Page 29 of Sword Dance

Varazda’s shoulder tensed, then relaxed minutely as he looked down at Damiskos’s fingers. He lifted his own hand to Damiskos’s, interlacing their fingers, turning the gesture into something else, something intimate and emotion-laden. It told a completely different story than the proprietary brush of the hand that Damiskos had contemplated and baulked at. It suggested Varazda might be glad to have been bought by Damiskos. Maybe they had talked about it beforehand; maybe Damiskos had promised to treat Varazda better than Aristokles Phoskos. It was perfectly judged.

Varazda looked up at Damiskos through his lashes, and Damiskos thought he was awfully good at this. Much better than Aristokles had been.

“You’re the Boukossian agent,” Damiskos said, as it flashed into his mind. “Not Aristokles.”

Varazda looked shyly down at the ground. “Mm. Perhaps we could talk about that later.”

Damiskos looked up and realized they were the centre of attention. Most of the students were looking disgusted. Helenos was frowning deeply. Eurydemos looked ready to compose another poem.

Nione was the only one who was smiling, but she also looked ready to burst into tears.

Looking flustered and embarrassed was probably the best thing Damiskos could have done, and if so, he played his part admirably.

Nione stood up abruptly. “Damiskos! I meant to ask you if your—if Pharastes—could dance for us tonight? We’re having a bonfire on the beach. The men who run my factory follow Opos, and it’s Hapikon Eve tonight. I like to hold some celebration for them. You are all welcome to join us.”

Damiskos looked down at Varazda for guidance. He was smiling and looking shy again, so Damiskos said, “It is up to him. I’ve no objection.”

Varazda gave Nione his gracious agreement, and she beamed at him and Damiskos. After a strained silence, it was Kleitos who spoke.

“Why did you ask his permission? I thought the Sasian belonged to Aristokles?”

“Well, they, they came to an agreement.” Nione had sat back down again, but fidgeted as though she wanted to get up and leave.

“I bought him,” said Damiskos bluntly. He wanted to get this over with. “Yesterday afternoon.”

“Really?” Kleitos looked surprised. “Yesterday afternoon? Huh.” He glanced around at Helenos, who showed no reaction.

“What for?” one of the new students asked, with a rather unpleasant, half-lidded smile.

Damiskos raised his eyebrows. “I need workers for my olive farm.”

Chapter 7

It was late afternoon by the time Damiskos was able to get down to the shore again. The students had quickly recovered from their shock at learning that he had bought Varazda. Gelon and Phaia still looked slightly disgusted, and Helenos was inscrutable, but the others seemed to have decided that if Damiskos, who was obviously very manly, had done this, then it must in some way be a very manly thing. They had discussed the question at length.

By this time, Damiskos was reasonably sure that Gelon had already been down to the shore—he had lost track of him at some point in the afternoon, to his annoyance—and whatever had been hidden in the undergrowth would be gone. But he had told Varazda, when they had managed to snatch a moment alone together, that he would go down and look, so he did. Varazda had gone back to the slave quarters, ostensibly to practice for that night’s performance.

Damiskos made his way back down to the beach and began methodically searching the bushes where Gelon had been hiding earlier.

At first he thought he wouldn’t find anything. He made it all the way down the stretch of brush where he remembered seeing Gelon—he was reasonably certain of the general area—and there was nothing hidden in among the bushes.

Then he retraced his steps, looking for something that wasn’t there, and he found it: an area of broken branches and disturbed leaves, and a sharp-cornered depression in the sand where something heavy had rested. Something square or rectangular, a couple of feet in length. About the size of a sea chest.

He could see a faint trail of disturbed undergrowth leading away from the spot, showing where Gelon had crawled down with the object, and when Damiskos had struggled to follow it for a few paces, he was rewarded with a glint of metal in the sand. He bent and dug out a leather belt with a round gold buckle, chased in a typical Zashian style.

He wrapped the belt around the buckle and hid it in the fold of his tunic for safekeeping, then he made his way back to the beach and up the stairs to the villa. He seemed to spend all his time here trudging up and down these gods-cursed stairs.

He made a token search around the house for Varazda, without result. He didn’t like to go to the slave quarters, as that didn’t seem like something Varazda’s master would do, or to send for him, as that very much did. What an absolutely ridiculous situation this was.

Like many Phemians, Damiskos had never personally owned a slave. There had been slaves in his parents’ house when he was a boy, so he had grown up taking the concept for granted, and there had been slaves attached to the Second Koryphos to whom he had given orders, but he had never owned another person, certainly never purchased one. The pretence made him surprisingly uncomfortable.

By this time, his knee was throbbing fiercely, and when he sank onto a bench in the garden, he could not move from it for some time.

* * *

As the sun was setting, the guests trooped down together to the beach, where the factory workers and many of Nione’s slaves were already assembled and preparing the bonfire. They were on the sheltered stretch of beach that Nione had shown Damiskos and Phaia the day before, happily out of range of the smell of the factory. Some of Nione’s women were putting down blankets and cushions, and the guests settled themselves comfortably.

Cups were passed around and filled, though most the students had been drinking steadily all afternoon. Only Helenos seemed quite sober.