Dead and naked
by Knobkerrie
An arena fight strews the sand with nine beautiful corpses
Update: 18/12/1997 to misc3


No one in the city could remember just how the quarrel had 
started.  Perhaps it was inevitable, once Myrina and her 
daughters had moved in to start a rival fighting school to 
Hunda's.  The two were just too much alike.  Both Hunda and 
the newcomer were ex-gladiatrices who had entered the arena 
as slaves -- Myrina at sixteen, Hunda at eighteen --  and 
gained their freedom after five years of survival, going on 
to raise daughters by various fathers and to establish 
schools of swordsmanship and other combat forms for those 
private citizens, both male and female, able to pay.  Like 
the blonde Hunda's five daughters, the four offspring of the 
black-haired Myrina acted as instructresses or at least 
sparring partners at their school, though the youngest was 
but sixteen.  Some whispered that Myrina had moved from the 
capital city to escape a legal inquiry after a handsome young 
nobleman with several rich enemies was found dead, naked, and 
supposedly drowned in a bathing pool at her school.  

For over a year the quarrel had been confined to mysterious 
acts of arson and street confrontations between groups of two 
or three well-armed girls; twice Myrina and Hunda themselves 
had actually clashed at sword's point.  Nobody had been 
killed or even seriously hurt. But finally came the day when 
Hunda spied, walking down a country lane,  a muscular male 
slave known to be Myrina's favorite lover.  Seeing her 
opportunity, she dismounted, approached the man, and knocked 
him out with a single punch to the jaw.  Quickly stripping 
him of his sandals and loincloth -- but pausing to admire his 
manhood -- she rode off with his nude body before her on her 
saddle.  That night her eldest daughter, twenty-two-year-old  
Molpadia revived the unconscious slave with her caresses, 
then made love to him.  He was still inside her when Hunda, 
as planned, looped a silken scarf about his neck and 
strangled him as he burst inside Molpadia, then let his limp 
sweaty body fall to lie atop her moaning daughter.

That night a slave-girl opened the rear door of Myrina's 
villa -- and the man's nude corpse fell  into the room.  The 
girl fainted, falling across the body, too distracted to 
notice that a green band of cloth -- Hunda's colors -- had 
been tied about the base of the dead man's flaccid sex.

Obviously, the challenge could not be ignored.  

"Let's travel to the capital, Mother," urged Myrina's eldest, 
Xantippe. "And request that a duel be staged in the Great 
Ampitheater, before the King himself!"

Myrina frowned.  "No," she said, outwardly calm despite her 
seething anger.  "We'll settle it in the local arena -- 
without an audience.  Just my daughters and I against Hunda 
and her cursed brood!"

"But Mother," objected the youngest, the slim, blonde-haired 
Ariel. "We're only five.  Hunda and her daughters are six!"

Myrina smiled.  "No fear, child.  We'll point that out to the 
bitch.  She can't refuse us a hired champion to even up the 
odds, can she?  In fact, we might want to rent a couple of 
fighting slaves as well, just to make things interesting.   
And I still have plenty of contacts with the gladiatrix and 
mercenary crowd.  In fact, there's a black Kushite mercenary 
in town right now who might be interested..."

Thus  it was arranged.  Three days later Myrina stood in the 
limestone arena, sword and round brass shield in hand, her 
armor bronze breastplates, greaves above bare feet, and a 
skirt of brass-studded leather strips.  She had tucked up her 
long black curls under her bronze helmet, which did nothing 
to conceal her handsome features.   She looked to her right 
and left to survey her four daughters, ranging in age from 
Ariel, at sixteen, to Xantippe at twenty-two.  Armed with 
either sword and shield or spear and net, they stood 
resolute, naked save for red loincloths depending from belts 
of thin leather or golden chains. Curly-haired Acca and the 
busty, blonde Vibiana, nineteen, also had daggers at their 
belts.

