The Warrior Rearmed

5

The room I awoke in was only torch-lit, but even if it had been blazing with bright, cheery light, there wouldn’t have been much of an improvement. All four of the walls were cold, undecorated stone, the floor uncarpeted stone, the ceiling dimly seen stone. Aside from the narrow pile of furs I lay on, one small table and a couple of torch sconces, the room was entirely bare. I shivered as I looked around at it, wondering if it was a cell rather than a room, wondering if the heavy wooden door was locked. I couldn’t remember how I had gotten there, or why someone would lock my in a cell. I moved around under the fur covering me, realizing I was naked, growing more and more upset—until the door opened, admitting a female slave carrying a tray. The naked slave hurried to put the tray down on the small table, fell to her knees and put her forehead to the floor, then scrambled up and backed out of the room. I didn’t know Aesnil stood by the door waiting for the slave to leave until I saw her, the bright red of her gown an incongruous sight in the drab of that room. She closed the door firmly behind the hurrying slave, moved gracefully to the tray that had been left, chose one of the bowls, then brought it over to me.

“I am pleased to see that you have recovered,” she said, handing me the bowl with a warm smile. “You must now eat to regain your strength, and then you will be completely whole again. ”

I took the bowl automatically, still trying to remember what had happened, and then I realized that my shield was closed. Not knowing any better I opened it—then slammed it closed again against the shock of more than atmospheric static.

“How long have I been here?” I gasped, putting one shaky hand to my head as memory came flooding back. “How long a time do those storms continue?”

“The new day has begun,” she answered, looking at me narrowly in the dim torchlight. “How are you able to know that the storms continue? Ah, but of course. You are able to feel them. I believe I no longer envy you your powers. ”

“No one possessed of sanity and sense would envy me my powers,” I came back, looking around for a place to put the bowl she had given me. “There is little pleasure in being sought for no more than their use.”

“Do not put your food aside!” she said sharply, taking the bowl back before I could get rid of it. Your strength will not return without it and your strength will be necessary if we are to escape from here!”

“Escape?” I echoed, staring at her with the frustration of not being able to read her. “Have you gone insane after all’? How would it be possible to escape, and to where would we run? Are we to float through these walls? And what of your position here? You cannot be Chama if you are no longer present.”

“I no longer am Chama!” she spat, squeezing the bowl between her hands as her lovely face twisted with grief. “I have publicly renounced the position, and will not take it up again no matter the doings of Cinnan! He believes I may be forced to his will, yet his beliefs will prove to be mistaken! One who has been a Chama will never be a slave!”

She looked down at the bowl in her hands, seemingly ready to throw it violently away from her, but then she realized what she was about to do. I could almost see her grabbing her fury and forcing it back down, establishing control over it before stepping closer and sitting down on the bed furs next to me. Her movements were still jerky as she took the small scoop out of the bowl, scraped off the excess cereal grain against the side of the bowl, then stabbed at my face with the scoop. I was so startled I opened my mouth, and found myself being fed the cereal grain I hadn’t really wanted.

“The man is insufferable,” she muttered, barely giving me a chance to swallow before stabbing at me with the scoop again. “He beats me and uses my body as though I were a slave, then demands that I behave as a Chama! When I refused to continue with the farce and informed the dendayy of my decision, he dared to give me as host-gift to the beast who holds you! I refuse to allow this state of affairs to continue, therefore shall we escape together. ”

“You still have not told my how we are to escape from this place,” I said as fast as I could before the next scoopful came at me.

“This fortress was built by my family,” she answered, grim satisfaction accompanying the sharp, angry movements of her hand. “For one of the blood, there is more than a single exit from it. We will await the end of the storms, and then we will depart. Do you fear to go with me?”

She stopped feeding me for the moment, but I still hesitated before answering her. I wanted very much to be away from that place, but—all alone on Rimilia, with no one but another woman like myself? Where would we go? Would I live to see my embassy again? What would we do if we were captured by strangers, men who decided they wanted us? Did I have the nerve to face Rimilia on my own?

“I do fear to accompany you,” I said at last, feeling more of the throbbing headache that had diminished so much from the day before. “You find yourself filled with the same anger which fills me, and yet—I fear the world beyond these walls and you do not. That I have even greater fear of the doings within these walls is happenstance. I do fear to accompany you, yet I shall do SO.”

“Ah, Terril, it seems it is best that I shall no longer be Chama,” she sighed, putting her hand on my arm. “Your lot must truly be worse than mine due to aid you gave me, yet I spent not a single moment in thought concerning what was to become of you. I must see to it that your reluctance to remain grows much greater than your reluctance to depart. In such a way will departure please the both of us.”

She reached forward to hug me briefly, smiled in a sympathetic way as she got to her feet, then returned the bowl to the tray and left the room. I stared after her, wondering what she could possibly have been talking about, then shrugged to myself to dismiss the question. Aesnil always had been somewhat on the strange side, and it wasn’t likely that she’d change. What she’d said meant nothing at all, and I would be foolish if I wasted time thinking about it.

Or so I idiotically believed, until the door opened again to reveal Tammad. I could see the anger in his eyes even in the torchlight, especially when he came closer to look down at me. He informed me coldly that the Chama Aesnil had told him that I was much better, but had refused all her attempts to make me eat something. She also said she intended arguing with me, but had suddenly found herself perfectly willing to drop the subject and leave. She didn’t understand why that had happened, but the barbarian did—and was furious about it. I was so shocked I couldn’t say a word, and then I was beyond shock and stumbling into panic. I babbled and tried to back away as the barbarian’s hands began to unbuckle his swordbelt, but there was nowhere to go and he wasn’t interested in listening to anything I had to say. He caught me easily before I could run and then beat me with the swordbelt, ignoring my screams that Aesnil was lying just as he ignored my begging that he stop. He punished me hard for something I hadn’t done, then forced almost everything on the tray down my throat. When he left his anger hadn’t diminished much, but mine was already growing.

I’d never been angry after being punished before, and the anger had a strange effect on the pain the barbarian had given me. I squirmed around belly down on the furs I’d been left on, feeling the flaming ache in my body and hating the barbarian more with every throb. He’d had no right doing that to me, not after I’d told him Aesnil was lying. He just didn’t care whether or not it was the truth, not if it meant he had to pass on strapping me. He enjoyed beating me, I knew he did, and I hated him more with every passing minute. Once I was gone he’d have to find someone else to beat, and I hoped he would choose someone who had more courage than I. It would serve him right if the woman he chose stole his dagger and plunged it into his body in revenge, ending his pleasure and his life together. I put my head down to the fur as the tears ran down my cheeks, knowing it would serve him right.

I was left alone in that cell of a room for hours, long enough to brood to my heart’s content. When the door finally opened and the same slave female came in with another tray, I ignored her and looked for Aesnil. The Charm stepped into the room in the same quiet way she had that morning, waited until the slave had left with the emptied first tray, then closed the door firmly and smiled.

“I am pleased to see that you ate well earlier,” she said as she approached me, her eyes moving over what she could see of me. “Your strength will now be sure to return, and as quickly as we require it.”

“Perhaps even more quickly than that,” I growled, beginning to turn under the fur. I fully intended getting up to thank her properly for what she had done, but I discovered immediately that I still hurt too much to move as easily as I wanted to. I swallowed a gasp against the stiffened protest of my body, then slumped back in defeat. On that world, I couldn’t even get my own back from a woman like myself.

“How badly were you beaten?” Aesnil demanded, stepping closer with her eyes narrowed. “What sort of man would give you such hurt merely for failing to take sustenance?”

“I was not beaten for failing to take sustenance,” I told her, closing my eyes against her ridiculous outrage. “I was beaten for attempting to control you, a doing which was absolutely forbidden me. Please accept my thanks for increasing my reluctance to remain here.”

“I—was unaware of this,” she stumbled, her voice sounding guilty and filled with confusion. “I merely sought a reason as to why I, myself, failed to command you to your food. Are you in great pain?”

“Certainly not,” I answered, keeping my eyes closed. “I remain unmoving solely through lack of interest in motion. You will, of course, forgive me for not rising in your presence.”

“Terril, you must believe that I did not know he would beat you in such a way,” she whispered, coming close to take my arm in both of her hands. “When he forced me to his use he seemed so gentle, so different from Cinnan. Though I fought him he gave me no pain, and even attempted to bring a smile to my lips. I thought he would do no more than punish you lightly, if at all, and be certain that you ate as I wished you to. I will seek him out and speak the truth to him, no matter that Cinnan will then give me what you were given. I will not have you suffer innocently for a doing that was mine, not even though I am no longer Chama. Once I was Chama, and I will never forget.”

I watched her get to her feet and head resolutely for the door, and couldn’t control the urge to peek. Opening my shield was still somewhat painful, but it didn’t take long to confirm Aesnil’s intentions. She meant to do what she said she would, and that was all I needed to know.

“Wait,” I called, and her reluctance when she stopped and turned back to me was real. “Speaking the truth now will do no more than delay our departure,” I said, knowing my voice carried conviction. “Should you wish to make amends for what you have done, do not delay our departure.”

