. “ … how have you always dealt with traitors?”Defiant and proud. But still Maciste gave a shiver. The pair of them knew the answer. But damned if Maciste was going to show his fears.“Waiting for the traitor .. top of the temple steps. What the rabble expects. What every traitor deserves.”Maciste wanted to snarl back that Kheir was the traitor. But he’d be wasting his breath. Kheir had it all worked out. The people subdued. Maciste’s own soldiers under arrest. And the traitor’s cross awaiting on the temple steps to receive Maciste. traitor’s crossMaciste could tell by the look on his step-brother’s face, Kheir couldn’t wait to blurt out what he had planned.“Packed .. the temple square is going to be bursting .. everyone turned out .. to see …”Kheir’s eyes glistening through the bars. Shining into the dank dark cell.The people forced to turn out. Maciste remembered his morning’s humiliation. The people had been summoned to appear. Failure to do so would earn them displeasure. They might not be desperate to see Maciste’s royal arse tanned .. they did want to stay alive.“Soldiers having to whip the rabble aside .. to get your sorry arse up on the temple steps.”Bound, probably in leg irons. .. Maciste could hardly make a run for it .. Kheir would make sure of that. And once within the temple square, no escaping fate. He’d not move an inch. Crushed in on all sides. Trapped.Executed. On the traitor’s cross. Naked before his people. For a crime he did not commit.How was he going to react? To this unjust death? Just meekly take the soldiers’ blows. Or was he going to stand up to them? Hit out. Fight them back .. blow for blow.Or should he go for dying with dignity? Unjust. But go down in history for the courage of his dying? Die with honour. Because he was done-for anyway? Just busting a gut to rub Maciste’s face in it. In Kheir’s triumph. In finally settling old scores.“Get your sorry arse up the top of the steps. Beating the shit out of the traitor if you give them trouble. Who’s is going to object?”Maciste shrugged back .. he widened his knees imperceptibly .. his manliness defiant. His way of telling this brat who thought he had accomplished so much .. this is what a real man looks like. This is how much your step-brother cares. “I’ve got them fashioning the cross now.”Kheir was looking annoyed. Maciste was not reacting as he should. Where was the snarling, the anger? Where were the tell-tale signs of anxieties beginning to twist in his guts? Not even a dick shrunken with fears.“Only the best quality wood. After all, you were royal. Once.”Maciste smirked back.“Takes more than some runt doing his mother’s bidding to take away the blood.”Kheir stiffened. Annoyed at the put-down. Annoyed Maciste was still capable of standing up to him. Not what he wanted. Then Kheir’s face lightened. He smiled.“Best quality wood. Hardwood.”Maciste knew already what that meant. But nothing showed on his face. Or in his stature. He just leaned back .. giving the appearance of not giving a fuck. As if the threat of being nailed to a hardwood cross bore no fears for him.“I hear …..”Kheir was desperate to grind some sign of fear out of his prisoner.“… can take an many as twenty blows to pound a nail right in.”Maciste didn’t need telling. He himself had supervised a traitor’s nailing. Thick ugly iron nails .. the length of a man’s hand .. driven in through the wrist. Smashing up bone .. crunching through agonised flesh. Hammered in repeatedly .. until the nail head was pressing on broken bones. Enough to hold a full-grown man’s weight. The traitor had passed out with the pain. Maciste had had him revived for the second arm. Even for the soldier administering the blows .. it had not been a pretty sight.Maciste was having none of the toying with him.“Ever been told …..?”Maciste was smirking back through the bars at Kheir. His full manly virility on show. Goading. Deliberately he tore himself away from the thoughts of the pain of the cross. He had bigger fights on his hands . a battle of wills to wage. His nailing would be tomorrow. Now .. he was at war with this brat who had stolen his throne. Down in some chilly dungeon. Just the two of them .. brothers-by-marriage .. Maciste might struggle with tomorrow’s fight. But here today he was taking no prisoners.“Noticed what a little prick you’ve always been?”Maciste the big brother .. all the fame .. all the looks .. the physique .. all the girls .. rubbing the usurper’s nose in his own runny shit.“ .. that you can’t find yourself a woman? Always resort to slave girls?”Maciste grinned.“Yeah, I’ve noticed that. Plenty others have too have … Something to do with your incy-wincy dick, they say …..”Maciste snorted. His splayed-out knee jiggled up and down. His not-so-subtle way of reminding Kheir that he himself had no such problems.But Kheir was not playing ball. It was him destined to grind his half-brother’s nose in his own shit.“The temple square has an incredible echo.”Kheir’s eyes glowed like a soothsayer high on drugs.“Ever noticed THAT? Sounds bounce off the walls.”Maciste was already hearing where this was going. He’d heard those echoes himself.“Twenty hammer blows .. hammer rattling off a metal nail-head. Screams of pain. Twenty times. Twenty blows. Metal nail driven through smashed up bone. Hammered through an out-stretched arm. Twenty times .. twenty cries .. bouncing off the walls. Echoing around the square.”Maciste felt a twist in his balls. Despite himself he sensed a shudder in his guts. He too remembered the echo from when he’d had that traitor nailed. That man’s screams had pierced the air. Reverberated off the walls. Even a traitor’s agonies had been like a nail driven through Maciste’s own brain.“Twenty ear-piercing screams.” Kheir giggled.“And then .. there’s the other wrist ….”Maciste wondered if his step-brother had got a hard-on. Getting off on this prospect. Busting a gut to get Maciste to show his fears. Hard at the thought of dominating like this. Maciste DID have his nerves. He was nervous of all that pain. Who wouldn’t be? He’d been close-up, he’d seen a nailing for himself. He’d heard the screams. He’d sweated through the gut-twisting agonies. He was not fooling himself. But no way was he going to show Kheir those uncertainties on his face.He turned his goading back on Kheir.“Death by nailing? Your idea?”Maciste smirked back.“Or that bitch-of-a-mother? Did your little brain need her to lay this out for you?”Maciste was satisfied. From outside his cage, he saw Kheir grabbed at the bars. In anger. In frustration that Maciste was getting his own back in. Wishing the nailing could happen sooner. Just to show Maciste his power. To see the suffering. And shut up Maciste’s jeering.Maciste was playing a dangerous game. But what had he got to lose? curious“They have to be curious .. don’t they? The rabble in the square ….”Kheir was still grabbing hold of the bars. Sneering through. Annoyed that his warnings wasn’t getting his half-brother riled. Trying to get some sign from Maciste. Driving a nail of fear into his heart.“Hearing all that screaming. Their ears assaulted by ear-piercing shrieks.”Kheir was painting the scene for Maciste .. the scene his hand had held hard in his bed for many weeks.“Wondering .. what the hell was happening on the steps. Hearing the hammering. The screams. Their ears pounded by the echoes bouncing off the walls. But they couldn’t see a thing.”“Hardly fair,” Kheir grinned maliciously. “Is it?”In his mind Kheir had Maciste stretched out on his back. Cross flat-down on the temple steps. Maciste’s arms out-stretched. Held down while each wrist was smashed to pieces by cruel nails.