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

Norman, John - Gor 25 - Magicians of Gor.txt Page 48

by Magicians of Gor [lit]

  I regarded her short brush of hair, the brief, tattered rag, scarcely more than

  a ta-teera, which was her only garment, the simple collar, no more than a strap

  of black iron curved about her throat, its small, right-angled, pierced

  terminations flush to (pg. 323) one another behind the back of her neck, held

  together by the rivet, her blistered, burned skin.

  “Field slave,” I said.

  “Yes, Master,” she said.

  “You have lied to free men,” I said.

  She regarded me in terror.

  “You told us that you had been brought in as a consequence of the levies,

  whereas it was in consequence of the couching laws.”

  “Forgive me, Master,” she whispered.

  “But I am not particularly angered,” I said.

  “Thank you, Master!” she said.

  “You hastened to rectify your account.”

  “Yes, Master!” she said.

  “And were on the whole exact, voluble and diligent in your subsequent

  responses.”

  “Yes, Master!” she said.

  “Do you think you would have lied to me, if I owned you?” I asked.

  She looked up at me. “No, Master!” she said.

  “I do not think you would have either,” I said.

  She shuddered.

  “But, of course, I do not own you.”

  “No, Master,” she said.

  “But as you know, an errant slave may be disciplined by an free man.”

  “Yes, Master,” she said.

  “For example, her master might not be present.”

  “Yes, Master,” she whispered.

  “Her slavery does not exist only in his presence,” I said.

  “No, Master.”

  “It is uncompromised, categorical and absolute, at any moment, wherever she is,”

  I said.

  “Yes, Master.”

  “And thus it is fitting, is it not, that she be subject to the discipline of any

  free man?”

  “Of course, Master.”

  “And Marcus, my friend, and I are free men.”

  “Yes, Master.”

  “And you are thus subject to our discipline.”

  “Yes, Master.”

  “And you lied to us.”

  “Forgive me, Master!” she begged.

  “If I were your master,” I said, “I do not know what I would have done with you.

  It is an interesting question. Surely, at the (pg. 324) least you would have

  been stripped and tied, and given a lashing.”

  She swallowed, hard.

  “And I do not think you would soon forget it,” I said.

  “No, Master,” she said.

  “Do you think you would then lie to me again?”

  “No, Master!” she said.

  “You would attempt to improve your behavior, in all ways?”

  “Yes, Master.”

  I regarded her.

  “Master?” she asked.

  “I am thinking that since we do not own you that perhaps it might be fitting if

  your discipline were decided by your master, the noble Appanius.”

  “Please, no, Master!” she said.

  “It would be easy enough,” I said, “to strip you and tie your hands behind your

  back, and then write upon your body some brief but suitable message.”

  She seemed to pale beneath her burns.

  “The left breast, as you know,” I said, “it the usual place for such messages.”

  This is, one supposes, because most masters are right-handed.

  “Please do not inform my master, Appanius!” she wept.

  “You seem to fear him,” I said.

  “Yes!” she wept.

  “It is good for a girl to fear her master,” I said.

  “You do not understand!” she said. “I have already it seems muchly displeased

  him. Already I have been shorn and put in the fields! If I gave him further

  cause for discipline I do not know what he would do with me!”

  “You might be whipped?” I said.

  “He might have me thrown to the eels in his pool!” she said.

  “Have no fear,” I said, “you have been helpful and cooperative, and I have

  obtained much of value from our conversation, more doubtless than you

  understand. Similarly, as this is the first time we have met, at least formally,

  I am inclined, somewhat against my better judgment, to be initially lenient. It

  might be pointed out, for example, that you did not know the sort of men we

  were. Perhaps some men ignore lies in a slave, pretending not to notice them,

  or, mistakenly, graciously accept them as trivial, as merely a girl’s

  peccadilloes. But we are not such men. We are not patient with such things. Even

  had you lied about something as small as a candy or pastry we would not have

  accepted it. We approve of, and expect, truth from a (pg. 325) slave. In short,

  had you known the sort of men we are, it is my speculation that you would not

  have lied to us.”

  “No, Master,” she said.

  “But, as I have suggested, I am inclined to be lenient, in this first offense.”

  “Thank you, Master,” she said.

  “Also, of course,” I said, “we are not your master, and it seems that serious or

  grievous discipline should be the prerogative of the master. These prerogatives

  we do not desire to usurp.”

  “No, Master!” she said.

  “Accordingly,” I said, “your discipline is to be light.”

