Beasts Of Gor

6
Two Girls Are Made Slaves; I Proceed Northward To Lydius

I lay on my belly before the small pond, and, with the palm of my hand, lifted water to my mouth.

When I heard the sound of the tharlarion, some four or five of them, I rose to my feet.

"Have you see aught of a sport slave?" she asked.

"No," I said.

She was very lovely and attractive in her hunting costume, brief tunic and long hose, brown, a scarlet cape and cap, the cap with a feather. She carried a short, yellow bow, of Ka-la-na wood, which could clear the saddle of the tharlarion, its missile being easily released to either side. Her black boots, slick and shining, were spurred. A quiver of arrows, yellow, was at the left of her saddle.

"Thank you, Warrior," she said, and wheeled the light saddle tharlarion, its claws scattering pebbles by the side of the pond.

She was with four men, also on upright tharlarion. They followed her as she sped away.

She had had dark hair, dark eyes.

I did not envy the sport slave.

I stood in the midst of fields south of the Laurius river, some forty pasangs inland from the shore of Thassa, some one hundred and twenty pasangs south of the river port of Lydius, lying at the mouth of the Laurius river, on its farther side. My tarn was foraging. I had brought it inland where game was more plentiful.

I had had at that time no intention of stopping at Lydius. My business lay far to the north.

I did not know how long it would take my tarn to make a kill and return. Usually this can be done within the Ahn. There is little scarcity of game on Gor, save in relatively populated areas. Usually one spots game from the saddle and calls "Tabuk," which is the tarn's hunting signal. I had, however, spotted little suitable game, and so had released the tarn to do his own foraging. When the tarn takes game one may either retain the saddle or not. If there is no press of time I have usually surrendered it, if only to stretch my legs. Too, the feeding of a tarn is not pleasant to witness.

From a distance, approaching, I could see a small retinue, not more than some fourteen persons.

A free woman, robed in white, veiled, was being carried in a sedan chair by four draft slaves. Beside the chair, on either side, afoot, walked a girl. Each was veiled but bare-armed. From the fact that their arms had been bared to the gaze of men I knew they were slaves.

The journey from Port Kar north had been long.

I felt in a good humor.

Besides the women and the draft slaves, the latter chained by the wrists and neck to the sedan chair, there were seven warriors, six spearmen and their captain.

I walked about the edge of the pond, to meet them. They were approaching the pond, presumably to draw water.

I waited, standing, my helmet over my back, my shield behind my left shoulder, leaning on my spear.

The retinue stopped, seeing me. Then, at a gesture from the robed figure in white, it proceeded again. It stopped some fifteen feet from me.

"Tal," said I, lifting my right hand to them, palm facing the left.

They did not respond.

The captain stepped forth. They did not seem then to me to be pleasant fellows.

"Who are you?" asked the captain.

"One who has greeted you," I said.

"Tal," said he, lifting his hand.

"Tal," I rejoined.

"We have seen nothing of the sport slave," he said.

"I do not hunt him," I said.

"Where is your tharlarion?" asked one of the men.

"I have none," I said.

"Do not block our way," said the captain.

"I mean you no harm," I said. "I greet you in peace and friendship."

"Who are you?" asked the captain.

"I am one who is of the warriors," I said. "And I am a traveler, a visitor now in this country."

"What is your business?" he asked.

"It lies in the north," I said.

"He is a brigand from the forests north of Laura," said the lady.

"No, Lady," said I, deferentially. I inclined my head to her, for she was free, and obviously of high station.

"You have been greeted," she said, icily. "Now stand aside."

I thought her tone surly.

I did not move.

"This is the retinue of Constance, Lady in Kassau, enroute to Lydius, returning from the sights of Ar."

"She must be rich," I said. Surely this was true, for her to travel as she did, not in public caravan.

"Stand aside," said the captain.

"A moment, Captain," said I. I looked to the free woman. "I am a man, dear lady," said I, "and am of the warriors. I have journeyed far."

"I do not understand," she said.

"I assume," said I, "that you will linger briefly here, to fill the flasks of water, if not camp for the night."

"What does he want?" she asked.

"He is of the warriors, milady," said the captain.

"Forgive me, Lady," said I, "but my need is much upon me."

The two slave girls, bare-armed and veiled, quickly glanced to one another.

"I do not understand," said the graceful figure in the sedan chair. She was free.

I grinned at her. "I have food," I said. "I have water. But I have not had for four days a woman."

She stiffened. The night before I had left Port Kar I had had Vella sent naked to my room. I had used her ruthlessly several times, before sleeping and, early in the morning, when I had awakened. "Take me with you," she had begged. "So that you might with another Bertram of Lydius," I asked, "conspire against me?" "He tricked me, Master," she wept. "He tricked me." "I should have you lashed to within an inch of your life, Slave Girl," I had told her. "I am innocent, Master," she had wept I had then turned my back on her and left her, naked, chained in the furs at the foot of my couch.

But that had been four days ago.

I gestured to the two girls with the free woman. One of them slightly lowered her veil.

"I will pay well for the use of one of these slaves," I said to the free woman.

"They are my personal slaves," she said.

"I will give a silver tarsk for the brief use of one, either that you might indicate," I said.

