Prize of Gor

by John Norman

  ****

  “March!” came the command, a command accompanied by the crack of a whip, sudden and sharp. Ellen heard tiny cries of fear and dismay, from both before and behind her. She was then aware that she, herself, had so cried out, softly, inadvertently, involuntarily, unable to help herself. That sound, you see, the fierce, sudden crack of the whip, is not unknown to slave girls. We understand its meaning well.

  The long coffle then began to move.

  It was a large coffle, of perhaps some two hundred and fifty to three hundred girls, each stripped, each chained by the neck.

  Ellen was toward the beginning of the chain, surely amongst the first twenty or thirty on the chain.

  She did not know what had become of her party. She did not know where she was being marched.

  The march was a large one, and contained a great deal more than the coffle. There was a long train of wagons, some drawn by bosk and others by tharlarion. There were some cage wagons, perhaps carrying high slaves or women of political importance. The slaves could be seen, stripped, behind the bars. Were they high slaves that must have been humiliating for them. But then high slaves are, when all is said and done, slaves, no more or less slave than the lowliest kettle-and-mat girl. On the other cage wagons, silken curtains were drawn, within the bars. To be sure, those within, perhaps robed free women, might put out their small hands, lightly, and feel the bars on the other side of the silk. They, too, were incarcerated, as much as a stripped slave. Sometimes captured free women are given only a light, single, sliplike garment to wear. This makes them uneasy. Many soldiers, infantry, and tharlarion cavalry, accompanied the march. There may have been as many as three companies with the march, two of infantry and one of tharlarion cavalry. Independently, there were many mounted guards with the march. It was from these, presumably, that scouts and outriders were drawn. On the other hand most of these guards, mounted, tended to flank the march, distancing themselves some yards apart, on each side. They and the girls were forbidden to communicate, save that commands might be issued, whips used, and such.

  ****

  “It is a slave girl,” said a young male voice.

  Ellen stirred, awakening, on her stomach, lying in the mud, half in the water, amongst the reeds, clinging still to the wreckage of her basket.

  There were two of them, standing in the water, one on each side of her. She did not look up, but hooked her fingers tightly in the remnants of the wicker.

  “Let us see her,” she heard.

  Her fingers were then loosened from the wicker. It was then thrust away, back into the water. Her fingers dug into the mud of the shore, the water lapping softly about her. She then felt herself being turned about and put to her back.

  “A pretty little vulo,” said one.

  “Neck-ringed and all,” said the other, approvingly.

  She lay on the mud then, on the sloping surface, descending to the water, her head down and back, toward the water. There were two of them, lads.

  “Let us use her,” she heard.

  She felt her tunic thrust up. “No,” she whimpered. She felt her ankles being grasped, and spread, widely. “No, Masters, please, no,” she said.

  Last night, when Ellen had been in the water, unable to swim, fearing for her life amidst the maddened, frightened, thrashing tarns, she had clung desperately to the wicker. Free of the harness it was forced away from the birds by their very struggles, their movements creating rolling swells of water, swirling into the darkness. Too, Ellen, as she could, squirmed and paddled her float away from the turbulence. As it was dark she had no idea what might be the closest shore. She could crawl only half upon the wicker without forcing it beneath the water. After a few minutes one of the tarns, that which had been fourth in the original line, and had been the leader of the six tarns once the line had been loosed or cut, lifted itself, wings beating, a few feet from the water, only to be dragged back down by the line linking it to his fellows. But his action had begun an alignment, a pull in a particular direction. The tarn behind him tried to beat its way forward, too, and this urged the first to make another attempt. The third tarn, whose wing had been entangled in the line, turned by the motion of the second tarn had had the wing freed, the loop drawn forward and away, not without the loss of several feathers. Then, one by one, the six tarns, as though recalling the order of the train, began, following one another, screaming, to plunge and beat their way behind the first tarn. The first then lifted itself from the water, furiously beating its soaked wings, plunging down, striking the water, then sweeping up again, the wet feathers scarcely sustaining its flight. This progress was imitated by the others. Then, after a hundred yards, the train left the water, clearing it at first by only feet, the shreds of baskets dangling below two of them, splashing, dragging in the water, but then, bit by bit, climbing, they were aflight.

  Ellen was then alone, in the darkness, in the cold water.

  She began to move the wicker, as she could, in the direction the tarns had gone. That must be, she supposed, the nearest shore. The tarn is not an aquatic species, and resists being flown out of the sight of land.

  Something brushed her leg, under the water, and Ellen screamed, and tried to scramble upon the wicker, but she only forced it under the water. Then she began to struggle to follow the tarns. In the distance she could see a sloping darkness, that seemed to be a hill, and she made toward that.

  About dawn she reached the shore and lost consciousness amongst the reeds.

  She felt her ankles held widely apart. “No, Masters, please, no,” she had said.

  Her ankles were released, and she quickly moved back, away, literally into the water, drew her legs together, smoothed down her tunic, and half sat, half knelt, the palms of her hands partly supporting her body, frightened, regarding the two young men, little more than boys, who had found her.

  Though she was not a runaway, she had the fear of a caught slave.

