by John Norman
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“Try again,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” she said. I again heard the drum.
Seleenya lifted her arms to me, and parted her lips. I touched her.
“Is it the intention of Master to use me slowly?” she said. “Yes,” I said.
“Seleenya loves Master,” she said.
At a languid gesture from Ibn Saran, Alyena lifted herself from the scarlet tiles, gracefully turning from her side to her knees, and then, head back, hair to the floor, slowly, inch by melodic protesting inch, arms before her body, lifted herself to a kneeling position, erect, the last bit of her to rise being her head, with a swirl of her blond, loose hair. Then, looking to Ibn Saran, suddenly she bent forward, as though impulsively, as though she could not help herself, and, hands on the tiles, head down, kissed the tiles at his feet, before his slippers. She looked up at him. I gathered she wanted to be bought by him. He was her “rich man.” He lifted his finger for her to rise. Her right leg thrust forth, brazenly, and then, from her kneeling position, slowly, hands above her head, moving, high, she rose swaying to her feet.
“May I strip your slave?” inquired Ibn Saran.
“Of course,” I said.
He nodded to the girl. To the music she unhooked her slave halter of yellow silk and, as though contemptuously, discarded it. I saw she was excited to see his interest in her. Only too obviously was she interested in him making a purchase of her. The churning of milk and the pounding of grain were not for lovely Alyena. That was for ugly girls and free women. She was too desirable, too, beautiful, to be set to such labors.
I decided I might care to taste the steaming, black wine. I lifted my finger.
The girl in whose charge was the silver vessel, filled with black wine, knelt beside a tiny brazier, on which it sat, retaining its warmth. Seeing my signal, she stiffened; she hesitated. She was white, dark-haired. She wore a high, tight vest of red silk, with four hooks; her midriff was bare; she wore the sashed chalwar, a sashed, diaphanous trousered garment, full but gathered in, closely, at the ankles; she was barefoot; her wrists and ankles were bangled; she was veiled; she was collared. She rose swiftly to her feet. She knelt, head down, before me. She poured, carefully, the hot, black beverage into the tiny red cup.
I dismissed her. Beneath her veil I had not been able to read the lettering on her collar, which would tell who owned her. I supposed it was Suleiman, since she was serving in the palace. The other girl, the white-skinned, red-haired girl, also in vest, chalwar and veil, and bangles and collar, lifted her tray of spoons and sugars. But I turned away. She was not summoned. The girls, white-skinned, were a matched set of slaves, one for the black wine, one for its sugars.
Alyena, now, slowly, disengaged the dancing silk from her hips, yet held it, moving it on and about her body, by her hands, taunting the reclining, languid, heavy-lidded Ibn Saran, to whom she knew, at his slightest gesture, she must bare herself.
He regarded her veil work; she was skillful; he was a connoisseur of slave girls.
I, too, in my way, though doubtless less skillful than the noble Ibn Saran, was a connoisseur of slave girls. For example, the dark-haired slave, she who was one of the matched set, she who was charged with the careful pouring of black wine, was a piece of delicious woman meat, a luscious, if inadequately disciplined piece of female flesh. To see her was to want her.
I had once had a chance to buy her, but, like a fool, I had not done so, carrying her in chains to my ship, to be taken to my house.
I had later sent Tab, one of my captains, a trusted man, to Lydius to buy her, but already had she been sold.
Her whereabouts had been unknown.
She had once disobeyed me, a male. For this she must be punished. I had not bought her in Lydius. Then I had been seeking Talena, to free her in the northern forests, and return her safe to Port Kar, where we might, as I had then thought, renew the companionship. Surely would it have seemed inappropriate to have returned in triumph with Talena, with that dark-haired wench, such a fantastic beauty, nude, wearing my chains, in the hold of my ship. Would Talena not have cut her throat, under the metal collar? And had I freed her would she not, soon, have fallen again to a man’s collar? Her flight from the Sardar had not won her freedom. She, a girl of Earth, had been swiftly caught by Panther Girls, and displayed, tied, roped, to a pole, on the banks of the Laurius, hands over head, ankles, throat and belly bound to it, a beautiful, taken slave.
