Mercenaries of Gor

by Norman, John;

  “That is true,” I granted him.

  “But still you have reservations?” he asked.

  “She is a free woman now,” I said. “Perhaps that is worth some consideration.”

  “Not at all,” said Hurtha.

  “Oh?” I asked, interested.

  “Come now,” said Hurtha. “Be realistic. Free women are often sold. No one expects you to give them away.”

  “That is true,” I said.

  “Where do slaves come from?” asked Hurtha. “Surely only a small percentage of them are bred.”

  “That is true,” I granted him.

  “If it were not for the bringing of free females into the toils of bondage, capturing them, getting them properly marked, seeing to the legal details, putting them up for sale, and so forth, there would be few slaves.”

  “True,” I said.

  “I shall not listen to such things!” said Boabissia. “Oh!”

  Hurtha’s hand was on her ankle.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded.

  “I am tying your ankles together,” he said.

  “Untie me!” she said.

  “Do not touch the cords,” he said.

  I observed her ankles. They looked well, lashed tightly together.

  “Why have you done this!” she asked.

  “I do not want you running away, while we are thinking about such things,” he said.

  “I am an Alar woman!” she said.

  “No,” he said. “You are only a woman who has been with the Alar wagons.”

  She cried out in rage, her fists clenched.

  “But she might not bring much,” said Hurtha, disconsolately. “She is only a free female, and is not trained.”

  “True,” I said.

  “I gather,” said Hurtha, “that you do not wish for me to accept spontaneous gifts from total strangers, or apply to them for loans.”

  I recalled the portly little fellow from Tabor. “I think I would prefer that you do not do so,” I said. That time we had narrowly missed tangling with guardsmen.

  “How then can we make some money?” asked Hurtha.

  “I suppose we could do some work,” I said.

  “Work?” asked Hurtha, in horror. He was an Alar warrior. To be sure, manual labor was not exactly prescribed by my own caste codes either.

  “It is a possibility,” I said. After all, desperate men will resort to desperate measures.

  “Rule it out,” said Hurtha.

  “How then do you propose, within the limits of legality, that we obtain our supper?” I asked.

  “You may sup with me,” said Mincon.

  “Thank you,” I said. “But imposing on your hospitality could be at best a temporary expedient.”

  “I, personally, on the other hand,” said Hurtha, “would not consider one or two meals thrust as a wedge between myself and starvation to be beneath contempt.”

  “Besides, in the morning,” I said, “I expect you will be returning to Brundisium.”

  “Yes,” admitted Mincon.

  “That would clear supper and breakfast,” said Hurtha.

  “I have a few coins left,” I informed Hurtha.

  “I thought you were merely being noble,” said Hurtha.

  “I am,” I said. “It is always easier to be noble when one has the price of supper.”

  “That is almost poetic,” said Hurtha, impressed.

  “Thank you,” I said. I had forgotten that Hurtha was a poet. This came then, I conjectured, as high praise. To be sure, he had hedged his declaration with the modification, ‘almost’. Still, when all was said and done, what could that matter?

  “Aha!” said Hurtha.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “I have an idea!” said Hurtha.

  My blood turned momentarily cold.

  “Selling Boabissia?” asked Mincon. Boabissia’s ankles squirmed in the thongs. She could probably not stand upright as she had been bound. We would probably have to help her down from the wagon box, and carry her to where we decided to put her.

  “No,” said Hurtha. “It is a different idea.”

  “I am glad to hear that,” said Boabissia.

  “But it may be every bit as good, or better, than that one,” said Hurtha.

  “I am eager to hear it, I assure you,” said Boabissia.

  “Would you like to hear it?” asked Hurtha of me.

  “Certainly,” I said, uncertainly. I felt a vague pang of anxiety.

  “Surely you would have no objection to our selling a few things,” said Hurtha.

  “What?” asked Boabissia. “Me?”

  “Not yet, at least,” said Hurtha.

