"A modest pudding," he said, surprised. "Forgive me, Lady," he said, bowing low. Then he staggered about, behind us, again. Then I suddenly felt the cloak being lifted behind me. "She has legs good enough to be those of a slave," he said. We then proceeded on our way. I was shaking. Too, I now had some idea of the publicness of a slave's body.
I was pulled back into the shadows between some tents. Two guardsmen, with a lantern, passed. Then, again, we threaded our way amongst the canvas-lined lanes of the camp of the men of Argentum.
Most of the tents were dark. Within some were small fires. When men passed between the fires and the canvas wall of the tent we could see their shadows on the canvas. In one tent a girl danced slowly, sensuously, before a seated male. Her skills suggested that she might be a camp slave, a girl from one of the strings of camp slaves, strings of girls owned by authorized merchants, holding contracts for certain seasons or campaigns, kept within the camp, and traveling with it, for renting out to soldiers at fees stipulated in the contracts. Too, of course, she might be a girl even from Corcyrus, or another community, perhaps a paga girl. Such as these are sometimes brought to the camps on speculation. The fees for their use are not contractually controlled, as are those of the regular camp slaves, but the fees of the camp slaves, of course, being fixed and almost nominal, tend to exert a considerable, informal influence on the market; they set competitive standards, ensure realistic pricings and reduce the risk of excessive local profiteering. On Earth it is not unusual for a free woman to attempt to take a profit on her own beauty, using it, for example, if only in mate competitions, to advance herself economically. On Gor, however, if that same woman should be enslaved, she will soon discover that the profits accruing from her beauty redound now not to her, but to her master. This is quite appropriate. It, like she herself, is his.
As we passed another tent, a darkened one, I heard the sounds of chains from within. "Oh, more, Master, I beg you, please, more," I heard, "more, more, please, oh, my Master, more, please more, please more, my Master, I beg you!" How scandalized I was! What was it within, a harlot, a whore! But I feared it was far worse, something a thousand times lower, something a thousand times more despicable and helpless, a slave.
In a few moments we stopped, between some darkened tents. I was then lifted from my feet and placed, sitting, on the ground.
"Why are we stopping here?" I whispered. "Who are you? What are you doing!"
My last question was prompted by the fact that one of the men, the larger of the two, he who had held my left arm, had now crossed my ankles. He was now wrapping a long piece of binding fiber about them, sometimes looping them both, sometimes taking it about only one ankle, sometimes snaking it about both ankles and securing it between both with tightly drawn loops. He even, occasionally, threaded an end through other, already secured loops. He then pulled the entire tie tight. What he had done was far more elaborate and complex than was required to hold a girl's ankles. A loop or two, properly knotted, I did not doubt, would be adequate for the perfect accomplishment of such a task. Then, to my surprise, he placed the two loose ends of the binding fiber in my hands. I held them, puzzled. He had not knotted the tie. Similarly no move had been made to secure my hands.
"Wait!" I whispered. "No!" I then understood what they intended.
The smaller of the two men, he who had been so expert with the locks and chains, placed his fingers across my lips.
"No!" I whispered. "Don't leave me! Who are you? Why have you done what you have done?"
He increased the pressure of his fingers on my lips, and I was silent.
He leaned close to me and whispered. I did not recognize the voice.
"We have brought you here," he said. "It is a half of a pasang from the cage."
I nodded, miserably.
"The camp will be awake in three Ahn," he said.
I nodded.
He withdrew his fingers from my lips.
"Do not leave me!" I begged.
"The camp will be awake in three Ahn," he said.
"Who are you?" I begged.
He was silent.
"Why have you done what you have done?" I asked.
"Once you did me a kindness," he said. "I have never forgotten."
"What kindness?" I asked.
"Our accounts are now squared," he said. "It is done. The matter is finished."
"And what, then, is his motivation?" I asked, indicating the larger man.
"It is other than mine," said the smaller man.
