Swordsmen of Gor

Chapter Two PERTINAX; A VESSEL WILL NOT BEACH

“Come forward,” said the fellow, gesturing toward the forest.

“You come forward,” I said, motioning him down, toward the beach. I did not know what might lurk in the forest.

“You want me within the circuit of your steel,” he remarked.

“You need not approach that closely,” I said. “Too, my blade is sheathed.”

“That seems unwise,” he said, “when greeting a stranger.”

“You do not appear to be armed,” I said.

I wondered if he realized how swiftly a blade might be unsheathed.

“Are you one of them?” he asked.

“One of whom?” I asked.

“I saw no ship,” he said.

“From the sky,” I said. “Do you know such ships?”

He wore a mottled tunic, irregularly green and brown. It would match in well with the background, with attendant shadows.

He did not have the blue and yellow chevrons which sometimes characterizes the lower-left-hand sleeve of the slavers, different, of course, from their more formal regalia, or robes, commonly blue and yellow, their colors. Some view the Slavers as a caste, others as a subcaste of the Merchants. The colors of the Merchants are yellow and white, or gold and white.

Had he been a slaver it was possible he might have been aware of the sky ships, so to speak, such as the disklike vessel of Peisistratus. On the other hand, the greater numbers, indeed, the vast majority, of Gorean slavers, one supposes, as Goreans of other sorts, had never seen such a ship. Indeed, many Gorean slavers, as many Goreans, might not even believe in the existence of such ships. They, of course, as most Goreans, would be well aware of the existence of Earth girls, from the markets, if from no other source, but they, as many Goreans, might suppose that Earth was somewhere on Gor, though doubtless far away. Much of Gor, you see, even from the point of view of Goreans, is, so to speak, terra incognita. Gor is somewhat smaller than Earth but having missed the cataclysm that drew, say, a sixth of Earth into space to form her magnificent single moon, leaving behind a mighty basin to become in time a vast ocean, her land area is quite possibly more extensive than that of Earth. In any event, much of Gor, to most Goreans, is unexplored, and consequently uncharted. There is thus no great difficulty in supposing the existence of unknown lands, even many of them, and one, perhaps, might be called “Earth.” And most Goreans, even today, would be as unacquainted with, and as skeptical of, the possibility of space travel as men of Earth might have been a thousand or more years ago.

The fellow, observing me carefully, came forward, some yards down the beach.

He was a tall man.

He glanced at the slave. “Her name is ‘27’?” he asked.

“You can read,” I said.

“Passably,” he said.

“‘27’ was a ring number,” I said. “Her name is Cecily.”

“That is a strange name,” he said.

“She is from Earth,” I said.

“That is far away,” he said.

“Yes,” I said.

“I am not unfamiliar with such women,” he said. “Some have been brought here, to content us.”

“There are others then,” I said.

“A few,” he said.

Gorean men need women, and by “women” they commonly understand the most luscious and desirable of women, the female slave. To be sure, the forests are dangerous, and what free woman would care to frequent them? Girls brought on chains, of course, have little to say about such things.

“She is pretty,” he said.

“She is not muchly trained,” I said, “and there are doubtless thousands who would bring higher prices.”

“Still, she is very pretty,” he said.

“Do you wish to challenge for her?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “I have a better.”

Unless there should be some misunderstanding here, one might observe that such challenges are not frequent, and normally require almost a ritual of circumstances. For example, aside from the usual impropriety of challenging one with whom one might share a Home Stone, Gorean honor militates against, if it does not wholly preclude, casual or unprovoked challenges. Obviously a skilled swordsman would have an advantage in such matters, which it would be inappropriate, and perhaps dishonorable, to press. Normally challenges would take place to recover a stolen slave, to protect a mortally endangered slave, perhaps to obtain a slave once foolishly disposed of, without which one cannot then bear to live, such things. Too, there may be economic constraints, as well, for if the challenge is not accepted, one is sometimes expected, depending on the city, the castes, and circumstances, to pay for the slave, with a purse several times her value. Few potential challengers then care to risk a refused challenge, as it is likely they cannot afford the slave, and must then retire in embarrassment. Many other possibilities enter into these things, but these remarks, hopefully, will give any who might chance to peruse these several sheets a sense of some of the prevailing customs in these matters. To be sure, brigands, pirates, enemies, and such, are not likely to concern themselves with challenges, but are rather the more likely, as they see fit, to attack, and kill. Similarly, in raids, and wars, it is understood that the property of the enemy, or quarry, or target, including not only his livestock and slaves, but even his free women, is legitimate booty. A proper challenge, on the other hand, is more akin to a duel, sometimes even to the setting of a time and place.