  “What could you sell?” I asked. “You do not have much clothing with you, or many possessions, it seems.”

  “True,” he said, his eyes shining with excitement.

  “Would you sell your ax?” I asked. It was an excellent one.

  “Of course not,” he said.

  “What then?” I asked.

  “Trust me,” he said.

  “Must I?” I asked.

  “All I wish from you,” he said, “as you are more experienced in the strange ways of civilization than I, is that you would have no objection to my selling a few things to raise money.”

  “No one could have any possible objection to that,” I said.

  “Wonderful,” he said, warmly. “I will then see you at the wagon yards!” He then turned about and disappeared.

  “He is a good fellow,” I said.

  “Yes,” said Mincon. “I wonder what it is that he intends to sell.”

  “I do not know,” I said.

  “As far as I could tell,” said Mincon, “he did not take anything with him.”

  “That is true,” I said. Hurtha’s bag was still in the wagon.

  “Maybe he will sell the ax,” said Mincon. “He took that.”

  “I doubt that he would sell that,” I said.

  “What then?” asked Mincon.

  “Perhaps he has precious stones, rare gems, sewn in his clothing, for an emergency,” I said.

  “That must be it,” said Mincon.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “At any rate,” said Mincon. “Hurtha is a clever, splendid fellow. Doubtless he knows exactly what he is doing.”

  “Doubtless,” I said.

  “I have great confidence in him,” said Mincon.

  “So do I,” I said.

  “Untie me,” said Boabissia.

  “Not yet,” I said.

  “Ho!” called Mincon to his tharlarion. “Ho! Move!” We then drew again into the street and began to follow the rough signs painted on the sides of buildings to the wagon yards.

  10

  We Proceed to the Wagon Yards

  “It is not necessary to look at those things,” I said to Boabissia.

  She had already put her head down.

  Judging from the condition of the bodies, the effects of the predations of birds, some still about, jards primarily, and the tattering of the winds and rains, they had been there for several weeks. The ropes on the necks had been tarred to protect them from the weather, an indication that it had been intended they should remain in place for some time. These inert, suspended, desiccated weights, now little more than skulls and the bones of men, with some bits of cloth, fluttering in the air’s stirrings, and threads and patches of dried flesh clinging about them, had been arranged in a line along the Avenue of Adminius, the main thoroughfare of Torcadino, near the Semnium, the hall of the high council, doubtless as some sort of mnemonic and admonitory display. They swung creaking, a few feet off the ground, some turning slowly, backward and forward, at the ropes’ terminations. A child reached up and struck the feet of one, to set it into motion.

  “They are still up,” said Mincon, angrily.

  “I gather you have seen them before,” I said.

  “Twice,” he said.

  “I see,” I said.

  “There is no need,
to reach the wagon yards, to pass this place,” said Mincon, angrily.

  “You know Torcadino then?” I said.

  “To some extent,” he said.

  “We have followed the signs,” I said.

  “Of course,” he said, bitterly.

  I nodded. Clearly it had been intended that those coming and going in Torcadino would take this route.

  “Who are they?” I asked.

  “Members of the high council, and lesser councils, and certain of their supporters,” he said, “who favored the cause of Ar.”

  “I had thought they might be,” I said.

  “Have you counted them?” he asked.

  “No,” I said.

  “There are more than two hundred,” he said.

  “That is a large number,” I said.

  “Others perished, too,” he said, “but were not regarded as prominent enough, I suppose, to serve as warnings.”

  “I see,” I said.

  We then continued on our way.

  “There must, by now, given the past weeks, be a great amount of supplies in Torcadino,” I said.

  “Yes,” said Mincon.

  “It is interesting that Ar has not struck,” I said.

  “Perhaps,” he said.

  “If Torcadino were to be stormed, and fired, and these supplies captured or destroyed, the Cosian movements would surely be hampered, if not altogether arrested. Such an action would frustrate and stall the invasion. This could give Ar the time she might require to deploy and arm for extensive action, what time she might need to meet the enemy in detail and force.”

