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.
I was pleased that I had been selected for the night. I found the kasbah’s seraglio pleasant, but I did not wish to remain here longer than necessary.
“I do not understand how it is that I, Hassan,” Hassan had said, “was not first picked for the pleasure of the mistress.”
“Doubtless I am the most fascinating,” I said to him.
“There is no accounting for the taste of women,” he had said.
“That is true,” I said. “I have noted that Alyena much prefers you to me.”
“That is true.” he said.
“She is, of course,” I pointed out, “only slave.”
“It is true that she is only a slave,” he said, “but she, though slave, is an extremely intelligent young woman.”
“That is true,” I admitted. The slave raiders of the Kurii, the Others, selected, among other things, for high intelligence in their victims. Their two major criteria, as neither as I could determine, were femininity and intelligence. These two traits, hormonal and intellectual, almost always produce a vulnerable, fragile, alert, sensitive beauty, one almost ready for the collar.
Extremely intelligent, feminine girls, as most Goreans know, make excellent slaves, Goreans show little interest either in stupid women, though some are sexually attractive, or in mules. Stupid women are too stupid to be good slaves; mules are not even women. But the true female, the awakened, helpless prisoner of her instincts and blood, with a fine mind, a deep, lovely, sensitive mind, imaginative and inventive, is the one the Goreans want, head down, at their feet. What man would want his collar on anything less precious? “Yet, Tarna,” I suggested, “does not seem to be obtuse.”
“No,” he admitted. “That is true.”
“And it is I who have been first chosen,” I pointed out.
“There is no accounting for the taste of women,” be said. “Alyena,” be said, “who is better, prefers me.”
“I have not seen Tama stripped and tied at the slave ring,” I said. “I do not know if Alyena is better or not.”
“Let us assume she is,” proposed Hassan.
“Very well,” I said.
“She prefers me,” he said, “There is no accounting for the taste of women,” I said.
At this point I had been summoned by the two bare-armed, white-garbed girls, for my bath.
“Do you object, Ali?” asked one of the silken fellows.
“No, I do not,” snapped the girl in the white garment, with towels.
I had not understood, for a moment, to whom he might be speaking. The girl, however, had answered him. I recalled I had asked her if she were kept for the men, and that she had responded, angrily, “Of course not!” He had then asked, “Do you object, Ali?”
I swam to the side of the bath and looked up at her. “What is your name?” I asked.
She stepped back. “Ali,” said she.
“That is a man’s name,” I said. “Or a boy’s.
“My mistress,” said the girl, “gives me what name she pleases.” She was angry.
The fellow who had spoken before laughed.
“Be silent, Fina!” she snapped, sharply.
His face turned white. He put his head down. “Yes, Mistress,” he said.
“Fina,” I said to her, “is a woman’s name, or a girls.”
“It pleases the mistress,” said she, “to give us what names she pleases.” She glanced at the males about, in their silk. “Each,” said she, “all of them have such names, the names of girls.” She glared at Hassan, and myself. “You two, too, will be so designated!” Then she cried, “Go! Go to your alcoves, Slaves!