Then I struggled again to put such thoughts from me.
I was pleased. I had escaped. I was at last safe. But the forest seemed dark, lonely, and cold. How could one be safe within it, unarmed, and unprotected? I did not even know how to make a fire. Amongst those dark trees and shadows might lurk life forms, prowling and hungry. I had escaped, yes, but into what had I escaped?
Had something moved, in the darkness to my right?
I hurried on.
Suppose I managed to cross the river, and make my way south, what then? Had I then escaped, truly?
Could I escape? I was even a barbarian, who might still be betrayed by her accent, and doubtless, indefinitely, by her ignorance of any number of things, such as customs, sayings, legends, stories, histories, festivals, and heroes.
I touched the disrobing loop at my left shoulder, all that kept the tiny garment on me. I touched my collar, which I could not remove. And seared into my left thigh, just beneath the hip, was a small, lovely mark, a kef, which, to any who might gaze upon it, would show me kajira.
It is said that there is no escape for the Gorean slave girl. She is marked, collared, and distinctively garbed. There is no refuge for her, no safe haven, nowhere for her to run. Her nature, condition, and status are unquestioned in custom and institutionalized in law. Society accepts her with the same unquestioned equanimity that it accepts other domestic animals. She is a familiar, recognized, sanctioned, accepted, welcomed, desired, even treasured, component in the culture. Certainly there is no doubt that she is an attractive and valued commodity, a vendible convenience and delight, surely a decorative and useful article of commerce. The culture and society wants its kajirae, and will have them. And the kajira herself well knows what she is, and what is expected of her, how she must behave, act, speak, and be. She has her place in society, and well understands it. It is as clear and fixed as the collar on her neck, the mark on her thigh.
How lonely it was in the forest!
Is it an escape, I wondered, to be dragged down by beasts, and eaten? Is it an escape, I wondered, if one starves, or freezes to death? Is it an escape, I wondered, if one manages to do nothing but change collars?
I no longer feared being captured by Panther Women. I now understood they seldom ranged this far to the north. Those whom I had earlier encountered were unusual, a small group bent on the business of espionage.
Too, what if I should encounter Panther Women, others, south of the river? I was not such a woman. I lacked their size, their power, their skills, their hatred, their masculinity, their ferocity. They would see me as worthless and despicable, as no more than another of the smaller, weaker, softer, more feminine women they despised, women whose wrists seemed made for slave bracelets, whose necks seemed made for the collar. Men do not hate women such as I, but Panther Women, for some reason, do. Why should that be? It is not our fault if men prefer us to women who are large, ill-tempered, cruel, belligerent, and gross, whose bodies might not interest a tharlarion. Were we the less women for our needs, our passion, our attractiveness, our beauty, our desire to love, and serve? I did not think so. Surely we had a right to exist, even though we were the sort men would buy and sell, the sort men fought to bring to the block. No, I knew enough now of Panther Women to avoid them. If I were not killed, I would be beaten for my beauty, if it were that, and then sold, if only for a sack of arrow points.
It was growing dark.
In my haste to escape the camp, I had stolen no food. Much had happened suddenly. In the confusion, I had darted away, precipitously. Who knew when such an opportunity might again present itself? Even a handful of gruel, softened in a pool, would have been more than welcome. It is not as though a girl who is not shopping can simply carry a basket or sack about with her. As is well known, the slave is a belonging, and can own nothing. She is not entitled to a free person’s accouterments, say, a purse or wallet. The slave tunic, like most Gorean garments, lacks pockets. Tunics are inspected occasionally, and, if an internal pocket is discovered, or an open hem, where, say, a candy, let alone a tarsk-bit, might be concealed, the girl must expect to be punished, and, quite likely, severely. Few slaves are so stupid as to expect patience or indulgence from a master. They are, after all, slaves.
I carefully avoided a patch of leech plants.
I was wiser now in the ways of the forest.
I wondered how it had come about, once, that I had inadvertently returned to Shipcamp. That still struck me as incomprehensible. In any event I was not likely to repeat that mistake. I was wiser now in the ways of the forest.
I lay on my belly and drank from a small stream. Its current told me the direction of the Alexandra. By such simple things one may orient oneself. I was wiser now in the ways of the forest.
Too, now that I was sure I was not followed, I might look about, to assuage my hunger.
