“Be kind to me, Master,” I said.
“You are a slave,” he said.
“Forgive me, Master,” I said.
“Behold!” said Axel, pointing across the river.
The great ship was moving away from the flaming dock.
Smoke billowed from Shipcamp, as well as the buildings and the stockade on our side of the river.
“The voyage is begun,” said my captor.
“There are forces massed at the mouth of the Alexandra to stop her,” said Axel.
“Straws might as well struggle to impede the rolling of a dislodged boulder,” said my captor.
“Thence it is to raging Thassa,” said Master Axel, “and its winter.”
“I do not think it will reach the World’s End,” said my captor. “But, if it should, a strange cargo, contraband, may tip the balance in the scale of war, the stakes perhaps two worlds.”
“Is there no way in which this may be drawn to the attention of the Pani?” asked Axel.
“It is too late,” said my captor. “The voyage is begun.”
The large vessel was now in midriver. I marked a slight adjustment of the large, single rudder. Most Gorean vessels with which I was familiar were double ruddered, with two helmsmen. The vessel was six-masted but no sail was set. She would be carried by the current.
“Tal,” said my captor, half moved from his place of stand, by the rough caress of the sleen’s snout, and the brush of its long, furred body.
“He is fond of you,” said Axel.
“I did not think so before,” said my captor.
“We were together in the forest,” said Axel.
“He was prepared to attack,” said my captor. “Did you not note the menace of the growl?”
“You know little of sleen,” said Axel. “The growl was one of recognition.”
“It sounded threatening enough,” said my captor.
“Only to one unfamiliar with sleen,” said Axel.
“He would not have attacked me?” said my captor.
“No,” said Axel.
“You knew this?” said my captor.
“Of course,” said Axel.
“I did not know it,” said my captor.
“Neither did Tyrtaios,” said Axel. “Else others might have been consigned to accompany me.”
“You said the interval of separation had been sufficient,” said my captor.
“I wanted you to believe that,” he said.
“I see,” said my captor.
“The sleen is a terrible beast,” said Axel, “but, too, it has a long memory, and it is capable of affection.”
“There is much I do not know of sleen,” said my captor.
“That was fortunate for me,” said Axel.
“How did you know I would not do the bidding of Tyrtaios and join the ship?”
“I did not know,” said Axel.
I shuddered.
“I would have known,” said Asperiche. “He is mad to possess this slave.”
“No!” said my captor.
“He followed her from Brundisium, and sought her for days in Tarncamp,” she said, “before finding her in Shipcamp.”
“Silence,” said my captor.
“It is my master, noble Axel of Argentum,” she said, “who should silence me, if I am to be silenced, not you, Master. You are not my master. You sold me,” and here Asperiche looked pleasantly at me, smiling, “— for a gold tarsk.”
“Far more than you are worth,” snapped my captor.
“Not more than I was worth to Axel of Argentum,” she said.
“His aberrations are of little interest to me,” said my captor.
“My judgment is notoriously suspect,” said Axel.
“Master!” protested Asperiche.
“But she does have lovely ankles,” said Axel.
“I have always found then so,” said my captor.
I glanced at my ankles. I was told they took shackles, and thongs, well.
“What if I had done as you seemed to wish,” said my captor, “slain the slave and rejoined the ship?”
“You would not have rejoined the ship,” he said. “I would have struck you down from behind, you unsuspecting, as you entered the boat.”
“Why?” asked my captor.
“That Tyrtaios have one less minion at his disposal,” said Axel.
“You would have permitted me to slay the slave?” asked my captor.
“I would have attempted to intervene,” he said.
“Honor?” asked my captor.
“You have heard of that?” asked Axel.
“It is within my recollections,” said my captor.
“I suspected so,” said Axel, “from the forest. But, too, aside from questions of honor, there are better things to do with a slave, I am sure you will agree, than cut her throat. We have two lovely slaves here. It would be absurd to slay them. It would be a waste. Slaves have their uses.”
“Slave uses,” said my captor.
“Certainly,” said Axel. “And if one does not want one, give her away, or sell her.”
