Si'Wren of the Patriarchs

The young girl sang softly to herself as she filled another container. Topping it off, she carefully stoppered the neck of the dainty clay vase and laid it to one side with the others.

An orphan prize of the conquests of the House of Rababull, she was small for her age, with long ebony hair nearly down to her waist in back, and perpetually of a rather plain appearance as a child, which safely hid her flowering beauty, unbeknownst to herself, from the lustful eyes of others.

She liked to hum and sing while she worked, although not too loudly, and was a painstaking, diligent servant. She had just finished filling nine of the little clay jars. They contained a medicinal salve comprised of rare aromatic resins and spices which were intended to be sold by an agent of Rababull, her master, in the market place at great profit.

Rababull kept many slaves, wives, and concubines, and had many sons and daughters. He was a strong, wealthy gentleman of noble birth, a titled land owner who wore much crude jewelry, together with the softest of furs and robes, and was always dressed in the finest weaves of red and purple.

He had long distinguished gray hair upon his head. His beard was elaborately curled every morning on a carefully heated rod of iron which was always cleaned and tested first with the judicious application of a wet thumb by his personal man servant, who kept it meticulously polished and free of rust with a dash of virgin olive oil and a cursory, daily polishing.

Rababull had hard, no-nonsense eyes and speech, and he always drove a hard bargain, whether it be something of as little consequence as the selling-off of an old slave or animal too advanced in years to be of proper use to him anymore, or the buying and selling of great tracts of land. He also saw to the scourging of slaves and the torture and questioning of thieves and miscreants, not infrequently even unto pain of death itself. Life could be cheap, depending on who you were, or who your father was.

Master Rababull was more than six hundred and fifty years old, although by the standards of the moderns, more than four thousand years in his future, he would have been described as an exceeding fit fifty-five. His life experience, like his age, was vast.

He was not afflicted by an old man's failings of the mind. He was missing no teeth, neither smitten by cavities. He was sound of stature. He was still keen of ear, and ate and drank as freely as any rash youth. He suffered no impairment of bone, limb, or mind, and had suffered no ailment since the day of his birth.

His eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated, and he craved a good physical match or a hard bet as much as any man 500 years his junior.

It was morning, and Nelatha labored steadily beside Si'Wren. Nelatha had been originally sold into slavery at birth for the unfortunate offense of having been a firstborn female, and her first owner had been fond of tatoos and ritual scars, of which Nelatha had received many all over her body.

Nelatha was accustomed to making no little ado of her mere five years seniority over Si'Wren, though not in an unkindly way. Nelatha's limbs were tireless and unfailing, for she was a large woman of short stature and powerful girth. The plenteous flesh of her upper arms rippled to an odd meter as she worked, grinding successful handfuls of spices and herbs in the stone pestle and mortise, to be portioned out into equal shares for each lot of balm.

The balm was made with fresh olive oil, pressed and drained out of a great wooden casement and ram located in the back yard of the compound. The ram was comprised of a flat, wheel-like lid, with many heavy stones laid on over the top of the lid by two powerful male slaves, crushing it down onto the open-topped barrel of olives. As the slaves piled on the stones, the progressively increasing weight of the ram steadily crushed out the fresh, strong-smelling olive oil which was drained through a bung hole at the casque's base.

This was a most pleasant time for Si'Wren, who, not having had any tatoos, not so much as one, applied anywhere on her body like Nelatha, and neither desiring any, yet greatly admired and envied Nelatha for her expert ability and wealth of worldly experience. Si'Wren always looked on with beaming countenance as the piles of freshly sorted and washed olives were slowly crushed down under the weight of so many heavy stones. She would watch the pooling olive oil in the collection bucket, diligent to pluck forth the bugs from the fresh pressing. Then the oil would be covered to settle out any remaining bits of dust, twigs, and dead insects.

Finally, the oil would be sieved through several layers of coarsely woven cheese cloth, to be stored in tall slender vases with narrow bottom ends into which the finest pollen grains and motes would eventually settle out during storage. She knew of no other method to obtain the olive oil, but this way worked quite well, and Si'Wren was faithful to obey all, and question nothing that she learned.

Pharmacopoeia was a noble trade to work in, and well-praised by all for a multitude of reasons, of which several might be mentioned.

Firstly, because of the wonderful, aromatic scents which lingered in the spice tent and were so soothing to mind and soul.

Secondly, because of constant skin contact with the salves, balms, and countless varieties of resins and floral concoctions used to make incense, which were prepared by her and Nelatha on an almost daily basis, which had a most beneficent effect, giving perpetual advantage to good health by virtue of being so frequently in direct contact with the ingredients.

There were but few drawbacks to the natural enjoyment of her work. The purgative herbs, for example, could be powerful and curiously disturbing to the bowels in their effects, and their dry powders sometimes drifted in the air in the confines of the spice tent, having a drastic effect upon her breathing passages and causing her to gasp, wheeze, and sneeze in a most extraordinary fashion sometimes.

But that was only because of their natural purging qualities, and she was soon over it with no harmful aftereffects. One of the herbs was poisonous to consume whole, whereas the oil of the seeds, pressed out in it's own little separate bucket and ram and imbibed in small quantities, acted as a safe and effective purgative to the bowels.

Yet by and large, Pharmacopoeia was interesting and rewarding work, and was pleasant enough to do. Work in the spice tent forbade the intrusion of flies or bugs, and except for the sun-drying process, there must be no direct exposure to the natural elements, lest the product become spoiled.

