David Clarke

The Second Nexus

Chapters 12-15

Chapter Twelve

I was really hoping that this had been forgotten – after all, we'd been here for more than six weeks now and nothing had been done about it. I could only hope that the senior instructor's lack of personal interest in the issue would meant that he'd just go through the motions, rather than conducting a full in-depth analysis of the place of portals in our lives.

He took me to a room on the far side of the building, and as soon as I stepped inside I realised that there was going to be nothing half-hearted about this: I found myself looking at a narrow bed fitted with restraining straps, with a helmet-like attachment at one end festooned with wires. It looked a bit like the apparatus the Kerpians used for implanting languages, except that I thought this equipment would be for taking things out of the head, rather than putting them in.

"Don't worry, it's completely painless," the instructor told me. "You won't feel a thing. The equipment follows your brain patterns and matches them to what you're saying – it's more of a back-up than anything else. Now if you'd like to lie down…"

Reluctantly I did as I was told, and the helmet was slid forward over my head.

"We're not going to bother strapping you down," the instructor told me. "Like I said, this won't hurt, and you're doing this voluntarily, after all."

If he thought that he wasn't much of a mind-reader, I thought. But perhaps he knew how I felt and was just trying to jolly me along. Well, tough, I thought: you won't hear anything about portals from me, whatever the thing on my head does.

"And now we'll just help you to relax a bit," said the instructor, and before I realised what he was doing he had jabbed a needle into my arm. And he was right: the relaxation followed almost at once.

"Now," he said, "one of my colleagues will be in shortly to ask you a few questions. All you have to do is to relax and answer him truthfully…"

And the next thing I remembered was someone helping me to stand up. The helmet had been removed, and although I felt a little woozy I still felt relaxed and unconcerned about what had just happened.

The senior instructor reappeared, glancing at his watch.

"That was a long session," he said. "We'll get you something to drink in a moment – I expect your throat is a little sore. If all of your colleagues have so much to say this will take longer than we'd expected.

"Now, we know that two of you don't speak the same language as the rest, but that you can speak their language equally well. So we're going to ask you to translate what they say into the language you call Kerpian – it'll be a lot easier for High Captain Aarnist if he only has to worry about translating from one language."

"Huh? Wasn't the whole point of waiting so that we could answer the questions in your language?" I asked.

"Oh, goodness, no – you really don't have the vocabulary for that yet. No, the point of waiting was so that we could give you your instructions in our language and so that you could understand them. Your answers have to be in your mother tongue, or in one that you speak with equivalent fluency. So we'll get the two non-Kerpian speakers done next, and then you can go back to work – we'll be able to manage the others without you. Sit down for a moment while we get the next one ready."

So I sat in the chair beside the bed, and another instructor brought me a cup of orange juice. The thought that I'd done so much talking that I'd given myself a sore throat was pretty scary, especially since I had no idea what I might have said. Perhaps I'd find out by translating whatever Nicky and Marc had to say, because presumably they were going to be asked the same questions.

Five minutes later Nicky was led into the room, and his face lit up when he saw me.

"Hey, Jake!" he said. "Stefan said he'd seen you a couple of times, and that you seemed to be okay but he wasn't sure what was happening to you. Is everything all right?"

"Yes I'm fine. What about you?"

He shrugged. "Not bad. I'm not really used to working quite this much, and my Konjässi gives me a headache sometimes, rooting about in my skull. But I'm okay. Why are we here, though?"

"They want to ask about the portals."

"Oh. Well, I'm hardly the person to ask, am I? I don't know anything about them, and I've only been through one twice."

"I know, but they're asking all of us about them."

"Oh, well, I suppose I'll have to tell them I don't know anything, then."

I smiled at him, hoping he'd be able to do that, and then watched as he lay on the bed and the helmet was put over his head. Next came the needle, and then the instructor told me to stand on the other side of the bed next to the microphone and to translate everything Nicky said into Kerpian. He also told me that if I said anything that didn't match Nicky's brain patterns we'd both be severely punished, and I thought that didn't really leave me a lot of choice. After all, surely there wasn't much that Nicky could tell them in the first place…

The instructor waited a moment for the drug to take effect and then told Nicky that he was going to ask some questions and that Nicky had to answer truthfully, using his own native language.

"What do you know about the portal you came through to reach this world?" he asked.

"It's irregular – the monks can't say how long it will be open, or how often it appears."

"What monks are these?"

"The ones in the monastery on the other side of the portal."

"And why is there a monastery there?"

"To look after travellers who come through the portals."

"How many portals are there?"

"Five…"

It was worrying to discover how much Nicky had learned during his stay at the monastery – worrying because he knew less than anyone else, which meant that if we were all questioned as carefully the authorities here would get a very complete picture of the monastery and the portals that it oversaw. I didn't know what they would do with that knowledge, but I didn't think it would be good news for the monks.

It didn't take too long to exhaust Nicky's knowledge of the portals, though he was questioned extensively about his own home world, too. But finally he was given another injection of some sort, and that revived him. He was led away, and I was given some more orange juice.

Five minutes or so later Marc was led in, and he was still completely naked. As soon as he saw me he ran to me and threw his arms round me, and I held him, wishing that I could project feelings of warmth and protection to him the way Harlan could to me when I was feeling bad.

The instructors gave him a minute or so with me and then told him to lie on the bed, and his nakedness seemed to make no difference at all to the way he was treated: presumably the instructors were well used to some of the slaves not having clothes for one reason or another. The helmet was put on his head and the injection given, and a couple of minutes later I was again recording his knowledge of the portals for posterity – or, at least, for High Captain Aarnist.

Marc had of course been through more portals than Nicky, and he was questioned about each one and about the worlds he had seen, especially his own – which was also, of course, my own adoptive world, and I really wasn't happy to think of these people knowing about it. But I had to keep translating: the first time I hesitated I felt a definite mental jab from the instructor.

Marc's testimony lasted quite a while, but eventually it was finished and he was revived.

"All right, you can both go," the instructor told us. "Report back to your students… no, I suppose it's a bit late: supper will be in twenty minutes. You're released from duties until supper."

And that gave me a chance to take Marc to the store-room at the end of Harlan's corridor and talk to him in private for a while. I didn't need to be a Konjässi to know that Marc wasn't happy: apart from his nakedness there were bruises on his back and legs, and especially on his buttocks. Once we were in the store-room I closed the door, pulled out a couple of chairs and sat down facing him.

"Are you okay?" I asked him, and felt my heart sink as he shook his head and then started to cry. I couldn't think of anything to say, so I just pulled him onto my lap facing me and hugged him while he cried against my shoulder. Holding an undeniably cute naked boy like this ought to have been extremely arousing, but I can honestly say I didn't get even a twinge: all I wanted to do was to try to comfort him as best I could. And seeing the state he was in made me realise that we really had to get out of here – it was clear that Marc was coming to the end of his tether. But of course I still had absolutely no idea of how we could do that.

"I'm going to sort this out," I promised him. "With Harlan's help if I can persuade him; without if I can't. But I'm not leaving you in this state. The only way Harlan is going to stop me is by putting me under a full control clamp twenty-four hours a day, and I don't think even he has the stamina to keep it in place that long. Come on, Marc: we're going to talk to him."

I led him along the corridor to Harlan's room and found my master sitting at his computer working.

"Ah, you've been out tending to the waifs and strays again," he commented as we came in. "I thought we'd agreed that we'd stay out of the slaves' internal affairs?"

"You agreed that. I went along because I didn't have any choice. But, look, Harlan, Marc's my friend, and I can't just leave things like this. I mean, haven't you got friends?"

"Well, yes, I suppose so. But my friends can look after themselves, so they don't need me to stick my nose in."

"Your friends are Konjässiem. They don't get picked on."

"You might be surprised," said Harlan, grinning. "I know of one… but then he definitely asked for it. I'll maybe tell you that story later. But, as for this, I've already told you I'm not going to get involved."

"I know. All I want is your permission to try to sort it out myself."

"Jake, if you stick your nose in it won't do any good and you're going to get hurt, and I need you in working order."

"It won't just be me. There are eight of us, remember?"

"Oh, so now you want to start a civil war among the slaves."

"No, I don't. I really want to sort this out without anyone getting hurt, so if I take Stefan, Alain and Nicky along with me it'll just be to make sure nobody attacks me without giving me a chance to speak first."

"You're just going to be stirring things up, and I really don't think…"

"Harlan, talk to Marc – have a look in his head and you'll see what sort of person he is, and then ask yourself if he deserves what's been happening to him. And why don't you ask him exactly what has been happening to him? Don't just wander away saying that it's got nothing to do with you – at least find out what's happening first – please?"

Harlan sighed. "Jake, you're way too lippy for a slave," he said. "I let you get away with far too much, which is my fault. Probably I ought to tighten up on you and beat you if you don't learn to know your place. Except… you know I like you too much to do that. But don't keep taking advantage of me, okay? Now, take Marc and sit him on the bed – you can sit with him and hold him if you like – and I'll talk to him."

So I led Marc over to the bed and we sat down side my side with my arm around him, and Harlan wheeled his chair over so that he could sit in front of us. And for a couple of minutes he said nothing at all, and nor did Marc, but I didn't interrupt because I knew there was some mental communication going on.

"Well," Harlan said to me, speaking his own language so that Marc wouldn't understand, "he's really unhappy. The worst problem is that he feels completely alone, and he's being kept away from you and his other friends to keep him feeling that way. If you want some good news, it's that he doesn't blame you at all – in fact he still thinks very highly of you, though whether he'll go on thinking like that if you can't help him I couldn't say."

"Oh." I switched to English. "Marc, Harlan says the thing that worries you most is being alone… but what about Radu? Isn't he there with you?"

He shook his head. "They sent him to another dorm," he said. "It was a couple of weeks ago now. Rusta said it wasn't fair if they kept both of us when there are two more junior dorms that could use a slave, so I've been on my own since. I'm not allowed to speak to anyone unless they ask me a question – they wouldn't be happy if they knew I was here talking to you now."

"Tell them Harlan wanted to talk to you. They can't go against a Konjässi. And actually I want you to talk to him – tell him exactly what happens to you on an average day."

"Do I have to? It makes me feel really ashamed…"

"It'll help," I said. "Harlan's really nice, and if you tell him what you have to go through I'm sure he'll help us."

Actually I was sure of nothing of the kind, but I hoped it might make a difference.

"You won't tell the others, will you?" said Marc. "I mean, Radu knows some of it, and I suppose the same sort of thing is happening to him too, but I still don't want anyone else to tell him. If we ever get back together I'll probably tell him myself, but for now… you understand, don't you, Jake?"

"Of course I do." And I hugged him to emphasise the point.

"Okay, then." He took a deep breath and addressed Harlan in Arvelan. "It isn't the same every day, but most mornings I have to be out of bed as soon as our alarm rings. Then I have to start making everyone's bed while they go and get washed, and there are sixteen slaves in my dormitory at the moment, so it takes a long time to get them all looking perfect. If any boy isn't satisfied with the way I've made his bed I have to do it again and he makes a mark on the board – there's a sheet there to keep track of how many punishments I have to come.

"If I've made all the beds in time I'm allowed to go and have some breakfast, though usually I'm only allowed a small bowl of porridge. And if I haven't finished the beds in time I don't get any breakfast at all.

"I spent most of the day with my Konjässi, but in the evenings I have to work in the dormitory, cleaning the boys' shoes, scrubbing the toilets and washing the floor, and when I've done all that I have to do… you know, sex things, for the other slaves."

"What sort of things?" asked Harlan.

"Well…"

Obviously Marc found it hard to talk about this, but I suppose Harlan gave him a sort of mental nudge, because he swallowed and went on, "I have to suck on their things. And some of them like to put it inside me… you know, in my bottom. I have to make everyone in the dormitory get excited every day if they want me to. And if they're not happy with how I do it they add some marks to my punishment list."

"And what do they do about that list?" asked Harlan.

"They beat me. They tie me to the bed in the dorm leaders' room and hit me with a strap. I get hit loads of times, even though I try really hard to do what they say." And he began to cry again, and all I could do was hug him.

And then he seemed to calm down.

"Lie on the bed," Harlan told him. "Jake, you can stay here with him if you like. He's going to rest for a bit while I go and have supper – I'll bring something back for you if you want to stay here."

"I'll stay," I said. "Thanks, Harlan."

Marc flopped over onto his side and I realised that Harlan had done something to make him sleepy. I lifted his feet up onto the bed and lay down beside him, and then Harlan must have done the same thing to me, because I felt extremely tired all of a sudden – in fact I can't even remember Harlan leaving the room.

He shook me awake a while later, and he'd brought a tray with him.

"Help yourself," he said. "We'll wake him up in a bit – the rest will do him good. And you were right, Jake: he is a nice kid, and he doesn't deserve to have his life made a constant hell. I can't get involved directly, but I won't get in your way if you want to try to fix things – at least, as long as you can do it without starting a war."

"I won't. I just want to talk – at least, that's all I'll do to start with. Though I might use your name once or twice…"

"Jake, if you get me involved I'll have to punish you – and I mean it this time. Just because I haven't beaten you yet it doesn't mean that I won't, understand?"

"Don't worry. If anything goes wrong I'll say you knew nothing about it. Of course, you'll have to teach me how to shield my mind if it's teachers I'm trying to lie to…"

"Forget it! You'd never be able to. We could always try finding a great big metal pole and ramming it up your bum – that ought to protect you…"

"Perhaps not. Trust me, Harlan – I won't let you down."

Harlan let Marc sleep for a couple of hours, and then offered him the remains of the cold cuts he had brought from the dining room. And when Marc had eaten Harlan took him back to his dormitory in person.

"I told them he's been working for me," he told me when he got back. "And I said he'd be too tired to do anything except sleep tonight. I waited until he was in bed and then made sure he'd stay under for a few hours, so at least he'll get a decent rest tonight. But that's the last time I'm getting involved, understand?"

"Of course. Thanks, Harlan."

Next morning I intercepted Marc on his way to his Konjässi's room and got the names of his chief tormentors from him. As I had expected, the dorm leader was the tribesman, Rusta, and Marc told me that his henchmen were two boys from the Republic and one from Maasaarvi, the large island off the north-east coast of the country – and that was very useful, because three of them spoke Harlan's language, and I was a lot better at that than at Arvelan.

I let Marc keep going and headed instead for the garage, and here I told the senior mechanic that my master wanted to borrow Stefan for an hour or so. I was hoping they wouldn't actually check – after all, this probably didn't qualify as keeping Harlan uninvolved – but they seemed to accept me message at face value, because five minutes later Stefan and I were making our way back into the main building. On the way I explained what I was doing and why, and he said that he'd be only too happy to help, even if we got into trouble for it.

Next I had to find Rusta, but by asking some of the other slaves I met I eventually discovered that he was supposed to be polishing the desks in the ground-floor classrooms. And so he was.

"You're Rusta, aren't you?" I said. "My master wants you. Come with us."

"Who is your master?"

"Harlan ved Istian. You know who he is, don't you?"

He swallowed. "He's the Chancellor's son."

That was news to me – all Harlan had told me was that his father was 'rather important'. From what I had learned since arriving here, the Chancellor was the right-hand man to the head of state, which made 'rather important' a bit of an understatement.

"Right," I said. "So you'd better come, hadn't you?"

I turned and walked away, and clearly Harlan's reputation was known, because Rusta came after us without hesitating.

"Why does he want me?" he asked.

"He needs someone who speaks his language fluently, so that narrows it down to slaves from the Republic," I told him. "And there are other considerations, too, which I'll tell you about when we get to his room. Come along."

We went to Harlan's room and I closed the door behind us.

"You're still a junior," I commented, looking at Rusta's shorts. "How old are you?"

"I'm thirteen."

"And how many months?"

"Nine. Why?"

I looked at Stefan. "He's over thirteen and a half. Looks like he'll be perfect."

Stefan nodded, even though he didn't know what Rusta would be 'perfect' for – I hadn't had time to give Stefan the details of the plan.

"We'd better make sure," I said. "If I present Harlan with an unsuitable candidate he'll have me whipped. Rusta, get undressed."

