The Usurper

by John Norman

  She did not know where she was.

  She had been taken from the slave house, hooded, bound, and leashed. On the street outside the slave house, she had gathered, from sounds, and words spoken, that two palanquins had been waiting, with their bearers, or attendants. The two women, one of whom it seemed had purchased her, took their places in the two conveyances, which were then put to the shoulders of the bearers. Her leash was fastened to the rear of the first palanquin, which she must follow, on foot. She was still naked, from the slave house, even in the street, but naked slaves, though not common in the public streets of Telnar, were not unknown. For example, the citizens of Telnar were not unfamiliar with chains of nude girls, captives not yet put under the iron, and marked slaves, sometimes from far worlds, being conducted from port pens to markets. Also, as a discipline, or punishment, Masters might send their girls about the city, on errands, and such, clad only in their collars. Slaves are well aware that a tunic may be awarded, withheld, or removed, at the discretion of the Master. The control of clothing, like food, blindfolding, gagging, whipping, binding, and such, are at the prerogative of the Master. Girls are well aware of this, and it is nothing likely to be forgotten more than once. Some Masters keep their slaves nude indoors, but almost all will have them clothed in public, though clothed as what they are, as slaves. Cornhair, on her leash, was grateful for the hood. In its way, it granted her a certain welcome anonymity. What would it matter if she should walk as a slave, if no one knew it was she? Had she not, as a woman, at least after she had been embonded, been often tempted to do so, to walk as a slave is expected to walk, so naturally, so gracefully, so beautifully? Might it not be thrilling to do so, to walk as other girls, so excitingly, so desirably, women who were well aware they were slaves, women who were delightedly slaves, women grateful to be slaves, women proud of specialness, vain of the collars on their necks? Certainly she was a woman and much more aware of her womanhood, and its power, in a collar than she had ever been as a free woman. As a free woman she would have been afraid to walk unabashedly as a woman. As a slave she need have no such inhibitions. Indeed she might be lashed if she tried to conceal or deny the loveliness, vulnerability, and fullness of her sex. It was no wonder free women so hated slaves, for in the chains of their freedom they were denied the freedom of their sex. As she followed the first palanquin she could not but be aware of the vulgar sounds, comments, compliments, and reactions which greeted her passage. Indeed, she started several times, crying out in the hood, in response to pinches and good-natured, sharp, stinging slaps. It was natural then, in her vanity, that she walk as a slave. Who would know?

  “She is a nasty little slave, Delia,” called out the woman in the second palanquin. “She will do very nicely!”

  “Excellent!” was the response from the first palanquin.

  “They are pleased,” thought Cornhair. “They must have bought me for a man, perhaps for a friend, a husband, a son, or nephew.”

  Whereas it was unusual for a wife to buy a female slave for her husband, it was not unusual for a husband to buy himself a female slave, for his couch ring. To be sure, this liberty was not reciprocated. If a wife desired extramarital male attention she would be well advised to proceed with caution, to arrange judicious assignations, or, incognito, visit male brothels.

  Perhaps it was the anonymity of the hood, or knowing herself leashed, or being unable to part her hands, bound behind her, but Cornhair had seldom felt herself so much alive as now, when she was so fully and helplessly in the power of others. Could it be that she was a natural slave, living to be owned? Too, the sensations of the unexpected attentions, a pinch, a slap, had been acute, keenly enlivening, not really painful, but assuredly stimulating. And were they not, in their way, flattering, as well? And surely the feel of a pinch, the sting of a slap, lingered in her body. To be sure, such things were far less troubling, or disturbing, or significant, she was sure, than would have been a kiss, put on her as a slave, a caress or a grasp, a handling of her as a slave. There was no mistaking such things. Why should she fear certain sensations, she wondered, if she were hooded? Who would see the parting of her lips, the sudden, astonished widening of her eyes? Who would even be close enough to sense the tiny changes in her breathing, its quickening, who so close that they might hear the tiny inadvertent noises which might escape her, scarcely audible beyond the layers of closely woven canvas?

