Scipio Metellus Slaver of Ko-ro-ba (3)

 

(Image courtesy The Palatine)

Previously in Scipio Metellus, Slaver of Ko-ro-ba

Scipio Metellus shook his head at the amount of dishonesty in the world. Atticus continued.

“One night, the Brothers in Ar disappeared. They were gone; their stock was gone. There was nothing left. They were pursued. One was caught and impaled. The other is still at large. The creditors in Ar, commissioned me to come to Abydos-Thebes and collect their losses from the Brothers here. I took tarn and came with two apprentices, cousins of the sister of my former Companion’s uncle. When we arrived, the creditors here were emptying this House. I have been dealing with the Praetor and creditors for the last week. There will be little left for any of us. The Brothers here had fled as well. But there is some hope. Just before I left the Praetor, word came by tarn that six of the Brothers, their wagons, and their Companion and families had been captured. There will be some profit from that.”

Scipio Metellus said, “I find it difficult to believe that they were so dedicated to their Companions that they did not abandon them and flee farther and more quickly.”

“It was not devotion to their Companions; it was devotion to their wagons. The wagons had false bottoms, and in the false bottoms, was some treasure. How much do we not know.”

“Now tell me, my friend, do you have anything to disclose to me? Some maidens stolen from an impossible tower perhaps.”

Scipio Metellus deflected the question. He wanted to have Atticus of Ar in a mellower mood before broaching delicate subjects.

“Tell me more of these captured wagons. Would the treasure hidden in secret compartments below the floorboards be enough to cover your losses, and the losses of your friends in Ar.

Atticus of Ar shook his head.

“It would if their were no other creditors. Yet sadly, there were others who were deceived by the Brothers Hieronymus. As many of them reside here in Abydos-Thebes, it is difficult to have our claims heard fairly. And by fairly, of course I mean first. After all, we are of Ar, and this is a provincial city, allied with Ar and beholden to it.

Yet I have been able to get the Praetor to a least give our claims equal consideration. Unfortunately, he has also admitted the small claims of small traders and craftsmen, diluting the pool of monies available.”

Scipio Metellus took a sip of his Black Wine.

“You might use that to your advantage. Let the small traders and craftsmen know that it was your representations for equal treatment that led to their inclusion in the numbers of those to be compensated. It will gain you much sympathy with the mob of people who will attend the final hearing. It can be useful to have the mob on your side.”

Atticus smiled.

“You are indeed a cunning old scoundrel, Scipio Metellus. But it is a dangerous thing to stir up a mob. I am not sure that the risk is worth the reward, if the tospit is worth the squeeze. As you get older, your plans and schemes seem to me to get more involved. I worry that you might go too far, to your own regret.”

“Funny you should mention that, Atticus. One of my recent schemes paid off handsomely.”

Scipio Metellus smiled mysteriously. Clearly, he was ready to start boasting. But now that Atticus had him eager to talk, Atticus changed the subject. He and Scipio Metellus may be close friends, but they are merchants as well; each eager for the greater profit. If Atticus could defer talk of any possible ‘missing maidens’ for a time, Scipio Metellus might give him a better price. So he changed the subject to one that always affected markets for slaves and all else on Gor.

“In your travels this spring, did the early seedlings look good? Were the Peasants hopeful and optimistic of a good harvest?”

“When have you ever encountered an optimistic Peasant? During all the years of your life have you ever encountered a Peasant who was happy and optimistic? A more dour and gloomy set of chaps there does not exist in any caste of Gor. Even the fishermen are more hopeful.

But the early shoots of crops looked promising. The seedlings looked healthy and plentiful. More to the point, the Peasants were not looking to sell their Field Girls, let alone their daughters. They all seemed to have seed, animals to pull their plows, girls to weed their fields. The vulo’s eggs were plentiful. And more significantly, not only were the Peasants not selling girls, slave or free, they all enquired about buying nebraskas. ‘Do you have any nebraskas to sell Esteemed Slaver?’ they would ask.  “ ‘Do you have any mary-annes to sell, or do you know any of your caste who have them for sale?’”

Atticus of Ar stroked his chin, as he did when pleased. A prosperous and well-fed City populace was good for his business. He did little trade in farm girls or in the daughters of Peasants. Peasant girls came on the market of course, in bad years, as Peasants had to sell their daughters to purchase seed, but it was a poor market and one that prosperous Slavers like Atticus and Scipio avoided.

