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When I returned to the beach, the child was sitting on a stone beside my possessions. I thanked her for watching them, and she said, "I didn't want anyone to take your book, master. Then you wouldn't know who you are, or who I am."
"Who are you?" I asked her. "And why do you call me master?"
"I'm your slave Io."
I explained that I had thought her the daughter of the couple with whom she had been chained.
"I knew you did," she said. "But we only met them a little while ago. I'm your slave, given you as your personal property by the Shining God when you were in Hill."
I shook my head.
"That's the truth, master, I swear by the club of Heracles. And if you'll just read your book you'll find out all about it, and about the curse the Great Mother laid on you. Then you'll see it isn't right for me to be like this"-she held up her chain to show me-"when you're free. I should be free too, to serve you."
I tried to recall what the woman had told me this morning. "The soldiers captured us when we were going somewhere."
"Not these soldiers, master. Those were the slaves of the Rope Makers. They beat you, and they treated me like a woman and made me bleed there, though I'm not a woman yet. Hilaeira says I won't have a baby, but she might." Io sighed, recalling much pain and weariness, I think, that I have forgotten.
"Then we met some real soldiers, shieldmen with helmets and big spears. They made the slaves of the Rope Makers give us up. I hid your book because I was afraid they'd take it from you, and they made us go to Tower Hill, but I don't think the people in Tower Hill wanted to keep us-they're afraid of the Rope Makers like everybody else, and they didn't want to have prisoners that were taken from them. But they're afraid of the People of Thought too, and the soldiers from my city helped burn theirs. So after a while they gave us to Hypereides. He separated us, but I could see he liked you, so when you came to talk to me I gave your book back. I had it under my peplos, with the cords around my waist. Did you read it? I told you to."
"I don't know," I said.
"Maybe you did. But if you didn't write anything afterward, it doesn't matter now."
"You're a very knowing little girl," I told her, pulling on my chiton.
"It hasn't helped me much. I was owned by a pretty nice family back in Hill. Now I'm here, and all I've got out of the trip is a bath. Will you talk to Hypereides and ask him to let me take off my chain?"
While I tied my sandals, I said, "You can't take off a chain as though it were one of these."
"Yes, I can. They have them to chain up bad sailors and barbarian prisoners, so they aren't made to fit somebody as little as me. It's tight, but I can get my foot out. I did it last night."
"Show me."
She crossed her chained foot over her knee, stuck out her tongue, and tugged at the shackle, which was indeed too large. "I was sweating a little then," she said. "I guess that made it easier. Now it's got sand under it."
"You'll take the skin off."
"No, I won't. Master, put your hand right here, and your thumb against my heel. Then pull with your fingers and tell me what you think."
I did so, and the shackle slipped from her foot as easily as an anklet. "You were joking," I said. "Why, you might almost have stepped out of it."
"Maybe I was, a little bit. You're not angry at me, are you, master?"
"No. But you'd better put it back on before someone sees you."
"I don't think I can," she told me. "I'll say it fell off in the water, and I couldn't find it."
"Then you'd better hide it under one of those stones."
"I know a better place. I found it while you were swimming around. Look at the edge of this big rock."
It was a hole the size of a man's head. When I thrust my arm into it, I discovered that it went almost straight down.
"I wouldn't do that," Io said. "Something smells bad down there." She dropped the chain and shackle into it. "I don't think they'll put another one on me. They'll be afraid that will get lost too."
One of the sailors who had reboarded the ship had returned now with a bronze fire-box. I was surprised to see how bright its vents seemed. The sun was setting behind the finger of land, plunging the beach into shadow.
"I'll go and get our food, master," Io said happily. "That's one of the things I ought to do for you."
"It won't be ready yet!" I called after her, but she paid no attention. I had picked up this scroll and started to follow her when someone tapped my shoulder.
It was one of the bowmen. I said, "She'll do no harm; she's only a child."
He shrugged to show he was not concerned about Io. "My name is Oior," he said. "I am of the People of Scoloti. You are Latro. I heard the man and woman speak of you."
I nodded.
"I do not know this land."
"Nor I, either."
He looked surprised at that but went on resolutely. "It has many gods. In my land we sacrifice to red fire and air the unseen, to black earth, pale water, sun and moon, and to the sword of iron. That is all. I do not know these gods. Now I am troubled, and my trouble will be the trouble of all who are here." He looked around to see whether anyone was watching us. "I do not have much money, but you will have all I have." He held out his hand, filled with bronze coins.
"I don't want your money," I told him.
"Take. That is how friends are made in this land."
To please him, I took a single coin.
"Good," he said. "But this is no good place to talk, and soon there will be food. When we have eaten and drunk, go high up." He pointed to the ridge, between the sentries who stood black against the sky to the north and south. "Wait for Oior there."
Now I am waiting, and I have written this as I wait. The sun has set, and the last light will soon leave the western sky. The moon is rising, and if the bowman does not come before I grow sleepy, I will go to a fire to sleep.
CHAPTER X-Under a Waning Moon
I write beside the fire. When I look about, it seems that no one is awake but the black man and me. He walks up and down the beach, his face turned to the sea as if waiting for some sail.
Yet I know many are awake. Now and then one sits up, sees the rest, and lies down again. The wind sighs in the trees and among the rocks; but there are other sighs, not born of the wind.
I asked Hypereides whether we would bury the dead man in the morning. He said we would not, that there is hope we will reach the city soon. If we do, the dead man can lie with his family, if he has one.
But I should return to the place where I stopped writing only a short time ago. Io carried food and wine to me, though I had eaten already, and we shared it with our backs against one of the highest rocks of the ridge, watching the moon rise over the sea and enjoying the spectacle provided by the fires of driftwood and the ships drawn up on the beach.
Hypereides was generous with food, and because no one had remembered I had eaten already, Io had received full portions for both of us. While I pretended to dine a second time, she piled what she did not want of her own meal onto my trencher, so there was a great deal there still when I drained the cup, wiped my fingers with bread, and laid it at my feet.
"I would like something of that."
I looked around to see who spoke. What I had thought only a stone resting by chance upon a larger stone was in fact the head of a woman. As soon as she saw I had seen her, she rose and came toward us. She was naked and graceful, beyond her first youth (as well as I could judge in the moonlight), though not her beauty. The black hair that fell to her waist seemed longer, thicker, and more tangled than any woman's hair should be.
As she came nearer to us, I decided she was a celebrant of some cult; for though she wore no gown, she had tied the shed skin of a snake above her hips like a cincture, with the head and tail hanging down.