'Only the caste leader may call the council,' said Bran Loort. 'And I do not choose to summon it into session.'
'Are you caste leader in Tabuk's Ford?' asked Thumus.
'I am,' said Bran Loort.
'Who has said this?' inquired Thurnus.
'I have said it,' said Bran Loort. And he gestured to his fellows. 'We have said it,' he added.
There were nine of them, including Bran Loort. They were large, strong young men. 'Yes,' said more than one of them.
'I am sorry,' said Thurnus. 'I had thought that you had in you the makings of a caste leader.'
'I am caste leader,' said Bran Loort.
'In what village is that?' asked Thurnus.
'In Tabuk's Ford,' said Bran Loort, angrily.
'Have you conveyed this intelligence to Thurnus of Tabuk's Ford?' inquired Thurnus.
'I do so now,' said Bran Loort. 'I am first in Tabuk's Ford.'
'I speak for Thurnus, caste leader in the village of Tabuk's Ford,' said Thurnus. 'He speaks it not so.'
'I am first here,' said Bran Loort.
'In the name of Thurnus, he of the peasants, caste leader of the village of Tabuk's Ford,' said Thurnus, 'I speak. He, Thurnus, is first'
'I am first!' cried Bran Loort.
'No,' said Thurnus.
Bran Loort turned white.
'Will it be the test of five arrows?' asked Thurnus.
In this the villagers, with the exception of the two contestants, leave the village and the gate is closed. Each contestant carries in the village his bow, the great bow, the peasant bow, and five arrows. He who opens the gate to readmit the villagers is caste leader.
'No,' said Bran Loort, uneasily. He did not care to face the bow of Thurnus. The skill of Thurnus with the great bow was legendary, even among peasants.
'Then,' asked Thurnus, 'it will be the test of knives?'
In this the two men leave the village and enter, from opposite sides, a darkened wood. He who returns to the village is caste leader.
'No,' said Bran Loort. Few men, I thought, would care to meet Thurnus in the darkness of the woods armed with steel. The peasant is a part of the land. He can be like a rock or a tree. Or the lightning that can strike without warning from the dark sky.
Bran Loort lifted his staff. 'I am of the peasants,' he said.
'Very well,' said Thurnus. 'We shall subject this matter to grim adjudication. The staff will speak. The wood of our land will decide.'
'Good!' said Bran Loort.
I noted that Sandal Thong had slipped from the crowd. None other seemed to note her going.
Slowly, step by step, Thurnus descended the stairs from his hut.
Melina, eyes glittering, stepped back from the foot of the stairs. Men, and villagers all, and slaves, cleared a space near the hut of Thurnus.
'Build up the village fire,' said Thurnus. Men hurried to do this. Thurnus opened his tunic, then pulled it down about his waist. He flexed his arms, and hitched up the skirt of the tunic, higher in his belt, until it was high on his thighs. Bran Loort, too, did these things.
Thurnus came to me and lifted me to my feet, his hands on my arms. 'Is it because of your beauty, little slave,' he asked, 'that this has come about?'
I could not answer him, so miserable I was. I could not stand without his holding me.
'No,' said Thurnus. 'There is more involved here.' He turned me about and untied my wrists, and unknotted the rope from my neck, throwing it away.
I stood in my brand and rope collar before him.
I looked up at him. He had been kind to me.
'Gag her and put her in the rape-rack,' he said to a man.
I regarded him, startled, as I was dragged from his presence. I would be secured in the rape-rack, the ready spoils for the victor. I did not know why I would be gagged.
The young men of Bran Loort gathered about him, encouraging him. Thurnus stood to one side, not seeming to pay them attention.
With a cry of misery I was thrown onto the beams of the rack. My left ankle was thrust into the semi-circular opening in the lower left ankle beam and the upper left ankle beam, with its matching semi-circular opening, was dropped, and locked, in place. My other ankle was similarly secured in the separate matching beams for the right ankle. The rape-rack at Tabuk's Ford is a specially prepared horizontal stock, cut away in a V-shape at the lower end. My wrists were seized and my hair and I was thrown down on my back, wrists held in place, and my head, too, by my hair, in three semi-circular openings. A single beam, with matching semi-circular openings, on a heavy hinge, closes the stock. It was swung up and then dropped in place, and locked shut. I was now held in the stock, on my back, by my ankles, wrists and neck. I could move very little. I closed my eyes. I opened them to see a man above me. Looking up and back, my head down, I saw a piece of cloth in his hand. It was large. I wept as it was wadded, painfully, in my mouth. He then secured it in place with a narrow piece of folded cloth which slipped deeply between my teeth. He then, with another three scarves, covering the bottom portion of my face, one over the other, completed the task of gagging the slave girl. I could not utter a sound. I did not know why I had been gagged. My neck rested on the back of the semi-circular opening in the lower beam. It was painful. I am Judy Thorton, I tried to tell myself. I am Judy Thorton! I am an Earth girl! This cannot be happening to me! But I knew I was only Dina, a Gorean slave at the mercy of masters.
I turned my head to the side, to see the combat. I saw Turnip looking at me. Her eyes were frightened. Then she looked away. It could have been she in the stock. Radish was watching Thurnus, frightened. So, too, was Verr Tail. Sandal Thong was nowhere to be seen.
'Are you ready, Thurnus?' asked Bran Loort.
Villagers had cleared a circle. The fire was now high, and one could see well.
'Will you not require a staff?' asked Bran Loort, grinning.
'Perhaps,' said Thurnus. He looked at the eight cohorts of Bran Loort. 'These fellows, I gather,' said Thurnus, 'will not enter our competition.'
'I am sufficient onto the task of putting a slack, fat fellow such as you under caste discipline,' grinned Bran Loort.
'Perhaps,' granted Thurnus.
'You will need a staff,' pointed out Bran Loort.
'Yes,' said Thurnus. He turned to one of Bran Loort's cohorts. 'Strike at me,' he said.
The young man grinned. He smote down at Thurnus. Thurnus seized the staff and, suddenly, with strength like that of a larl, jerked the young man toward him, at the same time kicking upward savagely, blasting the fellow in the teeth with the heel of his sandal, the young man reeling back, blood spattering from his nose and mouth, clutching at his face, the staff in the hands of Thurnus. There were teeth in the dirt. The young man sat, dazed, on the ground.
'A good staff,' said Thurnus, 'must be one with which one can thrust,' and, saying this, looking at one young man, he drove the staff, like a spear into the ribs of another, 'and slice,' added Thurnus, who then smote the first fellow, whose attention was now on his struck fellow, along the side of the face. The first fellow fell in the dirt clutching his ribs. I had little doubt that one or more had been broken; the second fellow lay inert in the dirt, blood at the side of his head. 'But,' said Thurnus, 'a good staff must also be strong.' The young men stood, tensed, five of them, and Bran Loort. 'Come at me,' said Thurnus to another of the men. Enraged the fellow charged. Thurnus was behind him and smote down, shattering the heavy staff across the fellow's back. He lay in the dirt, unable to rise. The staff had been more than two inches in diameter. 'That staff, you see,' said Thurnus, instructing the younger men, 'was flawed. It was weak. He gestured to the fellow lying in the dirt, his face contorted with pain, scratching at the dust. 'It did not even break his back,' said Thurnus. 'Such a staff may not be relied upon in