  “The Cosian armies are in the vicinity,” said Mincon. “It would require armies to cut through them.”

  “Perhaps there are other ways,” I said.

  “Not tarnsmen,” said Mincon.

  “Perhaps not,” I said.

  “It is hard to see at this time of day,” said Mincon. “But the sky over the city is crisscrossed with thousands of strands of tarn wire. Even in the daytime it can be hard to see. It is there, however, I assure you.”

  I did not doubt him. I could see mountings for it on several of the buildings.

  “The gates of Torcadino are firm,” he said. “Her walls are high and strong.”

  “Doubtless,” I said.

  “Torcadino is impregnable,” he said. “It cannot be taken.”

  “I know how I would take it,” I said.

  Boabissia was quiet. Feiqa and Tula, too, in the back, were quiet. I looked at some people in the streets. The streets were not too crowded. I saw a vendor with a cart. I saw a slave girl, in a brief tunic. She looked at me, and looked away. Beneath the tiny, brief skirt of that tunic it was almost certain that there would be only girl. In such a way do Gorean masters commonly keep their women. Certainly we kept Feiqa and Tula that way. It helps the girls to keep clearly in mind that they are slaves. I glanced at Boabissia. Her head was still down. She had her long skirt pulled down, and closely, about her ankles. It thus hid the fact that they were lashed together.

  “We will be in the wagon yards in a quarter of an Ahn,” said Mincon.

  “Good,” I said.

  11

  We Decide Boabissia Will Render Services, Helping Out with Our Finances

  “Perhaps you remember me,” said the fellow.

  “No, not at all,” I said, hastily.

  “From several nights ago,” he said, “on the Genesian Road, at one of the camps.”

  “Oh?” I said.

  “I am a merchant, from Tabor,” he said.

  “Ah, yes,” I said. Indeed, it was the merchant from Tabor, that portly fellow who had been so inflexibly and boorishly determined to retrieve a gift, one which he had bestowed, of his own free will, as I had pointed out to him, on one of the fellows traveling with me, Hurtha, as I recalled. “How are you?” I asked. I feared the answer would not be reassuring.

  “Fine,” he said, somewhat bitterly I thought.

  “That is good to hear,” I said. But his demeanor suggested, and rather clearly, that it might actually be his intention to broach some new grievance. I had some suspicion, also, as to what it might be. It is good, in such situations, to be friendly, and smile a good deal.

  “I see very little to smile about,” he said.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  He looked about himself. “That giant lout with the mustache and braided hair, and ax, is not about, is he?” he asked.

  “To whom might you be referring?” I asked.

  “To one who is called Hurtha,” said the fellow.

  “Oh,” I said.

  “That is, at any rate, what you told me his name was, the last time we spoke of him.”

  “Yes,” I said, “of course.” Perhaps I had made a mistake, earlier, several nights before, in revealing the Alar’s name. Still I did not think he would be a difficult fellow to locate, even if his name were not known. There were not too many like him with the wagons. It did not seem to me a very complimentary way, incidentally, in which to refer to Hurtha. He was, after all, even if perhaps a giant lout, from some points of view, a poet, and was entitled to some respect on that account, particularly if one was unfamiliar with his poetry. Too, he prided himself on his sensitivity. “No,” I said. “He is not about.”

  “Here!” said the fellow, firmly, thrusting a piece of paper toward me. There was some writing on it.

  “Whose writing is this?” I asked.

  “Mine,” he said.

  “Oh,” I said. To be sure, Hurtha was illiterate, like most Alars. Boabissia, too, incidentally, was illiterate. Illiteracy, however, has seldom deterred poets. Indeed, some of the greatest poets of all times were illiterate. Among folks as different as Tuchuks and Torvaldslanders, for example, poetry is seldom written down. It is memorized and sung about the fires, and in the halls, and thus is carried on the literary tradition. And poets such as Hurtha, it seemed to me, were even less likely to be deterred by illiteracy than many others.

