Conspirators of Gor cog[oc-31

by John Norman

  Goreans tend to be curious as to whence one’s income is derived. If one has no obvious means of support suspicion is aroused. Few would suspect that the Lady Bina might have at her disposal a cache of rubies, or similar stones. And it would be well that such suspicions were not entertained, lest they provoke the interest of the unscrupulously acquisitive.

  Indeed, I was not sure what resources the Lady Bina and the beast retained. Had the aforementioned ruby been their last? They had no new source of income of which I was aware, lest it might be from investments in the Street of Coins, but I knew of no such investments, and I suspected they would not wish their principal to be tethered to a particular location, nor, perhaps, would they care to have their wealth, if wealth they had, recognized.

  In any event, whether as a mere aspect of their disguise, or because the pittances of my earnings might actually be important to their economy, I found myself serving as a work slave, a laundering slave, several customers having been located on the public boards by Delia, companion of Epicrates. The inference to be drawn, correctly or not, was apparently that the Lady Bina was so tragically impecunious that it seemed advisable for her to take in laundry, by means, of course, of her slave, the girl, Allison. I was never permitted of course, to touch this money. Delia would collect coins from some customers, the richer ones, and others, the ones less well off, would deliver the coins to the shop of Epicrates.

  And so it came about that the former Allison Ashton-Baker, once of the upper classes of her world, once so superior and haughty, once so special and important in her own eyes, once one of the beauties of an exclusive sorority, at one of her country’s most selective and expensive schools, now tunicked and barefoot, carried laundry in Ar.

  I had at first rebelled at this suggestion.

  This had occurred after the incident of the Sul Market, that dealing with the Metal Worker. I was still smarting from that episode. I recalled my humiliation, my helpless fury, on my knees before him, put there by his words, half stripped and bound, and he one of lesser caste, only a Metal Worker! This may have motivated, at least in part, my transient, foolish recalcitrance. Did I think I was still Allison Ashton-Baker? Did I not know I was now a slave? I would be reminded. I would be left in no doubt. I would test my limits. I would be taught them.

  When I had first been brought to the house of Epicrates I suspected little more than the fact that the Lady Bina and the beast were not native to Gor. I thought this might constitute my opportunity for a manipulable, easy bondage. Certainly neither the beast nor the Lady Bina had treated me as I might have expected to be treated in a Gorean household, at least at first. For example, I had not been carried across the portal bound, thrown to the floor, and put under the whip. This is sometimes done to inform the slave that this is a household in which she is truly a slave, and must understand herself as such. Subsequently there is likely to be little doubt about the matter. And if doubts persist, they may be quickly dispelled. I took this lapse, if lapse it be, on the part of the beast, as an indication of indulgence or weakness, or perhaps merely a lack of interest, and, on the part of the Lady Bina, to be a consequence of ignorance, of her lack of familiarity with Gorean customs, and the attitudes and behaviors expected of a free woman. For all her petulance, pettiness, willfulness, vanity, and nastiness, she did not yet have the acculturated arrogance and sense of social power of the typical Gorean free woman. To be sure, she was highly intelligent and might be expected to learn such things. Delia, I am sure, would be an excellent tutor in such matters. She, like Epicrates, was of the Merchants, and the Merchants often take themselves as a high caste, though few others do. The five traditional high castes are the Initiates, the Scribes, the Builders, the Physicians, and the Warriors. Many would prefer not to count the Warriors as a high caste, but there are few who would openly deny their title to the status, as they are armed.

  “I do not do such things,” I had told them, “launder, and such.”

  “What?” had asked the beast.

  “Grendel?” had said the Lady Bina, puzzled, turning to the beast.

  I was standing, facing them.

  “I was an important person on my world,” I said. “I am not the sort of person who is set to such tasks.” Then I straightened my body. “You must find another,” I said.

  I would never have had the courage, or the stupidity, to speak so in a normal Gorean household.

  In such a household, I would have been only too aware of what I was.

  Before a man, for example, I would have knelt, head down, waiting to be commanded, hoping, at any cost, to be found pleasing.

  A bit of lip pulled back about a fang on the beast’s jaws. In this instance, it had an unpleasant look about it.

  I thought it best to kneel.

  “What?” said the beast.

  I lifted my head.

  “I was an important person on my world,” I said, falteringly. “I am not the sort of person who is set to such tasks.”

  From the throat of the beast their emanated a low sound, scarcely audible to me, though doubtless quite audible to the beast.

  It was not a pleasant sound.

  “You must find another,” I said, boldly.

  Then I was frightened, for I suddenly feared that the beast, though only a beast, might be familiar with how slaves were to be treated. Why might he not know such things? He may have learned them from others, or another.

  I remembered then not the gentle graciousness with which I had been borne here from the Tarsk Market, carried nestled in its arms, as though I might have been a free woman, but remembered, rather, the perfection with which I had been bound, bound as a slave. And the knots had been warrior knots!

