"Bit of sport, was it, eh?"
"Kids' stuff," answered Genshed. "Got tired of it. You learn it all quick enough and you're only allowed to do what you're told."
"Thot's not moch, eh?"
"Well, it's all right--watch their faces when they bring them out--you know, when they see it all laid out for their personal benefit--the clinders and the frags and that."
"Frags first, ain't it?"
"Can be either," answered Genshed, "long as the fingers are broken. But you can't let yourself go, only now and then."
"What's now and then?"
Genshed drank again, and considered.
"If a man's condemned, all you can do is carry out the sentence. That's all right, but it's no better than boys or animals, is it? That's what I came to see, anyway."
"Why, what more you can do, then?"
"Screaming and crying, you get tired of that," said Genshed. "There's a bit more to it when they want information. The real style's breaking a man's mind, so that he turns what you want and stays that way even when you've finished with him."
"You got you can do thot?"
"Needs brains," said Genshed. "Of course I could have done it, I got the brains, but the bastards wouldn't give me the chance. Job like that's sold to the one who can buy it, isn't it? They don't want quality. I knew what I was worth. I wasn't going to stay hot-iron man all my life, just for the bare living. I started taking what I could get from prisoners--you know, to let 'em off light--or just take the money and not let 'em off--what could they do? That was what lost me the job. After that I was in a bad way for a time. Most people don't want to employ you when you've been in that line of trade--more fools them."
Lalloc threw another branch on the fire and squinted into the neck of the wineskin. In the corner Shara twisted on the floor, babbled a few words and licked her dry lips without waking.
"Ortolgans give you chonce, eh, like me?"
"They wouldn't give me a license, the bastards. You know that."
"Why they don't?"
"Too many children injured, they said. More like I hadn't got the money to buy the license."
Lalloc chuckled, but broke off as Genshed looked sharply across at him.
"Well, I don't laugh, no, no, but you need style, Gensh, to be slave dealer, you know. Why you don't gotting proper overseers? Then don't lot your children die, don't hurt them where it shows. Make them look nice, you know, teach them act up a little for the costomers."
Genshed crashed his fist into his palm.
"All right for you, eh? I got to work on the cheap. You don't need overseers for kids. Pick out a couple of the kids themselves--get rid of them soon as they know more than you want them to know. You--you only buy from other dealers, don't you, got capital to work with? I got to go out and get 'em on the cheap, all the trouble, all the danger, no license, then you buy them off me and sell 'em for more, don't you?"
"Well, but you ollways spoil so monny, Gensh, ain't it?"
"You got to expect to spoil some--got to expect to lose some as well. You got to break their minds--make them so they can't even think of running away. Beat one or two to death if you have to--frighten the rest half silly. I don't have to do so much as I did once--not now I've got the trick. I've driven kids mad without even touching them--that's style, if you like."
"Bot you can't soll them if they're gone mad, Gensh."
"Not for so much," admitted Genshed. "But you can count on getting some sort of price for almost anything, and you've had a bit of sport for the difference. Loony ones, ugly ones, all the ones rich dealers like you don't take--I can still sell them to the beggar-masters. You know, chop their hands off, chop their feet off, something of that, send them out to beg. Man in Bekla used to live off eighteen or twenty, most of them he got from me. Used to send them out begging in the Caravan Market."
"Well, thot might be your style, Gensh, but it's not big money. You got to make them look pretty, jost ontil the costomer's bought them, you know. Then you got to stoddy what the rich costomer want, you got to talk to the children, tell them it's all for their good they tickle the costomer, you know, eh?"
His voice held a barely concealed note of condescension. Genshed slashed at the fire in silence.
"What you keeping the little girl for?" asked Lalloc. "You gotting rod all the girls in Tonilda, you told me. Why you not solling her?"
"Ah--to keep him in order, that's it," said Genshed, jerking his thumb at Radu.
"'Ow's thot?"
"He's a funny one," said Genshed. "Smartest thing I ever did, biggest risk I ever took; if it comes off I'll make a fortune, and it still could. That's a young aristocrat, this is--ransom job, once I get him back to Terekenalt. Long as I keep him I can lose all the rest. I can't break him--not altogether--you never can tell with that sort, even when they think they've broken themselves. The baby--she's better than anything for keeping the likes of him in order. Long as he's set himself to look after her, he won't be trying anything on, will he? The joke was he came to me of himself at Thettit and said we had to keep her--got her across the Vrako, too. That was a risk--he could have drowned--but it was worth it to have no trouble from him. That sort can make a lot of trouble. Pride--oh yes, he's too good for the likes of you and me. But I'll break him before I'm done, the fine young gentleman--I'll have him flogging boys to earn his supper and never have to raise a finger to force him--you see if I don't."
"Who is he?" asked Lalloc.
"Ah! Who is he?" Genshed paused for effect. "That's the Ban of Sarkid's heir, that is."
Lalloc whistled. "Oh, Gensh, woll, no wonder the place full of Ikats, eh? You done it right, now we know why they don't stop looking, eh? We got a lot to thonk you for, Gensh."
"Two hundred thousand meld," said Genshed. "Isn't that worth a risk? And you said we'd get over the river in the morning, didn't you?"
"Who's the other one, Gensh--the man? Thought you dodn't only go for boys and girls?"
"Don't you know?" replied Genshed. "You ought to, you oily, creeping, bribing bastard."
Lalloc paused in drinking, looking over the top of the wi
neskin with raised eyebrows and reflective eyes. Then the wine slopped in its hollow caverns as he shook his head and the skin together.
"That's King Crendrik, that is," said Genshed. "Him that used to be the priest-king of Bekla. Him with the bear."
Lalloc nearly dropped the wineskin, caught it just in time and lowered it in slow amazement.
"Found him lying senseless in a swamp thirty miles south of here," said Genshed. "Don't know how he came there, but I recognized him all right. Seen him in Bekla, same as you have. Well, he won't run. He knows the Ikats are out to kill him."
Lalloc stared questioningly.
"It's like this, you see," said Genshed, stabbing at the fire. "I'm sharp. I keep him and the boy--leave the rest, but keep those two at all costs. Well now, we know the Ban of Sarkid's fighting for the Ikats. If ever the Ortelgans was to catch me--I got no license, remember--I can tell them I've got the Ban's son, hand him over to them, very likely they'll be so pleased they'll let me go. But if the Ikats catch us, I can give them Crendrik. Same thing--they'd be glad to get him, might let us go. Crendrik's got no other value, of course, but the boy's got plenty if only we can get away. The way the luck's turned out, we look more like being caught by the Ikats than the Ortelgans, so I'm hanging on to Crendrik."
"But if the Ikats cotch you with the boy, Gensh?"
"They won't," said Genshed, "I'll see to that. They won't catch me with a single child--or find the bodies, either."
He stood up brusquely, broke two or three branches across his knee and fed the fire. Kelderek could hear the back of Shara's head thud against the cobbles as she tossed and cried in her sleep.
"What's the scheme, then?" asked Genshed presently. "How d'you reckon to cross the Telthearna?"
"Well, it's a big rosk, Gensh, but it's only chonce we got. We got to try it, olse we're for the Ikats all right. Down below here there's a vullage--Tissarn they call it--fishing vullage--by the ruvver, you know."
"I know--I came inland yesterday to avoid it."
"Woll, vorry soon as day we leave ovvrything--go straight down there, we find some man, I pay him all I got, he govv us canoe, boat, something, before the Ikats come. We go across, gotting to Deelguy. Current's strong, we go down long way, all the same we gotting across. Onnyway we got to try it."