Witness of Gor

by John Norman

  "He would use the men of the dark caste to clear the passages before him, of course," said the pit master.

  "But the three gates here, across the way, were locked."

  "Yes, that is interesting," agreed the pit master.

  "You are certain that there is no possibility of escape through the urt nest, through drains, or sewers, or such."

  "I think I hear the guard in the corridor," said the pit master. "They have found us."

  "I noted you held your torch behind the officer," said the officer of Treve.

  "Did I?" asked the pit master.

  "That silhouetted his head and shoulders well, even if an approach had been made under water."

  "I suppose it might have," said the pit master, "now that I think of it."

  "Were the chains of the prisoner tampered with?" inquired the officer of Treve.

  "That seems unlikely," said the pit master.

  "There is one thing I do not understand," said the officer of Treve.

  "What is that?"

  "They were prize sleen, trained to perfection. How could it be that they became confused and attacked the captain of those of the dark caste?"

  "As you know," said the pit master, "such beasts are unreliable."

  "I do not think so," said the officer.

  "Oh?"

  "How could they make such a terrible mistake?"

  "Perhaps they did not make a mistake," said the pit master.

  "I do not think they did," said the officer of Treve.

  "Perhaps you are right," said the pit master.

  "But the blanket was taken from the cell of the prisoner. It was kept, all the while, in a sealed sack. I saw the seal myself."

  "It was taken from the cell of the prisoner," said the pit master. "But that does not mean that it was the blanket of the prisoner."

  "The hunters insisted on spending the first night in the depths," said the officer of Treve, "presumably to guard against the prisoner being secretly removed."

  "I suspect that was their motivation," said the pit master.

  "Accordingly," said the officer of Treve, "the blankets of the captain of those of the black caste and the prisoner might have been switched early the next morning, before those of the black caste arrived at the cell."

  "An interesting possibility," said the pit master.

  "And the captain of those of the dark caste then, by using his own blanket, unbeknownst to himself, set the sleen upon himself."

  "That is a possibility," admitted the pit master.

  "You are guilty of collusion in the escape of a prisoner," said the officer of Treve.

  "We need not regard him as having escaped," pointed out the pit master. "Too, it was not I who kicked a sword to him, putting it within his grasp."

  "I am not fond of murder," said the officer.

  "I only dreamed of honor," said the pit master. "But I think you may have looked upon her, in a cell, face to face."

  "Sir," said one of eleven men, the current posting of the pit guard. They were now in the passage. Gito was far down the passage, crouching down. "We searched long for you."

  The pit master put his torch in a rack, beside the portal.

  "The guard reports for duty," said the man.

  "Feed the prisoners," said the pit master. "Secure the passages, return to your normal duties."

  "Are you safe?" asked the man.

  "Yes," said the pit master.

  "There is not one amongst us who will not take up arms on your behalf," he said. He looked about himself, and toward the darkness of the pool area. He touched his blade, slung over his left shoulder.

  "That will not be necessary," said the pit master. "Our guests have gone."

  The officer of the guard turned about arid went down the corridor, past Gito. His men followed him.

  "I wonder if we have done well here," said the pit master.

  "I do not know," said the officer of Treve.

  "I wonder if what we have done here truly comports with honor," said the pit master.

  "I do not know," said the officer of Treve.

  "Nor I," said the pit master.

  "She has many voices, and many songs," said the officer of Treve.

  Before we left the pool area the pit master, by means of the ropes and chains controlling the cage, brought the helpless Lady Ilene, she dangling on the rope, to the wall, where he lifted her up and put her on her knees, on the walkway. He freed her hands and feet, cutting the cords of twisted cloth, taken from her garments, which the peasant had used to bind them. When he freed her of the gag, being careful, in observance of her modesty, not to look upon her features, she pleaded desperately to speak, but this permission was denied to her. She then, kneeling before the pit master, put her head down to the bloody walkway.

  "She may soon be ready for a cell," said the officer of Treve.

  "Or even shackles," said the pit master.

  "Perhaps," said the officer.

  The Lady Ilene was then reinserted into the cage, and the cage restored to its place over the pool.

  I saw her kneeling in the cage, her small hands on the bars. The light cord ran from the walkway, up, through its rings, over its pulleys, to the latch at the bottom of the cage, that securing its gate.

  The urts were still feeding.

  The pit master lifted up the body of the lieutenant, and thrust it over the railing.

  There was a splash in the dark waters below.

  The pit master then cut the cords, in the center, that held the pairs of slaves together.

  We then left the pool area.

  The slaves preceded the pit master and the officer of Treve. We did wait for a moment, when the pit master stopped beside Gito, in the passage. "You will come with us," he said. "When we come to the sack in the passage, where it was dropped, you will pick it up, and bring it along."

  "Yes, yes, Masters," said Gito anxiously. He then hurried along with us.

  38

  "It is there," said the pit master to the messenger, indicating the sack.

  The pit master had been engaged in a game of Kaissa with the officer of Treve.

  "The messenger is here," Fina had announced.

  The pit master had then risen, to attend to the business at hand.

