Conspirators of Gor

Chapter Forty-Five

Shortly before the Ninth Ahn, I was in the large hall, leading to the great portal. I moved very carefully, my back to the wall on the left, as one would approach the great portal from the inside. I was several yards from the opening. One of the guards turned, regarded me for a moment, and then turned back, to his fellow. Shortly thereafter, some yards back from the opening, two slave girls, Jane and Eve, began pushing one another, and screaming at one another. In a moment, they were rolling on the floor of the hall, seemingly intent on tearing out one another’s hair, seemingly clawing at one another like embroiled she-sleen, while the male crouched nearby, waiting to pull the victor to his burrow by the fur at the back of the neck. The two guards turned about, to watch the sobbing, screaming, seemingly tearing, seemingly scratching slaves. Altercations amongst slave girls can be nasty things. Kurii, and, I fear, some men, find them amusing.

I slipped through the portal, unnoticed. I was frightened. I had crossed the threshold, without permission. In theory I knew I could be lashed, hamstrung, or slain. Mina was to have been fed alive to Kurii until Trachinos had intervened with coin, purchasing her.

I looked about, wildly.

I normally told Gorean time by the ringing of the bars, often public bars, but sometimes bars within a house. Grendel, however, in the domicile, had taught me to read time from the small chronometer he kept in his pouch. He doubtless would have recalled that he had done this. That was undoubtedly important. In the night I had pondered his strange words, about walking to the Sixth Ahn. Clearly, as he had told me to walk for only some Ehn, he had not meant that I should try to walk for several Ahn, until it was again the Sixth Ahn, almost a day later. What then could be meant? I was unfamiliar with Gorean directions, which I found complex, and, in any event, I not only lacked a compass, but would not have been able to read one if I had had one. I did know that the Gorean compass needle always pointed to the Sardar Mountains. It seemed clear then, upon reflection, that Grendel had given me a direction in which to proceed. It was also clear that he took it for granted that I would understand him. His confidence in this matter, although flattering, was not obviously warranted. Various difficulties obtained. I thought of time in terms of the bars, and not chronometers. I was not all that familiar with Gorean chronometers, and his casual lesson in the domicile had been brief. I tried to remember it. Most dangerously the chronometers with which I was familiar on my former world not only divided the day differently, but marked the divisions in a different order. On my former world the hands of chronometers begin to rotate to the right, whereas in your chronometers they begin to rotate to the left. Your concept of “clockwise” is thus opposite to that with which I was familiar. When I thought of Gorean time, as it might be measured by a chronometer, I always thought of it analogously to the chronometers of my former world; thus, in my mind I would think of the Fifth Ahn as to the right of the Twentieth Ahn, rather than, as you would think of it, as to the left of the Twentieth Ahn. Grendel, of course, would be thinking in terms of the Gorean chronometer. Accordingly, if a large Gorean chronometer had been placed flat before the great portal, and one was to move toward the Sixth Ahn one would go to the left and not the right. In any event, I sped from the portal, aligning myself with where the imaginary Sixth Ahn would lie.

I heard no cry, or roar from behind me, and so I supposed the attention of the guards might still be focused on the amusing spectacle of two squabbling slave girls.

The terrain was uneven and treacherous.

There were many rocks, and crevices about, and narrow passageways between boulders and out-juttings. In places ascending and descending narrow ledges skirted cliff-like projections. Here and there there were spears of stone. The morning sun would be bright before me, on rock, and then, in a moment, one would confront almost impenetrable, cave-like shadows, indicating recesses of an undisclosed depth. In such a place anything might hide. Occasionally, from a high place, I looked back, to see the great portal. I tried to keep the direction, I hoped it was correct, which I understood Grendel to have given me. I recalled I had seen a larl from the great portal once, perhaps one at much this distance from the Cave. I swallowed, and continued on. My feet hurt, for I had no sandals. Too, camisked, I began to shiver. I nearly slipped into a crevice, but pressed myself against the rock, and, bit by bit, made my way forward. Mighty boulders were scattered about, some jagged, and young, and some worn smooth by centuries of wind and rain. Might the knives of expanding ice in fissures have broken loose stones, some like small mountains? I wondered if, in its long past, the Voltai had witnessed the passage of oceans of ice at its feet, oceans which might bear ships of stone. I wondered what forces might have given birth to the mighty Voltai.

