by John Norman
Then I was afraid and angry. With what insolence, with what arrogance, he had cast his seed within me! And I must endure such things, as it pleased him! how he had held me, and then loosed himself within me! What arrogance, what insolence! He had not asked my permission. He had simply taken me, as a slave might be taken! Did he not know I was from Earth? Did he think I was only another Gorean girl? But I realized, then, that here I was perhaps even less than a Gorean girl, and, at best, only another slut in a collar.
"Please do not let me go, Master," I begged. "Hold me, please." He then for a time kept me in his arms.
I was not displeased to be a woman.
It was what I wanted to be, if there were such men.
I clung to him. He kissed me. "Thank you, Master," I whispered. It was lonely and dark inside the hood, but his body was warm. In a way I was pleased to be hooded. Otherwise I might have fallen in love with him. As it was, and this was according to the will of masters, I could not relate to him as a woman to a man, but only as a woman to any man, or men.
I heard sounds in the tavern outside.
I knew I was now a red-silk paga slave. I heard slave bells outside, the sort sometimes fastened on slaves, on their ankles, their wrists, their collars. Perhaps those I heard were bound on Tupita" s or Sita" s well-turned ankle. I clung yet more closely to him.
I was troubled.
He had made me begin to feel sensations, though doubtless I was now ready for them, which had alarmed me, sensations which spoke to me of female helplessness, and of female helplessnesses beyond them, and perhaps even beyond them, intriguing, fascinating helplessnesses, helplessnesses dimly sensed and terribly feared, yet somehow desperately longed for, of which I could scarcely conjecture.
He then thrust me away.
I lay there, in the darkness of the hood. I felt a coolness on my left thigh, like a thread. I had not noticed it before. I knew what it must be. I did not touch it.
I heard him dress.
He came back and, I think, crouched beside me. I felt his thumb rubbing on the interior of my left thigh. I then heard him pick up a sheet of paper and, seemingly, clean his thumb on the paper. He then rubbed his fingers on my thigh and lifted them gently to my mouth. "Yes, Master," I said. Obediently I licked his fingers, finding on them, sweet with sweat and oil, the dampness of my virgin blood. I thus, being granted the permission of my use master, tasted the fruits of my own first ravishment. The paper on which he had smeared blood was doubtless the attestation paper, the blood being presumably put at the bottom, in the place for it.
I sensed him stand.
I knelt before my use master. I put out my hand to him.
He had been kind to me. He had been patient with me. He had been gently, even in the rupturing of that fragile tissue, my sundering. I sought his legs, and, finding them, groping, put down my head, kissing his feet. "Thank you, Maser," I said.
I heard a slave girl crying out with pleasure outside. I shuddered. She must be being used so simply as having been flung across one of the tables, perhaps her hair and back in spilled paga.
I lifted my head, in its hood, to him. "Do not leave me," I begged. "Stay with me!"
He said nothing. This was in accordance, of course, with the custom in Brundisium, and in certain other cities, that in the light of which I had been given my first ravishing.
I then heard the snap of a slave whip outside the leather curtain, rather close to it, and a girl" s cry of pain. "We are going to the alcove, slave!" I heard. "Yes, Master!" she cried. It was Sita. I heard her then, probably, judging by the jangling of slave bells, being conducted, stumbling, to an alcove. Probably he had her had at his hip, held by her hair. "Yes, Master!" she was weeping, her voice fading. "Yes, Master!"
"Please," I begged, frightened. "Please!"
He was silent.
"Please, Master," I wheedled.
He had been kind. It seemed possible to me then, that he might be weak, like the men of Earth, that perhaps I could manipulate him. What a fool I was! Did I not understand he was a Gorean male?
"Please, Master!" I begged, prettily.
His only answer was a cuff that threw me to one side, startled, where I crouched, disbelievingly, at the end of the chain. Then he took me and thrust me on my back on the furs and, as he had before, when we had first come to the alcove, manacled my hands at the sides of my head. He then removed the shackle from my left ankle.
