AS San Thoy led Vernia to the cabin which had been assigned to her, his great round eyes, with their cat-like pupils, appraised her in a manner which made her fearful.
“Beauteous white Princess,” he said, when they were out of earshot of Thid Yet and the group of pirates surrounding him, “you are surrounded by enemies, yet San Thoy would be your friend.”
Weighing his look and words for a moment, Vernia asked:
“Just what do you mean?”
The slit pupils of his eyes narrowed, and this did not escape the observation of the Princess as he replied:
“I mean what I say, Majesty, in all sincerity. For the great respect and admiration I bear His Majesty, your husband, I would befriend you.”
“You know my husband?”
“Only through the echoes of his mighty exploits, which have penetrated even to Huitsen,” he replied. “But one brave man admires another, and feels a certain kinship with him. For his sake as well as for your own, I would be of assistance to you.”
“In what way?”
“If you will give me your full trust and co-operation, I can help you to escape. If not, you will shortly be sold into slavery to a human monster whose mistreatment of the women who fall into his lascivious clutches has made him notorious throughout the length and breadth of Zorovia.”
“Who?”
“I am under orders not to divulge his name, but we of the Huitsenni were offered an enormous sum in treasure and slaves for your safe delivery to him. It was for this reason and no other that our Rogo decided to brave the anger of that mighty fighter, your husband, and send a fleet to capture you at the wild and lonely spot where the spies of this licentious potentate had ascertained that you were but indifferently guarded.”
“It seems strange that this dissolute monarch, whose name I believe I can guess, did not send his own ruffians instead of employing the Huitsenni,” said Vernia.
“He feared the power of Reabon,” replied San Thoy. “Any evidence which his own men might have left as to their presence on Reabonian soil would have led to war and the inevitable dissolution of his empire. For who can stand against the mighty hosts of Reabon? But who could criticize his perfectly legal action were he to buy a beautiful white slave girl from the Huitsenni? And even though she should maintain that she were the Torroga of Reabon, what weight has the word of a slave? A thousand beautiful slave girls might make the same assertion for their own advantage and advancement, and he would be legally privileged to disbelieve them. The man who ordered your capture, Majesty, is as clever as he is lecherous.”
Vernia, who was familiar with the international laws of Venus, knew full well that no man could be held responsible under those laws for purchasing a slave. She knew, also, that it would be difficult to establish the fact in an international court that he was cognizant of the identity of that slave, whose word would have no legal weight, and could be doubted by him with impunity.
“Just what,” she asked, “is your price?”
“My price is but a trifle,” he responded. “In fact, it is scarcely worth mentioning.’
“Name it.”
“I should prefer to rescue you first.”
They were standing before the door to the cabin to which he had led her, and which he had not yet unlocked. Suddenly both saw Thid Yet, Romojak of the fleet rounding a curve in the deck and coming toward them.
Quickly unlocking the door, San Thoy said:
“The Romojak comes. Go into your cabin, and I will call later.”
Vernia stepped into a tiny cabin which contained a sleeping shelf that projected from the wall like the nest of a cave swallow, a small table, and a stool, both fastened to the floor. A ewer and a small bowl for washing were set in a niche in the wall.
As the door closed and the lock clicked behind her, she heard the approaching Thid Yet say:
“By what devious route did you take the prisoner to her cabin, San Thoy, that she but entered it?”
“I stood and talked to her for a moment, to cheer her,” replied San Thoy humbly.
“To cheer her? Ha! So this little beauty has aroused your libidinous fancy! But it was to be expected. Understand me, once and for all, San Thoy. This is no common slave girl. Her ransom is the price of a mighty empire, and she must be delivered unharmed. Let me but suspect you, and you shall die—very slowly and very painfully—mojak though you be.”
“You misapprehend, Excellency,” protested San Thoy. “Because I have spent my hard-earned treasure for a few slaves in the past, I pray you misjudge not my intentions toward this one. I was moved to pity for her, that was all.”
“You pity? Pah! Into your cabin with you, and lay our course that we may reach Huitsen as soon as possible. And do not forget my warning.”
A moment later, Vernia heard the door of the cabin which was next to hers, slam with unnecessary violence, and after laving her face and hands with scented water from the ewer, she lay down on her sleeping shelf to rest, and to overcome the giddiness which the rocking of the ship was beginning to induce. But bad as were the qualms of seasickness, they were as nothing as compared to her mental anguish, for she felt that only a miracle could save her. Although she had never been deceived by San Thoy’s protestations of friendship, she had been half ready to believe that an offer of treasure might win his help. But the words of the Romojak had thoroughly dissipated even that slim hope.
Late that afternoon, San Thoy himself brought her food and a bowl of kova. Because of her sea-sickness she could not eat the food, but she drank the hot, steaming kova. Shortly thereafter, she began to feel unaccountably drowsy, and soon fell into a deep sleep.
