“On such a world, then, women have won?” asked the man.
“No,” I said, “the machine has won. Women, too, have lost.”
“Surely, someday on Earth,” said the man, “the males will dare to be men?”
“I do not think so,” I said, “save for rare individuals. The process of teaching, unconscious, subtle, pervasive, is too effective. It is not unusual for a woman to fear her womanhood; what is less generally recognized is that many men fear their own manhood; they conceal their blood; they pretend it does not exist; it is even dangerous, in such a society, to suggest that men consider honesty in such matters, to suggest that they dare to be men, to suggest that they might, if they wished, tear away their own chains. The weakest, the most trapped among them, are often the first, with hysteria, knowing they themselves are not strong enough to take their rightful freedoms, and envying others they fear might have the strength, to denounce such modest suggestions.”
“The weak,” said the man, “are always those who fear the strong.”
“They fear, not strangely, a world in which not everyone is like themselves.”
“Let all be weak, for I am weak,” smiled the man.
“Yes,” I said.
“And what of the women?” asked the man.
“They attempt to imitate the masculinity they do not find in men,” I said.
“Grotesque,” said the man.
“It is depressing,” I said. “Let us see the slave.”
The slave master clapped his hands, then called through the silver curtain. “92683,” he said.
“She has a bit more fluidity, more sensuality, in her body movement now,” he said. “She moves somewhat better than she did. Here are her exercises.” He thrust a sheet of paper to me. I looked at it. They were familiar exercises, slave-female exercises, designed to keep a girl supple, loose, vital, fit, for her master. “You are familiar with matters of diet?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. The diet of the slave girl was regulated with the same attention and care as that which a man of Earth would bestow on his prize hunting dogs, or otherwise esteemed domestic animals. Caloric intake was supervised with particular care. A common problem with slave girls was petty thievery, as they attempted to steal pastries or sweets. Many slave girls have a craving for sweets. These are commonly kept from them. A girl might have to perform superbly for hours before her master before he, in his generosity, would consent to throw her a candy.
“Her body, of course,” said the man, “is now much more alive to the world about her.”
The stimulation chamber would have accomplished this. Now her skin would be much more aware of such tiny things as a change in air movement in a room, temperature, humidity, and such; also she would now be more keenly sensitive to differences in textures with which her body might come in contact, such as the granulation of the stones on which her feet walked, whether there was slight moisture on tiles, the fall of silk, in different varieties, on her shoulder, the precise feeling of the pile of a rug beneath her thigh, the exact feeling of a strap cinched on her body, the exact feeling of slave bracelets, cool and inflexible, on her small wrists. Her entire body would, now, be alive, an organ of touch, a sheet of sentience and vitality. I was satisfied. It was a step toward sensuality.
“The slave, 92683,” said a woman’s voice.
Through the strings of the silver curtain emerged the girl. “Kneel here, little Alyena,” said the slave master, in Gorean.
I observed as the girl knelt. I thought the slave master too modest. Subtly, but unmistakably, she was a different girl. She still had far to go, but there was no doubt as to the fact that improvement had been wrought in her. Interestingly, I sensed that the girl did not really understand certain changes which had been brought about in her. Doubtless she still thought herself the identical girl who had been placed in the pens. Certain of these changes, mostly in movements, and ways of holding the body, are, sometimes, unconscious concomitants of the training of the girl; they accompany, as pleasant consequences, a latent value, other forms of training which have rather different manifest objectives. An obvious example is the stimulation-chamber training which is overtly concerned with honing a physical and psychological responsiveness to surface sensation; this responsiveness, however, is reflected in the entire attitude, and expressions, of the girl. One does not, so to speak, train the girl to “look vital”; rather, one makes her vital; she then, perhaps without even understanding it, or thinking about it, looks vital.
The girl knelt before the desk of the slave master. I sat to one side, in a curule chair. She knelt obediently, beautifully, as a pleasure slave. She was in the presence of free men. I saw her eyes briefly close, relishing the feel of the stone floor, as she knelt back on her heels, on her knees and the tops of her toes; I saw her body straighten itself, exposing itself, drinking in the atmosphere of the room. Her eyes were very much alive, very blue. She looked irritated.
