“We have our regulations, Master,” said the pit master.
“That technicality was cleared this morning,” said the leader of the strangers.
The majority of the men in black tunics, incidentally, save for two who returned to the surface, to reparir the fault of their papers, had remained overnight in the quarters of the pit master. It seemed that, as tenacious and terrible as sleen, they would take their repose on the very trail they followed. Too, I am sure they did not trust the pit master. The officer of Treve had left the quarters of the pit master shortly after the arrival of the strangers, putatively to ensure that new papers would be properly prepared, that there would be no further difficulty in the documents, supposedly of transfer or extradition. The men in the black tunics who had remained overnight in the quarters of the pit master, including their leader and his lieutenant, seemed to be strange fellows. They were much unlike many, if not most, of the men of this world. They did not laugh, they did not joke, they did not tell stories. They were silent, frightening, terrible men. I did not think they had Home Stones. If they had some loyalty, and I do not doubt they did, I think it was rather to some bloody oath, or dark covenant, or even to a leader. They attended to their equipment, they sharpened their swords. They drank only water. They ate sparingly. The hospitality of the pit master, offering us to them, was declined. Even the women chained at the wall were not touched. We were, however, denied our blankets, and we must all be chained, even those in the kennels. One of the girls at the wall, Tissia, I do not know what she had done, was savagely kicked by one of the black-tunicked fellows. “Temptress!” he denounced her. She wept and crawled away from him, pressing herself against the wall in her chains. I supposed we were all temptresses, all women. But I could not understand the meaningless savagery of his rejection of her. How different it was from the average response of the average man of this world. The men of this world delight in our femaleness, and in its joyous subjugation, in owning and mastering it. They prize our softness, our beauty, our desirability. And it does not occur to them, in this natural world, to conceal their desires to relate to it in the order of nature, as a dominant sex to one whose biological calling it is to delight, to please, and obey. But these men, these men in dark tunics, were so different! They had us naked in our chains, but then they ignored us. It was no wonder that we drew back in our kennels, and huddled against the wall. Such treatment made us feel small, and ashamed of our beauty. But then perhaps these men had other concerns, concerns which took priority over the curves of chained bond-sluts. Perhaps when their business was done we, or such as we, might be recollected. Perhaps we might then, nude, serve them their food and drink, diffidently. I would fear to serve such men. This morning, before they left the quarters of the pit master each had, in turn, turned away from us, then being anointed, or something by one of his fellows. Each, following this ritual, had been donned his helmet.
“This one,” said the lieutenant, pulling Fina forward by the hair; “Was not kenneled.”
“Cut her throat,” said the leader of the strangers.
“No!” said the pit master, raising his hand.
“Show us the lower corridors,” said the leader of the darkly clad men.
“No, Master!” wept Fina.
“They are dangerous,” said the pit master.
“Show us,” said the leader of the strangers.
“I will show you,” said the pit master.
“He is a weakling,” said the lieutenant.
“Release the slave,” said the leader of the strangers, “but keep her, and the others, with us.”
The fellow who had brought Fina forward let her go. She, sobbing, began to back away. But another fellow stopped her, forcibly. He took her by the upper left arm and thrust her forward. She would remain with us.
“You will recognize him, my good Gito?” inquired the leader of the strangers.
“I am sure of it,” said the furtive fellow, the side of his face moving under the scar tissue. His face was such that it might once have been thrust into boiling oil.
“Go first,” said the leader of the strangers to the pit master.
“Master!” protested Fina, in misery. But she was cuffed to silence.
I had seen nothing of the officer of Treve this morning. He had, I gathered, thought it best to avoid the depths this day. Indeed, the guards of the pits had been dismissed. “We have no need of them,” had said the leader of the helmeted, darkly clad brethren.
We followed the pit master, descending toward the lower corridors.
“Cursed Assassins!” cried a fellow from a cell.
In a few minutes we were in the lower corridors. Here and there there was water on the corridor floor. It was cold to my bare feet. Sometimes it splashed, too, on my ankles, from the tread of the men about me. By myself, or with the pit master, I could avoid the water, keeping to the higher parts of the floor, but it was not easy to do so now, I muchly in line, with the other girls, the men about. Here and there the ceiling of the corridor was so low that even I must bend over. Two of the fellows with the leader carried lanterns. The passage was lit, too, here and there, with tiny lamps. Common cord held my wrists behind my back. I was tightly bound.
“Move back the observation panel on that door,” said the leader of the helmeted men.
One of the fellows with a lantern undid the panel latch and slid the panel, in its tracks, to one side. He lifted the lantern near the opening and peered within.
“Something is within,” he said.
“Open the door,” said the leader of the helmeted men.
“There is only a peasant within,” said the pit master. “He does not even know who he is.”
“And who is he?”
“41.”
“ ’41’?”
“Prisoners in this corridor are referred to only by numbers,” said the pit master.
“Let us see him,” said the leader of the strangers.
“ I do not have the key,” said the pit master.
“Why do you insist upon obstructing us in the line of our duty?” inquired the leader of the strangers. “Do you think no report will be made of this to the administration, to the administrator, to the high council?”
“I do not have the keys,” said the pit master.
“Keys may be fetched,” said a man.
“Tools may be brought,” said another. “We may then force the door.”
“I weary of these hindrances,” said the leader of the helmeted men.
“Shall we go back for the keys, for tools?” asked a man.
“Where are the keys?” asked the leader of the helmeted men.
“I do not know,” said the pit master.
“Seize him,” said the leader of the helmeted men.
The pit master was seized. Four men held him. He did not struggle. I think they did not know his strength. He did not try to throw them off.
The leader of the helmeted men pulled the pit master’s head up, by the hair.
“You are a tarsk, indeed,” said the leader of the helmeted men.
The pit master looked up at him, his mouth open, his eyes rolling. He growled, a sound not human.
“Where are the keys?’ asked the leader of the helmeted men.
“I do not know,” said the pit master.
“Kill him,” said the leader of the helmeted men. The lieutenant removed his dagger from its sheath.
“No, Masters!” cried Fina, thrusting herself forward, falling to her knees in the damp corridor. “He has not spoken the truth to you. The keys are here! They are on a cord, about his neck!”
the leader of the helmeted men reached inside the tunic of the pit master and pulled forth keys, on a string. He broke the string, jerking it against the back of the neck of the pit master, freeing it.
“Open the door,” he said to one of the men.
The pit master looked down at Fina.
“Forgive me, Master,” she said, putting down her head.