Mind Guest (25 page)
“Where did you think to go, slave?” the one on the left asked, letting his eyes move over me. “It was not expected that you would be awake as yet.”
“For what reason would I not be awake?” I countered, playing dumb as I usually did. Special Agents were harder than normal to put out, and had a faster snapback when wake-up time came. Survival is made up of edges like that, but it hadn’t been too helpful that time. “And I am not a slave! I am free, and therefore should not be chained in such a manner! I must be released immediately!”
I knew I was pushing it by making inane demands, but it was the sort of thing an innocent like Bellna would have done, and these people should have had some idea as to who I was supposed to be. I held my mental breath as the two men stared down at me, and then the one who had spoken a minute earlier laughed.
“It has never failed to amuse me to see wenches in chains declare themselves free,” he said, drawing another smile from the man beside him. “Best you prepare yourself, wench, for you will soon learn better. Also will you learn to respond quickly and completely to questions put to you. Those who brought you here spoke of having given you twice the vapors usually given a captured vessel, and yet are you awake before those others. For what reason are you awake, and where did you think to go?”
“I am awake from having awakened, and thought to take myself from this tasteless room! ” I snapped, cursing his persistence as I began to get to my feet. I didn’t want him to think there was anything special about me, but I wasn’t getting much of what I wanted just then. He moved forward a fast two steps to bend and get a fistful of my hair, then knocked my head into the hard scratchy floor.
“A slave is not permitted to take such a tone with anyone at all, not to speak of a free man, he said in a level voice after I had cried out at the double pain of the knock and the grip on my hair. “You will remain on the floor, face down, until you have my permission to rise. And I will recall this matter of early awakening, and will speak to our records keeper of it. It is a thing your future master will need to know.”
He waited a few seconds to see if I would have anything else to say, but with the damage already done, the effort wasn’t worth it. Bellna was sending waves of shivering disbelief through me, making my body tremble with her fear, and I let it happen to cover the almost-snarl I felt in my own right. Big, brave men who abused chained women were a special love of mine, and all I wanted to do was get my hands on the clown with or without being chained. But I wasn’t likely to get my hands on him, and even if I did it wasn’t likely to do much good with the second man there. Survival right then meant being a helpless, frightened little girl, and that’s what I’d have to be.
We’d all thought that Clero wanted Bellna’s life, but we’d been wrong; if I’d known he wanted her as a slave instead, I’d never have gotten involved. I’m not what would be considered good slave material, not even under the best of circumstances. Right then, with the main attack drawn away from its legitimate target, all I wanted was out of there.
Once my hair was released, my new friend and his companion moved past me, and moments later I heard groaning protests in female voices, telling me that my two roommates were being roused. I continued to lie face down where I’d been left, the chains and rings digging into me, my nose on the scratchy surface of the flooring. The part of my mind that was me rumbled uselessly with dark thoughts, and the part that was Bellna sniffled and blubbered in fright. It was a good opportunity to see if I could reach the Bellna presence to calm her, but after ten minutes of trying I gave it up. Nothing seemed to reach the Bellna presence but spiteful intentions, which could not be considered communication of the reliable sort. If I started out with the idea of doing some damage, I got either protest or silence, putting me in the driver’s seat; if I let things ride to see how they would go, Bellna’s feelings crowded mine aside. It looked as though I was too well controlled and Bellna not controlled enough, and that would be an-other problem to face in those chains. As if there weren’t enough without that.
The two newly awakened girls went through exclamations of disbelief and protest much in the same way that I had, but only one of them tried to insist. She was laughed at and roughed up in a small way the same as I had been, and then there was movement at the door flap to interrupt any further messing around. Another heavy in black pants and golden yellow shirt entered, but he just stood there holding the flap. The next man in was of slighter build, wearing a pale yellow shirt, moving with a polished grace, light brown hair and gray eyes adding to his air of superior breeding. Behind him came a pretty blond female slave, wearing the same sort of outfit and wrist chains that the rest of us wore, carrying a small package wrapped in cloth.
