In the delta village, on the evening the keel boat, hired by the barbarian, Ortog, was readied for the river, cargo lashed in place, to depart at dawn, one of the girls on the wharf, not yet boarded, had cried out and pointed to a streak in the sky. It seemed, at first, to be one of those familiar meteorological phenomena which some understood as the fiery passage of the vessel of Orak, king and father of the gods, or the cast, burning spear of Kragon, god of war, but others, doubtless more sophisticated, as merely the dislodgment and plummeting of a star. To be sure, those in the imperial navy, and, we suspect, some barbarians, would be likely to understand such things differently, as marking the flight of sky stones, often partly metal, which might occasionally, and sometimes, like a fierce rain, imperil ships, the far-ranging ships, those traversing the airless, lonely, nigh-vacant deserts between worlds. The passage of such stones through atmospheres, abraded by friction, would be marked by a debris of flaming particles. Indeed, occasionally, despite so tortuous a passage, the residue of such a stone would impact a surface.
But, in this case, such interpretations would have proved erroneous.
Several of the girls screamed and covered their ears, and shrank down in their chains, and large, rough men, startled, cried out in alarm.
It seemed a roaring projectile was now hurtling toward them, from over the sea, beyond the delta, and then it was passing overhead, taking its way past the village, northwest. The dusk was blasted with the sudden light of its brief, linear passage, and the air tore at them, affrighted with noise and heat, and then the object disappeared, descending into the marshes.
Cornhair lay in the darkness, her two hands on the chain, padlocked about her neck, which fastened her to the others.
Some yards away there was a small fire, and some boatmen, four or five, gathered about it, drinking.
From where she lay, she could hear the soft sounds of the river, the flowing, the rippling and stirring, the pressing amongst the reeds, the eddying about trees, lower trunks under the water. Interestingly, she had never noticed such sounds during the day. But at night, it was different. There was, too, the smell of rich, rotting detritus at its borders.
There was, too, the sound of some insects.
She suddenly became aware of a movement in the darkness, near her. It was a small party of men, three men, apparently those who had boarded the keel boat four days ago, before dawn, at the delta village. Shortly after their arrival the keel boat’s matted sail was raised, and the boat was poled from the wharf, to essay the long journey upstream to Telnar. She had not really seen the newcomers as she, with the other slaves, now chained to one another by the neck, were forward, behind a leaning canvas sheet fixed on poles, which might, if it were wished, be raised, and adjusted, to shield the girls from the sun, or, if it were thought judicious to conceal cargo, be drawn over them. Doubtless one of the main motivations for this arrangement, having the girls forward and behind the canvas wall, was to conceal the slaves from the sight of the crew. River men, no matter how unruly and rowdy they might be ashore, are commonly reliable and disciplined while doing the business of the boat. On the other hand, Orik, the captain of the keel boat, presumably saw little point in subjecting discipline, at least unnecessarily, to what might prove to be excessive stress.
Cornhair lay very quietly.
She again felt the chain on her neck. It would hold her well in place, as it did the others. The chain had been taken about a large tree, and then closed. The girls were thus held to one another by the chain, and, by the chain, to the tree itself.
“How helpless we are,” thought Cornhair to herself. “They do with us what they want.” She twisted a little in the grass. “But why not?” she asked herself. “It is fitting; we are their animals, the animals of men. I am a slave. I want a Master. I need a Master! How free I am, that I am now a slave. I am now free to belong to a Master, to be owned. I hope that I am beautiful enough to be pleasing to a Master. I do not want to be whipped.”
The three men were now close to her.
They had avoided the fire.
They spoke softly.
It seemed clear they did not wish to be overheard.
They had remained muchly in the deck cabin, during the day.
Then, suddenly, they ceased speaking.
A lantern was approaching, from the side of the river, moving inshore.
“Greetings,” said a voice, that of Gundlicht, to the three men. Gundlicht, and several others, of the men of Ortog, were accompanying the slaves west. Ortog himself, Cornhair gathered, had remained behind in the village with the larger set of slaves, presumably waiting until the blockade might be lifted, and he, with his ships, some four, she gathered, might make their departure. Indeed, for all Cornhair knew, the blockade might have been lifted already, and Ortog might have taken his leave. Indeed, perhaps even now the ships of the barbarian, Abrogastes, had been destroyed, or had fled, fearing the arrival of imperial fleets.
“Greetings,” said one of the three men to Gundlicht.
Cornhair feared, suddenly, she had heard the voice before.
“Do not lift your lantern to our faces,” said another.
“It matters not,” said Gundlicht, “I do not know you.”
“You might remember us,” said another voice.
“Very well,” said Gundlicht, turning away with the lantern. “I am doing slave check.”
He then began to make his way about the chain.
“Have I heard that voice before?” Cornhair asked herself. “Perhaps long ago, perhaps when I was free. If only he would speak more, so that I might rid myself of this apprehension, that I might recognize the foolishness of my uneasiness. I could not have heard that voice before. It is impossible.”
The lantern was then beside Cornhair, who turned her face away, frightened, away from the light.
She did not wish any of the three men, there in the darkness, to see her features. What if one of them was he whom she feared it might be?
“Oh!” she sobbed, for Gundlicht had seized her head by the hair, and turned it toward him, holding it helplessly before him, its features exposed, in the full illumination of the lantern.
“A slave is to be looked upon as men please,” said Gundlicht, holding her head still, in the light.
“Yes, Master,” whispered Cornhair. “Forgive me, Master!”
Then Gundlicht released her, and she put her head down, away from the light.
The lantern moved away.
The three men, in converse to one side, seemed preoccupied. It was not likely they had noticed the discomfiture and fear of a slave.
Too, what would it matter? Slaves are unimportant.
Supposedly Telnar was to be reached tomorrow, in the afternoon. She and the others would then, she supposed, be housed ashore and, within two or three days, sold, individually or as a lot.
Until this night, Cornhair, wisely or not, had had only the fears common to a slave, who would buy her, to what sort of Master would she belong, would she be able to please him, would he permit her to use her hands to feed herself, would she be permitted clothing, would he keep her on all fours and refuse her speech, would she be whip-trained to his pleasure, and such? But now, given that wisp of a word heard in the darkness, matters seemed far more problematical.
We recall that, long ago, at least in part because of her beauty, she had been recruited for a sensitive, clandestine mission by no less a personage than Iaachus, the Arbiter of Protocol in the emperor’s court. She had failed, utterly, in this mission, though she had little doubt that a mistaken account of her success had been transmitted to the Arbiter. Those who had misreported the outcome of her mission would presumably now be zealous to protect themselves, at her expense, for her discovery would prove the error of their report. Indeed, they had doubtless assumed her successful, and had fled Tangara, to leave her to her fate. But she had not been slain, following lengthy tortures, by the Otungen, but, rather, perhaps because of the failure of her mission, had been sold to Heruls, to be a “pig slave,” a cattle bell chained on her neck. And what would she have to hope for should she come, too, to the attention of the Arbiter himself, for surely she knew far too much, having been privy to his original plot, the secret arranging of an assassination, and would constitute a threat to his security and power.