Chains Released

2

Himlin took his time with the girl slave, and from the way Tandro moved just a little where he knelt Jake knew that his friend was suffering at least as much as Jake himself. Every time the girl moaned Jake’s suffering increased a notch, but there was a limit to the increase. The rise stopped just short of the point where Jake would have come just by watching, which showed another segment of the orders he’d been given. Without permission from his “master,” he was allowed nothing in the way of relief.

When Himlin finished with the girl he closed his body wrap again and sauntered back to his chair. The girl seemed to be deeply satisfied, and it took a minute or so before she was able to leave the form and follow Himlin to kneel at his feet—just out of Jake’s reach. She was also out of Tandro’s reach, and having her so close but still beyond touching and use made her presence even worse for Jake.

“And now for the regret I spoke of earlier,” Himlin said once the girl knelt in front of him, but the slaver’s gaze was on Tandro rather than the girl. “A slave is required to be pleasing at all times, and you, slave, were less than pleasing by being unable to answer my questions. Go to the form and bend over it the way the girl did.”

Jake watched as Tandro obeyed the orders he’d been given, but not even the expressionless expression Tandro showed was enough to keep Jake from knowing how really disturbed his friend was. The native tried hard not to limp—or flinch—as he made his way to the wooden form and bent over it, but Jake was sure Tandro knew what was coming as well as he did. Slaves who weren’t pleasing were punished…

“Your reward, slave, is to know that you won’t be punished—this time,” Himlin said, and Jake glanced up to see that the slaver now looked at him. “You should also be rewarded with the knowledge that you’ve pleased your master just as a good slave is supposed to do. Now let’s enjoy teaching a new slave his proper place in life.”

By that time one of the slaver’s men had positioned himself behind Tandro, a switch in his hand. Again Jake knew that a whipping would have been easier to take and watch, but he and Tandro weren’t going to be given a chance to salve their pride. Humiliating pain was what slaves were given, and that’s all that Jake and Tandro could look forward to. Stubborn defiance had a way of melting back faster in the presence of humiliation than in the face of real pain…

Not that there wasn’t real pain involved. Tandro couldn’t quite swallow a hiss when the first stroke of the switch reached his backside, and the sound of the thin branch striking tender flesh even made Jake wince. As Tandro himself had once pointed out, no one in their right mind wanted to experience a second switching right on top of a previous one. But the observation hadn’t been enough to save Tandro, and now an opinion was being turned into reality.

The second switching was given at the same pace as the first, and Tandro’s body writhed even when the switch wasn’t striking his backside. Every stroke added to the red the skin of his behind had turned, and by the third stroke Tandro was making soft sounds of pain. By the sixth stroke the sounds weren’t quite as soft, but the last four strokes, landing

“smack! … smack! … smack! … smack!” with precision and strength didn’t change the volume of the sound. At that point Himlin gestured to his man with the switch, and the man stepped back.

“All right, slave, you can come back now and kneel in place again,” Himlin said, his tone showing how much he’d enjoyed the show. “If you liked the punishment and want more of it, just continue to be displeasing. Your master will be more than happy to oblige you.”

Tandro straightened and began to return to his place at the feet of

Himlin, but Jake could see that the other man was holding his breath against the added pain of movement. And Tandro was so aroused that Jake wondered why the other man’s skin hadn’t yet burst. By rights the pain should have ended Tandro’s arousal, but thanks to those insertions he and Tandro were being allowed nothing of any kind of relief. Jake’s knees had started to hurt from the way he was being kept kneeling, but that wasn’t doing him any good either.

And it seemed that nothing would do him or Tandro any good. Once the native was kneeling, Himlin signaled to one of his men and a second female slave was allowed into the room. This second girl was easily as beautiful as the first and dressed in the same kind of silks, and when the flute player began to make music again Jake really did wish he could cry. His first thought was a silent demand to know just how many of these girls Himlin meant to parade in front of him and Tandro, but then Jake realized that he didn’t really want to know.

Whatever the number, the time would be as far from pleasant as it’s possible to get. Without the least chance of escape…

Tain started to lead Ennie back in the direction they’d come from, having decided that reaching the gate they’d used to enter the town would be a better idea than trying for a different gate. She kept close to the back of the building, moving through shadow whenever possible, but hadn’t gone far when a strange woman stepped out of a doorway only a few feet ahead of them. The woman wore the thin, knee-length smock of a free woman of the lower classes, and held up a hand toward Tain.

“Don’t be afraid, I only want to help you,” the woman called softly.

“Come inside and we can talk.”

“Do you think we can trust her?” Ennie asked in a whisper from behind Tain. “What if there are men inside and she’s only luring us into slavery again?”