The warriors looked at one another. The offer was quite generous. It was unlikely that either of the girls would bring so much on the block.

"No," said the free woman, icily.

"Permit me then to buy one," I said, "for a golden tarn."

The men looked at one another, the draft slaves, too. Such a coin would fetch from the block a beauty fit for the gardens of a Ubar.

"Stand aside," said the free woman.

I inclined my head. "Very well, Lady," said I. I moved to one side.

"I deem myself to have been insulted," she said.

"Forgive me, Lady," said I, "but such was not my intent If I have done or said aught to convey that impression, however minutely, I extend to you now the deepest and most profound of apologies and regrets."

I stepped back further, to permit the retinue to pass.

"I should have you beaten," she said.

"I have greeted you in peace and friendship," I said. I spoke quietly.

"Beat him," she said.

I caught the arm of the captain. His face turned white. "Have you raised your arm against me?" I asked.

I released his aim, and he staggered back. Then he slung his shield on his arm, and unsheathed the blade slung at his left hip.

"What is going on!" demanded the woman.

"Be silent, foolish woman," said the captain.

She cried out with rage. But what did she know of the codes?

I met his attack, turning it, and he fell, shield loose, at my feet. I had not chosen to kill him.

"Aiii!" cried one of the draft slaves.

"Kill him! Kill him!" cried the free woman. The slave girls screamed.

Men shouted with rage.

"Who is next?" I asked.

They looked at one another.

"Help me," said the captain. Two of the men went to him and lifted him, bleeding, to his feet. He looked at me, held between his men.

I stood ready.

He looked at me, and grinned. "You did not kill me," he said.

I shrugged.

"I am grateful," he said.

I inclined my head.

"Too," said he, "I know the skills of my men. They are not poor warriors, you understand."

"I am sure they are not," I said.

"I do not choose to spend them," he said. He looked at me. "You are a tarnsman," he said.

"Yes," I said.

"I thought it would be so," he said. He looked at me. "I give you greetings of the caste of warriors," he said.

"Tal," said I.

"Tal," said he.

"Kill him!" cried the free woman. "Kill him!"

"You have wronged this man," said the captain. "And he has labored within the permissions of his codes."

"I order you to kill him!" cried the free woman, pointing to me.

"Will you permit us to pass, Warrior?" asked the captain.

"I am afraid, under the circumstances," I said, "that is no longer possible."

He nodded. "Of course not," he said.

"Kill him!" cried the free woman.

"We are six now who can fight," said the captain. "It is true that we might kill him. I do not know. But never have I crossed swords with one such as he. There is a swiftness, a sorcery, a savageness in his steel which in a hundred fights to the death I have never encountered. And yet I now stand alive beside your chair to explain this to you, who are incapable of understanding it."

"He is outnumbered," she pointed out.

"How many will he kill?" asked the captain.

"None, of course!" she cried.

"I have crossed steel with him, Lady," said the captain. "Do not explain to me the nature of swordplay and odds." He looked to his men. "Do you wish to fall upon him, Lads?" he asked, smiling wryly.

"Command us, and we shall attack," said one of the men.

I thought their discipline good.

The captain shook his head ruefully. "I have crossed steel with him, Lads," said he. "We shall withdraw."

"No!" screamed the free woman.

The captain turned, supported by two men.

"Cowards!" she cried.

The captain turned to face her. "I am not a coward, Lady," said he. "But neither am I a fool."

"Cowards!" she cried.

"Before I send men against one such as he," said the officer, "it will be to defend a Home Stone."

"Coward! Cowards!" she screamed.

"I have crossed steel with him," said the captain. He then, held between his men, withdrew. More than one of them cast glances at me over their shoulder. But none, I think, wished to return to do contest.

I resheathed the blade.

"Turn about," said the free woman to the draft slaves. She would follow the retreating warriors.

"Do not turn about," I said to them.

They obeyed me. The sedan chair stayed as it was. "Why did you not kill them?" asked one of the draft slaves.

"You were of the warriors?" I asked.

"Yes," said he.

"It seems not fitting you should be chained to a lady's chair," I said.

He grinned, and shrugged.

"Will you not permit me to withdraw, Warrior?" asked the free woman.

"These seem fine fellows," I said. "Doubtless you have the key to these chains in your possessions."

"Yes," she said.

"Give it to her," said I, indicating one of the slave girls. This was done, and, at my gesture, the girl freed the draft slaves.

They rubbed their wrists, and moved their heads, no longer in the iron circle of the collars.

The sedan chair rested still on their shoulders. They looked at me, well pleased.

"I will let you have the use of one of the girls for a silver tarsk," said the free woman.

I looked up at her. "It is a bit late for that, my dear Lady Constance," I said.

"I will sell one of them to you for a golden tarn," she said.

"That seems a high price to ask for a slave girl," I said.

She lifted up her veiled head. "You may have the use of one or both for free," she said.

"Lady Constance is generous," I said.

She did not lower her head to so much as glance upon me. "I give them to you," she said.

"Lower the chair," I said to the draft slaves. The chair was lowered.

"Free them," I said, indicating the draft slaves.

They stood about her, looking at her. She sat nervously in the chair. "You are free," she said. "You are free."

They grinned, and did not move.

"You may go," she said. "You are free."

