Renegades of Gor (40 page)

“She is not longer Publia,” I said to Lady Claudia. “She had not yet been

named.”

The slave looked at me, in awe.

Then she cried out, suddenly, as I replaced the wadding in her mouth, tightening

it in again, with the cords.

“What are you doing?” asked Lady Claudia, frightened.

I saw the slave’s eyes regarding me, wildly, just before I drew the hood again,

over her beautiful features, securing it in place, tying the cord at the back of

her neck.

“What are you doing?” cried Lady Claudia.

“She has got us this far,” I said. “This is as far as we could expect to get

with her, unchallenged, she in her guise as you. She had done as much for us as

she can. She had thus served her purposes.”

“What do you mean?” whispered Lady Claudia.

I reached for the impaling spear.

“No,” said Lady Claudia.

I pressed the point of the spear against the interior of the slave’s thigh. She

threw back her head, and moaned.

“You knew she would declare herself a slave!” said Lady Claudia.

“She is a slave,” I said. “It is fitting.”

“I am no less a slave than she!” said Lady Claudia.

(pg.270) “That is true,” I said.

“And now,” she cried, “that you have won from her her confession that she was

slave, and she has said the words themselves, enacting imbondment upon herself,

you would put her, now, not even in the dignity of the free woman, but in the

misery and degradation of a shamed slave, upon the spear!”

“Do you not think this slave, when she was a free woman,” I asked, “would not

have enjoyed seeing you on the spear?”

“No matter!” cried Lady Claudia. “No matter!”

“Those of Ar’s Station,” I said, “will expect to see her on the spear. If she is

not there, I do not think we will get very far. When we leave the platform here,

let them think our work has been done. Then we will draw away somewhere, I

removing this mask, you retaining your rags and veil.”

“No!” said Lady Claudia.

“It may be our only hope at escape,” I said, “you falling to Cosians, I perhaps

managing to mingle with them.”

“You are a brave man,” she said. “I admire you. You have been strong with me.

You have been kind to me. You have risked much for me. I want to escape. I see

your reasoning. But if there must be a body on the spear, let it be mine. It is

I who am guilty of treason, not she. Thus, it is I who should be impaled, not

she.”

“But you are a free woman,” I said. “She is only a slave.”

“You know, truly,” she said, “she is no more, if as much, a slave as I. Surely

in the cell, often enough, I gave you ample evidence that my fitting destiny was

to give my entire being to the selfless love and service of a man!”

“You pity her because you are yourself no better than a slave,” I said.

“I would pity her if she were a free woman,” she said, “and I pity her now, that

she is a slave.”

“Because you, yourself, are a slave,” I said.

“Perhaps,” she wept. “I do not know.”

Within the hood, I smiled. Slaves, as is well known, are on the whole far more

loving and compassionate than free women. That is probably because they are so

much more female then the free woman.

“We must hang her on the spear,” I said, jocularly.

(pg.271) Suddenly Lady Claudia flung her body across that of the slave, as

though she would protect her from me. It was a touching gesture, I thought. To

be sure, it was a little silly. I could fling her a dozen feet away at my will,

or, if I wished, with a judicious blow, little more than a quick tap on the

diaphragm, have her instantly on her back helpless, gasping for breath. If

necessary, I could bind her, or, if I wished, in an instant, strike her

senseless.

“You would protect her, wouldn’t you?” I asked.

“Yes!” she wept.

“She is perhaps your worst enemy,” I reminded her.

“It does not matter,” she wept.

“You have incredibly deep feelings and emotions,” I said. “You would make a

superb slave.”

She looked up at me, puzzled. Her veil was wet with tears.

“Well, we had better hang this slave on the spear,” I said, removing my sword

belt.

“You have been joking,” she said, suddenly. “You never intended to put her on

the spear!”

“She is going to hang on the spear all right,” I said. I then removed the sword

from the sheath and thrust the sheath up, between the slave’s back and the

ropes, and then forced the point of the spear up, high, into the sheath. This

did not do the sheath any good, distending it, but then it was not one, I

reminded myself, for which I had had to put out my own tarsks. I then buckled

the sword belt, making a new hole in the belt with my knife, tightly about the

slender waist of the slave, up a bit, so it, too, was hidden behind the thickly

coiled ropes. The spear’s point was now entered into the sheath, the sheath held

in place behind the slave by her ropes, and the slave’s body held against the

sheath and spear by the rope and belt. She could not slip down the spear because

of the spear’s insertion in the sheath. In this way, when the spear was placed

in the mount, it would appear, I hoped, that the slave had been mounted on the

spear. To see that this was not so, I thought one would probably have to be

rather close. There is not much blood, incidentally, with the sort of impalement

which, I had gathered, they had intended for the prisoner, as the spear itself,

in such an impalement, packs the wound.

“You are sparing her!” breathed Lady Claudia.

(pg.272) “Of late,” I said, “she has been concerned to be pleasing.”

The former Lady Publia shuddered, realizing what might as easily have been her

fate.

I then lifted the spear up and inserted it, down, into its mount.

We heard some cheers from down on the wall, a handful presumably greeting the

appearance of the impaling spear, seemingly burdened. Most of the fellows,

though, I suspected, had other things on their mind. Behind the slowly

approaching towers, partly in their cover, advanced hundreds of men. the towers

themselves were now little more than seventy-five yards from the wall. They had

now aligned themselves, and the dropping of the bridges, when the towers were in

position, would be simultaneous. Surely men should be drawn up from below to

help defend the wall. The smaller probes, now, those of the scattered grapnels

and single-pole ladders, had ceased. There were dozens of supporting grapnel and

ladder crews, however, now approaching between the towers.

