This is an entirely fictional story. It is Historical Fantasy set in the Early Victorian Era. It involves graphic M/M sex between teenagers, and between adults and teens. The sex is sometimes romantic, sometimes rough with an authoritarian, medical, or BDSM bent. Because this is a different time period and there may be magic involved, things may happen that should not be attempted in modern real life. Protect yourself and your health by using PReP and condoms and do not try these things at home.

If you are a minor, or think something in this story might bother or offend you, or violate the laws of your locality, then do not read any further. If you enjoy this sort of thing, rock on, and feel free to email me with encouragement at taxandros@protonmail.com. And, as always, don't forget to donate to Nifty to keep this great site going.

_______________________________________

Topping the Duke (Chapter One - Darkness)

July 6th, 1840

St. Dafydd's Colliery, Llanelli, Wales

Bran worked his way down the tunnel in the pitch black. Oppressive and absolute, the darkness made him feel as if he had died already, and that his soul had been consigned to a cramped, stifling, lightless Hell made of coal dust and despair.

Even worse, The Cyhyraeth's keening had set Bran's heart hammering. The formless spirit moaned in the dark depths, a doleful warning of death to come. He knew her song well. He'd heard it often down below: a dire portent that haunted him before each rock fall or bank collapse or explosion of fire damp. Sometimes, he'd even heard it outside the mine.

She had moaned outside Driscoll's rowhouse one dismal November eve. The next morning Driscoll's best mate had slipped on the ice-encrusted stoop and brained himself on the cobbled street. When he was four years old, Bran had heard the Cyhyraeth outside his mother's brothel in Carmarthen. That night, the madam had died of apoplexy. Her replacement insisted that all the working girls remain childless. Bran was sent away, apprenticed to a cotton mill.

He never saw his mother again.

Now, the Cyhyraeth moaned in his ears as the stifling air from the small tunnel behind him mingled with the air from the ventilation shaft near the main bank. The breeze tugged at him like the steamy inhalation of a cruel and monstrous dragon preparing to swallow him whole. He shivered at the sensation, and tamped down the urge to unbuckle the chain that tied him to the dramming sled and run screaming back to the cage.

There was nothing for it.

Driscoll was English. He didn't believe in dragons or spirits or faeries. If Bran hauled less than a full day, Driscoll would beat and bugger him senseless. So, Bran kept going, heading for the lamps used by the men in his butty.

He was glad for the light. He'd run out of candles two days ago, and he wouldn't get another brace from Driscoll until next week. Bran nodded a greeting to the men as he moved through the glowing pool cast by the lanterns. He wondered if they'd heard the spirit's moaning.

Probably not. No one else had ever heard her. He paused to hitch the tattered, waterlogged breeches higher up on his narrow hips before he stepped up to the coal face and began filling his empty tub.

Mr. Jones, the leader of their butty, looked up from hewing at the bank and offered him a kind smile. "Ready for another load, are you?"

Jones' eldest son snickered at his father's innocent remark. Marc knew of the true nature of Bran's indenture to Driscoll. He'd seen the state Bran was in after Driscoll got through with him in the cage.

Bran put his head down, hefting chunk after chunk of coal into the tub atop his sled. As he worked, the other miners in the butty set their tools down, backing away from their work. They were sinewy men, naked from the waist up. Sweat drew glistening lines down through the coal dust coating their torsos. Looking at them for too long made Bran feel a strange fire in his blood.

He swallowed hard as the men gathered around a lantern and drew their lunch pails out from where ever they'd been stowed. Driscoll was as stingy with food as he was with candles, so Bran's stomach gave a growl loud enough for them all to hear. Marc snickered and stuck his tongue out at Bran, one hand cupping his prick. He knew what Driscoll really fed Bran.

Mr. Jones gave his son a stern look, and then extended a slice of buttered bread out to the little drammer. "God bless you, my boy."

Bran smiled as he took the bread, even as he felt the rage boil up in his veins.

