Rebels of Gor (78 page)

“Yes,” I said, looking down into her terrified, uplifted eyes, “you are beautiful. You are worthy of a collar.”

“A collar?” she said.

“Of course,” I said.

“No, no!” she wept. “I am a free woman!”

We had speculated that this might be the case.

“Perhaps you are a slave,” I said. “Perhaps I shall have you strip yourself before me, that your body may be examined for a slave mark.”

“No!” she said. “I am a free woman. I am Lady Kameko, of the household of the shogun!”

“You are a lure girl,” I said, “with confederates.”

“No,” she said. “I am alone!”

Now, that seemed quite likely to me, after Pertinax, Tajima, and I had explored so much of the palace, which now seemed barren and empty, unkempt, and deserted.

“If you are not a lure girl,” I said, “why did you flee from us, on the second level?”

“First I thought you were Ashigaru, returned to restore order, and rejoiced, but then I saw that you, and another, two of the three, were barbarians, and I was afraid, and fled.”

“You claim to be a free woman,” I said.

“I am a free woman!” she said. “Lady Kameko, of the household of the shogun!”

“Perhaps you are a mere contract woman,” I said, “whose contract may change hands, and be bought and sold, much as though you might be a slave.”

“No,” she said, “I am a free woman, and a free woman of the higher orders.”

“Considering your garmenture,” I said, “I find that hard to believe.”

“Upon the departure of soldiers,” she said, “peasants, laughing, curious, angry, riotous, streamed into the palace. They fell upon me, tore away my clothing, threw me to the tiles, and used me, several, like rutting tarsks, as a vessel for their pleasure.”

She squirmed in my hands.

“But you are clothed now,” I said.

“The beasts ransacked the palace,” she said. “Perhaps their simple women are now clothed in the kimonos, the sashes, the obis, and silks, of fine ladies. I found the shred of a garment, and put it about me.”

“You are well-featured and trimly formed,” I said. “I think you might sell as a slave.”

“What are you going to do with me?” she said.

“You inquire as to your fate?” I said.

“Yes!” she said.

“You are a helpless prisoner, and beautiful,” I said. “Speculate.”

She turned her head to the side.

“I fear the men of Temmu march south,” she said.

“It is possible,” I said.

She looked up at me. “I must not fall into their hands!” she wept.

“Perhaps,” I said, “you have already done so.”

“No!” she cried. “Have mercy! I am a free woman!”

“As of now,” I said.

I then pulled her by the upper right arm out into the hall.

“Tajima, Pertinax!” I called. “To me! To me! We have found our informant!” I also added, for good measure, several other names, choosing them at random. I thought this a good thing to do, as it would suggest that our party was a strong one, consisting of several men. That, I thought, might discourage inquiry, or attack.

Chapter Fifty-Seven

We Gather Intelligence;

We Look Forward to a Decent Meal;

We Wish to Find Nodachi;

We Will Search for a Particular Room

“You will kneel here,” I said. I helped her kneel, easing her into place, as I had thonged her wrists together behind her back. “As you are a free woman,” I said, “you may kneel with your knees closely together.”

It is common on the continent to interrogate slaves in a kneeling position. Indeed, slaves are often in a kneeling position before free persons, unless busied about their duties. Indeed, some masters prefer for the girl to be prone, or supine, or lying on their side, facing them. It depends on the master. Binding the slave’s hands behind her back, of course, emphasizes her helplessness, and helps her to keep clearly in mind that she is a slave, wholly subject to free persons. One would not be likely, of course, on the continent, to subject a free woman to such an indignity, unless one had a collar in mind for her.

“This, my friends,” I said, “is a free woman, an exalted high lady, one of the sort to whom you would, in the normal course of things, not dare to lift your eyes, the Lady Kameko, of the household of Lord Yamada.”

“Of the hated household of Lord Yamada,” snarled Tajima.

“Would you care to be stripped, my dear?” I asked her.

“No!” she said.

“You are to be interrogated,” I said. “You are a woman, before men, so straighten your body.”

“Perhaps I do not choose to do so,” she said.

“Would you prefer to do so,” I said, “before, or after, you have been stripped and lashed?”

She straightened her body.

Men wish women to be beautiful. Is the beauty of women not one of the pleasures of men?

The slave, for example, is required to be as beautiful as possible before men, even before a hated master, as well as, naturally, graceful, obedient, deferent, and submissive.

And as a woman is graceful, obedient, deferent, and submissive, soon she finds herself graceful, obedient, deferent, and submissive.

“To me,” I said, to Tajima and Pertinax, “she seems quite attractive, indeed, particularly lovely, but I am no fit judge of Pani beauty.” I turned to Tajima. “What do you think?” I asked.

“Fit for a secondary, or tertiary, slave block,” he said, “in a village market.”

Her eyes flashed with fury.

“I have fashioned a rope leash here,” I said. “Would you care to put it on her?”

“With pleasure,” said Tajima.

It was doubtless the first time the Lady Kameko had been leashed.

“Now, dear lady,” I said, “I and my confreres have been for several days out of the palace, so to speak, though, interestingly, in the palace. As a consequence, much must have ensued in our absence, so to speak. You will speak clearly, openly, fully, truthfully, and, as you are a woman and a captive, modestly and deferentially. We wish to know, in detail, what has recently transpired. You will answer any question put to you to the best of your ability. If we suspect you are holding anything back, or lying, you will be punished for any such indiscretion precisely as would be a slave. Is that understood?”

“Yes,” she said.

