by John Norman
But I suppose that I am as beautiful as she, thought Ellen.
And, of course, from time to time, one lane or another was emptied, as its occupants were conducted forward, or perhaps, one should say, “herded forward,” as that phrasing seems more accurate. Certainly the men who fetched them, the sales attendants, seemed more like rude herdsmen than solicitous merchants. They carried sticks, and it was not without jabbings, pokings and blows, and impatient expostulations, that they sped their linked, disconcerted, intimidated charges, those lovely, chained she-animals, forward, presumably to a final staging area prior to their sale.
Ellen was then angry with Selius Arconious. She recalled how he had looked upon her, when she had knelt in the silken enclosure, when she had lifted her wrists, and had had them tied, and had then been drawn by them, tethered, to her feet, to be led to the sales area.
“He looked upon me as an animal,” she thought. “In his eyes I was no more than a tethered beast!” Then she recalled, angrily, that that was all she was, in truth, a beast, an animal, a domestic animal, a small, sleek, exquisite, curvaceous domestic animal, who might be bought and sold. “I hate him!” she thought. “I hate him!”
Ellen was furious.
“He might have been looking upon any slave,” she thought. “How pathetic and miserable to be a slave! How glorious it would be to be free, so that I might tantalize and taunt him, that I might make him suffer, that I might make him miserable, that I might punish and torment him, if only with the glimpse of an ankle, with all the cleverness and all the power, and all the impunity, of the secure, protected free woman! But I am a slave! Such things are denied me! I cannot behave in such ways. I cannot do such things! Men have decided to own me, and will do so!”
“I hate him! I hate him!” she thought.
“Put him from your mind,” she thought, “a nothing, a lowly tarnster! You had twenty-one bids on you. You should obtain a well-fixed master. You might have sandals. You might be given a silken tunic. How pleased I am that he cannot afford me! I hate him! I hate him!”
The gong then rang again.
Ellen wondered if Louise and Renata had been sold. She had not seen them in the cages, or at the stakes, or in the lanes. That was not surprising, as there were, obviously, a great many slaves in the camp.
This was not a typical market, Ellen realized. It was not merely that it was a festival camp, for it was not that unusual to sell women on holidays, and at times of celebration, sometimes with special advertising on the public boards, and such; it had to do, rather, with the sales being conducted not by a private house, but by a state, in this case the state of Cos, the amount of merchandise being offered and the relatively brief duration of the sale, some three days, it seemed. That was not a long time in which to dispose of so considerable an amount of stock, something in the vicinity of a thousand women.
Perhaps that explained something of the urgency, the impatience, of the attendants.
To be sure, after the days of the sales, there might be some women left over. A thousand women, or so, was a great many to dispose of in three days, even if several were vended in lots.
The lane next to Ellen’s had now been emptied, and, a little later, another chain of women was introduced into it.
The lanes, it seemed, were not going in any obvious order, at least in any order obvious to the occupants of the lanes. Lanes on both sides of Ellen’s lane, nearer or farther away, had been emptied and refilled, some more than once.
“We are special,” the girl before Ellen, 116, said. This message was apparently being relayed from the girl before her, 115, who seemed pleased about the matter. So Ellen turned to the girl behind her, and transmitted the message. Ellen, too, was somewhat pleased. Apparently her lane was being held for later in the sales.
It was not difficult, upon occasion, however, to anticipate which lane would move next for a wastes bucket was passed down the lane, that the slaves might relieve themselves. This reduces the possibilities of accidents on the block, brought about perhaps by consternation or terror. Even so most blocks, in the gentle, circular depression toward their center, worn by the passing of so many small, bared feet, are furnished with sawdust. Following the passing along of the wastes vessel, over which the slaves must squat and relieve themselves in order, a girl brings a bucket and dipper with water. The slaves must then drink liberally from the large dipper, draining it, for this freshens their appearance and pleasantly rounds the belly. That liquid, of course, will not have time to pass through their body before their sale.
Ellen’s attention was drawn to a slave in the lane to her left. That slave, like the others, was linked by the left wrist to the others in her group. She, however, was red-eyed, apparently from crying. Also, on her back and elsewhere about her body there was a plenitude of stripes, which must have pained her sorely. The slave went to all fours, looking about herself, wildly. Some of the women in Ellen’s lane were conversing softly, which was permitted. “Slave girl,” whispered the slave fiercely, she in the lane to Ellen’s left, rather at her side, as the lanes were organized.
“Yes, slave girl?” said Ellen, irritably.
The woman looked at Ellen angrily.
“May we speak?” she whispered, looking about herself, presumably fearful of the presence of attendants.
“Yes,” said Ellen.
“They have beaten me!” she whispered.
“Perhaps you were displeasing,” said Ellen.
“You do not understand,” said the woman. “They have taken my clothes!”
“None of us are clothed,” said Ellen, puzzled.
“You do not understand, stupid slave girl,” said the woman. “I am the Lady Melanie of Brundisium! I am a free woman! A terrible mistake has been made! They seized me, yesterday evening! They have chained me! They think I am a slave!”
