by John Norman
Within the entrance to the Semnium was a marble-floored, lofty hall. Passageways and stairways led variously from this broad vestibule. The walls were adorned with mosaics, scenes generally of civic life, prominent among them were scenes of public gatherings, conferences and processions. One depicted the laying of the first stone in Torcadino's walls, an act which presumably would have taken place more than seven hundred years ago, when, according to the legends, the first wall, only a dozen feet high, was built to encircle and protect a great, sprawling encampment at the joining of trade routes. Within the hall were several soldiers, and several officers, at tables, conducting various sorts of business. To one side, permanent fixtures, immovable and sturdy, their supports fixed in the floor, were several rows of long, narrow, marble benches. It was on these that clients and claimants, with their various causes, grievances and petitions, would wait until their turn came to be called for their appointments or hearings. It was here, too, that witnesses, and such, might wait, before being summoned to give testimony on various matters before the courts.
"It is in here, I gather," I said, "that these letters of safety may be obtained." I eyed the various tables.
"Yes," said Mincon, making his way toward a guard station at the opening to one of the long corridors leading from the vaulted vestibule.
"Are we not to petition for these letters at one of the tables?" I asked, looking back.
"No," he said.
We were then following him down the corridor. He was known, it seemed.
"Is the city being administered from this building?" I asked.
"Yes," he said, "in most things, in most ways."
"The city is under martial law," I said. "Why is it not being administered from the central cylinder, or its arsenal?"
"This building supplies and appearance of civic normality," he said. "Thus it is more as though one form of municipal administration had merely succeeded another."
"I see," I said. "Your captain, however," I said, "is doubtless reigning in the central cylinder."
"No, he is conducting business in this building," said Mincon, continuing down the hall.
I said nothing. This seemed to me, however, politically astute, particularly since the city was not currently under attack. I had realized for years, of course, that Dietrich of Tarnburg was a capable mercenary, and one of Gor's finest commanders. I had not found mention, however, in the annals, or diaries, which had been generally concerned with marches and campaigns, a sufficient appreciation of this other side of his character. He was apparently not only a military genius but perhaps also a political one. Or, perhaps they are not really so separate as they are often considered to be. Territory must be held as well as won. "Civilians are being ejected from the city," I said. "Surely they are not being given letters of safety."
"No," said Mincon.
"You think, however that we might need them?" I asked.
"It seems very likely," said Mincon, "considering where you are going." "I do not understand," I said.
"I have gathered that you are familiar with the sword," he said, "and that you re from Port Kar,"
"I know something of the sword," I said. "And I have a holding in Port Kar." "Perhaps you are even of the scarlet caste," he said.
"Perhaps," I said.
"Port Kar is at war with Cos," he said.
"Yes," I said.
"We are here," he said. We stopped before a large door. He ushered us between guards. We found ourselves in a reception room. An officer was at a table at one end of the room, with two more guards. Behind him and to his right was another door. In this fashion, to pass him, as is common, one would have to pass him on his sword-arm side.
"Anything so simple as letters of safety could have been issued in the main hall," I said.
Mincon spoke to the officer at the table, who, it seemed, recognized him.
"I would think so," said Hurtha, righteously, adding "whatever a letter of safety might be." He looked about, with his Alar distrust of bureaucracy and enclosed spaces. "I trust there will be no necessity for me to read such a letter," he said, "as this would be difficult, as I cannot read."
"You could learn," I said, somewhat snappishly.
"Between now and when we receive the letters?" asked Hurtha, incredulously. "Alars do not read," said Boabissia, proudly. "And we are Alars."
"I am an Alar," said Hurtha.
"Doubtless we will get the letters from that fellow," I said, indicating the officer to whom Mincon was speaking. "My letter of safety would be my ax," said Hurtha, "if I had it." Mincon, however, to my surprise, went through the door behind the officer. "I frankly do not understand what is going on," I said.
"I have sometimes had that experience," said Hurtha.
"Mincon is behaving strangely," I said.
"What can you expect?" said Hurtha. "He is not an Alar."
"Neither am I," I said.
"I know," said Hurtha.
"This whole business makes little sense to me," I said.
"Civilization is bizarre," said Hurtha.
"Perhaps you can get a poem out of this," I said.
"I already have," he said, "two. Would you care to hear them?"
"There is no time now," I said.
"They are quite short," he said. "One is a mere fifty liner,"
"By all means, then," I said.
" "In the halls of Torcadino, " he began. " " "neath sacks of noosed bonesa€” " "You have composed more than one hundred lines of poetry while we have been standing here?" I asked.
"Many more," he said, "but I have eliminated many lines which did not meet my standards. "In the streets of Torcadino, "neath bundles of brittle bonesa€”" "Wait," I said. "That is not the same line."
"I have revised it," said Hurtha.
At this moment, Mincon, naively, his timing, from his point of view, tragically awry, emerged from the inner office. "What news, good fellow?" I called to him. "Please go in," he said to me. "The rest of you please remain here." We looked at one another.
"Please," he said.
"Very well," I said, resigned.
"Would you care to hear two poems?" asked Hurtha.
