The White Brand (The Eastern Slave Series Book 2)

by Victor Poole

  Ajalia saw her own unwanted young women as an untapped mine of potential; she set most of them to work in cleaning the houses in the city that she had wrestled from Gevad.

  Gevad had owned several dilapidated huts in the main road of the quarries, but many of his properties had been scattered throughout the walls of the city. Gevad had specialized in preying upon settled families who owned houses; as Ajalia traveled from house to house on her list, renewing agreements, and appointing more equitable rents, she heard story after story that followed the same pattern. A man from a wealthy family married, or a son with no property married a woman of substance. In every case, it seemed, the husband knew little of business or money. Gevad, Ajalia found, had known nearly everyone in the city, or at least, he had known everyone who owned a house. The deeper she delved into the history of the houses she had taken from him, the more she marveled that he had operated for so long without restraint. She was surprised that no one had attempted to overthrow his real estate empire before.

  The stories she pieced together, as she interviewed the current residents, the past owners, and the families who had fallen into bondage through the loss of their houses, showed a consistent pattern. Gevad made the acquaintance of a young man before he was married, and made him one or two favors during the young man's courtship of his future wife. Gevad was a benign presence, an innocuous acquaintance, sometimes for years, and formed an inconsequential piece of the background noise of the city. When the young man, now a husband, and usually a father, began to fall upon hard times, either through mismanagement, or through the natural decay of limited means, Gevad appeared as if by magic. He offered assistance, or connected the troubled man with a cheaper house, or a better investment for his substance. Over a series of months or years, the man grew more deeply indebted to Gevad. When the final crash came, the web of obligation had grown so great that Gevad was free to name his own terms, which always involved the surrender of the house, and often the sale of the wife and children into servitude.

  Ajalia was surprised to find how few business associates Gevad had formed through his years of dealing in Slavithe. Everyone seemed to have either known Gevad, or to have known someone who knew him. Everywhere that she spoke his name, an angry flush came over the faces around her, and a sort of strained silence followed. When her new tenants learned what she had done, or learned that Gevad had passed out of ownership, their tongues where loosed, and a cascade of wrongs and grievances poured out on Ajalia, and on Chad if he was with her.

  Within the walls of the city, Ajalia introduced herself everywhere as a servitor of Chad's; out in the quarries, she told the truth. She found that a great divide was between the city dwellers and the people of the quarries. Many of the quarry workers were city folk who had been driven out by the cost of living, and had fallen to the ranks of porters, or cheap laborers in the most menial tasks in the quarry work. Their children had suffered drastic changes, and a few had lost children or older parents in the rough work of the mines that lay beyond the quarries.

  TALBOS NEAR THE SEA

  Most of the trade of the city of Slavithe was conducted across the sea that separated the continent of Leopath from the Saroyan coast. Ajalia was shocked when, on one of her journeys to the quarries, she learned that a second city, Talbos, lay concealed along the coast, beyond the rim of mountains that hugged the back wall of Slavithe.

  She had heard nothing of this other city from her research in the East, or from the people of Slavithe. She was in talk with a man in the quarries, negotiating the release of a boy that had belonged to Gevad, when the man, a foreman in the works, mentioned that the boy's parents had fled to Talbos.

  When Ajalia asked where Talbos was, the foreman shifted on his feet, and gave her a grin.

  "Well, you know," he said. "It's the other city."

  Ajalia bared her teeth in a smile.

  "What other city?" she asked.

  It took some wheedling, but after many questions, Ajalia found that the population of Slavithe, as a whole, pretended that the city of Talbos did not exist. Talbos had no outlet to the rest of Leopath, and although the Slavithe harbor road was open to the sea, Talbos had its own set of isolated harbors to the north.

  When Ajalia returned to the little house that night, she cornered Philas, who was counting money in his room.

  "How's business?" she asked him.

  Philas smiled when he saw her.

  "The girls you lent me are terrible at sewing," Philas said. "And the boys are loud."

  "I'll take them back as soon as I have them all extricated," Ajalia said. "I'm on the last one now."