“You are a forester?” I said.

“Yes,” he said. “You are in the precincts of the reserves of Port Kar,” he said.

“I did not know that,” I said.

The great arsenal at Port Kar has its shipyards, as well as its warehouses and wharves. To guarantee a supply of valuable, suitable timber, for example Tur trees for strakes, keels, and planking, needle trees for masts, and tem wood, the rare yellow tem wood, for oars, the arsenal claims and badges selected trees within given ditched areas in the northern forests, which supplies, largely in a raw state, together with others, more processed, such as tars, resins and turpentines, items primarily suitable for naval stores, are transported southward on Thassa to the Tamber gulf. Occasionally, it is rumored, the precincts set aside by Port Kar are raided, or exploited, or poached upon, by other naval powers, particularly those of Tyros and Cos. On the other hand, I frankly doubt that this is true. Both of those formidable maritime ubarates have their own reserves, and extensively so, as does Port Kar. Indeed, predictably, there are similar rumors abroad, I understand, that Port Kar predates on the precincts of Tyros and Cos, and other maritime ubarates. I take these rumors to be false, as well. The last thing Port Kar, or these other powers, needs is a land war, which would have to be primarily conducted by mercenaries. Cos is already overextended in this manner in the south, at Ar. Indeed, there now tends to be little interaction, at least ashore, amongst these powers. Much contest, however, is done for the mastery of certain sea lanes, particularly toward the south, and towards Tabor and Asperiche, and even as far south as Bazi, Anango, and Schendi. If the forests were less abundant, one supposes, of course, that wars would be fought for scarce, possibly dwindling resources. On the other hand the environed trees, and, in particular, those marked or badged, tend on the whole to be left unmolested, in the various precincts.

I was soon to learn, however, that these surmises, however sound in principle, required certain qualifications.

“Your Home Stone,” I said, “is that of Port Kar?”

“Yes,” he said, “but I have not seen her for years.”

“You were not born in the forests?”

“No,” he said. “There are few free women in the forests.”

Slaves are commonly used for work and pleasure. They may be bred, of course, as the livestock they are, at their master’s will. There are slave farms here and there, but they are rare, and often specialize in exotics of various sorts. It is expensive and time consuming to raise female slaves from infancy. It is easier and less expensive to allow others to raise them, so to speak, and then, when convenient, attend to their harvesting and collaring. There are many female slaves on Gor and it is often, to the irritation of venders, and the mortification and chagrin of the slaves, a buyers’ market. Almost all Gorean slaves are captures, having once been free women. The bred slave, other than in the sense that all women are bred slaves, is rare.

One might mention, at this point, a word or two about the stabilization serums, which were developed centuries ago by the green caste, that of the Physicians. By means of these serums a given phase of maturation, say, beauty in a woman, strength in a man, and so on, may be retained indefinitely. The caste of Physicians, long ago, construed ageing as a disease, the “drying and withering disease,” and not as an inevitability or fatality, and so set to work to effect, so to speak, its cure. Scientists of Earth, as I understand it, are only now beginning to sniff about the edges of this problem. A radical shift in perspective, of course, is necessary. And such conceptual reformulations, as is well known, are difficult, rare, and, oddly, often unwelcome. Major truths, no matter what the evidence in their favor, are often, in the beginning, denied, then ridiculed, then battled, and then, if the cultural situation permits, and insufficient numbers of the heretics, or proponents, of the new views are imprisoned or executed, grudgingly accepted, and then, later, hailed as obvious, and those originally most adamant in their opposition, perhaps having run out of penitentiaries and firewood, will claim credit for the discoveries to which they have so reluctantly succumbed. Indeed, can they not find passages in their texts which hint of those very secrets, and other passages which allude to them in now-transparent metaphors?

