"You are a female," I said casually. "I do not accept your definition of man."
She made an angry noise.
"Argue," I suggested, "explain speak names."
She moaned.
"It is I said, "that when the full blood of a manis upon him, and he sees his female, and will have her, that it should be then that he is not a true man." She cried out in misery.
Then, as I had expected, she suddenly wept, and doubtless with great sincerity. I supposed at this time many men of Earth, properly conditioned, would have been shaken, and would have fallen promptly to this keen weapon, shamed, retreating stricken with guilt, with misgivings, as the female wished. But, smiling to myself, I knew that on this night her weeping, the little vixen, would gain her no respite. I smiled at her.
She looked at me, horrified, frightened, tears ire her eyes. "You are a pretty little slave," I said.
She struggled furiously, but could not escape.
When her struggles had subsided I began, half biting, half;t kissing, to move up her calf to the delights of the sensitive areas behind her knees. «Please» she wept.
"Be quiet, pretty little Slave Girl," I mumbled.
Then, kissing, but letting her feel the teeth which could, if I chose, tear at her flesh, I moved to the interior of her thigh. Slowly, with my mouth, by inches, I began to claim her. "Please," she said.
"What is wrong?" I asked.
"I find I want to yield to you," she whispered.
"Do not be frightened," I told her.
"No," she said. "You do not understand."
I was puzzled.
"I want to yield to you," she whispered, "as a slavegirl!" "You will so yield to me," I told her.
"No!" she cried. "No!"
"You will yield to me," I told her, "as a slave girl to her master." "No!" she cried. "No! No!"
I continued to kiss her, to touch her.
"Please stop," she wept.
"Why?" I asked.
"You are making me a slave," she whispered.
"I will not stop," I told her.
"Please," she wept. "Please!"
"Perhaps," I said to her, "the Goreans were right?" "No!" she cried. "No!"
"Perhaps that is what you desire," I said, "to yield with the utterness of a female slave."
"Never!" she cried, weeping in fury. "Leave me!"
"Not until you have become a slave," I told her.
She cried out in misery. "I do not want to be a slave!" But when I had touched the most intimate beauties of her she became uncontrollable, writhing, and in my arms I knew the feeling of a slave girl and such, for the moment, was the beautiful Elizabeth Cardwell, helpless and mine, female and slave.
Now her lips and arms and body, now those only of an enamoured wench in bondage, sought mine, acknowledging utterly and unreservedly, shamelessly and hopelessly, with helpless abandon, their master.
I was astonished at her for even the touch of the whip, her involuntary response to the Slaver's Caress, had not seemed to promise so much.
She cried out suddenly as she found herself fully mine. Then she scarcely dared to move.
"You are claimed, Slave Girl," I whispered to her. "I am not a slave girl," she whispered intensely. "I am not a slave girl."
I could feel her nails in my arm. In her kiss I tasted blood, suddenly realizing that she had bitten me. Her head was back, her eyes closed, her lips open.
"I am not a slave girl," she said.
I whispered in her ear, "Pretty little slave girl." "I am not a slave girl!" she cried.
"You will be soon," I told her.
"Please, Tarl," she said, "do not make me a slave." "You sense that it can be done?" I asked.
"Please," she said, "do not make me a slave."
"Do we not have a wager?" I asked.
She tried to laugh. "Let us forget the wager," said she. "Please, Tart, it was foolishness. Let us forget the wager?" "Do you acknowledge yourself my slave?" I inquired. "Never!" she hissed.
"Then," said I, "lovely wench, the wager is not yet done." She struggled to escape me, but could not. Then, suddenly, as though startled, she would not move.
She looked at me.
"It soon begins," I told her.
"I sense it," she said, "I sense it."
She did not move but I felt the cut of her nails in my arms.| "Can there be more?" she wept.
"It soon begins," I told her.
"I'm frightened," she wept.
"Do not be frightened," I told her.
"I feel owned," she whispered.
"You are," I said.
"No," she said. "No."
"Do not be frightened," I told her.
"You must let me go," she said.
"It soon begins," I told her.
"Please let me go," she whispered. "Please"
"On Gor," I said, "it is said that a woman who wears a collar can be only a woman."
She looked at me angrily.
"And you, lovely Elizabeth," said I, "wear a collar." She turned her head to one side, helpless, angry, tears in her eyes.~ She did not move, and then suddenly I felt the cut of herA nails deep in my arms, and though her lips were open, herr! teeth were clenched, her head was back, the eyes closed, her hair tangled under her and over her body, and then her eyes seemed surprised, startled, and her shoulders lifted a bit from r the rug, and she looked at me, and I could feel the beginning n her, the breathing of it and the blood of it, hers, in my own flesh swift and like fire in her beauty, mine, and knowing it was then the time, meeting her eyes fiercely, I said to her, with sudden contempt and savagery, following the common Gorean Rites of Submission, "Slave!" and she looked at me with horror and cried out «Nor» and half reared from the rug, wild, helpless, fierce as I intended, wanting to fight me, as I knew she would, wanting to slay me if it lay within her power, as I knew she would, and I permitted her to struggle and to bite and scratch and cry out and then I silenced her with the kiss of the master, and accepted the exquisite sur render which she had no choice but to give. "Slave," she wept, "slave, slave, slave I am a slave"
It was more than an Ahn later that she lay in my arms on the rug and looked up at me, tears in her eyes. "I know now," she said, "what it is to be the slave girl of a Master." I said nothing.
"Though I am slave," she said, "yet for the first tinge in my life I am free."
"For the first time in your life," I said, "you are a woman." "I love being a woman," she said. "I am happy I am a woman, Tarl Cabot, I am happy."
"Do not forget," I said, "you are only a slave."
She smiled and fingered her collar. "I am Tarl Cabot's girl," she said. j "My slave," I said.
"Yes," she said, "your slave."
I smiled.
"You will not beat me too often will you, Master?" she asked.
"We will see," I said.
"I will strive to please you," she said.
"I am pleased to hear it," I said.
She lay on her back, her eyes open, looking at the top of, the wagon, at the hangings, the shadows thrown on the scarlet hides by the light of the fire bowl.
"I am free," she said.
I looked at her.
She rolled over on her elbows. "It is strange," she said. "I am a slave girl. But I am free. I am free."
"I must sleep," I said, rolling over.
She kissed me on the shoulder. "Thank you," she said, "Tarl Cabot, for freeing me."
I rolled over and seized her by the shoulders and pressed her back to the rug and she looked up laughing.
"Enough of this nonsense about freedom," I said. "Do not forget that you are a slave." I took her nose ring between my thumb and forefinger.