In order of appearance and dialogue:

Ezra - Ennius
Chris - Caudex
Josiah - Junius
Buck - Petronius
Vin - Valerianus
JD - Terentius
Nathan - Novius

His skin was chafing against his tunic. Finest linen or no, it stuck fast to his body then rubbed against his sweat-dampened skin like the coarsest sackcloth. The night was pressing in so warm and humid that even standing up to cross the tent floor to get another cup of wine seemed like such a chore. Every tiny movement seemed to bring him out in a new wash of sweat. What he wouldn't give for a cool bath of water - or even a bucket and sponge. He was long past caring about how he could go about getting cool. Washing that rough, salty feeling from his skin was the only thing that mattered. One of Caesar's most trusted tribunes or no, right now he was just a man who needed to be cool and clean. The problem was, if there ever had been a bucket of cold, clean water in the whole of Caesar's camp, it was probably long gone by now. Nothing but a faded, cool, distant, fresh, long gone, cool memory...

Lying sprawled on his back on the heap of pillows he was supposed to be trying to sleep on, Ennius looked down at his sweating length with a sigh, his critical gaze paying particular attention to his ever dampening tunic. Finest linen or no, soon it would be nothing more than a wet rag clinging to its dehydrated master. Resignedly, he decided to take it off, stand up off the pillows and pull it over his head. He looked at his legs; they didn't look like they were in a mood to comply. He looked at the floor; it was doing it's best to be inviting. Marshalling his feet under him, he hauled himself up with a groan, sweating all the way. Then he just stood there sagging, his arms feeling like lead weights.

"Look," he addressed his arms sweetly, "the sooner we remove this clinging travesty that used to be our best tunic, the sooner we can get a cup of wine and go back to sprawling. I know you liked sprawling. I liked it too."

It took a moment, but soon, grudgingly, his arms complied. Unfortunately, the kiss of air that almost cooled his flushed skin in the wake of the sticky linen was altogether too short lived and only made him hungry for more.

His gaze rested speculatively on the earthen vessel of red wine sitting across the tent. The wine in the large dolia, which came up to his waist in height, was from the finest store and was given to him by Caesar himself. Well, technically, only one seventh of it was his, the remainder belonging to the other six officers in his elite cohort. Ennius continued to eye the dolia a moment longer before pouncing on it, wrenching off the top and dunking his head straight in before flicking back up to feel the cool liquid run down his body.

It felt so good he almost had an orgasm.

As the rivulets of wine warmed on his skin, he wanted more. Nothing could have stopped him dunking his head in again and again then using the large serving ladle looped over one of the handles of the dolia to pour wine over his chest and back. Before he knew it, half the wine had gone and he didn't care. If the other six wanted their wine so badly, they should have drank if before now. He was nodding at the wisdom of this thought when there was a gust a warm air behind him and he turned to find Caudex standing just within the entrance of the tent, staring at him. As the other five men in their group tumbled in behind, all rather inebriated judging by their reeling strides, they too all stopped to stare.

"Good evening, gentleman." Ennius smiled, edging behind the dolia's wide girth. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"Give us our wine," Junius responded, wasting no time in staggering forwards and dragging Petronius with him to take hold of the dolia's handles.

"Ennius, why haven't you got any clothes on?" Petronius asked drunkenly, staring down at Ennius' naked length - but Junius was busy staring elsewhere.

"Where'd all the wine go?" he asked into the dolia before scowling up at Ennius. "Where'd all the wine go?" he repeated with a growl then, eyes narrowing on Ennius' neck, he leaned over to deliberately lick at the drops of wine that had gathered in the hollow of Ennius' left collarbone. "Not bad." He nodded then moved Ennius around so he could lick the wine from the right hollow.

"Caudex," Petronius called back to the others while Ennius tried to move away from Junius' busy tongue without success. "He's wearing our wine."

"All of it?" Valerianus queried from where he stood holding up Terentius.

"Nope," Petronius answered. "But more than his own share."

"He's wearing my share," Junius muttered, busily cleaning Ennius' right nipple.

Petronius looked at the dolia then at Ennius.

Ennius shook his head slightly, but Petronius called out a cheery, "He's wearing my share too!" before proceeding to race Junius' tongue over the rest of Ennius' chest.

"Gentlemen, please," Ennius said, trying to push the busy heads off then looking helplessly over at the others who were still frowning from the tent entrance. "Could someone show a little sober maturity here and-"

"You know," Valerianus broke in, propping Terentius up against Novius. "I think I see a splash of my wine running down your hip, Ennius. Just there." He moved in to kneel down and catch a particularly fat trickle of wine with his tongue before going on to follow its brethren rolling down Ennius' thigh.

"Stop it, now just- Petronius don't- Junius, please-" Ennius tried to dodge and push them away but their persistent tongues followed him across the room, licking him anywhere he couldn't knock them away from fast enough. "Caudex!" Ennius looked imploringly at their de facto leader but he was busy inspecting the wine dolia with Novius and Terentius.

"You brought this on yourself, Ennius," Caudex replied in a preoccupied tone.

"Stop that!" Ennius yelped at a lick in a particularly personal place. "Why don't you just lick it of the floor!" He was trying to swat Petronius and Valerianus away from their intense exploration of his thighs and ass when something warm, wet and very demanding wrapped tightly around his growing arousal. Closing his eyes, he was talking himself into ignoring the whole situation and hoping it would go away, when Junius sucked so hard, his knees buckled.

Luckily, Petronius and Valerianus were only too happy to ease him down onto the pile of pillows, arranging his limbs for further exploration while Junius continued to suckle on his rapidly hardening erection. Just when Ennius thought he couldn't take any more licks of hot tongues followed by kisses of cool air, he looked up to find Caudex grinning down at him with a ladle full of wine paused in his hand.

"Caudex, do-" Ennius began, but then he was lost in the sudden overwhelming sensation of cool liquid and hot flesh battling over his body. Tongues were all over him then, licking every inch of his trembling length and it was all he could do to hold off his orgasm until Caudex's wine sweetened mouth found his own for a searing kiss.

End