Nomads of Gor (35 page)

     
Kamchak regarded Aphris of Turia.

     
"Why is a slave," he asked, "masquerading in the robes of

     
a free woman?"

     
"Please, no, Tuchuk," she said. "Please, no!"

     
And in a moment the lovely Aphris of Tuna stood at the

     
stake revealed to the eyes of her master.

     
She threw back her head and moaned, wrists still locked in

     
the retaining rings.

  
   
She had not, as I had suspected, deigned to wear the

     
shameful camisk beneath her robes of white and gold.

     
The Kassar wench, who had been bound across from her

     
to the opposing stake, had now been freed by a judge and she

     
strode to where Aphris was still confined.

     
"Well done, Tuchuk!" said the girl, saluting Kamchak.

     
Kamchak shrugged.

     
Then the girl, with vehemence, spat in the face of the

     
lovely Aphris. "Slave girl!" hissed the girl. "Slave! Slave girl!"

   
  
She then turned and strode away, looking for warriors of

     
the Kassars.

     
Kamchak laughed loudly.

     
"Punish her!" demanded Aphris.

     
Kamchak suddenly cuffed Aphris of Turia. Her head

     
snapped sideways and there was a streak of blood at the

     
corner of her mouth. The girl looked at him in sudden fear.

     
It might have been the first time she had ever been struck.

     
Kamchak had not hit her hard, but sharply enough to in-

struct her. "You will take what abuse any free person of the

Wagon Peoples cares to inflict-upon you," he said.

"I see," said a voice, "you know how to handle slaves."

I turned to see, only a few feet away, on the shoulders of

slaves standing on the bloodied sand, the open, bejeweled,

cushioned palanquin of Saphrar of the Caste of Merchants.

Aphris blushed from head to toe, enfolded transparent in

the crimson flag of her shame

Saphrar's round, pinkish face was beaming with pleasure,

though I would have thought this day a tragic one for him.

The tiny red-lipped mouth was spread wide with benign

satisfaction. I saw the tips of the two golden canines.

Aphris suddenly pulled at the retaining rings, trying to rush

to him, now oblivious of the riches of her beauty revealed

even to the slaves who carried his palanquin. To them, of

course, she was now no more than they, save perhaps that

her flesh would not be used to bear the poles of palanquins,

to carry boxes nor dig in the earth, but would be appointed

even more pleasing than theirs to a master. "Saphrar!" she cried.

"Saphrar!"

Saphrar looked on the girl. He took from a silken pouch

lying before him on the palanquin a small glass, with glass

petal edges like a flower, mounted on a silver stem about

which curled silver leaves. Through this he looked on her

more closely.

"Aphris!" he cried, as though horrified, but yet smiling.

'Saphrar,'' she wept, "free me!"

`'How unfortunate!" wailed Saphrar. I could still see the

tips of the golden teeth.

Kamchak had his arm about my shoulder, chuckling.

"Aphris of Turia," he said, "has a surprise coming."

Aphris turned her head to Kamchak. "I am the richest

woman in all Turia," she said. "Name your price!"

Kachak looked at me. "Do you think five gold pieces

would be too much?" he asked.

I was startled.

Aphris nearly choked. "Sleep," she wept. Then she turned

to Saphrar. "Buy mel" she demanded. "If necessary, use all

my resources, all! Free mel"

"But Aphris," Saphrar was purring, "I am in charge of

your funds and to barter them and all your properties and

goods for one slave would be a most unwise and absurd

decision on my part, irresponsible even."

its own tasks, lighter and more suitable. doubtless

  
Aphris suddenly looked at him, dumbfounded.

  
"It is or was true that you were the richest woman in

  
 
all Turia," Saphrar was saying, "but your riches are not yours
         
I

  
to manage but mine not, that is, until you would have

  
reached your majority, some days from now I believe."

  
"I do not wish to remain a slave for even a day!" she

  
cried.

  
"Is its over his eyes rising, "that you would upon reaching your I

  
majority transfer your entire fortunes to a Tuchuk, merely

  
to obtain your freedom."

  
"Of course" she wept.

  
"How fortunate then," observed Saphrar, "that such a

  
transaction is precluded by law."

  
"I don't understand," said Aphris.

  
Kamchak squeezed my shoulder and rubbed his nose.

  
"Surely you are aware," said Saphrar, "that a slave cannot

  
own property any more than a kaiila, a tharlarion or

  
sleep."

  
"I am the richest woman in Turia!" she cried.

