Kajira of Gor

by Norman, John;

  I had never felt a whip, but I had no doubt but what I would be responsive to it, and even more so to the domination which it expressed. It is the domination which is crucial, you see, and the recognition of our subjugation to it; it is that which contents us, and reassures us; it is that fulfills, and thrills, us.

  He then put his right hand in my hair and held my left wrist in his left hand. He drew my head back, painfully, until even my back was bent backwards.

  "It is interesting," he said, "how different she is from you. Yet, too, you seem in many ways so similar." I whimpered, helplessly held. "Do you know that women such as you are born to the chain?" he asked.

  "No," I said, strained. "No."

  "Yes," he said, "and you will not be complete until it is on you."

  I whimpered helplessly. Why did he not drag me to the bed and take me?

  I understood then what true womanhood was. It was not the denial and frustration of femininity but the full surrender to it, being true to, and honest to, my deepest nature and needs. Femininity was not incompatible with womanhood. It was its expression.

  What insanities, what perversions, what sickness, I had been taught on Earth!

  "Ah, forgive me, Lady Sheila," said Ligurious, as though concerned. "I almost forget, holding you in this fashion, that you are a free woman."

  He then released me.

  I straightened up, and, turning about, pulled away from him, as though I had managed to free myself.

  Ligurious bowed to me, from the waist, as though in deep apology. But he was smiling.

  I was horrified. I realized then that I must fight my femininity. I had learned, of course, that in doing this, far from expressing womanhood, I was frustrating and denying it, but that, in my terror, was what I then wished to do. I then, terribly, feared my womanhood, and that to which it might lead. I thus, then, decided that my femininity, and thereby my womanhood, must be denied and fought. I could no longer be so simple as to pretend to myself that my womanhood was best served by its own frustration, suppression and denial. I was no longer victimized by that propagandistic stupidity. The danger, I now understood clearly, was womanhood itself. Openly, honestly, must it be repudiated and denied. That was what was most to be feared, that was the great danger to women, their own womanhood, that which was what they were, in their deepest heart and belly. I was afraid to look deeply into myself. I was afraid of what I might find there.

  "I am a free woman," I said. "I am free! I am free!"

  "Of course you are," he said.

  "I am now going to put on my slippers," I said.

  "Have you received permission to do so?" he asked.

  I looked at him, frightened.

  "You may do so," he said.

  I slipped into the slippers. I then felt more secure. There is something about being barefoot before a man who is shod that tends to make a woman feel more like a slave before him. These sorts of feelings are intensified, of course, if the woman is naked, or partially clothed, as I was, according to his dictates, before him. Slaves, of course, are often commanded to nudity before their masters and their clothing, if any, is always subject to his approval.

  In the slippers, interestingly, I felt again the Tatrix of Corcyrus.

  "Are there spies in the city?" I asked.

  "Doubtless Argentum has spies in the city," he said.

  "Our spies," I said. "Ones who spy on our own people."

  "Of course," he said. "That is a realistic precaution in any city."

  "And to whom do these spies report?" I asked.

  "To the proper authorities," he said.

  "I am not aware of receiving the reports of these spies," I said.

  "You are still being trained in the governance of Corcyrus," he said.

  "How goes the war?" I asked.

  "As I reported earlier," he said, "well."

  "The enemy," I said, suddenly, almost faltering, "is within twenty pasangs of Corcyrus."

  "That information is, I believe," he said, "approximately correct."

  "That is too close!" I said.

  "Such matters need not concern the Tatrix," he said. "They need concern, rather, our generals."

  "That is too close!" I said.

  "We shall soon cut their supply lines," he said. "Do not fear, Lady Sheila. Our forces will be victorious."

  "Ar is in the war!" I said.

  "That is true," he said. "But momentarily we are expecting reinforcements from Cos."

  "I am afraid, Ligurious," I said.

  "There is nothing to fear," he said. "The city is secure. The palace is impregnable."

  "I do not want the war," I said. "I want the fighting stopped. I am afraid. I want a truce!"

  "Such matters," he said, "need not concern you. Leave them to others."

