Players of Gor (51 page)

"I am not Lana," she cried. "I am a free woman! I am not a slave!"

"Perhaps you should consider being silent," suggested Chino, "lest you be whipped for lying."

"Perhaps we should proceed with caution," said Petrucchio.

"They are clever slaves," mused Lecchio.

"I doubt that they are clever enough to fool one such as the great Petrucchio," said Chino.

"I do not know," said Lecchio, worryingly. Then he turned to Petrucchio. "Can such slaves fool you?" he asked.

"No," said Petrucchio. "Of course not!"

"See?" Chino said to Lecchio.

"Yes," said Lecchio.

"We are not slaves!" cried Rowena.

"Let us see if they chain as slaves," said Chino. "Do you have some chains in your things?" he asked Petrucchio.

"yes," said Petrucchio.

"What are you talking about?" demanded Rowena.

Chains, with collars, were brought out. "Oh!" said Bina, a collar with its looped chain in the hands of Chino, closed about her neck.

"What is going on?" asked Rowena, at the head of the line.

The chain, with two more collars, was passed between the legs, under the body, and between the arms of Lady Telitsia. "Oh!" she said. She now wore the chain's middle collar.

"I hear the clink of chain!" cried Rowena. "What is going on?"

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"Oh!" she cried, now in the first collar, its chain looping back beneath her body, and then looping up to Lady Telitsia's collar, from whose collar, of course, her own chain, passing beneath her body, swung back to keep its own sturdy, linked-steel rendezvous with the ring on the third collar, that locked on Bina's neck.

"you see," said Chino. "They chain as slaves."

"Yes," said Petrucchio, twirling a mustache. "The evidence mounts moment by moment. They have the faces of slaves. They have the bodies of slaves. They wiggle like slaves. They position like slaves. They chain like slaves. Clearly they are slaves. The matter is beyond all doubt."

"Not quite," said Lecchio, musingly.

"Oh?" asked Petrucchio.

"He is right," granted Chino. "We must see if they switch as slaves."

"Do not you dare!" cried Rowena.

Lecchio produced a switch, presumably from somewhere at the roadside.

"Oh!" cried Bina. An elongated, bright red mark was now upon her pretty white fundament, and now her entire cheek flared scarlet.

Again there was a hiss of the switch.

"Oh!" cried Lady Telitsia, similarly marked and colored.

"Do not you dare!" cried Rowena. "Do not you dare!" But her cries went unheeded. "Oh!" she cried. "Oh!" she cried again. "Oh!" she cried, yet again. Lecchio, incidentally, although he did not strike the girls as hard as he might have, was, nonetheless, in may ways, all things considered, a stickler for theatrical verisimilitude. he did give the girls actual, sharp, smart blows. This was called for in the characterization, and in the dramatic situation, of course. To be sure, had the actresses actually been free women, in real life, it would have been unthinkable.

"The evidence is complete," said Lecchio.

"You have now captured Lana, Tana and Bana," said Chino to Petrucchio. "Well done, Captain."

"It is nothing," said Petrucchio, modestly.

"We are free women!" cried Rowena. "Let us go!"

"When you slaves are properly branded and collared," said Chino to Rowena, "that will be the end of your silliness. Your days of pretending to be free females will then be over."

"Let us go!" she cried. "Oh! Oh!" she cried, again striped, and twice.

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"Did you have anything more to say?" asked Chino.

"No!" she said.

"No, what?" he asked.

"Never!" she said.

Again the switch fell.

"No-Master!" she said.

Lecchio now raised the switch near Lady Telitsia, and Bina. "Master!" cried Lady Telitsia. "Master!" cried Bina.

"Well," said Petrucchio. "I shall now return these captured slaves to Pseudopolis, where, doubtless, I shall receive a fine reward."

"A fine reward indeed he would be likely to receive," said Chino, confidentially, to the audience. "He would be fortunate, indeed, if he were not subjected to a thousand tortures, and then, if time permitted, impaled on the walls by sundown."

"If we let good Petrucchio return to Pseudopolis," said Lecchio, also addressing the audience, "that might well be the end of him and then our troupe and hundreds of other troupes, in ferior to ours, would be forced to do without him."

"I do not think the theater could sustain such a blow," said Chino to the crowd.

"Nor I," agreed Lecchio.

"Too, of course," confided Chino to the crowd, "we have had our eyes on these wenches from the beginning. It is our intention to make a profit not only on their coins and clothing, but on them, as well. I think they should bring us a few coins. What do you think?"

There were shouts of agreement from the audience.

"What are you babbling about?" inquired Petrucchio. "And to whom are you talking?"

"Oh, to no one," said Chino, innocently.

Petrucchio himself then turned to the audience. "I must be wary of these rascals," he said. "they seem like good fellows, but on the road one can never be too sure."

"To whom are you talking?" asked Chino.

"Oh, to no one," said Petrucchio, innocently.

"Give us these wenches," said Chino. "In some towns that way," he said, gesturing behind him with a jerk of his thumb, "we know some shops where these little puddings should bring a good price. Let us sell them for you."

"I grow instantly suspicious," said Petrucchio to the crowd. "But," said he to Chino, "what of returning them to their masters for rewards?"

"But what if there are no rewards?" said Chino.

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"That is a sobering thought," said Petruccio to the audience. "Well then," said he to Chino, "let me take them down the road and see how at these shops of which you speak go this day's pudding prices."

"Return us to Pseudopolis!" begged Rowena.

