Samos did not speak.
“What is to be my fate?” she asked.
“You are too beautiful not to be a slave,” said Samos.
“No!” she cried. “No!”
“Take her below,” said Samos to one of the two guards flanking the woman. “Put the iron to her body, left thigh, common Kajira mark, and, I think, for the time, a common house collar will do for her.” She looked at him, aghast. Then her two arms were seized by the guards. Samos looked down at the board. “It is your move,” he said. I, too, returned my attention to the board. The guards made as though to conduct the woman from our presence. The business with her, we assumed, was done.
She struggled. “No!” she cried. “No!”
Samos looked up, and the guards held her where she was. “Do you protest?” he asked.
“Certainly!” she cried.
“On what grounds?” he asked, puzzled. She was his by legitimate capture, and he could do with her whatever he pleased. Any court on Gor would have upheld this.
“On the grounds that I am a free woman!” she said.
“Oh?” he asked.
“Yes!” she said.
I could see that Samos was annoyed. He wished to return to his game.
“I would rather die than be a slave!” she cried.
“Very well,” said Samos. “Strip her.”
In moments her clothing was half torn from her, and was down about her hips.
“Why are you taking away my clothes!” she wept.
“In order that the blood not stain them,” he said.
“Blood!” she cried, in consternation. “I do not understand!”
Then she was naked and thrown on her knees, her right side facing us. Even her gloves and slippers had been removed. One of the guards held her on her knees, bent over. The other guard took her hair in both hands and, by it, pulled her head down, and forward. The back of her neck, with its tiny, fine, golden hair was bared.
“What are you going to do?” she cried.
Samos signaled to another of his men, who unsheathed his sword.
The fellow laid the edge of the blade gently on the back of her neck, and then he lifted the blade away and upward. He grasped the hilt with both hands, his left hand extending somewhat beyond the butt end of the hilt. In this way considerable leverage can be obtained. Several of the slave girls looked away.
“What are you going to do!” she screamed.
“Behead you,” said Samos.
“Why!” she cried.
“There is no place in my holding for a free woman,” he said.
“Enslave me!” she cried.
“I cannot believe my ears,” he said, skeptically.
“Enslave me!” she cried. “Enslave me!”
The fellow with the blade lowered it a bit, and looked at Samos.
“Is this the proud Lady Rowena of Lydius who speaks?” inquired Samos.
“Yes,” she wept, helpless in the grip of the guards, her body bent forward, her head down.
“The proud free woman?” he asked.
“Yes,” she wept.
“Let me understand this clearly,” said Samos. “In spite of the fact that I am willing to accord you the dignity of a swift and honorable death, one fitting for a free woman, you would choose instead, and prefer, the degradation of slavery?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Speak clearly,” he said.
“I beg slavery,” she said.
“You understand, of course,” he said, “that the slavery for which you beg is one which is total and absolute?”
“Yes,” she said.
I smiled to myself. It would be a Gorean slavery.
“You seemed to think earlier,” said Samos, “that such a slavery might be all right for your maidens, but not for yourself.”
“I was wrong,” she said. “I am no different from them. We are all members of the slave sex. I, too, am only a female.”
The fellow with the blade lowered it. The Lady Rowena, doubtless, saw it, near her neck.
“I am troubled,” said Samos.
The Lady Rowena twisted her head to the right, wincing, from the hold of the guard, with two hands, on her hair, to regard Samos. Her face was agonized. Her lip trembled. “Grant my petition, I beg you,” she said.
“I hesitate,” said Samos.
“Do you hesitate,” she asked, “because of some lack of certitude as to my nature, for fear of some impropriety or subtle lack of fittingness in such an action?”
Samos shrugged.
“Dismiss such reservations from your mind,” she said. Her body suddenly shook with sobs. “My pretense to freedom was always a sham. It was my envy of men, my hatred of my sex, and what I sensed to be its true nature, which prompted me to such deceptions, to such unpleasantness, hostility, and arrogance. I am now ready to be a woman. Indeed, in this, I sense a possible fulfillment greater than any of which I have hitherto dreamed. How marvelous to cast aside the artificiality of roles and become, at last, what one truly is, biologically, one’s self!”
“Speak more clearly,” said Samos.
“It is appropriate that I be enslaved,” she said.
“Why?” he asked.
“Because,” she said, “in the deepest heart and belly of me I am a slave.”
“How do you know?” he asked.
“It has been made clear to me in my needs,” she said. “It has been made clear to me in my feelings. For years it has been made manifest to me in hidden thoughts and secret desires, in countless recurrent dreams and fantasies. In such modalities, again and again, insistently, I have been spoken to by my deepest self.”
“Interesting,” said Samos.
“Enslave me,” she said.
“No,” he said.
She looked at him with horror. The fellow with the sword renewed his two-handed grip on its hilt.
“Pronounce yourself slave,” said Samos. The fellow relaxed his grip on the hilt.
“Do not make me do this,” she begged. “Pity me! Consider my sensibilities!”
His face was expressionless.
“I am a slave,” she said, pronouncing herself slave. Several of the slave girls cried out. There was now a new slave on Gor.
