15 Rogue of GorRogue of Gor
John Norman
Chronicles of Counter-Earth Volume 15
1      I Seek the Whereabouts of a Slave; I Spend an Evening in the Belled 
Collar
I slipped behind the girl and suddenly seized her, holding my hand tightly over 
her mouth. the trash she carried spilled. I dragged her backwards. She 
struggled. She made muffled noises. I threw her down, behind the row of trash 
containers behind the house of Oneander in Ar. My hand was at her throat, 
thrusting the light steel collar she wore up under her chin. Make no sound, I 
warned her. She was blond. She wore the brief, sleeveless white tunic of a house 
slave. She was barefoot. I recognized her. She was the woman, once free, who had 
been last on the coffle of Oneander long ago in Ar, the same coffle in which 
Miss Henderson had been secured. Rape me quickly, she said. I must soon be 
back.
Where is Oneander? I asked, my eyes hard. I had had little fortune with the 
guards at the gate to his holding. I knew little more than that he was not now 
in the city.
Gone, she said. To the north, business. Where? I asked. Where? My hand 
tightened on her throat. I do not know Master, she whispered. I do not know! 
I am only a slave! Is the slave, Veminia, in the house? I asked.
end of page 9 (This is how this edition numbers-starting with page 9)
The barbarian, the small dark-haired one, she brought from Vonda, she sold out 
of the house of Andronicus?
It is you! she said suddenly, recognizing me. The slave in the street! I am 
now fee, I said. Where is she? My grip tightened. Speak!
She was taken north, she with ten others, by Oneander, she whispered. Where? 
I demanded. I do no know, She whispered. I am only a lowly slave. Who would 
know? I asked, fiercely.
Those with him, she said. Pneander keeps a close counsel Who else? I 
demanded. There must be others. Alison, she said, the dancing slave at the 
Belled Collar, she might know. Oneander uses her when it pleased him!
I released her throast. She touched it, frightened, looking up at me. I looked 
down at her. I am not now in danger, am I? she asked. No more than any other 
slave, I said.
She lay back on the cement. Her left hand touched the garbage cans to her left. 
You are handsome, she said. I shrugged. You have me at your mercy, she said. 
Are you going to press your advantage? Do you beg it? I asked. Yes, 
Master, she said. You are not unattractive, I told her. Then I thrust up the 
brief house tunic and she put her arms around my neck, lifting her lips to mine.
I considered the belly and hips of the dancing girl as she thrust them toward 
me, undulatingly, as the music pounded in the tavern.
Have you heard the news? the man next to me was asking. No, I said.
The girl was naked, save that she wore many strings of jewels and armlets. Too 
she wore bracelets and anklets of gold, which had been locked upon her and were 
belled. Her collar too, was of gold and belled. She was blond, and it was said 
she was from Earth. A single pearl, fastened in a setting like a droplet, on a 
tiny golden chain, was suspended at the center of her forehead.
end of page 10
There has been major engagement, one long awaited, said the man next to me. 
south of Vonda. More than four thousand men were involved. Fighting was fierce. 
The mobility of our squares was crucial in the early phases, separating to 
permit the entrance of charging tharlarion into our lines, then isolating the 
beasts. Massed men, I knew, could not stand against the charge of tharlarion, 
not without a defense of ditches or pointed stakes. But then, said the man, 
there retreat was sounded, but the withdrawal was prearranged to creviced 
ground, to rock slopes and cragged, outjeutting formations. Our generals had 
chosen their ground well. I knew too that no fixed military formation could 
meet the phalanx on its own terms and survive. Different length spears are held 
by different ranks, the longer spears by the more rearward ranks. It charges on 
the run. It is like an avalanche, thundering, screaming, bristling with steel. 
Its momentum is incredible. It can shatter walls. When two such formations meet 
in a field, the clash can be heard for pasangs. One does not meet the phalanx 
unless it be with another phalanx. One avoids it, one outmaneuvers it. Our 
auxiliaries then drove the tharlarion, maddened and hissing, back into the 
phalanx. In the skies our tarnsmen turned aside the mercenaries of Artemidorus. 
They then rained arrows upon the shattered phalanx. While the spearmen lifted 
their shields to protect themselves from teh sky, our squares swept down the 
slopes upon them.
I nodded. I continued to regard the female before me. It was said she was from 
Earth. I lifted my page to my lips, from the low table behind which I sat, 
cross-legged.
She regarded me, as she danced her beauty before me.
The field was ours, said the man. Vonda herself now lies open to our troops!
I nodded. I did not take my eyes from the dancer. Her eyes on me were sensuous 
and hot, those of a true slave. It was hard for me to believe that she was 
really from Earth.
The women of Vonda will soon be emptied into our slave markets, said the man. 
It will lower prices, said another, gloomily.
end of page 11
I have heard, said anther, that forces from Port Olni are marching to the 
relief of Vonda. Our men will turn northeast to meet them, said another.
Please Master, whispered the girl to me. She extended her small hand, still 
dancing, as though to touch me. On her wrist was a golden bracelet, beled. I saw 
the small lock, with the key socket on the bracelet. She could not remove it.
She likes you, said the man next to me, now paying some attention to the 
dancer.
Suddenly there was the fierce crack of a slave whip and the girl, terrified, 
scurried from me. Busebius, proprietor of the tavern, stood at the edge of the 
sand. Do you think I have but one customer? he called to her. No, Master! 
she cried.There was laughter. Then she was dancing, too, before others and among 
the tables. I watched her. She was a sensuous dream. It was hard to imagine that 
she was from Earth.
There was another dancer here previously,  said the man next to me, one 
called Helen. She too was an Earth blonde. Alison was purchased to replace her. 
What happened to the other girl? I asked. Helen? hs asked. Yes, I said. 
She was seen once by Marleus of Ar, who purchased her. She was chained and sent 
as a gift somewhere. I see, I said.
Paga, Master? asked a dark-haired, belled paga slave, in a scrap of diaphanous 
yellow silk. I motioned her away. She had short, lovely legs and a sweet full 
boseom. The yellow silk was belted tightly aboug her waist by several turns of 
yellow binding fiber, more than enough to tie her for your pleasure in an 
alcove.
I continued to wach the dancer, now some yards away, under the low ceiling.
The girl who had offered me paga had not been truly interested in giving me 
paga. My cup, clearly, was still almost full. She was offering me something 
else, other than the wares of the tavern.
The dancer now, as the music was mounting in crescendo, was again approaching 
me. I considered her ankles and thighs, the sweet belly of her, her breasts, and 
shoulder and throat, the loveliness of her, her face and eyes, the latitudes of 
her swirling blonde hair, the shimmering restless jewelry on her body, the metal 
ocked on her wrists and ankles, her collar, the pearl at her forehead.
end of page 12
Master, she said, dancing before me. I regarded her through narrowly lidded 
eyes. Then she sank to her knees and on her knees, leaning backwards, danced 
before me as a kneeling slave. The music swirled to its climax and, as it ended, 
she straightened her body and then, from her knees, lowered herself to her right 
hip and extending her right arm to me, lay before me, submitted, her head to the 
floor.
There was Gorean applause in the room, the striking of the right palm on the 
left shoulder. I rose to my feet and placed two copper tarsks on the table. I 
went to the girl and, with the side of my foot, kicked her. Get to the alcove, 
I told her.
Yes, Master, she said, and scrambled up, hurrying with a rustle of jewelry and 
bells to a leather-curtained alcove. There was more Gorean applause as I 
followed her and, turning, from inside, drew shut the curtains of the alcove. 
When I had them buckled shut from the inside, I turned to face the girl.