Atticus pursued a related topic.

“Do you know why they are called ‘nebraskas’?, these farm girls, It is not a term that was used when I was younger. Yet now it seems to be everywhere in the central plain,”

Next to successfully completing one of his ‘little schemes’, and boasting of it naturally, Scipio Metellus loved to be consulted as an expert in his field.

“I found out a few years ago. I was talking to one of the free traders who run unlicensed voyages of acquisition.”

Atticus interrupted.

“The Priest-Kings have not sanctioned any such voyages for decades. Communication with the Slave World is supposed to cut off.”

“So they have, friend Atticus, so they have. Or so the Initiates tell us. But yet they continue, as things do when there is profit and beautiful women to be had.”

“I have heard there are dark forces behind the trade now.” Atticus sounded worried, yet he himself dealt in Barbarians.

“I haven’t seen any such signs, just profit,” rejoined his friend.

They sat in silence for a few moments, contemplating the line between danger and profit. Both men were careful when they could be, yet in each was, below the crust of respectability, the soul of a pirate. Scipio Metellus frowned as he recalled something.

“A Friend told me recently that certain Initiates were taking an interest in my doings, even following me. Not all Initiates but a few specific ones of the white clad bean-eaters, one in particular. I have no idea why.”

Atticus snorted. “Perhaps because you call them bean-eaters when beans are specifically denied them. Such a lack of respect would upset the White Caste.”

Scipio laughed. “I can more easily believe they refrain from beans than that they refrain from women, frankly.”

“More seriously, friend Scipio, do you think they have had word of your caravan scheme. It was successful twice, but will you try it again?”

“I already have a third attempt in progress. I hope to reap a good harvest a year from now.”

“Enslaving women at the Sardar Fairs is strictly forbidden.”

“I don’t exactly enslave them at the Fair. Of course there are at the Fair a few I persuade to offer themselves to the Priest-Kings. If they get collared between submitting themselves to the Sardar and the Sardar gates, that is not really enslaving them. They have already submitted to the Priest-Kings.”

Atticus shook his head. “That is splitting some mighty fine hairs. The Initiates would not agree. I think the hair-splitting you are doing there is finer than the belly hair of an auburn slave. And there is nothing thinner than that.”

Scipio sat silent after that. He could not dispute that he was taking great risks with the caravan scheme. The rewards were great though, and even greater was the fun the scheme gave the old scoundrel. He turned the subject back into safer channels.

“As to the name ‘nebraskas’ for sturdy well-fed farm girl slaves, I am told it comes from an area or maybe a city on the Slave World that is populated almost entirely by Peasants. The women there are sturdy and strong and well suited to farm labour. Energetic in the furs as well, above the norm for farm slaves, but above all, good for plowing and weeding. So all Peasants now want good sturdy strong girls, ‘nebraskas’ despite their place of origin.

“I do not know the origin of 'mary-annes' for the prettiest of the ‘nebraskas’ though.”

In the corner, kneeling patiently to be called upon, the barbarian kajira, Lesley, stirred.

“Speak slave.” Scipio Metellus was always observant. It helped him avoid danger and had often gained him much profit.

“I think Master, that the original mary-anne was a character in a play, like the ones Boots Tarsk-bit produces. I did not see it myself, but I have heard it spoken of by other Barbarian slaves, many from the land of the ‘nebraskas’.

“Speak more.”

“It was a play, or rather series of plays with stock characters, who were cast ashore on an island. There were two sailors, one a captain, the other a mighty sailing man: and their passengers. There was a rich merchant and his companion; and a wise scribe whose ideas allowed them to live in comfort but who could not come up with a plan that would allow them to leave their island. There were two slaves, one an auburn kajira, whose name even meant fire-crotch in the barbarian tongue, and the other was a farm slave, whose garden fed them all. She was both comely and a ‘nebraska’ and the character was called Mary-anne.

“I never saw it myself; I was above such cheap comedy when I was a serious free woman, but that is what I was told.”

