Witness of Gor coc-26

by John Norman

  “Tensius, Abnik, into the water!” cried the lieutenant, gesticulating to the pool.

  They looked across the pool as though their officer might be mad.

  “I am bloodied,” said Tensius. He had lost blood from the bites of urts, when he had separated them, near the closed gate, earlier.

  “It is safe now,” said the lieutenant.

  The urts did seem to be feeding now. To be sure, I doubted that all of them, and there must have been seventeen or eighteen of them, had had their fill.

  “The nest opening is there!” pointed the lieutenant. “Enter it! Find him! Kill him!”

  “Would you send them to their deaths?” asked the officer of Treve.

  “We have taken fee,” said the lieutenant.

  I supposed that the nest might be empty now. But it would not be likely to long remain empty.

  I shivered.

  In dealing with urts there are certain things to keep in mind. One does not intrude into their nest. One tries to avoid placing oneself between them. And one never denies them an avenue of escape.

  “Into the water!” screamed the lieutenant.

  The men looked at him.

  “It is safe now,” said the lieutenant. “The urts feed. Go! Go!”

  “He is drowned!” cried Tensius.

  “Urts took him!” said Abnik.

  “Bring me the body!” said the lieutenant.

  The lieutenant, this officer of the men in the black habiliments, seemed as tenacious as might be a sleen itself, this world’s finest and most relentless tracker, a sleen on its scent, single-minded, implacable, driven. He wanted confirmation of the kill. Too, I supposed, in a short while, the urts about, it might be difficult to obtain remains sufficient to constitute convincing evidence to a fee giver that the task which had been agreed upon had been successfully accomplished.

  Tensius first, who had refrained from attacking the sleen in the passage, but who had later separated the urts, removed his helmet and set aside his bow. The black dagger was still on his forehead, from yesterday morning. He then put his knife between his teeth and, with care, lowered himself over the railing, and dropped down into the pool. He did this as gently as was possible. Abnik followed him, similarly. The lieutenant remained on guard, with the bow, surveying the water.

  “They are brave men,” said the officer of Treve.

  Tensius and Abnik swam to the edge of the pool, to our right.

  They looked back.

  The lieutenant pointed to the place where the pit master had indicated lay the underwater entrance to the nest.

  I saw Tensius first submerge. He was followed, in a moment, by Abnik.

  “Look!” said the pit master.

  One of the urts, an arm in its jaws, was swimming back toward the nest.

  “Kill it!” urged the pit master.

  “It takes time to reload,” said the lieutenant.

  “It may just brush past them,” said the officer of Treve. “It has its meat.”

  “Yes,” said the lieutenant, surveying the surface of the water, “that is what it will do.”

  “Not if there are young in the nest,” said the pit master.

  “Are there young in the nest?” asked the officer of Treve.

  “Yes,” said the pit master.

  “It takes time to reload,” said the lieutenant.

  “It is too late now,” said the officer of Treve.

  The urt, too, had submerged.

  “Space the light about the pool,” said the lieutenant, with a gesture of his arm.

  The slaves spaced themselves then more about the pool. I remained with Fecha a little to the left of the entrance, as one would enter the area of the pool. The lieutenant was a few feet to our right. The pit master was behind him, holding aloft his torch. The officer of Treve was nearby. Gito was not in the pool area, but back in the passage. I had glimpsed him. He was crouched down, his back to the wall of the passage, looking toward the portal.

  We waited, it seemed for a long time.

  “Should your men not have returned by now?” asked the officer of Treve.

  The lieutenant did not respond. He continued to survey the flickering surface of the pool.

  There was a sound of chain as the cage swung a little. It was a few yards away, above us. It had been moved by the weight of the bound, gagged free woman, dangling on the rope over the pool.

  She looked at me.

