by John Norman
"These coins," said Lara, holding the tiny sack in her hand, gloved in gold, "were to buy my death."
"So few coins?" I asked skeptically.
"Obviously the full sum would follow upon the accomplishment of the deed," she said.
"The coins were a gift," I said. "Or so I thought."
"I do not believe you," she said.
I was silent.
"What full sum did Ost offer you?" she asked.
"I refused to be a party to his schemes," I said.
"What full sum did Ost offer you?" repeated the Tatrix.
"He spoke," I said, "of a tarn, a thousand golden tarn disks and provisions for a long journey."
"Golden tarn disks — unlike those of silver — are scarce in Tharna," said the Tatrix. "Someone is apparently willing to pay highly for my death." "Not your death," I said.
"Then what?" she asked.
"Your abduction," I said.
The Tatrix stiffened suddenly, her entire body trembling with fury. She rose, seemingly beside herself with rage.
"Bloody the yoke," urged Dorna.
Thorn stepped forward, his blade raised.
"No," screamed the Tatrix, and, to the astonishment of all, herself descended the broad steps of the dais.
Shaking with fury she stood before me, over me, in her golden robes and mask. "Give me the whip!" she cried. "Give it to me!" The man with the wrist straps hastily knelt before her, lifting it to her hands. She snapped it cruelly in the air, and its report was sharp and vicious.
"So," she said to me, both hands clenched on the butt of the whip, "you would have me before you on the scarlet rug bound with yellow cords, would you?"
I did not understand her meaning.
"You would have me in a camisk and collar would you?" she hissed hysterically.
The women of the silver masks recoiled, shuddering. There were exclamations of anger, of horror.
"I am a woman of Tharna," she screamed, "First in Tharna! First!" Then, beside herself with rage, holding the whip in both hands, she lashed madly at me. "It is the kiss of the whip for you!" she screamed. Again and again she struck me, yet through it all I managed to stay on my knees, not to fall.
My senses reeled, my body, tortured by the weight of the silver yoke, now wrapped in the flames of the whip, shook with uncontrollable agony. Then, when the Tatrix had exhausted herself, by some effort I find it hard to comprehend, I managed to stand on my feet, bloody, wearing the yoke, my flesh in tatters — and look down upon her.
She turned and fled to the dais. She ran up the steps and turned only when she stood at last before her throne. She pointed her hand imperiously at me, that hand wearing its glove of gold, now spattered with my blood, wet and dark from the sweat of her hand.
"Let him be used in the Amusements of Tharna!" she said.
Chapter Twelve: ANDREAS OF THE CASTE OF POETS
I had been hooded and driven through the streets, stumbling under the weight of the yoke. at last I had entered a building and had descended a long, swirling ramp, through dank passages. When I was unhooded, my yoke had been chained to the wall of a dungeon.
The place was lit by a small, foul tharlarion lamp set in the wall near the ceiling. I had no idea how far below ground it might be. The floor and the walls were of black stone, quarried in giant blocks of perhaps a tone apiece. The lamp dried the stone in its vicinity, but, on the floor and most of the walls, there was a dampness and the smell of mold. Some straw was scattered on the floor. From where I was chained, I could reach a cistern of water. A food pan lay near my foot.
Exhausted, my body aching from the weight of the yoke and the sting of tha lash, I lay on the stones and slept. How long I slept I didn" t know. When I awoke, each of my muscles ached, but now it was a dull, cold ache. I tried to move and my wounds tortured me.
In spite of the yoke I struggled to a cross-legged sitting position, and shook my head. In the food pan I saw half a loaf of coarse bread. Yoked as I was, there was no way to pick it up and get it to my mouth. I might crawl to it on my belly, and if my hunger were great enough, I knew I must, but the thought angered me. The yoke was not simply a device to secure a man, but to humiliate him, to treat him as if he were a beast.
"Let me help you," said a girl" s voice.
I turned, the momentum of the yoke almost carrying me into the wall. Two small hands caught it, and struggling, managed to swing it back, keeping my balance.