The larger man then drew his cloak away from me. I was then sitting in the dirt, naked, with my ankles fastened together, the two ends of the fiber clutched in my hands.
"Do not leave me," I begged. "Keep me. I am prepared even to be your slave!"
The larger man suddenly, angrily, reached for my throat. I felt those large hands close about it. For an instant things went black. I knew he could crush the life from me at his whim.
"Do not kill her," said the other.
The hands left my throat.
I gasped. I swallowed painfully. The larger man retrieved his cloak.
The two men stood, preparing to take their leave.
"Do not leave me here, I beg you!" I whispered.
"Already, in this," said the smaller man, "you have been granted more than a hundred times the lenience and favor that you deserve."
"Are you not my friends?" I asked.
"No," said he. "We are your enemies."
I looked up at him, in misery.
"Farewell," said he, "Lady Sheila, villainess and tyranness of Corcyrus."
"Wait!" I whispered.
But they were gone, and gone in different directions. I thought of crying out, but doubtless they would be away by the time men would come, and with their masks doffed, who would know them? I would succeed in doing little more than calling attention to myself.
"Wait!" I whispered softly, piteously. But they had vanished.
"The camp will be awake in three Ahn," the smaller man had said.
Feverishly I began to unwind and unthread the binding fiber on my ankles. It took me better than an Ehn to do so.
I saw a lantern approaching, held by one of two guardsmen. I cast aside the binding fiber, and then crept to the side, to lie on my belly in the shadows behind a tent. I felt one of the tent ropes on my shoulder. I heard someone inside the tent stirring in sleep. The lantern of the guardsmen had then passed.
I rose to my feet, wildly, frightened, and then hurried away between the tents.
15
Alarm Bars
"Hold! Who goes there?" called a voice. I heard the snarling of the patrol sleen, its jerking at its chain.
Weeping, I fled back among the tents. The guardsman did not release the sleen. He would probably not want it loose among the tents.
I crouched behind a tent, in the darkness. This was the third time I had tried to leave the camp. Once there had been stakes and wire; another time there had been a deep ditch; each time there had been guardsmen with sleen. The sleen, I had little doubt, had been able to detect my approach, and had led the guardsmen to my vicinity. The perimeter of the camp seemed ringed with guards and sleen. The camp was heavily guarded. This was perhaps because it was still within the range of Corcyrus, and perhaps, too, because of a special captive, a Tatrix, thought to be chained in a suspended cage.
I looked up. I moaned. In the moonlight, not more than a hundred yards away, I could see the cage slung from its branch. In my running, and fear, disoriented, and once pursued by drunken soldiers, I had inadvertently returned to its vicinity. If I were caught I did not doubt but what I would soon again find myself the prisoner of those cramped quarters, though doubtless in fresher, sturdier bonds, probably of iron, and not locked, but hammered closed about my neck and limbs. The cage, too, then would probably be closed with plates and rivets, and the guards doubled or tripled about it. I crouched down, my head in my hands. In a little more than an Ahn, I feared, the camp would be awakened.
Already it seemed to me that there were more people about than before, more men to avoid.
I shrank back into the shadows. Two men, cooks, I think, from their conversation, were passing.
I heard wings overhead. Looking up I saw a tarn. It was flying northwest. Behind it, on long ropes, dangled a tarn basket. Sleen were no problem for it, I thought bitterly. It was not the first such departure, or, indeed, arrival, I had noted in the camp.
I had hitherto avoided the more lit, busy portions of the camp, generally about the areas for tradesmen, suppliers and sutlers, and the storage, delivery and mess areas.
There were too many men there, and it would be, surely, too easy to be detected.
I, then, stealthily, my heart pounding, began to follow, keeping in the shadows, the two men who had just passed. I was terribly frightened. They were moving toward the center of the camp.
