Blood Brothers of Gor

by Norman, John;

  "But," said Cuwignaka, "I was thinking not so much in terms of any red slave, as of some red slave."

  "I see," I said. "Well, my friend, put the dream of Bloketu from your mind. She cannot be captured. She is Kaiila, and she is the daughter of a chief."

  "I know," smiled Cuwignaka. Such a woman, even though she might be haughty and insolent, stood outside of Kaiila capture permissions. She was safe from the Kaiila.

  "What is that you have there?" I asked. When Cuwignaka had come up to me he had been carrying an oblong object, wrapped in rawhide.

  "I have not forgotten it," he laughed. "I bring it from the lodge of Canka."

  "What is it?" I asked.

  "You may keep it," said Cuwignaka, "until the end of the festivals."

  "What is it?" I asked.

  "Look," he said, unwrapping the object.

  "Ah!" I said.

  "Canka was very pleased with your work with Winyela," said Cuwignaka.

  "Apparently," I said.

  "He desires that you keep this until the festivals' end."

  I looked at the object. It was a heavy, supple, beaded kaiila quirt. It was a symbol, of course, more than anything else. It gave its bearer warrior rights to open slaves, those not housed in private lodges, for the duration of the festivals. It was good for all of the girl herds of the Kaiila.

  "This is very generous on the part of Canka," I said.

  "He likes you," said Cuwignaka. "Also, as you know, he never wished to make you his slave. It was only that he had to do that, or have you attacked on the prairie, for having freed me from the stakes. Indeed, he is only waiting, I think, for an appropriate and safe time to free you. He must, of course, as having been a Blotanhunka, be judicious and politic in how he handles this matter."

  "He is very generous," I said.

  "I think he will free you during the feasts and giveaways," said Cuwignaka, smiling. "It would seem natural to do it then. Too, I think you will now be fairly safe among the Kaiila, even without a collar. They are used to you now, and they know that you are my friend."

  "This is welcome news, indeed," I said. For too long had I been inactive in my true mission in the Barrens, that of attempting to contact the Kur war general, Zarendargar, Half-Ear, and warn him of the death squad, determined remnants of which still survived, that was hunting him, that commanded by Kog and Sardak, the latter a Blood, a high officer, of the Kurii. My only clue to his whereabouts was a story hide, now in the keeping of Grunt. On this hide, among other things, was the representation of a shield bearing Zarendargar's image. If I could find the owner of this shield I might then, hopefully, be able to locate Zarendargar.

  "Too," said Cuwignaka, "I think Canka may buy a woman for you, as a gift, after the festivals, one to do your unpleasant work and warm you, helplessly, in the furs."

  "He must indeed be pleased with Winyela," I smiled.

  "He is," said Cuwignaka. "And, too, I might mention, though I do not know if it is appropriate to do so or not, that they are much in love with each other."

  "She must, nonetheless, be kept as a complete slave," I said.

  "Have no fear," said Cuwignaka. "She will be."

  I was pleased to hear this. The Earth redhead, under an iron discipline, would blossom most beautifully in her love.

  "Should Canka get me a woman," I said, "I will put her, too, of course, completely at your disposal. I will see that she provides you, too, unquestioningly, with any intimacy that you might desire."

  "How well things are going for us all!" said Cuwignaka. "A Yellow-Knife delegation is due in camp today. This is the time of the dances and feasts. Canka is happy. You may soon be free and I, Cuwignaka, Woman's Dress, will enter tomorrow the great lodge of the dance."

