Brotherband 4: Slaves of Socorro (35 page)

As they stepped onto the sand-covered floor of the arena, they were met by half a dozen guards, all armed with swords and spears and wearing leather and mail armour. They wore the now familiar turban/helmet combination. The guards formed a loose cordon around them, watching them warily, ready for any sign of aggression.

Hal held up his hands in a gesture of peace.

‘Relax,’ he told them. ‘We’re here to sell, not to fight.’

One of them, obviously the senior, gestured to the sand at his feet.

‘Weapons,’ he said. ‘Drop your weapons.’

Hal turned to his companions. ‘Do as he says,’ he told them. He could see that neither Stig nor Jesper liked the idea of surrendering their weapons. Thorn appeared more philosophical about the whole thing.

‘You’ll get them back when you leave,’ the guard told them. ‘But no weapons are allowed in the slave quarters.’

That was reasonable enough, Hal thought. There were dull thuds as Stig’s axe, then Jesper’s and Thorn’s swords, fell to the sand. One of the guards handed his spear to his neighbour and moved forward, stooping quickly to gather the weapons. He carried them to one side, and deposited them on a table.

‘Knives too,’ said the man in charge. All of the Skandians were wearing saxe knives. At his urging, they unbuckled them and handed the belts and sheathed weapons to the same guard. The saxes joined the other weapons on the table. Hal’s waist felt unnaturally light without the reassuring weight of the knife nestled there.

Satisfied that they posed no threat, the guard in command beckoned them to follow, heading for the opposite gateway. They fell in behind him, Hal leading the way with Ingvar, then Jesper, Thorn and Stig in a tight knot. Jesper’s eyes darted quickly about him, taking in the size of the gates and any other detail that might be important when they came to break in. So far, he could see nothing that would delay him more than a few seconds.

They trudged through the thick sand to the gateway. The guards kept pace with them, forming a screen around them. They stepped into the shade of the entry tunnel and the commander of their escort produced a ring of keys and proceeded to unlock the gate that faced them.

Jesper’s lip twitched derisively as he looked at the key, and the massive lock it fitted.

The guard shoved one of the double gates open and gestured for them to enter. They trooped in, their escorts following them, and found themselves in a large, well-lit room.

It was bare of furniture, apart from a rectangular table set facing the entry. A man sat at the table, looking up at them as they entered. He was small and dapper, with olive skin and a thin black moustache. He was dressed in the usual long white robe but, instead of a
kheffiyeh
, he wore a green turban. His dark, quick-moving eyes assessed them, lingering for a moment on Ingvar’s massive frame. He quickly categorised Stig and Thorn, marking them down as guards – muscle tasked with keeping the massive slave in line. Hal, he could see, was in charge. Jesper was another matter altogether. He frowned and pointed at him, addressing himself to Hal.

‘Who is this?’

‘My secretary,’ Hal replied without hesitation. ‘My assistant,’ he added, when the man seemed puzzled. The dark eyes checked Jesper again and seemed satisfied with the answer. Probably, he thought cynically, the ‘assistant’ was the only one among them who could count or calculate.

‘I’m Mahmel,’ the man said, making no movement to rise or to shake hands with them. He wasn’t introducing himself so much as identifying himself to them, and that required no ceremony. ‘I’m the market co-ordinator. You’re looking to sell this slave, I take it?’

Hal prevaricated. ‘Well, I could be,’ he said. ‘It depends on the price I get. What’s he worth?’

Mahmel looked at him with world-weary eyes. He wasn’t about to start haggling.

‘Where are you from?’ he asked, changing tack. Hal wondered what that had to do with the price but he answered readily enough.

‘We’re Hellenese,’ he said. ‘You know our country?’

‘Yes. I know it,’ Mahmel said in a bored tone. ‘And I know the people of Helleno love to haggle. You’ll do it all day if you get the chance. But we don’t do it here in this slave market. Your slave here –’ he jerked a thumb at Ingvar ‘– is worth whatever the highest bidder is willing to pay for him. No more. No less.’

‘That might not be acceptable to me,’ Hal said, a trace of righteous indignation in his voice.

Mahmel shrugged. He made it an expressive, graceful movement.

