The Totems of Abydos

by John Norman

  “This stuff,” said Rodriguez to Brenner, shoving a bowl in his direction, “is home-world mush. You would probably like it. Here it is probably fed to the women.”

  Brenner glanced to the brunette. She put down her head. He gathered that such gruel might indeed be a staple in her fare, and doubtless in that of the blonde. The zard would presumably feed them alike. Too, they would not be likely to thrive on the fare preferred by zards. They were, after all, of a different species.

  “Are you going to eat that?” asked Rodriguez.

  “What?” asked Brenner.

  “That,” said Rodriguez, indicating a dish near Brenner. “It is of the flesh of animals.”

  “No!” said Brenner.

  Rodriguez pulled the dish over to himself.

  Brenner was horrified.

  Brenner picked up a spoon and put it to the gruel before him. Such material tended to be unpalatable and tasteless, unless seasoned with various condiments. Some individuals on the home world, moral individuals, insisted upon eating it without condiments, in atonement for past species crimes.

  “Is everything satisfactory, sir?” asked the blonde, again, but now from her knees.

  Rodriguez felt under the table, where there was, apparently, under the upper surface, a sort of shelving. Brenner heard the slide, and rattle, of metal. To his horror he saw Rodriguez draw forth what appeared to be, at first, a handful of chain within a metal circle. He freed a tiny object from its housing in this apparatus, and slipped this tiny object into his vest pocket. He then tossed the remainder of the assemblage to the floor, before the blonde.

  “Put it on,” he said.

  She looked down at it, disbelievingly.

  Brenner now saw, that it was disarranged on the floor, that two objects were actually involved. There was a short chain, the first object, about a yard in length, with an opened clip lock at each end. At one end, this opened clip lock had been inserted through, and turned, but not closed about, a small, stout, rounded staple emerging at right angles from the flat, metallic circle, the second object. This metallic circle, about a quarter of an inch in thickness, and an inch and a quarter in height, had a hinge in the back, which permitted it to open. It also had a hasp in the front, hinged, which was apparently congruent with the staple.

  “Surely you cannot be serious,” said the blonde.

  Rodriguez looked at her.

  “Ah!” she whispered. “Of course!”

  Brenner looked back to the zard. He had lifted his head, on that rather long neck, when the metal had struck the floor.

  “Of course!” she said, rather loudly, doubtless for the benefit of the zard.

  Then, and Brenner gathered it was not the first time she had done this, she snapped the lower lock clip shut about the ring in the floor. She then placed the metal circle about her neck, adjusting it with both hands, the chain, held to the metal circle by the open lock clip, it inserted through the staple, dangling from it. She then removed the upper lock clip of the chain from the staple, closed the hasp over the staple, reinserted the lock clip through the staple, it now with the hasp behind it, in place, and clicked it shut. Brenner seized the edges of the table. There was a beautiful woman before Rodriguez, collared and chained.

  “You are clever,” she whispered to Rodriguez. Again it seemed there was some secret between them.

  Brenner wondered if she were mad. Did she not understand that she was chained, truly!

  “Chain me,” whispered the brunette to Brenner.

  “Never!” said Brenner.

  “You must!” she whispered. “Please! He is watching!”

  Brenner looked up, as discreetly as possible. It did seem that the zard was regarding them.

  “Please!” begged the brunette.

  Brenner felt under the table. There was, indeed, a shelf there, and his hand, groping about, encountered chain. Too, there was a curved, flat metallic surface there. He drew forth these objects. They were loosely connected, as they had been for Rodriguez, by a lock clip put through, and turned, but not closed about, a staple.

  Brenner looked at the objects. There was a key in one of the lock clips, that put through the staple, and Brenner removed it from the lock clip and put it on the table, beside a plate.

  The brunette reached for the chain and circle.

  “Put your hands down,” said Brenner, sharply.

  Instantly she did so. She looked at Brenner, startled.

  “On your thighs,” said Brenner. “Keep them there.”

  She put her hands on her thighs.

  “What do you say?” asked Brenner.

  “Yes, sir,” she whispered.

