Swordsmen of Gor (32 page)

“Save me from this fate!” she wept.

“Your lips and tongue felt well on my feet,” he said.

“Keep me,” she said. “Own me!”

“No,” he said.

“I do not understand,” she wept.

“You are worthless,” he said. “You are petty, radically petty, to the core.”

She stood there, in the grip of the guard, naked, forlorn, shaken, stunned.

Again, I thought the offer of Lord Nishida was genuine, but, again, I was confident he did not expect it to be accepted. He was, I gathered, a shrewd judge of men. I did not find this surprising, from my estimation of his position, and apparent acuity. Indeed, I suspected that these formal overtures on his part were largely intended to express his contempt for the slave. Some men, of course, find it pleasant to embond a woman they hold in contempt, and then treat her accordingly. And, when the slave fires have been ignited in her belly, and she is the helpless prisoner of her needs, it amuses them to have her at their feet, prostrate, piteous, begging for their least touch.

“I trust, Lord Nishida,” said Thrasilicus, “the slave pleases your senses.”

“She pleases my senses,” said Lord Nishida, “but I am not sure she pleases my heart.”

“In bondage,” I said, “a woman is often muchly transformed.”

This was true. Bondage, in which the woman learns her womanhood, effects in a woman not only a sexual but a moral and personal redemption. In the collar, and in submission, she learns service, fulfillment, wholeness, and love. In the collar, and in her complete and categorical submission to the master, sexually, emotionally, and personally, she becomes herself, and happy.

“If Lord Nishida is not pleased,” said Thrasilicus, “we may search out another.”

“And this one,” said Tajima, who had had, from the beginning, as I understood it, reservations pertaining to the former Miss Wentworth, “as she would be unworthy meat for larls or sleen, may be bound and cast into the garbage pit for the delectation of swarming urts.”

There seemed a general assent to this, amongst those present.

They took her to be poor slave stuff.

I myself, however, did not think she would look poorly on a block, if well exhibited.

“We shall see,” said Lord Nishida. Then he addressed the two guards who had had the former Miss Wentworth in custody. “After her branding and collaring,” he said, “shave her head, and send her to the stables, and see that she learns she is a slave.”

“Yes, great lord,” they said, and exited the pavilion, the former Miss Wentworth, whimpering, but afraid to speak, held by the upper left arm, in the grip of one of them.

“Regrettable,” said Lord Nishida.

“Another may be procured,” said Thrasilicus, concerned. “You may return her to me. I would not mind having her under my whip.”

“Your choice,” said Lord Nishida, “was excellent.”

Thrasilicus seemed surprised.

“If she learns her collar well,” said Lord Nishida, “another may find her pleasing.”

“I had thought you wanted her for yourself,” said Thrasilicus.

“No,” said Lord Nishida. “Her yellow hair, blue eyes, and fair skin will be rare at home. She may figure amongst a variety of gifts, for another.”

“For whom?” asked Thrasilicus.

“For the
shogun
, of course,” said Lord Nishida.

Lord Nishida then looked at me. “Now,” he said, “we may address ourselves to matters of importance.”

Chapter Eleven

CECILY AND I LOOK IN ON THE FORMER MISS WENTWORTH

A few days after her interview with Lord Nishida in his pavilion, curious, I decided to look in on the former Miss Wentworth, and so, after an inquiry or two, I made my way, heeled by Cecily, to one of the large stables in which draft tharlarion were housed, those which aided in the logging, and drew the wagons down the narrow path between the trees, to some destination, to the southeast. The stable was a long, large building, with a towering roof, to contain the longer-necked tharlarion. It would house several beasts, but I supposed, at this time of day, most, if not all, of the tharlarion would be about the camp, or active on the road to the southeast, hauling logs, or returning. By nightfall, as these things go, before the beasts returned, the stable should be cleaned, fresh straw strewn about, deeply, and the feed and water troughs filled. I chose the late afternoon for my visit, supposing the time one opportune to encounter the former Miss Wentworth alone. Late in the afternoon many of the “strange men” enjoy a pleasant soak in a warm tub. I trusted that the stable grooms might be enjoying this homely indulgence. Several collar-girls, such as those who had been former free women of Ar, were humbly, attentively, silently, here and there, bathing the men. I did not think that the former Miss Wentworth would be engaged in this activity, as it is regarded as a great privilege for a collar-girl to be permitted to bathe a master. Indeed, it is one of the lovely services in which a contract woman, naked beside her client in the pool, was expected to excel.

