by John Norman
I bounded up the stairs and entered the wagon.
The two girls were there, and Aphris was kneeling behind Elizabeth, combing Elizabeth's hair.
Kamchak, as I recalled, had recommended a thousand strokes a day.
The pelt of the larl which Elizabeth wore had been freshly brushed.
Both girls had apparently washed at the stream some four pasangs away, taking the opportunity to do so while fetching water.
They seemed rather excited. Perhaps Kamchak would permit them to go somewhere.
Aphris of Turia wore bells and collar, about her neck the Turian collar hung with bells, about each wrist and ankle, locked, a double row of bells. I could hear them move as she combed Elizabeth's hair. Aside from the bells and collar she wore only several strings of diamonds wrapped about the collar, some dangling from it, with the bells.
"Greetings, Master," said both girls at the same time.
"Ow!" cried Elizabeth as Aphris' comb apparently suddenly caught in a snarl in her hair.
"Greetings," I said. "Where is Kamchak?"
"He is coming," said Aphris.
Elizabeth turned her head over her shoulder. "I will speak with him," she said. "I am First Girl."
The comb caught in Elizabeth's hair again and she cried out.
"You are only a barbarian," said Aphris sweetly.
"Comb my hair, Slave," said Elizabeth, turning away.
"Certainly—Slave," said Aphris, continuing her work.
"I see you are both in a pleasant mood," I said. Actually, as a matter of fact, both were. Each seemed rather excited and happy, their bickering notwithstanding.
"Master," said Aphris, "is taking us tonight to see a Chain Dance, a girl from Port Kar."
I was startled.
"Perhaps I should not go," Elizabeth was saying, "I would feel too sorry for the poor girl."
"You may remain in the wagon," said Aphris.
"If you see her," I said, "I think you will not feel sorry for her." I didn't really feel like telling Elizabeth that no one ever feels sorry for a wench from Port Kar. They tend to be superb, feline, vicious, startling. They are famed as dancers throughout all the cities of Gor.
I wondered casually why Kamchak was taking the girls, for the proprietor of the slave wagon would surely want his fee for them as well as us.
"Ho!" cried Kamchak, stomping into the wagon. "Meat!" he cried.
Elizabeth and Aphris leaped up to tend the pot outside.
He then settled down cross-legged on the rug, not far from the brass and copper grating.
He looked at me shrewdly and, to my surprise, drew a tospit out of his pouch, that yellowish-white, bitter fruit, looking something like a peach but about the size of a plum. He threw me the tospit.
"Odd or even?" he asked.
I had resolved not to wager with Kamchak, but this was indeed an opportunity to gain a certain amount of vengeance which, on my part, would be sorely appreciated. Usually, in guessing tospit seeds, one guesses the actual number, and usually both guessers opt for an odd number. The common tospit almost invariably has an odd number of seeds. On the other hand the rare, long-stemmed tospit usually has an even number of seeds. Both fruits are indistinguishable outwardly. I could see that, perhaps by accident, the tospit which Kamchak had thrown me had had the stem twisted off. It must be then, I surmised, the rare, long-stemmed tospit.
"Even," I said.
Kamchak looked at me as though pained. "Tospits almost always have an odd number of seeds," he said.
"Even," I said.
"Very well," said he, "eat the tospit and see."
"Why should I eat it?" I asked. The tospit, after all, is quite bitter. And why shouldn't Kamchak eat it? He had suggested the wager.
"I am a Tuchuk," said Kamchak, "I might be tempted to swallow seeds."
"Let's cut it up," I proposed.
"One might miss a seed that way," said Kamchak.
"Perhaps we could mash the slices," I suggested.
"But would that not be a great deal of trouble," asked Kamchak, "and might one not stain the rug?"
"Perhaps we could mash them in a bowl," I suggested.
"But then a bowl would have to be washed," said Kamchak.
"That is true," I admitted.
"All things considered," said Kamchak, "I think the fruit should be eaten."
"I guess you are right," I said.
I bit into the fruit philosophically. It was indeed bitter.