I nodded to them and, together, grinning and striking one another in their pleasure, they withdrew. One remained for a moment. "My thanks, Warrior," he said.

"It is nothing," said I, "-Warrior."

He grinned, and turned, hurrying after the others.

The two slave girls looked at one another.

"Remove your veils," said the free woman.

The two girls pulled away their veils. Both were pretty.

I smiled at them. They blushed, basking in my smile.

"They are yours, of course, if you wish," said the free woman, gesturing with her head to the two girls.

One of the girls looked at me, and I nodded.

"No!" cried the free woman. One of the girls had lifted aside the first of the free woman's veils, and the other had brushed back the first of her hoods.

"No!" cried the free woman. Then, despite her protest, the first girl drew aside the last veil which concealed her features, and the second girl brushed back the final hood, revealing her hair, which was blond. The free woman's blue eyes looked at me, frightened. She had been face-stripped. I saw that she was beautiful.

"Stand," I said to her.

She stood.

"I will pay you well to conduct me to safety," she said. Her lip trembled.

"If the beauty of your body matches that of your face," I said, "it is the collar for you."

"It will be the collar for her, Master!" cried one of the slave girls, delightedly:.

"Fina!" cried the free woman.

"Forgive me, Mistress!" said the girl.

The two girls lifted aside the free woman's robes, until she stood displayed before me.

I walked about her. "Yes," I said, "it is the collar for you, Lady Constance."

"Daphne! Fina!" cried the free woman. "Protect me!"

"Do you not know enough to kneel before your master, foolish slave?" chided Fina.

Numbly the Lady Constance knelt.

"In my belongings, over there," I said to one of the girls, she called Daphne, "there is a collar. Bring it."

"Yes, Master," she cried happily, running to where I had indicated, a place beside a small tree some fifty yards from the pond. I had made a temporary camp there, while awaiting the return of the tarn. I scanned the skies. It was not in sight.

"On your hands and knees, head down," I said to the Lady Constance.

She assumed this posture, her blond hair hanging forward, downward, over her head.

I roughly collared her and she sank moaning to her stomach in the grass.

I then tied the hands of the two slave girls behind their backs and knelt them by the sedan chair. I then took what valuables and moneys there were in the chair, kept in the cabinets at its sides, and slung them, some scarfed and others placed in pouches, about the necks of the two slave girls. I was surprised. The owner of the chair had been rich indeed. There was a fortune there, and the notes for other fortunes. I would keep none of this. I had what I wanted. She lay collared in the grass.

"Stand," I said to the two slave girls.

They stood, obediently. I pointed off, over the grass. The former slaves could be seen in the distance. "Do you see the men?" I asked. "Yes, Master," they said. "Here in the wilderness, bound, alone, you will die," I pointed out. "Yes, Master," they said, frightened. "Follow the men," I said to them. "Beg them to keep you, and the riches you bear." "We shall, Master," they said. "I think they will be agreeable," I conjectured. "Yes, Master," they said, looking down. "And that you may appear more worth keeping about, and to facilitate your pursuit of the men," I said, "I will take the liberty of shortening your tunics." "Yes, Master," they said, pleased. But when I had finished my work they looked at me, frightened. They shrank back. "Hurry now," said I, "after the men, before I rape you myself." They laughed and turned and ran after the men. "Overtake them before dark," I said, "for sleen may soon be prowling." "Yes, Master," they cried. I laughed, watching them stumble, weighted with riches, after the former draft slaves.

I returned to where the girl lay in the grass. She was on her stomach. Her hands had dug into the dirt. She sensed I stood near her. I stood a bit behind her and to her left.

"Am I a slave?" she whispered.

"Yes," I said.

"You can do anything with me you want?" she asked.

"Yes," I said.

Her head was to one side. There were tears on her cheek.

"What are you going to do with me, Master?" she asked.

"Whatever pleases me," I said.

"I ordered my men to kill you," she said. "Are you going to slay me for that?"

"Of course not," I said. "That was the act of the Lady Constance. She no longer exists."

"A slave girl is now in her place," whispered the girl.

"Yes," I said.

"It seems I have escaped easily," she said.

"Not really," I said. "It is only that now you are subject to new risks and penalties, those of a slave girl."

She clutched the grass. She knew well of what I spoke.

"You may now be slain for as little as an irritable word, or for being in the least displeasing. Indeed, you may be slain upon the mere whim of a master, should it please him."

She sobbed.

"Do you understand?" I asked.

"Yes, Master," she said. Then she looked up at me. "Are you a kind master?" she asked.

"No," I said.

"I do not know how to be a slave," she said.

"Men will teach you," I said.

"I will try to learn swiftly," she said.

"That is wise," I said.

"My life will depend on it?" she asked.

"Of course," I said. I grinned. Gorean men are not patient with their girls.

"This morning," she said, "I was free."

"You are now a slave," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I looked up at the late afternoon skies. The tarn had not yet returned. Yet I was not displeased.

I looked down at the girl. "Go to my things," I said. "Spread furs upon the grass."

"I am a virgin," she said.

"You are white-silk," I said.

"Please do not use that vulgar expression of me," she begged.

"Do not fear," I said. "It will soon be inappropriate."

"Show me mercy," she begged.