  "Surely the enemy will consider a truce!" I said.

  Ligurious looked at me and, suddenly, laughed. His laughter unsettled me. I felt that perhaps I had said something unutterably naive or stupid.

  "That is out of the question?" I asked.

  "Yes," said Ligurious. Was the enemy so bitter, so determined? What had driven them to these passions of war? What was it that they desired in Corcyrus?

  "Sue for peace!" I said.

  "Everything is planned for," said Ligurious. "We have anticipated all contingencies."

  "I want us to sue for peace," I said.

  "That decision is not yours," said Ligurious.

  "Am I not the Tatrix of Corcyrus?" I demanded.

  "Of course," smiled Ligurious.

  "Do I not rule in Corcyrus?" I asked.

  "Of course," said Ligurious.

  "I rule in Corcyrus," I said.

  "Yes," said Ligurious.

  "And who rules me?" I asked.

  "I do," said Ligurious.

  I shuddered.

  "Did Lady Sheila enjoy her spiced vulo this evening?" he asked.

  "Yes," I whispered.

  He then left.

  I went to the barred window, looking out. I was confined to my quarters. Out there, somewhere, in the darkness, beyond the walls, was the enemy.

  Apparently they were such that they would not even consider a truce.

  I wondered what it was that they wanted, so keenly, so determinedly, in Corcyrus.

  I was frightened. Perhaps the troops of Cos would come to our rescue. I was pleased that I was safe in the palace.

  12

  I Sit upon the Throne;

  I Wait in the Hall

  "Dress her in her most regal robes," commanded Ligurious.

  "Yes, Master," said Susan, fumbling with the garments.

  I stood before the mirror in my quarters. I watched the glorious robes of state being placed about my shoulders.

  Earlier I had stood frightened behind the door, now kept locked, my ear to the wood.

  "They are within the city!" I had heard cry.

  "Impossible!" had cried a guard.

  "How was it done?" inquired another, insistently, bewilderedly.

  "It seems a Sa-Tarna wagon was fleeing before the approaching enemy, seeking to reach the city before being overtaken," said a man. "There was time, happily, it seemed, though the matter would be close, for the wagon to win its race, and sorely, as you know, did we need the grain. The gate was opened to admit the wagon. Surely there would then be time, and time enough, given the distances involved, to close the gate. The wagon seemed to be drawn by two strings of male slaves, twenty in each string, as is common. These men, however, were not slaves. The wagon within the portal, they threw off their harnesses and from beneath the grain drew forth swords. They prevented the closing of the gate. In moments the vanguard of the enemy had arrived."

  I had hurried then to the barred window. I could see smoke rising from the city.

  Shortly thereafter Ligurious and Susan had arrived at my quarters.

  Ligurious wore soldierly garb, but of a sort with which I was not familiar. I did not know the insignia, the markings.

  "Put
her in the veil of state," said Ligurious. Susan brought forth a long, lovely veil, intricately embroidered. She adjusted my robes about me, concealing, in the fashion of the robes of concealment, now not thrown back, but drawn up, my hair and much of my head. She then pinned the veil in place. It was very beautiful. It was opaque. Little could now be seen of me but my eyes and a bit of the bridge of my nose. I had not even known such a veil existed. Hitherto I had generally worn veils only when intending to travel incognito in the city, and I had never worn them on official occasions of state.

  "Come along," said Ligurious. He took my arm and, half dragging me, conducted me from my quarters.

  In moments we were hurrying through the halls. Falling in behind Ligurious were some five or six men, not my guards, who were dressed much as he was.

  The halls seemed, for the most part, oddly deserted. Occasionally a man ran past. At one point, crouching down, then kneeling, as we passed, by hangings at the side of the corridor, was a slave girl. She was terrified. She wore some twists of silk about her. She wore a collar of a sort, rather high and ornate, which is often jeweled. No jewels, however, caught the light as we passed. They had been, I gathered, pried from their settings.

  Susan was not with us. I did not know where she was. Apparently she had been left behind.

