A move and the knife was in his left hand as his right snatched the key from the air. Blindly he fumbled with the glittering band, his fingers searching for the tiny keyhole. Finding it, he slipped the key inside, took a breath and twisted. The key fit, the collar did not explode, and he flung it from him to lie like a gleaming serpent in the puddle of the slaver's blood.
"And now?" Kathryn shared his relief. "You've got rid of the collar but how does that help you?'"
"One thing at a time." Dumarest looked about the room. By this time, unless the place was totally staffed by hysterical fools, there would be guards waiting and ready to pounce. "If you gave me your word could I trust it?"
"Of course. I am the Matriarch of Esslin."
And a proud woman who would not easily forgive this insult. And one who could not be kept a prisoner indefinately. Even now she must be planning on how best to make a break. To risk the knife in the certain knowledge that, once beyond his reach, she would be safe. And she needn't even do that. Marksmen, correctly stationed, could burn him down without harming the woman.
"It seems that you are in a rather difficult position," she said dryly. "I can understand your desire to get rid of the collar, and the slaver was no loss, but what now?"
"We go on a journey."
"To the field?" She was shrewd. "Hylda's vessel? How can you be sure the crew will accommodate you?"
A gamble he had to take. The only chance he had. And he could afford to waste no time.
"We're leaving, my lady," he said quietly. "It would be wise for you to give me full cooperation. That way neither of us will get hurt."
"And if I struggle or appeal for help or anything like that which threatens you then you will kill me. Is that it?"
"Not kill you. Not if I can avoid it." He left the threat unspoken but the sting of the knife was enough, "Now lead the way out. Keep close and… and…" He blinked, looking at her face which seemed to waver. And then, suddenly, there was nothing.
Chapter Three
"Slaver gas." Gustav Acchabaron lifted his goblet and studied the wine within. "A compound designed to serve a specific purpose and I think you will admit most useful in certain emergencies."
"Such as the release of a hostage?"
"Certainly." Gustav sipped then lowered his goblet. "But come, Earl, you aren't eating and the physicians tell me that nourishment is essential after treatment with slow-time. Incidentally, how is the head?"
Healed, the wound nothing but a trace of scar tissue beneath the cover of his hair, the internal inflammation cured in a matter of hours during which he had lain unknowing and unconscious as drugs had accelerated his metabolism. Slow-time which had compressed the hours so that he'd had the benefit of long, natural healing.
And stranger still had been his welcome after waking.
Leaning back Dumarest looked at the chamber to which he had been guided, the man who was his host. The husband of the Matriarch who, in such a society, would take a minor part in public affairs. Private ones too if the culture followed the patterns of others he had known. Yet the man, for all his apparent show of kindness, was being cruel.
Dumarest said flatly, "What is my position now?"
"You are my guest."
"And?"
"You expect retribution?" Gustav shook his head and smiled. "I am remiss but you must remember that days have passed since the gas rendered you unconscious. Time in which things have been decided. Time too for anger to cool. The Lady Kathryn is a firm ruler but not a sadistic one. She would not allow you to be plied with wines and viands before your execution. She would consider it a waste."
"She would be right." Dumarest helped himself to more meat and ate it, chewing well before swallowing, merely wetting his lips with the wine. Gustav could be honest and mean what he said but he did not rule. "Your wife, my lord, is a most unusual woman."
"You think so?"
Dumarest nodded, remembering the hard lines of the body he had held, the firmness beneath the clothing. She had never, at any time, displayed fear. She had made no attempt to struggle, knowing it was useless. She had made no threats or protestations and she had offered no bribes.
And now, for some incredible reason of her own, she had spared his life.
And spared his neck the weight of a collar. Gustav saw the lift of Dumarest's hand to his throat and guessed the thought behind the gesture.
"You taught her something," he said quietly. "No man should wear a collar such as that."
"Nor should anyone be a slave."
"True."
"You agree? And yet you tolerate it?"
"I tolerate what I must." Gustav drank wine, remembering, finding no pleasure in the memories. "We are all the victims of our culture, Earl. On Esslin slavery is common. An ancient tradition which has been maintained and it has all the strength of established habit. The fields must be tended and the crops harvested and who else is to do the work if not slaves?"
"Machines. Free men and women. Paid workers."
"So I have argued. I know that slavery is uneconomic and inefficient aside from being inhumane. I know too that those who buy slaves are worse than those who raid for them, for without a market such creatures would cease to exist. But logic and sense have little weight against rooted conviction and there are few who dare to stand against the present order of things." Gustav helped himself to more wine. "It is a pleasure to talk to a man like yourself. You are a breath of fresh wind tearing away cobwebs. A man who has traveled far and seen much. Neiras, perhaps? Subik? Anchayha?"
Names lost among a mass of others and all to the forgotten. Planets and worlds which spun about their suns and with each revolution falling farther into the past. Points on a seemingly endless journey which had merged to form a pattern illuminated by violence and blood and pain and aching loss.
"No," said Dumarest. "I know none of the worlds you mention."
"But others?"
"Others, yes.'"
"Many like Esslin?"
Too many. Small worlds with limited areas and scant populations. Static cultures frozen in ancient moulds with the dead hand of long-established expediency stifling further growth. Clans, Houses, Families, Tribes-some locked in the maw of Unions and Guilds and none wholly free. Backwaters among the stars. Bad worlds for a traveler on which to land. Some of them almost impossible to leave. Planets on which men starved because they could find no work. Others in which savagery ruled in places, as isolated communes slid back down the ladder of evolution.
Perhaps, somewhere, there was a world which had forged ahead and on which all men were at liberty to make any choice they wished. A truly free world on which liberty and the concept of equality was accepted in the purest sense. One on which no man sought to impose his will on another.
It could exist.
Dumarest had never found it.
"Slavery," mused Gustav. "How did you come to be a slave?"
"Luck."
"Luck?"
"Bad luck. I was at the wrong place at the wrong time. Another day and I wouldn't be sitting here now." Dumarest selected a fruit from a bowl and peeled the scarlet rinds from the crisp flesh of the violet pulp. "What is to happen to me?"
"Now?" Gustav gestured at the table. "You eat and drink and enjoy the moment."