The two slavers sat cross-legged and finished their Black Wine. The candles were burning low. Scipio beckoned with his finger, and Lesley the blonde barbarian crawled forward. She pulled from under the low table a silver tray, with a decanter and two silver cups. She poured two measures from the decanter, one into each small cup. Using tongs, she heated the cups and their contents over the flame of the candle.

Then she served first Atticus as the guest; then her master Scipio Metellus as the giver of the feast. She held each cup first to her belly, then to her heart, then kissing the cup, she held it out between both arms, the unkissed side towards each man. She then knelt in nadu in front of the men, while Gold Key, the other slave glowered with jealousy in the corner of the room. Gold Key smiled as Lesley was waved back away from the talking men.

Atticus smiled when Scipio Metellus again began to speak of the twenty stolen maidens. Both he and Scipio Metellus were merchants, and by having Scipio speak of the subject directly, Atticus had won a small advantage. They were friends, but they were merchants.

“I have heard there was a terrible scandal when all of the girls who were prizes in the competition between Tarn Hill City and Tarn Hill Port, winners and losers were spirited away from the Impossible Tower at the Inn at the Ford.”

“I have heard the same,” Atticus admitted, “I have no idea how it could have been done, or who might have done it. I have heard that you pointed out to all who asked that your caravan was two pasangs short of Ford because you lost a wheel on one of your wagons and it took half a day to fix.

That alibi is a little suspicious given the well-known efficiency of Longinus of Argentum, your wagon master. Half a day to fix a wheel when it is know you keep spare wheels and other parts.”

 

Scipio shook his head. “I was an surprised as anyone, I assure you. And once the wagon was fixed we were surrounded at the camping place by the wagons, and carts of other travellers. There was no way we could move or even leave on foot.”

“It is you having so many witnesses that you were elsewhere that makes me suspicious. Just because I have known you a long time and know your tricky nature. That you and your wagon men and your Riders of the High Thalarion were all accounted for so neatly, makes me wonder how you did it.”

 

“The Purple gang was rumoured to have re-appeared, and a wisp of purple silk was found in the sanctum from which the twenty maidens disappeared. Or so I have been told,” Scipio added.

He went on. “However, by amazing chance, I have come into the possession of these women, now branded and collared. They were sold to me by wandering riders, who claim to have acquired them from other brigands in purple.”

Atticus ruefully shook his head at such luck.

“You just happened to be offered the most sought after captives in years. What luck you have. Will the captives confirm this outlandish story?”

Atticus of Ar smiled at such an outlandish tale. Scipio was mock-indignant that his word might be doubted.

“Of course, the twenty kajirae will confirm the story. Kajirae cannot lie to a master. They went to sleep in their chamber in the Tower, and awakened, stripped and bound in a clearing. Through inexplicable gaps in their blindfolds, they saw bandits, fearsome bandits wearing purple silk armbands, just as the Purple Gang were reported to wear. One at a time, they were branded and collared. Their blindfolds were re-adjusted. Then they heard a terrible clash of arms. They were hustled away by other brigands, with green armbands. They saw a few of the Purple Gang on the ground, with apparently terrible wounds. Those brigands sold them to me. That is what they know.”

Atticus said nothing, there was nothing to say to such a story. Scipio went on.

“Obviously, the best market for such a group of slaves, with such an interesting story is the Central Block in Ar. They would each compete with the others for the highest selling price. I would like you to sell them for me on consignment. I am turning north here to Ko-ro-ba, and as you are returning to Ar, it would be a profitable arrangement for us both. Shall we say you take 20% of the gross profit?”

Finally, they were bargaining. Atticus made a counteroffer.

“I have no wagons here. I would have to pay transport to Ar by tarn, that is expensive. Shall we say 25% after transportation and sales expenses?”

Scipio was mock outraged.

“Twenty-five percent and travel expenses, and sales expenses. I had my expenses too. You will leave me with no profit at all. Do you think I did all this for the fun of it?”

“Yes.”

Scipio laughed.

“Well, yes I did, But I still want my fun to pay for itself. Make me an offer.”

“I will make you two. Twenty per cent, and I pay the sales and transportation expenses, or,” Atticus paused. “Or you pay me 30% after sales and transportation expenses, and I let you tell me the story of how you did it. After all, who else can you tell? The Initiates? The men of Tarn Hill?"

