"Do not put your clothing on, Lola," said the Lady Gina. "Go directly to your kennel. You will hear from me later."
"Yes, Mistress," said Lola. Then she looked at me. "I hate you, Slave!" she cried. "Slave!"
"Run, Lola," said the Lady Gina.
"Yes, Mistress," said Lola, and fled from the room.
"What a slut she is," said one of them, "to be excited by a mere male slave."
"Yes," said another.
"Let us retire to a more comfortable room," said the Lady Gina, "and discuss the slaves."
The Lady Gina then left the room, followed by most of the women slavers. One of them remained for a moment, looking at me. It was she who had most closely examined me, she who had worn, beneath her silken sleeve, the metal-studded, black-leather wristlet.
"Are you coming, Lady Tuna?" asked one of the women, pausing at the door.
"Yes," said the woman regarding me. Then she turned and, with the other woman, who waited for her, left the room.
7 I AM THROWN A WOMAN
I sat alone in my cell. I now sat on a heavy bench, some five feet in length, before a stout, rectangular table. These things had been put in the cell for me. I wore a light, repcloth slave tunic. On the floor, on straw, was a blanket which I had been given. Though the cell door was locked, I was not chained. On the table was a bowl of cheap wine, some wedges of yellow bread and a wooden bowl containing vegetables and chunks of meat.
Today I had been appraised.
I was still furious with the shame of it. I was not a woman! Then I smiled to myself. The thought had been almost Gorean. I reminded myself I was a man of Earth. How shameful, too, must be such an ordeal for a woman. How piteous it was that such fair beauties should be enslaved for the pleasures of masters.
I wished I owned one. Then, of course, I thrust the thought from my mind.
I chewed on a piece of meat and drank from the shallow, chipped bowl of clay which contained the wine.
My thoughts were mixed and troubled. Today I had been appraised. I was confident, now, that I would not be kept much longer in the pens. But I did not even know the location of the pens. I did not even know the city in which I was kept. Curiosity, I had been told, was not becoming in a slave. I smiled to myself. How faraway seemed Earth now with its pettiness and vanity. I was not even, for some reason, miserable that I had been brought to Gor. I did not understand, clearly, why this should be. Surely my condition was shameful, and I had much to fear. Surely, in many ways, it was a horrifying world to which I had been brought. I remembered the sleen. I had felt the whip. Yet I was not, truly, unhappy. Earth had been a country of pollutions and poisons. The very air men breathed there, the very food they ate, contained recognized, but, incredibly, not removed, toxic elements. It was impossible, really, to do anything about such things, I had gathered. What an incredible world Earth was. Could it not understand that the environmental criminal was far more dangerous than.the lonely madman or assassin, that his crime affected not isolated, tragic victims but communities, a planet, unborn generations. Was his profit so sacred, truly? Was it truly more precious than lives, and the future? The men of Earth congratulated themselves smugly on the power of their democracies, in which the people, purportedly, ruled. But if the people, truly, ruled, why and how could their planet's processes proceed in such obvious ways inimical to their welfare? How could their world be so miserable for the people if they were truly kings within it? But perhaps they were not kings within it. Perhaps they have only been told they are kings, and.that satisfies them. Who, I wondered, were the true kings? Or, perhaps there were no kings, truly, only the madness of the untended machine.
I rose from the bench and walked about the cell. I felt one of the damp walls. I was grateful for the blanket I now had. I went and felt the heavy bars, with the lateral crosspieces, which formed one side of the cell. I gripped them. I was well confined within. I went back to the table. I was a prisoner and a slave. I even wore a steel collar. Yet I was not overly discontent. I was eager to sae this world to which I, a man of Earth, had been brought as a mere slave. It was my hope that if I obeyed my masters or mistresses, and well pleased them; I might be permitted to live.
Why was I not more miserable than I was that I had been brought to Gor? I pondered this. Because of the diet and exercise, enforced on me in the pens, I was now healthier and stronger than I had ever been. Perhaps this had something to do with my feelings. Such homely simplicities as diet, rest and exercise can often work wonders for one's outlook. Too, I was looking forward to the adventures of a new world, even though it might be one in which I was only a slave. I laughed. Perhaps the matter was so simple as even the water and air of Gor, so fresh and pure, so stimulating, compared to that of Earth, even in the depths of the pens.
I rose from the bench again and gripped one of its legs in my fist. I lifted it from the floor by one of the legs, lifting it slowly, directly upward, until I held it at an arm's length. I could never have done this on Earth. This was not merely a function of the reduced gravity of the planet but of newly acquired strength. "A Mistress may wish to know that she is in your arms," the Lady Gina had told me. I laughed, and lowered the bench slowly to the stones.
I sat down again on the bench and fed myself another piece of meat.
I looked about the cell. The greatest reason I was not more discontent than I was, I think, was simply that I had come to a world such as Gor. I remembered Earth, with its pettiness, its greed and vanity, its smugness, its pretensions, its pollutions and poisons, its teeming, crowded, miserable populations, and its endemic fears, fears such as that of not having enough energy to spin the wheels of an exorbitant and largely unnecessary technology, and the fear, fully warranted, of the falling of the sword of a nuclear Damocles. Earth seemed a world of sicknesses and traps, a world which seemed contrived as an offense against nature, a world in which the very sir itself, by the works of men, was laden with deleterious gases. How little surprising, then, that I should not have found myself overly discontent with the felicitous discovery that I had now been introduced into a quite different milieu. I sensed that in Gor there was a youth and an openness which had long been missing from my old world. In Gor I sensed an ambition, a freshness and hope, a sparkle, that had perhaps not been felt on Earth since the Parthenon was new. Doubtless there is much on Gor to be deplored, but I cannot bring myself to deplore it. Doubtless Gor is impatient, cruel and heartless, but yet, I think, too, it is innocent. It is like the lion, impatient, cruel, heartless, and innocent. It is its nature. Gor was a strong-thewed world, a new world, a world in which men might again lift their heads to the sun and laugh, a world in which they might again, sensibly, begin long journeys. It was a world of which Homer might have sung, singing of the clashing of the metals of men and the sweetness of the wine-dark sea.
I thought of the gray, blackened landscapes of Earth. How sad it is when a world grows old, resigned and vile.