I looked at Ho-Sorl. "She will try to escape," I said.
The black-haired scarred fellow looked at me, and smiled. "Of course," he said.
"If she escapes," I said, "Cernus will doubtless have you impaled."
"Doubtless," said Ho-Sorl. "But she will not escape."
Pretending not to be particularly observant, but watching very closely, Ho-Sorl and I observed Phyllis picking her way past two vendors with bread and honey. He smiled at me. "See," he said.
"Yes," I said. "I see."
Phyllis then, darting a look about her, suddenly turned and fled down one of the dark ramps at the races.
Ho-Sorl leaped nimbly to his feet and started after her.
I waited a moment or so and then I arose also. "Wait here," I said to Elizabeth.
"Don't let him hurt her," said Elizabeth to me.
"She is his prisoner," I told Elizabeth.
"Please," said Elizabeth.
"Look," I said, "Cernus would not be much pleased if she were slain or disfigured. The most Ho-Sorl will do to her is give her a good drubbing."
"She doesn't know any better," said Elizabeth.
"And that," I said, " would probably do her good."
I then left Elizabeth, and Relius and Virginia, and started off after Ho-Sorl and Phyllis, picking my way through the bustling crowd. The judge's bar rang three times, signaling that the tarns were coming to the track for the next race.
I had hardly walked more than fifty yards through the crowd when I heard a frightened scream, that of a girl, coming from the dark ramp down which Phyllis had disappeared. I then pushed and shoved my way through men and women, tumbling a vendor to the left, and raced to the passageway. I could now hear some angry cries of men, the sound of blows.
I bounded down the ramp, three turns, and managed to seize a fellow by the collar and seat of his tunic and fling him some dozen feet to the next landing below, who had been rushing on Ho-Sorl from behind. Ho-Sorl meanwhile was lifting one fellow over his head and hurling him down the ramp. On both the left and the right side there lay a battered, senseless fellow. Phyllis, wild eyed, the clothing half torn from her, the iron belt revealed, was trembling by the iron bannister on the ramp, on her knees shuddering, her left wrist braceleted to the railing, breathing spasmodically. The fellow Ho-Sorl had flung down the ramp rolled for some feet, struck the wall at the turn, struggled to his feet and drew a knife. Ho-Sorl immediately took a step toward him and the fellow screamed, threw down his knife, and ran.
Ho-Sorl strode over to Phyllis. The bracelet that fastened her to the railing was his. I gather he had come on the men, who had apparently seized the girl, beaten them away, braceleted her to keep her there, and then turned to fight them again as they had regrouped and attacked.
He glared down at Phyllis, who, this time, did not meet his eyes but looked down at the stones of the ramp on which she knelt.
"So," said Ho-Sorl, "the pretty little slave girl would run away?"
Phyllis swallowed hard, looking down, not speaking.
"Where did the pretty little slave girl think to run?" asked Ho-Sorl.
"I don't know," she said numbly.
"Pretty little slave girls are foolish, aren't they?" asked Ho-Sorl.
"I don't know," she said. "I don't know."
"There is no place to run," said Ho-Sorl.
Phyllis looked up at him, then, I think, feeling the true hopelessness of her plight.
"Yes," she said numbly, "there is no place to run."
Ho-Sorl did not beat her but rather, after removing the slave bracelets from the railing of the ramp and from her wrist, putting the bracelets in his belt, simply pulled her to her feet. He found the ripped slave cloak and hood which had been torn from her and helped her to tie together the parts of her slave livery. When she stood ready to return to the tiers she put her back to him and extended her wrists behind her. But he did not bracelet her, nor leash her. Rather he looked about on the ramp until he found the small coin he had given her to buy him bread and honey, which coin she had dropped when the four men had seized her. To her astonishment he gave her the coin.
"Buy me bread and honey," he told her. Then he said to me, "We have missed the sixth race," and together we turned about and went back into the stands, finding our seats.
Some minutes later Phyllis came to our seats, bringing Ho-Sorl his bread and honey, and the two copper tarn disks change. He became absorbed in the races. He may not have noticed that she knelt on the tier below us, her head down, her face in her hands, sobbing. Virginia and Elizabeth knelt with her, one on each side, holding her about the shoulders.
"I only regret," Ho-Sorl was saying to me, "that I never saw Melipolus of Cos ride."
Race followed race, and, eventually, we heard the judge's bar ringing three times, signaling that the tarns were being brought out for the eleventh race, the last of the day.
"What do you think of the Steels?" asked Relius, leaning toward me.
The Steels were a new faction in Ar, their patch a bluish gray. But they had no following. Indeed, there had never yet been a Steel in a race in Ar. I had heard, however, that the first tarn would fly for the Steels in this very race, the eleventh race, that which was shortly to begin. I did know, further, that a tarn cot for the Steels had been established during Se'Var and riders had been hired.
The backing of the faction was a bit mysterious. What gold there was behind the Steels was not clear, either as to quantity or origin. It might be noted, however, that a serious investment is involved in attempting to form a faction. There are often attempts to found a new faction, but generally they are unsuccessful. If a substantial proportion of races are not won in the first two seasons the law of the Stadium of Tarns discontinues its recognition of that faction. Moreover, to bring a new faction into competition is an expensive business, and involves considerable risk to the capital advanced. Not only is it expensive to buy or rent tarn cots, acquire racing tarns, hire riders and Tarn Keepers, and the entire staff required to maintain a faction organization, but there is a large track fee for new factions, during the first two probation years.
This fee, incidentally, can be levied even against older factions if their last season is a very poor one; moreover, a number of substandard seasons, even for an established faction, will result in the loss, permanently or for a ten-year period, of their rights on the track. Further, the appearance of new factions is a threat to the older factions, for each win of the new counts as a loss against the old. It is to the advantage of any given faction that there should be a small number of factions in competition and so the riders of an older faction, if unable to win themselves in given races, will often attempt to prevent a good race being flown by the riders of the new faction. Further, it is common among older factions not to hire riders who have ridden for the new factions, though sometimes, in the case of a particularly excellent rider, this practice is waived.
"What do you think of the Steels?" asked Relius again.
"I don't know," I said. "I know nothing of them." There had been something in his voice which puzzled me. Also, Ho-Sorl gave me a look at about this time. Neither of them, incidentally, had ever seemed much taken aback by the fact that I commonly wore the black of the Assassin. Now, of course, as I usually did when I was outside the house, I wore the red of the Warrior. They had not exactly attempted to become friends with me, but they had not avoided me; and often wheere I was I found them about.
"Now that is a bird!" cried Ho-Sorl, as the low, wheeled platforms were being drawn on the track.
I heard several in the crowd cry out in amazement.
I looked down to the track, and could not speak. I sat frozen on the tier. I could not breathe.