Slaves of the Mastery (11 page)

Pinto cried out loud. Arno bellowed with wounded pride. His left fist flew. His right armoured forearm parried. His left forearm swept aside a return strike. His head went down and in. With a
crunching sound, his head-blade drove deep into his opponent’s chest. For a moment, the two fighters were still, locked in a strange embrace. Then Arno pulled back. Dark blood came bubbling
out of the wound. The stricken manac sank to his knees. Then he fell forward onto the ground, and his heart-blood spread in a deep red stain over the sand.

Arno stood still, his own blood flowing unnoticed down his thigh. Then, slowly, he raised his right arm, to claim his victory and do homage to the Master. The cheer that greeted him shook the
arena, as thousands of voices bayed for the joy of a kill.

‘He should have taken the jump,’ said the guard, shaking his head, as arena servants carried the dead man away.

‘It’s horrible,’ said Pinto trembling, looking round at the shouting stamping crowd.

‘Yes,’ said Mumpo. ‘But it’s beautiful.’

There were no more kills that afternoon. As the manaxa came to an end, the shocked and excited captives were congratulated by their guards.

‘First day in the Mastery, and you see a manaxa
and
a kill! Someone’s watching over you.’

Ira Hath spoke low to her husband.

‘What sort of people are they? To make a show out of killing?’

‘People like us,’ said Hanno sadly. ‘People like us.’

Marius Semeon Ortiz now gave the command, and the soldiers moved down the lines ordering the slaves onto their feet. After their hour’s rest on the soft grass, it was a weary business
returning to the march.

‘How much longer, pa?’ asked Pinto.

‘I don’t know, my darling. Shall I carry you?’

‘No, I’m all right.’

Pinto had never once asked to be carried. In the early days of the march she had come very close. When her legs were so tired that the muscles shook even when she stood still, she had said to
herself, soon now I’ll ask to be carried. But just knowing she could ask had been enough, and she had struggled on by herself. Now she knew she would never ask.

The lines of slaves were marched down the sloping road, and into a cutting between high banks, and through a tunnel. They heard the sound of the great crowd, and saw evening light on sand ahead:
and so discovered they were to be marched into the arena itself.

The spectators had remained on the terraces, because the Master had not yet left the pavilion. Marius Semeon Ortiz rode into the sandy arena floor at the head of his column, and spurred his
horse up onto the mound. Here he faced the Master, still as a statue, as the Manth people marched through the arena, flowing round him on the mound in two streams.

As they passed, the great crowd of spectators applauded. The lines went on and on, and the crowd applauded more and more. The Master looked on, his broad benign face beaming as if all these
weary strangers had come to do him homage of their own accord. Bowman, following behind his father, looked up at the red pavilion just before passing into the tunnel, and for the briefest of
moments he met the Master’s eyes. The bearded fatherly face was smiling, but the eyes were not. In this half-second, Bowman caught the flash of an implacable will, and a chilling indifference
to the human traffic on whom he smiled. The impression made on him formed rapidly into a single realisation:
this man has no need of love.
Then the arched tunnel exit cut him off, and he was
following his father into the underground service chambers of the arena.

As they passed through this shadowy stone-vaulted space, they saw the manacs who had fought earlier, now lying on benches to have their wounds dressed and their muscles massaged. Mumpo trailed
more slowly than the rest, his eyes lingering on those scarred gleaming bodies with longing. They also passed the corpse of the dead manac, lying covered on a bench. Then they came out into the
open once more, and followed the long column down the slope to a series of marshalling yards.

Ortiz stayed motionless on his horse until the last of the slaves had left the arena. Then he bowed low to the Master, and raising his head, looking up into the face he knew and loved, called
out in a loud clear voice:

‘Master! All that I have done, I have done for you!’

The Master slowly inclined his head.

‘You have done well,’ he said, in his deep soft voice. ‘You have pleased me.’

Ortiz flushed with pleasure. It was more, far more, than he had dared hope for. A nod, a smile perhaps, would have been enough. But the Master had actually said, in public, that he was pleased!
Surely soon now he would send for him and speak the word he so longed to hear: the word that would make him his son.