  "This is to be transmitted to Lurius of Jad, Ubar of Cos," said the messenger.

  "As indicated on the orders," said the pit master, signing them and stamping them.

  I did not want to look at the sack. In it was the head of Gito.

  "He is your friend?" the pit master had asked Gito, in one of the passages, shortly after we had returned from the pool area. Gito had retrieved the sack, and was holding it, opened, as he had been requested.

  "Yes," had said Gito.

  The pit master had taken him by the throat, and pressed him back against the wall of the passage. The sack had slipped from his hand.

  "And you are his friend?" asked the pit master.

  "Yes, yes!" said Gito.

  "And I am your friend," had said the pit master. He had then lifted Gito up by the throat, holding him against the side of the passage. Gito squirmed, held so. I do not know if Gito, unable then to speak, held by the throat, saw the stiletto leave the tunic of the pit master or not. Surely he must have felt its point enter his body, on the left side, below the ribs. The point then, with terrible slowness, as Gito squirmed like an impaled urt, moved upward, behind the ribs, until it entered the heart. His head was shortly thereafter twisted and cut from the body. It was kicked into the opened sack by the foot of the pit master. The sack was then closed, and was later sealed, with a wax disk and string. The pit master cleaned his blade on Gito's tunic. The body itself was later given to tharlarion.

  I watched the messenger leave.

  The pit master then returned to the game.

  "A water urt was found in the valley three days ago," said the officer of Treve, studying the board.

  "That is interesting," said the pit master.

 
"Naturally I had the outlets from the sewers checked," said the officer.

  "Of course," said the pit master.

  "A bar was found broken from the stone, and another, beside it, bent to the side," said the officer, his fingers poised over a piece on the board.

  "Creating an opening large enough for the passage of a man?" asked the pit master.

  "Yes," said the officer, moving the piece.

  "Large enough for a large man?"

  "Quite," said the officer.

  "Interesting."

  "I thought you said there was no way out from the passages."

  "There was no way, when I spoke," said the pit master.

  "A way was apparently made," said the officer. "A ruined bow was found at the spot, the metal, and quarrels, used as tools, also the blade of a sword, and of a knife, blunted, broken from their hilts, these things used in furrowing stone, in scratching out the mortar."

  "Imperfect tools for such work," said the pit master.

  "Yes," agreed the officer.

  "You have repaired the damage?"

  "Of course."

  "I think we may assume that our friend has left us."

  "Yes," said the officer.

  "But he is now, it seems, unarmed?"

  "It would seem so," said the officer. "To be sure, in the hands of such a man a branch, a stone, could be dangerous."

  "What do you conjecture are his chances of survival?" asked the pit master, studying the board.

  "You are joking?"

  "No."

  "He has no chance," said the officer.

  "Oh?" said the pit master.

  "He will be detected by patrols," said the officer.

  "I would not count on it," said the pit master.

  "No man can live alone in the mountains," said the officer. "He will starve. He will die of exposure. He is, for most practical purposes, unarmed. Sleen will kill him."

  "I see," said the pit master.

  "He cannot escape the mountains," said the officer.

  "Nor could he escape the depths," said the pit master.

  "He is no more than a wild beast himself," said the officer, "a madman, roaming in the mountains."

  "That is true," said the pit master.

  "He will die," said the officer.

  "But his blood will not be on our hands," said the pit master.

  "No," said the officer.

  "He is a remarkable man," said the pit master. "He is cunning, and brilliant, and ruthless, and powerful. He is a relentless, implacable foe. He is generous and loyal to those he thinks are his friends and would be merciless with those he deems his enemies. It would not be well to betray such a man. I fear his vengeance would be terrible."

  "He will die in the mountains," said the officer.

  "It would be well for some if he did," said the pit master.

  "He is harmless now," said the officer. "He does not even know who he is."

  "And some had best hope he never remembers," said the pit master.

  I did not understand these things. It was the talk of masters. I was to one side, kneeling by a lamp, sewing a rent tunic for one of the guards. I had been taught to sew in the pens. Such skills are expected of us, as I have indicated. I had been ordered to kneel, and then the garment had been thrown to me, with instructions to repair it. "Yes, Master," I had said. But I enjoyed performing such tasks for the masters. I had learned to sew well, and must, in any event, comply, and the guard, too, was handsome. That he had selected me out to sew his garment, I was sure, was not without significance. Too, my needs, those of a slave, those which put me so much at the mercy of men, had begun, powerfully, irresistibly, to arise in me again.

  "I have never known such a man," said the pit master. "Have you, Terence?" I was startled. This was the first time I had ever heard the name of the officer.

  The pit master moved a piece.

  "That is an interesting move," said the officer.

  "Have you?" asked the pit master. "Have you ever known such a man?"

  "No," said the officer of Treve, Terence.

  "Do you know any who could stand against such a man?" asked the pit master.

  "One, perhaps," said Terence.

  "Who?" asked the pit master.

  "One I met long ago, when I was a mercenary tarnsman," said Terence. "I was in Port Kar."

  "A den of thieves, a lair of pirates," said the pit master.

  "It was at the time of the naval engagement between Cos and Tyros and Port Kar," said Terence.

