by John Norman
“Of course not,” she said irritably.
“Are you the most beautiful?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she said simply, and then she smiled and added, “perhaps …”
With a graceful movement she rose and went back again to the chests against the wall. She returned with a small tube of ointment.
“They are deeper than I thought,” she said.
With the tip of her finger she began to work the ointment into the cuts. It burned quite a bit.
“Does it hurt?” she asked.
“No,” I said.
She laughed, and it pleased me to hear her laugh.
“I hope you know what you are doing,” I said.
“My father,” she said, “was of the Caste of Physicians.”
So, I thought to myself, I had placed her accent rather well, either Builders or Physicians, and had I thought carefully enough about it, I might have recognised her accent as being a bit too refined for the Builders. I chuckled to myself. In effect, I had probably merely scored a lucky hit.
“I didn’t know they had physicians in Treve,” I said.
“We have all the High Castes in Treve,” she said, angrily.
The only two cities, other than Ar, which I knew that Treve did not periodically attack were mountainous Thentis, famed for its tarn flocks, and Ko-ro-ba, my own city.
If the issue was grain, of course, there would be little point in going to Thentis, for she imports her own, but her primary wealth, her tarn flocks, is not negligible, and she also possesses silver, though her mines are not as rich as those of Tharna. Perhaps Treve has never attacked Thentis because she, too, is a mountain city, lying in the Mountains of Thentis, or more likely because the men of Treve respect her tarnsmen almost as much as they do their own.
The cessation of attacks on Ko-ro-ba began during the time my father, Matthew Cabot, was Ubar of that city.
He organised a system of far-flung beacons, set in fortified towers, which would give the alarm when unwelcome forces entered the territory of Ko-ro-ba. At the sight of raiders one tower would set its beacons aflame, glittering by night, or dampen it with green branches by day to produce a white smoke, and this signal would be relayed from tower to tower. Thus when the tarnsmen of Treve came to the grain fields of Ko-ro-ba, which lie for the most part some pasangs from the city, toward the Vosk and Tamber Gulf, they would find her tarnsmen arrayed against them. Having come for grain and not war, the men of Treve would then turn back, and seek out the fields of a less well-defended city.
There was also a system of signals whereby the towers could communicate with one another and the city. Thus if one tower failed to report when expected the alarm bars of Ko-ro-ba would soon ring and her tarnsmen would saddle and be aflight.
Cities, of course, would pursue the raiders from Treve, and carry the pursuit vigorously as far as the foothills of the Voltai, but there they would surrender the chase, turning back, not caring to risk their tarnsmen in the rugged, formidable territory of their rival, whose legendary ferocity among her own crags once gave pause long ago even to the mighty forces of Ar.
Treve’s other needs seemd to be satisfied much in the same way as her agricultural ones, for her raiders were known from the borders of the Fair of En’Kara, in the very shadow of the Sardar, to the delta of the Vosk and the islands beyond, such as Tyros and Cos. The results of these raids might be returned to Treve or sold, perhaps even at the Fair of En’Kara, or another of the four great Sardar Fairs, or if not, they could always be disposed of easily without question in distant, crowded, malignant Port Kar.
“How do the people of Treve live?” I asked Vika.
“We raise the verr,” she said.
I smiled.
The verr was a mountain goat indigenous to the Voltai. It was a wild, agile, ill-tempered beast, long-haired and spiral-horned. Among the Voltai crags it would be worth one’s life to come within twenty yards of one.
“Then you are a simple, domestic folk,” I said.
“Yes,” said Vika.
“Mountain herdsmen,” I said.
“Yes,” said Vika.
And then we laughed together, neither of us able to restrain ourselves.
Yes, I knew the reputation of Treve. It was a city rich in plunder, probably as lofty, inaccessible and impregnable as a tarn’s nest. Indeed, Treve was known as the Tarn of the Voltai. It was an arrogant, never-conquered citadel, a stronghold of men whose way of life was banditry, whose women lived on the spoils of a hundred cities.
And it was the city from which Vika had come.
I believed it.
But yet tonight she had been gentle, and I had been kind to her.
Tonight we had been friends.
She went to the chest against the wall, to replace the tube of ointment.
“The ointment will soon be absorbed,” she said. “In a few minutes there will be no trace of it, nor of the cuts.”
I whistled.
“The physicians of Treve,” I said, “have marvellous medicines.”
“It is an ointment of Priest-Kings,” she said.
I was pleased to hear this, for it suggested vulnerability. “Then Priest-Kings can be injured?” I asked.
“Their slaves can,” said Vika.
“I see,” I said.
“Let us not speak of Priest-Kings,” said the girl.
I looked at her, standing across the room, lovely, facing me in the dim light.
“Vika,” I asked, “was your father truly of the Caste of Physicians?”
“Yes,” she said, “why do you ask?”
“It does not matter,” I said.
“But why?” she insisted.
“Because,” I said, “I thought you might have been a bred Pleasure Slave.”
It was a foolish thing to say, and I regretted it immediately. She stiffened. “You flatter me,” she said, and turned away. I had hurt her.
