Prize of Gor

Chapter 30 IN AR

Ellen, kneeling, poured the wine at the small table, filling the cups but half way.

About the table, cross-legged, sat Selius Arconious, her master, Portus Canio, Fel Doron, Bosk of Port Kar, and Marcus, of Ar’s Station.

These friends were again well met.

She served silently, deferentially, unobtrusively. It was almost as though she were not there.

So serve slaves.

After the wine was poured she rose up and body bent, head down, eyes cast down, backed gracefully, silently, away, withdrawing to the side.

There she would kneel down and wait, prepared to approach and serve again, if aught else might be needed.

Bosk of Port Kar regarded her.

She dared not meet his eyes. He was such a man, and she slave.

She knelt, obedient to the protocols of her condition, slimly, beautifully, back straight, back on heels, knees spread, the palms of her hands on her thighs.

The decanter of wine was beside her, at her right knee.

“It seems your girl has learned service,” said Bosk of Port Kar.

Selius Arconious shrugged, noncommittally.

And so there, in the background, she knelt, some seven feet from the table. At this distance a girl’s presence is unobtrusive, and one might easily forget she is present. On the other hand, she is conveniently at hand, and may be promptly summoned.

The men continued to speak, paying her no attention.

Ellen adjusted slightly the brief yellow tunic, slit at the sides, so that she might kneel with a bit more modesty, even in the brazen position required of her, that of the pleasure slave. Sometimes, interestingly, in such servings, as when the master entertains guests, a pleasure slave is allowed to kneel in the position of a serving slave, or tower slave, the knees closely together. That is regarded, by some, as being more discreet, less distractive. It is particularly the case when a free woman is present, that she not be disturbed by, or offended by, the obvious availability and sensuality of the slave. Too, it is widely thought judicious to conceal from free women the deep, thrilling, exciting and profound sexuality of the female slave, how vulnerable, helpless, needful and passionate she is. Can they understand our feelings at the slave ring? Yet I think the masters are naive if they truly believe, which I suspect they do not, that the free women do not understand, or at least suspect, the nature of such facts. They, too, free women, after all, are intelligent, and are women. I think it is no secret that the free women, who so despise us, who hold us in such contempt, who hate us so, who are often so cruel to us, envy us our masters and our collars. Why should we be happy and they be miserable? Is it not because we have found our way home, and they are still lost in the deserts of artifice? It is the paradox of the collar, thought Ellen. In the collar we are happiest, most liberated, most free.

Then Ellen’s thoughts drifted to Earth, tragic Earth, and its negativities, and eccentricities. Compared to Earth the deserts in which the free women of Gor might roam seemed fertile meadows indeed. Compared with the worst of Gor the Earth seemed far worse, a psychosexual, psychobiological wasteland, withered as by a moral plague, the victim of an ideological tragedy. Pity the putatively free women of Earth, she thought, in their deserts, cluttered with social artifacts largely constructed by the subglandular, pathological, effete, feeble and impotent, trying desperately, unhappily, to conform to orthodoxies imposed upon them, orthodoxies invented in effect by witch doctors and shamans to exalt the weak and cripple the strong, invented by petty, resentful, jealous pygmies whose ambition it is to make themselves herdsmen to a reduced, tamed, human race, who will exalt the whole at the expense of the part, who will deny the individual in the name of the mass, in order that they themselves will be the only part that matters, and that they, the masters of the mass, will be the only individuals to truly exist. It is sad, one supposes, to see one’s species domesticated, to see this done to our race, and seemingly to be done with its consent, too, a race which might otherwise have become children of the stars. But who knows, thought Ellen, perhaps one day they will see where they are going, and they will cry out “Stop!” and remember the stars.

The men, it seemed, eating, drinking, chatting, needed nothing, and, too, it seemed they were totally unaware of her.

She smiled to herself. Her master had made it clear to her, earlier, before the guests arrived that she, even though serving, would kneel in the position of the pleasure slave. To be sure, there were only men present. But Ellen knew that she, in her way, was being shown off. This pleased her, that her master was proud of her, and wished to display her. But could he not have done this, as well, if she had been permitted to kneel more demurely? No, she thought. These men remember me from the grasslands, and it is the intention of Selius Arconious to make it clear to them that his slave is different now from what they saw then, that she is muchly changed, that she is now an acceptable slave, a well-mastered slave. Too, her kneeling position was doubtless commanded with the intent as well, that there should not be the least doubt as to the nature of the relationship in which she stood to him, her master, that she was not merely a serving slave, or tower slave, but was to him wholly and fully, and in all ways, pleasure slave.

She had been ordered to make herself up, in the bedroom, and she had done so, she hoped with taste. The cosmetics of slaves are not that different, interestingly, from those of free women on Earth. Gorean free women do not use cosmetics, or supposedly do not use them, though ankle bells, concealed by their robes, and perfumes are permitted to them.

Cosmetics, on Gor, are regarded as salacious, improper, offensive and scandalous in the case of a free woman; such things are associated with slaves. Naturally enough then, that women of Earth not unoften so adorn themselves, and may appear in public so adorned, is taken by most Goreans, at least those who believe it, as evidence that they are slaves, and thus of their fittingness to be placed upon the auction block, appearing before masters to be bid upon.

Some Goreans seem to prefer Earth women as slaves; others prefer native Gorean women; I would not think it would make much difference; they are all women; doubtless it depends on the particular woman and man, on the particular slave and master, on the particular “chemistry,” so to speak; on the other hand I think it is true that their bondage is likely to have a special, remarkable flavor to Earth women, as many of them have been extracted from a crowded, unnatural, lonely, forlorn, miserable, meaningless, frustrating, negativistic, puritanical environment and they find themselves for the first time in a fresh, open, young, vital, exotic, sensuous, joyous, natural world; too, stripped and collared at the feet of a Gorean male they are likely to have experiences and feelings for which their relationships to men of Earth have simply failed to prepare them. For the first time in their lives, they have met masters.

Earth women do have, incidentally, a reputation on Gor for making excellent slaves. They seem to grasp their new identity, their new being, shortly after their collaring, after having been taught to crawl and kiss the whip. Most are comprehending slaves even before they are taken, sold, from the block. Swiftly then do they learn to lick, kiss and caress, to kneel and obey, to serve as what they have then become, as what they then are, the properties of their masters. In their joy they blossom, understanding that they are now owned, that the collar is truly on them. At last they have an identity and an actual value, a place in society. At last, too, and more importantly, they are in their place in nature, with its endemic codes of dominance and submission, selected for in the long biography of a planet’s evolution, codes pervasive throughout all animal life. At last they are where they belong, at the feet of men; at last they are at peace with their genes, with their nature. At last, too, they have a full and rewarding sex life, free of Earth’s conditioned guilts and shames, whose bizarre, twisted, diseased roots lie buried in remote superstition, in antique psychosis. At the feet of masters they find happiness; at the feet of masters they find the answer of nature to pain and suffering.

The sex life of the female slave is a sex life so rich and overwhelming, and transforming, that they could scarcely have dreamed of it on Earth. It is a wholeness of life which on Earth would have doubtless been beyond their ken. They are obedient vessels of sexual pleasure; they are subservient, lascivious beasts, anxious to please; they are summonable; they hope to be summoned; they are needful and zealous; one buys them for pleasure, and from them one will have one’s money’s worth, and a thousand times more. Perhaps it would be more accurate to speak not so much of a sex life, which suggests that sex is only an aspect or part of her life, as a life of sexuality. Sexuality, in its fullness, in its entirety, in its thousand strands and facets, in its thousand modalities and expressions, from almost unendurable, ruthlessly imposed sexual ecstasies, from which the slave may fear she will not survive, to the manner in which a meal is served, from the cruel, raping kiss of the master to the polishing of his boots, from the kissing of his feet to the careful keeping of his quarters, is the life of the female slave. Perhaps, most simply, it should be thought of as a life of femaleness, of essential femaleness, of complete femaleness.

