“So you fear to show the slave of you?”
“Yes,” she said, “we fear to show our slave.”
“Doubtless it takes courage to show the slave?”
“Yes,” she said. “And it can frighten men who do not have the master in them.”
“Perhaps the master is merely hidden, as is, in some women, the slave?”
“Perhaps,” she said. “But they can be cruel, very cruel. They can try to make you feel ashamed, and small and wrong, because of what you are, because they are not strong enough to accept what you are, and then relish it, and own it, and, rejoicing, put it uncompromisingly and zestfully to their pleasures and purposes. They refuse to accept the loving service of one who longs to serve lovingly; they will not accept the obeisance of one who yearns to yield it; they deny submission to she who longs to submit; they draw to her feet she who, weeping, longs to kneel; they deny the animal in her, the wonderful gift of evolution to men, the bartered, captured and sold woman, the victory and product of ten thousand generations of sexual selection, of ever more beautiful, yielding and loving mates, and prizes, and slaves; she desires to kneel before her master, and have the lash placed to her lips, that she may kiss it, lovingly, gratefully; instead she finds pretenses and lies imposed upon her, and then is told these pretenses and these lies, these frauds, are herself; obedient, she tries to live those lies, enact the frauds, embrace the pretenses; what a tragedy her culture imposes upon her; she is taught to wear hypocrisies and falsehoods like ill-fitting garments, garments designed to assuage the fears and conceal the weaknesses of small, resentful beings, beings unable or unwilling not only to look upon truth themselves but determined to keep her, and her sisters, the sensitive, the beautiful and vital, from even suspecting its existence, garments intended to hide herself from herself, designed to cloak and deny the raw, vulnerable, precious nakedness of her needs, but nature takes her revenge in sickness, frustration, loneliness, and misery; she desires to belong; and they refuse to own; they would force you to be free when what you want is to be theirs entirely, will-lessly, rightlessly. Perhaps they think we are men. Therefore they will not let us lie lovingly at their feet, as women, in our chains.”
“But you are less reluctant to show your slave to true masters?”
“Of course,” she said. “And the men of Gor are true masters. They know women, and what to do with them. It is in their culture.”
“I doubt that the free women of Gor would agree with you,” I said.
“No, no,” she said. “They agree. Do you not think they tremble inside those bulky garments, their precious Robes of Concealment, when a handsome, strong man passes by? Do you not think they ever consider what it would be to kneel naked before him, the boards beneath their knees, feeling the slightest movement of air on their bodies, owned, his slave? Do you not think they envy us the lightness of our garments, and the collars on our necks, and most, our masters? Do they not swiftly fall in line in the slave markets? Do they not bracelet easily and well? Do you think they are not thrilled, displayed on the block? Why do you think they hate us so, if it were not for their envy of our joy, our fulfillments, as women. Although we kneel and wear our collars, I think sometimes that we in our bondage are the free, and they, in their pride, and freedom, and in their slippers, and layers of brocade, are the slave.”
“Have you considered the nature of what you are saying?” I asked.
She then seemed to tremble with misery, kneeling before me. How much she had bespoken herself, how much she had revealed!
She had said such things before me, confessing such things, unburdening her mind and heart, as though I might have been a native Gorean.
Then, suddenly, clearly, she saw me again as a man of Earth.
“Respect me!” she begged.
“A slave?” I asked. “Surely you know that slaves are not to be respected. There are better things to do with a slave than respect her.”
“You are from Earth,” she said. “Please do not think of me as a slave.”
“But you are a slave,” said I, “Slave Girl.”
“Forgive me,” she said. “It is all madness. Surely! Surely! It must be! It is so different from everything I have been taught! I meant none of it. It merely spoke itself, from somewhere. I disclaim responsibility for it. It cannot be I who said such things.”
“You were hardly aware of what you were saying?”