She knelt in the position of the pleasure slave, back in the alcove, on the 
scarlet furs, in the light of the small lamp. I looked about. There were some 
chains in the alcove and an coil of rope and a whip.
If Master desires special equipment, she said, it will be provided by 
Busebius. There is more than enough here to tame you, I said. Yes, Master, 
she said.
You are Allison? I asked. In his use of me Master may name me as he please, 
she said. You are Allison? I asked. Yes, Master she said. It is an 
Earth-girl name, I said. Please do not be cruel to me on account of it, she 
said. Are you from Earth? I asked. Yes, she said, only now Gorean masters 
have put it on me, by their will, as a mere slave name.
end of page 13
How did you come to Gor, I asked. I do not know, she said, I retired one 
night and awakened later, how much later, I do not know, naked, in a dungeon, 
chained with other girls. All slaves? I asked. Yes, she said, though we 
did not know it at the time, we were all slaves. True slaves? I asked. Yes, 
she said, true slaves.
It is a pretty name, I said. Thank you Master, said said. Too, I said, it 
is a superb name for a female slave. Yes Master, she said, Thank you 
Master.
I regarded her. You appear to be a slave, I said. I am a slave, Master, she 
said. The men of Gor, I said say that the women of Earh are natural slaves. 
Is it true? Yes, Master, she said. I, and the other girls on my chain, 
swiftly learned that we were natural slaves.
How was this information received by them? I asked. Generally at first with 
chagrin and shame, she said, then with helpless resignation, objective 
recognition and sober acceptance, and then with a liberating and unspeakable 
joy.
Are you a natural slave? I asked her. Yes Mater, she said. I regarded her. 
Try me,  she said. Judge for yourself. But you are of Earth, I said.
Does it dismay you? she asked, that I, a woman of Earth, should be a natural 
slave? Get on your back, I said. Yes, Master, she said. She unlooped the 
strings of jewlery from her body putting them to one side.
No, I said, leave the armlets, the pearl drop at your forehead. Yes, 
Master, she said and lay down. What do you want to do? I asked her. Please 
my Master, she smiled. It is a slaves answer. I said. It is my answer, she 
said, and I mean it, and am proud of it.
end of page 14
On your stomach, I told her. Uneasily she turned to her stomach. She then lay 
tense in the furs. Master has removed the whip from the wall, she said. Am I 
to be whipped? I caressed the side of her body, gently, with the coils of the 
whip. She shuddered. You have a slaves fear, I said. Then I replaced the whip 
on the wall. I then touched her body and she squirmed in the fur, clutching at 
it with her small fingers. Yes, I said, you have a slaves reflexes.
On your back, I then ordered her sharply. Swiftly she turned to her back and 
looked up at me, frightened.
I took the rope from the side of the alcove and folding it as to make four 
strands, looped it several times about her throat and knotted it. I thus made a 
heavy rope collar for her, knotted under her chin with heavy guide strands. I 
then jerked her to her knees before me, her chin pulled up by the knot so that 
she must look at me.
I am prepared to believe that you are, as you claim, a natural slave, I said, 
Do you know the penalty for a slave who lies?
Whatever the Master wishes, she whispered, terrified, looking up at me.
Do you know the one called Oneander of Ar? I asked. He is a merchant she 
whispered. Do you know him? I asked. I have served him, she wept. Do you 
know him! I said. Yes yes, she sept, half pulled from her knees. He uses me 
as it pleases him, as an abject and total slave. I looked down at her fiercely. 
Busuebuis has me on retainer to him, she said, that he may use me when he 
wishes. Sometimes I am sent to his house!
Where is he! I said, Where!
Lara! she cried. Lara! This was a town in the Salerian Confederation at the 
confluence of Vosk and Olni.
end of page 15
It was no wonder that Oneander made no public fact of his most recent itinerary. 
I threw the girl from me to the furs.
Sometimes a man speaks freely to a slave. Oneander had, perhaps in his drink and 
pleasures, confided his intentions to the slave in his arms. I was not to 
tell, she wept.
Perhaps she, a foolish Earth girl, had asked him, and he had not been in the 
mood to beat her. Perhaps he was proud of his plan to undertake such a bold 
venture in troubled times. I did not know; Ar, of course was not at war 
technically with the Salerian Confederation. Similarly at that time hostilities 
with confederation cities had been limited to skirmished with Vonda. His act, 
thus though perhaps one of dubious propriety, and accordingly not one he would 
care to publicize in the streets of Ar, was neither treasonous nor illegal. It 
did, however, Lara being a member of the Salerian Confederation, suggest some 
economic desperation. Being denied the markets of Vonda, and perhaps of Port 
Olni and Ti, it was natural I supposed for Oneander to turn to Lara.
I was not to tell! wept the girl.
I pulled her up to her knees and threw her against the wall. I took the heavy 
guide strands of the rope on her neck and passed them through a slave ring on 
the wall and pulled them tight, pulling her against the wall. She was thus tied 
on her knees, her belly against the wall, fastened extremely closely by her neck 
and wrists, and some two inches of rope to the ring.
I was not to tell! she wept. Did Busebius, your true Master, order you not to 
tell? I asked. No, she said. Why then do you weep and tremble so at the 
ring? I asked.
Onesander did not wish me to tell, she said. But I wished you to tell, didnt 
I? I asked. Yes, Master, she said. And you told didnt you? I asked. Yes 
Master, she said.
end of page 16
Do you think it was wise for a man to have confided secrets to a female slave 
such as you? I asked. No, Master, she said. You do not regret having told 
me, do you? I asked. No, Master! she wept. Do you think it was wise to have 
obeyed me? I asked. Yes, Master! she said, Yes, Master!
You are a mere slave, arent you? I asked. Yes, Master! she said. Have 
mercy on me, Master! Accordingly, it was right for you to have told me, wasnt 
it? I asked. Yes, Master, she wept, Yes, Master.
Do you think a girl such as you should be told secrets? I asked. No, Master, 
she said. Why? I asked. Because we may be made to tell, she said. You were 
made to tell, werent you? I asked. Yes, Master, she said.
I then turned about and went to the leather curtains of the alcove. I reached up 
to unbuckle the straps which held them closed.
Are you going to leave me? she asked, behind me, bound. Certainly, I said. 
All you wanted from me was information, she said. I shrugged. I now have that 
information, I said. Dally but a bit, Master, she whispered. I turned to 
regard her. I do not understand, I said. She was looking at me over her 
shoulder. Please, she said. I do not understand, I said irritably. I danced 
before you, she said, and in the fullness of the slave I am. It is true, I 
said, You danced as a slave. I am a slave, she said. But you are of Earth, 
I said. For some reason, I was angry with her. The women of Earth, she said, 
are natural slaves. No! I cried. Do not disparage and condemn us, she 
said. Understand us!
end of page 17
No! I said angrily. Fulfill us! she begged. No! I said. No! Is a 
natural slave not to be granted her fulfillment? she asked. No, I said, No! 
Why not? she asked. I do not know, I said, I do not know!
Perhaps because we are slaves, she said. It is a cruelty you practice upon 
us. Perhaps, I said angrily. What greater cruelty can a man inflict upon a 
slave than to deny her the collar? she asked. I said nothing.
Do you not see how I danced before you? she asked. Yes, I said. You excite 
me, Master, she said. Does that horrify you? Does that scandalize you? Does it 
startle and discomfort you, does it dismay you, does it seem so hard to 
comprehend, that a woman from Earth could be sexually excited, that she could 
have sexual desires, that she could feel helpless and frustrating passion, that 
she could beg even to be sexually satisfied?
It is not typical, I said. And it is not permitted. It is typical! she 
said. How little you know of women! And on Gor it is permitted - to slaves!
