by John Norman
The officer of the court opened a box, one containing concentrated survival chocolate.
“Do not eat that,” said the shopgirl.
“I do as I please,” said the officer of the court.
“It is for all of us!” said the salesgirl.
“Be quiet,” said the officer of the court.
“Fat!” said the shopgirl.
“I am not fat,” said the officer of the court.
“Where are you going?” asked the shopgirl.
“I am going to the stream, to get a drink,” said the officer of the court.
Their water, you see, had been muchly depleted in the capsule, not only over time, but in virtue of their needs, given the physical dehydration which tends to occur in such an environment. The water in the stream, too, constituted a considerable improvement over the water in the capsule’s stores. The water in the stream, tested pure, was cold and fresh. It was not stale. It did not reek of the taste of containers. Indeed, it was the best water that the officer of the court had ever tasted. On Terennia, the water in certain town reservoirs, such as that in which the officer of the court had resided, tended to be heavy with the taste of various sanitizing chemicals.
Chocolate, too, of course, of which the officer of the court had taken a considerable portion, and was eating even now, on her way to the stream, tends, predictably, to make one thirsty.
“Fat!” called the salesgirl after her.
“I am not fat!” said the officer of the court, angrily.
The stream was not far from the camp, where the capsule was. The officer of the court walked through the trees. They were tall and thick, on both sides of her. There were many shadows at any time in that place, but there were a great many more now, as it was rather toward dusk. As she
made her way toward the stream she finished the chocolate. She wiped her fingers on the thighs of her “same garb.” Near the edge of the stream, no more than a few yards from it, she stopped. Ahead, a few feet back from the edge of the stream, fallen, she saw an object. She approached it more closely and discovered it to be the container which the woman in the pantsuit had borne toward the stream, to fill with water. Almost at the same time she heard, from her right, tiny, helpless, muffled sounds. She turned in that direction and saw, to her consternation, the figure of the woman in the pantsuit. Her back was to a large tree, and her arms were back, one on either side of the tree. Behind the tree her wrists had apparently been linked by some device, perhaps a foot of rope. The lower portion of her face seemed muffled in heavy cloths.
The officer of the court did not know what to do. She took a step, a frightened, uncertain step, toward her, but the woman shook her head, wildly. Then the officer of the court thought she saw a shadow among the trees, and then another. The tiny, muffled cries emanating from the bound woman seemed clearly enough to constitute a warning.
The officer of the court turned about and fled back toward the capsule.
She broke into the small clearing of the camp, and her distraught condition startled and alarmed the salesgirl, who leaped to her feet.
Breathless the officer of the court, her eyes wide, pointed back wildly toward the stream.
She had no sooner turned back toward the camp, gasping for breath, than she detected, emerging from the opposite side of the camp, not far from the capsule itself, the stumbling figure of the young naval officer. It seemed he had been pushed forward. But she could see no one behind him. His upper body was swathed with rope. Cords had been tightened in his mouth, pulled back tightly between the teeth.
“Run! Hide!” wept the officer of the court and she fled toward the capsule. The salesgirl, terrified by her demeanor, followed her. They hastily entered the capsule and closed the hatch, spinning the wheel which secured it.
They crouched inside, in the darkness.
“I can’t breathe!” said the salesgirl.
“Go outside,” said the officer of the court, angrily.
For a time there was silence about, and then the two young women cried out, suddenly, in alarm, startled by a sudden pounding of metal on the outside of the capsule.
“They can’t get in,” said the officer of the court.
“Who are they?” asked the salesgirl.
The officer of the court crept to one of the tiny ports, something like four inches in diameter.
“I cannot see who they are,” she said.
Then she drew back, because a stone, held in a fist, struck against the port.
“They cannot get in,” said the officer of the court, backing away.
There was more pounding on the exterior of the capsule. They could also hear the external hatch wheel being tried. It would not open, of course, as the hatch had been sealed from the inside. Then there was more pounding at the port. After a time the heavy material in the port was chipped away. A stick was thrust into the capsule, jutting in, then rimming flakes of glasseous substance away.
“We are safe,” said the officer of the court. “They cannot enter.”
The salesgirl drew a deep breath. It was less stifling now in the capsule. Air could enter through the opened port.
“Are they men?” asked the salesgirl.
“I do not know,” said the officer of the court.
“Look!” said the salesgirl.
“You look!” said the officer of the court.
The salesgirl rose to her feet and timidly looked out the nearest port.
She quickly drew her head back.
“What are they?” asked the officer of the court, crouching on the floor of the capsule, anxiously.
“They are men,” said the salesgirl.
“What sort of men?”
“By their garb — barbarians,” said the salesgirl, crouching down.
“Be pleased,” said the officer of the court, bitterly. “You will make a pretty little slave girl.”
“So, too, would you!” said the salesgirl.
“I jest,” said the officer of the court. “It is fortunate for us that they are barbarians. That means we have little to fear.”
“How is that?” asked the salesgirl.
“As barbarians,” said the officer of the court, “they will be stupid. They will have no patience.
They will soon leave.”
“What if they do not?” asked the salesgirl.
