Gor - Raiders Of Gor Part 34

"Spare me!" cried Tellius.

"Or," I said, "Henrius."

"Thank you, Captain," said the boy.

"But," said I, "to have such a name, which is a proud name, one would have to handle weapons very well."

"I shall," he said. "I shall!"

Then the boy turned and ran joyfully from the room.

The kitche master looked at me and grinned. "Never," said he, "Captain, did I see a slave run more eagerly to a beating."

"Nor did I," I admitted.

Now, at my victory feast, I drank more paga. That, I told myself, letting a boy train with weapons, have been a moment of weakness. I did not expect I would allow myself more such moments.

I observed the boy bringing in yet another roasted tarsk.

No, I told myself, I should not have shown such a lenience to a slave.

I would not again allow myself such moments of weakness.

I fingered the broard scarlet ribbon and the medallion, pendant about my neck, brearing its tarn s.h.i.+p and initials, those of the Council of Captains of Port Kar.

I was Bosk, Pirate, Admiral of Port Kar, now perhaps one of the richest and most powerful men on Gor.

No, I would not again show such moments of weakness.

I thrust out the silver paga goblet, studded with rubies, and Telima, standing beside my thronelike chair, filled it. I did not look upon her.

I looked down the table, to where Thurnock, with his slave Thura, and c.l.i.tus, with his slave, Ula, were drinking and laughing. Thurnock and c.l.i.tus were good men, they had taken a fancy to the boy, Fish, and had helped him with his work in weapons. Such men were weak. They had not in themselves the stuff of captains.

I sat back on he great chair, paga goblet in hand, surveying the room.

It was crowded with tables of my retainers, feasting.

To one side musicians played.

There was a clear s.p.a.ce before my great table, in which, from time to time, during the evening, entertainments had been provided, simple things, which even I had upon occasion found amusing, fore eaters and sword swallowers, jugglers and acrobats, and magicians, and slaves, riding on one another's shoulders, striking at one another with inflated tarsk bladders tied to poles.

"Drink!" I cried.

And again goblets were lifted and clashed.

I looked down the long table, and, far to my right, sitting alone at the end of the long bench behind the table, was Luma, my slave and chief scribe. Poor, scrawny, plain Luma, thought I, in her tunic of scribe's cloth, and collar! What a poor excuse for a paga slave she had been! Yet she had a brilliant mind for a the accounts and business of a great house, and had much increased my fortunes.

So indebted to her was I taht I had, this night, permitted her to sit at one end of the great table. No free man, of course, ,would sit beside her. Moreover, that my other scribes and retainers not be angered, I had had her put in slave bracelets, and about her neck had had fastened a chain, which was bolted into the heavy table. And it was thus that Luma, she of perhaps greatest importance in my house, saving its master, with us, yet chained and alone, apart, shared my feast of victory.

"More paga," said I, putting out the goblet.

Telima poured more paga.

"There is a singer," said one of my men.

This irritated me, but I had never much cared to interfere with the entertainments which were presented before me.

"It is truly a singer," said Telima, behind me.

It irritated me that she had spoken.

"Fetch Ta grapes from the kitchen," I told her.

"Please, my Ubar," said she, "let me stay."

"I am not your Ubar," I said. "I am your master."

"Please, Master," she begged, "let Telima stay."

"Very well," I said.

The tables grew quiet.

The man had been blinded, it was said, by Sullius Maximus, who believed taht blinding improved the quality of a singer's songs. Sullius Maximus, who himself dabbled in poetry, and poisons, was a man of high culture, and his opinions in such matters were greatly respected. At any rate, whatever be the truth in these matters, the singer, in his darkness, was now alone with his songs. He had only them.

I looked upon him.

He wore the robes of his caste, the singers, and it was not known what city was his own. Many of the singers wander from place to place, selling their songs for bread and love. I had known, long ago, a singer, whose name was Andreas of Tor.

We could hear the torches crackle now, and the singer touched him lyre.

I sing the siege of Ar of gleaming Ar.

I sing the spears and wall of Ar of Glorious Ar.

In the long years past of the siege of the city the siege of Ar of her spires and towers of undaunted Ar Glorious Ar I sing.

I did not care to hear his song. I looked down into the paga goblet. The singer continued.

I sing of dark-haired Talena of the rage of Marlenus Ubar of Ar Glorious Ar.

I did not wish to hear this song. It infuriated me to see that the others in that room sat rapt, bestowing on the singer such attention for such trifles, the meaningless noises of a blind man's mouth.

And of he I sing whose hair was like a larl from the sun of he who came once to the walls of Ar Glorious Ar he called Tarl of Bristol.

I glanced to Telima, who stood beside my great chair. Her eyes were moist, drinking in the song.

She was only a rence girl, I reminded myself. Doubtless never before had she heard a singer. I thought of sending her to the kitchens, but did not do so. I felt her hand on my shoulder. I did not indicate that i was aware of it.

