WINMX Assorted Textfiles/Ebooks.tar/Text - Compilations - The Library - Volume 03 - M to S - 242 fiction ebooks PDF HTM(L) RTF TXT DOC.zip/Norman, John - Counter Earth 04 - Nomads Of Gor.txt

Text File | 2001-02-20 | 783KB | 14,343 lines

Book #4 "NOMADS OF GOR"
 by John Norman

"Run" cried the woman. "Flee for your life"
 I saw her eyes wild with fear for a moment above the
 rep-cloth veil and she had sped past me.
 She was peasant, barefoot, her garment little more than
 coarse sacking. She had been carrying a wicker basket con-
 taining vulos, domesticated pigeons raised for eggs and meat.
 Her man, carrying a mattock, was not far behind. Over his
 left shoulder hung a bulging sack filled with what must have
 been the paraphernalia of his hut.
     He circled me, widely. "Beware," he said, "I carry a Home
 Stone."
     I stood back and made no move to draw my weapon.
 Though I was of the caste of warriors and he of peasants,
 and I armed and he carrying naught but a crude tool, I
 would not dispute his passage. One does not lightly dispute
 the passage of one who carries his Home Stone.
     Seeing that I meant him no harm, he paused and lifted an
 arm, like a stick in a torn sleeve, and pointed backward.
 'They're coming," he said. "Run, you fool Run for the gates
 of Turia"
     Turia the high-walled, the nine-gated, was the Gorean city
 lying in the midst of the huge prairies claimed by the Wagon
 Peoples.
 Never had it fallen.
 Awkwardly, carrying his sack, the peasant turned and
 stumbled on, casting occasional terrified glances over his
 shoulder
     I watched him and his woman disappear over the brown
 wintry grass.
 In the distance, to one side and the other, I could see other
 human beings, running, carrying burdens, driving animals
 with sticks, fleeing.
     Even past me there thundered a lumbering herd of star-
 tled, short-bunked kailiauk, a stocky, awkward ruminant of
 the plains, tawny, wild, heavy, their haunches marked in red
 and brown bars, their wide heads bristling with a trident of
 horns; they had not stood and formed their circle, she's and
 young within the circle of tridents; they, too, had fled; farther
 to one side I saw a pair of prairie sleen, smaller than the
 forest sleen but quite as unpredictable and vicious, each
 about seven feet in length, furred, six-legged, mammalian,
 moving in their undulating gait with their viper's heads mov-
 ing from side to side, continually testing the wind; beyond
 them I saw one of the tumits, a large, flightless bird whose
 hooked beak, as long as my forearm, attested only too clearly
 to its gustatory habits; I lifted my shield and grasped the long
 spear, but it did not turn in my direction; it passed, unaware;
 beyond the bird, to my surprise, I saw even a black larl, a
 huge catlike predator more commonly found in mountainous
 regions; it was stalking away, retreating unhurried like a
 king; before what, I asked myself, would even the black tart
 flee; and I asked myself how far it had been driven; perhaps
 even from the mountains of Ta-Thassa, that loomed in this
 hemisphere, Gor's southern, at the shore of Thassa, the sea,
 said to be in the myths without a farther shore.
     The Wagon Peoples claimed the southern prairies of GOR,
 from the gleaming Thassa and the mountains of Ta-Thassa to
 the southern foothills of the Voltai Range itself, that reared
 in the crust of GOR like the backbone of a planet. On the
 north they claimed lands even to the rush-grown banks of
 the Cartius, a broad, swift flowing tributary feeding into the
 incomparable Vosk. The land between the Cartius and the
 Vosk had once been within the borders of the claimed empire
 of Ar, but not even Marlenus, Ubar of Ubars, when master
 of luxurious, glorious Ar, had flown his tarnsmen south of the
 Cartius.
     In the past months I had made my way, afoot, overland,
 across the equator, living by hunting and occasional service in
 the caravans of merchants, from the northern to the southern
 hemisphere of GOR. I had left the vicinity of the Sardar
 Range in the month of Se'Var, which in the northern hemi-
 sphere is a winter month, and had journeyed south for
 months; and had now come to what some call the Plains of
 Turia, others the Land of the Wagon Peoples, in the autumn
 of this hemisphere; there is, due apparently to the balance of
 land and water mass on GOR, no particular moderation of
 seasonal variations either in the northern or southern hemi-
 sphere; nothing much, so to speak, to choose between them;
 on the other hand, Gor's temperatures, on the whole, tend to
 be somewhat fiercer than those of Earth, perhaps largely due
 to the fact of the wind-swept expanses of her gigantic land
 masses; indeed,` though GOR is smaller than Barth, with con-
 sequent gravitational reduction, her actual land areas may
 be, for all I know, more extensive than those of my native
 planet; the areas of GOR which are mapped are large, but
 only a small fraction of the surface of the planet; much of
 GOR remains to her inhabitants simply terra incognita.*
 ______________________________________________________________
  *For purposes of convenience I am recounting directions in English
  terms, thinking it would be considerably difficult for the reader to
  follow references to the Gorean compass. Briefly, for those it might
  interest, all directions on the planet are calculated from the Sardar
  Mountains, which for the purposes of calculating direction play a
  role analogous to our north pole; the two main directions, so to speak,
  in the Gorean way of thinking are Ta-Sardar-Var and Ta-Sardar-Ki-
  Var, or as one would normally say, Var and Ki-Var; 'Var' means a
  turning and 'Ki' signifies negation; thus, rather literally, one might
  speak of 'turning to the Sardar' and 'not turning to the Sardar', some-
  thing like either facing north or not facing north; on the other hand,
  more helpfully, the Gorean compass is divided into eight, as opposed
  to our four, main quadrants, or better said, divisions, and each of
  these itself is of course subdivided. There is also a system of latitude
  and longitude figured on the basis of the Gorean day, calculated in
  Ahn, twenty of which constitute a Gorean day, and Ehn and Ihn,
  which are subdivisions of the Ahn, or Gorean hour. Ta-Sardar-Var
  is a direction which appears on all Gorean maps; Ta-Sardar-Ki-Var,
  of course, never appears on a map, since it would be any direction
  which is not Ta-Sardar-Var. Accordingly, the main divisions of the
  map are Ta-Sardar-Var, and the other seven; taking the Sardar as
  our "north pole" the other directions, clockwise as Earth clocks move
  (Gorean clock hands move in the opposite direction) would be, first,
  Ta-Sardar-Var, then, in order, Ror, Rim, Tun, Vask (sometimes spoken
  of as Verus Var. or the true turning away), Cart, Klim, and Kail,
  and then again, of course, Ta-Sardar-Var. The Cartius River inciden-
  tally, mentioned earlier, was named for the direction it lies from the
  city of Ar. From the Sardar I had gone largely Cart, sometimes Vask,
  then Cart again until I had come to the Plains of Turia, or the Land
  of the Wagon Peoples. I crossed the Cartius on a barge, one of
  several hired by the merchant of the caravan with which I ww then
  seeing. These barges, constructed of layered timbers of Ka-la-na wood,
  are towed by teams of river tharlarion, domesticated, vast,herbivo-
  rous, web-footed lizards raised and driven by the Cartius bargemen,
  fathers and sons, interrelated clans, claiming the status of a cast
  for themselves. Even with the harnessed might of several huge thar-
  larion drawing toward the opposite shore the crossing took us several
  pasangs downriver. The caravan, of course, was bound for Turia. No
  caravans, to my knowledge, make their way to the Wagon Peoples,
  who are largely isolated and have their own way of life. I left the
  caravan before it reached Turia My business was with the Wagon
  Peoples, not the Turians, said to be indolent and luxury-loving; but
  I wonder at this charge, for Turia has stood for generations on the
  plains claimed by the fierce Wagon Peoples.
  For some minutes I stood silently observing the animals
  and the men who pressed toward Turia, invisible over the
  brown horizon. I found it hard to understand their terror.
  Even the autumn grass itself bent and shook in brown tides
  toward Turia, shimmering in the sun like a tawny surf
  beneath the fleeing clouds above; it was as though the unseen
  wind itself, frantic volumes and motions of simple air, too
  desired its sanctuary behind the high walls of the far city.
  Overhead a wild Gorean kite, shrilling, beat its lonely way
  from this place, seemingly no different from a thousand other
  places on these broad grasslands of the south.
  I looked into the distance, from which these fleeing multi-
  tudes, frightened men and stampeding animals, had come.
  There, some pasangs distant, I saw columns of smoke rising
  in the cold air, where fields were burning. Yet the prairie
  itself was not afire, only the fields of peasants, the fields of
  men who had cultivated the soil; the prairie grass, such that
  it might graze the ponderous bask, had been spared.
      Too in the distance I saw dust, rising like black, raging
  dawn, raised by the hoofs of innumerable animals, not those
  that fled, but undoubtedly by the bask herds of the Wagon
  Peoples.
      The Wagon Peoples grow no food, nor do they have
 manufacturing as we know it. They are herders and it is said,
 killers. They eat nothing that has touched the dirt. They live
 on the meat and milk of the bosk. They are among the
 proudest of the peoples of Gor, regarding the dwellers of the
 cities of Gor as vermin in holes, cowards who must fly behind
 walls, wretches who fear to live beneath the broad sky, who
 dare not dispute with them the open, windswept plains of
 their world.
 The bosk, without which the Wagon Peoples could not
 live, is an oxlike creature. It is a huge, shambling animal,
 with a thick, humped neck and long, shaggy hair. It has a
 wide head and tiny red eyes, a temper to match that of a
 sleen, and two long, wicked horns that reach out from its
 head and suddenly curve forward to terminate in fearful
 points. Some of these horns, on the larger animals, measured
 from tip to tip, exceed the length of two spears.
     Not only does the flesh of the bask and the milk of its
 cows furnish the Wagon Peoples with food and drink, but
 its hides cover the domelike wagons in which they dwell; its
 tanned and sewn skins cover their bodies; the leather of its
 hump is used for their shields; its sinews forms their thread;
 its bones and horns are split and tooled into implements of a
 hundred sorts, from awls, punches and spoons to drinking
 flagons and weapon tips; its hoofs are used for glues; its oils
 are used to grease their bodies against the cold. Even the
 dung of the bask finds its uses on the treeless prairies, being
 dried and used for fuel. The bask is said to be the Mother of
 the Wagon Peoples, and they reverence it as such. The man
 who kills one foolishly is strangled in thongs or suffocated in
 the hide of the animal he slew; if, for any reason, the man
 should kill a bask cow with unborn young he is staked out,
 alive, in the path of the herd, and the march of the Wagon
 Peoples takes its way over him.
     Now there seemed to be fewer men and animals rushing
 past, scattered over the prairie; only the wind remained; and
 the fires in the distance, and the swelling, nearing roll of dust
 that drifted into the stained sky. Then I began to feel,
 through the soles of my sandals, the trembling of the earth.
 The hair on the back of my neck seemed to leap up and I
 felt the hair on my forearms stiffen. The earth itself was
 shaking from the hoofs of the bask herds of the Wagon
 Peoples.
 They were approaching.
 Their outriders would soon be in sight.
     I hung my helmet over my left shoulder with the sheathed
 short sword; on my left arm I bore my shield; in my right
 hand I carried the Gorean war spear.
    I began to walk toward the dust in the distance, across the
 trembling ground.

 #2
I Make the Acquaintance of the Wagon People

    As I walked I asked myself why I did so-why I, Tarl
 Cabot-once of Earth, later a warrior of the Gorean city of
 Ko-ro-ba, the Towers of the Morning, had come here.
 In the long years that had passed since first I had come to
 the Counter-liarth I had seen many things, and had know
 loves, and had found adventures and perils and wonders, but
 I asked myself if anything I had done was as unreasoning, as
 foolish as this, as strange.
     Some years before, perhaps between two and five years
 before, as the culmination of an intrigue enduring centuries,
 two men, humans from the walled cities of Gor, had, for the
 sake of Priest-Kings, undertaken a long, secret journey, car-
 rying an object to the Wagon Peoples, an object bestowed
 on them by Priest-Kings, to be given to that people that was,
 to the Goreans' knowledge, the most free, among the fiercest,
 among the most isolated on the planet-an object that would
 be given to them for safekeeping.
     The two men who had carried this object, keeping well its
 secret as demanded by Priest-Kings, had braved many perils
 and had been as brothers. But later, shortly after the com-
 pletion of their journey, in a war between their cities, each
 had in battle slain the other, and thus among men, save
 perhaps for some among the Wagon Peoples, the secret had
 been lost. It was only in the Sardar Mountains that I had
 learned the nature of their mission, and what it was that they
 had carried. Now I supposed that I alone, of humans on
 Gor, with the possible exception of some among the Wagon
 Peoples, knew the nature of the mysterious object which once
 these two brave men had brought in secrecy to the plains of
 Turia and, to be truthful, I did not know that even I
 should I see it-would know it for what I sought.
 Could I, Tarl Cabot, a human and mortal, find this object
 and, as Priest-Kings now wished, return it to the Sardar─
 return it to the hidden courts of Priest-Kings that it might
 there fulfill its unique and irreplaceable role in the destiny of
 this barbaric world, Gor, our Counter-Earth?
 I did not know.
 What is this object?
     One might speak of it as many things, the subject of
 secret, violent intrigues; the source of vast strifes beneath the
 Sardar, strifes unknown to the men of Gor; the concealed,
 precious, hidden hope of an incredible and ancient race; a
 simple germ; a bit of living tissue; the dormant potentiality of
 a people's rebirth, the seed of gods─an egg─the last and
 only egg of Priest-Kings.
 But why was it I who came?
 Why not Priest-Kings in their ships and power, with their
 fierce weapons and fantastic devices?
 Priest-Kings cannot stand the sun.
     They are not as men and men, seeing them, would fear
 them.  Men would not believe they were Priest-Kings. Men con-
 ceive Priest-Kings as they conceive themselves.
 The object the egg might be destroyed before it could
 be delivered to them.
 It might already have been destroyed.
      Only that the egg was the egg of Priest-Kings gave me
 occasion to suspect, to hope, that somehow within that mys-
 terious, presumably ovoid sphere, if it still entwisted, quiescent
 but latent, there might be life.
      And if I should find the object, why should I not myself
 destroy it, and destroy thereby the race of Priest-Kings,
 giving this world to my own kind, to men, to do with as they
 pleased, unrestricted by the laws and decrees of Priest-Kings
 that so limited their development, their technology? Once I
 had spoken to a Priest-King of these things. He had said to
 me, "Man is a larl to man; if we permitted him, he would be
 so to Priest-Kings as well."
 "But man must be free," I had said.
 "Freedom without reason is suicide," had said the Priest
  King, adding, "Man is not yet rational."
       But I would not destroy the egg, not only because it
  contained life, but because it was important to my friend,
  whose name was Misk and is elsewhere spoken of; much of
  the life of that brave creature was devoted to the dream of
  a new life for Priest-Kings, a new stock, a new beginning; a
  readiness to relinquish his place in an old world to prepare a
  mansion for the new; to have and love a child, so to speak,
  for Misk, who is a Priest-King, neither male nor female, yet
  can love.
       I recalled a windy night in the shadow of the Sardar when
  we had spoken of strange things, and I had left him and
  come down the hill, and had asked the leader of those with
  whom I had traveled the way to the Land of the Wagon
  Peoples.
  I had found it.
  The dust rolled nearer, the ground seemed more to move
  than ever.
  I pressed on.
      Perhaps if I were successful I might save my race, by
  preserving the Priest-Kings that might shelter them from the
  annihilation that might otherwise be achieved if uncontrolled
  technological development were too soon permitted them;
  perhaps in time man would grow rational, and reason and
  love and tolerance would wax in him and he and Priest-Kings
  might together turn their senses to the stars.
  But I knew that more than anything I was doing this for
  Misk, who was my friend.
       The consequences of my act, if I were successful, were too
  complex and fearful to calculate, the factors involved being
  so numerous and obscure.
       If it turned out badly, what I did, I would have no defense
  other than that I did what I did for my friend for him
  and for his brave kind, once hated enemies, whom I had
  learned to know and respect.
        There is no loss of honor in failing to achieve such a task,
  I told myself. It is worthy of a warrior of the caste of
  Warriors, a swordsman of the high city of Ko-ro-ba, the
  Towers of the Morning.
  Tal, I might say, in greeting, I am Tart Cabot of Ko-ro-
  ba; I bring no credentials, no proofs; I come from the
  Priest-Kings; I would like to have the object which was
  brought to you from them; they would now like it back;
  Thank you; farewell.
  I laughed.
  I would say little or nothing.
  The object might not even be with the Wagon Peoples any
  longer.
        And there were four Wagon Peoples, the Paravaci, the
  Kataii, the Kassars, and the dreaded Tuchuks.
       Who knew with which people the object might have been
  placed?
  Perhaps it had been hidden away and forgotten?
  Perhaps it was now a sacred object, little understood, but
  revered and it would be sacrilege to think of it, blasphemy
  to speak its Barge, a cruel and slow death even to cast one's
  eyes upon it.
       And if I should manage to seize it, how could I carry it
 away?  I had no tarn, one of Gor's fierce saddlebirds; I had not
 even the monstrous high tharlarion, used as the mounts of
 shock cavalry by the warriors of some cities.
 I was afoot, on the treeless southern plains of Gor, on the
 Plains of Turia, in the Land of the Wagon Peoples.
 The Wagon Peoples, it is said, slay strangers.
       The words for stranger and enemy in Gorean are the
 same.
 I would advance openly.
       If I were found on the plains near the camps or the bosk
 herds I knew I would be scented out and slain by the do-
 mesticated, nocturnal herd sleen, used as shepherds and
 sentinels by the Wagon Peoples, released from their cages
 with the falling of darkness.
       These animals, trained prairie sleen, move rapidly and
 silently, attacking upon no other provocation than trespass on
 what they have decided is their territory. They respond only
 to the voice of their master, and when he is killed pr dies, his
 animals are slain and eaten.
       There would be no question of night spying on the Wagon
 Peoples.
 I knew they spoke a dialect of Gorean, and I hoped I
 would be able to understand them.
       If I could not I must die as befitted a swordsman of
 Ko-ro-ba.
       I hoped that I would be granted death in battle, if death it
 must be. The Wagon Peoples, of all those on Gor that I
 know, are the only ones that have a clan of torturers, trained
 as carefully as scribes or physicians, in the arts of detaining
 life.
       Some of these men have achieved fortune and fame in
 various Gorean cities, for their services to Initiates and
 Ubars, and others with an interest in the arts of detection
 and persuasion. For some reason they have all worn hoods. It
 is said they remove the hood only when the sentence is
 death, so that it is only condemned men who have seen
 whatever it is that lies beneath the hood.
       I was surprised at the distance I had been from the herds,
 for though I had seen the rolling dust clearly, and had felt
 and did feel the shaking of the earth, betraying the passage
 of those monstrous herds, I had not yet come to them.
 But now I could hear, carried on the wind blowing toward
 distant Turia, the bellowing of the basks. The dust was now
 heavy like nightfall in the air. The grass and the earth
 seemed to quake beneath my tread.
       I passed fields that were burning, and burning huts of
 peasants, the smoking shells of Sa-Tarna granaries, the shat-
 tered, slatted coops for vulos, the broken walls of keeps for
 the small, long-haired domestic verr, less belligerent and
 sizeable than the wild verr of the Voltai Ranges.
       Then for the first time, against the horizon, a jagged line,
 humped and rolling like thundering waters, seemed to rise
 alive from the prairie, vast, extensive, a huge arc, churning
 and pounding from one corner of the sky to the other, the
 herds of the Wagon Peoples, encircling, raising dust into the
 sky like fire, like hoofed glaciers of fur and horn moving in
 shaggy floods across the grass, toward me.
     And then I saw the first of the outriders, moving toward
 me, swiftly yet not seeming to hurry. I saw the slender line of
 his light lance against the sky, strapped across his back.
       I could see he carried a small, round, leather shield, glossy,
 black, lacquered; he wore a conical, fur-rimmed iron helmet,
 a net of colored chains depending from the helmet protecting
 his face, leaving only holes for the eyes. He wore a quilted
 jacket and under this a leather jerkin; the jacket was trimmed
 with fur and had a fur collar; his boots were made of hide
 and also trimmed with fur; he had a wide, five-buckled belt. I
 could not see his face because of the net of chain that hung
 before it. I also noted, about his throat, now lowered, there
 was a soft leather wind scarf which might, when the helmet
 veil was lifted be drawn over the mouth and nose, against
 the wind and dust of his ride.
       He was very erect in the saddle. His lance remained on his
 back, but he carried in his right hand the small, powerful
 horn bow of the Wagon Peoples and attached to his saddle
 was a lacquered, narrow, rectangular quiver containing as
 many as forty arrows. On the saddle there also hung, on one
 side, a coiled rope of braided boskbide and, on the other, a
 long, three-weighted bole of the sort used in hunting tumits
 and men; in the saddle itself on the right side, indicating the
 rider must be right-handed, were the seven sheaths for the
 almost legendary quivas, the balanced saddleknives of the
 prairie. It was said a youth of the Wagon Peoples was taught
 the bow, the quiva and the lance before their parents would
 consent to give him a name, for names are precious among
 the Wagon Peoples, as among Goreans in general, and they
 are not to be wasted on someone who is likely to die, one
 who cannot well handle the weapons of the hunt and war.
      Until the youth has mastered the bow, the quiva and the
 lance he is simply known as the first, or the second, and so
 on, son of such and such a father.
      The Wagon Peoples war among themselves, but once in
 every two hands of years, there is a time of gathering of the
 peoples, and this, I had learned, was that time. In the thinking
 of the Wagon Peoples it is called the Omen Year, though the
 Omen Year is actually a season, rather than a year, which
 occupies a part of two of their regular years, for the Wagon
 Peoples calculate the year from the Season of Snows to the
 Season of Snows; Turians, incidentally, figure the year from
 summer solstice to summer solstice; Goreans generally, on
 the other hand, figure the year from vernal equinox to vernal
 equinox, their new year beginning, like nature's, with the
 spring; the Omen Year, or season, lasts several months, and
 consists of three phases, called the Passing of Turia, which
 takes place in the fad; the Wintering, which takes place
 north of Turia and commonly south of the Cartius, the
 equator of course lying to the north in this hemisphere; and
 the Return to Curia, in the spring, or, as the Wagon Peoples
 say, in the Season of Little Grass. It is near Turia, in the
 spring, that the Omen Year is completed, when the omens
 are taken usually over several days by hundreds of harus-
 pexes, mostly readers of bask blood and verr livers, to
 determine if they are favorable for a choosing of a Ubar
 San, a One Ubar, a Ubar who would be High Ubar, a Ubar
 of an the Wagons, a Ubar of all the Peoples, one who could
 lead them as one people.*
     The omens, I understood, had not been favorable in more
 than a hundred years. I suspected that this might be due to
 the hostilities and bickerings of the peoples among them-
 selves; where people did not wish to unite, where they rel-
 ished their autonomy, where they nursed old grievances and
 sang the glories of vengeance raids, where they considered all
 others, even those of the other Peoples, as beneath them-
 selves, there would not be likely to exist the conditions for
 serious confederation, a joining together of the wagons, as
 *A consequence of the chronological conventions of the Wagon
  Peoples, of course, is that their years tend to vary in length, but this
  fact, which might bother us, does not bother them, any more than
  the fact that some men and some animals live longer than others;
  the women of the Wagon Peoples, incidentally, keep a calendar based
  on the phases of Gor's largest moon, but this is a calendar of fifteen
  moons, named for the fifteen varieties of bask, and functions inde-
  pendently of the tallying of years by snows; for example, the Moon
  of the Brown Bosk may at one time occur in the winter, at another
  time, years later, in the summer; this calendar is kept by a set of
  colored pegs set in the sides of some wagons, on one of which,
  depending on the moon, a round, wooden plate bearing the image of
  a bosk is fixed. The years, incidentally, are not numbered by the
  Wagon Peoples, but given names, toward their end, based on some-
  thing or other which has occurred to distinguish the year. The year
  names are kept in living memory by the Year Keepers, some of whom
  can recall the names of several thousand consecutive years. The Wagon
  Peoples do not trust important matters, such as year names, to paper
  or parchment, subject to theft, insect and rodent damage, deterioration,
  etc. Most of those of the Wagon Peoples have excellent memories,
  trained from birth. Few can read, though some can, perhaps having
  acquired the skill far from the wagons, perhaps from merchants or
  tradesmen. The Wagon Peoples, as might be expected, have a large
  and complex oral literature. This is kept by and occasionally, in
  parts, recited by the Camp Singers. They do not have castes, as
  Goreans tend to think of them. For example, every male of the Wagon
  Peoples is expected to be a warrior, to be able to ride, to be able
  to hunt, to care for the bask, and so on. When I speak of Year
  Keepers and Singers it 'muss be understood that these are not, for
  the Wagon Peoples, castes, but more like roles, subsidiary to their
  main functions, which are those of the war, herding and the hunt.
       They do have, however, certain clans, not castes, which specialize in
  certain matters, for example, the clan of healers, leather workers, salt
  hunters, and so on. I have already mentioned the clan of torturers.
       The members of these clans, however, like the Year Keepers and
  Singers, are all expected, first and foremost, to be, as it is said, of the
  wagons namely to follow, tend and protect the bask, to be superb
  in the saddle, and to be skilled with the weapons of both the hunt
  and war.
        The saying is; under such conditions it was not surprising that
   the 'omens tended to be unfavorable"; indeed, what more
   inauspicious omens could there be? The haruspexes, the read-
   ers of bosk blood and verr livers, surely would not be
   unaware of these, let us say, larger, graver omens. It would
   not, of course, be to the benefit of Turia, or the farther cities,
   or indeed, any of the free cities of even northern Gor, if the
   isolated fierce peoples of the south were to join behind a
   single standard and turn their herds northward, away from
   their dry plains to the lusher reaches of the valleys of the
   eastern Cartius, Perhaps even beyond them to those of the
   Vosk. Little would be safe if the Wagon Peoples should
   march.
        A thousand years ago it was said they had carried devasta-
   tion as far as the walls of Ar and Ko-ro-ba.
   The rider had clearly seen me and was moving his mount
   steadily toward me.
       I could now see as well, though separated by hundreds of
   yards, three other riders approaching. One was circling to
   approach from the rear.
       The mount of the Wagon Peoples, unknown in the
   northern hemisphere of Gor, is the terrifying but beautiful
   kaiila. It is a silken, carnivorous, lofty creature, graceful,
   long-necked, smooth-gaited. It is viviparous and undoubtedly
   mammalian, though there is no suckling of the young. The
   young are born vicious and by instinct, as soon as they can
   struggle to their feet, they hunt. It is an instinct of the
   other, sensing the birth, to deliver the young animal in the
   vicinity of game. I supposed, with the domesticated kaiila, a
   bound verr or a prisoner might be cast to the newborn
   animal. The kaiila, once it eats its fill, does not touch food
   for several days.
        The kaiila is extremely agile, and can easily outmaneuver
   he slower, more ponderous high tharlarion. It requires less
   food, of course, than the tarn. A kaiila, which normally
   stands about twenty to twenty-two hands at the shoulder, can
   over as much as six hundred pasangs in a single day's
   riding.*
        The head of the kaiila bears two large eyes, one on each
   side, but these eyes are triply lidded, probably an adaptation
   to the environment which occasionally is wracked by severe
   storms of wind and dust; the adaptation, actually a transpar-
   ent third lid, permits the animal to move as it wishes under
   conditions that force other prairie animals to back into the
   wind or, like the sleen, to burrow into the ground. The kaiila
   is most dangerous under such conditions, and, as if it knew
   this, often uses such times for its hunt.
   Now the rider had reined in the kaiila.
   He held his ground, waiting for the others.
   I could hear the soft thud of a kaiila's paws in the grass, to
   my right.
         The second rider had halted there. He was dressed much
   as the first man, except that no chain depended from his
   helmet, but his wind scarf was wrapped about his face. His
   shield was lacquered yellow, and his bow was yellow. Over
   his shoulder he, too, carried one of the slender lances. He
   was a black. Kataii, I said to myself.
          The third rider placed himself, reining in suddenly, pulling
   the mount to its hind legs, and it reared snarling against the
   bit, and then stood still, its neck straining toward me. I could
   see the long, triangular tongue in the animal's head, behind
   the four rows of fangs. The rider, too, wore a wind scarf. His
   shield was red. The Blood People, the Kassars.
   I turned and was not surprised to see the fourth rider,
   motionless on his animal, already in position. The kaiila
   moves with great rapidity. The fourth rider was dressed in a
   hood and cape of white fur. He wore a flopping cap of
   white fur, which did not conceal the conical outlines of the
   steel beneath it. The leather of his jerkin was black. The
   buckles on his belt of gold. His lance had a rider hook under
   the point, with which he might dismount opponents.
          The kaiila of these men were as tawny as the brown grass
    of the prairie, save for that of the man who faced me, whose
    mount was a silken, sable black, as black as the lacquer of
    the shield.
          About the neck of the fourth rider there was a broad belt
    of jewels, as wide as my hand. I gathered that this was
    ostentation. Actually I was later to learn that the jeweled belt
    is worn to incite envy and accrue enemies; its purpose is to
    encourage attack, that the owner may try the skill of his
    weapons, that he need not tire himself seeking for foes. I
    knew, though, from the belt, though I first misread its
    purpose, that the owner was of the Paravaci, the Rich People                 -
    "Tal!" I called, lifting my hand, palm inward, in Gorean
    greeting.
         As one man the four riders unstrapped their lances.
    "I am Tart Cabot," I called. "I come in peace"
    I saw the kaiila tense, almost like larls, their flanks
    quivering, their large eyes intent upon me. I saw one of the
    long, triangular tongues dart out and back. Their long ears
    were laid back against the fierce, silken heads.
    "Do you speak Gorean?" I called.
    As one, the lances were lowered. The lances of the Wagon
    Peoples are not pouched. They are carried in the right fist,
    easily, and are flexible and light, used for thrusting, not the
    battering-ram effect of the heavy lances of Europe's High
    Middle Ages. Needless to say, they can be almost as swift
    and delicate in their address as a saber. The lances are black,
    cut from the poles of young tem trees. They may be bent
    almost double, like finely tempered steel, before they break.
    A loose loop of boskhide, wound twice about the right fist,
    helps to retain the weapon in hand-to-hand combat. It is
    seldom thrown.
    "I come in peace!" I shouted to them.
    The man behind me called out, speaking Gorean with a
    harsh accent. "I am Tolnus of the Paravaci." Then he shook
    away his hood, letting his long hair stream behind him over
     the white fur of the collar. I stood stock still, seeing the face.
    From my left came a cry. "I am Conrad, he of the
    Kassars." He threw the chain mask from his face, back over
    the helmet and laughed. Were they of Earth stock, I asked
    myself. Were they men?
          From my right there came a great laugh. "I am Hakimba
     of the Kataii," he roared. He pulled aside the wind scarf with
     one hand, and his face, though black, bore the same marks as
     the others.
          Now the rider in front of me lifted the colored chains
     from his helmet, that I might see his face. It was a white
     face, but heavy, greased; the epicanthic fold of his eyes
     bespoke a mixed origin.
          I was looking on the faces of four men, warriors of the Wagon Peoples.
      On the face of each there were, almost like corded chev-
      roes, brightly colored scars. The vivid coloring and intensity
      of these scars, their prominence, reminded me of the hideous
      markings on the faces of mandrills; but these disfigurements,
      as I soon recognized, were cultural not genetic. They
      bespoke not the natural innocence of the work of genes but
      the glories and status, the arrogance and prides, of their
      bearers. The scars had been worked into the faces, with
      needles and knives and pigments and the dung of basks over
      a period of days and nights. Men had died in the fixing of
      such scars. Most of the scars were set in pairs, moving
      diagonally down from the side of the head toward the nose
      and chin. The man facing me had seven such scars ceremo-
      nially worked into the tissue of his countenance, the highest
      being red, the next yellow, the next blue, the fourth black,
      then two yellow, then black again. The faces of the men I
      saw were all scarred differently, but each was scarred. The
      effect of the scars, ugly, startling, terrible, perhaps in part
      calculated to terrify enemies, had even prompted me, for a
      wild moment, to conjecture that what I faced on the Plains
      of Turia were not men, but perhaps aliens of some sort,
      brought to Gor long ago from remote worlds to serve some
      now discharged or forgotten purpose of Priest-Kings; but
      now I knew better; now I could see them as men; and now,
      more significantly, I recalled what I had heard whispered of
      once before, in a tavern in Ar, the terrible Scar Codes of the
      Wagon Peoples, for each of the hideous marks on the face of
      these men had a meaning, a significance that could be read
      by the Paravaci, the Kassars, the Kataii, the Tuchuks as
      clearly as you or I might read a sign in a window or a
      sentence in a book. At that time I could read only the top
      scar, the red, bright, fierce cordlike scar that was the Cour-
      age Scar. It is always the highest scar on the face. Indeed,
      without that scar, no other scar can be granted. The Wagon
      Peoples value courage above all else. Each of the men facing
      me wore that scar.
          Now the man facing me lifted his small, lacquered shield
      and his slender, black lance.
      "Hear my name," cried he, "I am Kamchak of the
      Tuchuks!"
          As suddenly as he had finished, as soon as the men had
      named themselves, as if a signal had been given, the four
      kaiila bounded forward, squealing with rage, each rider bent
      low on his mount, lance gripped in his right hand, straining to
      be the first to reach me.

                    3
           The Spear Gambling

          One, the Tuchuk, I might have slain with a cast of the
      heavy Gorean war spear; the others would have had free
      play with their lances. I might have thrown myself to the
      ground as the tart hunters from- Ar, once their weapon is
      cast, covering myself with the shield; but then I would have
      been beneath the clawed paws of four squealing, snorting
      kaiila, while the riders jabbed at me with lances, off my feet,
      helpless.
          So gambling all on the respect of the Wagon Peoples for
      the courage of men, I made no move to defend myself but,
      heart pounding, blood racing, yet no sign visible of agitation
      on my face, without a quiver of a muscle or tendon betraying
      me, I stood calmly erect.
      On my face there was only disdain.
          At the last instant, the lances of four riders but a hand's
      breadth from my body, the enraged, thundering kaiila, hissing
      and squealing, at a touch of the control straps, arrested their
      fierce charge, stopping themselves, tearing into the deep turf
      with suddenly emergent claws. Not a rider was thrown or
      seemed for an instant off balance. The children of the Wagon
      Peoples are taught the saddle of the kaiila before they can
      walk.
      "Aieee" cried the warrior of the Kataiil
          He and the others turned their mounts and backed away a
      handful of yards, regarding me.
      I had not moved.
     "My name is Tarl Cabot," I said. "I come in peace.
      The four riders exchanged glances and then, at a sign from
      the heavy Tuchuk, rode a bit away from me.
      I could not make out what they were saying, but an
      argument of some sort was in progress.
      I leaned on my spear and yawned, looking away toward
      the bosk herds.
      My blood was racing. I knew that had I moved, or shown
      fear, or attempted to flee, I would now be dead. I could have
      fought. I might perhaps then have been victorious but the
      probabilities were extremely slim. Even had I slain two of
      them the others might have withdrawn and with their arrows
      or boles brought me to the ground. More importantly, I did
      not wish to introduce myself to these people as an enemy. I
      wished, as I had said, to come in peace.
      At last the Tuchuk detached himself from the other three
      warriors and pranced his kaiila to within a dozen yards of
      me.
      "You are a stranger," he said.
      "I come in peace to the Wagon Peoples," I said.
      "You wear no insignia on your shield," he said. "You are
      outlaw."
      I did not respond. I was entitled to wear the marks of the
      city of Ko-ro-ba, the Towers of the Morning, but I had not
      done so. Once, long, long ago, Ko-ro-ba and Ar had turned
      the invasion of the united Wagon Peoples from the north,
      and the memories of these things, stinging still in the honest
      songs of camp skalds, would rankle in the craws of such
      fierce, proud peoples. I did not wish to present myself to
      them as an enemy.
     "What was your city?" he demanded.
     But to such a question, as a warrior of Ko-ro-ba, 1 could
     not but respond.
     "I am of Ko-ro-ba," I said. "You have heard of her."
     The Tuchuk's face tightened. Then he grinned. "I have
     heard sing of Ko-ro-ba," he said.
     I did not reply to him.
     He turned to his fellows. "A Koroban!" he cried.
     The men moved on their mounts, restlessly, eagerly said
     something to one another.
     "We turned you back," I said.
     "What is your business with the Wagon Peoples?" demand-
     ed the Tuchuk.
     Here I paused. What could I tell him? Surely here, in this
     matter, I must bide my time.
    "You see there is no insignia on my shield or tunic," I said.
     He nodded. "You are a fool," he said, "to flee to the
    Wagon Peoples."
    I had now led him to believe that I was indeed an outlaw,
    a fugitive.
    He threw back his head and laughed. He slapped his thigh.
   "A Koroban! And he flies to the Wagon Peop1es!" Tears of
    mirth ran from the sides of his eyes. "You are a fool" he
    said.
    "Let us fight," I suggested.
        Angrily the Tuchuk pulled back on the reins of the kaiila,
    causing it to rear, snarling, pawing at the sky. "And willingly
    would I do so, Koroban sleep," he spit out. "Pray thou to
    Priest-Kings that the lance does not fall to me!"
    I did not understand this.
    He turned his kaiila and in a bound or two swung it about
    in the midst of his fellows.
    Then the Kassar approached me.
    "Koroban," said he, "did you not fear our lances?"
    "I did," I said.
    "But you did not show your fear," said he.
     I shrugged.
    "Yet," said he, "you tell me you feared." There was
    wonder on his face.
    I looked away.
    "That," said the rider, "speaks to me of courage."
        We studied each other for a moment, sizing one another
    up. Then he said, "Though you are a dweller of cities, a
    vermin of the walls, I think you are not unworthy, and thus
    I pray the lance will fall to me."
    He turned his mount back to his fellows.
        They conferred again for a moment and then the warrior
    of the Katau approached, a lithe, strong proud man, one in
    whose eyes I could read that he had never lost his saddle, nor
    turned from a foe.
        His hand was light on the yellow bow, strung taut. But no
    arrow was set to the string.
    "Where are your men?" he asked.
    "I am alone," I said.
     The warrior stood in the stirrups, shading his eyes.
     "Why have you come to spy?" he asked.
     "I am not a spy," I said.
     "You are hired by the Turians," he said.
     "No," I responded.
     "You are a stranger," he said.
     "I come in peace," I said.
     "Have you heard," he asked, "that the Wagon Peoples slay
     strangers?"
     "Yes," I said, "I have heard that."
     "It is true," he said, and turned his mount back to his
     fellows.
         Last to approach me was the warrior of the Paravaci, with
    his hood and cape of white fur, and the glistening broad
    necklace of precious stones encircling his throat.
    He pointed to the necklace. "It is beautiful, is it not?" he
    asked.
    "Yes," I said.
        "It will buy ten bosks," said he, "twenty wagons covered
    with golden cloth, a hundred she-slaves from Turia."
    I looked away.
    "Do you not covet the stones," he prodded, "these riches?"
    "No," I said.
    Anger crossed his face. "You may have them," he said.
    "What must I do?" I asked.
    "Slay me!" he laughed.
     I looked at him steadily. "They are probably false stones,"
     I said, "amber droplets, the pearls of the Vosk sorp, the
     polished shell of the Tamber clam, glass colored and cut in
     Ar for trade with ignorant southern peoples."
     The face of the Paravaci, rich with its terrible furrowed
     scars, contorted with rage.
         He tore the necklace from his throat and flung it to my
     feet.
     "Regard the worth of those stones!" he cried.  I fished the necklace from
     the dust with the point of my sword, it in the sun. It hung like a belt of light, sparkling with a spectrum of riches hundred merchants.
    "Excellent," I admitted, handing it back to him on the tip
    of the spear.
    Angrily he wound it about the pommel of the saddle.
    "But I am of the Caste of Warriors," I said, "of a high city
    and we do not stain our spears for the stones of men not,
    even such stones as these."
    The Paravaci was speechless.
    "You dare to tempt me," I said, feigning anger, "as if I
    beyond the dreams of a man, were of the Caste of Assassins or a common                thief with his dagger in the night." I frowned at him. "Beware," I   warned,
   "lest I take your words as insult."
   The Paravaci, in his cape and hood of white fur, with the
   priceless necklace wrapped about the pommel of his saddle,
   sat stiff, not moving, utterly enraged. Then, furiously, the
   scars wild in his face, he sprang up in the stirrups and lifted
   both hands to the sky. "Spirit of the Sky," he cried, "let the
   lance fall to motto mel" Then abruptly, furious, he wheeled
   the kaiila and joined the others, whence he turned to regard
   me.
       As I watched, the Tuchuk took his long, slender lance and
   thrust it into the ground, point upward. Then, slowly, the
   four riders began to walk their mounts about the lance,
   watching it, right hands free to seize it should it begin to fall.
   The wind seemed to rise.
        In their way I knew they were honoring me, that they had
   respected my stand in the matter of the charging lances, that
   now they were gambling to see who would fight me, to whose
   weapons my blood must flow, beneath the paws of whose
   kaiila I must fall bloodied to the earth.
   I watched the lance tremble in the shaking earth, and saw
   the intentness of the riders as they watched its Lightest
   movement. It would soon fall.
       I could now see the herds quite clearly, making out indi-
   vidual animals, the shaggy humps moving through the dust,
   see the sun of the late afternoon glinting off thousands of
   horns. Here and there I saw riders, darting about, all
   mounted on the swift, graceful kaiila. The sun reflected from
   the horns in the veil of dust that hung over the herds was
   quite beautiful.
   The lance had not yet fallen.
       Soon the animals would be turned in on themselves, to mill
   together in knots, until they were stopped by the shaggy walls
   of their own kind, to stand and grew until the morning. The
   wagons would, of course, follow the herds. The herd forms
   both vanguard and rampart for the advance of the wagons.
       The wagons are said to be countless, the animals without
   number. Both of these claims are, of course, mistaken, and
   I the Ubars of the Wagon Peoples know well each wagon and
   the number of branded beasts in the various herds; each herd
   is, incidentally, composed of several smaller herds, each
|  watched over by its own riders. The bellowing seemed now to
   come from the sky itself, like thunder, or from-the horizon,
   like the breaking of an ocean into surf on the rocks of the
   shore. It was like a sea or a vast natural phenomenon slowly
   approaching. Such indeed, I suppose, it was. Now, also, for
   the first time, I could clearly smell the herd, a rich, vast,
   fresh, musky, pervasive odor, compounded of trampled grass
   and torn earth, of the dung, urine and sweat of perhaps more
   than a minion beasts. The magnificent vitality of that smell,
   so offensive to some, astonished and thrilled me; it spoke to
   me of the insurgence and the swell of life itself, ebullient,
   raw, overflowing, unconquerable, primitive, shuffling, smell-
   ing, basic, animal, stamping, snorting, moving, an avalanche
   of tissue and blood and splendor, a glorious, insistent, invinci-
   ble cataract of breathing and walking and seeing and feeling
   on the sweet, flowing, windswept mothering earth. And it was
   in that instant that I sensed what the bask might mean to the
   Wagon Peoples.
   "Ho!" I heard, and spun to see the black lance fall and
    scarcely had it moved but it was seized in the fist of the
    scarred Tuchuk warrior.
       The Tuchuk warrior lifted the lance in triumph, in the
   same instant slipping his fist into the retention knot and
   kicking the roweled heels of his boots into the silken flanks of
   his mount, the animal springing towards me and the rider in
   the same movement, as if one with the beast, leaning down
   from the saddle, lance slightly lowered, charging.
       The slender, flexible wand of the lance tore at the seven-
   layered Gorean shield, striking a spark from the brass rim
   binding it, as the man had lunged at my head.
   I had not cast the spear.
   I had no wish to kill the Tuchuk.
      The charge of the Tuchuk, in spite of its rapidity and
  momentum, carried him no more than four paces beyond
  me. It seemed scarcely had he passed than the kaiila had
  wheeled and charged again, this time given free rein, that it
  might tear at me with its fangs.
  I thrust with the spear, trying to force back the snapping
  jaws of the screaming animal. The kaiila struck, and then
  withdrew, and then struck again. All the time the Tuchuk
  thrust at me with his lance. Four times the point struck me
  drawing blood, but he did not have the weight of the leaping
  animal behind his thrust; he thrust at arm's length, the point
  scarcely reaching me. Then the animal seized my shield in its
  teeth and reared lifting it and myself, by the shield straps,
  from the ground. I fell from some dozen feet to the grass
  and saw the animal snarling and biting on the shield, then it
  shook it and hurled it far and away behind it.
  I shook myself.
  The helmet which I had slung over my shoulder was gone.
  I retained my sword. I grasped the Gorean spear.
  I stood at bay on the grass, breathing hard, bloody.
  The Tuchuk laughed, throwing his head back.
  I readied the spear for its cast.
      Warily now the animal began to circle, in an almost
  human fashion, watching the spear. It shifted delicately,
  feinting, and then withdrawing, trying to draw the cast.
      I was later to learn that kaiita are trained to avoid the
  thrown spear. It is a training which begins with blunt staves
  and progresses through headed weapons. Until the kaiila is
  suitably proficient in this art it is not allowed to breed. Those
  who cannot learn it die under the spear. Yet, at a close
  range, I had no doubt that I could slay the beast. As swift as
  may be the kaiila I had no doubt that I was swifter. Gorean
  warriors hunt men and tarts with this weapon. But I did not
  wish to slay the animal, nor its rider.
      To the astonishment of the Tuchuk and the others who
  observed, I threw away the weapon.
      The Tuchuk sat still on his mount, as did the others. Then
  he took his lance and smote it on the small, glossy shield,
  acknowledging my act. Then so too did the others, even the
  white-caped man of the Paravaci.
         Then the Tuchuk drove his own lance into the dirt and
  hung on the lance his glossy shield.
  I saw him draw one of the quivas from a saddle sheath,
  loosen the long, triple-weighted bole from his side.
      Slowly, singing in a gutteral chant, a Tuchuk warrior song,
  he began to swing the bole. It consists of three long straps of I
  leather, each about five feet long, each terminating in a
  leather sack which contains, sewn inside, a heavy, round,
  metal weight. It was probably developed for hunting the
  tumit, a huge, flightless carnivorous bird of the plains, but the
  Wagon Peoples use it also, and well, as a weapon of war.
      Thrown low the long straps, with their approximate ten-foot
  sweep, almost impossible to evade, strike the victim and the
  weighted balls, as soon as resistance is met, whip about the
  victim, tangling and tightening the straps. Sometimes legs are
  broken. It is often difficult to release the straps, so snarled do
  they become. Thrown high the Gorean bole can lock a man's
  arms to his sides; thrown to the throat it can strangle him;
  thrown to the head, a difficult cast, the whipping weights
  can crush a skull. One entagles the victim with the bole, leaps
  from one's mount and with the quiva cuts his throat.
  I had never encountered such a weapon and I had little
  notion as to how it might be met.
      The Tuchuk handled it well. The three 'weights at the end
  of the straps were now almost blurring in the air and he, his
  song ended, the reins in his left hand, quiva blade now
  clenched between his teeth, bole in his swinging, uplifted
  right arm, suddenly cried out and kicked the kaiila into its
  charge.
     He wants a kill, I told myself. He is under the eyes of
 warriors of the other peoples. It would be safest to throw
 low. It would be a finer cast, however, to try for the throat
 or head. How vain is hey How skillful is he?
 He would be both skillful and vain; he was Tuchuk.
 To the head came the flashing bole moving in its hideous,
 swift revolution almost invisible in the air and I, instead of
 lowering my head or throwing myself to the ground, met
 instead the flying weighted leather with the blade of a Koro-
 ban short sword, with the edge that would divide silk
 dropped upon it and the taut straps, two of them, flew from
 the blade and the other strap and the three weights looped
 off pinto the grass, and the Tuchuk at the same time, scarcely
 realizing what had occurred, leaped from the kailla, quiva in
 hand, to find himself unexpectedly facing a braced warrior of
 Ko-ro-ba, sword drawn.
     The quiva reversed itself in his hand, an action so swift I
 was only aware of it as his arm flew back, his hand on the
 blade, to hurl the weapon.
 It sped toward me with incredible velocity over the hand-
 ful of feet that separated us. It could not be evaded, but only
 countered, and countered it was by the Koroban steel in my
 hand, a sudden ringing, sliding flash of steel and the knife
 was deflected from my breast.
 The Tuchuk stood struck with awe, in the grass, on the
 trembling plains in the dusty air.
 I could hear the other three men of the Wagon Peoples,
 the Kataii, the Kassar, the Paravaci, striking their shields
 with their lances. "Well done," said the Kassar.
 The Tuchuk removed his helmet and threw it to the grass
 He jerked open the jacket he wore and the leather jerkin
 beneath, revealing his chest.
 He looked about him, at the distant bosk herds, lifted his
 head to see the sky once more.
 His kailla stood some yards away, shifting a bit, puzzled,
 reins loose on its neck.
 The Tuchuk now looked at me swiftly. He grinned. He did
 not expect nor would he receive aid from his fellows. I
 studied his heavy face, the fierce scarring that somehow
 ennobled it, the black eyes with the epicanthic fold. He
 grinned at me. "Yes," he said, "well done."
 I went to him and set the point of the Gorean short sword
 at his heart.
 He did not flinch.
 "I am Tarl Cabot," I said. "I come in peace."
 I thrust the blade back in the scabbard.
     For a moment the Tuchuk seemed stunned. He stared at
 me, disbelievingly, and then, suddenly, he threw back his
 head and laughed until tears streamed down his face. He
 doubled over and pounded on his knees with his fist. Then he
 straightened up and wiped his face with the back of his hand.
 I shrugged.
     Suddenly the Tuchuk bent to the soil and picked up a
 handful of dirt and grass, the land on which the bosk graze,
 the land which is the land of the Tuchuks, and this dirt and
 this grass he thrust in my hands and I held it.
 The warrior grinned and put his hands over mine so that
 our hands together held the dirt and the grass, and were
 together clasped on it.
 "Yes," said the warrior, "come in peace to the Land of the
 Wagon Peoples."
 I followed the warrior Kamchak into the encampment of
 Tuchuks.
 Nearly were we run down by six riders on thundering
 kaiila who, riding for sport, raced past us wildly among the
 crowded, clustered wagons. I heard the lowing of milk bask
 from among the wagons. Here and there children ran be-
 tween the wheels, playing with a cork ball and quiva, the
 object of the game being to strike the thrown ball. Tuchuk
 women, unveiled, in their long leather dresses, long hair
 bound in braids, tended cooking pots hung on "em-wood
 tripods over dung fires. These women were unscarred, but
 like the bask themselves, each wore a nose ring. That of the
 animals is heavy and of gold, that of the women also of gold
 but tiny and fine, not unlike the wedding rings of my old
 world. I heard a haruspex singing between the wagons; for a
 piece of meat he would read the wind and the grass; for a
 cup of wine the stars and the flight of birds; for a fat-bellied
 dinner the liver of a sleen or slave.
 lithe Wagon Peoples are fascinated with the future and its
 signs and though, to hear them speak, they put no store in
 such matters, yet they do in practice give them great consider-
 ation. I was told by Kamchak that once an army of a
 thousand wagons turned aside because a swarm of rennels,
 poisonous, crablike desert insects, did not defend its broken
 nest, crushed by the wheel of the lead wagon. Another time,
 over a hundred years ago, a wagon Ubar lost the spur from
 his right boot and turned for this reason back from the gates
 of mighty Ar itself.
     By one fire I could see a squat Tuchuk, hands on hips,
 dancing and stamping about by himself, drunk on fermented
 milk curds, dancing, according to Kamchak, to please the
 Sky.
     The Tuchuks and the other Wagon Peoples reverence
 Priest-Kings, but unlike the Goreans of the cities, with their
 castes of Initiates, they do not extend to them the dignities of
 worship. I suppose the Tuchuks worship nothing, in the
 common sense of that word, but it is true they hold many
 things holy, among them the bask and the skills of arms, but
 chief of the things before which the proud Tuchuk stands
 ready to remove his helmet is the sky, the simple, vast
 beautiful sky, from which fans the rain that, in his myths,
 formed the earth, and the basks, and the Tuchuks. It is to the
 sky that the Tuchuks pray when they pray, demanding victory
 and luck for themselves, defeat and misery for their enemies.
     The Tuchuk, incidentally, like others of the Wagon Peoples,
 prays only when mounted, only when in the saddle and with
 weapons at hand; he prays to the sky not as a slave to a
 master, nor a servant- to a god, but as warrior to a Ubar;
 the women of the Wagon Peoples, it might be mentioned,
 are not permitted to pray; many of them, however, do
 patronize the haruspexes, who, besides foretelling the future
 with a greater or lesser degree of accuracy for generally
 reasonable fees, provide an incredible assemblage of amulets,
 talismans, trinkets, philters, potions, spell papers, wonder-
 working sleen teeth, marvelous powdered kailiauk horns, and
 colored, magic strings that, depending on the purpose, may
 be knotted in various ways and worn about the neck.
     As we passed among the wagons I leaped back as a tawny
 prairie sleen hurled itself against the bars of a sleen cage,
 reaching out for me with its sic-clawed paw. There were four
 other prairie sleen in the cage, a small cage, and they were
 curling and moving about one another, restlessly, like angry
 snakes. They would be released with the fan of darkness to
 rum the periphery of the herds, acting, as I have mentioned,
 as shepherds and sentinels. They are also used if a slave
 escapes, for the sleen is an efficient, tireless, savage, almost
 infallible hunter, capable of pursuing a scent, days old, for
 hundreds of pasangs until, perhaps a month later, it finds its
 victim and tears it to pieces.
 I was startled by the sound of slave bells and saw a girl,
 stripped save for bells and collar, carrying a burden among
 the wagons.
     Kamchak saw that I had noticed the girl and chuckled,
 sensing that I might find it strange, seeing a slave so among
 the wagons.
     She wore bells locked on both wrists, and on both ankles,
 thick cuffs and anklets, each with a double line of bells,
 fastened by steel and key. She wore the Turian collar, rather
 than the common slave collar. The Turian collar lies loosely
 on the girl, a round ring; it fits so loosely that, when grasped
 in a man's fist, the girl can turn within it; the common
 Gorean collar, on the other hand, is a flat, snugly fitting steel
 band. Both collars lock in the back, behind the girl's neck.
 The Turian collar is more difficult to engrave, but it, like the
 flat collar, will bear some legend assuring that the girl, if
 found, will be promptly returned to her master. Bells had
 also been afflicted to her collar.
 "She is Turian?" I asked.
 "Of course," said Kamchak.
 "In the cities," I said, "only Pleasure Slaves are so belled,
 and then customarily for the dance."
 "Her master," said Kamchak, "does not trust her."
     In his simple statement I then understood the meaning of
 her condition. She would be allowed no garments, that she
 might not be able to conceal a weapon; the bells would mark
 each of her movements.
 "At night," said Kamchak, "she is chained under the
 wagon."
 The girl had now disappeared.
 "Turian girls are proud," said Kamchak. "Thus, they make
 excellent slaves."
     What he said did not surprise me. The Gorean master,
 commonly, likes a spirited girl, one who fights the whip and
 collar, resisting until at last, perhaps months later, she is
 overwhelmed and must acknowledge herself his, utterly and
 without reservation, then fearing only that he might tire of
 her and sell her to another.
 "In time," said Kamchak, `'she will beg for the rag of a
 slave."
     I supposed it was true. A girl could take only so much, and
 then she would kneel to her master, her head to his boots,
 and beg for a bit of clothing, even though it be only to be
 clad Kajir.
     Kajira is perhaps the most common expression for a fe-
 male slave. Another frequently heard expression is Sa-Pora, a
 compound word, meaning, rather literally, Chain Daughter,
 or Daughter of the Chain. Among the Wagon Peoples, to be
 clad Kajir means, for a girl, to wear four articles, two red,
 two black; a red cord, the Curia, is tied about the waist; the
 Chatka, or long, narrow strip of black leather, fits over this
 cord in the front, passes under, and then again, from the
 inside, passes over the cord in the back; the Chatka is drawn
 tight; the Kalmak is then donned; it is a short, open, sleeve-
 less vest of black leather; lastly the Koora, a strip of red
 cloth, matching the Curia, is wound about the head, to hold
 the hair back, for slave women, among the Wagon Peoples,
 are not permitted to braid, or otherwise dress their hair; it
 must be, save for the Koora, worn loose. For a male slave,
 or Kajirus, of the Wagon Peoples, and there are few, save
 for the work chains, to be clad Kajir means to wear the Kes,
 a short, sleeveless work tunic of black leather. As Kamchak
 and I walked to his wagon, I saw several girls, here and
 there, clad Kajir; they were magnificent; they walked with
 the true brazen insolence of the slave girl, the wench who
 knows that she is owned, whom men have found beautiful
 enough, and exciting enough, to collar. The dour women of
 the Wagon Peoples, I saw, looked on these girls with envy
 and hatred, sometimes striking them with sticks if they should
 approach too closely the cooking pots and attempt to steal
 a piece of meat.
 "I will tell your master!" screamed one.
  The girl laughed at her and with a toss of her auburn hair,
  bound in the Koora, ran off between the wagons.
  Kamchak and I laughed.
      I gathered that the beauty had little to fear from her
  master, saving perhaps that she might cease to please him.
  The wagons of the Wagon Peoples are, in their hundreds
  and thousands, in their brilliant, variegated colors, a glorious
  sight. Surprisingly the wagons are almost square, each the
  size of a large room. Which is drawn by a double team of
  bosk, four in a team, with each team linked to its wagon
  tongue, the tongues being joined by "tem-wood crossbars. The
  two axles of the wagon are also of "tem-wood, which perhaps,
  because of its flexibility, joined with the general flatness of
  the southern Gorean plains, permits the width of the wagon.
      The wagon box, which stands almost six feet from the
  ground, is formed of black, lacquered planks of "em-wood.
  Inside the wagon box, which is square, there is fixed a
  rounded, tentlike frame, covered with the taut, painted, var-
  nished hides of basks. These hides are richly colored, and
  often worked with fantastic designs, each wagon competing
  with its neighbor to be the boldest and most exciting. The
  rounded frame is Fred somewhat within the square of the
  wagon box, so that a walkway, almost like a ship's bridge,
  surrounds the frame. The sides of the wagon box, incidental-
  ly, are, here and there, perforated for arrow ports, for the
  small horn bow of the Wagon Peoples can be used to advant-
  age not only from the back of a kaiila but, like the crossbow,
  from such cramped quarters. One of the most striking
  features of these wagons is the wheels, which are huge, the
  back wheels having a diameter of about ten feet; the front
  wheels are, like those of the Conestoga wagon, slightly small-
  er, in this case, about eight feet in diameter; the larger rear
  wheels are more difficult to mire; the smaller front wheels,
  nearer the pulling power of the bask, permit a somewhat
  easier turning of the wagon. These wheels are carved wood
  and, like the wagon hides, are richly painted. Thick strips of
  boskhide form the wheel rims, which are replaced three to
  four times a year. The wagon is guided by a series of eight
  straps, two each for the four lead animals. Normally, how-
  ever, the wagons are tied in tandem fashion, in numerous long
  columns, and only the lead wagons are guided, the others
  simply following, thongs running from the rear of one wagon
  to the nose rings of the bask following, sometimes as much as
  thirty yards behind, with the next wagon; also, too, a wagon
  is often guided by a woman or boy who walks beside the lead
  animals with a sharp stick.
      The interiors of the wagons, lashed shut, protected from
  the dust of the march, are often rich, marvelously carpeted
  and hung, filled with chests and silks, and booty from looted
  caravans, lit by hanging tharlarion oil lamps, the golden light
  of which falls on the silken cushions, the ankle-deep, intricat-
  ly wrought carpets. In the center of the wagon there is a
  small, shallow fire bowl, formed of copper, with a raised
  brass grating. Some cooking is done here, though the bowl is
  largely to furnish heat. The smoke escapes by a smoke hole
  at the dome of the tentlike frame, a hole which is shut when
  the wagons move.
      There was the sudden thud of a kailla's paws on the grass
  between the wagons and a wild snorting squeal.
  I jumped back avoiding the paws of the enraged, rearing
  animal.
  "Stand aside, you fool!" cried a girl's voice, and to my
  astonishment, astride the saddle of the monster I espied a
  girl, young, astonishingly beautiful, vital, angry, pulling at the
  control straps of the animal.
      She was not as the other women of the Wagon Peoples I
  had seen, the dour, thin women with braided hair, bending
  over the cooking pots.
  She wore a brief leather skirt, slit on the right side to allow
  her the saddle of the kaiila; her leather blouse was sleeveless;
  attached to her shoulders was a crimson cape; and her wild
  black hair was bound back by a band of scarlet cloth. Like
  the other women of the Wagons she wore no veil and, like
  them, fixed in her nose was the tiny, fine ring that proclaimed
  her people.
  Her skin was a light brown and her eyes a charged, spark-
  ling black.
  "What fool is this?" she demanded of Kamchak.
  'No fool," said Kamchak, "but Tarl Cabot, a warrior, one
  who has held in his hands with me grass and earth."
  "He is a stranger," she said. "He should be slain!"
  Kamchak grinned up at her. "He has held with me grass
  and earth," he said.
  The girl gave a snort of contempt and kicked her small,
  spurred heels into the Banks of the kaiila and bounded away.
  Kamchak laughed. "She is Hereena, a wench of the First
  Wagon," he said.
  "Tell me of her," I said.
  "What is there to tell?" asked Kamchak.
  'What does it mean to be of the First Wagon?" I asked.
  Kamchak laughed. "You know little of the Wagon Peo-
  ples," he said.
  "That is true," I admitted.
  "To be of the First Wagon," said Kamchak, "is to be of
  the household of Kutaituchik."
  I repeated the name slowly, trying to sound it out. It i8
  pronounced in four syllables, divided thus: Ku-tai-tu-chik.
  "He then is the Ubar of the Tuchuks?" I said.
  'His wagon," smiled Kamchak, "is the First Wagon and
  it is Kutaituchik who sits upon the gray robe."
  "The gray robe?" I asked.
  "That robe," said Kamchak, 'which is the throne of the
  Ubars of the Tuchuks."
  It was thus I first learned the name of the man whom I
  understood to be Ubar of this fierce people.
  "You will sometime be taken into the presence of Kutai-
  tuchik," said Kamchak. "I myself," he said, 'must often go to
  the wagon of the Ubar."
  I gathered from this remark that Kamchak was a man of
  no little importance among the Tuchuks.
  "There arc a hundred wagons in the personal household of
  Kutaituchik," said Kamchak. 'No be of any of these wagons
  is to be of the First Wagon."
  "I see," I said. 'And the girl she on the kaiila is
  perhaps the daughter of Kutaituchik, Ubar of the Tuchuks?"
  "No," said Kamchak. "She is unrelated to him, as are most
  in the First Wagon."
  "She seemed much different than the other Tuchuk wom-
  en," I said.
  Kamchak laughed, the colored scars wrinkling on his
  broad face. "Of course," said Kamchak, "she has been raised
  to be fit prize in the games of Love and War."
  "I do not understand," I said.
  Did you not see the Plains of a Thousand Stakes?" asked
  Kamchak.
  "No," I said. ''I did not."
  I was about to press Kamchak on this matter when we
  heard a sudden shout and the squealing of kaiila from among
  the wagons. I heard then the shouts of men and the cues of
  women and children. Kamchak lifted his head intently, listen-
  ng, Then we heard the pounding of a small drain and No
  blasts on the horn of a bask.
  Kamchak read the message of the drum and horn.
  "A prisoner has been brought to the camp," he said.
      Kamchak strode among the wagons, toward the sound,
      and I followed him closely. Many others, too, rushed to the
      sound, and we were jostled by armed warriors, scarred and
      fierce; by boys with unscarred faces, carrying the pointed
      sticks used often for goading the wagon bask; by leather-clad
      women hurrying from the cooking pots; by wild, half-clothed
      children; even by enslaved Kajir-clad beauties of Turia; even
      the girl was there who wore but bells and collar, struggling
      under her burden, long dried strips of bask meat, as wide as
      beams, she too hurrying to see what might be the meaning
      of the drum and horn, of the shouting Tuchuks.
      We suddenly emerged into the center of what seemed to
      be a wide, grassy street among the wagons, a wide lane, open
      and level, an avenue in that city of Harigga, or Bask Wagons.
      The street was lined by throngs of Tuchuks and slaves.
      Among them, too, were soothsayers and haruspexes, and
      singers and musicians, and, here and there, small peddlers
      and merchants, of various cities, for such are occasionally
      permitted by the Tuchuks, who crave their wares, to ap-
      proach the wagons. Each of these, I was later to learn, wore
      on his forearm a tiny brand, in the form of spreading bask
      horns, which guaranteed his passage, at certain seasons,
      across the plains of the Wagon Peoples. The difficulty, of
      course is in first obtaining the brand. If, in the case of a
      singer, the song is rejected, or in the case of a merchant, his
      merchandise is rejected, he is slain out of hand. This accept-
      ance brand, of course, carries with it a certain stain of
ignominy, suggesting that those who approach the wagons do as slaves.
Now I could see down the wide, grassy lane, loping
towards us, two kaiila and riders. A lance was fastened
between them, fixed to the stirrups of their saddles. The lance
cleared the ground, given the height of the kaiila, by about
five feet. Between the two animate, stumbling desperately, her
throat bound by leather thongs to the lance behind her neck,
ran a girl, her wrists tied behind her back.
I was astonished, for this girl was dressed not as a Gorean,
not as a girl of any of the cities of the Counter-Earth, not as
a peasant of the Sa-Tarna Belds or the vineyards where the
Ta grapes are raised, not even as a girl of the fierce Wagon
Peoples.
Kamchak stepped to the center of the grassy lane, lifting
his hand, and the two riders, with their prize, reined in their
mounts.
I was dumbfounded.

The girl stood gasping for breath, her body shaking and
quivering, her knees slightly bent. She would have fallen
except for the lance that kept her in place. She pulled weakly
at the thongs that bound her wrists. Her eyes seemed glazed.
She scarcely could look about her. Her clothing was stained
with dust and her hair hung loose and tangled. Her body was
covered with a sparkling sheen of sweat. Her shoes had been
removed and had been fastened about her neck. Her feet
were bleeding. The shreds of yellow nylon stockings hung
about her angles. Her brief dress was torn by being dragged
through brush.
Kamchak, too, seemed surprised at the sight of the girl,
for never had he seen one 80 peculiarly attired. He assumed,
of course, from the brevity of her skirt, that she was slave. He
was perhaps puzzled by the absence of a metal collar about
her throat. There was, however, literally sewn about her
neck, a thick, high leather collar.
Kamchak went to her and took her head in his hands. She
lifted her head and seeing the wild, fearsome scarred face
that stared into hers, she suddenly screamed hysterically, and
tried to jerk and tear herself away, but the lance held her in
place. She kept shaking her head and whimpering. It was
clear she could not believe her eyes, that she understood
nothing, that she did not comprehend her surroundings, that
she thought herself mad.
I noted that she had dark hair and dark eyes, brown.
The thought crossed my mind that this might lower her
  price somewhat.
  She wore a simple yellow shift, with narrow orange stripes,
  of what must once have been crisp oxford cloth. It had long
  sleeves, with cuffs, and a button down collar, not unlike a
  man's shirt.
  It was now, of course, torn and soiled.
  Yet she was not an unpleasing wench to look on, slim,
  well-ankled, lithe. On the Gorean block she would bring a
  good price.
  She gave a little cry as Kamchak jerked the shoes from
                                            about her neck.   I
  He threw them to me.
  They were orange, of finely tooled leather, with a buckle.
  They had heels, a bit more than an inch high. There was also
  lettering in the shoe, but the script and words would have
  been unfamiliar to Goreans. It was English.
  The girl was trying to speak. "My name is Elizabeth
  Cardwell," she said. "I'm an American citizen. My home is in
  New York City."
  Kamchak looked in puzzlement at the riders, and they at
  him. In Gorean, one of the riders said, "She is a barbarian.
  She cannot speak Gorean."
  My role, as I conceived it, was to remain silent.
  "You are all mad!" screamed the girl, pulling at the straps
  that bound her, struggling in the bonds. "Mad!"
  The Tuchuks and the others looked at one another, puz-
  zled.
  I did not speak.
  I was thunderstruck that a girl, apparently of Earth, who
  spoke English, should be brought to the Tuchuks at this
  time at the time that I was among them, hoping to discover
  and return to Priest-Kings what I supposed to be a golden
  spheroid, the egg, the last hope of their race. Had the girl
  been brought to this world by Priest-Kings? Was she the
  recent victim of one of the Voyages of Acquisition? But I
  understood them to have been curtailed in the recent subter-
  ranean War of Priest-Kings. Had they been resumed? Surely
  this girl had not been long on Gor, perhaps no more than
  hours. But if the Voyages of Acquisition had been resumed,
  why had they been resumed? Or was it actually the case that
  she had been brought to Gor by Priest-Kings? Were there
  perhaps others somehow others? Was this woman sent to
  the Tuchuks at this time perhaps released to wander on the
plains inevitably to be picked up by outriders for a pur-
pose and if so, to what end for whose purpose or pur-
poses? Or was there somehow some fantastic accident or
coincidence involved in the event of her arrival? Somehow I
knew the latter was not likely to be the case.
Suddenly the girl threw back her head and cried out
hysterically. "I'm mad! I have gone mad! I have gone mad!"
I could stand it no longer. She was too piteous. Against my
better judgment I spoke to her. "No," I said, "you are sane.'
The girl's eyes looked at me, she scarcely believing the
words she had heard.
The Tuchuks and others, as one man, faced me.
I fumed to Kamchak. Speaking in Gorean, I said to him,
"I can understand her."
One of the riders pointed to me, crying out to the crowd,
excitedly. "He speaks her tongue"
A ripple of pleasure coursed through the throng.
It then occurred to me that it might have been for just this
purpose that she had been sent to the Tuchuks, to single out
the one man from among all the thousands with the wagons
who could understand her and speak with her, thus identify-
ing and marking him.
"Excellent," said Kamchak, grinning at me.
"Please," cried the girl to me. "Help met"
Kamchak said to me. "Tell her to be silent."
I did so, and the girl looked at me, dumbfounded, but
remained silent.
I discovered that I was now an interpreter.
Kamchak was now, curiously, fingering her yellow gar-
ment. Then, swiftly, he tore it from her.
She cried out.
"Be silent," I said to her.
I knew what must now pass, and it was what would have
passed in any city or on any road or trail or path in Gor. She
was a captive female, and must, naturally, submit to her
assessment as prize; she must also be, incidentally, examined
for weapons; a dagger or poisoned needle is often concealed
in the clothing of free women.
There were interested murmurs from the crowd when, to
the Gorean's thinking, the unusual garments underlying her
yellow shift were revealed.
"Please," she wept, turning to me.
"Be silent," I cautioned her.
Kamchak then removed her remaining garments, even the
shreds of nylon stockings that had hung about her ankles.
There was a murmur of approval from the crowd; even
some of the enslaved Turian beauties, in spite of themselves,
cried out in admiration.
Elizabeth Cardwell, I decided, would indeed bring a high
price.
She stood held in place by the lance, her throat bound to it
with the wood behind her neck, her wrists thonged behind
her back. Other than her bonds she now wore only the thick
leather collar which had been sewn about her neck.
Kamchak picked up the clothing which lay near her on the
grass. He also took the shoes. He wadded it all up together in
a soiled bundle. He threw it to a nearby woman. "Burn it,"
said Kamchak.
The bound girl watched helplessly as the woman carried
her clothing, all that she had of her old world, to a cooking
fire some yards away, near the edge of the wagons.
the crowd had opened a passage for the woman and the
girl saw the clothing cast on the open fire.
"No, no!" she screamed. "No!"
Then she tried once more to free herself.
"Tell her," said Kamchak, "that she must learn Gorean
quickly that she will be slain if she does not."
I translated this for the girl.
She shook her head wildly. "Tell them my name is Eliza-
beth Cardwell," she said. "I don't know where I am or how
I got here I want to get back to America, I'm an Ameri-
can citizen, my home is in New York City take me back
there, I will pay you anything!"
"Tell her," repeated Kamchak, "that she must learn Gore-
an quickly and that if she does not she will be slain."
I translated this once more for the girl.
"I will pay you anything," she pleaded. "Anything!"
"You have nothing," I informed her, and she blushed.
"Further," I said, "we do not have the means of returning
you to your home."
"Why not?" she demanded.
"Have you not," I pressed, "noted the difference in the
gravitational field of this place have you not noted the
slight difference in the appearance of the sun?"
"It's not true!" she screamed
"This is not Earth," I told her. "This is Gor another
earth perhaps but not yours." I looked at her fixedly. She
must understand. "You are on another planet."
She closed her eyes and moaned.
"I know," she said. "I know I know but how?
how?"
"I do not know the answer to your question," I said. I did
not tell her that I was, incidentally, keenly interested for
my own reasons in learning the answer to her question.
Kamchalc seemed impatient.
"What does she say?" he asked.
"She is naturally disturbed," I said. "She wishes to return
to her city."
"What is her city?" asked Kamchak.
"It is called New York," I said.
"I have never heard of it," said Kamchak.
"It is far away," I said.
"How is it that you speak her language?" he asked.
"I once lived in lands where her language is spoken," I
said.
"Is there grass for the bask in her lands?" asked Kamchak.
"Yes," I said, "but they are far away."
"farther even than Thentis?" asked Kamchak.
"Yes," I said.
"farther even than the islands of Cos and-Tyros?" he
asked.
"Yes," I said.
Kamchak whistled. "That is far," he said. .
I smiled. "It is too far to take the bask," I said.
Kamchak grinned at me.
One of the warriors on the kaiila spoke. "She was with no
one," he said. "We searched. She was with no one."
Kamchak nodded at me, and then at the girl.
"Were you alone?" I asked.
The girl nodded weakly.
"She says she was alone," I told Kamchak.
"How came she here?" asked Kamchak.
I translated his question, and the girl looked at me, and
then closed her eyes and shook her head. "I don't know," she
said.
"She says she does not know," I told Kamchak.
"It is strange," said Kamchak. "But we will question her
further later."
He signaled to a boy who carried a skin of Ka-la-na wine
over his shoulder. He took the skin of wine from the boy and
bit out the horn plug; he then, with the wineskin on his
shoulder, held back the head of Elizabeth Cardwell with one
_



         40
                          NOMADS OF FOR
         hand and with the other shoved the bone nozzle of the skin
         between her teeth; he tipped the skin and the girl, half
         choking, swallowed wine; some of the red fluid ran from her
         mouth and over her body.
         When Kamchak thought she had drunk enough he pulled
         the nozzle from her mouth, pushed back the plug and re-
         turned the skin to the boy.
         Dazed, exhausted, covered with sweat, dust on her face
         and legs, wine on her body, Elizabeth Cardwell, her wrists
         thonged behind her and her throat bound to a lance, stood
         captive before Kamchak of the Tuchuks.
         He must be merciful. He must be kind.
         "She must learn Gorean," said Kamchak to me. "Teach
         her 'La Kajira'."
         "You must learn Gorean," I told the girl.
         She tried to protest, but I would not permit it.
         "Say 'La Kajira'," I told her.
         She looked at me, helplessly. Then she repeated, "La
         Kajira."
         "Again," I commanded.
         "La Kajira," said the girl clearly, "La Kajira."
         Elizabeth Cardwell had learned her first Gorean.
         "What does it mean?" she asked.
         "It means," I told her, "I am a slave girl."
         "No!" she screamed. "No, no, not"
         Kamchak nodded to the two riders mounted on kaiila.
         "Take her to the wagon of Kutaituchik."
         The two riders turned their kaiila and in a moment,
         moving rapidly, the girl running between them, had turned
         from the grassy lane and disappeared between the wagons.
         Kamchak and I regarded one another.
         "Did you note the collar she wore?" I asked.
         He had not seemed to show much interest in the high,
         thick leather collar that the girl had had sewn about her
         neck.
         "Of course," he said.
         "I myself," I said, "have never seen such a collar."
         "It is a message collar," said Kamchak. "Inside the leather,
         sewn within, will be a message."
         My look of amazement must have amused him, for he
         laughed. "Come," he said, "let us go to the wagon of Kutai-
         tuchik."
  The wagon of Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the Tuchuks,
  was drawn up on a large, flat-topped grassy hill, the highest
  land in the camp.
  Beside the wagon, on a great pole fixed in the earth, stood
  the Tuchuk standard of the four bask horns.
  The hundred, rather than eight, bask- that drew his wagon
  had been unyoked; they were huge, red bask; their horns had
  been polished and their coats glistened from the comb and
  oils; their golden nose rings were set with jewels; necklaces of
  precious stones hung from the polished horns.
  The wagon itself was the largest in the camp, and the
  largest wagon I had conceived possible; actually it was a vast
  platform, set on numerous wheeled frames; though at the
  edges of the platform, on each side, there were a dozen of
  the large wheels such as are found on the much smaller
  wagons; these latter wheels turned as the wagon moved and
  supported weight, but could not of themselves have supported
  the entire weight of that fantastic, wheeled palace of hide.
  The hides that formed the dome were of a thousand
  colors, and the smoke hole at the top must have stood more
  than a hundred feet from the flooring of that vast platform. I
  could well conjecture the riches, the loot and the furnishing
  that would dazzle the interior of such a magnificent dwelling.
  But I did not enter the wagon, for Kutaituchik held his
  court outside the wagon, in the open air, on the flat-topped
  grassy hill. A large dais had been built, vast and spreading,
  but standing no more than a foot from the earth. This dais
  41
_















         42
                           NOMADS OF
         was covered with dozens of thick rugs, sometimes four
         and five deep.
         There were many Tuchuks, and some others, crowded
         about the dais, and, standing upon it, about Kutaituchik,
         there were several men who, from their position on the dais
         and their trappings, I judged to be of great importance.
         Among these men, sitting cross-legged, was Kutaituchik,
         called Ubar of the Tuchuks.
         About Kutaituchik there were piled various goods, mostly
         vessels of precious metal and strings and piles of jewels; there
         was sills there from Tyros; silver from Thentis and Tharna;
         tapestries from the mills of Ar; wines from Cos; dates from
         the city of Tor. There were also, among the other goods, two
         girls, blonde and blue-eyed, unclothed, chained; they had
         perhaps been a gift to Kutaituchik; or had been the' daugh-
         ters of enemies; they might have been from any city; both
         were beautiful; one was sitting with her knees tucked under
         her chin, her hands clasping her ankles, absently staring at
         the jewels about her feet; the other lay indolently on her
         side, incuriously regarding us, her weight on one elbow; there
         was a yellow stain about her mouth where she had been fed
         some fruit; both girls wore the Sirilc, a light chain favored for
         female slaves by many Gorean masters; it consists of a
         Turian-type collar, a loose, rounded circle of steel, to which a
         light, gleaming chain is attached; should the girl stand, the
         chain, dangling from her collar, falls to the floor; it is about
         ten or twelve inches longer than is required to reach from
         her collar to her ankles; to this chain, at the natural fall of
         her wrists, is attached a pair of slave bracelets; at the end of
         the chain there is attached another device, a set of linked
         ankle rings, which, when closed about her ankles, lifts a
         portion of the slack chain from the floor; the Sirit is an
         incredibly graceful thing and designed to enhance the beauty
         of its wearer; perhaps it should only be added that the slave
         bracelets and the ankle rings may be removed from the chain
         and used separately; this also, of course, permits the Sirik to
         function as a slave leash.
         At the edge of the dais Kamchak and I had stopped,
         where our sandals were removed and our feet washed by
         Turian slaves, men in the Kes, who might once have been
         officers of the city.
         We mounted the dais and approached the seemingly som-
         nolent figure seated upon it.
         Although the dais was resplendent, and the rugs upon it
 even more resplendent, I saw that beneath Kutaituchik, over
 these rugs, had been spread a simple, worn, tattered robe o f
 gray boskhide. It was upon this simple robe that he sat. It
 was undoubtedly that of which Kamchak had spoken, the
 robe upon which sits the Ubar of the Tuchuks, that simple
 robe which is his throne.
 Kutaituchik lifted his head and regarded us; his eyes
 seemed sleepy; he was bald, save for a black knot of hair
 that emerged from the back of his shaven skull; he was a
 broad-backed man, with small legs; his eyes bore the epican-
 thic fold; his skin was a tinged, yellowish brown; though he
 was stripped to the waist, there was about his shoulders a
 rich, ornamented robe of the red bask, bordered with jewels;
 about his neck, on a chain decorated with sleen teeth, there
 hung a golden medallion, bearing the sign of the four bask
 horns; he wore furred boots, wide leather trousers, and a red
 sash, in which was thrust a quiva. Beside him, coiled, perhaps
 as a symbol of power, lay a bask whip. Kutaituchik absently
 reached into a small golden box near his right knee and drew
 out a string of rolled kanda leaf.
 The roots of the kanda plant, which grows largely in desert
 regions on Gor, are extremely toxic, but, surprisingly, the
 rolled leaves of this plant, which are relatively innocuous, are
 formed into strings and, chewed or sucked, are much favored
 by many Goreans, particularly in the southern hemisphere,
 where the leaf is more abundant.
 Kutaituchik, not taking his eyes off us, thrust one end of
 the green kanda string in the left side of his mouth and, very
 slowly, began to chew it. He said nothing, nor did Kamchak.
 We simply sat near him, cross-legged. I was conscious that
 only we three on that dais were sitting. I was pleased that
 there were no prostrations or grovelings involved in ape
 preaching the august presence of the exalted Kutaituchik. I
 gathered that once, in his earlier years, he might have been a
 rider of the kaiila, that he might have been skilled with the
 bow and lance, and the quiva; such a man would not need
 ceremony; I sensed that once this man might have ridden six
 hundred pasangs in a day, living on a mouthful of water and
 a handful of bask meat kept soft and warm between his
 saddle and the back of the kaiila; that there might have been
 few as swift with the quiva, as delicate with the lance, as
 he; that he had known the wars and the winters of the
 prairie; that he had met animals and men, as enemies, and
_


 44
 An!,

 I'

 f:
                     NOMADS 0F FOR
 had lived; such a man did not need ceremony; such a man, I
 sensed, was Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the Tuchuks.
 And yet was I sad as I looked upon him, for I sensed that
 for this man there could no longer be the saddle of the
 kaiila, the whirling of the rope and bole, the hunt and the
 war. Now, from the right side of his mouth, thin, black and
 wet, there emerged the chewed string of kanda, a quarter of
 an inch at a time, slowly. The drooping eyes, glazed, regard-
 ed us. For him there could no longer be the swift races
 across the frozen prairie; the meetings in arms; even the
 dancing to the sky about a fire of bask dung.
 Kamchak and I waited until the string had been chewed.
 When Kamchak had finished he held out his right hand
 and a man, not a Tuchuk, who wore the green robes of the
 Caste of Pysicians, thrust in his hand a goblet of bask horn;
 it contained some yellow fluid. Angrily, not concealing his
 distaste, Kutaituchik drained the goblet and then hurled it
 from him.
 He then shook himself and regarded Kamchak.
 He grinned a Tuchuk grin. "How are the bosk?" he asked.
 "As well as may be expected," said Kamchak.
 "Are the quivas sharp?"
 "One tries to keep them so," said Kamchak.
 `'It is important to keep the axles of the wagons greased,"
 observed Kutaituchik.
 "Yes," said Kamchak, "I believe so."
 Kutaituchik suddenly reached out and he and Kamchak,
 laughing, clasped hands.
 Then Kutaituchik sat back and clapped his hands together
 sharply twice. "Bring the she-slave," he said.
 I turned to see a stout man-at-arms step to the dais,
 carrying in his arms, folded in the furs of the scarlet larl, a
 girl.
 I heard the small sound of a chain.
 The man-at-arms placed Elizabeth Cardwell before us, and
 Kutaituchik, and drew away the pelt of the scarlet larl.
 Elizabeth Cardwell had been cleaned and her hair combed.
 She was slim, lovely.
 The man-at-arms arranged her before us.
 The thick leather collar, I noted, was still sewn about her
 throat.
 Elizabeth Cardwell, though she did not know it, knelt
 before us in the position of the Pleasure Slave.
 She looked wildly about her and then dropped her head.
  Aside from the collar on her throat she, like the other girls
  on the platform, wore only the Sirik.
  Kamchak gestured to me.
  "Speak," I said to her.
  She lifted her head and then said, almost inaudibly, trem-
  bling in the restraint of the Sirik. "La Kajira" Then she
  dropped her head.
  Kutaituchik seemed satisfied.
  "It is the only Gorean she knows," Kamchak informed
  him.
  "For the time," said Kutaituchik, "it is enough." He then
  looked at the man-at-arms. "Have you fed her?" he asked.
  The man nodded.
  "Good," said Kutaituchik, "the she-slave will need her
  strength."
  The interrogation of Elizabeth Cardwell took hours. Need-
  less to say, I served as translator.
  The interrogation, to my surprise, was conducted largely
  by Kamchak, rather than Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the
  Tuchuks. Kamchak's questions were detailed, numerous,
  complex. He returned to certain questions at various times, in
  various ways, connecting subtly her responses to one with
  those of another; he wove a sophisticated net of inquiry
  about the girl, delicate and fine; I marveled at his skill; had
  there been the least inconsistency or even hesitation, as
  though the girl were attempting to recollect or reconcile the
  details of a fabrication, it would have been instantly de"
  tected.
  During all this time, and torches had been brought, the
  hours of the night being burned away, Elizabeth Cardwell
  was not permitted to move, but must needs retain the posi-
  tion of the Pleasure Slave, knees properly placed, back
  straight, head high, the gleaming chain of the Sirik dangling
  from the Turian collar, falling to the pelt of the red tart on
  which she knelt.
  The translation, as you might expect, was a difficult task,
  but I attempted to convey as much as I could of what the
  girl, piteously, the words tumbling out, attempted to tell me.
  Although there were risks involved I tried to translate as
  exactly as I could, letting Miss Cardwell speak as she would,
  though her words must often have sounded fantastic to the
  Tuchuks, for it was largely of a world alien to them that she
  spoke a world not of autonomous cities but of huge na-
  tions; not of castes and crafts but of global, interlocking
  I, -
_



                                             46 NOMADS OF GOR  |
   industrial complexes; not of batter and tarn disks but of |
   fantastic systems of exchange and credit; a world not of tarns I
   and the tharlarion but of aircraft and motor buses and
   trucks; a world in which one's words need not be carried by
   a lone rider on the swift kaiila but could be sped from one
   corner of the earth to another by leaping through an artifi-
   cial moon.
   Kutaituchik and Kamchak, to my pleasure, tended to re-
   strain judgment on these matters; to my gratification they did
   not seem to regard the girl as mad; I had been afraid, from
   time to time, that they might, losing patience with what must
   seem to them to be the most utter nonsense, order her beaten
   or impaled.
   I did not know then, but Kutaituchik and Kamchak had
   some reason for supposing that the girl might be speaking the
   truth.
   What they were most interested in, of course, and what I
   was most interested in, namely, how and why the girl came
   to be wandering on the Plains of Turia in the Lands of the
   Wagon Peoples they, and I, did not learn.
   We were all, at last, satisfied that even the girl herself did
   not know.
   At last Kamchak had finished, and Kutaituchik, too, and
   they leaned back, looking at the girl.
   "Move no muscle," I said to her.
   She did not. She was very beautiful.
   Kamchak gestured with his head.
   "You may lower your head," I said to the girl.
   Piteously, with a rustle of chain, the girl's head and shoul-
   ders fell forward, and though she still knelt, her head touched
   the pelt of the larl, her shoulders and back shaking, trem-
   bling.
   It seemed to me, from what I had learned, that there was
   no particular reason why Elizabeth Cardwell, and not one of
   Parth's countless others, had been selected to wear the mes-
   sage collar. As yet the collar had not been removed and
   examined. It was perhaps only that she was convenient, and,
   of course, that she was lovely, thus a fitting bearer of the
   collar, herself a gift with the message to please the Tuchuks,
   and perhaps better dispose them toward its contents.
   Miss Cardwell was little different from thousands of lovely
   working girls in the great cities of Barth, perhaps more
   intelligent than many, perhaps prettier than most, but essen-
   tially the same, girls living alone or together in apartments,
   in''.'
 working in offices and studios and shops, struggling to earn a
 hying in a glamorous city, whose goods and pleasures they
 could ill afford to purchase. What had happened to her
 might, I gathered, have happened to any of them.
 She remembered arising and washing and dressing, eating a
 hurried breakfast, taking the elevator downstairs from her
 apartment, the subway, arriving at work, the routines of the
 morning as a junior secretary in one of the larger advertising
 agencies on Madison Avenue, her excitement at being invited
 to interview for the position of assistant secretary to the head
 of the art department, her last-minute concern with her
 lipstick, the hem of her yellow shift, then steno pad in hand,
 entering his office..
 With him had been a tall, strange man, broad of shoulder
 with large hands, a grayish face, eyes almost like glass. He
 had frightened her. He wore a dark suit of expensive cloth
 and tailoring, and yet somehow it seemed not that he wore
 it as one accustomed to such garments. He spoke to her,
 rather than the man she knew, the head of the department,
 whom she had seen often. He did not permit her to take the
 seat by the desk.
 Rather he told her to stand and straighten herself. He
 seemed to scorn her posture. Angry, she nevertheless did so
 until, embarrassed, she stood insolently erect before him. His
 eyes regarded her ankles with care, and then her calves and
 she was acutely aware, blushing, that standing as she did, so
 straight before him, the simple yellow, oxford-cloth shift ill
 concealed her thighs, the flatness of her belly, the loveliness
 of her figure. "Lift your head," he said, and she did, her chin
 high, the lovely, angry head set proudly on her aristocratic
 delicate neck.
 He then backed away from her.
 She turned to face him, eyes flashing.
 "Do not speak," he said.
 Her fingers went white with anger, clutching the steno pad
 and pencil.
 He gestured to the far side of the room. "Walk there," he
 said, "and return."
 "I will not," she said.
 "Now," said the man.
 Elizabeth had looked, tears almost in her eyes, at the
 department head, but he seemed suddenly to her soft, pudgy,
 distant, sweating, nothing. He nodded hastily, "Please, Miss
 Cardwell, do as he says."
                          ..