God had never blessed him. Not from the moment of his birth. Not when his poxy slattern of a mother swore he was a puny crimbil, a changeling left by the faeries. Not when she sold him off to scavenge under the gnashing gears and wheels of the clattering mechanical mule at the mill. Not when Driscoll assumed his indenture, because the law had changed, and the mill could no longer employ an eight-year-old. And especially not when Driscoll sent him to work the mine and consigned him to this Hell until he turned eighteen.

Even so, Bran appreciated Mr. Jones' kindness. Aside from the matron at the mill, few people had ever wished him well. He held onto the genuine warmth of the man. It was a candle against the gloom that lay ahead when his work was done and he returned to Driscoll's dreary rowhouse.

He hoped the Cyhyraeth hadn't been singing for Mr. Jones.

"Thank you, sir." Bran gobbled the bread down as quickly as he could. The tub was full, and there was still enough coal piled up to fill it twice more. Bran dragged his dram away from the oasis of light.

The load was heavy. The belt cut into his bony hips. He went down onto his hands and knees, fingers digging in, legs and back straining to move the dram up the tunnel into the suffocating darkness. He could hear the spirit groaning a low harmony with his labored breaths.

The tunnel opened up as Bran reached the horseway. He could finally stand again. To his right, an oil lamp swayed with the movement of a cart, silhouetting the ears and head of a pony. He heard the jingle of harness and smelled the yeasty, grassy tang of horse. He tied a metal motty to the tub, so that he could be paid for what he'd hauled--or so Driscoll could. Bran never saw a single farthing.

"Bran?" the lad leading the pony called out to him. He was on the far side of the animal, but Bran caught a glint of lantern light on blonde hair past the dark mane of the pony. It was Nat Jones, Marc's younger brother.

"Aye?" Bran replied, wary. Despite the gruff kindness their father had always shown him, the Jones brothers had bullied him relentlessly.

Even though he had turned fifteen last May, Bran was still small and slight, scarcely bigger than a trap boy. He had no family, and so he'd had to beg and scrape to get this work as a drammer. No butty would take him, until Mr. Jones took pity on him and convinced the other colliers to accept Bran onto the crew.

It took every whisper of strength left in him to make his quota every day. On the days after Driscoll had been unusually rough, Bran simply couldn't perform up to snuff. Those days, the entire butty lost a share of their wages, and Mr. Jones suffered for his charity. He took the brunt of the complaints from the others on the butty. His sons passed their displeasure onto Bran whenever they could.

"You're wanted at the pit bottom, you are," Nat called out.

"Says who?"

"'Mr. Driscoll's shoutin' for you at the cage. Says Mr. Champness is askin' after you." As if to emphasize the fact that the mine owner himself required him, Nat moved around the pony and helped Bran lift the tub onto the cart. He was two years younger than Bran, but a head taller and much broader.

Bran frowned and unbuckled the belt that tied him to the dram and set the sled against the stop so it didn't backslide down the tunnel.

Nat pulled the halter and the horse clopped along in the watery slime that lined the center of the horseway. Bran moved along with the light, preferring it to the darkness, despite the company of Nat. When they reached the pit bottom, a large, barrel-chested figure detached from the gloom around the cage. Driscoll. "There you are, you little goblin."

Bran groaned. "Mr. Driscoll."

"Come here, lad." The big man's voice was stern and threatening.

Bran winced and cringed. He had to force himself to continue towards the lanterns at the cage, lest he dart back down the roadway to hide in the tunnel. Driscoll would beat him worse if he ran. Each step was like walking in knee-deep mud.

When he drew close, he saw the thin line of white between the dark lines of Driscoll's beard. The man was smiling. "Get in the cage."

Bran shuddered, swallowing hard. He stepped into the metal contraption. Driscoll stepped in behind him and shouted to the bottom steward, who signaled the engineman. The winding gears moaned, and then clattered loudly and in their mechanical music he heard the song of the Cyhyraeth again.

The cage lifted, swaying with their weight in its long, slow ascent to the top of the shaft. Bran pressed his face to the bars of the cage and watched the lantern light dwindle.

