Norman, John - Gor 25 - Magicians of Gor.txt

Norman, John - Gor 25 - Magicians of Gor.txt Page 6

by Magicians of Gor [lit]

with a smiting to the side of the fellow’s head which staggered him. he then, at

  the last moment, held back. the opponent, dazed, sat back in the dirt, laughing.

  “Victory for Rarir!” cried one man. “Pay us!” called another. Extending his hand

  to the foe the victor pulled him to his feet. They embraced. “Paga! Paga for

  both!” called a fellow.

  I circled about a bit.

  I saw no sight of Marcus or his lovely slave. Perhaps they had returned to the

  tent.

  In one place, hearing the jingling of bells, I went over to a large open circle

  of fellows to watch a game of “girl catch.” There are many ways in which this

  game, or sort of game, is played. In this one, which was not untypical, a female

  slave, within an enclosure, her hands bound behind her back, and hooded, is

  belled, usually with common slave bells at the collar, wrists and ankles and a

  larger bell, a guide bell, with its particular note, at her left hip. Some

  fellows then, also hooded, or blindfolded, enter the enclosure, to catch her.

  Neither the quarry nor the hunters can see the other. The girl is forbidden to

  remain still for more than a certain interval, usually a few Ihn. She is under

  the control of a referee. His switch can encourage her to move, and,

  simultaneously, of course, mark her position. She is hooded in order that she

  may not determine into whose power she comes. When she is caught that game, or

  one of its rounds, is concluded. The victor’s prize, of course, is the use of

  the slave.

  I continued to walk about.

  Two fellows were haggling over the price of a verr.

  I saw a yoked slave girl, two buckets attached to the ends of the yoke. She was

  probably bearing water for draft tharlarion. There were some in the camp. I had

  smelled them.

  A fellow stumbled by, drunk.

  I looked after the girl. She was small, and comely. She would probably have to

  make several trips to water the tharlarion.

  I wondered if the drunken fellow knew where his camp was. Fortunately there were

  no carnaria in this vicinity. It would not do to stumble into one.

  (pg. 41) Around one of the campfires there was much singing.

  I heard the sound of a lash, and sobs. A girl was being disciplined. She was

  tied on her knees, her wrists over her head, tied to a horizontal bar between

  two poles. I gathered that she had been displeasing.

  In a tent I heard a heated political discussion.

  “Marlenus of Ar will return,” said a fellow. “He will save us.”

  “Marlenus is dead,” said another.

  “Let his daughter then, Talena, take the throne,” said another.

  “She is no longer his daughter,” said a fellow. “She has been disavowed by

  Marlenus. She was disowned.”

  “How is it then her candidacy for the throne is taken seriously in the city?”

  asked a man.

  “I do not know,” admitted the other.

  “Some speak of her as a possible Ubara,” said a man.

  “Absurd,” said another.

  “Many do not think so,” said a man.

  “She is an arrogant and unworthy slut,” said another. “She should be in a

  collar.”

  “Beware, lest you speak treason,” said one of the men.

  “Can it be treason to speak the truth?” inquired a fellow.

  “Yes,” said the other fellow.

  “Indeed,” said a man, heatedly, “she may even know the whereabouts of Marlenus.

  Indeed, she, and others, may be responsible for his disappearance, or continued

  absence.”

  “I have not heard what you said,” said a man.

  “And I have not said it,” was the rejoinder.

  “I think it will be Talena,” said a man, “who will sit upon the throne of Ar.”

  “How marvelous for Cos!” said a fellow. “That is surely what they would wish,

  that a female should sit upon the throne of Ar.”

  “Perhaps they will see to it that she does,” said a man.

  “Ar is in great peril,” said a man.

  “She had might between Cos and her gates,” said a fellow. “There is nothing to

  fear.”

  “Yes!” said another, fervently.

  “We must trust in the Priest-Kings,” said another.

  “Yes,” said another.

  “I can remember,” said a fellow, “when we trusted in our steel.”

  I then left the vicinity of this tent.

  I wondered if I could balance on the greased wineskin. I knew a fellow who, I

  had little doubt, could have done so, Lecchio, of the troupe of Boots Tarsk-Bit.

