by John Norman
The mother kissed her, and caressed her hair, softly, soothingly.
"I am a terrible person," said the girl.
"Such feelings are perfectly natural," said the mother. "Do not be ashamed of them. They tell you what you are. It is not wrong to be what you are. It is good to be what you are, exactly what you are, whatever it may be."
"Have you ever had such feelings?" asked the girl.
"Yes," said the mother.
"What can possibly be their meaning?" asked the girl, frightened.
"It is simple," said the mother.
"What?" asked the girl.
"That we are females," said the mother.
"Females?" said the daughter.
"Yes," said the mother. "Such feelings, of need and helplessness, are natural for us. Do not be afraid of them. They tell us what we are."
"Are wea€”are we slaves, Mother?" asked the girl.
"Hush," said the mother, quickly. "One approaches; a guard." Quickly they separated, each looking down. The mother rested now on her right thigh and hip, her hands on the floor of the Semnium, the girl on her left thigh and hip, her hands, too, on the Semnium's floor. They did not lift their heads. They did not wish to risk meeting the eyes of the guard, calling attention to themselves. They looked well in the collars, both affixed to the chain.
The woman near me, on the marble bench, grasped it more tightly. The padlock on her collar moved on the marble. The guard was removing her ankle shackles. He then sat her upright, and unchained her wrists. The ankle chain and wrist chain he left lying over the bench, in front of her. He then took her by the hair and drew her from the bench. He walked her, bent over, to a place on the chain. A second padlock was there, marking what had been her place. He knelt her there, and then opened the padlock on the chain. Without removing it from the chain he pushed its bolt through the ring on her collar and snapped it shut. She was again part of the chain. She lay down on the floor, in her place. The guard looked over the nearby women. None met his eyes. He was the same fellow who, earlier had brought in the newest arrival, bound and leashed, in the Semnium. "261," he said.
"Please, no," she said.
He regarded her.
"Master," she said, putting her head down.
A young girl, near her, gasped, hearing her mother use this word to a man. 261 was freed from the chain. He sat her on the bench, straddling it.
"Please," she said, "do not. My daughter is near." Then her ankles were shackled, the chain running under the heavy fixed-position bench. Then her wrists were enclosed in the wrist rings, the chain from them, too, running under the bench. He then put her down on the bench. She lay on it, on her stomach, her legs on either side of it. Her throat still wore the padlocked collar. The other padlock, that which had held the collar to the chain, he left on the chain. It marked the place to which she would be returned. He then left her. In a few Ahn it would be dawn. I had not slept well. I must make the decision soon, whether or not to carry certain letters. I gathered this couriership might be not without its dangers.
I glanced at the female on the bench. She was lusciously desirable. I put her from my mind.
I had reservations about taking Hurtha and Boabissia into danger. Even if they were willing, and informed, at least to the extent I was, I did not think I should permit them to accompany me. It might be too perilous for them, how perilous, of course, I did not know.
The female stirred on the bench. There was a tiny sound of chain. I forced the thought of her from my mind. She was excitingly desirable.
I had little doubt, however, that Hurtha would cheerfully come along, if asked, and perhaps if not asked, abounding with his customary indefatigable optimism whatever might be the odds. He had already complained, more than once, that his ax was getting rusty. This is an Alar way, I took it, of saying that it had not been used lately. That was perhaps just as well. If Hurtha came with me, however, it seemed that Boabissia should be left behind. If she were left behind, however, I did not doubt but what she would soon find herself in a collar. She was that attractive. I put the woman on the bench again from my mind. I wondered what Boabissia would look like on the bench, in such a predicament. Rather well, I supposed. I might slip from the city, without them, I thought. In that way I would not carry them into danger. That would be thoughtful on my part. If I did that, of course, I should speak to Hurtha and Boabissia. I wondered if I should slip from the city. I did not know what to do. It was hard to sleep.
"Oh!" said the woman on the bench, stiffening, my hand on her.
"Do not relax your body," I said. "Keep it tight against my hand." She moaned.
"You are a free woman, are you not?" I said.
"Yes," she said.
"You may relax your body," I said.
Quickly she drew herself forward on the bench, frightened, an inch or so.
"Move back," I said.
She moaned, and slid back a tiny bit.
"More," I said.
She complied, fearfully.
"More," I said.
She was now back where she had been before. "I do not know where your hand is," she said.
"It is here," I said, lifting a finger, touching her.
"Oh!" she said.
"You look well in a collar, and chains," I said.
"Please," she said. "Do not touch me."
"Why," I asked.
"My daughter is near," she said.
"What is that to me?" I asked.
"She can see, she can hear! she whispered. "Ohh!" She shuddered, caressed. "You are a lusciously bodied female," I said. "Doubtless you will bring your seller a good price."
"Ohh," she said.
"When you were brought in," I said, "it seems your wrists were quite tightly bound behind you, more than with the customary tightness ample to keep a female in perfect custody.
"Sir?" she asked.
"You may call me Master," I said.
"Master?" she said.
"The way you rubbed your wrists, that suggests you were not merely bound with customary tightness, but punishment bound."
