Maia

"And if I know anythin' about it, most of it's peasants' taxes," said Occula, drawing up a stool to a large mirror fixed to the wall. "That's a laugh, isn't it? Your mother takes Lalloc's money for you, pays her taxes to Sencho and Sencho pays it back to Lalloc. She might as well have blown it out of her venda, mightn' she?"

"But Occula, you said you were going to tell Lalloc about Genshed-what he got up to that night in Puhra: but you never."

"Oh, not yet, banzi! That'll come later, when we've become the bounciest girls in Bekla-thousand meld a bounce. But I shan' forget, believe you me. He'll come to bits like a turd in the rain, you see if he doesn'." She put on her necklace of teeth and arranged it carefully. "For Lespa's sake, do count your blessin's. Look at that bath- this mirror-your clothes! We're wallowin' in luxury! There's others outside beggin' their bread; and all you've got to do is learn a few bed-tricks and look as if you were enjoyin' yourself. With your looks you can' go wrong."

At this moment the Belishban girl, Meris, quite naked, entered quickly from the corridor leading to the bedrooms and, ignoring Occula and Maia, stepped down into the pool. Occula broke off and for a time there was silence, broken only by Meris's ripplings and splashes as she moved restlessly in the water. At length she looked up and said to Occula, "Where the hell are you from, anyway?"

"We're from Tonilda, both of us," answered Occula placidly.

"First I heard the people in Tonilda were black. Anyway, you can damn' well go back there for me."

She struck the surface hard with the flat of her hand, but the splash did not reach Occula and Maia.

The black girl got up, went to the end of the pool and stood over her. "What the hell's the matter? D'you want a row or somethin'? It'll only bring Terebinthia in, and then we'll all be in the shit."

"I don't care!" said Meris. "She can do what she likes: she's done enough already."

She was a very pretty girl, with dark eyes and a full, sensual mouth, but now her face was peaked and sharp with anger and latent violence. One could see what she might look like in ten years' time.

"What's happened, then?" asked Occula. "P'raps we ought to know, ought we?"

She put out a hand, drew Meris to her feet and began rubbing her down with a dry towel.

"Oh, it's Yunsaymis," replied Meris after a time. "One day I'm going to stick a knife into that fat bastard and hang upside-down for it. Yunsaymis was the only friend I had."

"Why, is she dead, then, or what?"

"No, she picked up a dose of the marjil: someone at a party where Sencho'd taken her. We might have put it right, the two of us, and no one any the wiser, only that bitch Terebinthia found out and told him. Terebinthia always hated Yunsaymis, only she never dared say so to Sencho, 'cos he had such a fancy for her; but she told me once that she meant to get Yunsaymis out of here one way or another. The moment she found out she'd got the marjil, she was off to Sencho like a scalded cat. I had to stay beside him and do what he wanted while he watched Yunsaymis being whipped."

"Where is she now?" asked Maia.

"Sold-her and Tuisto together. Tuisto was expecting it: she was well over twenty-four. Girls here are always sold about that age."

"How old are you?" said Occula.

"Nineteen."

"Been at it long?"

Meris smiled wryly. "Depends what you call 'it.' You want to take a good look at me, black girl: I'm an awful warning; or I shall be in a few years."

"Get away?" said Occula. "When did it all start, then?"

"Oh, when I was thirteen," said Meris. "That's not too young in Belishba, you know. I could have been married at thirteen, down there. I never wanted to get married,

though; I just liked basting. Didn't much matter who it was. I wore out every boy for miles around, until my father turned me out of doors. He said I was a whore, but I never took a damned meid, and that's the truth!"

She crashed her clenched fist hard against the woodwork of the wall. Maia and Occula exchanged glances. "What happened then?" asked Occula.

"Well, I couldn't starve, so I set off to walk to Herl. But on the way I took up with Latto-this lad I met. He was on the run."

"A slave?"

"What else? Belishba's always full of slaves on the run- or it was, five years ago. But Latto-he never would tell me a word about himself. 'I'm your gift from Shakkarn,' he used to say. 'That's good enough for you.' It was, too: that boy had a zard could have broken a door down! He used to-" And here Meris grew quite remarkably obscene, until it became clear to both the girls that she was talking to herself as much as to them.

"You are in a state, aren' you?" interrupted Occula at length.