Captive of Gor

by John Norman

  Sometimes, at night, lying in the straw of the cage, I would think of Verna, and when I did so, knowing her captured, destined for brand and collar, I would laugh to myself. I wished that I might have some opportunity to show my lack of fear of her, my contempt for her, that slave!

  In these days, as our training in the Koroban pens drew to its conclusion, I forgot both about Haakon of Skjern and Rask of Treve. Rask of Treve, it was said, had at last been driven from the environs and claims of the city of Ko-ro-ba. Certain of the tarnsmen of Ko-ro-ba boasted of having driven him from the lands of the state, but others, as I learned from guards, were only silent. At any rate, it seemed that Rask of Treve, and his raider's band, had left the lands of the Towers of the Morning. Sa-Tarna fields ripened in their yellow beauty, and caravans passed with safety. The skies remained clear of the thunder and screams of the tarns of Treve, the war cries of her spear-bearing warriors. Rask of Treve, it seemed, now sought elsewhere for the weight of gold and the flesh of women. Haakon of Skjern, it seemed, still remained in Ko-ro-ba. Skjern is an island in Thassa, muchly distant from Ko-ro-ba. It lies west of bleak, rocky Torvaldsland, substantially above even the vast, green belt of the northern forests. The men of Skjern seldom ventured as far south, or as much inland, as Ko-ro-ba, the Towers of the Morning. Haakon, with his tarnsmen, it seemed, came in peace. They paid for their entry into the city, claiming to need supplies for ventures, in trading. Their weapons, for they were a goodly number of warriors from a distant state, were surrendered at the great gate, to be returned to them upon their departure. In Ko-ro-ba the scabbards of Haakon of Skjern and his men would, by the order of the city, be empty. What was there to fear of a Haakon of Skjern with an empty scabbard? I could not understand the uneasiness of Targo, and certain of his men. Haakon had done business with them, and might wish to do so again. He might not even know we were in Ko-ro-ba. Besides, rumors had it that he would be remaining in Ko-ro-ba for days following our departure, and would then be flying northward, returning to Laura. Furthermore, in Ko-ro-ba Targo had purchased additional girls, and guards, and his caravan southeast to Ar would be a substantial one, one surely not to be endangered by some forty to fifty tarnsmen. Too, there seemed nothing menacing in the way in which Haakon spent his time in Ko-ro-ba. He seemed truly to be arranging for supplies, and his men, in their leisure, gambled and drank in the inns and taverns of the city, spending their time striking up acquaintances with men here and there, other tarnsmen, mostly men like themselves, from other cities, now, too, by coincidence within the walls of Ko-ro-ba. There was nothing to fear from Haakon of Skjern, and his men.

  * * * *

  "Slaves out," said the guard, turning the key in the heavy lock and swinging back the barred gate of the cage.

  In a few minutes I, pleased, knelt, naked, on the wooden platform in the large room in the public pens of Ko-ro-ba. This time I needed not be bound hand and foot, nor held by guards.

  I put my head back and the leather worker again reached toward my face.

  His instrument was rather like a pair of closed, long-handled pliers. He inserted the tip of this instrument, consisting of a pair of small, hinged rods, like opposing crescents, into the steel nose ring and then, with his two hands, pulling outwards on the handles, slowly, carefully, opened the instrument, spreading the ring. Then, with his fingers, he slipped it free, and dropped it on the platform.

  I ran joyfully from the platform to the wall. I felt my face and laughed. I no longer wore the hated nose ring! Elinor Brinton was free of the hated nose ring!

  "El-in-or," said Targo.

  I knelt immediately.

  "You are very beautiful when you are happy," he said.

  I blushed, looking down. "Thank you, Master," I said.

  Ute then came to the wall. She, too, now, was free of her ring.

  I wanted Ute to hold me and kiss me. I was so happy.

  "Ute," I said, "I am happy."

  "Good," she said, and turned away.

  I was hurt. When Inge came to the wall, I looked to her. She was my friend.

  "Inge," I cried, "I am happy!"

  But Inge, too, turned away, and went to kneel beside Ute.

  I felt alone, terribly alone.

  When Lana came to the wall I approached her, timidly. I put out my hand to touch her. "I want to be your friend," I said.

