"I can communicate with her, if you wish," I told Samos.
He nodded.
"I speak English," I informed her, speaking in that intricate, beautiful tongue.
She seemed startled. Then she cried out, angrily, pulling downward at the edges of the livery in which she had been placed, as though that would hide more of her legs, which were lovely. "I do not care to be dressed like this," she said. She pulled away, angrily, from the guard, and stood before us. "I have not even been given shoes," she said. "And what is the meaning of this?" she demanded, pulling at a plain ring of iron which had been hammered about her throat. Her throat was slender, and white, and lovely.
Samos handed the hair ribbon to a guardsman, gesturing to the girl. "Put it on," he said to her, in Gorean.
I repeated his command, in English.
"When am I to be permitted to leave?" she asked.
Seeing the eyes of Samos she angrily took the ribbon, and winding it about her head, fastened back her hair. She blushed, angrily, hotly, knowing that, as she lifted her hands gracefully to her hair, she raised the lovely line of her breasts, little concealed in the thin livery. Then she stood before us, angrily, the ribbon in her hair.
"Thus it was she came to us," said Samos, "save that she was clad in inexplicable, barbarous garments." He gestured to a guardsman, who fetched and spilled open a bundle of garments on the edge of the table. I saw that there were pants of some bluish, denim-type material, and a flannel, long-sleeved shirt. There was also a white, light shirt, short-sleeved. Had I not realized them to have been hers, I would have assumed them the clothing of an Earth male. They were male-imitation clothing.
The girl tried to step forward but the shafts of two spears, wielded by her flanking guardsmen, barred her way.
There was also a pair of shoes, plain, brown and low, with darker-brown laces. They were cut on a masculine line, but were too small for a man. I looked at her feet. They were small and feminine. Her breasts, too, and hips, suggested that she was a female, and a rather lovely one. Slave livery makes it difficult for a girl to conceal her sex.
There was also a pair of colored socks, dark blue. They were short.
She again tried to step forward but this time the points of the guards' spears prevented her. They pressed at her abdomen, beneath the navel. Rep-cloth, commonly used in slave livery, is easily parted. The points of the spears had gone through the cloth, and she felt them in her flesh. She stepped back, for a moment frightened and disconcerted. Then she regained her composure, and stood before us.
"This garment is too short," she said. "It is scandalous!"
"It is feminine," I told her. "Not unlike these," I said. I indicated the brassiere, the brief silken panties, which completed the group of garments on the table.
She blushed redly.
"Though you imitated a man outwardly," I said to her, "I note that it was such garments you wore next to your flesh."
"I don't know what you're talking about," she said.
"Here," I said, "You wear one garment, which is feminine, and where it may be seen, proclaiming your femininity, and you are permitted no other garments."
"Return my clothing to me," she demanded.
Samos gestured to a guardsman, and he tied up the bundle of clothing, leaving it on the table.
"You see," said Samos, "how she was."
He meant, of course, the ribbon in her hair. She stood very straight. For some reason it is almost impossible for a woman not to stand beautifully when she wears slave livery and is in the sight of men.
"Give me the ribbon," said Samos. He spoke in Gorean, but I needed not translate. He held out his hand. She, lifting her arms, blushing, angrily, again touched the ribbon. She freed it of her hair and handed it to a guard, who delivered it to Samos. I saw the guards' eyes on her. I smiled. They could hardly wait to get her to the pens. She, still a foolish Earth girl, did not even notice this.
"Bring your spear," said Samos to a guard. A guard, one who stood behind, gave his spear to Samos.
"It is, of course, a scytale," I said.
"Yes," said Samos, "and the message is in clear Gorean."
He had told me what the message was, and we had discussed it earlier. I was curious, however, to see it wrapped about the shaft of the spear. Originally, in its preparation, the message ribbon is wrapped diagonally, neatly, edges touching, about a cylinder, such as the staff of a marshal's office, the shaft of a spear, a previously prepared object, or so on, and then the message is written in lines parallel with the cylinder. The message, easily printed, easily read, thus lies across several of the divisions in the wrapped silk. When the silk is unwrapped, of course, the message disappears into a welter of scattered lines, the bits and parts of letters; the coherent message is replaced with a ribbon marked only by meaningless, unintelligible scraps of letters; to read the message, of course, one need only rewrap the ribbon about a cylindrical object of the same dimension as the original object. The message then appears in its clear, legible character. Whereas there is some security in the necessity for rewrapping the message about a cylinder of the original dimension, the primary security does not lie there. After all, once one recognizes a ribbon, or belt, or strip of cloth, as a scytale, it is then only a matter of time until one finds a suitable object to facilitate the acquisition of the message. Indeed, one may use a roll of paper or parchment until, rolling it more tightly or more loosely, as needed, one discovers the message. The security of the message, as is often the case, is a function not of the opacity of the message, in itself, but rather in its concealment, in its not being recognized as a message. A casual individual would never expect that the seemingly incoherent design on a girl's ribbon would conceal a message which might be significant, or fateful.
