Prize of Gor coc-27

by John Norman

  “I do not know,” said Ellen. “And do not call me “Mistress.”

  “Yes, Mistress,” whispered Dara.

  Ellen saw that the interior whip master was regarding her. He seemed puzzled, if not bewildered. Ellen put her head down. One must be careful about meeting the eyes of a free man.

  Then Ita was again through the parting in the silk, and again danced, again eliciting cries of pleasure from the crowd, again proving her right to perform as a slave before masters, even in so high a circle as the ba-ta circle.

  “I do not know what you are doing,” said Feike.

  “I am following your suggestion, to be a slave, Mistress,” said Ellen.

  “You are a slave,” said Feike, smiling.

  “Yes, Mistress,” smiled Ellen.

  “Then continue to be a slave,” said Feike.

  “Yes, Mistress,” said Ellen.

  As Ellen knelt on the rug inside the area of preparation, waiting, while the other girls danced, she thought of how far away, how remote, so many things seemed. Her life on Earth seemed so far away. It seemed to be dim, distant, faint, intangible, gray, and dull. It almost seemed unreal. Had it been real? Had it truly taken place? Had she once been there, actually lived there, in such a place? Could it be? She listened to the music outside the area of preparation, the cries of the men. “What was there, in that world,” she wondered, “to compare with even the light wisp of silk I feel upon my thighs, with the bells knotted about my left ankle?”

  Dara thrust back through the parting in the silk. Behind her there was a storm of applause. She had done well. She sank to her knees, gratefully. For the time she need not fear the leather. Dara was beautiful. Her number was 51, a very low number. It was not for nothing, Ellen surmised, that Dara had been originally scheduled as the last dancer. Doubtless lovely Dara would bring a high price on the block, being valued not only for her skills as a dancer, but for her obvious possibilities as a common pleasure slave.

  Ellen did not wish to delay this time on her return to the sand.

  “The bracelet, quickly!” she said to Dara.

  Ellen had spoken in the voice of a mistress and Dara, startled, responded instantly as a slave, slipping the bracelet from her wrist, putting her head down and lifting it to Ellen.

  “Thank you,” said Ellen, and then she hurriedly slipped the bracelet on her left wrist, gave Dara a quick kiss, and hurried out onto the sand.

  She knew she was the last dancer of the evening, at least in this circle.

  She pretended to stumble out upon the sand, to a point a bit behind its center. It was rather as she had done at first, but this time it was deliberate. She wanted her movements to seem uncertain, frightened.

  She turned about, to the music, and then lifted her left wrist, looking upon it, with dismay.

  There was an intake of breath in the crowd, a murmur of excitement.

  Now, as not in her second appearance, there was a ring of metal on her left wrist. Surely, as she looked upon it, with awe and dismay, it must suggest the bracelet of a slave. It seemed then, given the conclusion of her second appearance on the sand, that she, captured, had been in the interim embonded. Surely her movements suggested those of a new slave, timid, frightened, trying to understand what it would mean to be owned. She then, for the first time in her dance, seemed to notice the bells tied on her left ankle, and the sounds they made. She seemed to cry out in misery and despair, and hardly seemed to move. Surely she must be embonded now, for upon her there were slave bells. But, too, of course, in examining the bells she had revealed her leg, the left leg, the brand leg, through the parting in the swirling skirt of scarlet slave silk. The beauty of this limb was not lost on men accustomed to own women. “Ai, ai!” cried men. She then framed with the fingers of her left and right hand, regarding it, the tiny mark on her left thigh. There was a greater cry of pleasure from the attendant brutes. Surely she was branded, and so she must be now a slave! She seemed not to hear them but to be alone with herself, perhaps in a master’s house, or within a walled patio, or pleasure garden. She then put her hands to her throat, as thought she might be feeling there a circlet of bondage. Again men greeted this concern with delight. “Know yourself slave, little slut!” cried a man. She then, with the music, seemed to swirl about as though in incomprehension. It seemed she could not believe what had been done to her! “Slave!” cried a man. “Kiss the whip!” called another. She then, in moving to the music, seemed to first notice, back on the sand, to the left of the parting in the silk, as one would face it, the veil which she had earlier discarded. It had been left there, deliberately. She approached it, moving with the music, frightened. She bent down, reaching her hand toward it. “Beware!” called a man. But then, to the music, turning away, she drew back her hand in fear. She no longer dared touch the veil. Whereas a woman’s slave may, and often must, handle the clothing of a free woman, assisting the free woman in her cabinet, and such, she is seldom, if ever, permitted to wear the clothing of a free woman. As I have mentioned, it can be a capital offense for a slave girl to don such garments. When she had drawn her hand back quickly, not daring to touch the discarded veil, there had been applause from the men, who were now, it seemed, muchly drawn into the drama which the lovely slave had been enacting before them. It was clear now, if not in many ways earlier, that the character being portrayed by the dancer now understood herself to be no more than kajira.

