by John Norman
“If you would save the lives of your friends,” said the officer, irritably. “Speak.”
“No, no,” said the spokesman.
Mirus and the sleenmaster pulled at their bonds, and regarded the spokesman with fury.
“It must be pleasant to have such a friend,” mused the officer. Then he said to one of his men. “Free those brigands.”
The spokesman watched with horror as the bonds restraining Mirus, the sleenmaster and the wounded fellow were slashed away. Mirus and the sleenmaster stood, rubbing their wrists, angrily regarding the spokesman.
“No, no, no,” said the spokesman.
“He knows nothing,” said the officer, contemptuously. “Kill him.”
A dagger was whipped from its sheath. A hand seized the spokesman by the hair and pulled his head back, exposing his throat.
“No!” whispered the spokesman.
The dagger paused, wavering, the energy of the arm behind it revealing itself in the conflicted hesitation of the blade, narrow, bright, quivering, arrested by a sudden monitory glance from the officer.
In this moment, Mirus, within the cover of this distraction, all eyes on the officer, the spokesman, the threatening soldier with the dagger, with a flash of robes, threw himself across the grass, toward the place to which the slave had earlier seen him glance. There, as men looked about, startled, he seized up from the thick grass a closed holster and, in a moment, had freed the sixth pistol from its sheathing.
Even Tersius Major, who held a weapon, was taken aback.
Mirus now faced the group, the pistol, removed from its hiding place, ready in his hand. The slave had no doubt that he was adept with the weapon.
“Put it down,” said the officer, in horror. “It is a forbidden weapon!”
“Stand where you are,” said Mirus. “And spare me the prattle about weapons, forbiddings, laws, Priest-Kings and such! I am not a child!”
Fel Doron would have moved toward Mirus, but he was warned back by Portus Canio.
“What do you want?” asked the officer.
Mirus fixed his eyes upon the slave. He gestured toward himself with the weapon, violently. “Here, slave girl,” said he, “now!”
“Do not move,” snapped Selius Arconious.
“Come here!” snapped Mirus.
“I cannot, Master!” said Ellen. “My master has forbidden it.”
“Your master?” said Mirus.
“Yes!” cried Ellen. “My master!”
“Who is your master?” said Mirus.
“Selius Arconious, of Ar,” cried Ellen. “I am owned by Selius Arconious of Ar, tarnster, of the caste of Tarn Keepers!”
“I will have you!” said Mirus.
Ellen sank to her knees in the grass, in terror, weeping.
“Stand back,” she heard Mirus say. Then he was standing beside her. She felt the muzzle of the weapon through her hair, pressing, at the side of her head. It cut her there.
“If I cannot have her,” said Mirus, “no one will!”
“You will never be able to leave the camp,” said the officer. “Foes lurk, poised, unseen.”
“If I cannot have her, no one will!” cried Mirus.
Ellen shut her eyes. The muzzle of the gun hurt her. She wondered if she would even hear the report of the weapon. She remembered the boards irrupting from the corner of the wagon. Surely, at point blank range, it would tear half her head away.
“Stop!” said Selius Arconious.
Mirus straightened.
“I will give her to you before I will have her die,” said Selius Arconious.
The slave lifted her head, startled.
There was a terrible pause. Mirus lowered the weapon, it then at his thigh. “Then it seems,” said he, “that your love is greater than mine.”
Ellen knelt in the grass, shaken, startled, disbelievingly, bewildered. Had these men, such men, spoken of love? Love? Did they not know she was a slave? Love, for a slave?
“No, Master!” cried Ellen, for Mirus had then lifted the weapon slowly, and held it now at his own temple.
“No, Master!” cried Ellen.
“Do not be a fool,” said Selius Arconious.
“Put it down,” said the officer. “Put it with the other lightning devices, at the edge of the camp.”
“No!” said Tersius Major. “Give it to me!”
Mirus turned away, his head down. He pulled the weapon to the side, angrily, wearily, not permitting Tersius Major to snatch it from him.
He thrust the weapon in his belt.