With them were two tall blonde female slaves, armed with 
sword and shield, their fair oil-rubbed skin glistening in 
the sun, naked save for leather belts and thin strips of red 
cloth tied to their left forearms.  Each was a superbly 
trained gladiatrix, hired from their master by Myrina for the 
occasion, as she had small faith in her own current crop of 
trainees.

Some twenty paces away stood Hunda's five daughters, 
similarly armed, and clad in green loincloths.  The two dark-
haired, olive-skinned slaves who would fight along side them, 
Musa and Idrana, were, like Myrina's rented swordgirls, naked 
save for their belts and identifying strip of cloth, and they 
were likewise well-trained in arena-fighting. Unlike 
Myrina's, they belonged to the elite of Hunda's stable of 
slave fighters; she was punishing them for disobedience, and 
would punish them further if they did not distinguish 
themselves in the coming fight -- provided they survived, of 
course.

But where was Hunda?  "Too bad if she's too scared to show 
up," said Myrina -- loudly, so that Hunda's daughters could 
hear.   Hunda's oldest, blonde Molpadia, was obviously angry, 
and moved as if to take a step forward, fire flashing from 
her blue eyes. 

"I notice your Kushite girl hasn't shown up either," 
responded her youngest sister, the red-haired eighteen-year 
old Hippolyte. Myrina said nothing.  

The only spectators were five slave girls from each house, 
barefoot and clad only in short sleeveless tunics -- red for 
Myrna, green for Hunda -- sitting at opposite sides of the 
arena.  They were there to serve refreshments, take care of 
the dead and wounded,  and to tidy things up generally.

Hunda, however, had been busy.  Her curiosity had been piqued 
upon hearing that there were not one, but two Kushite girls 
in town -- magnificent black women, clad in leopard-skin 
loincloths, gold ornaments, and bronze breastplates, their 
hair hanging in a long braid down their backs.  She wondered 
what the sister of Hunda's proposed ally would be doing that 
day.  So before dawn, a tall fortyish woman with short blonde 
hair, dressed in a leather cuirass -- her bronze helmet 
removed lest it noisily scratch against a low-hanging branch 
--  stalked quietly through the woods overlooking the 
ampitheater where the other combatants waited.  There she saw 
a Kushite girl, standing with spear and oxhide shield as 
though on guard against an approach from the rear, and 
obviously not planning to join in the day's arena fight. 

But Hunda made a wide circle in the woods, backtracking, and 
silently creeping barefoot to within a few paces of her prey.  
One muscled arm went quickly around the guard's slim throat, 
squeezing vicelike as her other hand pressed against her 
enemy's neck.  Yanked out of her rawhide sandals, the guard 
dropped her spear, grabbed Hunda's forearm,  kicked a little 
with her bare feet as she strangled,  but soon all was over -
- as with a final groaning "uh..." her brown limbs went limp.  
Hunda finished her neatly with a sudden flexing of her bare 
arm and a muffled pop, and lowered her lifeless body to the 
grass.  She leaned over her, grinning as she easily turned 
the Kushite girl's head back and forth by her slack jaw.  
"I'm very good at necks," she whispered.  "But just to make 
things look good..."  She caressed the Amazon's warm, naked 
breast, admiring its brown color and silky texture.  Then she 
sank the girl's own spear-point in just beneath it, leaving 
behind a fresh wound.  "There, you'll look much braver 
now..."

Seizing the dead guard's naked feet, she dragged her deeper 
into the woods, then grabbed her under the armpits and yanked 
her into a sitting position against an old and appropriately 
dead tree, head lolling onto her breast by her broken neck.  
Hunda stripped her of her breastplates, golden earrings, 
anklets, and bracelets, and the leopard's-tooth amulet around 
her dead throat, before tearing off her leopard-skin 
loincloth and dusting it contemptuously against her exposed 
crotch.  She piled up some brush over her naked corpse and 
left her there.

