"What is her value?" demanded Melina.
"I could get for her, at best," he conjectured, "only a handful of copper tarsks."
I knew that I was a beautiful slave. What I had not realized was that slave beauty was so plentiful on Gor. Beautiful slaves are not unusual on this world. Beauty in collars was cheap on Gor. Girls more beautiful than I often slaved in the kitchens of great houses or, in state tunics and chains, scrubbed the floors of public buildings at night.
Melina was not pleased.
"Do you not want her?" she asked.
He caressed my flanks, and I held the post. "She is not without interest," he said.
Suddenly, without warning, he touched me, and I cried out, my body thrusting against the post, my hands clutching it, my eyes closed. I could not help myself.
"Ah," he said.
I opened my eyes, startled.
"She is a hot slave," he said. "That is good. That is very good."
"How hot is she?" asked Melina.
Again he touched me, and I cried out, miserable, bound. I could not help myself.
He laughed. "Very hot," he said. He laughed. Then he said, "Steady, little vulo."
"Please, Master, don't!" I begged.
Then I cried out, and began to writhe at the post. My fingernails tore at the wood. "Stop!" I wept. "Please, stop Master!"
He withdrew his hands and I shuddered against the post, fearing only that he might again so touch me.
He stood up.
"How hot is she?" asked Melina.
"She is hot enough to be a paga slut," he said.
"Excellent!" said Melina.
"Yet," said he, "still I think I could get only tarsks for her."
"Why is that?" inquired Melina.
"The wars," he said, "the raids, the falls of cities. There are many beauties, many of them even formerly free, who find themselves upon the block these days, being sold for. a pittance of tarsks."
"But are they as hot as this one?" demanded Melina.
"Yes, many of them," he said. "Brand a girl, put her in chains, give her a bit of training, and in a week she is panting, hot and ready for a master."
"So soon?" asked Melina.
"Yes," he said, "take a woman, any woman, not just these Earth girls, who are slave meat, but any woman, even one who is Gorean, and free, and of high caste, even one who is an iceberg, lock a collar on her, which she cannot remove; teach her she is a slave; and she will turn to fire."
Melina laughed. I reddened, bound at the post. How grievously had the women of Earth been slandered! Did they not know I was a woman of Earth? Of course they knew! How casually, how unthinkably, they spoke in the presence of a slave I But I wondered if it were true. If it were true, in Gorean law, it could be no slander.
"Lock a collar on her," said the man, putting his hands about my neck, as though they were a collar. I tensed, my throat collared in his hands. I knew he could crush my throat easily with his Gorean strength, did he choose. I felt very helpless. He removed his hands from my neck and put them in my hair. He tightened his hands, and pulled my head back. "Teach her she is a slave," he said. I cried out as he tightened his hands further in my hair, and pulled my head back further. He caused me only enough pain to let me know what he could do to me if he chose. Involuntarily I shuddered, acknowledging him as male and master. He removed his hands from my hair. I tensed at the post. I felt his hands at my flanks. "And," he said, chuckling, "she will turn to fire." He touched me, and I cried out, tears in my eyes, biting at the wood with my teeth.
"Hot enough to be a paga slut," said Melina.
"Yes," he agreed.
The women of Earth had been pronounced slave meat. I wept. If this were true, it was, in Gorean law, no slander.
I hoped that he would not touch me again.
The women of Earth are slave meat, I thought. I am a woman of Earth. I clung to the post, slave meat.
"Pretty slave meat," he said, gently touching my flanks.
I wondered if all the women of Earth were slave meat. I knew only that I, undeniably, was such. Perhaps others were not. Let other girls, in their secret heart, ask themselves that question. They need tell no one the answer to that most private and revealing of questions, unless perhaps they meet one before whom they can speak only the truth, their master. Perhaps the matter is hormonal. Perhaps there are hormones which fit a girl for slavery, as there are hormones which fit a man for mastery. I do not know.