I did not speak.
On Gor, she said, I have experienced feeling and sensations I never knew 
could exist. Inhibitions have been shattered, some of them commanded by strong 
men and the blows of the whip. I have learned to live and to feel. My emotions 
have been freed. My deepest sexuality and nature have on this world at last been 
fully liberated. I have found myself. I love and I serve. I now know at last 
what and who I am, a love slave for uncompromising Masters.
No, I said, No! I turned away from her, again to open the curtain. Did my 
dance interest Master? she asked.
I turned again to look upon her. She knelt close to the wall, fastened by the 
neck and wrists tightly to the ring. I heard the small movement of the bells 
upon her. I saw the barbaric armlets and the tiny chain that held the small 
peral drop at her forehead. Yes, I said. My fists clenched.
end of page 18
I beg to be fulfilled, she said. and as the salve I am. I know I have no 
right to beg this, for a slave is without rights. I do, however, beg it, placing 
myself vulnerable and fully at your mercy. You may, of course, deny me this 
fulfillment for I am a slave. I hope, however, that you will not do so. I hope 
rather, that you will see fit to show kindness to a miserable girl in bondage. 
I said nothing. I will strive to be worthy of my fulfillment, she said. I 
crouched down behind her and put my hands on her waist. She shuddered, pressing 
herself against the wall. In what way? I asked. By serving you completely and 
intimately, and as a abject and total slave, she said. I did not speak.
You will not regret it Master, she said. I freed her wrists and neck of the 
rope, leaving it fallen by the ring. I then had her in my arms, she on her 
knees, by the ring. Alison will strive to please Master well, she whispered. 
She then kissed me softly. Then softly, she whispered in my ear, The women of 
Earth are natural slaves.
No! I said. Judge by me, she said. I lowered her to the furs. I began to 
kiss at her body.Nok I said. Soon she began to gasp and sob in my arms. Then 
she began to writhe.Then she screamed in the alcove and then shuddering, 
shaking, was held in my arms. Am I not a natural slave? She asked. Yes, I 
said, you are. There had been no mistaking the nature of her movements, her 
reflexes. They were clearly those of a natural slave. These things troubled me. 
She lay back. And I am a woman of Earth she said. I looked down at her. What 
are you thinking? she asked. I was thinking, I said, regarding the girl, 
that the men of Earth if they could but see an Earth woman as you are now would 
scream with pleasure. We are waiting for our Masters, she smiled.
I listened to the musicians outside of the alcove, the sounds of the tavern.
end of page 19
When one brings a girl to an alcove one may keep her there for most practical 
purposes as long as he wishes. She is yours, for most practical purposes, until 
one chooses to re-open the curtains. After the tavern is closed and attendant 
will let you out and, taking charge of the girl, see that she is properly 
chained at her ring by the girl-wall or kenneled.
Do you now think it is so terrible a thing to fulfill the needs of a slave? 
she asked. No, I said. And if one is a natural slave, shes aid, surely it 
is accepgtable for her to seek, even desperately the fulfillment of her deepest 
needs.
Yes, I said. And surely, she said, it is permissible for the Master, though 
he is under no obligation to do so for she is only a slave, to deign in his 
kindness, it it be his whim or pleasure, to fulfill the needs of the slave. It 
is totally up to him, I said.
Yes Master, she said. She is only a slave. That you are a natural slave, 
Alison, I said, does not prove that all women of Earth are natural slaves. My 
entire chain in training she said, learned that they were. That proves 
nothing, I said. Do you think we were all so rare and different? she asked. I 
shrugged, I do not know, I said.
We were not, she said. Perhaps, perhaps not, I said. She smiled. How long 
have you known you were a slave? I asked. Since I was a young girl, said 
said. I first discovered it in my thoughts, and dreams, and feelings, and 
fantasies. But I thought I could never be more than a secret slave at the mercy 
of a secret master. Then I was brought to Gor. Here I wear my collar openly and 
kneel before my masters for all the world to see. It is true, I said.
Do you object that I have slave needs, Master? she asked. I do not object 
that you, personally, have slave needs, I said.
end of page 20
Indeed, I rejoice that you have slave needs for they make you a perfection and 
a dream of pleasure.
But you would not want all women to be like me? she asked. No, I said. But 
what if they were? she asked. I looked at her angrily. Or is it onlyo ne woman 
you would not want to be like me? she asked. No! I said. But what if she 
is? asked the girl.
I closed my eyes. The thought of Miss Beverly Henderson as a female slave was 
almost overpoweringly erotic. With difficulty, I controlled myself. I thrust the 
thought from my minds. I must not even permit myself to think such things. I 
opened my eyes.
Do not deny her nature to her, said the girl. Kneel to the whip! I cried. 
Terrified the girl scambled to her knees and knelt down, making herself small, 
her head to the furs. Her wrists crossed under her as though bound.She rembled. 
I now stood over her, the slave whip in my hand. I drew it back, then I threw it 
aside angrily. I crouched down. Then I jerked her head up, by the hair. 
Permission to placate, she begged, reaching for me with her lips and mouth. 
But I held her by the hair from me. She whimpered, denied. Then I released her 
hair and permitted her to touch me.
Thank you Master, she whispered. She was a slave. I would permite her to 
attempt to placate me, in one of the ancient fastions of the female slave.
I must soon be on my way, I said. Master searches for a slave, does he not? 
she asked. Perhaps, I said. Do not ever let her forget that she is a slave, 
said the girl. I must be on my way, I said. Have me, but once again, she 
begged.
I did so, and then, later, I rose to my feet. I unbuckled the leather curtains 
and threw them back. The tevern was not emnpty and closed. I turned about and 
again regarded the girl.
end of page 21
She had replaced the loops of her jewelry and knelt before me, in the position 
of the pleasure slave.
It is hard for me to think of you as a girl from Earth, I said. I am now only 
a Gorean slave girl, she said. You danced well, I said.
An attendant approached from a side door. I will put her in her kennel, he 
said. He anpped his fingers at her, come, Girl, he said.
Yes Master, she said. She rose quickly to her hfeet and ran softly to him. He 
took her by the arm. She whom you seek is a slave, is she not? she asked. She 
is a legal slave, I said, she is not a true slave.
She was then conducted to the small side door, thougt which the attendant had 
emerged. Beyond it, I gathered would lie such things as the kitchens, the 
offices, the cellars and pantries, the storaqge rooms, the dressing rooms, the 
discipline chamber and the kennels. At the door the attendant let her paus and 
she turned to me. Good hunting, Master, she called to me, Show her no mercy, 
she said. Then she brushed a kiss with the tips of her fingers in the Gorean 
fashion. I returned this gesture. She was then conducted through the door. In a 
short time I heard the sliding downward and locking in place of a kennel gate. 
Shortly afterward the attendant returned to the floor and let me out, thought 
the main entrance. I heard it being bolted shut behind me. I stood then in the 
streets of Ar. I looked up at the moons and stars, beyond the cylinders and 
bridges. I then turned my steps toward the Street of Tarns, that somewehere 
among its many shops and cots, I might arrange transportation northward, toward 
the Salerian city of Lara.
end of page 22
2      The Victory Camp
Greetings, Lady Tima, I said.
Jason! she said, struggling in the straps. Do not hurt me!
The night sky was red with the glare of the burning city.
it will be a tarsk bit, said the fellow walking down the long line of pleasure 
racks. I placed a tarsk bit in the small leather sack nailed to the frame of the 
rack. She pulled back in the straps.