Rusta had been a slave in this place long enough to do what he was told when he was told: even though I was only a slave myself, bringing him to Harlan's room made it seem as if the orders were coming from my master rather than from me. And so he stripped.

Once he was naked I examined his genitals closely. They were a nice size but, as I had hoped, still completely hairless.

"He is perfect," I confirmed. "See, we have a custom in my country: boys who reach the age of thirteen and a half and have not reached puberty are considered not to be proper boys at all. What happens is that they lose the right to wear boys' clothes, and they have to play the female part in sex for normal boys. And I was telling Harlan about this, and he said he thought it would be a really good basis for an experiment – he thinks that he can probably alter the boy's personality completely and make him enjoy being used that way.

"So what's going to happen is this: you're going to be kept here, and six or seven senior slaves are going to have sex with you two or three times every day. Harlan's going to start by watching the effect this has on you, and later he'll start fiddling about in your head to alter the way you feel about it, to see if he can change you permanently. You won't be allowed any clothes while you're in this room, and when you go out you'll be dressed as a girl, complete with make-up. Okay?"

Rusta's face was a picture. As I had hoped, masculinity was extremely important to him.

"But… you can't do that!" he protested.

"Of course he can. You're a slave."

"Yes, but… look, you just can't! I don't want to be used like a woman – it wouldn't be right!"

"Why not? You're old enough and you haven't got any hair, so this is exactly what would happen in my world. The only difference here is that Harlan will probably be able to change you so that you enjoy being fucked all the time."

"But I don't want to enjoy it – I don't want it to happen at all!"

"It doesn't matter what you want. It's the custom."

"Not where I come from! Maybe it's all right where you come from, but we don't do that!"

"So what? We're not in your country now, are we?"

"No, and we're not in yours, either! Come on, please choose someone else!"

"Sorry. You're the right age, you're still a junior and you speak the language. It'll have to be you."

I could see the emotions sweeping over him – you didn't have to be a Konjässi to do that, because it was obvious how he was feeling: he went through several, but he ended up, as I had wanted him to, feeling helpless and hopeless.

"Well?" I said. "How do you feel?"

He was trying not to cry, and he obviously didn't trust his voice because he just shrugged.

"Do you think this is unfair?" I asked.

He shrugged again.

"Get dressed," I told him, and he fumbled his clothes back on, still without speaking.

"I think I can persuade Harlan not to go ahead with this experiment," I said. "I mean, it would be cruel to make you suffer because of someone else's customs, wouldn't it?"

"Yes, it would," he agreed – and then apparently all the pieces dropped into place in his head.

"Oh, now I get it," he said, staring at me.

"Harlan said you were intelligent," I replied. "So, what are you going to do about it?"

"This is all made up, isn't it? There's no experiment at all, is there?"

"Not at the moment. I'm pretty sure I could interest Harlan in doing one, though – I'm with him all the time, and he listens to me. So?"

"You total bastard! I really believed it, you know. How do you know I won't get you back by whipping your friend till he bleeds?"

"I don't. I could tell you that if Marc does get hurt Stefan and I will beat the crap out of you, but… look, Rusta, there's no need for this: you've admitted yourself that you shouldn't apply a set of cultural rules to someone from a different culture. Where Marc comes from having the skin removed doesn't mean what it does among your people. Talk to him and he'll tell you why it was done. Harlan says that the tribesmen are honourable, but what you've been doing to Marc and Radu isn't honourable at all. I'm just asking you to treat them fairly, that's all."

"I don't think the others will agree. Okay, I can get them to ease up a bit, and we can share the cleaning work out, but it's been brilliant having someone there to have sex with, and I'm not sure I'll be able to persuade all of them to stop."

"You'd better, because you're the dormitory leader. And maybe if you ask him he won't mind doing stuff from time to time, as long as nobody's forcing him. Rusta, I don't want to get Harlan involved in this, but I will if I have to. I'd sooner you sorted it out yourself, but one way or another I'm going to stop what's been happening to my friends. We're all slaves, and life is hard enough without us making it worse for each other, don't you think? Anyway, I'll leave it to you to sort it out."

He got up and left, and I explained to Stefan what had happened – Stefan, of course, couldn't understand Harlan's language at all.

"Do you think he'll actually do anything?" he asked.

"He'd better. If he doesn't I'm quite prepared to go round there with you and Nicky and any other seniors you think might help and get physical with him."

"You? Get physical?"

"I'm serious, Stefi. I know I'm no good at fighting, but I'm not leaving Marc in that mess without doing everything I can to get him out, and if I have to try to hit a few people, I will."

"Don't worry. I think I could get one or two of the other kids in my dorm to help if I need to. I get on pretty well with most of them."

"Good. I hope we don't have to do that, because I sort of promised Harlan I wouldn't start a war, but… well, let's wait and see what happens. But there's another problem: we really need to get out of here, because now we've all spilled the beans about the portals…"

"Have we? I didn't think I said anything."

"Trust me, you did. I had to translate for Marc and Nicky, and I reckon the instructors now know everything we do about them. And that's why I want to get back to the one we came through before Aarnist and his boys find it – if we can get to the monastery first the monks will be able to build a mound to stop it appearing again, like they did with the one to the Grey world. If Aarnist gets there first, the monastery will be in trouble and we might not be able to get out of this world at all."

"Okay, but how are we going to get out of here? I can't see why they'd let us leave."

"Me neither. But I am starting to think of a plan that might work. The problem is going to be making sure nobody gets left behind, because I think I could get out of here on my own easily enough."

"Then you should go. It's better if someone gets away than nobody."

"No, it isn't. That's Grey thinking, Stefi: I'm not leaving without my friends. Somehow or other I'll find a way."

As we were alone in a room that had a bed in it we decided to take a risk and have a cuddle for ten minutes or so – after all, Harlan hardly ever came back to his room in mid-morning. And as usual, just being with Stefan made me feel much better, so that by the time he reluctantly went back to the garage I felt a lot more confident about everything.

"Ah," said Harlan when he returned at the end of morning school, "I see it went well, whatever it was: you're much more relaxed than you were this morning. So tell me about it, and don't leave anything out."

I gave him a full and complete account of what had happened with Rusta, and at the end of it he shook his head.

"You're too bright for your own good sometimes," he said. "And I'd told you not to involve me, too. And what did you do? You brought him to my room, threatened him with an experiment I was going to carry out, and suggested that you might get me to intervene personally if he didn't do what you wanted. I really can't let you go on taking advantage of me like that. This time I'm going to punish you. I've been using other slaves to practise my control on recently, but this time it's going to be you. You're going to get beaten. Get undressed and touch your toes."

I did that, and he found a thick leather belt in his cupboard and swished it a couple of times. And then the clamp of complete control came down on me again and I found that I couldn't so much as twitch. And while I was stuck like that he beat me hard ten times. He'd left my voice free, so I was able to yell, but that was all I could do.

As soon as he had finished he released me and put the belt away.

"Get dressed," he said. "Normally a slave who has been beaten is kept naked for an hour or so to let everyone see what has happened to him, but this is just between us, and I'm not having anyone else making fun of you… Wow, Jake – you're really not angry with me?"

"No. You told me what I could and couldn't do and I disobeyed you. And I'll do it again if I have to. I like you, you know that, but I have to do whatever it takes to help my friends if I can, even if it means I get punished."

"See, that's why I like you: you stand up for what you believe in. Come on, put your clothes on and let's go and get something to eat."

We spent the afternoon on a variety of tests, including a long session where I wore the metal band on my head and he tried vainly to get past it. And again I could feel the faintest of touch from his mind, and that was another reason why I wanted to get away from here fairly soon, because if he did learn to overcome the restrictions of the metal band my job would be a whole lot harder.

So that evening, once we were in bed, I laid the bait. So far I'd told him all about our first round of adventures and about the accident that had precipitated us into the Grey world at war, but now I told him the next bit, about how three Grey boys had travelled with us to escape the war in their own country.

"They're basically a different sort of human," I explained. "They're intelligent, like us, but they're descended from reptiles instead of mammals, so physically they're a bit different. Do you reckon you could control one of them like you can me?"

"I don't know," he said, "but I'd really like to try. And in theory I ought to be able to: if there's intelligence, there's a way to control it. It's a pity none of them came here with you."

"It's funny you should say that, because they did, all three of them. We thought it wouldn't be safe for them to come into town with us, and obviously that was right – look what happened to us. So they stayed near the portal."

"And do you think they're still there?"

"Probably not – after all, there's not a lot for them to do. I should think they'll have gone back through the portal as soon as it reappeared. But they won't have been able to go back to their own world because of the radiation, so they'll either be waiting for us at the monastery or, if they've got any sense, they'll have gone back to Vogesia. In either case they'll be easy to find."

"What's Vogesia?"

So I described the beach and the hot weather and the warm sea, because I thought that if the Greys weren't enough to captivate him on their own the concept of a holiday in Paradise might help.

"Ah. That sounds interesting. Perhaps I should visit that country sometime in the summer."

"The only problem is that the portal is really erratic," I said. "The monks don't know when it will appear next, so you might end up camping at the portal-site for days on end. It would be better to take a proper expedition, so you can send people to buy food and supplies and stuff while you're waiting."

Well, I'd dangled the hook; now all I could do was to hope he bit. I thought he would: I knew him well enough by now that I was sure he couldn't resist the challenge of the Greys. The hard bit was going to be making sure we all got to come along.

"Let me guess," he said. "You think the expedition should include you and all your friends, am I right?"

"Well, obviously not just us," I said. "You'll need some of your own colleagues along, not just to keep us in order, but in case you have problems with the Greys. If we're there you'll be safe enough – Tommi and I both speak their language, and they know all the others. And if anything happened to me, the others know where the portal is and how to use it, and they also know the monks, and the authorities in Vogesia. If you're with us you won't have any difficulties."

"Jake, you forget I can read you like a book. You just want to use the portal to escape from this world. Okay, it's true about the Greys, and so is everything else you've said, but really there's no need to take everyone with us. I think it would be much safer if we left some of them here – Stefan, for a start. And Marc and Radu – you wouldn't want to leave them at the mercy of Rusta and his friends, would you?"

"What's the matter, Harlan – scared you can't control us? Afraid that you and your colleagues can't keep a bunch of slaves under control?"

"You know perfectly well that's not true. I could probably manage all eight of you on my own."

"Now you're boasting. You told me you could only do three at a time."

"I could only forcibly operate three at a time. I could keep more than that quiescent without a problem."

"Prove it, then!"

"Do you want me to punish you again?" he asked. "Doubting my abilities is sort of disrespectful, don't you think?"

"You know I'd never disrespect you," I said, wriggling closer and putting an arm round him. "You should have seen how Rusta jumped to attention when I used your name this morning! Everyone respects you, Harlan, especially me. But I was going to suggest that if we do go on this trip there should be at least four of your colleagues with us, not because I don't think you could deal with us on your own, but so that you don't have to. I was thinking of this as a holiday – we go on a trip, we spend some time on the beach in Vogesia, and you get to work with the Greys while your colleagues make sure us slaves do what we're told. Alain and Oli can cook, Stefan and Nicky can do the heavy work, Tommi and I can help with translating, Radu can trap animals for food and Marc is our medical expert in case anyone gets hurt or feels unwell. We've lived that sort of life before, so all you and your colleagues would have to do would be to relax, enjoy the sea and the beach, and keep us safely under your thumbs. Don't you think that sounds like a good way to spend a couple of weeks?"

"It does. In fact I think a holiday like that would be really nice. And I'll think about it – I really will. But I still think we'll have to leave some of your friends here, just to make sure the rest of you behave themselves."

"You'll have me to guarantee that," I said. "You know I like being your slave, and I won't leave you. Look into my head and you'll see it's true."

And it was, because I'd decided that if the only way to make sure all my friends managed to get back through the portal was to stay behind myself, then I was ready to do that. Obviously in one way I'd like it if Stefan stayed behind as well, but I'd sooner know that he was safe. And if swearing to stay with Harlan and keeping my word would guarantee the freedom of everyone else I would do so happily.

"You mean it," said Harlan, wriggling closer and hugging me. "You really do like me that much. And I haven't done anything in your head to make you like me, either, so it's a real emotion. Thanks, Jake. I don't have a lot of friends, you know – people are nervous around me, both because of what I can do and because of who my father is. There are a couple of boys I get on quite well with, but every slave I've had before you has been scared of me and has just wanted to get away from me. You're different: you know what I can do, and you've had me control you, which I know can be really frightening. And today I beat you – and yet you still genuinely like me. I wish you were one of us – not quite as good as me, of course, but good enough for us to be able to have fun together. That would be so cool…"

"I'm sorry I'm not," I said. "I suppose you can't really be friends with a normal kid because we're so far below you – it would be like me being friends with a dog or something. But at least I can be a faithful dog."

"You're not that far below me. There's loads of stuff we can do together, the same as I could with other Konjässiem. And I can connect to your mind enough for us to be able to share thoughts – okay, I have to work harder than I would if you could do it too, but I can do it. Yes, you're my slave, but you're my friend too, sort of. That's why I don't want to lose you. And for you to commit to me like this even after I hurt you… I really appreciate it, Jake."

I realised for the first time how lonely it must be for him: here he was, with almost god-like powers, and the result was that everyone was too scared of him to get close. At that moment I felt really sorry for him and felt more determined than ever to do everything I could not to let him down. Quite how I was going to achieve that at the same time as getting my friends out of this world I wasn't sure, but at that point I felt ready to stay with Harlan if that was the only way to do it.

I knew not to push the expedition any further at that point. The seed had been sown, and now I just had to let Harlan think about it, and if I mentioned the Greys now and again, that would only help. The tricky bit was going to be persuading him not to leave any of my friends behind as hostages, because in his place I'd have done exactly that. I hoped I could talk him out of that; if I couldn't I would have to try to decide who would be an acceptable loss in return for saving everyone else, and I didn't think I would be able to do that – as far as I was concerned, nobody was an acceptable loss.

Harlan settled down to sleep and I kept my arm round him, trying to project feelings of warmth and friendship to him. Obviously I couldn't actually do that, but if he was still awake and could see what I was thinking he'd get the message.

Once I was sure he was asleep I relaxed a little. I wasn't sure that Harlan would be allowed to take himself and a party of colleagues and slaves out of school during term-time, even if his father was Chancellor of the Sanöljan Republic, but the longer we delayed, the more likely it was that Aarnist's men would be out in force looking for the portal, and that would make it much harder for us to get through unopposed.

I was less worried about coping with Harlan and his colleagues. For a start I was sure he wouldn't be able to get inside the Greys' heads: the Kerpians' language system didn't work on them because their brains were laid out differently, and I was confident that this would prove sufficient to defeat the Konjässiem. And Oli was also immune, so we already had four who could fight back. And if I could find a few more metal bands and keep them secret – which would obviously be difficult…

I decided that there would be time to worry about that later. I settled down and fell asleep.

So now at least Jake has a plan to get everyone back to the portal-site, though there's an awful lot that could still go wrong, as will become clear in due course.

Chapter Thirteen

Two days later I again waylaid Marc on his way to his Konjässi's room, and was delighted to see that this time he was fully dressed. And as soon as he saw me he flung himself into my arms and kissed me.

"I don't know how you did it," he said, "but whatever it was, it worked. Rusta got me on his own a couple of days ago and asked why I'd had the skin cut off, and when I told him he just said 'I see' and walked away. And then yesterday he told everyone they should stop using me as their slave because I didn't deserve that, and that I wasn't the failure he'd said I was before. Some of them weren't very happy, and a couple argued quite a lot, but Rusta is dorm leader and in the end everyone had to go along with it.

"Then last night Marlo got me on my own and tried to make me suck his thing, only Rusta came in and caught him. And Marlo got stripped and strapped the way they used to do it to me. So now everyone in the dorm knows that Rusta was serious about them leaving me alone. I think I'll be okay from now on."

"Great!" I said. "But if you do have any more problems, come and find me."

Marc went on his way, and I went and found Rusta and said 'Thanks' to him.

"No problem. Now I've talked to him a bit I think he's a nice kid, actually. I'll make sure he's okay from now on."

"What about Radu?"