                           l



                           l



                           .




 _


  1.



  @-



  ..

  .

                            .



                           '3~
   ,~. .
  i.,,,~,
  48 NOMADS OF GOR
  Elizabeth faced the tall, strange man. She was breathing
  rapidly now. She felt the pencil clutched in her sweating
  hand. Then it broke.
  "Now," said the man.
  Looking at him she suddenly had the feeling, a strange
  one, that this man, in some circumstances and for some
  purpose or another, had assessed and judged many women.
  This infuriated her.
  It seemed to her a challenge that she would accept. She
  would show him a woman indeed allowing herself for the
  instant to be insolently and fully female showing him in her
  walk her contempt and scorn for him.
  She would then leave and go directly to the personnel
  office, tendering her resignation.
  She threw back her head. "Very well," she said. And
  Elizabeth Cardwell walked proudly, angrily, to the far side of
  the room, wheeled there, faced the man, and approached
  him, eyes taunting, a smile of contempt playing about her
  lips. She heard the department head quickly suck in his
  breath She did not take her eyes from the tall, strange man.
  "Are you satisfied," she asked, quietly, acidly.
  "Yes," he had said.
  She remembered then only turning and starting for the
  door, and a sudden, peculiar odor, penetrating, that seemed
  to close about her face and head.
  She had regained consciousness on the Plains of Gor. She
  bad been dressed precisely as she had been the morning she
  had gone to work save that about her throat she had found
  sewn a 0th, thick leather collar. She had cried out, she had
  wandered. Then, after some hours "tumbling confused, ter-
  rified, hungry through the high, brown grass, she had seen
  two riders, mounted on swift, strange beasts. They had seen
  her. She called to them. They approached her cautiously, in a
  large circle, as though examining the grass for enemies, or
  others.
  "I'm Elizabeth Cardwell," she had cried. "My home is in
  New York City. What place is this? Where am 1?" And then
  she has seen the faces, and had screamed.
  "Position," said Kamchak.
  I spoke sharply to the girl. "Be as you were before."
  Terrified the girl straightened herself and again, knees
  placed, back straight and head 0th, knelt before us in the
  position of the Pleasure Slave.
  'the collar," said Kamchak, "is Turian."
Kutaituchik nodded.
This was news to me, and I welcomed it, for it meant that
probably, somehow, the answer to at least a part of the
mystery which confronted me lay in the city of Turia.
But how was it that Elizabeth Cardwell, of Earth, wore a
Turian message collar?
Kamchak drew the quiva from his belt and approached the
girl. She looked at him wildly, drawing back.
"Do not move," I told her.
Kamchak set the blade of the quiva between the girl's
throat and the collar and moved it, the leather collar seeming
to fall from the blade.
The girl's neck, where the collar had been sewn, was red
and sweaty, broken out.
Kamchak returned to his place where he again sat down
cross-legged, putting the cut collar on the rug in front of
him.
I and Kutaituchik watched as he carefully spread open the
collar, pressing back two edges. Then, from within the collar,
he drew forth a thin, folded piece of paper, rence paper
made from the fibers of the rence plant, a tall, long-stalked
leafy plant which grows predominantly in the delta of the
Vosk. I suppose, in itself, this meant nothing, but I naturally
thought of Port Kar, malignant, squalid Port Kar, which
claims suzerainty over the delta, exacting cruel tributes from
the rence growers, great stocks of rence paper for trade, sons
for oarsmen in cargo galleys, daughters for Pleasure Slaves in
the taverns of the city. I would have expected the message to
have been written either on stout, glossy-surfaced linen pa-
per, of the sort milled in Ar, or perhaps on vellum and
parchment, prepared in many cities and used commonly in
scrolls, the process involving among other thing tile washing
and liming of skins, their scraping and stretching, dusting
them with sifted chalk, rubbing them down with pumice.
Kamchak handed the paper to Kutaituchik and he took it
but looked at it, I thought, blankly. Saying nothing he handed
it back to Kamchak, who seemed to study it with great care,
and then, to my amazement, turned it sideways and then
upside down. At last he grunted and handed it to me.- I was suddenly amused, for it occurred to me that neither
of the Tuchuks could read.
''Read," said Kutaituchik.
I smiled and took the piece of rence paper. I glanced at it
and then I smiled no longer. I could read it, of course. It was
of.
_



         so
         in Gorean script, moving from left to right, and then from
         right to left on alternate lines. The writing was quite legible.
         It was written in black ink, probably with a reed pen. This
         again suggested the delta of the Vosk.
         "What does it say?" asked Kutaituchik.
         The message was simple, consisting of only three lines.
         I read them aloud.
                           NOMADS OF FOR
         Find the man to whom this girl can speak.
         He is Tart Cabot.
         Slay him.
         "And who has signed this message?" asked Kutaituchik.
         I hesitated to read the signature.
         "Wells" asked Kutaituchik.
         "It is signed," I said, "Priest-Kings of Gor."
         Kutaituchik smiled. "You read Gorean well," he said.
         - I understood then that both men could read, though per-
         haps many of the Tuchuks could not. It had been a test.
         Kamchak grinned at Kutaituchik, the scarring on his face
         wrinkling with pleasure. "He has held grass and earth with
         me," he said.
         "Ah!" said Kutaituchik. "I did not know."
         My mind was whirling. Now I understood, as I had only
         suspected before, why an English-speaking girl was neces-
         sary to bear the collar, that she might be the device whereby
         I would be singled out from the hundreds and thousands
         among the wagons, and so be marked for death.
         But I could not understand why Priest-Kings should wish
         me slain. Was I not engaged, in a sense, in their work? Had I
         not come to the Wagon Peoples on their behalf, to search for
         the doubtless golden sphere that was the last egg of Priest-
         Kings, the final hope of their race?
         l
         Now they wished me to die.
         It did not seem possible.
         I prepared to fight for my life, selling it as dearly as
         possible on the dais of Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the
         Tuchuks, for what Gorean would dare reject the command
         of Priest-Kings? I stood up, unsheathing my sword.
         One or two of the men-at-arms immediately drew the
         quiver
         A small smile touched the broad face of Kutiatuchik.
         "Put your sword away and sit down," said Kamchak.
         Dumbfounded, I did so.
_


 LA "J~
 51
 "It is," said Kamchak, "obviously not a message of Priest-
 Kings."
 "Now do you know?" I asked.
 The scarred face wrinkled again and Kamchak rocked
 back and slapped his knees. He laughed, "Do you think
 Priest-Kings, if they wished you dead, would ask others to do
 this for them?" He pointed at the opened collar lying before
 him on the rug. "Do you think Priest-Kings would use a
 Turian message collar?" He pointed his broad finger at Bliza-
 beth Cardwell. "Do you think Priest-Kings would need a girl
 to find you?" Kamchak threw back his head and laughed
 loudly, and even Kutaituchik smiled. "No," said Kamchak,
 slapping his knee, "Priest-Kings do not need Tuchuks to do
 their killing!"
 What Kamchak had said then seemed to make a great
 deal of sense to me. Yet it seemed strange that anyone, no
 matter whom, would dare to use the name of Priest-Kings
 falsely. Who, or what, could dare such a thing? Besides, how
 did I know that the message was not from Priest-Kings? I
 knew, as Kamchak and Kutaituchik did not, of the recent
 Nest War beneath the Sardar, and of the disruption in the
 technological complexes of the Nest who knew to what
 primitive devices Priest-Kings might now find themselves
 reduced Yet, on the whole, I tended to agree with
 Kamchak, that it was not likely the message came from
 Priest-Kings. It had been, after all, months since the Nest
 War and surely, by now, to some extent, Priest-Kings would
 have managed to restore-significant portions of the equip-
 ment, devices of surveillance and control, by means of which
 they had, for such long millennia, managed to maintain their
 mastery of this barbarian sphere. Besides this, as far as I
 knew, Misk, who was my friend and between whom and
 myself there was Nest Trust, was still the highest born of the
 living Priest-Kings and the final authority in matters of im-
 portance in the Nest; I knew that Misk, if no other, would
 not have wished my death. And finally, I reminded myself
 again, was I not now engaged in their work? Was I not now
 attempting to be of service to them? Was I not now among
 the Wagon Peoples, in peril perhaps, on their behalf?
 But, I asked myself, if this message was not from Priest-
 Kings, from whom could it be? Who would dare this? And
 who but Priest-Kings would know that I was among the
 Wagon Peoples? But yet I told myself someone, or some-
 thing must know others, not Priest-Kings. There must be
   others, who did not wish me to succeed in my work,
  Alto wished Priest-Kings, the race, to die, others who were !
   capable even of bringing humans from Earth for their pur- !
   poses technologically advanced others who were, perhaps, I
   cautiously, invisibly, at war with Priest-Kings who perhaps
   wished as prize this world, or perhaps this world and Earth
   as well, our sun and its planets others, who perhaps stood
   on the margins of our system, waiting perhaps for the
   demise of the power of Priest-Kings, perhaps the shield
   which unknown to men, had protected them perhaps frown
   the time of the first grasping of stones, from the time even
   before an intelligent, prehensile animal could build fires in the
   mouth of its lair.
   But these speculations were too fantastic, and I dismissed
   them.
   There was remaining, however, a mystery, and I was deter-
   mined to resolve it.
   The answer possibly lay in Turia.
   In the meantime I would, of course, continue my work. I
   would try, for Misk, to find the egg, and return it to the
   Sardar. I suspected, truly as it turned out, that the mystery
   and my mission were not utterly unconnected.
   "what," I asked Kamchak, "would you do if you thought
   the message were truly from Priest-Kings?"
   "Nothing," said Kamchak, gravely.
   "You would risk," I asked, "the herds the wagons the
   peoples?" Both Kamchak and I knew that Priest-Kings were
   not lightly to be disobeyed. Their vengeance could extend to
   the total and complete annihilation of cities. Indeed their
   power, as I knew, was sufficient to destroy planets.
   "Yes," said Kamchak.
   "Why?" I asked.
   He looked at me and smiled. "Because," said he, "we have
   together held grass and earth."
   Kutaituchik, Karnchak and I then regarded Elizabeth
   Cardwell.
   I knew that, as far as the interrogation was concerned, she
   had served her purpose. There was nothing more to be
   learned from her. She, too, must have sensed this, for she
   seemed, though she did not move, terribly frightened. Her
   fear could be read in her eyes, in the slight, tremulous
   movement of her lower lip. In the affairs of state she was
   now without value. Then uncontrollably, piteously, suddenly,
 trembling in the Sirik, she put her head down to the pelt of
 the larl. "Please," she said, "do not kill me."
 I translated for Kamchak and Kutaituchik.
 Kutaituchik addressed the question to her.
 "Are you zealous to please the fancy of Tuchuks?"
 I translated.
 With horror Elizabeth Cardwell lifted her head from the
 pelt and regarded her captors. She shook her head, wildly,
 "No, please no!"
 "Impale her," said Kutaituchik.
 Two warriors rushed forward and seized the girl under the
 arms, lifting her from the pelt.
 "What are they going to do?" she cried.
 "They intend to impale you," I told her.
 She began to scream. "Please, please, please!"
 My hand was on the hilt of my sword, but Kamchak's
 hand rested on mine.
 Kamchak turned to Kutaituchik. "She seems zealous," he
 said.
 Once again Kutaituchik addressed his question to her, and
 I translated it.
 "Are you zealous to please the fancy of Tuchuks?"
 The men who held the girl allowed her to fall to her knees
 between them. "Yes," she said, piteously, "yes!"
 Kutaituchik, Kamchak and I regarded her.
 "Yes," she wept, her head to the rug, "I am zealous to
 please the fancy of Tuchuks."
 I translated for Kutaituchik and Kamchak.
 "Ask," demanded Kutaituchik, "if she begs to be a slave
 girl."
 I translated the question.
 "Yes," wept Elizabeth Cardwell, "yes I beg to be a slave

 Perhaps in that moment Elizabeth Cardwell recalled the
 strange man, so fearsome, gray of face with eyes like glass,
 who had SO examined her on Earth, before whom she had
 stood as though on a block, unknowingly being examined for
 her fitness to bear the message collar of Turia. How she had
 challenged him, how she had walked, how insolent she had
 been Perhaps in that moment she thought how amused the
 man might be could he see her now, that proud girl, now in
 the Sirik, her head to the pelt of a larl, kneeling to barbari-
 ans, begging to be a slave girl; and if she thought of these
 things how she must have then cried out in her heart, for she
 would have then recognized that the man would have known
 full well what lay in store for her; how he must have laughed
 within himself at her petty show of female pride, her vanity,
 knowing it was this for which the lovely brown-haired girl
 in the yellow shift was destined.
 "I grant her wish," said Kutaituchik. Then to a warrior
 nearby, he said, "Bring meat."
 The warrior leapt from the dais and, in a few moments,
 returned with a handful of roasted bosk meat.
 Kutaituchik gestured for the girl, trembling, to be brought
 forward, and the two warriors brought her to him, placing
 her directly before him.
 He took the meat in his hand and gave it to Kamchak,
 who bit into it, a bit of juice running at the side of his
 mouth; Kamchak then held the meat to the girl.
 "Nat," I told her.
 Elizabeth Cardwell took the meat in her two hands,
 confined before her by slave bracelets and the chain of the
 Sirik, and, bending her head, the hair falling forward, ate it.
 She, a slave, had accepted meat from the hand of
 Kamchak of the Tuchuks.
 She belonged to him now.
 'La Kajira," she said, putting her head down, then cover-
 ing her face with her manacled hands, weeping. "La Kajira.
 La Kajiral"
 If I had hoped for an easy answer to the riddles which
 concerned me, or a swift end to my search for the egg of
 Priest-Kings, I was disappointed, for I learned nothing of
 either for months.
 I had hoped to go to Turia, there to seek the answer to the
 mystery of the message collar, but it was not to be, at least
 until the spring.
 "It is the Omen Year," had said Kamchak of the Tuchuks.
 The herds would circle Turia, for this was the portion of
 the Omen Year called the Passing of Turia, in which the
 Wagon Peoples gather and begin to move toward their winter
 pastures; the second portion of the Omen Year is the Winter-
 ing, which takes place far north of Turia, the equator being
 approached in this hemisphere, of course, from the south; the
 third and final portion of the Omen Year is the Return to
 Turia, which takes place in the spring, or as the Wagon
 Peoples have it, in the Season of Little Grass. It is in the
 spring that the omens are taken, regarding the possible elec-
 tion of the Ubar San, the One Ubar, he who would be Ubar
 of all the Wagons, of all the Peoples.
 I did manage, however, from the back of the kailla, which
 I learned to ride, to catch a glimpse of distant, high-walled,
 nine-gated Turia.
 It seemed a lofty, fine city, white and shimmering, rising
"Be patient, Tart Cabot," said Kamchak, beside me on his
 55
 .




_







 ;~
 8
                      The Wintering
 If I had hoped for an easy answer to the riddles which
 concerned me, or a swift end to my search for the egg of
 Priest-Kings, I was disappointed, for I learned nothing of
 either for months.
 I had hoped to go to Turia, there to seek the answer to the
 mystery of the message collar, but it was not to be, at least
 until the spring.
 "It is the Omen Year," had said Kamchak of the Tuchuks.
 The herds would circle Turia, for this was the portion of
 the Omen Year called the Passing of Turia, in which the
 Wagon Peoples Bather and begin to move toward their winter
 pastures; the second portion of the Omen Year is the Winter-
 ing, which takes place far north of Turia, the equator being
 approached in this hemisphere, of course, from the south; the
 third and final portion of the Omen Year is the Return to
 Curia, which takes place in the spring, or as the Wagon
 Peoples have it, in the Season of Little Grass. It is in the
 spring that the omens are taken, regarding the possible elec-
 tion of the Ubar San, the One Ubar, he who would be Ubar
 of all the Wagons, of all the Peoples.
 I did manage, however, from the back of the kailla, which
 I learned to ride, to catch a glimpse of distant, high-walled,
 nine-gated Turia.
 It seemed a lofty, fine city, white and shimmering, rising
"Be patient, Tart Cabot," said Kamchak, beside me on his
 55
_







        56
        kaiila. "In the spring there will be the games of Love War
        and I will go to Turia, and you may then, if you wish,
        accompany me."
        "Good," I said.
        I would wait. It seemed, upon reflection, the best thing to
        do. The mystery of the message collar, intriguing as it might
        be, was of secondary importance. For the time I put it from
        my mind. My main interests, my primary objective, surely lay
        not in distant Turia, but with the wagons.
        I wondered on what Kamchak had called the games of
        Love War, said to take place on the Plains of a Thousand
        Stakes. I supposed, in time, that I would learn of this.
        "After the games of Love War," said Kamchak, "the
        omens win be taken."
        I nodded, and we rode back to the herds.
        There had not been, I knew, a Ubar San in more than a
        hundred years. It did not seem likely, either, that one would
        be elected in the spring. Even in the time I had been with the
        wagons I had gathered that it was only the implicit truce of
        the Omen Year which kept these four fierce, warring peoples
        from lunging at one another's throats, or more exactly put, at
        one another's bask. Naturally, as a Koroban, and one with a
        certain affection for the cities of Gor, particularly those of
        the north, particularly Ko-ro-ba, Ar, Thentis and Tharna, I
        was not disappointed at the likelihood that a Ubar San would
        not be elected. Indeed, I found few who wished a Ubar San
        to be chosen. The Tuchuks, like the other Wagon Peoples,
        are intensely independent. Yet, each ten years, the omens are
        taken. I originally regarded the Omen Year as a rather
        pointless institution, but I came to see later that there is
        much to be said for it: it brings the Wagon Peoples together
        from time to time, and in this time, aside from the simple
        values of being together, there is much bask trading and
        some exchange of women, free as well as slave; the bask
        trading genetically freshens the herds and I expect much the
        same thing, from the point of view of biology, can be said of
        the exchange of the women; more Importantly, perhaps, for
        one can always steal women and bask, the Omen Year
        provides an institutionalized possibility for the uniting of the
        Wagon Peoples in a time of crisis, should they be divided and
        threatened. I think that those of the Wagons who instituted
        the Omen Year, more than a thousand years ago, were wise
        men.
 How was it, I wondered, that Kamchak was going to Tigris
 in the spring?
 I sensed him to be a man of importance with the wagons.
 There were perhaps negotiations to be conducted, perhaps
 having to do with what were called the games of Love War,
 or perhaps having to do with trade.
 I had learned, to my surprise, that trade did occasionally
 take place with Turia. Indeed, when I had learned this, it had
 fired my hopes that I might be able to approach the city in
 the near future, hopes which, as it turned out, were disap-
 pointed, though perhaps well so.
 The Wagon Peoples, though enemies of Turia, needed and
 wanted her goods, in particular materials of metal and cloth,
 which are highly prized among the Wagons. Indeed, even the
 chains and collars of slave girls, worn often by captive Turian
 girls themselves, are of Turian origin. The Turians, on the
 other hand, take factor or trade in trade for their goods obtained by manu-
 with other cities principally the horn and
 hide of the bask, which naturally the Wagon Peoples, who
 live on the bask, have in plenty. The Turians also, I note,
 receive other goods from the Wagon Peoples, who tend to be
 fond of the raid, goods looted from caravans perhaps a
 thousand pasangs from the herds, indeed some of them even
 on the way to and from Turia itself. From these raids the
 Wagon Peoples obtain a miscellany of goods which they are
 willing to barter to the Turians, jewels, precious metals,
 spices, colored table salts, harnesses and saddles for the
 ponderous tharlarion, furs of small river animals, tools for
 the field, scholarly scrolls, inks and papers, root vegetables,
 dried fish, powdered medicines, ointments, perfume and wom-
 en, customarily plainer ones they do not wish to keep for
 themselves; prettier wenches, to their dismay, are usually
 kept with the wagons; some of the plainer women are sold
 for as little as a brass cup; a really beautiful girl, particularly
 if of free birth and high caste, might bring as much as forty
 pieces of gold; such are, however, seldom sold; the Wagon
 Peoples enjoy being served by civilized slaves of great beauty
 and high station; during the day, in the heat and dust, such
 girls will care for the wagon bask and gather fuel for the
 dung fires; at night they will please their masters. The Wagon
 Peoples sometimes are also willing to barter silks to the
 Turians, but commonly they keep these for their own slave
 girls, who wear them in the secrecy of the wagons; free
 women, incidentally, among the Wagon Peoples are not per
       misted to wear silk; it is claimed by those of the Wagons,
       delightfully I think, that any woman who loves the feel of
       silk on her body is, in the secrecy of her heart and blood, a
       slave girl, whether or not some master has yet forced her to
       don the collar. It might be added that there are two items
       which the Wagon Peoples will not sell or trade to Turia, one
       is a living bask and the other is a girl from the city itself,
       though the latter are sometimes, for the sport of the young
       men, allowed, as it is said, to run for the city. They are then
       hunted from the back of the kaiila with bole and thongs.
       The winter came fiercely down on the herds some days
       before expected, with its fierce snows and the long winds that
       sometimes have swept twenty-five hundred pasangs across the
       prairies; snow covered the grass, brittle and brown already,
       and the herds were split into a thousand fragments, each
       with its own riders, spreading out over the prairie, pawing
       through the snow, snuffing about? pulling up and chewing at
       the grass, mostly worthless and frozen. The animals began to
       die and the keening of women, crying as though the wagons
       were burning and the Turians upon them, carried over the
       prairies. Thousands of the Wagon Peoples, free and slave, dug
       in the snow to find a handful of grass to feed their animals.
       Wagons had to be abandoned on the prairie, as there was no
       time to train new bask to the harness, and the herds must
       needs keep moving.
       At last, seventeen days after the first snows, the edges of
       the herds began to reach their winter pastures far north of
       Turia, approaching the equator from the south. Here the
       snow was little more than a frost that melted in the after-
       noon sun, and the grass was live and nourishing. Still farther
       north, another hundred pasangs, there was no snow and the
       peoples began to sing and once more dance about their fires
       of bask dung.
       "The bask are safe," Kamchak had said. I had seen strong
       men leap from the back of the kaiila and, on their knees,
       tears in their eyes, kiss the green, living grass. "The bosk are
       safe," they had cried, and the cry had been taken up by the
       women and carried from wagon to wagon, "IT he bosk are
       safer"
       This year, perhaps because it was the Omen Year, the
       Wagon Peoples did not advance farther north than was
       necessary to ensure the welfare of the herds. They did not, in
       fact, even cross the western Cartius, far from cities, which
       they often do, swimming the bask and kaiila, floating the
wagons, the men often crossing on the backs of the seam,,
ming bask. It was the Omen Year, and not a year, apparently,
in which to risk war with far peoples, particularly not those?
Of cities like Ar, whose warriors had mastered the tarn and'
might, from the air, have wrought great destruction on the
herds and wagons
The Wintering was not unpleasant, although, even so far
north, the days and nights were often quite chilly; the Wagon
Peoples and their slaves as well, wore boskhide and furs
during this time; both male and female, slave or free, wore
furred boots and trousers, coats and the flopping, ear-flapped
caps that tied under the chin; in this time there was often no
way to mark the distinction between the free woman and the
slave girl, save that the hair of the latter must needs be
unbound; in some cases, of course, the Turian collar was
visible, if worn on the outside of the coat, usually under the
furred collar; the men, too, free and slave, were dressed
similarly, save that the Kajiri, or he-slaves, wore shackles,
usually with a run of about a foot of chain.
  On the back of the kaiila, the black lance in hand, bending
down in the saddle, I raced past a wooden wand fixed in the
earth, on the top of which was placed a dried tospit, a small,
wrinkled, yellowish-white peachlike fruit, about the size of a
plum, which grows on the tospit bush, patches of which are
indigenous to the drier valleys of the western Cartius. They
are bitter but edible.
  "Well done!" cried Kamchak as he saw the tospit, unsplit,
impaled halfway down the shaft of the lance, stopped only by
my fist and the retaining strap.
Such a thrust was worth two points for us.
  I heard Elizabeth Cardwell's cry of joy as she leaped into
the air, clumsy in the furs, clapping her hands. She carried,
on a strap around her neck, a sack of tospits. I looked at her
and smiled. Her face was vital and flushed with excitement.
  "Tospit!" called Conrad of the Kassars, the Blood People,
and the girl hastened to set another fruit on the wand.
There was a thunder of kaiila paws on the worn turf and
Conrad, with his red lance, nipped the tospit neatly from the
tip of the wand, the lance point barely passing into it, he
having drawn back at the last instant.
  "Well done!" I called to him. My own thrust had been full
thrust, accurate enough but rather heavily done, in war, such
a thrust might have lost me the lance, leaving it in the
_

 60
 body of an enemy. His thrust was clearly, I acknowledged,
 worth three points.
 Kamchak then rode, and he, like Conrad of the Kassars,
 deftly took the fruit from the wand; indeed, his lance enter-
 ing the fruit perhaps a fraction of an inch less than had
 Conrad's. It was, however, also a three-point thrust.
 The warrior who then rode with Conrad thundered down
 the lane in the turf.
 There was a cry of disappointment, as the lance tip
 sheared the fruit, not retaining it, knocking it from the wand.
 It was only a one-point thrust.
 Elizabeth cried out again, with pleasure, for she was of the
 wagon of Kamchak and Tarl Cabot.
 The rider who had made the unsatisfactory thrust suddenly
 whirled the kaiila toward the girl, and she fell to her knees,
 realizing she should not have revealed her pleasure at his
 failure, putting her head to the grass. I tensed, but Kamchak
 laughed, and held me back. The rider's kaiila was now
 rearing over the girl, and he brought the beast to rest. With
 the tip of his lance, stained with the tospit fruit, he cut the
 strap that held the cap on her head, and then brushed the cap
 off; then, delicately, with its tip, he lifted her chin that she
 might look at him.
 "Forgive me, Master," said Elizabeth Cardwell.
 Slave girls, on Gor, address all free men as master,
 though, of course, only one such would be her true master.
 I was pleased with how well, in the past months, Elizabeth
 had done with the language. Of course, Kamchak had rented
 three Turian girls, slaves, to train her; they had done so,
 binding her wrists and leading her about the wagons, teaching
 her the words for things, beating her with switches when she
 made mistakes; Elizabeth had learned quickly. She was an
 intelligent girl.
 It had been hard for Elizabeth Cardwell, particularly the
 first weeks. It is not an easy transition to make, that from a
 bright, lovely young secretary in a pleasant, fluorescently lit,
 air-conditioned office on Madison Avenue in New
 to a slave girl in the wagon of Tuchuk warrior.
 When her interrogation had been completed, and she had
 collapsed on the dais of Kutaituchik, crying out in misery
 "La Kajira. La Kajira!" Kamchak had folded her, still weep-
 ing, clad in the Sirik, in the richness of the pelt of the red
 tart in which she had originally been placed before us.
 As I had followed him from the dais I had seen Kutaituchik,
 the interview ended, absently reaching into the small
 golden box of kanda strings, his eyes slowly beginning to
 close.
 Kamchak, that night, chained Elizabeth Cardwell in his
 wagon, rather than beneath it to the wheel, running a short
 length of chain from a slave ring set in the floor of the
 wagon box to the collar of her Sirik. He had then carefully
 wrapped her, shivering and weeping, in the pelt of the red
 larl.
 She lay there, trembling and moaning, surely on the verge
 of hysteria. I was afraid the next phase of her condition
 would be one of numbness, shock, perhaps of refusal to
 believe what had befallen her, madness.
 Kamchak had looked at me. He was genuinely puzzled by
 what he regarded as her unusual emotional reactions. He
 was, of course, aware that no girl, Gorean or otherwise,
 could be expected to take lightly a sudden reduction to an
 abject and complete slavery, particularly considering what
 that would mean among the wagons.
 He did, however, regard Miss Cardwell's responses as
 rather peculiar, and somewhat reprehensible. Once he got up
 and kicked her with his furred boot, telling her to be quiet.
 She did not, of course, understand Gorean, but his intention
 and his impatience were sufficiently clear to preclude the
 necessity of a translation. She stopped moaning, but she
 continued to shiver, and sometimes she sobbed. I saw him
 take a slave whip from the wall and approach her, and then
 turn back and replace it on the wall. I was surprised that he
 had not used it, and wondered why. I was pleased that he
 had not beaten her, for I might have interfered. I tried to
 talk to Kamchak and help him to understand the shock that
 the girl had undergone, the total alteration of her life and
 circumstances, unexplained finding herself alone on the
 prairie, the Tuchuks, the capture, the return to the Wagons,
 her examination in the grassy avenue, the Sirik, the interro-
 gation, the threat of execution, then the fact, difficult for her
 to grasp, of being literally an owned slave girl. I tried to
 explain to Kamchak that her old world had not prepared her
 for these things, for the slaveries of her old world are of a
 different kind, more subtle and invisible, thought by some
 not even to exist.
 Kamchak said nothing, but then he got up and from a
 chest in the wagon he took forth a goblet and filled it with an
 amber fluid, into which he shook a dark, bluish powder. He
 .~.i
_

       62
                        NOMADS OF GOR
       then took Elizabeth Cardwell in his left arm and with his
       right hand gave her the drink. Her eyes were frightened, but
       she drank. In a few moments she was asleep.
       Once or twice that night, to Kamchak's annoyance and my
       own loss of sleep, she screamed, jerking at the chain, but we
       discovered that she had not awakened.
       I supposed that on the morrow Kamchak would call for
       the Tuchuk Iron Master, to brand what he called his little
       barbarian; the brand of the Tuchuk slave, incidentally, is not
       the same as that generally used in the cities. which for girls,
       is the first letter of the expression Kajira in cursive script. but
       the sign of the four bask horns that of the Tuchuk standard;
       the brand of the four bask horns, set in such a manner as to
       somewhat resemble the letter "H." is only about an inch
       high; the common Gorean brand, on the other hand, is
       usually an inch and a half to two inches high; the brand of the
       four bask horns, of course, is also used to mark the bask of
       the Tuchuks, but there, of course, it is much larger, forming
       roughly a six-inch square; following the branding, I supposed
       that Kamchak would have one of the tiny nose rings affixed;
       all Tuchuk females, slave or free, wear such rings; after these
       things there would only remain, of course, an engraved

       Turian collar and the clothing of Elizabeth Cardwell Kajir.
       In the morning I awakened to find Elizabeth sitting, red-
       eyed, at the side of the wagon, leaning back against one of
       the poles that supported the wagon hides, wrapped in the pelt
       of the red larl.
       She looked at me. "I'm hungry," she said.
       My heart leaped. The girl was stronger than I had
       thought. I was very pleased. On the dais of Kutaituchik I had
       feared that she might not be able to survive, that she was too
       weak for the world of Gor. I had been troubled that the
       shock of her radical transposition between worlds, coupled
       with her reduction to servitude, might disarrange her mind,
       might shatter her and make her worthless to the Tuchuks,
       who might then have simply cast her to the kaiila and herd
       sleen. I saw now, however, that Elizabeth Cardwell was
       strong, that she would not go mad, that she was determined
       to live.
       "Kamchak of the Tuchuks is your master," I said. "He will
       eat first. Afterward, if he chooses, you will be fed."
       She leaned back against the wagon pole. " right," she
       said.
       When Kamchak rolled out of his furs Elizabeth, involun
tartly, shrank back, until the pole would permit her to with-
draw no further.
Kamchak looked at me. "How is the little barbarian this
morning?" he asked.
"Hungry," I said.
"Excellent," he said.
He looked at her, her back tight against the wagon pole,
clutching the pelt of the larl about her with her braceleted
hands.
She was, of course, different from anything he had ever
owned. She was his first barbarian. He did not know exactly
what to make of her. He was used to girls whose culture had
prepared them for the very real possibility of slavery, though
perhaps not a slavery as abject as that of being a wench of
Tuchuks. The Gorean girl is, even if free, accustomed to
slavery; she will perhaps own one or more slaves herself; she
knows that she is weaker than men and what this can mean;
she knows that cities fall and caravans are plundered; she
knows she might even, by a sufficiently bold warrior, be
captured in her own quarters and, bound and hooded, be
carried on tarnback over the walls of her own city. More-
over, even if she is never enslaved, she is familiar with the
duties of slaves and what is expected of them; if she should
be enslaved she will know, on the whole, what is expected of
her, what is permitted her and what is not; moreover, the
Gorean girl is literally educated, fortunately or not, to the
notion that it is of great importance to know how to please
men; accordingly, even girls who will be free companions,
and never slaves, learn the preparation and serving of exotic
dishes, the arts of walking, and standing and being beautiful
the care of a man's equipment, the love dances of their city,
and so on. Elizabeth Cardwell, of course, knew nothing of
these things. I was forced to admit that she was, on almost
all counts, pretty much what Kamchak thought a little
barbarian. But, to be sure, a very pretty little barbarian.
Kamchak snapped his fingers and pointed to the rug,
Elizabeth then knelt to him, clutching the pelt about her, and
put her head to his feet.
She was slave.
To my surprise Kamchak, for no reason that he explained
to me, did not clothe Elizabeth Cardwell Kajir, much to the
irritation of other slave girls about the camp. Moreover, he
did not brand her, nor fix in her nose the tiny golden ring of
the Tuchuk women, nor did he even, incomprehensibly, put
       her in the Turian collar. He did not permit her, of course, to
       bind or dress her hair; it must be worn loose; that alone,
       naturally, was sufficient to mark her slave among the wag-
       ons.
       For clothing he permitted her to cut and sew, as well as
       she could, a sleeveless garment from the pelt of the red larl.
       She did not sew well and it amused me to hear her cursing at
       the side of the wagon, bound now only by a collar and chain
       to the slave ring. time after time sticking the bone needle into
       her fingers as it emerged through the hide, or fouling the
       leather-threaded stitches, which would either be too tight,
       wrinkling and bunching the fur, or too loose, exposing what
       might eventually lie beneath it. I gathered that girls such as
       Elizabeth Cardwell, used to buying machine-made, presewn
       garments on Earth, were not as skilled as they might be in
       certain of the homely crafts which used to be associated with
       homemaking, crafts which might, upon occasion, it seemed,
       come In handy.
       At last she had finished the garment, and Kamchak
       unchained her that she might rise and put it on.
       Not surprisingly, but to my amusement, I noted that it
       hung serveral inches below her knees, indeed, only about four
       inches or so above her ankles. Kamchak took one look and,
       with a quiva, shortened it considerably,-indeed, until it hung
       even more briefly than had the quite short, delightful yellow
       shift in which she had been captured.
       "But it was the length of the leather dresses of the Tuchuk
       women," Elizabeth had dared to protest.
       I translated.
       "But you are slave," had said Kamchak.
       I translated his remark.
       She dropped her head, defeated.
       Miss Cardwell had slim, lovely legs. Kamchak, a man, had
       desired to see them. Besides being a man, of course,
       Kamchak was her master; he owned the wench; thus he
       would have his desire. I will admit if need he that I was not
       displeased with his action. I did not particularly mind the
       sight of the lovely Miss Cardwell moving about the wagon.
       Kamchak made her walk back and forth once or twice,
       and spoke to her rather sharply about her posture, then, to
       the surprise of both Miss Cardwell and myself, he did not
       chain her, but told her she might walk about the camp
       unattended, warning her only to return before dusk and the
       release of the herd sleen. She dropped her head shyly, and
  smiled, and sped from the wagon. I was pleased to see her
  that much free.
  "You like her?" I asked.
  Kamchak grinned. "She is only a little barbarian," he said.
  Then he looked at me. "It is Aphris of Turia I want," he
  said.
  I wondered who she might be.
  On the whole, it seemed to me that Kamchak treated his
  little barbarian slave notably well, considering that he was
  Tuchuk. This does not mean that she was not worked hard,
  nor that she did not receive a good drubbing now and then,
  but, on the whole, considering the corneas lot of a Tuchuk
  slave girl, I do not think she was ill used. Once, it might be
  noted, she returned from searching for fuel with the dung
  sack, dragging behind her, only half full. "It is all I could
  find," she told Kamchak. He then, without ceremony, thrust
  her head first into the sack and tied it shut. He released her
  the next morning. Elizabeth Cardwell never again brought a
  half-filled dung sack to the wagon of Kamchak of the
  Tuchuks.
  Now the Kassar, mounted on his kaiila, his lance under the
  tip of the girl's chin. who knelt before him, looking up at
  him, suddenly laughed and removed the lance.
  I breathed a Sign of relief.
  He rode his kaiila to Kamchak. "What do you want for
  your pretty little barbarian slave?" he asked.
  "She is not for sale," said Kamchak.
  "Will you wager for her?" pressed the rider. He was
  Albrecht of the Kassars, and, with Conrad of the Kassars,
  had been riding against myself and Kamchak.
  My heart sank.
  Kamchak's eyes gleamed. He was Tuchuk. "What are your
  terms?" he asked.
  "On the outcome of the sport," he said, and then pointed
  to two girls, both his, standing to the left in their furs,
  "against those two." The other girls were both Turian They
  were not barbarians. Both were lovely. Both were, doubtless,
  well skilled in the art of pleasing the fancy of warriors of the
  Wagon Peoples.
  Conrad, hearing the wager of A1brecht, snorted derisively.
  "No," cried Albrecht, "I am serious!"
  "Done!" cried Kamchak.
  Watching us there were a few children, some men, some
                            l
                            r
                            :
                            ,

  _


        66
        NOMADS OF (]OR
        slave girls. As soon as Kamchak had agreed to Albrecht's
        proposal the children and several of the slave girls immedi-
        ately began to rush toward the wagons, delightedly crying
        "Wager! Wager!"
        Soon, to my dismay, a large number of Tuchuks, male and
        female, and their male or female slaves, began to gather near
        the worn lane on the turf. The terms of the wager were soon
        well known. In the crowd, as well as Tuchuks and those of
        the Tuchuks, there were some Kassars, a Paravaci or two,
        even one of the Kataii. The slave girls in the crowd seemed
        particularly excited. I could hear bets being taken. The
        Tuchuks, not too unlike Goreans generally, are fond of
        gambling. Indeed, it is not unknown that a Tuchuk will bet
        his entire stock of bask on the outcome of a single kaiila
        race; as many as a dozen slave girls may change hands on
        something as small as the direction that a bird will fly or the
        number of seeds in a tospit.
        The two girls of Albrecht were standing to one side, their
        eyes shining, trying not to smile with pleasure. Some of the
        girls in the crowd looked enviously on them. It is a great
        honor to a girl to stand as a stake in Tuchuk gambling. To
        my amazement Elizabeth Cardwell, too, seemed rather
        pleased with the whole thing, though for what reason I could
        scarcely understand. She came over to me and looked up.
        She stood on tiptoes in her furred boots and held the stirrup.
        "You will win," she said.
        I wished that I was as confident as she.
        I was second rider to Kamchak, as Albrecht was to Con-
        rad, he of the Kassars, the Blood People.
        There is a priority of honor involved in being first rider, but
        points scored are the same by either rider, depending on his
        performance. The first rider is, commonly, as one might
        expect, the more experienced, skilled rider.
        In the hour that followed I rejoiced that I had spent much
        of the last several months, when not riding with Kamchak in
        the care of his bask, in the pleasant and, to a warrior,
        satisfying activity of learning Tuchuk weaponry, both of the
        hunt and war. Kamchak was a skilled instructor in these
        matters-and, freely, hours at a time, until it grew too dark to
        see, supervised my practice with such fierce tools as the lance,
        the quiva and bole. I learned as well the rope and bow. The
        bow, of course, small, for use from the saddle, lacks the
        range and power of the Gorean longbow or crossbow; still, at
        close range, with considerable force, firing rapidly, arrow
after arrow, it is a fearsome weapon. I was most fond,
perhaps, of the balanced saddle knife, the quiva; it is about a
foot in length, double edged; it tapers to a daggerlike point. I
acquired, I think, skill in its use. At forty feet I could strike a
thrown tospit; at one hundred feet I could strike a- layered
boskhide disk, about four inches in width, fastened to a lance
thrust in the turf.
Kamchak had been pleased.
I, too, naturally had been pleased.
But if I had indeed acquired skills with those fierce arti-
cles, such skills, in the current contests, were to be tested to
the utmost.
As the day grew late points were accumulated, but, to the
zest and frenzy of the crowd, the lead in these contests of
arms shifted back and forth, first being held by Kamchak and
myself, then by Conrad and Albrecht.
In the crowd, on the back of a kaiila, I noted the girl
Hereena, of the First Wagon, whom I had seen my first day
in the camp of the Tuchuks, she who had almost ridden
down Kamchak and myself between the wagons. She was a
very exciting, vital, proud girl and the tiny golden nose ring,
against her brownish skin, with her flashing black eyes, did
not detract from her considerable but rather insolent beauty.
She, and others like her, had been encouraged and spoiled
from childhood in all their whims, unlike most other Tuchuk
women, that they might be fit prizes, Kamchak had told me, in
the games of Love War. Turian warriors, he told me, enjoy
such women, the wild girls of the Wagons. A young man,
blondish-haired with blue eyes, unscarred, bumped against
the girl's stirrup in the press of the crowd. She struck him
twice with the leather quirt in her hand, sharply, viciously. I
could see blood on the side of his neck, where it joins the
shoulder.
"Slave!" she hissed.
He looked up angrily. "I am not a slave," he said. "I am
Tuchuk."
"Turian slaver" she laughed scornfully. "Beneath your furs
you wear, I wager, the Kes!"
"I am Tuchuk," he responded, looking angrily away.
Kamchak had told me of the young man. Among the
wagons he was nothing. He did what work he could, helping
with the bask, for a piece of meat from a cooking pot. He
was called Harold, which is not a Tuchuk name, nor a name
used among the Wagon Peoples, though it is similar to some
        of the Kassar names. It was an English name, but such are
        not unknown on Gor, having been passed down, perhaps, for
        more than a thousand years, the name of an ancestor, per"
        haps brought to Gor by Priest-Kings in what might have
        been the early Middle Ages of Earth. I knew the Voyages of
        Acquisition were of even much greater antiquity. I had
        determined, of course, to my satisfaction, having spoken with
        him once, that the boy, or young man, was indeed Gorean;
        his people and their people before them and as far back as
        anyone knew had been, as it is said, of the Wagons. The
        problem of the young man, and perhaps the reason that he
        had not yet won even the Courage Scar of the Tuchuks, was
        that he had fallen into the hands of Turian raiders in his
        youth and had spent several years in the city; in his adoles-
        cence he had, at great risk to himself, escaped from the city
        and made his way with great hardships across the plains to
        rejoin his people; they, of course, to his great disappoint-
        ment, had not accepted him, regarding him as more Turian
        than Tuchuk. His parents and people had been slain in the
        Turian raid in which he had been captured, so he had no kin.
        There had been, fortunately for him, a Year Keeper who had
        recalled the family. Thus he had not been slain but had been
        allowed to remain with the Tuchuks. He did not have his
        own wagon or his own bask. He did not even own a kaiila.
        He had armed himself with castoff weapons, with which he
        practiced in solitude. None of those, however, who led raids
        on enemy caravans or sorties against the city and its outlying
        fields, or retaliated upon their neighbors in the delicate mat-

        ters of bask stealing, would accept him in their parties. He
        had, to their satisfaction, demonstrated his prowess with
        weapons, but they would laugh at him. "You do not even
        own a kaiila," they would say. "You do not even wear the
        Courage Scar." I supposed that the young man would never
        be likely to wear the scar, without which, among the stern,
        cruel Tuchuks, he would be the continuous object of scorn,
        ridicule and contempt. Indeed, I knew that some among
        the wagons, the girl Hereena, for example, who seemed to
        bear him a great dislike, had insisted that he, though free,
        be forced to wear the Kes or the dress of a woman. Such
        would have been a great joke among the Tuchuks.
        I dismissed the girl, Hereena, and the young man, Harold,
        from my mind.
        Albrecht was rearing on his kaiila, loosening the bole at his
        saddle.
"Remove your furs," he instructed his two girls.
Immediately they did so and, in spite of the brisk, bright
chilly afternoon, they stood in the grass, clad Kajir,
They would run for us.
Kamchak raced his kaiila over to the edge of the crowd,
entering into swift negotiation with a warrior, one whose
wagon followed ours in the march of the Tuchuks. Indeed, it
had been from that warrior that Kamchak had rented the
girls who had dragged Elizabeth Cardwell about the wagons,
teaching her Gorean with thong and switch. I saw a flash of
copper, perhaps a tarn disk from one of the distant cities,
anal one of the warrior's girls, an attractive Turian wench,
Tuka, began to remove her fur.
She would run for one of the Kassars, doubtless Conrad.
Tuka, I knew, hated Elizabeth, and Elizabeth, I knew,
reciprocated the emotion with vehemence. Tuka, in the mat-
ter of teaching Elizabeth the language, had been especially
cruel. Elizabeth, bound, could not resist and did she try,
Tuka's companions, the others of her wagon, would leap
upon her with their switches flailing. Tuka, for her part,
understandably had reason to envy and resent the young
American slave. Elizabeth Cardwell, at least until now, had
escaped, as Tuka had not, the brand, the nose ring and
collar. Elizabeth was clearly some sort of favorite in her
wagon. Indeed, she was the only girl in the wagon. That
alone, though of course it meant she would work very hard,
was regarded as a most enviable distinction. Lastly, but
perhaps not least, Elizabeth Cardwell had been given for her
garment the pelt of a larl, while she, Tuka, must go about the
camp like all the others, clad Kajir.
I feared that Tuka would not run well, thus losing us the
match, that she would deliberately allow herself to be easily
snared.
But then I realized that this was not true. If Kamchak and
her master were not convinced that she had run as well as
she might, it wool not go easily with her. She would have
contributor to the victory of a Kassar over a Tuchuk. That
night, one of the hooded members of the Clan of Torturers
would have come to her wagon and fetched her away, never
to be seen again. She would run well, hating Elizabeth or
not. She would be running for her life.
Kamchak wheeled his kaiila and joined us. He pointed his
lance to Elizabeth Cardwell. "Remove your furs," he said.
_


  70
  ~ '
                      NOMADS or GOR
  Elizabeth did so and stood before us in the pelt of the larl,
  with the other girls.
  Although it was late in the afternoon the sun was still
  bright. The air was chilly. There was a bit of wind moving
  the grass.
  A black lance was fixed in the prairie about four hundred
  yards away. A rider beside it, on a kaiila, marked its place. It
  was not expected, of course, that any of the girls would reach
  the lance. If one did, of course, the rider would decree her
  safe. In the run the important thing was time, the dispatch
  and the skill with which the thing was accomplished. Tuchuk
  girls, Elizabeth and Tuka, would run for the Kassars; the two
  Kassar girls would run for Kamchak and myself; naturally
  each slave does her best for her master, attempting to evade
  his competitor.
  The time in these matters is reckoned by the heartbeat of
  a standing kaiila. Already one had been brought. Near the
  animal, on the turf, a long bask whip was laid in a circle,
  having a diameter of somewhere between eight and ten feet.
  The girl begins her run from the circle. The object of the
  rider is to effect her capture, secure her and return her, in as
  little time as possible, to the circle of the whip.
  Already a grizzled Tuchuk had his hand, palm flat, on the
  silken side of the standing kaiila.
  Kamchak gestured and Tuka, barefoot, frightened, stepped
  into the circle.
  Conrad freed his bole from the saddle strap. He held in his
  teeth a boskhide thong, about a yard in length. The saddle of
  the kaiila, like the tarn saddle, is made in such a way as to
  accommodate, bound across it, a female captive, rings being
  fixed on both sides through which binding fiber or thong may
  be passed. On the other hand, I knew, in this sport no time
  would be taken for such matters; in a few heartbeats of the
  kaiila the girl's wrists and ankles would be lashed together
  and she would be, without ceremony, slung over the pommel
  of the saddle, it the stake, her body the ring.
  "Run," said Conrad quietly.
  Tuka sped from the circle. The crowd began to cry out, to
  cheer, urging her on. Conrad, the thong in his teeth, the bole
  quiet at his side, watched her. She would receive a start of
  fifteen beats of the great heart of the kaiila, after which she
  would be about half way to the lance.
  The judge, aloud, was counting.
  At the count of ten Conrad began to slowly spin the bole.
It would not reach its maximum rate of revolution until he
was in full gallop, almost on the quarry.
At the count of fifteen, making no sound, not wanting to
warn the girl, Conrad spurred the kaiila in pursuit, bole
swinging.
The crowd strained to see.
The judge had begun to count again, starting with one, the
second counting, which would determine the rider's time.
The girl was fast and that meant time for us, if only
perhaps a beat. She must have been counting to herself
because only an instant or so after Conrad had spurred after
her she looked over her shoulder, seeing him approaching.
She must then have counted about three beats to herself, and
then she began to break her running pattern, moving to one
side and the other, making it difficult to approach her
swiftly.
"She runs well," said Kamchak.
Indeed she did, but in an instant I saw the leather flash of
the bole, with its vicious, beautiful almost ten-foot sweep,
streak toward the girl's ankles, and I saw her fall.
It was scarcely ten beats and Conrad had bound the
struggling, scratching Tuka, slung her about the pommel,
raced back, kaiila squealing, and threw the girl, wrists tied to
her ankles, to the turf inside the circle of the boskhide whip.
"Thirty," said the judge.
Conrad grinned.
Tuka, as best she could, squirmed in the bonds, fighting
them. Could she free a hand or foot, or even loosen the
thong, Conrad would be disqualified.
After a moment or two, the judge said, "Stop," and Tuka
obediently lay quiet. The judge inspected the thongs. "The
wench is secured," he announced.
In terror Tuka looked up at Kamchak, mounted on his
kaiila.
"You ran well," he told her.
She closed her eyes, almost fainting with relief.
She would live.
A Tuchuk warrior slashed apart the thongs with his quiva
and Tuka, only too pleased to be free of the circle, leaped up
and ran quickly to the side of her master. In a few moments,
panting, covered with sweat, she had pulled on her furs.
The next girl, a lithe Kassar girl, stepped into the circle
and Kamchak unstrapped his bole. It seemed to me she ran
excellently but Kamchak, with his superb skill, snared her
_


       72
       easily. To my dismay, as he returned racing toward the circle
       of the boskhide whip the girl, a fine wench, managed to sink
       her teeth into the neck of the kaiila causing it to rear
       squealing and hissing, then striking at her. By the time
       Kamchak had cuffed the girl from the animal's neck and
       struck the kaiila's snapping jaws from her twice-bitten leg
       and returned to the circle, he had used thirty-five beats.
       He had lost.
       When the girl was released, her leg bleeding, she was
       beaming with pleasure.
       "Well done," said Albrecht, her master, adding with a grin,
       "For a Turian slave."
       The girl looked down, smiling.
       She was a brave girl. I admired her. It was easy to see that
       she was bound to Albrecht the Kassar by more than a length
       of slave chain.
       At a gesture from Kamchak Elizabeth Cardwell stepped
       into the circle of the whip.
       She was now frightened. She, and I as well, had supposed
       that Kamchak would be victorious over Conrad. Had he been
       so, even were I defeated by Albrecht, as I thought likely, the
       points would have been even. Now, if I lost as well, she
       would be a Kassar wench.
       Albrecht was grinning, swinging the bole lightly, not in a
       circle but in a gentle pendulum motion, beside the stirrup of
       the kaiila.
       He looked at her. "Run," he said.
       Elizabeth Cardwell, barefoot, in the larl's pelt, streaked for
       the black lance in the distance.
       She had perhaps observed the running of Tuka and the
       Kassar girl, trying to watch and learn, but she was of course
       utterly inexperienced in this cruel sport of the men of the
       wagons. She had not, for example, timed her counting, for
       long hours, under the tutelage of a master, al against the
       heartbeat of a kaiila, he keeping the beat but not informing
       her what it was, until she had called the beat. Some girls of
       the Wagon Peoples in fact, incredible though it seems, are
       trained exhaustively in the art of evading the bole, and such
       a girl is worth a great deal to a master, who uses her in
       wagering. One of the best among the wagons I had heard
       was a Kassar slave, a swift Turian wench whose name was
       Dina. She had run in actual competition more than two
       hundred times; almost always she managed to interfere with
 and postpone her return to the circle; and forty times, an
 incredible feat, she had managed to reach the lance itself.
 At the count of fifteen, with incredible speed, Albrecht,
 bole now whirling, spurred silently after the fleeing Elizabeth
 Cardwell. She had misjudged the heartbeat or had not under-
 stood the swiftness of the kaiila, never having before ob-
 served it from the unenviable point of view of a quarry,
 because when she turned to see if her hunter had left the
 vicinity of the circle, he was upon her and as she cried out
 the bole struck her in an instant binding her legs and
 throwing her to the turf. It was hardly more than five or six
 beats, it seemed, before Elizabeth, her wrists lashed cruelly to
 her ankles, was thrown to the grass at the judge's feet.
 "Twenty-five!" announced the judge.
 There was a cheer from the crowd, which, though largely
 composed of Tuchuks, relished a splendid performance.
 Weeping Elizabeth jerked and pulled at the thongs re-
 straining her, helpless.
 The judge inspected the bonds. '`The wench is secured," he
 said.
 Elizabeth moaned.
 "Rejoice, Little Barbarian," said Albrecht, "tonight in
 Pleasure Silk you will dance the Chain Dance for Kassar
 Warriors."
 The girl turned her head to one side, shuddering in the
 thongs. A cry of misery escaped her.
 "Be silent," said Kamchak.
 Elizabeth was silent and, fighting her tears; lay quietly
 waiting to be freed.
 I cut the thongs from her wrists and ankles.
 "I tried," she said, looking up at me, tears in her eyes. "I
 tried."
 "Some girls," I told her, "have run from the bole more
 than a hundred times. Some are trained to do so."
 "Do you concede?" Conrad asked Kamchak.
 "No," said Kamchak. "My second rider must ride."
 "He is not even of the Wagon Peoples," said Conrad.
 "Nonetheless," said Kamchak, "he will ride."
  "He will not beat twenty-five," said Conrad.     ~
   Kamchak shrugged. I knew myself that twenty-five was a
 remarkable time. Albrecht was a fine rider and skilled in this
 sport and, of course, this time, his quary had been only an
 untrained barbarian slave, indeed, a girl who had never
 before run from the bole.
       "To the circle," said Albrecht, to the other Kassar girl.
       She was a beauty.
       She stepped to the circle quickly, throwing her head back,
       breathing deeply.
       She was an intelligent looking girl.
       Black-haired.
       Her ankles, I noted, were a bit sturdier than are thought
       desirable in a slave girl. They had withstood the shock of her
       body weight many times I gathered, in quick turnings, in
       leaps.
       1 wished that I had seen her run before, because most girls
       will have a running pattern, even in their dodging which, if
       you have seen it, several times, you can sense. Nothing simple,
       but something that, somehow, you can anticipate, if only to a
       degree. It is probably the result of gathering, from their
       running, how they think; then one tries to think with them
       and thus meet them with the bole. She was now breathing
       deeply, regularly. Prior to her entering the circle I had seen
       her moving about in the background, running a bit, loosening
       her legs, speeding the circulation of her blood.
       It was my guess that this was not the first time she had run
       from the bole.
       "If you win for us," Albrecht said to her, grinning down
       from the saddle of the kaiila, "this night you will be given a
       silver bracelet and five yards of scarlet silk."
       "I will win for you, Master," she said.
       I thought that a bit arrogant for a slave.
       Albrecht looked at me. "This wench," he said, "has never
       been snared in less than thirty-two beats."
       I noted a flicker pass through the eyes of Kamchak, but he
       seemed otherwise impassive.
       "She is an excellent runner," I said.
       The girl laughed.
       Then, to my surprise, she looked at me boldly, though
       wearing the Turian collar; though she wore the nose ring;
       though she were only a branded slave clad Kajir.
       "I wager," she said, "that 1 will reach the lance."
       This irritated me. Moreover, I was not insensitive to the
       fact that though she were slave and I a free man, she had not
       addressed me, as the custom is, by the title of Master. I had
       no objection to the omission itself, but I did object to the
       affront therein implied. For some reason this wench seemed
       to me rather arrogant, rather contemptuous.
       "I wager that you do not," I said.
 "Your terms!" she challenged.
 "What are yours?" I asked.
 She laughed. "If I win," she said, "you give me your bole,
 which I will present to my master."
 "Agreed," I said. "And if I should win?"
 "You will not," she said.
 "But if so?"
 "Then," said she, "I will give you a golden ring and a silver
 cup."
 "How is it that a slave has such riches?" I asked.
 She tossed her head in the air, not deigning to respond.
 "1 have given her several such things," said Albrecht.
 I now gathered that the girl facing me was not a typical
 slave, and that there must be a very good reason why she
 should have such things.
 "I do not want your golden ring and silver cup," I said.
 "What then could you want?" asked she.
 "Should I win," I said, "I will claim as my prize the kiss of
 an insolent wench."

 "Tuchuk sleep!" she cried, eyes flashing.
 Conrad and Albrecht laughed. Albrecht said to the girl, "It
 is permitted."
 "Very well, he-tharlarion," said the girl, "your bola
 against a kiss." Her shoulders were trembling with rage. "I
 will show you how a Kassar girl can run!')
 "You think well of yourself," I remarked. "You are not a
 Kassar girl you are only a Turian slave of Kassars."
 Her fists clenched.
 In fury she looked at Albrecht and Conrad. "I will run as I
 have never run before," she cried.
 My heart sank a bit. I recalled Albrecht had said that the
 girl had never been snared in less than thirty-two beats. Then
 she had doubtless run from the bole several times before,
 perhaps as many as ten or fifteen.
 "I gather," I said to Albrecht, casually, "that the girl has
 run several times."
 "Yes," said Albrecht, "that is true." Then he added, "You
 may have heard of her. She is Dina of Turia."
 Conrad and Albrecht slapped their saddles and laughed
 uproariously. Kamchak laughed, too, so hard tears ran down
 the scarred furrows of his face. He pointed a finger at
 Conrad. "Wily Kassar!" he laughed. This was a joke. Even I
 had to smile. The Tuchuks were commonly called the Wily
 Ones. But, though the moment might have been amusing to
       those of the Wagon Peoples, even to Kamchak, I was not
       prepared to look on the event with such good humor. If
       might have been a good trick, but I was in no state of mind
       to relish it. How cleverly Conrad had pretended to mock
       Albrecht when he had bet two girls against one. Little did we
       know that one of those girls was Dina of Turia, who, of
       course, would run not for the skilled Kamchak, but for his
       awkward friend, the clumsy Tarl Cabot, not even of the
       Wagon Peoples, new to the kaiila and bole! Conrad and
       Albrecht had perhaps even come to the camp of the Tuchuks
       with this in mind. Undoubtedly! What could they lose? Noth-
       ing. The best that we might have hoped for was a tie, had
       Kamchak beaten Conrad. But he had not; the fine little
       Turian wench who had been able to bite the neck of the
       kaiila, thereby risking her life incidentally, had seen to that.
       Albrecht and Conrad had come for a simple purpose, to best
       a Tuchuk and, in the process, pick up a girl or two; Eliza-
       beth Cardwell, of course, was the only one we had on hand.
       Even the Turian girl, Dina, perhaps the best slave among
       all the wagons in this sport, was laughing, hanging on the
       stirrup of Albrecht, looking up at him. I noted that his kaiila
       was within the whip circle, within which the girl stood. Her-
       feet were off the ground and she had the side of her head
       pressed against his furred boot.
       "Run," I said.
       She cried out angrily, as did Albrecht, and Kamchak
       laughed. "Run, you little fool," shouted Conrad. The girl had
       released the stirrup and her feet struck the ground. She was
       off balance but righted herself and with an angry cry she
       sped from the circle. By surprising her I had gained perhaps
       ten or fifteen yards.
       I took the binding thong from my belt and put it in my
       teeth.
       I began to swing the bole.
       To my amazement, as I swung the hole in ever faster
       circles, never taking my eyes off her, she broke the straight
       running pattern only about fifty yards from the whip circle,
       and began to dodge, moving always, however, toward the
       lance. This puzzled me. Surely she had not miscounted, not
       Dina of Turia. As the judge counted aloud I observed the
       pattern, two left, then a long right to compensate, moving
       toward the lance; two left, then right; two left, then right.
       "Fifteen!" called the judge, and I streaked on kailla back
       from the circle of the boskhide whip.
 I rode at full speed, for there was not a beat to lose.
 Even if by good fortune I managed to tie Albrecht, Elizabeth
 would still belong to the Kassars, for Conrad had a clear win
 over Kamchak. It is dangerous, of course, to approach any
 but a naive, straight-running, perhaps terrified, girl at full
 speed, for should she dodge or move to one side, one will
 have to slow the kaiila to turn it after her, lest one be carried
 past her too rapidly, even at the margins of bole range. But I
 could judge Dina's run, two left, one right, so I set the kaiila
 running at full speed for what would seem to be the unwilling
 point of rendezvous between Dina and the leather of the
 bole. I was surprised at the simplicity of her pattern.- I
 wondered how it could be that such a girl had never been
 taken in less than thirty-two beats, that she had reached the
 lance forty times.
 I would release the bole in another beat as she took her
 second sprint to the left.
 Then I remembered the intelligence of her eyes, her confi-
 dence, that never had she been taken in less than thirty-two
 beats, that she had reached the lance forty times. Her skills
 must be subtle, her timing marvelous.
 I released the bole, risking all, hurling it not to the expect-
 ed rendezvous of the second left but to a first right, unex-
 pected, the first break in the two-left, one-right pattern. I
 heard her startled cry as the weighted leather straps flashed
 about her thighs, calves and ankles, in an instant lashing them
 together as tightly as though by binding fiber. Hardly slack-
 ening speed I swept past the girl, turned the kaiila to face
 her, and again kicked it into a full gallop. I briefly saw a look
 of utter astonishment on her beautiful face. Her hands were
 out, trying instinctively to maintain her balance; the bole
 weights were still snapping about her ankles in tiny, angry
 circles; in an instant she would fall to the grass; racing past I
 seized her by the hair and threw her over the saddle; scarcely
 did she comprehend what was happening before she found
 herself my prisoner, while yet the kaiila did still gallop,
 bound about the pommel of the saddle. I had not taken even
 the time to dismount. Only perhaps a beat or two before the
 kaiila leapt into the circle had I finished the knots that
 confined her. I threw her to the turf at the judge's feet.
 The judge, and the crowd, seemed speechless.
 "Time!" called Kamchak.
 The judge looked startled, as though he could not believe
 what he had seen. He took his hand from the side of the
       "Time!" called Kamchak.
       The judge looked at him. "Seventeen," he whispered.
       The crowd was silent, then, suddenly, as unexpectedly as a
       clap of thunder, they began to roar and cheer
       Kamchak was thumping a very despondent looking Conrad
       and Albrecht on the shoulders.
       I looked down at Dina of Turia. Looking at me in rage,
       she began to pull and squirm in the thongs, twisting in the
       grass.
       The judge allowed her to do so for perhaps a few lien, may-
       be thirty seconds or so,  "The wench is secured," he
       said.
       There was another great cry and cheer from the crowd.
       They were mostly Tuchuks, and were highly pleased with
       what they had seen, but I saw, too, that even the Kassars and
       the one or two Paravaci present and the Kataii were unstint-
       ing in their acclaim. The crowd had gone mad.
       Elizabeth Cardwell was leaping up and down clapping her
       hands.
       I looked down at Dina, who lay at my feet, now no longer
       struggling.
       I removed the bole from her legs.
       With my quiva I slashed the thong on her ankles, permit-
       ting her to struggle to her feet.
       She stood facing me, clad Kajir, her wrists still thonged
       behind her.
       I refastened the bole at my saddle. "I keep my bole, it
       seems," I said.
       She tried to free her wrists, but could not, of course, do
       so.
       Helpless she stood waiting for me.
       I then took Dina of Turia in my arms and, at some length,
       and with a certain admitted satisfaction, collected my win-
       nings. Because she had annoyed me the kiss that was hers
       was that of master to a slave girl; yet was I patient because
       the kiss itself was not enough; I was not satisfied until,
       despite herself, I read in my arms her body's sudden, involun-
       tary admission that I had conquered. "Master," she said, her
       eyes glazed, too weak to struggle against the thongs that
       encircled her wrists. With a cheerful slap I sped her back to
       Albrecht, who, angry, with the tip of his lance, severed the
       bonds that had confined her. Kamchak was laughing, and
       Conrad as well. And, too, many in the crowd. Elizabeth
 Cardwell, however, to my surprise, seemed furious. She had
 pulled on her furs. When I looked at her, she looked away,
 angrily.
 I wondered what was the matter with her.
 Had I not saved her?
 Were not the points between Kamchak and I, and Conrad
 and Albrecht event
 Was she not safe and the match at an end?
 "The score is tied," said Kamchak, "and the wager is
 concluded. There is no winner."
 "/Agreed," said Conrad.
 "No," said Albrecht.
 We looked at him.
 "Lance and tospit," he said.
 "The match is at an end," I said.
 "There is no winner," protested Albrecht.
 "That is true," said Kamchak.
 "There must be a winner," said Albrecht.
 "I have ridden enough for today," said Kamchak.
 "I, too," said Conrad. "Let us return to our wagons."
 Albrecht pointed his lance at me. "You are challenged," he
 said. "Lance and tospit."
 "We have finished with that," I said.
 "The living wand!" shouted Albrecht.
 Kamchak sucked in his breath.
 Several in the crowd shouted out, "The living wand!"
 I looked at Kamchak. I saw in his eyes that the challenge
 must be accepted. In this matter I must be Tuchuk.
 Save for armed combat, lance and tospit with the living
 wand is the most dangerous of the sports of the Wagon
 Peoples.
 In this sport, as might be expected, one's own slave must
 stand for one. It is essentially the same sport as lancing the
 tospit from the wand, save that the fruit is held in the mouth
 of a girl, who is slain should she move or in any way
 withdraw from the lance.
 Needless to say many a slave girl has been injured in this
 cruel sport.
 "I do not want to stand for him!" cried out Elizabeth
 Cardwell.
 "Stand for him, Slave," snarled Kamchak.
 Elizabeth Cardwell took her position, standing sideways,
 the tospit held delicately between her teeth.
 For some reason she did not seem afraid but rather, to my
_

      8Q
                       NOMADS OF GOR
      mind, incomprehensibly infuriated. She should have been
      shuddering with terror. Instead she seemed indignant.
      But she stood like a rock and when I thundered past her
      the tip of my lance had been thrust through the tospit.
      The girl who had bitten the neck of the kaiila, and whose
      leg had been torn by its teeth, stood for Albrecht.
      With almost scornful ease he raced past her lifting the
      tospit from her mouth with the tip of his lance.
      "Three points for each," announced the judge.
      "We are finished," I said to Albrecht. "It is a tie. There is
      no winner."
      He held his saddle on his rearing kaiila. "There will be a
      winner!" he cried. "Facing the lancer"
      "I will not ride," I said.
      "I claim victory and the woman" shouted Albrecht.
      "It will be his," said the judge, "if you do not ride."
      I would ride.
      Elizabeth, unmoving, faced me, some fifty yards away.
      This is the most difficult of the lance sports. The thrust
      must be made with exquisite lightness, the lance loose in the
      hand, the hand not in the retaining thong, but allowing the
      lance to slip back, then when clear, moving it to the left and,
      hopefully, past the living wand. If well done, this is a delicate
      and beautiful stroke. If clumsily done the girl will be scarred,
      or perhaps slain.
      Elizabeth stood facing me, not frightened, but seemingly
      rather put upon. Her fists were even clenched.
      I hoped that she would not be injured. When she had stood
      sideways I had favored the left, so that if the stroke was in
      error, the lance would miss the tospit altogether; but now, as
      she faced me, the stroke must be made for the center of the
      fruit; nothing else would do.
      The gait of the kaiila was swift and even.
      A cry went up from the crowd as I passed Elizabeth, the
      tospit on the point of the lance.
      Warriors were pounding on the lacquered shields with their
      lances. Men shouted. I heard the thrilled cries of slave girls.
      I turned to see Elizabeth waver, and almost faint, but she
      did not do so.
      Albrecht the Kassar, angry, lowered his lance and set out
      for his girl.
      In an instant he had passed her, the tospit riding the lance
      tip.
      The girl was standing perfectly still, smiling.
The crowd cheered as well for Albrecht.
 Then they were quiet, for the judge was rushing to the
 lance of Albrecht, demanding it.
 Albrecht the Kassar, puzzled, surrendered the weapon.
 "There is blood on the weapon," said the judge.
 "She was not touched," cried Albrecht.
 "I was not touched!" cried the air!.
 The judge showed the point of the lance. There was a tiny
 stain of blood at its tip, and too there was a smear of blood
 on the skin of the small yellowish-white fruit.
 "Open your mouth, slave," demanded the judge.
 The girl shook her head.
 "Do it," said Albrecht.
 She did so and the judge, holding her teeth apart roughly
 with his hands, peered within. There was blood in her mouth.
 The girl had been swallowing it, rather than show she had
 been struck.
 It seemed to me she was a brave, fine girl.
 It was with a kind of shock that I suddenly realized that
 she, and Dina of Turia, now belonged to Kamchak and
 myself.
 The two girls, while Elizabeth Cardwell looked on angrily,
 knelt before Kamchak and myself, lowering their heads,
 lifting and extending their arms, wrists crossed. Kamchak,
 chuckling, leaped down from his kaiila and quickly, with
 binding fiber, bound their wrists. He then put a leather thong
 on the neck of each and tied the free ends to the pommel of
 his saddle. Thus secured, the girls knelt beside the paws of his
 kaiila. I saw Dina of Turia look at me. In her eyes, soft with
 tears, I read the timid concession that I was her master.
 "I do not know what we need with all these slaves,"
 Elizabeth Cardwell was saying.
 "Be silent," said Kamchak, "or you will be branded."
 Elizabeth Cardwell, for some reason, looked at me in
 fury, rather than Kamchak. She threw back her head, her
 little nose in the air, her brown hair bouncing on her shoul-
 dcrs.
 Then for no reason I understood, I took binding fiber and
 bound her wrists before her body, and, as Kamchak had
 done with the other girls, put a thong on her neck and tied it
 to the pommel of my saddle.
 It was perhaps my way of reminding her, should she
 forget, that she too was a slave.
      "Tonight, Little Barbarian," said Kamchak, winking at
      her, "you will sleep chained under the wagon."
      Elizabeth stifled a cry of rage.
      Then Kamchak and I, on kaiila-back, made our way back
      to our wagon, leading the bound girls.
      "The Season of Little Grass is upon us," said Kamchak.
      "Tomorrow the herds will move toward Turia."
      I nodded. The Wintering was done. There would now be
      the third phase of the Omen Year, the Return to Turia.
      It was now, perhaps, I hoped, that I might learn the
      answer to the riddles which had not ceased to disturb me, that
      I might learn the answer to the mystery of the message
      collar, perhaps the answer to the numerous mysteries which
      had attended it, and perhaps, at last, find some clue, as I had
      not yet with the wagons, to the whereabouts or fate of the
      doubtless golden spheroid that was or had been the last egg
      of Priest-Kings.
      "I will take you to Turia," said Kamchak.
      "Good," I said.
      I had enjoyed the Wintering, but now it was done. The
      bask were moving south with the coming of the spring. 1 and
      the wagons would go with them.
 There was little doubt that I, in the worn, red tunic of a
 warrior, and Kamchak, in the black leather of the Tuchuks,
 seemed somewhat out of place at the banquet of Saphrar,
 merchant of Turia.
 "It is the spiced brain of the Turian vulo," Saphrar was
 explaining.
 It was somewhat surprising to me that Kamchak and I,
 being in our way ambassadors of the Wagon Peoples, were
 entertained in the house of Saphrar, the merchant, rather
 than in the palace of Phanius Turmus, Administrator of
 Turia. Kamchak's explanation was reasonably satisfying.
 There were apparently two reasons, the official reason and
 the real reason. The official reason, proclaimed by Phanius
 Turmus, the Administrator, and others high in the govern-
 ment, was that those of the Wagon Peoples were unworthy
 to be entertained in the administrative palace; the real rea-
 son, apparently seldom proclaimed by anyone, was that the
 true power in Turia lay actually with the Caste of Mer-
 chants, chief of whom was Saphrar, as it does in many cities.
 The Administrator, however, would not be uninformed. His
 presence at the banquet was felt in the person of his plenipo-
 tentiary, Kamras, of the Caste of Warriors, a captain, said to
 be Champion of Turia.
 I shot the spiced vulo brain into my mouth on the tip of a
 golden eating prong, a utensil, as far as I knew, unique to
 Turia. I took a large swallow of fierce Paga, washing it down
 as rapidly as possible. I did not much care for the sweet,
       syrupy wines of Turia, flavored and sugared to the point where
       one could almost leave one's fingerprint on their surface.
       It might be mentioned, for those unaware of the fact, that
       the Caste of Merchants is not considered one of the tradi-
       tional five High Castes of Gor the Initiates, Scribes, Physi-
       cians, Builders and Warriors. Most commonly, and doubtless
       unfortunately, it is only members of the five high castes who
       occupy positions on the High Councils of the cities. Nonethe-
       less, as might be expected, the gold of merchants, in most
       cities, exercises its not imponderable influence, not always
       in so vulgar a form as bribery and gratuities, but more often in
       the delicate matters of extending or refusing to extend credit
       in connection with the projects, desires or needs of the High
       Councils. There is a saying on Gor, "Gold has no caste." It is
       a saying of which the merchants are fond. Indeed, secretly
       among themselves, I have heard, they regard themselves as the
       highest caste on Gor, though they would not say so for fear
       of rousing the indignation of other castes. There would be
       something, of course, to be said for such a claim, for the
       merchants are often indeed in their way, brave, shrewd,
       skilled men, making long journeys, venturing their goods,
       risking caravans, negotiating commercial agreements, among
       themselves developing and enforcing a body of Merchant
       Law, the only common legal arrangements existing among
       the Gorean cities. Merchants also, in effect, arrange and
       administer the four great fairs that take place each year near
       the Sardar Mountains. I say "in effect" because the fairs are
       nominally under the direction of a committee of the Caste of
       Initiates, which, however, largely contents itself with its cere-
       monies and sacrifices, and is only too happy to delegate the
       complex management of those vast, commercial phenomena,
       the Sardar Fairs, to members~of the lowly, much-despised
       Caste of Merchants, without which, incidentally, the fairs
       most likely could not exist, certainly not at any rate in their
       current form.
       "Now this," Saphrar the merchant was telling me, "is the
       braised liver of the blue, four-spired Cosian wingfish."
       This fish is a tiny, delicate fish, blue, about the size of a
       tarn disk when curled in one's hand; it has three or four
       slender spines in its dorsal fin, which are poisonous; it is
       capable of hurling itself from the water and, for brief dis-
       tances, on its stiff pectoral fins, gliding through the air,
       usually to evade the smaller sea-tharlarions, which seem to be
       immune to the poison of the spines. This fish is also some
_


