Norman, John - Gor 08 - Hunters of Gor.txt
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physiology. For example, it would not occur to a Gorean to speak of the “role”
of a female sparrow feeding her young or the “role” of a lion in providing meat
for its cubs. Goreans do not see the world in terms of metaphors taken from the
artificialities of the theater. It is certain, of course, that certain genetic
endowments have been selected by environmental considerations, and, in this
sense, the environment is a significant factor. The teeth of the lion have had
much to do with the fleetness of the antelopes.
In Gorean thinking man and woman are natural animals, with genetic endowments
shaped by thousands of generations of natural and sexual selection. Their
actions and behavior, thus, though not independent of certain long-range
environmental and sexual relationships, cannot be understood in terms of mere
responses to the immediate present environment. The immediate environment
determines what behavior will be successful, not what behavior is performed.
Woman, like man, is the product of evolution, and, like man, is a complex
genetic product, a product not only of natural selections but sexual selections.
Natural selections suggest that a woman who wished to belong to a man, who
wished to remain with him, who wished to have children, who wished to care for
them, who loved them, would have an advantage, in the long run, as far as her
genetic type was concerned, of surviving, over a woman who did not care for men,
who did not wish for children, and so on. Female freedom, of a full sort, would
not have been biologically practical. The loving mother is a type favored by
evolution. It is natural then that in modern women certain instincts should be
felt. The sparrow does not feed her young because the society has fooled her
into playing that exploitative role. Similarly, sexual selection, as well as
natural selection, is a significant dynamic of evolution, without which it is
less comprehensible. Men, being stronger, have had, generally, the option of
deciding on women that pleases them. If women had been stronger, as in the
spiders, for example, we might have a different race.
It is not unlikely that men, over the generations, have selected out for
breeding, for marriage, women of certain sorts. Doubtless women are much more
beautiful now than a hundred generations ago. Similarly, a woman who was
particularly ugly, threatening, vicious, stupid, cruel, etc., would not be a
desirable mate. No man can be blamed for not wishing to make his life miserable.
Accordingly, statistically, he tends to select out women who are intelligent,
loving and beautiful. Accordingly, men have, in effect, bred a certain kind of
woman. similarly, of course, is so far as choice had been theirs, women have
tended to select out men who are, among other things, intelligent, energetic and
strong. Few women, in their hearts, despite propaganda, really desire weak,
feminine men. Such men, at any rate, are not those who figure in their sexual
fantasies.
Goreans believe it is the nature of a man to own, that of a woman to be owned.
I observed Verna’s women, no longer hers, but now the slaves of their masters,
in the longboats.
Verna had given them their choice, had indeed forced the choice upon them.
I wondered if, in the forest, she had expected any of them to return to her. She
had had them clad in slave silk. She had had earrings put in their ears.
Perhaps she had already gone her own way. Her women, now slaves, waited in
longboats to be carried to the Rhoda, the Tesephone.
They had made their choice, to surrender to a man. They had yielded to their
womanhood.
Verna would hunt alone in the forests. She would have her freedom. About her
neck she wore the signet ring of Ar. She would be swift and free in the dark
green glades. She would be alone. I wondered if, at times, she would lie in the
darkness, clutching the ring of Marlenus, and twist, and weep. Her pride stood
between herself, and her womanhood. Yet in the darkness, as she lay on the
leaves in her lair, in her ears would glint the gold of earrings. She had not
removed them. They had been fastened in her ears upon the order of Marlenus,
when he had been her master. She would never forget, in her freedom, nor did she
wish to do so, that she had been once his utter slave. Perhaps from time to time
she would long for his collar and touch. She had made her choice, for her
independence. She had not been exchanged that even for the throne of Ar. Her
women had, too, made their choice. Verna was free. They were shamed, as slaves.
I did not know which was happiest. They sat silently in the longboats, obedient.
The hands of each were now being fastened behind her back. I saw Rena’s wrist
secured. They, new slaves, were shy. But they did not seem unhappy. I wondered
if any, as her wrists were drawn together behind her back and fastened together,
regretted her decision. If she did, it was too late. The binding fiber was upon
her. But they did not seem unhappy. They had yielded to their womanhood. They
had surrendered themselves to bondage, and love. This gift, this choice, which
she had refused for herself, Verna had given them.
Doubtless now, alone, somewhere within the forest, in freedom and solitude there
was a panther girl. She hunted. Her name was Verna. I wished her well.
I wondered if she might, sometime, trek to Ar, to call upon its Ubar, or if he,
attending to his hunting in the northern forests, might once more chance upon
her. I did not suppose it likely. “She is only a woman,” he had said. But he had
given her the signet of Ar. I wondered if Verna knew that she who wore that ring
about her neck was the Ubara of Ar.
“We have set the logs of the palisade in the form of a great beacon,” aid
Thurnock.