Claims to the effect, say, that ageing is, or is not, a disease are at least cognitive. One can be right or wrong about them. They should be distinguished from claims, or seeming claims, which are noncognitive, namely, which lack either truth or falsity. For example, it is impossible to confute nonsense for it is neither true nor false, and that which is neither true nor false cannot be shown to be either. The truth or falsity of such things is not hiding. It just does not exist. It must not be lost sight of in these matters, of course, that nonsense is often well armed. Consider poison. It, too, is neither truth nor false, but it is dangerous, and it can kill.

Please forgive the above digression.

I thought it germane to the narrative, however, to refer to the stabilization serums, because of the reference to the rare “bred slave.” Two characteristics of the economic condition, as is well known, are the scarcity of resources and the disutility of labor. Both of these conditions militate against the breeding of slaves, except in special cases, usually exotics, where the rarity is thought to justify the attendant expenditures. It is expensive and troublesome to raise a slave from infancy at one’s own expense and that is why slaves are seldom bred, at least on a wide scale. It is much more convenient to acquire them when they are ready for plucking, so to speak. Why raise the grapes when they are about, and one may pick them, as one sees fit, when they are nicely ready and ripe? To be sure, there are some slave farms which, after a few years, produce their annual crop, so to speak. On the other hand, these enterprises usually require a large initial investment, say, large physical facilities, and hundreds of breeding slaves, male and female, to be carefully matched and crossed, and it normally takes years for the first crop to be readied for market. And such farms, too, commonly deal in exotics. The most common exotic is the virgin slave who has been raised without the knowledge that men exist. Slaves, too, of course, may be bred for a diversity of colors, peltings, facial features, and such.

There is a technique, incidentally, based on a variation of the stabilization serums, for hastening physical maturation, but this is little used because one has then to show for one’s pains only an unusual child. Much can be done with the body, it seems, but little with the mind, saving, perhaps, by Priest-Kings in the recesses of the Sardar. Gorean men are not interested in children, even if they have the bodies of women. They find them uninteresting. Nor will they be of interest until several years have passed. Then they may be interesting, perhaps quite interesting. Humanity, one notes, exceeds physiology. Unfortunately, too, several of these children will suffer confusing stress, as they lack the emotional maturation to relate comprehensibly to the needs and demands of their grown bodies, bodies hastened beyond the horizons of a child’s understanding. Accordingly, this application of the stabilization serums is frowned upon in Gorean society, and in many cities is illegal. A much more benign, or, at least, more acceptable, application of the stabilization serums is founded on a related, and accepted, but opposing principle, the reversibility of all physical processes. In this application, within limits, adjustments to the serums may effect the restoration of youth. The usual application of this technique, as would be expected, is to return a middle-aged, or older, female, to her youth, health, energy, and beauty. As I understand it, this is normally done only with particularly selected women, ones whose once remarkable beauty, this usually determined from old drawings, paintings, and photographs, has faded. Brought to Gor, restored to their earlier vitality and beauty, and collared, they will find themselves, not surprisingly, of great interest on the block. All beauty, of course, is not confined to a particular generation. Would it not be nice to see Thais, Phyrne, Cleopatra, and such on the block?

The usual thing, of course, at least where girls from Earth are concerned, as free Goreans have access to these serums as a matter of course, is to pick out young, superb, slave fruit, and then bring it to the chains of Gor, and here, in the pens, or, at any rate, early in its bondage, subject it to the stabilization serums, that it may be protected from the ravages of alteration and deterioration. Gorean masters, predictably, tend to favor young, luscious, female slaves. Slavers, too, who wish to buy and sell them, wish them to stay this way, as their value is maintained and, in many cases, improved. Cecily, whom we have met in the preceding pages, was subjected to the serums not on Gor but in the Pleasure Cylinder associated with the Steel World ruled at that time by Agamemnon, Eleventh Face of the Nameless One. Though she was far from immortal, and might even be fed to sleen, she would retain her youth and beauty. To be sure, it would wear a collar.

