"By the balls of the Priest-Kings!" roared my Master's friend Titus, smashing his fist down on the low table, rattling the array of empty paga bowls and kaissa pieces that lay before him. "I'll find that sneaking little urt-faced welsher if it's the last thing I do. I'll slice off his balls and hang them from the top of the public impaling spear on the Cylinder of Justice."

The other patrons of The Fifth Passage Hand, my Master's favorite paga tavern, craned their necks and murmured. My Master smiled a little sardonically, straightened the checkered cloth, and replaced the fallen red and yellow pieces. "This is the third time you have disarranged the game pieces," he said. "And in any case, if you carry out your threat you will never get your money. By the laws of Ar, as you well know, dead men pay no gambling debts."

"I'll squeeze my gold tarn disks out of his miserly paga-swilling sul-paring Merchant's moneybags," Titus said blackly, "before I geld him." He snapped his fingers to Reena, who was kneeling at his left. She leapt to refill his paga bowl, and in one prodigious gulp he drained it again. "Assassin to Ubara five. And damn you for opening with the Physician's Gambit, anyway."

My Master grinned. "You should have responded with the Turian defense," he said. "Then you might not be sitting there attempting to choose between two equally impossible alternatives. Two thousand gold tarns is a fortune, Titus. I'm not surprised that the man is lying low."

"He could pay it from the small change he keeps to fling to beggars." Titus was staring at the board, a scowl on his dark, vital face. "I resign, Valerus. You have me in a hopeless position."

"Only because you are thinking of your golden tarns, and not of your play," my Master said. He began to gather up the pieces and put them away in their leather bag. This was a task that he alone could do, of course, as slaves are not allowed to touch kaissa pieces. When each piece was carefully secured and the bag closed, he handed it to me. Without a word I shook out the cloth, folded it neatly, and put it in its pouch on the side of the bag. It was my task, of course, to carry such things for my Master, the kaissa bag, his medical kit, the case with the paper and marking sticks that I used to write at his dictation, so that he would not be encumbered with such trifles.

I would have carried a hundred bags for him, and kissed his feet for being allowed to do so. I would have carried a live bosk through the avenues of Ar, if my Master had so much as lifted his little finger.

And I thought... I thought that he... I cannot bring myself to write what I thought, not in the beautiful Gorean script I have been acquiring so slowly and painfully. I will say only that an Earth upbringing, Earth conditioning, is impossible to eradicate completely. When one is most confident that one has become Gorean to the bone, the old Earth values reach out to entrap one.

I had forgotten the Sardar Fair of Se'Var, just three months before, when my Master had given me away without a qualm to advance his own purposes.

"Surely the man has a name," my Master was saying to Titus. "A family, a business, a home? Can you not trace him that way?"

"His name is Udalius," Titus said. "The gem merchant."

My Master made a low whistling sound. "Two thousand gold tarns is indeed nothing to him, then," he said. "Have you been to his place of business?"

"I've been everywhere. No one will speak with me. Damn it, I'll--"

"Cut off his balls. I know." My Master stood up and gestured to me. I straightened and took my place at his heel. Titus rose as well, scowling, with Reena behind him.

"It is a debt of honor," Titus said. "And it touches my honor that Udalius slinks around refusing to pay what he lawfully owes. That he refuses even to speak with me, as if he does not admit the justice of my claim. I tell you, Valerus, it would almost be worth the two thousand gold tarns to hold a good sharp knife in one hand and the little sleen's paga-soaked balls in the other. Such balls as he may possess, that is."

He did not bother to lower his voice. He would have spit on such discretion. Shocked and avid whisperings followed us as we passed through the tavern door into the night.

A hand and a day later Udalius the gem merchant was found dead in the detritus of a raucous revel celebrating the victory of the Sun-Striker faction in the arena races. Half of Ar had been there at some point in the course of the night, it seemed, although no one was completely sure which half. The little Merchant's body was not identified at once, because he was dressed in the blue tunic and mantle of a scribe instead of his own white-and-gold caste colors, and he had altered the color of his hair and beard.

