surprise, partly with sensation.
I chuckled. Her legs looked well, split, squirming, over the glossy saddle.
“Monster!†she wept, her head back.
Her hands jerked, the fingers moving. She could not reach me. I heard the small
sounds of the links, jerking taut, then relaxing, then jerking taut again,
joining the bracelets.
“Perhaps you are now more in the mood?†I asked.
“Do not stop!†she begged.
“And what shall you call me?†I wondered.
“Oh,†she moaned. “Ohhh!â€
“Surely you are curious to know what you should call me,†I speculated.
“Yes!†she cried. “Yes! Yes! What shall I call you? Oh! Oh!â€
“You may call me ‘master,’†I said.
(pg.147) “Yes, Master!†she cried.
I then held her still, trying to calm her for a time.
“I called you Master!†she cried. “Am I yet legally free?â€
“Yes,†I said, “but I think it will be well for you to accustom yourself to
calling free men Master.â€
“Yes!†she said.
I decided that I would not yet grant her the collar, ripe for it though she
might be. She was a free woman. I would make her wait longer, in frustration,
for it.
“Please touch me again,†she begged.
“You liked it?†I asked.
“I have now felt it,†she said. “I now desperately need it.â€
“Even to the surrender of all you are, and have been?†I asked.
“You have tried out your tarn,†she said. “Now, try me out!â€
I regarded her. I thought she would look well, naked, tied absolutely
helplessly, on her back or belly, over the saddle of the tarn.
“Master?†she asked.
It was a fitting tie for such as she.
“Perhaps later,†I said.
I then folded my cloak about her, to protect her from the wind.
We continued northward.
9 The Camp of Cos
(pg.148) “Who is it?†she asked, kneeling in the darkness of the tiny tent, the
large sack covering most of her body.
“It is I,†I said, reassuring her.
I crouched beside her and unfastened the drawstrings of the sack which I had
tied under her body and about her thighs, to hold it on her. I then pulled it
from her and unbraceleted her hands from behind her back.
“Were you successful?†she asked, shaking her head, loosening her hair.
“Cook,†I said.
I then sat, cross-legged, in the tiny tent. We were just within the fringes of
the Cosian camp. There were, in this vicinity, clouds of tiny tents and
shelters,’ some of them belonging to soldiers, most to civilians, sutlers,
merchants, slavers, and such. The nearest investment trench was a half pasang
away. One could see the walls of Ar’s Station from where we were. The girl
busied herself, preparing food. It seemed peaceful here. It was difficult to
believe that fighting took place daily in the vicinity of the walls, indeed,
sometimes at night.
“There is little but porridge,†she said.
I nodded.
There would be even less, I supposed, in most homes in Ar’s Station.
“Have you heard anything?†she asked. She was putting (pg.149) twigs and leaves
in a small pit outside the entrance of the tent.
“It is said the city will soon fall,†I said.
“The defenses cannot be long maintained?†she asked.
“It is thought not,†I said.
“You wish to gain entrance to the city,†she said.
“Yes,†I said.
“Why?†she asked.
“I have business there,†I said.
“Your accent is not of Ar,†she said.
“I would hope not, in this camp,†I smiled.
She used a tiny fire maker and set fire to the leaves and twigs. She blew on the
small flame, encouraging it.
We could smell cooking fires about. It was near dusk.
“Your plans have not proceeded as you hoped?†she asked.
“I do not complain,†I said. “Things might have proceeded better than they have,
but they have gone much as I expected they would.
She added sticks to the small flame.
The first portion of my plan had been to reach Ar’s Station as swiftly as
possible, which meant, in effect, to do so on tarnback, and in such a way as to
gain immunity from the attentions of Cosian tarn patrols. That I had managed.
The patrols, which were thick in the vicinity, given my habiliments and
accouterments, and my brandished pouch, presumably a diplomatic one, had taken
me for a courier. Also, although I had not planned it, the presence of the
blindfolded, braceleted girl before me, apparently a capture, presumably picked
up enroute, and doubtless soon to be collared, added to the effect. The ears of
the delicate Phoebe must have burned as she heard the snapping of wings near us
and the shouting of ribald, raucous jests, of which her beauty and its probably
disposition were the subject. At times I had even received an escort, which
happily, at their patrol limits, had been suspended.
I had hoped, of course, somehow, ideally, to be able to enter Ar’s Station on
tarnback. As I had feared, however, this had not been possible. Even my garb as
a courier had not permitted me access to the airspace over Ar’s Station. I had
(pg.150) been immediately pursued and fired upon by flights of Cosian tarnsmen.
