Chapter 14

In the split second that Rouya seemed to slip a few feet down the rope head first, all the tumblers and acrobats seemed to vanish at once. Not a single eye saw them slip under their robes and hide as the desert practice had taught them to do so well. Fu Choy went to ground on the side of the box within a box away from the Satrap's platform. The younger student of Vedeya was already folded up inside the inner box, a sturdy boy of eight, named Sung, who showed a surprising strength and flexibility.

Tsee was already bound by the Satrap's bailiff, and hung on the other end of the cross beam, thirty feet in the air. The Satrap was half ruler, and half judge. The Persian culture much valued wisdom and men who could see the truth of matters, even in the face of deception. Their folk tales told of wise men who discovered the truth of complex cases in a mixture of forensic science, psychology, and detective work. Honest men were honored, but cunning men existed in all parts.

One of the duties of the Satrap was to enforce the standard of weights and measurements set by the Great King, and standardized in all parts of His domains. There was a uniform code of law, and professional men who transported prisoners to have their cases heard before the Satrap of the area or if required, before the Great King.

The bailiff was celebrated for his binding of prisoners, so the small audience of the Satrap's administration didn't give Tsee much in the way of chances that he would get free.

John told Tsee not to humiliate the bailiff by escaping easily, although as it turned out, it could have been done in five or seven minutes. Instead, he struggled even longer than usual, kind of a background wriggling and thrashing which eventually was mostly ignored as the rest of the acts performed.

Rouya, looking like a spirit in gauzy streaming scarves was meanwhile was being spun in flight by Vedeya, and the music from the erghil floated the minds of the watchers aloft in daydreams high in the air also.

The fright of watching the young girl hanging on just with her teeth thirty feet in the air, the relief when she was again hanging on with feet at least, and the startle as she suddenly slipped all the way down the rope, stopping when her head was inches from the ground caused a lot of emotion and excitement, a thrilling act indeed.

The box was opened, the box taken from the box, and Song teased and flirted and emerged, picked up his box and walked off, whereupon the remaining box began to rock and more dainty flirting hands and feet peeked out and teased!

Amazing that one person could fit inside a box inside that box, but now another person was coming out of it! The Satrap was suitably impressed. But the show was only beginning.

Chin and Tuk threw a throwing knife at each other, catching it and throwing it back again and again. Afterwards Tuk threw it hard into the center post, where it stuck half way in. A minor clerk was invited down, and proved to be unable to remove the knife from the post. It was left there for the rest of the show.

The ring was cleared, and Tsee struggled and flopped alone, swinging in the wind. The music grew wild and frightening, portending dire events. Suddenly all the ropes except those binding Tsee's feet fell to the ground, for a second seeming as if he himself had fallen.

But he was very tired, it seemed, and unable to reach his feet to untie them, or to climb up the rope to the dubious safety of the cross beam.

He finally managed to untie the rope, and dangled there by one hand, a hand that was slipping! It was tragic and horrifying, was this the end of the brave young man? Unheard amidst the gasps of horror were some soft clicks, and suddenly, as if from the very ground itself sprang the colorfully dressed acrobatic troupers who had vanished so mysteriously earlier in the act!

They produced a silk blanket and spread it taut just as Tsee's fingers slipped off the last bit of rope and he plunged toward the ground, only to be caught safely in the silken cradle. He stood and waved at the crowd to show he was alright, but then the acrobats began to toss him high with the blanket.

Higher and higher he flew, until he got tired of being bounced about apparently, and he grabbed the rope which had suspended him aloft and inverted for so long. He ran up the rope like a monkey, and began to do slow cart wheels and hand stands on top of the cross beam! The audience screamed in approval and amazement.

After so much tension for so long, an intermission was announced, and Vedeya and Zithrusa prepared a tray of halvah and date bars, along with a silver ewer of pomegranate flavored honey sweetened mint tea and some jade cups. They each sipped some of the tea and ate a square of halvah or date bar, to show it was safe, and sent it up with the white ivory bear looking so distinct with its large paws and long snaky neck.