A well-trained Pharmacopoeist was worth much money, and merited the perpetual good favors of the Master for all of his or her days. Praise for the worker would assure eventual success and praise for the work.

Compared to this, the backs of those working the harvest fields, the threshing floor, and other more common or menial tasks such as brick-making, invited the whip, because that could not impair the work nor harm the product, and would only increase the yield of bricks or harvest of grain.

Si'Wren was knowledgeable and proficient in almost every aspect and phase of the work of Pharmacopoeia. She was well tutored in how to recognize and gather fresh herbs on foraging expeditions with Nelatha in the wilds, under the protective guardianship of an armed male slave.

Whatever other herbs were not found locally could be purchased readily enough in the market place for a fair price. Even in this, Si'Wren was becoming skillful in identifying, grading, and haggling over the prices of herbs according to their several worth, and she had already gained much knowledge and experience in this.

But sometimes when at market, she still required the presence of one with a heavy beard and a deep voice, to help her strike a good bargain, for many of the traders were so proud and vain of their ability to make a profusion of crude marks on the tally slate, as 'proof' of their ability to 'read and write' as well as to cheat and connive, as to be unwilling to bargain in any manner except 'man to man', and could on occasion be outright fiendish in their unwillingness to permit a mere slave girl to get anything like a fair deal out of them.

Si'Wren did not mind. If her Master wanted something, he would see to it that she was afforded whatever means was required to get it, and send her out with some broken-nosed, one-eyed brawler of a slave with cauliflower ears, a total illiterate who was willing enough to trade 'look for look' in the market place, in order to back her up in the demeaning cut-throat little realm of the traders.

Perhaps Si'Wren's most notable challenge of all, however, was her resolute refusal of becoming involved in any form of Sorcery, and a natural fear and reluctance of serving it's horrible totems and mystic signs employed publicly with such pomp and ceremony. Besides this, as a female she was ineligible to rise to a very high rank in the priesthood anyways.

Few women rose to such positions of power. After all, it was a man's world. Where superior strength was needed, of what use was beauty? Woe to the man who became physically useless, in such a world.

And so, through no fault of her own, Si'Wren had already missed out on the basic qualifying factor in life of being born male, a crucial qualification if one was to become a true Master of Pharmacopoeia. But she had always shunned, in heart and deed, the vile pursuits of being a Sorcerer, and secretly regarded it as no great loss in her young life.

Neither did Habrunt, the sage Slavemaster, take part in any Sorceries himself, ceremonial or other, and from what she saw, Si'Wren indirectly perceived a like sentiment in Habrunt to her own. She had never seen him so much as partake of such dark activities, even when she saw him off by himself at such and such a time as he felt mostly unobserved by others.

Habrunt was an exceeding strong man, and his true age was a mystery to all. He had a naturally weathered face, with deep, dark, friendly eyes, which held a slight but perpetual squint, as if he were ever vigilant against the many evils of an uncertain life. Si'Wren basically entrusted herself body and soul to Habrunt's unassuming tutelage in the many curiosities of the world, as if nothing could be more natural.

Habrunt was a formidable man. His tireless, muscular physique was battle-scarred, but although she knew him to be a fearless man, she had never seen him actually fight anyone. He had no tatoos. His dark hair, like his beard, was slightly wavy, and like his face, very pleasing to behold in the eyes of young Si'Wren, and he kept his hair cropped to a proper shoulder length, but no longer than that, as befitted his low station in life, for he was but a slave himself. Habrunt was greater in stature and strength than Master Rababull, but unlike that other, he was no idle boaster and displayed no jewelry upon his nearly naked person.

Although only a slave, Slavemaster Habrunt ranked second in importance in the House of Rababull after only the Master himself. The cast of Habrunt's eyes was of a dutiful mein, but his normally pleasant, preoccupied expression as he looked after his many responsibilities, could become hard and unyielding at a moment's notice, even piercing by aspect, such as when he was wont to evaluate a slave even unto his very soul with a mere look. For this, and other, less notable reasons, all of the slaves under Habrunt's fair-minded authority held him in regard of great fear and respect, and because the mark of Habrunt was so universally the mark of excellence throughout the House and it's surrounds, he received much praise from Master Rababull for all that he did.

Such widely-held acclaim for Slavemaster Habrunt, the chief agent of Master Rababull, was in no small part maintained by his sage words of advice, characteristically brief, unerring, and straight to the point, and by the certain knowledge in every servant's mind that if one failed at the fore to heed mere words from Slavemaster Habrunt, one must harken at the last to the whip of Master Rababull.

For Master Rababull always kept a large, blood-encrusted bull whip ready to hand for his most grievous personal judgements, when the real punishments must be meted out.

The two girls, Nelatha and Si'Wren, being naturally shy and industrious, counted themselves privileged to work together in the shelter of the spice tent. The tent of animal skins was located well off to one side in the large front courtyard of the House of Rababull, which was surrounded on all sides by a high stone wall.

The Master's holdings consisted of but a very small portion of the Emperor's kingdom, yet they were large tracts of land nevertheless. They were located on a broad fertile valley plain covered by dense scattered forest and jungle. Across this plain, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers flowed and converged together into one. This dry land, this lush fertile plain, would one day be known to all mankind as a large body of salt water, named the Persian Gulf.

