A third man stood between them, bigger than either and more richly dressed. He spoke to her in that strange tongue. When she shook her head, he suddenly bespoke her as she thought the beast had done.
“Ratbane tells me you can mindspeak, woman. Is this true?
“Mindspeak?” Neeka thought. “What is mindspeak?”
The big man grinned. “Just what you’re now doing, Ehleen. Never mind telling me what these degenerate scum have been up to. Ratbane imparted most of it to me, and I can guess the sorry rest of the tale.”
He snapped something aloud, and both of the guardsmen suddenly stood rigid and unmoving, their faces devoid of emotion, but fear still dwelling in their eyes. Then, speaking for her benefit in pure, southern Ehleeneekos, he ordered, “Report back to your barrack,
on the double]
Inform the senior sergeant that you’re under arrest and that he is to send two men to replace you here. Inform him that the initial charge is flagrant insubordination and that more charges will be added to that one as I think of them.
Dismiss!
.”
The two guardsmen almost fell over themselves in turning about to run off up the corridor.
The big man did not come into Neeka’s cell; instead he held out a hand. “Come out here. I have no doubt you’d enjoy a hot bath, and I, for one, would like to see what you look like in something besides dirt and rags and that old blanket. No doubt you could make good use of some food and strong wine too, eh?”
Captain Djordj Muhkawlee was as good as his word. When Neeka at long last emerged from the sunken tub, there were thick towels waiting to dry her body and hair, an impressive array of small flasks containing scents and fragrant oils, plus a pile of assorted items of female attire—few of the items were in her size, but all of them were wrought of far costlier fabrics than ever she had worn. Upon the top of the heap was a slender hair fillet that looked to be of pure gold.
When she had clothed herself as well as she might, Neeka was escorted by a manservant to a spacious, brazier-warmed room wherein the captain stood beside a low dining table filled with plate on heaping plate of meats, fish, vegetables, cheeses, breads and wine. At mere sight of so much food, Neeka’s eyes overflowed and she gasped great, ragged sobs. Gentry, the officer folded her into his strong arms and cradled her too-thin body against his red velvet brigandine, all stitched and embroidered with gold and silver threads. He stood immobile, silently patting her heaving shoulders, his mind broadbeaming soothing thoughts, until she had cried it all out. Then he led her over and sat her upon a dining couch.
“Eat your fill, Neeka. But be sure to eat before you take much of the wine—it’s quite strong. I must go now. I’ve some matters to attend, but I shall return as soon as I may.”
In her small workroom at Vawn-Sanderz Hall, Neeka used a pair of long-handled pincers to withdraw the glowing brass pin from its fiery bed, then dropped it into a flat pan of water with a hiss and a small puff of steam. The heat had discolored the brass, but any trace of poison-paste or blood had burned off in the brazier. She poured a half-cup of watered wine from an ewer and sipped at it until the pin had cooled enough for her fingers to lift it out and dry it, then she placed it in a box of similar pins. Master Lokos had always stressed the value of neatness to a practitioner of any of the arcane arts.
She sat back and stared into her winecup, staring as well into the dim past. Dear, dear, sweet, old Lokos. If only…
Neeka had remained Djordj Muhkawlee’s mistress for the year and a half he stayed in Esmithpolis, until his tour as fortress commander was completed and his replacement brought down his new posting orders from Goohm, General Headquarters of the Armies of the Confederation, along with notice of his promotion to
mehyahlehltehros
, or major, of heavy infantry. The new commander, Lieutenant First Grade Eenzeeos Rahbuhtz, also brought with him his young wife.
Three days before his scheduled departure for the western frontier and the veteran battalion he was to command, Djordj had set before her a lengthy document.
“Neeka, as you are aware, I am not a wealthy man. As you also know, I had been expecting a posting to the command of another coastal fortress, not to a command on the frontier. Therefore, I’ve had to scrape together every stray
thrahkmeh
and sell many of my personal effects in order to buy a set of decent plate and other essentials for campaigning in those hellish mountains.
