The Usurper (34 page)

“The sluts are proud of the bands on their necks,” said Lady Delia. “How unique, and special, that makes them! How superior to free women!”

Women in the stands cried out with rage.

“No, no, Mistress!” cried Cornhair. “They are only slaves!”

“Do they not see how men look upon their faces, their limbs, their figures, look so frankly, so appraisingly, so approvingly, knowing that such delights could be theirs, in exactly the same sense that they might purchase a pig or dog?”

“Be kind, dear Mistress!” wept Cornhair.

“Perhaps, slave,” said Lady Delia, “you are curious as to why your collar was removed.”

“Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair.

“We would not want it soiled,” said Lady Delia.

There was laughter in the stands.

“Mistress?” said Cornhair.

“Nor,” said Lady Delia, “would we wish it to injure the jaws of fine beasts.”

“I do not understand, lovely Mistress,” cried Cornhair. “Be kind to me!”

“You were curious as to the nature of our gathering, of our sisterhood, so to speak.”

“Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair.

“You may have wondered as to its purpose.”

“Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair.

“We all have something in common,” said Lady Delia.

“Mistress?” said Cornhair.

“We all hate slaves,” said Lady Delia.

“Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair. This made Cornhair decidedly uneasy, but she understood it well enough. Certainly it was common enough that free women resented, if not hated, slaves, for their attractions, for their appeal to men. Where men were concerned there was a natural rivalry between the free woman and the slave. Why should a man prefer a lovely, needful, collared beast on his chain to the inestimable privilege of relating to a free woman? Was that not incomprehensible? Who could understand it? Cornhair, as a free woman, had not hated slaves so much as despising them, and holding them in an utter contempt, for the meaningless animals they were. One can well imagine then her feelings at her own reversal of fortune, when she found herself in a collar. Still, even as a free woman, she had often wondered what it might be, to find herself owned, and helpless, at a Master's feet.

“But,” said Lady Delia, “our feelings go much beyond simple hatred. No. Much more is involved. Each of us has a personal interest in these matters. Though we are free women, each with the status and resources of free women, each of us, at one time or another, has been put aside or neglected, even abandoned, for a worthless slave. How foolish and stupid are men! Each of us, each a free woman, in all our glory, at one time or another, sustained this unspeakable indignity. Realize the outrage of being superseded by, or discarded in favor of, a meaningless, curvaceous beast, a slave, something we ourselves could have bought for a handful of coins!”

“It is not our fault, Mistress!” said Cornhair. “We are taken in war, chained, seized, abducted. It is done to us by men!”

“I have seen you, such as you,” said Lady Delia, “content, lips parted, half naked, pressing your lips to a man's thigh!”

“Have mercy, Mistress!” said Cornhair.

“You, such as you, belong chained at a man's feet,” said Lady Delia.

“Mercy, please, Mistress!” said Cornhair.

“We are met here for vengeance on such as you,” said Lady Delia.

“Hateful slave!” screamed a woman from the stands.

“I have done nothing, Mistress!” cried Cornhair.

“We know your sort,” cried Lady Virginia, from the side of Lady Delia. “You are all seductive sluts. You will all beg, all lick and kiss, all crawl for the caress of a Master!”

“How can a free woman compete with a slave?” cried a woman from the stands.

“Mercy, Mistresses!” cried Cornhair. “Have their bellies never been enflamed,” she asked herself, “as the bellies of slaves? Do they know what it is to wear a collar and be owned? Have they never felt the lash?”

“Slave! She is a slave!?” cried a woman.

“I have done nothing!” cried Cornhair.

“You, and others, will stand proxy!” said Lady Delia.

“Others?” said Cornhair.

“Those who served with you,” said Lady Delia. “They will be given knives and set on one another in the arena.”

Several of the women in the stands clapped their hands, and laughed.

“It will be amusing to see them set on one another,” said Lady Virginia, “screaming, weeping, crying for mercy, cutting and hacking, bleeding in the sand, slave girls set on slave girls!”

“Have mercy!” begged Cornhair.

“A different fate is in store for you,” said Lady Delia.

