by John Norman
"Well done, girls," said the keeper. "And do not forget the beauty of your breasts, and your squirmings, your glances and smiles."
Publia cried out in misery.
We were now something like a hundred yards from the piers. Two of the fellows on the bow deck already had the forward lines in hand.
"It has been decided, slaves," said the keeper to them, "hat you will be sold at auction. In order, however, that you come into the keeping of Cosians, attendance at the auction, save by sales personnel, will be limited to Cosians. After a Cosian buys you, of course, he can do with you what he wants. We are now nearing the pier. I will point out various Cosians in the crowd, for there will be several. They are recognizable by their habiliments. You will then direct your glances and your movements particularly to them. Be pretty. Arouse interest in yourselves. We want them sweating blood when they bid for you!"
Aemilianus was already raising his hand to the crowds. There was much cheering. "Look!" cried a fellow on the dock, pointing to the slaves.
"Yes!" said a man. "Yes!" cried another.
"Sensuous sluts!" laughed a man.
Claudia cried out with misery, but did not cease to move.
As so many were waving to us, I, too, with many of the others, at the starboard rail, waved back.
All seemed a riot of music and color.
"There," said the keeper, gesturing with his whip, as we drew alongside the pier. "There is a fellow of Cos! Present yourselves to him! You are female slaves! Do it! And there is another!"
"I am not such a girl!" suddenly cried Claudia. Then she threw back her head and shrieked, as the lash, like lightning and fire, struck about her body.
She dangled and jerked in the harness, sobbing, though she had been struck but once.
"I am such a girl!" cried Publia, fervently, seeing the keeper turn toward her. "I am such a girl!"
"If she is recalcitrant, or not pleasing," cried slave girls on the pier, "strike her! Strike her! Punish her! Punish her! Punish her severely!" Slave girls, kept under strict discipline themselves, they wanted it imposed on others with the same authority, exactness and perfection that it was imposed upon them. They were deeply concerned that Claudia not be permitted to get away with anything, no more than they. Was she, too, not a slave girl? Thus, interestingly, it is often slave girls themselves who are most zealous to see that masters are strict with their slaves. ' The keeper turned back toward Claudia.
"I, too, am such a girl!" she cried out, wildly, swinging in the harness. Clearly she did not wish another blow from the disciplinary instrument. Yet, too, I think that the matter was far deeper than that, and this became clear but an instant later. The chain-and-leather harness, incidentally, is muchly open. That is what one would expect, considering its display purposes. On the other hand, a consequence of this openness, also, of course, is that it affords little, or no, protection, from the slave whip. Claudia swung in the harness to face me. Our eyes met. "Yes!" she cried. "Yes! I am such a girl!" "You are," I assured her.
"Yes!" she wept. "Yes!"
I saw then that her small rebellion had been no more than a foolish sop to her pride, one perhaps she thought in order, I wondered if she had uttered her silly noise only because I was there, who had known her when she was a mere free woman. I hoped not. But in any case, whether because of her own pride, in itself, or her concern that I who had known her as a free woman was about, or because of the strangers in the crowd, or the other slave girls, or whatever, how woefully out of place was the absurd utterance in her new reality! But then I saw in her eyes, she half laughing, half crying, that whatever had been her motivation, whether some or all of the things I had wondered about, or even others, that she had only wanted the reassurance of the whip, the reassurance of the inflexibility of the will of men, that she must now obey, and was truly a slave. Moving as she did, and being what she was, a slave, was the deepest and most wonderful thing in her being, and she reveled in it, and loved it! She had wanted only the clear understanding that she must now surrender to it, that she was now truly a slave. She was elated in the harness.
"There!" said the keeper, pointing out a fellow with the coiled whip. She swung about. "Am I pretty, Master?" she cried. "Will you bid upon me?" "Bid upon me!: cried Publia to him. "I need a collar and a man!"
"There is another," said the keeper.
"Perhaps it will be you who will own me?" called Claudia to him.