“The poor souls .. heard all the screaming .. hadn’t seen a thing. Must be wondering. What is going on?”Steeling his guts against the threat of nailing. Maciste saw Kheir grin. If he’d been a dog .. Maciste thought .. he’d have been foaming at the mouth. Kheir was salivating like some sick cow. Under his kilt, the excitement of domination winning over his better senses.In his excitement Kheir clutched at the bars as if it was him trying to escape.“Can’t see for the press of the crowd. But needing like mad to know. “What’s happening to our champion?” “Can those be our hero’s screams?” Kheir sniggered.“How fares our stud-of-a-prince right now?” Maciste flopped his head over to one side, a smile lit up his lip .. looking Kheir in the face. Showing him his lack of concern. Unquestionably Maciste was a realist. He’d seen a nailing close-up. He was not fooling himself. He knew what to expect. It would be torture. Impossible to hold it in. He was a man, after all .. flesh and blood. He’d be smashed-up bones. Pain would be driving him out of his mind. He’d scream. No man would ever be able to hold his agonies back. Indisputably Maciste had his fears. He’d seen this for himself .. right under his nose. Of course he was scared. A traitor’s death .. the worse execution imaginable. But Maciste was damned now if it was going to show.For now .. this was a game. Whose will was going to win out?Maciste raised an eyebrow. Inviting Kheir to tell him what he was busting to tell him anyway.“Couldn’t see a thing. Poor stupid peasants - they’d not know what all the fuss is about.”As if there was going to be one single person in the crowd who was rooting for Kheir. Maciste knew instinctively where their sympathies would lie .. even if they were intimidated into inaction.“The metallic echo of the hammers. The screams of pain. Desperate to see. Itching to see for themselves …..”Kheir shrugged.“As their ruler .. I owe it to them .. don’t I?”He grinned.“To show them what a traitor looks like .. getting what he deserves.”Traitor. The word still rankled. But no point in arguing, Maciste decided. They both knew the score. Kheir had usurped the throne. His own mother’s troops had crushed any resistance. Maciste was not going to enter any futile game of counter-denial.“Gotta show them. Satisfy their curiosity.”Kheir looked like he’d cum there and then .. so aroused with the colour with which his imagination was painting this scene.“Have the cross raised up. Let them see. There on their own temple steps. The traitor nailed by his wrists. Raised up. For all to see.”Kheir sniggered to himself.“Brother-mine .. you’re gonna be quite a sight.”Maciste could see his step-brother scouring his face through the bars. Desperate for signs of anxieties. The more he painted in the detail .. the more Kheir was itching for a twitch of fear. Hoping, at the very least, to see Maciste looking nervous. “What a fine sight you’ll make. Naked. In your filth and degradation. Your guards jizm clinging in your hair.”He laughed.“The people’s adored champion … quite the hero!”Kheir was winding him up. Trying to get a rise out of him. And Maciste was as determined as hell that he see no such thing. But the idea of his whole muscled bodyweight suspended off a pair of cruel wounds through his smashed up wrists ….. The image could not fail to eat away at his guts. BUT … Show Kheir his nerves? Like hell. Maciste denied his fears .. not going to show the slightest sign of weakness. Under the hammer .. he’d scream .. he’d be nailed into mind-blowing agony. Maybe he too would pass out with the pain. But he’d face that problem when it came.Maciste slowly shook his head. Telling Kheir he didn’t give a shit. Because Maciste refused to believe it .. he was not yet done-in.Frustrated Kheir tried again.“All those cries. The screams of pain that had echoed off the walls. What had caused all that, thye’d be wondering?”Maciste knew Kheir had his ideas.“A ruler owes it to his people. To be honest. Transparent. No secrets.”From what Maciste had seen here, he knew already Kheir had no such intentions from his rule. But he was letting things pass. Transparency? Let his people in on how they were ruled? Like hell Kheir would.For Maciste, though. .. nailed and in agony as the soldiers raised him on the cross .. Kheir was going to make an exception. He’d have Maciste’s torture seen. He wanted Maciste to know that his agonies were being seen. His people seeing him tortured. In agony.Kheir had a tight grip on the rusty bars. His eyes were lit with the fire of a man losing his mind.“All that inhuman noise. All that squealing like a pig being killed. All that pain.”Kheir paused. As if he was already hearing those tortured cries.“A ruler owes it. To his people. Doesn’t he? He has to show.”Maciste had not the slightest doubt that Kheir couldn’t wait to rub his nose in it.“The rabble has to see the traitor getting what he deserves.” kindnessesThe man was naked. Stripped of everything that made him human .. never mind a prince. Clothes gone. Privileges gone. His enemy’s cum sticky in his hair. Little here spoke of the rightful king.Beaten and punched. Signs of ill-treatment blotched his torso. His guards had not been easy on him. Kheir would not have had it otherwise. At first Kheir had worshipped his adopted big brother. He could have followed him around like some dutiful dog. The son-and-heir who had everything. Who wrestled for sport .. and won. Surrounded by handsome-looking friends. Admired, loved. Popular with the people.Adored by the girls. Hardly a night passed by that sounds of laughter and mad passion didn’t escape Maciste’s chambers and make Kheir cringe. As he lay listening in the dark in his lonely bed.Admire? Hero-worship? That leaning to venerate an idol turned to envy. Kheir’s stomach turned at the sight of that chiselled physique. Always going without his tunic done-up. Maciste’s muscled torso on display. Rock-solid belly-muscle rubbing Kheir’s nose in his own meagreness. A peacock. What passed-over brother hadn’t the gnawing resentment turning to acrimony. Resentment twisting into spite. Maciste was used to being admired. The sight of his physique drew attention for men and women alike. But from Kheir .. safe the other side of these bars .. those eyes sent a tremor down Maciste’s backbone. That was not admiration. That was envy. Greed. Resentment.“The sight of this magnificent strength .. this warrior-prince .. muscular .. ALL-MAN … .”Maciste could almost feel the touch as Kheir’s gaze pawed at powerful shoulders. Greedily .. to take control, He stared back unmoved as the brat’s spiteful look took in his strong upper arms.“What is there not to drool at in all this manly muscular power?”The air was nippy, the wall against Maciste’s back was damp and chilled. Was that the cold sending a shiver down his backbone? But he was going to show nothing of his feelings.“Nailed to the traitor’s cross. Hanging by his wrists .. taking his whole weight …”The thought was less than inviting. “The suspension pulling every muscle into sharp relief. What a sight you’ll make. MAGNIFICENT!”Maciste could almost believe his stepbrother had cum under his kilt. Was the sick fool losing his control?“A god!”The tone in Kheir’s voice was not admiration. It was mockery. Laced with a good streak of spite.But still Maciste’s posture remained impassive. He felt the gaze through the bars come to rest between Maciste’s legs. Where his sturdy manhood sat at rest .. full, thick, pendulous. Relaxed and unintimidated by threats .. resting unperturbed between supremely muscular thighs. This weed of a step-brother .. forced on him by marriage .. had always crawled in Maciste’s manly shadow. And now the wimp had skulked out into the sun.“But you will not find me unkind .. not even to a state traitor ……”Kheir’s face had twisted into a smirk. Maciste sensed he had more surprises in mind.“Assistance is needed .. only fair .. to take some of that weight …..”Maciste was already imagining the kind of malevolent help Kheir had in mind.