His heart glad, his tiredness long forgotten, Ortiz spurred his horse off the mound and out of the arena.

The new slaves were already being quartered in the series of inter-connecting courtyards built for the purpose. Here beneath the open-fronted barns that walled each courtyard
they were drinking mugs of hot thick soup, and washing themselves in the long troughs, and lining up for the latrines. Tonight they would sleep on the ground for the last time. Tomorrow they would
be allocated their rooms, and put to work.

The Hath family lay down in their clothes with the rest. Hanno and Ira slept side by side, their hands clasped, as was their habit. Pinto curled up against her mother’s other side, Bowman
beside his father. Too weary even for a wish-huddle, they felt each other’s closeness, shut their eyes, and were soon asleep.

All but Bowman. He lay with his eyes closed, and saw again the Master’s smiling bearded face, and felt the power of his limitless will.

Come quickly, Kess. I can’t do this without you.

He was missing his sister more intensely than he wanted his family to know. It was at night, when the distractions of the day fell away, that the pain returned at its keenest. He had never been
parted from her for more than a few hours from the day they had been born. He was so accustomed to the wild tumble of her thoughts and the violence of her desires, that this silence in which he now
lived was almost unbearable. Without Kestrel, he was half-alive: less than half, since she had always been the more vital part of his being. He pined for her keen and restless spirit.

Where are you, Kess? Come back to me, I can’t live without you.

He poured his longing out into the silent night, reaching as far as his strength allowed. But wherever she was, she was farther away yet, and there came no answering voice.

T
he great yew tree stands alone, near the top of a ridge of land that shelters it from the prevailing north-west winds. It has stood here longer
than anyone knows, certainly for hundreds of years, guarding a small spring of clear water that, it’s said, never runs dry. Dogface chose the old yew for its solitary position, and for the
fresh water supply. He eats very little, but he drinks a lot. The tree has other virtues: it’s evergreen, and so provides shelter in winter and shade in summer; its principal branches fork
above the main trunk in such a way that he has been able to build a small but secure house here; and the view to the south is spectacular.

Dogface is a tree hermit, and therefore in theory he has no possessions. There’s the snug thatched tree-house, which he occupies but doesn’t own. There’s a water jug on a long
cord, which he uses but doesn’t own. And there’s a long thin sinuous grey cat called Mist, who keeps him company, but he doesn’t own. Here at least there’s no doubt of any
kind. Nobody owns Mist.

This morning, the morning that everything changes, begins no differently to any other. When Dogface wakes with the dawn, Mist is there as usual, sitting on the sill of the glassless window,
watching him with a look of mild disapproval.

‘I do sometimes ask myself,’ says Dogface as he sits up and stretches, and shrugs off his nightgown, ‘why you trouble to stay with me. You seem to get so little pleasure from
my company.’

‘I don’t stay with you,’ replies Mist. ‘I’m here. You’re in my vicinity.’

‘So you say, Mist, so you say.’ Dogface makes his way to the hole in the tree-house floor through which he relieves himself. A narrow line of brown yew leaves below testify to the
daily cascade, as does the circle of brown grass on the ground. ‘And yet you must like me, I tell myself, or you would choose some other vicinity.’

‘Like you?’ says Mist. ‘Why would I like you?’

‘I don’t say there’s any reason to like me.’

Dogface is not a vain man. He knows he’s strikingly ugly, with his long dog-like features and his bad eye. He knows he smells, not because he can smell himself, but because he hasn’t
washed since he settled in the tree, which is now three years, eight months and eleven days ago. Furthermore he knows he has nothing the cat wants, for the simple reason that he has nothing. But
the cat still chooses to stay.

‘I’ve come to the conclusion,’ he says, unreeling the jug on its long cord, ‘that your kindness to me, which I haven’t in any way earned, must come from your own
affectionate nature.’

‘My own affectionate nature?’ Mist watches the hermit lower the jug all the way down into the little pool at the foot of the tree. ‘You know perfectly well I’m incapable
of affection.’

‘So you say, Mist, so you say.’