  I was scarcely aware of its movements so swift it was, and I felt myself seized up, lifted, in mighty paws, and I sensed nails within them, and heard a roar of rage, and I was flung a dozen feet across the room, striking into a wall. Then I was pulled back, by one foot, to the center of the room.

  I was on my belly.

  The beast, with its size and weight, knelt across my body.

  I was pinned to the floor.

  It leaned forward.

  “Do not! Do not!” I heard the Lady Bina scream.

  It was my first experience of the sudden rage of that form of life, a rage easily aroused, swift, unexpected, unpredictable, terrible and overwhelming, a rage almost impossible to subdue.

  I would learn later that it was the rage of the Kur.

  Whatever might be the nature of that body in it coursed the blood of the Kur.

  I felt massive jaws close about my head. I felt the tongue, and saliva, of the beast, its hot breath.

  “No, no!” screamed the Lady Bina.

  The jaws seemed to tremble. They tightened, relaxed, then tightened again. Had they closed my head would have been bitten away.

  “No! Stop!” screamed the Lady Bina. I sensed she was dragging at the fur on the beast’s back.

  I sensed a titanic struggle being waged within the beast.

  Then the jaws were removed from my head.

  “Good, good,” said the Lady Bina, soothingly.

  “It seems you do not know you are a slave, and are in need of discipline,” said the beast.

  “No, no!” I said. “I am a slave. I am a slave, only a slave! I am not in need of discipline, Master! I will obey! I beg to obey!”

  “Cord,” said the beast to the Lady Bina.

  A Gorean male might have so spoken, calmly, one recognizing what must be done.

  Then, as I lay on my belly, helplessly, pinned down, I felt my wrists drawn up, over my head, behind me, and then, held, they were bound together.

  “You will beg on your belly,” said the beast, “for the privilege of serving your Mistress, and other free persons, as they might please, in whatever manner they might please.”

  “I am on my belly, Master!” I cried. “I so beg! I so beg!”

  My hands were still held up, bound, behind my head.

 
He then rose up and drew me to my feet, and to the side of the room, where there was a slave ring fastened in the ceiling, some two or three feet in from the wall. I was then bound to the ring, my hands high over my head. I could barely reach the floor, with my toes.

  “Go downstairs,” said the beast to the Lady Bina. “Fetch a slave whip.”

  “They have no slave,” she said.

  “They will have such a device,” he said.

  I did not doubt it.

  Such things are common in a Gorean household. Delia, companion of Epicrates, a free woman, I was sure, would not be without one. Who knew when a slave, perhaps near the shop, at a fountain, on the street, might be displeasing? Free women, abroad, often have a switch about their person.

  The Lady Bina scurried away.

  I heard her descend the stairs.

  I half turned about, muchly suspended from the ring. “It will not be necessary to whip me, Master,” I said. “I was foolish! I am sorry! I will obey, unquestioningly instantly. I am a slave. I beg for the privilege of serving masters and mistresses to the best of my ability!”

  “I see you have felt the whip,” said the beast.

  “Yes, Master,” I said, “in the house of Tenalion of Ar!”

  I had no wish for that experience to be repeated.

  Soon the Lady Bina had returned.

  “Please do not whip me, Master!” I said.

  “But you have not been pleasing,” he said.

  I was then whipped.

  When I was released from the ring I fell to the floor, on my belly, my hands still bound.

  “Have you anything to say, Allison?” inquired the beast.

  “Yes, Master,” I wept. “I am on my belly. I beg for the privilege of serving masters and mistresses, unquestioningly, instantly, as they might please, in whatever manner they might please.”

  “Anything else?” he asked.

  “Yes, Master,” I said, recalling my training. “I thank Master for my whipping. I hope that it has improved me.”

  “Has it?” he asked.

  “Yes, Master,” I said.

  “Go downstairs,” said Grendel to the Lady Bina. “Return the whip. But buy one. We should have one here.”

  She left.

  “You will not need a whip, Master,” I said.

  “That is for me to say,” he said.

  “Yes, Master,” I said.

  I later learned that the beast had indeed learned how to treat slaves, and that he had learned this on another world, a steel world, the former world of Agamemnon, Eleventh Face of the Nameless One.

  He was, of course, a beast, only a beast. I wondered what it might be to have a human master. That I thought might be even more frightening, for the human would be of one’s own kind, selected for according to the radical, dimorphic relationships of master and slave over countless generations, one well aware of, and sensitive to, the psychology, the needs, the fears, the vulnerabilities, the tricks, the wiles, the vanities, the pettinesses, the weaknesses, the helplessnesses of his natural prey and possession, the female slave.

  How terrifying, I thought, it would be to belong to a Gorean male, a natural male, one by whom one would be uncompromisingly exploited and mastered, as, of course, in one’s secret heart, one would wish to be.

  I thought of the Metal Worker, in the Sul Market. How arrogant and hateful he was! How I loathed him!

  My wrists were freed by the beast.

  “What are you going to do now, Allison?” he asked.

  “Prepare supper, Master,” I said.

