The Usurper (19 page)

“The Noble Masters and Mistresses would not be pleased,” hissed Cornhair.

White Ankles turned white, sobbed, and pulled again at her tethered wrists.

“I will throw dirt into the pan of your food, dirt into the pan of your water,” said White Ankles.

“And I into yours!” said Cornhair.

“I am larger than you,” said White Ankles. “I will beat you, and beat you!”

Tears sprang into the eyes of Cornhair, and she jerked helplessly at the cords that held her bound to the spoke. Her knees ground into the dust at the side of the wheel. She knew she was no match for White Ankles.

And then the switch began to fall on the both of them.

“Pigs, pigs!” said Borchu, gasping with her efforts.

“Mercy, Noble Mistress!” begged White Ankles.

“Mercy, Noble Mistress!” wept Cornhair.

“Admit that you are pigs!” cried Borchu.

“We are pigs!” cried White Ankles and Cornhair, their wrists bound to a spoke, their heads down between the spokes.

“Admit that you are less than pigs!” screamed Borchu.

“I am less than a pig!” cried White Ankles.

“I am less than a pig!” cried Cornhair. “Please stop, Noble Mistress!”

“You were purchased for a pig!” said Borchu. “A fool purchased you for a pig. He was cheated. You are not worth so much! You are worth less than a pig!”

“Yes, Noble Mistress!” wept Cornhair. “I am worth less than a pig! Please beat me no more!”

“You, White Ankles,” cried Borchu, “were purchased for three pigs!”

“Yes, Noble Mistress!” said White Ankles.

Sobbing, Cornhair jerked at her bonds. Could it be that Heruls had paid three pigs for White Ankles, and only one pig for herself? Was she so poor a slave, that even Heruls would pay so little for her?

She suddenly realized that she was inferior to White Ankles. Free women are entitled, in their vanity, to regard themselves as superior to all other women, but slaves are beasts and commodities, and their value is determined objectively, by what men will pay for them.

“And you, too,” snarled Borchu, “are worth less than a pig!”

“Yes, Noble Mistress!” said White Ankles.

“The Otung robbers, the Otung bandits, the Otung scoundrels!” cried Borchu. “You are both worth less than pigs!”

“Yes, Noble Mistress!” cried White Ankles and Cornhair.

Then, mercifully, the blows ceased.

“I am tired,” said Borchu. “The day is hot.”

Cornhair gasped, and shuddered. The slave bell hung about her neck clanked. Her back and body were afire. Borchu knew something of the beating of slaves. Cornhair put her head down, against the spoke. Yes, she thought, acquiescing, I am less than a pig, for I am a slave. Is there not a sense in which all slaves are worth less than pigs, as they are slaves? You would not even beat a pig. She knew, of course, that Borchu's assessments were spiteful. Yet, too, she knew, with wars, and such, slaves on many worlds were cheap. But, too, she knew that even a low slave might bring several
darins
. And some slaves, she knew, sold for many
darins
, and some even for a dozen rifles, with a thousand cartridges, even a hoverer. But here, she thought, I am worth only a pig, or less! The barbarian, and Qualius, and Ronisius, she thought, have well had their vengeance. She could not expect to be saved by Iaachus, the Arbiter of Protocol. His minions, Phidias, the captain of the
Narcona
, and the others, Corelius, and Lysis, had abandoned her, and doubtless had reported the assassination done, and would have supposed her to have been killed shortly thereafter, presumably slowly and unpleasantly. Too, what had she to hope, should she find herself before dour Iaachus, in his dark robes, for she had not only failed in her task but knew his complicity in the affair, which knowledge rendered her a threat to him, one who was not likely to be tolerant of unresolved threats.

Borchu freed White Ankles and Cornhair of the spokes, but kept their hands tied, before their bodies.

“Stand,” said Borchu.

Both could stand only with difficulty.

“Precede me,” said Borchu, pointing toward the center of the camp.

Cornhair and White Ankles preceded her for several yards, until she called for them to stop, near the center of the camp, near the large cooking kettles.

Men in the vicinity scarcely noted them.

A child ran by, pursuing a ball of fur, casting it into the air before him, and then hastening to catch it.

“I am not finished with you,” said Borchu.

“Cornhair was the liar!” said White Ankles.

