Skinner's fist
clenched in impotent rage around the bars of his cage. Zinah's body drooped in the tentacles of the
predatory Sime who had just drained her of selyn.
She was an
artist, you shendi-cursed lackwits, Skinner raged. Not an animal. The pen
raised Gens that shared his prison milled and wailed, pressing against the bars
as far away from the kill as they could get.
Garrett, the
only other Domestic in the pen, simply stood, eyes dull and arms hanging
limply. He had tried to escape once,
weeks ago, when he found out the Gendealer to whom they had been sold was
travelling along the border town route, and not to any major cities.
Small border
towns had no use for artisans or skilled craftsmen. There was only one use that Simes in such a place would have for
a Gen.
It was only
because Garrett was so valuable as a prime kill that the Gendealer hadn't had
him killed as an object lesson.
Instead, he had taken Rymi, a young woman with whom Garrett had
developed a friendship of sorts. At
least as much as you could have with a pen-bred. They had used whips on her, and knives, and then stripped her of
selyn.
Rule number one
of surviving in the pens. Nobody is
your friend.
After torturing
and killing Rymi in front of him, the Simes had held Garrett down and forced
drugged genslop down his throat.
Yesterday, the
twins, Sun and Moon, had been purchased as a wedding gift by a wealthy
trader. Matching kills. That left just him and Garrett as the only
two Domestics left in the caravan.
Skinner knew that
the only reason he was still alive was that nobody had yet been able to meet
the steep price the Gendealer was asking for him. It was less than Skinner would have fetched in a large city,
where his skills as a tanner and herbalist would have been highly prized.
One of the
Gendealer's hired hands dragged Zinah's body off to the side and tossed a
blanket over it.
Perhaps Zinah
was the most fortunate of the three of them.
At least her ordeal was over.
Skinner shifted his position, trying to find a spot that offered him
better protection from the hot sun.
It was only a
matter of time. Skinner gazed longingly
out at the far distant mountains. For
days, the caravan has been travelling near the border between In-territory and
out. It was so close, so tantalyzingly
close. A day or two at the most and he
could be free.
Small
shendi-flecking chance of that, he thought bitterly.
The pen raised
Gens had already forgotten that that they were frightened. They wandered about the cage, occasionally
bumping into the bars and each other.
Those who weren't too drugged grunted and fought over shade and what few
resources they possessed. Clothing,
such as it was. Hoarded food.
Two days to
freedom. Skinner let his forehead fall
against the bars, feeling the heat of them radiating into his flesh. It might as well be two hundred. Two days in the blazing heat with no food or
water. Two days in territory swarming
with Freeband Raiders, marauding Simes who killed any Gen they could find,
usually in a way calculated to maximize the Gen's pain and fear.
Killbliss, they
called it. Simes fed off Gens' fear as
much as off their selyn.
As he watched, a
man rode into camp, trailed by a cloud of yellow dust. Richly dressed, for a border dweller. Fancy buckles and expensive boots. Silver rings. Well bred horse and finely tooled tack.
One of the
Gendealer's overseers helped the man dismount, while another hurried off to
find the dealer. The man strolled
toward the pens, his eyes already fixed on Skinner.
There were
tricks Skinner could have used to make himself less tempting as a kill, but
they'd just have whipped him for using them.
Any Sime could zlin what he was doing, and how. Shen them...there was no hiding from
something that could zlin through walls, could read your nager.
Of course, a
whipping would be prefereble to what the approaching Sime had in mind. Skinner visualized a snake, slithering over
the ground. Back and forth, back and
forth. Sometimes it almost seemed he
could actually feel what was happening to his nager, but he knew that just
wasn't possible. Gens couldn't
zlin. He only knew about the effects
from what he had been told by Olbin, his first master. He saw the Sime wince as the fluctuations in
Skinner's nager whipped him out of his targeting focus.
Skinner let his
face relax into the bland stupid look worn by the pen Gens. If the Sime knew he was causing the wobbles
on purpose he'd realize that Skinner was a Domestic, and that all he had to do
was break Skinner's concentration to get to the selyn that he needed. Careful.
Keep it subtle.
The Sime shook
his head as if to clear it, and then his expression turned suddenly feral. Tentacles lashed out and he lunged with
blurring speed for the cage. Skinner
threw himself backward, falling aginst another Gen. If he'd been after me I never would have made it.
The large male
Gen who was the target of the Sime's attack screamed and struggled. Because of the bars separating them, the
Sime was unable to do more than just grip his intended victim with
dorsals. Even in hard need the Sime
wasn't stupid enough to risk his delicate laterals.
