Maggie certainly hoped so but she had a bad feeling about this. A really bad feeling.
Chapter One
“So very pleased to meet you, little Mistress.” The shirtless man bowed stiffly to Maggie. “I am the personal body slave of Lady Pope’nose.”
“Uh, nice to meet you.” She started to bow back and then remembered she wasn’t supposed to. Women were superior to men here so she should be courteous but distant—at least, that was what Ferna had said.
The shirtless slave frowned. “But where is your body slave? Forgive me, but I was told to expect a person of rank.”
“I am rank. I mean, of rank,” Maggie corrected herself hastily. “But I, uh…my slave got sick on the way here. Actually,” she went on, hoping to make her story even more convincing, “He died.”
“Oh!” The man bowed low. “My condolences, Little Mistress. Had you owned him long?”
“Oh yes, ten years! He was a…uh…a birthday present for my fifteenth birthday,” Maggie said. “I’m heartbroken over it, really. He had the…the uh, purple spotted chicken mumps.”
The slave frowned. “I’m sorry—the what? That disease is not known here.”
“Never mind.” Maggie waved airily. “It’s not contagious but it is deadly once contracted. Anyway, I thought it was better to continue here and give you the Hurkon collar in exchange for the historical documents as we agreed. So, uh, here.”
She held out the black velvet pillow which contained the strange device. It had multicolored lights all over its black wire surface, reminding her of some kind of bizarre Christmas wreath. But there was nothing Christmassy or cheery about it. Frankly, just holding the thing on the cushion gave her the creeps although she couldn’t say why. She was more than ready to get rid of it and the little remote control that went with it.
The half naked slave took a step back, his boots making a gooshing sound in the deep mud that surrounded the ship.
“Oh, I couldn’t take that, Little Mistress! You must deliver it to Lady Pope’nose yourself.”
Inwardly, Maggie sighed. Well, so much for an easy end to her quest. Although it did seem like the slave could have taken it. After all, he was wearing a similar collar himself, though his was much less elaborate than the Hurkon one.
“Of course,” she said smoothly. “Well, where is she?”
“She would never come to this side of the chasm,” the slave said. “I must take you to her.”
“All right,” Maggie said, resigned. “Let’s go then—lead the way.” She didn’t like the idea of tramping through mud in the one good dress she’d brought on this mission but she’d been on enough field expeditions that exposure to the elements didn’t make her squeamish. She could deal with it. She started to step down into the mud but the slave shook his head, obviously horrified.
“Please stop, little Mistress! You cannot soil your feet in such a manner. As you have no body servant of your own, I will carry you.”
He held out his arms to her but at this, Maggie balked. There was no way she wanted to be carried in the arms of a complete stranger across this field of mud. Besides, while the shirtless slave seemed nice enough, he had a strange, weasely look in his eyes which darted from side to side as they talked.
Also, he was skinny and she didn’t want to embarrass either of them if he couldn’t lift her. She was short but heavy in the hips—something no amount of exercise seemed to help—and she’d packed on a few pounds eating Lauren’s delicious cupcakes which seemed to be always available on the Mother Ship.
“No, that’s all right,” she said firmly. “I’ll just go get my field boots on so I can walk.”
“You mustn’t,” the slave insisted. Then he appeared to have an idea. “If you wish, you may ride upon my back instead of in my arms. Whatever makes you more content, only we must hurry as my Mistress, Lady Pope’nose, is waiting for us. She gets very angry when she’s kept waiting.”
“No, really,” Maggie said. “I couldn’t.”
The slave looked nearly desperate. “But my lady will punish me if you do not! If I slight you in any way I will taste her wrath.”
The look in his squinty little eyes was so fearful that Maggie began to reconsider her decision. Taking a piggy-back ride was scarcely more appealing than being held in his arms but she began to see that she had no choice. If she broke the protocol of this place, they would suspect her and dig into her background. And if they found out she was from a Kindred ship, she might lose the documents which had been promised.