I hurried about a boulder, turning, and screamed in terror, for I had plunged into the outstretched arms of a large, hairy shape, which clutched me to itself, its nostrils dilating and closing, and dilating and closing again, sucking in scent from about my neck and shoulders. A massive paw closed over my mouth. I could barely squirm. Then, gently, it released me, and I stepped back. There was no mistaking the seared pockets of tissue marking where once large, glistening eyes had glowed.

“You are alive!” I said.

It could not understand me, of course, for it had no translator. But it might have detected something of the shock and amazement in my voice. Certainly it was familiar with the sounds humans made, from its captors, from the carnival, from the house of Epicrates, perhaps even from before its capture, from the Cave, and from after its brief return to the Cave, before its banishment into the wilderness. Looking on this beast, not on the brink of starvation, not half dead, but alert and sound, I realized the explanation for Grendel’s many departures from the Cave. He had fed it, and kept it alive. It was one of his own, even though it had betrayed him, a treason which Grendel had understood, and had not resented. It had been to return this ruined, blinded beast to his fellows in the Voltai that Grendel had undertaken our perilous expedition to the mountains, which expedition had unexpectedly revealed large secrets of political and military significance. I was sure now, of course, that the point of my mission into the mountains was precisely to contact this beast, whom we spoke of as Tiresias.

The beast regarded me.

I was sure it would not attack me. I was sure, too, that it recognized me, by scent. Had I not been sent for it once before, in Ar, and had encountered it in the market of Cestias?

But how could I make clear to it the plight of Grendel, and even if I could manage to do so, of what help might be so powerful but so handicapped an animal?

“Lord Grendel,” I said, again and again. And again. I thought it possible he would recognize this name, for he had heard it often enough, from the Lady Bina and from myself, in the house of Epicrates. And, hopefully, he could recognize the apprehension, the frantic concern, the pleading note in my voice.

The beast growled suddenly, and lifted its sightless head. I saw fangs bared. I turned away, and retraced my steps, just a few steps. I thought it might follow me, if it understood. In any event, I had given him a direction. Suddenly he sprang forward and, as I cried out in fear, he took me in his left arm and nestled me against that broad, hirsute chest. I sensed the large heart beating within it. My feet were cold and bleeding. I pressed myself against that large body, half hidden in its long fur, perhaps its winter coat, grateful for the warmth. Its right paw extended before it, and sometimes brushed to the side. It began to move rapidly down the trail I had ascended. I realized then that it was extremely familiar with its immediate environment. Just as a blind human might negotiate its own house with relative ease, knowing the thresholds, the location of furniture, and such, so, too, the beast was at home in what, over the weeks of its exile, had become its territory. Indeed, it may have come this route many times, to meet Grendel. At the high points in this sometimes frightening trek, for it occasionally negotiated ledges which I, sighted, might have been reluctant to traverse, I could make out the great portal. At one point I cried out in fear, and clutched the beast’s fur, for, not more than a dozen paces from us, over a shelf of rock, I saw the lifted head of a larl, broad, triangular, quizzical. The beast was fully aware of it, for its head turned in that direction, its ears inclined to that place, and its nostrils drew in the alien scent, and then the beast, with no further action, either of a monitory or preparatory nature, continued on its way. The larl had not charged. I supposed it was recently surfeited. Like most carnivores, and unlike men and Kurii, it hunts only when hungry. I would discover later that more was involved. In much less time than it had taken me to rendezvous with Tiresias, he had brought me to a passageway which debouched onto a relatively flat slope of rock no more than a hundred paces from the great portal. This was the point, I gathered, at which Grendel and he might have met. In any event, I think it might have marked the end of its territory. The beast remained behind a turn of rock. It would not be visible from the portal. Released, I regained my footing and went cautiously to the opening of the passageway, and, shielding myself with the rock as much as possible, looked back to the portal.

“Grendel,” I whispered. I was sure the beast knew that name.