  He then removed the upper lock clip from the staple and crouched down, rather in front of her. He attached the lower lock clip to the ring in the floor. He jerked it against the ring. It was well fastened. He opened the collar. She then lifted her chin and looked outward, being careful not to meet his eyes. He put the collar on her and swung the hasp forward, over the staple. There was a small, but clear, rather decisive noise, as he did this. He then fitted the bolt of the lock clip through the staple and, decisively, snapped it shut. He jerked it against the staple. It was on her, well. Quite securely. She was chained.

  He then resumed his seat and put the key to the apparatus in his upper, left-hand shirt pocket.

  “I am sorry I was cross with you today,” she whispered.

  “You were more than “cross”,” said Brenner. “You were angry, and I did not care for it.”

  “Quirt her,” said Rodriguez.

  Brenner looked at him.

  “They look well, quirted,” said Rodriguez.

  “There is a whip upstairs,” whispered the girl.

  “You may remove your hands from your thighs,” said Brenner.

  She did so, putting them on the chain, three or four inches below the collar.

  “Perhaps you may free me,” said the blonde to Rodriguez, “so that I may serve you better.”

  “You will stay where you are,” Rodriguez informed her.

  “But perhaps others will come in,” she said.

  “You will remain where you are,” said Rodriguez.

  “Yes, sir,” she said, uneasily. And it seemed to Brenner that it might have been the first genuine response she had uttered all evening.

  “Let us eat,” said Rodriguez.

  He seized up a pair of zardian tongs. These could lift up a number of objects and could grasp quite firmly. Their width and gripping surfaces facilitated the capture of live food, scurrying about in dishes, for which zards had a taste. To be sure, as Rodriguez and Brenner were not zards, such materials had not been served to them. Zards, incidentally, particularly upper-class zards, tended to regard the use of the tongue to secure food as rude, at least in public. Certain exceptions were made for certain forms of food, of course, for which the use of the tongue was traditional.

  Brenner noted the blonde, her hands on the chain, near her collar, cast a glance, and, it seemed, a somewhat uneasy one, at the brunette. He wondered how the women, generally, felt about one another. The blonde, he had surmised, held herself superior to the brunette. Now, however, it seemed that the women were rather in a commonality, and that their current predicament might take precedence over any typical competitions consequent upon their vanity. Both were now chained and collared, and kneeling. He wondered if the brunette knew that she was incredibly beautiful.

  Brenner and Rodriguez then applied themselves to their repast, such as it was. In the course of the meal neither paid the women any attention. They did not, for example, offer to feed them. To be sure, at one point, Rodriguez did warn the blonde to silence.

  “Not bad,” said Rodriguez, eventually, thrusting back a plate.

  He then drew forth a letter, folded small, written in a feminine hand.

  “No, please!” whispered the blonde, suddenly, terrified, lifting her hand to Rodriguez.

  He read the letter, slowly, casually.

  “Please,�
� whispered the blonde.

  Rodriguez tossed the letter over to Brenner. “It was passed to me at the bar by this slut,” said Rodriguez.

  Brenner now understood the secrecy, and the confidence, which had seemed imminent in the blonde’s manner toward Rodriguez.

  “Please!” wept the blonde.

  “Shut up,” said Rodriguez.

  She pulled at the chain, but remained on her knees. She could not move from where she was, nor could she, of course, stand upright.

  “It is a note which she wishes me to take with us when we leave Abydos, seeing that it is posted to a certain executive in the middle-management echelons of the company on Naxos,” said Rodriguez.

