Quarry of Gor, page 19
“It is the Whip and Chain,” he said. “Do you know it?”
“Yes,” I said. “It is a low tavern. I have hurried past it, scarcely daring to look within, many times.”
“I suspect you looked within,” he said.
“I could see little or nothing,” I said, “the gate.”
“Perhaps you were curious as to what might occur within such a tavern,” he said.
“No!” I said.
“Liar,” he said.
I trembled, for a slave girl, unlike a free woman, may be punished for lying.
“Please be kind,” I said.
“You are a slave,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
I well knew how slaves could be treated.
“You were curious,” he said.
I was silent.
“Were you not?” he said.
“Perhaps,” I said.
“‘Perhaps’?” he said.
“Yes,” I said, “Master,” quickly, frightened. “I was curious.” I feared to displease him. I was a slave, and he was free.
“Now,” he said, “you are going to find out,” he said.
“Please, no, Master,” I said.
The wooden sign which jutted out, from over the door of the tavern, was a placard on which, crudely, were represented, as one would expect, a whip and chain.
“When we reach the gate,” he said, “you will drop to all fours, and crawl within. Then you will crawl to whatever alcove I designate.”
I had known him from Earth!
“Yes, Master,” I said—bitterly.
“Precede me,” he said.
“Master!” I protested.
“I will enjoy walking behind you,” he said, “and I would recommend that you walk well.”
“You do not own me,” I protested.
“I do not intend to own you, only to enjoy you,” he said.
“Surely you cannot be serious,” I said.
“I shall try you out,” he said, “as a meaningless sex object, no more, the meaningless sex object you were before and now are, appropriately, in full legality, a worthless, branded, collared slave.”
“No!” I wept.
“It is what you should have been on Earth,” he said, “and, in many times, and in many places, would have been.”
“Mercy,” I begged.
“Let us not dally,” he said, “I have other business to attend to.”
“I am to be back at the Golden Chain, by the Twelfth Ahn,” I said.
“You are a paga slut at the Golden Chain?” he said.
“I am a paga girl at the Golden Chain,” I said.
“I find that hard to believe,” he said. “The Golden Chain commonly has better girls.”
“Some men,” I said, “find me quite attractive.”
“There must be another reason you are there,” he said.
“Quite attractive,” I said.
“You have not begun to be attractive,” he said.
“I must be back by the Twelfth Ahn,” I said.
“Do not be concerned,” he said. “I will not keep you long. I will finish with you quickly. You are not worth spending time with.”
I was furious.
“Are you displeased?” he asked.
“No!” I said, quickly.
“The least sign of displeasure, hesitation, reluctance, or disinclination on the part of a slave may bring the whip,” he said.
“I know,” I said.
“I told you to precede me,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said, trembling.
“Must a command be repeated?” he asked.
“No, Master,” I said.
The repetition of a command is often cause for discipline.
I then preceded him to the tavern, my tunic clutched in my right hand.
He did not hurry with me, as it turned out, but mastered me, wholly, and repeatedly. I had thought I might, in the beginning, as subtly as I could, deny him pleasure, feigning inertness, but the collar of a slave was on my neck, and Gor had touched me too deeply. Shortly, to his amusement, I became no more than what he knew I would become, a helpless, sobbing, begging, yielding slave in his arms. Gorean men had well prepared me for him. When he was finished with me, he inserted a coin, a tarsk-bit, into my mouth. I felt the tiny coin in my mouth. “That is for your master,” he said.
Shortly thereafter I rose, stiffly, drew on the tunic, and left the alcove.
The tarsk-bit belonged to my master. It belonged to him. It was a payment for my use.
I recalled my responses.
How helpless a slave is in the arms of a man of Gor. How easy it is to understand how one could beg for their caresses. How easy it would be to belong to such a man. How easy it would be, as a helpless slave, subdued and owned, to fall in love with such a man, one of a thousand masters. I recalled with bitterness, when I had lain at his feet, after he had used me for his pleasure yet another time, how I had lifted my hand to him, and, tears in my eyes, begged to be bought. “Only a slave begs to be bought,” he had said, scornfully, standing over me. “Yes, Master,” I had said. “Buy me, Master.” “When I had seen you on Earth,” he said, “you dining with, and exploiting, one weakling or another, I had thought you might make an acceptable slave, naked, crawling under the table, at a man’s knees, in your collar, hoping to be fed.” “Do you think so little of me?” I said. “Less,” he said. “You thought of me so, even then?” “Of course,” he said. “Then you knew of Gor, even then?” I said. “Of course,” he said. “Who do you think submitted your worthlessness for consideration, who do you think called you to the attention of the acquirers, who do you think proposed you for only what you would be good for, meaningless block meat?”
I regarded him, aghast.
“Yes,” he said.
“It was you, then,” I said, “who so despised me, who held me in such contempt, that you would do such a thing to me, you, who, by your will, without my least consent or knowledge, at your pleasure, called me to the attention of masters and dealers, you who are responsible for this utter, radical transformation in my life, for my abject reduction to total bondage, for my branding and collaring, for my now being no more than a property, an object, a vendible animal!”