  "I'm glad for the help," Philas conceded. "We sell more dresses than plain cut silks now."

  "There's another city," Ajalia told him.

  "What?" Philas asked.

  "There's a second city, separate from Slavithe, down by the coast."

  Philas put down his accounts; he turned to Ajalia.

  "Say that again," he said.

  "You aren't Saroyan at all," Ajalia said, "or you would know this."

  "I was five when I left," Philas snapped. "I didn't know a lot of things."

  Ajalia glared at Philas, who met her eyes steadily.

  "I don't trust you," she said.

  "What else is new?" Philas replied. Things had grown strained between the two of them since Ajalia had embarked on her project of gathering up all that Gevad had possessed. Philas had not confronted her yet about her absence, but Ajalia could see that he wanted to.

  "You were wrong about the Thief Lord's wife," Philas said curtly, resuming his work. "She has not bothered us at all."

  "I told you she wouldn't. She won't do anything until you try to leave."

  "Until we leave," Philas said angrily. Ajalia waited for him to look at her.

  "Philas," she said.

  "No," Philas said.

  "Philas, he wants a trade route, not a pile of money," she said. Ajalia watched Philas turning coins over in his hands.

  "I don't like it," he told her. Ajalia shrugged.

  "I want to go see Talbos," she said. "We might have a better chance there."

  Philas sat up. His chin snapped into a harsh line.

  "Talbos is behind Slavithe?" he asked.

  Ajalia nodded. Philas had turned still, like a great beast carved in stone. His vision had gone inward.

  "I'm coming with you," he said.

  Ajalia stood up.

  "Good," she said. "I'm going the day after tomorrow."

  "I'll leave Jenna in charge," Philas told her.

  "Has Lim come sniffing around?" Ajalia asked.

  Philas shook his head. He gathered the coins into a pouch, and marked off the end of his accounts. Ajalia watched him. She had not been checking on him in the last weeks, though she had continued to pay her boy to watch him. Philas seemed calmer now than he had been, but his face was heavier. He looked sad.

  "That boy's been asking for you," Philas said. Ajalia knew that he meant Delmar. "He wants to know where you've gone to," he added. He stood up, but did not approach her. Ajalia looked at Philas. His eyes were not as hazy as they had been. Philas's shoulders were turned towards her. Ajalia did not feel as though she had to say anything. She saw that Philas did not know what to say.

  "Will you come back, after you collect the last servant?" Philas asked her.

  "I don't know," Ajalia said.

  "It would be nice," Philas said. "Everyone else wants you here."

  "Day after tomorrow," Ajalia said. "I'll come and pick you up on the way."

  As she went out of the room, she heard Philas sigh.

  The next day, she gave the quarry foreman a sum of money to release the boy, and brought him to one of the houses she owned in Slavithe. The boy was ten years old, and had been carrying baskets of rock in the quarry, and holding tools for the men, since he was five. He was quiet, and had a tuft of brown hair that fell into his eyes. His name was Leed.

  Leed followed Ajalia over the quarry roa
d, and into the city of Slavithe without speaking. He kept his calloused hands tucked into the front of his shirt, and his eyes followed Ajalia's heels. When Ajalia took him to the top of a white stone house, and spoke to Chad, who was living in a room there, Leed's eyes took in the room, and Chad's neat brown clothes.

  "I want you in the little house with the slaves," Ajalia told Chad. "Philas and I are going away for a day at least."

  "When will you be back?" Chad asked. He had grown accustomed to following orders, and his face was sharper now.

  "You do as Jenna says," Ajalia said. "Watch our new girls. Make sure they aren't learning to cheat from the slaves."

  Two thirds of the silks had been sold, and many of the women in Slavithe had commissioned gowns in the Eastern style. Philas had kept most of the slaves busy in the little house, cutting and sewing elaborate robes that followed the sweeping lines of the Eastern fashions. The young women Ajalia had collected from the quarries, who were not occupied in cleaning her new properties, were learning to sew. They had been in the way at first, but the slaves had shown them Eastern stitches, and the chattering workrooms in the little house were so novel to the Slavithe girls, and so vibrant with life and color, that their hands soon turned to the work. The little boys had been set to menial work around the house, and a few of them had been put out to the stables, to help the slaves there look after the great blue yurl, and the caravan's horses.

