Guardsman of Gor

by John Norman

  "Yes, Master, she begs it, abjectly and fervently!"

  "It seems you are an ardent slave."

  "Yes, Master, I am an ardent slave. Please, Master!"

  "It seems you are well in your collar," I said.

  "Yes, Master. I am well in my collar! Please, Master!"

  The collar, as is well known, enflames a woman. Indeed, it is the whole of bondage, the wholeness of it, which releases and intensifies her native sexuality. A woman finds her deepest and most profound self in the collar of a master.

  "So the former Miss Henderson begs to be raped?"

  She squirmed on the tiles. She looked up at me, needfully, overcome with passion. "Yes, Master," she said. "Please, Master!"

  She was at my mercy, fully. I might satisfy her or not, as I chose.

  It is a pleasant power to hold over a beautiful, bound woman.

  "And for what sort of rape does she beg?" I asked.

  There were, after all, several sorts of rapes. None are simple.

  "For the sort of rape appropriate for her, Master—," she said.

  "Yes?" I said.

  She threw her head to the side, in misery. Her hair was wild on the tiles.

  "Must I speak?" she said.

  "Yes," I said.

  "—for the rape of a slave," she said.

  I looked down upon her.

  She turned her head and looked up at me

  "—for slave rape," she whispered.

  "You beg slave rape?"

  "Yes, Master."

  "Excellent," I said. "I am pleased to hear that."

  "What man would not be?" she asked.

  "I think I shall now kennel you," I said.

  "No, no, no!" she cried.

  "Bound as you are, of course."

  "No, no, Master! Please not!"

  "I think you are actually concerned," I said.

  She lifted her small, beautiful body to me, piteously. Her eyes were widely open, and wild. "Please, Master!" she wept. "Do not kennel me! Do not leave me! Touch me! Touch me, please, Master!"

  I then crouched down and untied her ankles, but I held them together in my hands. I felt them trying, straining, to move apart, but they could not do so. She had little leverage and, in any event, her strength was as nothing compared to mine. They would not be thrown apart until I wished.

  She thrashed, helplessly.

  "Please be kind to a poor slave," she begged.

  I lifted her ankles up from the tiles, perhaps a foot or so. I regarded them, held. They were slim, her feet were small, her small calves swelled upward lusciously. The backs of the knees were nice, too, so concave, and soft. One enjoys touching a girl there. I saw the tendons there. One of the punishments for a girl who tries to escape is the severing of those tendons. She is thus hamstrung, and crippled. No more will she run. After that, of course, she is not good for much but piteously begging for her master on street corners. Some men buy such girls and cart them about in wagons in the morning, leaving them at various corners with a copper bowl and a crust of bread, collecting them again in the evening. They set an example for others, of course, of the foolishness of trying to flee the collar. The first punishment, of course, and sometimes the second, is merely a terrible whipping. Girls learn quickly there is no escape for them. They are marked, branded. They are collared. They are tellingly garbed. The society is against them. There is nowhere to run. Most are back in their master's chains within an Ahn or so. If they elude one master they are certain to fall to another who, recognizing them as a fugitive, is likely to subject them to a bondage far more grievous than the first. Most slave girls, incidentally, are trusted by their masters, who are fond of them. Most enjoy great freedom, at least in many ways. Many have the run of cities and fields; they meet with friends, who, too, of course, will be in tunics and collars; they enjoy wandering about, frequenting the parks, at least those in which they are allowed, and long, winding, colorful streets; too, they are frequently, as they are women, as one might expect, found in markets and bazaars, stimulated by the lavish wealth of goods displayed in the stalls and on the street blankets; indeed, one of the pleasures of the markets and bazaars, from a man's point of view, at least, is glimpsing the slave girls there, graceful and well revealed, wandering about, delighted, pointing out things, exchanging views, in their twos, and threes, and fours; they assess, sometimes quite critically, and quite vocally with amused merchants, goods they cannot buy, and often observe and negatively comment, though surreptitiously, as is wise, on the taste, color sense, and foolishness of free women.

