The Bridle Path Read online

  'You are sometimes little more than the animal I first thought you,' she muttered, but made no move to resist as his hand probed deeper between her thighs.

  'An animal that I think you would never seek to tame,' Savatch whispered, his mouth nuzzling against her ear. 'Rather, I think, you still yearn for this animal to bring out and tame the animal within you.'

  'Your skill with the whip is unsurpassed, my lord,' Corinna snickered, her eyelids drooping, the slaves in the courtyard below now forgotten. 'And bettered,' she added, dreamily, 'only by your skill with your rod!'

  Paulis prised a fragment of stone from the hard baked earth and, without rising from his sitting position, sent it skimming across the yellowing grass slope. The rough pebble bounced three, four times and clattered into the projecting rock that had been its intended target. However, far from triumphant at this hit, Paulis remained sour-faced.

  'How much longer are we just going to sit around here?' he complained. 'This is nearly two days now and all we have seen are salt caravans. Apart from those two fat merchants this morning,' he added, accusingly. 'They would have been easy pickings, for sure.'

  'Quite probably,' Jorkan conceded, 'though they may have had more beneath their robes than you suspect, my young friend. The addition of meat to the bones does not always mean that the bones themselves are any the weaker.'

  'A swift arrow or two would soon have settled their flab, no matter what bones it hung on,' Paulis persisted. Jorkan sighed and climbed down from the flat stone on which he had been sitting.

  'Save your arrows, Paulis,' he said. 'And we shall soon be away from this forsaken road. I promised you rich pickings and rich pickings we shall have, but not from common robbery. If it's rich victims we sought, then the northern road would have been far more fruitful. This route is seldom travelled by much other than the salters, as you have seen for yourself.'

  'Then why do we remain here?' Paulis complained. 'I have sat here and watched sun and dust and when we were presented with an opportunity, you had us spurn it.'

  Jorkan moved down behind Paulis and laid a hand on the younger man's shoulder. 'We wait here for the chance of a far greater opportunity, lad,' he said. 'And our prize itself is not to be found on this road, merely the pointer to where it is to be found.'

  'You speak in riddles, you old fox,' Paulis muttered. 'Perhaps you should explain in words that this poor simpleton might comprehend, for I am convinced there is much you have yet to tell me. I have put my trust in you, uncle, so should I expect less than that you should place yours in me?'

  Jorkan settled himself onto the rough grass and sighed. 'Indeed not,' he said. 'You are right and you have the right to know.' He pursed his lips, his right eye twitching and pointed east, to where the road disappeared among the nearest foothills.

  'We await a messenger, Paulis,' he said, quietly. 'This messenger will bring instructions for a quest, which, if we undertake and complete, will pay far better than any couple of fat merchants we might find in these forsaken parts.'

  'And do you know the nature of this quest?'

  Jorkan nodded. 'Some of it,' he said. 'I know only that a certain party is prepared to pay handsomely for the death of another certain party and more, still, if we could place another certain party into their hands.'

  'And the identity of these "certain parties", uncle?'

  'That is why we wait here,' Jorkan replied. 'I was told nothing more than that which I have told you now, other than that we would be met on this road and given the information we require. I suspect that our would-be patron, whoever he might be, would wish to lay a crooked trail between us and himself.'

  'It sounds, also, as if this might not be the first time you have undertaken such work,' Paulis said. He looked across, fixing Jorkan with a strange glare. 'The tales you brought back of your exploits along the caravan trails were maybe not as our family was always led to believe, I think?'

  Jorkan smiled ruefully and nodded. 'Aye, lad,' he grunted. 'But then, there are certain matters that are better left untold. A common bandit draws little attention in most parts, as you know.'

  'Whereas, a paid assassin...'

  'Is best left unsung,' Jorkan finished. 'Those that would pay for my services pay for more than a swift arrow and a sharp-edged blade. Still tongues are essential and loose tongues would soon be stilled if their wagging draft stirred the wrong ears.'

  'The man we are to kill,' Paulis said, 'will travel this road?'