He had not altered his bibulous habits, however. And while he lay drunk in a withdrawing room, someone had cut off his testicles and left him to bleed to death.

"I do not believe it," my Master said. He crushed the square of rence paper in his hand. "The fools. They have arrested Titus."

He added a few Gorean expletives that sizzled in the air of the atrium. With a snap of his fingers to me that meant get my medical kit, Minda, and the writing case, and heel he turned and strode out the door into the street.

I expected him to go straight to the Cylinder of Justice, but instead he went to Titus's compartment, in a busy, half-commercial district not far from the Street of Brands. He was too late. Already the doors had been sealed with the mark of the Administrator of Ar. In the street outside, two guardsmen, sweating and swearing and swinging their whips, were trying to subdue a black-eyed, black-haired blur of Tuchuk she-sleen.

Reena.

"Hold," my Master said sharply. "I am Valerus of the Physicians, a friend of the accused. I will take charge of his property until he returns."

"Master!" Reena tore free and threw herself at my Master's feet. "Master, they are taking me away to the public pens!"

She was disheveled and sobbing. I had never seen Reena, voluptuous Reena, provocative Reena, anything but sleek and arrogant. Now she lay in the dust clutching at my Master's ankles. The guard brought his whip down again on her exposed back, and she screamed.

"Hold," my Master said a second time, in his coldest voice. The guard stopped, just as he was drawing his arm back to deliver another blow. "Where is your warrant to take charge of my friend's property?"

The second guardsman drew a wrinkled packet of papers from his belt. "'ere yer are, Sir," he said. "Our orders is to seal up the compartment all right and tight, and then 'old the slut for questioning in the public pens."

"They will torture me," Reena wept. "I know nothing, nothing."

"I will deliver her for questioning at the appointed time," my Master said, taking the papers. I wondered if he was remembering, as I was, a day when Titus had taken charge of me, taken me on his own authority and saved me from an ignominious death for a crime I did not commit.

"That's all very well, Sir," the guardsman said a little truculently, "but orders is orders. She's to go to the public pens, she is, and all this screeching and 'owling ain't going to do no more good than a drop of water in the Cities of Dust. And once the bugger's impaled, she'll be sold off with the rest of 'is goods."

My Master unfolded the papers and scanned them quickly. I could see by his frown that they were exactly what the guardsman represented them to be.

"The... bugger," he said in a soft, dangerous voice, "is a guardsman of Ar, just as you are. Are you so quick to assume his guilt?"

"He's a toff," the guardsman with the whip said scornfully. "One o' they what goes around questionin' folks and writin' reports instead of doin' an honest day's work. He's not like us."

He dragged Reena to her feet and wrenched her hands behind her back, fastening them tightly in slave bracelets. She had stopped struggling and her eyes had gone blank, the eyes of an animal threatened, withdrawing into itself, conserving its strength. The guardsman clipped a leash to the ring on her collar and jerked it once or twice to test it.

My Master shrugged. In a sudden chilling moment I wondered what Titus would have done if Ixion the slaver had been a city official with a packet of papers, instead of a private businessman with a stake in keeping my Master's custom.

"I am on my way to see Titus now," my Master said. "Answer the questions that are put to you, Reena. In due time your Master will be free to reclaim you, if he chooses."

He gave the papers back to the second guardsmen, then turned and strode back down the street. I hurried behind him, at heel, stricken and silent. Neither one of us saw the guardsmen take Reena away.

My Master's name was known at the Cylinder of Justice. He was admitted without question and shown into a small room, curiously designed. On one side there was soft carpeting on the floor, a comfortable cushioned chair, a carved table with a jug of water and a cup. There were handsome tapestries on the walls, and even slave rings set along the back of the room to accommodate a visitor's desire to secure his property.

Down the center of the room ran a row of steel bars, set solidly from floor to ceiling, about-- I did some quick mental calculations. About five horts apart. On the other side of the bars there was nothing but bare stone, floor, walls, and ceiling.