  "Find out when we are leaving for Ar," said Lana.

  "I might be beaten," I whispered.

  "No," said Lana. "Targo likes you. He will not beat you."

  "Please, Lana," I begged.

  Lana looked away.

  "I will try," I whispered.

  I went to Targo, trembling, and knelt at his feet, my head to the boards of the floor.

  "May a slave speak?" I asked.

  "Yes," he said.

  But I could not form the words, so frightened I was.

  "Speak," he said.

  "When," I asked, in a whisper, terrified, "—when do we leave for Ar, Master?"

  There was a silence.

  "Curiosity," he said, "is not becoming in a Kajira." His voice was not pleasant.

  I moaned.

  I crossed my wrists beneath me and touched my head to the floor, exposing the bow of my back. It is the submissive posture of a slave girl who is to be punished. It is called Kneeling to the Whip. I shook, visibly, at his feet. I whimpered. I waited for him to call a guard, to bring the lash.

  "El-in-or," said Targo.

  I looked up.

  "In the morning," said Targo, "slaves will be fed before dawn. Then, at dawn we will leave Ko-ro-ba for Ar."

  "Thank you, Master," I breathed.

  He smiled, releasing me.

  I leaped to my feet and fled back to Lana's side. "We will leave at dawn tomorrow," I told her, excitedly.

  "I had thought so," said Lana.

  I reached out to touch Lana's arm, and she permitted me to do so. "I want to be your friend," I said.

  "All right," said Lana.

  "I am your friend," I said.

  "Yes," said Lana.

  "And you," I begged, "you, too, are my friend?"

  "Yes," said Lana, "I am your friend."

  "You are the only friend I have," I told her. I felt very alone.

  "That is true," said Lana.

  How lonely it was, to have only one friend. But I had at least one friend, someone who liked me, someone to whom I might talk, someone whom I might trust and in whom I might confide.

  "Tonight," said Lana, "if you are given a pastry, you must give it to me."

  "Why is that?" I asked.

  "Because we are friends," said Lana.

  "I do not want to do that," I said.

  "If you wish to be my friend," said Lana, "you will have to please me."

  I said nothing.

  "Very well," said Lana, looking away.

  "Please, Lana," I whispered.

  She did not look at me.

  "I will give you the pastry," I said.

  * * * *

  That night, before our departure, I had great difficulty in getting to sleep. Ute, Inge and Lana, all, slept soundly. I lay awake in the straw, looking up at the steel plating above me, dim, metallic, in the flickering of a lantern hung outside the cage, on a peg fixed into the wall on the opposite side of the corridor.

  Tomorrow we would leave for Ar.

  I was not much pleased with the evening feeding. Lana had taken the pastry, which I had agreed to give her.

  And when I had attempted to steal that of the Lady Rena of Lydius, unseen by Rena, Ute's hand had closed on my wrist. Her eyes were very hard. I released the pastry. And Ute and I returned to our food pans. I had had no pastry this night! I was angry.

  I hated Ute, the smug, ugly, stupid little thing.

  And I hated Inge, too, for she was skinny and ugly, and stupid.

  And I hated Lana, though she was my friend. I did not think her much of a friend.

  I hoped that I would sell for a higher price than any
of them. That would show them!

  I got to my knees in the cell and watched my shadow on the back wall, from the lantern outside. I stretched, and threw my hair up and back, arranging it on my back. I was beautiful. I wondered what a man would pay to own me. I wondered what I would bring on the great block at Ar, when I stood there naked for the buyers, Elinor Brinton, a nude female slave to be auctioned to the highest bidder.

  The thought of Verna, the outlaw girl, passed through my mind. She had captured me, and sold me for a hundred arrow points!

  How humiliating, and insulting!

  I was worth gold! Gold!

  Perhaps Marlenus, her captor, would choose to put her on the block! Perhaps she would sell for a hundred arrow points!

  But I would bring gold, much gold!

  I looked about at the slave flesh in the straw, that of Ute, and Inge, and Lana. They were slaves. I hated them all. I wanted to be free of them! I wanted to be free of them! I did not need friends. I was better than all of them! I wanted only to be rid of them!