Then he knelt to one side, his head in his hands.
“There are many markets,” said a soldier. “You can buy a girl in any of them. The shelves and cages are filled with shackled, unsold beauties, beauties begging for a collar, beauties needing a master, beauties needing to love and serve, to give all, and more.”
Ellen regarded the standing, bound Selius Arconious. He seemed angry.
“Do you love me, Master?” she asked.
“Do not be stupid,” he said. “You are a slave.”
“Yes, Master,” she said. “Forgive me, Master.”
Ellen wondered if she were a beauty. She certainly knew at least, now that she had come to understand bondage and her nature, that she was such that she would unhesitantly beg for a collar. On Gor she had learned explicitly what she had only suspected on Earth, that she needed a master, that she needed to love and serve, to give all and more.
“Sir!” called a guard from the periphery. “The sleen, the wild sleen, approach more closely.”
“Warn them back,” said the officer. “I think we will have something for them in a moment.”
“No, no!” said the spokesman.
“I have lost patience with you,” said the officer. He gestured, a nod of his head, to the soldier who carried still the unsheathed blade which had but moments ago so closely threatened the spokesman.
Ellen recalled the man the spokesman had earlier murdered in cold blood, his own ally, who had at one time been taken as the interpreter for the beasts.
Ellen glanced at the beasts. They seemed somnolent, as before. This reassured her. She wished Selius Arconious was free. She could see portions of that huge mound, that intertwined assemblage of meat and fur, move, as one or another of the beasts might twist or stretch. One lifted its head, and yawned. She could also detect breathing, where one or another of the giant barrel-like rib cages would lift and then subside. The breathing, where she could detect it, seemed deep, and regular, not quick, not agitated. The two domestic sleen were awake now, and had come out from under the wagon, the tharlarion now in its traces. If they were aware of their wild brethren outside the camp they gave no indication of it. The fur of the three beasts was matted, and spattered with mud, and glistened with water. Like the sleen, they had a strong animal odor. It reminded Ellen a little of that of bears. Ellen recalled the large man who had seemed so quietly formidable, Bosk of Port Kar, and his friend, Marcus of Ar’s Station, who had trekked with them earlier. She had seen him occasionally lifting his head and sampling the wind, doubtless taking scent. She now supposed that he had caught the scent of local sleen. Perhaps that is why, she thought, he and his friend deserted us, the reason why they fled the camp.
“Do not kill me!” cried the spokesman. “I have much information. I will speak! I will tell all! There are other worlds. There are life forms covetous of these worlds. They have untold power and wealth. They are ruthless! They will stop at nothing! I can arrange an alliance with them! Their headquarters is in the city of —”
A moment before this instant the camp was unexpectedly shattered by a great roar of fury, of howling, unbridled ferocity, and at the same time the great mound of beasts, hitherto so somnolent, suddenly, with no warning, exploded, sprang alive, erupted like a living volcano, issuing toward us like a bursting, living star, reaching out, lunging, scrambling forward, toward us, paws reaching, huge curved claws extended, fangs bared and there was a wild wailing cry of th
e spokesman which was cut short as Kardok, seizing him, enclosed his head in his cavernous jaws and with one violent, ferocious, twisting motion bit and tore the head away from the shoulders. Ellen saw the horror in the eyes of the decapitated head as it spun away, twisting, through the air and Kardok discarded the jerking headless body and looked about himself. What he said he said in his own tongue, but surely it was an utterance eliciting carnage for the beasts lunged toward the men who, startled, half paralyzed, could scarcely defend themselves. The slave, she fears, screamed and tried to rise, but, restrained, frightened, losing her balance, fell into the grass. Her wrists were cut, fighting the narrow, encircling bracelets which held her small hands so perfectly, so futilely, behind her. Men cried out in horror. Weapons were drawn. Portus Canio and his fellows leaped toward the weapons near the wagon. A beast stood astride them, snarling. One of the soldiers tried to fit an arrow to his bow. A beast leapt forward. A raking slash of claws. The man stumbling to the side, the weapon lost, the left side of his face, with the eye, gone, the bone visible, blood running at his neck. He sank to the grass on his hands and knees. Another man, then seized, was broken across the knee of one of the beasts. Another’s arm was torn from his body. A throat was bitten through. A great, clawed gash, opening a soldier’s tunic, flowed with six rivulets of blood. Tersius Major stood to one side, seemingly paralyzed with fear. A shield was torn from a soldier breaking an arm. One of the beasts looked up from a fallen body flesh dripping from its bloody jaws. Kardok uttered a howl and the beast leapt from the fallen man. It was not time to feed. A spear was snapped in two and one of the beasts forced the splintered shaft through the chest of another soldier. Kardok himself leaped upon a soldier and sank his teeth into the man’s shoulder, anchoring them there, and with his hind legs, tearing, as they both fell, tore open his abdomen, and then rose up, crouching, snarling, over the body, looking about, one leg, soaked with blood, looped with wet gut.