“The dogs, killing dogs, will be set on you,” said Lady Virginia.

“We will see you torn to pieces, before us,” said Lady Delia.

Cornhair looked wildly about, and ran across the sand to the heavy door which she had seen from within, from the far end of the tunnel, before she had been hooded and led to the sand. It was through this door that the two women who had accompanied her to the sand had recently withdrawn.

Cornhair yanked, again and again, with all her strength, on the handle. It was of iron. The door was of heavy timbers. It scarcely moved.

She looked about, again, and saw another door, to the side. She hurried, gasping, sand about her legs, halfway up her calves, to that door. Then she stopped. There was no handle on that door. It was such that it could only be opened and shut vertically, as it would be lifted and lowered, probably by means of balanced weights.

Then, from behind the door, she heard snarling and growling, and the movement of excited, massive bodies.

She threw her hand before her face, and cried out in misery, and then turned and ran to the sand before the box of Lady Delia and her friends, and fell to her knees, and extended her hands upward, piteously. She could now hear, from across the arena, the agitation of beasts from behind the vertical door, beasts now disturbed, now alerted, doubtless now anticipating their release and feeding.

“Do not release the dogs, kind, lovely Mistress!” cried Cornhair. “I am only a slave!”

“Slave! Slave!” cried several of the women in the tiers.

“Do not despair, Cornhair,” said Lady Delia, kindly. “Would you like a chance for your life?”

“Yes, yes, Mistress!” cried Cornhair, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Note the walls, and the railings,” said Lady Delia. “They are not too high. Might you not leap up and seize the railing and draw yourself up to safety?”

“I would be permitted to do so?” asked Cornhair.

“Yes,” said Lady Delia. “And, if you succeed, we will see that you are conveyed to Telnar and sold in some nice market.”

“Mistress?” said Cornhair.

“You have my word on it,” said Lady Delia, “freely and publicly given, the unimpeachable, sacred word of a free woman of the empire.”

“Thank you, Mistress!” cried Cornhair. It would require effort, surely, serious effort, for it was not an easy leap for a woman, or a normal woman, but Cornhair was desperate, and terrified, and she felt convinced she could reach the railing, grasp it, and then pull herself up, and over it, and thus reach the lowest level of the seats.

“You do not have a great deal of time, dear,” said Lady Delia. “I am preparing to give the signal, letting this lifted scarf fall, following which the dog gate will be opened.”

“Hurry, slave,” called a woman.

“It is fortunate that you are clad as you are,” said a woman.

“Decent robing would be an encumbrance,” said another woman.

There was laughter.

It may be recalled that the railings about the height of the wall were in the form of large, white, wooden cylinders.

Cornhair backed away, grateful, determined, secured good footing in the sand, hesitated, and then raced toward the nearest railing. A few feet away she was sure that she had been right, that she would be able to reach, and clutch, the railing.

She did so!

Her hands were on it.

To be sure, given its size, it could not be embraced, but she need only pull herself, inch by inch, up, inch by inch, over its painted, solid, immobile, dry curvature.

Then she cried out, a small cry of misery.

The cylinder was solid, indeed, but it was not immobile!

It turned!

She pulled herself up an inch or two.

The cylinder then, like an elongated wheel, like a heavy bar, rotated on its axis, toward the arena, some two or three inches.

There was laughter in the stands.

She drew herself up another inch, desperately.

The heavy bar turned again, slowly, four or five inches.

Cornhair's own efforts forced it to turn.

Then Cornhair slipped from the cylinder, and fell to the sand.

She heard cries of mirth.

She ran about the arena, and tried, again and again, at different points, to scramble to safety.

Each time the railing, like a smoothed log, spun slowly, reacting to her desperate grasp.

Her nails dug into the wood.

The railing again turned, and, again, she fell to the sand.

She stood up, and looked to the box.

She realized then that the railings had been designed to prevent escape from the arena, by animals, and, it seemed, slaves.

“No!” she cried. “No, please, no, Mistress!”

But even as she cried out, she saw the scarf flutter from the hand of Lady Delia.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

There are many varieties of dogs, or what we have, for convenience, tended to speak of as dogs, from various worlds, rather as we have spoken of “horses,” “pigs,” and such.

