“Oh, ohh,” said Lady Phoebe.
“Be silent,” I said to her.
“You have stopped!” she whispered.
“Be silent,” I said. Had she been a slave, and not a free woman, this causing of the repetition of a command might have earned her a beating.
The attendant looked about. There was the sound of some commotion coming from the vicinity of the court.
“Here, my good fellow,” I said to him.
“My thanks, tarnsman!” he cried, not having expected a gratuity of such size.
I was reasonably confident as to what the commotion might well be about, and so I thought I might as well take my leave of the Crooked Tarn.
“You are generous, indeed, tarnsman,” said the attendant, backing away now. It would scarcely do to be struck or swept from the platform to the moat some seventy or eighty feet below, particularly as one had just made an entire silver tarsk. Giving such a coin, of course, was, in its way, I suppose, a bit of braggadocio on my part, something of a gesture or flourish. On the other hand, I would not really miss it that much as I had extracted it from among the coins I had taken from the wallet of the fellow I had left in the tub, in the baths, the burly fellow who was of the company of Artemidorus.
I drew up the mounting ladder and secured it at the side of the saddle.
The shouting, angry shouts, a tumult almost, was clearer now. Four or five fellows must have been involved. There were, too, if I am not mistaken, the sounds of blows, or, at least, sudden grunts and cries of pain.
I moved the harness, drawing the straps evenly, and the bird, anticipatory, alerted, stalked to the front edge of the landing platform, outside the portal of the tarn gate. From such a platform the bird, with a single snap of its wings, addressing itself to flight, is immediately airborne.
“Hold tightly,” I told my servant.
She moaned. She clutched the pommel with all her strength.
“There is a fellow back there,” said the attendant. “He is naked! He is fighting!”
“Oh?” I said.
“Yes!” he said.
“Interesting,” I said.
“He has probably not paid his bills, and is trying to escape,” speculated the attendant. To be sure, he did not seem eager to rush down and join the fray.
“Disgusting,” I said.
I myself had paid my bills properly before leaving the Crooked Tarn. It is the thing to do. Inns, after all, if no one paid their bills, would have a difficult time making a go of it. It is not really practical to hold every fellow for ransom, or every lady for redemption. This is not to deny that some outlying Gorean inns, particularly where female travelers are concerned, function as little more than slave traps, an arrangement usually being in effect with a local slaver.
“He seems to be trying to come in this direction,” said the attendant.
“Interesting,” I said.
If the fellow was really trying to escape without paying his bills, and this was a peculiar direction for him to be coming if that was the case, then I could hardly blame him. The prices at the Crooked Tarn were indeed outrageous. My own bill, for example, all told, had come to nineteen copper tarsks, and a tarsk bit, the latter for the use of the Lady Temione last night. The itemization of that bill, frightful to contemplate, had been ten for lodging, two for the bath and supplies, two for blankets, five for bread, paga and porridge, and the tarsk bit for the use of the Lady Temione, the only particular on the bill which might have been argued as within reason. I had done without breakfast this morning primarily to save time, but it could also have been done, and I think legitimately, in protest over the prices of the Crooked Tarn. Fortunately I had some dried tarsk strips in my pack. I did not know if the Lady Phoebe would find these appealing or not but she would learn to eat them. Too, she would learn to take them in her mouth from my hand. This would help her to learn that she was now dependent on men for her food.
“How is our friend doing now?” I asked.
“He is down! They have him. No! He is up!” reported the attendant. “Hah! Now they have a chain on him!”
“I wish you well,” I said to the attendant. I had thought I might wait on the platform in case the fellow managed to reach it, and then take flight, but it did not seem now that he would get this far, at least this morning.
“I wish you well!” called the attendant, clinging then to a stanchion of the tarn gate.
I drew back, decisively, on the one-strap, and the tarn screamed and smote the air with its wings, and, my servant crying out in terror and clutching the pommel, was aflight!
