Gracefully then did he unloop, bit by bit, the silk from my left arm.
"A lovely limb," he said.
The crowd seemed quiet, intense, watchful. The auctioneer was clearly disturbed.
"Let us see if there is more of interest here," he said.
I heard an intake of breath from the crowd, but there were no bids.
We did not complete the choreography which had been planned. Much depends upon the crowd. It interacts in the drama of the block in a way that it, or many of its members, fails to understand. The auctioneer, puzzled, finally removed from my person the bands of silk. He did not spin me from them; he did not roll me from them at his feet.
"This is the woman," he said. "What am I bid?"
There was no bid.
"Look!" cried a voice. The crowd turned, and I and the auctioneer, looked as well. At the height of the center aisle, high, framed in the portal of the market hail, stood a warrior, in full panoply of war. He did not speak. He carried shield and spear. On his left shoulder hung the scabbard of the short sword. He was helmeted.
"Master?" inquired the auctioneer. His voice faltered.
The warrior did not speak.
The auctioneer indicated me, taking his attention from the figure who had recently entered the hail.
"This is the woman,"' he said, weakly. "What am I bid?"
At this point the helmeted warrior began to descend the aisle. We watched him approach.
In moments he stood, too, on the block, facing the crowd. He struck the butt of his great spear on the heavy wood. "Kajira canjellne!" he said. "Slave girl challenge!" He turned to look at me, and I knelt. I could not speak. I feared I might faint.
He turned again to face the crowd.
"I will have this woman," he said. "For her I will stand against all Ar, and all the world."
"I love you, Clitus Vitellius!" I cried, tears in my eyes.
"You were not given permission to speak!" cried the auctioneer. He lifted his whip to strike me.
But the point of the spear of Clitus Vitellius lay at his throat. "Do not strike her," said Clitus Vitellius.
"Yes, Master," said the auctioneer, white-faced, lowering his arm, frightened, hacking away.
Clitus Vitellius turned again to face the crowd of Ar. "Kajira canjellne," he said. "Slave girl challenge."
There was no response from the crowd. Then one man rose to his feet, striking his left shoulder. And then another rose to his feet and did the same, and another and another. Soon the crowd was on its feet, cheering and striking their left shoulders. Clitus Vitellius stood straight on that great platform, his great, circular shield on his left arm, his mighty spear, seven feet in length, headed in tapering bronze, grasped in his right hand. His head was high, his eyes were shrewd and clear, those of a warrior.
"She is yours, Master," said the auctioneer to Clitus Vitellius.
I knelt at his feet, joyfully. He would now free me, and take me as his companion. He put aside his shield and spear, to lift me to my feet as his equal.
"Your whip," said Clitus Vitellius to the auctioneer.
"You did not wish her whipped," he said.
"She is mine to whip," said Clitus Vitellius. The auctioneer placed his whip in the hands of Clitus Vitellius.
"Master?" I said.
"Yes?" he said.
"Are you not going to free me?" I asked.
"Only a fool," he said, "frees a slave girl."
"Master!" I cried.
"Kneel to the whip," he said.
I obeyed. I put my head down, and, beneath my body, crossed my wrists, as though they were bound. My back was bowed, ready for whatever punishment he might see fit to administer to me. I was in consternation. I trembled. Could I be still a slave girl? Could he be serious? Was it his intention to keep me still as a slave?
Surely not. Surely not!
"I would not wish you to take a loss on her," he was saying to the auctioneer. "Here is something which may cover the cost of the miserable little slave."
I heard a pouch, heavy, filled with metal, strike heavily on the smoothed beams of the surface of the block.
"The gratitude of the house, Master!" cried the auctioneer. He untied the strings of the pouch and, crying out with pleasure, spilled coins of gold to the woods. Swiftly he sorted the coins, expertly. "There are a hundred tarn disks of gold here!" he cried.
The crowd roared its approval.
I cried, tears falling to the wood of the block, mixing in the sawdust. It was ten to a hundred times, or more, what I was worth. I saw then the extent of the regard of Clitus Vitellius for me. I wept with joy.
I had not known that a man could desire a woman so much. Yet he kept me as a slave!
Perhaps it is only a slave who can be so bought and sold, and so desired.
Oh, the indescribable, incredible feeling of being owned, literally owned, by a man!
I knelt, a slave ready for punishment.
"Master is far too generous," said the auctioneer. "This is far more than the slave is worth."
"You are right," said Clitus Vitellius.
I shook with fury, but did not break the position.
"Give me the next then, too, on your chain," he said.
"No!" I cried.
He turned to face me, and, again, I swiftly lowered my head. Could he truly mean to keep me as a slave? Could he truly be that strong? I could not believe it.