  (pg. 42) I recalled the free female whose capture I had noted in Ar, that which

  had taken place in a street-level room in the Metallan district. Surely she must

  have know the law. The consorting of a free female with another man’s slave

  renders her susceptible to the collar of the slave’s master. The net had been

  cunningly arranged, that it might, when released, activated perhaps by springs

  or the pulling of a lever, fall and drape itself over the couch. It was clearly

  a device designed for such a purpose. The net and the room doubtless constituted

  a capture cubicle, simpler perhaps, but not unlike those in certain inns, in

  which a woman, lulled by the bolting on the doors, and feeling herself secure,

  may complete her toilet at leisure, bathing, combing her hair, perfuming herself

  and such, before the trap doors, dropped from beneath her, plunge her into the

  waiting arms of slavers. Guardsmen and magistrates, I had noted, had been in

  immediate attendance. She had had light brown hair and had been excellently

  curved. Yet I did not doubt but what her figure, even then of great interest,

  would be soon improved by diet and exercise, certainly before she would be put

  up on the block. To one side, in the half darkness, I heard the grunting of a

  man, and a female’s gasping, and sobbing. There, to one side, in the shadows,

  difficult to make out, a slave girl, I could see the glint of her collar,

  writhed in a fellow’s arms. I wondered if he owned her, or had simply caught her

  in the darkness. She was gasping, and squirming, and clutching at him. Her head

  twisted back and forth in the dirt. Her small, sweet, bared legs thrashed. Such

  responsiveness, of course, is not unusual in a female slave. It is a common

  function of the liberation of bondage. It comes with the collar, so to speak.

  Indeed, if a new slave does not soon exhibit profound and authentic sexual

  responsiveness, which matter may be checked by the examination of her body,

  within, say, an Ahn or so, the master’s whip will soon inquire why. One blow of

  the whip is worth six months of coaxing. I though again of the captured free

  woman, she taken in the net. Doubtless, she, too, soon, given no choice, would

  become similarly responsive. Indeed, she, like other female slaves, would soon

  learn to be, and discover that she had become, perhaps to her initial dismay and

  horror, helplessly responsive to the touch of men, any man.

  The pair thrashed in the darkness. She was pini
oned, she sobbed with joy.

  To be sure, if one prefers an inert, or frigid, or anesthetic, so to speak,

  woman, one may always make do with a free female, inhibited by her status, and

  such. They are plentiful, dismally so. Goreans, incidentally, doubt that any

  female is, qua female, (pg. 43) irremediably or ultimately frigid. It is a

  common observation, even on Earth, that one man’s petulant and frigid wife is

  another man’s, to be sure, a different sort of man’s. passionate, begging,

  obedient slave.

  “I yield me, Master!” wept the slave, softly.

  “It is known to me,” he said.

  “Yes, Master,” she said.

  I heard the sound of a tabor several yards away, and the swirl of a flute, and

  the clapping of hands.

  I went in that direction.

  “Marcus,” I said, pleased, finding him in the crowd there.

  “Women are dancing,” he said.

  “Superb,” I said.

  Behind Marcus was Phoebe, standing very straight, and very close to him, but not

  touching him. She was holding her lower lip between her teeth, presumably to

  help her keep control of herself. Also there was a little blood at the left side

  of her mouth. I gathered she must have dared in her need to brush hopefully or

  timidly against her master, or whimpered a bit more than he cared to hear.

  Indeed, perhaps she had even dared to importune him. Her wrists were still bound

  behind her. The lead on her leash looped up to Marcus’ grasp.

  “The camp is in a holiday mood,” I said.

  “Yes,” he said.

  I saw more than one fellow looking at Phoebe. She had marvelous legs and ankles,

  and a trim figure. She stood very straight. It was not difficult to tell now,

  even by glancing at her, that she was in need. One of the fellows looking her

  over laughed. Phoebe trembled, and bit her lip a little more.

  A fellow tore off the tunic of a slave girl and thrust her out, into the circle.

  “Aii!” cried men.

  The female danced.

  “I entered Phoebe in “meat catch,” ” said Marcus, “but she failed to catch even

  a single morsel.”

  “I am not surprised,” I said. “She can hardly stand.”

  “That one is pretty,” said Marcus. He referred to a redhead, thrust into the

  circle.

  “I had thought you might have taken Phoebe to the tent by now,” I said.

  “No,” said Marcus.

  There were now some four or five girls in the circle. One wore a sigh that said,

  “I am for sale.”

  Phoebe made a tiny noise.

  “I think Phoebe is ready for the tent now,” I said.

  “She did not even want to leave it,” said Marcus.

  “True,” I said.

  “Perhaps you should take Phoebe back to the tent,” I said. “She is hot.”

  “Oh?” asked Marcus.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Perhaps I should put her into the circle,” he said.

  “She can scarcely move,” I said.

  “Oh,” he said. I think he was pleased.

  “She is in desperate need of a man’s touch,” I said.

  “It does not matter,” he said. “She is only a slave.”

  “Look,” said Marcus. He referred to a new girl, joining the others in the

  circle. She wore ropes and performed on her knees, her sides, her back and

  stomach.

  “She is very good,” said Marcus.

  “Yes,” I said.

  The dance in the circle, as one might have gathered. Was not the stately dance

  of free maidens, even in which, of course, the maidens, though scarcely

  admitting this even to themselves, experience something of the stimulatory

  voluptuousness of movement, but slave dance, that form of dance, in its

  thousands of variations, in which a female may excitingly and beautifully,

  marvelously and fulfillingly, express the depths and profoundness of her nature.

