He held the hilt with two hands.

Then the larger sleen, scarcely lifting its belly from the floor, crawled quickly forward a foot or two, snarling, and stopped. His companion, to his right, did the same.

I knew little or nothing of sleen, but the intent, the agitation, the excitement of the animals, was evident.

Again the two sleen, first the larger, then the smaller, approached, and stopped.

"Draw," said the leader of the strangers.

But before blades could leave their sheaths the first animal scrambled forward, snarling, charging, its hind feet scratching and slipping, spattering urine back, just for an instant, on the floor of the pa.s.sage. The second animal was at its shoulder, scarcely a fang's breadth behind.

The leader of the strangers struck wildly down at the first animal, slashing its jaw and the side of its face, turned to orient its jaws to its prey, cutting into it, with his blade, and the force of its charge struck him back and the beast, shoulders hunched, was on him, he on his back, screaming, the other beast now, too, at his body, seizing it in its jaws, tearing it toward itself in its frenzy. The lieutenant and some five of the black-tunicked men, shouting, kicking, crying out with horror, crowded about the intent animals, cutting down at them with blades, trying to stab into those active, twisting bodies. The larger beast lifted its head from the leader of the strangers, its jaws flooded with blood, part of the body in its grip, it bleeding itself from the stroke of the leader's blade. The smaller animal continued to feed, being struck with stroke after stroke. Neither animal, in its excitement, seemed to be aware of, or even to feel, the attack of the other men. Again and again the blades cut and stabbed at them.

One man cried out in pain, wounded, by the thrust of another. Then, suddenly, the larger animal, snarling, turning about with blurring speed, caught another man in its jaws, shaking him.

A blade then found its heart, and in its death throes, not releasing ts new prey, it rolled and shook, and half of it fell free to the side. The smaller animal continued to feed until its vertebrae, at the base of the skull, had been severed.

When it became clear that the animals were dead the men stopped hacking and thrusting at their bodies.

Then they drew back, almost as though in shock, their reddened blades lowered.

They were breathing heavily, with their exertion. Blood was about, and the parts of two men. I drew back even more, trying not to let it, in its flow, touch me. I understood for the first time now, clearly, that there was a certain pitch in this part of the pa.s.sage. This could be determined from the path taken by the blood. Some of it now, trickling, running here and there, was better than twenty yards down the pa.s.sage.

One could see the reflection of the lamps in it.

I did not look at the pieces of the leader of the strangers, or of his fellow, caught by the larger beast. The two sleen were ma.s.ses of blood and hacked fur. Two paws, even, had been cut away, one supposed after the animals had died, the hacking, frenziedly, irrationally, prolonged.

The lieutenant looked at the pit master.

"Sleen are unpredictable," he said. "They are erratic beasts."

The lieutenant did not lower his gaze.

"We must sometime find our way out of this place," said one of the black-tunicked men.

"The pit guard will be reporting in soon," said another.

The lieutenant then wiped his blade on the coat of the nearest sleen, and sheathed it.

"Where is Gito?" asked a man.

"He fled," said another. He pointed down the pa.s.sage. There were no b.l.o.o.d.y footprints, so his flight had preceded the flood of blood in the corridor.

My neck hurt. When the sleen had attacked there had been amongst us terror and confusion.

Some of us had tried to flee to the left, others to the right, whichever was closer to us. As a result we had been tangled, hurt, wrenched, confused, held in place.

And the squealing and hissing, the snarling, the crying out, the cutting with the blades, had been so close to us that we might, had we not been bound, have reached out and touched the men, almost the bleeding, twisting bodies of the sleen. We had screamed, and begged to be freed, but none had attended to us, of course. More important business was at hand and we were only meaningless slaves. We were now again against the wall, put there by the men, backed against it, side by side, hands bound behind us, the cord on our neck holding us together, frightened.

"Be silent," said the pit master.

We tried to obey. I bit my lower lip, attempting to control its movement. My shoulders shook.

The side of my neck hurt, where the cord had burned it. The floor was sticky with blood.

Two of the black-tunicked men had not joined in the attack on the sleen. They had, in those sudden, unexpected, precipitate, grisly moments, stood back, perhaps fearing to act, perhaps unable to do so.

The lieutenant slowly turned to regard them.

"There is no blood on your blades," he said. The men stepped back a little, looking at one another.

"Surrender your blades," said the lieutenant. The men looked at one another, uneasily. "I am now in command," said the lieutenant.

"I suggest," said the officer of Treve, "that you need every man you have."

The two blades were surrendered to the lieutenant.

The lieutenant gestured to the two men who had surrendered their weapons.

"Hold them," said the lieutenant.

The two men were seized, each by two of their fellows.

