The stranger motioned with his sword that Callisthenes and Sempronius should move together. Reluctantly they did so, carefully keeping blade room between them. Their leader was gone. They could form no plan, it seemed, between them as to who should hold, who should seek an opening. Neither cared, it seemed, to advance. It there was an initiative here, or some advantage, oddly enough it seemed to lie on the side of the stranger, not the pair of them. They kept their eyes on him. Fulvius, I suspect, had been a very fine swordsman. Certainly Sempronius, earlier, had acknowledged his supremacy among them, with the blade. Yet Fulvius had lasted hardly an exchange with the stranger. This could not fail but weigh with them. Too, I did not doubt but what in their minds were the fates of their fellows, Alcinous and Portus, back at the wagon.
I looked about.
The other girls, too, were dumbfounded. I think they, even Gorean girls, in a culture where the knife and sword were familiar, common weapons, had never seen anything like this. Mirus, even, seemed stunned. He had lowered his own sword. Tupita, near him, white-faced, held him, supporting him.
I regarded the stranger. He was tall, very tall. He was broad-shouldered and narrow-waisted. He had long, bronzed arms. His hands were very large. I trembled. He held a steel sword, where such things made law. He was tall, fierce and hard. I was very small, and soft and weak. It was only the swords of Callisthenes and Sempronius which separated him from me. I saw myself then, noting his eyes in the mask, the subject of his gaze. I saw the point of his sword. He, looking at me, moved it, slightly. Inwardly I laughed with joy. I swiftly, in response to his gesture, as I could, spread my knees before him. Callisthenes, first, then Sempronius, hurled their swords, blade first, into the earth at their feet. The handles, upright, were visible in the grass. We belonged to the stranger! I looked wildly at him.
He motioned Callisthenes and Sempronius away from their weapons.
Callisthenes, I suspect, was not a fine swordsman. He had expressed some relief or satisfaction at their earlier inability to locate the stranger. I think he had not really wanted to meet up with him, he who had slain his fellows, Alcinous and Portus. Sempronius, probably more skilled, had been wounded. He ordered Callisthenes and Sempronius to stand to the side. He then approached Mirus. Mirus thrust Tupita behind him, and held his sword, ready to defend himself and his slave. The stranger then, with a decisive movement, sheathed his sword. It cracked into the sheath. Mirus grinned, and lowered his sword. Then, overcome with his exhaustion, his weakness, the loss of blood, he sat down in the grass.
The stranger came to the rail and examined Cara, and then Mina, and then Tela. 'You are well curved,' he said to Tela. 'Thank you, Master,' she said. Instantly I hated Tela. Then he came to stand before me. 'You, too, are well curved,' he said. 'Thank you, Master!' I said. I cast a glance at Tela. 'And you look well, tied so helplessly,' he said. 'Thank you, Master!' I said. I cast another glance at Tela. He had said two things to me, and only one to her! But when I looked back he had turned away for me! I squirmed in my bonds. I wanted to cry out 'master!' to him, but I did not dare. I did not want to be whipped. Did he think I could not recognize him in his mask? Did he not remember me?
We remained bound for several Ahn, until well after dark. In this time he had walked Callisthenes and Sempronius before him, back toward the trees, in which direction, it seemed, lay the slave wagon. There they had apparently buried three bodies, those of Licinius, who had been slain by Hendow, and Alcinous and Portus, victims, it seems, of his own blade. Too, from the wagon, or its vicinity, they retrieved supplies. These, however, were not immediately fed to us. Sempronius and Callisthenes first busied themselves, under the stranger' s supervision, with burying what humans lay about. The strange beasts were left for jards. Borko, however, was buried beside Hendow. The graves of the men had swords thrust in the earth, that they might thus be marked. Mirus scratched a board, taken from the ruins of the building about, which he fixed on the common grave of Borko and Hendow. I cannot read Gorean. Mirus told Tupita it said, 'Borko and Hendow, Hendow was of Brundisium. He was my friend.' Most Gorean graves, incidentally, are not marked even in so simple a fashion. Most Goreans do not care for such things. They believe that it is a man' s deeds which truly live after him, and that the difference, great or small, which they make in the world, the difference which he made, for having been there, is what is important. No matter how insignificant or tiny one is, in te Gorean belief, one is an incredible part of history. That can never be taken from anyone. That is better, they believe, than scratched wood or marked stone. There would be no pyres. Such might attract the attention of men about, or perhaps of tarnsmen aflight, even as far away as Venna.
