Galley Slaves

by Mark Andrews

  All the boys’ cocks were rigid and some were actually quivering as if with desire for our absent master’s body and it was the same with us girls. No-one had yet mentioned anything about sex to us newcomers. All we knew was that it was forbidden and the rings which we wore in our genitals each night precluded any hanky-panky, even including masturbation. Not that either of us had really wanted it to this time, for our bodies were just too tired from the exhausting exercise regime Zanda had put us through to even think about it, but now that we were so much fitter and could more easily cope with his programme, the natural inclination to think of sex had reared its head.

  The rings still prevented it, however, and our positions in the stall, so near and yet so far, prevented us even touching one another with a toe or fingertip. Our love was therefore reduced to one that could feed only on conversation and sight. Not enough, for we both loved each physically as well as mentally and we so desperately wanted to touch and feel and to consummate our love in the ultimate manner.

  It was potent weapon they used against us though. Zanda told us that if we were really good, we might - just might, be permitted a night of real love. But we would need to prove ourselves by obedience, zeal, performance and demeanour before he would even consider recommending it to our master. In the meantime, behave and work - and perhaps ...

  It was now time for us to take the galley offshore for our first practice run.

  It was moored off the pier by rods that kept it at an oar’s length away and ropes that tied it to the pier itself and had a very long gangplank connecting it to the wharf. That was first retracted by servants on the pier who then released the ropes and the rods.

  At Zanda’s signal, we, the inshore rowers had to stroke, while the others had to hold water. This involved dipping the blades into the sea and holding them stationary while we dipped ours and pulled back on them, thus thrusting the port side forward and turning the bow of the ship out to sea.

  Zanda took the helm and then came the order, “Give way together”. To the beat of the two electronic drums, one for the starboard rowers and one for us, each with a different sound recognisable by its rowers, we began the measured stroke that comprised each sequence of actions in moving the oars. Their movements were regulated by the mechanism that controlled how far and fast they could move, and these mechanisms were in turn controlled by the levers either side of the steering console where Zanda now stood, one for the port bank of oars, the other for the starboard.

  First there was the stroke, of course.

  This began with us leaning right forward, doubled over our thighs and legs and now I understood the reasons for the belly machine back in the gym in the house. Then, at the beat, we dipped the blades into the sea and began the long pull that dragged the oar backward through the water and thus propelled the galley forward. We had to continue this action until we were lying flat, right back, the handle of the oar right over our faces at which point the mechanism released the loom of the oar so it could be lifted out of the water and we could reverse the action.

  At this point, another beat signalled for us to jerk the blade up out of the water by pulling down hard on the loom and then push it back towards the stern of the vessel until we were again doubled over our knees and ready for the next beat.

  The mechanism actually worked as a timer and the levers on Zanda’s console acted like the engine room telegraphs on older ships but the drum was necessary to tell us the speed we were supposed to pull at and when we had reached the end of each stroke. The sound of the drum on each side told us the pace required of each set of rowers. It was all very high tech stuff and I wondered at the combination of ancient galley slaves providing the muscle power while such an electronic and hydraulic marvel controlled our actions so well.

  It was hard work but Zanda’s incredible training regime had prepared us very well for the effort - or so I thought. Exercise was one thing, but pulling on those oar blades for hour after hour and at a succession of different rates was quite another. He worked us to the bone - almost literally.

  Hour after hour we pulled back hard until our bodies were flat, then heaved the blade out of the water, pushed it forward, dipped it again and pulled back hard once more. Zanda used the oars to help steer the vessel, changing the pace from one side to the other to alter course and sometimes, when he wanted a hard turn around a buoy, actually reversing the thrust on one side so the ship almost turned on its nose, then the order to give way together was shouted out and the rowers who had been back-watering had to reverse the action so they were pulling with the other side once more.

  It was all very complicated for us newcomers, which of course, was why we were being trained in the various movements as well as the actual effort of pulling the oars.

