Savages of Gor (28 page)

"A boxlike device was then placed near my head," she said. "It was hinged at one end and, on the other side, where it opened, there were matched, semicircular openings. My head then, by the hair, was placed in this box, and it was closed, enclosing my head, and shutting snugly about my neck. This opening was then further closed by wrapping thick cloth about my neck and thrusting it up, so that it filled the space between my neck and the edges of the now closed semicircular openings."

"Interesting," I said.

"My head enclosed in the box," she said, "I heard a car being driven away. It was doubtless my own, driven by the fellow with the chain."

'That is quite likely," I said. "He would wish to have means to return to the city and, of course, it would be important to abandon or dispose of the car far from the scene of the abductors' rendezvous."

"And I must remain behind," she said, bitterly.

"Of course," I said. "You were then only a delivered capture."

"A gas was then entered into the box," she said. "I tried to struggle. A man's foot held me in place. I lost consciousness I awakened, I do not know how much later, in a grassy field on this world, chained by the neck with other girls."

"Interesting," I said. "I do not know, but you may have been stored for a few days, perhaps even a few weeks."

"Stored?" she asked.

"Yes," I said, "perhaps hibernated. Then, when the order was complete, it could have been shipped in its entirety."

"You speak of me as though I might be an object," she said, "a mere commodity."

"You are," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I thrust the slave tunic up and then, pulling her to a sitting position, I pulled it off, her arms rising, over her head.

"Do you object?" I inquired.

"No, Master," she said. "I may not object. I am a slave."

I cast the scanty garment to the side, on the grass.

"Lie down," I told her, "on your back, with your arms at sides, the palms of your hands up, facing the moons of Gor."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Lift your left knee, slightly," I told her.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I stood and looked down at her.

"I now lie exposed before you, as a slave, Master," she said.

"Is that fitting and proper?" I inquired.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Why?" I asked.

"Because I am a slave," she said.

"The answer is correct, and suitable," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Are you a new slave?" I asked.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"That is incorrect," I said.

"Master?" she asked.

"The only sense in which you are a new slave," I said, "is that it has not been long since your legal imbondment."

"Master?" she asked.

"For years, you have been a slave," I said, "only one who was not yet properly owned, a technicality recently remedied on Gor."

She looked up at me.

"This is what, implicitly, in effect, your aunt was recognizing," I said, "though perhaps not fully consciously. It seems to have been recognized even more clearly by your former superior, the female executive. She dressed you, and treated you, did she not, as, in effect, a slave?"

"Yes," said the girl, angrily.

"I think," I said, "in spite of other possible considerations and advantages which might have been involved in her behavior attitudes, she was trying to be kind to you, trying make it clear to you what you were, trying to encourage you to be true to your own nature."

"Perhaps!" said the girl, angrily.

"You like pretty clothes, do you not," I asked, "and like to be attractive to men."

"Yes!" she said.

"On Gor," I said, "as opposed to your world, It is customary to enslave slaves."

She looked up at me, angrily.

"On Gor," I asked, "have you been branded, and enslaved."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Why?" I asked.

"Because I am a slave?" she asked. "Yes," I said.

She turned her head, angrily, to the side.

I looked down at her. She was exquisitely beautiful. I did not doubt but that Grunt could get five hides of the yellow kailiauk for her.

"Look at me, Slave," I said.

She regarded me, quickly. "Yes, Master," she said.

"Slaves such as you, on Earth," I said, "not legally imbonded, often use their beauty to their own advantage. It opens doors. It smoothes ways. It makes things easy for them. They use it to further careers, to buy wealth, and to belittle other women."

"Yes, Master?" she whispered.

"But here, on Gor," I said, "Things are quite different."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Here, on Gor," I said, "your beauty is owned, and fully, as are you."

"Yes Master," she said.

"To whom does your beauty belong, on Gor?" I asked.

"To the master," she said.

"Yes," I said, "and it is he, not you, my dear, who will decide what is to be done with it, fully, and how it is to be used."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Your palms," I said, "have them facing upward, to the moons of Gor."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Have you had your slave wine?" I asked.

"Ginger, one of my Mistresses," she said, "forced me to drink a bitter beverage by that name."

"Why has your Master, Grunt, sent you to my blankets?" I asked. "Why has he himself not seen fit to open your slave's body to the pleasures of men?"

"I do not know, Master," she said.

I crouched down beside the naked body of the former Miss Millicent Aubrey-Welles, who had been a debutante, now that of a mere slave, supine on my blankets.

"What are the duties of a slave?" I asked.

'They are complex, and manifold, Master," she said.

"Speak generally," I said.

"We are to be absolutely docile," she said, "totally obedient and fully pleasing."

"Are there any qualifications to that?" I asked.

"No, Master," she said, "There are no qualifications. We are slaves.

"And are you prepared to fulfill the duties of a slave?" I asked.

"Yes, Master," she said, "and I must, Master, for I am a slave.

"The answers are correct, and suitable, Slave," I said.

"Thank you Master," she said.

"I am to take your virginity," I said. "You understand that?"

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Would you prefer that your virginity would have been taken from you while you were a free woman?" I asked.