Cornhair, then, did not know, really, what lay behind the vertical door.

She was familiar, of course, with the savage, or half-trained, “dogs” from the Herul camp. She knew she might be torn to pieces if she left the camp, but there was not much to fear when one remained within the assigned perimeter, usually within the circle of wagons, and the dogs had been fed within the week. Indeed, even Heruls would be in jeopardy if such creatures grew lean and impatient. Sometimes she knew that prisoners were run naked for the dogs.

She watched the dog gate, waiting for it to lift.

“Just one dog, at first, Cornhair,” called Lady Delia. “We do not want it to feel challenged, that it must act in haste. We want to see it circle you, and frighten you, and harry you. If you run, it will pursue you and bring you down, instantly. So do not run, not right away. To be sure, you will run soon enough, if you have the opportunity. Then you will be dragged down. Then, when the dog has you, we will release the other dogs and watch them fight over you.”

Cornhair, of course, knew enough not to run, not immediately, unless shelter might be reached. Even the Herul dogs were not likely to attack an immobile target, not immediately. Too, if one did not move, one might have somewhat longer to live. Stillness can confer invisibility, of a sort. Visual predators are particularly sensitive to movement, but may fail to notice the rabbit, paralyzed with fear. This behavior seems to have been favored, at least in the case of the rabbit. To be sure, if detected, it flees, instantly, darting away, with its sudden, difficult-to-predict changes of direction, and such. A Serian oolun can starve to death before a plate of dead crawlers, but, if one should move, the oolun strikes. The dog sees but not with the acuity of the hawk. It hears well, but not as well as the vi-cat. It does inhabit a world rich with scent, and may locate prey which the hawk does not see and the vi-cat does not hear.

Cornhair stood very quietly, in the sand, rather to one side of the arena.

The vertical door had lifted only a foot, when a snarling shape, eager, squirming, impatient, on its belly, thrusting up on the bottom of the door with its shoulders, scratched its way onto the sand. Its fur was flattened back, where it had scrambled under the door.

A small sound of fear, and dismay, escaped Cornhair, quite inadvertently.

Across the sand she saw the head of the beast instantly turn toward her, and the large, pointed ears rise, and turn toward her, like eyes.

It was similar to the Herul dogs, as large, as quick and agile, but it was more heavily furred, particularly about the head.

About its neck was a heavy leather collar, probably to protect it against competitive feeders, should the division of the prize be contested.

Dogs are trained for many purposes, war, herding, tracking, guarding, game location, game retrieval, pit fighting,
torodont
baiting, warning, message bearing, and such. These animals, or their sort, Cornhair had gathered had been bred for, and trained for, the hunting and killing of men.

The stands were quiet, and expectant. Many of the women leaned forward.

The beast padded toward Cornhair, some yards across the sand.

Cornhair knew she must not run, but it is one thing to know that, and another not to run.

The beast stopped, and looked about itself.

It was alone, save for Cornhair.

Doubtless it welcomed this intelligence.

It padded softly toward her, another three or four yards.

“She is afraid,” said a voice in the stands.

“See her tremble,” said another.

“She cannot run, even if she wished,” said another voice. “She is too frightened.”

“She is pretty, is she not?” said a voice.

“Just wait,” said another voice.

There was laughter.

“You may move, if you wish,” called a woman.

There was more laughter.

Cornhair's collar had been removed. She recalled that it was not to have been soiled, and that one would not wish to risk injuring the jaws of a fine animal.

Cornhair lifted her hand, timidly, to her throat.

The beast growled, and padded a step closer.

It had not circled Cornhair.

It had not feinted toward her, snapped, bitten and drawn back, to bite again.

Perhaps Lady Delia was not really used to such dogs. Perhaps she did not know their training, their dispositions. Perhaps this was the first time she had purchased, or rented, such beasts. Perhaps a smaller animal might have circled, circumspectly, considering the prey, assessing it, or harried it, testing its reflexes, seeing if it would threaten or strike back, perhaps trying to stimulate it to flight, when the leaping, the seizing and clawing, the bite through the back of the neck, would be facilitated, but this animal, crouching down, only watched Cornhair, who backed away a yard or so, which interval the beast closed immediately, crawling forward its yard or so.

