He did not expect it to feel so large in his mouth. When he first opened his mouth, Dirar suddenly grabbed him by the jaw. Dirar tsked, like he would a naughty child and told him he needed to open his mouth wider.
"I will teach you," Dirar had promised. His eyes shone like dark stones slick with blood. "You will do fine but you need to open wider or it will not fit."
The merchant made it sound simple, a passing fleeting thing for a few coins, something benign that would fill his and Yusuf's stomachs. He did not enjoy starvation as a child. He would not wish this on Yusuf.
"Deep breath in, relax your sweet mouth..."
But Dirar did not say how large it would feel.
The object bumped against his teeth. He started and the object slipped out to slap him on his lower lip.
Dirar huffed. Without warning, he slammed a fist to the side of his throat. He gasped which was exactly what Dirar wanted. The object darted back in with all the surety of a striking dagger.
"Do not do that again," Dirar snarled.
It tasted...not what he expected. Salty? It smelled of sweat. Yusuf smelled of sweat after they sword fight because decades shackled with him threatened to dull their blades. Yusuf always laughed, exhausted but exhilarated after yet another stalemate. He smelled of sweat and musk, tinged with something he could not find anywhere else.
This did not smell like Yusuf.
"...good...good," Dirar cooed. His hand tightened on his chin, forcing him to gape wider even though the object crawling into his mouth pushed his mouth to open more, his tongue trembling as the object crushed it to his bottom teeth.
"You will be rewarded well for letting me be your first..."
He tried to swallow the spit gathering. He could not. He began to drool out of the corner of his mouth and it dribbled into his beard.
His knees ached where he kneel in Dirar's ship. It smelled like citrus and dates and spice everywhere. Dirar's hands smelled the same. He wondered if the scents will soak into his clothes. Will Yusuf smell what he has done, cowered between a man's legs, mouth yawning and drooling as something moved deeper and deeper into his throat?
"Look at me..."
He did not want to.
The hand jerked his chin up. He convulsed as the object sank deeper as if it was trying to hammer him into the floor, a crucifixion through his tongue and bowels rather than his hands and feet.
"Your eyes..." Dirar sighed. The object moved faster, lighting fire within his throat, igniting tears to collect at the corners of his eyes, reaching for his empty lungs.
"Were these the eyes my people saw in Aleppo?" Dirar said, his voice soft and deadly. "Were your eyes the last thing my wife and children saw as they burned in your invasions?"
He could not speak, choking, wheezing as the object rammed faster into his throat, stealing what little air he tried to store in his lungs. Drool continued to run down his beard, pooling into the hollows of his throat. He thought his spit smelled foul, mingled with whatever was leaking from the object's tip.
"Yes, let me in. I demand entrance," Dirar breathed.
Dirar's stool squeaked as his hips snapped forward. His other hand clawed the back of his head, fingers pulling his hair free out of the leather tie. His hands scrabbled, clutching Dirar's knees to find purchase. Dirar hissed, knocking his knee into him, stomping down on both his hands to pin them to the floor.
"Let my eyes be all you see," Dirar seethed. Dirar's large hand pushed his head forward, his other hand clutching his chin like a pot handle. Dirar guided his head like a mace swinging into his own body, forcing his locked jaw to meet each parry the object thrust towards him.
The ship rocked under his knees, churning and blurring like the ship that took him to Antioch which led him to Jerusalem and to rivers of blood.
"Let me all in," Dirar spat out. The ship pitched and swayed violently under his knees. A snap and jolt ran up the floor and clawed at the pit of his belly.
"Earn your coin!" Dirar ordered. "Open wider. Wider!"
The room spun in strange colors and then no color at all. His jaw ached. His throat burned. His broken fingers ground unnaturally trapped under Dirar's boots. But nothing compared to the agony in his heart as Dirar screamed at him in Arabic, too fast to translate, too true to deny.
"Let me give you the first taste of what you deserve," Dirar shrieked as he yanked him up by the chin, almost off his knees and the object plowed into his mouth once more before it shook inside the clutch of his spasming throat. He tasted blood from his cut tongue, his vomit that has no where to go and a flood of bitter, bitter--
Nicolo dropped to his knees and vomited.
