Title: Gladiatrix Ch 2
Archive: Just ask
Author: Fox - madfoxzz
Disclaimer: I don't own them, I just like to fiddle with them. I don't claim to speak through any official channels for either show, or the production company, and there is no profit being made.
Pairing: Lucretia/Gaia/OFC Dana
Fandom: Spartacus – Blood and Sand/ Gods of the Arena
Rating: MA - NC-17 this chapter mostly violence
Spoilers: None
A/N: Heads up, this fic is in the true spirit of the show, it is crass, blunt and a little rough.
A/N2: AU Where physically strong beautiful women appear on film too.
What's with the OFC's? It's fun to have a character that can present the other characters from a third person POV. What's with all the strong butchy women OFCs in my fics? I write them because no one else does.
Two days later, Dana was taken to the training ground with the male 'recruits'. She had been left in the darkness of her cell while the Romans decided her fate. The sun stung as it hit her eyes, but she raised them anyway, shielding them with her arm. It was a clear morning with a cloudless sky. She and her peers were each handed a wooden shield and sword. The shield's diameter was much larger than she would have chosen on her own, but she hefted it willingly, knowing it might be her only hope to get to the arena and an honorable death.
As they were being paired off she stepped back, attempting to avoid Adad, the man who thanks to her, may never have fruit born from his loins again. This movement failed as it drew Doctore's attention and appeared to him as a fear of the fight.
Doctore pointed and shouted, "Dana, Adad."
Cringing inside but refusing to show it, she moved to the line to face the man. He had a broad grin on his face and he licked his lips. He was out for revenge, and she knew this would be no simple training day. There were many less painful ways to die than by a wooden sword and she hoped to find one of those. She looked around and up. There stood Domina, watching from on high and somewhat…distracting. Dana frowned and looked back to her opponent. The cliff was on her right, only one other pair between her and oblivion.
As they waited for the word to begin, she looked back up at the balcony. Another woman had appeared next to Domina and caressed the taller woman's arm, her laughter trickled down to the sand and caressed Dana's ears. The touch between them was more intimate than Dana would expect from a simple friend, but Dana had no time to wonder further as Adad charged her with a yell before the starting signal.
Reacting automatically she felt herself stepping to the side, parrying the blow and tripping him, only to run into the man on her left who grabbed her from behind and held on. Her attention and concern had been on the cliff, she had stupidly forgotten to check who was on her left side. It was Adad's friend holding her, the other man she had bloodied in the slave cage. She let her shield and sword fall, then dropped to her knees pulling the bigger man off his feet and over her head. He landed in Adad's path giving her a split second to think.
Dana picked up her shield and ducked behind it, bracing it against her thigh as she seized the wooden hilt of the only weapon available to her. The impact against the shield rocked her back and she caught the movement of feet sliding around it to her right out of the corner of her eye. She knew it would take her too long to swing the heavy weapon, so she raised her elbow and struck the nearest foot with the pommel and jumped backward, rolling away from the shield. She stopped on her knees and was able to look up in time to see Adad barreling toward her at a full charge, with the blunt point of his weapon aimed at her chest. She lunged forward under his attack and again using the pommel, slammed the wood deep into a quad muscle. His knee clipped her face as his leg gave out and he sprawled in the dust.
Dana sucked blood from her lip during as she got back on her feet. She knew by now that no one was going to intervene. Those who were not outright hostile to her presence were merely curious as to whether she could survive. No help would be coming, not even to simply maintain discipline. Taking in her position and still limited options she glanced again at the cliff.
She waited until both of her adversaries were standing and advancing again. Then feigning an expression of fear she dropped the sword, turned and ran away. She charged through the men standing and watching, weaving this way and that like a frightened rabbit. Circling back around, kicking up dust in her wake, she skidded to a halt in front of one chaser, faked left then ran right getting around him but barely she realized, as she felt her arm being raked by his fingernails.
A some of the others tried to stop her and trip her, but she was too agile. One trip succeeded but she simply rolled back to her feet and kept running. Finally, having drawn all of their focus on her and the chase, she made for the cliff full out. Closing on the edge she estimated the distance carefully until she finally dove head first into the dirt and rolled to her back. Catching sight of one aggressor nearly on top of her, she swung both feet up as she slid and planted them firmly in the man's belly, letting his momentum carry him over her and into nothing but air. The second man attempted to stop but Dana rolled to her side and scissor kicked, one leg hitting his shins and the other hitting the middle of his back simultaneously dropping him and propelling him forward into a harmless roll, except for the earth dropping away beneath him.
Dana came to a halt breathing hard, with one leg hanging over the precipice. Pulling herself up to a kneeling position she rested, staring into the dirt, chest heaving, droplets of sweat leaving trails down her dusted arms and flanks. She tested the split in her lip with her teeth and found a copious amount of blood and grit on her tongue.
"Your words were true. She has many tricks," Gaia, the shorter woman, commented.
"In a fight as well," Lucretia purred back, smiling at their shared secret.
"Let us be thankful there are no cliffs in the arena or I may lose still more money!" A loud, angry male voice cut in as Quintus scowled down at the woman. Startled, Dana looked up at the sound. She knew there would be repercussions for killing those two, but there had been no choice. She watched as the two women surrounded him and cooed. He eyed the shorter one then turned to his wife, spoke and walked away. The wife, Lucretia, followed but the other stayed and looked back down, watching her with dark glittering eyes and an amused expression.