"Spread the furs," I said.

"Please," she begged.

"I have no slave whip at hand," I said, "but I trust my belt will serve."

She leaped to her feet. "I will spread the furs, Master," she said.

"Then lie on them on your belly," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

She spread the furs on the grass by the tree, and then lay on them, on her belly.

"Throw your hair forward and over your head," I said.

She did so. The collar was now clearly visible on her neck. I stood behind her, and dropped my accouterments to the side.

"Why did you make me a slave?" she whispered.

"It pleased me," I said.

I crouched beside her and took her by the right arm and hair, and turned her to her back on the furs. She was delicately beautiful. She would ravish well.

"In Torvaldsland," I said, "it is said the woman of Kassau make superb slaves." I looked at her. "Is it true?" I asked.

"I do not know, Master," she said frightened.

"How marvelously beautiful you are," I said.

"Please be kind to me, Master," she begged.

"I have not had a woman in four days," I told her. Then she cried out.

The three moons were high.

The night was chilly. I felt her kissing softly at my thigh.

"Is it true," she asked, "what they say in Torvaldsland, that the women of Kassau make superb slaves?"

"Yes," I said.

"I never knew that I could feel this way," she said. "It is so different, so total, so helpless."

I touched her head.

"It is only the feelings of a slave girl," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I lay on my back, looking upward.

"Please, Master," she whispered, "subject me again to slave rape."

"Earn your rape," I told her.

"Yes, Master," she said, kissing me.

"Stop," I said.

"Master?" she asked.

"Be quiet," I said. I was listening. I rolled from her side and crouched in the furs. I was now certain that I heard it. I slipped my tunic over my head and looped the scabbard at my left shoulder. She crouched in the furs naked, beside me.

I drew the blade.

I could see him coming now, running over the fields, stumbling.

He was a large man, exhausted. At his hips he wore a rag. An iron collar, with broken chain, was at his neck.

He came near us and then stopped, suddenly. He stood unsteadily. "Are you with them?" he asked.

"With whom?" I asked.

"The hunters," he said.

"No," I said.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"A traveler, and a slave girl," I said. She shrank hack in the furs, pulling them about her throat.

"You are of the warriors?" he said.

"Yes," I said.

"You will not kill me, nor hold me for them?" he asked.

"No," I said.

"Have you seen them?" he asked.

"A girl, and four guardsmen?" I asked.

"Yes," he said.

"Earlier today," I said. "You are then the sport slave?" I said.

"Yes," said he, "purchased from the pens at Lydius, for a girl's hunting."

I recalled the dark-eyed, dark-haired girl, vital and trim in her carefully tailored hunting costume, with the tunic and hose, the boots, cape and feathered cap. It was an attractive outfit.

"You have done well to elude them this long," I said. "Would you care for food?"

"Please," said he.

I threw him meat and he sat down, cross-legged. Seldom had I seen a man so tear at food.

"Would you care for paga?" I asked.

"No," he said.

"I see that it is your intention to survive," I said.

"That is my intention," he said.

"Your chances," I said, "are slim."

"I now have food," he said.

"You are a courageous fellow," I said.

"Did they have sleen?" he asked.

"No," I said. "They were, it seems, making it truly a sport."

"Those well-armed and mounted can afford nobility," he said.

"You sound bitter," I said.

"If they do not find me tonight," he said, "they will return with sleen in the morning."

"That," I said, "would be the end." The sleen can follow a track better than a larl or a Kur. It is tireless and tenacious, and merciless.

"I have one chance," he said.

"What is that?" I asked.

"They had formed a hunting line," said he, "the girl in the center. It was in her path that I left a bit of rag, and did not deign thenceforward to conceal my trail. She should have come upon the bait by now."

"She will summon her guardsmen," I said, "and you will be finished."

"I assess her vanity differently," he said. "It is her sport, not theirs. She will pull away from her guardsmen to be first to the quarry."

"They will pursue," I said.

"Of course," he said.

"You will have little time," I said.

"True," he said.

"Do you think that you, afoot, will be able to elude a mounted archer, be she even female?" I asked.

"I think so," he said.

"There is little cover," I said. I looked at the fields.

"There is enough," he said. Then he rose to his feet and wiped his hands on his thighs. Then he walked over to the pond several yards away. He lay down on his belly and drank from the water.

"Yes," I said. 'There is cover. He is a clever fellow."

The man left tracks by the side of the pond, and then waded into the chill water. He broke off a reed and then waded deeper into the water.

I felt the girl beside me touch me, timidly. "May I labor now to earn my rape, Master?" she asked.

"Yes," I said.

I smiled to myself. The slave fires, which lurk in any woman, had been particularly easy to arouse in this girl. I recalled that the men of Torvaldsland regarded the women of Kassau as superb slaves. I saw now the justice of this assessment. Gorean girls, however, who are aware of the cultural implications of their collar, and its meaning, usually spend little time, once it is helplessly locked on their throats, in fighting their womanhood. They must bend, or die. In bending, in submission, in total, will-less submission to a master, they find themselves free for the first time from the chains of egoism, liberated from the grasping pursuits of the self, readied for the surrenders of love.

"Disgusting!" said the free woman, on the tharlarion, in the hunting costume.