The minor clerk was honored with the first nibble of the halvah and sip of tea, merely a formality, and then the Satrap and his highest ranking bureaucrats exclaimed over the marvelous treat.

Keeping the momentum up, the five and a half man stack was next, with Talus on top, the dancing camel this time doing the honors, but the dance wasn't a crazy dance, it was, not to put too fine a point on it, a seductive, alluring, erotic dance. It might be hard to imagine a camel doing an erotic dance, but that is the only way to describe it.

Helping a whole lot was the accompanying music. John had taught the musicians the strippers waltz, and Sukuli swayed to the beat, cocking her hips back and forth in a strange yet arousing parody of a woman's sexy sway, managing to be slinky and graceful despite her camel's shape. This had to be a woman, enchanted into the shape of a camel, there was no other explanation!

Adding to the illusion was the light blue gauzy scarf veil and headdress, the jeweled spike and the artful makeup enhancing her long lashes, darkening them and extending them as she fluttered them seductively, the red color on her cheeks and lips, not looking cheep and tawdry, but giving her the illusion of being a lovely woman of noble class who happened to have an unfortunate shape.

As had been learned with the puppets, a bit of costume, the movement and sound effects made more difference than shape. Sukuli stole the show, and was the center of attention to the detriment of the human stack. Talus signaled her, and she caught him as he jumped from the top of the stack onto her neck, lowering him as she slowed his fall, where he stepped off his straddle across her neck, and gave her a hug and a kiss worthy of his families maiden auntie.

The rest of the stack un stacked without much notice, and left the ring with their equipment. Now was John and Sukuli's 'balky camel' act, only this time it was played as if Sukuli was an enchanted princess who wouldn't stoop to laboring as a camel carrying loads, and John was a bewildered drover who just thought she was a camel.

The contrast between their behavior created a dynamic tension which made one want to scream. Both because of the plight of the poor noble lady camel, and the obtuseness of the oblivious drover. The little tricks Sukuli played on her ignorant drover mystified him, because he couldn't understand how they occurred, never suspecting his camel was smart or subtle enough to behave so humanly.

Finally he decided his camel was cursed, as near to the truth as he was able to come, and brought a wise man, played by Tuk in rich robes. The wise man covered the camel who he made kneel with the silken blanket, and when he removed it, there stood Zithrusa as the formerly enchanted noble lady, in rich silk robes and a light blue veil and headdress, her eyelashes long and dark, her lips and cheeks reddened in the best fashion.

Sukuli in the meantime, had her makeup removed, and was playing a dumb camel, while John praised the good spirits for his camel back, and made much over her, crying praises to the wise man who for some reason wouldn't take any payment, a shocking turn of events. The wise man went one way with the noble lady hanging coyly off his arm, and John and his camel, now loaded with goods went the other way, everyone happy.

It was an amazing little skit, and it was believable that the camel had been bewitched or enchanted before. The most amazing act to John was how Sukuli was able to portray a normal camel so well.

Next came the two little cousins Lishta and Farish threw many knives at even littler Talus, never hitting him and obviously never missing putting the knives exactly where they wished to. Despite not being blindfolded Talus never flinched, and after his jumping off onto Sukuli's neck, the audience knew he could see very well.

Then it was Chin's turn, and Tuk fired arrows at a target, but never hit it because blindfolded Chin kept grabbing them from the air. That was amazing enough, and proof of the concept, but Tuk took it another step further. John made a production of calling for silence, and had the music stop, and waited until a hush settled over the audience.

Both John and Tuk carefully paced off the distance, and Tuk himself positioned John where he wanted him, then went back to his own mark. There was a brief drum roll quickly silenced, and John nocked an arrow, and let the silence build. When the tension had built to the screaming point, he fired the arrow, and then it was in the blindfolded Tuk's hand.

