That was commonly referred to, for some reason, as the position of the tower slave. Girls, of course, may be commanded to one position or another. I did not know, at that time, why the position was referred to as the position of the tower slave. From the training house I had been brought to the domicile of my master, hooded.
“Yes, Master,” I said. I felt a tear form at my left eye. I feared it might move down my cheek. My master showed little inclination to beat me, but I had no desire to do anything that might prompt him to do so.
“What do you think of your collar?” he asked.
“It is attractive, Master,” I said.
“Women look well in collars,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Is it comfortable?” he asked.
“Yes, Master,” I said. “It is light, and comfortable. Commonly I do not even know it is on me.”
“But it is,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Do many women on your former world wear collars?” he asked.
“No, Master,” I said. Surely he knew that.
“That is unfortunate,” he said. “A collar much enhances the beauty of a woman.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Do slaves on your world wear collars?” he asked.
“I do not think so,” I said.
“At least not publicly,” he said.
“Perhaps not,” I said.
How did I know what might occur when a door was closed?
“Every slave should have her collar,” he said. “It reminds them they are slaves.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“On Gor,” he said, “it would not do for a slave to forget that she is a slave.”
“No, Master,” I said.
“So she wears her collar,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“It marks her well,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“It would not do to have her confused with a free woman,” he said.
“No, Master,” I said.
I did not speak, but there seemed little doubt, as well, that a woman clad in a slave tunic would not be likely to be confused with a free woman. Too, there was always the brand. My brand was small and delicate, but unmistakable. It had been placed high on my left thigh, just below the hip. It was an attractive mark. It had a vague resemblance to a cursive ‘k’ in English. I was told it was a ‘Kef’, which is the first letter in the Gorean expression, ‘kajira’. It was also, apparently, a very common brand. I was, accordingly, not privileged, or distinguished, by a special or unusual brand.
“I gather you cannot read your collar,” he said.
“No, Master,” I said. “Perhaps Master will teach me to read, or have me instructed.”
“No,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“You know what it says?” he said.
“I have been told,” I said. I had been told it read ‘I am the slave of Kurik of Victoria’. At that time I knew little or nothing of my surroundings. I would later learn that Victoria was a large river port. Amongst other things it was a large clearing station for the handling of slaves. It was difficult to trace slaves through Victoria, most of whom were sold without papers. Indeed, many slaves in her holding pens wore no more than chain collars, or capture collars, which suggested dubious origins, at best. Victoria was a trading port in which few questions were either asked or answered.
I put down my head, before my master.
Once he had suggested I did not know the meaning of the word ‘Master’, but that I would learn it.
I had learned it, in his case, and in the case of any man.
The morning after I had been “close chained,” at the foot of my master’s couch, he had entered, and stood over me.
He did not speak.
“I beg training!” I had said, tensely, piteously.
“What sort of training?” he asked.
“Slave training,” I said.
“The training of a slave?” he asked.
“Yes!” I said.
“Why?” he asked.
“I do not know,” I said.
He then prepared to turn away.
“Because I am a slave!” I cried.
“Your response seems incomplete,” he said.
“Because I am a slave—Master!” I wept.
He then began to undo the fastenings.
“Thank you,” I whispered, “thank you, Master.”
I wept, trembled, and moaned, and cried out, inadvertently, with tiny cries of pain. I could scarcely move my limbs. His hands on my limbs were firm, and strong, and unhurried. He slowly stretched out my legs and arms, and, gently, carefully, rubbed them alive. I had fantasized that I might never be able to walk again, that I could not rise, that I had been crippled for life.
He then desisted in his work, and sat on the edge of the couch, and I lay at his feet.
I may have lain there for the better part of an hour.
He was patient. He did not hurry me.
At last, by the use of my hands, I managed to struggle, slowly, painfully, to my knees, before him, my head over his feet.
“I beg to lick and kiss the feet of my master,” I whispered.
“Very well,” he said.
I then addressed myself to this humble task, hoping that he would be pleased. I belonged to him. I now knew what I was, a property, an animal, an owned animal. I suppose I had been an animal on my own world, as well, but not an owned animal. And now I was an owned animal.
After a time, I looked up, tears in my eyes.
“Is Master pleased?” I asked.
“You have much to learn,” he said.
“I trust I will be taught,” I said.
“On Earth,” he said, “I called you a ‘bitch’.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“On Earth you were a bitch,” he said.
“I trust I am no longer a bitch,” I said.
“You cannot be a bitch in a collar,” he said. “The whip sees to that.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Perhaps you think yourself still a bitch,” he said.
“I hope not,” I said. “But if so, I am surely Master’s bitch.”
“You are no longer a bitch,” he said.