Emerging from the portal was Grendel, bound, and on a leash. With him were two Kurii, each with a large ax.

The beast pushed his paw toward me, opening and closing the digits. “Counting,” I thought. “He wants me to count.” I took one digit in my hand, and then I took another, and then I held them together, and pressed the two, twice.

A small soft noise greeted this action.

I did not know where the execution was to take place, but I supposed it would not be all that far from the portal.

Grendel and his two guards continued for a time to approach our position, and then, some sixty or so paces from the portal, some forty or so from our position, they halted. I saw them kneel Grendel down. One of the Kurii pushed his head down, further, that the back of his neck would be the better exposed. It was clear to me that it would not be practical for Tiresias, blind, to attack two armed Kurii, let alone across an expanse of relatively flat rock in daylight.

Tiresias could tell me nothing, but he did look at me, and I thought the expression was almost human.

I stepped out from behind the rock. “Tal!” I called, lightly.

The two Kurii were clearly startled, at seeing a human, and a kajira, here, outside the Cave.

Neither Kur carried a translator, nor did Grendel. Indeed Grendel had been divested of most of his usual harnessing. I supposed it had been appropriated.

“Tal,” I said, again, approaching more closely.

I had been seen in the company of Grendel more than once, and I hoped I might be remembered as a putative grooming slave. On the other hand, as I have suggested, many Kurii are not that interested in distinguishing one human from another. This is particularly the case when they do not deal closely with them. Probably they could not have easily distinguished me from several other similarly clad, brunette kajirae. Could you, for example, easily distinguish one urt from another, mixing together, if they were similarly sized and pelted?

In a moment I was sure that neither recognized me, save, of course, as a human female, and one, of course, who was a collared slave.

I did not want to approach too closely, for I must be able to turn, run, and reach the cover behind me.

One of the Kurii gestured with his ax toward the portal. I gathered that he was ordering me to return to the Cave.

Instead, I remained where I was.

He repeated the gesture and, again, I remained where I was.

“Must a command be repeated?” is a question which strikes terror into a slave girl’s heart, for a repeated command is commonly a cause for discipline. The usual answer to that question is a hasty “No, Master,” followed by immediate compliance. It is another thing, of course, if the command has not been heard, is not clear, would be impractical to obey, or such.

“You are stinking beasts!” I called out. “You are cowards! You are the sons of urts, the brothers of tarsk!”!

There were no translators about, so neither the guards, nor Tiresias, could understand me.

Grendel, of course, who was at home with untranslated Gorean, could understand me, but he had the good judgment not to furnish the guards with a translation. Had he done so the execution might have been unofficially, infelicitously expedited.

My attitude, however, my tone, and the grimaces, and gestures with which I saw fit to accompany my address, would, I was sure, suffice.

I turned about and fled back toward the passageway amongst the boulders. I trusted this, following my insulting, truculent provocation, would initiate a chase response. This response, common to many animals, is familiar even to humans. I further trusted that only one would follow me. One would surely remain with Grendel, whose legs were not bound.

I had not realized how swiftly a Kur can move. I heard the scratching of claws behind me on the upward slope of rock. When the Kur drops to all fours, it can move faster than a man can run. Fortunately the beast kept his ax, and this kept its passage in the bipedalian mode. Even so, of course, few humans could outrun it. I had, of course, by design, a much shorter distance to traverse than the pursuing Kur. Even so I barely managed to swing about the rock behind which Tiresias was waiting. And I suddenly became aware I was no longer followed.

I turned about, and then turned away. Tiresias was slowly twisting the beast’s head from its body. Shortly thereafter he put the body and the head in a side passage. They would not be visible from the opening to the passageway.

It was then I dared to look.

I made as though to move to the opening between the rocks, but Tiresias growled, and I stopped. He charted my movements by the sound. He pointed behind him, and I went back in the passage, some twenty or thirty feet back, away from the opening. He then felt about and picked up the guard’s ax. I then lost sight of him, as he disappeared behind some rocks. I was not much pleased by his disappearance as I would have preferred to have him, blind or not, between me and the opening, as I expected the other guard, wary and curious, to appear there, once Grendel had been secured, presumably by using the leash to tie his ankles together. I was familiar with such ties, as I had sustained them in the house of Tenalion. It is a common way of rendering a back-bound slave immobile and helpless. I did not think the guard, alone, would strike Grendel, who might move, even leap up or flee, until he was secured, and when he was secured, there would be no hurry about the matter. Too, he would be curious, I supposed, as to the whereabouts of his fellow guard. Might he be still pursuing an annoying, wayward kajira?

