Players of Gor (16 page)

"yes, Brinlar," she said. She lifted the veil delicately, almost flirtatiously, drinking behind it. She looked at the man across from her.

"Drink, Master?" I asked.

"No," he said. I then withdrew a yard or two and knelt in the grass, holding the vessel of light Ka-la-na. I wore a tunic of white silk.

She dabbed at her lips with a napkin, under the veil, and then let the veil fall again into place.

"This is a pleasant spot," she had said earlier. "Spread the cloth here, Brinlar, and lay out the things from the basket."

"Yes, Mistress," I had said.

We could see the Sardar Mountains in the distance. I had been her servant for some three days. After the first night she had not commanded me to her intimate service. I think that first night had terribly unsettled her. She had apparently not understood that she could have such feelings. At times she had seemed almost taken out of herself. At times, clearly, she had responded uncontrollably, reflexively, at my mercy, almost as might have a slave. This sort of behavior was inappropriate in her, inexcusably so, she doubtless deemed, as she was a free woman. Roundly had I been scolded for my part in matters. Yet with mixed feelings, it was, I think, that she chastised me. I pretended, of course, to ignorance and innocence, and a perhaps overzealous desire to please. In any event she clearly now feared her feelings.

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She had not dared to again order me to her pleasure. I think she was now afraid of herself in a man's arms, and what she might become. Too, I think she clearly understood that what I had done to her might, as a matter of fact, have been done to her by almost any man.

"He is coming now, Brinlar," she had said earlier.

"Yes, Mistress," I had said, shading my eyes.

A rider, mounted on a high tharlarion, flanked by two footmen, had been approaching.

I had little doubt this had to do with her business in the vicinity of the Sardar.

"I must make my identification," said the fellow to her. "Lower your veil."

She unpinned the veil.

"Lady Yanina," he said.

"Yes," she said. I gathered they knew one another.

"You may replace the veil," he said to her.

"It does not much matter, does it," she asked, "as in the course of our work you have, of necessity, several times, seen me face-stripped?"

"Do as you please," he said.

I saw that she repinned the veil. She was extremely modest. She was not a slave. She was a free woman.

The fellow, clad in dark garments, with a cape spread behind him, sitting cross-legged at the edge of the cloth, she kneeling across from him, turned to look at me. I lowered my head.

"I do not care to speak before him," he said. His two footmen were in the background, a few yards away, where the tharlarion was tethered. Two of Lady Yanina's men, from her camp, were also nearby. They were withdrawn several yards to the rear, behind us, as his men were behind him. They were sitting cross-legged in the grass, playing stones.

"Do not mind him," she said. "He is only a servant."

"What sort of servant?" he asked.

"A common sort of menial," she said. "I use him for various things. He waits upon me, he combs my hair, he tidies up the tent."

"I see," he said.

"Does it bother you that I have such a servant?" she asked.

"No," he said. "Of course not."

"You have girls who tend you hand and foot," she said.

"I would rather not speak before him," he said.

"Several times," she said, "we have spoken openly before your slaves."

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"That is different," he said. "They are only slaves."

"Would you feel more comfortable if I put him in a collar?" she asked. "It is my intention to do that."

"I despise such servants," he said.

"I shall withdraw, Mistress," I said, making as though to rise.

"Stay, Brinlar," she said, imperiously, coldly.

"yes, Mistress," I said. I smiled inwardly. My trick had worked. I had been reasonably confident that she would choose to exert her authority in this fashion. She was obviously in some sort of competitive relationship with the male. There was a tautness, a tension, between them. She seemed jealous of him and his power. She was very defensive about her status in his eyes. I conjectured that they were theoretically on the same level, or nearly on the same level, perhaps reporting to the same superior, or superiors, presumably Priest-Kings. If it were acceptable to discuss sensitive matters before his slaves, women like herself, but reduced to a status as negligible as that of furniture or animals, then surely it should be similarly acceptable to discuss such matters before a male, she must have reasoned, one who shared his sex, but was now to her only as total servant. Clearly, of course, she did not understand the differences between men and women. They are not the same. No more fundamental mistake can be made. Too, in making his identification, he had her face-stripped. This is not a small thing from the point of view of a Gorean woman. I saw that it was important to her to pretend to be his equal. From his point of view, of course, she was only a woman. He must have often conjectured, like any strong man, what she would have looked like at his feet, stripped and in chains. If any roughnesses remained in their relationship after that, they could always be smoothed out with the whip.

"You have brought the materials?" he asked. I was relieved. I saw that he did not choose to contest these matters with her. They were beneath his dignity. She was only a female.

"They are in my tent," she said, airily. "I did not bring them to this meeting, of course. I wished to make certain of the contact first."

"Of course," he said. I wondered what the 'materials' were. He seemed to have spoken somewhat guardedly. I assumed that was because of my presence.

"I have them ready for delivery whenever and wherever you wish," she said.

In tidying up her tent, I had taken the opportunity to examine, in so far as I could, its contents. Certain of the trunks were kept

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locked. In one of those, I supposed, lay the 'materials' in question. I did not know the location of the keys to these trunks. I supposed most were locked in one of the trunks, and the key, say, to that trunk, or trunks, was carried about her person, probably concealed in her robes. I could not investigate these matters in detain at night as at night I was hooded and chained to a stake just within the entrance to her tent. In this way she kept me near her. Also, in this way, I did not have to be put with the other captives. It was feared they might harm me in their resentment or anger, given the nature and lightness of my duties.

