She looked out across the feast hall in Kandolus' House and saw some of her classmates, now supervising the training of other consignments of Earth women. She saw Chushi, the Indian girl she had spent her last night here with, scold a clumsy trainee. She thought about Vellra who had been given to a black Master and wondered where she was now. She hoped that she was as happy as Shemba herself.
"This'll be the last batch," commented the Master Mage, "until we can build a new door."
"More expense," moaned Orthos, "and at least a year's delay."
"Now, now, Orthos," said Kandolus, "don't despair. We'll manage it. You aren't begging in the streets yet. Come, I have a surprise for you."
The Wizard made a sign to a guard standing by a door. He opened it and a moment later Challya, Shemba's Teacher, entered. She led a slave on a leash who was dressed in dancing veils. They both knelt before the high platform where Kandolus and his guests feasted.
"Greetings, Challya! Is this slave ready to be displayed?"
"I think she will not displease you, Master."
The dancer looked up in awe at the guests, her face especially fixed on Orthos, who looked down on her with stern displeasure. Shemba nearly gasped when she saw that kneeling in front of her, legs wide apart and her body held erect on display, a slave ring through her nose, was her old Mistress, Aliciana!
At a signal from Kandolus the band began to play and Aliciana began to dance, displaying her body to the guests and gradually discarding the veils that hid it. All the time she glanced at the impassive face of Orthos, striving desperately to win some note of approval from him.
Karrak whispered in his slave's ear: "It is only just. She was given more authority than is proper for a woman. Now my father will not spoil her again. She will know her proper place."
"As you say, Master." When or if Aliciana returned to Orthos' villa Shemba would be the senior slave. And she would enjoy reminding her former Mistress of it.
"Tell me, do you miss your old world? Do you wish you could return?"
"No Master. My old world had nothing like this. And no-one like you. I am content. But I do wonder what happened to Thergo."
To her surprise Kandolus not only heard but spoke to her: "I wonder too. One day I will return to your world. What will I find there? Did Thergo reach the gate at the other side before it too was destroyed by the shattering of the enchantment that bound the two doors together. Or does he wander the abyss between the worlds searching for a way out? Yes I wonder. I wonder."
**********
Thergo picked himself up from the dusty floor of the room. Behind him the oak door had shattered into a thousand pieces just seconds after he had come through. So, now he was trapped here until he could find the materials to build a gate back. And Kandolus would be coming after him. It was only a matter of time.
But the slave had said that this world had no mages. If that was true, incredible as it seemed, then he could soon win riches and power here. When Kandolus came her would be ready. He wandered to the window and drew aside the blinds. Out there was a whole new world to conquer.
CONTINUED IN: "SLAVEWORLD INCORPORATED"