The forward lines were cast to fellows on the pier. Ina moment they were made fast to mooring cleats.
There was much cheering, and waving, and calling out, between the pier and the railing. Drums and pipes on board the Tais sounded. A plank was being run out to the pier. The following ships in the flotilla, scarcely less resplendent than the Tais herself would, in moments, in turn, take their own berths.
"What manner of slaves are those?" called a fellow on the pier, apparently, by his garb, a Cosian, to the keeper on the bow deck. "Are they common slaves?" "They are as common as you will have them!" shouted back the keeper. "They are not branded, are they?" asked the fellow. "They are not collared!" "Such details will be soon attended to," laughed the keeper.
I did not doubt it. Goreans are efficient about such matters. For an instant Publia, startled, and Claudia, frightened, stopped writhing in the harnesses. It was, after all, their own branding and collaring of which the men were speaking! "Move," growled the keeper.
Then again they moved, frightened, obedient slave girls.
There was laughter from the pier. "Wriggles!" called out a slave girl to them.
"Squirm! Squirm, Kajirae!" called out another.
"Do you not know how to squirm?" laughed another girl.
"How is it that these two are at the prow?" called another fellow.
"They squirm well," said a man.
"Writhea€”writhea€”more slowly," said the keeper to them.
"Aiii!" cried a man.
"How is it that these two are at the prow?" called the fellow again. "Stop," said the keeper to the two slaves. Motionless were they then, their arms high, their bodies beautifully elongated, stretched out, suspended from the outjutting beams in the shackles and harness.
"Beautiful!" cried a man.
The keeper then, with his coiled whip, in two expansive gestures, one to port, one to starboard, indicated, and called attention to, the lineaments of the figures of the two lovely slaves. "Can you not guess?" he asked the fellow who had asked the question.
"Yes!" said the fellow.
"Are they not worthy to be at the prow?" asked the keeper.
"They are!" called out more than one man. And they were worthy not only because of the beauty of their figures, so well displayed, but because of their facial beauty as well.
I saw a slave girl in her skimpy tunic, scarcely a rag on her, nuzzling a fellow, rubbing her face and head against his left shoulder. She was trying to distract him from the suspended slaves. She was urging a consideration of her own not inconsiderable charms upon his attention.
"But perhaps, too, there is another reason!" hinted the keeper.
"Oh?" asked his questioner.
"This one was call "Publia, " said the keeper, "and this one "Claudia. " As he said these names, he reached out, and, in turn, Publia first, flicked each of them with the whip. At this touch, even as light and playful as it was, each of them recoiled in dread. Both had now felt the whip at one time or another, indeed, Claudia only a moment ago. There was more laughter. "They were both free women of Ar's Station," continued the keeper. "Publia dressed in such a way that her caste, that of the Merchants, would be concealed."
A Cosian merchant in the crowd cried out in anger.
"And that none would know she was wealthy!" said the keeper.
"She is not wealthy now!" cried a man.
"Let her now serve the wealthy!" called out a well-dressed fellow.
"Or serve a master of low caste," called out a fellow in the garb of the metal workers, "with the same or gre
ater perfections than would be required of her in a high house!" I smiled. A great deal, indeed, is expected in low-caste domiciles of slaves who were formerly of high caste. To be sure, they no longer have caste then, of any sort. Even the lowest of castes is then undreamt-of heights above them, for in such houses they are only animals.
"She was determined to survive the fall of Ar's Station, whatever might prove to be the fate of her sisters in the city," said the keeper.
There were cries of anger.
"Thus, by such means as provocative dress and habiliments, baring even her calves, hoping then to be taken for a lowly, beautiful, meaningless maid, by even refusing to cut her hair on behalf of the city's needs, an act by means of which she hoped to appear more attractive to strong men, more attractive than might her sheared sisters, and a lack which, incidentally, as you can see, has been made up upon her, and by carrying gold with her, not shared with her sisters, with which she hoped to bribe captors to spare her for a nose ring and cord, she gave great attention to the readying of herself for a Cosian master." There was much laughter.