“Why would men bother doing it that way?” Tain murmured back, having already considered the point. “As far as they would know, they’d only have to step outside and order us to come to them. And now that you mention it, there’s something I should have done sooner. Don’t take orders from anyone but me.”

A glance back showed Tain the way Ennie nodded almost distractedly, the momentary animation already beginning to slip away. Being in danger obviously let Ennie escape the depression holding her for short periods of time, but the relief wasn’t, unfortunately, permanent. Well, Tain knew there was nothing she could do about the problem right now, so she led Ennie toward the doorway the strange woman had come out of.

The door stood slightly ajar, so Tain pushed it open further before stepping inside. Three women stood waiting in the empty warehouse, all of them dressed alike, and the woman who’d spoken a moment before took one step away from her companions.

“It’s all right, we won’t hurt you,” the woman said with a smile. “I’m

Risdin, and I also used to be a slave, but now we’re all free. To prove it, I’ll say don’t take anyone’s orders ever again. It’s just that easy to be free of the drug.“

Tain knew that being freed would have been just that easy—if she hadn’t been given orders not to take orders from anyone but Killen. And if Ennie hadn’t been given orders not to listen to anyone but Tain herself. She felt the urge to tell the woman Risdin about not being able to take orders from her, but since she didn’t really have to protect herself from Risdin the urge was easy to push aside. Since she knew that the order she’d been given had been meant for use with men, ignoring the required response was easier than it would have been ordinarily.

“Why are you risking yourselves by helping us?” Tain asked, a question that really did have to be put. Risdin was of average height and build, just like the two women behind her, but she was the only one of the three smiling. She had brown hair and seemed to have matching eyes, and was only faintly pretty. The two women behind her were downright plain.

“We’re risking ourselves for you because others risked themselves for us,” Risdin answered, her face sobering. “We saw you run when your owners were attacked, but we didn’t show ourselves right away. Some slaves in your place would have gone back to the men once the fighting was over, and if you’d done that we couldn’t have helped you. But you didn’t go back, which meant you wanted to escape, so now we can help. Let’s start with giving you some real food to eat.”

“I—think we need a few more answers first,” Tain said, ignoring the way Risdin’s gesture directed them more deeply into the building. “You seem to be saying that you and those others were once slaves yourselves, but if that’s true then I don’t understand why you’re in this town. You ought to be out of here, to make sure you aren’t caught and enslaved again.”

“We were out of here, but we volunteered to come back,” Risdin said, her face wearing an odd expression. “We fear slavery as much as the rest of our group, but some of us can’t bear to just hide out and do nothing to help free as many women as we can. We stay here for about a month at a time, and then others of the group come to take our place. During the seasons when these warehouses are in use we hide elsewhere, but we prefer this place because it’s closest to our secret way out of town.”

“You shouldn’t have told her that, Risdin,” one of the other women said at once with a frown. “We still don’t know if these two are real runaways or decoys to help catch us.”

“She didn’t tell me anything I hadn’t already guessed,” Tain said just as quickly before Risdin could speak. “If you three had come in through a gate without any men to act as your protection, you probably would have been taken as soon as you were out of sight of the guardhouse. And you don’t have to worry that we’re acting for the slavers. I’d sooner cut my own throat than give a slaver the time of day.”

“I don’t think they’re decoys, Celene,” the third woman said just as the second opened her mouth to argue. “Look at that other one, at the way she’s staring at nothing. The slavers would never use someone like that as a decoy.”

“She’s … had a hard time,” Tain said, turning to put an arm around Ennie. “Once we’re out of here I’m sure she’ll do better, but right now… Come on, Ennie. Our new friends here are inviting us for a late breakfast, and it would be rude to refuse them.”

Ennie didn’t really respond to Tain’s words, but she did let herself be urged into motion. The woman Celene, who had limp blond hair and hard blue eyes, was the only one who hesitated before coming forward to help with Ennie, but after a moment she did the same as her friends. Ennie’s pain and distance were too deep to be an act, and all three women seemed to know that.

The third woman went to close the door Tain had left open before coming back to the small crowd, Risdin pretty much leading the way toward the right side of the warehouse. There were a few doors in that direction which suggested the presence of rooms rather than an open floor, and when they reached one of the doors and Risdin opened it Tain found that her guess was right. Behind the door was a fairly large room that looked cleaner and sturdier than the rest of the warehouse but just as empty.

“If you get sloppy and leave signs that you’re around, you end up being retaken,” Risdin said as she gestured to the floor. “If you two will sit down and make yourselves comfortable, we’ll have a meal put together for you in just a couple of minutes. Areen, will you close this door too, please?”

The third woman, Areen, turned and closed the door the way she had the outer one. She’d been staring at Ennie while Tain urged the girl to sit down on the floor, a heavy sadness in her brown eyes. Tain had the feeling that Areen might have been as bad off as Ennie at one time, and now felt a kinship with the girl. That Areen had pulled out of the depression said something about the woman’s strength, a strength that her slender body and short brown hair didn’t show signs of.

