"In whose name do you ask this?" I asked.
"In the name of all women such as I, and all men such as you," she said. "You are but a hair's breadth from slavery," I said.
"It is my hope that you will eventually permit me to traverse that hair's breath," she said.
The tarn opened and closed its wings, and she lowered her head, turning it to the side, and shrank down, frightened, cringing, so low that her head was but inches from the ground. She was terrified of the bird.
I considered the mounting ladder.
"Take me with you," she begged, lifting her head.
I saw the desperation in her.
"I want to be myself," she said, "what I really am!"
"Do you know what you are asking?" I asked.
She shuddered.
"Where I am going," I said, "men do not compromise with females." She looked up at me, trembling.
"And clad as you are," I said, "I assure you men will see you as a female." "It is what I am," she said.
"Do you understand the nature of such men?" I asked.
"I do not desire a relationship with any other sort of man, she said. "Such men prefer slaves," I said.
"I will serve them as such!" she said.
The tarn moved again, shifting about, and she cried out, frightened, again shrinking small.
How terrified she was of the tarn!
She was very beautiful, so slim and piteous, kneeling on the heavy beams of the platform.
"No slave need I now," I said.
"Take me then now only as your servant, she said.
"My full servant?" I smiled.
"Yes," she said. "Then afterwards do with me what you will."
"You tempt me," I said. "You are a beautiful female, one worthy to be sold from a slave block."
"Let me buy my servitude," she said.
"I hesitate to carry a free woman into danger," I said.
"You would surely hesitate less," she said, "if I were a captive, or servant." "True," I said. "Them," said she, lifting the coins, "let me buy my captivity, and servitude."
I took the coins from her, and out them in my pouch. "Stand," I said. "Put your head back. Open your mouth, widely."
I determined in a moment or two that she was not concealing any small coins or tiny jewels in her nostrils, her ears, her hair or mouth. I then conducted her by the arm to the side of the threshold of the tarn gate and stood her there, her feet well back, her arms extended, the palms of her hands leaning against the wood. There was nothing concealed beneath her arms, as was easy to determine, she in this position. I lifted her feet one at a time, checking the insteps and between the toes for any taped materials. I then examined the rest of her body. "Oh!" she said. "Oh!" I then pulled the cloth up again, snugly, as it had been. I then pulled her back from the side of the gate, standing her again on her feet.
She looked up at me, reproachfully.
"it would appear that you are coinless," I said.
"I am," she said.
"Put out your hands," I said.
She did so, and cried out, suddenly, startled, as slave bracelets danced upon her wrists.
She lifted her wrists before her, as if not understanding how they could be so suddenly clasped in steel.
"You are now my captive," I told her, "and I am going to keep you, for a time, though for perhaps no more than a few Ehn, as merely my servant, though a full servant. At the end of that time, however long I choose for it to be, I will do with you as I wish, perhaps making you a slave, perhaps giving you to another, perhaps selling you into slavery, whatever I please."
She looked at me, frightened.
"Do you understand?" I asked.
"Yes," she said.
I then thrust her, not gently, toward the tarn, until she stood near the foot of the mounting ladder, it dangling from the saddle.
There, in the proximity of the winged giant, she trembled.
"Hold still," I said. I then, with a piece of scarflike cloth taken from my pouch, a wind veil, sometimes bound across the mouth and nostrils of a tarnsman, usually at high altitudes, blindfolded her. A great many women, particularly the most sensitive and intelligent among them, fear tarns greatly. It is not unusual for them to become hysterical in their vicinity. It is not uncommon then for the tarnsman to hood or blindfold them. This aids in their control and management. Too, of course, if the woman is a captive, or slave, one may not wish her to understand where she is, or be able to retrace her route, or know where she is being taken. It is enough for her to know, when the blindfold or hood is removed, that she is in perfect custody. Sometimes a woman does not learn for weeks, sometimes until, say, the very night of her sale, where she is, in what city she finds herself.
"I can't see!" she said.
"That is the purpose of a blindfold," I said.
"You could punish me, couldn't you?" she said.
"Yes," I said.
"And you would, wouldn't you?" she said.
"Yes," I said.
I then put her on my shoulder, her head to the rear, as a slave is carried, and mounted the ladder. I put her before me on the saddle. She grasped the pommel desperately. At the sides of the saddle there are various rings, and straps, which may be used in fastening things to it, or across it. Needless to say, such may be used to fasten females in place. Lady Phoebe of Telnus was, of course, a free woman, and though she was a capture, in a sense, she had a special status with me. I did not, thus, throw her across the saddle, on her belly, or back, fastening her there in utter helplessness as I might have a common capture. I did, however, loop a left strap about her right wrist, and tie it back to its ring, and loop a right strap on her right wrist, tying it back to its ring. In this way, as she wore slave bracelets, although she might slip, she could not fall, and her hands would be kept in the vicinity of the pommel. I then put the safety strap about myself, and buckled it shut.
Once before, long ago, in the vicinity of the city of Ar, I had been lax in doing that. It had been fortunate that I had survived. It was a precaution which, if time permitted, I had seldom neglected thereafter. I thought of lithe, sinuous, olive-skinned Talena, the daughter of Marlenus of Ar until disowned, she having given evidence that she was a slave. After she had been returned to Ar by Samos, of Port Kar, into whose chains she had fallen, Marlenus, shamed, had had her sequestered, in the Central Cylinder. Now, in his absence, he having vanished in the Voltai Mountains, on a punitive raid against the tarnsmen of Treve, it seemed her fortunes were recovering. She had appeared at public functions. Her palanquin was now again seen abroad in the streets. Doubtless she was once again becoming proud and haughty. I had not seen the slave in her. On the other hand, Rask of Treve, and others, had. I, too, now, I suspected, might be more perceptive. Though she had been the daughter of a Ubar, and now, again, it seemed, stood high in Ar, she was, after all, only a female. I wondered what she might look like, naked and in chains, or writhing at my feet, trying to interest me.
"Oh!" said Lady Phoebe, softly.
"You are slim," I said, "but you are well curved."
"Thank you," she said.
"It is pleasant to caress you," I said.
She was silent.
"Do you object?" I asked.
"No," she said.
"Why not?" I asked.
"I am a full servant," she said.
Her body was unusually sensitive for that of a free woman. It was not slave, of course, but then she was not a slave. Such transformation in her, of course, might easily come with the collar, and discipline.
I again, briefly, considered the proud, haughty Talena, who had been the daughter of a Ubar, and who now, again, it seemed, stood high in Ar. Yes, she would, I thought, considering the matter carefully, look well in chains, or writhing at my feet, trying to interest me. Too, I recalled she had been contemptuous of me, and haughty and cruel to me, in Port Kar, scorning even the memory of my love, when I had been paralyzed, helpless to move from a chair, the victim of the poison of Sullius Maximus, once one of the five Ubars of Port Kar, before the Sovereignty of the Council of Captains. I wondered if she thought that I was still in Port Kar, perhaps huddled before a fire in that same chair, an invalid, its prisoner. But I had recovered, fully, receiving even the antidote for the poison of Torvaldsland. I suspected, however, she might have seen me from her palanquin in Ar. The following night an attempt had been made on my life in the Tunnels, one of the slave brothels of Ludmilla, from which the street called the Alley of the Slave Brothels of Ludmilla is named. Too, I had seen evidence near Brundisium that she was guilty of treason against Ar.