Gor - Witness Of Gor Part 90

The guard swiftly left the room.

The girl whom he had thrust from him looked after him, in consternation, clutching a bit of slave rag to herself.

"Fecha, Janice," said the pit master with a swift gesture, "to your kennels!"

I quickly pulled my tunic off and hurried to the kennel, backing into it, pulling shut the gate after me. I was then locked in. I drew back in the kennel. Fecha discarded the slave rag and locked herself, too, in her kennel. Fina, who had no kennel, but was commonly slept at the slave ring of the pit master, quickly seized up a polis.h.i.+ng rag and, kneeling to one side, head down, began to buff a goblet.

But the first figure which entered the quarters was not that of a stranger, but one who had, upon occasion, frequented these precincts before, the officer, he whose name I knew not, but whose rank was captain.

The pit master looked up from some papers which he had but a moment before spread before him. He had also, beneath these papers, I had noted, concealed a stiletto.

"The projected invasion has landed," said the officer. "It has made landfall, as antic.i.p.ated, at Brundisium."

"It has begun," said the pit master.

"It seems they think it safe now," said the officer.

"And perhaps now, it is," speculated the pit master.

"But an Ahn ago," said the officer, "emissaries from Lurius of Jad have arrived in the city.

They have obtained clearances from the administration. They are authorized to enter the depths."

"Members of the black caste, the a.s.sa.s.sins," said the pit master. "They are not far behind you."

"You know?"

"I have just received word."

"They wish to take custody of the prisoner," said the officer. "I am sure of it."

"It will be a brief custody, I am sure," said the pit master.

"He is to be removed to Cos," said the officer.

"He will never reach Cos," said the pit master.

"I have heard he is to be removed to Cos," said the officer, firmly.

"Why a.s.sa.s.sins?" asked the pit master. "Why those of the black caste?"

"Efficiency, anonymity," said the officer.

"What has Lurius to fear?" asked the pit master. "Is the prisoner not safe here? Has he not enough spies on the continent, even in Ar herself? Has he not a thousand traitors in high places?"

"They approach," said the officer, uneasily.

"Are you armed?" asked the pit master.

"Yes," said the officer, touching his left side, beneath his robes.

"Last night," said the pit master, "I dreamed of honor."

"If he is taken from us," said the officer, "Treve loses a counter of inestimable value."

"And would Cos permit us to retain such a counter?" said the pit master.

"Numbers beyond count have landed in Brundisium," said the officer.

"There must be better than a thousand s.h.i.+ps, better than a thousand companies."

"What is their destination?" asked the pit master.

"It is rumored Torcadino," said the officer.

"And thence to Ar?"

"Doubtless."

"Such forces might be turned eventually toward the northeast," said the pit master. "The mountains could swarm with them. There could be too many to turn back."

"Ar must fall," said the officer, in a terrible voice. "She is our ancient enemy."

"And what may we expect from Cos, and Tyros, once entrenched upon the mainland?"

queried the pit master.

The officer looked down, angrily.

"Ar is divided against itself," said the pit master. "There are traitors in high places."

"Excellent," growled the officer.

"Had there not been he would not have been encouraged into the Voltai, had there not have been we would not have received the information which permitted us to ambush and snare him as we did."

At that point, from outside, somewhere down the corridor, we heard a sounding of metal, perhaps the beating of a sword hilt on a closed gate.

"Open!" we heard. "We have orders! Open!"

"The pa.s.sage is sealed," said the pit master.

"It must be opened," said the officer. "The administration has cleared them. They have authorization."

"What has Rask said of this?" asked the pit master.

"He has pledged a thousand men to stop them," said the officer.

"And would precipitate war," said the pit master, irritably.

"And what Kaissa would you play?" inquired the officer.

"I have a game in mind," said the pit master.

"Neither of us may betray the honor of our post," said the officer.

"And where is found the house of honor?"

