by John Norman
I sensed, as naive or unrealistic as she might be, there might somehow be a world at stake.
“Oh,” she said, “someone, but someone of importance.”
I was sure this illusion, or fantasy, had been implanted by the blind Kur who had guested with us in the house of Epicrates.
What was involved here, I was sure, had less to do with the Lady Bina than with one with whom it was thought she might exercise great influence.
“When I am suitably emplaced,” she said, “I will not forget my friends.”
“We hope to be numbered amongst them,” said Astrinax.
Poor Astrinax, I thought. He thinks she is insane.
“We are to follow the caravan of Pausanias,” said Master Desmond.
“Yes,” said Astrinax, “but, obviously, not that closely.”
“It should be easy enough to do,” said Desmond, “ten wagons, heavily laden, even should there be torrential rains.”
“I think so,” said Astrinax.
I hoped that we might return to Ar, quickly and safely, once the blind Kur had been reunited with his fellows. On the other hand, it seemed clear that this practical expediency, as sensible as it might seem, might not be congenial to either the Lady Bina or to he in whose charge I was. They might have subtler, deeper interests in this wilderness.
“The caravan of Pausanias left the Aqueduct Road,” said Desmond.
“There are hundreds of trails in the Voltai,” said Astrinax.
“And thousands of places where there are no trails,” said Desmond.
“Call Lykos, Trachinos, Akesinos,” said Astrinax. “We must harness the tharlarion and be on our way.”
It would take some time to do this, and turn the wagons, to follow the tracks of the departed caravan. I did not care to leave the road. I stood up, by the mat and harness, and jar of oil, and the rags, and looked about myself.
The Voltai Mountains are called the Red Mountains. Their color, dull and reddish, is doubtless a consequence of some property of the soil. They are, I think, the most extensive of Gor’s mountain ranges. They may also be the highest and most rugged. There are villages here and there in the Voltai, usually of herders of domestic verr. These are generally, though not always, in the foothills. I know of only one city in the Voltai, like a remote tarn’s aerie, and that is the bandit city of Treve.
The mountains are beautiful, but forbidding. They contain larls and sleen, and, in the lower ranges, wild tarsk, as well. As noted, at the higher altitudes, there is little to be found but wild verr and tiny snow urts.
The sun was high.
I could see snow on some distant peaks.
I did not care to leave the road, the aqueduct. I was afraid, very much afraid. Had I known more of this world I would have feared even to enter the Voltai. Certainly many did. Even Jane and Eve, untutored, illiterate barbarians, as myself, had known enough to fear the Voltai. They had been double chained to the slave post in the Venna camp. And Astrinax had been largely unsuccessful in recruiting drivers and guards for our small caravan.
I did not wish to go further into the Voltai.
I was terrified to do so.
Perhaps some of you feel that under the circumstances, so threatening and uncertain, I should have considered flight, but I did not do so. I would stay with the wagons. We all would, Jane and Eve, as well. I do not think it was merely that we knew ourselves safer with the wagons, though that was surely true. Certainly we did not wish to be eaten by animals. It was frightening enough, sometimes, just to gather firewood. Too, of course, we accepted that there was no escape for the Gorean slave girl. Marked, collared, and slave-clad, and given the culture, the best she might hope for, if she were not bound and returned to her master, would be, as a fugitive, to fall into a harsher and more grievous bondage. Men like to own us, and have us in collars. Too, one did not care to be hamstrung, fed to sleen, or cast to leech plants. We were aware of all these things. Too, for whatever reason, I was reluctant to leave the vicinity of the brute I so hated, Desmond of Harfax, he who had treated me so badly, who held me in such contempt, who had so scorned me. Perhaps my lips had been bred to be pressed to the leather of his whip. Might I not belong in his slave bracelets? Might he not be my master? But aside from all these things, I think, rather, primarily, and more profoundly, the reason we would not run away was quite simple, that we were now quite other than we had once been; we now well knew what we had become, and were. We now clearly understood, in every fiber of our bodies, in the bottom of our bellies and in the depths of our hearts, that we were no longer those cultural artifices which are called free women, but now something quite different, something more natural, more ancient, more biological, that we were now belongings and properties, that we were now slaves. This understanding brings about a radical transformation in a woman. She is no longer the same. She cannot be. We would not run away. We could not run away. We were owned.
I gasped, and drew back, from half under the wagon.
“Have you finished with the harness?” asked Desmond of Harfax. He had come about the wagon. I had not realized his presence until he spoke.
“Nearly!” I said.
I scrambled back, to return to the mat. I knelt, of course, as I was in the presence of a free person.
“Who gave you permission to stop work?” he asked.
“No one, Master,” I said.
“Why then did you stop work, before you were finished?” he asked.
I put my head down.
“You were listening,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said. “Forgive me, Master.”
“Curiosity is not becoming in a kajira,” he said.
I kept my head down.
“Should you not be tied to a wagon wheel and lashed?” he asked.
“It will be done with me as masters please,” I said.
“Do not speak of what you heard to Jane and Eve,” he said.
“No, Master,” I said.
“There must be no changes in their behavior which might arouse the suspicions of certain others in the party.”
