"I know," she said. "Imnak taught it to me."
"You now know two Gorean sayings," I said.
"Yes," she said. "`Only a fool buys a woman clothed' and `Curisoity is not becoming in a Kajira."'
"Yes," I said.
"Please, Master," she said.
"You have them down well," I said.
"Oh, please, please, Master," she begged.
It was natural that she should be desperately eager to learn the nature of a slave girl's lot.
"Perhaps," I said.
"Oh, thank you, thank you, Master," she said.
"What would you like to know?" I asked.
She was at my side, on her stomach and elbows. Her eyes were excited. "In the south," she asked, "would a master put me in a collar?"
"It is quite likely," I said.
"I might like a pretty collar," she said.
"Do not think of the collar as a simple piece of jewelry," I said, "though it can serve that purpose. Its primary objective is to identify he to whom you belong."
"What if I take it off?" she asked.
"It locks on your throat. You cannot take it off," I said.
"Oh," she said. She looked at me. "Will I be given pretty things to wear," she asked, "and cosmetics, perfumes?"
"It is quite likely," I said. "Masters like their girls to make themselves beautiful."
"I hope that I will please my master in the furs," she said.
"You will do so or be lengthily and severely punished," I said. "If you fail, you could even be slain,"
She shuddered. "I will try to be pleasing to him," she said.
"Most masters," I said, "own only one girl. Do not think you are likely to spend all your time squirming at the slave ring."
"I do not understand," she said.
"There is much for a girl to do," I pointed out. "She keeps his compartments. She dusts and cleans. When they do not use the public kitchens she must cook for him. If he does not wish to take advantage of the public laundries, she must do his washing and ironing. She shops for him, and bargains in the markets, and so on. There is much for her to do."
"Does it take long to clean compartments?" she asked.
"Only a few moments," I admitted. "Goreans live simply, and do not much approve of cumbersome furniture."
"It does not sound to me like the slave girl is overburdened with domestic labors," she said.
"I suppose, objectively, she is not," I said. "Still, there are things for her to do."
"Is she as occupied as the wife of Earth?" asked the girl.
"Of course not," I said. "That would be foolish. The wife of Earth is, from the Gorean point of view, much overworked. When the husband returns home she is often, actually, engaged in labors. How can she greet him properly? At night, so numerous and excessive have been her labors, she is often exhausted. That would be preposterous from the Gorean point of view. The Gorean master does not buy a girl with the primary objective of obtaining a domestic servant but with the intention of acquiring a marvelous slave. He wants the girl to be a wonder to him. He is quite cheerful about the sacrifice of domestic servitude in order to obtain what is far more important to him. When he returns to his compartments he does not want to find a worn chore woman there but a lovely slave, fresh, vital, eager and fully alive, kneeling before him, waiting to be commanded."
"What does the girl do in her free time?" asked Audrey.
"Much what she pleases," I said. "She will have friends among other slaves. She walks, she visits. She exercises, she reads. Within limits she does what she wants to do."
"Can she work outside the compartments?" asked Audrey.
"If it is permitted by the master," I said, "and it does not in any way compromise her slavery." I smiled. "Some women," I said, "wear to their work the garments of a free woman but, when they return to their compartments, don as they must the silk of a slave, which is their true condition."
"Is such a thing often permitted by a master?" asked Audrey.
"Commonly not," I said. "Such a thing is often thought to compromise a girl's slavery. It is usually not permitted to her. Usually she is kept as full and absolute slave, not so much as permitted to touch the garment of a free woman."
"I would like my master to be like that," said Audrey.
"Most masters are," I said.
"If I am a slave, I would want to be a full slave," she said.
"I think you have little to fear, pretty Audrey," I said. "Any master who so much as looks at you would know that you should be kept only as a full slave."
"Yes," she said, kissing me, "that is right for me."
"Sometimes, Masters, as a discipline, rent their girls out to employers to perform repetitious, trivial tasks."
"How horrid," she said.
"See that you please your master well," I said.
"I will certainly try," she said.
"There are, of course, many slaveries in the south," I said. "I have described only the most common to you."
"Tell me of others," she begged. "For I might be sold into them."
"There are paga slaves," I said, "who must please their master's customers in his tavern. There are the girls who staff the public kitchens and laundries. There are rent slaves, who may be rented to anyone for any purpose, short of their injury or mutilation, unless compensation be rendered to the master. There are state slaves who maintain public compartments, and work in offices and warehouses. There are girls in peasant villages, and girls on great farms, who cook and carry water to the slave gangs. There are beauties who are purchased for a man's pleasure gardens. There are other girls who work in the mills, chained to their looms."
