by John Norman
I grinned. “No,” I said. “But, on the other hand, it is well known upon the river that Kliomenes is an excellent swordsman. Surely I should be forgiven if I do not find myself eager to be spitted upon his blade.”
“Draw,” smiled Policrates.
I threw the cloak behind me and drew forth the blade which was slung at my hip. With one foot I moved aside the low table, watching Kliomenes, that he not attack me as I step upon the table, maintaining an uneven balance.
Kliomenes, I saw, noted this.
There was then silence in the hall. The pirates, feasting at the low tables, stopped eating, and watched. The girls, too, with their vessels and trays, serving, many of them nude, save for their collars and bangles, stood or knelt quietly, not moving, watching. The torches could then be heard, cackling at the walls.
Kliomenes thrust suddenly at me and I parried the blow, smartly. I did not attempt to strike him.
He thrust then thrice again and, each time, I turned aside the steel.
Men murmured at the tables. He had been too easily thwarted. Suddenly, angrily, Kliomenes attacked. For three or four Ehn he struck and slashed at me. Then, sweating, he lowered his blade, angrily. I had, of intent, particularly in the last two Ehn, parried heavily. Strength, as well as skill, is significant in swordplay, something which is insufficiently understood by many unfamiliar with weaponry. It is particularly telling if the action is prolonged.
Whereas one may turn aside steel deftly one may also, if one chooses, turn it aside with power, which necessitates an additional exertion on the part of the antagonist to return his steel to the ready position. He must, in order to protect himself, under such conditions, bring his blade back through a greater arc, and with additional speed and pressure. Similarly, as may be understood in terms of a simple simile, if one is holding an implement and it is struck with greater force it will be more difficult and tiring to return it to its original position than if it has not been struck heavily and has not been moved significantly. Sometimes, though I had tried not to make this obvious, I had, in effect, beaten his blade to the side, rather than merely turned it away.
“Obviously this man cannot be Jason of Victoria,” smiled Policrates.
Kliomenes angrily thrust his steel into its sheath. I dropped my blade, too, into my sheath. I had not attempted to respond to him, truly, but had only defended myself. Since I had limited myself only to defense, and had not risked the exposures of attack, I had been in little danger, at least for a time. It is difficult, of course, to strike a swordsman who is both competent and careful.
It is dangerous, of course, over a period of time, to rely solely on defense. For one thing the antagonist, emboldened, may press more and more dangerous attacks, far more difficult to avert than if he were subject to the necessity of protecting himself. Secondly, of course, one’s defense might falter or become imperfect, particularly over time. Obviously the consequences of even a moment’s inadvertence in the dialogue of blades could be irremediable. One who limits oneself solely to defense, and is unwilling to attack, obviously can never win. Too, sooner or later, it seems, he must be doomed to lose. There is no wall so strong that it will not one day crumble.
Kliomenes returned to his place, and I, replacing the table to its original position, returned, too, to my place.
“Kliomenes,” observed Policrates, “you seem weary.”
“I only wished to make test of him,” said Kliomenes, “to determine whether or not he knew the sword.”
“And what is your opinion?” asked Policrates.
“His skills seem adequate,” said Kliomenes.
“I thought so, too,” said Policrates, smiling.
I was grateful to Callimachus, he of Port Cos, my teacher. In long hours, from dawn to dusk, and even in the light of lamps, over the past several days, in my house in Victoria, he had labored with me, instilling in me techniques, and anticipation and reflexes, subjecting me, too, to a tutelage of apprehensions and tactics. I had proved, I think, a not inapt pupil. Yet I remained clearly aware of my limitations. A high order of skill with steel is not easily purchased. This is particularly true with the subtle differences, and dimensions and increments, which tend to divide masters.
“I only wished to make test of him,” said Kliomenes, “to see whether or not he knew the sword. I did not wish to kill the courier of Ragnar Voskjard.”
“That is clearly understood,” smiled Policrates. “Music,” then he called, “and a new dancer, and wenches to serve! Let the feast continue!”