"Perhaps," she said.
"Perhaps you had showed less than absolutely perfect deference to men?" I speculated.
"No, Master," she said. "I am not a fool." "I would guess then," I said, caressing her, "that the tie was intended to be an informative, or admonitory one, one from which you were to gather something of the meaning of your reduction in station."
"Yes," she said.
"Doubtless, then, you were formerly of some importance."
"Yes," she said. "I was important."
"Are you important now?" I asked.
"No!" she gasped.
"Are you sure?" I asked.
"Yes, yes!" she gasped.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"I ama€”261!" she said.
I pulled her to a sitting position, before me, and then bent her backward and turned her body. "Yes," I said, "you are 261." I then put her back on her stomach. "And who is your daughter?" I asked.
"437," she said.
"Are you more beautiful than your daughter?" I asked.
"I do not know," she wept, clutching the bench.
I heard a gasp from the side, from our right, from among the other women.
I stepped from the bench, looking at the other women. "You," I said to a girl there. "Kneel, straighten your back, put your chin up, throw your hair behind your back." She did these things. "You are 437," I said, reading her number. "Yes," she said.
"Yes, what?" I asked.
"Yes, Master," she said, quickly.
"Yes," I said to the woman on the bench, "she has something of your beauty." "Something!" gasped the girl.
"You are both quite beautiful," I said to the woman on the bench, returning to her. "I suppose it would be difficult to say who, ultimately, under proper slave disciplines, will prove the most beautiful, but, clearly, now, at the moment, if these things are pertinent to the issue, you would bring the highest price." "I?"
asked the woman before me, wonderingly. "Yes," I said. "But she has something of your coloring and characteristics, and is quite beautiful, and I think it likely, in time, with more experience in life and love, she might aspire to equal your beauty." The girl gasped.
"Please," said the woman. "We are mother and daughter."
"You are only two women," I said, "two women in collars, and, at this time, you, my chained beauty, would bring a higher price on the auction block, a price she could not hope, for perhaps years, to equal or excel. To be sure, I think you are both excellent collar meat."
The woman moaned. I then renewed my attentions to her body.
"I gather it has been a long time since you have been touched," I said. "Yes," she said. "Are you disappointed in me? Do I take too long to respond?" "Mother!" cried the girl, scandalized.
"You are not a slave," I said. "You do not have trained, honed reflexes. Smoldering fires have not been set in your belly, never far from the surface, ready to leap into flame at the smallest touch. You are a free woman. I do not expect much of you."
"Oh!" she cried, suddenly.
"Still," I said, "you seem to have in you the promise of vitality." "Oh," she said.
"Interesting," I said.
"Oh!" she said. "Oh!"
"Perhaps, as in all women," I mused, there is a slave in you."
She moaned.
"Or perhaps it is not so much that there is a slave in you," I mused, "as that you are simply a slave."
"Please do not make me yield!" she begged, suddenly. I continued to caress her. "Be silent!" she said. "Be silent! Can't you see I am in the hands of a man!" "Mother!" cried the girl. "Oh!" cried the woman.
"You squirm like a slut!" cried the girl.
"What you are doing to me!" cried the woman, half rearing up on the palms of her hands, the chains on her wrists.
"Lie down," I instructed her.
She then lay there, on the cool marble, clutching it, tensely, her eyes wild, her head to the left.
"Is anything wrong?" I asked.
She lay extremely still, almost rigid, tensely, on the bench. She gripped the marble tightly. It seemed she did not dare to move.
"Yes?" I asked.
"Do not make me yield," she begged. She was very beautiful, and very helpless. Such a female would indeed, I thought, bring a high price.
"Why?" I asked.
She moaned.
"Why?" I pressed. It was not necessary to beat her for not having responded promptly to my question. She was a free woman. Such tardiness in a slave, of course, is not acceptable. It can mean the whip for her.
"Please," she said.
"You want to yield, do you not?" I asked.
"No, no," she said.
"I think it has been a long time since you have yielded, if ever before you have truly yielded to a man."
"Yes," she whimpered.
"Did you ever before, truly, yield to a man?" I asked.
"No," she whispered.
"I think you now suspect what it might be like to do so," I said.
"Yes, yes," she whispered, tensely.
I touched her, slightly. "Oh," she said, grasping the marble even more tightly. "Be strong, Mother," called the girl.
Tears fell from the woman's eyes, falling to the marble. The padlock, holding her in the close-fitting metal collar, moved a little on the smooth marble. It made a small sound. She had long, dark hair.
"I think you want to yield," I said.
"No, no," she said.
I touched her, gently, "Ohhh," she said.
"I think you want to yield," I said.
"No, no!" she said.
I again caressed her, this time with an exquisite delicacy, a brief, sweet touch that brought her, in her present condition, to the brink of an uncontrollable response. If I should continue I had little doubt but what she would, in a moment or two, be jerking on her belly, crying out in a rattle of chain, writhing helplessly on the marble, then bruising and marking the soft interiors of her lovely thighs against it, so tightly gripping it.
"No man can make you yield, Mother!" cried the girl.