  I lay there in the straw, and recollected the forest north of Laura.

  I recalled Verna, and the panther girls, dancing in the circle. I recalled them, when they could no longer restrain themselves, throwing themselves to the grass, writhing in their helpless need, even the proud, arrogant Verna!

  They were all weak.

  I was hard, and strong. I was Elinor Brinton. I was a slave girl, and a true slave girl, that I knew, but I was not weak. I was hard, and strong. I would enslave some man, and exploit him, and make a fool of him. I would conquer. Elinor Brinton, though only a female, and a slave, would conquer!

  Now, satisfied with myself, I began to grow drowsy. For some reason my thoughts strayed back, to the time when the slaver, Soron of Ar, had passed through the pens, in the company of Targo.

  "Buy me, Master," I had said to him, as I had had no choice but to do.

  "No," he had said.

  I twisted in the straw, angrily. Then I lay still, looking up at the steel plating of the ceiling.

  He had purchased no girls.

  That seemed to me strange, but it was not what bothered me, as I lay there.

  To me he had simply said, curtly, "No."

  How offended I had been.

  With every other girl, as far as I knew, in our cage, and further along the tier of cages, as far as I could hear, he had either spoken with them, or dismissed them, or told them to return to their place. It was only, as far as I knew, to my "Buy me, Master" that he had said, simply, "No."

  He had rejected the purchase of all of us, and yet only I, as far as I knew, had been rejected in precisely that way. It was only to my "Buy me, Master," that he had said, with such crude bluntness, "No." I did not care that he did not buy me! Indeed, I did not want him to buy me! So he would not purchase me? What was that to Elinor Brinton? She was pleased! She did not want to belong to him! But I recalled that I had seen him looking at me, afterwards. I had tossed my head and, angrily, insolently, had looked away. When I had looked again, his eyes were yet upon me, yet appraising me. I had been frightened. I had known myself helpless, held captive in the cage. I must wait there, behind bars! There had been no escape for me! Men might do with me what they pleased. I was their prisoner. I was theirs, their slave!

  But after I was sold, then could I, though slave, conquer!

  What could a girl do locked in a cage with other girls, some of them perhaps almost as beautiful as she?

  I was a slave girl.

  Very well!

  I would make my master suffer, as only a woman can make a man suffer. I would humble him, and, using his needs, would bring him to his knees before me, to beg for my pleasures. I would wring from his weakness whatever I might wish to please my will!

  I would conquer!

  Men are beasts!

  I hated them!

  "Buy me, Master," I had said to Soron, the Slaver of Ar.

  "No," he had said.

  I think of all men, at that time, I most hated Soron of Ar. How he had appraised me, as I had stood helpless, naked, behind the bars, on the straw of the slave cage, his to be seen as he wished; how he had examined me, candidly, objectively, every inch of me, Elinor Brinton, female slave merchandise! How I hated him! How I hated men! How I hated most Soron of Ar!

  I fell asleep.

  I had a strange dream, turning and moaning in the straw. I dreamed that I had escaped, and that I was free, running and walking in the high grass of a Gorean field. How pleased I was to be free!

  And then suddenly I turned and, behind me, some eight or ten feet away, standing, not speaking, tall in the blue and yellow robes of the slaver, still partially hooded, the band of leather across his left eye, was Soron of Ar.

  I fled.

  But then it seemed he was ahead of me. I turned, and ran again, back, and then to the left, and the right, but each time, as I thought myself escaped, I saw his tall figure, standing there, in the grass.

  I was naked.

  I ran and ran.

  And then, once again, I turned.

  Again, some eight to ten feet away, not speaking, he stood. We were alone, in the high grasses of the field.

  "Buy me, Master," I said to him. I did not kneel.

  "No," he said.

  "Purchase me!" I begged. "Purchase me!"

  "No," he said.

  I now saw, in his hand, coiled, several slender loops of braided leather.

  I screamed, and turned and fled.

  The leather loop suddenly dropped about me and jerked tight, pinning my arms to my sides.

  I screamed.

  "Be silent," cried Lana, shaking me, in the straw. "Be silent!"