And, as the torches burned lower in the wall racks, the singer continued to sing, and sang of graey Pa-Kyr, Master of the Aa.s.sa.s.sins, leader of the hordes that fell on Ar after the theft of her Home Stone; and he sang, too, of banners and black helmets, of upraised standards, of the sun flas.h.i.+ng on the lifted blades of spears, of high siege towers and deeds, of catapults of Ka-la-na and tem-wood, of the thunder of war tharlarion and the beating of drums and the roars of trumpets, the clash of arms and the cries of men; and he sang, too, of the love of men for their city, and, foolishly, knowing so little of men, he sang, too, the bravery of men, and their loyalties and their courage; and he sang then, too, of duels; of duels fought even on the walls of Ar herself, even at the great gate; and of tarnsmen locked in duels to the death over the spires of Ar; and of yet another duel, one fought on the height of Ar's cylinder of justice, between Pa-Kur, and he, in the song, called Tarl of Bristol.

"Why does my Ubar weep?" asked Telima.

"Be silent, Slave," said I. Angrily I brushed her hand from my shoulder. She drew back her hand swiftly, as though she had not known it had lain there.

The singer had now finished his song.

"Singer," called I to him, "is there truly a man such as Tarl of Bristol?"

The singer turned his head to me, puzzled. "I do not know," he said. "Perhaps it is only a song."

I laughed.

I extended the paga goblet to Telima and, again, she filled it.

I rose to my feet, lifting the goblet, and my retainers, as well, rose to their feet, lifting their goblets.

"There is gold and steel!" I said.

"Gold and steel!" cried my retainers.

We drank.

"And song," said the blind singer.

The room was quiet.

I looked upon the singer. "Yes," I said, lifting my goblet to him, "and songs."

There was a cry of pleasure from my retainers, and again we drank.

When again I sat down I said to the serving slaves, "Feast the singer well," and then I turned to Luma, slave and accountant of my house, braceleted and chained at the end of the long table, and said to her, "Tomorrow, the singer, before he is sent on his way, is to be given a cap of gold."

"Yes Master," said the girl.

"Thank you, Captain!" cried the singer.

My retainers cried out with pleasure at my generosity, many of them striking their left shoulders with their right fists in Gorean applause.

Two slave girls helped the singer from the stool on which he had sat and conducted him to a table in a far corner of the room.

I drank more paga.

I was furious.

Tarl of Bristol lived only in songs. There was on such man. There were, in the end, only gold and steel, and perhaps the bodies of women, and perhaps songs, the meaningless noises that might sometimes be heard in the mouths of the blind.

Again I was Bosk, from the marshes, Pirate, Admiral of Port Kar.

I fingered the golden medallion with the lateen-rigged tarn s.h.i.+p, and the initials of the Council of Captains of Port Kar in its half-curve beneath it.

"Sandra!" I called. "Send for Sandra!"

There were cheers from the tables.

I looked about. It was indeed a feast of victory. I was only angered that Midice was not present with me. She had felt ill, and had begged to remain in my quarters, which leave I had given her. Tab, too, was not present.

Then there was a rustle of slave bells and Sandra, the dancing girl of Port Kar, whom I had first seen in a Paga tavern, and had purchased, primarily for my men, stood before me, her master.

I looked on her with amus.e.m.e.nt.

How desperate she was to please me.

She wanted to be first girl, but I had kept her primarily with my men.

Beautiful, dark-haired, slender, marvelously-legged Midice was, in my house, first girl, and my favored slave. As Tab was my first Captain.

But yet Sandra was of interest.

She had high cheekbones, and flas.h.i.+ng black eyes, and coal-black hair, now worn high, pinned, over her head. She stood wrapped in an opaque sheet of s.h.i.+mmering yellow silk. As she had approached me I had heard the bells which had been locked on her ankles and wrists, and hung pendant from her collar.

It would not hurt, I thought, for Midice to have a bit of competion.

And so I smiled upon Sandra.

She looked at me, eagerness and pleasure transfusing her features.

"You may dance, Slave," I told her.

It was to be the dance of the six thongs.

She slipped the silk from her and knelt before the great table and chair, between the other tables, dropping her head. She wore five pieces of metal, her collar and locked rings on her wrists and ankles. Slave bells were attached to the collar and the rings. She lifted her head, and regarded me. The musicians, to one side, began to play. Six of my men, each with a length of binding fiber, approached her. She held her arms down, and a bit to the sides. The ends of six lengths of binding fiber, like slave snares, were fastened on her, one for each wrist and ankle, and two about her waist; the men, then, each holding the free end of a length of fiber, stood about her, some six or eight feet from her, three on a side. She was thus imprisoned among them, each holding a thong that bound her.

I glanced to Thura. I recalled that she had been caught in capture loops on the rence island, ot unlike the two now about Sandra's waist. Thura was watching with eagerness.

So, too, were all.

Sandra then, luxuriously, catlike, like a woman awakening, stretched her arms.

There was laughter.

It was as though she did not know herself bound.

When she went to draw her arms back to her body there was just the briefest instant in which she could not do so, and she frowned looked annoyed, puzzled, and then was permitted to move as she wished.

I laughed.

She was superb.