Mercenaries of Gor

by Norman, John;

  A long plank had been laid across the first of the siege ditches.

  The small fellow with the narrow eyes and the mustache like string was ahead of us. He went across the plank. I then crossed it, too, the plank bending under my weight, and was followed by Boabissia, and Hurtha, and Feiqa.

  “That way,” said the soldier, pointing.

  We were, in a few Ehn, over other entrenchments, and were then near the hurdles commanding the interior ditches. Interspersed among these was an occasional lookout tower, composed of poles and planks, the lashed poles supporting a horizontal platform of planks, from which a watch could be kept on the gate of Torcadino. At night fires would be set and lanterns hung at various points about the siegeworks.

  “That way,” said a soldier, directing us.

  We were then within the perimeters of the Cosian camp. Most of the tents were circular, with low, sloping tops. Many were brightly colored, and set with bold stripes, and various striking designs and patterns. Goreans tend to be fond of such things. A Gorean camp is often a spectacular sight, with its arrays of silks and flags, even from a distance. They also tend to be fond of fabrics stimulatory to the touch, spices tantalizing to their taste, strong, powerful melodies, and beautiful females. In this they make clear their primitiveness, and their vitality and health. The streets were laid out geometrically. This is usually done by engineers, with surveying cords.

  “Look,” said Boabissia.

  “I see,” I said.

  Seeing herself the object of our attention the girl lying on her side in the mud shrank back, pressing her back against the heavy stake, some eight inches in diameter, it sunk deeply in the mud. She did not meet our eyes. She was naked, and dirty. She was chained to the stake by a heavy chain, it looped three times about the stake, tight in a groove, and bolted in place, then looped twice about her neck and fastened there by a padlock. She could not move more than four feet from the stake.

  “Girl,” I said to her.

  She, addressed, scrambled to her knees. She kept her head down. She whimpered.

  “She does not speak,” said Boabissia.

  “She is perhaps under the discipline of the she-quadruped,” I said.

  The girl whimpered, looking at us, nodding her head affirmatively. Then she put down her head, again.

  “Oh,” said Boabissia. In this discipline the female is forbidden human speech. She is also forbidden human posture, in the sense that she is not allowed to rise to her feet. Her locomotion, unless commanded to roll, or put under similar commands, suitable for a pet, will be on all fours. Her food will be thrown to her, or put in pans on the ground. In either case, she must feed without the use of her hands. She may also, of course, be fed by hand, but, again, will not be permitted to touch the food with her hands. She may be taught tricks. Sometimes these are taught as functions of arbitrary sounds, so that she must learn them as any animal might, without the benefit of an earlier understanding of the words used. If she is slow to learn, of course, she is punished, as would be any other animal. When used, too, it will commonly be in the modality of the she-quadruped. This discipline is often used as a punishment, but it may also figure in the training of a new girl. It helps her to understand what she now is, an animal totally subject to her master. After some time, sometimes as little as a few Ahn, in this discipline, she begs mutely, pleadingly, as eloquently as she can, to be permitted to serve her master in fashions more typical of the normal female slave, fashions in which her bondage, because of the greater complexities and latitudes of dutifulness and subservience possible with human activity, speech and posture, for example, dance, beginning at least on her feet, and song, may be even more deliciously complete and pleasing to him. To make certain that there are no possible confusions or misunderstandings involved in such cases the master usually gives the female a brief opportunity to speak, usually only a few Ihn, in which she must make her pleas, hoping to win his favor. If he is not satisfied with her pleas, of course, she is returned promptly to the former discipline. Too, for wasting his time, she might be exposed to other disciplines, as well, usually the lash.

  We continued on, through the camp. In a few Ehn, as we were making our way through a corner of the camp, we would presumably encounter some contravallation, some outer lines or ditches, set up to protect the besiegers against possible attack by an outside, relieving force.

  “There,” said Hurtha, pointing, “there are the pens for camp girls.”