  In the center of the camp a great circular brush lodge had been erected. Its high walls, some forty feet in height, built on poles, from platforms, and ceilinged with poles and branches, enclosed a dancing space, cleared, circular and packed down, of about fifty feet in diameter. In the center of this space was the pole which had been formed, some days ago, from the tree which Winyela had felled. Fixed in the earth, buried to a depth of about seven or eight feet, and supported, too, with a circle of heavy stakes, to which it was bound, it was about twenty-two feet in height. Two forks had been left on the pole, one about ten feet from the ground and one about fifteen feet from the ground. In the lower fork, rolled in a bundle, were the jewelry and clothes Winyela had worn when she had cut down the tree. From the higher fork dangled two leather representations, one of a Kailiauk and the other of a male, with an exaggerated phallus. These representations were doubtless intended to be significant in the symbolism and medicine of the dance. This dance, to the red savage, is holy. It is sacred to him. It is a mystery medicine. I shall not, therefore, attempt to reduce it to simple terms or translate it into simplistic concepts. It does have to do, however, at least, obviously, with such things as luck, hunting and manhood.

  "I am happy for you, Cuwignaka," I said.

  "I have waited for years to enter the dance lodge," he said. "It will be one of the great things in my life."

  "I am happy for you," I said.

  12

  I Utilize the Entitlements of the Beaded Quirt

  "What do you want?" cried the boy, reining in his kaiila but feet before me. His words had a sibilant, explosive quality. This is a general characteristic of many of the languages of the red savages. It is even more pronounced, of course, when the speaker is excited or in an emotional state.

  "Greetings, young man," I said, calmly. "You are Isanna, are you not?"

  "I am Isanna," said the youth. "Who are you?" Another two lads, on kaiila, now approached me, remaining, however, some yards away.

  "I am Tatankasa, a slave of Canka, of the Isbu," I said.

  "He is a great warrior," said the youth, impressed.

  "That is my understanding," I said.

  "What are you doing here?" asked the youth.

  "A man hunger is on me," I said.

  "You should have a beaded quirt," said the youth.

  "He is the slave of Canka," said another. "Let us not require the quirt."

  "Behold," I smiled. I unwrapped the object which I carried.

  "A beaded quirt," said the first youth, pleased.

  "Yes," I said. About my left shoulder, in five or six narrow coils, there was a rope of braided rawhide. It was a light rope but it was more than sufficient for the sort of animal in which I was interested.

  "You should have said you had the quirt," said the youth. Then he said to the two others, "Round them up!"

  They raced away, through the grass.

  "Follow me," said the first youth, and he then turned his kaiila, and led the way from the place. These youth were naked save for the breechclout and moccasins. They carried ropes and whips.

  In a few moments we had surmounted a small rise, and I was looking down into a wide, shallow, saucerlike valley, some half of a pasang in width. "Hei! Hei!" cried the boys, in the distance, bringing together the members of the herd. Their ropes swung. Their whips cracked. Then the herd was together, well grouped by its young drovers. It now occupied, its members bunched and crowded closely together, a small, tight circle. It was now, in effect, a small, relatively fixed, directionless, milling mass. In such a grouping it may be easily controlled and managed. In such a grouping it has no purpose of its own. In such a grouping it must wait to see what is to be done with it. It must wait to see in what direction it will be driven.

  "Hei! Hei!" called the young drovers, kicking their heels back into the flanks of their kaiila, waving their ropes, cracking their whips.

  The herd now, the young drovers on either side of it, and slightly behind it, began to move in my direction.

  "Hei! Hei!" cried the young drovers, ropes swinging, whips cracking. The herd then began to run towards me. I could see the dust it raised. Lagging beasts were incited to new speeds, treated to the admonishments of hissing leather, falling across th
eir backs, flanks and rumps. Then one of the lads sped his kaiila about the herd, heading it off and turning it. He had done this expertly. Not more than a few yards away, below me, below where I stood on the small rise, the herd was again in a small tight circle, turned in on itself, purposeless, milling, stationary.

  "You boys drive them well," I said.

  "Thank you," said the young man on the kaiila, with whom I had been waiting. "We practice it, of course. If danger should threaten we wish to be able to move them quickly into the vicinity of the camp."

  "It is the same with kaiila," said another lad.