 APHRIS OF
 85
 times referred to as the songfish because, as a portion of its
 courtship rituals, the males and females thrust their heads
 from the water and utter a sort of whistling sound.
 The blue, four-spired wingfish is found only in the waters
 of Cos. Larger varieties are found farther out to sea. The
 small blue fish is regarded as a great delicacy, and its liver as
 the delicacy of delicacies.
 "How is it," I asked, "that here in Turia you can serve the
 livers of wingfish?"
 "I have a war galley in Port Kar," said Saphrar the
 merchant, "which I send to Cos twice a year for the fish."
 Saphrar was a short, fat, pinkish man, with short legs and
 arms; he had quick bright eyes and a tiny, roundish red-
 lipped mouth; upon occasion he moved his small, pudgy
 fingers, with rounded scarlet nails, rapidly, as though rubbing
 the gloss from a tarn disk or feeling the texture of a fine
 cloth; his head, like that of many merchants, had been
 shaved; his eyebrows had been removed and over each eye
 four golden drops had been fixed in the pinkish skin; he also
 had two teeth of gold, which were visible when he laughed,
 the upper canine teeth, probably containing poison; mer-
 chants are seldom trained in the use of arms. His right ear
 had been notched, doubtless in some accident. Such
 notching, I knew, is usually done to the ears of thieves; a
 second offense is normally punished by the loss of the right
 hand; a third offense by the removal of the left hand and
 both feet. There are few thieves, incidentally, on Gor. I have
 heard, though, there is a Caste of Thieves in Port Kar, a
 strong caste which naturally protects its members from such
 indignities as ear notching. In Saphrar's case, of course, he
 being of the Caste of Merchants, the notching of the ear
 would be a coincidence, albeit one that must have caused him
 some embarrassment. Saphrar was a pleasant, gracious fel-
 low, a bit indolent perhaps, save for the eyes and rapid
 fingers. He was surely an attentive and excellent host. I
 would not Rave cared to know him better.
 "flow is it," 1 asked, "that a merchant of Turia has a war
 galley in Port Kar."
 Saphrar reclined on the yellow cushions, behind the low
 table covered with wines, fruits and golden dishes heaped
 with delicate viands.
 "I did not realize Port Kar was on friendly terms with any
 of the inland cities," I said.
 "She is not," said Saphrar.
_


      86
      NOMADS OF GOR
      "Then how?" I asked.
      He shrugged. "Gold has no caste," he said.
      I tried the liver of the wingfish. Then another swig of
      Saga.
      Saphrar winced.
      "Perhaps," he suggested, "you would like a piece of
      roasted bask meat?"
      I replaced the golden eating prong in its rack beside my
      place, shoved back the glittering dish in which lay several
      theoretically edible objects, carefully arranged by a slave to
      resemble a bouquet of wild Bowers sprouting from a rock
      outcropping. "Yes," I said, "I think so."
      Saphrar conveyed my wishes to the scandalized Feast Stew-
      arc, and he, with a glare in my direction, sent two young
      slaves scampering off to scour the kitchens of Turia for a
      slice of bask meat.
      I looked to one side and saw Kamchak scraping another
      plate clean, holding it to his mouth, sliding and shoving the
      carefully structured design of viands into his mouth.
      I glanced at Saphrar, who was now leaning on his yellow
      cushions, in his silken pleasure robes, white and gold, the
      colors of the Caste of Merchants. Saphrar, eyes closed, was
      nibbling on a tiny thing, still quivering, which had been
      impaled on a colored stick.
      I turned away and watched a fire swallower perform to the
      leaping melodies of the musicians.
      "Do not object that we are entertained in the house of
      Saphrar of the Merchants," Kamchak had said, "for in Turia
      power lies with such men."
      I looked down the table a bit at Kamras, plenipotentiary
      of Phanius Turmus, Administrator of Turia. He was a large-
      wristed strong man with long, black hair. He sat as a
      warrior, though in robes of silk. Across his face there were
      two long scars, perhaps from their delicacy the scars of quiva
      wounds. He was said to be a great warrior, indeed, to be
      champion of Turia. He had not spoken with us nor acknowl-
      edged our presence at the feast.
      "Besides," Kamchak had told me, nudging me in tile ribs,
      "the food and the entertainment is better in the house of
      Saphrar than in the palace of Phanius Turmus."
      I would still, I told myself, settle for a piece of bask
      meat.
      I wondered how the stomach of Kamchak could sustain
      the delightful injuries he was heaping into it with such gusto.
      1



_


 APHRIS 0P TUNA
 87
 To be sure, it had not. The Turian feast usually consumes the
 better part of a night and can have as many as a hundred
 and fifty courses. This would be impractical, naturally, save
 for the detestable device of the golden bowl and tufted
 banquet stick, dipped in scented oils, by means of which the
 diner may, when he wishes, refresh himself and return with
 eagerness to the feast. I had not made use of this particular
 tool, and had contented myself with merely taking a bite or
 two, to satisfy the requirements of etiquette, from each
 course.
 The Turians, doubtless, regarded this as a hopelessly bar-
 barian inhibition on my part.
 I had, perhaps, however, drunk too much Paga.'
 This afternoon Kamchak and I, leading four pack kaiila,
 had entered the first gate of nine-gated Turia.
 On the pack animals were strapped boxes of precious
 plate, gems, silver vessels, tangles of jewelry, mirrors, rings,
 combs, and golden tarn disks, stamped with the signs of a
 dozen cities. These were brought as gifts to the Turians,
 largely as a rather insolent gesture on the part of the Wagon
 Peoples, indicating how little they cared for such things, that
 they would give them to Turians. Turian embassies to the
 Wagon Peoples, when they occurred, naturally strove to
 equal or surpass these gifts. Kamchak told me, a sort of
 secret I gather, that some of the things he carried had been
 exchanged back and forth a dozen times. One small, flat box,
 however, Kamchak would not turn over to the stewards of
 Phanius Turmus, whom he met at the first gate. He insisted
 on carrying that box with him and, indeed, it rested beside
 his right knee at the table now.
                                            I was very pleased to enter Turia, for I have always been          j
                                            excited by a new city.     -    I'
 I found Turia to match my expectations. She was luxuri-
 ous. Her shops were filled with rare, intriguing paraphernalia.
 I smelled perfumes that I had never smelled before. More
 than once we encountered a line of musicians dancing single
 file down the center of the street, playing on their flutes and
 drums, perhaps on their way to a feast. 1 was pleased to see
 again, though often done in silk, the splendid varieties of
 caste colors of the typical Gorean city, to hear once more the
 cries of peddlers that I knew so well, the cake sellers, the
 hawkers of vegetables, the wine vendor bending under a
 double verrskin of his vintage. We did not attract as much
 attention as I had thought we would, and I gathered that
        every spring, at least, visitors from the Wagon Peoples must
        come to the city. Many people scarcely glanced at us, in spite
        of the fact that we were theoretically blood foes. I suppose
        that life in high-walled Turia, for most of its citizens, went on
        from day to day in its usual patterns oblivious of the usually
        distant Wagon Peoples. The city had never fallen, and had
        not been under siege in more than a century. The average
        citizen worried about the Wagon Peoples, customarily, only
        when he was outside the walls. Then, of course, he worried a
        great deal, and, I grant him, wisely.
        One disappointment to me in trekking through the streets
        of Turia was that a crier advanced before us, calling to the
        women of the city to conceal themselves, even the female
        slaves. Thus, unfortunately, save for an occasional furtive
        pair of dark eyes peering from behind a veil in a recessed
        casement, we saw in our journey from the gate of the city to
        the House of Saphrar none of the fabled, silken beauties of
        Turia.
        I mentioned this to Kamchak and he laughed loudly.
        He was right, of course. Among the Wagons, clad in a
        brief bit of cord and leather, branded, wearing nose ring and
        Turian collar, could be found many of the beauties of Turia.
        Indeed, to the annoyance of Elizabeth Cardwell, who had
        spent her nights under the wagon in the last weeks, there
        were two such in our own wagon, the girl Dina, whom I had
        snared in the contests of the bole, and her companion, the
        fine wench who had bitten the neck of Kamchak's kaiila and
        had attempted to conceal her injury by the lance of Albrecht,
        Tenchika, a Tuchuk corruption of her Thurman
        name, Tendite; she struggled to serve Kamchak wed, but it
        was clear that she lamented her separation from Albrecht of
        the Kassars; he had, surprisingly, twice tried to buy his little
        slave back, but Kamchak was holding out for a higher price;
        Dina, on the other hand, served me skillfully and devotedly;
        once Albrecht, having a bole match planned, tried to buy her
        back, as well as Tenchika, but I had demurred.
        "Does it mean," Dina had asked me that night, head to
        boot, "that Dina's master is pleased with her?"
        "Yes," I said, "it does."
        "I am happy," she had said.
        "She has fat ankles," Elizabeth Cardwell had observed.
        "Not fat," I said, "Strong, sturdy ankles."
        "If you like fat ankles," Elizabeth had said, turning about,
_


APHRIS 0P TIM
89
perhaps inadvertently revealing the delightful slimness of her
own ankles, and leaving the wagon.
Suddenly I became aware again of the banquet of Saphrar
of Turia.
My piece of bask meat, roasted, had arrived. I picked it up
and began to chew on it. I liked it better cooked over the
open-fires on the prairie, but it was good bask. I sank my
teeth into the juicy meat, tearing it and chewing on it.
I observed the banquet tables, laid out in an open-ended
rectangle, permitting slaves to enter at the open end, facilitat-
ing the serving, and, of course, allowing entertainers to
perform among the tables. To one side there was a small
altar to Priest-Kings, where there burned a small fire. On
this fire, at the beginning of the feast the feast steward had
scattered some grains of meal, some colored salt, some drops
of wine. "Ta-Sardar-Gor," he had said, and this phrase had
been repeated by the others in the room. "To the Priest-
Kings of Gor." It had been the general libation for the
banquet. The only one in the room who did not participate in
this ceremony was Kamchak, who thought that such a li-
bation, in the eyes of the sky, would not have been fitting. I
partook of the libation out of respect for Priest-Kings, for
one in particular, whose name was Misk.
A Turian sitting a few feet from me noted that I had
partaken of the libation. "I see," he said, "that you were not
raised among the wagons."
"No," I said.
"He is Tarl Cabot of Ko-ro-ba," Saphrar had remarked.
"How is it," I asked, "that you know my name?"
"One hears of such things," he said.
 I would have questioned him on this matter, but he had     j
turned to a man behind him and was talking with him, some
matter I gathered pertaining to the feast.
I forgot about it.
If there had been no women for us to view in the streets
of Turin, Saphrar, merchant of the city, had determined to
make that omission good at his banquet. There were several
women present at the tables, free women, and several others,
slaves, who served. The free women, shamelessly to the mind
of the rather prudish Kamchak, lowered their veils and threw
back the hoods of their Robes of Concealment, enjoying the
feast, eating with much the same Gorean gusto as their men.
Their beauty and the sparkle of their eyes, their laughter and
1
_



       9o
                       NOMADS OF GOR
       conversation, to my mind, immeasurably improved the eve-
       ning. Many were swift-tongued, witty wenches, utterly charm-
       ing and uninhibited. I did think, however, that it was some-
       what unusual that they should appear in public unveiled,
       particularly with Kamchak and myself present. The women
       in bondage present, who served us, each wore four golden
       rings on each ankle and each wrist, locked on, which clashed
       as they walked or moved, adding their sound to the slave
       bells that had been fixed on their Turian collars, and that
       hung from their hair; the ears of each, too, hall been pierced
       and from each ear hung a tiny slave boil. The single garment
       of these women was the Turian camisk. I do not know
       particularly why it is referred to as a camisk, save that it is a
       simple garment for a female slave. The common camisk is a
       single piece of cloth, about eighteen inches wide, thrown over
       the girl's head and worn like a poncho. It usually falls a bit
       above the knees in the front and back and is belted with cord
       or chain. The Turian camisk, on the other hand, if it were to
       be laid out on the floor, would appear somewhat like an
       inverted "T" in which the bar of the "T" would be beveled
       on each side. It is fastened with a single cord. The cord binds
       the garment on the girl at three points, behind the neck,
       behind the back, and in front at the waist. The garment
       itself, as might be supposed, fastens behind the girl's neck,
       passes before her, passes between her legs and is then lifted
       and, folding the two sides of the T's bar about her hips, ties
       in front. The Turian camisk, unlike the common camisk, will
       cover a girl's brand; on the other hand, unlike the common
       camisk, it leaves the back uncovered and can be tied, and is,
       snugly, the better to disclose the girl's beauty.
       We had been treated to exhibitions of juggling, fire swal-
       lowing, and acrobats. There had been a magician, who par-
       ticularly pleased Kamchak, and a man who, whip in hand,
       guided a dancing sleen through its paces.
       I could pick up snatches of conversation between Kam-
       chak and Saphrar, and I gathered from what was said that
       they were negotiating places of meeting for the exchange
       of goods. Then, later in the evening, when 1 was drunker on
       Paga than I should have permitted myself to become, I heard
       them discuss details which could only have pertained to what
       Kamchak had called the games of Love War, details having
       to do with specifications of time, weapons and judges, and
       such. Then I heard the sentence, "If she is to participate, you
       must deliver the golden sphere."
_



 APHRIS 0F TURIA
 91
 Abruptly, it seemed, I came awake, no longer half asleep,
 more than half drunk. It seemed suddenly I was shocked
 awake and sober. I began to tremble, but held the table, and,
 I believe, betrayed no sign of my inward excitement.
 "I can arrange that she is chosen for the games," Saphrar
 was saying, "but it must be worth my while."
 "How can you determine that she is selected?" Kamchak
 was asking.
 "My gold can determine that," Saphrar was saying, "and
 further determine that she is ill defended."
 Oust of the corner of my eye I could see Kamchak's black
 eyes gleaming.
 Then I heard the feast steward call out, his voice silencing
 all else, all conversation, even the musicians. The acrobats
 who were at the moment performing fled from between the
 tables. The feast steward's voice was heard, "The Lady
 Aphris of Turia."
 I and all others turned our eyes to a wide, swirling marble
 stairway in the back and to the left of the lofty banquet hall
 in the house of Saphrar the merchant.
 Down the stairway, slowly, in trailing white silk bordered
 with gold, the colors of the Merchants, there regally descend-
 ed the girl who was Aphris of Turia.
 Her sandals were of gold and she wore matching gloves of
 gold.
 Her face could not be seen, for it was veiled, a white
 silken veil trimmed with gold, nor even her hair, for it was
 hidden in the folds of the free woman's Robes of Conceal-
 ment, in her case, of course, done in the colors of the
 merchants.
 Aphris of Turia, then, was of the caste of merchants.
 I recalled Kamchak had spoken of her once or twice.
 As the woman approached I suddenly became aware again
 of Saphrar speaking. "Behold my ward," he was saying, indi-
 cating the approaching girl.
 "The richest woman in all Turia," Kamchak said.
 "When she reaches her majority," Saphrar remarked.
 Until then, I gathered, her means were in the doubtless
 capable hands of Saphrar the merchant.
 This supposition was later confirmed by Kamchak. Saphrar
 was not related to the girl, but had been appointed by the
 Turian merchants, on whom he undoubtedly exercised con-
 siderable influence, the guardian of the girl following the
 death of her father in a Paravaci caravan raid several years
_



       92
       before. The father of Aphris of Turia, Tethrar of Turia, had
       been the richest merchant in this city, itself one of the richest
       cities of Gor. There had been no surviving male heir and the
       considerable wealth of Tethrar of Turia was now that of his
       daughter, Aphris, who would assume control of these remark-
       able fortunes upon attaining her majority, which event was to
       occur this spring.
       The girl, not unaware I am sure of the eyes upon her,
       stopped on the stairway and loftily surveyed the scene of the
       banquet. I could sense that she had almost immediately seen
       myself and Kamchak, strangers at the tables. Something in
       her carriage suggested that she might be amused.
       I heard Saphrar whisper to Kamchak, whose eyes glowed
       as they rested on the figure in white and gold on the distant
       stairway.
       "Is she not worth the golden sphere?" asked the mer-
       chant.
       "It is hard to tell," said Kamchak.
       "I have the word of her serving slaves," insisted Saphrar.
       "She is said to be marvelous."
       Kamchak shrugged, his wily Tuchuk trading shrug. I had
       seen him use it several times while discussing the possible sale
       of little Tenchika to Albrecht in the wagon.
       "The sphere is actually not of much value, Saphrar was
       saying, "it is not truly of gold but only appears so."
       "Still," Kamchak said, "the Tuchuks are fond of it."
       "I would only wish it as a curiosity," Saphrar was saying.
       "I must think on the matter," Kamchak was saying, not
       taking his eyes from Aphris of Turia.
       "I know where it is," Saphrar was saying, his lips pulled
       back, revealing the golden canines, "I could send men for it."
       Pretending not to listen I was, of course, as attentive as
       possible to their conversation. But few in that room would
       have noted my interest had I displayed it openly. All eyes, it
       seemed, were on the girl on the stairs, slim, said to be
       beautiful, veiled, clad in Robes of Concealment of white and
       gold. Even I was distracted by her. Even I, in spite of my
       preoccupation with the conversation of Kamchak and
       Saphrar, would have found it difficult, had I wished, to take
       my eyes from her. Now she descended the last three stairs
       and, stopping to nod her head and grace an eager fellow here
       and there along the tables with a word or gesture, she began
       to approach the head of the table. The musicians, at a signal
       from the feast steward, took up their instruments again and
                       NOMADS OF GOR

       _


 APHRIS OF TURIA
 93

 the acrobats rushed back among the tables, tumbling and
 leaping about.
 "it is in the wagon of Kutaituchik," Saphrar was saying. "I
 could send mercenary tarnsmen from the north, but I would
 prefer not to have war."
 Kamchak was still watching Aphris of Turia.
 My heart was beating with great rapidity. I had learned
 now, if Saphrar was correct, that the golden sphere, undoubt-
 edly the last egg of Priest-Kings, was in the wagon of
 Kutaituchik, said to be Ubar of the Tuchuks. At last, if
 Saphrar was correct, I knew its location.
 I barely noticed, as Aphris of Turia made her way toward
 the head of the table, that she did not speak to nor acknowl-
 edge in any way any of the women present, though their
 robes suggested they must be of wealth and position. She
 gave them no sign that she recognized their existence. To a
 man here and there, however, she would nod her head or
 exchange a word or two. I thought perhaps Aphris was
 unwilling to acknowledge unveiled free women. Her own
 veil, of course, had not been lowered. Over the veil I could
 now see two black, deep, almond-shaped eyes; her skin, what
 I could see of it, was lovely and clear; her complexion was
 not so light as that of Miss Cardwell, but was lighter than
 that of the girl Hereena, of the First Wagon.
 "The golden sphere for Aphris of Turia," Saphrar whis-
 pered to Kamchak.
 Kamchak turned to the small, fat merchant and his
 scarred, furrowed face broke into a grin, bearing down on
 the round, pinkish face of the merchant. "The Tuchuks," he
 said, "are fond of the golden sphere."
 "Very well," snapped Saphrar, "then you will not obtain
 the woman, I shall see to that and somehow I shall have
 the sphere understand that!"
 Kamchak now turned to watch Aphris of Turia.
 The girl now approached us, behind the tables, and
 Saphrar leaped to his feet and bowed low to her. "Honored
 Aphris of Turia, whom I love as my own daughter," he said.
 l he girl inclined her head to him, "Honored Saphrar,'? she
 said.
 Saphrar gestured to two of the camisk-clad girls in the
 room, who brought cushions and a silken mat and placed
 them between Saphrar and Kamchak.
 Aphris nodded her head to the feast steward and he sent
 the acrobats running and tumbling from the room and the
       musicians began to play soft, honeyed melodies. The guests
       at the banquet returned to their conversation and repast.
       Aphris looked about her.
       She lifted her head, and I could see the lovely line of her
       nose beneath the veil of white silk trimmed with gold. She
       sniffed twice. Then she clapped her little gloved hands two
       times and the feast steward rushed to her side.
       "I smell bosk dung," she said.
       The feast steward looked startled, then horrified, then
       knowledgeable, and then bowed and spread his hands. I He
       smiled ingratiatingly, apologetically. "I 'm sorry, Lady
       Aphris," said he, "but under the circumstances"
       She looked about, and then it seemed she saw Kamchak.
       "Ah!" she said, "I see a Tuchuk of course."
       Kamchak, though sitting cross-legged, seemed to bounce
       twice on the cushions, slapping the small table, rattling dishes
       for a dozen feet on either side. He was roaring with laughter.
       "Superb!" he cried.
       "Please, if you wish, Lady Aphris, join us," wheezed
       Saphrar.
       Aphris of Turia, pleased with herself, assumed her place
       between the merchant and Kamchalc, kneeling back on her
       heels in the position of the Gorean free woman.
       Her back was very straight and her head high, in the
       Gorean fashion.
       She turned to Kamchak. "It seems we have met before,"
       she said.
       "Two years ago," said Kamchak, "in such a place at such a
       time you recall it was then you called me a Tuchuk sleen."
       "I seem to recall," said Aphris, as though trying very hard
       to do so.
       "I had brought you a five-belt necklace of diamonds," said
       Kamchak, "for I had heard you were beautiful."
       "Oh," said Aphris, "yes I gave it to one of my slaves."
       Kamchak slapped the table in merriment again.
       "It was then," he said, "that you turned away, calling me a
       Tuchuk sleen."
       "Oh, yes!" laughed Aphris.
       "And it was then," said Kamchak, still laughing, "that I
       vowed I would make you my slave."
       Aphris stopped laughing.
       Saphrar was speechless.
       There was no sound at the tables.
       Kamras, Champion of the City of Turia, rose to his feet.
 He addressed Saphrar. "Permit me," he said, "to fetch weak
 ones."
 Kamchak was now swilling Paga and acted as though he
 had not heard the remark of Kamras.
 "No, no, no!" cried Saphrar. "The Tuchuk and his friend
 are guests, and ambassadors of the Wagon Peoples they
 must not come to harm!"
 Aphris of Turia laughed merrily and Kamras, embar-
 rassed, returned to his seat.
 "Bring perfumes"" she called to the feast steward, and he
 sent forth the camisk-clad slave who carried the tiny tray of
 exotic Turian perfumes. She took one or two of these small
 bottles and held them under her nose, and then sprinkled
 them about the table and cushions. Her actions delighted the
 Turians, who laughed.
 Kamchak now was still smiling, but he no longer laughed.
 "For that," he said, smiling, "you will spend your first night
 in the dung sack."
 Again Aphris laughed merrily and was joined by those of
 the banquet.
 The fists of Kamras were clenched on the table.
 "Who are you?" asked Aphris, looking at me.
 I was pleased to see that she, at least, did not know my
 name.
 "I am Tart Cabot," I said, "Of the city of Ko-ro-ba."
 "It is in the far north," she said. "Even beyond Ar."
 "Yes," I said.
 "How comes it," asked she, "that a Koroban rides in the
 stinking wagon of a Tuchuk sleep?"
 "The wagon does not stink," I said, "and Kamchak of the
 Tuchuks is my friend."
 "You are an outlaw of course," she said.
 I shrugged.
 She laughed.
 The girl turned to Saphrar. "Perhaps the barbarians would
 care to be entertained," she suggested.
 I was puzzled at this, for throughout much of the evening
 there had been entertainment, the jugglers, the acrobats, the
 fellow who swallowed fire to music, the magician, the man
 with the dancing sleen.
 Saphrar was looking down. He was angry. "Perhaps," he
 said. I supposed Saphrar was still irritated at Kamchak's
 refusal to give up, or arrange the transfer, of the golden
 sphere. I did not clearly understand Kamchak's motivations
      in this matter less, of course, he knew the true nature of
      the golden sphere, in which case, naturally, he would recog-
      nize it as Priceless. I gathered he did not understand its true
      value, with some seriousness earlier in the evening only that, ap-
      pareutly, he wanted more than Saphrar was offering, even
      though that might be Aphris of Turia herself.
      Aphris now turned to me. She gestured to the ladies at the
      tables, with their escorts. "Are the women of Turia not
      beautiful?" she asked.
      "Indeed," I admitted, for there were none present who
      were not, in their own ways, beautiful.
      She laughed, for some reason.
      "In my city," I said, "free women would not permit them-
      selves to be seen unveiled before strangers."
      The girl laughed merrily once more and turned to
      Kamchak. "What think you, my colorful bit of bosk dung?''
      she asked.
      Kamchak shrugged. "It is well known," he said, "the wom-
      en of Turia are shameless."
      "I think not," snapped the angry Aphris of Turia, her eyes
      flashing above the golden border of her white silicon veil.
      "I see them," said Kamchak, spreading his hands to both
      sides, grinning.
      Seeing that he had apparently discussed its exchange
      "I think not," said the girl.
      Kamchak looked puzzled.
      Then, to my surprise, the girl clapped her hands sharply
      twice and the women about the table stood, arid together,
      from both sides, moved swiftly to stand before us between
      the tables. The drums and flutes of the musicians sounded, and
      to my amazement the first girl, with a sudden, graceful swirl
      of her body lifted away her robes and flung them high over
      the heads of the guests to cries of delight. She stood facing
      us, beautiful, knees flexed, breathing deeply, arms lifted over
      her head, ready for the dance. Each of the women I had
      thought free did the same, until each stood before us, a
      collared slave girl clad only the diaphanous, scarlet danc-
      ing silks of Gor. To the barbaric music they danced.
      Kamchak was angry.
      "Did you truly think," asked Aphris of Turia arrogantly,
      "that a Tuchuk would be permitted to look upon the face of
      a free woman of Turia?"
      Kamchak's fists were clenched on the table, for no Tuchuk
      likes to be fooled,
 Kamras was laughing loudly and even Saphrar was giggling
 among the yellow cushions.
 No Tuchuk, I knew, cares to be the butt of a joke,
 especially a Turian joke.
 But Kamchak said nothing.
 Then he took his goblet of Paga and drained it, watching
 the girls swaying to the caress of Turian melodies.
 "Are they not delightful?" spurred Aphris, after a time.
 "We have many girls among the wagons quite as good,"
 said Kamchak.
 "Oh?" asked Aphris.
 "Yes," said Kamchak, "Turians slaves such as you will
 beg'
 "You are aware, of course," she said, "that if you were not
 an ambassador of the Wagon Peoples at this time I would
 order you slain."
 Kamchak laughed. "It is one thing to order the death of a
 Tuchuk," he said. "It is another to kill him."
 "I'm sure both could be arranged," remarked Aphris.
 Kamchak laughed. "I shall enjoy owning you," he said.
 The girl laughed. "You are a fool," she said. Then she
 added, unpleasantly, "But beware for if you cease to amuse
 me, you will not leave these tables alive."
 Kamchak was swilling down another bolt of Paga, part of
 it running out at the side of his mouth.
 Aphris then turned to Saphrar. "Surely our guests would
 enjoy seeing the others" she suggested.
 I wondered what she meant.
 "Please, Aphris," said Saphrar, shaking his fat, pinkish
 head, sweating. "No trouble, no trouble."
 "Hoi" cried Aphris of Turia, summoning the feast steward
 to her, through the turning bodies of the girls dancing among
 the tables. "The others!" ordered Aphris, "For the amuse-
 ment of our guests!"
 The feast steward turned a wary eye toward Saphrar, who,
 defeated, nodded his head.
 The feast steward then clapped his hands twice, dismissing
 the girls, who rushed from the room; and then he clapped his
 hands twice more, paused a moment, then twice more.
 I heard the sound of slave bells attached to ankle rings, to
 locked wrist bracelets, to Turian collars.
 More girls approached rapidly, their feet taking small
 running steps in a turning line that sped forth from a small
 room in the back and to the right.
       My hand clenched on the goblet. Aphris of Turia was bold
       indeed. I wondered if Kamchak would rise to do war in the
       very room.
       The girls that now stood before us, barefoot, in swirling
       Pleasure Silks, belled and collared, were wenches of the
       Wagon Peoples, now, as could be determined even beneath
       the silks they wore, the branded slaves of Turians. Their
       leader, to her surprise, seeing Kamchak, fell in shame to her
       knees before him, much to the fury of the feast steward; the
       others did so as well.
       The feast steward was handed a slave whip and stood
       toweling over the leader of the girls.
       His hand drew back but the blow never fell, for with a cry
       of pain he reeled away, the hilt of a quiva pressed against the
       inside of his forearm, the balance of the blade emerging on
       the other side.
       Even I had not seen Kamchak throw the knife, Now, to
       my satisfaction, another of the blades was poised in his finger
       tips Several of the men had leaped from behind the tables,
       including Kamras, but they hesitated, seeing Kamchak so
       armed-I, too, was on my feet. "Weapons," said Kamras, "are
       not permitted at the banquet."
       "Ah," said Kamchak, bowing to him, "I did not know."
       "Let us sit down and enjoy ourselves, recommended
       Saphrar. "If the Tuchuk does not wish to see the girls, let us
       dismiss them."
       "I wish to see them perform," said Aphris of Turia, though
       she stood within arm's reach of Kamchak's quiva.
       Kamchak laughed, looking at her. Then, to my relief, and
       doubtless to the relief of several at the table, he thrust the
       quiva in his sash and sat back down.
       "Dance," ordered Aphris.
       The trembling girl before her did not move.
       "Dance!" screamed Aphris, rising to her feet.
       "What shall I do?" begged the kneeling girl of Kamchak.
       She looked not too unlike Hereena, and was perhaps a
       similar sort of girl, raised and trained much the same. Like
       Hereena, of course, she wore the tiny golden nose ring.
       Kamchak spoke to her, very gently. "You are slave," he
       said. "Dance for your masters."
       The girl looked at him gratefully and she, with the others,
       rose to her feet and to the astounding barbarity of the music
       performed the savage love dances of the Kassars, the Parava-
       ci, the Kataii, the Tuchuks.
 They were magnificent.
 One girl, the leader of the dancers, she who had spoken to
 Kamchak, was a Tuchuk girl, and was particularly startling,
 vital, uncontrollable, wild.
 It was then clear to me why the Turian men so hungered
 for the wenches of the Wagon Peoples.
 At the height of one of her dances, called the Dance of the
 Tuchuk Slave Girl, Kamchak turned to Aphris of Turia, who
 was watching the dance, eyes bright, as astounded as I at the
 savage spectacle. "I will see to it," said Kamchak, "when you
 are my slave, that you are taught that dance."
 The back anti head of Aphris of Turia was rigid with fury,
 but she gave no sign that she had heard him.
 Kamchak waited until the girls of the Wagon Peoples had
 performed their dances and then, when they had been dis-
 missed, he rose to his booted feet. "We must go" he said.
 I nodded, and struggled to my feet, well ready to return to
 his wagon.
 "What is in the box?" asked Aphris of Turia, as she saw
 Kamchak pick up the small black box which, throughout the
 banquet, he had kept at his right knee. The girl was clearly
 curious, female.
 Kamchak shrugged.
 I remembered that two years before, as I had learned, he
 had brought Aphris of Turia a five-string diamond necklace,
 which she had scurried, and had, according to her report at
 least, given to a slave. It had been at that time that she had
 called him a Tuchuk sleen, presumably because he had dared
 present her with a gift.
 But, I could see, she was interested in the box. Indeed, at
 certain times during the evening, I had seen her casting
 furtive glances at it.
 "It is nothing," said Kamchak, "only a trinket."
 "But is it for someone?" she asked.
 "I had thought," said Kamchak, "that I might give it to
 you."
 "Oh" asked Aphris, clearly intrigued.
 "likely you would not like it," He said.
 "How do you know," she said, rather airily, "I have not
 seen it."
 "I will take it home with me," said Kamchak.
 "If you wish," she said.
 "But you may have it if you wish," he said.
 "Is it other," she asked, "than a mere necklace of dia-
        monds?" Aphris of Turia was no fool. She knew that the
        Wagon Peoples, plunderers of hundreds of caravans, occa-
        sionally possessed objects and riches as costly as any on Gor.
        "Yes," said Kamchak, "it is other than a necklace of
        diamonds."
        "Ah!" she said. I then suspected that she had not actually
        given the five-string diamond necklace to a slave. Undoubted-
        ly it still reposed in one of her several chests of jewelry.
        "But you would not like it," said Kamchak, diffidently.
        "Perhaps I might," she said.
        "No," said Kamchak, "you would not like it."
        "You brought it for me, did you not?" she said.
        Kamchak shrugged and looked down at the box in his
        hand. "Yes," he said, "I brought it for you."
        The box was about the size in which a necklace, perhaps
        on black velvet, might be displayed.
        "I want it," said Aphris of Turia.
        "Truly?" asked Kamchak. "Do you want it?"
        "Yes," said Aphris. "Give it to met"
        "Very well," said Kamchak, "but I must ask to place it on
        you myself."
        Kamras, the Champion of Turia, half rose from his posi-
        tion. "Bold Tuchuk sleen!" he hissed.
        "Very well," said Aphris of Turia. "You may place it on
        me yourself."
        So then Kamchak bent down to where Aphris of Turia
        knelt, her back straight, her head very high, before the low
        table. He stepped behind her and she lifted her chin delicate-
        ly. Her eyes were shining with curiosity. I could see the
        quickness of her breath marked in the soft silk of her white
        and gold veil.
        "Now," said Aphris.
        Kamchak then opened the box.
        When Aphris heard the delicate click of the box lid it was
        all she could do not to turn and regard the prize that was to
        be hers, but she did not do so. She remained looking away,
        only lifting her chin a bit more.
        "Now!" said Aphris of Turia, trembling with anticipation.
        What happened then was done very swiftly. Kamchak
        lifted from the box an object indeed intended to grace the
        throat of a girl. But it was a round metal ring, a Turian
        collar, the collar of a slave. There was a firm snap of the
        heavy lock in the back of the collar and the throat of Aphris
        of Turia had been encircled with slave steel! At the same
instant Kamchak lifted her startled to her feet and turned her
to face him, with both hands tearing the veil from her face!
Then, before any of the startled Turians could stop him, he
had purchased by his audacity a bold kiss from the lips of the
astounded Aphris of Turia! Then he hurled her from him
across and over the low table until she fell to the floor where
Tuchuk slaves had danced for her pleasure. The quiva, ap-
pearing as if by magic in his hand, warned back those who
would press in upon him to revenge the daughter of their
city. I stood beside Kamchak, ready to defend him with my
life, yet as startled as any in the room at what had been
done.
The girl now had struggled to her knees tearing at the
collar. Her tiny gloved fingers were locked in it, pulling at it,
as though by brute force she would tear it from her throat.
Kamchak was looking at her. "Beneath your robes of
white and gold," he said, "I smelled the body of a slave girl."
"Sleen! Sleen! Sleen!" she cried.
"Replace your veil!" ordered Saphrar.
"Remove the collar immediately," commanded Kamras,
plenipotentiary of Phanius Turmus, Administrator of Turia.
Kamchak smiled. "It seems," he said, "that I have forgot-
ten the key."
"Send for one of the Caste of Metal Workers!" cried
Saphrar.
There were cries on all sides, "Slay the Tuchuk sleen!"
"Torture for him!" "The oil of tharlarions!" "Leech plants""
"Impalement!" "Tongs and fire!" But Kamchak seemed un-
moved. And none rushed upon him, for in his hand, and he
was Tuchuk, there gleamed the quiva.
"Slay him!" screamed Aphris of Turia, "Slay him!"
"Replace your veil," repeated Saphrar to the girl. "Have
you no shame?"
The girl attempted to rearrange the folds of the veil, but
could only hold it before her face, for Kamchak had ripped
away the pins by which it was customarily fastened.
Her eyes were wild with fury and tears.
He, a Tuchuk, had looked upon her face.
I was pleased, though I would not have admitted it, at
Kamchak's boldness, for it was a face for which a man might
risk much, even death in the torture dungeons of Turia,
utterly beautiful though now, of course, transformed with
rage, far more beautiful than had been that of the most
        beautiful of the slave girls who had served us or given us of
        the beauty of their dances.
        "You recall, of course," Kamchak was saying, "that I am
        an ambassador of the Wagon Peoples and am entitled to the
        courtesies of your city."
        "Impale him!" cried a number of voices.
        "It is a joke," cried out Saphrar. "A joker A Tuchuk joker"
        "Slay him!" screamed Aphris of Turia.
        But no one would move against the quiva.
        "Now, gentle Aphris," Saphrar was purring, "you must be
        calm soon one from the Caste of Metal Workers will ap-
        pear to free you all will be well return to your own
        chambers."
        "Nor" screamed Aphris. "The Tuchuk must be slain!"
        "It is not possible, my dear," wheezed Saphrar.
        "You are challenged!" said Kamras, spitting to the floor at
        Kamchak's booted feet.
        For an instant I saw Kamchak's eyes gleam and thought
        he might at the very table at which he stood accept the
        challenge of the Champion of Turia, but instead, he shrugged
        and grinned. "Why should I fight?" he asked.
        It did not sound like Kamchak speaking.
        "You are a coward!" cried Kamras.
        I wondered if Kamras knew the meaning of the word
        which he had dared to address to one who wore the Courage
        Scar of the Wagon Peoples.
        But to my amazement, Kamchak only smiled. "Why should
        I fight?" he asked.
        "What do you mean?" demanded Kamras.
        "What is to be gained?" inquired Kamchak.
        "Aphris of Turia!" cried the girl.
        There were cries of horror, or protest, from the men
        crowded about.
        "Yes!" cried Aphris of Turia. "If you will meet Kamras,
        Champion of Turia, I, Aphris of Turia, will stand at the
        stake in Love War!"
        Kamchak looked at her. "I will fight," he said.
        There was a silence in the room.
        I saw Saphrar, a bit in the background, close his eyes and
        nod his head. "Wily Tuchuk," I heard him mutter. Yes, I said
        to myself, wily Tuchuk. Kamchak had, by means of the very
        pride of Aphris of Turia, of Kamras, and the offended
        Turians, brought the girl by her own will to the stake of
        Love War. It was something he would not buy with the
golden sphere from Saphrar the merchant; it was something
he was clearly capable of arranging, with Tuchuk cunning, by
himself. I supposed, naturally, however, that Saphrar, guard-
ian of Aphris of Turia, would not permit this to occur.
"No, my dear," Saphrar was saying to the girl, "you must
not expect satisfaction for this frightful injury which has been
wrought upon you must not even think of the games
you must forget this unpleasant evening you must try not to
think of the stories that will be told of you concerning this
evening what the Tuchuk did and how he was permitted to
escape with impunity."
"Never!" cried Aphris. "I will stand, I tell you! I will! I
will!"
"No," said Saphrar, "I cannot permit it, it is better that
the people laugh at Aphris of Turia and perhaps, in some
years, they may forget."
"I demand to be permitted to stand," cried the girl. Then
she cried, "I beg of you Saphrar, permit mel"
"But in a few days," said Saphrar, "you will attain your
majority and receive your fortunes then you may do as you
wish. "
"But it will be after the games!" cried the girl.
"Yes," said Saphrar, as though thinking, "that is true."
"I will defend her," said Kamras. "I will not lose."
"It is true you have never lost," wavered Saphrar.
"Permit it!" cried several of those present.
"Unless you permit this," wept Aphris, "my honor will be
forever stained."
"Unless you permit it," said Kamras sternly, "I may never
have an opportunity to cross steel with this barbaric sleen."'
It then occurred to me, suddenly, that, following Gorean
civic law, the properties and titles, assets and goods of a
given individual who is reduced to slavery are automatically
regarded as having been transferred to the nearest male
relative or nearest relative if no adult male relative is avail-
able or to the city or to, if pertinent, a guardian. Thus, if
Aphris of Turia, by some mischance, were to fall to
Kamchak, and surely slavery, her considerable riches would
be immediately assigned to Saphrar, merchant of Turia.
Moreover, to avoid legal complications and free the assets
for investment and manipulation, the transfer is asymmetri-
cal, in the sense that the individual, even should he somehow
later recover his freedom, retains no legal claim whatsoever
on the transferred assets.
      "All right," said Saphrar, his eyes cast down, as though
      making a decision against his better judgment, "I will permit
      my ward, the Lady Aphris of Turia, to stand at the stake in
      Love War."
      There was a cry of delight from the crowd, confident now
      that the Tuchuk sleen would be fittingly punished for his bold
      use of the richest daughter of Turia.
      "Thank you, my guardian," said Aphris of Turia, and with
      one last vicious look at Kamchak threw back her head and
      with a swirl of her white gown, bordered with gold, walked
      regally from between the tables.
      "To see her walk," remarked Kamchak, rather loudly,
      "one would hardly suspect that she wears the collar of a
      slave."
      Aphris spun to face him, her right fist clenched, her left
      hand muffling her veil about her face, her eyes flashing. The
      circle of steel gleamed on the silk at her throat.
      "I meant only, little Aphris," said Kamchak, "that you
      wear your collar well."
      The girl cried out in helpless rage and turned, stumbling
      and clutching at the banister on the stairs. Then she ran
      up the stairs, weeping, veil disarranged, both hands jerking at
      the collar. With a cry she disappeared.
      "Have no fear, Saphrar of Turia," Kamras was saying, "I
      shall slay the Tuchuk sleen and I shall do so slowly."
 It was early in the morning, several days after Saphrar's
 banquet, that Kamchak and myself, among some hundreds of
 others of the Four Wagon Peoples, came the Plains of a
 Thousand Stakes, some pasangs distant from lofty Turia.
 Judges and craftsmen from Ar, hundreds of pasangs away,
 across the Cartius, were already at the stakes, inspecting
 than and preparing the ground between them. These men, as
 in every year, I learned, had been guaranteed safe passage
 across the southern plains for this event. The journey, even
 so, was not without its dangers, but they had been well
 recompensed, from the treasure chests of both Turia and the
 Wagon Peoples. Some of the judges, now wealthy, had offici-
 ated several times at the games. The fee for even one of their
 accompanying craftsmen was sufficient to support a man for
 a year in luxurious Ar.
 We moved slowly, walking the kaiila, in four long lines, the
 Tuchuks, the Kassars, the Kataii, the Paravaci, some two
 hundred or so warriors of each. Kamchak rode near the head
 of the Tuchuk line. The standard bearer, holding aloft on a
 lance a representation of the four bask horns, carved from
 wood, rode near us. At the head of our line, on a huge kaiila,
 rode Kutaituchik, his eyes closed, his head nodding, his body
 swaying with the stately movement of the animal, a half-
 chewed string of kanda dangling from his mouth.
 Beside him, but as Ubars, rode three other men, whom I
 took to be chief among the Kassars, the Kataii, the Paravaci
 I could see, surprisingly near the forefront of their respective
       lines, the other three men I had first seen on coming to the
       Wagon Peoples, Conrad of the Kasars, Hakimba of the
       Kataii and Tolnus of the Paravaci. These, like Kamchak,
       rode rather near their respective standard bearers. The stan-
       dard of the Kassars is that of a scarlet, three-weighted bole,
       which hangs from a lance; the symbolic representation of a
       bole, three circles joined at the center by lines, is used to
       mark their bask and slaves; both Tenchika and Dina wore
       that brand; Kamchak had not decided to rebrand them, as is
       done with bask; he thought, rightly, it would lower their
       value; also, I think he was pleased to have salves in his
       wagon who wore the brand of Kissers, for such night lie
       taken as evidence of the superiority of Tuchuks to Kassars,
       that they had bested them and taken their slaves; similarly
       Kamchak was pleased to have in his herd bask, and he had
       several, whose first brand was that of the three-weighted
       bole; the standard of the Kataii is a yellow bow, bound
       across a black lance; their brand is also that of a bow, facing
       to the left; the Paravaci standard is a large banner of jewels
       beaded on golden wires, forming the head and horns of a
       bosk its value is incalculable; the Paravaci brand is a symbol-
       ic representation of a bask head, a semicircle resting on an
       inverted isoceles triangle.
       Elizabeth Cardwell, barefoot, in the larl's pelt, walked
       beside Kamchak's stirrup. Neither Tenchika nor Dina would
       be with us. Yesterday afternoon, for an incredible forty
       pieces of gold, four quivas and the saddle of a kaiila, Kachak
       had sold Tenchika back to Albrecht. It was one of the
       highest prices ever paid among the wagons for a slave and 1
       judged that Albrecht had sorely missed his little Tenchika;
       the high price he was forced to pay for the girl was made
       even more intolerable by Kamchak's amusement at his ex-
       pense, roaring with laughter and slapping his knee because
       only too obviously Albrecht had allowed himself to care for
       the girl, and she only slave! Albrecht, while binding her wrists
       and putting his thong on her neck, had angrily cuffed her two
       or three times, calling her worthless and good for nothing;
       she was laughing and leaping beside his kaiila, weeping with
       joy; I last saw her running beside his stirrup, trying to press
       her head against his fur boot. Dina, though she was slave, 1
       had placed on the saddle before me, her legs over the left
       forequarters of the animal; and had ridden with her from the
       wagons, until in the distance I could see the gleaming, white
 walls of Maria. When I had come to this place I set her on
 the grass She looked up at me, puzzled.
 "Why have you brought me here?" she had asked.
 I pointed into the distance. "It is Turia," I said, "your
 city."
 She looked up at me. "Is it your wish," she asked, "that I
 run for the city?"
 She referred to a cruel sport of the young men of the
 wagons who sometimes take Turian slave girls to the sight of
 Turia's walls and then, loosening bole and thong, bid them
 run for the city.
 "No," I told her, "I have brought you here to free you."
 The girl trembled.
 She dropped her head. "I am yours so much yours," she
 said, looking at the grass. "Do not be cruel."
 "No," I said, "I have brought you here to free you."
 She looked up at me. She shook her head.
 "It is my wish," I said.
 "But why?" she asked.
 "It is my wish," I said.
 "Have I not pleased you?" she asked.
 "You have pleased me very much," I told her.
 "Why do you not sell me?" she asked.
 "It is not my wish," I said.
 "But you would sell a bosk or kaiila," she said.
 "Yes," I said.
 "Why not Dina?" she asked.
 "It is not my wish," I said.
 "I am valuable," said the girl. She simply stated a fact.
 "More valuable than you know," I told her.
 "I do not understand," she said.
 I reached into the pouch at my belt and gave her a piece
 of gold. "Take this," I said, "and go to Turia find your
 people and be free."
 Suddenly she began to shake with sobs and fell to her
 knees at the paws of the kaiila, the gold piece in her left
 hand. "If this is a Tuchuk joke," she wept, "kill me swiftly."
 I sprang from the saddle of the kaiila and kneeling beside
 her held her in my arms, pressing her head against my
 shoulder. "No," I said, "Dina of Turia. I do not jest. You are
 free.'
 She looked at me tears in her eyes. "Turian girls are never
 freed," she said. "Never."
 I shook her and kissed her. "You, Dina of Turia," I said,
      "are free." Then I shook her again. "Do you want me to ride
      to the walls and throw you over?" I demanded.
      She laughed through her tears. "No," she said, "no."
      I lifted her to her feet and she suddenly kissed me. "Tarl
      Cabot!" she cried. "Tarl Cabot!"
      It seemed like lightning to us both that she had cried my
      name as might have a free woman. And indeed it was a free
      woman who cried those words, Dina, a free woman of Turia.
      "Oh, Tarl Cabot," she wept.
      Then she regarded me gently. "But keep Dina a moment
      longer yours," she said.
      "You are free," I said.
      "But I would serve you," she said.
      I smiled. "There is no place," I said.
      "Ah, Tarl Cabot," she chided, "there is all the Plains of
      Turia."
      "The Land of the Wagon Peoples, you mean."
      She laughed. "No," she said, "the Plains of Turia."
      "Insolent wench," I observed.
      But she was kissing me and by my arms was being lowered
      to the grasses of the spring prairie.
      When I had lifted her to her feet I noted, in the distance, a
      bit of dust moving from one of the gates of the city towards
      us, probably two or three warriors mounted on high thar-
      larion.
      The girl had not yet seen them. She seemed to me very
      happy and this, naturally, made me happy as well. Then
      suddenly her eyes clouded and her face was transformed with
      distress. Her hands moved to her face, covering her mouth.
      "Oh!" she said.
      "What's wrong?" I asked.
      "I cannot go to Turia!" she cried.
      "Why not?" I asked.
      "I have no veil!" she cried.
      I cried out in exasperation, kissed her, turned her about by
      the shoulders and with a slap, hardly befitting a free woman,
      started her on the way to Turia.
      The dust was now nearing.
      I leaped into the saddle and waved to the girl, who had
      run a few yards and then turned. She waved to me. She was
      crying.
      An arrow swept over my head.
      I laughed and wheeled the kaiila and raced from the
 place, leaving the riders of the ponderous tharlarion far
 behind.
 They circled back to find a girl, free though still clad
 Kajir, clutching in one hand a piece of gold, waving after a
 departed enemy, laughing and crying.
 When I had returned to the wagon Kamchak's first words
 to me had been, "I hope you got a good price for her."
 I smiled.
 "Are you satisfied?" he asked.
 I recalled the Plains of Turia. "Yes," I said, "I am well
 satisfied."
 Elizabeth Cardwell, who had been fixing the fire in the
 wagon, had been startled when I had returned without Dina,
 but had not dared to ask what had been done with her. Now
 her eyes were on me, wide with disbelief. "You sold her?"
 she said, uncomprehendingly. "Sold?"
 "You said she had fat ankles," I reminded her.
 Elizabeth regarded me with horror. "She was a person"
 said Elizabeth, "a human person"
 "No!" said Kamchak, giving her head a shake. "An ani-
 mal! A slaver" Then he added, giving her head another
 shake, "Like yourself!"
 Elizabeth looked at him with dismay.
 "I think" said Kamchak, "I will sell you."
 Elizabeth's face suddenly seemed terrified. She threw a
 wild, pleading look at me.
 Kamchak's words had disturbed me as well.
 I think it was then, perhaps the first time since her first
 coming to the Wagon Peoples, that she fully understood her
 plight for Kamchak had, on the whole, been kind to her
 he had not put the Tuchuk ring in her nose, nor had he
 clothed her Kajir, nor put the brand of the bask horns on her
 thigh, nor even enclosed her lovely throat with the Turian
 collar. Now, again, Elizabeth, visibly shaken, ill, realized that
 she might, should it please Kamchak's whims, be sold or
 exchanged with the same ease as a saddle or a hunting sleen.
 She had seen Tenchika sold. Now she assumed that the
 disappearance of Dina from the wagon was to be similarly
 explained. She looked at me disbelievingly, shaking her head.
 Por my part I did not think it would be a good idea to tell
 her that I had freed Dina. What good would that information
 do her? It might make her own bondage seem more cruel, or
 perhaps fill her with foolish hopes that Kamchak, her master,
 might someday bestow on her the same beautiful gift of
       freedom. I smiled at the thought. Kamchak, Free a slaver
       And, I told myself, even if I myself owned Elizabeth, and not
       Kamchak, I could not free her for what would it be to free
       her? If she approached Turia she would fall slave to the first
       patrol that leashed and hooded her; if she tried to stay
       among the wagons, some young warrior, sensing she was
       undefended and not of the Peoples, would have his chain on
       her before nightfall. hand I myself did not intend to stay
       among the wagons. I had now learned, if the information of
       He that the golden sphere, doubtless the
       egg of Priest-Kings, lay in the wagon of Kutaituchik. I must
       attempt to obtain it and return it to the Sardar. This, I knew,
       might well cost me my life. No, it was best that Elizabeth
       Cardwell believe I had callously sold the lovely Dina of
       Turia. It was best that she understand herself for what she
       was, a barbarian slave girl in the wagon of Kamchak of the
       Tuchuks.
       "Yes," said Kamchak, "I think I will sell her."
       Elizabeth shook with terror and put her head to the rug at
       Kamchak's feet. "Please," she said, in a whisper, "do not sell
       me, Master."
       "What do you think she would bring?" asked Kamchak.
       "She is only a barbarian," I said. I did not wish Kamchak
       to sell her.
       "Perhaps I could have her trained" mused Kamchak.
       "It would considerably improve her price," I admitted. I
       also knew a good training would take months, though much
       can be done with an intelligent girl in only a few weeks.
       "Would you like to learn," asked Kamchak of the girl, "to
       wear silk and bells, to speak, to stand, to walk, to dance to
       drive men mad with the desire to own and master you?"
       The girl said nothing but shuddered.
       "I doubt if you could learn," said Kamchak.
       Elizabeth said nothing, her head down.
       "You are only a little barbarian," said Kamchak wearily.
       Then he winked at me. "But," said he, "she is a pretty little
       barbarian, is she not?"
       "Yes," I said, "She is that indeed."
       I saw Miss Cardwell's eyes close and her shoulders shake
       with shame. Her hands then covered her eyes.
       I followed Kamchak out of the wagon. Once outside, to
       my astonishment, he turned to me and said, "You were a
       fool to free Dina of Turia."
       "How do you know I freed her?" I asked.
  "I saw you put her on your kaiila and ride toward Turia,"
  he said. "She was not even running beside the kaiila bound."
  He grinned. "And I know that you liked her that you would
  not wager for her and," he added, nodding toward the
  pouch at my belt, "your pouch is no heavier now than when
  you left."
  I laughed.
  Kamchak pointed to the pouch. "You should have forty
  pieces of gold in that pouch," he said. "That much for her at
  least maybe more because she was skilled in the games of
  the bole." He chuckled. "A girl such as Dina of Turia is
  worth more than a kaiila," he said. "And, too," he added,
  "she was a beauty!" Kamchak laughed. "Albrecht was a fool,"
  he said, "but Tarl Cabot was a bigger one!"
  "Perhaps," I admitted.
  "Any man who permits himself to care for a slave girl,"
  said Kamchak, "is a fool."
  "Perhaps someday," I said, "even Kamchak of the
  Tuchuks will care for a slave girl."
  At this Kamchak threw back his head and roared, and
  then bent over slapping his knee.
  "Then," I said, determinedly, "he may know how it feels."
  At this Kamchak lost all control over himself and he
  leaned over backward slapping his thighs with the palms of
  his hands, laughing as though he were demented. He even
  reeled about roaring as though he were drunk and slapped
  the wheel of a neighbor's wagon for a minute or two until his
  laughter turned into spasmodic gasps and, making strange
  noises, he wheezingly fought to get a mouthful or two of air
  under his shaking ribs. I would not have much minded if he
  had asphyxiated himself on the spot.
  "Tomorrow," I said, "you fight on the Plains of a Thou-
  sand Stakes."
  "Yes," he said, "so tonight I will get drunk."
  "It would be better," I said, "to get a good night's sleep."
  "Yes," said Kamchak, "but I am Tuchuk so I will get
  drunk."
  "Very well," I said, "then I, too, shall get drunk."
  We then spat to determine who would bargain for a bottle
  of Paga. By starting from the side and turning his head
  quickly, Kamchak bested me by some eighteen inches. In the
  light of his skill my own effort seemed depressingly naive,
  quite simple-minded, unimaginative and straightforward. I
        had not known about the head-twisting trick. The wily
        Tuchuk, of course, had had me spit first.
        Now this morning we had come to the Plains of a Thou-
        sand Stakes.
        For all his uproarious stomping about the wagon last
        night, Paga bottle in hand, singing gusty Tuchuk songs, half
        frightening Miss Cardwell to death, he seemed in good spir-
        its, looking about, whistling, occasionally pounding a little
        rhythm on the side of his saddle. I would not tell Miss
        Cardwell but the rhythm was the drum rhythm of the
        Chain Dance. I gathered Kamchak had his mind on Aphris
        of Turia, and was, perilously to my mind, counting his
        wenches before he had won them.
        I do not know if there are, by count, a thousand stakes or
        not on the Plains of a Thousand Stakes, but I would suppose
        that there are that many or more. The stakes, flat-topped,
        each about six and half feet high and about seven or eight
        inches in diameter, stand in two long lines facing one another
        in pairs. The two lines are separated by about fifty feet and
        each stake in a line is separated from the stake on its left and
        right by about ten yards. The two lines of stakes extended
        for more than four pasangs across the prairie. One of these
        lines is closest to the city and the other to the prairies
        beyond. The stakes had recently been, I observed, brightly
        painted, each differently, in a delightful array of colors;
        further, each was trimmed and decorated variously, depend-
        ing on the whim of the workman, sometimes simply, some-
        times fancifully, sometimes ornately. The entire aspect was
        one of color, good cheer, lightheartedness and gaiety. There
        was something of the sense of carnival in the air. I was
        forced to remind myself that between these two lines of
        stakes men would soon fight and die.
        I noted some of the workmen still affixing small retaining
        rings to some of the stakes, bolting them one on a side,
        usually about five feet to five and a half feet from the
        ground. A workman sprang a pair shut, and then opened
        them with a key, which he subsequently hung from a tiny
        hook near the top of the stake.
        I heard some musicians, come out early from Turia, playing
        a light tune behind the Turian stakes, about fifty yards or so
        away.
        In the space between the two lines of stakes, for each pair
        of facing stakes, there was a circle of roughly eight yards in
 diameter. This circle, the grass having been removed, was
 sanded and raked.
 Moving boldly now among the Wagon Peoples were ven-
 dors from Turia, selling their cakes, their wines and meats,
 even chains and collars.
 Kamchak looked at the sun, which was now about a
 quarter of the way up the sky.
 "Turians are always late," he said.
 From the back of the kaiila I could now see dust from
 Turia. "They are coming," I said.
 Among the Tuchuks, though dismounted, I saw the young
 man Harold, he whom Hereena of the First Wagon had so
 sorely insulted at the time of the wagering with Conrad and
 Albrecht. I did not, however, see the girl. The young man
 seemed to me a strong, fine fellow, though of course un-
 scarred. He had, as I mentioned, blond hair and blue eyes,
 not unknown among the Tuchuks, but unusual. He carried
 weapons. He could not, of course, compete in these contests,
 for there is status involved in these matters and only warriors
 of repute are permitted to participate. Indeed, without the
 Courage Scar one could not even think of proposing oneself
 for the competition. It might be mentioned, incidentally, that
 without the Courage Scar one may not, among the Tuchuks,
 pay court to a free woman, own a wagon, or own more than
 five bosk and three kaiila. The Courage Scar thus has its
 social and economic, as well as its martial, import.
 "You're right," said Kamchak, rising in the stirrups. "First
 the warriors."
 On long lines of tharlarion I could see warriors of Turia
 approaching in procession the Plains of a Thousand Stakes.
 The morning sun flashed from their helmets, their long thar-
 larion lances, the metal embossments on their oval shields,
 unlike the rounded shields of most Gorean cities. I could
 hear, like the throbbing of a heart, the beating of the two
 tharlarion drums that set the cadence of the march. Beside
 the tharlarion walked other men-at-arms, and even citizens of
 Turia, and more vendors and musicians, come to see the
 games.
 On the heights of distant Turia itself I could see the flutter
 of flags and pensions. The walls were crowded, and I sup-
 posed many upon them used the long glasses of the Caste of
 Builders to observe the field of the stakes.
 The warriors of Turia extended their formation about two
 hundred yards from the stakes until in ranks of four or five
      deep they were strung out in a line as long as the line of
      stakes itself. Then they halted. As soon as the hundreds of
      ponderous tharlarion had been marshaled into an order, a
      lance, carrying a fluttering pennon, dipped and there was a
      sudden signal on the tharlarion drums. Immediately the
      lances of the lines lowered and the hundreds of tharlarion,
      hissing and grunting, their riders shouting, the drums beating,
      began to bound rapidly towards us.
      "Treachery!" I cried.
      There was nothing living on Gor I knew that could take
      the impact of a tharlarion charge.
      Elizabeth Cardwell screamed, throwing her hands before
      her face.
      To my astonishment the warriors of the Wagon Peoples
      seemed to be paying very little attention to the bestial ava-
      lanche that was even then hurtling down upon them. Some
      were haggling with the vendors, others were talking among
      themselves.
      I wheeled the Kaiila, looking for Elizabeth Cardwell, who,
      afoot, would be slain almost before the tharlarion had
      crossed the lines of the stakes. She was standing facing the
      charging tharlarion, as though rooted to the earth, her hands
      before her face. I bent down in the saddle and tensed to kick
      the kaiila forward to sweep her to the saddle, turn and race
      for our lives.
      "Really," said Kamchak.
      I straightened up and saw that the lines of the tharlarion
      lancers had, with much pounding and trampling of the earth,
      with shouting, with the hissing of the great beasts, stopped
      short, abruptly, some fifteen yards or so behind their line of
      stakes.
      "It is a Turian joke," said Kamchak. "They are as fond of
      the games as we, and do not wish to spoil them."
      I reddened. Elizabeth Cardwell's knees seemed suddenly
      weak but she staggered back to us.
      Kamchak smiled at me. "She is a pretty little barbarian,
      isn't she, he said.
      "Yes," I said, and looked away, confused.
      Kamchak laughed.
      Elizabeth looked up at us, puzzled.
      I heard a cry from the Turians across the way. "The
      wenches!" he cried, and this shout was taken up by many of
      the others. There was much laughing and pounding of lances
      on shields.
 In a moment, to a thunder of kaiila paws on the turf,
 racing between the lines of stakes, scattering sand, there came
 a great number of riders, their black hair swirling behind
 them, who pulled up on their mounts, rearing and squealing,
 between the stakes, and leaped from the saddle to the sand,
 relinquishing the reins of their mounts to men among the
 Wagon Peoples.
 They were marvelous, the many wild girls of the Wagons,
 and I saw that chief among them was the proud, beauteous
 Hereena, of the First Wagon. They were enormously excited,
 laughing. Their eyes shone. A few spit and shook their small
 fists at the Turians across the way, who reciprocated with
 good-natured shouts and laughter.
 I saw Hereena notice the young man Harold among the
 warriors and she pointed her finger imperiously at him, gestur-
 ing him to her.
 He approached her. "Take the reins of my kaiila, Slave,"
 she said to him, insolently throwing him the reins.
 He took them angrily and, to the laughter of many of the
 Tuchuks present, withdrew with the animal.
 The girls then went to mingle with the warriors. There
 were between a hundred and a hundred and fifty girls there
 from each of the four Wagon Peoples.
 "Hah!" said Kamchak, seeing now - the lines of thar-
 larion part for a space of perhaps forty yards, through which
 could be seen the screened palanquins of Turian damsels,
 borne on the shoulders of chained slaves, among them un-
 doubtedly men of the Wagon Peoples.
 Now the excitement of the throng seemed mostly to course
 among the warriors of the Wagon Peoples as they rose in
 their stirrups to see better the swaying, approaching palan-
 quins, each reputedly bearing a gem of great beauty, a fit
 prize in the savage contests of Love War.
 The institution of Love War is an ancient one among the
 Turians and the Wagon Peoples, according to the Year
 Keepers antedating even the Omen Year. The games of Love
 War, of course, are celebrated every spring between, 80 to
 speak, the city and the plains, whereas the Omen Year occurs
 only every tenth year. The games of Love War, in them-
 selves, do not constitute a gathering of the Wagon Peoples,
 for normally the herds and the free women of the peoples do
 not approach one another at these times; only certain dele-
 gations of warriors, usually about two hundred from a peo-
 ple, are sent in the spring to the Plains of a Thousand Stakes.
      The theoretical justification of the games of Love War,
      from the Turian point of view, is that they provide an
      excellent arena in which to demonstrate the fierceness and
      prowess of Turian warriors, thus perhaps intimidating or, at
      the very least, encouraging the often overbold warriors of the
      Wagon Peoples to be wary of Turian steel. The secret justifi-
      cation, I suspect, however, is that the Turian warrior is fond
      of meeting the enemy and acquiring his women, particularly
      should they be striking little beasts, like Hereena of the First
      Wagon, as untamed and savage as they are beautiful; it is
      regarded as a great sport among Turian warriors to collar
      such a wench and force her to exchange riding leather for
      the bells and silks of a perfumed slave girl. It might also be
      mentioned that the Turian warrior, in his opinion, too seldom
      encounters the warrior of the Wagon Peoples, who tends to
      be a frustrating, swift and elusive foe, striking with great
      rapidity and withdrawing with goods and captives almost
      before it is understood what has occurred. I once asked
      Kamchak if the Wagon Peoples had a justification for the
      games of Love War. "Yes," he had said. And he had then
      pointed to Dina and Tenchika, clad Kajir, who were at that
      time busy in the wagon. "That is the justification," said
      Kamchak. And he had then laughed and pounded his knee. It
      was only then that it had occurred to me that both girls
      might have been acquired in the games; as a matter of fact, I
      however, I later learned that only Tenchika had been so
wenches!" he cried, and this sand
 The wagon girls, watching this, some of them chewing on
 fruit or stalks of grass, jeered.
 One by one, clad in the proud arrays of resplendent silks,
 each in the Robes of Concealment, the damsels of Turia,
 veiled and straight-standing, emerged from their palanquins,
 scarcely concealing their distaste for the noise and clamor
 about them. ~
 Judges were now circulating, each with lists, among the
 Wagon Peoples and the Turians.
 As I knew, not just any girl, any more than just any
 warrior, could participate in the games of Love War. Only
 the most beautiful were eligible, and only the most beautiful
 of these could be chosen.
 A girl might propose herself to stand, as had Aphris of
 Turia, but this would not guarantee that she would be cho-
 sen, for the criteria of Love War are exacting and, as much
 as possible, objectively applied. Only the most beautiful of
 the most beautiful could stand in this harsh sport.
 I heard a judge call, "First Stakel Aphris of Turial"
 "Hah!" yelled Kamchak, slapping me on the back, nearly
 knocking me from the back of my kaiila.
 I was astonished. The Turian wench was beautiful indeed,
 that she could stand at the first stake. This meant that she
 was quite possibly the most beautiful woman in Turia, cer-
 tainly at least among those in the games this year.
 In her silks of white and gold, on cloths thrown before
 her, Aphris of Turia stepped disdainfully forward, guided by
 a judge, to the first of the stakes on the side of the Wagon
 Peoples. The girls of the Wagon Peoples, on the other hand,
 would stand at the stakes nearest Turia. In this way the
 Turian girls can see their city and their warriors, and the girls
 of the Wagons can see the plains and the warriors of the
 Wagon Peoples. I had also been informed by Kamchak that
 this places the girl farther from her own people. Thus, to
 interfere, a Turian would have to cross the space between the
 stakes, and so, too, would one of the Wagon Peoples, thus
 clearly calling thcn~selves to the attention of the judges, those
 officials supervising the Games.
 The judges were now calling names, and girls, both of the
 Wagon Peoples and of Turia, were coming forward.
 I saw that Hereena, of the First Wagon, stood Third
 Stake, though, as far as I could note, she was no less
 beautiful than the two Kassar girls who stood above her.
 Kamchak explained that there was a slight gap between
      two of her teeth on the upper right hand side in the back.
      "Oh," I said.
      I noted with amusement that she was furious at having
      been chosen only third stake. "I, Hereena of the First Wag-
      on, am superior," she was crying, "to those two Kassar
      she-kaii1a!"
      But the judge was already four stakes below her.
      The selection of the girls, incidentally, is determined by
      judges in their city, or of their own people, in Turia by
      members of the Caste of Physicians who have served in the
      great slave houses of Ar; among the wagons by the masters
      of the public slave wagons, who buy, sell and rent girls,
      providing warriors and slavers with a sort of clearing house
      and market for their feminine merchandise. The public slave
      wagons, incidentally, also provide Paga. They are a kind of
      combination Paga tavern and slave market. I know of noth-
      ing else precisely like them on Gor. Karuchak and I had
      visited one last night where I had ended up spending four
      copper tarn disks for one bottle of Paga. I hauled Kamchak
      out of the wagon before he began to bid on a chained-up
      little wench from Port Kar who had taken his eye.
      I looked up and down the lines of stakes. The girls of the
      Wagon Peoples stood proudly before their stakes, certain that
      their champions, whoever they were to be, would be victori-
      ous and return them to their peoples; the girls of the city of
      Turia stood also at their stakes, but with feigned indifference.
      I supposed, in spite of their apparent lack of concern, the
      hearts of most of the Turian girls were beating rapidly. This
      could not be for them an ordinary day.
      I looked at them, veiled and beautiful in their silks. Yet I
      knew that beneath those Robes of Concealment many wore
      the shameful Turian camisk, perhaps the only time the hated
      garment would touch their bodies, for should their warrior
      lose this match they knew they would not be permitted to
      Lithe stake in the robes in which they came
      two of her teeth on the upper right hand side in the back.
      "Oh," I said.
      I noted with amusement that she was furious at having
      been chosen only third stake. "I, Hereena of the First Wag-
      on, am superior," she was crying, "to those two Kassar
      she-kaii1a!"
      But the judge was already four stakes below her.
      The selection of the girls, incidentally, is determined by
      judges in their city, or of their own people, in Turia by
      members of the Caste of Physicians who have served in the
      great slave houses of Ar; among the wagons by the masters
      of the public slave wagons, who buy, sell and rent girls,
      providing warriors and slavers with a sort of clearing house
      and market for their feminine merchandise. The public slave
      wagons, incidentally, also provide Paga. They are a kind of
      combination Paga tavern and slave market. I know of noth-
      ing else precisely like them on Gor. Kamchak and I had
      visited one last night where I had ended up spending four
      copper tarn disks for one bottle of Paga. I hauled Kamchak
      out of the wagon before he began to bid on a chained-up
      little wench from Port Kar who had taken his eye.
      I looked up and down the lines of stakes. The girls of the
      Wagon Peoples stood proudly before their stakes, certain that
      their champions, whoever they were to be, would be victori-
      ous and return them to their peoples; the girls of the city of
      Turia stood also at their stakes, but with feigned indifference.
      I supposed, in spite of their apparent lack of concern, the
      hearts of most of the Turian girls were beating rapidly. This
      could not be for them an ordinary day.
      I looked at them, veiled and beautiful in their silks. Yet I
      knew that beneath those Robes of Concealment many wore
      the shameful Turian camisk, perhaps the only time the hated
      garment would touch their bodies, for should their warrior
      lose this match they knew they would not be permitted to
      The stake in the robes in which they came. They would
       away as free women.
      To myself, wondering if Aphris of Turia, standing
      first stake, wore beneath the robes of while
       of a slave girl. I guessed not. She would wench?
      Egg his kaiila through the crown
 He leaned down from the saddle. "Good morning, little
 Aphris," he said cheerily.
 She stiffened, and did not even turn to regard him. "Are
 you prepared to die, Sleen?" she inquired.
 "No," Kamchak said.
 I heard her laugh softly beneath the white veil, trimmed
 with silk.
 "I see you no longer wear your collar," observed Kamchak.
 She lifted her head and did not deign to respond.
 "I have another," Kamchak assured her.
 She spun to face him, her fists clenched. Those lovely
 almond eyes, had they been weapons, would have slain him
 in the saddle like a bolt of lightning.
 "How pleased I shall be," hissed the girl, "to see you on
 your knees in the sand begging Kamras of Turia to finish
 you!"
 "Tonight, little Aphris," said Kamchakj "as I promised
 you, you shall spend your first night in the dung sack."
 "Sleen!" she cried. "Sleen! Sleen!"
 Kamchak roared with laughter and turned the kaiila away.
 "Are the women at stake?" called a judge.
 Prom down the long lines, from other judges, came the
 confirming cry. "They are at stake."
 "Let the women be secured," called the first judge, who
 stood on a platform near the beginning of the stake lines, this
 year on the side of the Wagon Peoples.
 Aphris of Turia, at the request of one of the minor judges,
 irritably removed her gloves, of silk-lined white verrskin,
 trimmed with gold, and placed them in a deep fold of her
 robes.
 ' "The retaining rings," prompted the judge.
 "It is not necessary," responded Aphris. "I shall stand
 quietly here until the sleen is slain."
 "Place your wrists in the rings," said the judge, "or it shall
 be done for you."
 In fury the girl placed her hands behind her head, in the
 rings, one on each side of the stake. The judge expertly
 lipped them shut and moved to the next stake.
 Aphris, not very obviously, moved her hands in the rings,
 fed to withdraw them. She could not, of course, do so. I
 ought I saw her tremble for just an instant, realizing herself
 cured, but then she stood quietly, looking about herself as
 though bored. The key to the rings hung, of course, on a small
 hook, about two inches above her head.
        "Are the women secured?" called the first judge, he on the
        platform.
        "They are secured," was relayed up and down the long
        lines.
        I saw Hereena standing insolently at her stake, but her
        brown wrists, of course, were bound to it by steel.
        "Let the matches be arranged," called the judge.
        I soon heard the other judges repeating his cry.
        All along the lines of stakes I saw Turian warriors and
        those of the Wagon Peoples press into the area between the
        stakes.
        The girls of the wagons, as usual, were unveiled. Turian
        warriors walked along the line of stakes, examining them,
        stepping back when one spit or kicked at him. The girls
        jeered and cursed them, which compliment they received
        with good humor and pointed observations on the girls' real
        or imaginary flaws.
        At the request of any warrior of the Wagon Peoples, a
        judge would remove the pins of the face veil of a Turian girl
        and push back the hood of her robes of concealment, in
        order that her head and face might be seen.
        This aspect of the games was extremely humiliating for the
        Turian girls, but they understood its necessity; few men,
        especially barbarian warriors, care to fight for a woman on
        whose face they have not even looked.
        "I would like to take a look at this one," Kamchak was
        saying, jerking a thumb in the direction of Aphris of Turia.
        "Certainly," remarked the nearest judge.
        "Can you not remember, Sleen," asked the girl, "the face
        of Aphris of Turia?"
        "My memory is vague," said Kamchak. "There are so many
        faces."
        The judge unpinned her white and gold veil and then, with
        a gentle hand, brushed back her hood revealing her long,
        lovely black hair.
        Aphris of Turia was an incredibly beautiful woman.
        She shook her hair as well as she could, bound to the,
        "Perhaps now you can remember?" she queried acidly.
        "It's vague," muttered Kamchak, wavering, "I had in mind
        I think the face of a slave there was, as I recall, a collar"
        "You tharlarion," she said. "You sleety"
        "What do you think?" asked Kamchak.
        "She is marvelously beautiful," I said.
   "She must be plain indeed," remarked Kamchak, looking
   closely again at Aphris.
   "No," said the judge, "it is because she is defended by
   Kamras, Champion of Turia."
   "Oh, no!" cried Kamchak, throwing his fist to his forehead
   in mock despair.
   "Yes," said the judge, "he."
   "Surely you recall?" laughed Aphris merrily.
   "I had had much Paga at the time," admitted Kamchak.
   "You need not meet him if you wish." said the judge.
   I thought that a humane arrangement that two men must
   understand who it is they face before entering the circle of
   sand. It would indeed be unpleasant if one suddenly, unex-
   pectedly, found oneself facing a superb, famed warrior, say,
   a Kamras of Turia.
   "Meet him!" cried Aphris.
   "If no one meets him," said the judge, "the Kassar girl will
   be his by forfeit."
   I could see that the Kassar girl, a beauty, at the stake
   opposite Aphris of Turia was distressed, and understandably
   so. It appeared she was to depart for Turia without so much
   as a handful of sand kicked about on her behalf.
"Meet him, Tuchuk!" she cried.
    "Where are your Kassars?" asked Kamchak.
   I thought it an excellent question. I had seen Conrad
   about, but he had picked out a Turian wench to fight for
   some six or seven stakes away. Albrecht was not even at the
   games. I supposed he was home with Tenchika.
   "They are fighting elsewhere!" she cried. "Please, Tuchuk!"
   she wept.
   "But you are only a Kassar wench,') pointed out Kamchak.
   "Please!' she cried.
   "Besides," said Kamchak, "you might look well in Pleasure
   Silk."
   "Look at the Turian wench!" cried the girl. "Is she not
   beautiful? Do you not want her?"
   Kamchak looked at Aphris of Turia.
   "I suppose," he said, "she is no worse than the rest."
   "Fight for met" cried Aphris of Turia
   "All right," said Kamchak. "I will."
   The Kassar girl put her back against the stake, trembling
   with relief.
   "You are a fool," said Kamras of Turia.
   I was a bit startled, not realizing he was so close. I looked
  at him. He was indeed an impressive warrior. He seemed
  strong and fast. His long black hair was now tied behind his
  head. His large wrists had been wrapped in boskbide straps.
  He wore a helmet and carried the Turian shield, which is
  oval. In his right hand there was a spear. Over his shoulder
  was slung the sheath of a short sword.
  Kamchak looked up at him. It was not that Kamchak was
  particularly short, but rather that Kamras was a very large
  man.
  "By the sky," said Kamchak, whistling, "you are a big
  fellow indeed."
  "Let us begin," proposed Kamras.
  At this word the judge called out -to clear the space
  between the stakes of Aphris of Turia and the lovely Kassar
  wench. Two men, from Ar, I took it, came forward with
  rakes and began to smooth the circle of sand between the
  stakes, for it had been somewhat disturbed in the inspection
  of the girls.
  Unfortunately for Kamchak, I knew that this was the year
  in which the Turian foeman might propose the weapon of
  combat. Fortunately, however, the warrior of the Wagon
  Peoples could withdraw from the combat any time before his
  name had actually been officially entered in the lists of the
  games. Thus if Kamras chose a weapon with which Kamchak
  did not feel at ease, the Tuchuk might, with some grace,
  decline the combat, in this forfeiting only a Kassar girl,
  which I was sure would not overly disturb the philosophical
  Kamchak.
  "Ah, yes, weapons," Kamchak was saying, "what shall it
  be the kaiila lance, a whip and bladed bole perhaps the
  quiva?"
  "The sword," said Kamras.
  The Turian's decision plunged me into despair. In all my
  time among the wagons I had not seen one of the Gorean
  short swords, so fierce and swift and common a weapon
  among those of the cities. The warrior of the Wagon Peoples
  does not use the short sword, probably because such a weap-
  on could not be optimally used froth the saddle of the
  kaiila; the saber, incidentally, which would be somewhat
  more effective from ltaiilaback, is almost unknown on Gor;
  its role, I gather, is more than fulfilled by the lance, which
  may be used with a delicacy and address comparable to that
  of a blade, supplemented by the seven quiva, or saddle
  knives; it might further be pointed out that a saber would
  barely reach to the saddle of the high tharlarion; the warrior
  of the Wagon Peoples seldom approaches an enemy more
  closely than is required to bring him down with the bow, or,
  if need be, the lance; the quiva itself is regarded, on the
  whole, as more of a missile weapon than a hand knife. I
  gather that the Wagon Peoples, if they wanted sabers or
  regarded them as valuable, would be able to acquire them, in
  spite of the fact that they have no metalworking of their own;
  there might be some attempt to prevent them from falling
  into the hands of the Wagon Peoples, but where there are gold
  and jewels available merchants, in Ar and elsewhere, would
  see that they were manufactured and reached the southern
  plains. Most quivas, incidentally, are wrought in the smithies
  of Ar. The fact that the saber is not a common weapon of
  Wagon Peoples is a reflection of the style, nature and condi-
  ffons of warfare to which they are accustomed, a matter of
  choice on their part rather than the result of either ignorance
  or technological limitation. The saber, incidentally, is not
  only unpopular among the Wagon Peoples but among the
  warriors of Gor generally; it is regarded as being too long
  and clumsy a weapon for the close, sharp combat so dear to
  the heart of the warrior of the cities; further it is not of
  much use from the saddle of a tarn or tharlarion. The
  important point, however, in the circumstances was that
  Kamras had proposed the sword as the weapon of his en-
  counter with Kamchak, and poor Kamchak was almost cer-
  tain to be as unfamiliar with the sword as you or I would be
  with any of the more unusual weapons of Gor, say, the whip
  knife of Port Kar or the trained varts of the caves of Tyros.
  Incidentally, Turian warriors, in order to have the opportunist
  to slay a foe, as wed as acquire his woman, customarily
  choose as the weapon of combat in these encounters, buckler
  and dagger, ax and buckler, dagger and whip, ax and net, or
  the two daggers, with the reservation that the quiva, if used,
  not be thrown. Kamras, however, appeared adamant on the
  point. "The sword," he repeated.
      ,,"But I am only a poor Tuchuk," wailed Kamchak.
  Kamras laughed. "The sword," he said, yet again.
    I thought, all things considered, that the stipulation of
  Kamras regarding weapons was cruel and shameful.
    "But how would I, a poor Tuchuk," Kamchak was moan-
  ing, "know anything of the sword?"
    'when withdraw," said Kamras, loftily, "and I will take
  this Kassar wench slave to Turia.
The girl moaned.
 Kamras smiled with contempt. "You see," he said, "I am
 Champion of Turia and I have no particular wish to stain my
 blade with the blood of an urt."
 The urt is a loathsome, horned Gorean rodent; some are
 quite large, the size of wolves or ponies, but most are very
  small, tiny enough to be held in the palm of one hand.
  "Well," said Kamchak, "I certainly would not want that to
  happen either."
  The Kassar girl cried out in distress.
   "Fight him, filthy Tuchuk" screamed Aphris of Turia,
    pulling against the retaining rings.
    "Do not be uneasy, gentle Aphris of Turia," said Kamras.
    "Permit him to withdraw branded braggart and coward.
     Let him live in his shame, for so much the richer will be your
     vengeance."
     But the lovely Aphris was not convinced. "I want him
     slain," she cried, "cut into tiny pieces, the death of a thou
     sand cuts!"
     "Withdraw," I advised Kamchak.
      "Do you think I should," he inquired.
       "Yes," I said, "I do."
       Kamras Divas regarding Aphris of Turia. "If it is truly your
       wish," he said, "I will permit him to choose weapons agreea
       ble to us both."
       "It is my wish," she said, "that he be slaint"
        Kamras shrugged. "All right," he said, "I will kill him." He
         then turned to Kamchak. "All right' Tuchuk," he said, "I will
        permit you to choose weapons agreeable to us both."
        "But perhaps I will not fight," said Kamchak warily.
         Kamras clenched his fists. "Very well," he said, "as you
         wish."
         "But then again," mused Kamchak, "perhaps I shall."
          Aphris of Turia cried out in rage and the Kassar wench in
           distress.
           "I will fight," announced Kamchak.
          Both girls cried out in pleasure.
          The judge now entered the name of Kamchak of the
           Tuchuks on his lists.
          "What weapon do you choose?" asked the judge. "Remem
          ber," cautioned the judge, "the weapon or weapons chosen
          must be mutually agreeable."
      Kamchak seemed lost in thought and then he looked up
      brightly. "I have always wondered," he said, "what it would
      be like to hold a sword."
      The judge nearly dropped the list.
      "I will choose the sword," said Kamchak.
      The Kassar girl moaned.
      Kamras looked at Aphris of Turia, dumbfounded. The girl
      herself was speechless. "He is mad," said Kamras of Turia.
      "Withdraw," I urged Kamchak.
      "It is too late now," said the judge.
      "It is too late now," said Kamchak, innocently.
      Inwardly I moaned, for in the past months I had come to
      respect and feel an affection for the shrewd, gusty brawny
      Tuchuk.
      Two swords were brought, Gorean short swords, forged in
      Ar.
      Kamchak picked his up as though it were a wagon lever,
      used for loosening the wheels of mired wagons.
      Kamras and I both winced.
      Then Kamras, and I give him credit, said to Kamchak,
      'withdraw." I could understand his feelings. Kamras was,
      after all, a warrior, and not a butcher.
      "A thousand cuts!" cried the gentle Aphris of Turia. "A
      piece of gold to Kamras for every cull" she cried.
      Kamchak was running his thumb on the blade. I saw a
      sudden, bright drop of blood on his thumb. He looked up.
      "Sharp," he said.
      "Yes," I said in exasperation. I turned to the judge. "May I
      fight for Lima" I demanded.
      "It is not permitted," said the judge.
      "But," said Kamchak, "it was a good idea."
      I seized Kamchak by the shoulders. "Kamras has no real
      wish to kill you," I said. "It is enough for him to shame you.
      Withdraw."
      Suddenly the eyes of Kamchak gleamed. "Would you see
      me shamed?" he asked.
      I looked at him, "Beher, my friend," I said, "that than
      death."
      "No," said Kamchak, and his eyes were like steel, "better
      death than shame."
      I stepped back. He was Tuchuk. I would sorely miss my
      friend, the ribald, hard-drinking, stomping, dancing Kamchak
      of the Tuchuks.
      In the last moment I cried out to Kamchak, "For the sake
      of Priest-Kings, hold the weapon thus" trying to teach him
the simplest of the commoner grips for the hilt of the short
sword, permitting a large degree of both retention and flexi-
bility. But when I stepped away he was now holding it like
a Gorean angle saw.
Even Kamras closed his eyes briefly, as though to shut out
the spectacle. I now realized Kamras had only wished to
drive Kamchak from the field, a chastened and humiliated
man. He had little more wish to slay the clumsy Tuchuk than
he would have a peasant or a potmaker.
"Let the combat begin," said the judge.
I stepped away from Kamchak and Kamras approached-
him, by training, cautiously.
Kamchak was looking at the edge of his sword, turning it
about, apparently noting with pleasure the play of sunlight on
the blade.
"Watch out!" I cried.
Kamchak turned to see what I had in mind and to his
great good fortune, as he did so, the sun flashed from the
blade into the eyes of ELamras, who suddenly threw his arm
up, blinking and shaking his head, for the instant blinded.
"Turn and strike now!" I screamed
"What?" asked Kamchak.
"Watch out!" I cried, for now Kamras had recovered, and
was once again approaching.
Kamras, of course, had the sun at his back, using it as
naturally as the tarn to protect his advance.
It had been incredibly fortunate for Kamchak that the
blade had flashed precisely at the time it had in the way it
had.
It had quite possibly saved his life.
Kamras lunged and it looked like Kamchak threw up his
arm at the last instant as though he had lost balance, and
indeed he was now tottering on one boot. I scarcely noticed
the blow had been smartly parried. Kamras then began to
chase Kamchak about the ring of sand. Kamchak was nearly
stumbling over backward and kept trying to regain his bal-
ance. In this chase, rather undignified, Kamras had struck a
dozen times and each time, astoundingly, the off-balance
Kamchak, holding his sword DOW like a physician's pestle,
had managed somehow to meet the blow.
"Slay him!" screamed Aphris of Turia.
I was tempted to cover my eyes.
The Kassar girl was wailing.
Then, as though weary, Kamchak, puffing, sat down in the
      sand. His sword was in front of his face, apparently blocking
      his vision. With his boots he kept rotating about, always
      facing Kamras no matter from which direction he came
      Each time the Turian struck and I would have thought
      Kamchak slain, somehow, incomprehensibly, at the last in-
      stant, nearly causing my heart to stop, with a surprised
      weary little twitch, the blade of the Tuchuk would slide the
      Turian steel harmlessly to the side. It was only about this
      time that it dawned on me that for three or four minutes
      Kamchak had been the object of the ever-more-furious as-
      sault of Turia's champion and was, to this instant, un-
      scratched.
      Kamchak then struggled wearily to his feet.
      "Die, Tuchuk!" cried Kamrus now enraged, rushing upon
      him. For more than a minute, while I scarcely dared to
      breathe and there was silence all about save for the ring of
      steel, I watched Kamchak stand there, heavy in his boots, his
      head seeming almost to sit on his shoulders, his body hardly
      moving save for the swiftness of a wrist and the turn of a
      hand.
      Kamras, exhausted, scarcely able to lift his arm, staggered
      backward.
      Once again, expertly, the sun flashed from the sword of
      Kamchak in his eyes.
      In terror Kamras blinked and shook his head, thrashing
      about wearily with his sword.
      - Then, foot by booted foot, Kamchak advanced toward
      him. I saw the first blood leap front the cheek of Kamras,
      and then again from his left arm, then from the thigh, then
      from an ear.
      "Kill him!" Aphris of, Turia was screaming. "Kill him!"
      But now, almost like a drunk man, Kamras was fighting
      for his life and the Tuchuk, like a bear, scarcely moving
      more than arm and wrist, followed him about, shuffling
      through the sand after him, touching him again and again
      with the blade. '
      "Slay hind" howled Aphris of Turia!
      For perhaps better than fifteen minutes, patiently, not
      hurrying, Kamchak of the Tuchuks shuffled after Kamras of
      Turia, touching him once more and ever again, each time
      leaving a quick, bright stain of blood on his tunic or body
      And then, to my astonishment, and that of the throng who
      had gathered to witness the contest, I saw Kamras, Champi-
      on of Turia, weak from the loss of blood, fall to his knees
 before Kamchak of the Tuchuks. Kamras tried to lift his
 sword but the boot of Kamchak pressed it into the sand, and
 Kamras lifted his eyes to look dazed into the scarred, inscru-
 table countenance of the Tuchuk. Kamchak's sword was at
 his throat. "Six years," said Kamchak, "before I was scarred
 was I mercenary in the guards of Ar, learning the walls and
 defenses of that city for my people. In that time of the
 guards of Ar I became First Sword."
 Kamras fell in the sand at the feet of Kamchak, unable
 even to beg for mercy.
 Kamchak did not slay him.
 Rather he threw the sword he carried into the sand and
 though he threw it easily it slipped through almost to the hilt.
 He looked at me and grinned. "An interesting weapon," he
 said, "but I prefer lance and quiva."
 There was an enormous roar about us and the pounding of
 lances on leather shields. I rushed to Kamchak and threw my
 arms about him laughing and hugging him. He was grinning
 from ear to ear, sweat glistening in the furrows of his scars.
 Then he turned and advanced to the stake of Aphris of
 Turia, who stood there, her wrists bound in steel, regarding
 him, speechless with horror
      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.
"Here, here!" he cried cheerily, hauling the exhausted
Aphris to her knees "There is work to be done, !"
She looked up at him, the thong still on her neck, her
wrists bound. Her eyes seemed dazed.
"There are bask to be groomed," he informed her, "and
their horns and hoofs must be polished there is fodder to be
fetched and dung to be gathered the wagon must be wiped
and the wheels greased and there is water to be brought
from the stream some four pasangs. away and meat to ham-
mer and cook for supper! hurry! hurry, Lazy Girl!"
Then he leaned back and laughed his Tuchuk laugh, slap-
ping his thighs.
Elizabeth Cardwell was removing the thong from the girl's
neck and unbinding her wrists. "Come along," she said,
kindly. "I will show you."
Aphris stood up, wobbling, still dazed. She turned her eyes
on Elizabeth, whom she seemed to see then for the first time.
"Your accent," said Aphris, slowly. "You are barbarian." She
said it with a kind of horror.
 She turned in fury and followed Elizabeth Cardwell away.
 After this Kamchak and I left the wagon and wandered
 about, stopping at one of the slave wagons for a bottle of
 Paga, which, while wandering about, we killed between us.
 This year, as it turned out, the Wagon Peoples had done
 exceedingly well in the games of Love War a bit of news
 we picked up with the Paga and about seventy percent of
 the Turian maidens had been led slave from the stakes to
 which they had been manacled. In some years I knew the
 percentages were rather the other way about. It apparently
 made for zestful competition. We also heard that the wench
 Hereena, of the First Wagon, had been won by a Turian
 officer representing the house of Saphrar of the Merchants,
 to whom, for a fee, he presented her. I gathered that she
 would become another of his dancing girls. "A bit of per-
 fume and silk will be good for that wench," stated
 Kamchak. It seemed strange to think of her, so wild and
 insolent, arrogant on the back of her kaiila, now a perfumed,
 silken slave of Turians. `'She could use a bit of whip and
 steel, that wench," Kamchak muttered between swallows of
 Paga, pretty much draining the bottle. It was too bad, I
 thought, but at least I supposed there would be one fellows
 among the wagons, the young man Harold, he whom the girl
 had so abused, he who had not yet won the Courage Scar,
 who would be just as pleased as not that she, with all her
 contempt and spleen, was now delightfully salted away in
 bangles and bells behind the high, thick walls of a Turian's
 pleasure garden.
 Kamchak had circled around and we found ourselves back
 at the slave wagon.
 We decided to wager to see who would get the second
 bottle of Paga.
 "What about the flight of birds?" asked Kamchak.
 "Agreed," I said, "but I have first choice."
 "Very well," he said.
 I knew, of course, that it was spring and, in this hemi-
 sphere, most birds, if there were any migrating, would be
 moving south. "South," I said.
 "North," he said.
 We then waited about a minute, and I saw several birds
 river gulls flying north.
 "Those are Vosk gulls," said Kamchak, "In the spring,
 when the ice breaks in the Vosk, they fly north."
 I fished some coins out of my pouch for the Paga.
      "The first southern migrations of meadow kites," he said,
      "have already taken place. The migrations of the forest hurlit
      and the horned aim do not take place until later in the
      spring. This is the time that the Vosk gulls fly."
      "Oh," I said.
      Singing Tuchuk songs, we managed to make it back to the
      wagon.
      Elizabeth had the meat roasted, though it was now consid-
      erably overdone.
      "The meat is overdone," said Kamchak.
      "They are both stinking drunk," said Aphris of Turia.
      I looked at her. Both of them were beautiful. "No," I
      corrected her, "gloriously inebriated."
      Kamchak was looking closely at the girls, leaning forward,
      squinting.
      I blinked a few Ames.
      "Is anything wrong?" asked Elizabeth Cardwell.
      I noted that there was a large welt on the side of her face,
      that her hair was ripped up a bit and that there were five
      long scratches on the left side of her face.
      "No," I said.
      Aphris of Turia appeared in even worse shape. She had
      surely lost more than one handful of hair. There were teeth
      marks in her left arm and, if I was not mistaken, her right
      eye was ringed and discolored.
      "The meat is overdone," grumbled Kamchak. A master
      takes no interest in the squabbles of slaves, it being beneath
      him. He of course would not have approved had one of the
      girls been maimed, blinded or disfigured.
      "Have the bask been tended?" asked Kamchak.
      "Yes," said Elizabeth firmly.
      Kamchak looked at Aphris. "Have the bask been tended?"
      he asked.
      She looked up suddenly, her eyes bright with tears. She
      cast an angry look at Elizabeth. "Yes," she said, "they have
      been tended."
      "Good," said Kamchak, "good." Then he pointed at the
      meat. "It is overdone," he said.
      "You were hours late," said Elizabeth.
      "Hours," repeated Aphris.
      "It is overdone," said Kamchak.
      "I shall roast fresh meat," said Elizabeth, getting up, and
      she did so. Aphris only sniffed.
      When the meat was ready Kamchak ate his fill, and drank
   down, too, a flagon of bosk milk; I did the same, though the
   milk, at least for me, did not sit too well with the Paga of the
   afternoon.
   Kamchak, as he often did, was sitting on what resembled a
   gray rock, rather squarish, except that the corners tended to
   be a bit rounded. When I had first seen this thing, heaped
   with other odds and ends in one corner of the wagon, some
   of the odds and ends being tankards of jewels and small,
   heavy chests filled with golden tarn disks, I had thought it
   merely a rock. Once, when rummaging through his things,
   Karnchak had kicked it across the rug for me to look at. I
   was surprised at the way it bounced on the rug and, when I
   picked it up, I was interested to see how light it was. It was
   clearly not a rock. It was rather leathery and had a "rained
   surface. I was a bit reminded of some of the loose, tumbled
   rocks I had once glimpsed in certain abandoned portions of
   the place of Priest-Kings, far beneath the Sardar. Among
   such rocks it would not have been noticed. "What do you
   make of it?" Kamchak asked.
   "Interesting," I observed.
   "Yes," said he, "I thought so." He held out his hands and I
   tossed the object back. "I have had it for some time," he
   said. "It was given to me by two travelers."
   "Oh," I said.
   When Kamchak had finished his freshly roasted meat and
   his flagon of bask milk, he shook his head and rubbed his
   nose.
   He looked at Miss Cardwell. "Tenchika and Dina are
   gone," said he. "You may sleep once more in the wagon."
   Elizabeth cast a grateful look at him. I gathered that the
   ground under the wagon was hard.
   "Thank you," she said.
   "I thought he was your master," remarked Aphris.
   "Master," added Elizabeth, with a withering look at
   Aphris, who smiled.
   I now began to understand why there were often problems
   in a wagon with more than one girl. Still, Tenchika and Dina
   had not quarreled very much. Perhaps this was because
   Tenchika's heart was elsewhere, in the wagon of Albrecht of
   the Kassars.
   "Who, may I ask," asked Aphris, "were Tenchika and
   Dina?"
   "Slaves, Turian wenches," said Kamchak.
   "They were sold," Elizabeth informed Aphris.
      "Oh," said Aphris. Then she looked at Kamchak. "I do not
      suppose I shall be fortunate enough to be sold?"
      "She would probably bring a high price," pointed out
      Elizabeth, hopefully.
      "Higher than a barbarian surely," remarked Aphris.
      "Do not fret, Little Aphris," said Kamchak, "when I am
      finished with you I shall if it pleases me put you on the
      block in the public slave wagon."
      "I shall look forward to the day," she said.
      "On the other hand," said Kamchak, "I may feed you to
      the kaiila."
      At this the Turian maiden trembled slightly, and looked down.
      "I doubt that you are good for much," Kamchak said, "but
      kaiila feed."
      Aphris looked up angrily.
      Elizabeth laughed and clapped her hands.
      "You," said Kamchak, glaring at Elizabeth, "you stupid
      little barbarian you cannot even dance!"
      Elizabeth looked down, confused, rather shamed. It was
      true, what Kamchak had said.
      The voice of Aphris was timid and quiet. "I can't either,"
      she said.
      "What!" howled Kamchak.
      "No," cried Aphris, "I never learned!"
      "Kaiila feed!" cried Kamchak.
      "I'm sorry," said Aphris, now a bit irritated, "I just never
      planned on becoming a slave."
      "You should have learned anyway," cried the disappointed
      Kamchak.
      "Nonsense," said Aphris.
      "It will cost money," grumbled Kamchak, "but you will
      learn, I will have you taught."
      Aphris sniffed and looked away.
      Elizabeth was looking at me. Then she turned to
      Kamchak. To my astonishment, she asked, "Could I, too, be
      taught?"
      "Why?" he asked.
      She looked down, blushing.
      "She is only a barbarian," said Aphris, "All knees and
      elbows she could never learn."
      "Hah!" laughed Kamchak. "The Little Barbarian does not
      wish to become second girl in the wagon!" He gave Eliza-
      beth's head a rough, affectionate shake. "You will fight for
      your place! Excellent!"
  "She can be first girl if she wishes," sniffed Aphris. "I shall
  escape at the first opportunity and return to Turia."
  "Beware of the herd sleep," said Kamchak.
  Aphris turned white.
  "If you attempt to leave the wagons at night they will
  sense you out and rip my pretty little slave girl in pieces."
  "It is true," I warned Aphris of Turia.
  "Nonetheless," said Aphris, "I will escape."
  "But not tonight!" guffawed Kamchak.
  "No," said Aphris acidly, "not tonight." Then she looked
  about herself, disdainfully at the interior of the wagon. Her
  gaze rested for a moment on the kaiila saddle which had
  been part of the spoils which Kamchak had acquired for
  Tenchika. In the saddle, in their sheaths, were seven quivas.
  Aphris turned again to face Kamchak. "This slave," she said,
  indicating Elizabeth, "would not give me anything to eat."
  "Kamchak must eat first, Slave," responded Elizabeth.
  "Well," said Aphris, "he has eaten."
  Kamchak then took a bit of meat that was left over from
  the fresh-roasted meat that Miss Cardwell had prepared. He
  held it out in his hand. "Eat," he said to Aphris, "but do not
  touch it with your hands."
  Aphris looked at him in fury,- but then smiled. "Certainly,"
  she said and the proud Aphris of Turia, kneeling, bent for-
  ward, to eat the meat held in the hand of her master.
  Kamchak's laugh was cut short when she sank her fine white
  teeth into his hand with a savage bite.
  "Aiii!" he howled, jumping up and sticking his bleeding
  hand into his mouth, sucking the blood from the wound.
  Elizabeth had leaped up and so had I.
  Aphris had sprung to her feet and ran to the side of the
  wagon where there lay the kaiila saddle with its seven
  sheathed quivas. She jerked one of the quivas from its saddle
  sheath and stood with the blade facing us. She was bent over
  with rage.
  Kamchak sat down again, still sucking his hand. I also sat
  down, and so, too, did Elizabeth Cardwell.
  We left Aphris standing there, clutching the knife, breath-
  ing deeply.
  "Sleep!" cried the girl. "I have a knife!"
  Kamchak paid her no attention now but was looking at his
  hand. He seemed satisfied that the wound was not serious,
  and picked up the piece of meat which he had dropped,
  which he tossed to Elizabeth, who, in silence, ate it. He then
  ~1