I rolled over, looking up. The blond girl by my side, the slave, cried out with misery, and dared not meet the eyes of her free sister.

"Greetings," I said.

"Do not permit me to interfere with your pleasures," she said cooly.

The slave girl whimpered and put down her head. How shamed she was before the freedom and grandeur of the free woman.

"Have you found your sport slave yet?" I inquired.

"No," she said. "But he is quite near."

"I have not been paying much attention," I said.

"You have been otherwise engaged." she, said loftily. I wondered at the hatred which free women seem to bear to their imbonded sisters. This hatred, incidentally, is almost never directed at the master, but almost always at the slave. Do they envy the slaves their collar?

"That is true," I admitted.

"It is fortunate I am here," said the free woman. "You might need my protection."

"You think there is a dangerous fellow lurking about?" I asked.

"I am sure of it," she said.

"We shall be on our guard," I said.

"I will take him soon," she said. "He is not far." She wheeled the tharlarion away. "Return to the pleasures of your slut," she said.

"But we must be on our guard," I called.

"There is little need," she said. "I will take the fellow within minutes."

I turned to the girl beside me, who was crying.

"Are you shamed?" I asked her.

"Yes," she said.

"Good," I said.

She looked at me.

"You are a slave," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said, her head down.

"Watch," I said. She lifted her head.

The free woman was at the edge of the pond. She did not dismount. Her bow was ready. In an instant it might clear the saddle to either side. From the saddle she studied the tracks in the moonlight. She moved the tharlarion into the water. Doubtless she thought the pond had been waded, to obscure tracks, which would emerge on the other side. Had she been a more experienced hunter she would have circled the pond to determine this for certain.

The blond girl beside me kissed me. "What does she know of being a woman?" she asked.

"Very little," I said. "But perhaps by tomorrow at noon she will know more."

"I do not understand, Master," said the girl.

"Watch," I said.

The girl, astride the tharlarion, moved deeper into the pond.

"She is an arrogant girl, is she not, Master?" asked the slave.

"Yes," I said.

Suddenly emerging from the water at the very side of the tharlarion there was the large, fierce figure of a man. His hand closed on the girl's left arm and dragged her swiftly, forcibly from the saddle, she crying Out, startled, dashing her shoulder and headfirst into the water at his side. He thrust her under the surface following her under.

"She knew too little of men even to fear them," I said.

In a moment the figure of the man reared up shaking his head to clear his eyes of water. The girl's knife was in his right hand; his left hand held her head, grasped by the hair, beneath the surface. He looked about. He jerked her head up from the water and she gasped and sputtered. When she could scream he thrust her head again beneath the surface. The tharlarion moved about, water at the stirrup, shifting, tossing its head about. Then its reins hung in the water. It was a small, hunting tharlarion, controlled by bit and bridle. The large upright tharlarion, or war tharlarion, are guided by voice commands and the blows of spears. The man put the knife in his teeth and, fiercely, smote the tharlarion. It grunted and, splashing, fled from the water, running in its birdlike gait across the fields. The man again pulled up the girl from the water. She spit water into the pond, and vomited, and coughed. The man then tore the belt from her and fastened her hands behind her back. He thrust the knife he had held in his teeth in his belt. He broke off a tube of reed. The girl looked at him, frightened. In the distance I could see the four guardsmen, moving swiftly, trying to catch up with the girl who had broken away from them in the rash vanity of her hunt, desiring to be first upon the prize. She had apparently broken the hunting line without informing them. Perhaps, too, her tharlarion was swifter than theirs. It bore less weight. I saw the man take the tube of reed he had broken off and thrust it in her mouth; then the knife he carried, hers, lay across her throat; I saw her eyes, wild, in the moonlight, and then he, another bit of reed in his mouth, pulled her quietly below the surface.

In a few moments the four guardsmen, distraught, reined up beside my furs.

I looked up from the collared slave in my arms.

"Tal," said their leader.

"Tal," I said.

"Have you see aught of the Lady Tina of Lydius?" inquired one of the men.

"The huntress?" I asked.

"Yes," he said.

"She was here, inquiring about a sport slave," I said.

"Where did she go?" asked one of the men.

"Have you not taken the sport slave yet?" I asked. "It is late."

"Have you see the Lady Tina?" asked the leader of the men.

"Yes," I said, "earlier."

"Where did she go?" asked the leader.

"Are there tracks?" I asked.

"Here," said one of the men, "here, see here. There are tracks."

They followed the tracks to the side of the pond. Had they crossed the pond they might, in the breadth of their passage, have struck the submerged couple. These men, however, apparently more skilled than the girl, first circled the pond to discover emergent tracks. They found these, of course, almost immediately, those of the running tharlarion. In their haste, and in their desire to overtake their lovely charge, they sped into the night. It was not even clear to me that they, in their concern with the tracks of the tharlarion, observed the tracks of the man leading to the pond. Too, as I determined later, his tracks had been, for the most part, obscured by the tracks of the beast of his lovely huntress. Some of the more obvious ones, too, I had erased with a branch.

I assumed the couple might be chilled upon emerging from the water and so I took the liberty of building a fire. The wood was gathered by my slave, whom I named Constance.

