Smugglers of Gor

by John Norman

  “Mila, Vulo,” said Hiza. “Fetch water.”

  We were each given a pitcher, and we then went down to the shore, on our rope, filled our vessels, and returned to the camp. Hiza observed us, from the camp. It was not necessary. We would not run. We were slaves, obedient slaves.

  “Mila, Vulo,” said Hiza. “Gather fire wood.”

  This task was much less difficult than I had anticipated. Whereas last night it had rained fiercely further east on the Alexandra, it had rained less heavily in this area, and the day had been sunny and warm. The best wood would be gathered on the shore of the Alexandra, which was quite close, where debris was exposed to the sun.

  Mila and I, bending over, roped together by the neck, filled our arms at the shore. We were accompanied by Hiza and Emerald.

  “You can sell Mila,” said Emerald to Hiza. “I will sell Vulo.”

  “Darla will decide,” said Hiza.

  “I caught Vulo,” said Emerald.

  “Darla will decide,” said Hiza.

  “It does not matter,” said Emerald. “All is shared.”

  “I trust so,” said Hiza.

  “I can exhibit her better,” said Emerald.

  “Only men know how to exhibit a slave,” said Hiza.

  Mila and I could scarcely bear more wood. Hiza then, with a gesture of her javelin, indicated that we should return to the camp.

  The fire hole had been dug, and soon Darla, with a fire drill and shredded tinder extracted from a pouch in one of the packs, and a number of small sticks removed from a wrapper in the same pack, had ignited a small blaze. She then, after adding some of our wood to the blaze, placed four stones about the blaze. On these stones she placed a small iron fire rack. Soon, then, a pot of sullage, tended by Tula, was bubbling over the fire. Emerald put some dried meat from her pack into the brew, and Hiza cast in two handfuls of our picked berries into the brew. When the provender was ready, Tula, with a ladle, filled four shallow, golden bowls with the sullage, and, humbly, head down, as a slave, served the mistresses. I was surprised at the golden bowls, which were, I supposed, some sort of loot. Sometimes, in concert, bands of Panther Women will attack a small caravan in the forest or an outlying trading post on the coast. On the other hand, perhaps the bowls were payment of a sort, or a token of more to come, from the mysterious “employer” Darla had mentioned.

  When the mistresses had satisfied themselves with sullage, Tula was returned to the rope, and the rope shackles she had worn were removed. We then knelt to the side, hungry.

  Tuza carefully returned the golden bowls to the pack.

  “There are four,” said Darla.

  Tuza angrily thrust the fourth bowl into the pack.

  Emerald then drew three shallow, porcelain cups from several others in another pack. She then dipped these into the pot, filling them with sullage, and then placed them on the ground, near the fire.

  She observed us, to note our reaction. We knew enough not to move.

  She then handed each of us one of the cups. Mine was chipped. I looked at it, held in my two hands. I could feel the warmth of the sullage. I was desperately hungry. I supposed we all were. We looked up at Emerald. I took it her name was from her greenish eyes. I did not regard her as bad looking. I thought there would be men who might find her acceptable as a slave. I imagined her, deprived of talmit and ornaments, briefly tunicked, with a collar on her neck. She might do, I thought. Perhaps very well.

  “Feed,” she said, and we gratefully lifted our cups to our mouths.

  “Enjoy it,” she said. “But do not hasten. It is all you will receive. We must be careful of your figures. You are, after all, to be sold.”

  Then she bent down, near me, and whispered. “I am going to sell you,” she said. “You may speak.”

  “Yes, Mistress,” I whispered. She then placed her finger before her lips, and I knew I had been again silenced.

