“Think nothing of it,” I said. “How often can one save a tarsk so adroitly? Had there been two fellows we might have saved two tarsks.”
“No,” said Hurtha. “For there was only one dedication.”
“You are right, of course,” I said.
“Let us go,” said Hurtha.
“Wait, just a moment,” I said.
“Yes?” he said.
“Do you notice anything unusual about the camp?” I asked.
“It is very beautiful,” said Hurtha, “as was observed even by Boabissia, who is only a female.”
“Something else,” I said.
“What?” he asked.
“We are beyond the camp,” I said.
“Yes?” he said.
“There is no contravallation here,” I said, “no defending, outer ditches, nothing to protect the camp against outside attack.”
“Interesting,” said Hurtha.
“The Cosians,” I said, “apparently do not fear the arrival of a relieving force from Ar.”
“That seems very strange, does it not?” asked Hurtha.
“I find it very troubling,” I said. “I do not understand it. Too, such an arrangement, such a defensive perimeter, is simply, if nothing else, a matter of routine military precaution.”
“How can they be so sure that Ar will not come to the relief of Torcadino?” asked Hurtha.
“I do not know,” I said. I found this detail, however, the absence of external contravallation, like many others in the past weeks, disturbing. It seemed to be a new military anomaly. It, like several of the other things, such as the absence of fortified camps and defended supply trains, seemed inexplicable, and, cumulatively now, alarmingly so.
“What can explain such things?” asked Hurtha.
“I do not know,” I said. “I am uneasy.”
“I think we should go on,” said a man, another refugee with us. “If we are caught here we may be taken for loiterers, or spies.”
“That is true,” I granted him.
I then looked back at Feiqa, the former Lady Charlotte of Samnium. She wore a brief slave tunic, with a neckline that plunged to her belly. The soft, interior curvatures of her breasts could be seen within the opening of the garment. This is suitable for women who are only slaves. I considered her. She was lovely. I went to stand near her, the camp and the walls of Torcadino behind her. I put my hands within her garment. She looked up at me. My touch was gentle. The straps of my pack, which she bore for me, were wet and hot on her shoulders. There were bands of sweat beneath the straps, and beneath them, too, the tunic was wet and wrinkled. Some of the wrinkles would leave a mark on her skin for a time. Her breasts felt interesting, warm, full, moist with sweat. She had a collar locked on her neck. She was mine.
“Let us go,” said Boabissia.
“Tonight,” I said, “we will have to get you cleaned up. Your body is sweaty. Your feet are dirty.”
“Yes, Master,” she said, pressing herself softly, purring, like the small, sweet, owned beast she was, against my hands. I put down my head and let her lift her lips to mine, where they briefly met. “Ah,” she said, softly. Then I lifted my head away from her. I removed my hands from her. I drew then the sides of her tunic back to their original position. I held her then by the upper arms. My grip was tight. She could not think of freeing herself. “You are a slave, are you not?” I asked.
“Yes, Master,” she said, “totally, and yours, completely!”
I turned her about, facing the camp, with Torcadino in the distance.
“Do you think you have the favor of your master?” I asked.
“It is my fervent hope that I do,” she said.
“Do you see that area?” I asked, pointing.
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“Speak,” I said.
“It is the enclosure of camp girls,” she said.
“Yes,” I said. “Do you recall a girl there,” I asked, “one who had not been fully pleasing last night to a rent master?”
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“What was done to her?” I asked.
“She was whipped, mercilessly,” she said.
“Tonight,” I said, “you will serve me.”
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“What will be done to you, if you are not fully pleasing?” I asked.
“I will be whipped, mercilessly,” she said.
“Do you object?” I asked.
“No, Master,” she said. “I would have it no other way.”
I then stepped away from her, and rejoined the others. “That is the Treasure Road,” I said, indicating a narrow road in the distance. “At its end lies Ar.”
