Delia glanced across to the alcove where the kitchen staff gawped away, fascinated. Nan the Bosom, no doubt, was busy picking up techniques of head thwacking.
During the short interludes between acts and scenes, Delia was called on to provide incidental music, which she did. While the players postured through their buffoonery, she studied this Chica and this Nath the Muncible. She very soon came to the conclusion that what Sissy had said was right. They did not get on. Chica, so Sissy had said, awed, would slit a man's throat as soon as kiss him.
“And has Nath kissed you, Sissy?"
Whereupon Sissy had giggled in her own not-silly way, and left Delia with the assumption that Nath the Muncible and Sissy were farther along the road of romance than anyone suspected.
The atmosphere thickened. Smoke from the fires began to twine tendrils into the refectory, and a subsequent tremendous racket sorted out the damned stupid incompetent whip-fodder slaves to attend to their fires. Some of the men enjoyed that. They flexed their arms afterward. The fires were attended to; but Lart the Boil had a broken arm and Nath the Turnips had not one but two black eyes, and others of the slaves nursed their bruises.
Catching Nath the Muncible's eye as he looked at her, Delia half-smiled, and made an unmistakable gesture that she wished to leave. Nath bent to the lord. Cranchar Gillois did not turn around. Nath straightened up and shook his head.
Delia would stay and play until she was given leave to go. That was the word of the lord.
In the nature of the fight that broke out at the far end, no one knew exactly what the cause was and cared less. Two men leaped into the center, swords whickering as the players might have said, and started to knock seven kinds of brick dust out of each other. Their comrades applauded and bellowed, and bet on one or t'other. When the first lay senseless upon the floor and the second staggered with a broken left arm, the bout was considered ended.
More wine flowed, the slave wenches were chased, more wine flowed, and still no one had struck up a song. And more wine flowed. Half a dozen more fights erupted, more wine flowed—and still no singing.
“Shishivakka!” someone yelled and fell over backwards off his stool. His wine pot fell on his head.
Most of the cutthroat crew in Cranchar's band were apims, but there were a few diffs, a Khibil, a Rapa, and a Fristle whose catlike face blazed up as he yelled, “Fifivakka!"
Nath the Muncible spoke again to Cranchar. In the Muncible's posture was eloquence and urgency. Cranchar hoisted his goblet—of gold and encrusted with jewels, a pretty piece of ostentatious bad taste—and laughed and shook his head.
“Let them race,” he shouted. “And a bag of gold on it!"
“Hai!” the men roared. “Hai for Lord Cranchar!"
“Clear that harp out of the way,” directed Nath.
Despite his romance with Sissy, the Muncible was, Delia had little need to remind herself, a traitorous slave-mongering acolyte of Cranchar Gillois. She could expect no favors from him.
The Vuvushi Race, where girls ran and used sharpened steel to hinder their opponents, was one thing. Down at the end of the hall girls were herded in for quite another.
Slaves lifted the harp. For the first time Delia became aware of the stain in the wooden floor as a rug was skidded away. She knew how that stain had come there.
The man who had been impaled, early on in Nyleen's own games, to have bets wagered on just what he would do, the quantity and caliber of his screams, the amount of blood, and of course how long he would last before he died, had died in the end and the floor under him had been stained. Slaves had scrubbed; the stain remained. Delia moved away.
The harp was set up again to one side, nearer to Cranchar. Delia walked slowly across, carrying her stool. She did not hurl the stool at Cranchar the Cranchu. She did not wish to throw her life away uselessly.
He wore a rapier and main gauche, the Jiktar and the Hikdar. They were overly ornate. Now he took the left-hand dagger out and rapped it on the table before him.
He obtained a degree of quiet.
“Strip them. You start there and you finish here!” and he flung the dagger into the floor before the table, where it stuck and quivered. “That is your winning post."
Rapacious fingers ripped the tattered clothes from six girls, who tried to cover themselves in the uproar. The men were all jovial now, more laughter and jokes flying. If they gave a thought to what the girls were feeling the Ice Floes of Sicce might go up in steam.