I will take you no closer to Lara than this, had said the fellow who had flown 
the tarn which had brought me to this place. Tarnsmen of Ar, had said he, 
patrol the corridor between Vonda and Ar, but are insufficient in numbers to 
guard the sky beyond the corridor. Too tomorrow, as the cavalries mass for 
attack, the guard on the corridor itself will be abandoned. I had nodded and 
paid him, crawling from the heavy basket. On his return trip he would doubtless 
take refugees or perhaps bound girls from Vonda, back to Ar.
What news of the war is there? I asked the fellow who was guarding the long 
line of pleasure racks. I have just come from Ar. We have been successful 
here, he said, defeating in battle both the forces of Vonda and those of the 
tarnsmen of Atemidorus of Cos. Vonda is geing sacked. The city burns. This is a 
victory camp, one for loot and pleasure. Surely the Salerian Confederation is 
not commited to war,  I said.
end of page 23
He shrugged. Forces from Lara, march south? said he forces from Port Olni are 
within a hundred pasangs, marching south. They are delaying now only to match 
their strike with that of the men of Lara. I nodded, it would be a pincher 
move, to take the men of Ar, far from their supply line, on two fronts.
We must now retreat. I said. He laughed No, said he. While those of Port 
Olni dally in camp we are marching upon them. We will taken them separately. 
Defeating them we will return south to meet the forces of Lara, perhaps even 
here, in the sight of the ashes of Vonda. I see, I said.
We fear only that the forces of Ti will be committed, he said. Ti was the 
largest and most populous city of the Salerian Confederation. It had, to date, 
refused to involve itself in the machinations of Vonda and Cos. Surely it will 
be only a matter of time, I said.
I suspect so, said the man. Even now Ebullius Gaius Cassius, of the Warriors, 
Administrator of Ti, meets with the high council Ti. Their delay seems 
inexplicable. I said.
Those of Cos enemies to Ar, and merchants of Vonda, said the man, have 
precipitated the war, hoping to engage the entire confederation. A minor party 
then,  I said, is maneuvering the situation.  I think so, said the man.  I 
doubt frankly that either Ti or Ar wishes a full-scale conflict.
How much is this one? called a man, a few racks from us. It was a blonde, 
strapped on her rack.
Excuse me, said the man, turning away from me, A tarsk bit, he said to the 
fellow. Surely, I said.
It was evening, fires, on high poles, illuminated the area. Many men were about, 
moving here and there. From where I stood, I could see many tents, long tents, 
and holding areas where there were temporary stockades or circular embankments. 
Within thses enclosures ther were, for the most past, goods and prisoners. Two 
drunken soldiers stagggered past.
How were you taken? I asked the Lady Tima.
end of page 24
By soldiers in the city, she said. with others. She looked at me. Be kind 
to me Jason, she begged. I am absolutely helpless.
How were you brought here? I asked. On a rope, she said. I was brought 
here, stripped and fastened on the rack. I looked down the long rows of 
pleasure racks, aligned under the high tourches. The blonde a few racks away in 
the same line was crying out for mercy.
Your market and goods? I asked. The market was burned, she said, and the 
goods and slaves taken. Did many of those of Vonda escape the city? I asked. 
Many she said.
In flying over this area, I said, I saw several stockades, mostly filled with 
women. We were hunted more relentlessly, she said bitterly. Yet some women 
must have escaped the city I said. Yes, she said, Particularly those who 
fled early. Many have gone as refugees to Lara.
The blonde a few racks away began to squrim and sob in her straps. No, no, she 
begged. But she was not being shown the mercy for which she pleaded.
What of the House of Andronicus? I asked. Gone, said said, burned, its 
slaves and personnel fled or taken. What of the Lady Gina? I asked. I 
remembered her with some fondness. Shackled, she said, In the food tens, 
where she waits upon men. Do you think she enjoys serving them? I asked. 
They enjoy having her serve them, she said angrily.
Doubtless, I said. Do you recall the slave, Lola, of the House of 
Andronicus? I asked. Yes, she said. I do not know her fate,. Lola and Tela 
had been the girls who had first taught me Gorean.They had been the first Gorean 
slae girls I had ever seen. I had never forgotten my first sight of them. That 
such women could exist and be slaves had been a stunning and welcome revelation 
to me of certain of the realities of Gor.
You had an assistant, I said,  a superb actress, who, pretended to be a mere 
Earth-girl slave, even to the collar and Ta-Teera, well prepared me for for my 
sale in your market.
end of page 25
The Lady Tendite, she said. Dont touch me! Yes, she, I said. She well 
made a fool of me.
Please dont Jason, I believed her, I said. Jason, she begged. No! I 
believed her,  I said, completely. I am completely helpless, Jason, she 
said. Please have mercy on me!
The sale must have been amusing, I said. Your hands! she wept. Did you plan 
it togeteher? I asked. Your body seems smaller and more helpless than I 
rememberd it, I observed. Yes, yes, she sobbed, but it was her original 
plan, her ideas. She thought it would be amusing to do it to you., I see, I 
said. Please stop touching me, she begged.
Suddenly a few racks away, the blonde throwing her had back and rearing 
helplessly in her straps, screamed her submission. The Lady Tima shuddered, and 
then suddenly lifted herself to me. But my hand did not quite touch her. Where 
is she? I asked. She fled from Vonda, she said. She went to Lara. Please do 
not stop touching me. Are you prepared to beg to be touched? I asked. Yes, 
she said, I beg it!
How do these things work? I asked, looking at the rack. Jason, please! she 
whispered. I note that you are not yet branded, I said, nor, I suppose are 
the others. Jacon! she pleaded. Speak, I said.
We were put on the racks as free women, she said, that we, the women of the 
enemy, be properly humiliated. Too is it not a rich joke for the men of Ar that 
more than a thousand of the free women of Vonda adorn their pleasure racks, 
fastened down like slave girls, their use available for a tarsk bit to the 
passers-by?
Yes, I smiled, it is a rich joke. The men of Gor are fond of such jokes.
end of page 26
And only after this, our profound humiliation, she said, will the men ofAr it 
it should please them see fit to permit us to be divided into lots, and be 
branded and collared and sold into slavery throughout the towns and cities of 
Gor.
Splendid, I said, splendid! She looked at me with horror. Are you a man of 
Gor? she asked. I shrugged. I did not know.
Then again, suddenly, she lifted her body to me. You have aroused me, she 
whispered. You know you have aroused me and cruelly. You lift you body like a 
female slave, Lady Tima, I said. She groaned and lay back. She moaned.
The blonde a few racks down was now sobbing with pleasure. She was alone. 
Masters, Masters, she called. I am only a tarsk bit! Please touch me! What 
a slut she is, I said. Yes, Jason, whispered the Lady Tima.
These straps seem to hold you quite well, I said. I am absolutely helpless, 
she said. Touch me, I beg you!
The pleasure rack is an interesting device, I said. I examined the wooden 
wheels the levers. In virtue of the axes of the device and the various gears and 
pinions and the joints braces, fitted, sliding boards, notches and lock points, 
it can be adjusted to a variety of positions. To be sure not all the pleasure 
racks were as sophisticated as that on which was bound my former Mistress, the 
former female slaver, the Lady Tima of Vonda. This device, like some of the 
others, had doubtless been brought from the city, perhaps dragged forth by 
shackled men of Vonda hauling on wagon ropes.
Jason, begged the Lady Tima. I have never seen one this close before, I 
said. Jason! she cried. You look well on your knees before me, I said. 
Jason! she wept.
