Free Conspirators of Gor by John Norman Page B

to my left, and Luta, who had spoken to me so contemptuously in the holding room, was to my right. I thought to myself, “See, Luta, we are not so different.”
    I was aware of sandaled feet stepping about, amongst us.
    We did not look up.
    After a time, a voice said, “A silver tarsk, for the lot.”
    “Very well,” said the officer, “but see that they are sold in the Tarsk Market.”
    “A stipulation?” said a voice.
    “Yes,” said the officer.
    “Done,” said the voice.
    I heard a clink of coins, and, shortly thereafter, I felt a rope looped about my left ankle, snugly, and knotted, tightly, and then passed to Midice, on my left, and thence to those beyond her.
    “A silver tarsk!” I thought. “We have been given away!”
    “Keep your hands fastened in your hair,” said a fellow.
    Then another said, “Kajirae, up!”
    We rose to our feet.
    I stole a glance at he who seemed to have completed the purchase, in which I was an item. He was a small man, in a dirty white tunic, with a yellow sash.
    I kept my hands in my hair, while the tunic was cut from me. We were then, in ankle coffle, herded through the lower streets of Ar, to the Tarsk Market.
    The first step is made with the left foot.
     
     

 
    Chapter Seven
     
     
    The cages, of heavy, cable-like woven wire, are made for tarsks, not kajirae. One cannot stand in them. They are long, narrow, and low. Thus, more than one can be placed on a sideless, flat-bedded wagon, roped in place. Too, like the common slave cages designed for kajirae, they may be stacked.
    I hooked my fingers in the wire, and looked out, frightened, from my knees. The Tarsk Market has its name, obviously enough, I suppose, because it is a general market for tarsks. Certainly the smell of tarsk was all about. And there was little doubt, from the condition of the cage, that the previous occupants of the cage had been tarsks.
    Needless to say, it is only low slaves who are vended from such a market.
    I lay down in the cage, on my right side, in the straw, facing the back wall of the warehouse.
    How vulnerable we were, as slaves!
    But, had we been free women I did not doubt but what we would have been abandoned, left in the house, to perish in the flames.
    The marks on our thighs, our collars, had saved us. We had been saved, but only as animals.
    It is often safer to be a slave than a free person. Who, for example, would bother slaying a tarsk, or a kaiila?
    Instead, one would herd them, or rope them. One would appropriate them.
    It is for such a reason that free women, trapped in a burning city, a fallen city, being sacked, will not unoften steal collars from their girls, and fasten them on their own necks, hoping to be taken for slaves, to be spared as slaves.
    I had recognized two of the soldiers, and the officer. They had been patrons of the house.
    They had lost heavily.
    Of course we were guilty! Did we not know of the manipulation of the tables’ spins, of the dishonest stones, the fraudulent dice, the ostraka which, to the informed eye, could be read?
    Did we not invite in the patrons, at the door, with our smiles, the glances over our shoulders, our fingers lightly touching our brands beneath the cloth, not silk, but rep cloth, for ours was a shabby den for its purposes. We served as the slaves we were in the wide, low-ceilinged, ill-lit interior of the outer room. We would bring the gamesters paga and ka-la-na, and platters of meat and bread, and cakes and sweets, to keep them at the tables. We pretended zestful enthusiasm for their playing, as if it might be our own. How we rubbed against them, so inadvertently, laughed, joked, touched their arms, and hands, applauded their boldness, pretended dismay at a loss, pretended chagrin and sorrow when they made to leave the tables. Rather they should choose and again match ostraka, hazard another turn of the wheel, another placement of the stones, another roll of the dice! We must serve our paga and ka-la-na modestly, of course, for