The musicians then again began to play, the sensuous, melodious, exciting, wild music of Gor.
I picked up a leg of vulo and bit into it. I was relieved, though I gave little sign of it. Kliomenes, angrily, continued to swill wine. A new dancer came forth upon the floor and began, a tall brute near her with the leather, to perform a whip dance. Girls, some nude, some scantily clad, hurried about the tables, serving food and drink. I looked about, considering the wenches. I did not see Miss Beverly Henderson among them. I did see several, however, whom I would have been delighted to own.
“Wine, Master?” asked a redheaded girl with two leather straps wound about her body. I took wine from her, and gave my attention then to the dancer, a luscious, dark-haired girl.
In the whip dance, though there are various versions of it, depending on the locality, the girl is almost never struck with the whip, unless, of course, she does not perform well. When the whip is cracked, however, the girl will commonly react as though she has been struck. This, conjoined with the music, and her beauty, and the obvious symbolism of her beauty beneath total male discipline, can be extremely, powerfully erotic. In an elegant, civilized context, one of beauty and music, it makes clear and bespeaks the raw and essential primitives of the ancient, genetic, biological sexual relationship of men and women, the theme of dominance and submission, that man is master by blood and woman is slave by birth. Neither, too, as say the Goreans, will know their fulfillment until they become true to themselves. We can be conquered, but nature cannot. In attempting to conquer nature, we defeat only ourselves. True freedom and happiness, perhaps, lies not in denying and repudiating our nature but in fulfilling it.
“Bread, Master?” asked a blond-haired beauty, kneeling down beside me. She offered me a silver tray on which, hot and steaming, were wedges of Gorean bread, made from Sa Tarna grain. I took one of them and, from the tureen, with the small silver dipper, both on the tray, poured hot butter on the bread. I then dismissed her with a gesture of my head and she rose lightly to her feet and left, to serve another. She was unclothed.
“I would prefer,” said Kliomenes, “that he did not wear a mask.”
“Surely you must understand,” said Policrates, “that his identity must remain concealed.” Policrates gestured about himself, to the tables. “What if one here should turn traitor, and later identify and, betray our guest, say, for gold? Or, what if his features might be seen by a slave, says a mere serving wench, who might later, herself being sold or given away, inadvertently, by her reaction, give suspicion as to his identity?”
Kliomenes nodded glumly, and turned again to his wine.
“Do even the slaves here know that I am the courier of Ragnar Voskjard?” I asked.
“Of course,” said Policrates. “To celebrate your arrival, and the bringing of the pledge of the topaz, this very feast has been commanded. Indeed, even if it were not so, it is difficult to keep rumors of such matters from the kitchens and kennels. The little sluts, even in their chains, are prone to gossip and are eager for the least tidbit of news.”
I smiled.
“Meat, Master?” asked a girl, nude, who knelt now beside me. She offered a tray on which small cubes of roasted bosk, on tiny sticks, steamed. I took several, dipping them by the sticks, in a sauce, carried on the same tray. I returned the tiny sticks to the tray and looked at the girl. She put down her head. Her hair had been cut quite short, probably as a punishment. She must now, nude, offer meat
to men. It is understood, of course, in such a situation, that in asking such a question that the girl is offering herself to the male, as much, or more, than the steaming, nourishing delights on her plate. This sort of thing, incidentally, is quite common in Gorean serving. This sort of question, generally, is understood more broadly than merely being an inquiry into the male’s culinary preferences of the moment. The classical question in this respect, almost universal on Gor, is “Wine, Master?”
“Do you think, truly,” asked Policrates, “that the fleet of Ragnar Voskjard, fully rigged and fitted, can be here in twenty days?”
“I see no difficulty in the matter,” I assured him.
“Good,” he said.
I looked about, at the girls among the tables. Some, but not all, wore five steel loops on their body, a rounded, narrow collar loop, and, rounded and narrow, loops on their wrists and ankles. Such loops, in a variety of ways, can provide a variety of ties. Only a bit of binding fiber, slipped behind the loops, is required. Gorean men are sometimes ingenious in the ties to which they subject slave girls. Different ties, of course, have different purposes. One may generally distinguish among such things as control ties, discipline ties and pleasure ties. These ties are not mutually exclusive, of course.