She hesitated, clearly struggling within herself, trying to decide between what was right and what was desirable. She seemed to have begun changing from the arrogant brat I’d known only a couple of days earlier, but I doubted if she saw the change in herself as yet. She was beginning to think about others, beginning to step out of the limelight now and then. She hesitated another moment, still unsure, then slowly returned to the side of my bed to sit down.

“As it is your wish, I will not speak of what I have done,” she grudged, not sounding happy about it. “Although I fear Cinnan’s anger, I will not lie to save myself from him, and this failure to speak feels much like a lie. The storms without have begun to lose their fury, and it is believed they will be gone by dark. Will you be able to travel by dark?”

“If necessary, I will crawl,” I assured her, shifting to get more comfortable on the furs. “How will you find yourself able to return here at dark? Will Cinnan not demand that you remain in your apartments and see to his needs?”

“I foresaw the problem and have already seen to it,” she answered with a headshake. “When you and that other were first brought here, I informed Cinnan that tradition demanded the presence of one of the blood here in the fortress as long as strangers were to be found within. He knows little of my family’s traditions, and allowed the thing after only a brief hesitation. To see to his needs he must visit me here, which he has not failed to do. In his absence he leaves a guard at the foot of the bridge, thinking me in such a way penned within. A pity he will soon be disillusioned.”

“What of this other you speak of?” I asked, partly to distract her from the bitterness I could see in her eyes, partly to find out how Len was doing. “Has he regained consciousness as yet? Has the pain lessened its hold upon him?”

“He fares at least as well as you,” she answered, taking a deep breath. “He has regained his senses, and complains that the storms have not yet ceased. Also, he allows the slave who brings his tray to feed him. Though I have not been officially declared slave, you must allow me to do the same for you. Should your strength fail through lack of sustenance, it may well mean the end of both of us; we depart together, so shall we remain together, for I will not abandon you.”

Even without opening my shield, I could feel the truth and determination in what she said. It was possible she was trying to make up for what she had done to everyone else by being loyal and straight with me, but her reasons didn’t really matter much. When someone offers you absolute loyalty without asking more than a little in return, it’s very difficult to refuse.

“Very well,” I said with a sigh, not sure how far willingness would take me. “I will attempt to build my strength as you wish.”

Aesnil smiled encouragingly and went for the first bowl, and I managed to eat more than I thought I could. Being beaten doesn’t do much for the digestion, but being angry rather than frightened and shaky seems to compensate for that. I ate everything I could stuff down, more than I wanted but less than Aesnil wanted, then finally called a halt. It wouldn’t help either one of us if I threw up everything I’d swallowed, and she seemed to understand that. She put back the last bowl with only a small amount of reluctance, helped me finish the last of the light wine she’d had brought, then left me alone. I moved around on the bed furs trying to get comfortable, thinking I’d earned some more undisturbed brooding time, but it turned out I was mistaken. Not five minutes later I became aware of the presence of someone else in the room, and when I twisted around I saw Tammad standing just inside the doorway.

“The Chama tells me that this time you have obediently eaten nearly all that was brought you,” he said, slowly stepping farther into the room. “It pleases me that you were obedient.”

I stared at him very briefly then turned completely away, unwilling to hear anything he had to say, unwilling even to look at him. There was silence for short while, and then he was standing directly behind me.

“Wenda, I came to see how you fared,” he said, sounding as calm and contained as he always did. “Though the strapping you had was well earned, it may perhaps have been a trifle-harsh. I would know what pain you continue to have.”

I bit back the urge to be sarcastic and just kept quiet, knowing well enough that sarcasm wasn’t called for. I usually reserved sarcasm for people I could like, and the barbarian didn’t qualify.

“Wenda, I hear no words from you,” he said after a moment, his tone showing nothing of the touch of annoyance I was sure was in his mind. “I asked after what pain you felt.”

When I still didn’t answer, his hand went to the fur covering me and pulled it aside. I could imagine from his silence what he was seeing, knowing damned well what it felt like. He’d been furious when he’d beaten me, and my back hurt even when I did no more than breathe. Between the leather swordbelt and the strength of his anger, my back must have been a fascinating sight.

“I—feared as much,” he said at last, his voice nearly a whisper as he gently replaced the fur. “How great a fool a man is, who loses himself to anger when his intention is merely to punish. Come and let me hold you, hama, and swear that I will never again be such a fool. Open your mind and share the pain with me, for I have earned that and more.”

He put his hands to my shoulders, waiting for me to turn and be held, but I didn’t want to be held by him. I wanted to be left alone to wipe away the damp film hanging in front of my eyes, to finally make myself understand how really alone I was on that world. I hated being so alone, bat it was all I’d ever be.

“Hama, do not hold yourself so far from me,” he whispered, the tips of his fingers just touching my shoulders. “Never will I love another as I love you, this you must believe though you disbelieve all else you have ever heard. Never have I wished pain for you, yet pain is all I bring. Turn to my arms so that I may hold you close, and swear that I will never bring you such pain again.”

I lay still in the furs, my eyes closed, feeling the pain he spoke of even without repeating it in my mind. I couldn’t stand any more, not without collapsing or going insane, and not moving was the easiest of all impossible options. He waited a very long time behind me, not saying another word, but even the worst of tortures has to end. When I heard the door close I knew he was gone, and I cried as hard as I ever had in my life.

I slept for a while after the sobs finally left me, jerking awake only once in the grip of a bad dream. Once it was gone I couldn’t remember what it had been about, but I was nearly afraid to go back to sleep. When I finally woke all the way another tray was being brought into the room, but this time the slave was alone. I bit back the urge to ask her where the Chama was, waited until she’d left, then gingerly opened my shield. The static-pain I’d felt from the storm was gone, letting me open my mind wide to stretch after what seemed like years of confinement. It felt good to spread out, but that was all I accomplished. If Aesnil was within range of my mind, she was either unconscious or dead.

I moved my body even more gingerly than I had my mind, this time finding pain but a lot less than I thought I would. I got up and walked and stretched, cursing the barbarian with every twinge, wondering if it was too early to begin worrying about Aesnil. I wasn’t quite sure whether dark had already fallen outside, but if it hadn’t it couldn’t be far off. Had she changed her plans, been delayed—or gotten caught? There was absolutely no way of telling until and unless the ax fell on me as well, a method of gaining answers I would have preferred avoiding. The bare stone floor under my feet made me shiver, so I hurried back to the bed furs and lay down again, determined not to borrow trouble. Time enough to decide something had gone wrong if morning carne and Aesnil still hadn’t shown up. A pity I hadn’t thought to ask her where her bolt-hole was when I’d had the chance.

Subjective time is always a burden, even when pain isn’t involved. It either creeps or flies, depending on what you’re involved in, depending on how distracted or bored or anxious you are. I shifted around all over the bed furs, got up and walked to the tray of food, decided I had no appetite worth mentioning, walked back to the bed furs again, then nearly tore my hair. Despite the fact that time was creeping, it had been passing; what sort of crisis could possibly be keeping Aesnil?

When the door to the room finally opened, I had to stifle a gasp as I whirled around. I’d been so distracted with worrying that it could have been anyone barging in, but it was only Aesnil. She slipped inside and closed the door quickly and quietly, then turned to me as she leaned against it.

“There was an unforseen delay,” she panted, pushing back her long blond hair with her free hand. The other hand clutched a bundle of cloth, and it was clear she’d been hurrying.

“What was the cause of the delay” I asked, waiting for my heart to stop pounding. “Does someone suspect what we are about to attempt?”

“No,” she answered, shaking her head as she swallowed large draughts of air. “No, we are not suspected. It was simply that—Cinnan came to me before returning to his apartments in the outer palace.”

She walked over to the bed furs and sat down on them, dropping her bundle as she shook her head to clear the damp hair from her face. She wasn’t saying anything else aloud, but her mind was clamoring and whirling so wildly she should have been shouting or screaming or jumping around. I stood it for as long as I could—about thirty seconds—then went to sit down next to her.

“What disturbs you so deeply” I asked, ready to put an arm around her. “What has Cinnan done that affects you so strongly?”

“He has done nothing—and much,” she stumbled, turning painfully confused eyes to me. “When he came to visit me, it was as though he cared for me. He made no demands, found no fault with my actions, sought no vengeance at the expense of my dignity. Though I had no wish to be held by him, he took me in his arms and spoke gently of love, a thing he had never spoken of before. I had thought he had banded me solely out of a sense of duty, and I had greatly feared being bound to one who felt no more than duty toward me. When he touched his lips to mine it was as though a spell had been cast upon me, turning my flesh to liquid and destroying my will to resist him. When he took my body I was overwhelmed, so thoroughly that I was unable to stir for some time after he left me. Now—now I am here.”

“And considerably more reluctant to depart than earlier,” I commented, finally able to resolve some part of her emotions. “You now wish to remain with him, to learn more of his intentions and feelings. He is no longer the man you thought to run from.”

