I felt myself being pulled, foot by foot, upward. I felt the rope press even more cruelly into my body, and I felt myself, foot by foot, lifted. My hands felt so helpless. I wanted to clutch the rope, to hold it! But I could not. Then, looking up, I saw the great talons of the tarn, held in against its body, above me. They were huge, curved and sharp.
I felt my body dragged against the side of the bird, and then I felt my shoulder rub against the metal and leather of the saddle, and a man's leg.
Then he held me in his arms. I could not move, so terrified was I.
I saw his eyes, through the apertures in his helmet. They seemed amused. I looked away.
He laughed.
It was a great, raw laugh, that of a tarnsman. I shuddered.
He removed the tarn rope from my body. On the saddle before him, facing him, I clung about his neck, terrified that I might fall. He coiled the tarn rope, and fastened it at the side of the saddle.
He then removed his tarn knife from his belt.
I felt the knife between the camisk and the binding fiber that belted it on my body. There was a movement of the knife and the binding fiber whipped from my body and, in the rushing wind, the camisk began to tug, snapping away from me, and then it was high, about my throat, pulling at my neck, flapping and snapping. He lifted it over my head and it flew behind the tarn. I felt against my body his leather, the buckle of his tarn belt. My cheek lay against the metal of his helmet. My hair streaked with the wind.
With his two hands he disengaged my arms from his neck.
"Lie before me, on your back," he said, "and cross your wrists and ankles." Terribly afraid of falling, I did so. He bent across my body and I felt my crossed wrists lashed to a saddle ring. He then bent to the other side and, in moments, I felt my crossed ankles lashed to another ring.
I lay there on my back before him, my body a bow, bound helplessly across his saddle.
He slapped my belly twice.
He then laughed another great laugh, that great raw laugh, that of a tarnsman, who has his prize bound helpless before him.
I cursed my misfortune, that I had been driven from the thicket when a tarnsman had been in the sky!
I pulled at my bound wrists, and ankles, fastened to the rings.
I turned my head to one side and wept.
I had again fallen captive.
What an incredible misfortune that I had been driven from the thicket just at the moment when a tarnsman had been in the sky!
I then became aware that the tarn was circling, and descending.
It was hard to breathe. I could see little but the sky, and the clouds. Then, with a jolt to my back, and with a scattering of dust and a snapping of wings, the tarn alit.
I became aware, as well as I could see, that we stood in the midst of a clearing in a peasant village. I could see, my head hanging down, in the distance a great thicket of Ka-la-na. Peasants were crowding about. Turning my head to one side, I could see men with spears and flails, in peasant tunics. Women and children, too, in the dusty square crowded about. I heard some clanging of pans. I saw sticks in the hands of some of the children.
"I see you have her, Warrior," said a large peasant, bearded, in a rough tunic of rep cloth.
I trembled.
"You flushed her well into the field," said the warrior. "My thanks." I groaned in misery.
"It is little enough for the many services you have rendered us," said the man. "She stole meat from us last night," said a man.
"Yes," said another, "and before that, the night before, from the village of Rorus."
"Give her to us, Warrior," said a man, "for a quarter of an Ahn, for a switching."
The warrior laughed. I trembled.
"There are men of Rorus here, too," said the man. "They, too, would like to punish her. Give her to us for a quarter of an Ahn, that we may switch her." Bound, I trembled.
"Let us switch her," cried the women and the children. "Let us switch her!" Upside down, fastened in the straps, I shook with fear.
"What is the cost of the meat?" inquired the warrior.
The people were silent.
From a pouch he threw a coin to a man of the village, and another to another man, doubtless one of the other village, called Rorus.
"Thank you, Warrior," they cried. "Our thanks!"
"Her first beating," said the warrior, in his strong voice, "is mine to bestow!" There was much laughter. I pulled helplessly at the straps.
"I wish you well!" they cried.
I felt the one-strap of the tarn harness jerk tight across my body, and suddenly, taking my breath away, the great bird screamed and began to beat its wings, and the saddle pressed up against my back, and I, upside down, saw the conical huts of the peasants drop away below us, and the bird, stroke by violent, majestic stroke, its head forward, was climbing toward the clouds.
The tarn streaked through the skies. I could fell the wind on my body. I lay bound over the saddle. My hair fled back in the wind, across his left thigh. I could scarcely move my wrists and ankles. He had lashed them securely. He was incredibly strong. Never before, even in the hut, had I been tied more tightly, more helplessly. I did not know where we were going, or even in what direction we were flying. I knew only that I, Elinor Brinton, a captured girl, was being carried helplessly, cruelly bound, tightly and uncompromisingly secured, into slavery.
It is now clear to me that we were flying southeastward.
Shortly after we had attained the skies, and he had set his direction, he turned me on my flank, facing him, and, with the fingers of his right hand, fingered my brand. "Only a Kajira," he said. Then, with the palm of his hand he thrust me back on my back.
In a moment or two, he reached down and took my hair, lifting my head, painfully, and turning it from side to side. "Your ears are pierced," he said. Then he dropped my head back against the side of the saddle.
I groaned, helplessly.
The tarn streaked on.
Once, he said to me, "We are crossing the Vosk."
I knew then we were within the territory of Ar, and must be high over the Margin of Desolation, a barren area, now recovering itself, which, years ago, had been cleared and devastated, that the northern fields of Ar by such a natural barrier, by such a wall of hunger and thirst, might be protected, presumably from invasion from the north or, more likely, from the incursions of Vosk pirates. In the reign of Marlenus, prior to his exile, and later, after his restoration, the Margin of Desolation had been deliberately left untended, that it might recover. Marlenus had set a swift fleet of light, Vosk galleys to clear the river waters adjoining his Ubarate of pirates. They had been successful, or muchly so. Seldom did Vosk pirates ply their trade where the Vosk bordered the regions of Ar. Other cities, to the north, of course, looked with apprehension on Marlenus' permitting the Margin of Desolation to recover its fertility and shade. He may have been only intending to extend the arable lands of Ar. On the other hand, under Marlenus, it became clear that Ar no longer feared for her borders. Also, the ambition of Marlenus, the Ubar of Ar, said to be the Ubar of Ubars, was well known. If it was now possible, or soon would be possible, to bring a land army easily southward to Ar, once the Vosk was traversed, by the same token, it would be similarly possible for Ar to bring, swiftly a considerable force of men northward, to the very shore of the Vosk. Of tradition, the northern shore of the Vosk was disputed by various cities. Ar, among others, had mde her claims.
Ahn after Ahn, the tarn flew.
He did not unbind me to feed me.
"Open your mouth," he said.
He thrust yellow Sa-Tarna bread into my mouth. I chewed the bread and, with difficulty, swallowed it. He then, with his tarn knife, from a piece of raw bosk meat, cut four small pieces of meat, which he placed in my mouth. "Feed," he said. I chewed the meat, eyes closed, swallowing it. "Drink," he said. He thrust the horn nozzle of a leather bota of water between my teeth. I almost choked. He withdrew the nozzle and capped the bota, replacing it in his saddle pack. I closed my eyes, miserable. I had been fed and watered.