"I've told his dorm leader to leave him alone, too. I'll go and make sure it's happening in a day or so."

So at least that problem had apparently been resolved, I thought.

Over the next two or three weeks I met some of Harlan's colleagues. This wasn't a lot of fun because each of them wanted to try forcing me to do something, and I already knew how unpleasant it could be when someone else took control of my body. The first one was brutally efficient, but at least didn't make me do anything worse than stand up, walk around the room and then sit down again. The second one took a few seconds to get a grip, and I thought I was going to be able to resist. But then he clamped down and took over, and he made me jump up and down and then bend over, at which he kicked my bum hard enough to knock me onto the floor.

The third was a little weedy kid that I thought I'd be able to resist easily, which just goes to show that you should never judge by appearances. I was even stupid enough to make a rude remark when he came in (what I actually said was "What's this little weed doing here?"). The shrimp then demonstrated what he was doing here my making me strip naked and run up and down the corridor outside Harlan's room until I was too tired to keep going, at which he allowed me to return to the room, though not to get dressed.

"I apologise," I said, once I was able to speak again. "You're good."

"He is, isn't he?" said Harlan, grinning at me. "This is my cousin Terraxian ved Merlian of the Clan of the Founder, but you can call him Terry."

"Bloody hell, if I'd known he was related to you I'd have kept my mouth shut!" I commented.

"You're mouthy, for a slave," commented Terry.

"He is, isn't he?" agreed Harlan, grinning some more. "What do you reckon we should do to him, Terry?"

"Well, we could seal his lips for a day or two."

"Wow, could you do that without glue or something?" I asked. "You could just force me to keep my mouth shut for two days? Wouldn't your instructions wear off if you didn't keep repeating them?"

"Not if we do it properly," said Harlan. "Of course, you'd get pretty hungry if you couldn't open your mouth for two days, so perhaps it would be better to freeze your vocals cords instead. Or we could just beat you in relays for a few hours, but that would get tiring."

"I think beating him would be fun," said Terry. "And he definitely wouldn't be rude to me again if I whipped him a couple of hundred times."

I was feeling pretty nervous by now, but then Harlan told me to sit down on the bed and sat down beside me, putting his arm round my shoulders.

"It's my fault if he's a bit too talkative," he said. "I like talking to him – he's not really like any other slave. So we shouldn't be too cruel to him."

"We shouldn't spoil him, either," said Terry. "Still, if he's generally a good slave I suppose we could let him off…"

"Thanks, Terry," I said. "I swear I'll never be rude to you again."

"If you are you'll be sorry, because I'm going to go away now and think of hundreds of super-brilliant tortures to try on you, and when I do I'll use them all, one after the other. And I won't even let you scream – you'll just have to lie there and suffer!" And he put his tongue out at me.

"Don't worry, Jake," said Harlan. "I won't let him go overboard with you. And if he does I'll hold him down and you can spank him."

"That'd be fun!" I said.

"Try it and see what happens!"

"Jake, would you like to go and get that piece of equipment out of my cupboard?" said Harlan. "Then you can spank my stroppy little cousin if you want."

"Come near me and I'll make you pull your own balls off!" threatened Terry.

I went to the cupboard and put the metal band on my head, and Terry promptly started to panic.

"That's not fair!" he yelled. "Come on, Harlan, you can't let him do that!"

"Try to stop him," advised Harlan, and Terry's face screwed up as he tried to force his will past the metal. Once more I felt something, but it wasn't doing any good. I advanced on him, trying to look threatening.

"Why don't you both try stopping me at once?" I suggested. "If you can combine your efforts it might be enough to get through."

They looked at each other and then I felt more futile tickling. I kept advancing until I was able to grab Terry, who shrank away from me looking nervous… but then I let go of him.

"Why don't you try… you know, like you did with me that time?" I said to Harlan. "If one of you tries to stop me and the other acts as a fuel tank, maybe you'll have enough power."

"What's he talking about?" asked Terry.

"I'll tell you later, but I think he's right. Just relax completely – I'm going to try borrowing some of your mental energy."

Terry looked as if he wanted to argue, but instead he closed his mouth again. Harlan took his hand and stared at me. And this time I could definitely feel something – it was like insects buzzing round my head and occasionally flying into the front of the metal band. It wasn't going to stop me, but I was aware that they were trying.

I decided it had been worth giving them the idea – even if they had been able to stop me it would have been worth it, just to see what their limits were. As it was I now knew that even working in pairs they wouldn't be able to stop one of us if we were equipped with metal bands. They kept it up for quite a long time, but it didn't make any difference.

"That seems to be better," I said. "I'm definitely aware of you trying, even though it's still not getting through. I think if you practise like that and get used to working together you might develop enough power in the end."

"See?" said Harlan to his cousin. "Now you know why I treat Jake better than the average slave – he's clever, and he comes up with helpful ideas. Shall we let him get dressed now?"

"I don't think so," said Terry. "I like keeping slaves naked – that way they don't forget their place and start getting lippy. Besides, Jake's got a funny-looking cock."

"I bet it's bigger than yours, though," I said.

"Well, obviously it is – I'm only eleven. And you're being mouthy again – take that band off and I'll show you what happens to mouthy slaves."

"No, thanks. I'm happy to wait until you've dreamed up all those super-brilliant tortures you were talking about – that should take about ten years, I should think."

"I can think of plenty right now."

"Too bad, I'm not taking it off."

"You wait – I'll catch you outside this room sometime when you're not wearing it, and then you'll be sorry."

He was grinning while he said it, and I was confident that he didn't really mean it, and in any case I thought Harlan wouldn't want me damaged. But I still thought it might be sensible to stop teasing him.

"Do you think you could combine with more than one other person?" I asked Harlan. "If three or four of you could sort of link together it would probably make you stronger than all of you acting individually. Maybe if we're really going to do that expedition you could start practising with the ones who will be coming with us, and then we can go on practising all through the holiday. By the time we get back, maybe metal won't be a problem any more."

"What's he talking about?" asked Terry.

"We might be going on a trip in the summer. I was going to ask you to come anyway, since you're family, but I haven't asked my father for permission yet, so we might not be able to do it. Still, since the subject has come up I might as well go and sound out a couple of my colleagues. You two stay here – Jake, tell Terry about the portals and about the Greys."

So I sat on the bed beside Terry – without asking permission – and told him the basics, about how we had been travelling with three reptilian boys, and about what portals were and how they worked.

"And Harlan wants to see if he can control the Greys," I finished. "That's why we're thinking about going to Europe. And since the Greys will probably be in this hot, sunny country we visited, Harlan thought we might as well have a holiday on the beach at the same time. He's taking me and my friends to do all the work, and you and a couple of others to help keep us under control."

"Then I want to take control of you personally – I'll spank you every day unless you behave!"

"I'd like to see you try!"

He grinned and grabbed me, pulling me onto the floor and trying to pin me down. I was handicapped by still being naked, but I was bigger than him and soon ended up on top. And then he did something that Harlan didn't do when we were wrestling: he got an arm free and knocked the band off my head.

"Hey, that's cheating!" I cried, freezing.

"So? You're bigger than me, so it wouldn't be fair otherwise. Now, stand up!"

I couldn't feel anything, so I stayed where I was.

"I'll do it by force if you make me," he warned me. "I'm just being nice to you at the moment. Now stand up."

"You know what?" I said to him. "I think you're too tired. Harlan was really trying hard just now, and I know from when he did that with me how exhausting it is. Okay, you can probably withstand it longer than me, but I still reckon you're too tired to force me. Go on, prove me wrong!"

He glared at me. "You just wait five minutes!" he said.

"Thought so. Come on, I'm not going to fight you while you're too tired. I'm not a bully."

I got up and helped him to his feet, and then we sat on the bed once more.

"You're strange," he said to me. "Pretty much any of the other slaves I've used would have beaten me up if they caught me like this."

"I'm not any of the other slaves. I don't mind wrestling with you, but not until you've recovered. But please may I get dressed while we're waiting?"

"No," he said, grinning at me. "I like you being naked. And why is your cock like that, anyway?"

"Because I'm Jewish. My foreskin was removed when I was a week old – all Jewish boys have it done. It's called circumcision."

"I thought that was just some old religion from ages back, and that it was only people from West Asia somewhere who followed it?"

"In my world there are Jews all over the world. I come from the country Harlan calls U-Pretannia, and where I used to live in the capital city there are thousands of us."

"You're really from a different world? I thought you were making up all that stuff about portals just to see how gullible I am."

"No, it's real, and I'm surprised Harlan hasn't told you. We really don't come from this world at all, which is probably why I don't know how slaves are supposed to behave."

"I could teach you!" he offered, smiling broadly.

"Yes, I'm sure you could. Do you torture all your slaves?"

"Not really. But most of them are so wet they deserve to get hurt."

"And yet you're complaining about me being too mouthy. How do you want your slaves to behave?"

"Well, they should be obedient, but they shouldn't act terrified all the time."

"But can't you understand how it is for an ordinary boy like me to be faced with a Konjässi like you? In about five minutes' time, unless I put the band back on, you'd be able to make me do anything you want, even though you're at least two years younger than me and even more weedy than I am. That really is scary, Terry. Imagine how you would feel if you were exhausted and I was wearing a band on my head and had the power to force you to do anything I want. Wouldn't you be scared?"

He shrugged. "It's hard to imagine, because I'm a Konjässi, and we're different. Why haven't you got dressed yet?"

"Because you said I couldn't."

"Yes, but I couldn't stop you, could I?"

"I know, but I'm still a slave, and slaves are supposed to obey their masters. Besides, if I did get dressed you'd only force me to strip again as soon as you got your breath back."

"No, I won't. Go on, you can get dressed."

So I did that, and once I was dressed I picked up the band from the floor and put it back in Harlan's cupboard.

"You could have put it back on, and then you'd have been safe," he commented as I returned to the bed and sat down.

"Slaves aren't supposed to be safe. And if you ordered me to take it off I'd have to, or you'd really punish me later."

"You really are strange – most slaves would… all right, I know, you're not like most slaves. So, tell me the truth: do you like my cousin?"

"Yes, I do. He scares me sometimes, but I suppose that's just because I know what he can do. I think he's nice, and I'm trying to be a friend as well as a good slave."

"A friend? Someone like you can't be friends with someone like us!"

"Why not?"

"Well, because… we're so different: we can do so much and you can do so little – why would one of us want to be friends with one of you?"

"Well, that's what I thought, too. But Harlan says he thinks we can be sort of friends. Not like you and him are friends, obviously, but still… After all, don't you ever get lonely? You're surrounded by kids so far below you that we're like a different species, and you can't relate to them – and yet you Konjässiem all have to shield your thoughts from each other. You must sometimes want to have someone to talk to, even if it's only a slave you can trust."

"Well… yes, I suppose that is true sometimes. I mean, I can't even trust Harlan really, because we're from different branches of the same family and there are political differences – if my father was Chancellor he'd do things differently from the way Harlan's father does them. But it isn't safe to confide in a slave – any of us could retrieve the information easily from inside a slave's head."

"I suppose so. But you wouldn't have to tell your slave anything important, just tell him how you're feeling and why, and if you're unhappy he can sort of hold you and make you feel better."

"What do you mean?"

"I'll show you."

I got him to lie on the bed and then I lay down beside him, put my arms around him and tried to project feelings of warmth and support, though apparently I didn't get it quite right.

"You pity me?" he said, sitting up and staring at me.

"Well, not exactly. But I do feel kind of sorry for you – it's difficult being so powerful, because it makes it so hard for you to have real friends."

"But wouldn't you like to be able to do the things we can do?"

"Not if it cost me my friends."

"You really are unbelievably strange! But… I'm starting to see why Harlan likes you. Maybe I won't bother thinking up hundreds of tortures for you after all."

"Thanks!"

Harlan came back with two of his colleagues, one of whom I'd already met earlier that morning, and they spent the rest of the time until lunch trying to co-operate and to join their power together to defeat my metal band. They didn't succeed, but they did produce a sort of humming in my head that was faintly uncomfortable.

"If you work on it, I think you're going to get there," I said as we went to lunch. "You've got plenty of power between you; you just need to find a way to use all of it at once and focus it."

Of course I would be happier if they didn't manage to break through, but knowing that it would take all four of them to get past one metal band was nonetheless encouraging: there were, after all, eight of us as well as the three Greys (and if we caught up with them in Vogesia we could probably expect help from Eddie and his friends as well), so unless Harlan was going to bring around forty colleagues with him they'd never be able to handle all of us, provided I could find enough metal bands to go around. And I thought it highly unlikely that Harlan could mount an expedition that large.

***

During this period Harlan continued to allow me and Stefan to spend time together, and as before he permitted us some time on our own in exchange for being allowed to sit in on some of our activities, during which he would connect to one or other of us mentally in order to experience what we were feeling. Stefan still wasn't very keen about it, but I thought it a reasonable price to pay for being able to spend time together. And on one occasion when Harlan wasn't with us I brought up the subject of metal.

"I don't know what sort of supervision you have at work," I said, "but there must be metal around in a garage. We need as much as you can find, preferably stuff that's thin enough to be cut and bent into shape. If we're going to get everyone along on this expedition I'd like as many of us as possible to be protected by metal when the time comes. We'll get Oli to carry it somehow: they can't penetrate his mind anyway, so he won't give away that he's carrying it. You and I will have to do our absolute best not to think about it, and it would be best not to tell anyone else about it until we get back to the portal."

"Do you really think they'll let us all come?" he asked. "If it was me I'd make sure at least half of us were kept here, starting with me. That way they'll think the rest of you will behave. But if that does happen you have to get away with as many as come with you. If you miss the chance, probably none of us will ever get away. Better three or four make it than nobody."

"I'm not going without you," I said, flatly. "How do you think I'd be able to live with myself if I got back to Elsass but knew that you were going to be a slave for the rest of your life?"

"But…"

"No, Stefi," I interrupted. "I'm not going without you, and that's the end of it. If I get a chance to send Alain and Oli back, or Radu and Marc, or Tommi and Nicky, or even all six of them, I will, but if you're kept here I'm coming back for you, and that's all there is to it."

Of course I was just digging myself further into a hole here, because I'd already decided I couldn't betray Harlan, and that meant I'd be asking Stefan to go and leave me behind, something I thought he'd be no more inclined to do than I would be to leave him behind. But I decided I'd worry about that when the time came.

"And now let's just make the most of being on our own," I went on. "I don't know how long Harlan's going to give us, so we'd better get on with it. Let's get these stupid clothes out of the way, for a start."

So we got undressed and climbed into Harlan's bed, and there we held each other, kissing now and again and rubbing our bodies against each other – and I was just about to wriggle down into the bed and say hello to Stefan's special part when the door opened and Harlan came in – and today he was not alone.

"Ah, it's the lippiest slave in the school," commented Terry.

"Hello, shrimp," I replied. "You're not staying, are you?"

"Yes, I am. Now introduce me to your friend."

"Stefi, this is Harlan's cousin Terry," I said. "Terry, this is Stefan. Right, you've been introduced – you can go now."

"You're being cheeky again," he told me. "Can I whip him, Harlan?"

"Not right now. You and I are just going to shut up and let them get on with it Jake, is it okay if we ride along with you while you get each other excited?"

"What do you mean, 'Is it okay'?" asked Terry in astonishment. "They're slaves – you don't ask permission to do something from slaves! You order them to do it, and that's it!"

"Not in this case. You already know Jake's different – and, besides, you can't force two boys to do sex stuff if you want to find out how it feels for them, because if you force them they won't enjoy it and you won't get the benefit. When Jake and Stefan are together something special happens, and we'll only get to share it if they let us. So, may we, Jake? Please?"

In reality I couldn't say no – Harlan might not punish me directly, but it would put a chill on our relationship for a bit, and I needed him to be sympathetic if I was going to persuade him to take all of us on his expedition. Besides, I was fairly sure Terry was right: slaves didn't normally get treated as gently as Harlan treated me.

"Of course you can," I said, ignoring Stefan's stifled groan. "But try to keep quiet and be gentle in my head – it'll work best if we aren't constantly aware that you're with us."