“Grapes, Master?” said a soft, feminine voice near to me.
I looked about, but I did not react. It was the free woman, or the woman who had been free, who had been ordered from the crowd on the wharves of Victoria. I recalled her having been stripped by the pirate, and his blade at her throat. She had tied the knot of bondage in her own hair. She had been ordered to run to the galley. There I had seen her bound helplessly at its railing, her back to it, exposing her beauty, with others.
“Master?” she asked. Her voice, and mien, were deferential, and totally submissive. An incredible transformation had come over her. She was now soft, and lovely, and beautiful, a woman who was, and knew herself, owned. I wanted to take her in my arms.
She lifted the tray of grapes to me, proffering it. They were Ta grapes. I smiled. Each, I noted, had been carefully peeled. Doubtless that had been the task to which she had set that afternoon. Such trivial, painstaking tasks are often useful in teaching a woman, that she is a slave. “Master?” she asked. I wanted to take her in my arms. I permitted her to feed me a grape. Then she withdrew. I watched her withdraw. She was beautiful. She wore a snatch of yellow silk.
“I see that she pleases you,” said Policrates. “You may have her this evening, in your chambers, if you wish.”
“Perhaps,” I said. I shrugged.
The whip dance continued before us.
“Fruit, Master?” asked a girl, softly, timidly, kneeling down lightly beside me. Her head was down. She was frightened. I turned, sitting, to face her. She trembled. She did not raise her head.
“She fears you,” said Policrates, “for she knows you are the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. Too, she is perhaps intimidated by my presence, and that of Kliomenes, for we are highest in this holding.”
I smiled. Such men, of course, held over her the total power of life or death.
I regarded the girl.
There were five, narrow loops of steel locked upon her fair body, one serving as collar, and the others for her wrists and ankles. In her hands she carried, held, ripe, rounded fruit. She wore, like the girl before her, tantalizing to the eye, what might constitute a master’s conception of a garment suitable for a lovely female slave, a fragment of silk which made unmistakably clear that the beauty to which it clung, and which it made little pretense to conceal, lay fully at the disposition and mercy of lusty men. Yet it was, in its way, more demure than that which had been worn by the girl before her. In particular, as it was tied snugly, it gathered her breasts, holding them together and lifting them.
“She is a new slave,” said Policrates, “and is not yet fully broken to her collar.”
Her dark hair was coiffured loosely and high upon her head. It was bound with a braided yellow cord, strong enough to hold her wrists, should she be bound with it. If the cord were jerked loose the hair would fall, unbound, to the small of her back.
“She is exquisite, isn’t she?” asked Policrates.
I put my thumb under her chin and lifted up her head. Her soft brown eyes, frightened, met mine. There was a look in them which I had seen before, I thought, in other girls, in the eyes of a slave girl as she looks into the eyes of a master. That interested me. Then she turned aside her head, though it was still held much in place by the obdurate pressure of my thumb. She did not recognize me. Her delicate lips wore lipstick, red. There was a subtle shading of blue on her upper eyelids.
“She fears that you will find her pleasing,” said Policrates, “but yet, I think, desires that you will.”
The girl trembled.
I removed my thumb from beneath her chin, and she put her head down.
Policrates regarded her.
“Little fool,” he said, “for what purpose have you come to this table?”
The girl lifted her head then and, timidly, lifted the ripe, rounded fruit which she held in her hands, Gorean peaches and plums, to me. Her eyes met mine, and then she looked down, blushing. I then understood the purpose of the gathering of her brief yellow garment at her breasts, lifting them, sweet, rounded and swelling, for the inspection and delectation of masters. In her gesture, her offering of the fruit, it was clearly understood that she was offering to me as well the lovely fruits of her service and beauty.
I took one of the peaches and bit into it, watching her. She shuddered.
