Dangerous

by Sharon Green

  "See how nicely this outfit does?" he said as he stepped closer to slip his left hand into the front of the vest and his right hand behind the "skirt's" front panel. "You're covered well enough to protect the modesty of innocent free ladies, but you're still completely available to the man who owns you. I think having slaves dressed is a great idea."

  You would, Tain countered, but only in her mind. Her body was too busy wanting to squirm from the way Killen was touching her to actually put coherent words together, and she was too busy refusing to let herself move in that particular way. Anger was only a small help against the arousal she was being made to feel, but Tain wasn't about to refuse any kind of help.

  "All right, Kitten, now go and help the other girl put away the pots and bowls," Killen finally said as he stepped back. "My brother and I want to be out of here in no more than another ten minutes."

  It took a moment or two before Tain could move from where she stood, and the amusement in Killen's eyes said he knew why. There wasn't enough left of that insertion to give her real trouble, only enough to make her extremely uncomfortable and open to … suggestion. Killen's hands had made the suggestion, and now she had the job of coping with it until the feelings faded. If they ever did.

  Walking over to Ennie showed that the girl had been given the same "clothing" Tain had, but Ennie wasn't looking at the matter in the same way.

  "It's not what I'm used to, but it's definitely better than being naked," the girl whispered from the crouch Tain joined her in as she began to pack away the pots and pan and bowls, a smile of satisfaction on her face. "Why are you looking so sour - and when are we going to escape from these beasts?"

  "I've been ordered not to try escaping," Tain murmured in answer, stopping Ennie from shoving everything into the pack just any old way. "I'm looking for a way around the order, but so far I haven't found one. The pan goes on the bottom, then the pots, then the stacked bowls. And don't mention escaping out loud again. Slaves who try to escape are tortured to death if they're caught, and even just talking about the subject can get you beaten."

  "That's stupid!" Ennie protested, more annoyed than upset. "Talking and doing are two different things, and I have the right to say anything I please. As long as I don't actually try to escape they can't - "

  "Shut up and listen to me!" Tain snapped, completely out of patience with the little fool. "Slaves don't have any rights and you're now a slave, a fact you'd better not be too stupid to get through your head. That man you've been messing with could kill you in cold blood in front of everyone on this world, and the only reaction the watchers would have would be to consider him a fool for throwing away whatever price he paid for you. He owns you, and what you were before you came here means absolutely nothing."

  "But - he'd never kill me," the girl protested again, coming up with a small, nervous laugh. "Most of the time he doesn't even try to keep me from saying anything I like, so you have to be wrong. He - "

  "He's letting you speak freely because he considers that the best and fastest way to get you trained," Tain interrupted again, distantly wondering why she was wasting her breath. "When you say or do something he disapproves of he punishes you, which teaches you not to say or do the same thing again. In just a little while you won't be doing or saying anything he doesn't want you to, and you'll think the actions - or lack of actions - are completely your choice. But what you'll really be is a well-trained slave, and once that happens you may never put the state completely behind you again… Do you have any idea what I'm talking about?"

  "Now I do," Ennie replied slowly, her gaze on something other than what was right in front of her. "Last night, when he took me into the tent… I expected him to give me the sex I needed right away, but he didn't. First he lit a candle and made me arrange the blankets we would be sleeping on, then he sat down and made me kneel in front of him. He also ordered me to make only small, almost soundless sounds, to keep from bothering the one who had you, you know?"

  Tain nodded in answer, but wasn't certain whether or not the girl saw her nod.

  "Once I was on my knees he told me I had to beg for what I wanted," Ennie continued in the same soft, distant voice. "I refused, of course, because someone like me doesn't ever have to beg for anything, and that was when he brought out that paddle again. He put me over his lap and paddled me hard, and that second session on top of the first really hurt. But all I could do was kick and squirm and make these ugly little sounds."

  Ennie's hands had been put flat on her middle to show her inner agitation, but Tain made no effort to interrupt a third time.

  "Once my bottom hurt so much I could barely stand it, he put me back on my knees," the girl went on, still not looking directly at Tain. "I also thought I'd die from the need I felt, and when he said again that I had to beg to be eased I … did it. Mostly I did it because I thought I meant something to him, more than I meant to almost anyone else. He wasn't letting me get away with the things everyone else did, so I had to mean more to him than just a slave he'd bought. But that isn't true, is it? He's training me as if I were a dog or something, and I don't mean anything to him at all."

  The girl's blue eyes were now on Tain, and the look in them wasn't flat and bored any longer. Pain was clear in those eyes, and while trying to think of what to say, Tain wondered if she wouldn't have been smarter to keep her big mouth shut.

  "All right, girls, we're ready to leave now," Killen suddenly interrupted as he took the pack holding the pots and things. "You two will walk a couple of feet behind the pack horses, but not too far behind. If for some reason you have to stop, you're to call out and let us know. Let's go."

