Swordsmen of Gor

Chapter Twenty-Eight IN THE FOREST, ITS MISERIES; A TALENA; I AM ATTACKED; A SLEEN IS IN THE VICINITY

It was now the third day on the forest road.

The rain which had intruded itself lightly, intermittently, then more heavily, briefly, for some Ehn, when I had been aflight, responding to what had turned out to be the summons of Seremides, had been little more than a harbinger of storms which had begun in earnest some two days later.

The track was muddy, and we were surely far behind schedule, for wagons, on the already deeply rutted road, became frequently mired. Often they required a twenty of men, and levers, to free them, and then, an Ahn later, one must again strive to unfasten them from the deep pools and clutching mud. Finally some tharlarion were unharnessed from a given wagon and added to the team of another wagon, simply to free the wagon. One had then, again, of course, to take the time to put them once more in their proper traces. Often, too, the wagons must be unloaded, freed, and then again loaded. Sometimes trees were felled to widen the road, to avoid the miring. Twice the road was washed out and a bridge of felled, roped trees must span it, a bridge that would sometimes break and be swept away, given the current and the weight to which it was subjected. I doubted that we would reach our destination for another two or three days, due to the impediments we faced.

The weather had been hitherto unusually warm for the season, even given the moderations in temperature, and the warmth, associated at this latitude with the current of Torvald, but now a chill snapped in the air. My calculations, corroborated by those of Torgus and Lysander, placed us in the fourth day of the Eighth Passage Hand, the five days preceding the ninth month, on the last day of the passage hand of which occurs the winter solstice, the Gorean new year beginning when the world begins its own, on the vernal equinox, which follows the last day of the waiting hand, which follows the passage hand of the twelfth month. Most Gorean months are numbered, and not named, rather as October would have been the eighth month, November the ninth month, December the tenth month, and so on, of the Julian calendar. On the other hand, some months are named in given cities, for example, the third month is called Camerius in Ar, Selnar in Ko-ro-ba, and so on. Generally the four named months are associated with the solstices and the equinoxes. For example, the fourth month, that following the third passage hand and the summer solstice, is En’var or En’var-Lar-Torvis, the First Standing of the Sun; the seventh month, following the sixth passage hand and the autumnal equinox is Se’Kara or Se’Kara-Lar-Torvis, The Second Turning of the Sun; the tenth month, following the ninth passage hand and the winter solstice is Se’Var or Se’Var-Lar-Torvis, the Second Standing of the Sun; and the first month, following the twelfth passage hand and the waiting hand, culminating in the vernal equinox, is En’Kara or En’Kara-Lar-Torvis, the First Turning of the Sun. The passage hands and the waiting hand are five days each. A Gorean month consists of five five-day weeks. The Gorean year, as that of its sister world, Earth, is approximately 365 days in length. Every few years, as necessitated, an additional day is inserted into the calendar, at the end of the waiting hand, but, as the Gorean year is apparently somewhat shorter than the Earth year, and as its orbit seems to vary somewhat, from time to time, presumably due to the adjustments of Priest-Kings, the insertion year varies somewhat. The calculations in these matters are due to the devices and measurements of Scribes. Two important fairs take place in the vicinity of the Sardar Mountains, in the spring and fall, that of En’Kara in the spring, and Se’Kara in the fall.

I heard the snap of a whip and a cry of pain.

One of the slaves had fallen into the mud.

Had she been careless, or was it something that could not have been helped, something for which she was utterly blameless?

But such discriminations, one supposes, are too subtle for the whip.

“Please do not strike me again, Master!” I heard.

But there was then another stroke of the whip, and another cry of pain.

The trek was not pleasant for the slaves. Such treks seldom are.

Their hands had been unbound though the ropes stayed on their necks. In this way it was easier for them to keep their balance in the mire.

Yet the reprimanded slave had fallen.

Doubtless she had been careless.

For the most part they followed the wagons to which they were neck-fastened.

Men, too, slipped, and fell, and cursed.

The girls were cold, and rain was falling.

Several, standing to the side, waiting, wept and shivered.

The rope which fastened them together was wet, cold, and stiff. They held their arms about themselves and shuddered, barefoot, in their tiny, clinging, soaked tunics.

How miserable, I thought, they must be.

But, too, it was clear they were well-figured. One could scarcely fail, under the circumstances, even in their helplessness and misery, to notice the excellence of their slave curves.

But it is for such reasons, and others, that such as they are brought into the collar. Men will have it so.

Several slaves, a few yards ahead, were thrusting against the back of a wagon, lending their small strength to the effort to free it. Some had their slight shoulders to the two rear wheels. Some others were trying to turn the wheel by means of the spokes. Rain was falling, cold and pelting, almost blinding. Their hair was clotted with mud and their tunics were filthy. Mud covered their legs to the thighs.

“Mercy, Masters!” cried one, on her knees in the mud, lifting her hand piteously, and her outcry, unacceptable and importunate, was answered with a stroke of the switch.

She regained her feet and, joining her coffled sisters, pressed, weeping, with the palms of her small hands against the rude back of the wagon.