Dogface draws up the cord hand over hand, and swings the heavy dripping jug back into the tree-house. He holds it towards the cat. Mist jumps down from the sill, and takes three or four laps at
its brimming top. When he’s done, Dogface drinks, long and steadily, and then splashes the remainder over his face. Refreshed, he draws a deep breath, and settles down to sing the morning
song.

Had there been a passer-by, and there are none, for there’s no road or track within sight, he would have heard nothing of the discussion between the hermit and the cat. It has taken place,
but not aloud. Dogface has lived alone for so long now that he has forgotten there’s a kind of speech that makes vibrations in the air. As for Mist, cats can’t talk. But in every other
way than sound, they have ordinary conversations, much like anyone else; and had Dogface stopped to think about this, he would have realised that this is his special value to the cat. The more
thoughtful species of animals greatly appreciate conversations with humans, but very few humans know how to do it. Mist finds Dogface ridiculous, and his chosen way of life incomprehensible, but at
least he replies when spoken to. From Mist’s point of view, there’s no way of telling which humans have this knack. All you can do is address them and see if they hear you. It’s
typical, Mist thinks, of the generally bungled nature of existence, that the only human he’s found who talks back is a one-eyed hermit who lives in a tree.

The conversation between man and cat has been silent. Dogface’s song is not. Here is another bond that keeps Mist in the hermit’s company. He has grown to like his songs. The morning
song in particular has a sweet waking stretch to it, as the wordless melody hums and buzzes around the tree-house, calling up life and vigour and the new day itself. Dogface has dozens of songs.
There’s an eating song and a sleeping song, songs for rainy weather and songs for sunshine, songs for cramp and songs for indigestion and songs for loneliness. Mist has come to know them
all.

As the morning song heads towards its end, the cat slips out of the tree-house and stalks along one of the yew tree’s spreading branches. Here he chooses a spot and lies down, still and
silent, and waits for breakfast.

Dogface finishes his song, stands up, stretches so high he pushes on the underside of the thatched roof with the palms of both hands, and then shakes out his day robe. It’s the simplest
garment imaginable: a tunic of coarse undyed wool, with long baggy sleeves, and a hem that comes down almost to the ground. Dogface never washes it, but every morning he shakes it violently out of
his window, and so, he hopes, prevents the dirt from settling.

This shaking of his shift acts as a signal to the birds that live in the tree. At once they all rise up from their various perching places, skitter around in the air, and flutter down to land on
the branches round the hermit’s door. Dogface pulls the robe over his head, jerks it straight, and steps out onto the broad branch he calls his front porch. Here, forty feet above the ground,
he sits down on a convenient seat-like protuberance, long worn smooth by his bottom, and all the birds come and sit on him.

The birds love Dogface: the small birds most of all, the tits and robins and finches. A pair of woodpeckers live in the tree, and never fail to greet him, occupying always the same place on his
left shoulder. The starlings come in a rowdy gang, but they never sit still for long. The blackbirds like to stand on his head, and the sparrows hop about all over his thighs and knees.

‘Good morning, birds,’ says Dogface, lifting one gnarled finger to smooth the feathers on a chaffinch’s breast. ‘The days are getting shorter. The swifts will be with us
by and by.’

The birds chirrup back at him, and cock their heads to one side when he speaks, and chirrup again. Birds’ brains are too small to manage conversation, but they hear the hermit well enough,
and find everything he says interesting. They’re proud that he’s come to their tree. The morning gathering gives them something to think about all day, and lends variety to their life.
Dogface senses this, and tries to say at least one new thing every morning, like a calendar that prints a wise thought at the top of each page. But first, he receives his gifts.

He holds out his hands, and the birds fill the air with their beating wings as they deliver their tributes. Over the time he’s been among them they’ve learned what he likes, and no
longer offer him worms or beetles. Now each morning his hands are filled with berries and grains and seeds, and nuts carefully pecked out of their shells. Dogface waits until one hand is full,
sorts through the offerings to put aside some for his winter store, and puts the rest into his mouth. He chews the grains and the fruits all together, his hand back out again for more. This is his
only meal of the day, and it’s entirely supplied by his friends the birds. In winter they don’t feed him, because they can barely feed themselves, and he hibernates, half-starved, till
spring. Fortunately there’s a song for hunger that takes away most of the pain.