Hunters of Gor

by John Norman

  "You have well earned your freedom, wench," said Turus.

  "Oh!" she cried.

  He had reached into her garment and removed his amethyst-studded bracelet from where she had slipped it.

  She looked at him, offended.

  Then she laughed. "Your purse!" she cried. She flung it to him, and sped down the beach laughing, toward the longboat that would take us back to the Tesephone.

  He pursued her for a moment, bent down to pick up a rock and sailed it after her. It stung her, smartly, below the small of the back, on the left side. She turned about, tears in her eyes.

  "I shall see you in Port Kar!" he cried.

  "Yes," she said, "you beast! You will! You will!"

  He took a step toward her, and she stumbled away, and fell against the longboat, and then climbed into it, laughing, watching him. "I'm free!" she called. "Tina is free!"

  He ran suddenly toward her and she tried to scramble away, climbing over the thwarts, but he caught her by the scruff of the tunic and pulled her under the water. He dragged her, holding her by the hair under water until he came to the beach. Then, she gasping, soaked, he wet from the chest down, he threw her to the sand. I saw them fall to kissing and touching. No longer did the little thief reach for his purse or his wristlet. Her garment beneath her in the wet sand, she reached now for his lips, his head and body, touching him and crying out.

  There was laughter from my men, and those of Marlenus. I expected that little Tina and handsome, young Turus would see much of one another in Port Kar, jewel of gleaming Thassa. I saw her small body leaping helplessly to his touch.

  "I love you," she cried.

  "I love you," said he. "I love you, sweet wench!"

  "This woman," said Marlenus of Ar, "I want." He indicated Mira, on her knees, wrists bound behind her body, kneeling in the sand.

  "Please, Master," she said to me. "Do not give me to him!"

  "She betrayed me," said Marlenus of Ar. "I will have her, too." Hura lay, unmoving, her eyes dry, her body still twisted in the sand.

  "Very well," I said to Marlenus. "I give her to you."

  Marlenus took her by the hair and threw her, too, to the sand beside Hura.

  Both of the women lay at his feet. Both would march nude, chained to the stirrup of his tharlarion, in his triumph in Ar. Both would later, in silks and bells, barefoot, in bangles and slave rouge, serve him in his pleasure gardens. Dancing for him, pouring him wine, serving his pleasure, perhaps together, both would much please him. Hura and Mira were lovely souvenirs of the northern forests, fitting mementos for the great Ubar; they were tokens of his victories, reminders of his success; their captive bodies would be found by him doubtless, when he looked upon them, rich in meaning as well as in pleasure. I could imagine him, drinking, pointing to one, telling his companions the story of the northern forests. "Now dance, Beauties!" he would cry, and they would, slaves, leap to their feet to please his companions. I wondered if, in the telling of that story, there would be mention of one called Bosk of Port Kar.

  I did not think so. My part did not sufficiently honor the great Ubar, Marlenus of Ar.

  He was always victorious.

  I could not move the fingers of my left hand. The wind, sweeping across the beach, was cold.

  "These men," said Marlenus, indicating Sarus, and his ten men, chained, "are to be returned to Ar, for public impalement."

  "No," said I.

  There was utter silence.

  "They are my prisoners," I said. "It was I who took them, I and my men."

  "I want them," said Marlenus of Ar.

  "No," I said.

  "Let them be impaled on the walls of Ar," said Marlenus. "Let that be the answer of Ar to Chenbar of Tyros!"

  "The answer," said I, "is not Ar's to give. It is mine."

  He looked at me for a long time. "Very well," he said. "The answer is yours."

  I looked at Sarus. He looked at me, chained, haggard, puzzled.

  He had been through much, as I had. We had lost, both Sarus and I.

  "Free them," I said.

  "No!" cried Marlenus.

  Sarus and his men were stunned.

  "Return to them their weapons," I said. "And give them medicine and food. The journey they have before them is dangerous and long. Help them prepare stretchers for their wounded."

  "No!" cried Marlenus.