“Hold,” I said, moving forward.

I put my back under the wagon, facing backward, and, straightening a little, managed to lift it from the mud, and thrust it forward a foot or two. “Ai!” said a mercenary, nearby. “Master!” breathed one of the slaves. Others stepped back, and stood in awe, in the mud, on their neck-rope. I withdrew from the wagon, and stepped back, away, to the side of the road. Many men could have done what I had done. Leverage is important in such matters. One lifts mostly with the legs, the back little more than a lever. At least I had not slipped. I moved away. I did not think my contribution had made much difference. I did not doubt but what the wheel would soon again be arrested.

I walked down the line of wagons, toward the head of the march, some two or three hundred yards. The march itself must have been a pasang or more in length.

It was toward evening, and the light, in the rain, and within the looming trees, was poor.

The rain continued to fall, but it had lessened from some Ehn before.

Several of the wagons had a coffle of slaves.

Some of them, lips trembling, looked piteously upon me as I passed. Could the march not stop? Could they not rest?

Did they think I was in charge of the march? I was not.

I had no doubt they were weary, even exhausted, and that, from their unaccustomed efforts at the wagons, their small bodies must be unsteady, and tremble and ache. It was no wonder that so many had fallen.

“Forward!” cried men, and the wagons moved again, creaking, and many of the slaves, the cold, muddy water to their thighs, whimpered, and again, wading, staggered forward, obedient to the tether which bound them.

At dawn the march had begun, as much on Gor begins with the first light. And it was now late. And there was the rain and cold.

I changed my position.

The water here was only ankle deep.

Once again the rain began to fall heavily. A wind swept the forest, with a rushing noise, whipping wet, overhanging branches, tearing away leaves, shedding and spattering more and more water onto the pools in the road.

Another coffle passed, fastened to the back of its wagon.

This coffle was much as the others.

The hair of the girls, sopped, and bedraggled, spread about their faces and shoulders. Their tiny tunics were drenched. And not one tunic was without its stains and soiling. Some were open at the back, cut apart, and reddishly stained, where the whip had fallen. One could see the track of rivulets of water on their necks and shoulders, and note the progress of its tiny, coursing, chill streams elsewhere on their bodies, on their arms, and muddied thighs and calves. Their scanty, revealing garmenture, suitable for slaves, was chilled and soaked, the cold, pelting water easily penetrating the light, porous cloth, not only from without but from within, as well, as water ran from their bodies. Some of the girls clutched the tunic about their neck, tightly, to keep water from slipping within the garment. Some of the girls, staggering, clung even, with both hands, desperately, to the stiff, wet, cold neck-ropes, perhaps that they might be steadied in the march, or perhaps merely that they might have something, anything, to cling to, even be it the bond which fastened them, directly or indirectly, to the back of a wagon, the very bond which in its way left them in no doubt that they were women, and slaves. Muchly were their eyes filled with anguish and fear, and muchly did they shiver and tremble. Could one not read in their countenances a mute plea for pity? They did not dare speak for fear of being struck. “Please, Master, please!” begged their eyes.

Was mercy not to be shown to them?

Was it not understood that they were females, and slaves?

I continued on my way.

I wondered how many of them, as free women, might have teased men, or led them on, or sported with them.

Such days, if they had been, were now behind them. They were now slaves, and the properties of men.

An unharnessed tharlarion was led by, his might to be applied to some wagon forward.

A whip master, too, passed by.

One is not to intrude oneself, incidentally, between a whip master and his duty.

Although one should show no concern for slaves, I felt sorry for them. They are, of course, to be understood as, and treated as, the animals they are, that goes without saying, but this does not mean that one should not be concerned for their health, comfort, and safety. After all, it is appropriate to care for one’s animals. One should be concerned with the health, comfort, and safety of all one’s stock, of whatever sort, even that which is well-curved and two-legged. To be sure, a typical husbandman is likely to be more concerned for the welfare of his kaiila than his female slaves, but then the kaiila is a far more valuable animal. But it is obvious that an animal which is well cared for is likely to provide a much better service and last longer than one which is ill fed, frightened, and abused. Slaves, like other animals, respond well to kindness, provided it occurs within a context of a never-compromised, iron discipline.

Somewhere a tharlarion bellowed.

It was probably hungry.

I hoped we would soon halt for the night. Tenting would be set up for the men, the Pani, the craftsmen, the teamsters, mercenaries, and others. Small fires, fueled with sheltered, dried kindling, collected earlier and brought hither, in the wagons, could be set under the roofing of canvas shelters, permitting some cooking. Certainly I would appreciate a cup of steaming kal-da, and later an opportunity to take refuge under a tarpaulin in the back of one of the wagons. The slaves were slept under the wagons. Bedded, they were kept on their neck-ropes, but their hands were retied, behind them, lest any be so foolish as to try to address themselves to the knots at the ends of the coffle rope. Their ankles were not bound, lest men, late at night, might be inconvenienced in the darkness.

I suspected the terminus of our journey would be the Alexandra.

As it was we were nearly in the ninth month.

