'I have no money,' she said.
'I have very little,' I said, taking the pouch and spilling the stones in a glittering if not very valuable heap on the small table in her central room.
She laughed and poked through them with her fingers. 'I learned something of jewels,' she said, 'in the wagons of Albrecht and Kamchak and there is scarcely a silver tarn disk's worth here.'
'I paid a golden tarn disk for them,' I asserted.
'But to a Tuchuk' she said.
'Yes,' I admitted.
'My dear Tart Cabot,' she said, 'my sweet dear Tarl Cabot.' Then she looked at me and her eyes saddened. 'But,' said she, 'even had I the money to reopen the shop it would mean only that the men of Saphrar would come again.'
I was silent. I supposed what she said was true.
'Is there enough there to buy passage to Ar?' I asked. 'No,' she said. 'But I would prefer in any case to remain in Turia it is my home.'
'How do you live?' I asked.
'I shop for wealthy women,' said she, 'for pastries and | tarts and cakes things they will not trust their female slaves to buy.'
In answer to her questions I told her the reason for which I had entered the city to steal an object of value from Saphrar of Turia, which he himself had stolen from the Tuchuks. This pleased her, as I guessed anything would which was contrary to the interests of the Turian merchant, for whom she entertained the greatest hatred.
'Is this truly all you travel' she asked, pointing at the pile of stones.
'Yes,' I said.
'Poor warrior,' said she, her eyes smiling over the veil, 'you do not even have enough to pay for the use of a skilled slave girl.'
'That is true,' I admitted.
Slit laughed anti with an easy motion dropped the veil from her face and shook her head, freeing her hair. She held out her hands. 'I am only a poor free woman,' said she, 'but might I not do?'
I took her hands and drew her to me, and into my arms. 'You are very beautiful, Dina of Turia,' I said to her. For four days I remained with the girl, and each day, once at noon and once in the evening, we would stroll by one or more of the gates of Turia, to see if the guards might now be less vigilant than they had been the time before. To my disappointment, they continued to check every outgoing per- son and wagon with great care, demanding proof of identity and business. When there was the least doubt, the individual was detained for interrogation by an officer of the guard. On the other hand I noted, irritably, that incoming individuals and wagons were waved ahead with hardly a glance. Dina and myself attracted little attention from guardsmen or men- at-arms. My hair was now black; I wore the tunic of the Bakers; and I was accompanied by a woman.
Several times criers had passed through the streets shouting that I was still at large and calling out my description. Once two guardsmen came to the shop, searching it as I expect most other structures in the city were searched. Dur- ing this time I climbed out a back window facing another building, and hoisted myself to the flat roof of the shop, returning by the same route when they had gone.
I had, almost from the first in Kamchak's wagon, been truly fond of Dina, and I think she of me. She was truly a fine, spirited girl, quick-witted, warm-hearted, intelligent and brave. I admired her and feared for her. I knew, though I did not speak of it with her, that she was willingly risking her life to shelter me in her native city. Indeed, it is possible I might have died the first night in Turia had it not been that Dina had seen me, followed me and in my time of need boldly stood forth as my ally. In thinking of her I realized how foolish are certain of the Gorean prejudices with respect to the matter of caste. The Caste of Bakers is not regarded as a high caste, to which one looks for nobility and such; and yet her father and her brothers, outnumbered, had fought and died for their tiny shop; and this courageous girl, with a valor I might not have expected of many warriors, weapon- less, alone and friendless, had immediately, asking nothing in return, leaped to my aid, giving me the protection of her home, and her silence, placing at my disposal her knowledge of the city and whatever resources might be hers to com- mand.
When Dina was about her own business, shopping for her clients, usually in the early morning and the late afternoon, I would remain in the rooms above the shop. There I thought long on the matter of the egg of Priest-Kings and the House of Saphrar. In time I would leave the city when I thought it safe and return to the wagons, obtain the tarn and then make a strike for the egg. I did not give myself, however, much hope of success in so desperate a venture. I lived in constant fear that the gray man he with eyes like glass would come to Turia on tarnback and acquire, before I could act, the golden sphere for which so much had been risked, for which apparently more than one man had died.
Sometimes Dina and I, in our walking about the city, would ascend the high walls and look out over the plains. There was no objection to this on the part of anyone, provided entry into the guard stations was not attempted. Indeed, the broad walk, some thirty feet wide, within the high walls of Turia, with the view over the plains, is a favorite promenade of Turian couples. During times of dan- ger or siege, of course, none but military personnel or civilian defenders are permitted on the walls.
'You seem troubled, Tarl Cabot,' said Dina, by my side, looking with me out over the prairie.
'It is true, my Dina,' said I.
'You fear the object you seek will leave the city before you can obtain it?' she asked.
'Yes,' I said, 'I fear that.'
'You wish to leave the city tonight?' she asked.
'I think perhaps I shall,' I said.
