Mariners of Gor cog[oc-30

by John Norman

  “It fitted you well!” said Alcinoe.

  “I was naked, save for it!” said Adraste.

  “I would not have given you so much,” said Alcinoe, “despicable traitress!”

  “I am Ubara!” said Adraste.

  “Go back to Ar and claim your throne!” said Alcinoe.

  “I am Ubara!” wept Adraste.

  “You are a collared slave!” said Alcinoe.

  Adraste clutched the collar on her neck, and shook it, as though it might be removed.

  “See?” said Alcinoe.

  “You, too, you slut,” said Adraste, “are collared. You, too, are a slave!”

  It may be recalled that I had taken Alcinoe by the hair, bent her over, and thrust her into same small kennel with Adraste, and had then swung shut the gate, it locking with its closure. In this way, the two former highest, richest women in Ar, both traitresses, both muchly involved in the Great Treason, both wanted in Ar, both now slaves, were forced to confront one another, in their current humiliation, shame, and degradation. I had thought this would be of interest, even amusing, to put the slaves together.

  “Slave! Slave!” said Alcinoe.

  “Slave, slave!” cried Adraste.

  I had earlier sought out Adraste’s kennel, and stood before it. I had not spoken. Adraste, within, kneeling, in the rather generous tunic, given to the slaves by the Pani, looked out, through the bars. “Master?” she said, uncertainly.

  “Do you know me?” I asked.

  “No, Master,” she said.

  I thought it likely she had not recognized me in the private area of the Venna keeping area, some nights ago, for the light of the lantern had fallen full on her face, perhaps half blinding her, not on mine, and not on that of Alcinoe, who stood back, rather out of the light. Too, soon in position, she had scarcely dared to do more than stare ahead. Some masters do not permit the eyes of the slave to meet theirs, unless commanded to do so, or given permission. To me, that seemed absurd. Surely one of the pleasures of the mastery is to look directly into the eyes of the slave. Are their eyes not often beautiful, brown, blue, hazel, green, so delicate, so soft, so moist? Why should one not in all ways enjoy one’s property? And is it not pleasant to hold her face in your hands, and look deeply upon it? Does her lip tremble? Has she committed a fault of which you might be unaware? Is she afraid of your switch? Or are her eyes pleading for the chains and fur?

  “Look closely upon me,” I said. I stepped more into the light.

  Suddenly she shook with fear.

  “You recognize me,” I said.

  “No, no!” she said.

  “I recognize you,” I said.

  “I think not, Master,” she said.

  “Oh?”

  “I am only a slave,” she said, “only a humble slave. My name is Adraste! I am Adraste, Adraste!”

  “If it pleases Master?”

  “Yes, of course,” she said, “if it pleases Master.”

  “It pleases me, muchly,” I said.

  “Thank you, Master,” she said.

  “You speak truly,” I said.

  “Master?”

  “You are the slave, Adraste.”

  “Yes, Master!”

  “And,” I said, “once Talena, of Ar.”

  “No!” she said. “No!”

  “You are no longer a free woman,” I said. “You may now be punished for lying.”

  “Please, no, Master,” she said.

  “Have you ever felt the lash?” I asked.

  “I?” she asked, disbelievingly.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “No,” she said.

  “Some time with it would doubtless do you good,” I said. Thousands, I supposed, would be pleased to think of the once-proud Talena, of Ar, now a slave, bound, and writhing under the lash, the slave lash, now appropriately to be applied to her. I had little doubt that the imperious and demanding Talena had put her own slaves under it, often enough. Now she, too, as they, a mere slave, was subject to it.

  “I beg mercy,” she said.

  I did not deign to respond. Let her consider what might be done to her.

  “Please do not punish a poor slave,” she said.

  “Have you not lied?” I asked.

  “Forgive me, Master!” she said.

  “The whip,” I said, “is an excellent device for encouraging dutifulness in a slave, and a desire to please, a zealous desire to please. Surely you noted that in your own slaves.”

