"Why did they not show themselves?" asked a man.
"We did not even see them," said a man.
"Perhaps they struck and fled, like the brigands they are," said a man.
"Perhaps," said another fellow.
"No," I said. "They are still in the vicinity, somewhere."
"The delta is so huge," said a fellow beside us, on the deck, looking out.
"It is so vast, so green, so much the same, yet everywhere different," said another. "It frightens me."
"We need scouts," said another.
"We need eyes," said another.
"Look!" cried a fellow, pointing upward.
"There are our eyes!" said the fellow who had spoken before.
There was a cheer from the hundreds of men about.
A tarnsman, several hundred feet above us, coming from the south, wheeled in flight. Even at the distance we could make out the scarlet of his uniform.
"He is bringing the bird around," said a man.
"He will land," said another.
Several of the fellows lifted their hands to the figure on tarnback who was now coming about.
The lookout on the observation platform behind us, on that barge which served the officer as his command ship, began, with both hands, to call the tarnsman down.
I watched the pattern in the sky. I was uneasy. There was a smoothness in it, the turning, and now, as I had feared, the wings of the tarn were outspread.
"He is arming!" I said. "Beware!"
I watched the smooth, gliding descent of the bird, the sloping pattern, the creature seemingly almost motionless in the air, but seeming to grow larger every instant. The tarn's claws were up, back, beneath its body. "Beware!" I cried. "It is not landing!" Men looked upward, puzzled. "Beware!" I cried. "It is an attack pattern!" Could they not see that? Did they not understand what was happening? Could they not understand the rationale of that steadiness, the menace of the motionlessness of those great wings? Could they not see that what was approaching was in effect a smoothly gliding, incredibly stable, soaring firing platform? "Take cover!" I cried. The fellow on the observation platform, on the barge, watching the approach of the bird and rider, lowered his arms, puzzled. "Take cover!" I cried. One could scarcely see the flight of the quarrel. It was like a whisper of light, terribly quick, little more than something you are not sure you have really seen, then the bird had snapped its wings and was ascending. It then, in a time, disappeared, south.
"He is dead," said a fellow from the deck of the captain's barge, where the lookout had fallen, the fins of a quarrel protruding from his breast. It had not been a difficult shot. It might have been a stationary target, a practice run on the training range.
"Those are not your eyes," I said to a fellow looking up at me. "Those are the eyes of Cos." The tarn had returned southward. That was as I would have expected.
Men stood about, numb.
"Where are our tarnsmen?" asked a fellow.
"Cos controls the skies," I said. "You are alone in the delta."
"Kill him," said a man.
"Surely," I said, "you do not think the paucity of your tarn support in an area such as this, and even hitherto in the north, in the vicinity of Holmesk, is an accident?"
"Kill him!" said another.
"Kill him!" said yet another.
"What shall we do, Captain?" asked a man.
"We have our orders," said the officer. "We shall proceed west."
"Surely, Captain," said a man, "we must dally, to punish the rencers!"
"Then Cos would escape!" said a fellow.
"Our priority," said a man, "is not rencers. It is Cosians."
"True," affirmed a man.
"And we must be now close upon their heels," said a man.
"Yes!" said another.
"I would recommend the swiftest possible withdrawal from the delta," I said.
"Excellent advice, from a spy!" laughed a fellow.
"Yes," laughed another, "now that we are nearly upon our quarry!"
"It is you who are the quarry," I said.
"Cosian sleen," said another.
"We shall continue west," said the officer.
"To be sure," I said, bitterly, "you will encounter the least resistance from the rencers to such a march, for it takes you deeper into the delta, and puts you all the more at their mercy."
"Prepare to march," said the officer to a subordinate.
"The rencers are not done with you," I said.
"We do not fear rencers," said a man.
"They will hang on your flanks like sleen," I said. "They will press you in upon yourselves. They will crowd you. They will herd you. Then when you are in close quarters, when you are huddled together, when you are weak, exhausted and helpless, they will rain arrows upon you. If you break and scatter they will hunt you down, one by one, in the marsh. Perhaps if some of you strip yourselves and raise your arms you might be spared, to be put in chains, to be taken, beaten, to trading points, thence to be sold as slaves, thence to be chained to benches, rowing the round ships of Cos."
"Sleen!" hissed a man.
"To be sure," I said, "perhaps some will serve in the quarries of Tyros."
"Kill him!" cried a fellow.
"You must withdraw from the delta, in force, immediately," I said.
"There are many columns in the delta," said the officer.
"This column," I said, "is in your keeping."
"We have our orders," he said.
"I urge you to withdraw," I said.
"We have no orders to that effect," he said.
"Seek them!" I urged.
"The columns are independent," he said.
"Do you think it an accident that you are in this place without a centralized chain of command?" I asked.
He looked at me, angrily.
"Ar does not retreat," said a fellow.
"You are in command," I said to the officer. "Make your decision."
"We did not come to the delta to return without Cosian blood on our blades!" said a fellow.
"Make your decision!" I said.
"I have," he said. "We continue west."
There was a cheer from the men about.
