Flam who didn’t seem to believe in guards. His house was large but easy to get into, and there were three female slaves sleeping on pallets in what seemed to be a closet in his bedroom. Flam himself was alone in his bed, so after closing the closet door Tain and her companions fed the man the drug. He reacted in the same way that Gordi had, and Tain put him under immediate control. They now had Gordi’s main opponent, and had only

Gordi’s supporters still to get.

They finally made it back to the warehouse with all three men, and as far as Tain could tell no one had sounded an alarm yet. Their luck was running better than she’d dared to hope it would, but that might not be the blessing it seemed. They had all four of the men they wanted in their control, but how those men would react to what was done to them remained to be seen.

Ennie wasn’t waiting this time when Tain opened the secret door, which probably meant she hadn’t felt it wise to leave Gordi by himself even asleep. She left Killen and Tandro to see to their prisoners after she closed the secret door again, then went ahead to find out if her guess had been right.

“You’re back,” Ennie exclaimed with a smile when Tain walked into the fourth alcove, the room they’d gotten ready for their prisoners. Ennie sat on the floor next to a sleeping Gordi, but now she got to her feet. “I

thought about leaving this man alone when I found that the other women were asleep, but considering the fact that he’s the important one I

decided it might be better if I stayed. Did you get all the others?“

“We certainly did,” Tain said, relieved that her worry had been misplaced. “Killen and Tandro are bringing them down so they ought to be here in a minute or two.”

“After that I think we all ought to get some sleep,” Ennie said, running a weary hand through her hair. “I know I had that nap earlier, but all the good it did has been slowly wearing off.”

Tain nodded her agreement, then turned to wait for the men to be brought to the alcove. If she cued the others to her voice the way she had with Gordi, none of the men would wake up until she wanted them to. But that didn’t mean she’d be able to sleep anywhere but right there in the alcove with the prisoners. If the native women hadn’t made any trouble yet, that didn’t mean tomorrow wouldn’t be another story entirely…

Jake had trouble falling asleep after they got the captives bedded down, and then suddenly found himself awake after a period of time that didn’t feel very long at all. Ennie had joined Tandro on his pallet again, and even though the two didn’t make love, this time was harder on Jake than the last when they did make love. Even without looking Jake knew that Tandro had his arms around Ennie, and that knowledge was oddly painful. Tain had taken a pallet into the captives’ alcove, giving Jake not the smallest indication that she would have welcomed his presence on the pallet with her.

Not that he wanted to sleep with Tain. She’d been treating him like some kind of unintelligent hireling, someone whose expertise was to be used when necessary but at all other times completely ignored. Being treated that way made Jake feel like less than he knew himself to be, and he refused to accept being put down like that. He was a human being, and no matter how he was treated he intended to continue acting like a human being.

Trying to fall asleep again turned out to be a waste of time, so Jake got up quietly and went into what was called the cooking alcove. His intention was to make a fresh pot of coffee, and discovering that there was already fresh coffee being kept warm was something of a surprise. The native women were all asleep in the first alcove, so Jake didn’t find out who had made the coffee until he carried his cup into the captives’ area. Tain sat on her pallet drinking instead of sleeping, looking up when he appeared in the doorway. Looking up but not saying anything…

“I want a chance to talk to Gordi before you go on with the rest of your … plan,” Jake found himself saying, something he’d been thinking about since the night before. “If I can bring the man over to our side with just words, we won’t have to chance turning him completely against us from what the women do.”

“It’s worth a try,” Tain conceded after a very long moment of simply staring at him. “But that’s the only thing I want you to try without checking with me first. You aren’t to order any of these men to obey no one but you, not unless I say you can.”

Jake nodded his head once, hating the fact that Tain didn’t need his agreement. He was still required to obey her, a fact he couldn’t forget even if he wanted to. She seemed to take every opportunity to remind him… Once Jake had been given his orders, Tain got up and went over to where Gordi lay on a plain blanket. That was all any of the captives had been given to lie on, which meant they would definitely wake up hurting.

“Gordi, listen to me,” Tain said softly right next to the big man. “In a moment you’re going to wake up, but when you do you won’t remember what was done to you in your house before you were taken out of it. You won’t have any idea how you got here, but you’ll be able to see and hear and smell things again. You just won’t be able to leave without permission or try to hurt the people around you. All right, you can wake up now.”

The big man Tain had been speaking to began to stir, and then he sat up slowly on the blanket as he looked around. Gordi used one hand to rub at his shoulder as his gaze took in the other men who were still sleeping, and then suddenly his attention was completely on Jake.

“What the hell is this?” Gordi asked in a deep voice that suggested the man was very used to giving orders. “Why are we all here and who the hell are you?”

“I’m one of the men you’d agreed to meet with the day before yesterday,” Jake answered mildly as he moved a step closer to where Gordi sat. “When my friend made the appointment he asked you and your people to keep the subject of our visit private, but one of you dropped a word in the wrong ear. My friend and I were attacked twice by assassins, once before we reached town, once in our hostel. And then yesterday morning, when we were on our way to your house, my friend and I were knocked unconscious by men with clubs and he and I were taken captive.”

“I thought my people could be trusted, but it looks like I was wrong,” Gordi answered after a very brief hesitation, a touch of guilt showing in the blue of his eyes. “When you and your friend didn’t show up I thought you might have changed your minds… But that still doesn’t explain what I and those others are doing here. And if you were taken captive, how come you’re free now instead of being dead?”

“I’m free because an associate helped out, and I’m not dead because dead wasn’t the way Himlin wanted me to be,” Jake said, watching Gordi carefully. “One of his assassins named Himlin, and Tandro and I lodged formal complaints against him. Himlin wanted Tandro and me to withdraw those complaints.”

“Hearing that slaver’s name doesn’t surprise me one bit,” Gordi said, his face twisted in a grimace that showed his opinion of Himlin. “And if that’s who one of my people talked to, I’m definitely going to find out who the big-mouth is.”

“That’s fine for later, but right now we have another point to talk about,” Jake said, crouching down in front of Gordi. “There are a lot of people who listen to what you have to say, Gordi, and that’s why I wanted to talk to you. I was told that you aren’t all that fond of slavery, and that you might even listen when I proved that slavery needs to be abolished. Are you willing to listen?” “I listen to what everyone has to say,” Gordi returned with a much more neutral expression. “If you don’t listen to both sides of an argument you can’t decide which side to support with any hope of being right.”