I looked to the stony beach. There, high on the stones, rose the beacon, tier
upon tier of crossed logs.
“Pour oil upon it,” I said.
“Yes, Captain,” he said.
Oil was poured.
I sat high on the beach, wrapped in blankets, in the captain’s chair, cold. I
looked at the beacon.
Its light would be seen more than fifty pasangs at sea.
I turned back to the beach. My men stood about.
“Put the slave Rissia, before me, she who was of Hura’s band,” I said.
I heard Ilene’s switch strike Rissia, twice across the back. Rissia stripped,
her ankles, wrists and throat locked in the graceful chain and rings of the
sirik, stumbled forward. She knelt before my chair, on the sand. Twice more fell
Ilene’s switch, and I saw bloody stripes leap on the girl’s exposed back. Her
knees were in the sand, her head was down.
“Withdraw,” I said to Ilene, who stood over Rissia in her white woolen slave
tunic, herself barefoot, my collar at her throat. Ilene backed away, the switch
still in her hand, to stand to one side.
“This woman,” said I to Thurnock, indicating Rissia, “remained behind in the
camp of Sarus and Hura, when many of her fellow panther women were drugged.”
Thurnock nodded.
“She had a bow,” I said, “ with an arrow to the string. It was her intention to
defend her d
rugged sisters, to protect them.”
“I see, Captain,” said Thurnock.
“She might have slain me,” I said.
Thurnock smiled.
“What should be her fate?”
“That,” said he, “is for my captain to decide.”
“Her act,” I asked, “does it not seem brave?”
“It does indeed, my captain,” said Thurnock.
“Free her,” I told him.
Grinning, Thurnock bent to the shackles which graced Rissia’s fair limbs,
removing them one by one.
Rissia lifted her head, looking at me, dumbfounded.
“You are free,” I told her. “Depart.”
“My gratitude, Captain,” she whispered.
“Depart!” I commanded.
Rissia turned about and regarded Ilene. He Earth girl took a step backward.
“May I not remain a moment, Captain?” asked Rissia. She turned to face me.
“Very well,” I said.
“I ask the rite of knives,” she said.
“Very well,” I said.
One of my men held Ilene by the arms. She was frightened.
Two daggers were brought. One was given to Rissia. The other was pressed into
the unwilling hand of Ilene.
“I—I do not understand,” stammered Ilene,
“You are to fight to the death,” I told her.
She looked at Rissia. “No!” she wept. “No!’ Ilene threw away the knife.
“Kneel,” ordered Rissia.
Ilene did.
Rissia stood behind her.
“Do not hurt me,” begged Ilene.
“Address me as Mistress,” said Rissia.
“Please do not hurt me, Mistress,” begged Ilene.
“You do not seem so proud now, Slave, without your switch,” said Rissia.
“No, Mistress,” whispered Rissia.
With her knife, from the back, Rissia cut away Ilene’s slave tunic, stripping
her.
Rissia picked up the discarded sirik. She reached over Ilene’s head and fastened
the collar about her throat, the chain dangling before her body. Then, reaching
about her, she fastened Ilene’s hands in the bracelets attached to the chain,
confining them before her body. She then drew the chain between her legs and
under her body and fastened the two ankle rings, attached to the chain, on her
ankles. Ilene knelt stripped in sirik.
“With your permission, Captain,” said Rissia.
I nodded.
Picking up the switch from the sand, with which Ilene had often beaten her, she
struck her.
Ilene cried out. “Please do not beat me!” she wept. “Please do not beat me,
Mistress!”
“I do not choose,” said Rissia, “to comply with the request of a slave.”
She beat Ilene until Ilene wept and screamed, and then could weep and scream no
more.
Then she threw aside the switch and disappeared into the forest.
Ilene, tears in her eyes, her head turned to the side, lay on her stomach in the
sand, confined in the sirik. The entire back of her body was hot and bright with
the scarlet marks of the switch.
“To your knees,” I told her.
Ilene struggled to her knees, and looked up at me.
“Take her to the Tesephone,” I told two of my men, “and put her in the hold with
the other female slaves.”
“Please, Master,” wept the girl.
“And then,” said I, “see that she is sold in Port Kar.”
Weeping, Ilene, the Earth-girl slave, was dragged from my presence. She would be
sold in Port Kar, a great slave-clearing port. Perhaps she would be sold south
to Shendi or Bazi, or north to a jarl of Torvaldsland, Scagnar or Hunjer, or
across Thassa to Tabor or Asperiche, or taken up the Vosk in a cage to an island
city, perhaps eventually to find herself in Ko-ro-ba, Thentis or Tharna, or even
Ar itself. Perhaps she would be carried south in tarn caravans, or by slave
wagons of the Wagon Peoples, the Tuchuks, the Kassars, the Kataii, the Paravaci.