The wide tent was open at both ends and shielded by thin gauze veils to keep out flying insects, and preserve the salves and other herbal preparations. Infestation by insects could cause the finest ointment to give forth a stinking savor, and invoke the certain displeasure of the Master. The tent was also equipped with extra flaps so that it could be closed up at night or during the day when it became too misty.

L'acoci, an old slave woman of the House, spoke once of seeing the colors of a virgin's garments, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet, as a banded scimitar slash in the heavens, a colored arch, a wound in a darkened noonday sky misty enough that it wetted her upturned face and garments, and obscured her vision most strangely.

None had ever heard of such foolishness, and all, even Si'Wren, had laughed her to scorn. Colors in the sky? L'acoci was deluded. No one had ever heard of such a preposterous thing, and the very suggestion was flatly impossible.

A heavy dew came out of the ground every night and often in the day, and caused all life to flourish. But as Si'Wren well knew from unfortunate firsthand experience, such enshrouding mists could cause rare herbs and spices, if they were left exposed, to quickly turn stale, causing Master Rababull much displeasure.

To guard against such calamity, the tent was equipped to afford proper shelter from the clammy, clinging mists, which could arise on a moment's notice and transform the torches in men's hands into pale blobs of moon glow, like spirits at large upon the land.

Within the sheltering confines of the tent, Si'Wren counted herself a cherished and defended slave, safe within the walls of her Master's House, where strange men could not ogle or frighten her. For savage, rogue men walking in the lusts of their wicked hearts went out at all times of day or night, seeking human prey, upon whom they might work their unspeakable evils, men who loudly proclaimed their honor before others, and yet were so wicked in their ways that no woman or child dared venture alone beyond the protection of some trusted strong man or tribe.

Sometimes a local sorcerer was rumored to have kidnaped an unsuspecting victim for occult and sacrificial purposes. Such men were oft upon the land by night, when swords slept in their owners' grasps, and brave men retired upon their racks behind the stoutest walls and doors they could manage. There was no law except the law of the pack. The only real law was right of might and sword and the dictates of powerful warlords and landowners, even unto the changeable whim of the Emperor himself. Against such, mere empty words were but as the ring of brass or a sounding cymbal, dumb bells all, and the clink of the condemned slave's heavy chains. Too often, the ring of a sword was the only proper answer.

The world was a place of much beauty, but even greater evil.

Si'Wren prayed oft in her bed at night, that she might one day be given in marriage to some strong and decent man. Was it not supposed to be one man and one wife, as had once been that great and mythical Patriarch Adam and his helpmeet, Eve? Eve first bore Cain, then Abel, and then after the sons of Cain were already abroad upon the land even unto the sixth generation, Eve bore Seth. Adam and Eve were, then, one husband and one wife in the beginning. Yet now, after fewer generations than the fingers on one's hands, men stole, bought, and murdered for as many wives and female slaves as cunning, sword, and gold could get.

A good husband, if Si'Wren should one day become so blessed as to find, could be both protector and benefactor to her. She was young, and still had her whole life ahead of her. A wise woman must overlook her man's faults, and stand beside him, even help lift him up when he might otherwise perish, and Si'Wren believed in the promise of the proverb that a faithful woman who served well might hope to find such a man, together with riches, happiness, and a houseful of many offspring.

Abruptly, as she worked, there came the crack of whips and the sound of curses, and Si'Wren looked up in momentary astonishment as a team of two big oxen straining against their yokes plodded slowly past the open end flap of her tent accompanied by several dirty-looking boys and driven by two brawny slaves who presently followed the beasts into view. Truly, Si'Wren observed meekly, a woman's place was under a man's protection, for what woman could match such men in the daily toil of such backbreaking labors as this?

The oxen were dragging a stone boat. A stone boat was no boat at all, but actually a great, wheelless, wooden sled or sledge used to transport big building stones from the rock quarry, or round stones from the harvest fields where they were unearthed by the plow, to be dragged as deadweight upon a platform made with two wooden skids, and transported across the dry land to the construction site for use in the making of more stone walls and buildings.

The young slave boys walked alongside the grating and squealing runners of the stone boat with goat skin bags, ready to provide grease or water to make sludge or mud under the runners, when the sled ground to a halt sometimes and must have something extra added to unstick it. The boys also carried straw brooms for the same purpose, as well as staffs to load and unload the sledge.

One of the young boys had suffered a massively crippled hand from the carelessness of his overseers when he was ordered to apply the grease and water and insert the end of a broom more closely beneath the runners. Such boys must reach in and work the water and grease and dirt together with their brooms and fingertips, because sometimes what was poured on would merely run off as quickly again without sinking in.

The older or more experienced boys could also employ the ends of their staffs for this purpose, but when a boy was especially young or new to the job and had never seen a stone boat before, it sometimes pleased the others who had the charge of such a green and inexperienced youth, to order him into the worst labors possible, and few other boys would give the temporary loan of their sticks and staffs, lest one of them suffer a similar ghastly fate. Si'Wren had once heard an agonizing episode of high-pitched screams that began so suddenly as to jolt her right down to the very pit of her stomach. The pitiful childish screams had gradually subsided into long dismaying moans that had continued long into the night, and thus had she known that something of the sort had happened, and she spent the night praying desperately on her bed for the sufferings of the hapless young victim.