When she awakened, Vernia felt the craft beneath her lurching and pitching violently. She put out a hand for the light switch, but there was none. Instead, her hand encountered the wet gunwale of a small boat, in the bottom of which she was lying. She sat up, and the salt spray sprinkled her face. Far away, she saw a number of mast lights twinkling in the darkness. A short bulky figure loomed up before her.
“Who are you?” she asked in terror. “Where are you taking me?”
“Have no fear, Majesty” mouthed the figure. “It is San Thoy that has rescued you.”
“You drugged me.”
“For your own sake, Majesty. You might otherwise have made an outcry when I came to carry you off, thus arousing the ship and defeating your rescue.”
“And you will take me back to Reabon at once?”
“In the morning. Tonight we must seek shelter. The surface of the Azpok swarms with fierce and mighty monsters, which by day seek their dark lairs in the ocean’s depths. Night travel in a small boat is extremely dangerous. Hark! I hear the breakers now. The island is not far off.”
Steering entirely by the sounds that came to him—for nothing was visible in the pitchy blackness—San Thoy brought the little sailboat through booming breakers which evidently covered a bar or sunken reef, and into comparatively calm water. It was not long after that the keel rasped on a gravelly shore.
Leaping into the shallow water, the pirate dragged the boat high up on the beach. Then he furled the sail, and taking Vernia by the hand said:
“Come. I will take you to a place where you may spend the night safely. In the morning, I will call for you and take you to Reabon.”
“You will be well rewarded,” replied Vernia. “I will double the ransom which was offered for me and add to it a thousand kantols of land, and purple of a nobleman for life.”
“Your Majesty is generous,” said San Thoy, “but then I have cut myself off from my own people, property, and position, in order to effect your rescue.”
He led her up a narrow winding path, where leaves, dripping with the night dew, brushed her face and body. Presently they came to a small clearing.
San Thoy fumbled with a latch for a moment, and then opened a door. He released Vernia’s hand, and struck a light with the small flame maker which he carried. When he had lighted a torch that hung from a bracket on the wall, Vernia saw that they were in a tiny cabin which contained a sleeping shelf, a crude table, three chairs, some utensils, and a place for cooking beside which fuel was piled.
“I will light the fire for you, that you may dry your clothing,” said San Thoy. “Then I will brew kova.”
Vernia seated herself on one of the chairs, and watched the broad, greasy back of the pirate as he squatted before the fire. When he had it blazing brightly, he took a kettle and went outside for water. Returning, he dropped in some kova roots which he found on a shelf beside the fireplace, and soon had it boiling. As Vernia watched, she wondered if his intentions were as magnanimous as he pretended, or if he were as perfidious as the words of his commander implied. So far, his impassive features had betrayed nothing. Only time would tell.
Presently, he placed a chair before the fire for her, that she might dry her clothes, and poured her a bowl of steaming kova. While she slowly sipped the hot, stimulating beverage, he tossed off bowl after bowl until the pot was empty and another had been set to brewing. She noticed that with each bowl, the slits in his round eyes became more bestial. San Thoy was drunk.
When the second pot of kova was ready, the pirate offered to refill Vernia’s bowl, but she declined. He leered a little as he refilled his own, and it was not long before the second had gone the way of the first. Then San Thoy extracted a kerra pod from his belt pouch, and, breaking it open, emptied the red contents into his toothless mouth.
For a while he mumbled the drug, expectorating thin streams of scarlet juice into the fire from time to time, and muttering drunkenly to himself as they hissed among the hot embers.
Presently he arose, and unclasping a belt which held his tork, scarbo, and knife, hung it on a peg on the wall. Then he stretched his arms and yawned hideously, the red juice trickling from the corners of his flabby mouth, and staining his greasy chin.
“My dear,” he said thickly, “it is time to retire. May your humble servant assist you to disrobe?”
With this he lurched unsteadily toward her.
Panic stricken, Vernia jumped up and placed the chair between herself and the advancing pirate.
“Back!” she said. “Go back! Don’t you dare touch me!”
“There, there,” he said, still advancing. “Do not be frightened. I will not hurt you.”
Only the chair and two feet of space separated them now. Suddenly seizing the chair, he hurled it to one side and flung out both arms to grasp her. She leaped back, and his arms embraced empty air. But now she was cornered. She looked longingly at the weapons hanging on the peg, but between her and them was San Thoy.
Half crouching, arms spread, he advanced toward her. Suddenly he sprang like a beast of prey. Then like crushing bands of steel his greasy arms encircled her. His grinning, lecherous features were close to hers, leering down at her.
“Little she-marmelot!” he said. “Think you that you can resist San Thoy, who has subdued a thousand slave girls?”
She struggled desperately, striking and clawing at the bestial face, squirming and kicking with all her strength, but to no avail.
With a laugh of exultation, he picked her up, and carrying her to the sleeping shelf, flung her down upon it.