She moved to the edge of the clearing, where she saw the 
second black girl -- an archer -- behind a tree.  She had 
removed her breastplates and sandals for greater ease in 
shooting  while seeking out a good view of the arena below 
from behind a tree.   Hunda quietly drew her gold-hilted 
dagger and approached the half-naked girl, intent on 
examining a steel-tipped arrow.  She suddenly seized her 
braid and touched the dagger gently to her naked back.  The 
girl gasped, dropping her bow and raising her hands as though 
to show she held no weapon.  Hunda  released her hair, noting 
that the girl's lips were parted in fear and surprise, her 
head turned to the side, dark eyes anxious.

"Quiet," Hunda commanded softly, her dagger point still 
lightly depressing her enemy's bare flesh.   "Were you to 
start shooting us all down from a distance before the fight 
started -- hired by that slut Myrina?  Talk, and perhaps I 
won't use this."

"Y-yes," breathed the captive girl. "Then we'd help Myrina 
and her daughters finish the wounded and use hand weapons on 
your dead bodies, so that the marks of the arrow wouldn't 
show."

"And proclaim to the people that they'd slain us in fair 
fight, eh?"

"Y-yes," the black girl admitted.  "Where is my sword-
sister?"

For answer, Hunda clapped one hand over the girl's sensuous 
lips and pulled her head back; with the other, she plunged 
the dagger into her captive's kidney as the girl's eyes wide.  
She tried to scream, eyes wide, but only muffled cries 
emerged as she struggled, naked brown legs kicking wildly, 
her hands gripping Hunda's forearm as the older woman 
maintained her grip on her mouth.  Her eyelids fluttered, 
slipped shut, and she sighed sweetly as her beautiful body 
relaxed and went limp in Hunda's arms.

Hunda slowly withdrew the dagger, wiped the blade on the 
girl's loincloth, and held it lightly to her victim's throat, 
savoring the warmth and limpness of her dark body.  But there 
was no need. She was safely dead.  "Shhh," she whispered. 
"Sleep tight.  I'll take you to your sister now."  She 
removed her hand from the dead girl's slack, parted lips, 
quickly turning her around and kissing her before tossing her 
over her shoulder, lifeless limbs dangling.  Her dead, naked 
breasts felt good on Hunda's muscular back, as she headed 
deeper into the woods.

"Where are they?"  muttered Myrina, impatiently waiting in 
the sun.   Suddenly Hunda strode into the arena, taking her 
position just in front of her five daughters.  She smiled, 
and held up a leopard's-tooth amulet and a leopard-skin 
loincloth.

"Recognize these?" she cried. "Your young Kushite sluts are 
dead -- and they've paid the price of your treachery."

Hunda tossed down the loincloth and hurled the amulet at her 
foes. "And now," she cried, thrusting upward with her 
glittering sword, "We'll really have a fair fight! -- to the 
death!"

"To the death!" echoed her daughters.  And the fight was on 
as the two sides rushed at each other, weapons flashing in 
the sun.  Myrina and Hunda led the way, each seeking out her 
hated archrival.

Of course, with the mercenary girls' corpses  already lying 
in the woods, Myrina's forces were outnumbered eight to 
seven.  And soon the odds were even greater.  While the other 
fourteen women paired off, Hunda's middle daughter, twenty-
year-old Antiope, dashed with her spear around the edge of 
the line, taking Myrina's eldest, Xantippe, on the flank.  As 
Xantippe dueled with Hunda's red-haired daughter Eppia, 
fending off her sword blows with her own spear and trying to 
throw her net, Antiope came up on her left side.  Seeing 
Myrina's daughter make  a backward draw on her net before 
hurling it over Eppia's weapon, Antiope stepped on it -- and 
as the surprised Xantippe turned to face her Eppia seized her 
chance and thrust her shortsword into her bare back.  The 
girl cried out, turning around to thrust wildly with her 
spear as Antiope grabbed the net with her shield-hand and 
suddenly yanked it -- and the girl still holding it -- up 
close, smashing away Xantippe's spear with her shield and 
thrusting her own sword into her enemy's naked belly above 
the navel.  Xantippe screamed once and fell to the sand, her 
shapely legs spread wide. "That one went toes and tits up," 
chortled Antiope.