Scipio laughed. He laughed so hard he fell over sideways. When the Slaver of Ko-ro-ba righted himself, he spat on his hand and held it out to seal the bargain. The two men shook on the agreement.

 

“Well he began, it was like this. You presented me with an impossible challenge, which you knew I would accept, the stealing of twenty maidens, the prizes in a game of girl catch, ten winners and ten captives to be enslaved from the Impossible Tower at the Inn at the Ford. I decided to try the impossible.”

“You recall how you described the Tower to me:  (Sardar Fair IV)

“The Women’s Keep at the Inn is an old stone watch tower. It was abandoned a century ago and the Inn was built around the tower. It is four levels and has a cellar. The walls are eight feet thick at the bottom and three at the top. The cellar has a separate entrance and does not communicate with the rest of the Tower. There is only one way in and one stairway between levels. There are no secret ways or stairs; people have been searching for at least one hundred years. Are you following so far?”

The main floor is a common room which is entered from the lobby of the Inn; the paga room is across the lobby in a separate wing. The common room of the Tower at the Inn is only for guards and male companions of Ladies staying at the Inn. A single stairway leads to the second level. This is a common sleeping room for Women who cannot afford better but is still very safe. From the second level a stairway leads to the third level. At the top of the stairs is an iron door. It is barred from the inside by the ladies staying on the third level. The bars are heavy beams of wood that it takes three to four women to lift into place. No one can enter easily, and one or two traitors inside cannot compromise the safety of the others. There is a small eating room and separate sleeping rooms on this level. There is one window, it has an iron shutter that is secured by bolts on the inside and in any case it overlooks rapids.

The fourth floor is more of the same, except more exclusive and expensive. On the night they are there, only the ten Free Maidens from the winning city will be on that floor; along with the ten captives, not yet enslaved, from the losing city. If they had been enslaved they would not be permitted on the fourth level. Indeed, only Free Women may ascend above the first level. There is no way to insinuate any spy or agent into the tower, no way of forcing the doors before rescue arrives.

The tower has a peaked roof, so a Tarn cannot be landed upon it; the fourth level’s window overlooks a courtyard which will be full of Warriors. There is no way to get the twenty women you see in front of you out of the Tower at the Inn at the Ford.”

 

“So obviously the first thing to do was to find allies inside the tower. Just as obviously the way to get inside any locked door is a golden key. I had made the acquaintance of two Free Ladies who were openly desirous of gold. Like many with enough, they were greedy for more. Further I despised their parsimony. Those with gold should be open-handed with it. I gave them gold, a tarn disk of gold each and a promise of a further suitable reward following a successful completion of the enterprise.

But that only went so far. The strength of two women could not unbar the doors, anyway I could not infiltrate any men into the bottom levels of the Tower. But they could open windows, more of that anon.

I had no allies on the fourth floor where the twenty maidens, ten captive, and ten free were to sleep. Their window overlooked the courtyard where Tarn Hill troops were encamped. What to do. They had to be induced to open the door between their floor, and the floor below where my allies were.

            All in the tower had to be induced to sleep                 while I secured my prizes..

Then I had to get my prizes away.

 Quite a series of problems. I loved it.

                                

The first I solved with the aid of  the best baker on Gor. Andre the Baker. The problems of tassa powder are twofold. The first is the difficulty of adding it to food. The second is dosage, how can one be sure how long the effect will last when one doesn’t know how much wine or paga the victim will consume. I did not want anyone in the tower oversleeping.

Andre, though is a precision baker. Unlike others, he does not guess at the measures of ingredients or measure using cups of dubious accuracy. So if I could, for a consideration, and for the challenge of the thing, have him add a precisely measured amount of tassa powder to a precise measure of liquid, and then bake with it, and divide the pastries such that each piece would induce a four hour sleep in an average sized women, then the induced sleep would blend into their natural sleep and they would awake none the wiser.

I provided my allies with pieces enough for each woman on the uppermost floor as well as each woman on the floor below. So that was done.

Next, how to get the women out of the tower. At the fair I had encountered acrobats, cousins named Dromio. They went ahead and took rooms at the Inn. Because they counterfeited illness, they were placed on the top floor, across from the tower, to keep their counterfeited illness away from the other patrons.

