by John Norman
“I would alter the garments you wear, if I were you,” said Imnak, “for you might be mistaken for one of the men of the complex.”
I removed the suit I had worn. I donned boots and fur trousers. I did not wish to wear a shirt or parka in the complex, because of its heat.
More hunters came past us. Imnak explained to some of them the nature of the dart-firing weapons.
The prisoners, captured outside, shuddering, half-frozen, were herded within the complex, bound.
“Go to where it is warmer,” I told the girls shivering in the recessed room.
Arlene, Audrey, Barbara, Constance, and the others, hurried to a place of greater shelter.
Karjuk went then to direct the operations within the complex. He was accompanied by Imnak.
I stepped outside, into the arctic night, though bare-chested, to survey the rear of our position.
I checked the ice cliffs, the ice about, to see if any organized sortie might be obvious. I saw nothing. If men of the complex fled the complex I did not think they would last long in the arctic night. The power units in their suits would eventually be exhausted, and they would then be at the mercy of the snow and ice.
I looked about, and, suddenly, saw that the port to the complex was being slowly closed. Swiftly I re-entered. The Lady Rosa, startled, turned toward me, from the wheel which controlled the panel. She backed away, shaking her head. Her mouth had been on the wheel.
Not speaking I went to her and put her to her knees. With my knife I cut a length of her hair, about a foot in length, and crossed and tied together her ankles. I then dragged her by the arm across the steel, out through the portal, and onto the ice. “No,” she screamed, “No!” I left her on her side on the ice. “No!” she screamed.
I returned within the complex and, with the wheel, closed the heavy, sliding hatch.
I heard her screaming on the other side of the steel. “Let me in!” she cried. “I demand to be let in!” Her cries could be heard with some clarity. She had doubtless twisted and squirmed frenziedly, until she must be, on her knees, just outside of the steel.
“I am a free woman!” she cried. “You cannot do this to me!”
I did not think she would last long outside in the arctic night, silked as she was.
She had tried to kill me.
“I will be your slave,” she cried.
She did not know if I were still on the other side of the door or not.
“I am your slave!” she cried. “Master, Master, I am your slave! Please spare your slave, Master!” She wailed with misery and cold. “Please spare your slave, Master!” she wept.
I turned the wheel, opening the hatch.
She fell inward, across the threshold, shivering. I drew her within the room, and spun shut the hatch.
I looked down at her, shuddering at my feet. She looked up at me, terrorized. “What manner of man are you, my Master?” she asked. I looked down at her. She struggled to her knees and put her head down, to my feet. She began to kiss them, desperately, in an effort to placate me. “Look up,” I said to her. She did so. “You will be whipped severely,” I told her. “Yes, Master,” she said. “I tried to kill you.”
“You did that when you were a free woman,” I told her. “I discount it.”
“But then why would you have me whipped?” she asked.
“You kiss poorly,” I told her.
“I beg instruction,” she said.
“I will have a girl try to teach you some things,” I told her. Experienced slave girls are often useful in teaching a new girl, fresh to her condition, how to please men.
“I will try to learn my lessons well,” she said.
I threw her to my shoulder, to carry her within the complex to a holding area. “You will learn your lessons well,” I told her, “or you. will be thrown to sleen for feed.”
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“The complex is secure,” said Ram, “save for the chamber of Zarendargar, Half-Ear. None has entered there.”
“I shall go in,” I said.
“We can blast our way in,” said Ram. “Let us do that,” said Drusus.
I walked down the long hail toward the chamber of Zarendargar. Behind me, some hundred yards or so, were Ram, and Drusus, and Karjuk and Imnak, and numerous red hunters.
I carried a dart-firing weapon in my hand. It seemed a long way down the hall. I had not remembered it as being that far. The overhead track system stopped some forty feet or so from Zarendargar’s chamber. I looked at the monitor lens in the ceiling. Doubtless my approach had been observed on it. The interior of the chamber, though it contained monitors, was not itself monitored.
At the door to Zareridargar’s chamber I paused, and lifted the dart-firing weapon. But the door seemed ajar.
The fighting in the complex had been sharp and bloody. Men of the complex, and red hunters, had fallen. The resistance had been led by the giant Kur, whose left ear had been half torn away. But there had been too many red hunters, and too many weapons. He had, when the battle had turned against him, freed his Kurii and his men to flee or surrender as they would. No Kur had surrendered. Most had been slain, fighting to the last. Some had departed from the complex, hobbling wounded away into the arctic night. Zarendargar himself had withdrawn to his chamber.
The door there seemed ajar.
I thrust it open with the barrel of the dart-firing weapon.
I recalled the chamber well.
I slipped inside, furtively, but then lowered the weapon.
“Greetings, Tarl Cabot,” came from the translator.
On the furred dais, as before, I saw Zarendargar. There was a small device near him.
The great shape, stiffly, uncurled, and sat there, watching me.
“Forgive me, my friend,” it said. “I have lost a great deal of blood.”
“Let us dress your wounds,” I said.