Perhaps she would be, even, the slave of peasants. It was not known where the
lovely Ilene would wear her collar; it was known, though, that she would wear
it, and wear it well; a Gorean master would see to that.
I looked to the beacon. I looked, too, to the Tesephone. Rim’s men had the Rhoda
ready for the tide.
“Carry my chair,’ I said, “to the longboat.”
Four crewmen reached to lift the chair.
“Wait,” I said.
“Captain!” called a voice. “I have caught two women!”
I saw one of my men, one of those set at guard about the beach.
He approached, pushing two captives before him. They wore the skins of panther
girls. Their hands were tied behind their backs. They were fastened together by
a single branch, tied behind their backs.
I did not recognize the,’
“They were spying,” said her.
“No,” said one. “We were looking for Verna.”
“Strip them,” I said. It is easier to get a woman to talk when she is nude.
It was done.
I knew who these women must be.
“Speak,” I said to the comeliest of the two.
“We were in the hire of Verna,” she said, “but we are not of her band.”
“You task,” I told them, “was to guard a female slave.”
They looked at me, startled. “Yes,” she said.
“This slave,” I said, “was the daughter of Marlenus of Ar.”
“Yes,” whispered one.
“Where is she?’ I demanded.
“When Marlenus disowned her,” said one, frightened, “and she was no longer of
value, Verna, through Mira, instructed us to dispose of her, taking a price on
her.”
“For what did she sell?” I asked.
“For ten gold pieces,” said the comeliest of the two captives.
“It is a high price for a wench without caste of family,” I said.
“She is very beautiful,” said one of the girls.
The other wench looked at me. “Did the captain wish her?” she asked.
I smiled. “I might have bought her.” I said.
“We did not know!” cried the comely girl. “Do not punish us, Captain!”
“Do you still have the money?” I asked.
“In my pouch,” cried the comelier of the two captives.
I gestured to Thurnock and he gave me the pouch. With my right hand I counted
out the ten gold pieces. I held them in the palm of my right hand. It was the
closest I had come to Talena in many years. I closed my hand on the coins. I was
bitter. I threw them before the captive women.
“Free them,” I told Thurnock. “let them go.”
They looked at me, startled. Their bonds were removed. They drew on again the
skins of panthers.
“Find Verna in the forest,” I told them. “Give her the coins.”
“Will you not keep us as slave girls?” asked one.
“No,” I told them. “Find Verna. Give her the coins. They are hers. Tell her that
the woman brought a good price because, though she had neither caste nor family,
she is very beautiful.”
“We will do so, Captain,” said the comelier of the two.
They prepared to depart.
“To whom,” I asked, “did you sell the slave?”
“To the first ship which chanced by,” said the comelier of the girls.
“Who was its captain?” I asked.
She looked at me. “S
amos,” she said. “Samos, of Port Kar.”
I gestured that they might leave.
“Lift my chair,” said I to the crewmen. “I would return to the Tesephone.”
That night, sitting on the stern castle of the Tesephone, I looked north and
eastward.
The sky to the north and east was bright. On the western coast of Thassa, high
above Lydius, on a remote, stony beach, a beacon burned, marking a place on the
coast where there had once stood a stockade, where men had fought, where deeds
had transpired.
We had poured oil, and wine and salt into the sea. We were enroute to Port Kar.
Before we had left the shore we had set the beacon afire. I could still see its
light.
I did not think I would ever forget it. I sat on the stern castle, wrapped in
blankets, looking back.
I recalled Arn, and Rim and Thurnock, and Hura and Mira, and Verna and Grenna,
and Sheera. I recalled Marlenus of Ar and Sarus of Tyros. I recalled Ilene. I
recalled Rissia. I recalled them all. We had come to Lydius and Laura, and the
northern forests.
Bosk of Port Kar, so wise, so bold and arrogant, had come mightily to the
northern forests. Now, like a maimed larl, heavy, bitter, weighty with pain, he
returned to his lair. He looked back, noting in the sky the light of a beacon,
one which burned on a deserted shore.
Few would see the beacon. Few would know why it burned. I myself did not know.
In time there would be only ashes, and they would be swept away in the rain and
the wind. The tracks of sea birds might, like the thief’s brand, be found in the
sand, but they too, in time, would be washed away.
I would not see Talena in Port Kar. I would have her returned to Marlenus of Ar.
I was cold. I could not feel the left side of my body.
“A good wind, Captain,” said Thurnock.
“Yes, Thurnock,” I said. “It is a fair wind.”
I could hear the snapping of the tarn sail of the Tesephone.
I heard Thurnock’s steps going down to the deck from the stern castle.
I wondered if Pa-Kur, Master of the Assassins, yet lived. I thought it not
impossible.
I heard the creak of the rudder.
I had, in my fever and delirium, cried the name of Vella. I did not understand
this, for I no longer cared for her. She had once resisted my will.
She had fled from the Sardar, when I, in her own best interest, would have