Magicians of Gor (65 page)

you away, hurrying you back to your proper business.”

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“Tuck the note in your tunic,” I said. “Deliver it when the opportune moment

arises.”

“Yes, Master,” she said. She kissed the note, and then thrust it into her tunic.

“It is a well-written note,” I said.

“Thank you, Master,” she said. She herself, as it had turned out, had written

the note, it compliant, of course, with my directives and objectives. Marcus and

I had struggled with the note for a time and then, for all practical purposes,

had given it up. Lavinia had then composed it. It was sensitive, lyrical,

tender, poignant and touching, the desperate, pleading letter of a highly

intelligent, profoundly feminine, extremely vulnerable, extremely needful woman

hopelessly in love, one eager to (pg. 382) abandon herself and to surrender all

to the lover. Both Marcus and myself were astonished that Lavinia did such an

excellent job with it. It was almost as though she were writing the letter in

her own behalf, and not as part of a plot. Only Phoebe had not seemed surprised,

but had merely smiled. She did make a couple of suggestions, about the formation

of certain letters, but, as it turned out, such things were common in the

cursive script of Ar, a point in which Marcus concurred with Lavinia. The script

of Ar’s Station is, apparently, for the most practical purposes at any rate, the

same as that of Ar. There are some differences in speech, that is, in accent,

but even they tend to be negligible. For example, whereas Marcus’ speech would

have attracted immediate attention in Tyros or Cos, or even in the western Vosk

basin, it attracted little, if any, attention in Ar.

“You understand why I did not permit the fellow to cuff you, do you not?” I

asked.

“To protect me, Master,” she said.

“Not really,” I said. “There are other sorts of points more involved. First,

there is a consideration of fittingness. For example, whereas others,

particularly on certain occasions, and in certain circumstances, may, and should

discipline you, this did not seem to me to be such an occasion, or such a set of

circumstances. For most practical purposes, you see, you are primarily mine to

cuff, or beat, as I might please, and not others.”

“Yes, Master,” she said, swallowing hard.

“Secondly,” I said, “I do not want you to present yourself before our quarry

with, say, a scarlet cheek, or a swollen bloodied lip, such things. Such might

provoke distractive speculation.”

“I understand, Master,” she said.

I glanced down Aulus, to the palanquin, still in its place. “You speed about,” I

said to Lavinia. “Our quarry will be along shortly. His conversation with the

lady in the palanquin, although she is perhaps unaware of it, is about to

conclude.”

“What if I cannot do it, Master,” suddenly wept Lavinia.

“I do not understand,” I said.

“What if I should die of fear, not even daring to approach him?”

“I am prepared to take that risk,” I told her.

“Master!” she said. “I am serious!”

“I doubt that you can manage it to die of fear in this business,” I said, “but

if you should manage it, I shall just have to find another girl.”

(pg. 383) “I see,” she said.

“So, rest easy,” I said. “As you see, there is nothing to worry about.”

“I am much set at my ease,” she said.

I crouched down before her.

“What are you?” I asked.

“A slave,” she said.

“What else?” I asked.

“Only that,” she said. “A slave, and only that.”

“That is what you must remember,” I said to her, softly. “When he approaches

remember that, and its truth, in your mind, your heart and belly, that you are a

slave, and only that.”

“I see, Master,” she smiled, through tears.

“I do not think you will fail,” I said, “and if you do, do not fear, you will be

severely beaten.”

“I do not think I will now fail, Master,” she smiled.

“Good,” I said, standing up.

“You are so kind,” she said.

“It seems you do wish to be beaten,” I said.

“No, Master!” she said.

Then I waved my arm, back down Aulus street. “Do not dally here, slave girl,” I

said, loudly. “Be off. Be about your duties!”

“Yes, Master,” she said, springing up, and hurrying back down Aulus.

I had decided that it would be better for her to carry the note in her tunic, in

order that it not attract attention. The free man, for example, had noticed it.

It had been all right for her to carry it in her hand, I had thought, when we

had hoped that she would be able to deliver it almost immediately, say, behind

the theater, but it seemed now she would have to wait a little, say, until our

quarry reached Tarn Court, which, if had anything to do with it, would not be

long.

I turned and looked at the palanquin. In a moment I was beside it.

“One side,” I said to the handsome interlocutor standing beside the palanquin.

“Oh!” said the woman within it, drawing back.

“I feared this,” said the free fellow I had talked to earlier, up the street.

The handsome interlocutor, our quarry, of course, did not interfere, but stood

back. Had I insisted on it, he must kneel. He was slave.

“What is the meaning of this!” exclaimed the woman, hastily raising her veil,

holding it about her face.

(pg. 384) “This fellow,” I said, indicating the free fellow with whom I had held

brief converse but a moment or so ago, “interfered with the progress of a state

slave.”

“Be off!” said the woman.

“I thought you would like to know that,” I said.

“Pummel him!” she said to the free fellow.

“That might not be wise,” he said. He glanced to the other free fellow with the

palanquin. Their exchange of glances suggested that his fellow fully

corroborated his speculation.

“Will no one protect a free woman?” she inquired.

The handsome interlocutor, at this point, seemed for a moment undecided. He

might even have been considering the wisdom, all things considered, of hastening

forward. I said to him, rudely, I fear, considering his indubitable fame and

talent, controversial though the latter might be, “Kneel!”

Immediately he did so.

“Oh!” said the woman in dismay, seeing the handsome fellow put to his knees.

The two fellows with the handsome fellow, both free men, started forward a

little at this point, but I threw them a welcoming, menacing glance, and they,

looking to one another, decided to remain in the background. After all, on what

ground should they object to a legitimate command issued by a free person to one

who, after all, was but a slave?