A time was approaching in which the temperamental vagaries of restless Thassa would predictably begin. Goreans seldom brave her churning, often towering, violent green waves between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. That is the season of bitter cold in the northern latitudes, and of high winds and storms. In such a season Gorean mariners refrain from taunting mighty Thassa. Their ships remain in port, and, in Torvaldsland, even the slim, open dragons of the Torvaldslanders, as resilient and supple as they are, remain in the sheds. Let Thassa close her roads then as she will. Let her have then her season of privacy, of isolation and ferocity, of storms and terror. In such moments she wills to be alone. Do not then venture upon her. Leave her to her moods, and her dark, swelling frenzies. Later the sun will ascend, the air will warm, and the waves subside. Then fit and rig your vessels; then roll your dragons to the shore. No, the winter is not a time to venture forth on Thassa. It is a time rather for the taverns and halls, for fires and brew, for paga and kaissa, for brawls and slaves, and the waiting for En’Kara, when, one’s resources likely having been depleted, one will seek out captains and merchants, and seek perchance a new bench, a new oar.

Pertinax and I had, from time to time, sought out Cecily and Jane who, as their embonded sisters, were tunicked and coffled. We had assured ourselves thusly that they were well, or, at least, no more miserable than the others. As at Tarncamp, we had no free women with us, and no male slaves. We did have, obviously, as at Tarncamp, several female slaves. Females make excellent slaves. Had it not been for the female slaves I do not think the discipline at Tarncamp, particularly with the mercenaries present, could have been maintained. Gorean males expect to have access to female slaves, rather as the right of a free male. They expect them to be in attendance, to be provided, rather as they might expect, on some venture or another, food and lodging to be provided. Strong men do not care to do without women in collars. This, for example, is something well known to any paga slave.

With a great bellowing, calling out, and a creaking of wagons, the long line of our march came to a halt.

It was here, on the road, we would stay for the night.

I was looking forward to meat and kal-da.

Later, after supper, and a cup of hot kal-da, this doing much to restore my spirits and reconcile me to the day’s travails, rather than immediately retiring to a damp tarpaulin and the hard, chill, soaked boards of a wagon, a respite to which I had earlier looked forward, I took it upon myself to make the rounds of the march. This could be done in less than an Ahn. Too, whereas a tarpaulin and a wagon bed may be preferable to the mud beneath a wagon it is, in itself, as you might suppose, no prize lodging either. It is certainly inferior to the furs and a well-curved slave chained at one’s feet, against whom one may warm one’s feet. Here and there a lantern hung on a wagon, and I could make my way about without much difficulty. Occasionally, in passing a wagon, I would hear a gasping and moaning, and a rolling and thrashing in the mud where, it seemed, some fellow, presumably a mercenary, had pulled a slave from under a wagon, to the end of her tether, and was in the midst of reminding her of her bondage. I did not interfere in such matters, nor was I expected to do so. These were matters internal to the camp and not within the province of myself, or guards.

“How goes the night?” I asked a fellow.

“Well, Commander,” he said.

I passed an enclosed, windowed, sutlers’ wagon. It was one of several recently allotted, given the weather, to the contract women. They would ride, of course, in any case, and not go afoot, as the collar-girls. Even so I did not doubt but what they had been jostled well about, and sorely discomfited by the lurchings and tiltings of their conveyances. I could imagine them within, amongst rattling pans, shifting vessels, and boxes, bracing themselves against walls, or clinging to supports. I supposed they would have, even so, some rude discolorations which might be laid to the account of the journey. Lord Nishida, interestingly, marched with his troops, braving the cold and mud, and slept in his pavilion tent. I did not know what might be typically the case with one of his rank amongst the Pani, but, if he were typical, they chose to share the hardships of their men. To be sure, he occasionally removed his mud-caked garments, bathed, donned a kimono, and honored his contract women with his presence.

I accepted the greeting of a guard, and continued on my way.

I have chosen, incidentally, in this narrative, as you have perhaps noted, to omit any explicit account of signs and countersigns. I am supposing the rationale for this is sufficiently obvious. Although such devices are frequently changed, some are used more than once. Also, certain recognition devices are portions of a secret tradition within Pani clans, the members of which may be separated by thousands of pasangs, and these are either permanent, or relatively so.

Pertinax, I suspected, was with his Jane. The former free brat of Ar, now nicely collared, thrashed well.

It is easy to caress a slave into submission, a submission in which she is yours, pleading and piteous, helplessly begging for the least continuation of your touch.

Too, it is pleasant to have a slave so.

Are they not lovely in their collars?

Pertinax had avoided Saru.

It seemed he had not forgiven her for having become a helpless slave, now in obvious, plaintive need, as other slaves, of the caresses of men.

