I did not understand this.
Had this something to do with me?
Was I somehow different?
If so, how, in what way?
Once, when I was laboring in a field, sickle in hand, with others, harvesting sa-tarna, a great shadow, as of a cloud, raced across the golden grain. I looked up. I heard girls scream, and I saw a sight that I would never forget, what had to be my first tarn, one of the enormous saddlebirds of Gor. Masters with us, peasants, who would bind the sheaves we cut and brought to them, looked up, shading their eyes. “Is it wild?” I asked the girl nearest me. “No,” she said, trembling. “It has passed,” said another girl. “No,” said another. “It is turning!” said another. I saw two of the peasants seize up their bows, large things, at hand even in the field. Many men could not draw such a bow. Arrows were put to the string. The tarn was now no more than fifty feet or so above the grain, approaching rapidly. “Down!” cried a master, “into the grain!” I and the others quickly crouched down, well concealed, for ripened sa-tarna, with its golden, nodding heads, can grow to the chest of a tall man. But then the thing had passed. I had glimpsed the rider, helmeted, seemingly small on his mighty mount. Then the apparition was no more than a dot in the distance, and then it had disappeared. Arrows were removed from the string. We returned to work. Four days later I was sold, in Rarir.
This sort of thing, in my case, had not been unusual.
Oddly, at least to me, I had been not only frequently sold, as I have indicated, but was never sold within the same locale, within the same city, or such, as one would normally expect. I understood nothing of this. If a master tired of me, or needed a stronger girl for heavier labors, for I served commonly as a work slave, why should he not simply hood me and take me to some convenient local market, to be disposed of there? Why did he always solicit a traveling slaver, a passing dealer, the master of a caravan on the brink of departure? The prices I brought, for the most part, were typical, and realistic, and once, thrilling me, most of a silver tarsk, but then, many times, afterward, often to my chagrin or confusion, I would be sold for a pittance, sometimes for little more than being given away. Why must I be so cheaply discarded? Surely masters would not welcome taking a loss on their buy. Indeed, some were merchants, and Goreans, generally, are careful with their coins, often jealously, extremely so. What a worthless, miserable slave, I must be, I sometimes thought. And then I would be purchased for a decent price. Why, I wondered, am I not longer kept, more wanted, for certainly my flanks, as I tried to remain still, standing or lying, had been stroked more than once with interest, in one venue or another. Surely I had noted desire in the eyes of more than one master. But perhaps, I thought, I am not so beautiful, nor so desirable, as I, in my vanity, had conjectured. Yet I did not see myself as that different from others in the same cage, in the same cell, in the same tent, on the same shelf. I had questioned other slaves, but they could make no more of it than I. Sometimes, they had simply turned away from me, uneasily.
Masters vary.
But they are all masters.
In the past few months, since my sale in Victoria, I think the major change that had taken place in me, which muchly transformed me, was the kindling of my slave fires. They had been kindled by masters, as they wished, I given nothing to say about it. Periodically they would rage, and I would become, sometimes to the amusement of masters, cruelly needful, even beggingly so. What can so humble a woman as needing attention so desperately that she must beg for it, and hope that her petitions, often lodged at a master’s feet, will be favorably received? How different this seemed from Earth where I, and others, had been sought, and might acquiesce or not, with a kiss or not, as it pleased us, to the importunities of males. But here, on Gor, at least for slaves, whose slave fires raged, the situation was much the reverse. I had sometimes felt ashamed, crawling to a master on my belly, begging for his touch, until I recalled I was a slave. How helpless we were on Gor! How much here, on Gor, were we at the mercy of men, our masters! How cool and superior to us were the exalted, refined, proud, serene, aloof free women! How they despised us for our needs! But did they not know we were collared? Would they be different, stripped and chained, their slave fires lit, fiercely burning, at a master’s feet?
Why should the masters sometimes smile at me, lying before them, on the tiles, my body scarlet, lifted, my eyes piteous?
