by John Norman
But perhaps we should all be grateful when granted permission to speak.
Women love to speak.
It is one of our great pleasures.
Therefore, that we must request this privilege well reminds of who is Master.
I really thought they were more harsh with her than with us. A slave is almost always allowed to speak. It is merely that she is expected to ask permission to do so. The Lady Ilene, on the other hand, had seldom been granted that permission. I wondered if she realized, though she was a free woman, that that was part of collar training, or slave training.
I was pleased that they had given her permission to speak. It was clearly, this time, more than usually, quite important to her.
Indeed, so concerned she had been that she, doubtless in a momentary lapse, occasioned by her agitation, her sense of vulnerability, had failed to enunciate a standard permission request. I had seen that she had been frightened, but a moment after the utterance of the word 'Masters'. She had not, clearly, or at least clearly enough, though there had been supplication in her voice and tears in her eyes, requested permission to speak. Had she forgotten that she was naked and chained to a ring at their feet?
But they were kind to her.
"So speak," said the other guard.
"I have a question," she said.
"What is it?" asked the first guard.
"What, Masters," she asked, "—what, Masters—what if there is a tie, a draw, Masters?"
"Then we share you," said one of the fellows. "Now be silent."
"Yes, Masters," she said, and lay back down, quietly, on the stones, naked, in her chains, to await their pleasure.
She had hoped, I was sure, that the first guard would win. It was he who had so initially terrified her in the chamber of the commercial praetor, who had placed his hands upon her hips and looked down upon her, who had reached within her hood to turn her face to his, who had dared to threaten the integrity of her veil, who had brushed up the hem of her robes and had calmly examined an ankle and calf.
I had realized even then that she had found him despicably handsome. Even then it had been clear to me that she had wondered what it would be to be in his arms. She had inquired if I thought he liked her, and my response, I fear an unpleasant one, had been to the effect that he might if she were inclined to be pleasant and was nude at his feet. This response, of course, had incensed her. "Slut! Slut!" she had cried. "Yes, Mistress," I had said, and then hooded her.
She was looking up at him now. Her eyes were moist. Her lips were slightly parted.
I saw she was apprehensive, but curious, and eager, as well.
Her hair had been nicely brushed and combed. She had been washed.
I did not think she had any reason to be afraid. She had nothing to fear, saving perhaps failing to please.
It seemed likely that he would win, or, at least, not lose, and in that case he would be one of the two who would share her.
She was a prize for men. But then are not all women, in their way, prizes for men?
I looked at her.
Her head was now down, her eyes closed. I think she was trying to understand her feelings.
She addressed them as "Master," you see, as she addressed us as "Mistress." She served in the chamber, though free, as, in effect, a slave of slaves, that her character might be improved, and that such experiences might to some extent mitigate the abruptness of any possible transition to bondage, when such behaviors would not only be suitable for her, but required. And she would address free men as "Master," similarly, that she might become accustomed to that form of address, it perhaps becoming incumbent upon her one day. Too, the pit master thought it fitting, as she was a female.
"Capture of Home Stone," said Terence.
"Ah," said the pit master, leaning back.
Terence began to reset the board.
"No," said the pit master, lifting his hand.
"Do you not wish to play again?"
The pit master shook his head.
"Is your heart not in the game?"
"Did we do well?"
"I think so."
"It is my hope that we did well," said the pit master.
"Let us play again."
"No."
"It will take days for the object to reach Lurius of Jad," said Terence, "and days for his response."
"That is not important," said the pit master.
"I have seen that the papers have been arranged," said Terence, "those attesting even to the departure of those of the black caste from the city."
"I have never lost a prisoner before," said the pit master.
"He will die in the mountains," said Terence. "He will never reach Ar."
I recalled that there had been some speculation that the holding of the peasant might be in the vicinity of Ar. To be sure, he himself had not seemed sure of it.
"I think you do not understand," said the pit master. "I betrayed my trust, my post, my oath to the city."
Fina looked up from her work.
"What we did may well be in the best interests of the city," said Terence.
"That does not alter the fact that I betrayed my oath."
"Would you have had murder done?" asked Terence.
"No," said the pit master.
"You did what you had to."
"Of course."
"Dismiss the matter then from your mind," said Terence.
"I must now do again what I must," said the pit master.
"I do not understand," said Terence.
"What I must do is quite clear," said the pit master. "The moves were determined from my first action. I have known that from the beginning. It is a forced continuation."
"I do not understand," said Terence.
"There are no alternative moves."
"Let us play again."
"No."
Fina seemed frightened. She had stopped her work.
"I will take my leave," said Terence. "I wish you well."
"I wish you well," said the pit master.
Terence then gathered together his things, and left the chamber.