“I told you I would provide for you and I have. Although I can leave you no money, I’ve arranged an apprenticeship for you with Master Lokos Prahseenos, the
fahrmahkohpios
. This is an agreement of indenture; he agrees in it to provide you food, lodging and clothing and, in return for eight years of work for him, to train you and impart to you sufficient of his knowledge in his craft to enable you to earn a living anywhere as a craftsman of his calling. His mark is already affixed and properly witnessed—you need only sign below and I will witness your own mark. It is an honorable craft, Neeka, and one of the few that will accept women as apprentices or masters.
“Now, Lokos is an old man and sometimes crotchety, Neeka, hut he is universally recognized a true master-of-masters and those whom he has trained are in great demand from Kuhmbuhluhnburk to Ehlehfuhntpolis. That alone, that artistry at his craft and value as a teacher, has kept him out of the fortress prison on more than one occasion, for he is one of the most rabid of the Ehleen radicals. But learn his skills, Neeka; you need not also imbibe of his politics.”
She had signed, for, as Djordj had pointed out, few honorable professions or crafts were open to mere women, and apprenticeship under so renowned a master was a priceless opportunity. That night, he had had her one last time in his tender, gentle way. In the morning, he had set her off into the city with a guardsman to guide her to Master Lokos’ shop-residence, his manservant having delivered her clothing and effects there earlier.
In her eighteen months with Djordj, he had taught her many things—to read and write in both the principal languages of the Confederation, Ehleeneekos and Mehrikan (in her homeland, Kehnooryos Mahkedohnya, well-bred girls learned household skills and nothing more; most could not write their own names); how to ride astride a horse. He was a mindspeaker and had encouraged and helped her to develop and train her own powerful, but latent, mindspeak abilities; he had also, from time to time and in a spirit of fun, taught her the essentials of good close-in knifework and the accurate casting of knives, darts and light throwing axes.
She and Djordj had often ridden their horses through the city, so she had a fair general knowledge of the various sections and streets. And she and her “guide” had not walked a half mile from the fortress when she realized that this route could not possibly lead to the area where the well-to-do craftsmen’s shops were situated. When she spoke of this to the man, however, he smiled and nodded agreement.
“The captain sez to take you, lady, but he don’ say how we gotta go. It’s a long walk, it is, but I got this friend, y’see, as has this ass cart an’ goes that wav ever mornin’. Ifin he ain’ lef yet, we can save our pore feet a bit.”
The tale sounded plausible, so Neeka nodded assent and continued to follow the scale-shirted guardsman. As they passed the mouth of a narrow alley between two stone warehouses, the guardsman stumbled and half-fell. Neeka bent to give him a hand up and, as she straightened, a thick sack was dropped over her head. Despite her struggles and her muffled cries, several pairs of strong, ungentle hands bound the mouth of the sack tightly about her, pinioning her arms firmly against her body. An unseen man lifted her clear off the ground, and another bound her at knees and at ankles with scratchy rope. A thrill of burning agony shot up her arm as the tight-fitting silver ring—given to her by Djordj, at the midwinter Sun-birth Feast—was jerked off her finger and she screamed.
But screams gained her nothing, nor did demands or entreaties. Rough hands lifted her, bore her up the alleyway, the stone walls scraping her. Then she was unceremoniously dropped into a fishy-smelling cart and, with the snap-crack of a whip and a shout and the shrill protest of a grease-starved axle, the conveyance began to move. Over the cobbled streets, the springless vehicle provided a swaying, bumping, jolting and thoroughly uncomfortable ride. Each time Neeka tried to sit up, a horny hand slammed her back down onto the slimy boards. The last time, her head struck the wood with enough force to fill it with flashing light before a total blackness descended.
Djoy Skriffen had been miscast by nature. Only her genitali and her huge breasts imparted a hint of female appearance; otherwise her physique was masculine—broad shoulders and muscular arms ending in big square hands, narrow hips and once-flat buttocks. Her jaw was square and her chin prominent; prominent too was her nose, and when she allowed them to grow out, her eyebrows were bushy. Nonetheless, twenty years before, she had been a highly successful camp whore, following condottas and armies on the march and to the rear of siegelines, ready and willing and able to take on a dozen or more men in a night.