If you would be a woman be a slave.

Ellen thought, again, of cosmetics.

I wonder, she thought, if, in the privacy of their compartments, even free women, with their companions, might resort to cosmetics, perhaps even serving their companions as though they might be no more than slaves, but they would not be, of course, true slaves. Ellen wondered if free women might do such, to keep their companions out of the markets, where they might buy an actual slave, a woman over whom they would genuinely have absolute power, as her master had over her.

Perhaps a brief cast of irritation then traversed the countenance of Ellen, as she thought of free women. Little love is lost betwixt free women and slaves, in either direction. Happily the men did not notice.

It is one of the fears of a slave that she might be purchased by a woman. They know, in their hearts, they belong to men, and wish to belong to men, their appropriate masters in the order of nature.

As Ellen knelt there she suddenly trembled. How vulnerable we are, slaves, she thought. We are owned. We are branded. We are in collars. We can be bought and sold. We must obey. We are subject to discipline. Sometimes we are whipped, it seems, merely to remind us that we are slaves.

Again the men did not notice her tiny movement. She then addressed herself, again, to the retaining of position, that lovely position which had been enjoined upon her for the evening, and which in any event was generally incumbent upon her, given the nature of her bondage, the position of the pleasure slave. She did not wish to risk discipline.

If you would be a slave, dear haughty free sisters, thought Ellen, then be a slave. Know what it is to actually wear a collar and be owned! Know what it is to kneel naked, chained, before your master! Know what it is to cast him shy, fearful glances, trying to read his moods! Know what it is to service his compartments, perhaps shackled, to make his couch, to dust and clean, and cook, and sew, and launder, hoping that your services will be found satisfactory. Let your wash be sparkling, let your stitches be small, fine and straight! Know what it is to kiss the whip, knowing that it will be used on you if you are not fully pleasing. Know what it is to crawl fearfully to him, your master, bearing the whip in your teeth! Where are your brands and papers, dear free sisters? And have you ever stood stripped on an auction block, to be bid upon, as the property you are?

On Earth Ellen had seldom, if ever, worn cosmetics, regarding them as ideologically inappropriate, an obvious confession of a terrible, unworthy desire, that of being attractive, literally attractive, in all that that means, to the opposite sex. When Ellen had looked in the mirror, after the make-up had been applied, she had been, for a moment, startled. She remembered a lovely teenager, from long ago, one perhaps no more than eighteen or nineteen, who had once made herself up, and had been shocked and thrilled, and then, suddenly, distraught, overcome with confusion and guilt, had smeared her face with cold cream and wiped away the evidence of that politically harrowing indiscretion. But she did not dare this evening, even if she had desired to do so, to remove from her features these delightful enhancements. The decision was not hers. She had been commanded. She must obey her master. But how charming it had been, to see, again, as it were, that slender, sensitive, lovely teenager. She had feared, for a moment, before the mirror, that her master, regarding her, she seeing him behind her in the mirror, was going to seize her and hurl her to the very floor before the mirror, putting her yet again, imperiously, to the “master’s pleasure.” But he had growled in anger, and, clenching his fists, had turned away. She had smiled, inwardly. Poor master, she thought. Then she pitied free women, they not knowing what it was to be desired as a slave is desired.

Her master had also ordered her to put up her hair, with combs, in an upswept hairdo. Perhaps he thought that that would make her look older, more sophisticated or such. She complied, with pleasure, and admired her handiwork. Her hair had never been cut on Gor, other than to shape it, and it was “slave long.” She saw her master looking at her. “Ah,” she thought to herself, “he will enjoy taking it down, freeing it, and casting it about me!” Much can be done with long hair, to give pleasure to the master. A cruel punishment for slave girls is to shave the head or crop the hair. To be sure, the hair of low slaves, such as factory slaves, laundry slaves, farm slaves, and such is commonly worn short, sometimes cropped.

At that time, she had already muchly prepared the supper, and knew that the guests might soon arrive. She surveyed herself in the mirror, the brief tunic, the make-up, the hairdo. “I think, Ellen,” she said to herself, “that you are worth money, yes, money, serious money. I think, slave girl, you would bring a good price!” She then, as a last touch, adjusted her collar, with two hands, making certain that the lock was squarely at the back of her neck.

The men continued to speak, and Ellen’s mind wandered a bit, drifting from thought to thought.

She saw Portus Canio taking a sip of the wine she had poured.

She had not, of course, offered wine to the men as she might have, in private, to her master, kneeling naked before him, in her collar, touching the cup variously to her body, pressing it here and there against, moving it here and there against her beauty, feeling the steel rim firmly, unyieldingly, against her yielding softness, kissing it, placing it, kissing it, placing it, this commonly done at the belly, the waist, at each breast, and at each shoulder, and then, lifting her eyes, regarding him over the rim of the cup, kissing it again, one last time, lingeringly, lovingly, and then lifting it to him in two hands, her head deferentially down, between her extended arms.

In many ways may a slave girl beg the attention of her master. One of these is “serving wine.”

She heard a snapping of fingers.

She looked up.

“Bread,” said Selius Arconious, gesturing toward the kitchen.

“Yes, Master!” she said, leaping to her feet and hurrying to the kitchen.

In a few moments she was again at her post, kneeling, and the men were once again in converse.

Her thoughts drifted to the slave ring at the foot of her master’s couch and the small, coarsely woven mat there on which she was permitted to sleep, a threadbare blanket her only covering.

Ellen, she understood, was not to be spoiled.

At night she was attached to the ring, by neck or ankle, so that she would always be at hand.

She loved being so chained. She was slave, she was his.

She wondered if, one day, he might purchase a lamp of love, and love furs. Perhaps, someday, who knew, she might, if she served long enough, and deferentially enough, with sufficient perfection, be permitted sometimes the dignity of the surface of the couch, though still chained by neck or ankle, first kneeling beside it, kissing its furs, and then being permitted to ascend to its surface and then, kneeling at its foot, head downward, rendering obeisance there, before being commanded, or positioned, and swept into ecstasies to be known only by chained, ravished slaves.

She knew that she was now much different from what she had been in the grasslands. She knew herself now to be a submitted slave; she had learned submission. She was now hot, devoted and dutiful. She feared her master, but she loved him. He was quite strict with her. No laxity was permitted her. He was, it seemed, keeping a very careful eye on her. She strove to be perfect, and pleasing. She kept her body clean and sparkling, her hair brushed and combed, her tunics crisp and freshly laundered. She gave much concern to her appearance for she was her master’s property, and any fault in her appearance or behavior might be thought to reflect poorly on him, on his capacity to own and manage a slave. She was zealously scrupulous in the performance of all her duties. She tried to stand and move gracefully, was attentive to her servings and kneelings, and to her smallest glances and gestures. She was owned. How can I explain this, these changes in my life and being, she sometimes asked herself, but then the answer came clearly to her, she was a slave girl. She was happy. I must be as I am, she said to herself. My master will permit me no latitude. I love him for it! He has mastered me. I have been mastered!

As she knelt to the side and the men spoke, not considering her, her mind drifted back, several days ago, weeks ago, to the approach to the Viktel Aria, north of Venna, and to a wood, and to an abandoned tarsk pen in that wood.

She recalled her beating and her surprise, and horror, at the first stroke, and how it was like fire and snakes and wire, and how she could scarcely believe what was being done to her. Did they not know she was a woman of Earth? That such things were not done to women of Earth? And then the lash had struck again and she was no more a woman of Earth but only a punished Gorean slave girl.

Then she began to be clearly aware of the pain.

She rose to her feet, bent over, as she was tied.

“Back on your knees!” she was ordered, and she sank down, again, on her knees.

She was then struck again. She screamed, and put down her head, and was struck again, and raised her head and put it back, sobbing, and was again struck.

It was then she knew that she would be mastered, and mastered wholly.

