“What of all the hoverers, of the shuttle, of the Narcona?” asked another.
“The Narcona remains in orbit,” said the brunette. “The shuttle is within her. The hoverers are covered, in the yard, with the supplies.”
“Where did he go?”
“Who knows,” said the brunette.
“Which direction did he go?” asked another girl.
“We do not know,” said the brunette. “Doubtless he has his own plans, or destination.”
“Surely a search was made!” said a girl.
“There are no traces,” said the brunette. “The storm! The hoverers were forced to return, unable to maneuver.”
“What is wrong, Cornhair?” asked the girl next to the, blonde.
“Call me ‘Filene’!” cried the blonde, in tears. “That is the name I have been given!”
“That is the name the masters gave you!” said the girl next to her. “Say it! It is the name the masters gave you!”
“Very well,” said the blonde, in tears. “It is the name the masters have given me!”
“That is better, Cornhair,” said the girl.
“I will buy and sell you all!” screamed the blonde. “I will see to it that you are all sold to beasts and reptiles!”
“Secure your freedom first, slave slut!” said the girl near her.
“Slut! Slut! Bitch! Bitch!” screamed the blonde.
“Be silent, slave,” said she whose cot was near the door, she who was first girl.
“Yes, Mistress,” said the blonde.
“What is wrong, Cornhair?” asked the girl on the other side of her.
“Nothing,” said the blonde, and sat, frightened, on her cot, her legs drawn up, on the simple, striped mattress, the palms of her hands down upon it.
“I do not know what is going on,” said another girl.
“Nor I,” said another.
The blonde felt sick, and it seemed she was reeling. She was chained to a cot in a slave shed in a small town far from the inner Telnarian worlds. Her only garment, as was the case with the other girls, as well, was a simple, scandalously brief slave tunic. Her lovely legs were well bared. She looked at the ring on her ankle, with its attached chain. She could not slip it, no more than could the other girls in the shed.
For all they knew, and for all those in Venitzia might know, and for all those, or most of those, of the Narcona might know, she might even be a slave, an actual slave!
It might be easy enough to believe she was a slave.
Certainly she was beautiful enough to be a slave.
What if, somehow or other, her actual identity was lost? What if her protestations as to her true identity, her true status, as a free woman, were ignored, or disbelieved? She was far from home. What if she were merely beaten, as a mad slave? Doubtless Iaachus had seen to it that there were slave papers on her. She had even been, in Lisle, photographed, and measured, in detail, and fingerprinted, and toeprinted, as might have been any slave.
She had had a business to do, and it was to have been done on Tangara, presumably in some camp in the Tangaran wilderness, surely, in any event, not on the Narcona.
The Narcona and its crew were not to be compromised.
How could she manage it now?
Where was the dagger?
She did not even know, as yet, the identity of her mysterious confederate.
She recalled a night, two nights ago, on the Narcona.
“You summoned me?” she had asked.
“Why are you standing?” he had asked.
She had knelt before the young blond officer, Corelius.
He had a small, light, folded, silken sheet on the arm of his chair.
“Remove your tunic,” he said.
“Surely,” he said, “a command need not be repeated.”
She drew the tiny tunic off, over her head, blushing.
“Surely you understand, Filene,” he said, “that modesty is not permitted to a slave.
“The proper response,” he said, “is ‘Forgive me, Master. Yes, Master.’ “
“Forgive me, Master,” she said. “Yes, Master.”
Can it be he, she wondered, is he my contact, the agent, he who will supply the dagger?
He tossed her the small sheet and she put it hastily, quickly, gratefully, about her. It came about her thighs, as she knelt, but was not long enough to cover her knees.
“What is the meaning of the removal of my clothing, and that I have been given this tiny sheet?” she asked.
“Were you given permission to speak?” he asked.
“Forgive me, Master,” she said.
“But you are curious?”
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“You are all alike,” he said.
She stiffened.
“You have been called for,” he said.
“‘Called for’?”
“Yes,” he said.
“By whom?” she asked, frightened.
“Perhaps by Qualius,” he said.
That was the name of the porcine stocksman, he with the fat face, with the tiny, closely set eyes, who had denied her even a rag in her cage.
She turned white.
She had not anticipated that she, in her adventure, in her pursuit of station, and wealth, might, if only to preserve the integrity of her guise as a slave, find herself put to slave use. Perhaps he was not the agent. Perhaps he did not know that she was truly free. How could she confess to him that she was not a slave?
“I jest,” he smiled.
She shuddered, clutching the tiny sheet about her.
“Normally,” he said, “stock slaves, in common transport, as opposed to privately owned slaves, are available to the crew, and officers, generally.”
“Are we so available?” she asked.
“Interestingly, not,” he said.
“We are special slaves,” she said. “We are not even branded.”
“You are available to the higher officers, the captain, the first officer, the supply officer, and such,” he said.
“Oh,” she said.
“Like the others,” he said.
“You yourself, however,” she said, lightly, but archly, boldly, “could not ‘call for me.’ “
“It might be arranged,” he said.
She shrank back.
He smiled.
She sensed, uneasily, a slave’s vulnerability. How could she make clear that she was not a slave?
“Who has called for me,” she asked, “the captain?” The captain, she speculated, might be the agent. He might want this opportunity to identify himself, to confirm her instructions, even to entrust her with the dagger.
“No,” he said.
“Lysis, officer in charge of supply,” she said.
It must be he, for it was he who was in charge of the slave consignment!
“Do not consider yourself meat of such interest,” he said.
She made an angry noise, and clutched the sheet more closely about herself.
“To be sure,” he said, “your body, though it requires some trimming, and is a bit stiff, is not without interest.”
She was silent.
“It is more like the body of a free woman,” he said.
“I see,” she said.
“And your movements,” he said, “lack the natural, seductive, vulnerable grace, the lovely, helpless, total femininity, of the female slave. They are too stiff, too awkward, too clumsy, too inhibited. They are like the movements of a free woman.”
“I see,” she said.
“To be sure,” he said, “your body, and your movements, have improved considerably, even in the brief time you have been with us.”
“Oh?” she said.
And then she was frightened, for she did not know what that might mean.
Perhaps there was something about kneeling before men, and being subject to the mastery?
She dared not speculate what it might be, to be actually a slave. Often, in the last few days, she had had to fight feelings which had begun to arise spontaneously, frighteningly, within her.