"Gladly," cried the auctioneer. "Ninety-two," he cried.
The virginal girl, slender, sweetly shouldered, lovely legged, terrified, crept to the surface of the block. The bit of fluff clung about her. It did not much conceal her. Her legs were well exposed to the inspection of masters, and the sweetness of her breasts was evident, it but scarcely concealed in the wafting of insinuative, tantalizing fluff.
The crowd roared its approval, and she shrank back on the block. I wondered what men saw in her. She was herself only a bit of fluff, to rape and serve.
"Come here," said Clitus Vitellius to the girl.
Swiftly she fled to him, to stand before him.
"Position," he snapped.
She dropped to her knees before him, in the position of the pleasure slave.
"Get your back straighter," he said. She did so.
He crouched beside her and, with his belt knife, cut away the strings which held the fluff about her. It floated to the surface of the block, stirring in the slight movements of air.
He regarded the girl. He then looked, too, to me. "I will take both," he said.
"Master!" I cried in protest.
Then he stood over me, with the whip.
I looked up into his eyes. Then I was frightened. I saw that he was a Gorean master. However much he might hold me in regard, however much he might desire me, I saw that I could be to him only a helpless slave girl. Whatever might be his feelings for me I saw that he would have me only at his feet as a slave. I would be uncompromisingly owned. He would have all, fully, from me. I would not be permitted to hold anything back, ever. He would be master, and I slave. No longer did I dare to suggest that I might be freed. No longer did I dare to think it. He was Gorean.
I put my head down, kneeling to the whip.
"Forgive me, Master," I whispered.
"Once this evening," said he, "you, a slave, addressed me by my name, rather than as `Master.'"
"Forgive me, Master," I said. I trembled. I recalled I had cried out, "I love you, Clitus Vitellius!" How foolish I had been. It was a girl's mistake. It would not go unnoticed.
"Too," he said, "more than once this evening you have spoken without permission."
"Yes, Master," I said.
"Too," said he, "I think you dared to protest this evening my purchase of a girl."
I had indeed done so!
"Do you oppose your will to mine, or question my will in the least?" he asked.
"No, Master," I said.
"Do you think me an easy master?" he asked.
"No, Master," I said.
"Do you beg now to be punished?" he asked.
"Yes, Master," I said. "I beg to be punished."
I saw him grip the slave whip on the long handle with two hands. I put down my head. further, I shut my eyes, I tightened my body, I clenched my fists, held crossed, as though bound, beneath my body.
I determined to hold position.
I heard the swift sound of the leather in flight.. Never had I heard it approach so swiftly. After the fourth blow I could no longer hold position. "Tie me at the slave ring," I begged. "Put me at a post, Master!" I lay on the block on my stomach, my hands over my bead. There was sawdust on my lips and face. I could not, after the second blow, scream. Yet he struck me only ten times. I cried, lying on the block, punished. I felt him thrust a steel collar about my throat, and lock it.
I was collared. He had not been angry with me. He had only been punishing me. I had deserved a whipping. He had given it to me.
Yet it is hard for a girl to grow used to the leather. One can be a slave for years and still fear it. The Gorean master uses it unhesitantly if we are not pleasing. We know that he will do so. We are pleasing.
Clitus Vitellius had turned to the slender, virginal girl. "Do you wish to be in the least troublesome?" he asked her, lifting the whip, laughing.
"No, Master!" she cried.
He collared her, as he had done me. We both wore his collar. He knelt us together. "I submit, fully, Master," I said. "I submit, fully, Master," said the virginal girl, quickly, following my example.
The slave whip lay to one side.
"We have surely delayed the sales of the Curulean too long," said Clitus Vitellius, to the auctioneer.
The auctioneer bowed, the pouch of gold in his hand.
"Come, Slaves," said Clitus Vitellius to the two of us, naked in his collar.
He lifted his shield and took up his spear, and then descended the steps of the great block. We followed him. He ascended the long aisle leading from the hall. Men cried out his name, and cheered, and smote their left shoulders, as he passed them. He strode as a Warrior. We hurried after him, his slave girls.
"Will he march us through the streets naked?" asked the virginal girl.
"He will do with us as he pleases," I told her. "He is a Warrior"
29
A Warrior's Vengeance; The Furs Of My Master
We were but four bridges from the Towers of the Warriors when Clitus Vitellius turned suddenly, regarding me. I stopped, suddenly, naked, behind him, where I was heeling him. The virginal girl, too, stopped suddenly. But he did not look at her. He approached me. He stood before me, his shield on his left arm, the mighty spear grasped in his right hand. Immediately I trembled, and knelt, head down.