“White Ankles!” said Cornhair.

“Kneel,” said Borchu.

Swiftly Cornhair and White Ankles assumed the prescribed position.

“Bakaar!” called Borchu, “here! Assist me!”

Bakaar, like many of the Heruls, a short, thickly bodied male, shuffled to Borchu's side. On horseback Heruls seemed at ease, as we have noted, even graceful, in a menacing way, but afoot, they often seemed ungainly.

“Tie their ankles,” said Borchu.

This was promptly done, with narrow thongs.

“Now,” said Borchu, “fasten their wrists, behind the back of their necks.”

“Noble Mistress?” said White Ankles, as her bound wrists were pulled up, jerked over her head, and then down, back, behind her neck, where they were fastened.

The same was done with Cornhair.

Both slaves then knelt, their ankles crossed and tied behind them, and their hands, bound, behind the back of their necks.

With a common key, Borchu unlocked the slave bells from the girls' necks, and cast them to the side.

“Noble Mistress?” said Cornhair, questioningly, plaintively.

“Heat two kettles!” called Borchu to a slave, who scurried to obey.

“No, please, no, Noble Mistress!” cried White Ankles.

Cornhair screamed with misery.

At a gesture from Borchu, the Herul, Bakaar, lifted White Ankles first, and then Cornhair, placing each in one of the kettles, where the water swirled about their throats. As their ankles were tied, they could not rise to their feet.

Smoke curled upward, about the sides of the kettles, where the turf grass, the sticks, and dried dung sprang into flame.

“Mercy, Noble Mistress!” screamed White Ankles!

“Spare us, beloved Noble Mistress!” wept Cornhair. “We will be better slaves, the best of slaves, beloved Mistress!”

Some Heruls gathered about, amongst them some women, and children.

“Boil White Ankles! Cook her! Not me!” wept Cornhair.

“No, no!” cried White Ankles. “Cornhair! Not White Ankles!”

“No!” screamed Cornhair, her eyes wild, thrashing about, unable to rise.

“Be silent, Pigs,” scolded Borchu. Then she turned to the slave who had lit the fires. “Bring tallow,” she said, “rags, and brushes.”

“Mistress?” begged White Ankles.

“You are filthy, both of you,” said Borchu. Then she called to two other slaves. “Wash the dirt from their hair, from their bodies, comb them, scrub them!”

“Yes, Noble Mistress!” cried the two slaves.

Bakaar then, by the hair, thrust the head of White Ankles under the water, and shook it, painfully, and then served Cornhair similarly. Both girls raised their heads from the water, half blinded, gasping for breath.

“Stupid pigs,” said Borchu. “If you were to be cooked, your hands would have been bound behind your back, that you might boil more uniformly.”

“Oh!” cried Cornhair, recoiling from the bristles of a stout brush on her body. In moments, she shut her eyes, from the yanking at her hair of a horn comb. To her left she heard White Ankles, sobbing.

Herul men drew the slaves to their feet, and held them in place. The water was then to their waist.

Cornhair had not washed since the wilderness camp.

“Be gentle!” begged White Ankles.

In a few moments the two Heruls released their hold, and White Ankles and Cornhair, unable to stand, fell to their knees in the kettles, putting their heads back, that they not be submerged.

“Are they ready?” asked a voice.

The voice was not that of a Herul. It was a human, male voice.

“Yes,” said Borchu. “Bakaar, hold that pig upright. You, Odai, hold up the other one.”

Both girls were then, again, held upright, the water in the kettles now, again, about their waist.

The human was a large man, muscular, in a sleeveless leather jacket. A knife sheath, at his waist, was empty. Heruls seldom allowed armed humans in their camps. Each large wrist was bound with leather.

Held, Cornhair tried to lift her feet from the bottom of the kettle, as it was becoming uncomfortably hot. A growl from the Herul caused her to remain unmoving.

“I see you have them in an exhibition tie,” said the human.

Suddenly, then, Cornhair flushed with embarrassment. Not only was the behind-the-neck tie an attractive tie, and one of superb slave security, but it lifted the breasts in such a way as to flatter and accentuate the figure.

“We have washed them for you, even in warm water,” said Borchu. “That is better for removing filth, all the dust, the dirt and dung.”

