Swordsmen of Gor

Chapter Nineteen AT THE STABLE

“Wait!” I called to Pertinax, who would have rushed headlong into the confines of the stable.

He drew up short, sword drawn.

“Do not frame yourself in the threshold,” I said.

Lord Nishida had remained in the centrality of Tarncamp, directing officers and men. He spoke directly to Pani. He communicated with mercenaries through their officers.

There was much dust about, like gray clouds, settling slowly, from the movements of the tharlarion.

The stable had its strong, distinctive odor.

Men coughed.

Pertinax wiped his eyes.

Darkness would fall within the Ahn.

There were grooms about, and one of the Pani, a subaltern, set them to recover, as they could, frightened, confused tharlarion. Ashigaru accompanied them, lest fugitives be encountered. Some had surely escaped. To be sure, I was confident the last thing such fugitives would desire would be to encounter Lord Nishida’s Ashigaru. They would be more likely to dare the forests, and hungering beasts. Few, I suspected, would find their way back to their Home Stones, if Home Stones they had. Fortunately the gigantic draft beasts, disoriented, snorting and lumbering, had not been loosed amongst buildings, or much of the camp, where it was intact, might have been reduced to shambles. I had no doubt hundreds of the wands would now be uprooted. I trusted this would not result in an eventual, casual intrusion of larls into formerly secure areas. A small building of wood, as were most of the camp structures, would not fare well against the bulk and momentum of a distressed, uncontrolled, rapidly moving tharlarion. Indeed, the beast might scarcely notice the obstacle, almost ignoring it, thrusting through it as it might through brush or picketing. The inertia of a tharlarion is formidable. It cannot be turned and halted with the same ease as might, say, a kaiila, or horse, which may be instantly turned or halted, pulled up short, and so on. When the tharlarion has its own head it is difficult to control. Consider the difficulties of trying to communicate with, or control, a boulder tumbling down a mountainside. Draft tharlarion, of which variety these were, are normally driven slowly, and with care. War tharlarion, often larger than draft tharlarion, can be, and are, used in charges. There is little defense against them if encountered on unprepared, level ground. Open formations will try to let them pass, and attack them from behind. Closed formations seek uneven ground, use ditches, diagonally anchored, sharpened stakes, and such. If they become slowed, or are milling, they can be attacked by special troops, with broad-bladed axes, designed to disable or sever a leg. I have never much favored tharlarion in combat, as, if they are confused, or wounded, they become uncontrollable, and are as likely to turn about and plunge into their own troops as those of the enemy, thereby, indiscriminately, wherever they trod or roll, whether amongst friends or foes, spreading disorder and death. Some kaiila, incidentally, become hard to handle in the presence of tharlarion, if they are unfamiliar with them. The issue of more than one battle had turned on this seeming oddity. For this reason, the Tuchuks, and others of the Wagon Peoples, and, I suppose, others, accustom their kaiila to the sight and smell of tharlarion. In the case of the Wagon Peoples, these are usually taken from raided caravans.

Tajima looked at me.

“Not yet,” I said.

“Very well, Tarl Cabot, tarnsman,” he said.

The enemy which stampeded the tharlarion would have realized the value, if danger, of such a cover. I recognized their cunning, and understood their desperation. It was an excellent strategy. I could think of only one better, and it would have required the execution of the first.

“Do not enter the stable,” I warned Pertinax.

“What of Miss Wentworth?” he demanded.

“Saru!” I snapped. “The needful slave.”

“‘Needful’?” he said.

“Yes,” I said, irritably. He did not realize what had been done to the female, how she was now different, how she was now a slave.

“Surely it is safe,” said Pertinax. “The enemy has fled!”

“No,” I said.

“How so?” said he.

“Some flee,” I said. “One might suppose all have fled. Some remain, clever ones, in hiding, their presence unsuspected, to escape in the darkness.”

“Why do you think this?” asked Pertinax.

“Put yourself in the place of the most astute, the shrewdest, of your enemies,” I said. “What might you do, if you were they? Too, Saru is presumably within the stable, and, I am confident, alive, as she is a slave. One would no more kill her than any other domestic animal. But she has not called out to us. I infer she is being kept silent. If this is the case, one or more enemies are within.”