  “Please do not whip me, Master,” she said.

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “I do not want to be whipped,” she said.

  “What is that to me?” I asked.

  Tears suddenly sprang into her eyes, and her small, lovely hands clutched the bars, through which, pathetically, she peered up at me.

  “You would have me whipped, would you not?” she said.

  “More likely I would bind you, and do it myself,” I said.

  “Surely not!” she said.

  “Know yourself recognized, slut,” I said, “once Talena of Ar.”

  “No!” she wept. “No!”

  “You are in need of correction, girl,” I said. “I go now, to fetch the slave lash.”

  “Please, no, Master!” she said.

  I turned back.

  “Slave,” I said.

  “-Yes, Master.”

  “Who am I?” I asked.

  “Callias,” she whispered, “Callias of Jad, Cosian, spearman, first of nine, guardsman, the occupation, the Central Cylinder.”

  “Better,” I said.

  In her terror, and misery, she tried to rise up, but could not do so, as the kennel does not allow that. Then again she was on her knees. Tears now ran down her cheeks. She grasped the bars, tightly, desperately. She pressed her face, as she could, against the bars.

  “And who are you?” I asked.

  “You know!” she said.

  “Speak it,” I said.

  “Once Talena, of Ar,” she whispered.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Dear Callias,” she said. “Please do not tell anyone!”

  “‘Master’,” I said.

  “Please, Master,” she said. “Do not tell anyone!”

  “You know the bounty on you?” I said.

  “Yes,” she whispered, frightened.

  “Here is my hand,” I said, extending it to the close-set, narrow, but sturdy bars, adequate to hold a female. “Kiss it, and lick it, first the palm, and then the back, reverently.”

  She put her face, as she could, through the bars, and carefully, with her small tongue, kissed it and licked it, first the palm, and then the back, reverently, and then drew back in the kennel, looking at me, but continued to grasp the bars. “Please do not tell anyone who I am,” she said.

  “Were I to do so,” I said, “I would doubtless be killed, and others would fight over you, and there would be much bloodshed.”

  “We are far from Ar,” she said.

  “That, too,” I said.

  “As long as I am only Adraste,” she said, “we are both more safe.”

  “How came you into the keeping of the Pani?” I asked.

  “You, of Cos, well know of the insurrection,” she said, “and its success.”

  “Indeed,” I said, ruefully.

  “I was betrayed in Ar,” she said, “by the traitor, Seremides, by the hateful Flavia of Ar, traitress whom I had befriended, and others, who would turn me over to the forces of revolt, to bargain for their own amnesty or escape.”

  I knew something of this from Alcinoe.

  “But on the roof of the Central Cylinder,” she said, “there was sudden confusion, and darkness, and I was seized, and rendered unconscious. When I regained consciousness I found myself stripped and chained, with others, in a wooden stockade, somewhere in the northern forests, in the power of these strange, inexplicable men, Pani. I was collared, and enslaved, no different from the others, as though I might be no more than they.”


  “There is much in this that I do not understand,” I said.

  “Nor I,” she said.

  “I gather from keepers,” I said, “that you bear in your left thigh, high, under the hip, not the common kef, but the mark of Treve.”

  She reddened.

  “This is not the first time you have been a slave,” I said.

  “I was captured by Rask of Treve,” she said, “a warrior amongst warriors, a man amongst men. I must wear a Trevan collar. I was tented with his women. Well did he humble me, and teach me how spasmodically helpless might be a slave in the arms of her master. I bathed him. He made me dance for him. I wore his silk, what he would give me of it.”

  “It is my understanding that women do not escape the chains of Rask of Treve,” I said.

  “He thought little of me,” she said, “as I suppose is appropriate for a slave. And his interest in me, I gather, was primarily that I was the daughter of Marlenus of Ar, his mortal enemy, and the mortal enemy of Treve. It was doubtless primarily for that reason that he captured me, bound me naked before him, supine, over the saddle of his tarn, caressed me into need, and took me to his camp. It amused him, doubtless, to have the daughter of his worst enemy in his collar, an obedient, silked slave in his tent.”