‘Then that will be a pity, because you will take what is offered. That’s the rule of this market. Once you bring a slave here for sale, you accept our terms and conditions. You can’t beat around the bush and waste everyone’s time with your Hellenese-style bargaining. He’s here. He’s for sale. You take what you get – less our commission.’

‘Nobody told me that,’ Hal began.

Mahmel raised a hand to stop him. ‘Did you ask anyone?’

Hal hesitated. ‘Well . . . no. But I –’

‘Then that was your mistake,’ the manager said, with a tone that said no further discussion was invited. ‘If you bring him here to sell him, you automatically accept the rules and conditions of the market.’

‘That’s not fair! I –’

‘You assumed that you could set your own rules? Well, you can’t. He’s here. He’s in the auction in three days’ time. And he’ll stay here until then.’

Hal glanced desperately at Thorn and Stig. Thorn gave the slightest shrug of his shoulders. They couldn’t really argue too strongly. They were unarmed and outnumbered. Mahmel had obviously done this before. Yet they hadn’t considered the possibility that Ingvar might be held here and forbidden to leave.

Ingvar stepped forward, his hands joined in a pleading gesture towards Mahmel. The instant he moved, there was a multiple rasp of steel on leather and their escort all drew their swords. He stepped back a pace immediately, but spoke in a pitiful whine.

‘Please, sir,’ he said, ‘may I talk to my master?’

Up until now, the discussion had been carried on in the common tongue. But now Ingvar spoke in Skandian.

Mahmel frowned, obviously not understanding. ‘I don’t speak Hellenese,’ he snapped. Then he looked at Hal. ‘Tell him to speak the universal tongue if he speaks to me. Better still, tell him not to speak to me.’

But before Hal could say anything, Ingvar turned to him and dropped to his knees, sobbing as he spoke. He had spoken Skandian to see if Mahmel could understand the language. Now, seeing that he obviously couldn’t, Ingvar spoke urgently to Hal. His words, however, were completely at variance to the tone of submissive pleading that he adopted.

‘This is a good thing, Hal. If I’m kept prisoner here, I can contact the Araluan captives and get them ready for the breakout.’

Hal glanced at him, working overtime to keep the look of admiration from his face. People all too often thought of Ingvar as slow, because of his size and his poor vision. But his mind was as sharp as a sword and he’d instantly seen the advantage that would come from having someone on the inside at the slave market.

‘Good point, Ingvar. I hadn’t thought of that,’ he said, making his words sound harsh and commanding. He looked back at Mahmel. ‘I’ve told him that if he doesn’t obey you, you’ll beat him with whips.’

Mahmel shrugged. ‘Of course I will. Someone that size needs to be kept in line.’

‘Exactly. And that raises another matter. If you’re planning to keep him prisoner here . . .’ He paused.

‘And I am.’

‘Then I want reassurance that you’re capable of holding him. He’s my property, he’s a valuable slave and I want to know that your arrangements here are secure. After all, as you point out, he’s big and powerful and he could be a handful for your men.’

Mahmel considered the request. It was perfectly reasonable, he thought. After all, the young Hellenese had deemed it necessary to have two brawny armed men to control the slave. The request simply showed that he had a good head for business, and that was something Mahmel respected.

‘That’s logical,’ he said. ‘You can inspect our arrangements while we take him down to the holding pen.’

He clicked his fingers at the guard commander, who stepped forward, his hand out to take the chain from Hal. Hal passed him the chain and the guard started towards a door at the rear of the room.

Ingvar baulked. ‘I’ll see you in two days, Hal,’ he said in Skandian, making his voice sound like a submissive whimper.

‘Trust me, Ingvar. We won’t leave you here,’ Hal replied in the same language. Then, to Mahmel, he said: ‘Right. Let’s see how secure this prison is.’ Sensing that Mahmel was about to order his companions to stay behind, he pre-empted the man and pointed to Stig and Thorn.

‘You two stay here,’ he said brusquely. ‘Jesper, come with me.’

Mahmel had, in fact, been on the point of restricting access to Hal alone. But he decided to let the matter ride. The assistant was nowhere near as large or as muscular as the other two and seemed harmless enough.

‘Very well,’ he said. Then he indicated for Hal and Jesper to follow the guards as they led Ingvar through to the slave pen.

