The Nameless Slave

by Vitaly Zykov

  The sixpaw pulling the wagon roared lingeringly. That was a remarkable beast about three yards in height, with six paws, a hefty head with large silly eyes, and very long wool which covered the animal from nostrils to the tip of its tail. Sixpaws were herbivores, like Earth's camels. The same unpretentious in food (sixpaws ate grass roots, which they constantly dug out with their paws), they were terribly stubborn in everything else. Only a hit with a goad-stick could make a sixpaw work, and drivers used it all the time. And how they stank! It was impossible to express it in words. Maybe for people who lived with sixpaws side by side since childhood that smell was not terrible, but for Yarik it was like a torture. Tirrs, the riding reptiles, were a different matter. Smart, swift and deadly, they were moving on two legs, their front paws were pressed to the chest, with riders mounted on them, they looked fascinating. But tirrs were taboo for slaves. Even free people, not soldiers, could not come close to these animals. Soldiers took care of these beautiful creatures themselves. A tirr for a warrior was like a friend or a brother, and they cherished them.

  Yarik hooked his foot on something, stumbled, and flew forward, plowing the dust with his nose. He miraculously escaped a serious injury.

  – Well, what a ground here! What boulder did I hit on? – whispered the slave rubbing and touching his bruises and scratches. – You all be damned by evil gods!

  The last cry broke out when he saw that the wagon had already moved ahead. The pain from the collar was to come in few seconds. He had to move quickly, Yarik ran limping on the bruised foot. His heels sank in dust by an inch (Yarik already was getting used to the local measurement system), but then began to stumble on something solid like stones.

  «Why even the stones in the desert?!» – The question came quite unexpectedly.

  Yarik squatted and scraped the dust away. He had to hurry. The carriage was moving not too fast (at walking pace), but it was moving! Under a fine layer of gray dust appeared flat solid surface of a stone slab with some carving. Yarik looked at the wagon, the distance was becoming critical. He must hurry up! Yarik furiously raked with his hands, cleaning the picture. The next moment the lines of a strange and vaguely familiar sign opened before his eyes. His eyes slid over the plate, soaking up the smallest details. He already had no time. His neck under the collar began to ache presaging the pain, and it intensified with every heartbeat.

  His time was over! Yarik jumped on his feet and in a few giant leaps reached his place in the caravan. The wagoner from the van following behind the leader's one gave Yarik a hit of goad to speed him up. It was painful, marhuz dammit!

  Why did the sign seem so familiar? Yarik was sure that he met this sign for the first time, but he could guess something elusively familiar in it, in the form of its lines and in the manner of their drawing. Yarik scratched his head, but it did not help! What was that sign? At this moment his look fell on his right wrist. There were the white lines of his true name. It was as if the sign on the stone and on his wrist had been drawn by the same hand.

  – But why would anyone carve his own true name on the plates of the road, I wonder? – Puzzled Yarik whispered absently.

  After that case, he found a few more stone plates with carved characters in the dust. All of them differed in details, but the general motive remained. However, Yarik had doubts that these signs had been actually carved. Their lines were too smooth, as if the signs were extruded in molten rock, which froze later, keeping the desired shape.

  – Hey, you, whoever you are! Savage! Move your ass here! – came a barking voice from aside.

  Of course, Dukan was bored again! Surely he would be puffed up by the filling of his own importance again and would teach a savage to live. Yarik sighed under his breath and trotted toward the sound.

  «I don't want listen to Dukan talking about these sixpaws, Jurga devour them!» – he thought.

  Yarik ran to the coachbox where the wagoner was sitting.

  – Yes, master! – This phrase sounds very simple, but try to pronounce it without grinding your teeth or hatred in your eyes.

  – Sit down here! Instead o' rushing back and forth along the road risking safety o' the skin which no longer belongs to you, – Dukan remarked grudgingly.

  – I just stumbled and hurt my leg, and looked what I hit it on.

  – Yeah! It's clear – Dukan said. – I thought you interested in the tract of Ancient Kings.

