Chains - Chains Released Part 2

It wasn't possible to hear what the big boss said to his two new slaves, not even before the girl in the see-through silks was brought in to dance.

The man in the fancy vest spoke softly to the two kneeling near him, and there was nothing in the way of an echo to bring even some of his words to where Tain stood. All she could do was watch the dance along with the men, hoping that something useful to her would soon happen.

But the only thing that happened was a sudden realization that Killen and Tandro - and the other men in the room - weren't nearly as bored with the dance as Tain was. When the girl finished her dance and knelt in front of the man in the vest, Killen looked ready to attack the girl and Tandro didn't seem any better. The man in the vest spoke to the two kneeling men one at a time, and then Killen said something. The something seemed to be what the man in the vest wanted to hear, and he grinned as he sent the girl to bend over the wooden form Killen had used.

Tain knew at once that the girl would be used, and it was obvious that Killen knew the same. Killen fairly quivered where he knelt, for some reason expecting to be allowed to go to the girl, but he ended up disappointed. It was the man in the vest who went and used the girl, which increased Killen's - and Tandro's - suffering.

Once the girl was kneeling again, Tandro was sent back to the wooden form to be switched a second time. It looked like Tandro had done something wrong or hadn't done something right enough, and the punishment he was given looked brutal. But not brutal enough for the native to accept what was done with stubborn courage. It's hard to be courageous when your bottom is being spanked, even if the spanking hurts more than being beaten up might. A spanking is a suitable punishment for a child; how are you supposed to show dignity and pride when you're being punished like a child?

Tain had already learned that lesson, and Tandro was taught the same thing thoroughly before he was allowed to go back to kneeling. When another dancing girl was brought in Killen looked like he wished he could cry, and Tain didn't really blame him. She'd wondered if those insertions would be as terrible for a man as they were for a woman, and now it looked like the question had been answered.

The second dancer was used by another of the men in the room, and then a third dancer was brought in. After the third dancer was used by a third man, Killen was ordered to his feet and back to the wooden form.

There had been some conversation with the man in the vest while the third girl danced, and this time it was Killen who hadn't done something in the proper way.

And there was a definite change from when Killen and Tandro had been switched and even from when Tandro had been punished alone.

When the first stroke landed on Killen's backside he squeaked out an "Ow!" as he danced in place. The second stroke of the switch made him yell even louder and dance harder, and the third stroke made him cry. All the men in the room were laughing and so were the dancing girls, but that didn't stop Killen's performance. Every time the switch struck his bottom he howled and cried and danced with the pain, and Tandro now looked as if he wished he could close his eyes.

I'll bet Killen was ordered to act like a girl during the punishment, Tain thought once she'd gotten over the shock of seeing Killen doing something she would have sworn he'd never do. That man wants something from his two prisoners, and he knows he has to break them or he won't get whatever it is. But he can't afford to break them too far or he'd be using a whip on them instead of a switch. I wonder what it is that he wants...

That was another question Tain knew she couldn't answer, so it went on the mental shelf along with her previous question and any others of the same kind that would come along later. She felt tempted not to watch the way Killen was being humiliated, but remembering that other persona he'd forced on her made her change her mind. If Killen survived what was done to him, there would now be a chance that he'd have a better understanding of just how awful the time had been for Tain.

Killen continued to howl and dance for a while after the switching stopped, and the tears definitely kept streaming down his face.

Once his noise quieted a little he was ordered back to his place, and the way he limp-hopped back made his audience laugh all over again. It was hard for Tain to tell whether the male laughter or the female was worse for Killen, but when the man was back to kneeling his expression reminded Tain of Ennie.

The next few hours dragged by much too slowly. Each of the girls danced a second time, and after each dance a different man took the girl's use.

Just about every man in the room got his jollies, all except Killen and Tandro. Those two were only allowed to watch while others were given relief, and it was perfectly obvious that they had no relief of their own.

When serving slaves began to enter with trays of food, it became clear that the man in the vest had called a meal break. Everyone was given the choice of actual food, but the everyone didn't include Killen and Tandro.

Those two were given bowls with spoons, and Tain didn't have to look into the bowls to know they contained that cereal slaves were most often fed.

Even the dancing girls were allowed real food, but the two newest slaves had to make do with the cereal.

Tain watched as Killen and Tandro stuffed down their food, obviously under orders to eat the tasteless fare. Once they finished they just knelt and watched everyone else eat real food, and once the others finished the dancing started again. The two kneeling men seemed to get a small amount of respite from their bodily demands during the meal, but once the dancing started again they went right back to where they'd been earlier.

