Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience.
 
 Author's Note: (Skip the next three paragraphs if you like; the story
starts down there.) Some of the stuff in this story accurately reflects the
way things were during the First Crusade.  Much of it does not, and much of
it is just my perverted BSing.  This is no substitute for our Medieval
Islamic History and/or Medieval European History classes, kids, even if
some of us would rather write porn than seminar papers.

   At the time of the First Crusade, most of those European Christians who
were aware of the existence of Muslims believed--for reasons I will not get
into here--that they were polytheistic idol-worshippers, and thus
considered them beneath contempt.  The word "Saracen", which I employ
throughout the story, was used to denote Arabs and sometimes Muslims in
general.  It was a broad and vague term used by people who had little
understanding of the populations they were dealing with.

   The First Crusade was not a kind and gentle time and this is not a kind
and gentle story.  All chapters have significant and exclusively homoerotic
sexual content, much of which is violent.  I hope some people will find the
story enjoyable, since I enjoyed writing it.  Drop me a line if you like.
Criticism will be approached in the same spirit that it is given. 
Compliments are, of course, always appreciated and always acknowledged.  I
get mail at s.k.stories@hotmail.com.

   Chapter 1

   It was summer, the days long and arid, the sun furious.  The clear,
moon-bathed nights seemed mercifully cool in contrast.  Finally arrived, we
were camped outside the walls, preparing as best we could for the
inevitable siege.  I clearly remembered the tearful excitement of many of
my men as we had approached the Holy City.  Now, they were becoming
restless.

   Water was difficult--and dangerous--to come by; had to carry empty skins
to a spring miles away in order to bring it back to camp.  Saracen arrows
and raiding parties were a constant risk, but there was no choice.  The
first week they had shot down one of my men.  Just out of boyhood, he had
been useful enough to me--quick and fearless in the field, if a bit
foolish--and I was angered to be losing another loyal fighter to infidel
arrows.  I had entertained fantasies about making him useful in other ways.


   He didn't live long after they brought him back to my tent.  I watched
him die.  His skin, blanched from blood loss, was still appealingly soft to
the touch, his blond hair caked with gore.  I could do nothing at the time,
but I was waiting for an opportunity for revenge.

   Early one morning, while the sun was weak, I again set out with a party
to bring water.  On our way we encountered several dozen of the enemy.  My
hunger after the trek, and my unrelenting thirst, seemed to sharpen my zeal
for blood.  We routed them after a short and intense fight.

   Nine captives were taken.  On our arrival back at camp I was not
immediately able to examine them, as I was busy tallying up our other
rather meager spoils, counting our losses, making sure our wounded were
seen to.  When I had dispensed with these duties I collapsed in my tent,
too tired to think.

   I was roused later that evening by Ekkehard, one of my men.  He was
about five years younger than my thirty-eight, and very good-looking, tall
and nicely-built, with well-shaped brown eyes and soft light-brown hair.  I
tried as often as possible to surround myself with men both capable and
pleasing to the eye.

   He wanted to discuss the ransoming of captives--or their execution,
followed by the ostentatious display of their infidel carcasses.  I was for
the latter; I didn't trust these enemies of Christ to pay up without some
trick, and our ambushers hadn't looked much like rich men.  And besides, I
had grown accustomed to-no, fond of, I must admit-the drawing of blood.

   They were kept in several tents on the far side of the camp, under
guard. Five in the largest of the three tents, three in the middle tent,
one alone in the smallest one.  I asked Ekkehard why he'd had them
separated so, and he grunted and smiled.

   "You'll see."

   And I did see.  In the first tent were older men, variously
battle-hardened, and I didn't look twice at them.  In the middle tent were
two attractive youths of about eighteen and a serenely handsome man in his
late twenties, all three darkly beautiful in the manner of the heathen men,
with their deep eyes and heavy black hair and their skins in lush shades of
honey and bronze.  I had always liked dark men best, men with olive skin
and twilight eyes and dark curls, so difficult to find in my native
country. The oldest man was a warm brown, his bones strong, his eyes fine
and thick-lidded.  He was asleep, drool and blood oozing from a sensual
plump mouth.