At a gesture from Samos the fellow with the blade resheathed the weapon, and the two guards who had held the girl in position released her, standing up.
She was now on her hands and knees, naked on the tiles, before the table. She looked wildly at Samos. “See the slave!” laughed more than one of the slave girls, pointing at her. They were not reprimanded. The girl, frightened, looked from face to face. The words had been spoken. They could not now be unspoken. She was now rightless, only a nameless animal, incapable of doing anything whatsoever to qualify or alter her status.
“Slave! Slave!” laughed the slave girls.
At a gesture from Samos the two guards pulled the girl to her feet and held her before us.
“Take her away,” said Samos, “and throw her to sleen.”
“No, Master!” she screamed. “Please, no, Master! Mercy, Master!”
I could see that he was not too pleased with she who had formerly been the Lady Rowena of Lydius.
“Master!” she cried.
She was turned away from us. Her toes barely touched the tiles. She was utterly helpless in the grip of the guards. She looked wildly back, over her shoulder. “Why are you doing this?” she cried. She did not, of course, question his authority, or his right to do with her as he pleased.
The guards hesitated, holding her in place, her back to us, in case Samos might be pleased to respond to her. In a moment, if Samos did not speak, they would proceed on their way, she in helpless custody between them.
“It is one thing to be a slave,” said Samos. “It is another to be permitted to live.”
“Why would you do this to me?” she sobbed, over her shoulder. “Why would you have me thrown to sleen?”
“I think,” said Samos, “there is s
till too much of the free woman in you.”
“No!” she cried. “There is no more free woman left in me! The free woman is gone!”
“Is it true?” he asked.
“Yes,” she cried, “yes, Master!”
“What, then, is left in you?” he asked.
“Only the slave!” she cried.
“What do you mean ‘in you’?” he asked.
“I spoke loosely, Master,” she wept. “Forgive me. That which I only and totally am is now a slave!”
“Is there a division between the ‘I’ and the slave?” he asked.
“No,” she said. “The slave and I are the same, wholly.”
“You are then a slave, fully?” asked Samos.
“Yes, Master,” she said. “The slave is one with herself. She is self-identical.”
“It is one thing to be a slave,” said Samos. “It is another to be an adequate slave.”
“Master?” she asked, in misery.
“Keeping you would be a waste of collar and gruel,” he said.
“No, Master,” she said. “I would strive to serve well. I would strive desperately to be found worthy of being kept in my collar, and to be pleasing within it!”
“You do not have what it takes to be a good slave,” said Samos. “You are too stupid, too cold and self-centered.”
“No, Master!” she said.
“You lack the talent, the intelligence of the slave,” he said.
“No, Master, no!” she cried.
“Release her,” said Samos.
The girl, released, turned about and threw herself in supplication to her belly before the table. She lifted her head. There were tears in her eyes. “Let me prove to you that I can be acceptable as a slave!” she begged.
“Do you realize what you are asking?” he asked.
“Yes, Master!” she wept.
“What do you think?” Samos asked of me.
I shrugged. The decision, it seemed to me, was his.
“Please, Master,” begged the girl, tears in her eyes.
“Do you think you can be pleasing?” Samos asked the slave.
“I will try desperately, Master,” she said.
“Stand,” he said.
She stood.
“Straighten your back,” said Samos. “Suck in your stomach. Thrust out your breasts.”
Tears ran from her eyes.
“Remember, my dear,” said Samos, not unkindly, “you are no longer a free woman. You have now entered a new modality of life altogether, one in which rigidities and inhibitions are no longer permitted you, a form of life in which, in many ways, you are strictly and uncompromisingly controlled, but one in which, in other ways, your deepest desires and needs need no longer be restrained, but may be, and must be, fully liberated, a form of life in which you, though categorically subjected to the perfections of absolute discipline, that of the total slave, are, paradoxically, freed to be yourself.”
She looked at Samos, wonderingly.
“These things may now seem hard to understand,” said Samos, “but they, and their reality, if you are permitted to live, will soon become clear.”
“Yes, Master,” she said, gratefully. I saw that she, already, now a slave, deeply sensed the truth of his words.
Then his eyes were hard, and she trembled.
“Lift your hands to the level of your shoulders,” he said, “and flex your knees, slightly.”
She complied.
Samos then signaled to the musicians, who were seated to one side, that they should prepare to play.
“What is it that a man wants from a woman?” asked Samos.
“Everything, and more,” she whispered.
“Precisely,” he said.
She trembled.
“I suggest that you do well,” said Samos.
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“You dance, and perform, for your life,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
“Yes, Master,” she whispered.
Samos signaled again to the musicians, and they began to play a sensual, slow, adagio melody.
“I had placed my Home Stone,” said Samos, turning his attention to the board. “It is your move.” That was true. It was my eleventh move. I considered the board and the placement of his Home Stone. An attack, I thought, would be premature. I would continue my development. I would attempt to secure the center, garnering thereby the mobilities and options commonly attendant on the control of these customarily vital routes. He who controls the roads, some say, controls the cities. This, of course, is not strictly true, not in a world where most goods can be carried on the back of a man, not in a world where there are tarns.