Ellen became aware of a man, bound, interposing his body between her and the beasts. It was her master, Selius Arconious! The beasts had ignored him in their first onslaught, as they had the slave, for he was bound with rope, and she no more than female and slave, and braceleted. Ignored they, too, the wounded man, no threat to them, he on the grass, unable to move. They had sought out, and attacked, first, the soldiers, for these were armed, and the most obviously dangerous. Others, of less perceived menace, might be disposed of later. One of the beasts turned toward the fellow who had rented the hunting sleen in Brundisium, the fellow of the spokesman and Mirus. He backed away, putting his arms before his face, crying out. But the beast hesitated for, suddenly, the two gray hunting sleen, rented for mere coin at Brundisium, had placed themselves, crouching, shoulders hunched, ears laid back, snarling, between the sleenmaster and itself. “Command them!” cried Selius Arconious, wildly. “Command them to attack!”
“Attack! Kill! Kill!” said the sleenmaster, hoarsely, scarcely able to speak.
Instantly the two sleen sprang toward the startled beast.
Kardok, crouching apart, roared with rage, as the sleen and the beast fell together, rolling, and biting and tearing, so mixed together and so soon covered with blood that one could scarcely distinguish amongst them. Vengefully Kardok pointed to Selius Arconious and the free beast lunged forward, jaws slavering. It seized Selius Arconious by the shoulders and opened its great, cavernous, fanged jaws, and bent toward his throat, and the slave screamed, and suddenly, almost at her ear, almost like being enwrapped within a clap of thunder and a stroke of lightning, there was a loud report, the blast, of a pistol. The beast released Selius Arconious and looked puzzled for a moment. Then blood began to pour from its ear. It shook its head, growling. Then it turned about, moved a bit away, uncertainly, stumbled, twisted about twice, and sank to the ground, scratched twice at the grass, and lay still. Kardok, who meanwhile had hurried to the relief of his other fellow, it beset by sleen, turned wildly about. Mirus, half in shock, stood there, the smoking weapon in hand.
“My master lives!” cried the slave.
Selius Arconious cast Mirus a glance of hatred, which attention seemed unnoticed by the shaken Mirus.
Portus Canio, bloody, hastened in this moment to Selius Arconious and slashed apart the bonds that bound him.
“Give me a blade!” said Selius Arconious.
Such weapons, those not seized up, lay near the wagon.
Kardok, reaching bloodied arms into the midst of the frenzied, intent gray sleen, drew them, first one, and then the other, twisting, snarling, by the neck, from the body of his fellow, one with its jaws still filled with fur and meat, and bit each, in turn, through the back of the neck. The sleen had seemed not even aware of him, so intent, so fixed, they were on their business.
Kardok cast the second sleen from him. The attacked beast tried to stand, but fell. Then it stood upright, but with difficulty. It was covered with blood, both its own, and that of the sleen.
There was no sign of the sleenmaster, who, it seemed, had fled.
Kardok examined the field.
No longer was the element of surprise with him.
The soldiers now, and Portus Canio, and Fel Doron, had gathered together, in one place, armed. Loquatus had been half torn apart in one of the attacks. Of the soldiers there were only five left, including the officer.