“That superbly masculine .. wondrously muscled .. etched, sculpted, shredded .. cut .. manly .. weighty ….”Kheir giggled to himself. All words that had been used to describe his loathed stepbrother’s physique.Kheir twisted the screw into his hated stepbrother’s guts.“Help needed. Nails through the ankles .. either side of the upright ……”He sniggered.“To take some of that superbly muscular weight.”Kheir drooled.“Remind me. How many blows was it taking to drive the nails right in?”Maciste could do the arithmetic. His guts knew to twist at the thought of that much pain. But his head knew not to give the slightest twitch. His face showed not a single reaction. With satisfaction Maciste noticed Kheir’s gaze kept returning to his exposed crutch. In envy. Kheir’s spiteful look sliding in between his muscled thighs. Begrudging this defiant display of manliness. Not shrunk to nothing out of fear. Not blown up to full by fear-driven nerves. Relaxed. Unmoved. For all the threats piled up on Maciste’s suffering. Maciste’s message. For all Kheir’s posturing and power-play .. Maciste didn’t give a fuck.Kheir threw his mastery full into Maciste’s face.“Kill two birds with one stone. Take some of your weight off your wrists. AND …. Show the rabble what all that noise was about. Seeing for themselves what all that screaming was for.”Maciste saw the picture too himself .. in blindingly agonising colours .. red-yellow. His ankle held against the side of the upright. The nail pressed against the joint. And then the countless blows as the metal hammer smashed that thick ugly nail through his bone. Each blow hammering out a scream.Kheir grabbed at the cold rusty bars.“Echoing off the walls. Screams as each blow becomes too much.”Maciste felt the shiver down his backbone. This time it was not the cold.Kheir was warming to the scene. The thought of more agony smashing up Maciste’s ankle bones. Getting him going.“The rabble now seeing with their own eyes .. what all that screaming fuss had been about. Their one-time prince .. raised up .. nailed through the wrists to the traitor’s cross. Naked as the day he was born .. bleeding from nails driven through his wrists …. “Maciste knew that Kheir was aching to draw one single show of fear from him. Frustrated at not getting any sign of nerves. To any man the thought of that pain was terrifying. But here-and-now Maciste’s task was denying his step-brother that satisfaction. Any satisfaction of his cruel plans.“Screaming out .. another body-crushing blow .. another metallic ring of hammer pounding on metal nail. Crunching up human bone. Another round of agonised echoes bouncing off the walls. Metal blows drowned out by a will-breaking cry. Inhuman. A beast in agony. An ear-piercing shriek. A pig being slaughtered. Bone smashed up.”Kheir sniggered.“No shame .. my brother. Letting it go .. dear brother-mine. Any man would shriek.”Gripping the bars. Eyes alight. Kheir smirked.“Doesn’t bear thinking about.Kheir grinned. Cruelly.“Does it?” Chapter 5Kingly constraintsMaciste modelled by Tavi CastroIt hadn’t had to be like this. The pair of them could have got on like a house on fire. First time Kheir saw his new brother it was all he could do not to gasp. Stood there bare to the waist .. as he always was. Kheir had never been drawn to the beauty in a man before. But he couldn’t take his eyes off his new brother. Eyes drawn to the lines from broad hard shoulders down to narrow muscled waist. Eye-catching muscle all the way down. Kheir had never know feeling like that for a man. He could have hero-worshipped Maciste .. from first sight.What did the best big brothers do with their younger kin? Take them hunting .. teach the thrill of returning back triumphant with game. Wrestle? Show the youngster his best winning moves? Encourage him to come out triumphant in his fights. And pass on those essential tips? The experienced brother’s winning ways with the girls.Best of big brothers? Maciste? Was he hell! Kheir never heard the talk behind his back. But he saw the looks from Maciste’s friends. Their grins. The smirks. All too clear what they thought of him. Ignored. As if Kheir did not exist. The also-ran.The strutting peacock going around court bare to the waist .. showing off. Winning battles. Loved by his troops. Adored by the rabble .. for the peace he kept in their land. And he barely had to blink .. some girl was already naked and waiting in his bed.Ignored. But Kheir had the arsehole’s attention now. His arse was sore. He’d been anointed by his men’s seed. Shamed. Humiliated. And for the rest of the short time Maciste was still drawing breath, Kheir was going to make sure that swaggering pain-in-the-arse took him seriously. Making up for lost time ….. murderer “Where did such animal cruelty come from?” Maciste didn’t mean from the beating he’d just got. He’d as-good-as invited that. It was with a touch of satisfaction he noted that his defiance had got up Kheir’s nose. He’d pissed this usurper off. The wimp had expected him to behave otherwise. Beg. Show fear. Instead Maciste had offered the prick the defiant example of a manly cock to rub his nose in. Well worth the beating.Sitting with his knees apart .. naked .. sticking his stubborn manliness in Kheir’s face .. rubbing his nose in Maciste’s steadfastness. No cringing. No show of fears. Threatened with the worst, the traitor’s death. But not giving a single fuck! Maciste sticking it right up Kheir’s nose. Goading Kheir with his refusal to feel daunted. Maciste’s dangerous game. But he reckoned, what had he got to lose? Maciste read the annoyance on his stepbrother’s face .. feeling a spark of satisfaction in his dick . the warm glow of success. Even if it had earned him a good beating. “Guards! Get the fuck in here.”Kheir’s temper had snapped. He had had enough. Tired of Maciste’s arrogance. Frustrated with his refusal to cringe. Kheir had summoned his men to teach Maciste the lesson he deserved. As king he had every right to interrupt the guards from their treat of beer and cheese.“Teach this fucker some respect.”The guards hadn’t needed asking twice. Not in front of their king. He wanted the dickhead taught respect. They’d not wonder why. Unquestioning they had rushed Maciste in his cell. Maciste was already up on his feet for them. But a dozen in his cell against just him .. he was soon taking their blows. Backed up against the bars, arms held out to the side. Taking a good thumping .. to the guts .. punches to his ribs.Finally satisfied that his prisoner had been taught some regret, Kheir then made sure his brother was not going to waggle a defiant dick in his face anymore. Kheir ordered Maciste tied up, his arms tied to a beam in the ceiling. Out of spite for that insolent defiance, Kheir chose to prove it to his step-brother .. nothing was under Maciste’s control any more. Before giving the guards permission to return to their treat, sniggering Kheir praised the guards for their earlier ingenuity.“That thing you did with this traitor’s cock .. forcing it to stand to your will.”Kheir smirked into his scowling brother’s face.“Show me how you did that again.”Only then .. when the guards had got Maciste stood erect .. only after Kheir had leered over every little bit of the rise .. when Maciste had been made to stand and salute the new king, proud and erect .. only then did their king give soldiers permission to withdraw .. to return to their treat. Jokingly Kheir ordered the guards to “get the fuck back to your beer” .. promising he’d send them a pair of slave girls in reward for their good work. Bravely, now Kheir entered the cell .. now that the danger from Maciste’s fighting fists was safely pinned down.