They descended a flight of eight stone steps, then the stairway turned ninety degrees to the left and a heavy iron gate barred further progress. The senior guard handed Ingvar’s chain to one of his followers and produced a large key ring from an inner pocket. There were only two keys on it and he used one of them to open the gate. Jesper watched, lynx-eyed. The key turned easily, evidence that the lock was in constant use. Jesper studied the pattern of the wards – the notches cut into the blade of the large key – as the guard withdrew it from the lock. It was a simple enough design and he suppressed a smile. A loop of rope over a post might take him longer to crack, if it was knotted tightly.

They trooped down the stairs and took another right-angle turn to the left. A wooden door, set in an arched opening and reinforced with brass strips, faced them. The area was dimly lit by two lanterns high in the wall beside them. The guard now produced the second key, a smaller one this time. He pounded on the timber door twice in quick succession, then once more after a pause. Then he inserted the key and unlocked the door. Again, the lock turned smoothly and they heard a slight click as it opened.

‘Why knock if you have a key?’ Hal asked.

Mahmel glanced round at him. ‘There are eight guards on the other side of that door. If they hear it opening without that knock, they’ll be ready to cut down anyone who enters.’

Hal nodded. ‘Impressive. How often do you change the signal?’

‘Every week,’ Mahmel told him. ‘We have six patterns and we rotate them at random.’

Hal pursed his lips thoughtfully. It was the second day of the week and they planned to let the slaves loose on the fifth day. He’d wager that the coded knock changed every week on the first day. That meant the knock they had just heard should still be valid when they broke in.

The guardroom was a large square, with flagstone walls and floor. Rush matting was laid over the floor to provide a modicum of comfort. The room was furnished with a table and eight comfortable-looking wooden chairs – all with curved backs and arms. There was an iron stove in the centre of the room, with a pipe chimney that went out through the ceiling. The grate glowed red with flames now. Hal guessed that it was kept burning constantly. In spite of the outside heat, the air in the room was damp and chill. Four bunks were ranged along a second wall and each was occupied by a guard. The other guards were grouped around the table, playing dice. The dice players wore their armour and their weapons were stacked close to hand. The four in the bunks were in various stages of undress. Hal studied them keenly, although he appeared to be uninterested in them. None of them were young. Three were grey haired and all of them appeared to be either overweight or in poor condition. They were guards, used to dominating unarmed, submissive prisoners, not fighting men, he assessed. One of them yawned. There were several lanterns in the room, and light also came in through a high skylight.

The men at the table looked up curiously as the group entered. Seeing Mahmel, one of them made to rise, calling the others to attention. But Mahmel waved them down again.

‘Relax,’ he told them. ‘We’re bringing in a new prisoner.’

There was another heavy wooden door on the wall to the right of the point where they had entered. This one, Jesper noted, was locked with a simple draw bolt. The guard commander drew the bolt and they followed him through into a small antechamber, where once more, they encountered an iron grille gate. This led into a huge, low-ceilinged room. As they approached it, there was a murmur of voices and a rustle of movement from within. Hal could make out the pale shape of faces peering at them through the gloom. This was the slave pen, he realised.

‘How many have you got in here?’ he asked.

‘At the moment, seventy-three. Your man makes seventy-four. We can fit ninety at a pinch but we rarely get that many,’ he said.

Hal looked doubtful. ‘Seventy prisoners and you’ve only got eight guards?’ he said. ‘That hardly seems adequate to me.’

Mahmel smiled confidently. ‘It’s adequate. The prisoners are chained in strings of ten or twelve. They’re manacled to the main chain by the wrist, so they find it hard to move. And the guards are armed, of course. Besides, there are also the guards from the gatehouse.’ He indicated the man who was leading Ingvar. ‘There are twenty of them. And there’s a garrison building thirty metres from the main entrance, tasked with keeping order in the gold market. They’re
dooryeh
– fifty fully armed and trained fighting men – not your normal prison guard. They can be in here within minutes if there’s trouble.’

Hal nodded, maintaining an absent, careless look on his face. But his brain was racing as he added the figures. Seventy-eight guards, he thought. That was going to take some handling.

The guard commander turned to Hal now, fingering the padlock that fastened the heavy chain around Ingvar’s neck.

‘Got the key?’ he asked. ‘We won’t need this any longer. I’ll chain him with one of the strings inside.’