I then bend her backwards, and then lifting and turning her, examined the left 
side of her beautyk ad then the rights. I then put her through a variety of 
positions, more experimenting with the possibilities of the apparatus than 
annything else, though the experiments had their aesthetic value, for the Lady 
Tima was a lovely woman.
end of page 27
Fascinating, I said. Jason, she protested. I then, as I had grown more 
proficient with the device, used it for one of its two major purposes, that of 
exhiting and displaying the helpless prisoner. Its second major purpose of 
course, is to hold the woman in any position one pleases. I rotated her to her 
back. I then turned away. Jason! she cried. Jason!
I turned back, again, to face her. You have humiliated and abused me, she 
said,You have turned me about and examined me on ther rack as though I might be 
a slave girl! You have cruelly arounsed me. You cannot leave me now! I can, I 
told her. Please come back, she wept. Touch me! Touch me!
Do you beg it? I asked. Yes, she said, I beg it as a slave! As a slave? 
I asked. Yes, yes, she said. I beg it as a slave!
But that is lower than a mere slut, I said. Surely you remember the blonde 
girl, I said, indicating the girl some racks from her. I beg it as both a slut 
and a slave, she said.
I then went slowly to the rack. She looked up at me frightened. Then I fastened 
her in position, preading her thighs uncomfortable apart. Then looking down upon 
her, I spread her legs by another four inches. Then I had her.
end of page 28
3      The Food Tent
Over here, I told the Lady Gina, Kneel down, I indicated a place on the 
straw, at the wall of the food tent, a clear place, between other couples. She 
knelt before me, looking up at me, You are the first man who has ordered me to 
the straw, she said. Do you think you are unattractive? I asked. I know I am 
unattractive, she said. To many men, I said, you would be very attractive.
I am a naked and shackled prisoner, she said, soon perhaps, if it should 
please the men of Ar, to be branded a slave. I have waited upon your table and 
brought you food and drink. Beyond these things, I beg you not to insult and 
torture me.
You performed your duties as a naked waitress well, I said, expertly and 
deferentially. I do not wish to be killed, she said.
You were a fine trainer, I said. You taught me much. And now,  she smiled, 
is it your intention to give your training a little training? Perhaps, I 
said. I have never had the feelings of a normal woman, she said.
Lie down, I told her. I obey, she said. She looked up at me. You do not 
seem angry with me, she said.
I sat beside her. I am not, I said. Keeper! I called, Give me the key to 
the shackles of this one.
end of page 29
He came to me and gave me a key, with which I removed the shakle from her right 
ankle. I returned the key to him. I did not unlock the shackle on her left 
ankle. She continued to wear it, with the short chain and the opened right 
shackle.
He did not seem surprised or started, I said, that I should open your 
shackle. No, she said, bewildered. He did not. Is it not thus so 
unthinkable, I said, that a man might desire to free your legs. She looked at 
me, frightened.
Remember, I said, you are not now carrying a whip and keys, clad in black 
leather in a position of power, men at your mercy. No, she whispers.
And even in that guise, I said, it is not so improbably but what men might 
wish to take your whip from you and throw you down and teach you what it is to 
be a women.
I wanted them to do so, she said. I wanted them to make me a woman. You are 
a women, I told her. Dare to be it. No! she said. It means surrender to 
men! Of course, I told her.
I do not have the feelings of normal women she said. perhaps it is only that 
you are afraid to have them, I said. No no! she said. Then have them, I 
said.
No! she said. The Lady Gina will never be a submitted slave! You are too 
proud to be a woman? I asked. Yes, she said. Even though you are in truth, a 
woman?
Yes, she said. It is wrong to be a woman! It is wrong to be a woman! You 
could always pretend that to be a woman is to be like a man, I said.
I am not a fool, she said. Do you reallly think it is wrong for a woman to be 
a true woman? Yes, she said, for it is to be a woman and not a man! But 
you are not in fact a man, I said. I know, she said.
end of page 30
Be a woman then, I said. I dare not, she said. Why? I asked. I do not 
know, she said.
Is it such a terrible thing to be a woman? I asked. Yes, yes! she said. 
No, I said, it is not terrible. It is deeply and profoundling marvelous. She 
trembled.
Take your place in the order of nature, I said. At the feet of men! she 
said. It is where you belong, I said.
She began to shudder at my side. I begin to feel such emotions, such feelings, 
she said. They frighten me. They threaten to overwhelm me. It is 
uncontrollable. It is like a storm, I said. Yes, she said. Yield to them, I 
said. I do not want to be a women! she wept. I do not want to be a woman!
How fared the House of Andronicus? I asked her. She looked at me , startled. 
The goods and the slaves fled or were taken, she said. The House itself was 
destroyed. And Andronicus? I asked. He fled, she said with the others.
How did Lola fare? I asked. She fled, she said. I do not know if she was 
taken by the looters or not. Do you think she managed to escape? I asked. 
The looters, perhaps, she said. But she wears a collar.
I nodded. Lola was attractive. By now she was doubtless on someones chain. 
Lovely female slaves do not remain long at large.
Did you now she sometimes cried your name aloud in her sleep? asked the Lady 
Gina. No, I said. It was long ago, she said. True, I said.
You seem different now, she said. I shrugged. Perhaps, I said.
end of page 31
Jason, she whispered. Yes, I said. You freed my legs, she said. Yes, I 
said, but it was a mistake. Why? she asked. You do not have the feelings of 
a normal woman, I said. It is doubtless nothing that you can help. I then 
bent to reshackle her. Quickly she drew her legs back. What is wrong? I asked. 
Please do not reshackle me, just yet, she said. Why? I asked.
I want to be a woman, she whispered. Truly? I asked. yes, truly, she 
sobbed. Then, I said, you must be prepared, holding nothing back, to yield to 
your deepest and most profound feelings. But then, she said, I would be only 
a submitted slave, overwhelmed and mastered.
I took her in my arms. She ws tense and frightened. Youre trembling I said. 
I am only a woman and a prisoner, she said. Do not forget it, I told her. 
No, Jason, she said. you do not seem large and strong. I said. I am not 
large and strong, she said.
Your body is soft, I said, and feels good in my hands, I jerked her by the 
arms to a sitting position and looked at her.
Could a man find me desirable? she asked. Yes, I said, Escape me! She 
struggled, fuutiely. I cannot escape you, she siad. You know that!
I thew her then down to her back in the straw. Do not be rough with me, Jason, 
she said. you will not be treated as men please, I told her. Yes, Jason, she 
said. Will it be necessary to whip you? I asked. No, Jason, she said. 
Prepare now to yield to your deepest and most profound feeings,  I said.
end of page 32
I will try, she said. Oh! she cried, my hands in her hair. You will not 
merely try, I told her. You will yield to them. Yes, she said. Yes what? 
I asked. Yes, Master, she said.
You yielded well, Lady Gina, I said. I would never have believed I could have 
such feelings, she said. I did not know such feelings could exist.
Surely you have seen writhing, screaming slave girls? I asked. Yes, she 
said, but not until moments ago did I have more than an inkling of what they 
might be feeling. She smiles. It is no wonder the luscious little sluts are so 
fond of their collars.
There can be progress in such matters, I said. Perhaps no woman has yet truly 
sounded the depths of slave joy,. Yes, she said, the joy of being owned by a 
man of being in his power, completely, of being fully his, and of totally 
loveing and serving him. Perhaps, I said.
She kissed me. You handle women well, Jason, she said. you put me through my 
paces well. Any captor or Master, I said, can put you through your paces. 
It is true, she said and kissed me. She put her head on my belly. I have seen 
women such as myself on the block, she said. We do not bring high prices.
Perhaps, I said. If I were sent to the kitchens or the mills or laundries, 
she said, I would be under the will of my task master would I not?
Yes, I said.
Perhaps I might, under the whip, pulling his plow, please a peasant, she said, 
or perhaps I might keep the hut of a dock worker, preparing his food and when 
he wished, warming his mat. Perhaps, I said. Did I please you? she asked. 
