by John Norman
“The skins he wears,” said the minor officer, to her in the pantsuit, “are from animals which he himself has killed.”
“Interesting,” she said.
But her interest, we may suspect, was taken less by those savage skins than by something else, by the savage himself, he so muscular, so mighty within them, he whom they so primitively bedecked.
The officer of the court swayed a little.
Her heart, like that of many of the other women in the tiers, was beating rapidly, fearfully.
Out there, somewhere, in the galaxy, there were men such as these!
What could be the fate of women in the hands of such men?
Did she not know?
The borders must hold!
“Are you all right?” asked the minor officer.
“Yes,” she said.
The women in the tiers, who were educated, civilized women, looked upon the barbarian, even though he was chained, with some apprehension. How different he was from the men with whom they were personally acquainted!
The officer of the court, seeing such a man, became suddenly quite conscious of the shocking undergarments she had dared to place beneath her “same garb.”
How frightening were such men. Their attitudes, their values, would doubtless be quite different from those of civilized men, gentlemen. Who knew how they might look upon a woman, or in what terms they might see her?
“Are you alarmed?” asked the minor officer, looking over to the officer of the court.
“Certainly not,” she said.
“He is now quite helpless,” said the minor officer.
“Are their women dressed similarly?” asked the officer of the court, as though idly.
“The women commonly wear cloth, some, the finest, obtained in trade, some, particularly in remoter areas, which they themselves have spun and loomed. The most common garment of free women is a long dress, which muchly covers them, that their men may not be driven mad with desire.”
“Not all their women are free?”
“No.”
“They then keep slaves.”
“They are barbarians, of course,” he said.
“And what is the most common garment of slaves?” she asked.
“Usually the long dress,” said he, “as with free women.”
“But not always?” asked the officer of the court.
“No,” said the minor officer.
“And how then would they be dressed?” asked the officer of the court.
“As slaves,” said the minor officer.
“If dressed?”
“Of course,” said he.
“How many women do such men have?” asked the officer of the court.
“Some have several,” he said.
“Both wives and slaves?”
“Sometimes,” said the officer.
Despite the ponderous chains on the barbarian, and the presence of the vigilant, armed guards, many of the women continued to be apprehensive, regarding the kneeling figure.
They knew themselves to be civilized women, of course, and thus no more than prey to such men.
Such men, they understood in their bellies, would see them as women, and put them to the uses of women.
How dreadful!
At this moment the main door to the section opened and the young naval officer, he who was putatively on leave, entered.
The officer of the court gasped.
Yesterday evening she had seen him only in a lounging robe, a leisure, or pleasure, garment, one suitable for the captain’s table, but he was now in what must be a dress uniform. It was white with gold braid. Too, she was startled to note, at the left shoulder, three purple cords.
As he entered, in uniform, the captain himself, and his officers, had risen, in salute. The two guards in whose custody knelt the prisoner, too, came to attention.
“Hail to the empire!” called the captain.
“Hail to the empire!” called the other officers, and the guards, as well. Even the minor officer who sat near the women in the tiers, the women with whom we are now familiar, had come to attention when the young officer had entered, as had some other minor officers here and there on the tiers. They, too, had joined in the greeting.
“Hail to the emperor! Hail to the empire!” said the young officer.
This cry was repeated by the officers, and by others, too, in the stands.
“See the cords,” said the woman in the pantsuit.
“Of course I see them,” said the officer of the court. She had been struck speechless when the young officer had first entered. She, of all, who was herself of the blood, would understand such insignia. But she had not realized that one of a rank far beyond hers, compared to which hers, and even that of Tuvo Ausonius, was as nothing, was aboard the vessel.
The young officer then turned to regard the prisoner, kneeling in the sand, now at his feet.
The prisoner had been made to wait, kneeling, for the arrival of the young officer.
And thus was made clear to the prisoner, and to all in the tiers, the superiority of the empire.
The naval rank of the officer was not high. We might say, to suggest something familiar, that he was an ensign. On the other hand, the cords made it clear that this was no ordinary ensign, but one of the noblest of bloods.
“The three cords,” said the woman in the pantsuit.
“Yes,” said the officer of the court, irritably. The three cords, of that color, indicated the highest of ranks. The blood of this young officer was doubtless as high as that of the imperial house itself.
How incredible it was that one such as he would be aboard this vessel.
Tears formed in the eyes of several of the men in the tiers.
With a gesture the young officer put the company at ease.
The young officer then, as would be in accord with the protocols of the service, saluted the captain, who smartly returned this greeting.
He then took his seat, beside the captain.
At this point Pulendius emerged from behind the tiers, opposite the main door, followed by four pairs of gladiators. These were powerful men, clad in brief leather, with their hair fastened back, their bodies oiled.
“There is to be an exhibition,” said the minor officer.