Doubtless a value judgment is involved in such things.

One might balance, say, freedom, misery, and death, against bondage, happiness, and life.

One might consider two lives. In one, we might suppose a given woman who, with some good fortune, might live a life of, say, some eighty to ninety years, and live to watch her interest and beauty fade, and observe her once lovely body submit to the slow degradations of age, watch it dry, wither, suffer, decay, and weaken until it subsides into an infantile helplessness, characterized by misery and pain, or perhaps a semi-comatose, bedridden state in which, indifferent and drugged, she waits for an encroaching end which she no longer even understands. Conceivably that could be the choice of a given woman. Does it fulfill her? Does it make her happy? Has her life been a good life? Let us hope so. Then let us consider another life. Let us suppose a young woman is brought to Gor, to be collared and sold like meat off a block. She will learn she is property, and a slave. She will find herself at the feet of men, subject to discipline, chains, and the whip. She will find herself the most degraded and despised, and the most valued and sought-after, of women. She will be expected to kneel and obey. She will be dressed in revealing fashions. She will learn to labor. She will learn what it is to be roped, to wear a chain, perhaps to crouch in a tiny, locked cage. She will learn a life of radical and profound sexuality, in which she will be expected to perform for, and well please, a master, in ways which might have been beyond her hopes, dreams, and ken as a mere female of Earth. She will learn what it is, for the first time in her life, to breathe good air, to look into a blue sky, to see an unpolluted sunset or sunrise, to eat fresh and natural foods, to relish the taste of fresh bread, to be grateful for a piece of meat fed to her by a master’s hand, to put her tongue, if permitted, to a wine beyond what she thought might exist. The purpose of her life will be to please her master. She may fall in love with him, but she should be wary of letting him suspect this, and surely should not speak of it, lest she be peremptorily sold. And in this degradation she may live indefinitely. She learns to understand men and herself. She is likely, in most cases, to be rapturously content, and is likely to live in joy, but she is, of course, when all is said and done, only a slave. She is in a collar. It gives her security, and meaning, and happiness, and identity. Perhaps it is right for her. Could that be? But whether it is right for her or not, she cannot remove it. She is slave.

“How is it that a forester,” I said, “claims as his the Home Stone of Port Kar?”

“I once lived there,” he said, “before I took caste. At that time, long ago, there were few, if any, castes in Port Kar. She had no Home Stone. She was a den of thieves, as it was said, a lair of cutthroats, and such, a stinking maze of canals at the marshes, squalid and foul, and malignant.”

“And without honor,” I said.

“Yes,” said he, “and without honor.”

“I think once she had no Home Stone,” I said.

“That is true,” he said. “Can you conceive of a city, a town, a village, a hamlet, without a Home Stone?”

“There are probably such places,” I said.

“Then,” said he, “that changed. In a moment of crisis, in a time of confusion and terror, when a vulnerable Port Cos awaited the onslaught of the combined fleets of Tyros and Cos, the word spread, the startling mysterious word, a word like the flash of lightning, a word striking through the darkness, a word as mighty as the rallying of a thousand battle horns, as swift as the flight of a tarn, that there was now a Home Stone in Port Kar.”

“Jewel of Gleaming Thassa,” I said.

“Tatrix of the Sea,” said he.

“So you chose caste, that of the foresters, and came here, to serve the Home Stone hundreds of pasangs away?”

“The Home Stone of Port Kar may be served here as well as at the gulf, as well as in the shops of the arsenal, as well as on the wharves, as well as on the decks and benches of her ships.”

“True,” I said.

“I am fond of the forests,” he said. “Most are born to their caste. I chose mine.”