Those who are horsemen know the exhilaration of riding, the marvelous animal, its strength, its pacings, its speed, its responsiveness, how one seems augmented by its power, how one can feel it, and its breathing, the movements of its body, sensing even the blows of its hoofs in the turf. It is little wonder that peoples knowing not the horse fled in terror when they first encountered riders, taking the rider and his mount for one thing, something half animal, half human, an awesome, unbelievably swift, gigantic, armed chimera, something that could not be outrun, that seemed to fly upon the earth, that seemed tireless, something irresistible, merciless and relentless to which it seemed the world must rightfully belong. To such initial glimpses, fraught with fear, might harken back the stories of the centaur, half man, half horse. And the legendary nature of the centaur, its appetites, its rapacity and power, harken back, too, perhaps, in the canny ways in which half-forgotten historical fact colors the fancies of tamer times, to the first perceptions of the horseman, and his ways, among those afoot. And even later, when the separation of man and mount became clearly understood, the fear of the horseman, and his ways, would abide. Fortunate that they lingered largely on the fringes of civilization. And yet, how often, as with the Hyksos, in Egypt, did they ride in from the desert like a storm, their horses among the barley. The mystique of the rider lingered unquestioned for centuries. Alexander would turn cavalry into a decisive arm. Centuries later the stirrup and barbarian lancers would crush the world’s most successful civilization. The very word for “Knight” in German is “Ritter,” which, literally, means “Rider.” The ascendancy of the cavalry would remain unchallenged until the achievement of revolutions in infantry tactics and missile power, such things as the coming of the massed pikes, and the flighted clothyard shafts of a dozen fields. Something of the same joy of the rider, and mystique of the rider, exists on Gor in connection with the tarn as existed on Earth in connection with the horse. For example, if you have thrilled to the movements and power of a fine steed, you have some conception of what it is to be aflight on tarnback. There is the wind, the sense of the beast, the speed, the movements, now in all dimensions, the climb, the dive, soaring, turning, all in the freedom of the sky! There is here, too, a oneness of man and beast. There is even the legend of the tarntauros, or creature half man, and half tarn, which in Gorean myth, plays a similar, one might even say, equivalent, role to that of the centaur in the myths of Earth. Too, the tarnsman retains something of the glamour which on Earth attached to the horseman, particularly so as the technology laws of the Priest-Kings, remote, mysterious masters of Gor, preclude the mechanization of transportation. The togetherness of organic life, as in the relationship of man and mount, a symbiotic harmony, remains in effect on Gor.
I was aflight!
For a time I muchly gave the bird its head, and then, some pasangs out, drew it about, to sweep the sky in a vast circle, this centering about the inn, far below.
“You will caress me again, will you not?” asked my servant.
“Perhaps,” I said, “if you beg it.”
“I beg it!” she said.
“I will consider the matter,” I said.
She moaned.
“For now you will wait, girl.”
“‘Girl’?”
“Clad as you are,” I said, “you must be so seen. Clad as you are you cannot be more. Clad as you are you cannot be less.”
> “It is how you think of slaves!” she said.
“Yes,” I said. “You must now be seen not as a pretentious, lofty, secure, arrogant, sacrosanct free woman, shielded and sheltered in societal immunities, snug in status and privileges, but rather now as something quite different, rather, now, as exquisitely feminine, as radically and unutterably female, as lovely, as beautiful, as exciting, as helpless, as vulnerable, as desirable—as a girl—a girl—as much an exciting girl as any attractive, chained, collared slave, subject to sale, subject to ownership, obliged to give pleasure, obliged to obedience, alert to the danger of the whip, cringing, desiring to please, hoping to be found pleasing, knowing she may be beaten. Do you object?”
“No,” she said, shivering, trembling inadvertently, suddenly, with pleasure. “I love it!”
“Hold to the pommel, tightly,” I said.
She did so.
I would have time for her later. This was not the moment. It is good for women to sometimes wait. It helps them to understand that they are women.
When one first ascends a new mount, or, indeed, masters a new woman, it is well to put them through their paces, to see what they can do, to see what they are like. In the case of the tarn one’s very life can depend on such things as understanding its speed, its rate of climb, the sharpness of its turns, and so on.
My lovely, half-naked, blindfolded servant cried out, flung back, her arms almost straight, her small hands, the wrists braceleted closely together, gripping the pommel.
The bird hovered well, arrested in flight.
The girl gasped and cried out again, in fear, her back almost horizontal as the tarn climbed. The ascent was steep and swift. The air grew cold. Such a maneuver is often useful. More than once it had carried me above adversaries, their attack speed prohibiting so swift an adjustment in their trajectory. The girl clung desperately to the pommel. She seemed very frightened, for some reason. Too, now, clad as she was, in what was, in effect, no more than a curla and chatka, fit garments for a slave, not a free woman, she must be very cold. Doubtless she was in extreme discomfort. In a few Ehn I had established the approximate ceiling of the bird. The earth seemed far below. I could see the surface of a lake, like a shimmering puddle, to my right. I had not even hitherto known it was there. On the left, far below, I could see the Vosk Road, like a bright thread in the sun. “Please, let us go down. Let us stop!” she wept.
“You are braceleted,” I told her. “Such matters are no longer within your control.”
“Let us go down!” she wept.
“Are you cold?” I asked.
“Yes!” she wept. “But I am frightened, too! We are high, are we not?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Please, let us go down!” she begged.
“It was my mistake to let you ride in such honor,” I told her. “It is more appropriate for a woman on tarnback to ride differently, to be tied across the saddle on her back or belly, or, say, if she is one of a brace, perhaps wrist-tied to one end of a shared rope thrown over the saddle or, say, tied to a ring at the side, this, too, providing a balance with the other captive.”
“I am a free woman,” she said. “Surely you would not dare to tie me so.”
“I would think little of it,” I informed her.
She shuddered, though whether with the thought of this restraint which I might, if I wished, impose upon her, or of cold, I do not know.
“Please, let us go down,” she said.
“What does your will mean?” I asked.
“Apparently it means nothing,” she said.
“Hold tightly, my lovely slut,” I said.
Already it seemed I was thinking of her as mine. And surely for most practical purposes she was.
“‘Slut’!” she cried. “‘Slut’?” she said.