I found the former Miss Wentworth toward the back of the stable, on the right, as one would face the large double gate which gave access to the structure. She was facing the back of the stable. I watched her for a time. She was on her knees, moving about, leaning forward, a small, pathetic figure. She would reach down and, again and again, with her small, lovely hands, quite bare, her bare arms stained to the elbows, scrape together tharlarion dung. When a suitable heap had been formed, she would lift it, again with her bare hands, and place it on a low flat cart, which she drew beside her.

She was naked, not yet permitted a tunic, and was filthy, and doubtless stank.

She had not yet been permitted even a slave strip.

The common slave strip is a single, narrow, dangling piece of cloth anchored in binding fiber, double-looped about the waist of the slave. It is usually tied snugly, to accentuate the figure of the slave. It is fastened with a slip knot that it may easily, with a tug, be undone. The binding fiber, of course, is long enough to bind the slave, hand and foot, or, if one desires, to serve as a leash, the slave strip then usually folded and placed between the slave’s teeth, which she dare not drop. Sometimes the binding fiber, in its double loop, is looser, that it may ride low on the hips. The point of this is to exhibit the navel of the slave, which, in Gorean, is known as “the slave belly.” The Gorean free woman, as I understand it, who often mates while gowned, commonly refuses to reveal her “slave belly” to her companion, because of the shame of it. What if he should become excited, tear off her gown, and put her to use with the same audacity, aggression, exhilaration, and exultation with which he might use a vulnerable, meaningless animal, say, a chain-slut or paga girl?

I watched the former Miss Wentworth for a time, she unaware of my presence.

They were teaching her what it was to be a slave.

Yet I feared she had not even, as yet, begun to learn.

I considered her.

How far she was now from the seats of commercial power, far from the treasure houses of wealth, far from paneled board rooms, long corridors, marshaled desks, and bright offices.

This was a world other than that to which she had been accustomed, and which she had thought to leave behind only for a life of wealth and leisure.

I continued to regard her.

I saw there was a collar on her neck. The lock was in the back, as is common. It was doubtless that of Lord Nishida.

I had no doubt she had no access to its key.

Now, doubtless as never before, she knew what it was to be in a slave collar.

“Saru,” I called.

She threw herself to her belly in the straw, facing away from me, and covered her head with her hands. “Please, please do not whip me!” she begged.

The slave had been given the name ‘Saru’.

The saru is found variously on Gor, but usually in tropical areas. For example, it is common in the jungles of the Ua. Also, I had learned from Tajima, it is found, here and there, in the home, so to speak, of the “strange men.” The saru is a small, usually arboreal animal. It is usually regarded with amusement, or contempt. It figures in children’s stories as a cute, curious, mischievous little beast, but also one that is stupid, vain, and ignorant. Although the saru, as far as I can tell, is not a monkey zoologically, it surely occupies a similar ecological niche, and resembles the monkey in its diet, habits, groupings, and such. It is tailless. I think it would not be amiss to think of the saru as a Gorean monkey. In any event Tajima, when he put the slave before him on her knees, in the stable, to be named, told her, in English, that there be no mistaking the matter, and she clearly understand what was being done to her, what ‘Saru’ meant, its connotations, and such. She was, in effect, he told her, going to be named “Monkey.” “Yes Master,” she whispered. The slave, of course, is named by masters. She has nothing to say as to what she will be named, no more than a sleen or kaiila. Names may be changed, from time to time. Some names, like ‘Saru’, are belittling names, or contempt names. Other names may be fit for low slaves, others for prized slaves, and so on. Names may be used to punish or commend, to humiliate or delight, and so on. Earth-girl names, which may be put on any slave, regardless of her world of origin, are commonly used for low slaves. ‘Cecily’, the name of my slave, had once been one of her free-woman names. Now, of course, it was not the same name, for I had given it to her as a slave name. The slave understands, of course, that she has no name, not in a legal sense, and that the name she is given is a name bestowed on her by a master, and removable by a master. Even the name which appears on formal slave papers is a slave name.