“Yes, I now wish to remain yet I may not do so.” she whispered, looking down at her lap while misery flared in her mind. “The thought has come to me that his love has been professed merely to insure the presence of a Chama, one who will rule as the laws of the land demand. Would his duty not then be properly seen to, without difficulty and without disgrace? While deep within my body he laughingly called me small girl-child, yet he errs in believing me a child. I am not a child, and will not be gulled as easily as a child. I will leave Grelana, and never again return.”

She somehow managed to keep the tears out of her eyes, but I could see them plainly in her mind. I gave in to the urge to put an arm around her shoulders, then patted her awkwardly.

“Aesnil, should you wish the truth, I am able to give it to you,” I said, automatically trying to soothe the misery in her mind. “That Cinnan feels love for you is beyond doubt, for he has spoken to me of his feelings and I was able to verify them. You may believe him without fear of being gulled.”

“I cannot believe him!” she cried, twisting away from my arm as her mind twisted away from my comfort. “How may I believe him?”

“For what reason can you not?” I countered, seeing her agitation even in her back. “Is it not part of my power to know such things? Have I not assured you of the truth of his words?”

“And what of his actions?” she demanded, whirling back to face me. “Have I not also the truth of his actions? Was he not the one returned me to my apartments from the vendra ralle, already aching from the strapping he had given me, only to rip my gown from me as though I were a slave? Was he not the one who then forced the degradation of slavery upon me, demanding that I bow to him and serve him and beg his use of my body? When I angrily refused he strapped me again, beating me till I was unable to deny him. These are not the actions of a man who feels love, Terril, and it is for that reason that I cannot believe you.”

She took her gaze away from me and went back to the bundle she had brought, wiping angrily at her eyes with the back of her hand. I closed my lips again without speaking further, knowing from the shut-tight feel of her mind that she would refuse to listen to anything else on that subject. That she refused to believe the truism that angry men do vengeful things, I could understand; the thought was highly disturbing to any woman who had to deal with them—after getting them angry. What I couldn’t understand was her refusal to believe what I had to say. I could see it all so much more clearly and unemotionally than she; why didn’t she believe me?

“We must hurry if we are to make good our escape,” Aesnil said, immediately banishing all questions on belief from my mind. “I have stolen clothing for us, for gowns will not do upon the journey we undertake. The fit will not be perfect, yet it matters little as we cannot hope to do better.”

I didn’t understand her comment until I saw the clothing, and then I understood only too well. She had brought two sets of the clothing her guard wore, loose, wide-sleeved shirts and baggy trousers, with wide leather belts to cinch them. The only thing she hadn’t brought was the sort of heavy sandals the men wore, undoubtedly for the obvious reason. Clothing can be forced into fitting; leather sandals can’t be. It took another minute to realize a second obvious thing, which made me revise my opinion on how unselfish the Chama was growing: Aesnil already wore a pair of sandals, her own. The only one who would be going barefoot was me.

Ten minutes later saw us both in the new clothing, and to say the fit wasn’t perfect was at least an accurate description—as far as it went. Considering the size of Rimilian men, we didn’t have to be wearing the clothes of the largest of them for us to feel we were wrapped in tents. The brown and yellow shirt I wore came down to just past my knees, making it almost unnecessary to lug on the brown pants. If it hadn’t been for the red leather belt—supplied with extra buckle holes all the way around its circumference—I couldn’t have walked more than a step and a half without being hobbled. Aesnil’s outfit was blue and gray with blue pants, but even her extra inch or so of height didn’t make it better than mine. We rolled and tied sleeves and trouser legs with strips of leather, then decided not to waste any more time. If the outfits came apart we could fix them later, somewhere where there was less risk of getting caught.

When it actually came down to leaving the fortress, I was somewhat disappointed. I suppose I’d expected sliding walls with fiendishly clever release levers, but I must admit rock makes a poor medium for sliding. The bolt hole we used was just that, a narrow, wooden trapdoor in the far corner of the room, painted and disguised to look just like the rock of the rest of the floor. The trapdoor groaned slightly when we raised it, but the lack of hinges meant it didn’t need regular oiling to keep it usable. The door rested on a built-in ledge at the proper point below floor level, and just below the ledge were three torches, tied to metal stakes driven into the rock on three sides. The fourth side contained a wooden ladder, and I hoped it was as strong as it looked. It disappeared far down into unlit depths, a place I wanted to reach at a pace of one rung at a time. I was in something of a hurry to leave that fortress room, but not in that much of a hurry.

While Aesnil untied two of the torches and went to light them from the room’s torch, I looked around to see if we’d left any clues showing that we’d left the palace. The only thing I found was Aesnil’s discarded red gown, and knew immediately that it couldn’t be left behind. If there’d been a window I would have thrown it out, but lacking a window I decided the escape tunnel would have to do. After wadding it into a ball I threw it down, half expecting to hear it hit bottom as if it were a rock. I still hadn’t heard anything when Aesnil came over with the two lit torches, and then it was time to go.

Aesnil lowered herself through the trapdoor first, reached up to take one of the torches I was holding, then began a slow descent. When she was far enough down I took my turn, putting the torch down on the bare stone floor just long enough to find the top of the ladder with my feet. We’d decided Aesnil would go first to lead the way, but that left me with the job of reclosing the trapdoor. I immediately discovered that I needed one hand to hold a ladder rung, one hand to hold the torch, and one or two hands to pull the wooden cover back into place. I was seriously considering the acrobatics of draping one leg over a rung and holding the torch in my teeth when I saw an horizontal torch bracket set into the stone beneath one set of the stakes the torch had been tied to. With a sigh of relief I used the bracket, fought the wooden door back onto its ledge, then reclaimed the torch. The hardest part of the descent was behind me, and for the first time in a long time I felt like singing.

It’s embarrassing to look back on that night and ask myself if I really was that innocent, or if I had just been suffering from a severe case of wishful thinking. My urge to sing lasted all of five minutes, just long enough to let me appreciate the necessary routine for descending that ladder. The narrow, enclosed space was hot and airless, making it more than necessary that the torch be kept as far away from me as possible. Its orange and yellow flickering illuminated the rough gray stone walls and dark brown ladder, but it also started the sweat rolling down my forehead into my eyes and made my hair feel singed. I tried resting my torch hand on the highest rung above my head that I could reach, but that put the torch too close to the ladder and made me nervous. If the ladder caught on fire Aesnil and I were both dead, and in a place it was unlikely anyone would ever find us. Being dead is bad enough, but being dead and unmourned somehow makes it seem worse. The torch had to be held up, with my arm unbraced.

The arm not burdened with a torch had trouble of its own, needing to steady me on the ladder as my feet climbed down. My body seemed to tend away from the ladder, making it necessary that I hold on with my free hand, not simply guide myself with it. While stepping down to the next rung there was little difficulty other than strain; moving the hand down to a new position quickly became a race, to see if I would be able to secure the new position before my body swung too far back from the ladder. Early on I almost missed, and thereafter the race became much more absorbing.

As if the other problems weren’t bad enough, the ladder itself was a problem. Considering the fact that it had undoubtedly been built by the men of that world, it had also undoubtedly been built for them. Stepping down from one rung to the next was an exercise in body stretching, a leg below, an arm above. The squarely cut rungs were solid enough to hold a man’s weight, but after a couple of minutes the shape of them began hurting my bare feet. Add to that the fact that the trouser legs of my stylish new outfit didn’t take long before beginning to escape the confines of their leather ties, and we have almost all of an exciting, fun-filled picture. The last major point left out of it was that Aesnil was having the same trouble I had, which slowed her descent. If I hadn’t kept a regular watch on her progress, I would have lowered myself right onto her torch, instead of merely struggling through the smoke from it.

Subjectively speaking, how long the descent really took is impossible to know. It seemed three or four lifetimes before my groping lower foot found rock instead of ladder-rung, and I nearly cursed Aesnil for not giving me the good news sooner—until I saw her. She had moved only two steps away from the ladder bottom into a narrow tunnel before dropping to the rock floor, her head and back against the rock wall, her eyes closed, her torch forgotten on the rock beside her. I knew exactly how she felt, but I managed to put my torch into a bracket set in the wall before doing the same. I was soaked with sweat and nearly exhausted, but I didn’t want us to be left in the dark in a place like that.

It took at least twenty minutes before we were able to force ourselves on our way again. If we hadn’t been filled so full with the need to escape, we’d probably still be there, breathing hard and moaning at the aches in our arms and legs and backs. Aesnil stirred first, sending me her intention without words, forcing me into following her example. I wouldn’t have admitted it out loud, but if there hadn’t been the ladder to contend with, I might have considered turning back.

The narrow tunnel we began following went on a long way, but other than that it posed no problem. We passed three other wooden ladders descending out of rough square holes in the ceiling, but found no other idiots struggling down them. I’d long since begun wondering how good an idea we’d had, but couldn’t argue the fact that there were no viable alternatives. If we weren’t to be forced into someone else’s idea of what was right, we had to go our own way. The tunnel was narrow and dark before and behind us, the torches smoked just enough to be annoying, and the sweat poured into the heavy cloth sacks we were draped in; nevertheless we kept going, and finally reached an area that was noticeably cooler.