“I think that is true,” said a quiet, even voice, behind me. I knew the voice was Pani, but I could not place it.

I heard men gasp, and sensed them drawing back.

This was, I took it, a reverenced personage, one of whom lesser men stood in awe.

Who could this be?

I turned about.

I then saw before me one of the Pani, but one such as I had not seen before. Had a larl by some incantation taken the form of a man, I thought it might be such a man. He was not large, but I felt a largeness somehow within him. Although of the Pani his visage was bearded, thinly, roughly, uncut, save perhaps by the sword, and his hair was long, and unkempt. His clothing was soiled, and uncared for. He was barefoot. In his belt, blades uppermost, were the two swords, the companion sword and the longer blade. There was blood on his loose, short-armed robe. Some of it was spattered, and, in other places, he had apparently drawn his blades against the cloth, to clean the blade. I was startled to look upon him, for he seemed so different from the other Pani. He might, I supposed, be a hermit, or a recluse, one who lived by himself, with his thoughts. Perhaps he was a madman. That seemed to me possible, but then it seemed to me, rather, that there was a solidity about him, and a finely tempered, perhaps dangerous, rationality about him. I thought surely he was an unusual man, and one of perhaps a ferocious singleness of interest and purpose. I would learn later, however, that he carved wood, and composed small poems on bark. I had the sense he was without companion or slave, and by choice. Perhaps such might have distracted him from some more remote purpose, or goal, or ideal. He seemed to me a man driven, like a thing of nature, but from what or to what I did not know.

“Master,” said Tajima, bowing deeply, which greeting was politely returned.

“Master,” said Pertinax, putting down his head.

“It is he,” said one of the Ashigaru.

“He has come from the forest,” said another.

“He came to the sound of striking steel,” said another.

“He took seven heads,” whispered a man.

I bowed then, for I knew in whose presence I stood.

“I am Nodachi,” he said.

“I know,” I said.

“It will be dark soon,” said one of the Ashigaru.

“May I speak to the men?” I inquired of Nodachi.

Whereas he held no office to my knowledge, nor any instituted authority, as far as I knew, I felt the inquiry, the question, was appropriate.

I sensed that those others in the vicinity, too, felt a deference, a respect, a recognition, a salute, a propriety of some such sort was in order.

His consent or approval seemed important to me, somehow, and to the others.

Some men are not officers, or daimyos, or shoguns, but are such that officers, daimyos, shoguns, or such, in their presence, would not hesitate to be the first to bow.

I sensed the awe in which this man was held, an awe to which I, not even of the Pani, was acutely sensitive. It seemed an awe as palpable as an atmosphere. Doubtless this was in part due to many things, perhaps to his unusual, imposing, even wretched, appearance, and in part to his reputation, an understanding of who this was, and what he had done, and what he could do, and perhaps, in part, too, to that sense of being in the presence of one who lives alone, undeviating and undistracted, one who is absorbed in, and centered upon, a quest, one not altogether clear to other men, a journey as much within as without. Some men are alone, essentially solitary, their lives given over unswervingly to an ideal, or dream, the search for a fact, the discovery of a cause, or planet, the unraveling of a mystery, the creation of a perfect poem. I thought of Andreas of Tor, and his longing for a song that might be sung for a thousand years, of Tersites, of Port Kar, and his plans for a mighty ship, finer than all others. This man was such a man, I suspected, a seeker, a traveler on uncharted, even invisible, roads, roads thusly undiscerned by others. The perfection he sought, I gathered, was a simple one, one sought by many, and found by few, one which I, even of the Warriors, and others of my brethren in arms, would find harrowing, and almost incomprehensible, and to which we surely dared not aspire, a perfection of heart, eye, mind, and body, to undergo a lifetime of meditation, sacrifice, and discipline, to understand and become one with, as it was said, the soul of the sword.

He was Nodachi.

“I am near the camp, but I am not of the camp,” he said. “I am one who is outside.”

I thought he was, indeed, in many ways, one who was outside.

I gathered from his remark that he eschewed an engagement in our work, that he chose not to concern himself with it.

This was his decision.

I bowed.

“Master,” said Tajima, bowing.

“Master,” said Pertinax, bowing.