“What about such things,” I asked the slave master, “as giving pleasure to men.”
“We have shown her some simple things,” he said, “about all she is now capable of.”
“Have you taught her to dance?” I asked.
“She is not yet ready to dance,” said the slave master.
I looked at the girl, to detect how much of the conversation, in Gorean, she understood. Her grasp was imperfect.
“Stand, Girl,” I said to her in Gorean.
Gracefully she stood. I observed her.
“Bracelets!” I said in Gorean, harshly.
The girl snapped to position, hands behind the small of her back, head lifted, chin up, turned to the left. In such a posture she may be conveniently put in bracelets, and leashed.
“Kneel,” I told her. Again she knelt, in the position of the pleasure slave.
To one side, her arms folded, the quirt in her hand, in leather strips and halter, with collar and ring, with high-laced sandals, stood the large female slave, who had originally conducted the girl from the room, and had brought her back today. She smiled.
I pointed to the stones at my feet. “Crawl,” I said, in Gorean.
The girl slipped to her belly, and, as a slave girl, crawled to my feet. She put her lips to my foot; I felt her hair over it. “Return,” I told her. On her belly, head down, she returned to where she had knelt.
“Kneel,” I said.
Again she knelt in the position of the pleasure slave. Her eyes were angry.
Excellent, I thought to myself.
“She has been diligent?” I asked the slave master.
“Yes,” he said.
I smiled. The girl had fallen into the rebellion of compliance. To avoid the deprivation of food, the whip, she obeyed perfectly, but outwardly. She was trying to retain an island in which she would be her own mistress. She thought she was deceiving us. I did not see that it was mine to do, but doubtless, in time, her master, when he wished, would shatter her, taking this island from her, making her completely a slave. For now, I thought I would let her think she was fooling us. Later, when a master wished, he would, when it pleased him, to her horror, break her totally to his will.
I had little doubt that the lovely Alyena would one day, in the arms of a strong man, for whom I was saving her, become a true slave, adoringly and vulnerably the property of her master.
I glanced to the large female slave, with the quirt, standing near the silver curtain.
“Why are you not in slave silk?” I asked her.
Her eyes flashed. Her hand clenched on the quirt.
“She is useful in the pens,” said the slave master. “She terrorizes feminine girls.”
I turned to Alyena. “What do you think,” I asked, in English, “of the female slave?”
“I fear her,” whispered small, lovely Alyena.
“Why?” I asked.
“She is so strong, so hard,” said Alyena.
“What you fear in her,” I said, “is masculinity, but it is not a true masculini
ty; it is fraudulent.” I looked down at her. “The masculinity you must learn to fear,” I told her, “is the masculinity of men.”
“She is a match for any man,” said Alyena. Her eyes shone with pride.
I turned to the slave master. “Fetch a male slave,” I said.
One was brought. He was not a large fellow. He was, however, an inch or so taller than the female slave.
“You certify to me,” said I to the slave master, “that this man is neither clumsy nor stupid, nor drunk, nor an instructor in combat intent upon increasing the confidence of his pupils.”
“It is so certified,” he smiled. “He is used in cleaning the pens. He is a drover who falsified the quality-markings on spice crates.”
I placed a copper tarn disk on the desk of the slave master.
“Fight,” I said to the slaves.
“Fight,” said the slave master.
The man looked puzzled. With a cry of rage, shrill and vicious, the female slave leapt toward him, slashing him across the face with the quirt. She struck him twice before he, angry, took the quirt from her and threw it aside.
“Do not anger me,” he told her.
He turned and caught her kick on his left thigh. She leapt at him, fingers like claws, to tear out his eyes. He seized her wrists. He turned her about. She could not move. Then, with considerable force, as she cried out with misery, he flung her, the length of her body, belly front, against the stone wall. He then stepped back, jerked her ankles from under her and flung her to the stones, and knelt across her back. She wept and struck the stones with her fists. Then her halter was removed and her hands pulled behind her and bound with it. He discarded her belt and the strips of leather. He removed her sandals. With one of the long, straplike laces, he crossed and bound her ankles.