  I was suddenly, intensely, ashamed, aware of my nudity. How such as she must scorn such as I! In what contempt must she hold me! How she must despise me! But I was not such as she! I was a slave! I was collared! I must be as men would have me! If they saw fit to deny me clothing then I would not have clothing! If they ordered me to dance, I must dance. If they wished me to serve, I must serve! I was not such as she! But then I, for anything, would not have wished to be such as she! I had learned my womanhood! I would never, never surrender it, not now that I had tasted it, not for all the garbage and politics in the world. I had learned it at the hands of strong men, their precious gift to me, an inestimable treasure, men to whom I would be forever grateful. I had now found myself, and accepted myself, and loved myself! I was not a man, or a kind of man. I was a woman, something radically different and wonderful. I pitied men not being women! But then, suddenly, even though I knew her to be free, I did not sense contempt or scorn in her. It was strange. I quickly looked away. It is seldom wise for a female slave to look directly into the eyes of a free woman. But then I recalled that she had been in the cage. There, suspended in the darkness, helpless, alone, perhaps she had had time to think, to ask herself what she was, and wanted to be, and might be, and where she herself might be found.

  “Surely your men should have returned by now,” said the officer of Treve.

  “It is not clear what has occurred,” said the lieutenant.

  The urts continued to feed, turning the two bodies about in the water.

  I saw another swimming toward the nest, a shred of muscle trailing behind it.

  “By now,” speculated the officer of Treve, “it seems he should have been taken, or the body found.”

  “The two of you,” said the lieutenant, not taking his eyes from the water, “have been insufficiently cooperative. Your actions, you may be assured, will be reported to the administration.”

  The pit master continued to hold his torch aloft, as he had, rather behind the lieutenant.

  “They must have found him, they must have killed him, by now,” said the lieutenant.

  “Undoubtedly,” said the officer of Treve.

  “Perhaps they have all died in the nest,” said the pit master.

  “He may have drowned.” Said the lieutenant.

  “Possibly,” said the pit master.

  “Where is he?” cried the lieutenant.

  “Somewhere, one supposes,” said the officer of Treve.

  “Masters,” cried Gito, from back in the passage, “let us go to the surface!”

  “Go!” said the lieutenant, not taking his eyes from the pool.

  “I do not know the way!” cried Gito.

  “Where is he?” asked the lieutenant. He received no response.

  “He must have drowned,” said the lieutenant. He received no response.

  “Where are my men?” asked the lieutenant.

  “I would not know,” said the pit master.

  “They are in the nest,” said the lieutenant, “waiting for the way to clear of urts.”

  “Perhaps,” said the officer of Treve.

  “They are clever fellows,” said the lieutenant.

  “Doubtless,” said the pit master.

  “Picked men.”

  “I do not doubt it,” said the pit master.

  It was an elite squad, I gathered, which had come to Treve. To someone, it seemed, their mission must have been of great moment.

  “They have with them the body, or the head, of the prisoner,” said the lieutenant.

  “Possibly,” said
the officer of Treve.

  “They will return any moment,” said the lieutenant, determinedly.

  “Possibly,” said the officer of Treve.

  “There is something across the way,” said the pit master. He gestured toward the opposite wall, several yards from the nest entrance. There, something humped, like a cloth filled with air, had come to the surface.

  “Where?”

  “There.”

  “What is it? A dead urt?”

  “It is a body,” said the pit master.

  “Excellent!” said the lieutenant. “It has come to the surface!”

  An urt swam to the object and began to bite at it. Once it pulled it beneath the surface. It then emerged, again, closer to us. Another urt then swam toward it.

  “It is Tensius,” said the lieutenant.

  The eyes were still open, staring upward. One could see the dagger on the forehead. When the body was pulled back, again, one could see that the left leg was gone, and the left hand.

  “Urts,” said the lieutenant.

  I did not know if Tensius had reached the nest or not. I supposed that he might have, as we had not detected a disturbance in the water near the entrance to the nest. But if he had been killed in the nest, why had the urts not fed on him there?