My lip had been cut by his blow. I could taste blood there. "Master?" I asked. Then I felt him, and I could not have stopped him, had I wished to do so, as I was chained, remove the white-silk ribbon from my collar. In a moment he had fastened something else there, in its place, doubtless another ribbon, doubtless the red-silk ribbon which had been given to him earlier by Mirus. He jerked it down on the collar, snugly.
He was then, I think, crouching near me. I pulled at the manacles. I was helpless. There was another trickle of blood on my leg. He put his thumb in this and scrawled a «Kef» on my belly, the first letter of "Kajira." Then I felt the whip thrown beside me. "Master!" I wept. "Forgive me, if I have been displeasing, Master! Please, forgive me!" I recoiled, whimpering, from a kick from the side of his foot. Then I heard him unbuckling the leather curtain, and leaving. I was helpless in the alcove. "Master!" I called after him. "Master!" I tried to rise but, by the chains, was prevented from doing so. I sand back, miserable, on the furs. He had been kind to me, and the first thing I had tried to do was to take advantage of him, to bend him to my will. I had then been cuffed. Then he had chained me. Too, he had thrown the whip against me, and had kicked me, showing his contempt for me, a caught, would-be manipulative slave. Then he had left. I moaned. What a fool I had been! he was Gorean! Had I not understood that it was I who was the slave, and he the master? Perhaps the whip had been flung against me to remind me of my subjectability to it. Or perhaps he had flung it there that my master, or his man, might understand, when he came to unchain me, that at the least failure in my pleasingness I was due for a whipping. Yet he himself had not used it on me. That was perhaps yet another evidence of his kindness, or of his understanding and patience with me, his recognition that I was still naught but an ignorant and naA?ve novice with respect to the rigors of my bondage. Had I irritated him further, however, I do not doubt but what he himself would have used it on me. As it was, he had not been pleased when he had left me. If he were to use me again, in the future, I feared he would be merciless with me, treating me as the foolish, and errant Earth woman I had been.
"Master?" I asked. I had heard the curtain being parted. "Master!" I said, elatedly. "Master?"
but then I felt my ankles flung apart.
"Oh!" I said, suddenly and smoothly penetrated, deeply.
I lay there, absolutely still.
This was not the same man!
I did not dare to move, so penetrated.
He made an animal noise.
"Master?" I asked.
I was very alive to him, so much so that I was unwilling to move.
"Dance," said Tupita, apparently from the opening of the alcove. There was laughter there, too, mostly that of men. The curtain I realized had not been drawn!
"He wants you to dance, slave," laughed Tupita. "You are a dancer. Go ahead, dance."
I moaned.
"Did you see the «Kef» on her belly?" asked Tupita.
"Yes," said a man.
"It belongs there," she said.
"Yes," agreed another fellow.
"There is now a red-silk ribbon on your collar, Doreen," said Tupita. "What is the meaning of that?"
"That I have been red-silked, Mistress," I said.
"Yes," said Tupita.
"Close the curtain, Mistress!" I begged.
"Why?" asked Tupita. "Are you modest?"
"No, Mistress," I sobbed. Slaves are not permitted modesty.
"You are now only a red-silk slut, Doreen," she said, "no different from the rest of us!"
"No, Mistress," I said.
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"And do not forget it," she said.
"No, Mistress," I said.
There was laughter.
"Do you hear pounding?" asked Tupita.
"She has already been pounded," said a man.
There was laughter.
"Listen," said Tupita.
I could then hear pounding. It was far off, somewhere perhaps in the front of the tavern.
"So you hear it?" she asked.
"Yes, Mistress," I said.
"Do you know what it is?" she asked.
"No, Mistress," I said.
"It is your attestation paper, together with your white ribbon, being nailed to the wall in the vestibule of the tavern," she said. "It is there now with mine, and Sita" s, and those of some of the other girls."
I did not respond.
"But not with Inger" s," said a fellow.
"No," laughed Tupita.
Several of the fellows laughed. Inger, from distant Skjern, had been taken by Torvaldslanders. She was voluptuous. Too, Torvaldslanders seldom deliver virgins to the slave markets.
"You are fortunate that I am not a man?" laughed Tupita.
"Mistress?" I asked, puzzled.
