should be, a naked, worthless slut, no more than a chained slave!”
“I am free! Free!” cried Darla.
“I thought free women were clothed,” said Tuza.
“Please, Tuza!” wept Darla.
“Do not dare to speak my name!” said Tuza.
“Do not kill her!” cried Hiza.
Tuza stepped back, and indicated Darla with the point of her knife. “There is the one you feared,” she said to Hiza and Emerald. “The mighty leader! See her helpless, see her without her talmit, without her skins, her weapons, her ornaments. Is she so mighty now! See her as she is, stripped, chained, and shackled, frightened, in tears, only a woman!”
Then Tuza turned back to Darla. “Get on your knees,” she said, “where you belong.”
Darla knelt, and looked up at Tuza. “What are you going to do with me?” she asked. “What is to be my fate?”
“You will learn later,” said Tuza. “First we will have breakfast. Busy yourself, Tula. Mila, Vulo, lay out the mats, the plates, the goblets and utensils, and then kneel, prepared to serve your mistresses. Hiza, fetch the talmit once unworthily worn by our pretty prisoner, and tie her ankles together.”
“Please,” said Darla.
“Will it be necessary to gag you?” asked Tuza.
“No,” said Darla.
“You might look well in a gag,” said Tuza, “pretty one.”
“It will not be necessary to gag me,” said Darla.
“You have gagged enough slaves,” said Tuza. “Why should you not be gagged, and as a slave?”
“I will be silent,” said Darla.
The breakfast was prolonged, doubtless by intent. It was served by Tula, returned to the rope, Mila, and myself. We were even, following the meal of the mistresses, allowed to feed ourselves with our own hands.
“Eat well, kajirae,” said Tuza. “We have a long trek to the coast before us.” I recalled we were to be sold on the coast. Darla knelt to the side, unable to rise, her ankles tied together. She had not been fed.
After breakfast, we cleared the mats, extinguished the fire, washed the gear of cooking and feeding in the Alexandra, and tidied the camp. Our bundles had been arranged and put to order by Hiza and Emerald.
We were standing by our burdens, I think about the eighth Ahn, awaiting the command to bear them, when Tuza drew out her knife, went to Darla, seized her by the hair, bent her head back, and put the blade of the knife to her throat.
“What is to be done with you?” asked Tuza.
“Sell me,” whispered Darla.
Hiza and Emerald gasped.
“Do my ears deceive me?” laughed Tuza.
“Sell me,” she said. “The sham is done. The charade is complete. The pretense is over. I am a woman, and a slave.”
Tuza sheathed her dagger, slapped her thigh, and turned, laughing, to Hiza and Emerald. “Hear that,” she laughed, “hear that!” But neither Hiza nor Emerald was laughing. Tula, Mila, and I stood near our burdens, frightened, mere women, feminine women, so unlike the mighty Panther Women, so unlike that we could be to them as naught but despised slaves, women of the sort which men immediately think of in terms of a brand and tunic, women of the sort which men think little of enslaving, and seek for their chains, their cords, their ropes, and straps, their collars. We dared not meet the eyes of the mistresses. I had thought that Darla, who was large and strong, was the fiercest, the mightiest, the most formidable of women, the bold and daring leader of a dangerous band of Panther Women, women to look up to, women before whom other women might kneel in fear, women not unlike the masters themselves, women not unlike men, but here was mighty Darla, naked, on her knees, chained and shackled, her ankles bound together with her own talmit, begging to be sold. Darla, I then realized, was a woman, and perhaps not so different from other women. Who knew what her thoughts had been, and her dreams? Perhaps she did have something in her of the woman, the blood, the instincts, the hopes, the needs, the fears, the desires, the longings, of the woman, the secret understanding, however hysterically denied, of her true place in nature, out of which she could not be herself. It was as though some image, some proud, contrived, clay encasement of a reality had finally broken apart, separating, revealing, hitherto hidden within, something quite unlike the image, or encasement, something not hard but soft, not artificial but real, not false but true, and needful. Yes, I thought, she was a woman, a true woman, but,