Renegades of Gor (22 page)

girl whom I had enjoyed last night under the wagon, in the storm. I thought she

looked rather like a “Liadne.” That was a beautiful name. I thought I would give

it to her. I decided upon it. She was now, although she did not yet know it,

Liadne.

I looked down at the Vosk Road, below. There were fewer refugees on it now than

last night. Perhaps many had passed through the area last night. Perhaps now,

for most practical purposes, the route was cut off.

My attention was then drawn to the girl on the saddle before me. She was bent

low, cowering over the pommel, sobbing, grasping it with both hands. She had had

a very difficult time of it. There was no gainsaying that. I took her by the

hair and straightened her, and, turning her head, twisting her body, looked upon

her. The blindfold was still well in place. She moaned. Her cheeks, under the

dampened blindfold, were run with tears. These, too, had run upon her body. I

then turned her about again.

We flew northward, in silence.

She sobbed.

I considered feeling pity for her, and then dismissed the thought, for it was

weakness. She was a woman. Her wrists, too, were in my bracelets.

We flew further, in silence.

She wept.

I saw that she, though slender, was well curved, and beautiful.

“You may beg,” I informed her.

(pg.146) “What?” she said.

“You may beg to be caressed,” I said.

“You’re mad,” she said.

“Is it your intention to be difficult?” I asked.

“Do not beat me,” she said.

“You may now beg to be caressed,” I told her.

“Have I fallen into the hands of a monster?” she cried.

She was a legally free woman, but she was now before me, half naked, blindfolded

and braceleted, my captive and servant. Indeed, she had even purchased her

captivity and servitude. I wondered if she regretted what she had done. She now,

at any rate, understood it more clearly.

“Beg,” I said.

“I am not in the mood,” she cried.

I laughed. How amusing are free woman! Slaves learn to be in the “mood”

instantaneously, at so little as a glance or a snapping of the fingers, and a

pointing to the floor.

“Please,” she said. “please!”

“Beg,” I said.

“I beg to be caressed,” she said, weeping.

I then began to caress her, she before me, weeping, trying to resist, captive

and servant, clinging to the pommel.

“Monster,” she moaned. “Monster.” Then she sobbed, suddenly, partly with

surprise, partly with sensation.

I chuckled. Her legs looked well, split, squirming, over the glossy saddle.

“Monster!” she wept, her head back.

Her hands jerked, the fingers moving. She could not reach me. I heard the small

sounds of the links, jerking taut, then relaxing, then jerking taut again,

joining the bracelets.

“Perhaps you are now more in the mood?” I asked.

“Do not stop!” she begged.

“And what shall you call me?” I wondered.

“Oh,” she moaned. “Ohhh!”

“Surely you are curious to know what you should call me,” I speculated.

“Yes!” she cried. “Yes! Yes! What shall I call you? Oh! Oh!”

“You may call me ‘master,’” I said.

(pg.147) “Yes, Master!” she cried.

I then held her still, trying to calm her for a time.

“I called you Master!” she cried. “Am I yet legally free?”

“Yes,” I said, “but I think it will be well for you to accustom yourself to

calling free men Master.”

“Yes!” she said.

I decided that I would not yet grant her the collar, ripe for it though she

might be. She was a free woman. I would make her wait longer, in frustration,

for it.

“Please touch me again,” she begged.

“You liked it?” I asked.

“I have now felt it,” she said. “I now desperately need it.”

“Even to the surrender of all you are, and have been?” I asked.

“You have tried out your tarn,” she said. “Now, try me out!”

I regarded her. I thought she would look well, naked, tied absolutely

helplessly, on her back or belly, over the saddle of the tarn.

“Master?” she asked.

It was a fitting tie for such as she.

“Perhaps later,” I said.

I then folded my cloak about her, to protect her from the wind.

We continued northward.

9
     
The Camp of Cos

(pg.148) “Who is it?” she asked, kneeling in the darkness of the tiny tent, the

large sack covering most of her body.

“It is I,” I said, reassuring her.

I crouched beside her and unfastened the drawstrings of the sack which I had

tied under her body and about her thighs, to hold it on her. I then pulled it

from her and unbraceleted her hands from behind her back.

“Were you successful?” she asked, shaking her head, loosening her hair.

“Cook,” I said.

I then sat, cross-legged, in the tiny tent. We were just within the fringes of

the Cosian camp. There were, in this vicinity, clouds of tiny tents and

shelters,’ some of them belonging to soldiers, most to civilians, sutlers,

merchants, slavers, and such. The nearest investment trench was a half pasang

away. One could see the walls of Ar’s Station from where we were. The girl

busied herself, preparing food. It seemed peaceful here. It was difficult to

believe that fighting took place daily in the vicinity of the walls, indeed,

sometimes at night.

“There is little but porridge,” she said.

I nodded.

There would be even less, I supposed, in most homes in Ar’s Station.

“Have you heard anything?” she asked. She was putting (pg.149) twigs and leaves

in a small pit outside the entrance of the tent.

“It is said the city will soon fall,” I said.

“The defenses cannot be long maintained?” she asked.

“It is thought not,” I said.

“You wish to gain entrance to the city,” she said.

“Yes,” I said.

“Why?” she asked.

“I have business there,” I said.

“Your accent is not of Ar,” she said.

“I would hope not, in this camp,” I smiled.

She used a tiny fire maker and set fire to the leaves and twigs. She blew on the

small flame, encouraging it.

We could smell cooking fires about. It was near dusk.

“Your plans have not proceeded as you hoped?” she asked.

“I do not complain,” I said. “Things might have proceeded better than they have,

but they have gone much as I expected they would.

She added sticks to the small flame.