  When I looked away from the water I saw that the lieutenant’s attention was returned, intently, to the pool. Indeed, he held his bow more at the ready than before.

  It was indeed an elite that had come to Treve.

  Had the prisoner died in the pool it seemed his body would have surfaced before that of Tensius.

  But the body of Tensius, it seemed, had not served as a diversion.

  It was merely meat, floating in the water, being eaten.

  The moments taken for its identification, the lapse of attention to the tunnel entrance occasioned by its appearance, had been without cost.

  The lieutenant lowered his bow.

  One could not climb from the pool to the walkway without a rope, or some such device, the tunnels to the walkway having been sealed.

  “The prisoner,” said the officer of Treve, “may have died in the nest. Too, he may have been trapped beneath the water, wedged under an outcropping, or between rocks.”

  The latter hypothesis was an interesting one, as water urts sometimes secure prey under the water, saving it for later, rather as certain predatory beasts will bury a kill, or place it in a tree, to be finished later. Some birds impale insects on thorns, for a similar purpose.

  “He is alive, somewhere,” said the lieutenant. “I am sure of it.”

  “That seems improbably,” said the officer of Treve.

  “The body of Tensius shows that he is alive,” said the lieutenant. “If he had been killed by urts his body would have made that clear. It would have been a mass of bites, or the throat would have been gone. The condition of the body, on the other hand, shows that it was not attacked by urts until either it was dead of unable to defend itself. And he would not have drowned unless he had been held under the water, in which case the prisoner is alive. I am sure Tensius was stabbed, and the wound washed free of blood.”

  “Interesting,” said the officer of Treve.

  “He is clever,” said the lieutenant. “He is cunning. He is magnificent prey. It is a pleasure to hunt him.”

  “Those of the black caste are famed for their prowess in hunting,” said the officer of Treve.

  “But he has miscalculated,” said the lieutenant. “He thought to use the body of Tensius as a diversion, to cover his exit from the pool, but he could not leave the pool. Instead, he has only managed, unbeknownst to himself, to inform me that he is still alive.”

  “Let us get more men,” said Gito, who had crept closer to the portal.

  “I need only one clear shot,” said the lieutenant.

  “He is surely dead,” said Gito. “Let us hasten to the surface.”

  “I have not seen the body,” said the lieutenant.

  “You truly think he is alive?” asked the officer of Treve.

  “Yes,” said the lieutenant. “He has now inadvertently informed me of that fact. That loses him his advantage. I am now ready for him, quite ready.”

  “Come away!” begged Gito.

  “I need only one clean shot,” said the lieutenant.

  The quarrel lay ready in the guide, as quiet as a bullet.

  Suddenly from the part of the pool near the entrance to the nest we saw a hand reach up, breaking the surface, and then an arm. A head momentarily broke the surface, and then the body seemed dragged under again. Then it came back again to the surface, arms thrashing. It cried out with pain. “It is your man!” said the officer of Treve.

  It was the black-tunicked fellow, Abnik, who had had his foot injured in the crossbow’s suirrup yesterday morning.

  He went under again, seemingly pulled down, and then, choking, spitting water, came again to the surface, closer. “Help! Help!” he cried.

  “He is fleeing the nest!” said the officer of Treve.

  Abnik tried to swim toward us. It seemed something held him back, under the surface.

  “urts have him!” said the officer of Treve.

  “Help! Please!” cried Abnik. Then, choking, he was drawn under again.

  One of the girls on the other side of the pool, tied by her neck to her cord-mate, screamed, horrified.

  “Keep the torch up!” cried the lieutenant.

  I suddenly realized his attention was not on the pathetic figure in the pool but on the waters behind it and about it.

  “Help!” cried Abnik.

  The water was bloody about him.