Why should they find this amusing, when it was they who had made me so? I had had no choice. But this is commonly done with slaves. It improves our price. Men prefer needful slaves.
I had changed much, of course, in many other ways, as well, over the months since Victoria. A girl learns her collar. She becomes more and more a slave. And this, doubtless, in no way I clearly understood, was manifested in my demeanor, my expressions, my movements. Slaves obviously move differently, carry themselves differently, feel differently, speak differently, act differently, from free women. The slave is graceful, deferent, softly spoken, unobtrusive. She is the most female of all women, the most helplessly feminine of all women; she is owned; she is to please. Too, bondage, as is well known, puts a woman at peace with herself. She has come home to her own heart. Too, certainly some of my pricings suggested a discernible increase in my value, however slight or negligible. Yet, despite my understanding of the appropriateness of, and, I confess, my happiness in, my collaring, I remained troubled, and far from content. There is no doubt that the frequency of my sales, which disturbed me, muchly impaired my ease.
It seemed, sometimes, masters wished themselves free of me, and soon. I could not understand this. My body was tanned, and my hair longer. Diet and exercise had shaped me to the interests of men. My Gorean was becoming fluent. I looked well in a tunic. In one sale, I had sold for most of a silver tarsk. I could not help myself, kicking and gasping, on the mat, in the furs. Nor did I wish to help myself. Often I had tied the bondage knot in my hair, and knelt to lick the ankles of a master, or of one of his men.
So my thoughts roved about.
One longs for the master of one’s dreams.
If only one could buy such, but it is we who are bought!
The pan, well scoured, I now rinsed with scented water. The senses of Goreans seem much alive, even in small things, and they are likely to employ color, sound, and scent even where there is no practical purpose to be served in doing so. But, then, what is a practical purpose? Is the pursuit of beauty, or pleasure, a practical purpose? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But then, I suppose, there are ends that might be well served even if there was no practical purpose in doing so. Why not? One supposes that a scent in a pan of water, the tone of a flute, the color of a simple thing, like that of a spoon handle or the door of a shed, may serve an end that is very real, if not practical. One has no objection. Indeed, one wonders if some things might be demeaned, and less lovely, and less worthy of regard, had they such a purpose.
I dried the second of the five pans with the towel.
I reached for the third pan.
“Is there a slave in the kitchen whose name is ‘Phyllis’?” asked a voice, from somewhere behind me, at the portal to the kitchen.
I stiffened with apprehension.
I was alarmed.
What had I done?
I had tried to be a good slave. I was docile, and obedient, as most slaves. It is wise to be so. We do not wish to be punished.
Let free women speculate on how clever and pert, how sprightly, they might be in the collar, how impudent, even insolent, but they are not in the collar. Such latitude is permitted by some masters, even encouraged, but it is a lenience that the slave is not well advised to abuse. Surely she must understand that it is a permitted lenience, allowed perhaps because the master finds it interesting or charming, but that it is a lenience that might be easily replaced, at his will, with a sterner measure of discipline. The leash may be lengthened, or shortened. It is up to the master. Surely she understands she
may at any time be brought again, quickly enough, to her knees. It is easy to break a woman to the will of masters. I knew myself, though once of Earth, to be broken to the will of masters. I did not wish it otherwise.
“Yes,” responded the kitchen master.
I feared I had been displeasing, in no way I understood. In the sa-tarna field, I had once helped myself to a dipper of water from the field bucket and I had been foot switched, put to my belly, my legs held up by two slaves, the switch applied to the soles of my bare feet until I wept with pain and begged for mercy. I had not even understood that I should have first requested permission to perform so simple an act. And many masters do not require such a permission. I should have asked first, of course, for masters differ. If I had been more beautiful, perhaps I would not have been switched, at all. I had seen other girls help themselves. Perhaps it had to do with my being a barbarian. In any event, any slave knows it is possible to be inadvertently displeasing, and come to rue the indiscretion, no matter how innocent it might have been.
“Phyllis?” asked the voice.
“There,” said the kitchen master, doubtless indicating me.