The game between the two guards, unexpectedly, I gathered, did turn out to be a draw. He with the advantage had apparently been overconfident, or careless, in the endgame. The draw turned, apparently, on a single Spearman. Some games are such, that the outcome depends not on the pieces of power, which may balance one another, but on the smallest move of the most insignificant piece on the board. I suppose that this may upon occasion be true in greater games, as well, that even a child, or slave, properly placed, at a critical juncture, might serve to topple empires. The free woman knelt before the two men and kissed their feet. She was then freed of the neck chain, pulled to her feet, turned about, and thrust toward the portal. This was not done ceremoniously. She might have been no more than a slave. She then hurried, in her manacles and shackles, as she could, toward the guards' quarters, to prepare wine for them. They followed, their arms about one another's shoulders. She knew the way. She had served on the mats before.
Fina seemed frightened.
I did not understand her apprehension.
I returned to my sewing. I hoped the guard for whom I labored would be pleased. I did not wish to be beaten. It was my hope, as well, that he would ask for me, and that the pit master would see fit to assign me to him. Oh, how I would run to his mat! How I longed to lie in his arms, and be reminded, once again, of what I was, a slave.
39
I became aware of it only dimly at first.
The sound seemed far off, a pounding, perhaps even a shouting.
Terence, the officer of Treve, had not visited in the depths for several days, not since the last game of Kaissa he had played with the pit master.
The pit master had been unusually sedulous in his duties the past days. Too, he had seemed involved in various mysterious arrangements of which we pit slaves could make nothing, comings and goings, and conversations with various functionaries.
I
knew, of course, that by now the grisly gift transmitted to Cos must have arrived.
Again I thought I heard the pounding, far off.
I changed my position, on the tiles, beside the divan of Terence. He had summoned me to him yesterday evening. He had made me serve him exquisitely well. He had accepted only perfections of service from me.
I had seldom been more aware that I was a slave than in his presence.
He was attracted to me, I am sure, as a female fit for the purposes of men, but I think, too, he took a rather special pleasure in using me, as one may, with one woman or another, for one reason or another. The special little pleasure he had in me, a particular pleasure with me, as he might and doubtless did have other particular pleasures from other women, aside from the usual marvels, excitements, and gratifications of our slave usages, his to command and ours to provide, again and again at the cost of our own delicious, complete conquest, had to do with the fact that I was from Earth. He seemed to have some sense of what, politically, educationally, and culturally, was being done to the men of Earth, to destroy them, and cripple them, and deprive them of their masculinity. Accordingly it was with a particular pleasure that he made me, a woman of Earth, now taken from Earth, now collared, now in Gorean bondage, throb, and kick, and spasm in his arms, squirming, and crying out, leaping and writhing, gasping, and moaning, licking and kissing, a ravished, subdued, begging slave. "You are pretty in your collar, little slut," he would whisper. "Thank you, Master!" I would moan. "You have nice slave curves," he would say. "Thank you, Master!" "Are there others like you, on Earth?" he would inquire. "I do not know, Master!" I would cry. "I do not know!" "How fortunate are the men of Earth," he would say, "to have women such as you in their collars." "Have mercy, Master!" I would beg. "Have mercy, Master!" And then he would ruthlessly force again and again upon me the ecstasies of the surrendered woman, those of the subjugated female, those of the utterly vanquished slave. Afterward, sometimes when I lay at his thigh, clasping his leg, daring to press my lips to him, again and again, softly, humbly, so gratefully, so very gratefully, he would say bitterly, "I should whip you." "No, Master," I would whisper. "Please, no, Master."
I opened my eyes. There was no light now in the room. The tiny lamp had flickered out long ago.
After his uses of me he had, as he had before, put me to the tiles, beside the divan. I lay on its left side, as one would look toward its foot. I was chained there, as before, by the neck. My head, too, as before, was toward its foot. It is not uncommon to sleep the slave with her head at the feet of the master. Most usually there is a slave ring fixed in the couch itself, or on the floor, at the foot of the couch, to which the slave is chained. She is thus commonly slept on the floor, at the foot of the couch. She is also, commonly, when the heat of the master is upon him, used there, by the slave ring to which she is chained. It is a great honor, of course, to be allowed upon the surface of the couch. When one is granted this privilege, one commonly kneels at the foot of the couch, at the left side, as one looks toward its foot, and kisses the coverlets or furs, and then enters upon its surface. One enters at that point, first, because it is the foot, and, second, because most masters are right-handed, and it is thus, as they turn to their side, more convenient for them to stroke and caress the slave. To be sure, it is not at all unknown for a master who is fond of his slave to permit her to share his couch. She is well aware of the privileges entailed, and realizes that they are subject to revocation.
I had been given a sheet.
I now sat up, holding the sheet about me.
It was clearly a pounding. Someone was at the door. Too, someone was calling out, insistently, urgently.
I was afraid, for it was quite early in the morning.
His brace of yellow-clad slaves, and Dorna, as well, had been sent, braceleted and coffled, as an evening's gift to one of the off-duty shifts of the wall guard. I did not think Dorna was much pleased with being coffled with the lesser slaves, or with being charged with the recreation of common soldiers. I was sure, however, that the second or third could make her squirm, as she was handed from one to the other. She was now, of course, a slave, and her slave needs, now ignited, would sooner or later, if not now, give her no choice in such matters. We learn to beg in the arms of any man.