  'Maybe,' Jorkan said, 'but then again, I doubt it. As I said, I do not know the details yet, any more than you do, but I suspect that he will not only not travel this road, but that he will be found many miles from it. Not for nothing have we been sent out here to meet with our herald. Our real work will take place in a far different setting, I think.'

  It had been a long and painful afternoon for Demila. Bextra was an established mistress of her profession, typical of those women who sought employment as slave handlers in the houses of the wealthy. Not only the equal of most men in strength, but more than their equal when it came to showing little or no compassion to their charges, treating them as if they were little more than livestock on a country farm, animals to be used, disciplined and reared only for their value to their owners.

  As a recaptured runaway, Demila knew well enough that the treatment she had received originally at the woman's hands would pale into insignificance now, for she had heard the stories from those girls with whom she had shared the cages at the market and seen, too, the two former escapees that had been offered for resale on the day Daskot had purchased her.

  Now, as the expressionless Pecon looked on, the woman set about her work with a relish that was all too evident. She began with Demila's waist-length black hair, seizing and twisting it into a long tail with one hand and shearing it off close to her scalp with the other, leaving only a ragged stubble, which in turn was quickly lathered and shaved.

  'You'll need no hair where you're going,' she snarled, as Demila whimpered in fear of the flashing razor. 'You'll be sold on as a field hand, or maybe a stable girl, and the less hair to matte with mud and dung, the better. We'll have these off, too,' she added, jabbing a finger at one of Demila's eyebrows.

  The trader who had bought Demila from the men responsible for her original abduction from her home village in Erisvaal had previously shaven what had been a thick bush of pubic hair, and the few wisps that had since re-grown now also fell prey to Bextra's ministrations, so that when she finally dropped the razor back into the earthenware bowl, not a single hair was left on Demila's body, save for her eyelashes.

  'I always think there is something quite pleasing about them when they are reduced to this, don't you?' Bextra laughed. Pecon said nothing still, but the corners of his thin mouth twitched upwards slightly. 'Perhaps you would care for another sample of her?' she added. 'Once I have finished with her, that is. Or maybe you would like to stripe her back and arse, as compensation for my master's apparent lack of appreciation?'

  'I always think it a pity to mar unblemished flesh,' Pecon said. 'There are other punishments without reverting to the lash, or is your homeland of Mesarium still locked in the dark ages?'

  'Indeed not!' Bextra snapped, her eyes flashing. 'I could find a hundred penances for this stupid girl, but my master has given me his instructions and I must carry them out.'

  'Even though you would rather find a far more subtle use for such a dark peach, eh?' Pecon said. Bextra drew back her shoulders and lifted her chin in defiance.

  'My master's observations concerning your tongue are well made,' she retorted. 'The art of diplomacy must be little considered in your homeland.'

  Pecon's mouth curved into a full smile, though the expression fell short of reaching his eyes. 'My father,' he said slowly, 'taught me it were best to say what was in one's mind than to piggle with fine words that mean nothing and you, lady, are no better and no worse than many others in your trade. Tell me now that you have never taken any of your soft-titted charges t
o your own bed and I will take you at your word, if'n you swear it on the Wind Goddess that your people hold in such reverence. If not, then hold your own tongue and pierce this wench's, along with the rest of her.'

  Bextra bridled still, but, as she regarded the tall bounty hunter, she quickly recovered her usual detachment and returned his smile, revealing two rows of even white teeth, even save for the two long incisors that seemed more pointed and pronounced than would be considered normal.

  'It would seem that you have read me better than I supposed,' she said, deliberately lightening her tone, 'but, in my country, the love of one woman for another is considered to be more pure than that of woman for man. Besides,' she added, patting her flat and strongly muscled stomach, 'there is then no chance of getting a belly full of small limbs.'

  'So, you have never known a man, eh?' Pecon said.

  Bextra's smiled contracted to a wicked grin. 'I never said as much, sir,' she said, looking and sounding almost coy now.

  'But you have your preference,' Pecon suggested.