  I turned to Sarus. "Follow the coast south," I said. "Be wary of exchange points."

  "I shall," he said.

  "No!" cried Marlenus.

  His men shouted angrily. My men shifted uneasily. I heard blades move in scabbards.

  "No!" said Marlenus.

  There was silence.

  We stood, the two groups of men on the beach. Sheera was beside me. Hura's women, bound, shrank back. Hura and Mira, secured, lay frightened on the sand. My men, even those who had had Verna's women in their arms, came forward. The women, hair loose, the slave silk wet and covered by sand, earrings in their ears, followed them, standing behind them.

  Marlenus looked about, from face to face.

  Our eyes met.

  "Free them," said Marlenus.

  The chains were removed from Sarus and his men. Two stretchers were improvised. They were given supplies, and medicine.

  "Give back to Sarus his own sword," said I.

  It was done.

  Their weapons, too, were returned to the other men.

  Sarus stood before me.

  "You have lost, Sarus," said I.

  He looked at me. "We have both lost," said he.

  "Go," I said.

  He turned and left, followed by his men, two of them carried by others, lying on the stretchers. We observed them departing, southward, down the long, curved stony beach.

  They did not look back.

  "Take down the stockade," said Marlenus to his men.

  They did so, leaving the logs strewn on the beach. They then returned to his side.

  "We will depart," said Marlenus.

  Then the Ubar turned and regarded me. He was not pleased.

  Our eyes met.

  "Do not seek to come to the city of Ar," said he.

  I was silent. I had no wish to speak to him.

  "Do not come to Ar," said he.

  Then he, with his men, and slaves, Hura and Mira now added to his coffle, departed. They entered the forests. He would return to his camp north of Laura, where his tarns waited. He would thence return to Ar, Hura doubtless bound nude across his saddle.

  I watched them leave.

  His head, nor the heads of his men, did not wear the degradation stripe. He would bring with him as slave Hura and Mira, panther girl leaders, who had sought to accomplish dishonor upon him. Several of their women, too, nude and chained, would grace his triumph as lovely slaves. The men of Tyros, who had sought his capture, were mostly dead or to be sold as slaves. Even their ship was prize, the possession of which he had not disputed with one called Bosk of Port Kar, who had aided him. He had come to the forest to capture Verna and free the woman Talena. He had succeeded in the first objective but had magnanimously, after first forcing her to serve him as a helpless, obedient slave girl, after sexually conquering her, freed her. It was a gesture, was it not, worthy of a Ubar? As for the second objective, the freeing of the woman Talena, that was no longer important to him, no longer a worthy aim of a Ubar's act. She had begged to be purchased, thus showing that the collar she wore truly belonged on her throat. To beg to be purchased acknowledges that one may be purchased, that one is property, that one is slave. He had repudiated her. He had disowned her as his daughter. If it were convenient for him now to free her, merely as an ex-citizen of Ar, he might do so, but he was not concerned in the matter. He had not even asked Verna her location. And Verna, Gorean to the core, had not dishonored him by imparting such information. Had she done so her act would have constituted a demeaning insinuation, that he, a free man, a Ubar even, might have an interest in the fate of a slave. Verna respected Marl
enus, doubtless more than any other man on Gor. She would not do him insult. She would, however, I had little doubt, send the two women who guarded Talena to his camp north of Laura, with their prisoner, to see if he, as a free man merely, might be interested in the purchase of a slave. He might then, without show of concern, without solicitude, do what he wished.

  She would have, thus, protected the honor of the Ubar.

  Marlenus and his men disappeared into the forest.

  I looked at the uprooted, strewn logs of the palisade, scattered on the stones by Marlenus' men. "Thurnock," I said, "gather these logs, those from the stockade, and with them build a beacon."

  He looked at me. His eyes were sad. "There will be none to see it," he said, "but I will build it. I will build a beacon the light of which will be seen fifty pasangs at sea."