"Besides," said Kamchak, "I do not much care for tospits."
"I am not surprised," I said.
"They are quite bitter," said Kamchak.
"Yes," I said.
I finished the fruit and, of course, it had seven seeds.
"Most tospits," Kamchak informed me, "have an odd number of seeds."
"I know," I said.
"Then why did you guess even?" he asked.
"I supposed," I grumbled, "that you would have found a long-stemmed tospit."
"But they are not available," he said, "until late in the summer."
"Oh," I said.
"Since you lost," pointed out Kamchak, "I think it only fair that you pay the admission to the performance."
"All right," I said.
"The slaves," mentioned Kamchak, "will also be coming."
"Of course," I said, "naturally."
I took out some coins from my pouch and handed them to Kamchak who slipped them in a fold of his sash. As I did so I glowered significantly at the tankards of jewels and chests of golden tarn disks in the corner of the wagon.
"Here come the slaves," said Kamchak.
Elizabeth and Aphris entered, carrying the kettle between them, which they sat on the brass and copper grating over the fire bowl in the wagon.
"Go ahead and ask him," prompted Elizabeth, "Slave."
Aphris seemed frightened, confused.
"Meat!" said Kamchak.
After we had eaten and the girls had eaten with us, there not being that night much time for observing the amenities, Elizabeth poked Aphris, "Ask him," she said.
Aphris lowered her head and shook it.
Elizabeth looked at Kamchak. "One of your slaves," she said, "would like to ask you something."
"Which one?" inquired Kamchak.
"Aphris," said Elizabeth firmly.
"No," said Aphris, "no, Master."
"Give him Ka-la-na wine," prompted Elizabeth.
Aphris got up and fetched not a skin, but a bottle, of wine, Ka-la-na wine, from the Ka-la-na orchards of great Ar itself. She also brought a black, red-trimmed wine crater from the isle of Cos.
"May I serve you?" she asked.
Kamchak's eyes glinted. "Yes," he said.
She poured wine into the crater and replaced the bottle. Kamchak had watched her hands very carefully. She had had to break the seal on the bottle to open it. The crater had been upside down when she had picked it up. If she had poisoned the wine she had certainly done so deftly.
Then she knelt before him in the position of the Pleasure Slave and, head down, arms extended, offered him the crater.
He took it and sniffed it and then took a wary sip.
Then he threw back his head and drained the crater. "Hah!" said he when finished.
Aphris jumped.
"Well," said Kamchak, "what is it that a Turian wench would crave of her master?"
"Nothing," said Aphris.
"If you do not ask him, I shall," said Elizabeth.
"Speak, Slave!" shouted Kamchak and Aphris went white and shook her head.
"She found something today," said Elizabeth, "that someone had thrown away."
"Bring it!" said Kamchak.
Timidly Aphris rose and went to the thin rep-cloth blanket that was her bedding near the boots of Kamchak. Hidden in the blanket there was a faded yellow piece of cloth, which she had folded very small.
She brought it to Kamchak and held it out to him.
He took it and whipped it out. It was a worn, stained
Turian camisk, doubtless one that had been worn by one of the Turian maidens acquired in Love War.
Aphris had her head to the rug, trembling.
When she looked up at Kamchak there were tears in her eyes. She said, very softly, "Aphris of Turia, the slave girl, begs her master that she might clothe herself."
"Aphris of Turia," laughed Kamchak, "begs to be permitted to wear a camisk!"
The girl nodded and swiftly put her head down.
"Come here, Little Aphris," said Kamchak.
She came forward.
He put his hands in the strings of diamonds on her throat. "Would you rather wear diamonds or the camisk?" he asked.
"Please, Master," she said, "the camisk."
Kamchak jerked the diamonds from her collar and threw them to the side of the room. Then he withdrew from his pouch the key to her collar and bells and, lock by lock, removed them from her. She could hardly believe her eyes.
"You were very noisy," Kamchak said to her, sternly.
Elizabeth clapped her hands with pleasure and began to consider the camisk.
"A slave girl is grateful to her master," said Aphris, tears in her eyes.