As his Jane was a Gorean female he had no reservations about accepting her slave nature. I thought this somewhat arrogant on his part. It was also, in its way, quite amusing. His Jane had been a Gorean free woman, with all that that entailed, and thus, on Gor, until her collaring, she would have been regarded as immeasurably superior to a mere barbarian female, an Earth female, such as the former Miss Margaret Wentworth, who would have been regarded as far beneath her as a pig beneath a princess. Goreans tend to view the women of Earth as natural slave stock. Do they not commonly bear their faces? Are their shapely calves and ankles not visible in public? Consider the frequent scandal of their garmentures, beach, and summer wear, the shortness of skirts, and such. Consider, too, the provocative nature of their secret undergarments. Do they not say, “Strip me, and find a slave!”? Some even dare to color their lips, or eyelids, a liberty on Gor permitted only to slaves, and sometimes forced upon them. Too, consider that many Earth females, of their own free will, have their ears pierced, an act which on Gor is likely to be inflicted only on the lowest of slaves. Many of the new slaves brought to Gor from Earth, who are, naturally, not yet familiar with Gorean, are startled, in their sale, while they are being exhibited, to understand that the bidding on them has suddenly become much more heated. The reason is often simple. Most likely, the auctioneer has just called it to the attention of the bidders, at a moment he deems propitious, that she is a “pierced-ear girl.” In any event, from the Gorean point of view, chasms separate the free woman of Earth, in so far as she has not yet been legally embonded, from the dignity, nobility, and glory of the Gorean free woman. The Gorean free woman, for example, is not only not a meaningless barbarian, but she has a Home Stone. What Pertinax’s Jane and Lord Nishida’s Saru had in common, of course, was that they were both human females, and thus, from a common Gorean point of view, at least amongst Gorean males, they were both, and should be, natural slaves. Many Goreans believe that all women are slaves, only that some are in collars and some are not. Certainly Pertinax’s Jane was now a slave, only a slave. And I suspect that anyone, with the possible exception of Pertinax, could see that not only was Saru a slave, but that she had the makings of a superb slave. Or was it that Pertinax saw this only too clearly, but, for some reason, was reluctant to accept it? I really found it hard to believe he did not want her at his feet, in his collar. And, too, it seemed clear that that was the dream, and hope, of the girl. In her heart, it seemed, she wanted to be his slave, and knew herself his slave.

The collar well liberates a woman’s deepest and most feminine nature, the desire to wholly and helplessly serve and love, to be fully pleasing, in all ways, to her master.

Women long for masters, as men for slaves.

Saru, interestingly, was the only collar-girl in the march who was not afoot but wagoned. She was back-braceleted and shackled, and put on blankets, that she not be bruised, and was occasionally covered with a tarpaulin to protect her from the rains. This was obvious evidence of her specialness. It would not do, of course, for her to share a wagon with contract women, but, on the other hand, as she was intended for a shogun, one would certainly not wish to risk her either in the mud and cold of the march, put her at the mercy of impatient whip-masters, who might mark her back, or place her in possible jeopardy from the attacks of men or beasts along the way. This special attention accorded to Saru, of course, earned her the resentment, even the hatred, of many of her sister slaves, behind the wagons. “She is not more beautiful than I,” doubtless thought many of them, and doubtless correctly. But, her eye and hair coloring was unusual. Occasionally, as the opportunity afforded itself, she was spat upon by other slaves. Saru herself, I did not doubt, did not relish her privileges, and would have much preferred to be on a neck rope struggling with the others, but it was not permitted. I did talk to Lord Nishida once about her, commenting on the rationale for her special treatment, that doubtless being to protect her from the miseries and ardors of the march. “But, too,” had said Lord Nishida, “we wish her to fear her fellow slaves.” “Why is that?” I had asked. “That,” said Lord Nishida, “she will see men as her only protectors, her only defense, and will thus be the more anxious to be fully pleasing to them.” The lovely Saru wore one other bond than I have mentioned, other than, of course, the common bond of all Gorean slave girls, their brands and collars, and that was a chain on her neck, which fastened her to a ring set in the wagon bed. This was intended to make her theft less practicable. Are not valuable objects often chained down? Indeed, many a female slave, at night, is chained to her master’s slave ring. In this fashion, they are not only nicely secured but are conveniently at hand should the master desire them in the night.

I passed two more sets of guards.

A bit later I stopped suddenly, back from a lantern.

Two guards were there.

We exchanged glances.

“Yes,” said one of the guards, “they are in the forests.”

“Have you seen one?” I asked.

Taking light, even that of a lantern, the membrane behind the eyes can suddenly flash like molten copper, an anomaly in the darkness. It is the same with panthers and larls.

“No,” said one of the guards.

“If you have taken its scent,” I said, “it is not on your track.”

When the fur is wet the scent is even more obtrusive. It might be fifty yards or more, back in the trees.

“No,” said one of the guards.

It is well known that the undetected sleen is he to be most feared.

“Observe the night,” I said.

“Yes, Commander,” said the guards.

I continued on my way.

I recalled that the scent of a sleen had also been detected back in the vicinity of Tarncamp, on the road between the central camp and the training and storage area. Vigilance is certainly to be recommended, but, on the whole, the human is not the common prey of sleen.

I had the edged buckler with me, brought from the wagon after I had supped. I made my rounds in what, from the point of view of an Earth chronometer, not a Gorean chronometer, would be a clockwise fashion. In this way the buckler, on my left, was always between myself and the darkness. Too, one did not linger in the light of lanterns. I thought the forests empty of men, but one did not know, and I had been assured that there were spies in the camp of Lord Nishida. Someone, too, in league with Seremides, must have slain the fellow who had drugged the tarn, and accosted me in the vicinity of Tarncamp.