“You are pretty enough to be a slave,” said Ellen.
“I am Melanie, of Brundisium! The Lady Melanie of Brundisium! How can I convince them of this? How can I correct this terrible misunderstanding!”
“Explain the matter to the masters,” suggested Ellen.
“I tried! They beat me!” wept the woman.
“Cosians?” asked Ellen.
“Yes!”
“They do as they wish,” said Ellen. “One does not question the spears of Cos.”
“Tell me what I am to do! Tell me how to free myself!”
“Do I not know you?” asked Ellen.
The woman looked at Ellen, closely. “The slave girl!” she said.
“I know you,” said Ellen. “I can tell your voice! You are the free woman by the campfire, in the Robes of Concealment, with the necklace, and the jewels on your robes. You had me pour wine for you! You made me kneel before you!”
“Yes, slut!” said the woman.
“When you are sold, perhaps your master will give you a tunic,” said Ellen, “— if you beg prettily enough.”
“Insolent slave!” said the woman. “I shall order you beaten!”
“Not unless you have the talmit, or the switch, or unless you are first girl,” said Ellen, angrily.
“Slave, slave!” hissed the woman.
Ellen moved a bit forward, and to the side, and the woman tried to turn quickly away, but she had not detected Ellen’s intent quickly enough, and Ellen had a glimpse of what she had suspected.
“You are branded,” said Ellen, delightedly.
“No!” said the woman.
“I think you are,” said Ellen. “Show me!”
The woman, angrily, turned a little, to the side.
“Yes,” said Ellen, “you are branded.”
“The beasts held me down! I could not move! They marked me!”
“A nicely done brand,” said Ellen.
“Do you think so?” asked the woman.
“Yes,” said Ellen. “It is the common kef.”
“It is meaningless!” cried the woman.
“I do not think you will find it so,” said
Ellen.
“I am not a slave!” said the woman.
“You have been marked,” said Ellen. “You will be sold. Then you will doubtless find yourself in a collar, your master’s collar. Whether or not you will be permitted clothing, a tunic, a rag, a slave strip, will be up to your master.”
“I am the Lady Melanie of Brundisium!” she protested.
“I am not sure you have a name,” said Ellen. “Did a scribe give you a name?”
“Of course not!” she said.
“What did the scribe put on your records?”
“‘Melanie’,” she said.
“Then you have been given a name, ‘Melanie’,” said Ellen. “Your master may change it, if he does not like it. But it is a pretty name. Perhaps he will permit you to keep it.”
“It is my name!” she said.
“No,” said Ellen, “not in the sense you think. In the sense you have in mind, you have no name, no more than a tarsk. Your name, if it is seen fit to give you a name, will be whatever masters wish.”
“— if it is seen fit to give me a name?” she said.
“Have no fear,” said Ellen. “Masters commonly give us names. We may thus be the better referred to, distinguished from other slaves, summoned, ordered about, and such.”
The slave knelt and put her head down, her face in her hands, weeping.
“What a hypocrite you are,” said Ellen.
The slave looked up, tearfully. “I do not understand,” she said.
“You came unattended, unprotected, to a festival camp of conquerors, of Cosians. You sat with men, chatting with them. Do you not think they would be curious as to what might lie hidden beneath your veils? Do you not think they would speculate as to what delights might lie concealed within your cumbersome robes? And do you think they would fail to note the putative value of your necklace, the sparkle of your jeweled robes and veils? And surely you knew that hundreds of women were to be marketed. And did you not flirt with the men? Was your veil not disarranged as though inadvertently when you drank? Did you not sit in a certain fashion, turned to the side, legs together, as a slave girl might sit, if she were permitted to sit? Did you not insolently, haughtily, arrogantly, put a naked slave to your feet, and not realize that men would be curious as to what you yourself might look like, put similarly to their feet? Did you not know that your carriage, and demeanor, your pride and pretensions, might try the patience of men? Did you not know that such might tempt them to transform you into something of more interest to them, that they might consider taking you in hand and turning you into a luscious, cringing slave, pathetically begging to please in whatever manner they might desire? And do not think that I did not see the hem of your robe lifted in such a way as to bare an ankle!”
“No,” wept the slave. “No!”
“Perhaps they wondered what that ankle would look like, encircled with bangles, or thonged with slave bells.”
“No!” she protested.
“You were begging the brand! You were courting the collar!”
“No, no!”
“At least,” said Ellen, “they have permitted you some modesty.”
“What?” she asked.
“The wrists of a free woman, as I understand it,” said Ellen, “as generally the rest of her body, are not to be publicly exposed, to prevent that being the function of gloves and sleeves.”
“Yes,” said the slave, bewildered.
“You are wearing a manacle on your left wrist,” said Ellen. “Does that not conceal a bit of wrist, thus affording you some modesty?”
“Insolent slave!” cried the woman.
“To be sure,” said Ellen. “It is not a great deal.”
“I was not courting the collar!” said the woman.
“You were, obviously,” said Ellen.
“What is it like to be a slave?” whispered the woman.
“Much depends on the master,” said Ellen, warily.
“But we must serve our masters — in all ways?” she asked.