“Let us be on our way,” said Boabissia. “I am eager to reach Ar.”
I glanced back once at Feiqa. She smiled. She was very beautiful. I would look forward to having her tonight. I was confident she would prove to be fully pleasing. If she were not, of course, I would whip her, and well. One cannot compromise with female slaves. They are women.
We then began to descend from the crest of the slope, making our way slowly toward the road. Most of the refugees were already there, or in its vicinity. In my sheath were the letters of safety, and, below them, thrust down beneath them, the letters given to me by the officer, he who was now the master of Torcadino. These letters, all, bore his signature. The signature was written in an ascendant, bold script. It was not difficult to read. It was “Dietrich of Tarnburg.” I noticed the small fellow with narrow eyes, he with the mustache like string, nearby. He had apparently lagged behind. I did not give this much thought at the time.
17
Papers;
Slavery Agrees with Feiqa
“Papers, papers?” inquired the soldier. “Have you papers?”
“No,” I said. I did not think it would be wise to advertise my possession of letters of safety until it should prove impossible to proceed further without them.
He then went to others, making the same inquiry. None of the refugees, of course, carried such papers.
We were in a roadside camp, eleven days from Torcadino. It was not a bad camp. There was shade, and a spring nearby. Peasants came there to sell produce. In a few Ehn Boabissia, Hurtha and I, and Feiqa, would be again on our way. I had purchased passage on a fee cart.
“It is good to see a uniform of Ar,” said a man.
“Yes,” I said.
“Does one need papers?” the small fellow with the mustache like string was asking the soldier.
The soldier did not respond to him.
“Can one enter Ar without them?” he asked.
But the soldier had then continued on his way.
Boabissia came up to me. “I have spoken to the driver,” she said. “He is ready to leave.” Many of the refugees, afoot, had already left the camp.
I nodded.
“You are looking pretty, Feiqa,” observed Boabissia, somewhat critically.
Feiqa looked up smiling from where she knelt, packing my things. “Thank you, beautiful Mistress,” she said, and then put down her head.
“Slavery apparently agrees with you, slut,” said Boabissia.
“Yes, Mistress. Thank you, Mistress,” said Feiqa, smiling, looking down.
“Cart Seventeen will leave in two Ehn!” called a fellow.
“That is our cart,” said Boabissia.
“We had better get Hurtha,” I said.
“He is still asleep,” she said.
“Awaken him,” I said. “He can sleep on the cart.”
“Finish that packing, lazy slut,” said Boabissia to Feiqa.
“Yes, Mistress!” she said.
“Hurry!”
“Yes, Mistress!”
“Do you wish to be switched for dawdling?”
“No, Mistress!”
Boabissia then went to awaken Hurtha. I did not envy her this task. It was not always easy to awaken the Alar giant.
“I am ready, Master,” said Feiqa, smiling,
shouldering my pack.
I went to Feiqa and put my hands on the collar on her throat. She looked up at me, eagerly.
“Apparently slavery does agree with you,” I said, looking into her eyes.
“Oh, yes, Master,” she whispered. “Yes, yes!”
18
The Treasure Road
“Way! Make way!” called the driver. He sat on the wagon box, some yard or so below, and separated from, the high railed wagon bed, serving, with its benches, as the passenger area. The wheels of the cart were narrow, and some seven feet in height. There were two of them. They were treaded with strips of metal. The cart was drawn by a bipedalian tharlarion, a slighter breed than, but related to, and swifter than, the common shock tharlarion used generally by the lancers of Gorean heavy cavalry.
“Rich tarsks,” snarled a fellow on the road, moving to the side.
“Make way!” called the driver, cracking his whip. The arrival of the cart was announced as well by the jangling of two bells, affixed to projections on its sides, before the wheels. Then we were through the group of refugees, and moving swiftly again.
“I think little treasure moves these days upon this road,” said Hurtha.
“You are doubtless right,” I said, “and the traffic, it seems, flows toward Ar.”