  “You escaped?” I said.

  “No, Master,” she said. “As you noted, women do not escape the chains of Rask of Treve. I was given away, and, to show his scorn, to a woman, Verna, a Panther Girl of the northern forests.”

  “You would seem to be a prize,” I said. “How is it that he would let you go so cheaply?”

  “To humiliate me, of course,” she said. “I, the daughter of a Ubar, given away like a pot girl!”

  “Still,” I said, “it seems surprising.”

  “There was another woman,” she said.

  “Of course,” I said.

  “It was a young, blond barbarian,” she said, “blue-eyed, and shapely, who could not even speak Gorean properly, a meaningless slut, one named El-in-or.”

  “That is, I think,” I said, “a barbarian name.”

  “I think so,” she said. “Certainly she was a barbarian.”

  “She must have been very beautiful,” I said.

  “You can buy ten of them off any chain in a market,” she said.

  “You were then, it seems, deemed inferior to a girl, ten of whom might be bought off any chain in a market.”

  Her hands turned white on the bars.

  How furious she was.

  “She is now doubtless his companion,” she said.

  “Rask of Treve,” I said, “does not free women. She is probably being kept as the most perfect of slaves.”

  Men desire slaves, women desire masters.

  “I was taken to the northern forests,” she said, “the slave of Panther Girls. Later I was sold, and eventually returned to Ar.”

  “It is my understanding,” I said, “that you begged to be purchased.”

  “Of course,” she said, angrily.

  “You had compromised the honor of Marlenus,” I said. “Accordingly you were disowned, made no longer his daughter. An embarrassment to the city, you were sequestered in the Central Cylinder. It is easy to understand your outrage, your bitterness, at such a reduction. Then something happened to Marlenus. He was long from the city. In his absence, with which you or others may have had something to do, you plotted with dissident factions and the island ubarates; you laid your plans carefully, and put them into patient and subtle execution; and then, eventually, by means of enemies without and treachery within, your schemes bore their ugly, dark fruit. You received the medallion. You were declared Ubara. The rest is well-known.”

  She was silent.

  “So,” I said, “you were adjudged inferior to a barbarian named El-in-or.”

  “By Rask of Treve!” she said.

  “To be sure,” I said.

  “What does he know?” she said.

  “What, indeed?” I said.

  “He is only one man!”

  “True,” I said.

  “I am the most beautiful woman on all Gor!” she said.

  “Perhaps your slaves, and courtiers, told you that,” I said.

  “Certainly,” she said.

  “And you believed it?”

  “Am I not the most beautiful woman you have ever seen?” she said.

  “No,” I said, “but you are quite beautiful. In a normal market, you might bring three, perhaps four, silver tarsks.”

  “Others might bring more?” she said.

  “Of course,” I said. “What I think you should understand, is that a woman might be the most beautiful woman in the world to one fellow, and not to another. A woman who is incomparably beautiful to one fellow might not be taken as a free pot girl by another. Perhaps the first fellow senses in her something the others have missed. There are mysteries in these matters. And often a fellow wants not the most beautiful woman, anyway, but the most desirable, the one he wants most, which is not necessarily the same thing. Who knows why one fellow wants one woman in his collar and not another?”

  “You will keep my secret,” she said.

  “For the time being, certainly,” I said.

  “Do others know I am here?” she said.

  “Doubtless some of the high Pani,” I said, “or you would not be here, at all.”

  “Of what value am I to them,” she said, “that I would be here?”

  “I do not know,” I said.

  “Are there others?” she asked.

  “I know of one woman,” I said.

  “What woman?” she said, frightened.

  “You might be surprised,” I said. “Perhaps I shall introduce you later.”

  “And others?” she said.

  “Possibly,” I said. “I do not know.”

  “I am afraid,” she said.

  “Seremides is here,” I said.