“This cruelty. Who brought out the slavering beast in you?”Maciste didn’t mean the ease with which Kheir had just ordered him worked over. It was the way this transformed Kheir talked so loosely about intimidating the people .. uncaringly threatening to kill innocents if they didn’t turn up for Maciste’s execution .. indifferently murdering to enforce his will. How he had set about decimating his father’s officers .. that other Kheir would never have known where to start. Never mind the sickening sadism with which he had drooled over the details of Maciste’s crucifixion. Maciste and his half-brother had never got close. Thrown together by a marriage of convenience .. his father’s realm had impoverished itself in defending itself against invaders seeking their mineral wealth. The king’s second marriage to Kheir’s mother had settled the debts.But had it only drawn a female viper into the nest? If Kheir had taken easily to cruelty once he had power .. truth was, he was a mere novice. He was being used. There was a bitch behind the throne. And Kheir was fooling himself if he thought he’d ever have any say …..“Suckled it from my mother’s breast? You think?”Kheir’s tone was joking. But Maciste was sure that wasn’t far from the truth. He saw the grasping hand of Kheir’s mother all over this. If Kheir thought he had taken easily to exercising cruelty, Maciste was in no doubt he was still learning the ropes. He was only a faint shadow of his mother. Where the real power lay.“Did my father even die of natural causes?”Maciste snarled. As much angered by the thought of that murder as Kheir’s hands pawing him.“Or was THAT BITCH’s hand on the knife?”Kheir was running his hand up and down Maciste’s stiff manhood. Goading .. enjoying his efforts to humiliate. He’d had Maciste re-tied in the soldiers’ leather cord. Clearly something appealed about having his step-brother forced into this purple-headed powerful erection. And showing that Kheir owned that too.“And get your filthy hands off.”Angrily Maciste snapped out. He reminded his stepbrother of the fact.“I am your rightful king. The only son of the bloodline. My father’s elder son.”Smirking Kheir just shrugged. His thumb circled over the solid head of Maciste’s engorged cock. “Looks like it,” Kheir sniggered. “Only the blood seems to have got trapped. Right here.”A hand squeezed hard. Kheir gripped the solid pulsating flesh in the palm of his hand. Determined to dominate. Itching to force a show of anger. A futile show of strength. Again his grip squeezed. Waiting for Maciste’s anger at this mauling to break free.“OUR father,” Kheir insisted.Of course, Maciste registered, without a claim to being his father’s adopted son Kheir had no legitimate claim to the throne. But once he had disposed of an inconvenience called Maciste, his claim was absolute.“How did he die?”Kheir was chortling in derision at Maciste’s uselessness.“OUR father.”Kheir corrected Maciste again. He gave the sweaty angry hardness in his palm a tweak.“That’s the way you should be putting it.”Kheir topped his brother’s claim with a pair of taunting squeezes.“BROTHER-DEAR.”“Die? How’d he die?”Kheir winked.“Now that would be telling … wouldn’t it?”But his wink left Maciste in no doubt. His temper rose. SHE’d have done it. Kheir would not have known where to start .. ordering an assassination. Kheir’s mother. Her hand was all over the knife. Was there nothing she was not capable of? Killing the man who had adopted her son after the second marriage. Treating him as his own. The king whom now Kheir dared claim as his father. After his mother had had him murdered.“You …!”Maciste’s outburst was cut short when his stepbrother gripped hard on his ballsack. And gritting his teeth, Kheir gave Maciste’s royal jewels a long punishing squeeze. Shutting off his protest with a powerful hiss.“Enough!”Kheir snarled. His thumb squeezed down. Crushing one of Maciste’s gonads. Squeezing hard. Long. Painful. Seeing Maciste clench his teeth together under the pain, Kheir added an extra layer. Twisting his wrist. Maciste grunted out loud .. fighting back on the pain. Eye-watering. Eye-watering pain crushed out of his balls.“DOG. I’ve heard enough.”Kheir hissed .. at the end of his tether. Bored with taunting his older brother. Tired of failing to getting Maciste’s back up. Eager to get his own back. Time to get on with things. Busting a gut to make Maciste show the newly anointed king his due. Determined that Maciste was going to take him seriously. protocol“What I would give .. to be there to hear. The thwack of the mallet onto the nail. The cries of pain. Crunch of bones smashing up. The sweated pain hanging off nailed wrists.”Kheir’s head was swinging from side-to-side .. his eyes somewhat glazed over .. clearly enjoying imagining Maciste suffering on the cross .. and relishing every pain-filled moment. Kheir felt delirious with the thoughts. Seeing that unbearable suffering following on from the walk of humiliation. Shoved and barged naked and in chains through the watching rabble. Walked in abject filth and shame to his execution. Object on display .. object of the new king’s derision.Champion of the people. Beloved son and heir. All that hero-worship. All that strutting muscle. A lifetime of swaggering .. going bare to the waist. His whole conceited being one great showing-off.Held down on the cross. Crying out .. blunted nails smashing up his bones. Flesh and busted bone. The brave champion of the people .. screaming under the blows. Lifted up .. for all to see .. the soldier’s hero .. hanging in his agonies. Naked. Flesh and blood .. gushing from his smashed-open wounds. The shame. The pain. The agonies of the traitor’s cross. What a sight his stepbrother would make!“But it wouldn’t be seemly .. would it? Their king turning up for a public execution?”Kheir was smirking away to himself .. still relishing his domination as he saw Maciste hung in anguish off a cross .. stuck up in the temple square. “For a traitor’s execution.”Kheir’s gaze was off somewhere else. Relishing the scene he had mapped out. Maciste crucified .. condemned to die a long excruciating death .. in agonies in front of the people over whom he should have ruled.“Turning up for a traitor’s public execution.”Kheir sniggered.“Our father would not have approved .. would he?”From his position .. forced to stand erect before the brother who had abducted his throne, Maciste scoffed back.“I doubt my father would have approved of his wife plotting his murder either. The bitch.”Prospects for Maciste looked gloomy. He saw no way out. But if he was to be unjustly hammered to a cross .. he’d go with dignity. Every fibre in his body would deny the charge. No traitor. Head held high .. proud muscled chest, broad back unbent. Maciste answered the usurper with his disdain. Eyes creased in contempt for his step-brother’s treacherous act.“And facts remain .. you have no right to call yourself king.”Kheir was unfazed by Maciste’s powerless rants. “Just remind me .. whose stinking arse is it sitting on the throne?”To prove his control over the situation, his thumb again circled Maciste’s erect cock. Maciste in anger swung away. “Get the fuck off!”But Kheir’s other hand grabbed him by the shaft. Held still Maciste’s gyrating body. And again ran his thumb over the treacherous underside .. stimulating the arousal. And smirking into the face of this stupid step-brother .. who was still refusing to face facts. Denying the reality .. Maciste was done-for. The over-muscled prick!“Which is why my little inconvenience has to be removed. The first of the bloodline. Has to be disposed of. Goes without saying .. of course.”Kheir was glorying in his power .. symbolised by goading shame out of Maciste’s rampant cock.“Can’t have some idiot thinking he can organise some uprising and put YOUR muscled arse back on my throne.”Kheir smirked. His eyes popped open with joy. Observant he had spotted a pearl of seed collected at the head of Maciste’s cock. His fingers joined-in to add more stimulation.