“Please, no, Master!” she wept. “I will be good! I will obey, totally, in all things! I will be pleasing, in all ways! I will try to do my best to be a good slave! Please, no, Master!”

Yes, she would be mastered, wholly.

And the lash fell again. Not so easily would she escape her due!

He is my master, she thought, truly my master!

She sobbed, uncontrollably.

Then strangely, she felt a sudden incredible elation, and fulfillment, in the pain. She recalled how she had, in the depths of her heart, strangely, desired to be whipped, desired to be put beneath the lash of a master! Thus, it seemed, suddenly, she felt her womanhood and slaveness, that this could be done to her, and that she, a female, one in the order of nature to be suitably submissive to a male, had not been found pleasing and that she would pay for that. He owns me, she thought! How better can he teach a foolish slave that she is his? Thus he proves my slaveness to me! Thus he proves his ownership of me! I know now that I am a slave, and that he is my master! I have longed for this beating, this confirmation, this demonstration! Yes, yes, Master, she thought, I acknowledge myself slave and yours! You have put your unmistakable seal upon my embondedness!

Then, again, there was only the pain, and she wept, and pulled at the ropes, and shook with misery.

She did not know how many strokes were administered to her. She was barely aware of her wrists being freed from the post, though they remained bound together. She then lay under the post on her stomach, her bound wrists stretched out, moaning, sobbing. Then she felt herself dragged on her belly through the wood chips and grass under the post and toward the center of the tarsk pen. There, to her misery, she was turned to her back and her wrists, over her head and back, fastened to a pole. She looked up in fear and pain at her master, standing above her.

“Speak!” he cried, angrily.

“Thank you, Master!” she wept, in terror, looking up at him. “Thank you, Master! Thank you for beating me!”

He angrily cast the whip aside, and then crouched beside her. She felt her legs thrust widely, brutally, apart. He was not gentle with her.

Afterwards he left her there, in the tarsk pen, and she turned, weeping, blubbering, half in shock, eyes wide, to her side, to relieve her back from contact with the soiled, rough ground, the stained wood chips, of the abandoned pen.

It was there in the tarsk pen that she spent the night.

Before dawn, the next day, Portus Canio came to her, sponged her back, and her body, with a damp rag, cooling her and cleaning her, and freed her.

Unbidden, she set about her duties.

She tidied the camp, built the fire, set up the cooking rods, boiled water, and prepared breakfast for the men. While they ate, she knelt down beside their blankets, kissed them, shook them out and folded them, and placed them in the wagon.

When she was finished she returned to the vicinity of the fire. There were now two shallow pans there, one filled with water, the other with a handful of moist gruel. “Thank you, Masters,” she whispered. Then she went to all fours before the pans, and, putting her head down, ate and drank from the pans.

She cast many an anxious look at her master, but he did not so much as look at her. This disturbed her, terribly.

When the tharlarion had been hitched, and the men were clearly ready to depart, she could stand it no more, and ran to the feet of her master, and put her head down, and wept, and covered his feet with tears and kisses. “Please, forgive me, Master!” she wept. “Please forgive me!”

Then, as she dared to lift her eyes, clutching his calves, and looking fearfully up at him, she suddenly felt an almost uncontrollable cry of need in her belly, one suffusing upward and downward throughout her small body. She made a small noise of astonishment, and of fear. It was so sudden. She pressed her thighs together, frightened. Surely she was in need. She hoped he could not smell her need, her raw, naked slave’s need. She remembered his hands upon her, and how she had been handled and used, how she had been put to his pleasure.

“You will be used, slut,” said he, “if and when I please.”

She put down her head, in consternation.

“Stand,” said he, “and put your hands behind you, wrists crossed.”

She did so and her wrists, in a moment, were tightly thonged behind her. A rope was then tied on her neck and attached to the back of the wagon.

“You will be a naked slave,” he said, “publicly exposed on a common road.”

She put her head down, remembering her own former words.

She wondered if, and when, she would again be given a tunic. A slave, she knew, cannot count upon a tunic. Sometimes she must earn a tunic, or a slave strip.

The wagon then left the camp and, shortly thereafter, trundled onto the heavy, broad, fitted stones of the Viktel Aria.

Ellen, on the rope leash, followed. In the vicinity of Venna there were several caravansaries outside the walls. Ellen heard a delighted female voice cry out, “Greetings, slave girl!”

Looking about, Ellen saw that it was the blonde she had tormented yesterday afternoon, but now the blonde was tunicked, although, to be sure, briefly.

“Respond,” called Selius Arconious, from behind her.

“Greetings, Mistress,” said Ellen.

“Now,” said Selius Arconious, “eyes front, slave!”

And then Ellen continued on her way, not looking to the side, or back. She kept her gaze fixed squarely ahead. Tears streamed down her face, and under the coarse rope knotted about her neck.

The men, having finished their repast, retired to a larger, open area, smoothly floored, looking out over Ar. The night was beautiful, and there were many lights. The slave cleared. Later, rising from her knees within, at a gesture from her master, the slave brought forth and served small glasses of Turian liqueurs.

Toward the Twentieth Ahn, the Gorean midnight, the guests took their leave. The door closed and the slave was alone with her master.

Selius Arconious, standing, regarded his property, kneeling.

“May I speak, Master?” she asked.

“Yes,” said he.

“It is my hope,” she said, “that the evening went well.”

“I think it went very well,” said he.

“A slave is pleased, if master is pleased,” she said.

“Though perhaps,” he said, “it lasted too long.”

“Master?” asked the slave.

She knew that she was exquisitely beautiful, and would bring a high price in the market. She could tell, too, that her master was now regarding her with that look which slaves know only too well. No woman in a collar can mistake such a look. She put her head down, shyly.

“You did well this evening,” he said.

“Thank you, Master.”

“You are a good slave, Ellen,” he said.

“Master has taught me how to be a good slave,” said Ellen. “He has given me no choice.”

“Do you wish a choice?” he asked.

“No, Master,” she smiled.

The slave whip hung on its peg not far from the great couch, with its slave ring. On the other hand, it was seldom used. A supple switch served sufficiently for occasional admonitions.

One time, however, several days ago, he did strip her, tie her wrists together before her body and conduct her down the stairs to the hall of the building, where it opened at the street level. Two children, and, later, a free woman, were passed on the stairs. None paid her attention. Her master then tied her wrists over her head to a dangling ceiling ring in the hall, a ring for the use of the tenants, one not far from the door, and drew her up in such a way that she was stretched upward by the wrists, and standing on the tips of her toes.

“What have I done, Master?” she had asked in genuine puzzlement.

A free woman then entered the building, who had been shopping. “Slut!” she said to Ellen. “Yes, Mistress,” said Ellen. “Beat her well,” she said. “Have no fear, dear lady,” said Selius Arconious, politely.

“I do not know what I have done, Master!” said Ellen.

“Surely you recall,” said he, “the festival camp, where you were to be punished on two counts, first, for not having revealed skill in slave dance, and, second, for having spoken without permission.”

“Master?” asked Ellen.

“You were to receive ten strokes for the first offense, and five for the second,” said Selius Arconious. “That is, accordingly, a total of fifteen strokes.”

“But Master kindly purchased the strokes!” said Ellen. “He paid fifteen tarsk-bits! One for each blow! Thus, he spared me the blows!”

“Yes,” he said, “I purchased the strokes, but only, you see, in order that I might deliver them myself.”

“No, Master!” she cried.

“I bought them that they might be mine to give, my little charmer,” he said. “I had waited a long time to give you some much-needed whip strokes.”

“Be kind, Master!”

“Did you think that you would escape your due?” he asked.

“I had hoped Master had forgotten!” she said.

“Had you forgotten?” he asked.

“No, Master,” she wept.

“Nor did I.” She heard the strands of the whip shaken out.

“Please, Master,” she said.

“If you had not forgotten, why did you not remind me?” he asked.

She was silent.

“That will be an additional five strokes,” he said.