"Oh!" cried the virginal girl. He, placing the spear and shield to one side, had moved to her and was tying her hands behind her back. He fastened her by the wrists to a ring at the foot of the Four Lamps bridge. Such rings are common in Gorean cities, in public places, and serve the convenience of masters in tethering their slaves. The ring was mounted on a post, about a yard high. She stood at the post, naked, tethered there, her hands fastened behind her back, at the foot of the Four Lamps bridge. I could see the lights of glorious Ar. The light of one lamp was upon her. She was very beautiful. "Master?" she begged.
He took a blunt marking stick from his pouch and wrote Gorean words on her left shoulder.
He then, to her amazement, and mine, removed his collar from her throat.
"Master?" she sobbed.
He replaced the collar and marking stick in his pouch. "Can you read?" he asked her.
"Yes," she said.
"Read then what I have inscribed upon your body," said he.
"I cannot well see it, Master," she said. "But from the feel of it in my flesh, I know what you have written."
"Speak it aloud," said he, "Slave."
"You have written `Collar me. Own me,'" she said.
"Yes," he said.
"You are leaving me here for the first stranger who passes, Master?" she asked.
"Do you object, Slave?" he asked.
"No, Master!" she said, drawing back. The point of the spear, which Clitus Vitellius had now retrieved, was at her throat.
I then felt the point of the spear in my back. "On your feet, Slave," he said.
Swiftly I rose to my feet.
He then strode past me, and began the crossing of the bridge of Four Lamps. I hastened to follow him, heeling him obediently. I did turn, on the crest of the bridge, to look back at the tethered girl. The area at the foot of the bridge was deserted. It was late. She seemed very much alone there, naked, the light of the lamp on her, tethered, waiting for the first individual who might chance by.
I turned away, hurrying to follow Clitus Vitellius. I remembered the look he had given me when first, moments ago, he had stopped and turned, and approached me. Never had I seen such lust, possessiveness and desire in a man's eyes. I felt weak. I wondered about the service of how many girls I would have to render to him. He had cast aside the virginal girl, arrogantly, in a warrior's gesture, leaving her for whomsoever might find and desire her. Her slave service, and mine, and more, he would now want from me. I did not know if I could be so much a slave to him.
We were but a short way from the Towers of Warriors, on the second of its approaching high bridges, when again Clitus Vitellius turned and faced me.
"I cannot wait," he said to me.
"Yes, Master," I said. We were on a high bridge, one of the highest in all Ar. The lights of the city were strewn beneath us; above us burned the stars of Gor.
He placed his shield upon the bridge, straps down, its convex surface like a bow facing the stars.
He indicated that I should take my position upon it, and I did so, my head down. With the straps, brought about the sides of the great shield he fastened my wrists apart, one on each side, about at shoulder level, at the edges of the shield. I lay over the shield, bound upon it.
"Now I have you where I want you, Dina," said he, "Earth girl."
"Yes, Master," I said.
Swiftly he took me in his arms. I yielded immediately to my master.
"I love you, Master," I said to him.
His hands were upon my shoulders. He dragged me upward to his pressing mouth, pulling me against the wrist straps which held my wrists at the shield's edges. I thought he might tear me from the shield. Then he flung me back, arched across its surface. I felt his lips at my belly and thighs. I could not protect myself from the fierce ardor to which I must submit. Then again I cried out, lost in my slave's love of him, my master.
He unbound my wrists from the shield. He thrust me from its surface. I rolled to my side, on the bridge. I lay quietly on the bridge, in his collar.
"It is getting late," he said. "I must get you to the love furs."
"Yes, Master," I said.
"Get up," he said. He moved his foot against my body.
I tried to get up, but could scarcely stand. I sank to my hands and knees.
He laughed at me.
I sank to my side. I lifted my hand to him.
"Get up, Earth girl," he said.
"I will try, Master," I said.
But again I fell to my knees.
"Do not beat me, Master," I begged. "You have made me so weak."
"I can smell your weakness," he said.
"Yes, Master," I. said. I was so overcome by my love for him that I could not stand. I had never known such weakness. I felt I had the strength only to lie vulnerably before him, perhaps holding and kissing him, awaiting him. It is, I suppose, one of nature's utilities, reducing the female's effectiveness in self-defense or flight, putting her all the more at the mercy of the stronger beast.
"I cannot walk, Master," I said. "Let me crawl to your furs."
He slung his shield upon his back, and tied his spear, too, beneath the shield's edge, upon his back.
I felt myself lifted gently into his arms. He carried me, my head against his l
eft shoulder, over the bridge and toward the second bridge, leading to the Towers of the Warriors.
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