  “No!” she wept. “He had me bound at his feet, in the rag of a slave, to bargain with me in Ar!”

  “He does not know you are here,” I said, “though he may suspect it.”

  “Keep him from me!” she begged. “Do not let him know I am here!”

  “He need only look into your kennel,” I said.

  “‘Kennel’?” she said.

  “Surely you know you occupy a slave kennel,” I said.

  “I am helpless,” she moaned.

  “At least,” I said, “the Pani have given you a rather ample tunic.”

  “It is clearly the garment of a slave,” she said.

  “Perhaps it will protect you from the Pani free women,” I said.

  “They look upon me as though I were a beast,” she said.

  “That is all you are,” I said.

  She shook the bars.

  “Are you hungry?” I asked.

  “Very!” she said.

  “Master?” I said.

  “Very, Master,” she said.

  I took a small cake from my pouch, and she eagerly reached for it, but I drew it back. I gathered she was indeed hungry.

  “Hands on the bars,” I said, “face forward, open your mouth.”

  She complied, and I fed her by hand. Slaves may be fed that way. Sometimes they are knelt and their hands bound behind them. Sometimes they must take food and water from pans on the floor, without the use of their hands. Such homely practices are useful in reminding them that they are slaves.

  It pleased me that the former Talena, of Ar, the former Ubara of Ar, was now before me, a kenneled slave. It pleased me that she had kissed and licked my hand, first the palm, and then the back, reverently. That is a common conciliatory act on the part of a slave, to lick and kiss, reverently, the hand by which she might be cuffed, first the palm, and then the back. In this way she might express her fear that she might be, and her hope that she will not be, struck. Commonly, however, this serves as a simple, lovely act of deference, by means of which the slave acknowledges that she is her master’s beast, his owned, domestic animal. A
similar act, perhaps more clearly symbolic, is involved when the slave, kneeling, licks and kisses the master’s whip, held to her lips. Sometimes she must bring it to him in her teeth, on all fours, and then, on all fours, or kneeling, lick and kiss it, as it is held to her lips. In this way she acknowledges that she is subject to him, that she is his slave, his property. It pleased me, too, of course, that the former Ubara had fed from my hand. The hand-feeding of a slave, she not permitted the use of her hands, is, too, an act rich in symbolism. In this way it is signified that the slave is wholly dependent on the master, even for her food, and that it will be granted to her, if it is, only when, and as, he pleases. Domestic beasts, of course, are often fed by hand.

  “Master well knows how to teach a girl her collar,” she said.

  “I know of someone whom you might be interested in meeting,” I said.

  “Not Seremides!” she said.

  “No,” I said, “a woman.”

  “Does she know me?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “And she is here?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who is she?”

  “I will introduce you,” I said. “I think you will be surprised.”

  “Who is she?” she said.

  “An old friend,” I said.

  “Who,” she said, “who?”

  I then turned away, leaving the slave, Adraste, in the kennel.

  “Slave! Slave!” had said Alcinoe.

  “Slave, slave!” had cried Adraste.

  “Is this any way for old friends to greet one another?” I asked.

  “How is it that you are here?” asked Alcinoe.

  “I do not know,” said Adraste.

  “What happened on the roof of the Central Cylinder?” asked Alcinoe.

  “I do not know,” said Adraste, “but you failed to sell me for your freedom in Ar!”

  “You looked well on your knees, at the feet of Seremides,” she said, “bound, helpless, waiting, in the rag of a slave!”

  “You betrayed me!” said Adraste.

  “You betrayed all of us, and Ar!” said Alcinoe.

  “Do not pretend fidelity to the Home Stone,” said Adraste. “You were eager, and much with me, each hort of the way! We were arch traitresses, we two, so vain and proud, so ambitious, so ruthless, each abetting and urging on the other. You would line your purse with gold and your station with power! No opportunity for wealth, for influence, for self-aggrandizement was neglected! We glorified our offices and despoiled the city, ruined our enemies and enriched our favorites, our pets and hirelings!”