I looked at the girl. Perhaps she was plain, but I found her attractive. There was a warmth in her I would not have expected to find in Tharna. Her dark eyes regarded me, filled with concern. Her hair, which was reddish brown, was bound behind her head with a coarse string.
As I gazed on her she lowered her eyes shyly. She wore only a single garment, a long, narrow rectangle of rough, brown material, perhaps eighteen inches in width, drawn over her head like a poncho, falling in front and back a bit above her knees and belted at the waist with a chain. "Yes," she said with shame. "I wear the camisk."
"You are lovely," I said.
She looked at me, startled, yet grateful.
We faced each other in the half darkness of the dungeon, not speaking. There was no sound in that dark, cold place. The shadows of the tiny tharlarion lamp far above flickered on the walls, on the face of the girl. Her hand reached out and touched the silver yoke I wore. "They are cruel," she said.
Then, without speaking more, she picked up the bread from the pan, and held it for me. I bit two or three voracious mouthfuls of the coarse stuff and chewed it and gulped it down.
I noted her throat was encircled by a collar of grey metal. I supposed it indicated that she was a state slave of Tharna.
She reached into the cistern, first scraping the surface of the water to clear it of the green scum that floated there, and then, in the palms of her cupped hands, carried water to my parched lips.
"Thank you," I said.
She smiled at me. "One does not thank a slave," she said.
"I thought women were free in Tharna," I said, gesturing with my head toward the grey metal collar she wore.
"I will not be kept in Tharna," she said. "I will be sent from the city, to the Great Farms, where I will carry water to Field Slaves."
"What is your crime?" I asked.
"I betrayed Tharna," she said.
"You conspired against the throne?" I asked.
"No," said the girl. "I cared for a man."
I was speechless.
"I once wore the silver mask, Warrior," said the girl. "But now I am only a Degraded Woman, for I allowed myself to love."
"That is no crime," I said.
The girl laughed merrily. I love to hear the sudden glad music of a woman" s laughter, that laughter that so delights a man, that acts on his senses like Ka-la-na wine.
Suddenly it seemed I no longer felt the weight of the yoke.
"Tell me about him," I said, "but first tell me your name."
"I am Linna of Tharna," she said. "What is your name?"
"Tarl," I said.
"Of what city?"
"Of no city."
"Ah!" said the girl, smiling, and inquired no further. She would have concluded that she shared her cell with an outlaw. She sat back on her heels, her eyes happy. "He was," she said, "not even of this city." I whistled. That would be a serious matter in Gorean eyes.
"And worse than that," she laughed, clapping her hands, "he was of the Caste of Singers."
It could have been worse, I thought. After all, though the Caste of Singers, or Poets, was not a high caste, it had more prestige than, for example, the Caste of Pot-Makers or Saddle-Makers, with which it was sometimes compared. On Gor, the singer, or poet, is regarded as a craftsman who makes strong sayings, much like a pot-maker makes a good pot or a saddle-maker makes a worthy saddle. He has his role to play in the social structure, celebrating battles and histories, singing of heroes and cities, but also he is expected to sing of living, and of love and joy, not merely of arms
and glory; and, too, it is his function to remind the Goreans from time to time of loneliness and death, lest they should forget that they are men.
The singer was thought to have an unusual skill, but so, too, were the tarn-keeper and the woodsman. Poets on Gor, as in my native world, were regarded with some skepticism and thought to be a little foolish, but it had not occurred to anyone that they might suffer from divine madness or be the periodic recipients of the inspiration of the gods. The Priest-Kings of Gor, who served as the divinities of this rude planet, inspired little but awe, and occasionally fear. Men lived in a truce with the Priest-Kings, keeping their laws and festivals, making the required sacrifices and libations, but, on the whole, forgetting about them as much as possible. Had it been suggested to a poet that he had been inspired by a Priest-King the fellow would have been scandalised. "I, So-an-So of Such-and-Such a City, made this song," he would say, "not a Priest-King."