“Ah, we will soon be free of these confines,” Aesnil said, stopping to wipe at her forehead with the back of her hand. “The exit undoubtedly lies only a short distance ahead of us.”

“There is another thing which lies directly ahead of us,” I said, keeping my voice low as I put a restraining hand on her arm. “I feel the presence of a number of minds, and they seem to be male.”

“They could not have found us!” she cried, but softly as fear flooded her mind. She’d been projecting so much fear going down that ladder, I was surprised she had any left. I thought my own quota had just about been used up, but I suppose there’s such a thing as reserves.

“Their minds hold nothing resembling a desire to search for and find,” I soothed her, wondering what they were doing there if they weren’t looking for us. “Let us advance cautiously, and see what we might see.”

Her soft, shaky agreement came quickly, but once again we had to do things the hard way. We couldn’t take the chance of anyone seeing our torches so we had to leave them there, sputtering on the rock floor, and go ahead without them. We edged slowly along one wall, seeing nothing in the deep darkness all about, but we didn’t have all that far to go. The tunnel ended at a blank face of rock with a single fold in it, and once we’d negotiated the fold we saw dark, cloudy skies and heard the sound of night creatures.

“See them there, about their campfire,” Aesnil whispered, squeezing my shoulder from behind. “How many do you make them to be?”

“Five,” I told her, positive about the number even though they were too far away to be probed. We seemed to have exited in the woods, a short way up a rocky slope. The men were camped at least fifty feet away, farther into the woods and below us to the left.

“They should not be there, camped and taking their ease,” Aesnil whispered angrily, compressing my shoulder even more. “They are undoubtedly the wood patrol, meant to move about singly and remain unseen. What if enemies came to attack?”

“Then they would surely be the ones who were attacked first,” I whispered back, reaching up to loosen her hold on my shoulder. “Is it your intention to march forward and remonstrate with them?”

“Certainly not,” she answered, sounding outraged even in a whisper. “I have scarcely put myself through rigor and danger merely to remonstrate with inept guardsmen. We must avoid them at all costs.”

“I think not,” I disagreed, looking back at the cheery campfire. “Their seetarr are tied not far from them, and riding is much preferable to walking. That is, if our destination is not too near to require mounts.”

“Our destination is not near at all,” she said, also looking toward the camp. “I had not considered the possibility of obtaining mounts, for it seemed unlikely that we would. Now that the possibility presents itself, we would be foolish to fail to take advantage of it.”

“Then, by all means, let us not be foolish,” I said, and began moving forward, away from the rock fold. Aesnil followed along behind me, her mind extremely pleased, her attention on walking softly and carefully.

There were a good number of dark shapes on the slope all around us, boulders and stones and rocks and pebbles. The overcast sky must have hidden us from observation as we made our cautious way down the slope, moving from cover to cover, but otherwise wasn’t much of a help. It was difficult seeing things even directly in our path, and the pebbles and silt kept making us lose our footing. The night air had started out being cool and damp, but by the time we reached the foot of the slope we were covered with sweat again.

I left Aesnil behind a boulder and moved forward into the woods alone, my mind questing all about against detection or attack, at the same time trying to ignore what my feet felt like. Going down that slope had hurt, but I didn’t have time to sit and clutch them and cry the way I wanted to. Babies had no business being out on their own, without someone to comfort their tears. If I wanted to be on my own, and I was sure I did, I had to forget about tears.

It took time and effort getting within twenty feet of the five men without being detected, but cheating helped. I was scarcely so capable in the woods that they were likely to miss my presence once I was near enough, so I watched their minds very carefully. As soon as the first one noticed something, I fed him a combined dose of conviction—regarding identification and relaxed dismissal. The two emotions worked to tell the man that I was a harmless night prowler, and lack of attack reinforced the belief. I was noticed three times and instantly dismissed as not being worth bothering about, and then I had reached the position I wanted.

The men were totally relaxed and enjoying themselves, but I picked up the definite impression that they were there for a relatively brief rest stop, not permanently settled in. Their campfire had been built against the damp of the night and the aftermath of the rains, and they were handing around a large skin of what had to be drishnak, the spiced wine l’lendaa liked so much. The evening breeze brought the smell of it to me, wrinkling my nose, but that was one time I was pleased to see the horrible stuff. I could tell from the way they drank, carefully rationing themselves, that they probably intended the supply to last the rest of the night at least; happily for Aesnil and myself, that intention was subject to change.

Careful to project to all five men at once, I began by sending unconcern and the feeling that there was no need to hurry, that they had all the time in the world. Once those thoughts were firmly established I went after the one who was being passed the skin, making him worried about the amount of drishnak left and concerned that he might miss his share. The worry and concern were too generalized to convey such specific thoughts, but the wineskin in his hands and the unconcern about everything else tended to establish a focus. The man took two long pulls, more than he had at any other time, then reluctantly passed the skin on to his right. I passed on along with the skin, and tackled the second man in the same way.

I may dislike drishnak intensely, but there’s no faulting the way it works. The amount the skin contained would have been enough to teeter twice their number of men; having only five of them to work on it put them all out cold even before the skin was empty. When the last mind slid down the well into oblivion, I stood up from behind the bushes I’d crouched near, stretched the newest aches out of my back and shoulders, then signaled to Aesnil to join me. She approached with caution, curiosity and worry intermingled, peered at the five motionless bodies, then laughed her tinkling laugh.

“Truly, Terril, your match does not exist,” she said, turning away from the campfire to hug me briefly but warmly. “We may now take two of their seetarr and depart.”

“We may take two of the seetarr,” I said, “but we may not depart as yet. To leave these men here, in such a way, would surely be to leave them to their deaths. We must somehow protect them from predators.”

“How are we to protect l’lendaa?” she demanded, impatiently. “Are we to stand over them with swords in our hands till they wake? They are sure to be grateful then, and strap us no more then till midday. Do not be foolish, Terril.”

“There must be a way,” I insisted, looking around, and then my attention was caught by the five seetarr. The big black animals were tied to a line strung between two trees, their reins fastened tight but their legs unhobbled. I’d checked them briefly earlier to make sure there were two who would accept new riders, and had found only one of the five was so attached to his present rider that even his thoughts didn’t stray far from the man. Seetarr are more than just dumb animals, their intelligence higher than most Rimilians know. Aesnil and I couldn’t have stood over the men and protected them even if we’d wanted to, but that didn’t mean no one else could.

I crossed the small camp and headed directly for the seetarr, swerving only to avoid the unconscious men. Now that I’d thought of something I wanted to get it done as soon as possible and then continue with our escape, hopefully before I became exhausted. I was already tired, already feeling what I’d done to the men, and I didn’t have all that much left. Whatever I did would have to be done before I reached the bottom of the barrel.

I quickly untied the two seetarr I’d chosen as mounts, and urged them to follow me back to where I’d left Aesnil. It took a certain amount of clambering and scrambling before we were in the saddles but climbing up was necessary; making the seetarr kneel would have wasted my strength. Then I turned back to the other three. The two who had no attachment to their riders made no resistance to the suggestion that they pull off the line and take themselves for a walk. Rope and reins snapped in any number of directions as two moved and one stood still, underscoring the puzzlement in the mind of the last to remain. I touched his mind and merged with the puzzlement, then changed it to determination as I brought his attention to the five men. When his concern appeared I increased it, then urged him to come closer and stand in a position above the unmoving bodies. By that time he knew there was something wrong, and wouldn’t have left his position of protection unless taken from it by his rider. I wiped at the sweat on my face with a sleeve, got the proper direction from

Aesnil, set our seetarr off on their way, then slumped forward to rest.

We rode through the dark woods for hours, Aesnil silent, me half-dozing, before it occurred to either one of us that we hadn’t brought any food along. The only thing on our minds had been escaping from captivity, and I couldn’t help but rant silently against the stupidity we’d shown. Granted we were both relatively new to escaping, but I should have thought of it even if Aesnil hadn’t. I remembered the well-filled tray I’d been sent but hadn’t touched, thought about how easy taking most if it along would have been, and could have kicked myself. I was too used to traveling with the men of that world, l’lendaa who had no trouble hunting for what they wanted to eat. I stirred in the hard,

uncomfortable leather saddle and looked over toward the dark shape of Aesnil, riding in discomfort to my right. As Chama she had gone out on occasional hunting parties, but I was willing to bet she hadn’t done any of the hunting herself. The realization of hunger didn’t breed the determination to do something about it in her, a sure sign she had only gone along for the ride. She had said we had a long way to go; if it was too long a way, we might find that we’d escaped relative safety and comfort for the freedom of disaster and death.

