Maia Page 8

  As soon as the man had gone Occula threw back her cloak, knelt beside the pail and dipped one end of the towel in the steaming water.

  "Come on, banzi," she said. "Sit on this stool; and lean forward, so I can get at those shoulders and arms. Who knows where that bastard's filthy knife has been?"

  Her hands were surprisingly gentle. None of the scratches and pricks was deep, though one continued to bleed despite repeated stanching with the towel.

  "Leave it," said Occula at length. "It'll clean out the cut, and we can see to it in the mornin'. Doesn' hurt much, does it?"

  Maia smiled faintly. "Not now. You've been-oh, thank you for what you've done! I don't know what I-"

  "So now we can both get back to sleep," interrupted the black girl, carrying the pail into the further corner of the room."This bed's big enough for two." she grinned. "You used to someone else in bed?"

  Maia grinned back. "My little sister."

  "What a shame!" replied Occula unexpectedly. "You poor banzi! Well, you can tell me all about it tomorrow."

  She waited as Maia climbed into the bed and then, blowing out the candles, got in on the other side. Maia was

  asleep almost as soon as her companion had settled herself beside her.

  Often, when we have fallen asleep in an unaccustomed place, we wake in the momentary belief that we are back at home, or wherever we have recently been used to sleeping, so that we have to suffer the initial grief of disillusion even before trying to face up to whatever trouble, known or unknown, the coming day may have in store. This, however, Maia was spared. Waking smoothly from several hours of profound sleep, the first thing she saw was Oc-cula's brown arm lying across the pillow. At once she recalled where she was and all that had happened the previous day.

  For a little while she lay still, watching the black girl's face and the rise and fall of her breathing. Her lashes, under the silvered lids, were very long and thick and her hair, like none that Maia had ever seen, curled close about her head like some miraculous cap. Seeing her now, in repose and daylight, Maia felt that although she was certainly not what most people would have called beautiful, her appearance was so unusual and striking that the question scarcely applied. Suppose, she thought, that somewhere in the world there was a race of people who'd never seen a cat. Then if a cat was to appear, they wouldn't hardly stop to argue about whether or not it was beautiful, would they? Everyone would want to look at it and touch it-yes, and keep it for themselves, too, if they could.

  Who was this strange girl, and what was she doing here? Was she going to sell fine clothes in rich Tonildan houses? Yet she had spoken of arriving in Bekla. Little as Maia had really taken in of her scalding words to Genshed, she remembered that. The girl had been very kind. Perhaps she would help her to return home?

  It was still early-not long after dawn, as she could tell by the strength and lie of the light. Supping quietly out of bed, she stole across to the barred window.

  The sun was out of sight to her left, but the late summer wilderness below her was already full of light; the tangled, dew-drenched grass glittering, the trees looped and netted with shadow, spiders' webs iridescent among the brambles. In the silence she could hear the intermittent murmuring

  of a pigeon. The place, she could see, had once been a garden, for there were fruit-trees and rose-bushes half-buried in undergrowth, while further off a broken fountain stood in the center of its empty basin.

  Half out of sight, beyond a grove of zoans, she could make out the ruins of a big house. Roofless it was, its stone walls streaked black with fire, weeds trailing from window-spaces that framed only the sky. Why then, she thought, this place where she had spent the night must indeed be the servants' quarters, or some such, of that house. She wondered how it had come to grief, and what might have befallen its lord and his followers when the flames roared up and the roof fell in. How long ago had it happened? Some time, by the look of the place.

  How far was she from home? If it were not for these bars on the windows she would have risked jumping down into the long grass, found some way out and been off before anyone knew she was gone. She bent forward, trying to see what lay on either side of the window.

  A hand fell on her shoulder and she started. Occula, wrapped in her red cloak, was standing behind her, yawning like a cat and rubbing the sleep out of her eyes together with what remained of the silver paint on her eyelids.

  "Oh! You frightened me!" said Maia. "I didn't know you were awake."