Sarpedon, a tavern keeper from Lydius, had bought her from Panther Girls. It was in his chains that I had found her, a lowly paga slave in his establishment. She had, in fleeing the Sardar, taken my tarn. Yet, when 1 found her in Lydius, I had not slain her for this act. I had only used her, and left her slave. The tarn had later returned; in fury I had driven it away. She had cost me the tarn; it was worth ten times the cost of her body on a public block. None but its master should it have permitted its saddle! Of what value is a tarn of war who permits a stranger, even a girl, a mere wench, to ascend to its saddle? I had driven it away. When I thought of the tarn I sometimes wanted to lash her beauty to the bone. Yet I recalled that once had she labored, as I, before her flight, her disobedience, for Priest-Kings. I, in my courtly simplicities, my romantic delusions of those times, had wished to return her safe to Earth. She had declined, fleeing the Sardar. It had been a brave act. But it had been not without its consequences. She had gambled. She had lost. I left her slave.
At a signal from Ibn Saran, Alyena drew the veil about her body, and around it, and, with one small hand, threw it aside. She stood boldly before him, arms lifted, head to the side, right leg flexed. The veil, floating, wafted away, a dozen feet from her, and gently, ever so gently, settled to the tiles. Then, to the new melodic line, she danced.
Did the girl, in Lydius, truly think I would have freed her, yielding to her pleadings, I, in whose veins flowed Gorean blood, whose tarn she had cost him? I had not slain her. What a pretty little fool she was! I recalled her pleading that I buy her. Only a slave would so plead. I had not realized until then that she was truly a slave. I recalled, to my chagrin, that once, long ago, we had thought we had cared for one another. I recalled that once, in delirium, in weakness, when poison had burned in my body, I had cried out for her to love me.
But when, long later, after I had learned the lessons of Torvaldsland, I ridded myself of the poison in the cleansing delirium of the antidote, I had not cried out, in weakness, for her love, begging it, but rather, in strength, laughing, had collared her, putting her to my feet and making her my slave. Proud women, their pride stripped from them, belong at the feet of prouder men. She had begged to be freed. She was a slave. And I, once, had been fool enough to care for her.
Once, it was true, she had served Priest-Kings, but then, so, too, had I, and that was long ago. And then we did not know, and she did not know, that she was a true slave, as was revealed in a tavern in Lydius. We had thought her a free woman, pretending to be slave. Then, in a tavern in Lydius, we had learned her slave. It was now out of the question that she, a slave, might serve Priest-Kings. The collar, by Gorean law, cancelled the past. When Sarpedon had locked his collar on her throat her past as a free woman had vanished, her current history as a slave had begun. “She fled the Sardar,” had said Samos to me. “She disobeyed. She is untrustworthy. And she knows too much.” He had wished to send men to Lydius to purchase her, and return her to Port Kar that she might be, under his direction, thrown to urts in the canals. “She cannot be depended on,” said Samos. “And she knows too much.”
“There are better things to do with a beautiful slave,” I told him, “than throw her into the canals, to feed the urts.”
Samos had grinned at me. “Perhaps,” he had said. “Perhaps.”
What a fool I had been to be willing to return such a luscious piece of female to Earth. Had I had my wits about me I would have put a collar on her then and fastened her to the slave ring at the foot of my couch.
I could not deny that I was now pleased she was not, in innocuous triviality, ensconced on Earth. I was pleased rather that her beauty was on Gor, where I, and other males, might have access to it. She might have been safe on Earth; she had chosen to be unsafe, as any beautiful woman without a Home Stone must be, on Gor. She would now pay the penalties, and well, exacted of her beauty by the powerful men of a primitive culture. She had gambled. She had lost. I was pleased she had lost. My only regret was that I had not bought her in Lydius, and returned her to Port Kar, to keep her as one of my own slaves. I had thought, at that time, however, that I would find Talena. Talena, unless she, too, were collared, and had no choice, would not be likely to accept such a beauty beneath the same roof with her. If she did not kill her, she would have soon sold her, probably to a woman, or, for a pittance, to the most despicable master she could find. I had not known until Lydius that Vella, the former Miss Elizabeth Cardwell, of Earth, was a true slave.