I was suddenly frightened. For all my fear of him, I did not want my master to sell me. And yet I knew he could do so. I must try so to please him that he would not wish to do so.
“On your feet,” said Axel to Asperiche, who leapt up.
“Rise,” said my master, and I, too, stood.
The two men then regarded us, and we stood as slaves, regarded. I recalled that Axel had spoken of two lovely slaves. Asperiche had her head lifted, so I, too, lifted mine. The men were obviously comparing us, as properties.
“Nice,” said Axel. “But mine is better.”
“Obviously,” said my captor.
I jerked angrily at the slave bracelets which confined my hands behind my back.
“I think, however, Master,” said Asperiche, “that we must admit that Laura, for a barbarian, is attractive.”
“Many barbarians are attractive,” said Axel. “It is only that they are stupid.”
“May I speak, Master?” I asked.
“No,” said my master. “Barbarians,” said my master, “are not simply found under a veil when a city is falls or a caravan raided. They are selected for beauty and intelligence.”
I straightened my body, and lifted my head a little more.
“And passion,” he added.
I reddened. I could not help the nature of my belly, the needs of my body, the helplessness of my responses to a man’s touch. But why, I asked myself, should I be embarrassed by, or shamed by, or disconcerted by, signs of, and the obvious consequences of, health, life, hormonal richness, and vitality? Had not nature made me so, designed me to be a yielded, surrendered slave in the arms of masters? And in the collar, and in bondage, and on Gor had not nature liberated me a thousand fold to be myself? In a natural world does not nature thrive?
“Both are excellent slaves,” said Axel.
“One at least,” said my master.
“Put either one of them in with a crowd of free women, all stripped,” said Axel, “and one would see her as the slave.”
Perhaps that was the case, I thought. I did not know. Certainly I was a slave. I had often thought that my master, when he had first seen me on my former world, had seen me as such, and immediately, even without thought, as a slave.
Both men then turned to the river, and we two, slaves, standing, followed their gaze. The great ship was nearly out of sight. Momentarily it would reach a bend in the river, and we would no longer be able to follow its course from our vantage point.
“Tyrtaios would have paid well,” said Axel.
“Gold, women, fleets, cities, a ubarate or ubarates,” said my master.
“We might have been mighty men,” said Axel, fondling the shaggy, lifted head of Tiomines.
“It is quite possible,” said my master, “that the World’s End would never be reached.”
“Thassa,” said Axel, “is treacherous, deep, and cruel.”
“It is a voyage, as no other,” said my master.
“Tersites,” said Axel, “would challenge the winds and the sea, fearful Thassa, in the fiercest and most ruthless of seasons.”
“He is mad,” said my master.
“Perhaps, it is so,” said Axel, “of all who, so to speak, build great ships.”
“Do you trust Tyrtaios?” asked my master.
“No,” said Axel. “He would be as likely, when he had of us what he wanted, to pay with steel as gold.”
“Still,” said my master, “we might have been well rich.”
“Then it seems our desertions were ill-advised,” said Axel.
“Masters may have sacrificed much,” said Asperiche.
“And have little to show for it,” said Axel.
“Two slaves!” laughed Asperiche.
“Your slave is insolent,” said my master. “Does she have permission to speak? Have you suffered her to speak?”
“She has always spoken freely before me, owned or not owned,” said Axel. “I enjoy having her speak her mind.”
“I see,” said my master. I did not think he would be as permissive as Master Axel.
“It makes it all the more pleasant then,” said Axel, “to bring them again to their knees.”
“I see,” said my master, with satisfaction.
“A privilege not granted is not much missed,” said Axel, “but a privilege granted is more missed when it is withdrawn.”
“Of course,” said my master.
As is well known we speak well, and love to speak. It is one of the delights of our being. Accordingly few things more impress our bondage upon us, and with greater keenness, than the fact that our speech, as other aspects of our being, is subject to our master’s will. Unless we have a standing permission to speak, which might, of course, be rescinded at any time, we are commonly expected to request permission to speak, and are not to speak without such permission, which permission might or might not be granted. How painful it is, and how frustrating, to wish to speak, to desire fervently to do so, and not be permitted to do so! But it is not we, but the master, who will decide these things. They do not always wish to hear us speak, and then we may not do so.