“Certainly.” said Ellen.
“Sexually?” she asked.
“Yes, particularly so,” said Ellen.
“I am not — white silk,” she whispered.
“Few of us are,” said Ellen. She did not inform the slave that she had been white silk herself, even when brought to Gor. She had not become red silk until Mirus, her master, had seen fit in his audience hall to open her for the uses of men. And Ellen recalled he had not done so in any way that might have been regarded as in a sensitive, or considerate, manner. To be sure, his use of her had been instructive, apprising her of the sort of thing that might be done to her as a slave. It had come to her as something of a revelation. Then he had sold her.
“He was polite, and feeble,” she said. “It was terribly disappointing.” She looked down, reddening. “Is this all there is to it, I asked myself. Is there no more? I remained dissatisfied. This could not be all! I was starving! And on my plate there was flung no more than the tiniest of crumbs!”
“You were not mastered,” said Ellen.
The slave looked at her, wildly.
“You should have been stripped and bound, and caressed for hours, until you shrieked with need and ecstasy,” said Ellen. “Then you should have been penetrated with all the imperious ruthlessness of the callous, self-serving master. You would then know yourself nothing and slave. Then you should have been chained for the night at the foot of his bed, that you might there, in that place, recollect your feelings, and what had been done to you, and what you now were. In the morning you would be freed to kneel, and kiss the whip, to belly, to wash his feet with your tongue. You would learn to be ordered about, to work, to serve, to obey with alacrity and perfection. You would know yourself owned, and by a master whom you know will have all from you. And that is what you want, a master who will be satisfied with nothing less than all from you. And soon you would learn to beg, and serve, with all the vulnerable, passionate intimacy of the slave. Your life would then be changed. You would find yourself dominated, and subject as any slave to the whip. I assure you you would strive to be pleasing, and in this service, and in this relationship, you will have feelings, and experiences, forever beyond the ken of the lesser woman, the narrower, colder, shallower, more inert, less awakened free woman. Your sexual fulfillment comes not from him alone or from yourself alone, but from the complementarities of nature, the male and female, the man and woman, the master and the slave, he who commands and she who, conquered, surrendered and loving, obliged to please, subject to discipline, serves, serves gratefully, zealously, lovingly, with every fiber of her owned being. In her service she is joyous; she desires to serve, fervently, and she knows that she must serve, and perfectly, whether she will or no. This reassures her and pleases her. She knows that she has been found attractive enough to put in chains. She rejoices that she has been found worthy of the collar. She knows she is the most intensely desired of all women, the female slave. She has been found exciting enough, attractive enough, desirable enough, to be enslaved, to be owned. At last she is at peace with her sex; at her master’s feet; she has come home to the collar.”
“Thank you, Mistress,” said the slave, and lay down in her lane.
“Perhaps you could call out from the auction block, proclaiming your freedom, seeking to attract the attention of citizens of Brundisium.”
“They would beat me,” she said.
“Nonetheless, you could try,” said Ellen.
“No,” she said. “I want to be sold.”
“I understand,” said Ellen. “But there might be another consideration.”
“What is that?” she asked, lying down, her head resting on her left elbow.
“If you do not attempt to call out, you may never know, thereafter, what might have happened.”
“Yes?” asked the woman.
“There might then be a lingering doubt left in your mind, that you might have been able to regain your freedom, at that one moment, before that opportun
ity disappeared forever, the price being small, only a beating, a few strokes of the lash.”
“But I do not want to be free now,” she whispered.
“But perhaps you will not fully appreciate your slavery, or understand its inflexibility, its absoluteness, unless you have made every effort to obtain your freedom, and have failed, and have come to understand the absolute hopelessness of such an endeavor. Surely then you will better understand yourself as slave. Accordingly, I recommend that you conduct this experiment, that you call out, boldly, from the block, desperately inviting rescue, zealously seeking succor.”
“Do you think I would be successful?” asked the woman, apprehensively.
“Certainly not,” said Ellen. “But in this manner you will learn the perfect categoricality of your situation and status, that you cannot alter or qualify your condition in any way whatsoever, to even the smallest possible degree, that you are helpless, absolutely helpless in all such matters, in short, that you are a complete and helpless slave.”
The woman regarded Ellen, red-eyed, her lower lip trembling.
“And if you should manage to obtain your freedom, which I assure you you will not, by calling out upon the block, that is not the end of the matter.”
“Mistress?” she asked.
“If your bondage is important to you, and you understand it as your one possibility to obtain your total fulfillment as a female, you may always again expose yourself to the risk of the collar, disarranging a veil, walking lonely bridges at night, lifting the hem of a garment, as though to avoid soiling it in puddles in the street, speaking insolently to strangers, denouncing the Home Stones of visitors to your city, accompanying ill-guarded caravans, and such.”
The gong rang again, from the vicinity of the great block. The two slaves lifted their heads, listening for the moment. The slave to Ellen’s left gazed upon the manacle on her left wrist. There was a small sound of chain. The note of the gong then faded away, with diminishing vibrations. The slaves regarded one another. Another sale had been concluded.