_

       142
       pointed at the remains of the overdone roast, indicating that
       she might eat it.
       "I have a knife!" cried Aphris in fury.
       Karochak was now picking his teeth with a fingernail.
       "Bring wine," he said to Elizabeth, who, her mouth filled with
       meat; went and fetched a small skin of wine and a cup, which
       she filled for him. When Kamchak had drunk the cup of wine
       he looked again at Aphris. "For what you have done," he said,
       "it is common to call for one of the Clan of Torturers."
       "I will kill myself first," cried Aphris, posing the quiva over
       her heart.
       Kamchak shrugged.
       The girl did not slay herself. "NO," she cried, "I will slay
       you."
       "Much better," said Kamchak, nodding. "Much better."
       "I have a knife!" cried out Aphris.
       "Obviously," said Kamchak. He then got up and walked
       rather heavily over to one wall of the wagon and took a slave
       whip from the wall.
       He faced Aphris of Turia.
       "Sleep!" she wept. She threw back her hand with the knife
       to rush forward and thrust it into the heart of Karnchak but
       the coil of the whip lashed forth and I saw its stinging tip
       wrap four times about the wrist and forearm of the Turian
       girl who cried out in sudden pain and Kamchak had stepped
       to the side and with a motion of his hand had thrown her off
       balance and then by the whip dragged her rudely over the
       rug to his feet. There he stepped on her wrist and removed
       the knife from her open hand. He thrust it in his belt.
       "Slay me!" wept the girl. "I will not be your slave!"
       But Kamchak had hauled her to her feet and then flung
       her back to where she had stood before. Dazed, holding her
       right arm, on which could be seen four encircling blazes of
       scarlet, she regarded him. Kamchak then removed the quiva
       from his belt and hurled it across the room until it struck in
       one of the poles of the frame supporting the wagon hides,
       two inches in the wood, beside the throat of the girl.
       "Take the quiva," said Kamchak.
       The girl shook with fear.
       "Take it," ordered Kamchak.
       She did so.
       "Now," he said, "replace it."
       Trembling, she did so.
        "Now approach me and eat," said Kamchak. Aphris of
 Turia did so, defeated, kneeling before him and turning her
 head delicately to take the meat from his hand. "Tomor-
 row," said Kamchak, "you will be permitted after I have
 eaten to feed yourself."
 Suddenly Elizabeth Cardwell said, perhaps unwisely. "You
 are cruel"
 Kamchak looked at her in surprise. "I am kind," he said.
 "How is that?" I asked.
 "I am permitting her to live," he said.
 "I think," I said, "that you have won this night but I warn
 you that the girl from Turia will think again of the quiva and
 the heart of a Tuchuk warrior."
 "Of course," smiled Kamchak, feeding Aphris, "she is
 superb."
 The girl looked at him with wonder.
 "For a Turian slave," he added. He fed her another piece
 of meat. "Tomorrow, Little Aphris," said he, "I will give you
 something to wear."
 She looked at him gratefully.
 "Bells and collar," said he.
 Tears appeared in her eyes.
 "Can I trust you?" he asked.
 "No," she said.
 "Bells and collar," said he. "But I shall wind them about
 with strings of diamonds that those who see will know that
 your master can well afford the goods you will do without."
 "I hate you," she said.
 "Excellent," said Kamchak. "Excellent."
 When the girl had finished and Elizabeth had given her a
 dipper of water from the leather bucket that hung near the
 door, Aphris extended her wrists to Kamchak.
 The Tuchuk looked puzzled.
 "Surely," she said, "you will lock me in slave bracelets and
 chain me tonight?"
 "But it is rather early," pointed out Kamchak.
 The girl's eyes showed a moment of fear but then she
 seemed resolved. "You have made me your slave," she said,
 "but I am still Aphris of Turia. You may, Tuchuk, slay
 Aphris of Turia if it pleases you, but know that she will never
 serve your pleasure never."
 "Well," said the Tuchuk, "tonight I am pretty drunk."
 "Never," said Aphris of Turia.
 "I note," said Kamchak, "that you have never called me
 Master."
       "I call no man Master," said the girl.
       "I am tired tonight," said Kamchak, yawning. "I have had
       a hard day."
       Aphris trembled in anger, her wrists still forward.
       "I would retire," she said.
       "Perhaps then," said Kamchak, "I should have sheets of
       crimson silk brought, and the furs of the mountain larl."
       "As you wish,)' said the girl.
       Kamchak clapped her on the shoulders. "Tonight," he said,
       "I will not chain you nor put you in the bracelets."
       Aphris was clearly surprised. I saw her eyes furtively dart
       toward the kaiila saddle with its seven quivas.
       "As Kamchak wishes," she said.
       "Do you not recall," asked Kamchak, "banquet of  Saphrar?"
       "Of course," she said, warily.
       "Do you not recall," asked Kamchak, "the affair of the tiny
       bottles of perfume and the smell of bask dung how nobly
       you attempted to rid the banquet hall of that most unpleas-
       ant and distasteful odor?"
       "Yes," said the girl, very slowly.
       "Do you not recall," asked Kamchak, "what I then said to
       you what I said at that time?"
       "Nor" cried the girl leaping up, but Kamchak had jumped
       toward her, scooped her up and threw her over his shoulder.
       She squirmed and struggled on his shoulder, kicking and
       pounding on his back. "Sleep!" she cried. "Sleep! Sleen!
       Sleen!"
       I followed Kamchak down the steps of the wagon and,
       blinking and still sensible of the effects of the Paga, gravely
       held open the large dung sack near the rear left wheel of the
       wagon. "No, Master!" the girl wept.
       "You call no man Master," Kamchak was reminding her.
       And then I saw the lovely Aphris of Turia pitched head
       first into the large, leather sack, screaming and sputtering,
       threshing Shout.
       hi
       ~ _ a _
       "Master!" she cried. "Master! Master!"
       Sleepily I could see the sides of the sack bulging out wildly
       here and there as she squirmed about.
       Kamchak then tied shut the end of the leather sack and
       wearily stood up. "I am tired," he said. "I have had a diffi-
       cult and exhausting day."
       I followed him into the wagon where, in a short time, we
       had both fallen asleep.
       "J
_


   12
                         The Quiva
   In the next days I several times wandered into the vicinity
   of the huge wagon of Kutaituchik, called Ubar of the
   Tuchuks. More than once I was warned away by guards. I
   knew that in that wagon, if the words of Saphrar were
   correct, there lay the golden sphere, doubtless the egg of
   Priest-Kings, which he had, for some reason, seemed so
   anxious to obtain.
   I realized that I must, somehow, gain access to the wagon
   and find and carry away the sphere, attempting to return it
   to the Sardar. I would have given much for a tarn. Even on
   my kaiila I was certain I could be outdistanced by numerous
   riders, each leading, in the Tuchuk fashion, a string of fresh
   mounts. Eventually my kaiila would tire and I would be
   brought down on the prairie by pursuers. The trailing would
   undoubtedly be done by trained herd sleen.
   The prairie stretched away for hundreds of pasangs in all
   directions. There was little cover.
   It was possible, of course, that I might declare my mission
   to Kutaituchik or Kamchak, and see what would occur but
   I knew that Kamchak had said to Saphrar of Turia that the
   Tuchuks were fond of the golden sphere and I had no
   hopes that I might make them part with it, and surely I had
   no riches comparable to those of Saphrar with which to
   purchase it and Saphrar's own attempts to win the sphere
   by purchase, I reminded myself, had failed.
   Yet I was hesitant to make the strike of a thief at the wagon
   of Kutaituchik for the Tuchuks, in their bluff way, had
       made me welcome, and I had come to care for some of
       them, particularly the gruff, chuckling, wily Kamchak, whose
       wagon I shared. It did not seem to me a worthy thing to
       betray the hospitality of Tuchuks by attempting to purloin an
       object which obviously they held to be of great value. I
       wondered if any in the camp of the Tuchuks realized how
       actually great indeed was the value of that golden sphere,
       containing undoubtedly the last hope of the people called
       Priest-Kings.
       In Turia I had learned nothing, unfortunately, of the
       answers to the mystery of the message collar or to the
       appearance of Miss Elizabeth Cardwell on the southern
       plains of Gor. I had, however, inadvertently, learned the
       location of the golden sphere, and that Saphrar, a man of
       power in Turia, was also interested in obtaining it. These bits
       of information were acquisitions not negligible in their value.
       I wondered if Saphrar himself might be the key to the
       mysteries that confronted me. It did not seem impossible.
       How was it that he, a merchant of Turia, knew of the golden
       sphere? How was it that he, a man of shrewdness and
       intelligence, seemed willing to barter volumes of gold for
       what he termed merely a curiosity? There seemed to be
       something here at odds with the rational avarice of mercan-
       tile calculation, something extending even beyond the often
       irresponsible zeal of the dedicated collector which he
       seemed to claim to be. Yet I knew that whatever Saphrar,
       merchant of Turia, might be, he was no fool. He, or those
       for whom he worked, must have some inkling or perhaps
       know of the nature of the golden sphere. If this was true,
       and I thought it likely, I realized I must obtain the egg as
       rapidly as possible and attempt to return it to the Sardar.
       There was no time to lose. And yet how could I succeed?
       I resolved that the best- time to steal the egg would be
       during the days of the Omen Taking. At that time Kutai-
       tuchik and other high men among the Tuchuks, doubtless in-
       cluding Kamchak, would be afield, on the rolling hills sur-
       rounding the Omen Valley, in which on the hundreds of
       smoking altars, the haruspexes of the four peoples would be
       practicing their obscure craft, taking the omens, trying to
       determine whether or not they were favorable for the elec-
       tion of a Ubar San, a One Ubar, who would be Ubar of all
       the Wagons. If such were to be elected, I trusted, at least
       for the sake of the Wagon Peoples, that it would not be
       Kutaituchik. Once he might have been a great man and
  warrior but now, somnolent and fat, he thought of little save
  the contents of a golden kanda box. But, I reminded myself,
  such a choice, if choice there must be, might be best for the
  cities of Gor, for under Kutaituchik the Wagons would not
  be likely to move northward, nor even to the gates of Curia.
  But, I then reminded myself even more strongly, there would
  be no choice there had been no Ubar San for a hundred
  years or more the Wagon Peoples, fierce and independent,
  did not wish a Ubar San.
  I noted, following me, as I had more than once, a masked
  figure, one wearing the hood of the Clan of Torturers. I
  supposed he was curious about me, not a Tuchuk, not a
  merchant or singer, yet among the Wagons. When I would
  look at him, he would turn away. Indeed, perhaps I only
  imagined he followed me. Once I thought to turn and ques-
  tion him, but he had disappeared.
  I turned and retraced my steps to the wagon of Kamchak.
  I was looking forward to the evening.
  The little wench from Port Kar, whom Kamchak and I
  had seen in the slave wagon when we had bought Paga the
  night before the games of Love War, was this night to
  perform the chain dance. I recalled that he might have, had
  it not been for me, even purchased the girl. She had surely
  taken his eye and, I shall admit, mine as well.
  Already a large, curtained enclosure had been set up near
  the slave wagon. For a fee, the proprietor of the wagon
  would permit visitors. These arrangements irritated me
  somewhat, for customarily the chain dance, the whip dance,
  the love dance of the newly collared slave girl, the brand
  dance, and so on, are performed openly by firelight in the
  evening, for the delight of any who care to watch. Indeed, in
  the spring, with the results of caravan raids already accumu-
  lating, it is a rare night on which one cannot see one or more
  such dances performed. I gathered that the little wench from
  Port Kar must be superb. Kamchak, not a man to part easily
  with a tarn disk, had apparently received inside word on the
  matter. I resolved not to wager with him to see who would
  pay the admission.
  When I returned to the wagon I saw the bask had already
  been tended, though it was early in the day, and that there
  was a kettle on an outside fire boiling. I also noted that the
  dung sack was quite full.
  I bounded up the stairs and entered the wagon.
       The two girls were there, and Aphris was kneeling behind
  Elizabeth, combing Elizabeth's hair.
       Kamchak, as I recalled, had recommended a thousand
       strokes a day.
       The pelt of the larl which Elizabeth wore had been freshly
       brushed.
       Both girls had apparently washed at the stream some four
       pasangs away, taking the opportunity to do so while fetching
       water.
       They seemed rather excited. Perhaps Kamchak would per-
       mit them to go somewhere.
       Aphris of Turia wore bells and collar, about her neck the
       Turian collar hung with bells, about each wrist and ankle,
       locked, a double row of bells. I could hear them move as she
       combed Elizabeth's hair. Aside from the bells and collar she
       wore only several strings of diamonds wrapped about the
       collar, some dangling from it, with the bells.
       "Greetings, Master," said both girls at the same time.
       "Ow!" cried Elizabeth as Aphris' comb apparently sudden-
       ly caught in a snarl in her hair.
       "Greetings," I said. "Where is Kamchak?"
       "He is coming," said Aphris.
       Elizabeth turned her head over her shoulder. "I will speak
       with him," she said. "I am First Girl."
       The comb caught in Elizabeth's hair again and she cried
       out.
       "You are only a barbarian," said Aphris sweetly.
       "Comb my hair, Slave," said Elizabeth, turning away.
       "Certainly slave," said Aphris, continuing her work.
       "I see you are both in a pleasant mood," I said. Actually,
       as a matter of fact, both were. Each seemed rather excited
       and happy, their bickering notwithstanding.
       "Master," said Aphris, "is taking us tonight to see a Chain
       Dance, a girl from Port Karl"
       I was startled.
       "Perhaps I should not go," Elizabeth was saying, "I would
       feel too sorry for the poor girl."
       "You may remain in the wagon," said Aphris.
       "If you see her," I said, "'I think you will not feel sorry for
       her." I didn't really feel like telling Elizabeth that no one
       ever feels sorry for a wench from Port Karl They tend to be
       superb, feline, vicious, startling. They are famed as dancers
       throughout all the cities of Gor.
       I wondered casually why Kamchak was taking the girls,
  for the proprietor of the slave wagon would surely want his
  fee for them as well as us.
  "Ho!" cried Kamchak, stomping into the wagon. "Meat!"
  he cried.
  Elizabeth and Aphris leaped up to tend the pot outside.
  He then settled down cross-legged on the rug, not far from
  the brass and copper grating.
  He looked at me shrewdly and, to my surprise, drew a
  tospit out of his pouch, that yellowish-white, bitter fruit,
  looking something like a peach but about the size of a plum.
  He threw me the tospit.
  "Odd or even?" he asked.
  I had resolved not to wager with Kamchak, but this was
  indeed an opportunity to gain a certain amount of vengeance
  which, on my part, would be sorely appreciated. Usually, in
  guessing tospit seeds, one guesses the actual number, and
  usually both guessers opt for an odd number. The common
  tospit almost invariably has an odd number of seeds. On the
  other hand the rare, long-stemmed tospit usually has an even
  number of seeds. Both fruits are indistinguishable outwardly.
  I could see that, perhaps by accident, the tospit which
  Kamchak had thrown me had had the stem twisted off. It
  must be then, I surmised, the rare, long-stemmed tospit.
  "Even," I said.
  Kamchak looked at me as though pained. "Tospits almost
  always have an odd number of seeds," he said.
  "Even," I said.
  "Very well," said he, "eat the tospit and see."
  "Why should I eat it?" I asked. The tospit, after all, is
  quite bitter. And why shouldn't Kamchak eat it? He had
  suggested the wager.
  "I am a Tuchuk," said Kamchak, "I might be tempted to
  swallow seeds."
  "Let's cut it up," I proposed.
  "One might miss a seed that way," said Kamchak.
  "Perhaps we could mash the slices," I suggested.
  "But would that not be a great deal of trouble," asked
  Kamchak, "and might one not stain the rug?"
  "Perhaps we could mash them in a bowl," I suggested.
  "But then a bowl would have to be washed," said
  Kamchak.
  "That is true," I admitted.
  "All things considered," said Kamchak, "I think the fruit
  should be eaten."
 "I guess you are right," I said.
 I bit into the fruit philosophically. It was indeed bitter.
 "Besides," said Kamchak, "I do not much care for tospit
 "I am not surprised," I said.
 "They are quite bitter," said Kamchak.
 "Yes," I said.
 I finished the fruit and, of course, it had seven seeds.
 "Most tospits," Kamchak informed me, "have an odd
 number of seeds."
 "I know," I said.
 "Then why did you guess even?" he asked.
 "I supposed," I grumbled, "that you would have found a
 long-stemmed tospit."
 "But they are not available," he said, "until late in the
 summer."
 "Oh," I said.
 "Since you lost," pointed out Kamchak, "I think it only
 fair that you pay the admission to the performance."
 "All right," I said.
 "The slaves," mentioned Kamchak, "will also be coming."
 "Of course," I said, "naturally."
 I took out some coins from my pouch and handed them to
 Kamchak who slipped them in a fold of his sash. As I did so
 I glowered significantly at the tankards of jewels and chests
 of golden tarn disks in the corner of the wagon.
 "Here come the slaves," said Kamchak.
 Elizabeth and Aphris entered, carrying the kettle-between
 them, which they sat on the brass and copper grating over
 the fire bowl in the wagon.
 "Go ahead and ask him," prompted Elizabeth, "Slave."
 Aphris seemed frightened, confused.
 "Meat)" said Kamchak.
 After we had eaten and the girls had eaten with us, there
 not being that night much time for observing the amenities,
 Elizabeth poked Aphris, "Ask him," she said.
 Aphris lowered her head and shook it.
 Elizabeth looked at Kamchak. "One of your slaves," she
 said, "would like to ask you something."
 "Which one?" inquired Kamchak.
 "Aphris;" said Elizabeth firmly.
 "No," said Aphris, "no, Master."
 "Give him Ka-la-na wine," prompted Elizabeth.
  Aphris got up and fetched not a skin, but a bottle, of wine,
  Ka-la-na wine, from the Ka-la-na orchards of great Ar itself.
  She also brought a black, red-trimmed wine crater from the
  isle of Cos.
  "May I serve you?" she asked.
  Kamchak's eyes glinted. "Yes," he said.
  She poured wine into the crater and replaced the bottle.
  Kamchak had watched her hands very carefully. She had had
  to break the seal on the bottle to open it. The crater had
  been upside down when she had picked it up. If she had
  poisoned the wine she had certainly done so deftly.
  Then she knelt before him in the position of the Pleasure
  Slave and, head down, arms extended, offered him the crater.
  He took it and sniffed it and then took a wary sip.
  Then he threw back his head and drained the crater.
  "Hah!" said he when finished.
  Aphris jumped;
  "Well," said Kamchak, "what is it that a Turian wench
  would crave of her master?"
  "Nothing," said Aphris.
  "If you do not ask him, I shall," said Elizabeth.
  "Speak, Slave!" shouted Kamchak and Aphris went white
  and shook her head.
  "She found something today," said Elizabeth, "that some-
  one had thrown away."
  "Bring it!" said Kamchak.
  Timidly Aphris rose and went to the thin rep-cloth blanket
  that was her bedding near the boots of Kamchak. Hidden in
  'the blanket there was a faded yellow piece of cloth, which
  she had folded very small.
  She brought it to Kamchak and held it out to him.
  He took it and whipped it out. If was a worn, stained
  Turian camisk, doubtless one that had been word by one of
  the Turian maidens acquired in Love War.
  Aphris had her head to the rug, trembling.
  When she looked up at Kamchak there were tear" in her
  eyes. She said, very softly, "Aphris of Turia, the slave girl,
  begs her master that she might clothe herself."
  "Aphris of Turia," laughed Kamchak, "begs to be per-
  mitted to wear a camisk"
  The girl nodded and swiftly put her head down.
  "Come here, Little Aphris," said Kamchak.
  She came forward.
  He put his hands in the strings of diamonds on her throat.
  "Would you rather wear diamonds or the camisk?" he asked.
       "Please, Master," she said, "the camisk."
       Kamchak jerked the diamonds from her collar and threw
       them to the side of the room. Then he withdrew from his
       pouch the key to her collar and bells and, lock by lock,
       removed them from her. She could hardly believe her eyes.
       "You were very noisy," Kamchak said to her, sternly.
       Elizabeth clapped her hands with pleasure and began to
       consider the camisk.
       "A slave girl is grateful to her master," said Aphris, tears
       in her eyes.
       "Properly so," agreed Kamchak.
       Then, delighted, Aphris, assisted by Elizabeth Cardwell,
       donned the yellow camisk. Against her dark almond eyes and
       long black hair the yellow camisk was exceedingly lovely.
       "Come here," commanded Kamchak, and Aphris ran light-
       ly to him, timidly.
       "I will show you how to wear a camisk," said Kamchak,
       taking the cord and adjusting it with two or three pulls and
       jerks that just about took the wind out of the Turian girl. He
       then tied it tightly about her waist. "There," he said, "that is
       how a camisk is worn." I saw that Aphris of Turia would be
       marvelously attractive in the garment.
       Then, to my surprise, she walked a bit in the wagon and
       twirled twice before Kamchak. "Am I not pretty, Master?"
       she asked.
       "Yes," said Kamchak, nodding.
       She laughed with delight, as proud of the worn camisk as
       she might have been once of robes of white and gold.
       "For a Turian slave," added Kamchak.
       "Of course," she laughed, "for a Turian slave!"
       "We will be late for the performance," said Elizabeth, "if
       we do not hurry."
       "I thought you were staying in the wagon," said Aphris.
       "No," said Elizabeth, "I have decided to come."
       Among them even some Kassars and Paravaci, and one of the
 rare Kataii, seldom seen in the encampments of the other
 peoples. The Tuchuks, of course, were most in evidence,
 sitting cross-legged in circles rather about a large fire near
 the center of the enclosure. They were in good humor and
 were laughing and moving their hands about as they regaled
 one another with accounts of their recent deeds, of which
 there were plainly a great many, it being the most active
 season for caravan raiding. The fire, I was pleased to note,
 was not of boskdung but wood, timber and planking, I was
 less pleased to note, torn and splintered from a merchant's
 wagon.
 To one side, across a clearing from the 'fire, a bit in the
 background, was a group of nine musicians. They were not as
 yet playing, though one of them was absently tapping a
 rhythm on a small hand drum, the kaska; two others, with
 stringed instruments, were tuning them, putting their ears to
 the instruments. One of the instruments was an eight-stringed
 czehar, rather like a large flat oblong box; it is held across
 the lap when sitting cross-legged and is played with a horn
 pick; the other was the kalika, a six-stringed instrument; it,
 like the czehar, is flat-bridged and its strings are adjusted by
 means of small wooden cranks; on the other hand, it less
 resembles a low, flat box and suggests affinities to the banjo
 or guitar, though the sound box is hemispheric and the neck'
 rather long; it, too, of course, like the czehar, is plucked;' I
 have never seen a bowed instrument on Gor; also, I Night
 mention, I have never on Gor seen any written music; I do
 not know if a notation exists; melodies are passed on from
 father to son, from master to apprentice. There was another
 kalika player, as well, but he was sitting there holding his
 instrument, watching the slave girls in the audience. The
 three flutists were polishing their instruments and talking
 together; it was shop talk I gathered, because one or the
 other would stop to illustrate some remark by a passage on
 his flute, and then one of the others would attempt to correct
 or improve on what he had done; occasionally their discus-
 sion grew heated. There was also a second drummer, also
 with a kaska, and another fellow, a younger one, who sat
 very seriously before what appeared to me to be a pile of
 objects; among them was a notched stick, played by sliding a
 polished "em-wood stick across its surface; cymbals of vari-
 ous sorts; what was obviously a tambourine; and several
 other instruments of a percussion variety, bits of metal on
       wires, gourds filled with pebbles, slave bells mounted on hand
       rings, and such. These various things, from time to time,
       would be used not only by himself but by others in the
       group, probably the second kaska player and the third flutist.
       Among Gorean musicians, incidentally, czehar players have
       the most prestige; there was only one in this group, I noted,
       and he was their leader; next follow the flutists and then the
       players of the kalika; the players of the drums come next;
       and the farthest fellow down the list is the man who keeps
       the bag of miscellaneous instruments, playing them and par-
       celing them out to others as needed. Lastly it might be
       mentioned, thinking it is of some interest, musicians on Gor
       are never enslaved; they may, of course, be exiled, tortured,
       slain and such; it is said, perhaps truly, that he who makes
       music-must, like the tarn and the Vosk gull, be free.
       Inside the enclosure, over against one side, I saw the slave
       wagon. The bask had been unhitched and taken elsewhere. It
       was open and one could go in and purchase a bottle of Paga
       if one cared to do so.
       "One is thirsty," said Kamchak.
       "I'll buy the Paga," I said.
       Kamchak shrugged. He had, after all, bought the admission-
       sions.
       When I returned with the bottle I had to step through,
       over, and once or twice on, Tuchuks. Fortunately my clum-
       siness was not construed as a challenge. One fellow I stepped
       on was even polite enough to say, "Forgive me for sitting
       where you are stepping." In Tuchuk fashion, I assured him
       that I had taken no offense, and, sweating, I at last made my
       way to Kamchak's side. He had rather good seats, which
       hadn't been there before, obtained by the Tuchuk method of
       finding two individuals sitting closely together and then sitting
       down between them. He had also parked Aphris on his right
       and Elizabeth on his left. I bit out the cork in the Paga and
       passed it past Elizabeth to Kamchak, as courtesy demanded.
       About a third of the bottle was missing when Elizabeth,
       looking faint at having smelled the beverage, returned it to
       me.
       I heard two snaps and I saw that Kamchak had put a
       hobble on Aphris. The slave hobble consists of two rings, one
       for a wrist, the other for an ankle, joined by about seven
       inches of chain. In a right-handed girl, such as either Aphris
       or Elizabeth, it locks on the right wrist and left ankle. When
       the girl kneels, in any of the traditional positions of the
 Gorean woman, either slave or free, it is not uncomfortable.
 In spite of the hobble, Aphris, in the yellow camisk, black
 hair flowing behind her, was kneeling alertly by Kamchak's
 side, looking about her with great interest. I saw several of
 the Tuchuks present eye her with admiration. Female slaves
 on Gor, of course, are used to being eyed boldly. They
 expect this and relish it. Aphris, I discovered, to my delight,
 was no exception.
 Elizabeth Cardwell also had her head up, kneeling very
 straight, obviously not unconscious that she herself was the
 object of a look or two.
 I noted that, in spite of the fact that Aphris had now been
 in the wagon for several days, Kamchak had not yet called
 for the Iron Master. The girl had neither been branded nor
 had the Tuchuk nose ring been affixed. This seemed to me of
 interest. Moreover, after the first day or two he had hardly-
 cuffed the girl, though he had once beaten her rather severely
 when she had dropped a cup. Now I saw that, though she
 had been only a few days his slave, already he was permitting
 her to wear the camisk. I smiled rather grimly to myself and
 took a significant swallow of Paga. "Wily Tuchuk, eh?" I
 thought to myself.
 Aphris, for her part, though the quivas were still available,
 seemed, shortly after having begun to sleep at Kamchak's
 boots, for some reason to have thought the better of bury-
 ing one in his heart. It would not have been wise, of course,
 for even were she successful, her consequent hideous death at
 the hands of the Clan of Torturers would probably, all things
 considered, have made her act something of a bad bargain.
 On the other hand she may have feared that Kamchak would
 simply turn around and seize her. After all, it is difficult to
 sneak up on a man while wearing collar and bells. Also, she
 may have feared more than death that if she failed in an
 attempt to slay him she would be plunged in the sack again
 which lay ever ready near the back, left wheel of the wagon.
 That seemed to be an experience which she, no more than
 Elizabeth Cardwell, was not eager to repeat.
 Well did I recall the first day following the first night of
 Aphris as the slave of Kamchak. We had slept late that day
 and finally when Kamchak managed to be up and around,
 after a late breakfast served rather slowly by Elizabeth, and
 had recollected Aphris and had opened the end of her sleep-
 ing quarters and she had crawled out backward and had
 begged, head to boot, to be allowed to draw water for the
bask, though it was early, it seemed evident to all that the
      lovely wench from Turia would not, could she help it, spend
      a night again similar to her first in the encampment of
      Tuchuks. "Where will you sleep tonight, Slave?" Kamchak
      had demanded. "If my master will permit," said the girl, with
      great apparent sincerity, "at his feet." Kamchak laughed.
      "Get up, Lazy Girl," said he, "the bask need watering." Grate-
      fully Aphris of Turia had taken up the leather buckets and
      hurried away to fetch water.
      I heard a bit of chain and looked up. Kamchak tossed
      me the other hobble. "Secure the barbarian," he said.
      This startled me, and startled Elizabeth as well.
      How was it that Kamchak would have me secure his slave?
      She was his, not mine. There is a kind of implicit claim of
      ownership involved in putting a wench in slave steel. It is
      seldom done save by a master.
      Suddenly Elizabeth was kneeling terribly straight, looking
      ahead, breathing very quickly.
      I reached around and took her right wrist, drawing it
      behind her body. I locked the wrist ring about her wrist. Then
      I took her left ankle in my hand and lifted it a bit, slipping
      the open ankle ring under it. Then I pressed the ring shut. It
      closed with a small, heavy click.
      Her eyes suddenly met mine, timid, frightened.
      I put the key in my pouch and turned my attention to the
      crowd. Kamchak now had his right arm about Aphris.
      "In a short time," he was telling her, "you will see what a
      real woman can do."
      "She will be only a slave such as I," Aphris was respond-
      ing.
      I turned to face Elizabeth. She was regarding me, it
      seemed, with incredible shyness. "What does it mean," she
      asked, "that you have chained me?"
      "Nothing," I said.
      Her eyes dropped. Without looking up, she said, "He likes
      her.
      "Aphris the Slave?" I asked.
      "Will I be sold?" she asked.
      I saw no reason to hide this from the girl. "It is possible,"
      I said.
      She looked up, her eyes suddenly moist. "Tart Cabot," she
      said, whispering, "if I am to be sold buy me."
      I looked at her with incredulity.
      "Why?" I asked.
 Kamchak reached across Elizabeth and dragged the Paga
 bottle out of my hand. Then he was wrestling with Aphris
 and had her head back, fingers pinching her nose, the neck of
 the bottle thrust between her teeth. She was struggling and
 laughing and shaking her head. Then she had to breathe and
 a great draught of Paga burned its way down her throat
 making her gasp and cough. I doubt that she had ever before
 experienced a drink stronger than the syrupy wines of Turia.
 She was now gasping and shaking her head and Kamchak
 was pounding her on the back.
 "Why?" I again asked Elizabeth.
 But Elizabeth, with her free left hand had seized the Paga
 bottle from Kamchak, and, to his amazement, had thrown
 back her head and taken, without realizing the full import of
 her action, about five lusty, guzzling swallows of Paga. Then,
 as I rescued the bottle, her eyes opened very wide and then
 blinked about ten times. She exhaled slowly as if fire might
 be sizzling out instead of breath and then she shook, a
 delayed reaction, as if she had been thumped five times and
 then began to cough spasmodically and painfully until I,
 fearing she might suffocate, pounded her several times on the
 back. At last, bent over, gasping for breath, she seemed to be
 coming around. I held her by the shoulders and suddenly she
 turned herself in my hands and, as I was sitting cross-legged,
 threw herself on her back across my lap, her right wrist still
 chained to her left ankle. She stretched insolently, as well as
 she could. I was astounded. She looked up at me. "Because I
 am better than Dina and Tenchika," she said.
 "But not better than Aphris," called Aphris.
 "Yes," said Elizabeth, "better than Aphris."
 "Get up, Little She-Sleen," said Kamchak, amused, "or to
 preserve my honor I must have you impaled."
 Elizabeth looked up at me.
 "She's drunk," I told Kamchak.
 "Some men might like a barbarian girl," Elizabeth said.
 I hoisted Elizabeth back up on her knees. "No one will buy
 me," she wailed.
 There were immediate offers from three or four of the
 Tuchuks gathered about, and I was afraid that Kamchak
 might, if the bids improved, part with Miss Cardwell on the
 spot.
 "Sell her," advised Aphris.
 "Be quiet, Slave," said Elizabeth.
_

  158
                               :




                         NOMADS OF GOR
  - Kamchak was roaring with laughter.
  The Paga had apparently hit Miss Cardwell swiftly and
  hard. She seemed barely able to kneel and, at last, I per- I
  misted her to lean against me, and she did, her chin on my j
  right shoulder.
  "You know," said Kamchak, "the Little Barbarian wears
  your chain well."
  "Nonsense," I said.
  "I saw," said Kamchak, "how at the games when you
  thought the men of Turia charging you were prepared to
  rescue the wench."
  "l wouldn't have wanted your property Kamchak," I said.
  "You like her," announced Kamchak.
  "Nonsense," I said to him.
  "Nonsense," said Elizabeth, sleepily.
  "Sell her to him," recommended Aphris, hiccuping.
  "You only want to be First Girl," said Elizabeth.
  "I'd give her away myself," said Aphris. "She is only a
  barbarian."
  Elizabeth lifted her head from my shoulder and regarded
  me. She spoke in English. "My name is Miss Elizabeth
  Cardwell, Mr. Cabot," she said, "would you like to buy me?"
  "No," I said, in English.
  "I didn't think so," she said, again in English, and put her
  head back on my shoulder.
  "Did you not observe," asked Kamchak, "how she moved
  and breathed when you locked the steel on her?"
  I hadn't thought much about it. "I guess not," I said.
  "Why do you think I let you chain her?" asked Kamchak.
  "I don't know," I said.
  "To see," he said. "And it is as I thought your steel
  kindles her."
  "Nonsense," I said.
  "Nonsense." said Elizabeth.
 "I suppose," said Elizabeth, "I could hop all the way on
 one foot."
 I myself doubted that this would be feasible, particularly In
 her condition.
 "You probably could," said Aphris, "you have muscular
 legs"
 I did not regard Miss Cardwell's legs as muscular. She
 was, however, a good runner.
 Miss Cardwell lifted her chin from my shoulder. "Slave,"
 she said.
 "Barbarian," retorted Aphris.
 "Release her," said Kamchak.
 1 reached into the pouch at my belt to secure the key to
 the hobble.
 "No," said Elizabeth, "I will stay."
 "If Master permits," added Aphris.
 "Yes," said Elizabeth, glowering, "if Master permits."
 "All right," said Kamchak.
 "Thank you, Master," said Elizabeth politely, and once
 more put her head on my shoulder.
 "You should buy her" said Kamchak.
 "No," I said.
 `'I will give you a good price," he said.
 Oh, yes, I said to myself, a good price, and ho, ho, ho.
 "No," I said.
 "Very well," said Kamchak.
 I breathed more easily.
 About that time the black-clad figure of a woman ap-
 peared on the steps of the slave wagon. I heard Kamchak
 hush up Ahpris of Turia and he gave Elizabeth a poke in the
 ribs that she might bestir herself. "Watch, you miserable
 cooking-pot wenches," he said, "and learn a thing or two!"
 A silence came over the crowd. Almost without meaning
 to, I noticed, over to one side, a hooded member of the Clan
 of Torturers. I was confident it was he who had often
 followed me about the camp.
 But this matter was dismissed from my mind by the
 performance which was about to begin. Aphris was watching
 intently, her lips parted. Kamchak's eyes were gleaming.
 Even Elizabeth had lifted her head now from my shoulder
 and was rising on her knees a bit for a clearer view.
 The figure of the woman, swathed in black, heavily veiled,
 descended the steps of the slave wagon. Once at the foot of
 the stairs she stopped and stood for a long moment. Then the
        musicians began, the hand-drums first, a rhythm of heartbeat
        and flight.
        To the music, beautifully, it seemed the frightened figure
        ran first here and then there, occasionally avoiding imaginary
        objects or throwing up her arms, ran as though through the
        crowds of a burning city alone, yet somehow suggesting the
        presence about her of hunted others. Now, in the back-
        ground, scarcely to be seen, was the figure of a warrior in
        scarlet cape. He, too, in his way, though hardly seeming
        to move, approached, and it seemed that wherever the girl
        might flee there was found the warrior. And then at last his
        hand was upon her shoulder and she threw hack her
        and lifted her hands and it seemed her entire hotly was
        wretchedness and despair. He turned the figure to hen and,
        with both hands, brushed away hood and veil.
        There was a cry of delight from the crowd.
        The girl's face was fixed in the dancer's stylized moan of
        terror, but she was beautiful. I had seen her before, of
        course, as had Kamchak, but it was startling still to see her
        thus in the firelight her hair was long and silken black, her
        eyes dark, the color of her skin tarnish.
        She seemed to plead with the warrior but he did not move.
        She seemed to writhe in misery and try to escape his grip but
        she did not.
        Then he removed his hands from her shoulders and, as the
        crowd cried out, she sank in abject misery at his feet and
        performed the ceremony of submission, kneeling, lowering
        the head and lifting and extending the arms, wrists crossed.
        The warrior then turned from her and held out one hand.
        Someone from the darkness threw him, coiled, the chain
        and collar.
        He gestured for the woman to rise and she did so and
        stood before him, head lowered.
        He pushed up her head and then, with a click that could
        be heard throughout the enclosure, closed the collar a Turi-
        an collar about her throat. The chain to which the collar
        was attached was a good deal longer than that of the Sirik,
        containing perhaps twenty feet of length.
        Then, to the music, the girl seemed to twist and turn and
        move away from him, as he played out the chain, until she
        stood wretched some twenty feet from him at the chain's
        length. She did not move then for a moment, but stood
        crouched down, her hands on the chain.
 I saw that Aphris and Elizabeth were watching fascinated.
 Kamchak, too, would not take his eyes from the woman.
 The music had stopped.
 Then with a suddenness that almost made me jump and the
 crowd cry out with delight-the music began again but this
 time as a barbaric cry of rebellion and rage and the wench
 from Port Kar was suddenly a chained she-larl biting and
 tearing at the chain and she had cast her black robes from
 her and stood savage revealed in diaphanous, swirling yellow
 Pleasure Silk. There was now a frenzy and hatred in the
 dance, a fury even to the baring of teeth and snarling. She
 turned within the collar, as the Turian collar is designed to
 permit. She circled the warrior like a captive moon to his
 imprisoning scarlet sun, always at the length of the chain.
 Then he would take up a fist of chain, drawing her each time
 inches closer. At times he would permit her to draw back
 again, but never to the full length of the chain, and each
 time he permitted her to withdraw, it was less than the last.
 The dance consists of several phases, depending on the gener
 al orbit allowed the girl by the chain. Certain of these phases
 are very slow, in which there is almost no movement, save
 perhaps the turning of a head or the movement of a hand;
 others ate defiant and swift; some are graceful and pleading;
 some stately, some simple; some proud, some piteous; but
 each time, as the common thread, she is drawn closer to the
 caped warrior. At last his fist was within the Turian collar
 itself and he drew the girl, piteous and exhausted, to his lips,
 subduing her with his kiss, and then her arms were about his
 neck and unresisting, obedient, her head to his chest, she was
 lifted lightly in his arms and carried from the firelight.
 Kamchak and I, and others, threw coins of gold into the
 sand near the fire.
 "She was beautiful," cried out Aphris of Turia.
 "I never knew a woman," said Elizabeth, her eyes blazing,
 showing few signs of the Paga, "could be so beautiful!"
 "She was marvelous," I said.
 "And l," howled Kamchak, "have only miserable cooking-
 pot wenches!"
 Kamchak and I were standing up. Aphris suddenly put her
 head to his thigh, looking down. "Tonight," she whispered,
 "make me a slave."
 Kamchak put his fist in her hair and lifted her head to
 stare up at him. Her lips were parted.
 "You have been my slave for days," said he.
 :,,