Soon, about the trunk of a tree, one of two so adorned, or afflicted, I saw, at a height I could reach, thick and coiling, a nest of Tur-Pah. I tore a length of it from the trunk about which it clung, its tiny, sharp roots anchored in the bark, and pulled away several of the heavy fleshy leaves. One would prefer Tur-Pah, certainly on a cool night, boiled in Sullage, or in some stew, or even fried, salted, and honeyed, but, too, it is often, perhaps most often, eaten raw. It is the basic ingredient in most Gorean salads.
I fed well.
I suppose a man, such gross beasts, would have wanted a great deal more, hot food, meat, and such, but I was content. Why should I not be? The fleet, graceful tabuk, for example, is not the ponderous, clumsy, lumbering, shaggy bosk, not the gigantic, tearing, voracious larl.
I now had no fear, at least at present, at least until winter, of starving in the forest. Other than Tur-Pah, I could recognize the leafage which betokened Suls, usually found in the open, in drier, sandier soils, and was familiar with a number of edible nuts and berries, such as ram berries and gim berries, the latter common at this time of year. Even the horrid sip root was edible, despite its bitterness.
I looked about.
I knew I must, even if I crossed the river, avoid villages, and certainly cities. I could not well walk into a village clearing, or through the gates of a town or city, and say, “Tal, I am a female slave. Who will put a chain on me?”
Escaped slaves I knew were commonly returned to their masters, as a courtesy, but sometimes there would be some negotiations having to do with a capture fee. My collar, of course, was a plain collar. I might then invent a master, and claim that I was attempting to return to him, not that that would keep the ropes off me. In problematical situations, escaped slaves are commonly publicly exhibited for a time, chained under a pertinent notice and then, if not claimed, auctioned, or delivered to the finder. Sometimes a slave is tortured and, in this case, she is likely to acknowledge herself the slave of anyone whom the magistrate might suggest, perhaps a relative in another village. To be sure, a slave is seldom subjected to any grievous torture, as it might lower her value. An exception is when her testimony is to be taken in a court of law. Then any slave, male or female, will be placed on the rack, the theory being that this will guarantee a veracious testimony, even from the lips of a slave. What it commonly guarantees is that the slave, howling in misery or screaming through tears, will tell the judge whatever he wishes to hear.
I stopped, suddenly, in the dusk. Something was moving, nearby. I remained perfectly still. Then I heard it no more.
I wondered if it had been with me for some time.
But perhaps I had not heard it, at all.
I was now familiar enough with the forest, of course, to realize I should seek shelter before the fall of darkness. Though both sleen and panthers hunt when hungry, they prowl most frequently in darkness.
Both the sleen and the panther can leap well over their length, and may be found on stout branches several feet above the ground, but neither is a climbing animal, as one commonly thinks of climbing animals, probably because of their weight, which would render many branches precarious, either because of a bending, wavering instability or the possibility of breakage.
But it was not practical for me to climb in this area.
The trees about were like lofty, isolated, living columns, separated by wide corridors of leaves. They foliaged in canopies high above the ground. It had been similar, often enough, on the march from the coast to Tarncamp. This arrangement is a consequence, one supposes, of a competition for light, a contest possibly spanning centuries of seasons. Yet, as noted earlier, a forest is not uniform, and there are forests within forests. Nor is the terrain itself uniform, for there may be streams and basins, and clearings, and meadows, elevations, canyons, and depressions, brush, thickets, even jumbles of rocks, from ancient glaciers, and weathered, winter-and-ice-cracked hills of stone.
From where I stood, in the dusk, I could see a large, fallen tree, its trunk black in the light, its exposed roots extended like claws, lying athwart a low sloping outcropping of rocks. I was sure I could wedge myself between the rocks and the tree, but, upon investigating, I found, to my delight, behind the tree, something much better, an open, narrow space between two large rocks. One could enter or leave this opening at either end, and, though the opening was quite narrow, it was large enough for me to enter, and, at the same time, I was sure, too narrow to admit either a sleen or panther. How frustrated they would be, did they discover me, that they could not reach me! In time a panther would look for new game. A sleen would presumably discount my presence, unless he had been following my trail. If he had been following my trail, he would presumably, after a time, depart, allowing me, sooner or later, to leave the shelter, after which, perhaps several Ahn later, he would pick up the trail again. Such things are tenacious. Further, if foresters, or independent huntsmen, were in the vicinity, my shelter would be as invisible to them as it had been at first to me.
I was furious with the girl. Did she not know she was in a collar? Was she unaware she was marked?