The first portion of my plan had been to reach Ar’s Station as swiftly as

possible, which meant, in effect, to do so on tarnback, and in such a way as to

gain immunity from the attentions of Cosian tarn patrols. That I had managed.

The patrols, which were thick in the vicinity, given my habiliments and

accouterments, and my brandished pouch, presumably a diplomatic one, had taken

me for a courier. Also, although I had not planned it, the presence of the

blindfolded, braceleted girl before me, apparently a capture, presumably picked

up enroute, and doubtless soon to be collared, added to the effect. The ears of

the delicate Phoebe must have burned as she heard the snapping of wings near us

and the shouting of ribald, raucous jests, of which her beauty and its probably

disposition were the subject. At times I had even received an escort, which

happily, at their patrol limits, had been suspended.

I had hoped, of course, somehow, ideally, to be able to enter Ar’s Station on

tarnback. As I had feared, however, this had not been possible. Even my garb as

a courier had not permitted me access to the airspace over Ar’s Station. I had

(pg.150) been immediately pursued and fired upon by flights of Cosian tarnsmen.

I had made the attempt in the afternoon and again in the evening of the first

day I had arrived in the vicinity of Ar’s Station. Had it not been for the

strength of the bird and my start I might have been downed over the city. I had

escaped the second time only with considerable difficulty, by taking my way over

the citadel and harbor, past the chained rafts closing the harbor, and across

the Vosk itself, eluding my pursuers only after a long run, under the cover of

darkness.

In these attempts I had, of course, not taken Phoebe. I had no wish to risk a

quarrel’s penetrating that beauty, which properly refined and improved, would,

in my opinion, not have shamed even the central block of the Curulean. Too, her

weight, slight as it was, might have made the difference between falling to

pursuers and eluding them.

I had, accordingly, before these excursions, sat her down, closely, before a

small tree, her legs on either side of it. I had then tied a rope on her left

ankle, looped the rope about another tree, a yard or so away, and brought it

back, to tie about her right ankle. I did this is such a way, adjusting the

length of the rope, that though her legs were forced to be rather extended, they

were also permitted to flex enough for comfort. I then pushed her belly against

the bark and braceleted her arms about the tree. The extension of her legs, of

course, was such that she could not reach the ropes on her ankles with her

braceleted hands. It also, of course, made it impossible for her to rise to her

feet. I had sat her down there, and she would remain there, sitting, and as I

had placed her. The location of the tree was close enough to the road that she

might, if I had not returned by morning, call out, attracting attention to

herself, thus saving herself, even if, at the same time, making it almost

certain that soon thereafter her thigh would know the fiery kiss of slave iron,

and her neck the clasp of a master’s collar.

She built up the fire.

I watched her.

She unfolded and adjusted a single-bar cooking rack, placing it over the fire.

From this she suspended a kettle of water. The single bar, which may be loosened

in its rings, and has a handle, may also function as a spit.

(pg.151) “And what did you do today?” I asked.

“I knelt in a body hood,” she said.

“It was only a sack,” I said.

“It served,” she said.

The sack I had drawn over her was an improvised body hood. There are several

varieties of body hoods on Gor, which is not surprising in a society in which

slavery, and particularly female slavery, is an essential ingredient. Most body

hoods are made of leather or layers of stout canvas. I have seen at least one in

which two layers of canvas were sewn about a lining of linked chain. They may be

fastened by means of such devices as cords, straps and laces. They may be tied

shut or locked shut.

The prisoner is entered into some body hoods from the back, her legs being

placed through openings in the lower portion of the hood, the hood then being

pulled up and, from the back, lacked shut. Most of these hoods do not have

openings for the arms, but some do. In most hoods the arms are confined within

the hood, either free within the hood itself or bound or braceleted within it.

Some hoods are open at the bottom, and fastened on the prisoner by means of

thongs or straps, often looped about the thighs. Others are constructed in such

a way that they may be opened at the bottom, for the master’s convenience.

Sometimes the hood is thrust up and fastened about the prisoner’s waist.

The typical hood provides hand and arm security with the advantages of the

blindfold. Most body hoods, unlike many common slave hoods, do not have

provisions for an internal gag. The prisoner, of course, may be gagged before

being hooded. The body hood, like the slave hood, tends to keep a female docile.

This may be a particular advantage early in her training, when she may not yet

fully understand her new nature and its meaning. Another advantage of the body

hood is that it is intriguing and attractive on a woman, baring her legs but

usually, unless the arms are also intriguingly bared, concealing the rest of

her, this sort of thing exciting male interest, and yet in virtue of the

predominant concealment afforded, making her seizure less likely than if she

lying about more exposed in common hoods.

Slavers, in moving their wares through the streets, sometimes place them in body

hoods. To be sure, it is more (pg.152) common to throw a cloak or sheet, which

might be of various lengths, over their heads, this usually being fastened on

them by means of a cord or strap looped once or twice about the neck and

fastened under the chin. In many cities free women object to the marching of

naked slaves through the streets. Still, even though the girls may be covered

with cloaks or sheets, the men will usually come to watch, and call out to them,

and jeer, and such. It is understood, of course, that the girls, beneath those

cloaks or sheets, are slave naked. It is sometimes very trying, though also

perhaps very instructive, for a new slave, perhaps a woman of a conquered city,

to be marched thusly through the streets, stung with pebbles, pinched and

slapped, subjected to the most intimate forms of raillery, jocosity and abuse.

“Do you object?” I asked.

“No,” she said, suddenly, quickly. Then she put herself on her belly, on the

dirt floor of the small tent, before me. She lifted her head, looking up at me.

“When,” she asked, “may I use the word ‘Master’ truly to you, in all honesty?”