“Some do,” I said. To be sure, it is not easy to change caste, nor is it frequently done. Indeed, few would wish to do it. Goreans tend to be extremely devoted to their castes. In a sense they belong to their caste. It is surely part of their self-identity, and not only in their own eyes, but in the eyes of others, as well. And, indeed, there are few caste members who are not convinced that their caste, somehow, is especially important, even that it may be, in some way, the most essential or the most estimable of all. Surely the peasants, supposedly the lowest of all the castes, have this view. They regard themselves as the “ox on which the Home Stone rests,” and, in a sense, they may be right. On the other hand, where would any of the other castes be, or civilization itself, were it not for my own caste, that of the Warriors?

“You are pleased with the forests?” I said.

“Yes,” he said. “When you see them,” he said, “you will understand.”

“Perhaps,” I said.

I was not clear why the Priest-Kings had arranged my being in this place at this time. I did suspect, however, that they had their reasons. Little took place in the Sardar which was not planned without an end in view, their own end.

“What is your Home Stone?” he asked.

“It is not that of Cos, or Tyros,” I said.

“No,” he said. “Your accent is different.”

As he was of Port Kar, or claimedly so, I thought it well to establish this matter. A state of war exists between Port Kar and the maritime ubarates of Cos and Tyros. To be sure, sometimes enemies meet affably enough.

“My sword, once, long ago,” I said, “was pledged to the Home Stone of Ko-ro-ba.”

“Long ago,” he said.

“I have served Port Kar,” I said.

“Were you there on the 25th of Se’Kara?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Were you?”

“Yes,” he said.

On the 25th of Se’Kara, in Year One of the Sovereignty of the Council of Captains, a great naval a battle was fought between Port Kar and the fleets of Cos and Tyros. Port Kar, on that occasion, was victorious. In the chronology of Ar, this battle took place in 10,120 C. A., that is “Contasta Ar,” or “From the Founding of Ar.” To be sure, I doubt that anyone really knows when Ar was founded.

“We are then in our way, are we not, ‘trust brothers,’” he said.

“It would seem so,” I said.

Certainly a bond would forever unite those who had been at sea on the 25th of Se’Kara, who had met Tyros and Cos that day.

From that day on they would be different.

“Were you there?” one seaman might ask another in the taverns of Port Kar, over kaissa or paga, the girl of his choice lying bound hand and foot by his table, waiting to be carried over his shoulder to an alcove, at his convenience, or wherever two fellows of that unusual polity might meet, perhaps even on a remote beach, by forests, and one need never ask “Where?”

But he had asked, in a way, had he not, for he had specified the date.

“Have you ever seen the Home Stone of Port Kar?” he asked.

“How is it that I, one not of Port Kar, should have seen her Home Stone?” I asked. “Have you?”

“Of course,” he said.

“I have heard,” I said, “that it is large and well-carved, and inlaid with silver.”

“With gold,” he said.

“I am not surprised,” I said. “In the cupboards of Port Kar, it is said, one is as likely to find gold as bread.” It was a saying. The corsairs of Port Kar venturing at sea, prowling the merchant routes, unannouncedly visiting coastal towns, and such, often returned to port well freighted with various assortments of goods, fruits and grains, weapons, vessels, tools, leathers, viands and wines, precious metals and stones, diverse jewelries, unguents, perfumes, silks, women, and such. These women are often wholesaled, given their numbers. Not infrequently they are wholesaled south to Schendi, for those of Schendi are fond of white-skinned female slaves. Slavers, of course, come from various cities to bid. Port Kar is well known for the high quality of her “fresh collar meat.” Many of these women, of course, on the other hand, are distributed as gifts by the captains or, more likely, retailed locally, for example sold to various local taverns. The women are usually of high quality or they would not be taken. When they are stripped, if ashore, before embarking, before returning to port, it is determined whether or not they are, as the saying is, “slave beautiful.” If they are not, they are freed and dismissed. If they are, they are taken aboard and chained, sometimes on deck, sometimes in the hold. If at sea, those who are less than “slave beautiful” are separated from the others, as though they might contaminate them, and kept for pot girls, laundresses, kettle-and-mat girls, and such. Interestingly, a kettle-and-mat girl, or such, in the collar, often becomes beautiful. In my view this far exceeds the matter of diet and exercise. In bondage a woman, even a beautiful woman, becomes more beautiful. The collar, it seems, has a remarkable and lovely effect on a woman. It softens her and, in it, in her place in nature, she becomes, as she must, doubtless for the first time in her life, a total woman. Mastered, at a man’s feet, she discovers fulfillments which were beyond her ken as a free woman. She finds an inward meaning and happiness and this is inevitably expressed in her features, bodily attitudes, and behaviors.