  “Thank you Master,” she said.

  I then lashed her head back and forth, first with the palm of my right hand, and

  then its back. Then, with the last backhand stroke, I struck her from her knees,

  to her side, and she was lying on her side, twisted, her palms down in the white

  dust. She looked back at me, disbelievingly, startled, tears in her eyes, over

  her right shoulder.

  “Position,” I said.

  She crawled back to where she had knelt, and resumed her former position, her

  head bowed.

  I walked about her and then crouched before her.

  I put my hand under her chin and lifted it. Her face was red from the cuffing.

  There were tears on her cheeks. Her lip was swollen. There was some blood at the

  side of her face. I removed my hand, and let her once again lower her head.

  “Oh!” she said.

  “You have a good belly,” I said.

  “Ai,” she said, softly.

  “And an excellent figure,” I said.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed, softly, helplessly.

  I removed my left hand from the small of her back, where I had held it, that she

  might not draw back more than I would permit. “And you have at least the

  glimmerings of slave vitality,” I said.

  She moaned.

  “You are not going to lie to us again, are you?” I asked.

  “No, Master!” she sobbed.

  I then rose to my feet and stepped back a little.

  She squirmed a little. “May I speak?” she begged.

  “Yes,” I said.


  “That was a light discipline?” she asked.

  “Yes,” I said, “naught but a mere cuffing.”

  Normally, of course, one cuffs with a single blow. She had, (pg. 326) however,

  lied. Even so, I had, of course, pulled the strokes. One does not wish to injure

  the slave, only punish her. Had I struck her heavily, with the force easily

  summonable by a strong man, I might have broken her neck.

  “I am sorry, if I have displeased Masters,” she said.

  I did not speak.

  “But Masters are wrong in one thing,” she said.’

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “I have in me more than the glimmering of slave vitality,” she said.

  “It seems so to you now,” I said, “but in some months, when you are truly

  helpless under the lash of your needs, and you understand the prison in which

  they have placed you, you will better understand my words.”

  “Even so!” she wept.

  Her eyes pleaded with me.

  “You may break position,” I said.

  She flung herself to her belly before me, and pressed her lips to my feet.

  “Please,” she said. “Please!”

  “You grovel as a slave,” I said.

  “I am no longer a free women,” she said. “I no longer have to pretend. I no

  longer have to lie.”

  I looked down at her, pondering her needs. Her lips were soft on my feet, timid,

  petitioning.

  “I am now half naked and in a collar!” she sobbed. “I am at your mercy. Take

  pity on me!”

  “You wish to placate masters?” I asked.

  “If I have displeased them, yes!” she said.

  “You would like to escape further punishment?” I asked.

  “Surely it is understandable that a girl such as myself, one so helpless, one in

  bondage, would seek to avert the wrath of men, that she would seek by her

  curves, her service and love to soften the hearts of masters.”

  Yes, I thought, that is understandable. Slave girls are, when all is said and

  done, in spite of their beauty, so vulnerable, so owned, so ultimately helpless.

  “Please, Master,” she said.

  “You wheedle and beg well,” I said.

  She looked up at me.

  “Doubtless you learned that in your first days as a slave, in the house of

  Appanius, perhaps desiring to be fed.”

  “I am begging!” she said.

  I looked down at her.

  “Surely master understands for what I am begging,” she said.

  “Oh?” I said.

  (pg. 327) “Command me to strip,” she wept. “There is shade on the other side of

  the tank. The dust is cool there. You do not need a blanket or a wrap. Put me in

  the dust itself!”

  I did not speak.

  “If you wish,” she said, “I shall serve you here, in the hot dust, in the glare

  of the sun.”

  “A begging slave,” I commented to Marcus.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Please,” she said.

  “Kneel over there,” I said. I indicated a position near the yoke and the

  buckets, near the tank. Quickly she rose up and went and knelt where I had

  indicated. I then lifted up the yoke, which, as I have mentioned, was thrice

  drilled, once in the center, and once near each end. At these points leather

  thongs were wound in and around the yoke.

  “Master?” she asked.

  I put the yoke across her shoulders.

  “Master!” she said.

  I loosened the thongs at the center of the yoke and then, by means of them,

  looped about her neck and tied, fastened the yoke on her. I then used the thongs

  on her right to fasten her right hand to the yoke there, and then, to her left,

  similarly served her left hand. I then stepped back to regard her, fastened in

  the yoke, her hands widely separated.

