Conspirators of Gor (66 page)

I recalled that the former Lady Persinna of Ar had sold for more than I, considerably more.

“You are heartless,” I said to Desmond of Harfax. “You have tied her too tightly!”

I was suddenly cuffed, struck to the dirt. I looked up at him, frightened. The left side of my face stung, terribly.

“We leave,” said Astrinax.

“Proceed,” said Desmond of Harfax. “We shall join you shortly.”

I struggled to my knees, and watched our party proceed down the trail. Once Jane and Eve looked back at me, frightened. They were last in the march. Trachinos, who held the leash of the former Lady Persinna of Ar, was forward. This was, I supposed, that the leashed slave would be prominently displayed, to make it clear that she was not being concealed, or such. One might suppose, then, that our party would be amenable to returning her, now captured and helpless, to her rightful owner or owners. Astrinax and the Lady Bina were also forward.

I looked up, at Master Desmond.

“Why did you speak as you did?” he asked.

“I hate you,” I said.

“I find it difficult to understand you,” he said. “Perhaps it is because you are a barbarian.”

“Do you find it difficult to understand Jane and Eve?” I asked.

“No,” he said.

“They are barbarians,” I said.

“True,” he said.

“Why, then,” I asked, “am I so difficult to understand?”

“I do not know,” he said.

“I thought it was easy for a man to understand a woman who was in his collar,” I said.

“You are not in my collar,” he said.

I looked up at him, tears in my eyes. “Am I not?” I said.

“You are jealous of Mina?” he said.

“Perhaps if I were in a camisk,” I said, “you would find me more attractive.”

“Your tunic,” he observed, “conceals little.”

“Our party advances,” I said.

“Do not concern yourself,” he said.

“I loathe you, I hate you,” I said.

He looked down at me, thoughtfully.

“What are you going to do with me?” I asked.

“Perhaps bind you, hand and foot,” he said, “and leave you here, on the trail, for larls or sleen.”

“You cannot do that,” I said. “I am not yours! I belong to the Lady Bina!”

“I could do that,” he said. “But I would not do it.”

“Why?” I said.

“Because,” said he, “you are not mine. You belong to the Lady Bina. Too, you are in my care.”

“Yes, Master,” I said.

“I could, though,” he said, “give you a good lashing with my belt. I think you would profit from such a lashing.”

“I trust that you will not do so,” I said, uneasily.

“You said that you and Mina were sold together,” he said.

“Yes, Master, many months ago, in the Metellan district.”

“It is strange that she would have been sold in the Metellan district,” he said.

“How so?” I asked.

“She is quite beautiful,” he said.

“But not so strange that I would have been sold there?” I asked.

“She brought a higher price,” he said.

“Yes,” I said.

“Much higher?” he asked.

“Yes!” I said.

“I begin to see your concern,” he said.

“Master is perceptive,” I said. “Please do not strike a kneeling slave!” I said.

He lowered his hand, and I breathed more easily. I could still feel his former blow.

“You regard yourself as far inferior to her?” he asked.

“I merely, as a pitying slave,” I said, “dared to call attention to your cruelty, your heartlessness, the way you bound her wrists behind her.”

“It is merely the way one binds a slave,” he said. “It is not done with excessive cruelty. It is merely that a slave is to be made utterly helpless, that she be bound with perfection, and that she will know herself utterly helpless, and bound with perfection.”

“I see,” I said.

“She has more body than you,” he said, “but I do not see that you are all that inferior to her.”

“Oh?” I said, angrily.

“You are generally worthless,” he said. “You are stupid, vain, petty, selfish, deceitful, and, if the opportunity should present itself, I fear dishonest. I have serious reservations concerning your character.”

“I am not stupid,” I said.

“Still,” he said, “your face and figure, and something indefinable about you, are not without interest.”

“I rejoice,” I said.

“Remove your tunic,” he said. “I want to see you in nothing but your collar.”

“Surely Master has seen me often enough in the slave wagon,” I said.

“In nothing but your collar,” he said.

“You would have me strip myself here, in the open?” I asked.

“Now,” he said.

I slipped from my tunic, a slave.

I straightened my body. “Is Master pleased?” I asked, acidly. “No!” I cried. “Please, no!”

Then I was kneeling down, head down, to the dirt, muchly cuffed, twice kicked. “It is my hope that Master is pleased,” I wept.

“You had best hope that I am pleased,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” I wept. “Yes, Master!”

“We shall see,” he said.

“Master?” I said.

“Perform,” he said.

“Please, no, Master!” I said.

“Roll about,” he said. “Writhe! Pose. Assume attitudes. Display your limbs! Various positions. Show what you have, slave! Perhaps someone will buy you. Perhaps you will not be beaten. Perhaps you will not be thrown to sleen!”

The dust, scattered and stirred, was wet with sweat and tears.

“More!” he said. “More frenziedly, more pathetically, more wildly, more boldly, more violently, more desperately!”

“Yes, Master,” I wept.

“And so,” he said, “the slave performs before the loathed, hated master, frantically hoping to be found pleasing.”

“I do not hate you Master!” I cried out, an outburst breaking from my tortured body.

“Enough,” he said, angrily.

I crawled to him on my belly, weeping. I pressed my lips to his boots and kissed them, again and again.