“Thank you, Master,” I said.
“But not for the reason you might think,” he said. “A slave is far less than a bitch.”
“Yes, Master,” I said. Doubtless it was so.
“Shortly,” he had said, “I will hood you and take you to your house of training. It is not far. This training will take only a few days, and, at the end, you will be poorly trained, as we have little time, but well enough trained, I shall hope, to survive the block and your first weeks of bondage, in which time, applying yourself, you must strive earnestly to become a better and better, and a more and more pleasing, slave. The first several days will doubtless be the hardest, the most frightening, the most harrowing, the most difficult, but, if you are intelligent, diligent, devoted, hot, and dutiful, things should go well. You will have begun to learn your collar. Masters, of course, differ, and most will train a slave to their own tastes. You must attend well to such lessons. You will discover that a man wants everything from his kajira, and that is why he has purchased her, but you will also discover that he who has everything from his kajira is likely to be pleased, contented, and happy. Why not? What can a man want, beyond everything? Some men, fools, even become fond of their kajira. That is indeed difficult to understand.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Incredible,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“If you suspect your master is becoming fond of you,”
he said, “you may expect to be beaten, or sold.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“One is not to care for a slave,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Slaves are worthless,” he said. “They are to be despised.”
“I understand, Master,” I said.
I had then been hooded and taken to the house of training.
“May I speak?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said.
“I know that curiosity is not becoming in a kajira,” I said, “but, as Master is doubtless aware, curiosity is not unknown amongst kajirae.”
“I am aware of that,” he said.
“I am of Earth,” I said. “Yet I was brought here, and put in a collar to serve masters.”
“So?” he said.
“I gather I am not unique,” I said.
“Certainly not,” he said.
“Clearly, on this world,” I said, “female slavery exists.”
“And male slavery,” he said, “but male slavery is less obvious, as most male slaves are utilized in the quarries, on the galleys, on the great farms, in such places. Occasionally a male is taken from your former world, a typical male of your former world, suitably conditioned, and thus reduced and tamed, to be sold as a silk slave to a Gorean mistress. Such can be perilous though, for they sometimes, on this world, learn their manhood, and may thus constitute a danger to the mistress, who might find herself gagged and put in a slave sack, to be sold, or even, collared, to find herself at the feet of her former slave. Accordingly most slaves brought to Gor are women, namely, members of the slave sex.”
“The slave sex?” I said.
“Yes,” he said, “though it would not do to say that to a Gorean free woman.”
“I see,” I said.
“But, enslaved, they learn their collars quickly enough,” he said.
“There is a slave traffic with Earth?” I said.
“There is an extensive slave traffic, an extensive slave trade, on Gor,” he said. “Indeed, wars have been fought to obtain slaves. There are Slave Roads. There are hundreds of markets, large and small. Cities may exchange slaves. Tributes are often levied in terms of female slaves, and so on. But there is nothing like a slave traffic, or slave trade, where Earth is concerned, not recently, at any rate. Rather, Earth is regarded as a breeding ground for female slaves, a place from which suitable stock may be easily obtained.”
I trembled, at his feet.
“The women of Earth,” he said, “sell well in our markets. Some men prefer them even to Gorean women. They have never had a Home Stone. One need not be concerned with them. They are nothing. Too, they make excellent slaves. They are soon grateful for their collars.”
I was silent.
“Women have needs,” he said, “slave needs. The women of Earth, familiar only with the typical men of Earth, confused, crippled, timid, diffident, apologetic, diminished, eager to conform, zealous to please those who hate them, are frequently starved for sex. How can they be fulfilled by half men, by nonmen?”
“Surely there are true men on Earth,” I said.
“Are they not against the law?” he asked.
“Perhaps they exist, in secret,” I whispered.
“That is doubtless wise,” he said.
“Master?” I said.
“Why should they not keep manhood secret?” he asked.
“Master?” I said.
“A thousand squeaking urts,” he said, “could eat a tethered kailiauk alive.”
I did not understand what he said.
“Goreans,” he said, “regard the women of Earth as self-acknowledged, self-confessed, slaves. Consider the lack of veiling and concealment, the brazen display of their faces, the frequent flaunting of ankles and calves, even of arms and shoulders, the styles of summer wear, the garments of beaches, the nature of night wear, the sheerness of hose, the pleasantries of lingerie, the use of cosmetics and perfumes, which a master might enforce upon a slave. These delicious and delightful adornments are the obvious vanities of slaves. Do they not beg, in their way? Do they not say, ‘Consider me! I am here! I am lovely! Have me! Own me! Collar me!’?”
“I wore an anklet,” I said. “When I awakened, at the foot of your couch, it was gone.”