  She then seemed suddenly to see someone approach. She recoiled with fear, half bent over. She tried to cover herself, as though she might have been stripped. She half turned away. Then, as though ordered, she faced forward, and straightened up, but held out her hands, as though to fend away some individual. Then, as though ordered, she put down her hands and, as with a moan of misery, she knelt, looking up, as though into someone’s face. Then it seemed she lifted her hands and received into them an object, which, putting down her head, she kissed, and then, lifting the object, returned it to the unseen master. And doubtless there were few if any men in that audience to whom it did not seem that it was into their hands that the whip was returned.

  And thus was the sovereignty of the male, and his command over her, acknowledged by the slave.

  She now knelt with the knees closely together. Then, as the music swirled, she apparently protested, and pleaded with the master, regarding him with disbelief and misery, shaking her head piteously, negatively. Then, her supplications obviously unavailing against his sternness, she put down her head and covered her eyes with her hands, as though weeping. And her knees then, slowly, furrowing the sand, widened. Men cheered.

  She then uncovered her eyes and her expression had changed dramatically, from tearful protest, to surprise, to awe, to, as though for the first time, a sense of her own sexuality.

  She then rose up, as though now an aroused slave. She extended her hands to the master, piteously, now begging, moving her hips and love cradle in mute entreaty, regarding him with wild, startled eyes, beseeching him with her beauty, imploring attention, soliciting, seemingly to her amazement, the touch of a free man, however, casual, on her embonded loveliness. But to her consternation, it seemed he remained adamant. Then, with ever greater desperation, she attempted to stir his interest, to inflame his passion, and as a piteous, now-aroused, begging, needful slave. Whatever might have been the reluctance or severity of her supposed master there was little doubt but what the slave was more than successful with her audience.

  Suddenly, to her actual consternation, briefly, until she caught herself, she glimpsed, in the back of the enclosure, near the wall of silk, standing there, back among several other men, his arms folded, Mirus. How long had he been there? Had he seen her earlier appearances? He might have been there, unnoticed. But whatever might have been the case, clearly he was there now.

  She cried out wildly in misery that he, Mirus, should see her as she was now, dancing as a slave. How amused must he be! How justified now was all his contempt for her! How could she ever hope to win h
is respect, now that he had seen her thusly! This was now all she could ever be to him! Never again could he see her as anything but what she now was, something worthless, the most abject and degraded of slaves!

  Then suddenly she was furious. You have done this to me, she thought. You have made me like this! Oh, I was always a slave, yes, doubtless, but it was you who forced me to reveal it! You, then, it was who forced me to acknowledge myself, who forced me to show myself as what I truly am! Surely a woman is entitled to this privacy! Surely she is entitled to conceal this truth!

  But on Gor, of course, a slave girl is permitted no such thing.

  She must be herself, openly, publicly, as innocently and unapologetically as the rhythm of her breathing, the beating of her heart, as innocently and unapologetically as the scar of her brand and the metal of her collar!

  Why did you come to see me, she thought, dancing. I am not being beaten! Has your joke, clever master, turned out badly?

