I had neared the compound a hundred times before, but this time I was determined to enter. I began to walk with a quickened pace, my heart began to beat powerfully, and I felt the elation of decision. I would act. It would be suicide to attempt to cut my way in, but Pa-Kur was in the environs of Ar, directing the siege operations, and I might, with luck, pass myself off as his messenger; who would be bold enough to deny entrance to one whose helmet bore the golden slash of the courier?
Without hesitation I climbed the hillock and presented myself impatiently to the guards.
"A message from Pa-Kur," I said, "for the ears of Talena, his Ubara-to-be."
"I will carry the message," said one of the guards, a large man, his eyes suspicious. He regarded me closely. Obviously, I was not anyone he knew.
"The message is for the Ubara-to-be, and for her alone," I said angrily. "Do you deny admittance to the messenger of Pa-Kur?"
"I do not know you," he growled.
"Give me your name," I demanded, "so that I may report to Pa-Kur who it is that denies his message to his future Ubara.
There was an agonized silence, and then the guard stepped aside. I entered the compound, not having a settled plan, but feeling that I must contact Talena. Perhaps together we could arrange an escape at some later time. For the moment I did not even know where in the compound she might be kept.
Within the first wall of black silk, there was a second wall, but this time of iron bars. Pa-Kur was not as careless about his own safety as I had conjectured. Additionally, overhead I could see lines of tarp wire. I walked about the second wall until I came to a gate, where I repeated my story. Here I was admitted without question, as though my helmet were sufficient, guarantee in itself of my right to be there. Inside the second wall, I was escorted among the tents by a tower slave, a black girl whose livery was golden and who wore large golden earrings that matched a golden collar. Behind me, two guards fell into line.
We stopped before a resplendent tent of yellow-andred silk, some forty feet in diameter and twenty feet high at the dome. I turned to my escort and the guards. "Wait here," I said. "My message is for the ears of she who is pledged to Pa-Kur, and for her ears alone." My heart was beating so loudly I wondered that they didn't hear it. I was amazed that my voice sounded so calm.
The guards looked at one another, not having anticipated my request. The tower slave regarded me gravely, as though I had chosen to exercise some long-neglected or obsolescent privilege.
"Wait here," I commanded, and stepped inside the tent.
In the tent was a cage.
It was perhaps a ten-foot cube, entirely enclosed. The heavy metal bars were coated with silver and set with precious stones. I noted with dismay that the cage had no door. It had literally been constructed about its prisoner. A girl sat within the cage, proudly, on a throne. She wore the concealing robes and veils, the full regalia of a Ubara.
Something seemed to tell me to be careful. I don't know what it was. Something seemed to be wrong. I suppressed an impulse to call her name; I restrained an impulse to leap to the bars, to seize her and to crush her to them and to my lips. This must be Talena whom I loved, to whom my life belonged. Yet I approached slowly, almost cautiously. Perhaps it was something in the carriage of the muffled figure, something in the way the head was held. It was much like Talena, but not as she had been. Had she been injured or drugged? Did she not recognize me? I stood before the cage and lifted my helmet from my head. She gave no sign of recognition. I sought for some glimmer of awareness in those green eyes, for the slightest sign of affection or welcome.
My voice sounded faraway. "I am the messenger of Pa-Kur," I said. "He wishes me to say that the city will soon fall and that you shall soon sit beside him on the throne of Ar."
"Pa-Kur is kind," said the girl.
I was stunned, but I revealed not the slightest surprise. Indeed, I was momentarily overwhelmed with the cunning of Pa-Kur and rejoiced that I had followed something of Kazrak's counsels of patience and caution, that I had not disclosed my identity, that I had not attempted to cut my way to her side and bring her out by the blade of the sword. Yes, that would have been a mistake. The voice of the girl in the cage was not the voice of the girl I loved. The girl in the cage was not Talena.