Yes, I said.
end of page 33
Do you think I could please other men? she asked. Yes, I said. I know that 
I am not as desirable as most women, she said. You are desirable, I said. 
And to some men you will be inutterable desirable.
How kind you are to a helpless female prisoner, she said. I speak the truth, 
I said. You are kind, she said. I said nothing.
I will try to please my masters well, she said. I would recommend it, I 
said. She shuddered against me. The men of Ar, said said, took my freedom 
from me, when they made me prisoner. You hae taken my freedom from me, when you 
forced me to yield as a female slave.
Your yielding, I said, was not that of a female slave, for you are not yet, 
truly, a female slave. Yet is was doubtless the fullest yielding of which you 
were at this time capable. Can there be more? she asked.
You can not at this time, I said, even begin to suspect the depths, the 
dimensions, the wonders and marvels of slave submission. What you have done to 
me is irreversible. she said, I can never go back now knowing what I do, to 
being a proud free woman.
I shrugged. It was nothing to me.
And yet, she said, sobbing, I am too plain to be a slave. You are a women, 
I told her. Yes, she said, I am a woman. I did not know it before, truly, 
what it was to be a woman.
It is not being a kind of man, I told her. No, she said, it is being a full 
female in the order of nature. Yes, I said. She sobbed.
end of page 34
What is wrong? I asked. I want a master, she said. I want to be everything, 
and do everything for him. I want to give him all of me, holding nothing back. I 
want to be nothing to him, onl his owned slave, totally loving and seving him. 
And so? I said. But I am plain, she said. No man will want me.
Are you done with her yet? asked a rough voice. We were startled and looked 
up. There at the edge of the stara standing, was a large uncouth fellow in the 
garments of the Tarn Keepers. Yes, I said. I smiled. I sat up and took the 
Lady Ginas free shackle and jerked her ankels closely together. I preapred to 
close the openshackle about her right ankle. Her ankles would then be chained 
together, as before, with about eight inches of chain separating them. The 
shackles were large and of heavy iron.
Do not reshackle her, he said. Very well, I said and got up. You look like 
a tasty pudding, he said to the Lady Gina. She looked up at him from the straw. 
Are you branded yet, Female? he asked her. Her hand went inadvertently to her 
left thigh. No, she said, no. Is she any good? he asked me. Yes, I said, 
she is pretty good. And thereis no telling how good she will be when she is 
properly enslaved and finds herself in the possession of the right master. Of 
course, he said. He again looked down at her.There was a startled, soft light 
in the eyes of the Lady Gina as she looked up at the fellow. Suddenly, to me, 
she seem very soft and very vulnerable in the straw. It was as though a 
transformation somehow had come over her.
She is beautiful, He said. Yes, I said, for somehow, suddenly, perhaps with 
the sudden understanding and acceptance of her nauture and condition, it had 
become true.
She gasped and looked up at him, spoken of as beautiful. She trembled. He then 
kicked her and she cried out in pain.Split your legs Woman of Vonda, he said. 
You are to be had. Yes, Master! she cried out.
end of page 35
I watched for a moment as she writhed in his arms. You will look well on the 
block, he told her.
Yes, Master, she whispered. Perhaps I will buy you, he said. Yes Master, 
she whispered, Yes, Master!
I left the two together, and began to thread my way through the tables, between 
the soldiers and merchants, and others, and the stripped, shackled women of 
Vonda, serving as waitressed, toward the opening of the food tent. Our forces 
have already moved north, one man was saying. The troops from Lara will not be 
here for two dsays, said another. By that time they will find here only the 
ashes of Vonda, laughed another. As I accidentally brushed against a woman of 
Vonda she trembled and put down her head and knelt swiftly. I continued past 
her. It is dangerous for merchant caravans, a man was saying. Many have been 
attacked, said another. It is rumored the river pirates are the worst, said 
another. They grow bold with the withdrawal of troops from Lara. They have 
struck even into Lara herself, then withdrawing to their galleys. Perhaps this 
will cause the troops of Lara to return, said another, to protect their own 
holdings. No, said another,they are committed. They are to be sold in the 
river markets said somone, as I went past. I did not understand the meaning of 
his remark. It did not , I gathered, pertain to the women of Vonda. It would be 
difficult to get them to the river markes, which lay beyond Lara, down teh Vosk, 
and higher prices, presumable, could be obtained for them in the markets of the 
south. Most of them, I assumed, women of the enemy, would be sold from the slave 
blocks of Ar herself.
As I went through the opening of the tent, I was jostled by a large man. He wore 
a mask. Watch where you are going, he said angrily. I stepped back, but did 
not respond to him. I was angry. It had been he, it seemed to me, who had struck 
against me. Suddenly for a moment he stopped and looked at me closely. It seemed 
as though he might have thought he knew me. Too, it seemed to me that I might in 
spite of the mask somehow have found him familiar. Then saying nothing more, he 
brushed past me and entered the tent. He was alone. I could not place him. Then 
I left the food tent and went to the tarn cots. I hoped to be able to arrange 
for transportation to the vicinity of Lara. I retained five silver tarsks.
end of page 36
This is a considerable sum. I felt reasonably certain I could find some 
tarnsman, perhaps from a neutral city, who might, by a suitably circuitous 
route, get me into the neighborhood of Lara.
Some tarns had apparently recently arrived from the west. Some of them had 
apparently been carrying refugees. I saw some wounded men. Here and there small 
groups of men huddled about, dismally. I saw no women in theses groups, even 
slaves. Some of these wore the white and gold of the merchansts. Some of them 
even wore masks. They crouched about fires.
Who are these people, I asked one of the fellows near the cots. Mostly 
merchants, said he. There are the victims of the predations of river pirates 
in Lara. Some wear masks, I said. Yet most are know to us, said the man. 
Even masked. There, not masked if Splenius and Zarto. You know Zarto, the iron 
merchant? No, I said. He lost his wagons of igots, said the man. Beside 
him, masked is Horemius. Eight stone of perfumes were taken from him. There, 
farther to the left, in the brown mask is Zadron, the dealer in silver. He lost 
almost everything. In the red mask is Publius, also of thesilver merchants, He 
retains only the belt of silver on his shoulder.
I see no woman with them, no slaves, I said. They were embattled, said the 
man. For their lives they bartered their goods and slaves.
They were all from Lara or her vicinity? I asked. Yes, said he. They had 
not realized that the troops of Lara would be moving east or that hte brigands 
and pirates would move so boldly.
Are these all of them? I asked apprehensively. No, said the fellow. Some of 
them have gone to the food tents. Was one of them Oneander, a salt and leather 
merchant? I asked. Yes, said the fellow.
end of page 37
4      The City of Lara; I Renew An Acquaintance
The girl sstirred uneasily. Her legs were drawn up. She wore the Ta-Teena, the 
slave rag and a collar. She lay in the corner of the main room of the inn. She 
lay on a slave mat. I had put here there.
I sat, cross-legged, behing one of the low tables in the room. I chewed on a 
crust of bread. The inn, now, was deserted. It had been evacuated early this 
morning.
That is ten copper tarsks, had said the man last night placing before me a 
bowl of sul porrage. I had not argued. I had paid him.
You cannot put me out! a free woman had been crying to the proprietor of the 
inn aat his counter to the side. You did not pay me for your last nights 
lodging, hd toldher. Pay me now for that, and for tonight, or you may not 
remain within the inn.