“Please, Master, no, Master!” she said.

He then put the first stroke to her, and she spun in the ropes, to look at him, protestingly, in misery. And then, at his gesture, she turned away again, groaning, her back to him. The second stroke was then put to her. He did not make her count the strokes, but he counted them. This was merciful. The blows were nicely predictable, and well measured. This, too, was merciful. This did not diminish the fact, however, that they were effectively severe. She was being beaten. “Fourteen!” he said. She now hung sobbing in the ropes. Two fellows of the caste of metal workers entered the hall. “Tal,” said they to Selius Arconious. “Tal,” said he to them. “Aii!” wept Ellen. “Fifteen,” said Selius Arconious. “Have mercy, Master!” begged Ellen. “That is fifteen!” But he gave her five more strokes. “Twenty,” he said. He then released her from the ring, and she collapsed to the dark, polished, narrow wooden boards beneath it. “It is nearly time to prepare supper,” he said. “Yes, Master,” she said. “But I do not know if I can stand!” “You are not to stand,” he said. “You are to crawl up the stairs.” “Yes, Master,” she wept. “Have you not forgotten something?” he asked. “Master?” she asked. “You have been beaten,” he said. “Forgive me, Master,” she said. “Thank you for whipping me.” “More properly,” he said. “Ellen, his slave, thanks master for whipping her,” she sobbed. “You are welcome,” he said. “Now, up the stairs.” “Yes, Master,” she said and crawled to the stairs, across the dark boards of the hall, and then, on all fours, her back doubtless rich with stripes, ascended the steps, landing by landing.

But, as stated, Ellen was almost never beaten, save for an occasional stroke of the switch. The reason for this, of course, was not that her master was weak, but that she had become an excellent slave, and thus there was little, if any, reason to beat her. This is common on Gor. Gratuitous cruelty is far more common on Earth, I fear, than on Gor. The value of the whip, you see, is not so much in its being used, as in the slave’s knowledge that it can be used and, under certain circumstances, will be used. Occasionally, of course, the slave may be tied and whipped that she may the better know herself, that she may be reminded of what she is, that she is a slave.

The dinner had gone well.

Selius Arconious, a tarnster of Ar, had been pleased.

His slave, Ellen, a female of Earth origin, whom he had purchased at a festival camp outside Brundisium, knelt before him, made-up, in a brief yellow tunic, collared.

“One of your endearing features,” he said, “is that you do not know how exciting, how attractive, you are.”

“Do not be too sure of that, Master,” said the slave.

“Oh?” he said.

“I think I would bring a high price,” she said.

“Vain slave,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“To be sure,” he said, “there are thousands, thousands upon thousands, who are much more exciting, and attractive.”

“To you, Master,” she asked.

“Yes, of course,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“So do not become arrogant,” he said.

“No, Master,” she said.

“You are smiling,” he said.

“Forgive me, Master,” she said.

He cast aside his tunic.

Then he rushed upon the slave and half lifted her from her knees and looked fiercely into her eyes, and she gasped, so regarded by a man, and one a master, with such ferocity and passion. “Master!” she cried. And he threw her to his feet and, crouching beside her, she first, startled, on all fours, and then thrust to her belly, tore away her tunic, shred by silken shred, flinging these narrow, delicate, yellow, rent scraps behind him, they fluttering away to alight, scattered, like startled flowers, on the narrow boards of the dark, hardwood floor. Then it was gone! He turned her violently to her back then, and knelt across her body, pinning her wrists to the floor, at the sides of her head, with his large hands. She squirmed a little, and looked up at him. He grinned down upon her. The irresistible, overwhelming, powerful, handsome beast, the virile, desiring, lustful, arrogant monster! How obviously he was regarding his property with inordinate pleasure! Muchly then was she aware of the collar on her neck, and that she was owned, and that she was in the grasp of her master, helplessly and deliciously in the grasp of her master.

“I love you, Master,” she said.

“Are you so presumptuous, so arrogant, that you dare to speak such words to your master?”

Slaves are often helplessly, hopelessly, in love with their masters, often pathetically so. After all, his collar is on their necks. But they are only slaves, lovely properties, shapely beasts, purchasable goods, degraded articles of commerce, immeasurably beneath a free person, beneath the notice of a free person, save as they may prove to be of some service, convenience, pleasure or profit, such things, to him. Thus the slave may kneel before the master, tears in her eyes, her heart offered up to him as can only be the heart of a slave, and this obvious to him, but she knows his love is to be reserved, if it be given, at all, to a free woman, not to a slave, an animal he might obtain in any market. Thus she repines and dares not hope for his love. Thus she, conscious of the chasms between them, and of her lowliness, and unworthiness, fears to speak her heart. Commonly he is well aware of her feelings, but how insulted, how furious, he might be, should she be so unwise or bold as to profess them!

“Forgive me, Master,” she whispered.

“How dare you love a free man?”

“May not even a she-sleen love her master?”

“The she-sleen is a splendid animal,” he said. “You are a mere slave.”

“Forgive me, Master.”

But she did not think he was displeased at her declaration.

“Perhaps I should whip you and sell you,” he said.

“Please do not, Master,” she said.

“You do not seem to fear that I will sell you,” he said.

“I am, of course, a slave, and am at Master’s disposal.”

“But you do not seem to fear I will sell you.”

“Master may do with me as he wishes,” she said, “but it is my hope that I will not be sold.”

“It could be done to you.”

“That is well known to your slave, Master.”

“Why should you not be sold?”

“I think Master would have difficulty recouping his losses,” she smiled. “Did he not pay something in the neighborhood of twenty-one tarsks, and of silver, for me?”

“Doubtless I muchly, and foolishly, overpaid,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” she agreed.

Many girls such as she, she knew, and excellent girls, quality shackle sluts, went for as little as one and a half to three silver tarsks. She recalled there had been a bid of fifteen silver tarsks on her even before Mirus and Selius Arconious had entered upon their competition for a slave, the shapely, gray-eyed brunette being displayed and auctioned. Fifteen silver tarsks, though, she thought, was surely excessive. Much, of course, had to do with the place, the wealth at hand, the number of bidders, the fever of the bidding, and such.

“Perhaps your master is a fool,” he said.

“A girl dare not comment on such things,” she said.

“Would you like to be whipped?” he asked.

“No, Master,” she said.

“But actually I am not, as it seems, such a fool,” he said.

“Master?”

“I have received higher offers for you,” he said, “even from men who have merely seen you on the streets, of twenty-five silver tarsks, and more.”

The slave began to tremble. She had understood nothing of this.

“What is wrong?” he asked.

“Master!” she wept.

“There are tears in your eyes, pretty slut,” he said.

“Please do not sell me, Master,” she begged. Her sale now seemed an option within the purview of her master, one he might plausibly view with favor.

“You now seem in earnest,” he said, not displeased.

“Yes, Master!”

“Why should I not sell you?” he asked.

“I am pretty,” she said. “I juice quickly, I squirm helplessly!”

“Many slaves are pretty,” he said, “and they, too, juice quickly and squirm helplessly. One expects such things of a slave.”

“I work hard,” she said. “I strive zealously to be pleasing to you!”

“I can work any slave,” he said. “And the whip will assure that they strive zealously to be pleasing to me.”

“I think Master is pleased with me, when I experience great pleasure in his arms.”

“Slave pleasure,” he said, dismissively.

“Yes, Master,” she said. “But I do not think I could experience such pleasure in the arms of any other man.”

“Nonsense,” he said. “You are a slave. In the arms of any man you would leap and cry out.”

“Does it not give Master pleasure to know I am so subjugated, so unmitigatedly and irremediably subjugated, that I am so much his, and that in his arms I experience the most ecstatic of joys, those of the overcome, yielding and ravished slave?”

“Who cares,” asked he, “aught of a slave’s pleasure?”

“You, Master!” she exclaimed.

“Bold slave,” he said.