Kardok, his bloodied fellow with him, crouched warily on the turf.
They may have communicated, but, if so, it was not audible to the human ear.
The quiet was suddenly rent by an inhuman scream of terror, from out in the grassland.
“He should have remained in the camp,” said Portus Canio.
“Prairie sleen,” said Fel Doron.
“Yes,” said Portus Canio.
The rent sleen had given their lives to defend him, who was only a rent master. Although sleen are muchly despised on Gor, and feared, they are respected, as well. The sleen, it is said, is the ideal mercenary.
Portus Canio gestured to the two beasts, some yards across the camp. Then he waved toward the grasslands. “Go!” he cried. “Go!”
Tersius Major approached Mirus. “Is there more lightning in your weapon?” he asked.
“No, no,” said Mirus, wearily.
“Put the thing with the others,” said the officer.
Mirus shrugged, and went across the camp, between the men and the beasts, and placed the pistol with the others, where they lay on a small knoll. There were five pistols there.
The tharlarion champed at the grass.
Mirus returned to his place.
“Go, go!” shouted Portus Canio to the two beasts. One was still bleeding, and it licked at serrated flesh, visible where the fur was gone. Blood seemed to rise to the surface there, like water rising through sand.
“They cannot understand you,” said the officer. His left shoulder was bloody where he had been clawed. “They are performing beasts,” he said, “dangerous, inexplicable, unpredictable beasts.”
“They can understand,” said Portus Canio.
“Perhaps the gesture,” granted the officer.
Kardok lifted a paw. “Peace,” he said.
“Did he speak?” asked the officer.
“Yes,” said Portus Canio.
“Beware,” said Fel Doron.
“No peace,” called Portus Canio. “Go!”
“Give us the she, the she-slave,” said Kardok.
It was for her, at least in part, Ellen knew, that they, the spokesman and his men, and Kardok and his beasts, had originally followed Portus Canio and the other fugitives from the Brundisium camp. Doubtless some of them, or at least those higher amongst them, had hopes, as well, of obtaining clues as to the location of purloined gold. But they would have followed, in any event, merely to obtain her, for they believed, it seemed, that she had seen or heard too much. This seemed to her pathetically ironic, for she understood little or nothing. To be sure, she had gathered that the beasts and the men were not what they seemed, and that
there was some form of communication amongst them. Perhaps that was seeing, and hearing, too much. She did not know.
But all here now, even the soldiers, understood at least that much!
If only she could convince the beasts that she knew nothing! Or that what she knew was meaningless and inconsequential, or no more than what others here, and doubtless others elsewhere, too, might know! If only she could convince them that they had nothing to fear from her, she only a slave!
How naive Mirus had been!
Well he might have understood a quest for gold, for such a quest is no stranger to the interests of men, but how mistaken he had been as to the motivation of a slave’s pursuit! He had foolishly supposed that the interest taken in her by his fellows and the beasts was his own, that it was their intention merely to abet him, to assist him in obtaining her for himself, that she would wear his collar, kneel before him and serve at his feet.
How naive he had been!
It was not their intention to assist him in acquiring a particular property; it was rather their intention to destroy it. It was not their intention to assist him in acquiring a particular animal, one he might find of interest; it was rather their intention to kill it.
It had not been her beauty they sought but her blood.
But did they understand so little?
Did they think she was a free woman, of wealth and title, of placement and connections, who might threaten them, one to whom magistrates would carefully attend?
She was only a slave.
I know nothing, she thought. I have done nothing.
I am not a free woman, she thought. Have I not at least the protection of my collar?
Chain me, she thought. Market me, but do not kill me.
The beasts stood across the grass, waiting.
She moaned. Surely they would give her to the beasts, she of no account, a mere slave, thus winning their way free from this place of war.
“No!” said Selius Arconious.
She looked at him, wildly. Could he care for her? But, of course, no. It was merely his Gorean pride, that he would grant no concession to a foe, not a tarsk, not even an urt?