   "Unconscious," Ekkehard explained, making a striking motion with his
sword-hilt.

   One of the two youths was of similar coloring and build; he and the
sleeping young man, I felt certain, were cousins, or even brothers.  The
third was a lighter golden color, his large eyes full of unspoken fear,
though he tried hard to keep his flower of a mouth set in a brave line.

   I smiled.

   "Beauties, these three."

   I was rethinking--for the time being--the prospect of
ostentatiously-displayed infidel carcasses.  My men deserved a bit of fun
at the expense of these spiritually wretched yet physically lovely
unfortunates.  I followed Ekkehard to the smaller tent, my cock was already
thick with lust from the sight of the three dark jewels all tightly bound,
their clothes half-torn from their well-trained young bodies, stained with
their own blood and the blood of the dead.



   The man in the third tent was their commander.  He was younger than me
by maybe seven or eight years, his body fit and lean, with a fine face, a
hawkish nose, and great shadowy eyes.  Except for a small scar under the
left eye, the skin was an even golden-brown.  He was unshaven, but had a
small beard which had once been very neat.  His mouth was large and
sensual. Tthere was something cannibalistic, dangerous, about that mouth.
His hair was black as pitch, thick and heavy.  His ferocious gaze would
have given me pause had he not been tied to a pair of stakes driven into
the ground, bound hand and foot, and completely nude, his prominent
buttocks and tapered back facing up.  It was like having a venomous serpent
pinned to the ground by metal rings.

   He thrust his sleek strong body back and forth, trying to loosen
himself, which made the shapely muscles stand out under his warm olive
skin. He couldn't move much the way he was tied.  I stepped over to him and
placed a booted foot on the left cheek of his jutting ass.  He looked up at
me, cursed in his barbaric language, his succulent lips parted in a snarl.

   "Good and firm," I commented, pressing my foot harder into the springy
muscled buttock.  "He could stand a nice whipping.  And look beautiful
taking it."

   Ekkehard smiled.  "A fine-looking man, yes.  I thought you'd be
pleased."

   "I'm very pleased."

   I nudged one of the buttocks aside using the dusty tip of my boot.  The
cleft was a tantalizing pink-brown, with an even pinker closed rosebud in
the center.  It was lined with small shiny black curls.  My blood pumped
harder, and I felt a thrill in my cock.  The man shivered under me.

   I called three of my men, had then release him from the stakes him and
take him, hands bound, outside the tent before the eyes of my jeering
countrymen.  He seemed a prideful and arrogant man.  And why not?  He was
an accomplished soldier, I had seen that.  He was accustomed to being
obeyed and deferred to.  It would be a great joy to smash some of that
dignity.

   We soon had him strapped to a long post set up in the middle of the
camp, his brown body glistening in the sinking sun and exposed for all to
scrutinize.  I was sure he could feel us watching.  The back of his body
was positioned exquisitely.  His broad and smooth back split into a set of
round hard buttocks made to be publicly flayed.  He rested his dark head
against the post, his eyes closed.  One of my men went and stood behind
him. He must have felt it, because his magnificent body tensed up, his ass
clenched.  I could almost hear him gritting his teeth.  I wanted to take
out my cock and begin flogging it almost before his flogging began.  I
loved seeing that proud, lovely, manly body all arched and stiff with grim
anticipation.

   My man licked his lips.  He drew the whip back and struck the young
commander below his buttocks, across the strong brown thighs.  A hard red
line appeared across the bronzy flesh.  The commander shuffled his feet; he
wouldn't cry out.  The whip fell twice more across his thighs, making him
wince and twist his beautiful bound body around.  His head remained bowed.
He would not look at us, nor would he make a sound.  He was a very haughty
man.  Another lash, this time directly on the plump buttocks.  Below the
waist, he was criss-crossed with red lines.  My man knew better than to
draw blood, and the whip could cause plenty of pain without creating so
much as a nick in the flawless bronzy skin.