I turned about, and put my head the floor.
Two days ago I had stolen a tospit from the fruit bin, and had been switched for my trouble, a slight, betraying yellow stain having been noted at the corner of my mouth. Surely that was done with. Surely I was not to be punished again, at least not for that. What then had I done? I did not think the kitchen master’s favorite, Fina, would have been switched!
I wondered if she gasped and leaped better in his arms than I. I doubted it. There is no accounting for the tastes of masters.
We, kitchen slaves, were all at his disposal. We all responded to him. Certainly I had writhed in his arms, on my chain, pleading, as I succumbed, helpless under his Gorean touch.
But Fina had golden hair, and loved him.
Perhaps that made a difference.
I had now recognized the voice of the fellow who had entered the kitchen. He was Faisal, Lysander’s house manager, his bailiff or chamberlain, so to speak.
I had seen him twice before. He rarely came to the kitchen.
“You are Phyllis?” he asked, standing near me.
“Yes, Master,” I said, my head down, to the floor.
Though different names had been put on me, from time to time, I was usually named ‘Phyllis’.
“You have been chosen to serve, at this evening’s supper,” he said. “Follow me.”
He turned about, and made his way to the portal, without looking back. I rose and looked about. I saw that the kitchen master, and my sister slaves, even Fina, understood no more of this than I.
Certainly I had had no special training, at serving so.
He had disappeared down the hall. I hurried after him.
Chapter Fourteen
I ladled the grain and vulo soup, seasoned with brown, ground tur-pah, carefully into the bowl.
It would not do to spill it.
Serving slaves, and slaves, in general, were not expected to be clumsy. Clumsiness may be ignored or dismissed in a free woman, but it is not acceptable in a slave. An accident or mistake that will be routinely overlooked in the case of a free woman may, in the case of the slave, bring the whip.
Four served, and there were nine to be served, five men, including my master, Lysander, and four women. I knew none of those served other than my master, and I had scarcely seen him, since having been presented before him, tunicked, after my purchase. He had never so much as touched me.
Being a serving slave in a great house is, by many, viewed as an envied slavery, at least with respect to the lightness of its labors. Surely it is preferable to the fields, the laundries, the mills, bearing water in the mines or quarries, and such. Being a kitchen slave, on the other hand, in a great house is not much different from being a kitchen slave in any large house.
“Enough,” said the guest, lifting his finger.
I backed away, head down, as I had been told, and then approached the next guest.
We slaves who served were decorously gowned, though our arms were bare. We wore white, woolen gowns, which descended to our ankles. Our necklines were shallow, and nothing that might distress a free woman. We had washed thoroughly, our bodies and hair, and our hair was bound back, tightly, with fillets of white wool. Our feet were bare.
There was, of course, an obvious difference between us and the free women, other than our serving. We were collared. Too, of course, if one were to investigate, it would be discovered that our left thighs were marked, high, below the hip. We all wore the Kef, the most common slave brand.
The first girl amongst us was Selena, who had been captured on Teletus by raiders from Hunjer, and, with others, sold in Brundisium, where prices seem to run high. Teletus was somewhere to the west, and Hunjer was north, north even, I gathered, of the Vosk. Brundisium, apparently a port, was north, but, as I understood, it was south of the Vosk. I would later learn that both Teletus and Hunjer were islands.
Free Goreans commonly eat at low tables, the men sitting cross-legged, and the women kneeling, their knees closely together within their robes. On the other hand, in certain high houses, and surely in the house of Lysander, often, particularly given the presence of guests, dining couches were employed. It was so this night. On these couches, usually arranged in a square or rectangle, sometimes in a circle or oval, the guests recline and help themselves from the low, narrow tables, these set before the couches. The height of these tables, a bit higher than the common Gorean table, is matched to the surface of the couches, for ease of access. The serving, given the spacing between the couches, may be done from either outside or inside the parallel concentricity, so to speak, of couches and tables. Guests occupying the central position on the couches are, as would be expected, served from the inside, namely, from within the arrangement. In this arrangement the men and women may recline beside one another which, doubtless, in the way of a nice fillip, adds to the informality, stimulation, and delight of the occasion. What male appetite is unlikely to be stirred by the presence of a lovely woman reclining at his side?