He was outside of the market. The sounds of people and their lives untainted by invasion rose high behind his bowed back. He did not realize his feet carried him so far and so quickly.
Was Yusuf still with Dirar? Dirar was the only name in Nicolo's grasp. The others...he gave them petty names because he would not see them again. And most, he did not. What they pay him for was only worthy of being done in the dark. After, many slithered away, happy to be forgotten despite their emptied purses.
But Dirar, Nicolo remembered how the merchant offered withered fruit at a discount, the prices cheaper and cheaper until there was no coin to spend at all.
He saw it in Dirar's evaluating eyes. There was something else Nicolo could barter. But when he asked to speak with Nicolo in private one day, Nicolo refused. He even pressed his dagger to Dirar's throat, unsure why Dirar only laughed.
Dirar kept asking as the docks inexplicably offered less and less work. Until finally, when Nicolo realized their bins were bare and Yusuf's smiles were starting to hollow like his cheeks, Nicolo sought Dinar.
Dinar did not ask again and after he taught Nicolo what to do, he paid Nicolo, minus a fee and penalty for the vomit on his floor.
Work at the docks was plentiful again, but where Dirar became silent, others began asking.
First, it was for a bit of coin for meat. Then for when the docks were empty of ships due to a storm. Then for the paper. Then for a blanket because the roof would not stay whole. After...
He could not remember what each time was for anymore.
Nicolo pressed a fist to his cramping stomach. He was too spent to shuffle away from the blood splattered sick on the weeds.
Oh. Blood. That was new as well.
He could still feel Dirar's thumb scratching his lower lip to demand entry. He could remember the smell of cardamom embedded under Dirar's nails, the plush fruit dripping and slick, so close to feeling like something else, Dirar's thumb pressing down his lip, open, open, and it slipped in tasting wrong, but he needed to swallow, gulp it down oily and slippery...
Nicolo's chin knocked into his knees as he hunched lower and gagged. Nothing would come out, but his mouth tasted like something did.
Sweat beaded on the back of his neck, reminding Nicolo why he had tied his hair back before. He remembered how warm Yusuf's hand felt as it palmed the ends of his hair and joked how better humored Nicolo looked now. Yusuf did not touch him. Not quite. But he longed to feel the heat brushing against his nape again.
Nicolo was about to wipe the sweat off his brow with the back of his hand when he discovered his hand was wet. Staring at his fingers, Nicolo was confused why his fingers were tipped in ebony ink--Oh no...
A strangled sound escaped Nicolo's throat when he looked down and found the vial of ink was dribbling down his trouser and trailed back into the market. He jerked up the tin container and found a tiny pin hole at the bottom. It had bled precious ink from the market. And he ran, fled like a coward, sloshing and spilling more ink without noticing.
Breathing harshly, unwilling to release whatever sound that shook at the base of his throat, Nicolo wrapped the bottom with a strap of leather he hastily cut off the top of his left boot.
The vial stopped bleeding ink, but the damage was done. Almost half was gone.
"Fool," Nicolo murmured. "You should not have run." His head hung low.
"Nicolo?" A hand slipped around his arm, possessive and demanding.
No, Nicolo thought, his throat working. Not now. Not when it was still day. He was too tired, he was too brittle, no, he'll bargain for whoever it is to meet later. Much later, but not too late because he needs to buy more ink...
"Nicolo," a voice insisted. The hand shook Nicolo and it rattled his pleas out.
"Not now," Nicolo whispered. "Please have pit--not now. I will meet you--"
"Not now? Nicolo, what are you talking about?"
Yusuf came into view, his warm eyes bright with worry. He stood close to Nicolo, his hand curled around his wrist. He stood close enough to smell like Yusuf. No one else ever did.
"Nicolo," Yusuf said sharper. He looked afraid. Were they discovered? What was wrong?
"You were gone when I turned around. Are you ill again? Was the vomit by my feet yours? There is blood in it."
...Oh.
