"Do you think it would be wise to attempt to escape from a Gorean master?" he asked.
"No, Master," I said, frightened.
"And do you think it would be wise to attempt to escape from Teibar of Ar?" "No, Master," I said.
"Lie down, here," he said.
"There?" I asked. "Beside you?"
"Yes," he said. "Why?"
"I thought you might chain me at your feet, sleeping me there, like a sleen," I said.
"Perhaps later," he said.
I snuggled up, against him. how huge and mighty seemed his body, that of this magnificent, primitive male, on this barbaric, beautiful world, and how small and soft I seemed next to it.
"Master," I said.
"Yes," he said.
"You told me earlier, at the fire, that «he» was not coming," I said. "This relieved my anxieties. It assuaged my fear. I relaxed. I even bent forward." "Yes," he said.
"You used me to lure the beast in, to the attack," I said. "You tricked me. You used me without my knowledge. You used me without taking me into your confidence. You used me as a slave!"
"Yes," he said.
But, of course, I thought to myself, he had used me as a slave. I was a slave! "Master," I said.
"Yes," I said.
"Tela would seek out Aulus, overseer of the work camp of Ionicus, near Venna. She is his love slave. Do you think she found him?"
"it is possible," he said. "I do not know."
"But Ionicus owns her," I said.
"If the fellow Aulus is the overseer," said my master, "he is doubtless empowered to buy and sell slaves from the chain. Thus, if he wants her, it would not be difficult for him to purchase her. Probably no more would be required than the transfer of a sum between accounts.
"But what if she did not come into his power?" I asked.
"Then," he said," she had presumably been transported elsewhere, carried away in the chains of another, to a different fate, presumably never to see him again. She is, after all, only a slave."
"Yes, Master," I said. I was frightened. How much we were at the mercy of our masters! We were only slaves!
"Master," I said.
"Yes," he said.
"I am your slave," I said. "I am owned by you. You have total power over me." "Yes?" he said.
"Will you be gentle with me, and kind with me?" I asked.
"You are a slave," he said. "You will be treated precisely as it pleases me to treat you."
"Am I to be permitted clothing?" I asked.
"Only if it pleases me," he said.
"Am I to be often whipped?" I asked.
"When may a slave be whipped?" he asked.
"Whenever a master pleases," I said.
"That, then, he said, "is when you will be whipped, whenever a master pleases." "Yes, Master," I said. "Forgive me, Master."
"You are a cuddly slut," he said.
"Thank you, Master," I said.
"You are very female," he said.
"Thank you, Master," I said.
"Are there many women like you on Earth?" he asked.
"I suppose so, Master," I said. "I do not know."
"It is incredible that there should be any," he said, "given the depth and extensiveness of the masculinist conditioning programs to which they are subjected, the values they are trained to accept, the seeking of which is reinforced, the models they are encouraged to emulate, the images which are held forth for them to fulfill, the manifold enticements and rewards offered for male surrogation, the contempt in which love and service, and biological womanhood, are held. It is as though all the forces of communication, education and law had gone insane, with no better objective than to bring the sexes to ruin, destroy the human gene pool and doom the species.
"Only there, Master," I said. "Not here."
"How is it that a woman like you should have come from such a place?" he asked. "I am sure there are thousands, perhaps millions, like me," I said. I think it must be the case that all women, at lest when they are alone, know the truth, if only in their bellies.
"Perhaps," he said.
"You have done slaving on Earth," I said. "Apparently you find us not unattractive."
"True," he said.
"Once collared, do we not prove satisfactory?" I asked.
"You would be well whipped, did you not?" he said.
"Even so?" I said.
"Yes," he said. "It is true."
"Freed, we will destroy you, and then ourselves," I said. "Kept in collars, we will worship you, and serve you well."
"Perhaps I will have you write your story, in English," he said.
"But who could read it, here?" I asked.
"I have been to Earth," he said. "I have seen works there, dealing with my world."
I looked at him, startled.
"Yes," he said.
"But how could they know?" I asked. "How could such things get to Earth?" "I am not sure," he said. "I think perhaps they are put on the platforms outside the palisade of the Sardar Mountains, for Priest-Kings. Then perhaps the Priest-Kings see that they reach Earth."
"I do not think there are such things as Priest-Kings," I said. "Some people," he said, "do not believe the beasts exist."
"Do such exist on Earth?" I asked.
"I think some," he said, "probably exiles, and the offspring of exiles, marooned criminals, beached on a foreign world, degenerate scions of the People, and such."
"Where?" I asked.
"In lonely areas," he said, "the mountains of Asia, the forests of the Pacific Northwest, and such."
"If such works exist," I said, "then some women must know that there is such a world as Gor."
"Or that there might be such a world," he said. "Did you know if it?" "No!" I said. "Do they know that such slaving occurs?"
"Some, perhaps," he said. "On the other hand, such books are generally regarded as fiction. It is better that way, don" t you think?"
"I don" t know," I said, frightened. I touched my right hand to my breasts, so soft, and my left hand to my collar. I was now a Gorean slave. Would it have been better on Earth if I had known such things were possible, or had it been better if, as in my case, I had not even suspected their possibility? I did not know. But, in any event, I was now here, and in a collar.
"We will leave in the morning," he said.
I wondered what sort of man he was, this magnificent, formidable brute to whom I now belonged.
He had not even given me clothing!
"Master keeps his girl naked," I pouted.
"Sometimes a bit of clothing looks well on a female," he said, "if it is sufficiently revealing, and can be swiftly removed, or torn away."
"Master?" I asked.
"For example," he said, "some of the lingerie, as you call it, with which you Earth females delight to secretly bedeck yourselves, concealing it beneath the camouflage of your prescribed habiliments."
"I am no longer an Earth female," I said, kissing him.
"Such garments," he said, "though perhaps too indecent for the streets or market place a Gorean master might require of his slave in the privacy of his own quarters."
"Yes, Master," I said.
"a€”if permitted her clothing, at all," he added.
"You took away my slave strip, and my belt of rolled cloth," I said. "They were almost nothing, but they were all I had to cover myself." "That was in accord with my decision," he said, "that for the time being, at least, you will be kept naked."
"I shall be proud to walk naked behind you, on the road," I said.
"My pack is not heavy," he said.
"I shall carry it?" I asked.
"Yes," he said. "Of course."
"May I ask where we are going?" I asked.
"I am going to my small villa, deserted now, in the hills of northeast Ar," he said. "You will simply follow, as my draft animal."
"Does master have other slaves?" I asked, apprehensively.