“Yes,” I assured her. Had I not already sensed in her, though she was no more than a free woman, the potential for a marvelous responsiveness? In a collar I had no doubt she would, whether she wished it or not, develop sexual vulnerabilities and sensitivities which were now beyond her ken. One of the pleasures of the mastery is to have a woman at one’s mercy as a helpless, vulnerable, writhing, begging slave.
It is not hard to understand why Goreans are fond of enslaving females.
The enslaved female is a great source of pleasure for a man. It is little wonder men kill for them.
“‘Slut’?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said.
I then seized her at the waist, and she tried to press back against me.
“See?” I said.
“Yes, yes,” she moaned.
It is useful to encourage the woman to think of herself in terms of vitality and appetition. A tactic in this procedure to help her become aware of herself as a sexual creature is to describe her to herself in terms she may have dreaded aforetimes, to use words to her which she may have been conditioned to avoid, and find offensive, and so on. This helps her to become more aware of her needs, and their innocence and importance. She must cease to think of herself in terms of convention and fiction, and be freed to think of herself as an honest, biological reality, a natural, vital, needful, awakened woman.
A word, or words, then, as the woman learns, grows, and blossoms, while substantially retaining their original literal, unadorned, or cognitive, meaning, can alter their original emotive meaning.
For example, two friends may meet in the marketplace, one with his girl on her leash. When he stops to chat, she kneels beside him. Later, as she is noticed, the friend may regard her, and as a slave may be regarded, and inquire, “Is the slut any good?” Whereas the girl may sense the natural diminution in the referral, and perhaps lingeringly resent it, at least slightly, she will also, in her slave’s pride, accept the designation proudly. Of course she is a slut, as she is a slave, and she has well learned, too, that she is in any event a slut, having learned this beggingly yielding in her master’s arms. She now revels in this common and normal way of referring to her. She is proud to be a slut. She would willingly, now, be nothing else. It gives her joy to be her master’s slut, her master’s slave. Similarly, an auctioneer, vending beauties, may inquire, “What am I offered for this slut?” This is a way of suggesting that the slave is worthy of that description, and may be counted upon to please in the way of the collared slut, namely, inordinately. Too, obviously, the use of such expressions has its value to the male, as well, as it informs him that the bothersome and inconvenient inhibitions, restrictions and civilities appropriate in relating to free women have happily no application here. These women then may be related to, dealt with, and handled as men prefer to relate to, deal with, and handle women, namely, as their slaves, as rightless, marvelous, excruciatingly delicious properties.
She was beautiful.
I would surely make time for her later.
I would look forward to it.
“Hold on,” I told her, “tightly.”
“I do not understand,” he said.
Then she screamed, a long, wild wailing scream, as the tarn, responding to the four-strap, began a sudden, precipitous descent. With one hand I kept her on the saddle. Her hair flew above us, trailing like a flag. The tarn dove well. The swiftness of that descent is incredible. Its force, even arrested at the last moment, can break the back of a full-grown tabuk. I let the bird come within fifty yards of the earth before I reined back, and it swooped, low, leveling, over the grass.
“Stop! Stop! Stop!” she begged. “What are we doing! Where are we?”
“We are within a man’s height of the ground,” I said. In such flight one can use the screening of a forest or of low hills, even buildings, to make an approach to an objective. Too, of course, lower flight, in general, reduces the possibilities of sightings.
“We are going too swiftly!” she said. “Please, stop!”
“It is better that you are blindfolded,” I said.
“What are you going to do?” she cried.
“One must try out a tarn,” I sa
id.
“Monster!” she wept.
“Hold tightly,” I said.
She moaned. She hunched over the pommel, clinging to it, sobbing.
She screamed, suddenly, flung to the left, as I drew the two-strap and three-strap at the same time, the tarn veering to the right. It was responsive. I then tested it in a dozen ways, to speeds, to flights, to turns. The girl was beside herself with fear. She sobbed, moaned, gasped, cried out, whimpered, and screamed, in turn, in the darkness of the blindfold, clutching the pommel, as the bird, obedient to the obligations of the harness, bent itself to his maneuvers. I was well satisfied. It was a warrior’s mount, indeed.
“Please, please,” wept the girl.
I had now returned the tarn to the vicinity of the Crooked Tarn.
I then made three passes near the Crooked Tarn, two over the palisade, over the tarn wire, and a third near its bridge and gate.
In the first pass I hovered the bird for a time, some fifty yards over a portion of the court on the top of the palisaded plateau, one rather behind and to the left of the main inn buildings, as one would face them, entering. There, sitting, heavily chained to a sleen ring, its plate bolted into the stone, wrists and ankles fastened quite closely to it, was a large, naked, bearded man, the burly fellow. I gathered he had not had the means wherewith to pay his bill. Seeing me, he seemed somehow agitated, even extremely so. He could do little more, however, than crouch, struggling, and pulling, at the ring, his head back, his face upward. He was howling something, but I could not well hear what he said. It is perhaps just as well. I did wave the pouch on its strap to him, cheerily, before proceeding onward, to make the second pass. He did not seem pleased with matters. I supposed I could not, in fairness, blame him.
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