"I..." Nicolo began, but could not finish. His mind went blank, a peace he has not know in a while and forgot what he should say. All he could think of was...
"Not now."
"Eh?" Yusuf gripped both his shoulders now. He did not shake Nicolo, for which he was grateful. He feared what other stupid thing he would blurt out. He just, he wished...
"Not now," Nicolo could not stop from whimpering. His breath hitched and he felt like he was choking but he did not understand how that was possible. He was not on his knees and he smelled like Yusuf and no, no, the ink, he needed to find another, the docks, there were always sly eyes watching, but his skin itched at the thought, but the ink, how foolish he was to...
"All right," Yusuf said suddenly. Very carefully, he pulled Nicolo to his shoulder and for a brief moment, all that existed in Nicolo's mind was the melody of Yusuf's breathing by his ear and the rise and fall of Yusuf's chest against his.
Nicolo closed his eyes. He tensed because he can not collapse against Yusuf and weep. He has not weep since a faceless woman left him in the monastery. She said she did not want such as stupid child. And weeping made noise the monastery did not like. If he weeps, he starves. No, he will not weep. He needed to go, he needed to earn his coin, earn his place by his side, get the ink--
Yusuf cupped the back of Nicolo's head. Fingers pressed gentle circles on his scalp.
Nicolo's thoughts dried up to nothingness.
"Ah, Nicolo," Yusuf said softly, profoundly sad for some reason. "Whatever it is, not now. Yea? Sh, not now."
Nicolo dropped his head to Yusuf's shoulder. It felt sturdy and under his feet, the ground no longer swayed like the ships and of bodies lurching forward to spear his mouth.
Nicolo, not trusting his voice, simply nodded.
Yes. Please. Not now.
Yusuf continued to draw symbols into Nicolo's scalp.
"All right," Yusuf breathed out unsteadily, "Good. Let's go home."
Nicolo could only nod again and hobbled towards the path, Yusuf's arm around his middle to guide him the way.
Yusuf/Nicolo Forced Prostitution Fill : Needs of the Other 4/12
Part 4
———————————————-
(Nicolo)
Cairo, 12th century
"...breathe through your nose..."
He did not expect it to feel so large in his mouth. When he first opened his mouth, Dirar suddenly grabbed him by the jaw. Dirar tsked, like he would a naughty child and told him he needed to open his mouth wider.
"I will teach you," Dirar had promised. His eyes shone like dark stones slick with blood. "You will do fine but you need to open wider or it will not fit."
The merchant made it sound simple, a passing fleeting thing for a few coins, something benign that would fill his and Yusuf's stomachs. He did not enjoy starvation as a child. He would not wish this on Yusuf.
"Deep breath in, relax your sweet mouth..."
But Dirar did not say how large it would feel.
The object bumped against his teeth. He started and the object slipped out to slap him on his lower lip.
Dirar huffed. Without warning, he slammed a fist to the side of his throat. He gasped which was exactly what Dirar wanted. The object darted back in with all the surety of a striking dagger.
"Do not do that again," Dirar snarled.
It tasted...not what he expected. Salty? It smelled of sweat. Yusuf smelled of sweat after they sword fight because decades shackled with him threatened to dull their blades. Yusuf always laughed, exhausted but exhilarated after yet another stalemate. He smelled of sweat and musk, tinged with something he could not find anywhere else.
This did not smell like Yusuf.
"...good...good," Dirar cooed. His hand tightened on his chin, forcing him to gape wider even though the object crawling into his mouth pushed his mouth to open more, his tongue trembling as the object crushed it to his bottom teeth.
"You will be rewarded well for letting me be your first..."
He tried to swallow the spit gathering. He could not. He began to drool out of the corner of his mouth and it dribbled into his beard.
His knees ached where he kneel in Dirar's ship. It smelled like citrus and dates and spice everywhere. Dirar's hands smelled the same. He wondered if the scents will soak into his clothes. Will Yusuf smell what he has done, cowered between a man's legs, mouth yawning and drooling as something moved deeper and deeper into his throat?
"Look at me..."
He did not want to.