  I was thrust into an anteroom, one off the great hall. In this room there were some four or five men and a woman. The woman wore a robe, hooding her, and was turned away from me. She was about my height. Interestingly she was barefoot and the robe she wore came only a bit below the knees. I thought she had nice calves and ankles. Mine, I thought, might be better. A man, dressed rather in the fashion of Ligurious and the others, was lifting a sheet about her. She clutched this sheet about her, drawing it even about her head, and held it together, before her face, effectively veiling herself with it. She turned to face me. Then she turned away. Her eye color, I noted, was not dissimilar to mine.

  Ligurious turned me, so that I faced the door to the great hall, where, on the lofty dais, reposed the throne of Corcyrus.

  "Is all ready?" asked Ligurious.

  "Yes," responded a man.

  "The tarns?" asked Ligurious.

  "Yes," said the man. "Everything is ready."

  I turned. I saw that the sheet, now, had been drawn completely over the woman, as though thrown over her. As it hung about her, its hem fell midway between her ankles and knees. I was startled. It was almost as though, under the sheet, she might be naked. I gasped. Something was being fastened about her throat, over the sheet, under her chin. It was round. There was a long strap connected with it. It was a slave collar and leash!

  Ligurious took me by the arm and turned me about, again, facing me toward the door to the great hall.

  I did not know who the woman was, but I suspected that she might be she with whom Ligurious had confessed himself to be so smitten, she to whom I apparently bore some resemblance. It seemed odd to me, almost incomprehensible, that Ligurious, a man such as he, who must have had some fifty women at his feet, women such as Susan, women kneeling in terror and awe about him, for he was their total master, should be so much like a callow youth, should be so weak, with this woman. Did he not know, I asked myself, scornfully, that she, too, ultimately, was only a woman, that she, too, ultimately, needed only the whip and a master?

  I was then conducted into the great hall by Ligurious. It was empty. The two great entrance doors, at the far end, were locked from the inside, with the great beams in their brackets. It took ten guardsmen to move those beams. I could not begin to budge them.

  "Is there any sign of the men of Cos?" I heard a man ask behind us, from the anteroom.

  "They are not fools," said another man. "They will not meet Ar on the land."

  "Do the people resist the enemy?" I heard another man ask.

  "No," said another man. "They abet them."

  I ascended the steps of the dais, conducted by Ligurious. At his indication I took my place on the throne.

  "The doors of the anteroom will be locked behind us," said Ligurious. "You will not be able to open them."

  "What is going on?" I asked.

  "You will soon serve your purpose," said Ligurious.

  "What purpose?" I said.

  "That purpose which we feared might one day have to be served, that purpose, or major purpose, why you were brought to Gor."

  "I do not understand," I said. I did recall that last night I had been assured that everything had been planned for, that all contingencies, according to Ligurious, had been anticipated. I wondered if I still had a role to play in these contingencies.

  "You still need me, then?" I said. "I still figure in your plans?"

  "Of course," he said.

  I was relieved to hear this. I was afraid as to what might prove to be my fate if a man such as Ligurious no longer had any particular or special use for me. I was pretty. I could conjecture what fates might lie in store for me.

  "Listen," said he. "Do you hear it?"

  "Yes," I said. It was a dull, striking sound, coming as though from a great distance. It had a rhythm to it.

  "It is a ram," said he, "doubtless slung from a cradle, drawn by ropes, doubtless with a will by citizens of Corcyrus."

  "It sounds far away," I said.

  "It is at the outer gate," he said.

  "The citizens of Corcyrus love me," I said.

  "Do not doubt it," he said. "I must now take my leave. I fear there is little time."

  "But what of me?" I said. "I am afraid. Will you come back for me?"

  "Have no fear, Lady Sheila," he said. "You will be come for."

  "Soon?" I asked.

  "Yes," he said. He then backed down the stairs. He bowed deeply. "Farewell, Lady Sheila, Tatrix of Corcyrus," he said.

  He then withdrew.

  I heard a splintering in the distance, and then, in a moment, a new striking, doubtless on the interior gate.

