Dawn of Empire Read Free Page A

movement. At the same time, other warriors herded the remaining slaves even closer together, still on their knees, so they could see the torture. All must watch and none could turn away or close their eyes.
    Warriors knelt next to each bound victim. Rethnar nodded and his men began, using their knives to slice into their captives, or fist - sized stones to break or crush their flesh. The helpless men cried out in terror even before the first cut or blow. When the actual torture began, shrieks of pain rebounded off the mud walls. The torture must be drawn out, so that the victims suffered as much as possible for as long as they could endure.
    Their fate would serve as an example to those forced to watch. A few spectators trembled uncontrollably in their fear, others cried in grief, but most just stared in shock. Anyone who turned away or closed his eyes received a blow from the flat of a sword.
    At the same time other warriors attended to the women. A cart, one used by the villagers to display fruits or vegetables, now served another purpose. Their simple shifts ripped from their bodies, they found themselves side by side, bent backward across the cart and held down by laughing warriors, while the first group of grinning Alur Meriki lined up to take their pleasure. Both women would be raped into near insensibility, then cut to pieces, a practice that always instilled the proper amount of terror in newly captured women.
    The process wouldn’t take long. Afterward there would be no resistance. The new slaves would learn the lesson their new masters intended: obey every command instantly, suffer any abuse, or face even worse punishment. The Alur Meriki had few problems with their slaves, male or female. Death by slow torture for the slightest offense, real or imagined, made for an effective deterrent that kept slaves docile while their masters worked them to death.
    Thutmose - sin turned back to Rethnar and saw his subcommander pushing aside his undergarment. He’d be the first to take one, or both of the women. “Don’t let them die too soon, Rethnar.”
    The rising screams of the victims drowned out Rethnar’s reply.
    Thutmose - sin turned his horse and rode out of the village, three guards still accompanying him. This time he inspected the neighboring farms, studying the farmhouses, fields, and even the endless irrigation that carried water to the crops. No warrior would ever stoop to farming, but Thutmose -
    sin wanted to know how this village had grown so large, how so many could be fed from these fields. The answer eluded him, however, and by the time he returned, Rethnar’s lesson had ended. The four bodies, now covered with flies, lay sprawled where they had died. Silence filled the marketplace. Obey-ing their new masters, the slaves kept silent. They’d learned the first lesson.
    He dismounted, then stepped past the bodies to where the villagers knelt, their gaze fixed on the victims as they’d been ordered. A few had glanced at the Alur Meriki leader as he approached, but one brief look at his unsmiling face, and they turned their eyes back to the grisly tableau in front of them. Ignoring the men and children, he examined the women’s faces. Three or four looked comely enough.
    “Bring them out for me,” he ordered his bodyguards. They grabbed those he indicated, pulling them to their feet, out of the crowd of kneeling bodies. It took only moments to rip off their garments and force them to their knees in the dirt.
    These looked to be the prettiest of the lot, though Thutmose - sin knew that tears and terror could change a woman’s face. Two women, their bodies shaking, cried softly, bitter tears that would soon pass. Eyes could only hold so much water, after all. The other two just looked at him, fear and shock already fading into hopelessness.
    Thutmose - sin examined each in turn, grasping their hair and pulling their faces upward. The two he chose looked older, about sixteen or seventeen seasons. He liked