The free woman is to be sought and wooed; the slave is to be summoned, and instructed.

“It is surprising to encounter one here, for the beach is lonely,” I said.

“I was passing,” said he, “and noted you.”

“And one from Port Kar,” I said, “as well.”

“That is not so surprising,” he said, “for one of the major precincts of Port Kar is close, one of her major timber reserves.”

“Of course,” I said.

The ship of Peisistratus, I was sure, had not set us ashore at random. Coordinates would have been supplied, presumably as long ago as the Steel World.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“Tarl,” I said.

“A Torvaldslander name,” he said.

“It is a name not unknown in Torvaldsland,” I said.

“My name,” said he, “is Pertinax.”

“Alar?” I said.

“Perhaps in origin,” he said. “I do not know.”

“Is there a village nearby?” I asked.

“Some huts,” he said, “foresters, guards.”

“Why are you not armed?” I asked.

“The huts are nearby,” he said.

Whereas brigands, assassins, and such will strike an unarmed man, the common Gorean would not be likely to do so. It seemed clear to me that his unarmed approach was not then merely to reassure me but, in a way, to diminish, if not preclude, the possibility of himself being attacked. In Gorean there is only one word for “stranger” and “enemy.” Too, in the codes there is a saying that he who strikes first lives to strike second.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I do not know,” I said.

“You were put ashore, marooned?” he asked.

“Perhaps I am to be met,” I said.

“Here?”

“Yes.”

He looked about warily.

“You asked earlier, if I were ‘one of them.’ Who are they?”

“Brigands, assassins, mercenaries,” he said. “I think they are from the wars, from the south, even from Ar. Hundreds have come, in many ships.”

“To this remote place?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said.

“They cannot be from Ar,” I said. “Ar has fallen, and been garrisoned by Cos and Tyros. Ar lies under the heel of Chenbar of Tyros and Lurius of Jad, of Cos. Ar is looted, bled, and chained. Ar is beaten, subdued, and helpless. Her riches are carted away. Many of her women are led naked in coffles, to Brundisium, to be put on slave ships bound for Tyros, Cos, and the islands. Myron of Temos, of Cos, is polemarkos in Ar. On the throne of Ar sits an arrogant puppet Ubara, a traitress to her Home Stone, a woman named Talena, a hypocrite and villainess, a female once the daughter, until disowned, of the great Marlenus of Ar himself.”

“Perhaps things have changed in Ar,” he said.

“Impossible,” I said. I had been in Ar. I had seen her helplessness and degradation, even how her citizenry was being taught to acclaim their conquerors, to blame themselves for the faults of others, to seek forgiveness for crimes of which they themselves were the victims. Wars could be fought with many weapons, and one of the most effective was to induce the foe to defeat himself. And so men, defeated and disarmed, must learn to rejoice in their weakness, and commend it as virtue. Every society has its weaklings and cowards. But not every society is taught to celebrate them as its wisest and noblest, its boldest and bravest.

“The strangers, hundreds of them, disembarked, from ship after ship, trek in long lines through the forest,” he said. “They are the dregs and rogues of Gor. I do not know their destination.”

“You,” I said, “have not come to meet us?”

“Certainly not,” he said. “And if others are to be here, to meet you, I am apprehensive.”

“You are afraid?”

“Yes,” he said.

“But you do not fear me?”

“No,” he said. “Were we not together on the 25th of Se’Kara?”

“Give me your hand on that,” I said.