“They will,” said the officer of the court. “They are stupid.”
“I have heard that barbarians enjoy making slaves of civilized women,” said the salesgirl.
“If they can get them,” said the officer of the court.
“What if they wait outside?” asked the salesgirl. “We have nothing to eat or drink within.”
“They do not know that,” said the officer of the court.
“I am afraid,” said the salesgirl.
“Do not be afraid,” said the officer of the court. “They are barbarians. They are stupid. They will quickly grow weary of waiting, and depart. We will then leave the capsule, and escape. Nothing could be simpler.”
“We shall outsmart them,” said the salesgirl.
“Certainly,” said the officer of the court. “We are far more clever than they are. We are civilized women.”
“How then is it,” asked the salesgirl, “that we are bought and sold, and kept as helpless slaves, on so many worlds?”
“It is quiet outside now,” said the officer of the court.
“What of Oona and the ensign?” asked the salesgirl.
“We must think of ourselves,” said the officer of the court. “They were stupid enough to permit themselves to be captured.”
“It seems very quiet,” said the salesgirl.
“Perhaps they have already left,” said the officer of the court.
The salesgirl stood up and looked through a port. “They have not left,” she whispered.
“Then they are not as impatient as I thought,” said the officer of the court.
“No,” said the salesgirl. “They are even more imp
atient than you thought.”
“They are leaving?”
“No.”
“I do not understand.”
“But they are not as stupid as you thought,” said the salesgirl.
“I don’t understand,” said the officer of the court.
“They are bringing brush, and wood,” said the salesgirl, “and placing it about the capsule.”
In a few moments the flames were roaring about the lower hull of the capsule.
“I cannot breathe!” wept the salesgirl.
“Ai!” cried the officer of the court, touching the side of the capsule.
The officer of the court lifted one foot, and then the other, from the heated floor.
The salesgirl wept with pain, wringing her hands.
“What are we to do?” wept the officer of the court.
“That has been decided for us, has it not!” cried the salesgirl.
“What choice have we?” wept the officer of the court.
“The only choice they have accorded us!” wept the salesgirl. “A slave’s choice!”
“Ohh,” wept the officer of the court, crying, gasping for breath in the heated vehicle.
Then she heard the salesgirl struggling with the hatch wheel.
“Me first! Me first!” cried the officer of the court, thrusting the salesgirl aside. The hatch wheel burned her hand. Then she thrust it up. Her hands were burned on the rungs of the hatch ladder.
The outside of the capsule had begun to glow redly.
The officer of the court burst from the hatch, crying, and gasping for air. She felt herself seized in strong hands, on each side, and flung to the dirt on her belly beside the roaring fire heating the capsule. She turned her face away from the blaze. She felt her hands pulled behind her and tied there, securely. She was aware, too, of a similar fate befalling the salesgirl, who had followed her from the capsule a moment later. She was still gasping for breath, shuddering, on her belly, trying to pull her hands apart, when she felt a rope being tied about her neck. She turned about and saw that the salesgirl was bound, too, just as she herself was, and that she, too, now, had a rope on her neck.
CHAPTER 18
“What irons are these?” inquired Otto, chieftain of the Wolfungs.
“My chieftain knows, surely,” said Astubux.
“They are slaving irons,” said Otto.
“Yes.”
“But surely not made by our smiths,” said Otto.
“No,” said Astubux. “These are irons formed on other worlds, civilized worlds. They are such as are used by the Drisriaks to mark women for sale throughout the galaxies.”
“The flower,” said Otto.
“Yes, Master,” said his slave, Janina. Her own thigh bore a not dissimilar brand.
The chieftain considered the irons.
They would leave behind a small, tasteful mark, but one which would be clear and unmistakable.
“The slave rose,” said Otto, the chieftain. This seems, incidentally, the first time, then in the village of the Wolfungs, that he was known by this name. It may be surmised that he chose it for himself before being lifted on the shields. The name, incidentally, was a common one in the Vandal nation, even at that time. Research has made that clear. It is not as though it only became so later. It is also interesting, in the light of historical studies, that he chose that particular name. It was one which had been borne generations earlier by Otung kings.
“Yes, Master,” said Janina, putting her head down.
“How came they here?” asked Otto.
“They were left by the Drisriaks, to remind us of their power,” said Axel, who was the older, grizzled Wolfung warrior who had been with the hunting party which had first made contact with a marooned gladiator and slave.
“When they come for tribute,” said Astubux, “they pick out what goods they want, including women. Then they brand them before our very eyes.”
“They should be here soon?” said the chieftain. The sign had been burned into the forest two days ago.
“I would say three or four days,” said Axel.
“They wish to give us time to gather together the tribute,” said Astubux.
“Twice we have fled, but they have always found us.”
“We flee no more,” said the chieftain.
“They are not pleased when we hide,” said Axel. “They kill off men and take twice the tribute.”
“We hide no more,” said the chieftain.
“It was from the first vengeance that they denied us chieftains,” said Astubux.
“You now have a chieftain,” said Otto.
“I fear your tenure as chieftain will be brief,” said Astubux.