The muscular fellow approached the kettles.

Seldom had Cornhair felt examined, as she then was.

“Mouth open, head back,” said the man.

“Good teeth,” said Borchu.

Cornhair felt her body slapped, variously.

How dare the brute?

She was furious.

Had she not been bound, she would have been tempted to cry out, even to strike at the fellow. At that time, you see, Cornhair was not yet fully aware of what it was to be a slave. She knew the dreadful slavery of being a human female in a Herul camp, but the Heruls were not of her species. In the camp, most Heruls viewed her as they might have viewed a pig, or a dog, something that had little personal meaning to them, and was not of great interest. But then, examined as an animal by a man of her own species, and being considered as an animal by a member of her own species, she suddenly realized, to her terror, that among such, amongst members of her own species, she would be a thousand times more a slave than she had been in the Herul camp. Amongst the Heruls she had been, for the most part, a simple animal, such as a dog or pig, but amongst humans she would be not merely an animal, such as a dog or pig, but a very special sort of animal, an unusually attractive and exciting form of animal, the female slave. The members of her species would understand her bondage and its meaning, only too well, as it was meant to be understood. She would be an object and a commodity, vulnerable to, and helpless before, the free. Men might lust for her, and have their will with her, as they might please. And women would hate her.

The muscular fellow then, to Cornhair's satisfaction, subjected White Ankles, whom he had saved for last, for some reason, to a similar, thorough, explicit examination.

He then stepped back.

“See, sound,” said Borchu.

“Lift them from the kettles,” said the fellow.

Bakaar and Odai lifted the wet, dripping bodies of White Ankles and Cornhair from the kettles.

Cornhair and White Ankles were then knelt before the muscular fellow. Neither dared to meet his eyes.

Water slipped from their heated bodies, dampening the ground. The soles of their feet were sore and reddened, from the metal of the kettles. Their hair was wet, and coarsely combed. There was water about their knees.

The muscular fellow walked about the pair. “They have been beaten,” he said.

“They are slaves,” said Borchu.

“What do you want for them?” he asked.

“Consider their ankles, their flanks,” said Borchu. “Would they not be of interest to a human?”

“Perhaps,” said the fellow.

“Twenty
darins
for each,” said Borchu.

“Ten, for the pair,” he said.

“Too little!” cried Borchu.

“Keep them, eat them,” said the fellow, and turned away.

“Pig, human!” said Borchu.

“Take it,” said Bakaar. “Ten
darins
will buy eight to ten pigs.”

Borchu wavered a moment, her body seething with anger. Then she called out, “Sir! Sir!”

The fellow turned about, perhaps as he had expected to do.

“Agreed!” said Borchu. “But that only for good will, for good will with the dealers of Venitzia!”

“Take them to my wagon,” said the fellow, unslinging the purse from about his shoulder.”

Bakaar undid the thongs on Cornhair and White Ankles. He then put a hand in the hair of each, and, holding them bent over, their heads at his hips, Cornhair on his left, White Ankles on his right, took his way toward the current portal to the camp, where two wagons had been drawn to the side, one to the left, one to the right, this opening the wagon wall, broadly, outside of which waited the dealer's wagon, drawn by two horses.

“Kneel here,” said Bakaar, releasing them behind the dealer's wagon and then returning to the interior of the wagon camp.

“We are out of the camp!” said White Ankles, elatedly. “We have been sold! We have been sold!”

“I cannot be sold!” said Cornhair.

“You have been sold,” said White Ankles, “as have I!”

“I can not be sold, not truly,” said Cornhair, “for I am a free woman.”

“Are you mad?” said White Ankles.

“I am the Lady Publennia Calasalia,” said Cornhair, “of the Larial Calasalii!”

“You are whoever Masters choose to name you,” said White Ankles.

“The dealer is from Venitzia,” said Cornhair. “It is a provincial capital. If he knows the empire, he will know of the Calasalii!”

“Once perhaps you were of the Calasalii, whoever they are,” said White Ankles. “But now you are no more than a slave, as am I.”

“No,” said Cornhair.

“They would not want you back,” said White Ankles, “you are now no more than an embarrassment, an insult and a scorn to them. The collar spoils a woman for freedom. Once collared, she can no longer be free. She is then a slave, and knows herself a slave.”