"To weak masters who did not even have you collared and branded!" scoffed Chino. "No! You will be sold to strong men who will well teach you your womanhood."

Rowena groaned.

"Did you ask permission to speak?" inquired Lecchio.

"No," se said, "-Master."

She was then, to the amusement of the crowd, given another stripe.

"May I speak, Master!" begged Rowena.

"No," said Lecchio.

"I thought," said Petrucchio, "that you two were going toward Pseudopolis, not back the other way."

"We were," said Chino, "but Lecchio here forgot a ball of yarn, having left it in a Cal-da shop."

"I did?" asked Lecchio.

"Surely you remember?" asked Chino.

"No," said Lecchio.

"I remember it quite clearly," said Chino.

"That is good enough for me," said Lecchio. "It was probably not an important ball of yarn."

"And we are going back for it, anyway," said Chino.

"All that way?" asked Lecchio, "for only a ball of yarn?"

"Yes," said Chino, irritably.

"It must have been an important ball of yarn," said Lecchio.

"It was," said Chino, angrily.

"Then it seems I should remember it," said Lecchio.

At this point Chino delivered to Lecchio one of the numerous kicks in the shins, and such, which the crowds had come to expect in these diversions.

"That ball of yarn!" cried Lecchio.

"Yes, that one," said Chino.

"I remember it clearly," said Lecchio. "It was red."

"Yellow," said Chino.

"Well, I remembered it fairly clearly," said Lecchio.

"Very well, my friends," said Petrucchio, indicating the direction from whence Chino and Lecchio had come, "we shall all go this way. WE can travel together."

"We welcome your company," said Chino. "There is little to

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fear in that direction, as long as one is not from Turia. By the way, where did you say you were from?"

"Turia," said Petrucchio, puzzled.

"That could be very unfortunate," said Chino, apprehensively.

"How is that?" asked Petrucchio.

"But it probably does not matter," speculated Chino, "given your prowess in combat."

"I do not understand," said Petrucchio.

"It is only that we have recently come from that way," he said, gesturing with his head back down the road.

"Yes?" said Petrucchio.

"You have probably not yet heard the news," said Chino. "Yet perhaps you have. It is spreading like wildfire."

"What news?" asked Petrucchio.

"The war," said Chino.

"What war?' asked Petruccio.

"The war with Turia," said Chino.

"What war with Turia?" asked Petrucchio.

"Ten downs down the road," he said, "have jsut declared war on Turia. A great hunt is on. They are looking for fellows from Turia."

"What for?" asked Petrucchio, alarmed.

"I am not sure," said Chino. "It was hard to make out, for all the shouting and the clashing of weapons. I think it was something about frying them in tarsk grease or boiling them alive in tharlarion oil, I am not really sure."

Petrucchio began to quake in terror.

"I see that you are trembling with military ardor," said Chino.

"Yes," Petrucchio assured him.

"You are welcome to come with us, of course," said Chino. "The warding off of bloodthirsty troops and maddened, hostile mobs, with bulging eyes, would be nothing for you."

"True," asserted Petrucchio, "but I am in spite of my fierce appearance sometimes a gentle fellow, one who is often hesitant to wreak broadcast massacre too impulsively, particularly on so balmy a day. Too, only this morning, as luck would have it, I cleansed my sword from my most recent slaughters and I am accordingly loath to immerse it so soon once more in baths of blood."

"You may actually spare, then, the maddened mobs and the town militias, the assembled soldiery of the district?"

"Perhaps," said Petrucchio.

"It is a lucky day for these lands then," said Chino.

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"Dispose of the puddings," said Petrucchio. "I shall wait here."

"It may be difficult to make it back through the war zone," said Chino. "Too, it may be dangerous to remain here."

"Dangerous?" asked Petrucchio.

"Yes, for the mobs and soldiers," said Chino. "They are scouring the countryside, looking for Turians. If they should find you here, it would be too bad for them, even in all their numbers."

"Certainly, certainly," said Petrucchio, looking anxiously about himself. "What do you suggest?"

"I wonder what all that dust is over there," said Chino, looking off in one direction.

"I do not see any dust," said Petrucchio, anxiously.

"It was probably just my imagination," said Chino.

"Perhaps you could give me something now," said Petrucchio.

"We are very short on cash," said Chino.

"But you have the gold," said Petrucchio.

"You do not wish to be paid in false gold, or stolen gold, do you?" asked Chino, disbelievingly.

"No, of course not," said Petrucchio.

"Perhaps we could have a wager," said Chino, drawing out a coin. "Do you wish top or bottom?"

"Top," said Petrucchio.

Chino flipped the coin, looked at it, and tucked it back in his wallet. "Bottom," he said.

"I did not see the coin!" said Petrucchio.

"There," said Chino, fishing out the coin, and pointing to it. "Bottom," he said, indicating the coin's reverse.

"You're right," said Petrucchio, dismayed.

"Would you care for another wager?" asked Chino.

"Yes," said Petrucchio.

"I am thinking of a number between one and three," said Chino.

"Two!" cried Petrucchio.

"Sorry," said Chino. "I was thinking of two and seven eighths."

"Captain Petrucchio," cried Rowena. "May I speak!"

"Of course," said Petrucchio.

"Do not let these rascals trick you," she cried. "I assure you we are truly free women."

"Are you?" asked Petrucchio, now that he had lost he wagers apparently being willing to reconsider that matter.

"Yes," she cried. "Do not be beguiled by our brazenly bared

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flesh, our degrading positions, our neck chains, forced upon us by men!"

"I wonder," mused Petrucchio.