Then, during the great rout at the Field of Hats, as she leaned forward on the seat of the cart she had hurriedly stolen to lash the mules to a full gallop, a war dart near the end of its cast had penetrated her hipbone after tearing through the flesh of her right buttock. Due to its angle, she had been unable to get either hand in position to remove it and so had, perforce, ridden the jolting cart on away from the lost battle, screaming with agony.
Eventually, the cart lost a wheel and she was thrown from the seat, to roll down a steep bank. This stress caused the ill-tempered dart point to snap, leaving only the few millimeters of steel that were imbedded in her bone, while the shaft and the rest of the head were jerked out of her flesh. Fortunately, she was shortly found by a small condotta of Freefighters from the victorious forces of the Count of Keelzburk. The men knew Djoy of old, and seeing her grievously hurt, they halted, kindled a fire and doctored her on the spot, laying a red-hot spearblade to her lacerated, blood-spouting buttock.
Even after her burned wound was become only puckered, purplish scar tissue, Djoy found sitting on the seats of wagons or carts or sitting even the best-gaited mule pure torture, and such activities or even damp weather would cause her right hip to swell and to ache intolerably, so she knew that her days as a camp whore were numbered. She spent her last few months in her initial profession servicing the winter siege lines around beleaguered Balzburk and, when at last a general attack proved successful and the camps were almost deserted, she and a pack of carefully chosen noncombatant ruffians murdered the guards at the pavilion of the siege commander and made off with the army’s pay chest and everything else valuable-looking and portable.
In the course of the long flight from Balzburk in the western mountains, across the widths of both the Kingdom of Pitzburk and the Kingdom of Harzburk, to the port city of New Filburk, on the seacoast, almost all of the ruffians had met with “accidents” and a large part of the loot had been frittered away. Even so, after she had paid for the murders of the last two of her original companions, Djoy still had enough gold to establish and set herself up as madam of a fine bordello, wherein she prospered for a number of years.
But then came the night when, in a drunken rage, she stabbed one of her silent partners—several dozen times. He was not the first man or woman she had slain in New Filburk, but he was not just some nobody of a seaman or whore who could be dumped into a convenient cesspit or weighted and dropped into the harbor. She packed a small trunk with the contents of her strongbox, her jewel chest and her victim’s well-stuffed purse, a few items of clothing and a few personal possessions.
She bought passage on the first ship she found and, thus, came ashore in Esmithpolis, where she scouted about, greased the proper hands with gold and set herself up in another bordello. After twelve years of her experienced, ruthless operation, Djoy Skriffen was more than prosperous and had run to fat, being almost as broad as a huckster’s table, though there still were hard muscles, a harder heart and a cold, calculating mind lodged within the mounds of jiggling adipose tissue.
Neeka was not the first kidnapped girl she had bought, but most of her whores were in her house on a voluntary basis, originally at least, though they all soon found to their sorrow that getting in was much easier than was getting out—alive, at least. Djoy handled some of the inevitable discipline problems herself: most she left in the hands of her four resident goons, all former Freefighters and sadistic murderers, all with prices on their heads in the Middle Kingdoms. Recalcitrant “recruits” were given to the foursome for a day and night, sometimes for a weekend; few visible marks were ever left on their flesh, but subsequently a girl so treated would accept, would perform, any act a customer demanded, rather than chance being again turned over to Stoo, Neel, Djimi and Iktis.
On her way down to the lowest cellar to inspect the girl offered for sale by three city guardsmen, a servant reminded his mistress of the unfortunate incident of the previous night—a valued and regular customer had been bitten by a rat.
“Send a boy to the fortress,” she snapped. “Tell them to send me a hungry fencat—maybe two, since we have no idea how many rats we have.”
As Neeka’s consciousness slowly returned, she thought at first that she was back in that horrible, freezing cell in the fortress wall, for she had been stripped of every shred of her clothing and she lay on a narrow cot set against a stone wall. Then, as things became a bit clearer, she could see differences. This cell was wider and she was lying on a true bed, not in a trough of straw. Two walls were of stone, but the other two, including that in which the door was set, were fabricated of wide, age-darkened boards; the board walls reached to within a couple of feet of the timber ceiling, fourteen feet up, from which hung a large brass oil lamp. The cell was comfortable—cool, but not cold. Aside from the bunk, there was a covered slop bucket, a box of hay balls, a stone jug and a clay cup.