My Master did not trouble himself to leash me. He gestured for me to take out the paper and marking sticks and write down what was said. Then he seated himself.

The door on the other side of the room opened. Titus of the Guardsmen entered.

He was naked. He was chained. And yet he tossed back his thick black hair and grinned at my Master and said, "You took long enough, my friend."

"I went to your compartment," my Master said. "It was already sealed. Reena has been taken in charge."

Titus shrugged. "One slut is the same as another," he said. "When I am out of here they will at least have to pay me for her."

I wrote it down very carefully. I concentrated on the shapes of the letters, the spelling, the placement of the lines on the paper.

One slut is the same as another.

"Tell me what you know of Udalius," my Master said. "Did he gamble often? Did he have enemies? Did he engage in sharp business practices?"

"I didn't know him well," Titus said. "But he was indeed an incessant gambler. He'd bet on anything, anytime, with anyone. And he was quick enough to demand payment when he was the winner. I did hear a tale that once he forced a man to surrender his companion for a night, in lieu of a debt he could not pay."

"Udalius was a womanizer, then?"

Titus laughed. "The way I heard the story, Udalius used the woman in the manner of a rent slave for the night. He was more interested in his money than in the woman herself."

"Do you remember the man's name?"

Titus paced back and forth in front of the bars like a caged larl. "Malsenus... Misenus... something like that. And there is something else."

My Master leaned forward. "Yes?" he said.

"A whiff of blackmail," Titus said. "One man is said to have fallen on his sword rather than pay further. And there were others. I don't know any names... maybe Minesius can help you there."

My Master nodded and stood up. "Excellent," he said. "I will--"

"Valerus."

My Master stopped. He looked at his friend.

"A certain amount of haste," Titus said casually, "would not be unappreciated. I have already been condemned. I will be impaled at sundown tomorrow."

In the Cylinder of Justice itself Titus was well-liked, and with only a word or two my Master obtained permission to examine the body of Udalius the Merchant. Despite my Master's involvement in several irregular matters, I had never quite fathomed the complex Arian laws regarding the disposition of the bodies of murder victims. I knew only that the punishment of murderers was harsh and swift.

In a cold room deep in a cellar, my Master lifted the shroud that lay over the gem merchant's body. The stench of old blood was immediately apparent. The deceptive, rather threadbare blue robes were stiff with it. There was a lingering trace of paga's pungent odor as well, and other smells that were peculiar to sudden, violent death.

My Master drew the robes aside, his face expressionless.

"There appear to be no marks on the body, other than the wound which caused exsanguination and death," he said. There was no one else in the room, and he was certainly not speaking to me to make conversation. It was his Physician's voice, cool and dispassionate, expecting to be recorded. I scribbled, recording.

"No blow to the head, no marks of ligatures, no apparent means of subduing or immobilizing the victim. A strong odor of paga, spilled on the robes and cloak. Conclusion: the victim was killed while intoxicated. Such a barbaric attack could not be made on a man unless he is unconscious, tightly bound, or drunk."

Drunk indeed, I thought, wrinkling my nose. Mixed with the smells of blood and alcohol and death there were other smells, vomit, sweat, a trace of flaminium-essence perfume, the sweet-sour spittle of kanda-leaf addicts. The revel had obviously been one of some licentiousness.

"Titus," my Master went on, "would not take advantage of a man in a drunken state. He would face him fairly, blade to blade. That is conclusive evidence to me, although I fear it is not evidence I can lay before a magistrate."

I scribbled.

"The wound was accomplished with two... perhaps three cuts. The murderer is not only without honor, but without the courage to accomplish his purpose decisively. Again, clear evidence that it was not Titus who killed the man."

I took a deep breath, swallowed, and continued to write. The smell was beginning to sicken me.

My Master rearranged the robes decently and drew up the shroud. "Come, Minda," he said. "We will begin by calling on Udalius' son and heir."

The house of Udalius the gem merchant was on a short, luxurious cul-de-sac off the Avenue of the Central Cylinder. It was a handsome walled villa with a garden courtyard and a shaded portico that appeared to extend to at least three sides of the house. Even to my untrained eyes, the garden had been neglected. But of course the house would be in mourning.