“By-the-by ….”Kheir was tickling seductively up and down his brother’s shaft. Encouraging the unwelcome glow.“How many times is it now? That you’ve called our mother a bitch?”Maciste scoffed.“That murdering whore is no mother of mine.”Surprisingly Kheir seemed pleased at another insult describing his mother.“Just as well, then … Be grateful it is me deciding your fate ….. Insults like that ….”Kheir chortled.“She’d have THIS …” Kheir’s hand gave the thrusting man-flesh a good squeeze … “ .. and feed it down your throat.”His fingers moved to slick in the seed dribbling out. Spreading it around over the solid cockhead. The slickness massaging more arousal out of the helpless cock. Grinning as he tried to infuriate his brother.“Can’t have a brother who is a ….?”Kheir paused, But his thumb continued spreading wasted seed over a cockhead solid in its purple strain.“Now … what is it you have become, brother of mine?”The sensations from the pawing over his cockhead were rumbling treacherously in Maciste’s shaft.“Born to rule. The cocksure prince. Become a dog. A slave. A nothing …..The flow of wasted seed was flowing. Kheir’s thumb provocatively rubbed it over Maciste’s hot-spot underneath.“Be grateful. You owe it to me. I’ve elevated in rank. No dog, not the strutting warrior-prince. I’ve named you traitor. Raised you high. Up on the traitor’s cross. A threat to the throne.”Kheir sniggered.“Be glad. If my mother had her way .. you’d spend the rest of your life a quarry guard’s whore.”Kheir’s shoulders chuckled at the thought. Maciste growled back.“WHORE yourself!”Maciste was trying to ignore the unstoppable sensation churning between his legs.“Over my dead body!”Kheir sniggered.“Oh, it will be. OVER YOUR DEAD BODY. You can bet your skin on that. Precious brother-of-mine.” loss of controlThe signs were far from good. Kheir might pull this off. Maciste was his stepbrother’s prisoner. Deep in the dungeons .. any chance of escape as good as nothing. His father’s generals slaughtered. The army gone. The people cowed. Maciste was on his own. His future .. down to him alone ….His execution ordered. Agonies on the traitor’s cross. What hope? Even if there was none .. Maciste saw only the over-riding drive .. to beat Kheir. Kheir might execute him. But come out on top? Never! Kheir wanted him broken. Fuck him! Desperate for Maciste to break-down. Beg. Plead. FUCK HIM! Or when nailed to the cross .. to have Maciste shame himself. Piss himself with fear.LIKE HELL!Kheir transferred his smirk from Maciste’s anger to his purple-headed dick. An enforced string of seed drooling from the gaping slit.“But … for calling OUR mother names .. for insulting OUR mother’s honour ….”Kheir was a mixture of mock anger and sadistic pleasure.“ … for that .. there will be a price to pay.”Angrily Maciste shook at the overhead chains that kept him in place. Frustrated. Taking it out on the chains. Busting to get his hands on the wimp’s neck. He’d snap it in two. Exasperated. Forced him to endure this brat’s goading. Maciste snapped back in anger.“Then .. get-the-fuck-on-with-it.”Kheir looked down at Maciste’s rampant cock. Then he flashed his eyes back full on Maciste’s angry face. Lasciviously he licked his lips.“Get on with it? In a hurry now, are we?” Kheir mocked.Words he might live to regret but Maciste had had enough. Enough of this prick playing him for a fool. Maybe he was playing this wrong but all he wanted to do was throttle the wimp. The look on Kheir’s face only seemed pleased. As if Maciste had built his own trap and walked right into it.“As I have said .. Unseemly for a king to join the mob in some public execution. A pity. But the price of kingship, I suppose ….”Kheir was smirking at him again. The triumphant prick! If only Maciste wasn’t bound by these chains. That irritating leer! Maciste suspected even more Kheir still had something up his sleeve.“Just going to have to arrange my own fond farewell .. instead.”Maciste had started to drool. Watching the string lengthen Kheir’s shoulders jerked in a slight chuckle. Seeing this enforced dribble of his step-brother’s seed dangling in a long thread. Feeling his anger. Sensing the fury building .. bubbling away under the surface. Maciste hating being used like this.Kheir’s finger collected the string of jizm. He held it up .. making to wipe it on Maciste’s lip. Predicting rightly Maciste would whip his face away. Instead, eyes afire Kheir stuck his own tongue out. Like luxuriating on a fine delicacy, his taste-buds sparkled at the flavour. Savouring pure humiliation.“Yes … some ingenious way of bidding a brother a fond goodbye …. ”Kheir was play-acting, Maciste could tell .. looking as if he was still musing over his plans. But this brat had been working up his ideas for weeks. His hand had been all over his hardness in the dark of his bed .. thinking it out. Every step of Maciste’s return .. this frustrating slide from warrior-prince to being strung up and tormented like this .. Kheir didn’t still need to think things through. The treacherous bastard had it all worked out. The prick knew exactly what he had planned for Maciste.“.. some final memorable leave-taking .. bidding a brother a last farewell. Important, I think …..“Maciste had tried to back away. Kheir’s two fingers had come to rest on the end of his tumescent cock. Pressing slowly downwards on the cockhead.“ .. some way of remembering him by …”The downward pressure continued.“ …. Something I won’t forget ….”The pressure had reached Maciste’s limits. His cock would not point downwards any further .. not without something breaking. Irritatingly Kheir’s pressure forced him to lean his hips backwards. A move dictated by this hated brother. And necessity.“Get your fucking hands of me.”Maciste snarled. His teeth clenched tight together. He tried pulling his hips back .. to give the downward pressure some slight relief. But Kheir readily anticipated .. a counter-move took up the slack. He soon had Maciste at full downward stretch again. Kheir saw him holding his breath. With nervousness. But more with rage.At Maciste’s words Kheir looked down. Two fingers pressing on a cockhead full and bulging .. purple-headed, bristling with manly potency. But a prisoner to Kheir’s power. He had Maciste pointing well down. To prove his point, Kheir gave Maciste’s solid flesh a slight downwards push. The rock-hard shaft did not budge, it could not. Kheir looked up. His eyebrow lifted. His unspoken way of pointing out that not even this most private part of this supreme fighter body was Maciste’s to command anymore. His younger brother’s plaything. A toy. But trapped in a dangerous game.For all his warrior training .. for all his claim to the throne .. Maciste had nothing to his name. Not even his cock. Even his seed drooled to Kheir’s command. His manhood was tightly bound .. summoned to stand to attention .. saluting this usurper of the throne. Maciste was nothing. A nobody. Kheir’s plaything. And ….. with just one little shove Kheir could unman the warrior-prince. Snap it off.“Something royally entertaining, I think.”Kheir took his fingers away. Maciste rose. His solid shaft slapping upwards. Smacking against his bare belly.“And of course .. that little matter of insulting my mother’s honour …..”Kheir was not smiling anymore. He had proven his dominance over this prisoner. He did not have to play anymore.“That will command a price.”Kheir’s hand again returned. “Get some rest. Scum. The entertainment begins after supper.”Kheir’s voice was harsh. His eyes cold. His finger played lightly on the solid length of Maciste’s helplessly strung-out shaft. Like plucking the strings of a harp. Plucking useless anger out of Maciste’s temper.Kheir gave his stepbrother a grin.