Also, the deal for the Hurkon collar had already been held up once and it had to be delivered soon. Apparently there was a dangerous prisoner who could only be tamed by the strange thing in her hands. Plus, she didn’t want the skinny little guy to get punished—she felt sorry for him, even if he did look a little like a weasel without its fur.
“All right,” she said at last, hiking up the skirt of her best dress and nodding for him to turn around. “Piggy back it is—let’s go.”
He looked relieved. “Thank you, little Mistress. I will not fail you.” He turned his back to her and crouched down, getting ready to take her weight. With grave misgivings, Maggie hitched her dress a little higher and began to climb aboard.
Getting on his narrow back while still holding the pillow with the collar on it wasn’t easy. It would have been considerably easier if she could have brought herself to touch the collar but somehow the black wire contraption with its blinking lights scared her. She tried to balance it on the cushion while scrambling onto the slave’s scrawny back. If only he was wearing a shirt she could hold on to! Putting her arms and legs around a strange, half-naked man was really not appealing to Maggie at all.
“Ooof!” he gasped, when she was finally mounted with one arm around his skinny throat.
“I’m sorry,” Maggie said at once. “You’d better put me down. I’m too heavy for you.”
“Not at all,” the slave said in a tight, strained voice. “Are you well mounted, my lady?”
“Uh, yes, I guess so,” Maggie said, feeling miserable. She really should have laid off those cupcakes on the Mother Ship! But she’d been indulging herself, knowing that she wouldn’t see Donald for six long months. With no one to criticize her for letting go a little, it had been easy to say yes to just one more sweet and even easier to skip her usual gym time.
“Let us proceed,” the slave said in the same, tight voice. “I must get you to my lady soon if I wish to avoid punishment.”
He started out, staggering through the thick, deep mud, his boots making slurping and gooshing noises with each step. Maggie held on for dear life, still trying to balance the Hurkon collar and its remote on the satin pillow with one hand while she clung to the man’s skinny, pale back with the other.
“Have you lived here on Yonnie Six long?” she asked, trying to make conversation to defuse the awkwardness of the situation.
“All…my life,” he gasped, still plodding along. “My mistress…bought me from the training house…when I was but fifteen cycles old.”
“Wow,” Maggie said. “So you’ve been with Lady Pope’nose a long time then? Say…fifteen or twenty years?”
“Only…five years,” the slave puffed. “I am but twenty cycles…little Mistress.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” Maggie felt worse than ever. “I’m a terrible judge of age,” she said apologetically. But really, the man looked to be at least in his mid thirties. Did they age faster here on Yonnie Six or was he just living a really hard life?
“You must not apologize,” he protested. “Many other slaves have…” He paused to take a deep breath and then continued. “Have fallen under the whip or been rendered useless by the pain collar. But I…I survived.”
“Wow,” Maggie muttered. Was the slave mortality rate really so high here? What was this Lady Pope’nose doing to her people? She had an awful feeling she was going to find out.
“Here we are,” the slave gasped out and Maggie looked up to see a rickety lookin
g cart and a narrow track spanning a vast, deep trench that looked a little like the Grand Cavern.
“That’s…wow, that’s huge,” she breathed. “Are we really supposed to cross it?”
“The only way to Opulex is by crossing the chasm,” Lady Pope’nose’s slave assured her. “And so—”
But just then, Maggie felt herself slipping. She tried to hold on but the slave’s narrow, bare back was clammy with sweat and there was simply nothing to hold on to.
“Oh!” she gasped, beginning to slide down his back. “Oh my! Oh, no!”
“Little Mistress!” he cried, trying to grab her legs. Unfortunately he got her dress instead which made a loud ripping sound as Maggie fell on her back in the thick brown mud. Worse, the Hurkon collar and its remote went flying and landed with a juicy splat several yards away.
“Oh, my lady! Little Mistress!” The slave floundered around in the mud, clearly unsure of what to do. He tried to haul Maggie to her feet but just when she was getting up, they over balanced and she fell in the mud again—face first this time.
Maggie lifted her head, spluttering, and wiped the cold, oozing muck off her cheeks. Luckily, it was just the bottom half of her face which had been dunked in the mud—except for a few splatters, her glasses were clear. The slave reached for her again but she shook her head.
