“They make me wait,” said Cornhair, standing before the heavy, varnished, paneled double door leading to the audience chamber.
“Do not complain, do not be in a hurry,” said the slave with the switch, she in the lovely tunic. “Inside, you may be whipped.”
“What are they doing inside?” asked Cornhair.
“Business, discussion, a meeting, conferring,” said the slave. “Who knows what the Masters do. When they are finished with the work of men, that will be time for you.”
“What shall I do?” asked Cornhair.
“We are slaves,” she said. “We will kneel, and wait.”
Cornhair and the slave then went to their knees, to the side of the door.
Cornhair stood alone, small, forlorn, nude, collared, in the portal, at the end of the long carpet leading toward the thronelike chair at the far end of the audience chamber, the large, double doors now closed behind her.
“The slave,” said he whom, earlier, between the two outer gates, Cornhair had conjectured to be the enclave’s constable or bailiff. It was he who had put her in her new collar.
“Approach your Master,” said he whom we shall now refer to as the constable, “on all fours, naked and collared, as befits a woman once of the Calasalii, before one of the Farnichi.”
Cornhair went to all fours. She raised her head to look to the far end of the room. There, on a dais, was a large, thronelike chair. On this chair, though now in informal robes, simple house robes, not a uniform, was the officer she remembered from Tenrik’s market, he whose subordinate, on his behalf, had dealt with Tenrik. Flanking the thronelike chair were several men, some in uniform, some in house robes, as well. Of these men, some were to the right of the chair, others to the left of the chair, some on the dais, others on the floor. She was the only woman in the room.
“Head down,” said the constable.
So, head down, on all fours, Cornhair began the long journey down the long carpet to the foot of the dais.
The constable accompanied her.
“Stop,” he said.
Cornhair could see the first step of the dais before her, the robes and sandals of the constable to her left. She kept her head down.
“A bitch, once of the Calasalii, naked and collared, fittingly so, before her Masters, the Farnichi,” said the constable.
“Speak your former status, slave,” said the figure on the thronelike chair.
“I was once the Lady Publennia Calasalia, of the Larial Calasalii,” said Cornhair, “of the honestori, of the patricians, of the senatorial class.”
“How is that?” he asked.
“Master?” she said.
“You were not on the rolls of the Calasalii,” said the officer.
“I fear not,” said Cornhair.
“We utilized these rolls to prepare the Morning of the Great Apprehension, that morning on which, on three worlds, every identifiable, locatable scion of the Calasalii, male, female, and child, was taken into custody.”
“I was removed from the rolls,” she said, “for profligacy, for irresponsibility, for scandal, for bringing disgrace, discredit, on the family. I would no longer be recognized or received. I was allotted a pittance, and denied all contact with the family.”
“Unfortunately,” said the officer, “we did not seize you on the Morning of Apprehension, in the full glory of your freedom. It would have pleased us to strip and brand you, and then fasten your neck in its first collar.”
“I fear,” she said, “I was already marked and collared before what you call the Morning of Apprehension.”
“How came you to the collar?” he said.
“I was party to a political intrigue,” she said, “in which I thought myself, in judicious masquerade, to play the part of a slave girl, but I later discovered that the legalities inflicted on me were authentic, and I had been truly enslaved.”
“Where did this take place?”
“On Inez IV,” she said.
“Continue,” he said.
“I first discovered myself truly a slave,” she said, “on Tangara, when the plot of the intrigue was foiled. I was then marked. I was sold to Heruls, a dreadful, fearful form of life, who later sold me to a dealer from Venitzia, the provincial capital of Tangara. In Venitzia I was sold to an agent, or agents, of Bondage Flowers. I and others were shipped to Telnar. I subsequently found myself in various collars. Most recently, as Master is aware, I was purchased from the sales shelf of Tenrik’s Woman Market, in Telnar.”
“We will want a name for you,” he said. “What were you most recently called?”
“Cornhair, Master,” she said.
“It will do,” he said. “What is your name?”
“‘Cornhair’, Master,” she said.
“The highest women of the Calasalii,” he said, “are worthless tarts and belong in collars, at the feet of Masters. Their noblest and finest deserve no better than to be the degraded slaves of the Farnichi.”
“I fear, Master,” said Cornhair, “that I am not amongst their noblest and finest. Indeed, I have been removed from the rolls of the Calasalii.”
“But once?” he said.
“Yes,” she said, “once.”
“Do you know what this is?” he asked, lifting an object which had been reposing on the right arm of his chair.
“Yes, Master,” she said, “it is a slave switch.” Surely there was no mistaking the nature of the artifact. Any Telnarian would be familiar with such things. And surely she knew it well from her miserable days in the collar of the Lady Gia Alexia of the Telnar Darsai.
The officer then cast the switch to the side. “Fetch,” he said, “and bring it to me, in your teeth.”
Cornhair crawled to the artifact, put down her head, and picked up the object in her teeth. She held it crosswise between her teeth, evenly, and aesthetically, as is expected, when a slave is put to this simple task.
“See the Calasalii bitch,” laughed a man.
Cornhair, the switch between her teeth, crawled to the dais, and climbed upon it, and, when she was before her Master, at his knees, she lifted her head, proffering him the implement, which he took, and put across his knees.
“You may now beg to be beaten,” he said.
“I beg to be beaten,” she said, “Master.”
“Do you truly wish to be beaten?” he asked.
“No, no, Master!” she said. “Please do not beat me.”
Men about the thronelike chair laughed.
“But you are a slave,” said the officer.
“Even so, Master!” said Cornhair.
“Why do you wish not to be beaten?” he asked.
“Because it hurts,” she said. “Because it hurts, terribly, Master.”
“Back off the dais,” he said. “Go down, to the floor, some feet before the dais, where we can all see you, and well.”
Cornhair, shuddering, complied.
“On your belly,” he said.
Cornhair then lay prone before her Master.
“A fitting posture of a Calasalii woman before one of the Farnichi,” said a man.
“You are unclothed,” said the officer.
“I have not been given clothing, Master,” said Cornhair.
“On your back,” he said.
Cornhair could now see the vaulted ceiling above her. She felt very vulnerable, lying so.
“You, and you,” said the officer, addressing himself to two of the men in uniform. “Fetch each of you a slave whip, and position yourselves a few feet from the slave, one on each side.”
A minute or so later, perhaps following some sign given by the officer on the thronelike chair, which chair Cornhair could not see, both whips were suddenly unexpectedly, snapped.
Cornhair, startled, cried out in misery. She had not been touched.
“You do not wish to be beaten?” he said.
“No, Master!” said Cornhair.
“We shall see,” he said. “Are you willing to try not to be beaten, and try in the way of the slave?”