  – What? But I did not know that we were going along a tract.

  The driver squinted at him:

  – Yeah, o' course! You're a savage!

  And Yarik's interlocutor laughed. The young slave had already noticed that Dukan loved to laugh, not particularly caring if it was it funny or not.

  – All right, listen here! – Dukan continued finishing laughing. – Our caravan's going along the tract, which is only gods know how many years old. Maybe a thousand, or maybe five. Old men say that in ancient times here was a mighty kingdom, ruled by magician-kings. That was even before the Dusk Empire, can you imagine?

  Yarik who did not even know what the Dusk Empire meant nodded.

  – Oh, you know nothing, you waste o' skin! So, these kings built roads throughout their kingdom, in order t' make it easier t' move for troops and merchants. And on each plate was carved a name of a great nobleman or warrior or magician, but most of all, of course, of kings!

  – But what happened then? – Yarik asked cautiously.

  – Then a war began, in which the mighty kingdom was ruined, and only remained the Forbidden Land where you came from and Plaguelands where we all live, and this road.

  – And where does it lead?

  – Its one end is lost in lands of Spawns, the other one rests in the Border Mountains, where the Master's tunnel begins.

  – Who are these Masters?

  – Yeah, they're shorties, such underground inhabitants. Bold-faced and arrogant beyond measure. They use the fact that no one can work with stone as good as them, so they're so bold. They have cut the tunnel, and now demand money from all who want t' go through.

  – But why were not they banished and the tunnel taken away?

  Dukan even choked:

  – Who can beat Masters in mountains? They are great warriors and first-class mages, they turned the tunnel into an impregnable fortress, made a lot of passages through the mountain and live happily. Even such a fool as you, must understand that! That's all, get out o' my cart! What a fool's sitting next t' me. It's disgusting!

  With those words, he pushed Yarik on the ground, but his idea to draggle the helpless slave in the dust failed: Yarik managed to regroup in mid-air and successfully landed on his feet. It only remained for the driver to spit in irritation and hit an innocent sixpaw with goad, Dukan already could not reach Yarik.

  – Yes, of course, you all are great warriors, but it turns out that there are some short people, and even an idea to attack them, causes irritation and fear, – Yarik muttered maliciously.

  The movement continued. Dust was rising from under the van's wheels and sixpaws were moaning sadly all the same. Occasionally there were heard guttural cries of drivers and dry crackling of goads. Tirr-riders were prancing on both sides of the caravan, showing off to each other and to the leader. Rocky peaks of the Border Mountains were inevitability approaching.

  «Who are this Masters, I wonder? Shorties, wow! The principle is: spit at your enemy, and he'll become less terrible, works here too. – The only entertainment which Yarik could afford now was thinking. – Shorties, who work in mountains and could easily slap on other's greedy hands deserved respect, at least».

  A sharp whistle interrupted his thoughts. He turned to the left. There, a young soldier was shouting something very excitedly, forcing his tirr to dance on the spot, angrily gaping its mouth. The rider shook his sword and pointed upward. Yarik looked up and saw a dot high in the sky. Actually, not really a dot, but a vague silhouette of a flying beast with its wings wide opened. Yarik did not know what kind of animal that was, but t
he reaction of the others was surprising.

  The young warrior rode along the caravan with the cry: «Wings! Wings!». Yarik did not understand what that meant, but the rest did. The caravan stopped. People flowed out of the wagons, and stood looking up into the sky in anticipation. Groups of soldiers distributed along the caravan. They all had bows ready for fight, and the same intense gaze directed into the sky. Even slaves were anxiously looking up. Yarik saw the eyes of a slave called Bulb mad from fear and his twitching Adam's apple. The unknown silhouette in the sky clearly was familiar to everybody and its appearance promised nothing good.

  After some time, the dot was gone and disappeared from sight. And only then Yarik realized what a silence was around. As if everything around died, and only after disappearance of the mysterious «Wings» did the movement revive. People moved, slapping each other's backs and laughing gleefully.