  I cannot read your expression. It is dark there, and you conceal your feelings well.

  I think you do want me, in spite of what you pretend. How long have you been there?

  Well, then, see your Ellen! Despise me if you will. I do not care! See her dance, as the slave she is! You sought to destroy her, to reduce and ruin her, but you have succeeded only in giving her the dearest, the most precious and greatest fulfillment a woman can know! I love being what I am, being joyfully, willingly, helplessly, given over wholly to love and service. You put me in chains, and in them I have found the greatest freedom and happiness a woman can know!

  Oh, I know my vulnerability, and I fear the bonds of a slave, but I would not have things other than as they are!

  Oh, I fear the whip, but I would not be other than subject to it!

  So see me dance, Master! See me dance, one you once reduced to bondage, now only another slave, now only another slave before free men!

  Ellen had then, in her dance, a sense of her power over men. She saw interest, their fevered wildness, their blazing eyes, their clenched fists, heard their applause, their cries of pleasure. You, Masters, she thought, have the power of strength, and dominance, and weapons, but I, a mere slave, and my lowly sisters, have power as well, the power of our desirability, the power of our beauty!

  And our power is not inconsiderable, I assure you!

  Who is strongest, I wonder, she asked herself.

  Then suddenly it seemed she knew who was strongest for, to her astonishment, she now saw, toward the back of the silk, only a few feet from Mirus, to his left, Selius Arconious!

  He, though impecunious, though a simple workman, no more than an ordinary tarnster, was a Gorean master. He was the sort of man, she knew, who could easily, and without thinking, put her in her place and keep her there.

  He cannot be here, she said to herself, swaying before the men. He must be in Ar! I do not understand this!

  Then tears burst into her eyes.

  “I am dancing as a slave!” she thought. “I cannot let him see me in this way! Not in this way!”

  She stopped dancing for a moment, confused, but tried not to look at Selius Arconious, lest their eyes meet.

  The czehar player looked up, puzzled.

  There was a growl from the exterior whip master, and the snap of a whip.

  Instantly, frightened, obedient to this warning, she was again a dancing slave.

  “Why not?” she asked herself. “Slaves are not permitted to conceal themselves from their masters, in any way. I must be what I am. Gorean masters are not men of Earth! They do not require hypocrisy in women. We must be before them as we truly are. They will have it no other way. We must be naked before our masters, naked not just in the body, for even a free woman may be stripped, but in every way.”

  “What are you doing here, Selius Arconious,” she wondered. “Are you searching for Portus Canio, for Fel Doron, for Tersius Major? Beware of Tersius Major!”

  “Or,” she thought wildly, “have you come here following a slave? I trust you have not come here for me, for my number is 117, and you will not be able to afford me! You are the sort of man to whom a woman desires to belly, to whose feet she desires to crawl! You are such that even a free woman might beg to bring you your sandals, crawling naked to you, bearing them humbly in her teeth. How much more then a lowly slave! Or have you come for a girl, but not one such as I? You would have no way of knowing that I was here! Then you have not come for me! Are you surprised to see me here, and to see me as I am, in bells and silk? There is a great sale. Doubtless you have heard of it. Men have come from hundreds of pasangs to buy. Many women will go cheaply. Why did you have to come here, and make me miserable, reminding me of your imperious strength and mastery! I will go to a richer master! I do not think you could afford a girl whose lot number is less than seven or eight hundred. Yet there are many pretty bargains, even at that price!” Tears ran down Ellen’s cheeks.

  Then, in fury, arrogantly, she danced her beauty to Mirus. Men even turned to look at him, but his expression remained impassive. Ellen saw the scribe who had queried her earlier, in the exhibition cage, and, oddly, momentarily, was frightened. Beside him was a guardsman. Then, with a toss of her head, and a whirl of her hair, she danced toward Selius Arconious. “I will show you what you have lost,” she thought. “I will show you, proud, handsome master, what you cannot afford!”

  Then, she moved from Selius Arconious to Mirus again, dancing in the sand, regarding him steadily. Conscious of her power, she danced before these two men, first one and then the other, danced before them the arousing beauty of an insolent slave.