The gendealer
and his men came racing around the corner.
One of them uncoiled a whip. The
others circled the attacking Sime, handling tentacles weaving, waiting for an
order from their boss.
Taking in the
fact that the man was wealthy and in hard need, the Gendealer said "You
kill 'em, you buy em."
"I'll
pay!" the man snarled. "I
have money."
"Let's see
it, then."
The man fumbled
at his belt with a ventral tentacle, ripping a bag free and flinging it at the
Gendealer.
After a quick
glance into the bag, the Gendealer said "Give 'im the kill."
Skillfully, his
men coaxed the kill-fixed Sime into releasing the sobbing Gen long enough to
get him out of the cage. In a matter of
moments, it was over.
Chuckling, the
Gendealer hefted his money and went back to his wagon.
"Hey. That was no Domestic. You took twice what it was worth,"
complained the man. Post, his complaint
was little more than a grumble.
"I took
what you gave me," the gendealer snorted.
"Next time pay before you grab."
The man mounted
his horse, tore the reins free of the overseer's tentacles and kicked his horse
into a gallop, barely missing another man as he swept by.
When his disgruntled
high field customer had left, the gendealer had his men drag Skinner out of the
cage. He knew better than to struggle;
any augmenting Sime could outmuscle a Gen.
Besides, struggle could lead to injury, and Gen pain was an irresistible
enticement to any Sime who wasn’t high field.
He pushed down a
stab of panic when they bound him upright to a display rack. Face out, it was a kill position, not for
punishment.
One of the men
whistled. “Zlin that nager. It was masked in the cage with all the others. He’s full to bursting. And he knows how to use it, I’ll wager.”
The gendealer
stood in front of him, hands on hips.
“That thing you did with your nager, boy. That trick. Do it again.”
“I didn’t do
anything.” Skinner tried to look as confused and simple as a pen bred would
have looked in his place. They knew he
was a Domestic, but most Simes didn’t distinguish.
“Mik. Take one of his testicles off,” the
gendealer ordered.
White sparks of
panic roared in Skinner’s head. One of
the Simes yanked his threadbare breeches down, and unsheathed a short knife.
The gendealer
was watching him closely, an anticipatory smile hovering on his lips.
Have to
focus… It took all of Skinner’s
concentration to picture himself back in Olbin’s tidy visiting room. There was an odd glass sculpture there, blue
and white, all irregular wavy lines. He
used to stare at it when he wanted to shut out the world around him. That’s how he learned that he could
influence his nager.
A hand fumbled
roughly between his legs and he lost his concentration for one panicky moment,
then he regained it. Pack of
lorsh. I’ll give you a
demonstration. He pictured himself
surrounded by a wall of lashing whips, snapping and crackling all around
him. Flay the flesh from their bones,
slice open their laterals, how he hated them all, the shendi flecking
Simes. All of them. If he could exterminate them all with a
word, he would have spoken it, eagerly.
He opened his
eyes. One of the Simes was on the
ground, crawling away. The other had
dropped his knife and was retching into the dirt. Only the gendealer remained on his feet, ruddy face gone pale,
but still baring his teeth in that malicious grin that spoke of unpleasantness
to come.
He kicked the
retching Sime. “Mik. Don’t be a dirt-pup. You ain’t even close to need yet. Now get up.
I want a good solid set of chains for this one. Welded on.
No locks. He can wear ‘em til
he’s got no more use.” The gendealer
chuckled. “This boy’s gonna make me a
lot of money.”
Mik spat to clear
vomit from his mouth. “How is he going
to do that?” he asked sullenly.
“You see how
eager that mark was, earlier? Paid
choice price for a pen bred. They come
in, we wave this boy with his fat juicy nager under their noses, we negotiate
and take their money, then the boy whips ‘em into hard need and we toss a pen
bred into reach and let nature take its course.”
“What if the Gen
won’t cooperate?” Mik stared at Skinner with open hatred.
The gendealer
shrugged. “He’ll change his mind. Losing a few fingers and toes won’t drop his
nager none.”
Skinner’s
stomach lurched. I won’t do it, he
wanted to scream at them, but he knew the gendealer would carry out his
threat. Losing an arm would make him
useless for the kill, but fingers and toes were peripheral, for a Sime’s
purpose. He hung limply in the ropes,
feeling hopelessness overwhelm him. At
least I know they won’t be drugging me.
Beside, why should I care what the murderous, shendi-flecking Simes did
to each other?
He looked over
at the Gen cage and saw Garrett, staring dully at him through the bars.
I was right, he
thought bitterly. Zinah had been the
most fortunate of the three of us.