  He had indicated a fenced enclosure, within which were various smaller enclosures, and some cages. In such areas, there was probably more than one in a camp of this size, public girls are kept, slaves for the pleasures of the soldiers. The Gorean seldom does without women. Such girls are usually supplied in groups by contract slavers, for the course of given campaigns. They may be used in their enclosures or, more commonly, they are sent to the tents of the men who rent them, usually for the night. In the morning they return to their masters. Outside the entrance to this enclosure, where the girls could see it, coming and going, was a simple structure of three heavy, squared timbers, two of which were upright, and the third fixed upon them, crosswise, in the manner of a lintel. In the underside of the horizontal beam there was fixed a stout ring, from which cords dangled. In these cords, her wrists crossed and bound over her head, there was now a fair prisoner. On the outside surface of the horizontal beam, the side facing us, there were two hooks, over which there hung a sign. The hooks are permanent fixtures, the signs may be changed, if one wishes to use them at all, depending on the error, deficiency or offense. This sign read, “I was not fully pleasing to my master of the night. Punish me. Use whip at left.” To the girl’s left, on the vertical beam there, suspended from a hook, was a five-stranded Gorean slave lash.

  “Wait,” said Boabissia.

  “Yes?” I said.

  “She was not fully pleasing,” said Boabissia.

  The girl tensed in the cords, hearing us behind her.

  “It would seem not,” I said.

  “Are you not going to strike her?” asked Boabissia.

  “I think she has already been well punished,” I said. Certainly the girl’s back suggested that. To be sure, most of those stripes had probably been put on her earlier by her master, that he might assure himself that no matter what happened later in the day, the girl would be brought to understand that anything less than perfect performance was not to be tolerated in a female slave. The female slave is not permitted flaws in her service. She is not purchased for that. They will not escape notice, or correction.

  “Men are weak,” said Boabissia. She went to the hook and removed the lash. “Girl,” she said.

  “Yes, Mistress,” said the girl, frightened.

  “You were not fully pleasing to your master of the night,” said Boabissia, sternly.

  “Yes, Mistress,” said the girl, trembling.

  “Let her go,” I said. “You can see she has been well lashed.”

  “What are you?” asked Boabissia.

  “A slave, Mistress,” said the girl, trembling in the confining cords. Her small hands twisted above the tight loops.

  “Then it is up to you to be pleasing,” said Boabissia.

  “Yes, Mistress,” said the girl.

  “Fully pleasing,” said Boabissia.

  “Yes, Mistress,” said the girl.

  “But you were not,” said Boabissia.

  “No, Mistress,” said the girl, trembling.

  “You must then be punished,” said Boabissia.

  “Yes, Mistress,” moaned the girl.

  “She has already been punished,” I said to Boabissia. “Show her mercy.”

  “No,” said Boabissia.

  “Girl,” I said to the bound slave.

  “Yes, Master!” she cried, eagerly.

  “Is it your intention to improve your service in the future?” I asked.

  “Yes, Master!” she said.

  “And will you strive to be a dream of perfection to your ma
sters hereafter, no matter how brief your term of service may be to them, or whoever they might be?”

  “Yes, Master! Yes, Master!” she said.

  “You see, Boabissia?” I asked.

  “She is lying,” said Boabissia. “I am a female. I can tell.”

  “No, Mistress!” wept the girl.

  “Are you lying?” I asked the girl.

  “No, no, Master!” she wept.

  “I believe her,” I said. “Let us be on our way.”

  “You are apparently more tolerant than I of inadequacies in a slave,” said Boabissia.

  “Let us go,” I said.

  “Not yet,” she said.

  “Come along,” said Hurtha.

  “I know females,” said Boabissia. “I am one of them. If you are weak with them, they will take away your manhood and destroy you. If you are strong with them, they will lick your feet with gratitude.”

  She touched the body of the female slave with the whip. “Is it not so?” she asked the girl.

  “Yes, Mistress,” wept the girl.

  “If you are not strict with slaves,” said Boabissia, “they will grow lax, and then arrogant, and then begin to assume the airs of free persons.”