Surely it was not impossible that a metal-finned quarrel might rest on its guide, patient in the darkness.

I thought of the fellows encountered in the tent of Lord Nishida, at Tarncamp, Quintus, Telarion, Fabius, Lykourgos, and Tyrtaios. One or more, I had gathered, were spies, and one was possibly of the dark caste, the Assassins.

Some leaders would have had all five killed, innocent and guilty alike, to guarantee the elimination of the guilty. Lord Nishida, however, had not done so. His motivations in this matter, I suspected, were primarily political. The spy is, after all, a conduit to the enemy.

I thought of Seremides, and the strange conversation we had shared, on tarnback, in the darkness, partly in the rain.

“Master!” I heard, a soft, pleading voice, from my right, in the darkness, from the ground, from beneath a wagon.

I stopped.

“Please, please, Master!” said the voice.

Gorean men are not unfamiliar with that sound. They know it from their own slaves.

“Please, Master,” said the voice.

The voice bore within it the easily recognized, unmistakable note of the needful slave, a sound soft, tiny, uttered as though by one who might fear to be whipped, half a whimper.

“You may speak, girl,” I said, authorizing her to speak.

She squirmed a bit from beneath the wagon, until arrested by the neck tether. Her hands were tied behind her back.

“He aroused me, and left me helpless,” she said.

This is a cruel thing to do to a slave, of course.

“What did you do,” I asked, “to be so punished?”

“I did nothing!” she said. “He did this for his hatred, for his amusement. I was of Cos, and he of Ar! So he brought me to this point and left me! Have mercy on me!”

“You are no longer of Cos,” I said. “You are only a slave.”

“Yes, Master,” she wept.

“Only a slave,” I said.

“Yes, Master, yes, Master!” she wept.

There are many warring polities on Gor, and there is often a deep-seated hatred amongst them. After all, do not enemies threaten one another’s cities, goods, fields, and resources, their walls, and Home Stones? Some vendettas and rivalries have continued for generations. Too, wars on Gor are fought not only for adventure and sport, but for gain, as well. An enemy’s trading posts may be looted, his mines seized, his crops harvested. Wars may be fought for arable land, for markets, for high ground, for defensible passes, for routes, for access to the sea, for olive groves and stands of timber, for orchards and vineyards, for precious metals, cloths, and jewels, for kaiila, tarsks, verr, many things. Indeed, a warrior’s pay is commonly the loot he can acquire. Too, we might note that amongst the most prized and sought-after fruits of war are the females of the enemy. They are valuable loot and bring good prices in the markets. Too, one may wish to keep them. One of the greatest pleasures of a Gorean warrior is to have a woman of the enemy as his slave. And often, she in his power, and as he is teaching her her collar, he may have it, however foolishly, that she stands proxy for her city and he may, however absurdly, vent upon her all the contempt and spleen he feels for a hated foe. Does she not then, chained in her cage at night, try fruitlessly to tear the collar from her throat? Then, in the morning, after sobbing herself to a fitful sleep, she is ordered forth from her cage again, naked, on all fours, in her shackles, to be again abused and set once more to arduous, exhausting, seemingly endless, humiliating labors, to be once more subjected to a misplaced vengeance, a vengeance now as meaningless, as inappropriate, and as out of place, now that she is a slave, as would be the gratuitous abuse of an innocent, helpless, tethered verr. One supposes the master’s victimization of his property will eventually subside, one certainly hopes so, when he no longer sees her as a scion of, and in terms of, hated foes, but comes to understand that she is no longer a proud, exalted free woman of the enemy toward whom a sword may be legitimately directed, but is now no more than a collar-beast he owns, a sleek, lovely collar-beast fully in his power, one who depends upon him, totally, and one who hopes to be found pleasing. She knows, of course, that Home Stones are now behind her, forever. She is collared. Too, she now has what she has always desired, a master, and she hopes to please him, to warrant a caress, and to one day win his love. As a former free woman certainly the extraordinary pleasure she gives her master and the extraordinary pleasure, psychological and physical, she derives from his mastery has come as a revelation, a welcome and astonishing joy which she as a free woman had only suspected in fearful, secret moments. Already it seems she is a love slave.

“Please, Master,” she begged. “Complete his work! I beg it!”

“What is your name?” I asked.

“Talena,” she said.

“No,” I said, suddenly. “You are not Talena!”

“It is the name I have been given,” she said, frightened. “If it does not please you, name me as you will.”

I fetched a nearby lantern, and held it over the supine slave, who half closed her eyes against the light.

“You are not Talena,” I said.

“I was of Cos,” she said. “They gave me a name of the mainland, of Ar.”

“As masters may,” I said.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

This was not surprising. Had she been of Ar and taken to Cos it was likely she would have been given a Cosian name. The same animal on Earth, say a dog, would be likely to receive one name in Britain, another in France, another in Italy, and so on.