I made a move to approach her but without turning, she said, “Please do not touch me.”
And then she seemed to straighten and turned to face me, once again the old and scornful Vika, challenging, hostile. “But of course you may touch me,” she said, “for you are my master.”
“Forgive me,” I said.
She laughed bitterly, scornfully.
It was truly a woman of Treve who stood before me now.
I saw her as I had never seen her before.
Vika was a bandit princess, accustomed to be clad in silk and jewels from a thousand looted caravans, to sleep on the richest furs and sup on the most delicate viands, all purloined from galleys, beached and burnt, from the ravished storerooms of outlying, smoking cylinders, from the tables and treasure chests of homes whose men were slain, whose daughters wore the chains of slave girls, only now she herself, Vika, this bandit princess, proud Vika, a woman of lofty, opulent Treve, had fallen spoils herself in the harsh games of Gor, and felt on her own throat the same encircling band of steel with which the men of her city had so often graced the throats of their fair, weeping captives.
Vika was now property.
My property.
Her eyes regarded me with fury.
Insolently she approached me, slowly, gracefully, as silken in her menace as the she-larl, and then to my astonishment when she stood before me, she knelt, her hands on her thighs, her knees in the position of the Pleasure Slave, and dropped her head in scornful submission.
She raised her head and her taunting blue eyes regarded me boldly. “Here, Master,” she said, “is your Pleasure Slave.”
“Rise,” I said.
She rose gracefully and put her arms about my neck and moved her lips close to mine. “You kissed me before,” she said. “Now I shall kiss you.”
I looked into those blue eyes and they looked into mine, and I wondered how many men had been burned, and had died, in that smouldering, sullen fire.
Those magnificent lips brushed mine.
“Here,” she said softly, imperiously, “is
the kiss of your Pleasure Slave.”
I disengaged her arms from my neck.
She looked at me in bewilderment.
I walked from the room into the dimly lit hall. In the passageway, I extended my hand to her, that she might come and take it.
“Do I not please you?” she asked.
“Vika,” I said, “come here and take the hand of a fool.”
When she saw what I intended she shook head slowly, numbly. “No,” she said. “I cannot leave the chamber.”
“Please,” I said.
She shook with fear.
“Come,” I said, “take my hand.”
Slowly, trembling, moving as though in a dream, the girl approached the portal, and this time the sensors could not glow.
She looked at me.
“Please,” I said.
She looked again at the sensors, which stared out of the wall like black, gutted metal eyes. They were burned and still, shattered, and even the wall in their vicinity showed the seared, scarlet stain of their abrupt termination.
“They can hurt you no longer,” I said.
Vika took another step and then it seemed her legs would fail her and she might swoon. She put out her hand to me. Her eyes were wide with fear.
“The women of Treve,” I said, “are brave, as well as beautiful and proud.”
She stepped through the portal and fell fainting in my arms.
***
I lifted her and carried her to the stone couch.
I regarded the ruined sensors in the portal and the wreckage of the surveillance device which had been concealed in the energy bulb.
Perhaps now I would not have so long to wait for the Priest – Kings of Gor.
Vika had said that when they wished me, they would come for me.
I chuckled.
Perhaps now they would be encouraged to hasten their appointment.
I gently placed Vika on the great stone couch.
Chapter Nine
THE PRIEST-KING
I would allow Vika to share the great stone couch, its sleeping pelts, and silken sheets.
This was unusual, however, for normally the Gorean slave girl sleeps at the foot of her master’s couch, often on a straw mat with only a thin, cottonlike blanket, woven from the soft fibres of the Rep Plant, to protect her from the cold.
If she has not pleased her master of late, she may be, of course, as a disciplinary measure, simply chained nude to the slave ring at in the bottom of the couch, sans both blanket and mat. The stones of the floor are hard and the Gorean nights are cold and it is a rare girl who, when unchained in the morning, does not seek more dutifully to serve her master.
This harsh treatment, incidentally, when she is thought to deserve it, may even be inflicted on a Free Companion, in spite of the fact that she is free and usually much loved. According to the Gorean way of looking at things a taste of the slave ring is thought to be occasionally beneficial to all women, even the exalted Free Companions.
Thus when she has been irritable or otherwise troublesome even a Free Companion may find herself at the foot of the couch looking forward to a pleasant night on the stones, stripped, with neither mat nor blanket, chained to a slave ring precisely as though she were a lowly slave girl.
It is the Gorean way of reminding her, should she need to be reminded, that she, too, is a woman, and thus to be dominated, to be subject to men. Should she be tempted to forget this basic fact of Gorean life the slave ring set in the bottom of each Gorean couch is there to refresh her memory. Gor is a man’s world.
And yet on this world I have seen great numbers of women who were both beautiful and splendid.