Almost at the same instant, Hunda's force was reduced by one, 
as Myrina's next-1/4youngest daughter, the lithe, bronze-
skinned Acca, eagerly confronted the slave girl Idrana.  The 
naked slave fighter swung her shortsword in a wide arc as 
Acca, grinning, stepped back, but recovered before Myrina's 
daughter could take advantage of her unbalanced stance.  
Parrying Acca's own slash, she drew back for a blow aimed at 
the young girl's tanned, taut belly.  Before she could 
strike, Acca boldly hooked her own shield over Idrana's and 
pushed them both upward, exposing Idrana's belly and flank.  
She struck quickly, her sword piercing Idrana's olive skin 
under her ribs, driving upward into the lung.

The naked girl's face showed wide-eyed shock as blood flowed 
down her side and leg to the hot sand.   A horrible rasping 
noise came from her throat as she weakly raised her shield to 
protect herself. But Acca contemptuously smashed it aside 
again and, as the wounded Idrana spun away from her 
helplessly, stabbed her low  in the back. Idrana screamed, 
arching her back, her nude body quivering as Acca  again 
yanked out her bloody blade.  Then she relaxed and fell back 
to the sand, her dark curls partly obscuring her girlish face 
as her head lolled to the side with her last breath.  She 
kicked out once, and her bare foot gave a twitch,  but that 
was all.  Acca made a joyous leap into the air.  "Now I'll 
add your mistress Hunda to the pile!" she exulted.

Approaching as Acca gloated over her victim's lovely corpse, 
Hunda's own next-youngest, red-haired Hippolyte, took the 
seventeen-year-old with a spear-thrust to her shapely left 
breast, catching her even as her shield moved to parry 
Hippolyte's decoying net.  As she withdrew the spear dripping 
scarlet, the nearly naked brunette groaned and fell dead at 
her enemy's bare feet. Hippolyte, joyous over her first 
battle victory, gave her a perfunctory kick to the ribs, 
admiring her athletic body, and looked for new enemies to 
slay. 

On the other flank, Hunda's daughter Narcissa of the dark 
eyes battled sword to sword against Deena, one of Myrina's 
fierce blonde slave fighters.  She parried her blows and 
stabbed the tall nude woman between her ripe breasts.  
Withdrawing her weapon with a sudden jerk, she watched as the 
slave-girl dropped her sword and clutched at her bleeding 
chest, sinking to her knees.  She looked up at the 
pantherlike Narcissa as her enemy stabbed her again in the 
chest, downward.  Her eyes rolled back into her head, the 
lids slipping shut as she shuddered and fell back, her 
nerveless legs involuntarily  unfolding under her and 
spreading wide as she collapsed, exposing her shaven sex.   
Narcissa planted her foot on her victim's crotch and yanked 
the sword out.  

Suddenly she felt a rope net snaking from the rear over her 
head; she turned around and saw that it was wielded by 
Myrina's daughter Vibiana, the fierce, big-breasted blonde.   
She cried out and felt her leg give way under her in a flash 
of red pain, as Vibiana pulled back from her spear-thrust to 
Narcissa's thigh.  But as Vibiana moved forward again  to 
deal her enemy a death-blow, she was distracted by the 
eighteen-year-old Hippolyte, who brought her own net into 
play.  Narcissa felt Vibiana's net suddenly pulled away from 
her as a new fight began.   But for the moment she was in too 
much pain to do much more than watch.

Meanwhile sixteen-year-old Ariel, her long blonde hair and 
red loincloth flying as she whirled and lunged, was proving a 
formidable foe, her sword battering ferociously, 
relentlessly, on the brass shields of Molpadia and Hunda's 
own youngest, seventeen-year-old Clonia.  The latter, a slim 
black-haired girl with hair close-cropped like her mother's, 
was forced back despite her futile attempts to land a blow, 
then struck a blow to her right temple with Ariel's shield 
that sent her staggering away before dropping half-conscious 
to the sand.