A silver tarsk for a nights lodging! she cried. That is unheard of. It is 
outrageous. You hae no right to charge such prices! Others, too, about the 
counter uttered such cries. The Inn was thta of Strobuis, in Lara, at the 
confluence of the Olni and Vosk. It was crowded with refugees from Bonda. Many 
hundreds had fled from Vonda and most had taken the river southward, paying 
highly for their fares on the varities of river craft, barges, skiffs, river 
galleys and even coracles, which had brought them to Lara.
end of page 38
Those are my prices, said Strobuis. Sleen! cried more than one man. 
Whatever the traffic will bear, had grinned a fellow near me at my table. I 
am a free woman of Vonda! the woman at the counter was crying.
I lifted the sul porrage to my lips. The mask I wore, like those of some of the 
others in the room, covered only the upper portions of my face.
There was a pounding at the inn door. Guards, sliding back a panel in the door 
looked through. Then they admitted another small group of refugees. There would 
be no rooms for them, as there were none for many of the guests, but they, too, 
albeit only for a space in a crridor, would be charged a full silver tarsk for 
their lodging. The inn of Strobius was not thught to be a good inn, but it was a 
large inn, and a stout one. Too, it was one of the few inns remaining open in 
Lara. Many o f the refugees, destitute, who had come to Lara had not been 
permitted to land at the quays, but had been driven further downriver. Too, here 
and there in the city, river pirates, with impunity, sought women and plundered.
Several of the men in the room, other than myself, wore masks. I lowered the sul 
porrage to the table. It ws not good, but it was hot.
I am a free woman of Vonda! the woman at the counter was crying. You cannot 
put me out!
Oneander of Ar, the salt and leather merchant, and some others, had worn masks 
at the loot camp outside the city of Vonda.He had been, perhaps, well advised to 
do so. He had intended to trade with Lara, a member of the Salerian 
Confederation.
This would not make him popular in Ar, or in the strongholds of Ar. Too, he had 
been, as I had ascertained, attacked by river pirates on the south bank of the 
Olni and, embattled, had bargained for his life and those of his men by 
delivering his goods and slaves to the assailants. It was little wonder that he 
had chosen to mask his features. he did not wish to encounter the wrath of those 
of Ar, and he wished, doubtless, to conceal his chagrin and shame over the 
embarassing termination of his business venture in the north.
I had waited outside the food tent in the loot camp. The sky to the west was lit 
with the flames of Vonda.
end of page 39
Are you Oneander of Ar? I asked the fellow who emerged from the tent. No, he 
said. I think you are Oneander of Ar, I said to him. Do not speak so loudly, 
had said he, looking about, you fool!
I had then reached to his tunic and seized him, dragging him toward me. Remove 
you mask, I told him. Is no one to protect me? he called. What is going on 
here? inquired a guardsman. I think this is Oneander of Ar, I said. I had 
heard he ws in the camp, said the guardsman, Are you he? Yes, said the man, 
hesitantly, angrily. Remove the mask, I said, Or I shall.
Angrily he drew away the mask. It is Oneander, said the guardsman, not 
pleased. Do not leave me here with him, called Oneander of Ar. But the 
guardsman had turned his back and left.
Who are you? asked Oneander of Ar, apprehensively. I was once a silk slaves, 
I said. You may recall me from the streets of Ar, some months ago, in the 
neighborhoood of the shop of Phileubs. You set two slaves upon me. Do not kill 
me, he whispered.
I have heard, said I, that you were embatted near lara and surrendered slaves 
and goods. On the south bank of the Olni, he said, yes, it is true. You 
did well, I said, to save the lives of your men and yourself. I have lost 
much, he said. What do you conjecture, I asked, to be the fate of your goods 
and slaves? They are no longer mine, he said. They are now the property of 
the river pirates, theirs by the right of sword and power. That is true, I 
said. But what do you conjecture is to be their fate?
It is not likely they could be sold in Lara, or northward, he said. Usually 
the river pirates sell their goods and captures somewhere along the river in one 
of the numerous river towns.
end of page 40
What towns? I asked. There are dozens, he said. Perhaps Ven, Port Cos, 
Iskander, Tafa, who knows. He who attacked you, the pirate chieftain, I was, 
who was he? There are many bands of river pirates, he said. Who was he? I 
asked. Kliomenes, a lietenant to Policrates, he said. In whta town does he 
sell his wares? I asked. It could be any one of a dozen towns, said Oneander. 
I do not know.
I seized him by the tunic and shook him. I do not know! he said. I do not 
know! I held him. Please do not kill me, he whispered. Very well, I had 
said, and released him. I had then turned about and went toward the tarn cots of 
the loot camp, that I might arrane with some bold tarnsman to provid me with 
transporataion by a suitably circuitous route to the vicinity of Lara.
The girl again stirred in the corner of the room. She rolled to her back. One 
knee was raised. She was lucious in the slave rag and collar. She turned her 
head from side to side. She made a small noise. She opened and closed one small 
hand. I wondered if she were aware, dimly, of the corase fibers of the slave mat 
beneath her back. I did not think so, not yet.
I am a free woman of Vonda! the woman at the counter had been crying out last 
night. You cannot put me out! You will pay or be ejected, Strobius had told 
her. You cannot put me out into the street! she said. I had taken another sip 
of the sul porridge.
The woman at the counter had been veiled as is common with Gorean women, 
particularly those of high caste and of the high cities. Many Gorean woman in 
their haughtiness and pride, do not choose to have their features exposed to the 
common view. They are too fine and nobel to be looked upon by the casual rabble. 
Similarly the robes of concealment worn by many Gorean women are doubtless 
dicated by similar sentiments. On the other hand veiling is a not impractical 
modesty in a culture n which capture, and the cahin and the whip are not known.
end of page 41
One justification for the veiling and for the robes of concealment, which is not 
regareded as inconsiderable, is that it is supsed to provide something of a 
protection against abduction and predation. Who would risk his life, it is said, 
to carry off a women who might when roped to a tree and stripped, turn out to be 
as ugle as a tharalarion? Slave girls, by contract, are almost never permitted 
veils. Similarly, they are usually clad in such a say that their charms are 
manifest and obvious to even th e casual onlookers. This, aside from having such 
utilities as remining the girls that they are total slaves and giving pleasure 
to the men who look upon them, is supsed to make them, rahter than free women, 
the desiderated objects of capture and rapine. I think there is something to 
this theory for statistically, it is almost always the female slave and hot her 
free sister who finds herself abducted and struggling in the lashings of captors 
or slavers. On the other hand, in spite of the theories pertaining to such 
matters, free somen are certainly not immmune to the ftes of capture and 
enslavement. Many men, despite the theories pertaining to such matters, and 
accepting the risks involved, enjoy taking them. Some slavers specialize in the 
capture of free women. Indeed, it is thought by some, perpaps largely because of 
the additional risks involved, and the interest in seeing what one has caught, 
that there is a special spice and flavor about taking them. Similarly it is said 
to be pleasant, if one has the time and patience, first to their horror and then 
to their joy, training them to the collar.
You cannot put me out into the street! had cried the free woman. I can, he 
informed her soberly. I am a free woman of Vonda, she said, a member of the 
Confederation. I am an innkeeper, said he. My politics are those of the 
ledger and silver.
I had sipped the sul porridge while listening to this conversation.
There are various reasons why Gorean men, upon occassion resort to masks. 
Oneander had worn a mask as had others in the loot camp because of his fear of 
the anger of the men of Ar, concerning his trading venture with Larak and 
doubtless, because of his shame at his failure in that venture. Several men in 
the main room of the inn wore masks now presumable to conceal their identity for 
various reasons.
end of page 42
Times were troubled. It might not well serve their purposes to be recognized, as 
perhpas men of wealth or position, now in diffiuclt straits. Some might have 
been seized or held for ransom. Others perhaps shamed by the fall of Vonda orthe 
necessity for their flight from the city, did not iwsh to be recognized in Lara. 