  There was no way to consider Killen's words anything but direct orders, so both Tain and the girl rose from the crouch they'd been in near the pack and followed along behind. The tents and the rest of the gear was already loaded onto the pack horses, and once Killen added the last pack he went to his saddle horse and mounted. Tandro was already seated on his horse, and a minute later the two men were moving off through the woods. Since the pack horses' leads were attached to the men's saddles the pack horses followed, and last - as well as least - Tain and Ennie brought up the rear.

  Walking along behind the horses wasn't anything like a simple stroll through the woods. The men weren't setting a really hard pace, but Tain had to stretch a little to keep up and Ennie had to stretch more than a little. The girl wasn't in the best of shape, so it wasn't long before Ennie was breathing hard and beginning to sweat. But Ennie made no effort to say she couldn't keep up, which left Tain no choice but to ignore the girl's struggle. At least an hour went by before Ennie said anything at all, and then her words came as something of a surprise.

  "Aren't we ever going to get to some kind of road?" she put, very little in the way of complaint or demand in her voice. "Walking through this grass and these bushes is harder than I thought it would be."

  "The roads are mostly used only for wagon traffic," Tain answered, privately glad the girl had spoken. "But if you're picturing paving of some kind, don't. The roads this far away from any city or town are all dirt and stones, which are a lot harder to walk on."

  Tain didn't add that that was something Ennie ought to already know from the briefing packet she'd been given to read while they were still back at headquarters. Another time would be better to bring up the point, most especially since the girl simply nodded at what she'd been told and then lapsed back into silence.

  After another hour or so of walking, the woods were left behind. The horses ahead of them moved out onto an open plains, the tall grass all around moving a bit like ocean waves in the breeze that had sprung up. There were also clouds beginning to move across the sky, dark clouds that made the glaring sun less of a problem now that there weren't any trees to shade them. Tain glanced at the clouds as she walked, wondering if they were going to be getting one of the bad thunderstorms of that world. If they were, being out in the open wasn't likely to be pleasant.

  Something like
another hour passed when Ennie made a sound that seemed to be filled with pain. Tain looked over at the girl quickly, wondering if she'd hurt one of her feet or ankles or was simply close to collapse, but Ennie wasn't staggering or down on the ground. Instead the girl stared at the men she could just see over the pack horse in front of her, and then she quickly went back to studying the ground in front of her.

  Wondering what the problem could be, Tain also looked at the men. She'd been doing her best to ignore the mounted two, and one glance told her what had disturbed Ennie. The men were eating something, probably some of the dried meat from their supplies, and it was fairly clear that they had no intention of sharing the food with their "property."

  Bastards, Tain thought as she also looked away from the two. I'm feeling hollow myself after all that walking, and I had that cereal before we started. Ennie must be empty down to her toes, and added to everything else…

  Finishing that thought wasn't something Tain wanted to do. Ennie wasn't looking angry or outraged, just more depressed than she'd looked earlier. It had finally come to Tain that Ennie had been acting like a mindless brat with Tandro because she'd wanted the man to show his "concern" and "caring" by punishing her. The girl seemed to believe that being allowed to do as she pleased was a sign of being ignored, and even the pain of punishment was preferable to being ignored.

  But it wasn't concern or caring that had moved Tandro, and now he was adding to the girl's torment by eating in front of her without a single thought about how the action made her feel. Ignored and unimportant would be Tain's guess about how Ennie now felt, but there was nothing Tain could do to lift the girl's depression. She'd been forbidden to tell Ennie that they were on their way back to the base, the one thing that might have pulled the girl back from the brink.

  There was the faintest of chances that the men intended to finish their own meal before offering food to their slaves, but as time wore on that faint chance faded to nothing. The men each took a pull on a waterskin, and then they went back to simply riding. Which proved what fools they were, Tain growled to herself. When she and Ennie collapsed from dehydration, the two fools would have nothing to complain about -

  Tain's angry thoughts disappeared abruptly when she saw two mounted men heading toward them from the left. Seeing other riders wasn't anything unusual, but the two newcomers weren't just riding along. They were definitely heading for Killen and Tandro, and then Tain made an even more unsettling discovery. Over on the right, beyond where Ennie walked, it was possible to see two more riders, also heading for Killen and Tandro. The two men she and Ennie were following had pulled their mounts to a halt, and now they sat waiting the arrival of both sets of newcomers.

  But Killen and Tandro sat stiffly, proving that the arrival of the strangers wasn't something they'd been expecting - or particularly liked. Tain stopped moving the way Ennie already had, wondering just how much trouble they were about to have…

  Chapter Five

  Jake Killen wasn't happy. He'd finally gotten a reaction from Tain, but not the one he'd been looking for. She'd flatly refused to put on the outfit she'd been given, and the defiance he'd seen in her pretty blue eyes had been something he couldn't overlook or excuse. It had almost been as if she were challenging him, and Jake Killen wasn't at all used to turning down a challenge.

  So he'd answered the challenge instead, announcing that he meant to punish her at some later time. Once the words were spoken he couldn't very well take them back, but the look of disgust she'd given him had made him wish he could. If it were possible to erase spoken words as easily as those written in pencil or in the dust…

  But erasing a rash decision just wasn't possible, not unless you wanted to look like a fool. Jake never worried much about what he looked like to others, but Tandro had heard his promise and there might be trouble with the native if Jake backed down. Jake needed Tandro's backing when they reached the town they were headed toward, so Tain would not be getting away with defying him.