From the girl's reactions I gathered that she understood now that the ribbon bore some message, but that she had not clearly understood this before.
"It is a message?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
"What does it say?" she asked.
"It is none of your concern," I said.
"I want to know," she said.
"Do you wish to be beaten?" I asked.
"No," she said.
"Then be silent," I said.
She was silent. Her fists were clenched.
I read the message. "Greetings to Tarl Cabot, I await you at the world's end. Zarendargar. War General of the People."
"It is Half-Ear," said Samos, "high Kur, war general of the Kurii."
"The word `Zarendargar'," I said, "is an attempt to render a Kur expression into Gorean."
"Yes," said Samos. The Kurii are not men but beasts. Their phonemes for the most part elude representation in the alphabets of men. It would be like trying to write down the noises of animals. Our letters would not suffice.
"Return me to Earth!" demanded the girl.
"Is she still a virgin?" I asked Samos.
"Yes," he said. "She has not even been branded."
"With what brand will you mark her?" I asked.
"The common Kajira brand," he said.
"What are you talking about?" she demanded. "Give me my clothing," she demanded angrily.
Again the points of the two spears pressed against her abdomen. Again they penetrated the loosely woven cloth. Again she stepped back, for the moment disconcerted.
I gathered that she had been accustomed to having her demands met by men.
When a woman speaks in that tone of voice to a man of Earth he generally hastens to do her bidding. He has been conditioned so. Here, however, her proven Earth techniques seemed ineffectual, and this puzzled her, and angered her, and, I think, to an extent frightened her. What if men did not do her bidding? She was smaller and weaker, and beautiful, and desirable. What if she discovered that it were she, and not they, who must do now what was bidden, and with perfection? A woman who spoke in that tone to a Gorean man, if she were not a free woman, would find herself instantly whipped to his feet.
T
hen she was again the woman of Earth, though clad in Gorean slave livery.
"Return me to Earth," she said.
"Take her below to the pens," said Samos, "and sell her off."
"What did he say!" she demanded.
"Is she to be branded?" asked the guard.
"Yes," said Samos, "the common brand."
"What did he say!" she cried. Each of the two guards flanking her had now taken her by an arm. She looked very small between them. I thought the common Kajira mark would be exquisite in her thigh.
"Left thigh," I suggested.
"Yes, left thigh," said Samos to one of the guards. I liked the left-thigh branded girl. A right-handed master may caress it while he holds her in his left arm.
"Give me back my clothing!" she cried.
Samos glanced at the bundle of clothing. "Burn this," he said.
The girl watched, horrified, as one of the guardsmen took the clothing and, piece by piece, threw it into a wide copper bowl of burning coals. "No!" she cried. "No!"
The two guards then held her arms tightly and prepared in conduct her to the pens.
She looked with horror at the burnt remnants, the ashes, of her clothing.
She now wore only what Gorean men had given her, a scrap of slave livery, and a ring hammered about her neck.
She threw her head about, moving the ring. For the first time she seemed truly aware of it.
She looked at me, terrified. The guards' hands were on her upper arms. Their hands were tight.
"What are they going to do!" she cried.
"You are to be taken to the pens," I said.
"The pens!" she asked.
"There," I said, "you will be stripped and branded."
"Branded?" she said. I do not think she understood me. Her Earth mind would find this hard to understand. She was not yet cognizant of Gorean realities. She would learn them swiftly. No choice would be given her.
"Is she to be sold red-silk?" I asked Samos.
He looked at the girl. "Yes," he said. The guards grinned. It would be a girl who knew herself as a woman when she ascended the block.
"I thought you said I would be stripped and branded," she said, laughing.
"Yes," I said, "that is precisely what I said."
"No!" she screamed. "No!"
"Then," I said, "you will be raped, and taught your womanhood. When you have learned your womanhood, you will be caged. Later you will be sold."
"No!" she cried. "No!"
"Take her away," said Samos.
The guards' hands tightened even more on the beauty's arms. She might as well have been bound in steel. She must go as they conducted her. "Wait! Wait!" she cried. She struggled, squirming in their grasp, her feet slipping on the tiles. Samos motioned that they wait, momentarily. She looked at me, and at Samos, wildly. "What place is this?" she asked.
"It is called Gor," I told her.
"No!" she said. "That is only in stories!"
I smiled.
"No!" she cried. She looked about herself, at the strong men who held her. She threw her head back, moaning, sensing the ring on her throat. "No, no!" she wept. "I do not want to be a woman on Gor! Anything but a woman on Gor!"
I shrugged.
"You are joking," she said, wildly.
"No," I said.
"What language is it here which they speak?" she asked.
I smiled.
"Gorean," she said.
"Yes," I said.
"And I must learn it quickly?" she said.