I glanced casually back to look upon her, kneeling beside, the slender, silvered, long-spouted vessel of black wine, resting over its tiny brazier, she only one of a pair, a matched set, of slaves. Her eyes were angry, over her veil. Her bare midriff, long, between the high, hooked vest of red silk and the low-slung, sashed chalwar, about her hips, some inches below her navel, was quite attractive. To see her was to want her; and to want her was to wish to own her.
Alyena now to a swirl of music spun before us, swept helpless with it, bangles clashing, to its climax.
Then she stopped, marvelously, motionlessly, as the music was silent, her head back, her arms high, her body covered with sweat, and then, to the last swirl of the barbaric melody, fell to the floor at the feet of Ibn Saran. I noted the light hair on her forearms. She gasped for breath.
Ibn Saran, magnanimously, gestured that she might rise, and she did so, standing before him, head high, breathing deeply.
Ibn Saran looked at me. He smiled thinly. “An interesting slave,” he said.
“Would you care to bid upon her?” I asked.
Ibn Saran gestured to Suleiman. He acknowledged the courtesy. “I would not bid against a guest in my house,” he said.
“And I,” said Ibn Saran, “would not feel it gracious to bid against the host in whose house I find such welcome.”
“In my Pleasure Gardens,” smiled Suleiman, “I have twenty such women.”
“Ah,” said Ibn Saran, bowing.
“Seventy weights of dates for the stones,” said Suleiman to me. The price was fair, and good. In his way, he was being magnanimous with me. He had bargained earlier, and had, in this, satisfied himself as a trader of the desert. It was now as Suleiman, Ubar and Pasha of Nine Wells, that he set his price. I had little doubt it was firm. He had cut through much haggling. Had he been truly interested in bargaining and dates I suspected I would not have been permitted to deal with him at all, but one of his commissary officers.
“You have shown me hospitality.” I said, “and I would be honored if Suleiman Pasha would accept these unworthy stones for sixty weights.”
Had it not been for Ibn Saran, I suspected I would not have been admitted even to the presence of the Pasha of Nine Wells.
He bowed. He called a scribe to him. “Give this merchant in gems.” said he, “my note, stamped for eighty weights of dates.”
I bowed. “Suleiman Pasha is most generous.” I said.
I heard a noise from afar, some shouting. I did not think either Ibn Saran or Suleiman heard it.
Alyena stood on the scarlet tiles, head back, sweating, breathing heavily, nude save for her ornaments and collar, the bangles about her ankles and wrists, the armlets, the several chains and pendants looped about her neck. She brushed back her hair with her right hand.
I now heard some more shouting. I heard, too, incongruous in the palace of the Pasha of Nine Wells, from afar, the squealing of a kaiila.
“What is going on?” asked Suleiman. He stood, robes swirling.
Alyena looked about.
At that instant, buffeting guards aside, sending them sprawling, to our amazement, in the carved, turret-shaped portal of the great room, claws scratching on the tiles, appeared a war kaiila, in full trappings, mounted by a veiled warrior in swirling burnoose. Guards rushed forward. His scimitar leapt from its sheath and they fell back, bleeding, reeling to the tiles.
He thrust his scimitar hack in his sheath. He threw back his head and laughed, and then tore down the veil, that we might look on his face. He grinned at us.
“It is the bandit, Hassan!” cried a guard.
I drew my scimitar and stood between him and Suleiman.
The kaiila pranced. The man uncoiled a long desert whip from his saddle.
“I come for a slave,” he said.
The long blade of the whip lashed forth. Alyena, her head back, cried out with pain. Four coils of the whip, biting into her, lashing, snapped tight about her waist. He yanked her, stumbling, the prisoner of his whip, to the side of his kaiila. By the hair he yanked her across his saddle.
He lifted his hand to us. “Farewell!” he cried. “And my thanks!” He then spun the kaiila and, as guards swarmed after him, to our astonishment, leapt the kaiila, catlike, between pillers, through one of the great arched windows of the palace room. He struck a roof below, and then another roof, and then was to the ground, racing away, men turning to look after him.