   He whipped the commander's buttocks, then struck his back twice--one
stroke along the shoulders, and once in the sensitive middle, the lash
smacking sharply on the taut flesh.  I watched the splendid body writhe,
wanting the man it belonged to more the more he suffered.  After the
whipping, he would be all mine, broken, shaking, and sweating.  The lash
returned to our captive's raw rump, landing hard from the left, then the
right, as the man behind him changed position.  The regular motions, the
pathetic jerking of the man's body as he leapt up on his toes and ground
his teeth and growled through them, all were intensely stimulating to me.

   Next we strapped the heathen's ankles to a heavy board on the ground so
that his thighs were forced apart, his buttocks open.  I saw the tempting
dusky cleft between, where I would bury my cock after he was ready for me,
the brown sack dangling below it.  My man holding the whip stepped behind
him again.  The commander shuddered as he felt the air from the practice
swings on his body.  My man brought the whip down with a crack between the
Saracen's buttocks, missing the sack just barely, provoking a howl from the
once-proud throat.  He whipped him in the same secret place a second and
third time, each before his screams from the last had died down.  He danced
in agony within the tight circumscription of his bonds.  I signaled to my
man to stop a moment, then moved to the other side of the post so I could
see my brave commander's face.  The noble, beautiful features were a
gorgeous wreck; the cheeks flushed; eyes wide with pain, humiliation, and
fear; mouth open and gasping; spittle soaking the once-neat bit of facial
hair.  I reached up to caress his messy thatch of black heavy hair, then
the soft skin of the cheek near the nose, where it was clear of stubble. 
His eyes found mine and met them with a mixture of terror and hate.  I
caressed also those fine dark eyes, from which shameful tears had leaked.
Though I knew he would not understand, I leaned in to whisper to him about
his pride and arrogance in seeking to attack God's servants, and how it had
brought him to this.

   Then I gave the order for my man to whip him three more times in the
tender place between the sweaty cheeks of his rump.  His squirming and
twisting and the perspiration glistening on his lean muscles made me keen
to get him back to the tent and have him.



   It took four men, including me.  We threw him over a table in one of the
tents and forced his head down.  We bound his wrists and ankles, already
raw and red, to its legs.  His own men, the other three good-looking
captives, their wrists and ankles shackled, watched in impotent horror as
their commander was dragged in and wrestled over the thick plank of wood.
The two youngest men were particularly affected, their large dark eyes
growing wider with distress when they saw his red welted ass, how he
trembled, how his face was damp with tears.  One of them, the golden one
with the flower mouth, lunged forth to try to intercept one of my men who
stepped near him, but a painful boot in his ribs made him double over and
regret his momentary rashness.

   A few more of my men came in, already drunk, but carrying more wine.  We
were fortunate to have it.  As we finished securing the commander to the
table, they fell upon the three bound men, petting their naked brown
bodies, biting and pinching the firm flesh.  The oldest captive, still
looking sleepy, as though the blow to the head had not quite worn off,
closed his eyes and muttered to himself, praying to his false gods.  He did
not stop even when he was slapped, and slapped again by laughing men.  His
face all flushed from the blows, eyes shining from the sting, he continued
moving his shapely dark lips as if he had not been interrupted.  One of my
men, maddened with lust, began kissing him roughly, running his hands over
his lean young muscles, gripping his thick black hair to hold him fast. 
Meanwhile, the younger two squirmed under the eager, unwelcome caresses of
my besotted men, anxiously watching their commander all the while.

   His bronzy, meaty rump was spread open due to the position of his
thighs, the dusky crack swollen and ruddy from the whipping.  Someone
placed a rolled blanket beneath his flat belly in order to force his
backside higher, causing the buttocks to part even more.  He moaned
hoarsely in protest as I ran my finger up and down his reddened valley,
pulling at hairs, pausing to trace the little ridged opening.  Guessing
what was to happen to him, he made a pathetic attempt to clench his ass
shut.

   I spat on my hand and rubbed it into my hard shaft.  I looked back at
the two watching boys.  Their eyes followed my movements as their
wine-fueled tormentors, gleefully awaiting the commander's latest
degradation, lazily caressed the boys' half-limp brown cocks and
black-furred testicles, A few feet away from them, the older one was still
trapped by the hungry lips and groping hands of my obviously smitten man. I
might need to remind Roland he was forbidden to fuck his chosen prize until
I gave the word, for he looked ready to slake his thirst.  He had the man
on his back and was lapping at his chest and belly with his tongue while
fondling his cock and reaching beneath to probe his back passage with
spit-covered fingers.