The stones comprising this particular load, broken by the stone masons into crude blocks of two and three times the weight of a man, were for the Master's garden wall, which Si'Wren must pass by every day on her way to and from the spice tent. As the two sweating drivers were helped along by the boys, many looked on disinterestedly and more than a few openly laughed and mocked at the slowness of their progress.

One onlooker shouted gleeful insults, bringing on the inevitable vile curses from the aggravated drivers.

The men kept the oxen at their yokes with cursings and whippings, as they dragged the stone boat screeching over the exposed surfaces of rocks and stones in the ground and the wooden runners scraped over them with ear-splitting squealings. Si'Wren watched also as the team made their way slowly past the spice tent and beyond, to where the stone masons labored to build the new garden wall.

Si'Wren bowed her head a little, and shut her eyes gently as she softly sang a prayer for the physical safety of the young boys. She often sang prayers during her work, swaying gently to the rhythm of her own soft sweetly-uttered syllables. It was not merely a prayer she sang always, but sometimes rather, a long-favored tribal song, a song of old which kept alive the promise about the Garden of Heaven to which all good souls must surely one day go.

The day was warm and pleasant. It was the kind of day to lull one into a drifting somnambulance, inviting weary slaves to seize upon the unwatched moment now and then to pause, and wander freely with their eyes across the inner mind and the far skies, in spite of the ever-present risk of sudden discovery and displeasure by the Master.

Nelatha's sudden intake of air accompanied by a frightened gasp of startlement caused Si'Wren to cease abruptly from her labors and look up quickly.

Immediately Si'Wren shrank back in an involuntary motion as she beheld the terrifying sight of a hairy, muscled giant of a man, easily twice the height of any normal individual. The giant had six great fingers, like stout wooden pegs, on each hairy, enormous hand. Because of his size he appeared to be walking with exaggerated slowness, although the long strides with which he covered the ground took him across the level courtyard and up the front steps of the House of Rababull in a surprisingly short time.

His size was truly staggering to behold, and Si'Wren counted it her good fortune that he was already moving away from the tent entrance in such a way that she was not so much as glimpsed by him.

Such men, if they be men, could be unpredictably violent, and who could withstand such a one when he should happen to suddenly lose his temper? Although they were too big to ride horses, they could run on their long legs almost as swiftly as any horse, especially in a short sprint when attacking in a burst of speed. When they did ride, they were fond of more fitting steeds, such as elephants.

"Was he not terrible to behold?" Nelatha barely breathed, her voice a terrified series of gasped utterances.

"Aye, he is possessed!" Si'Wren agreed readily.

Indeed, he looked every bit of that.

Demon-possessed men had abnormal strength. How much the more so, such a one as this human tree?

With trembling fingers, Si'Wren carefully finished filling another tiny bottle and stoppered it carefully, checking to ensure that it could not possibly leak if accidentally tipped over or upended within some traveler's pouch.

"There," she said softly, still shivering in fear. "Ten bottles."

"So soon?" asked Nelatha, looking over her shoulder and double-checking

Si'Wren's finger-count swiftly.

Si'Wren nodded. "I do good, aye?"

Nelatha, sensing how frightened Si'Wren still was, smiled her approval, and leaned over to hug Si'Wren in a reassuring embrace.

"You keep up a good pace," Nelatha agreed with evident satisfaction. "I am proud of you, Si'Wren."

They were charged to labor without ceasing, but sometimes both girls would alike find themselves the free time to rest and watch others, for which neither girl was apt to criticize the other too unfairly.

Outsiders could not easily see into the tent, thereby to voice any complaint of idleness, for the veil screened the girls while they worked, keeping them safely out of view while they labored happily within it's shadowy confines.

Even so, the two girls did try to be faithful and willing servants who would scarce conscience the deliberate wasting of their Master's valuable time and resources, and whose household they rightly considered themselves to be a part of. To be sure, they counted themselves but inferior members of the House, and yet, if not heirs, nevertheless exceeding fortunate to be the property of so great a one as Master Rababull.

This, then, was their fate and fortune, and it was good in their sight.

Master Rababull had never deliberately mistreated either of them, although he was known to deal harshly enough with rightly deserving wrongdoers or habitual slackers if they pushed their luck too far.

He had more than enough of those to preoccupy his attentions. According to the elder slaves, times were never so evil as now. Si'Wren wondered at this, being too young to say for herself. But she was inclined to agree with them.

The giant came out again, and made equally short work of his brief walk across the wide courtyard to the foundry. To the tune of many hammers, a group of talented artificers was busy at their labors there as they worked diligently to create numberless idols of stone, brass, silver, pearl, ivory, gold, wood, bone, and sparkling, mystically colored gemstones and jewels.

These skilled men worked together like tireless oxen under the unflinching eyes of the sweating, dirt-streaked Foundryman, the traditional Task Master of their Trade, and could readily produce any sort of cleverly carved and molded artifact, and an endless variety of molten and engraved idols and gods of all sizes, shapes, and descriptions. These were always sold or traded off at a handsome profit for Master Rababull, although some were given as gifts instead. The handiwork of the clever craftsmen went mostly, as did the wares of Si'Wren and Nelatha, to the market place in the nearby city of Emperor Euphrates, ruler over all the land.

Across the yard, the giant stood talking in a voice so deep that it was like the continuous lowing of a great talking ox. His huge, ugly face was like a terrible stone mask, and all men of ordinary stature were utterly dwarfed by him, and so afraid of him that they stood frozen in stark fear if he so much as but glanced in their direction momentarily.

