Part 1 (2/2)
”No!” I screamed with the fury of insanity, refusing to accept the fact that I'd been recaptured, trying to fight my way free again. My own efforts and the stream's had carried me away from the city! I couldn't be recaptured, I just couldn't!
But I was. The thick arm around my waist had no trouble retaining its grip, and expending the last of my strength like that sent me down into bitter blackness.
Chapter 2.
Consciousness began to return with the awareness of lying face down in the gra.s.s, all of me apparently wringing wet. Confusion and disappointment and bitterness and fury all raged around in my head, and I couldn't remember the reason for it until I heard the voices.
”... out of the stream, then carried her here,” the first voice said, a deep male voice full of casual authority. ”That wound in her shoulder isn't doing too well, and she looks as though she hasn't eaten since the full moon before last.”
”Most people consider it foolish to waste much food on a slave,” a second male voice said, this one sounding more casually arrogant than authoritative. ”Leftovers usually keep them going long enough to earn back whatever price you paid for them, plus a small profit. After that you can always buy a new slave.”
”I don't like waste,” the first voice returned, now heavy with distaste. ”My people currently do the same thing, or at least the upper cla.s.ses do, and it's time the practice was changed. I foresee a time when we won't have enough - ”
”Well, what is it you want now?” a querulous older male voice interrupted, accompanied by the sound of approaching footsteps. ”How am I to continue with my studies when I find myself constantly badgered by all of you over trifles? I agreed to ply my arts during this campaign, but not every moment of the day and night!”
”My apologies, Honorable, but this is more than a trifle,” the first voice said, sounding not at all apologetic. ”I pulled that girl from the stream, and her wound is in need of your healing arts.
She's - ”
”Girl?” the older voice interrupted, now even more annoyed. ”What girl? I see no girl.”
I heard exclamations of surprise from the other two men, and I cursed silently while trying to crawl faster. I'd pulled myself along the ground to the bushes at the edge of that clearing and was right now behind one of the bushes, but that didn't put nearly enough distance between me and whoever it was who had captured me. If only that conversation could have continued uninterrupted for a little while longer - !
”G.o.ds rot her, she's actually run off!” that second, arrogant voice exclaimed in outrage. ”Even half drowned as she was, we should have chained her!”
”She didn't run, she crawled,” the first voice corrected with what sounded strangely like amus.e.m.e.nt. ”Wait here for a moment, Honorable, and I'll fetch her back.”
When I heard heavy footsteps starting after me I tried to get to my feet to run, but I managed to struggle no higher than my knees before he caught up. Once again an arm went around my waist and then there was another under my knees, both raising me from the ground with no effort at all.
”No, you don't!” he warned me as I closed my left fist, intending to smash him in the face.”Hitting me won't do you any more good than trying to run did. You don't have enough strength to do me much damage, but the same doesn't hold true for me toward you. Why don't you save it at least until that shoulder's been fixed?”
He stared at me with a faintly amused smile on his face, his red hair dripping with the same water that soaked his blue thigh-length tunic. His green eyes seemed just as amused as his smile, but despite all that enjoyment he'd made a very good point. If they were going to fix my shoulder, I'd be better off waiting until then before starting a fight.
”Well, well, it looks like we've achieved a truce even if lasting peace is nowhere in sight,” he said with a chuckle, turning and beginning to make his way back to the clearing. ”Introductions now seem to be in order, so I'll begin by saying I'm Talasin of Redann. What's your name, girl?”
I was right now paying more attention to where he was carrying me than to what he was saying, as I hadn't done much looking around the last time I'd been in the clearing. It wasn't entirely a natural clearing, that could be seen at a glance, and the direction we were moving in was the way to get back to the stream. I'd been going in the opposite direction, toward the deeper forest, away from the area of fancy tents which filled the clearing. To the left and right of the tents, scattered among the trees, was what looked to be the campsites of a fairly large number of fighters. Guardsmen of some sort would have been my guess, but as to whose guardsmen...
”A slave?” a voice suddenly said in outrage, and I turned my head to see a short, brown-haired, beardless man dressed in light blue robes. His sallow face was narrow and entirely humorless, and his dark eyes blazed.
”You called me here to tend a slave?” he demanded, most of his fury aimed at the man who carried me. A second man standing beside the one in blue was a lot larger, more the size of the one carrying me, a sandy-haired, brown-eyed fighter in dark red tunic rather than blue. He and my most immediate captor wore swords, but no leather other than in the sandals on their feet.
There were also a couple of guardsmen who were in leather above dark gold tunics, but they stood a short way off and were only casually interested in the goings-on.
”I called you here to tend this slave,” the man carrying me, Talasin, returned with the beginnings of annoyance. ”Didn't you listen to anything Fearin said? I know you were there when he warned us, you were standing less than two strides away from me. You can't mean you've forgotten?”
The sallow-faced little man scowled, half in embarra.s.sment over the accusation, half in what seemed like an attempt to search his memory, and the big man beside him laughed.
”Lokkel here might be quicker to remember if that slave was worth remembering,” he said, proving himself to be the second voice I'd heard, the arrogant one. ”I've seen and made use of worse in my time, but certainly not lately. Those blue eyes don't belong in a face as unattractive as hers.”
”You can't expect everyone to be as beautiful as you are, Garam,” the man holding me said with a laugh, obviously very amused. ”But Fearin didn't say if she was as beautiful as a song or as plain as a sword rag. He just said we had to have her.”
”It appears to me that you do have her,” the small man Lokkel said, stiffness as well as petulance now filling him. ”If she needs to be tended, call one or two of the animal handlers seeing to the horses and mules. They're certain to be perfectly adequate to the task, and I have far better things to occupy my time. I trust you'll excuse me now?”