"In the case of a man, the repetition of a command is commonly a cause for discipline."
"A command, Mistress?" I asked, frightened.
"Yes," she said.
I knew that Tupita was having her sport with me, but, too, I knew that she might beat me tomorrow, in the slave area. As first girl she had that privilege. I did not want her to whip me, or switch me, or have the other girls put my ankles over the low bar and tie them there, and then have her spank the soles of my bare feet with the springy, flat board. It is very painful, and it is hard to walk after it.
"What command?" I asked, frightened.
"Dance," laughed Tupita.
"Mistress, I am chained!" I said. "I am held!"
"Dance," said a man, from the entryway, and a grunt of pleasure from him in whose arms I lay slave captive.
I had been commanded by a man. I obeyed immediately, or did my best to obey. If a command needs to be repeated, as the saying goes, the girl needs to be punished. If the girl thinks, however, that the command may have been, say, an inadvertence, or mistake, or that the master might relent, or something along these lines, she might, say, beg or inquire. She is reassured of the intent and seriousness of the command if, for example, she is asked if the command need be repeated, which eventuality she will presumably be anxious to avoid. If she has, sincerely, and not as a girl" s trick, not understood the command, or has not heard it, or fears she may not have heard it correctly, she may also inquire into the matter, of course, and normally without penalty. In such cases the repetition of a command is not regarded as cause for discipline. A girl is seldom punished for trying to be pleasing, at least at first. If her efforts continue to fail, however, that is a different matter. The whip is an absolutely marvelous instructional device for improving female conduct.
I had not even wanted to move, him so within me!
But I was a slave. I must obey.
"You wriggle well, Doreen," called Tupita.
I cried out with misery.
"Come, see the slave dance!" called a man from the entryway.
"Do not stop, slut," warned Tupita.
I moaned.
I had not wanted to move, him so within me! But now, choicelessly, I moved. He was mostly quiet within me. It was I, the slave, who must move! I twisted and writhed. I then became aware, to my horror, that I was being forced to arouse myself upon him.
I whimpered in protest.
"Come, look," called a fellow. "She is getting hot!"
I sensed men crowding about the entryway.
"No!" I sobbed. I was a woman of Earth. I must remain frigid! I must not be "hot!" But then I realized I was no longer a woman of Earth. I was now only a Gorean slave.
"Please him," said Tupita.
"Yes, Mistress!" I sobbed. "Yes, Mistress!"
"Ai!" growled the brute who held me like chains.
The techniques of ethnic dance, as is perhaps no well-kept secret, because of the movements of the hips, the control of the muscles of the abdomen, and such, have delicious applications in the making of love. It is no wonder that this form of dance, for centuries, was commanded by emirs, pashas and caliphs of their concubines and slaves. Too, of course, it is initially arousing to the woman, for she understands that she is dressed as a slave, is displayed as a slave and must dance as a slave. And later, of course, if she is truly a slave, she must satisfy, and with dividends, the passions she has aroused in her dance. If a woman could be a dream of pleasure to men, let her learn this form of dance.
"Ai, Ai!" said the fellow.
I then begun to feel incredible sensations, sensations I did not fully understand.
But then he gripped my hips so I could scarcely move, and pulled me tight to him, and was eager, surgent and eruptive within me! Then he withdrew, with something like a snarl and a smacking of his lips. I feared I had been bruised. "Master?" I asked. Would he leave me, so soon?
"I am next!" said a fellow.
I then again felt my ankles flung apart. I heard Tupita laughing.
"Oh!" I said, forcibly entered.
"Dance," called Tupita.
I recalled, suddenly, what I had heard, from back on the floor, behind us, when I was being carried on the shoulder of my first use master to the alcove, that fourteen more ostraka would be chosen!
"Dance!" laughed Tupita.
Again I danced.
It must have been near morning, I lay alone now in the alcove, now on my belly, my hands manacled apart, at the sides of my head. One of the men, earlier, when I was on my back, had put me in left-ankle shackle, had freed me of the manacles, had tied my hands behind my back, and had then had me please him, astride him. he had then, afterwards, left me lying on my side in the alcove. The next fellow had freed my hands of the thongs, put me on my stomach, and chained my wrists apart, at the sides of my head, much as I had been before, for much of the evening, but now turned, now on my stomach, and had then freed me of the ankle shackle.
