"You have told me," she said, "that I might, upon occasion, beg to be used."
"It is my intention to use you again," I said. "You need not beg."
"But may I not beg, if I wish?" she asked.
"Of course," I smiled.
"I beg to be used, Master," she whispered.
"You are an incredibly beautiful and desirable woman," I said. "How miserable it would be for men if you were not a slave."
"But I am a slave," she laughed. "And men may buy me, and do what they want with me."
I kissed her.
"Will you not accede to the plea of your aroused slave, Master?" she asked.
"Perhaps," I said.
"I must now be silent on the matter and await your decision," she said.
"That would be wise," I said.
"You could beat me, if you wished, couldn't you?" she asked.
"Of course," I told her.
"I desire you," she whispered.
"We shall see," I said.
"Oh," she laughed. Then she said, "It is well that I spoke the truth." She kissed me. "Do you customarily subject your girls to such an examination?" she asked.
"When it pleases me," I said.
"Of course, Master," she said. "We are slaves."
I again placed my hand upon her, and she put her head back. "You see that I did not lie, Master," she said.
"Yes," I said. I felt her small body move beneath my hand. She lifted her body, piteously. "Am I not ready for my master?" she asked.
"Yes, Slave," I said. "You are well ready."
"Ready as is an Earth woman for the penetration of an equal?" she asked.
"No," I said, "ready as is a Gorean slave girl, begging for the least touch of her master."
"It is true, Master," she said. "No longer am I an Earth woman. I am now only a Gorean slave girl, nothing more."
"Are you loving and obedient, Slave?" I asked.
"Yes, Master," she said.
I kissed her.
"If I dared," she said, "I would again beg to be taken."
"You may beg," I told her.
"Please take me, Master," she begged. "Please take me, Master."
"What a slave you are," I said.
"Yes, Master," she said.
"How do you wish to be treated?" I asked.
She pressed herself against me, kissing, half sobbing. "Treat me as the amorous, worthless slave I am," she said.
"You are not worthless," I said. "You have a market value, Indeed, it has been improved this night."
"But I am a total slave," she said.
"That is true," I said, "and a squirming, aroused, amorous one."
"Yes, Master," she said.
I held her head in my hands. I kissed her about the throat.
"Please take me, Master," she begged.
"With mercy?" I asked her.
"No," she whispered, "without mercy."
"How incredible was that experience," she said.
"There are many ways to take a woman," I told her, "even many ways to take her without mercy."
"Perhaps it is only the free who permit themselves to be imprisoned by routine," she said.
"Perhaps," I said. "I would not know." I kissed her, gently. "Sleep now," I said. "It is nearly light."
"Yes, Master," she said.
"It is light, Master," she said, softly.
I awakened. I rolled over and lifted myself on one elbow. I regarded her in the glistening, moist jungle dawn. She was lying beside me, the tether on her throat, her hands tied behind her back.
"We must soon be on our way," I said.
"Yes, Master," she said. I saw that she was very beautiful. Yesterday she had been a woman who had been enslaved. This morning she was a slave.
"Master?" she asked.
I took her ankles and threw them apart.
"Yes, my master," she whispered.
Later I stood over her, and looked down upon her. She looked up at me. "I love you, Master," she said.
"You will doubtless be bought and sold many times, Slave," I said, "and will have many masters."
"I will try to love my masters," she said.
"That would be wise on your part," I told her.
"Yes, Master," she smiled. I looked down upon her. Perhaps someday she would find her love master, he to whom she would be the perfect love slave. Sometimes such individuals know one another immediately, sometimes not. Sometimes a man simply sees a naked woman in her chains upon the block and knows suddenly that she is the perfect one, she who is destined to be the perfect love slave for whom he ha. always sought. Sometimes a girl, kneeling before a new master, is seized by a sudden wild emotion. Perhaps it is something in the way his steel is locked upon her body; perhaps it is something in the audacity and assurance with which he handles her. She lifts her head, meeting his eyes. Quickly she puts her head down, trembling. She knows then she has met one who may well be her love master, one to whom she can be but the most helpless of love slaves. I looked down at the girl, lying at my feet. Perhaps someday, I mused, she would find her perfect love master, he to whom she would be the perfect love slave. Until then let her be bought and sold, and passed from hand to hand, subject to exchanges, and vendings and barterings; let her know the joys and miseries of diverse bondages; it did not matter, for she was only a slave.
I kicked her with the side of my foot. "On your feet," I told her.
"Yes, Master," she said.
I let her stand there, tethered and bound, and naked, while I ate some of the roast tarsk. I brushed black ants from it. I then removed the one end of the tether from the slave stake and drew her to the tarsk. "Kneel and feed," I told her. She knelt and, putting down her head, bit at the tarsk. After a time I pulled her away from it and, again using the tether as a leash, led her to a fan palm. I tied the tether to the fan palm. "Drink," I told her. "Yes, Master," she said. While she quenched her thirst, and then knelt beside the fan palm, I destroyed the signs of our encampment. I even, slowly, painfully, drew up the slave stake and discarded it in some growth. It need not reveal that a slave, or slaves, had been tethered here. I then tied the pieces of roast tarsk together, in a heavy ring of meat. Then, fetching the lovely slave, my pretty beast of burden, I stood her in the clearing. I untied her hands and removed the tether from her throat. I threw her the bit of bark cloth for her hips. "Dress," I told her. "Yes, Master," she smiled. She wound the bit of cloth about her hips, and tucked it in. She then thrust it down further, well over her hips, that the loveliness of the slave belly be well revealed.
"Do I meet with the approval of my master?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
She posed before me, smiling. "The morning garb," she said, "of the well dressed slave girl."
"Often," said I, "slave girls are kept naked, save for their collar and brand."
"Ah," she said, "and I do not even have a collar. How deprived I am! But I am wearing my brand."
"You cannot take it off," I said.
"That is true," she smiled.
"It marks you well," I said.
She drew up the bark skirt. "Yes," she said, "it does."
"How did you get it?" I asked.
"Some cruel brute burned it into my flesh with a hot iron," she said.
"I recall," I said.
"I love my brand," she said.
"Most girls do," I said.
"It makes me prettier, doesn't it, as well as marking me as what I am, a slave?"
"Yes," I said, "a brand makes a woman a thousand times more beautiful. It is not just the aesthetic loveliness of the mark, of course, though that in itself incredibly enhances a woman's beauty; it is, of course, even more, its meaning."
"I understand, Master," she said.
"What is its meaning?" I asked.
"It means that I am a slave," she said.
"Yes," I said. "one of the most helpless, beautiful, exciting and desirable of women, she who is owned, she who is at the complete mercy of the master, she who must well serve and obey in all things."