“It was no longer needed,” he said.
“I know little of your world,” I said.
“There are things about this world,” he said, “of which many Goreans, themselves, know nothing.”
“I do not understand,” I said.
“Dark forces are afoot,” he said. “Worlds are at stake. Species, equipped and resolute, are at war. Laws are ignored, at great peril. Mysterious ships stalk the night.”
“I understand nothing of this,” I said, frightened.
“Do not be concerned,” he said.
“But I would know!” I said.
“Curiosity,” said he, “is not becoming in a kajira.”
“Yes, Master,” I whispered, lowering my head.
I sensed he was considering me. Even on Earth many women are sensitive to such things. How can some, I wondered, pretend to be ignorant of the tensions, the cords of interest and desire, which attend the interactions of the sexes? Are they unaware of the radical centrality of sexuality to the human condition? Do they lie, or are they somehow ignorant, or inert, simply blind to the turbulence of invisible torrents rushing about them? Have they never experienced seemingly small things, betokening broad, sweeping currents, tiny things hinting at looming storms, the lifting of eyes, the catching of breath, the pounding of a heart, the unsteadiness of a body? Have their bodies and emotions never responded to having been viewed with interest, even desire? Have they never trembled, knowing they were wanted, and have they never admitted to themselves, as well, their own desires, that they, too, hope, and want? These things, so natural, so vital, and healthy, so frequently denied on Earth, subject to even fearful, pathological denials or dismissals, things taught on Earth to be soiled by shame and hypocrisy, are accepted and welcomed on Gor. Goreans, male and female, are not conditioned to dread and fear nature, to abet the agendas of the weak, strange, and ill-constituted, those who would seek power by means of imposing values and disvalues, those who would strive to instill and manipulate guilt to their own advantage. In any event, Goreans, male and female, slave and free, by whatever glimpse of wisdom and truth, or by whatever stroke of fortune, have never been taught to suspect themselves of some shameful unworthiness for the crime of being alive and human. It would no more occur to them to do so than it would to denounce breathing, or the circulation of the blood.
I did not speak.
Even I, from childhood on, I suspected, had been taught a sort of treachery to myself.
To be sure, one is taught, as well, not to ask questions, not to notice that views and values may have origins, histories, and purposes.
But perhaps they do.
Surely it was not difficult to detect the work of militant factions on my former world, intending to advance their own interests by distorting, denying, diminishing, and even nullifying nature. Surely there was an agenda behind the project of cultivating suspicion and hostility toward men in females and striving to devirilize males, so that the ‘true male’, the male to be societally approved, would be the least like a man.
But surely one must sympathize with those who would commit themselves to so ambitious a project, to so arduous an endeavor!
How brave and noble they are!
It is not easy to do away with nature.
It is not an easy thing to destroy, even if one wishes earnestly to do so.
Nature, unlike self-serving political programs, is not the product of ideologically motivated committees; who would seize control of education and the means of communication, to bend innocent, trusting children, and even unw
itting populations, to their views; nature is an obstacle to such programs; it is not contrived to serve the interests of a particular group on a particular afternoon. It is real, and tenacious. It lurks in secret places, in each gene in the human body.
And not all cultures and societies need view her as an enemy, to be denounced, and done away with as soon as possible.
I suspected there were other ways to live.
And I feared that one such way had been found on Gor.
In any event, on Gor, as far as I could determine, the realities of sex not only existed, as they must, but, too, more significantly, they were acknowledged, and welcomed.
The mightinesses of nature, and the profound, interrelated, complementary differences between men and women were recognized and celebrated.
Considering these things, I shook with terror, for here I was not a free woman, exalted in society, possessed of a Home Stone. I was the most vulnerable of all women, the female slave, in a world in which men had never relinquished their sovereignty, their nature as men, their possessiveness, their aggression, their claimancy, and lust, a world in which they might do as they wished with one such as I.
And yet I feared I had a place on such a world, a natural place, one for which I might be fitted, and one in which I belonged.
“What is wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing, Master,” I said.
I recalled the words of one of my instructresses, she switch bearing and herself collared, in the house of training. “You are a slave,” she said, “behave as a slave, move as a slave, speak as a slave, think as a slave, feel as a slave, be honestly and openly, in every bit of your body and mind, what you are, and want to be, a slave.”
“Is something wrong?” he said.
“No, Master,” I said.
The differences between men and women, profound as they were anywhere, I would learn, were far more intensified, far more visible, far more open, on Gor than on my former world, even amongst the free, and so would they not be multiplied a thousandfold between the free and slave, and I was slave.
I was sure he was thinking of me, kneeling before him, tunicked. What man would not?
“You are frightened,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“That is fitting,” he said.
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