Mindgames Ch. 01

Chapter 1: Stranger

The stranger had tried to steel himself to the size of Riviera, or at least what its size had been a century. The first time he looked at the maps in Harmony's library he assumed the scale must be wrong. The elders assured him there was no error. Harmony, with all its outlying farms and valleys, would fit into Riviera's walled land a dozen times and more.

Nevertheless, when the old road broke out of the trees into a meadow, with a muted gasp the stranger pulled his horse up short. The far side of the field ended at a ten foot high stone wall covered with barbed wire that seemed to curve around to either side into eternity.

The path cut through the meadow at an angle to a gate about a quarter mile beyond. This should be the Holden Outpost, the same gate by which Harmony's founders had left Riviera generations before.

The loud caw of a crow from a tree above startled the stranger out of his reverie, and he clicked his tongue, urging his horse forward. After days in the forest he felt nervous in the open field, and he kicked the horse into a trot until they were in the morning shadow of the wrought iron gate. The stranger dismounted and peered through the bars.

Inside, the meadow continued, and so did the road. To its right was a small house covered with yellow paint which in places was peeling. The house had a sagging wraparound porch, and on it was a woman dressed in a green tunic and leggings, leaning her chair back on two legs until it rested against the wall. Her face hung slack, and delicate snores escaped her mouth. Her long strawberry blond hair hung in heavy braid over one shoulder, with wisps escaping here and there. By her side, on the floor of the porch, also sleeping, curled up like a dog, was a naked man with dark curly hair and pinkish skin mottled by cuts and bruises. His only covering was a metal collar, perhaps two inches wide, attached by a long chain to a post of the porch.

The stranger cleared his throat. Neither gatekeeper nor slave stirred. He called out but they did not hear. His horse came to his rescue, snorting impatiently.

The slave awoke with a start, scrambling to his hands and knees and looking around in confusion. The stranger cleared his throat again. The slave, seeing him, bowed his head to the floor but overshot, hitting it with a bang. Whimpering, he slid his entire torso back down to the ground and kissed the floor boards, pushing his mouth down until the stranger was certain he would get blisters on his lips. By his side, the gatekeeper slept on.

"Excuse me," the stranger said in the most courteous tone he could manage, although his voice croaked from lack of use. The slave boy looked up, and immediately lowered his head in a panic. Slowly he looked up again, as if he were a small child playing peek-a-boo. The stranger made no move. After a moment of deliberation, the slave boy carefully wriggled up to where his mistress' boots touched the floor, and cautiously nuzzled their toes.

The gatekeeper woke in an instant. "You dare," she hissed, and kicked him in the chest.

"No, don't," the stranger cried out involuntarily from behind the gate. The slave fell back and made a gurgling sound.

At the sound of the stranger's voice, the gatekeeper looked up, startled. She had light blue eyes and a fine, aquiline nose just a touch too narrow. The stranger realized the woman was younger then he had first assumed. Her mouth opened and closed in surprise, and then she broke into an easy laugh. "Whyever not?" she said. Absently she took the whip from her belt, doubled it over, and smashed it into the slave's lower back, marking a half circle in his skin. The slave keened through closed lips but did not move. The stranger grasped the wrought iron of the gate tightly.

The gatekeeper took no further notice of the slave, but arose from her chair and descended down the two or three steps of the porch. Lazily, as if stretching, she pulled from her tunic and then overhead a leather string with a large metal key attached. When she unlocked the gate it swung inward. She stood aside and let the stranger lead his horse through. "You didn't leave by this gate or I'd have been expecting you back," she remarked defensively.

"I'm sorry," said the stranger, embarrassed. "I didn't mean to put you out. Or cause trouble for him," he added indicating the slave with a jerk of his head.

The gatekeeper laughed in a puzzled way. "You're an odd one, aren't you?" she said. When she finished relocking the gate she reached up and petted her neck, smiling when the horse snorted. "Say, this is a fine beast. What stable is she from? She could use some water, I bet." She gave a friendly, expectant smile. At the same time she yanked the chain attached to the slave's collar, causing him to slide headfirst down the porch steps.

The sick metallic feeling flooded the stranger's limbs. He shook his head to clear his mind. Misunderstanding him, the gatekeeper frowned. "You should mind your horse better," she said. "You can't always put your needs above the beast's." For emphasis she kicked the naked slave who now knelt on his hands and knees at her side. The slave gave a short keening through closed lips but made no other sign.

Recklessly the stranger grabbed at the gatekeeper's arm.

