Free Mutiny in Space by Avram Davidson Page A

Levvis, it proved — and when his long figure popped to its feet, there was another shout. It was not long before everyone was awake. The small men came, fearfully, at first, cheerfully, before long, flocking around the big ones. Awe was on their faces as they touched their taller brothers. At first too shy to speak, they found their tongues soon enough.
    “Men!”
    “Great Men!”
    “The old daddy’s tale was a true one — see — giants!”
    Then they were falling back, stumbling over one another in alarm. Sejarra came striding through the throng, almost running, one hand laid threateningly on her sword-hilt, the other hand knocking the frightened men aside. Her face, ugly even in repose, was now quite hideous in rage. She shook her fist.
    “What have you brought among us, Narra!” she shouted. “Anarchy? Rebellion? Treason?”
    Accusations poured from her. She almost frothed at the mouth. Every man-servitor for miles around must have left his mistress — and even some of the women. More shame to them. What would be the result if men left their labor, fled from their kitchens, abandoned their flocks, deserted their wives? If servitors of either sex felt free to ignore their tasks …? Their positions in society?
    “Heaven and Earth tremble!” she continued, with a shriek.
    A voice cut short her hysterical rage as if with an ax. “Great Lady,” it said — and the words were an insult in that tone of scorn and contempt — “Great Lady, if there were no crying children here and if we desired to make them cry, your hysterical babble would serve a useful purpose. You sound like a bailiff with a bellyache berating an awk-boy.”
    Someone laughed, and at the sound, Sejarra’s face, which had been for a moment almost bewildered, changed. Her sallow color became gray, almost that of a corpse. Then it grew mottled and patchy. Her breath hissed in her mouth. She seemed to crouch, She said one word.
    “Draw.”
    Nelsa, one hand on her hip, tilted her head. “What?” she continued, still in the same insulting tone. “Is a Great Lady condescending to match her sword against the plebian blade of an outlaw? Why … Sejarra … what would they say at Court, if they knew — ”
    But Sejarra was not to be baited any longer. The word broke like a howl —
”Draw!”
— and while it still came, baying, from her mouth, she had drawn herself and was attacking.
    Nelsa, freeing her own weapon from its sheath, and engaging in some nimble and defensive footwork, said, looking only at her antagonist, “I ask you to witness, Narra, that it was no challenge of mine which broke this truce …
Ah!
Not this time, Sejarra!”
    As attack succeeded attack, Sejarra was beside herself. Jory shivered, his mouth twisting awry, as he heard the horrid war-cries once again, as they burst and bellowed from Sejarra’s mouth. Nelsa, after her first comment, saved her breath.
    She had need of it. Sejarra was lighter and moved more quickly; she was the angrier and moved furiously. Sejarra’s weapon was longer and enabled her to strike out with hope of striking home at distances which gave Nelsa no such advantage.
    Circling, leaping, withdrawing, the two figures as they flew about in the dust were surrounded almost at once by spectators — all of whom, however, took care to remain at a safe distance. Moha’s voice, filled with outrage trembling against respect, sounded at Jory’s ear. “Who drew first? Sir — ?”
    “The challenge was Lady-Sejarra’s,” he said, shortly.
    “Oh! Against an outlaw to whom I had granted truce!” Her conditioned contempt toward outlawry was overcome by the almost instinctive horror of any breach in the code of war — outlawry by its very nature standing apart from the necessity of obedience. Had it been Nelsa who had challenged or first drawn, Moha would not have felt a tithe of the indignation which now showed so plainly on her face.
    A howl of triumph from Sejarra was followed by a groan from the