Nervousness to be out of the vicinity of the palace kept me quiet until daybreak, but once the sun began to rise over the mountainous and upward trending country we rode through, I had to insist on stopping for a while. I still hurt from the beating the barbarian had given me, and the saddle I’d been in for hours hadn’t helped any. Aesnil was nearly as uncomfortable as I was, but the growing light had brought recognition to her of where we were, and .she insisted that we ride on a little farther before stopping. Since she seemed to know what she was doing I reluctantly agreed, and followed along through woods that turned from black to green as though by magic, the rising sun already beginning to warm the damp. The seetarr picked their way through the trees until we reached a pebbled road, followed the road upward for about another half mile, then let themselves be guided off the road to the right, behind a number of giant boulders that lay at the foot of the craggy rockface that rose high on that side of the road. Grelana had turned out to be a small country tucked into the skirts of a moderately small mountain range, and now we were heading up higher into those mountains. I preferred the mountains to the desert that lay on the other side of Grelana, but for some reason climbing higher into them was making me uneasy. I thought about it as we pulled the seetarr to a halt behind the boulders on a flat, rocky area that almost seemed swept, and decided that the lack of food was what was making me uneasy. I didn’t seem to think much about food unless there wasn’t any there not to think about.

“We may rest here awhile.” Aesnil announced, then raised her arm to point beyond three or four boulders that lay closer to the rockface. “There is a small spring over there, from which we may drink to heal our thirst. A pity we lacked the foresight to bring along the emptied drishnak skin, which might have been filled instead with water. There are sure to be other springs ahead of us, yet I know only a few of them.”

I looked at her sharply as she began dismounting from the seetar, wondering if she was blaming me for having forgotten the skin, but her mind held only vague accusation. She was unconcerned over everything except having gotten where we currently were, and was pleased over that, extremely pleased. She slid to the ground with no more than a grunt for the stiffness she felt, still too relieved to really be bothered by it, feeling a lot more chipper than I felt. It had also occurred to me to wonder what the seetarr were going to eat, and I was tired of asking myself such depressing questions. We had defied the l’lendaa who had claimed us and had made good our escape; why couldn’t I be like Aesnil and simply be pleased with the accomplishment? I sighed deeply then tackled the movement necessary for dismounting, not looking forward to it; I hurt too much for it to be anything but unpleasant.

It took Aesnil’s help before I was able to lower myself all the way to the rocky ground. She tsked and fussed over the pain I felt, seriously concerned, and immediately insisted that I lie down for a while. I was in no condition to argue with her imperious commands, and merely waited while she struggled to untie the rolled sleeping furs from the back of my seetar, then watched her spread them next to a boulder. It didn’t occur to me to be thankful that those furs were there until much later; it didn’t seem that men out on a brief night patrol would need them, but I certainly did. If I’d realized sooner they were there, I would have used them to cushion myself from the saddle. I lowered myself to one of the furs and stretched out on my left side, then sighed with the comfort of it as Aesnil covered me with the second. It would soon be too warm for the covering fur, but right then it felt good. Aesnil chose one corner of the furs to sit down on, toward my feet, and I looked over at her.

“You seem quite pleased to have arrived here,” I observed, watching her gather her long blond hair away from her face as she stretched. She looked ridiculous in the shirt and trousers she wore, and seemed as uncomfortable in them as I was; their one redeeming feature seemed to be that as awkward and uncomfortable as they were, they were better than gowns would have been.

“Indeed am I pleased,” she smiled, beginning to take off one sandal. “We have begun the journey to lasting freedom, the journey which may even return my country to me. These are things which cannot fail to please me.”

“To what lasting freedom do you refer?” I asked, more than aware of the excitement that filled her. “Where do we go, that you speak of having your country returned to you?”

“We travel to the land of Vediaster, whose ambassador I recently received,” she laughed, rubbing at her foot, “Their country lies beyond this mountain, and is governed solely by females. Even their l’lendaa are female. Should I promise them their choice of captives as slaves, they may well return with me to attack Grelana. Male slaves bring high prices in Vediaster, and the first to be sold there will be my council of dendayy.”

She laughed softly, inordinately pleased with the idea, her thoughts taking on the sort of movement which usually indicated fantasizing. I was glad she’d taken her attention away from me, as I wasn’t sure how well pleased she would have been with my expression. I’d been there when Aesnil had received the ambassador from Vediaster, a big, unpleasant-looking woman who had brought a matched set of male slaves as one of her gifts, handsome twin men who had been so filled with fear and true servility that it had nearly made me ill. I don’t know where I’d thought Aesnil was heading us, but it had never occurred to me that it might be a place like Vediaster. I wouldn’t have trusted women like them, but it wasn’t surprising that Aesnil did. They were her only hope of getting her country back on her own terms, and she was far too desperate to question her actions. If we managed to survive until we got there, I’d have to be sure to leave as soon as possible. All other considerations aside, the last thing I needed was to be caught up in the middle of a war.

“I may perhaps keep Cinnan as my own slave,” Aesnil mused, still half-fantasizing. “He has great skill in pleasing a woman’s body, though his manner is far too brash. How did you find him?”

Her eyes came to me with the question, her curiosity genuine despite its mildness. Caught unawares, all I could do was stare in confusion, not knowing what to say. When she saw the pink in my cheeks, her amusement came out in tinkling laughter.

“For what reason do you feel embarrassment, girl?” she asked, back to raising her hair up off her neck. “You have known far more men than I, yet I feel no embarrassment discussing their various qualities. Did you find Cinnan awkward and inept?”

“N-no,” I stumbled, somehow even more embarrassed at her amusement. “He was . . . adequate to the task.”

“Adequate to the task!” She laughed, slapping her knee. “Indeed is he adequate. His manhood was so thick and adequate that I thought it likely I would die from the pleasure of it. His manner of use is somewhat different from that of him who claims you, he called Tammad. He, too, is more than adequate, and I found myself helpless to resist his demands. Cinnan, though, is far more exciting than Tammad. Tammad, I think, would quickly bore me as a slave.”

“I could not imagine holding that beast as a slave,” I muttered, still uncomfortable with the conversation. “How might I ever approach him, with fury and pain blazing from his mind as he struggled in his bonds? How would it ever be possible to sleep, knowing he might break free of his chains and come seeking me? I believe I would be even more eager to run from him as a slave than I am to run from him while he remains free. ”

“You fear him,” Aesnil said, and the amusement was gone from her as she stared at me. “You fear him so deeply that you cannot even consider holding him in chains. I spit on one such as he, who gives such fear through pain as he has done. You are well rid of him, Terril, well free.”

In anger she rose to her feet, holding one sandal, and began to walk toward the place she had earlier pointed to, where water might be found. As I watched her take her anger further away, I tried to consider her statement objectively. Was it true that I feared the barbarian as Aesnil believed? I knew I couldn’t seem to face him when he was angry with me, and I knew how panic-stricken I grew at the prospect of being punished by him, but those two considerations paled to nothing when I thought about trying to keep him as a slave. I knew I hated him, so why shouldn’t I find pleasure in the thought of chaining him up with metal the way he had chained me up with strength? The only logical answer was that I did fear him, even more deeply than I hated him, but it wasn’t something he had done to me. The world of Rimilia had proven my cowardice to me any number of times, and he had merely noted the fact and used it. That I hated him for helping to show me my cowardice didn’t mean I blamed him for causing something that had been there all the time. I turned slowly in the fur until I was face down, then tried to do something about the pain I felt. Cowards don’t like pain, and I was no exception.

I didn’t realize I’d drifted off to sleep until Aesnil woke me, excited over what she had found. She’d begun searching the seetarr in the hopes of finding something which would hold water, and had succeeded. Each seetar had a good-sized water skin in its leather saddlebags—right next to an unbelievable amount of leaf-wrapped food. The food was enough to last at least three or four days, the leaf wrappings certain to keep it mostly unspoiled during that time.

“Clearly, those l’lendaa were not the woods patrol,” Aesnil summed up, replacing the food she had pulled out to show me. “Perhaps they were passing through the woods, and not of my guardsmen at all. Had I disregarded the wishes of the Council and commanded that all members of my guard be properly clothed, rather than merely those who served about the palace, it would be possible to know for certain.”

I distracted her sharp-edged anger by suggesting that we eat some of the food she’d found, then made sure not to ask why she found those shirts and trousers so attractive. The sun couldn’t have been up more than two or three hours and was partially obscured by clouds to boot, but I was already sweating in the sacks hanging on me even without the fur that had originally covered me. Aesnil’s hair looked damp and stuck together, but there wasn’t a word out of her about being uncomfortable; as well as I was beginning to know her, I didn’t expect any such words in the future, either.

As soon as we finished eating, refilled the water skins, and fed the seetarr, we resumed our journey. The small amount of sleep I’d had gave me back some of my strength, but it wasn’t likely to last long in the heat of the day riding a seetar. Aesnil wasn’t allowing herself to acknowledge the exhaustion she felt, and again I had the impression that she was pushing herself to reach a particular destination. The depression that had settled on me didn’t seem to let up, and it took me a long while before I understood why Aesnil had the determination I seemed to have lost. Aesnil was running to something, but all I was doing was running away from something. I had nowhere to go and no purpose awaiting me when I got there, nothing that promised to solve all my problems if I just reached one particular goal. I had run to keep myself from being sold like a slave, but that was beginning to look as though it had been a major mistake. Now that I had my freedom, I didn’t know what to do with it.