  They commonly regard themselves, at least among themselves, as superior to free women. And, in a way, I suppose there is something to be said for that, at least if free women are not present. It is they, after all, who have been chosen by men, who have seen them and wanted them. It is they who have been found exciting enough, and beautiful enough, and desirable enough, to be sought, captured and chained; it is they who have been marked slave; it is they who have been bid upon in a competitive market; it is they who have been purchased, to serve and please; it is they, not free women, who have been prized in the most profound and radical sense in which a female can be prized, so prized that men, so fiercely do they desire them, will be content with nothing less than owning them; it is they, not free women, who are tunicked; it is they, not free women, who are collared.

  They know themselves as the most attractive, exciting, and delicious of women. They know themselves the most wanted, the most coveted, of females. How could free women forgive them that?

  Why cannot a man see that they are nothing, only despicable sluts? Why should he prefer such an appetitious, shapely thing, a mere animal and property, obedient and submissive, desperately needful and helplessly sensual, fearing his whip, hoping to please him in all ways, to a noble free woman?

  They compare notes on many things, for example, on fashions, those of the free and the slave; the handsomeness of masters; the inferior quality of the new girls, stripped captures at the warehouses, being bought in by the young men from distant cities to be branded and enslaved, and so on; too, they may exchange beauty secrets, and subtle master-pleasing lore, of which slave girls know much; and, too, of course, as all women, they love to talk, and can easily wile away an afternoon, here and there, gossiping and chatting. They may have their petty jealousies and feuds, but, on the whole, for most of them, their lives are quite pleasant. Indeed, they have a great deal more freedom, in some ways, than the exalted Gorean free women. To be sure, they are owned; they are collared; they are slaves. Most free women, for example, do not need to ask permission to leave the house, need not explain their intentions and itinerary, nor need to report back by the sounding of a given ringing of the city's time bar, lest they risk a monitory lashing. And, unlike free women, naturally, they have the various pleasures of being owned, and serving at a man's slave ring.

  I considered the former Miss Henderson's ankles, securely in my grasp.

  I recalled that, long ago, as I had lost consciousness, gassed, in a cab in New York City, it outfitted as a capture vehicle, I had glimpsed one of her lovely ankles, she already having lapsed into unconsciousness, and had thought, strangely enough, at the time, I suppose, that it would look well in a loop and ring. They had not wanted me. They had wanted her, for obvious reasons. I had been accidentally associated in her abduction. That was how I had begun my journey to Gor. But now she was not theirs, but mine. I was much pleased with the exquisite judgment of the Gorean slaver. I congratulated them. Well did they know their business! The former Miss Henderson was an excellent choice. Indeed, given the opportunity, I would have picked her out myself. I was much pleased that she was now mine. I wondered if many of the Earth girls brought to Gor realized the careful screening to which they had been subjected, and the care with which they had been selected.

  Not every woman is regarded as apt fruit to be picked from the "slave orchards of Earth," or deemed suitable meat for a Gorean sales block, or acceptable for the G
orean slave band, or of sufficient interest to be owned by, and serve, a Gorean master.

  Accordingly, Gorean men have excellent stock from which to choose.

  The criteria by means of which this stock is selected and supplied, of course, are diverse, for it is well known that men differ in their tastes in women, and enjoy selecting slaves to their particular taste.

  The pens are filled with diverse riches.

  There is a plenitude of such lovely animals available in the Gorean markets, then, selected with different tastes and interests in mind. One want list I heard of requested a female Classics Scholar, between the Earth age of twenty and thirty. She was delivered within the month, naked and chained, and found that she was now to share the fate of countless women in ancient cultures, women whose lot she had feared and secretly envied.

  Gorean men, of course, want good slaves. And the slavers intend to see to it that they get them.

  From the woman's point of view, of course, she finds herself at the mercy of men of assurance, power, and virility, of a sort of which she had scarcely dared hitherto to dream. And she finds herself their slave. She soon grasps that they know what to do with slaves, and that she will fare accordingly.

  Yes, I thought those ankles would look well in loops and rings. Occasionally, I thought, I would put the little beauty in shackles. Nudity and shackles remind a woman well of her bondage.

  I lowered her ankles to the tiles, but did not release them.