“Speak,” she said, “as though our pleasures were nothing, which perhaps they are, but it is clearly one of the joys of the mastery to see the effect wrought upon a slave by your attentions. You cannot tell me it is not a triumph for you, and a pleasure, to see a slave begging and pleading for more, fearing only that you will not continue, weeping with gratitude, half blinded with ecstasy, in the throes of her submission orgasms.”

“I acknowledge,” he said, “it is pleasant to have a slave so, to have her so much in your power, to force her, if one wishes, she willing or not, to undergo such pleasures.”

“Do you think, Master, that we do not desire such pleasures?”

“I suppose you want them,” he said, “you are not free women. You are mere slaves.”

“We are women, Master! We desire our bondage. We long for masters. Without them we are incomplete!”

“So you desire sexual pleasure?”

“We do, we do, as Master well knows.”

“Say it,” said he.

“We desire sexual pleasure,” she said.

“Speak specifically,” said he.

“I, Ellen, the slave of Selius Arconious, tarnster of Ar, desire sexual pleasure.”

“Do you beg it?”

“Yes, Master! Please, Master!”

“Beg, then.”

“I, Ellen, slave, property of Selius Arconious, of Ar, beg sexual pleasure!”

She looked up at him, pathetically. Would it be granted to her? She was, after all, only a slave.

“Slaves beg for such things,” he said. “It is expected of them. One thinks nothing of it. But they are not free women. They are only domestic animals, no more than worthless beasts.”

“Free women also desire sexual pleasure,” she said.

He smiled.

“They do, they do!” insisted the slave. “Let them redden, and froth and deny it, if they will, but they do! I was a free woman! I know! But I did not know what sexual pleasure was until I was put in a collar!”

“It is true you are a hot slut,” he said.

“Yes, Master!” she said, defiantly. “But do you think those free women, brought into collars, are so different?”

“They do learn to kiss one’s feet quickly,” he observed.

“Of course,” she said. “All they needed was to be collared, to be owned, and mastered.”

“It is undeniable,” he said, “that women make excellent slaves.”

“Of course, Master,” she said. “It is what they are in their hearts, and wish to be. The sexes are complementary, two parts which together form a whole! Each is an enigma, a puzzle, meaningless, until they are brought together, each in their difference and perfection, to form one whole. Two radical differences, female and male, but one whole! Is the character of nature so difficult to discern? Can you not see it in the great themes of dominance and submission? One is bred to submit, one to dominate; one is bred to obey, and one to command; one is bred to serve, and another to rule. And the perfection of this complementarity, as societally recognized, as socially articulated, as culturally enhanced and celebrated, and fixed into the matrix of custom and legality, is the relationship of master and slave.”

“And you are a slave,” he said.

“Yes, Master!”

“I think I will have you,” he said.

“Please do, Master!”

“But why you, and not another?” he asked.

“Master?”

“Are not women women, and slaves slaves?”

“But one slave is not another slave.”

“True,” he said, “each is exquisitely different, each wholly slave, and yet each so remarkably and preciously different a slave.”

True, thought Ellen. Each is sold off the platform as living meat, as a property, as no more than a shapely beast, and yet each is wonderfully different and unique.

How men search the markets for their perfect slave, and how slaves hope for their perfect master!

“Are you an insolent slave?” he asked.

“I trust not, Master,” she said.

“Yet you spoke earlier — as I recall — of love.”

“Forgive me, Master.”

“You love me?”

“Yes, Master.”

“You, only a slave, dare to love a free man?”

“Forgive me, Master.”

“A slave,” he mused. “The love of a slave.”

“We cannot help ourselves, Master,” she said. “You own us. We are in your collars. We are with you so much, so intimately. We serve you so abjectly. We bring you your sandals. We bathe you. We kneel before you. It is on our limbs that your chains are fastened. It is you by whom we are mastered.”

“I see,” he said.

“The first time I saw you,” she wept, “I wanted to be your slave.”

“The first time I saw you,” he said, “I wanted you as my slave.”

“Master!” she breathed.

“Not to love you, of course,” he said, “just to have you as my slave, a simple collar slut, you understand.”

“Of course, Master,” she said.

“But you did seem, somehow, as I recall, of particular interest.”

“A slave is pleased,” she said.

“I fought my feelings for you,” he said.

“As I for you, Master.”

“Oh?”

“But not well! Not successfully!”

“Good,” he said.

“Scorn me, if you wish,” she said, “for I am only a slave, and that I well know, but I do love you.”

“With the love of a slave,” he smiled.

“Yes, Master,” she said, “with the love of a slave, with the helpless, vulnerable love that only a slave can give.”

“I see,” said he, “my pretty, nicely curved Earth slut.”

The love of a free woman, should they be capable of love, is very different from the love of a slave. The free woman must have her respect, her self-esteem, her dignity. She must consider how her friends will view her, and the match, and what they will think of her, and say of her. She must consider her assets, her properties, and their protection. All details of contracts must be arranged, usually with the attention of scribes of the law. She must have a clear understanding of what will be permitted to her companion and what will not be permitted to him. Certainly, as she is free, her modesty is not to be compromised. All things are to be regulated with care, how and where he may touch her, and such. She has her position in society to consider, her station and status. She is hedged in with a thousand trammels and compromises, militating against her selfless surrender. The love of a free woman, then, to the extent that she can love, is beset with a great number and variety of considerations, with a thousand subtle and noxious calculations, plannings and governances. Needless to say, these several appurtenances do not enter into the ken of a slave. Sometimes a free woman, who fears that her feelings for a projected companion, to her dismay and scandal, are more intense, suffusive, overwhelming and passionate than is proper for one of her status will withdraw from the projected match. She is terrified to think of herself as, in effect, a slave. Sometimes, too, a free man will withdraw from a match if he suspects that the woman’s desires and needs are unworthy of a free woman. After all, he is looking for a free woman, not a slave, a proud, lofty, noble, free woman, one who will fulfill the customs of her station, and prove to be a suitable asset, particularly with respect to connections and career.

So pity the poor free woman who would yield herself as a slave to her lover and does not do so, for her enmeshment in the chains of pride. And scorn the foolish free man who cannot recognize and accept, and rejoice in, the slave in a woman.

And consider that free man who calculates so carefully the advantages of a companionship, who so carefully measures out the prospects of a relationship, as a merchant might weigh grain upon a scale. He treats the woman as an instrument to his future, and thus treats her as more a slave than a slave.

And what of the calculating free woman, as well, she, ensconced in veils and customs, despising men as weaklings, exploiting them, though sheltered and protected by them, viewing them as conveniences, as little more, at best, than sources of social and economic advantage, save, of course, for the gratifications she derives from their torment, from delightfully arousing in them a hundred hopes and desires which she will then enjoyably frustrate.

Sometimes a slave learns that her master is to be companioned. In such a case she must expect to be given away or sold. This often causes her great sorrow. But certainly one could not expect the projected companion to tolerate so distractive a presence in their domicile. Free women are well aware that they cannot compete with slaves; accordingly, to the best of their ability, they see to it that any such competition is precluded.

Two more points may be briefly enunciated.

First, some free women, disconsolate and lonely, unhappy, miserable, deprived of sex, starved for love, distressed with the numerous circumscriptions and constraints which confine them, realizing the boredom, the emptiness, of their lives, “court the collar.” Consciously, of course, they will deny this sort of thing. An example might be the former Lady Melanie of Brundisium, now collared. They might, for example, wander the high bridges at night, or frequent low markets and gloomy streets. They may undertake long and dangerous journeys, stay at unsavory inns, and so on. They might be careless with their veiling, or, seemingly inadvertently, reveal a wrist or ankle. Some might even disguise themselves as slaves, convincing themselves that this is merely a sprightly lark, unattended with danger. Perhaps they even dare to enter a paga tavern, just to see what they are like, or perhaps wander in the Street of Brands, to stroll through the open markets or slave yards, to see true slaves, chained, or caged. But how easily they might suddenly sense a narrow cloth loop passing over their head and before their eyes, what is it, and then feel it jerk back tightly, cruelly, between their teeth. In strong arms they are helpless. Soon ropes are fastened on them, plenteously, perhaps to convince them that they are now other than they were, and they are carried between buildings, and down stairs, to be left in a basement, gagged, and bound hand and foot, heavily, until nightfall, when they will be placed in a wagon, perhaps with others, to be removed from the city.