My Master pulled the call rope. After several ehn, the door was opened by a young man in a white-and-gold tunic.

I was surprised. In such houses, there are usually many slaves to answer the sound of the call bar. I did so, in my Master's house, as did old Sofia from the kitchen, and Chispa and Lita, the kettle girls.

"What do you want?" the young man said ungraciously.

"I am Valerus of the Physicians," my Master said. "I am sorry to intrude on your grief, but I have an important reason for desiring a few ehn's conversation with the son of Udalius the Merchant."

"I am Danus, the son of Udalius," the young man said. "Come in, Physician. You had business with my father? You have heard, perhaps, of the very fine emeralds that have just come into our hands from the mines of the south?"

He seemed unusually eager to do business, on the day after his father's death. My Master made the inconspicuous sign to me that meant, pay attention to everything he says so that you can write it down as completely as possible after I leave, and followed the young man into the house. I followed as well.

"You may tether your stock on the portico," Danus said. "It is relatively shady there."

"I prefer to keep her with me," my Master said. "She is foolish and unpredictable and better off under my eye."

Danus shrugged. "As you wish," he said.

The room he led my Master to was luxuriously furnished with carven tem-wood couches and a rich Torian carpet on the floor. Again, however, there was an air of neglect, of incompleteness. Spaces between the couches should have been filled with low tables, further examples of the carver's art. On the walls there were lighter areas that whispered of paintings and hangings removed. In one corner, a pierced-work brass bowl filled with dried scarlet flower petals provided a feminine touch, but did little to dispel the smells of dust and deterioration. I began to wonder if Udalius the Merchant were as rich as he was reputed to be.

Danus did not offer refreshment. He sat opposite my Master and said again, "You had business with my father?"

My Master considered him for a moment. I loved my Master's face in such moments, when his wide-set brown-gold eyes were intent and thoughtful, when the fine complexity of his mind was clear to see. I knew him well enough by now to know that he was deciding whether to temporize, to express an interest in the emeralds, or to simply tell the truth.

"Your father had gambling debts," he said at last. "Large ones."

He had chosen the truth as his opening gambit.

Danus frowned. "Did he own you money, then?" he said. "If he were still alive, I would be liable, of course, but since he is dead..."

He spread his hands eloquently.

It was true, of course, that according to Arian law gambling debts lived only as long as the gambler lived. If Udalius were still alive, not only he himself but his entire family would be forced to beggar themselves, even sell themselves into slavery, to make payment. Naturally, if Udalius had daughters, or if his free companion were beautiful, they would be much more valuable than this weedy boy. But now it did not matter. Udalius was dead. If he had business debts, or personal debts, his family was liable. His gambling debts, however, as they were outside the general legal structure of the city, were no longer any concern of theirs.

They were debts of honor, of course. An honorable son would make every effort to pay. Danus, apparently, had no honor.

The murderer is not only without honor, but without the courage to accomplish his purpose decisively...

Had Danus murdered his father for two thousand gold tarns? Were the reputed riches of Udalius only a front?

He had been an incessant gambler, Titus had said. The house showed signs of a losing battle to keep up appearances.

"He did not owe me money," my Master said. "But Malsenus is a somewhat different case."

Danus went pale. "Malesios, do you mean?" he said. "That was settled some time ago. And the case was different indeed, in that it was Malesios who owed my father money, and not the other way around."

"Indeed," my Master said noncommittally. He stood up. "May I pay my respects to your mother before I go?"

Danus rose as well. "She is in seclusion," he said. "I will give her a message."

My Master bowed, snapped his fingers to me, and left the house. I followed, repeating to myself, Malesios. Malesios. Malesios.

"I'm glad the little piece of refuse is dead," Malesios the Builder said. "If that guardsman hadn't sliced off his stinking balls I would have done it myself one day."