But to Ariel's left appeared the bronzed form of Musa, one of 
Hunda's eighteen-year-old fighting slave girls.  She lunged 
forward, trying to thrust under Ariel's raised shield as the 
blonde girl fended off an overhand blow from Molpadia and 
simultaneously slashed at her bare belly.  Ariel quickly spun 
away and lowered the brass circle so that Musa's thrust 
glanced off, then caught the slave off-balance and struck 
upward with the shield, hitting her squarely on her shapely 
chin.  Musa stumbled, black eyes unfocused in her confusion.  
Ariel thrust home and quickly pulled her sword out as the 
rich red blood spouted from between Musa's firm breasts.  She 
cried out and fell onto her side, groaning, and suddenly went 
limp.  "Good work, mistress" shouted a slave girl from the 
sidelines. "One less of Hunda's sluts!"  As Molpadia stood 
back to catch her breath and realize that her belly had only 
been lightly nicked, Ariel quickly placed her bare foot on 
Musa's ribs and rolled her over roughly onto her back with a 
push, kicking her  exposed crotch for good measure.  
Satisfied that Hunda's girl was already dead or unconscious, 
the youngster resumed her whirling clash of steel with 
Molpadia.   

Through her fog of pain, Narcissa saw blonde Deena lifting 
herself up into a sitting position.  Despite the pain from 
her leg wound, and forgetting her weapons in her new-found 
lust to destroy, she crawled over the hot arena sand to the 
wounded slave-girl, who moaned as she bled into the sand.  
She looked up to notice her dark-eyed enemy, fear flaring up 
into her blue eyes just as Narcissa pushed her onto her back.   
She straddled her and covering her mouth and nose with her 
hand, squeezed her throat with the other as she pressed her 
blonde head into the sand. 

Deena struggled feebly, her cries stifled, Narcissa watching 
with interest as her blue eyes lost focus and slipped shut, 
and her tensed legs suddenly relaxed and parted.  Her hands 
flopped to her sides, and Narcissa felt her body go limp 
under her.  Narcissa waited a while, then removed her hand 
from the dead girl's  mouth and collapsed atop her, face 
against her victim's moist breast, hearing no heartbeat as 
she listened to the din of the battle around her.   After a 
few moments, she rose, her pain forgotten, and began 
stripping her victim of her leather belt, fashioning it into 
a tourniquet around her thigh.  She seized Deena's weapons,  
and staggered to her feet.

Evidently instructed to act  as a bodyguard, the blonde slave 
Ajaxa had sought to guard Myrina's flank as her mistress 
dealt with Hunda.  But Hunda caught her off guard by feinting 
at Myrina and then whirling to run Ajaxa entirely through the 
body above the navel with a powerful thrust that split open 
her leather waistbelt.  Hunda pulled her sword out and turned 
to her left to catch an overhand chop from Myrina on her 
shield as the groaning Ajaxa, holding her belly-wound, 
staggered away naked, out of the fight.  Dropping her arms to 
her sides, legs wobbling, the tall girl wandered over to the 
wall.  She slumped down against it into a sitting posture, 
leaving a bright red smear against the whitewashed wall and 
presenting a fine view between her long,  parted legs.  

With sheer hatred joined to the lust for survival, the duel 
between Hunda and Myrina was perhaps the most ferocious seen 
in the arena's thirty years of existence.  Sparks flew from 
sword and shield as they thrust and hacked and parry, each 
trying to force her way within her enemy's defenses for a 
death-blow, neither yielding more than a step or two at a 
time, their bare feet churning up the well-raked sand of a 
small circle within the arena.  Sweat flowed from their 
bodies.  At one point both paused as if to catch their breath 
and adjust their grip on sweat-slick sword grips, but even 
then they fought with words.

"I'll lay you out dead and naked, woman," breathed Hunda.  
"And your girls too."

"My girls will be too busy stripping your daughters' corpses, 
slut!" replied Myrina.

