Witness of Gor coc-26

by John Norman

  “Light! Light!” cried the leader of the strangers.

  We heard a man cry out with pain.

  In a moment or two one of the lamps was found and lit.

  One of the black-tunicked men lay in the portal, his chest bright with blood.

  “Where is the prisoner!” demanded the leader of the strangers.

  “He is gone,” said a man.

  32

  The leader of the strangers, warily, the fellow with one of the lamps, tiny and flickering, preceding him, went to the portal.

  “The corridor is dark,” said the fellow with the lamp.

  “He extinguished the lamps as he passes,” said a man.

  “He cannot get far, not in the pits,” said the leader. “Light more lamps.”

  The lamps which were still serviceable were lit. one of the lanterns, even, though its glass was broken, was lit.

  “There are more lamps, torches, and such, in my quarters,” said the pit master, helpfully.

  The lieutenant, carefully, crouching beside the fellow, spreading the metal, removed the helmet from the first victim of the peasant, he whose head had been struck by the stone on the chain. The lieutenant laid the bloody helmet to one side. On the broken skull within, on its forehead, distorted by the breakage, was a tiny black dagger, set there this morning.

  “Your actions have been noted,” said the leader of the strangers to the pit master, “and yours as well,” he added, addressing himself to the officer, “and will be duly reported to the authorities.”

  “Surely Lurius of Jad, the paragon of honor,” said the officer, “would not have condoned the murder of a prisoner.”

  “From whom do you think we obtained our charge?” said the leader of the strangers.

  “He cannot escape us,” said the lieutenant, standing up. “He is in the vicinity.”

  “You need only find him,” said the pit master.

  Neither the officer of Treve nor the pit master were now in custody of the black-tunicked men. The pit master had, I supposed, slipped his stiletto back within his tunic. He did not have it, at any rate, in his hand.

  “I trust we may, from this point further, now, that he is free, and dangerous, have the assurance of your support,” said the leader of the strangers.

  “Do not doubt it,” said the pit master.

  “He will be trapped against the first gate, that sealing this tunnel,” said the lieutenant.

  “Arm your bows,” said the leader of the strangers. “Fire even at a shadow.”

  Gito was still half buried in the straw, huddled there, shaking, whimpering, to the left, as one would enter.

  The leader of the strangers regarded us. We kept our heads down. We dared not meet his eyes. I think there was not one of us who would not have rather, a thousand times over, been elsewhere, almost anywhere, in the heaviest of chains in the foulest of dungeons; pitching, sick, bound to our pallets, almost immobile, in the holds of stinking slave ships, covered with vermin; sweating in the mills, chained to our looms; carrying water, shackled, in the fields; even drawing sleds or wagons, padlocked in our harnesses, draft beasts. But we were beautiful, and a different sort of slave. But what would even our beauty, and our hope to please, to be spared to serve, avail ourselves with these men? And we had perhaps, they might judge, seen too much.

  The leader of the strangers turned away from us.

  The black-tunicked men then, following him, withdrew from the cell.

  The officer of Treve followed them.

  A moment later Gito, fearing to be alone, scrambled out, to join the black-tunicked men.

  The pit master snapped his fingers.

  We struggled to our feet, aligning ourselves, standing, the tallest first, Fina was third of the ten, I was seventh.

  At a gesture of the pit master, discerned in a lamp from outside the door, held by one of the men, we filed out of the cell. We followed the officer of Treve, Gito, the black-tunicked men. The pit master came behind us.

  I tried to free my wrists, but I could not do so. They, like those of the others, had been bound by men, our masters.

  The water in the corridor was cold on my feet.

  I was sick with fear.

  33

  “The gate has been thrust up,” said the leader of the strangers, angrily.

  “It seems it was not secured,” said the pit master.

  “He could be anywhere in the depths,” said the lieutenant.

  “We will return to the quarters of the depth warden,” said the leader of the strangers. “We will make that our headquarters.”