Second, it is not unusual, a point suggested earlier, for a slave to fall in love with her master. It is quite common, in fact. I do not think this is hard to understand, her being owned, and such. The love of a slave, of course, is supposedly worthless, and so she often conceals it, as best she can. Might the master not be annoyed or embarrassed by something as unwelcome and absurd as, say, the explicit expression of a slave’s love? She lies then at the foot of her master’s couch. She kisses her chains. She kisses her fingertips and presses them to her collar. Tears well in her eyes. She fears to speak, for she is only a slave. She does not wish to be whipped, or sold. In any event, in the fertile meadow of bondage the flower of love finds a fertile soil. Even if it should be forbidden, or feared, or dreaded, it will have its way, as the spring and the tides, and bloom. What terror can this bring to the heart of the slave girl!

“It is acceptable,” he said, “that a slave should love her master.”

“Perhaps Master likes his slave, a little,” she said.

“Perhaps,” he said, “a little.”

“Your slave begs to serve your pleasure, Master,” she whispered.

He then knelt to the side but continued to hold her wrists.

She sensed that it was only with great difficulty that he resisted seizing her. Surely in a moment she would be put to slave use.

But then, too, suddenly, it seemed, her entire body began to be suffused, more so than ever before, this startling her, almost frightening her, with an incandescence of surrender, of helpless heat, of overwhelming love, of total, unmitigated submission, of a woman’s desperate, frenzied need to put herself lovingly, helplessly, at the mercy of a master.

He must have sensed this, for he smiled.

“Take pity on a slave,” she begged. How helpless was the slave so suddenly in the grip of her need!

“So,” said he, “in your pretty little belly, there burns slave fire?”

She half scrambled up, half lying, half kneeling, looking up at him, her master, her wrists still held, regarding him, wildly.

“Yes, Master” she said. “In my belly there burns slave fire!”

“In the belly of an Earth woman?”

“In the belly of one once a woman of Earth, but now only a branded, collared Gorean slave!”

“I see,” he said.

“I confess my needs! I am no longer permitted to deny them!”

He continued to hold her wrists, keeping her from him.

“I am yours, Master,” she cried.

She tried to touch his face with her hands but his grip would let her come only so close, a finger’s breadth away.

“I must touch you,” she begged.

He then put her hands down, to her sides, forcibly, and she dared not raise them. She understood herself then, as though bound by his will.

Her body shook with frustration.

“Master?” she whispered.

He tore the combs from her hair, and her hair then, with his two hands, he cast about her. Then he put it behind her back.

She regarded him.

He stood. How tall, how powerful, how mighty he seemed, looming above her, before her.

“Kneel,” he said.

Instantly, frightened, she assumed first position.

Now she was before him, kneeling, his, collared, slave naked.

“May I speak?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said.

“I beg permission to go to my master’s slave ring,” she whispered.

“No,” he said.

“Master?” she asked.

“No!” he cried. “No!”

Then he rushed upon the slave and took her in his arms and cried out “I cannot wait! I will not wait! I want you now! Now! I want you now, this instant!” He regarded the slave wildly. “I cannot even wait to get you to the slave ring!” he cried.

“I am always at your slave ring, Master!” she cried.

“I cannot even wait to put a chain on your neck, a shackle on your ankle!” he murmured, pressing his lips above her collar, deeply, possessively, into her throat.

How slave she felt, desiring to be helplessly his, to be bound, to be totally mastered!

“No, no, Master!” she wept. “Chain me! Chain me, please!”

“What?” he cried.

“Chain me, please, Master!”

He smiled.

The slave regarded him, frantic with need.

“My love for you is a bond a thousand times stronger than a chain on my neck, than a shackle on my ankle!” she cried. “But I want the chain! I beg the chain! I crave the shackle!”

“What a slave you are!” he laughed.

“Yes, yes, slave, slave!” she gasped. “Your slave, your slave!”

Then with a great laugh he swept her up into his arms and carried her lightly, helplessly, to the bedroom.

The slave, so carried, clung to him, kissing at him, wildly, piteously.

Then, in a moment, she was thrown on the couch, a chain on her neck, a shackle on her ankle!

“Surely not on the surface of the couch, Master!” she cried.

“Be silent!” he cried, and, mad with passion, cuffed her, striking her head to the side but she turned back, instantly, her mouth bleeding, kissing at his body, leaving small, bright prints of blood upon it.

Then he took her in his arms. He uttered a great cry of joy. He was not patient with her. Instantly was she penetrated. He cried out with pleasure, and exuberance, owning her, possessing her, his purchased slave. And then, clutching him, holding to him as tightly as she could, enraptured, as a used, ravished, shameless slave, chained and shackled, she yielded to him, and, oh, with the fullness of a slave’s yielding, with that yielding which a slave longs to yield, with that yielding which a slave must yield, with that yielding which can be known to no woman who is not a slave, she yielded, and she yielded, and yielded!

“Are you a free woman?” he asked.

“No, Master,” she cried. “I am a slave, your slave!”

“Do you wish to be freed?” he inquired.

“No, Master!” she said. “Keep me in your collar!”

“Have no fear, my meaningless little barbarian,” he said. “I shall. I shall!”

“Yes, Master!” she wept. “Yes, Master!” And then in his arms there writhed a slave, a mere slave, one I would come to know well, one whom her master would continue to call ‘Ellen’, as it pleased him to do, a tearful, grateful, ecstatic slave, she who was his, she who was I.

And many times that night, in many ways, sometimes abruptly, sometimes lengthily, was she put to his purposes and pleasures. And so, too, did she serve him, frequently, in the commanded secret intimacies of her slavehood, eagerly.

****

It is now time to close this narrative.

It is written with the permission of my master. That such a thing, this writing, might be done was suggested to my master by his friend, Bosk, of Port Kar. I am deeply grateful to my master for permitting me to write this, and to that unusual, complex gentleman, Bosk of Port Kar, scholar and warrior, master of weapons and slaves, sometimes so fierce and terrible, sometimes so thoughtful and gentle, uncompromising but understanding, for suggesting that it might be done. The narrative, I fear is only too obviously a first-person story, though I have tried to tell it with some objectivity, largely in the third person, as perhaps befits a collared slave. To be sure, I fear my feelings have often intruded themselves. Indeed, sometimes I fear that I have spoken in the first person and not the third. This is then, I conjecture, a first-person narrative expressed largely, humbly, I trust, in the third person. Now, however, in these last remarks, with no presumption intended, I will speak in my own first person, not of the slave, Ellen, who is I, but as I, who am Ellen, the slave.

This has been so good for me to write this story. I had to tell someone, if only myself.

It is written on large sheets of rence paper, from the delta of the Vosk, in pen and ink.

I do not know the fate of this manuscript, or if it has a fate, so to speak. One thing is clear to me, that it is surely unlikely that these things will be allowed to be known on my old world. These are not truths of the sort which are to be spoken on that world. Indeed, many, should the occasion arise, will attempt to prevent the publication of this manuscript. If, somehow, it should find publication on my old world, one must then expect it to be derided and denounced variously, with cuteness and cleverness, with subtlety and cunning, with virulence and hysteria. It belongs, you see, to a genre of manuscripts which are to be suppressed on that world. To the ignorant, fearful and weak these truths must, I suppose, seem frightening, perhaps as other truths concerning nature, long ago, the movement of the earth, the nature of the sun, the distance of stars, seemed so frightening. But these truths are not really so frightening, not really. No more than the beating of the heart, the circulation of the blood. But those who fear to learn need not consider these matters. Let them remain in ignorance, or labor with excuses and qualifications to maintain their sheltered enclaves of comforting sophistries, such fragile defenses against storms of fact. I do not object. I mean them no harm. Perhaps it is best for them not to seek the truth. There is always danger in seeking the truth, the danger that it might be found.