The hand jerked his chin up. He convulsed as the object sank deeper as if it was trying to hammer him into the floor, a crucifixion through his tongue and bowels rather than his hands and feet.
"Your eyes..." Dirar sighed. The object moved faster, lighting fire within his throat, igniting tears to collect at the corners of his eyes, reaching for his empty lungs.
"Were these the eyes my people saw in Aleppo?" Dirar said, his voice soft and deadly. "Were your eyes the last thing my wife and children saw as they burned in your invasions?"
He could not speak, choking, wheezing as the object rammed faster into his throat, stealing what little air he tried to store in his lungs. Drool continued to run down his beard, pooling into the hollows of his throat. He thought his spit smelled foul, mingled with whatever was leaking from the object's tip.
"Yes, let me in. I demand entrance," Dirar breathed.
Dirar's stool squeaked as his hips snapped forward. His other hand clawed the back of his head, fingers pulling his hair free out of the leather tie. His hands scrabbled, clutching Dirar's knees to find purchase. Dirar hissed, knocking his knee into him, stomping down on both his hands to pin them to the floor.
"Let my eyes be all you see," Dirar seethed. Dirar's large hand pushed his head forward, his other hand clutching his chin like a pot handle. Dirar guided his head like a mace swinging into his own body, forcing his locked jaw to meet each parry the object thrust towards him.
The ship rocked under his knees, churning and blurring like the ship that took him to Antioch which led him to Jerusalem and to rivers of blood.
"Let me all in," Dirar spat out. The ship pitched and swayed violently under his knees. A snap and jolt ran up the floor and clawed at the pit of his belly.
"Earn your coin!" Dirar ordered. "Open wider. Wider!"
The room spun in strange colors and then no color at all. His jaw ached. His throat burned. His broken fingers ground unnaturally trapped under Dirar's boots. But nothing compared to the agony in his heart as Dirar screamed at him in Arabic, too fast to translate, too true to deny.
"Let me give you the first taste of what you deserve," Dirar shrieked as he yanked him up by the chin, almost off his knees and the object plowed into his mouth once more before it shook inside the clutch of his spasming throat. He tasted blood from his cut tongue, his vomit that has no where to go and a flood of bitter, bitter--
Nicolo dropped to his knees and vomited.
He was outside of the market. The sounds of people and their lives untainted by invasion rose high behind his bowed back. He did not realize his feet carried him so far and so quickly.
Was Yusuf still with Dirar? Dirar was the only name in Nicolo's grasp. The others...he gave them petty names because he would not see them again. And most, he did not. What they pay him for was only worthy of being done in the dark. After, many slithered away, happy to be forgotten despite their emptied purses.
But Dirar, Nicolo remembered how the merchant offered withered fruit at a discount, the prices cheaper and cheaper until there was no coin to spend at all.
He saw it in Dirar's evaluating eyes. There was something else Nicolo could barter. But when he asked to speak with Nicolo in private one day, Nicolo refused. He even pressed his dagger to Dirar's throat, unsure why Dirar only laughed.
Dirar kept asking as the docks inexplicably offered less and less work. Until finally, when Nicolo realized their bins were bare and Yusuf's smiles were starting to hollow like his cheeks, Nicolo sought Dinar.
Dinar did not ask again and after he taught Nicolo what to do, he paid Nicolo, minus a fee and penalty for the vomit on his floor.
Work at the docks was plentiful again, but where Dirar became silent, others began asking.
First, it was for a bit of coin for meat. Then for when the docks were empty of ships due to a storm. Then for the paper. Then for a blanket because the roof would not stay whole. After...
He could not remember what each time was for anymore.
Nicolo pressed a fist to his cramping stomach. He was too spent to shuffle away from the blood splattered sick on the weeds.
Oh. Blood. That was new as well.
He could still feel Dirar's thumb scratching his lower lip to demand entry. He could remember the smell of cardamom embedded under Dirar's nails, the plush fruit dripping and slick, so close to feeling like something else, Dirar's thumb pressing down his lip, open, open, and it slipped in tasting wrong, but he needed to swallow, gulp it down oily and slippery...