  “You will be most welcome,” said the pit master.

  “We will require a map of the depths,” said the leader of the strangers.

  “None exists in the city, by policy,” said the pit master,” just as no map of the city, either, may be prepared.”

  This, as I understood it, was not uncommon in this world. In some cities it is regarded as a capital offense to make or be found in possession of a city map. The motivations for such policies, one assumes, are military.

  “I will be pleased, of course, to furnish guides,” said the pit master.

  “We shall manage on our own,” said the leader of the strangers.

  “I know the depths well,” said the pit master.

  “You two,” said the leader of the strangers to the pit master and the officer of Treve, “will remain in our headquarters, as our guests.”

  “As you wish,” said the pit master.

  I myself, of course, would not have cared to tread the passages of the depths unguided. I knew some myself, of course, but I knew only areas in which I had been permitted.

  “There are many passages,” said the lieutenant, uneasily.

  “I think we shall find him easily, systematically,” said the leader of the strangers. “We shall mark each passage searched. Eventually we shall have searched them all.”

  “You are thorough,” said the pit master.

  “Guards are set at the tunnel entrances, of course,” said the leader of the strangers.

  “Yes,” said the pit master.

  “He is as good as ours,” said the lieutenant.

  “Do you have sleen?” asked the leader of the strangers.

  “Most were killed in the tunnels, recently,” said the pit master. “Two survived.”

  They were magnificent beasts. It was not surprising that they had been the two which, released in the tunnels, defending the depths, attacking the raiders earlier, had survived. Both of them had taken the peasant’s scent, but the leader of the strangers would not know that. One of them was also one of the two which had earlier, been imprinted with my scent. The other had died in the tunnels, in the fighting.

  “There are two who might hunt?”

  “Yes,” said the pit master.

  “Sleen will tear him to pieces,” said the lieutenant. “There will be little, if anything, to return to Lurius of Jad, to prove the successful discharge of our office.”

  “They are to be utilized only as a last resort,” the leader assured his lieutenant.

  “They will not be necessary,” said the lieutenant.

  “They are trailers or hunters?” asked the leader.

  The distinction, in fact, is sometimes a subtle one, particularly if the beast’s bloodlust becomes aroused.

  “Hunters,” said the pit master.

  Sleen are trained variously. The five most common trainings are those of the war sleen, which may also be utilized as a bodyguard; the watch sleen, to guard given precincts; the herding sleen, which will kill only if the quarry refuses to be herded rapidly and efficiently to a given destination, usually a pen or slave cage; the trailing sleen, which is used, in leash, to follow a scent; and the hunter, which is trained to hunt and kill. It is next to impossible to use a hunter as a trailer, because, when the quarry is near, and the killing fever is on it, it will even turn and attack its leash holder, to free itself for the strike on the quarry. A trailer is usually a sm
aller beast, and one more easily managed, but it is, when all is said and done, a sleen, and trailers not unoften, at the hunt’s end, their instincts preponderating, break loose for the kill. When they begin to become unmanageable they must sometimes be killed. The hunters are used generally, of course, in the pursuit of fugitives, free or slave. Unleashed, they are not retarded in their hunt by the lagging of their keepers. I was terrified of sleen. I had seen how they could tear apart great pieces of meat. Most houses in which female slaves may be found, it might be mentioned, as it may be of interest to some, would not have sleen. The sleen is, as least in civilized areas, a rare, expensive and dangerous beast. They do about in some areas in the wild, as, for example, in the surrounding mountains. The sleen often burrows, and it is predominantly nocturnal. There are also several varieties of the animal apparently, adapted to diverse environments. The most common sleen in domestication, as I understand it, is the forest sleen. It is also the largest, animal for animal. There are also, as I understand I, prairie sleen, mountain sleen and snow sleen. There is a short-haired variety found in some tropical areas, the jungle sleen. And one variety, it seems, is adapted for an aquatic environment, the sea sleen.

