Quarry of Gor, page 12
My forehead was down, to the stones.
“Who is your master?” demanded the woman.
“Ela,” I wept, “I do not know!”
“Liar!” cried the woman. “Do you think to escape punishment so easily?”
“No, Mistress,” I said.
“Who is your master?” she demanded, again.
“I do not know,” I said. “I truly do not know!”
“She is in flight,” said another woman’s voice. “Yes!” said another. “She is a runaway slave!” said yet another. “Let the tendons behind her knees be severed,” said another. “Let her feet be cut off,” said another. “She will not run away again,” said another.
“I am not a runaway slave,” I said. “I am a helpless slave, naked, hooded, and bound!”
“Who is your master,” inquired the first woman, yet again.
“I do not know,” I said. “I was sold last night from the House of Anesidemus. I do not know to whom I was sold. It will be on the records of the House of Anesidemus. Even now I seek the House of Anesidemus.”
“Insolent slave,” said the first woman.
“No, Mistress,” I said.
“How dared you buffet me, how dared you strike against a free woman?” asked the first woman.
“I could not see,” I said. “It was an accident. I could not avoid Mistress. I beg Mistress’ forgiveness.”
“Perhaps you think the fault was mine?” said the woman.
“Surely not, Mistress!” I said.
“Perhaps you think that I was unobservant,” she said, “careless, my attention directed elsewhere, that I might have been distracted, or such?”
“No, Mistress!” I said.
“Then you acknowledge that the fault was entirely your own?” she said.
“Yes, Mistress,” I said.
“You should then be punished,” she said.
“Mercy, Mistress!” I begged. “I beg mercy, sweet, compassionate, beautiful, noble Mistress!”
“We shall see,” she said.
I waited, head down, helpless, frightened.
Some Ihn passed.
I gathered that she had relented, that I would not be punished.
How kind she was!
“Thank you, Mistress,” I whispered, gratefully.
“Oh!” I cried in misery, stung by the lash of a switch. Many free women carry such an implement with them. It comports with their authority, their dignity, and status. Slave girls look upon that device with well-justified apprehension. They well know its meaning. Have they not felt it, often enough? Free women, who resent and hate, even loathe, female slaves, scantily clad and collared, often use it on them with little or no provocation. Presumably this has much to do with the pleasure males derive from female slaves. Could the free women be actually jealous of slaves, such meaningless, worthless beasts? Do they envy them their brands and collars? Do they themselves wish to feel the kiss of the searing iron and the clasp of the degrading metal collar?
I screamed in misery and writhed on the wood for the first stroke of the switch was soon followed by a rain of strokes.
I twisted, and wept, struck again and again.
Then I lay on my belly, shuddering, trembling, submitted.
My legs and back were afire.
“There, insolent slave!” cried the woman, gasping for breath. “Perhaps, in the future, you will be more careful of where and how you walk.”
“Yes, Mistress,” I said. “Forgive me, Mistress.”
She then kicked me in the left thigh.
“Slave,” she hissed.
“Yes, Mistress,” I said.
“You are tired,” said a woman’s voice. “Let me beat her now.”
“Do so,” said the first woman.
“No,” said a man’s voice. “She has had enough.”
“Who are you?” asked a woman.
“Agent,” said he, “of the House of Anesidemus.”
I recognized the voice. It was that of one of the men of the House of Anesidemus. He had been one of the men in the hall, while the slaves were on all fours, waiting to be herded into the street outside the house, to protect them from the possible spread of a fire which had begun on the docks. He, and perhaps others, may have been in the streets looking for me.
“Guardsman!” called a woman.
“What is going on here?” asked a male voice.
The fellow who had intervened, I was sure it was he, it must have been he, drew me by an arm up to my knees, and, his hand on the hood, pulled my head back, far back.
“The collar of the House of Anesidemus,” said the other male voice, presumably that of a guardsman.
“A mistake was made last night,” said he who had intervened. “In the confusion of the fire, and the alarms, this slave was separated from the coffle. I have been making inquiries, and looking about for her. Now I have located her.”
“You are fortunate she is not now on her way to the Farther Islands, in chains,” said the other male voice.
“Officers of the port authorize departing vessels, after an examination of cargo,” said he who had intervened.
“The collar?” asked he whom I took to be a guardsman.
“Papers would be requested,” said he who had intervened.
“You think some sort of mistake was involved?” said he whom I took to be a guardsman.
“Clearly,” said he who had intervened.
“You have doings with the House of Anesidemus?” asked he whom I took to be a guardsman.
“My credentials,” said he who had intervened.
“Proceed,” said he whom I took to be a guardsman, and, apparently, he stepped away.
Similarly, I gathered the crowd had now dissipated.
“Can you stand?” asked he who had intervened.
“Yes,” I said, struggling to my feet.
“Master,” I said.