He removed the blindfold and stepped two paces to the side, and John fired again, his arrow going into the center of the bulls eye in the target he had been standing in front of, the arrow head going all the way into the target.

No point in tempting the good fates, they only did this feat once, and once was enough. The Satrap was stunned, he had never even heard of such a thing before. To catch an arrow from the air, yes. But to do it blindfolded, when the arrow was aimed at your heart? It was beyond astonishing, there were just no words.

He didn't know how to describe this to his High King. He would just have to tell the bare facts, he couldn't put into words the effect this entire performance had made on him. He decided to give John his prize possession, a Nubian captive, hostage, slave. She was too haughty anyway, and he feared for his life if he ever fell asleep in the same room as her. She had been at his side for the performance, and he took her chain, and had her led down to John, who couldn't refuse the gift given in exchange for his ivory bear.

Tuk looked at her and his heart suddenly discovered the love of a man for a woman. She had a high rounded forehead, straight shiny black hair, a proud mouth with full lips of a dark wine color and a long straight narrow nose set between two sharp gray eyes that gave nothing away. For all the emotion her face displayed besides its innate pride and determination, she might as well have been a statue.

John made the appropriate thanks, knowing this gift was intended to be a high honor, and then had to endure the prattle of the Satrap's fulsome praise and small talk for a sumptuous lunch that John was feeling too sickened to eat, although he hid his feelings quite well himself, and managed to move his food around enough that the chatty Satrap didn't notice.

John had thought he was through with slaves when he had managed to get his last slave, Wong, the position of Regent to and father of the Eastern Emperor. John really didn't hold with slavery, and was made very uncomfortable with being forced to accept the ownership of another human being. At least this young lady, Atasakaliye, was not a slave in spirit and so would be easy to free, when doing so would not offend the Satrap.

Finally John was able to tear free from the effusive Satrap, using the excuse of needing to attend to his caravan. The Satrap told John to expect an invitation to perform for the High King some time soon. John had expected this bit of advice. He gathered his troupers and they headed back to where the caravan was encamped.

John was not unaware of the effect 'Saka' as she was called, had on Tuk, and so he put her right hand in Tuk's left, and bound them together with a silk scarf he had in his vest pocket, Tuk hardly noticing he was so entranced with her. She neither resisted nor refused, but seemed content to leave her had in his, and John thought he had transferred ownership quite nicely, although ownership of whom to whom he would withhold judgment on.

Saka could tell that Tuk was a great man, sure and brave enough that he would let an arrow be fired at his heart as he was blinded by a bandage. She had know doubt that he was also noble and true, it was apparent in his visage. She wasn't sure of her status, but she was fairly certain that she was no longer considered anyone's slave.

The binding that John had performed was a binding equally on her and this man Tuk, and was more of a marriage of equals than the giving of a slave, as she understood John's manner and actions. She respected Tuk, and didn't have any objections to being his wife, since any other marriage arrangements would have been called off and herself declared soiled goods as soon as she had been captured.

She had fought with all her strength to preserve herself inviolate, but of course that was impossible for a slave against the power of a man who commanded as many people as the Satrap did. Still, she had never given in, and had always had to be forced, fighting with all her not inconsiderable strength every time, injuring those who sought to assist the Satrap in his purpose.

He hadn't tried to use her as much as he might, it was just too much trouble, about like bedding a leopard. It could be done, but probably wouldn't be as pleasurable as one hoped. And, in the end, he had given her away, in effect giving up on trying to tame her.

She had been captured when a marauding Persian war band had surprised her twenty guards and slain them all in a daring raid deep into the Nubian territory, and had taken her and her four maids captive as hostages and novelties. Struck by her beauty and obvious nobility, they had not raped her like they had her maids, but had kept her for someone of higher rank.

The Satrap was the only one who had sullied her, and since he had needed ten helpers, few whom had escaped unscathed, she felt that she had won something, her dignity perhaps.