I, and others, turned back from the window. On the cushions lay Suleiman, Pasha of Nine Wells. I ran to him. I saw Hamid, who was the lieutenant of Shakar, captain of the Aretai, slip swiftly behind hangings, a dagger, bloodied, held within his cloak.
I turned Suleiman. His eyes were open. “Who struck me?” he said. There was blood deep in the silk of the cushions.
Ibn Saran drew forth his scimitar. He did not seem languid now. His eyes blazed.
He seemed a silken panther, lithe, tensed for the spring. He pointed the scimitar at me. “He!” he cried. “I saw it! He did it!”
I leaped to my feet.
“Kavar spy!” cried Ibn Saran. “Assassin!”
I spun about, facing steel on all sides.
“Cut him down!” cried Ibn Saran, raising his scimitar.
6 A Slave Girl Testifies
The bodies of the two girls, stripped, lay on the narrow rectangles, networks, of knotted ropes, on the racks. The ropes, slung, were pressed down with their weight. Their hands were at their sides, but ropes were attached to them, and fixed on the axle of the windlass, above their heads. Both wore collars. Their ankles were roped to the foot of the device.
I knelt on the circle of accusation. My wrists were manacled behind my back. On my neck, hammered, was a heavy ring of iron, with two welded rings, one on each side, to which chains were attached, these chains in the hands of guards. I was stripped. My ankles were chained.
“Cut him down!” had cried Ibn Sarah, raising his scimitar.
“No!” had said Shakar, captain of the Aretai, staying his arm. “That would be too easy.”
Smiling, Ibn Saran had sheathed his weapon.
Ropes had been put upon me.
I struggled in the chains. I was helpless.
“Let the testimony of slaves be taken,” said the judge.
The red-haired girl on the rack cried out in misery. The testimony of slaves, in a Gorean court, is commonly taken under torture.
Two brawny male slaves, stripped to the waist, spun the two handles on the racks.
The red-haired girl, she who had been one of the matched set of slaves, who had had in her charge the tray of spoons and sugars, wept. Her wrists, and those of the other girl, as the long wooden handles turned, were pulled up and over her head. The red-haired girl writhed on the cords. “Master!” she wept.
Ibn Saran, in silken kaftan, and kaffiyeh and agal, strode to the rack.
“Do not be frightened, pretty Zaya,” he said. “Remember to tell the truth, and only the truth.”
“I will, Master!” she wept. “I will.”
; At a sign from the judge the handle moved once, dropping the wooden pawl into the ratchet notch. Her body was now tight on the rack; her toes were pointed; her hands were high over her head, the rough rope slipped up her wrists, prohibited from moving further by its knots and the wide part of her hands.
“Listen carefully, little Zaya,” said Ibn Saran. “And think carefully.”
The girl nodded.
“Did you see who it was who struck noble Suleiman Pasha?”
“Yes.” she cried. “It was he! He! It was he, as you, my Master, have informed the court.” The girl turned her head to the side, to regard me. “He!” she cried.
Ibn Saran smiled.
“Hamid it was!” I cried, struggling to my feet. “It was Hamid, lieutenant to Shakar!”
Hamid, standing to one side, did not deign to look upon me. There were angry murmurs from the men assembled in the court.
“Hamid.” said Shakar, not pleased, standing near, “is a trusted man.” And he added, “And he is Aretai.”
“Should you persist in accusing Hamid,” said the judge, “your penalties will be the more severe.”
“He it was,” said I, “who struck Suleiman.”
“Kneel,” said the judge.
I knelt.
The judge signaled again to the slave who controlled the handle of the red-haired girl’s rack. “No, please!” she screamed.
Once more the handle moved and the pawl slipped into a new notch on the ratchet.
Her body, now, was lifted from the network of knotted ropes and hung, suspended, between the two axles of the rack.
“Masters!” she cried. “Masters! I have told the truth! The truth!”
The pawl was moved yet another notch. The girl, now hurt, screamed.
“Have you told the truth, pretty Zaya?” inquired Ibn Saran.
“Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!” she wept.
At a signal from the judge the handle was released. The axle of the windlass at the girl’s head spun back and her body fell into the network of knotted ropes.