"And thus," said the keeper, lifting the whip, "we think it is only appropriate that her planning not have gone for naught. It is to a Cosian, some Cosian, that she will be sold!"
Men, hearing this, slapped their thighs with pleasure. Slave girls, too, laughed.
"I am a Cosian!" called out a fellow. He, to be sure, did not wear the habiliments of Cos.
"Perhaps, then," said the keeper, "yours will be the collar she will wear!" "Perhaps," he laughed.
"And this one," said the keeper, indicating Claudia, "betrayed her compatriots, declared for Cos and took Cosian gold for treason!"
"But she is a slave now?" called a man.
"Yes," said he keeper.
"Traitress!" cried a fellow, angrily, one in the habiliments of Cos. Claudia looked wildly at the keeper. He nodded. He would permit her to speak. "I regret what I did!" cried Claudia. "And I am only a slave now! Please have mercy on a slave!"
"She, too," said the keeper, "it to be sold to a Cosian."
"Traitress!" cried a Cosian. "Traitress!" cried another.
"perhaps I will buy you!" cried another. "The whips in my house lash hard!" "I will try to be pleasing, Master!" she wept.
It was very hard to hear now. The drums and pipes aboard the Tais were sounding. There was other music, too, here and there, from the piers, greeting other ships. There was much shouting, and calling, and raillery, between the piers and ships.
Aemilianus, pausing now and then to wave to the crowd, and partly supported by Surilius, and most of those with him were conducted back from the bow deck. Calliodorus, I suspected, had now left the stern castle and was awaiting his friend, Aemilianus, amidships. Aemilianus, who had commanded at Ar's Station, it seemed, would be the first to disembark. I, and some others, including the young warrior, Marcus, remained where we were. In a few moments, then, to drums and pipes, and cheers, I saw Aemilianus, unsupported, but obviously weak, make his own way down the gangplank. Behind him were Calliodorus and Surilius. Aemilianus and Calliodorus, and other officers, were embraced by several fellows wearing medallions of office at the foot of the gangplank.
Following this official party, so to speak, the refugees of Ar's Station disembarked, a few clutching tiny bundles containing meager belongings, and some of their other belongings following timidly, on their own bare feet. Much of the crowd, in a few Ehn, then, had followed the procession of officials and officers, and refugees, and properties, from the wharf. Oars were inboard, stowed. Oarsmen and sailors now, save for a watch, weapons and sea bags over their shoulders, entering upon their leaves, and other fellows, their service now discharged, passed down the gangplank. Reunions were common and often demonstrative, those with relatives and friends, those of companions, those of masters with eager, scantily clad, loving slaves. Much the same sort of thing was occurring elsewhere, at other piers.
"It was a good voyage," said the keeper, reaching out with a staff and hook to draw Publia, by the chain from which her harness was suspended, close to the rail.
"Yes," I said.
When Publia had been drawn closer to the rail two other fellows reached out and pulled her to the bow deck where they knelt her, in the shackles, in the harness, still attached to the chain. In a moment he, and the others, similarly, had retrieved Claudia and she, too, knelt on the bow deck.
"I gather," said the keeper, "that you have had some relationship, or something to do, with these two slaves.
"Yes," I said.
"Slaves," said the keeper.
"Yes, Master," said Publia.
"Yes, Master," said Claudia.
"You may bid him farewell," said the keeper, "in a manner suitable for slaves." "I wish you well, Master," said Publia, humbly, kneeling before me in her shackles and harness, putting down her head, kissing my feet.
"I wish you well, slave," I said.
Claudia then, too, as had Publia, was kneeling before me. She, too, put down her head. "I, too, wish you well, Master," she said. She then softly, delicately, kissed my feet.
"I wish you well, slave," I said.
The young warrior, Marcus, was not looking toward the piers, or the town, ascending from the harbor. His attentions seemed to be outward, and back, toward the entrance of the harbor.
