or feet. Her
body writhed and quivered under the chastisement, her head swayed from
side to side in rhythm with the blows. Her teeth were sunk into her
lower lip and a trickle of blood began as the punishment continued. But
she did not cry out.

The pliant cords made no great sound as they encountered the quivering
body of the captive; only a sharp crackling snap, but each cord left a
red streak across Yasala's dark flesh. Valeria inflicted the punishment
with all the strength of her war-hardened arm, with all the
mercilessness acquired during a life where pain and torment were daily
happenings, and with all the cynical ingenuity which only a woman
displays toward a woman. Yasala suffered more, physically and mentally,
than she would have suffered under a lash wielded by a man, however
strong.

It was the application of this feminine cynicism which at last tamed
Yasala.

A low whimper escaped from her lips, and Valeria paused, arm lifted, and
raked back a damp yellow lock. "Well, are you going to talk?" she
demanded. "I can keep this up all night, if necessary!"

"Mercy!" whispered the woman. "I will tell."

Valeria cut the cords from her wrists and ankles, and pulled her to her
feet. Yasala sank down on the couch, half reclining on one bare hip,
supporting herself on her arm, and writhing at the contact of her
smarting flesh with the couch. She was trembling in every limb.

"Wine!" she begged, dry-lipped, indicating with a quivering hand a gold
vessel on an ivory table. "Let me drink. I am weak with pain. Then I
will tell you all."

Valeria picked up the vessel, and Yasala rose unsteadily to receive it.
She took it, raised it toward her lips--then dashed the contents full
into the Aquilonian's face. Valeria reeled backward, shaking and clawing
the stinging liquid out of her eyes. Through a smarting mist she saw
Yasala dart across the room, fling back a bolt, throw open the
copper-bound door and run down the hall. The pirate was after her
instantly, sword out and murder in her heart.

But Yasala had the start, and she ran with the nervous agility of a
woman who has just been whipped to the point of hysterical frenzy. She
rounded a corner in the corridor, yards ahead of Valeria, and when the
pirate turned it, she saw only an empty hall, and at the other end a
door that gaped blackly. A damp moldy scent reeked up from it, and
Valeria shivered. That must be the door that led to the catacombs.
Yasala had taken re