  I again lifted the small porcelain bowl to my lips. The meat was gone, but there were some berries left. I had had such berries, from time to time, in Kennel Five, mixed with the slave gruel. Slave gruel is not that different from some pottages I had known on my former world. As slave feed, however, it is commonly served plain and bland, served without spices, sugars, salts, or other flavors. It is apparently quite nourishing. I am told that in public eating houses, not brothels or taverns, slaves, when admitted, and not chained to rings outside, may kneel beside their master’s bench, and while he eats from the plates, and such, on the table, if it be his will, may be given a bowl of slave gruel, which will be placed either on the bench beside him, or on the floor near his place. Should he bring a sleen with him it might be similarly fed, though with a different provender, one suitable to its digestive system. Some eating houses object to admitting sleen, but the matter is sensitive. Sleen are dangerous.

  “Ho,” said Tuza, reaching into a pack. “Now that we are safe, ka-la-na!”

  Hiza uttered a sound of delight, and Emerald clapped her hands in delight. I gathered that this was a welcome surprise.

  “You sly she-sleen,” said Darla.

  Small golden goblets, matching the bowls, emerged, and Tuza poured ka-la-na into each. I noted she was particularly generous with Darla. Perhaps she wished to mollify her. Too, of course, Darla was leader.

  I had never tasted ka-la-na but I had gathered there were a great many varieties, differing much in quality. Some Ubars might barter a city or a hundred slaves for a given flask of the beverage. Others were so cheap and common that, as the joke goes, they might be mixed with the swill of tarsk. The word itself, which is generic for several wines, derives from the ka-la-na trees, or wine trees, of Gor. But wines, as is well known, may be derived not only from the clustered fruits weighting the branches of the ka-la-na tree in the autumn, but, as on my former world, from vine fruit, tree fruit, bush fruit, even from some types of leaves.

  “Have more wine,” said Tuza to Darla, holding the bottle toward her. “There is more.”

  “You are a sly she-sleen,” said Darla, smiling. But she drew back her cup. “Bed the animals,” she said.

  Tuza corked the bottle, rose up, and loosed the switch from her belt. We kept our heads down. Our hands were on our thighs.

  “Bara!” she snapped.

  Instantly we turned about in the neck rope, with its three knotted double loops, and went to our stomachs, our heads to the left, our wrists crossed behind us, and our ankles, as well. It is not advisable to hesitate in responding to a command. The bara position was, I suppose, the first slave position in which I had been placed. Of course I did not at that time understand it, or know its name. I had been in that position when I had regained consciousness in what appeared to be a warehouse, long ago, on my former world. I had been in that position, tied helplessly, when a foot had turned me over, to my back, and I had seen him, the man by whom I had known myself, for the first time, looked upon as what I had always suspected myself to be, a slave. I knew nothing of Gor, save uneasy rumors I had heard whispered about in the employee’s cafeteria, when men were not present, and in the female employees’ locker room at the store. How I had dismissed their whisperings as absurd, and yet, at the same time, wondered if I might appeal to the slavers of such a world. What would it be, I had wondered, to stand naked on a block, and be sold? I would learn. Then I had found myself turned to my back, and, bound hand and foot, looking up at him, he from whom I had fled in consternation in the store. I knew little, if anything, of Gor, but I knew I was looking up into the eyes of a man who was a natural master of women, one to whom a woman could be but a slave.

  “They are prepared,” said Tuza.

  One is quite helpless in the bara position. One is on one’s stomach and one’s hands are behind one, so one cannot use them to rise, and one’s body is extended, with one’s ankles crossed. One cannot easily rise from that position. Too, psychologically, one feels oneself submitted, and at the mercy of others. One knows one is at the feet of free persons, prostrate, perhaps even as a
mere slave might be. Too, obviously, so positioned, one may be conveniently and easily tied.

  “Hiza,” said Darla, “secure our little beasts for the night.”

  In a few moments, with light cords, we had been bound for the night.

  We lay very still, helpless, waiting, frightened.

  We knew Tuza was behind us.

  Then we cried out with pain as Tuza gave each of us, with her long switch, two strokes across the back of our thighs.