In time I saw the man's head lift slowly, almost imperceptibly, from the pond… He reconnoitered, and then, dragging the girl with him, her wrists bound behind her back, approached the fire.

"You had better get out of those wet clothes," I told the girl.

She looked at me with horror.

"Don't," she begged her captor.

She squirmed, held, as he cut the tunic and cape from her, and then she was thrown on her belly on the grass and the wet hose and boots were drawn from her. He then knelt across her body and freed her hands. With the knife he slit the belt into narrow strips, improvising binding fiber. He then retied her hands behind her back and, crouching beside her, crossed and bound her ankles. She struggled to her knees. She faced us.

"I am the Lady Tina of Lydius," she said. "Free me!"

We looked at her.

"I am the Lady Tina of Lydius," she said. "I demand to be immediately freed."

I thought she would look well dancing naked in a paga tavern before men.

"Free me!" she cried.

I had once owned a slave named Tina, who also had been from Lydius. It is not that uncommon a name. The Tina whom I had known was now free, an esteemed member of the caste of thieves in Port Kar, one of the most skillful in the city. She was doing well for herself.

I looked at this Tina. She was obviously too beautiful to free. She would be kept as a slave for men.

"You have won," she said to the slave. "I acknowledge that in the generosity of my freedom. Release me now and I shall petition that you not be slain."

"In the morning," he said, "they will bring sleen."

"Yes," she said.

"Will you discuss the matter with them?" he asked.

"Perhaps they will be leashed," she said.

The man laughed. "Do you think me a fool?" he asked. "They will be run free from the kennels. Do you think they want me alive?"

"I own you," she said to the man. "Free me!" I recalled that he had been purchased from the pens of Lydius for her sport. Apparently she had stood the purchase price. Her arrogance, and airs, suggested that she might well have done so.

"You seem rich and educated," I said.

"I am both," she said. "I am of the high merchants."

"I, too, was of the merchants," said Constance.

"Be silent, Slave Girl," snapped the free woman.

"Yes, Mistress," stammered Constance. She placed a branch upon the fire. She withdrew. She was new to her collar.

The free woman glared at the man who had captured her. "Free me, now!" she said.

He looked at her, fingering the knife he had taken from her.

The free woman squirmed in her bonds, frightened. She looked at me. "You are free," she said, "protect me!"

"What is your Home Stone?" I asked.

"That of Lydius," she said.

"I do not share it," I said.

The man crouched near her. His hand was behind her neck, holding her. The point of the dagger was in her belly.

"I free you! I free you!" she said.

"Have some meat," I said to him. I had been roasting some bosk over the small fire.

He, now a free man, came and sat near me, across the fire from me. The free woman shrank back, in the shadows. Constance knelt behind me and to my left, making herself unobtrusive. Occasionally she fed the fire.

The free man and I fed. "What is your name?" I asked. I threw a hit of meat to Constance, which she snatched up and ate.

"Ram," said he, "once of Teletus, but friendless now in that island, one banished."

"Your crime?" I asked.

"In a tavern," he said, "I slew two men in a brawl."

"They are strict in Teletus," I said.

"One of them stood high in the administration of the island," he said.

"I see," I said.

"I have been in many cities," he said.

"How do you work your living?" I asked. "Are you a bandit?"

"No," said he. "I am a trader. I trade north of Ax Glacier for the furs of sleen, the pelts of leem and larts."

"A lonely work," I said.

"I have no Home Stone," he shrugged.

I pitied him.

"How is it," I asked, "that you fell slave?"

"The hide bandits," he said.

"I do not understand," I said.

"They have closed the country north of Ax Glacier," he said.

"How can this be?" I asked.

"Tarnsmen, on patrol," said he. "I was seized and, though free, sold south as a slave."

"Why should these men wish to close off the north?" I asked.

"I do not know," he said.

"Tarns cannot live at that latitude," I said.

"In the summer they can," said he. "Indeed, thousands of birds migrate each spring to the nesting cliffs of the polar basin."

"Not tarns," I said.

"No," said he. "Not tarns." Tarns were not migratory birds.

"Surely men can slip through these patrols," I said.

"Doubtless some do," he said.

"You were not so fortunate," I said.

"I did not even know they came as enemies," he laughed. "I welcomed them. Then I was shackled." He chewed on a piece of meat, then swallowed it. "I was sold at Lydius," he said. He looked up, again chewing, at the free woman. "I was bought there by this high lady," he said. He swallowed down the meat.

"What are you going to do with me?" she asked.

"I can think of many things," he said, regarding her.

"It would be simple to untie her ankles," I said.

"Do not touch me!" she said. "I am free."

"Perhaps you are a slave," he said.

"No," she said. "No! I am free!"

"We shall see," he said.

"I do not understand," she said.

He turned away from her, wiping his hands on his thighs. He went over to the edge of the pond, and, kneeling down beside the water, drank. When he got up he looked at the tracks there. When he returned, he smiled. "My thanks," said he.

I nodded.

I scanned the skies for the tarn. Game must indeed be scarce, I thought.

Constance put more wood on the fire. She glanced at the Lady Tina.

"Do not look at me, Slave!" hissed the Lady Tina.

"Forgive me, Mistress," said Constance. She looked away, frightened. She did not wish to be beaten.

"Sir," said the free woman, addressing her captor, Ram, once of Teletus.