In spite of some reservations the Poet, or Singer, was loved on Gor. It had not occurred to him that he owed misery and torment to his profession, and, on the whole, the Caste of Poets was thought to be a most happy band of men. "A handful of bread for a song," was a common Gorean invitation extended to members of the caste, and it might occur on the lips of a peasant or a Ubar, and the poet took great pride that he would sing the same song in both the hut of the peasant and the halls of the Ubar, though it won for him only a crust of bread in one place and a cap of gold in the other, gold often squandered on a beautiful woman who might leave him nothing but his songs.
Poets, on the whole, did not live well on Gor, but they never starved, were never forced to burn the robes of their caste. Some had even sung their way from city to city, their poverty protecting them from outlaws, and their luck from the predatory beasts of Gor. Nine cities, long after his death, claimed the man who, centuries ago, had called Ko-ro-ba the Towers of the Morning.
"The Caste of Poets is not so bad," I said to Linna.
"Of course not," she said, "but they are outlawed in Tharna."
"Oh," I said.
"Nonetheless," she said, her eyes happy, "this man, Andreas, of the Desert City of Tor, crept into the city — looking for a song he said." She laughed. "But I think he really wanted to look behind the silver masks of our women." She clapped her hands with delight. "It was I," she continued, "who apprehended and challenged him, I who saw the lyre beneath his grey robes and knew him for a singer. In my silver mask I followed him, and determined that he had been within the city for more than ten hours." "What is the significance of that?" I asked, for I had heard something of the sort before.
"It means one is made welcome in Tharna," said the girl, "and this means one is sent to the Great Farms to be a Field Slave, to cultivate the soil of Tharna in chains until ond dies."
"Why are strangers not warned of this," I asked, "when they enter the gates?"
"That would be foolish indeed, would it not?" laughed the girl. "For how then would the ranks of Field Slaves be replenished?"
"I see," I said, now understanding for the first time something of the motivation behind the hospitality of Tharna.
"As one who wore the silver mask," continued the girl, "it was my duty to report this man to the authorities. Yet I was curious for I had never known a man not from Tharna. I followed him, until we were alone, and then I challenged him, informing him of the fate that lay before him." "Then what did he do?" I asked.
She dropped her head shyly. "He pulled away my silver mask and kissed me," she said, "so that I could not even cry for help."
I smiled at her.
"I had never been in the arms of a man before," she said, "for the men of Tharna may not touch women."
I must have looked puzzled.
"The Caste of Physicians," she said, "under the direction of the High Council of Tharna, arranges these matters."
"I see," I said.
"Yet," she said, "though I had worn the silver mask, and counted myself a woman of Tharna, when he took me in his arms, I did not find the situation unpleasant." She looked at me, a little sadly. "I knew then that I was no better than he, no better than a beast, worthy only to be a slave." "You do not believe that?" I demanded.
"Yes," she said, "but I do not care, for I would rather wear the camisk and have felt his kiss, than live forever behind my silver mask." Her shoulders shook. I wished that I could have taken her in my arms, and comforted her. "I am a degraded creature," she said, "shamed, a traitress to all that is highest in Tharna."
"What happened to the man?" I asked.
I sheltered him, she said, "and managed to smuggle him from the city." She sighed. "He made me promise to follow him, but I knew that I could not." "What did you do?" I asked.
"When he was safe," she said, "I did my duty, giving myself to the High Council of Tharna and confessing all. It was decreed that I must lose my silver mask, don the camisk and be collared, and be sent to the Great Farms to carry water to Field Slaves."
She began to weep.
"You should not have given yourself to the High Council," I said. "Why?" she asked. "Was I not guilty?"
"You were not guilty," I said.
"Is love not a crime?" she asked.
"Only in Tharna," I said.
She laughed. "You are strange, too," she said, "like Andreas of Tor." "What of Andreas?" I asked. "When you do not join him, will he not come searching for you, re-enter the city?"
"No," she said. "He will think I no longer love him." She lowered her head. "He will go away, and find himself another woman, one more lovely than a girl of Tharna."
"Do you believe that?" I asked.