She looked at me, frightened.
"Any of these slaveries, or any of many others," I said, "could be yours. It depends entirely, pretty Audrey, on who buys you, and what he wants."
"How helpless I feel," she whispered.
"You are helpless, absolutely helpless," I told her.
"Surely," she whispered, "I can attempt to influence the nature of my slavery."
"Of course," I said. "But the decision is never yours. In that sense you are absolutely helpless."
"Yes, Master," she said, trembling.
"The mills and the public kitchens, and such, are not pleasant." I said.
"I do not want to go to such slaveries as the mills or public kitchens," she said. "I will try to be a pleasing slave."
"Excellent, Audrey, Slave Girl," I said.
"Do masters much talk with their girls, or take them with them?" she asked.
"Certainly," I said. "It is extremely pleasurable to talk with a girl one owns. Also, one takes her many places, she heeling him, to concerts, contests, song dramas and so on, both to show her off and because he finds her a joy to be with."
"I think I could well serve such a master," she said.
"You would," I said, "or you, being a slave, would be promptly and efficiently disciplined, most likely whipped."
"Whipped?" she asked. "Could such a man whip a girl?"
"Of course," I said. "Do not think that the pleasure he finds in you will be permitted in the least to compromise his mastery of you."
"I would thrill to be owned by such a man," she said.
I smiled to myself. Girls sometimes fought one another viciously, merely to be the first to display themselves naked before a Gorean master.
I lay there on my back.
"Master," she said.
"Yes," I said.
"The others, soon, will be awake," she said.
"Yes?" I said.
"Please, Master," she said. "Once more, before they awaken, have your slave."
"Have you?" I asked.
"Yes, have me," she whispered.
"Does Audrey beg?" I asked.
"Yes, Master," she said.
"How shall I have you?" I asked. "Gently, tenderly, politely, courteously, respectfully, accomodatingly, solicitously, as would a man of Earth?"
"No, no," she begged. "Take me
as what I am, a slave!"
I touched her, gently, timidly.
"Oh!" she cried, miserably. "No, that is like a man of Earth! How cruel you are! Do not insult the helpless womanhood of a poor slave. Do not play with my needs as a man of Earth, oh, Master; fulfill them as a man of Gor! I beg it of you, Master."
I laughed.
"You teased a slave," she said, reproachfully. "How helpless I am as a slave."
"Spread your legs, Slave," I said.
"Yes, Master," she said. "My Gorean master has spoken," she said.
"Wider," I said.
"Yes, Master," she said.
She watched my hand. Her teeth were clenched. Her eyes were wide.
"Aiii!" she started to cry, but my left hand closed her mouth. She squirmed helplessly. Her thighs were clenched on my hand. She looked at me, over my hand on her mouth.
"You are a pretty slave," I told her.
With my knee I thrust apart her legs.
Then her body clasped me. Her eyes were closed. I removed my hand from her mouth. She opened her eyes. "Thank you," she whispered, "for covering my mouth, that I not be heard to scream."
"You did not wish to awaken the others," I said.
"I could not bear to have them know how I yielded to you," she whispered. "It would be humiliating."
"It is nearly time for them to awaken," I said.
"Master?" she asked. "Master, no!" she cried. "What are you doing?"
"I am going to induce in you," I said, "the first of your slave orgasms."
"No," she wept. "Please, no! There are others in the tent! I do not want the other girls to know what a slave I am! Please, no, Master!"
But I did not choose to show her mercy.
"Cover my mouth!" she begged. "Oh, oh!"
I held her arms pinned to her sides. Then she half reared up under me, squirming and struggling, and then threw back her head, screaming, and I pressed her down on the furs. Imnak lifted his head quickly, and then, understanding the nature of the noise, shook his head and reached over and seized Poalu. She was drawn to him, tightly, and began to kiss him. "I submit," screamed Audrey. "I submit to you, oh, my Master!" Arlene and Thimble, sullenly, angrily, regarded her.
"Slave!" said Arlene.
"Yes, slave, slave!" sobbed Audrey, then covered my face with tears and kisses. I later held her quiet in my arms while she, with her small, soft tongue, licked clean the stubble of my beard.
16
Imnak Carves
Imnak sat in the corner of the tent, aimlessly whittling at a piece of tabuk horn.
Once in a while he would stop and turn the ivory, and look at it. Sometimes he would whisper, "Who hides in there? Who are you?" Then he would begin to carve again. Then, suddenly, he said, "Ah, sleen!"