Risdin and Celene were busy moving aside one section of one of the room’s walls, behind which there seemed to be quite a number of things. One of those things was a cast-iron griller, and after Risdin had dragged the thing out Celene filled it with charcoal. Getting a fire going didn’t take long, and once the fire was burning well Risdin put a coffee pot on one side of the griller. Areen used the other side for a frying pan filled with eggs and potatoes, and in no time Tain’s mouth began to water.

The food was ready before the coffee, but Areen didn’t wait and neither did Tain. She accepted the metal plate handed to her and immediately began to stuff down the food, stopping only when she saw that Ennie was ignoring a similar plate.

“Ennie, you have to get your strength back,” Tain said to the girl, speaking softly. “I’d really like you to eat as much of that food as you can hold, otherwise you’ll be putting us and our new friends in danger. If we have to make a run for it at any point and you pass out, I can’t see the rest of us just leaving you behind. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Tain was hoping hard that the girl wouldn’t choose to ignore her, and for once her hopes came true. Ennie’s head came up just a tad while she considered what Tain had said, and then she picked up the plate and began to eat. A glance at the three women showed Risdin smiling, Celene frowning, and Areen disturbed, but none of the three said anything. Relief at the silence let Tain go back to her own food, since she was fairly certain that she’d lied to Ennie. The three women most probably would not have risked stopping for Ennie if she fainted, but they’d realized that the truth was sometimes something that shouldn’t be mentioned.

The coffee was ready by the time Tain had finished eating, and when Ennie refused a cup Risdin asked if Ennie would like to rest instead. The girl agreed that she would like to rest, so Areen got out a pallet that was downright fat with stuffing, put it against the far wall of the room, then arranged a blanket on it. Ennie seemed a bit steadier when she got up to go to the pallet, and once she’d lain down Areen came to join her two companions where they sat near Tain with coffee of their own.

“We can get you out of town tonight, once it gets dark,” Risdin said to Tain in a low voice after tasting the coffee. Tain had already given her name and Ennie’s, which had apparently made all the women feel better. “Our group has a few hiding places, but we know only one of them so that’s the one we’ll take you to.”

“That makes sense,” Tain said after tasting her own coffee. The liquid was strong and unsweetened, but it added strength to what she’d gotten from the food. “If you happen to get captured, you won’t be able to betray more than the one hiding place. But it’s possible you won’t betray anyone anyway unless you’re tortured. Since you’re still really under the influence of the drug, being given the drug a second time might not negate that order to ignore orders.”

“You know, that never occurred to us,” Risdin said after exchanging startled glances with the other two women. “We’ve never met anyone who was given the drug twice, so we don’t know for certain what would happen. Do you know for certain?”

“No,” Tain had to admit, but she’d also been trying to make up her mind about something. “Tell me, approximately how many women are in your group, and just how far are you prepared to go to be really free?”

“Why do you want to know how many of us there are?” Celene asked at once, suspicion flaring in her eyes again. “And what do you mean by really free? We’re free right now and we mean to stay that way.”

“You’re not free of the drug and you’re not free to walk the streets any time you please,” Tain countered just as quickly, doing nothing to avoid that hard blue gaze. “I don’t need to know exactly how many of you there are, but even if there are no more than fifty or so that’s still too many to spend the rest of their lives in hiding. The rest of your lives. If there was a way to get rid of slavery for good, would you be willing to take a few chances?”

“What way, and what kind of chances?” Risdin asked as Celene just stared at Tain. “And why do I have the feeling that you’re not like the rest of us? You should be both terrified and delighted at having been offered our help, but you don’t seem to be either. What makes you so different?”

“I’m different because I’m not a native of this world,” Tain said, having consciously overridden the need to keep her true origins secret.

“I’m part of a group that’s trying to end slavery on this world, and it was just bad luck that my partner and I ended up as slaves ourselves. I meant to take my partner back to where our people can help her, but there’s really something else I ought to do first. If I can count on you ladies getting Ennie out of here in case something happens to me, I can do that something else with a clear head.”

“Why would people from another world care about what happens to us?” Areen asked, a question Tain had expected from Celene rather than from her. “Slavery has been going on for years and years, but now, suddenly, you’re in the mood to stop it?”

“Our people have been trying for years, but the sad fact is that they expected to get somewhere with diplomacy,” Tain explained, grimacing to show her opinion of the mindless waste of time. “Diplomacy may work when you’re dealing with people exactly like yourself, but when there’s a big enough difference in cultures diplomacy doesn’t stand much of a chance. That’s why we were sent, to see if we could find a different way to settle the problem, but we’re not alone. One of the two men you saw taken prisoner is one of mine.”