  
Saphrar reclined a bit more on his cushions. His little

  
round pinkish face shone. He pursed his lips and then smiled.

  
He poked his head forward and said, very quickly, "You are

  
a slaver" He then giggled.

  
Aphris of Turia threw- back her head and screamed.

your wardrobes and jewels, your investments and assets,

chattels and lands, became mine."

Aphris was weeping uncontrollably at the stake. Then she

lifted her head to him, her eyes bright with tears. "I beg you,

noble Saphrar," she wept, "I beg of you I beg of you to

free me. Please! Please! Please!"

Saphrar smiled at her. He then turned to Kamchak,

"What, Tuchuk, did you say her price was?"

"I have lowered it,"' said Kamchak. "I will let you have

her for one copper tarn disk."

Saphrar smiled. "The price is too high," he said.

Aphris cried out in distress.

Saphrar then again lifted the tiny glass through which he

had regarded her, and examined her with some care. Then he

shrugged and gestured for his slaves to turn the palanquin.

"Saphrar" cried out the girl one last time.

"I do not speak to slaves," said he, and the merchant,

on the palanquin, moved away toward the walls of distant

Turia.

Aphris was looking after him, numbly, her eyes red, her

cheeks stained with tears.

"It does not matter," said Kamchak soothingly to the girl.

"Even had Saphrar been a worthy man you would not now

be free."

She turned her beautiful head to stare at him, blankly.

"No," said Kamchak, taking her hair and giving her head a

friendly shake, "I would not have sold you for all the gold in

Turia."

"But why?' she whispered.

"Do you recall," asked Kamchak, "one night two years

ago when you spurned my gift and called me sleep?"

The girl nodded, her eyes frightened.

"It was on that night," said Kamchak, "that I vowed to

make you my slave."

She dropped her head.

"And it is for that reason," said Kamchak, "that I would

not sell you for all the gold of Turia."

She looked up, red-eyed.

"It was on that night, little Aphris," said Kamchak, "that I

decided I wanted you, and would have you, slave."

The girl shuddered and dropped her head.

The laugh of Kamchak of the Tuchuks was loud.

He had waited long to laugh that laugh, waited long to see

     
his fair enemy thus before him, thus bound and shamed, his,

     
a slave.

     
In short order then Kamchak took the key over the head

     
of Aphris of Turia and sprang open the retaining rings. He

     
then led the numb, unresisting Turian maiden to his kaiila.

     
There, beside the paws of the animal, he made her kneel.

     
"Your name is Aphris of Turia," he said to her, giving her a

     
name.

     
"My name is Aphris of Turia," she said, accepting her

     
name at his hands.

     
"Submit," ordered Kamchak.

     
Trembling Aphris of Turia, kneeling, lowered her head and

     
extended her arms, wrists crossed. Kamchak quickly and

     
tightly thonged them together.

     
She lifted her head. "Am I to be bound across the saddle?"

     
she asked numbly.

 
    
"No," said Kamchak, "there is no hurry."

     
"I don't understand," said the girl.

     
Already Kamchak was placing a thong on her neck, the

     
loose end of which he looped several times about the pom-

     
mel of his saddle. "You will run alongside," he informed her.

     
She looked at him in disbelief.

     
Elizabeth Cardwell, unbound, had already taken her posi-

     
tion on the other side of F~ teak's kaiila, beside his right

     
It might have been the first time ship

     
Kamchak had not hit her hard, but ship

To be sure there might have been some doubt that the

miserable wench thonged behind Kamchak's kaiila could

have been first stake. She was gasping and stumbling; her

body glistened with perspiration; her legs were black with

wet dust; her hair was tangled and thick with dust; her feet

and ankles were bleeding; her calves were scratched and

speckled with the red bites of fennels. When Kamchak

reached his wagon, the poor girl, gasping for breath, legs

trembling, fell exhausted to the grass, her entire body shaking

with the ordeal of her run. I supposed that Aphris of Turia

had done little in her life that was more strenuous than

stepping in and out of a scented bath. Elizabeth Cardwell, on

the other hand, I was pleased to see, ran well, breathing

evenly, showing few signs of fatigue. She had, of course, in

her time with the wagons, become used to this form of

exercise. I had rather come to admire her. The life in the

open air, the work, had apparently been good for her. She

was trim, vital, buoyant. I wondered how many of the girls in

her New York office could have run as she beside the stirrup

of a Tuchuk warrior.

Kamchak leaped down from the saddle of the kaiila,

puffing a bit.