“Attack him!” said the woman to the free men with her.

“He is armed!” said the fellow I had met earlier.

Actually I was not armed today, as I was not in uniform, not wearing, that is,

the armband of the auxiliary guardsman, and I did not want to be stopped by

guardsmen, line or auxiliary, as being in possible violation of the injunction

against unauthorized weapons in the city, that injunction which placed a

populace at the mercy of anyone armed. When I had reached to my tunic earlier,

of course, I had merely meant to convey the suggestion to the fellow that I had

a concealed weapon there. This suggestion he, a bright fellow, had been quick to

accept. To be sure, had I been really armed, I would not have cared to be he,

calling the bluff.

“Be off!” cried the women. “Or I shall set my bearers on you!”

“You would set your slaves on a free man in the streets?” I asked.

Her eyes flashed.

“Who are you?” I asked.

“That is none of your business!” she cried.

“It will surely be of interest to guardsmen,” I said.

(pg. 385) “Go away!” she cried.

“They will wish to ascertain what person ordered slaves to attack a free man, an

innocent fellow merely engaged in reporting a misdemeanor.”

“Begone!” she cried.

“Besides,” I said, “if I disembowel a couple of these fellows, how will you get

home? I do not think that you would care to walk through the streets, perhaps

soiling your slippers.” The slippers were well worked, colorful and intricate

with exquisite embroideries. Slave girls, on the other hand, commonly walk the

streets, barefoot, sometimes with something on an ankle, usually the left, a few

loops of cord, an anklet, bangles, a tiny chain, such things.

“Also,” I said, “what were you doing here, accosting a male slave?”

“Oh!” she cried, in anger.

“Do you not think guardsmen will be interested in that?” I asked.

“Beast!” she said.

“But then perhaps you are a slave girl,” I said.

“Beast!” she said.

“Are you branded?” I asked.

“No!” she said.

“Why not?” I asked.

“Sleen! Sleen!” she cried.

“Then I gather you are not branded,” I said.

“No,” she said, “I am not branded!”

“I see,” I said. “Then you are an unbranded slave girl.”

“Sleen!” she wept.

“There are doubtless many of those,” I said.

“Sleen! Sleen!” she cried.

I reached to her veil, and tore it away, face-stripping her. She seized the veil

in my hands but, as I held it, she could do nothing with it. Indeed, she could

not, as she held the veil, even draw her hood more closely about her features.

She looked at me in disbelief, in astonishment, in fury. Her features, though

distorted by rage, were of interest. They were well formed, and exquisite. “You

are very pretty, slave girl,” I said.

She released the veil, cried out with misery, turned about in the palanquin, and

threw herself down in it, covering her face with her hands, hiding it from me.

Her head was now toward the foot of the palanquin, and her knees were drawn up.

This well displayed her curves to me, even beneath the robes of concealment.

“You apparently have an excellent figure,” I said to her. “It would be

interesting to see how it might look in a bit of slave silk.”

(pg. 386) “Take me home! Take me home!” she wept.

One of the free men with her, the one with whom I had earlier held converse,

signaled to the bearers, and they lifted the palanquin. Soon it was on its way.

He drew shut its curtains as it moved down the street. But I did not doubt but

what he, too, before he drew shut the curtains, had formed some conjecture of

his own on the lineaments within, and how they might appear if properly clad, in

slave silk.

I glanced to the fellow kneeling there on the stones. “You may rise,” I informed

him.

He stood up.

“Kneel,” I said to him, sharply, angrily.

Immediately, startled, he went again to his knees.

The two fellows with him started forward, but I warned then back with a look.

“Do you not know who that is?” asked one of them.

“A slave,” I said. Then I turned to the slave. “Let us now try this again,” I

said. “You may rise.”

“Yes, Master,” he said. “Thank you, Master.”

He then rose properly to his feet, humbly, permitted.

More than one person about gasped.

I think, as well, that this was not a familiar experience for the fellow.

The slave, of course, need not verbally respond to all such permission, and

such, but it is expected that his behavior will be in accord with the decorums

of obedience.

“You may continue on your way,” I said to the three of them, releasing them from

the custody of my will.

“Come along,” said one of the two fellows to the slave. The three of them then,

together, lost little time in making their way down Aulus street. I noted that

the fellow had not responded deferentially to the summons to come along, but

then, I did not think that was my business. If the two fellows were disposed to

treat the slave as though he might not be a slave. I did not think that that

need be considered my concern. The interaction had not taken place, with me, for

example. Also, of course, I had upon occasion, though quire infrequently, to be

sure, on this world, remarked an instance in which a slave had seemed to me at

least minimally deficient in deferentially to a master. In such instances, of

course, one does not desire to usurp the prerogatives of the master, even if he

is a weakling. One may always hope that he will eventually understand what must

be done, and reach for the whip. Needless to say, all Gorean slave girls find

themselves sooner or later, perhaps after a renaissance of manhood in the

master, or a new sale, or (pg. 387) some change of hands, kept under perfect

discipline. It is the Gorean way. Only one can be master. The fellow did turn

once, and look back at me, as though puzzled, and then, with the others, he

continued on his way. I suspect he had not been reminded that he was a slave for

a very long time. Perhaps Appanius had let that slip his mind. In my opinion,

that would have been a mistake. At any rate I had seen no reason for doing so,

particularly in the light of my plans. I did not think it would take them long

to reach Tarn Court. Also, as I had cut short the fellow’s conversation with the

free woman in the palanquin, I had surely saved them a little time. I neither

expected, nor wished, thanks for this, however. Briefly I recollected the free

woman in the palanquin. Surely I had given her something to think about. Perhaps