"The gods of the giants are exceeding mighty!" breathed Si'Wren, keeping her voice low so as not to be overheard. To this Nelatha made no reply, but watched only, and kept her silence.

Because of the six-fingered giants, one could speak of another race. But the way of ordinary men, throughout the known world, was; one kind, one race, one speech, easily recognized and understood by all. This was the way it had always been and it would scarce have occurred to any to so much as question it.

Only two kinds of men might speak and not be understood; drunkards, and the possessed, and though foul be the reproaches and slurred speech of a drunkard, so much the worse be the abuses one risked in knowingly dealing with some possessed madman!

Giants, Si'Wren was told, were all possessed.

The two frightened girls stayed hidden, watching motionlessly in the spice tent as the giant stood like a temple god himself and conversed at great length with the Foundryman. They could not hear clearly what was said, but the giant gesticulated with his huge hands so much that it was interesting to watch and try to figure out.

He wanted an idol made. This much was plain to see. Verily, for that, he had come to the right place.

Si'Wren knew no Polynesians, Asians, Eurasians, or Mongolians. She knew no Amerinds northern or southern, no Hispanics, Negroids, or Pygmies. She knew no Caucasians, rain forest people, or Eskimos. She knew no people other than her own kind, for there was but one race of Man the world over.

Yet these unknown future races -with their diverse tongues yet to be born out of history- were hidden in the bloodline of Si'Wren's one world-wide race, one day to emerge, and then would come proud evil speeches of 'the purity of the race' with exclusive regard to individual strains, and a need to 'ethnic cleansing' and racial 'purges' of the 'mixed breeds'.

The human race, of which Si'Wren was but a single leaf, one lone, timid female, had spread abroad by a plethora of land bridges. There were many shallow seas and easily crossed land bridges in this, the world of Si'Wren, land which was but slightly above the level of the seas, with broad exposed continental shelves, vast coastal plains, and virgin, fertile land. Much territory was given over to swamp, tropical jungle, and dense forest.

Thus there was but one people in the world, medium-color, and more or less medium-dark of hair. To suggest that from the loins of a single man and his wife would one day spring forth all future races in their manifold colors and countless differences would have been a source of great astonishment to Si'Wren, could she but have known. One might as well harken unto the daffy old woman, L'acoci, and her crazy talk of colors in the sky, as to speak of many differing colors among the skins of men.

There was no other kind of human, except for the giants, and even these spoke the same language as the rest of the human race, in spite of their great difference in size. Even those with six fingers were not so different as all that. Yet in spite of the fact that there was only one race among men -which included the giants- there was hatred in almost every heart, wickedness such as to compound every evil, and deliberate mimicry of the savage wild beasts which roamed this wild primitive world so overflowing with such indescribable natural beauty.

Si'Wren reached for the water skin, and fumbled as her fingers plucked for it, and accidentally dropped it in the dirt. She reached down and picked it up, ignoring the rough coating of caked-on mud which clung to the bag as she raised it to her lips. The water ran freely out of the bag's horn spout, it's mud coating wrinkling across the contracting, silken wet goat skin, giving rise to many miniature ridges.

When she had drunk her full, she heedlessly hung the depleted goat skin back on the stub of a knot-end on the tent pole upright, a small axe-hewn sapling. The half-dried mud clung to the goat skin in a curious pattern of broken and layered ridges that were partly crushed together wherever their broken edges collided and overran one-another as a result of the escape of water beneath the muddy leather, which Si'Wren had taken to quench her thirst.

The water skin forgotten, she rubbed her hands lightly to brush the coating of mud off her palms and turned to her work, while unheeded behind her, some of the water skin's encrusted mud crumbled and dropped to the ground behind her bare feet in little broken clods that contained the tiny seeds of plants, and the remains of a few dead insects.

Even as there was but one race of man, which included the giants and the six-fingered ones, there was also but one breed, likewise, of the dog.

Hardly a noble creature to look upon, the common camp dog was a different breed altogether from the huge and fearsome dire wolves that stood as tall as a man at the shoulder and roamed the farthest and deepest wilds in savage packs.

The dogs of men more resembled the small wild plains dogs.

Yet, like the wolves, which ran in packs, this hardy domesticated breed retained a strong pack instinct. It was used as a guard dog and camp scavenger, but could, like any wolf, become dangerous if starved too long or unduly provoked, as by the tauntings of foolish children.

Covertly watching the giant visitor, Si'Wren found it a relief not to be seen by him, unlike the unhappy Foundryman, who, normally considered by all to be no runt in his own right and anything but a coward, looked now equally as puny and scared as any small boy. He looked so scared that Si'Wren could not help but feel sorry for him. The giant was so tall that the Foundryman must needs tilt his head back and look almost straight up at the hairy visitor. What an ugly head, to behold against the majesty of the skies.

"Their gods may indeed be strong," said Nelatha, "but the fight is not always to the strong, nor the race to the swift, and I have heard speakings in my time, of an Invisible God."

Si'Wren was so distracted by observing the giant that she forgot herself and suddenly had to look at Nelatha and say foolishly, "Huh? Forgive me Nelatha, what did you say?"

Nelatha sighed patiently.

"I said, the gods of the Giants may seem exceeding fierce and large, and like themselves, false-hearted, but there is an Invisible God that I have heard of, who is strongest of all."

"Indeed?"