  Chad examined Leed.

  "Is this one for me?" Chad asked.

  "Leed is coming with me," Ajalia said. A fervor of dislike roiled within her at Chad. She did not bother to reprimand him. Ajalia thought that he never really absorbed what she said.

  "That quarry man came up again today," Chad told her. "He wants too much money."

  "You give Card what he asks for," Ajalia said, "or I will find a new agent."

  Chad shuffled his feet.

  "I wasn't complaining," he said. "I just think you don't know how much it's costing from the rents."

  Ajalia looked at Chad. She stared at him until a crimson blush began to spread from Chad's neck into his cheeks.

  "I'm just trying to help," Chad said weakly.

  Ajalia's face was impassive.

  "Chad," she said, "you aren't handling any money."

  "I'm keeping the list," Chad said. "The list is important."

  "Chad," Ajalia said, "you are working for me. Soon, if you continue to behave in this way, you will work for someone else, or for no one." Chad's blush spread up to the roots of his hair, and out to the tips of his ears. "I will get rid of you, if we have this talk again," Ajalia said. She turned away, and led Leed down the stairs.

  "Sorry," Chad shouted after her.

  Partway down the stairs, Leed stopped walking, and pulled on Ajalia's sleeve. She stopped, and turned towards him.

  "Where are we going?" Leed asked.

  "I'm taking you to Talbos," Ajalia told him.

  "Oh," Leed said. His eyes did not change, but the skin on his cheeks tightened a little. The scars on Ajalia's wrists itched suddenly. She wanted to comfort the boy, but she could not afford to help him. She had tried to help other slaves, when she had been younger, and she had learned that helping led into dark corners. The boy looked younger than he was. Ajalia reflected that she had probably seen worse than the boy had. She waited, but the boy did not say anything else.

  When she and Leed came out of the house, Delmar was in the street, waiting for her. Ajalia saw him before he saw her, and she paused in the doorway. A chaotic meld of heat and cold spun through her chest. She went up to him.

  "You're following me again," she said. Delmar smiled when he saw her.

  "Oh yes," he said, "but only for good reasons."

  "Well?" Ajalia asked. She set out in the direction of the stables. Leed trotted along behind her.

  "I stole food, like you said," Delmar said chattily. "I hid in the kitchen, and then I took some food."

  Ajalia stopped walking; she turned to Delmar. He looked like a child bringing a shining toy to his parent. An unholy rage swept over her vision. She wanted to tell Delmar that he was a spoiled child; she wanted to tell him he was a fool. She remembered what Chad had told her about Delmar being the oldest son.

  "Have you ever been to Talbos?" Ajalia asked Delmar. She wanted to strike at him with her words, but his vague blue eyes were too like a baby's.

  "My parents are in Talbos," Leed put in, for Delmar's benefit.

  "Talbos is a horrible place," Delmar told Ajalia. "People get killed there all the time. And there are robberies."

  "Great," Ajalia told him.

  "Talbos isn't that bad," Leed told Delmar. "My parents live there, and they send me money."

  "Your parents send you money?" Ajalia asked Leed.

  "No one can get to the money," Leed told her. "My grandmother is saving it. She says if I live to be a man, she will buy me a business with it."

  Ajalia blinked. Delmar opened his mouth to speak, but Ajalia put up a hand.

  "Where does your grandmother live?" Ajalia asked Leed.

  "Over there," Leed said, pointing down the street to a series of wooden shacks that had been erected in the alley behind a house.

  "That's convenient," Delmar said.

  "Go away," Ajalia said.

  "No," Delmar told her. "Can I come to Talbos?"

  "I guess," Ajalia said. She began to walk towards the stables again.

  "Aren't you going to go find that boy's grandmother?" Delmar asked, jogging to keep up with Ajalia.

  "No," she said shortly.

  "My grandmother is not a very good person," Leed told Delmar.

  "She sounds nice," Delmar told Leed. "She's saving money for you."