  “Surely you will do so,” she whispered. “You are strangers here. You will be leaving Abydos. It will be easy for you to do! I have no other way to contact him, what with the censorship here, and the control of my movements! Women such as I are not even permitted within the precincts of the agent’s office!” The blonde squirmed, her hands on her chain, as Brenner read the note. It was not difficult, from the note, to gather what the situation was. The woman, now apologetic and willing, contrite, begging for another chance, wishing to be reconsidered, had refused the advances of a given executive. She had then been selected for reassignment. On Thasos, enroute to Aegina, her credits had been canceled, presumably as a matter of clerical error, from Naxos. Fortunately the company maintained offices on Thasos, to which she immediately appealed, only to discover that her identificatory credentials were no longer to be found in the company files. The agent on Thasos, it seemed, could do nothing. To be sure, he had expressed sympathy for her, in her dilemma, for it is surely not pleasant to be found stranded on a distant world, and in particular on one such as Thasos, on which visible evidence of support, sponsorship, or kinship is required. It could have been far worse, of course, for Thasos is relatively civilized. On some worlds she might have found herself in a slave pit by nightfall. The agent had suggested to her, as a temporary expedient, that she consider placing herself under contract to the company, embarrassing and regrettable as such an act might be, by means of which act she would come again under its aegis, and might once more profit from its power, protection, and solicitude, which contracts he was authorized to prepare and execute. The misunderstanding might then, at a later date, be corrected, all errors rectified, the contract canceled, and such. Indeed, he assured her that she would doubtless receive a profound apology from the company, small compensation though this might be for her humiliation. More tangibly, of course, he suggested that she might expect a full restoration of her canceled credits and, doubtless, a substantial compensatory bonus posted to her account. Gladly then did she put her name and personal number, having to do with her world of birth, species, and such, to the contract, for which act a certain number of credits were immediately posted to her account. “I am now a contract person,” she had laughed. “Yes, you are,” he had smiled. He had then conducted her to a small side room, which was bare, with no furniture, rugs or such. She was locked in this room. Later, toward the end of the working day, he opened the room, and handed her a small, neatly folded, white camisklike garment. This garment was narrow and fitted over the head. Its sides were open, except that by means of strings, on both sides, on both edges, under the arms, at the waist, and at the thighs, it could be tied modestly shut. It was a plain garment, except that at the left shoulder, tiny, and discrete, was placed the company logo. He then retired discretely while she changed. She was somewhat dismayed to discover the brevity of this garment. Also, when he first returned, he discovered she had retained undergarments, leg coverings and shoes. He then retired again, that she might remove these objects, which she did, putting them neatly to one side. She was to wear, it seemed, only the light, brief, white garment, literally that, and nothing else. When he returned, matters were in order, as was proper. He then carried her garments from the room, leaving her disconcerted within, in only the brief white garment. When he returned again he had her put her hands behind her back and put them in bracelets. “Routine,” he had assured her. He had then had her sit on the floor at the back of the room and put a small chain and disk on her left ankle, locking it there. “This marks you as company property,” he informed her. “ I am a free woman1” she exclaimed. “Of course,” he had reassured her. He had then gagged her and left her in the room, locked within. That night, still gagged, she was conducted from the room. He permitted her to see her clothing disintegrated. Then, hooded, she was transported from the office to the spaceport in an air car. In due course she found herself in a cell on a freighter, with five other females, none of whom spoke her language, and two of whom were not of her species. When she shrieked or complained, she was not fed. In time she found herself on Damascus where she, or, more exactly, her contract was put up for sale at auction. For the purposes of this sale, of course, not even the brief white garment in which she had been placed was permitted to her. In such sales, as you can easily understand, it is important for the bidder to be in a position to form a reliable conjecture as to the worth of the contract. On Damascus, as on a number of such worlds, although the young lady did not understand it at the time, incidentally, sales of contracts tend to be somewhat informal. Whereas the company would receive its credits for the sale, it would not receive any information, nor would any be kept on Damascus, of the disposition of the contract. In this there is, incidentally, a borrowing from slave handling. Suitable endorsements, however, as one would expect, are kept in the contract itself. Similarly, such endorsements are commonly kept on slave papers, where such papers are kept on a slave. Her contract was purchased by a native of the planet, a zard, who had recently negotiated the opening of a concession, a bar, on Abydos, at Company Station. In his bidding he was assisted by the advice of a fellow of the woman’s own species, that his selections, bids, and such, might be