I was afraid to awaken the captain.
I clutched the sheet more closely about me. I thought there were strange things going on in Treve, of late, things I did not understand, but which made me afraid.
Late last night, when he had finished with me, he had knelt me beside the divan. He had then put the chain on my neck. He had then looked down at me, I kneeling before him, he seated on the divan. He had leaned forward and taken my head in his hands, brushing back my hair a little. It was a gesture which seemed tender for so strong a man, one so imperious and brutal.
"Janice," had said he.
"Yes, Master?" I had said.
"Do you ever expect to see he who was your charge, the prisoner, 41, the peasant, he of interest to the black caste, again?"
"No, Master," I said.
"If, perchance, you saw him again, do you think you would be able to recognize him?"
"Yes, Master," I said.
"How long did you attend upon him?"
"Months," I said.
"You could then undoubtedly recognize him," he said.
"I would think so, Master," I said.
"You are doubtless one of the very few people who could do so," he said.
I supposed this were true. The pit master, and he himself, of course could recognize him. Too, I would suppose certain guards could do so, and, of course, the other pit slaves had seen him, at least twice, once in the cell, once in the vicinity of the urt pool. But I did not doubt that I might be thought to be more familiar with the prisoner than any, save, of course, the pit master himself. Certainly I had little doubt that I was more familiar with him than he who now interrogated me.
"That makes you very special," he said.
"Master?" I asked.
"You were even purchased to attend upon him," he said.
"Yes, Master," I said.
"And many know that," he said, "not only here, in Treve, but also elsewhere, for example, even those in the pens where you were first collared, and trained."
"Are these things important?" I asked.
"Probably not," he said.
"The prisoner died in the mountains, did he not?" I asked.
"Undoubtedly," he said.
"Am I to be afraid?" I asked.
"Curiosity is not becoming in a kajira," he said.
"Please, Master!" I begged.
But he took me then by the shoulders and threw me, with a rattle of chain, to the tiles beside the divan. He rose, angrily, from the divan. I lay there then at his feet, trembling, reminded that I was a woman, and a slave. "Forgive me, Master!" I begged. He drew back his foot to kick me, and I tensed, but he did not kick me. Rather he turned to one side, and, in a moment, cast me a sheet. "Thank you, Master," I had said.
I could hear the pounding at the door, the cries. I was sitting up, on the tiles, the sheet clutched about me. I was afraid, afraid to awaken the captain, afraid not to awaken him, afraid of what was occurrent in Treve, unknown to me, afraid of what might be the purport of that insistent pounding, those urgent cries.
I quickly knelt beside the divan and put my hand on his leg. "Master! Master!" I said. "Master! Awaken! Please, awaken!" I shook him then by the shoulders. "Master!" I said. "The door! Someone is without!"
He awakened suddenly, sitting upright.
"The door, Master," I said. I had been frightened by the quickness of his response, once awake. It was the way one might awaken in a camp, perhaps, if an alarm had been sounded.
In a moment he had left the bed and thrown a robe about his broad shoulders.
I could not hear the rushed conversation at the door. I knelt beside the divan, holding the sheet about me.
In a moment he had returned to the
room and hastily donned a tunic. He slung a sheathed sword about his left shoulder. When the blade is in use the sheath and belt are discarded.
He looked down at me.
"Master?" I asked.
"You had best come," he said. He unlocked the chain from my neck. I had only time to seize up a bit of silk and follow him. I ran after him, catching up with him only in the corridor. Two pit guards, I knew them both, I had served them both, were with him.
"We came as soon as he left," said one of the men.
"You did well," said the officer. Then he addressed himself, striding down the hall, to the other guard. "What of the girl?" he said.
"He left her chained in the chamber, as you anticipated," said the guard.
"Fetch her," said the officer. "The keys are in the chamber. Hurry. You know where he will be."
"Yes, Sir," said the man, turning about, hurrying away.
"Master!" I cried, gasping, trying to keep up.
"Be silent," he said.
In a few moments we were outside the tower and hurrying through the streets. It was gray, and cold, and there was a fog about. We began to ascend winding stairs, and were soon traversing high bridges. I did not look down, save at the narrow passages I trod. I am frightened on the higher bridges. We heard the first bar sound.
40
I knew the place. I had been here once before, on the height of this windy, lofty tower.
It was here that I had received the state collar of Treve. It was here that the great chair had been set on the dais. It was here I had first stood before the officer of Treve. It was here I had been suitably humbled, and whipped. It was here I had learned that it was not the practice of this city to compromise with its slaves.
Too, it was here that I had trod, hooded, a plank, one extending out, unbeknownst to me, over a terrible drop, hundreds of feet down, to jagged rocks below. I had removed the hood, and seen, to my horror, my situation. The jailer, the warden of the cliff cells, Tenrik, in whose care I had first been in this city, had come out upon the plank and brought me back to safety, before I might fall. Later, bound hand and foot, I had been carried to the wall again, that I might realize what could be done with me, that I might be cast down from that terrible height. I had been informed, too, that sleen came to the rocks below, at night, to look for bodies.