Nomads of Gor (9 page)

 
thirty yards behind, with the next wagon; also, too, a wagon

 
is often guided by a woman or boy who walks beside the lead

 
animals with a sharp stick.

 
   
The interiors of the wagons, lashed shut, protected from

 
the dust of the march, are often rich, marvelously carpeted

 
and hung, filled with chests and silks, and booty from looted

 
caravans, lit by hanging tharlarion oil lamps, the golden light

 
of which falls on the silken cushions, the ankle-deep, intricat-

 
ly wrought carpets. In the center of the wagon there is a

 
small, shallow fire bowl, formed of copper, with a raised

 
brass grating. Some cooking is done here, though the bowl is

 
largely to furnish heat. The smoke escapes by a smoke hole

 
at the dome of the tentlike frame, a hole which is shut when

 
the wagons move.

 
   
There was the sudden thud of a kailla's paws on the grass

 
between the wagons and a wild snorting squeal.

 
I jumped back avoiding the paws of the enraged, rearing

 
animal.

 
"Stand aside, you fool!" cried a girl's voice, and to my

 
astonishment, astride the saddle of the monster I espied a

 
girl, young, astonishingly beautiful, vital, angry, pulling at the

 
control straps of the animal.

 
   
She was not as the other women of the Wagon Peoples I

 
had seen, the dour, thin women with braided hair, bending

 
over the cooking pots.

 
She wore a brief leather skirt, slit on the right side to allow

 
her the saddle of the kaiila; her leather blouse was sleeveless;

 
attached to her shoulders was a crimson cape; and her wild

 
black hair was bound back by a band of scarlet cloth. Like

 
the other women of the Wagons she wore no veil and, like

 
them, fixed in her nose was the tiny, fine ring that proclaimed

 
her people.

 
Her skin was a light brown and her eyes a charged, spark-

 
ling black.

 
"What fool is this?" she demanded of Kamchak.

 
'No fool," said Kamchak, "but Tarl Cabot, a warrior, one

 
who has held in his hands with me grass and earth."

 
"He is a stranger," she said. "He should be slain!"

 
Kamchak grinned up at her. "He has held with me grass

 
and earth," he said.

 
The girl gave a snort of contempt and kicked her small,

 
spurred heels into the Banks of the kaiila and bounded away.

 
Kamchak laughed. "She is Hereena, a wench of the First

 
Wagon," he said.

 
"Tell me of her," I said.

 
"What is there to tell?" asked Kamchak.

 
'What does it mean to be of the First Wagon?" I asked.

 
Kamchak laughed. "You know little of the Wagon Peo-

 
ples," he said.

 
"That is true," I admitted.

 
"To be of the First Wagon," said Kamchak, "is to be of

 
the household of Kutaituchik."

 
I repeated the name slowly, trying to sound it out. It i8

 
pronounced in four syllables, divided thus: Ku-tai-tu-chik.

 
"He then is the Ubar of the Tuchuks?" I said.

 
'His wagon," smiled Kamchak, "is the First Wagon and

 
it is Kutaituchik who sits upon the gray robe."

 
"The gray robe?" I asked.

 
"That robe," said Kamchak, 'which is the throne of the

 
Ubars of the Tuchuks."

 
It was thus I first learned the name of the man whom I

 
understood to be Ubar of this fierce people.

 
"You will sometime be taken into the presence of Kutai-

 
tuchik," said Kamchak. "I myself," he said, 'must often go to

 
the wagon of the Ubar."

 
I gathered from this remark that Kamchak was a man of

 
no little importance among the Tuchuks.

 
"There arc a hundred wagons in the personal household of

 
Kutaituchik," said Kamchak. 'No be of any of these wagons

 
is to be of the First Wagon."

 
"I see," I said. 'And the girl she on the kaiila is

 
perhaps the daughter of Kutaituchik, Ubar of the Tuchuks?"

 
"No," said Kamchak. "She is unrelated to him, as are most

 
in the First Wagon."

 
"She seemed much different than the other Tuchuk wom-

 
en," I said.

 
Kamchak laughed, the colored scars wrinkling on his

 
broad face. "Of course," said Kamchak, "she has been raised

 
to be fit prize in the games of Love and War."

 
"I do not understand," I said.

 
Did you not see the Plains of a Thousand Stakes?" asked

 
Kamchak.

 
"No," I said. ''I did not."