More time went by, leading Tain to wonder how long it would be before darkness fell. It also came to her to wonder if Killen and Tandro would be left here in this warehouse or taken somewhere else once it was dark enough out. If the man in the vest left and took enough of his people with him, freeing Killen and Tandro shouldn't be hard at all. But if the

two.

men themselves were taken somewhere else, Tain would have to try to follow - without being spotted and captured.

Finally, at long, long last, the man in the vest stood up and stretched.

He said something to the two men still kneeling at his feet, and the

two.

tried to stand up. After so long a time kneeling Killen and Tandro must have been in a lot of pain, and watching them force themselves to their feet showed Tain how much trouble they were having. Tandro actually fell on his first try, but the native spent no time at all lying still in an effort to ease the pain he felt. His second try was immediate, and this time he made it erect.

Once both of the men were standing, they headed for the door they'd come out of so many hours earlier. Their progress was on the slow side, but once they were through the doorway the door was pulled closed and two of the men in the room stood beside the door, one on each side. With that done the man in the vest spoke to the rest of his people, and then he led the way to a door opposite Tain's watchpost and to the left. The dancers brought up the rear with one of the men walking behind them, and in just a couple of minutes the room was empty of everyone but the two door guards.

Tain had s.h.i.+fted position on a regular basis during the past hours, so when she left the opening she'd been watching through she had no real trouble moving. She ghosted to the end of the corridor to the left, being very careful now, and got to the end of the closed-in area in time to see the man in the vest and the rest of his people leaving the warehouse through the door in front. Once the door closed Tain took a deep breath and let it out slowly, knowing that she had a fairly hard time ahead of her. She now had to wait for the two guards to be relieved, and only then would she be able to move. But first...

First she waited a short while to be certain the man in the vest and the rest of his people were gone, and then she made her careful way back to the warehouse across the street. There was no one outside, happily, so getting back to the other warehouse wasn't hard at all. Tain slid through the darkness to the back of the warehouse and went through the door carefully, then groped around for the candle and firemaker that had been left for her use.

When the candle was lit, Tain moved slowly toward the door that hid the living quarters the escaped slave women had been using. By now Risdin ought to know she was here, but it was possible the woman had taken a break. Tain had almost reached the door when the door was opened, but Risdin didn't step out. She simply opened the door widely enough to show she was alone, and then she waited.

"There are guards on my friend and I have to wait until the guards are replaced before I can do anything, but hopefully it won't be much longer."

Tain had stopped a few feet from the door and her voice was relatively soft, but still loud enough to carry to where Risdin stood. "How are you doing?"

"Aside from being surprised I haven't had a heart attack, I'm not doing badly at all," Risdin answered, her grimace showing she wasn't really joking. "How badly did they hurt your friend?"

"Physically they didn't do anything to him that hasn't been done to women, but how he's taking it psychologically is another matter entirely,"

Tain answered with a sigh. "If a man isn't used to being treated like property, it can do a lot of harm to his mind."

"You can't mean they tried to make him a slave?" Risdin returned, her expression now looking shocked. "It isn't possible to do something like that to a man."

"It's more than possible if you give the man that slave drug," Tain pointed out, apparently shocking Risdin again. "Yes, they fed him the drug, and then they treated him the way they would treat a disobedient female slave. He didn't enjoy it at all when they switched him twice."

"Imagine that," Risdin murmured distractedly, her mind seemingly busy with whirling thoughts. "Not enjoying being switched at someone's whim... So the drug does work on men as well as women. A lot of people believe only women can be affected because women are weak, but now we know that that isn't true. Celene thought I was being obscene and disgusting and dark, but it looks like she was wrong."

"What was she wrong about?" Tain asked, wondering what the other woman could be referring to.

"A slaver pa.s.sing by with some new slaves accidentally dropped a pouch with a few doses of the drug, and I took the pouch and kept it."

Risdin's answer was accompanied by a spreading smile. "I had no idea why I wanted to keep it, maybe to let the drug act as something I could hate instead of hating the people around me, but now... Now I know that keeping the drug was pure inspiration."

"I think we can definitely do something with that," Tain said, her own thoughts starting to whirl. "Just make sure you don't run off on your own with some wild idea about getting even. Proper getting even takes planning and preparation, not to mention all the help you can find. If you can make yourself be patient I'll be delighted to do what I can to help."