  “He leaped out at me, from behind a wagon, with his ax!” said the fellow. “‘I am a poet,’ he announced, his ax at the ready. ‘Would you care to purchase a poem?’ ‘Yes!’ cried I. ‘Write,’ he then said, and dictated to me this poem, which I, for my very life, hastily scribbled on this slip of parchment.”

  “You did so, of your own free will,” I noted, thinking it important to emphasize this fact.

  “I want my silver tarsk back!” he said.

  “It is a very fine poem,” I said.

  “You have not read it,” he pointed out.

  “I have read others of his,” I said. “I am sure it is every bit as good.” Indeed, I had already read three others this very night. The Tabor merchant was the fourth fellow who had come by to look me up. Too, coincidentally, he was the fourth fellow who was demanding his silver tarsk back.

  “To me,” said the merchant, “it seems merely strange, or perhaps, at best, unmitigated trash, but then I am a simple man of business, and not a scribe. Doubtless such things come more within their jurisdiction than mine.”

  “That is true,” I said, encouraging him.

  “Would you care to interpret this line?” he asked, pointing to a line.

  “No,” I said.

  “What about this one?” he asked.

  “I do not think so,” I said.

  “What about this?” he asked. “‘Her eyes were like green moons.’”

  “That is an easy one,” I said. “Doubtless moons are supposed to suggest romance, and green the vitality and promise of life.”

  “It is addressed to a wounded tharlarion,” he said.

  “Oh,” I said.

  “I want my silver tarsk back,” he said.

  “Of course,” I said, emptying my wallet into the palm of my hand. It was not hard to do. “Perhaps that tarsk is it,” I said.

  “I suspect so,” he said. “You have only one there, and that is stamped with the mark of the mint of Tabor.”

  “So it is,” I said, handing i
t back to him. One thing about Hurtha. He thought highly of his poems. He did not let them go for nothing. They were not cheap. He maintained his standards. Still, it seemed that a silver tarsk was a high price to pay for a poem, even if it were as good as one of Hurtha’s, particularly one one had to copy oneself. Indeed, many lovely women on Gor do not bring as much as a silver tarsk on the slave block.

  “Thank you,” said the merchant.

  “Yes?” I said. He was still there.

  “I am surely entitled to something for my trouble,” he said.

  The other fellows had not taken this attitude. Still, they had not been merchants.

  “Here,” I said, giving him a copper tarsk. That left me with two.

  “Thank you,” he said, after scrutinizing the change in my palm.

  “You are welcome,” I said. He then left.

  “Alas,” said Hurtha, coming up to me, disconsolately, “I fear I have made a terrible mistake.”

  “How could that be?” I asked.

  “In my good-hearted enthusiasm to assuage our needs,” he said, “I fear I may have suffered dishonor, if not ruination.”

  “How is that?” I asked. That was certainly an interesting thing to hear.

  “I have been selling my poems,” he said, collapsing near Mincon’s fire, by the wagon. He sat there, with his head in his hands.

  “Oh?” I said.

  “Yes,” he said. “Surely you recall the four silver tarsks I gave you earlier in the evening.”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “I received them from the sale of poems, my poems!” he said, shaking with emotion.

  “No!” I cried.

  “Yes,” he said, miserably.

  “I had thought it must be from the sale of numerous rich gems, doubtless sewn in your jacket,” I said.

  “No,” he said. “I looked about the yards, and when I found fine-looking, sensitive-looking chaps, splendid-seeming fellows, of apparent refinement and taste, those of a sort I thought might be capable of appreciating my work, I offered them one of my poems, and for no more than a mere token of appreciation, a silver tarsk.”

  “That was incredibly generous,” I said.

  “It was a terrible mistake,” said Hurtha.

  “I am glad you realize that,” I said.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” I said.