  I nodded. These lads, and lads like them, were set to watch the herds, not to defend them. At the first sign of danger, such as the appearance of an enemy party, they were to bring the herds back to the village, sending one lad ahead to sound the alarm. Under no circumstances were they to engage the enemy. Red savages do not set boys to fight men. Too, the lads were in little danger. It would be very difficult for a mounted warrior, even if he wished to do so, to overtake a boy, lighter in weight than he, on a rested kaiila, by the time the lad could reach the lodges, usually no more than two or three pasangs away.

  "It is a fine herd," I said. It was the third such herd I had looked at this morning.

  "We think so," said the first lad, proudly. "There is one with nice flanks," he said, indicating a brunette with his whip.

  "Yes," I said.

  The girl, frightened, seeing our eyes upon her, tried to slip back, unobtrusively, among her fellow lovely beasts.

  "I have used her myself," said the first lad. "Do you wish to have us cut her out of the herd for you?"

  "No," I said.

  "There is a pretty one," said another lad, "the one with brown hair and the little turned-up nose."

  "She is pretty," I said. "What is her name?"

  The lads laughed. "These are herd girls," said one of them. "They have no names."

  "How many are here?" I asked. I had not bothered to count.

  "Seventy-three," said the first lad. "This is the largest of the Isanna girl herds."

  "And the best," added another lad.

  "They seem quiet," I said.

  "In the herds they are not permitted human speech," said one of the boys.

  "No more than she-kaiila," laughed another.

  "They may, however," said the first, "indicate their needs by such things as moans and whimpers."

  "This helps in their control," said another lad, "and helps them to keep in mind that they are only beasts."

  "Do you drive them sometimes to water?" I asked.

  "Of course," said one of the lads.

  "We feed them on their knees," said another lad.

  "They supplement their diets by picking berries and digging wild turnips," said the first lad.

  "We make them chew carefully and watch closely to see that they swallow, bit by bit, in small swallows, sip roots, as well," said another.

  "We then examine their mouths, forcing them widely open, to determine that they have finished their entire allotment of the root," said another.

  I nodded. Sip roots are extremely bitter. Slave wine, incidentally, is made from sip roots. The slaves of the red savages, like slaves generally on Gor, would be crossed and bred only as, and precisely as, their masters might choose.

  "Do you often have strays?" I asked.

  "No," laughed a lad, slapping his whip meaningfully into his palm.

  "At night," said another lad, "to make it harder to steal them, we put them in twist hobbles and tie them together by the neck, in strings, their hands tied behind their backs. These strings are then picketed near the village."

  "Do any ever try to escape?" I asked.

  "No," said one lad.

  "Not more than once," laughed another.

  "That is true," said the first lad. "No such beast ever tries to escape from the Isanna more than once."

  "Some who try to escape are killed by sleen on the prairie," said one of the lads. "The others are trailed and brought back to the camp where they are tied down by our women and, over three days, taught that escape is not permitted."

  "What is the penalty for a second attempt at escape?" I asked.

  "Hamstringing," said one of the lads, "and then being left behind when the camp moves."

  "I see," I said. "May I speak to one of them?"

  "Surely," said the first lad.

  I approached the women.

  "You," I said, indicating a dark-haired woman, "step forward."

  She came forward immediately, and knelt before me.

  "You may speak briefly to me," I said. "After that, you are returned, once more, to the linguistic condition of the herd, that condition in which, without the permission of a master or masters, or one acting in such a capacity, you may not use human speech. Do you understand?"

  "Yes, Master," she said.

  "Is there any escape for you?" I asked.

  "No, Master," she said, frightened, and then put down her head, trembling. I saw, too, several of the other women shrink back.

  "Are you certain?" I asked.

  "Yes, Master," she said, frightened.

  "What of these other women," I asked, "do they, too, know that?"

  "Yes, Master," said the woman. "We all know it! We all know that escape is impossible for us!"

  "You may withdraw," I said.

  Quickly the woman scrambled back, into the herd.