Would that I had had the senses of a Tiomines.
So she had sported with me, humiliating me before Genserich and his men, even before slaves! So then I would sport with her, and she would not soon forget the sport, might I find her!
Twice she had fled!
Did she think such things might be done with impunity?
Did she think the band about her neck, lovely as it was, was no more than a free woman’s decoration, a bauble to be put on and taken off? Did she not understand its nature? Did she not understand its meaning? It was a slave collar, and locked on her. Did she think the beauty mark on her thigh was only a beauty mark? It was a brand, as well, seared into her pretty skin, identifying her for all to see, as kajira.
I would have given much for the services of Tiomines, now well on his way to Shipcamp.
I had anticipated difficulty in picking up the foolish slave’s trail, which might have begun anywhere, but, eventually, from stirred leaves, a dislodged stone, a broken twig, a bent branch, such things, I had expected to be able to do so. As trackers went, I was not inept, and I had had training in such matters, common for those of my caste. As yet, however, I had failed. I had followed several trails, made by light, bared feet, but none had been hers. One would follow a trail, and then, to my frustration, it would return to camp. Donna, the slave of Genserich, and the camp slaves, Tula, Mila, and even she in whom I was interested, had left trails, in gathering wood, berries, and such, which, followed, would merely return to the camp. I had not located a single trail, which clearly left the camp, and had not returned. No one, it seemed, had seen her leave the camp. I had even traversed the shore of the Alexandra, for a pasang or more, both east and west, given the possibility that she might have waded, before returning to the land. Additionally, footprints would not be as clear now as one might desire, given the drying after the rain. Wind, too, may stir leaves, as well as a small, passing foot. Meanwhile, the little fool would be moving farther and farther away.
Axel had said to forget her but I, for some reason, though she was only a slave, did not wish to do so. He had suggested that the forest would claim her. I supposed that that was the case. How calm he had been! I wondered if he would have been as indifferent if, say, an Asperiche had been at issue. To be sure, she, too, was only a slave. “The forest will claim her,” he had said. Yes, I had no doubt he was right in that. Sooner or later, it seemed certain that her foolish and ill-advised flight, so pointless and futile, would be abruptly terminated, beneath the teeth and claws of a panther or sleen. I gave her no more than four or five days, if that. Sometimes a panther, if it has fed recently, will shadow a new quarry for two or three days, keeping it under surveillance, so to speak, until its hunger prompts it to feed anew.
I supposed I should return to Shipcamp, like Axel. When the great ship cast its moorings, I was to be aboard her.
Already I might be too late.
I then sat in the old camp, cross-legged. I recalled how she had looked, in the water, bathing. I recalled her about the camp, in a dozen ways, fetching water, assisting Tula, tending the fire, serving the men. How was she different from others? To be sure, she was no longer the frightened girl sold in Brundisium. She now moved well. They learn such things. I wondered if they knew the effect such small things might have on a male. I supposed so. She seemed to serve well, at least others, as the slave she was, obedient, docile, compliant, attractive, beautiful, timid, hoping to please, realizing the lash might respond to the least imperfection of service. I now knew she had been in the slave house, though I had never found her there personally, not that I had looked for her, nor that it would have mattered to me, one way or the other, if she had been there or not. You must understand I was not much interested in her. Nor was I now. Had I found her there, in the darkness, in the light of the lamp, on her chain, I doubted that I would have condescended to put her to use. Doubtless I would have passed her over, in favor of other slaves, better slaves. Yet I had little doubt but what the slave house had changed her. It does that to a woman. She would no longer be able to help herself. By now, despite any pretense she might make to indifference, or disinterest, and despite any asseverations to the contrary, there would be combustible tinder beneath that tiny, flimsy tunic, which might be ignited by a glance, or touch. We make them slaves; they soon learn to beg. I did not now think, all in all, that she was all that inferior as slave stock, at least considering that she was only barbarian collar meat. Axel, I recalled, had not despised her, not wholly. I imagined her, exhibited naked on the block, in chains, dancing to the flute and tabor, to the snap of the auctioneer’s whip, her belly promising untold pleasure to the master who would buy her. No, I thought, she was not all that unattractive, not really. Perhaps, I thought, she might bring as much as two and a half. It was hard to tell. I recalled the first time I had seen her, long ago, in the aisle of the huge emporium, startled, frightened, clearly a slave but not yet collared. I recalled, with amusement, those outlandish, concealing garments she had worn.