Hunda replied with a downward slash that cut the strap 
between Myrina's breastplates, and they fell away to expose 
her impressive breasts.  Undeterred by this close call, 
Myrina lunged forward with her short sword -- too recklessly, 
as Hunda parried and nicked the exposed sword-arm above the 
elbow.  With a cry of pain, Myrina swung her own shield to 
protect herself, forcing Hunda to dodge back.  The raven-
haired woman laughed as Hunda stumbled and fell, and advance, 
her sword-arm raised for a crippling slash.

But the muscular blonde instantly recovered, springing up 
into a low crouch  and thrusting forward her own sword up as 
Myrina lunged upward, her shield carelessly held to one side.  
The blade entered Myrina's naked flesh just below her left 
breast, well in.  She straightened up with a savage cry as 
the two women stood connected by the steel blade, which now 
dripped red.

Myrina looked at Hunda with a mixture of pain and surprise on 
her beautiful, sweaty face.  Then her head nodded weakly.  
"Hunda..." she whispered, already sinking into her death-
swoon.

"Dead and naked, bitch..." whispered Hunda.  She pulled out 
her sword and Myrina cried out again, softly this time, as 
she dropped her weapon and shield.  She sighed girlishly and 
swayed backward, limbs unstrung, and crashed backward like a 
great tree, her arms and legs bouncing and flopping back upon 
impact, breasts jiggling.  She lay in the dust, her 
magnificent body sweaty and half-naked, legs spread wide and 
bare feet canted outward, her helmeted head turned to the 
side, eyes and mouth half-open -- dead.

"No!" screamed Vibiana, as Hunda quickly knelt and dealt the 
already-dead Myrina a second thrust beneath her left armpit.  
She began to rush toward the older woman.  But with all but 
one of her sisters fallen, Hunda's daughters were free to 
combine against her or Ariel as they chose.  As Vibiana 
turned away from young Hippolyte, Eppia seized her net and 
Clonia, rallying from her head-blow, stabbed her in the side.  
As she cried out and dropped her spear, her first opponent 
approached Vibiana while Eppia and Clonia grabbed her arms.  
As she struggled, the eighteen-year-old redhead put her hand 
on her shoulder, looked her in the eye and plunged a spear 
into her bare belly, then withdrew it as her sisters released 
her prey.  The twenty-year-old blonde dropped to her knees 
groaning, head thrown back.  Then her nearly naked body 
slumped forward with a sigh and relaxed, her slack lips 
resting on Hippolyte's naked foot.  The redhead  raised her 
weapon in triumph and placed her other foot gently on the 
dead girl's blonde head.  

Hunda, satisfied that she had killed Myrina, had immediately 
looked to the safety of her daughters.  But as she saw 
Vibiana fall, and the reviving Xantippe groggily sit up --- 
only to fall back dead with a sleepy moan after a smiling  
Antiope lifted up her limp arm to thrust a dagger-blade into 
her armpit --  she knew the situation was well in hand.  
Seeing that Molpadia was holding her own against Ariel, and 
that Narcissa was not badly hurt, she contented herself with 
pushing the leather strips of the dead Myrina's armored skirt 
up with her toe,  exposing her privates and parted thighs.  
"Well fought, Myrina," she admitted.

Now encircled by all five of Hunda's daughters, even the 
wounded Narcissa, young Ariel fought on, holding her enemies 
at bay with her flashing sword, turning and lunging at each 
in succession  -- until Clonia threw an ashwood spear 
squarely into her naked back.  She opened her mouth as if to 
scream, but only a gasping intake of breath could be heard as 
her blood dripped from the spear onto the warm sand.  She 
staggered dizzily toward Hunda, legs wobbly, blue eyes wide 
and staring, still gripping her sword. "I'll..." she rasped.