The Gorean woman, for reasons that are not altogether clear to me, considering the culture, rejoices in being a woman. She is often an exciting, magnificent, glorious creature, outspoken, talkative, vital, active, spirited. On the whole I find her more joyful than many of her earth-inhabiting sisters who, theoretically at least, enjoy a more lofty status, although it is surely true that on my old world I have met several women with something of the Gorean zest for acknowledging the radiant truth of their sex, the gifts of joy, grace and beauty, tenderness, and fathoms of love that we poor men, I suspect, may sometimes and tragically fail to understand, to comprehend.
Yet with all due respect and regard for the most astounding and marvellous sex, I suspect that, perhaps partly because of my Gorean training, it is true that a touch of the slave ring is occasionally beneficial.
Of custom, a slave girl may not even ascend the couch to serve her master’s pleasure. The point of this restriction, I suppose, is to draw a clearer distinction between her status and that of a Free Companion. At any rate the dignities of the couch are, by custom, reserved for the Free Companion.
When a master wishes to make use of a slave girl he tells her to light the lamp of love which she obediently does, placing it in the window of his chamber that they may not be disturbed. Then with his own hand he throws upon the stone floor of his chamber luxurious love furs, perhaps from the larl itself, and commands her to them.
I had placed Vika gently on the great stone couch.
I kissed her gently on the forehead.
Her eyes opened.
“Did I leave the chamber?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said.
She regarded me for a long time. “How can I conquer you?” she asked. “I love you, Tarl Cabot.”
“You are only grateful,” I said.
“No,” she said, “I love you.”
“You must not,” I said.
“I do,” she said.
I wondered how I should speak to her, for I must disabuse her of the illusion that there could be love between us. In the house of Priest-Kings there could be no love, nor could she know her own mind in these matters, and there was always Talena, whose image would never be eradicated from my heart.
“But you are a woman of Treve,” I said, smiling.
“You thought I was a Passion Slave,” she chided.
I shrugged.
She looked away from me, toward the wall. “You were right in a way, Tarl Cabot.”
“How is that?” I asked.
She looked at me directly. “My mother,” she said bitterly, “– was a Passion Slave – bred in the pens of Ar.”
“She must have been very beautiful,” I said.
Vika looked at me strangely. “Yes,” she said, “I suppose she was.”
“Do you not remember her?” I asked.
“No,” she said, “for she died when I was very young.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“It doesn’t matter,” said Vika, “for she was only an animal bred in the pens of Ar.”
“Do you despise her so?” I asked.
“She was a bred slave,” said Vika.
I said nothing.
“But my father,” said Vika, “whose slave she was, and who was of the Caste of Physicians of Treve, loved her very much and asked her to be his Free Companion.” Vika laughed softly. “For three years she refused him,” she said.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because she loved him,” said Vika, “and did not wish him to take for his Free Companion only a lowly Passion Slave.”
“She was a very deep and noble woman,” I said.
Vika made a gesture of disgust. “She was a fool,” she said. “How often would a bred slave have a chance of freedom?”
“Seldom indeed,” I admitted.
“But in the end,” said Vika, “fearing he would slay himself she consented to become his Free Companion.” Vikar regarded me closely. Her eyes met mine very directly. “I was born free,” she said. “You must understand that. I am not a bred slave.”
“I understand,” I said. “Perhaps,” I suggested, “your mother was not only beautiful, but proud and brave and fine.”
“How could that be?” laughed Vika scornfully. “I have told you she was only a bred slave, an animal from the pens of Ar.”
“
But you never knew her,” I said.
“I know what she was,” said Vika.
“What of your father?” I asked.
“In a way,” she said, “he is dead too.”
“What do you mean, in a way?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said.
I looked about the room, at the chests against the wall dim in the reduced light of the energy bulbs, at the walls, at the shattered device in the ceiling, at the broken sensors, at the great, empty portal that led into the passageway beyond.
“He must have loved you very much, after your mother died,” I said.
“Yes,” said Vika, “I suppose so – but he was a fool.”
“Why do you say that?” I asked.
“He followed me into the Sardar, to try and save me,” she said.
“He must have been a very brave man,” I said.
She rolled away from me and stared at the wall. After a time she spoke, her words cruel with contempt.
“He was a pompous little fool,” she said, “and afraid even of the cry of a larl.”
She sniffed.
Suddenly she rolled back to face me. “How,” she asked, “could my mother have loved him? He was only a fat, pompous little fool.”
“Perhaps he was kind to her,” I suggested, “– when others were not.”
“Why would anyone be kind to a Passion Slave?” asked Vika.
I shrugged.
“For the Passion Slave,” she said, “it is the belled ankle, perfume, the whip and the furs of love.”
“Perhaps he was kind to her,” I suggested again, “– when others were not.”
“I don’t understand,” said Vika.
“Perhaps,” I said, “he cared for her and spoke to her and was gentle – and loved her.”
“Perhaps,” said Vika. “But would that be enough?”
“Perhaps,” I said.
“I wonder,” said Vika. “I have often wondered about that.”
“What became of him,” I asked, “when he entered the Sardar?”
Vika would not speak.
“Do you know?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said.
“Then what?” I asked.
She shook her head bitterly. “Do not ask me,” she said.
I would not press her further on the matter.