"Saphronicus is not even in the delta!" I said.
"If that were true," said the officer, "it could be known only by a spy."
"And I had it from a spy!" I said.
"Then you, too, are a spy," said a fellow.
"Spy!" said another.
"Gag him," said the officer.
I was again gagged. This was done by my keeper.
"Let me kill him," said a man, his knife drawn, but the officer had turned away, consulting with his fellows.
"He tried to warn Aurelian of the tarnsman," said a man.
"He feared only for his own skin," said my keeper.
"And let him fear even more, now," said the other fellow. I felt the point of the knife in my belly, low on the left side. Its blade was up. It could be thrust in, and drawn across, in one motion, a disemboweling stroke.
I stood very still.
Angrily the fellow with the knife drew it back, and sheathed it. "Cosian sleen," he said. He then, with others, turned away.
My keeper then, pushing on the back of the yoke, thrust me over the rail of the barge, and I fell heavily, yoked, into the water and mud. I struggled to my feet, slipping in the mud. I tried to clear my eyes of water. "Precede me," he said. In a moment I was stumbling forward, before him, returning to the raft, the rope on my neck over the yoke, running behind me, to his grasp. I shook my head, wanting to get the water out of my eyes. I felt rage, and helplessness. I wanted to scream against the gag. The men of Ar, I thought, wildly, are mad! Do they not understand what has been done to them! I wanted to cry out to them, to shout at them, to tell them, to warn them! But the gag in my mouth was a Gorean gag. I could do little more in it then whimper, one whimper for "Yes," two for "No," in the common convention for communicating with a gagged prisoner, the verbal initiative
s, the questions, and such, allotted not to the prisoner but to the interests or caprices of the captors. But then I thought they would not listen to me even if I could speak to them. They had not listened before. They would not now! I must escape from them, I thought. I must escape! Somehow I must avoid the fate into which they seemed bound to fall. I had no interest in sharing their stupidity, their obstinacy, their doom. I must escape! I must escape! We were then at the raft. It was where it had been left, where it had been thrust up, on a small bar, that it might not drift away when we went forward. He bent down. He picked up the harness attached to the raft. I tensed. I saw a fellow wading by. "Face away from me," said my keeper. I faced away. Another fellow waded by. "Stand still, draft beast," said my keeper. Another fellow moved by. I stood still. "Do not move," he said. Another man was approaching. I did not move. The harness was fitted about me. The fellow waded by. Angrily I felt the harness buckled on me. I did not know how long the rencers would give them, perhaps until dark. Already the stones might be striking together beneath the water. It seemed then for a moment that we were alone, that none were immediately with us. I spun about, in the rence. His eyes were wild for one instant, and then the yoke struck him heavily, on the side of the head. Surely some must have heard the sound of that blow! Yet none seemed about. None rushed forward. I looked down at the keeper. He was now lying on the bar. He had fallen with no sound. I drew the raft off the bar, into the water. If I could get beyond the men of Ar I was sure I could break the yoke to pieces, splintering it on the logs of the raft, thus freeing my hands, then in a moment discarding the harness and slipping away. I moved away, drawing the raft after me.
For several Ehn I was able to keep to the thickest of the rence. In such places, one could see no more than a few feet ahead. Sometimes I heard soldiers about. Twice they passed within feet of me. The raft tangled sometimes in the vegetation. Once I had to draw it over a bar. Once, to my dismay, I had to move the raft through an open expanse of water. Then, to my elation, I was again in the high rence.
"Hold," said a fellow.
I stopped.
I felt the point of a sword in my belly.
Another fellow was at the side.
These were of course pickets, pickets of the defense perimeter. It had been in accord with my own recommendation I realized, in fury, that this perimeter had been so promptly set, that it was so carefully manned.
I heard men wading behind me.
"Do you have him?" I heard.
I knew that voice. It was that of my keeper. He was a strong fellow.
"Yes," said one of my captors, the fellow with the point of the sword in my belly. He pressed the blade forward a little, and I backed against the raft. I was then held against it, the point of the sword lodged in my belly. I could not slip to one side or the other. I was well held in place, for a thrust, if my captor desired. I did not move. "Here he is, waiting for you, yoked and harnessed, and as docile as a slave girl."
I heard the sound of chain, of manacles.
"Put iron on his wrists," said my keeper. "No, before his body."
In this way my back would be exposed.
One manacle was locked on my right wrist before that wrist was freed of the yoke. Then, as soon as it was free of the yoke, it was pulled to the left, and the other manacle was locked on my left wrist. Only then was I freed of the yoke. My manacled hands were then tied at my belly, the center of the tie fastened to the linkage, the ends of the tie knotted together, behind my back.
"Has the beast been displeasing?" asked a fellow, solicitously.
Men laughed.
My keeper was now behind me, on the raft. Others, too, were there, it seemed, from its depth in the water.
I heard the snap of a whip.
"Turn about, draft beast," said my keeper. "We are marching west!"
My wrists were helpless in the clasping iron.
"Hurry!" said the keeper.
I felt the lash crack against my back. Then, again, it struck.
"Hurry!" he said.