"I mean no disrespect to you," he said in a strained voice. "But maybe out of hospitality to a visitor to your land you could be kinder to the fellow."

The gatekeeper started and stared, and then laughed a low laugh. "A visitor! To Riviera!" she exclaimed. "Well, I'll be." She looked at him closely for the first time. "Say, you're not from Alphronsia, are you? I had an aunt who went visiting there once. Never came back."

The stranger shook his head. "No, not from so far. I come from Harmony."

"Harmony!" The gatekeeper looked him up and down, slowly, and then over to his horse. "You don't look like much of a rebel, but you never can tell, my Da says. Are you the healer that was sent for, then? I thought it would be an elder that would come." She frowned at him.

"I am the healer. I finished my apprenticeship these two years past." He held out his hand for her to shake, and added, "I am called Gabriel."

"I am Nadia," she said, taking his hand limply. She continued, more formally, "I welcome you to Riviera." Then she smiled as if amused by her own words.

Gabriel looked down at the slave still cowering on his hands and knees by Nadia's side. He felt green as he realized that the slave, although undersized, was an adult. His dark, wavy hair hung over his face, hiding it, and his thin limbs put Gabriel in mind of a coyote. The slave's shoulders trembled, but whether from fear or exertion Gabriel could not tell. If he was aware of Gabriel's scrutiny he gave no sign.

Nadia said, "Hugo's got no more energy than a snake in the shade. But if you've the need and inclination after your journey, one slave kneeling over is pretty much like another. You're welcome to him."

Gabriel looked at her in complete bafflement, until he realized with a shock what she meant. "Oh, no," he said, involuntarily taking a step back from her and the slave.

Nadia furrowed her eyebrows. "Which side you favor is nothing to me," she said. Hugo remained silent and motionless, except for the tremors in his shoulders, which seemed to be increasing.

Gabriel forced himself to take a deep, slow breath into his diaphragm, sending the air to find his center of gravity. The green feeling subsided slightly. "You've misunderstood me," he said. "I was looking at him only because I am a healer. Some of his cuts are infected, and I see can see from here he's feverish. I'd like to try to make him more comfortable." He hoped the expression on his own face was pleasant, even as he determined to himself that he would treat the man whatever Nadia said, and whatever the consequences. He hoped to reach the Bearer's daughter, and to acquit himself well, but he could not put that purpose above the man who cowered before him. He had taken the healer's oath and he would uphold it.

Nadia contemplated his countenance. After a moment she stepped aside, stiffly and grudgingly, her shoulders taut with anger that belied her staccato words. "In Riviera we believe in hospitality to strangers. You can have a few minutes to do as you like with him. The key is in his collar." She turned on her heel and walked purposefully around the far side of the house, not looking back.

As Gabriel approached the groveling figure he saw that, indeed, the heavy metal collar had a key in it. He turned the key, opened the collar, and flung it into the dirt some feet away. The metal had left a red tattoo in Hugo's neck. Gabriel asked him softly, "Are you in pain?"

"Yes, sir," Hugo responded in a hushed, cracked voice. He bowed his head down to the ground.

"I am a healer," Gabriel said. "Will you let me help you?"

Hugo did not lift his forehead from the ground. "I am your vessel, master," he said raggedly.

Gabriel shuddered and sat next to the man's bent over figure, looking at the bloody X cut in his back by Nadia's whip. He saw that Hugo's entire back was covered with scars and whipmarks. He touched gently next to where the X crossed. "Is that where it hurts the most?" he said softly.

"I am your vessel, master," Hugo repeated. He raised his head slightly and coughed, a dry rasping cough. Then he quickly lowered his head again, banging his forehead on the ground without a whimper.

Gabriel opened the waterskin he carried on his waist. "Can you sit up?" he asked Hugo. Hugo instantly raised up his body and sat back on his knees, his head down, his eyes staring expressionless at the ground in front of him. Gabriel pressed his waterskin into Hugo's hand. "Drink," he said, "It will make you feel better."

Hugo obediently raised the water skin and squirted water into his mouth, swallowing it without expression. Gabriel stood and went to Pegasus, who had wandered a few steps away to nibble on some thistle. He retrieved a pack from the bags hanging on Pegasus' saddle and fiddled with various small, odd shaped paper and leather packets until he found the one he was looking for. Taking out a cake of soap, he turned back to the slave, who was still pouring water into his mouth and swallowing robotically. Gabriel gently took the skin from him. "Easy," he said. "You don't want to drown in that." Hugo kept his head tilted back, expressionless.

