Sacred Ground Watered With the Tears of Blood

[Airindel]

Sacred Ground Watered With the Tears of Blood

Inspired by Spartacus: Blood and Sand
Spartacus: Gods of the Arena
Spartacus: Vengeance

Taken

Once he was a free man, a man of strength, a man of honour and of his word.
Once he was a prisoner of war and sold into slavery in the markets of Rome.
Once he joined the sacred brotherhood of the gladiators.
Once he reigned as a champion yet to be defeated.

He bought his freedom, and all that had been in his past was just that: a past.
Forward he moved to live in tranquility, to find contentment.
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Praeneste.
It was a haven for Roman families of wealth and power. Vast villas dotted the city, and many splendors there were including that of the gladiatorial shows. However, the shadows were haunted with political maneuvering and deceit reigned.
Those whom Fortune once graced met ill fate.
The walls ran red, and the sands pooled in gore and blood at the ludus of Seneca Gaius Livianus. The slaves, the gladiators, the family, were slaughtered ... yet one remained alive, wounded yet not fatally.
She was the youngest daughter, a girl of seventeen years by the name Aurelia, and a beauty like no other. It was said that she was always blessed by the gods, favoured, and her survival proved as such for she was not to share the same fate as her family.
In having no where to go, in knowing that her life was endangered, that enemies existed, that she would be hunted by them, Aurelia sought out the one man who once offered her family, their ludus, fame and fortune through his blood and toil: the former gladiator.


Notes:
First and foremost, this is a much beloved older idea of mine, once written with a partner who, unfortunately, was kidnapped by the realities of life. I would like to revisit the concept with another writing partner. However, I would like to keep the same opening post (with minor edits, obviously) as the original story. I mention this because that may offend some, and I wish to be straightforward regarding that issue.

Opening Post:

Spoiler: Click to Show/Hide

The step caused the shallow pool to ripple, to slowly flow outward with a gentleness, with a hint of disturbance, and skimming over the sleek surface of crimson gore was the delicate hem of a gown that was once an opulent white christened with an accent of elegant gold. Stained it was now, saturated with filth, with blood, and it bore a resemblance of a poetic tale of struggle, of tragedy, of the neglect of gods and goddesses; Fate was fickle as was Fortune, and Mercy dared not to answer despite the screams and beggary.

Alone she was, the grip of the gladius foreign in her thin hand, and as if awakening from a dream, she walked. Aimless were the steps, small in pace, and once or twice her eyes peered at her feet, at the sandals soiled with the essence of life, with the entrails of those she once knew, with those she loved as family and slave alike, and her nose wrinkled. It was not from repulsion nor from the stench of death, but that of pain. Pierced between the lower short ribs she had been, her slight form stilled as the mercenary worked the blade deeper into her flesh and burrowed the point into the wooden pillar. She was certain she had pleaded, but those words were bestowed on deaf ears, and she was certain that she had screamed when he lifted  her skirts, lifted her slender legs parting them to penetrate her unblemished, virginal sex.

She recalled laughter, and the laboured breathing, the grunting near her ear. The heat of him, the scent of his sweat, she still felt upon her to perfume her flesh, to mar her beauty. Left her for dead, he did, for she fell limp from his carnal exertions, from her wound, and as minutes passed, as time beckoned forth, blackness finally lulled her into the comfort of being unconscious.

She awoke to silence, and to needling discomfort for she had remained pinned by the gladius, and it was not without struggle that she worked herself free.

No one did they leave alive within the Livianus family villa and ludus.

The limp body of her sweet brother, Gaius, had been brutalized much like her own fate before they killed him. Blood had seeped into the tunic from the multiple stab wounds within his back, and his throat had been slit to the core of his spine. Her old sister, Cassia, the beloved daughter-by-law to the magistrate, had met worse fate for a gladius had been carved into her sex and badly had the pregnant woman been mutilated; the unborn child was strewn from her once rounded belly and left upon her bosom which lacked the breasts. Claudia, her mother, had been bludgeoned to death; her skull had been caved in, her mind spilled from the bone, and her father, the revered ludus owner, the famous Seneca Gaius Livianus, had been crucified upside down in the training ground. His head, however, was missing.

