Warlock by Andre Norton

“First, winged one, a sickness, and then the blight of ignorance.”

Tolskegg’s great fist struck the table with a drum thud. “Speak words we can understand!”

The captain smiled. “You have claimed for this child knowledge. I have the right to decide whether that knowledge makes her worth my buying. In the water of the north there are splinters of ice.” Again he used one of the Five Tongues—that of Danther.

“But the winds of the south melt them swiftly.” Charis replied to that code address almost mechanically.

“I say—speak what a man can understand. She has learning, this one. She is useless to us here. But to you she is worth at least another laborer!”

“How say you, Gentle Fem?” The trader addressed Charis. “Do you deem yourself worth a man?”

For the first time the girl allowed herself a thrust in return. “I am worth several of some!”

The captain laughed. “Well said. And if I take you, will you sign an indefinite contract?”

For a long moment Charis stared at him, her small spark of hope crushed before it had time to warm her. As her eyes met his, she knew the truth—he was not really an escape at all. This man would not take her from Demeter to someone in authority. Any bargain would be made on his terms, and those terms would bind her on almost every planet he would visit. With a labor cargo he would set down only on those worlds where such a shipment would be welcome and legal. With an indefinite contract to bind her, she could not appeal for freedom.

“That is slavery,” she said.

“Not so.” But his smile held almost as much malice as Mazz’s grin. “To every contract there comes an end in time. Of course, you need not sign, Gentle Fem. You may remain here—if that is your wish.”

“We trade her!” Tolskegg had followed this exchange with growing exasperation. “She is not one of us, nor our kind. We trade her!”

The captain’s smile grew broader. “It would seem, Gentle Fem, that you have little choice. I do not think that this world will be very kind to you under the circumstances if you remain.”

Charis knew he was right. Left to Tolskegg and the rest, their hatred of her the hotter for losing out on what they thought was a bargain, she would be truly lost. She drew a ragged breath; the choice was already made.

“I’ll sign,” she said dully.

The captain nodded. “I thought you would. You are in full possession of your senses. You—” he pointed to Mazz, “loose the Gentle Fem!”

“Already once she has run to the woods,” Tolskegg objected. “Let her remain bound if you wish to control her. She is a demon’s daughter and full of sin.”

“I do not think she will run. And since she is about to become marketable property, I have a voice in this matter. Loose her now!”

Charis sat rubbing her wrists after the cords were cut. The captain was right—her strength and energy were gone; she could not make a break for freedom now. Since the trader had tested her education to a small degree, it was possible that learning was a marketable commodity for which he already foresaw profit. And to be off-world, away from Demeter, would be a small measure of freedom in itself.

“You present a problem.” The captain spoke to her again. “There is no processing station here, and we cannot ship you out in freeze—”

Charis shivered. Most labor ships stacked their cargo in the freeze of suspended animation, thus saving room, supplies, all the needs of regular passengers. Space on board a trader ship was strictly limited.

“Since we lift without much cargo,” he continued, “you’ll bunk in the strong room. And now—what’s the matter—are you sick?”

She had striven to rise, only to have the room whirl about her with a sickening lurch of floor and ceiling.

“Hungry.” Charis clutched at the nearest hold, the arm the captain had put out involuntarily when she swayed.

“Well, that can be remedied easily enough.”

Charis remembered little of how she got to the spacer. She was most aware of a cup pushed into her hands, warm to her cold palms, and the odor which rose from it. Somehow she managed to get the container to her lips and drink. It was a thick soup, savory, though she could not identify any of its contents. When she had finished, she settled back on the bunk and looked about the room.

Each Free Trader had a cabin with extra security devices intended to house particularly rich, small cargo. The series of cupboards and drawers about her were plainly marked with thumbprint locks which only the captain and his most trusted officers could open. And the bunk on which she sat was for a port-side guard when such were needed.

So she, Charis Nordholm, was no longer a person but valuable cargo. But she was tired, too tired to worry, to even think, about the future. She was tired—

The vibration of the walls, the bunk under her, were a part of her body, too. She tried to move and could not; panic caught at her until she saw that the webbing of the take-off belts laced her in. Thankful, Charis touched the release button and sat up. They were off-planet, headed toward what new port of call? She almost did not want to know.

Since there was no recording of time in the treasure cabin, Charis could portion hours, days, only by the clicking of the tray which brought her food through a hatch at intervals—long intervals, for the food was mostly the low-bulk, high-energy tablets of emergency rations. She saw no one and the door did not open. She might have been imprisoned in an empty ship.

At first Charis welcomed the privacy, feeling secure in it. She slept a lot, slowly regaining the strength which had been drained from her during those last weeks on Demeter. Then she became bored and restless. The drawers and cupboards attracted her, but those she could open were empty. At the fifth meal-period there was a small packet beside her rations, and Charis opened it eagerly to find a reader with a tape threaded through it.

Surprisingly enough, the tape proved to be one of the long epic poems of the sea world of Kraken. She read it often enough to commit long passages to heart, but it spurred her imagination to spin fantasies of her own which broke up the dull apathy induced by her surroundings. And always she could speculate about the future and what it might hold.

The captain—odd that she had never heard his name—had hers now, along with her thumbprint, on his contract. She was signed and sealed to a future someone else would direct. But always she could hope that chance would take her where she could appeal for aid and freedom. And Charis was very sure now that a future off-world would be better than any on Demeter.

She was reciting aloud her favorite passage from the saga when a loud clang, resounding from the walls of the cabin, sent her flat on the bunk, snapping the webbing in place. The spacer was setting down. Was this the end of the trip for her or just a way stop? She endured the pressure of planeting and lay waiting for the answer.

Though the ship must be in port, no one came to free her, and as the moments passed she grew impatient, pacing back and forth in the cabin, listening for any sound. But, save that the vibration had ceased, they could as well have been in space.

Charis wanted to pound the door, scream her desire to be out of what was now not a place of security but a cage. By stern effort she controlled that impulse. Where were they now? What was happening? How long would this continue—this being sealed away? Lacing her fingers tightly together, she went back to the bunk, willed herself to sit there with an outward semblance of patience. She might be able to communicate through the ration hatch if this went on.

She was still sitting when the door opened. The captain stood there with a bundle under his arm which he tossed to the bunk beside her.

“Get into this.” He nodded curtly at the bundle. “Then come!”

Charis pulled at the fastening of the bundle to unroll a coverall uniform, the kind worn by spacemen off duty. It was clean and close enough to her size to fit if she rolled up the sleeves and pants legs. She changed in the pocket-sized refresher of the cabin, glad to discard her soiled and torn Demeter clothing. But she had to keep her scuffed and worn boots. Her hair was shoulder-length now, its light brown strands fair against her tanned skin, curling up a little at the ends. Charis drew it back to tie with a strip of cloth, forming a bobbing tail at the back of her head. There was no need to consult any mirror; she was no beauty by the standards of her race and never had been. Her mouth was too wide, her cheekbones too clearly defined, and her eyes—a pale gray—too colorless. She was of Terran stock, of middle height which made her taller than some of the mutated males, and altogether undistinguished.