I waited an Ehn or two, and then I heard the other guard calling out, in raucous Kur. After another Ehn, he called out again, less temperately.

There was then silence, and I could scarcely breathe.

I was sure that he was approaching.

I sensed then that he was at, or near, the opening. I saw the blade of the ax first, and then saw the shaft, and then the whole weapon grasped in his paws, and his body crouched over it. I did not think I could have run, even if I had wanted to.

Clearly the beast was puzzled. It saw me, standing back a few feet in the passageway, and it saw nothing of its fellow.

Irrationally, it said something to me in Kur.

I shook my head. I could not understand it, nor, had I spoken, could he have understood me.

He came toward me a pace or two.

Then, suddenly, he lifted his head, and those wide dark nostrils distended. I was sure he smelled blood.

I then screamed and covered my eyes, for the ax of the first guard, in the grasp of Tiresias, from behind, from where he had come about the boulder, smote down on the second guard, hemmed in by the narrow passageway. The blow, I took it, was not a good one, as Tiresias could not see his target, though he must have been aware, reasonably closely, of its position. The blade missed the center of the head, and clove downward, through the side of the skull, close to the left ear, and continued through the shoulder, and half into the ribs. I am sure the ax had been well sharpened for an execution. Still I think it was a blow such that few but a Kur could have struck.

I was back several feet and yet the rocks near me were spattered with blood. The entire end of the passageway, where it opened onto the sloping rock, about the fallen Kur, was run with blood. Tiresias was crouching over his kill, divesting it of harnessing. He cast the harness toward me, impatiently, growling. Grendel had not yet joined us. Thus he must have been unable to do so. “Yes,” I whispered, “yes.” I removed from the sheath a Kur side knife. The blade was some fourteen horts in length, and double-edged, but the handle, made for the grip of a Kur, was large for my hand. I seized it with both hands. Again, with a growl, Tiresias admonished me for what he must have interpreted as dalliance. It was with exquisite care that I made my way about the body in the passageway. Tiresias was less fastidious and the fur of his feet, and his paws, were soaked with blood. In a moment or two I had made my way from the passageway to where Grendel was secured, and, with the knife, slashed apart the leash strap which had bound his ankles together. Another moment and the ropes which had bound his arms to his sides were lying about his feet, as he crouched down, looking back to the portal. He put out his paw and I surrendered the knife. That handle would be comfortable in his grasp. He looked behind himself again, and then thrust me toward the passageway from which I had emerged.

When we reached the passageway Tiresias had dragged away the body of the second Kur, presumably to place it with the body and head of the other. I went several feet away from where the fearsome blow had been struck, that which had felled the second guard. I stood there, shaken, trembling, while speech in Kur passed between Grendel and Tiresias. Each took the hand of the other in his mouth, and I shuddered, as those massive, fanged jaws closed about the other’s hand, but not even the skin was broken. This was, I took it, some sign of confidence, of fellowship, of respect, perhaps even of affection. Each might have torn away the hand of the other, but not even the skin was broken. Suddenly Grendel turned toward me, and I went instantly to my knees, and put my head down. He stood then before me. I lifted my head, and smiled. Was he not pleased? Would he not be grateful? Had I not done well? Had I not played a part in saving his life, at least for the moment? I waited for him to speak. Then he turned away, again to speak to Tiresias.

I regarded him disbelievingly, he facing away from me.

Tears sprang to my eyes.

I was then acutely conscious of my camisk, of the collar on my neck, the mark borne by my thigh.

I was a slave!

One does not thank a slave. Would one thank an animal?

I had done, in effect, what I had been expected to do, what, in effect, I had been instructed to do. I had, in effect, obeyed. One does not thank a slave for obeying. It is what she must do.