  Several of the other women in the herd, I had noticed, had been following these conversations, my conversation with the boys and then, later, my conversation with the woman. In their eyes I had seen terror. Well did they understand, I saw, the hopelessness of even the thought of escape. Even if they should elude their red pursuers, which seemed almost unthinkable, there would be waiting for them only the prairie, and the sleen. These women, like most white women in the Barrens, and they well knew it, to their terror, lived at the mercy of, and on the sufferance of, red masters.

  "In a moon or two it will be time to thin the herds," said one of the lads.

  "We will trade some off and sell some others," said another lad.

  "It seems that any of these would be worth keeping," I said, admiringly.

  "It is a sleek herd," said one of the boys. "Doubtless several will be clothed and taken into private lodges for the winter moons."

  "They are useful for digging under the snow for kailiauk chips," said a lad. Kailiauk chips were a common fuel on the plains.

  "They are good, too," said the first lad, "for squirming in the robes."

  "Yes," said another.

  "If you like," said the first lad, "we will cut a girl out of the herd for you."

  "He is the slave of Canka," said another lad. "Give him a good one."

  "Would you like the dark-haired one you spoke to?" asked a lad. "It will take only a moment to put a rope on her neck."

  "No," I said. "Thank you." To be sure the dark-haired woman was a lovely specimen, a fine example of the lovely two-legged beasts in the herd. She was sweetly breasted, narrow-waisted and widely hipped. She had a delicious love cradle. I had little doubt but what she might be worth two hides.

  "There is a good one," said one of the boys, pointing out an auburn-haired beauty. "One lash of the quirt and she juices superbly."

  "Actually," I said, "I am looking for a particular beast. May I examine the herd, to see if it is here."

  "Of course," said the first lad.

  I had thought that I had seen the particular animal I sought, shapely and blond, trying to hide itself in the herd.

  It would take but a moment to make the necessary determination. I thrust the quirt I carried and the hide in which it had been wrapped, in my belt.

  I entered among the women. "Give way," I said. "Kneel." The herd knelt.

  I threaded my way among the kneeling slave beasts of the Isanna. Then I stopped beside one. She knelt low, her head down to the grass. I stood beside her and she began to tremble. I then took her by the hair and, cr
ouching beside her, threw her, twisting her, to her side in the grass. My hand in her hair I then turned her face forcibly towards me, and held it thusly, so that I might see her features, fully. Yes, it was she whom I sought. I then put her again to her knees, pushing her head down to the grass.

  "Place your wrists behind you, crossed," I said. She did so and, in a moment, with one end of the light, narrow rope I carried, removed from my shoulder, I bound them together. I then took the rope up from her wrists and, pushing up her collar, looped it five times about her throat, and then took the free end of the rope under the rope leading up from her bound wrists, and then brought it forward. In this fashion a convenient, unknotted tether is formed. This type of tether is suitable for short leadings. The free end of the tether is slipped under the bond leading up from the wrists to prevent the girl from slipping it by the simple expedient of lowering and dipping her head a few times. She would still, of course, even in such a case, remain bound by the wrists.

  The usual tether, it might be mentioned, is tied snugly but not tightly. There should be room to place two fingers between the throat and the inside of the tether. Any pressure felt by the prisoner must be felt on the back of the neck. A good Gorean tether constitutes no impediment whatsoever to a girl's breathing. An exception is the choke collar which does interfere with a girl's breathing, but only if she is in the least bit recalcitrant. In the cities it is more common to use collars and leashes than looped tethers, or knotted tethers. The common leash has a snap clip, sometimes a locking one. This snap clip has a variety of uses. It can snap about a link or ring in its own leash, the leash then functioning as a self-contained collar-and-leash device, or about such things, say, as a collar, collar ring or neck bond, perhaps of rope or chain.

  "On your feet," I said. The girl stood. I then led her forth from the herd, a sleek, curvaceous animal on her tether, my choice. She hurried behind me, that the slack in the tether not be taken up, as it was a wound, and unknotted tether, that it not tighten on her throat.

  "She is pretty, but she is not the best choice," said the first lad.

  "Oh?" I said.

  "She is a block of ice," he said.