  An urt beneath the railing turned smoothly in the water, orienting itself toward the figure in the water. It did not, however, approach it. Rather it twisted about, suddenly, and returned to its work at hand. We saw the figure of Tensius pulled under, beneath the railing. Then it surfaced, again. The side of its face was gone.

  “Help!” cried Abnik.

  We could now see, surfaced behind him, the head and neck of an urt, one that was very large.

  Then it dove down again and Abnik cried out in misery.

  “Please!” he wept.

  His face was contorted. It was hideous. His hands clutched at the air as though he might gain purchase there to drag himself to safety.

  “Help! Help!” he cried.

  The attention of the lieutenant I noted, to my horror, was not on the struggling figure of Abnik. He was intensely considering, rather, the waters to the side and back.

  The head and neck of the urt surfaced again, behind Abnik.

  I screamed.

  “There it is!” cried out the officer of Treve. “Kill it! Kill it! Save your man!”

  “Do not be foolish,” said the lieutenant, without taking his attention from the pool. “Do you not understand what is occurring?”

  “Please, help me!” cried Abnik.

  “Give me the bow,” said the officer of Treve. “I will kill it.”

  But the lieutenant, angrily, pulled the bow away.

  The pit master stood rather behind the lieutenant, his torch lifted. I could see the urts below us, at the bodies near the wall, beneath where we stood.

  “Kill the thing!” said the officer of Treve. “Kill it!”

  “No,” said the lieutenant.

  “Save him!” begged the officer of Treve.

  “I have ten fee, as has he,” said the lieutenant.

  “Kill it, kill it!” said the officer of Treve.

  The man in the water, thrashing about, screaming in misery.

  “No,” said the lieutenant.

  “It is an easy shot,” said the officer of Treve, desperately.

  “At this distance you could not miss!”

  “I will not waste the quarrel,” said the lieutenant.

  “Help!” screamed Abnik.

  “He will die,” said the officer of Treve.

  “I am hunting,” said the lieutenant.

  �
�Shoot!” begged the officer of Treve.

  “No,” said the lieutenant.

  It took time, I knew, to reload.

  The lieutenant did not even see the hands of the man in the water raised to him, supplicatingly. Nor did he see the fear in those eyes, the terror and pain. His attention was elsewhere, on the waters behind the figure and the thing at his back. But it might have been to his advantage had he paid closer attention to the figure in the water for suddenly the thing behind Abnik rose up in the water and, at the same time, we saw the quarrel of a bow emerge and the cable snapped forward and the quarrel took the lieutenant in the side of the throat just under the chin and tore upward through the skull breaking the helmet away from the head and we saw, below, for one terrible moment, cowled in the head and pelt of an urt, the pelt about his shoulders, the eyes, and the fierce visage, of the peasant, and then that head descended again into the water, and it seemed, once more, eerily, only the head and shoulders of an urt. It moved slowly away, across the pool. It then, near the entrance of the nest. Slipped under the water.

  The pit master now leaned forward, over the railing. Abnik was now rolling lifeless in the water, lost in the midst of the urts and bodies.

  “Is there a way from the urt nest, other than to the pool and walkway?” asked the officer of Treve.

  “Ways are barred,” said the pit master.

  “But there are ways?”

  The pit master shrugged.

  “Water must be brought to the pool,” said the officer of Treve. “A drain? A conduit?”

  “They are impassable,” said the pit master.

  “Do you believe that?” asked the officer of Treve.

  “They are impassable by an ordinary man,” said the pit master.

  “I see,” said the officer.

  “They are barred, they pass through tharlarion nests.”

  “Is there any possibility that the prisoner could escape?” asked the officer.

  “None whatsoever,” said the pit master.

  “Could he live in such passages?”

  “Perhaps on urts,” said the pit master.

  “There is no way out?”

  “No,” said the pit master.

  “Would it be wise to use men, pursing him in the passages beneath the city?”

  “I would not think so,” said the pit master.

  “What has happened?” called Gito, from down the corridor.