I had lost count of the men, but there had doubtless been, counting my first use master, the full fifteen who had purchased winning ostraka.
It was quiet outside in the tavern.
I did not remember if the curtain had been drawn shut by my last use visitor, when he had left, or if he had left it open.
I lay there alone, on my belly, chained.
The former Doreen Williamson" s virginity had been raffled off. And so too, had her first uses. I supposed that Teibar, who had been my capture master, who had caught me on Earth, and brought me here to be a slave, would have found that amusing, his "modern woman" being taught her sex on Gor.
I rubbed my belly a little on the furs. I held the chains above the manacles close about my wrists.
Yes, I thought, I had been taught something about my sex tonight. I supposed I stank of the uses of men.
Outside, near the front of the tavern, indeed, in its vestibule, I gathered, nailed to a wall there, with other such objects, was my attestation paper, with its smear of my virginal blood upon it, and the white ribbon which had been on my collar.
There was now another ribbon, I gathered, tied on my collar, one of red silk. I was now, at any rate, "red silk."
I wondered what the men who had worked at the library would have thought. I wondered if they, too, would have crawled to me, and put me to their purposes. It would be their right, of course. I was now a slave.
I lay there, troubled.
I wanted to cope with my feelings. I was confused. The first fellow had been, on the whole, very gentle and understanding with me. I thought I would always be grateful to him for that. he could have been quite otherwise, for I was only a collar-slut whose virginity he had won in a raffle. After he had removed my virginity he had treated me with much less courtesy and patience. In his arms, after my virginity had been taken, I ha
d had the first genuine intimations of what it might be to be a slave in the arms of a man. In the arms of the second fellow I had begun to feel incredible sensations but he had then, eager in his own pleasures, seized me helplessly to him, and, as I was held, startled, the helpless vessel of his pleasure, used me, and left. In such a usage, and public as it was, before Tupita, and others, I was well reminded that there was a steel collar on my neck. But I was then, too, to my transitory shame, until I recalled I was a slave, and such feelings were required of me, more than ready for the next man, and then, more eagerly then I perhaps now cared to recall, I «danced» for him. Helpless, and in chains, hooded, almost alone with my sensations, I was discovering my sexuality, the root sexuality of the used female. To be sure, as I would later discover, I was only doing something like beginning to respond to them. When the fourth man had entered the alcove, and he seemed to be just standing there, not yet touching me, I had actually lifted my belly to him, begging. He had laughed. I had then sunk back in a paroxysm of humiliation and embarrassment on the furs, overcome with shame, from my grotesque anti-sexual Earth conditioning in which female merit is regarded as being threatened or diminished by any sign of truly deep sexual needs, or any evidence of intense, genuine interest in the opposite sex. But if I wanted their touch why should I not ask for it, or beg for it? As a slave what else could I do? Too, even if my needs and my interests, and the incredible depth and intensity of my desires proved that I was «worthless» and without "merit," I did not care! Of course I was worthless, though, to be sure, men would pay hard cash for me! I was worthless because I was only a property! I was worthless because I was bond! I was worthless because I was the sort of woman who could be put upon a slave block and be sold! I was worthless because I was only an owned animal! Of course I did not have «merit»! I was beyond «worth» and "merit," of those sorts. I was only a slave! But thus I could be as free, and piteous, and begging, and lewd, and loving, and sexual as I wished! I had nothing to conceal, nothing to keep secret. I belonged to my master, all of me, my thoughts, my love, my body, everything I was and could be! I lay there for a moment moaning in shame. But then he had crouched near me and, with a few deft, unbelievable touches, had me, in spite of myself, leaping and squirming before him. Then I realized he had laughed at me not so much to humiliate me, thought perhaps he had enjoyed doing so, as I was an Earth woman, but because he was amused at my obvious readiness, unusual in so new a slave. I gathered that this vitality, or responsivenesss, coming from so new a branded slut, must be surprising. Then he entered me, and I think I pleased him.