“I’ll manage myself. Just get the collar.”
He did as he was told, wading over to the hopelessly stained satin pillow and the blinking Hurkon collar which was half buried in the sludge.
“Ugh.” Maggie finally managed to stand up but by now she was completely covered from head to toe in cold, brownish muck. “This is awful. Maybe I should go back to my ship and change.”
“But if you do, we’ll be even later.” The slave had rescued the collar and it was resting on the pillow, which he had tried to wipe clean without success.
“All right,” Maggie said. But I’m hardly fit to be seen like this.” She gestured to herself.
“True. True. And if my lady sees you this way, she’ll know I failed. I will be punished for certain!” The slave was nearly dithering with fright.
Maggie took a deep breath. “Look, don’t worry—I’ll tell her it was all my fault. This kind of thing is always happening to me. I’m not exactly as graceful as a ballerina.”
“I do not know what a ballhyena is, my lady,” the slave said humbly. “But you need not take the blame—the fault is clearly mine.”
“No, no,” Maggie protested. “Seriously, I’m an accident waiting to happen. That’s what my fiancé, Donald, always says.”
“All the same, if you wish to go change, I cannot stop you. Though we will be very late.” The slave still looked fearful.
Maggie was about to insist that she needed to go take a shower and put on some new clothes (although she didn’t have anything else even remotely dressy in her kit) when she had an idea. Surely if she showed up in this state, Lady Pope’nose wouldn’t make her stay for dinner or spend the night. She’d probably just want to do the deal and let Maggie go.
“Let’s just go see your mistress,” she said, nodding to the slave. “Do you have the collar?”
“Yes. Yes, I do.” He indicated the mud smeared satin pillow and the collar, which was also quite muddy.
“Good, well then, let’s just go.” Maggie looked at the rickety track over the vast chasm and shivered. “Before I lose my nerve.”
Chapter Two
“My dear Lady Jor’don, whatever happened to you?”
Lady Pope’nose was a tall, severely thin woman with sharp aristocratic features and strands of gold woven into her jet black hair. She looked extremely elegant in her low cut black velvet gown but there was a look of cruelty in her face—an expression that said she was just waiting to be offended. Maggie reminded herself to be careful around her.
“I’m afraid I fell in the mud.” She gestured to herself ruefully. She had scraped as much of the rich brown muck off as she could but her ripped dress was still sodden and her skin was very dirty. “I’m, uh, sorry about the prints on your floor.” She nodded at the muddy footprints she’d left on the beautiful multicolored flagstones in the entryway. Lady Pope’nose lived in a very big building which she apparently owned part of—Maggie wasn’t sure what her business was but clearly she wasn’t hurting for money.
“Think nothing of it.” Lady Pope’nose gestured dismissively. “I’ll have a slave clean it up. But may I ask how exactly this happened? Did your body slave drop you? If so, may I recommend severe punishment at once. A clumsy slave is not to be tolerated.”
“I dropped her, my lady.” The skinny slave who was also covered in mud knelt abjectly at his mistress’s feet. “Forgive me but I had to carry the little Mistress as her own body slave is dead and I was not strong enough for the task. I…I failed,” he ended in a quavering voice.
“What?” Lady Pope’nose’s face went scarlet and two little white dents appeared on either side of her long, narrow nose. “Do you mean to tell me you dropped my honored guest in the mud? You clumsy oaf! You fool!”
“Forgive me, my lady!” the slave cried and knocked his head against the floor at her feet, which left a large, chocolate brown stain. “Forgive me! Oh, please, forgive me.”
“I cannot.” Lady Pope’nose crossed her arms over her narrow chest. “For this is an unforgivable offense. You must be punished, Jonas, and severely at that.”
“Now, wait a minute,” Maggie said, stepping between Lady Pope’nose and the cowering slave. “Please don’t hurt him—this is my fault, really it is. It wasn’t his fault he couldn’t deal with the extra cupcakes I’ve been eating lately and I just slipped off his back, that’s all. I’m not hurt, not even bruised—the mud cushioned my fall.”