"Guardsman?" My Master raised his eyebrows. Although the manner of Udalius' death had crackled through the city like wildfire, the arrest and condemnation of Titus had so far been made known only to those in high circles, and to those, like my Master, with whom Titus himself had communicated.

Malesios flushed. "Well, he did do it, didn't he?" he said. "He talked about it enough, in every paga den in Ar. Who else could have done it?"

My Master smiled. It was a dangerous smile. "Who indeed," he said. "I understand that Udalius had many enemies."

"And I'm first on the list," the Builder said malevolently. "If you already know why, you're a damned meddling bastard, and if you don't know why, I'll go to the Cities of Dust before I'll tell you."

"I have a good reason to meddle," my Master said. "Who else is on the list? I understand that Udalius was not above blackmail when there was money to be made by it."

"The filthy quala," Malesios said. "He was sinking in a morass of debt and would do anything for money. He squeezed Guillaume the Warrior until the poor bastard ran out of money and fell on his sword. And--"

He stopped.

"And?" my Master prompted.

"And he was squeezing Lupo, too." It all came out in a rush, and there was a gleam of calculation in the Builder's eyes. Clearly he was not unwilling to provide other suspects after his own equivocal statements. "Lupo's another gem merchant, like Udalius himself, the putrid little grunt. Udalius caught him out selling some false stones, or so he said. He threatened to go to the Caste Council of Merchants with it, unless Lupo paid."

"And now," my Master said thoughtfully, "Lupo is safe."

Malesios grinned. Was there the faintest glitter of relief in his eyes? "Yes," he said. "Now Lupo is safe."

We made our way home from the house of Malesios in the dark. It was too late to call on Lupo that night with any hope of being admitted.

On my Master's orders I sat down at once and wrote out everything I could remember of the interviews. My Master took the pages and read them, one by one, as I finished them, making additions and corrections in his own hand. When I was finished, he sent me curtly to the furs at the foot of his couch.

I lay awake for a long time, waiting for him to enter the room, undress, rest a little, perhaps even use his slave girl. I was still tormented by the vision of Reena in the hands of the guardsmen, and by Titus' words.

One slut is the same as another.

One slut is the same as another.

One slut is the same as another.

I waited in vain. My Master did not come.

The morning was bright and clear and beautiful. The air was crisp. The sun, Tor-Tu- Gor as the Goreans call it, light upon the home stone, rose with an explosion of gold. It would set on the body of Titus of the Guardsmen, thrust down on the impaling post and raised high over the roof of the Cylinder of Justice, unless my Master could expose the real murderer in time.

He found Lupo the gem merchant in his shop on the Avenue of Turia, just as the doors were opening. The man started at the sight of my Master and attempted to scuttle behind the curtains at the back of the shop, but my Master could move like a hunting sleen when it suited him to do so. He caught Lupo by the none-too-clean scruff of his neck, shook him sharply, and dropped him on the floor in front of his display counter.

"You are a coward," he said. "That is one point against you. And if you were truly selling false stones, you have no honor. What else have you done, Lupo of the Merchants, that you wish to tell me about?"

The merchant began to sob and tried to crawl away. My Master put one foot on his neck.

"Nothing, nothing," Lupo blubbered. "I am an innocent man."

"Why, then, did you try to flee when you saw me?"

"Malesios, Malesios," Lupo choked out. "He sent me a message, warning me. He said that you were coming to kill me."

My Master grunted with disgust and withdrew his foot. "Do I look like an Assassin, you fool?" he demanded.

"I am innocent," Lupo cried. "Innocent."

"Fool," my Master said again. I could see that he was tired and tense and his patience was thin. "If you thought I was coming to kill you, why are you babbling about your innocence? Innocence of what?"

"I did not kill him."

My Master twisted his hand in the Merchant's hair and jerked him to his knees. "I did not accuse you of killing anyone," he said. "How far have you gone, I wonder, to preserve the pathetic illusion of your integrity with your Caste brothers?"

Lupo's eyes rolled back in his head, and he fainted.