"We'll sit back from the bed and keep quiet," promised Harlan, and he got up and moved the chairs halfway across the room.

"Do we have to put up with this?" asked Stefan.

"Probably. But if we give them a good show and they get a kick out of it, it's far more likely that they'll let us both come on the expedition."

"Well, I suppose so. But it feels perverted to me."

"It's worth it if it helps us get away from here together, though – isn't it?"

"Of course." And he smiled at me and kissed me, and we tried to forget the audience, and gradually we relaxed. And it helped that we were actually under the covers and so not visible, even though mentally we were wide open.

For the next half hour we cuddled and handled each other, and finally we took it in turns to suck each other, and there were audible gasps and moans from across the room as we climaxed. And afterwards they came back and sat on the edge of the bed, and they were both breathing heavily.

"That was pretty amazing," admitted Terry. "It was almost like actually having it done myself, only better in a way because the emotions were so positive. When I make slaves do it to me it's usually pretty obvious that they don't like doing it, so I have to block out what they're thinking and just concentrate on the physical feelings. But that – that was what sex should feel like, I think."

For a moment that seemed like a rather ridiculous thing for an eleven-year-old to say, but I supposed that these boys learned about sex a lot faster than ordinary kids like me.

"I'm glad you enjoyed it," I said. "We certainly did."

"I could tell. I'd like to be able to sit in on that again, Harlan, if it's okay?"

"I should think so."

"Great!"

***

At the end of that week Harlan told me he was going back to Sanöve for the weekend to see his father and to ask permission to mount our expedition.

"Do you think he'll say yes?" I asked.

"Probably. It would be a useful learning experience, even if we don't find your reptiles. Controlling slaves over a long period outside the confines of the school is something we all have to practise, and a trip to the German border would be a perfect challenge. I should think my father will certainly be willing. Anyway, I'll be gone for a couple of days – it's quite a long journey – so while I'm gone I want you to stay with Terry. It'll do you good to see how another of us operates. And you'd better behave – you know Terry thinks I spoil you, and I'm pretty sure he won't do the same. And don't underestimate him because he's younger than me – he's probably at least as good as I was a year ago."

"Okay. Do I sleep in his room, or should I go back to the dormitory – assuming I even still have a bed there, that it?"

"That'll be up to him. All you have to do is to behave yourself and do what Terry tells you to and you'll be fine. I should be back by Monday, but if I'm not you're to stay with Terry until I do get back, okay?"

Harlan took me to Terry's room after lunch on the Friday and left me with him, and then he headed off towards the station. I did ask why he didn't fly, and he told me that there was very little civilian flying in this world except for very long distance journeys, and those were prohibitively expensive.

"So," said Terry, once Harlan had left, "I've got the mouthiest slave in the school to play with for a couple of days. You'd better behave while you're with me, Jake, because I won't put up with your stroppy behaviour the way my cousin does. Now, I'm going to get on with some work with another slave. You can watch, but keep quiet and don't interfere. Go and stand over there out of the way."

I did as he told me, standing at the foot of the bed, while he continued to do something on his computer. Five minutes later there was a knock at the door and a young slave came in. He had the mousy brown hair of the Republic, and I supposed that Terry found it easier to work with slaves who had the same native language as he did.

The rest of that afternoon was a complete eye-opener. So far I had only seen glimpses of the way other Konjässiem worked with the slaves, but I was about to see something far more typical than what I had experienced myself.

"I'm going to try to take control of your body," Terry told the slave. "I want you to try to fight me off – resist as hard as you can. If you succeed in keeping me out I'll get you exempt from duties for a week. Ready? Go!"

Within thirty seconds it was clear that Terry was controlling the boy, who was made to slap himself hard in the face and then walk briskly into the wall. For maybe ten minutes Terry made the boy hurt himself, pulling his own hair and punching himself in the balls, which had him writhing on the floor straight afterwards. I stared appalled at what was happening, but at least I had the sense not to intervene – though if it had been one of my friends instead of an unknown boy being used as a puppet I don't think I could have restrained myself.

At the end of ten minutes or so Terry ordered the boy to lie on the bed and then told him, presumably with mental back-up to the spoken order, to forget what had happened during the previous few minutes. The slave got up, looking dazed but generally okay, and Terry dismissed him.

"Did you have to make him hurt himself like that?" I asked, once he had gone.

"Obviously. Look, Jake, we're trying to practise control here, and the only way to find out if you have full control is to make the subject do something he otherwise wouldn't. Punching yourself in the nuts is something nobody would do if they had a choice, so it's a good test. And now he won't remember doing it, and once the ache wears off he'll be fine. Not all of us bother with the memory wipe, but we're supposed to if the slave is likely to get traumatised – slaves cost money, after all, so we don't want them going off their head and killing themselves.

"And if you think that was harsh… come with me."

I followed him along the corridor to the room of one of the other Konjässiem I'd met previously when they had tried to combine with Harlan to defeat the metal band. We arrived to find him alone.

"Hello, Terry," he said. "I'm just waiting for my second subject. What can I do for you?"

"I want Jake here to see you in action," Terry told him. "He doesn't seem to realise what we're about."

"Really? Okay, then – just keep him out of my way."

This time the slave was slightly older, and when the Konjässi started by ordering him to strip I thought this experiment was going to be sexual in nature.

"No, it isn't," said Terry, quietly, accurately seeing what I was thinking. "Dervoran just doesn't want to get blood on the boy's clothes – it has a negative effect on the other slaves he might meet later. Now shut up and watch."

At first there didn't seem to be anything to watch, but then the slave started to tremble, and then he got a nosebleed, and then he fell on the floor and started to thrash about. I stared in horror, but the moment I opened my mouth to protest Terry clamped me and I couldn't speak.

The slave jerked about in convulsions for a few more seconds, fouling himself and losing control of his bladder in the process, and then Dervoran released him and he lay still.

"Go and get some cleaning materials and clean the floor," he ordered me. "Terry, give me a hand getting him into the shower."

I ran off to the cleaning cupboard while the two Konjässiem dragged the slave in the direction of the shower-room. By the time I got the mess on the floor cleaned up they had revived him, and he managed to walk back through the door into the bedroom, though he was leaning on Dervoran and didn't look completely aware of where he was. They helped him to get dressed again and then parked him on the bed for five minutes to recover, and after that he was able to walk again unsupported. Dervoran dismissed him and turned to me.

"You didn't like seeing that, did you?" he said.

I shook my head.

"Well, you'll have to get used to it. He was lucky I hadn't got him signed off by the senior instructor or he'd be leaving here feet first."

"What do you mean, 'signed off'?" I asked.

"I mean that slaves cost money, and so if we want to push an experiment through to the end we have to get the senior instructor's permission in advance. If we kill a slave without permission we get into trouble. But sometimes it's a job to know where to leave off… still, I suppose it helps us to develop better control. And now you're really unhappy… Terry, take him away and explain the facts of life to him – I've got another slave coming in a couple of minutes."

I felt stunned as Terry led me out of the room, but he hadn't finished with me yet: next he led me down into the basement.

"We can't do everything in our rooms," he explained. "The rooms down here are soundproofed, and sometimes we need that if we're not going to disrupt what's going on around us."

I didn't want to ask, but I found out anyway soon enough. When Harlan had first spoken about controlling me I'd had visions of being made to stab myself or hold my hand in a flame or something, and that afternoon in the basement I found that if anything I'd been underestimating the dangers. What I saw actually made me vomit – it was the boy being made to paint acid onto his own chest that did that, though knives and flames were also in evidence. Once I'd cleaned up the mess I'd made Terry hustled me back to his room, and I've never been happier to leave somewhere.

"What the hell is this place?" I asked, once I was able to speak normally again.

"Nobody's told you what we do when we grow up, have they?" he replied.

"I thought you worked as advisers to the great and the good, and as consultants to the police and justice departments to find out when a suspect is lying. But I didn't know you worked as torturers."

"Harlan's different, Jake: he'll succeed his father one day and become Chancellor, unless he fails his manhood tests, in which case his kid brother will get the job. But a lot of the rest of us will end up working in Intelligence. Have you any idea what that means?"

I thought of the TV series Spooks and any number of Hollywood thrillers. "You mean you'll be working as spies?" I asked.

"Sometimes. But some of us will be working as interrogators. Just because we can generally see someone's thoughts doesn't mean there aren't techniques ordinary people use to seal information away inside their heads, buried deep where we can't get at it. You can imagine how necessary it is to be able to do that in a world where people like us exist. What you saw downstairs are some of the techniques we use to break the shielding and get at the hidden information. Pain will do that, but self-inflicted pain is best from a psychological point of view.

"As for what Dervoran was doing, some of us will end up working as trouble-shooters – or assassins, if you prefer – and it's better to have someone die of apparently natural causes, rather than shot full of holes. Dervoran will eventually be able to induce a fatal grand mal seizure in someone – he's almost there now, actually."

I stared at him, unable to reconcile the words with the cute eleven-year-old uttering them.

"You mean, you're training to murder people?" I said, appalled.

"Well, it depends how you define 'murder'. But in general terms, yes."

"But… how can you bring yourself to do that?"

"To be honest I'm not sure I could do that just yet. I'm still a bit young. But the first step is to recognise that ordinary people are a different species to us – it's harder to kill an equal than an inferior. Which is why you're a bit of a nuisance, actually, because it's hard not to like you. I hope they don't ask me to use you as a test subject, because I probably wouldn't enjoy it."

"But you'd do it anyway?"

"Of course. We have to do what we're told, just like you. Oh, dear, now you're almost as unhappy with me as you were with Dervoran. Look, would you like me to wipe the last couple of hours for you? It's probably a bit much to take in at one go. I could let it seep back slowly if you like – perhaps you could cope with it like that."

"No, thanks – I'd sooner hang on to it."

"Suit yourself. If it makes you feel any better, not everyone here is doing stuff like that – a lot of us are still working on less harmful stuff like trying to infiltrate ideas into people's heads unobtrusively, or simply trying to read emotions and states of mind. I'm probably mentally capable of doing that sort of work, but I wouldn't take pleasure in it the way some students do. Actually I think taking pleasure in that sort of thing is a sign of a lack of professionalism."

"You really don't sound eleven years old when you talk, you know."

"You're forgetting that our intelligence is higher than yours – we learn stuff much earlier than you, and I suppose that includes vocabulary. But that doesn't stop me acting eleven when I'm not studying: let's stop working and have some fun. I'll get a couple of slaves in and we'll play some sex games, shall we?"

"I'm not in the mood."

"No, I can see that… look, Jake, I know you're upset, but you have to know how things are. I think Harlan was wrong to try to shelter you – if you were my friend the way you seem to be his I'd prefer you to know the truth."

I nodded. "I appreciate it, Terry, really – I'm glad I know now. But it's hard to deal with, you know? To me this just seems wrong."

"The morality is different, that's all. Humans use lower mammals for their experiments; we use humans. It's just a question of what you're used to, I suppose."

He sat down beside me. "There's no point in worrying about it," he said. "You're protected by Harlan, so you won't end up on the wrong end of any of those experiments. And if anything happens and he has to leave – like if his father died, for example – I'll make sure nothing happens to you, too. So just relax a bit."

And I did relax a bit, though I'm sure that was because he was manipulating me again. The problem was of course that, although I might have been safe, my friends weren't. The idea of Radu being forced to have a fit, or Alain being made to burn himself, was more than I could handle. And then Terry did something else inside my head and I relaxed a bit more and forgot to worry for a while.

"Get undressed," he said. "You might as well relax properly. In fact you can get into bed and rest for a bit while I go to supper. I'll bring you back a sandwich or something."

"I'm not really very hungry," I said, removing my shirt.

"No, but you might be later. And if you're not I'll eat it myself."

I finished undressing and got into his bed, and I suppose he did another of those little mind tricks on me because I went to sleep almost at once.

When I woke up he was lying next to me, wearing nothing but his briefs – I could tell despite us being under the covers because he was pressed up against me.

"Feeling better?" he asked.

I thought about it. I remembered being upset about something earlier on, but the details escaped me.

"Terry, do you really like me, or are you just pretending?" I asked.

"I really like you. I suppose it's because you're different from the other slaves. I don't really understand it, because we're completely different, but…" He shrugged. "Why do you ask?"

"Because I don't want you messing about with my memories and stuff. Harlan's promised me he wouldn't do that, and I don't want you to, either. See, I'm scared of… well, being changed. I like being me."

"Don't worry, I won't do anything permanent to you. So, earlier on you were thinking that I'm cute. Did you mean that?"

"You know I did."

"Good. Then let's have some fun. What sort of sex things do you like doing?"

"Ones with Stefan, mostly."

"Yes, I know, but he's not here, so you'll have to make do with me – unless you'd prefer me to get a slave in? I mean, if you like hurting people I'll have to, because you're not hurting me."

"Hurting people?"

"Yes – some people's idea of fun is hurting other people. Like I said earlier… oh, probably you've forgotten that bit. Well, some of us are like that, but a couple of the slaves are, too. There's one kid from my country who gets hard when he whips someone. And some people like getting whipped… actually, there's a story there. See, back at the start of the school year – that's around six months ago now – this new student turned up. He came from some little town out in the sticks somewhere where there probably weren't any other Konjässiem, so he'd been taught at home, and he thought he was God's gift. You've never seen arrogance like it – he waltzed in here telling everyone how brilliant he was and how he was going to show us all how things should be done, and stuff like that.

"Anyhow, after a couple of days of this everyone had had more than enough of it, and so Harlan decided to see how good he was – and it turned out he was hopeless. His shield lasted about five seconds. So Harlan made him strip and run about the place in the altogether for a bit – not that he had anything worth looking at: he even made me look big – and then released him, hoping he'd got the message. Only it turned out he was stupid as well as arrogant, because he set a couple of slaves onto Harlan and managed to rough him up a little – not much, because it didn't take long for Harlan to override their orders, but they landed a couple of blows first. So then Harlan got really angry and did some rather more drastic mental surgery on the kid. Now he's no trouble to anyone – he's polite and docile, and he spends his evenings being abused by slaves. And he likes it – at least, now that Harlan's finished adjusting his thinking for him, he does: it turns him on getting whipped and pissed on and fucked. Harlan's locked him into it and made it self-reinforcing, so the more he gets degraded, the more he likes it. And the moral of that is, don't cross my cousin: when Harlan gets angry, you don't want to be the cause."

"Doesn't it interfere with the boy's studies if he lets the slaves do stuff like that to him?"

"Strangely, no – in fact he's a good student now. He's got a couple of slaves who share his room and have fun with him in the evenings, and a couple of others who join in from time to time, and they're free to do what they want to him – they all have metal bands to wear, just in case he decides he doesn't like it after all. But he can still control slaves who aren't protected by metal. His studies and his sex life are kept apart, same as anyone else's – after all, I suppose most of us have used slaves for sex, one way and another. Most of us are decent enough to wipe the slave's memory afterwards if the slave doesn't enjoy doing stuff like that, though some of them are really enthusiastic. In fact…"

He got out of bed, got dressed and went out, returning five minutes later with a red-haired slave of around thirteen.

"This is Caradoc," Terry told me, speaking Arvelan. "Caradoc, tell him what you enjoy doing most."

"I like sucking," said the boy, happily. "When I'm good I'm even allowed to suck our masters."

"Get undressed, then," said Terry, starting to take his own clothes off.

The next hour or so was a lot of fun: Caradoc sucked both of us twice, and he was extremely good at it – and the erection he had himself made it obvious that he really was enjoying this, not doing it because Terry was forcing him to. And when he had finished we rewarded him: I wanked him while Terry added the mental stroking that amplified the experience for him. When Terry dismissed him he said enthusiastically that he'd enjoyed it and that he'd like to do it again next time we were in the mood.

"See?" said Terry, once he had gone. "We don't always have to make people do things. Anyway, I suppose you need to get back to the dormitory now, don't you?"

"I'm not sure I have a bed there," I said.

"Huh? Where do you sleep, then?"

"In Harlan's room."

"What, on the floor?"

"Well, I started on the floor. Now I share his bed."

"Wow! Gods, Jake, he really must trust you – I mean, you could easily kill him while he's asleep."