  “I suppose that is true,” I said.

  “They must be kept under perfect discipline,” said Boabissia, “absolutely uncompromising and perfect discipline.”

  “Of course,” I said.

  Boabissia drew back the whip. How she hated the female slave. It is sometimes hard to understand the hatred of the free female for her embonded sister. It has to do, I suppose, with the venomous jealousy of a woman who has taken an unhappy path, a road commended to her by many but one which she has discovered leads only to her ultimate frustration, misery, and lack of fulfillment. No woman is truly happy until she occupies her place in the order of nature.

  “Do not strike her,” I said.

  “I am a free woman,” said Boabissia, “and I shall do as I please.”

  “Do not strike her,” said Hurtha. “Come along.”

  “Men are weak,” said Boabissia. “I will teach you what women deserve, and need.”

  “Please, no, Mistress!” wept the girl.

  Boabissia then, holding to the butt of the whip with two hands, swung it back, the lashes separated, free.

  “Please, no, Mistress!” cried the girl.

  Boabissia then, taking her time, struck her five times. She did not spare the wench. Then the girl, punished, hung in the cords, gasping, weeping.

  “Now will you be pleasing to your masters?” asked Boabissia.

  “Yes, Mistress,” wept the girl.

  “Now have you learned your lesson?” asked Boabissia.

  “Yes, Mistress. Yes, Mistress,” wept the girl.

  “She is now telling the truth,” said Boabissia. She then hung the whip again on its hook.

  I looked into the eyes of the slave. Swiftly she put down her head. But in that instant I saw that what Boabissia had said was true. She would now be pleasing. She had now learned her lesson.

  “Now,” said Boabissia, “let us go.”

  “Interesting,” I said.

  “You must learn how to handle women,” said Boabissia. “That is all.”

  “You are a woman,” I said.

  “Do not be clever,” she said. “I am a free woman.”

  “This way, this way,” said a Cosian soldier. “Do not straggle.”

  We then again set out on our way, following others. In my wallet there was a sack of coins, a plentiful supply of coins, though mostly of small denomination, such as would not be likely to attract attention. They had been given to me by the officer in Torcadino. I had kept them. I would attempt to discharge his commission. They would be more than enough, it seemed, to get us to Ar. In my sheath were his letters, and my letters of safety. I did not know what lay before me.

  “That way,” said a soldier.

  “You have not yet heard my entire poem,” said Hurtha.

  “True,” I admitted, reluctantly.

  Then, for several Ehn, he altering lines here and there, with a liberal abandon, subjecting the piece, it seemed, to immediate and amazing revisions, rampant and wholesale, doubtless justified by certain disputable if not heinous exploitations of poetic license, generously construed, I was regaled by Hurtha’s latest creation.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “I have never heard anything just like it,” I admitted.

  “Really?” he asked, eagerly.

  “Yes,” I said, “except, of course, certain of your other poems.”

  “Of course,” he said. “Do you think it will become immortal?”

  “It is hard to say,” I said. “Are you worried about it?”

  “Somewhat,” he said.

  “Why?” I inquired.

  “Because it is dedicated to you, my friend,” he said.

  “I do not understand,” I said.

  “Suppose it becomes immortal,” he said.

  “Yes?” I said.

  “It well might do so,” he said, “for it is a genuine Hurtha.”

  “Yes?” I said.

  “Then you might be remembered in history as being no more than a despicable, loathsome, notorious sleepyhead.”

  “I see your point,” I admitted.

  “And even if that should be true,” he said, “you are still my dear friend, in spite of all, and I simply could not bring myself to do that to you. What am I to do?”

  “Dedicate it to some mythical fellow,” I said, “someone you just made up.”

  “A splendid suggestion!” cried Hurtha. He then turned to one of our fellow refugees. “Excuse me, Sir,” he said, “but what is your name?”

  “Gnieus Sorissius, of Brundisium,” he said.

  “Thank you, Sir,” said Hurtha. He then turned back to me. “I shall dedicate the poem to Gnieus Sorissius, of Brundisium.”