We waited, my Master, Lupo, and me, in the strange half-and-half room at the Cylinder of Justice. Other chairs had been placed on the carpeted side. Lupo huddled in one of them, moaning softly to himself. My Master sat in one, erect, easy, although his eyes were dark with fatigue and strain. Three chairs were still empty.

I knelt slightly behind my Master's chair, silent, ignored.

Any one of them could have done it. Any one... and yet something bothered me, niggled at me. Something was hidden in the back of my mind like a juicy, scarlet-winged butterfly in a crevice of bark, and my mindar-bird self strained to peck it free. I had seen something. Somewhere. Something that I should have been able to put together with something else to reveal the identity of the true murderer.

The door on the carpeted side of the room opened and a man in a gray robe entered. "A man in a gray robe" sounds simple, and yet the man was tall and spare, with a bony intelligent face and generations of pride in his bearing. The fabric of his robe was rich and heavy, cut with a master Clothier's hand, and there were wide stripes of red and gold, the colors of Ar, sewn on the left shoulder.

My Master rose. "Tal, Chief Magistrate," he said. "I thank you for allowing this... meeting to be called."

The Chief Magistrate nodded. "It is a capital case," he said gravely. "Sundown is only an ahn away. I am willing to review additional evidence, if you can provide it."

"There are two more--" my Master began.

The door opened again. Malesios sauntered in, followed by young Danus. Leaning heavily on Danus' arm was a free woman in white and gold robes of concealment.

"I brought... my m-mother insisted on accompanying me," Danus stammered. "This matter touches her more nearly than anyone else, of course."

My Master recovered first. "Of course," he said. With a courteous gesture he indicated his own chair. "Please be seated, Lady--?"

"Romola," the woman whispered. "I beg your pardon, Chief Magistrate, for intruding, but I could not let my boy go off alone, to face such a meeting as this. He is all I have now."

"Indeed, indeed," the Chief Magistrate said. "Guard!"

A guardsman appeared at the door.

"See that the prisoner is given suitable attire before being brought in," the Chief Magistrate said. "Now, Valerus. We are all here. What is it that you have to say?"

My Master stood silently for a moment, looking at each man in turn. Danus son of Udalius, a boy, too weak to face other men without his mother's support. Malesios the Builder, with his undisguised malevolence. Lupo the Merchant, shivering and sniveling.

The murderer is not only without honor, but without the courage to accomplish his purpose decisively...

It could be any one of them. And yet... and yet...

The Lady Romola shifted in her chair, which had been my Master's chair. Her robes were a little threadbare when one looked at them closely. She wore no jewelry. A faint scent of flaminium essence clung about her... a small act of extravagance, perhaps, to give herself the courage to go out among men when she sensed her boy was in danger.

My Master still said nothing.

And all of a sudden it all fell into place.

Flaminium essence.

A small cold room in the bowels of the Cylinder of Justice. A dead man in blue robes that had not succeeded in disguising his identity from his killer. Smells of blood and alcohol and death, vomit, sweat, a trace of flaminium-essence perfume, the sweet-sour spittle of kanda-leaf addicts.

And at the house of Udalius... the pierced-work brass bowl, the dried scarlet flower petals.

Flaminium petals.

I trembled. What did my Master intend to say? There had been only three chairs. He had not expected Danus to arrive with his mother.

Or had he?

Did he know? Had he noticed the brass bowl? Had he been close enough to her to catch that faint, elusive scent?

The door on the other side of the room opened and Titus was pushed into the cell. He was pale but calm. He was still chained, but had been given a rough rep-cloth tunic in deference to the presence of a free woman.

I took my chance. I flung myself at the bars, wailing and sobbing like a wild thing. "Master Titus, Master Titus," I cried. "Oh, no, no, please no."

I felt my own Master's hand close around my collar. He shook me harshly. "What is the matter with you, slut?" he said.

I had only an ihn. No chance for lengthy explanations. I gasped out, so low that only he could hear it, "She smells of flaminiums."