“It is the sleen for her,” I heard a man say.
Samos glanced at the dancer.
I, too, glanced at her. She was not trained. She did not know slave dance. Her movements were those of a virgin, a white-silk girl. She had not yet been taught slave helplessness. No man yet in his arms had taught her the exquisite, transforming degradations of the utilized, screaming slave, the wrenching surrender spasms, enforced upon her by his will, of the conquered bondwoman, experiences which, once she has had them, she is never willing to give up, experiences which she comes to need, experiences for which she will do anything, experiences which, whether she wishes it or not, put her at, and keep her at, the mercy of men.
“She is clumsy,” said Samos. He was irritated. But I saw he did not wish, really, to have her killed.
A man laughed at her, as she tried to dance before him. “Her throat will be cut within the Ahn,” laughed another man. Another man turned away from her, when she approached him, to have his goblet of paga filled by a luscious, half-naked, collared slave.
“Clumsy, clumsy,” said Samos. “I thought she might have the makings, somehow, of a pleasure slave.”
“She is trying,” I said.
“She does not have what it takes,” said Samos.
“Her body is richly curved,” I said. “That suggests an abundance of female hormones, and that, in turn, suggests the potentialities, the capacities for love, the sensibilities, the dispositions of the pleasure slave.”
“She is not acceptable,” said Samos. “She is inadequate.”
“She is trying desperately to please,” I said.
“But she is not succeeding,” he said.
“She has a lovely body,” I said. “Perhaps someone could buy her for a pittance, for a pot girl.”
“She is not adequate,” said Samos. “I will have to have her destroyed.” He looked back to the board.
I saw several of the slave girls looking fearfully at one another. I do not think that they cared much for their new sister in bondage, the former Lady Rowena of Lydius, who perhaps in some subtle way, perhaps in virtue of her former background, held herself superior to them, but, too, I do not think they cared to have her thrown alive, screaming, to sleen. She was, after all, now, like them, only a slave. “Dance, you stupid slave,” hissed one. “Do you not know you are a slave? Do you not know you are owned?”
A wild look, one of sudden, fearful insight, came over the face of the dancer. She had not thought, specifically, objectively, it seemed, about this aspect of matters. But, of course, she was owned. She was now property. She could now be bought and sold, like a tarsk, at the pleasure of masters.
She belonged to Samos, of course. It had been within the context of his capture rights that she had, as a free woman, of her own free will, pronounced upon herself a formula of enslavement. Automatically then, in virtue of the context, she became his. The law is clear on this. The matter is more subtle when the woman is not within a context of capture rights. Here the matter differs from city to city. In some cities, a woman may not, with legal recognition, submit herself to a specific man as a slave, for in those cities that is interpreted as placing at least a temporary qualification on the condition of slavery which condition, once entered into, all ci
ties agree, is absolute. In such cities, then, the woman makes herself a slave, unconditionally. It is then up to the man in question whether or not he will accept her as his slave. In this matter he will do as he pleases. In any event, she is by then a slave, and only that.
In other cities, and in most cities, on the other hand, a free woman may, with legal tolerance, submit herself as a slave to a specific man. If he refuses her, she is then still free. If he accepts her, she is then, categorically, a slave, and he may do with her as he pleases, even selling her or giving her away, or slaying her, if he wishes. Here we might note a distinction between laws and codes. In the codes of the warriors, if a warrior accepts a woman as a slave, it is prescribed that, at least for a time, an amount of time up to his discretion, she be spared. If she should be the least bit displeasing, of course, or should prove recalcitrant in even a tiny way, she may be immediately disposed of.
It should be noted that this does not place a legal obligation on the warrior. It has to do, rather, with the proprieties of the codes. If a woman not within a clear context of rights, such as capture rights, house rights, or camp rights, should pronounce herself slave, simpliciter, then she is subject to claim. These claims may be explicit, as in branding, binding and collaring, or as in the uttering of a claimancy formula, such as “I own you,” “You are mine,” or “You are my slave,” or implicit, as in, for example, permitting the slave to feed from your hand or follow you.
“Dance, fool!” cried one of the slave girls to the former Lady Rowena of Lydius.
“See the free woman!” laughed one of the slaves. “It is the sleen for her,” said another.
“Please men!” cried another. “What do you think you are for?”
“Like this!” cried a brunette, leaping away from the tables to the tiles, tearing away her silk.
“Do not interfere,” warned a man. The brunette, terrified, seized up her silk, and shrank back behind the tables, into the shadows, where, huddled, knelt other slaves.
She who had been the Lady Rowena fell sobbing to her knees, helpless on the tiles, covering her face with her hands. The music stopped.
“You are cruel, all of you!” cried out Linda, the blond Earth-girl slave of Samos, springing to her feet. All eyes turned towards her. “You put us in collars! You take away our clothes! You make us serve you! You do with us as you please!” She looked beautiful, in her brief tunic, barefoot, her body filled with passion, her small fists clenched, in her collar.
Players of Gor Page 2