  "I'm not," replied the black girl, stretching her arms above her head. "Just walkin' in m' sleep." Again she put her hand on Maia's shoulder, caressing and stroking. "Want to come back to bed?"

  Maia laughed. "I just want to get out of here, that's all. What's more, I'm going to, soon as I can: this very morning."

  Occula frowned a moment, as though puzzled: then she looked up sharply. "You doan' mean-kill yourself? It's never that bad, you know, banzi. That little bastard woan' try anythin' again, believe you me."

  "Kill myself?" answered Maia, puzzled in her turn. " 'Course not; why should you think that? I just mean I don't want to work for these people and I'm going back home."

  "But how?"

  "Well, very like I'll have to walk, but it can't be more than ten or twelve miles, I suppose."

  Occula sat down on the nearest stool. For about a quarter

  of a minute she remained looking down at the floor, tapping her knee with the fingers of one hand. At length she asked, "Banzi, do you know where you are and who these people are?"

  "No, I don't," answered Maia, " 'ceptin' I don't like 'em."

  "You'd better tell me how you come to be here. You talk and I'll listen."

  Maia gave an account of what had happened the previous day, omitting only any mention of what had passed between herself and Tharrin.

  "-so then, last night, I got up from the table, 'cos I was going to go straight out and start off back in the dark, see?" she concluded. "Only I was that done up, what with being in that cart and everything, I must 'a gone right off on the floor, 'cos next thing I remember's being woken up by that man and then you coming in."

  Occula, taking both her hands in her own, looked gravely up at her from the stool.

  "How old are you?"

  "Fifteen."

  "Just a banzi. What's your name?"

  "Maia. My mother's Morca. We live near Meerzat, up along the lake."

  "Well, listen, Maia. I've got to tell you somethin' you doan' know-somethin' very bad, too. Are you ready for it?"

  Maia stared. "What you mean, then?"

  "Tell you what I mean. These men are slave-traders. They're employed by dealers in Bekla-mostly by a man called Lalloc. He buys and sells girls-and little boys too. And from what you've just told me, I'm certain as I can be that your mother sold you to them yesterday."

  Like a great work of art, really bad news-enormous loss, ruin, disaster-takes time to make its full impact. Our first reaction is often almost idle, as though by trifling with the business we could reduce it, too, to triviality.

  "What would she do that for?" asked Maia.

  "You tell me," replied the black girl. " 'Cos that's what she did, and it's no good pretendin' she didn'; not if what you've told me's right. So what have you left out?"

  Suddenly it dawned on Maia why Morca should have done it. Thereupon she felt like one who, having woken from sleep but still half-awake, realized that the dully-perceived

  object swaying a foot or two from her head is in fact a deadly snake. All was clear on the instant: everything fitted. There was no way in which what had happened could be otherwise explained. Shuddering, she sank to the floor, burying her face in her hands and moaning.

  "The pretty dress-that's an old trick to get a sight of a girl naked," went on Occula matter-of-factly. "They'd have been hidin' somewhere, of course, where they could watch you. And then she sent you off on some errand or other while they worked out the price. And what was in the wine, I wonder?-yours, of cou
rse; no one else's. Tes-sik, most likely. They'd not risk theltocama on a banzi like you-might 'a killed you. And the padded cart-well, some girls throw themselves about, you know, when they realize what's happened-bang their heads and so on."

  Maia lay sobbing hysterically on the wooden boards. There was a knock and the door opened.

  "Get out, Megdon," said Occula. "Go on, piss off."

  "Brought your breakfast," said the man, in an injured tone. "Hot water, too. Don't you want it?"

  "Yes, when I say," replied the girl. "Just leave the hot water and get out." The door closed.

  Taking her stool over to the window, she sat looking out through the bars. At last she said, "Banzi, listen to me. I've seen a lot of girls this has happened to. I know what I'm talkin' about."