Disputes arose among the men over who would be the first six. A tall fellow staggered out, ripping off his own clothes, shrieking he would ride, damn you all, and fell flat on his face, out to the world, drunkenly snorting. He was kicked aside and the six men who elbowed their way to their mounts prepared. The race was simple. The girls would gallop, run, crawl on hands and knees to the winning post, and the men would sit astride their backs and whip them on.
That was the race known as the Shishivakka.
A bag of gold pieces jingled for the winner.
Cranchar need turn his head the merest fraction to see Delia. That florid face, brilliant and flushed, swung toward her. The mouth, crimson and full, parted.
“Play for the race, girl."
“No,” said Delia.
* * *
Chapter fifteen
Shishivakka
In the general uproar, Cranchar barely heard her. He most certainly did not believe what she had said could be what it sounded like.
“We'll have ‘The Agate-Winged Jutmen'—that's a good rousing tune. Play, girl."
“No,” said Delia.
He heard her.
He still could not believe what his ears told him this slave girl said.
“Play!"
“No."
The noise at the far end of the refectory bounced off the ceiling. The caterwauling mingled with the jingle of bottles, the crash of overturned benches as men crowded to get a better view. Cranchar put a hand to his ear, and sticking a finger in rubbed vigorously. He shook his head.
“You say you will not play for the race, slave?"
The blood rushed and collided in that already fully blown face. He gave her no chance to reply, spilling out words in a froth of passion.
“You refuse to obey? You are slave and you will obey!” At Delia's small shake of the head he roared on: “Then you will be flogged jikaider until your back is a pudding! Hai! Chica!"
But Chica was no longer in the refectory. At the first shouts of shishivakka she had gone.
A bright thrumming thrilled through Delia's head. She felt like one of the strings of her harp just touched by a cunning finger, vibrating and resonating through her out to the whole world. She deplored, at the same time laughed at, the pretensions of women like Nyleen Gillois; but she felt as a woman that she could not bring herself to play for this race. That unpleasantness would ensue was without doubt. She acted as a slave; this showed her that, despite all, she did not possess a slave mentality.
Cranchar the Cranchu bellowed his outrage. He surged to his feet, roaring. His men stopped their own roaring to stare stupidly at him.
“The slave harpist refuses to play!” The words rattled around. The men stared. And, suddenly, Delia saw this as a direct confrontation with the will of the master. The lord had ordered; a slave had disobeyed. In so petty a matter, surely, the men would say, the lord will brook no opposition.
“The whips!” screeched Cranchar.
Nath the Muncible stood up. He spoke swiftly into his master's ear. Cranchar gestured irritably, as though brushing away a pestiferous fly; but then he listened.
With graphic gestures, Nath indicated Delia's back, the harp, and then—so Delia guessed—mentioned the amount of gold the slave was worth to the kovneva. “If,” no doubt Nath was saying, “if you have her whipped, how will you explain this to your sister the kovneva?"
“Very well!” Abruptly, Cranchar erupted into jovial good humor. He laughed widely, swinging his arms. “Very well! The sla
ve will not play for the race. That is of small consequence. She shall race herself!"
Before his men had time to digest any suggestion that their lord had climbed down before the fear of his sister, Cranchar was roaring again.
“Fetch her down!"
“Make room!” shouted the Muncible. He was leaping for Delia before anyone else moved. His face blazed with anger and passion. He looked a remarkably ugly customer. He took Delia by the upper arm. He bent close.
“Listen, my girl!” He looked ferocious; he spoke softly. “You're in for a thrashing if you make another mistake. I cannot save you. You are alone. Do as you are bid and no worse will befall you."
Quietly, Delia said: “I will race; I will not play. And I do not stand in debt to you."
“Women!” said Nath the Muncible, and dragged her off.