Servants were slaughtered, their valued lives worthless to those that invaded the Livianus villa, and as for ludus, the gladiators had been butchered in their cells. Struggled there, the mercenaries had, for tables and cots had been broken, turned over, and the walls were wet, dripping, with blood.

"Aurelia." The name was murmured, was implored, in the silence of death. It was but a husky noise that permeated the stillness of the foul air, and besought the attention of the girl who roamed what was once her home, her life. Turned she did to look behind her, yet there was nothing but light and shadow, and the solemness that lifelessness rendered.

For that moment, Aurelia arched her brow in question to her mind, to her ears, but once more her name was whispered. Numbed feet stole upon the floor, stepped over bodies of men that bore the mark of her family, of the Livianus ludus, and there she saw but one stir, but one move, and recognized him with familiarity she did: the Gaul, the lanista. Trevidos had been his name, and sweet on him Aurelia was since she was but a girl. In awe she was of Trevidos for although an older man, he had earned his glory in the arena and still had the strength of the gods, and with that, gratitude from her family for training the male slaves to become gladiators.

"What have they done?" Aurelia asked him, the gladius falling from her hand. The clatter of noise echoed in the eve, and the blade danced along the floor. Instinctively, the girl knelt by Trevidos' side. Her gaze met his until it traveled over his muscular body to stare at his belly that he grasped. Guts were unraveling from his abdomen, spewing forth, and Aurelia pressed her hands upon him as if the gesture could save him.

"I do not know who they were," Trevidos stated while trying to mask the pain that coursed and webbed through his body. "But you must leave. They will come back."

"Where would I go? There isn't anywhere, Trevidos." She whispered, and all words faltered when the trainer's hand took purchase upon her face, cupped her jaw, her chin.

"Justice will prevail, Aurelia. I will see to that from the afterlife." Trevidos vowed, and offered her a stern expression. "But first, I will see you safe." A raspy noise left his throat, and the girl drew closer to him, her ear pressing near his lips; tears were warm against her face, her cheeks. "The Persian." Those two words were all that Trevidos whispered before Aurelia felt his breathing halt and limbs relax. It made her peer into his face once more, her hand caressing his cheek with some sentimentality, and smiled upon him she did. A good man he had been, and an unjustly death for him it was; deserved better, Trevidos had, and the fact that she could not see him to the gods, prepare his body or that of her family, it brought forth an overwhelming emotion within her.

Wept she did over his body, that of Trevidos, and exhausted, tainted with the evils of the day, Aurelia fell into slumber. The arms of a dead man, that of Trevidos, offered her strange comfort and protection.

Hours passed, and noise from above, from within the bowels of the villa, woke Aurelia. Cheek pressed against the dead Gaul's bare chest, her eyes widened with fright for Trevidos had been right. Back they were, the men, or so she believed, and in not knowing what to do, Aurelia reached for the gladius, and mechanically wandered to the doors that lead to the training yard, to where her father had endured torture, and then to the gates where she freed herself.

Faint she was; the loss of blood from her weeping wound gave her pause to rest  in the alleys of Praeneste. Eyes she felt upon her, stares of the poor men and women of the city, and they made clear of her for she was cursed: the blood of others tainted her.

Beyond the gates of Praeneste she walked, and in no particular director for she knew not of the location of the Persian. Never had her father mentioned the Persian after his freedom was restored, bought, and in the heat of the midday sun, and in looking at the cloudless blue sky, Aurelia collapsed. In the green grasses she fell, the grasses that lambs grazed upon, and shaded it was from the elderly olive trees yet to be ripe with fruit.

Secondly, I am looking for somebody willing to write the role of the former gladiator as well as minor characters (NPCs). Details of the gladiator's life, that is for my partner to decide, and I would also like contribution/suggestions/ideas with the plot. I'm also a detailed writer and I would appreciate the same in my partner.

My partner should be open to the ideas of gore, violence, vulgar language, homosexuality, non-consensual encounters and possibly incest. I would like to place this story into the Extreme Solos category. Too, I'm not looking for accuracy in the Ancient Roman era. However, I think a basic knowledge of it is a necessity.

I won't lie: I'll be particular on who I accept as a writing partner for this concept.
If interested, please PM me.
Many thanks.