which the two sacks had been drawn from the pommel of my saddle. I then removed the rope's ends from the large, closed, high handles of the sacks.
Across the prairie I dould see riders approaching, some four or five in the lead, and others, drawn out, behind them.
I cut the rope apart in the center. I then threaded one length of the rope through the handles on Bloketu's sack and tied the two ends together, drawing it up from the handles in such a way as to make a long, double loop, the two high protions of the loop well above the handles and adjacent to one another; I then, with the other length of the rope, did the same thing with Iwoso's sack.
The lead riders, then, had stopped. They seemed confused about the trail. Perhaps it had crossed another trail. Certainly it did not seem likely that it would lead to this upjutting, flat-topped, weathered rock. Other riders, then, from the village, caught up with them.
I scanned the skies. There was no sign of Cuwignaka or Hci.
I looked down at Iwoso, laced securely, helplessly in her sack. 'You seem to be missing your gag.' I said.
She remained absolutely quiet. Had she not tricked me into the loosening of her gag, in the lodge, giving her an opportunity to cry out and raise the alarm, and opportunity which she had well exploited? It was little wonder she was quiet. Doubtless now, so fully at my mercy, she must be wary of my wrath. I glanced at Bloketu. Her gag was still fixed as firmly, as perfectly, in her mouth, as the first moment it had been put there.
The riders were now again approaching.
Slave sacks, as you may have gathered, are known not only among the red savages but also among the men of the cities. Given their obvious utility, among men who own and master women, they may have arisen independently in both places. Their appearance in diverse loci, for example, need not imply borrowing. Such sacks, however, do have a utility among the men of the tower cities which they are not likely to have, or welucl selcome have, among the bold savages of the Barrens. To understand this utiity it is well to understand that on Gor slaving, like marketing and farming, is a business. One of the problems which often arises in this business is that of getting the capture from, say, her own bedroom to your pens where she may be properly branded and collared, and taught to kiss and obey, later to be retailed naked from a suitable outlet, into her new life as a slave.
I heard cries below me. The riders below had seen the approach of the tarn almost as soon as I had.
Cuwignaka would be in the lead. The large wooden hook dangled from the girth rope of his tarn.
'there are the sounds of pursuers,' said Iwoso. 'They will soon be here. Free me. You cannot escape.'
I lifted Bloketu to her feet, holding her with my left arm, the double loop in my right hand.
'What are you doing?' asked Iwoso.
I kept my eye on the appraoching tarn.
'Free me,' said Iwoso. 'You cannot escape.'
Cuwignaka's tarn seemed suddenly upon us. It was moving at great speed. The wooden hook was no more than four or five feet from the surface of the rock. Iwoso, startled, at my feet, screamed. I flung the double loop over the hook. bloketu, at what must have been a breathtaking acceleration, was jerked upward and away.
'No, no!' screamed Iwoso.
I lifed her to her feet. She squirmed in the sack, her eyes wild with terror.
'Please, no!' whispered Iwoso. Then I had flung the double loop on her sack over the hook on Hci's tarn and she, her scream fading in the distance, was lofted away into the night.
The Yellow Knives, below looked upward in consternation. I trusted that Canka, on one of the tarns we had purloined from teh Kinyanpi, would soon make his appearance.
One of the Yellow Knives pointed to me. I was still on the rock. Two or three of them, suddenly, began to urge their kaiila toward me.
I turned about. Canka's tarn swept by. My own tarn, on a longether, held by Canka, was only yards behind. I heard the scratching of kaiila claws on the rock face. I extened myhands and thrust my arms through the rope netting, it dangling from the girth rope of my tarn, and whipped and snapping, too, at the surface of the rock it skimmed. I seized then the netting with my hands and felt myself drawn up and away from the rock. After I had caught my breath I climbed by the netting and girth rope to the back of my tarn and took my place there. Canka, with a cry of congratulations, hurled me the tether and I coiled it and put it beneath the girth rope. The tarns of Cuwignaka and Hci, with their lovely cargoes, were now far in the distance. I circled once, broadly, looking back. Several of the Yellow Knives, on their kaiila, were now on the large, flat surface of the rock.
I then turned my tarn to follow the tarns of my friends.
To be sure,we had given up one kaiila, but that, perhaps, was not too much considering that we had obtained Iwoso. It was the first time, I supposed, tht the Yellow-Knife beatuty had been, in effect, exchanged for a kaiila. I did not know whether or not it would be the last.
I looked up at the glorious sky, with its moons and clouds. I began to sing, a warrior song, one from Ko-ro- ba.
After a time, looking back, I became aware of another shape in the sky. It was two or three hundred yards behind me, above my tarn and to my right. It was a great, black tarn. I turned my tarn to meet it. We circled one another. Then I took my tarn down to the prairie. The other tarn, too, then, alit near me, on the grass.
'Greetings, old friend,' I said. 'It has been a long time.'
Chapter 44
YELLOW KNIFES COME TO COUNCIL ROCK
'Oh!' said Iwoso, wincing, as I pulled tight the knots on her wrists, fastening them back and on each side of the stout post.
'How dare you treat me like this?' asked Iwoso.
'Rejoice,' I told her, 'that you are not being bound in whipping position.'
'Whipping position?' she said. 'But I am a free woman!'
'It is not only slaves who may be whipped when their captors please,' I told her.
She shrank back, her back against the post. To be sure, she was not tied with her belly against the post and her hands over her head, out of the way of the lash, or kneeling, her hands tied in front of her, about the post, common whipping positions.
I then crouched down and roped her ankles, closely, to the post.
'I am a free woman,' she said. 'It is undignified from me to be tied to a post.'
'Hci has decided it,' I said.
'Hci!' she cried. 'What right has he to decide such things?'
'He is your captor,' I said.
'Oh,' she said, frightened. I suspect that there were frew things which the sly, clever Iwoso feared in this world, but, high among them, I had little doubt, were the scarred face and fierce heart of Hci, of the Isbu Kaiila.
I then stood up and unlooped some more rope.
There were two posts. They were wedged deeply in a fissure in the surface of Council Rock, near the brink of the escarpment. From the position of the posts one could see the prairie, hundreds of feet below, for pasangs about, particularly to the west. The posts, too, because of their position near the edge of the escarpment, commanded a fine view of the main, sloping trail leading up to the summit.
I then, looping rope about Iwoso's belly, twice, snugly, pulled her back against the post, roping her closely to it. There was a deep notch in the back of the post, into which the rope fitted, to prevent slippage.
'You might have permitted us clothing,' said Iwoso.
'No,' I said. Bloketu, naked, was already bound to the first post.
Not only would the girls command an excellent veiw of the prairie, especially to the west, and of the main trail to the summit, but those who might approach from this direction or ascend the trail should, similarly, be able to entertain an excellent view of the girls.
They were prominently displayed.