 
I was about to press Kamchak on this matter when we

 
heard a sudden shout and the squealing of kaiila from among

 
the wagons. I heard then the shouts of men and the cues of

 
women and children. Kamchak lifted his head intently, listen-

 
ng, Then we heard the pounding of a small drain and No

 
blasts on the horn of a bask.

 
Kamchak read the message of the drum and horn.

 
"A prisoner has been brought to the camp," he said.

     
Kamchak strode among the wagons, toward the sound,

     
and I followed him closely. Many others, too, rushed to the

     
sound, and we were jostled by armed warriors, scarred and

     
fierce; by boys with unscarred faces, carrying the pointed

     
sticks used often for goading the wagon bask; by leather-clad

     
women hurrying from the cooking pots; by wild, half-clothed

     
children; even by enslaved Kajir-clad beauties of Turia; even

     
the girl was there who wore but bells and collar, struggling

     
under her burden, long dried strips of bask meat, as wide as

     
beams, she too hurrying to see what might be the meaning

     
of the drum and horn, of the shouting Tuchuks.

     
We suddenly emerged into the center of what seemed to

     
be a wide, grassy street among the wagons, a wide lane, open

     
and level, an avenue in that city of Harigga, or Bask Wagons.

     
The street was lined by throngs of Tuchuks and slaves.

     
Among them, too, were soothsayers and haruspexes, and

     
singers and musicians, and, here and there, small peddlers

     
and merchants, of various cities, for such are occasionally

     
permitted by the Tuchuks, who crave their wares, to ap-

  
   
proach the wagons. Each of these, I was later to learn, wore

     
on his forearm a tiny brand, in the form of spreading bask

     
horns, which guaranteed his passage, at certain seasons,

     
across the plains of the Wagon Peoples. The difficulty, of

     
course is in first obtaining the brand. If, in the case of a

     
singer, the song is rejected, or in the case of a merchant, his

     
merchandise is rejected, he is slain out of hand. This accept-

     
ance brand, of course, carries with it a certain stain of

ignominy, suggesting that those who approach the wagons do as slaves.

Now I could see down the wide, grassy lane, loping

towards us, two kaiila and riders. A lance was fastened

between them, fixed to the stirrups of their saddles. The lance

cleared the ground, given the height of the kaiila, by about

five feet. Between the two animate, stumbling desperately, her

throat bound by leather thongs to the lance behind her neck,

ran a girl, her wrists tied behind her back.

I was astonished, for this girl was dressed not as a Gorean,

not as a girl of any of the cities of the Counter-Earth, not as

a peasant of the Sa-Tarna Belds or the vineyards where the

Ta grapes are raised, not even as a girl of the fierce Wagon

Peoples.

Kamchak stepped to the center of the grassy lane, lifting

his hand, and the two riders, with their prize, reined in their

mounts.

I was dumbfounded.

The girl stood gasping for breath, her body shaking and

quivering, her knees slightly bent. She would have fallen

except for the lance that kept her in place. She pulled weakly

at the thongs that bound her wrists. Her eyes seemed glazed.

She scarcely could look about her. Her clothing was stained

with dust and her hair hung loose and tangled. Her body was

covered with a sparkling sheen of sweat. Her shoes had been

removed and had been fastened about her neck. Her feet

were bleeding. The shreds of yellow nylon stockings hung

about her angles. Her brief dress was torn by being dragged

through brush.

Kamchak, too, seemed surprised at the sight of the girl,

for never had he seen one 80 peculiarly attired. He assumed,

of course, from the brevity of her skirt, that she was slave. He

was perhaps puzzled by the absence of a metal collar about

her throat. There was, however, literally sewn about her

neck, a thick, high leather collar.

Kamchak went to her and took her head in his hands. She

lifted her head and seeing the wild, fearsome scarred face

that stared into hers, she suddenly screamed hysterically, and

tried to jerk and tear herself away, but the lance held her in

place. She kept shaking her head and whimpering. It was

clear she could not believe her eyes, that she understood

nothing, that she did not comprehend her surroundings, that

she thought herself mad.

I noted that she had dark hair and dark eyes, brown.

The thought crossed my mind that this might lower her

 
price somewhat.

 
She wore a simple yellow shift, with narrow orange stripes,

 
of what must once have been crisp oxford cloth. It had long

 
 
sleeves, with cuffs, and a button down collar, not unlike a

 
man's shirt.