So I would not expect this manuscript to be published on my old world. Who would dare to do so? Who would take the risk?

Alas, Earth, that world, how beautiful you might have been!

How sadly you tread now toward your gray future, toward the goal of the beehive, toward the ideal of the ant heap. Strange how democracy has come to be the choice between six and six, and twelve. I wonder if there are any left upon you now who can tear their way through the tapes of their conditioning programs and see reality clearly, vividly. Are there any left upon you now who can think for themselves? Must truth and reason be forever denied; must honesty be always outlawed? How strange it is to hail free speech and then make certain, simultaneously, that it shall not exist. I wonder if there are any individuals left on you now, or are there only the gangs, the masses and their masters?

But let me put aside such tragic thoughts.

Earth is no longer my world. Gor is now my world, a world on which I am a slave.

In Ar, times are troubled. It remains unclear as to whether Marlenus of Ar, the great Ubar, is within the city or not. One hears many things, frequently conflicting. Sporadic resistance to Cosian occupation continues. Mercenaries grow ugly. Skirmishes occur between crowds and the garrison forces, the mercenaries and the Cosian regulars, but, too, sometimes between the mercenaries themselves and the Cosians. Myron, polemarkos, strives to maintain order. Reprisals occur. Buildings are burned, stores looted. Many free women of Ar are levied for the collar, branded and sent to Cos to serve foreign masters. Some are forced to serve as naked paga slaves, belled and chained, in the taverns of what was, prior to their embondment, their own city. Slaves, of course, no more than tarsks and kaiila, have Home Stones. Even if one day Ar should be returned to herself, and her former power and glory, these women would be kept as slaves, then simply being sold out of the city. Once a woman has worn the collar, truly worn it, you see, she is forever spoiled for freedom. She can never again be truly free for she, as a female, has known the touch of masters. And many slave girls, too, are being brought to the city to content and pacify the troops. And many, it seems, are harvested for this purpose from my old world, Earth. How their lives will change! Talena, acclaimed by some as Ubara, denounced by others as traitress, is seldom seen now in public. It is said she hides within the fortresslike Central Cylinder. I do not know what will be the issue of these complex, troubled matters. Much is kept from me, of course, as I am a slave. There is a saying that curiosity is not becoming in a kajira, and yet how well the masters understand our incessant and insatiable curiosity! But sometimes I think my master keeps much from me not simply because he enjoys keeping me, tormentingly, appropriately, as Goreans see it, in “slave ignorance,” but for my safety, as well. The less I know, the less I understand, the safer, or so he deems, I will be. In the storms of war and revolution it is, not surprisingly, the animals which have the least to fear. There is a joke in Ar now, that it is a good time to be a kaiila. Too, the testimony of slaves in Gorean courts is commonly taken under torture.

I fear for the well-being of my master and his friends.

Often there seems a calmness in the city, sometimes an unnatural calmness, but I do not doubt that intrigues abound, and that dark, hot currents, calculated and violent, turbulent and meticulous, seethe beneath the surface.

How kind of my master to let me express myself, to let me tell this story, so remarkable to me, and yet, perhaps, not all that unusual or unprecedented. There is a business in women, of course. We have value. Apparently a large business. And I have little doubt but what it is excellently organized. Perhaps some of the mysterious, untraceable, coded radio signals on Earth, seemingly indecipherable, perhaps indexed to an unfamiliar language, so perplexing to terrestrial authorities, pertain to this form of merchandising, the transmission of orders, the reports of scouts, the arrangements for, and coordinates of, pickups, and such. In any event, it is clear that the ships of slavers ply the space routes. There is a road, a secret road, so to speak, between Earth and Gor. And I assure you, it is not untraveled. I know. If you are a female of Earth, and, perchance, somehow, despite all probabilities, you one day read this, despite all efforts to prevent that, despite all the efforts to keep these things from you, know that there is truly a Gor. These very words are being written in longhand, in the city of Ar, by one who was once much as you, but is now a collared slave. Know, too, proud, vulnerable woman of Earth, that you might be observed, yes, you, literally you, personally you, exactly you, you who are now reading this, observed, carefully observed, scrutinized and noted, perhaps in the bright, cool office where you work; perhaps at the beach, where you thought to tantalize men and flaunt slave curves with impunity; perhaps at the theater, you so elegant in your black dress and pearls; perhaps on the street, in your high heels and smartly tailored mannish suit, walking swiftly; perhaps going to or coming from the gym, in your shorts, your head back, your hair free, your bag upon your shoulder; perhaps while in the supermarket, in slacks, foolishly with a bared midriff, the “slave belly,” do you not know how men see that, pushing your cart, examining shelves, comparing wares, shopping; perhaps while buying gas, looking out the passenger-side window, smiling, as though innocently, delighting in tormenting the fellow at the pump with your putative seemingly carefree security and invulnerability; perhaps in quickly exiting a taxi, in your miniskirt, so strikingly reminiscent of a slave garment, did you know that, revealing a well-turned calf, a knee, perhaps even a swift, deliberately insolent flash of a supposedly inaccessible thigh.

Are you aware of these things? Surely you are. Do you know how you look to men, who see you in such ways? Perhaps. Do you know how desirable you are, truly? If so, do you live in trepidation, fearing strong hands, thongs and a collar?

Do you think these things go unnoticed, or are noticed only by weakened, helpless males of Earth, reduced and crippled, whom you secretly despise for what they have permitted to be done to them, whom to their anger you may freely, safely, insult, taunt and tease, and that without fear of consequences, brazenly displaying yourselves, delicious, provocative goods on which, culturally, they are not even permitted to gaze? Does it not serve them right? What fun for you! But then, of course, what have you to fear? You are not slaves. No. Or you are not yet slaves, not yet, not at least in a strictly legal sense. I leave aside the sense of the “natural slave,” she who in a natural world would, without a second thought, be fittingly embonded, who would find herself promptly, legally, in the collar in which she belongs.

But these thing, you see, may not be going unnoticed, or noted fruitlessly, only to the misery of the observer.

There are other possibilities, other authentic possibilities.

Remember the mysterious, unaccountable radio signals.

Someone, you see, may be watching you, you entirely unsuspecting, unaware, unwitting of this so significant a surveillance. Someone may be thoughtfully considering how you might look in sirik, that striking custodial device with its collar, the connecting chains, the wrist and ankle rings, or conjecturing, taking notes, on your likely value, as he watches you, what you might be expected to bring on the slave block, first, and then later, after having been suitably informed and trained. All your laws then, your politics, your ideologies, your legal remedies, your petty threats, your thousand devices to obtain power, to control, reduce, tame and destroy men, would be useless. Remember them, such seekings, such devices, when you are chained naked in a Gorean dungeon, collared, with other slaves, a mark burned into your thigh, waiting to be brought to the auction block.

But with you, on the same chain, perhaps prized even more highly than you, their collars locked as securely as yours, their chains clasping as perfectly, their bodies as bared, may be other women, they selected as carefully as you, quiet, gentle, loving, needful, natural women, women less removed initially from their sex than you, women who disdained to strive to be facsimile males, such monstrous transmogrifications of human reality, those to whom grotesque propagandas could not speak, those who could never bring themselves to believe the catechisms of negativity, horror and hatred, those who had no difficulty in detecting the unsatisfying special nature and hollowness, the idiosyncratic party-serving nature of diverse bromides and slogans, the lies that others would impose upon them, but who knew themselves female, even from the beginning, despite all the propaganda and conditioning, female radically and profoundly, those who even on Earth have longed to fulfill their femaleness in the service of men, men who will understand them and treasure them, but will nonetheless give them the domination they crave, who will supply the masculine to their feminine, the yang to their yin, who will see to it that they are, as they desire to be, let it be stated explicitly, mastered, wholly, and beautifully, and uncompromisingly mastered.