  I heard the closing of the anteroom door behind Ligurious, and then the dropping in place of beams, the sliding of bolts. It had been locked from within, from the other side.

  I sat on the throne, clutching its arms, alone in the great hall.

  13

  The Golden Cage;

  Miles of Argentum Speaks with Me

  The great beam cracked, and then splintered, and the doors burst in at the far end of the aisle, leading towards the throne.

  I clutched the arms of the throne in terror.

  Before this I had heard the screams of the crowd outside the doors, their shouting and pounding, then the striking of a heavy beam against the door.

  Men and women, many in rags, brandishing knives and implements, mixed with soldiers, poured into the great hall. The doors were open, and one hung awry on its hinges. The mob, with the soldiers, swirling about the heavy beam, now dropped, which had been used to breach the doors, flooded toward the dais. At the foot of the dais, shaking fists, shouting angrily, some restrained by soldiers, the crowd stopped. "Cut her to pieces!" I heard. "Tear her to pieces!" More than one man, brutally by soldiers, was struck back. I shrank back, on the throne.

  The crowd seemed to part, scurrying to the sides about the central aisle.

  Down the aisle, now, approaching, his sword in his right hand, his helmet in the crook of his left arm, came a large, sturdy figure. Others followed behind him. I recognized him.

  "Miles, General of Argentum, Victor over Corcyrus!" announced a soldier.

  He ascended the first two steps of the dais. He was sweaty. He had dirt on the side of his face. There was blood on his legs.

  "Greetings, Sheila," he said, "Tatrix of Corcyrus."

  "I am from Earth," I cried out. "My name is Tiffany Collins!"

  "She is Sheila, Tatrix of Corcyrus!" cried men in the crowd. "It is Sheila, Tatrix of Corcyrus!" "It is she!" "It is Sheila!" "It is Sheila, the Tatrix of Corcyrus!"

  I moaned. I was terrified that they should know that.

  Miles of Argentum sheathed h
is sword. He handed his helmet to one of the men with him.

  He approached the throne.

  "Please, don't," I said.

  Then he jerked away the veil of state from my features. I, though a free woman, had been face-stripped before free men. My face was as bare to them as though I might be a slave. Face-stripping a free woman, against her will, can be a serious crime on Gor. On the other hand, Corcyrus had now fallen. Her women, thusly, now at the feet of her conquerors, would be little better than slaves. Any fate could now be inflicted on them that the conquerors might wish, including making them actual slaves. The hand of Miles of Argentum then brushed back my robes, that my whole head and features, to the throat, might be revealed to the crowd.

  "This is the way in which I am more accustomed to seeing you," he said. "Greetings, Lady Sheila, Tatrix of Corcyrus."

  "I am Tiffany Collins," I said, weakly. "I am from Earth."

  "Your features," said Miles of Argentum, "are surely well known to hundreds, if not thousands."

  "Cut her to pieces!" cried men in the crowd. "Tear her to pieces!" cried women in the crowd.

  "I am from Earth!" I cried. "I am Tiffany Collins!"

  "Bring forth the palace slave called Susan," said Miles of Argentum.

  Susan, from somewhere in the back, was thrust forward. I gasped. She was absolutely naked, save that she still wore the collar of Ligurious. Her hands were bound behind her back. In her nose there was a small, circular, wire apparatus which had apparently been held open, thrust through her septum, and then permitted to spring shut. Attached to this apparatus, tied through it, dangling, was a looped thong, about two feet in length. It was clearly a device by means of which a slave, or perhaps any female, might be led.

  "You are Susan, are you not," inquired Miles of Argentum, "who was as personal serving slave to Sheila, the Tatrix of Corcyrus?"

  "Yes, Master," she said.

  He indicated that she might kneel before the throne.

  "Is this she who was to you as Mistress?" inquired Miles of Argentum, addressing himself to the terrified slave from Cincinnati at his feet.

  "Tell them I am Tiffany Collins, from Earth!" I told Susan.

  "She is truly from Earth, I think, Master," wept Susan, "and that is what, I recall, she told me her name was."