“No,” he said. “I fear my hand is harsh, from the ax.”

“Forgive me,” I said.

“You will share my hospitality, of course,” he said, “for the 25th of Se’Kara?”

“With pleasure,” I said.

He who designated himself as Pertinax then smiled, and looked upon the kneeling slave, who, as was suitable, had been silent, as she had been unaddressed, and in the presence of free persons.

“Can she speak?” he asked.

“She has a general permission to speak,” I said. Such a permission, of course, at a word or gesture, may be revoked.

“You are generous with a slave,” he said.

“Many allow their girls that liberty,” I said. To be sure, the slave is to speak as a slave, and act as a slave, with suitable deference in words, tone of voice, physical attitude, and such. They are not free women. Sometimes a new slave thinks she may hint at insolence, or even manifest the barest glimmering, or thought, of disobedience, say, in a tone of voice, or a tiny gesture, or fleeting expression, but she is seldom going to repeat this infraction, even in the most transitory and petty manner. She is likely to find herself instantly under the switch or whip, put in lock-gag, be forbidden human speech, be put in the discipline of the she-tarsk, or worse.

“Girl,” said Pertinax to the slave.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“I understand your name is Cecily,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” she said, “if it pleases master.”

“If it pleases your master,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” she said, putting her head down.

“You are very pretty Cecily,” he said.

“Thank you, Master,” she said.

“Cecily,” I said.

“Yes, Master,” she said, lifting her head.

“You are in the presence of a free man,” I said. “Show him deference. Go to him, put your head down, and lick and kiss his feet, and then kneel before him and take his hands and lick and kiss the palms of his hands, gently, softly, moistly, tenderly.”

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“Yes,” said Pertinax, after a time. “She is a lovely slave.”

The kneeling, and kissing and licking the male’s feet, is a common act of deference in the female slave. Too, the holding of the hands, and putting one’s lips, and tongue, to the palms, humbly and gratefully, and kissing and licking them, is a lovely gesture. It can also, of course, ignite male desire. The slave is caressing the very hands which, if she be displeasing, may cuff and strike her. Interestingly, this same act can be quite arousing for the slave herself. So, too, of course, is something as simple as kneeling before the male.

“Back, girl,” I said. “Position.”

I did not think it wise to let her prolong such ministrations to a Gorean male.

Cecily drew back and knelt beside me, to my left.

“A Pleasure Slave,” said Pertinax, approvingly.

“Yes,” I said. “She is from Earth, as noted earlier. In that place, she is from a place called England.”

“I have never heard of it,” said Pertinax. “Was she free there?”

“Yes,” I said.

He regarded her, appraisingly, as a Gorean may look upon a slave. “Absurd,” he said.

“Yes,” I said.

“Is she any good?” asked Pertinax.

“She now knows she is in a collar,” I said.

“Good,” he said.

I thought Cecily would look nice in a camisk, a common camisk. The camisk is much more revealing than the common slave tunic. It is a one-piece, extremely simple, suitable for slaves, narrow, poncholike garment. It is slipped over the head. It is usually belted with a loop or two of binding fiber. One may use the binding fiber to bind the slave. It is tied with a slip knot, which may be loosened with a casual tug, at the left hip, as most masters are right-handed. The common camisk is seldom worn publicly, in cities. One supposes the reasons for that are clear.

“Women make lovely slaves,” he said, wistfully, I thought.

“As you would know from yours,” I said.

“Of course,” he said.

“They are bred for the collar,” I said, “and they are not whole until they are within it.”

“True,” he said.

“Ai!” he said, suddenly, and, shading his eyes, looked out to sea. I turned, too. The slave started, but remained in position, not daring to turn about.

“A sail,” I said.

It was far off, a lateen-rigged sail, so presumably from the south, not the north. In Torvaldsland the common sail is square. Too, their ships commonly are clinkerbuilt, with overlapping planks, to allow more elasticity in hard seas. Most of the southern ships are carvelbuilt, so they ship less water. The northern ships commonly have a single steering board, whereas most of the southern ships are double helmed.

