I then reknotted the binding fiber from where it was fastened, behind the small of her back, and also unknotted it, in front, from the chain of the slave bracelets. I put the binding fiber in my belt. I then unlocked the left slave bracelet.

“Climb,” I told her, indicating a nearby tree.

She stood, unsteadily. She shook her head. She was weak. She had lost blood. “Climb,” I told her, “or I shall bracelet you on the ground.” Slowly she climbed, branch by branch, I following her.

“Keep climbing,” I told her.

At last she was more than thirty feet from the ground. She was frightened. “Edge out on the limb,” I told her, “and lie down upon it, your head to the trunk of the tree.” She hesitated.

“Do so!” I told her.

She lay, her back on the limb.

“Farther out,” I told her.

She edged, on her back, along the limb. Then she was more than five feet from the trunk.

She shuddered.

“Let your arms hang free,” I said.

She did. The slave bracelets, one locked on her right wrist, dangled. I then relocked her left wrist in the slave bracelets. Her wrists were now locked under the branch and behind her. I then crossed her ankles and bound them to the branch. Then, with another length of binding fiber, taken from my own pouch, I bound her by the belly, tightly, to the branch.

She looked back at me, over her shoulder, fear in her eyes.

I climbed downward. The sleen is a burrowing animal. It seldom climbs. The panther can climb, but it is accustomed to take its hunting scents from the ground.

I expected the girl would be safe. If she were not, I remembered, as a Gorean, that she had tried to kill me. If ought befell me, of course, it would not be well for her. She was gagged, braceleted, and bound. I was confident that she would wish me well in whatever enterprise I might be engaged. Though she was my enemy and prisoner, her desires would be most fervid for my success. The girl taken care of, I resumed my journey.

An Ahn before darkness I found the camp.

It was situated back from the bank of a small stream, one of the many tiny tributaries of the Laurius which interlace the forest.

I eased myself upward into the branches of a tree, whence I might command a better view.

It consisted of five huts, conical, of woven sapling and thatched, and was surrounded by a small palisade of sharpened saplings. A rough gate, fastened with vines, gave entrance into the camp. In the center of the camp there was a cooking hole, banked with a circle of flat stones. On a wooden spit, set on sticks, grease dropping into the fire and flaming, was a thigh of tabuk. It smelled good. The smoke, in a thin line, trickled upward into the sky. The thigh of tabuk was tended by a squatting panther girl, who, from time to time, picked bits of meat from it and thrust them in her mouth. She sucked her fingers clean. Over to one side another girl worked on a slave net, reworking and reknotting the weighted cords.

Elsewhere two girls, sitting cross-legged, were playing a cat’s-cradle game, matching one another’s intricate patterns with the twine. There were skillful. This game is popular in the north, particularly in the villages. It is also played frequently in Torvaldsland.

I saw, clearly, no other panther girls in or about the enclosure. I did see, however, a movement within one of the huts, and I supposed that to be another girl.

I saw no evidence of Talena. She might, of course, lie chained within one of the dark huts. Perhaps the movement I had seen within the hut had been she. I did not know.

One thing, however, seemed quite clear. Not all of Verna’s band was now within the enclosure.

There was probably five or six girls there at the most.

Her band, most reports agreed, consisted of some fifteen women.

I looked at the girls in the enclosure. They did not know I regarded them. They did not realize their camp had been found. They did not know that soon, perhaps tomorrow, their camp would be stormed, and they would be captives, destined for the iron and the slave markets of the south.

But we must move rapidly. I had learned from Grenna, my prisoner, that an unusually large band of panther girls, under a woman named Hura, was even now advancing toward these areas of the forests.

I smiled.

When Hura’s band arrived, ready to fight for these pasangs of forest, ready to drive Verna’s band out, they would meet no opposition.

By that time Verna and her band would be my captives.

Hura’s band would find only an empty camp, and perhaps some signs of struggle. But we must move swiftly.

Additional members of panther girls, entering these countries of forests, might well confuse or complicate my plans.

I must conclude my business before their arrival. It did not seem it would be difficult to do so. I wondered how it was that Hura had under her command so many girls. Such bands of girls scarcely ever number more than twenty. Yet, if Grenna was to be believed, following this Hura were a hundred or more armed women.

I must not allow them to interfere with my plans.

I looked down into the camp, at the girls. I regarded them as a Gorean. They had had their chance. They had refused to sell Talena to me. They had not dealt with me. That had been their mistake. The lesson they would be taught would be sharp. Let each of them, on the auction block, as the men bid upon them, consider how their affairs might have been better conducted.

Two more girls arrived at the camp, and untied the gate, entered, and then retied it.

I thought they would look well in slave chains.

I looked again about the camp. I saw some poles behind the huts, on which, drying, were stretched the skins of four panthers. There were some boxes, some kegs, near one of the huts.

There was not much else.

I expected, by nightfall, all, or most, of Verna’s band would have returned to their slender stockade.

I slipped down from my hiding place, and disappeared in the forest. “Take this captive,” I told Rim, “back to the Tesephone.” I thrust Grenna toward him. I had again put her wrists in slave bracelets, and bound them at her belly. She stumbled and fell to her knees, her head down, at Rim’s feet.

She no longer wore her gag. It was not now necessary.

“I would prefer,” said Rim, “to join in the attack on her band, who once enslaved me.” “I recall,” I said, “and I fear that you might be too precipitate.” Rim smiled. “Perhaps,” he said.

It was now almost impossible to detect where the two-inch strip had been shaved on his head, from the forehead to the back of his neck.

“I will accompany you,” said Arn.

“Good,” I said.

Arn was eyeing Grenna appreciatively. She saw his eyes, and put down her head again, swiftly.

I was pleased that Arn liked her. Perhaps I would later give her to him. “At the Tesephone,” I said, indicating Grenna with my foot, “brand her, and see that she is enslaved. After that, see to the wounds of the slave.” The girl moaned.

“Yes, Captain,” said Rim. He reached down and lifted her up, lightly in his arms.

How beautiful women are, I thought.

Rim carried her from the small fire, and moved into the darkness.

I looked about, at the nine men with me.

“Let us sleep now,” I said. “We shall awaken two Ahn before dawn. We will then march on the camp of Verna.” “Good,” said Arn.

I lay down on the leaves, within the ring of sharpened saplings we had set about our small camp.

I closed my eyes. In the morning I would have Talena back. Who knew how high might be raised the chair of Bosk?

Things were going well.

I fell asleep.