  In such dance the woman moves as a female, and shows herself as a female, in all

  her excitingness and beauty. It is no wonder that women love such dance, in

  which dance they are so desirable and beautiful, in which dance they feel so

  free, so sexual, so much a slave.

  Another woman entered the circle. She, too, was excellent.

  “How do you like them?” Marcus asked Phoebe. It was no accident, surely, that he

  had brought her here to watch the slave dance.

  “Please take me to the tent, Master,” she begged.

  As Marcus had undoubtedly anticipated the sight of the slave dance would have

  its effect on his little Cosian. She saw how beautiful could be slaves, of which

  she was one. On the other hand, I suspected he had not counted on the effect on

  himself.

  Another girl, a slim blonde, was thrust into the circle. Her master, arms

  folded, regarded her. She lifted her chained wrists above her head, palms facing

  outward, this, because of the linkage of the manacles, tightening it, bringing

  the backs of her hands closely together. She faced her master. Desperate was she

  to please him. There was a placatory aspect to her dance. It seemed she wished

  to divert his wrath.

  (pg. 45) “Ah,” said Marcus, softly.

  The girl who wore the sign, “I am for sale,” danced before us, as she had before

  others, displaying her master’s proffered merchandise. I saw that she wanted to

  be purchased. That was obvious in the pleading nature of her dance. Her master

  was perhaps a dealer, and one, as are many, who is harsh with his stock. Her

  dance, thusly, was rather like the “Buy me, Master,” behavior of a girl on a

  chain, the “slaver’s necklace,” or in a market, the sort of behavior in which

  she begs purchase. A girl on such a chain, or in a market, who is too much

  passed over has reason for alarm. Not only is she likely to be lowered on the

  chain, perhaps even to “last girl,” which is demeaning to her, and a great blow

  to her vanity, but she is likely to be encouraged to greater efforts by a

  variety of admonitory devices, in particular, the switch and whip. Earth-girl

  slaves brought to Gor, for example, are often, particularly at first,

  understandably enough, I suppose, afraid to be sold, and accordingly, naturally

  enough, I suppose, sometimes attempt, usually in subtle ways, to discourage

  buyers, thereby hoping to be permitted to cling to the relative security of the

  slaver’s chain. Needless to say, this behavior is soon corrected and, in a short

  time, only too eager now to be off the slaver’s chain, they are displaying

  themselves, and proposing themselves, luscious, eager, ready, begging

  merchandise, to prospective buyers.

  The girl for sale was a short-legged brunet, extremely attractive. I considered

  buying her, but decided against it. This was not a time for buying slaves. I

  gestured for her to dance on. She whirled away. A tear moved diagonally down her

  cheek.

  She might, of course, not belong to a dealer.

  There are many reasons why a master might put his girl
, or girls, up for sale,

  of course. He might wish, for example, if he is a breeder, to improve the

  quality of his pens or kennels, trying out new blood lines, freshening his

  stock, and such. He might wish, casually, merely to try out new slaves, perhaps

  ridding himself of one to acquire another, who may have caught his eye. Perhaps

  he wants to keep a flow of slaves in his house, lest he grow too attached to

  one, always a danger. Too, of course, economic considerations sometimes become

  paramount, these sometimes dictating the selling off of chattels, whose value,

  of course, unlike that of a free woman, constitutes a source of possible income.

  Indeed, there are many reasons for the buying and selling of slaves, as there

  are for other forms of properties.

  I continued to watch the female, the sign about her neck, dance. No, I said to

  myself, it would not do to bring her into peril. Then I chastised myself for

  weakness. One would not (pg. 46) wish to purchase her, of course, because she

  might constitute an encumbrance. Still, she was attractive. Even as I considered

  the matter she received a sign from a fellow, her master, I suppose, and she

  tore open her silk, and danced even more plaintively before one fellow and then

  another. She seemed frightened. I suspected she had been warned as to what might

  befall her if she should prove unsuccessful in securing a buyer. I saw her

  glance at her master. His gaze was stern, unpitying. She danced in terror.

  “Ahh,” said Marcus. “Look!”

  He was indicating the slim blonde, she with the chained wrists, whose dance

  before her master seemed clearly placatory in nature. She had perhaps begged to

  be permitted to appear before him in the dancing circle, that she might attempt

  to please him. he had perhaps acquiesced. I recalled he had thrust her into the

  circle, perhaps in this generously according her, though perhaps with some

  impatience, and misgivings, this chance to make amends for some perhaps

  unintentional, minuscule transgression. Perhaps his paga had not been heated to

  the right temperature. Women look well in collars.

  “See?” asked Marcus.

  I wondered how long he could hold out.

  “I can do that, Master,” sobbed Phoebe, trying to stand very still.

  The blonde was now on her knees, extending her arms to her master, piteously,

  all this with the music in her arms, her shoulders, her head and hair, her

 

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