"Be patient," Risdin said with another grimace, but the wildness was beginning to fade from her eyes. "You don't ask for much in return for your help, do you? Okay, yes, I promise I won't run off on my own. You'd just better know that when it comes to getting even I don't have a whole lot in the way of patience."

"You won't have to have a lot of patience, since we can't afford to wait very long before moving," Tain a.s.sured her. "I just have to figure out the best direction to do that moving, and my friend might be able to help. I think he knows something we need to know, and with that in mind I'd better get back. Don't get sloppy or careless while I'm gone."

"The same right back at you," Risdin countered with a feral grin. "If you get grabbed you'll miss out on what promises to be a lot of fun."

"When there's a purpose behind your fun, you tend to enjoy it a lot more,"

Tain said, then turned and went back to the warehouse's door.

Blowing out the candle, making sure the wick was cool, and then putting the candle down on the floor again took only a couple of minutes, and by then Tain's night vision had returned so she could step outside. There was still no one around, but Tain didn't let that make her careless. She slid through the darkness the way she had earlier, listening to every sound the night air brought, and then she entered the other warehouse again.

It took about three hours before the guards were relieved by a different pair of men, and the only way Tain could stand the wait was to do it in hunting mode. When you're out hunting, either game or men, the only way to make the hunt successful is to have patience. If you move too soon you either go hungry or end up dead or captured, so Tain forced patience on herself and waited. Once the two guards had been replaced it was only necessary to wait a few minutes to make certain the first two would not be coming back, and then the waiting was over.

As Tain moved around to the door that would take her into the room where the guards waited, she found that she was actually grateful for the so-called clothes she wore. If she'd been dressed in any other way she probably would have had a problem, but as it was...

The attention of both guards came to Tain the instant she stepped through the door, which hardly came as a surprise. Sneaking up on the two men would have been impossible, so Tain simply strolled toward them in the most provocative way she could manage. Her smile was teasing as well as faintly challenging, and the men got the exact idea she wanted them to.

"It looks like Himlin wants to be sure we don't fall asleep," one of the men said to the other without moving his delighted gaze from Tain.

"I.

think I can promise that I won't fall asleep."

"h.e.l.l, I'd do her even if I was asleep," the second man said with a very wide grin. "I heard that the ones who were with Himlin earlier got to use those dancers, and I've been hot ever since. Now I get to put the hot to use."

Neither of the men moved from his post as Tain approached, but they did start to discuss who would get to use her first. That gave Tain enough time to get into position, and once she was close enough to the first man she didn't hesitate. Throwing a fist into the man's throat put him down at once, and while the second was frozen in shock Tain jump-kicked him in the face. The man's neck snapped just the way it was supposed to, which let Tain turn back to her first victim. That man's throat and windpipe were crushed, and after thras.h.i.+ng around some he'd fallen unconscious.

In just a short while he would be dead, so Tain was able to turn her attention to the door they'd guarded.

Beyond the door was a fairly small room, a single candle providing an even smaller amount of light. Killen and Tandro were stretched out face down on pallets, and the very brief, mostly silent fight outside their door hadn't wakened them from what looked like exhausted sleep. Tain hesitated only a second, and then she was moving to where Killen lay. When she reached him she knelt beside the pallet, then put a hand over his mouth.

"No talking and no struggling right now," she said when Killen's eyes flew open. "You'll only take orders from me, both of you. Do you understand?"

Tandro had awakened only a moment after Killen, so both men nodded in answer to her question. At that point Tain had no choice but to take her hand away from Killen's mouth, and when the big man stayed silent Tain let out the breath she'd been holding. If Killen had given her an order she would have had to obey him, but she'd managed to get her own order in first.

"Good," Tain said, getting back to her feet. "You, Killen, aren't to ever give me orders about anything again, but right now you have to take my orders. Can both of you walk?"

"If it means getting out of here, I'm willing to crawl," Killen answered, turning to his side on the pallet. "But we'll have to be ordered to leave our 'beds.' Himlin ordered us into bed before he left."

"Then I order you to get to your feet and follow me," Tain said, privately relieved that Killen sounded so normal. "If anyone shows up and tries to stop us, you two are also ordered to fight. Do anything you have to in order to keep from being recaptured."

"That's one order I'll obey with a big smile," Tandro said as he moved slowly to his feet. "a.s.suming, of course, that my knees are able to hold me up."