'Shall we now dig two more?' asked Sempronius.
'For whom?' asked the stranger.
'For ourselves,' said Sempronius, indicating himself and Callisthenes. 'No,' said the stranger. 'Wash. Perform the customary purifications.' Sempronius and Callisthenes looked at one another. 'Very well,' said Sempronius. After they had washed and performed the rites we were fed. Of slaves only Tupita was permitted to feed herself. She also fed Mina and Cara. I was fed by Sempronius. Tela by Callisthenes. The stranger did this perhaps to torture them, I supposed, that they might be so close to half-naked female slaves and yet be forbidden to so much as touch them.
After we had been fed, and Callisthenes and Sempronius, too, had partaken of food, the stranger directed them to put us in coffle, with the exception of Tupita. He also specified the exact positions we would occupy in this coffle. Accordingly, in a given order, we were roped together by the neck. Mina, Cara and Tela were freed of the rail, and all our ankles were untied. Mina and Cara, of course, still wore their shackles. Thought it was with joyful relief that I fel my ankles at last freed from my wrists and could get up, though in pain, and stretch my legs, my hands still bound behind me, it was with chagrin that I considered my position on the coffle. I was last! Last! Did he think I did not recognize him in the mask? Did he not remember Tela was before me, and she had led a much larger coffle entering the work camp of Ionicus near Venna, that of the black chain. Mina and Cara were ahead of us. And Mina was first on the coffle! How proud she seemed! Look at her, so beautiful, so proud to be first! Callisthenes and Sempronius supported Mirus between them, and helped him toward the woods. Tupita followed, closely. After them came the stranger. He paused, on his way, to pick up the swords of Callisthenes and Sempronius. He had also taken the blanket and the silver, and purses, which had been on it. The bodies, too, I gathered, of those who had been about had been relieved of what coins or valuables they might have carried. The coins of Hendow the stranger had given to Mirus. He was, then, truly a brigand! A masked brigand! But how he could handle a sword! How he had fought!
The group now made its way toward the woods. We, Mina, Cara, Tela and I, in coffle, followed it. Ti did not even seem that they were paying any attention, to see if we came or not. We followed them, of course, docilely, like tethered animals! But, of course, we were tethered animals. We were slaves.
I looked back in the moonlight once, at the grave of Borko and Hendow. I could see the hilt of Hendow' s sword there, and, behind it, the narrow board fixed in the earth by Mirus, that simple, crude marker, not bearing much of a message, really, little more than the data that Hendow had been of Brundisium, and had had a friend.
I cried on the way to the woods.
30 The Slave Wagon
I sat up.
I could not believe what he apparently intended to do to me. Yet I suppose it was not anything that unusual for a slave.
The three moons were full. It was late. We were now in the woods. The slave wagon was not far away. The tharlarion, unhitched, but tethered, browsed among the trees, pulling at herbs in the grass, lifting its neck to nibble at wide leaves.
Cords encircled my ankles. I could not bring my legs together. My ankles were tied at the insides of two saplings, about a yard apart. My hands were no longer tied behind me. They were braceleted there. This was far more comfortable. On the other hand whereas before I had had only to contend helplessly with simple binding fiber I was now the prisoner of clasping steel.
Surely he did not intend to put me through this! Did he not recognize me! Was I to be treated only as another slave?
I, sitting up in this awkward position, jerked at the bracelets, sensed the sudden straightening of the linkage,