We continued moving most of the day, stopping briefly only once to stuff down some food. Aesnil was just about ready to drop—with me not far behind her—when we reached the place she’d been heading us toward. The dulled afternoon sunshine showed us a tiny but fast-moving stream beneath a few thin shade trees, about twenty-five feet from the mouth of a cave. I checked the area carefully for signs of life before we dismounted, paying special attention to the cave. Nothing but insects and bird life came through, which made Aesnil and me laugh giddily with relief. We had no weapons to defend ourselves with, and if anything native to the area had argued our presence, we would have had to move on. We took ourselves into the cave in record time, bringing the seetarr along to make sure we didn’t lose them to restlessness or predators, then dragged brush in front of the cave entrance to keep everything out and the seetarr in. The brush didn’t strike me as being much of a hindrance to the exit of the seetarr if they really wanted to go, so I made the effort to impress the command to stay in their minds before dragging my furs off the saddle and arranging them on the cave floor. Aesnil had already collapsed into hers, their softness and the pleasant cool of the cave dragging her immediately down to sleep. Her example was the best one I’d seen in a long time, and I lost no time in following it.

When we awoke again it was still dark out, but that didn’t mean we turned over and went back to sleep. We had to assume there was pursuit behind us, even if the pursuit was only one of a number of search parties, beating the bush of the countryside trying to flush us out. We led the seetarr out of the cave, got us all fed and watered, then began traveling again.

It was a number of hours before the sun came up, and I spent the time we moved along the road stretching my mind. Everything in the dark seemed so quiet and deserted to Aesnil peaceful and empty except for the sound of our seetarr’s hooves, clopping evenly against the stones of the road. To my mind the dark was anything but peaceful, with predators and prey hunting and fleeing throughout the woods we rode near. A cough sounded not far away to our left, registering in Aesnil’s awareness but immediately ignored, registering in the seetarr’s awareness and bringing them alert for further sounds like that. The cough had come from a night hunter in the woods, standing with bloody feet over the kill it had just made, hearing our passage and immediately prepared to challenge us if we tried to approach its spoils. I had felt the kill when it had been made, the shock and terror of the victim as its throat was slashed out, the keen, gnawing satisfaction of the hunter as it knew victory, the fading of the shocked mind force as life faded and drained away. I’d shuddered at the raw savagery of the scene as it came to me, sickened but in some manner also fascinated. How did that predator develop the emotions that let it kill without regret? What told it its survival was so important that it had the right to take other lives in order to continue its own? And what kept its victim from fighting back, from trying to do more for its own survival than merely running? What if its victim did fight back; how would its emotions be affected then? Would it be angry, outraged, shocked—intimidated? Would it fight anyway, or would it turn tail and run? The answers to those questions would be totally useless in any frame of reference I would care to find myself, but something inside me still wanted to know. It was an itch that couldn’t be scratched, and probably never would be.

The night prowlers settled down for the day and the day prowlers took their place, but moving along the road atop the giant black seetarr kept Aesnil and me safe. The sun had been up three or four hours when we came upon a branching in the road, one arm leading off to the right, steeper-looking than the main road and turning higher into the mountains.

“That road would also take us to our destination,” Aesnil observed, giving it a brief glance as we passed by it. “It was used by all before the construction of the bridge across the abyss, yet is it considerably longer and more arduous than the bridge road, which halves the distance. We will reach the bridge well before dark at our current pace, therefore will we cross before seeking a place of rest. When we reach Vediaster, we shall allow ourselves proper rest.”

But not before, I thought to myself, feeling her eagerness and determination. I, myself, was beginning to feel annoyed, but I didn’t know why. I didn’t begrudge Aesnil her shining purpose, but it was possible her continued “we” was beginning to rub me the wrong way. Her attitude wasn’t simply a matter of friendship or concern over what would become of me; her thoughts became somehow proprietary when she said “we,” and I didn’t care for it. If she was thinking about owning me again the way she had when she was still actively Chama, she was in for a rude shock.

We rode on another couple of hours, sweating in the heat, eyes slitted against the peek-a-boo glare of the sun every time it came out from behind the high-floating clouds. Since Aesnil hadn’t said anything about the road branching again I was surprised when the second branching appeared, also off to the right but this time going level if not dropping. As unexpected as it seemed there were trees around this second road, and it looked a decent place to stop and have lunch. Keeping to a saddle so long had me feeling as though I’d been switched, but when I made the suggestion Aesnil’s reaction surprised me even more than the sudden appearance of the branching had.

“We may not stop here,” she said at once, her voice even despite the agitated jumping of her mind. “That road holds difficulty and danger for us, for it leads to the holding of enemies of mine. We will continue ahead, and will take our sustenance only when well away from here.”

Even if I’d wanted to argue with her words, I couldn’t very well argue with the fear she felt. I could tell she wasn’t simply being high-handed, so I sighed and gave in again. If it had been anything but fear motivating her I wouldn’t have, but fear is too strong to ignore.

Lunch break was hardly long enough to let me stretch the kinks out of my back before we were mounted and moving on again. Aesnil had developed a heavy anxiety to reach and cross the bridge, and the longer it went on the better chance it had of giving me a headache or forcing me to shield. I had begun thinking about going my own way as soon as we were out of the mountains, and the more I thought about it, the better it sounded. I still hadn’t decided on a definite place to go, but once I was alone I could stop to think about it. The one thing I really wanted was to get off that planet, but I didn’t yet know how I could accomplish that. Maybe thinking about it would give me an answer, so undisturbed thinking time was the first order of business. Having something of a plan, if not a true purpose, raised my spirits, making me feel better despite the ever-increasing saddle-ache.

If I was feeling happier, Aesnil was suddenly feeling considerably worse. The road went on and on, bearing ever so slightly to the right, and then we reached a curve, rounded it—and came upon the abyss Aesnil had mentioned. It was no more than twenty feet ahead of us, the road disappearing over its near edge, better than sixty feet of emptiness gleaming in the sun before the far edge appeared, the road then beginning again. I gasped at the unexpected sight, but Aesnil moaned with true pain.

“The bridge!” she cried, undecided whether to wring her hands or tear her hair. “What has happened to the bridge?”

I dismounted without answering her, then walked closer to the abyss to get a better look. A wind blew in over the openness, flapping my clothes and sending my hair backward, but it wasn’t strong enough to drive me back before I peeked over the edge. There, just below me, was what was left of the bridge, a tangle of charred and broken wood, rope, vines and boards, all of it much too short to reach to the other side of the dizzying drop. It didn’t look as though it had been all that sturdy to begin with, the sight keeping me from summoning up the sort of knife-edged disappointment Aesnil was feeling.

“It appears to have burned,” I called back to Aesnil, fighting with my hair as I turned away from the chasm. “Are there those about who would have burned it?”

“No,” she choked, fighting with tears which became more obvious the closer I got. “It must have been the storms recently past, the lines of fire thrown from the skies. Once before this happened, bringing about the need to rebuild the bridge once the storm season was done. It had not occurred to me it would happen a second time, when my need for the bridge was so urgent. What are we to do?”

The tears were rolling freely down her cheeks by then, her desolation so strong I winced. She’d gone ahead with her plans as though nothing in the world could stop her, and now that nature had gotten in her way she wasn’t prepared to cope. It was the reaction of someone who hadn’t often been denied whatever it was she’d wanted, and it annoyed me.

“As we are ill-equipped to fly over the abyss, we would do well retracing our steps,” I answered, getting ready to remount even though I didn’t want to. “Though the alternate route to our destination is longer, it seems we have little choice.”

“Yes, yes, the alternate route,” she gulped, wiping at her tears as new hope welled within her. “We will surely grow a bit hungry before we arrive in Vediaster by that route, yet will we arrive there. Let us continue on at once.”

She backed up her seetar then turned it to go back the way we’d come, moving slowly despite the return of her anxiety to allow me time to catch up to her. I followed suit on my own seetar, but not because I was that anxious to be moving on again. Being that close to such a deep chasm bothered me, but once we were far enough away I intended calling a halt. I needed time to sleep and rest my body, more time than I’d recently been allowed. It would help us very little if we avoided all pursuit, only to fall over dead from pushing ourselves too hard.

Going back took us down rather than up, and the seetarr showed their enjoyment of the change by increasing their pace. I stood the bouncing, jarring motion as long as I could, then called out to Aesnil that it was time we stopped. I could see in her mind that she heard me, but there was no other positive acknowledgment from her aside from that. Instead she kicked her seetar to increase its pace even further, pulling away ahead as though she were intent on winning a race. If I’d had any intelligence I would have let her go on alone and be damned, but what she’d done had gotten me mad. If we were going to part company then rather than later, I had a few words I wanted to say first. I jiggled the reins of my own mount to let it know I wanted to go faster, and began chasing after the former Chama of Grelana.

Since I’d come to Rimilia I’d spent more time on seetarr than I’d ever been interested in, but only rarely as the sole passenger and the one doing the steering. Seetarr are so calm and manageable in a walk or slow trot that they tend to lull whatever normal caution one possesses, making one believe that they will be the same at any pace. I discovered my mistake only when it was too late, only when the seetar I rode gleefully picked up more speed than I had anticipated it would, now bent on the game of catching up to its companion. I had time enough to grab on to its mane and saddle with one hand each when the first headlong jolting began, and thereafter didn’t even have the time to gasp.

