Renegades of Gor (53 page)

“He can be trusted,” said the man with me. This trust, I gathered, I had earned

on the wall, at the gate, on the walkway. Too, I think there was little truly

secret about this ship, or the others.”

“Do as you wish,” said the fellow on board.

I lifted up the canvas a bit, and then let it drop back, in place. I had read

there, in archaic script, the name ‘Tina’.

“Your ship, then,” I said to the fellow on board, “is indeed the Tina.”

“There are doubtless many ships with that name,” said the fellow, smiling.

(pg.352) “And what is the port of registry of your ship?” I asked.

“It is registered west of here,” he grinned.

“Victoria?” I asked.

“Or Fina, or somewhere,” he said.

“Surely these ships with you, those surprisingly flying no colors, are not of

the Vosk League.”

“We are an innocent trading fleet,” he said.

“One Cosian ship has been destroyed in the harbor,” I said, “and another has

been disabled.”

“Yes,” he said. “It seems two regrettable accidents occurred in the harbor.”

“You are embarking women and children,” I said.

“Passengers,” he said.

“Some may think these are ships of the Vosk League,” I said.

“What do you think, Vitruvius?” asked the fellow, leaning on the rail.

“It seems to me unlikely that these could be ships of the Vosk League,” said the

fellow beside me, “for the Vosk League, as is well known, is neutral. Does it

not seem unlikely to you, as well?”

“Yes,” said the man on the ship, “It seems quite unlikely to me, as well.”

“What is your name?’ I asked the fellow on the ship.

“What is yours?” he asked.

“Tarl,” I said.

“That is a common name,” he said.

“Yes,” I said, “especially in the north.”

“My name, too, is a common one,” he said, “especially west, on the river.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“Jason,” said he.

“Of what town?” I asked.

“The same which serves as the home port of my ship,” he said.

“West of here?” I said.

“Yes,” he said.

“Victoria?” I asked.

“Or Fina, or somewhere,” he said.

“I wish you well,” I said.

“I wish you well,” he said.

(pg.353) Women and children, and now men, were being taken aboard this vessel as

well. Turning about, looking back to my left, toward the flagship, I saw

Aemilianus being carried aboard. Some tarnsmen flew overhead, but none fired

downward.

I watched the piers being emptied, women and children, and men, of Ar’s Station,

embarking.

I then saw, a rope on her neck, her hands thonged behind her back, still veiled,

still clad in the provocative rages which had been those of the former Lady

Publia, Lady Claudia. She had been caught among the crowds of women and children

on the pier, perhaps noted by the wounded Marsias, or one of the others who had

been with us in the cell, or perhaps by others still, alerted by one or the

other of them, as to her probable disguise. The Cosians had not come to the

piers. She had not received her opportunity to surrender herself to them,

begging from them the desperate boon and privilege of reduction to absolute

slavery. Among others boarding the flagship, too, in her improvised hood, naked,

her hands, too, thonged behind her back, as I had fastened them earlier, being

pulled on her leash by one free woman, being herded from behind, poked and

jabbed, and struck, with a stick by another, stumbling, ascending the narrow

plank to the flagship, was a slave, one who had once been Lady Publia of Ar’s

Station.

I saw her lose her footing once on the plank and fall, belly downward on it, her

legs on either side of it. She must have been utterly terrified, in the darkness

of the hood, helpless, unable even to cry out. The first woman tugged at the

leash. The other beat her with the stick. She struggled to her feet, and then,

obedient to the leash, and trying to hurry before the cruel incitements of the

stick, she ascended the plank. Female slaves are seldom left in any doubt on Gor

that they are slaves, and particularly when they are in the keeping of free

women. I saw two of the oarsmen lift her from the height of the plank, down,

between the thwarts, and then place her kneeling, behind them, amidships, on the

deck. Other slaves already knelt there. Too, in that place, kneeling, too, a

neck rope dangling before her, but in no one’s keeping, knelt Lady Claudia.

The two free women who had had the former lady Publia (pg.354) in their care

were courteously directed forward, where, before and about the stern castle and

even on the small bow deck, were gathered several woman and children. These,

already, were being fed ships’ rations. Four or five ships, crowded with

passengers, had come and gone more than once at the piers. These were ferrying

passengers to the ships lying at anchor in the harbor. Then they themselves

retained their last loads of passengers and, too, drawn away from the piers, out

in the harbor, rode at anchor. Many other passengers had boarded the ship which

had remained wharfed, such as the Tina and Tais. The various ships were now

crowded with the men, women and children of Ar’s Station. I doubted that any one

of them now held less than a hundred passengers.

It must be remembered, too, that these were river galleys and, on the whole,

smaller than the galleys of Thassa. Too, the river galley, for those whom it

might interest, is normally shorted masted than a Thassa galley, seldom has more

than one mast, and seldom carried the varieties of sails, changed on the yard

according to wind conditions, that are carried by a Thassa galley. River

galleys, also, as would be expected, seldom carry more than twenty oars to a

side, and are almost always single-banked.

Fifteen ships, mostly of Port Cos, were now at the piers, which, now, except for

armed men, were mostly empty. I heard a battle horn sound, from the stern castle

of the Tais. It was, I gathered, the recall. In orderly fashion, unchallenged,

the numerous soldiers, guardsmen, armed oarsmen and such who had lined the inner

side of the piers, facing the inner harbor, withdrew to the fifteen waiting

ships. Many clambered over the sides. Others made use of various planks and

gangplanks.