“It certainly appears that way.” Lady Pope’nose looked her up and down with an expression of distaste. “But Jonas should not have let you slip off in the first place.”
“He did everything he could to try and stop me,” Maggie said. “Besides, the important thing is that I’m here with the collar you wanted and everything is all right.”
Lady Pope’nose began to look slightly mollified.
“Very well, let me see the Hurkon collar. I have been waiting ages to get it.”
“Of course.” Maggie went to retrieve the muddy satin cushion, feeling relieved that she’d diverted the angry woman’s attention to something other than the cringing slave. Poor guy, no wonder he was so afraid of her! “Here you go,” she said, handing the collar carefully over to Lady Pope’nose. “It’s a little muddy but once you clean it up, I’m sure it will perform just fine.” She hoped, anyway. The lights on the collar still seemed to be blinking so presumably it was still operational.
“Yes, it still appears to be in working order,” Lady Pope’nose said at last, after a lengthy inspection.
Maggie felt a rush of relief. “Wonderful! Well, then, if you’re satisfied then I’ll just take the documents you promised and—”
“Where’s the remote?” Lady Pope’nose turned to look at her.
“The, uh…isn’t it there?” Maggie’s relief turned to worry as she peered at the muddy satin cushion which held only the collar. “I mean I thought…”
“Forgive me!” Jonas the slave began knocking his head against the multicolored flagstones again. “I must have left it when I retrieved the collar!”
Lady Pope’nose’s face got red again.
“Do you mean to tell me that the only means of controlling the very rare and delicate collar I ordered is currently resting in the ooze outside the chasm?” she demanded of her slave. “Are you saying you just left it there?”
“Forgive me, my lady!”
“Well, go and get it. At once!” Lady Pope’nose’s voice was shrill with fury. “And you can expect a punishment when you return, Jonas. A severe one.”
“Yes, my lady,” the slave whimpered. “To hear is to obey.”
He scuttled off leaving Maggie alone with the very angry
Lady Pope’nose.
“I’m really sorry,” she began. “I should have noticed that the remote wasn’t there but my glasses are kind of smeared which makes it hard to see—”
“My dear child, no one is blaming you.” Lady Pope’nose fluttered her long white hands expressively. “It is the slave’s fault entirely. You must forgive me for sending him—Jonas has always been trustworthy before. I thought he was dependable.” She shook her head. “I see now that I was wrong.”
“He was actually very nice on the way here,” Maggie offered, hoping to spare the slave his punishment. “He—”
“Never mind about Jonas—he’ll be dealt with appropriately, I promise you,” Lady Pope’nose said ominously. “Now then…” She clapped her hands. “Since the deal cannot continue apace until the remote is located, perhaps you’d like to get cleaned up before dinner.”
“Oh, I don’t want to be any trouble,” Maggie protested.
“No trouble at all, my dear. I’ll have you shown to a guest room and see what I can find you to wear. I think I have a dinner gown that might work for you…” She looked at Maggie critically. “I wore it a few seasons back before I went on my reducing diet.”
“Oh, um…” Maggie felt her heart dropping. Clearly she was going to be stuck here with this hypercritical woman for some time. But if Lady Pope’nose wasn’t willing to relinquish the Kindred documents until the collar’s remote was found, then what else could she do? Maggie just hoped the slave, Jonas, could locate it without too much trouble or delay.
Lady Pope’nose clearly took her indecision for consent.
“Right, then—that’s settled.” She smiled at Maggie. “I’ll call for a slave at once. And then, after you’re all cleaned up and presentable, maybe you’d like to see the slave I wanted the Hurkon collar for in the first place. He’s a rare specimen—I’m very proud of him.”
“Of course.” Maggie nodded, resigned. “I would be honored, Lady Pope’nose.”
* * * * *
He heard them coming down the hall well before the door to his prison opened. The clatter of high heeled shoes was unmistakable. Pope’nose was on the way for another one of her gloating sessions.