I watched him flake and trim ivory from the horn. Slowly, as I watched, I saw the shape of a sleen emerging, almost as though it had been hidden in the ivory, the snout and legs, and the long, sinuous shape. Its ears were flat back against its head.
Often the red hunter does not set out to carve something, but rather to carve, patiently waiting to see if there is something there, waiting to be released. It is a little like hunting. He is open to what may be found. Sometimes there is a shape in the ivory or bone, or stone. Sometimes there is not. He removes the excess ivory and there, where it had lain hidden before, now revealed, is the shape.
Imnak's knife had a wooden handle, some fourteen inches long. Its point was some three inches in length. He braced it on his leg in carving, his fingers near the blade end where they might delicately control the movement of the metal. Bracing the knife permits force from the leg to be applied, whereas balance and control are not sacrificed, because the point is subtly guided by the movement of the fingers.
Imnak held up the sleen.
In the language of the Innuit there is no word for art or artist.
"It is a handsome animal," I said.
They need no such words. Why should there be special words for men who find beauty in the world. Is this not a concern of all men?
"It is your sleen," said Imnak, giving it to me.
"I am grateful," I said. I looked at it. It was a snow sleen, easily identified by the thickness of the coat, the narrowness of the ears, the breadth of the paws.
"I am very grateful," I said.
"It is nothing," he said.
17
I First Hear Of Karjuk; I Must Meet Him
"But I have never seen it before," said Imnak.
He examined the carving.
It was the head of a Kur, in bluish stone, the ear at the left side of its head half torn away. I had brought it with me from Port Kar. I had originally obtained it at the Sardar Fair, at the booth of the curio dealer.
"I thought you had sold it to the dealer at the fair," I said.
"I sold carvings at the fair," said Imnak, "yes, but I did not sell this."
"I had thought you did," I said.
"No," said Imnak.
"Then he must have obtained the carving from some other," I said.
Imnak shrugged. "It would seem so," he said.
"Who other than you of the Innuit," I asked, "journeyed this year to the lair?"
"Only I," said Imnak.
"Can you be sure?" I asked.
"Reasonably so," said Imnak. "It is a long journey to go to the fair. If some other had gone I think I would have heard of this. It makes good telling in the tents."
"Where then," I asked, "might the dealer have obtained this carving?"
"I do not know," said Imnak. "I am sorry, Tarl, who hunts with me."
"Forgive me, Imnak, who hunts with me," I said, "it was not my intent to impugn your honesty." I had pressed the matter too much with him. He had told me he had not seen the carving before. For a red hunter that was sufficient.
"Can you tell from the styling or toolwork," I asked, "who might have made this carving."
The art of the Innuit is often similar, from object to object. Yet to a subtle eye there are slight differences. One man will release from bone or ivory, or stone, a figure in a way which is slightly different from the way in which another will release it.
Imnak examined the carving carefully, turning it about in his hand.
I felt sick. That carving had, in effect, brought me to the north. Now it seemed it had led me only to a dead end. Miserably in my mind I contemplated the vastness of the polar basin. The summer, too, was already advanced.
"Imnak," I asked, "have you heard of a mountain that does not move?"
He looked at me.
"A mountain of ice," I said, "in the polar sea."
"No," said Imnak.
"Have you not even heard the story of such a mountain?" I asked.
"No," said Imnak.
I looked down at the mat. "Imnak," I said, "have you ever seen such a beast as is represented in that carving?"
"Yes," he said.
I looked up at him, quickly.
"North of Torvaldsland," he said, "I saw one once, some years ago. I threatened it with my harpoon, and it went away."
"Was its ear thusly torn?" I asked.
"It was night," he said. "I did not see it well. I do not think so."
"Was it a large animal?" I asked.
"Not too large," he said.
"What do you call such animals?" I asked.
He shrugged. "Beasts," he said.
I sighed. Some years ago Imnak had seen a Kur north of Torvaldsland. It had probably been a young beast, an offspring of ship Kurii, stranded long ago on Gor. Such animals are found occasionally, usually in remote areas.
"But it was not an ice beast," he said. I did not understand him.
"It was not white," he said.
"Oh," I said. "Are there such beasts in the north?"
"Yes," he said, "here and there, on the ice."
These too, I assumed would be native Kurii, the survivors of stranded ship Kurii, perhaps crashed, brought down or marooned generations ago. There were d
ifferent races of Kurii, I knew, though from my point of view there did not seem much point in discriminating among them. It was speculated that it had been fratricidal wars among such various forms of Kur which had resulted in the destruction of their native world.
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