“You are dismissed,” said Policrates.
“Yes, Master,” she said, frightened, and rising quickly, lightly, hurried away, barefoot on the tiles, to serve others.
I thought Miss Beverly Henderson made a lovely slave girl.
The whip dance was now approaching its climax.
“She is a pretty little thing,” I said, looking after Miss Henderson. “What do you call her?”
“Beverly,” said Policrates.
“You are cruel,” I said, smiling, “to give her an Earth-girl name.”
“She is an Earth girl,” he said, grinning.
“Oh,” I said.
“Do you like Earth girls?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“That one is raw,” he said, “but, in time, like the others, I think she will make an excellent slave.”
“Do you think she is a natural slave?” I asked.
“Undoubtedly,” he said. “I meant that she was not yet fully trained, not yet broken fully to the collar.”
“I see,” I said.
“Kliomenes fell in with her at the tavern of Hibron, the Pirate’s Chain, in Victoria,” he said. “He immediately sized her up as slave meat. Thinking herself in delightful converse with him she informed him that her name on Earth had been Beverly. Accordingly it seemed fitting that we should put that name again upon her, though now only as a slave name, by our whim.”
“Of course,” I said.
“She herself,” said Policrates, “repudiated the assistance of a fellow desiring to extricate her from her peril, mocking and dismissing him, one called Jason, of Victoria, he to whom you bear some physical resemblance.”
“I see,” I said.
“Kliomenes did not even use Tassa powder on her,” he said “He simply bound her and carried her, struggling, to his ship.” He indicated the girl, among the tables, moving about, kneeling and serving fruit. I thought her thighs and ankles, and her back, which was much exposed, were beautiful. “She now serves us well,” he said.
I turned my attention to the dancer on the floor. She lay now on her back, one knee lifted, her arms at her sides, palms down, before the brute with his whip, who towered over her. Her head, too, was turned to the side. Then she turned her head to face the brute who tyrannized her. She looked deeply into his eyes. Then, delicately, in a graceful gesture, she turned her hands, putting their backs to the floor, exposing her palms,
and the soft flesh of her palms, to him, indicating her surrender, her submission, her vulnerability and her readiness.
There was applause, the striking of the left shoulder, from the tables.
The brute then crouched beside her and encircled her neck with the coils of his whip. He drew her to her knees then before him. She looked up at him, her neck in the whip coils, his.
There was more applause. Then the brute looked to Policrates, who indicated a table. He then pulled the girl to her feet and, running her over the tiles, and then releasing the coils from her neck, threw her stumbling into the arms of waiting pirates who, with a cry of pleasure, seized her and began to work their lusty wills upon her. There was more applause, and laughter.
I rose to my feet.
“The feast has but begun,” laughed Policrates.
“I am weary,” I said. “I think I shall retire to my chambers.”
“Certainly!” he laughed. “Your journey has been long. I shall, of course, send a girl to wash your body, and content you.”
“Policrates is generous,” I said.
“It is nothing,” he said.
This form of hospitality, of course, is common on Gor. It is common to provide a guest with a girl for the night, to see to his comfort. My compliment, nonetheless, was appropriate, as was his reply. Ritualistic amenities, and pleasantries, on such occasions are invariably observed.
He rose to stand beside me. Together we looked about the tables, at the various girls, slaves, nude and partially clothed, who served there.
“Take your pick of the wenches,” he said.
I looked about, at the girls, attending dutifully to their serving, many of them not even conscious of my attention. One of them could discover later that she had been selected to be sent to my chambers for the evening.
“Tais is interesting,” said Policrates. A dark-haired girl quickly averted her eyes from ours, putting down her head and hurrying to pour wine nearby. Two silver chains ran from a large loop on her collar to her wrists. The snug metal bracelets there were jeweled.
“There is Relia there,” he said. “Consider her.” He indicated another dark-haired girl. She wore a long, lovely red gown, but it had been pulled down about her waist. She carried a tray of tiny cups, filled with liqueurs. She was willowy and sweetly-breasted. A silver collar graced her throat.