  I did have time though to glance at Andy’s beautiful body beside me, marvelling at how magnificent he looked, especially as he was nearly at the end of a stroke and his belly muscles stood up in sharp lumps from right under his broad chest, down nearly to his groin; his powerful thigh muscles stood out in great cords and his arms and shoulders quivered with the strain of pulling hard on the oar handle.

  And likewise, I looked (surreptitiously, for we were supposed to look ahead at the head of the girl in front of us) at other slaves around me, all of whom, whether male or female, were possessed of bodies an ancient god would have been proud of. Of course this was part of our owners’ pleasure in possessing us.

  Not only were we being trained to row their beautiful galleys in very real races on the outcome of which hundreds thousands of dollars in wagers rested, we were also living things of beauty to be admired, used and abused for their pleasure. It was diabolical but it was real.

  We had been kidnapped by the wiles of Kerry Harker (whom we both now hated with a venom you wouldn’t believe) and enslaved to be trained and to toil as galley slaves on this admittedly beautiful island. We had no idea of our medium or long term future; only that right here and right now we were slaves who, if we didn’t perform to the very best of our abilities, would be whipped or caned or suffer a series of those terrible shocks from the implants to our internal genital organs - something to be avoided at any cost.

  All afternoon we trained and nothing, not even the most luxurious bed in the world could have pleased me more than my own little pile of straw when I finally reached it that night.

  I hardly even bid Andy good night after we had been bathed and fed and he was just as exhausted. But through that exhaustion there was a strange exhilaration. I also felt weirdly very satisfied with my performance on the oars and, get this, was actually looking forward to the next session on the oars.

  It came soon enough. Not the next day. Zanda really was a master at physical development and conditioning and he carefully rotated our exercise so that every muscle got the work it needed. How he kept each of our physiques in his head I don’t know but he did, varying each of our exercise regimes subtly to enhance a muscle there, define another one a little better here, and so on. As a result, we all boasted superbly athletic physiques and after seeing other teams either on the track or prancing down to the wharf, I think we might have been the best.

  It’s odd but I (and Andy too) became fiercely competitive when it came to our team. I really wanted us to win! Not for our master, whom I hadn’t yet even seen; not for Zanda whom I ought to have hated for his rigid treatment of us slaves (but didn’t for some inexplicable reason), but for myself and for my fellow slaves.

  I suppose there is the competitor in us all and remember Andy and I were up and coming and very keen IronWoman and Man competitors. Competition was ingrained in us. Perhaps Zanda was also a master of psychology and had somehow hit on just the right balance to create this fierce loyalty to each other in our own psyches ... I don’t know. All I can report is that both Andy and I put everything we had, physically and mentally into our training - all aspects of it.

 
I know I should have felt terrible at our slavery. At the kidnapping, the nudity, the modifications to my body and the forced training, not to mention the possibility that I would at some indeterminate time, be used as a breeding sow - but I wasn’t. I don’t think I was (or am) a latent masochist but perhaps there is an element of that in it - how else would a keen sportsman or woman so punish his or her body to achieve results - it can’t just be a sense of competition, can it?

  Whatever it was, the next time we were scheduled to prance down to that galley in that rigid and so impressive gait, each in perfect step with his or her body displayed so magnificently - and apparently all as proud of themselves as I now knew myself to be, I did so with a weird joy that I was again going to ply that oar and exhaust my body alongside my handsome and just as naked husband.

  We both willingly offered our necks for the collars and the bars that connected them together and at the signal, thrust our loins up in the royal salute to our absent master and then, after warping the ship off the wharf with the reverse oar movement, began to row in earnest, putting everything I had into the work and glorying in my sweating flesh, my quivering muscles - and my husband there beside me, applying himself just as hard.

  We looked at one another (again, surreptitiously) and grinned at our apparent knuckling down to this life but we had to admit it. We had! We really had and were now enjoying it as much as we had delighted in punishing our bodies at the swim, cycle and run of the triathlon for our bodies were already so much improved we both knew that if, somehow, we did get back to Australia and took up the sport again, we would leap right to the top instantly.

