The monster, or whatever it might have been, entered the passage, the slave behind him. He paused at a panel set in the stone, unlocked it, opened it, and revealed several lavers, one of which he moved. Lines of bars emerged from the walls about the pool and, diagonally, descended, fitting into sockets in the retaining wall. This sealed off the area of the pool. He moved a second lever, and I saw bars descend, closing our passage. From the sound I thought that other passages might have been sealed, as well. I could not see from where I was. As there were several levers it seemed possible that passages might be sealed off selectively, or, perhaps, as I thought might be the case now at the same time. The panel box was perhaps a master control for the adjacent passages. If all the passages were sealed off, and the side bars engaged, as they were now, that would isolate the walkway. I could see the walkway beyond the bars in the torchlight. Another lever was depressed. I did not, at the time, understand its function, but, in a moment or two, its effect had become clear. It must have opened some access between the pool and the walkway, for I heard a scratching and sniffing and then saw, to my horror, on the other side of the bars of the passage gate, reflected in the torchlight, the blazing eyes of one of the large rodentlike creatures. There were other bodies, too, behind it. I saw snouts pressed against the bars. These things then might, if one wished, be introduced into various passages, depending on the opening and shutting of the gates. I also learned, later, that access to nesting areas was similarly provided. This was, of course, but one area in the “pits,” of the many different sorts of areas, and, I might mention, neither the best nor the worst. They constitute almost a city beneath a city. I think regiments might lie concealed within them, and I have little doubt they could, passage by passage, be tenaciously defended. I would come to know certain portions of them very well, but in many portions I would not be permitted. I was, after all, a slave.
“Precede us,” said the pit master.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Turn left here,” he would say, “and right there, and now left again,” and so on.
I was soon bewildered and lost, but, nude, head down and bound, I must precede them.
“Harta!” said he. “Faster!”
I hurried, even more, as I could.
Mostly I could see little but the floor of the passage at my feet, and the shadows, my own before me, and his, a misshapen, gliding thing, half on the floor, half on the wall, to the right of mine.
“Left here,” he would say. “Right here!”
“Yes, Master!” I would cry.
I was aware, too, as we passed them, the gates here and there, some barred, beyond which I could see the darkness of a further corridor, and some of plain iron, secured with bolts and padlocks, leading perhaps, too, to further passages. Sometimes I trod not on stone but on perforated plate of grill work. What, if anything, or of what depth, might lie beneath most such platings or grillwork I did not know. Beneath one such flooring, however, far below, I heard moving water. Beneath another I thought I heard, far off, a sort of roaring. I did not know the cause of the sound. It may have been that of wind or water, oddly magnified and distorted in the tunnels, or, perhaps, that of some beast or beasts.
“Hold!” said the monster behind me, sharply.
Instantly I stopped.
I screamed!
From either side of the passage, with a swift, loud, rattling sound, there had suddenly sprung forth a set of sharpened metal projections.
The closest of these was only inches from me.
I sank faintly to my knees, sick, unable to stand.
“On your feet,” I heard.
I struggled to my feet. I could see the torchlight reflected on the points.
“In the pits,” said he, “there are numerous such devices. Some you will learn. Others you will be kept ignorant of, even within passages with which you will be familiar. Will they be set, or not? It will be in your interests to confine your movements to prescribed routes at specified times. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“It is well that you obeyed promptly,” he said.
“Yes, Master” I said. “Thank you, Master.”
We are, of course, trained to instant obedience. The value of such training, of course, is easy to see in matters as obvious as that recent noted. What may not be as immediately obvious is its similar value in avoiding what may be even greater dangers, such as displeasing the master. We are not first here, at least women such as I. It is the men, they, who are the masters.
He went to the side of the wall, as I could see from the shadow, but I could not detect what he did. The points receded into the walls.
“Precede us,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Harta! Harta!”
“Yes, Master!” I wept.
Sometimes, too, we crossed chasmlike gaps in the passages. We did this on narrow, metal bridges. These bridges were not such as the earlier “bridge,” that which had led toward the surface of the turret, or tower, which had been little more than a flat rail. These bridges, while frightening, were considerably less harrowing. They must have ranged from twelve to eighteen inches in width. In the torchlight I picked my way carefully across the. I did not dally, for fear the monster behind me. I feared him more than the bridge. The bridges were locked in place on pegs. For one possessing the means, they could be freed and drawn away, to one side or the other, or even plunged into the opening below. I did not know how deep these openings were. Given the narrowness of the bridges a single man, armed, could have defended them against several foes, for they could approach him only singly. The monster behind me, and the lovely slave with the torch, crossed them easily. I was from Earth, however, and was uneasy on such passages, as routine or secure they might have been fro those of this world.
I could not rid my mind of the sudden appearance of the rattling projections. Such devices, I supposed, might be common in places such as these. I had heard, too, of such things as blades and pits. Naturally then I was terrified that I must hurry ahead. Yet I reminded myself that I was not a free person, but only a domestic animal and thus, presumably, as long as I was docile, and obedient, and perfect in my service, and fully pleasing, I might hope to be spared. I do not here, incidentally, discuss the nature of slave traps, as they constitute a different object of discourse. Some of these are rather benign devices, with no object more in mind than to discommode a free woman until the hunters arrive and collect her. Others, with coiled wire, with springs and steel teeth, generally designed for the capture of escaped male slaves can be quite cruel. Smaller, lighter versions of such traps exist for escaped female slaves. Within some of these devices, surrounded by the wire and blades, one cannot move without cutting oneself to pieces. I had once, in training, been carefully entered into one, and then left there, standing, for more than an hour. It helped to impress upon me, as did a thousand other considerations, physical and social, the hopelessness of escape for a female slave.
We crossed another such bridge.
“Hold,” said the pit master.
Instantly I stopped, gasping, looking wildly about me. But he merely unlocked the bridge from its pegs behind us, drew it on our side of the opening, and locked it there, so that it could not be slid back, without being unlocked, from our side.