He then stood up. She lay between his legs, bound. She made as though to turn to her back, but his foot, at the small of her back held her in place, prone. In his hand he held the second long, straplike lace. He stepped back, to survey his work.
I could see he was angry. Doubtless the strokes of the quirt had stung. There were two marks on his face.
I assumed he would not yet pull her ankles up and tie them to her wrists with the second straplike lace.
He had not yet administered discipline to the slave.
He fetched the quirt.
“With your permission,” he asked the slave master.
“Certainly,” said the slave master.
“Please do not quirt me, Master!” she begged.
He then laid the quirt richly to the body of the female slave.
She began to weep, and cry out, tears bursting from her eyes. She did not care, I surmised, to feel the strokes of the quirt which she herself had doubtless often used.
Alyena looked on, aghast.
She was from Earth. She was not used to seeing a woman punished. On Earth a woman is never punished, no matter what she has done. But this woman, of course, was not of Earth, and she was a slave.
Alyena did not understand that the discipline under which slaves are kept must be real, whatever the planet.
And doubtless she was not unaware that she herself, here, on this world, was a slave.
He then, with the second strap, pulled her ankles up, high, and tied them closely to her wrists. He then, by means of the ring on her collar, jerked her up, to her knees, and she knelt before him.
“Please, no, Master!” she said.
He struck her across the face, with the quirt, as she had struck him, twice. And he then struck her twice more.
Tears ran down her cheeks.
He then seized her head between his hands and forced it back. He then poised his thumbs, held downward, over her eyes.
“I am a woman at your mercy,” she wept. “Please, Master, do not hurt me!”
The male slave then thrust her head down to the tiles, and stepped back from her, angrily.
He then took the strap that bound her wrists to her ankles, leaving her wrists tied behind her, and took it under her and tied it tautly about the ring on her collar, this holding her head down, as she knelt. She was then tied on her knees, her ankles crossed and bound, and fastened by a short length of strap to the ring on her collar. Her body was then bound in a tight, helpless, forward bow. Indeed it was in effect in one of the positions of obeisance, that in which the slave kneels with her head to the floor, with her hands held behind her, the wrists crossed, or the right wrist held in the left hand.
“Are you a woman?” asked the male slave.
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“You have learned that now?” he asked.
“Yes, Master!” she said.
He put his foot before her, and she thrust her lips down, and kissed it.
“Do you beg use?” he asked.
“Yes, Master,” she whispered, “if Master would deign to use me.”
He looked to the slave master.
“Certainly,” said the slave master.
“Has she had slave wine?” asked the male slave.
“Yes,” said the slave master. “All female slaves in the public pens of Tor are on slave wine.”
The male slave then put the female slave to his pleasure. He did not take long with her, but, in moments, she had suddenly gasped, startled, her eyes wide, and then had uttered small cries, and moaned.
I assumed that she would no longer be effective in the intimidation of female slaves.
The slave master then came to where the woman knelt, her head down, fastened to her ankles. He looked down at her. He called two slaves from behind the silver curtain. They, too, looked down at the woman. Then the slave master said, “Put her in slave silk, and give her to male slaves.”
She was freed of the strap binding her ankles to her collar ring.
She was jerked to her feet, and held there; she could not stand by herself for her feet were still crossed and bound. “Who are the masters,” asked the slave master of her.
The woman, hair before her face, held upright by men, looked at Alyena. The woman trembled. “Men,” she whispered. “Men are the masters.”
Alyena’s face turned white.
The woman was carried from the room, to the pens.
She looked back once, over her shoulder, at the male slave who had used her.
The look was hard to read, as it was piteous. There was something in it of awe, of wonder, of plaintive gratitude.
Subdued, she was now in her place in nature.
For a silver tarsk I purchased the male slave, and freed him.
“Thank you,” said he, “Citizen.”
“It is nothing,” I said. “Did you enjoy the slave?”
