I looked at Drusus Rencius.
“Publius,†said Drusus Rencius, “is the house master. I know him from Ar.â€
“He would like to see you, after your tour,†said the young man, “to drink a cup
of paga.â€
“I shall be delighted,†said Drusus Rencius. He did not ask me for my permission
to do this, I noted.
“She is truly free?†asked the guard.
“Yes,†averred Drusus Rencius.
“It is a shame,†said the guard. “Curves like that should be up for sale.â€
“From what I have heard of her,†said Drusus Rencius, smiling, “she is the sort
of a woman who has her price.†I wondered what lie meant by that.
“Hermidorus will accompany you in the house,†said the young man, “if we can
tear him away from his scrolls.â€
He understands, does he not,†asked Drusus Rencius, “that the woman is free and,
accordingly, certain things are not to be seen.â€
“Of course,†smiled the young man. “Hermidorust†he called, loudly.
Swiftly I put down my head again and winced as Drusus fastened his hand in my
hair.
Thus again was I led past a stranger in the alleys. As we passed the stranger,
be approaching us, be was on our right.
Goreans commonly pass in this fashion, the sword arms of right-handed
individuals being thus on the side of the approaching stranger.
I saw some girls rummaging through a garbage can. They wore short tunics but
they were not slaves. Goreans sometimes refer to such women as “strays.†They
are civic nuisances. They are occasionally rounded up, guardsmen appearing at
opposite ends of an alley, trapping them, and collared.
“Buy me, Master,†begged the girl, kneeling before Drusus Rencius. “I will give
you much pleasure.â€
“Next!†barked the trainer, in the house of Kliomenesy
The next girl hurried forward and knelt before Drusus Rencius, kissing his feet,
and then lifting her head, piteously, to him. “Buy me, Master,†she said. “I
will give you much pleasure..â€
“Next!†barked the trainer.
The next woman then hurried to Drusus and, threw herself to her belly before
him, kissing his feet. She then rose slowly to her knees, kissing him from the
ankles to the waist.
Kneeling before him, then, close to him, holding his legs she looked up at him.
“Buy me, Master,†she whispered. “I will give you much pleasure.â€
How furious I was that these women were being sent to the feet of Drusus
Rencius. They were naked and beautiful, but who would want to buy them? They
were only slaves. That could be told by the collars they wore, bars of rounded
iron which, here, in the house, had been curved about their necks and hammered
shut. I stood in the background, angry, braceleted, helpless.
“You!†said the trainer, gesturing to another girl with his Whip. “To his feetl
Beg for love!â€
This girl hurried forward and knelt before Drusus Rencius.
“I beg for love, Master,†she whispered.
“You!†said the trainer, indicating another girl. She, too, hurried forward. She
knelt before Drusus Rencius, her palms on the floor, her head to the very tiles.
“I beg for love,†she whispered. “I beg for love, Master.â€
I was startled. I realized, suddenly, that these two women, indeed, were begging
for love. “Beg elsewhere, sluts!†I thought. “Leave Drusus Rencius alone!†And
how offensive that a woman should beg for love! Surely her intimate, desperate
needs for attention, for affection and love were better concealed even from
herself, if possible, and certainly, at least, from others! And if they must
beg, the helpless sluts, did they not know how a woman be~, by looks, by
glances, by small, hopeful services. Surely a woman should not be expected to
speak honestly in such matters. What brute would force her to such extremities?
Too, how vulnerable a woman would make herself, placing herself so at the mercy
of men, subject to being spurned, subject to his scorn and rejection.
Yet how simple, how straightforward and liberating might be such a confession.
How beautiful it might be to so express one’s vulnerability, and femininity, so
tenderly, so piteously, so openly. To be sure, one would expect such a
confession only from a woman whose needs were both desperate and deep, a woman
who had needs such as might characterize slaves.
“Come along,†said Hermidorus.
“Please, Drusus,†I said. “My hands have been braceleted long enough. I am
beginning to feel too helpless, too much like a slave. Please release me.â€
“I will release you in the room,†he said. I then continued to follow him, still
braceleted, through the alleys, toward the inn of Lysias.
“Slowly, more humbly,†cautioned the trainer, half crouching over, watching
carefully, moving slowly beside the girl. Then he moved about her, more quickly,
varying his perspective. Then he moved to the end of the room, where he might
wait for her to approach. “Head lower,†he said. “Better, better.†I watched her
approach him, head down, on her hands and knees, her breasts depending
beautifully. Then she dropped the whip from her teeth before his booted feet.