  "As I understand it, you had some role in that."

  "Yes," said Terence.

  "One which did not endear you to those of either Cos or Tyros," said the pit master.

  "It was the first time tarns were used at sea," said Terence.

  "What was his name?" asked the pit master.

  "Bosk," said Terence, "Bosk, of Port Kar."

  Two guards were at the far end of the long table, also involved with Kaissa.

  "What is the war news, from the surface?" asked the pit master.

  "Dietrich of Tarnburg has seized Torcadino," said Terence. "In the north, Ar's Station is under siege."

  "Dietrich's action stops the drive to Ar," said the pit master. "That will give Ar the time she needs."

  "Ar deserves no such good fortune," said Terence.

  "The siege of Ar's Station, on the large scale of things," said the pit master, "seems surprising. I would think it would be unimportant."

  "One would think so," said Terence. "One trusts that it will remain so."

  Besides myself, of the pit slaves, there were now in the chamber only Fina, Kika, and Tira. Most of the slaves were about their duties in the corridors. Two had been permitted to the surface for holiday. One, Tassy, had been thought in the view of the pit master to have shown too little deference to a particular prisoner. She had, accordingly, last night, been put in with him. I had seen her pulled back by the hair, screaming, from the bars, her hands trying to reach through them. This morning I had seen her lying at his thigh, in the straw, docile and timid. I feared she had become his slave. Fina was kneeling near the pit master, cleaning leather. Kika and Tira were washing suls. These would be later baked, and used in the evening feeding.

  Terence thrust a piece to a new position on the board.

  "A strong counter to my move," said the pit master. "I fear I must think again."

  "Guard your Tarnsman," said Terence.

  I bent to my work. I made my stitches small, and fine, and closely and evenly spaced. I hoped the master, the guard, for whom I labored would be pleased. I did not wish to be beaten.

  "Ai!" said one of the two guards to the side, at the far end of the table, responding to some move in his own game.

  This utterance was followed by a sound of chain as the woman near them lifted herself a little, looking up. She was now half lying, half kneeling. Her legs were together. Her weight was muchly on her right thigh and hip. The palms of her hands were on the floor. The sound had been the consequence mainly of the movement of the chain on her neck, the links moving against one another, and the terminal link pulling at the holding ring of the metal collar, but there had been, too, the movement of the links on the floor of the chamber, those of the chain which joined her ankle rings, and that of the chain which joined her wrist rings. She was the only free woman in the chamber. Too, perhaps paradoxically, she was the only woman in the chamber who had not been given clothing. The rest of us had our tunics. She was chained where she was, to a ring, near the guards, because she, or, perhaps more accurately, her use for the evening, was to figure as prize in the guards' game. She must also, though free, address the pit slaves as 'Mistress', and wait upon us, as we might please. She was the girl, Ilene. She had learned much in the cage. The pit master had decided that it would not harm her, to spoil her for freedom. What could her sisters do, after all, if what was returned to them was, at that time, little better than a needful female slave? She would still be legally free, and that would su
ffice for the justification of the ransom's collection, a ransom measured, interestingly enough, to a rate appropriate to a free female. What did it matter if, returned to her house, she might writhe and squirm in tears in her bed, striking her pillows in need? I think she now feared only that the ransom might be paid. I myself was not certain that her fears were justified. I had gathered that her sisters might be loath to pay and, also, now having tasted the wealth and power of the house, might be unwilling to do so. I expected that it would eventually be her fate to ascend the slave block, to be auctioned. Such a fate is quite common with those in her predicament. And once the collar was on her neck her sisters need fear her not at all. Indeed, they might even keep her in their own house, as a slave. I was a little bit angry that she had been selected as the prize in the guards' game. I think that was not so much because she was beautiful, which she was, as because she was free. Her being a free woman gave something of a fillip, it seemed, to her use as a prize. Once she was collared, of course, if that should occur, she would have to compete with such as I on a more even basis. Her treatment, her caresses, her rewards, and such, would then be more clearly a function of what she was in herself alone, more clearly a function of whatever intrinsic merit, quality, or worth she might possess in herself alone, as a female, as a slave.

  "Surrender your Home Stone," said the other guard. "You are done, finished!"

  "Hold, hold," said the first fellow, irritably, he who had uttered the exclamation only a moment ago.

  "Your Ubar and Ubar's Builder are forked," said the other guard. "Any honorable fellow in these circumstances would hasten to resign."

  "I will defend the Home Stone while yet a Spearman remains," said the other, irritably.

  "Very well," said the other.

  "I retain two Physicians to your one," said the first.

  "So it will be a lengthy endgame," said the other.

  "I may even tease out a draw," said the first.

  "—Masters," said the Lady Ilene, suddenly, falteringly.

  "Did you request permission to speak?" asked one of the guards.

  "Forgive me, Masters," she whispered, frightened. "May I speak?"

  "Yes," said the fellow.

  "Thank you, Masters," she said. The Lady Ilene, you see, was not always granted permission to speak. She was, accordingly, appreciative. That permission could have been denied to her, of course, even as it might be denied to a slave.