But even such women must expect the whip if they are in the least bit unpleasing. They, too, of course, are slaves, every bit as much as the others, total slaves.

Many are the sorts who will be brought to Gor, for the tastes and interests of buyers vary. In the markets there is much diversity.

There are apparently “want lists.” I wonder if your type appears on such a list. I wonder if you, as an representative of such a type, are now on such a list, a considered item, a proposed item, an item to be picked up, to satisfy a given request.

The haughty will be reduced; the insolent will have their insolence taken from them; the inert will be awakened; the frigid will be enflamed, made helplessly, beggingly needful; the awkward will learn grace; the plain will learn beauty; those who sought to dominate will learn submission; those who sought to be served will serve.

But there will be a common denominator. All will be owned, all will be slaves. All will learn, sooner or later, totally, their womanhood.

Gorean free women can be difficult and troublesome. But the pain that Gorean men will accept from their free women, in deference to their freedom, and their sharing of a Home Stone, they do not, and will not, accept in their slaves.

That is something to be remembered, if you are brought to Gor. To be sure, you would quickly learn it.

Perhaps you will be selected. Perhaps, unbeknownst to you, you have already been selected. I wonder. Perhaps your papers have already been prepared. That is an interesting thought. I wonder if they will come for you.

It takes little time to heat the iron that will mark you.

Perhaps a collar is waiting for you, just the right size, snugly fitting, but not tight. The common collar is not uncomfortable. You will not, of course, be able to slip it. It will be on you, lightly, almost unobtrusively, but securely, I assure you. I wonder how it will be engraved. If someone has already spoken for you, you, specifically, it may already be engraved. Most women, of course, are surrendered to the markets.

The lock on the collar, as most of you will now be aware, is normally at the back of the neck. You will be taught to keep it there. If one looks closely, one will see it there, beneath your hair.

The Gorean slave girl must be extremely careful about such things, even small things, such as the positioning of her collar lock. She is not a free woman. She is to be pleasing to her master in both appearance and demeanor.

I think there is little advice to give you, at this point.

Most of what you need to know will be made clear to you. I might warn you, however, in general, that the men of Gor are much unlike the men of Earth. You will not have been prepared for them. They have not been broken and tamed. Do not think you can deal with them as you have the men of Earth. Do not attempt to manipulate them unless you are prepared to accept the consequences. Remember that they will see you as what you are, and what you will soon understand yourself to be, and only be, a rightful slave.

To be sure, although the men of Gor tend to be larger and stronger than the men of Earth, I am sure the primary differences between them are largely cultural. Doubtless on Earth, somehow, despite all, there are true men, masters, and rare and precious they must be, but such are abundant, indeed, almost universal, on Gor. A Gorean youth, for example, is early accustomed to the care and management, the training and disciplining, the hooding, binding, chaining, and such, of female slaves. There are even games, held within large low-walled enclosures, with spectators in attendance, in which lads compete, each hunting another lad’s slave, she doing her best to elude capture, that her own master may score more highly than her pursuer. These contests are timed. A given lad’s time is determined by how long it takes to capture his fair quarry, bind it helplessly, hand and foot, and hurl it, futilely thrashing, squirming and struggling, to the sand before the judges. Any girl of whom it is suspected that she did not do her best to elude capture is whipped.

Why do we make excellent slaves?

We make excellent slaves, perhaps in part, at least at the beginning, because we know we will be whipped if we are not. And to be sure, even later, if we are not fully pleasing, we know we will be whipped. We are, after all, slaves. But do not misunderstand such things. Gorean men, while demanding and severe, are seldom cruel. It is not in their nature. That sort of thing, I think, is more common on Earth, where, unfortunately, I fear that some males, hopefully few, see women less as wondrous and delicious properties, less as fascinating, attractive, beautiful, desirable domestic animals, less as possessions to be sought, owned, relished, celebrated, treasured, and mastered, than as something alien to be hurt, oddly enough, incomprehensibly, for one’s pleasure. Whatever this may be, or its explanation, it is not Gorean. The Gorean master seldom, if ever, inflicts gratuitous pain. What would be the point of it? Similarly he would not abuse children, torture small animals, or such. Goreans would simply not understand such things. If they did understand them, they would doubtless account them offenses against honor.

To be sure, the slave may be whipped for any reason, or for no reason. This comprehension helps her understand that she is a slave. It adds a flavor to her existence.

The slave desires to serve and please. Be firm with her, but patient. Help her learn her collar. Does she not make a lovely pet? Do not subject her to meaningless cruelty or she will be confused and miserable. Make certain she knows what you want, and she will do her best to see that you are satisfied. You are, after all, her master. Help her to become what she wishes to be, an attentive, subservient treasure. Do not let her know how important and precious she is to you. Treated well, she will be to you a dream of pleasure. If she should be the least bit difficult or recalcitrant, punish her, sharply and effectively. Make certain she understands clearly why she is being punished. Similarly, if she fails to be fully pleasing, punish her, again letting her know in what respect she may have fallen short of the perfection you demand in a female slave. See, of course, that she cares for her person and appearance, and is suitable in her demeanor and speech. She is not a free woman. You are to see that she carries herself appropriately in your presence, kneels properly, and such. You may, if you wish, encourage her with small attentions and rewards. A candy, nibbled from the floor, on all fours, may be more effective than three stokes of the switch. If you wish, you may upon occasion accede to her slave needs. You should understand that these needs, as she is not a free woman, are acute and cruel. They are difficult for the slave to bear. Accordingly, be patient with her. Often she will want little more than to writhe helplessly in your chains, gasping, and lifting her body to you. Imagine her gratitude then when, at last, with as little as a touch, you give her the relief for which she has been begging.

Remember that the slave is not a free woman. She is a property, a domestic animal, a lovely beast whom you are kind enough to domicile, keeping her about for your service and pleasure.

You wish to get the most out of her.

How then should she be treated?

As she is an animal, the answer to that is obvious.

She is, in all respects, and without qualification, to be wholly and perfectly mastered.

On such matters there is no temporizing or concessions.

If she is not fully pleasing, do not hesitate to use the whip on her.

Remember, she is not a free woman.

She is a slave.

****

So, dear reader, remember that the master is all, and you are nothing. You may love him. And perhaps he may love you. As a female slave you will live the most degraded and the most beautiful of lives. You will know pleasures forever beyond the ken of the free woman.

It is not strange that a woman loves best in a collar. In a collar she is most a woman.

Love and serve your masters.

It is what you are for, sweet slut.

Do not forget to wear your tunic well, and keep the collar lock at the back of your neck.

After all, you do not wish to be whipped.

I wish you well.

I now close this narrative.

I kiss my finger tips and touch my collar. It has been put on me by my master, whom I love. I am his slave. I desire to serve him. I would die for him.

I wonder if any of you can understand this, or if it merely seems puzzling, alien, incomprehensible. But I think you understand it; these things may be deep, but they are not that strange, or unfamiliar. They are very close to us, to all of us.

And so I have come a long way. I am no longer on Earth. I have returned to the biological heritage of my sex. I have learned to call men “Master,” for, as I am a woman, and they are true men, they are master to me. I pity my sisters who do not know the collar. How incomplete they are. I have been the most free of the free, or thought myself such, and am now amongst the most enslaved of the enslaved, and am yet, because of that, the most free of the free, the truly free, for I am no longer at war with myself. I am now one with my nature. I have at last come home, come home to myself, to the deepest truths of my being. I am at my master’s feet. It is where I belong. May I prove pleasing to him, my master!

Behold, I hear him approach!

I must hasten to the door, to meet him there, to kneel before him!