“Yes,” he said.
“I did not mean to obstruct the way of the free woman,” I said.
“You did not do so,” he said. “I saw her watch you. She smiled, removed, the switch from her belt, and placed herself in your path. You could not help yourself.”
“It was deliberate?” I said.
“Certainly,” he said.
“Why would she do that?” I asked.
“Free women,” he said, “do not care for kajirae.”
“I might have been beaten even further, by the other women,” I said.
“Undoubtedly,” he said. “Two, without switches, had removed a slipper, with which to strike you.”
“If you saw what happened,” I said, “why did you not speak out, why did you not denounce the free woman, and protect me?”
“You know little of Gor,” he said. “One does not criticize free women. They are free. Would you have had her gainsaid? Would you proclaim her to be in error, or, worse, lying? Would that not be unthinkable, insupportable? Would it not be grievously insulting? Would you dare to hint, even privately, that she, in her status and freedom, might be flawed, might be less than righteously perfect?”
“I see,” I said, bitterly.
“And you, on the other hand,” he said, “are a slave.”
“I see,” I said.
“What does it matter,” he asked, “if a slave is switched?”
“She is only a slave,” I said.
“Precisely,” he said. “Too,” he said, “I thought a switching for you might prove beneficial. I thought it would be instructive. It will help you to better understand that you are a slave and, in particular, it will help you to better understand that you are not a free woman. The free woman, as you will learn, hates the slave. Moreover, the free woman is mistress. She is mighty and powerful, and the slave is vulnerable, defenseless, helpless, and at her mercy. You will learn to tremble in the presence of free women.”
“Yes, Master,” I whispered.
“Let us now return to the House of Anesidemus,” he said.
“May I be unhooded?” I asked.
“Later, in the house,” he said. “Let us keep your features concealed, for the present.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Curiosity is not becoming in a kajira,” he said.
“Does Master know to whom I have been sold?” I asked.
“Certainly,” he said.
“To whom?” I asked.
“Curiosity is not becoming in a kajira,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said. “Forgive me, Master.”
I had heard a small sound of chain, and I had turned about, again. The slave was now on her belly, on the boards of the deck, and she still held the chain in her hands. Then she wept and, putting down her head, kissed the chain.
I wondered, again, what could have tempted her to leap from the ship.
Surely there was some mystery here.
I knelt beside her, curious.
“The masters are not watching,” I said.
She shuddered, and pressed her lips again to the chain.
“You are safe now,” I said.
“The sharks,” she whispered.
“You are safe now, on the deck, on the chain,” I said.
She was silent.
“Euphrosyne,” I said.
“Yes,” she said.
“We were angry with you below,” I said. “You might have cost us our deck privileges.” Surely it was not pleasant to be chained in the hold of a round ship. “The masters were kind enough to allow you on deck. You abused their forbearance and trust.”
“You are ignorant,” she said, bitterly, “only a barbarian.”
“Why did you leave the ship?” I asked.
“How little you know,” she said.
“Teach me,” I said. “Inform me.”
“I overheard the masters,” she said.
“I do not understand,” I said, apprehensively. “What did you hear?”
“Nothing,” she said, bitterly.
“Something so fearful that you would leave the ship?” I said.
“I knew the risks,” she said. “They follow vessels at sea, the sharks, to seize garbage, anything cast into the sea.”
“And yet you leapt overboard?”
“In the water I lost my nerve,” she said. “I turned back to the ship. I was frightened. I was weak, a coward. I should have continued on.”
“You could never have reached the shore,” I said.
“I was afraid to die,” she said. “I clung to life.”
“You are now safe on board,” I said. “You are safe on your chain.”
“I kiss it,” she wept, “I am such a slave!”
“You could have been killed,” I said, “eaten alive, only yards from the ship.”
“I should have permitted the sharks to seize me, and feast on me.”
“Surely not,” I said.
“Surely it would have been better,” she said.
“Surely not,” I said.
“I should, when possible, seize up a sword or knife,” she said.
“No,” I said, frightened. “A slave can be slain for daring to touch a weapon.”
“To throw myself upon it,” she said.
“Do not do so,” I said.
“I could dash my head against the ring,” she said.
“Banish such thoughts,” I said.
“But I am afraid,” she said. I am weak. I am a coward. “I cling to life—despite what I know.”
“What do you know?” I asked.
She wept, and put her head down, beside the chain.
“Better to perish in the water, torn by the fangs of sharks,” she said.
“What fate could be so horrible,” I asked, “that to it you would prefer so frightening, so terrible, a fate?”
“I hoped to reach the shore,” she said.
“And escape?” I said.
“Yes,” she said.
“Do you not know that you are unclothed, that you are marked, that you are in a collar?”
She was silent.
“We are slaves,” I said. “We are helpless in our collars. We will be kept in them. Even to think of escape is absurd.”