  “Excellent,” said the leader of the strangers.

  He then turned to the fellow who carried the sack. “Return to the cell and get the prisoner’s blanket,” he said. “Put it in the sack, and seal the sack, that there may be no mistake as to the blanket in question.”

  The man turned about and hurried back to the cell. In a few moments he had returned, with the sack sealed.

  “Lead us to your quarters,” said the leader of the strangers to the pit master. “We shall organize our searches from that point.”

  “I should be honored,” said the pit master, graciously.

  We then continued on. In a moment I had passed beneath the spikes of the lifted gate. I had turned my head to the side, just a little. The pit master was now in front. Perhaps one might drift back, to crouch down, and hide somewhere? But they would search all the passages, eventually, and I would be found. Too, I was not eager to be alone in the passages. Indeed, the peasant must be somewhere in the. I heard a cry behind me, from the last girl in the line. I turned about. Perhaps she, too, had had such thoughts. But there was, I now saw, one of the black-tunicked men at the end of the line. He had apparently taken up his position there when the pit master had moved forward. Perhaps the girl had dallied. She had been thrust forward, I gathered, not gently. I saw him turn and draw down the gate. It was not locked down, but I could not have lifted it, even h ad I not been bound.

  “Move!” he said, irritably.

  We hurried on, in front of him, bound, in single file.

  34

  “What time is it now?” demanded the leader of the strangers.

  “It is near the tenth Ahn,” said a man, inspecting the level of the water in the clepsydra. In the depths one cannot tell day from night, except by the clocks.

  We had been returned to the quarters of the pit master better then two Ahn ago.

  The officer of Treve and the pit master were sitting at the table, playing Kaissa, which is a board game of this world. They were absorbed in the game. I think they were both skilled.

  The leader of the strangers paced the floor angrily. His lieutenant was sitting by, cross-legged. Gito was crouched in one corner, his knees drawn up under his chin. He looked about himself, furtively.

  Five of the black-tunicked men had perished in or near the cell, two being struck by the chain and stone, two in swordplay, and one apparently thrust though, in the darkness, the peasant exiting from the cell.

  Three more, since that time, as was determined from reports arriving at the quarters of the pit master, now the headquarters of the strangers, had perished. One had been pierced by a concealed spear, spring-released from the side of a corridor, another in crossing one of the narrow bridges over a crevice, it buckling as weight was placed at its center, another when an apparently solid portion of the corridor had fallen away beneath him, plunging him screaming, we heard the screams even where we were, into a nest of tiny, active serpents below, serpents called osts. They are, it seems, highly poisonous. The effects of the poison, too, I am told, are not pretty to watch.

  In the case of the first man, the pit master had reminded the leader of the strangers that various security devices in the corridors were armed, especially in view of the incursion of the raiders earlier, and reiterated his offer to furnish expert guidance. “You will remain here,” the leader of the strangers had informed him. “As you wish,” said the pit master. In the case of the second man, it seemed that the had neglected to lock two small rods in place, toward the center of the bridge, before sliding it out, into place, without which action, it buckles and turns, as on a hinge. In the third case, the man had apparently not noted the small fanglike sign carved into the wall of the corridor, some two inches above the floor. Accordingly it was not surprising he did not locate the lever which would have secured the trap, disarming it. In both of these cases, too, the pit master’s expressed willingness to be of assistance was spurned.

  “An excellent move,” said the officer of Treve, studying the board before him.

  “What is the delay!” cried the leader of the strangers. “They should have taken him by now!”

  “There are many passages,” said the pit master, looking up. The leader of the strangers spun away from him, in fury. The pit master then returned his attention to the game.

  A watch of pit guards, as noted earlier, had been dismissed. A second watch, reporting in but a few minutes ago, had also been dismissed.