He cuffed me hard across the mouth and threw me into the corner of the room. I curled against the stone, bruised, sobbing. The woman had done it. At the revel she had clung to Udalius, led him on, left her scent on his robes... and then when he was insensible with drink she had taken advantage of Titus' much-gossiped-about threats to kill him in such a way that Titus would be instantly accused.

She had loved him once. It had taken her two, three tries to do what she had to do.

The neglected garden, the deteriorating house, the threadbare robes. All the wealth of Udalius was a sham. The two thousand gold tarn disks he had lost to Titus could well have been the last of his fortune. But dead men paid no gambling debts in Ar. And the Lady Romola, torn between her companion and her son, had chosen her son, and made sure that there would be something, at least, for him to inherit.

But there was no proof. A scent of flaminiums? A brass bowl of petals? The Chief Magistrate would frown, and shake his head sadly.

Titus would die.

"Titus of the Guardsmen," my Master's voice said suddenly, as coolly as if my outburst had never happened, "did not kill Udalius the Merchant."

"I know that is what you contend," the Chief Magistrate said. "But proof is required, or a confession, for the condemnation to be overturned."

"You shall have what you require," my Master said. His voice was no louder than it usually was, but somehow it seemed to command the very air in the little room. "Danus, son of Udalius, stand forward. Guards. Take him."

He had not a shred of authority to order the guards to do anything, of course. But I would have defied anyone, anyone, not to be compelled by the force of his personality in that moment. The guards stepped into the room and took Danus by either arm, pulling him from his chair.

Danus struggled weakly. "No," he said. "No. Not me."

The guards began to drag him out of the room.

And then the Lady Romola rose to her feet slowly, a little unsteadily, her knuckles white as bone as they pushed against the arms of the chair. "Let my boy go," she said, in a small clear voice. "I am the killer."

"Physician's gambit," my Master said.

The Fifth Passage Hand was crowded with well-wishers. Both my Master and Titus were drunk, and clearly intending to get drunker. I had been running and running, back and forth, keeping their bowls full. There was only me. I tried not to think about Reena.

"I knew I could not prove that she did it," my Master went on. The crisp edge of his voice was blurred a bit. "So I appeared to accuse the boy, in order to place her between two impossible alternatives. She was a mother. She chose to confess, and sacrifice herself, rather than see her child condemned."

"That," Titus said owlishly, "is not a gambit. That is a skewer." He drained another bowl. "A gambit is when a player offers a sacrifice to gain a tactical advantage. A skewer is when a valuable piece is on the same line as a less valuable piece, and the defender is forced to move the more valuable piece and give up the one behind it."

My Master laughed. "Physician's skewer, then," he conceded. "Although I would think you would let me call the stratagem anything I please, since you would have been skewered most decisively a few ahn ago if it had not succeeded."

"Verr' true," Titus said. "Verr' true indeed. Funny things, words. Get you skewered if you're not careful."

"'A sowing of wild words,'" my Master said, in his quoting-an-old-Gorean-proverb voice, "'A reaping of trouble.' And speaking of trouble, are you not going to retrieve Reena from the public pens? Now that you are exonerated, your property is yours again."

"No," Titus said. "Too much trouble. Was getting tired of her anyway. Listen, my friend, how 'bout selling me Minda instead? Look how she cried, there, throwing herself at the bars and all, when she thought they were going to skewer me."

My Master nodded solemnly. My heart stopped.

One slut is the same as another.

"That was all part of the gambit," my Master said. "Er... the skewer. Minda had a bit of information to impart without the other people in the room being aware of it, and she chose the only way she could think of to do it. Very helpful slut, Minda is sometimes."

"Give you ten silver tarsks for her."

My Master put his head to one side consideringly. I knelt at his feet, in the position called nadu, my thighs parted, my back arrow-straight, my eyes cast down. For all the romantic Earth thoughts I had been thinking, here was solid and inescapable Gorean truth. I was a slave. I was branded, collared, helpless, my Master's property to dispose of. Hot wetness started in the depths of my body, and I shuddered with a sudden animal response that was painful in its intensity.

"Perhaps another time," my Master said. "More paga, Minda."