  As Maia, prone on the floor, continued sobbing, she went across to her, turned her over bodily and then sitting down beside her, took her head in her lap. "Listen to me; because this may very well save your life, and I'm not jokin'. Save your fife! Understand this-from now on you're in danger; as much as a soldier on a battlefield. But if your mate-that's me-stands by you and if you can keep your head and make good use of what you've been taught- that's to say, what I'll teach you-you've got a good chance of stayin' alive."

  Maia, with another burst of tears, tried to struggle from her arms.

  "O Kantza-Merada give me patience!" cried the black girl, holding her down by force. "All right, you're not a bastin' soldier, then! But I've got to make you see it, banzi! How? How? Here-answer me-can you swim?"

  The simple question penetrated Maia's hysteria.

  "Yes."

  "In the lake? You've always swum, have you? You swim well?"

  When we are plunged in desperate trouble, often it affords some slight relief to give what we know to be the right answer to a question-any question-even one that seems to have no bearing on our misery. Perhaps this is due to superstition-in some unforeseeable way the answer, being correct, may help. Certainly it can do no harm, and the mere giving of it grants a little respite.

  "I've swum three miles before now. Anything an otter can do, I can do it."

  "Good," said Occula. "Well, now, banzi, understand this. You're out in deep water, and it's a bastin' long way to the land. Never mind how you got there. No good thinkin' about that now; that woan' keep you afloat. You're there, in the water, got it? What you goin' to do? Tell me, because I'm no swimmer."

  "Take it steady," replied Maia without hesitation. "No good losing your head, start splashin' about; only wear yourself out, start swallowing water an' then very likely that's it."

  "Anythin' else?"

  "Well, say you're making for somewhere as you can see, you got to watch ahead-make out if you're drifting one way or t'other. Then you can alter according, see, with the drift."

  "Fine! You've just given yourself better advice than ever I could. Now you just keep afloat and stop strugglin', because I'm goin' to tell you where we are. Right?"

  Maia, biting her lip, stared at her.

  "You're a. slave now," said Occula deliberately. "A slave bought and sold. You can't go home. If you try to escape, they've got ways of hurtin' you that doan' show. Now go on listenin' to me, because it's important. Tell me, where is this place, d'you know?"

  "Puhra, isn't it?"

  "Yes, about a mile outside Puhra. Ever heard of Senda-na-Say?"

  Maia nodded. "He used to be High Baron of Bekla. He's dead, isn't he?"

  "He was murdered by the Leopards nearly seven years ago. That out there-" she nodded towards the window- "that's what's left of one of his great houses. They burnt it, and most of his household, too. This used to be the

  grooms' quarters, but after the big house was burned, Lal-loc and Mortuga and one or two more of the big slave-dealers in Bekla turned it into a sort of depot. They've got their agents out all over the eastern provinces, you see, and this makes a convenient collectin'-place for slaves being sent up to Bekla.

  "The big money's in girls; girls and little boys, that is. As far as I can make out, they're even hotter for girls in Bekla than they are in Thettit, and that's sayin' somethin'. That's why I'm goin' there. Still, there'll be plenty of time later on to tell you about me.

  "Now listen, Maia, and try not to get upset any more, because that woan' help you. But I'll help you: I'm your big sister. Got it?"

  Maia nodded again.

  "They're goin' to take us up to Bekla, to this man Lalloc, to be sold for bed-girls. And now I'm goin' to tell you two bits of sense that may very well make all the difference to you. First, a bed-girl's got to be cunnin' and tough, even if she never shows it. Other people have fathers, mothers, families, homes, money, social standin', Cran knows what. We've got nothin'. We just have to rely on ourselves. A bed-girl who isn't tough and cunnin', or starts feelin' sorry for herself, just goes down and down until she dies young. And I mean dies, banzi! Have you got that?"

  Her eyes, brown-irised and slightly bloodshot, gazed earnestly into the younger girl's.

  "Yes," whispered Maia faintly.

  "Now the second thing is this. People value a girl as she values herself. Behave like a queen and you may even end up by convincin' some of the bastards that you really are one. Never ask a favor or tell them what's really in your heart. Somehow or other, you've got to keep your authority. Never act as if you wanted anyone to feel sorry for you. Do you understand?"