“I know,” she said. “But I was frightened. Everything reeled. Things began to go black. Then I saw the shore.”
“Why did you leave the ship?” I asked. “What did you overhear?”
She shook her head, shuddered, and did not speak.
“Tell me,” I said.
“No,” she said.
“You could not have escaped,” I said. “The men, if they wished, could overtake you. They could hire hunting sleen. Peasants could apprehend you. You can see the villages on the shore. Then you would have a miserable slavery, a rural slavery, worked from dawn to dark, often whipped, chained at night, in the open, in the cold and rain, to a stake in the yard, penned with tarsks, housed in a cramped, damp, log kennel.”
“You do not understand,” she said.
“No,” I said, “I do not.”
“Surely you rage against the collar on your neck, the mark on your thigh,” she said.
“Seldom,” I said, “though I understand their meaning and my helplessness.”
“You do not understand,” she said. “What I heard! What I heard!”
“I love my collar,” I said. “I would not change it for a necklace of diamonds. I am a slave, a natural slave. I have known this even from girlhood. I want to be owned, to belong, to be a possession. I want to be dominated, mastered. I want to be rightless. I want to surrender to a man, wholly, to be his, wholly, his animal, his property. I want to kneel, kiss, caress, obey, love, and serve.”
“I, too,” she said.
“I want a kind, strong master,” I said, “who will own me completely, and fulfill me, as the slave I am.”
“I hope for that, too,” she said.
“Would,” I said, “that we could choose our masters.”
“But we cannot,” she said.
“Why then did you flee?” I asked. “Why did you leap overboard? Of what were you so terrified, that you would risk sharks, recapture, peasants, hamstringing, or being fed to sleen?”
She turned, and looked up at me, tears in her eyes.
“Tell me,” I said.
“I will,” she said.
At that point there was a cry, from the height of the mast. “Ho!” I heard. “Ship, ship!” And almost at the same moment, from the lookout at the stern, I heard, “Ship aft, to the right!” The hortator awakened, shook his head, and reached for his mallets. The kaissa board and pieces were set aside. Cards and game stones were put in small sacks. The oarsmen took their places on the benches.
Euphrosyne knelt up, beside me.
“Get up, look,” she said to me. “It is hard for me to see.” She could not rise for the length of chain which held her to the ring would not permit her to stand erect.
I rose to my feet.
Behind us, to my left, as I stood, looking back, as though appearing from nowhere, doubtless just departed from some concealed or inconspicuous inlet, for its presence had just been noted, was a lovely ship, low in the water.
“Speak, speak,” said Euphrosyne.
“It is a ship,” I said. How beautiful, I thought, were the galleys of Gor. To be sure, there seemed a subtle menace to that form.
“Is its sail set?” asked Euphrosyne.
“I see no sail,” I said.
“The mast is down,” she said.
“I see no mast,” I said.
“The ship is hard to see, is it not?” she said.
“It is low, close to the water,” I said.
“It is green, like the green of Thassa,” she said.
“It is such a color,” I said. I supposed such a color would blend in well with a common mood of Thassa, the sea.
“It is long, and narrow, like a knife in the water,” said Euphrosyne.
“We have seen other ships, from time to time,” I said.
“Its prow wears a snout of iron,” she said.
“I see nothing like that,” I said.
“Then it is below the water, just below the water,” she said.
“On each side of the bow,” I said, “as on some ships moored at Brundisium, there is a large, flat hemisphere of metal, an armor, a shield, to protect the ship from injury.”
“Naive barbarian,” she said.
I did not know, at that time, the function of those mighty blades.
“How so?” I asked, not pleased.
“What do you think its business is?” she asked.
“How should I know?” I asked.
“It is a cargo ship, you suppose, a round ship, casually, surprisingly encountered,” she said.
“One supposes so,” I said.
“That is no cargo vessel, no round ship,” she said.
“How can you tell?” I asked.
“It is a long ship,” she said, “no sail set, the mast down, thus less detectible at a distance, painted green, not easily noticed in the swells of Thassa.”
“You sense danger?” I asked.
“An honest ship, by day, would be at sea,” she said, “not just emerged, between us and the shore.”
“You do sense danger,” I said.
“What I do not understand,” she said, “is why the men are so calm. The alarm has been given. Are they obtuse? Does the tabuk note the presence of the larl with equanimity? Does the verr choose to ignore the prowling sleen?”
“If there were truly danger,” I said, “the men would evince agitation; they would behave differently.”
“At least we are slaves,” said Euphrosyne, joyously, “animals of value. We have nothing to fear. We will be spared. We need only wait to be put on our bellies and tied, as the animals we are. We will be rescued.”
“‘Rescued’?” I said.
“For different chains,” she said happily, “to be vended in a different market.”
I understood better then what it might be to be a female slave on this world.