“Will the Cosians take this route?” asked Hurtha.
“Probably,” I said. “It is the most direct route between Torcadino and Ar.”
I glanced at Boabissia. She was standing at the front of the cart, grasping the front rail, looking forward. Her hair and dress were blown backward in the wind.
“Look,” I said to Hurtha. “See the soldier by the road, there?”
“Yes,” he said, turning about to get a better look.
“That is another uniform of Ar,” I said.
“That is comforting news,” said the fellow to my right. We had seen few such uniforms lately.
“Are you going to Ar?” asked the small fellow sitting across from me. It was he who had the thin mustache.
“Yes,” I said.
“Do you have papers?” he asked.
“No,” I said.
“Oh,” he said, smiling.
“Why?” I asked.
“I assume Ar will not accommodate all the refugees who may seek asylum there,” he said. “It is hard to see how she could. Doubtless papers, or letters, might be needed.”
“Perhaps,” I said.
“Such might be worth their weight in gold,” he speculated.
“Perhaps,” I said.
He leaned forward, confidentially. “Are you carrying valuables?” he whispered.
“No,” I said. My left hand, I fear, moved, as though to touch the sheath beside me. Then I checked the movement.
“It is just as well,” he said.
“Why?” I asked.
“Do you see the fellow at the end of your bench?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. “Why?”
He covered the right side of his mouth with his open hand. “That is Ephialtes,” he whispered, “the notorious thief of Torcadino. Beware of him.”
“My thanks,” I said. It is always good to have such warnings.
The fellow nodded, and sat back on his bench, leaning back against the railing.
I resolved that I must watch out for the fellow at the end of the bench, Ephialtes. I was grateful to the fellow across the way for pointing this out to me.
In the back of the cart there was a place for baggage. It was there, in that section, behind that railing, that I had put Feiqa. This was appropriate, as she was property. She was in chains. I did not fear that she would attempt to escape. But it is good, from time to time, to so secure your girls. Just as they are subject to the whip, so, too, are they subject to chains.
It is an unforgettable moment for a woman when she is first chained, when she is first shackled, usually when stripped. Often he who first chains her is a slaver. And it may well be done with the same perfunctory nonchalance with which one might secure any animal. It is a familiar, routine, you see, for such men. They chain many women. She realizes, almost instantly, of course, perhaps to her initial dismay, that she cannot break such bonds, and that she is their helpless prisoner. Can she mistake the snapping shut of locks, the clasping of the iron? Within them she will be held with perfection. It will be done with her as men wish. Too, as it is commonly only slaves who are chained, as the days go by, the chaining convinces her as few other things could, that she is a slave, then, of course, a chained slave. Soon, interestingly, she finds chains sexually stimulatory. They doubtless impress her bondage on her, and its meaning. She understands, too, of course, as any woman would, that a chained female is sexually stimulatory to a male, unless perhaps it be a bored, jaded slaver, the chains making clear her vulnerability and property status, that she is a possession. As she begins to understand that she is a possession, literally, and legally, she finds herself becoming progressively more sexual, and needful. She well knows what slaves are for, work, and pleasure. The human female, incidentally, is an intensely sexual creature, but one subject in her alleged freedom to innumerable inhibitions, constraints, frustrations and denials. Her turbulent needs, insistent, churning within her, thwarted, suppressed and denied, may enact their vengeance in a variety of cultural and psychological pathologies. These rigidities and misfortunes, of course, are not permitted to her in the state of bondage. In bondage, she is no longer subjected to the formalities and reservations attaching to her free, unhappy sister. In bondage she is free at last to be sexual. Indeed, she must be so. If she is reluctant, the whip will convince her that it is not only now permissible for her to be sexual, but that her sexual dispositions and nature are now to be as accepted and manifest as the color of her eyes and of her hair, and the delights of her figure, and that she is now to seek the satisfaction of her sexual needs with the same innocence, openness, and honesty that she would bring to any other need, say, for food or drink, or love. It is only in bondage, you see, that a woman is free to be fully sexual. It is only in bondage, too, that she comes to understand how sensuous she is, and how truly exciting and desirable she is. And as she, with her high intelligence, is swift to learn how to move as a slave, with a slave’s beauty and grace, and to serve and kneel, and perform obeisance, and to wear revealing tunics and silks, appropriate to her status, so, too, she is quick to learn how to wear chains, and move in them, and display herself in them to her delicious, seductive advantage.