It was not clear why the dog, which was a large, trained animal, weighing perhaps three or four times what Cornhair weighed, did not rush upon her, knocking her from her feet, sprawling her to the sand, and then seizing an arm or leg, shaking her, dragging her about, and then, having tasted blood, working its way, grip by shifting grip, to the throat. Certainly it would have been hungry enough. Its keepers would have seen to that. Our speculation is that it was unaccustomed to prey of the sort constituted by such as Cornhair. It had been trained on, and was habituated to, larger, stronger, more fearsome prey, prey which might resist, and fight, prey on which more than one dog at a time would be likely to be loosed, prisoners of war, criminals, and such, uniformly, men. Cornhair, on the other hand, was much different. Her entire form and demeanor was unfamiliar. She was slight, slender, small, and soft.

The eyes of the beast were on Cornhair.

They blinked, and then they were on her, again.

Slave girls seldom figured in arena sports, save as prizes to be bestowed on victors. Whereas free women might be slain, slave girls, as they were domestic animals, were no more likely to be slain than other domestic animals. They had value. They would merely change hands. Too, of course, there were better things to do with slave girls than feed them to dogs. That option, of course, was always at a Master's disposal, should a girl prove a poor slave.

The beast had not yet attacked. But it was, of course, quite hungry. That, as we noticed earlier, had been seen to.

Had there been more than one dog on the sand, say, two or three, this delay, most likely, would not have taken place. Each beast would have been apprehensive that the other might first seize the prey, and then stand over it, to defend it. Too, it was not as though several had attacked at once and a frenzy had ensued, in which each, with tearing, bloody jaws, must fight for its share of the common spoils.

“Why does it not attack?” queried a woman in the stands.

The beast growled. Cornhair could see fangs at the side of its mouth. Some saliva dropped to the sand, dampening it.

Cornhair's body tensed to run.

She wanted to stay still.

She wanted to run.

She knew she must not move.

She knew she would move.

She knew she must not run.

She knew she was going to run.

Perhaps she could reach a railing and clamber to safety.

“We paid good money for these beasts,” said Lady Virginia.

“Be patient,” said Lady Delia.

“Are you afraid, female slave?” called a woman.

Cornhair dared not respond, for she feared the slightest sound, or movement, might tip a precious, invisible balance, precipitating the beast's charge.

“Open the gate!” cried a woman in the stands.

“Loose the dogs!” cried another.

Then Cornhair noted a subtle change in the demeanor of the beast, difficult to place, but indisputable. The fur rippled, almost unnoticeably. Muscles were moving, tensing. She saw the hind legs move a little deeper into the sand. The head of the beast lowered some inches, but the eyes remained fixed on her.

“It is going to charge,” thought Cornhair.

“Run, Cornhair!” cried Lady Delia. “Run!”

“She wants me to run,” thought Cornhair. “I must not run. It is going to charge. I am close. I see it. I must run!”

“Run!” cried Lady Delia.

Cornhair, in misery, crying out, terrified, turned and ran.

She heard the shriek of the crowd, the sudden, scrambling scratching of paws in the sand behind her, the great beast speeding forward.

She sensed the great body in flight, as she threw herself to the sand, was conscious of a sharp, hissing sound, the shadow of the beast above her, wild, hawklike, then its furred weight half on her, half beside her, her tunic and body spattered with blood.

She heard cries of alarm and dismay from the stands.

She struggled to free herself from the weight of the dog, half on her. She pulled herself free, and stood, unsteadily, bewildered, in the sand, beside the beast. It was half torn apart. She could see bones, half of its head. The sand was drenched with blood. She looked to the box of the hostess, the box where Lady Delia had presided over the sport. A man stood there, large, roughly clad, bearded, behind the railing, in his arms a rare Telnarian rifle, a weapon seldom found these days except in the possession of members of the imperial guard and certain elite forces.