As I’d noticed on other occasions, terror has the ability to freeze both body and mind without the least difficulty. Plunging down a mountain road at breakneck speed in mid-afternoon light appeared to be an excellent source of terror, and if I hadn’t been entirely convulsed into a death grip to keep from failing off, I probably would have screamed myself blue. The woods and mountainside flashed past in a blur that made my eyes water, the jouncing rattling my teeth and bones so thoroughly that I couldn’t even appreciate the cooled air flowing by. In a distant way I became aware of the fact that Aesnil’s mount had also speeded up, which convinced me she must be crazy. Anyone who traveled at that speed voluntarily on a seetar had to be crazy!

I don’t know how long it took before I realized that Aesnil wasn’t any more a voluntary passenger than I was. She might have started the speed escalation, but it hadn’t been her choice to continue it. Our seetarr were having fun playing a game after spending so long in dull routine, and I finally understood why the barbarian had never wanted me to ride one on my own. It was clearly in the nature of the beast to do things like that, especially to riders who hadn’t the strength and experience to stop them. I can’t say the realization made me any less terrified, but along with the thoughtless fear anger appeared, easing the grip on my mind just enough to let me do more than quiver and shake. With a calm deliberation I wasn’t feeling, I reached out first to Aesnil’s mount and ordered it to slow and stop, then did the same to mine. The seetarr felt the beginnings of rage in me and reluctantly obeyed, slowing carefully until they came to a full stop, one beside the other. The miserable beasts were scarcely even breathing hard, but Aesnil was gulping in deep, desperate swallows of air, and I was having trouble unclenching my hands from mane and saddle. I felt as battered and bruised as I had after the barbarian had beaten me, but as soon as I could I twisted out of the saddle and dropped to the ground. The pebbles of the road hurt the bottoms of my feet, and my legs felt as though they were made of rain cloud; nevertheless I staggered across to the grass of the forest, lowered myself, then leaned back against a tree with a groan.

“Once again I owe you my thanks,” Aesnil croaked, dismounting stiffly and with as much pain as I had. “Had you not stopped this thoughtless beast, it would undoubtedly have taken my life. I had not the strength to cling to it much longer,”

“How good of you to give me your thanks,” I croaked back, watching her totter to the grass and collapse on it. “Had you given me your consideration instead, your thanks would have been unnecessary. The beast you ride is not alone in thoughtlessness. ”

“How dare you speak to me in such a manner,” she huffed, trying for outrage but managing no more than a weak glare. She lay in the grass holding herself up on one elbow, her head still hanging despite the attempted glare. “Though I am no longer Chama I will be again, therefore do I demand respect from those about me who serve my will.”

“Respect may not be demanded,” I told her, letting some cold enter my voice. “To obtain it one must earn it, and be willing to give it to others as well. A true leader would know this, and know also the difference between a companion and a servant. Was this the reason you saw so carefully to my escape along with your own? So that I might serve you?”

“It is a great privilege to serve a Chama,” she answered, but the attempted belligerence was gone, replaced by traces of confusion and hesitancy which also showed in the slight widening of her pretty blue eyes. “To what other would I allow such a privilege, if not she who served me once and was given pain for the doing?”

” I want none of privileges such as that!” I answered harshly. “I am not a slave, to be given the privilege of serving! I shall serve you now no more than I did previously, which is not at all! No more than my own purposes were served them, and the pain I received no more than the fruits of my own foolishness! To aid one who cares for no more than the use he might put you to is a foolishness I will not allow myself with you! More than enough that I allowed it with another.”

I turned away from her then and blocked her off with my shield, not trusting myself not to strike at her out of anger. All her help and solicitous concern had in reality been self-directed, all for her own benefit and none for mine. I was nothing but a handy tool to her, something to be rescued from savage, uncaring hands, cleaned carefully, then tucked away in a traveling bag against future need. It wasn’t as though it hadn’t happened before or that I hadn’t suspected it; my anger stemmed from the fact that I was so damned sick of it!

“You aided his escape from the ralle, and still he beat you as he did?” Aesnil asked after a long moment, now close behind me. “He hopes, then, to force you to aid him by giving you pain. It had not seemed to me that he was so cruel and without feeling, yet he is undoubtedly no other thing. Were you to serve me instead, I would not give you pain, for I value your powers too highly. Surely you would prefer my service to his?”

Aesnil hovered on her knees behind my right shoulder, waiting with what she considered patience for my answer. I sat cross-legged next to the tree, looking down, suddenly filled with waves of almost overpowering confusion. He knew damned well he couldn’t force me to work for him by giving me pain, so why had he punished me like that? He never hesitated to punish me when I did something he didn’t approve of, and that made no sense! He should have been pampering me and giving me everything I wanted, just the way Aesnil was offering to do. And I still didn’t understand about his offering me to those other l’lendaa. Unless he was doing it only to threaten me into toeing the line, he couldn’t be serious about it.

“Have you heard my words, Terril?” Aesnil prodded gently. “Would you not prefer my service to his?”

I turned my head and opened my mouth to tell her exactly what I thought of her service, but never got to say the words. I saw her go pale and heard her gasp at exactly the same time that I felt the startled upset of the seetarr. It was only then that I became aware of the other mind traces, the ones that I would have been aware of much sooner if I hadn’t had my shield closed. I jerked my head back to the left and saw them then, nine low, dark shadows with eyes still gleaming from the deeper shade of the forest. They had crept close to where we sat, and now they were grinning and growling, baring fangs in anticipation of the feast before them.

“A pack of virenjj,” Aesnil whispered, her throat almost closed with terror. “We are done!”

No, I thought to myself, still feeling the rising anger she’d started in me, and then I shouted, “No!” and projected that anger toward the nine slinking shapes. I could feel their minds wince at the touch of the projection and then they snarled, viciously rejecting the denial I’d sent. They were hunters and we were prey, and it was the way of the world for the first to take the second.

I wonder if it’s possible to explain in words how I had grown to feel about being a perpetual victim. I’d been kidnapped and beaten on that world, attacked, embarrassed, shamed, denied and forced to act against my will. I’d been too close to death and also too far from it, and all the fury and frustration from all of those things surfaced in me right then, driving away the fear any sane person would have felt, and leaving behind nothing but refusal. The virenjj snarled again, baring their fangs and preparing to move in, and I raised up on my knees and clenched my fists, determined to go down fighting.

They’d rejected my denial, but glee and eagerness for them to come closer was harder for them to ignore. They felt the emotions clearly and hesitated, not understanding why I felt that way. They were familiar with traps and beasts who hunted them, but I didn’t smell like a trap, just like a victim. One of those in the forefront cried out with a high-pitched howl, rejecting my suggestion, and began launching himself toward Aesnil and me.

The terror Aesnil had been putting out all along crescendoed then, and I shunted it through to the attacking beast in one great wallop, hitting it harder than with a physical blow, then added my own strength of projection and sent it toward the other eight. The one who had begun its attack howled hideously and twisted in the air, maddened by the terror and no longer aware of its original intent, spitting and screaming in all directions. The rest of the pack screamed and clawed at the frenzied one, filled with heavy fear and swirling confusion. They none of them understood what was going on, and their uncertainty was my cue to press harder.

Deeper uncertainty and fearful mistrust soon had each member of the pack striking out in all directions, back-biting and being back-bitten as the madness spread among them. Hate and envy laced into their minds, turning their screams and howls deafening, drenching me with sweat as I struggled with the effort of reaching them all. Nine of them there were, each requiring a special balance to their madness, each swirling about the trees, slashing and tearing at its fellows. My breathing came even faster than theirs did, dizziness fighting to overwhelm my struggle, and then, distantly, I became aware of Aesnil pulling at my arm and shoulder, whispering urgently that we had to run. It was hard understanding why we had to run, harder yet to pull my mind away from the nine I was so closely linked to, but Aesnil was insisting and I couldn’t think clearly. I let her pull me to my feet and away from the bedlam, back toward the road, then felt her shock when she realized the two seetarr were nowhere in sight. To my vague surprise the shock faded immediately and then we were running, down the road and away from death and savagery.

I was able to keep going until all sounds of pain and fury were lost behind us, but after that I just had to stop. I stumbled and pulled at the grip Aesnil still had on me, almost throwing the two of us down, forcing her to slow and pull at me again. Instead of increasing my pace as she wanted, I went to my knees, holding up one hand to show that I was done. Mentally and physically I had nothing left, and all the wishing in the world couldn’t change that.

“Terril, you must continue to run with me,” Aesnil panted, pulling ineffectually at my arm. “We may not yet be safe from those beasts, and we must try to find the seetarr. Without them and the food they carry, we will never reach Vediaster!”

“I . . . cannot,” I gasped, looking up at her sweat-stained face and greasy, disarranged hair. “I cannot go . . . another step . . . though all the beasts . . . in the world . . . come behind me. Should you feel it possible that . . . the seetarr may be caught . . . you must go on . . . without me.”

“Leave you?” she demanded, her pretty face twisting in outrage “Here, where you may fall prey to the first beast to chance across you? Where you might die from lack of a companion? Never would I do such a thing, never!”

