by John Norman
“So?” said Astrinax.
“Perhaps then,” said Desmond, “cavalry tharlarion, war tharlarion.”
“Let us make festival,” said the leader of the newcomers. “You have meat and paga, I trust, and we have coin, though doubtless your hospitality may be depended upon, and wagons approach, as well, doubtless well supplied.”
“Welcome,” called Astrinax.
“Tonight we drink,” said the leader of the hunters. “Tomorrow we hunt.”
“And tomorrow night,” said one of his fellows, “who knows?”
I felt slightly chilled, even in the day’s heat, and despite the newcomer’s jollity. The results of addressing oneself to the pursuit of wild tarsk, I suspected, were difficult to anticipate.
I trusted such animals would not be in the vicinity of the wagons.
“This is a strange juncture for festival, the clearing at the six hundredth pasang stone, is it not?” asked Trachinos.
“It would seem so,” said Desmond.
Trachinos then turned away.
The newcomers, whom I took to be hunters, had dismounted, and were conversing with Astrinax, and Lykos.
Far down the road, behind us, one could make out a darkness, some dust rising from the road.
Master Desmond, shading his eyes, watched it for a time. He then turned to me. His eyes on me, I immediately knelt, and lowered my head.
It is appropriate for a female slave, gazed upon.
“Lift your head,” he said.
I did so, but feared to meet his eyes.
“You may speak,” he said.
I then looked at him, disbelievingly, my eyes wide.
“I saw you in the arms of Trachinos,” he said.
“Forgive me, Master,” I whispered. It seemed I could hardly form words. In a moment I was sure that this would pass. How strange it seemed, after several days, to hear my own voice.
“I think you will do very well for what I have in mind,” he said.
“There was a flickering of light, in the hills,” I said.
“I know,” he said.
“I tried to resist,” I said.
“But you were not entirely successful,” he said.
“I am a slave,” I said.
“It is interesting what the collar does to a female,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
Certainly it informs us that we are females, and properties, the properties of men.
“Perhaps Trachinos will buy you,” he said.
“I would rather be purchased by another,” I whispered.
“You once served in a gambling house, did you not?” he said.
“Yes,” I said, “on the Street of Chance, in Ar.”
“Good,” he said.
“Thank you for permitting me to speak,” I said.
“I may have need of you, tonight,” he said.
Chapter Nineteen
“A kiss, barbarian slut,” said the driver, reaching for me.
“You have had your kiss, Master,” I laughed. “I must now serve another.”
“You should be lashed to the bone,” he said, but then fell to his side, asleep.
“Paga!” called another driver.
“I hasten, Master!” I said, and conveyed the damp, bulging bota to him.
“To me!” called another.
I hurried to him.
“What is your use fee?” he asked.
“That would have to be arranged with my Mistress,” I said.
“Mistress?” said a fellow, drunkenly.
“Yes, Master,” I said. “I am a woman’s slave.”
“Your tunic,” said a fellow, “is that of a man’s slave.”
“I must be tunicked as my Mistress wishes,” I said.
“She is renting you out, to make coin,” said a fellow. “What is her price for your use?”
I hurried away from him.
“Give me the bota!” cried a driver, and pulled it away from me.
“Master!” I protested.
“Here, by the fire!” called a fellow. “On your back! Lift your right knee. Roll over, in the dirt! On your back now, squirm, to your side, draw your knees up. On your back! Arch your back!”
It was hard to know what I might look like to them, half in the firelight, half in the shadows.
Men enjoy mastering kajirae.
“Stand!” said a fellow. “Examination position.”
“Please, no, Masters!” I said.
One is so helpless in that position!
“Good,” said a fellow.
“Oh!” I said.
“A silver tarsk!” said a fellow.
I was startled that he had said this.
“It is a barbarian,” said another.
“So less,” said the fellow.
Of course, I thought, a barbarian, so less!
“Pass her about,” said a fellow.
“No, Masters!” I begged.
Two men seized me and I was put to my back in the dirt, beside the fire. I felt my ankles seized.
Then a fellow was pulled away from me. Then another.
“Ho, lads,” said he in whose keeping I was. “It is late. It is time for her shackling.”
“No!” cried several fellows.
By the hair, he drew me to my feet.
“Is she to be so tunicked, so collared, and put to serving so, and for two Ahn, and then simply to be wafted away, as might be a tower slave?”
“She is a woman’s slave,” Master Desmond reminded them.
“See that face and figure,” said a fellow, “those legs, and ankles.”
“Nonetheless,” said Master Desmond.
He kept my head at his hip, his right hand in my hair.
“She is a little thin,” said a fellow.
“Obviously,” said Master Desmond.
Many Goreans, I knew, preferred a little more body in a woman.
Still, I was sure, few of them would have any objection to this slave.
With the wagons there had been four slaves, former state slaves, as it turned out, purchased cheaply in Ar. But these were chained to a tree, off in the shadows, a guard set over them. Apparently these, for some reason, were not for the use of the drivers. I did not understand why such slaves would be brought into the Voltai. Indeed, I was not clear as to the reason the arrived caravan might be here. It was not a Builder’s caravan, with its tools and work crews.