"Aye, and He is a loving, forgiving god. But," Nelatha said, her voice lowered to a conspiratorial whisper, "the idol makers despise this Invisible God, because they cannot make any money selling idols of Him."

Nelatha giggled, and Si'Wren smiled also.

It must be a joke, of course.

Si'Wren and Nelatha both loved to privily mock the moneymakers. The wheelers and dealers must provide their own fare, and were much obsessed with money-making schemes in the market place. They were shrewd cheats, long accustomed to swapping not only goods, but lies and lives, and often resorted to savage ambushes and bloodlettings after dark. There was ample reason to be fearful of the night. Hence, they deserved not only to be feared, but mocked on occasion.

Nelatha giggled because the artificers who made the idols always acted so godly and superior, and were so full of the greed of dogs but could never seem to suspect the similarity of themselves to such lowly creatures. It seemed to the two girls like Heaven's well-deserved gift of madness to such evil ones.

At least, that was Si'Wren's unspoken opinion. However, it would never do for a mere slave girl to be so blunt as to speak with such open foolishness. Si'Wren always guarded her thoughts. For as the wise men, who ever sat in the city gates, were fond of repeating so often and so well-deservedly, 'What is foolishly uttered in private, will surely be regretted openly in public'.

Wise counsel dictated that one such as Si'Wren must not criticize others more important than herself (which was virtually everybody), even if she saw cutthroats setting up their gods of greed under every green tree, with which to furnish themselves an imagined, perpetual divine approval of their moral filth and wickedness.

For the idol-makers, greediness begat holiness, and their chief deity was the god of gain. But Si'Wren could not help wondering whether such be gods at all. Hence, her sudden and immediate interest in Nelatha's words.

"How could a god be invisible?" asked Si'Wren. "How could one make proper obeisance to him? Which way would you bow?"

"Well," Nelatha thought a minute, pausing in her work. Then she said, "Little one, when you close your eyes in prayer to the Master's family god, and then bow, tell me this; do you see him at the precise moment of bowing?"

"No, I do not," said Si'Wren. "How interesting! I have never thought of that before. One can bow in any direction, then?"

"I think so," said Nelatha, showing with her slowness of speech, that she was becoming very, very preoccupied about what had up until now been mere conversation to Si'Wren.

Si'Wren, noticing this sudden onset of seriousness on Nelatha's part, sought how to retreat from the imagined danger of causing any possible offense to Nelatha.

"There are many gods," said Si'Wren quickly. "I am sure yours is just as good as anyone else's, in spite of the unfortunate fact that you cannot see him."

"Not so," said Nelatha flatly. "The Invisible God is the only true god. It is not so difficult if one cannot see him. Consider, Si'Wren, such a time as when you are suddenly frightened while lying in your bed after dark, when it is not possible to go to the House temple which the Master has built, therein to pray. Then, surely you must make prayers to the Master's god without seeing him."

"Aye," agreed Si'Wren, wondering at this, for, of a curiosity, she perceived strange new truths in Nelatha's words.

"Well, then," Nelatha said simply, "that's all there is to it."

"Pray tell; 'that is all there is to what?'" inquired an imperious and sultry female contralto, coming from almost directly behind their unguarded backs.

Both girls started like birds and together as one bent swiftly and automatically to their tasks as if bowing to one of the many idols of the House of Rababull with an instinctive zeal born of grievous prior experience. One must never be caught openly slacking, and the voice was that of Sorpiala, standing just at the opening of the tent flap.

Sorpiala, so slender and tall for her sex, with long glossy dark hair, and such lovely almond-shaped eyes, was a beautiful young slave woman greatly favored by Master Rababull. Like the Master, Sorpiala was not always so agreeable with the sometimes carelessly chosen words of others, unlike amiable Nelatha.

What made Si'Wren even more afraid, was that some of the others had been heard to remark of late on how beautiful Si'Wren was becoming. In fact, some said Si'Wren was even more beautiful now than cruel, proud Sorpiala.

It gave Si'Wren a scary feeling. In fact, sometimes a positively dreadful feeling. From the warnings Si'Wren had been privately given by others in the House, it was evident to all that Master Rababull had been making eyes at Si'Wren in the months since young Si'Wren had begun to physically blossom, and as was increasingly clear to all, had begun at long last upon the path of becoming transformed from a human reed into something a little more shapely, after the manner of all womankind.

Si'Wren somehow found herself becoming progressively more aware of such dire warnings by the older female slaves in the House, who seemed to feel that it would be Si'Wren's very life if Sorpiala should perceive Si'Wren as a threat to her domain.

But, being so young and innocent, and not able to fully comprehend the meaning of such dark speakings, Si'Wren could only shrug inwardly, knowing not how or what she might do to avoid such an unintended confrontation of fates. Lives should intertwine and complement, not strangle, one-another. And it seemed to her that sometimes now Si'Wren felt Master Rababull's eyes lingering inordinately long upon her, and could only feign not to notice, for she was utterly at a loss to know how to behave, even without the unconventional idea of some unguessable danger stemming out of Sorpiala's secretly harbored and uncontrolled upwellings of jealousy.

It was well-enough known to all, that syrupy sweet Sorpiala could without warning become subtle and vicious at the slightest perceived insult. For Sorpiala's lips were quick to smile, although her almond-shaped eyes had always betrayed an hardness, and Sorpiala could be unrelentingly vindictive about her jealousies, which were countless. Sorpiala had been the Master's favorite for as long as Si'Wren could remember. Cross up Sorpiala, and you could end up strapped to the nearest alter with a stone knife hovering in a pair of hairy fists over your chest.