These deferences were accepted by the strange figure who then turned about, and withdrew.

“It was Nodachi,” said a man.

“I have only now seen him, but I knew him,” said another.

“Who would not know him?” asked another.

“He is more than a man,” said one of the Ashigaru.

“He would deny that,” said another.

“I think he is less than a man,” said another. “He is part of a man.”

“Men are various,” said another. “He is one thing a man can be.”

“A single, terrible thing,” said another.

“Within him resides a demon,” said another.

“And a holiness,” said another.

“Or an evil,” said another.

“He is a monster,” said another.

“He is the blade’s brother,” whispered another.

“He listens to the sword,” said another. “It speaks to him.”

“The sharpness of his blade, unmoving in the water, can divide a floating blossom,” said a man.

I had seen that sort of thing, and did not doubt it.

It was not unusual for silk to fall, parted, from a shaken blade.

“His stroke can descend like lightning, cutting in two a grain of sa-tarna placed on the forehead of a man, without creasing the skin,” said another.

This was possible, I supposed, but I would not have cared to be the fellow involved in the demonstration.

“One stroke can cut through seven bodies,” claimed another.

If we were talking of the bodies of men this was unlikely. The force required would surpass the violence of a hurricane.

“He can strike out in eight directions at once,” claimed another.

Some of these things seemed to me obviously impossible, and were clearly the fruits of imagination, and myth, but it is common to suppose that at the foot of legends, in the lost soil of the remote past, there is a seed from which such legends sprang, and I had little doubt, in any event, that the mysterious fellow who had just appeared, and then departed, was both unusual and remarkable.

He himself, I was sure, was not the source of such conjectures. Indeed, I suspected they were legends founded on another individual altogether, legends to which he found himself, however reluctantly and unwillingly, an heir. Such legends tend to blossom and enlarge long after their alleged source has vanished, and is no longer about to contradict them. Humans are so fond of wonders that it seems almost churlish to call them into question. To be sure, such legends, in their way, betray and belittle he whose origin they might have been. Hercules and Perseus, and so on, if they existed, were doubtless remarkable enough in themselves, and might have found the wonders attributed to them embarrassing, at the least. Nodachi, I was sure, was a dedicated, great, and charismatic teacher and swordsman, in his own right, and did not require, and doubtless would not appreciate, the mantles of myth, woven for others, and misplaced upon him, mantles which might be cast upon him by smaller men, needful of marvels.

“Why did he come here?” asked one of the Ashigaru, uncertainly.

“We do not know,” said a man.

“He took seven heads,” said another.

He left them at the feet of Lord Nishida,” said another.

“Now he is gone,” said another.

I could see the trees through which he had disappeared. I wondered what his relationship, if any, might be to Lord Nishida, and his mysterious project. If he had put the seven heads before Lord Nishida, that suggested that Lord Nishida was his daimyo. To be sure, it seemed he had asked nothing of Lord Nishida. Was the presentation rather, then, in the nature of an assertion, a token, or even a defiance, or insult? Nodachi was clearly Pani, and yet seemed other than the Pani. He must be here for some reason, in the forest, I supposed, but for what reason?

I would learn more of Nodachi later.

I recalled that Lord Nishida, after the attack, had said that his plans would be advanced.

Nodachi, I did not doubt, figured in these plans.

“It is growing dark,” said one of the Ashigaru. “Shall we enter the stable?”

I had little interest in risking men, and I had no way of knowing how many foes, if, indeed, any foes, were concealed in the stable. Too, I wished, to the extent possible, to protect Saru, assuming she was within. I doubted that she would be in danger, as she was a slave, any more than a verr or kaiila, but it is hard to anticipate the actions of frightened, desperate men. The situation would have been much different, of course, if she were a free woman. A free woman would constitute an excellent hostage. To be sure slaves, too, have their value. For example, they can be sold.

“No,” I said, loudly enough to be heard within the stable. “No one is within. We will return to the main camp.”

The men about looked at me, puzzled, and disappointed, some angrily, or reproachfully, but I waved them back, away from the stable. “No,” I said to Pertinax, who seemed on the brink of rushing through the threshold.