He treated her gently. They reached the waiting group of female steeds and male riders and the old brown tunic vanished in a twinkling, torn off by greedy hands. When calloused fingers reached for the yellow breechclout, Nath struck them away. He bellowed a raucous comment on the beauty of this steed. Then he roared: “I'll do the honors. We don't want to damage the merchandise."
The yellow breechclout whisked away. Delia stood forth.
A broad hand thrust against the small of her back. She was aware of the room and the ranked tables and the inflamed faces of the men, of brandished wine goblets and heat and uproar. Then the hand knocked her over and she was on all fours on the floor.
Nath appeared in front as she twisted her head up to see. He held a rapier aloft. This would be the signal.
A hard yet soft bulk squashed down on Delia. She let out an involuntary gasp. Whoever was straddling her was broad and heavy and hot. Hands grasped her hair. A thick and hairy leg stuck forward past her left ear, and its fellow jutted forward past her right ear. She almost squashed flat into the floor. But that she would not allow.
She bunched her muscles and fought back against the weight.
The bedlam in the room continued unabated. The heat puffed into her face. The man sitting on her back felt as though he weighed as much as the Heart Heights of Valka, mountain upon mountain. She drew two ragged gasps, and Nath slashed the rapier down.
Instantly a thin, hot, scorching pain laced across her buttocks.
The bastard up there had a switch and was whipping her on.
She started to crawl forward. The floor razored off a layer of skin at every movement, or so it seemed. She felt as though she was pressed down as flat as a sheet of paper. She struggled on, her mind a blank, hearing a shrill continuous uproar, seeing only the floor ahead and the next painful place on which to put down her hands and her knees.
Seven naked girls ridden by seven men, they scrabbled their way along.
Her knees were pits of fire.
Through the blankness of her mind the idea that this just would not do rose up in letters of flame. She stood up.
The man on her back yelped and wrapped his legs around her body. He held on, one hand in her hair, the other over her shoulder. If he'd fallen off that would have been his hard luck. Delia stood up, swaying, feeling the weight. She bowed a little forward, got her breath, and then started to run.
The run was more in the nature of a stagger, a lurching struggle from side to side, one foot after the other. She knew how to put one foot in front of the other when every instinct screamed at her to lie down, roll over and die. She kept on.
The noise grew prodigious in the refectory.
The man on her back shifted his grips, deliberately, dragging on her. So that confirmed his chances.
She stumbled on.
No other girl and rider preceded her. As for winning this disgusting race, that was nothing. She just wanted to get to the winning post and free herself of this incubus.
What she looked like she had no idea. She was aware of the table at the far end, slowly, as she neared it. Cranchar was roaring with the rest, waving a wine goblet, inflamed.
She began to think she could never complete the course. Her body felt as though it were being crushed down into the floor with each step she took. The man on her back held her in such a way that it was difficult to breathe. If he pulled her hair out by the roots she would not be surprised. On and on she struggled, and her doubts grew. She could never make it to the far end! Never! But she would. Pride—damned stupid pride. What had pride ever done for her? Now—all it did was make her struggle on with this man on her back instead of falling face down, to be kicked and whipped on like anyone else.
Something like ten strides remaining. Strides! Ha! More like ten feebly tottering steps. Lurching, rolling like a dismasted vessel in a gale, she staggered on.
Eight steps, seven and six. A splinter in the floor jagged her heel wickedly, and she barely noticed.
Five and four.
Now Cranchar, drinking his wine at a gulp, tossed the goblet over his shoulder and reached for a fresh. Three steps, two...
The left hand dagger stuck up from the floor.
That was the winning post.
One last step...
Beneath her feet the floor seemed to her to be swooping up and sinking down, nauseatingly. The man on her back clawed at her, yelling in her ear, thrashing her with the stick. She ignored him. The whole world fined down to two objects, circled in roseate fire, limned, coruscating, beckoning.
One—Cranchar Gillois the Cranchu.
Two—the left-hand dagger.
The first waved his new goblet so that the wine flew like golden rain, his face a scarlet bloom, his mouth open and bellowing. Sweat clustered on his face.