On some of the ships now there was scarcely room for the oarsmen to ply their

levers. Water lapped high on the hulls; the rams were now at least a yard under

the water; even the lower tips of their shearing blades were submerged. Mariners

of some ships freed the mooring lines of others, and then their own, and then

boarded, some of them using the lines themselves to regain the decks. Several of

the ships then departed from the piers, pushing off with the three traditional

poles. Among these was the ship called the Tina.

I looked out into the harbor.

(pg.355) I saw some of the ships there drawing up their anchors, generally two,

one at the bow, one at the stern, and putting about, those that had faced the

piers. The huge, painted eyes of these ships were then turning north, toward the

mighty Vosk. The eyes of the other ships out in the harbor, those which had had

the task of ferrying out passengers, already faced north. Such eyes are common

on Gorean ships. How else, some mariners inquire, could she see her way? To the

Gorean mariner, as to many who have followed the ways of the sea, learning her,

fearing her, loving her, the ship is more than an engineered structure of iron

and wood. It is more than tackle and blocks, beams and planks, canvas and

calking. There is an indefinability and preciousness about her, a mystique which

informs her, an exceeding of what is seen, a nature and wondrous mystery, like

that of a companion and lover, a creature and friend. Though I have seldom heard

them speak explicitly of this, particularly when landsmen are present, many

Gorean mariners seem to believe that the ship is in some way alive. This is

supposed to occur when the eyes have been painted. It is then, some say, that

she comes alive, when she can see. I suppose this may be regarded as

superstition; on the other hand, it may also be regarded as love.

The ships in the outer harbor which had been facing north now, too, drew up

their anchors.

I looked back toward the landing and the citadel in the distance, across the

inner harbor. I could see the remains of walkway from where I was. The citadel

was burning.

I looked back to the harbor.

The first of the ships was now moving toward the river. others were following

her, in line.

Once again I looked back toward the citadel.

Smoke drifted out to the piers, too, from the city itself. Those fires, I

supposed, might burn for two or three days yet.

I looked at the walkway. It had been a good fight, the fight that had been

fought here. I did not think that those of either Cos or Ar’s Station had cause

to regret what had been done there. Glory is its own victory.

The last ships at the piers, one by one, began to depart their wharfage. I could

see the water fall from the lifted oar blades into the harbor. Only the Tais,

then, remained at the wharf.

(pg.356) “Captain?” said a voice. It was that of the young crossbowman.

His friend was with him.

They cast off the mooring lines and then followed me aboard. After our boarding

the plank was drawn back, over the rail. Three mariners, managing the long

poles, thrust the Tais from the pier.

“Out oars!” I heard the oar master call.

21
   
The River

(pg.357) “Let the first of the two females be fetched,” said Aemilianus.

It was now the middle of the morning, following yesterday’s late-afternoon

action at the piers.

The Tais moved with the current west on the Vosk. She led the main body of the

flotilla westward. Ahead of us, in oblique formation, barely discernible, were

four smaller galleys. These formed, as it were, an advance guard. Similarly,

behind the main body of the flotilla, bringing up the rear, back a pasang or so,

flying no colors, their markings concealed, were two galleys. One of these was

the ship to whose captain I had spoken earlier, the Tina.

“Yes, Commander,” said a man.

Aemilianus sat on the deck, rather before the steps leading up to the helm deck

and, above that, to the height of the stern castle, leading against a backrest

of canvas and rope. Calliodorus of Port Cos, his friend, stood near him. beside

him, too, stood his aide, Surilius. Marsias, too, and the fellows whom I had

encountered in the cell earlier, and who had fought with us on the walkway, were

there, too. The grizzled fellow, too, had asked to be present. These were

wounded. Marsias and one other fellow were lying on pallets. The others of the

wounded sat on the deck. The young man, Marcus, was there, too. It was he who

had made it through to Port Cos and returned with the ships which had made

possible the evacuation from the piers. Now, in spite of his youth, he (pg.358)

stood high in these councils, those of the survivors of Ar’s Station. Many

others were there, too, several of whom had fought with me on the wall and

elsewhere. Among them were the two young fellows who had served me so well on

the wall, as my messengers, and had served well later, too, on the landing.

Those who stood with us here, I gathered, stood high among the survivors of Ar’s

Station.

I looked about myself.

It was remarkable to see the difference in the fellows from Ar’s Station, now

that they had had some food and a decent night’s sleep, though only stretched

out on the crowded deck of a galley. It had been perhaps the first night’s sleep

many of them had had in weeks, not disrupted by watches or alarms.

The “first of the two females” had not yet been fetched. They were arranging a

special chaining for her. This would be the one in the improvised hood. I had

had her hood pushed up yesterday evening and early this morning, though at

neither time in such a way as to uncover her eyes, and, after having had her

warned to silence, had had her gag removed, and had had her fed and watered.

Though she would know that she was on a galley and moving with the current on

the Vosk, thus west, she had no real idea as to where she was or what was to be

done with her. She was being kept with other women, also ordered to silence,

who, with one exception, were slaves. The voices she had heard about her, for

the most part, naturally enough, given the crew of the Tais, would have had

Cosians accents, or accents akin to them.

Yesterday afternoon, shortly after we had cleared the harbor at Ar’s Station, I

had drawn the mask of Marsias from my features, and had shaken my head, glad to

feel the air of the Vosk about me, so fresh and clear.

“I thought it was you,” had said Aemilianus, weakly. “It had to be you. your

escape and that of the heinous traitress, Lady Claudia, became generally known

after the recall of the troops from the citadel, in the retreat to the landing.

We were informed of it by the good Marsias, and his fellow guardsmen. Too, there

was no sword like yours in Ar’s Station.”

“You might perhaps have joined with those of Cos,” had said a fellow, “in the