"Why on earth would I want to kill him?"

"Some slaves would, just as they'd like to kill all of us."

"Why?"

There was a pause, and then I remembered everything that I'd seen during the afternoon.

"Sorry," he said, "but I thought you needed to relax a bit, so I walled that stuff away for the evening. But that's why a lot of slaves would like to kill us. And I suppose that from a slave's point of view it's easy to see why. Okay, maybe not all of them feel like that, but even a slave like Caradoc won't enjoy the afternoons the way he enjoyed this evening. If we all lost our powers overnight and the slaves knew about it, very few of us wouldn't be at risk of serious retribution."

"That I can understand," I said, remembering what I'd seen.

"So for Harlan to let any slave sleep next to him shows amazing trust. Even though nobody has hurt you too badly, you're still a slave and you'd like to get out of here if you could, so…"

"Terry, I like Harlan – okay, he's controlled me a couple of times, but he's never deliberately hurt me, except for one time when I deserved it. It's the same with you: you've never hurt me, either. Okay, I don't like what you do with the other slaves, but I don't want to hurt you, let alone kill you. Look inside my head and see if you don't believe me."

"I do believe you. And I do like you, too – it was fun sharing Caradoc with you, and I've never shared him with a slave before… all right, Jake: if Harlan can trust you, I think I can, too. You can stay here with me tonight. But… do you really share his bed?"

"Really. But I'll sleep on the floor if you prefer."

"No. I've never shared a bed before, but I think I'd like to find out what it's like. Do you wear anything in bed?"

"No, Harlan likes us to sleep naked."

"Then we'll do that, too."

So we did. We cuddled for a bit, and then Terry proved that he trusted me by falling asleep quite quickly. Asleep, he just looked like a normal eleven-year-old, sweet and innocent, but what I'd seen that afternoon proved that appearances could be very deceptive. And it was now even clearer to me that, one way or another, I had to get my friends out of here as quickly as I could.

So now Jake knows what is really going on at the Academy. Whether he will be able to get himself and his friends away from it, however, remains to be seen.

Chapter Fourteen

I woke up before Terry did next morning, and he still looked cute and harmless as he slept. But in another couple of years he'd be doing horrible things to the slaves, torturing them and even trying to kill them – and I recognised how perfect an assassin a Konjässi could be, standing innocently by fifty yards away while his victim's heart exploded or his lungs shut down in front of a hundred witnesses. And I realised again how horribly I had underestimated the danger of this place – I'd been lulled into a false sense of security by Harlan's kind treatment of me, while other slaves were being hideously abused all around me.

I desperately hoped that Harlan's father would allow his son to take us to look for the Greys with him, though I was more determined than ever to make sure none of my friends was left behind here. If he turned us down… well, I simply didn't have a Plan B. I was contemplating hopeless ideas like getting Stefan to steal a vehicle from the workshops, all of us piling into it, using it to batter down the gates and then just driving off and hoping to remain free. And I knew how completely unrealistic that was.

Terry started to stir, and I waited until he was awake.

"See?" I said. "I managed not to murder you in your sleep."

"Yes, and I slept really well, too. Perhaps I should get a slave to sleep with me permanently. It's a pity I can't trust any of them the way I can you."

"You probably could if you didn't do nasty experiments on them."

"Yes, but then I'd get really bad marks for my work. Anyway, I generally wipe their memories, like I said."

"Yes, and Harlan told me that often wears off after a bit."

"And he's right, which is why I can't trust any of the slaves I've worked with – at least, not enough to let them share my bed."

"What about Caradoc?"

"Well, it would be nice to be sucked every night… and I've never actually used him for anything else myself… maybe I could trust him enough… I'll think about it. Still, at the moment he's not here – you are. And it's Saturday, so we don't have to get up, so what would you like to do?"

"You're asking me? I'm the slave, remember?"

"Well, if I don't agree with you I don't have to do what you suggest, do I? What do you and Stefan do when you wake up in the morning and don't have to get up?"

"Terry, it's a bit different. Stefan's my boyfriend, and we love each other – I mean, you know that from the other day."

"I know, but you could pretend a bit, couldn't you?"

"Well, we could dye your hair blond, give you some blue contact lenses, pump you full of hormones so that your voice breaks, stretch you so that you're about thirty centimetres [1 foot] taller, triple your muscle capacity and make your cock about triple the length and thickness, and then you'd be close…"

"Now you're being lippy again! But… is his cock really that big?"

"He's bigger than me, so you should be able to get an idea."

He took hold of me, and it quickly responded. Without waiting for permission I did the same for him, and I found that his little organ was already hard, so I stroked it slowly.

"I'm sorry it's so small," he said. "I know you're used to something a lot bigger, but I bet even Stefan's wasn't very big when he was eleven. Or yours, come to that."

"You're right. I don't think I ever measured myself at that age, but I don't think it was very different to how yours is now. Actually I quite like yours – it's really hard."

"Yours feels really strange, but I think I like it. It's different, anyway. So…"

He wriggled across and lay on top of me, so I put my arms round him and hugged him gently.

"That feels so nice," he said. "And I can feel that you actually like doing it, and that you like me. You were right, Jake: it is sometimes a bit lonely for us. Once we leave here we usually work alone, and unless you get married – and it's not easy to meet girls in our work, and we can only marry other Konjässiem – there's nobody you can really get close to. I suppose you get used to it later in life, but it's hard when you're my age. I was still living at home with my family until six months ago… I couldn't ever relax with another Konjässi the way I can with you, because we all have to be on our guard all the time in case they try to break our shield and take control. With you I don't even need a shield, so it's far easier just to relax. I know I'm completely safe with you, and that feels really good. I'll have to try to train Caradoc up to be as good as you…"

"Terry, if you're nice to people you don't have to 'train' them to do anything," I pointed out. "I like you, and as far as I know you haven't done anything to force me to like you. And because you're nice-looking, too – I mean, I don't have to force myself to look at you or anything."

He giggled. "I can see that you fancy me," he said. "That is sort of flattering. But I'm not really talking about sex. Obviously I enjoy sex, but I can get that from Caradoc or any other slave, one way or another. What you offer is affection, and maybe that's something we all lack. Harlan's lucky to have found you… anyway, are you going to suck me, or what?"

So I sucked him, taking my time about it. It was tiny compared to Stefan's, but apparently I didn't do a bad job at all.

Afterwards we went and had breakfast – by now the other students were so used to me appearing in their dining-room that nobody even noticed that Harlan wasn't with me. And after breakfast we went back to Terry's room, where he asked me to tell him a bit more about my world and what it was like going through portals into completely different ones, and so I started to tell him my story, the way I had told it to Harlan.

I'd got as far as our discovery of Hub Two when there was a knock at the door and a small redhead came in, and he took one look at me and his face lit up.

"Jake!" he exclaimed, jumping into my arms. "I haven't seen you for ages! Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, Tommi. What about you?"

"I'm okay. I'm lucky, really, because I'm used as a runner – it means I hardly ever get used for experiments. Anyway, I'm working at the moment…"

He turned to Terry. "Are you Terraxian ved Merlian?" he asked.

"That's me."

"The Senior Instructor wants to see you and Jake straight away."

"We'd better go, then. Jake, I take it this is one of your friends?"

"That's right – this is Tommi."

"Perhaps he can come and play with us later. I like red-heads."

"I'm sure he'd like that." I translated that into Kerpian for Tommi's benefit – he couldn't understand Sanöljan, of course – and he said that sounded like fun, though as things turned out we had to postpone the fun for a bit.

"Harlan's father wants to talk to Jake," the senior instructor told us. "Obviously he can't travel alone, so you'll have to go with him. We've got a travel warrant here for both of you – you're booked on the train that leaves at 1125. Can you handle him on your own?"

"Of course," replied Terry.

"Make sure that you do. If he escapes we'll take the cost of his recapture out of your funds, understand?"

"I won't try to escape," I said. "I wouldn't know where to go if I did, and all my friends are here. I'm not going to run off and leave them."

"I can see that you mean that," said the instructor. "Nonetheless, I'll expect Terraxian to keep you confined, just in case you change your mind. Terraxian, we'll expect you both back in time for your studies on Monday morning unless I get a call from the Chancellor himself telling me otherwise, understand? Good. Then off you go."

We went back to Terry's room so that he could pack a small overnight bag (which I had to carry, of course) and then we caught a tram to the East Station, followed by an underground train to the Victory Station on the other side of the city centre.

"Will you promise me that you won't try to run?" he asked me.

"Of course," I said. "I won't do anything to get you into trouble."

"Good. I think the instructor wanted me to put you in the goods van for the journey, which you wouldn't have enjoyed much. The travel warrant doesn't specify how you'll be travelling, so you can come and sit with me instead. That'll be a lot nicer."

I thought so, too, and even though we were travelling second class it was a lot more comfortable than a goods van would have been, especially as this turned out to be a very long journey – I hadn't really grasped from looking at the map just how vast this continent really was. The train didn't stop very often, but it still seemed to take a long time to get anywhere: the countryside I could see through the window rolled onwards, first long plains of agricultural country, then a range of rolling hills, then more fields, then some high hills or small mountains that we didn't see too much of because there were a series of long tunnels underneath them.

Before we reached the mountains we flashed through several small towns and stopped at a couple of large ones, and once we emerged from them we ran through a huge forest and then returned to farm country. And then we came into a major city and I thought we'd reached our destination, though when we stopped in a huge station I could see that the boards on the platform read 'Jellave' rather than 'Sanöve'.

"Where are we?" I asked.

"Jellave. This used to be the capital of the Eastern Empire. We'll be here for a bit because this is where they do all the frontier stuff, even though the border is way further east. We actually crossed into Sanölja about an hour ago."

The 'frontier stuff' turned out to be a bit of a problem, because of course I still didn't have any means of identification. The grey-uniformed Arvelan guards were satisfied by Terry's letter from the school, but the brown-clad Sanöljans were far less ready to allow an undocumented slave into their territory, and even when Terry told them where we were going and that my presence had been ordered by the Chancellor himself they still stood around pointing machine pistols in my general direction until one of their officers received radio clearance from Sanöve to let me through.

"We're going to have to get you chipped," commented Terry once they had finally left us in peace. "I suppose they didn't bother because they thought you wouldn't be leaving the school, far less the country. But if you're going to be travelling across this border on a regular basis they'll have to fix you up with some ID. They'd never let you cross on your own, and I'm sure Harlan's father won't want to get calls from the border guards every time you move."

I wasn't sure I wanted some sort of implant in my arm, but I could see that Terry was right. Hopefully I wouldn't have to cross this border again after our return trip.

The train eventually set off again. To start with the scenery was the same as on the other side of the border – farm country with occasional small towns. Then we came into a region of fruit trees and hop farms, and then, after another stop, we crossed a massive river, before following a slightly smaller one for the remainder of the journey. We finally reached the capital at around seven o'clock in the evening.

I have to say that I wasn't particularly impressed: the station was in a poor state of repair and the tram we took into the city centre was old and rattled, unlike the modern ones back in Arvel. I made some passing comment about it to Terry.

"The problem is money," he told me. "We lost the last war with Arvel, so they're the ones that get all the investment from the Japanese Empire and New Holland. You might not believe it, but things here are actually improving – if you'd been here twenty years ago apparently three-quarters of the shops were boarded up, the streets only got cleaned on an occasional basis and all of the trams were like this one. Today half the fleet has been replaced by modern ones and most of the shops are open. I'd have to admit that Harlan's father is doing a pretty good job."

We changed trams in the city centre, and the second one was indeed a much newer one. This one took us to the Imperial Palace.

"I thought this was a republic?" I asked.

"It is now, but it was an empire until the end of the last war, when the Arvelans deposed the last emperor. There's still a claimant to the throne living in exile in Rövissia, but I can't see him making a comeback any time soon. Now we have a president. Actually the job of Chancellor was much easier with an emperor – then there was only one person you had to influence. Now it's anything up to twenty."

The palace was a fairly new building – apparently the Arvelans had bombed the old one flat during the war – and Harlan's room was large and comfortable. We found Harlan playing games on his computer.

"We're not allowed games at school," he explained, "so I make the most of it while I'm at home. How was the journey?"

"Okay," I said. "I hadn't realised how far away this place was."

"It's a big continent. I hope Terry let you travel with him, not locked in a cage in the goods wagon?"

"Of course I did," said Terry. "It would have been boring for me without someone to talk to. Look, will it be okay for me to go home and see my family? I mean, you won't need me for the rest of the day, will you?"

"I shouldn't think so. Off you go, then – come back after breakfast tomorrow."

Harlan took me straight off to meet his father. The Chancellor didn't seem to be wearing anything special to mark who he was – in fact he was dressed exactly like Irfan had been back in Schlettstadt, or like the instructors at the school: white Japanese-style robe, black sash around his waist, white headband restraining his long dark hair.

"So you're Jake," he greeted me. "My name is Istian ved Lorcan of the Clan of the Founder and, as you know, Harlan is my eldest son. He's told me about your reptiles and the means by which you came to this world, and about how he wants to go and look into it and to try to read the reptiles. In principle I have no objection, but I want to be sure it won't be dangerous before I give my permission – after all, Harlan will follow me into this job one day, and so obviously he can't be allowed to put himself at serious risk. So I want to hear all about it."

And, over the next two or three hours, he did, except that this time I was aware of what I was saying. As far as I was aware he didn't try to compel me to answer, but then he didn't have to, because I was happy to answer his questions. I didn't tell any lies, either: I replied honestly that I didn't know whether Harlan would be able to control the Greys or not, but I said that there would be no danger if we were there because the Greys knew and liked us. I told him a bit about Vogesia, too, and I obviously did a good job as a travel agent because he said it sounded splendid, and that if the portal back to the monastery could be made less erratic he'd be interested in visiting it himself. And when the question of us escaping through the portal was raised I told him I had promised Harlan I would be loyal to him and not leave him, and that seemed to impress him, too.

Eventually, some time after midnight, the questioning ended and I was sent back to Harlan's room to wait for him. I presumed that father and son were discussing the proposed trip further, because it was another twenty minutes before Harlan came back.

"The trip's on," he told me. "He was quite impressed by you, for some reason. He suggests that I don't take too many slaves with me, which is probably good advice, but otherwise he said I should do whatever I think sensible. But there's no question of doing it in term time, so we'll need to wait until the end of the school term."

"When's that?" I asked.

"The fourteenth day of the seventh month."

I already knew that the local calendar had thirteen months of twenty-eight days each, plus a separate day for New Year, which took place at the Winter Solstice. And a quick calculation in my head told me that school was due to end for the summer on June 22nd or thereabouts. That was less than four weeks away, so although I would have liked to leave before that I supposed it wasn't too long to wait.

"Okay," I said, taking his clothes as he removed them and hanging them up in his wardrobe or putting them out to be washed as appropriate. "If we go to Vogesia it'll be really hot there at that time of year, so you'll need to bring lots of sun-screen and stuff."

"I'll pack plenty. You'll be carrying it, so I won't care how heavy my bag gets." And he grinned at me, handing me his underwear to put in the laundry bin.

He got into bed and waited for me to get undressed and get in with him, and then he put out the light.

"It's a pity Terry didn't stay," he commented. "We could have had fun with three of us sharing. Still, I suppose there's more room with just you and me."

"So who's coming with us?" I asked. I know that question might have been better unasked, at least for now, but I had to know.

"You're still thinking about sneaking off through the portal when I'm not looking, aren't you?" he said.

"No, I'm not. You can see that for yourself."

"Okay, but you'd like some of your friends to be able to, all the same."

"Wouldn't you?" I countered.

"Probably. I don't think I can let it happen, though – slaves cost money, and I don't want my father getting the bill because I let some of them escape. That's mainly because he'd pass the bill on to me, so I wouldn't get any more allowance for years."

"That's why you should bring enough of your colleagues to make sure we keep doing what we're told."

"Yes, I could do that, but it would be a lot easier to leave everyone else at the school and just take you, plus maybe a couple of other slaves chosen at random to do the heavy work."

"But if we're really going to leave this world and go to the monastery, or Vogesia, you'll need slaves who can speak the local languages," I pointed out. "And we're the only ones who can do that."