She knew as well as I that the guards were still questioning those who would depart from Turia, but she knew too, as I, that each day, each hour, I remained in Turia counted against me.
'It is my hope that you will be successful,' she said. I put my arm about her and together we looked out over the parapet.
'Look,' I said, 'there comes a single merchant wagon it must be safe now on the plains.'
'The Tuchuks are gone,' she said. And she added, 'I shall miss you, Tart Cabot.'
'I shall miss you, too, my Dina of Turia,' I told her. In no hurry to depart from the wall, we stood together there. It was shortly before the tenth Gorean hour, or noon of the Gorean day.
We stood on the wall near the main gate of Turia, through which I had entered the city some four days ago, the morning after the departure of the Tuchuk wagons for the pastures this side of the Ta-Thassa Mountains, beyond which lay the vast, gleaming Thassa itself.
I watched the merchant wagon, large and heavy, wide, with planked sides painted alternately white and gold, cov- ered with a white and gold rain canvas. It was drawn not by the draft tharlarion like most merchant wagons but, like some, by four brown bask.
'How will you leave the city?' asked Dina.
'By rope,' I said. 'And on foot.'
She leaned over the parapet, looking skeptically down at the stones some hundred feet below.
'It will take time,' she said, 'and the walls are patrolled closely after sundown, and lit by torches.' She looked at me. 'And you will he on foot,' she said. 'You know we have hunting sleen in Turia?'
'Yes,' I said, 'I know.'
'It is unfortunate,' she said, 'that you do not have a swift kaiila and then you might, in- broad daylight, hurtle past the guards and make your way into the prairie.'
'Even could I steal a kaiila or tharlarion,' I said, 'there are tarnsmen'
'Yes,' she said, 'that is true.'
; Tarnsmen would have little difficulty in finding a rider and mount on the open prairie near Turia. It was almost certain they would be flying within minutes after an alarm was sounded, even though they need be summoned from the baths, the Paga taverns, the gaming rooms of Turia, in which of late, the siege over, they had been freely spending their mercenary gold, much to the delight of Turians. In a few days, their recreations complete, I expected Ha-Keel would weigh up his gold, marshal his men and withdraw through the clouds from the city. I, of course, did not wish to wait a few days or more or however long it might take Ha-Keel to rest his men, square his accounts with Saphrar and depart. The heavy merchant wagon was near the main gate now and it was being waved forward.
I looked out over the prairie, in the direction that had been taken by the Tuchuk wagons. Some five days now they had been gone. It had seemed strange to me that Kamchak, the resolute, implacable Kamchak of the Tuchuks, had so soon surrendered his assault on the city not that I expected it would have been, if prolonged, successful. Indeed, I respected his wisdom withdrawing in the face of a situation in which there was nothing to be gained and, considering the vulnerability of the wagons and bask to tarnsmen, much to be lost. He had done the wise thing. But how it must have hurt him, he, Kamchak, to turn the wagons and withdraw from Turia, leaving Kutaituchik unrevenged and Saphrar of Turia triumphant. It had been, in its way, a courageous thing for him to do. I would rather have expected Kamchak to have stood before the walls of Turia, his kaiila saddled, his arrows at hand, until the winds and snows had at last driven him, the Tuchuks, the wagons and the bask away from the gates of the beleaguered city, the nine-gated, high-walled stronghold of Turia, inviolate and never conquered. This train of thought was interrupted by the sounds of an altercation below, the shouting of an annoyed guardsman at the gate, the protesting cries of the driver of the merchant wagon. I looked down from the wall, and to my amusement, though I felt sorry for the distraught driver, saw that the right, rear wheel of the wide, heavy wagon had slipped the axle and that the wagon, obviously heavily loaded, was now tilting crazily, and then the axle struck the dirt, imbedding itself.
The driver had immediately leaped down and was gesticu- lating wildly beside the wheel. Then, irrationally, he put his shoulder under the wagon box and began to push up, trying to right the wagon, surely an impossible task for one man. This amused several of the guards and some of the pas- sersby as well, who gathered to watch the driver's dis- comfiture. Then the officer of the guard, nearly beside him- self with rage, ordered several of his amused men to put their shoulders to the wagon as well. Even the several men, togeth- er with the driver, could not right the wagon, and it seemed that levers must be sent for.
I looked away, across the prairie, bemused. Dina was still watching the broil below and laughing, for the driver seemed so utterly distressed and apologetic, cringing and dancing about and scraping before the irate officer. Then I noted across the prairie, hardly remarking it, a streak of dust in the sky.
Even the guards and townsfolk here and there on the wall seemed now to be watching the stalled wagon below. I looked down again. The driver I noted was a young man, well built. He had blond hair. There seemed to be something familiar about him.
Suddenly I wheeled and gripped the parapet. The streak of dust was now more evident. It was approaching the main gate of Turia.
I seized Dina of Turia in my arms.
'What's wrong!' she said.