Only on Gor had I felt my true femaleness, and that in the presence of Gorean males, who owned or could own me, men capable of owning a woman, as most men of Earth simply are not. My femaleness had been suppressed on Earth, first by my own conditioning, the confused product of centuries of intellectual and social pathology, and, secondly, by the set of societal institutions in which I had grown up and existed, rather than lived, institutions to which sexuality was irrelevant, if not inimical. It is difficult to know what would constitute a good society. Perhaps it would be a necessary condition for such a society that its institutions would be compatible, at least, with the truths of biology. A society which sickens and weakens its members, which cripples them and denies them to themselves, is not obviously superior to a society in which human beings are organic and whole, healthy, and happy and great. The test of a society is perhaps not its conformance or nonconformance to principles but the nature and human prosperity of its members. Let each look about himself and judge for himself the success of his own society. Man lives confused in the ruins of ideologies. Perhaps he will someday emerge from the caves and pens of his past. That would be a beautiful day to see. There would be a sunlit world waiting for him.
There is perhaps little to be said for the Gorean world, but in it men and women are alive.
It is a world which I would not willingly surrender.
It is a very different world from mine; in its way, I suppose it is worse; in its way, I know it is better.
It is its own place, not another's. It is honest and real. In it there is good air.
"Who is your master, little vulo?" asked Tup Ladletender of me.
"My master is Thurnus," I said, "caste leader in Tabuk's Ford, of the caste of peasants, one who makes fields fruitful and is, too, a trainer of sleen." I was proud of Thurnus, who owned me. A peasant who is actively engaged in agricultural pursuits is spoken of as one who makes fields fruitful. Sometimes this expression is applied, too, to peasants who are not actively engaged in such pursuits, as an honorific appelation. Whereas caste membership is commonly connected with the practice of an occupation, such as agriculture, or commerce, or war, there can be, of course, caste members who are not engaged in caste work and individuals who do certain forms of work who are not members of that caste commonly associated with such work. Caste, commonly, though not invariably, is a matter of birth. One may, too, be received into a caste by investment. Normally mating takes place among caste members, but if the mating is of mixed caste, the woman may elect to retain caste, which is commonly done, or be received into the caste 'of the male companion. Caste membership of the children born of such a union is a function of the caste of the father. Similar considerations, in certain cities, hold of citizenship. Caste is important to Goreans in a way that is difficult for members of a non-caste society to understand. Though there are doubtless difficulties involved with caste structure the caste situation lends an individual identity and pride, allies him with thousands of caste brothers, and provides him with various opportunities and services. Recreation on Gor is often associated with caste, and tournaments and entertainments. Similarly, most public charity on Gor is administered through caste structure. The caste system is not inflexible and there are opportunities for altering caste, but men seldom avail themselves of them; they take great pride in their castes, often comparing others' castes unfavorably to their own; a Gorean's caste, by the time he reaches adulthood, seems to have become a part of his very blood and being; the average Gorean would no more think of altering caste than the average man of Earth would of altering his citizenship, from, say, American to Russian, or French to Chinese. The caste structure, in spite of its many. defects, doubtless contributes to the stability of Gorean society, a society in which the individual has a place, in which his work is respected, and in which he can plan intelligently with respect to the future. The clan structures are kinship groups. They function, on the whole, given mating practices, within the caste structure, but they are not identical to it. For example, in a given clan there may be, though often are not, individuals of different castes. Many Goreans think of the clan as a kinship group within a caste. For most practical purposes they are correct. At least it seldom does much harm to regard the matter in this way. Clans, because of practical limitations on mobility, are usually associated, substantially, with a given city; the caste, on the other hand, is transmunicipal or intermunicipal. These remarks would not be complete without mentioning Home Stones. Perhaps the most significant difference between the man of Earth and the Gorean is that the Gorean has a Home Stone, and the man of Earth does not. It is difficult to make clear to a non-Gorean the significance of the Home Stone, for the non-Gorean has never had a Home Stone, and thus cannot understand its meaning, its reality. I think that I shall not try to make clear what is the significance to a Gorean of the Home Stone. It would be difficult to put into words; indeed, it is perhaps impossible to put into words; I shall not try. I think this is one of the saddest things about the men of Earth, that they have no Home Stone.