  «Yeah, as if we have escaped death!» – There was no limit to Yarik's surprise.

  A clatter of clawed paws came from behind: a rider rode towards the head of the column. Yarik looked back and saw his master accompanied by two assistants – Namir and Glos. They sharply stopped their tirrs near every wagon and told something fiercely. Some men tried to argue, the shaman's driver, for example, and then the shaman himself, leaning out of the wagon, but a short, chopped phrase of the leader was enough. Due to his keen hearing Yarik understood that they were talking about putting slaves into the wagons and moving as fast as possible to the tunnel. Finally the three warriors came to the head wagon and stopped. Darg showed something to his companions in strange gestures, they nodded and rode back. Darg turned to Dukan, and without giving him a chance to open his mouth, commanded:

  – You will drive twice as fast. Others, will adjust to our wagon, as usual.

  – But the beasts will resent… – Dukan mumbled confusedly. – Sixpaws are so capricious.

  – I don't care! If you are not able to drive properly, I'll hack you to death, as Cali did it with Alma – the master suddenly got infuriated. – Is it clear?!

  – Yes, my lord!

  At this moment Darg noticed Yarik:

  – Shit o' marhuz, what are you doing here? Into the coachbox, now!

  Yarik rushed to obey the order. With the collar he had no chance to argue with his owner.

  When movement began, Yarik was sitting next to Dukan quiet as a mouse, and Darg was prancing on his black tirr ahead, the young slave asked Dukan:

  – Master, what happened?

  From such total ignorance Dukan even jumped on the spot and hit the sixpaw with goad. It roared resentfully. Darg turn and swore evilly. When the chief turned away, Dukan gave Yarik a resounding slap. He could escape, but did not do that: his status did not allow that.

  – Are you an idiot?

  – But, master, I really don't understand, – Yarik added a touch of humility in his voice, but still insisted on the answer.

  Fortunately for him, Dukan was easily appeased.

  – Well, then, you're lucky! It's a kurraz[36] rider. Damn Nold's sent its «Wings» t' us again.

  – But he did nothing to us. Why are we running then?

  – Well, you're just like a child. How do we know what he has on his mind? Right now, he might have been flying on some business, but on the way back he'll return and burn the entire caravan. They can do anything! Therefore master Darg ordered to double the speed so that we can be in the tunnel the next morning. There, they cannot get us, besides on the other side dragon riders have no such strength as here. – Dukan paused, thought, and then said: – At least I hope so.

  At this point Yarik stopped inquiries. In Dukan's brief and very emotional story there was too much new information to consider.

  The caravan moved as fast as never before. The road was free, nobody attacked them: evidently, everybody hastened to hide from eyes of the mysterious kurraz and its rider, including warriors of hostile tribes. Despite such favorable conditions for movement, they had to stop for the night because sixpaws were exhausted and completely refused to continue moving. Darg scurried along the caravan, fountaining curses, but could do nothing. There was only day's march before the entrance to the tunnel!

  When he realized that no one could force the stubborn sixpaws to move, the chief ordered to make a circle of wagons and to double patrols. The tribe prepared for night filled with fear and tense expectation. Soldiers were watching for no one to violate the prohibition to kindle fires, so for dinner they all had only cold tortillas: both slaves and free men as well. The camp seemed deserted: no screaming kids, no swearing women or singing of drunken soldiers. Only the snorts of sixpaws occasionally torn the curtain of dead silence.

  Yarik was lying under the wheels of a wagon. He was perhaps the only man in the camp, who remained perfectly calm. And it was not because of the lack of his awareness of the danger. It just that life had taught Yarik healthy fatalism: if you have no power to influence something, so do not hustle and do what you can. This evening, probably for the first time in captivity, he was not busy. Usually he installed his owner's tent, cleaned, brought something, cleaned again and so on until the end of a day. But this evening, master Darg prohibited to put tents, and everybody slept in wagons. Darg himself slept in the wagon, where Dukan usually slept alone. This evening the useless slaves, who were meant for sale, simply herded into the center of the circle fenced by wagons (usually they were put in a special paddock with guards who prevented fights between slaves). Just the same paddock where Yarik used to spend his first nights there. From under his wagon Yarik, who could see well in the dark, saw that the same slaves as him, were sitting helplessly on the bare ground and trembling. There was no doubt that without suppressing collars, they would have already fled into the steppe.