“Leave her here,” said a fellow, staggering to his feet. He had a knife half drawn from its sheath.
Happily, he was drawn back by one of the other drivers.
None of them were entitled to my use. None owned me, nor did he in whose care I was.
The fellow who had half drawn the knife was not alone in his disgruntlement. It is common for a camp girl in a feast or festival, after a time, to be handed about, from fellow to fellow.
“Line up!” called he in whose care I was. “A last kiss.”
There were some fifteen or twenty drivers, tending the ten or so wagons which had come to the clearing shortly after dark.
I was stood, and he in whose charge I was corded my wrists behind my back.
Then, in the helplessness of a tethered kajira, I was enfolded into the arms of each, one after the other, some gently, some fiercely, some closely, some more closely.
“Kiss well, Allison,” said he in whose charge I was.
I then, helpless, was well reminded of my hatred for this brute who could deny me speech, who could punish me, who could do much what he wished with me, and would, and to whom I suspected I belonged.
“Consider her lips,” said he in whose charge I was, “are they not helplessly moist, open, soft, sweet, and full, yielding, and ready, and eager, just right for a collar slut.”
“Ah!” said a fellow.
“Look there,” said he in whose charge I was. “Did you not detect a movement of her small body within that tunic?”
There was laughter.
“I am sure I saw a
movement of her thighs,” said he in whose charge I was.
“No, no,” I said, but my protest was futile, and undecipherable, mumbled, beneath the pressure of the lips pressed to mine.
“Enough,” said Master Desmond, pleasantly, and pulled me back, and forced my head down, it held by the hair, again, to his right hip, and then, the slave in leading position, her hands fastened behind her, tied with a short cord, took his way from the fire.
Behind us, the men began to sing songs.
“The master of the wagons,” said Master Desmond, “is of Ar. His name is Pausanias. The leader of the hunters, or supposed hunters, is Kleomenes. Pausanias spent the evening in card-sport, with Kleomenes.”
His hand was still tight, almost absently so, in my hair.
“I would be interested in seeing the cards,” he said.
I did not understand his interest there.
“You are familiar with card-sport from the gambling house, are you not?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “I did not know those games. Some were played at tables in the back.”
There are different decks of cards, containing different numbers of cards, with different markings, and such. The most common deck of cards is thick, and contains a hundred cards. For the most part there is little standardization on Gor, and many things differ from city to city. One game does tend to be standardized, or relatively standardized, however, and that is kaissa. The kaissa of Turia is apparently identical with that of Ar, and that with that of Port Kar, Ko-ro-ba, Anango, Tabor, the island ubarates, and so on. This probably has to do with the Sardar Fairs. As you know, there is literally a caste of Players, generally itinerant, which makes its living by “the Game.” The charge for a game can range from a tarsk-bit, which is common, to a golden tarn disk, of double weight. Important kaissa players are celebrities, welcomed in a hundred cities, and entertained at the courts of Ubars. They have a status comparable to that of conquerors and poets.
“Was the card-sport honest in the gambling house?” asked he in whose care I was.
“I do not think so,” I said.
“No more than other games?”
“One guesses not,” I said.
“You seem to know little of it,” he said.
“I am a slave,” I said.
Such things were managed by the masters. They were seldom made clear to slaves. Our concern was to keep men at the tables.
“Here we are at the wagon,” he said. He then released my hair, and I stood up, stiffly. “Go over there, beside the clearing,” he said, “where I can see you, and relieve yourself, and then return to be shackled.”
In a bit he lifted me in his arms, to place me in the wagon.
I felt small in his arms, and he seemed very strong. I lifted my head to him. “Perhaps Master would care, as several others, to sample the lips of a slave?” I said.
“No,” he said.
“You did in Ar,” I said.
“Only to establish that you were vain, petty, and meaningless, and, of course, a true slave slut,” he said.
“Perhaps this vain, petty, meaningless slave slut is of interest to Master,” I said.
“Perhaps,” he said.
“Kiss me!” I said.
“No,” he said.
“I am tunicked,” I said.
“So?” he said.
“It seems Master is distracted,” I said. “Perhaps it is because there is a slave in his arms.”
“Oh?” he said, annoyed.
“In slave wagons,” I said, “kajirae are commonly kept naked.”
He put me on my feet.
“Remove your tunic,” he said.
“That will be difficult,” I said, “as my hands are tied behind me.”
He then unbound my wrists, and I slipped the tunic from my body. I stood before him, in the moonlight. “Perhaps the body of a lithe slave pleases Master,” I said. I had little doubt that the answer to that speculation would be affirmative, given the diet and exercises imposed on a female slave. Astrinax, two days ago, had lined Jane, Eve, and I up before him, and regarded us. “Excellent,” he had said, “three pretty little vulos, all ready for a block.” We trusted, of course, that there were no blocks in the Voltai.