"Yes," said she. "And," she added, "he will not enter the city. He knows he would be caught and, considering his crime, he might be sent to the mines." She shuddered. "Perhaps even be used in the Amusements of Tharna." "So you think he will fear to enter the city?" I asked.
"Yes," said she, "he will not enter the city. He is not a fool." "What," cried a merry young voice, insolent and good natured, "could a wench like you know of fools, of the Caste of Singers, of Poets?" Linna sprang to her feet.
Through the door of the dungeon a yoked figure was thrust by the butt ends of two spears. He stumbled through the entire room before he struck the wall with the yoke. He managed to turn the yoke and slide down the wall to a seated position.
He was an unkempt, strong-looking lad, with cheerful blue eyes and a mop of hair like the mane of a black larl. He sat on the straw, and smiled at us, a jolly, impish, shamefaced smile. He stretched his neck in the yoke and moved his fingers.
"Well, Linna," he said. "I have come to carry you off."
"Andreas," she cried, rushing to him.
Chapter Thirteen: THE AMUSEMENTS OF THARNA
The sun hurt my eyes. The white sand, perfumed, sprinkled with mica and red lead, burned my feet. I blinked again and again, trying to lessen the torture of the glare. Already I could feel the heat of the sun soaking into the silver yoke I wore.
My back felt the jab of spears as I was prodded ahead and stumbled forward, unsteady under the weight of the yoke, my feet sinking to their ankles in the hot sand. On both sides of me were other wretched fellows, similarly yoked, some whining, some cursing, as they, too, were driven forward like beasts. One, silent, to my left, I knew to be Andreas of the Desert City of Tor. At last I no longer felt the spear point in my back.
"Kneel to the Tatrix of Tharna," commanded an imperious voice, speaking through some type of trumpet.
I heard the voice of Andreas next to me. "Strange," said he, "usually the Tatrix does not attend the Amusements of Tharna."
I wondered if I might be the reason that the Tatrix herself was present. "Kneel to the Tatrix of Tharna," repeated the imperious voice. Our fellow prisoners knelt. Only Andreas and I remained standing. "Why do you not kneel?" I asked.
"Do you think that only warriors are brave?" he asked.
Suddenly he was struck from behind, brutally in the back by the butt of a spear, and, with
a groan he sank downwards. The spear struck me, too, again and again, in the back and across the shoulders, but I stood, somehow strong in the yoke, like an ox. Then with a harsh crack a lash suddenly struck my legs and curled about them like a fiery snake. My legs were jerked from beneath me and I fell heavily in the sand.
I looked about myself.
As I had expected I and my fellow prisoners knelt in the sands of an arena. It was an oval enclosure, perhaps a hundred yards in diameter on its longest axis, and enclosed by walls about twelve feet high. The walls were divided into sections, which were brightly coloured, with golds, purples, reds, oranges, yellows and blues.
The surface of the area, white sand, perfumed and sparkling with mica and red lead, added to the colourful mien of the place. Hanging over favoured portions of the stands, which ascended on all sides, were giant striped awnings of billowing red and yellow silk.
It seemed that all the glorious colours of Gor which had been denied the buildings of Tharna were lavished on this place of its amusements. In the stands, shaded by the awnings, I saw hundreds of sliver masks, the lofty women of Tharna, reclining on benches softened with cushions of coloured silk — come to view the Amusements.
I also noted the grey of the men in the stands. Several were armed warriors, perhaps stationed there to keep the peace, but many must have been common citizens of Tharna. Some seemed to be conversing among themselves, perhaps laying wagers of one sort or another, but most sat still on the stone benches, glum and silent in their grey robes, their thoughts not easily read. Linna, in the dungeon, had told Andreas and me that a man of Tharna must attend the Amusements of Tharna at least four times a year, and that, failing that, he must take part in them himself. There were cries of impatience from the stands, shrill, female voices oddly contrasting with the placidity of the silver masks. All eyes seemed turned to one section of the stands, that before which we knelt, a section that gleamed with gold.
I looked above the wall and saw, vested in her robes of gold, regal on a golden throne, she who alone might wear a golden mask, she who was First in Tharna — Lara, the Tatrix herself.