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"The room is beautiful," I said.
"Kneel," said Sucha.
I knelt.
"You are Dina," she said. "You are slave now within the Keep of Stones of Turmus. This is a merchant keep, under the ba
The other girls in the room came casually to where I knelt before Sucha. There were several of them. Most were naked. All wore Turian collars.
"A new silk girl," said one.
I straightened my body. It pleased me that they saw me as a silk girl.
"There are twenty-eight girls in Stones of Turmus," continued Sucha. "We come from nineteen cities. Six of us are bred slaves."
"She is a pretty one," said another girl.
I smiled.
"Teach her she is low girl," said Sucha.
One of the girls seized me from behind by the hair and threw me back to the tiles. I cried out. The other girls then, swiftly, kicked and struck at me. I screamed, twisting. "Enough," called Sucha. The beating had lasted no more than a brief handful of seconds, perhaps no more than five or six seconds. Its purpose was no more than to intimidate me. I looked up, horrified, my head still held down by the hair. My leg was bleeding where I had been bitten.
"Release her," said Sucha. "Kneel, Dina."
My hair released, I knelt.
"You are low girl," said Sucha.
"Yes, Mistress," I said. I was terrified. I did not even dare look into the eyes of the other girls. I could sense their readiness, their eagerness, on the least provocation, to put me under slave-girl discipline.
There was a pounding on bars, from several yards away. I heard a man's voice. It sounded authoritative, especially significant, in such a place. We listened, Sucha carefully, too.
"The girl, Sulda," he called, "is summoned to the couch of Hak Haran."
"Be swift, Sulda," whispered Sucha. "Hak Haran does not like to be kept waiting."
"Yes, Mistress," said a stu
"The girl hears and obeys," called Sucha.
"It is well," said the man.
"I," said another of the girls, "am never summoned except to the couch of Fulmius."
The other girls laughed at her.
"Leave us," said Sucha.
The other girls, some with last looks at me, drifted away.
"They do not like me," I said.
"You are very pretty," said Sucha. "It is natural for them to resent you."
"I thought they were tamed," I said.
"They are tamed to men, who are the masters," said Sucha. "But we are not tamed to one another."
"I do not want to be hurt," I said.
"Remember then," said Sucha, "that you are low girl. Please them. Conduct yourself with care among your sisters in bondage."
"Yes, Mistress," I said.
"Get up. Follow me," said Sucha.
"Yes, Mistress," I said.
I knew that slave girls were often left to impose their own order upon themselves, masters usually not interfering in such matters. The ke
"Here is your ke
"Yes, Mistress," I said.
It was a cell alcove, off the large room, with a small, barred gate. It must be entered and left on the hands and knees. A girl, thus, ca
"I trust you find the accommodations satisfactory," she said.
"Yes, Mistress," I smiled. Indeed, it was the most luxurious cage I had seen. It was dry, and there was a mattress. Short of being chained on furs at the foot of a master's couch, what more could a girl desire?
"Follow me," said Sucha.
"Yes, Mistress," I said, following her.
She took me about the pool to another room. In walking about the pool she pointed out the gates of the ke
Sucha walked past a small room, and came to a short corridor, leading from the lofty room. In it was a large, barred gate, with another visible beyond it. It had been on the bars of the i