"Of course," said Mincon. He was a fine fellow. "Bara," said Mincon to Tula. "Bara," said I to Feiqa. Both slaves immediately to their bellies, their heads to the left, their wrists crossed behind their backs, their ankles also crossed. It is a common binding position. We did not bother to bind them, however. It was enough that they lay there in this position. Hurtha dropped their leashes to the tiles beside them. His hands were now freed for gestures, and important contributory element in oral poetry. "Would you care to hear two poems?" Hurtha asked the officer at the table. "What?" he asked.
Then I had entered the inner office.
15 The Semnium; What Transpired in the Inner Offices
I whipped my head to the side. The blade moved past me and with a solid sound, followed by a sturdy vibration, lodged itself in the heavy wood of the door. "Excellent," said a voice. "You have had some training."
I looked down the room. At the end of the room, standing behind a functionary's desk, some forty feet away, there stood a soldier.
"Perhaps you are of the scarlet caste?" he asked.
"Perhaps," I said. I removed the blade from the wood behind me, over my shoulder, not taking my eyes off the fellow behind the desk.
"You are quick," he said. "Excellent. It is doubtless as Mincon had suspected. His judgement is good. You are a soldier."
"I have fought," I said. "I am not now in fee."
"Tal, Rarius," said he to me then. "Greetings Warrior,"
I regarded him, He did not seem to me the sort of fellow from whom one might expect letters of safety, license of passage, or bureaucratic services. He wore no insignia. His men, I gathered, must know him by sight. His presence, I suspected, whether in the camp or in the march, in the mines, on the walls, in the trenches or fields, would not be unfamiliar among them. They would know him. He would know them.
His dark hair was graying at the temples, unusual among Goreans. He reminded me something of Centius of Cos, though he had not the latter's gentleness. In him I sensed practicality, and mercilessness, and intelligence and power. On the table before him, resting on what appeared to be state papers, was a sword.
"Tal Rarius," I whispered.
"Come forward," he said. "It was only a test. I even favored you, to your left. Do not be afraid."
I approached the fellow, who then took his place behind the desk.
At the side of the desk, to its right, as you faced it, on the bare tiles, there lay a chained, naked woman. She was dark-haired, and beautiful. It was not surprising to me that such a woman should lie at the side of his desk. He was obviously a man of great strength. Many Goreans believe that woman is nature's gift to man, that nature has designed her for his stimulation, pleasure and service. Accordingly, they seldom hesitate to avail themselves of this gift. Too, they are sensitive to the pleasures of power. They know the pleasures of power, and they honestly and candidly seek, appreciate and relish them. They know there is no thrill in world comparable to having absolute power over a female. These feelings, like those of glory and victory, to which they are akin, are their own reward. Goreans do not apologize for such natural and biologically validated urges. Too, they do not feel guilty over them. Indeed, to feel guilty over such natural, profound, deep and common urges would be, from the Gorean point of view, madness. The male is dominant, unless crippled. Without the mastery there can be no complete male fulfillment, and, interestingly, without complete male fulfillment there can be no complete female fulfillment.
"How do you call yourself?" he asked.
"Tarl," I said.
"You are from Port Kar?" he said.
"I have a holding there," I said.
"Are you a spy for Ar?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"Perhaps for Cos?" he asked.
"No," I said. I put the knife on the desk, before him.
"Your sympathies, I assume, are with Ar?" he said.
"I have no special love for Ar," I said. Once I had been banished from that city, being denied there bread, salt and fire.
"Good," he said. "That way it will be easier for you to retain your objectivity."
"You are no simple officer," I said, "from whom may be obtained letters of safety."
"You are no simple man-at-arms," he said.
"Oh?" I said.
"These days," he said, "dozens of captains are buying swords. Yet you do not seem to be in fee. Further, I gather from Mincon, my friend, that your financial resources are quite limited."
I said nothing.
"It was clever of you to use the free woman with you in the manner of a rent slave. Some men will pay higher use rents for a free prisoner."
I shrugged.
"But you would make only a handful of copper coins in that sort of thing," he said. "It is not like receiving the weight of your sword in gold coin." "True," I said.
"You may also, of course, have ruined her for freedom," he said.
"Possibly," I said.
He rose from the desk and went to its side. He kicked the woman who lay there. She recoiled and whimpered, with a rattle of chain.
"What do you think, Lady Cara?" he asked.
"Yes, Master," she said. "I think possibly, Master."
I saw, interestingly enough, that he seemed to be genuinely interested in her opinion. This did not, of course, in any way alter the categorical relation in which they obviously stood to one another.
"Have you been spoiled for freedom?" he asked her.
"What you have done to me!" she wept. "I beg the brand! I beg it! Put the mark on me! Collar me! Confirm it on my body! Confirm it on me with fire and iron, and with the circlet of locked steel, for all the world to see, what you have done to me, what you have made me!" "She is still free," I observed.
"Yes," he said.
"Do not shame me by keeping me free," she said. "Mark and collar me, so that I may at last be free to be what I now know I am!"
"Do you wish to feel the lash again, Lady Cara?" he asked.
"No, Master," she said, shuddering.