  The grin on her face remained. 'On cold days I prefer soup,' she said, 'whereas, on hot days I might prefer iced wine.'

  Pecon studied her, approving her statuesque physique and the brief garments that did little to conceal it. 'And what would today be?' he smirked. 'Do the winds blow hot, or cold?'

  'That, sir,' Bextra reposted, 'is yet to be determined. First things first and this thing,' she added, nodding towards the limp form hanging from the wall, 'is first, or I am falling down in my duties.'

  'Indeed,' Pecon agreed. 'One must earn one's silver, before one can spend it. But forget the lash for this one. Ring her teats and her clit, plus her nose, and then hood and cuff her.'

  'But Master Daskot—'

  'Is a greedy, fat, lazy old bastard,' Pecon interrupted her. 'And if I offer him thirty silver telts for this wench, he'll take it gladly. He'll do well if she makes that much at market and it'll cost him three of those pieces for the auctioneer's book.'

  'Thirty telts for this?' Bextra echoed in astonishment. 'The market price for field women is only twenty-five this summer, surely you would know that?'

  'The market price for a field hand, back scarred and welted, cunnie stitched and clit cut, yes,' Pecon agreed. 'Such a creature has then only one use and I think we would both agree that would be a waste here.'

  'Then why not offer Daskot the bare twenty-five telts?'

  'Because I choose not to,' Pecon said. He took a step closer to Demila, who was now watching him carefully through half closed eyes. 'And because, if I did, he would take great delight in refusing my offer anyway, as his way of repaying me for earlier. Whereas, the prospect of the extra five telts will be irresistible to someone who would seek to risk his own hide in order to cheat me of that very sum.

  'And, if that thought sits uncomfortably with you, lady,' he added, 'then you can simply forget to account to me for the slave hood and cuffs you will supply with her. The two telts they would fetch can be yours instead. Call it your own commission, if you like.'

  'Perhaps,' Bextra said slyly, one hand resting lightly across her lower stomach, 'I would prefer to take my commission by other means.'

  'Then take it that way too,' Pecon laughed. 'I am sure you are worth easily double whatever that fat charlatan pays you.'

  'Easily,' Bextra said, and turned to pick up the tray on which her piercing needles and the small brass rings lay waiting.

  The Lady Dorothea carefully closed the heavy ledger and lifted it onto the lower shelf of the three that sat in the alcove alongside the wide fireplace.

  'It has been a very profitable year, Agana,' she said. Dorothea herself was tall, but her black-skinned companion was almost a head taller, her high boots and erect posture adding further to the impression of height and power, the coiled whip that hung from the broad belt about her waist simply a badge of her authority at most times, for her mere presence was enough to cow even the most rebellious slave.

  'Indeed, lady,' she murmured, her brown eyes flicking about the room. 'By my own count, I make it that we have shipped on more than ten score girl slaves and four score boys.'

  'And you disapprove of my keeping the dozen or so of each that I have selected from our traffic, eh?' Dorothea rejoined. 'No, don't deny it, Agana, for I know you too well.'

  'It is only that it means extra mouths to feed, lady,' Agana said, 'and the household already has what many would consider a sufficiency of pleasure slaves. Some extra field hands, maybe, but...'

  'You make a good point,' Dorothea replied. 'Give instructions to the regular traders that they can bring us back a few sturdy specimens on their return trips. Tell them I shall offer one pleasure girl for every two suitable for field work, even if they be former runaways. I presume you will have no trouble ensuring that their spirits remain broken?'

  'None at all,' Agana said. 'But why bother with runaways? The trader Halik had six perfectly suitable slaves in his last caravan and his prices are lower than any you could expect to pay for anything coming back from the cities.'

  'But they were all males, Agana,' Dorothea pointed out, 'and I have always felt it is a mistake to use the sort of male slaves who are suitable for field work. I have forty or more guards here in this castle and we are some days away from their nearest source of pleasure, so why reduce their options here, eh?