“Wriggle,” I commanded the new slave, bound on the spear. “Wriggles well, and

deliciously, or I shall set you on the spear properly!”

She then wriggled, and writhed, helplessly.

“Could you really put her on the spear?” asked Lady Claudia, softly.

“Certainly,” I said. It was true.

We heard laughter from down on the wall, and, I think, even from Cosians below

the wall. They, too, had little respect for traitresses.

Lady Claudia shuddered.

“Not too much,” I cautioned the new slave, “mostly at first, then less. Then

hold yourself tense, trying not to move.”

The new slave, hung in the ropes, moaned her acquiescence.

“What is wrong?” I asked Lady Claudia.

“It could have been I, truly impaled,” she said.

“But it is not,” I said.

“The ram pounds the gate,” she said.

We could feel the vibrations, even here.

“Let us leave,” I said to Lady Claudia.

“There is no safety,” she said.

Down on the lower walkway we looked back to the battlements (pg.273) over the

gate. It did look as though the former Lady Publia were on the spear.

The towers were now but thirty yards away. There was no way their discharge,

their rushing, armed effluxes could be stayed by the men here.

“If she is rescued,” said Lady Claudia, looking back at the lovely, nude figure,

seemingly mounted upon the impaling spear, “doubtless she will deny she is a

slave.”

“But even so,” I said, “she would still be a slave, and would know it in her

heart.”

“Yes,” said Lady Claudia.

The slave cannot free herself. She can be freed only by an owner. The condition

of slavery does not require the collar, or the brand, or an anklet, bracelet or

ring, or any such overt sign of bondage. Such things, as symbolic as they are,

as profoundly meaningful as they are, and as useful as they are for marking

properties, identifying masters, and such, are not necessary to slavery. They

are, in effect, though their affixing can legally effect imbondment, ultimately,

in themselves, tokens of bondage, and are not to be confused with the reality

itself. The uncollared slave is not then a free woman but only a slave who is

not then in a collar. Similarly a slave is still a slave even if her brand could

be made to magically disappear or, if she has been a made a slave in some other

way, if she had not yet been branded. Indeed, some masters, somewhat foolishly,

I think, dally in the branding of their slaves. Indeed, some, perhaps the most

foolish, do not brand them at all. Such girls, however, when they come into the

keeping of new masters, usually discover that that oversight is promptly

remedied.

“The slave who lies about her slavery,” I said, “is not thereby the less a

slave. It is only that she is then a lying slave.”

“I have heard that bondage is difficult to conceal,” said Lady Claudia.

“That is particularly so,” I said, “if one has been a slave for a time. It can

be given away in many ways, by the movements of the body, by certain timidities,

and deferences, dispositions to kneel, slips of the tongue, and such. Slavers,

and others, it is well known, can often pick out a slave from among women all

clad in the Robes of Concealment, by (pg.274) simply having her walk, or speak,

or by looking in her eyes. She is then disrobed, the brand revealed, and given

over for punishment.”

She looked up at me.

“I spoke of legal bondage, of course,” I said. “Perhaps you meant natural

bondage, that of the woman who is by nature a slave?”

She looked down.

“That,” I said, “is independent of the proprieties of legal bondage, of course.”

“Yes,” she whispered.

“To be sure,” I said, “that condition of the natural slave, like that of the

legal slave, can be difficult to conceal, particularly under certain stimulus

conditions. It need not remain, however, simply a guilty secret locked in the

heart of a frustrated, unfulfilled free woman, not yet in the keeping of her

master. It can be shown by such things as her profound psychological

dispositions to selflessly serve and love, her desire for, and response to, male

domination, her understandings of chains and the whip, the quickening, deepening

and intensification of her sexuality under conditions of bondage, her happiness

and fulfillment when she finds herself placed in her proper relationship to the

male, her joy in fulfilling her biological role, her joy in obedience,

submission and love, her elation in knowing herself owned and mastered, subdued

and conquered, a condition manifested in acts as disparate, and yet strangely

akin, as the tying of her master’s sandals and slave writhings in the furs,

being forced to thrash helplessly in the orgasmic ecstasies he chooses to impose

upon her.”

She trembled.

“There are women who understand such things,” I said.

“All women understand such things,” she said.

“Perhaps,” I said. “I do not know.”

Again she trembled.

“But we were speaking of the former Lady Publia,” I said. “She now knows herself

a slave, having said the words. Too, she knows that she, a slave, can be freed

only by a master. What will she make of these things? That, I take it, is your

question?”

“Doubtless she would pretend she had never said the words,” she said.

(pg.275) “That she would, in one way or another, attempt to conceal her true

condition?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Perhaps,” I said. “But, of course, she would still, in her heart, know the

truth, that she was a slave.”

“Yes,” she said.

“And that only a master could free her?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Surely it might be difficult to live with such a hidden truth,” I said. Perhaps

it, irrepressible, insistent within her, might finally require some resolution.

She must then take action. She might turn herself over to a praetor, hoping for

mercy, as she had surrendered herself. Or perhaps she might solicit some person

to make active claim upon her, such a claim, after certain intervals,

superseding prior claims. Although there are various legal qualifications

involved, which vary from city to city, effective, or active, possession is

generally regarded as crucial from the point of view of the law, such possession

being taken, no other claims forthcoming within a specified interval, as

conferring legal title. This is the case with a kailla or a tarsk, and it is

also the case with a slave. In such a case, presumably the woman would expect

the master who has then put claim on her to free her. That would presumably be

the point of the matter. Otherwise she could simply submit herself to him as an

escaped or strayed slave. Thus, in this fashion, she could reveal her hidden