“I understand,” I said.
“And you,” he said, “have heard nothing.”
“I understand,” I said.
“In particular,” he said, “you are not to avoid Trachinos.”
“Master?” I said.
“Trachinos,” he said, “finds you of slave interest. He may seize you, may press himself upon you, fondle you, and such. You are not to resist his advances.”
“A slave dare not resist the advances of a free man,” I said. “She is a slave.”
“Respond to him,” he said.
“Master?” I said.
“Have no fear,” he said. “You will not be able to help yourself.”
“I see,” I said. I feared it was true. I was a slave.
“You are a pretty slut,” he said.
“And might not others find me of slave interest, as well?” I said.
“Certainly,” he said. “Many men would find you of slave interest.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because you are of slave interest,” he said.
I, kneeling, clutched my collar, with two hands, as though I would tear it from my throat.
“Rejoice,” he said, “not every woman is of slave interest.”
“I hate you!” I said.
“How long will it take you to finish the harness?” he said.
“I am nearly done,” I said. “Two or three Ehn.”
“Finish it,” he said, “and then deliver it to Master Astrinax.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“We will leave within the Ahn.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
He then left.
I was so pleased that I was such as might be of slave interest. What woman does not wish to be of slave interest?
And I knew I was such, for I had been collared. It was for women such as I that men had constructed the elevated slave block, that we might b
e exhibited and sold.
I then bent again, to my work. I began to hum. It was only later I realized that it was a slave tune which I had heard, long ago, in the house of Tenalion.
Chapter Twenty-One
“Please,” I said, turning my head away, and I felt his mouth on the side of my neck, above the collar, and then at the side of my face, fierce, under my ear.
It was the heat of the day. We had stopped, for two Ahn.
It was the fourth day we had been following the caravan of Pausanias.
I was pinned against the wagon wheel. At least he had not tied me to it.
“No!” I begged. I felt his hand on my left thigh. “Please, do not, Master!”
I had seen both Jane and Eve fastened at a wheel, but, in each case, for discipline. Eve had been tied with her back to the wheel, her wrists bound widely apart to spokes, and her legs widely spread, fastened, too, to spokes. She, in the care of Lykos, had dared to speak without permission, when she had not received a standing permission to speak. She had perhaps been testing him, to see, as the saying is, how many links of chain were permitted to her, which is an unwise venture with a Gorean male. She had discovered, so to speak, as she should have known, that the chain was quite short. Afterwards she had been almost inseparable from him. Sometimes he had had to order her from his presence. “I want him to buy me,” she had later whispered to me, in the darkness, in the wagon, when Jane was asleep. “I think I am his slave.” Jane, who was in the care of Astrinax, had been tied facing the wheel, naked, wrists widely apart, ankles widely apart, fastened to spokes. She had been lashed. She had tied a narrow, folded strip of cloth about her head, to hold back her hair and keep sweat from her eyes. This could be interpreted as a talmit, which is a common sign of a first girl, the girl in charge of other female slaves, who usually reports directly to a master. First girls are common when there are many slaves in a group, or household. They keep the other girls in order, assign tasks, settle disputes, and such. Many masters, if several girls are involved, do not care to involve themselves in such matters. It is enough for him to issue instructions to the first girl, usually in the morning, as she kneels before him, and she, according to her lights and biases, her choices and favorites, sees to their implementation. In a house containing a hundred or more slaves, there may be more than one first girl, there being various groups of slaves, and these first girls, in turn, will report to the first girl of first girls, so to speak. She, in turn, of course, reports to the master, or the master’s representative. In such a household the lower first girls will wear a talmit of one color, and the high girl, or first girl of first girls, she who reports to the master or his representative, the kajira sana, will wear one of a different color. The colors depend on the customs of cities, the whims of particular masters, and such. In any event, Jane, who was not first girl, as we had no first girl, had seemingly, without permission, arrogated to herself a talmit, commonly understood as a badge of authority. I had no doubt this was done in all innocence, and I am sure Astrinax himself thought it to have been done in all innocence, as well, but, still, it had been done, and the prestige of the talmit was deemed to have been compromised. Certainly Jane, and Eve and myself, who, to our misery, were forced to be present at the lashing, had had well impressed upon us the significance of the talmit. One lives in terror of it. She who wears the talmit is as Mistress to the other slaves, who will address her as Mistress. Slaves often live in terror of the first girl, speak deferently to her, kneel to her, and such. As is often the case, as with free women, we hope that men, given our beauty and sex, will protect us. Jane, like Eve, it seemed to me, should have known better. It is easy enough to knot a cloth about one’s neck and use it to wipe away sweat, and men, for some reason, seem to find sweat-wet hair, loose about a kajira’s features, attractive. Are they not lovely, even when hot and working?
“Please, stop, Master,” I begged Trachinos.
I heard a tearing of cloth.
“Please do not strip me, Master,” I begged, “not here, beside the wagon.”
“Elsewhere then,” he said.
“Please, stop, Master!” I said.
“You must have a use fee,” he mumbled, the words now blurred against my bared shoulder.
“Oh!” I said.
“Ah!” he said, triumphantly.