"No," she said, "rather as a will-less slave, as I am now subject to the decision and imperious will of a strong master."

I held my hand, opened, a bit above her left breast. She arched her back, pressing that marvelous, lush contour of her enslaved softness against my hand. I did not move my hand. She lay back, tears in her eyes. "You well know how to humiliate a slave, Master," she said. I smiled. The test had been an interesting one.

"Do you think, in time, you will prove to be a hot slave?" I asked.

"Hot?" she asked.

"Yes," I said, "responsive, sexually vital, owned, helplessly and uncontrollably passionate."

"I do not know, Master," she said. "What if I do not?"

"Then you will presumably be slain," I said.

She shuddered with terror.

"But do not fear," I said. "Most masters are patient. You will, most likely, have a month or more in which to develop the appropriate secretions and spasms!'

She looked at me, with misery.

"I do not think it is anything to worry about, really," I said. "Most girls, under the circumstances, find very little difficulty in becoming passionate female slaves. Too, the entire Gorean milieu contributes to the development of passion in the female slave. She is dressed in a certain way, for example; she is commonly collared; she is subject to discipline; her performances are commanded, and subject to scrutiny and improvement, and so on. The main thing is to attempt to be fully pleasing to the Master, in every way. Too, you will commonly have a gauge of your progress; if your master is not pleased you will be beaten or whipped."

"I see, whispered the girl.

"I have seen girls such as you before," I said. "They commonly develop into the hottest of slaves."

She trembled, frightened.

"Remember," I said, "it will be to your advantage to be a hot slave, and, indeed, the hottest slave you can be. This will make you more pleasing to your master, and to those to whom he, at his caprice, consigns you."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"The true wonder in these matters," I said, "and what seems most delightful to me, is the way, gradually, the girls heat begins to develop from within, until she is transformed, in effect, into a needful slave. She is then, of course, not only legally and physically at the mercy of men, but needfully, as well."

"How much a slave she would be then!" exclaimed the girl.

"No one claims that the Gorean slave girl has an easy lot," I said.

"How piteous to be such a girl!'' she said. "Surely men would have mercy on her!"

"Perhaps," I said, "if she is sufficiently beautiful, and sufficiently pleasing."

"Do you think I will develop such passion?" she asked, frightened.

"Yes," I said.

"Do you think, then," she asked, "that men might be moved to show me mercy?"

"You already begin to sense what you might become, do you?" I asked.

"Yes," she whimpered.

"It is a good sign," I said.

"Do you think that if I became such a girl, Master, men might show me mercy?" she asked.

"Perhaps," I said, "if you were sufficiently beautiful, and sufficiently pleasing."

"I would try to be both," she said.

"You are a slave, aren't you?" I asked.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"I think it likely that you would be shown mercy, at least upon occasion," I said. "But you, yourself, in a few weeks, will better know the answer to your question."

"In a few weeks?" she asked.

"Yes,"' I said, "when you find yourself on your knees at the feet of a man, or on your belly, crawling to him, to lick his feet, to beg his least touch."

I then, gently, began to caress her. In a few moments, interestingly, she began to moan.

"I am a slave," she whimpered, looking up at the stars, the Gorean moons.

"You may now request your fulfillment," I informed her.

"I request my fulfillment, Master," she said.

"I will be gentle with you this time," I said, "but sometimes, you must understand, you will be used quite differently, for example, with contempt or scorn, or brutality, or cruel indifference, or, perhaps, with ruthless power."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Similarly," I said, "you will learn to serve in whatever position your master dictates and in whatever garb, or lack of garb, he pleases."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"And sometimes, too," I said, "You may have to serve in bonds, even cruel bonds, such things as thongs, and cords and chains."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"And sometimes, too," I said, "Willessly, even though your back and legs may still sting from his lash."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"You will learn to serve him whenever, wherever and however he wishes," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"And perfectly," I said.

"Yes, yes, Master," she said.

"For he is the Master, and you are the Slave," I said.

"Yes, Master she said.

"For you are nothing, and he is all," I said.

"Master," she whispered.

"Are you now prepared to be opened?" I asked.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I looked down into her eyes.

"Open me, Master," she said. "Open me, I beg you, as a slave, for the pleasures of men!"

"Very well," I said, and then, as she cried out softly, I opened her, a nameless slave, who had once been Miss Millicent Aubrey-Welles, from Pennsylvania, a debutante, for the pleasures of men.

"Please, do not put me back so soon with the others, Master," she begged.

"It is nearly morning," I said.

"Please, Master," she said. She clutched me beneath the blankets, pressing her warm, vulnerable softness against me "Please," she begged. The blood on the interior of her left thigh had now dried. When it was fresh I had taken some on my finger and forced it into her mouth, and onto her tongue forcing her to taste it. "Yes, Master," she had whimpered. I had also traced the common Kajira mark, the common slave-girl mark that which was the same as her brand, on her thigh in the blood, and had then smeared its residue down and onto her left calf. In the morning I wanted to make sure that the other girls in the coffle were perfectly clear on how she had spent the night and what had been done to her.