As I mentioned, there were nine to be served, five men, including my master, Lysander, and four women. All wore chaplets of flowers, both men and women, which is not uncommon, I learned, in many Gorean cities and towns on festive occasions, holidays, celebrations, companionings, parties, and such. As nearly as I could determine none of the four women were companioned, in a strict sense, to any of the men present, but seemed to have been engaged as professional companions, for the pleasantries of their company and conversation. Such women are not slaves, though they are sometimes, in effect, mistresses. In any event, I knew Lysander was not companioned in the sense of the free companionship, and this seemed to be the case with three of the others, as well, as their charming partners gave no indication of being free companions, either of their partners or of any other, who might not be present. The women, though lavishly and abundantly robed, were not veiled, as presumably they would be on the streets, and of them, though all fair, two, I thought, though free, might be beautiful enough to be slaves, perhaps even “high slaves.” The most beautiful seemed to be the dinner companion of Lysander himself. The three other women were paired off with three of the other men. One of the males, a pleasant, handsome fellow, with ringed fingers, in a golden robe, which betokened no caste to my knowledge, was not paired with any of the free women. He was, it seems, an independent, though a congenial, contributor to the evening, chatting, in particular with one or another of the free women who were ensconced beside him. The erudition, and the sparkle, of the conversation of the women tended to confirm my suspicion that they were professional companions. Needless to say, the presence of such women, witty and skilled, much enlivens a dinner. What it costs to hire one for a dinner, I supposed, might frequently suffice to buy a low slave, such as I. Alert to nuan
ces, expressions, and such, I suspected that Lysander’s partner might not be averse to a proposal of free companionship. To be sure, such women are seldom taken into the free companionship. It might be added that in many Gorean cities and towns, professional companions are outlawed, their presence being construed as violating sumptuary laws. Indeed, such laws existed in Market of Semris, but it seems they failed to be noted by Lysander, and, I suppose, by other individuals of influence or importance. Laws, it seemed, when inconvenient, might be ignored by the powerful. Laws, as is well known, are not for the mighty. As some concession to propriety, however, that one might not think ill of Lysander and others, it might be noted that women such as those now at the table were, of late, not identified as professional companions but rather as “friends.” And what laws would deny to a host a right to entertain his friends in his own home?
As I mentioned, one of the males, the handsome fellow with ringed fingers, he in the golden robe, which betokened no caste to my knowledge, was not paired with one of the free women. In this sense he was alone, though he participated readily and charmingly to Lysander’s small event. Perhaps he had been invited late or had appeared unexpectedly and had had no time to either hire, or have hired for him, a companion.
“What of the paga?” I whispered to Selena.
“Wine now,” she said, “paga later.”
Selena had, in the time at her disposal, coached me in certain niceties of serving, that there was an order to utensils and courses, that one should serve from the left, that there was a way to pour, that free women were to be served first, that one should keep one’s head down, and eyes lowered, that one must be quiet, graceful, deferent and unobtrusive, that when one was not serving one was to kneel to the side, head down, that one might be conveniently summoned, and so on. “Watch me, and the others,” she said. “I will do so,” I said. I was surely muchly uneasy, and was more than eager to attend to, and imitate, genuine serving slaves. “You are not beautiful enough to be a serving slave,” she said. “Forgive me, Mistress,” I had said. Actually I regarded myself as every bit as attractive as any of them, including herself, even more so, to be perfectly honest. To be sure, such things are best left to men. “You are not trained as a serving slave,” she said. “No, Mistress,” I said. That was surely true. “Why then,” she asked, “have you been sent to the tables?” “I do not know, Mistress,” I said. “I do not like it,” she said. “If you are clumsy, or spill something, we may all be punished.” I lowered my head, and remained silent.
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