  She squirmed in her bonds.

  "Are you agitated?" I asked.

  "Agitated!" she cried. "Yes, I am agitated! I am an aroused, bound slave, in the throes of her need!"

  "Indeed," said I, "you seem so."

  "Master?"

  "Poor female," I said, "how far you seem from Earth, tied with golden sandal cords. How unkindly you have been treated. Surely none but a cad would be unsolicitous of you, none but a cad would be unconcerned with your feelings, none but a cad would deny you dignity, and respect."

  "No!" she said. "No!"

  "No?" I asked.

  "Do not torture me," she begged.

  "I am a slave!" she wept. "Surely you understand that! Show me that you accept that, truly, and know it! Do you not understand? I am a slave, a slave! So do not speak to me of dignity and respect. I am in a collar! Such things are not for me! Rather for me is the pitiless, proprietary caress of the master, the kissing of the whip! I am not entitled to dignity, so grant me none. I am not entitled to respect, so show me none!"

  "Poor thing," I said.

  "Bestow upon me, rather, if you will, in your kindness, your generosity, what is more precious to me than they, what is less demeaning than they, what is more germane to my needs, and more thrilling to my blood than they, my subjection to the mastery! Forget the reverences, the courtesies, you mistakenly thought owed to me on Earth. Did you not know I was a female? Did you not know that it was I who should rather have honored you, and gratefully, for you were a male? Is the proper relation of the sexes so obscure to you? How you strove to please me! What a fool you were, dear Master! That time is over! Let it be over! It is gone. Let it be gone! This is Gor! Gor! What was she to you, that tart I once was, dear Master, that you should have deferred to her? Did you never once point to the floor at your feet, and tell her to kneel? Why not? What mistakes the men of Earth make with the women of Earth! It is no wonder the women of Earth try, in vengeance, in frustration and spite, to deprive the men of Earth of their manhood! Why does the whip not give them immediate response, the answer of a man outraged, clasping and licking with leather flames their startled, disrobed flesh? But let Earth concern itself with Earth, and Gor with Gor! Let the men of Earth, if they wish, consent to their own emasculation. Let them acquiesce nobly, with appropriate sensitivity, and understanding, to their own reduction and gelding. If castration makes them happy, who could be so heartless as to deny them this gratification? But to apply the knife, through discourse, and teaching, and law, to the innocent and unwilling is indeed offensive. Perhaps men are stupid. Can they be so stupid as not to see what is being done to them, and the motives and agendas involved, so stupid as not to see who is profiting from their diminishment or extinction? But, alas, as men come into ruin, so, too, do women. When men fall, they take women with them. When man is burned, woman perishes as well, for both are bound at the same stake. In the mingling of remains and ashes there is no victory for either. In certain relationships, a species flourishes; in others it sickens and dies, or becomes an envying, unhappy, intimidated, eroded, miasmic bog of mediocrity and conformity. Strange that those so hypocritically enamored of physiological diversity are so maniacally determined to prevent the least intellectual diversity. What is the adaptive value of an enforced unanimity, a molding of the mind more hideous than the shapings of skulls, the distentions of lips, the bindings of feet?"

  "Strange thoughts," I said, "for she whom I knew on Earth."

  "On this world," she said, "I have learned of men and women. They are not the same."

  "Do you betray your ideology?" I asked. "Are you not confused, and lost, without it?"

  "On Gor," she said, "I have learned what I am! It has been taught to me, and I am not discontent. I have learned it in a collar, and in the bracelets of a slave, and at the end of a flashing strap."

  "I see," I said.

  "Men are dominant," she said. "I am a woman. I require masculine domination. Without it I cannot know myself as a true female. Without it I cannot be complete!"

  "It sounds as though you thought women were slaves," I said.

  "In their heart, they are," she said. "But few are fortunate enough to meet their masters."

  "On Earth?" I said.

  "Yes," she smiled. "On Gor there is no dearth of masters."

  "Perhaps you misjudge the men of Earth," I said. "Perhaps they are not as weak and broken as you surmise."

  "Perhaps not, my Master. I hope not, my Master!"