"What are you doing there, Slut, skulking about?" called a man. I had not seen him, between the tents. He had some gear slung over his shoulder. He was apparently waiting there. I backed away from him. "Let her go," said another man, emerging from a tent. He, too, carried some gear. "You can see she is a slave, returning to her master." I then hurried away. In the darkness they had not detected that I lacked a brand. Too, they had not noticed that my neck was not encircled by a slave collar.
I was now in consternation. I did not see how I could proceed. People seemed to be getting up now about the camp.
"Ena!" called a girl, hurrying to catch up with another.
I stepped back into the shadows.
A tall, slim girl, naked, turned about. A bit of slave silk dangled languidly from her left hand.
The new girl was short and lusciously bodied. She wore a brief, silken slave tunic, fastened with a single tie at her bosom. A single tug frees the tie and allows the garment to be parted for the view and pleasures of a master. Both women wore collars.
"And how did the night go?" asked the new girl. "Were you well used?"
"Yes," responded the taller girl, dreamily. "And you?"
"Superbly," said the shorter girl.
The two girls then began to walk down the lane between the tents. I, my head down, my hair about my neck and shoulders, hopefully tending to conceal the bareness of my neck, the absence there of a steel circlet, fell into step behind them, seemingly, I hoped, only another slave on her way back to her master.
I soon became aware that this must be a lane leading to the chains. Other girls, soon, here and there, entered it, before and behind me, and between me and those who had been directly before me.
"And what of the resistance you intended to offer?" one girl was asking another.
"It was crushed," said the other. "He did not choose to accept it. Then he made me serve him well."
"It is the fifth time you have served in his tent since we left Argentum," said the first girl.
"Yes," said the second.
"I think he likes you," said the first girl.
"Perhaps," said the other.
"Do you think he will buy you?" asked the first girl.
"It matters not to me," said the other. "I do not care, one way or the other."
"There are stains on your face as though you had been crying," said the girl. "And it does not seem to me that you have been beaten."
"Oh?" asked the other.
"You pretentious tarsk sow," laughed the first girl, "you were begging him to buy you!"
"What if I was!" said the other, tossing her head.
"And when did you beg this?" asked the girl.
"After my resistance had been crushed, and he made me serve him without compromise as a slave," said the other, "and again this morning, before we parted."
"You seem pleased enough now," observed the girl.
"Tassy," said the other, "he is going to make an offer for me!"
"That is marvelous, Yitza!" said the first girl.
"But will Myron let me go?" asked the second girl.
"I do not know," said the first. "Such matters are between the men."
The second girl moaned.
"Look at it this way," said the first girl. "If we did not wear collars we would not even know the touch of such men as Rutilius. Too, if we were not slaves and sent to their tents, we would not even know what to do. We would be only ignorant free women."
"How I sometimes pity free women!" laughed the second girl. "They are so stupid!"
"But fear them, Yitza," said the first girl, "for they are free and you are enslaved."
"Of course," said the second girl, shuddering.
"And remember that they hate you," said the first.
"I know," said the second.
A man stepped out, into the center of the lane. I stopped, frightened. But his attention was on another.
"Yeela," said he.
A girl, addressed by a free man, fell to her knees before him.
"I have paid fee for you," he said.
"It is early, Master," she laughed. "Would you lie to a poor slave?"
"Perhaps," he said.
"If you have not, know that you will be charged," she laughed. "I am not for free!"
But then he had crouched down and taken her in his arms. She was thrown beneath him, grasping at him, to the dirt. Frightened, I took my way about them. I tried to hide among other girls. I hoped that no man would decide to pull me out from among them.
"What is for breakfast?" I heard one girl asking another.
"I have heard," said the other girl, who was a shorter one, "that each of us will have five berries put in our gruel this morning."
"Good," said the first.
"If no bad reports are received on any of us," added the second.
"I was pleasing," said the first.
"So, too, was I," averred the second.
"If Jasmine is not fully pleasing again," said the first girl, "I think I will pull her hair out."