 '1


_


         162
         NOMADS OF GOR
         "Tonight," she begged, "please, Master, tonight!"
         With a roar of triumph Kamchak swept her up and slung
         her, hobbled as she was, over his shoulder and she cried out
         and he, singing a Tuchuk song, was stomping away with her
         from the curtained enclosure.
         At the exit he stopped briefly and, Aphris over his shoul-
         der, turned and faced Elizabeth and myself. He threw up his
         right hand in an expansive gesture. "For the night," he cried,
         "the Little Barbarian is yours!" Then he turned again and,
          singing, disappeared through the curtain.   !
         I laughed.
         Elizabeth Cardwell was staring after him. Then she looked
         up at me. "He can do that, can't he?" she asked.
         "Of course," I said.
         "Of course," she said, numbly. "Why not?" Then suddenly
         she jerked at the hobble but could not rise and nearly fell,
         and pounded her left fist into the dirt before her. "I don't
         want to be a slaver" she cried. "I don't want to be a slave!"
         "I'm sorry," I said.
         She looked up at me. There were tears in her eyes. "He
         has no right!" she cried.
         "He has the right," I said.
         "Of course," she wept, putting her head down. "It is like a
         book, a chair, an animal. She is yours! Take her! Keep her
         until tomorrow! Return her in the morning when you are
         finished with her!"
         Head down she laughed and sobbed.
         "I thought you wished," I said, "that I might buy you." I
         thought it well to jest with her.
         "Don't you understand?" she asked. "It could have been
         anyone to whom I was given, not just to you, but to
         anyone, anyone!"
         "That is true," I said.
         "To anyone!" she wept. "Anyone! Anyone!"
         "Do not be distraught," I said.
         She shook her head, and looked up at me, and through the tears smiled.
          It seems, Master," she said, "that for the hour I am yours."
         "It would appear so," I said.
         "Will you carry me over your shoulder to the wagon;" she
         asked, lightly, "like Aphris of Turia?"
         "I'm sorry," I said.
         I bent to the girl's shackles and removed them.
 She stood up and faced me. "What are you going to do with
 me?" she asked. She smiled. "Master?"
 I smiled. "Nothing," I told her. "Do not fear."
 "Oh?" she asked, one eyebrow rising skeptically. Then she
 dropped her head. "Am I truly so ugly?" she asked.
 "No," I said, "you are not ugly."
 "But you do not want me?" she asked.
 "No," I said.
 She looked at me boldly, throwing back her head. "Why
 not?" she asked.
 What could I tell her? She was lovely, but yet in her
 condition piteous. I felt moved on her behalf. The little
 secretary, I thought to myself, so far from her pencils, the
 typewriter, the desk calendars and steno pads so far from
 her world so helpless, so much at Kamchak's mercy and
 this night, should I choose, at mine.
 "You are only a little barbarian," I said to her. Somehow I
 thought of her still as the frightened girl in the yellow
 shift caught up in games of war and intrigue beyond her
 comprehension and, to a great extent, mine. She was to be
 protected, sheltered, treated with kindness, reassured. I could
 not think of her in my arms nor of her ignorant, timid lips
 on mine for she was always and would remain only the
 unfortunate Elizabeth Cardwell, the innocent and unwitting
 victim of an inexplicable translocation and an unexpected,
 unjust reduction to shameful bondage. She was of Earth and
 knew not the flames which her words might have evoked in
 the breast of a Gorean warrior nor did she understand
 herself truly nor the relation in which she, slave girl, stood to
 -a free man to whom she had been for the hour given I
 could not tell her that another warrior might at her-very
 glance, have dragged her helpless to the darkness between the
 high wheels of the slave wagon itself. She was gentle, not
 understanding, naive, in her way foolish a girl of Earth but
 not on Earth not a woman of Gor female on her own
 barbaric world she would always be of Earth the bright,
 pretty girl with the stenographer's pad like many girls of
 Earth, not men but not yet daring to be woman. "But," I
 admitted to her, giving her head a shake, "you are a pretty
 little barbarian."
 She looked into my eyes for a long moment and then
 suddenly dropped her head weeping. I gathered her into my
 arms to comfort her but she pushed me away, and turned
 and ran from the enclosure.
          I looked after her, puzzled.
          Then, shrugging, I too left the enclosure, thinking that
          perhaps I should wander among the wagons for a few hours,
          before returning.
          I recalled Kamchak. I was happy for him. Never before
          had I seen him so pleased. I was, however, confused about
          Elizabeth, for it seemed to me she had behaved strangely this
          night. I supposed that, on the whole, she was perhaps dis-
          traught because she feared she might soon be supplanted as
          first girl in the wagon; indeed, that she might soon be sold.
          To be sure, having seen Kamchak with his Aphris, it did not
          seem to me that either of these possibilities were actually
          unlikely. Elizabeth had reason to fear. I might, of course, and
          would, encourage Kamchak to sell her to a good master, but
          Kamchak, cooperative to a point, would undoubtedly have
          his eye fixed most decisively on the price to be obtained. I
          might, of course, if I could find the money, buy her myself
          and attempt to find her a kind master. I thought perhaps
          Conrad of the Kassars might be a just Master.  He had,
          however, I, knew recently won a Turian girl in the games.
          Moreover, not every man wants to own an untrained barbarian slave,
          for much, even if given to them, must be fed
crawl under the rope that joined them, my assailant was
 gone. All I received for my trouble were the angry shouts of
 the man leading the kaiila string. Indeed, one of the vicious
 beasts even snapped at me, ripping the sleeve on my shoul-
 der.
 Angry I returned to the wagon and drew the quiva from
 the boards. ~
 By this time the owner of the wagon, who was naturally
 curious about the matter, was beside me. He held a small
 torch, lit from the fire bowl within the wagon. He was
 examining, not happily, the cut in his planking. "A clumsy
 throw," he remarked, I thought a bit ill-humoredly.
 "Perhaps," I admitted.
 "But," he added, turning and looking at me, "I suppose
 under the circumstances it was just as well."
 "Yes," I said, "I think so."
 I found the Paga bottle: and noted that there was a bit of
 liquid left in it, below the neck of the bottle. I wiped off the
 neck and handed it to the man. He took about half of it and
 then wiped his mouth and handed it back. I then finished the
 bottle. I flung it into a refuse hole, dug and periodically
 cleaned by male slaves.
 "It is not bad Paga," said the man.
 "No," I said, "I think it is pretty good."
 "May I see the quiva?" asked the man.
 "Yes," I said.
 "Interesting," said he.
 "What?" I asked.
 "The quiva," said he.
 "But what is interesting about it?" I asked.
 "It is Paravaci," he said
       In the morning, to my dismay, Elizabeth Cardwell was not
       to be found.
       Kamchak was beside himself with fury. Aphris, knowing
       the ways of Gor and the temper of Tuchuks, was terrified,
       and said almost nothing.
       "Do not release the hunting sleep," I pleaded with
       Kamchak.
       "I shall keep them leashed," he responded grimly.
       With misgivings I observed the two, six-legged, sinuous,
       tawny hunting sleen on their chain leashes. Kamchak was
       holding Elizabeth's bedding a rep-cloth blanket for them
       to smell. Their ears began to lay back against the sides of
       their triangular heads; their long, serpentine bodies trembled;
       I saw claws emerge from their paws, retract, emerge again
       and then retract; they lifted their heads, sweeping them from
       side to side, and then thrust their snouts to the ground and
       began to whimper excitedly; I knew they would first follow
       the scent to the curtained enclosure within which last night
       we had observed the dance.
       "She would have hidden among the wagons last night,"
       Kamchak said.
       "I know," I said, "The herd sleep." They would have torn
       the girl to pieces on the prairie in the light of the three
       Gorean moons.
       "She will not be far," said Kamchak.
       He hoisted himself to the saddle of his kaiila, a prancing
       and trembling hunting sleen on each side of the animal, the
       chains running to the pommel of the saddle.
 "What will you do to her?" I asked.
 "Cut off her feet," said Kamchak, "and her nose and ears,
 and blind her in one eye, then release her to live as she can
 among the wagons."
 Before I could remonstrate with the angry Tuchuk the
 hunting sleen suddenly seemed to go wild, rearing on their
 hind legs, scratching in the air, dragging against the chains. It
 was all Kamchak's kaiila could do to brace itself against their
 sudden madness.
 "Hahl" cried Kamchak.
 I spied Elizabeth Cardwell approaching the wagon, two
 leather water buckets fastened to a wooden yoke she carried
 over her shoulders. Some water was spilling from the buck-
 ets.
 Aphris cried out with delight and ran to Elizabeth, to my
 astonishment, to kiss her and help with the water.
 "Where have you been?" asked Kamchak.
 Elizabeth lifted her head innocently and gazed at him
 frankly. "Fetching water," she said.
 The sleen were trying to get at her and she had backed
 away against the wagon, watching them warily. "They are
 vicious beasts," she observed.
 Kamchak threw back his head and roared with laughter.
 Elizabeth did not so much as look at me.
 Then Kamchak seemed sober and he said to the girl. "Go
 into the wagon. Bring slave bracelets and a whip. Then go to
 the wheel."
 She looked at him, but did not appear afraid. "Why?" she
 asked.
 Kamchak dismounted. "You were overly long in fetching
 water," he said.
 Elizabeth and Aphris had gone into the wagon.
 "She was wise to return," said Kamchak.
 I agreed with him but would not say so. "It seems she was
 fetching water," I pointed out.
 "You like her, don't you?" asked Kamchak.
 "l feel sorry for her," I said.
 "Did you enjoy her yesterday?" asked Kamchak.
 "I did not see her after she left the enclosure of the
 dance," I said.
 "If I had known that," said Kamchak, "I would have had
 the sleen out last night."
 "Then," I said, "it is fortunate for the girl that you did not
 know it.
          "Agreed," smiled Kamchak. "Why did you not make use
          of her?" he inquired.
          "She is only a girl," I said.
          "She is a woman," said Kamchak, "with blood."
          I shrugged.
          By this time Elizabeth had returned with the whip and
          bracelets, and had handed them to Kamchak. She then went
          to stand by the left, rear wheel of the wagon. There
          Kamchak braceleted her wrists thigh over her head about the
          rim and over one of the spokes. She faced the wheel.
          "There is no escape from the wagons," he said.
          Her head was high. "I know," she said.
          "You lied to me," he said, "saying you went to fetch
          water."
          "I was afraid," said Elizabeth.
          "Do you know who fears to tell the truth?" he asked.
          "No," she said.
          "A slave," said Kamchak.
          He ripped the larl's pelt from her and I gathered that she
          would wear the garment no longer.
          She stood well, her eyes closed, her right cheek pressed
          against the leather rim of the wheel. Tears burst from be-
          tween the tightly pressed lids of her eyes but she was superb,
          restraining her cries.
          She had still uttered no sound when Kamchak, satisfied,
          had released her, but fastening her wrists before her body
          with the bracelets. She stood trembling, her head down. Then
          he took her braceleted hands and with one hand raised her
          hands over her head. She stood so, her knees slightly flexed,
          head down.
          "You think," said Kamchak to me, "she is only a girl."
          I said nothing.
          "You are a fool, Tarl Cabot," said he.
          I did not respond.
          Coiled, in his right hand, Kamchak still held the slave whip.
          "Slave," said Kamchak.
          Elizabeth looked at him.
          "Do you wish to serve men?" he asked.
          Tears in her eyes she shook her head, no, no, no. Then her
          head fell again to her breast.
          "Observe," said Kamchak to me.
          Then, before I could realize what he intended, he had
          subjected Miss Cardwell to what, among slavers, is known as
          the Whip Caress. Ideally it is done, as Kamchak had, unex-
pectedly, taking the girl unawares. Elizabeth suddenly cried
out throwing her head to one side. I observed to my amaze-
ment the sudden, involuntary, uncontrollable response to the
touch. The Whip Caress is commonly used among Slavers to
force a girl to betray herself.
"She is a woman," said Kamchak. "Did you not see the
secret blood of her? That she is eager and ready that she
is fit prize for the steel of a master that she is female, and,"
he added, "slave?"
"Nor" cried Elizabeth Cardwell. "Nor" But Kamchak was
pulling her by the bracelets toward an empty sleen cage
mounted on a low cart near the wagon, into which, still
braceleted, he thrust her, then closing the door, locking it.
She could not stand in the low, narrow cage, and knelt,
wrists braceleted, hands on the bars. "It is not truer" she
screamed.
Kamchak laughed at her. `'Female slave," he said. She
buried her head in her hands and wept. She knew, as well as
we, that she had showed herself that her blood had leaped
within her and its memory must now mock the hysteria of
her denial that she had acknowledged tows and to herself,
perhaps for the first time, the incontrovertible splendor of her
beauty and its meaning.
Her response had been that of an utter woman.
"It's not true!" she whispered over and over, sobbing as
she had not from the cruel strokes of the whip. "It's not
truer"
Kamchak looked at me. "Tonight," lie said, "I shall call
the Iron Master."
"Don't," I said.
"I shall," he said.
'Why?" I asked.
He smiled at me grimly. "She was too long in fetching
water."
I said nothing. Kamchak, for a Tuchuk, was not unkind.
The punishment of a runaway slave is often grievous, some-
times culminating in death. He would do no more to Elizabeth
Cardwell than was commonly done to female slaves among
the wagons, even those who had never dared to speak back
or disobey in the least particular. Elizabeth, in her way, was
fortunate. As Kamchak might have said, he was permitting her
to live. I did not think she would be tempted to run away again.
I saw Aphris sneaking to the cage to bring Elizabeth a
dipper of water. Aphris was crying.
          Kamchak, if he saw, did not stop her. "Come along," he
          said. "There is a new kaiila I want to see near the wagon of
          Yachi of the Leather Workers' Clan."
          It was a busy day for Kamchak.
          He did not buy the kaiila near the wagon of Yachi of the
          Leather Workers though it was apparently a splendid beast.
          At one point, he wrapped a heavy fur and leather robe-about
          his left arm and struck the beast suddenly on the snout with
          his right hand. It had not struck back at him swiftly enough
          to please him, and there were only four needlelike scratches
          in the arm guard before Kamchak had managed to leap back
          and the kaiila, lunging against its chain, was snapping at him.
          "Such a slow beast," said Kamchak, "might in battle cost a
          man his life." I supposed it true. The kaiila and its master
          fight in battle as one unit, seemingly a single savage animal,
          armed with teeth and lance. After looking at the kaiila
          Kamchak visited a wagon where he discussed the crossing of
          one of his cows with the owner's bull, in exchange for a
          similar favor on his own part. This matter was arranged to
          their mutual satisfaction. At another wagon he haggled over
          a set of quiva, forged in Ar, and, obtaining his price, ar-
          ranged to have them, with a new saddle, brought to his
          wagon on the morrow. We lunched on dried bask meat and
          Paga and then he trooped to the wagon of Kutaituchik,
          where he exchanged pleasantries with the somnolent figure on
          the robe of gray boskhide, about the health of the bask, the
          sharpness of quivas and the necessity of keeping wagon axles
          greased, and certain other matters. While near Kutaituchik's
          wagon, on the dais, he also conferred with several other high
          men among the Tuchuks. Kamchak, as I had learned before,
          held a position of some importance with the Tuchuks. After
          seeing Kutaituchik and the others, Kamchak stopped by an
          Iron Master's wagon, and, to my irritation, arranged for the
          fellow to come by the wagon that very night. "I can't keep
          her in a sleen cage forever," Kamchak said. "There is work
          to be done about the wagon." Then, to my delight,
          Kamchak, borrowing two kaiila, which he seemed to have no
          difficulty doing from a Tuchuk warrior I had not even seen
          before rode with me to the Omen Valley.
          Coming over a low, rolling hill, we saw a large number of
          tents pitched in a circle, surrounding a large grassy area. In
          the grassy area, perhaps about two hundred yards in diame-
          ter, there were literally hundreds of small, stone altars. There
          was a large circular stone platform in the center of the field.
 On the top of this platform was a huge, four-sided altar
 which was approached by steps on all four sides. On one side
 of this altar I saw the sign of the Tuchuks, and on the others;
 that of the Kassars, the Kataii and the Paravaci. I had not
 mentioned the matter of the Paravaci quiva which had al-
 most struck me last night, having been in the morning dis-
 turbed about the disappearance of Elizabeth Cardwell and in
 the afternoon busy following Kamchak about in his rounds. I
 resolved to mention the matter to him sometime but not
 this evening for I was convinced this would not be a good
 evening for anyone in the wagon, except perhaps for
 Kamchak, who seemed pleased about the arrangements he
 had made with the herder pertaining to crossing livestock and
 the bargain, it seemed, he had contracted with the fellow
 with the quivas and saddle.
 There were a large number of tethered animals about the
 outer edge of the circle, and, beside them, stood many
 haruspexes. Indeed, I supposed there must be one haruspex
 at least for each of the many altars in the field. Among the
 animals I saw many verrs; some domestic tarsks, their tusks
 sheathed; cages of flapping vulos, some sleen, some kaiila,
 even some bask; by the Paravaci haruspexes I saw manacled
 male slaves, if such were to be permitted; commonly, I
 understood from Kamchak, the Tuchuks, Kassars and Kataii
 rule out the sacrifice of slaves because their hearts and livers
 are thought to be, fortunately for the slaves, untrustworthy in
 registering portents; after all, as Kamchak pointed out, who
 would trust a Turian slave in the kes with a matter so
 important as the election of a Ubar San; it seemed to me
 good logic and, of course, I am sure the slaves, too, were
 taken with the cogency of the argument. The animals sac-
 rificed, incidentally, are later used for food, so the Omen
 Taking, far from being a waste of animals, is actually a time
 of feasting and plenty for the Wagon Peoples, who regard
 'the Omen Taking, provided it results that no Ubar San is to
 be chosen, as an occasion for gaiety and festival. As I may
 have mentioned, no Ubar San had been chosen for more than
 a hundred years.
 As yet the Omen Taking had not begun. The haruspexes
 had not rushed forward to the altars. On the other hand on
 each altar there burned a small bosk-dung fire into which,
 like a tiny piece of kindling, had been placed - an incense
 stick.
 Kamchak and I dismounted and, from outside the circle,
         watched the four chief haruspexes of the Wagon Peoples
         approach the huge altar in the center of the field. Behind
         them another four haruspexes, one from each People, carried
         a large wooden cage, made of sticks lashed together, which
         contained perhaps a dozen white vulos, domesticated pigeons.
         This cage they placed on the altar. I then noted that each of
         the four chief haruspexes carried, about his shoulder, a white
         linen sack, somewhat like a peasant's rep-cloth seed bag.
         "This is the first Omen," said Kamchak, "The Omen to
         see if the Omens are propitious to take the Omens."
         "Oh," I said.
         Each of the four haruspexes then, after intoning an in-
         volved entreaty of some sort to the sky, which at the time
         was shining beneficiently, suddenly cast a handful of some-
         thing doubtless grain to the pigeons in the stick cage.
         Even from where I stood I could see the pigeons pecking
         at the grain in reassuring frenzy.
         The four haruspexes turned then, each one facing his own
         minor haruspexes and anyone else who might be about, and
         called out, "It is propitious!"
         There was a pleased cry at this announcement from the
         throng.
         "This part of the Omen Taking always goes well," I was
         informed by Kamchak.
         "Why is that?" I asked.
         "I don't know," he said. Then he looked at me. "Perhaps,"
         he proposed, "it is because the vulos are not fed for three
         days prior to the taking of the Omen."
         "Perhaps," I admitted.
         "I," said Kamchak, "would like a bottle of Paga."
         "I, too," I admitted.
         "Who will buy?" he asked.
         I refused to speak.
         "We could wager," he suggested.
         "I'll buy it," I said.
         I could now see the other haruspexes of the peoples
         pouring with their animals toward the altars. The Omen
         Taking as a whole lasts several days and consumes hundreds
         of animals. A tally is kept, from day to day. One haruspex, as
         we left, I heard cry out that he had found a favorable liver.
         Another, from an adjoining altar had rushed to his side. They
         were engaged in dispute. I gathered that reading the signs
         was a subtle business, calling for sophisticated interpretation
         and the utmost delicacy and judgment. Even as we made our
 way back to the kaiila I could hear two more haruspexes
 crying out that they had found livers that were clearly
 unfavorable. Clerks, with parchment scrolls, were circulate
 ing among the altars, presumably, I would guess, noting the
 names of haruspexes, their peoples, and their findings The
 four chief haruspexes of the peoples remained at the huge
 central altar, to which a white bask was being slowly led.
 It was toward dark when Kamchak and I reached the
 slave wagon to buy our bottle of Paga.
 On the way we passed a girl, a girl from Cos taken
 hundreds of pasangs away in a raid on a caravan bound for
 Ar. She had been bound across a wagon wheel lying on the
 ground, her body over its hub. Her clothing had been re-
 moved. Fresh and clean on her burned thigh was the brand of
 the four bosk horns. She was weeping. The Iron Master
 affixed the Turian collar. He bent to his tools, taking up a
 tiny, open golden ring, a heated metal awl, a pair of pliers. I
 turned away. I heard her scream.
 "Do not Korobans brand and collar slaves?" asked
 Kamchak.
 "Yes," I admitted, "they do."
 I could not rid my mind of the image of the girl from Cos
 weeping bound on the wheel. Such tonight, or on another
 night, would be the lovely Elizabeth Cardwell. I threw down
 a wild swallow of Paga. I resolved I would somehow release
 the girl, somehow protect her from the cruelty of the fate
 decreed for her by Kamchak.
 "You do not much speak," said Kamchak, taking the
 bottle, puzzled.
 "Must the Iron Master be called," I asked, "to the wagon
 of Kamchak."
 Kamchak looked at me. "Yes," he said.
 I glared down at the polished boards of the wagon floor.
 "Have you no feeling for the barbarian?" I asked.
 Kamchak had never been able to pronounce her name,
 which be regarded as of barbarian length and complexity.
 "E-liz-a-beth-card-vella" he would try to say, adding the "a"
 sound because it is a common ending of feminine names on
 Gor. He could never, like most native speakers of Gorean,
 properly handle the "w" sound, for it is extremely rare in
 Gorean, existing only in certain unusual words of obviously
 barbarian origin. The "w" sound, incidentally, is a complex
 one, and, like many such sounds, is best learned only during
 the brief years of childhood when a child's linguistic flexibility
       is at its maximum those years in which it might be trained
       to speak any of the languages of man with native fluency a
       capacity which is, for most individuals at least, lost long prior
       to attaining their majority. On the other hand, Kamchak
       could say the sound I have represented as "vella" quite easily
       and would upon occasion use this as Elizabeth's name. Most
       often, however, he and I simply referred to her as the Little
       Barbarian. I had, incidentally, after the first few days, re-
       fused to speak English to her, thinking it would be more
       desirable for her to learn to speak, think and hear in Gorean
       as rapidly as possible. She could now handle the language
       rather well. She could not, of course, read it. She was
       illiterate.
       Kamchak was looking at me. He laughed and leaned over
       and slapped me on the shoulder. "She is only a slaver" he
       chuckled.
       "Have you no feeling for her?" I demanded.
       He leaned back, serious for a moment. "Yes," he said, "I
       am fond of the Little Barbarian."
       "Then why?" I demanded.
       "She ran away," said Kamchak.
       I did not deny it.
       "She must be taught."
       I said nothing.
       "Besides," said Kamchak, "the wagon grows crowded
       and she must be readied for sale."
       I took back the Paga bottle and threw down another
       swallow.
       "Do you want to buy her?" he asked.
       I thought of the wagon of Kutaituchik and the golden
       sphere. The Omen Taking had now begun. I must attempt
       this night or some other in the near future to purloin the
       sphere, to return it somehow to the Sardar. I was going to
       say, "No," but then I thought of the girl from Cos, bound on
       the wheel, weeping. I wondered if I could meet Kamchak's
       price. I looked up.
       Suddenly Kamchak lifted his hand, alert, gesturing for
       silence.
       I noted, too, the other Tuchuks in the wagon. Suddenly
       they were not moving.
       Then I too heard it, the winding of a bask horn in the-
       distance, and then another.
       Kamchak leaped to his feet. "The camp is under attack!"
       he cried.
 Outside, as Kamchak and I bounded down the steps of the
 slave wagon, the darkness was filled with hurrying men, some
 with torches, and running kaiila, already with their riders.
 War lanterns, green and blue and yellow, were already burn-
 ing on poles in the darkness, signaling the rallying grounds of
 the Oralus, the Hundreds, and the Oralus, the Thousands.
 Each warrior of the Wagon Peoples, and that means each
 able-bodied man, is a member of an Or, or a Ten; each ten
 is a member of an Oralus, or Hundred; each Oralus is a member
 of an Oralus, a Thousand. Those who are unfamiliar with the
 Wagon Peoples, or who know them only from the swift raid,
 sometimes think them devoid of organization, sometimes con-
 ceive of them as mad hordes or aggregates of wild warriors,
 but such is not the case. Each man knows his position in his
 Ten, and the position of his Ten in the Hundred, and of the
 Hundred in the Thousand. During the day the rapid move-
 meets of these individually maneuverable units are dictated
 by bask horn and movements of the standards; at night by
 the bask horns and the war lanterns slung on high poles
 carried by riders.
 Kamchak and I mounted the kaiila we had ridden and, as
 rapidly as we could, pressed through the throngs toward our
 wagon.
 When the bask horns sound the women cover the fires and
 prepare the men's weapons, bringing forth arrows and bows,
 and lances. The quivas are always in the saddle sheaths. The
       bosk are hitched up and slaves, who might otherwise take
       advantage of the tumult, are chained.
       Then the women climb to the top of the high sides on the
       wagons and watch the war lanterns in the distance, reading
       them as well as the men. Seeing if the wagons must move,
       and in what direction.
       I heard a child screaming its disgust at being thrust in the
       wagon.
       In a short time Kamchak and I had reached our wagon.
       Aphris had had the good sense to hitch up the bask. Kam-
       chak kicked out the fire at the side of the wagon. "What is it?"
       she cried.
       Kamchak took her roughly by the arm and shoved her
       stumbling toward the sleen cage where, holding the bars,
       frightened, knelt Elizabeth Cardwell. Kamchak unlocked the
       cage and thrust Aphris inside with Elizabeth. She was slave
       and would be secured, that she might not seize up a weapon
       or try to fight or burn wagons. "Please!" she cried, thrusting
       her hands through the bars. But already Kamchak had
       slammed shut the door and twisted the key in the lock.
       "Master!" she cried. It was better, I knew, for her to be
       secured as she was rather than chained in the wagon, or even
       to the wheel. The wagons, in Turian raids, are burned.
       Kamchak threw me a lance, and a quiver with forty
       arrows and a bow. The kaiila I rode already had, on the
       saddle, the quivas,-the rope and bole. Then he bounded from
       the top step of the wagon onto the back of his kaiila and
       sped toward the sound of the bask horns. "Master!" I heard
       Aphris cry.
       Of their ranks with a swiftness and precision that was incredi-
 ble, long, flying columns of warriors flowed like rivers be-
 tween the beasts.
 I rode at Kamchak side and in an instant it seemed we had
 passed through the bellowing, startled herd and had emerged
 on the plain beyond. In the light of the Gorean moons we
 saw slaughtered bask, some hundreds of them, and, some two
 hundred yards away, withdrawing, perhaps a thousand war-
 riors mounted on tharlarion.
 Suddenly, instead of giving pursuit, Kamchak drew his
 mount to a halt and behind him the rushing cavalries of the
 Tuchuks snarled pawing to a halt, holding their ground. I saw
 that a yellow lantern was halfway up the pole below the two
 red lanterns.
 "Give pursuit!" I cried.
 "Wait!" he cried. "We are fools! Fools!"
 I drew back the reins on my kaiila to keep the beast quiet.
 "Listen!" said Kamchak, agonized.
 In the distance we heard a sound like a thunder of wings
 and then, against the three white moons of Gor, to my
 dismay, we saw tarnsmen pass overhead, striking toward the
 camp. There were perhaps eight hundred to a thousand of
 them. I could hear the notes of the tarn drum above control-
 ling the flight of the formation.
 "We are fools!" cried Kamchak, wheeling his kaiila
 In an instant we were hurtling through ranks of men back
 toward the camp. When we had passed through the ranks,
 which had remained still, those thousands of warriors simply
 turned their kaiila, the last of them now first, and followed
 us.
 "Each to his own wagon and war!" cried Kamchak.
 I saw two yellow lanterns and a red lantern on the high
 pole.
 I was startled by the appearance of tarnsmen on the south
 em plains. The nearest tarn cavalries as far as I knew were
 to be found in distant Ar.
 Surely great Ar was not at war with the Tuchuks of the
 southern plains.
 They must be mercenaries!
 Kamchak did not return to his own wagon but now raced
 his kaiila, followed by a hundred men, toward the high
 ground on which stood the standard of the four bosk horns;
 on which stood the huge wagon of Kutaituchik, called Ubar
 of the Tuchuks.
         Among the wagons the tarnsmen would have found only
         slaves, women and children, but not a wagon had been
         burned or looted.,
         We heard a new thunder of wings and looking overhead
         saw the tarnsmen, like a black storm, drum beating and tarns
         screaming, streak by overhead.
         A few arrows from those who followed us looped weakly
         up after them, falling then among the wagons.
         The sewn, painted boskhides that had covered the domed
         framework over the vast wagon of Kutaituchik hung slashed
         and rent from the joined "em-wood poles of the framework.
         Where they were not torn I saw that they had been pierced
         as though a knife had been driven through them again and
         again, only inches apart.
         There were some fifteen or twenty guards slain, mostly by
         arrows. They lay tumbled about, several on the dais near the
         wagon. In one body there were six arrows.
         Kamchak leaped from the back of his kaiila and, seizing a
         torch from an iron rack, leaped up the stairs and entered the
         wagon.
         I followed him, but then stopped, startled at what I saw.
         Literally thousands of arrows had been fired through the
         dome into the wagon. One could not step without breaking
         and snapping them. Near the center of the wagon, alone, his
         head bent over, on the robe of gray boskhide, sat Kutai-
         tuchik, perhaps fifteen or twenty arrows imbedded in his
         body. At his right knee was the golden kanda box. I looked
         about. The wagon had been looted, the only one that had
         been as far as I knew.
         Kamchak had gone to the body of Kutaituchik and sat
         down across from it, cross-legged, and had put his head in his
         hands.
         I did not disturb him.
         Some others pressed into the wagon behind us, but not
         many, and those who did remained in the background.
         I heard Kamchak moan. "The bask are doing as well as
         might be expected," he said. "The quivas I will try to keep
         them sharp. I will see that the axles of the wagons are
         greased." Then he bent his head down and sobbed, rocking
         back and forth.
         Aside from his weeping I could hear only the crackle of I
         the torch that lit the interior of the rent dome. I saw here
         and there, among the rugs and polished wood bristling with
         white arrows, overturned boxes, loose jewels scattered, torn
robes and tapestries. I did not see the golden sphere. If it had
been there, it was now gone.
At last Kamchak stood up.
He turned to face me. I could still see tears in his eyes.
"He was once a great warrior," he said.
I nodded.
Kamchak looked about himself, and picked up one of the
arrows and snapped it.
"Turians are responsible for this," he said.
"Saphrar?" I asked.
"Surely," said Kamchak, "for who could hire tarnsmen but
Saphrar of Turia or arrange for the diversion that drew
fools to the edge of the herds."
I was silent.
"There was a golden sphere," said Kamchak. "It was that
which he wanted."
I said nothing.
"Like yourself, Tart Cabot," added Kamchak.
I was startled.
"Why else," asked he, "would you have come to the
Wagon Peoples?"
I did not respond. I could not.
"Yes," I said, "it is true I want it for Priest-Kings. It is
important to them."
"It is worthless," said Kamchak.
"Not to Priest-Kings," I said.
Kamchak shook his head. "No, Tart Cabot," said he, "the
golden sphere is worthless."
The Tuchuk then looked around himself, sadly, and then
again gazed on the sitting, bent-over figure of Kutaituchik.
Suddenly tears seemed to burst from Kamchak's eyes and
his fists were clenched. "He was a great man!" cried Kam-
chak. "Once he was a great man."
I nodded. I knew Kutaituchik, of course, only as the huge,
somnolent mass of man who sat cross-legged on a robe of
gray boskhide, his eyes dreaming.
Suddenly Kamchak cried out in rage and seized up the
golden kanda box and hurled it away.
 "There will now have to be a new Ubar of the Tuchuks," I
said, softly.
Kamchak turned and faced me. "No," he said.
"Kutaituchik," I said, "is dead."
Kamchak regarded me evenly. "Kutaituchik," he said,
b 'divas not Ubar of the Tuchuks."
        "I don't understand," I said.
        "He was called Ubar of the Tuchuks," said Kamchak, "but
        he was not Ubar."
        "How can this be?" I asked.
        "We Tuchuks are not such fools as Turians would be-
        lieve," said Kamchak. "It was for such a night as this that
        Kutaituchik waited in the Wagon of the Ubar."
        I shook my head in wonder.
        "He wanted it this way," said Kamchak. "He would have it
        no other." Kamchak wiped his arm across his eyes. "He said
        it was now all he was good for, for this and for nothing
        else."
        It was a brilliant strategy.
        "Then the true Ubar of the Tuchuks is not slain," I said.
        "No," said Kamchak.
        "Who knows who the Ubar truly is?" I asked.
        "The Warriors know," said Kamchak. "The warriors."
        "Who is Ubar of the Tuchuks?" I asked.
        "I am," said Kamchak.
 Turia, to some extent, now lay under sedge, though the
 Tuchuks alone could not adequately invest the city. The other
 Wagon Peoples regarded the problem of the slaying of Kutai-
 tuchik and the despoiling of his wagon as one best left to the
 resources of the people of the four bask. It did not
 concern, in their opinion, the Kassars, the Kataii or the
 Paravaci. There had been Kassars who had wanted to fight
 and some Kataii, but the calm heads of the Paravaci had
 convinced them that the difficulty lay between Turia and the
 Tuchuks, not Turia and the Wagon Peoples generally. In-
 deed, envoys had flown on tarnback to the Kassars, Kataii
 and Paravaci, assuring them of Turia's lack of hostile inten-
 tions towards them, envoys accompanied by rich gifts.
 The cavalries of the Tuchuks, however, managed to
 maintain a reasonably effective blockade of land routes to
 Turia. Four times masses of tharlarion cavalry had charged
 forth from the city but each time the Hundreds withdrew
 before them until the charge had been enveloped in the
 swirling kaiila, and then its riders were brought down swiftly
 by the flashing arrows of the Tuchuks, riding in closely, al-
 most to lance range and firing again and again until striking
 home.
 Several times also, hosts of tharlarion had attempted to
 protect caravans leaving the city, or advanced to meet sched-
 uled caravans approaching Turia, but each time in spite of
 this support, the swift, harrying, determined riders of the
 Tuchuks had forced the caravans to turn back, or man by
        man, beast by beast, left them scattered across pasangs of
        prairie.
        The mercenary tarnsmen of Turia were most feared by the
        Tuchuks, for such could, with relative impunity, fire upon
        them from the safety of their soaring height, but even this
        dread weapon of Turia could not, by itself, drive the Tuchuks
        from the surrounding plains. In the field the Tuchuks would
        counter the tarnsmen by breaking open the Hundreds into
        scattered Tens and presenting only erratic, swiftly moving
        targets; it is difficult to strike a rider or beast at a distance
        from tarnback when he is well aware of you and ready to
        evade your missile; did the tarnsman ap-
        proach too closely, then he himself and his mount were
        exposed to the return fire of the Tuchuks, in which case of
        proximity, the Tuchuk could use his small bow to fierce
        advantage. The archery of tarnsmen, of course, is most
        effective against massed infantry or clusters of the ponderous
        tharlarion. Also, perhaps not unimportantly, many of Turia's
        mercenary tarnsmen found themselves engaged in the time-
        consuming, distasteful task of supplying the city from distant
        points, often bringing food and arrow wood from as far away
        as the valleys of the eastern Cartius. I presume that the
        mercenaries, being tarnsmen a proud, headstrong breed of
        men made the Turians pay highly for the supplies they
        carried, the indignities of bearing burdens being lessened
        somewhat by the compensating weight of golden tarn disks.
        There was no problem of water in the city, incidentally, for
        Turia's waters are supplied by deep, tile-lined wells, some of
        them hundreds of feet deep; there are also siege reservoirs,
        Bled with the melted snows of the winter, the rains of the
        spring.
        Kamchak, on kaiilaback, would sit in fury regarding the
        distant, white walls of Turia. He could not prevent the
        supplying of the city by air. He lacked siege engines, and the
        men, and the skills, of the northern cities. He stood as a
        nomad, in his way baffled at the walls raised against him.
        "I wonder," I said, "why the tarnsmen have not struck at
        the wagons with fire arrows why they do not attack the
        bask themselves, slaying them from the air, forcing you to
        withdraw to protect the beasts."
        It seemed to be a simple, elementary strategy. There was,
        after all, no place on the prairies to hide the wagons or the
        bask, and tarnsmen could easily reach them anywhere within
        a radius of several hundred pasangs.
 '`They are mercenaries," growled Kamchak.
 "I do not understand your meaning," I said.
 "We have paid them not to burn the wagons nor slay the
 bosk," said he.
 `'They are being paid by both sides?" I asked.
 "Of course," said Kamchak, irritably.
 For some reason this angered me, though, naturally, I was
 pleased that the wagons and boss; were yet safe. I suppose I
 was angered because I myself was a tarnsman, and it seemed
 somehow improper for warriors astride the mighty tarns to
 barter their favors indiscriminately for gold to either side.
 "But," said Kamchak, "I think in the end Saphrar of Turia
 will meet their price and the wagons will be fired and the
 bask slain" He gritted his teeth. "He has not yet met it,"
 said Kamchak, "because we have not yet harmed him nor
 made him feel our presence."
 I nodded.
 "We will withdraw," said Kamchak. He turned to a subor-
 dinate. "Let the wagons be gathered," he said, "and the bosk
 turned from Turia."
 "You are giving up?" I asked.
 Kamchak's eyes briefly gleamed. Then he smiled. "Of
 course," he said.
 I shrugged.
 I knew that I myself must somehow enter Turia, for in
 Turia now lay the golden sphere. I must somehow attempt to
 seize it and return it to the Sardar. Was it not for this
 purpose that I had come to the Wagon Peoples? I cursed the
 fact that I had waited so long even to the time of the Omen
 Taking for thereby had I lost the opportunity to try for the
 sphere myself in the wagon of Kutaituchik. Now, to my
 chagrin, the sphere lay not in a Tuchuk wagon on the open
 prairie but, presumably, in the House of Saphrar, a merchant
 stronghold, behind the high, white walls of Turia.
 I did not speak to Kamchak of my intention, for I was
 confident that he would have, and quite properly, objected to
 so foolish a mission, and perhaps even have attempted to
 prevent my leaving the camp.
 Yet l did not know the city. I could not see how I might
 enter. I did not know how I might even attempt to succeed in
 so dangerous a task as that which I had set myself.
 The afternoon among the wagons was a busy one, for they
 were preparing to move. Already the herds had been eased
        westward, away from Turia toward Thassa, the distant sea.
        There was much grooming of wagon bask, checking of har-
        ness and wagons, cutting of meat to be dried hanging from
        the sides of the moving wagons in the sun and wind. In the
        morning the wagons, in their long lines, would follow the
        slowly moving herds away from Turia. Meanwhile the Omen I
        Taking, even with the participation of the Tuchuk haruspexes, ~
        continued for the haruspexes of the people would remain j
        behind until even the final readings had been completed. I
        had heard, from a master of hunting sleen, that the Omens
        were developing predictably, several to one against the choice
        of a Ubar San. Indeed, the difficulty of the Tuchuks with the
        Turians had possibly, I guessed, exerted its influence on an
        omen or two in passing. One could hardly blame the Kassars,
        the Kataii and Paravaci for not wanting to be led by a
        Tuchuk against Turia or for not wanting to acquire the
        Tuchuk troubles by uniting with them in any fashion. The
        Paravaci were particularly insistent on maintaining the inde-
        pendence of the peoples
        Since the death of Kutaituchik, Kamchak had turned ugly
        in manner. Now he seldom drank or joked or laughed. I
        missed his hitherto frequent proposals of contests, races and
        wagers. He now seemed dour, moody, consumed with hatred
        for Turia and Turians. He seemed particularly vicious with
        Aphris. She was Turian. When he returned that night from
        the wagon of Kutaituchik to his own wagon he strode angrily
        to the sleen cage where he had confined Aphris with Eliza-
        beth during the putative attack. He unlocked the door and
        ordered the Turian maiden forth, commanding her to stand
        before him, head down. Then, without speaking, to her
        consternation he tore swiftly away the yellow camisk and
        fastened slave bracelets on her wrists. "I should whip you,"
        he said. The girl trembled. "But why, Master?" she asked.
        "Because you are Turian," he said. The girl looked at him
        with tears in her eyes. Roughly Kamchak took her by the
        arm and thrust her into the sleen cage beside the miserable
        Elizabeth Cardwell. He shut the door and locked it. "Mas-
        ter?" questioned Aphris. "Silence, Slave," he said. The girl
        dared not speak. "There both of you will wait for the Iron
        Master," he snarled, and turned abruptly, and went to the
        stairs to the wagon. But the Iron Master did not come that
        night, or the next, or the next. In these days of siege and war
        there were more important matters to attend to than the
        branding and collaring of female slaves. "Let him ride with
  his Hundred," Kamchak said. "They will not run away let
  them wait like she-sleep in their cage not knowing on which
  day the iron will come." Also, perhaps for no reason better
  than his suddenly found hatred for Aphris of Turia, he
  seemed in no hurry to free the girls from their confinement.
  "Let them crawl out," he snarled, "begging for a brand."
  Aphris, in particular, seemed utterly distraught by Kamchak's
  unreasoning cruelty, his callous treatment of herself and Eliza-
  beth perhaps most by his sudden, seeming indifference to
  her. I suspected, though the girl would not have dreamed of
  making the admission, that her heart as well as her body
  might nova rightfully have been claimed as his by the cruel
  Ubar of the Tuchuks. Elizabeth Cardwell refused to meet my
  eyes, and would not so much as speak to me. "Go away!" she
  would cry. "Leave me!" Kamchak, once a day, at night, the
  hour in which sleen are fed, would throw the girls bits of
  bask meat and fill a pan of water kept in the cage. I
  remonstrated with him frequently in private but he was
  adamant. He would look at Aphris and then return to the
  wagon and sit cross-legged, not speaking, for hours, staring at
  the side of the wagon. Once he pounded the rug on the
  polished floor in front of him and cried out angrily, as though
  to remind himself of some significant and inalterable fact,
  "She is Turian! Turian!" The work of the wagon was done by
  Tuka and another girl, whom Kamchak hired for the pur-
  pose. When the wagons were to move, Tuka was to walk
  beside the cart of the sleen cage, drawn by a single bask, and
  with a bask stick guide the animal. I once spoke harshly to
  her when I saw her cruelly poke Elizabeth Cardwell through
  the bars with the bask stick. Never did she do so again when I
  was nearby. She seemed to leave the distressed, red-eyed
  Aphris of Turia alone, perhaps because she was Turian,
  perhaps because she had no grievance against her. "Where
  now is the pelt of the red larl, Slave?" Tuka would taunt
  Elizabeth, threatening her with the bask stick. "You will look
  pretty with a ring in your nose!" she would cry. "You will
  like your collar! Wait until you feel the iron, Slave like
  Tuka!" Kamchak never reproved Tuka, but I would silence
  her when I was present. Elizabeth endured the insults as
  though paying no attention, but sometimes at night I could
  hear her sobbing.
  I searched among the wagons long before I found, sitting
  cross-legged beneath a wagon, wrapped in a worn bosk robe,
         his weapons at hand folded in leathers the young man whose
         name was Harold, the blond-haired, blue-eyed fellow who
         had been so victimized by Hereena, she of the First Wagon,
         who had fallen spoils to Turia in the games of Love War.
         He was eating a piece of bask meat in the Tuchuk fashion,
         holding He meat in his left hand and between his teeth, and
         cutting pieces from it with a quiva scarcely a quarter inch
         from his lips, then chewing the severed bite and then again
         holding the meat in his hand and teeth and cutting again.
         Without speaking I sat down near him and watched him
         eat. He eyed me warily, and neither did he speak. After a
         time I said to him, "How are the bask?"
         "They are doing as well as night be expected," he said.
         "Are the quivas sharp?" I inquired.
         "We try to keep them that way," he said.
         "It is important," I observed, "to keep the axles of wagons
         greased."
         "Yes," he said, "I think so."
         He handed me a piece of meat and I chewed on it.
         "You are Tart Cabot, the Koroban," he said.
         "Yes," I said, "and you are Harold the Tuchuk."
         He looked at me and smiled. "Yes," he said, "I am
         Harold the Tuchuk."
         "I am going to Turia," I said.
         'That is interesting," said Harold, "I, too, am going to
         Turia."
         "On an important matter?" I inquired.
         "No," he said.
         "What is it you think to do?" I asked.
         "Acquire a girl," he said.
         "Ah," I said.
         "What is it you wish in Turia?" inquired Harold.
         "Nothing important," I remarked.
         "A woman?" he asked.
         "No," I said, "a golden sphere."
         "I know of it," said Harold, "it was stolen from the wagon
         of Kutaituchik." He looked at me. "It is shill to lie worth-
         less."
         "Perhaps," I admitted, "but I think I shall go to Turia and
         look about for it. Should I chance to see it I might pick it up
         and bring it back with me."
         "Where do you think this golden sphere will be lying
         about?" asked Harold.
  "I expect," I said "it might be found here or there in the
  House of Saphrar, a merchant of Turia."
  "That is interesting," said Harold, "for I had thought I
  might try chain luck in the Pleasure Gardens of a Turian
  merchant named Saphrar."
  "That is interesting indeed," I said, "perhaps it is the
  same."
  "It is possible," granted Harold. "Is he the smallish fellow,
  rather fat, with two yellow teeth."
  "Yes," l said.
  "Then I shall attempt not to he hitter," I said.
  "I think that is a good idea," granted Harold.
  Then we sat there together for a time, not speaking fur-
  ther, he eating, I watching while he cut and chewed the meat
  that was his supper. There was a fire nearby, but it was not
  his fire. The wagon over his head was not his wagon. There
  was no kaiila tethered at hand. As far as ~ could gather
  Harold had little more than the clothes on his back, a
  boskhide robe, his weapons and his supper.
  "You will be slain in Turia," said Harold, finishing his
  meat and wiping his mouth in Tuchuk fashion on the back of
  his right sleeve.
  "Perhaps," I admitted.
  "You do riot even know how to enter the city," he said.
  "That is true," I admitted.
  "I can enter Turia when I wish," he said. "I know a way."
  "Perhaps," I suggested, "I might accompany you."
  "Perhaps," he granted, carefully wiping the quiva on the
  back of his left sleeve.
  "When are you going to Turia?" I asked.
  "Tonight," he said.
  I looked at him. "Why have you not gone before?" I
  asked.
  I-Ic smiled. "Kamchak," he said, "told me to wait for you."
  "I expect," I said "it might be found here or there in the
  House of Saphrar, a merchant of Turia."
  "That is interesting," said Harold, "for I had thought I
  might try chain luck in the Pleasure Gardens of a Turian
  merchant named Saphrar."
  "That is interesting indeed," I said, "perhaps it is the
  same."
  "It is possible," granted Harold. "Is he the- smallish fellow,
  rather fat, with two yellow teeth."
  "Yes," l said.
  "Then l shall attempt not to he hitter," I said.
  "I think that is a good idea," granted Harold.
  Then we sat there together for a time, not speaking fur-
  ther, he eating, I watching while he cut and chewed the meat
  that was his supper. There was a fire nearby, but it was not
  his fire. The wagon over his head was not his wagon. There
  was no kaiila tethered at hand. As far as ~ could gather
  Harold had little more than the clothes on his back, a
  boskhide robe, his weapons and his supper.
  "You will be slain in Turia," said Harold, finishing his
  meat and wiping his mouth in Tuchuk fashion on the back of
  his right sleeve.
  "Perhaps," I admitted.
  "You do riot even know how to enter the city," he said.
  "That is true," I admitted.
  "I can enter Turia when I wish," he said. "I know a way."
  "Perhaps," I suggested, "I might accompany you."
  "Perhaps," he granted, carefully wiping the quiva on the
  back of his left sleeve.
  "When are you going to Turia?" I asked.
  "Tonight," he said.
  I looked at him. "Why have you not gone before?" I
  asked.
  He smiled. "Kamchak," he said, "told me to wait for you.
           It was not a pleasant path to Turia that Harold the Tuchuk
           showed to me, but I followed him.
           "Can you swim?" he asked.
           "Yes," I said. Then I inquired, "How is it that you, a
           Tuchuk, can swim?" I knew few Tuchuks could, though some
           had learned in the Cartius.
           "I learned in Turia,' said Harold, "in the public baths
           where I was once a slave."
           The baths of Turia were said to be second only to those of
           Ar in their luxury, the number of their pools, their tempera-
           tures, the scents and oils.
           "Each night the baths were emptied and cleaned and I was
           one of many who attended to this task," he said. "I was only
           six years of age when I was taken to Turia, and I did not
           escape the city for eleven years." He smiled. "I cost my
           master only eleven copper tarn disks," he said, "and so I
           think he had no reason to be ill satisfied with his investment."
           "Are the girls who attend to the baths during the day as
           beautiful as it is said?" I inquired. The bath girls of Turia are
           almost as famous as those of Ar.
           "Perhaps," he said, "l never saw them during the day I
           and the other male slaves were
           chained in a darkened cham-
           ber that we might sleep and preserve our strength for the
           work of the night." Then he added, "Sometimes one of the
           girls, to discipline her, would be thrown amongst us but we
           had no way of knowing if she were beautiful or not."
           "How is it," I asked, "that you managed to escape?"
   "At night, when cleaning the pools, we would be
   unchained, in order to protect the chain from dampness and
   rust we were then only roped together by the neck, I had
   not been put on the rope until the age of fourteen, at which
   time I suppose my master adjudged it wise prior to that I
   had been free a bit to sport in the pools before they were
   drained and sometimes to run errands for the Master of the
   Baths it was during those years that I learned how to swim
   and also became familiar with the streets of Turia one
   night in my seventeenth year I found myself last man on the
   rope and I chewed through it and ran, I hid by seizing a
   well rope and descending to the waters below there was
   movement in the water at the foot of the well and I dove to
   the bottom and found a cleft, through which I swam under-
   water and emerged in a shallow pool, the well's feed basin I
   again swam underwater and this time emerged in a rocky
   tunnel, through which flowed an underground stream
   fortunately in most places there were a few inches between
   the level of the water and the roof of the tunnel it was very
   long, I followed it."
   "And where did you follow it to?" I asked.
   "Here," said Harold, pointing to a cut between two rocks,
   only about eight inches wide, through which from some
   underground source a flow of water was emerging, entering
   and adding to the small stream at which, some four pasangs
   from the wagons, Aphris and Elizabeth had often drawn
   water for the wagon bask.
   Not speaking further, Harold, a quiva in his teeth, a rope
   and hook on his belt, squeezed through and disappeared. I
   followed him, armed with quiva and sword.
   I do not much care to recall that journey. I am a strong
   swimmer but it seemed we must confront and conquer the
   steady press of flowing water for pasangs and indeed we did
   so. At last, at a given point in the tunnel, Harold disappeared
   beneath the surface and I followed him. Gasping, we
   emerged in the tiny basin area fed by the underground
   stream. Here, Harold disappeared again under the water and
   once more I followed him. After what seemed to me an
   uncomfortably long moment we emerged again, this time at
   the bottom of a tile-lined well. It was a rather wide well,
   perhaps about fifteen feet in width. A foot or so above the
   surface hung a huge, heavy drum, now tipped on its side. It
   would contain literally hundreds of gallons-of water when
   filled. Two ropes led to the drum, a small rope to control its
        filling, and a large one to support it; the large rope, inciden-
        tally, has a core of chain; the rope itself, existing primarily to
        protect the chain, is treated with a waterproof glue made
        from the skins, bones and hoofs of bask, secured by trade
        with the Wagon Peoples. Even so the rope and chain must be
        replaced twice a year. I judged that the top of the well might
        lie eight or nine hundred feet above us.
        I heard Harold's voice in the darkness, sounding hollow
        against the tiled walls and over the water. "The tiles must be
        periodically inspected," he said, "and for this purpose there
        are foot knots in the rope."
        I breathed a sigh of relief. It is one thing to descend a long
        rope and quite another, even in the lesser gravity of Gor, to
        climb one particularly one as long as that which I now saw
        dimly above me.
        The foot knots were done with subsidiary rope but worked
        into the fiber of the main rope and glued over so as to be
        almost one with it. They were spaced about every ten feet on
        the rope. Still, even resting periodically, the climb was an
        exhausting one. More disturbing to me was the prospect of
        bringing the golden sphere down the rope and under the
        water and through the underground stream to the place
        where we had embarked on this adventure. Also, I was not
        clear how Harold, supposing him to be successful in his
        shopping amongst the ferns and flowers of Saphrar's Pleasure
        Gardens, intended to conduct his squirming prize along this
        unscenic, difficult and improbable route.
        Being an inquisitive chap, I asked him about it, some two
        or three hundred feet up the rope
        "In escaping," he informed me, "we shall steal two tarns
        and make away."
        "I am pleased to see," I said, "that you have a plan."
        "Of course," he said, "I am Tuchuk."
        "Have you ever ridden a tarn before?" I asked him.
        "No," he said, still climbing somewhere above me.
        "Then how do you expect to do soy" I inquired, hauling
        myself up after him.
        "You are a tarnsman, are you not?" he asked.
        "Yes," I said.
        "Very well," said he, "you will teach me."
        "It is said," I muttered, "that the tarn knows who is a
        tarnsman and who is not and that it slays him who is not."
        "Then," said Harold, "I must deceive it."
        "How do you expect to do that?" I asked.
  "It will be easy," said Harold. "I am a Tuchuk."
  I considered lowering myself down the rope and returning
  to the wagons for a bottle of Paga. Surely tomorrow would
  be as propitious a day as any for my mission. Yet I did not
  care to pursue again that underground stream nor, particu-
  larly, on some new trip to Turia, to swim once more against
  it. It is one thing to roll about in a public bath or splash
  about in some pool or stream, but quite another to struggle
  for pasangs against a current in a tunnel channel with only a
  few inches between the water and the roof of the tunnel. -
  "It should be worth the Courage Scar," said Harold from
  above, "don't you thinly so?"
  "What?" I asked.
  "Stealing a wench from the House of Saphrar and return-
  ing on a stolen tarn."
  "Undoubtedly," I grumbled. I found myself wondering if
  the Tuchuks had an Idiocy Scar. If so, I might have nomi-
  nated the young man hoisting himself up the rope above me
  as a candidate for the distinction.
  Yet, in spite of my better judgment, I found myself some-
  how admiring the confident young fellow.
  I suspected that if anyone could manage the madness on
  his mind it would surely be he, or someone such as he,
  someone quite as courageous, or daft.
  On the other hand, I reminded myself, my own probabili-
  ties of success and survival were hardly better and here I
  was, his critic climbing up the drum rope, wet, cold,
  puking, a stranger to the city of Turia, intending to Steal an
  object the egg of Priest-Kings which was undoubtedly, by
  now, as well guarded as the Home Stone of the city itself. I
  decided that I would nominate both Harold and myself for
  an Idiocy Scar and let the Tuchuks take their pick.
  It was with a feeling of relief that I finally got my arm
  over the crossbar of the windlass and drew myself up. Harold
  bad already taken up a position, looking about, near the edge
  of the well. The Turian wells, incidentally, have no raised
  wall, but are, save for a rim of about two inches in height,
  flat with the level. I joined Harold. We were in an inclosed
  well yard, surrounded by walls of about sixteen feet in
  height, with a defender's catwalk about the inside. The walls
  provide a means for defending the water and also, of course,
  considering the number of wells in the city, some of which,
  by the way, are fed by springs, provide a number of defensi-
  ble enclaves should portions of the city fall into enemy
          hands. There was an archway leading from the circular well
          yard, and the two halts of the timbered, arched gate were
          swung back and fastened on both sides. It was necessary only
          to walk through the archway and find ourselves on one of the
          streets of Turia. I had not expected the entry to the city to
          be so easy so to speak.
          "The last time I was here," said Harold, "was over five
          years ago."
          "Is it far to the House of Saphrar?" I asked.
          "Rather far," he said. "But the streets are dark."
          "Good," I said. "Let us be on our way." I was chilly in the
          spring night and my clothes, of course, were soaked. Harold
          did not seem to notice or mind this inconvenience. The
          Tuchuks, to my irritation, tended on the whole not to notice
          or mind such things. I was pleased the streets were dark and
          that the way was long.
          "The darkness," I said, "will conceal somewhat the wetness
          of our garments and by the time we arrive we may be
          rather dry."
          "Of course," said Harold. "That was part of my plan."
          "Oh," I said.
          "On the other hand," said Harold, "I might like to stop by
          the baths."
          "They are closed at this hour, are they not?" I asked.
          "No," said he, "not until the twentieth hour." That was
          midnight of the Gorean day.
          "Why do you wish to stop by the baths?" I asked.
          "I was never a customer," he said, "and I often wondered
          like yourself apparently if the bath girls of Turia are as
          lovely as it is said."
          "That is all well and good," I said, "but I think it would be
          better to strike out for the House of Saphrar."
          "If you wish," said Harold. "After all, I can always visit I
          the baths after we take the city."
          "Take the city?" I asked.
          "Of course," said Harold.
          "Look," I said to him, "the bask are already moving
          away the wagons will withdraw in the morning. The siege is
          over. Kamchak is giving up."
          Harold smiled. He looked at me. "Oh, yes," he said.
          "But," I said, "if you like I will pay your way to the
          baths."
          "We could always wager," he suggested.
          "No," I said firmly, "let me pay."
 "If you wish," he said.
 I told myself it might be better, even, to come to the
 House of Saphrar late, rather than possibly before the twenti-
 eth hour. In the meantime it seemed reasonable to while
 away some time and the baths of Turia seemed as good a
 place as any to do so.
 Arm in arm, Harold and I strode under the archway
 leading from the well yard.
 We had scarcely cleared the portal and set foot in the
 street when we heard a swift rustle of heavy wire and,
 startled, looking up, saw the steel net descend on us.
 Immediately we heard the sound of several men leaping
 down to the street and the draw cords on the wire net
 probably of the sort often used for snaring sleen began to
 tighten. Neither Harold nor myself could move an arm or
 hand and, locked in the net, we stood like fools until a
 guardsman kicked the feet out from under us and we rolled,
 entrapped in the wire, at his feet.
 "Two fish from the well," said a voice.
 "This means, of course," said another voice, "that others
 know of the well."
 "We shall double the guard," said a third voice.
 "What shall we do with them?" asked yet another man.
 "Take them to the House of Saphrar," said the first man.
 I twisted around as well as I could. "Was this," I asked
 Harold, "a part of your plan?"
 He grinned, pressing against the net, trying its strength.
 "No," he said.
 I, too, tried the net. The thick woven wire held well.
 Harold and I had been fastened in a Turian slave bar, a
 metal bar with a collar at each end and, behind the collar,
 manacles which fasten the prisoner's hands behind his neck.
 We knelt before a low dais, covered with rugs and cush-
 ions, on which reclined Saphrar of Turia. The merchant wore
 his pleasure Robes of white and gold and his sandals, too,
 were of white leather bound with golden straps. His toenails,
 as well as the nails of his hands, were carmine in color. His
 small, fat hands moved with delight as he observed us. The
 golden drops above his eyes rose and fell. He was smiling and
 I could see the tips of the golden teeth which I had first
 noticed on the night of the banquet.
 Beside him, on each side, cross-legged, sat a warrior. The
 warrior on his right wore a robe, much as one might when
           emerging from the baths. His head was covered by a hood,
           such as is worn by members of the Clan of Torturers. He
           was toying with a Paravaci quiva. I recognized him, some-
           how in the build and the way he held his body. It was he who
           had hurled the quiva at me among the wagons, who would
           have been my assassin save for the sudden flicker of a
           shadow on a lacquered board. On the left of Saphrar there
           sat another warrior, in the leather of a tarnsman, save that
           he wore a jeweled belt, and about his neck, set with dia-
           monds, there hung a worn tarn disk from the city of Ar.
           Beside him there rested, lying on the dais, spear, helmet and
           shield.
           "I am pleased that you have chosen to visit us, Tarl Cabot
           of Ko-ro-ba," said Saphrar. "We expected that you would
           soon try, but we did not know that you knew of the Passage
           Well."
           Through the metal bar I felt a reaction on the part of
           Harold. He had apparently when fleeing years ago, stumbled
           on a route in and out of the city which had not been unknown
           to certain of the Turians. I recalled that the Turians, because
           of the baths, are almost all swimmers.
           The fact that the man with the Paravaci quiva wore the
           robe now seemed to be significant.
           "Our friend," said Saphrar, gesturing to his right, "with the
           hood preceded you tonight in the Passage Well. Since we
           have been in touch with him and have informed him of the
           well, we deemed it wise to mount a guard nearby
           fortunately, as it seems."
           "Who is the traitor to the Wagon Peoples?" asked Harold.
           The man in the hood stiffened.
           "Of course," said Harold, "I see now the quiva he is
           Paravaci, naturally."
           The man's hand went white on the quiva, and I feared he
           might leap to his feet and thrust the quiva to its hilt in the
           breast of the Tuchuk youth.
           "I have often wondered," said Harold, "where the Parava-'
           ci obtained their riches."
           With a cry of rage the hooded figure leaped to his feet,
           quiva raised.
           "Please," said Saphrar, lifting his small fat hand. "Let
           there be no ill will among friends."
           Trembling with rage, the hooded figure resumed his place
           on the dais.
           The other warrior, a strong, gaunt man, scarred across the
  left cheekbone, with shrewd, dark eyes, said nothing, but
  watched us, considering us, as a warrior considers an enemy.
  "I would introduce our hooded friend," explained Saphrar,
  "but even I do not know his name nor face only that he
  stands high among the Paravaci and accordingly has been of
  great use to me."
  "I know him in a way," I said. "He followed me in the
  camp of the Tuchuks and tried to kill me."
  "I trust," said Saphrar, "that we shall have better fortune."
  I said nothing.
  "Are you truly of the Clan of Torturers?" asked Harold of
  the hooded man.
  "You shall find out," he said.
  "Do you think," asked Harold, "you will be able to make
  me cry for mercy?"
  "If I choose," said the man.
  "Would you care to wager?" asked Harold.
  The man leaned forward and hissed. "Tuchuk sleen!"
  "May I introduce," inquired Saphrar, "Ha-Keel of Port
  Kar, chief of the mercenary tarnsmen."
  "Is it known to Saphrar," I inquired, "that you have
  received gold from the Tuchuks?"
  "Of course," said Ha-Keel.
  "You think perhaps," said Saphrar, chuckling, "that I
  might object and that thus you might sow discord amongst
  us, your enemies. But know, Tarl Cabot, that I am a mer-
  chant and understand men and the meaning of gold, I no
  more object to Ha-Keel dealing with Tuchuks than I would
  to the fact that water freezes and fire burns and that no
  one ever leaves the Yellow Pool of Turia alive."
  I did not follow the reference to the Yellow Pool of Turia.
  I glanced, however, at Harold, and it seemed he had sudden-
  ly paled.
  "How is it," I asked, "that Ha-Keel of Port Kar wears
  about his neck a tarn disk from the city of Ar?"
  "I was once of Ar," said scarred Ha-Keel. "Indeed, I can
  remember you, though as Tarl of Bristol, from the siege of
  Ar."
  "It was long ago," I said.
  "Your swordplay with Pa-Kur, Master of the Assassins, was
  superb."
  A nod of my head acknowledged his compliment.
  "You may ask," said Ha-Keel, "how it is that I, a tarns-
         man of Ar, ride for merchants and traitors on the southern
         plains?"
         "It saddens me," I said, "that a sword that was once raised
         in defense of Ar is raised now only by the beck and call of
         gold."
         "About my neck," he said, "you see a golden tarn disk of
         glorious Ar. I cut a throat for that tarn-disk, to buy silks and
         perfumes for a woman. But she had fled with another. I,
         hunted, also fled. I followed them and in combat slew the
         warrior, obtaining my scar. The wench I sold into slavery. I
         could not return to Glorious Ar." He fingered the tarn disk.
         "Sometimes," said he, "it seems heavy."
         "Ha-Keel," said Saphrar, "wisely went to the city of Port
         Kar, whose hospitality to such as he is well known. It was
         there we first met."
         "Ha!" cried Ha-Keel. "The little urt was trying to pick my
         pouch!"
         "You were not always a merchant, then?" I asked Saphrar.
         "Among friends," said Saphrar, "perhaps we can speak
         frankly, particularly seeing that the tales we tell will not be
         retold. You see, I know I can trust you."
         "How is that?" I asked.
         "Because you are to be slain," he said.
         "I see," I said.
         "I was once," continued Saphrar, "a perfumer of Tyros
         but I one day left the shop it seems inadvertently with some
         pounds of the nectar of talenders concealed beneath my tunic
         in a bladder and for that my ear was notched and I was
         exiled from the city. I found my way to Port Kar, where I
         lived unpleasantly for some time on garbage floating in the
         canals and such other tidbits as I could find about."
         "How then are you a rich merchant?" I asked.
         "A man met me," said Saphrar, "a tall man rather dread-
         ful actually with a face as gray as stone and eyes like
         glass."
         I immediately recalled Elizabeth's description of the man
         who had examined her for fitness to wear the message collar
         on Earth
         "I have never seen that man," said Ha-Keel. "I wish that I
         might have."
         Saphrar shivered. "You are just as well off," he said.
         "Your fortunes turned," I said, "when you met that man?"
         "Decidedly," he said. "In fact," continued the small mer-
chant, "it was he who arranged my fortunes and sent me,
some years ago, to Turia."
"What is your city?" I demanded
He smiled. "I think," he said, "Port Karl"
That told me what I wanted to know. Though raised in
Tyros and successful in Turia, Saphrar the merchant thought
of himself as one of Port Karl Such a city, I thought, could
stain the soul of a man.
"That explains," I said, "how it is that you, though in
Turia, can have a galley in Port Karl"
"Of course," said he.
"Also," I cried, suddenly aware, "the rence paper in the
message collar, paper from Port Kar!"
"Of course," he said.
"The message was yours," I said.
"The collar was sewn on the girl in this very house," said
he, "though the poor thing was anesthetized at the time and
unaware of the honor bestowed upon her." Saphrar smiled.
"In a way," he said, "it was a waste I would not have
minded keeping her in my Pleasure Gardens as a slave."
Saphrar shrugged and spread his hands. "But he would not
hear of it, it must be she!"
"Who is 'he'?" I demanded.
"The gray fellow," said Saphrar, "who brought the girl to
the city, drugged on tarnback."
"What is his name?" I demanded.
"Always he refused to tell me," said Saphrar.
"What did you call him?" I asked.
"Master," said Saphrar. "He paid well," he added.
"Fat little slave," said Harold.
Saphrar took no offense but arranged his robes and smiled.
"He paid very well," he said.
"Why," I asked, "did he not permit you to keep the girl as
a slave?"
"She spoke a barbarous tongue," said Saphrar, "like your-
self apparently. The plan was, it seems, that the message
would be read, and that the Tuchuks would then use the girl
to find you and when they had they would kill you. But they
did not do so."
"No," I said.
"It doesn't matter now," said Saphrar.
I wondered what death he might have in mind for me.
"How was it," I asked, "that you, who had never seen me,
knew me and spoke my name at the banquet?
           "You had been well described to me by the gray fellow,"
           said Saphrar. "Also, I was certain there could not have been
           two among the Tuchuks with hair such as yours."
           I bristled slightly. For no rational reason I am sometimes
           angered when enemies or strangers speak of my hair. I
           suppose this dates back to my youth when my flaming hair,
           perhaps a deplorably outrageous red, was the object of doz-
           ens of derisive comments, each customarily engendering its
           own rebuttal, both followed often by a nimble controversy,
           adjudicated by bare knuckles. I recalled, with a certain
           amount of satisfaction, even in the House of Saphrar, that I
           had managed to resolve most of these in my favor.
           My aunt used to examine my knuckles each evening and
           when they were skinned which was not seldom, I trooped
           away to bed with honor rather than supper.
           "It was an amusement on my part," smiled Saphrar, "to
           speak your name at that time to see what you would
           do, to give you something, so to speak, to stir in your
           wine."
           It was a Turian saying. They used wines in which, as a
           matter of fact, things could be and were, upon occasion,
           stirred mostly spices and sugars.
           "Let us kill him," said the Paravaci.
           "No one has spoken to you, Slave," remarked Harold.
           "Let me have this one," begged the Paravaci of Saphrar,
           pointing the tip of his quiva at Harold.
           "Perhaps," said Saphrar. Then the little merchant stood up
           and clapped his hands twice. From a side, from a portal
           which had been concealed behind a hanging, two men-at-
           arms came forth, followed by two others. The first two
           carried a platform, draped in purple. On this platform, nes-
           tled in the folds of the purple, I saw the object of my
           quest what I had come so far to find that for which I had
           risked and, apparently, lost my Life, the golden sphere.
           It was clearly an egg. Its longest axis was apparently about
           eighteen inches. It was, at its widest point, about a foot
           thick.
           "You are cruel to show it to him," said Ha-Keel.
           "But he has come so far and risked so much," said Saphrar
           kindly. "Surely he is entitled to a glimpse of our precious
           prize."
           "Kutaituchik was killed for it," I said.
           "Many more than he," said Saphrar, "and perhaps in the
           end even more will die."
"Do you know what it is?" I asked.
"No," said Saphrar, "but I know it is important to Priest-
Kings." He stood up and went to the egg, putting his finger
on it. "Why, though," he said, "I have no idea, it is not truly
of gold."
"It appears to be an egg," said Ha-Keel.
"Yes," said Saphrar, "whatever it is, it has the shape of an
egg."
"Perhaps it is an egg," suggested Ha-Keel.
"Perhaps," admitted Saphrar, "but what would Priest-
Kings wish with such an egg?"
"Who knows?" asked Ha-Keel.
"lt. was this, was it not," asked Saphrar, looking at me,
"that you came to Turia to find?"
"Yes," I admitted. "That is what I came to find."
"See how easy it was!" he laughed.
"Yes," I said, "very easy."
Ha-Keel drew his sword. "Let me slay him as befits a
warrior," he said.
"No," cried the Paravaci, "let me have him as well as the
other."
"No," said Saphrar firmly. "They are both mine."
Ha-Keel angrily rammed his sword back into the sheath.
He had clearly wanted to kill me honorably, swiftly. Clearly
he had little stomach for whatever games the Paravaci or
Saphrar might have in mind. Ha-Keel might have been a
cutthroat and a thief but, too' he was of Ar and a tarns-
man.
"You have secured the object," I inquired, "to give it to
the gray man?"
"Yes," said Saphrar.
"He will then return it to Priest-Kings?" I asked inno-
cently.
"I do not know what he will do with it," said Saphrar. "As
long as I receive my gold and the gold will perhaps make
me the richest man on Gor I do not care."
"If the egg is injured," I said, "the Priest-Kings might be,
angry.,'
"For all I know," said Saphrar, "the man is a Priest-King.
How else would he dare to use the name of Priest-Kings on
the message in the message collar?"
I knew, of course, that the man was not a Priest-King. But
I could now see that Saphrar had no idea who he was or
for whom, if anyone, he was working. 1 was confident that
        the man was the same as he who had brought Elizabeth
        Cardwell to this world he who had seen her in New York
        and decided she would play her role in his perilous sports
        and that thus he had at his disposal an advanced technology
        certainly to the level of at least space flight. I did not know,
        of course, if the technology at his disposal was his own, or
        that of his kind, or if it were furnished by others unknown
        not seen who had their own stake in these games of two
        worlds, perhaps more. He might well be, and I supposed it
        true, merely an agent but for whom, or what? something
        that would challenge even Priest-Kings blat, it must be, I
        something that feared Priest-Kings, or it would naturally have I
        struck this world, or Earth something that wanted Priest-
        Kings to die that the one world, or two, or perhaps even
        the system of our sun, would be freed for their taking.
        "How did the gray man know where the golden sphere
        was?" I asked.
        "He said once," said Saphrar, "that he was told"
        "By whom?" I asked.
        "I do not know," said Saphrar.
        "You know no more?"
         "No," said Saphrar.
        I speculated. The Others those of power, not Priest-
        Kings, must, to some extent, understand or sense the politics,
        the needs and policies of the remote denizens of the Sardar─
        they were probably not altogether unaware of the business of
        Priest-Kings, particularly not now, following the recent
        War of Priest-Kings, after which many humans had es-
        caped the Place of Priest-Kings and now wandered free, if
        scoffed at and scorned for the tales they might bear pos-
        sibly from these, or from spies or traitors in the Nest itself,
        the Others had learned the Others, I was sure, would neither
        jeer nor scoff at the stories told by vagabonds of Priest-Kings.
        They could have learned of the destruction of much of the
        surveillance equipment of the Sardar, of the substantial re-
        duction in the technological capabilities of Priest-Kings, at
        least for a short time and, most importantly, that the War
        had been fought, in a way, over the succession of dynasties
        thus learning that generations of Priest-Kings might be in the
        offing. If there had been rebels those wanting a new gener-
        ation there must have been the seeds of that generation.
        But in a Place of Priest-Kings there is only one bearer of
        young, the Mother, and she had died shortly before the War.
        Thus, the Others might well infer that there was one, or
 more, concealed eggs, hidden away, which must now be
 secured that the new generation might be inaugurated, but
 hidden away quite possibly not in the Place of Priest-Kings
 itself, but elsewhere, out of the home of Priest-Kings, beyond
 even the black Sardar itself. And they might have learned, as
 well, that I had been in the War of Priest-Kings a lieutenant
 to Misk, the Fifth Born, Chief of the Rebels, and that I had
 now made my way to the southern plains, to the land of the
 Wagon Peoples. It would not then have required great intelli-
 gence to suspect that I might have come to fetch the egg or
 eggs of Priest-Kings.
 If they had reasoned thus, then their strategy would seem
 likely to have been, first, to see that I did not find the egg,
 and, secondly, to secure it for themselves. They could
 guarantee their first objective, of course, by slaying me. The
 matter of the message collar had been a clever way of
 attempting to gain that end but, because of the shrewdness of  !
 Tuchuks, who seldom take anything at its face value, it had
failed; they had then attempted to bring me down among the
 wagons with a Paravaci quiva, but that, too, had failed; I
 grimly reminded myself, however, that I was now in the
 power of Saphrar of Turia. The second objective, that of
 obtaining the egg for themselves, was already almost accom
 plished; Kutaituchik had been killed and it had been stolen
 from his wagon; there was left only to deliver it to the gray
 man, who would, in turn, deliver it to the Others whoever
 or whatever they might be. Saphrar, of course, had been in
 Turia for years. This suggested to me that possibly the Others
 had even followed the movements of the two men 'who had'
 brought the egg from the Sardar to the Wagon Peoples.
 Perhaps they had now struck more openly and quickly
 employing Gorean tarnsmen fearing that I might myself
 seize the egg first and return it to the Sardar. The attempt on
 my life took place one night and the raid on Kutaituchik's
 wagon the next. Saphrar, too, I reminded myself, had known
 that the golden sphere was in the wagon of Kutaituchik. I
 was puzzled a bit that he had had this information. Tuchuks
 do not make good spies, for they tend to be, albeit fierce and
 cruel, intensely loyal; and there are few strangers allowed in
 the wagon of a Tuchuk Ubar. It occurred to me that perhaps
 the Tuchuks had made no secret of the presence of the
 'golden sphere in Kutaituchik's wagon. That puzzled me. On
 the other hand they may well not have understood its true
 value. Kamchak himself had told me the golden sphere was
         worthless poor Tuchuk! But now, I said to myself, poor
         Cabot! However it came about and I could not be sure
         Others than Priest-Kings had now entered the games of
         Gor and these Others knew of the egg and wanted It and,
         it seemed, would have it. In time Priest-Kings, those remain-
         ing, would die. Their weapons and devices would rust and
         crumble in the Sardar. And then, one day, like the pirates of
         Port Kar in their long galleys, unannounced, unexpected,
         Others would cross the seas of space and bring their craft to
         rest on the shores and sands of Gor.
         "Would you like to fight for your life?" asked Saphrar of
         Turia.
           "Of course," I said.
         "Excellent," said Saphrar. "You may do so in the Yellow
         Pool of Turia."
  At the edge of the Yellow Pool of Turia Harold and I
  stood, now freed of the slave bar, but with wrists tied behind
  our backs. I had not been given back my sword but the quota
  I had carried was now thrust in my belt.
  The pool is indoors in a spacious chamber in the House
  of Saphrar with a domed ceiling of some eighty feet in
  height. The pool itself, around which there is a marble
  walkway some seven or eight feet in width, is roughly
  circular in shape and has a diameter of perhaps sixty or
  seventy feet.
  The room itself is very lovely and might have been one of
  the chambers in the renowned baths of Turia. It was decorat-
  ed with numerous exotic floral designs, done primarily in
  greens and yellows, representing the vegetation of a tropical
  river, perhaps the tropical belt of the Cartius, or certain of
  its tributaries far to the north and west. Besides the designs
  there were also, growing from planting areas recessed here
  and there in the marble walkway, broad-leafed, curling
  plants; vines; ferns; numerous exotic flowers; it was rather
  beautiful, but in an oppressive way, and the room had been
  heated to such an extent that it seemed almost steamy; I
  gathered the temperature and humidity in the room were
  desirable for the plantings, or were supposed to simulate the
  climate of the tropical area represented.
  The light in the room came, interestingly, from behind a
  translucent blue ceiling, probably being furnished by energy
  bulbs. Saphrar was a rich man indeed to have energy bulbs in
        his home; few Goreans can afford such a luxury; and,
        indeed, few care to, for Goreans, for some reason, are fond
        of the light of flame, lamps and torches and such; flames
        must be made, tended, watched; they are more beautiful,
        more alive.
        Around the edge of the pool there were eight large
        columns, fashioned and painted as though the trunks of trees,
        one standing at each of the eight cardinal points of the
        Gorean compass; from these, stretching often across the
        pool, were vines, so many that the ceiling could be seen only
        as a patchwork of blue through vinous entanglements. Some
        of the vines hung so low that they nearly touched the surface
        of the pool. A slave, at a sort of panel fused with wires and
        levers, stood at one side. I was puzzled by the manner in
        which the heat and humidity were introduced to the room,
        for I saw no vents nor cauldrons of boiling water, or devices
        for releasing drops of water on heated plates or stones. I had
        been in the room for perhaps three or four minutes before I
        realized that the steam rose from the pool itself. I gathered
        that it was heated. It seemed calm. I wondered what I was
        expected to meet in the pool. I would have at least the quiva.
        I noted that the surface of the pool, shortly after we had
        entered, began to tremble slightly, and it was then once again
        calm. I supposed something, sensing our presence, had stirred
        in its depths, and was now waiting. Yet the motion had been
        odd for it was almost as if the pool had lifted itself, rippled,
        and then subsided.
        Harold and I, though bound, were each held by two
        men-at-arms, and another four, with crossbows, had accom-
        panied us.
        "What is the nature of the beast in the pool?" I asked.
        "You will learn," Saphrar laughed.
        I conjectured it would be a water animal. Nothing had yet
        broken the surface. It would probably be a sea-tharlarion, or
        perhaps several such; sometimes the smaller sea-tharlarion,
        seemingly not much more than teeth and tail, puttering in
        packs beneath the waves, are even more to be feared than
        their larger brethren, some of whom in whose jaws an entire
        galley can be raised from the surface of the sea and snapped
        in two like a handful of dried reeds of the rence plant. It
        might, too, be a Vosk turtle. Some of them are gigantic,
        almost impossible to kill, persistent, carnivorous. Yet, if it
        had been a tharlarion or a Vosk turtle, it might well have
        broken the surface for air. It did not. This reasoning also led
me to suppose that it would not be likely to be anything like
a water sleen or a giant urt from the canals of Port Karl
These two, even before the tharlarion or the turtle, would by
now, presumably, have surfaced to breathe.
Therefore whatever lay in wait in the pool must be truly
aquatic, capable of absorbing its oxygen from the water
itself. It might be gilled, like Gorean sharks, probably descend-
ants of Earth sharks placed experimentally in Thassa mil-
lenia ago by Priest-Kings, or it might have the gurdo, the
layered, ventral membrane, shielded by porous plating, of
several of the marine predators perhaps native to Gor, per-
haps brought to Gor by Priest-Kings from some other, more
distant world than Earth. Whatever it was, I would soon
learn.
"I do not care to watch this," Ha-Keel said, "so with your
permission, I shall withdraw."
Saphrar looked pained, but not much more so than was
required by courtesy. He benignly lifted his small fat hand
with the carmine fingernails and said, "By all means, my dear
Ha-Keel, withdraw if you so wish."
Ha-Keel nodded curtly and turned abruptly and angrily
strode from the room.
"Am I to be thrown bound into the pool?" I asked.
"Certainly not," said Saphrar. "That would hardly be fair."
"I am pleased to see that you are concerned with such
matters," I said.
"Such matters are very important to me," said Saphrar.
The expression on his face was much the same as that I
had seen at the banquet, when he had prepared to eat the
small, quivering thing impaled on the colored stick.
I heard the Paravaci, behind the hood, snicker.
"Fetch the wooden shield," commanded Saphrar. Two of
the men-at-arms left the room.
I studied the pool. It was beautiful, yellow, sparkling as
though filled with gems. There seemed to be wound through
its fluids ribbons and filaments and it was dotted here and
there with small spheres of various colors. I then became
aware that the steam that rose from the pool did so periodi-
cally, rather than continuously. There seemed to be a rhythm
in the rising of the steam from the pool. I noted, too, that
the surface of the pool licking at the marble basin in which it
lay trapped seemed to rise slightly and then fall with the
discharge of the steam.
This train of observation was interrupted by the arrival of
         Saphrar's two men-at-arms bearing a wooden barrier of
         sorts, about four and a half feet high and twelve feet wide,
         which they set between myself and my captors, and Saphrar,
         the Paravaci and those with the crossbow. Harold and his
         captors, as well, were not behind the barricade. It was, like
         the curving wall of the room, decorated in exotic floral
         patterns.
         "What is the shield for?" I asked.
         "It is in case you might feel tempted to hurl the quiva at
         us," said Saphrar.
         That seemed foolish to me, but I said nothing. I certainly
         had nothing in mind so ridiculous as to hurl at enemies the
         one weapon which might mean life or death to me in my
         struggle in the Yellow Pool of Turia.
         I turned about, as well as I could, and examined the pool
         again. I still had seen nothing break the surface to breathe,
         and now I was determined that my unseen foe must indeed
         be aquatic. I hoped it would be only one thing. And, too,
         larger animals usually move more slowly than smaller ones
         If it were a school of fifteen-inch Gorean pike, for example, I
         might kill dozens and yet die half eaten within minutes.
         "Let me be sent first to the pool," said Harold.
         "Nonsense," said Saphrar. "But do not be impatient for
         your turn will come."
         Though it might have been my imagination it seemed that
         the pool's yellow had now become enriched and that the
         shifting fluid hues that confronted me had achieved new
         ranges of brilliance. Some of the filamentous streamers
         beneath the surface now seemed to roil beneath the surface
         and the colors of the spheres seemed to pulsate. The rhythm
         of the steam seemed to increase in tempo and I could now
         detect, or thought I could, more than simple moisture in that
         steam, perhaps some other subtle gas or fume, perhaps
         hitherto unnoticed but now increasing in its volume.
         "Let him be untied," said Saphrar.
         While two men-at-arms continued to hold me, another
         undid the bonds on my wrists. Three men-at-arms, with
         crossbows, stood ready, the weapons trained on my back. ~
         "If I succeed in slaying or escaping the monster in the
         pool," I said, casually, "I take it that I am then, of course,
         free.',
         "That is only fair," said Saphrar.
         "Good," I said.
 The Paravaci, in the hood, threw back his head and
 laughed. The crossbowmen also smiled.
 "None has, of course," said Saphrar, "ever succeeded in
 doing either."
 "I see," I said.
 I now looked across the surface of the pool. Its appear-
 ance was now truly remarkable. It was almost as if it were
 lower in the center and the edges higher near the marble
 basin, inching as high as they could toward our sandals. I
 took it that this was an optical illusion of some sort. The
 pool was now, it seemed, literally coruscating, glistening with
 a brilliance of hues that was phenomenal, almost like hands
 lifting and spilling gems in sunlit water. The filamentous
 strands seemed to go mad with movement and the spheres of
 various colors were almost phosphorescent, pulsating beneath
 the surface. The steam rhythm was now swift, and the gases
 or fumes mixed with that moisture, noxious. It was almost as
 though the pool itself respired.
 "Enter the pool," commanded Saphrar.
 Feet first, quiva in hand, I plunged into the yellow fluid.
 To my surprise the pool, at least near the edge, was not
 deep. I stood in the fluid only to my knees. I took a few
 more steps out into the pool. It became deeper toward the
 center. About a third of the way toward the center I was
 entered into the pool to my waist.
 I looked about, searching for whatever it was that would
 attack me. It was difficult to look into the fluid because of
 the yellow, the glistening brilliance of the surface troubled by
 my passage.
 I noted that the steam, and gas or fumes, no longer rose
 from the pool. It was quiet.
 The filamentous threads did not approach me, but now
 seemed quiet, almost as if content. The spheres, too, seemed
 quiescent. Some of them, mostly whitish, luminescent ones,
 had seemed to float nearer, and hovered slightly beneath the
 surface, in a ring about me, some ten feet away. I took a
 step towards the ring and the spheres, doubtless moved by
 the fluids displaced in my step, seemed to slowly disperse and
 move away. The yellow of the pool's fluid, though rich, no
 longer seemed to leap and startle me with its vibrance.
 I waited for the attack of the monster.
 I stood so, in the fluid to my waist, for perhaps two or
 three minutes.
 Then, angrily, thinking perhaps the pool was empty, or
 had been made fool of, I cried out to Saphrar. "When is it that I meet the monster?"
Over the surface I heard Saphrar, standing behind the wooden shield, laugh. "You have met it," he said.
"You lie!" I cried.
"No," he responded, amused, "you have met it."
"What is the monster?" I cried.
"The pool!" he shouted.
"The pool?" I asked.
"Yes," said Saphrar, gleefully. "It is alive!"
At the very instant that Saphrar had called out there was a
great blast of steam and fumes that seemed to explode from
the fluid about me as though the monster in which I found
myself had now, its prey satisfactorily entrapped, dared to
respire and, at the same time, I felt the yellow fluid about my
body begin to thicken and yell. I cried out suddenly in alarm
horrified at my predicament and struggled to turn back and
wade to the edge of the marbled-basin that was the cage of
the thing in which I was, but the fluid, tightening about me,
DOW seemed to have the consistency of a rich yellow, hot
mud and then, by the time I had reached a level where it
rose to a point midway between my knees and waist the fluid
had become as resistant as wet, yellow cement and I could
move no further. My legs began to tingle and sting, and I
could feel the skin beginning to be etched and picked by the
corrosive elements now attacking them.