Chapter 17
Chains of Gold
I HAD BEEN OUTWITTED BY the brilliance of Pa-Kur. It was with a heart filled with bitterness that I left the compound of the Assassin and returned to Kazrak's tent. In the next days, frequenting the Paga tents and markets, I sought, by cornering slaves and challenging swordsmen, to learn the whereabouts of Talena. But the answer, when I received an answer, whether by virtue of a golden tarn disk or mortal fear, was always the same — that she was kept in the tent of red and yellow silk. I had no doubt that these minions of Pa-Kur whom I either cajoled or terrorized surely believed that the girl in the cage was Talena. Of those actually living in the compound of Pa-Kur, it was perhaps only he who knew the true location of the girl.
In despair I realized I had done nothing more than make clear the fact that someone was desperately interested in the whereabouts of the girl, and, if anything, this information would make Pa-Kur redouble his precautions for her security and doubtless attempt to apprehend the individual responsible for the inquiries. In these days I did not wear the garb of the Caste of Assassins, but dressed as a nondescript tarnsman, wearing the insignia of no city. Four times I eluded special patrols of Pa-Kur, led by men I had questioned at sword point.
In the tent of Kazrak, ruefully I understood that my efforts had been futile and that the Tarnsman of Marlenus, so to speak, had at last — been neutralized. I considered attempting the destruction of Pa-Kur, but this would not only be unlikely of success but would bring me no nearer my goal of rescuing Talena. Yet nothing but the sight of my beloved would have brought me more satisfaction than driving my sword into the heart of the Assassin.
These were terrible days for me. In addition to my own failures, I received no word from Kazrak, and reports from Ar on the stand of Marlenus in the Central Cylinder became obscure and contradictory. As nearly as I could determine, he and his men had been overcome, and the height of the Central Cylinder was again in the hands of the Initiates. If this had not yet taken place, it was momentarily expected.
The siege was in its fifty-second day, and the forces of Pa-Kur had breached the first wall. It was being methodically razed in seven places, to allow for the passage of the siege towers to the second wall. Moreover, hundreds of light "flying bridges" were being constructed; at the moment of the final assault these would be extended from the first wall to the second, and the men of Pa-Kur would scramble upward toward the looming ramparts of Ar's last defense. Rumor had it that dozens of tunnels, unimpeded, now extended beneath the second wall and could be opened in a matter of hours at various places in the city. The countermining operations of the men of Ar had apparently been desultory or incompetent. It was Ar's misfortune, at this most critical time in its long history, to be in the hands of.the bleakest of all castes of men, the Initiates, skilled only in ritual, mythology, and superstition. Worse, from the reports of deserters, it became clear that the city was starving and that water was running short. Some of the defenders were opening the veins of surviving tarns, to drink the blood. The tiny urt, a common rodent of Gorean cities, was bringing a silver tarn disk in the markets. Disease had broken out. Groups of looters from Ar itself prowled the streets. In the camp of Pa-Kur we expected the city to fall any day, any hour. Yet, indomitably, Ar refused to surrender.
I truly believe that the brave men of Ar, in their valorous if blind love for their city, would have maintained the walls until the last slain warrior had been thrown from them to the streets below, but the Initiates would not have it so. In a surprise move, which perhaps should have been anticipated, the High Initiate of the city of Ar appeared on the walls. This man claimed to be the Supreme Initiate of all Initiates on Gor and to take his appointment from the Priest-Kings themselves. Needless to say, his claim was not acknowledged by the Chief Initiates of Gor's free cities, who regarded themselves as sovereign in their own cities. The Supreme Initiate, as he called himself, raised a shield and then set it at his feet. He then raised a spear and set it, like the shield, at his feet. This gesture is a military convention employed by commanders on Gor when calling, for a parley or conference. It signifies a truce, literally the temporary putting aside of weapons. In surrender, on the other hand, the shield straps and the shaft of the spear are broken, indicating that the vanquished has disarmed himself and places himself at the mercy of theconqueror.