"You'll what, little bitch?" laughed Hunda.  The sword fell 
from Ariel's nerveless fingers, sticking upright in the sand.  
Her eyes rolled upward, lids closing, as she rocked back on 
her naked heels.  Then with  a sigh she crashed forward onto 
her beautiful face, arms at her sides, her lower legs arching 
up before flopping down limply, the spear quivering in her 
back.  She lay quite still.

As Hunda surveyed the nine nude or nearly nude female bodies 
slumped or sprawled across the arena floor, young Clonia 
advanced, planted her bare foot on the back of Ariel's neck, 
and pulled out the reddened spear with a grunt.  She looked 
at her mother, eyes gleaming, girlish voice fierce with 
exultation. "The last of Myrina's brood is dead."  She rolled 
the slim pale body over, kicked Ariel's legs apart, and 
yanked off the dead girl's red loincloth, leaving her wearing 
only a slim gold chain about her waist.

"Then let us treat them as arena losers should be treated," 
intoned Hunda, her foot on the dead Myrina's naked breast.  
She removed her own helmet, exposing her short-cropped blonde 
hair, and wiped her brow, accepting a drink from a goblet 
brought by a kneeling slave-girl before kneeling to straddle 
Myrina's corpse and close her eyes.  As per arena ritual, she 
cut the chin strap of the dead woman's helmet with her 
dagger.  She yanked off the helmet, letting Myrina's sweaty 
black curls spill free as her limp head lolled back, and 
struck  her on the left temple  with a small bronze-headed 
rod to crack the skull, though here it was mostly a symbolic 
death blow.  Then she took her in her arms and bent to kiss 
Myrina fiercely on her warm, slack lips -- a victor's kiss -- 
before lowering her gently back into the dust.

She proceeded to the pleasant task of stripping her dead foe 
of her armor, and soon Myrina lay stark naked in the dirt.  
Hunda admired the firm, muscled body, noting each battle scar 
with a professional's eye -- along with the fresh death-wound 
she had inflicted beneath Myrina's firm left breast.  "Not 
bad for forty  summers," she brooded. "But then, I'm not so 
bad myself."

 Despite Myrina's boast, her daughters would do no stripping 
of corpses today.  They were all dead.

Giggling and gossiping about their dead foes' boyfriends and 
bodies, Hunda's own daughters busied themselves in knocking 
each of Myrina's girls on the head with small wooden clubs 
provided by their maidservants, then seizing their bare heels 
and dragging the four bodies off to the side of the arena.  
They were laid out near the wall and stripped naked, and 
after personally dragging Myrina's nude corpse by her feet to 
lie alongside blonde Vibiana, Hunda paused to examine each of 
the dead girls.

She gazed  down at young Ariel, who looked even lovelier than 
before as she lay open-mouthed and naked in death.  Admiring 
her small firm breasts, she pushed the girl's lolling head to 
one side with a naked foot on her jaw.  "Tonight, you'll each 
have a dead enemy to use as your couch-pillow at the banquet, 
and  to sleep at the foot of your bed -- or alongside you, as 
you choose.  They are your proper prizes and trophies.   
That'll toughen you up.  Remember, not all enemies will be as 
easy to take as these sluts."

"Ha!" Antiope grabbed Acca's black, curly hair and pulled her 
into a seated position, bare breasts jiggling, face slack. 
"I'll take this one."  She released her hold and let the 
olive-skinned  Acca fall back with a thump into the dust.

"But there are only five bodies, and six of us!"  objected 
Clonia. 

"Never fear, daughter," chided Hunda, as she bound Narcissa's 
wounded thigh.   "You've forgotten about the two black girls.  
One of you can take both of them, and I assure you that 
they're both quite beautiful.  You, Clonia, take Ariel, since 
you're both the youngest.  I'll take Myrina."   She strode 
proudly over to the latter's scarred, shapely body, planting 
her bare foot again firmly between Myrina's big breasts. 
"After all, I've waited a long time for this."  It was 
actually hard to believe, but it was true.  They were all 
dead -- dead and naked at her feet.