“I do not hate you, Master,” I said. “I love you!”

“Your hair is growing out,” he said.

“I love you,” I said. “I love you!”

“Of what worth is the love of a worthless slave?” he asked.

“Of no worth, Master,” I said.

I rose to all fours. I dared not meet his eyes.

“Garmenture,” said he. “And fetch your pack. We must join the others.”

Shortly thereafter I stood on the trail. I was now tunicked. I stood very still. Our party must be a pasang, or so, ahead. He adjusted the pack. That is sometimes done.

“I do love you, Master,” I whispered to him. “I think I have loved you since the Sul Market, in Ar, when I was half-stripped, with my wrists bound behind me, and you, a stranger, ordered me to my knees before you.”

“I see,” he said.

“I looked up, and feared you were my master, and, I fear, I desired it so.”

“I see,” he said.

“And perhaps,” I said, “as you gazed upon me, a kneeling slave, with your master’s appraisal, you wondered how I might appear, naked, chained at a slave ring.”

“That sort of thing is common with any fellow,” he said, “looking on any woman, slave or free.”

“Yes, Master,” I said.

“And,” said he, “as you were at the time, that conjecture required little imagination.”

“Did my performance please you?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said.

“You made me perform well,” I said.

“That was my intention,” he said.

“You humiliated me,” I said.

“You enjoyed it,” he said.

“Oh?” I said.

“What woman does not enjoy displaying herself, naked, as the slave and slut she is?” he asked.

“It is my hope,” I said, “that the Lady Bina will give me to you, or sell me to you.”

“Do not concern yourself with such things,” he said.

“Such thoughts occur to a slave,” I said.

“Matters of moment abound,” he said.

“Please care for me,” I begged.

“Though you be but a slave,” he laughed.

“Though I be but a slave!” I said.

“We must hasten, to rejoin the group,” he said.

“Master!” I begged.

“Slave girls are unimportant,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” I wept.

“One does not care for the female slave,” he said. “She is no more than a beast. For her it is the whip, bonds, the collar, service, ownership, work, and the inordinate pleasures which she must frequently and unquestioningly provide.”

“Yes, Master,” I said.

“Why else do you think women are collared?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Surely you learned such things in the slave house,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” I said.

“What was your name when free?” he asked.

“Allison Ashton-Baker,” I said.

“Well,” said he, “does the former Allison Ashton-Baker understand these things?”

“Yes,” I said, “Master.”

“Heel,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” I said, and hurried to follow him, a bit behind, on the left.

* * * *

We made our way along the trail.

We were well behind the party, but I had little doubt that we, a free man and one slave, might shortly overtake it, possibly within the passage of an Ahn. The Lady Bina was robed, though less decorously than would have been thought proper in Ar, and Mina, our captive, was leashed and bound. Such things commonly reduce the speed of a march. Moreover, the party would presumably proceed slowly in this unfamiliar terrain, and certainly with the Crag of Kleinias in the offing, rearing up before them, into the sky.

“I am lovely, am I not?” I asked Master Desmond.

“Yes,” he said, “and vain, and such.”

“Might I not now bring a good price?” I asked.

“Forget about Mina,” he said.

“Master!” I begged

He did not look back.

“I would suppose so,” he said.

“Better than Mina?” I said.

“Do not be absurd,” he said.

“Might Master bid on me?” I asked.

“Many men might,” he said, “who did not know your true nature.”

“My true nature?” I said.

“Your pettiness, and such,” he said.

“My belly wants you,” I said.

“Do slave fires burn there?” he asked.

“Not yet,” I said. “I do not think so.”

“It is easy enough to ignite them,” he said.

“Ignite them!” I said.

“No,” he said.

“You did such things to me in Ar, by Six Bridges,” I said, “with your kiss, your touch.”

“It is pleasant to do such things to a slave,” he said, “to render her helplessly responsive, whether she wishes it or not.”

“I wish it, Master,” I said.

“Even a petty slave,” he said, “of little worth, may bring a good price if she kicks, and squirms, and gasps and moans, and writhes well.”

“Allison begs Master for his touch!” I said.

“You are in my care,” he said.

“No one would know!” I said.

“I would know,” he said, “and the slave would know.”

“Oh, yes,” I said, angrily, “honor! Honor!”

He did not respond, but I saw a fist clench.

“But Master is tempted, is he not?” I said.

“Yes,” he said, “Master is tempted.”

I smiled to myself, and was well satisfied with this answer.

We continued on, and then he said, “Do you think you would be any good in the furs?”

“I would do my best to be pleasing to my Master,” I said.

“So, too,” said he, “would any slave.”

“Yes, Master,” I said.

After a time, I called out, “I think Master would bid on me!”

“Perhaps,” he said.

“Hold!” he said, stopping. “Ahead!”

“Yes, Master,” I said.

Ahead, on the trail, was our party, Astrinax; the Lady Bina; Lykos; Trachinos, his leash on Mina, the former Lady Persinna of Ar; Akesinos, the confederate of Trachinos; and two slaves, bearing packs, Jane and Eve.

With them, before them, and about them, were several other figures. Several of these figures were human. I recognized Kleomenes amongst them. Several were not human. They were large and shaggy. Some carried long-handled, double-bladed axes. These were Kurii.