  I awakened, crying out. Then I saw Lana, and the straw, and the lantern on its peg on the other side of the bars, on the wall across the corridor. Ute had risen to her hands and knees, and Inge was on one elbow. Both were looking at me. Then they lay down again, sleepily, in the straw.

  I reached to Lana. I was terrified. "Lana," I begged.

  "Go to sleep," said Lana, and she lay down in the straw.

  I crawled to Ute. "Ute," I begged. "Please hold me, Ute."

  "Go to sleep," said Ute.

  "Please, please!" I begged.

  Ute gave me a kiss, and put her arm about my shoulder. I pressed my head against her shoulder.

  "Oh, Ute!" I wept.

  "It is only a dream," said Ute. "We will sit up for a time, and then we will go to sleep."

  After a time we lay down, side by side, and I, holding to Ute's hand, kissing it, fell asleep.

  12

  I Gather Berries

  How good it was to be out of the slave wagon!

  Standing in the grass, in the sunlight, I stretched, and laughed.

  I wore my new camisk. I was much pleased.

  I had sewn it in the wagon, the first day out of Ko-ro-ba. My old camisk, long ago, had been burned near the compound of Targo.

  I suppose girls of Earth might find the camisk a shameful, scandalous garment, but I was much pleased to have it. We had not been permitted camisks in the pens of Ko-ro-ba. In the stinking straw they might have been soiled. Also, it is thought by slavers that it is, upon occasion, good for a girl to find herself naked and behind bars. But now the dimly lit cells, the steel and cement, the stomach-wrenching heat and dampness, the close, foul air, the soiled straw, the stink, the crowding, the heavy bars, were behind us. Sometimes free women fall desperately ill when brought to the pens. Inge and I had vomited for more than an hour after we had been forced into the pens, and locked in our cell. But now the pens were behind us.

  I stretched again.

  It was a day in the early summer, the second day of En'Var. In the chronology of Ar, that city for which we were bound, it was said to be the year 10,121.

  I could feel the grass at my calves, the sun on my face and arms and legs, the warm, fresh, root-filled earth beneath my bare feet.

  I was happy.

  I lifted my face to t
he sun and closed my eyes, letting its warmth and light bathe my face and closed eyes.

  Elinor Brinton, the rich girl of Earth, was happy.

  I felt the pull of a strap on my throat, and opened my eyes. By a long, leather strap, some ten feet in length, I was fastened by the neck to Ute. We were picking berries.

  Elinor Brinton, the Gorean slave girl, quickly bent down and, with her fingers, pulled berries from the twigs of a small bush, and put them in her leather bucket.

  Ute had her back to me, and the guard, too. He, drowsy, was leaning on his spear.

  I was pleased with my new camisk.

  It was a "common camisk," of course, as was the first one I had worn, not a Turian camisk. A Turian camisk is perhaps too fine a garment for an ordinary girl. As I recollect I have already described the nature of the common camisk in some detail, its construction, design, belting, and such, but another remark or two might not be amiss. Given that the common camisk is, substantially, open on the sides, it is a provocative garment, presenting a delicious, substantially bared, vertical "stripe" of slave on each side, while, with charming reserve, as she faces toward you, it shelters the attractions of her bosom, or, away from you, the pleasant curvatures of her luring derriere. To be sure, even so, given the common nature of the fabric, which is usually rep-cloth, it is seldom difficult to conjecture with some accuracy the lineaments of its lovely, half-naked occupant, or prisoner. The "skirt," too, in front and back, below the binding straps, or binding fiber, at least as permitted to Targo's girls, is quite short. Gorean men enjoy seeing the legs of women. Indeed, as well as the rest of her. On the side, of course, given the opening of the garment on each side, her brand is exposed. There is no nether closure to the camisk, of course, but that is common in Gorean slave garments, diaphanous tunics and such. The girl is to know herself accessible to, and be accessible to, the master at all times. The Turian camisk is a notable exception to this rule. Seeing a woman in a camisk makes it clear she is a slave. The girls of Earth, one supposes, would find such a garment inordinately attractive, but they are advised not to wear it, as it is a slave garment. Should they dare to wear it, they should beware, for it brings out the slave in a woman's blood, and the master in the blood of a man.