Of course, her own side had lost two fighters, who had been 
laid out near the others.  She carefully examined the naked, 
tawny bodies of Musa and Idrana, slapping their faces and 
breasts and feeling carefully for a pulse, planning to 
quietly dispatch them should they prove alive but too badly 
wounded to survive as fighters. "Dead," she muttered, with 
some relief.  With a rueful sigh, she reached down a hand to 
each, seizing the belts at their waists.  Straightening up 
effortlessly, she dragged the breathless nudes to a nearby 
cart, their heads dangling back, eyes closed and mouths open, 
dusty bare heels dragging in the sand.  "You girls are an 
awful lot of trouble," she said scoldingly. "But your 
mistress is supposed to take care of you, and I can't just 
leave you lying around here naked."  So Hunda personally 
lifted their nude bodies into a waiting cart.  Though slaves, 
they had fallen in her service and would also attend 
tonight's banquet, limply adorning a single couch.

As for Myrina's two fallen, rented blondes, their owner would 
just have to take the loss.  The one against the wall 
actually showed signs of life as Hunda approached, drawing up 
her legs and opening her eyes and raising her head, to weakly 
whisper, "I surrender...." Hunda swung her hammer downward: a 
dull thud and a groaned "Uh!" and Ajaxa's head again slumped 
forward, as her long naked legs stretched out and parted in 
death to expose her sex.  Hunda ordered the dead blondes 
tossed into the same cart holding Musa and Idrana, the 
wounded Narcissa being comfortably laid out atop the slaves' 
naked bodies.  She would drop the bodies off with the belts 
and weapons later, as a professional courtesy.

Myrina's five weeping slave-girls were forced to rake and 
clean up the bloody  arena -- then lined up and  knocked 
unconscious with clubs as Hunda and her daughters formally 
took possession of them.  As prearranged, the dead losers had 
forfeited their property to the winners.  The unconscious 
maids were stripped of their short tunics by Hunda's own 
mocking slave-girls, their thumbs and big toes tied together 
with rawhide, and they were slung nude over the backs of the 
dead women's horses -- also Hunda's property.  Each of the 
dead mercenary girls was soon brought in, slung butt-up over 
her own horse, a slave girl thoughtfully brushing the fine 
sand from each silken brown bottom.  Eleven bodies in all.

Besides sealing their wounds, Hunda's own slave-girls would 
have the task of washing, oiling, and perfuming the lifeless 
bodies of Myrina's nude daughters, to which they now gave a 
brief sponging off before loading them roughly into a second 
two-wheeled cart, bare feet sticking out over the edge of its 
bed.  Waving away her slaves, Hunda personally heaved 
Myrina's body over her shoulder and dumped her into the cart 
into a sitting position behind the driver's seat, legs spread 
wide.  Though heavy, her muscular, naked corpse had made a 
pleasant weight on the shoulder, her full breasts feeling 
even better than those of the Kushite maiden. 

With the four dead fighting slaves and Narcissa in the lead 
wagon, Hunda gave the signal, again grinning from ear to ear, 
and the victorious fighters set out for home.  The rearward 
cart jostled the five stripped bodies of Myrina's extinct 
clan, and Myrina's beautiful black-curled head seemed to nod 
as it slumped sullenly on her massive chest.  Hunda let her 
horse fall back from the column to inspect her stark-naked 
prize.  She sat flanked by the seated, nude corpses of 
daughters Acca and Vibiana, the first with her chin resting 
on Myrina's shoulder, the other slumping with parted lips 
touching the dead matriarch's breast, while to Vibiana's left 
Xantippe sat with limp head thrown back and mouth open.  
Stretched out naked over the others' legs, the cart jostling 
her pale feet as they dangled lifelessly at an angle over the 
wagon bed, young Ariel lay  peacefully on her back, lips 
parted, with her blonde head in Xantippe's lap.   Glancing 
only briefly at each of the four dead girls,  Hunda silently 
regarded her fallen archfoe.

A treacherous bitch to share one's bed with, she thought.  
But I don't think she'll give much trouble tonight.