  "She's not saving money for me," Leed said scornfully.

  "Good boy," Ajalia told Leed. Delmar looked shocked.

  "You are a very strange boy," Delmar said.

  "Have you ever ridden a horse?" Ajalia asked Leed. He said that he hadn't.

  "Are we riding horses to Talbos?" Delmar asked.

  "You aren't," Ajalia told him. "I am."

  "Well, it's a shame not to find that boy's grandmother," Delmar said. "She probably wants to know if he's happy."

  Ajalia was passing near a long wall that had been carved with dancing beasts, and whirling birds. She turned around sharply. Delmar was behind her, and he almost ran into her. Ajalia pushed a finger into Delmar's chest.

  "Is your mother a nice person?" she demanded. Delmar's eyes went totally blank. His shoulders inched up around his neck, as though he were trying to hide within his body. "Is she?" Ajalia demanded.

  Delmar's lips formed the word "No", but no sound came out.

  "Is she?" Ajalia demanded. People in the street were glancing at them. Delmar's eyes darted at the passerby, and then at Leed.

  "No," he said.

  "Fine," Ajalia said, and resumed walking. Leed followed close behind her. Delmar did not. She walked to the stable district, and wound through the labyrinthine passages of the back entrance, until she came to her black horse's stall. The horse was gone. Ajalia sat down in the straw, and put her face into her arms. Leed stood discreetly near the stall door, and chewed on a piece of straw.

  Ajalia had not felt so out of control since the very first time she had been enslaved, when the traders had put the marshland brand on her forearm. She had vomited then; now she could feel the air around her spinning, and she could not breathe. She wished that Philas was around; he irked her so much that she hid what she felt, but now she was exposed to all the agony of the things that were inside of her. She almost wished that Delmar would appear again, so that she could shout at someone.

  The rectangle of stone she had been carrying protruded sharply against her ribs, and she drew it out. The wild black letters twisted over the surface, their brushstrokes black and dangerous. She had not studied them yet. Some deep foreboding in her heart had kept her from opening the leather book, or learning the new letters. A part of her sensed that if
she overbalanced, and lost control, she would not recover. The idea of the trade route between the East and Slavithe, of a solid foothold in this city, had grown in Ajalia's mind almost from the moment she had heard her master propose the idea. It was her opportunity to redeem herself from obscurity, a finishing point to her life as a useful slave.

  She wanted the trade route, and she was not entirely sure why.

  "Those are the old letters," Leed said. Ajalia looked up. He was leaning over the stall door, a length of straw dangling from between his teeth. His feet were hooked over the lowest rung of the door.

  "You can read this?" Ajalia asked.

  "Some of it," Leed said. "My dad was teaching me, before he left. That's an 'L'."

  "L," Ajalia said.

  "You say it differently," Leed told her, "like this." He made a strange burring noise in his throat. Ajalia copied him. "That wasn't bad," he said. "Most of the people down in the quarries use some of the old words. The people in the city don't like them. They don't learn them anymore."

  "So you have a secret language," Ajalia said. Leed shrugged.

  "It isn't a secret. The city people just don't care. They don't think we count as people, down in the quarries." Leed sucked on his piece of straw, and chewed off a length of the end. "You'd like it there," he said.

  "In the quarries?" Ajalia asked.

  "No," Leed said. "Talbos. They have slaves there, too, just like in Saroyan."

  Ajalia put the stone rectangle back into her robe. She plucked at the straw, and made it into a heap near her thigh.

  "Are your parents slaves?" she asked.

  Leed shrugged again. He spat his piece of straw on the ground. The sound of a jingling harness came nearby. Ajalia scrambled to her feet, and brushed the straw out of her clothes. Her black horse was being led up to the stall by the man she was paying to feed and board him. When the man saw Ajalia, his eyes grew wide, and his mouth turned down at the corners. He began to turn away, and then stopped, and came to the stall door, leading the black horse.

  Ajalia's horse was wearing a heavy set of tandem harness; his hide was wet, and streaked with white sweat. Ajalia moved aside, and waited as the man led the black horse into the stall, and began to remove the harness.