Gabriel wet his hands with water from the skin, and washed with the soap. Returning it to his pack, he again looked at various packets until he the dried leaves he needed, and, with more ease, a small clay bowl wrapped in leather. He poured a few drops of water into the bowl and then crushed the leaves into dust over it, stirring the mixture into paste with his forefinger.

Gabriel returned to Hugo. He knelt in front of him and placed the bowl on the ground between them. Hugo was still looking up to the heavens. Gabriel sat motionless for several minutes, merely looking steadily at the slave, and breathing slowly and deeply. At length, with a moan, the slave shivered and then looked at Gabriel full in the face, his pupils dilated with fear. He started to look up again, but Gabriel said, "It's all right. I won't hurt you." Hugo's eyes widened but he looked down, towards Gabriel's knees, rather than up. This seemed to be a much more comfortable stance.

Gabriel continued to breathe deeply and slowly, almost ostentatiously, into his belly. Slowly, subtly, Hugo's own breathing slowed and became deeper, until the bellies of the two men rose and fell in sync. They sat otherwise motionless. The pupil's of Hugo's eyes slowly shrank to normal size, and the tremors in his shoulder calmed.

Without interrupting the flow of his breathing, and moving so slowly that he barely seemed to moving at all, Gabriel dipped his finger into the paste he had made, and moved around to Hugo's back. Gently, he spread the paste over the X where the worst of Hugo's cut's crossed. Hugo gave a start at his first touch, but then was still.

"The cassia will help your wounds heal, and fight infection," Gabriel said to him softly. "This concoction isn't very strong, but it should relieve some of your pain and make you more comfortable."

To Gabriel's dismay, Hugo began to cry, first a sniffle and then a sob. "Not kindness, Master," he begged. He threw his body to the ground and banged his forehead on the dirt. "Not the kindness mindgame." He stuck out his tongue and began to feverishly lick the ground in front of him.

"It's not a game," Gabriel said desperately. "I want to help you. I'm a healer."

Hugo looked up and made a sound between a croak and a groan. "No kindness. No mindgames. Please..." He sobbed and banged his head into the dirt.

Gabriel dove to the ground and put shoved his hands under Hugo's forehead, shielding it from the hard dirt, desperately trying to stop the man from seriously injuring himself. When his forehead touched Gabriel's soft palms, Hugo stopped pounding his head, but he continued sobbing, on the verge of hyperventilating. Gabriel gently extricated his hands and reached under Hugo's shoulders, pulling gently until he sat up. With his arm still around Hugo's shoulder, Gabriel pulled him close, like he would a scared child. He searched for words to say to the man, but could find none. Instead, he softly stroked Hugo's head, crooning softly. Hugo began to relax and breathe more normally, and the danger of hyperventilation passed. Gabriel could still feel his pulse beating wildly, though, and he knew the man was terrified. He closed his eyes, matching his breathing to Hugo's shallow breath, only ever so gently beginning to slow it down.

His meditation was interrupted by a whistle and Nadia's voice saying, "Well, I'll be."

Hugo tried to escape from Gabriel's grip and bow down before her, but Gabriel placed his other arm in front of his body, keeping him upright. Hugo began to shake uncontrollably. He muttered, "Mercy, mercy," whether to Nadia or to Gabriel himself, or to both, Gabriel did not know.

"Shsh," he said to the slave. "Nadia won't hurt you, will you, Nadia?" and he looked at her, pleading.

Nadia pursed her lips together until they formed two thin whitish lines. "You overreach yourself, Healer," she said. "He is my slave."

Hugo trembled and moaned, and hid his face in Gabriel's arm. "Stop it!" Nadia hissed at him. In terror Hugo pulled himself away from Gabriel and threw himself to the ground in front of Nadia, completely prostrate, sniffling.

Nadia ignored him. She spoke coldly to Gabriel. "The Bearer sent for you. I didn't. If you've a mind to ruin his slaves, that's your business and his. But I'll thank you to leave mine alone." In her anger, Nadia's face had turned pale, save for two round red spots on each cheek and one at the tip of her nose.

Gabriel willed his heart to beat more slowly. He took a breath so deep his lungs hurt, expelled it slowly, and said to her, "You call him a slave but he is a man. You've no right to treat him so."