How conscious I was then of my bondage!

Indeed, it can be frightening for a slave to be thanked. What might it mean? Is it a warning, a criticism, that she is behaving too much like a free woman, who would expect to be thanked? Is it a trick? Is he thinking of her in terms of close chains, or the slave whip? Is he thinking of selling her? Has she already been sold, or given away?

“Master,” I said, softly, “may I speak?”

Grendel turned to face me. “Yes,” he said.

“What occurred may have been seen from the portal,” I said. “It may be supposed that the guards took you into the mountains, but, in time, when they do not return, an investigation will be made. There will be a search, a pursuit in force. You must flee.”

“I have not finished my work,” he said. “There is more to do.”

“There is nothing you can do,” I said. “They will hunt you down. They are merciless. You must flee.”

“What of you?” he asked.

“I am freezing,” I said. “I am half lame.”

“We will build a fire,” he said.

“You must not,” I said. “Smoke will be seen. You must flee!”

“When they come to the fire,” he said. “We will be gone.”

“The fire,” I said, “will be a distraction?”

“There will be a better,” he said.

“Master?” I said.

“After dark,” he said, “you will go by the portal, but keep against the wall, to the right, where you will not be seen. Then, when it is opportune, slip into the Cave.”

“How will I know when it is opportune?” I said. “There are guards, Kur guards.”

“It will be clear,” he said. “The matter will be arranged by our friend, Tiresias.”

“You must flee, both of you,” I said.

“We will hide,” he said.

“Where?” I asked.

“Where,” said he, “they will not look.”

“Flee!” I begged him.

“I have work to do,” he said.

I saw Tiresias approach, some short, gnarled branches in his grasp, and some shrubbery, dirt still about the roots.

I also noted he was now in harness, as well.

Grendel fetched the ax of the second guard, and lifted that long-handled, double bladed, weighty weapon. He handled it as I might have wielded a stick.

“Master,” I called to him.

“Yes?” he said.

“Tiresias cannot understand us,” I said. “He has no translator.”

“So?” said Grendel.

“Did I not do well?” I asked.

“You did splendidly,” he said.

“Is Master not pleased?”

“I am pleased,” he said.

“Should I not be thanked?” I asked.

“Are you a free woman?” he said.

“No, Master,” I said.

“Are you a slave?” he asked.

“Yes, Master,” I said.

“Then you should not be thanked,” he said.

“I see,” I said.

“I am not sure you do,” he said.

“I do not understand,” I said.

“It is a kindness,” he said.

“I do not understand,” I said.

“It is a lesson,” he said. “It may save your life.”

“Master?” I said.

“The slave,” he said, “is not to be self-concerned, self-seeking, or self-interested. That is for the free woman. The free woman thinks of herself. The slave thinks of her master, and hopes to be found pleasing. The slave serves selflessly, surrendering herself wholly to the master. She belongs to him, as a tarsk or a sandal. She does not obey to be rewarded. She does not serve to be thanked. She is a slave. It is hers, his animal, to obey unquestioningly, immediately, thanklessly. It is what she is for.”

“Surely a master might throw her a candy, or give her a caress,” I said.

“Yes,” he said, “but such things are not owed to her. Rather, let her be grateful for any attention the master may give her.”

“I want to serve so,” I said, “helplessly, mastered!”

“On Gor,” he said, “you will have no choice but to serve so.”

“Yes, Master,” I said.

“So,” said he, “do you still wish to be thanked?”

“No, Master,” I said.

“But,” he said, “you would perhaps like to know that you have been found pleasing?”

“Oh, yes, Master!” I said.

He then put a great paw in my hair, and shook my head, affectionately, as one might the head of domestic sleen.

“You have been found pleasing,” he said.

“Thank you, Master,” I said.

“We will now light a fire,” he said. “You must be cold.”

“Thank you, Master,” I said.

“But you must understand,” he said, “that I am part Kur. A human master might not be so tolerant.”

“I understand,” I said.

“What do you think they buy women for?” he asked.

“To be slaves,” I said.

“And what sort of slaves?” he asked.

“Perfect slaves,” I said.

“Keep that in mind,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” I said.