"Properly so," agreed Kamchak.
Then, delighted, Aphris, assisted by Elizabeth Cardwell, donned the yellow camisk. Against her dark almond eyes and long black hair the yellow camisk was exceedingly lovely.
"Come here," commanded Kamchak, and Aphris ran lightly to him, timidly.
"I will show you how to wear a camisk," said Kamchak, taking the cord and adjusting it with two or three pulls and jerks that just about took the wind out of the Turian girl. He then tied it tightly about her waist. "There," he said, "that is how a camisk is worn." I saw that Aphris of Turia would be marvelously attractive in the garment.
Then, to my surprise, she walked a bit in the wagon and twirled twice before Kamchak. "Am I not pretty, Master?" she asked.
"Yes," said Kamchak, nodding.
She laughed with delight, as proud of the worn camisk as she might have been once of robes of white and gold.
"For a Turian slave," added Kamchak.
"Of course," she laughed, "for a Turian slave!"
"We will be late for the performance," said Elizabeth, "if we do not hurry."
"I thought you were staying in the wagon," said Aphris.
"No," said Elizabeth, "I have decided to come."
Kamchak was fishing about among his paraphernalia and he came up with two wrist-ankle hobbles.
"What are those for?" asked Aphris.
"So that you will not forget you are slave girls," growled Kamchak. "Come along."
* * * *
Kamchak, with my money, fairly won in wager of course, paid our admission and we found our way within the curtained enclosure.
Several men, and some of their girls, were there. I saw among them even some Kassars and Paravaci, and one of the rare Kataii, seldom seen in the encampments of the other peoples. The Tuchuks, of course, were most in evidence, sitting cross-legged in circles rather about a large fire near the center of the enclosure. They were in good humor and were laughing and moving their hands about as they regaled one another with accounts of their recent deeds, of which there were plainly a great many, it being the most active season for caravan raiding. The fire, I was pleased to note, was not of bosk dung but wood, timber and planking, I was less pleased to note, torn and splintered from a merchant's wagon.
To one side, across a clearing from the fire, a bit in the background, was a group of nine musicians. They were not as yet playing, though one of them was absently tapping a rhythm on a small hand drum, the kaska; two others, with stringed instruments, were tuning them, putting their ears to the instruments. One of the instruments was an eight-stringed czehar, rather like a large flat oblong box; it is held across the lap when sitting cross-legged and is played with a horn pick; the other was the kalika, a six-stringed instrument; it, like the czehar, is flat-bridged and its strings are adjusted by means of small wooden cranks; on the other hand, it less resembles a low, flat box and suggests affinities to the banjo or guitar, though the sound box is hemispheric and the neck rather long; it, too, of course, like the czehar, is plucked; I have never seen a bowed instrument on Gor; also, I might mention, I have never on Gor seen any written music; I do not know if a notation exists; melodies are passed on from father to son, from master to apprentice. There was another kalika player, as well, but he was sitting there holding his instrument, watching the slave girls in the audience. The three flutists were polishing their instruments and talking together; it was shop talk I gathered, because one or the other would stop to illustrate some remark by a passage on his flute, and then one of the others would attempt to correct or improve on what he had done; occasionally their discussion grew heated. There was also a second drummer, also with a kaska, and another fellow, a younger one, who sat very seriously before what appeared to me to be a pile of objects; among them was a notched stick, played by sliding a polished tem-wood stick across its surface; cymbals of various sorts; what was obviously a tambourine; and several other instruments of a percussion variety, bits of metal on wires, gourds filled with pebbles, slave bells mounted on hand rings, and such. These various things, from time to time, would be used not only by himself but by others in the group, probably the second kaska player and the third flutist. Among Gorean musicians, incidentally, czehar players have the most prestige; there was only one in this group, I noted, and he was their leader; next follow the flutists and then the players of the kalika; the players of the drums come next; and the farthest fellow down the list is the man who keeps the bag of miscellaneous instruments, playing them and parceling them out to others as needed. Lastly it might be mentioned, thinking it is of some interest, musicians on Gor are never enslaved; they may, of course, be exiled, tortured, slain and such; it is said, perhaps truly, that he who makes music must, like the tarn and the Vosk gull, be free.