It seemed to me that the woman, obviously, was now ready for enslavement. To be sure, whether it was to be granted to her or not was up to her captor. At any rate, whether she was to be put legally into slavery or not she was now clearly bond, psychologically, intellectually and emotionally. She would now never be anything else.
"This is the Lady Cara. Of Venna," he said. "Once she was overheard making remarks disparaging of Tarnburg. Perhaps I shall take her there one day, and keep her there as a house slave.
The prone woman groaned. Her chains slid a little on the tiles.
"Or would you prefer, Lady Cara," he asked, "to serve there only as a cleaning prisoner, simply as a confined servant, a mere housekeeper in captivity?" "No," she sobbed, "as a slave, a full slave."
"Why," he asked.
"It is what I am," she said.
I regarded her. She looked luscious at our feet, in her chains. Clearly, too, she had been "ruined for freedom." I wondered about Boabissia. I wondered if she, too, had been ruined for freedom. To be sure, she still spoke much like a proud free woman. Still, too, she often seemed bitter, selfish, frustrated, haughty and arrogant. Too, she had never been put under slave discipline. I had noticed, however, unless it were only my imagination, that she now seemed to move her body somewhat differently under her dress than she had before, before we had prostituted her to replenish our resources.
"And so," asked the fellow, "what of your free tart? Did her rent uses spoil her for freedom?"
"Perhaps," I said. "I do not know." "Well, if so," he said, "you may always sell her and be done with it." "True," I said. I thought it might be fun to sell Boabissia. She occasionally got on one's nerves. Too, as a free woman, she could be something of a nuisance. Too, I thought she might make a fine slave. Too, like any other woman, she would look lovely in a collar.
"If you have a holding in Port Kar," he said, "I gather you have no fondness for Cos."
"No," I said. "I have no fondness for Cos," I had fought against her, and Tyros at sea. I had once served on a Cosian galley. Once, in last carnival time in Port Kar, before the Waiting Hand, her Ubar, gross Lurius of Jad, had sent an assassin against me. His dagger I had thrust into his own heart.
"Yet," said he, "you were traveling with a Cosian supply train, using the cover of the train to move southward in troubled times. This is an act of audacity, of inventiveness, of courage."
I said nothing.
"I respect such things," he said.
I had little doubt he did. I also had little doubt who it must be, he with whom I spoke. I had stood in awe of this man for years. I had studied his campaigns, his tactics and strategems. Yet nothing had prepared me for the presence I felt in this room, a simple room, a bare room, with a large window behind, suitable for a minor functionary in the bureaucracy of Torcadino. How odd it seemed that I should meet this man here, in such a place, rather than in a feast of state, in the corridors of a conference, or on a bloodstained field. The power of this man seemed to radiate forth from him. This is a difficult thing to explain, unless one has felt it. Perhaps in another situation, or in another time I would not have felt this. I do not know. Certainly it had nothing to do with pretentiousness or any obvious demonstrations of authority on his part. If anything, he seemed on the surface little more than a simple soldier, perhaps no more than merely another unpretentious, candid, efficient officer. It was beneath the surface that I sensed more. This was perhaps a matter of subliminal cues. I had little doubt that when he chose he could be warm and charming. Too, I supposed he could be hearty and convivial. Perhaps he was fond of jokes. Perhaps one might enjoy drinking with him. His men would die for him. I thought he must be much alone. I suspected it might be death to cross his will.
"I suspect," he said, "that you were heading toward Ar."
"I have busin
ess in Ar," I said.
"Do you know the delta of the Vosk?" he asked.
"I once traversed it," I said.
"Tell me about it," he said.
"It is treacherous, and trackless," I said. "It covers thousands of square pasangs. It is infested with insects, snakes and tharlarion. Marsh sharks even swim among its reeds. In it there is little solid ground. Its waters are usually shallow, seldom rising above the chest of a tall man. The footing is unreliable. There is much quicksand. It protects Port Kar from the east. Few but rencers can find their way about in it. Too, for most practical purposes, they keep it closed to traffic and trade."
"That, too is my impression." He said.
"Why do you ask?" I asked.
"Do you understand much of military matters?" he asked.
"A little," I said.
"Do you know who I am?" he asked.
"I think so," I said.
"Do you know why I have brought you here?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"Why do you think Torcadino has been taken?" he asked.
"To stall the invasion," I said. "To give Ar time to arm. It is a powerful and decisive stroke. Torcadino is Cos's major depot for supplies and siege equipment. You have now seized these things. They are now yours. You may remain indefinitely in Torcadino with these vast quantities of supplies. Too, though you will be doubtless invested. Cos now lacks the equipment to dislodge you. Similarly, because of their new shortage of supplies, they will have to withdraw many of their troops from this area. Presumably they will also have to be divided, marched into diverse areas to facilitate the acquisition of new supplies. You have thus scattered and disrupted your enemy. Too, I suspect your ejection of the civilian population from Torcadino is not merely political, to appear to show concern, generosity, and mercy, not merely expedient, to remove them from the city, thus conserving supplies and removing possible Cosian sympathizer from behind your back, but to increase the intensity of Cos's supply problems."