There was no way of knowing how long Sorpiala had stood behind the two of them in deathly silence, listening at their backs while Nelatha and Si'Wren spoke foolishly, uttering what could all too easily become their own death warrants on a moment's notice, for appearing to so willfully and heedlessly forsake their proper duties.

Deep in her heart, Si'Wren had always held as deep a love, reverence, and respect for Sorpiala as if she were an elder sister, although they were unrelated by blood. An orphan, Si'Wren had no known siblings. As for the other slaves in the House, many were known to be the children of Master Rababull, for he was a man who had many wives, and the slave-offspring which he had sired might at least claim many half-brothers or half-sisters among their kin. Not being freeborn, this was anyhow counted an honor among those slaves who could boast of it, for it gave them many incidental advantages they might not otherwise enjoy in their low estate.

But Si'Wren had none to call blood kin. Not a soul.

Si'Wren had also been afraid of Sorpiala more recently, purely aside from the warnings of others, because of the queerest look Si'Wren thought she saw in Sorpiala's eyes now and again. It was an alarming expression, like a deep, searing mask of thinly-veiled hatred, the way that a surface layer of whitest ash masked the red glow of a fire living in a long-burning bed of coals while betraying no visible flame or spark on the surface.

Such confused goings-on both frightened and perplexed Si'Wren, and she was naturally at a loss how to respond, and so did nothing. What could she have done anyway?

Si'Wren had been given special warning by old L'acoci, and now also began to understand, dimly, that to a slave girl, any degree of beauty could be a terrible curse, if it brought the wrong kind of attention from the wrong kind of person. To a slave, especially a young girl such as Si'Wren, were not all others superior to herself? She was virtually at the mercy of whoever chose to molest her, for she did not even know how to run away or where to go.

Now, fearful in the presence of Sorpiala's ominous silence, Si'Wren kept her eyes downcast on her little jars, pretending with an agonized trembling and the barest amount of fumbling over everything she touched, to be utterly oblivious of anything out of the ordinary.

Unexpectedly, Sorpiala stepped forward to face Si'Wren and smiled tenderly from one side.

"Si'Wren, what is this? Did I not just have the good fortune to hear you talking about the Invisible God?" Sorpiala asked in the sweetest tone of voice. "How curious," Sorpiala went on, "that I have never before noticed your belief in him, dear. Is He not wonderful?"

Si'Wren lifted up her eyes to Sorpiala in a shy smile. Of course she could trust Sorpiala! Who could dare to think otherwise?

"Aye, Sorpiala," said Si'Wren, looking up and nodding readily and continuing to smile beamingly. "We were just talking about him. I have never before heard of a god so unusual that one could not even see him."

But abruptly, as Si'Wren turned from smiling at Sorpiala in order to include Nelatha in the conversation, she was struck dumb with shock by the stark, thinly veiled terror in Nelatha's trapped-looking eyes. After betraying that one warning look to Si'Wren, Nelatha bent over her work and pretended not to be aware of anything around her, especially anything in the direction of Sorpiala.

Si'Wren looked back at Sorpiala again quickly, blinking rapidly in confusion.

"Fear not," soothed Sorpiala, reaching to stroke Si'Wren's cheek gently with her fingertips. "I have heard of the Invisible God. Does he not watch over all the world and even ourselves at this very moment?"

"Aye," Si'Wren nodded doubtfully, casting her round eyes from Sorpiala's curiously reassuring countenance, to Nelatha, who, looking sick at heart, seemed ready to die of fear on the very spot.

Si'Wren suddenly wished that Nelatha would stop worrying. Could Nelatha not see how loving and faithful Sorpiala was, both to them and to this Invisible God?

"Don't work too hard, Nelatha," Sorpiala said, and then let out a funny little laugh. "Remember; the Invisible God is always watching every move, and hears every word. Bye-bye, girls."

"Bye, Sorpiala," said Si'Wren, smiling fondly.

But Nelatha did not return the farewell, and when Sorpiala was gone, Si'Wren stood motionless for a long time, as motionless as any dumb graven idol, as she struggled with some nameless, faceless inner turmoil in her effort to take proper stock of the situation.

Why was Nelatha so troubled, and so unwilling to so much as speak of it?

* * *

In the following days, Sorpiala seemed to harbor a special look of affection which she secretly displayed for Si'Wren's eyes only, whenever they chanced to meet. It gave Si'Wren the most deep-down, sisterly feeling for Sorpiala, and made her feel inexpressibly contented with life.

But with each passing day, Nelatha became if possible even more fearful, and finally, she would no longer so much as speak scarcely a word to Si'Wren or even acknowledge her presence with so much as a nod, causing Si'Wren much anguish when they worked together in the spice tent at their labors and causing her to long desperately for their former good times together.

Whenever Master Rababull would chance to pass by, he would nod and beam and smile at her, filling Si'Wren's day with consternation and no little dismay that she should feel so dumb about everything. Any simple slave girl might quite sensibly have experienced a right and proper bliss, even a contentment, at such attentions, but all Si'Wren felt was a terrible sense of foreboding.

Si'Wren occasionally saw Sorpiala standing in the shadows, frowning, but only once did Si'Wren chance to deliberately spy on Sorpiala, as she stood across the courtyard in the shadow of the House and stared down at an overripe fruit that had turned partly rotten. The fruit had already begun to dry up, and Si'Wren could see the shrunken, wrinkled, flattened side on which it had lain in the dirt, and the flies that scattered when Sorpiala shooed them away with a distracted frown.