“Yes,” she said, “I was hardly aware of it. My speech was unguarded. It was not I who spoke but something else, the words themselves.”
“It just slipped out?” I said.
“Yes,” she said, eagerly, “it just slipped out, inadvertently, accidentally!”
“I think,” I said, “you have seldom in your entire life spoken so honestly, Slave Girl.”
“Please do not use that word of me,” she said.
“Why not?” I asked.
“You are from Earth,” she said.
“I am from Earth,” I said. “I am of Gor.”
“I trust not,” she said, frightened.
“So, Slave Girl,” said I, “who is your master?”
“My master?”
“Yes, Slave Girl.”
“Slave girl?”
“Yes,” I said, “—slave girl.”
She drew herself up, angrily, proudly. “Ibn Saran,” she said, “the master of the very kasbah itself, the Salt Ubar, the Guard of the Dunes, is my master!”
“No,” I said.
“Do not jest, Tarl!” she said.
“I understand,” I said, “that when you were owned by Ibn Saran—”
“I am owned by him!” she said.
“—that you were pleasant on the cushions.”
“Do not speak of me so,” she begged.
“—and that you crawled well to him.”
She put her head down in her hands, her wrists bound, and wept.
“So much in you remains of the woman of Earth,” I observed.
She then lifted her head, tears in her eyes, and cried out, defiantly, “Yes, yes! I serve my master! In his arms I am a slave! In his arms I can be nothing else! He conquers and possesses me! In his arms, as he ravishes me, he gives me inordinate pleasure, and it is my hope that he derives from my embonded flesh the pleasures which are his by right, as he is a man, and my master. And it is my hope that I crawl well to him!”
I smiled upon her, at my feet, in my tether.
“But I do not love him!” she said.
“And whom do you love?” I asked.
“You, Tarl!” she said. “I love you, Tarl Cabot! It is you I love! I love you! I love you, Tarl Cabot!”
“How can a slave love?” I asked.
“How can one who is not a slave love?” she asked.
I pondered this for a moment. Ibn Saran, as I recalled, had informed me that Vella had changed, that she had, I gathered, come to some deeper understanding of her needs, her desires, herself.
I did not, based on what had earlier transpired, doubt this.
Indeed, my judicious, relentless tormenting of her, the cruelty of my questioning, had done much to confirm not only the words of Ibn Saran, but my own conjectures. I had not been gentle with the slave, but, too, I remembered Klima.
Why should I permit her even a shred of slave silk to hide behind?
She seemed desperately determined, of course, still, before me, a former man of Earth, however foolishly, to present the postures, pretenses, and attitudes of a free Earth woman, apparently hoping that I would somehow commiserate with her and regard her as a free woman unfortunately placed in bondage. But from Ibn Saran I had learned she had, her brittle defenses overridden and crushed, learned that, instead, on Earth, she had been a slave who, merely, had not yet been placed in bondage. I should have seen that before, when she was brought to the camp of the Wagon Peoples, her neck bound to the lance, run between kaiila, when she had been in the pelt of the red larl, when she had worn the nose ring, and been exhibited in the chatka and
curla, the kalmak and koora. It seemed she was ready to bare her slave, upon command, to a Gorean, but was reluctant to reveal her to a man of her own world. That said much for the effectiveness of the conditioning programs to which those of Earth, men and women, fellow victims, so often found themselves subjected. But walls of cardboard, and chains of paper, however formidable in aspect, are easily rent, and discarded, by those who see beyond them the banquets, the beauties and glory of nature.
“I did not mean that,” she said, suddenly, frightened. “It just slipped out!”
“Again?” I said.
“Yes,” she said, “yes!”
“It does not matter,” I said.
“Tarl?” she asked.
Of course, it did not matter. What did it matter what a slave girl thought? They were nothing. It was theirs to love and serve, or, if need be, to hate and serve, but, in either case, to serve, and to serve with perfection.
The collar looked well on her neck.