  “She is pretty,” said one of the boys.

  “She is filthy,” said the other.

  “Let us take her back to the village and chain her with the village slaves,” said the first.

  “I am already owned!” said Ellen, quickly. “I am not a runaway. My master is Portus Canio, of Ar. We were in flight. There was an accident.”

  “We found you,” insisted the first lad.

  “Thank you for finding me,” said Ellen. “I seek news of my master, and his party, that I may be returned to him.”

  “Let us not take her back to the village,” said the first. “Let us keep her for ourselves.”

  “Surely I am too old for you, youthful Masters,” said Ellen, quickly.

  “You are not much older than we,” said one of the lads.

  Ellen supposed that that was true, but two or three years, in a female, made quite a difference. These were young males, little more than youngsters, who could scarcely grow beards, whereas she, perhaps no more than two or three years older, as she now was, was prime block material.

  “It would be hard to keep her just for ourselves, as our secret,” said the first lad. “We could keep her in the forest, chained to a tree, or in our hideout cave, but sooner or later someone would suspect, or find her. If we take her back to the village, they will take her away from us.”

  “Then we must sell her,” said the second. “And keep the money for ourselves.”

  “Please, Masters,” said Ellen. “Help me find my master. Return me to him. Doubtless he will reward you.”

  “And where is your master?” asked the second.

  “I do not know,” said Ellen.

  “You are a runaway,” said the first.

  “No!” cried Ellen.

  “Be grateful if we do not hamstring you,” said the second.

  Ellen regarded him with horror.

  “You are a slave girl, are you not?” asked the first.

  “Yes, Master,” said Ellen.

  “Should you not be kneeling,” asked the first, “as you are before
free men?”

  Quickly Ellen knelt. She kept her knees closely together. She did not wish to be used by boys. Yet she knew that either of them could easily overcome her lesser, her slight, female’s strength. They would not know that she was not a tower slave.

  But the older of the two lads splashed toward her and, with the back of his hand, lashed out and struck her across the mouth, causing her to half rise, stumble, and then fall back, some feet, to her side, in the deeper water.

  “You are too pretty for that sort of slave,” he snarled. “I have been to the fairs. I have seen them dancing in the booths, I have seen them on their leashes. Do you think I do not know a slut slave when I see her?”

  Quickly Ellen recovered her balance, turned, and knelt before them in the water, muchly where she had fallen, her knees widely spread.

  The water there, say, some three or four yards from shore, was some eight to ten inches deep. It moved about her and between her thighs. It felt chilly and gritty. Under the water she felt the mud, slippery and cold, beneath her toes and knees. A breeze came over the water. It moved her hair just a little, she felt it on her arm, and it rustled beyond her, through the reeds.

  She did not wish to be again struck.

  Her cheek still stung.

  Had they a switch or whip she did not doubt but what they would use it on her.

  She was, after all, a slave.

  She was miserable, and felt helpless.

  She was sure she could not placate them, or appeal to them, or use her vulnerability and beauty to protect herself, as she might have with a fully grown male.

  They were boys.

  What did they know of men and the women in their collars?

  The older lad motioned that she should come closer, and then cautioned her to approach no more closely.

  The water now, where she knelt, was no more than two or three inches in depth.

  She could now feel, in the mud, sand, and pebbles, beneath her knees.

  She was perhaps four or five feet from shore.

  “Pull up your tunic,” said the first lad, angrily. “On your back. Split your legs!”

  “Please, no, Masters!” said Ellen.

  She then went to her back in the muddy water. She felt it cold, in her hair. Her head was down, given the slope of the shore.

  “She is filthy,” said the youngest of the lads.

  “I like to see them spread like that,” said the older lad.

  “Please, do not use me, Masters,” begged Ellen, supine, obedient, in the shallow water, it lapping about her. “I am not yours! You do not have my master’s permission! You do not own me!”

  “No one will know,” said the second lad.

  “The condition of my body will betray your use of me,” cried Ellen.

  “You can always be drowned in the lake,” said the second lad.

  “Then you will have no money for me!” cried Ellen.

  The two lads looked at one another and grinned, and Ellen, the naive, gullible butt of their rude humor, their rustic joke, reddened.

  “What a stupid slave you are,” said the second lad.

  Ellen moaned. She, indeed, felt foolish and stupid. As though Gorean males, of whatever age, would waste so lovely and useful a property as a female slave! Better to have her a thousand times, and then, when one tired of her, give her to another.

  One of the lads then, the older, wading toward her, touched her, and she drew back, quickly.

  The slave girl cannot control her sensitivities.

  She is helpless.

  She belongs to men.

  He touched her again, and she twisted suddenly about, and turned her head wildly to the side. She felt muddy water in her mouth.

  “See?” said the older lad to the younger.

  “I see,” said the younger lad.

  “Keep your hands on your tunic,” said the older lad. And Ellen clutched the hems of the tunic tightly, the tunic up, about her waist.

  He touched her again, and she cried out, softly, unwillingly, uncontrollably.

  “See?” said the older lad to the younger.

  “Yes,” said the younger again, interested.

  “Oh!” cried Ellen.

