Claudia seemed about to faint. She was supported by the guardsman behind her, and not gently. Then she was stood again, wavering, on her small feet.
"And, citizens," called Talena to the crowd, "have you not heard her, even here, on this very platform, in my very presence, utter shamelessly seditious discourse!"
"Yes!" cried men.
"Kill her," cried others. "Kill her!"
"But," said Talena to the horrified Hinrabian. "I am prepared, on my own responsibility, and in spite of your crimes, in recollection of our former affection for one another, which I still entertain for you, and in respect of your exalted lineage, and the contributions of your family in Ar, before the accession of your father, the infamous Minus Tentius Hinrabius, to the chair of Administrator, to permit you, instead, to make amends to us all, by permitting you the honor of serving your city."
"I am innocent!" wept Claudia.
"Kill her!" cried men.
"Prepare to hear yourself sentenced," said Talena.
"No!" cried Claudia.
"It is with a heavy heart and tearful eyes that I utter these words," said Talena.
"Marlenus of Ar freed me from bondage!" cried Claudia.
"We have observed you before us," said Talena, "carefully and closely, how you move and such."
"He freed me!" cried Claudia.
"That was a mistake," said Talena.
"Perhaps!" said Claudia.
Men regarded one anotehr.
"Speak," said Talena, amused.
"Twice I have a slave," said Claudia. "I have had my head shaved. I have felt the whip. I have worn the collar. I have served men."
"Doubtless such experiences will put you in good stead," said Talena. "Perhaps they will even save your life."
"In the Central Cylinder," said Claudia. "I have been lonely, more lonely than I ever knew a woman could be. My life was empty. I was unhappy. I was miserable. I was unfulfilled. In those long years I remembered my time in bondage, and that it had been, in spite of its terrors and labors, the most real, and the happiest, of my life. I had learned something in the collar that I was afraid even to tell myself, that I, Claudia Tentia Hinrabia, of the Hinrabians, belonged at the feet of men.
"You will not object then when I return you to your proper place," laughed Talena.
But there was little laughter from about her, for the men attended to the Hinrabian.
"I confess," wept Claudia, "now, publicly, and before men, that I am in my heart and belly a slave!"
"The rejoice as I order you imbonded!" said Talena.
"No!" wept Claudia. "It is one thing to be captured by a man and taken to his tent, and put to his feet and made to serve, or to be sentenced by a magistrate in due course of law to slavery for crimes which I have actually committed, and another to stand here publicly shamed, before my enemy, a woman, in her triumph, to be consigned by her to helpless bondage."
"What difference does it make?" asked a man.
"True," wept Claudia. "What difference does it make!"
"Put the slave to her knees!" cried Talena.
"I am a free woman!" wept Claudia. "I am not yet legally imbonded!"
"Thus," said Talena, "will you learn to kneel before free persons!"
Claudia struggled, but, in a moment, her small strength, that of a mere female, availing her nothing, by two guardsmen, was thrown to her knees.
"You look well there, Hinrabian!" said Talena.
"False Ubara!" screamed Claudia, held to her knees.
Talena made an angry sign and a guardsmen withdrew his blade from its sheath. In a moment Claudia's head was held down and forward by another guardsman.
"She is to be beheaded!" said a man.
I tensed.
Talena made another sign, and the fellow who held Claudia's hair pulled her head up, that she might see Talena.
Talena's eyes flashed with fury, and Claudia's eyes, then, were filled with terror.
"Who is your Ubara?" asked Talena.
"You are my Ubara!" cried Claudia.
"Who?" asked Talena.
"Talena," she cried. "Talena of Ar is my Ubara!"
This response on the part of Claudia seemed to me judicious, and, indeed, suitable. Talena of Ar was her Ubara.
"Do you confess your faults?" inquired Talena.
"Yes, my Ubara," sobbed Claudia.
"And do you beg forgiveness of your Ubara?" asked Talena.
"Yes, yes, my Ubara," sobbed Claudia.
"Who begs forgiveness?" asked Talena.
"I, Claudia Tentia Hinrabia, of the Hinrabians, beg forgiveness of Talena of Ar, my lawful Ubara!" she wept.
"I am prepared to be merciful," said Talena.
The guardsman with the drawn blade resheathed it. The guardsman holding Claudia's hair released it, angrily, pushing her head down. The other two guardsmen, one holding each arm, retained their merciless grip on the Hinrabian. "Talena, Ubara of Ar," announced a scribe, "will now pronounce judgment on the traitress, Claudia Tentia Hinrabia."
"Enemy of Ar, enemy of the people of Ar, enemy of the Home Stone of Ar, Claudia Tentia Hinrabia," said Talena,you are to be imbonded, and before nightfall." Claudia's body shook with sobs.
"Send her to the chain," said Talena.
Claudia was pulled up to the side and rudely manacled. She, on her knees, looked back at Talena.
"You look well in the chains of men," said Talena.
"You, too, Talena of Ar, my Ubara," wept the Hinrabian, "would doubtless look well in the chains of men!"
Men gasped, in fury.
"Take her away," said Talena.
"Beware the chains of men!" cried the Hinrabian. Then she was pulled down the ramp and, men jeering her and striking at her, buffeting and bruising her, was thrown to her knees before me, to be added to the chain.
"As she is poor stuff," said Talena, loudly, "let a silver tarsk be added to the reparations, to compensate, if it can, for her inadequacies of face and figure." There was much laughter.
The Hinrabian put down her head, and I took her wrist chain and, in a moment, with the joining ring, had attached her to the coffle chain.
She looked up at me, tears in her eyes. She gasped. My eyes warned her to silence. Doubtless she remembered me from years before. She turned back then, and looked toward the platform. She looked at me then, again, woneringly. "Stand, slut of Ar," said the auxiliary guardsman opposite me. "Move to the first position."
"Yes, Master," she said, obeying.
"No, my dear," Talena was saying to another woman on the platform. "You are too young."
That woman was conducted to the rear of the platform. Earlier in the morning, it might be noted, Talena had consigned woman as young, or younger than that one, to the chain.
"No, not she," said Talena, as the next woman was presented. "We must keep some beauty in Ar," she explained.
The woman looked at her, gratefully, and quickly pulled the proferred robe again about herself, and hurried from the platform.
Men expressed approval of the decision of their Ubara.
"Master," whispered Claudia to me, standing about a yard behind me, and to my right.
I went to stand beside her. "Yes," I said, She looked up at me, her cheeks stained with tears. "Am I beautiful?" she asked, frightened.
"Yes," I said.
"Thank you, Master," she said.
"Years ago," I said, "even in your time of power and cruelty, you were beautiful."
"Such things are behind me now," she said.
"Yes," I said.
She smiled.
"Thank you, Master," she said.
"Never doubt your beauty," I said.
"Yes, Master," she said.
"You are still free," I said. "You need not address me as Master."
"Surely," she said, "it would be well for me to accustom myself, once again, to the utterance of such appropriate deferences."
"True," I said.
"Not she, either," said Talena.
"How merciful is Talena," marveled a man.