I heard Saphrar remark, "It sometimes takes hours to be
fully digested."
 Wildly, with the useless quiva, I began to slash and pick at
the damp, thick stud about me. The blade would sink in
fully, as though in a tub of wet cement, leaving a mark, but
when it was withdrawn the mark would be erased by the
material flowing in to fill the aperture "Some men," said Saphrar, "those who do not struggle have lived for as much as three hours long enough in some
cases to see, I saw one of the vines hanging near me. My heart leaped
        wildly at this chance. If I could but reach it! With all my
        strength I moved towards it an inch and then another
        inch my fingers stretched, my arms and back aching, until
        in another inch I might have grasped it and then, to my
        horror, as I reached in agony for the vine, it rustled and
        lifted itself just beyond my reach. I moved toward it again,
        and again it did this. I howled with rage. I was going to try
        again when I saw the slave I had noticed earlier watching
        me, his hands on certain of the levers in the panel on the
        curving wall. I stood in the coagulating, tightening fluid, held
        fast a prisoner, and threw back my head in despair. He had,
        of course, controlled the movement of the vine from the
        panel, undoubtedly by wires.
        "Yes, Tarl Cabot," wheezed Saphrar, giggling, "and yet
        you will, in an hour or so, when you are mad with pain and
        fear, try yet again and again to touch and grasp a vine,
        knowing that you will not succeed but yet again and again
        trying, believing that once somehow you will be successful.
        But you will not!" Saphrar now giggled uncontrollably. "I
        have even seen them reach for vines a spear's length above
        their head and think they could reach them!" Saphrar's two
        golden teeth, like yellow fangs, showed as he put back his
        head and howled with pleasure, his fat little hands pounding
        on the wood of the shield.
        The quiva had turned itself in my hand and my arm flew
        back, that I might take with me in my death the tormentor,
        Saphrar of Turia.
        "Beware!" cried the Paravaci and Saphrar suddenly
        stopped laughing and observed me warily.
        If my arm should fly forward he would have time to leap
        below the wooden frame.
        Now he was putting his chin on the wooden shield and
        watching me again, once more giggling.
        "Many have used the quiva before now," he said, "but
        usually to plunge it into their own heart."
        I looked at the blade.
        "Tarl Cabot," I said, "does not slay himself."
        "I did not think so," said Saphrar. "And that is why you
        were permitted to keep the quiva." Then he threw back his
        head and laughed again.
        "You fat, filthy urt!" cried Harold, struggling in his bonds
        with the two men-at-arms who held him.
        "Be patient," giggled Saphrar. "Be patient, my impetuous
        young friend. Your turn will come!"
 I stood as still as I could. My feet and legs felt cold and
 yet as if they were burning presumably the acids of the
 pool were at work. As nearly as I could determine the pool
 was thick, rubbery, gelatinous, only in the area near to my
 body. I could see it rippling, and splashing a bit against the
 edge of the marbled basin. Indeed, it was even lower toward
 the edge now, and had humped itself in my vicinity, as
 though in time it might climb my body and, in some hours
 perhaps, engulf me. But doubtless by then I would have been
 half digested, much of me little more than a cream of fluids
 and proteins then mixing with and nourishing the substance
 of my devourer the Yellow Pool of Turia.
 I pushed now, with all my might, not toward the edge of
 the marbled basin, but rather toward the deepest part of the
 pool. To my satisfaction I found that I could move, though
 barely, in this direction. The pool was content that I should
 enter it more deeply, perhaps it even desired that I do so,
 that its meal might be even more readily obtained.
 "What is he doing?" cried the Paravaci.
 "He is mad," said Saphrar.
 Half inch I moved toward the center of the pool my
 journey became easier. Then suddenly, the yellow, encircling
 cementlike substance had oozed from my limbs and I could
 take two or three free steps. The fluid was now, however, to
 my armpits. One of the luminescent, white spheres floated
 by, quite close to me. To my horror I saw it change its shade
 as it neared the surface, more closely approaching the light.
 As it had risen toward the surface, just beneath which it now
 rested, its pigmentation had changed from a luminescent
 white to a rather darkish gray. It was clearly photosensitive. I
 reached out and slashed at it with the quiva, cutting it, and it
 withdrew suddenly, rolling in the fluid, and the pool itself
 seemed suddenly to churn with steam and light. Then it was
 quiet again. Yet somehow I knew now the pool, like all
 forms of life, had some level of irritability. More of the
 luminescent, white orbs now floated about me, circling me,
 but none of them now approached closely enough to allow
 me to use the quiva.
 I splashed across the center of the pool, literally swim-
 ming. As soon as I had crossed the center I felt the fluids of
 the pool once again begin to yell and tighten. By the time I
 had reached the level of my waist on the opposite side I
 could, once again, no longer move toward the edge of the
 pool. I tried this twice more, in different directions, with
         identically the same result. Always, the luminescent, photo-
         sensitive orbs seemed to float behind me and around me in
         the fluid. Then I was swimming freely in the yellow fluid at
         the center of the pool. Beneath me, vaguely, several feet
         under the surface, I could see a collection, almost like
         threads and granules in a transparent bag, of intertwined,
         writhing filaments and spheres, imbedded in a darkish yellow
         jelly, walled in by a translucent membrane.
         Quiva in my teeth I dove toward the deepest part of the
         Yellow Pool of Turin, where glowed the quickness and sub-
         stancc of the living thing in which I swam.
         Almost instantly as I submerged the fluid beneath me
         began to jell, walling me away from the glowing mass at the
         bottom of the pool but, hand over hand, pulling at it and
         thrusting my way, I forced my way deeper and deeper into it.
         Finally I was literally digging in it feet below the surface. My
         lungs began to scream for air. Still I dug in the yellow fluid,
         hands and fingernails bleeding, and then, when it seemed my
         lungs would burst and darkness was engulfing me and I
         would lose consciousness, I felt a globular, membranous
         tissue, wet and slimy, recoil spasmodically from my touch.
         Upside down, locked in the gelling fluid, I took the quiva
         from my mouth and, with both hands, pressed down with the
         blade against that twitching, jerking, withdrawing membrane.
         It seemed that the living, amorphous globe of matter which I
         struck began to move away, slithering away in the yellow
         fluids, but I pursued it, one hand in the torn membrane and
         continued to slash and tear at it. Crowded about my body
         now were entangling filaments and spheres trying, like hands
         and teeth, to tear me from my work, but I struck and tore
         again and again and then entered the secret world beneath
         the membrane slashing to the left and right and suddenly the
         fluid began to loosen and withdraw above me and within the
         membranous chamber it began to solidify against me and
         push me out, I stayed as long as I could but, lungs wrenching,
         at last permitted myself to be thrust from the membranous
         chamber and hurled into the loose fluid above. Now below me
         the fluid began to yell swiftly almost like a rising floor and
         it loosened and withdrew on all sides and suddenly my
         head broke the surface and I breathed. I now stood on
         the hardened surface of the Yellow Pool of Turia and saw
         the fluids of the sides seeping into the mass beneath me and
         hardening almost instantly. I stood now on a warm, dry
  globular mass, almost like a huge, living shell. I could not
  have scratched the surface with the quiva.
  "Kill him!" I heard Saphrar cry, and there was suddenly
  the hiss of a crossbow quarrel which streaked past me and
  shattered on the curving wall behind me. Standing now on
  the high, humped dried thing, lofty on that protective
  coating I leaped easily up and seized one of the low hanging
  vines and climbed rapidly toward the blue ceiling of the
  chamber; I heard another hiss and saw a bolt from the
  crossbow shatter through the crystalline blue substance. One
  of the crossbowmen had leaped to the now dry floor of the
  manic basin and stood almost beneath me, his crossbow
  raised. I knew I would not be able to elude his quarrel. Then
  suddenly l heard his agonized cry and saw that beneath me,
  once again, there glistened the yellow fluids of- the pool,
  moving about him, for the thing perhaps thermotropic
  had again, as rapidly as it had hardened, liquified and swirled
  about him, the luminescent spheres and filaments visible
  beneath its surface. The crossbow bolt went wild, again
  shattering the blue surface of the dome. I heard the wild,
  eerie cry of the luckless man beneath me and then, with my
  fist, broke the blue surface and climbed through, grasping the
  Iron of a reticulated framework supporting numerous ener-
  gy bulbs.
  Far off, it seemed, I could hear Saphrar screeching for
  more guards.
  I ran over the iron framework until, judging by the di-
  tance and curve of the dome, I had reached a point above
  where Harold and I had waited at the edge of the pool.
  There, quiva in hand, uttering the war cry of Ko-ro-ba, feet
  first, I leaped from the framework and shattered through the
  blue surface landing among my startled enemies The cross-
  bowmen were each winding their string tight for a new
  quarrel. The quiva had sought and found the heart of two
  before even they realized I was upon them. Then another
  fell. Harold, wrists still bound behind his back, hurled himself
  against two men and, screaming, they pitched backward into
  the Yellow Pool of Turia. Saphrar cried out and darted
  away.
  The remaining two guardsmen, who had no crossbows,
  simultaneously whipped out their swords. Behind them, quiva
  poised in his fingertips, I could see the hooded Paravaci.
  I shielded myself from the flight of the Paracaci quiva by
  rushing towards the two guardsmen. But before I reached
 globular mass, almost like a huge, living shell. I could not
 have scratched the surface with the quiva.
 "Kill him!" I heard Saphrar cry, and there was suddenly
 the hiss of a crossbow quarrel which streaked past me and
 shattered on the curving wall behind me. Standing now on
 the high, humped dried Thing, lofty on that protective
 Coating I leaped easily up and seized one of the low hanging
 vines and climbed rapidly toward the blue ceiling of the
 chamber; I heard another hiss and saw a bolt from the
 crossbow shatter through the crystalline blue substance. One
 of the crossbowmen had leaped to the now dry floor of the
 manic basin Ed stood almost beneath me, his crossbow
 raised. I knew I would not be able to elude his quarrel. Then
 suddenly l heard his agonized cry and saw that beneath me,
 once again, there glistened the yellow fluids of- the pool,
 moving about him, for the thing perhaps thermotropic
 had again, as rapidly as it had hardened, liquified and swirled
 about him, the luminescent spheres and filaments visible
 beneath its surface. The crossbow bolt went wild, again
 shattering the blue surface of the dome. I heard the wild,
 eerie cry of the luckless man beneath me and then, with my
 fist, broke the blue surface and climbed through, grasping the
 iron of a reticulated framework supporting numerous ener-
 gy bulbs.
 Far off, it seemed, I could hear Saphrar screeching for
 more guards.
 I ran over the iron framework until, judging by the dis-
 tance and curve of the dome, I had reached a point above
 where Harold and I had waited at the edge of the pool.
 There, quiva in hand, uttering the war cry of Ko-ro-ba, feet
 first, I leaped from the framework and shattered through the
 blue surface landing among my startled enemies The cross-
 bowmen were each winding their string tight for a new
 quarrel. The quiva had sought and found the heart of two
 before even they realized I was upon them. Then another
 fell. Harold, wrists still bound behind his back, hurled himself
 against two men and, screaming, they pitched backward into
 the Yellow Pool of Turia. Saphrar cried out and darted
 away.
 The remaining two guardsmen, who had no crossbows,
 simultaneously whipped out their swords. Behind them, quiva
 poised in his fingertips, I could see the hooded Paravaci.
 I shielded myself from the flight of the Paracaci quiva by
 rushing towards the two guardsmen. But before I reached
         them my quiva, with the underhand hilt cast, had struck the
         guardsman on my left. I moved to his right and from his
         strengthless hand, even before he fell, tore his weapon.
         "Down!" cried Harold, and I fell to the floor barely sensi-
         ble of the silverish quiva of the Paravaci speeding overhead. I
         took the attack of the second guardsman by rolling on my
         back and flinging up my blade in defense. Four times he
         struck and each time I parried and then I had regained my
         feet. He fell back from my blade, turned once and fell into
         the glistening, living liquid of the Yellow Pool of Turia.
         I spun to face the Paravaci but he, weaponless, with a
         curse, turned and from the room.
         From the breast of the first guardsman I removed the
         quiva, wiping it on his tunic.
         I stepped to Harold and with one motion severed the
         bonds that constrained him.
         "Not badly done for a Koroban," he granted.
         We heard running feet approaching, those of several men,
         the clank of arms, the high-pitched, enraged screaming of
         Saphrar of Turia.
         "Hurry!" I cried.
         Together we ran ate-out the perimeter of the pool until we
         came to a tangle of vines depending from the ceiling, up
         which we climbed, broke through the blue substance, and
         cast wildly about for an avenue of escape. There would be
         such, for the ceiling had been unbroken by a door or panel,
         and there must surely be some provision for the rearrange-
         ment and replacement of energy bulbs. We quickly found the
         exit, though it was only a panel some two feet by two feet, of
         a size for slaves to crawl through. It was locked but we
         kicked it open, splintering the bolt from the wood, and
         emerged on a narrow, unrailed balcony.
         I had the guardsman's sword and my quiva, Harold his
         quiva alone.
         He had, running swiftly, climbed up the outside of a dome
         concentric to the one below, and was there looking about.
         "There it is!" he cried.
         "What?" I demanded. "Tarns! Kaiila!"
         "No," he cried, "Saphrar's Pleasure Gardens!" and disap-
         peared down the other side of the dome.
         "Come back!" I cried.
         But he was gone.
         Angry, I sped about the dome, not wishing to silhouette
  myself against the sky on its curve, lest there be enemy
  bowmen within range.
  About a hundred and fifty yards away, over several small
  roofs and domes, all within the vast compound that was the
  House of Saphrar of Turia, I saw the high walls of what was
  undoubtedly a Pleasure Garden. I could see, here and there,
  on the inside, the tops of graceful flower trees.
  -I could also see Harold bounding along, from roof to roof,
  in the light of the three moons.
  Furious I followed him.
  Could I have but put my hands on him at the time I might
  have wrung a Tuchuk neck.
  I now saw him leap to the wall and, scarcely looking
  about, run along and then leap to the swaying trunk of one
  of the flower trees and descend swiftly into the darkness of
  the gardens.
  In a moment I followed him.
         I had no difficulty finding Harold. Indeed, coming down
         the segmented trunk of the dower tree, I almost landed on
         top of him. He was sitting with his back to the tree, puffing,
         resting.
         "I have formed a plan," he said to me.
         "That is good news indeed," I responded. "Does it include
         some provision for escaping?"
         "I have not yet formed that part of it," he admitted.
         I leaned back against the tree, breathing heavily. "Would it
         not have been a good idea to reach the streets immediately?" I
         I asked.
         "The streets will be searched," puffed Harold, "Im-
         mediately by all the guardsmen and men-at-arms in the
         city." He took two or three deep breaths. "It will never occur
         to them to search the Pleasure Gardens," he said. "Only fools
         would try to hide there."
         I closed my eyes briefly. I felt ready to concede his last
         point.
         "You are aware, of course," I mentioned, "that the Plea"
         sure Gardens of so rich a man as Saphrar of Turia may
         contain a large number of female slaves not all of whom
         might be trusted to keep silent and some of whom will
         undoubtedly notice something as unusual as two strange
         warriors wandering about among the shrubs and ferns?"
         "That is true," said Harold, "but I do not expect to be here
         by morning." He picked up a stalk of a patch of violet grass,
         one of several hues used in such gardens, and began to chew
on it. "I think," said he, "an hour or so will be sufficient
perhaps less."
"Sufficient for what?" I asked.
"For tarnsmen to be called in to aid in the search," h
said. "Their movements will undoubtedly be coordinated in
the house of Saphrar and some tarns and their riders, if
only messengers or officers will surely be available."
Suddenly there seemed to me a real possibility in Harold's
plan. Undoubtedly tarnsmen, mounted, would come from
time to time during the night to the House of Saphrar.
"You are clever," I said.
"Of course," lie said, "I am a Tuchuk."
"But 1 thought you told me," I said, "that your plan did
not yet contain a provision for escape."
"At the time," he said, "it did not but while sitting here I
formed it."
"Well," I said, "I am glad."
"Something always comes to me," he said. "I am a
Tuchuk."
"What do you suggest we do now?" I asked.
"For the time," said Harold, "let us rest."
"Very well," I said.
And so we sat with our backs against the flower tree in the
House of Saphrar, merchant of Turia. I looked at the lovely,
dangling loops of interwoven blossoms which hung from the
curved branches of the tree. I knew that the clusters of
flowers which, cluster upon cluster, graced those linear, hang-
ing stems, would each be a bouquet in itself, for the trees are
so bred that the clustered flowers emerge in subtle, delicate
patterns of shades and hues. Besides several of the flower
trees there were also some Ka-la-na trees, or the yellow wine
trees of Gor; there was one large-bunked, reddish Tur tree,
about which curled its assemblage of Tur-Pah, a vinelike tree
parasite with curled, scarlet, ovate leaves, rather lovely to
look upon; the leaves of the Tur-Pah incidentally are edible
and figure in certain Gorean dishes, such as sullage, a kind of
soup; long ago, I had heard, a Tur tree was found on the
prairie, near a spring, planted perhaps long before by someone
who passed by; it was from that Tur tree that the city of
Turia took its name; there was also, at one side of the
garden, against the far wall, a grove of "em-wood, linear,
black, supple. Besides the trees there were numerous shrubs
and plantings, almost all flowered, sometimes fantastically;
among the trees and the colored grasses there wound curved,
          shaded walks. Here and there I could hear the Rowing of
          water, from miniature artificial waterfalls and fountains. From
          where I sat I could see two lovely pools, in which lotuslike
          plants floated; one of the pools was large enough for swim"
          ming; the other, I supposed, was stocked with tiny, bright fish
          from the various seas and lakes of Gor.
           Then I became aware of the flickerings and reflections of
           light from over the wall, against some of the higher buildings
           about. I also heard the running of feet, the sound of arms. I
           could hear someone shouting. Then the noise, the light,
           passed.
            "1 have rested," said Harold.
            "Good," I said.
           "Now," said he, looking about, "I must find myself a
           wench."
            "A wench!" I cried, almost a shout.
            "Shhhh," said he, cautioning me to silence.
            "Have we not enough troubles?" I inquired.
            "Why do you think I came to Turia?" he asked.
            "For a wench," I said.
           "Certainly," said he, "and I do not intend to depart with-
           out one."
           I gritted my teeth. "Well," I said, "I am sure there are
           many about."
           "Doubtless," said Harold, getting to his feet, as though he
           must now be back to work.
            I, too, got to my feet.
           He had no binding fiber, no slave hood, no tarn. Yet this
           absence of equipment did not deter him, nor did he seem to
           regard his deprivations in these particulars as worthy of note.
           "It may take a moment to pick out one I like," he
           apologized.
            "That is all right," I assured him, "take your time."
           I then followed Harold along one of the smooth, stone
           paths leading among the trees, brushing our way through the
           clusters of blossoms, skirting the edge of the nearer blue
           pool. I could see the three moons of Gor rejected in its
           surface. They were beautiful shining among the green and
           white blossoms on the water.
           The masses of flowers and vegetation in Saphrar's Pleasure
           Gardens filled the air with mingled, heavy sweet fragrances.
           Also the fountains had been scented and the pools.
           Harold left the walk and stepped carefully to avoid tram-
           pling a patch of talenders, a delicate yellow flower, often
 associated in the Gorean mind with love and beauty. He
 made his way across some dark blue and yellowish orange
 grass and came to the buildings set against one wall of the
 gardens. Here we climbed several low, broad marble steps
 and passed down a columned porch and entered the central
 building, finding ourselves in a dim, lamp-lit hall, bestrewn
 with carpets and cushions and decorated, here and there,
 with carved, reticulated white screening.
 There were seven or eight girls, clad in Pleasure Silks,
 sleeping in this hall, scattered about, curled up on cushions.
 Harold inspected them, but did not seem satisfied. I looked
 them over nod would have thought that any one of them
 would have been a prize, presuming it could be safely trans-
 ported somehow to the wagons of the Tuchuks. One poor
 girl slept naked on the tiles by the fountain. About her neck
 was a thick metal collar to which a heavy iron chain had
 been fastened; the chain itself was attached to a large iron
 ring placed in the floor. I supposed she was being disciplined.
 I immediately began to worry that that girl would be the one
 who would strike Harold's eye. To my relief, he examined
 her briefly and passed on.
 Soon Harold had left the central hall and was making his
 way down a long, carpeted, lamp-hung corridor. He entered
 various rooms off this corridor and, after, I suppose, inspect-
 ing their contents, always emerged and trekked off again.
 We then examined other corridors and other rooms, and
 finally returned to the main hall and started off down another
 way, again encountering corridors and rooms; this we did
 four times, until we were moving down one of the last
 corridors, leading from one of the five main corridors off the
 central hall. I had not kept count but we must have passed
 by more than seven or eight hundred girls, and still, among
 all these riches of Saphrar, he could not seem to find the one
 for which he searched. Several times, one girl or another,
 would roll over or shift in her sleep, or throw out an arm,
 and my heart would nearly stop, but none of the wenches
 awakened and we would troop on to the next room.
- At last we came to a largish room, but much smaller than
the main hall, in which there were some seventeen beauties
strewn about, all in Pleasure Silk. The light in the room was
furnished by a single tharlarion-oil lamp which hung from the
ceiling. It was carpeted by a large red rug on which were
several cushions of different colors, mostly yellows and or-
anges. There was no fountain in the room but, against one
         wall, there were some low tables with fruits and drinks upon
         them. Harold looked the girls over and then he went to the
         low table and poured himself a drink, Ka-la-na wine by the
         smell of it. He then picked up a juicy, red larma fruit, biting I
         into it with a sound that seemed partly crunching as he went
         through the shell, partly squishing as he bit into the fleshy,
         segmented endocarp. He seemed to make a great deal of
         noise. Although one or two of the girls stirred uneasily, none,
         to my relief, awakened.
         Harold was now fishing about, still chewing on the fruit, in
         a wooden chest at one end of the table. He drew out of the
         chest some four silken scarves, after rejecting since others
         which did not sufficiently please him.
         Then he stood up and went to where one of the girls lay
         curled on the thick red carpet.
         "I rather like this one," he said, taking a bite out of the
         fruit, spitting some seeds to the rug.
         She wore yellow Pleasure Silk, and, beneath her long black
         hair, on her throat, I glimpsed a silverish Turian collar. She
         lay with her knees drawn up and her head resting on her left
         elbow. Her skin color was tarnish, not too unlike the girl I
         had seen from Port Karl I bent more closely. She was a
         beauty, and the diaphanous Pleasure Silk that was the only
         garment permitted her did not, by design, conceal her
         charms. Then, startled, as she moved her head a bit, restlessly
         on the rug, I saw that in her nose was the tiny golden ring of
         a Tuchuk girl.
           "This is the one," Harold said.
           It was, of course, Hereena, she of the First Wagon.
         Harold tossed the emptied, collapsed shell of the larma
         fruit into a corner of the room and whipped one of the scarves
         from his belt.
         He then gave the girl a short, swift kick, not to hurt her,
         but simply, rather rudely, to startle her awake.
           "On your feet, Slave Girl," he said.
         Hereena struggled to her feet, her trend down, but Harold
         had stepped behind her, pulling her wrists blind her back
         and tying then with the scarf in his hand.
           "What is it?" she asked.
           "You are being abducted," Harold informed her.
         The girl's head flew up and she spun to face him, pulling to
         free herself. When she saw him her eyes were as wide as
         larma fruit and her mouth flew open.
           "It is I," said Harold, "Harold the Tuchuk."
  "No!" she said. "Not you!"
  "Yes," he said, "I," turning her about once again, routinely
  checking the knots that bound her wrists, taking her wrists in
  his hands, trying to separate them, examining the knots for
  slippage; there was none. He permitted her to turn and face
  him again.
  "How did you get in here?" she demanded.
  "I chanced by," said Harold.
  She was trying to free herself. After an instant she realized
  that she could not, that she had been bound by a warrior.
  Then she acted as though she had not noticed that she had
  been perfectly secured, that she was his prisoner, the prisoner
  of Harold of the Tuchuks. She squared her small shoulders
  and glared up at him.
  "What are you doing here?" she demanded.
  "Stealing a slave girl," he said.
  "Who?" she asked.
  "Oh, come now," said Harold.
  "Not I!" she said.
  "Of course," said he.
  "But I am Hereena," she cried, "of the First Wagon!"
  I feared the girl's voice might awaken the others, but they
  seemed still to sleep.
  "You are only a little Turian slave girl," said Harold, "who
  has taken my fancy."
  "Nor" she said.
  Then Harold had his hands in her mouth, holding it open.
  "See," he said to me.
  I looked. To be sure, there was a slight gap between two
  of the teeth on the upper right.
  Hereena was trying to say something. It is perhaps just as
  well she could not.
  "It is easy to see," said Harold, "why she was not chosen
  First Stake."
  Hereena struggled furiously, unable to speak, the young
   Tuchuk's hands separating her jaws.
    "I have seen kaiila with better teeth," he said.
    Hereena made an angry noise. I hoped that the girl would
    not burst a blood vessel. Then Harold removed his hands
    deftly, narrowly missing what would have been a most savage   !
  bite.
    "Sleen!" she hissed.
    "On the other hand," said Harold, "all things considered,
    she is a not unattractive little wench."
           "Sleen! Sleen!" cursed the girl.
           "I shall enjoy owning you," said Harold, patting her head.
           "Sleep! Sleen! Sleen!" cursed the girl.
         Harold turned to me. "She is, is she not all things con
        sidered a pretty little wench? I could not help but regard the angry, collared Hereena, furious in the swirling Pleasure Silk.
  "Yes," I said, "very."
 "Do not fret, little Slave Girl," said Harold to Hereena.
           "You will soon be able to serve me and I shall see that you
           shall do so superbly."
       Irrationally, like a terrified, vicious little animal, Hereena
         struggled again to free herself.
       Harold stood by, patiently, making no attempt to interfere.
          At last, trembling with rage, she approached him, her back
           to him, holding her wrists to him. "Your jest has gone far
           enough," she said. "Free me."
           "No," said Harold.
        "Free me!" commanded the girl.
        "No," said Harold.
      She spun to face him again, tears of rage in her eyes.
           "No," said Harold.
          She straightened herself. "I will never go with you," she
       hissed. "Never! Never! Never!"
           "That is interesting," said Harold. "How do you propose to prevent it?"
         "I have a plan," she said.
           "Of course," he said, "you are Tuchuk." He looked at her
           narrowly. "What is your plan?"
           "It is a simple one," she responded.
          "Of course," said Harold, "though you are Tuchuk, you
           are also female."
    One of Hereena's eyebrows rose skeptically. "The simplest
       plans," she remarked, "are often the best."
    "Upon occasion," granted Harold. "What is your plan?"
         "I shall simply scream," she said.
           Harold thought for a moment. "That is an excellent plan,"
           he admitted.
         "So," said Hereena, "free me and I will give you ten Ihn
           to flee for your lives."
        That did not seem to me like much time. The Gorean Ihn,
        or second, is only a little longer than the Earth second.
         Regardless of the standard employed, it was clear that
        Hereena was not being particularly generous.
    "I do not choose to do so," remarked Harold.
    She shrugged. "Very well," she said.
  "I gather you intend to put your plan into effect," said
  Harold.
    "Yes," she said.
    "Do so," said Harold.
  She looked at him for a moment and then put back her
  head and sucked in air and then, her mouth open, prepared
  to utter a wild scream.
  My heart nearly stopped but Harold, at the moment just
  before the girl could scream, popped one of the scarves into
  her mouth, wadding it Up and shoving it between her teeth.
  Her scream was only a muffled noise, hardly more than
  escaping air.
  "I, too," Harold informed her, "had a plan a counter-
  plan."
  He took one of the two remaining scarves and bound it
  across her mouth holding the first scarf well inside her
  mouth.
  "My plan," said Harold, "which I have now put into effect,
  was clearly superior to yours."
  Hereena made some muffled noises. Her eyes regarded him
  wildly over the colored scarf and her entire body began to
  squirm savagely.
    "Yes," said Harold, "clearly superior."
  I was forced to concede his point. Standing but five feet
  away I could barely hear the tiny, angry noises she made.
  Harold then lifted her from her feet and, as I winced,
  simply dropped her on the floor. She was, after all, a slave.
  She said something that sounded like "Ooof," when she hit
  the floor. He then crossed her ankles, and bound them tightly
  with the remaining scarf.
    She glared at him in pained fury over the colored scarf.
  He scooped her up and put her over his shoulder. I was
  forced to admit that he had handled the whole affair rather
  neatly.
  In n short while Harold, carrying the struggling Hereena,
  and I had retraced our steps to the central hall and descend-
  ed the steps of the porch and returned by means of the
  curving walks between the shrubs and pools to the flower tree
  by means of which we had originally entered the Pleasure
  Gardens of Saphrar of Turia.
       "By now," said Harold, "guardsmen will have searched the
       roofs, so it should be safe to proceed across them to our
       destination."
         "And where is that?" I asked.
         "Wherever the tarns happen to be," he responded.
        "Probably," I said, "on the highest roof of the highest
        building in the House of Saphrar."
         "That would be," suggested Harold, "the keep."
        I agreed with him. The keep, in the private houses of
        Goreans, is most often a round, stone tower, built for de-
        fense, containing water and food. It is difficult to fire from
        the outside, and the roundness like the roundness of Gorean
        towers in general tends to increase the amount of oblique
        hits from catapult stones.
       Making our way up the Dower tree with Hereena, who
       fought like a young she-larl, was not easy. I went part way
       up the tree and was handed the girl, and then Harold would
       go up above me and I would hoist her up a way to him, and
       then I would pass him, and so on. Occasionally, to my
       irritation, we became entangled in the trailing, looped stems
       of the tree, each with its richness of clustered flowers, whose
       beauty I was no loner in a mood to appreciate. At lust we
       got Hereena to the top of the tree.
        "Perhaps," puffed Harold, "you would like to go back and
        get another wench one for yourself?"
         "No," I said.
         "Very well," he said.
 Although the wall was several feet from the top of the tree
 ~ managed, by springing on one of the curved branches, to
 build up enough spring pressure to leap to where I could get
 my fingers over the edge of the wall. I slipped with one hand
 and hung there, feet scraping the wall, some fifty feet from
 the ground, for a nasty moment, but then managed to get
 both hands on the edge of the wall and hoist myself up.
   "Be careful," advised Harold.
 I was about to respond when I heard a stifled scream of
 horror and saw that Harold had hurled Hereena in my
 direction, across the space between the tree and the wall. I
 managed to catch her. She was now covered with a cold
 sweat and was trembling with terror. Perched on the wall,
 holding the girl with one hand to prevent her tumbling off, I
 watched Harold springing up and down and then he was
 leaping towards me. He, too, slipped, as I was not displeased
 to note, but our hands met and he was drawn to safety.
  "Be careful," I advised him, attempting not to let a note of
  triumph permeate my admonition.
 "Quite right," wheezed Harold, "as I myself earlier pointed
 out "
 I considered pushing him off the wall, but, thinking of the
 height, the likelihood of breaking his neck and back and
 such, and consequently thereby complicating our measures
 for escape, I dismissed the notion as impractical, however
 tempting.
 "Come along," he said, flinging Hereena across his shout-
 ders like a thigh of bask meat, and starting along the wall.
 We soon came, to my satisfaction, to an easily accessible, flat
 roof and climbed onto it. Harold laid Hereena down on the
 roof to one side and sat cross-legged for a minute, breathing
 heavily. I myself was almost winded as well.
 Then overhead in the darkness we heard the beat of a
 tarn's wings and saw one of the monstrous birds pass above
 us. In a short moment we heard it flutter to alight somewhere
 beyond. Harold and I then got up and, with Hereena under
 one of his arms, we circumspectly made our way from roof
 to roof until we saw the keep, rising like a dark cylinder
 against one of Gor's three moons. It stood some seventy feet
 from any of the other buildings in the compound that was
 the House of Saphrar, but now, swaying, formed of rope and
 sticks, a removable footbridge extended from an open door
 in its side to a porch some several feet below us. The bridge
 permitted access to the tower from the building on the roof
         of which we stood. Indeed, it provided the only access, save
         on tarnback, for there are no doors at ground level in a
         Gorean keep. The first sixty feet or so of the tower would l
         presumably be solid stone, to protect the tower from forced
         entrance or the immediate, efficient use of battering rams.
         The tower itself was some one hundred and forty feet in I
         height and had a diameter of about fifty feet. It was fur-
         nished with numerous ports for the use of bowmen. The roof
         of the tower, which might have been fortified with impaling
         spears and tarn wire, was now clear, to permit the descent of
         tarns and their riders.
         On the roof, as we lay there, we could hear, now and
         then, someone run along the footbridge. Then there was
         someone shouting. From time to time a tarn would descend
         or take flight from the roof of the keep.
         When we were sure there were at least two tarns on the
         roof of the keep I leaped down from the roof and landed on
         the light bridge, struggling to retain my footing as it began to'
         swing under my feet. Almost immediately I heard a shout
         from the building. "There's one of then!"
           "Hurry!" I cried to Harold.
         He threw Hereena down to me and I caught her on the
         bridge. I saw briefly the wild, frightened look in her eyes,
         heard what might have been a muffled plea. Then Harold
         had sprung down beside me on the bridge, seizing the hand
         rope to keep from tumbling off.
         A guardsman had emerged, carrying a crossbow, framed in
         the light of the threshold at the entrance to the bridge from
         the building. There was a quarrel on the guide and he threw
         the weapon to his shoulder. Harold's arm flashed past me
         and the fellow stood suddenly still, then his knees gave slowly
         way beneath him and he fell to the flooring of the porch, a
         quiva hilt protruding from his chest, the crossbow clattering
         beside him.
           "Go ahead," I commanded Harold.
           I could now hear more men coming, running.
         Then to my dismay I saw two more crossbowmen, this
         time on a nearby roof.
           "I see them!" one of them cried.
         Harold sped along the bridge, Hereena in his arms, and
         disappeared into the keep.
         Two swordsmen now rushed from the building, leaping
         over the fallen crossbowman, and raced along the bridge
         toward me. I engaged them, dropping one and wounding the
 other. A quarrel from one of the crossbowmen on the roof
 suddenly shattered through the sticks of the bridge at my
 feet, splintering them not six inches from where I stood.' I backed rapidly along the bridge and another quarrel sped
past me, striking sparks from the stone tower behind me.
Now I could see several more guardsmen rushing toward the
bridge. It would be eleven or twelve seconds before the
crossbowmen would be ready to fire again. I turned and
began to hack at the ropes that bound the swaying bridge to
the tower. Inside I could hear a startled guard demanding to
know who Harold was.
  "is it not obvious!" Harold was yelling at him. "You see I
  have the girl!"
   "What girl?,' the guard was asking.
  "A wench from the Pleasure Gardens of Saphrar, you
  fool!" Harold was crying at him.
   "But why should you be bringing such a wench here?" the
- guard was asking.
  "You are dull, are you not!" demanded Harold. "here
  take her!"
   "Very well," said the guard.
  I then heard a sudden, sharp crack, as of a fist meeting
  bone.
 The bridge began to rock and sag on its ropes and several
 men from the building began to thunder across towards me.
 Then there was a horrified cry as one rope was cut and the
 flooring of the bridge suddenly pitched, throwing several of
 the guardsmen to the ground below. A quarrel now struck
 the flooring of the tower at my feet and skidded into the
 building. I struck again and the other rope burst from my
 stroke and the bridge swung rapidly back against the wall of
 the building opposite with a clatter of sticks and cries, knock-
 ing the remaining, clinging guardsmen from it, dropping them
 like wood senseless to the foot of the wall. I leaped inside the
 door of the keep and swung it shut. Just as I did so the bolt
 of a crossbow struck the door and splintered through it, its
 head projecting some six inches on my side. I then flung the
 two bars in position, which locked the door, lest men on
 ladders from the ground attempt to force it.
 The room in which I found myself contained an uncon-
 scious guard, but no further sign of Harold or Hereena. I
 then climbed up a wooden ladder to the next level, which
 was empty, and then another level and another, and another.
 Then I emerged in the chamber below the roof of the keep
          and there found Harold, sitting on the bottom rung of the
          last ladder, breathing heavily, Hereena lying squirming at his
          feet. "I have been waiting for you," said Harold, gasping.
          "Let us proceed," I said, "lest the tarns be flown from the
          roof and we be isolated in the tower."
          "My plan exactly," said Harold, "but first should you not
          teach me to master the tarn?"
          I heard Hereena moan with horror and she began to
          struggle madly to free herself of the scarves that bound her. I
            "Normally," I said, "it takes years to become a skilled
          tarnsman."
          "That is all well nod good," responded Harold, "but can,
          you not impart certain important information relating to the
          matter in a briefer span?"
            "Come to the roof!" I cried
          I preceded Harold up the ladder and thrust up the trap
          admitting us to the roof. On the roof there were five tarns. !
          One guard was even then approaching the trap. The other !
          was releasing the tarns one by one.
          I was ready to engage the first guard, half on the ladder, |
          but Harold's head emerged from the opening behind me. !
          "Don't fight," he called to the guard. "It is Tarl Cabot of
          Ko-ro-ba, you fool!"
          "Who is Tarl Cabot of Ko-ro-ba?" asked the guard, star-
          tled.
            "I am," I responded, not knowing much what else to say.
 The fellow came running across the roof. "Where is
 Kunrus?" he asked.
  "Below," Harold informed him.
 "Who are you?" asked the guard. "What is going on
 here?"
 "I am Harold of the Tuchuks," responded Harold of the
 Tuchuks.
  "What are you doing here?" asked the guard.
 "Are you not Ho-bar?" inquired Harold. It was a common
 name in Ar, whence many of the mercenaries had come.
  "I know of no Ho-bar,'' said the man. "Is he Turian?"
 "I hoped to find Ho-bar," said Harold, "but perhaps
 you will do."
  "I shall try," said the guard.
  "Here," said Harold. "Take the wench."
 Hereena shook her head violently at the guard, protesting
 through the muffling folds of the scarf wadded in her mouth.
  "What will I do with her?" asked the guard.
  "Just hold her," said Harold.
  "Very well," said the guard.
 I closed my eyes and it was over in a second. Harold once
 more had Hereena over his shoulder and was boldly ap-
 preaching the tarns.
  There were two of the great birds left on the roof, both
fine specimens, huge, vicious, alert. Harold dropped Hereena to the floor of the roof and strode to the first tarn. I shut my eyes as he vigorously struck- it once, authoritatively, across the beak. "I am Harold of the
Tuchuks," he said, "I am a skilled tarnsman I have ridden
over a thousand tarns, I have spent more time in the tarn
saddle than most men on their feet, I was conceived on
tarnback, I was born on Tarnback, I eat tarns fear me! I
am Harold of the Tuchuks!
 The bird, if such emotions it could have, was looking at
 him, askance and baffled. Any instant I expected it to pick
 Harold from the roof with its beak, bite him in two and eat
 the pieces. But the bird seemed utterly startled, if possible,
 dumbfounded.
 Harold turned to face me. "How do you ride a tarn?" he
 asked
  "Get into the saddle," I said.
 "Yes!" he said, and climbed up, missing one of the rungs
 of the rope ladder at the saddle and slipping his leg through
 it. I then managed to get him to the saddle and made sure he
        fastened the safety strap. As swiftly as I could I then ex-
        plained to him the guidance apparatus, the main saddle ring
        and its six straps.
        When I handed Hereena to him the poor girl was shivering
        and moaning in terror, uncontrollably trembling. She, a girl
        of the plains, familiar with fierce kaiila, herself a proud,
        spirited wench, brave and daring, was yet like many
        women utterly for some reason terrified of a tarn. I felt
        genuine pity for the Tuchuk girl. On the other hand Harold
        seemed quite pleased that she was beside herself with terror.
        The slave rings on the tarn saddle are similar to those on the
        kaiila saddle and in a trice Harold, using the thongs stream-
        ing from the slave rings, one on each side of the saddle, had
        bound the girl on her back across the saddle in front of him.
        Then, without waiting, uttering a great cry, he hauled on the
        one-strap. The tarn did not move but, I thought, though it
        was undoubtedly not the case, turned and regarded him
        skeptically, reproachfully.
          "What is the matter?" asked Harold.
          "It is still hobbled," I said.
        I bent to the tarn hobble and opened it. Immediately the
        huge bird's wings began to beat and it sprang skyward.
        "Aiii!" I heard Harold cry, and could well imagine what had
        happened to his stomach.
        As quickly as I could I then unhobbled the other bird and
        climbed to the saddle, fastening the broad safety strap. Then
        I hauled on the one-strap and seeing Harold's bird wheeling
        about in circles against one of the Gorean moons sped to his
        side.
        "Release the straps!" I called to him. "The bird will follow
        this one!"
          "Very well," I heard him call, cheerily.
        And in a moment we were speeding high over the city of
        Turia. I took one long turn, seeing the torches and lights in
        the House of Saphrar below, and then guided my bird out
        over the prairie in the direction of the wagons of the
        Tuchuks.
        I was elated that we had managed to escape alive from the
        House of Saphrar, but I knew that I must return to the city,
        for I had not obtained the object for which I had come the
        golden sphere which still resided in the merchant strong-
        hold.
          I must manage to seize it before the man with whom
        Saphrar had had dealings the gray man with eyes like
       glass could call for It and destroy it or carry it away.
     As we sped high over the prairie I wondered at how it was
     that Kamchak was withdrawing the wagons and bosk from
    Turia that he would so soon abandon the siege.
    Then, in the dawn, we saw the wagons below us, and the
    bosk beyond them. Already fires had been lit and there was
    much activity in the camp of the Tuchuks, the cooking, the
    checking of wagons, the gathering and hitching up of the
    wagon bosk. This, I knew, was the morning on which the
    wagons moved away from Turia, toward distant Thassa, the
     Sea. Risking arrows, I, followed by Harold, descended to
   alight among the wagons.
          I had now been in the city of Turia some four days, having
          returned on foot in the guise of a peddler of small jewels. I
          had left the tarn with the wagons. I had spent my last tarn
          disk to buy a couple of handfuls of tiny stones, many of them
          of little or no value; yet their weight in my pouch gave me
          some pretext for being in the city.
          I had found Kamchak, as I had been told I would, at the
          wagon of Kutaituchik, which, drawn up on its hill near the
          standard of the four bask horns, had been heaped with what
          wood was at hand and filled with dry grass. The whole was
          then drenched in fragrant oils, and that dawn of the retreat,
          Kamchak, by his own hand, hurled the torch into the wagon.
          Somewhere in the wagon, fixed in a sitting position, weapons
          at hand, was Kutaituchik, who had been Kamchak's friend,
          and who had been called Ubar of the Tuchuks. The smoke of
          the wagon must easily have been seen from the distant walls
          of Turia. ~
          Kamchak had not spoken but sat on his kaiila, his face
          dark with resolve. He was terrible to look upon and I, though
          his friend, did not dare to speak to him. I had not returned
          to the wagon I had shared with him, but had come immedi-
          ately to the wagon of Kutaituchik, where I had been in-
          formed he was to be found.
          Clustered about the hill, in ranks, on their kaiila, black
          lances in the stirrup, were several of the Tuchuk Hundreds.
          Angrily they watched the wagon burn.
           I wondered that such men as Kamchak and these others
           would so willingly, abandon the siege of Turia.
 At last when the wagon had burned and the wind moved
 about the blackened beams and scattered ashes across the
 green prairie, Kamchak raised his right hand. "Let the stan-
 dard be moved," he cried.
 I observed a special wagon, drawn by a dozen bask, being
 pulled up the hill, into which the standard, when uprooted,
 would be set. In a few minutes the great pole of the standard
 had been mounted on the wagon and was descending the hill,
 leaving on the summit the burned wood and the black ashes
 that had been the wagon of Kutaituchik, surrendering them
 now to the wind and the rain, to time and the snows to
 come, and to the green grass of the prairie.
   "Turn the wagons!" called Kamchak.
 Slowly, wagon by wagon, the long columns of the Tuchuk
 retreat were formed, each wagon in its column, each column
 in its place, and, covering pasangs of prairie, the march front
 Turia had begun.
 Far beyond the wagons I could see the herds of bask, and
 the dust from their hoofs stained the horizon.
 Kamchak rose in his stirrups. "The Tuchuks ride from
 Turial" he cried.
 Rank by rank the warriors on the kaiila, dour, angry,
 silent, turned their mounts away from the city and slowly
 went to find their wagons, save for the Hundreds that would
 flank the withdrawal and form its rear guard.
 Kamchak rode his kaiila up the hill until he stood, that
 cold dawn, at the edge of the burned wood and ashes of
 Kutaituchik's wagon. He stayed there for some time, and
 then turned his mount away, and came slowly down the hill.
 Seeing me, he stopped. "I am pleased to see you live," he
 said.
 I dropped my head, acknowledging the bond he had ac-
 knowledged. My heart felt grateful to the stern, fierce war-
 rior, though he had been in the past days harsh and strange,
 half drunk with hatred for Turia. I did not know if the
 Kamchak I had known would ever live again. I feared that
 part of him perhaps that part I had loved best had died
 the night of the raid, when he had entered the wagon of
 Kutaituchik. ~
 Standing at his stirrup I looked up. "Will you leave like
 this?" I asked. "Is it enough?"
 He looked at me, but I could read no expression on his
 face. "The Tuchuks ride from Turia," he said. He then rode
 away, leaving me standing on the hill.
          Somewhat to my surprise I had no difficulty the next
          morning, after the withdrawal of the wagons, in entering the
          city. Before leaving the wagons I had joined them briefly on
          their march, long enough to purchase my peddler's disguise
          and the pound or so of stones which was to complete it. I
          purchased these things from the man from whom Kamchak
          had, on a happier afternoon, obtained a new saddle and set
          of quivas. I had seen many things in the man's wagon and I
          had gathered, correctly it seems, that he was himself a
          peddler of sorts. I then, on foot, following for a time the
          tracks of the departing wagons, then departing from them,
          returned to the vicinity of Turia. I spent the night on the
          prairie and then, on what would have been the second day of
          the retreat, entered the city at the eighth hour. My hair was
          concealed in the hood of a thin, ankle-length rep-cloth gar-
          ment, a dirty white through which ran flecks of golden
          thread, a fit garment, in my opinion, for an insignificant
          merchant. Beneath my garment, concealed, I carried sword
          and quiva.
          I was hardly questioned by guards at the gates of Turia,
          for the city is a commercial oasis in the plains and during a
          year hundreds of caravans, not to mention thousands of
          small merchants, on foot or with a single tharlarion wagon,
          enter her gates. To my great surprise the gates of Turia stood
          open after the withdrawal of the wagons and the lifting of
          the siege. Peasants streamed through them returning to their
          fields and also hundreds of townsfolk for an outing, some of
          them to walk even as far as the remains of the old Tuchuk
          camp, hunting for souvenirs. As I entered I regarded the
          lofty double gates, and wondered how long it would take to
          close them.
          As I hobbled through the city of Turia, one eye half shut,
          staring at the street as though I hoped to find a lost copper
          tarn disk among the stones, I made my way toward the
          compound of Saphrar of Turia. I was jostled in the crowds,
          and twice nearly knocked down in the guard of
          Phanius Turmus, Ubar of Turia.
          I was vaguely conscious, from time to time, that I might
          be followed. I dismissed this possibility, however, for, glanc-
          ing about, I could find no one I might fear. The only person
          I saw more than once was a slip of a girl in Robes of
          Concealment and veil, a market basket on her arm, who the
          second time passed me, not noticing me. I breathed a sigh of
          relief. It is a nerve-wracking business, the negotiation of an
enemy city, knowing that discovery might bring torture or
sudden death, at best perhaps an Impalement by sundown on
the city's walls, a warning to any other who might be similar-
ly tempted to transgress the hospitality of a Gorean city.
I came to the ring of flat, cleared ground, some hundred
feet or so wide, which separates the walled compound of
buildings which constitutes the House of Saphrar of Turia
from all the surrounding structures. I soon learned, to my
irritation, that one could not approach the high compound
wall more closely than ten spear lengths.
"Get away you!" cried a guard from the wall, with a
crossbow. "There is no loitering here"
"But master!" I cried. "I have gems and jewels to show the
noble Saphrar!"
"Approach then the nearer gate!" he called. "And state
your business."
I found a rather small gate in the wall, heavily barred, and
begged admittance to show my wares to Saphrar. I hoped to
be ushered into his presence and then, on the threat of
slaying him, secure the golden sphere and a tarn for escape.
To my chagrin I was not admitted into the compound,
but my pitiful stock of almost worthless stones was examined
outside the gate by a steward in the company of two armed
warriors. It took him only a few moments to discover the
value of the stones and, when he did, with a cry of disgust,
he hurled them away from the gate into the dust, and the
two warriors, while I pretended fright and pain, belabored
me with the hilts of their weapons. "Be gone, Fool!" they
snarled.
I hobbled after the stones, and fell to my knees in the
dust, scrabbling after them, moaning and crying aloud.
  I heard the guards laugh.
I had just picked up the last stone and tucked it back in
my pouch and was about to rise from my knees when I
found myself staring at the high, heavy sandals, almost boots,
of a warrior.
  "Mercy, Master," I whined.
"Why are you carrying a sword beneath your robe?" he
asked.
I knew the voice. It was that of Kamras of Turia, Champi-
on of the City, whom Kamchak had so sorely bested in the
games of Love War.
  I lunged forward seizing him by the legs and upended him
          in the- dust and then leaped to my feet and ran, the hood
          flying off behind me.
          I heard him cry. "Stop that man! Stop him! I know him!
          He is Tart Cabot of Ko-ro-ba! Stop him!"
          I stumbled in the long robe of the merchant and cursed
          and leaped up and ran again. The bolt of a crossbow splat-
          tered into a brick wall on my right, gouging a cupful of
           masonry loose in chips and dust.           ;,
          I darted down a narrow street. I could hear someone,
          probably Kamras, and then one or two others running after
          me. Then I heard a girl cry out, and scream, and two men
          curse. I glanced behind me to see that the girl who carried
          the market basket had inadvertently fallen in front of the
          warriors. She was crying angrily at them and waving her
          broken basket. They pushed her rudely to one side and -
          hurried on. By that time I had rounded a corner and leaped
          to a window, pulled myself up to the next window, and
          hauled myself up again and onto the flat roof of a shop. I
          heard the running feet of the two warriors, and then of six
          more men, pass in the street below. Then some children,
          screaming, ran after the soldiers. I heard some speculative
          conversation in the street below, between two or three pas-
          sersby, then it seemed quiet.
          I lay there scarcely daring to breathe. The sun on the flat
          roof was hot. I counted five Gorean Ehn, or minutes. Then I
          decided I had better move across the roofs in the opposite
          direction, find a sheltered roof, stay there until nightfall and
          then perhaps try to leave the city. I might go after the
          wagons, which would be moving slowly, obtain the tarn I had
          left with them, and then return on tarnback to Saphrar's
          house. It would be extremely dangerous, of course, to leave
          the city in the near future. Certainly word would be at
          the gates to watch for me. I had entered Turia easily. I did
          not expect I would leave as easily as I had entered. But how
          could I stay in the city until vigilance at the gates might be
          relaxed, perhaps three or four days from now? Every guards-
          man in Turia would be on the lookout for Tarl Cabot, who
          unfortunately, was not difficult to recognize.
          About this time I heard someone coming along the street
          whistling a tune. I had heard it. Then I realized that I had
          heard it among the wagons of the Tuchuks. It was a Tuchuk
          tune, a wagon tune, sometimes sung by the girls with the
          bask sticks.
            I picked up the melody and whistled a few bars, and then
  the person below joined me and we finished the turn.
  Cautiously I poked my head over the edge of the roof. The
  street was deserted save for a girl, who was standing below,
  looking up toward the roof. She was dressed in veil and
  Robes of Concealment. It was she whom I had seen before,
  when I had thought I might be followed. It was she who had
  inadvertently detained my pursuers. She carried a broken
  market basket.
    "You make a very poor spy, Tart Cabot," she said.
    "Dina of Turia!" 1 cried.
  I stayed four days in the rooms above the shop of Dina of
  Turia. There I dyed my hair black and exchanged the robes
  of the merchant for the yellow and brown tunic of the
  Bakers, to which caste her father and two brothers had
  belonged.
  Downstairs the wooden screens that had separated the
  shop from the street had been splintered apart; the counter
  had been broken and the ovens ruined, their oval domes
  shattered, their iron doors twisted from their hinges; even the
  top stones on tile two grain mills had been thrown to the
  floor and broken.
  At one time, I gathered from Dina, her father's shop had
  been the most famed of the baking shops of Turia, most of
  which are owned by Saphrar of Turia, whose interests range
  widely, though operated naturally, as Gorean custom would
  require, by members of the Caste of Bakers. Her father had
  refused to sell the shop to Saphrar's agents, and take his
  employment under the merchant. Shortly thereafter some
  seven or eight ruffians, armed with clubs and iron ban, had
  attacked the shop, destroying its equipment. In attempting to
  defend against this attack both her father and her two older
  brothers had been beaten to death. Her mother had died
  shortly thereafter of shock. Dina had lived for a time on the
  savings of the family, but had then taken them, sewn in the
  lining of her roles, and purchased a place on a caravan
  wagon bound for Ar, which caravan had been ambushed by
  Kassars, in which raid she herself, of course, had fallen into
  their hands.
  "Would you not like to hire men and reopen the shop?" I
  asked.
    "I have no money," she said.
    "I have very little," I said, taking the pouch and spilling
         the stones in a glittering if not very valuable heap on the
         small table in her central room.
          She laughed and poked through them with her fingers. "I
          learned something of jewels," she said, "in the wagons of
          Albrecht and Kamchak and there is scarcely a silver tarn
          disk's worth here."
           "I paid a golden tarn disk for them," I asserted.
           "But to a Tuchuk" she said.
           "Yes," I admitted.
          "My dear Tart Cabot," she said, "my sweet dear Tarl
          Cabot." Then she looked at me and her eyes saddened.
          "But," said she, "even had I the money to reopen the shop
          it would mean only that the men of Saphrar would come
          again."
           I was silent. I supposed what she said was true.
            "Is there enough there to buy passage to Ar?" I asked.
          "No," she said. "But I would prefer in any case to remain
          in Turia it is my home."
                                                       "How do you live?" I asked.     I
          "I shop for wealthy women," said she, "for pastries and |
          tarts and cakes things they will not trust their female slaves
          to buy."
          In answer to her questions I told her the reason for which
          I had entered the city to steal an object of value from
          Saphrar of Turia, which he himself had stolen from the
          Tuchuks. This pleased her, as I guessed anything would which
          was contrary to the interests of the Turian merchant, for
          whom she entertained the greatest hatred.
          "Is this truly all you travel" she asked, pointing at the pile
          of stones.
           "Yes," I said.
          "Poor warrior," said she, her eyes smiling over the veil,
          "you do not even have enough to pay for the use of a skilled
          slave girl."
            "That is true," I admitted.
          Slit laughed anti with an easy motion dropped the veil
          from her face and shook her head, freeing her hair. She held
          out her hands. "I am only a poor free woman," said she, "but
          might I not do?"
          I took her hands and drew her to me, and into my arms.
          "You are very beautiful, Dina of Turia," I said to her.
          For four days I remained with the girl, and each day, once
          at noon and once in the evening, we would stroll by one or
   more of the gates of Turia, to see if the guards might now be
   less vigilant than they had been the time before. To my
   disappointment, they continued to check every outgoing per-
   son and wagon with great care, demanding proof of identity
   and business. When there was the least doubt, the individual
   was detained for interrogation by an officer of the guard. On
   the other hand I noted, irritably, that incoming individuals
   and wagons were waved ahead with hardly a glance. Dina
   and myself attracted little attention from guardsmen or men-
   at-arms. My hair was now black; I wore the tunic of the
   Bakers; and I was accompanied by a woman.
   Several times criers had passed through the streets shouting
   that I was still at large and calling out my description.
   Once two guardsmen came to the shop, searching it as I
   expect most other structures in the city were searched. Dur-
   ing this time I climbed out a back window facing another
   building, and hoisted myself to the flat roof of the shop,
   returning by the same route when they had gone.
   I had, almost from the first in Kamchak's wagon, been
   truly fond of Dina, and I think she of me. She was truly a
   fine, spirited girl, quick-witted, warm-hearted, intelligent and
   brave. I admired her and feared for her. I knew, though I
   did not speak of it with her, that she was willingly risking her
   life to shelter me in her native city. Indeed, it is possible I
   might have died the first night in Turia had it not been that
   Dina had seen me, followed me and in my time of need
   boldly stood forth as my ally. In thinking of her I realized
   how foolish are certain of the Gorean prejudices with respect
   to the matter of caste. The Caste of Bakers is not regarded
   as a high caste, to which one looks for nobility and such; and
   yet her father and her brothers, outnumbered, had fought
   and died for their tiny shop; and this courageous girl, with a
   valor I might not have expected of many warriors, weapon-
   less, alone and friendless, had immediately, asking nothing in
   return, leaped to my aid, giving me the protection of her
   home, and her silence, placing at my disposal her knowledge
   of the city and whatever resources might be hers to com-
   mand.
   When Dina was about her own business, shopping for her
   clients, usually in the early morning and the late afternoon, I
   would remain in the rooms above the shop. There I thought
   long on the matter of the egg of Priest-Kings and the House
   of Saphrar. In time I would leave the city when I thought it
   safe and return to the wagons, obtain the tarn and then
         make a strike for the egg. I did not give myself, however,
         much hope of success in so desperate a venture. I lived in
         constant fear that the gray man he with eyes like glass
         would come to Turia on tarnback and acquire, before I could
         act, the golden sphere for which so much had been risked,
         for which apparently more than one man had died.
         Sometimes Dina and I, in our walking about the city,
         would ascend the high walls and look out over the plains.
         There was no objection to this on the part of anyone,
         provided entry into the guard stations was not attempted.
         Indeed, the broad walk, some thirty feet wide, within the
         high walls of Turia, with the view over the plains, is a
         favorite promenade of Turian couples. During times of dan-
         ger or siege, of course, none but military personnel or civilian
         defenders are permitted on the walls.
         "You seem troubled, Tarl Cabot," said Dina, by my side,
         looking with me out over the prairie.
           "It is true, my Dina," said I.
         "You fear the object you seek will leave the city before
         you can obtain it?" she asked.
           "Yes," I said, "I fear that."
           "You wish to leave the city tonight?" she asked.
           "I think perhaps I shall," I said.
         She knew as well as I that the guards were still questioning
         those who would depart from Turia, but she knew too, as I,
         that each day, each hour, I remained in Turia counted
         against me.
           "It is my hope that you will be successful," she said.
         I put my arm about her and together we looked out over
         the parapet.
         "Look," I said, "there comes a single merchant wagon it
         must be safe now on the plains."
         "The Tuchuks are gone," she said. And she added, "I shall
         miss you, Tart Cabot."
           "I shall miss you, too, my Dina of Turia," I told her.
         In no hurry to depart from the wall, we stood together
         there. It was shortly before the tenth Gorean hour, or noon
         of the Gorean day.
         We stood on the wall near the main gate of Turia, through
         which I had entered the city some four days ago, the morning
         after the departure of the Tuchuk wagons for the pastures
         this side of the Ta-Thassa Mountains, beyond which lay the
         vast, gleaming Thassa itself.
           I watched the merchant wagon, large and heavy, wide,
 with planked sides painted alternately white and gold, cov-
 ered with a white and gold rain canvas. It was drawn not by
 the draft tharlarion like most merchant wagons but, like
 some, by four brown bask.
   "How will you leave the city?" asked Dina.
   "By rope," I said. "And on foot."
  She leaned over the parapet, looking skeptically down at
  the stones some hundred feet below.
  "It will take time," she said, "and the walls are patrolled
  closely after sundown, and lit by torches." She looked at me.
  "And you will he on foot," she said. "You know we have
  hunting sleen in Turia?"
   "Yes," 1 said, "I know."
  "It is unfortunate," she said, "that you do not have a swift
  kaiila and then you might, in- broad daylight, hurtle past the
  guards and make your way into the prairie."
  "Even could I steal a kaiila or tharlarion," I said, "there
  are tarnsmen"
   "Yes," she said, "that is true."
 ; Tarnsmen would have little difficulty in finding a rider and
  mount on the open prairie near Turia. It was almost certain
  they would be flying within minutes after an alarm was
  sounded, even though they need be summoned from the
  baths, the Paga taverns, the gaming rooms of Turia, in which
  of late, the siege over, they had been freely spending their
  mercenary gold, much to the delight of Turians. In a few
  days, their recreations complete, I expected Ha-Keel would
  weigh up his gold, marshal his men and withdraw through
  the clouds from the city. I, of course, did not wish to wait a
  few days or more or however long it might take Ha-Keel
  to rest his men, square his accounts with Saphrar and depart.
  The heavy merchant wagon was near the main gate now
  and it was being waved forward.
  I looked out over the prairie, in the direction that had
  been taken by the Tuchuk wagons. Some five days now they
  had been gone. It had seemed strange to me that Kamchak,
  the resolute, implacable Kamchak of the Tuchuks, had so
  soon surrendered his assault on the city not that I expected
  it would have been, if prolonged, successful. Indeed, 1 re-
  spected his wisdom withdrawing in the face of a situation in
  which there was nothing to be gained and, considering the
  vulnerability of the wagons and bask to tarnsmen, much to
  be lost. He had done the wise thing. But how it must have
  hurt him, he, Kamchak, to turn the wagons and withdraw
          from Turia, leaving Kutaituchik unrevenged and Saphrar of
          Turia triumphant. It had been, in its way, a courageous thing
          for him to do. I would rather have expected Kamchak to
          have stood before the walls of Turia, his kaiila saddled, his
          arrows at hand, until the winds and snows had at last driven
          him, the Tuchuks, the wagons and the bask away from the
          gates of the beleaguered city, the nine-gated, high-walled
          stronghold of Turia, inviolate and never conquered.
          This train of thought was interrupted by the sounds of an
          altercation below, the shouting of an annoyed guardsman at
          the gate, the protesting cries of the driver of the merchant
          wagon. I looked down from the wall, and to my amusement,
          though I felt sorry for the distraught driver, saw that the
          right, rear wheel of the wide, heavy wagon had slipped the
          axle and that the wagon, obviously heavily loaded, was now
          tilting crazily, and then the axle struck the dirt, imbedding
          itself.
          The driver had immediately leaped down and was gesticu-
          lating wildly beside the wheel. Then, irrationally, he put his
          shoulder under the wagon box and began to push up, trying
          to right the wagon, surely an impossible task for one man.
          This amused several of the guards and some of the pas-
          sersby as well, who gathered to watch the driver's dis-
          comfiture. Then the officer of the guard, nearly beside him-
          self with rage, ordered several of his amused men to put their
          shoulders to the wagon as well. Even the several men, togeth-
          er with the driver, could not right the wagon, and it seemed
          that levers must be sent for.
          I looked away, across the prairie, bemused. Dina was still
          watching the broil below and laughing, for the driver seemed
          so utterly distressed and apologetic, cringing and dancing
          about and scraping before the irate officer. Then I noted
          across the prairie, hardly remarking it, a streak of dust in the
          sky.
          Even the guards and townsfolk here and there on the wall
          seemed now to be watching the stalled wagon below.
          I looked down again. The driver I noted was a young man,
          well built. He had blond hair. There seemed to be something
          familiar about him.
          Suddenly I wheeled and gripped the parapet. The streak of
          dust was now more evident. It was approaching the main
          gate of Turia.
            I seized Dina of Turia in my arms.
            "What's wrong!" she said.
  I whispered to her, fiercely. "Return to your home and
  lock yourself in. Do not go out into the streets!"
  "I do not understand," said she. "What are you talking
  about?"
  "Do not ask questions," I ordered her. "Do as I say! Go
  home, bolt the door to your rooms, do not leave the house!"
    "But, Tarl Cabot," she said.
   "Hurry!" I said.
    "You're hurting my arms," she cried.
    "Obey mel" ~ commanded.
  Suddenly she looked out over the parapet. She, too, saw
  the dust. Her hand went to her mouth. Her eyes widened in
  fear.
    "You can do nothing," I said. "Run!"
  I kissed her savagely and turned her about and thrust her a
  dozen feet down the walkway inside the wall. She stumbled a
  few feet and turned. "What of you?" she cried.
    "Run!" I commanded.
  And Dina of Turia ran down the walkway, along the rim
  of the high wall of Turia.
  Beneath the unbelted tunic of the Bakers, slung under my
  left arm, its lineaments concealed largely by a short brown
  cloak worn over the left shoulder, there hung my sword and
  with it, the quiva. I now, not hurrying, removed the weapons
  from my tunic, removed the cloak and wrapped them inside it.
   I then looked once more over the parapet. The dust was
   closer now. In a moment I would be able to see the kaiila,
   the flash of light from the lance blades. Judging from the
   dust, its dimensions, its speed of approach, the riders, perhaps
   hundreds of them the first wave, were riding in a narrow
   column, at full gallop. The narrow column, and probably the
   Tuchuk spacing, a Hundred and then the space for a Hun-
   dred, open, and then another Hundred, and so on, tends to
   narrow the front of dust, and the spaces between Hundreds
   gives time for some of the dust to dissipate and also, inciden-
   tally, to rise sufficiently so that the progress of the conse-
   quent Hundreds is in no way impeded or handicapped. I
   could now see the first Hundred, five abreast, and then the
   open space behind them, and then the second Hundred. They
   were approaching with great rapidity. I now saw a sudden
   flash of light as the sun took the tips of Tuchuk lances.
   Quietly, not wishing to hurry, I descended from the wall
   and approached the stalled wagon, the open gate, the guards.
       Surely in a moment someone on the wall would give the
alarm.
         At the gate the officer was still berating the blond-haired
         fellow. He had blue eyes, as I had known he would, for I had
         recognized him from above.
         "You will suffer for this!" the commander of the guard
         was crying. "You dull fool!"
          "Oh mercy, master!" whined Harold of the Tuchuks.
          "What is your name?" demanded the officer.
         At that moment there was a long, wailing cry of horror
         from the wall above. "Tuchuks!" The guards suddenly looked
         about themselves startled. Then two more people on the wall
         took up the cry, pointing wildly out over the wall. "Tuchuks!
         Close the gates!"
         The officer looked up in alarm, and then he cried out to
         the men on the windlass platform. "Close the gates!"
         "I think you will find," said Harold, "that my wagon is in
         the way."
         Suddenly understanding, the officer cried out in rage and
         whipped his sword from his sheath but before he could raise
         his arm the young man had leaped to him and thrust a quiva
         into his heart. "My name," he said, "is Harold of the
         Tuchuks!"
         There was now screaming on the walls, the rushing of
         guardsmen toward the wagon. The men on the windlass
         platform were slowly swinging the great double gates shut as
         much as possible. Harold had withdrawn his quiva from the
         breast of the officer. Two men leaped toward him with
         swords drawn and I leaped in front of him and engaged
         them, dropping one and wounding the other.
           "Well done, Baker," he cried.
         I gritted my teeth and met the attack of another man. I
         could now hear the drumming of kaiila paws beyond the
         gate, perhaps no more than a pasang away. The double gate
         had closed now save for the wagon wedged between the two
         parts of the gate. The wagon bask, upset by the running
         men, the shouting and the clank of arms about them, were
         bellowing wildly and throwing their heads up and down,
         stomping and pawing in the dust.
         My Turian foe took the short sword under the heart. I
         kicked him from the blade barely in time to meet the attack
         of two more men.
         I heard Harold's voice behind me. "I suppose while the
         bread is baking," he was saying, "there is little to do but
         stand about and improve one's swordplay."
   I might have responded but I was hard pressed.
  "I had a friend," Harold was saying, "whose name was
  Tarl Cabot. By now he would have slain both of them."
   I barely turned a blade from my heart.
   "And quite some time ago," Harold added.
  The man on my left now began to move around me to my
  left while the other continued to press me from the front. It
  should have been done seconds ago. I stepped back, getting
  my back to the wagon, trying to keep their steel from me.
  "There is a certain resemblance between yourself and my
  friend Marl Shot," Harold was saying, "save that your
  sword is decidedly inferior to his. Also he was of the caste
  of warriors and would not permit himself to be seen on his
  funeral pyre in the robes of so low a caste as that of the
  Bakers. Moreover, his hair was red like a larl from the
  sun whereas yours is a rather common and, if I may say so,
  a rather uninspired black."
  I managed to slip my blade through the ribs of one man
  and twist to avoid the-thrust of the other. In an instant the
  position of the man I had felled was filled by yet another
  guardsman.
  "It would be well to be vigilant also on the right," re-
  marked Harold.
  I spun to the right just in time to turn the blade of a third
  man.
  "It would not have been necessary to tell Tarl Cabot that,"
  Harold said.
  Some passersby were now fleeing past, crying out. The
  great alarm bars of the city were now ringing, struck by iron
  hammers.
  "I sometimes wonder where old Tarl Cabot is," Harold
  said wistfully.
   "You Tuchuk idiot!" I screamed.
  Suddenly I saw the faces of the men fighting me turn from
  rage to fear. They turned and ran from the gate.
  "It would now be well," said Harold, "to take refuge under
  the wagon." I then saw his body dive past, scrambling under
  the wagon. I threw myself to the ground and rolled under
  with him.
  Almost instantly there was a wild cry, the war cry of the
  Tuchuks, and the first five kaiila leaped from outside the gate
  onto the top of the wagon, finding firm footing on what I had
  taken to be simple rain canvas, but actually was canvas
  stretched over a load of rocks and earth, accounting for the
 incredible weight of the wagon, and then bounded from the
 wagon, two to one side, two the other, and the middle rider
actually leaping from the top of the wagon to the dust beyond
      the harnessed bask. In an instant another five and then
    another and another had repeated this maneuver and soon,
     sometimes with squealing of kaiila and dismounting of riders
          as one beast or another would be crowded between the gates
          and the others, a Hundred and then another Hundred had
          hurtled howling into the city, black lacquered shields on the
         left arms, lance seized in the right hand. About us there were
          the stamping paws of kaiila, the crying of men, the sound of
          arms, and always more and more Tuchuks striking the top of
          the wagon and bounding into the city uttering their war cry.
          Each of the Hundreds that entered turned to its own destina
          tion, taking different streets and turns, some dismounting and
          climbing to command the roofs with their small bows. Al
          ready I could smell smoke.
          Under the wagon with us, crouching, terrified, were three
          Turians, civilians, a wine vendor, a potter and a girl. The
          wine vendor and the potter were peeping fearfully from
          between the wheels at the riders thundering into the streets.
          Harold, on his hands and knees, was looking into the eyes of
          the girl who knelt, too, numb with terror. "I am Harold of
          the Tuchuks," he was telling her. He deftly removed the veil
          pins and she scarcely noticed, so terrified was she. "I am not
          really a bad fellow," he was informing her. "Would you like
          to be my slave?" She managed to shake her head, No, a tiny
          motion, her eyes wide with fear. "Ah, well," said Harold,
          repinning her veil. "It is probably just as well anyway. I
          already have one slave and two girls in one wagon if I had
          a wagon would probably be difficult." The girl nodded her
        head affirmatively. "When you leave the wagon," Harold told
          her, "you might be stopped by Tuchuks nasty fellows who
          would like to put your pretty little throat in a collar you
          understand?" She nodded, Yes. "So you tell them that you
          are already the slave of Harold the Tuchuk, understand?"
          She nodded again. "It will be dishonest on your part," said
          Harold apologetically, "but these are hard times." There were
          tears in her eyes. "Then go home and lock yourself in the
          cellar," he said. He glanced out. There were still riders
          pouring into the city. "But as yet," he said, "you cannot
          leave." She nodded, Yes. He then unpinned her veil and took
          her in his arms, improving the time.
            I sat cross-legged under the wagon, my sword across my
  knees, watching the paws and legs of the swirling kaiila
  bounding past. I heard the hiss of crossbow quarrels and one
  rider and his mount stumbled off the wagon top, falling and
  rolling to one side, others bounding over him. Then I heard
  the twang of the small ham bows of Tuchuks. Somewhere,
  off on the other side of the wagon, I heard the heavy
  grunting of a tharlarion and the squealing of a kaiila, the meeting of lances and shields. I saw a woman, unveiled, hair
streaming behind her, twisting, buffeted, among the kaiila,
somehow managing to find her way among them and rush
between two buildings. The tolling of the alarm bars was now
fearful throughout the city. I could hear screaming some
hundred yards away. The roof of a building on the left was
afire and smoke and sparks were being hurled into the sky
and swept by the wind across the adjoining buildings. Some
dozen dismounted Tuchuks were now at the great windlass
on its platform slowly opening the gates to their maximum
width, and when they had done so the Tuchuks, howling and
waving their lances, entered the city in ranks of twenty
abreast, thus only five ranks to the Hundred. I could now see
smoke down the long avenue leading from the gate, in a
dozen places. Already I saw a Tuchuk with a dozen silver
cups tied on a string to his saddle. Another had a screaming
woman by the hair, running her beside his stirrup. And still
more Tuchuks bounded into the city. The wall of a building
off the main avenue collapsed flaming to the street. I could
hear in three or four places the clash of arms, the hiss of the
bolts of crossbows, the answering featherswift flight of the
barbed Tuchuk war arrows. Another wall, on the other side
of the avenue, tumbled downward, two Turian warriors
leaping from it, being ridden down by Tuchuks, leaping over
the burning debris on kaiilaback, lance in hand.
 Then in the clearing inside the gate, on his kaiila, lance in
 his right fist, turning and barking orders, I saw Kamchak of
 - the Tuchuks, waving men to the left and right, and to the
 roof tops. His lance point was red. The black lacquer of his
 shield was deeply cut and scraped. The metal net that de-
 pended from his helmet had been thrown back and his eyes
 and face were fearful to behold. He was flanked by officers
 of the Tuchuks, commanders of Thousands, mounted as he
 was and armed. He turned his kaiila to face the city and it
 reared and he lifted his shield on his left arm and his lance in
 his right fist. "I want the blood of Saphrar of Turia," he cried.
         It had, of course, been the Tuchuk turn.
        One makes a pretext of seriously besieging a city, spending
        several days, sometimes weeks, in the endeavor, and then,
        apparently, one surrenders the sedge and withdraws, moving
        away slowly with the wagons and bask for some days in
        this case four and then, the bask and wagons removed from
        probable danger, swiftly, in a single night, under the cover of
        darkness, sweeping back to the city, taking it by surprise. |
        It had worked well.
        Much of Turia was in flames. Certain of the Hundreds,
        delegated the task, had immediately, almost before the alarm
        bars could sound, seized many of the wells, granaries and I
        public buildings, including the very palace of Phanius Turmus
        itself. The Ubar, and Kamras, his highest officer, had fallen
        captive almost immediately, each to a Hundred set that
        purpose. Most of the High Council of Turia, too, now re- ~
        posed in Tuchuk chains. The city was largely without leader- I
        ship, though here and there brave Turians had gathered I
        guardsmen and men-at-arms and determined civilians and
        sealed off streets, forming fortresses within the city against
        the invaders. The compound of the House of Saphrar, how-
        ever, had not fallen, protected by its numerous guardsmen
        and its high walls, nor had the tower elsewhere that sheltered
        the tarn cots and warriors of Ha-Keel, the mercenary from
        Port Karl
         Kamchak had taken up quarters in the palace of Phanius
         Turmus, which, save for the looting and the ripping down of
         tapestries, the wanton defacing of wall mosaics, was un-
 harmed. It was from this place that he directed the occupa-
 tion of the city.
 Harold, after the Tuchuks had entered the city, insisted on
 squiring the young woman home whom he had encountered
 under the wagon, and, for good measure, the wine vendor
 and potter as well. I accompanied him, stopping only long
 enough to rip away most of the upper portions of the baker's
 tunic and rinse the dye from my hair in a street fountain. I
 had no wish to be brought down with a Tuchuk arrow in the
 streets as a Turian civilian. Also I knew many of the Tuchuks
 were familiar with my perhaps too red hair and might, seeing
 it, generously retain from firing on its owner. It seemed to
 me that for once my hair might actually prove useful, a
 turnabout I contemplated with pleasure. Do not take me
 wrong, I am rather fond, on the whole, of my hair, it is
 merely that one must, to be objective about such matters,
 recognize that it has, from time to time, involved me in
 various difficulties beginning about my fourth year. Now,
 however, it might not hurt at all to be promptly and accu-
 rately identified by means of it.
  When I lifted my head from the fountain in the Turian
  street Harold cried out in amazement, "Why you ARE Tart
  Cabot!"
   "Yes," I had responded.
  After we had taken the girl and the potter and wine
  vendor to whatever safety their homes might afford, we set
  out for the House of Saphrar, where, after some examination
  of the scene, I convinced myself there was nothing immedi-
  ately to be done. It was invested by better than two of the
  Thousands. No assault of the place had yet begun. Doubtless
  rocks and large pieces of building stone had already been
  piled behind the gates. I could smell tharlarion oil on the
  walls, waiting to be fired and poured on those who might
  attempt to dig at the walls or mount ladders against them.
  Occasional arrows and crossbow bolts were exchanged. One
  thing troubled me. The standing wall about the compound
  kept the Tuchuk bowmen far enough from the roof of the
  keep within that tarns might, without too great a danger,
  enter and leave the compound. Saphrar, if he chose, could
  escape on tarnback. As yet, cut off, he probably had no way
  of knowing how serious his danger was. Within he undoubt-
  edly had ample food and water to withstand a long siege. It
  seemed to me he could fly with safety when he chose, but
  that he had merely not yet chosen.
         I then wished to proceed immediately to the palace of
         Phanius Turmus, where Kamchak had set up his headquar
         ters, to place myself at his disposal, but Harold insisted
         rather on trooping about the city, here and there examining
         pockets of Turian resistance.
           "Why?" I asked.
           "We owe it to our importance," he said.
           "Oh," I said.
         At last it was night and we were malting our way through
         the streets of Turia, sometimes between burning buildings.
         We came to a high, walled structure and began walking
         about it.
         I could hear occasional shouts inside. Also, at one point,
         the wailing of women carried to my ears.
           "What place is this?" I asked.
           "The palace of Phanius Turmus," he said.
           "I heard the crying of women," I said.
         "Turian women," said Harold, "taken by Tuchuks." Then
         he added, "Much of the richest booty of Turia lies behind
         these walls."
         I was astonished when, at the gate to the palace of Phanius
         Turmus, the four Tuchuk guards smote their lances three
         times on their leather shields. The lance strikes the shield
         once for the commander of a Ten; twice for the commander
         of a Hundred; three times for the commander of a Thou-
         sand. "Pass, Commanders," said the chief of the four guards,
         and they stepped aside.
         Naturally I inquired of Harold, shortly after entering, the
         meaning of the guards' salutation. I had expected to be
         challenged and then perhaps, if all went well, wrangled inside
         on some stratagem dreamed up by Harold on the spur of, the
         moment.
         "It means," remarked Harold, looking about the court-
         yard, "that you have the rank of a Commander of a Thou-
         sand."
           "I don't understand," I said.
         "It is a gift of Kamchak," said Harold. "I suggested it as
         appropriate in view of your manly, if somewhat clumsy,
         efforts at the gate."
           "Thank you," I said.
         "I of course recommended the same rank for myself," said
         Harold, "inasmuch as I am the one who really carried the
         thing off."
           "Naturally," I said.
        "You do not, of course, have a Thousand to command,"
         pointed out Harold.
          "Nonetheless," I said, "there is considerable power in the  rank itself."
      "That is true," he said.
  Indeed it was true, for the next level beneath a Ubar
  among the Wagon Peoples is that of the Commander of a
  Thousand.
   "Why did you not tell me?" I asked.
  "It did not seem to me important," remarked the young
  man.
  I clenched my fists and considered punching him in the
  nose, moderately hard.
  "Korobans, though," remarked Harold, "are probably
  more impressed with such things than Tuchuks."
   By this time I had followed Harold over to a corner of the
courtyard wall, which was heaped high, banked into the         ,
  corner, with precious metals, plates, cups; bowls of jewels;
  necklaces and bracelets; boxes of coins and, in heavy, wood
  en crates, numerous stacked cubes of silver and gold, each ;
 stamped with its weight, for the palace of a Ubar is also the
 mint of a city, where its coins are struck one at a time by a
 hammer pounding on the flat-cap of a die. Incidentally,
 Gorean coins are not made to be stacked and accordingly,
 because of the possible depth of the relief and the consequent
 liberties accorded to the artist, the Gorean coin is almost
 always more beautiful than the machine-milled, flat, uniform
 coins of Earth. Some Gorean coins are drilled, incidentally, to
 allow stringing, the coins of Tharna, for example; Turian
 coins, and most others, are not.
 Further on down the wall there were great piles of cloth,
 mostly silk; I recognized them as Robes of Concealment.
 Beyond them, again in a large heap, were numerous weap-
 ons, saddles and harnesses. Beyond them I saw numerous
 rugs and tapestries, rolled, for transport from the city.
 "As n commander," said Harold, "you may take what you
 want of any of this."
   I nodded.
 We now entered yet another courtyard, an inner court-
 yard, between the palace and the inside wall of the outer
 courtyard.
 Here I saw, along one wall, a long line of Turian women,
 unclothed, who were kneeling, fastened together in various
 ways, some by chains, some by thongs. The wrists of each,
          however, were bound, one girl's before her body and the next
          behind her back, alternately. It was these women whom I
          had heard outside the wall. Some were sobbing, others
          wailing, but most were silent, numb with shock, staring at the
          ground. Two Tuchuk guards stood over them. One carried a
          slave whip and, occasionally, should the cries of one of the
          girls grow too obtrusive, he would silence her with the lash.
          "You are the commander of a Thousand," said Harold. "If
          one of the girls pleases you, let the guard know and he will
          mark her for you."
            "No," I said. "Let us proceed directly to Kamchak."
          At that moment there was a scream and commotion at the
          gate to the inner courtyard and two Tuchuks, one laughing
          and with a bloody shoulder, were dragging a fiercely resist-
          ing, unveiled but clothed girl between them.
            It was Dina of Turia!
          The laughing Tuchuk, he with the bloody shoulder, hauled
          her before us.
            "A beauty," said he, "Commander!" He nodded to his
           shoulder. "Marvelous! A fighter!"          1
          Suddenly Dina stopped pulling and kicking and scratching. ',
          She flung up her head and looked at me, breathing hard,
        startled. - ~
          "Do not add her to the chain," I said. "Neither remove her l
          clothing nor put her in bonds. Permit her to veil herself if she
          wishes. She is to be treated in all respects as a free woman.
          Take her back to her home and while we remain in the city,
          guard her with your lives."
          The two men were startled, but Tuchuk discipline is re-
          lensless. "Yes, Commander!" they both cried, releasing her.
          "With our lives!"
            Dina of Turia looked at me, gratitude in her eyes.
            "You will be safe," I assured her.
            "But my city burns," she said.
          "I am sorry," I said, and turned swiftly away, to enter the I
          palace of Phanius Turmus.
          I knew that while the Tuchuks remained in Turia there
          would be in all the city no woman more safe than lovely
          Dina, she only of the Caste of Bakers.
          I sprang up the steps, followed by Harold, and we soon
          found ourselves in the marbled entry hall of the palace.
          Kaiila were stabled there.
          Directed by Tuchuks we soon made our way to the throne
          room of Phanius Turmus, where, to my surprise, a banquet
 was in progress. At one end of the room, on the throne of
 the Ubar, a purple robe thrown over his black leather, sat
 dour Kamchak of the Tuchuks, his shield and lance leaning
 against the throne, an unsheathed quiva on the right arm of
 the throne. At the low tables, perhaps brought from various
 places in the palace, there sat many Tuchuk officers, and
 even some men without rank. With them, now freed of
 collars, were exuberant Tuchuk girls bedecked in the robes of
 free women. All were laughing and drinking. Only Kamchak
 seemed solemn. Near him, in places of honor, at a long, low
 table, above the bowls of yellow and red salt, on each side,
 sat many of the high men of Turia, clad in their finest robes,
 their hair oiled, scented and combed for the banquet. I saw
 among them Kamras, Champion of Turia, and another, on
 Kamchak's right hand, a heavy, swollen, despondent man,
 who could only have been Phanius Turmus himself. Behind
 them stood Tuchuk guards, quivas in their right hands. At a
 sign from Kamchak, as the men well knew, their throats
 would be immediately cut.
   Kamchak turned to them. "Eat," he said.
 Before them had been placed large golden dishes heaped