The girl hurried through the opening and moved quickly to one side, keeping as much distance as possible between herself and the male slave who entered slowly behind her. The man was big by almost any standard you care to use, and his chains were a lot heavier and wider than the ones used on females. He was followed by two whip carrying, armed men in dark gold, and he’d been given nothing but a faded green loin wrap to wear, a green that matched the color of the very brief cloth poncho his female counterpart was wearing. The other two girls and I were wearing white, but this girl and the man both wore faded green. The concept of color-coding is a lot older and more universal than most people know, but before I could think about what the differences might be, the newcomer in the light yellow shirt got the show on the road.
“I see they are all awake and aware,” he said to the two men who had entered earlier. “A prompt beginning is ever a good sign. Arrange them now, and prepare to take your own places.”
The man in pale yellow walked to a wooden chest, pulled out a thick, wool-like mat and several yellow pillows, then sat down on the mat and made himself comfortable against the pillows. By the time he was ready, the other two girls and I had been put into a row halfway across the room from the man, all of us on our feet and facing the man, all of us tinged with the flush of embarrassment. Being displayed like that was as horrible for Bellna as it was for the other two girls, but the grin the man wore showed he was enjoying the sight.
“You are each of you quite lovely, slaves,” he said, examining us one at a time in frank approval. “Your future masters will be pleased, most especially after you have completed your training. You will learn quickly and obey completely, else will you be punished as you have never before experienced.”
“You cannot treat me so!” blurted the girl on the extreme left, her voice quivering with emotion. The third girl stood between us, smaller than either of us, frightened from the roots of her hair to the tips of her toes. “When my father has discovered where I have been taken, he will bring his guard and destroy this evil place!”
“There will be neither discovery nor destruction, slave,” the man answered without anger, locking eyes with the pretty brunette. “Best you know that it was your father himself who allowed your capture, to provide a gift for his good friend who desires you in slavery. Your second eldest brother is now pledged in marriage to the daughter of this friend, an arrangement which will bring considerable benefits to your father. Your enslavement was but a small part of the bride price.”
The man’s tone was so matter-of-fact that the girl just stared at him open-mouthed, knowing the truth when she heard it. Even if she managed to escape the chains she wore, she no longer had a home to return to. The man in yellow smiled faintly when he saw the point hit home, then he turned his eyes to the next girl in line.
“You, slave, were foolish enough to be rude to a man of considerable position,” he told her, watching as her trembling increased. “The haughtiness of your family place is to be made into slave obedience and a desire to please, and then you will be his. Your family now believes you to be dead, therefore may you also consider the matter of search and discovery closed.”
The small girl just stood there shaking, not even bowing her chestnut-haired head, probably due to being deeply in shock or as forced to believe the bitter truth as the first girl. The man in yellow let his eyes move over her small but lush curves another minute, and then it was my turn.
“As for the last of our newest slaves, the matter is somewhat different,” he said, smiling faintly as he met my eyes. Your father dared to attempt elevating you to a position which was not meant to be yours, therefore must another position be given you. In your instance discovery is, to a small extent, possible, and yet for you discovery would undoubtedly mean ultimate destruction. One who was enslaved, even for a brief time, would be totally unacceptable for the marriage you were pledged to, and the insult of your presence might well bring about war between your father and the father of your intended husband. Your father, surely as well aware of the point as any, would either have your life taken as quickly as you were found, else would you be sent to a far-distant retreat, there to live out your life in unrelieved solitude. As a slave, you will be spared both of those consequences.”
The shock Bellna was feeling brought a shudder to me, silencing me as effectively as the other two girls had been silenced. Everything the man in yellow had said to the girl he thought of as the Princess Bellna was true, and the cruelty of that truth was worse than a flogging. I felt abandoned and alone and helpless and betrayed and completely destroyed, all of it at once and all of it overwhelming.