“‘Talena’,” I said, “is the name of one who was Ubara of Ar.”

“A false Ubara!” she said. “That is known even in Cos.”

My hand tightened menacingly on the ring by means of which the lantern was suspended.

“Do not strike me!” she pleaded.

“Yes,” I said, drawing back, wearily, “she was a false Ubara.”

“There are many Talenas,” she said.

“Yes,” I said. ‘Talena’ was a not unfamiliar name on Gor, at least on the mainland. To be sure, it would be an unusual name for a slave. There was at least one other Talena, of course, who was a slave. I recalled the Metellan district. I had not changed her name on the embondment papers, but had permitted her to retain the name ‘Talena’, though then, of course, not as a free name but as a slave name, put upon her by the will of her master. Now, I supposed, she would, if somewhere collared, have yet a different name.

“I do not like the name ‘Talena’ for you,” I said. “It is too fine a name for a slave.”

“Forgive me, Master,” she said.

“When you have a private master,” I said, “should you be so fortunate, beg him for a different name. Masters are commonly indulgent in such matters.”

“I will!” she said.

Slave names are often short, and convenient, such as ‘Lita’, ‘Lana’, ‘Dina’, and such. Earth-girl names, it might be noted, are commonly accounted slave names on Gor, and may be put upon Gorean girls as well as slaves harvested from the fields of Earth. For example, ‘Jane’, on Gor, would be clearly understood as a slave name. There are many names on Gor, of course, both masculine and feminine, which are frequently encountered, as is the case on Earth. My own first name, ‘Tarl’, for example, was quite common in Torvaldsland.

I placed my hand on her right knee.

“Yes, Master,” she said. “Please, Master!”

I was annoyed at my reaction to being apprised of the slave’s name. Her voice had not been that of Talena. And I had even fetched the lantern to look upon her. She had not been Talena, of course, not the Talena.

Again I recalled the conversation with Seremides, in the darkness above the forest.

I gathered that the Ubara had not yet been brought before the throne of a Ubar’s justice.

Strange, I thought, that so mighty a bounty, ten thousand tarn disks, of gold, of double weight, had not yet been claimed.

What value might she have to someone, or something, which might exceed such a sum?

Did a captor wait for even so incredible a sum to be increased? Were negotiations now in progress? Perhaps a captor was amused to have the former Ubara at his slave ring for a time, before, say, tiring of her, and then delivering her to the justice of Ar. I could well imagine the slave, in such a situation, striving mightily to please whoever, or whatever, might be her master of the moment, to postpone as long as possible the day of her return to Ar.

“Please, Master,” whispered the slave.

I rose from her side and returned the lantern to its place.

I heard her sob behind me.

I returned to her side.

“Master?” she whispered, disbelievingly.

She had thought, I supposed, that I had abandoned her.

“Are you still in heat, girl?” I inquired.

One would seldom use so vulgar an expression, I supposed, in the case of a free woman, but it is often used in the case of animals, which makes it acceptable in the case of a slave, as she is an animal, a lovely form of domestic animal.

“Yes,” she said.

It is not unusual for a slave girl to approach her master, kneel before him, kiss his feet, straighten up, and inform him that she is in heat, openly, clearly, frankly, honestly, and innocently. The slave is not ashamed of her sexual needs, no more than it would occur to the free woman to be ashamed of her needs for, say, food and water. “Master’s girl is in heat,” she might say. “She begs for his caress.”

I lightly touched the interior of her right thigh.

“Yes,” she said. “A touch will free me, the least touch!”

I bent gently to her and, to her astonishment, put my tongue to her heat.

In an instant I had to place my right hand over her mouth, tightly, that her cries might not disturb the camp. It was hard to hold her in place, even with my right hand over her mouth, and my left hand grasping her arm, above the elbow. She thrashed wildly, gratefully, kicking mud about, half rising up, and twisting from side to side, and then lay back, and still. I became, only a bit later, aware that she was kissing and licking at the palm of my right hand, desperately, gratefully. I drew it away a bit and she still sought it with her kisses, on the side of the hand, on the back, and fingers, and wrist.

“Thank you, Master,” she whispered. “Thank you, Master!”

“You are not a Talena,” I informed her. “You are a Lita.”

“Lita, Master?” she said.

“You are a camp slave, are you not?” I asked.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“You have been renamed ‘Lita’,” I said. “If any object, have them bring their complaint to me.”

“And who is Master?” she asked.

“Tarl Cabot,” I said.

“He who is captain, commander, of the cavalry?” she said.

“Yes,” I said.

“Then I am Lita,” she said.

I then stood up and brushed away some mud, and wiped my hands on my tunic. I gathered in the edged buckler.

“Master!” called another girl.

“Please, Master,” called another.

“No,” I said, and continued on my rounds.

I had not realized that others had been aware of my presence.

I supposed we were bound for the Alexandra.

If there were ships there, they could not make voyage, of course, until the spring.

Yet, from the time of the attack on the camp, Lord Nishida had made it clear to me that his plans, whatever they might be, must be advanced. It seemed he would, at least, change camps. That must be all. He surely could not be mad enough to contemplate braving Thassa unseasonably, between the winter solstice and the spring equinox.

