“Yes.”
The sound he made in his throat was like a muffled laugh. He turned the back of his head to her. “You’ll do anything.” His loose hair slid over his shoulders, wavy from being clubbed. His back flexed.
“I got in a fight with Leno, once,” he said. He was facing the wall. “In Colorado’s. Before I married Illy. He stretched me out in about fifteen seconds.”
“That was a while ago. He’s older than you are. What about Tanuojin? Can he help you?”
His head swiveled around again, directing his eyes toward her. “If I took him in there, in me?”
She nodded. Her hands and face were cold.
“I’ve thought of that. But he won’t be well. It’s too dangerous. It’s dangerous enough for him when he’s sound.”
“Could he help you?”
Saba propped himself up on one elbow and reached for the crystal lamp on the window sill. He switched it on. The light sprang into the room; she blinked, dazzled. He put the lamp on the floor midway between them.
“He knows half again as many tricks as Leno. But it could kill him. If he leaves his body it will start to bleed again.”
Paula held her legs out to put her feet into the warmth of the lamp. Leno was the Prima Cadet, second only to Machou. If Saba defeated him, Saba took his place. He had to win, whatever it cost him. She wiggled her toes in the glow of the lamp.
The broad porch of the House teemed with people. Paula went through the short entry, with its glittering wall of gold names, and down the hall on the first floor. The hall like a tunnel caught the voices of the men standing thick around the double doors at the far end. She followed a short white figure through the smaller slave door to the left.
She came into a large room full of slaves. Most of the floor was taken by a great open pit with a railing around it. She squeezed through the packed white shoulders to it. The pit was easily a hundred feet across, circular, its sloping walls ringed with three ledges. The rAkellaron sat there with their aides, scratching and drinking and talking, picking their noses, chewing laksi: the masters of the Empire. She leaned on the rail, her chin barely clearing it, stiff with excitement. She wondered if she were the first free Sun-worlder ever to see this.
Machou sat on the second ledge, a little to her right, deep in talk with the handsome man: Bokojin. Leno was across the pit from her on the first ledge. She could not find Ymma. While she looked around, the double doors banged wide, and Saba came into the Chamber.
The other men all craned their necks to see him, and many stood up. Ketac and Sril trailed him. He went straight down the steps of the pit, past her without noticing her, into the round sandy space at the bottom. Now he saw her; he gave her an intense look. Paula held on to the railing with both hands. The slaves around her were avoiding her. Somehow they always knew who she was. Now Ymma came into the Chamber.
Saba saw him. He went to the rail around the little arena. “Ymma, you know why I’m here!”
Machou waved his hand, and the sentries at the double doors swung them shut. The rAkellaron hushed. Ymma was chewing his tongue. He went along the uppermost ledge to a stretch of bare bench. Machou stood up, and all around the pit, every other man stood.
“This session is open. Matuko, you have some special business?”
“You know about it, Prima,” Saba called. “You know about it all.”
The Prima sat down. “Are you challenging me, Akellar?” Ht did not sound worried.
Saba went around the pit toward Ymma. His voice rose in a harsh whine. No one but Paula seemed to notice how much he sounded like Tanuojin. He called, “Come down here, Ymma—I want you, and you know why.”
Ymma was still on his feet, although everyone else had sat when Machou sat. In a low voice, the Lopka Akellar said, “I have my rights. He shamed me—”
“So you beat him up in the street?”
Here and there on the ledges someone murmured. Directly below her a man leaned toward another and whispered, “I take it Ymma paid his little debt to Tanuojin?” Ymma was sidling along the ledge to the nearest stairs. Paula sucked in a deep breath, her eyes on Saba.
He glanced over his shoulder at Leno and sideways at Bokojin. Backing across the sand, he gave Ymma the room to come into the arena, and turned so that when Ymma came in through the bottom rail Saba was facing all of them, Ymma, Leno, and Bokojin. Ymma stepped out onto the sand. Saba jumped on him.
The onlookers howled. The slaves around her rushed forward to see and nearly crushed her against the railing. All around the ledges the rAkellaron bounded to their feet. Saba hit Ymma so hard the other man landed on his back on the far side of the sand circle. Leno vaulted down across the bottom ledge to the sand. Ymma curled up, his arms around his head. Saba took two steps and fell to his knees on Ymma’s chest. He sprang around to meet Leno.
Leno feinted, and Saba shifted to meet him. They grappled. Paula could hardly breathe. The slaves were pushing her hard against the rail. The cheers and screams packed her ears. Leno tripped Saba down. They rolled over on the sand, their claws hooked in each other’s face. Ymma was trying to get up. On his knees, Leno straddled Saba’s chest, reared back, and slashed at him with his spread hand. Saba caught his wrist. They strained against each other a moment, motionless, their faces twisted with effort. Abruptly Saba gave way and Leno fell, off-balance. Saba pulled him forward and butted him.
The Merkhiz Akellar collapsed, dazed. Saba heaved himself off the sand and drove his elbow like a hammer into Leno’s side, all his weight behind it, and when Leno dropped to the sand struck him again in the same way between the shoulder blades. Merkhiz sagged down slack on his face. Saba sprang up to his feet and backed away, his head turning from Leno to Ymma. Blood streamed along his face. The cheering rolled out deafening from the men watching.
Paula elbowed and shoved a way through the slaves to the stair. Machou was on his feet. Everybody was watching him. The Prima turned on his heel and walked up the ledges, through the rail past Paula, and went out of the Chamber. Ketac and Sril went into the pit with Saba. His son gave him a towel.
Paula went down the ledges, stretching her legs from step to step. Saba had seen her. He came up to meet her, took her by the hands, and bent and kissed her.
The uproar died abruptly. Behind her a man swore. Her tongue tasted of copper.
“Take her back,” Saba said. Ketac stood one step below him. Paula’s head whirled in a sudden giddy rush, and she staggered. Ketac took her by the arm.
“Are you hurt?”
She leaned on him. She had lost her voice. Her throat was numb and her sight darkened. At the top of the steps Ketac lifted her up in his arms.
“Open this door.”
He carried her along the hall, through the glitter of the Gold Wall, and out onto the plain. Someone shouted. She rested her head on Ketac’s shoulder, exhausted.
“Saba just took Leno and Ymma both in thirty-two seconds!”
A raw-throated cheer grated in her ears. Ketac stopped in a circle of other men. He was talking but she was too tired to make out the words. She felt him walking down the stairs. A cold dark fell over her; he had brought her into the arcade.
She said, hoarse, “Tanuojin.” She opened her eyes.
“He’s asleep, Paula.”
“Let me in there.”
When he set her on her feet she nearly fell.
She went through Tanuojin’s empty office to the back room. Her strength was seeping away. A cold weakness crept like death along her backbone, freezing her mind numb. She sat down on the edge of the bed. Fresh blood was pooled on the floor under it.
In her mind, his voice murmured, “Make sure it’s still alive.”
She put one hand over the body’s mouth. His faint breath cooled her palm. She bent over him and kissed him. Her tongue and lower lip tingled. His mouth was cold. The life woke in her muscles. She ran her tongue over his lips and down his mouth and into his throat.