 with delicacies prepared by the kitchens of the Ubar, tall
 precious goblets filled with Turian wines, the small bowls of
 spices and sugars with their stirring spoons at hand.
 The tables were served by naked Turian girls, from the
 highest families of the city.
 There were musicians present and they, to the best of their
 ability under the circumstances, attempted to provide music
 for the feast.
 Sometimes one of the serving girls would be seized by an
 ankle or arm and dragged screaming to the cushions among
 the tables, much to the amusement of the men and the
 Tuchuk girls.
   "Eat," ordered Kamchak.
 Obediently the captive Turians began to put food in their
 mouths.
 "Welcome, Commanders," said Kamchak, turning and re-
 garding us, inviting us to sit down.
   "I did not expect to see you in Turia," I said.
 "Neither did the Turians," remarked Harold, reaching over
 the shoulder of one of the high council of Turia and taking a
 candled verr chop.
 But Kamchak was looking away disconsolately toward the
 rug before the throne, now stained with spilled beverages,
         cluttered with the thrown garbage of the feast. He hardly
         seemed aware of what was taking place. Though this should
         have been a night of triumph for him, he did not seem
          pleased.                                    l
         "The Ubar of the Tuchuks does not appear happy,"
         observed.
           Kamchak turned and looked at me again.
           "The city burns," I said.
           "Let it burn," said Kamchak.
           "It is yours," I said.
           "I do not want Turin," he said.
           "What is it you seek?" I asked.
           "Only the blood of Saphrar," said he.
            "All this," I asked, "is only to avenge Kutaituchik?" `
         "To avenge Kutaituchik," said Kamchak, "I would burn a |
         thousand cities." ;
           "How is that?" I asked.
           "He was my father," said Kamchak, and turned away.
         During the meal, from time to time, messengers, from
         various parts of the city, and even from the distant wagons, 0~
         hours away by racing kaiila, would approach Kamchak,
         speak with him and hastily depart.
         More foods and wines were served, and even the high men
         of Turia, at quiva point, were forced to drink heavily and ~
         some began to mumble and weep, while the feasters grew, to -
         the barbaric melodies of the musicians, ever more merry and,
         wild. At one point three Tuchuk girls, in swirling silks,
         switches in their hands, came into the room dragging a
         wretched, stripped Turian girl. They had found a long piece
         of rope and tied her hands behind her back and then had
         wound the same rope three or four times about the girl's
         waist, had-securely knotted it, and were leading her about by
         it. "She was our mistress!" cried one of the Tuchuk girls;
         leading the Turian girl, and struck her sharply with the -
         switch, at which information the Tuchuk girls at the tables
         clapped their hands with delight. Then, two or three other
         groups of Tuchuk struggled in, each lending some
         wretched wench who had but hours before owned them.
         These girls they forced to comb their hair and wash their feet
         before the tables, performing the duties of serving slaves.
         Later they made some of them dance for the men. Then one
         of the Tuchuk girls pointed to her ex-mistress and cried out,
         "What am I offered for this slave!" and one of the men,
         joining in the sport, would cry out a price, some figure in
  terms of copper tarn disks. The Tuchuk girls would shriek
  with delight and each joined in inciting buyers and auctioning
  their mistresses. One beautiful Turian girl was thrown, weep-
  ing and bound, into the arms of a leather-clad Tuchuk for
  only seven copper tarn disks. At the height of such festivities,
  a distraught messenger rushed to Kamchak. The Ubar of the
  Tuchuks listened impassively and then arose. He gestured at
  the captive Turian men. "Take them away," he said, "put
  them in the Kes and chain them put them to work." Phani-
  us lilrmus, Kamras and the others were dragged from the
  tables by their Tuchuk guards. The feasters were now
  watching Kamchak. Even the musicians were now silent.
   "The feast is done," said Kamchak.
  The guests and the captives, led by those who would claim
  them, faded from the room.
  Kamchak stood before the throne of Phanius Turmus,
  the purple robe of the Ubar over one shoulder, and looked at
  the overturned tables, the spilled cups, the remains of the
feast. Only he, Harold and I remained in the great throne  room.
   "What is the matter?" I asked him.
   "The wagons and bask are under attack," he said.
   "By whom?" cried Harold.
   "Paravaci," said Kamchak.
         Kamchak had had his hying columns followed by some
         two dozen of the wagons, mostly containing supplies. On one
         of these wagons, with the top removed, were the two tarns
         Harold and I had stolen from the roof of Saphrar's keep.
         They had been brought for us, thinking that they might be of
         use in the warfare in the city or in the transportation of
         goods or men. A tarn can, incidentally, without difficulty,
         carry a knotted rope of seven to ten men.
         Harold and I, mounted on kaiila, rascal toward these
         wagons. Thundering behind each of us was a Thousand,
         which would continue on toward the main Tuchuk encamp-
         meet, several Ahn away. Harold and I would take a tarn
         each and he would go to the Kassars and I to the Kataii,
         begging their help. I had little hope that either of these;
         peoples would come to the aid of Tuchuks. Then, on the path .,
         to the main Tuchuk encampment, Harold and I were each to
         join our Thousand, subsequently doing what we could to
         protect the bask and wagons. Kamchak would meanwhile
         marshal his forces within the city, preparing to withdraw,
         Kutaituchik unavenged, to ride back against the Paravaci.
         I had learned to my surprise that the Ubars of the Kassars, Kataii and
        Paravaci were, respectively, Conrad, Hakim-
         ba and Tolnus, the very three I had first encountered with
         Kamchak on the plains of Turia when first I came to the
         Wagon Peoples. What I had taken to be merely a group of
         four outriders had actually been a gathering of Ubars of the
         Wagon Peoples. I should have known that no four comma n
  warriors of the four peoples would have ridden together.
  Further, the Kassars, the Kataii and the Paravaci did not
  reveal their true Ubars with any greater willingness than the
  Tuchuks had. Bach people, as the Tuchuks had, had its false
  Ubar, its decoy to protect the true Ubar from danger or
  assassination. But, Kamchak had assured me, Conrad,
  Hakimba and Tolnus were indeed the true Ubars of their
  peoples.
  I was nearly slain by arrows when I dropped the fern
  amidst the startled blacks of the Kataii, but my black jacket
  with the emblem of the four bosk horns, emblem of the
  Tuchuk courier, soon proved its worth and I was led to the
  dais of the Ubar of the Kataii. I was permitted to speak
  directly to Hakimba, when I made it clear to my escort that
  I knew the identity of their true Ubar and that it was with
  him I must speak.
  As I expected, Haldmba's brown eyes and richly scarred
  countenance showed little interest in my presentation of the
  plight of the Tuchuks.
  It was little to him, apparently, that the Paravaci should
  raid the herds and wagons of the Tuchuks when most of the
  Tuchuk warriors were engaged in Turia. He did not, on the
  other hand, approve of the fact that the raid had taken place
  during the Omen Year, which is a time of general truce
  among the Wagon Peoples. I sensed, however, that he was
  angry when I spoke of the probable complicity of the Para-
  vaci with the Turians, striking when and how they did, even
  during the Omen Year, presumably to draw the Tuchuks
  away from Turia. In short, though Hakimba did not approve
  of the Paravaci action and was incensed at their presumed
  league with the Turians, he did not feel sufficiently strongly
  to invest his own men in a struggle that did not seem to
  concern him directly.
  "We have our own wagons," said Hakimba, at last. "Our
  wagons are not the wagons of the Tuchuks or of the Kas-
  ears or of the Paravaci. If the Paravaci attack our wagons,
  we will fight. We will not fight until then."
  Hakimba was adamant and it was with a heavy heart that
  I climbed once more to the saddle of my tarn.
  In the saddle I said to him, "I have heard that the
  Paravaci are killing bask."
  Hakimba looked up. "Killing bosk?" he asked, skeptically.
  "Yes," I said, "and cutting out the nose rings to sell In
   Turia after the Tuchuks withdraw."
          "Will you help?" I asked.
        "We have our own wagons," said Hakiba. "We will
        watch our own wagons."
        "What will you do," I asked, "if in another year the Para-
        vaci and the Turians turn on the Kataii and kill their bosk?"
        "The Paravaci," said Hakimba slowly, "would like to be
        the one people and own the grass of all the prairie and all
        the bosk."
           "Will you not fight?" I demanded.         |
        "If the Paravaci attack us," said Hakimba, "then we will
        fight." Hakimba looked up. "We have our own wagons," he
        said. "We will watch our own wagons."
        I drew on the one-strap and took the tarn into the air,
        striking out across the prairie skies to intercept my Thousand
        on its way to the wagons of the Tuchuks.
        In my flight I could see at one point the Omen Valley,
        where the haruspexes were still working about their numer- |
        ous, smoking altars. I laughed bitterly.
        In a few Ehn I had overtaken my Thousand and given the
        tarn over to five men, who would keep it until its wagon I
        should, following the tracks of the riders, reach them.
        Within perhaps the Ahn a grim, angry Harold brought his
        tarn down between the- two columns, that of his Thousand
        and of mine. It took only a moment for him to give the tarn
        into the keeping of some five warriors and leap on the back
        of his kaiila. I had noted, to my satisfaction, that he now
        handled the tarn rather well. He had apparently, in the past
        several days since our escape from Saphrar's keep, been
        familiarizing himself with the saddle straps and the bird's
        habits and responses. But he was not elated as he rode beside
        me nor did he speak lightly.
        Like my own mission to the Kataii, Harold's mission to the
        Kassars had been fruitless. For much the same reasons as the
        Kataii, Conrad was unwilling to commit his forces to the
        defense of Tuchuk herds. Indeed, as we rode together, we
        wondered that Kamchak had even sent us on an errand so
        unlikely of success, an errand in its way, considering the
        temper of the Wagon Peoples, so foolish.
        Our kaiila were spent when we reached the wagons of the
        Tuchuks and the herds, and we were only two thousand.
        Hundreds of the wagons were burning and fighting was
        taking place among them. We found thousands of bosk slain
  in the grass, their throats cut, their flesh rotting, the golden
 nose rings chopped or torn away.
  The men behind us cried out with rage.
 Harold took his Thousand into the Wagons, engaging the
 Paravaci wherever he could find them. I knew that in little
 more than fifteen or twenty Ehn his forces would be lost,
 dissipated among the wagons, and yet surely the Paravaci
 must be met and fought there as well as on the prairie. I
 swept with my Thousand about the outskirts of the herds
  until we found some hundred or two hundred Paravaci en-
 gaged in the grisly work of destroying Tuchuk bosk. These
 two hundred, stood, looking up with their quivas
 axes, startled, screaming, were ridden down in a matter
 of an Ehn. But then we could see, forming on the crest of a
 hill, thousands of Paravaci warriors, apparently held in read-
 iness in case reinforcements should come. Already they were
 mounting their fresh, rested kaiila. We could hear the bosk
 horns forming their Hundreds, see the movements of the
 sunlight on their arms.
 Raising my arm and shouting, I led the Thousand toward
 them, hoping to catch them before they could form and
 charge. Our bosk horns rang out and my brave Thousand,
 worn in the saddle, weary, on spent kaiila, without a murmur
 or a protest, turned and following my lead struck into the
 center of the Paravaci forces.
 In an instant we were embroiled among angry men the
 half-formed, disorganized Hundreds of the Paravaci striking
 to the left and right, shouting the war cry of the Tuchuks. I
 did not wish to remain on the crest of the hill long enough to
 allow the left and right flanks of the Paravaci rapidly as
sembling to fold about my men and so, in less than four .
Ehn as their disorganized, astonished center fell back our
bosk horn sounded our retreat and our men, as one, with-
drew to the herds only a moment before the left and right
flanks of the Paravaci would have closed upon us. We left
them facing one another, cursing, while we moved slowly
back through our bosk, keeping them as a shield. We would
rennin chic cuough that small parties would not be able to
approach the bosk with impunity again. If they sent archers
 forth to slay the beasts, we could, from within the herd,
 answer their fire, or, if we wished, open the herd and ride
 forth, scattering the archers.
   Among the bosk I ordered my men to rest.
 But the Paravaci neither sent forth small groups nor con-
        tingents of archers, but formed and, en masse, riding over the
        bodies of their fallen comrades, began to approach the herd l
        slowly, to move through it, slaying them as they went, and;
        close with us.
        Once again our bosk horns sounded and this time my
        Thousand began to cry out and jab the animals with their
        lances, turning them toward the Paravaci. Thousands of
        animals were already turned toward the approaching enemy
        and beginning to walk toward them when the Paravaci sud-
        denly realized what was happening. Now the bosk began to
        move more swiftly, bellowing and snorting. And then, as the,
        Paravaci bosk horns sounded frantically, our bosk began to
        run, their mighty heads with the fearsome horns nodding up
        and down, and the earth began to tremble and my men cried
        out more and jabbed animals, riding with the flood and the
        Paravaci with cries of horror that coursed the length of their
        entire line tried to stop and turn their kaiila but the ranks
        behind them pressed on and they were milling there before
        us, confused, trying to make sense out of the wild signals of
        their own bosk horns when the herd, horns down, now
        running full speed, struck them.
        It was the vengeance of the bosk and the frightened,
        maddened animals thundered into the Paravaci lines goring
        and trampling both kaiila and riders, and the Paravaci who
        could manage turned their animals and rode for their lives.
        In a moment, maintaining my saddle in spite of the leaping
        and stumbling of my kaiila over the slain bosk, fallen kaiila
        and screaming men, I gave orders to turn the bosk back and
        reform them near the wagons. The escaping Paravaci could
        now, on their kaiila, easily outdistance the herd and I did not
        wish the animals to be strung out over the prairie, at the
        mercy of the Paravaci when they should at last turn and take
        up the battle again.
        By the time the Paravaci had reformed my Tuchuks had
        managed to swing the herd, slow it, get it milling about and
        then drive it back to a perimeter about the wagons.
        It was now near nightfall and I was confident the Parava-
        ci, who greatly outnumbered us, perhaps in the order of ten
        or twenty to one, would wait until morning before pressing
        the advantage of their numbers. When, on the whole, the
        long-term balance of battle would seem to lie with them,
        there would be little point in their undertaking the risk of
        darkness.
          In the morning, however, they would presumably avoid the
  herd, find a clear avenue of attack, and strike, perhaps even  rid
  through the wagons, pinning us against our own herd.
  That night I met with Harold, whose men had been ,
  fighting among the wagons. He had cleared several areas of
  Paravaci but they were still, here and there, among the
  wagons. Taking council with Harold, we dispatched a rider to
  Kamchak in Turia, informing him of the situation, and that
  we had little hope of holding out.
  "It will make little difference," said Harold. "It will take
  the rider, if he gets through, seven Ahn to reach Turia and
  even if Kamchak rides with his full force the moment the
  rider comes to the gates of the city, it will be eight Ahn
  before their vanguard can reach us and by then it will be
  too late."
  It seemed to me that what Harold said was true, and that
   there was little point in discussing it much further. I nodded wearily.
Both Harold and I then spoke with our men, each issuing  by
orders that any man with us who wished might now with-
draw from the wagons and rejoin the main forces in Turia.
Not a man of either Thousand moved.
We set pickets and took what rest we could, in the open,
 the kaiila saddled and tethered at hand.
In the morning, before dawn, we awakened and fed on
dried bosk meat, sucking the dew from the prairie grass.
Shortly after dawn we discovered the Paravaci forming in
their Thousands away from the herd, preparing to strike the
wagons from the north, pressing through, slaying all living
things they might encounter, save women, slave or free. The
latter would be driven before the warriors through the wag
ons, both slave girls and free women stripped and bound
together in groups, providing shields against arrows and lance
 charges on kaiilaback for the men advancing behind them.
Harold and I determined to appear to meet the Paravaci in
the open before the wagons and then, when they charged,
to withdraw among the wagons, and close the wagons on their
attacking front, halting the charge, then at almost point
blank range hopefully taking heavy toll of their forces by our
  archers. It would be, of course, only a matter of time before
our barricade would be forced or outflanked, perhaps from
five pasangs distant, in an undefended sector.
The battle was joined at the seventh Gorean hour and, as
planned, as soon as the Paravaci center was committed, the
  bulk of our forces wheeled and retreated among the wagons,
         the rest of our forces then turning and pushing the wagons
         together. As soon as our men were through the barricade
         they leaped from their kaiila, bow and quiver in hand, and
         took up prearranged positions under the wagons, between
         them, on them, and behind the wagon box planking, taking
         advantage of the arrow ports therein.
         The brunt of the Paravaci charge almost tipped and broke
         through the wagons, but we had lashed them together and
         they held. It was like a flood of kailla and riders, weapons
         flourishing, that broke and piled against the wagons, the rear
         ranks pressing forward on those before them. Some of the
         rear ranks actually climbed fallen and struggling comrades
         and leaped over the wagons to the other side, where they
         were cut down by archers and dragged from their kaiila to
         be flung beneath the knives of free Tuchuk women.
         At a distance of little more than a dozen feet thousands of
         arrows were poured into the trapped Paravaci and yet they
         pressed forward, on and over their brethren, and then arrows
         spent, we met them on the wagons themselves with lances in
         our hands, thrusting them back and down.
         About a pasang distant we could see new forces of the
         Paravaci forming on the crest of a sweeping gradient.
         The sound of their bask horns was welcome to us, sig-
         naling the retreat of those at the wagons.
         Bloody, covered with sweat, gasping, we saw the living
         Paravaci draw back, falling back between the newly forming
         lines on the gradient above.
         I issued orders swiftly and exhausted men poured from
         beneath and between the wagons to haul as many of the
         fallen kaiila and riders as possible from the wagons, that
         there might not be a wall of dying animals and men giving
         access to the height of our wagons.
         Scarcely had we cleared the ground before the wagons
         when the Paravaci bask horns sounded again and another
         wave of kaiila and riders, lances set, raced towards us. Four
         times they charged thus and four times we held them back.
         My men and those of Harold had now been decimated and
         there were few that had not lost blood. I estimated that there
         was scarcely a quarter of those living who had ridden with us
         to the defense of the herds and wagons.
         Once again Harold and I issued our orders that any wish-
         ing to depart might now do so.
           Again no man moved.
           "Look," cried an archer, pointing to the gradient.
There we could see new thousands forming, the standards
of Hundreds and Thousands taking up their position.
"It is the Paravaci main body," said Harold. "It is the end."
  I looked to the left and right over the torn, bloody barri
cade of wagons, at the remains of my men, wounded and
exhausted, many of them lying on the barricade or on the
ground behind it, trying to gain but a moment's respite. Free
women, and even some Turian slave girls, went to and fro,
bringing water and, here and there, where there was point in
 it, binding wounds. Some of the Tuchuks began to sing the
Blue Sky Song, the refrain of which is that though I die, yet
there will be the bask, the grass and sky.
I stood with Harold on a planked platform fixed across the
wagon box of the wagon at our center, whose domed frame
  work had been torn away. Together we looked out over the
field. We watched the milling of kaiila and riders in the
distance, the movement of standards.
   "We have done well," said Harold.
"Yes," I said, "I think so."
We heard the bosk horns of the Paravaci signaling to the
  assembled Thousands.
   "I wish you well," said Harold.
I turned and smiled at him. "I wish you well," I said.
Then again we heard the bask horns and the Paravaci, in
vast ranks, like sweeping crescents, like steel scythes of men
and animals and arms, far extending beyond our own lines,
began to move slowly towards us, gaining steadily in momen
tum and speed with each traversed yard of stained prairie.
Harold and I, and those of our men that remained, stood
with the wagons, watching the nearing waves of warriors,
observing the moment when the chain face guards of the
  Paravaci helmets were thrown forward, the moment when
   the lances, like that of a single man, were leveled. We could
now hear the drumming of the paws of the kaiila, growing
ever more rapid and intense, the squealing of animals here
and there along the line, the rustle of weapons and accou
terments.
"Listen!" cried Harold.
 I listened, but seemed to hear only the maddeningly inten
sifying thunder of the Paravaci kaiila sweeping towards us, but then I heard, from the far left and right, the sound of distant bosk horns.
"Bosk horns!" cried Harold.
         "What does it matter?" I asked.
         I wondered how many Paravaci there could possibly be.
       I watched the nearing warriors, lances ready, the swiftness
       of the charge hurtling into full career.
       "Look!" cried Harold, sweeping his hand to the left and
       right.
       My heart sank. Suddenly rising over the crest of rolling
       hills, like black floods, from both the left and the right, I saw
       on racing kaiila what must have been thousands of warriors,
       thousands upon thousands.
       I unsheathed my sword. I supposed it would he the last
       time I would do so.
         "Look!" cried Harold.
         "I see," I said, "what does it matter?"
         "Look!" he screamed, leaping up and down.
       And I looked and saw suddenly and my heart stopped
       beating and then I uttered a wild cry for from the left, riding
       with the Thousands sweeping over the hills, I saw the stan-
       dard of the Yellow Bow, and on the right, flying forward
       with the hurtling Thousands, its leather streaming behind its
       pole, I saw the standard of the Three-Weighted Bola.
         "Katain!" screamed Harold, hugging me. "Kassars!"
        I stood dumbfounded on the planking and saw the two
        great wedges of the Kataii and the Kassars close like tongs
        on the trapped Paravaci, taking them in the unprotected
        flanks, crushing the ranks before them with the weight of
        their charge. And even the sky seemed dark for a moment
        as, from the left and right, thousands upon thousands of
        arrows fell like dark rain among the startled, stumbling,
        turning Paravaci.
         "We might help," remarked Harold.
         'Yes!" I cried.
        "Korobans are slow to think of such matters," he re-
        marked.
        I turned to the men. "Open the wagons!" I cried. "To your
        animals!"
        And in an instant it seemed the wagon lashing kind been
        cut by quivas and our hundreds of warriors, the pitiful
        remnant of our two Thousands, swept forth upon the Parava-
        ci, riding as though they had been fresh rested and ready,
        shouting the wild war cry of the Tuchuks.
        It was not until late that afternoon that I met with Hakim-
        ba of the Kataii and Conrad of the Kassars. On the field we
        met and, as comrades in arms, we embraced one another.
"We have our own wagons," said Hakimba, "but yet we are of the Wagon Peoples."
    "It is so, too, with us," said Conrad, he of the Kassars.
  "I regret only," I said, "that I sent word to Kamchak and
  even now he has withdrawn his men from Turia and is
  returning to the wagons."
  "No," said Hakimba, "we sent riders to Turia even as we
  left our own camp. Kamchak knew of our movements long
  before you."
  "And of ours," said Conrad, "for we too sent him word
  thinking it well to keep him informed in these matters."
  "For a Kataii and a Kassar," said Harold, "you two are
  not bad fellows." And then he added. "See that you do not
  ride off with any of our bask or women."
  "The Paravaci left their camp largely unguarded," said
  Hakimba. "Their strength was brought here."
   I laughed.
  "Yes," said Conrad, "most of the Paravaci bask are now in
  the herds of the Kataii and Kassars."
   "Reasonably evenly divided I trust," remarked Hakimba.
    "I think so," said Conrad. "If not, we can always iron
  matters out with a bit of bask raiding."
  "That is true," granted Hakimba, the yellow and red scars
  wrinkling into a grin on his lean, black face.
  "when the Paravaci those who escaped us return to
  their wagons," remarked Conrad, "they will find a surprise in
  store for them."
   "Oh?" I inquired.
  "We burned most of their wagons those we could," said
  Hakimba."
   "And their goods and women?" inquired Harold.
  "Those that pleased us both of goods and women," re-
  marked Conrad, "we carried off of goods that did not
  please us, we burned them of women that did not please us,
  we left them stripped and weeping among the wagons."
  "This will mean war," I said, "for many years among the
  Wagon Peoples."
  "No," said Conrad, "the Paravaci will want back their
  bask and women and perhaps they may have them for a
  price."
   "You are wise," said Harold.
  "I do not think they will slay bask or join with Turians
  again," said Hakimba.
   I supposed he was right. Later in the afternoon the last of
         the Paravaci had been cleared from the Tuchuk wagons,
         wherever they might be found. Harold and I sent a rider
         back to Kamchak with news of the victory. Following him, in
         a few hours, would be a Thousand each from the Kataii and
         the Kassars, to lend him what aid they might in his work in,
         Turia.
        In the morning the warriors remaining of the two Thou"
        sands who had ridden with Harold and I would, with the help
        of other Tuchuks surviving among the wagons, move the
        wagons and the bask the field. Already the bask were
        growing uneasy at the smell of death and already the grass
        about the camp was rustling with the movements of the tiny
        brown prairie arts, scavengers, come to feed. Whether, after
        we had moved the wagons and bask some pasangs away, we
        should remain there, or proceed toward the pastures this side
        of the Ta-Thassa Mountains, or return toward Turia, was not
        decided. In the thinking of both Harold and myself, that
        decision was properly Kamchak's. The Kataii main force and
        the Kassar main force camped separately some pasangs from
        the Tuchuk camp and the field and would, in the morning,
        return to their own wagons. Each had exchanged riders who,
        from time to time, would report to their own camp from that
        of the other. Each had also, as had the Tuchuks, set their
        own pickets. Neither wished the other to withdraw secretly
        and do for them what they together had done for the
        Paravaci, and what the Paravaci had attempted to do to the
        Tuchuks. It was not that they, on this night, truly distrusted I
        one another so much as the fact that a lifetime of raiding
        and war had determined each to be, as a simple matter of
        course, wary of the other.
        I myself was anxious to return to Turia as soon as it could
        be well managed. Harold, willingly enough, volunteered to
        remain in the camp until the commander of a Thousand
        could be sent from Turia to relieve him. I appreciated this
        very much on his part, for I keenly wished to return to Turia
        as soon as it would be at all practical I had pressing and ~
        significant business yet unfinished behind its walls.
          I would leave in the morning.
          That night I found Kamchak's old wagon, and though it
        had been looted, it had not been burned.
         There was no sign of either Aphris or Elizabeth, either
         about the wagon, or in the overturned, broken sleen cage in
         which, when I had last seen them, Kamchak had confined
         them. I was told by a Tuchuk woman that they had not been
                     in the cage when the Paravaci had struck but rather that
                      Aphris had been in the wagon and the barbarian, as she
                    referred to Miss Cardwell, had been sent to another wagon,
                    the whereabouts she did not know. Aphris had, according to
                     the woman, fallen into the hands of the Paravaci who had
                    looted Kamchak's wagon; Elizabeth's fate she did not know;
                   I gathered, of course, from the fact that Elizabeth had been
                      sent to another wagon that Kamchak had sold her. I won-
                    dered who her new master might be and hoped, for her sake,
                    that she would well please him. She might, of course, have
                  also fallen, lice Aphris, into the hands of the Paravaci. I was
                    bitter and sad as I looked about the interior of Kamchak's
                       wagon. The covering on the framework had been torn in
                      several places and the rugs ripped or carried away. The
                      saddle on the side had been cut and the quivas had been
                    taken from their sheaths. The hangings were torn down, the
                     wood of the wagon scratched and marred. Most of the gold
                     and jewels, and precious plate and cups and goblets, were
                    missing, except where here and there a coin or stone might
                  lie missed at the edge of the wagon hides or at the foot of
were gone and those that were not had been shattered
against the floor, or against the wagon poles, leaving dark
stains on the poles and on the hides behind them. The floor
was littered with broken glass. Some things, of little or no
worth, but which I remembered fondly, were still about.
There was a brass ladle that Aphris and Elizabeth had used
  in cooking and a tin box of yellow Turian sugar, dented in
now and its contents scattered; and the large, gray leathery
object which I had upon occasion seen Kamchak use as a
stool, that which he had once kicked across the floor for my
  inspection; he had been fond of it, that curiosity, and would
 perhaps be pleased that it had not been, like most of his
 things, carried away in the leather loot sacks of Paravaci
  raiders. I wondered on the fate of Aphris of Turia.
 Kamchak, I knew, however, cared little for the slave, and
                      would not be much concerned; yet her fate concerned me,
                      and ~ hoped that she might live, that her beauty if not
                   compassion or justice might have won her life for her, be it
                     only as a Paravaci wagon slave; and then, too, I wondered
                     again on the fate of Miss Elizabeth Cardwell, the lovely
                      young New York secretary, so cruelly and so far removed
                    from her own world; and then, exhausted, I lay down on the
 boards of Kamchak's looted wagon and fell asleep.
        Turia was now largely under the control of Tuchuks. For
        days it had been burning.
        The morning after the Battle at the Wagons I had
        mounted a rested kaiila and set forth for Turia. Some Ahn
        after departing from the Tuchuk camp I encountered the
        wagon that carried my tarn, and its guard, still advancing
        toward the camp. The wagon carrying Harold's tarn and its
        guard accompanied it. I- left the kaiila with the Tuchuks and
        mounted my tarn, and in less than an Ahn, saw the shimmer-
        ing walls of Turia in the distance, and the veils of smoke
        rising over the city.
        The House of Saphrar still stood, and the tower that had
        been fortified by Ha-Keel's tarnsmen. Aside from these there
        remained few pockets of organized - resistance in the city,
        though here and there, in alleys and on roof tops, small
        groups of Turians furtively and sporadically attempted to
        carry the war to the invaders. I and Kamchak expected
        Saphrar to flee by tarn at any moment, for it must now be
        clear to him that the strike of the Paravaci against the
        Tuchuk wagons and herds had not forced Kamchak to with-
        draw; indeed, his forces were now supplemented by Kataii
        and Kassars, a development which must have horrified him.
        The only reason that occurred to me why Saphrar had not
        yet fled was that he was waiting in Turia for an excellent
        reason possibly the arrival on tarnback of the gray
        man with whom he had negotiated apparently to secure the
        golden sphere. I reminded myself, beyond this, that if his
  house should actually be forced, and himself threatened, he
  could always flee, with relative safety, at the last moment,   At
  abandoning his men, his servants and slaves to the mercies of
  ravaging Tuchuks.
  I knew that Kamchak was in constant touch, by means of
  riders, with the wagons of the Tuchuks, and so I did not
  speak with him of the looting of his wagon, nor of the fate of
  Aphris of Turia, nor did I deem it well to speak to him of
  Elizabeth Cardwell, for it seemed evident that he had sold
  her, and that my inquiry, to a Tuchuk mind, might thus
  appear prying or impertinent; I would discover, if possible,
  her master and his whereabouts independently; indeed, for all
  I knew, perhaps she had been abducted by raiding Paravaci,
and none among the Tuchuks would even know.
I did ask Kamchak why, considering the probabilities that If'
the Kataii and the Kassars would not have come to the aid
of the Tuchuks, he had not abandoned Turia and returned
with his main forces to the wagons. "It was a wager," said
he, "which I had made with myself."
"A dangerous wager," I had remarked.
"Perhaps," he said, "but I think I know the Kataii and the Kassars."
"The stakes were high," I said.
"They are higher than you know," he said.
"I do not understand," I said.
"The wager is not yet done," he said, but would speak no dusk more.
On the day following my arrival in Turia, Harold, on
tarnback, relieved at his request of the command of the
wagons and herds joined me in the palace of Phanius Turmus must.
During the day and night, taking hours of sleep where we
could, sometimes on the rugs of the palace of Phanius Tur-
mus, sometimes on the stones of the streets by watch fires,
Harold and I, at Kamchak's orders, performed a variety of
tasks, sometimes joining in the fighting, sometimes acting as
liaison between him nod other commanders, sometimes merely
 positioning men, checking outposts and reconnoitering.
Kamchak's forces, on the whole, were so disposed as to push
the Turians toward two gates which he had left open and
undefended, thus providing a route of escape for civilians
and soldiers who would make use of it. From certain post-
lions on the walls we could see the stream of refugees fleeing
the burning city. They carried food and what possessions they
         could. The time of the year was the late spring and the
         prairie's climate was not unkind, though occasionally long l
         rains must have made the lot of the refugees fleeing toward .
         other cities miserable. There were occasional small creek,
         across the paths of the refugees and water was available.
         Also, Kamchak, to my pleasure but surprise, had had his men
         drive verr flocks and some Turian bask after the refugees
         I asked him about this, for Tuchuk warfare, as I under-
         stood it, was complete, leaving no living thing in its wake,
         killing even domestic animals and poisoning wells. Certain
         cities, burned by the Wagon Peoples more than a hundred
         years ago, were still said to be desolate ruins between their
         broken walls, silent save for the wind and the occasional foot-
         fall of a prowling sleen hunting for urts.
           "The Wagon Peoples need Turia," said Kamchak, simply.
         I was thunderstruck. Yet it seemed to me true, for Turia
         was the main avenue of contact between the Wagon Peoples
         and the other cities of Gor, the gate through which trade-
         goods flowed to the wilderness of grasses that was the land of
         the riders of the kaiila and the herders of bask. Without
         Turia, to be sure, the Wagon Peoples would undoubtedly be
         the poorer.
         "And," said Kamchak, "the Wagon Peoples need an enemy."
           "I do not understand," I said.
         "Without an enemy," said Kamchak, "they will never stand
         together and if they fail to stand together, someday they
         will fall."
         "Has this something to do with the 'wager' you spoke of?"
         I asked.
           "Perhaps," said Kamchak.
         - Still I was not altogether satisfied, for, on the whole, it
         seemed to me that Turia might yet have survived even had
         Kamchak's forces wrought much greater destruction than
         they had for example, opening but a single gate and permit-
         ting only a few hundred, rather than thousands to escape the
         city. "is that all?" I asked. "Is that the only reason that Be
         many of Turia yet live beyond the city?"
          He looked at me, without expression. "Surely, Command"
          or," he said, "you have duties elsewhere."
          I nodded curtly and turned and left the room, dismissed.
          Long ago I had learned not to press the Tuchuk when he did
          not wish to speak. But as I left I wondered at his compare
          five lenience. He professed a cruel hatred of Turia and
 Turians, and yet he had, considering the normal practices of
 the Wagon Peoples, not noted for their mercy to helpless
 foes, treated the unarmed citizens of the city with unique
 indulgence, permitting them, on the whole, to keep their lives
 and freedom, though only as refugees beyond the walls. The
 clearest exception to this, of course, lay in the case of the
 more beautiful of the city's women, who were treated by
 Gorean custom, as portions of the booty.
 I spent what free time I could in the vicinity of Saphrar's
 compound. The structures about the compound had been
 fortified by Tuchuks, and walls of stone and wood had been
 thrown into the streets and openings between the buildings,
 thus enclosing the compound. 1 had been training some
 hundred Tuchuks in the use of the crossbow, dozens of which
 had now fallen into our hands. Each warrior had at his
 disposal five crossbows and four Turian slaves, for winding
 and loading the bows. These warriors I stationed on roofs of
 buildings encircling the compound, as close to the walls as
 possible. The crossbow, though its rate of fire is much slower
 than the Tuchuk bow, has a much greater range. With the
 crossbow in our hands, the business of bringing tarns in and
 out of the compound became proportionately more haz-
 ardous, which, of course, was what I intended. In fact, to my
 elation, some of my fledgling crossbowmen, on the first day,
 brought down four tarns attempting to enter the compound,
 though, to be sure, several escaped them. If we could get the
 crossbows into the compound itself, perhaps even to the
 outside walls, we could for most practical purposes close the
 compound to entrance and escape by air. I feared, of course,
 that this addition to our armament might hasten Saphrar's
 departure, but, as it turned out,' it did not, perhaps because
 the first word Saphrar had of our intentions was the tumbling
 of dying tarns behind the walls of the compound.
 Harold and I chewed on some bask meat roasted over a
 fire built on the marble floor of the palace of Phanius
 Turmus. Nearby our tethered kaiila crouched, their paws on
 the bodies of slain verrs, devouring them.
 "Most of the people," Harold was saying, "are out of the
 city now."
   "That's good," l said.
 "Kamchak will close the gates soon," said Harold, "and
 then we shall get to work on Saphrar's house and that tarn
 roost of Ha-Keel's."
   I nodded. The city now largely clear of defenders, and
        closed to the outside, Kamchak could bring his forces to bear
        on Saphrar's house, that fort within a fort, and on the tower
        of Ha-Keel, taking them, if necessary, by storm. Ha-Keel
        had, we estimated, most of a thousand tarnsmen still with
        him, plus many Turian guardsmen. Saphrar probably had,-
        behind his walls, more than three thousand defenders, plus a
        comparable number of servants and slaves, who might be of
        some service to him, particularly in such matters as reinforc-
        ing gates, raising the height of walls, loading crossbows,
        gathering arrows from within the compound, cooking and
        distributing food and, in the case of the women, or some of
        them, pleasing his warriors.
        After I had finished the bask meat I lay back on the floor,
        a cushion beneath my head, and stared at the ceiling. I could
        see stains from our cooking fire on the vaulted dome.
          "Are you going to spend the night here?" asked Harold.
          "I suppose so," I said.
        "But some thousand bask came today from the wagons,"
        he said.
        I turned to look at him. I knew Kamchak had brought,-
        over the past few days, several hundred bask to graze near
        Turia, to use in- feeding his troops.
        "What has that to do with where I sleep?" I asked. "You
        are perhaps going to sleep on the back of a bosk because
        you are a Tuchuk or something?" I thought that a rather
        good one, at any rate for me.
        But Harold did not seem particularly shattered, and I
        sighed.
        "A Tuchuk," he informed me loftily, "may if he wishes
        rest comfortably on even the horns of a bask, but only a
        Koroban is likely to recline on a marble floor when he might
        just as well sleep upon the pelt of a larl in the wagon of a
        commander."
          "I don't understand," I said.
          "I suppose not," said Harold.
          "I'm sorry," I said.
          "But you still do not understand?"
          "No," I admitted.
        "Poor Koroban," he muttered. Then he got up, wiped his
        quiva on his left sleeve, and thrust it in his belt.
          "Where are you going?" I asked.
        "To my wagon," he said. "It arrived with the bask along
        with better than two hundred other wagons today including
        yours."
 I propped myself up on one elbow. "I do not have a.
 - wagon," I said.
 "But of course you do," he said. "And so do I."
 I merely looked at him, wondering if it were merely
 Harold the Tuchuk at work again.
 "I am serious," he averred. "The night that you and I to
 departed for Turia, Kamchak ordered a wagon prepared for
 each of us to reward us."
 I remembered that night the long swim against the un-
 derground current, the well, our capture, the Yellow Pool of
 Turia, the Pleasure Gardens, the tarns and escape.
 "At that time, of course," said Harold, "our wagons were
 not painted red, nor filled with booty and rich things, for we
 were not then commanders."
 "But to reward us for what?" I asked.
 "For courage," said he.
 "Just that?" I asked.
 "But for what else?" asked Harold.
 "For success," I said. "You were successful. You did what
 you set out to do. I did not. I failed. I did not obtain the
 golden sphere."
 "But the golden sphere is worthless," said Harold.
 "Kamchak has said so."
 "He does not know its value," I said.
 Harold shrugged. "Perhaps," he said.
 "So you see," I said, "I was not successful."
 `'But you were successful," insisted Harold.
 "How is that?" I asked.
 "To a Tuchuk," said Harold, "success is courage that is
 the important thing courage itself even if all else fails
 that is success."
 "I see," I said.
 "There is something here I think you do not realize," said
 Harold.
 "What is that?" I asked.
 He paused. "That in entering Turia and escaping as we
 did even bringing tarns to the camp we the two of us
 won the Courage Scar."
 I was silent. Then I looked at him. "But," I said, "you do
 not wear the scar."
 "It would have been rather difficult to get near the gates
 of Turia for a fellow wearing the Courage Scar, would it
 not?"
 "Indeed it would," I laughed.
        "When I have time," said Harold, "I will call one from the
        clan of Scarers and have the scar affixed. It will make me
        look even more handsome."
           I smiled.                                 |
        "Perhaps you would like me to call him for you as well?"
        inquired Harold.
          "No," I said.
        Fit might take attention away from your hair," he men-
        tioned.
          "No, thank you," I said.
        "All right," said Harold, "it is well known you are only a,
        Koroban, and not a Tuchuk." But then he added, soldierly.
        "But you wear the Courage Scar for what you did not all
        men who wear the Courage Scar do so visibly."
          I did not speak.
         "Well," said Harold, "I am tired and I am going to my
         wagon, I have a little slave there I am anxious to put to
         work."
          "I did not know of my wagon," I said.
         . "I gathered not," said Harold, "seeing that you apparently
         spent the night after the battle comfortably resting on the
         floor - of Kamchak's wagon, I looked around for you that
         night but didn't find you." He added, "Your own wagon,
         you will be pleased to hear, was among the wagons, un-
         touched by the Paravaci as was mine."
         I laughed. "It is strange," I said, "I did not even know of
         the wagon."
         "You would have found out long ago," said Harold, "had
         you not rushed off to Turia again immediately after our
         return when the wagons were moving toward Ta-Thassa.
         You did not even stop by Kamchak's wagon that day. Had
         you done so Aphris, or someone, might have told you."
          "From the sleen cage?" I asked.
         "She was not in the sleen cage the morning of our return
         from Turia with the tarns," said Harold.
          "Oh," I said, "I am glad to hear it."
          "Nor was the little barbarian," said Harold.
          "What became of her?" I asked.
          "Kamchak gave her to a warrior," he said.
         "Oh," I said. I was not glad to hear it. "Why didn't you
         tell me of my wagon?" I asked.
          "It did not seem important," he said.
          I frowned.
  "I suppose, however," he said, "Korobans are impressed
  with such things having wagons and such."
   I smiled. "Harold the Tuchuk," I said, "I am tired."
   "Are you not going to your wagon tonight?" he asked.
   "I think not," I said.
  'As you wish," said he, "but I have had it well stocked
  with Paga and Ka-la-na wines from Ar and such."
  In Turia, even though we had much of the riches of the
  city at our disposal, there had not been much Paga or
  Ka-la-na wine. As I may have mentioned the Turians, on the
  whole, favor thick, sweet wines. I had taken, as a share of
  battle loot, a hundred and ten bottles of Paga and forty
  bottles of Ka-la-na wine from Tyros, Cos and Ar, but these I
  had distributed to my crossbowmen, with the exception of
  one bottle of Paga which Harold and I had split some two
  nights ago. I decided I might spend the night in my wagon.
  Two nights ago it had been a night for Paga. Tonight, I felt,
  was a night for Ka-la-na. I was pleased to learn there would
  be some in the wagon.
   I looked at Harold and grinned. "I am grateful," I said.
  "Properly so," remarked Harold and leaped to his kaiila,
  untethering the beast and springing to its saddle. "Without
  me," he said, "you will never find your wagon and I for one
  will dawdle here no longer!"
   "Wait!" I cried.
  His kaiila sprang from the room, bounding across the
  carpet in the next hall, and then thudding down a corridor
  toward the main entrance.
  Muttering I jerked loose the reins of my kaiila from the
  column to which I had tethered it, leaped to the saddle and
  raced after Harold, not wishing to be left behind somewhere
  in the streets of Turia or among the dark wagons beyond the
  gate, pounding on wagon after wagon to find which one
  might be mine. I bounded down the stairs of the palace of
  Phanius Turmus, and sped through the inner and outer court-
  yard and out into the street, leaving the startled guards
  trying to salute me as a commander.
  A few yards beyond the gate I hauled my kaiila up short,
  rearing and pawing the air. Harold was sitting there calmly
  on the back of his kaiila, a reproachful look on his face.
  "Such haste," he said, "is not seemly in the commander of
  a Thousand."
  "Very well," I said, and we walked our kaiila at a stately
  pace toward Turia's main gate.
        "I was afraid," I said, "that without you I would not be
        able to find my wagon."
        "But it is the wagon of a commander," said Harold, as
        though puzzled, "so anyone could tell you where it is."
          "I did not think of that," I said.
        "I am not surprised," said Harold. "You are only a Koro-
        ban."
          "But long ago," I said, "we turned you back."
          "I was not there at the time," said Harold.
          "That is true," I admitted.
          We rode on a while.
        "If it were not for your dignity," I remarked, "I would
        settle these matters by racing you to the main gate."
          "Look out!" cried Harold. "Behind you!"
        I spun the kaiila and whipped my sword from its sheath. I
        looked about wildly, at doorways, at roof tops, at windows.
          "What?" I cried.
          "There!" cried Harold. "To the right!"
        I looked to the right but could see nothing but the side of
        a brick building.
          "What is it?" I cried.
        "It is," cried Harold decisively, "the side of a brick build-
        ing!"
          I turned to look at him.
        "I accept your wager," he cried, kicking his kaiila toward
        the main gate.
        By the time I had turned my animal and was racing after
        him he was almost a quarter of a pasang down the street,
        bounding over beams and rubbish, and litter, some of it still
        smoking. At the main gate I overtook him and together we
        sped through it, slowing our mounts on the other side to a
        decorous pace suitable to our rank.
        We rode a bit into the wagons and then he pointed. "There
        is your wagon," he said. "Mine is nearby."
        It was a large wagon, drawn by eight black bask. There
        were two Tuchuk guards outside. Beside it, fixed in the earth,
        on a pole, there was a standard of four bask horns. The pole
        had been painted red, which is the color of commanders.
        Inside the wagon, under the door, I could see light.
          "I wish you well," said Harold.
          "I wish you well," I said.
        The two Tuchuk guards saluted us, striking their lances
        three times on their shields.
We acknowledged the salute, lifting our right hands, palm inward.
"You certainly have a fast kaiila," remarked Harold.
"The race," I said, "is all in the rider."
"As it was," said Harold, "I scarcely beat you."
  "I thought I beat you," I said.
"Oh?" asked Harold.
"Yes," I said. "How do you know I didn't beat you?"
  "Well," said Harold, "I don't know but that would cer
    tainly seem unlikely, would it not?"
  "Yes," I sail, "I suppose so."
  "Actually," said Harold, "I am uncertain who won."
  "So am 1,"1 admitted. "Perhaps it was a tie," I suggested.
  "Perhaps," he said, "incredible though that might seem."
      He looked at me. "Would you care to guess seeds in a
tospit?" he inquired. "Odd or even?"
"No," I said.
"Very well," said he, grinning, and lifted his right hand in
Gorean salute. "Until morning."
I returned the salute. "Until morning," I said.
I watched Harold ride towards his wagon, whistling a
Tuchuk tune. I supposed the little wench Hereena would be
waiting for him, probably collared and chained to the slave ring.
 Tomorrow I knew the assault would begin on the House of
 Saphrar and the tower of Ha-Keel. Tomorrow one or both of
 us, I supposed, might be dead.
 I noted that the bask seemed well cared for, and that their
 coats were groomed, and the horns and hoofs polished.
 Wearily I gave the kaiila to one of the guards and
 mounted the steps of the wagon.
        I entered the wagon and stopped, startled.
        Within, a girl, across the wagon, beyond the tiny fire bowl -
        in the center of its floor, standing on the thick rug, near a
        hanging tharlarion oil lamp, turned suddenly to face me,,
        clutching about herself as well as she could a richly wrought
        yellow cloth, a silken yellow sheet. The red band of the
        Koora bound back her hair. I could see a chain running
        across the rug from the slave ring to her right ankle.
          "You!" she cried.
          She held her hand before her face.
        I did not speak, but stood dumbfounded, finding myself
        facing Elizabeth Cardwell.
        "You're alive!" she said. And then she trembled. "You
        must flee!" she cried.
          "Why?" I asked.
          "He will discover you!" she wept. "Go!"
          Still she would not remove her hand from before her face.
          "Who is he?" I asked, startled.
          "My master!" she cried. "Please got"
          "Who is he?" I inquired.
        "He who owns this wagon" she wept. "1 have not yet seen
        him!',
        Suddenly I felt like shaking, but did not move, nor betray
        emotion. Harold had said that Elizabeth Cardwell had been
        given by Kamchak to a warrior. He had not said which
        warrior. Now I knew
          "Has your master visited you often?" I asked.
"As yet, never," said she, "but he is in the city and may
this very night come to the wagon!"
  "I do not fear him," I said.
She turned away, the chain moving with her. She pulled
the yellow sheet more closely about her. She dropped her
hand from before her face and stood facing the back of the
wagon.
"Whose name is on your collar?" I asked.
  "They showed me," she said, "but I do not know I
cannot read"
What she said, of course, was true. She could speak Gorean but she could not read it. For that matter many Tuchuks could not, and the engraving on the collars of their slaves was often no more than a sign which was known to be theirs.
Even those who could read, or pretended to be able to,
would affix their sign on the collar as well as their name, so
that others who could not read could know to whom the slave belonged. Kamchak's sign was the four bask horns and two quivas.
I walked about the fire bowl to approach the girl.   "Don't look at me," she cried, bending down, holding her face from the light, then covering it with her hands. I reached over and turned the collar somewhat. It was
  attached to a chain. I gathered the girl was in Sirik, the chain on the floor attached to the slave ring running to the twin ankle rings. She would not face me but stood covering her face, looking away. The engraving on the Turian collar consisted of the sign of the four bask horns and the sign of
  the city of Ko-ro-ba, which I took it, Kamchak had used for
my sign. There was also an inscription in Gorean on the collar, a simple one. I am Tart Cabot's girl. I restraightened the collar and walked away, going to the other side of the wagon, leaning my hands against it, wanting to think.
I could hear the chain move as she turned to face me.
"What does it say?" she begged.
I said nothing.
"Whose wagon is this?" she pleaded.
I turned to face her and she put one hand before her face, the other holding the yellow sheet about her. I could see now that her wrists were encircled with slave bracelets, linked to the collar chain, which then continued to the ankle rings. A second chain, that which I had first seen, fastened the Sirik
itself to the slave ring. Over the hand that shielded the lower
       part of her face I could see her eyes, and they seemed filled
       with fear. "Whose wagon is it?" she pleaded.
         "It is my wagon," I said.
       She looked at me, thunderstruck. "No," she said, "it is the
       wagon of a commander he who could command a Thou-
       sand."
         "I am such," I said. "I am a commander."
         She shook her head.
         "The collar?" she asked.
         "It says," I said, "that you are the girl of Tarl Cabot."
         "Your girl?" she asked.
         "Yes," I said.
         "Your slave?" she asked.
         "Yes," I said.
       She did not speak but stood looking at me, in the yellow
       sheet, with one hand covering her face.
         "I own you," I said.
       Tears shone in her eyes and she sank to her knees, trem-
       bling, unable to stand, weeping.
       I knelt beside her. "It is over now, Elizabeth," I said. "It is
       finished. You will no longer be hurt. You are no longer a
       slave. You are free, Elizabeth."
       I gently took her braceleted wrists in my hands and re-
       moved them from her face.
       She tried to twist her head away. "Please don't look at me,
       Tarl," she said.
       In her nose, as I had suspected, there glinted the tiny, fine
       golden ring of the Tuchuk woman.
         "Don't look at me, please," she said.
        I held her lovely head with its soft dark hair in my hands,
        gazing on her face, her forehead, her dark, soft eyes, with
        tears, the marvelous, trembling mouth, and set in her fine
        nose, delicate and lovely, the tiny golden ring.
         "It is actually very beautiful," I said.
        She sobbed and pressed her head to my shoulder. "They
        bound me on a wheel," she said.
        With my right hand I pressed her head more closely
        against me, holding it.
         "I am branded," she said. "I am branded."
         "It is finished now," I said. "You are free, Elizabeth."
         She lifted her face, stained with tears, to mine.
         "I love you, Tarl Cabot," she said.
         "No," I said softly, "you do not."
  She leaned against me yet again. "But you do not want
  me," she said. "You never wanted me."
  I said nothing.
  "And now," she said, bitterly, "Kamchak has given me to
  you. He is cruel, cruel, cruel."                 .
  "I think Kamchak thought well of you," I said, "that he
  would give you to his friend."
  She withdrew from me a bit, puzzled. "Can that be?" she
  asked. "He whipped me, he---touched me," she shuddered,
  "with the leather." She looked down, not wanting to look
  Into my eyes.
  "You were beaten," I said, "because you ran abbey. Nor-
  mally a girl who does what you did is maimed or thrown to
  Been or kaiila, and that he touched you with the whip, the
  Slaver's Caress, that was only to show me, and perhaps you,
  that you were female."                          `,
  She looked down. "He shamed me," she said. "I cannot
  help it that I moved as I did I cannot help that I am a
  woman."
  'fit is over now," I told her.
  She still did not raise her eyes, but stared down at the rug.
  "Tuchuks," I remarked, "regard the piercing of ears as a
  barbarous custom inflicted on their slave girls by Turians."
  Elizabeth looked up, the tiny ring glinting in the light of
  the fire bowl.
  "Are your ears pierced?" I asked.
  "No," she said, "but many of my friends on Earth who
  owned fine earrings, had their ears pierced."
  "Did that seem so dreadful to you?" I asked.
  "No," she said, smiling.
  "It would to Tuchuks," I said. "They do not even inflict
  that on their Turian slaves." I added, "And it is one of the
  great fears of a Tuchuk girl that, should she fall into Turian
  hands, it will be done to her."
  Elizabeth laughed, through her tears.
  "The ring may be removed," I said. "With instruments it
  can be opened and then slid free leaving behind no mark
  that one would ever see."
  "You are very kind, Tart Cabot," she said.
  "I do not suppose it would do to tell you," I remarked,
  '`but actually the ring is rather attractive."
  She lifted her head and smiled pertly. "Oh?" she asked.
  dyes," I said, "quite."
  She leaned back on her heels, drawing the yellow silken
          sheet more closely about her shoulders, and looked at me,
          smiling.
           "Am I slave or free?" she asked.
           'Free," I said.
          She laughed. "I do not think you want to free me," she
          said. "You keep me chained up like a slave girl!"
          I laughed. "I am sorry!" I cried. To be sure, Elizabeth
          Cardwell was still in Sirik.
           "Where is the key?" I asked.
          "Above the door," she said, adding, rather pointedly, "just
          beyond my reach."
           I leaped up to fetch the key.
           "I am happy," she said.
           I picked the key from the small hook.
           "Don't turn around!" she said.
          I did not turn. "Why not?" I asked. I heard a slight rustle
          of chain.
          I heard her voice from behind me, husky. "Do you dare
          free this girl?" she asked.
          I spun about and to my astonishment saw that Elizabeth
          Cardwell had arisen and stood proudly, defiantly, angrily
          before me, as though she might have been a freshly collared
          slave girl, brought in but an Ahn before, bound over the
          saddle of a kaiila, the fruit of a slave raid.
            I gasped.
          "Yes," she said, "I will reveal myself, but know that I will
          fight you to the death."
          Gracefully, insolently, the silken yellow sheet moved about
          and across her body and fell from her. She stood facing me,
          in pretended anger, graceful and beautiful. She wore the Sirik
          and was, of course, clad Kajir, clad in the Curia and Chatka,
          the red cord and the narrow strip of black leather; in the
          Kalmak, the brief vest, open and sleeveless, of black leather,
          and in the Koora, the strip of red cloth that bound back her
          brown hair. About her throat was the Turian collar with it'
          chain, attached to slave bracelets and ankle rings, one of the
          latter attached to the chain running to the slave ring. I saw
          that her left thigh, small and deep, bore the brand of the four
          bask horns.
          I could scarcely believe that the proud creature who stood
          chained before me was she whom Kamchak and I had
          referred to as the Little Barbarian; whom I had been able to
          think of only as a timid, simple girl of Earth, a young, pretty
          little secretary, one-of nameless, unimportant thousands of
such in the large offices of Earth's major cities; but what I
now saw before me did not speak to me of the glass and
rectangles and pollutions of Earth, of her pressing crowds
and angry, rushing, degraded throngs, slaves running to the
whips of their clocks, slaves leaping and yelping and licking
for the caress of silver, for their positions and titles and
street addresses, for the adulation and envy of frustrated
mobs for whose regard a true Gorean would have had but
contempt; what I saw before me now spoke rather, in its
way, of the bellowing of bask and the smell of trampled
earth; of the sound of the moving wagons and the whistle of
wind about them; of the cries of the girls with the bask stick
and the odor of the open cooking fire; of Kamchak on his
kaiila as I remembered him from before; as Kutaituchik
must once have been; of the throbbing, earthy rhythms of
grass and snow, and the herding of beasts; and here before
me now there stood a girl, seemingly a captive, who might
have been of Turia, or Ar, or Cos, or Thentis; who proudly
wore her chains and stood as though defiant in the wagon of
her enemy, as if clad for his pleasure, all identity and mean-
ing swept from her save the incontrovertible fact of what she
now seemed to be, and that alone, a Tuchuk slave girl.
"Well," said Miss Cardwell, breaking the spell she had
cast, "I thought you were going to unchain me."
"Yes, yes," I said, and stumbled as I went toward her.
Lock by lock, fumbling a bit, I removed her chains, and
threw the Sirik and ankle chain to the side of the wagon,
under the slave ring.
  "Why did you do that?" I asked.
"I don't know," she responded lightly, "I must be a Tuchuk
slave girl."
  "You are free," I said firmly.
  "I shall try to keep it in mind," she said.
  "Do so," I said.
  "Do I make you nervous?" she asked.
  "Yes," I said.
She had now picked up the yellow sheet and, with a pin or
two, booty from Turia probably, fastened it gracefully about
her.
  I considered raping her.
  It would not do, of course.
  "Have you eaten?" she asked.
  "Yes," I said.
  "There is some roast bosk left," she said. "It is cold. It
        would be a bother to warm it up, so I will not do so. I am
          not a slave girl, you know."
        I began to regret my decision in freeing her.
          She looked at me, her eyes bright. "It certainly took you a
          long time to come by the wagon."
            "I was busy," I said.
            "Fighting and such, I suppose," she said.
            "I suppose," I said.
          "Why did you come to the wagon tonight?" she asked. I
          didn't care precisely for the tone of voice with which she
          asked the question.
            "For wine," I said.
            "Oh," she said.
          I went to the chest by the side of the wagon and pulled out
          a small bottle, one of several, of Ka-la-na wine which reposed there.
          "Let us celebrate your freedom," I said, pouring her a
          small bowl of wine.
          She took the bowl of wine and smiled, waiting for me to
          fill one for myself.
          When I had done so, I faced her and said, "To a free
          woman, one who has been strong, one who has been brave,
          to Elizabeth Cardwell, to a woman who is both beautiful and
          free."
            We touched the bowls and drank.
              "Thank you, Tart Cabot," she said.
         I drained my bowl. I
          "We shall, of course," Elizabeth was saying, "have to make
          some different arrangements about the wagon." She was ?
          glancing about, her lips pursed. "We shall have to divide it
          somehow. I do not know if it would be proper to share a
          wagon with a man who is not my master."
           I was puzzled. "I am sure," I muttered, "we can figure out
           something." I refilled my wine bowl. Elizabeth did not wish
           more. I noted she had scarcely sipped what she had been
           given. I tossed down a swallow of Ka-la-na, thinking perhaps
           that it was a night for Paga after all.
             "A wall of some sort," she was saying.
           "Drink your wine," I said, pushing the bowl in her hands
           toward her.
            She took a sip, absently. "It is not really bad wine," she
           said.
             "It is superb!" I said.
  "A wall of heavy planks would be best, I think," she
  mused.
  "You could always wear Robes of Concealment," I ven-
  tured, "and carry about your person an unsheathed quiva."
   "That is true," she said.
  Her eyes were looking at me over the rim of her bowl as
  she drank. "It is said," she remarked, her eyes mischievous,
  "that any man who frees a slave girl is a fool."
   "It is probably true," I said.
   "You are nice, Tarl Cabot," she said.
  She seemed to me very beautiful. Again I considered
  raping her, but now that she was free, no longer a simple
  slave, I supposed that it would be improper. I did, however,
  measure the distance between us, an experiment in specula-
  tion, and decided I could reach her in one bound and in one
  motion, with luck, land her on the rug.
   "What are you thinking?" she asked.
   "Nothing that I care to inform you of," I said.
  "Oh," she said, looking down into her bowl of wine,
  smiling.
   "Drink more wine," I prompted.
   "Really"" she said.
   "It's quite good," I said. "Superb."
   "You are trying to get me drunk," she said.
   "The thought did cross my mind," I admitted.
  She laughed. "After I am drunk," she asked, "what are you
  Being to do with me?"
   "I think I will stuff you in the dung sack," I said.
   "Unimaginative," she remarked.
   "What do you suggest?" I asked.
  "I am in your wagon," she sniffed. "I am alone, quite
  defenseless, completely at your mercy."
   "Please," I said.
  "If you wished," she pointed out, "I could in an instant be
  returned to slave steel simply be reenslaved and would
  then again be yours to do with precisely as you pleased."
   "That does not sound to me like a bad idea," I said.
  "Can it be," she asked, "that the commander of a Tuchuk
  Thousand does not know what to do with a girl such as I?"
  I reached toward her, to take her into my arms, but I
  found the bowl of wine in my way, deftly so.
   "Please, Mr. Cabot," she said.
   I stepped back, angry.
        "By the Priest-Kings," I cried, "you are one woman who
        looking for trouble"
        Elizabeth laughed over the wine. Her eyes sparkled. "I am
        free," she said.
          "I am well aware of that," I snapped.
          She laughed.
        "You spoke of arrangements," I said. "There are some.
        Free or not, you are the woman in my wagon. I expect to
        have food, I expect the wagon to be clean, the axles to be
        greased, the bosk to be groomed."
        "Do not fear," she said, "when I prepare my meals I will
        make enough for two."
          "I am pleased to hear it," I muttered.
        "Moreover," she said, "I myself would not wish to stay in
        a wagon that was not clean, nor one whose axles were not
        greased nor whose bask were not properly groomed."
          "No," I said, "I suppose not."
        "But it does seem to me," she said, "that you might share
        in such chores."
          "I am the commander of a Thousand," I said.
          "What difference does that make?" she asked.
          "It makes a great deal of difference!" I shouted.
          "You needn't shout," she said.
          My eye glanced at the slave chains under the slave ring.
        "Of course," said Elizabeth, "we could regard it as a
        division of labor of sorts."
          'Good," I said.
        "On the other hand," she mused, "you might rent a slave:
        for such work."
          "All right," I said, looking at her. "I will rent a slave."
          "But you can't trust slaves," said Elizabeth.
          With a cry of rage I nearly spilled my wine.
          "You nearly spilled your wine," said Elizabeth.
        The institution of freedom for women, I decided, as many
        Goreans believed, was a mistake.
        Elizabeth winked at me, conspiratorially. "I will take care
        of the wagon," she said.
          "Good," I said. "Good!"
        I sat down beside the fire bowl, and stared at the floor.
        Elizabeth knelt down a few feet from me, and took another
        sip of the wine.
        "I heard," said the girl, seriously, "from a slave whose
        name was Hereena that tomorrow there will be great
        fighting."
I looked up. "Yes," I said. "I think it is true."
 "If there is to be fighting tomorrow," she asked, "will you
 take part in it?"
   "Yes," I said, "I suppose so."
   "Why did you come to the wagon tonight?" she asked.
  "For wine," I said, "as I told you."
  - She looked down.
 Neither of us said anything for a time. Then she spoke. "I
 am happy," she said, "that this is your wagon."
 I looked at her and smiled, then looked down again, lost in
 thought.
 I wondered what would become of Miss Cardwell. She
 was, I forcibly reminded myself, not a Gorean girl, but one
 of Barth. She was not natively Turian nor Tuchuk. She could
 not even read the language. To almost anyone who would
 come upon her she might seem but a beautiful barbarian, fit
 presumably by birth and blood only for the collar of a
 master. She would be vulnerable. She, without a defender,
 would be helpless. Indeed, even the Gorean woman, outside
 her city, without a defender, should she escape the dangers of
 the wild, is not likely long to elude the iron, the chain and
 collar. Even peasants pick up such women, using them in the
 fields, until they can be sold to the first passing slaver. Miss
  Cardwell would need a protector, a defender. And yet on the
 very morrow it seemed I might die on the walls of Saphrar's
 compound What then would be her fate? Moreover, I re
 minded myself of my work, and that a warrior cannot well
 encumber himself with a woman, particularly not a free
 woman. His companion, as it is said, is peril and steel. I was
 sad. It would have been better, I told myself, if Kamchak
 had not given me the girl.
 My reflections were interrupted by the girl's voice. "I'm
 surprised," she said, "that Kamchak did not sell me."
   "Perhaps he should have," I said.
 She smiled. "Perhaps," she admitted. She took another sip
 of wine. "Tarl Cabot," she said
   "Yes," I said.
   "Why did Kamchak not sell me?"
   "I do not know," I said.
   "Why did he give me to you?" she asked.
   "I am not truly sure," I said.
    I wondered indeed that Kamchak had given the girl to me.   ;
  There were many things that seemed to me puzzling, and I
  thought of Gor, and of Kamchak, and the ways of the
          Tuchuks, so different from those native to Miss Cardwell and
          myself.
          I wondered why it was that Kamchak had put the ring on
          this girl, had had her branded and collared and clad Kajir
          was it truly because she had angered him, running from the
          wagon that one time or for another reason and why had
          he subjected her, cruelly perhaps, in my presence to the
          Slaver's Caress? I had thought he cared for the girl. And then
          he had given her to me, when there might have been other
          commanders. He had said he was fond of her. And I knew
          him to be my friend. Why had he done this, truly? For me? l
          Or for her, as well? If so, why? For what reason?
          Elizabeth had now finished her wine. She had arisen and
          rinsed out the bowl and replaced it. She was now kneeling at ~
          the back of the wagon and had untied the Koora and shaken l
          her hair loose. She was looking at herself in the mirror,
          holding her head this way and that. I was amused. She was
          seeing how the nose ring might be displayed to most advan
          sage. Then she began to comb her long dark hair, kneeling
          very straight as would a Gorean girl. Kamchak had never
          permitted her to cut her hair. Now that she was free I
          supposed she would soon shorten it. I would regret that. I
          have always found long hair beautiful on a woman.
          I watched her combing her hair. Then she had put the
          comb aside and had retied the Koora, binding back her hair.
          Now she was again studying her image in the bronze mirror,
          moving her head slightly.
          Suddenly I thought I understood Kamchak! He had indeed
          been fond of the girl!
            "Elizabeth," I said.
            "Yes," she said, putting the mirror down.
          "I think I know why Kamchak gave you to me aside
          from the fact that I suppose he thought I could use a prettier
          wench about the wagon."
            She smiled.
            "I am glad he did," she said.
            "Oh?" I asked.
          She smiled. She looked into the mirror. "Of course," she
          said, "who else would have been fool enough to free me?"
            "Of course," I admitted.
            I said nothing for a time.
          The girl put down the mirror. "Why do you think he did?.
          she asked, facing me, curious.
 "On Gor," I said, "the myths have it that only the woman
 who has been an utter slave can be truly free."
 "I am not sure," she said, "that I understand the meaning
 of that."
 "It has nothing to do, I think," I said, "with what woman
 is actually slave or free, has little to do with the simplicity of
 chains or the collar, or the brand."
   "Then what?" she asked.
 "It means, I think," I said, "that only the woman who has
 utterly surrendered and can utterly surrender losing her-
 self in a man's touch can be truly a woman, and being what
 she is, is then free."
 Elizabeth smiled. "I do not accept that theory," she re-
 marked. "I am free now."
   "I am not talking about chains and collars," I said.
   "It is a silly theory," she said.
   I looked down. "I suppose so," I said.
 "I would have little respect for the woman," said Elizabeth
 Cardwell, "who could utterly surrender to a man."
   "I thought not," I said.
 Abdomen," said Elizabeth, "are persons surely as much as
 men and their equals."
   "I think we are talking about different things," I said.
   "Perhaps," she said.
 "On our world," I said, "there is much talk of persons -
 and little of men and women and the men are taught that
 they must not be men and the women are taught that they
 must not be women."
   "Nonsense," said Elizabeth. "That is nonsense"
  'I do not speak of the words that are used, or how men of
  Barth would speak of these things," I said, "but of what is
  not spoken of what is implicit perhaps in what is said and
  taught.
 "But what," I asked, "if the laws of nature and of human
 blood were more basic, more primitive and essential than the
 conventions and teachings of society what if these old
 secrets and truths, if truths they be, had been concealed or
 forgotten, or subverted to the requirements of a society con-
 ceived in terms of interchangeable labor units, each assigned
 id functional, technical sexless skills?"
   "Really!" said Elizabeth.
   "What do you think would be the result?" I asked.
   "I'm sure I don't know," she said.
   "Our Earth," I suggested.
         'Women," said Miss Cardwell, "do not wish to submit to
         men, to be dominated, to be brutalized."
           "We are speaking of different things," I said.
           "Perhaps," she admitted.
         "There is no freer nor higher nor more beautiful woman,"
         I said, "than the Gorean Free Companion. Compare her with
         your average wife of Earth."
         "The Tuchuk women," said Elizabeth, "have a miserable
         lot."
         "Few of them," I said, "would be regarded in the cities as
         a Free Companion."
         "I have never known a woman who was a Free Compan-
         ion," said Elizabeth.
           I was silent, and sad, for I had known one such.
         "You are perhaps right," I said, "but throughout the mam
         mats it seems that there is one whose nature it is to possess
         and one whose nature it is to be possessed."
         "I am not accustomed to thinking of myself," smiled Eliza
         teeth, "as a mammal."
         "What do you think of yourself as," I asked, "biologically?"
           "Well," she smiled, "if you wish to put it that way."
         I pounded the floor of the wagon and Elizabeth jumped.
         "That," I said, "is the way it is!"
           "Nonsense," said she.
         "The Goreans recognize," I said, "that this truth is hard
         for women to understand, that they will reject it, that they
         will fear it and fight it."
           "Because," said Elizabeth, "it is not true."
         "You think," I said, "that I am saying that a woman is
         nothing that is not it, I am saying she is marvelous, but
         that she becomes truly herself and magnificent only after the
         surrenders of love."
           'Silly!" said Elizabeth.
         'That is why," I remarked, "that upon this barbaric world
         the woman who cannot surrender herself is upon occasion
         simply conquered."
           -Elizabeth threw back her head and laughed merrily.
          "Yes," I smiled, "her surrender is won often by a master
          who will be satisfied with no less."
          "And what happens to these women afterwards?" asked
          Elizabeth.
          "They may wear chains or they may not," I said, "but they
          are whole they are female."
 'No man," said Elizabeth, "including you, my dear Tarl
 Cabot, could bring me to such a pass."
 "The Gorean myths have it," I said, "that the woman longs
 for this identity to be herself in being his if only for the
 moment of paradox in which she is slave and thus Freed."
  "It is all very silly," said Elizabeth.
 "It is further said that the woman longs for this to happen
 to her, but does not know it."
  "That is the silliest of all!" laughed Elizabeth.
 "Why," I asked, "did you earlier stand before me as a
 slave girl if you did not, for the moment, wish to be a
 slave?"
   "It was a joker" she laughed. "A joker"
  "Perhaps," I said.
  She looked down, confused.
   "And so," I said, "that is why I think Kamchak gave you
   She looked up, startled. "Why?" she asked.
  "That in my arms you would learn the meaning of a slave
  collar, that you would learn the meaning of being a woman."
   She looked at me, astonished, her eyes wide with disbelief.
 "You see," I said, "he thought well of you. He was truly
 fond of his Little Barbarian."
  I stood up and threw the wine bowl to the side of the
  room. It shattered against the wine chest.
    I turned away.
    She leaped to her feet. "Where are you going?" she asked.
   "I am going to the public slave wagon," I said.
   "But why?" she asked.
   I looked at her frankly. "I want a woman," I said.
   She looked at me. "I am a woman, Tart Cabot," she said.
   I said nothing.
   "Am I not as beautiful as the girls in the public slave
   wagon?" she asked.
   "Yes," I said, "you are.
    "Then why do you not remain with me?"
    "Tomorrow," I said, "I think there will be heavy fighting."
    "I can please you as well as any girl in the slave wagon,"
   she said.
   "You are free," I told her.
    "I will give you more," she said.
    "Please, do not speak so, Elizabeth," I said.
    She straightened herself. "I suppose," she said, "you have
       seen girls in slave markets, betrayed as I was by the touch of
      the whip."
          I did not speak. It was true that I had seen this.
          "You saw how I moved," she challenged. "Would it not
          have added a dozen gold pieces to my price?"
          "Yes," I said, "it would have."
          I approached her and gently held her by the waist, and
          looked down into her eyes.
          "I love you, Tarl Cabot," she whispered. "Do not leave
          me."
          "Do not love me," I said. "You know little of my life and
          what I must do."
          "I do not care," she said, putting her head to my shoulder.
          "I must leave," I said, "if only because you care for me. It
          would be cruel for me to remain."
          "Have me, Tart Cabot," she said, "if not as a free woman
        as a slave."
          "Beautiful Elizabeth," I said, "I can have you as neither."
          "You will have me," she cried, "as one or the other!"
          "No," I said gently. "No."
          Suddenly she drew back in fury and struck me with the flat
          of her hand, a vicious slap, and then again and again, and
          again.
        "No," I said.
       Again she slapped me. My face burned. "I hate you," she
       said. "I hate your"
          "No," I said.
          "You know your codes, do you not?" she challenged. "The
         codes of the warrior of Gor?"
          "Do not," I said.
       Again she slapped me and my head leaped to the side,
       burning. "I hate you," she hissed.
      And then, as I knew she would, she suddenly knelt before
       me, in fury, head down, arms extended, wrists crossed, sub"
        milting as a Gorean female.
        "Now," she said, looking up, her eyes blazing with anger,
          "You must either slay me or enslave me."
          "You are free," I said sternly.
        "Then slay me," she demanded.
        "I could not do that," I said.
        "Collar me," she said.
          "I have no wish to do so," I said.
          "Then acknowledge your codes betrayed," she said.
      "Fetch the collar," I said.
 She leaped up to fetch the collar and handed it to me,
 again kneeling before me.
 I encircled her lovely throat with the steel and she looked
 up at me, angrily.
  I snapped it shut.
  She began to rise to her feet.
 But my hand on her shoulder prevented her from rising. 'I
 did not give you permission to rise, slave," I said.
 Her shoulders shook with anger. Then she said, "Of
 course, I am sorry, master," and dropped her head.
 I removed the two pins from the yellow silken sheet, and it
 fell from her, revealing her clad Kajir.
  She stiffened in anger.
  "I would see my slave girl," I said.
 "Perhaps," she said, acidly, "you wish your girl to remove
 her remaining garments?"
   "No," I said.
   She tossed her head.
   "I shall do it," I told her.
   She gasped.
 As she knelt on the rug, head down, in the position of the
 Pleasure Slave, I took from her the Koora, loosening her
 hair, and then the leather Kalmak, and then I drew from her
 the Curia and Chatka.
   "If you would be a slave," I said, "be a slave."
 She did not raise her head but glared savagely down at the
 rug, her small fists clenched.
 I went across the rug and sat down cross-legged near the
 fire bowl, and looked at the girl.
   "Approach me, slave girl," I said, "and kneel."
 She lifted her head and looked at me, angrily, proudly, for
 a moment, but then she said, "Yes, master," and did as she
 was commanded.
 I looked at Miss Elizabeth Cardwell, kneeling before me,
 head down, clad only in the collar of a slave.
   "What are you?" I asked.
   "A slave," she said bitterly, not raising her head.
   "Serve me wine," I said.
She did so, kneeling before me, head down, handing me
the black, red-trimmed wine crater, that of the master, as
 had Aphris to Kamchak. I drank.
 When I had finished I set the wine crater aside and looked
 on the girl.
   "Why have you done this, Elizabeth?" I asked.
               She looked down sullenly. "I am Vella," she said, a Gorean slave."
               "Elizabeth" I said.
               "Vella," she said angrily.
         "Vella," I agreed, and she looked up. Our eyes met and we ~
              looked at one another for a long time. Then, she smiled, and I
            looked down.
              I laughed. "It seems," I said, "that I will not make it to the
              public slave wagon tonight."
           Elizabeth looked up, shyly. "It seems not, master."
               "You are a vixen, Vella," said I.
              She shrugged. Then, kneeling before me in the position of
            the Pleasure Slave, she stretched indolently, with feline grace,
              lifting her hands behind the back of her neck and throwing
              her dark hair forward. She knelt so for a languorous mo-
              ment, her hands over her head holding her hair, looking at I
              me.
              "Do you think," she asked, "that the girls in the public
              slave wagon are as beautiful as Vella?"
               "No," I said, "they are not."
               "Or as desirable?" she asked.
               "No," I said, "none is as desirable as Vella."
              Then, her back still arched, with a half-smile, she stretched
              even more, and, as though weary, she slowly turned her head
              to one side, with her eyes closed, and then opened them and
              with a small, lazy motion of her hands threw her hair back
              over her head, and with a tiny motion of her head shook it
              into place.
          "It seems Vella wishes to please her master," I said.
              "No," said the girl, "Vella hates her master." She looked at
              me with feigned hatred. "He has humiliated Vella. He has
              stripped her and put her in the collar of a slaver"
                '0f course," I said.
              "But," said the girl, "perhaps she might be forced to please
              him. After all she is only a slave."
               I laughed.
             "It is said," remarked the girl, "that Vella, whether she
              knows it or not, longs to be a slave the utter slave of a
              man if but for an hour."
              I slapped my knee with amusement. "That sounds to me,"
              I said, "like a silly theory."
               The girl shrugged in her collar. "Perhaps," she said, "Vella
          does not know."
           'Perhaps," I said, "Vella will find out."
   "Perhaps," said the girl, smiling.
  "Are you ready, Slave Girl," I asked, "to give pleasure to a
  master?"
   "Have I any choice?" she asked.
   "None," I said.
   "Then," she said, with resignation, "I suppose I am ready."
   I laughed.
Elizabeth was looking at me, smiling. Then, suddenly,
playfully, she put her head to the rug before me. I heard her
 whisper, "Vella asks only to tremble and obey."
   I stood up and, laughing, lifted her to her feet.
  She, too, laughed, standing close to me, her eyes bright. I
  could feel her breath on my face.
   "I think now I will do something with you," I said.
  She looked resigned, dropping her head. "What is to be the
  fate of your beautiful, civilized slave?" she asked.
   "The dung sack," I replied.
   "No!" she cried, suddenly frightened. "No!"
   I laughed.
   "I will do anything rather than that," she said. "Anything."
   "Anything?" I asked.
  She looked up at me and smiled. "Yes," she said, "any-
  thing."
  "Very well, Vella," said I, "I will give you but one
  chance  if you well please me the aforementioned miserable
  fate will not be yours at least for tonight."
   "Vella will well please you," she said earnestly.
   "Very well," I said, "please me."
  I recalled keenly how she had sported with me earlier and
  I thought there might be some point in giving the young
  American a taste of her own medicine.
  She looked at me startled.
  Then she smiled. "I will teach you that I well know the
  meaning of my collar, master," she said.
  Suddenly she kissed me, a deep kiss, moist, rich, too soon
  ended.
  "There"" she laughed. "The kiss of a Tuchuk slave girl!"
  Then she laughed and turned away, looking over her shoul-
  der. "You see," she said, "I can do it quite well."
   I did not speak.
  She was facing the other way. "But," she said, teasingly, "I
  think one will be enough for master."
  I was a bit angry, and not a little aroused. 'The girls in the
  public slave wagon," I said, "know how to kiss."
"Oh?" she said, turning about.
"They are not little secretaries," I said, "pretending to be slave girls."
Her eyes flashed. "Try this!" she said, approaching me, and
this time, my head in her small hands, she lingered with her
lips upon my mouth, warm, wet, breaths meeting and mingling in the savoring touch. My hands held her slender waist. When she had finished, I remarked, "Not bad."
"Not bad!" she cried. Then fully and for much time, she kissed me, with increasing determination, yet attempted subtlety, then noxlety, then woodenly, and then she dropped her head. lifted her chin with my finger. She looked at me angrily.
"I should have told you, I suppose," I remarked, "that a woman kisses well only when fully aroused, after at least half an Ahn, after she is helpless and yielding."
She looked at me angrily and turned away.
Then she spun about laughing. "You are a beast, Tarl," she cried.
   "And you, too," I laughed, "are a beast a beautiful little
collared beast."
"I love you," she said, "Tarl Cabot."
 "Array yourself in Pleasure Silk, Little Beast," I said, "and enter my arms."
The blaze of a challenge flared suddenly in her eyes. She transfused with excitement. "Though I am of Earth," she said, "try to use me as slave."
I smiled. "If you wish," I said.
"I will prove to you," she said, "that your theories are false."                                  I shrugged.
"I will prove to you," she said, "that a woman cannot be conquered."                                  "You tempt me," I said.     |
"I love you," she said, "but even so, you will not be able to
conquer me, for I shall not permit myself to 'he conquered, not even though I love your"
"If you love me," I said, "perhaps 1 would not wish to conquer you."
But Kamchak, generous fellow, gave me to you, did he," she asked, "that you should teach me as slave to be female?"
"I think so," I admitted.;
"And in his opinion, and perhaps yours, would that not be
In my best interests?"
"Perhaps," I said. "I do not really know. These are compli-
cated matters."
  "Well," said she, laughing, "I shall prove you both wrong"
  "All right," I said, "we shall see,"
"But you must promise to try to make me truly a slave if
only for a moment."
  "All right," I said.
 "The stakes," she pronounced, "will be my freedom
 against"
  "Yes?" I asked.
  "Against yours?" she laughed.
  "I do not understand," I said.
 "For one week," she said, "in the secrecy of the wagon
 where no one can see you will be my slave you will wear
  collar and serve me and do whatever I wish."
  "I do not care much for your terms," I said.
 "You seem to find little fault in men owning female
 slaves," she said. "Why should you object to being a slave
  owned by a female?"
  "I see," I said.
 She smiled slyly. "I think it might be rather pleasant to
 eve a male slave." She laughed. "I will teach you the
 bearing of a collar, Tarl Cabot," she said.
  "Do not count your slaves until you have won them," I
  cautioned.
  "Is it a wager?" she asked.
 I gazed on her. How every bit of her seemed alive with
 allengel Her eyes, her stance, the sound of her voice I saw
 e tiny nose ring, barbaric, glinting in the light of the fire
 bowl. I saw the place on her thigh where not many days
 before the fiery iron had been so cruelly pressed, leaving
  hind it, smoking for the instant, deep and clean, the tiny
  ark of the four bask horns. I saw on her lovely throat the
 ring of Turian steel, gleaming and locked, so contrast
  g with, so barbarically accentuating the incredible softness
  her beauty, the tormenting vulnerability of it. The collar, I
  knew, bore my name, proclaiming her, should I wish, my
  slave. And yet this beautiful, soft, proud thing stood there,
  trough ringed and branded, though collared, bold and brazen
  staringing at me, eyes bright, her challenge, the eternal chal-
  lenge of the unconquered female, that of the untamed woman
  daring the male to touch her, to try, she resisting, to
            reduce her to yielding prize, to force from her the uncondi
            tional surrender,-the total and utter submission of the woman
            who has no choice but to acknowledge herself his, the help
            less, capitulated slave of him in whose arms she finds herself
            prisoner.
            As the Goreans have it, there is in this a war in which the
            woman can respect only that man who can reduce her to
            utter defeat.
          But it seemed to me there was little in the eyes or stance
          of Miss Cardwell which suggested the plausibility of the
          Gorean interpretation. She seemed to me clearly out to win,
            to enjoy herself perhaps, but to win, and then exact from me
            something in the way of vengeance for all the months and
       days in which she, proud, independent wench, had been only
          slave. I recalled she had told me that she would teach me
        well the meaning of a collar. If she were successful, I had
         little doubt that she would carry out her threat.
          "Well," she challenged, "Master?"
        I gazed at her, the tormenting vixen. I had no wish to be
          her slave. I resolved, if one of us must be slave, it would be
            she, the lovely Miss Cardwell, who would wear the collar.
         "Well," she again challenged, "Master?"
           I smiled. "It is a wager," said I, "Slave Girl."
            She laughed happily and turned, and standing on her
           tiptoes, lowered the tharlarion oil lamps. Then she bent to
            find for herself among the riches of the wagon yellow Plea
           sure Silks.
           At last she stood before me, and was beautiful.
         "Are you prepared to be a slave?" she asked.
            "Until you have won," I said, "it is you who wear the
            collar."
            She dropped her head in mock humility. "Yes, Master," she
          said. Then she looked up at me, her eyes mischievous.
            I motioned for her to approach, and she did so.
            I indicated that she should enter my arms, and she did so.
            In my arms she looked up at me.
        "You're sure you're quite ready to be a slave?" she asked.
            "Be quiet," I said gently.
         "I shall be pleased to own you," she said. "I have always wanted a handsome male slave."
   "Be quiet," I whispered.
"Yes, Master," she said, obediently.
 My hands parted the Pleasure Silk and cast it aside.
   "Really, Master!" she said.
  "Now," I said, "I will taste the kiss of my slave girl."
  "Yes, Master," she said.
  "Now," I instructed her, "with more passion."
 "Yes, Master," she said obediently, and kissed me with
 feigned passion.
 I, hand in her collar, turned her about and put her on her
 back on the rug, her shoulders pressed against the thick pile.
  She looked at me, a sly smile on her face.
 I took the nose ring between my thumb and forefinger and
 gave it a little pull.
 "Oh!" she cried, eyes smarting. Then she looked up. "That
 is no way to treat a lady," she remarked.
  "You are only a slave girl," I reminded her.
  "True," she said forlornly, turning her head to one side.
  I was a bit irritated.
  She looked up at me and laughed with amusement.
 I began to kiss her throat and body and my hands were
 behind her back, lifting her and arching her, so that her head
 was back and down.
  "I know what you're trying to do," she said.
  "What is that?" I mumbled.
  "You are trying to make me feel owned," she said.
  "Oh," I said.
  "You will not succeed," she informed me.
  I myself was beginning to grow skeptical.
 She wiggled about on her side, looking at me. My hands
 were still clasped behind the small of her back.