  Oddly, we had no real wish to do that. Not even with the possibility of my being mated with another man, of a different race to my own, forced to carry his ‘sucker’ and then lose it to be reared elsewhere, did I really want to escape. It’s weird as I write it down now, but it’s what we both felt.

  We were allowed to talk at night, as long as we kept it quiet and didn’t raise such subjects as escape or the like and we tried to delve deep into the whys and wherefores of our strange new attitude - but to no avail. None of it made sense so we just accepted it.

  Once more I put my back into that rowing and despite the tiredness, the sweat and the lecherous looks of the guards who prowled up and down the central raised passageway between the two sets of rowers, I realised I was actually delighting in my new role. I thrust out my naked breasts proudly as I pulled back on that oar handle and as I glanced at the splendid muscles of my husband beside me, I felt my juices moving. I was on a sexual high, partly from the effort I was expending but also from watching Andy’s beautiful muscles bunching and cording. (It is said hard exercise releases a drug that allows us to work even harder - well I think it also makes us more libidinous; it certainly does me).

  I’m not sure about the other slaves. Certainly, many of them were in the same boat as Andy and me - yes, he felt the same way, he said - for I could see it in their eyes. As for the others, well if they were hiding a desire to escape, they were certainly doing it very well. I know humans can be conditioned to do just about anything but in my own case I can’t believe my willingness, no my actual joy at my new position, could be just Zanda’s mental conditioning or physical abuse.

  As the weeks passed, Andy and I earned less and less of this and in time, after we had learned how to control our sexual responses, they didn’t even use the implant to create the sexual responses required of us. Less and less they whipped or caned us, too. Zanda was a fair, if utterly ruthless taskmaster. He whipped and otherwise goaded us to better effort and skill but once we gave him what he wanted, it was relaxed and in time, in Andy’s and my case, ceased altogether. We had become perfect galley slaves ...

  Chapter 4

  The days went on in this vein, all much the same but interesting enough for us since we loved working our bodies so much. Callisthenics followed by heavier gym work in the mornings and track work or rowing practice in the afternoons. It was hard work and we were slaves whose every minute was regulated by others but since we had put that out of our minds and concentrated only on the exercise and how strong it was making us, not to mention our much increased stamina, we made the best of our lives, forgetting our past as much as we could - and what might have been if that slime-bag Kerry Harker hadn’t arranged our kidnapping.

  Alone of all those who had taken part in it, we nursed a continuing hatred for that slimy, ever-smiling scumbag who had brought us to this end. It is perhaps strange, but we didn’t resent Zanda, Dr Musad or any of the guards who worked us so hard and at this point we hadn’t even met our ‘owner’, Sheikh Ali bin Mustapha. That omission was to be rectified very soon for the next racing season was now drawing near and in a few days the owners of the big estates on the island would be arriving.

  I don’t know what Andy had expected from our sheikh since we hadn’t really discussed him in physical terms but my own picture was of a fat, probably middle-aged to old man in flowing Arab garments complete with head-dress. The reality was quite a shock.

  Just as the Aga Khan only wore traditional dress when performing his ceremonial functions, so did our sheikh, when not at home, wear dress appropriate to the climate and in the South Seas, that meant an open necked shirt and light trousers. He wasn’t old, either.

  I would guess he was in his mid-thirties and was tall and lean and handsome, if somewhat cruel-looking. But he was certainly a real sportsman. Apart from this craze for racing human-powered slave galleys, he played polo, squash, was a really good tennis player and something of a gymnastic star as well. This latter I discovered when we came upon him working out in the gym one day and as we stood there, waiting for him to finish, I instantly knew he was near, if not at, Olympic standard.

  But I jump ahead. Upon his arrival, the first thing he wanted to do was to look us over and we had to line up, in pairs, for his inspection. This was both thorough and intrusive. Like all of the owners of the big houses on that island, he delighted in the ‘owning’ of us slaves.