  “What?” asked Gnieus Sorissius, of that coastal city.

  “Rejoice,” said Hurtha to him. “You may now die, for you have just become immortal.”

  “What?” asked Gnieus Sorissius, somewhat alarmed. Hurtha was, after all, carrying a large ax.

  “But what if you discard your poem,” I asked, “feeling as you often do, that it may not be up to your incredible standards, or what if you should be struck heavily upon the head, as I could conceive happening, sometimes more readily than others, and simply forget it?”

  “I see your point,” said Hurtha, gravely. “I would then be denying poor Gnieus his place in history.”

  “Of course,” I said. “It is not fair to make him so dependent on you.”

  “Yes,” said Hurtha.

  “Suppose, thinking himself immortal,” I said, “he then lives recklessly, fearing nothing, takes unwise risks gleefully and perhaps suffers unfortunate and grievous consequences?”

  “I had not thought of that,” admitted Hurtha.

  “You might feel terribly responsible,” I said.

  “Yes,” said Hurtha. “I am a sensitive fellow.”

  “Too, he might then go through life uneasily, not knowing whether you had kept the poem not, and thus not knowing whether he was still immortal or not.”

  “True,” moaned Hurtha. “What am I to do?”

  “Is this that poem about fellows who sleep late,” asked Gnieus, “that one you have been carrying on about for the past ten Ehn?”

  “Yes,” said Hurtha.

  “Well,” said Gnieus, “it is my habit to arise each morning by the fourth Ahn.”

  “The fourth Ahn?” cried Hurtha, aghast. “That is rather early.”

  “In my opinion,” snapped the fellow, who seemed in a rather disagreeable mood, perhaps still somewhat disgruntled at having been turned out of Torcadino with little more than the clothes on his back, “folks who remain longer in the furs are no better than lazy sleen.”

  “Oh,” said Hurtha. He shuddered.

  “Yes,” said the fellow.

&nb
sp; “I am afraid I cannot dedicate my poem to you,” said Hurtha. “You get up just too early.”

  “It is just as well,” said Gnieus, “for I charge a fee for having poems dedicated to me.”

  “What?” cried Hurtha.

  I decided I liked Gnieus. He was not a bad fellow, even for coming from Brundisium.

  “A silver tarsk,” snapped Gnieus.

  “That is very expensive,” said Hurtha.

  “That is what I charge,” said the fellow.

  “Do we have a silver tarsk?” asked Hurtha.

  “You would sell your priceless dedications, for mere money?” I asked.

  “Never!” cried Hurtha, resolved.

  That was a close one. I had saved a silver tarsk, or its equivalent in smaller coins.

  Gnieus Sorissius had now taken his leave.

  “What a scoundrel,” growled Hurtha, looking after him.

  “Indeed,” I admitted. I wished that I had managed to handle my large friend as neatly as Gnieus Sorissius, even if he was from Brundisium. Perhaps he had had dealings with Alar poets before. Could that be?

  “Perhaps I shall have to dedicate the poem to you, after all,” said Hurtha.

  “We have now come to the edge of the camp,” I said.

  We paused, to look back. We were on a slight slope.

  “How beautiful it is,” said Boabissia.

  The camp was a splendid sight. Torcadino was in the distance.

  “I think,” said Hurtha, looking back, “I shall compose a poem, a mood piece.”

  “What about the poem about fellows who sleep late?” I asked.

  “I think I shall discard it,” he said. “The subject is trivial, and perhaps unworthy of my powers. Do you mind, much?”

  “No,” I said.

  “Good fellow,” said Hurtha.

  “That also solves your problem about the dedication,” I said.

  “It does, doesn’t it?” he said.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Since I have saved us a silver tarsk then,” he said, “perhaps you would be so good as to divide a tarsk with me, sharing and sharing alike, as always.”

  “Very well,” I said. Alars are not always adept at mathematics, but many of them are large, fearsome fellows.

  “Thank you,” said Hurtha.