«Hmmm… and you say he gave her to Blade?»
«So Blade told me. It did not make him happy.»
«Jantor is cunning,» said Sybelline. «He sends Alixe to Blade to amuse him and also to spy.»
«I thought that,» said Norn. «Just as you sent me to spy. But with me it is different. I love the man Blade. I want only him. I would be his woman.»
Sybelline said nothing to that, only smiled at herself in the mirror. When Norn had served her purpose-but that could wait.
«I have observed something else,» said Norn.
Sybelline swerved on her stool. «Well? Am I to beg for this information?»
«The child Alixe is a troublemaker,» said Norn. «I have watched her closely and when I could I spoke to her. I do not have much time with Blade, as you know, for all the other women are jealous and the line is long, but I have observed. Alixe is a stupid child, a stubborn child. She makes trouble for the pure joy of making it. I think this is so, for I cannot believe that Jantor told her to act so.»
Sybelline did not betray her interest. A vague, half-formed idea crept into her mind. She knew how much Jantor cared for his little Alixe, how he would bed no other but she, and what a wrench it must have been to deliver her to Blade. Of course Jantor meant to take her back as soon as he could. But meanwhile-
Was there any way the child-woman Alixe could be used?
«Continue,» she commanded Norn. «Tell me, how does Alixe act? How does she make trouble?»
«The man Blade has a servant,» explained Norn. «He is called Sart. He is really a slave, for the man Blade defeated him in battle and spared his life, but the man Blade does not call him slave and-«
«I know all that,» said Sybelline. «Get to the important matter.»
«Blade will have nothing to do with her, will not bed her. I do not understand this but it is so.»
«That is nothing remarkable,» said Sybelline in scorn. «After he has bedded ten to fifteen Gnomen cows a day, his is fatigued.»
«Perhaps that is it. But the child Alixe is unhappy. She is not really a child and has bedded her father since she was ten years. But Blade ignores her. She turns to the slave Sart and teases him. She touches him and offers herself and displays her body. The slave, Sart, is terrified.»
Sybelline smiled. «I do not blame him. If he touches Jantor's child and bedmate he will be sent to the pits. But what of Blade in all this?»
Norn shook her head. «I do not think the man Blade really understands what is happening. He is strange in many ways I do not understand. And he is busy, of course. There is always a line of women to be serviced.»
«Then Blade did not tell you this?»
«No. I went to wash, for Blade insists on it now, and I saw Alixe taunting the poor slave.»
Sybelline's interest was growing with every word. «Taunting him-how? Exactly?»
Norn's tone was matter of fact. She was a Gnomen female, albeit a beautiful one, and she regarded sex much as she did food and drink.
She explained: «Alixe was making Sart kneel before her, as a slave should, and she was making him kiss her parts. I was not seen for a moment, so I know it was not for my benefit. I saw Sart stop groveling and reach for her and she struck him in the face and laughed. She told him that if he touched her she would tell Jantor.»
Sybelline was thoughtful. «And Blade suspects nothing of this?»
Norn shrugged. «I do not think so. He does not think as we do.»
«I know that also,» said Sybelline. «That is why I need him. I think he has more brain power than the Morphi, even perhaps as much as the Selenes, and I know he is a warrior. He would probably not notice such a trifle as Sart being plagued by Alixe. I doubt that it is important.»
Norn looked doubtful. Association with Sybelline had made her more intelligent than most Gnomen girls. Now she said, «It might cause trouble before you are ready for it, mistress.»
But Sybelline's thoughts were elsewhere. She dismissed the girl and thought no more of the slave and Alixe. When she was alone, she began to dress carefully in Morphi clothing. She must go up into the city-alone and unseen, to face her own masters.
CHAPTER 9
There was no way in which Blade could have foreseen the disaster. True that he was not at his peak either physically or mentally, due to the strain of excessive copulation, but even at the height of his powers he could not have guessed that Alixe, beneath her childish exterior, was sexually precocious beyond anything he could understand. The situation developed slowly, with Blade unaware of the emerging pattern.
During his brief periods of rest, he sought to get in touch with Lord Leighton and Home Dimension by means of the crystal implanted in his brain. He did not always succeed in making contact. When he did, the message came back:
Will abort mission if you demand. But unless in immediate peril insist you continue try to discover source of power. Suggest possible magnetic field-beams or rays of some sort. Final decision your discretion. L.
That was pretty much that. He bided his time. He knew that the child Alixe spied on him and reported to Jantor, as Norn spied and reported to Sybelline. He sensed the crunch approaching and knew that he must take sides. Jantor had made his offer and had minced no words. Sybelline still did not contact him but through Norn, and the last word had been to wait. When Sybelline was ready, she would let him know.
Alixe tried to invade his bed and Blade constantly repulsed her. Her tantrums should have warned him, but he did not see. When he refused Alixe, she at times screamed and rolled on the floor and clawed and even threatened him.
«I will tell Jantor that you misuse me,» she screamed. «I will have you sent to the five-mile pits.»
«Do as you wish,» he answered. «You are but a babe and I will have nothing to do with you. In any case I am exhausted. You know the task I have, and when I am finished for the day I wish nothing but rest. Continue to torment me, Alixe, and I will send you back to your father.»
Alixe squatted at the foot of his bed and made faces at him. He could not believe that this was the same quiet child who had brought him the chair in Jantor's chambers.
«You are a liar,» she told him. «You do not speak to Norn so, and she is but a little older than I am. As for being a babe, do you not know, are you such a fool, that you do not understand-I have bedded my father for the past two years!»
Nothing he encountered in Dimension X ever shocked Blade, nor did this information, but it was his first inkling that among the Gnomen there was no such thing as incest. Logically, when he had time to examine it, it made sense. Jantor, after all, had fathered all the Gnomen children now alive.
He let it pass without thought. «I care nothing for that,» he told her coldly. «Stay or go, as you wish. But if you stay you will obey me. Now I have had enough of you. Go and amuse yourself while I sleep.»
Blade awoke to find Alixe astride him, trying to arouse him. He cuffed her away, not gently, and she began to berate him.
Blade had had it. He seized her and laid her over his knee and began smacking her hard little buttocks with his open hand. He meant to hurt and he did. Alixe screamed at the top of her voice, interspersing the screams with foul oaths. He had never heard such filth pour from a child's mouth. He laid on all the harder.
Sart came rushing in. He pleaded with Blade.
«You risk our lives, master. She is Jantor's child and favorite. When you strike her, you strike Jantor. Please, master, I beg you. No more. It is sure to get back to Jantor and-«
One of the Gnomen women was waiting just outside the door. She had been waiting a long time, first in a long line, and she had grown impatient. When she heard the screams she could not control her curiosity and stepped through the hangings to see her herself.