“I” was lost beneath the onslaught, and I sank to a sitting position on the floor, only peripherally aware of the fact that the other two girls had done the same thing before me.
“And now it is time to truly begin,” the man in yellow announced briskly, as though he were getting more than dull, uncomprehending attention from his three victims. “Two of you are as yet virginally untouched, the third used so little that there is scarcely a difference. We will begin by teaching you the truth concerning your bodies, yet first must another matter be seen to.”
He gestured in the direction of the slave female he had brought with him, and she immediately hurried with the package she carried to the two men in golden yellow shirts, who had been standing behind the line formed by the other two girls and myself. The third man in golden yellow, the one who had held the flap open for the man in light yellow, followed the slave to join the other two behind us, but Bellna’s upset left me nothing in the way of curiosity as to what they were doing. I sat in an envelope of misery, one palm against the scatchy mat to lean on, both legs and their ankle chain to the other side, beyond even the thought of trying to escape. Because of that, I found myself crying out in pained surprise with the other two girls when a big hand tangled in my hair and forced me to my knees.
“Slaves are not permitted a sitting position save they be ordered to it by their master,” the man in light yellow said mildly, looking from one to the other of us. “You will now be fitted with a device to remind you of this stricture, and also to remind you of the matter of punishment. You may proceed.”
The last was for the men around us, and proceed they did. One of the armed, whip-carrying men circled the male slave, crossed to the girl on the far left, then took a fistful of her hair when the man behind her released his grip. The whip man waited while the other took the girl’s wrist chain, pulled it out between the two rings, wrapped it several times around the two rings, then used the metal tongue on her chain belt to hold the whole arrangement in place. The girl’s wrists were then tight to her waist, having no motion-room at all, and the girl was even more frightened than she had been. She struggled in an attempt to free her wrists, getting nowhere of course, and then the whip man bent her low to the floor mat, her forehead not far from her knees. She was ready to be done, and it didn’t take long.
The man from behind her had thrust something into his belt while he was securing her wrist chain, and once he was through and behind her again he pulled it out. The something was T shaped and about two and a half or three inches long, of polished wood, as thick around as my little finger, and tapering slightly toward the uncrossed end. The cross-bar itself was less than an inch in length, and had a thin strip of leather running through a small hole in the center of the bar, where it met the body of the T. The man went down to one knee behind the girl, pushed the six inches of her poncho skirt out of his way, then brought the wooden something to her bottom. She screamed at the first touch of it, a lot more fear than pain in the sound, and again tried to struggle, but it was still a waste of time. The thing was slowly forced into her to the cross-bar, and then one end of the leather strip was tied to a similar thin strip already knotted around her waist under the cloth poncho. At a nod from the man behind the girl, the arined man straightened her to kneeling again so that the other end of the leather strip could be tied snugly in front. The girl was wild with fright and panting hard just short of hysterics, but she wasn’t struggling any longer. The man in the golden-yellow shirt brushed her tiny skirt back down, the armed man released her hair, and then the two of them came toward the second girl and me.
At that point struggling was no more than strength-wasting, but I couldn’t tell the Bellna presence that. Because of her I struggled to keep my wrists from being secured to my waist, struggled to keep from being bent forward, and struggled and screamed when that wooden thing was pushed inside me. It was one of the most uncomfortable things ever done to me, but Bellna felt shattered by it. I was able to get most of the way back to control then, but I wasn’t entirely sure that I wanted control. Every one of us had screamed and struggled, and slaves weren’t usually allowed the luxury of emoting as they pleased.
The man behind me was the one who had spoken to me when he and the second had first arrived, and he smoothed my skirt down once the front leather tie had been secured, and then looked at me with a faint grin. None of us would be getting away with anything, that grin said, and Bellna’s tremor of fear sent a shiver through me.