  Where we were, in the headquarters of the strangers, there were, besides the pit master, the officer of Treve, the leader of the strangers, his lieutenant, Gito, and ourselves, the slaves, three men. The others, originally twelve in number, had been divided into four such parties of three men each.

  I knelt by the wall. I was chained there, with the others, the ten of us, the pit slaves. I think they wanted all of us together, where we might, collectively, be easily observed. Too we might then easily be removed from the wall, individually, or together. In any event, the kennels were not in use. The slaves at the wall were normally fastened there by two chains, one on the left ankle, the other on the neck. Now, however, each of us wore but one chain. Mine was on the left ankle. In virtue of this arrangement, that of the single chain, we could be quickly, conveniently, removed from the wall. Our hands were still bound. Food had been thrown to us. We fed as we could.

  “Capture of Home Stone,” said the pit master.

  “It is the eleventh Ahn,” said a man, looking at the clepsydra.

  The leader of the black-tunicked men made a noise of disgust.

  His lieutenant was sharpening his sword. Three crossbows, armed, rested on the table.

  I lay down by the wall, to rest.

  The pit master and the officer of Treve reset the board, for another game. They had played very evenly, as I understood it, first one winning, then the other.

  “Your move,” said the pit master.

  I pulled a little at my bound wrists. The wonder and terror of this suddenly came to me. How was it that I should be here? I did not even know how I had come to this world! But I was here now, helpless, owned, where I must serve, and please and obey, a slave girl on an alien, exotic world. Who had first seen me, who had marked me out, who had first decided this? Who had speculated how I might look in a collar, who had conjectured my liniments, who had read my body, and my heart?

  “The Turian opening?” asked the pit master.

  “Perhaps,” said the officer of Treve.

  I became suddenly angry. How could they play a game, now, at a time like this?

  Sometimes I, and others, had served as prizes in such contests, between guards. Sometimes we must lie to one side, or even under the table, chained hand and foot, waiting to see who would be victorious, to whom we would be awarded for the evening.

  “You are
intent on the Turian,” said the pit master.

  “Perhaps,” said the officer.

  I was furious.

  I hated the game.

  How often I had had to wait for contentment, even such as might be granted to a slave, because of Kaissa! How often I had been uneasy, restless, in my kennel, pressing a tear stained face against the bars, grasping them, they damp from the sweat of my palms. How I would squirm with need, and must wait! Could they not understand my small cries and moans, and then I would be warned to silence, that I not distract them from their foolish game! Then I would crawl back in the kennel, my fists clenched, trying not to cry.

  After a time one of the black-tunicked men said, “It is the twelfth Ahn.”

  “Vanarik preceded us,” said a man, limping, he whose foot had been twisted in the stirrup of the crossbow, when the peasant had attacked him and the other. His fellow’s head had been almost ripped from his body by the stone on the chain. “Two gates fell, one before, one behind. A panel slid upward. Tharlarion entered the area. Before we could kill them Vanarik was pulled from the gate, he clinging to it, not inches from us.”

  “That would be on level two, in passage eighteen,” said the pit master not looking up from the board.

  Another of the black-tunicked men died where two passages had intersected. The crossbows had been armed, the men tense. The leader of the strangers, I recalled, had advised them to fire even at a shadow. That shadow had been one of their own men, brought down with three quarrels.

  The black-tunicked men had had better fortune in another passage, where five urts had charged them. One of these sleek beasts had been directly killed, by bolts. Two others, wounded, had been turned back. Two others had been, wheeling about amongst them, slashing and biting, destroyed my swords. The men had then pursued the two wounded urts, following a trail of blood, until they had them cornered, quarrels hanging from their flanks, where they slew them, hissing and snarling, against a gate with further quarrels. One of the black-tunicked men had been seriously bitten, and another clawed, but none had perished. The bows had served, in their way, as shields, the urts snapping at them, clinging to them, permitting the defender to draw and hack at their stretched necks with his sword. Sleen would not have made that mistake. They go for warmth and blood.