  I made my way toward the tower of Six Bridges.

  I was wary, as I did not wish my laundry to be soiled.

  There was a reason for my fear.

  All this was before the incident of the blind Kur.

  I had had no idea, of course, when I and my sisters were transported to Gor where we would be sold. I was delivered to the house of Tenalion of Ar. Had others been, as well? I did not know. The house was large. And in a city the size of Ar there are many slave houses, many markets. The most famous is the Curulean. And, of course, there are hundreds of cities, mostly small, even in known Gor, and each would presumably have its emporium for collar-girls.

  Still, upon reflection, though one supposes the catch from the sorority, the harvested items in that particular “slaver’s basket,” so to speak, would be distributed about, it is also plausible, upon reflection, that it might be more convenient to the masters, from the point of view of transportation, that several, if not all, might be disposed of in one location, or a limited number of such locations. From such a location, or locations, they might then be distributed variously. In this way, the wholesaler, so to speak, need not march coffles about, bundle his beasts into closed slave wagons, ankles chained to the central bar, ship them bound hand and foot in tarn baskets, and so on. Such things may be done by retailers.

  I had hopes, of course, at least at first, that I might meet some of my sisters in Ar.

  Surely that was a possibility.

  Ar is large, but the number of laundry troughs, with their flowing water, is limited. So, too, is the number of wells and fountains, where water may be drawn. Kajirae, as is well known, though I think we are no different in this from many of our sex, delight to chat, gossip, observe, speculate, exchange views, recount anecdotes, waft rumors about, and so on. And the foremost gathering places for this sort of thing, for kajirae, at any rate, as they are not allowed in the baths unless they are bath girls, are the laundering troughs, those to which they are permitted access.

  In any event, I had hoped, at least at first, that I might, at the troughs, or fountains, or in the markets, or on the street, encounter some of those I knew from the sorority, but I had not done so.

  Then later it seemed to me that it was just as well, and perhaps better, that we not encounter one another again.

  I assumed they would not have been freed. They were comely, and it is said that only a fool frees a slave girl.

  How could I bear that they might look upon me now, in my shame and degradation, now no more than a barefoot, tunicked, collared slave? And what of them? How could I bear to look upon my former sisters, shamefully garbed, their necks clasped in the circlet of bondage?

  Yet I knew I would be thrilled to see them so, owned, but, too, so free, so natural, so alive, so basically and radically female.

  But how could I bear to have them see me, as a slave?

  It was no dog collar now buckled, and locked, about my neck, as at the party, but, on my neck, now, a true slave collar, marking me as what I now was, a true slave.

  Yet somehow, though I scarcely dared admit it to myself, I had never felt so healthy, so alive, so excited, so meaningful, so female, as here. I suppose this had something to do with the air of Gor, and the food, fresh, wholesome, tasty, and uncontaminated. But even more, I thought, it had to do with the culture, and the ethos, in which I found myself. These were so natural, so open, so innocent, so honest, so real. Here I could be what I always sensed I was. Here it seemed I had found myself. I found I loved what I was. And there was no doubt about what I was, no confusion, no uncertainty, no ambiguity. I was slave. Here, in a collar, I felt myself a thousand times more free than I had on my own world. Forgive me, Mistresses, if you are reading this, but it is true. I must speak the truth, for I wear a collar.

  Whereas the Lady Bina was extremely intelligent, she was not always well informed, nor always realistic, and, I fear, she was not always wise.

  She thought very highly of herself, and justifiably.

  But she knew very little of Gor, or, I suppose, of any other complex human world.

  From what sort of world, I had often wondered, had she been derived.

  She was certainly well aware that she was unusually beautiful.

  Indeed, she seemed to believe that she might well be the most beautiful woman on Gor.

  For all I knew she might be, but, too, I had little doubt that there were thousands of other quite beauti
ful women who entertained the same suspicion, if not conviction. It was rumored that the former Ubara, Talena of Ar, daughter of Marlenus, the current Ubar of Ar, until disowned, might have regarded herself, or been regarded by many, as the most beautiful woman on all Gor. To be sure, given all the veiling of free women, and the dispersal of the population, who can speak practically of such things? Perhaps the most beautiful woman on all Gor is in some tiny village in Torvaldsland or herding bosk on the plains of the Wagon Peoples. Too, I had little doubt there were thousands of fellows about who thought that their companion or slave was the most beautiful woman on all Gor, for any woman, even ones whose appearance might frighten tharlarion, may appear beautiful when seen through the eyes of love. No one knew where Talena might now be. A large reward had been offered for her capture and return to Ar but the reward had never been claimed. I supposed she was in a collar somewhere. Certainly if she were as beautiful as many said, it would be almost certain she would have a collar on her neck. For some fellows, Goreans, having such a woman in a collar might be worth more than what she will bring in gold, thrown stripped and shackled to the foot of a Ubar’s throne. But, of course, for others, the gold might be preferred. Much would depend on the man, and here men are the masters. I was pleased I was not Talena of Ar.