  'A few sturdy field women will make them good sport and maybe keep them from impregnating the girls within the household. How many have needed the doctor's attentions this past year, eh? Not to mention how many of my pretty boy slaves have spent half their days unable to sit down comfortably.

  'No, Agana, I think a few cheap runaways will help our situation in more than one way. You can tell Halik that we will still be in the market for fresh field slaves from the east, but not males.'

  Agana nodded. 'As you wish, lady,' she assented.

  'And now,' Dorothea continued, signifying that the discussion was at an end, 'how is our special slave progressing?'

  'Snow in summer - how this reminds me of home.' The speaker, Vala Valkyr Kirislanna Friggitsdottir, more usually known as Alanna, turned in her saddle and smiled back at her companion, the now red-haired Jekka, who rode a half-length to her right and rear. Jekka, like Alanna, was naturally white blonde, but when the need to disguise her Yslandic pedigree had led her to dye her hair the previous year - despite the fact that, in common with most of the females of her race she was considerably taller than six feet - the young warrior decided the change of colour was to her liking and had continued with it ever since.

  Curiously, although the flame colour contrasted well against her pale skin, it was certainly no indication to her character, for Jekka's temperament was generally as placid and detached as it was possible to be. She even killed with an air of remoteness, preferably with one of her steadily growing collection of lethal gadgets, although in hand-to-hand combat she was as deadly as Alanna and any other of their warlike race.

  'You know what reminds me of home?' she replied. 'No people, that's what. And why are there no people? I'll tell you why,' she went on. 'There are no people, because all there is is snow. Snow, snow and more snow. I never can understand why any of you get so nostalgic about snow when we are further south. Give me green hills and running streams every time.'

  'Warm nights have much to be said for them,' Alanna agreed, 'but the cities of the south are too full of the people you seem to yearn for, and not the sort of people I care to spend too much time in such proximity with.'

  'You prefer these wastelands?'

  'At times, yes.' Alanna sat back in her saddle, her gaze travelling across the entire horizon. 'Unspoiled by the hand of man,' she sighed. 'True virginity.'

  'On which subject you're suddenly the great expert, heh?' Jekka grinned.

  Alanna ignored the quip. 'This is a little used trail,' she said, changing the subject. 'This snow has lain since the last fall, three days since, yet there are no tracks.'

  Jekka shrugge
d and pointed ahead to the approaching line of peaks. 'Even from here it is obvious that there are only two passes,' she said, 'and the last snows probably blocked them. Had you thought of that, princess? What stops horses in one direction will stop them in the other. Or are we to sprout wings and fly over that range?'

  'The two passes are seldom open,' Alanna said. 'We are so far north that the snows remain for most of the year, which is why this trail is so deserted and why I chose it as our route. The main route into the interior of the Snow Kingdoms lies forty leagues to the south, but this is a safer journey for us. Fewer eyes upon us, Jekka, and few tongues to wag.'

  'I couldn't fault your reasoning on that score,' Jekka retorted, 'but that still doesn't answer my question. It's all very well travelling unobserved, but there is little point to any journey unless it can be completed.'

  Alanna did not answer immediately. Instead, she reached inside her fur robe and withdrew a small cylinder of horn. Reining in her mount, she passed the container to her companion.

  'Look inside,' she instructed. 'It is a chart copied from an original that few people have ever seen.'

  Removing her mittens, Jekka inserted two slender fingers inside the cylinder and withdrew the roll of vellum it contained, spreading it across the neck of her mount and peering at the lines and symbols. Once or twice she raised her head to look along the tooth-like row of peaks that dominated the skyline ahead.

  'It seems to be accurate enough,' she grunted, 'but then there is very little here to confuse a scribe. Snow, snow, mountains, snow - oh, and a river.' She jabbed a long fingernail at the dark line. 'That would be the great lump of ice we keep crossing, yes?'

  'It would,' Alanna agreed. 'I am told that river is a river only for one tenth of the year. But look again, Jekka. See where it crosses the mountains ahead of us? See also where the scribe has marked the trails?'

  Jekka pored over the little map once more.