girl, and for a very good reason.
'Come now,' said he, 'where is she?'
'Over here,' I said.
I led him over to the stake, a few yards away, among other stakes, to which the female, tied kneeling, head down, covered with a sheet, was chained by an ankle.
'Unsheet her,' he said.
I bent down and untied the cord which, about her neck, held the center of the sheet, hoodlike, over her head. I put the cord in my pouch. I then, perhaps somewhat dramatically, suddenly drew the sheet away from the bound girl. She moved, wildly, but could not lift her head up, as it was tied down, fastened to her crossed ankles.
'It is she!' cried Marcus, startled, with joy!
The girl, as she could, turning her head in the rope, looked wildly, joyfully, at Marcus.
He fell to his knees beside her, fumbling with the ropes, almost beside himself.
'How! How!' he asked.
I put my fingers over my mouth, to warn the girl not to speak.
She was sobbing with joy.
'How is it possible!' cried Marcus, tearing at the ropes at her ankles.
'She was my captive, and full servant, from long ago,' I said, 'from the Crooked Tarn.'
' 'Full servant'!' said Marcus.
I saw that he would not be too pleased to share this special female. I think he wanted every bit of her to himself. To be sure, I could presumably find a woman here and there on the road, or even, as we passed various markets, buy one and sell her, and then buy another and sell her, and so on, as we traveled.
'Ephialtes was holding her for me,' I said.
'She is now a slave!' he announced.
'Yes,' I said. I had had Ephialtes do this yesterday afternoon. He had taken her to a processing chain in the slave camp. On her neck there was a common iron collar, a strap collar, hammered shut, as there had been on the neck of she who, until a few Ehn ago, had had the name 'Ina'. Similarly, as she who had had the name 'Ina' this slave was now branded. She, too, as that slave, now wore the common Kajira brand, the tiny, delicate, lovely cursive Kef. This is a good brand for females, as it tells them that they are only common slaves.
'I must have her!' he cried. He tore the ropes from her neck.
She gasped, and uttered a joyous sound, but dared not speak. He seized her in his arms, she kneeling, her hands bound behind her, helpless, sobbing, laughing, and drew her toward him.
'The ankle!' I cried.
He had drawn her toward him and her left leg was now extended back, toward the stake, the chain taut.
'Free it! Free it!' cried Marcus, covering her with kisses. I got the key into the shackle and opened it, and he pulled her loose. I lifted my arm to the stake attendant. One pays two tarsk bits, one for the rental, one as a deposit against the key. Marcus and the slave were lost in the rapture of one another. In a moment I had turned in the key and received my tarsk bit back, that which had been held as a deposit. A tarsk bit may not be much but sometimes it can be very important, as, for example, when one does not have one. 'You are not going to use her here are you?' inquired the attendant of Marcus. 'It is hard enough,' he said, indicating a nearby blonde and redhead, both back-braceleted, chained, too, by their left ankles to their respective stakes, 'to keep these other slaves from whimpering and moaning.'
The girl we had just freed from the stake laughed with pleasure in Marcus' arms.
'Carry her back to the camp,' I advised him. 'She is a slave!' I reminded him.
And then he threw her over his shoulder, her head to the rear, as is proper for a slave, and carried her the few yards to our camp.
'Touch me, Master! I beg it!' cried the blonde to the attendant.
'No, touch me! Please touch me!' wept the redhead.
'See?' asked the attendant of me. 'Yes,' I said.
'Master!' called the blonde.
'Master!' called the redhead. 'Please, Master!'
'Be silent, sluts,' he said.
I followed Marcus to our camp. He had put the girl down there, on her knees, and she was looking up at him, rapturously.
'I must have her!' he cried to me.
The girl looked at me wildly, hopefully.
'She is yours,' I said. She cried out with joy. 'A gift?' he cried.
'Yes,' I said, 'a mere gift.'
'No!' he cried. 'Here!' He then threw me the entire sack of gold which he had taken from Octantius earlier in the afternoon.
'Well, very well,' I said, taking the gold. One hundred pieces of gold is nothing to be sneezed at, so to speak. Also, I suspected that there might prove to be a good reason for accepting it. I could always divide it with him later, if I wished.
'You have done this!' said Marcus to me, grandly. He clasped my hand warmly. 'How can I ever thank you?'
'It is nothing,' I said. Of course, I had just, as a matter of fact, received a hundred pieces of gold. Surely that should count for something.
'I own you!' he cried proudly, happily, to the girl.
She flung herself to her belly before him, covering his feet with kisses. In an instant he had knelt before her and drawn her up to her knees, holding her and kissing her. She had her head back.
He then pulled her half to her feet, she bent back, and then, he crouching over her, lowered her, gently, to her back. He then knelt there, beside her, joyously, almost unbelievingly, gazing on her. She was a beautiful slave, branded, bound there, before him, his. I knew this girl, and she was a slave to the bottom of her pretty little belly. She had waited long for her master.
'Perhaps you would like to know how much gold is in this sack,' I said to the girl.
She looked at me, suddenly, extremely interested, extremely attentive. She was extremely female. She wanted to know what she had brought, in her sale.
'Would you like to know?' I inquired.
She nodded, desperately. I had warned her to silence earlier.
'But curiosity is not becoming in a Kajira,' I said.
Her expression changed instantly. Tears sprang to her eyes.
'But it is a hundred pieces of gold,' I said, 'tarn disks of Ar, full weight.' To be sure, I had not counted this, and I doubt that Marcus had either. On the other hand, it was the money which had been ready as a reward for she whose name earlier had been 'Ina' and I had no doubt that it had been carefully counted and weighed. If the amount had been short, in either number or weight, I would not have wished to be Octantius, dealing with his hirelings.
She looked at me, startled. Such an amount, one might expect to have been brought by the preferred pleasure slave of a Ubar.
'Had I thousand times more,' exclaimed Marcus, 'I would have given it all to you!'
She looked at him, frightened. It is one thing to go for a silver tarsk, or such, and quite another for a hundred pieces of gold. She knew, of course, something of the worth of women in the markets. She knew that she was not, for example, a trained slave, a high slave, a politically sensitive slave, the shackled daughter of a Ubar being publicly sold in the city of her father's conquerors, or such. Indeed, she was only a new slave. She probably did not even know the hundred kisses.
Marcus then put his hands on her ankles, preparing to separate them. 'Prepare to be used, beautiful slave,' he said.
'What are you going to name her?' I asked.
'What was her name when she was a free woman?' asked Marcus. ' 'Tullia', 'Publia'?'