  Cornhair had the uneasy sense that she might become needful, as a slave is needful.

  How helpless would she then be!

  Could she resist being enflamed? What if men should do it to her?

  What would it be to feel a man’s hands on her, to know herself truly his slave?

  She must then hope to please him.

  She had felt the lash in the slave house.

  “I am afraid of the whip,” she thought. “How is it that I should fear the whip? Only slave girls fear the whip. I fear the whip. What can that mean? Is its meaning not clear? I am a slave girl!”

  Cornhair was well aware of the responses from the crowd, the noises, the comments, assessing her, as a beast may be assessed.

  “Thirty darins,” she heard. “Thirty-five,” she heard.

  And then Cornhair walked, as might have a thirty-five-darin girl.

  She heard the women in the palanquin behind her call out to her companion in the lead palanquin, that to which her leash was attached. “She is the sort that men like,” she heard.

  “Excellent,” she heard, from the lead palanquin. “She will do very nicely.”

  But Cornhair was puzzled. It was a woman who had bought her. But, why? Surely to give her to a male. But what woman would buy a girl for a man? Was there not a war between the free woman and the slave?

  Cornhair followed on her tether, for better than an hour, through various streets, some perhaps, from the sounds, and from the smoothness of the footing, boulevards, others less favored, more cobbled, streets of a more common sort, and, occasionally, it seemed, from the adjustments of the bearers, from the dampness and spillage, from the coolness, from the absence of sunlight on her body, from the sense of compressed, narrowly channeled wind brushing her, streets less streets than dismal alleys or secluded walkways, some little more than muddy trails, crevicelike, between walls. Then, later, the passage of the palanquins once more grew linear and their progress proceeded apace. Why, Cornhair wondered, had a seeming detour, through narrow, poorly paved, even sodden, streets, been effected? Were the grand ladies, for already Cornhair had begun to think of the free in terms quite different from those in which she thought of herself, reluctant to be recognized in this part of the journey? Did they wish to conceal their approach to a particular destination, by recourse to a less public, more circuitous route? Had she not thought she had heard the drawing of the curtains on two palanquins?

  What is becoming of me, wondered Cornhair.

  What are these strange feelings I am beginning to have? Surely they are not appropriate for one of the honestori, for one, even, of the patricians, even of the senatorial class! But I am no longer of the honestori, no longer of the patricians, no longer of the senatorial class!

  I am becoming different. I cannot help myself!

  Are these two women so truly grand, so different from me?

  Would I not have despised them, even mocked them, in my freedom?

  Why do I now fear them as so far above me, so far beyond me?

  Why do I tremble before them? Why do I fear to meet their eyes?

  Why should I stand in awe of them? Why should I hurry to kneel before them, and feel it right that I should do so?

  Would they not be the same as me if their thighs were marked, if they were stripped, if their necks were clasped in the close-fitting, locked band of servitude!

  No, they would not then be different.

  But now they are!

  So different!

  I a
m changing, she thought. I cannot help myself. I am beginning to see the world as what I now am, as a slave, as one who is owned. I am beginning to think as a slave, move as a slave, speak as a slave. I am beginning to feel my body as the body of a slave, my mind as the mind of a slave, my feelings as the feelings of a slave.

  And I want it so!

  No, no, no, I must not want it so!

  After something more than an hour, the small procession had halted, and the two palanquins had been set down.

  To Cornhair’s surprise the bearers, or their leader, were paid. The palanquins, then, had been rented.

  The ladies then, if they owned palanquins, had elected not to use them. Would private palanquins have been recognized, or noted?

  Also, almost at the same time, Cornhair heard the warming of an engine, and the familiar hum of a hoverer.

  Too, one may have landed nearby.

  It seemed another was being readied.