“It is I who will face them, who will bear the brunt of their wrath,” said Otto.
“Let us fly, Master,” urged Janina.
“I am chieftain,” said Otto.
“They need never know we were here!” said Janina.
“Do you wish to be tied at the whipping post?” asked the chieftain.
“No, Master!” said Janina.
Quickly she withdrew to one side, and knelt, and put her head down.
“You have a plan?” asked Astubux.
“Yes,” said the chieftain.
“And if it fails?”
“I fear then, good Astubux,” said Otto, “you will once more be without a chieftain.”
“No!” said Astubux.
“Things then, good Astubux,” said Otto, “will be much the same for you as they were before, no better, no worse.”
“But we would have no chieftain!” said Astubux.
“As before!” laughed Otto.
“We will follow you, all of us, into the forest,” said Axel. “Let us hide again.”
“We have hidden long enough,” said the chieftain. “One day the Wolfungs must come from their forest.” Then he went to the door of the hut, and looked out, over the palisade, toward the trees beyond, and the horizon, and the sky. “Let the Wolfungs be the first,” said he.
“What means my chieftain?” asked Astubux.
“Nothing,” said Otto. He regarded the sky, moodily.
“Who knows,” said Axel, “what strands the sisters of destiny have woven into the rope of fate.”
“Last night,” said Otto, “the skald sang not only of the Wolfungs, but of the Darisi, the Haakons, the Basungs, the Otungs.”
“The people, the nation,” said Astubux.
“You think long thoughts,” said Axel.
“Has it not been demeaned, and scattered and persecuted long enough?” asked Otto.
“Yes,” said Axel.
“Is it not among the fiercest of warrior nations?”
“It is the fiercest, and most terrible,” said Axel.
“It once was,” said Astubux.
“And has your blood grown thin and cold?” asked Otto.
“Spears,” said Astubux, “are no match for fire from the stars.”
“Unless we, too, can stand among stars, and grasp that fire,” said Otto.
“You have long thoughts,” said Axel.
“Yes,” said Otto.
“Is there a way?” asked Axel.
“Yes,” said Otto.
“I fear the chieftain is mad,” said Astubux.
Otto turned about and lifted Astubux toward the roof of the hut, and laughed. “Yes,” said he, “your chieftain is mad! Come, share his madness, and die a man!”
“Better than to live as a filch!” said Axel.
“I hear horns,” said Otto, and he lowered Astubux good-naturedly to the floor of the rush-strewn hut. “I am not yet familiar with their signals,” he said. “Tell me their meaning.”
“Do not attend to the horns,” said Astubux. “Rather prepare for the coming of the Drisriaks.”
“What is the meaning of the horns?” asked Otto.
Axel listened for a moment.
“Prisoners,” he said. “Prisoners have been taken.”
“What more?”
asked Otto.
“Three women, and a man,” said Axel.
CHAPTER 19
Otto sat alone in his hut.
Outside, beef roasted on a spit.
Beer, in drinking horns, was being passed about.
From where he sat, Otto could hear, clearly, the blows of a smith’s hammer.
The huts of the chieftain’s village, within the palisade, tended to circle about a rather large open space. It was larger than was required for the huts in the chieftain’s village itself, and served as a place of assembly for not only the occupants of the chieftain’s village, but of the several nearby Wolfung villages as well. It was in this open place that Otto, that being the name he had taken for himself, as we have learned, had been lifted upon the shields, to the clamor and acclaim of the Wolfungs. Too, the palisade of the chieftain’s village was the stoutest of any of the villages, and his village, in case of need, was intended as a bastion of defense and a refuge for the Wolfungs for miles about. There were also supplies stored in the capital village, so to speak, which might alleviate the hunger of a great many people, in case of the failure of local croppage, or in the unlikely event of a siege conducted by men armed similarly to themselves. To be sure, a single blast from a Telnarian rifle would have blown the gate away. There was, at one point within the palisade, a deep well, which, within living memory, had never gone dry, even in the late summer. The largest hut, but primitive, as well, was the chieftain’s hut, which had only recently been reoccupied. Its floor was strewn with rushes, but there were rolled skins and furs there, which might also, if one wished, be spread upon the floor. The roofs were thick, and thatched. The walls of most of the huts were of daub and wattle, but the walls of the chieftain’s hut were made of timbers and roughly hewn planking. The interior area of the chieftain’s hut, the roof supported by several posts, gave an area with a diameter of some fifty feet. It could house then, in council, the high warriors of the Wolfungs. Others, women, retainers, and such, could wait outside. There were also, within the palisade, and within the palisades of other villages, as well, coops, stables and pens for domestic animals, which we shall call, for purposes of convenience, chickens, cattle, sheep and pigs, such terms being sufficiently appropriate for our purposes. Many of these were gathered in at night. Some cattle, in particular, milch cows, as we shall call them, were housed with families, in their own huts. There were also, here and there, cages, mostly quite small, with thick iron bars. The Wolfungs had their smiths, you see, who attended to their metalwork, in particular, the forging of weapons, spearblades, and such. There were also other devices, such as log kennels and chaining logs.