“Have some paga,” it said. It indicated the bottles and glasses to one side.
I went to the shelves and, looping the dart-firing weapon over my shoulder, by its stock strap, poured two glasses of paga. I gave one of the glasses to Zarendargar, who accepted it, and retained the other. I went to sit, cross-legged, before the dais, but Zarendargar indicated that I should share the dais with him. I sat near him, cross-legged, as a Warrior sits.
“You are my prisoner,” I said to him.
“I think not,” he said. He indicated, holding it, the small metallic device which had lain beside him on the dais. It nestled now within his left, tentacled paw.
“I see,” I said. The hair rose on the back of my neck.
“Let us drink to your victory,” he said. He lifted his glass. “A victory to men and Priest-Kings.”
“You are generous,” I said.
“But a victory is not a war,” he said.
“True,” I said.
We touched glasses, in the manner of men, and drank.
He put aside his glass. He lifted the metallic object.
I tensed.
“I can move this switch,” he said, “before you can fire.”
“That is clear to me,” I said. “You are bleeding,” I said. The dais on which I sat was stiff with dried blood. And it was clear that so small an effort as rising to meet me, and touching his glass to mine, had opened one of the vicious wounds on his great body.
He lifted the metallic object.
“It is this which you sought,” he said.
“Of course,” I said. It was that object which lay beyond the reach of men, and where it could not be scanned by the monitoring system.
“Did you know it would be here?” he asked.
“I understood that it would be here only later,” I said.
“You will not take me alive,” it said.
“Surrender,” I said. “It is no dishonor to surrender. You have fought well, but lost.”
“I am Half-Ear, of the Kurii,” it said.
It fondled the metal device, looking at me.
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p; “Is there so much of value here,” I asked, “that you would be willing to destroy it?”
“The supplies here, and the disposition maps, the schedules and codes, will not fall into the hands of Priest-Kings,” it said. It looked at me. “There are two switches on this mechanism,” it said. It lifted the mechanism.
There were indeed two switches on the mechanism.
“When I depress either switch,” it said, not taking its eyes from me, “a twofold, irreversible sequence is initiated. First, a signal is transmitted from the complex to the steel worlds. This signal, which can also be received by the probe ships and the fleet, will inform them of the destruction of the complex, the loss of these munitions and supplies.”
“The second portion of the sequence, simultaneously initiated, triggers the destruction of the complex,” I said.
“Of course,” he said.
His finger rested over the switch.
“There are several humans left in the complex,” I said.
“No Kurii save myself,” he said.
“True,” I said. “But there are humans here,”
“Free,” he asked.
“Some are free,” I said.
He shrugged. The great furry shoulders then hunched in pain.
I could smell blood.
“Some of the humans here,” I said, “prisoners, were among your cohorts.”
“My men?” it asked.
“They fought bravely,” I said.
The beast seemed lost in thought. “They are in my command,” he said. “Though they are human, yet they were in my command.”
He depressed the second of the two switches.
I tensed, but the room, the complex, did not erupt beneath me.
“You are a good officer,” I said.
“The second switch was depressed,” he said. “The signal to the worlds, the ships, the fleet, is transmitted. Secondly the destruct sequence is now initiated.”
“But it is a second destruct sequence,” I said.
“Yes,” said Half-Ear, “that which allows for the evacuation of the complex.”
“How much time is there?” I asked.
“Three Kur Ahn,” he said. ‘The device is set on Kur chronometry, synchronized to the rotation of the original world.”
“The same chronometry which is used in the complex?” I asked.
“Of course,” he said.
“That is a little more than five Gorean Aim,” I said.
“Two Ehn more,” he said.
I nodded. The Kur day was divided into twelve hours, the Gorean day into twenty. The periods of rotation of the original Kur world and of Gor were quite similar. That was one reason the Kurii were intesested in Gor. They wished a world which would be congenial to their physiological rhythms, developed in harmony with given environmental periodicities of darkness and light.
“But I would advise you to be better than a Kur Ahn afoot away before the time of destruction,” he said.
“I shall act quickly,” I said. “You must accompany us to safety.”
The great Kur lay back on the dais, his eyes closed.
“Come with us,” I said.
“No,” it said. I could see the blood emerging from the large body of the animal.
“We can transport you,” I said.
“I will kill any who approach me,” it said.
“As you will,” I said.
“I am Zarendargar, Hall-Ear, of the Kurii,” it said. “Though I am in disgrace, though I have failed, I am yet Zarendargar, Half-Ear, of the Kurii.”
“I will leave you alone now,” I said.
“I am grateful,” it said. “You seem to know our ways well.”
“They are not dissimilar to the ways of the warrior,” I said.
I poured him a glass of paga, and left it near him on the dais.
I then turned away and went to the portal of the chamber. He wished to be left alone, to bleed in the darkness, that no one might see or know his suffering. The Kurii are proud beasts.
I turned at the portal. “I wish you well, Commander,” I said.
No response came from the translator. I left.
36. To The Victors Belong The Spoils; I Lift A Glass Of Paga
Orders were swiftly given.