"Talk about unexpected pain," Killen added as he made his own awkward way to his feet. "I had no idea kneeling so long could hurt so much, but I sure as h.e.l.l know it now."

Tain felt the urge to comment about lessons that some people deserved to learn, but wasting time right now would have been stupid. Just because no one should have shown up didn't mean no one would, so the sooner they got out of this place the better off they would be. She watched until the men were fairly steady, told them to pick up their discarded body wraps, and then she led the way out of the room.

Walking past the two bodies on the floor wasn't hard for Tain at all, and a glance showed her that Killen wore an expression of deep satisfaction at the sight. Tandro, though, seemed deeply shocked, and he looked at Killen in confusion.

"Does this mean she can fight the way you do?" he asked Killen as they all headed for the door that would lead them out into the rest of the warehouse. "I never pictured women being taught this kind of thing."

"If she hadn't been taught this kind of thing, we'd still probably be prisoners in that room," Killen pointed out, his hands playing with the body wrap he hadn't been told he could put on again. "Would you be happier if we were still prisoners?"

"I get the point and I'm not arguing," Tandro said after taking a deep breath. "Funny how outrage disappears in the face of a good enough cause."

There wasn't anything to say to that, so both men were silent as they paused to pick up their rifled but otherwise untouched saddlebags, put the bags over one shoulder, then followed Tain to the back door of the warehouse.

Tain stepped outside with every one of her senses alert, but the night still felt empty and calm. It wouldn't have surprised her to find that the man in the vest was paranoid enough to set up a trap in case anyone came to free his prisoners, but it looked like the man had been sure no

one.

would come. If the man in the vest knew about the missing female slaves his captives had had, he'd dismissed the slaves as being completely unimportant. More fool, he.

Tain had to slow her pace to allow the men to follow her without trouble, but they all finally reached the back of the other warehouse and slipped inside. The candle wasn't hard to find but the firemaker was another story, and it took a good deal of groping before Tain had the thing in her hand. Shortly thereafter the candle was lit again, so Tain led her small parade toward the door where Risdin was supposed to be waiting.

When Risdin opened the door wide Tain felt a bit of relief, but her relief increased when she saw the grin the other woman wore.

"I forgot to ask how you would let me know that the men were in your control rather than you being in theirs," Risdin said as she studied Killen and Tandro. "The point worried me, but I'm not worried any longer.

Have you asked them how they liked being treated in the way they treated others without the least hesitation?"

"I thought I'd leave that for you to do," Tain said as she moved toward the room and the door that could be closed. "As a reward for the patience you were forced to have. After you're done I'll put the questions I have."

"The coffee is still hot if you want some," Risdin said as she stepped back out of the way to let the three people enter, her gaze still on the men. "I couldn't wait that long without having coffee to sustain me, so help yourself while I put these slaves to their knees the way I was put so often."

"I don't want them on their knees," Tain said at once as she headed for the coffee pot that stood above dully glowing coals. "That man, Himlin, I think his name is, kept them on their knees for hours, and doing it again could cripple them for a time. If we're going to move, we'll want them with us."

"All right, then let's have them sit down," Risdin said, having taken the candle to circle the two men after she closed the door behind them.

"A lot of times a slave is sent to sit on a wooden bench or a high stool after a switching, and she isn't even allowed to scream."

"Listen to me," Killen said to an angry Risdin before Tain could answer, his words gentle and filled with understanding. "I know how furious and hurt you feel, and I knew it even before I shared your experience as a slave for a few hours. I hate the idea of slavery and always have, and now that I know how damaging it is to everyone involved I hate it even more.

We didn't mind risking our lives to put an end to this horror before now, but from now on we'll be dedicated to the idea with a pa.s.sion only a former slave can appreciate. Do you understand?"

Risdin stood in silence for a time, staring first at Killen and then at Tandro, seeing the way neither man made any effort to avoid her gaze. Tain knew that Risdin had been looking forward to getting some of her own back, but she was now being forced to admit that these men weren't the ones she wanted to get even with.

"Hurting them would make me as bad as the ones who hurt me, wouldn't it?"

Risdin said, finally breaking the silence. "I didn't understand that before, but now I do. Just because it was men who hurt me, I can't put the blame on every man alive, can I."

"Some people do, but they're the ones who let their fear and hatred rule them," Tain answered, since she was the one Risdin had spoken to.

"Just as some men blame all women when it was only one who hurt them.