Do not think they do not know what they are doing. How clever are these alluring, sinuous, purchasable little beasts! How one must strive to protect oneself from their cleverness, their beauty, their wiles!
Naturally the master is not immune to these fascinations. He is seldom above showing off his women, for example, walking them leashed in the city, perhaps stopping to chat with friends, who may have girls on their own leashes, and such. The girls in these situations will kneel to the side, waiting, not participating in the conversations of the masters. There is competition amongst masters as to the beauty of their slaves, understandably enough, as there might be amongst them with respect to other estimable possessions, say, pictures, or tapestries, or, perhaps better, kaiila or hunting sleen. When a fellow gives a party for friends, if free women are not to be present, it will be served by his slave or slaves, who may well then serve naked, and in chains. It is pleasant, for example, to be served by a naked, chained slave. Certainly he knows how beautiful they are, and so, too, then, will his friends, and the slaves, too, will be under no delusion as to their own desirability. Girls in collars are seldom unaware of their attractiveness. Perhaps that is one of the reasons free women hate them so.
Later she finds chains reassuring, and looks forward to her chaining, which is often a part of the routine of her day. That her master chains her is, of course, an indication of his interest, and informs her not only that she is a slave, but that she is desired, and that she is regarded as valuable, as worth chaining. The chaining can be m
inimal, and almost fail to restrict her movements, but they are on her, and she is pleased by this. She is pleased to wear the chains of her master. In them she is happy. Let the free woman try to understand that, if she can.
I rose to my feet and went to stand beside Boabissia.
“Greetings,” she said.
“Greetings,” I said to her.
“I cannot wait to see Ar,” she said.
“If you are standing here, hoping for a first glimpse of Ar,” I said, “you are a few days too early.”
“I cannot wait to get to Ar,” she said.
“Look,” I said, gesturing to the side of the road with my head.
“Female slaves,” she said, noting them, as we sped past. They were off the road, on the grass, in various attitudes of rest.
“Yes,” I said.
“They could give them clothing,” she said.
“The day is warm,” I said. “Too, such women are often marched naked to save their tunics, that they may not be soiled with dirt and sweat.”
The girls were chained together by the neck. Some of them watched us as we passed. Then they were behind us.
“Normally, many more slaves are transported on this road,” I said. “We have actually seen very few.”
“What will I find in Ar?” asked Boabissia. She fingered the copper disk at her neck.
“I do not know,” I said.
“I am sure that I derive from Ar,” she said.
I had gathered this from her interest in going to Ar.
“Why?” I asked.
“Clearly,” she said, “I am not of Alar blood.”
“Very well,” I said, “but why Ar? Why not any one of a thousand other cities and towns?” I did not think that Boabissia would appreciate being informed that she was indeed not only unlike the usual Alar woman, but that she was of a quite different sort, a sort that many Goreans were familiar with, a sort often found in pleasure gardens and paga taverns, delightfully luscious, well-curved, eminently salable, and exciting, the sort that would seem incorrectly garbed, literally inappropriately dressed, at least from the Gorean point of view, if not clad in a tunic and collar.
“Because it is the greatest city in thousands of pasangs,” she said. “Because it is rich and busy, populous and thriving, a hub of commerce, the mistress of thousands of pasangs of arable soil and verdant pasture land.”
Mercenaries of Gor Page 26