“You are no longer Miss Margaret Wentworth,” Tajima explained to her. “As soon as you were entered on an acquisition list, months ago, you were only a nameless slave.”

“Yes, Master,” she said, kneeling before him.

“I have explained to you the meaning of ‘Saru’,” he said. “You have understood?”

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“I am now going to name you,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” she whispered.

“You are Saru,” he said. “Rejoice that you are no longer a nameless slave.”

“Yes, Master,” she said, frightened.

“You may thank me,” he said.

“Thank you, Master,” she said.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“‘Saru’, Master,” she said.

“Who are you?”

“I am Saru,” she said, “Master.”

He then turned about, and left her, and she collapsed to the straw of the stable, wracked with sobs.

She shuddered in the straw, naked. “Please do not whip me!” she begged.

“It is I, Tarl Cabot,” I said. “Do not be afraid. I have not come to whip you.”

She rose to all fours, and turned about, and regarded me, in the gloom of the stable, almost half-uncomprehendingly.

Cecily stood, behind me, to my left.

“Do not be afraid,” I said. Then I snapped my fingers, and pointed to the floor, before me, and she crawled to that place, on all fours, and looked at me.

Her head had been shaved.

I thus inferred that the gifting of her, amongst other gifts, to a
shogun
by Lord Nishida, which I understood to be his intent, would not be imminent, but perhaps months away.

Surely she was in no condition to be presented, now, to anyone, even a herder of tarsks, a lowly shearer of the bounding hurt.

But her bondage journey had begun. By the time she had learned her collar, and her skin would again sparkle, and her hair would be again a glory, and her eyes would no longer reflect terror but rather the eagerness of a surrendered slave, hoping to be found pleasing by her master, she would be worthy, I was sure, of having the vestiture of a silken presentation sheet removed before a
shogun
, or even a Ubar.

“Master?” she asked, her head lifted to me.

“Slave?” I said.

“Has Master Pertinax inquired after me?” she asked.

“No,” I said. “Why do you ask?”

She put down her head, “Nothing, Master,” she said.

“Perhaps,” I said, “it is his whip you would like to feel?”

Among slaves, a common way for one slave to inquire of another her owner is to ask, “Who whips you?”

To be sure, the slave may never have been whipped. She is, of course, subject to the whip of the master, for she is a slave. Sometimes a slave may be bound and whipped, to remind her that she is a slave. After this, she is under no illusions as to her condition. She now knows well what she is; she is slave, only slave.

The slave was silent, but trembled.

“As a slave, of course,” I said, “you are unworthy of any free man.”

“Yes, Master,” she said. Then she looked to Cecily. “She is standing,” she said.

“Of course,” I said. “You are a slave. If you were a free person, she would be on her knees.”

She looked at Cecily. “I am sorry,” she said, “that I was cruel to you.”

“It is nothing,” said Cecily.

Saru looked up from all fours, her knees and hands in the straw. “May I kneel, Master,” she asked.

“Yes,” I said.

She had not asked for permission to stand. She knew herself in the presence of a free man.

I wondered if Thrasilicus was looking into a different slave for Lord Nishida. Perhaps a better slave would be sought.

“Back straight, head up,” I told her.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“Knees,” I said.

“Before her?” asked Saru, in misery. Cecily was standing.

“Before me,” I said.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“Wider,” I said.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“I see you are collared,” I said.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“And you have been branded?” I asked.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

I crouched beside her. “It is an excellent mark,” I said. It was, as I had expected, the common Kef.

“I am told so,” she said. “I am now well marked. There will be no confusing me now with a free woman.”

“Nor should there be,” I said.

“No, Master,” she said.