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off northern Havilfar; and she had heard casual tales of great hunts to be had there. She had no idea that
this Jikai was the hunting of people, and she had met the jiklos with utter horror.
Like all the continents and the nine islands of Kregen  with the exception of Vallia  Havilfar is
divided up into different countries. I set myself to learn their geography and histories, as well as Lilah
could inform me, and when it is necessary for you to know any part of these, then that is when I shall
introduce it.
In the circle of vaol-paol all things may come to pass.
Nath the Guide winked at us as we shuffled outside and into the cleared area before the slave barracks.
Waiting for us and backed by a strong guard contingent stood Nalgre and his customers. Today the great
hunters were dressed in leathers, with tall boots, wide hats, and a massive armory hung about them. The
chief weapon of the hunt would be the crossbow. As always, I studied the weapons of those who were
my foemen and who sought to slay me.
The fashion in swords here was for the short straight blade, perhaps not quite as robust a brand as the
shortswords of my clansmen, but a useful and all-purpose cut-and-thrust weapon that would do its work
efficiently and without fuss. The crossbows were beautiful artifacts, the wood a close-grained hurm  a
close relative of the ubiquitous sturm-wood  and the butts and stocks shone in the mingled rays of the
suns. The bows themselves were of tempered steel. Most of these crossbows were spanned by
cranequins, one or two by goat s-foot lever. I did not see a single windlass. The bolts were notched in
leather. In addition these infamous hunters had loaded themselves with various bloodthirsty weapons. It
infuriated me to see, for instance, a plump and laughing woman, her hair looped up in a net of priceless
pearls, leaning on her crossbow and talking to her companion, who kept digging the point of his
vosk-spear into the ground. They all looked a little self-conscious in their hunting leathers and they
handled their weapons rather as tourists handle implements with which they are not totally familiar.
All this spending of money and time and effort  to hunt a raggle-tail bunch of half-naked slaves through
the jungles!
Half-naked: we were issued with gray slave breechclouts which we put on, out there, on the ground, in
sight of everyone. Lilah acted as though the hunters did not exist.
I waited for the clothes and the knives, but Nath the Guide whispered fiercely and at his words I forbore
to inquire, sensing a part of the secret the guides kept against the man-hunters of Faol.
In this little group of slaves  sixteen of us  only Lilah and I and two others, a man and woman, were
humans. All the rest were halflings. I couldn t equate Nath as a slave. Despite the air of docility and fear
he assumed there was about him the unmistakable sense of the free man, the man who fought against
odds, and expected to win.
This fine morning Nalgre had his little pet with him.
He clicked his fingers and a jiklo ran across the clearing toward him, tongue lolling, eyes bright, frisking
about him. I watched, sickened. This jiklo was a woman. She panted about her master on all fours,
pricking her ears, emitting little gobbles of pleasure at his notice of her, and at the dribble of ground vosk
he let fall, which she lapped up greedily. She wore a red bolero jacket, and a gray breechclout, and she
ran on all fours, and she was a manhound of Antares, and she was a woman.
The studs and plaques on her leather collar were all of gold. Her brown hair frizzed up into that angry
matted crest, and blonde streamers of hair fell back in a tail from the central mass. Her naked rump
frisked about Nalgre, and had a tail sprouted there, I suppose, one might have accepted the picture
more.
Lilah s supple figure quivered at sight of the jiklo, then she controlled herself. The halflings were
whispering to one another, and a couple of Fristles unashamedly clasped each other in their furry arms.
I had no doubt why Nalgre played with his pet before us.  Look, he was saying.  This is a manhound.
These are the creatures who will chase you and hunt you and pull you down.
The jiklo trotted over to us. The halflings went rigid with fear. I looked down as the red bolero swung
past. The thing emitted little gasps and wheezes, and the pug nose wrinkled up. The thing was smelling
us! She was taking our scent!
 Get away, you filthy kleesh! snarled the human man, a husky youngster called Naghan, who came, so
he said, from Hamal itself. He told us this with pride. The girl with him screamed as the jiklo s tongue, all
lolling and wet and red, rasped down her naked calf. Naghan kicked out and then he, too, screamed and
writhed as a guard lashed his back with a cunning whipblow called the rattler.
 Stay in line there, you rasts! shouted Nalgre.
He turned and spoke quietly to his customers the hunters, and then they glanced swiftly and at an angle
beneath their hands at the suns, to tell the time, and then all turned and walked off out of the clearing,
back to their comfortable Jikai villas to await the time to be off.
The time for the slaves to leave was now.
With the whips cracking about our heads, and words of advice from Nalgre, we set off. His advice
amounted to:  Run and run, cramphs. If you do not afford good sport and are taken without a good
chase, you will be more sorry than you may imagine! He snickered as he said this, and fondled the
female jiklo, who crooned in pleasure at the touch of her master s hand.
We set off due east.
The jungle closed above our heads and strange noises rose from the depths of the greenery. The brilliant
light of the twin suns muted to a long lazy green-gold radiance, and here and there mingled shafts of ruby
and jade struck down through interstices in the leafy cover. The trail was hard-packed for the first
dwabur. Five miles was a fair distance to travel, and when we came out to a little clearing the slaves were
happy to flop down, panting, to rest.
Nath the Guide crossed to a heap of lichened stones and lifted one to the side. I looked over his
shoulder.
In the hollow between the stones lay clothing, food  and knives! Also there were clumsy-looking
shoes. The halflings pounced on the shoes first. Well, that made sense. I have been accustomed all my life
to going barefoot, and I had walked across the Hostile Territories, and the Owlarh Waste without
footwear. The journey across the Klackadrin, too, was not without a lively memory or two, and then I
had been barefoot.
I said I did not want a pair of shoes.
At this Nath the Guide protested, saying I would slow the others up. They were putting on the clothes, [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]