serve and please him, her master, as much or more than any similar animal which might be in his possession.
'She is hot!' said a fellow.
Ina made an inarticulate cry of protest.
'Yes!' said another.
Ina, as I caught sight of her, was shaking her head, negatively.
'Do not lie to us, rence slut!' snarled a man.
I heard her cuffed.
'Look,' said a fellow.
Ina uttered a startled, warm, helpless little cry.
'See?' asked the fellow.
'Yes,' said the other.
'She is hot all right,' said a man.
'She is worthy of the iron,' said a man.
'Yes,' said another.
Now I heard Ina whimpering, and moaning. Labienus, for whatever reason, had rejected her.
'Aii!' cried a fellow.
I heard Ina handed to yet another fellow.
Then she was moaning again, her head back, her hair about, helpless in this new grasp.
'I am ready again!' said a fellow.
'Wait!' snarled a fellow.
I feared Ina might cry out in words, belying our posture of her muteness, but she did not do so.
'Hurry!' said a man.
Ina made a protesting noise, a begging noise, that he who gripped her take pity upon her and not too soon desist in his attentions.
'Ah!' cried the fellow in whose grasp she lay.
'I am next!' said a man.
'Give her to me!' said another.
Labienus, for whatever reason, had rejected her. To these fellows, however, she was a dream of pleasure.
'Superb!' said a fellow.
'Let us instruct her in how to move,' said a man.
'She is not a slave,' said a fellow.
'What does it matter?' asked another.
'Next you will want to teach her tongue work,' said another.
'An excellent idea,' said a man.
'Do you wish to learn tongue work, mute rence slut?' asked a man.
Ina made a frightened noise.
'Yes?' he asked.
Ina, terrified, whimpered once.
'Good,' said the fellow.
Ina did not now, it seemed, have to fear dismissal, or rejection.
'Tarl, of Port Kar,' said Labienus.
'I am here, Captain,' I said.
'Are any others close about?' he asked.
'I do not think so close that they might overhear sort speech,' I said.
'Too,' smiled Labienus, 'I gather they are occupied.'
'It would seem so,' I said.
Labienus did not look directly at me while he spoke. Rather he looked out over the marsh. He did not see anything, however, as he was blind. This was the result of the work of the sting flies, or, as the men of Ar are wont to call them, the needle flies. In their attacks he had insufficiently defended himself from their depredations which, too often, are toward the eyes, the surfaces of which are moist and reflect light. Most, of course, would shut or cover their eyes, perhaps with cloth or their hands or arms. The rencers use rence mats most commonly, or hoods made of rence, for these, screenlike, permit one to see out but are too small to admit the average sting fly. Had Labienus protected himself, and not tried, at all costs, to maintain his cognizance and command, I do not doubt but what he, like the others, could have prevented the flies, in numbers, from inflicting such injuries on himself. He must have been stung several times in, or about, the eyes. Labienus, in my opinion, was a fine, responsible, trustworthy officer. His faults in command, as I saw them, however, had been several. He had been too inflexible in his adherence to orders; he had had too great a confidence in the wisdom and integrity of his superiors; he had been too slow to detect the possibilities of betrayal and treason; he had not speedily extricated his command from a hopeless situation; and even on the level of squad tactics, by attempting to maintain cognizance and command in a situation in which it was impractical to do so, he had, in the long run, by sustaining grievous personal injury, jeopardized not only himself but the men who depended upon him. To be sure, many of these faults, as I thought of them, might, from another point of view, have been regarded as virtues. I suspected that it had not been an accident that Labienus had been in command of the vanguard. Saphronicus had probably wanted a simple, trusting, reliable, tenacious, indefatigable officer in that post. One who would continue to doggedly carry his command deeper and deeper into the delta, regardless of what might appear to be the hazards or untenabilities of the situation.
'The rence woman you brought into the camp is a mute,' he said.
'Yes,' I said.
'Surely it is unlikely that a given rence girl, picked up in the marsh, would be a mute,' he said.
'Yes,' I said. 'I would think it extremely unlikely.'
'But such a thing could occur,' he said.
'Certainly,' I said.
'I gather that it was you who prepared the tharlarion for the men,' he said.
'Yes,' I said.
'Why would the rence girl not do that?' he asked. 'Surely she would expect to have to do that.'
'I would not wish to place a weapon in her hands,' I said. This seemed to me a plausible reply as she, supposedly a recent capture, might not yet be fully aware of the irrationality and uselessness of even token resistance. Similarly in many cities a slave may be slain, or her hands cut off, for so much as touching a weapon.
'Doubtless you would expect her, from time to time,' he said, 'to handle utensils, to serve, for example, in kitchens.'
'She is not yet branded and collared,' I said.
'It is surprising to me,' he said, 'that rencers are not scouring the delta to recover her.'
'Perhaps they are,' I said.
'Perhaps,' he said.
'Perhaps she was fleeing an unwanted mating,' I said. She had tried to convince me of that, or something like that, I recalled, when she was pretending to be a rence girl, preposterous though that was, with her accent, when I had first encountered her on the pole, tied there for tharlarion.
'And found herself instead in your ropes?'
'Yes,' I said.
'Perhaps she, a mute rence girl, doubtless an outcast, was merely living alone in the marsh when you found her?'
'Perhaps,' I said.
'The Lady Ina,' he said, 'for whom you have named your capture, was also, as I recall, just a bit short of average height for a female.'
'Or thereabouts,' I said.
'That would make the name more appropriate,' he said.