“Tarl?” she again asked.
“Remember Klima,” I said.
“Surely you care for me,” she said.
I smiled down upon her, a slave, bound at my feet.
“Let me remove this tiny, stinking, greasy, foul rag in which you have put me,” she said. “It is scandalous, and ugly and filthy! It befouls me! It demeans me!”
“You will wear it,” I said.
“Please!” she said.
“Remember Klima,” I said.
“My master, Ibn Saran, will not be pleased,” she said.
“Ibn Saran is not your master,” I said.
“And who, then, is my master?” she asked, archly.
“At the moment,” I said, “former high slave, present reduced, tied slut, I am.”
“Don’t be absurd,” she said.
“You look well on your knees, tied, in a collar, before me,” I said.
“Tarl!” she said, accusingly.
I continued to look upon her.
So scrutinized, as a slave, she squirmed, uneasily.
She looked up at me. “What are you thinking?” she asked.
“What do you think a man would be thinking of, seeing you as you are?” I asked.
“No!” she said.
“But I was pondering another thought, as well,” I admitted.
“What?” she asked, warily.
“I am considering whether or not I should have your head shaved,” I said.
“No!” she cried, frightened, suddenly lifting her bound wrists toward her luxurious wealth of long, cascading, dark, glossy hair.
“Remember Klima,” I said.
“Do not do that!” she begged.
How the vanity of the beauty was engaged!
“Why not?” I asked.
“It—it would lower my price, considerably!”
“As you are a slave, that is an important consideration,” I granted her.
“Yes!” she said.
“It is a pleasure to note how readily you acknowledge yourself a slave,” I said. “But you must understand that money is not everything to a master.”
“No!” she wept.
“Remember Klima,” I said.
She looked at me, fearfully.
We then heard the beginning of the sounding of the house bar, tolling the Ahn.
“You are mad!” she cried. “It is the twentieth Ahn. Free me, and escape, if you can! I must be at the north tower. If I am late more than five Ehn I will be beaten!”
“Do you not find it strange that a high slave should be sent to the north tower, to serve guards?”
“I do not understand it,” she said.
“Ibn Saran does not wish his men to slip away, into the desert,” I said, “so it may behoove him to be more generous with choice cutlets of the kasbah’s best slave meat.”
“I do not understand,” she said.
“And you are doubtless among such,” I said.
“I do not understand,” she said.
“Perhaps things have changed in the affairs of the desert,” I said.
“How?” she asked.
“Curiosity is not becoming in a Kajira,” I said.
Tears welled in her eyes.
“I will take no more of this,” she cried, and sprang to her feet.
Instantly, angrily, I seized her and cuffed her, back to her knees. “You were not given permission to rise, Slave Girl,” I said.
“Slave girl?” she said. “To you, Tarl? Slave girl? Only Slave girl?”
“You are a stupid, despicable slut,” I said, “not even worthy of a collar.”
She looked up at me, disbelievingly, blood at her lip.
“How could you strike me?”
“You rose without permission,” I told her.
“You are a man of Earth,” she said. “You cannot treat me, a woman of Earth, as a slave girl!”
“Try rising again, without permission, Slave Girl,” I said.
She remained on her knees. “But, Tarl,” she said, “I love you!”
“Put your head down,” I said.
“I hate you,” she said.
“Is it not now time, woman of Earth,” I asked, “for you to attempt to manipulate me by utilizing persuasive discourse, belittling expressions, scorn words, the abundant, pathetic panoply of cultural artifacts designed to confuse and dominate males. Is it not time now to gasp and frown, to throw your verbal switches, press your buttons, ring your bells, that the male may salivate or cringe, as you choose?”
She shook her head, numbly. “I am at your feet,” she said.
“The bar has finished ringing,” I noted. It was, accordingly, the twentieth Ahn.
“You must flee,” she said. “You are in great danger here.”
“Those in the kasbah are in greater danger than I,” I smiled.