  I suppose every human being, at some stage, imagines owning others. I certainly have fantasised about it from time to time but my fantasies never included being owned. As I’ve already said, I don’t think I am masochistic and I think you would need to be to enjoy being a slave. I didn’t enjoy it. I put up with it since there was nothing I could do about it, but I didn’t enjoy having my every action dictated for me, even to such personal functions as urinating and defecating.

  But Ali and his companion owners certainly did delight in owning us slaves and they had the means to indulge the fantasy. Now, as we stood there in a rigid line, hands properly clasped up behind our heads, legs exactly two feet apart, every muscle in perfect tension, he strolled down the line, accompanied by Zanda and took in each of us for a few seconds then went round the back, doing the same behind us.

  Then it was the more personal, individual inspection of each one of us and now his lean brown hands went over our flesh in fine detail, examining almost every muscle while his eyes stared into our faces, daring us to glance at him. We didn’t because if we had removed them, even for one second from the far wall and dared to actually look at him, we would have been taken out, there and then, strung up by our ankles (spread wide apart) and then paddled with the leather paddle until our backsides were a puffy, very bruised mass of bleeding flesh.

  This wasn’t cruelty. Not in their eyes. It was discipline. And much as the Royal Marines and the Royal Navy in times past used rigid discipline to build the best fighting forces in the world, so did Zanda and his men now.

  When he came to me, I tensed every muscle just that little bit more and concentrated my eyes on a tiny black spot on the wall directly in front of them. It was hard for I desperately wanted to look at this man who owned me; to size him up, seek out a weakness, find a chink in the solid steel discipline enforced there. But I didn’t want to be the first to be strung up and f
logged either and so I stood there, in the so revealing pose, every muscle in full tension while his hands began to explore my naked body.

  He took his time and I think he was a real expert, his comments to Zanda indicated as much. By now, from listening to Zanda talk to the guards, both Andy and I had a fair smattering of Arabic and although they used English when talking directly to non-Arabic speaking slaves, I worked hard to learn their own language without letting on that I could actually now understand them.

  Translated, what he said to Zanda included such things as: “fine skin, well-toned muscles, good self-discipline, fine hair and a slave of fine beauty ...”

  Zanda, also speaking in Arabic, commented that I was a hard worker and good rower as well. I didn’t for one second let on that I understood these remarks but I thrilled inside. Strange, isn’t it, that although I was a slave, naked, depilated, my sex lips modified to suit their tastes, trained in perhaps the hardest regime in the world - yet I could feel pleasure at the praise these two men heaped on me. Perhaps it was the training and conditioning of our minds to knuckle under. I don’t know; but I am reporting as faithfully as I can what I really felt during that time as a slavegirl to Ali bin Mustapha.

  Of course I felt the old shame and humiliation as his fine hands roved over my flesh, feeling my firm breasts, belly, thighs and rear but it was worse when he ordered me to open my mouth so he could check my teeth (or so he said - actually I think it was just to shame us more), worse still when he delved into my anus and felt around up there - and worst of all when he returned to my front and poked a finger, then two into my frontal orifice and began to tease my clit until I was shaking in the throes of a powerful climax while he grinned maliciously and commented to Zanda that I was a lustful slut, wiped his fingers on my belly and moved to Andy.

  I relaxed (just a mite) and then he began on my husband’s body, making similar, if not the same comments about his muscles and skin and his handsome good looks and curly brown hair and he seemed to spend just as much time admiring his (and the other males there) body as he did with us girls. He actually masturbated Andy to ejaculation and out of the corner of my eye I was glad to see his cock spurt a huge load up and over the floor to land a good six feet away. Not surprising I suppose if you consider we had both been kept celibate for all the weeks we had been kept there. But he commented favourably on it and said he was going to be a perfect stud stallion to one of the Asian or black girls ...