I turned about and, my feet slipping in the mud, my back burning from the blows, wet with blood, turned the raft. I then began to draw it westward, deeper into the delta.
"Hurry!" said he, again.
Again the lash fell.
Again I pressed forward, straining against the harness, westward.
14
The Attack
"You see," said my keeper, thrusting a bit of raw fish in my mouth, "there is no danger."
My gag was wrapped about the neck rope, it now lengthened from the mooring stake on the bar, to permit me to sit up. My feet were still tethered closely, in the usual fashion, to another mooring stake. My hands were now manacled behind my back. Again I did not know who held the key to my manacles. It changed hands, as a security measure, from day to day.
"Listen for the rocks, under the water," I said to him.
"You are mad," he said.
"Did you convey my warnings to your captain?" I asked.
"A watch is being kept," he said, "foolish though it may be."
On the bar there were perhaps some five hundred men.
"Eat," said my keeper. "Swallow."
I fed. I was eager to get what food I could. I think there was little enough for anyone. Ar had brought, by most reckonings, some fifty thousand men into the delta. This had been done without adequate logistical support.
"That is all," said he.
I looked at him, startled.
"No more," he said.
"You are a hardy chap," said the officer, looking down at me. "I had thought you might have died in the marsh today." It had been hot. The raft had been heavy, many men using it. The keeper had not been sparing with his whip. "Yet it seems you are alive, and have an appetite." Then he said to my keeper. "Do not gag him yet. Withdraw."
As soon as the keeper had moved away a few yards the officer crouched down beside me, and looked at me, intently. I had not seen him approach, earlier.
"You have men listening?" I asked.
"Yes," he said.
"You think the thought absurd?" I asked.
"Yes," he said.
"But you have them listening?"
"Yes," he said.
"It seems now," I said, "that it is you who would wish to speak with me."
"You attempted to escape today," he said.
I did not respond to this.
"It is fortunate that you are not a slave girl," he said.
I shrugged. That was doubtless true. On Gor there is a double standard for the treatment of men and women, and, in particular, for the female slave. This is because women are not the same as men. That women are the same as men, and should be treated as such would be regarded by Goreans as an insanity, and one which would be cruelly deprivational to the female, robbing her of her uniqueness, her delicious specialness, in a sense of her very self. To be sure, it was indeed fortunate in this instance that I was not a slave girl. Gorean masters tend not to look with tolerance upon escape attempts on the part of such. They do not accept them.
"You understand the point of your gagging?" he asked.
"Yes," I said, "that I not instigate questioning, that I not sow dissension, that I not produce discontent, confusion, among the men, that I not reduce, in one way or another, morale, such things."
He looked down at the ground.
"Do you fear for yourself, that you might begin to reflect critically on the occurrences of recent days?" I asked.
"State your views," he said.
"You seem to me an intelligent officer," I said. "Surely you have arrived at them independently by now."
"Speak," he said.
"I do not think it matters now," I said. "You are already deep in the delta."
He regarded me, soberly.
"Ar," I said, "if you wish to know my opinions on the matter, has been betrayed, in the matter of Ar's Station, in the matter of the disposition of her northern forces, and, now, in her entry, unprepared, into the delta. You w
ere not prepared to enter the delta. You lack supplies and support. By now what supply lines you may have had have probably been cut, or soon will be, by rencers. You do not have tarn cover, or tarn scouts. Indeed, you do not even have rencer guides or scouts. Obviously, too, you have not been unaware of the deterioration of your transport in the delta. Do you truly think it is a simple anomaly that so many vessels, flotillas of light craft, on such short notice, could be obtained in Ven and Turmus? Was that merely unaccountable good fortune? And now do you think it is merely unaccountable ill fortune that these same vessels, in a matter of days, sink, and split and settle beneath you?"
He regarded me, angrily.
"They were prepared for you," I said.
"No," he said.
"Withdraw from the delta, while you can," I said.
"You are afraid to be here," he said.
"Yes," I said, "I am."
"We have all become afraid," he said.
"Withdraw," I said.
"No," he said.
"Do you fear court-martial?" I asked. "Do you fear the loss of your commission, disgrace?"
"Such things would doubtless occur," said he, "if I issued the order for retreat."
"Especially if it were done singly," I said.
"Yes," he said.
"And there is no clear unified command in the delta," I said.
"No," he said.
"That, too, perhaps seems surprising," I observed.
"Communication is difficult," he said. "The columns are separated."
"And that, you think," I asked, "is the reason?"
"It has to be," he said.
"If you were Saphronicus," I said, "what would you do?"
"I would have a unified command," he said. "I would go to great lengths to maintain lines of communication, particularly under the conditions of the delta."
"And so, too," I said, "would any competent commander."
"You challenge the competence of Saphronicus?" he asked.
"No," I said. "I think he is a very able commander."
"I do not understand," he said.
"Surely it is clear," I said.
"You do not think Saphronicus is in the delta," he said.
"No," I said. "He is not in the delta."
"You could have learned that only from a spy," he said.
"True," I said. "I had it from a spy."
Vagabonds of Gor Page 15