  “Sleep well, sluts,” she said. “We have a long trek ahead of us, in the morning. By the next Passage Hand you will be bound naked to selling poles on the beach, awaiting passing galleys.”

  She then returned to the fire.

  “Have more ka-la-na,” she said to Darla.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  “Ho!” said Axel, pointing to the ground.

  Tiomines was snuffling about, scratching at the ground.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Our little friend has been here,” he said, “but so, too, has another. See, the stirred leaves, the sandal print. Excellent, excellent!”

  “I do not understand,” I said.

  “I had hoped for such fortune,” he said, “but was muchly uncertain that it might be obtained.”

  “I would appreciate it,” I said, “if you would speak more clearly.”

  “It is thought the camp was under surveillance,” he said. “Shadows, glimpses, the uneasiness of larls in their cages. But there was no clear trail, one of relevance, one to which to put a sleen. There are many trails, those of larl masters, of deserters, those of scouts, trails of recruits, being conducted here, such things. But if you were to find a coin in the sand, even one of modest value, you might stoop to pick it up, might you not?”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “That was our hope,” he said. “Your stupid little barbarian friend is such a coin. Our visitors, or spies, if they exist, would have the vicinity under surveillance, and thus it is not impossible that they might note the unauthorized departure of an unwise slave. She has some value, even if it is negligible. Why should they not drop their net on her, and haul her in?”

  “They are greedy,” I smiled.

  “It is a common fault,” he said. “Her trail will now lead us to them.”

  “There may be several,” I said, “and we are only two.”

  “We will be wary,” he said. “Our business is to locate the enemy, not engage him, or her.”

  “‘Her’?” I said.

  “See the sandal print,” he said, pointing. “It is small. It is almost certainly the print of a woman’s sandal.”

  “Panther Girls,” I said.

  “They might do well in matters of observation, and surveillance,” he said.

  “They may have men with them,” I said.

  “That is unlikely,” he said, smiling.

  “I see,” I said. “But there may be several.”

  “Possibly,” he said. “That might be better determined later. In any event, you may recall that I informed you while in camp that we have allies about, from the coastal ships, levies from some crews.”

  “But not from Shipcamp,” I said.

  “No,” he said, “they know little or nothing of Shipcamp. The word of Tyrtaios may be accepted on this.”

  “They do not know why they have been stationed in the forest?” I said.

  “No,” he said. “Is it to intercept deserters, to trade, to convey departing contingents to the galleys, to take part in some action? They do not know.”

  “I see,” I said.

  “We wish to have a force on the ground, one between Shipcamp and the coast, which may be utilized in the case of an emergency. It is a precaution, I gather, on the part of Lord Okimoto.”

  “He who is first in Shipcamp,” I said.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “He leaves little to chance,” I said.

  “It is his way,” he said.

  “If you locate the enemy,” I said, “you will utilize these allies?”

  “One would attempt to do so,” he said.

  “How will you contact them?” I asked.

  He drew from his tunic a whistle, looped on a string about his neck. “They have a larl with them,” he said. “The Pani have seen to it. This whistle will be heard only by the larl, and such beasts. The larl will then lead the contingent to the source of the sound.”

  “How far does it carry?” I asked.

  “I do not know,” he said. “But far, easily for a pasang or two. It is said some larls can hear the squeal of a wounded animal from five pasangs away.”

  “And if it does not hear it?” I asked.

  “Then, my friend,” he said, “depending on the situation, it might prove wise to withdraw with discretion.”

  “To return to Shipcamp and report,” I said.

  “Yes,” he said. “Tarnsmen might be dispatched. And the tarn can outdistance the kaiila.”

  “Your beast,” I said, “appears ready to continue the hunt.”