I gathered she was a mere virgin. Doubtless in the next few weeks she would learn better.
"Be silent, you stupid girl!" wept the mother.
"Mother!" protested the girl.
"Why do you not wish to yield?" I asked the woman.
"My daughter," she gasped. "My daughter is here!
"But you would be willing to yield if she were not present," I asked.
"Yes, yes!" said the woman.
"Interesting," I said.
"Mother!" protested the girl, horrified.
"Do you think I would have her removed from the room?" I asked.
"Please! said the woman.
"No," I said.
She moaned.
"Do you not want her to know what a pleasure and a joy you can be to a man?" I asked.
"I am her mother! she wept.
"You are only another woman in a collar," I said. "And, soon, you will be going your different ways. Besides, I do not think she is your equal in these things. Perhaps sometime she might possibly be your equal. I do not know. Perhaps you, in your love, could hope that for her, and even give her training, and advice. At present, however, dear lady, it is you, I assure you, who are the prize, you whom strong men would relish most on her belly before them. Who knows? Perhaps you will both find yourselves eventually in the same household. It might be interesting to see you competing for the favor of the same master. I have little doubt it would be you, properly enslaved, my dear, and not she, who would be most often drawn by the hair to the master's couch."
The woman sobbed.
"What has been the relationship between you and your daughter?" I asked. The woman did not respond.
"I gather it has been distant," I said. "I gather that you love for her has been little reciprocated, that your sacrifices, your concerns and efforts in her behalf, have been little understood or appreciated. I gather that she, in the customary, unquestioning self-centeredness and vanity of her youth, seemingly so inevitable in the young, has given little concern to your feelings, to your reality as an independent woman and human being, that she has scarcely thought of you, or understood you, in these ways, that she has, typically, much taken you for granted, considering you often as little more than a convenience, a tool and fixture, in her world, as little more than her servant and satellite." "No, no!" said the daughter.
The woman was silent.
"But such things are over now," I said.
"Yes," whispered the woman.
"You are now only two women," I said, "each in the custody of impartial iron, each destined to stand by herself on the sawdust of the slave block, each, separately, to helplessly submit to, and endure, the objective scrutiny of buyers. There it will not matter that you are mother and daughter. Probably you will not even be sold in proximity to one another, but in the order of your numbers, or in some order deemed aesthetically or commercially appropriate by professional slavers. There you will be evaluated, bid upon and purchased, as different animals, as separate properties, merely as independent items up for sale, solely on your own merits. Then you will go your own ways, doubtless never to see one another again, doubtless each to the chains of a separate master. I wonder who will make the better slave?"
I then touched her, gently, again.
"Ohhh," she said, softly.
"Who would be the best?" I asked.
"I do not know," said the woman.
"Mother!" scolded the girl.
"Doubtless, in the end, under the suitable tutelage of strong men, you will both become superb," I speculated.
"Yes," whispered the woman.
"Perhaps, in the end, when you are both marvelous, there will be little to choose from between you," I speculated.
The woman said nothing.
"But now," I said, "there is a great deal to choose from, between you." The girl cried out in anger.
Th
e woman groaned, clutching the bench.
"Can you imagine your daughter in slave silk?" I asked the woman. "Can you imagine her in a collar, kneeling and obeying?"
"Yes," whispered the woman.
"Do not speak so," begged the daughter.
"Can you imagine her naked, kicking in her chains," I asked, "crying out, begging for a man's touch.
"Yes," said the woman.
The daughter put her head in her hands, sobbing.
"Hush, dear," said the woman. "It will be so."
"Men are horrid," wept the girl.
"No," she said, "they are the masters. They are as they are, as we are as we are."
"I will never yield to them," wept the girl.
"Then you will be killed," said the woman.
The girl gasped, shrinking back in the chains. "I could pretend to yield," she whispered.
"That is the crime of false yielding," said the mother. "It is easy to detect, by infallible physiological signs. It is punishable by death."
"What, then, can I do?" she wept.
"Yield truly, or die," she said.
"What chance have I, then?" asked the girl.
"None," said the mother. "You will be a slave."
"If you like," I said to the woman, "I can go over there and, in moments, one hand on the back of her neck, my other hand free, have her leaping like a child's toy."
"No," said the woman. "It will be soon enough done to her, such things. She will learn soon enough, what it is, a bond maid, to be owned by men."
"Do not worry so much about her," I said.
"I am her mother," she said.
"I would worry more about myself, if I were you," I said. "I think you will find that you will prove to be a much more frequent object of male aggression than she. Merely to see you is to want to strip you and put you in a collar." "No!" gasped the woman.
"I am a man, and I can vouch for it," I said. I gave her an intimate, friendly pat.
"Please!" she said.
"Be silent," I said.
"Yes, Master," she said.
"I assure you," I said, "you are at present much more likely to excite the predations of men, to be viewed as a mere imbonded lust object, than your daughter. You are much more likely than she, at least at present, in my opinion, to discover that you have, perhaps to your terror and distress, and with predictable consequences to yourself, then a slave, occasioned their interest. "No!" said the girl.