  “This is a good slave,” said the older lad.

  “Yes,” said the younger.

  “See,” said the older, “she is ready.”

  “No!” cried Ellen.

  “Good,” said the younger.

  “Please do not use me, Masters!” Ellen begged.

  The older of the two lads grinned.

  “Sell me for coins!” said Ellen.

  “Why should we not have coins and your use?” inquired the older lad.

  “Please, no, Masters!” cried Ellen.

  “Are you a virgin slave?” asked the younger.

  “Think carefully before you respond,” said the older.

  “No, Masters,” said Ellen. “I am not a virgin slave.”

  “That can be told from the way you move, slave,” said the older lad. “No virgin slave moves like that, or not until later.”

  The older lad now knelt beside her, in the shallow water. His right hand was then on her left leg, above the knee.

  The younger lad, standing in the water, was near him.

  “I think we will enjoy you, pretty slut,” said the older lad.

  “Yes,” said the younger.

  “Beware!” cried Ellen, suddenly. “I belong to Cos! I am a property of the empire of Cos!”

  The two lads exchanged sudden glances, clearly of concern.

  “Yes,” cried Ellen. “Yes! Yes! Beware, Masters! I belong to Cos!”

  “Liar,” said the first lad.

  “See my collar, the tag!” cried Ellen.

  “You said you belonged to some fellow of Ar,” said the older lad.

  “Ar is far away,” said the second.

  “I did, but I have been confiscated. Beware, young Masters, I am now the property of Cos!”

  “You can read,” said the younger to the older.

  “A little,” said the older. He turned the collar tag and looked at it.

  “What does it say?” asked the younger.

  “Something —’in the name of Cos’,” said the older.

  “‘Confiscated’,” said Ellen.

  “Can you read?” asked the older lad.

  “No,” admitted Ellen.

  “How do you know it says that?” he asked.

  “I heard it read,” said Ellen.

  “We do not want the village burned,” said the younger of the two.

  “Get a rope from the boat,” said the older lad. He then, angrily, his hand in her hair, drew the slave to her feet, and conducted her, bent over, her head at his right hip, in leading position, onto the shore. There he knelt her, in the sand, facing away from him. Then he said to her, “On your belly, slave girl, and cross your wrists behind you.”

  The slave obeyed instantly, unquestioningly, as slaves must.

  She heard the younger lad now splashing through the reeds. In a short time he returned and her hands were bound behind her back. The rope was long enough to serve as well as a leash, and, moments after she had been ordered to her feet, some yard or so of it, rising from her confined wrists, had been looped and knotted about her throat, its free end then, some five feet or so in length, serving as a leash. Ellen knew that sometimes even desiderated slaves, before a submission ceremony, were put on a simple camp rope and led about, that they would better understand their condition and status, that of a domestic animal, but in her case the rope was not symbolic in nature, but effected a simple utility, constituting a device for keeping and controlling a girl. Ellen, bound, was led on her leash, stumbling, wading, through the reeds. A bit later she was placed in a small, flat-bottomed boat, on her belly, under a tarpaulin. In the boat were two wide, shallow, wooden buckets, each half filled with wet, glistening leeches, taken from the water, often from the stems of water plants, such as rence.

  Before being put o
n her belly in the boat, Ellen’s face, she on her knees, was almost thrust into these two buckets, one after the other, filled with twisting, inching, churning leeches, that she might see them. She shrank back, as she could, in terror.

  These creatures are utilized in some manner by the caste of physicians, not for indiscriminate bleeding as once on Earth, but for certain allied chemical and decoagulant purposes. Such creatures may also be used, of course, for less benign purposes, for torture, the extraction of information, punishment and, in the extreme, executions. The “leech death” is not a pleasant one. These creatures are not to be confused with the leech plant, which supplements its photosynthetic activities with striking, snakelike, at passing objects. It has paired, curved, hollow, fanglike thorns, associated with a pulsating, podlike bladder. The leech plant can draw a considerable amount of blood in a short time. They tend to grow in thick patches. There is not a great deal of danger from such plants provided one can remove oneself from their vicinity. They are not poisonous. Sometimes one literally uproots the plant in one’s escape, so tenacious is the clasp of the thorns. It is different, of course, if one loses one’s footing amongst them, or is thrown, naked, bound, amongst them. They are normally cleared away from areas of human habitation, from the sides of roads and such.

  Ellen was then put to her belly in the bottom of the boat, hands tied behind her, the rope on her neck, under the tarpaulin.

  “You are not to utter a sound,” said the older lad, “not the least sound, or we will put you on your back, and put a stick between your teeth and tie it there, so that you cannot close your teeth, and then bind leeches in your mouth.”

  “Yes, Master,” said Ellen, terrified.

  “There is a Cosian retinue some ten pasangs to the west,” said the older lad, working the back oar. “Their foragers came to the village yesterday, from the west. We will intercept the retinue, or find its camp. With a lantern we can follow the tracks of the verr they took. We will hide her until dusk in the forest, in our cave. We will both return to the village. Toward dusk we will take a wagon, pick her up, and take her to the camp. We can be back before morning, and no one will know, and we will have coins.”