“Whatever master wishes,” she said.
“What have you been called that pleases you? I asked.
“If it pleases Master,” she said, “I should like to be called Vinca.” “You are Vinca,” I said.
“Thank you, Master,” she said.
I regarded Ilene.
“No!” she said. “Please do not take my name away!”
“You no longer have a name,” I told her.
She looked at me with horror, and fell to her knees piteously before me. “Please,” she begged. “Please, no!” She looked up at me. She then realized that she was nameless. Her entire body, fresh from its switching, shook with the horror of it. Her identity, her very sense of self, from her earliest understandings had been fused with that name, inseparable from it. Now it was gone. Who was she? What could she be? She looked up at me, piteously. A she-verr, a tarsk sow, a tabuk doe had no more nor less name then she. The collared female animal, nameless, knelt at the feet of its owner.
“I will give you a name,” I told her. “It will be more convenient.” There were tears in her eyes.
“I will call you Ilene,” I said.
“Thank you, Master,” she whispered.
“There is a difference, of course,” I told her, “in the name Ilene you once wore, and in the name Ilene you now wear.” She nodded, miserably. Her old name, her old identity, had been taken from her forever. Her new name, though in sound the same, was not her old. Between them there was a difference of worlds, a gulf wider than that dividing planets. Her old name had been hers as a free person, publicly registered, legally certified, historically identified with her throughout her life, until her capture by slavers. It had been a proud, intimate possession, giving her pleasure and dignity. It had ennobled her. It had served, with other properties, to distinguish her as a precious person, a unique individual, among all others on the planet Earth. When asked who she was, it was with that name that she would answer. That was who she was. Then the name had been taken from her. She was then only an animal in bondage. In Gorean courts her testimony would normally be exacted only under torture. In such courts she could not, legally, be named, but would rather be described as, say, Ilene, the slave of Hesius of Laura, or Ilene, the slave of Bosk of Port Kar. Her name might be changed, or altered, as often as a master wished. Indeed, he need not even give her a name. Changing a girl’s name, or taking it away, are common modes of Gorean slave discipline. So I would call her Ilene.
But this was not her old name, though in sound it was the same. This was now a Gorean slave name. It carried no dignity nor civil significance. It might be changed; it might be wore that name now, and she knew it, only by the whim of her master. That was the name to which he had decided she would answer. Thus, simply, but his will, it was her name. The first name, Ilene, had been a proud Earth name; the second name, Ilene, was only a Gorean slave name. It was the second name to which she would answer; it was the second name which she would now wear; it was the second name which was now, by my will, hers.
“You are Ilene,” I told her.
“Yes, Master,” she said. Then she put down her head and wept.
I turned to Vinca. “Have the slaves prepare to lift their burdens,” I told her. There was much work to be done today.
“Coffle!” cried Vinca, striking two of the girls. Swiftly they lined up beside their burdens. “Posture!” cried Vinca. “Stand straight!” she struck another girl. “Straight!” cried Vinca. “Remember that you are beautiful slaves!” “We are not slaves!” cried one of the panther girls. “We are panther women!” I went to one of the boxes, that which contained uninscribed slave collars. As the girls stood straight in the coffle, looking directly ahead, fearing not to. I, from behind, one by one, moving their hair aside, snapped a slave collar on the throat of each.
I nodded to Vinca.
“Lift your burdens,” she called.
In tears the panther girls lifted their burdens. “Excellent”, called Vinca. “Remember now, you are graceful and beautiful slaves!” I strode from the clearing.
“March!” called Vinca. I heard the switch fall twice, and then heard, alternating with silence, the movement of the chain.
16 I Find Some Tunics of Tyros
Mira, who was the lieutenant of Hura, rolled to her side. She slept fitfully. The march of the men of Tyros had become a rout. Even before I had come upon the column in the morning, I had found abandoned baggage strewn along the trail. I had found also the chains and leg irons that had been fastened on the left ankles of the male prisoners. They had been struck off that the column might move with greater speed. That meant that the male slaves now were fastened in their coffle only by their neck chains. Too, of course, their hands were manacles behind their back.
It had been necessary to slow the column down, so I had done so.
Eight men of Tyros I felled near the front of the column.
There had been no flankers, no points set. The panther girls were apparently now terrified to leave the column. And the men of Tyros were unwilling to do so. I had heard fierce words being exchanged between them.
In my teeth I held two slender lengths of binding fiber. In my right hand I held a heavy wadding of fur. Looped loosely about my right wrist, so that it would fall when my hand was held downwards, was a thick, wide strip of panther skin, twisted in its center.
The arrows which had struck the men of Tyros had been those of panther girls, taken from their captures. The men of Tyros and the girls of Hura did not know the nature nor the number of their stalkers. The first man, felled at the conquest circle, had been felled with a pile arrow from the great bow. The others had fallen to the arrows of panther girls, of which I had acquired a great number.
Mira had first betrayed Verna. She had been betrayed Marlenus of Ar. Her treacheries were not yet completed.
I approached her with the stealth of a warrior. She lay in her own small shelter. Other girls lay about. I did not touch them in my passage. After I had felled the eight men at the beginning of the column I had withdrawn to the forest, where I slept for an Ahn. Then, refreshed, I had returned to the column. It had begun to move again. I felled men much as I pleased, in particular those who would dare to hold the whips to encourage the slaves in speed. Soon none would hold the whips.
The men of Ar, led by Marlenus, begin to sing in the coffle, a song of glorious Ar. They now marched, at their own pace, their heads high, with pride. Angry the men of Tyros demanded that they stop, but they did not do so. Even the panther girls in charge of the coffle of captive females struck them less now with the switch.
Vera now, in the coffle, walked well. Even though she wore slave silk, and lipstick and earrings, she walked well. There might not even have been slave bells on her ankle. I marveled at her. Her ears had been pierced. That is regarded, in Gorean eyes, as an almost ultimate degradation of a female. Yet her head was high, her gaze proud and fearless. The large, delicate golden rings in her ears were stunning. How beautiful a woman is in earrings! I could tell that she was no longer ashamed of them, but proud of them. Not only do earrings enhance a woman’s beauty, but they speak, openly to all, both men and women, regardless of social pressures and repercussions, of the pride and pleasure she takes in her womanhood. Verna was no longer a pretend man, or a pretend nothing. She was now full and perfect in what she was, in her own right, a human female, a woman. She walked well. She might have been a tatrix. Indeed, she was, though braceleted and collared, a tatrix of the forests.