“You had to be found suitable by others, too, of course,” he said.
“Undoubtedly,” I said, angrily.
“You will be pleased to know,” he said, “that you were assessed as acceptable.”
“Merely acceptable?” I said.
“Superbly acceptable,” he said. “Like many other selections, you had excellent slave reflexes, even prior to your collaring.”
“Oh?” I said.
“All women have excellent slave reflexes,” he said, “only some must first learn they are slaves. Others, in their heart, such as you, on one level or another, know that they are already slaves.”
“How could you know of such a thing?” I asked.
“What thing?” he asked.
“Slave reflexes,” I whispered.
“You were assessed,” he said.
“I do not understand,” I said.
“Perhaps you recall,” he said, “a particularly vivid dream?”
“No!” I said.
“I see you do,” he said.
How vulnerable are women!
“Perhaps you received a finder’s fee?” I said, archly.
“No,” he said, “it was a personal matter.”
“I see,” I said.
“Too,” he said, “you were not that beautiful.”
“I hate you!” I said.
“Of course,” he said.
“Buy me!” I begged. “Own me! I beg to be your slave!”
It was then that he had knelt beside me and placed the tarsk-bit in my mouth. He then rose up, and, with his foot, scornfully thrust me to the side, and withdrew. I went to my stomach, and, head lifted, looked after him. Then I had struck the furs, angrily, futilely, in frustration, again and again, with my fists.
His laughter had rung behind him.
How well I knew then that I was no longer Miss Margaret Henderson, of Earth, but now only Zia, of Gor, an animal, a property, a slave.
“Ah, Zia,” said Euphrosyne, “it seems you were raped in the street.”
“In a tavern,” I said.
“Were you any good?” she asked.
I dropped the tarsk-bit from my mouth into the palm of my hand. “Excellent,” I said.
“You must have been,” she said. “You were not whipped.”
“No,” I said.
“Your master was even paid for your use,” she said.
“Of course,” I said.
“It would not do to keep the tarsk-bit too long,” she said. “I would hasten to the master, kneel, lower your head. and lift the coin to him, and hope not to be beaten.”
“I will do so,” I said.
“Then,” she said, “hurry to the floor. There is a crowd. The tavern is busy. Paga flows, and many are the alcoves which will be strapped shut from the inside.”
I stood for a moment, hesitant, bemused.
I was trying to understand my feelings. When I had hurried to Master Addison on the walkway, I had, as had seemed appropriate under the circumstances, he being of Earth, and such, and I being confused and startled, and emotionally in tumult, astounded at seeing him, mouthed expected, prescribed bromides about despair, misery, shame, deliverance, rescue, release, liberation, and such. Surely that seemed appropriate at the moment. Would not such things be expected of me? But, too, almost immediately, I had seen through the fraudulence of such an act. Almost immediately I had feared that I might have been taken from myself, denied to myself, and plunged into the loneliness, the estrangement, the alienation, the meaninglessness, the misery, the despair of freedom. Let the free be free, and the slaves be slaves. I had found the fulfillment of my deepest desires, urges, needs, and being on Gor. I was fearful of being imprisoned in a freedom imposed on me, one foreign to my own nature.
I remembered Addison Steele
I remembered I had begged to be his slave.
He had spurned me, but such things are not that unusual for a slave.
We are often spurned.
We are slaves.
I wiped a tear from my eye.
“Zia,” said Euphrosyne.
“I am on my way,” I said.
I could hear the sounds of the crowd in the tavern, and the music. I looked through the dangling beaded curtain. On the square of dancing sand, Adraste would dance, a keeper standing nearby, his whip ready to be used on her.
Clutching the tarsk-bit in my hand I then turned about and hurried down the stairs, to the office of the proprietor of the tavern, Ho-Tosk, my master.
I would kneel before him, lower my head, lift the coin to him, and hope not to be beaten.
Chapter Twelve
I Cannot Forget Addison Steele;
I am Hooded;
I Discover that I have been Reserved
Seven days had passed since Addison Steele, a free man, a former acquaintance from Earth, unexpectedly, amazingly, encountered on Gor, in Port Kar, on the Thieves’ Way South, had taken advantage of me, a helpless slave, putting me to his pleasure.
How unlike the men of Earth he had been! How helpless I had been in his arms, no more than a worthless, grateful, yielding slave!
I had been well ravished.
Let me now speak briefly on a matter, the elucidation of which bears on my story.
My experiences on Earth had not prepared me for the typical Gorean male, free of programmed conflicts, guilts, and weaknesses, the uncrippled, unreduced male, so open, simple, honest, and direct in his unassumed, unquestioned, natural animal manhood, in his assurance, confidence, strength, and appetites. I supposed he might be diffident or ill at ease in the presence of one of those exalted, lofty Gorean free women, secure in her status, haughty, mercenary, and demanding, protected by a shared Home Stone, but his relation to the female slave, a half-naked property, purchasable, collared, and marked, was quite different. He knows, and we know, that we are pleasure animals. It is a simple dyadic relationship, that of master and slave. We see ourselves and understand ourselves in terms of that relationship, just as we are so seen and so understood by free men. I think this must be the natural relationship of the male and the female, for the men seem so healthy and vital, and I, at least, have never felt so alive, so real, so meaningful, and vital as in a collar. How glorious it is to be in the arms of a Gorean male, and as a slave! How I pity the poor free women, lacking a collar. No wonder they so envy and hate us. And no wonder we so fear them!