She then remained there, head down, in position. “Better,†he said. He then
picked up the whip and tossed it across the tiles. “Again,†he said. She then
rose lightly to her feet and hurried to the whip, where, once more, she dropped
to her hands and knees. She picked up the whip delicately in her teeth, and
looked at him. He snapped his fingers. Again, then, head down, slowly, she
approached him, the whip held in her mouth.
“Kneel, back on your heels,†said the trainer to the dark haired woman.
“Straighten your back, suck in your gut, put your shoulders back, thrust out
your breasts, spread your knees, widely, lift your chin, put your hands on your
thighs.
You are not going to be sold as a tower slave, Lady Tina. You are going to be
sold as a pleasure slave.â€
The whip cracked, and I jumped. But it had not touched the girl, only startled
her.
She knelt behind the dark, smooth post, facing it, her knees on either side of
it, her belly and breasts against it, her hands embracing it.
“this may be done to music,†said Hermidorus, “and, as you know, there are many
versions to the post dance, or pole dance, singly, or with more than one girl,
with or without bonds, wand so on, but here we are using it merely as a training
exercise.
The whip cracked again and the girl, suddenly and lasciviously, became active.
I gasped.
She began to writhe about the pole. “Kiss it, caress it, love It!†commanded the
trainer, snapping the whip. “Now more slowly, now scarcely moving, now use your
thighs, and breasts more, moving all about it, holding it. Touch it with your
tongue, lick it! Use the inside of your thighs more, your breasts, turn about
it, slowly, sensuously. Lift your hands above your head, palms to the pole,
caressing it. Turn about the pole! Twist about it! Now to your knees, holding
it!†He then cracked the whip again. “Enough!†he said. She was then as she had
been before, kneeling behind the post, her knees on either side of it, her belly
and breasts pressed against it, her hands embracing it. The girl was looking at
me. She was wondering, perhaps, if I were the next to be put to the post. I
looked away, angrily. Did she not know I was not a lowly thing like she? Did she
not know I was free?
“It is a useful exercise,†said Hermidorus to Drusus.
‘Obviously,†agreed Drusus.
I looked back at the girl. She was now looking away. I looked at the post. It
was dark, and shiny. It had been polished smooth, apparently, by the bodies of
many girls.
The girl looked suddenly at me. There was a hostility in our looks toward one
another. She saw, I think, in my eyes, that I thought I could have done better
at the post than she.
Then I looked away. What would I care for her opinionsi
Were we competitive women?
“Come along,†said Hermidorus.
“These women,†said Hermidorus, “are practicing their floor movements.â€
A trainer stood among them, with a whip. Occasionally he would snap this whip
near a girl. I did not doubt but what the girls on the tiles, if they were found
sufficiently displeasing to the trainer, or too frequently required the
admonitory signal of the cracking leather, would soon hear the snap of the lash
not in their mere vicinity but on their own bared bodies. Two of the girls, I
saw, had stripes on them, one on the thigh, and one on the side. The trainer was
not now paying them much attention. They were now, apparently, doing well.
“Come along,†said Hermidorus.
“How beautiful!†I breathed.
Drusus Rencius looked sharply at me. I feared for a moment I might be struck.
Hermidorus, on the other hand, did not seem to notice. My exclamation, perhaps,
had seemed sufficiently inadvertent, involuntary and irrepressible, to be
ignored; or perhaps it was to be ignored because I was not a slave, but a free
woman. I did not meet Drusus Rencius’s eyes. It was not like I had just decided
to speak and had spoken. In a place like this I did not know if I was subject to
discipline or not. I did not think so, for I was a free woman. On the other hand
I knew I was here on the sufferance of the house of Kijomenes. Indeed, on these
premises, I knew that Drusus Rencius even held a license on me.
The drummer and the flautist prepared once more to play.
The girl in the long, light chain smiled at me. She, at any rate, was pleased by
my response.
A wrist ring was fastened on her right wrist. The long, slender, gleaming chain
was fastened to this and, looping down and up, ascended gracefully to a wide
chain ring on her collar, through which it freely passed, thence descending,
looping down, and ascending, looping up, gracefully, to the left wrist ring. If
she were to stand quietly, the palms of her hands ~n her thighs, the lower
portions of the chain, those two dangling loops, would have been about at the
level of her knees, just a little higher. The higher portion of the chain, of
course, would be at the collar loop.
The musicians began again to play. There is much that can be done with such a
chain. It was a dancing chain. Its purpose was not to confine the girl but to
allow her to incorporate it in her dance, enhancing the dance with its movements
and beauty. It is, of course, symbolic of her bondage, this adding fantastic
dimensions of significance to the dance.