In two Ahn we were ready to withdraw from the complex. Sleds were readied; prisoners, men of the complex, now in furs, some forty of them, were tied, their hands behind them, their necks linked by a long rope of rawhide, placing them in coffle. There was no fight left in them; they knew that on the ice, away from the technology of the complex, they could survive only if the red hunters chose to let them do so. Some would be sold to traders in the spring; others might be kept in the camps, to serve the red hunters; they, male slave beasts, would be stronger than female slave beasts. Perhaps eventually a hunter would take a trading trip south and take them with him, bound, to dispose of them in, say, Lydius, with his furs and other trade goods.
I regarded fifteen women who had been in the complex. women being trained as Kur agents for work in their cause. All were kneeling naked; most already had bondage strings on their necks; those that did not the hunters could sort out or do contest for.
“Put them in the sacks,” I said.
Each was thrust in a deep furred sack, which was then placed within another heavy fur sack, larger than the first. There was an opening in the sacks only for the head, which was then rimmed with a hood, so that only the face was exposed, and that could be withdrawn to protect it from the cold. The rawhide straps on the sacks were then drawn tight. looped about, and tied tightly behind the hoods; the women could not reach the straps; they were, thus, effectively imprisoned.
“Tie the sacks on the sleds,” I said. It was thus that the women would be transported.
The women moaned as they were carried helplessly to the sleds.
They would eventually learn to serve red masters.
She who had been the Lady Rosa was not, of course, with them. She was elsewhere, where I wanted her.
“Are we ready for departure?” I asked Imnak.
“Almost,” said Imnak. Poalu, already furred, was with him.
“Come with me,” I said to Imnak. “And bring, too, the bravest and best of your hunters, who performed for our cause in this place the best and noblest works of war.”
There was a cheer.
“Surely Karjuk stands highest among them,” he said.
“Come with us, Karjuk!” I cried.
“Go on without me,” he said. He smiled wryly. “I am a sour and solemn man.”
“Surely you would like a little thing to warm and pleasure you in your house?” I asked.
“I might grow too fond of it,” be said. He bent down. tying a bundle, which he would put on his sled.
Imnak winked at me. “Come along, grim friend,” said he. “You can help us make our choices.”
“I know little of such matters,” said Karjuk. “I am a lonely man.”
“Come along,” said Imnak. “Surely you can tell us which would be best at pulling sleds.”
“You must look at the legs,” said Karjuk. “Strong legs are important.”
“Come along,” said Imnak.
“Very well,” said Karjuk.
We walked along a hallway. With us were many of the red hunters, some seventy or eighty, and Ram, and Drusus.
We entered a large room, off the hall.
In the room, alone, in its center, knelt a young red woman, her head down. She had been the only woman of her race, other than Poalu, who had been slave in the complex. She had been found in security chaining, in one of the slave rooms. She looked up.
“No one wants this one,” said Imnak, “She has been a slave to white men.”
There were tears in the girl’s eyes. She was very pretty. She was short and plump like most of the women of the red hunters.
“What are you going to do with her?” asked Karjuk.
“Put her out in the snow,” said Imnak. “She sham
es the People.”
“I live apart from the People,” said Karjuk.
“Do you want her?” asked Imnak.
“Of course not,” said Karjuk, quickly. “She is too pretty for me.”
“Do you know her?” asked Imnak.
“She was Neromiktok, of the Copper Cliffs Camp,” he said. The word ‘Neromiktok’, in the language of the People. means ‘Smooth-and-Soft-to-Touch’. I had learned this from Imnak. I had learned, too, that she had once been the beauty of the Copper Cliffs Camp.
“Do you know him?” inquired Imnak, innocently, of the girl.
“He is Karjuk, Master,” she whispered, “once of Bright Stones Camp, who became the guard.”
“It is said he left the camps and became the guard,” said Imnak, “because his gifts were once refused by a proud girl of the Copper Cliffs Camp.”
She put down her head.
“How did you become a slave,” asked Imnak.
“I was too good for men,” she said.
Several of the red hunters with. us laughed, to hear a slave so speak.
“I ran away from Copper Cliffs to avoid an unwanted match,” she said. “I was captured. I was made a slave.”
“Are you still too good for men?” asked Imnak.
“No, Master,” she said.
“You have shamed the People,” said Imnak sternly.
“Yes, Master,” she said, her head down.
“What sort of woman are you?” asked Imnak.
“One who wants to kneel at the feet of men, and love them,” she said.
“Shameful! Shameful!” cried Imnak cheerfully.
“Yes, Master,” she said, sobbing, not raising her head.
“Do you know the fate for shaming the People?” he asked.
“Please, no, Master!” she said.
“Seize her,” said Imnak, to two of the red hunters. They seized her, each taking an arm, and dragged her to her feet.
“They are going to put me out in the snow!” she cried to Karjuk, agdnized.
“Are you going to put her out in the snow?” asked Karjuk.
“Of course,” said Imnak.
“But she has strong legs,” said Karjuk.