I hadn’t the breath or strength to argue with her, and I didn’t even know if she was right or wrong. I hung my head, wanting nothing more than to collapse the rest of the way to the road surface, and only then did I become aware of the sound. It sounded something like calm thunder with pebbles in it, quickly growing louder, and Aesnil twisted her head around to look down the road toward the curve. That was the direction the sound was coming from, and she identified it long before I would have.

“Riders!” she gasped, paling under the flush our running had put in her cheeks. “We must hide or they will see us!”

I felt the same clutch at my heart that she undoubtedly did and tried to get to my feet again, but it was absolutely impossible, not even with Aesnil pulling at my arm. I shook my head even as I leaned on my left hand, the road pebbles cutting into my palm, trying to make Aesnil understand that more running was beyond me. She continued tugging at me for another minute, casting wild glances back at the curve, and then the first riders appeared around it, moving at a considerably faster pace than we had when coming up. Aesnil made a low sound of misery and let go of my arm, threw one last frantic glance at the riders, then ran for the shelter of the trees.

The l’lendaa coming up the road seemed surprised to see us, but surprise rarely keeps a Rimilian warrior from acting. While most of the seven or eight riders began slowing down, one of them leaned forward on his seetar and sent the beast flashing forward into the woods, clearly after Aesnil. I tried to put up a wall of repulsion in the mind of his seetar, hoping to make it shy away from the chase, but I couldn’t even detect its mind, let alone influence it. It moved faster than anything that large had a right to move, and a brief moment later Aesnil’s scream came, showing the chase was ended. By then the others had reached me and were dismounting, and I didn’t have the heart even to look at them.

“It is a wenda,” came a startled male voice, a voice I had never heard before. “What does a wenda do here, all alone and unprotected?”

“Two wendaa,” said a second voice, and I could hear the approach of another set of seetar hooves. “Never has a l’lenda grown hair the length of that second one.”

“Two wendaa, dressed like members of the Chama’s guard,” said the first. “Where might they have come from, and where might they be going?”

“It seems clear their destination was the Chama’s palace,” the second one answered. “For what other reason would they dress themselves so?”

The man looking at me so intently was as blond and blue-eyed as all Rimilians were, but he was also a total stranger. He wore a plain brown haddin and swordbelt just as the others did, but they were all strangers. It took me a short while to understand that we were caught but not caught, and by then the last rider had arrived and had put. She looked furious and afraid, but her eyes darted from one face to the next, her slight confusion showing that the men were strangers to her as well. The man holding my face looked up at Aesnil with the same sort of inspection he had given me, then he shifted his attention to the last man who was then dismounting.

“This one is four-banded,” he said, indicating me with a short movement of his head. “What of the little bird who attempted flight?”

“She is five-banded,” answered the other with a grin, looking down at Aesnil. “Had she not been, I might not have returned so soon. ”

All the men laughed at that, causing Aesnil to flinch and back a step, and the one before me snorted.

“You show fear at a mere jest, girl,” he said, the sternness in his tone capturing Aesnil’s attention immediately. “Were we the sort to do other than jest upon the matter, you would suffer far more than slight discomfort. What do you do on this road unprotected, with your sister so near to collapse that she was unable to follow you? Do you seek your deaths?”

“What we do here is our own concern,” Aesnil answered, her chin high despite the obvious quiver in her voice. “By what right do you detain us?”

“Right?” the man exploded, rising to his full height to look down at the faintly trembling girl in front of him. “There is no question of right here, only a question of responsibility! It is the responsibility of any man to assure the safety of wendaa, whether they be his own or another’s! Were my wenda to be found wandering this road, for whatever reason, I would most certainly wish her to be returned to me, so that I might strap her soundly for placing herself in jeopardy rather than speaking to me of her unhappiness. We will do the same for the l’lendaa to whom the two of you belong, for we cannot leave you here. Tell us their names and where they may be found.”

“Why must you refuse to understand that we have no wish for your protection and assistance?” Aesnil demanded, trembling harder. “Leave us as you found us, and no others need know!”

“We would know,” the man returned in a remorseless tone, continuing to stare down at her. “From where do you come?”

Aesnil turned away from him and raised her chin high, giving him the only answer she could. When he looked at me I simply dropped my head, not about to give up after what we’d gone through. We might end up right back where we’d started, but not through anything we’d done. I heard a hiss of exasperation escape from the man, his annoyance so strong I actually felt a shadow of it, and then the first man stepped closer to him.

“There can be but one place they come from, denday,” he said, his voice tinged with the same annoyance. “As the bridge spanning the pass downed in the storm, they must surely have come from Gerleth.”

“Indeed,” answered the one who led them, satisfaction showing in his voice at the way Aesnil had started in upset at the mention of Gerleth. The name meant something to me as well, but I couldn’t quite remember what. “As we now ride home to Gerleth, it will be a simple matter to take them with us. Once there, their l’lendaa should not be difficult to discover. ”

“I, myself, will be curious to see the one to whom she belongs,” said the first man, pointing to me. “A wenda such as that, dark-haired and green-eyed, and no more than four-banded? Perhaps he will accept an offer for her.”

“Perhaps he will,” allowed the second man, also looking down at me. “Yet surely not before he punishes her for her foolishness. Let us continue on now, for the day grows no longer. ”

The one identified as their leader turned back to his seetar, leaving Aesnil to the rider who had caught her and me to the l’lenda who was anxious to meet my owner. Aesnil kicked and fought as she was lifted to the l’lenda’s saddle, but all I could do was think about it. The broad, well-muscled l’lenda lifted me from the road with no effort at all, laughed softly as I moved feebly in protest, then boosted me up to his saddle.

“Were you not so fatigued, I believe you would prove yourself to be even more spirited than that other,” he murmured as he quickly mounted behind me. “I will be sure to speak with him to whom you belong, for spirit holds a great attraction for me. ”

He put his arm around my waist as we began moving up the road again, and I thought about where we could be going to keep from thinking about what attracted the men of that world. Everything seemed to attract them, as long as the everything was female and still breathing. Aesnil and I were a couple of wrecks, dirty, wrinkled, unkempt, sweaty and exhausted, but that didn’t seem to matter to the Rimilian male libido. We were female and alive, and therefore attractive.

I was so tired, I stared at the suddenly appearing branch road with surprise, wondering how I could have missed it on the way up. I didn’t recognize it until we had turned off onto it, and Aesnil had tried slipping out of the grip of the man holding her. The branch road led downward and widened, and only when the direction had finally come through to me did I remember the road Aesnil had identified as leading to the lands of enemies of hers. It was the second branch road we had passed on the way up, and between the downgrade plunge we had taken on seetar-back and the wild, thoughtless rout we had indulged in after encountering the virenjj, I hadn’t known we’d passed it a second time. The l’lenda holding me tightened his grip, pulling me against his chest, but I still lacked the strength to do more than stir. Enemies of Aesnil would be enemies of mine, and that wasn’t the best of times to be taken to them. I’d need hours of sleep before I had my strength back, and I could only pray that I would get it before the first encounter.

The road ran down and around the mountainside away from the direction in which we’d been going, and we rode on for a short while with no one speaking and nothing untoward happening. I fell into a light sleep against the chest of my l’lenda, something that pleased him so much I could feel the faint tendrils of the emotion in his mind. One minute we were moving sedately along in the late afternoon heat, me nodding, and then we were pulling up short to keep from running into a large group of men coming the other way around a curve at a much faster pace. The second group also slowed immediately, and the leader of our group made a sound of recognition.

“Well met!” he called, urging his seetar ahead to the van of the second group. “It was my intention to stop at the palace, and now I need not take the time. Ferran, as commander of the palace guard, you are aware of much that occurs in our towns. Has there been word spread about concerning the disappearance of two wendaa, one four-banded and the other five-banded? We encountered these two on the road above, alone and unprotected. ”

“Missing wendaa?” the man addressed as Ferran frowned, looking toward Aesnil and me. “No, Hiddar, I have heard of no such thing, nor do I know of a man in our towns who possesses a wenda such as that. Her dark hair and green eyes would have been spoken of by every man who saw her. You must excuse us now, for we ride with purpose and in haste.”

“Hold,” came another voice from the middle of the second group, stopping the man Hiddar as he was about to gesture his men out of the way. “What is this of a dark-haired, green-eyed wenda?”

The voice that had spoken had somehow sounded familiar, but the denday Hiddar spoke again before I could place it.

“We have found a dark-haired wenda on the road above, accompanied by a wenda less distinctive yet none the less striking,” Hiddar answered, craning his neck around to see into the mass of men. “Do you know of these two? Who speaks?”

“I speak,” said the ticklingly familiar voice, and the men began moving aside to let him through. “I am Dallan, drin of Gerleth, and I do indeed know of those two. The dark-haired one is she whom I intend banding, and other is my dearly beloved cousin.”

I could see him clearly then, his eyes directly on me, but I still couldn’t believe what I was seeing. In front of me was Daldrin, my servant-slave from Aesnil’s palace, now called Dallan, Prince of Gerleth!