"I suppose so. That doesn't mean I have to take all of you, though."

"That depends how much of the work you want to do yourself."

"Don't push it, Jake! I'll decide exactly who is coming when I know which of my colleagues are definitely available and allowed to come. At the moment the only one I'm certain of is Terry."

That was clearly a signal to back off, so I just said 'Okay' and settled down to sleep.

The next day I met Harlan's mother, who also gave me a mental check-over and declared that I was acceptable as a slave for her son. We weren't able to stay too long after breakfast because we had a train to catch – in fact we headed back to the station as soon as Terry arrived. The return trip was a little more comfortable than the outward one because Harlan had booked us a four-seat compartment in First Class, but that didn't prevent us from being harassed by the border guards at Jellave once more – even though Harlan had a cover letter from his father, the guards were clearly unconvinced of its authenticity until another phone call had been made.

"You'd think we were still at war," was Harlan's comment.

Once we were safely over the frontier we closed the door, lowered the blinds and had fun playing strip card games. The only problem was that they wouldn't let me wear the metal band, which meant that unless I was able to generate enough interference they were often able to see my cards, and the result was that I lost most of the games. I was then given forfeits that generally involved sexual stimulation of one sort or another. But since they were both good-looking boys whom I liked, I have to say that I didn't mind too much.

***

Two more weeks went by, and then it was June 12th, my fourteenth birthday. Harlan bought me a small cake and then he and Terry ate about half of it, but at least the thought was there. And he also gave me a present: he lent me his bedroom.

"I'll spend the night with Terry," he said, "so you and Stefan can do whatever you want, and this time we won't be sitting here distracting you. I promise once we go we won't come back until tomorrow after breakfast."

"Thanks, Harlan," I said, and I meant it: while I appreciated being allowed to spend time with Stefan, it was still a little off-putting having the pair of them watching us and sharing the experience. Being able to relax and actually sleep together without being observed was a rare treat.

"You're spoiling him again," commented Terry.

"I know. But this won't cost me anything, except having to listen to you snoring all night."

"I don't snore."

"Well, if you do I'll just seal your mouth and nose for a minute or so. That should stop it."

"Hey, if you're sharing my room you'll have to swear not to use your powers on me. Otherwise you can sleep in the cleaning cupboard."

"Okay, I swear. But that goes for you, too: no using your powers, no trying to break my shield, nothing. Okay?"

"Fair enough."

They wished me a happy birthday again and then left us to it. It was only eight in the evening, so we had loads of time.

"What's happening with the expedition?" Stefan asked me.

"Well, we've got the go-ahead, but I still don't know exactly who's coming – Harlan's having trouble finding enough of his colleagues who are free, and he won't bring all of us if he isn't sure he can control us."

"Then you might have to decide who goes and who stays."

I stared at him. "Stefi, I can't do that!" I protested.

"If Harlan says 'We can only take four of you – who do you want me to take?' you'll have to. You need to think about it, Jake, because it could easily happen."

"Oh, God," I said, sinking onto the bed, because this simply hadn't occurred to me.

"You'll have to pick the ones who most need to get out of here," he went on. "I'm strong enough to stay – shut up and let me finish! – but I don't think Marc is. Oli is fairly safe here because he's immune, but that might change if they find out about his arm and take the support out – which they can probably do now, anyway, because the bone has probably healed by now. Tommi's too young to be left here. So I'd say those three should go, plus you, obviously. Alain, Nicky and I are strong enough to stay, and I think Alain and I would both feel better if we knew you and Oli were safe. Probably Radu will be okay to stay, too, as long as he knows Marc is safely back home. That's what I'd suggest, anyway."

I shook my head. "I'm not going until everyone else is safe," I said stubbornly.

"I know," he said, quietly. "But I had to try. I know you, Jake – you'd still insist on coming back even if everyone else was out except for one of us. So, okay, you and me are last out, then. And there's no point in arguing about that, because I'm not leaving until you do. As for the others, you have to put them in order of priority, like I said. So: Marc, Tommi, Oli…"

"No," I said. "Oli's older than he looks, don't forget, and he won't want to go without Alain. And he's safe, at the moment anyway. Nicky goes next. I know he's technically a senior, but he didn't expect this – all he wanted was to find a better life than he had in Vogesia. So he's third. Then Radu – he's been through enough already. Then Oli, Alain, you and me. I'm the leader, so I'm last, and that's final. But, God, I hope it doesn't come to this. Do you actually know what really goes on here?"

"I've a pretty good idea. Sometimes boys come back with unexplained injuries – nasty ones, sometimes – and they can never remember what happened. And occasionally a boy doesn't come back at all. I'd guess some of the experiments are terminal."

"That's right. Terry took me to see some of it on Friday. It's horrible, Stefi! I can't stand the thought of leaving any of our friends here."

"I know. You'll just have to smile at Harlan a lot. Now, let's think about something nicer, like how we're going to spend the rest of the evening. It's your birthday, after all – so are we going to… you know?"

I thought about that. Surely this would be the perfect time – on my birthday, when we had a bed and a room to ourselves… and there was a strong possibility that we wouldn't get another chance, either. Either of us could be left behind while the other made it back through the portal, and this time there was a real chance that we might not ever see each other again. What better reason could there be for finally doing this while we still could? And yet…

"No," I said. "We're going to get home, Stefi – I'm not ready to give up yet."

He smiled at me. "I'm really glad you said that, Jake – not that I don't want to do it with you, obviously, but I was afraid you were starting to lose hope. As long as you still believe there's a chance, you won't stop trying to find a way out of here for us. And we need you to do that, because you're the only one of us who is clever enough to think of a proper plan. So, are we still agreed: we'll only do that when we're back home in our own bed at the Residence?"

"Agreed," I said. And although I would really like to have found out what it was like to connect to each other like that, I was even happier to find that Stefan felt the same way I did – he wasn't ready to give up yet, either.

So although we still didn't take the final step that night we nevertheless did pretty much everything else we could think of, and when I finally fell asleep in his arms sometime after midnight I felt better than I had at any time since Terry had taken me to visit the basement. And even if the odds were very much against us, I still felt ready to fight on.

***

By Thursday of the following week Harlan's plans were more or less set, but he was still short of one colleague – the one he'd originally asked had been summoned home by his family. He'd decided to take four, including himself, and he only had three – himself, Terry and Dervoran, whom I'd met previously. I tried hard to persuade him that three would be ample to deal with eight slaves, but he was worried about what would happen if he or either of his colleagues fell ill. Also, it wasn't eight slaves, it was ten, because both Terry and Dervoran wanted to bring a personal slave with them.

"So I think we'll have to leave some of yours behind after all," he said. "You know I've thought all along that would be sensible…"

"There has to be another Konjässi somewhere in this place who's free!" I protested.

"They'll mostly want to get home to their families," said Terry, who was with us again. "Even if you dangle a sunny beach in front of them you'll probably find that most of them prefer to get back to their mothers' cooking. About the only one I know who isn't rushing off back home is Killian, and he hardly counts."

"Who's Killian?" I asked.

"The one I told you about – you know, the mouthy one who Harlan fixed up. He's probably hoping to spend the summer being whipped by his slaves."

"But he's still a Konjässi, isn't he?" I asked.

"Well, yes, but…"

"Didn't you tell me he was still perfectly capable of controlling slaves, and that he kept his sex life separate?"

"Yes, but even so… I'm not sure he and Harlan could actually work together."

"Why not? Do you really think Harlan can't adapt when he has to?"

"Shut up, Jake," said Harlan. "I know what you're doing, so just stop it. If you really want to know, the main reason I'm actually contemplating taking all of you is to show you once and for all that I can handle you, and that there's no point in thinking about running away. And then once we get back here afterwards you'll have all got any idea of escape out of your system, and you won't let it distract you ever again. And that's why I'll talk to Killian, and if he can come with us I'll take him. With four of us we'll have no problem keeping everything under control even if one of us falls ill, or something. I know I can keep six or seven slaves quiescent on my own, and I know Dervoran can manage at least that."

"I can probably do four," said Terry. "And even a feeble failure like Killian should be good for two or three."

"So we've got plenty of cover," continued Harlan. "Besides, I already know you're not going to betray me, Jake – you're still determined to stick with me. I can see that. And even if your friends don't feel the same way – though I'd be willing to bet that Stefan at least won't want to go anywhere without you – they won't be able to do anything about it. Of course, if they've got any sense they'll just accept that from the start, and then we'll all be able to enjoy a nice holiday – but maybe that's too much to ask."

I was trying to keep my thoughts under control here, because apparently a combination of my persistence and Harlan's own slightly arrogant desire to prove that he could handle all of us was going to mean that all of my friends would be coming with us, and that was all I could possibly ask. Of course, that would by no means be the end of our problems: the portal might not be there and might not appear before we had to return to school, or Aarnist and his men might have already found it and sealed it off. The one thing that kept me optimistic on that issue was that neither Marc nor Nicky had actually been asked exactly where the portal was – both had simply referred to it being in the mountains near a monastery. And when Aarnist had first interviewed us we'd told him that we'd set out that morning from the monastery in Oberehnheim. Provided he remembered that he would hopefully be concentrating his search up there, a long way north of the real site.

"Come on," he went on. "We're going to talk to Killian. You can tell him about Vogesia if he needs a bit of a spur."

He led me to a corridor in the East Wing, paused in front of a door halfway along and then just went in without knocking. The only person in the room was one of the Bisvelan slaves, the ones who looked like North Africans, and he was lying on the bed reading a book. He looked up as we came in and jumped up from the bed, obviously not wanting to look idle in front of another Konjässi, even though Harlan couldn't have done anything to him had he stayed on the bed, because he was wearing a metal band.

"Where is he?" asked Harlan.

"In the cupboard," said the slave, grinning. "Nevis wasn't happy about the standard of cleaning in the shower room, so he's being punished: no meals until supper."

"Get him out," ordered Harlan.

The slave went to the small cupboard in the corner of the room, unlocked it and called to whoever was inside to come out, and a boy of about Terry's age crawled out, wearing only a torn pair of underpants and with his hands handcuffed behind his back. The boy saw Harlan and struggled to his feet.

"Killian," said Harlan. "What have you got planned for the summer?"

"Well, I'm going to go home for part of it, probably for the last four weeks or so, because Altur can come with me then. Nevis won't be able to because he's been grabbed to help with the redecoration, and at the start of the holiday Altur's got to go with a couple of the instructors who are going to Bisvel on school business, because they need an interpreter. Nevis says I'll have to stay here until Altur gets back so he can look after me. Why?"

"How do you fancy a holiday by the sea on a hot, sunny beach?"

"He's not allowed stuff like that!" declared the slave.

"Shut up, Altur. Killian, if you were allowed to choose, would you want to take a holiday like that?"

"Well, yes, obviously. But I'd need to bring someone to keep me under control, and neither of my slaves would be able to come until the end of the holiday. Can we go then?"

"No, but I expect we can find another slave to come with you. Give me the names of all the ones who know about you and have helped with you before – I'm sure at least one of them will be able to come. And if not we'll train up one of Jake's friends. See, I need another Konjässi to come with me and help to control the slaves, and you're about the only one who's available. And I know you can work normally, just as long as there's a slave with you to give you what you need at night…"

"Of course I can," said Killian, straightening up and looking more business-like. "I can do a full control on two at once now – just about… I mean, that's why Nevis and Altur have to wear metal all the time. And I can probably manage three or even four if you just want them immobilised. And I'd really like a holiday – otherwise I'll just be stuck here for the first six weeks of the holiday, like I said."

"All right, I'll take you, but if you let me down I'll give you a punishment you won't enjoy. Altur, get the cuffs off him and clean him up, and then I want to see him in my room straight after lunch. Oh, and send him down to get something to eat – I don't want his stomach rumbling all afternoon."

That afternoon I sat in as the four Konjässiem sat down and made plans for the journey. I kept a list of what we would need – food, water, tents, sleeping bags, and so on. We'd need to arrange transport, and I was able to explain how we had travelled from Schlettstadt on the outward journey.

"There's one more thing," said Harlan. "Jake, you and your friends need to be chipped. We can't have eight slaves outside the school with no ID. I've spoken to the senior instructor, and we'll take you all to the hospital to get your chips inserted over the next three days."

I wasn't very keen on that, but I supposed it would be a price worth paying if it got us all away from the school. And in fact when it was done to me on the Saturday it didn't really hurt at all, though the scar itched for a couple of days afterwards. Harlan told me that my chip gave my name and date of birth (translated into the local calendar, of course), my address (the school), the contact phone number for my next of kin (the senior instructor) and my status (slave, together with the details of my owner). Non-slaves' chips also held a lot more information, including financial records, so that they could use their chips to operate a bank account.

"If you stay with me after I leave school we'll get that bit changed to say that I'm your owner," he told me. "I'd like that, actually being officially responsible for you… the chips are updated every six and a half months anyway, even if nothing much has changed. But wouldn't you prefer to belong to me, rather than to the school? It would sort of mean us being together is official."

"Well, you know I like the thought of staying with you and being your slave, but having it on a chip in my arm… it makes it seem like a metal disc on a dog's collar."

"Okay, I can see that… but you know I don't think of you as a dog, Jake."

"I know. And if I have to wear a little identity thingy I'd sooner it said 'My name is Jake and I belong to Harlan ved Istian of the Clan of the Founder' rather than 'Property of the Central Konjässi Academy, King Juuniss XIV Street, Laztaale'. But really I'd prefer neither. After all, I am capable of telling people who I belong to."

"You've got a good memory, Jake – I'm sure I only told you the address of the school once. And you got my full name right, too."

"Of course I did. I belong to you, even if it isn't official yet."

I was laying it on a bit, but the core fact was that I did intend to stick with Harlan, and I wanted all four of them to recognise that – it would mean, I hoped, that I'd be under a bit less scrutiny later on.

"I think we should make him wear a dog-collar with his name on, too," said Terry.

"Shut up, shrimp," I said. Terry merely put his tongue out at me, but Killian looked at me with interest and Dervoran practically fell off his chair.

"Aren't you going to do something about that?" Dervoran asked.

"Nah. It's just Jake. He's sort of different," said Terry. "I know, it's weird having a slave back-chat you like that, and when I first heard him I hated it. But now I sort of like it. It's weird, but…" And he shrugged. "You'll get used to it."

"Not if he does it to me, because if he does I guarantee he'll never do it again."

It seemed safer to keep my mouth shut at that point, so I did.

A bit later Harlan told me to go with Killian while he went and found a slave to bring with him. Killian was fully dressed in his robe this afternoon, making him look exactly like all the other Konjässiem, and I wondered if he was actually aware of what had been done to him.

"Oh, yes," he said, matter-of-factly, when I asked. "But there's nothing I can do about it. I don't suppose you can possibly understand, but the way I feel when the slaves are doing stuff to me is sort of addictive, like a drug. I love it and I can't live without it, even if it's deeply humiliating and often very painful. I'd be lost without a slave to run my life. As long as I can keep it apart from my studies I'll be fine, though I have no idea how I'm going to explain away Altur when I take him home with me. Maybe my father will be able to find a way to put me straight again, though I'm afraid it's much more likely he'll disown me instead. At least now I'll get a decent holiday first… Hey, Jake, are you really feeling sorry for me?"

"Well… yes, I suppose so. You're right, I can't imagine what it's like for you, but I'd hate to need to be hurt in order to feel good… even just saying it like that feels insane."

"That's about how it feels to me, too… anyway, I've got a short-list of three here. They're none of them as good as Nevis and Altur, but then the three of us have got used to each other by now. As long as one of them can come with us I'll be fine. If not I'll have to ask you or one of your friends to do it."

"Not me," I said. "Sorry, but I hate hurting people, and I don't think the fact that you'd want me to would make any difference. Let's try the ones on your list first."

In fact he got lucky with his first choice, who had not yet been assigned any specific tasks for the summer by the school. I'd seen him before, as it happened: he was one of the ones who had been beating Marc when I had first learned what was happening to him and Radu. The slave's name was Marlo, and he was a small, sharp-faced boy from Lostan in East Sanölja. And he was very enthusiastic about being in sole charge of Killian for the first half of the summer holidays.

