“Olath?” asked Abrogastes.
Olath, of the Tusked People, shrugged, the movement involving almost his entire upper body.
“Anton?” asked Abrogastes.
This was a scion of one of several primate peoples, other than men, within the compass of the empire. His world was, in theory, a world loyal to the empire, and, indeed, he held an imperial post on that world, that of imperial agent, or commissioner, to those of his people who, long ago subdued by the empire, had been relocated to that world, that as the consequence of an imperial policy dating back to the days of the Tetrarchy. We have seen, earlier, how the Wolfungs had been relocated to Varna, and the Otungs to Tangara.
Anton scratched his elbow, and turned his large, yellow eyes on Huta.
“For what she has done, I think she should be killed,” he said.
“Yes!” cried men about the tables.
“And she is almost hairless!” cried another primate, in disgust.
“See how repulsively smooth she is!” cried another species of primate, one with long, silken hair.
“Kill her!” said his fellow.
“Yes,” said another.
“I do not object,” said Anton, who was of a short-haired species, “to her hairlessness.”
There was knowing laughter among several other varieties of primates about the tables.
“She does not even have a tail!” pointed out the long-haired primate.
“Nor do I!” laughed Anton.
“She can compensate for that with her hands and mouth,” said another primate.
“You should know,” laughed his fellow.
“She is smooth and would be pleasant to grasp,” said another.
“They feel pleasant, squirming and wriggling against you,” said another.
“They can perform other services, as well,” said another.
“Yes,” agreed another.
These were doubtless services which they would not think of expecting from their own mates.
“But any of those, or any like them,” said one of the primates, gesturing widely, indicating the former ladies of the empire, kneeling about, “would feel much the same, and, commanded, must supply eagerly, zealously, such services.”
“True,” said another primate.
There was an uneasy, frightened jangle of bells on the ankles of the former ladies of the empire, as they stirred. One almost rose to her feet but a swift stroke of her youthful keeper’s switch put her quickly down again, frightened, on her knees.
“And so, Anton?” asked Abrogastes.
“For what she has done,” said Anton, “I think she should be killed, but I am willing that the pellets be weighed.”
“Yes,” said one or more of the primates, regarding the slave.
Abrogastes grinned.
He had thought that the mammalians, and, in particular, the primates, with whom the small, smooth, curved slave had more of an affinity, might be more willing than certain others, less similar life forms, to suspend judgment, at least for the moment, on the fate of the miserable slave, preferring to watch and wait, and gather evidence, and weigh matters, and then, in the light of the evidence, and their considered judgment, cast their pellets.
“So,” said Abrogastes, addressing the slave, “the priestesses of the Timbri do not dance?”
“No, Master!” cried Huta. “The officiants of the rites of the ten thousand gods of Timbri are chaste, and sworn to purity! We are sacred virgins. We are consecrated virgins! We must not even think of men!”
There was laughter about the tables.
“Surely in your sacred beds you must think a little on such things, and wriggle upon occasion,” called a fellow.
Huta blushed scarlet, her body aflame.
“Ours is a spiritual religion,” she wept, crying out to the tables, looking one way, and then another. “We are concerned only with matters of the spirit! We must move sedately, with dignity. We must be modestly, heavily, and concealingly clothed! We may not reveal so much as an ankle! We dare not dance! It is forbidden! The dance is too biological! It is too real! In it it is often impossible to conceal the form of the body! It is a form of expression even of many animal species!”
“But no animal can dance like a slave girl,” said a man.
That was true, of course. The dance was a form of expression of incredible psychophysical, psychosexual import. It was no mere instinctual acting out of ancient genetic patterns, but an acting out of such patterns, and imbued templates, as was consequent upon, embellished by, and enriched by, thousands of meaningful, expressive cultural, institutional, and societal refinements and enhancements. Still, of course, beneath all this sophistication and refinement, there lurked, in all their pristine fury, in all their primitive urgency, as old as tiny fires and limestone caves, ancient things, the pounding in the loins and the aching in the belly.
Huta put her head in her hands, weeping.
The pointer on the scale was now, of course, given the cast pellets, inclined clearly to the left, toward the tiny skull at the left, bottom termination of the semicircular, graduated dial.
“You have forsworn your gods,” said Abrogastes, loudly, as Huta looked up, between her hands.
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“Then you are no longer a priestess of the Timbri,” he said.
“No, Master,” she said.
“Then you are no longer a sacred virgin, a consecrated virgin?”
“No, Master!”
“But you are a virgin,” he said.
“Until Master sees fit to take my virginity from me, or have it taken,” she said.
“A priestess of the Timbri may not dance,” said Abrogastes. “But you are not a priestess of the Timbri.”
“No, Master.”
“You are no longer modestly, heavily, concealingly clothed,” observed Abrogastes.
“No, Master,” she said.
There was laughter from the tables.
“What are you?” he asked.
“A slave girl, Master,” she said.
“And it is permissible for a slave girl to dance?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Many are even trained in the dances of slaves,” said Abrogastes.
“I would not know, Master,” she said.
“It is true,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“And for what do you exist?” he asked.
“To serve my masters with instant, unquestioning obedience and total perfection!” she said, frightened.
“Do not fear,” he said. “I shall not, not now, command you to dance.”
“Thank you, Master!” she said.
“The decision, rather, shall be yours,” said Abrogastes.
“Master?” she said.
“Behold the scale,” said Abrogastes.
Huta moaned.
Abrogastes signaled to the musicians, and they began to play a simple, arresting melody, one that seemed to speak of the sand latitudes of Beyira II, and the secret lamp-hung interiors of the dark tents, but, as the slave did not move, they ceased.
They looked at Abrogastes, to see if they should continue.
He gave them no sign.
“I cannot dance!” wept Huta. “I do not know how! I would be clumsy, and the pellets would condemn me.”
“Consider the scale,” said Abrogastes. “As it stands now, you already stand condemned.”
“You would so humiliate me, that I should dance as I am, and as a slave, and might still be condemned to death?”
“Yes,” said Abrogastes.
“I was a priestess of the Timbri!” she cried. “I was a sacred virgin, a consecrated virgin, sworn to chastity, to purity and spirituality, and you would have me dance-as a slave!”