Nadia's green eyes seemed to take on a yellow tint, and her pupils shrank to tiny specks. "No right?" she shrieked. "No right? I'll show you my rights." She took her whip and began to slash at Hugo's bare back with it. Gabriel grabbed at her wrist, and the whip went wide, barely brushing Hugo's side. Nadia wrenched away and whipped at Hugo again. This time Gabriel grabbed the whip itself, which wrapped around his hand several times, cutting him. Oblivious to the pain, Gabriel pulled, and the handle came flying from Nadia's hand, hitting him smartly on the forehead.

"How dare you?" Nadia hissed.

Before Gabriel could answer, a man's voice said from behind them, "Yes, how dare you?"

Gabriel and Nadia both turned in surprise. A tall, balding man with a belly that preceded him, holding a great tan mare by the reins, looked upon them. His frown deepened. "Perhaps you'd care to explain why you are interfering with Gatekeeper Nadia's oversight of her slave?" he asked Gabriel in a slow, ponderous tone.

The whip was still wrapped around Gabriel's hand, which was beginning to throb. Ignoring it, Gabriel said, more heatedly than he would have liked, "I am interfering with senseless torture. No creature should be treated in this manner." His statement was punctuated by a deep sob from Hugo.

The man puckered his eyebrows and crossed his arms about his chest, scrutinizing Gabriel intensely. He said, after a moment, with exaggerated courtesy, "Surely you do not say that Mistress Nadia has not complete dominion over her own slave?"

Nadia broke in, angrily. "He knows nothing, Jonquil. He is a rebel come from Harmony." She spat her words as if anxious to have them leave her mouth.

Jonquil took a step back and scrutinized Gabriel. "Are you then the healer sent for by the Bearer to attend his daughter?" Nadia scowled.

"I am," Gabriel said.

Jonquil bowed stiffly. "On behalf of the Bearer and his daughter, and indeed all of Riviera, I thank you for answering the summons." He frowned. "Being a guest and a stranger here, of course you do not know our ways. If you will accompany me to the mansion, we will get you settled immediately."

A low moan came from Hugo. He immediately began to lick at the dirt beneath his face, frantically, his tongue making a circle.

Gabriel clutched at the whip which was still wrapped around his hand. "I'm sorry," he said. "Hugo is my patient now. I cannot leave him while he suffers."

Nadia gave an exasperated snort. "He is a slave. He lives only to suffer." She looked petulantly at Jonquil.

Jonquil nodded in agreement. "The gatekeeper speaks the truth," he said. "The creature is her slave. If she wants him to suffer, no one may interfere." Hugo stopped licking the dirt, and lay utterly motionless.

Gabriel turned so he was standing between Hugo and Nadia and Jonquil, and planted his legs firmly. He crossed his arms, the whip handle dangling down.

Jonquil contemplated him for a moment, and then said, with the barest nervous crack in his polite facade, "Come, come, dwellers of Harmony and Riviera are cousins. Certainly we can find common ground here."

Nadia spat, "You can't be intimidated by him, Jonquil. Look at him. He's bedraggled as a farm rag, and as skinny as one too."

Jonquil enunciated, as if trying to overcome a lisp, "I am not intimidated, gatekeeper Nadia. I am considering the options. A compromise must be reached." He paused. "You will agree not to punish the slave for today's events."

Gabriel interrupted, heatedly. "Punish him! He's done nothing!"

Jonquil held up his hand. "She will agree not to punish him for today's events," he repeated, "And she will agree that if he does not misbehave she will neither beat nor torture him for two weeks."

Nadia began to sputter in protest. Jonquil ignored her and said to Gabriel, "That will give the creature time to heal his wounds and perhaps even to win his mistress's affections. No more can be asked." Jonquil held Gabriel's gaze. Gabriel's blood roared in his ears as he saw Hugo, prostrate on the ground. Deliberately he unwrapped the whip from his hand, resisting the urge to rub his cut hand.

A long, petrified groan came from Hugo. The knowledge broke on Gabriel like a dropped egg that he could not make a stand here. Would he insist that Hugo be set free? The concept was meaningless. Hugo could not take care of himself, even if he were healthy, outside of these walls. He would die of exposure in a day, or of hunger in a week at most. Freedom within the walls for him was impossible. He was one of--how many? Tens or even hundreds of thousands of slaves, for all Gabriel knew. They would not be freed on account of one stranger asking for it.

Gabriel looked back at Jonquil and slowly nodded his acquiescence, bile building at the back of his throat. Jonquil clasped his hands together. He turned to Nadia and said, "I shall certainly convey your good grace in this matter, gatekeeper," he said. "Your sacrifice will not go unnoted. Perhaps it will merit a return to the mansion." Nadia nodded stonily.