Perhaps, I thought, lovely Asperiche could thus be well reminded that she is a slave. The whip, too, of course, is useful in this regard.
The great ship of Tersites was no longer in sight.
“We will trek,” said Axel. “I think it best to do so separately.”
“I agree,” said my master.
“Axel,” said my master.
“Yes?” he said.
“Genserich,” said my master, “speculated as to the possibility of two large and complex forces, each of which might well have spies in the camp of the other, perhaps even highly placed spies.”
“I recall,” he said.
“I think you are such a spy,” said my master.
“Possibly,” he said.
“For whom do you work?” asked my master.
“I do not know,” he said.
“You are hired through agents,” said my master.
“Of course,” he said.
“To what end?” asked my master.
“To inquire into the doings of Tyrtaios, and others,” he said, “to see if deceit is practiced, to see if there is treachery amongst the Pani, to see if the cards are marked, the dice weighted.”
“And it is so?” said my captor.
“As you have confirmed,” he said.
“And what is to be done?” asked my master.
“Nothing now,” said Axel. “It is too late. The ship is upon the river.”
We looked after the ship, which was now gone from sight. There was only the empty river, quiet in the morning sun, and the cries of some birds, fishing, skimming its surface, sometimes diving under the water, and there was smoke, here and there, drifting about. It seems there had been fires in the vicinity.
“Are you a spy?” asked Axel.
“No,” said my master.
“I wish you well,” said Axel.
“I, too, wish you well,” said my master.
Asperiche hurried to me and kissed me. “I wish you well, Laura,” she said. “And you are very beautiful.”
“I wish you well, Asperiche,” I said, kissing her. “And you are very beautiful.” I could not hold her, as my hands were braceleted behind me.
“Hoist my pack,” said Axel to Asperiche.
“Yes, Master,” she said, happily, and slung it about her shoulder.
Shortly thereafter Axel made his way up from the bank, south, into the forest, heeled by his slave. Tiomines rubbed his snout, head, and coat against the thigh of my master, and then, turning about, padded away, in the wake of Axel and his slave, Asperiche.
My master turned to face me.
“No,” he said. “Do not kneel. Turn away.”
I felt the key inserted into the bracelets, and they were removed from my wrists. I then turned about, to face him.
He pointed to the ground, and I knelt.
“Do you think you are a tower slave?” he asked.
“I do not know what sort of slave I am,” I said.
“Get your knees apart,” he said. “Widely! More widely!”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Do you now know what sort of slave you are?” he asked.
“Yes, Master,” I said. There was now no doubt about that. I was frightened, but excited and thrilled, as well. How frightening it is to be wanted, wanted not as a free woman is wanted, but wanted as a slave is wanted, to be wanted with all the power and force, and uncompromising authority, that a slave is wanted! And yet, too, what woman would wish to be less wanted? What woman does not wish to be so desired that she will be collared and possessed? A slave is many things to her master. Among them is his beast and pet, his plaything. I hoped he would not be difficult to please. I did not wish to be whipped.
“I grant you a standing permission to speak,” he said.
“Thank you, Master,” I said. “I thank you for saving my life. I thank you for freeing me of the bracelets.”
“You will wear them frequently,” he said.
“As Master wills,” I said.
“Do you think to escape?” he asked.
“No, Master,” I said. “I am collared, tunicked, and marked. There is no escape for me.”
“Do you fear me?” he asked.
“Yes, Master,” I said. How small, helpless, and weak I felt, kneeling before him. I was a scion of a far world kneeling before a Gorean master.
“It is well,” he said, “that a slave fear her master.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“You well humiliated me in the camp of Genserich,” he said, “with the tortures of the provocative slave girl.”
“Forgive me, Master,” I said.
“The men of Genserich were much amused,” he said.
“I was angry,” I said. “You had turned away from me! You had scorned me. I hated you. I wanted to make you suffer! I wanted to have my vengeance on you!”
“You do not seem so forward, so bold, so impudent, so insolent now,” he said.