The second jutted up from the floor, its point stuck, its hilt ornately chased, and its blade a silver length of death.
The limpet on her back with his legs wrapped about her had to be dealt with. The matter scarcely warranted comment. She had not dislodged him before, and she knew why. Now she gave a rolling twist to her shoulders, smoothly shining, and shed him as she might shed a sack of laundry. He went over, spilling untidily onto his back. She gave him not a glance. The throw was merely a throw taught any girl who went through Lancival.
She lunged for the left-hand dagger.
Astonishment gripped her.
She was slow.
Agonizingly slow.
A fierce and condemnatory anger suffused her at her own lethargy. Her muscles shrieked protest. Her body felt as though she were forcing it through molten metal.
Her right hand scrabbled for the dagger.
The main gauche would not fit comfortably, the quillons and the pierced and scrolled shield baffling her desperate attempts to take up the dagger as a fighter would. She had to turn her hand over and take up the blade with her thumb to the pommel and her little finger to the blade. Upside down for a rapier and dagger fighter...
Cranchar gaped for only an instant. Then he was leaping backwards, dropping the wine goblet, groping for his rapier.
Delia leaped for him.
The main gauche glittered as she struck.
A long thin rapier blade slashed in from the side. That licking splinter of steel struck the dagger down. Delia lurched on and the dagger struck ferociously into the wood of the tabletop.
Cranchar shrieked insanely.
“Spit her, Nath, you fool!"
Nath the Muncible held his rapier down over Delia's outstretched arm. She panted, heaving with the effort of drawing air into her lungs. Her legs and arms trembled. Her hair swung forward over her face, half-obscuring the fury and desire to kill blazing there.
“Lord! Your sister—"
“Then if you will not, I will!"
Cranchar's rapier was in his fist. It snouted up.
Delia drew in a painful lungful of air, twisted herself around. Nath's rapier withdrew. For a horrid instant, as she lay sideways against the table, panting and naked, she thought he would thrust her through.
The next instant, as Cranchar drove forward savagely, she slipped away, fell along the floor, and t
he dagger remained fast wedged in the table. Cranchar's rapier hissed past her head.
As she rolled over she saw a pair of thick and hairy legs above her. A bloated belly jutted above. A red face lowered toward her.
“Stay there, slave!"
The man who had ridden her in the race shouted. He shouted hard and high.
“The gold! Lord! I won—the gold you promised!"
Cranchar looked bewildered. His rapier flicked back, ready for another thrust when he could see his target. The slave girl had vanished beyond the table. Now he shook his head.
“The gold? Magero? What gold?"
A bedlam of shouts broke out at this from the men.
Magero hollered louder than all the rest, bloated, red-faced, triumphant, and not to be cheated of the gold he had fairly won.
“The bag of gold for the winner. Lord! I claim my right!"
If she'd had the dagger now she'd have stuck it straight up and Magero would have been less of a man than he was.
But he had told her to stay there, to lie still. Now he was yelling angrily that, by Vox! he'd won the gold promised. He reached for the bag upon the table, near where the dagger jutted.
“My gold!"
Something soft crashed into Delia and she sprawled half-under the table. A naked girl with limbs flailing fell with her and the man riding the girl's back toppled over them. The rest of the field followed. Most of the girls dragged forward in complete exhaustion. Blood stained the floor in their tracks. One girl, with blonde hair and a heavy body, screamed and screamed as the man riding her whipped her on.
Magero was yelling for his gold. Cranchar was shrieking for the slave wench to be dragged up for him to spit. The girls were crying and sobbing, two or three simply flopping over and sprawling still, and their riders were fiercely arguing that Magero's mount had cheated. Nath the Muncible appeared.
The whole scene sickened Delia. She felt nauseated.
“You said you do not owe me anything, Alyss. This may be so. I do not stand to suffer for you.” The Muncible's face was pale, his nostrils pinched. He reached for her and took her shoulder in a firm grip. “Up! And speak small before the lord."
Delia of Vallia [Dray Prescot #28] Page 15