  Maia smiled faintly, returning the squeeze of her hand.

  "Good," said the black girl. "Now understand: I'll stick by you, because I've taken a fancy to you. Aren't you bastin' lucky? Doan' cry in front of those swine out there. Cry when you're alone with me and I'll wipe your eyes. Right?"

  "Best's I can," replied Maia, choking back a sob.

  "Then you can start bein' tough now, this very minute. We'll wash and dress-is that all you've got, what you've

  slept in? I'll make them give you better than that-and go downstairs and eat breakfast as if there was nothin' the matter. But doan' start chatterin' in front of them, d'you see? You've got to keep your dignity, else they'll despise you and start treatin' you worse than a slave. How hot's that water? Has it gone cold?"

  Maia went over to the pail.

  "No; reckon it's about right."

  "Then you have it first. Properly, too; head to foot."

  Obediently, Maia stripped and stood in the pail, stooping and rinsing. The warm water was refreshing. As once before, a sudden feeling came upon her that the only thing to do was to refrain from thought or deliberation and simply leave her body to carry on.

  Looking round, she was startled to see the black girl staring at her with an air of astonishment.

  "What's up?" she asked nervously.

  "Oh, banzi," whispered Occula, "you're nice, aren't you? Turn round: let's have a proper look!" Maia turned and faced her. "Oh, Cran and Airtha, what a figure! You'll be worth a fortune, my girl! Just keep your head screwed on right and doan' make a fool of yourself, and you can' go wrong! This may even turn out to be the best thing that's ever happened to you-a lot better than a hut on the Tonildan Waste, I wouldn't wonder. Stick with me, banzi, and before we're done we'll turn Bekla upside down!"

  8: KANTZA-MERADA

  Occula spent some time in dressing and preparing herself to go downstairs. Maia, despite the misery and anxiety flooding her mind, watched with involuntary fascination as the black girl selected from her chest a Yeldashay-style metlan of brilliant orange, over which she belted on a kind of leather hunting-jacket trimmed with scarlet bows. The whole effect, bizarre and incongruous, was nevertheless most arresting, as though the wearer were a kind of incarnation of fantasy and extravaganza, exempt from all normal sartorial conventions.

  Looking up from a battered metal mirror as she finished painting a crimson streak along the outer edge of each eye, Occula winked.

  "Interestin', aren't I? Start as you mean to go on. Doan' worry, banzi, you'll be gettin' plenty of nice clothes before you're much older; that's one co
nsolation."

  Picking up a shining, golden stud, she fitted it into place through the side of one nostril.

  "For now, you'll have to wear the dress that bastard ripped, but put my cloak on over the top. No, not like that, banzi: here, let me help you. Cran! What a shame to cover up a pair of deldas like those!"

  When the girls came down into the stone-floored kitchen, it was empty except for the old woman, who was sitting by the fire slicing a pile of brillions. By daylight she looked still more sleazy. Even by Maia's standards she was dirty, and had on one cheek a weeping sore. Occula stood looking her up and down without a word, until at length the old woman, plainly annoyed but apparently wary of provoking the black girl, made shift to save her face by looking briefly at the remaining brillions and remarking, "Well, that's enough o' them, I reckon. And I suppose now you want something to eat, miss, is that it, after sending back what Megdon took you up earlier?"

  "This place is filthy," said Occula, "and so are you. We'll stick to boiled eggs and fruit, and boiled milk to drink."

  "Why, you little bitch," retorted the old woman, "you just wait till they sell you up in Bekla! They'll soon teach you to mind your tongue there, you black-faced tart-"

  "You were a tart once," replied Occula calmly. "But you mustn' judge me by yourself, you know. I'm goin' to be much more successful and finish up a lot better off. When I'm your age I shan' be crawlin' about in a pile of shit, slicin' brillions for slave-traders."

  "Basting hell!" shouted the old woman, rushing at her and swinging back her arm. Occula caught her by the wrist, gripped it for a few moments and then pushed it gently back to her side.