Renegades of Gor Read Free Page A

heard the snap of the whip, and the cries of the beast.
    Other men, too, hurried back to their wagons. The heavy wagon trundled away. I
    stood on the road, watching it leave, my pack in hand. Some men hurried after
    it, to strike and kick at the prisoners, who were only too willing to hurry
    after the wagon. They had been brigands, accumulating loot. Now, in a way, they
    themselves were loot, and would bring something good, at long last, to honest
    men, their captors. I continued to look after them, for a time. Yes, they were
    now themselves loot, as much more commonly were women.
    “Perhaps you will now permit us to proceed,” said a man.
    “In a moment,” I said. I wanted the wagon to get a bit down the road. With the
    slow going, and the storm, and its start, it was not likely another wagon would
    catch up quickly with it.
    (pg.17) “Had some of you lost goods to those fellows?” I asked.
    “I have,” said a man.
    “Most of a wagonload of loot,” I said, speaking in the rain, “was emptied down
    there, by the ditch. Perhaps you fellows would like to see if you can reclaim
    anything.”
    “The loot of Andron!” cried a man.
    “Perhaps the tracks of the wagon, too, might lead to some cache, or hideaway,” I
    said.
    Men lifted lanterns.
    “There is something down there,” said a man. Almost immediately he began to
    descend the embankment. Two other men followed him. “Take the wagon ahead,” said
    another man. “I will catch up with you later.” He then followed the others. I
    moved to one side as the wagons, then, began to pass. “The loot or Ardon,” I
    heard someone say. “Where?” asked another. “Where those men are,” said another.
    Two more men left the road. The wagons continued to move by. The fellow who had
    had the knife looked at me. “Is there really anything down there?” he asked.
    “Yes,” I said. “Well,” said he, “perhaps I shall get something for the evening,
    after all.” He slipped down the embankment, to join the others. I went then
    again to the left side of the road and, when a wagon trundled by, unknown to the
    driver, I put my pack in it, and, again, as I had before, held to its right side
    with my left hand, to keep from falling in the road.
    I thought the storm might have abated a bit but the rain was still heavy. Too,
    from time to time, lightning shattered across the sky, suddenly bathing the road
    and countryside in flashes of wild, white light, this coupled almost
    momentarily, sometimes a little sooner, sometimes a little later, with a
    grinding and explosion of thunder.
    “It seems the Priest-Kings are grinding flour,” laughed a man near me.
    “It would seem so,” I said.
    This was a reference to an old form of grinding, for some reason still
    attributed to Priest-Kings, in which a pestle, striking down, is used with a
    mortar. Most Sa-Tarna is now ground in mills, between stones, the top stone
    usually turned by water power, but sometimes by a tharlarion, or slaves. In some
    villages, however, something approximating the old mortar and pestle is
    sometimes used, the two blocks, a pounding (pg.18) block strung to a springy,
    bent pole, and the mortar block, or anvil block. The pole has one or more ropes
    attached to it, near its end. When these are drawn downward the pounding block
    descends into the mortar block, and the springiness of the pole, of course,
    straightening, then raises it for another blow. More commonly, however, querns
    are used, usually, if they are large, operated by two men, if smaller, by two
    boys. Hand querns, which may be turned by a woman, are also not unknown.
    The principle of the common quern is as follows: it consists primarily of a
    mount, two stones, an overhead beam and a pole. The two stones are circular
    grinding stones. The bottom stone has a small hub on its upper surface which
    fits into an inverted concave depression in the upper stone. This helps to keep
    the stones together. It also has shallow, radiating surface