I did not suppose that any foe within would be so simple as to suppose we thought the stable empty, as no search had been made. I did hope that they would be cognizant of the dangers we would face in seeking them out, either in darkness or in the light of lamps or torches. Torches, in particular, would not be practical as a single torch, fallen into the straw, would result in the loss of the stable, and its housing for several tharlarion. A similar danger, of course, but one considerably less, would attend the use of lamps, whose flames were small, and whose effects might be more easily smothered or stamped out. To be sure, the lamps would cast less light, and the dangers, accordingly, to those who entered would be the greater. What I did hope was that the foes within, if any were there, would suppose that the attending commander, in this case myself, preferred discretion to a hazardous intrusion into darkness.

Once withdrawn I stationed my men about the stable, encircling it fully, lest any makeshift exit be attempted. I set archers in place, particularly in the vicinity of the entrance, and, in support, Ashigaru.

I put some men to the gathering of firewood.

I also sent several men to the training area, to storage sheds which were adjacent to several of the improvised tarn cots. I expected them to return within the Ahn.

Meanwhile darkness was almost upon us.

“I am going into the stable,” said Pertinax.

“Remain where you are,” I said.

“Miss Wentworth may be in danger,” he said.

“Saru,” I said, “a slave, in effect ‘Monkey’.”

“She may be in danger,” he said.

“She may be dead,” I said.

He regarded me, agonized.

“But it is unlikely,” I said, “as she is a meaningless beast.”

“I must know!” he said.

“You would risk your life for her?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said.

“She must never know that,” I said. “She must think you despise her.”

“I do despise her,” he said. “But I desire her, as well.”

“She belongs to Lord Nishida,” I reminded him.

“I know,” he said.

It is interesting, I thought. The slave is nothing, no more than a purchasable beast, a mere animal to be ordered about, who must obey instantly and unquestioningly, and yet men will die for them. How is it that one would risk one’s life for a soft, sleek, curvaceous little beast, one at whose least indiscretion, lapse, or failure to please one would put unhesitantly to the whip. And the slave was not even his own.

“Wait,” I said.

“How long?” he asked.

“Perhaps until morning,” I said. “There will then be sufficient light, even within the stable.”

“If any are within,” he said, “they will attempt to flee before morning.”

“I think so,” I said. “That is my hope.”

“Your hope?”

“Certainly,” I said. “They are almost certain to be seriously outnumbered. Would you wait until morning?”

“No,” he said.

“Men have returned from the tarn cots,” said Tajima.

“Good,” I said. “Let them follow their instructions.”

Tajima nodded, and disappeared into the gloom, darkness now about.

In a few Ehn I gave a signal and, one by one, so that they would be immediately visible within the stable I had the lighting of six fires begun, lit at intervals of twenty Ihn, these fires to ring the threshold of the stable.

Such fires could be fed and tended until morning.

Shortly, even before the third fire was burning, there was movement within the stable as I had hoped and several foes, concealed within, realizing their danger, and the greater danger of morning, rushed outward, to slip away before the entire area might be illuminated.

At that point the roll of netting, some six feet in width, cut from the cordage used for the repair of the improvised tarn cots, was lifted upright from the ground and formed a wall impeding the fugitives.

In a moment the Ashigaru were upon them.

Heads were extracted from the cordage and tied to belts.

“They are dead, all of them,” said Pertinax.

“Some, less swift, some less valorous, some more fearful, some less frightened, some more circumspect, some more clever, may remain within,” I said.

Tajima joined Pertinax and myself.

“You took no heads,” I observed.

“I am Pani,” said Tajima, in English, “but not every custom of my people appeals to me.”

“In the Barrens,” I said, “they take scalps.”

“The Barrens?” he said.

The Barrens were east of the Thentis Mountains.

“Great, central plains,” I said.

“That does not appeal to me either,” said Tajima, again in English. “One knows what one has done. That is sufficient.”

“Nodachi?” I said.

“Yes,” he said. “Nodachi.”

“It is a cultural thing,” I said.

“Doubtless,” said Tajima. “But culture should serve one, not be served by one.”

“I see,” I said.

“Vanity is pleasant,” said Tajima, “but it is dangerous, as well. While seeking and gathering trophies, while grasping at evanescent glories, while posing and preening, one may die.”

“Nodachi?” I asked.