  Yarik shook his head. No matter how it was tempting to lay down and sleep, but the present situation suggested, that he needed urgently to get rid of this collar. To be a slave is unbearable in itself, but to die only because of the fact that you cannot neither defend nor even run away – it was the climax of stupidity.

  Yarik lay on his back and relaxed. His mind habitually slipped into the state of Sat'tor where he had not been for over a month – he just had had no strength because of the lost opportunity to feed from external sources! The spell of the Dark collar still entangled his mind fencing it off from the Source of Force like an unbreakable wall, but even a drop can ruin stone if it, of course, grinds it constantly. Yarik scooped a fraction of his vital force, and formed a small probe. With that probe he began to look for smallest gaps in the imposed spell. Here one was found, then two, three… yes a lot of them! It was a feeling that the spell consisted of hundreds of threads entangled into a ball, in the middle of which was Yarik's Source of Force. He had only to understand where and what thread to move in order to loosen the whole spell. It was not an easy task. Seconds were trickling tensely… Damn it! Nothing was clear. Threads of the spell were intertwined in such a complex way, that Yarik almost lost heart. And in addition, his internal sarcastic voice asked: «May be it's the time for despair?!»

  «Damn you! I'll not surrender! There must be a way out». – Yarik continued his intense search for a solution.

  What can he do? What? If it's impossible to untangle this clew, what else could he undertake?.. Maybe there is no need to untangle it? After all, the one thing necessary for him at this moment is access to his own magic. So he needed a channel to the own source, which is hidden now in the middle of the clew. Well, he will build this channel, slowly pushing and loosening the threads of the magic weaving, standing on his way. His vital force should be enough for that, or, at least, Yarik hoped so.

  A thin probe faced an interweaving of two threads of the spell. They had not moved. What would be if he added force and turned the probe into a drill?.. So, somewhere screwing and somewhere creeping Yarik passed through the interweaving of the two threads, and formed a narrow channel. There was not enough strength to continue. He would move in very tiny steps, drop by drop
punching his way to desirable freedom. But as you know, walk and ye shall reach. Even if it would take months of painstaking hard work, so be it! But now Yarik knew that freedom was possible. He had hope and that was a lot. His future freedom was in his hands and depended only on him. The main thing was to make it to his release.

  Yarik came out off Sat'tor, and only by miracle did not groan. At first he thought that a sixpaw sat on him – such suffocating heaviness pinned his body.

  – D-d-d-damn! Marhuz kill you all. What the…? – His lips refused to obey.

  Yarik felt as if he had worked in the field without a break for lunch and sleep for several months – such exhausting weakness fettered his limbs. Immediately a guess pierced him like a lightning – he should pay for everything. The forces which were spent on weakening the obedience spell had been taken from himself, and now he had nothing to fill the gap. If he was to manipulate with vital energy absolutely carelessly, once he may not wake up at all. Apparently, the way to freedom will be even longer than it seemed at first.

  He felt wildly sleepy. Frustrated Yarik had no strength even to curse. His emotions were dulled, apathy fell on him. Yarik did not resist it. «Let's hope that organism knows better what it needs» – Yarik thought and sank into sleep, like into a whirlpool of the Bone River.

  Yarik was standing on a rock. Below there was a familiar view of swaying sea of green forest connecting further with the real blue sea. There was ringing silence and lofty mountains around… It was such a familiar picture! With a sudden brainwave Yarik looked back and saw the silhouette of the mountain threatening to the sky.

  «History repeats itself!» – Yarik's condition could be compared with panic.