The various revelations had the three women looking at each other, but for a long moment no one said anything. It was definitely disturbance that filled the three, but when Risdin looked directly at Tain again Tain saw something that might have been hope.

“That must be why the men were captured instead of killed,” Risdin said, and Tain had the impression that she spoke more for the benefit of the other two women than for Tain’s. “They have a plan, and someone wants to know what that plan is so they can stop it. Do you really think that whatever their plan is it will work?”

“Truthfully, I don’t know,” Tain admitted, refusing to let herself sigh.

“Ennie and I were originally on our own, but when the accident happened our people sent the two men to buy us out of slavery. I do know that they had some kind of meeting to attend that kept us from leaving this town, but they were taken before they could get to the meeting. What I want to do is free them from where they’re being held.”

“And you expect us to help with that?” Celene said with a snort of scorn.

“I don’t know about you, but I swore off beating up on men twice my size.”

“Well, it so happens that I didn’t,” Tain returned with the most evil grin she could produce. “Beating up on those men will be a true pleasure, but I’m not fool enough to think I can take a large number of them all at once. What I want to do is sneak into that warehouse, wait until dark, and then break the two prisoners loose. But before I make my try I’ll come back here and tell you that it’s time. If I’m not back with the men an hour later at the most, you’ll know that you have to take Ennie and get out of here.“

“And what happens if you’re found while you’re sneaking around?” Celene demanded, her face showing that a struggle of some sort was going on inside her. “We still don’t know if a second dose of the drug will put you back under their control, and even if it doesn’t there’s always that torture you mentioned. Sitting here waiting for you to get back could get us retaken.”

“Not if only one of us waits for her,” Risdin said before Tain could answer the objection, the dark-haired woman’s body straightening where she sat. “I think this woman can do what she says, and I’m willing to risk my own freedom to help her. Help her help us, that is. You and Areen will take the girl and hide, and if a group of men come bursting in instead of Tain, you’ll all run. I’ll be able to keep from being recaptured long enough for you three to get away from the city and warn everyone in the hideout.”

“That sounds like a plan to me,” Tain agreed, sending Risdin a smile. “The only change I’d make is that you do your own hiding, Risdin. That way if

I’m taken and the men come looking for you, they’ll have to tear this place apart to find you. If the others are close enough to hear the noise, they’ll know enough to run.“

“I’m willing to stay close enough to hear the noise, assuming it happens,”

Areen said, the words not quite forced out of her. “Celene had a harder time than we did as a slave, so she has to be the one to take the girl farther away. Remembering what she went through will let her run as far and as fast as it’s possible to go, and that’s best for all of us.”

Celene had looked as if she were trying to force herself to argue about who stayed close, but Areen’s line of logic gave Celene a reason to simply nod her agreement. The decision was made, then, with everyone prepared to do her part, so they all went back to drinking coffee. Tain noticed that

Ennie hadn’t moved from the pallet and the girl’s eyes were closed, so it was possible that Ennie had fallen asleep. Tain sipped her coffee and hoped so, considering that the girl would need all the strength she could muster. Even if things went well, that would not be the same as having them go easily…

When she’d finished her coffee, Tain left the warehouse by the back door and made her cautious way to the front of the building. She’d considered letting the women take the red bands off her arms, then rejected the idea. If anyone saw her she wanted them to think she was a slave, a point she’d had to make with her three new companions. No man believed that a slave could be dangerous to him, which gave Tain a very large advantage. Taking off the bands and borrowing a change of clothes from one of the women would have thrown away the edge.

No one was in sight when Tain crossed the street to the warehouse Killen and Tandro had been taken into, but that didn’t mean Tain simply opened the door and walked inside. Instead she made her way around to the back of the building, found a window, then peeked inside. There was still no sign of guards or anyone else, so she took a chance and opened the back door. Nothing but emptiness greeted her entrance, but she could hear voices from somewhere else in the building. Walls had been put up to divide the inner expanse, which ought to help Tain with her sneaking. Lurking behind walls was easier than lurking in shadows.

Ghosting around from place to place wasn’t easy on Tain’s nerves, but the search had to be made so she did it. She’d found a large room with chairs in it that could be seen through a crack in one of the walls, but there was no sign of Killen and Tandro. The narrow corridor she’d been using dead-ended just ahead, so Tain was about to retrace her steps to find a more productive corridor when she heard voices in the large room.

Looking through the crack again showed Tain that a number of men had entered the room, but again none of them were the two she searched for. For the second time she was about to walk away when a big man entered the room from a doorway to the right. The big man wore a gaudily bejeweled vest and swordbelt, and right behind him came Killen and Tandro. The two men had been stripped naked, but they were still alive.

Now all she had to do was figure out a way to get them out of this place…