Returning to my story, I had been so certain of my view of the men of Earth that I had assumed that Addison Steele was no different from so many others I had known on my former world; I had approached him on the Thieves’ Way South as though he might be a typical man of Earth, concerned, weak, pathetic, and manipulable, and how terrified I had been when I found myself on my feet, before the fierce gaze of a Gorean master. How quickly, trembling, reprimanded, I had gone to my knees before him, my head down, my lips to his feet! What a fool I had been! I had even dared to address him not as ‘Master’ but by his name, the name of a free man, putting that name on a slave’s lips, an effrontery bordering on insolence or explicit disobedience!
How stern he had been with me, yet so lenient, in a way, for I had not even been lashed. Perhaps he had thought that I, a new slave, might not yet be fully in my collar. But little did he know how perfectly I was in my collar! Surely that became clear enough in the alcove! How amused he had been to see that the proud, vain, pretentious Margaret Henderson he had so properly disdained, if not despised, on Earth was now no more than a groveling, needful Gorean slave. And was it not he who had called me to the attention of slavers, thereby releasing my hidden slave, and giving me to her, she who was myself! I had thought much of Addison Steele since that interlude. My attitudes and emotions concerning him swept from pole to pole, from horizon to horizon, in gamuts ranging from stinging humiliation at how he had treated me, I, a woman of Earth, educated and intelligent, a former acquaintance, now half-naked, collared, and marked, now an abject slave at his mercy on another world, to an overwhelming, submissive awe at his manhood, his rightful power over me, from rage at how he had scorned and commanded me, handling me as though I might be no more than a domestic animal, to a slave’s desire to surrender herself, flaming and begging, in tears, to his least touch. I hated Addison Steele, and longed for his collar.
He had not lashed me, but I had little doubt he would have done so, had I been in the least bit displeasing.
How my slave’s body and heart had responded to his dominance!
I hated him, and wanted him to own me. I hated him, and wanted to be his slave.
I had begged him to buy me, this making it clear to him, and to myself, what I was.
I had been on my belly to him, and had been scorned.
Well did I then understand I was a slave!
He had put a tarsk-bit in my mouth and returned me to my master.
How I hated him, and had never forgotten him!
Each night, in serving, I had scanned the customers, fearing to see him, dreading to see him, hoping to see him. I recalled he had been surprised that I served in the Golden Chain, apparently thinking me too plain for the quality and prestige of that establishment. How little he knew! Was he so blind to beauty? I was sure a master could get a good price for me on the block. I was proud of my bondage, and what it said for my attractiveness. Had not slavers, discriminating professionals in such matters, selected me, included me on their cargo manifests, and shipped me, with others, like the animals we were, to the markets of Gor?
Every bit of me was now a slave.
Had I not seen the eyes of masters often on me?
Was I not frequently alcoved?
“Be busy, idle girl,” snapped the Vat Master, pointing to a table, “or I will put the punishment mark on your neck.”
Before we were caged, our necks were examined by the Whip Slave.
“Forgive me, Master!” I cried, hurrying to the indicated table.
“Hold,” said the taverner’s deputy.
“Master?” I asked, paused at the beaded curtain, preparing to enter upon the floor.
Euphrosyne slipped past me, and the beading of the curtain, in its colorful strands, with its tiny clatter, fell again into place.
The taverner’s deputy made a slight adjustment of my collar. When a master lifts, inspects, or adjusts the collar, one commonly lifts one’s chin that the matter may be easily and conveniently attended to. Interestingly, one then becomes much more aware of one’s collar. Commonly one does not even think of it, or notice it, but, of course, however unaware one may be of its presence, it is always there, locked nicely about one’s neck. I was surprised that he adjusted the collar. Surely it could not have been much awry. Before we enter upon the floor we inspect ourselves in a full-length mirror. Certainly I had done so. It is well-known that the sight of a female in a collar is sexually stimulating to a man. I suspect this is because it suggests that the female is a desirable animal, a prize animal, and fittingly to be owned and enjoyed. And, in the case of the slave, of course, this is literally true. I felt his fingers touch my neck, and felt heated. How slave I was! Yet I, shamelessly, thrilled to my responsiveness. The slave is free to be uncritically, unquestioningly sexual, free to be her vital, natural, needful, uninhibited self. Indeed, should she be reluctant or hesitant in such matters, perhaps as a consequence of some oppressive upbringing or restrictive education, or as a result of having been subjected to some pathological, negativistic, societally inculcated conditioning program, she may feel the lash.
Well she then knows that her world has changed.
She is now choiceless.
She must be herself.