"I want to talk to Nevis and Altur before we leave," he said. "I'll want to borrow some of the toys they use on you."

I didn't ask because it really wasn't any of my business. But Killian seemed happy enough, and so I left the pair of them to their planning and went to find Stefan.

"I haven't had a lot of luck with metal," he told me. "I've only managed to make a couple of makeshift headbands, and I'm not sure they'll stay on unless you keep completely still while you're wearing them. But I suppose it's better than nothing."

"It certainly is. And I reckon I can get a couple more from Killian, because his slaves won't need them while he's away."

"Who?"

"Never mind. Give yours to Oli, and we'll try to find a way for him to carry them without anyone else knowing he's got them. And if you can find him a decent-sized knife to carry as well, so much the better. I don't want to hurt anyone if I don't have to, but we might need to do some threatening."

By the end of the day everything had been finalised: Harlan had booked the trains and the boat and he'd assembled the tents and other camping equipment we would need. And I had taken the opportunity to ask if our own property – well, former property, officially – was still here, because if it was we probably had some kit in it that would be useful. And it turned out that our kit was still here – it had just been put in a storage cupboard and forgotten – and so Harlan allowed us to retrieve the bags and everything in them except for our clothes: he said we could only wear our slave uniforms. He checked my bag fairly thoroughly but didn't find anything dangerous, had a cursory look at Radu's and Nicky's and then gave up, just saying we could use our bags and anything that might be useful, which meant that we once again had access to Stefan's compass, notebook and various other bits and pieces, everyone's water bottles and, best of all, Oli's catapult. We also had our jewellery back, though it seemed sensible to leave it with our other valuables in our bags, because I was fairly certain that if any of the Konjässiem caught us wearing it they would confiscate it.

I was nervous right through the weekend; convinced that someone was going to prevent us from going – the Senior Instructor, perhaps, or Harlan's father – or that something else would stop us in our tracks, maybe an earthquake or a German invasion of Eastern France. But none of that happened, and on the Monday morning the whole party was driven to the East station in one of the school minibuses.

There were fifteen of us altogether: myself and my seven friends, the four Konjässiem and the three extra slaves they had brought with them: Killian had brought Marlo, Terry had chosen Caradoc (which didn't surprise me at all), and Dervoran had brought an Arvelan slave called Dannis. Once we were on the train my friends were locked into a separate compartment, just as had happened on our outward journey, while I joined the rest of the party in the next compartment along. And that meant that I wouldn't get a chance to talk to my friends during the journey. But that didn't really bother me too much because, finally, we were on our way back to the portal.

So the first part of Jake's plan seems to be working – at least nobody has been left behind. But there's a long way to go yet, and things aren't going to go quite as smoothly as he might hope…

Chapter Fifteen

The journey back to Maasjioleeme was interesting because I was able to listen to the four Konjässiem chatting about school and the various experiments they had been working on recently. They spoke Arvelan, which handicapped me a bit because I still didn't speak it very well, but then it wasn't the native language of Marlo or Caradoc, either, so I wasn't the only slave having trouble following the conversation. Besides, we weren't included in the discussion: all we had to do was to sit still and keep quiet.

The school had supplied us all with sandwiches to eat on the way. Ours were rather less exotic than theirs – the four of us got a thin slice of mousetrap cheese, while our masters' were bulging with a wide variety of contents. Still, at least we were being fed. It was obvious that Marlo wanted to confiscate Killian's sandwich, and equally obvious that he didn't dare do it in front of the other three Konjässiem, though I have no doubt that Killian would have gone hungry had they not been there.

The train reached Maasjioleeme at around three o'clock (my watch was still in my bag, but Harlan was wearing his) and we went straight to the ship. My friends were taken straight to their cabins and locked in – Stefan, Alain and Oli in one cabin and the others next door – and Harlan took the rest of us up on deck. Marlo and Dannis had never seen the ocean before, and nor had Killian, so this was a new experience for all of them, and their excitement was obvious.

"Have you been to Europe before?" I asked Harlan.

"No. I sailed over to Arconia once with my family, but that's all. And I've never flown. Have you?"

I nodded. "I've been in an ordinary aeroplane a couple of times," I told him. "And when I was in Vogesia I went in an airship. That was amazing – it's much quieter than a normal plane, and you get a great view. Maybe if we end up there you can try it – it doesn't cost very much. We could fly over to Greater Bavaria and back, and then you'll see for yourself what it's like."

"I'd like that. I like the idea of flying and seeing the whole world spread out below you. That would be cool."

"You'd have to travel when the weather's good, because planes go above the clouds, and then you can't see anything at all. You need a fine, sunny day with no clouds. When I went to Crete with my family the Greek end was like that, but coming back into Heathrow it was really cloudy and we didn't see anything much. Still, you might be lucky."

We stayed on deck until the ship sailed, watching as it moved slowly out of the harbour, and once we were properly under way we went downstairs to the cabins. As Harlan's father was paying most of the cost of the expedition Harlan had made the most of it, booking four first-class, single-berth cabins as well as three second-class ones for us slaves. Harlan and I went into the one he was going to be using and he closed the door on the outside world.

"So, how are you going to try to escape?" he asked me.

"I'm not, you know that. I've sworn I won't desert you, and I haven't changed my mind."

"No, you haven't… though I don't really understand it. You're strange, Jake – most boys in your situation would be trying to escape, so why aren't you?"

"Because you're my master, and my friend – well, sort of."

"Yes, but… well, okay, I'm not going to complain. But I'm still not letting any of your friends go either, and if they try I'll kill them if I have to. Just as long as you understand that – the fact that I like you won't prevent me from doing what I have to do if they force me to. Anyway, tell me about the place we're heading for – what's it like?"

So for a while I described the Vosges to him, in general terms and without pinpointing where we were heading, and he said they sounded like the Taru Ugreni, the range of hills between Sanölja and Arvel, and after that we talked about his country rather than where we were going, which suited me fine. And then supper time came round.

"I imagine you'd prefer to spend the night with Stefan and the other two," he said, "though you can go in with Dannis, Caradoc and Marlo if you want. No? There's a surprise!"

He took me up a deck to the second class berths and let me into the cabin.

"We'll bring you round something to eat a bit later," he said, and he ushered me inside and locked the door behind me.

"I thought you'd be sailing first class, not slumming it with us," said Stefan, hugging me.

"No such luck. Even the first class bunks are too narrow for two. Anyway, I prefer the company here."

"Good. At least we'll be together again for a few hours, then."

"I wonder if this ship will be stopping in Ireland on the way back?" mused Alain, grinning at me.

"I knew you'd be the one to remember that," I said, grinning back. "Well, you'll have to wait until after supper, because I don't want that door flying open while I'm paying my debts."

"It's okay," said Alain, more seriously. "I mean, obviously I'd like you to do it, but maybe we should wait until we're safely through the portal again… that is, if we are going to get through it. What are our chances, Jake?"

"Honestly? I don't know. It depends on a lot of things: whether the portal opens at all, to start with, because I can't see Harlan being willing to sit around in the mountains for more than about three weeks without giving up on it and taking us all back to the school. Then there's the question of whether Aarnist and his men have already found it, because if they have I can't see them letting us go through. And finally there's the Greys: I'm assuming Harlan won't be able to control them, but if I'm wrong we lose our strongest card.

"Our best chance will be if the portal opens, we can get through it and catch up with the Greys in Vogesia, because I'm counting on the local boys helping us if we make it back there – and hopefully Sergeant Schwarz and his men will help us, too. We need the Greys to be immune and there to be too many of the rest of us for them to be able to subdue us all at once. If we can knock a couple of the Konjässiem out we should be able to overwhelm the others."

"Knock them out?" queried Stefan. "Don't you mean kill?"

"No," I said, firmly. "We don't kill unless there's absolutely no other choice, not only because I like Harlan and Terry and feel sorry for Killian, but because if we kill them – especially Harlan – they'll never stop hunting for us."

"So what? All we have to do is get the monks to block the portal from appearing again and they'll never get near us. Jake, you're too soft-hearted. You know what those bastards do to kids like us – we've just been lucky that they haven't done anything worse to us than give us a headache yet. But if we go back to the school, sooner or later it'll be one of us who ends up on the wrong end of a death experiment. Okay, if we can get away without killing them, fair enough, but I'm absolutely not going to let that hold me back if there's no other way."

"Me neither," agreed Alain. "So far Oli's been safe, but sooner or later they're going to twig about his arm, realise it's safe to take the brace out by now and do it, and that'll leave him in the same danger as the rest of us. And that's not happening if I can stop it, okay? I think we're dead lucky they let him come with us at all – I can only assume Harlan forgot about him when he said we could all come with you. Next time they probably won't, so if the remotest chance comes up on this trip, we're taking it, no matter who gets in our way. Sorry, Jake, but that's all there is to it."

"And it'll be easier for us because they can't stop me," added Oli. "With any luck Dervoran and Killian won't realise I'm immune because as far as I know I've never met either of them before. And I've got my catapult in my bag. I'm like a secret weapon!"

"Okay, but don't do anything unless I say, because if it goes wrong and they catch you I don't think they'll use mental power to stop you – they'll just grab you and break your neck. Look, we have to wait until we catch up with the Greys, unless the portal isn't there, in which case we might have to try on our own – but not until we're sure there's no alternative. Stefi, how did you get on with what you were trying to find at work?"

"No more, I'm afraid. Oli's got what we have."

"I've got Harlan's, and Marlo's got at least one of Killian's, and I asked him to bring a spare so that two of us could work on him together if we got a chance. I haven't had a chance to ask him yet, but from what I've seen of him and Killian both I would guess he has it."

"What are you talking about?" asked Alain.

"Sorry, Alain, but if you don't know they can't see it in your head. Don't worry, you're first in line if we get a chance to use our second secret weapon, but it has to stay secret until then."

Alain didn't look happy about being the only one of us in the dark, but it was a mark of how much he had matured that he didn't question it

"Well, as long as you've got a plan, that's good enough for me," he said. "Like we said before, you've never let us down yet. So the idea is that we just go on doing what we're told like good little slaves until we reach the portal, and then… well, I'll leave it to you. I trust you, Jake, you know that."

Once again I found myself worrying that I was going to let him down, the more so since I didn't have a concrete plan at all. But that was deliberate: if I had a firm plan there would be a danger that Harlan or one of his colleagues would be able to pluck it from my head, so instead I'd got a number of strands worked out and would try to weave them together into a proper plan on the spot, once we caught up with the Greys, or at the portal site if it didn't open before Harlan wanted to leave.

"Have you got your cards?" I asked Alain.

"Yes – and thanks for getting our stuff back, Jake: I thought we'd lost our bracelets, and as they were the first proper present we gave each other, well… Even if we can't wear them at the moment, at least we know they're not lost. So, what are we going to play?"

We sat and played a game Alain had taught us until the food arrived, and after we had eaten we switched to poker.

"I think if Jake loses he ought to suck us all twice," suggested Alain, shuffling the pack.

"Okay, but if I beat all of you I get let off altogether," I countered.

"Fair enough," agreed Alain. "You might beat one of us, but you'll never beat all three."

And he was right, and in fact the cards treated me so badly I'd have suspected Alain of cheating if I hadn't known him better… though, come to think of it, these were his cards, and he'd been playing for several years, and perhaps…

I put the thought out of my mind and kept playing until I lost my underwear, long before anyone else was even close.

"Hah!" crowed Alain. "That's twice! Want to go double or quits?"

"Yes, okay," I agreed, rashly. "As long as I can deal."

"Fine," agreed Alain immediately, which suggested that he hadn't been cheating after all. But the bottom line was that he was simply a better player than me – we were playing a proper version with rounds of wagering, rather than just showing the cards straight away – and although I beat Oli and Stefan a couple of times as the evening went on, I couldn't beat Alain. So when we finally stopped playing a couple of hours later I had still not managed to reverse my earlier defeat.

"Once tonight," I offered, "and once to celebrate when we're safely through the portal with the Konjässiem behind us."

Of course, I didn't expect to be making the trip through the portal myself, but I wasn't going to tell my friends that just yet.

"Sounds good to me," agreed Alain.

There wasn't a lot of room in the cabin, but by putting all four mattresses on the floor we made ourselves a comfortable work area, and then… well, it was the nearest I'd ever come to taking part in an orgy. It was a lot of fun, to be honest, even if I was doing most of the work: all four of us were naked, lying on the mattresses and stroking each other while I sucked each of them in turn. I did it for Stefan first because I was used to him and knew exactly what to do to please him, and then I moved on to Alain.

"Hey, Alain, you're getting some hair!" I told him.

"Is he? We can't have that!" said Oli, grinning. "He's not allowed hair until I get some!"

"Get lost! You won't get any for another two or three years, and by then I'll be nineteen – there's no way you're keeping me hairless until then!"

"Wanna bet?"

"Shut up, you two," I interrupted. "You can discuss it later. But I'd let it grow, Oli – I think it'll look good. And if it turns out like Stefan's, it'll feel nice and soft when you stroke it."

I got back to work. Alain was definitely growing up: apart from the hair, it was bigger now than it had been the last time I did this back in Hub Two, and – as I discovered eventually – he had rather more spunk now than he had had back then, too.

Finally I moved on to Oli, who hadn't grown at all: it was still as small as it had been the first time I'd seen it. But it was very hard, and he obviously enjoyed it, wriggling about and squeaking as I finished him off.

Afterwards they rewarded me for a good job: I lay on my back and Stefan sucked me while the other two snuggled up on either side of me, stroking me and occasionally kissing me, and it felt incredible, even better (if that were possible) than the orgasms I had when Harlan stimulated my mind and body at the same time.

"This is fun!" said Oli, as I recovered. "We should do this again!"

"I suppose it is a bit strange that we've never done stuff together before," I agreed. "After all, we've been together for a long time now, and we know we all like doing this sort of thing. If you all think it's a good idea we can do this sometimes after we get back home…"

I tailed off, realising that I wouldn't be going back home. I didn't know how I could lose friends like these three, but if the only way to get them home safely was to stay behind myself I'd have to do it… though right then my resolve was as weak as it had ever been. I liked Harlan, but if it came to a free choice between spending the rest of my life with him or with Stefan, Alain and Oli there was absolutely no contest. The problem was that I didn't have a free choice.

"What's the matter, Jake?" asked Stefan.

"Huh? Oh, nothing," I said – I didn't want them to get any hint that I was going to be staying here. "I was just thinking about getting back to the Residence, that's all. I mean, even if everything goes perfectly and we get rid of Harlan and the others, we'll still be back at the monastery with no idea of how to get home. Either we'll have to hang around until the Green World puts in an appearance, or we'll have to get some proper winter clothing and have another go at the Frozen World. Maybe it won't be quite so cold there in summer…"

"I hope not,"' agreed Stefan. "If I'm right and anyone living there is underground, it'll take us a long time to find them, and all that time we'll be stuck on the surface. I don't see how the Greys could survive in that place. Maybe we'd have to leave them in Vogesia until we found another portal in the frozen world and then come back for them."

"Let's worry about getting out of this one first," I suggested. "I think that'll be hard enough without worrying about where we go after that. And probably it would be a good idea to get some sleep first. I suppose there's just about room for us all to sleep here on the floor – it would be a bit sort of cosy, but I wouldn't mind that."

So we collected our pillows and a blanket each and snuggled up on the floor, and although it took me a while to get to sleep, what with worrying about next day and having Alain's elbow jabbing into my back, at least I got to sleep in the end. And I didn't even wake up when the ship put in to Eastharbour, which I now knew was the capital of the island of Maasaarvi.

I woke up next day when Stefan kissed me, which is, as I've observed before, about the nicest way to wake up in the morning. The other two were still asleep, so we got up very carefully and quietly and put our clothes on and then tiptoed into the washroom and closed the door.