The gladiators, two pairs armed with blunt spears, two pairs with wooden swords, began to exercise and stretch in the tiny arena.
Some of the women inadvertently gasped, seeing the rippling of such muscles, the movements of the mighty thighs. Doubtless most had seen fighters before, but it is not likely they had seen them at this proximity.
The officer of the court looked about for a particular gladiator, he who had been the bodyguard of Pulendius, he who had been behind him and to the right.
He was nowhere in view.
Then, after a moment he, with his fellow, appeared, both at the opening in the tiers, through which Pulendius and the others had but recently emerged.
They, as was the business of such fellows, surveyed the crowd. She sat very straight, in “same garb,” with the “frame-and-curtain,” making certain that she did not look at him, or, at least, not obviously. Her interest, he must clearly understand, was on the ring. See her as a common slave, would he? Let him see her now, as she really was, a high creature, one far above him, one immeasurably above him, a woman of Terennia, one even of the blood itself!
But, of course, she looked back to see if he might be looking at her, and, as one might expect, what should happen to be the case but that, to her embarrassment, their eyes met. Swiftly then, blushing, she looked away.
At least she was in “same garb,” and in the “frame-and-curtain”! But she knew, too, that she had been before him not simply, in “same garb,” and in the “frame-and-curtain,” but in those other garments, too, those to which we earlier alluded. She could now feel them, in all their filmy, sensuous softness, on her body. She was wearing them before him. Of course, he could not see them, but she knew they were there, and
that she had them on, before a man. The nature of these garments was doubtless quite innocent, but scarcely so from the point of view of a woman from Terennia. For a woman of Terennia, of her class, the garments which she now wore went well beyond the merely daring, and doubtless beyond even the perimeters of the scandalous. They were soft and sensuous, and provocative. They were the sort of thing which only a woman who should be a slave would wear. They were emphatically indecent. She could feel her breasts straining against the soft, filmy silken bonds which constrained them, she was scarcely aware of the so-brief tiny thing which enclosed her lower body, with its sweet nether intimacies, so light it was. These two garments, the brassiere and the panties, as we may think of them, not inaccurately, had both been, of course, purchased at the ship’s shop. It had required great courage for her to buy them. Had the salesgirl not looked at her askance, or had she imagined it? None, of course, would know that she had purchased them, only herself. Did the salesgirl wear such things? Had there been anything strange, or disapproving, in her expressions, in her tone of voice? Did the salesgirl, herself, wear such things, she wondered. They would be her secret, of course, her secret from all the world. She would never dare to show them to Tuvo Ausonius. He would be unwilling to let such a woman in his bed. Such a woman is rather such that she is to be chained at the foot of a bed.
He could not know, of course, that she wore such garments under the “same garb,” under the “frame and curtain.”
But she knew.
Hotly she regretted wearing such things.
Oh, she had put them on and off a dozen times in the privacy of her cabin, sometimes even daring to look at herself in the mirror. But surely the image could not be hers. Surely she could not be that lithe, graceful, curvaceous creature in the mirror. She had decided at last not to wear such things to the entertainment, but, when she had tried them on again, just for the last time, as she told herself, she realized suddenly, to her consternation, the time, and that, if she were to assure herself of a seat, she must best be on her way. Having no choice then she had put on the “same garb,” and the “frame-and-curtain,” over them, and hurried out.
How handsome was the bodyguard, how strong he seemed, how small she seemed, compared to him.
Then she sat straight on the tier. She was now pleased to have worn the intimate garments. No one could see them. And they were comfortable. That was a good reason to wear them. And no one could see them. Thus no one could ever guess what sort of woman she was, secretly.
The bodyguard was not far from her, over to her left, where one opening was in the tiers, that opposite the other, nearer the door.
Again their eyes met.
“Where is your collar?” he asked.
She stiffened, and pretended not to hear. He was referring, doubtless, to the necklace she had worn the night before. It would not go with the “same garb” and the “frame-and-curtain,” of course. Too, it was a necklace. It was not a collar. Collars were for slaves. He must know that.
The minor officer glared at the gladiator, but the gladiator met his gaze squarely, and not pleasantly, and the minor officer looked away.
The woman in the pantsuit leaned over to the officer of the court, and nodded her head, subtly, indicatively, toward the gladiator. “He finds you attractive,” she whispered confidingly, delightedly.
” ‘Attractive’?” asked the officer of the court.
“Yes,” said her companion.
“I am of Terennia,” said the officer of the court. “I do not even understand such matters.”
“Very attractive,” whispered her companion.
“I am not in the least interested,” said the officer of the court.
“Why are you blushing?” asked her companion.
“I am not,” insisted the officer of the court, her skin aflame.
“He wants you,” whispered her companion.
“He is an illiterate brute,” said the officer of the court.