“We’ll meet soon.” Chapter 6 Entertainment fit for a kingclash of willsMaciste's swore it to himself.? Again and again. Abandoned by Kheir in the darkness. Naked and cold.?His skin?shivered but his blood boiled. With every chilled shudder that rattled through hard muscled flesh he vowed it to himself. Kheir could not win.Nothing in Maciste's warrior spirit could allow that wimp to get away with this.? That evil scheming bitch Kheir called mother had had Maciste's father secretly murdered. Maciste might go the way of his father .. just?publicly?killed.BUT ..? Maciste could not let that prize prick he was forced to call brother think he had won. Everything in Maciste's manly pride would deny him that. Whatever it cost ....Walked the full length of his own Great Hall. The sides lined by the nobility of Maciste’s enemies. Down a tunnel of soldiers .. men who had spent months suppressing Maciste’s people. Living symbols of his defeat. Enemies who wanted Maciste dead.The last of the line .. Maciste’s father had found an unexpected death. Maciste, last remnant of the old ruling family, still breathing. But for how long?Hands chained in front, clanking leg irons hampering his gait .. the last dregs of a kingly dynasty prisoner of his enemy’s whim. Short leg-chains making him mince along .. destroying any idea of him looking brave. Gone any chance of defiantly facing down his enemy. A mincing fool. Object of derision.An earnest silence hung in the air. Broken only by the humiliating shuffle of Maciste’s leg irons. A broken man, he had to be. No chance of winning, surviving. Beaten. Humiliated. Defeated at every turn. Publicly whipped. A day in the dungeons .. stewing in his own fears. Enough food and water .. to keep up his strength. Enough strength to last out the lingering death his brother had planned. And the eradication of his kingly line. .. It takes more than power? -? being a leader.? There's more to it than personal worth?? ..? courage in the face of battle.? A muscular physique might catch a girl's eye.? A soldier doesn't follow a broad muscled back into a fight? ..? not risking his life for that.But Maciste had it? ..? that mysterious spark.? Leading from the front? ..? in the thick of battle.? Earning his men's loyalty.? Never expecting from others what he did not offer himself.? Winnng by his efforts respect.Just what his stepbrother couldn't do? ......“Captains. To me”Kheir did not bother to look at them as his officers stepped forward. His eyes riveted on the smug-looking brother stood before him, in chains. But smirking, though surrounded by armed guards. Glaring at his irritating older brother, full-grown, muscled, the revered warrior-prince. Daring to sneer at him.“I place this traitor in your charge.”Popular hero of the people .. look at him now. Disdainful Kheir dismissed their champion in his chains.“Tomorrow you will rid my kingdom of this threat"The king did not look at his captains. Annoyed by the looks being shot back at him from Maciste. Still that insolent hostility.One of the captains turned to assess the prisoner. He saw a man eye-catchingly well-built. An aura about him, recognisably a leader of men. A successful general popular with soldiers. The rightful king. If this man tried something on .. if he aroused the people .. it would be the captains who'd pay for a king's wrath. Best get all that muscle well tied-down, he thought warily. Maybe gag the prick, shut off chances of mouthing-off. This prince had beat-back armies of superior strength, his determination had kept his country free. Even captive like this, he represented a threat.“Your king is addressing you.”Kheir snapped at the captain who had dared look away.“Does this over-muscled brute impress you? More than your king?"The captain knew better than to answer back. Enough men had unaccountably disappeared. And this inexperienced cocky young ruler never missed a chance “This muscle-head get you going?” Kheir mocked.“This last runt of his royal litter?”He stared back across the great Hall. Seemingly relaxed. That proud muscle seemingly unconcerned. He'd usually gone bare to the waist. Flaunting his young man's body. Strong, proud. A damned show-off. Like his every move was laughing in his brother's face. Sneering .. Could he match looking this good? Did his brother make the girls get moist? Could he pass between men and make them turn round. In envy of the power knotted between those hard-bunches shoulders? Would Kheir ever have that power?Well, he had it now. The power to grab Maciste's attention. And all that arrogantly strutting muscle .. bare to the waist .. showing off .. Kheir was going to make it stand up and take notice. He'd get Maciste moist .. sweating blood. Those enviously masculine shoulders .. Kheir would see them tight-knotted. .. bunched with fear. Arrogant. Haughty. Maciste stared him back. Seemingly unconcerned. Kheir was going to give this show-off muscle-head he had something to be concerned about ...Symbolically Kheir talked over the head of his captains. Signalling their right to stand at the foot of his throne was at his discretion.“These last dregs, eh?”Sneering, he addressed his muscle-head stepbrother, humiliated before Kheir’s court, in chains. Condemned to a long-lingering death. “Last piece of old-shit to rule these lands?”Despite his words, Kheir felt thwarted. Annoyed. How come Maciste did not look cowed? Surrounded by hostile enemy. Mocked by this court. Condemned to the worst death, the once-time prince .. general .. hero. Now this pain-in-the arse had been summoned for a brotherly “farewell”. And he had to know nothing kindly was planned.But Maciste just stood chained-up and sneered back. His demeanour telling his enemy-brother all of this hostility did not intimidate. He didn’t give a toss about being surrounded by those who hated him. Chains and manacles did not bully. Nothing here could make him bend.Well, Kheir would just have to show the prick. It was HIS arse now sitting on this throne. And he WOULD give the muscle-head something to worry about Probably just play-acting, Kheir guessed. Maciste, the great hero - posturing. Couldn’t let himself be shown up. Well, like hell,! Kheir was going to make this brother smirk on the other side of his smug face! Or did Maciste actually harbour some dumb belief that his stepbrother would not go ahead? Not condemn him to the drawn out torture of the cross? Well, stepbrother-dear, we’ll see about that …. THAT and more …. Maciste was furious. Now he knew the truth. The guards could not stop themselves .. getting in another dig at him. While Maciste was made to wait outside the Great Hall. Made to attend the new king’s pleasure. And to kill time the guards had tormented Maciste with the story. His father’s death.Maciste’s poor people .. ground into the dirt since the invasion .. forced to watch their own king hung in their market place. Maciste’s own father. Slowly hauled up by the neck. Legs kicking out, desperation fighting for breath. Maciste had assumed his father secretly murdered. But the bitch-wife had no such qualms. This was a conquest, no secret plot. Her husband, Maciste’s father, the people’s king - stripped naked .. hung publicly .. like a common criminal. Mocking the soldiers had laughed. “Took him a fucking-long time to die.”Maciste struggled to countenance this shit that had taken over his country. He refused to accept Kheir’s stinking arse had any right to soil his father’s throne. He would not satisfy Kheir’s taunts with a reply. Or any show of nerves. He could tell his defiant stance in the face of pain and death was getting right up Kheir’s nose.Kheir had mocked .. trying to squeeze out some reaction. Hoping for a rush at him on the throne .. the guards would cut him down as soon as Maciste made a move. A rash attempt hampered by leg irons .. cutting Maciste to the floor .. getting the sycophants lining the walls tittering.Maciste was not so stupid. Refusing to rise to the jibes – that was almost as good as a fist in Kheir’s guts.