* * *

After the attack of the iron dragon on the camps and the siegeworks of Lord Yamada in the north there was, as we would have supposed, a great deal of consternation and confusion. A thousand rumors must have sped about the islands. It seems that Tyrtaios and his colleague, the two tarnsmen at the disposal of Lord Yamada, had been held at the palace, and the first information pertaining to the new, startling developments in the north were a result of the communications borne by several message vulos. These reports, certainly at first, given the confusion at the front, the haste with which they were drafted, and the limitations on content imposed by the nature of the small, swift carriers, as well as the contradictory nature of some of these accounts, seemed to have created little more than alarm and perplexity in the south. Despite Lord Yamada’s announcements of a great victory in the north, it soon became clear that his armies had been thrown into disarray. This was less because of any damage, however severe, wrought by the dragon, than the fact that the attack had taken place. The iron dragon, it seemed, had withdrawn from the cause of Yamada and espoused that of the house of Temmu. This matter, of course, went far beyond the physical details of a brief military engagement. It was as though there had been a cosmic shift in allegiances, as though the world itself had turned its back on Lord Yamada. The dice of the future had rolled awry; the very cards of destiny had proved unpropitious. It was as though a thousand castings of the bones and shells had uniformly rattled, in a thousand holdings, a knell of doom against the house of Yamada. Terror had been cast into the hearts of thousands of brave men, men who would face a common, charging, comprehensible foe with readiness and resolve, with bow and lowered glaives, but who had no heart to withstand the singular and incomprehensible, the mysterious, unnatural, and weird. Into such realms arrows do not fly; no steel blade can halt the coming of darkness, the fall of night.

Daimyos deserted the shogun, withdrawing their men, hurrying to their own holdings. Units melted away; supplies were abandoned. The road to the south was filled with disorganized, routed troops, with stragglers and refugees. Many had now passed even beyond the grounds of the Yamada heartland, continuing to move further south. Who would dare to attempt to hold, or stop, such desperate, frightened men? In the confusion, the chaos, and disorder, in the sudden disarrangements of power, in the lapse of authority, peasants rose, many following a charismatic leader named Arashi, himself of the peasants. The beast in the hearts of men had broken its tether, and was now afoot, free, prowling, and ravening.

Lord Yamada had sent Tyrtaios north to apprise him of the situation, but he had returned only days later, with dire reports and small comfort. Later he, and his colleague, took flight, it was rumored to pledge their swords to the house of Temmu, to which house they had seemingly been long devoted, and in whose interest they had labored secretly.

Five days ago Yamada’s household troops, most of his staff, his wives, his chattels, verr, tarsks, and slaves, had been moved south.

Three days ago the deserted palace had been overrun by looting, riotous peasants.

The location of Lord Yamada, and perhaps that of some of his closest associates, who might have remained with him, was not known.

Lady Kameko feared, but did not know, that contingents of Lord Temmu were advancing south. Certainly the common wisdoms of war would recommend such an action. One expects the wise commander to press an advantage, allowing his foe no respite. Whereas the forces at the disposal of Lord Temmu were small compared to those which had maintained the siege in the north, the variables involved in the equations of war had changed dramatically. The thousands of Lord Yamada were disorganized and routed, in chaotic retreat, unnerved by panic and superstition, having no stomach for standing against an enemy on whose behalf had flown the iron dragon. Who would choose to hold ground or counterattack under a sky in which might suddenly appear the stern, beating wings of fate’s implement, a gigantic dragon sprung alive from legend and myth, capable of palpable arson and destruction, appearing in a world where the canvas over one’s head might burst into flame, where trenches could be flooded with fire as with water, and where the very stones of one’s path might glow and melt before one’s eyes?

I was not clear, of course, whether Lord Temmu would pursue his advantage or not. He tended to be a cautious and defensively minded commander. In Daichi’s absence, who now would read the bones and shells for him? Lord Nishida, I was sure, would urge pursuit; Lord Okimoto, I suspected, would advise restraint, until intelligence, and more intelligence, and more intelligence, might be gathered. Lords Nishida and Okimoto had at their disposal, from the continent, something like three hundred and fifty Pani warriors, and some eleven hundred barbarian mercenaries and mariners. Lord Temmu had some two thousand warriors. As nearly as I could estimate the matter, from the outside, so to speak, the house of Temmu, altogether, could muster something in the neighborhood of thirty-five hundred men. This might, of course, be supplemented by deserters from the house of Yamada, new recruitings of Ashigaru from the northern villages, and, possibly, the pledges of hitherto uncommitted daimyos, and even, possibly, those of daimyos who, in the light of recent developments, might withdraw their support from the house of Yamada. The role of the cavalry in all this was not clear, and it had remained a substantially independent force since the betrayal of its commander to the house of Temmu’s foe, Lord Yamada. I conjectured it might fly somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty tarns. It was difficult to know if one or more tarns might have been lost, or recaptured. Fifty tarns, of course, might provide invaluable intelligence, telling attacks at carefully selected points, and, equipped with flame vases, threaten any number of structures, even the palace of Lord Yamada itself, with relative impunity.

It remained unclear at this point, of course, whether or not Lord Temmu would seize the tempo of war and invest troops in consolidating his advantage, and, if so, in what numbers.

“Why did you remain in the palace?” I asked the Lady Kameko.

“Contingents, different parties,” she said, “left at different times. We were to be in separate groups.”

“That some groups might elude pursuit,” I said.

“Perhaps,” she said

“Your group was then to leave,” I said.

“I was frightened,” she said. “I went as far as the gate. The others were hurrying. Soldiers escorted them. We were to travel lightly. My ornaments were left behind. I hurried back to fetch them. I bundled them. When I came again to the gate, the others were gone, and I saw soldiers, not in formation, on the road. I was alone. I dared not present myself to them. They did not seem men under appropriate discipline. I was a woman. I was afraid. I hurried back, into the palace, to hide, and I have been afraid to leave it.”