“Yes,” said he, “I may buy her.”
“I wish you well,” said I to him.
“I wish you well,” said he to me.
“Stand,” I said to Alyena, who was trembling.
I put the walking chains on her, which I had purchased a few days ago in the bazaar.
I looked down into her eyes. “Who are the masters?” I asked.
She looked up at me, angrily. Then she said, “Men—men are the masters.”
I then left the office of the slave master of Tor, followed by the slave girl.
* * * *
On the back of the kaiila, on the road to the Oasis of Nine Wells, drowsily, I listened to the kaiila bells.
It was in the late afternoon. We would stop in an Ahn or two for camp.
Fires would be lit. The kaiila would be put in circles, ten animals to the circle, and fodder, by kaiila boys, would be thrown into the center of the circle.
The tents would be pitched. The opening of the Tahari tent usually faces the east, that the morning sun may warm it. Gor, like the Earth, rotates to the east. The nights require, often, a heavy djellaba or an extra blanket. Many nomads build a small kaiila-dung fire in the tent, to smolder during the night, to warm their feet. I needed not do this, of course, for at my feet slept the former Miss Priscilla Blake-Allen, the gir
l, Alyena.
At night the kaiila are hobbled. The slave girls, too, are hobbled. With the kaiila a simple figure-eight twist of kaiila-hair rope, above the spreading paws, below the knees, is sufficient. A girl, of course, is chained. When finished with her, I would cross Alyena’s ankles and, with the walking chain, suitably shortened, chain them together. That way she could not stand. I would then throw her her brief djellaba against the desert cold, and order her to a position of sleep. In the privacy of the tent, of course, I did not require her to wear the veil. When I had first informed her of this, she had said, “Thank you, Master,” acidly, and put aside the tiny scrap of diaphanous yellow silk. On the mat, toward morning, she would pull the hood over her face, fold her arms and pull up her legs, knees bent; the djellaba came far up her thighs; I would watch her sleeping, sometime, for she was quite beautiful. Once she opened her eyes. “Master,” she said. “Sleep, Slave,” I told her. “Yes, Master,” she said. In the morning I would unchain her early that she might, like the other slave girls in camp, be about her duties. Once she stole a date. I did not whip her. I chained her, arms over her head, back against the trunk, to a flahdah tree. I permitted nomad children to discomfit her. They are fiendish little beggars. They tickled her with the lanceolate leaves of the tree. They put honey about her, to attract the tiny black sand flies, which infest such water holes in the spring. When we would break camp, I would lift her to the kurdah, placing her within.
I became aware of the pounding of kaiila pads on the dry surface. Suddenly I was alert, awake.
I spun the kaiila, and stood in the stirrups.
A man was riding by, the length of the caravan, one of the points. “Riders!” he cried. “Riders!”
I could see them now, more than a hundred of them, sweeping toward us over the crest of one of the hills, to my left, the east. Their burnooses whipped behind them as they mounted the crest of the hill and, the animals half sliding, descended the other side, approaching us. Guards from our caravan were hastening outward to meet them. I stood in the stirrups. I saw no one approaching from other directions. There might be, of course, such delayed charges. Reassured I was to see points riding out about the caravan, outriders, to guard against such surprise. I saw Farouk, merchant and caravan master, ride by, burnoose swirling behind him, lance in hand. With him were six men. I saw drovers, holding the reins of their beasts, shading their eyes, looking over the dust to the east. One of the kinsmen of Farouk went to the kurdahs of slave girls, hobble chains at his saddle pommel; he would rein in before a kurdah, throw the girl the hobble and order her, “Shackle yourself”; he would wait the moment it took for the girl to snap the small ring about her right wrist and, behind her body, the larger one about her left ankle; the rings are separated by about six inches of chain; they are not sleeping hobbles, which confine only the ankles; then he would rush to the next kurdah, fling a hobble to the next girl, and repeat his command. I rode down the caravan until I came to Alyena’s kurdah. She thrust her head out, veiled, her fists holding apart the rep-cloth curtain.
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