She had not moved her head, of course, for she knew she had been placed in a common leading position for slave girls.
She tried to look up at Kenneth, but the hand of Barns did not permit it. She must look to the dirt at her feet.
Bares turned away from us, leading her.
'Bares,' said Kenneth.
'Yes,' said Bares, stopping, and looking back.
'See that the new girl is worked well,' said Kenneth.
'The south stables should be cleaned,' said Bares.
'Shoveled and scrubbed,' said Kenneth.
Barns grinned.
'And then water must be drawn and carried to fill the tanks in stables six through ten'
'Yes,' said Bares. He turned then and strode away, pulling the half-running Taphris beside him.
Water is drawn from wells. It is then carried, in yoked buckets, to great wooden tubs in certain of the stables.
I did not envy the beautiful Taphris.
Kenneth turned to me. 'You cannot read,' he said.
'No, Master,' I said, 'not Gorean.' Slaves are commonly kept illiterate. It makes them more helpless. It gives the masters more control over them. Besides, it is said, why should a slave know how to read?
'I do not think our little friend, Taphris,' said Kenneth, 'has fallen in the favor of the Mistress.'
'Oh, Master?'
'No,' he said.
'But she has been sent to the stables,' I said.
'And she will learn what it is to be a stable slut,' said Kenneth, grimly.
I smiled. I had little doubt but what Kenneth said was true.
'May I inquire as to the contents of the note, that which accompanied her?' I asked I gathered that Kenneth would have been willing to let me read it, had I been able to do so.
'It specifies that she is to be exempt from assignment to male stable slaves, that she is not to be given to them for wench sport.'
'That is interesting,' I said.
'And, further, it specifies that under certain conditions she is to be granted certain freedoms of observation and movement. Too, once, weekly, she is to be sent to the house on some errand or other.'
'What are these conditions under which she is to be granted movement and freedom of observation?' I inquired.
'Conditions deemed pertinent to the cognizance of a certain male slave's whereabouts and activities,' he said.
'Mine?' I asked.
'Yes,' said Kenneth, grinning.
I said nothing.
'Our lovely Taphris, it seems,' said Kenneth, 'has business in the stables.'
I said nothing.
'It seems the Mistress has not forgotten her former silk slave.'
I did not speak.
'Taphris is a spy,' said Kenneth. 'She has been sent to the stables by the Mistress to spy on you.'
'I see,' I said.
'Beware of her,' he said.
'I will,' I said.
20 I LEARN THAT THE MISTRESS WILL HAVE HOUSE GUESTS
I reeled back, sprawling in the sand. I could feel blood about my mouth.
I grunted, kicked. He threw himself at me, fists striking.
I heard the screams of the crowd, in the tiers. I rolled to one side, eluding the attacker.
I staggered up. He, too, then, was on his feet. I tried, gasping, to thrust him away. He struck me in the gut with his head, driving me half to the wall. He again lowered his head. I clasped my hands, and flung them upward, catching him under the chin and he staggered backward. I spit blood into the sand. He again rushed at me, seizing me, and flung me against the low palings. 'Fight! Fight!' I heard. 'Jason!' I heard. 'Kaibar!' I heard. 'Now you have him!' I heard. 'Get away from the wall!' Kenneth was screaming. The slave, Kaibar, then, of the stables of Shandu, holding his hands together, slashing sideways, struck me with his left elbow, and then his right. 'Get away from the wall!' I heard. I grunted, taking a blow in the gut and then another, the fists now, like battering rams. 'Get away from the wall!' screamed Kenneth. But it was not he, the bastard, who was pinned against it. I clenched Kaibar, holding to him, gasping. He tried to shake me from him. 'Do not delay the fight!' Warned the referee, moving about us. I felt his whip lash at me. Then he was between us, forcing us apart. But I was now in the center of the pit. Kaibar and I faced one another. We were both bloody, and exhausted. He struck at me with his balled fist. I blocked the blow. He was strong. My arms ached. Even to parry the blows of a strong man takes its toll.
My shoulders and arms- ached. I could scarcely lift them. Kaibar staggered toward me again. Again I seized him, holding to him.
We heard then the bar being struck.
'Here!' called Kenneth. I, turning about, followed the sound of his voice and in a moment he had seized me and pulled me down on the box. Bares, with a sponge, dipped in a bucket, squeezed water over my head.
'You are doing splendidly,' Kenneth assured me.
I could not even answer him.
Bares sponged sand and blood from my body.
'Drink,' said Kenneth to Taphris, who knelt at our side.
She thrust the bottle filled with water, thick with sugar, to Kenneth who, holding it for me, poured some of it down my throat. I spit the rest of it away into the sand. Kenneth pushed the bottle back to Taphris.
Bares now toweled my body. Weakly I pushed him away. The sweat and water on my body, I hoped, would tend to slide blows away, were they struck at oblique angles.
He then dried the leather on my fists, that it would grip when it struck flesh.
The bar was again struck, a sharp, ringing note.
'You have him now,' said Kenneth. 'Finish him quickly.'
I was half thrust to my feet and staggered toward the center of the pit. Kenneth, I decided, was insane. Yet he had seen hundreds of such bouts.
I took the first blow, staggering to the side. I straightened and, stumbling, smashed my fist into the gut of Kaibar. He reached for me, and I struck aside his hands, and struck him on the left side of the face. We stood in the sand, unsteadily.
'Fight!' cried the referee. 'Fight!' cried the crowd. The crowd, mostly, was an excited and motely assortment of low caste males, but, here and there, there were veiled women amongst them, generally these, too, of low caste. There were, in favored seats, some upper-caste Goreans, recognizable by the colors and qualities of their robes, and among these, here and there, heavily veiled, erect and lovely, some upper-caste women. At one end of the enclosure, where it was entered, there was a barred gate. Behind this, pressed against it, watching, excited, holding to the bars, were collared, halfnaked slave girls, stable sluts, crying out for the champions of their various stables.
'Fight!' cried the referee. His lash fell on Kaibar.
I suddenly felt chilled. I realized then I should have permitted Bares to towel my body, drying it. I feared I