The last part of my plan was a troop of Riders of the High Thalarion. I had ostentatiously paid off a mercenary troop of twenty such Riders when they had completed their duties escorting me to the Sardar Fair. Secretly, I engaged them for one last service before they rode to Victoria to take part in a little war that city is fighting.

On the night in question, when the Iron Doors on the third and fourth floors were secured, my plan was put into action. My two allies, the Free Ladies offered pieces of pastry, a special ba-kla-va by Andre the Baker, already cut and precisely portioned, to the ladies staying on the third floor. If the other ladies had known my allies better, they would have known that such generosity, indeed, any generosity was out of their character.

Greed and gluttony, overcame any suspicion. Such is human nature. The ladies from Tarn Hill, captives and free alike were also seduced by gluttony. My ladies promised them pieces of ba-kla-va for all, but sadly the door was barred. After much straining and heaving, the bars were removed and the free women trooped down to engage in gluttony. My allies said it was a shame that the captives who were still technically free ladies should not share in the bounty. It was while my allies were ‘helping’ unchain the captives that one of them, unhooked tha catch on the window, although leaving it look like it was still secure.

Once the ba-kla-va and wine party was over, the Tarn Hill ladies went upstairs, again securing the bars on the door. The tassa in the pastry taking effect, they went to sleep.

Likewise the ladies on the floor below sought their couches, my allies leaving out the bottles of wine, so that the dregs could be tested and found innocent of any tampering.

At the Nineteenth Ahn the acrobatic Dromios left their attic quarantine rooms by the attic window, and made their way across the roofs to the Tower. The roofs were no trouble to them, due to their acrobatic training. They let themselves down by silken ropes to the window of the fourth floor. Only the yellow moon was up, and it was on the other side of the tower. Although there was light in the courtyard below, the window in the tower was shrouded in shadow. They used a wire to open the insecure window and entered. Capture scent, added to the effect of the tassa powder, and the ten free and ten captive women were all secured.

But how to get them out of the Tower? The courtyard below was guarded.

 But the Riders of the High Thalarion could enter the stream under the third floor window, and while men or boats would be swept away, their beasts would not.

Now you understand while the women on the third floor also had to be put to sleep. One by one the twenty women were lowered to the twenty riders, who proceeded upstream for two pasangs. The Captain of the group took silk scarves from some of the women and laid a false trail of scent into the forest in the opposite direction dropping them with a purple scarf and some distance from the Inn. Another scrap of purple silk was left on the fourth floor.

The acrobats retreated to the fourth floor and secured and barred the door. They left, as they had come, by the window, using a thin wire to secure the catch. They just made it back to their room when the white moon rose and bathed everything in light.

In the morning, the Tarn Hill troops had the ladies on the third floor unbar and open the door. But they could not enter the fourth floor. They pounded and hammered, but no one answered. The door was such that it took hours to force open. The place was empty; all the women were gone.

After much enquiry the women on the Third floor were all cleared of complicity. They had slept through the night and not heard a thing. Their door and window were secured. Likewise the door and window on the fourth floor were secured from inside. It was a mystery.

The rest you know. The women were stripped, collared, and branded. They were kept blindfolded. Then they heard the sound of combat, and when they were carried away, they saw ‘victims’, ostensibly dead. Makeup by a slave I owned, who had been an actress at one time, proved effective as the twenty slaves were only allowed a quick peek.

Then they were ‘sold’ to me, again by the Riders wearing disguises. Now they meet their fate on the Central Block of Ar. The official story of theft by bandits with the real story of the Girl Catch contest should net a nice profit for us both.”

Atticus laughed as the story ended. He regretted he could not share it, but that was part of the deal.    “There are some loose ends. The Riders might talk.”

“They are far away fighting in Victoria. The life expectancy in such combats is low.’

“The acrobats, then?”

“Besides being excellent acrobats, they are part-time thieves. Not something they will advertise. To ensure their silence, I gave them the address of an accomplished lady thief to add to their troup.”

“The two greedy Free Ladies. They are sure to blackmail you”

“When I made the agreement with them, I promised them a suitable reward for their aid. We met in the forest two nights after the affair of the Tower. What more suitable reward for two Free Women who aided in the abduction of twenty maidens than to be put in the collar themselves. Tonight, they served the men of my wagons most completely.”