"I think it was a mistake to have routed them through Port Kar," he said.

This speculation had to do, I supposed, with possible recent misgivings on the part of Priest-Kings pertaining to the loyalty of Samos.

"Not at all," she said. "Dour Babinius held passage with me. I had to deliver him to Port Kar, that he might there, in accord with his sealed orders, conduct his affairs."

She had told me earlier that she had had business in Port Kar. That, I supposed, had been the business. While there, of course, she had taken advantage of carnival to expeditiously accomplish her captures, among which I like a fool, must be counted.

"Do you know the nature of those orders?" he asked.

"No," she said.

"I do," he said.

"Oh," she said, irritatedly. I gathered he must stand somewhat higher than she in some hierarchy of power.

"He was to have made a strike in Port Kar," he said.

"His target?" she asked.

"An admiral," he said, "one called 'Bosk'."

"I have heard of him," she said.

"He failed," he said.

"Oh," she said, surprised.

"He was found in one of the purple booths, in his heart his own knife."

"This 'Bosk' did that?" she asked.

"Presumably," he said.

"Where is this 'Bosk' now?" she asked.

"His whereabouts are now unknown," he said. "It is even suspected that he has fled from Port Kar."

"So the entire matter came to naught?" she asked, scornfully.

"Yes," he said.

"It would have been better for Belnar to have entrusted the

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entire matter to me," she said. Belnar, I supposed, might be their common superior.

"You?" he asked, skeptically.

"Yes," she said.

"How might you have succeeded where Babinius failed?" he asked. "With a bludgeon? With a quicker dagger?"

"With no means so crude," she said.

"Then, how?" he asked.

"I am a woman," she said, straightening her body, making clear the indications of considerable beauty concealed beneath her silk. "I could present myself to him. I could allure him. I could win his interest. I could win his confidence. I could make him desperately eager for so much as a touch or kiss. Then, when, in effect, I could twine him about my tiny finger, when I could do with him as I wished, I could drug or poison him."

I wondered what she would look like, naked and in a collar, in the shadow of a whip. When a woman is absolutely powerless it is easy to teach her her sex.

"Doubtless it is Belnar's mistake," said the guest, dryly, "not to entrust you with greater matters."

"In Port Kar," she said, "on my own initiative, and by means of my own plan, I took fifteen men!"

"Doubtless you had some help in this," he said.

"I command my subordinates, as you command yours," she said, angrily.

"You are a woman," he said.

"Serve us, Brinlar!" she said, angrily, lifting and holding her goblet, not looking at me.

"Yes, Mistress," I said, rising and approaching with the vessel of Ka-la-na.

"Is this one of the 'men' you captured?" inquired the guest.

I poured the Ka-la-na for them.

"At least fourteen are true men," she said, angrily. "You may withdraw, Brinlar."

"Yes, Mistress," I said, and returned to where I had knelt before.

"Do you know where lies the old in of Ragnar, on the old west road?" he asked.

"Yes," she said. "It is now2 abandoned, is it not?"

"It is not now in use," he said, "though it is occasionally reopened when there is an overflow of folks from Torvaldsland, come for the fair."

Some two years ago the merchants and builders had opened the road of Cyprianus, named for the engineer in charge of the

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project, which led to the fairs rather from the southwest. This had considerably reduced the traffic on the road of Clearchus, now to its north, which had approached the fairs in such a way as to favor the traffic from the northwest, with the result that several of the establishments on the road of Clearchus had been abandoned or relocated. One advantage of the more southern route is that it passes through less rough terrain, terrain which provides less cover for highwaymen. In particular, it does not pass, for several pasangs, though the woods of Clearchus.

As rumor has it, Clearchus was a famous brigand of some two centuries ago who decided to legitimize and regularize his brigandage. He proclaimed his area of operations a ubarate, proclaimed himself its ubar, and then proceeded to impose taxes and levy tolls. Interestingly enough, in time, several cities accorded this ubarate diplomatic recognition, generally in return for concessions on the taxes and tolls. Finally a large force of mercenaries, in the hire of the merchant caste, in a campaign that lasted several months, put an end to the spurious reign of Clearchus, driving him from the forest and scattering his men. It is generally conceded, however, that had Clearchus had more men he might have turned out to be the founder of a state.

It is not altogether clear what happened to Clearchus but some historians identify him with Clearchus of Turia, an immigrant, with followers, to Turia, now chiefly remembered as a patron of the arts and philanthropist. The woods of Clearchus, incidentally, to this day, remain a haunt of brigands.

In the old days the road of Clearchus was often referred to as the "west road." This designation became less useful after the recent opening of the road of Cyprianus. It is not unusual, now, to refer to the road of Clearchus as the "old west road" and that of Cyprianus as the "new west road." Neither of these roads, incidentally, are "great roads," in the sense of being mounted in the earth several feet deep, built of stone like a sunken wall, the sort of roads which are often intended to last a thousand years, the sort of roads which, typically, are found in the vicinity of large cities or are intended to be military roads, speeding directly to traditionally disputed territories or linking strategic points. These roads are both secondary roads, so to speak, generally graveled and rutted; occasionally they are paved with such materials as logs and plated stone; they can be almost impassable in rainy weather and in dry, warm weather, they are often dusty. Tertiary roads, so to speak, are often little more than unfrequented twisting trails. There is often talk of improving the secondary