   "Roland, watch me," I snapped.

   My man lifted his head.  Roland was twenty-four years old.  Since he was
a tender and handsome youth of fourteen, he'd been with me, and all that
time had been beyond reproach in his service and loyalty.  His eyes--a most
beautiful cornflower blue, with heavy dark lashes-were hazy with desire. 
Spit shone on his soft mouth.  He eased his probing finger away from the
captive's nether regions.  The heathen shuddered with relief.

   I aimed the tip of my drooling cock at the spread and reddened hole,
pressed it into the unwilling dark rosebud.  It took effort to work it in,
to force open his tough delicate ring and slide through to his deliciously
slick inner sanctum.  He was so tight, partly because he struggled to close
his insides against me and partly because this had never happened to him
before.

   My men, five of the ones I trust most--and handsome ones, too--kept up
their slow stroking of the two younger captives, breaking their rhythm for
a sip of wine every so often.  The two youths writhed in unwanted pleasure,
succumbing inexorably to the sensations inflicted upon them.  Their fine
brown penises stood hard, rubbed by my men's white calloused hands.  Their
wiry young bodies squirmed under pinches, slaps, and gruff caresses.  Their
faces were dazed masks, dulled eyes, wet parted lips, sweat gathering in
their thick black hair.  When they saw my cock stab between their
commander's spread buttocks, the shock and helplessness in their faces was
beautiful to behold.

   Roland had returned to caressing his favorite, probing him with a
spit-moistened finger as he watched me press close to the commander's
welted ass.  Then, after a pause to feel him all around me, sleek and hot,
to run my hands triumphantly down his broad sculpted back, I withdrew so
that only my tip remained inside his clenching ring, and slammed back in
again.  I caught Roland's eyes as I did it, knowing how much he longed to
do the same to the man under him.  I decided I might like to take him
myself before I allowed Roland to do so.  I might have young Roland wet my
cock with his own pretty mouth before I stuck it inside the object of his
wine-flushed lust.  I'd make him watch the slow, deep penetration--for I
thought I'd go slow and deep with the sleepily handsome prize--make him
burn with envy and desire.  Watching Roland lean in to kiss the other man's
glistening mouth, I thought how I would make him clean the Saracen's hole
out with his tongue after I'd finished with him.  When finally I let Roland
take him, I decided, I would lash his well-shaped white buttocks with my
short leather whip as he thrust.

   These salacious musings flowed easily as I thrust in and out of the
commander's warm taut passage.  These thrusts were fast and stern and
always to the hilt, as much punishment as his earlier whipping.  I loved
watching the muscles in his back strain as he coped with the pain of my
quick deep jabs, the lustrous hair on his head growing slick with
perspiration.  I reached to tug at those thick wet curls, making him growl
in fresh pain and indignation.  I stroked his graceful, strong neck, placed
my hands around it, wondering how it would be to squeeze, to choke him. 
And I did squeeze, a little, enough to hear a catch in his throat.  That
was exciting; it made me want to fuck him faster and harder.  So hot inside
him, moist with my leaking.  I crushed his strong young neck between my
hands, slamming in and out of that fleshy constricted ring.  I heard the
strained croak of his breath.  My body tingled with the ecstasy of
possessing him and the power of clutching his throat, his life, in my hard
hands.  I could choke him and let him die with my cock inside him.

   My men cheered and shouted lewd encouragement as my thrusts gathered
speed and force.  They yelled approval when the commander's face turned
ruddy as he gasped for air.  I let him breathe after another moment, moving
my hands away and giving him a resounding slap to the side of his face.  He
gritted his teeth.  I pressed that thick firm ass, ready to finish.  The
orgasm shot through me, exploding from my cock deep into his helpless body.
I shivered, my head rocked back.  There was more cheering.  Then it was
done.