  "Perhaps one day they will have had enough, and will rise, and reassert their sovereignty, and masculinity. Perhaps one day they will again be kings."

  "And masters!" she cried. "And masters!"

  "Perhaps," I said.

  "Oh, yes," she said. "Yes, yes, yes!"

  "I recall you from Earth," I said.

  "Forget me as I was on Earth. I am not as she, that little thing, any longer. Oh, yes, we may look alike! Our hair and eye color may be the same. We may be much the same weight, be similarly complexioned and figured, and such, but we are different. We are quite different! She was free. I am not! She wore no collar. I do! She dressed with reserve and concealment. I may not. She was shielded by law. I am not! She was a person. I am a property! She was a citizen. I am an animal! She might disdain men. I may not. Rather I am of a sort that is owned by them, and must fear them. She might hold men in contempt. I may not. I must kneel to them, and hope to please them. She held herself superior to male scrutiny. I may not. See me as I am! I lie before you. My lineaments are exhibited. I am assessed, nude and bound, a slave, at your feet. And I must hope that you will not be displeased. She was not branded. I am marked. She knew nothing of slave rings. I have been chained to them! She needed not fear the whip. I am subject to it! We are different! I am different! Put from your mind all thoughts of me as I was then, that sexually inert, pretentious, silly little fool! I am no longer as she! She was free! I am not! I have been embonded! Embonded! I have been in the hands of Gorean men! I have been changed! I am a slave, that, totally! Handle me then, treat me then, as what I am, a slave, only that! I beg it—Master, Master!"

  "Perhaps," I said.

  "I am a woman!" she cried. "I want a master!"

  "You have one," I told her.

  "Impose your will upon me! Dominate me! I want to obey you! See that I do, and with perfection! Be strict with me! Give me no choice! Remember the whip! Use it on me, if I am not pleasing!"

  "I will," I said.

  "I have always wanted to be mastered," she said. "I have always wanted
to love, and serve, with the sweetness of a slave, devotedly, heatedly, gladly, rightlessly, helplessly! I have always wanted bondage. I have thrilled to the feel of ropes on my body, and straps. I love to be stripped, and belled, and collared and chained. I love to kneel and serve. It gives me great pleasure to be dominated by a male, to be subject to a man's commands, and to obey unquestioningly. How right that seems! My brand is precious to me. I would not trade this lovely token of what I am for all the treasures in the house of Croesus, or the warehouses of Mintar, merchant of Ar. I have always wanted to be found beautiful, and desirable, and to be taken in hand by a strong, lustful man, one who truly wants me, one who desires me with might, and with irresistible fury and power, and, as he wants it so, and it pleases him, made his slave. I want to love, and serve. I want to be owned and prized, I want to obey a master, and be found pleasing by him. I want bondage, and I love it! Enforce it upon me, fully, Master, even when I sob, and protest, and cry out for mercy. I beg it. That is how I want to live! It is what is right for me! I cannot be complete without it! I beg to be mastered! Chain me at your pleasure, command me, put me to your slave ring, whip me when you wish. I am yours! Do with me what you will! I am naught but your slave! Oh, Master, beloved Master, master me! I beg it! Master me, Master! Please master me, Master, wholly!"

  "Have no fear, well-curved, delectable morsel of collar meat," I said, "you will know an unqualified bondage, that of the Gorean slave girl."

  Gratitude shone in her eyes, briefly, and then, suddenly, the renewed torment of her unappeased needs.

  "Have me! Have me! Take me! Take me! Be ruthless with me! I am a woman, and your slave! Make of me naught but a despised instrument of your pleasure!"

  "Is that what you want?"

  "Yes, Master! Yes, Master!"

  Could this be the former Miss Henderson, of Earth?

  How she reminded me of the helpless sluts in the paga taverns. She was no different, only another girl, only another begging, needful slave.

  "Look upon me!" she begged. "What do you see?" Then her eyes grew frightened. "No!" she said. "I see it in your eyes! They are the eyes of a master! So might a lion regard a tethered hind! You do see me then as what I am! I am frightened! I shall be shown no mercy! You see me as what I am! You see me as a slave!"