“How did you get in?” she said. “Is there a secret entrance?”
I shrugged. “I entered unobserved,” I said. I looked at her. “Curiosity is not becoming in a Kajira,” I said.
She stiffened.
I had waited near one of the gates of the kasbah, in the shelter of the ring’s invisibility. When a reconnoitering party left the kasbah I had simply slipped unseen within. I had stopped in the kitchens of the kasbah to find a suitable garment for Vella. Then I had examined various areas, until I found her, in her luxurious, private chamber, off that larger room, with its small alcoves, each like a small cell, which was sufficient for lesser girls. That room had been open and empty. Its occupants were doubtless in service elsewhere in the kasbah, hoping now to please ruder men than Ibn Saran and his high officers. Whereas this may have injured their vanity somewhat I supposed this possible slight to their status would be more than compensated for by the strength of the new arms in which they would now gasp and writhe. In the bellies of slave girls there commonly burn “slave fires.” Accordingly I suspected that many of the higher slaves would be more than eager to escape the loneliness and deprivation of the slave quarters for the mats of even common soldiers. And, of course, there would always be the lower slaves, the commonest slaves, still available for use, those kept below, in the dungeons of the kasbah. I had, of course, given the cloak of the ring, experienced no difficulty in moving about. The kasbah, so to speak, was mine.
I looked to the lamps at the side of the mirror. One of them would do well.
Soon, Vella closely before me, her wrists bound before her, the tether looped about her forearm, I left her quarters, and entered into the larger room, now empty.
I looked about, curious. “Do you know a slave named Tafa?” I asked.
“I have heard of her,” said Vella.
“Do you know if she is usually kept here, or below, in lower levels of the kasbah?”
“I would suppose she would be kept below,” said Vella. “Why?”
“Ah,” I said. “Here is her alcove. Here is her name, above it.”
“Do you know her?” asked Vella.
“We have met,” I said.
&nbs
p; “She is a lesser girl,” said Vella.
“At the moment she is probably better dressed than you,” I said.
“At the moment,” said Vella. “She is probably not dressed at all. What is your interest in her?”
“I think she is a very well-curved slave,” I said.
“More so than I?” asked Vella.
“About the same,” I conjectured.
Vella looked down, angrily.
“Is a slave jealous?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “No.”
Perhaps I might utilize Vella, and perhaps Zaya, who had also testified at Nine Wells against me, later as serving slaves, kneeling to one side, in chalwar and vest, and bangles, attending to black wine, and its sugars, and fruits and pastries, summonable by so little as a languid gesture, while I enjoyed a lengthy slave banquet, and dessert, of Tafa.
On second thought perhaps not in chalwar and vest, in bangles perhaps, bangles and collar. That would be sufficient. What does a slave girl need besides her collar? Some jewelry perhaps, perhaps some bells. They are, after all, not free women.
I had heard that some free women would permit their companions to touch them only in the dark, beneath coverlets, while they perhaps were still garbed, in, say “love robes,” “modesty silks,” or the “himations of intimacy.” These precautions, I gather, are to ensure the dignity of the free woman and to impress upon the male that he is not dealing then with a cheap, amorous, worthless slave. Goreans, not too unlike the men of Earth, when dealing with free women, are often tolerant of cheating nature, of reducing and degrading her. This is not the case, of course, when they are dealing with slave girls. And the Gorean, of course, has this option, that of owning his woman and getting from her whatever he wants. Slave girls are utilized at any time of the day or night, and, commonly, though not always, in light, so the master can discern how beautiful is the object of his desire, of his lust and love. And the slave, of course, commonly, though not always, serves nude. Masters tend to be fond of the bright, heated skin of their girls. A collar, a chain, a length of cord, slave bracelets, perhaps, such things, what more is required? To be sure, all a girl has to bring to the foot of the couch is her bondage.
Tribesmen of Gor Page 42