"Yes," he said.

"My modesty is offended," she said. "I find it disagreeable to be unclothed before a slut of a slave who is not even my personal maid."

"In the morning," said he, "you will be partially clothed." She looked at him, puzzled.

"May I command your girl," he asked.

"Yes," I said.

"Constance," said he.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Look well and carefully upon our prisoner," he said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

The free woman turned her head away, in fury.

"Do you think," he asked, "that she might make a pretty slave."

"I am not a man, Master," said Constance, "but I should think she might make even a beautiful slave."

"Please!" protested the free woman.

"Look upon her when and as you wish," said Ram.

"Yes, Master," smiled Constance. I saw her make a tiny face at the Lady Tina.

"Oh!" cried the Lady Tina, in fury, squirming in the leather.

"What do you think?" asked Ram of me.

"She squirms well," I said. "I think she is excellent meat for marking."

"I hate you all!" said the Lady Tina. "And I will never be a slave! You cannot make me a slave! Never, never will I be a slave. No man can make me a slave!"

"I shall not even try," said Ram.

She looked at him, startled.

"I shall not make you my slave," he said. "unless you beg to be my slave."

She threw back her head and laughed. "I would die first," she said.

"It is late now," I said. "I think we should sleep."

"What is your name?" he asked.

"Tarl," said I. "Let that suffice."

"Accepted," he said, smiling. He would not pry further into my affairs. Doubtless he assumed I was bandit, fugitive or assassin.

I took Constance by the arm, and threw her to his feet. It was a simple act of Gorean courtesy.

Constance looked at me, wildly.

"Please him," I said.

"Yes, Master," she whispered.

"Yes, slut," called the free woman. "Please him! Please him well, you stinking little slave!"

"My thanks, my friend," said the fellow once from Teletus. He took Constance by the arm to one side and threw her on the grass beneath him.

In a few Ehn she crept to my side in the furs, shuddering. He was asleep.

I looked over at the free woman. She was struggling in the narrow leather which confined her. But she would be unable to free herself. She had watched in fury, and, I think, ill-concealed envy at the rapine which had been worked upon Constance.

I, in the light of the subsiding fire, watched the Lady Tina fight weeping with her bonds.

He had said that in the morning he would partially clothe her. I had not understood this.

I observed her struggling. I thought she would look well in a slave collar. Then I went to sleep.

"Hear it?" I asked.

It was early morning. Ram sat upright in the grass. I stood near the tam, which had returned in the night, its beak smeared with blood and the hairs from the small yellow tabuk, of the sort which frequent Ka-la-na thickets. I cleaned its beak and talons with dried grass. I had already saddled the beast.

Constance lay to one side, curled in the furs. The free woman, the Lady Tina of Lydius, too, slept, lying on her side, exhausted from her struggles of the night. The sky was overcast, and gray.

"Yes," he said. "Sleen."

We could hear their squealing in the distance. There must have been four or five of the beasts.

"Master?" asked Constance, rubbing her eyes.

"It is sleen, in the distance," I said. "Get out of the furs, lazy girl."

She was frightened.

"We have time," I said.

"What weight can the tarn carry?" asked Ram.

"It is strong," I said. "It can carry, if need be, a rider and freighted tarn basket."

"Might I then request passage?" he smiled.

"It is yours," I said.

I rolled the furs in which Constance had lain, and put them across the back of the saddle, fastening the two straps which held them.

We could hear the sleen cries quite clearly now. I do not think they were more than a pasang away.

"This ring," I said to Ram, pointing to a ring at the left of the saddle, "will be yours."

"Excellent," he said.

"Come here, Constance," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said, running to me.

"Awaken, Lady Tina," I heard Ram say. He was bending near her.

"Cross your wrists before your body," I said to Constance. She did so and I lashed them together. I then carried her to the right side of the saddle and placed her left foot in a ring there, which I had wrapped with fur. Her tied wrists I looped over the pommel.

I, standing in the stirrup, looked over the fields. There were five sleen. They were about a half of a pasang away, excited, squealing, their snouts hurrying at the turf.

"I have an extra tunic here," I said to Ram, throwing it to him.

"What are you doing?" demanded the Lady Tina.

He had taken the rags he had worn about his hips and was, with what had been her dagger, punching holes in them. Through these holes he threaded a strip of her belt. He knotted the rags about her hips. Because of the lovely flare of her hips, the smallness of her waist, the sweet, exciting swelling of her breasts, she would be unable, her hands tied behind her, to pull or scrape the garment from her.

"Is your modesty less offended now?" he asked. He slipped on the tunic which I had thrown him.

"What is that sound I hear?" she asked.

"Sleen," he said.

"I do not understand," she said, tremulously.

He cut the leather strips which had bound her ankles. "You will now be able to run," he said.

"I do not understand," she said.

"You soon will," he said.

I climbed to the saddle. Ram placed his left foot in the ring which I had designated and looped his left arm about the pommel of the saddle.

She struggled to her feet. "Where are you going?" she cried.

"To Lydius, Lady Tina," I informed her. I had not originally intended to go to Lydius, but I had acquired a girl in the fields. She was not yet branded. I would have her marked in Lydius.