judicious. Most of the workers at Company Station, of course, as we have noted, were of the woman’s own species. It was thus, apparently, that the woman came to Company Station. We might also mention, incidentally, that on the same night some five other contracts, for similar purposes, were purchased by the zard. Amongst these was the contract for the brunette. The other women, unknown to Rodriguez and Brenner, were in the back. Thus, if one should fear that new customers at the bar might not be adequately served, one may discard such apprehensions. In the author’s opinion, the best of the lot were the blonde and the brunette. This might seem to be the opinion of others, as well, as the blonde and the brunette were the first to be sent to the floor. On the other hand, the others, I might mention, were also quite nice. The same night on which their contracts were sold the blonde and the brunette had lost their virginities. This seemed a negligible payment on the part of the zard, indeed, nothing from his point of view, for the services of the fellow who had been so helpful. And thus had the blonde and the brunette, and certain others, in cells, come with the zard and his coworkers, who were lodged in cabins, to Abydos. The blonde had worn the small white garment on the freighter to Damascus, incidentally, for several days before she realized what must have been regarded as one of its major assets, and was certainly a consequence of its design. This had become clear to her when a new girl had been put on at Thera or Rhodes, it was not easy to tell in the cells, weeks before they reached Damascus. This new girl, who was in an adjoining cell, was presumably also a company contractee. At any rate she was clad in the same small white garment, marked with the same logo, as the woman we are particularly concerned with here, and her cellmates. Interestingly this newcomer, despite the fact that she had presumably freely entered into contract, and was still a free woman, seemed determined to be rebellious. Accordingly, to the dismay of those in the adjoining cell, who must witness these things, she had been subjected to certain mild correctives, such as bonds and strippings. It was in the course of these events that the blonde had come to realize that the sort of garment she wore, the strings loosened, and such, could be removed from, and placed on, a boun
d woman, these things without injuring the garment or removing the bonds. She found that feature of interest, if a bit unsettling. In a few days the female’s rebellion, even given the gentleness of the admonitions applied to her, was over. She was on her knees to the zard crew members, her head down, cleaning the claws of their feet with her tongue, and such. All the females had learned something of discipline, thusly, either in the first person, or, so to speak, in the second person. To be sure, as they were free women, and not slaves, they could presumably not even begin to conjecture what it might be to be subject to a very different sort of discipline, one which we might, for want of a better word, call “slave discipline,” a sort of discipline to which, nonetheless, many females in the galaxy found themselves subject. One should not, incidentally, feel any particular horror or regret at the nature of the contract sales. On Damascus, for example, there are also slave sales, and they are quite different, being on the whole, as you might expect, far more brutal and exotic, which is however undoubtedly appropriate, considering the nature of the merchandise. For those of you who might be interested in the fate of the credits advanced to the blonde upon her signing of the contract, it might be mentioned that they were returned to the company, being used to pay her passage to Damascus. In this fashion she arrived on Damascus, as the agent had doubtless intended, under contract, and with not one credit of her own. Indeed, she arrived slightly in debt, as certain charges had been made against her enroute, for food, and certain minor sundries. These small charges, of course, were paid off by the zard, as a surcharge on his successful bid for the contract. The surcharges, of course, were made clear to the clientele of the auction, as well as, naturally, the house’s commission. The contractee’s earnings, as Rodriguez had suggested to Brenner, are usually arranged in such a way as to either fall short of the contractee’s debits, or to equal them. In this case, as the zard, though severe, was an honest sort, he had arranged matters in such a way that the blonde’s earnings, and those of her fellow contractees, as well, were exactly balanced by her debits, for example, those charged against her for her keep and food. In this fashion the blonde, and the others, would remain under contract, could make no progress in paying it off, and would have, naturally, not even one credit of their own. In this the zard was not cruel, as were some contract holders, for example, in letting a contractee seem to make progress toward buying back the contract, and then, again and again, on one pretext or another, at the last moment, levying new and large charges against them, bringing them back to their original position. By now, it might be mentioned, it was clear to the blonde, as it eventually becomes clear to most contractees, that she was absolutely helpless in herself, and that she must depend on others. That was doubtless the motivation for her letter. Out of her earnings, incidentally, the zard had recovered both the surcharge on his purchase of the contract and the broker’s commission. He had then raised the cost of her food and lodging to equal her earnings. One need not bother with this sort of accounting in the case of slaves, of course, as they are domestic animals.