  None could have her until her sale, she knew.

  “Suffer,” she thought, “Masters!”

  Mirus followed her dancing, and looked carefully upon Selius Arconious, and Selius Arconious, when she danced to Mirus, had little difficulty in detecting the object of the slave’s provocative, haughty glances.

  “Dance to all, slave girl, or feel the whip!” snarled the exterior whip master.

  And Ellen, then, terrified, returned to the character she had created on the sand, and danced her needs to all, piteously inviting the attentions of one after another of the ostraka-possessing patrons of the silken enclosure.

  In moments the men again were commending her, with applause, and hearty cries of appreciation.

  Ellen, dancing, circumambulated the interior edge of the dancing sand, sometimes closer, almost within an arm’s reach of the men, sometimes farther back. The eyes of men glistened. Slave bells jangled. The bracelet was upon her wrist. The music swirled about her.

  She was afraid. What if the men were not pleased? What if the exterior whip master was not pleased?

  “Exploit your beauty,” thought Ellen. “You are very beautiful. You know you are. Use your beauty. Use it! Trust in it to compensate for your lack of training, for your lack of skill, in slave dance. Do not regard Master Mirus or Master Selius! You are a slave girl and can be whipped in an instant. You must perform, even as though they were not here. The men seem pleased. Obey the music! Let it teach you! The resources of the slave girl are limited. What have we to offer, to bargain with, to petition with, but our beauty, our desirability, our intelligence, our passion, our desire to serve and love helplessly and wholly, asking nothing, giving all? I feel the music. It is doing things to me. It is like the thought of being a slave. It is like the thought of being owned. It is like being on your knees, naked, before a man, his. It is like straps and chains, it is like the sight of the whip. You are acting a part, Ellen, only that, the part of an aroused slave girl, dancing her need before strong men, before whom she is nothing, only an animal and slave. Do not forget you are only acting a part. You are only acting a part, aren’t you? Please, my body, do not reveal your needs! No! I fear that I am becoming aroused! I must not let this show, certainly not before Masters Mirus and Selius. It is a part I am playing. I must disengage myself from this part. I am acting! I must be only acting! Please, body, be merciful to me!”
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  But she found herself flushed, and gasping, and holding out her hands to the men. And then in her belly, undeniably, as many times afore, there burned slave fire. Tears came to her eyes. And she and the part, despite her will, became one!

  Men cried out.

  She did not doubt but what there would now be more than twenty-one bids upon this slave.

  In an instant’s glimpse she read scorn in the eyes of Mirus. How helpless she was in the throes of her slave needs. Let her yowl in heat like a she-sleen. What did the men mind? The face of Selius Arconious was impassive. Doubtless he had seen the dancing of many desperate, needful slaves, doubtless many more lovely than she.

  And she was only an Earth girl, a scion of female slave stock, a barbarian. How could he do other than hold her in contempt?

  Then, exhausted, miserable, aroused, tearful, she, in a sudden swirl of music, concluded her dance, hurling herself to the sand, to her left side, her legs drawn up, she on her left elbow, her right hand lifted piteously to the crowd. Then she put her head down, surrendered. It was then the concern of masters whether or not they would deign to summon her, a needful, submitted slave, to their feet.

  Quickly then, flushed, in tears, amidst shouting and applause, she sprang to her feet and fled within the area of preparation.

  “Out, out, all of you!” commanded the interior whip master, and the dancers emerged once more, all, to the sand, to receive the plaudits of the crowd.

  The exterior whip master waved expansively to the musicians who rose and, smiling, bowed their heads briefly to the crowd.

  “First obeisance position,” said the exterior whip master, and this position was instantly assumed.

  Ellen, her head down, then heard small sounds, and the murmur of conversation, as men moved toward the exits of the enclosure.

  At least she had not been beaten. She supposed now that she would return her silks and adornments, the bells and such, to the interior of the area of preparation, and return to the vat of Callimachus.