“Want to know how that cretin you called father died, ” Kheir mocked. Some last-ditch attempt at provoking him.Maciste did not react. He had suspected. Now he knew. And his hatred for that murdering prick was intense. Maciste was now the last of the line. With his own death the ruling family died out. And he had every reason to think Kheir would not make it easy.But bend? Now he knew the truth? To this slug? Break his neck. Snap his back. YES. But give in to this murderous prick? Never. Show his fears? Betray his birthright? Fail his people? Over his dead body. He’d pay .. for infuriating Kheir. But everything else .. a betrayal of the man he was …..This was dynastic, this confrontation with Kheir. Maciste, the last of the line. His father’s bloodline to be wiped out with his death of the cross. He’d hold his head high .. to that bitter end. To show the enemy. To hold his own end up. To stand up to them .. for as long as humanly possible.But it was also intensely personal, the one-on-one with Kheir .. now Maciste knew the truth about his father. The smug wimp had been put on that throne by his mother’s scheming. To rule over Maciste’s people. A weak ruler, jerked his mother pulling the strings. That prick did not deserve to be there. It was the people who would suffer.And got there by assassination. Murderously stringing Maciste’s own father up. Shamefully hanged like a common criminal. And it didn’t end till they were all eradicated. Next-up .. Maciste in agony on the traitor’s cross.Give him one chance .. give Maciste the slightest chance .. He’d snap the murdering prick’s neck.“Captain ……”At the call Maciste looked over at Kheir on his throne. He had been backed up against a massive stone pillar and his hands were being tied to an iron ring above his head.“Your men intercepted this dog when he landed.”It had hardly been a tough job. Maciste had been returning to mourn his father's death. Unthinking he’d let himself get ambushed on the ship .. after all, as the returning heir he’d expected an escort.The same damned captain that had led Maciste into the city on a noose. Held up for that publicly shaming. Who’d had Maciste’s bare arse whipped on the temple steps. Kheir encountered Maciste’s sneering gaze from off that pillar, irritated. This damned brother was not even resisting. His manacles had been removed. But he did not even deign to throw a retaliating punch. Just stood defiant watching Kheir. ALLOWING the guards to chain him to the pillar. No sign of nervousness or fear, damn him.Proud, haughty. As if there was no punishment from Kheir that could make him fear. After the guards’ humiliations of the dungeons .. after Kheir had told Maciste of his planned execution .. the most humiliating, the most long-drawn-out .. And still Kheir had not got through to him. Still the cur dared to stand up to him.Kheir’s foot stamped up and down in anger. But he WOULD catch on. Kheir promised himself. This insolent stepbrother of his .. Maciste would show fear. Kheir would make sure of that.Kheir hadn’t brought out Maciste on display to the court to let him show off. The prick still thought too much of himself .. thought he was free to strut his muscle and stuff. Time for a king to cut this toppled stepbrother down to size. Gloating, from the authority of the throne, Kheir had Maciste’s ragged breeches ripped away.Again as if to spit in his enemy’s face, the prisoner did not flinch. Insolently Maciste stared back. Unfazed by public humiliation. Demonstrating he had nothing to fear here. Even stood naked before a hall-full of his enemies. Even made naked, menaced. Even like this he was more man than the rest of them together. Maciste stood looking like he couldn’t be got at.In response, his frustrated brother snarled back.“Get him hard.”Roughly soldiers shoved Maciste’s legs apart. Deftly they got thin cord tied bitingly tight around the root of his cock. In no time Maciste stood fully endowed. Throwing an enforced boner. Against his will. BUT …. Maciste looked down at himself. He smiled. This was nothing he had wished on himself. But he knew advantage when he spotted it. Watched by his enemies, insolently he stood studying his studly manhood rise to the full. Stood fearless and erect .. in its supreme virile prime. Proudly jutting out. Provocatively Maciste studied himself. Aware of what they were watching.Hard-muscled chest high and proud. The head-turning might of his cobblestone stomach highlighted by the upwards pull of his arms. His eyes inviting this court to get an eyeful of the unintimidated power at the tops of his legs.Maciste turned his defiance back on Kheir. Drawing his eye towards that jutting might. Like Maciste was poking it right in Kheir’s eye.Insolent his face sneered. Chin up he smirked over at Kheir. Not a whiff of shame for being forcibly put on display like some breeding animal. No fear. Not a sign of anger. Proud of himself like this. Defiant. Pleased to show off the man in himself. Proud his manliness stood defiant before this weak and hated enemy. Maciste snorted. Giving his upstart stepbrother his contempt. Showing there was nothing this nonentity of a stepbrother could do to him. Could Kheir match him .. the way he looked right now? Could he hell, that wimp! Kheir could do nothing to shame him. Maciste would just laugh in his face.A dangerous game .. winding Kheir up. After all, they were surrounded by his court .. watched by the sycophants. Kheir would resent getting shown up. He’d end up taking it out on Maciste.But what choice was left? This wimp was profiting from his father’s murder. He had wiped out the generals. These conquerors had Maciste’s people oppressed, subdued. Maciste was on his own.Like hell was he going down without a fight. The wimp would never take up a challenge .. never take Maciste on in a fight .. even if Maciste was weaponless .. even if he was bound. The wimp knew he’d be shown up. Even Kheir was not dumb enough for that ….Down to strength of mind, then … Guts, determination, standing up for himself. Whatever malicious tricks the wimp turned on him, Maciste was going to stand up to the prick.He’d fume. Go mad with frustration. Embarrassed before his court. Kheir would turn nasty. Get vicious. Turn to the cruellest tricks.Risky. But let the arsehole get away with thinking he was coming out on top …..? The last thing Maciste’s manly pride could allow.“Last of the line, then?”Acting the dominant king, Kheir had joined his captive at the pillar.“It all comes down to this …”The king’s hand slapped at the boner. He snorted at the jerk his sudden move had caused. The muscular body suddenly crumpling together. Kheir caught a quick flash of anger. He grinned. Glad he’d forced a reaction.A second later the insolence was back. But still Kheir was happy to have broken down that wall of smug defiance.“THIS .. “Roughly Kheir grabbed the stiff cock. Held it tight in his grip. Hot, clammy .. pulsing against his hand.Maciste jerked backwards. He looked down .. suddenly shocked. The swish of a light whip had stung at his chest. Then Kheir held it up .. for scrutiny .. his weapon of choice .. for his captive stepbrother to admire.He’d promised Maciste he’d wipe that smirk off his insolent face. An elegant, nobleman’s whip .. short-handled .. about a dozen cords of thin cord dangled down. They had raised light welts on Maciste’s chest.Kheir now stroked it lightly across the breadth of Maciste’s erect cock. The movement spoke for itself. Kheir let the cords do their own talking .. hanging limp down off the solid protruding shaft. He smiled tantalising into his stepbrother’s grim face. Smiling an unspoken threat.