It was uncharacteristic for Sorpiala to touch such filth with her hands, and Si'Wren could only wonder at what could have motivated one such as she to do such a thing. It fretted Si'Wren to see her elder sister in bondage grieving so over a mere rotting fruit. Were there not an hundred fresh ones, ripe for the taking, to replace the rotten one that seemed to concern Sorpiala so?

Si'Wren was fairly mystified at this.

Suddenly three of Sorpiala's female consorts approached, catching her off-guard with the offending fruit still held openly in her palm. Sorpiala seemed to give a sudden start at the appearance of the others, as if not expecting them and for some reason seemed uncharacteristically at a loss how to face them, although Si'Wren could not say why. There were many such slave girls under Sorpiala's personal power, who were virtually as answerable to Sorpiala as they were to Master Rababull himself.

Si'Wren watched in blank astonishment, secure behind her tent skirts, as the other three women made carefully orchestrated faces of sham sorrow over the fruit to Sorpiala's face, and then when they departed, delivered with equal skill and dispatch the most despicably reviling, hateful looks to Sorpiala behind her back.

Sorpiala's slave attendants were like flounders, fish that could not swim with a proper motion, that dwelt in the mire at the bottom of the sea, and looked strangely at one with the peculiar oddness of two eyes both wrongfully on one side only, but no eye on the other side. So that, wherever the flounder looked, it looked while concealing it's other side, all the while appearing to be as falsely over-sincere as only a flounder could seem.

The following morning, Si'Wren found herself working in the spice tent beside a disturbingly quiet Nelatha. It was early enough that the morning mists still drifted thickly over the glistening outer walls and swirled wetly through the compound and softening and obscuring all form and substance.

Softly, Si'Wren sang a prayer to herself for a day filled with blessings from Heaven for all who lived in Master Rababull's House, respectfully beseeching various and sundry gods as she followed a tribal melody with the words of her prayer. Forgotten were her fears, for there remained only, from time to time, that distressing silence of Nelatha, which Si'Wren had been so vainly at odds to dispel with her cheerfulness.

She had never been so happy, working in the spice tent. Only now, she was aware of the fact that she did pray to unseen gods. Gods whose graven idols were not in her immediate, visible presence, just as Nelatha had scornfully pointed out earlier when still on speaking terms with her. This led Si'Wren to consider more seriously the strange Invisible God of whom Nelatha had initially spoken.

Nelatha still adamantly refused to speak of the Invisible God, in spite of the fact that Sorpiala clearly meant no harm, and stubbornly refused now to so much as say one word about this or practically anything else.

But Si'Wren could not stop herself from wondering about this strange Invisible God. For the whole idea was still very unclear to her. She was still so young, and the world so vast.

She supposed that the elders of every village must know all about this Invisible God, and imagined that they must surely understand why His image could not be somehow made visible by the contrivance of wooden or golden idols made with hands. Yet, she was fearful of going to any of them and asking.

The least of the elders of any of the villages round about, and those also that sat in the gates of the Emperor's city, was each and every one of them, from the highest to the very lowest in rank, a great civil dignitary. That was how Si'Wren had always viewed them.

Such great men should not be trifled with, especially by a mere girl, and might severely chastise Si'Wren for her boldness, and perhaps as well for her blatant ignorance of such matters. What if, in their anger, any of them was to complain to her Master Rababull and shame him openly for the stupidity of the foolish girl slave called Si'Wren? The more that even one of them should happen to laugh and make mention of it to him, the more Master Rababull would punish her, it seemed to Si'Wren. No, it was not worth such a risk, merely to ask such a curious and doubtful question.

"Nelatha, I have longed that I might speak with you once more about this curious Invisible God," Si'Wren finally said, eyes meekly downcast to her work. "Why has He given us eyes, and then made Himself invisible, that none might ever look upon His face? Is it because He is ashamed?"

Nelatha worked on, as if she had not heard.

"Why would God be ashamed?" Si'Wren whispered, as if to herself now.

Finally, Nelatha looked up with an expression of open impatience and exasperation.

"Only man is ashamed," Nelatha said with quiet assurance, at long last overcoming her reluctance of speaking of the Invisible One again. "Not God. Foolish Si'Wren, you must try your best to live a sinless life. Do good, and shun evil! Does not the wisdom of our folk lore teach us that Adam, and Eve his wife, saw God openly and spoke to Him freely and often, before they were both cast out of the Garden of Heaven for one sin? No wonder He never shows His face! And does this not also teach us that there is but one God?"

"It is curious," Si'Wren agreed, "that Adam and Eve should have been created by only one god, when all men say there be many gods. Of a truth, I have never considered it before. How can this be?"

"There is but one God," said Nelatha, "and in this life, no one may see God and live. For all are sinful. Sin, before God, burns like charcoal in a fire. But you will see Him on high some day, if you go to Paradise after you die."

"You mean; if I have lived a good life?" Si'Wren said.

"Aye," nodded Nelatha, "that too. More, it will be to your good and everlasting fortune if you have had good inside your heart, which like Him is unseen, and not just in your outward behavior. Then you will surely rejoice to see Him in all of His eternal glory. Aye, you shall stand before the living God for all eternity, and live, and not die."