The free women were on their feet, and were being thrust, and herded, at gunpoint, toward one of the exits from the stands, except one, the Lady Delia, who was held in place, standing alone, in the box of the hostess.

There were perhaps twenty or thirty men about, in shabby garments, in the caps of boatmen, variously armed.

Perhaps there were others, elsewhere.

Cornhair saw the last of the free women, saving the Lady Delia, disappear through one of the exits of the stands.

“Slave!” called the fellow with the rifle, perhaps the leader of the strangers.

“Master!” responded Cornhair, and ran quickly to the sand before the box, and fell to her knees. How natural, and right, that now seemed to her.

The fellow with the rifle gestured to a confederate, and he unlooped a rope at his belt and flung its loose end over the railing to the sand.

“Hold to it!” he called, and Cornhair seized the rope and was soon pulled up to, and over, the railing. She instantly knelt and put her head down before the man with the rifle, and pressed her lips to his boots.

“Stinking slave,” hissed Lady Delia.

“Thank you, Master,” whispered Cornhair.

“You are sweaty, filthy, covered with blood,” said the man with the rifle. “Do you know where you can wash, and clean yourself?”

“Yes, Master,” said Cornhair. She recalled the room of the bath. To be sure, it was little more than a cistern, a bath for slaves. Doubtless, in the domicile, there were facilities fit for free women.

“Do so,” said he, “and then return here, naked.”

“Yes, Master,” said Cornhair.

“Doubtless,” said Lady Delia, bitterly, fixing her contemptuous gaze on the man with the rifle, “you like to look on the bodies of slaves.”

“Yes,” he said.

“You have done well, for robbers and pirates,” said Lady Delia. “We here, your captives, are not merely free women, but each of us, each one, is a woman of station and means.”

“That is known to us, fine lady,” said the man.

“We may be exchanged for handsome ransoms,” she said.

“Doubtless,” said the man.

“You seem strange fellows, for river men,” said Lady Delia.

“We are not river men,” said the man.

Cornhair then rose, and hurried to the room of the slave bath.

On her way she passed several cells. Many were empty. In one cell, now crowded together, frightened, were the twenty or so slaves who had served with her at the suppers. They were still in serving tunics. The eyes of one, wildly, regarded her. Clearly none, Cornhair realized, understood what had transpired, nor, really, did she. They saw her bloody, in a brief, bloodied tunic, hurrying by, feet and legs covered with clinging sand. They would not know she had been in an arena. Probably they did not even know there was an arena. Nor, Cornhair supposed, would they realize what the free women had held in store for them, that they would be given knives and set on one another. They did not speak, nor, in her uneasiness, did Cornhair. They had not been given permission to do so. Speaking without permission, as slaves were well aware, could bring the whip. A bit later, on her route to the bath, Cornhair passed several cells crowded with free women, still in their abundant, expensive finery. So closely were they packed into the small cells, that they could scarcely move. Several, bodies pressed against the bars, cried out to her.

“Free us, slave!”

“On the wall, across the way, see, keys! Take them! Undo the locks! Free us!”

“Open the cells!”

“Now!”

“Obey!”

“Obey!”

Cornhair hurried past, frightened. Free men had turned the keys in those locks! How could she, a slave, dare to undo their work?

Soon Cornhair had finished her bath, and, with a few hasty strokes, had brushed and combed her hair.

As she was hurrying back, making her way through the domicile, to ascend the internal stairs leading up to the stands, several of the strangers, certainly looking much like rough river fellows, passed her, apparently on their way to the cells below, that of the slaves, those of the free women.

Cornhair kept her eyes down. It is not always wise to meet the eyes of a free man.

“Thirty
darins
,” said a fellow.

“Thirty-five,” said another.

“Perhaps forty,” said another.

Cornhair, who had last sold for five
darins
, was quite ready, perhaps in her vanity, to welcome such enlarged, unsolicited assessments of her likely block value. Whereas free women quite commonly compare themselves to one another with respect to beauty, and have very clear views on the matter, most such estimations remain speculative. The value of the slave, on the other hand, is what men will pay for her.