  Someone undid her leash from the back of what had been the lead palanquin. From the feel of the leash on the leash ring Cornhair conjectured it was in someone’s hand. A slave grows quite aware of such things. Did they truly fear she might dart away, hooded, her small wrists tied behind her back? Did they truly think that a bound slave was heedless or unmindful of the futility of eluding her restraints? Did they not realize how helpless, disoriented and dependent, a woman is, blindfolded, or hooded?

  She felt herself lifted in strong, masculine arms and placed over the rail of the hoverer. A moment or two later, she was knelt on the floor grating of the hoverer; her ankles were crossed; her head was forced down to the grating; the leash was taken back between her legs, it was then pulled back tightly, tautly, and used to fasten her crossed ankles together.

  Her head was then held down.

  She could not raise it, in the leash collar.

  Her hands moved a little in the cords that held them fastened behind her back.

  “Satisfactory?” asked the male voice.

  “Quite,” said a woman’s voice.

  “A compact, fetching little slave bundle,” said the male voice.

  Cornhair supposed that a woman did look well, so tied, so displayed, so helpless. She could scarcely move.

  “Do you think men would find her attractive?” asked another woman.

  “She would do for a use or two,” said the man.

  “Do you think she could do for a brothel slut?” asked the first woman.

  “Certainly,” said the man.

  “She is the sort?” he was asked.

  “Eminently,” said the man.

  “I do not want to be sold to a brothel!” thought Cornhair. “Do not sell me to a brothel, Mistresses!”

  Cornhair had hitherto, for no good reason, taken it for granted that she would be sold to a private Master. It had never occurred to her that she might be sold to a business, an organization, a household, or such. Suddenly, to her astonishment, as she had not really thought of it before, she realized that, as a slave, she hoped very much for, and, for some reason, as though it made any difference, desperately wanted, a private Master. She hoped to be owned by a man, by one man, by only one man, whom she might then strive to serve and please, and, interestingly, she wanted to be his only slave. She suddenly realized, too, to her surprise, that she would hope to be a good slave, and would try, with all her intelligence and her emotional being, to be a good slave, indeed, the best slave she could be. And she sensed more might be involved in such a matter than merely being frightened of the whip. To be sure, the whip would be there, for she would be a slave.

  “So,” said the man, “you are going to sell her to a brothel?”

  “No!” thought Cornhair.

  “No,” said the voice of the first woman.

  In her bonds, Cornhair rejoiced.

  The fellow then, apparently, left the hoverer, though she was not altogether sure of that, and, shortly thereafter, she felt the vibration of the grating, the hum of the engine, and, a moment later, the sweep of wind on her back, as the small, circular vessel rose swiftly, smoothly, into the air.

  “Stand here,” said a woman’s voice.

  “Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair, her feet in the warm sand to the ankles.

  “Is this a market, of some sort?” she wondered. “It does not seem likely. There is sand. Perhaps I am to be run for boys, with ropes, to be awarded to the winner in a game? I have heard of such things. Perhaps they will have nets, and be on horseback? But I do not want to be won by boys. I would want to be owned by a man. If I am hooded, I would be helpless to favor a given contestant. I hope they will unhood me.”

  She considered the assailing of her lips with a Master’s claiming kiss.

  This made her uneasy, but she knew she would yield, as a slave.

  She sensed she would press against him, begging.

  Could this be me, she wondered?

  Cornhair had no idea, for a time, where she was, but she, of course, had some familiarity with Telnar, and, given her time in the hoverer, she assumed she must be a hundred miles or so from the capital. She was reasonably sure she was somewhere in the countryside, perhaps in the vicinity of a villa, or set of villas, from which one might commute to Telnar.

  She heard birds. Perhaps there were trees about.

  Once the hoverer had landed, her ankles had been freed and she had been stood upright, though with some unsteadiness and awkwardness, on the grating. She had then heard the rail gate of the hoverer opened, and she had been led from the vessel down the gate ramp, for the gate, when unlocked and opened, swings out, and lowers, to form the ramp. Exiting the hoverer, to her pleasure, she descended to a surface of short, soft grass, this constituting a most welcome change following her earlier trek through the streets of Telnar.