  “He has been ready,” said Axel. “Let us proceed, lest he become annoyed at the delay.”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  I squirmed a little in my bonds. I am not sure why I had awakened. Tula and Mila were asleep. I was uneasy. I moved my neck a little in the coarse, knotted, double loop which encircled my throat, which held me to the others. We were lying as we had been placed, facing away from the fire, and the mistresses. They had been drinking for some time before retiring. They had not posted a guard. They apparently thought themselves safe. Certainly they were now far from Shipcamp. Tuza had plied Darla with ka-la-na, even more than the others. Perhaps she wished to better ingratiate herself with the leader, for I had sensed some tension, if not animus, between them. Darla, Hiza, and Emerald had, long ago, retired to their blankets, spread on the mattresses of soft boughs we had gathered for them. They, of course, were free. We, on the other hand, lay in the dirt, bound. On my former world I could have scarcely grasped the chasm which separates the slave from the free. On Gor it was easy to grasp. There was an insurmountable division, a separation into kinds. How unbridgeable is the gap which separates the free from property, from goods, from merchandise, from the owned animal, from the slave!

  Why had I awakened? I did not know.

  I turned to my left side, and turned about, careful not to draw on the rope, which might have awakened Mila, and Tula, beyond her. I propped myself up on my left elbow, and twisted about, to where I might see the remains of the fire, now muchly burned down. I could hear the Alexandra several yards away, soft in its banks.

  I could see Hiza and Emerald, asleep. Darla, too, was asleep. I did not see Tuza. This frightened me, for if she were about, and saw me turned about, it might earn me a thrashing. Tuza was short-tempered. She was impatient. Her switch was supple and cruel. I think she enjoyed beating slaves, at least lovely slaves, for some reason. Was she jealous of us, even though she had the glory of freedom on her and we were no more than docile, servile, collared beasts? Did it have to do with the fact that men found us of interest, and would buy us, and own us? Was it our beauty, if beauty it was, which so infuriated her? Why should she be concerned with us? Did she not know we were slaves, simple beasts, and could be sold? I dreaded the morning, when I would be again at her mercy. Why did she use the switch so upon us? What if we might be attractive to men? What did it matter? We were no more than simple beasts, animals, at her mercy. Our bodies were rich with the stripes of her displeasure. Did she not know we were desperate to please her? She was so different from a man. We would hardly ever be struck by a man, unless we were somehow displeasing. To be sure, we might sometimes be lashed, if only to remind us that we were slaves. The lash well confirms our bondage upon us.

  I had had the sense, from the evening, though to be sure I was facing away, my head to the left, my right cheek on the dirt, that Tuza may not have drunk as deeply as the others. I had conjectured this from various remarks, from chidings, from jo
kes, from laughter, protests, and such. She had seemed to be pouring wine, and pressing it on others. I was not sure she was as eager to drain her own goblet, certainly not again, and again. I had wondered about this, and even wondered if it was the case, but I had then fallen asleep. Such things were not my concern. They were the business of the mistresses. Curiosity, as I recalled, was not becoming in a kajira.

  But where was Tuza? She was not in her blankets.

  Perhaps, I thought, she has fled, has perhaps robbed and deserted the band. But would she not have taken one of us with her, gagged, to carry her loot? The packs seemed much to me as they had been earlier.

  I then saw Tuza emerge, like a shadow, from the forest. In her hands she carried some object.

  I could not have called out even had I wished to do so. It was not that I was simply afraid to speak, though I was, or because I had been silenced by the will of the mistress. It was different. I watched in horror. I could not make a sound. I was too frightened. I tried to call out. But no sound came from my throat.

  Too, it was finished in an instant. Nothing would have been different, even had I managed to cry out.

  Tuza had slipped to her knees beside Darla, lifted her hands over her head, grasping the dark object, which was a heavy stone, and struck downward. Darla made a small noise, and then, apparently, lapsed into unconsciousness. Tuza put the stone to one side, and drew out her knife. I realized clearly that Tuza, had she wished, might have broken open the skull of her victim, killing her instantly, but had controlled the blow, for, it seemed, she had other plans for the leader of the band of Darla.