 "It is said by Goreans," remarked the girl, very seriously,
 "that every woman, whether she knows it or not, longs to be
 a slave the utter slave of a man if but for an hour."
  "Please be quiet," I said.
  "Every woman," she said emphatically. "Every woman."
  I looked at her. "You are a woman," I observed.
 She laughed. "I find myself naked in the arms of a man
 and wearing the collar of a slave. I think there is little doubt
  at I am a woman!"
  "And at the moment." I suggested, "little more."
She looked at me irritably for a moment. Then she smiled.
'fit is said by Goreans," she remarked, with very great
r seriousness, with mock bitterness, "that in a collar a woman
can be only a woman."
 "The theory you mention," I said, grumbling, "about wom-
 en longing to be slaves, if only for an hour, is doubtless
 false."
        She shrugged in her collar and put her head to one side,
        her hair falling to the rug. "Perhaps," she said, much as she
        had before, "Vella does not know."
         "Perhaps Vella will find out," I said.
         "Perhaps," she said, laughing.
        Then, perhaps not pleasantly, my hand closed on her
        ankle.
         "Oh!" she said.
         She tried to move her leg, but could not.
        I then bent her leg, that I might, as I wished, display for my
        pleasure, she willing or not, the marvelous curves of her calf.
        She tried to pull her leg away, but she could not. It would
        move only as I pleased.
         "Please, Tarl," she said.
         "You are going to be mine," I said.
        "Please," she said, "let me go." My grip on her ankle was
        not cruel but in all her womanness she knew herself held.
         "Please," she said again, "let me go."
         I smiled to myself. "Be silent, Slave," said I.
         Elizabeth Cardwell gasped.
         I smiled.
        "So you are stronger than me she scoffed. "It means
        nothing!"
        I then began to kiss her foot' and the inside of her Achilles,
        beneath the bone, and she trembled momentarily.
         "Let me go!" she cried.
        But I only kissed her, holding her, my lips moving to the
        back of her leg, low where it joins the foot, where an ankle
        ring would be locked.
        "A true man," she cried out suddenly, "would not behave
        so! No! A true man is gentle, kind, tender, respectful, at all
        times, sweet and solicitous! That is a true man!"
        I smiled at her defenses, so classical, so typical of the
        modern, unhappy, civilized female, desperately frightened of
        being truly a woman in a man's arms, trying to decide and
        determine manhood not by the nature of man and his desire,
        and her nature as the object of that desire, but by her own
        fears, trying to make man what she could find acceptable,
        trying to remake him in her own image.
        "You are a female," I said casually. "I do not accept your
        definition of man."
          She made an angry noise.
          "Argue," I suggested, "explain speak names."
          She moaned.
"It is I said, "that when the full blood of a man  is upon him, and he sees his female, and will have her, that it should be then that he is not a true man."
  She cried out in misery.
 Then, as I had expected, she suddenly wept, and doubtless
 with great sincerity. I supposed at this time many men of
 Earth, properly conditioned, would have been shaken, and
 would have fallen promptly to this keen weapon, shamed,
 retreating stricken with guilt, with misgivings, as the female
 wished. But, smiling to myself, I knew that on this night her
 weeping, the little vixen, would gain her no respite.
  I smiled at her.
  She looked at me, horrified, frightened, tears ire her eyes.
  "You are a pretty little slave," I said.
She struggled furiously, but could not escape.
When her struggles had subsided I began, half biting, half    ;t
kissing, to move up her calf to the delights of the sensitive areas behind her knees.
"Please" she wept.
"Be quiet, pretty little Slave Girl," I mumbled.    ,
Then, kissing, but letting her feel the teeth which could, if
I chose, tear at her flesh, I moved to the interior of her
thigh. Slowly, with my mouth, by inches, I began to claim her.
"Please," she said.
"What is wrong?" I asked.
"I find I want to yield to you," she whispered.
 "Do not be frightened," I told her.
 "No," she said. "You do not understand."
I was puzzled.
"I want to yield to you," she whispered, "as a slave                                             girl!"
"You will so yield to me," I told her.
"No!" she cried. "No!"
"You will yield to me," I told her, "as a slave girl to her master."
  "No!" she cried. "No! No!"
I continued to kiss her, to touch her.
"Please stop," she wept.
"Why?" I asked.
"You are making me a slave," she whispered.
"I will not stop," I told her.
"Please," she wept. "Please!"
 "Perhaps," I said to her, "the Goreans were right?"
         "No!" she cried. "No!"
       "Perhaps that is what you desire," I said, "to yield with the
       utterness of a female slave."
        "Never!" she cried, weeping in fury. "Leave me!"
        "Not until you have become a slave," I told her.
         She cried out in misery. "I do not want to be a slave!"
       But when I had touched the most intimate beauties of her
       she became uncontrollable, writhing, and in my arms I knew
       the feeling of a slave girl and such, for the moment, was the
       beautiful Elizabeth Cardwell, helpless and mine, female and
       slave.
       Now her lips and arms and body, now those only of an
       enamoured wench in bondage, sought mine, acknowledging
       utterly and unreservedly, shamelessly and hopelessly, with
       helpless abandon, their master.
       I was astonished at her for even the touch of the whip, her
       involuntary response to the Slaver's Caress, had not seemed
       to promise so much.
        She cried out suddenly as she found herself fully mine.
        Then she scarcely dared to move.
        "You are claimed, Slave Girl," I whispered to her.
       "I am not a slave girl," she whispered intensely. "I am not
       a slave girl."
       I could feel her nails in my arm. In her kiss I tasted blood,
       suddenly realizing that she had bitten me. Her head was
       back, her eyes closed, her lips open.
        "I am not a slave girl," she said.
        I whispered in her ear, "Pretty little slave girl."
        "I am not a slave girl!" she cried.
        "You will be soon," I told her.
        "Please, Tarl," she said, "do not make me a slave."
         "You sense that it can be done?" I asked.
        "Please," she said, "do not make me a slave."
         "Do we not have a wager?" I asked.
       She tried to laugh. "Let us forget the wager," said she.
       "Please, Tart, it was foolishness. Let us forget the wager?"
        "Do you acknowledge yourself my slave?" I inquired.
        "Never!" she hissed.
         "Then," said I, "lovely wench, the wager is not yet done."
       She struggled to escape me, but could not. Then, suddenly,
       as though startled, she would not move.
        She looked at me.
        "It soon begins," I told her.
         "I sense it," she said, "I sense it."
  She did not move but I felt the cut of her nails in my
  arms.                                           |
  "Can there be more?" she wept.
  "It soon begins," I told her.
  "I'm frightened," she wept.
  "Do not be frightened," I told her.
  "I feel owned," she whispered.
  "You are," I said.
  "No," she said. "No."
  "Do not be frightened," I told her.
  "You must let me go," she said.
  "It soon begins," I told her.
  "Please let me go," she whispered. "Please"
  "On Gor," I said, "it is said that a woman who wears a
  collar can be only a woman."
  She looked at me angrily.
  "And you, lovely Elizabeth," said I, "wear a collar."
  She turned her head to one side, helpless, angry, tears in
  her eyes.                                       ~
  She did not move, and then suddenly I felt the cut of her  A
  nails deep in my arms, and though her lips were open, her  r!
  teeth were clenched, her head was back, the eyes closed, her
  hair tangled under her and over her body, and then her eyes
  seemed surprised, startled, and her shoulders lifted a bit from r
  the rug, and she looked at me, and I could feel the beginning
  n her, the breathing of it and the blood of it, hers, in my
  own flesh swift and like fire in her beauty, mine, and knowing
  it was then the time, meeting her eyes fiercely, I said to her,
  with sudden contempt and savagery, following the common
  Gorean Rites of Submission, "Slave!" and she looked at me
  with horror and cried out "Nor" and half reared from the
  rug, wild, helpless, fierce as I intended, wanting to fight me,
  as I knew she would, wanting to slay me if it lay within her
  power, as I knew she would, and I permitted her to struggle
  and to bite and scratch and cry out and then I silenced her
  with the kiss of the master, and accepted the exquisite sur
  render which she had no choice but to give. "Slave," she
wept, "slave, slave, slave I am a slave"
   It was more than an Ahn later that she lay in my arms on
   the rug and looked up at me, tears in her eyes. "I know
  now," she said, "what it is to be the slave girl of a Master."
   I said nothing.
   "Though I am slave," she said, "yet for the first tinge in my
   life I am free."
          "For the first time in your life," I said, "you are a woman."
        "I love being a woman," she said. "I am happy I am a
        woman, Tarl Cabot, I am happy."
          "Do not forget," I said, "you are only a slave."
        She smiled and fingered her collar. "I am Tarl Cabot's
        girl," she said. j
          "My slave," I said.
          "Yes," she said, "your slave."
          I smiled.
        "You will not beat me too often will you, Master?" she
        asked.
          "We will see," I said.
          "I will strive to please you," she said.
          "I am pleased to hear it," I said.
          She lay on her back, her eyes open, looking at the top of,
         the wagon, at the hangings, the shadows thrown on the
         scarlet hides by the light of the fire bowl.
         "I am free," she said.
         I looked at her.
         She rolled over on her elbows. "It is strange," she said. "I
         am a slave girl. But I am free. I am free."
         "I must sleep," I said, rolling over.
         She kissed me on the shoulder. "Thank you," she said,
         "Tarl Cabot, for freeing me."
         I rolled over and seized her by the shoulders and pressed
         her back to the rug and she looked up laughing.
         "Enough of this nonsense about freedom," I said. "Do not
         forget that you are a slave." I took her nose ring between my
         thumb and forefinger.
         "Oh" she said.
         I lifted her head from the rug by the ring and her eyes
         smarted.
         "This is scarcely the way to show respect for a lady," said
         the girl.
         I tweaked the nose ring, and tears sprang into her eyes.
         "But then," she said, "I am only a slave girl."
         "And do not forget it," I admonished her.
         "No, no, Master," she said, smiling.
         "You do not sound to me sufficiently sincere," I said.
         "But I arm" she laughed.
          "I think in the morning," I said, "I will throw you to
        kaiila." ''
        "But where then will you find another slave as delectable
        as I?" she laughed.
   "Insolent wench!" I cried.
   "Oh!" she cried, as I gave the ring a playful tug. "Please!"
  With my left hand I jerked the collar against the back of
  her neck.
  "Do not forget," I said, "that on your throat you wear a
  collar of steel."
   "Your collar!" she said promptly.
  I slapped her thigh. "And," I said, "on your thigh you wear
  the brand of the four bask horns"
   "I'm yours," she said, "like a bosk!"
   "Oh," she cried, as I dropped her back to the rug.
  She looked up at me, her eyes mischievous. "I'm free," she
  said.
  "Apparently," I said, "you have not learned the lesson of
  the collar."
  She laughed merrily. Then she lifted her arms and put
  them about my neck, and lifted her lips to mine, tenderly,
  delicately. "This slave girl," she said, "has well learned the
  lesson of her collar."
   I laughed.
  She kissed me again. "Vella of Gor," said she, "loves
  master."
   "And what of Miss Elizabeth Cardwell?" I inquired.
   "That pretty little slave" said Elizabeth, scornfully.
   "Yes," I said, "the secretary."
  "She is not a secretary," said Elizabeth, "she is only a little
  Gorean slave."
   "Well," said I, "what of her?"
  "As you may have heard," whispered the girl, "Miss Eliza-
  beth Cardwell, the nasty little wench, was forced to yield
  herself as a slave girl to a master."
   "I had heard as much," I said.
   "What a cruel beast he was," said the girl.
   "What of her now?" I asked.
  "The little slave girl," said the girl scornfully, "is now
  madly in love with the beast."
   "What is his name?" I asked.
  "The same who won the surrender of proud Vella of
  Gor," said she.
   "And his name?" I asked.
   "Tart Cabot," she said.
  "He is a fortunate fellow," I remarked, "to have two such-
  women."
    "They are jealous of one another," confided the girl.
    "Insolent wench!" I cried.
   "Oh" she cried, as I gave the ring a playful tug. "Please"
  With my left hand I jerked the collar against the back of
  her neck.
  "Do not forget," I said, "that on your throat you wear a
  collar of steel."
   "Your collar!" she said promptly.
  I slapped her thigh. "And," I said, "on your thigh you wear
  the brand of the four bask hornet"
   "I'm yours," she said, "like a bosk."
   "Oh," she cried, as I dropped her back to the rug.
  She looked up at me, her eyes mischievous. "I'm free," she
  said.
  "Apparently," I said, "you have not learned the lesson of
  the collar."
  She laughed merrily. Then she lifted her arms and put
  them about my neck, and lifted her lips to mine, tenderly,
  delicately. "This slave girl," she said, "has well learned the
  lesson of her collar."
   I laughed.
  She kissed me again. "Vella of Gor," said she, 'doves
  master."
   "And what of Miss Elizabeth Cardwell?" I inquired.
   "That pretty little slaves" said Elizabeth, scornfully.
   "Yes," I said, "the secretary."
  "She is not a secretary," said Elizabeth, "she is only a little
  Gorean slave."
   "Well," said I, "what of her?"
  "As you may have heard," whispered the girl, "Miss Eliza-
  beth Cardwell, the nasty little wench, was forced to yield
  herself as a slave girl to a master."
   "I had heard as much," I said.
   "What a cruel beast he was," said the girl.
   "What of her now?" I asked.
  "The little slave girl," said the girl scornfully, "is now
  madly in love with the beast."
   "What is his name?" I asked.
  "The same who won the surrender of proud Vella of
  Gor," said she.
   "And his name?" I asked.
   "Tart Cabot," she said.
  "He is a fortunate fellow," I remarked, "to have two such-
  women."
    "They are jealous of one another," confided the girl.
          "Oh?" I asked.
        "Yes," she said, "each will try to please her master more
        than the other, that she will be his favorite."
          I kissed her.
          "I wonder who will be his favorite?" she asked.
        "Let them both try to please him," I suggested, "each
        more than the other."
        She looked at me reproachfully. "He is a cruel, cruel
        master," she said.
          "Doubtless," I admitted.
        For a long time we kissed and touched. And from time to
        time, during the night, each of the girls, Vella of Gor and the
        little barbarian, Miss Elizabeth Cardwell, begged, and were
        permitted, to serve the pleasure of their master. Yet he,
        unprecipitate and weighing matters carefully, still could not
        decide between them.
        It was well toward morning, and he was nearly asleep,
        when he felt them against him, their cheek pressed against his
        thigh. "Girls," mumbled he, "do not forget you wear my
        steel."
          "We will not forget," they said.
          And he felt their kiss.
          "We love you," said they, "Master."
        He decided, falling asleep, that he would keep them both
        slave for a few days, if only to teach them a lesson. Also, he
        reminded himself, it is only a fool who frees a slave girl.
In the dampness and darkness long before dawn the forces
 of Kamchak, crowding the streets of Turia in the vicinity of
 Saphrar's compound, waited silently, like dark shapes on the
 stones; here and there the glint of a weapon or accouterment
 could be made out ~ the fading light of one of the flying
 moons; someone coughed; there was a rustle of leather; I
 heard to one side the honing of a quiva, the tiny sound of a
 short bow being strung.
 Kamchak, Harold and I stood with several others on the
 roof of a building across from the compound.
 Behind the walls we could hear, now and then, a sentry
 calling his post, answering another.
 Kamchak stood in the half darkness, his palms on the wall
 running about the edge of the roof of the building on which
 we stood.
 More than an hour ago I had left the commander's wagon,
 being roused by one of the guards outside. As I had left
 Elizabeth Cardwell had awakened. We had said nothing, but
 I had gathered her into my arms and kissed her, then left the
 wagon.
 On the way to the compound I had met Harold and
 together we had eaten some dried bask meat- and drank
 water, from one of the commissary wagons attached to one
 of Hundreds in the city. As commanders we could eat where
 we chose.
 The tarns that Harold and I had stolen from Saphrar's
 keep several days ago had both been brought into the city
       and were nearby, for it was thought that such might be
       needed, if only to convey reports from one point to another.
       There were also, in the city, of course, hundreds of kaiila,
       though the main body of such mounts was outside the city,
       where game could be driven to them with greater ease.
       I heard someone chewing nearby and noted that Harold,
       who had thrust some strips of bask meat from the commis-
       sary wagon in his belt, was busily engaged, quiva in hand,
       with cutting and eating the meat.
       "It's nearly morning," he mumbled, the observation some-
       what blurred by the meat packed in his mouth.
        I nodded.
       I saw Kamchak leaning forward, his palms on the wall
       about the roof, staring at the compound. He seemed humped
       in the half darkness, short of neck, broad of shoulder. He
       hadn't moved in a quarter of an Ahn. He was waiting for the
       dawn.
       When I had left the wagon Elizabeth Cardwell, though she
       had said nothing, had been frightened. I remembered her
       eyes, and her lips, as they had trembled on mine. I had taken
       her arms from about my neck and turned away. I wondered
       if I would see her again.
       "My own recommendation," Harold was saying, 'would be
       first to fly my tarn cavalry over the walls, clearing them with
       thousands of arrows, and then, in a second wave, to fly
       dozens of ropes of warriors to the roofs of the main buildings,
       to seize them and burn the others.
        "But we have no tarn cavalry," I noted.
       'That is what is wrong with my recommendation," granted
       Harold, chewing.
       I closed my eyes briefly, and then looked back at the dim
       compound across the way.
        "No recommendation is perfect," said Harold.
         I turned to a commander of a Hundred, he who was in   .
       charge of the men I had trained with the crossbow. "Did
       tarns enter or leave the compound last night?" I asked.
        "No," said the man.
        - "Are you sure?" I asked.
       "There was moonlight," he said. "We saw nothing." He
       looked at me. "But,', he added, "there are, by my count
       some three or four tarns from before within the compound."
        "Do not permit them to escape," I said.
        "We shall try not to do so," he said.
       and were nearby, for it was thought that such might be
       needed, if only to convey reports from one point to another.
       There were also, in the city, of course, hundreds of kaiila,
       though the main body of such mounts was outside the city,
       where game could be driven to them with greater ease.
       I heard someone chewing nearby and noted that Harold,
       who had thrust some strips of bask meat from the commit
       sary wagon in his belt, was busily engaged, quiva in hand,
       with cutting and eating the meat.
       "It's nearly morning," he mumbled, the observation some-
       what blurred by the meat packed in his mouth.
        I nodded.
       I saw Kamchak leaning forward, his palms on the wall
       about the roof, staring at the compound. He seemed humped
       in the half darkness, short of neck, broad of shoulder. He
       hadn't moved in a quarter of an Ahn. He was waiting for the
       dawn.
       When I had left the wagon Elizabeth Cardwell, though she
       had said nothing, had been frightened. I remembered her
       eyes, and her lips, as they had trembled on mine. I had taken
       her arms from about my neck and turned away. I wondered
       if I would see her again.
       "My own recommendation," Harold was saying, "would be
       first to fly my tarn cavalry over the walls, clearing them with
       thousands of arrows, and then, in a second wave, to fly
       dozens of ropes of warriors to the roofs of the main buildings,
       to seize them and burn the others.
        "But we have no tarn cavalry," I noted.
       'Chat is what is wrong with my recommendation," granted
       Harold, chewing.
       I closed my eyes briefly, and then looked back at the dim
       compound across the way.
        "No recommendation is perfect," said Harold.
         I turned to a commander of a Hundred, he who was in   .
       charge of the men I had trained with the crossbow. "Did
       tarns enter or leave the compound last night?" I asked.
        "No," said the man.
        - "Are you sure?" I asked.
       "There was moonlight," he said. "We saw nothing." He
       looked at me. "But,', he added, "there are, by my count
       some three or four tarns from before within the compound."
        "Do not permit them to escape," I said.
        "We shall try not to do so," he said.
         Now, in the east, as on Earth, we could see a lightness in the sky. I seemed to be breathing very deeply.    |
  Kamchak still had not moved.
  I heard the rustling of men below in the streets, the
 checking of arms.
 "There is a tarn" cried one of the men on the roof.
 Very high in the sky, no more than a small speck, speeding
 toward the compound of Saphrar from the direction of the   Nil,
 tower I believed held by Ha-Keel, we saw a tarn.
 "Prepare to final" I cried.
 "No," said Kamchak, "let it enter."
 The men held their fire, and the tarn, almost at the center
of the compound, as far from our encircling positions as
 possible, suddenly plummeted downward, its wings high,
opening them only at the last minute to land on the top of
 the keep, beyond accurate crossbow range.
 "Saphrar may escape," I pointed out.
 "No," said Kamchak, "there is no escape for Saphrar."
 I said nothing.
 "His blood is mine," said Kamchak
 "Who is the rider?" I queried.
 "Ha-Keel, the mercenary," said Kamchak "He is coming
 to bargain with Saphrar, but I can better whatever terms he
 is offered for I have all the gold and women of Turia, and
by nightfall I will have the private hordes of Saphrar him
 self."
"Beware," I warned, "the tarnsmen of Ha-Keel they
might yet turn the brunt of battle against you."
  Kamchak did not respond.
"The thousand tarnsmen of Ha-Keel," said Harold, "left
before dawn for Port Karl Their tower is abandoned."
  "But why?" I demanded.
"They were well paid," said Harold, "with Turian gold of
which substance we have a great deal."
  "Then Saphrar is alone," I said.
  "More alone than he knows," remarked Harold.
  "What do you mean?" I asked.
     "You will see," he said.
It was now clearly light in the east, and I could see the ,
faces of men below me, some of them carrying rope ladders
 with metal hooks at the ends, others scaling ladders.
 It seemed to me that a full storming of the compound
 would take place within the Ahn.
The House of Saphrar was encircled literally by thousands
       of warriors.
       We would outnumber the desperate defenders of his walls
       perhaps by twenty to one. The fighting would be fierce, but it
       did not seem that the outcome would be in doubt, even from
       the beginning particularly now that the tarnsmen of Ha-
       Keel had left the city, the saddle packs of their tarns bulging
       with Turian gold.
       Then Kamchak spoke again. "I have waited long for the
       blood of Saphrar of Turia," he said. He lifted his hand and
       one who stood near him climbed to the wall of the roof and
       blew a long blast on a bask horn.
       I thought this might signal the beginning of the storming of
       the compound, but none of the men below moved.
       Rather, to my astonishment, a gate of the compound itself
       opened and wary men-at-arms, their weapons ready, each
       carrying a cloth sack, emerged. They filed before us in the
       street below, each under the contemptuous eyes of the war-
       riors of the Wagon Peoples, each in turn going to a long
       table whereon were placed many pairs of scales, and each at
       that table was weighed out four Gorean stone of gold, about
       six Barth pounds, which he put in his cloth sack and scurried
       away, through an avenue opened for him between the war-
       riors. They would be escorted beyond the city. Four Gorean
       stone of gold is a fortune.
       I was utterly startled, overcome. I was shaking. Hundreds
       upon hundreds of men must have passed thus before us.
         "I, I do not understand," I stammered to Kamchak.
       He did not turn to face me, but continued to stare at the
       compound. "Let Saphrar of Turia die by gold," he said.
       Only then did I understand with horror the depth of
       Kamchak's hatred of Saphrar of Turia.
       Man by man, stone by stone of gold. Saphrar was dying,
       his walls and defenses being taken grain by grain from him,
       slipping away. His gold could not buy him the hearts of men.
       Kamchak, in his Tuchuk cruelty, would stand quietly to one
       side and, coin by coin, bit by bit, buy Saphrar of Turia.
       Once or twice I heard swords ringing from within the
       walls, as perhaps some men, loyal to Saphrar, or to their
       codes, attempted to prevent their fellows from leaving the
       compound, but I gather, judging from the continued exodus
       from the walls, that those who were this loyal were scattered
       and few in number. Indeed, some who might have fought for
       Saphrar, seeing their fellows deserting in such numbers, un
  doubtedly realized their own imminent danger, now increased
  a hundred fold, and hastened to join the deserters. I even saw
  some slaves leaving the compound, and these, though they
  were slave, were given the four stone of gold as well, perhaps
  the more to insult those free men who had accepted the
  babes of Tuchuks. I gathered that Saphrar, in the years he
  had built his power in Tuna, had for his own purposes
  gathered such men about him, and now he would pay the
  pace ---with his own life.
  Kamchak's face was impassive.
  At last, perhaps an Ahn after daylight, no more men came
  from the compound and the gates were left open.
  Kamchak then descended from the roof and mounted his
  kaiila. Slowly, at a walk, he rode toward the main gate of the
  compound. Harold and I, on foot, accompanied him. Behind
  us came several warriors. On Kamchak's right there walked a
  master of sleen, who held two of the vicious, sinuous beasts
  in check by chain leashes.
  About the pommel of Kamchak's saddle were tied several
  bags of gold, each weighed out to four stone. And following
  him, among the warriors, were several Turian slaves, dad in
  chains and the Kes, among them Kamras, Champion of
  Turia, and Phanius Turmus, the Turian Ubar, all of whom
  carried large pans filled with sacks of gold.
  Inside the gate of the compound I saw that it seemed
  deserted, the walls emptied of defenders. The clear ground
  between the walls and the first buildings was similarly empty,
  though here and there I saw some litter, pieces of boxes,
  broken arrows, patches of cloth.
  Kamchak stopped inside the compound and looked about,
  his dark, fierce eyes looking from building to building, examin
  ing with great care the roof tops and windows.
  Then he gently moved his kaiila toward the main portal. I
  caught sight of two warriors standing before it, ready to
  defend it. Behind them I was startled to see suddenly a
  currying figure in white and gold, Saphrar of Turia. Then he
  stood back from the door, holding something large in his
  arms, wrapped in purple cloth.
  The two men prepared to defend the portal.
  Kamchak stopped the kaiila.
  Behind me I heard hundreds of ladders and grappling
  hooks strike against the wall, and, turning, I saw, climbing
  over the walls, as well as entering through the open gates,
  hundreds and hundreds of men, until the walls were swarm-
       ing with Tuchuks, and others of the Wagon Peoples. Then,
       on the walls and within the compound, they stood, not mov-
       ing.
       Astride his kailla Kamchak announced himself. "Kamchak
       of the Tuchuks, whose father Kutaituchik was slain by
       Saphrar of Turia, cads upon Saphrar of Turia."
       "Strike him with your spears," screamed Saphrar from
       within the doorway.
         The two defenders hesitated.
       "Give greetings to Saphrar of Turia from Kamchak of the
       Tuchuks," said Kamchak calmly.
       One of the guards turned woodenly. "Kamchak of the
       Tuchuks ' he said, "gives greetings to Saphrar of Turia."
         "Kill him!" screamed Saphrar. "Kill him!"
       Silently a dozen Tuchuk bowmen, with the short horn
       bow, stood afoot before Kamchak's Kaiila, their arrows trained
       on the hearts of the two guards.
       Kamchak untied two of the sacks of gold from the pom-
       mel of his saddle. He threw one to one side for one guard,
       and the other to the other side for the other guard.
         "Fight!" cried Saphrar.
       The two guards broke from before the door, each picking
       up his sack of gold and fled through the Tuchuks.
       "Sleen!" cried Saphrar, and turned and ran deeper within
       the house.
       Not hurrying Kamchak walked his kaiila up the stairs of
       the house and, on kaiilaback, entered the main hall of the
       House of Saphrar.
       In the main had he looked about and then, Harold and I
       following, and the man with the two Sleen, and the slaves
       with gold, and his archers and other men, he began to walk
       his kaiila up the broad marble stairs, following the terrified
       Saphrar of Turia.
       Again and again we encountered guards within the House
       but each time, when Saphrar took refuge behind them,
       Kamchak would throw gold to them and they would dissipate
       and Saphrar, panting, puffing, clutching the large, purple-
       wrapped object in his arms, would on his short legs hurry off
       again. He would lock doors behind himself but they were
       forced open. He would throw furniture down stairs towards
       us, but we would step around it. Our pursuit carried us from
       room to room, through hall after hall, in the great house of
       Saphrar of Turia. We passed through the banquet hall, where
       long before we had been entertained by the fleeing merchant.
We passed through kitchens and galleries, even through the
private compartments of Saphrar himself, where we saw the
multitudinous robes and sandals of the merchant,` each
worked predominantly in white and gold, though often mixed
with hundreds of other colors. In his own compartments the
pursuit had seemed to end, for it seemed Saphrar had disap
peered, but Kamchak did not show the least irritation or annoyance.
He dismounted and picked up a lounging garment from
He vast sleeping platform in the room, holding it to the noses
of the two sleen. "Hunt," said Kamchak.
The two sleen seemed to drink in the scent of the robe and
then they began to tremble, and the claws on their wide, soft
feet emerged and retracted, and their heads lifted and began
to sway from side to side. As one animal they turned and
pulled their keeper by the chain leashes to what appeared to
be a solid wall, where they rose on their back two legs and
set their other four legs against it, snarling, whimpering.
"Break through the wall," said Kamchak. He would not   |
bother to search for the button or lever that might open the
panel.  In a few moments the wall had been shattered, revealing
the dark passage beyond.
"Bring lamps and torches," said Kamchak.
Kamchak now gave his kaiila to a subordinate and, on
foot, carrying torch and quiva, began to prowl down the
passage, beside him the two snarling sleen, behind him
Harold and I, and the rest of his men, several with torches,
even the slaves with gold. Guided by the sleen we had no
difficulty in following the track of Saphrar through the pas-
aage, though often it branched variously. The passage was, on
the whole dark, but where it branched there was often set a
mall, burning tharlarion oil lamp. I supposed Saphrar of
Curia must have carried lamp or torch, or perhaps that he
knew the passage by heart.
At one point Kamchak stopped and called for planks, The
door of the passage had been dropped, by the release of a
bolt, for an area of its width and for a length of about twelve
feet. Harold tossed a pebble into the opening and it took
about ten Ihn before we heard it strike water far below.
Kamchak did not seem disturbed at the wait, but sat like a
rock, cross-legged before the opening, looking across it, until
       planks were brought, and then he, and the Sleen, were the
       first to cross.
       Another time he warned us back and called for a lance,
       with which he tripped a wire in the passage. Four spears,
       with bronze heads, suddenly burst across the passage, emerg-
       ing from circular openings, their tips striking into other small
       openings across the passage. Kamchak, with his boot, broke
       the spear shafts and we moved between them.
       At last we emerged into a large audience room, with a
       domed ceiling, heavily carpeted and hung with tapestries. I
       recognized it immediately, for it was the room in which
       Harold and I had been brought prisoner before Saphrar of
       Turia.
         In the room there were four persons.
       Sitting in the place of honor, cross-legged, calm, on the
       merchant's cushions, on his personal dais, applying a bit of
       oil to the blade of his sword, sat the lean, scarred Ha-Keel,
       once of Ar, now a mercenary tarnsman of squalid, malignant
       Port Karl
       On the floor below the dais were Saphrar of Turia, frantic,
       clutching the purple-wrapped object, and the Paravaci, he
       who still wore the hood of the Clan of Torturers, he who
       would have been my assassin, he who had been with Saphrar
       of Turia when I had entered the Yellow Pool of Turia.
       I heard Harold cry out with delight at the sight of the
       fellow, and the man turned to face us, a quiva in his hand.
       Beneath his black mask I wager he turned white at the sight
       of Harold of the Tuchuks. I could sense him tremble.
       The other man with them was a young man, dark-haired
       and eyed, a simple man-at-arms, perhaps not more than
       twenty. He wore the scarlet of a warrior. He carried a short
       sword and stood between us and the others.
       Kamchak regarded him, and I thought with the merest
       trace of amusement.
       "Do not interfere, Lad," said he, quietly. "There is the
       business of men afoot in this place."
       "Stand back, Tuchuk," cried the young man. He held his
       sword ready.
       Kamchak signaled for a bag of gold, and Phanius Turmus
       was kicked forward, and from a large, bronze pan which he
       carried, Kamchak removed a sack of gold and threw it to
       one side.
       The young man did not move from his place, but set
       himself to take the charge of the Tuchuks.
 Kamchak threw another sack of gold to his feet, and then
 another.
 "I am a warrior," said the young man proudly.
Kamchak signaled his archers and they came forward,
their arrows trained on the young man.
He then threw, one after another, a dozen bags of gold to
the floor.
"Save your gold, Tuchuk sleep," said the young man. "I
am a warrior and I know my codes."
 "As you wish," said Kamchak and raised his hand to signal
 the archers.                                   ;`
 "Do not" I cried.
 In that moment, uttering the Turian war cry, the young
man rushed forward with his sword on Kamchak and the
dozen arrows flew simultaneously, striking him a dozen times,
turning him twice. Yet did he try still to stagger forward and
then another arrow and another pierced his body until he fell
at Kamchak's feet.
To my astonishment I saw that not one of the arrows had
penetrated his torso or head or abdomen, but that each had
struck only an arm or leg.
 It had been no accident.
Kamchak turned the young man over with his boot. "Be a
Tuchuk," he said.
"Never," wept the young man in pain, between clenched
teeth. "Never, Tuchuk sleen, never!"
Kamchak turned to certain of the warriors with him.
"Bind his wounds," he said. "See that he lives. When he can
ride teach him the saddle of the kaiila, the quiva, the bow
and lance Put him in the leather of a Tuchuk. We have need
of such men among the wagons."
 I saw the astonished eyes of the young man regarding Kamchak, and then he was carried away.
"In time," said Kamchak, "that boy will command a Thou-
sand."
Then Kamchak lifted his head and regarded the other
three men, seated Ha-Keel, calm with his sword, and the
frantic Saphrar of Turia, and the tall Paravaci, with the
quiva.
 "Mine is the Paravaci!" cried Harold.
The man turned angrily to face him, but he did not
advance, nor hurl his quiva.
 Harold leaped forward. "Let us fight!" he cried.
       At a gesture from Kamchak Harold stepped back, angry, a
       quiva in his hand.
       The two sleen were snarling and pulling at their collar.
       The tawny hair hanging from their jaws was flecked with the
       foam of their agitation. Their eyes blazed. The claws when
       they emerged and retracted and emerged again tore at the
       rug.
       "Do not approach!" cried Saphrar, "or I shall destroy the
       golden sphere!" He tore away the purple cloth that had
       enfolded the golden sphere and then lifted it high over his
       head. My heart stopped for the instant. I put out my hand, to
       touch Kamchak's leather sleeve.
         "He must not," I said, "he must not."
         "Why not?" asked Kamchak. "It is worthless."
         "Stand back!" screamed Saphrar.
         "You do not understand!" I cried to Kamchak.
       I saw Saphrar's eyes gleam. "Listen to the Koroban!" he
       said. "He knows! He knows!"
       "Does it truly make a difference," asked Kamchak of me,
       "whether or not he shatters the sphere?"
       "Yes," I said, "there is nothing more valuable on all
       Gor it is perhaps worth the planet itself."
       "Listen to him!" screamed Saphrar. "If you approach I
       shall destroy this!"
         "No harm must come to it," I begged Kamchak.
         "Why?" asked Kamchak.
         I was silent, not knowing how to say what had to be said.
       Kamchak regarded Saphrar. "What is it that you hold?" he
       asked.
         "The golden sphere!" cried Saphrar.
         "But what is the golden sphere?" queried Kamchak.
       "I do not know," said Saphrar, "but I know that there are
       men who will pay half the wealth of Gor for this"
       "I," said Kamchak, "would not give a copper tarn disk for
       it."
         "Listen to the Koroban!" cried Saphrar.
         "It must not be destroyed," I said.
         "Why?" asked Kamchak.
       "Because," I said, "It is the last seed of Priest-Kings an
       egg a child the hope of Priest-Kings, to them all---
       everything, the world, the universe."
       The men murmured with surprise about me. Saphrar's eyes
       seemed to pop. Ha-Keel looked up, suddenly, seeming to forget his sword and its oiling. The Paravaci regarded Saphrar.
 "I think not," said Kamchak. "I think rather it is worth-
 less."
   "No, Kamchak," I said, "please."
 "It was for the golden sphere, was it not," asked
 Kamchak, "that you came to the Wagon Peoples?"
 "Yes," I said, "it was." I recalled our conversation in the
 wagon of Kutaituchik.
  The men about us shifted, some of them angrily.
  'You would have stolen it?" asked Kamchak.
  "Yes," I said. "I would have."
  "As Saphrar did?" asked Kamchak.
  "I would not have slain Kutaituchik," I said.
  "Why would you steal it?" asked Kamchak.
  "To return it to the Sardar," I said.
  "Not to keep it for yourself, nor for riches?"
  "No," I said, "not for that."
 "I believe you," said Kamchak. He looked at me. "We
 knew that in time someone would come from the Sardar. We
did not know that you would be the one."
"Nor did I," I said.
 Kamchak regarded the merchant. "Is it your intention to
 buy your life with the golden sphere?"
 - "If necessary," said Saphrar, "yes"
  "But I do not want it," said Kamchak. "It is you I want."
  Saphrar blanched and held the sphere again over his head.
 I was relieved to see that Kamchak signaled his bowmen
 not to fire. He then waved them, and the others, with the
 exception of Harold and myself, and the Sleen keeper and his
 animals, back several yards.
  "That is better," wheezed Saphrar.
  'Sheath your weapons," ordered the Paravaci.
  We did so.
 "Go back with your men" cried Saphrar, backing away
 from us a step. "I will shatter the golden sphere!"
 Slowly Kamchak, and Harold and I, and the sleen keeper,
 dragging the two sleen, walked backwards. The animals raged
 against the chain leashes, maddened as they were drawn
 farther from Saphrar, their prey.
 The Paravaci turned to Ha-Keel, who had now resheathed
 his sword and stood up. Ha-Keel stretched and blinked once.
"You have a tarn," the Paravaci said. "Take me with you. I
can give you half the riches of the Paravaci Bosk and gold
and women and wagons!"
"I would suppose," said Ha-Keel, "that all that you have is
        not worth so much as the golden sphere and that is Saphrar
        of Turia's."
          "You cannot leave me here" cried the Paravaci.
          'You are outbid for my services," yawned Ha-Keel.
        The Paravaci's eyes were white in the black hood and his
        head turned wildly to regard the Tuchuks clustered in the far
        end of the room.
        "Then it will be miner" he cried and raced to Saphrar,
        trying to seize the sphere.
        "Miner Mine" screamed Saphrar, trying to retain the
        sphere.
          Ha-Keel looked on, with interest.
        I would have rushed forward, but Kamchak's hand
        reached out and touched my arm, restraining me.
          "No harm must come to the golden sphere!" I cried.
        The Paravaci was much stronger than the fat, tiny mer-
        chant and he soon had his hands well on the sphere and west
        tearing it out of the smaller man's clutching hands. Saphrar
        was screaming insanely and then, to my astonishment, he bit
        the Paravaci's forearm, sinking the two golden upper canine
        teeth into the hooded man's flesh. The Paravaci suddenly
        cried out in uncanny fear and shuddered and, to my horror,
        the golden sphere, which he had succeeded in wresting from
        Saphrar, was thrown a dozen feet across the room, and
        shattered on the floor.
        A cry of horror escaped my lips and I rushed forward.
        Tears burst from my eyes. I could not restrain a moan as I
        fell to my knees beside the shattered fragments of the egg. It
        was done, gone, ended My mission had failed! The Priest-
        Kings would diet This world, and perhaps my other, dear
        Earth, would now fall to the mysterious Others, whoever or
        whatever they might be. It was done, gone, ended, dead,
        dead, hopeless, gone, dead.
        I was scarcely aware of the brief whimpering of the
        Paravaci as, twisting and turning on the rug, biting at it,
        holding his arm, his flesh turning orange from ost venom, he
        writhed and died.
       Kamchak walked to him and tore away the mask. I saw
       the contorted, now-orange, twisted, agonized face. Already it
       was like colored paper and peeling, as though lit and burned
       from the inside. There were drops of blood and sweat on it.
    I heard Harold say, "It is Tolnus."
  "Of course," said Kamchak. "It had to have been the Ubar
  of the Paravaci for who else could have sent their riders
  against the Tuchuk wagons, who else could have promised a
  mercenary tarnsman half the bask and gold and women and
  wagons of the Paravaci?"
  I was only dimly aware of their conversation. I recalled
  Tolnus, for he had been one of the four Ubars of the Wagon
  Peoples, whom I, unknowing, had met when first I came to
  the Plains of Turia, to the Land of the Wagon Peoples.
  Kamchak bent to the figure and, opening his garments,
  tore from his neck the almost priceless collar of jewels which
  the man had worn.
  He threw this to one of his men. "Give this to the Parava-
  ci," he said, "that they may buy back some of their bask and
  women from the Kataii and the Kassars."
  I was only partly cognizant of these things, for I was
  overcome with grief, kneeling in Saphrar's audience hall
  before the shards of the shattered golden sphere.
  I was conscious of Kamchak now standing near to me, and
  behind him Harold.
    Unabashed I wept.
  It was not only that I had failed, that what I had fought
  for had now vanished, become ashes not only that the war
  of Priest-Kings, in which I had played a prominent part,
  fought long before over such matters, had now become
  fruitless, meaningless that my friend Misk's life and its
  purpose would now be shattered even that this world and
  perhaps Earth itself might now, undefended, fall in time to
  the mysterious Others but that what lay in the egg itself,
  the innocent victim of intrigues which had lasted centuries
  and might perhaps being worlds into conflict, was dead it
  had done nothing to warrant such a fate; the child, so to
  speak, of Priest-Kings, what could have become the Mother,
  was now dead.
   I shook with sobs, not caring.
  I heard, vaguely, someone say, "Saphrar and Ha-Keel have
  fled.
  Near me Kamchak said, quietly, "Release the sleen. Let
  them hunt."
  I heard the chains loosened and the two sleen bounded
  from the room, eyes blazing.
   I would not have cared to have been Saphrar of Turia.
"Be strong, Warrior of Ko-ro-ba," said Kamchak, kindly.
"You do not understand, my friend," I wept, "you do not
         understand."
         The Tuchuks stood about, in their black leather. The sleen
         keeper stood nearby, the chain leashes loose in his hands. In
         the background there stood the slaves with their pans of
         gold.
         I became aware of a strong odor, of rottenness, exuding
         from the shattered thing which lay before me.
         "It smells," Harold was saying. He knelt down near the
         fragments, disgust on his face, fingering the stiff, leathery
         ruptured egg, some of the golden pieces broken from it. He
         was rubbing one of them between his thumb and forefinger.
          My head down, I cared for nothing.
         "Have you examined the golden sphere carefully?"
         Kamchak was asking.
          "I never had the opportunity,' I said.
         "You might do so now," said Kamchak.
          I shook my head negatively.
         "Look," said Harold, thrusting his hand under my face. I
         saw that his thumb and forefinger were marked with a golden
         stain.
          I gazed at his hand, not comprehending.
          "It is dye," he said.
          "Dye?" I asked.
        Harold got up and went to the shattered, stiff shard" of the
        egg. From it, wet, wrinkled. rotted, dead for perhaps months
        or years, he drew forth the body of an unborn tharlarion.
        "I told you," said Kamchak, kindly, "the egg was worth
        less."
         I staggered to my feet, standing now and looking down at
         the shattered fragments of the egg. I stooped down and
         picked up one of the stiff shards and rubbed it, seeing the
         golden stain now left on my fingertips.
         "It is not the egg of Priest-Kings," said Kamchak. "Do you
         truly think we would permit enemies to know the wherea-
         bouts of such a thing?"
          I looked at Kamchak, tears in my eyes.
         Suddenly, far off, we heard a weird scream, high, waver-
         ing, and the shrill howls of frustrated sleen.
          "It is ended," said Kamchak. "It is ended."
         He turned in the direction from which the scream had
         come. Slowly, not hurrying, in his boots he tramped across
         the rug, toward the sound. He stopped once beside the
         twisted, hideous body of Tolnw of the Paravaci. "it is too
  bad," he said, "I would have preferred to stake him out In
  the path of the bask." Then, saying no more, Kamchak, the
  rest of us following, left the room, guiding ourselves by the
  distant, frustrated howls of disappointed Sleen.
  We came together to the brink of the Yellow Pool of
  Turia. At its marbled edge, hissing and quivering with rage,
  throwing their heads now and again upward and howling in
  frustrated fury were the two, tawny hunting sleen, their
  maddened round eyes blazing on the pathetic figure of
  Saphrar of Turia, blubbering and whimpering, sobbing,
  reaching out, his fingers scratching the air as though he
  would climb it, for the graceful, decorative vines that hung
  above the pool, more than twenty feet above his head.
  He struggled to move in the glistening, resprung, sparkling
  substance of the Yellow Pool, but could not change his place.
  The fat hands with the scarlet fingernails seemed suddenly to
  be drawn and thin, clutching. The merchant was covered
  with sweat. He was surrounded by the luminous, white
  spheres that floated under the surface about him, perhaps
  watching, perhaps somehow recording his position in virtue
  of pressure waves in the medium. The golden droplets which
  Saphrar wore in place of eyebrows fed unnoticed into the
  fluid that humped itself thickening itself about him. Beneath
  the surface we could see places where his robes had been
  eaten away and the skin was turning white beneath the
  surface, the juices of the pool etching their way into his body,
  taking its protein and nutriment into its own, digesting it.
  Saphrar took a step deeper into the pool and the pool
  permitted this, and he now stood with the fluids level with his
  chest
    "Lower the vines!" begged Saphrar.
    No one moved.
  Saphrar threw back his head like a dog and howled in
  pain. He began to scratch and tear at his body, as if mad.
  Len, tears bursting from his eyes, he held out his hands to
  Kamchak of the Tuchuks.
    "Please" he cried.
    "Remember Kutaituchik," said Kamchak.
  Saphrar screamed in agony and moving beneath the yellow
  glistening surface of the pool I saw several of the filamentous
  fibers encircle his legs and begin to draw him deeper into the
  pool and beneath the surface.
   Then Saphrar, merchant of Turia, struggled, pounding
   against the caked material near to him, to prevent his being
       drawn under. The eyes were bulging perhaps a quarter of an
       inch from the little round head and the mouth, with its two
       golden teeth, now emptied of ost venom, seemed to be
       screaming but there was no sound.
       "The egg," Kamchak informed him, "was the egg of a
       tharlarion it was worthless."
       The fluid now had reached Saphrar's chin and his head was
       back to try and keep his nose and mouth over the surface.
       His head shook with horror.
       "Please!" he cried once more, the syllable lost in the
       bubbling yellow mass that reached into his mouth.
       "Remember Kutaituchik," said Kamchak, and the filament-
       tous fibers about the merchant's legs and ankles drew him
       slowly downward. Some bubbles broke the surface. Then the
       merchant's hands, still extended as though to grasp the vines
       overhead, with their scarlet fingernails, the robes eaten away
       from the flesh, disappeared beneath the sparkling, glistening
       surface.
       We stood silently there for a time, until Kamchak saw
       small, white bones, like bleached driftwood, rocking on the
       sparkling, now watery surface, being moved bit by bit, almost
       as if by tides, to the edge of the pool, where I gathered
       attendants would normally collect and discard them.
         "Bring a torch," said Kamchak.
       He looked down into the sparkling, glistening living fluid of
       the Yellow Pool of Turia.
       "It was Saphrar of Turia," said Kamchak to me, "who first
       introduced Kutaituchik to the strings of kanda." He added,
       'it was twice he killed my father."
       The torch was brought, and the pool seemed to discharge
       its vapor more rapidly, and the fluids began to churn, and
       draw away from our edge of the pool. The yellows of the
       pool began to flicker and the filamentous fibers began to
       writhe, and the spheres of different colors beneath the sur-
       face began to turn and oscillate, and dart in one direction
       and then the other.
       Kamchak took the torch and with his right hand, in a long
       arc, flung it to the center of the pool.
       Suddenly like an explosion and conflagration the pool
       erupted into flames and Kamchak and I and Harold and the
       others shielded our faces and eyes and withdrew before the
       fury of the fire. The pool began to roar and hiss and bubble
       and scatter parts of itself, flaming, into the air and again to
       the walls. Even the vines caught fire. The pool then at
       drawn under. The eyes were bulging perhaps a quarter of an
       inch from the little round head and the mouth, with its two
       golden teeth, now emptied of ost venom, seemed to be
       screaming but there was no sound.
              It tempted to desiccate itself and retreat into its hardened
 shell-like condition but the fire within the closing shell burst it
 apart and open and then it was again like a lake of burning
 oil, with portions of the shell tossed like flaming chips upon it
 For better than an hour it burned and then the basin of
 the pool, now black, in places the marble fused and melted,
 was empty, save for smears of carbon and grease, and some
 cracked, blackened bones, and some drops of melted gold,
 what had been left perhaps of the golden drops which
 Saphrar of Turia had worn over his eyes, and the two golden
 teeth, which hall once held the venom of an ost.
 "Kutaituchik is avenged," said Kamchak, and turned from
 the room.
 Harold and I, and the others followed him.
 Outside the compound of Saphrar, which was now burn-
 ing, we mounted kaiila to return to the wagons outside the
  walls.
 A man approached Kamchak. "The tarnsman," he said,
 "escaped." He added, "As you said, we did not fire on him
 for he did not have with him the merchant, Saphrar of
 Turia."
 Kamchak nodded. "I have no quarrel with Ha-Reel, the
 mercenary," he said. Then Kamchak looked at me. "You,
 however," he said, "now that he knows of the stakes in these
 games, may meet him again. He draws his sword only in the
 name of gold, but I expect that now, Saphrar dead, those
 who employed the merchant may need new agents for their
 work and that they will pay the price of a sword such as
 that of Ha-keel" Kamchak grinned at me, the first time
 since the death of Kutaituchik. "It is said," remarked
 Kamchak, "that the sword of Ha-Keel is scarcely less swift
 and cunning than that of Pa-Kur, the Master of Assassin"
   "Pa-Kur is dead," I said. "He died in the siege of Ar."
   "Was the body recovered?" asked Kamchak.
   "No," I said.
  Kamchak smiled. "I think, Tart Cabot," he said. "you
  would never make a Tuchuk."
    'Why is that?" I asked.
   "You are too innocent," he said, "too trusting."
  "Long ago," said Harold, nearby, "I gave up expecting
  more of a Koroban."
   I smiled. "Pa-Kur," I said, "defeated in personal combat
     on the high roof of the Cylinder of Justice in Ar, turned and
     to avoid capture threw himself over the ledge. I do not think
     he could fly."
     "Was the body recovered?" Kamchak asked again.
     "No," I said. "But what does it matter?"
     "It would matter to a Tuchuk," said Kamchak.
     "You Tuchuks are indeed a suspicion lot," I remarked.
     "What would have happened to the body?" asked Harold,
     and it seemed he was serious.
      "I-suppose," I said, "it was torn to pieces by the crowds
     below or lost with the other dead. Many things could have
     happened to it."
     "It seems then," said Kamchak, "that he is dead."
     "Surely," I said.
     "Let us hope so," said Kamchak, "For your sake."
     We turned the kaiila from the courtyard of the burning
    House of Saphrar and, abreast, rode from that place. We
rode without speaking but Kamchak, for the first time in
     weeks, whistled a tune. Once he turned to Harold. "I think in
     a few days we might hunt tumits," he remarked.
     "I would enjoy that," remarked Harold.
     "Perhaps you will join us?" inquired Kamchak.
     "I think," I said, "I shall leave the Wagons soon for I
        have failed in my mission on behalf of Priest-Kings."
     "What mission is that?" inquired Kamchak innocently.
       'No find the last egg of Priest-Kings," I said, perhaps
     irritably, "and to return it to the Sardar."
    'Why do Priest-Kings not do their own errands?" asked
         Harold.
        'Whey cannot stand the sun," I said. "They are not as
   Men and if men saw them they might fear and try to kill
         them the egg might be destroyed.
          "Someday," said Harold, "you must speak to me of Priest
          Kings."
     "Very well," I agreed.
    "I thought you might be the one," said Kamchak.
            "What one?" I asked.
         "The one that the two men who brought the sphere told
       me might come one day to claim it."
    "The two men," I said, "are dead their cities warred
       upon one another and in battle they slew one another."
      "They seemed to me fine warriors," said Kamchak. "I am
       sorry to hear it."
       "When did they come to the wagons?" I asked.
    "As recently as two years ago," he said.
    "They gave you the egg?" I asked.
  "Yes," he said, "to keep for Priest-Kings." He added, "It
  was wise of them, for the Wagon Peoples are among the
  farthest and most fierce of the Goreans, living free hundreds
  of pasangs from all cities, save Turia."
    "Do you know where the egg is now?" I asked.
    "Of course," he said.
  I began to shake in the saddle of the kailla, trembling. The
  reins moved in my hands and the beast shifted nervously.
    I reined in the kailla.
  "Do not tell me where it Is," I said, "or I should feel
  bound to attempt to seize it and take it to the Sardar."
  "But are you not he who is to come from Priest-Kings to
  claim the egg?" inquired Kamchak.
    "I am he," I said.
  "Then why would you wish to seize it and carry it away?"
  he asked.
  "I have no way to prove that I come from Priest-Kings," I
  said. "Why would you believe me?"
    "Because," said Kamchak, "I have come to know you."
    I said nothing.
  "I have watched you carefully, Tarl Cabot of the City of
  Ko-ro-ba," said he, Kamchak of the Tuchuks. "Once you
  "pared my life, and we held grass and earth together, and
  from that time, even had you been outlaw and knave, I
  would have died for you, but still, of course, I could not give
  you the egg. Then you went with Harold to the city, and so I
  knew that to seize the egg against such overwhelming odds
  you were ready to give your life. Such a venture would not in
  all likelihood have been attempted by one who labored only
  for gold. That taught me that it was indeed probable that you
  were he chosen by Priest-Kings to come for the egg."
   "That is why," I asked, "you let me go to Turia though
   you knew the Golden Sphere was worthless"
    "Yes," said Kamchak, "that is why."
   "And why, after that," I asked, "did you not give me the
   egg?"
    Kamchak smiled. "I needed only one last thing," said he,
    Tarl Cabot."
     "And what was that?" I asked.
   "To know that you wanted the egg for Priest-Kings alone,
   and not for yourself." Kamchak put out his hand and
   touched my arm. "That is why," he said, "I wanted the
        golden sphere shattered. I would have done it myself had it
        not been broken, to see what you would have done, to see if
        you would have been enraged at your loss, or if you would
        have been overcome with grief, on behalf of Priest-Kings."
        Kamchak smiled gently. "When you wept," he said, "I knew
        then that you cared for it, and for Priest-Kings that you
        had truly come for the egg and that you wanted it for
        them and not for yourself."
          I looked at him, dumbfounded.
         "forgive me," he said, "if I am cruel for I am a Tuchuk,
         but though I care much for you I kind to know the truth of
         these mattes."
         "No forgiveness is necessary," I said. "In your place, I
         think I might well have done the same thing."
          Kamchak's hand closed on mine and we clasped hands.
          'Where is the egg?" I asked.
          "Where would you think to find it?" he asked.
         "I don't know," I said. "If I did not know better, I would
         expect to have found it in the wagon of Kutaituchik the
         wagon of the Ubar of the Tuchuks."
         "I approve of your conjecture," he said, "but Kutaituchik,
         as you know, was not the Ubar of the Tuchuks."
           I gazed at him.
          "I am Ubar of the Tuchuks," he said.
          "You mean" I said.
         "Yes," said Kamchak, "the egg has been in my wagon for
         two years."
           "But I lived in your wagon for months!" I cried.
           "Did you not see the egg?" he asked.
           'No," I said. "It must have been marvelously concealed."
           "What does the egg look like?" he asked.
         I sat still on the back of the kaiila. "I don't know," I
         said.
         "You thought, perhaps," he asked, "it would be golden and
         spherical?"
           "Yes," I said, "I did."
         "It was for such a reason," he said, "that we Tuchuks dyed
         the egg of a tharlarion and placed it in the wagon of
         Kutaituchik, letting its position be known."
           I was speechless, and could not respond to the Tuchuk.
         'I think," said he, "you have often seen the egg of Priest-
         Kings, for it lies about in my wagon. Indeed, the Paravaci
         who raided my wagon did not regard it as of sufficient
         interest to carry away."
    'That!"" I cried.
  "Yes,' said he, "the curiosity, the gray, leathery object
  that."
    I shook my head in disbelief.
  I recalled Kamchak sitting on the gray, rather squarish,
  grained thing with the rounded corners. I recalled he had
  moved it about with his foot, that once he had kicked it
  across the wagon for me to examine.
  "Sometimes," said Kamchak, "the way to conceal some-
  thing is not to conceal It, it is thought that what is of value
  will be hidden, and so it is natural to suppose that what is not
  hidden will not be of value."
  "But," I said, my voice trembling, "you rolled it about
  you would throw it to the side of the wagon once you even
  kicked it across the rug to me that I might examine it." I
  looked at him, incredulously. "Even," I said, "did you dare to
  sit upon it"
   'I shall hope," chuckled Kamchak, "that the Priest-Kings
   will take no offense, but understand that such little bits of
   acting rather well carried off, I think were important
   parts of my deception."
   I smiled, thinking of Misk's joy at receiving the egg. "They
   will take little offense," I said.
   "Do not fear the egg was injured," said Kamchak, "for to
   injure the egg of Priest-Kings I would have had to use a
   quiva or ax."
    "Wily Tuchuk," I said.
    Kamchak and Harold laughed
    "I hope," I said, "that after this time the egg is still
   Kamchak shrugged. "We have watched it," he said, "we
   have done what we could."
    "And I and Priest-Kings are grateful to you," I said.
   Kamchak smiled. "We are pleased to be of service to
   Priest-Kings," he said, "but remember that we reverence only
   the sky."
    "And courage," added Harold, "and such things."
    Kamchak and I laughed.
   "I think it is because at least in part," I said, "that you
   reverence the sky and courage and such things that the
   egg was brought to you."
   "Perhaps," said Kamchak, "but I shall be glad to be rid of
   it, and besides it is nearly the best time for hunting tumits
   with the bole"
      "By the way, Ubar," asked Harold, winking at me, "what
      was it you paid for Aphris of Turia?"
      Kamchak threw him a look that might have been a quiva
      in the heart.
        "You have found Aphris!" I cried.
      "Albrecht of the Kassars," remarked Harold, casually,
      "picked her up while raiding the Paravaci camp."
        "Wonderful!" I cried.
        "She is only a slave, and unimportant," growled Kamchak.
      "What did you pay for her return?" inquired Harold, with
      great innocence.
      "Almost nothing," muttered Kamchak, "for she is nearly
      worthless."
      "I am very pleased," I said, "that she is alive and well
      and I gather that you were able to purchase her from A1-
      brecht of the Kassars without difficulty.""
      Harold put his hand over his mouth and turned away,
      sniggering, and Kamchak's head seemed to sink angrily into
      his shoulders.
        "What did you pay?" I asked.
      "It is hard to outwit a Tuchuk in a bargain," remarked
      Harold, turning back, rather confidently.
      "It will soon be time to hunt tumits," growled Kamchak,
      looking off across the grass toward the wagons beyond the
      walls.
      Well did I recall how Kamchak had made Albrecht of the
      Kassars pay dearly for the return of his little darling Ten-
      chika, and how he had roared with laughter because the
      Kassar had paid such a price, obviously having allowed
      himself to care for a mere slave girl, and she a Turian at
      that
      "I would guess," said Harold, "that so shrewd a Tuchuk as
      Kamchak, the very Ubar of our wagons, would have paid no
      more than a handful of copper tarn disks for a wench of
      such sorts."
      "The tumits run best this time of year rather toward the
      Cartius," observed Kamchak.
      "I'm very happy," I said, "to hear that you have Aphris
      back. She cared for you, you know."
        Kamchak shrugged.
      "I have heard," said Harold, "that she does nothing but
      sing around the bask and in the wagon all day I myself
      would probably beat a girl who- insisted on making all that
      noise.
"I think," said Kamchak, "I will have a new bole made
for the hunting."
  "He is, of course," observed Harold, "quite handsome."
  Kamchak growled menacingly.
"At any rate," continued Harold, "I know that he would
have upheld the honor of the Tuchuks in such matters and
driven a hard bargain with the unwary Kassar."
"The important thing," I said, "is that Aphris is back and
safe." We rode on for a while more. Then I asked, "By the
way, as a matter of fact, what did you pay for her?"
  Kamchak's face was black with rage. He looked at
 Harold, who smiled innocently and questioningly, and then at    I
me, who was only honestly curious. Kamchak's hands were
like white clubs knotted on the reins of the kaiila. "Ten
thousand bars of gold`," he said.
I stopped the kaiila and regarded him, astounded. Harold
began to pound his saddle and howl with laughter.
Kamchak's eyes, had they been jets of fire, would have
frizzled the young, blond Tuchuk in his saddle.
 "Well, well," I said, a certain regrettable malicious elation
 perhaps unfortunately detectable in my voice.
  Now Kamchak's eyes would have frizzled me as well.
Then a wry glint of amusement sparkled in the Tuchuk's
eyes and the furrowed face wrinkled into a sheepish grin.
'Yes," he said, "Tart Cabot, I did not know until then that I
was a fool."
"Nonetheless, Cabot," remarked Harold, "do you not
think, all things considered, he is on the whole albeit unwise
n certain matters an excellent Ubar?"
"On the whole," I agreed, "albeit perhaps unwise in certain
Matters an excellent Ubar."
Kamchak glared at Harold, and then at me, and then he
looked down, scratching his ear; then he looked at us again,
and all three of us suddenly burst together into laughter, and
tears even streamed down Kamchak's face, running here and
there among the scarred furrows on his cheeks.
"You might have pointed out," said Harold to Kamchak,
"that the gold was Turian gold."
"Yes," cried Kamchak, "that is true it was Turian gold!"
He cracked his fist on his thigh. "Turian gold"
  "One might claim," said Harold, "that that makes quite a difference.
"Yes!" cried Kamchak.
        "On the other hand," said Harold, "I for one would not
        claim that."
        Kamchak straightened in the saddle and thought about it.
        Then he chuckled and said, "Nor would I."
        Again we laughed and, suddenly, we urged the kailla
        forward in great bounding strides, eager to reach the wagons,
        each of us, for waiting in these wagons were three girls,
        desirable, marvelous, ours, Hereena, she who had been of the
        First Wagon, the slave of Harold, her master; Aphris of
        Turia, almond-eyed and exquisite, once the richest and per-
        haps the most beautiful woman of her city, now the simple
        slave of the Ubar of Tuchuks, he Kamchak; and the slender,
        lovely, dark-haired, dark-eyed Elizabeth Cardwell, once a
        proud girl of Earth, now only the helpless and beautiful slave
        of a warrior of Ko-ro-ba; a girl in whose nose had been fixed
        the delicate, provocative golden ring of Tuchuk women, a
        girl whose thigh bore unmistakably the brand of the four
        bask horns, whose lovely throat was encircled by a collar of
        steel, bearing my name; a girl whose rapturous and uncon-
        trollable submission had, in its utterness, astounded both
        herself and me, both he who commanded and she who
        served, he who took and she who was given no choice but to
        yield unreservedly. When she had left my arms she had lain
        upon the rug and wept. "I have nothing more to give," she
        cried. "Nothing morel"
          "It is enough," I had told her.
        And she had wept with joy, pressing her head with its
        loose, wild hair to my side.
          "Is my master pleased with me?" she had asked.
        "Yes," I had told her. "Yes, Vella, Kajira mire. I am
        pleased. I am pleased indeed."
        I leaped from the back of the kaiila and ran toward the
        wagon and the girl waiting there cried out with joy and tad
        to me and I swept her into my arms and our lips met and she
        wept, "You are safer You are safer"
        "Yes," I said, "I am safe and you are safe and the
        world is safer"
          At the time I believed that what I kind said was true.
           I gathered that the best season for hunting tumits, the
       large, flightless carnivorous birds of the southern plains, was
 at hand, for Kamchak, Harold and others seemed to be
 looking forward to it with great eagerness. Kutaituchik
 avenged, Kamchak was no longer interested in Turia, though
 he wished the city to be restored, perhaps in order that the
 Wagon Peoples might have a valuable trade outlet whereby
 they could manage, if the caravan raids turned out poorly, to
 barter hides and horn for the goods of civilization.
 On the last day before the withdrawal of the Wagon
 Peoples from nine-gated, high-walled Turia, Kamchak held
 court in the palace of Phanius Turmus. The Turian Ubar
 himself, with Kamras, former Champion of Turia, both clad
 m the Kes, were chained at the door, to wash the feet of
 those who would enter.
   Turia had been a rich city, and though much gold had
 been given to the tarnsmen of Ha-Keel and the defenders of
 t he House of Saphrar, it was a tiny amount when compared
 with the whole, not even counting that lost by being carried
       by civilians through the gates Kamchak had designated as I
 escapes from the burning city. Indeed, Saphrar's secret hordes
 alone, kept in dozens of vast underground storehouses,
 would have been enough to have made each and every
 Tuchuk, and perhaps each Kataii and Kassar as well, a rich
 man a very rich man in any of the cities of Gor. I
 recalled that never before had Turia fallen, not since the
 founding of the city, perhaps thousands of years ago.
         Yet a large portion of this wealth perhaps a third
         Kamchak designated should be left behind in the city, to aid
         in its rebuilding.
         Kamchak, as a Tuchuk, could not bring himself to be quite '
         as generous with the city's women, and the five thousand
         most beautiful girls of Turia were branded and given to the
         commanders of Hundreds, that they might be distributed to
         the bravest and fiercest of their warriors; the others were
         permitted to remain in the city or flee through the gates to
         seek their fellow citizens beyond the walls. Additionally, of
         course, beyond the free women, numerous slaves had fallen
         into the hands of the warriors, and these, too, were sent to
         the commanders of Hundreds. The most marvelous set of the
         latter were the beauties from the Pleasure Gardens of
         Saphrar of Turia. The girls of the Wagon Peoples, of course,
         who had been enslaved, were freed; the others, however, save
         for some of Ko-ro-ba on whose behalf I spoke, would change
         their perfumed silks and their warmed, scented baths for the
         hardships of the trek, the care of bask, and the arms of
         warrior masters. Few it seemed to me, surprisingly perhaps,
         much objected to leaving the luxurious delights of the gar-
         dens of Saphrar for the freedom of the winds and prairies,
         the dust, the smell of bask, the collar of a man who would
         master them utterly but before whom they would stand al
         human shes, individual, each different, each alone and mar-
         velous and prized in the secret world of her master's wagon.
         In the palace of Phanius Emus, on his throne, eat.
         Kamchak, the purple of the Ubar's robes thrown casually
         over one shoulder, over his Tuchuk leather. He did not now
         sit dourly as before, stern and lost in thought, but attended to
         the details of his business with good humor, stopping only
         now and then to throw scraps of meat to his kaiila, which
         was tethered behind the throne. As a matter of course
         various goods and riches were heaped about his throne, and'
         among them, as part of the booty, there knelt some of the
         most beautiful of Turia's maidens, clad only in the Sirik, but
         at his right knee, unchained and clad Kajir, there knot t
         Aphris of Curia. ;
         About his throne as well there stood his commanders, and
         some leaders of Hundreds, many with their women. Beside
         me, clad not Kajir but in the brief leather of one of the
         Wagon Girls, though collared, stood Elizabeth Cardwell; sim
         ilarly attired and collared, I noted, standing a bit behind
         Harold of the Tuchuks, I saw the fiery Hereena; she was
 perhaps the only one of all the girls of the Wagon Peoples that
 day in Turia who was not free; she alone remained slave, and
 would so remain until or unless it might please Harold, her
 master, that it should be otherwise; "I rather like the look of
 a collar on her throat," he once remarked in his wagon,
 before ordering her to prepare food for Kamchak and
 Aphris, and myself and Elizabeth, or Vella, as I would
 sometimes can her. 1 gathered that the proud Hereena might
 long be the slave of Harold of the Tuchuks.
 As fellow after fellow, men of importance in Turia, were
 dragged before his throne, in the Kes and chained, Kamchak
 would say to them, "Your goods and your women are mine.
 Who is the Master of Turia?"
 "Kamchak of the Tuchuks," they would say, and be
 dragged away.
   To some he would ask, "Has Turia fallen?"
   And they would bow their heads and say, "She has fallen."
 At last Phanius Turmus and Kamras were pulled before
 the throne and thrust to their knees.
 Kamchak gestured to the riches piled about him. "Whose
 h the wealth of Turia?" he asked.
   "Kamchak of the Tuchuks'," said they.
 Karuchak thrust his fist affectionately into the hair of
 Aphris of Turia and twisted her head to him.
   "whose are the women of Turia?" he asked.
   "Master," said Aphris.
   "Kamchak of the Tuchuks'," said the two men.
   "Who," laughed Kamchak, "is Ubar of Turia?"
   "Kamchak of the Tuchuks," said the two.
  "Bring the Home Stone of the city," commanded
  Kamchak, and the stone, oval and aged, carved with the
  initial letter of the city, was brought to him.
 He lifted the stone over his head and read fear in the eyes
 of the two men chained before him.
  But he did not dash the stone to the floor. Rather he arose
  Tom his throne and placed the stone in the chained hands of
  Phanius Turmus. "Turia lives," said he, "Ubar."
  Tears formed in the eyes of Phanius Turmus and he held
  the Home Stone of the city to his heart.
  "In the morning," called Kamchak, "we return to the
  wagons."
 "You will spare Turia, Master?" asked Aphris, wondering,
 knowing the hatred he had borne the city.
  "Yes," said he, "Turia will live."
         Aphris looked at him, not understanding.
       I myself was startled, but would not speak. I had thought
      that Kamchak might destroy the stone, thus breaking the
        heart of the city, leaving it in ruins in the minds of men. It
         was only at that time, as he held court in the palace of
       Phanius Turmus that I realized he would permit the city its
         freedom, and its soul. I had hitherto only understood that
       Turians might perhaps return to the city, and that its walls
         would be left standing. I had not understood that it would be
         permitted to retain a Home Stone.
        It seemed to me a strange act for a conqueror, for a
       Tuchuk.
         Was it only because Kamchak believed, as he had once
         said, that the Wagon Peoples must have an enemy? or was
         there some other reason, beyond that?
        Suddenly there was commotion at the door and three men,
     followed by some others, burst into the hall.
    The first was Conrad of the Kassars, and with him were
      Hakimba of the Kataii and a third man I did not know, but
       who was Paravaci. Behind them were some others, among
         whom I saw Albrecht of the Kassars, and behind him, to my
       astonishment, clad in brief leather, not collared, was Ten
     chika, who held a small bundle tied in cloth in her right hand.
     Conrad, Hakimba and the Paravaci strode to the throne of
    Kamchak, but none of them, as befitted Ubars of their peoples, knelt.
 Conrad spoke. "The Omens have been taken," he said.
        "They have been read well," said Hakimba.
    "For the first time in more than a hundred years," said the
        Paravaci, "there is a Ubar San, a One Ubar, Master of the
    Wagons!"
   Karnchak stood up and threw from his shoulders the
    purple of the Turian Ubar and stood in the black leather of a
Tuchuk.
     As one man the three Ubars raised their arms to him.
         "Kamchak," they cried, "Ubar San!"
    The cry was taken up by all in the room, even myself.
    ''Kamchak' Ubar San"
         Kamchak held forth his hands and the room was quiet.
         "Each of you," he said, "the Kassars the Kataii the Para
         vaci have your own bask and your own wagons live so
         but in time of war when there are those who would divide
         us when there are those who would fight us and threaten
   our wagons and our bask and women our plains, our land
   then let us war together and none will stand against the
   Wagon Peoples we may live alone but we are each of us of
   the Wagons and that which divides us is less than that which
   unites us we each of us know that it is wrong to slay bosk
   and that it is right to be proud and to have courage and to
   defend our wagons and our women we know that it is right
   to be strong and to be free and so it is together that we will
   be strong and we will be free. Let this be pledged."
   The three men came to Kamchak and he and they placed
   their hands together.
     "It is pledged," they said. "It is pledged."
   Then they stood back. "All hail Kamchak," they cried,
   "Ubar San!"
   "All hail Kamchak," rang throughout the hall, "Kamchak
   Ubar San!"
   It was late in the afternoon before the business of the day
   had subsided and the great hall emptied.
   At last only a few remained in that place, some command-
   ers and some leaders of Hundreds, and Kamchak and Aphris.
   Harold and I were there, too, and Hereena and Elizabeth.
   Shortly before Albrecht and Tenchika had been there, and
   Dina of Turia with her two Tuchuk guards, who had kept
   her safe from harm during the fall of the city.
     Tenchika had approached Dina of Turia.
     "You wear no collar now," Dina had said.
   Tenchika had dropped her head shyly. "I am free," she
   said.
     "Will you now return to Turia?" asked Dina.
   "No," said Tenchika, smiling. "I will remain with Albrecht
   With the wagons."
   Albrecht himself was busy elsewhere, talking with Conrad,
   Ubar of the Kassars.
   "Here," said Tenchika, thrusting the small cloth sack she
   held into Dina's hands. "These are yours you should have
   them you won them."
   Dina, wondering, opened the package and within it she
   saw the cups and rings, and pieces of gold, which Albrecht
   had given her for her victories in the runnings from the bole.
     'Wake them," insisted Tenchika.
     "Does he know?" asked Dina.
     "Of course," said Tenchika.
     "He is kind," said Dina.
        "I love him," said Tenchika, kissing Dina and hurrying
        away.
        I approached Dina of Turia. I looked at the objects she
        held. "You must have run well indeed," I remarked.
        She laughed. "There is more than enough here to hire
        help," she said. "I shall reopen the shop of my father and
        brothers."
        "If you like," I said, "I will give you a hundred times
        that."
          "No," she said, smiling, "for this is my own."
        Then she lowered her veil briefly and kissed me. "Good-
        bye, Tarl Cabot," she said. "I wish you well."
          "And I," I said, "wish you well noble Dina of Turia."
        She laughed. "Foolish warrior," she chided, "I am only the
        daughter of a baker."
          "He was a noble and valiant man," I said.
          "Thank you," said she.
        "And his daughter, too," I said, "is a noble and valiant
        woman and beautiful."
        I did not permit her to replace her veil until I had kissed
        her, softly, one last time.
        She refastened her veil and touched her fingertips to her
        lips beneath it and then pressed them to my lips and turned
        and hurried away.
        Elizabeth had watched but she had shown no sign of anger
        or irritation.
          "She is beautiful," said Elizabeth.
        "Yes," I said, "she is." And then I looked at Elizabeth.
        "You, too," I told her, "are beautiful."
          She looked up at me, smiling. "I know," she said.
         "Vain wench," I said.
        "A Gorean girl," she said, "need not pretend to be plain
        when she knows that she is beautiful."
        'what ~ true," I admitted. "But where," I asked, "did you
        come by the notion that you are beautiful?"
        "My master told me," she sniffed, "and my master does
        not lie does he?"
        "Not often," I said, "and particularly not about matters of
        such importance."
       'And I have seen men look at me," she said, "and I know
       that I would bring a good price."
         I must have appeared scandalized.
       "I would," said Elizabeth firmly, "I am worth many tarn
       disks."
  "You are," I admitted.
  "So I am beautiful," she concluded.
  "It is true," I said.
  "But," said she, "you will not sell me---will you?"
 "Not immediately," I said. "We shall see if you continue to
 please me."
  "Oh, Tarl!" she said.
  "Master," I prompted.
  "Master," she said.
  "Well?" I asked.
 'I shall," she said, smiling, "strive to continue to please
 you." '
  "See that you do," I said.
 "I love you," she said suddenly, "I love you, Tarl Cabot,
 Master." She put her arms about my neck and kissed me.
 I kept her long in my arms, savoring the warmth of her
 lips, the delicacy of her tongue on mine.
 "Your slave," she whispered, "Master, forever your
 slave."
 It was hard for me to believe that this marvelous, collared
 beauty in my arms was once a simple girl of Earth, that this
 astounding wench, Tuchuk and Gorean, was the same as
 Miss Elizabeth Cardwell, the young secretary who 80 long
 before had found herself inexplicably thrust into intrigues and
 circumstances beyond her comprehension on the plains of
 Gor. Whatever she might have been before, a clock number,
 a set of records in a personnel file, an unimportant employee,
 with her salary and benefits, under the obligation to please
 and impress other employees, scarcely more important than
 herself, she was now alive, and free in her emotions though
 her flesh might be subject to chains; she was now vital,
 passionate, loving, mine; I wondered if there were other girls
 of Barth in whom a transformation might be wrought,
 others who might, not fully understanding, long for a man
 and a world a world in which they must find and be
 themselves, for no other choice would be theisms world in
 which they might run and breathe and laugh and be swift and
 loving and prized and in their hearts at last open and free
though paradoxically perhaps, for a time, or until the man
should choose otherwise, wearing the collar of a slave girt
But I dismissed such thoughts as foolish.
 None remained now in the court of the Ubar other than
 Kamchak and Aphris, Harold and Hereena, and myself and
 Elizabeth Cardwell.
         Kamchak looked across the room to me. "Well," said he,
        "the wager turned out well."                 ~
        I recalled he had spoken of this. "You gambled," I said,   I
        "when you did not surrender Turia to return to defend the
        bask and wagons of the Tuchuks that the others, the Kataii
        and Kassars, would come to your aid." I shook my head. "It
        was a dangerous gamble," I said.
        "Perhaps not so dangerous," said he, "for I know the
        Kataii and the Kassars better than they knew themselves."
        "You said there was more to the wager though," I re-
        marked, "that it was not yet done."
        "It is now done," said he.
        "What was the latter part of the wager?" I asked.
        'That," said he, "the Kataii and the Kassars and, too, in
        time the Paravaci would see how we might be divided against
        ourselves and singly destroyed and would thus recognize
the need for uniting the standards, bringing together the -
        Thousands under one command"
        "That they would," I said, "recognize the need for the
        Ubar San?"
        "Yes," said Kamchak, "that was the wager that I could
        teach them the Ubar San."
        "Hail," said I, "Kamchak, Ubar San!"
        "Hail," cried Harold, "Kamchak, Ubar San!"
        Kamchak smiled and looked down. "It will soon be time
        for hunting tumits," he said.
        As he turned to leave the throne room of Phanius Turmus,
        to return to the wagons, Aphris lightly rose to her feet to
        accompany him.
        But Kamchak turned and faced her. She looked up at him,
        questioningly. It was hard to read his face. She stood quite
        close to him.
        Gently, ever so gently, Kamchak put his hands on her arms
        and drew her to him and then, very softly, kissed her.
        "Master?" she asked.
        Kamchak's hands were at the small, heavy lock at the back
        of the steel, Turian collar she wore. He turned the key and
        opened the collar, discarding it.
        Aphris said nothing, but she trembled and shook her head
        slightly. She touched her throat disbelievingly.
        "You are free," said the Tuchuk.
        The girl looked at him, incredulously, bewildered.
          "Do not fear," he said. "You will be given riches." He
 smiled. "You will once again be the richest woman in all of
 Turia."
   She could not answer him.
 The girl, and the rest of us present, stood stunned. Most of us
 knew the peril, the hardship and danger the Tuchuk had
 sustained in her acquisition; all of us knew the price he had
 been willing to pay only recently that she, fallen into the
 hands of another, might be returned to lam
   We could not understand what he had done.
 Kamchak turned abruptly from her striding to his kailla,
 which had been tethered behind the throne. He put one foot
 in the stirrup and mounted easily. Then, not pressing the
 animal, he took his way from the throne room. The rest of us
 followed him, with the exception of Aphris who remained,
 stricken, standing beside the throne of the Ubar, clad perhaps
 Kajir, but now uncollared, now free. Her fingertips were
 before her mouth. She seemed numb. She shook her head.
  I walked behind Kamchak, on his kaiila. Harold walked
  beside me. Hereena and Elizabeth followed us, each, as was
  proper, some two paces behind.
    "Why is it," I asked Harold, "that he spared Turia?"
    "His mother was Turian," said Harold.
    I stopped.
    "Did you not know?" asked Harold.
    I shook my head. "No," I said. "I did not know."
  "It was after her death," said Harold, "that Kutatuchik
  first tasted the rolled strings of kanda."
    "I did not know," I said.
    Kamchak was now well in advance of us.
  Harold looked at me. "Yes," he said, "she had been a
  Turian girl taken as slave by Kutaituchik but he cared for
  her and freed her. She remained with him in the wagons
  until her death the Ubar of the Tuchuks."
  Outside the main gate of the palace of Phanius Turmus,
  Kamchak, on his kaiila, waited for us. Our beasts were teth-
  ered there, and we mounted. Hereena and Elizabeth would
  run at our stirrups.
   We turned from the gate, to ride down the long avenue
   leading toward the main gate of Turia.
    Kamchak's face was inscrutable.
    "Wait!" we heard.
   We turned our mounts and saw Aphris of Turia, barefoot,
   clad Kajir, running after us.
  She stopped beside Kamchak's stirrup, standing there, her head down.
       "What means this?" demanded Kamchak sternly.
       The girl did not respond, nor did she raise her head.
       Kamchak turned his kaiila and began to ride toward the
       main gate, the rest of us following. Aphris, as Hereena and
       Elizabeth, ran by the stirrup.
       Kamchak reined in, and we all stopped. Aphris stood
       there, her head down.
       "You are free," said Kamchak.
       Without raising her head, she shook it negatively. "No,"
       she said, "I am Kamchak of the Tuchuks'."
       She put her head timidly to Kamchak's fur boot in the
       stirrup.
       "I do not understand," said Kamchak.
       She lifted her head and there were tears in her eyes.
       "Please,"' she said, "Master."
       "Why?" asked Kamchak.
       She smiled. "I have grown fond of the smell of bosk," said
       she.
       Kamchak smiled. He held his hand to the girl. "Ride with
       me, Aphris of Turia," said Kamchak of the Tuchuks.
       She took his hand and he drew her to the saddle before
       him, where she turned, sitting across the saddle, and placed
       her head against his right shoulder, weeping.
       "This woman," said Kamchak of the Tuchuks, brusquely,
       his voice stern but almost breaking, "is called Aphris know
       her she is Ubara of the Tuchuks, she is Ubara Sana, of my
       heart Ubara Sana!"
       We let Kamchak and Aphris ride ahead, and followed
       them, by some hundred yards, toward the main gate of
       Turia, now leaving the city, and its Home Stone and its
       people, returning to the wagons and to the open, windswept
       land beyond the high walls of the city, once-conquered,
       nine-gated Turia of the southern plains of Gor.
  Tuka, the slave girl, did not fare well at the hands of Elizabeth
  Cardwell.
  In the camp of the Tuchuks Elizabeth had begged that I
  not free her for but another hour.
   "Why?" I had asked.
  "Because," she had said, "masters do not much care to
  interfere in the squabbles of slaves."
  I shrugged. It would be at least another hour before I was
  ready to take wing for the Sardar, with the egg of Priest-
  Kings safe in the saddle pack of my tarn.
  There were several people gathered about, near the wagon
  of Kamchak, among them Tuka's master, and the girl her-
  self. I recalled how cruel she had been to Elizabeth in the
  long months she had been with the Tuchuks, and how she
  had tormented her even when she was helpless in the cage of
  a sleen, mocking her and poking at her with the bask stick.
  Perhaps Tuka gathered what might have been on Elizabeth's
  mind, for no sooner had the American girl turned toward
  her than she turned and fled from the wagon.
  Within something like fifty yards we heard a frightened
  squawk and saw Tulca thrown to the ground with a tackle
  that might have done credit to a qualified professional player
  of the American form of football. There shortly thereafter
  followed a vigorous and dusty broil among the wagons,
  involving much rolling about, biting, slapping, scratching and,
  from time to time, the easily identified sound of a small fist,
apparently moving with considerable momentum, meeting
 with venous partially resistant, protoplasmic curvatures.
         There was only so much of this and we soon heard Tuka
         shrieking for mercy. At that juncture, as I recall, Elizabeth
         was kneeling on top of the Turian maiden with her hands in
         her hair pounding her head up and down in the dirt. Eliza
         beth's Tuchuk leather had been half torn from her but Tuka,
         who had been clothed only Kajir, had fared not even this
         well. Indeed, when Elizabeth finished, Tuka wore only the
         Curia, the red band that ties back the hair, and this band
         now knotted her wrists behind her back. Elizabeth then tied a
         thong in Tulca's nose ring and dragged her to the creek,
         where she might find a switch. When she found a suitable
         implement, of proper length and flexibility, of appropriate
         diameter and suppleness, she then secured Tuka by nose ring
         and thong to the exposed root of a small but sturdy bush,
         and thrashed her soundly. Following this, she untied the
         thong from the root and permitted the girl, thong still
         streaming from her nose ring, wrists still bound behind her,
         to run for her master's wagon, but pursued her each foot of
         the way like a hunting sleen, administering innumerable
         stinging incitements to greater and ever greater speed.
         At last, panting, bleeding here and there, discolored in
         places, half-naked, triumphant, Elizabeth Cardwell returned
      to my side, where she knelt as a humble, obedient slave girl.
          When she had somewhat caught her breath I removed the
     collar from her throat and freed her.
       I set her on the saddle of the tarn, telling her to hold to
       the pommel of the saddle. When I myself mounted I would
         tie her to the pommel with binding fiber. I would fasten
       about myself the broad safety strap, usually purple, which is
         an invariable portion of the tarn saddle.
       Elizabeth did not seem affrighted to be astride the tarn. I
        was pleased that there were some changes of clothing for her
       in the pack. I observed that she needed them, or at least one
         of them.
         Kamchak was there, and his Aphris, and Harold and his
         Hereena, still his slave. She knelt beside him, and once when
         she dared to touch her cheek to his right thigh he good-
         naturedly cuffed the slave girl away.
          "How are the bosk doing?" I asked Kamchak.
          "As well as might be expected," he responded.
          I turned to Harold. "Are the quivas sharp?" I inquired.
          "One tries to keep them that way," said Harold.
  I turned back to Kamchak. "It is important," I reminded
  him, "to keep the axles of the wagons greased."
   "Yes," he said, "I think that is true."
   I clasped the hands of the two men.
   "I wish you well, Tarl Cabot," said Kamchak.
   "I wish you well, Kamchak of the Tuchuks," I said
  "You are not really a bad fellow," said Harold, "for a
  Koroban."
   "You are not bad yourself," I granted, "for a Tuchuk."
   "I wish you well," said Harold.
   "I wish you well," I said.
  Swiftly I climbed the short ladder to the tarn saddle, and
  tied it against the saddle. I then took binding fiber and looped
  it several times about Miss Cardwell's waist and then several
  times about the pommel of the saddle, then tying it.
 Harold and Kamchak looked up at me. There were tears
 in the eyes of both men. Now, diagonally, like a scarlet
 chevron coursing the flight of the cheek bones, there blazed
 on the face of Harold the Tuchuk the Courage Scar.
  "Never forget," said Kamchak, "that you and I have
  together held grass and earth."
   "I will never forget," I said.
 "And while you are remembering things," remarked
 Harold, 'you might recollect that we two together won the
 Courage Scar in Turia."
   "No," I said, "I will not forget that either."
 "Your coming and going with the Wagon Peoples," said
 Kamchak, "has spanned parts of two of our years."
 I looked at him, not really understanding. What he said, of
 course, was true.
 "The years," said Harold, smiling, "were two the Year in
 which Tarl Cabot Came to the Wagon Peoples and the Year
 in which Tarl Cabot Commanded a Thousand."
 Inwardly I gasped. These were year names which would
 be remembered by the Year Keepers, whose memories knew
 the names of thousands of consecutive years.
 "But," I protested, "there have been many things of much
 greater importance than those in these years the Siege of
 Turia, the Taking of the City, the Election of the Ubar San"
 "We choose most to remember Tarl Cabot," said
 Kamchak.
   I said nothing.
 "If you should ever need the Tuchuks' Tarl Cabot," said
 Kamchak, "or the Kataii or the Kassar or the Paravaci
         you have only to speak and we will ride. We will ride to
         your side, be it even to the cities of Earth."
         "You know of Earth?" I asked. I recalled what I took to
         be the skepticism of Kamchak and Kutaituchik long ago
         when they had questioned myself and Elizabeth Cardwell of
         such matters.
         Karnchak smiled. "We Tuchuks know of many things," he
         said, "Of more than we tell." He grinned. "Good fortune
         attend you, Tart Cabot, Commander of a Thousand Tuchuks,
         Warrior of Ko-ro-ba!"
         I lifted my hand to them and then drew on the one-strap
         and the wings of the great tarn began to strike the resistant
         air and the Tuchuks on all sides fell back stumbling in the
         dust and the driven wind smote from beneath the mighty
         wings of the bird and in that instant we saw the wagons fall
         away beneath us, extending in their squares for pasangs, and
         we could see the ribbon of the creek and then the Omen
          Valley and then the spires of distant Turia, far off. I
         Elizabeth Cardwell was weeping, and I put my arms about I
         her, to comfort her, and to protect her from the blasts of the
         swift air. I noted with irritation that the sting of the air had
         made my own eyes moist as well.