  “As you may recall,” I said, “you incurred discipline twice, once for lying, for

  which you were cuffed, a preposterously light discipline considering the

  offense, and secondly for daring to suggest that a master might not be

  interested in the answer to a question which he had asked.”

  “Forgive me,” she said.

  “It is your business to answer questions, with exactness, and with the fullness

  desired,” I said, “not to comment on such matters as their propriety or

  appropriateness.”

  “Yes, Master,” she said.

  “Your needs are apparently on you,” I said.

  “Yes, Master!” she said, delightedly. “But I am helpless!” She moved her head

  about a little, turning it a little from side to side, her neck within the loops

  of the thongs; too, she moved her hands a little, futilely, they held back

  against the wood, by the thonged wrists.

  “Surely you are aware that a woman may be used in a yoke,” I said.

  “Yes, Master!” she said.

  Indeed, it is quite pleasant to use a woman in a yoke. Too, a girl is sometimes

  given to field slaves that way, cords attached (pg. 328) sometimes to the ends

  of the yoke, that she may be pulled about, turned this way and that, and, in

  general, moved about and controlled as the slaves wish, until they weary of the

  sport and choose to have their way with her. I gathered, however, that this had

  not been done, at least as yet, with the lovely slave before us. She had,

  apparently, been tied to a stake for the men once or twice. The usual procedure,

  of course, is simply to put the girl in the common kennel after dark, where she

  is utilized, serving muchly, sometimes handed about, from man to man.

  “But that is not our intention,” I said.

  “Master?” she said.

  I put one of the vessels of water on the yoke. She had to bend down, that its

  weight was on the ground. Then I put the other vessel, too, on the yoke.

  She squirmed in the yoke, she sobbed.

  “What is to be my second discipline?” she asked.

  “Stand,” I said.

  With difficulty she stood. She could hardly stand upright. She wavered a little.

  “Am I not to serve?” she asked.

  “No,” I said.

  She looked at me in misery.

  “That is the second discipline,” I said.

  She closed her eyes, and tears forced themselves between those clenched eyelids.

  “I am not a free woman!” she said. “I am a slave. I need your touch!”

  “It is the second discipline,” I said.

  “Please, please!” she wept.

  “You are dismissed,” I informed her.

  “Please, Master!” she wept.

  “Turn about, and be about your labors,” said I, “field slave.”

  She moved then a little from the vicinity of the tank, a few steps. The weight

  was considerable for her. She staggered once or twice. She turned to regard us,

  pathetically.

  “Away, field slave!” I said, with a gesture.

  “Yes, Master,” she sobbed, and turned away. We watched
her moving slowly away,

  staggering at times, across the fields.

  “How could you do that to her?” asked Marcus.

  “Cuff her?” I asked, puzzled.

  “Of course not,” he said. “That was nothing.”

  “She thought it something,” I said.

  “She was let off easily,” he said.

  “True,” I said.

  (pg. 329) “Doubtless she will in time, in trembling gratitude, realize how

  easily she was let off.”

  “Even as easily as she was let off,” I said, “I do not think she will soon again

  consider lying to a free man.”

  “Probably not,” he said.

  I took saddle.

  “What would you have done?” I asked.

  “I would have put her under the belt,” he said.

  “And had it been Phoebe?”

  “Phoebe knows better,” he said.

  “But if it had been her?”

  “A number of disciplines,” he said, “over successive days.”

  “What did you meant then,” I asked, “how could you do that to her?”

  “Sending her packing,” he said, “rather than putting her to use.”

  “Should you speak that way,” I asked, “of the former free woman, Lavinia of Ar?”

  “Be serious,” he said.

  “Was it not merciful?” I asked.

  “Certainly not,” he said.

  “As a discipline?” I asked.

  “No,” he said.

  “Speak,” I said.

  “You dominated her, making her feel her womanhood, and its relationship to the

  male,” he said, “and then, her belly ready, aching, vulnerably aflame,

  helplessly stirred, you sent her packing.”

  “What would you have done?” I asked.

  “Nothing so heartless, so cruel,” he said.

  “You are speaking of the second discipline,” I said.

  “Of course,” he said.

  “What, then?’ I asked.

  “I would have whipped her.” He said. “Then I would have flung her to the ground,

  thrust her about, let her feel the side of my foot, such things, and then, when

  I wished, I would have knelt her, her head to the ground, and used her.”

  “In such fashion?’ I asked.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “I see,” I said.

 

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