"Get Oli on his own at some point and tell him to keep those metal rings in easy reach," I said. "The two he's got go to you and Alain. One of us should try to get the spare one from Marlo if we can, but we'd better let him keep the one he uses himself – if we try to pinch it he's sure to complain to Killian, and I don't want any of the Konjässiem to know what we're doing. If he does have a spare, we'll give it to either Radu or Nicky. I want our strongest boys protected because they'll probably try to use the unprotected ones against us, and I reckon you won't have too much trouble against Tommi or Marc. If we've caught up with the Greys, try to get our unprotected kids into the tank, because they'll be safe enough in there.

"After that we'll have to make it up as we go along, but I know you're good at that, so just do whatever you can think of. Make sure everyone only speaks English – we know the Konjässiem don't understand a word of that. And… however you feel, try not to kill anyone unless there really is no other choice, okay?"

"I promise."

We got washed and went back out to the cabin, where we found Alain still fast asleep but Oli awake and stretching.

"You don't have to tip-toe around," he told us. "It takes a lot to wake him up. We could chuck a bucket of water over his head – I'm sure that would do it – but it might be a bit cruel. I generally wake him up by dragging him onto the floor, but today he's already on the floor, so I can't do that. So I'm going to do something else."

He moved the blankets off Alain's body, revealing that Alain had an erection, and so Oli started to stroke it, very gently. Pretty soon Alain started to move about in his sleep.

"I've done this before," Oli told us. "He says it gives him really nice dreams, so I think it's a good way to wake him up."

"I hope you're listening, Jake," commented Stefan. "You can try waking me up this way any time you like."

"Problem is, you're a light sleeper," I pointed out. "You generally wake up before I do – so maybe you could try it on me."

"Maybe. Depends what sort of mood I'm in."

"You're always in a good mood with me," I said confidently, and I sat beside him and hugged him.

Oli kept going, and still Alain didn't wake up, though he was starting to make little gasping noises. I'm not sure what he was dreaming about, but he seemed to be enjoying it. And then Oli pushed him past the edge and he spurted onto himself – and now he was spurting properly, three or four little jets of the stuff. Only then did he wake up, looking at us all blearily.

"Nice dream?" asked Oli, smiling at him.

"Oh, yes," said Alain, using a corner of one of the blankets to clean himself up. "Almost as good as the real thing – though not quite." And he grabbed Oli and hugged him hard.

"Come on, you two," I said, eventually. "Break it up – they'll probably be coming to bring us breakfast before long, and we ought to get the mattresses back on the bunks before they get here."

Breakfast duly turned up about half an hour later, by which time Alain and Oli were washed and dressed, and not too long after that we docked in Paazi-Beretokheeme, which I was pretty sure was called by the substantially shorter and easier name of Brest in my world.

Harlan and Terry came and escorted us off the ship, through customs – which was as empty as on our outward journey – and into the railway station, and soon all eight of us were again locked into a compartment on a train. Now that we were all together again it gave me a chance to talk to Radu and Marc, who were both okay – Rusta had kept his promise to make sure nobody abused them any longer – though they were both keen to get out of this world. Marc wasn't happy that Marlo was in the party, because he had been one of the ones to have beaten him before, but so far Marlo had ignored him completely, and I assured him that in any case he'd be safe now that we were all together again: now Marlo was the one who was outnumbered.

All four of them – Radu, Marc, Nicky and Tommi – wanted to know if we were going to be able to escape, and I told them that I hoped so, but that it would depend on whether we could use the portal and whether we could catch up with the Greys.

"You just have to stay alert and keep an eye on me and Stefan," I said. "If we get a chance to do anything you'll soon know. We'll speak English, because we know the Konjässiem don't understand that and all of you do, at least a bit. But don't try doing anything on your own – I don't think they'll be happy if any of us just try running off. If we're getting out of this we have to work together."

The trip back to Lottentaale, or Strasbourg, took about seven and a half hours and we arrived there in mid-afternoon. I wasn't sure what would happen next: I thought we would probably have to catch a local train back to Sélestat and walk from there, but Harlan had already decided that he didn't want to start his holiday with a long, unnecessary walk and so he had hired a minibus and driver to take us to the foot of the mountains. We loaded up the kit and climbed into the bus ourselves, and Harlan kept me up front with him so that I would be able to tell the driver where to go. We headed south out of Lottentaale and joined the motorway, which we followed until we were a short distance south of the town that was called Oberehnheim on my map but something unpronounceable on the Arvelan one, and there we took a smaller road that ran along the base of the mountains. And we had only been on that road for a couple of kilometres when we were stopped at a police checkpoint.

I was a bit worried about us being recognised: if Aarnist's men knew who we were and where we were heading it would point them in the direction of the portal, assuming they were still looking in the wrong place. But I didn't recognise either of the officers manning the checkpoint, neither of whom had red hair.

"Where are you heading?" the senior one asked the driver, who told him he was just following Harlan's instructions.

"We're going into the mountains for a training and control exercise," Harlan told him. "Why? What's happening?"

"Where exactly are you going?" asked the cop, ignoring Harlan's question.

"Show him, Jake," instructed Harlan, so I got the map out and pointed to a place a little north of where we were actually going.

"That's fine," said the cop. "But you mustn't go very far north of that area: there's a police operation under way north of Puha-Martiin and Uusikirik and civilians are not permitted north of those two settlements. As long as you remain south of there you have permission to continue."

Harlan thanked him and told the driver to drive on, and I relaxed a little, because if there was a police operation going on north of those two villages it sounded as if Aarnist still had his eyes fixed on the area south and west of Oberehnheim, which was a safe distance from the real portal site.

With some help from Stefan I directed the bus driver to the closest point on the road to the portal site, and he stopped at the side of the road while we unloaded. The bus turned round and headed back towards Strasbourg, and Harlan told us all to listen to him.

"Okay, the real holiday starts here," he said. "And I want to make it absolutely clear to all of you that you have to do what you're told straight away. I'm sure some of you are thinking about running off, but that would be a major mistake, and I'm going to tell you why. First, because any slave who runs will be hunted down and caught. You know that's true – slaves are always recaptured, because at the end of the day there's nowhere to run to. And that will even be true if we find Jake's portal and are able to use it: I give you my word that any slave running will be recaptured and punished, no matter where he is. And the punishment is likely to be terminal: we'll give you to those of our colleagues practising extreme interrogation techniques and induced medical failures.

"Second, because if one of you does run the rest will all be punished by being whipped morning and night until the runner is caught, so if you do manage to sneak off it'll be your friends who pay the penalty until you give yourself up or are recaptured.

"And third, because we'll be making it as difficult as possible for you to run. You probably think you'll be able to sneak away at night, but you won't, because before you go to your tent for the night you'll strip completely naked and leave all your clothes locked in a metal-mesh sack that will be kept in one of our tents. In fact, since the weather isn't too bad I might decide to keep you all naked permanently – you won't get far in bare feet, and even if you did you'd find having no clothes a serious handicap. I'll decide that when we get the camp set up, depending on what the surrounding area is like.

"On the other hand, if you're sensible you can enjoy this as a holiday, because none of us is going to use you for anything other than minor experiments while you're with us, and we'll make sure that none of those are painful. So you can relax and enjoy the change of scenery. Now, get the kit on your backs and let's go. Jake and Stefan, lead the way."

So Stefan got his compass and notebook out, worked out where we were by taking a reading on the town of Sélestat that we could see off to the east, and led us up into the hills. By now we'd done this so many times and in so many worlds that he could probably have done it without the compass, just by following contours, but once we were in the trees it was obviously sensible to make sure we were going the right way.

On we went, around the base of the hill on which Haut-Koenigsbourg stood in my world and on towards the valley where the portal appeared. I'd expected to get all the way to the portal-site without seeing anyone at all, so I was completely taken aback when someone called my name from off to our left – and there was Torth. His appearance drew gasps from the Konjässiem and the three other slaves, but personally I was delighted to see him.

"Why are you still here?" I asked him in Grey.

'"Because the damned portal hasn't reappeared yet. It disappeared a day after you left us, and we're still waiting for it to come back. We didn't dare go into town because we were certain it wasn't safe – after all, we were sure you'd have come back otherwise. So we've been stuck here, living on rabbits and squirrels and tinned meat. I've never been so bored in my life – though at least having Sarleth with us gave us something to do. So who are all these people?"

"Torth, we're in trouble. The boys in the robes are really powerful – they can get into your head and make you do things you don't want to, and we're their prisoners, more or less. I'm hoping they won't be able to get into your heads because your brains work differently to ours, but if it looks as if they can you need to get something metal to protect yourselves – they can't work through metal. And…"

"Aren't you going to introduce us?" asked Harlan, looking at Torth with interest.

"Harlan, this is Torth. As you can see, he's a Grey. I was just telling him who you are."

"Good. Make sure he knows what'll happen to you and the others if he doesn't obey us, won't you? And…" There was a pause. "Hmm. I have to say I can't get in there right away, but there is something… if we work at it I think I should be able to get there. Anyway, let's get the camp set up – how far are we from the portal site?"

"Only two or three hundred metres [600-900 ft.]. The valley floor is fairly flat near the portal, so we can probably set the tents up there."

It was also a little distance away from the vehicles, which were, I supposed, still camouflaged where we had left them. I didn't want Harlan knowing about the tank.

We pitched the tents – one large one for us, four smaller ones for the Konjässiem, a stores tent and a kitchen where Alain and I would be preparing meals – a short distance from the portal-site, which Torth had sensibly marked with a couple of spare tent-pegs, and we got all the kit put away. Once the camp was set up to Harlan's satisfaction he got all of us to get on our hands and knees and clear the ground around the tents of fallen leaves and tree debris, and then he made us all remove our shoes and socks and put them into the stores tent.

"You won't need footwear unless you have a legitimate reason for leaving the camp," he told us. "Stefan's dug the latrines not too far away and you've cleared a path to them, so that isn't an excuse. Any slave caught wearing shoes without permission will be whipped. Now I'd like Jake and Alain to start making us a meal, and I'd like Tommi to come and help me speak to our Grey friend… incidentally, Jake, I thought you said there were three of them? So where are the other two?"

"He wants to meet Verdess and Sarleth," I told Torth. "And I don't want him knowing about the vehicles, so you'd better bring them here, rather than making him go look for them. I'll tell him they're out hunting at the moment."

"That's true, actually," Torth told me. "I'll go and find them if you like."

"Good idea. And maybe after that it would be a good idea if the three of you bring your tent up here with the rest of us – when we get a proper chance to escape it'll be a lot easier if we're all together."

"It shouldn't be too hard to kill those four," he commented. "All we have to do is shoot them."

"I'd prefer to avoid that if we can," I said. "Besides, it might not be quite that simple – this lot usually have a trick or two up their sleeve. But it would certainly be a good idea not to let them know you've got guns, so don't use them for hunting from now on and it might be better if you leave them with the vehicles when you bring your tent up here. And – nobody has come up here since we left, have they?"

"No, but there's been a flying machine come over a couple of times. They didn't see us – we kept under the trees while it was around – and I suppose if they were carrying special equipment it couldn't see us because we're cold-blooded."

I told Harlan that Torth had gone to find the others and then headed for the kitchen tent before he could ask me anything else – after all, the fact that we had rifles was something I really didn't want Harlan getting wind of, because they were our one major advantage. On the other hand I didn't want the Greys just to start shooting, because I was sure Harlan and his colleagues would respond to that violently – and in any case I had no wish to see any of the Konjässiem shot.

I think we'd been lucky that Harlan had never asked if we had weapons, though I suppose there was no reason why he should have done: after all, kids of our age don't generally walk about the place carrying guns, and if we had they would no doubt have been confiscated by the police when we were first arrested.

Alain started boiling some water ready for the pasta, and I began preparing a sort of Bolognaise sauce for it, using tinned ingredients, which wasn't the way I generally liked to do it, though I supposed that when you're cooking miles from anywhere you have to use whatever is available. And then Torth came back into camp with his two colleagues, and I got Oli to keep an eye on my sauce while I went out to greet Verdess and Sarleth. They looked happy to see me, insofar as Greys ever look happy.

"Does this mean we're going to get out of here at last?" asked Verdess.

"I hope so. Torth will fill you in later, if he hasn't already. We've got a problem here, but I'm hoping you can help us with it. Anyway, you'd better come and meet our master."

I left Torth to explain what I meant by that and went and found Harlan, and once I'd done the basic introductions I left Tommi to handle the interpreting and went back to my sauce.

After supper I went and joined Harlan: he and Terry were working together to try to penetrate Torth's mind, and to my alarm it seemed that they were actually getting somewhere: Torth was reporting that he could feel something inside his head, and Harlan reckoned he was getting a faint view of what Torth was thinking. The last thing I wanted was the Greys coming under Harlan's control: I was counting on them to remain free agents – even though they wouldn't normally have put themselves at risk for anyone except themselves, I was hoping that in this case they would see that it was in their interests to help us.

By the time Harlan was ready to turn in for the night he was convinced he was making progress, and I was getting seriously concerned – maybe we would have to try to break free sooner rather than later…

Before we were sent to our tent for the night we were all made to put our clothes in one of Harlan's metal bags, and that left all eleven of us naked in a tent that otherwise contained only our sleeping bags and some inflatable pillows, because our bags had been taken to the stores tent along with our clothes. I suppose having eleven naked boys in one tent ought to have resulted in some form of sexual entertainment, but I really wasn't in the mood for an orgy, and neither, it seemed, was anyone else – they were too tired from the journey to do anything except sleep. Only Marlo seemed reluctant to settle down: he was complaining about having to sleep here with us when he should have been giving Killian a hard time in his tent. However, that reminded me of something.

"Did you manage to bring two metal bands with you?" I asked him, quietly. "So that someone can help you punish Killian, I mean?"

"Yes, but they're in his tent at the moment. I can get them if I need them, though…"

He broke off and stared at me. Up until now I'd just thought of Marlo as a bit of a bully, a boy who liked dominating other boys, be it Marc or Killian, and with not too much upstairs, but apparently I'd been wrong.

"Right," he breathed. "Except… you're not to hurt Killian, understand?"

"What?"

"You've got a plan, haven't you? You're going to escape, and you need the spare band to do it. That's fine by me, and I really don't mind what you do to the other three – your pet lizards can eat them for all I care – but I don't want Killian getting hurt. I know you think I'm just a thug who gets his kicks from beating him, but it's not really like that. In a way, we're friends – he needs me and I give him what he wants, and underneath it all he's a decent kid. I know the story, obviously, how he came to the school and started boasting about how good he was, but he's changed a lot since then, and not just… you know, what he likes us to do to him. His head is a mess and it isn't his fault, and… well… he doesn't deserve to get killed."

"I don't really understand him at all," I said. "I sort of get that he enjoys it when Nevis and Altur abuse him, and I suppose you're here to do the same thing – and you enjoy it, don't you?"

"Of course. You've been here long enough to understand why we hate the Konjässiem, and being able to piss on one and fuck him and stuff is great… except Killian isn't anything like the rest of them – he's had all the arrogance knocked out of him. Yes, I still enjoy doing stuff to him, but I probably wouldn't if I didn't know that he enjoys it too. I'd enjoy pissing in Dervoran's face a lot more, but obviously I can't. Anyway, I don't overstep the line with Killian, and neither do Nevis and Altur, because deep down they like him, too. I keep hoping one of them will get moved so I can take over full-time – I'd be safe from the real bastards like Dervoran if that happened… that doesn't matter, though. What matters is that if you try to hurt Killian I'll fight you, but if you try to hurt the others I'll help any way I can. So if you're okay with that I'll find a way to pass you the spare band tomorrow."

"Thanks," I said. "I don't suppose we'll be trying anything for a day or two yet – I'll need a bit of time to organise things with the Greys. But when we're ready I'll give you the nod, and you should keep your own band close by when we get to that stage. You'll probably need it."

I settled down, thinking that another metal band would certainly improve our chances, provided that Harlan didn't manage to take control of Torth too quickly. I still needed time to try to make a proper plan, but in the event I didn't get the time I needed, because something happened that I hadn't foreseen: when I emerged from the tent the next morning there was a thin bank of mist starting to appear further up the valley. The portal was reforming.

So now we're coming to the crunch: in the next chapter we'll find out what happens when the portal reappears, and although Jake is hoping for the best, in the event everything is going to run out of control…

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