“Please, stop, Master!” I begged.
“You want it, slut,” he said.
“Please release me, Master,” I said.
“Do you resist?” he asked.
“I may not,” I wept. “I am a slave.”
“Do you doubt that I could make you leap to my touch?” he growled.
“No, no,” I said. I knew any man could do this to me. I was kajira.
How defenseless we are, in our collars!
“You do not own me!” I said.
“Who will dispute my use?” he said. “A woman, a Metal Worker?”
“Honor, honor!” I said.
“Honor,” said he, “is for fools.”
I was miserable, and his hands were strong, and I was kajira!
“Allison,” said a voice, pleasantly. “You have torn your tunic.”
I pulled away from Trachinos, and slipped to the side. I held the tunic, as I could, about me.
Trachinos had turned about, angrily, to see Desmond of Harfax.
“Be off,” growled Trachinos, “Metal Worker.”
Desmond of Harfax was unarmed. Trachinos, claimedly of Turia, had his blade at his left hip, suspended from the belt slung over his right shoulder.
“Do you find her pleasant to hold?” inquired Desmond. “I would think she would be such.”
“Go,” said Trachinos.
“It is not I alone with whom you might deal,” said Desmond, “but with Lykos, and Astrinax, and perhaps others.”
“Others?” said Trachinos, uneasily.
“I believe so,” said Desmond, politely.
I noted that Akesinos, lean and swarthy, as though from nowhere, was now in the background, rather behind Desmond. His shadow, however, was on the wagon, so I am sure that Master Desmond was aware of his presence. I supposed he was not so much concerned to conceal his presence as to have Desmond placed between him and Trachinos. One can face in only one direction at a time.
“What is her use fee?” asked Trachinos, angrily.
I suspected Trachinos was unwilling to bring his enterprise, his band in the hills, to a premature closure, thus perhaps precluding an access to a greater wealth, one which might await a more patient man.
“That would have to be arranged,” said Desmond, “with the Lady Bina, but I think I can speak for her, and that she would support my recommendations in the matter.”
“So?” said Trachinos.
“For most,” said Desmond, “I would suppose her use fee should be a tarsk-bit. Unfortunately there is no smaller coin. Perhaps one might split a tarsk-bit in two.”
I backed against the wagon, clutching my tunic to me. The boards were rough and hot.
How angry I was!
How I hated Desmond of Harfax! Was I, the former Allison Ashton-Baker, worth so little?
To be sure, she was now only kajira.
A tarsk-bit is not unheard of for a use, but the use would presumably be brief, as, say, for a coin girl, used on the stones of a street. It might be two or three tarsk-bits if one is going to keep a girl for the evening. To be sure, a slave may be rented for a day, or two or three, at some negotiated rate. Sometimes this is done to try out a prospective slave, to see if she is worth buying. If she wishes to be bought, she is zealous to please her rent master. If she is bought, and is truly owned, she may be sure that her former rent master, now her owner, will see to it that she is now held to standards of performance which she had scarcely dared to conjecture might exist when she was a mere rent girl. This is to be expected, of course, as he then owns her. The rent fee, incidentally, is often applied to the purchase fee. Apparently this encourages sales.
“A ta
rsk-bit then,” said Trachinos.
“For most,” said Desmond of Harfax, “but for you, a golden tarn disk, of double weight.”
Trachinos smiled.
“It is not that I think her worth that, of course,” said Desmond. “I would suppose her use worth would be something like a quarter or an eighth of a tarsk-bit, if that. Indeed, one would be embarrassed to charge anything for the use of such a slave, so inferior she is, but it is, rather, that, this afternoon, I do not feel disposed to deal with fellows from Turia.”
“I am not from Turia,” said Trachinos.
“You said you were,” said Desmond.
“Teletus,” he said.
“I see,” said Desmond.
“So?” said Trachinos.
“And I am even less disposed to deal with liars,” said Desmond of Harfax.
The blade of Trachinos leapt from its sheath.
I screamed.
At that moment, from somewhere on the other side of the wagons, I heard Jane scream, and Astrinax cry out, “Tarsk, tarsk!”
Trachinos turned about, startled.
I heard something, several things, seemingly large things, scrambling, and grunting and squealing, descending the hillside on the other side of the wagon.
“Into the wagon!” said Desmond.
Something from the other side buffeted the wagon, and it tipped toward us, and I heard a squeal, angry and piercing. Then, emerging from under the wagon, half lifting the wagon with its passage, was a large, hairy, humped, four-footed form, shaggy and immense, and it sped past. The wagon righted itself. I had had a glimpse of tiny, reddish eyes, a wide head, and a flash of four curved, white tusks, two like descending knives, two like raised knives, on each side of a wide, wet jaw.
Trachinos ran to the left, and Akesinos darted to the first wagon, and drew himself within.
“Into the wagon!” cried Desmond.
Dust was all about.
I coughed. It was hard to see.
The tharlarion had been unharnessed.
Master Desmond seized me by the upper right arm and right ankle, and thrust me into the wagon, over the wood, under the canvas, and I found myself on all fours, over the central bar. In a moment he was beside me.