Pathways - Jeri Taylor [190]
Her two captors—for that is what they must surely be— scuttled her toward the man and then let go of her arms. The hulking man in the chair sat up in curiosity and peered at her. Kes decided once more to go on the offensive.
“I’d like to know who you are and why you’ve brought me here,” she said, and was glad that this time her voice held steady. The man smiled, but it was not a smile of warmth or friendliness.
“By all means, plucky one. I am Jabin. These are the men that work in the mines under my command. And they wisely brought you here because they realized you can be of great service to us.”
“Are you Kazon?”
The man smiled again, and this time Kes noticed that his teeth were stained in ugly brown blotches. “We are indeed. Kazon-Ogla, the strongest and most courageous of all the sects.”
Kes’s stomach clutched slightly. Everyone else had been right—the Kazon still loomed on the surface. Did they still consider the Ocampa their enemy? “What do you mean,” she asked, “by being ‘of great service’?”
Jabin reached out and put his fingers on her face, turning it first one way and then the other. “I mean it literally. You will make a lovely serving girl.”
Kes jerked her chin out of his grasp. “I have no intention of becoming your servant,” she said hotly, deciding that the time had come to let them know she wouldn’t be taken advantage of.
But immediately she felt a stinging blow to the side of her head and she went sprawling heavily to the floor, her ear ringing as though it were on fire. She clutched at it, trying to stifle the pain, as Jabin stood over her. “Let’s be clear on this. Everyone in this camp does exactly as I tell them. You are certainly no exception. Do you understand?”
Kes managed to nod, but Jabin drew back his boot and kicked her viciously in her shin. She screamed and grabbed at it, the pain eclipsing that in her ear. “When I ask you a question, answer me. Like this: ‘Yes, Maje.’ That’s all I ever want to hear from you. ‘Yes, Maje.’ Do you understand?”
“Yes, Maje,” whispered Kes, who could barely make herself form the words as she battled to combat the pain in her leg and her ear. She was suddenly jerked to her feet and she struggled to stand alone.
“That’s much better. You’re a pretty little thing and I’d rather not deface you. If you behave, we can get along very nicely. Don’t you think?”
He looked piercingly at her and Kes knew what he was waiting for. “Yes, Maje,” she said hoarsely. He positively beamed.
“Very good. Very good. Bring me some of the bread from that table, and then we can have a nice, long conversation. I want to know all about you—and I particularly want to know how you got to the surface. You, my little Ocampa, will be the means of our regaining the water that is rightfully ours.”
Kes went to the table with dread in her heart, and for the first time in her life she wished devoutly that she had listened to others instead of following her own youthful impulses.
Three weeks later, Kes could barely remember anything of her life underground. Only the now, the miserable present, was with her. She spent long days waiting on Jabin, preparing and serving him meals which he consumed rapidly and messily, all but destroying her own appetite. When she wasn’t busy tending to his needs, he made her chip cormaline nuggets, a hateful job that left her hands splintered with shards of the ore, nasty little cuts that took forever to heal. He never told her why she was doing it, and she suspected it was for no purpose other than to make her do a mind-numbing task.
Sometimes at night, when she was finally allowed to crawl to a crude mat in a small outbuilding and sleep for a few hours, she would try to summon up the memory of her mother and father, but they seemed like dream figures,