He’d lived a little.
But given what he had already experienced at this place called Gomorrah, he was starting to feel like an infant who was still in swaddling.
Upon entering the mysterious establishment, they had masks put on their faces and were told that at Gomorrah, every man lived a fantasy. That meant you weren’t to give your real name, nor were you to ever remove your mask. This was a place with no names, no past, and no future. A man, or a woman, could do as he, or she, pleased. Nothing was off limits.
Andreas was about to see just what that meant.
It wasn’t just the lavish food that impressed him. He’d been to plenty of feasts that had been far more lavish and better attended, although he had to admit that there were dishes presented that even he had never seen before. He’d managed to taste quite a bit of it before Theodis had dragged him off. Then, they had passed by the cells where prostitutes were doing what prostitutes did and men were enjoying every minute of it.
After that, they’d moved into a rather large chamber that was filled with people who were dancing to very good music. But it wasn’t so much dancing as it was publicly fondling one another. Sure, they were dancing in the literal sense, but he saw more than one man grab a woman’s breast uninvited or another pull a woman into his embrace so he could suckle on her neck.
It was sexual debauchery without restraint.
As they watched the dancing, they had been brought drinks by a servant dressed in transparent clothing who had served them a heavily mulled wine that, Andreas thought, had something else in it that made his head swim. When he realized that the wine was spiked with something unpleasant, he went for ale that seemed to be free of any kind of stimulant. Tor and William followed his lead, as they weren’t too thrilled with the wine, either.
Theodis wasn’t even drinking. They’d lost him when he ran out onto the dance floor and grabbed a woman to dance with, who quite happily appreciated his company. But he didn’t try to kiss her or caress body parts. He simply wanted to dance and she was more than happy to comply. He was a perfect gentleman, in truth, and the girl apparently grew bored with his good behavior and moved on with another partner who stuck his hand down her bodice.
But Theodis took it in stride. He left the throng of dancers and took his friends into yet another corridor that led to a chamber that was probably the most outrageous thing Andreas had ever seen. It was full of men, and even some women, all focused on a woman who sat on a table at one end of the chamber.
The woman was quite lovely and she was dressed like a queen. All of the men in the room seemed to be very excited about her presence and Andreas had no idea why until the woman laid back on the table and spread her legs, knees bent, as a man stood next to her with a big bunch of red grapes. As Andreas and the others watched in fascination and curiosity, the woman promptly shoved a grape into her woman’s center and, as the men cheered wildly, shot the grape out and into the crowd of men.
The roar of their approval was deafening.
Andreas couldn’t help it; he started laughing. Tor and William, too. They were all laughing heartily as the woman shot grape after grape from her private parts, and the men who were so enthusiastically waiting for every single grape were trying to catch them in their mouths. The woman was very good with her aim and she was able to shoot it into a mouth more often than not.
It was the wildest thing Andreas had ever seen.
A woman who could shoot grapes across the room from a body part meant to pleasure a man and birth children.
They watched the grape lady for quite some time and Andreas began to wonder how he was going to explain such a thing to his stepmother and grandmother. He wasn’t looking at it from a sexual standpoint, but rather from a standpoint of skill. The grape lady had a good amount of skill to be able to shoot those grapes out from between her legs with such accuracy. He thought it was quite fascinating but realized quickly that his beloved stepmother and adoring grandmother would not be so fascinated.
They would probably box his ears for being so lewd.
When the novelty of the grape lady faded, Theodis move them away from the performance. He also moved them because the audience was becoming quite rowdy and a fight erupted. When the fists started to fly, the four of them moved into another corridor that took them back to the chamber where everyone was still dancing. There were a few doorways off of that chamber and they picked one, ending up in an incredibly tame chamber given the riotous nature of the establishment. Men were simply sitting around, drinking ale and listening to a woman sing as a man accompanied her on his harp.
Andreas with more comfortable in this room than he had been in any of the others, so he found a place to sit along with Tor and William and Theodis, and the four of them listened to the music and sampled a few good ales that the servants provided for them. The alcohol in this chamber didn’t seem to be spiked.
“So,” Andreas said, smacking his lips as he tasted an ale that had hints of apples in it. “I think you really did bring us to Sodom and Gomorrah, Tay.”
Theodis grinned. “Only the best for my dearest friends.”
Andreas cocked an eyebrow. “If you do this for your dearest friends, I would hate to see what you would do for an enemy.”
Theodis laughed, pouring more ale for them from a pitcher brought by a servant. “Truly, this is a festive place,” he said. “Where else can you see things you would not normally see outside of Paris?”
William, seated on Andreas’ other side, smacked his lips at the surprisingly good ale. “So this is the Roman temple, is it?” he asked. “I had no idea it would be so elaborate.”
Theodis nodded his head. “Indeed, it is,” he said. “It was a temple dedicated to Eros.”
“The god of love,” William muttered. When the others looked at him with some surprise, he tapped his head. “I remember my education. Ancient gods and goddesses always fascinated me. But I doubt Eros could have imagined what the Hessians would do to his temple.”
They all started chuckling, remembering the grape lady when Theodis mockingly spread his legs. “That was… charming,” William said, lifting his eyebrows. “I’m sure her father must be proud.”
“Mayhap he is. Mayhap he’s the one who put her up to it.”
“Mayhap it’s her mother’s profession.”
Deeply, they laughed. “Can you imagine what childbirth will be like for her?” Andreas asked. “The midwife will have to stand back from the bed and catch the infant as it shoots out into the room.”
“Mayhap she’ll catch it in her mouth,” Theodis said.
That brought more laughter and more drinking. The woman singing the lovely songs had a haunting voice, made more haunting by the harp that accompanied her. A servant brought around some food on a tray, food from the main feasting room. There were small tarts with beef and raisins, along with sweets. They were only supposed to take a few from each tray, as there were more people in the chamber listening to the woman’s lovely singing, but Andreas took the entire tray from the servant and he and William and Tor and Theodis made short work of it.
Now that they were away from the debauchery of the rest of the establishment, it really wasn’t so bad. Copper bowls in the corner of the chamber burned with peat, keeping the room nice and warm as they listened to the dulcet tones of the harp. There was a variety of ale and they sampled each one, enjoying the camaraderie in a peaceful moment. Times like this were rare for fighting men such as them, moments when their entire existence didn’t revolve around a life or death struggle.