"And so, too, will the rest of the chain!" laughed the second girl, the shorter one.
Jasmine, I suspected, would soon learn to be pleasing. Certainly it would be in her best interests to be so. She would probably have to spend at least a portion of every day within the reach of her chain sisters. Doubtless soon she would be begging them for counsels in sensuality, for tricks and techniques, that she might improve herself and become less inadequate as a slave.
"He took away my clothes," one girl was telling another, "but then he did not so much as touch me. He made me serve him, rather, in small and menial ways. I must cook sullage for him. Then I must launder and iron a tunic. Then I must dust his goods, and clean and tidy his tent. Then I was made to sew, and then clean and polish his leather."
"And how did you feel," asked the girl to whom she was speaking, "performing these small tasks for him, suitable for a slave?"
"Gradually, serving him helplessly, then lovingly in these fashions, I became more and more aroused," she said. "Then, finally, after the polishing of the leather, I could stand it no longer. I threw myself to my belly before him, juicing like a larma."
"Did he then content you?" asked the other girl.
"Yes," said the girl, "though the brute made me squirm a little first."
How well that master had understood sex, and the sexuality of the female, I thought. He apparently understood something of the pervasiveness and totality of female sexuality. They had been, in their way, having sex together for hours, before he even touched her. Well had he understood the woman, and her needs and desires to be pleasing, and to submit and serve in many ways. It was the total woman, in her wholeness, which he, to her joy, had chosen to dominate.
How terrible, I thought, to be a slave!
"Would you like to be sent again to his tent?" asked the other girl.
"Yes," said the girl. "Yes! Oh, yes!"
What a meaningless slut she was! How pleased I was that I was not a slave!
"You, Slave!" called a voice.
I stopped in my tracks. I put my fists before my mouth, in terror, b
ut, too, to hide my neck.
"Not you, you!" said the voice.
I quickly hurried on, trembling. It seemed that any moment I must be discovered.
"I must see him again," the girl in front of me was saying.
"Why?" asked the other.
"I think he is my love master," she breathed.
"It is more likely that you are his love slave," laughed the other.
"He must call for me again!" said the girl.
"You are, of course, entitled to hope that," said the other, "when you lie alone, chained in your place."
"He must!" she wept.
"Perhaps he will have you summoned again to his tent," said the second girl.
"I must see him again!" she said.
"That will be decided by masters," said the second girl. How horrifying to be a slave, I thought. How pleased I was that I was not a slave.
Swiftly, then, seeing more men waiting further down the lane, some with loops of chain in their hands, I slipped to the side between the tents. I could see women lining up down there, too, being put in wrist or throat coffle, each one doubtless reporting in, and in the proper position, to the appropriate slave master.
I skirted a large cooking area. I could smell freshly baked bread, and the cooking of eggs and meat.
I made my way among tents, every sense alert, sometimes crawling on my hands and knees.
It was still quite dark. Here and there there were morning fires. The moons were down.
I cried out in misery. A sleen, snarling, leapt toward me, but was stopped by its chain.
I continued on my way, treading narrow valleys between mountains of sacks, narrow aisles separating cliffs of boxes.
"Where are you going, little lady?" called a fellow from above me. He was standing on boxes, carrying a box. I had not even seen him. "The chains," he said, "are behind you and to your right."
Swiftly I sped away, in the general direction he had indicated. Then, when I was confident I was out of his sight, I resumed, as nearly as I could, given the bundles, the boxes and crates, my original direction.
Then I found myself in a blind alley, a place where the passage was closed by a sheer wall of boxes, several feet over my head. I hurried back and tried another passage. It, too, to my misery, was blocked. Then I suddenly realized I had lost my direction. Between the boxes, at places, darknesses in the darkness, there were narrow cracks. I did not know which were passages and which were mere places where several boxes had been removed. I struck with my fists at the wall of boxes.
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