“Throw down your weapons!” cried he who was held by Arconious. “Cast them down!”
“But we are prepared to leave in peace,” said one of the riders, inching his mount forward.
“Cast down your weapons!” said Arconious.
“Cast down your weapons!” cried he whom Arconious held.
The rider who had come forward a little smiled.
“Please!” cried the fellow.
In that moment Ellen’s heart sank, for she understood that he who had spoken for the monsters was not first amongst the riders, nor, earlier, it had been clear, was Mirus.
“We wish only to leave in peace,” said the rider.
It was he then, she supposed, who was first amongst the visitors. He was the one who had been rather to the side and behind Mirus. He was the one who had asserted that Portus Canio’s group had put the purloined gold somewhere.
The two sleen began to growl menacingly. One began to scratch at the turf. The other crouched even lower. It was, Ellen surmised, the more dangerous of the two.
“Let us give up the weapons,” said Mirus.
“You are mad,” said one of the riders.
“We would then be less than they,” said another.
“Forget the slut,” said another. “You can obtain another, a better.”
“Put down your weapons!” whispered he whom Arconious held. He did not wish even to speak aloud, lest he inadvertently cut his own throat, so close against his throat was set the narrow edge of Arconious’s blade.
“Let us discard our weapons,” said Mirus. “He is essential to our work. No other can communicate with the beasts.”
“Yes, yes, only I can speak with the beasts!” whispered he whom Arconious held.
At this point, from the largest of the beasts, he spoken of as Kardok, there emanated a low rumble of sound. Too, the lips of the monster drew back, revealing moist fangs.
The translator, Arconious’ knife at his throat, turned white.
He whom Ellen now took to be first amongst the visitors urged his tharlarion forward a few feet. He was then somewhat in advance of his fellows, and a few feet from the translator and Selius Arconious.
“Translate,” he said.
“No, no!” said the man.
“It seems,” said the darkly clad, mounted fellow, quietly, he now in advance of his fellows, he whom Ellen took to be first amongst the visitors, “a translation is not necessary.”
“No, no!” said the translator.
“Throw down your weapons!” demanded Arconious.
“Of course,” said the first rider. “Tell your men not to fire,” he said to Portus Canio.
“Be ready,” said Portus Canio.
Very slowly the first rider drew an automatic pistol from its holster. He smiled.
“No!” cried the fellow held by Arconious.
The report was very loud, at so close a range. Ellen screamed. The men about the wagon seemed stunned, paralyzed with shock.
Selius Arconious released the body and it fell from him, to the grass. Bewildered, Arconious regarded he who had fired the shot. Arconious, stunned, lowered his knife.
“The sleen are restless,” said one of the riders, in the background.
“Step away from the body,” said the first rider.
Selius Arconious stepped back.
At a sign from the first rider, a fellow in the back suddenly cried out to the sleen, “Now!”
Ellen screamed as the two gray bodies scrambled past her. There was oil from the pelt of one on her bound arm, as she twisted away. They might have trailed her, presumably from a scent lingering in her cage, from before her sale. But she had not been and, it seemed, was not now designated their reward. The rope on her neck whipped behind her, sped by a rushing rear paw.
Then the sleen were at the body, tearing and scratching through the leather, through the clothing. Ellen thought for an instant that the eyes of he whom Selius Arconious had briefly held had opened for an agonized instant, the body understanding that it was being eaten, but this was doubtless merely a consequence of its subjection to the frenzied molestation. The bullet, she was sure, had been well placed, casually, and at short range. The body was probably dead before it reached the grass, fallen before the sandals of the stunned, disbelieving Selius Arconious, he shaken from the noise and the horror, his knife held lamely in his hand.
“How will we now communicate with the beasts?” asked Mirus.
Kardok stood up, his height expanding upward, almost as though he were slowly, somehow unnaturally enlarging, to something like nine feet. He looked about. His head was enormous. The eyes were huge, rounded. His massive body was perhaps a yard in width, viewed frontally. It could not have been encircled by the arms of large man. “He was not necessary,” it said.
All regarded the beast, all in awe, save he who was the first rider, he closest to the wagon, whose weapon was still in his grasp.
A pungency of expended powder laced the air.
The sounds had now been unmistakable Gorean, cavernously, vitally, exotically, distantly, strangely formed, but Gorean. It was as though a gigantic, dark, misshapen, deformed, threatening bearlike beast, like a massive, awakening living boulder of flesh and cruelty, had spoken. The sounds, despite their frightening, astonishing nature, and their remarkable source, could be clearly understood. The sounds were quite unlike the sounds which it had earlier uttered.
“It can speak!” said one of Portus’s men.
“So, too, can you,” said Kardok. “Should I find that strange?”
The sleen continued to feed.
“We do not teach our humans to speak,” it said.
“Call away your beast,” said Portus, half sick.
The first rider smiled.
“Who is first amongst you?” demanded Portus Canio.
“I am,” said Kardok.
“You have two crossbows,” said the assailant, the first rider. “There are five of us, and we can kill from a distance. We do not surrender our weapons.”
“Nor we ours,” said Portus Canio. “Some of us can reach you, surely, for we are nine, and you are now but five.”
“I think, then, we have a truce,” said the first rider. “We shall now, peacefully, take our leave.”
“Do not move,” said Portus Canio.
“They will move away, and then slay you with impunity, Masters!” cried Ellen.
“Be silent, slave,” snarled Selius Arconious.
“That is obviously their plan,” said Portus Canio.
The first rider tensed. The hands of the other riders moved closer to their weapons.
“There are five of us,” said the first rider, “and two sleen.”
“On whom would you be able to set them, and how?” inquired Portus Canio. “Too, I do not think I would care, personally, to interrupt a sleen in its feeding.”
“Actually,” said the first rider, “there are ten of us.”
“The beasts are not armed,” said Portus Canio.
“So, five,” shrugged the first rider.
“Why are the beasts not armed?” asked Portus Canio.
Something seemed to move behind the eyes of the first rider. It was brief, and subtle, scarcely tangible, rather like a movement in the air, hardly noticed. “I do not know,” he said. “But they are formidable, I assure you.”
“So then there are ten of you, and only nine of us,” said Portus Canio.
“It seems so,” granted the rider.
“How many are you prepared to lose?” asked Portus Canio.
“I would prefer to lose none,” he said.
“Then discard your weapons,” said Portus Canio.
“It seems our kaissa has come to a locked position,” said the rider.
“There are no locked positions here,” said Portus Canio. “This is not kaissa.” His hand was tensed on the hilt of his blade.