Nicolo's chin knocked into his knees as he hunched lower and gagged. Nothing would come out, but his mouth tasted like something did.
Sweat beaded on the back of his neck, reminding Nicolo why he had tied his hair back before. He remembered how warm Yusuf's hand felt as it palmed the ends of his hair and joked how better humored Nicolo looked now. Yusuf did not touch him. Not quite. But he longed to feel the heat brushing against his nape again.
Nicolo was about to wipe the sweat off his brow with the back of his hand when he discovered his hand was wet. Staring at his fingers, Nicolo was confused why his fingers were tipped in ebony ink--Oh no...
A strangled sound escaped Nicolo's throat when he looked down and found the vial of ink was dribbling down his trouser and trailed back into the market. He jerked up the tin container and found a tiny pin hole at the bottom. It had bled precious ink from the market. And he ran, fled like a coward, sloshing and spilling more ink without noticing.
Breathing harshly, unwilling to release whatever sound that shook at the base of his throat, Nicolo wrapped the bottom with a strap of leather he hastily cut off the top of his left boot.
The vial stopped bleeding ink, but the damage was done. Almost half was gone.
"Fool," Nicolo murmured. "You should not have run." His head hung low.
"Nicolo?" A hand slipped around his arm, possessive and demanding.
No, Nicolo thought, his throat working. Not now. Not when it was still day. He was too tired, he was too brittle, no, he'll bargain for whoever it is to meet later. Much later, but not too late because he needs to buy more ink...
"Nicolo," a voice insisted. The hand shook Nicolo and it rattled his pleas out.
"Not now," Nicolo whispered. "Please have pit--not now. I will meet you--"
"Not now? Nicolo, what are you talking about?"
Yusuf came into view, his warm eyes bright with worry. He stood close to Nicolo, his hand curled around his wrist. He stood close enough to smell like Yusuf. No one else ever did.
"Nicolo," Yusuf said sharper. He looked afraid. Were they discovered? What was wrong?
"You were gone when I turned around. Are you ill again? Was the vomit by my feet yours? There is blood in it."
...Oh.
"I..." Nicolo began, but could not finish. His mind went blank, a peace he has not know in a while and forgot what he should say. All he could think of was...
"Not now."
"Eh?" Yusuf gripped both his shoulders now. He did not shake Nicolo, for which he was grateful. He feared what other stupid thing he would blurt out. He just, he wished...
"Not now," Nicolo could not stop from whimpering. His breath hitched and he felt like he was choking but he did not understand how that was possible. He was not on his knees and he smelled like Yusuf and no, no, the ink, he needed to find another, the docks, there were always sly eyes watching, but his skin itched at the thought, but the ink, how foolish he was to...
"All right," Yusuf said suddenly. Very carefully, he pulled Nicolo to his shoulder and for a brief moment, all that existed in Nicolo's mind was the melody of Yusuf's breathing by his ear and the rise and fall of Yusuf's chest against his.
Nicolo closed his eyes. He tensed because he can not collapse against Yusuf and weep. He has not weep since a faceless woman left him in the monastery. She said she did not want such as stupid child. And weeping made noise the monastery did not like. If he weeps, he starves. No, he will not weep. He needed to go, he needed to earn his coin, earn his place by his side, get the ink--
Yusuf cupped the back of Nicolo's head. Fingers pressed gentle circles on his scalp.
Nicolo's thoughts dried up to nothingness.
"Ah, Nicolo," Yusuf said softly, profoundly sad for some reason. "Whatever it is, not now. Yea? Sh, not now."
Nicolo dropped his head to Yusuf's shoulder. It felt sturdy and under his feet, the ground no longer swayed like the ships and of bodies lurching forward to spear his mouth.
Nicolo, not trusting his voice, simply nodded.
Yes. Please. Not now.
Yusuf continued to draw symbols into Nicolo's scalp.
"All right," Yusuf breathed out unsteadily, "Good. Let's go home."
Nicolo could only nod again and hobbled towards the path, Yusuf's arm around his middle to guide him the way.