"It is true," said Portus. "When gold will not do, only steel can meet steel."
"You say that this house of which you speak is the largest and richest, the most powerful, on the Street of Brands?"
"Yes," said Portus.
"What is the name of this house?" asked Kuurus.
"The House of Cernus," said Portus.
"I shall permit my sword to be hired," said Kuurus.
"Good!" cried Portus, his hands on the table, his eyes gleaming. "Good!"
"By the House of Cernus," said the assassin.
The eyes of Portus went wide, and his body trembled. He rose unsteadily to his feet, and staggered backwards, shaking his head, turned, and stumbled over one of the low tables, and fled from the room.
His drink finished, Kuurus rose and went to the darkened corner of the room, where the wall sloped down. He looked into the eyes of the girl in the yellow slave livery, who knelt there. Then he turned the key in the lock of collar seven and released her. Thrusting her to her feet and forcing her to walk before him, he went to the counter, behind which stood the man in the grimy tunic of white and gold. Kuurus threw the key to him. "Use twenty-seven," said the man, handing Kuurus a bit of silk, Pleasure Silk, wrapped about a set of slave chains.
Kuurus threw the silk and chains over his shoulder and motioned the girl to move ahead of him and, numbly, she did so, crossing the room, going between the tables, and stopping before the narrow ladder at the right side of the high wall, in which were found the ledges with their alcoves. Not speaking, but woodenly, she climbed the ladder and crawled onto the shelf near the tiny alcove marked with the Gorean equivalent of twenty-seven and entered, followed by Kuurus, who drew the curtains behind them.
The alcove, with its enclosing, curved walls, was only about four feet high and five feet wide. It was lit by one small lamp set in a niche in the wall. It was lined with red silk, and floored with love furs and cushions, the furs being better than some six to eight inches deep.
In the alcove the demeanor of the girl changed and she suddenly rolled onto her back and lifted one knee. She looked at him saucily.
"I have never been in one of these places before," she said.
Kuurus tossed the silk and the chains to one side of the alcove and grinned at her.
"I now understand," she said, "why it is that free women never enter Paga taverns."
"But you are only a slave girl," said Kuurus.
"True," she said forlornly, turning her head to one side.
Kuurus removed her slave livery.
The girl sat up, her eyes bright, holding her ankles with her hands.
"So this is what these places are like," she said, looking about her.
"Do you like them?" asked Kuurus.
"Well," she said, demurely, looking down, "they make a girl feel-rather-well-."
"Precisely," agreed Kuurus. "I see that I shall have to bring you here more often."
"That might be pleasant," said she, "Master."
He fingered the collar on her throat, yellow enameled over steel. It bore the legend: I am the property of the House of Cernus.
"I would like," he said, "to remove the collar."
"Unfortunately," said she, "the key reposes in the House of Cernus."
"It is a dangerous thing you are doing, Elizabeth," said Kuurus.
"You had best call me Vella," said she, "for that is the name I am known by in the House of Cernus."
He gathered her in his arms, and she kissed him. "I have missed you," said she, "Tarl Cabot."
"And I have missed you, too," I said.
I kissed her.
"We must speak of our work," I mumbled, "our plans and purposes, and how we may achieve them."
"The business of Priest-Kings and such," said she, "is surely less important than our present activities."
I mumbled something, but she would hear nothing of it, and suddenly feeling her in my arms I laughed and held her to me, and she laughed, and whispered, "I love you, Tarl Cabot," and I said to her, "Kuurus, Kuurus-of the Caste of Assassins," and she said, "Yes, Kuurus-and poor Vella of the House of Cernus-picked up on the street and brought to this place, given no choice but to serve the pleasure of a man who is not even her master-cruel Kuurus!"
We fell to kissing and touching and loving, and after some time she whispered, eyes bright, "Ah Kuurus, you well know how to use a wench."
"Be quiet," Kuurus told her, "Slave Girl."
"Yes, Master," she said.
I reached over and put the bit of Pleasure Silk under her, that it might be wrinkled and bear the stains of her sweat.
"Clever, Master," said she, smiling.
"Be silent, Slave Girl," I warned her, and she heeded my injunction, for she then, for better than an Ahn, served in a silence that was exquisite, broken only by our breathing, her small moans, and cries.
3 — THE GAME
When I deemed it wise to depart from Vella, I knotted her yellow slave livery about her neck and cried out, "Be gone, Slave!" and then slapped my hands together at which juncture she let forth a howl as though she had been struck, and then, blubbering hysterically and crying out, she scrambled from the alcove, hastily and awkwardly, half falling, descended the narrow ladder and fled weeping from the Paga tavern, much to the delight and amusement of the customers below.
A few moments later I emerged, descended the ladder and went to the proprietor of the shop, throwing the bit of soiled Pleasure Silk and the slave chains to the counter. I looked at him and he did not ask for pay, but looked away, and so I left the tavern and entered the street.
It was still light and in the early evening.
I was not much afraid of being recognized. I had dyed my hair black. I had not been in Ar in several years. I wore the habiliments of the Caste of Assassins.
I looked about myself.
I have always been impressed with Ar, for it is the largest, the most populous and the most luxurious city of all known Gor. Its walls, its countless cylinders, its spires and towers, its lights, its beacons, the high bridges, the lamps, the lanterns of the bridges, are unbelievably exciting and fantastic, particularly as seen from the more lofty bridges or the roofs of the higher cylinders. But perhaps they are the most marvelous when seen at night from tarnback.
I remembered the night, so many years ago, when I had first streaked over the walls of Ar, on the Planting Feast, and had made the strike of a tarnsman for the Home Stone of Gor's greatest city, Glorious Ar. As I could I put these thoughts from my mind, but I could not fully escape them, for among them was the memory of a girl, she, Talena, the daughter of the Ubar of Ubars, Marlenus, who so many years before had been the Free Companion of a simple Warrior of Ko-ro-ba, he who had been torn from her at the will of Priest-Kings and returned to distant Earth, there to wait until he was needed again for another turn of play in the harsh games of Gor. When the city of Ko-ro-ba had been destroyed by Priest-Kings and its people scattered, no two to stand together, the girl had disappeared. The Warrior of Ko-ro-ba had never found her. He did not know whether she was alive or dead.
For those who passed in the street some might have been startled had they noted, standing in the shadows, one who wore the black of the Assassins, who wept.
"Game! Game!" I heard, and quickly shook my head, driving away the memories of Ar, and of the girl once known, always loved.
The word actually cried was "Kaissa," which is Gorean for «Game». It is a general term, but when used without qualification, it stands for only one game. The man who called out wore a robe of checkered red and yellow squares, and the game board, of similar squares, with ten ranks and ten files, giving a hundred squares, hung over his back; slung over his left shoulder, as a warrior wears a sword, was a leather bag containing the pieces, twenty to a side, red and yellow, representing Spearmen, Tarnsmen, the Riders of the High Tharlarion, and so on.