The sleen were now within a few hundred yards of the tarn. I took the tarn straps in my left hand, the one-strap in my right.

Their squealing was loud. I could see them moving swiftly toward us.

Suddenly Lady Tina went white. "Oh, no! No!" she cried. She tried with her bound wrists to tear away the rags which she wore but they, because of the knotted belt strip, were perfectly fastened upon her.

"No!" she screamed.

The rags she wore, of course, were rich and heavy with the scent of him who had been her quarry. Such rags would have been used to put the sleen on his track.

"No!" she screamed. "No! They will tear me to pieces!"

The sleen were now no more than two hundred yards away. The squealing was wild now, as they caught sight of the bound girl in the field.

"They will tear me to pieces!" she wept.

"Run, Lady Tina," suggested Ram.

"They will tear me to pieces!" she wept, screaming.

"It is the same chance," said he, "which I in your place would have had."

The five sleen stopped now, tails thrashing, crouched down, shoulders high, heads low, eyes blazing. They were some fifty yards from the girl. Their nostrils were flared, their ears laid back against the sides of their broad, triangular heads. I saw the tongue of one darting in and out.

They crept forward, there must be no mistake of losing the prey.

The girl turned and fled, bound, the rag on her hips to the legs of the tarn. She knelt in the grass. She looked up, her eyes wild.

"Take me with you!" she wept.

"There is no room for free women here," said Ram.

"But I am a slave!" she cried.

"Are you a natural slave?" asked Ram.

"Yes, yes," she wept. "I have known for years in my heart that I was truly a slave. I lack only the brand and collar!"

"Interesting," said Ram.

"Make me your slave!" she wept.

"But perhaps," said he, "I do not want you."

"Want me! Want me!" she begged.

"Do you acknowledge yourself a true slave?" asked Ram.

"Yes, yes!" she cried.

"Do you beg to be my slave?" he asked.

"Yes, Master," she said, on her knees.

"Then beg," said he.

"I beg to be your slave, Master," she said.

The sleen charged. Ram, with his left hand on the tarn harness, managed to get his right hand on her arm. The tarn, given the sudden force on the one-strap, reared and, smiting the air with his mighty wings, lifted itself into the air. The girl screamed, dangling. One of the sleen leaped more than twenty feet into the air, tearing at her, but fell back to the turf, twisting, squealing. She who had been the Lady Tina was held safe in the arms of Ram, her master. He freed her hands that she might hold to him. With his knife he cut the rags from her hips and we watched them fall among the angry sleen who tore them to pieces.

"It seems we have a new slave girl," said Constance.

She who had been the Lady Tina looked at her with fear.

"Yes," I said.

I turned the head of the tarn toward Lydius.

"We are flying in the direction of Lydius, Master," said Constance, her hair lifted by the wind.

"We shall stop there for a time," I said. "I acquired a girl in the fields. She has not yet been branded. It is my intention to have her marked."

She turned white.

"Did you expect to escape the brand?" I asked.

"No, Master," she said. She, Gorean, knew well that slave girls are marked.

She was silent.

I would let her anticipate the iron.

"I, too, acquired a girl in the fields," said Ram. "I may, in Lydius, as well, see that her thigh is clearly marked, that identifying her as what she is, a slave."

I looked at the naked girl clinging fearfully, helplessly to Ram. "She is so beautiful," I said, "there could be little doubt in anyone's mind that she is a slave, whether she is branded or not."

"She is comely," admitted Ram. "But I will nonetheless have her incontrovertibly marked."

"The mark will improve her beauty," I said, "making it doubly desirable."

"True," said Ram, "perhaps even infinitely more desirable."

"Perhaps," I said. It was true that a brand incredibly enhanced the beauty of a female. Some women did not know what male lust was, until they became slaves, and found themselves, suddenly, vulnerably exposed to its full predations.

She who moments before had been free held to Ram, her master, clutching him, desperately, that she might not fall.

I let her hold to Ram for a while; then I said to her, "Extend your wrists to me, crossed."

"I will fall," she wept.

"If your master pleases," I said, "he will hold you."

"Hold me, Master," she wept. "I beg you!

"Perhaps," he said.

She extended her wrists to me, crossed. I lashed them together with binding fiber.

She knew that it was only her master's hands on her which prevented her from failing to the ground, hundreds of feet below. She depended on him totally for her life, that he would hold her.

Then her hands were bound, and I drew her up and over the saddle. I then lifted up Constance's arms and thrust the new slave's tied wrists over the pommel, then placed Constance's bound wrists over hers.

The load was thus balanced on the tarn, the weight of the two beauties on one side, that of Ram on the other.

I had placed Constance's bound wrists over those of the new slave for Constance was first girl. She would be first to be lifted from the pommel.

"You are first girl," I told Constance.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Constance is first girl," I told her who had been the Lady Tina of Lydius.

"Yes, Master," said she who had been the Lady Tina of Lydius.

"Address her as Mistress," I told the former free girl. "Mistress," said she who had been the former Lady Tina of Lydius, frightened, to Constance.

"Slave," responded Constance to her confirming the former free woman as second girl.

"Now, on to Lydius!" I said.

"Yes, Master," said the two girls, the blond and the brunet, first girl and second girl, yet both really new slaves, neither of whom had as yet even been branded.