“He looks at you as though you were a common slave,” said her companion.
“Perhaps he will buy me,” said the officer of the court, acidly.
“And what man would not, if he could afford you?” said the woman.
The officer of the court did not deign to respond to this remark. The very thought of it, she, for sale!
“But perhaps he would merely bind and gag you, and carry you off,” she said.
“Perhaps,” said the officer of the court.
“He wants you,” she said.
“Let him want me then, in vain,” said the officer of the court.
“You might not speak so proudly,” she said, “if you were on your knees before him, naked, your hands tied behind your back.”
“Please,” protested the officer of the court.
“And you would be made his slave,” she said.
The officer of the court trembled.
“And you would serve him well,” she said.
“Please,” said the officer of the court.
“He would see to it,” she said.
At this point the young naval officer was looking about the stands, and, to her pleasure, their eyes met. This gave her the much-desired opportunity to escape the humiliating embarrassments of her conversation with her companion on the tiers. The young officer would surely remember her from the captain’s table, the preceding evening. He would recall, too, the bit of purple accenting her sheath, which, so subtly, but nonetheless clearly, proclaimed her own nobility. She, too, was of the blood! This, too, would give her a way of putting her companion in her place, who was of the honestori , but not of noble blood. This would make it clear to her that she must not speak in such a way to her, so frankly, so intimately, as though they might be of the same station, as though they might be equals, even as though they might both be no more than women huddled naked at the foot of a slave block, each waiting, in her turn, to be dragged to its surface, to be exhibited and sold. He was only a few feet from her, in his place on the first tier, in the place of honor, between the captain and the first officer, at the edge of the circle.
“Hail to the emperor!” she said. “Hail to the empire!”
He looked away, returning his attention to the activities of the gladiators, they preparing for their exhibition.
The companion of the officer of the court, the woman in the pantsuit, tactfully took no official notice of this episode.
The officer of the court stiffened in humiliation. Tears ran down her cheeks, which she swiftly wiped away.
She, too, said nothing of the episode.
Could the naval officer, he of the blood, have somehow suspected, or guessed, that she wore soft garments beneath her “same garb”? Was that why he had not deigned to recognize her, to return her greeting, even to indicate that he had noticed it?
She looked to the gladiator, by the opening of the tiers. He regarded her. On his lips there was, playing there, ever so subtly, a smile. It was a smile of amusement, of contempt. Quickly the officer of the court jerked her head away, angrily, looking to the sand, as though something of great interest might be occurring there.
She had never been so embarrassed, so humiliated, in her life.
There were, in the empire, you see, matters of distance, of rank and hierarchy.
Such were not to be lightly violated.
She had done so.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” called Pulendius, “welcome, all, to the festivities of the evening.”
All attention was upon him.
“And let us welcome, too, our special guest, one honoring us with his presence this evening,” he called, pointing to the fellow kneeling to one side, in skins, laden with chains, “Ortog, a prince of the Drisriaks, king of the secessionist house of Ortog.”
There was laughter, and polite applause.
The fists of the barbarian, in close proximity to one another, his wrists well confined in weighty manacles, clenched in futile rage.
This, too, caused amusement in the crowd.
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Even had he no acquaintance with some patois interactive with Telnarian there could be little doubt, given Pulendius’s exaggerated, pompous references, clearly directed at him, and the amusement of the crowd, that he was the object of ridicule.
It will be helpful to the reader to follow certain later events if I make clear certain relationships, certain lineages, involved here. Ortog was a prince of the Drisriaks, which was one of the eleven traditional tribes of the Alemanni nation. His house, however, was secessionist, and thusly he was a prince of one house, of the Drisriaks, and the king, or pretender to kingship, in another, his own, that of the Ortungen.
“He dared to raise arms against the empire!” said Pulendius. “Now he kneels before us, humbled, in chains, as helpless as a slave!”
There were cries of delight from the audience.
“We shall now see him bow to the empire!” said Pulendius.
But the back of the kneeling, scowling figure remained straight, quite straight.
Pulendius regarded the prisoner.
But the prisoner remained motionless.
Pulendius, for a moment, seemed nonplussed, but, at a nod from the captain, he gestured to the two guards.
They seized the prisoner and, with great difficulty, forced his head down, into the sand.
But when they released him, he straightened his body, sand clinging about his beard and face.
In his eyes there was a terrible fire, that of a cunning, and a covetousness, and a hatred almost inconceivable to the educated, sophisticated, civilized passengers of the Alaria , a hatred which burned, like watch fires, outside the walls of the empire.
“Had we your weapons!” he cried.
“Such men have their possibilities,” said the naval officer to the captain.
“They make fearless, but dangerous, auxiliaries,” said the captain.
“Fortunately they are apt to spend more time dealing out death and destruction to one another than to the empire,” said the first officer.