I looked back to the pier. Here and there, lingering, some four or five of them, were slave girls.
The keeper was now crouching by Publia. He freed her wrist shackles from the chain and then her wrists from the shackles. He then pulled her small wrists behind her back and locked them there, in slave bracelets. He then, similarly, removed her ankle shackles from the chain and then freed her ankles from the shackles themselves. He then removed her harness. He similarly handled Claudia.
"You do not seem eager to see Port Cos," I said to the young warrior. "Where," asked he, "do you think the northern forces of Ar are?" "South of the river," I said, "back, to the east, somewhere."
"The expeditionary force of Cos will never be able to slip between then and the river," he said.
"Perhaps not," I said.
"It would be impossible," he said.
"Perhaps," I said.
I turned about. A fellow had brought two slave hoods and a neck chain, it appeared to be about five feet in length, terminating at each end with a collar. I watched while Publia was turned about and set, kneeling, before the kneeling Claudia. Claudia's neck was the first locked in the collar. Publia appeared apprehensive, but did not dare turn about. The second collar was locked on her neck. The two slaves were now linked together. The chain was, indeed, some five feet in length. Claudia's eyes, frightened, met mine. Then she was hooded, and the hood straps, beneath her chin, drawn snug, and buckled shut, behind the back of her neck. In a moment Publia, too, similarly, had been hooded. Publia was then drawn to her feet by an arm and conducted back, through the passage between the starboard rail and the stem castle, back amidships, to the gangplank, Claudia, responding to the cues of the chain, helpless in the hood, with tiny steps, hurrying behind.
I looked toward the pharos, on the promontory. Its light at night could be see, it was said, pasangs east and west on the river.
"What are you thinking of?" I asked the young warrior, Marcus.
"Of vengeance," he said, bitterly, "and loyalty."
"An odd juxtaposition of thoughts," I commented.
I then turned about and watched Publia and Claudia, hooded, naked, on their common chain, their wrists braceleted behind them, being herded along the pier, among boxes and bales. Beyond the pier, abutting on harborside wharfage, there were numerous buildings, mostly shops, such as those of sailmakers, oarmakers and sawyers, and warehouses, and, here and there, between these buildings, narrow streets, stretching up toward the city. I expected that they would be herded up one of these streets to the house of some slaver or other. They would have very little idea, at this time, of what Port Cos was like. Their hoods would be removed, presumably,
only in the slaver's house. They would be very helpless, and muchly disorientated. Later, perhaps never having been given access to a window, or never having been outside unhooded, they would find themselves auctioned. From that time on, what was permitted to them would be determined by their master.
"I am angry," said the young man, perhaps more to himself than to me. "Why is that?" I asked.
"There are many things I do not understand," he said.
"There are many things which none of us understand," I said.
"I am bitter," he said.
"Because war is not all nodding plumes and the sun flashing from silvered shields?" I asked, recalling the words of Aemilianus.
"Perhaps," he said.
I looked to the pier. There were still some slave girls there. I now saw three. Two were bare-breasted.
"Put dark thoughts from you," I said. "You have come safe to Port Cos. Rejoice. See the city. Come, if you like, and sup with me. Let us see what Port Cos has to offer in the way of enslaved females. She is noted, like Victoria, and certain other towns, for excellent wares in that respect."
"I thank you," said he. "But go on without me."
"You are a hero, and a warrior," I said. "Surely you do not mind squeezing luscious female flesh, branded and collared, in your arms."
"Outrage a treachery and blood, and confusion, and hatred, are now in my thoughts," he said, "not the belled, perfumed bodies of female slaves.: "Yes," said I, "such are pleasant, crawling and licking about your feet and legs, looking up at you, begging to please. Make use of them. Use them for recreation. They are your due.: "No," said he.
"It is hard to suppose that you would not be pleased to see them dancing before you, in the beads and chains of slaves."
"It is on less pleasant things that my thoughts now dwell," he said. "For some," I said, "you might give your purse, and even draw your sword, to take them from the auction block."