“Come back, into the trees,” said Pertinax, anxiously.

“I do not think they can see us from there, not yet,” I said, “but we will join you momentarily.” I bent to gather up the small bit of supplies with which we had disembarked the ship of Peisistratus. The girl came to assist me.

“The palms of our friend’s hands?” I said to her.

“Soft, smooth,” she said.

“He is not a forester,” I said.

“Who is he, Master?” she asked.

“I do not know,” I said. “He is, however, a liar and a hypocrite.”

“Master?” she said.

“Pretend something has been dropped, and you are looking for it, in the sand,” I said.

She began to feel about, in the sand.

“He has never seen the Home Stone of Port Kar,” I said. “It is not well-carved, inlaid with gold, and such. It is rough, and of common rock. It is not large, only a bit larger than a man’s fist. It is gray, heavy, granular, nondescript, unimposing. The initials of Port Kar, in block script, are scratched into its surface. It was done with a knife point.”

“How do you know?” she asked.

“I did it,” I said.

“He is not of Port Kar?” she said.

“I do not think so,” I said. “Certainly he did not speak of the 25th of Se’Kara as would one of Port Kar. He was probably not abroad upon turbulent, green Thassa on that remarkable and unusual day.”

“Then he is not a ‘trust brother’,” she said.

“He is no more a trust brother of mine,” I said, “than Myron, polemarkos of Temos.”

“I am afraid,” she said.

“Do not show fear,” I said. “Too, although we know he is a liar and a hypocrite, he may be a benign liar and hypocrite.”

“Master?” she said.

“I think he was to meet us,” I said. “Things would not make much sense otherwise.”

“But for whom does he work, whom does he serve, Master?” she asked.

“I would suppose the Priest-Kings of Gor,” I said.

“There is no other possibility?” she said.

“There is one other possibility,” I said.

“Master?”

“Kurii,” I said. “But not those with whom we were allied. Others. Others might have had the coordinates.”

“Former minions of Agamemnon?” she asked.

“Or of others,” I said.

“You have now found what you were looking for,” I said. “Put it in the sack.”

She obediently executed this small charade.

I rose to my feet, and she stood, too, beside me. I looked back, at the horizon. The sail was larger now.

“Hurry! Hurry!” called Pertinax, back amongst the trees.

We joined him in the shadows.

The ship, a common Gorean ship, small, light, oared, straight-keeled, ram-prowed, shallow-drafted, would be drawn up on the sand, if the night was to be spent here. It swung athwart, however, some yards from shore.

“Come,” said Pertinax. “It is dangerous to remain here.”

Men, some clambering over the side, lowering themselves, others leaping, entered the water, which at that point was waist to chest high. They began to wade ashore. These men were armed variously. Most had sacks slung about them. These tended to buoy upward in the water. More than one fellow steadied his approach with the butt of a spear.

“Who are these men?” I asked. They seemed a nondescript, but dangerous lot. There were some fifty men.

“Bandits, mercenaries, assassins, outcasts, men without captains, strangers, all strangers,” he said.

“What are they doing here?” I asked.

“I do not know,” said Pertinax. “Do not let them see you.”

“Where do they go?” I asked.

“They follow the blazings, the flags,” he said.

“To where?” I asked.

“I do not know,” he said. “Somewhere deep in the forest, perhaps to the headwaters of the river, well south and east of the reserves.”

“What river?” I asked.

“The Alexandra,” he said.

“I know it not,” I said.

“It is not a large river,” he said.

“And why might they go to the headwaters of that river?” I asked.

“I do not know,” he said.

“The river, I gather,” I said, “is narrow, but deep, sheltered by rock, as might be a fjord.”

“I thought you said you knew not the river,” he said.

“I do not,” I said, “but certain things would be needful, if certain purposes were to be served.”

“The men are unlawed, and dangerous,” he said. “Come away.”

He then withdrew silently into the woods, and I, and a slave, followed him.

I turned back, once.

The ship had swung about. Water fell from the oars. The ship would not beach.

It was growing dark.