"I do not advise this course of action," said the officer of Treve.

"There will be blood on your blades," said the lieutenant.

"No!" cried one of the two held men, struggling.

"Let us redeem ourselves!" cried the other.

"You would then be left with only four men," said the officer of Treve.

The lieutenant's eyes were cold. The blade was leveled for its thrust.

I closed my eyes that I might not see the blade, his own, pa.s.s between the ribs of the first of the two held men.

Then the lieutenant said, "Release them."

Their fellows stepped away from them.

I expected the two men to turn about then, and run.

But they did not.

Rather they stood where they were. I then gathered something of the discipline of the black caste.

The blade was motionless steadied on the left forearm of the lieutenant, leveled with the first man's heart.

"Masters!" we heard "Masters!" It was Gito's voice. He was running toward us, coming from down the corridor. He was distraught. gasping. He ran through the blood, spattering it about.

"He is ahead!" he cried. "I saw him! He is ahead!"

"In this pa.s.sage?" asked a man.

"Yes, yes!" cried Gito, pointing backward.

"Why did he not kill you?" asked a man.

"He is my friend," said Gito. "He is ahead! Hurry! You can kill him!"

The lieutenant did not lower his poised blade. He had not even looked back at Gito.

"Where does this pa.s.sage lead?" asked the lieutenant.

"To the urt pool," said the pit master, reluctantly.

"And there is an interposed gate?"

"Yes," said the pit master.

"Then we have him!" cried a man.

The lieutenant did not take his eyes from the fellow before him.

The fellow, he at whose heart the steel was poised, trembled, but he did not break and run.

"If you would take him, I suggest dispatch," said the officer of Treve.

The lieutenant then turned to one side and thrust the blade deeply into the body of one of the dead sleen, that closest to him, the larger of the two animals. He then returned the blade to the black-tunicked man.

The lieutenant then took the other man's blade, which he had held in his left hand, and did with it the same, returning it also to its owner.

"Your blades are bloodied," said the lieutenant.

"Hurry! Hurry!" urged Gito.

Again the lieutenant regarded the pit master.

"Sleen are erratic beasts," said the pit master.

"Form the s.l.u.ts in front," said the lieutenant. "Set your bows."

We were thrust a little down the pa.s.sageway, the first group, that "cord" of five in front, the second group, the second "cord" of five, in which I was one, behind, and in the interstices of the first group. In a moment the bows were set, six of them.

"May I have the first shot?" inquired one of the black-tunicked men.

"Granted," said the lieutenant.

"When the command 'Down!' is heard," said a man to us, "you will fling yourselves to your belly instantly. When the command 'Up!' is heard, you will stand, instantly, arranging yourselves as you are now."

"Yes, Master," we said.

There is a common command, familiar to all female slaves, "Belly,"

which brings us instantly to our bellies before he who commands us. This particular command expression, however, was not used in this context. I speculate that this was because the context of the two commands, and certainly their connotations, was so different. It is one thing, for example, to aesthetically and beautifully signify submission by bellying, perhaps on the furs at the foot of the couch, we being permitted upon them, and quite another to fling oneself down so that quarrels may be suddenly fired from behind one. Too, normally in a "belly command" one orients oneself toward he who commands, not away from him.

Gito hung back.

The lieutenant took him by the scruff of the neck and threw him some feet down the pa.s.sageway, before us.

"Proceed," he said.

Gito hurried a few feet down the pa.s.sageway. The blood was now viscous in places, half dried. In some places, where he had stepped, it was pulled up, like syrup, clinging to his sandals, exposing the floor of the pa.s.sageway.

Gito turned about, and looked back.

He went a few feet further down the pa.s.sageway.

He turned back, again.

"This way," he said. Then he said, "Let me behind the wall!"

"You are in no danger," said the lieutenant. "You are his friend." Gito moaned, and, looking over his shoulder frequently, rea.s.suring himself of our continued presence, made his way down the pa.s.sageway, staying close to the wall.

"We will pin him against the gate," said the man who had requested the first opportunity for fire.

Suddenly, from down the pa.s.sageway, we saw, blazing in the reflected light of a lamp, two eyes.

"Sleen!" cried a man, alarmed.

We screamed, and tried to draw back, but were held in place.

"No," said the pit master. "It is an urt."

It was crouched down, before us.

It was large, but not large for those I had seen in the pits. It probably weighed no more than twenty or thirty pounds. Most species of urts are small, weighing less than a pound. Some are tinier than mice.

Gito had fled back. He now hid behind us.

"What is it doing in the pa.s.sage?" asked the lieutenant.

"Someone must have left the panels open," said the pit master.

"Look," said a man. "There is another behind it."

"There seems much carelessness in the management of the pits," said the lieutenant.