"He is to be surrendered to them," said the officer. "There is no other way."

"You understand what that means?"

"There is no other way."

"There is a possibility."

"None we may with honor pursue."

"Honor has many voices, and many songs."

"Open! Open!" we heard, from down the corridor. There was a repet.i.tion of the pounding on the bars of the gate. "Open! Open!"

"We need time!" said the officer.

"They will not have their way this day," said the pit master.

"And how is that?" asked the officer.

"Their papers are not in order," said the pit master.

"I see," said the officer.

"Open," we heard. "Open!"

"Coming, coming, Masters!" called the pit master.

THIRTY ONE

"We have seen a hundred prisoners!" cried the fellow in the black tunic, the leader of the strangers.

"None is he, I am sure of it, Master," said a furtive, twisted fellow, his face a ma.s.s of jerking scar tissue.

"If I knew whom you seek, perhaps," said the pit master.

"Gito will know him," said the fellow in black.

"We can kill every male prisoner in the depths," said one of the fellows in black, a lieutenant.

"You have no authorization for that," said the pit master.

"You know whom we seek," said the leader of the men in black tunics.

There were twentythree in their party, the leader, a lieutenant, the fellow called 'Gito', and twenty men.

Each of the twenty men carried a sword, a dagger, and a crossbow. Some had their bows set.

"If you have come to take custody of prisoner, as your orders state,"

said the pit master, "why have you no chains with you?"

I had noted this, too. One of the men carried a leather sack. It was the only unique, or unusual, object they seemed to have with them.

"Are any of these a preferred slave?" asked the leader of the fellows in black.

The ten female slaves kept in the quarters of the pit master, I among them, had been, at the insistence of the leader of the strangers, brought along in the corridors. Our hands were bound behind our backs. We were stripped. I had not understood why we were taken along. I now began, uneasily, to suspect why.

"They are only slaves," said the pit master.

"Cut their throats," said the leader of the strangers.

We cried out, and shrank back, and might have run, but there was nowhere to run. Men were all about.

One fellow took me by the hair, to hold me in place.

"Hold!" said the pit master. "Know that these women are the property of the state of Treve!

You are within the walls of Treve. You are sheltered by her Home Stone.

You cannot deal with the property of Treve with impunity."

"You have delayed us long enough," snarled the leader of the blacktunicked men. "We came yesterday to the pits, and you put us off with some absurd technicality."

"We have our regulations, Master," said the pit master.

"That technicality was cleared this morning," said the leader of the strangers.

The majority of the men in black tunics, incidentally, save for two who returned to the surface, to repair the fault in their papers, had remained overnight in the quarters of the pit master. It seemed that, as tenacious and terrible as sleen, they would take their repose on the very trail they followed. Too, I am sure they did not trust the pit master. The officer of Treve had left the quarters of the pit master shortly after the arrival of the strangers, putatively to ensure that new papers would be properly prepared, that there would be no further difficulty in the doc.u.ments, supposedly of transfer or extradition. The men in the black tunics who had remained overnight in the quarters of the pit master, including their leader and his lieutenant, seemed to me strange fellows. They were much unlike many, if not most, of the men of this world. They did not laugh, they did not joke, they did not tell stories. They were silent, frightening, terrible men. I do not think they had Home Stones. If they had some loyalty, and I do not doubt they did, I think it was rather to some b.l.o.o.d.y oath, or dark covenant, or even to a leader. They attended to their equipment, they sharpened their swords.

They drank only water.

They ate sparingly. The hospitality of the pit master, offering us to them, was declined. Even the women chained at the wall were not touched. We were, however, denied our blankets, and we must all be chained, even those in the kennels. One of the girls at the wall, Tissia, I do not know what she had done, was savagely kicked by one of the blacktunicked fellows.

"Temptress!" he denounced her. She wept and crawled away from him, pressing herself against the wall in her chains. I supposed we were all temptresses, all women.