His bow was pure sarcasm, undoubtedly saying he had no need at all to ask anyone's permission to leave, but he was answered in an unexpected way. Without his knowing it a younger man in deeper blue robes had come up behind him, a man with blond hair and beard and blue eyes to match his robes.
”Your trust is misplaced, Lokkel, since you're not excused,” the man said in a very deep voice, one that caused the smaller, older man to pale and start. ”You'll use your arts to heal that slave as you were told to do, and then you can go back to your studies.””I fail to see why you don't use your own arts, Fearin,” Lokkel retorted as he turned, false aggressiveness trying to cover extreme nervousness. ”A master of your rank should find very little beyond his ability, therefore - ”
”Therefore I should do your job for you,” the man Fearin interrupted, disgust in his tone as he stared down at the smaller man. ”You've been trying to push things off on me since you joined us, Lokkel, and I'm more than tired of the practice. Yes, I can heal the slave as well as you can, but no, I have no intention of wasting my time refres.h.i.+ng the spells in my memory. Learning those spells is what you've chosen to devote your life to, and now you're going to use some of them.”
”Since you insist, Fearin, of course I'll give you the benefit of my learning,” Lokkel came back, now using stiffness to cover his increased upset. ”I have no need to be told how many things there are demanding your time and attention, I merely thought the healing spells were among the great many you maintain mastery of. Set the slave on her own feet, Talasin, and then step away from her. This will only take a moment.”
”Spend two moments and do the job properly,” Fearin said, his attention now on the way Talasin began to put me down. ”That wound in her shoulder isn't the only thing requiring healing, something you would know if you had looked at her more closely. Stop thinking of her as a slave and start to consider her someone we've been commanded to add to our numbers.”
”Commanded,” Lokkel echoed, his narrow face now openly disturbed. ”I hadn't realized...”
Lokkel stopped worrying about the conversation at that point, possibly because of the difficulty he could see I was having standing up all alone. What he'd just been told seemed to mean quite a lot to him, which cut short his fiddling around. He raised his arms, sent an unfocussed gaze directly at me, then began to speak his spells.
The pa.s.sage of time turns strange when one of Power directs a spell at you, and the experience is never easy to describe. Everyone knows, of course, how the entire world seems to turn blue, and how the shade of blue always indicates the amount of strength possessed by the one wielding the Power. Explaining what the Power does to you is the hard part, and my experience this time was as confusing as anyone else's. It felt as though half of forever and most of all things ever born or made were used to repair my wound and the ravages of slavery, but it also happened in a single instant through the use of nothing but words. When the forever-instant was over and Lokkel began to lower his arms, I no longer found standing up a problem.
”Now that's an example of proper, efficient healing,” Fearin said with such deep satisfaction that the Healing Master nearly blushed from the compliment. ”You have my thanks, Lokkel, and now you can go back to your studies. You're obviously not wasting your time with them.”
”You honor me with your words of praise, Fearin,” Lokkel answered with a bow he meant this time. ”Should you have further need of me, please don't hesitate to call.”
The small man turned and walked away with his head held high, his entire bearing saying he was sure he was being watched with awe and admiration by everyone behind him, but that wasn't quite the truth. The two fighters Talasin and Garam seemed more bored than awed, and the High Master Fearin was looking at me.
”You were so close to the end you were nearly beyond the help of all but the G.o.ds,” Fearin commented, his dark blue eyes as calm as his voice. ”I don't have to be told you weren't the best of slaves, but that's all over with now. Once you've helped us to our final victory, your reward will be your freedom. What's your name, slave?”
”What my name isn't is slave,” I answered, using my left hand to rub my shoulder while I gently flexed my re-strengthened right arm. ”Whoever your victory is supposed to be over, it means less than nothing to me. Keep your reward, man of high Power. When you come across a slave you can use the reward then to impress her.”
”Watch your mouth, Ugly!” the fighter Garam barked, taking one step toward me. ”Even free men don't get away with talking to High Masters like that, and you're nothing but a scruffy girl slave. If he doesn't care to knock you flat, I'll be glad to do it for him.””Prince Garam, please,” Fearin interrupted as I s.h.i.+fted my gaze to the fighter, the High Master's deep voice sounding more than annoyed. ”I appreciate your offer of help, but I'm capable of answering an insult by myself. Look here, girl, I don't have the time to play around with you. I can take back that healing you were given and then simply stand here and watch you die. If you prefer that to pledging your cooperation, just say so.”
”I prefer that to pledging my cooperation,” I responded obligingly, still keeping my eyes on the fighter Garam. I didn't trust Garam to keep his distance the way he'd been told to do, but his only reaction to what I said was a tightening of his jaw and a thicker reflection of anger in his eyes. The other fighter, Talasin, simply looked surprised.
”You think I'm joking,” Fearin said very flatly, the coldness increasing in his voice. ”You think I wouldn't have had you healed if I intended to take it back again. You think - ”
”I think I don't particularly care what you do,” I said, finally turning my head back to Fearin.
”I spent almost two full seasons as a slave and refuse to spend a moment more that way. Free or dead, whichever I become I will be it now, not at some future time and at the pleasure of my ... betters. If you think I'm not serious, call my bluff.”
”Free or dead are only two of the things it's possible for someone to be,” Fearin said, the coldness now reaching for his eyes as he straightened where he stood. ”There are worse things than death, worse than you can possibly imagine, horrors so overpowering that strong men have been known to soil themselves from no more than glimpses. Shall I give you one of those rather than death?”
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