“Yes, Tarna,” said the man.
“This one,” said the girl, looking down at me, calmly, strip him, and chain him to my stirrup.”
12 What Occurred in Tarna’s Kasbah; Hassan and I Decide to Take Our Leave from that Place
I rolled about, on my back, splashing in the water.
It was quite pleasant. The temperature of the water, perhaps, was a bit warm.
Also, it was perfumed. Yet I did not mind. It had been weeks since I had had a bath. I was appreciative of this hospitality in the male seraglio of the kasbah of Tarna, bandit chieftain of the Tahari.
“Hurry, Slave,” said the tall, dark-haired girl, bare-armed, in an ankle-length, flowing white garment. “The mistress will be ready for you soon.” She held four large, heavy snowy towels, each of a different absorbency. To one side another girl, clad similarly, was replacing bath oils in a rack, with which I had been rubbed prior to entering the second sunken bath. I had now rinsed them from my body, but I was not eager to leave the water. I reveled in it.
Hassan, in a brief, white-silk garment, sat cross-legged nearby.
“You do not appear too dismal,” said he to me.
“Is your mistress, Tarna, pretty?” I asked the tall dark-haired girl.
“Emerge and towel yourself,” said the girl.
“I can well use the bath,” I said to her, grinning.
“That is true,” she conceded. “Hurry!”
Four days ago, at dawn, Tarna, at the head of her men, left the Oasis of the Battle of Red Rock in flames. Only its citadel, its kasbah, had been impregnable. Its palm groves had been cut down, its gardens destroyed, four of its five public wells caved in and filled. The other well, by two many men, had been defended with too much vigor. There had been some four or five hundred raiders. When they left Red Rock their kaiila had been heavy with loot. Some forty female slaves, coffled, braceleted, had been taken. Two males, too, had been taken, myself and Hassan. As Tarna had left Red Rock, not looking back, straight in the saddle, burnoose swelling in the morning wind over the sand, I had marched beside her, stripped, wrists manacled behind my back, chained by the neck to her stirrup. Hassan, similarly secured, trudged at the stirrup of one of her lieutenants. Before the sun was high and the sands burning we reached her loot wagons, kept in the desert. There, Hassan and I, locked in slave hoods, and chained, were thrown into one of the wagons, with other loot. Even the female slaves, when fastened in their wagons, were hooded. The location of the kasbah of Tarna, bandit chieftain of the Tahari, her lair, was secret. We had reached its vicinity this morning, shortly after dawn. We, and the other prisoners, had been unhooded. Then, again, Hassan and I had been chained at stirrups. I at Tarna’s own, by her boot. “Where are we?” I had asked Hassan. The kaiila crop of a guard had struck me across the mouth. “I do not know,” had said Hassan. He, too, was struck. The female prisoners were ranged, in coffle, between two riders, one at the head and one at the foot of the chain, A chain from the neck of the first, some ten feet in length, ascended to the pommel of the lead guard; a chain from the neck of the last, some ten feet in length, ascended to the pommel of the guard bringing up the rear. They were marched this way that residents and the garrison of the kasbah, in the great yard, behind the gate, regardless of the side on which they stood, might, with unimpeded vision, see the flesh loot well displayed. The canvas covers of the wagons, too, were thrown back, that the goods taken at Red Rock could be seen in their abundance and richness.
As the raiders returned, from their column, by mirror, a signal was flashed to the kasbah. On receipt of this signal a pennon, a victory pennon, was raised on the gate tower. We saw the gate swinging open.
Suddenly Tarna kicked her kaii1a in the flanks and bolted from the column. The chain tore at the back of my neck and I was thrown from my feet and dragged through the brush and dust, twisting. She rode for a hundred yards and reined in the kaiila. “Have you stamina? Can you run?” she asked. I looked at her, coughing, covered with dust, cut by brush. “On your feet!” she said, her eyes bright over the purple veil. “I will teach you to crawl,” she said. I struggled to my feet. She walked the kaiila, then, widely circling, increased its pace, gradually, smoothly. “Excellent!” she cried. I was of the warriors. She increased the pace. “Excellent,” she cried, “excellent!” Even among warriors I had been agile, swift. My heart pounded; I fought for breath. More than a pasang she ran me into the desert. “Incredible!” she laughed. Then, laughing, she kicked the kaiila and I was again hurled from my feet, and wrists manacled behind me, was dragged, rolling, twisting, behind her. After a quarter of a pasang she let me regain my feet, then, cantering, I bloody and stumbling, body shaking, neck burning, vision black at the edges, returned to the head of her column; I sank to my knees in the dust below her stirrup; “Look up,” said she, “Slave”; I looked up; “I will make you crawl,” she said; then she said, “On your feet.” I got up. She seemed startled. She did not think that I could yet stand.
“You are strong,” she said. I felt the tip of her scimitar beneath my chin, forcing it up. “I enjoy running men at my stirrup,” she said. “You are strong. I shall enjoy taming you.” Then she turned in the saddle and, with her scimitar, indicated her distant kasbah. “Onward!” she cried, and the column, with loot and slaves, made its way toward the high, arched gate of her desert for-tress. To my interest I noted that this was but one of two kasbahs. Another, even larger, lay to its cast some two pasangs. I did not know to whom this larger kasbah belonged.
Soon Tarna, with her men, and loot and slaves, entered the great gate of her for-tress. She lifted her arms and scimitar, acknowledging the cheering.
“Hurry, Slave,” said the tall, dark-haired girt, bare-armed, in her ankle-length, flowing white garment. “The mistress will be ready for you soon.”
“Is your mistress pretty?” I asked her. I had not, because of the purple sand veil worn by Tama, which she had looped loosely about her face, well looked upon her. What I had seen of her seemed to me not only pretty, but beautiful. I bad little doubt that she was a proud, striking female. I had not been able, of course, to well judge, in her mannish garb, and burnoose, the lineaments of her body. The beauty of a woman can only be judged well when she is naked, as female slaves are sold.
“She is as ugly as a sand sleen,” snapped the dark-haired girl. “Hurry!”
“We have never seen our mistress,” said the other girl, in long garment, who was in charge of the bath oils.
“Hurry, Slave,” said the first girl, “or we will call the guards, to have you beaten!” She looked anxiously about. I had little doubt that it might be she who would be held responsible if I were not ready on time for the pleasure of the mistress. I saw the other girl laying out a light tunic of red silk, and a necklace of yellow, rounded beads, which I supposed way for me. “Get out now,” she said, “and towel yourself!”
I rolled back in the water. I had been well fed. I had slept much since morning.
I felt refreshed, and rested. I had a long kaiila ride before me tonight.
“What,” I asked the girl, “is the fate of the female slaves taken from Red Rock?”
“Even now,” she said, “under guard, in wagons, they are bound for the markets of Tor, where they will be sold.”
“Are there, then, few girls kept in the fortress?” I asked.
“Girls are kept, of course, some girls,” she said, “for the men.”
“Where?” I asked.
“On the lower levels of the kasbah,” she said.
“But you are not kept for the men?” I asked.
“Of course not!” she said, angrily.
There were several of Tarna’s males sitting about, in silken tunics, some with jewelry, curious about Hassan and myself. Some of them were rather sullen. The mistress had not, this night, chosen one of them for her evening’s pleasure. One of them, earlier, a fellow in a ruby necklace, had said, “I am more handsome, surely, than he,” referring to me. I supposed it were true. On the other hand, Hassan and myself had a certain advantage, I supposed, in freshness and novelty.