“Tajima,” he smiled.

It was one of the few times I had seen him smile.

“Surely the fruits of victory are desirable,” I said.

“Victory is the fruit of victory,” said Tajima.

“Tajima?” I asked.

“No,” he said, smiling, “Nodachi.”

“Men desire fruits of victory other than victory herself,” I said. “They desire land, power, gold, ships, villas, cities, women, other valuables.”

“Not Nodachi,” said Tajima.

“Nodachi is not as other men,” I said.

“No,” said Tajima, “he is not as other men.”

“He must desire something,” I said.

“Perhaps,” said Tajima.

“What?” I asked.

“The recovery of honor,” said Tajima. “Why else do you think he is here, with Lord Nishida?”

I was then silent, sensing that this matter might best be left unaddressed.

“What do we do now?” asked Pertinax. He had remained with me, and had not participated at the slaughter within the nets.

“We keep the fires lit,” I said. “We arrange watches. Arrows are to remain at the string. And we wait until morning.”

“What if any remain within and sue for quarter?” asked Pertinax.

“There is no quarter,” said Tajima. “It is the law of Lord Nishida.”

“I have heard nothing from within, of Miss Wentworth,” said Pertinax, and then he corrected himself, “of the slave, Saru.”

“She may be dead,” I said.

“I would know,” he said.

“In the morning we will know,” I said.

“I would know now,” he said, angrily.

“Remain where you are,” I said.

“And if I do not?” he asked.

“Then I will have you killed,” I said.

“I hate you,” he said.

“I accept that,” I said. “It is a familiar hazard of command.” I then turned to Tajima. “Tajima,” I said, “set watches, and see that most of the men at any given time are at rest. In the morning they must be fresh. Food must be brought before dawn.”

“Yes, Tarl Cabot, tarnsman,” said Tajima.

“What will you do now?” asked Pertinax.

“Sleep,” I said.

“You can sleep?”

“Yes,” I said. “And I recommend that you do the same.”

“I think I shall stay awake for a bit,” he said.

I turned to two of my fellows at hand, mercenaries. I indicated Pertinax. “Bind him,” I said, “hand and foot.”

Pertinax struggled, but was subdued, and soon trussed. He struggled, futilely, and glared at me.

“I do not really want to have you killed,” I said.

“But you would?” he said.

“Yes,” I said. “It is a matter of orders, of maintaining discipline.”

“I see,” he said.

“Get some sleep,” I advised him.

He struggled, fiercely.

“Do not bother,” I said. “You have been bound by Goreans. You are now as helpless as a trussed vulo, or, should we say, a bound slave girl, a nicely tethered kajira.”

“Tarsk,” he cried, “tarsk!”

“Good,” I said. “You are becoming more Gorean by the day.”

His struggles subsided. He would wait, helplessly. He had been bound by Goreans.

I lay down and thought of the hundreds, nay thousands, of slave girls I had seen on Gor, many of them deliciously helpless, fully at a man’s mercy, roped, braceleted, chained, collared, and such. How incredibly beautiful, I thought, are women. It is no wonder men desire to own them. Indeed, what male would not desire to own one? What could give a man more delight and pleasure than the owning of a lovely, well-mastered slave?

How beautiful they are, I thought, that most exquisite form of domestic animal. And how abundant they are on Gor! I had seen them tunicked in the cities, laboring in the fields, and so on. I had seen them in markets, awaiting their sale, and during their sale; I had seen them trekked in coffle, transported in slave wagons, reclining in cages, looking out at men who might buy them; I had seen them hurrying in the streets, bargaining with vendors, busy on the quays, laughing, and teasing, and running about; I had seen them kneeling, laundering at the public troughs; I had seen them chained to the side in matches, even kaissa matches, waiting to be awarded to victors; I had seen them belled in paga taverns, serving their master’s customers; I had seen them, serving quietly, demurely, in their masters’ houses; I had seen them dancing in the firelight, in camps, to the rhythms of the czehar, the kalika, the flute, and tabor.

Yes, I thought, what could give a man more delight and pleasure than the owning of a lovely, well-mastered slave.

It is said that there is only one thing more miserable than a master without a slave, and that is a slave without a master.

I hoped that Saru was still alive.

Then I slept.