  I did not know why I would build such a beacon. There would be few to see it on Gor. And none, ever, would see it on the planet Earth. And if some should see it, who should understand it? I myself did not know why I built it or what its flames might mean.

  I turned to Sheera.

  "You did well in the stockade," I said. "You are free."

  I had already, the night preceding, on the Tesephone, freed Vinca, the red-haired girl, and the two paga slaves, the dark-haired one, and the blond one, who had assisted her.

  They would be given gold, and conducted in honor and safety to their cities.

  "Very well," she said. There were tears in her eyes. She had known I would free her.

  "A cripple," I said, "has no need of a beautiful slave."

  She kissed my arm. "I care for you," she said, "sweet Bosk of Port Kar."

  "Is it your wish to remain with me?" I asked.

  She shook her head. "No," she smiled.

  I nodded.

  "No, sweet Bosk," she said. "It is not because you are crippled."

  I looked at her, puzzled.

  "Men," she laughed, "understand so little." She put down her head. "Men are fools," she said, "and women are greater fools, for they love them."

  "Remain with me then," I said.

  "It was not my name you cried out," she said, tears in her eyes, "when you lay in fever in the cabin of the Tesephone."

  I looked out to sea.

  "I wish you well, sweet Bosk of Port Kar," said she.

  "I wish you well, Sheera," said I. I felt her kiss my hand, and then she went to Thurnock, that he might remove her collar, that she, like Verna, might disappear into the forest. Marlenus had said that the wind on the beach was cold, and had stung his eyes. Too, it stung my eyes.

  "Rim," said I.

  "Captain," said he.

  "You are captain of the Rhoda," I said. "Weigh anchor with the tide."

  "I will, Captain," said he.

  "You know what you are to do?" I asked.

  "Yes," said he. "I will sell those in the hold, the men of Tyros who crewed the Rhoda and Tesephone, in Port Kar."

  "Is there nothing else?" I asked.

  He grinned. "Yes," said he. "We shall, first, journey up the Laurius to Laura. We will have business with one named Hesius of Laura, who sent paga slaves and drugged wine to our camp. I shall burn the tavern. His women will find themselves in our chains. We shall bring them to Port Kar and dispose of them there in the slave markets."

  "Good," I said.

  "And Hesius himself?" he asked.

  "His strong box," I said, "must be seized. Distribute its contents to the poor of Laura."

  "And Hesius himself?" asked Rim.

  "Strip him and leave him poor and penniless in Laura," I said. "He will serve our purposes well in telling and retelling, for a coin, the story of the vengeance of those of Port Kar."

  "Our ships should be safe thereafter in Laura," said Rim.

  "I expect so," I said.

  "I must attend to arrangements," said Rim.

  "Be about your duties," said I, "Captain."

  Rim, followed by Cara, turned about and went to a longboat.

  Verna's women, one by one, were now taking leave of those of my men, whom they had served.

  They, some weeping, some turning about, tears in their eyes, lifting their hands, bade crewmen farewell.

  The men stood on the sand and watched them depart. Some lifted their hands to them.

  Then suddenly one girl turned from the forest and fled to a crewman, kneeling before him, back on her heels, head down, arms extended, wrists crossed as though for binding. He gestured that she should rise and get into a longboat. She did so, his slave.

  To my amazement, one after another of the girls then ran down the beach. Each, before he who had touched her, knelt, submitting herself.

  Last to run down the beach was Rena, whom I had once touched long ago, in Marlenus' camp. She had hesitated, agonized, and then, crying out, had fled to the one who had touched her. I saw her, in the wet silk, her hair unbound, kneel before him, making herself his and his alone.

  She, too, was ordered to a longboat, abruptly, as one commands a slave.

  In the forest Verna would wait for her women, until she understood that they were not coming.