  She heard no men about.

  Perhaps a male had piloted the hoverer, but she did not know. Perhaps it had even been the fellow who had lifted her over the rail in Telnar. He might have returned to the small ship, or not really have left it. She did not know. There was the hood. In any event, shortly after landing, and the disembarking of the passengers, including at least the two women whose voices she was familiar with, it had departed.

  She was led across the grass and into some structure, and down a passage. At the end of a short journey over a smooth, tiled surface, her journey was arrested.

  The hood was unbuckled and pulled from her head, and she knelt instantly, naturally, as became her status as beast and slave. She shook her head, freeing her hair, and blinked her eyes. There were several women about, perhaps seven or eight, richly clad in Telnarian regalia. Clearly they were women of station and, doubtless, of means. And she heard the voices of others from somewhere, doubtless in another room. Several of the women present had laughed when she had shaken her head, freeing her hair. “See?” said one to another. “Yes,” laughed the other. But surely it had been a natural enough gesture for a woman, any woman? “Let them sweat blindly in a canvas hood,” she thought. “See if they would not be grateful, when it is pulled away. See if they would not struggle to accustom themselves to the light, and try to see through wet, matted hair!”

  “Mistresses?” she said.

  “What is your name?” asked the woman who seemed first amongst them, whom she would learn was the Lady Delia Cotina, of the Telnar Farnacii.

  “Publennia,” said Cornhair.

  “Oh!” cried Cornhair, struck with a switch.

  “What is your name?” asked Lady Delia.

  “Filene!” cried Cornhair, frightened. Then she winced, and sobbed, as the switch struck her again.

  “What is your name?” asked Lady Delia.

  “Cornhair!” cried Cornhair, and then she recoiled twice more, from two fresh blows of the switch.

  “Mistresses?” she begged.

  “A slave has no name, no more than any
other beast, unless the Masters or Mistresses please,” said the woman. “She is named whatever Masters or Mistresses please.”

  “Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair. “Forgive me, Mistress.”

  “What is your name?” asked Lady Delia.

  “Whatever Mistresses please,” said Cornhair.

  “She is indeed a poor slave,” said another woman, she whose voice Cornhair recalled from the cell in the slave house, and the palanquins, the woman who was Lady Virginia Serena, of the lesser Serenii. She was also, as one recalls, of Telnar. “I first saw her,” said the woman, “standing on a slave shelf in one of the Woman Markets, one supplied by Bondage Flowers. I had a fellow read her placard. She is new to bondage.”

  “It does not matter,” said Lady Delia, “for our purposes.”

  “Certainly not,” said another woman.

  “She will do as well as another,” said another woman.

  “They are all the same,” said another.

  “Yes,” said another.

  “You were a pretty little thing,” said the Lady Virginia, “standing there, the placard hanging about your neck.”

  “Thank you, Mistress,” murmured Cornhair.

  “I would think men would find you a tempting morsel,” she said.

  Several of the women laughed.

  “Thank you, Mistress,” whispered Cornhair.

  “That makes you ideal for our purposes,” said another woman.

  There was more laughter.

  “In the slave house,” said Lady Delia, “they referred to you as ‘Cornhair’.”

  “Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair.

  “You are Cornhair,” said Lady Delia, naming the slave. “Who are you?”

  “‘Cornhair’, Mistress,” said Cornhair.

  “You are going to be put in a temporary collar,” said Lady Delia.

  “‘Temporary’, Mistress?” said Cornhair.

  “Yes,” she said. “And then you will be unleashed and unbound.”

  “Yes, Mistress,” said Cornhair.

  “You will also be conducted to a bath,” she said. “You will be given oils and tools, towels, brushes and combs. You are to clean and groom yourself, and well. We want you to be as fresh, clean, and lovely as though you were being sent to the couch of a Master.”