   I asked the two men pawing the golden-skinned heathen to bring him over.
They pulled the shackled man to where I stood, recovering from the pleasant
shock of my climax.  He was in the bloom of young manhood--supple skin,
light shadow of black beard, big anxious eyes, strong lithe young body.  I
had them put him on his knees so that his head was level with the
commander's abused ass.  I gripped his hair and shoved his face into the
red cleft between the commander's buttocks.  He did nothing.  I made him
understand, using gestures, that I would happily cut his commander's throat
if he didn't lick that round muscled ass clean.

   Frightened, he opened his lush lips and put out his pink tongue, then
gingerly lapped a streak of white seed from the red-whipped swarthy flesh,
to the mocking approval of my men.

   "He looks like he likes the taste."

   "I've got more for him here!"

   "Only if he sucks as nicely as he licks..."

   "With those pretty lips, he'd have to."

   The commander shivered slightly at the sudden soft touch of his tongue.
I yanked on the young man's thick black locks, forcing his face deeper
between his commander's plump hard buttocks, where most of my seed was. 
Some had dripped down the man's crack, even onto his sack.

   The boy, again reluctant--yet, I noted with interest, somehow also
tender--began to slurp my pearly cream from the red cleft.  I wondered what
he must be thinking.  The way he and his companions had looked at the
commander when we brought him in indicated profound horror and sorrow at
the debasement of a man they all admired, even loved.  Perhaps part of the
youth was willing, or glad, to be able to offer him even this small,
shameful comfort.

   The commander wiggled at the deeper, more vigorous lickings, which made
us all laugh.  I moved the boy's head further down between his thighs,
where his plump brown sack glistened from some of my seed which had
trickled there.  When I tightened my hold on his hair, the youth obligingly
licked the dangling sack clean.  I enjoyed yanking on his thick curls to
direct his efforts.  I moved his head so his lips slid back up along the
slimy crack to his commander's pucker, where more of my warm seed had slid
out.  He gently lapped and sucked.  I could hear him sucking, as though he
really wanted to properly clean the other man's sore, messy hole, so that
nothing was left.  The commander again shuddered as he felt the soft mouth
sucking hot seed from his anus.  I gave the youth's buttocks a hearty slap
to show my appreciation when he'd finished.

   My men dragged him back over to where his companion lay in an agony of
involuntary delight, his hard penis in the mouth of one man, another's
first two fingers buried between his bronzy buttocks.  They fell upon him
again, subjecting him to the same pleasant tortures.

   Roland and another man had forced Roland's favorite to crouch over them.
He was sucking each of their cocks in turn with his shapely Saracen mouth,
Roland's fingers twined hard in his hair.  The man had seen my threatening
gestures toward the commander and knew how much depended on his compliance.
Thus, he fell to his task lustily, prompted by a tug on his curls whenever
his enthusiasm waned.

   I called Ekkehard up, sweeping my hand toward the commander's ass in
offering.  The crack was shiny with spittle from the youth's loving
ministrations.

   "He's still not as well-fucked as he could be.  Let's see if you can't
open up this sweet hole a little more."

   Grinning, Ekkehard stepped behind the man, stroking his cock a bit as he
surveyed the target.

   "Doubt I'll have any trouble."

   He then pointed his dripping cock-head at the painfully blooming rose of
the commander's hole, slid in.  He fucked the man in rough, abrupt jerks,
using the raw orifice to relieve the tension he'd built up watching my
performance and the boy's tender cleaning job, while fondling the other
bound lad.  As I had, he stroked his calloused palms down the man's back,
relishing the feel of his flesh.  He held his hips, lifting his ass to meet
his thrusts.  I heard the smack of pelvis against thick, springy, solid
buttock.  It was only a few frenzied minutes before Ekkehard, flushed,
popped his cock out of the man's passage and shot several arcs of white
over his spread buttocks and tensed lower back.

   I decided he looked good like that, sloppy with seed, so this time I
didn't make one of the youths clean him.  I looked over at my Roland, his
hands still tangled dreamily in the sucking Saracen's hair, and nodded my
head.  He eased the heathen off him and handed him off to the man next to
him, who was waiting his turn to be sucked.