  As they rode along, Jake eyed the gathering clouds less with suspicion than with the hope of being distracted. Tain had been doing better than he'd expected with obeying him, acting as if she didn't much care what he told her to do. Why, then, had she gone so far as to ignore him when he told her to put on that outfit?

  She hadn't enjoyed having that insertion put in her bottom last night, but the explosion he'd expected and had been hoping for never came. Instead she'd saved her reaction for this morning, out where Tandro could see her rather than taking advantage of the privacy the tent provided. It was almost as if the woman knew how arousing she looked in those skimpy so-called clothes, but that was ridiculous. Of course she didn't know what sight of her like that did to him…

  "I think it's time we had our lunch," Tandro said from where he rode to Jake's right, the words as lazy as most of the things he said. "Our slaves ought to be hungry enough themselves to react properly to the sight, teaching them the easy way that whether or not they starve is entirely our decision. If they don't behave themselves they won't be fed."

  "Your little brat may learn that lesson, but I don't think mine will," Jake answered, speaking softly. "She isn't the same as yours, and the idea of starving doesn't intimidate her. You do understand, I hope, that my kitten isn't like most other women."

  "I still have trouble understanding how your people can trust a female with a really important job," Tandro said, his dark eyes showing that he wasn't joking about being troubled. "It's perfectly obvious that if we keep on enslaving women at the rate it's now being done all the best women will soon be unavailable for breeding, but that's a different matter entirely."

  "Actually, you're talking about another side of the same problem," Jake said, glad to be discussing a topic he hadn't wanted to bring up himself. "If you raise women to believe that cooking and cleaning is all they're capable of, you won't find many who can be used for something else. But if you raise women to believe they can do anything that takes their interest, you're actually doubling the number of hands available to raise your world up to the next level. Holding down half your population does the same with the world you live in."

  "In other words, even if the women are used for nothing more than to free the time of men with ideas, we'll still benefit," Tandro said, suddenly looking surprised. "I hadn't considered the matter in that light, and I doubt if anyone else on this world has either."

  "When you're too busy enjoying the women around you, thinking of other things for those women to do isn't easy," Jake said with something of a smile. "Making it legal to enslave women triples or quadruples the problem, which is why we really need to change that law. And then make sure the slavers really do find a different way to earn a living. They're not likely to give up their … trade without a struggle."

  "That's something no one will have to be told," Tandro said with a snort of amusement. "Slavers do love their trade, even more than most men enjoy having slaves around them. You weren't able to completely understand the lure of having a slave before, I think, but my guess would be that your understanding has been going through a change."

  "Yes and no," Jake admitted, deciding he might as well share his own viewpoint. "There's no question that it's very pleasant to have a woman available who has to obey everything you say, but unless there's something seriously wrong with you - or you have no experience with any other arrangement - the novelty wears off fairly quickly. There can be so much more to a relationship with a woman than having her serve you in bed and out that you have to have experience with that something more before you can know what losing it means."

  "You almost sound as if you pity me for not having experienced that something more," Tandro mused, happily showing nothing of insult as he studied Jake. "Can you describe the kind of thing you're talking about?"

  "I don't know if I can," Jake answered, trying to figure out a way to explain color to a blind man. "When a woman is free and self-confident and whole, you can share things with her that you'd never share wi
th another man. Say you're feeling depressed for some reason. If the woman is your friend as well as your lover, she'll do or say something to pull you out of the dark mood. A slave wouldn't know how to do something like that even if she weren't afraid of being punished if she intruded on your mood."

  "What if I didn't want to be pulled out of the dark mood?" Tandro said, possibly playing devil's advocate as he frowned with the attempt to understand. "Sometimes a man needs to think dark thoughts so he can figure out a way to deal with the things bothering him."

  "A woman who was your friend would understand the point and leave you alone to brood," Jake said, smiling faintly. "Sometimes women have the same needs, and the really wise ones will recognize the need when you have it. And you have no idea how much fun arguing with a free woman can be. After the argument comes the time of making up, and no man who hasn't dealt with a free woman can know what that's like."

  "You'd better not mention arguing with a woman when you speak to Gordi," Tandro advised after shaking his head at the grin Jake's smile had become. "Gordi can be made to see reason up to a certain point, but beyond that point he'll dig in his heels and refuse to listen. He has a very large following among the men of this world, so getting him on our side is the first step in abolishing female slavery. I'm glad you're not insisting that we take the females back to your base before your interview with him, but you will have to watch what you - and the females - say."

  "Since the women will be under orders to say nothing, we don't have to worry about them," Jake assured the other man. "And I'm not about to throw away the opportunity I was given when Gordi agreed to hear what I had to say. If he has to wait too long for me to get there, he could well change his mind about listening. And I intend to be very careful of what I say. New ideas have to be handed out slowly, one at a time, so the people involved have a chance to get used to one before they're exposed to the next."