“THIS can no longer be allowed to do its job.”Kheir still had his older stepbrother gripped by his powerful erection. They were close .. bodies almost touching. Kheir felt the heat radiating off Maciste. Pure anger. Being handled like this. Before Kheir’s court. Raging hot. But soon to be shivering with fear. In dread for his peacock-preening manliness.“How manly little bastards has this ….” Kheir gave a goading squeeze … “ .. how many little bastard Maciste’s has this thing sired?”Kheir stroked the flails gently back over the thickness of the rampant cock. Each flail bearing its own message of dread. He sniggered.“Enough! No more … “Unseemly .. to get up this close. The king’s hands soiled by the despised stepbrother’s hard-on. But even more inappropriate to perform the act himself .. however much Kheir’s resentment was burning to do the job.But the benefits of his arse on a throne …. always someone to do the dirty work. Someone ever eager to please. Who’d do a good job .. to please a king ……Kheir’s malicious eyes hit back at Maciste’s defiant gaze. Anxious for the moment when he caught on. That sweet trembling moment when Maciste took in what Kheir’s whip had mind for him. When this overweening defiance thawed and Kheir felt the chilled ice of fear in his hand.“No more snivelling heirs to lay claim to my throne.”Kheir’s mouth lit up in a mocking smirk.The power over his stepbrother’s conceit had sent a burning rush to Kheir’s loins.“It all comes down to …”The king’s mauling grip squeezed on the captive erection again. “ … THIS.” His hand gave the stiff cock a squeeze.“This weapon needs some attention ….” His eyes lit up in triumph. Kheir didn’t take his eyes off the still insolent look of his captive. He snapped out an order. Holding out the flail. Ordering someone to take over. Do his dirty work on Maciste ….“Captain Tiradates. You arrested this traitor. You had his bare arse whipped.”Kheir tightened his grip. He returned Maciste’s insolent look. In his own loins he relished a glorious stiffening. Flushed with power over this loathed stepbrother .. this over-muscled conceited peacock. Always showing-off .. bare to the waist. The people’s hero. The soldier’s soldier.Now helpless. Trapped against this pillar. Kheir’s eyes were flushed. Not bothering to look at his officer. His malevolent look all for Maciste. Impatiently Kheir flicked the whip for his captain to take it. Get on with it. Do the dirty on Maciste. Burn off those years of resentment for his king.Imperious Kheir countered Maciste’s glare. He smirked.“Finish off the job.”And afterwards? Next day? He couldn’t wait to see Maciste suffer. Kheir believed a king should keep his promises. And Kheir meant to keep every single one. To the people .. promised a traitor’s execution. Summoned to attend .. or else incur a king’s wrath. His adoring people stood watching Maciste’s inglorious death.His promise to Maciste .. his vow .. He’d hear the overbearing preening peacock scream. He’d see Maciste tremble at Kheir’s power.Kheir’s pledge to himself. The younger stepbrother’s promise to himself. To make that damned warrior-prince take him seriously for once. For a final time. Taken in chains. Dragging heavy leg irons through the city. The streets lined with Maciste’s adoring people. Who should have been hailing their prince.Kheir was determined they’d see him broken .. their revered muscular warrior-prince. Ordered lashed and beaten at every step .. each tread of his bare bleeding feet one step closer to an agonising death. Naked .. signs of unspeakable torture visible on his flesh.Soldiers had followed him into battle. Now reluctant his people would follow him to his death. Maciste tortured on the traitor’s cross.Sharp clanking echoes of metal hammering on nails. Thick rough nails smashing up bones. Dozens of hard-hammered blows thwacked through his tortured wrists. Blunted nails struggling to penetrate the hardwood cross.Blow-after-blow. Breaking bones. Breaking his will. Breaking that conceit. Smashing up his standing as the fearless warrior-prince as he screamed. Smashing Maciste’s lie that Kheir could do nothing to hurt him.He’d scream, all right. Raised upright, naked and soiled. Shamed before his people. Fear pissing down his legs. Pain clawed out of every fibre as he hung. Talons of agony ripping through that hated muscular torso.He’d strutted. He’d rubbed his conceit into Kheir’s nose. Showing-off .. always bare to the waist. Popular. Beloved. Revered by his troops. Resented by his brother.Whose stinking arse was not on the throne, brother-dear? Kheir longed to hear Maciste scream back his response. As more evil nails smashed up his ankles and nailed a loathed stepbrother inescapably to that cross.epilogueText onlyMaciste may have been out-manoeuvred. Fallen foul of a plot to overthrow him. Putting his younger stepbrother on the throne. But Maciste understood the setup better than Kheir.“If Kheir had taken easily to cruelty once he had power .. truth was, he was a mere novice. He was being used. There was a bitch behind the throne. And Kheir was fooling himself if he thought he’d ever have any say …..”Kheir planned for Maciste the traitor’s execution. A tortured death.His mother, “the bitch who had Kheir by the gonads and was leading him by the balls” - she had other ideas. She wanted Maciste alive. She had plans on him. She had sentenced Maciste to back-breaking punishment in the mines. Kept out of harm’s way for now. A tortured life. Maciste knew who had Kheir by the “short-and-curlies” and was pulling his strings. Maciste is not destined for a slow lingering death on the cross. Kheir’s mother has her mind set on a slow lingering life. Life-long suffering. Punishing hard work. Filth. Degradation. A back-breaking future. A will-crushing destiny.But THAT is the matter for another tale …….defianceThe end but not the conclusion. There’s more to come .. later ….A question was raised as this story began. From the movies little is known about where Maciste came from.What do we know about Maciste? This righter-of-wrongs. This hero who leapt to other people’s defence. Espoused others’ causes. What made him battle on the side of justice. Against tyrants. Against rulers in sway to evil gods.Why did Maciste fight cruel rulers? Suffer to free people from tyrants? Had he suffered himself? What had shaped his destiny?Well, here’s been one theory, at least.So where exactly does this ending leave us?How do we follow in the steps of Maciste? What about all those films about the older Maciste?How does this ending tie in with what we know about the legend -- the fabled hero as shown in all those Italian movies? Now THAT would be telling. A subject for another tale. Another day.rendsz’ world is not finished with Maciste. Or even with this storyline.But one thing we do know .. Maciste will defy his stepbrother to the last.I had a dear friend .. Special Forces. A friend very special to me. From him I learned a wonderful message. The power of standing up for what you believe in. Yourself. Standing up to an enemy .. and hang the costs. His life was a hundred times more risky than mine. He risked the costs of taking that attitude .. I never had to. He risked the consequences of standing up for himself .. I never did.I worried for him .. what it meant .. if he fell into the wrong hands. But his courage ..his conviction that he couldn’t lower himself .. that his sense of himself as a man could not go that far down .. to give in ….. -his self-belief was so strong. He was no fool, he knew the costs. But he could never lower himself .. not that far. I worried. What that thinking could do to him.But what was there not to admire? In standing up for yourself? ................
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