My interlude with the needful slave, a girl once of Cos, who had been named ‘Talena’, now ‘Lita’, put me naturally in mind of the former Ubara, and her possible fates.

I recalled that, long ago, Miss Margaret Wentworth, before she became the slave, Saru, had spoken of a hold over me, by means of a woman. This had made little sense to me at the time.

I thought now, however, from my rendezvous with Seremides, once of the Taurentians, the woman would be Talena.

But how could someone or something think they had a hold over me, in virtue of one such as she, a false Ubara, now deposed, last seen bound on the height of the Central Cylinder in Ar, kneeling at the feet of men, fearing apprehension, fittingly placed in the rag of a slave?

How could anyone, or anything, think that?

But, if so, how grievously then had someone, or something, whether human, Kur, or Priest-King miscalculated!

What now would Talena be to me?

I did not want her.

I would not now buy her, even as a pot girl for my kitchens in Port Kar.

She had been beautiful, but, too, she had been proud, ambitious, selfish, vain, and cruel. Had I not understood that, long ago? Had I not then understood that she belonged, if at all, only under the whip? I recalled how badly she had treated me and how with such delight and venom she had scorned me in the holding of Samos of Port Kar, when I had been confined to the chair of an invalid, thought perhaps never to walk again, imprisoned there by the lingering effects of a poison contrived by Sullius Maximus, a renegade captain of Port Kar, then in the fee of Chenbar, the Sea Sleen, Ubar of Tyros. Later, at the first opportunity, escaping her sequestration in the Central Cylinder of Ar where she, disowned by her father, had been confined in dishonor, having begged to be purchased, a slave’s act, in the northern forests, she had betrayed her Home Stone, conspiring with the forces of Cos and Tyros to bring down, belittle, and subdue her own city, mighty Ar, to achieve a meretricious ascent to a Ubara’s throne, to reign there as a puppet, her strings in the keeping of enemies and invaders. But then her father had somehow returned, it seemed from the Voltai, and the insurrection had subsequently occurred, casting forth, violently and bloodily, the occupying forces and restoring the rightful governance of the city.

I smiled to myself.

How fitting that I had had her trapped and embonded in the Metellan district, then arranging that she should be returned to the throne of Ar, though knowing herself, so secretly, as then a slave. How she must have lived in terror, fearing that this secret might be revealed, which was then indisputable and certifiable. What hubris that a slave should dare to don the garments of a free woman, let alone take a place on a Ubara’s throne! Would not each tiny particle of her flesh, one after another, have been publicly removed over weeks, or months, on a needle’s point?

I had seen to it that she was enslaved, in her own city, making use of a couching law of Marlenus himself, Ubar of Ubars.

It had been easily and perfectly done. I trusted that she, to her rage, consternation, and chagrin, in all her utter helplessness, that of a female in the hands of men, had realized that.

How pleasant it is to enslave a woman.

How better can one degrade them? But how strange it is that they so thrive in their degradation. Do they not understand what has been done to them, or do they understand it only too well? How is it that they kiss your feet in gratitude, leap instantly to do your bidding, kiss their fingertips and touch them to their collars, buck and squirm in your arms, gasping and writhing in grateful, uncontrollable, orgasmic ecstasy, kneel, heads bowed, before you. How radiant and joyful they are in their collars! Are they not born to thongs? Is it so strange that they find their joy and fulfillment at a man’s feet, or is it merely to be expected, given a genetic heritage of the surrenders of love, without which a woman cannot be whole?

Who is the man who truly loves a woman, he who denies reality or he who recognizes it, and embraces it, he who betrays her and panders to propagandas, or he who consents to answer the cries of her heart?

So Talena was now a slave, no different from any other slave, save for the bounty on her head.

Excellent, I thought, save for the bounty.

I did not think I would buy her even for a pot girl. And surely many were the slaves more beautiful than she!

She had thought herself the most beautiful woman on all Gor.

How absurd that was!

She had never been ranged naked in a coffle, standing, legs widely spread, hands clasped behind the back of her head, for assessment.

Yes, she was beautiful, but there were thousands more beautiful than she. Had she not once been the daughter of a Ubar, what might she have brought? Perhaps three silver tarsks? Much would depend on the market, and the season. Spring is a good time for selling slaves.

If then some thought to have a hold over me in virtue of a slut named Talena, doubtless even now somewhere in a collar and a slave’s rag, if that, they were muchly, and profoundly, mistaken!

I wondered where she might be.

In any event, it was no concern of mine.

There was suddenly a rush from my left, and something emerged from the darkness, from the trees, and I knelt down, on my right knee, heard the scrape of a blade on the metal, and, almost simultaneously, rose up, swinging the edged buckler up, violently, to the left, and it met resistance, and there was an ugly gurgling cry, and something stumbled back, and fell, away from the buckler. I crouched down, alert. At the same time, from within the trees, I heard a screaming, and a shaking and a tearing, as though an arm might be being torn from its shoulder. Within moments lanterns were rushing toward me, and men, and guards. “Call Lord Nishida!” I heard.