Hands took Dana's arms from behind and hoisted her painfully to her feet. She put up no resistance as her arms were pulled behind her and manacles encircled her wrists, the chain so tight she had to straighten her spine to relieve the pressure in her shoulders. Half led and half dragged to a support post she felt them attach another chain to the rings behind her, then a hand on her shoulder forced her back down into a kneeling position. There she remained, feeling her muscles stiffen under the sun, watching the men train, waiting for the outcome of the discussion she had seen begin above her.
"You can see Quintus, she is a fast and clever fighter. Once she has a sword in her hand that will cut and thrust she will have no need of a cliff." Lucretia reasoned to her irate husband.
"Those two had potential," he clenched his fist.
"She has more Quintus, think of it. If she only lives but for one fight she will be something new and exciting. Another diversion offered by the house of Batiatus." Lucretia pressed. "She was reacting to being attacked, as you have said, that is instinct that can not be taught."
He breathed sharply out of his nose and turned to a guard, "Unchain her and set her to training, then bring her to the house slave baths." Then under his breath he added, "She may be an oddity, but she is our oddity and we shall see profit from her yet."
Dana was unchained and set to sparring first on recruit, then another until the sun dipped below the horizon. Afterward she was lead through the lower level of the house. The guard left her at the baths to attend to herself and she did so. Seated at the edge of the pool, she winced when she began to clean the ragged scratches on her arm. She raised her eyes and found the woman she had seen on the balcony with Domina looking back at her through the curtain. She paused her washing and did not look away. She knew she should demure as a slave in the presence of any Roman, but she couldn't. This woman's eyes were deeper, somehow more aware than Domina's. Domina was perceptive, but this woman was that and more. Dana could not shake the feeling that this woman had her every action mapped five moves ahead. More than any other Roman, Dana believed this woman got what she wanted, and right now, she appeared to want Dana herself.
The connection was broken as another slave came into the room past the brown-eyed temptress. Nervously approaching Dana the girl kept her eyes lowered and set down the basket in her hands. As she did so, Dana recognized the girl as Domina's personal slave. She pushed Dana's hand away from the scratches and began dabbing them herself with a clean rag. Dana's muscle twitched but the touch was gentle for all of the girl's nervous trembling.
Once the wound was clean the girl applied a salve that smelled of herbs and honey. That was good Dana thought, fingernail scratches got the worst kind of infections and she didn't want to think about the kind of filth that could have been under that man's nails. She looked up again and watched the Roman woman watch her as the girl wrapped a bandage around her bicep and then began cleaning the scrapes on her back. Before long the slave girl had finished and gathered up the rags and salve. Handing Dana a hunk of bread from the bundle, she left as quietly as she had entered.
The other woman felt her own dark hair free itself from the clip and it fell over one eye. She brushed it back as her eyes slid over the body before her and she saw Lucretia had not exaggerated. Gaia's appraisal paused on Dana's hands, then flicked up to her face as the woman's tongue explored the split in her bottom lip, then collect a drop of sweat from the top. Gaia stepped inside the curtain as the girl left the room and walked up to Dana, a smile graced her features.
"They are taking your measure." She said, indicating the upper level of the house with her eyes. "Will you or will you not, earn more than you cost to keep?" She added thoughtfully.
Dana looked away and brushed the bread crumbs off her fingers then dipped them in the pool. She didn't know all of the words, but the woman's meaning was clear. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the woman step behind her. Dana's muscles jumped as she felt fingertips graze across her shoulders.
The woman came back around her other side and met her gaze again as Dana looked up. "Treated as neither a woman nor a man…" She trailed off airily.
Dana understood 'woman' 'man' and 'neither' from that sentence. She gave the woman a hard look, flexed her bicep and touched it with her other hand, then slid that hand over her heart and made a fist.
"I see," said Gaia, "Woman of strength - still a woman." Her eyes roamed over Dana's body again drawing a finger across her own lips, "Well such is clear." The expression on her face as she looked down at Dana would be a leer on anyone else, but on hers it was simply unmasked desire. Dana felt her pulse quicken. She looked down again and scowled at herself.
Fingertips caressed the side of Dana's neck up to her ear, brushing her hair back and over her shoulder. Dana closed her eyes and drew a long deep breath, involuntarily leaning into the touch. So this was what her life had become, sex and violence. Maybe that's all her life had ever been and she just had never realized it… But no, she thought as the fingertips traveled down her arm and lightly over the bandage, there had been more. Once there had been family, and love, commitment, and respect, but now, there was pleasure where she could find it and pain everywhere else.
Dana turned her head. Her eyes were level with the Roman's thigh. She looked down and took in the other woman's sandals and feet; both were well cared for. Dana took a chance and reached over, tracing the line of a vein from ankle to toe. She heard the woman take a breath above her. Understanding the lack of punishment as permission, she lifted her hand and laid it back on the woman's ankle, then slowly ghosted it upward under the folds of the dress to a toned calf.
Fingernails scraped her scalp and fingers fisted in her hair to pull her head back. Dana let her hair be pulled. Looking up into the pale face she gave the woman an impassive look, and left her hand where it was.
"Impertinent as well," Gaia purred, "You will be a pleasure." She laughed, and the sound feel on Dana's ears softly, like flower petals. Gaia released Dana's hair and stepped back out of reach. Dana let her hand drop and stood, wondering what the woman would do next. When she did nothing, Dana found a cloth and dried her self, then put her clothes back on. She found herself aroused and she was not sure she liked it. When she turned back, the Roman woman was gone. Dana went to the door and stood, waiting for the guard to return her to her cell for the night. If these women's intentions were to make her a toy, she'd make sure she got her pleasure from it as well.