I had made the attempt in the afternoon and again in the evening of the first
day I had arrived in the vicinity of Ar’s Station. Had it not been for the
strength of the bird and my start I might have been downed over the city. I had
escaped the second time only with considerable difficulty, by taking my way over
the citadel and harbor, past the chained rafts closing the harbor, and across
the Vosk itself, eluding my pursuers only after a long run, under the cover of
darkness.
In these attempts I had, of course, not taken Phoebe. I had no wish to risk a
quarrel’s penetrating that beauty, which properly refined and improved, would,
in my opinion, not have shamed even the central block of the Curulean. Too, her
weight, slight as it was, might have made the difference between falling to
pursuers and eluding them.
I had, accordingly, before these excursions, sat her down, closely, before a
small tree, her legs on either side of it. I had then tied a rope on her left
ankle, looped the rope about another tree, a yard or so away, and brought it
back, to tie about her right ankle. I did this is such a way, adjusting the
length of the rope, that though her legs were forced to be rather extended, they
were also permitted to flex enough for comfort. I then pushed her belly against
the bark and braceleted her arms about the tree. The extension of her legs, of
course, was such that she could not reach the ropes on her ankles with her
braceleted hands. It also, of course, made it impossible for her to rise to her
feet. I had sat her down there, and she would remain there, sitting, and as I
had placed her. The location of the tree was close enough to the road that she
might, if I had not returned by morning, call out, attracting attention to
herself, thus saving herself, even if, at the same time, making it almost
certain that soon thereafter her thigh would know the fiery kiss of slave iron,
and her neck the clasp of a master’s collar.
She built up the fire.
I watched her.
She unfolded and adjusted a single-bar cooking rack, placing it over the fire.
From this she suspended a kettle of water. The single bar, which may be loosened
in its rings, and has a handle, may also function as a spit.
(pg.151) “And what did you do today?†I asked.
“I knelt in a body hood,†she said.
“It was only a sack,†I said.
“It served,†she said.
The sack I had drawn over her was an improvised body hood. There are several
varieties of body hoods on Gor, which is not surprising in a society in which
slavery, and particularly female slavery, is an essential ingredient. Most body
hoods are made of leather or layers of stout canvas. I have seen at least one in
which two layers of canvas were sewn about a lining of linked chain. They may be
fastened by means of such devices as cords, straps and laces. They may be tied
shut or locked shut.
The prisoner is entered into some body hoods from the back, her legs being
placed through openings in the lower portion of the hood, the hood then being
pulled up and, from the back, lacked shut. Most of these hoods do not have
openings for the arms, but some do. In most hoods the arms are confined within
the hood, either free within the hood itself or bound or braceleted within it.
Some hoods are open at the bottom, and fastened on the prisoner by means of
thongs or straps, often looped about the thighs. Others are constructed in such
a way that they may be opened at the bottom, for the master’s convenience.
Sometimes the hood is thrust up and fastened about the prisoner’s waist.
The typical hood provides hand and arm security with the advantages of the
blindfold. Most body hoods, unlike many common slave hoods, do not have
provisions for an internal gag. The prisoner, of course, may be gagged before
being hooded. The body hood, like the slave hood, tends to keep a female docile.
This may be a particular advantage early in her training, when she may not yet
fully understand her new nature and its meaning. Another advantage of the body
hood is that it is intriguing and attractive on a woman, baring her legs but
usually, unless the arms are also intriguingly bared, concealing the rest of
her, this sort of thing exciting male interest, and yet in virtue of the
predominant concealment afforded, making her seizure less likely than if she
lying about more exposed in common hoods.
Slavers, in moving their wares through the streets, sometimes place them in body
hoods. To be sure, it is more (pg.152) common to throw a cloak or sheet, which
might be of various lengths, over their heads, this usually being fastened on
them by means of a cord or strap looped once or twice about the neck and
fastened under the chin. In many cities free women object to the marching of
naked slaves through the streets. Still, even though the girls may be covered
with cloaks or sheets, the men will usually come to watch, and call out to them,
and jeer, and such. It is understood, of course, that the girls, beneath those
cloaks or sheets, are slave naked. It is sometimes very trying, though also
perhaps very instructive, for a new slave, perhaps a woman of a conquered city,
to be marched thusly through the streets, stung with pebbles, pinched and
slapped, subjected to the most intimate forms of raillery, jocosity and abuse.
“Do you object?†I asked.
“No,†she said, suddenly, quickly. Then she put herself on her belly, on the
dirt floor of the small tent, before me. She lifted her head, looking up at me.