As the inky gloom swallowed them, he prayed that what Nat had said was true: Mr. Champness really did want him, for some inconceivable reason. Perhaps, if that were true, Driscoll wouldn't--

His hopes were dashed when Driscoll laid a heavy, rough hand on the back of his neck, chuckling as Bran tensed. His hand slid around, his callused fingers squeezing just below the jawline: a subtle threat if Driscoll did not emerge from the cage pleased. The heat of Driscoll's woolen trousers ground against Bran's naked back. "Bend over, boy." Driscoll's thick, tobacco-stained fingers slid between Bran's lips. "You know what I want."

Bran did as he was told, mouth opening. He heard the rustle of clothing as Driscoll unbuttoned his flap, and tasted the sour grime on Driscoll's fingers. "Get them wet," Driscoll growled. "Or you'll take me dry."

Bran did as he was told, slobbering all over the callused pads and bony knuckles as Driscoll used his other hand to yank Bran's breeches down to his knees. Driscoll removed his fingers abruptly and plunged them into the cleft between Bran's buttocks, sliming up the region as he searched for the entrance. Bran groaned as they invaded him, roughly and without preamble. Driscoll poked him with the digits until they ran dry, then thrust his fingers back into Bran's mouth for another load of saliva.

Bran grimaced at the bitter taste of his own nethers, but did not dare turn away. He obediently did what he could to help Driscoll prepare him for what came next, as the alternative was far, far worse. By and by, Driscoll seemed satisfied and Bran felt the heat of Driscoll's prick slide along his cleft until the heavy, slick head rested against the entrance.

Bran braced himself, clinging tightly to the bars of the cage. His cry of anguish was lost in the darkness as Driscoll buried himself to the root in one fell thrust. Bran tried to get away from the pain, to climb through the bars, but they were every bit as rigid and unforgiving as Driscoll. His thrashing served only to excite the man more.

"You're so bloody tight," Driscoll groaned. "It's been years, and you're always as tight as a virgin, every time."

Bran had no explanation for it, either. He had always healed quickly, much more quickly than anyone else. He had even grown back the tip of a finger he had lost the first week he was at the mill. Perhaps he was a crimbal, after all.

"So bloody tight," Driscoll crooned. By his tone, he enjoyed this every bit as much as Bran despised it. His wiry pubic hair scraped Bran's arse as he ground in deep. His big hands clutched the boy's bony hips, and he began to stitch in and out with abandon.

It hurt, but it also teased against something inside of Bran that made his own cock struggle awake into a limp half-stand. He was never sure what to make of this. Bran hated being buggered, and especially by Driscoll, but there was a pleasurable glow that diffused through him when his own member woke up. It pushed back the pain, so that it was tolerable. When Driscoll was at the right angle, it was even enjoyable.

Since they were in the dark, and Driscoll could not see what he was up to, Bran finally mustered the courage to take hold of himself. He stroked experimentally, the way he was sometimes ordered to frig Driscoll or his mates before they had their way with him.

A shudder ran through him at the delicious sensation. A soft moan escaped him, lost in the clatter of the ascending cage. His shaft grew harder, and he squeezed tighter, increasing his speed as the wonderful friction lighted a blaze in his belly that swept away the pain of Driscoll's invasion. Images of Mr. Jones' kind smile and half-naked torso flitted through his mind.

"What are you up to?" Driscoll growled, seeming to sense Bran's relaxation. Perhaps without the pain he was not clenching as tightly. "Are you wanking yourself, you filthy little cheat?"

Driscoll slammed his big fist against Bran's temple, sending stars across his vision, making him lose his grip on the cage bar. His face clanged into the hard iron, his nose sending an excruciating jolt through his skull that kept him from swooning at what Driscoll's fist had done. Driscoll clawed at Bran/s arm and tore his hand away from that warm, willing flesh. "You're my apprentice. You serve me, boy. Don't you ever go touching yourself, or I'll take the strap to you again. Understand?"

"Aye." Bran's voice sounded thin and reedy in his ears. He fumbled around until he could get both hands on the bars to steady himself. He thrust his bum out, trying at least to find that pleasant angle.

Driscoll slapped the side of his face savagely. "Aye, what? Treat me with respect, you little bugger."

"Aye, sir," Bran mumbled, clenching down on that thick, angry spike impaling him, putting all his effort into pleasing his master, so that this torment could be over.

Oh, how he loathed the darkness.