Free Maia by Richard Adams Page A

to shit or just piss, which is it now?"
    Maia choked back her tears. A cunning thought had come to her. Once she had got a little way clear of them she would run. She might or might not be a match for the tall man, but it was worth trying.
    "The first," she answered, avoiding the coarse word.
    The sandy-haired man took the leather leash from his companion, fastened it round her neck and gave it a gentle tug.
    "Come on, then," he said, sniggering. "Good doggie! No, don't try to undo it, miss, else I'll only have to get rough. Don't want that, do we?" He patted her cheek.
    "How
dare
you treat me like this?" blazed Maia. "You just wait till my stepfather hears of it! I'll be damned if I'll work for you, or your master either; no, not for a fortune I won't!"
    The tall man seemed about to speak, but the other cut in quickly.
    "Don't tell her, Perdan. Makes it easier, yer, long as possible. Come on now, miss, d'you want to shit or not?"
    Holding the leash, he led her across the road and a few yards in among the trees. Here he stopped.
    "Well, go away!" she said, pointing. "Right away, too! Back there!"
    "We better get this straight," replied the sandy-haired man. "I can't leave you; got no chains, see? But it'll be a good two hours to Puhra, so if you want to do anything you'd better get on with it, yer, else you'll only be laying in there in your own muck."
    "You mean you're taking me to Puhra by force? How
can
you s'pose I'd work for your master after that? Does he know what you're doing?"
    The man made no reply but, still holding the leash, turned his back on her.
    "Go on if you're going."
    Weeping with shame and humiliation, she crouched and relieved herself; then allowed him to lead her back to the cart and lock her in.
    The creaking and rumbling began again, but soon afterwards the cart stopped once more. From the murmur of voices and the bovine stamping and blowing, Maia realized that they must be changing the bullocks. Probably they had already been changed once earlier in the afternoon, while she lay asleep. Evidently these men had standing arrangements along the roads they used.
    It occurred to her to call out for help from whomever might be talking to the men. Yet instinctively she sensed that this would be useless. Besides, she had conceived a terror of the man with the broken nose. Though born poor, Maia had never experienced any violence worse than her mother's fits of temper, and unconsciously she had grown up not to expect it. The tall man's unhesitant use of force had frightened her badly, leaving her with the flinching realization that here was someone to whom terror and the infliction of pain were all in a day's work.
    She was still unshaken in her determination to go home at the first opportunity, but clearly there could be no attempting anything for the time being. She would have to wait until they reached Puhra. She had never been to Puhra in her life, and knew of it only as a small fishing town, presumably much like Meerzat, at the southern end of Lake Serrelind; though of a trifle more consequence on account of lying not far from the high road between Thettit and Bekla. No doubt there would be ordinary, decent folk there who would help her to get away from these disgusting men.
    The time dragged on. Her headache, as she lay in the stuffy, musty-smelling box, grew worse, until she felt near-feverish and too much confused to think clearly. At last, from sheer exhaustion, she dozed off again, and woke to feel the cart rumbling over a paved surface.
    A minute or two later it stopped and she heard the men talking together as they got down. She waited for the door to be opened, but instead the voices receded and vanished. Listening, she could hear various sounds from outside: clattering pots, the shutting of a door, a thudding noise like someone beating something soft and heavy-bedding, perhaps-against a hard surface. There was a smell of wood-smoke and cooking, but no bustle, cries or other normal sounds of a