"Yes," I said. "You must learn it quickly, or be slain. Gorean men are not patient"
"-Gorean," she said.
"It is the language of your masters," I said.
"-Of my masters?" she asked.
"Yes," I said. "Surely you know that you are a slave girl."
"No!" she cried. "No! No! No! No!"
"Take her away," said Samos.
The girl was dragged, screaming and sobbing, from our presence, to the pens.
How feminine she seemed then. No longer did she seem an imitation male. She was then only what she was, a slave girl being taken to the pens.
Samos, thoughtfully, began to unwind the long ribbon, that which the girl had worn, and which formed the scytale, from the spear's shaft.
We heard her screaming down the corridor, and then she cried out in pain, and was silent. The guards, wearied by her outcries, had simply cuffed her to silence. Sometimes a girl is permitted to scream. Sometimes she is not It depends on the will of the man. When she is branded a girl is commonly permitted to scream, at least for a time. But we would not hear that screaming, for, when it was done, she would be below, and far away, in the pens.
I dismissed her from my mind, for she was a slave. Her history as a free woman had terminated; her history as an imbonded beauty had begun.
Samos, the ribbon freed from the spear's shaft, the spear retrieved by the guardsman, looked down at the table, at the ribbon, which now seemed only a ribbon, with meaningless marks.
"Greetings to Tarl Cabot," I said, recalling the message. "I await you at the world's end. Zarendargar. War General of the People."
"Arrogant beasts," he said.
I shrugged.
"We had no clue," he said. "Now we have this." He lifted the ribbon, angrily. "Here is an explicit message."
"It seems so," I said.
We did not know where lay the world's end, but we knew where It must be sought. The world's end was said to lie beyond Cos and Tyros, at the end of Thassa, at the world's edge. No man had sailed to the world's end and returned. It was not known what had occurred there. Some said that Thassa was endless, and there was no world's end, only the green waters extending forever, gleaming, beckoning the mariner and hero onward, onward until men, one by one, had perished and the lonely ships, their steering oars lashed in place, pursued the voyage in silence, until the timbers rotted and one day, perhaps centuries later, the brave wood, warm in the sun, sank beneath the sea.
"The ship is ready," said Samos, looking at me.
Others said, in stories reminiscent of Earth, and which had doubtless there had their origin, that the world's end was protected by clashing rocks and monsters, and by mountains that could pull the nails from ships. Others said, similarly, that the end of the world was sheer, and that a ship might there plunge over the edge, to fall tumbling for days through emptiness until fierce winds broke it apart and the wreckage was lifted up to the bottom of the sea. In the maelstroms south and west of Tyros shattered planking was sometimes found. It was said that some of this was from ships which had sought the world's end.
"The ship is ready," said Samos, looking at me.
A ship had been prepared, set to sail to the world's end. It had been built by Tersites, the half-blind, mad shipwright, long scorned on Gor. Samos regarded him a genius. I knew him for a madman; whether he might be, too, a genius, I did not know. It was an unusual ship. It was deep-keeled and square-rigged, as most Gorean ships are not. Though it was a ramship it carried a foremast. It possessed great oars, which must be handled by several men, rather than one man to an oar. Instead of two side-hung rudders, or oars, it carried a single oar, slung at the vessel's sternpost. Its ram was carried high, out of the water. It would make its strike not below, but at the waterline. It was a laughing stock in the arsenal at Port Kar, but Tersites paid his critics no attention. He worked assiduously, eating little, sleeping at the side of the ship, supervising each small detail in the great structure. It was said the deep keel would slow the ship; that the two masts would take too long to remove in the case of naval combat; that so large an oar would constitute an impractical lever, that it could not be grasped by a man, that the oarsmen could not all sit during the stroke, that if more than one man controlled an oar some would shirk their work. Why one rudder rather than two? With lateen rigging one could sail closer to the wind. Of what use is a ram which makes its strikes so high?
I was not a shipwright, but I was a captain. It seemed to me s
uch a ship would be too heavy to manage well, that it would be clumsy and slow, that it might be better fitted to cargo service when protected in a convoy than entrusted to confront, elude or brave the lean, lateen-rigged wolves of gleaming Thassa, hungry for the cargoes of the ineffectual and weak. Were I to hunt the world's end I would prefer to do so with the Dorna or the Tesephone, a sleep ship whose moods and gifts I well knew.
Yet the ship of Tersites was strong. It loomed high and awesome, mighty with its strakes, proud with its uprearing prow, facing the sea canal. Standing beside the ship, on the ground, looking up at that high prow, so far above me, it seemed sometime that such a ship, if any, might embark upon that threatening, perhaps impossible voyage to the ,world's end. Tersites had chosen to build the ship in such a way that its prow faced west; it pointed thus not only to the sea canal; it pointed also between Cos and Tyros; it pointed toward the world's end.
John Norman - Counter Earth12 Page 3