  I then understood her wisdom as I had not before. She had known the touch of a man, and such a man as Marlenus. She had feared his touch, and, even in parting, would not permit him to so much as place his hand on hers. In Verna, as in others, two natures warred, that to surrender and that to be free. These matters are complex, and much remains speculative. Goreans, in their simplistic fashion, often contend, categorically, that man is naturally free and woman is naturally slave. But even for them the issues are more complex than these simple formulations would suggest. For example, there is no higher person, nor one more respected, than the Gorean free woman. Even a slaver who has captured a free woman often treats her with great solicitude until she is branded. Then his behavior toward her is immediately and utterly transformed. She is then merely an animal, and is treated as such. Goreans do believe, however, that every woman has a natural master or set of masters, with respect to whom she could not help but be a complete and passionate slave girl. These men occur in her dreams and fantasies. She lives in terror that she might meet one in real life. Further, of course, if a girl should be enslaved, her slavery is supported by the entire Gorean culture. There are hundreds of thousands of women who are also slaves. In such a situation, with no escape, a girl has no choice but to make the best of her bondage. Further, in the Gorean view, female slavery is a societal institution which enables the female, as most Earth societies would not, to exhibit, in a reinforcing environment, her biological nature. It provides a rich soil in which the flower of her beauty and nature, and its submission to a man, may thrive.

  The Goreans do not believe, incidentally, that the human being is a simple function of the independent variables of his environment. They have never endorsed the "hollow body" theory of human beings, in which a human being is regarded as being essentially a product of externalities. They recognize the human being has a genetic endowment which may not be, scientifically, canceled out in favor of the predilection of theories developed by men incompetent in physiology. For example, it would not occur to a Gorean to speak of the "role" of a female sparrow feeding her young or the "role" of a lion in providing meat for its cubs. Goreans do not see the world in terms of metaphors taken from the artificialities of the theater. It is certain, of course, that certain genetic endowments have been selected for by environmental considerations, and, in this sense, the environment is a significant factor. The teeth of the lion have had much to do with the fleetness of the antelopes.

  In Gorean thinking man and woman are natural animals, with genetic endowments shaped by thousands of generations of natural and sexual selection. Their actions and behavior, thus, though not independent of certain long-range environmental and sexual relationships, cannot be understood in terms of mere responses to the immediately present environment. The immediate environment determines what behavior will be successful, not what behavior is performed.
Woman, like man, is the product of evolution, and, like man, is a complex genetic product, a product not only of natural selections but sexual selections. Natural selections suggest that a woman who wished to belong to a man, who wished to remain with him, who wished to have children, who wished to care for them, who loved them, would have an advantage, in the long run, as far as her genetic type was concerned, of surviving, over a woman who did not care for men, who did not wish children, and so on. Female freedom, of a full sort, would not have been biologically practical. The loving mother is a type favored by evolution. It is natural then that in modern women certain instincts should be felt. The sparrow does not feed her young because the society has fooled her into playing that exploitative role. Similarly, sexual selection, as well as natural selection, is a significant dynamic of evolution, without which it is less comprehensible. Men, being stronger, have had, generally, the option of deciding on women that please them. If women had been stronger, as in the spiders, for example, we might have a different race.

  It is not unlikely that men, over the generations, have selected out for breeding, for marriage, women of certain sorts. Doubtless women are much more beautiful now than a hundred generations ago. Similarly a woman who was particularly ugly, threatening, vicious, stupid, cruel, etc., would not be a desirable mate. No man can be blamed for not wishing to make his life miserable. Accordingly, statistically, he tends to select out women who are intelligent, loving and beautiful. Accordingly, men have, in effect, bred a certain kind of woman. Similarly, of course, in so far as choice has been theirs, women have tended to select out men who are, among other things intelligent, energetic and strong. Few women, in their hearts, despite propaganda, really desire weak, feminine men. Such men, at any rate, are not those who figure in their sexual fantasies.

  Goreans believe it is the nature of a man to own, that of a woman to be owned.

  I observed Verna's women, no longer hers, but now the slaves of their masters, in the longboats.

  Verna had given them their choice, had indeed forced the choice upon them.

  I wondered if, in the forest, she had expected any of them to return to her. She had had them clad in slave silk. She had had earrings put in their ears.