It is not merely a beautiful woman who dances, but one who can be bought and
sold, one who is subject to male ownership. Too, of course, the wrist rings, and
the collar, are truly locked on her. There is no doubt about it. It is a slave,
with all that that means, who is dancing.
I watched her, my breath almost taken away by her beauty.
“She is a valuable woman,†said Hermidorus.
I did not doubt it.
“’Come along,†he said.
We are readying her for her sale,†said Hermidorus.
I watched her naked on the block, under the tutelage of a whip-carrying trainer.
It was small, rounded room, with mirrors. He was putting her through slave
paces.
“She is to be auctioned in five days,†said Hermidorus.
My eyes and those of the girl met. At that instant her weight was on the palms
of her hands, her arms straight, and the sides of her feet, her body lifted from
the block, her legs ~ight and spread widely behind her.
I realized then, with a shock, that she was going to be sold
Then she was being put through further slave paces.
“Come along,†said Hermidorus.
I was trembling. The hand of Drusus Rencius on my arm drew me, bodily, from the
room.
‘I have changed my mind!†wept the girl. “I will be pleasing! I will be
pleasing!â€
I looked through the heavy bars of the cell, some three inches in thickness,
reinforced with crosspieces, to the opposite wall. It was hard to see. There,
kneeling on straw, trying to pull towards us, her wrists tied behind her hack to
a ring set in the wall, was a blond girl. “I will be pleasing!†she wept. “I
will be pleasing! I will be pleasing!â€
I then turned away from her, following Hermidorus and Drusus Rencius.
“She is not yet begging to be pleasing,†said Hermidorus to Drusus.
“Correct,†he said.
I looked behind myself, following them, at the dark cells, most of them empty,
along the corridor. This was certainly not my favorite part of the house. It was
dark, and cold, and clammy. Occasionally my bare feet stepped in puddles of cold
water, seeped to this level, and caught in concavities or irregularities in the
corridor flooring. And, here and there, I could see passages, narrow, crooked
and dark, leading to even lower levels. I was pleased that we were not going to
traverse them. It had seemed frightening enough to me to come even to this
level. Sometimes, in our descent, bn cat-walks, we had even passed over pit
cells, little more than holding holes, ceilinged with locked iron gates, sunk in
the floor of the corridor. I had cried out with misery and terror in passing
over one of these for a large hand, emerging suddenly through the grating, had
seized my ankle. Drusus Rencius had pried open the fingers ‘and thrust the hand
away. I then kept closely to the center of the catwalks. There were male slaves
in this house, too, I had learned. Had the slave known I was free, I do not
think he would have touched me.
He might have remained crouching in his hole, thinking what thoughts he might,
but I do not think he would have dared to touch me. A male slave can be slain
for touching a free woman. “She is not here for punishment,†Hermidorus had
&nb
sp; informed the dark shapes beneath the grating. I then realized that a slave girl,
perhaps for purposes of her discipline, might be lowered through the grating
hole, doubtless into eager hands, the grating then being resecured.
In the corridors, in our movements through them, particularly in the upper
levels, we would sometimes encounter slaves, usually employed in domestic tasks,
such as running errands, carrying burdens, dusting or cleaning. These women were
usually naked, except for their collars, which, I gathered, was the way women
were usually kept in a slaver’s house. At the approach of the free men,
Hermidorus and Drusus, they would immediately position themselves, usually with
their knees wide, kneeling back on their heels, their heads up, their bands on
their thighs, in the position I had come to understand was that of the pleasure
slave, but sometimes, instead; kneeling with the palms of their hands on the
tiles, their heads down, too, to the same tiles.
There was one temporary, partial exception to this, which I wrn mention. After
we had left some carpeted corridors, higher in the house, and were moving to the
lower levels, and traversing heavy, ftagstonelike tiles, we approached a
slender, dark-haired girl who, on her hands and knees, in chains, with a bucket
of water, cloths and a brush, in that portion of the corridor, was scrubbing
tiles.
As we approached, she oriented herself towards us, palms of her hands on the
floor, and put her head to the tiles. But, as we neared her, she lifted her
head, desperately.
“Hermidorus!†she cried, suddenly. “Hermidorus!â€
He stopped before her, a few feet from her, and we stopped, too, behind him.
“Do you not know me?†she begged. The chain she wore was a work sirik. It
resembles the common sink but the wrists, to permit work, are granted about a
yard of chain.
Like the common sirik, it is a lovely chain. Women are beautiful in it.
“Deirdre!†she cried. “Deirdre! Two years ago ill Ar we lived in the same
building!â€
He looked at her, not speaking.
“Deirdre,†she whimpered.
“In the instant you were imbonded, you ceased to be Girl,’ be said.
“Girl?†she said.
“what is your house name?†be asked.
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