“Are all the women of your world slave sluts?” he asked.
“I am sure I do not know,” I said.
“You are, clearly,” he said.
“I am in a collar,” I said.
“The collar,” he said, “does not make the slave slut. It releases the slave slut.”
“I see,” I said.
“Yes,” he said.
“We do not wish to be lashed,” I said.
“That is only an excuse,” he said.
“I see,” I said.
It was true that I felt extraordinarily free, marvelously liberated, in a collar. How right I felt in it! It was as though the sign of something inside of me had been put on the outside of me, for all to see, something which was now obvious, something it was no longer possible to deny.
“I am now ready to be shackled,” I said.
“Not quite,” he said.
“Master?” I said, hopefully. I approached him, closely, with slave closeness. It seemed my body was afire.
I felt weak and slave before him. He could dominate me with a glance, a word, a gesture. I sensed myself his.
Then I was turned abruptly about and, to my consternation, my wrists were again corded behind my back.
I was then, again, lifted lightly into his arms.
“I am bound,” I said.
“Kiss me,” he said.
“Oh, yes, Master!” I said.
“You do that well,” he said.
“I have been trained,” I said.
Again our lips met.
“Buy me, buy me, Master!” I whispered. “Please, buy me!”
“Only a slave begs to be bought,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said. “Buy me! Please buy me!”
Shortly thereafter I was shackled to the central bar. Jane and Eve were asleep.
“Will Master not unbind me now?” I said.
“No,” he whispered.
He then prepared to slip from the wagon.
I jerked at my bound wrists. What a monster he was, to leave me in this fashion, not only naked and shackled, but bound helplessly, as well!
He was Gorean.
He knew what might be done with women, with slaves.
“What was Master doing, earlier?” I asked.
“Examining the contents of the new wagons,” he said. “They contain no common haulages. There are various metals, subtle metals, alloys, and such, with not all of which I am familiar, coils of wire, unusual machines, unfamiliar tools, boxes of tubing, canisters of diverse powders, and other objects, crated and secured, which I could not examine. I suspect that Pausanias, and his drivers, do not even understand the cargo they carry.”
“Do you understand it?” I asked.
“No,” he said, “but I suspect its nature.”
“You are not of the Metal Workers,” I said.
“No,” he said.
“What is your interest in the card-sport of Pausanias and Kleomenes?” I asked.
“Import I am sure is borne within those cards which has little to do with the games of men.”
“If not of men,” I whispered, “of what?”
“Of things other than men,” he said.
“Games?” I said.
“Dark games,” he said.
“From Ar,” I said, “you know of Kurii.”
I recalled this from Six Bridges.
“Yes,” he said.
“And doubtless you know of the beast, who resided with the Lady Bina?”
“Of course,” he said. “Many did.”
“A guard animal,” I said.
“Perhaps,” he said.
“I understand now,” I said, bitterly, “your presence here, which has in fact little to do with a slave. I understand now the inter
est you have feigned in me, following me about, as though you might have been intrigued, aroused, slave stimulated, perhaps even a prospective buyer or slave thief. I understand now your protecting me, your petitioning for my charge, why you have attached yourself to our party! It is not to be near me! It is to pursue some other purpose, one of your own!”
“Do not underestimate your slave interest, barbarian,” he said. “It is true, of course, that a useful confluence of conveniences has occurred here.”
“Would not any girl do?” I asked.
“Yes,” said he, “but not as well.”
“I see,” I said.
“I find it difficult to understand my interest in you,” he said, “given the pettiness and mediocrity of your character.”
“Surely my beauty is not negligible,” I said.
“No,” said he.
“I have seen myself in the mirror,” I said.
“There are many women more beautiful,” he said.
“What, then?” I asked.
“I do not know,” he said. “Your ankles look well, shackled, of course.”
“You do not care for me,” I said.
“A slave is not to be cared for,” he said. “She is to be purchased and owned, worked and enjoyed, tied and mastered, humiliated and ravished, reduced to needful, whimpering meat, writhing helplessly in her chains, crying, begging for another touch.”
“Yet,” I said, “some men care for their slaves.”
“Perhaps,” he said.
“Suppose,” I said, “these matters of alleged import did not obtain.”
“Then,” said he, “you would by now be cowering at my slave ring in Harfax.”
“I see,” I said.
“You would find yourself, ignorant barbarian,” he said, “as you would never have dreamed on your old world, mastered.”
I knew that any woman can be mastered.
I had already been mastered, and thoroughly, in the house of Tenalion, in the eating house of Menon, in the gambling house, on the Street of Chance. Indeed, I now realized that I had been mastered, as I had lain naked and bound, in the conveyance which had transported me from the house on my former world to some collection point, from which I had been shipped, as one of several captured beasts, to the markets of Gor.
“You would kneel me and put your whip to my lips?” I asked.
“And you would lick and kiss it lengthily, devotedly, splendidly,” he said.
“And if not?”