Inside the enclosure, over against one side, I saw the slave wagon. The bosk had been unhitched and taken elsewhere. It was open and one could go in and purchase a bottle of paga if one cared to do so.
"One is thirsty," said Kamchak.
"I'll buy the paga," I said.
Kamchak shrugged. He had, after all, bought the admissions.
When I returned with the bottle I had to step through, over, and once or twice on, Tuchuks. Fortunately my clumsiness was not construed as a challenge. One fellow I stepped on was even polite enough to say, "Forgive me for sitting where you are stepping." In Tuchuk fashion, I assured him that I had taken no offense, and, sweating, I at last made my way to Kamchak's side. He had rather good seats, which hadn't been there before, obtained by the Tuchuk method of finding two individuals sitting closely together and then sitting down between them. He had also parked Aphris on his right and Elizabeth on his left. I bit out the cork in the paga and passed it past Elizabeth to Kamchak, as courtesy demanded. About a third of the bottle was missing when Elizabeth, looking faint at having smelled the beverage, returned it to me.
I heard two snaps and I saw that Kamchak had put a hobble on Aphris. The slave hobble consists of two rings, one for a wrist, the other for an ankle, joined by about seven inches of chain. In a right-handed girl, such as either Aphris or Elizabeth, it locks on the right wrist and left ankle. When the girl kneels, in any of the traditional positions of the Gorean woman, either slave or free, it is not uncomfortable. In spite of the hobble, Aphris, in the yellow camisk, black hair flowing behind her, was kneeling alertly by Kamchak's side, looking about her with great interest. I saw several of the Tuchuks present eye her with admiration. Female slaves on Gor, of course, are used to being eyed boldly. They expect this and relish it. Aphris, I discovered, to my delight, was no exception.
Elizabeth Cardwell also had her head up, kneeling very straight, obviously not unconscious that she herself was the object of a look or two.
I noted that, in spite of the fact that Aphris had now been in the wagon for several d
ays, Kamchak had not yet called for the Iron Master. The girl had neither been branded nor had the Tuchuk nose ring been affixed. This seemed to me of interest. Moreover, after the first day or two he had hardly cuffed the girl, though he had once beaten her rather severely when she had dropped a cup. Now I saw that, though she had been only a few days his slave, already he was permitting her to wear the camisk. I smiled rather grimly to myself and took a significant swallow of paga. "Wily Tuchuk, eh?" I thought to myself.
Aphris, for her part, though the quivas were still available, seemed, shortly after having begun to sleep at Kamchak's boots, for some reason to have thought the better of burying one in his heart. It would not have been wise, of course, for even were she successful, her consequent hideous death at the hands of the Clan of Torturers would probably, all things considered, have made her act something of a bad bargain. On the other hand she may have feared that Kamchak would simply turn around and seize her. After all, it is difficult to sneak up on a man while wearing collar and bells. Also, she may have feared more than death that if she failed in an attempt to slay him she would be plunged in the sack again which lay ever ready near the back, left wheel of the wagon. That seemed to be an experience which she, no more than Elizabeth Cardwell, was not eager to repeat.
Well did I recall the first day following the first night of Aphris as the slave of Kamchak. We had slept late that day and finally when Kamchak managed to be up and around, after a late breakfast served rather slowly by Elizabeth, and had recollected Aphris and had opened the end of her sleeping quarters and she had crawled out backward and had begged, head to boot, to be allowed to draw water for the bosk, though it was early, it seemed evident to all that the lovely wench from Turia would not, could she help it, spend a night again similar to her first in the encampment of Tuchuks. "Where will you sleep tonight, Slave?" Kamchak had demanded. "If my master will permit," said the girl, with great apparent sincerity, "at his feet." Kamchak laughed. "Get up, Lazy Girl," said he, "the bosk need watering." Gratefully Aphris of Turia had taken up the leather buckets and hurried away to fetch water.