   When Roland came up I gave him an encouraging slap on his own rounded
rump, which made the other men laugh even as Roland blushed.

   He took out his juicy, pink-flushed cock.  He blushed deeper, exposed,
about to fuck a man in front of a gang of onlookers.  He put the head
against the commander's tender, stretched hole and pushed, sliding in very
smoothly, the sensation of yet another invasive cock provoking only a weary
moan from the exhausted Saracen.  His punishment--whipped and then
raped--was working to humiliate him.  Bent over, unable to move, his
red-beaten ass perked up higher than the rest of his body and open wide for
anyone to use.

   While Roland worked behind him, I stepped to the other side of the
table, where his handsome head hung over the edge, his mouth closed hard,
his breath fast and hissing.  I lifted his head by the hair and made him
look at me with those tough, tired, dark eyes.  With my other hand I took
out my tumescent member and brushed the moist tip against his lips.

   Naturally, he refused to open them.  Naturally, I punished this
impudence with a slap across that fine flushed face.

   His eyes opened wide as Roland twisted and thrust behind him.  Again, by
motioning across the tent at them and making threatening gestures, I showed
the commander that I would kill his pretty young soldiers, cut their sweet
warm throats before his eyes, if he didn't open his voluptuous mouth and
take care of me.  He cursed me--I can only assume--but soon enough my cock
had slid down the length of his soft wet throat.

   Roland and I both took him at once, as if roasting him on a spit, his
cock pounding the abused back-passage, mine gliding back and forth in the
virgin gullet.  Roland's rocking jabs pushed the man's mouth further along
the length of my cock.  He gagged on me, but kept himself from vomiting,
lucky for him.

   I moved in and out brutally, looking down at his eyes, serenely shut,
like he thought he could take himself away from here.  His lashes were
thick and black, very beautiful.  His eyelids too, thick and soft.  His
hair was sticky with sweat, his face ruddy.  Behind him, Roland rocked his
lean hips fast and hard, his pink lips parted and moist, his face
transported.  I ejaculated before he did, coating the infidel's throat with
spurts of salty white cream.  When I pulled out I wiped the remainder on
his lips, his unshaven face that prickled my sensitive cockhead, his soft
eyelids and thick lashes.  He moaned, low, an involuntary sound; he would
never let me see how much pain he felt, how much shame.  Roland jerked
another few times, deep inside him, then orgasmed, his handsome features
tightening then relaxing utterly.  When he caught his breath and looked at
me, his blue eyes were dazed, momentarily sated.

   One by one my men penetrated the sweaty Saracen and fucked him till they
came.  Every time someone finished inside him, one of the two lush-lipped
youths was put to work cleaning him for the next man.  We took turns
sliding our cocks into his slack mouth.  By now he limply allowed it; his
mind seemed divorced from his violated body.  The other three we probed and
stroked, forcing them to suck us while we waited for others to finish with
the commander.

   Finally, drained and blurry, drugged with pleasure, we released the
commander from the table.  He was barely conscious, bleeding from the mouth
where someone had hit him.  I found him very attractive that way, all loose
and unmoving in my arms.  His eyelids softly closed, that delicious bloody
mouth.  But I was too tired, too thoroughly satiated, to enjoy him again.
We tied his hands and ankles tightly together and dropped him next to the
two youths.  Tears and sweat shone on their shadowed cheeks.  The other
handsome infidel, the one Roland liked, lay curled facing the tent wall.  I
thought he might be crying as well.

   As we went out I aimed a swift kick at his well-shaped rump, to the
muted laughter of my men.  The Saracen only winced a little, as if he
barely felt it.  We left the captives alone in the hot stale dark.

   Back in my tent I undressed and dropped down onto the blankets.  I
couldn't think of the siege preparations, or of anything other than the
sights, sounds, and sensations I had experienced that night.  I wasn't
disturbed, as I so often was, by dreams of thirst or fatigue.  My sleep was
almost immediate and completely dreamless, a heavy relieving black wave.

   My last thought was of the commander's lush bleeding mouth slipping
salaciously over my ready cock.  Tomorrow night.