“When,†she asked, “may I use the word ‘Master’ truly to you, in all honesty?â€
“But you are a free woman,†I said to her.
“I beg the collar!†she said.
“Is that not an unusual request for a free woman?†I asked.
“My freedom is now a mockery,†she said. “After what you have done to me these
past two nights, how could I even thing of being free? Do you think that that
delusion can be meaningful to me any longer?â€
“You have then learned something about yourself?†I said.
“Yes,†she said. “I have learned that I should be branded, that I should be in a
collar!â€
I smiled.
“Do not frustrate me,†she begged. “Let me be what I truly am, in all honesty!â€
“The porridge water should be salted,†I said.
“Yes, Master,†she said, and crawled to the front of the tent.
“Salt it lightly,†I said. She was learning to serve.
“Yes, Master,†she said.
The days I had spent here had not been fruitless. I had muchly reconnoitered. I
had thought that perhaps I might (pg.153) have been able to ascend the walls of
Ar’s Station on one of the scaling ladders, in a morning attack, but I had soon
thought the better of it. Resistance was still such that few Cosians could reach
the parapets, and those who did were usually driven back. Whereas I supposed it
was possible that I might enter the city in this way this modality of ingress
seemed dubious at best. It was difficult to see how my projects would be
furthered if, while attempting to identify myself and explain my mission, I were
to be cut open with a boat hook. Similarly I was not interested, in the midst of
friendly overtures, in receiving a bucket of flaming oil in the face or, say,
being struck from a ladder by a roofing tile brought from the interior of the
city. I had also considered trying to enter the city through its main gate, in
the confusion, when it opened for sorties by the defenders. There had been no
sorties, however, for twenty days. That in itself was an index of the straits of
the defenders, their will and numbers. Also, it did not seem to me practical to
try and enter the city during the daylight hours from the harbor side because of
the besiegers. Similarly, during the night hours, it seemed the defenders might
be unusually alert.
I did not, of course, know any appropriate signs and countersigns. One might
well be set upon as soon as one tried to haul oneself unto a wharf. Indeed, they
probably patrolled the pilings and such in small boats. An additional problem,
at least to a swimmer, I had gathered, from talking with some of the soldiers,
were Vosk eels. These often lurk in shadowed areas, among the pilings beneath
piers. Whereas they normally feed on garbage and small fish it is not unknown
that they attack swimmers. In the last few weeks, too, given the fighting at the
rafts, and in the harbor, predictably, river sharks, usually much farther to the
west, had made their
appearance.
My second plan, or the second portion of my plan, involved the women from the
Crooked Tarn. Late this afternoon, as I had expected, they, in the keeping of
the sutler, Ephialtes, had arrived. I had made contact with him away from his
wagon and I had had him blindfold the women, with the exception of Liadne, the
first girl, and the only slave among them, before I inspected them. Liadne, who
was delighted with her name, showed them off to me, proudly. (pg.154) She had
done a good job with them, in only three days. The free women knelt very
straight, their bellies sucked in, their shoulders back, their breasts thrust
forward. Too, they knelt back on their heels, their knees spread, as those of
slaves. They were all there, Lady Temione, Lady Amina, the Vennan, Lady Elene,
from Tyros, and Ladies Klio, Rimice and Liomache, all from Cos. All of them had,
or had desired, to exploit men. now they knelt before me, not knowing who it was
before whom they knelt. I regarded them. Once they had been haughty, proud free
women. They now knelt within the fringes of a military camp, frightened,
confused, chained, blindfolded, shave-headed prisoners. They did not know in
whose power they were, or what their fate might be. I had plans for them, or
some of them. They, or some of them, would learn soon enough what these might
be.
I watched Phoebe pour some meal into the boiling, salted water.
Temione and Klio had had marks on their bodies. Perhaps they had dared to be
initially recalcitrant, at least to some small degree. Perhaps, incredibly
enough, they had even had some reservations, free women, to being handled and
treated as slaves, being stripped, and chained behind a wagon, for example, or
to having to obey promptly and perfectly the orders of a slave, Liadne, who had
been put over them, as first girl, kneeling before her, addressing her as
Mistress, and such. Perhaps, free women, they had dared, at least initially to
think that they might be above such things. They had learned differently. Too,
their treatment might, in some trivial ways, perhaps smooth, or make a bit less
traumatic, the transition to bondage, which was a likely, as well as suitable,
disposition for them. To be sure, there is probably no fully adequate way for
one to anticipate, or prepare for, psychologically, the actual transition to
bondage, even if one eagerly seeks it, even if one welcomes it joyously, for
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