In the light of the lanterns I looked down on the shape at my feet. The edged buckler had caught it under the chin, and taken the head half from the body. From the trees there was a hideous wailing and four Pani, glaives ready, slipped amongst the trees. In moments they drew forth from the darkness, dragging it, a sobbing, mauled figure, the left arm missing. It was trying to stanch the flooding stream bursting from its body with its free hand, and then it was thrown to the mud amongst us, several mercenaries and Pani now having hurried forward.

I watched the living figure twitch before us. Then I thought perhaps it felt no pain, its body perhaps then flooded with endorphins. Its eyes were wide with shock. Blood ran freely between the fingers of its right hand.

“Stanch his wound,” I said.

The fellow’s hand was pulled away and cloth was thrust into the hole in his body.

“Where is the arm?” asked a man.

Two Pani, with lanterns, entered the forest.

I became aware of Lord Nishida, now standing at my side. “What is going on?” he asked.

“I know not,” I said.

“Give me a lantern,” said Lord Nishida, and was handed a lantern. He bent down, to examine the two fellows before us. And then he stood up.

The two Pani who had just entered the forest returned. One carried a crossbow.

“The assassin’s weapon,” said Lord Nishida.

“A weapon commonly employed by assassins,” I granted him.

“We could not find the arm,” said one of the Pani, he without the crossbow. “It was a sleen attack,” said the other. “The beast must have carried it away, into the trees, to feed.”

“We caught the scent of a sleen in the vicinity earlier,” said a mercenary, one of the guards.

“Apparently the bowman did not,” said a fellow.

“Nor would he,” I said.

“Double the guard,” said Lord Nishida.

“Behold,” said one of the Pani, indicating with the shaft of his long glaive the figure brought recently to the road. “This man is dead.”

“He bled to death,” said a mercenary.

“Unfortunate,” said Lord Nishida. “We might have learned much from him.”

A man drew the wadded, blood-soaked cloth from the inert body.

“Well, Tarl Cabot, tarnsman,” said Lord Nishida, “we have solved one of our problems.”

“How is that?” I asked.

“We have discovered our assassin,” said Lord Nishida. “This man, whose head is still muchly in his helmet, is Lykourgos, and this other, he with the crossbow, is Quintus, so one or the other, perhaps both, are of the Assassins.”

“Both may have attempted the work of the assassin,” I said, “but neither, I fear, are of the Assassins.”

“How so?” asked Lord Nishida, interested.

“This man,” I said, indicating he who had been caught beneath the chin by the edged buckler, “rushed clumsily from the darkness. He lacked the skill one would expect from a professional at dark work, and the other, he with the crossbow, did not risk a miss, preferring to leave the strike to the knife of his confederate, he himself then serving muchly as support, either for a second strike, or, more likely, to disconcert any who might too quickly approach, to cover the retreat of his companion. The professional assassin, I would suppose, would have trusted to his own quarrel, and not waited. Too, the professional assassin will usually choose to work alone, depending on himself, no others.”

“Interesting,” said Lord Nishida.

Although I said nothing, it seemed to me that we had now limited the suspicions of Lord Nishida, expressed to me earlier in Tarncamp, in his tent after I had left the feast, if they were warranted, that they had now been narrowed to Fabius, Telarion, and Tyrtaios

“But why, then,” asked Lord Nishida, “would these men attack you?”

“I think,” I said, “this has to do with a personal matter, which I would prefer to keep to myself.”

“As you wish,” said Lord Nishida.

Doubtless he supposed this had something to do with the seemingly inveterate and irascible tensions and tempers of barbarians. I myself supposed the attack was founded on my failure to satisfy Seremides in our interview of some nights ago. I had not furnished him with information as to the whereabouts of Talena, former Ubara of Ar, so was now useless to him, and he had revealed to me his identity and his interests in her pursuit, both matters he doubtless preferred to be kept unknown. He must have had a way of contacting his minions at Tarncamp or in the march, but I suspected he had had no more than two with us. If that were the case, I had nothing to concern myself with at present from that quarter. I hoped not. Similarly, if there were spies or assassins in the camp, it seemed to me that their target of primary interest, once it was decided to strike, would be not me but Lord Nishida.

“May I have a lantern?” I asked one of the Pani, and, given this artifact, I moved back, between the trees. Two or three men accompanied me, and, too, so did Lord Nishida.

It was easy to discover where Quintus had been attacked, from the dislodgment of the leaves, the rupture of the earth, the sight and smell of blood. There was no doubt the attack had been by a sleen, as there were sleen tracks about. One could see where the sleen had made its leap, from the deeper indentations in the soil, and the absence of prints between that point and the point where the prey was struck. It was several feet. The sleen must have been large, and powerful. The slight wind moving the branches would have been toward the sleen. This was what I would have expected.

“Sleen do not normally attack humans, do they?” asked Lord Nishida.

“Not usually,” I said.

“You are sure those are sleen tracks?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Do you notice anything unusual about the tracks?”

“No,” he said.

“The sleen was lame,” I said.

“Interesting,” said Lord Nishida.