Maskes too are sometimes worn by men in disgrace, or who wish to travel 
incognito. I recalled the Lady Florence. Dougtless the young men of Vonda and 
the estates aout Vonda who would attend her secret auction might wear masks. She 
might now know who had purchased her until she knelt his slave, before him, at 
the foot of his couch. I wore a mask because I had not wished to be recognized 
in Lara. In Lara there were many refugees from Vonda and its vicinity. Some 
might hae watched me in the stable bouts. I did not think my tasks would be 
either expedited or facilitated by being recognized as a former fightling slave. 
Now, however, for an independent reason, I was pleased to have worn the mask.
Sometimes, incidentally, free young men wear masks and capture a free woman, 
taking away her clothing and forcing her to perform as a slave for them. Sheis 
then commonly released. Afterwards, of course, in meeting them, she does not 
know for which of them, if any of them, she was forced to perform as a slave. 
Such a woman commonly begins to take risks inappropriate for a free woman. She 
is, sooner or later, caught and enslaved. She is then, as she has wished, sold, 
and will truly wear the collar. Perhaps one of the yound men will buy her and 
keep her as his own.
I am a free woman! the woman at the counter cried. That condition, said the 
inkeepr, could prove temperary. I have nowhere to go, she said. I am safe 
here. River pirates may still be within the city. It is not safe for me to be 
put out. You owe me a silver tarsk. said he, for your last nights lodging. 
Too, if you would stay here this night, you must payme another tarsk. I do not 
have them, she wept. Then you must be ejected, said he. Take my baggage, 
she said, my trunks. I do not want them, he said.
end of page 43
It was my plan to arrange transportation downriver in the moring. My business 
lay not in Lara but further west on the river. Many refugees, incidentally, had 
not remained in Lara. It was to close for them to the war zone. It lay well 
within the striing distance of a tarn cavalry, such as that which had been 
employed so devastatingly on the fields and hills south of Vonda. Several shipsk 
coming and going, made their trips between Lara and the nearer downriver towns, 
such as White Water and Tancreds Landing.
You cannot put me out into the street! she cried.
Strobius, the innkeeper, then, in irritation motioned to one of his assistants. 
The fellow came up behind the free woman and took her by the upper arms, holding 
her from behind. She was helpless.
Eject her, said Strobius. You cannot put me out into the street! she cried. 
Rejoice, said Strobius, that I do not strip you and sell you into slavery.
What is going on here? I had asked, rising to my feet and going to the 
counter. We are putting her out,  said Strobius. She ows me money. She cannot 
pay, But she is a free woman, I said. She cannot pay, he said. What does 
she owe? I asked. A silver tarsk for last night, he said, and if she would 
stay here this night, another tarsk and in advance.
I believe this is the proper sum, I said. I placed two silver tarsks on the 
counter. Indeed it is, said Strobius. He swept the coins from the counter into 
his hand and put them in his apron. There is your money, Fellow, said the free 
woman to Strobius, haughtily, as haughtily as she could manage, still the 
helpless prisoner of his assistants grip. Yes, Lady, said he, bowing 
deferentially to her. Perhaps now, she said squirming in the assistants grip, 
you will have this ruffian unhand me.
He regarded her. She suddered. Her Home Stone was not that of Lara, times were 
troubled,, and Strobius was master in his own inn. Too, she had for a time owed 
him money. Would he like to see her stripped and collared?
end of page 44
Please kind sir, she said. Gorean men are sometimes slow to release their grip 
on the bodies of females. They enjoy holding them. They are men.
Of course, Lady, said Strobius smiling, again bowing. He then signaled the 
fellow to release the woman, which he did. She then drew back angrily and 
smoothed down her garments. Then straightening herself, she cam regally to where 
I stood.
My thanks, Sir, she said looking up at me.It is nothing, I said. I am 
grateful, she said. Perhaps you would care to join me at my table, I 
suggested. There is little but sul porridge but I could order you a bowl, I 
said.
One must make do in trying circumstances, she said, with what there is. Do 
you have any wine? I asked Strobius. He smiled. Yes, he said.
Would you care for some wine? I asked her.
Her eyes glistened over her veil. It had been some days, I gathered since she 
had been able to afford or had had wine. Yes, she said, it would give me 
great pleasure to drink your wine. Please go to the table, I said, indicating 
the table. and I will made the arrangements. Very well, she said and turned 
away going to the table.
Sul porridge, said Strobius, is ten copper tarsks. I will charge you forty 
copper tarsks for the wine, two cups. Very well, I said.
In a few moments he had had fellow bring a tray with the sul porridge and two 
cups of wine to the counter. I paid him. Oh, by the way, I asked, do you have 
a packet of Tassa powder? He grinned and reached under the counter. Yes, he 
said handing it to me. How much do I owe you for this? I asked. For that 
one, he said, it is free. Take it with the compliments of the house. Very 
well, I said.
The girl turned uneasily on the mat. She was then again on her side.
end of page 45
Her legs were again drawn up. She moaned. I saw the small fingers of her right 
hand touch the mat. Her fingertips were soft against the rough tibers. On her 
legs, where she had lain, there were markings from the mat.
I saved a part of the crust of bread I ws eating. She moved uneasily and made a 
small noise. She must not sense that it was morning.
I looked about myself. The inn was deserted. It bore the signs of having been 
hastily evacuated. Tarnsmen of Ar, the rumors had had it, were soon to be 
aflight toward Lara. The evacuation of the inn had been a portion of the 
evacuation of the entire city. Outside the streets were empty and quiet. There 
were few persons, I conjectured, now left in Lara. There were of course the girl 
and myself.
She rolled onto her belly on the mat. She lay there, the left side of her face 
against the map, her small hands at the sides of her head. I watched her. I saw 
her small fingers move slightly, and her fingertips touch the fibers of the mat.
Then, suddenly, I saw her fingerstips press down on the mat, and then, suddenly, 
her fingernails, frightened, dug at it. Her entire body stiffened.
You are awake, I observed. What is this on which I find myself? she asked, 
frightened. Is it not obvious? I asked. It is a slave mat. Where am I? she 
asked, lifting her head.
In the main room of the inn of Strobius, I said, in the city of Lara. She 
rose to her hands and knees. I noticed that her breasts were lovely, inside the 
rag that she wore. What happened? she asked.
You were drugged, I told her. She shook her head. She looked at me. I did not 
think she could yet well focus on me. You should not have drunk my wine, I 
told her. Where are my clothes? she asked. I discarded, burned or destroyed 
your luggage and your things, I said, with the exception of what you now wear, 
a Ta-Teer and a collar.
end of page 46
I am collared, she whispered, disbelievingly. She tried the steel. It is 
locked, I assured her. I saw her hand, subtly,, furtively, touch the side of 
her Ta-Teera. The key is no longer there, I informed her. Too, I have ripped 
away and discarded the tiny pocket which you had sewn there. Girls are not 
permitted to carry things in their Ta-Teera. Surely you know that.
Where is the key, she whispered. I threw it away, I told her. She shook her 
head. I remember you, she said. You paid for my lodging. You gave me wine. 
Yes, I said. It was drugged, she said. Of course, I said.
Give me the key to this collar! she cried, suddenly. She sprang to her feet, 
her hands pulling at the collar. Do not leave the slave mat. I cautioned her. 
I threw the key away, I reminded her.
Threw it away? she said. Yes, I said. But it is a real collar, she said, 
I cannot remove it. No, I said, It has not been designed to be removed by a 
girl. She looked at me with horror. Do not leave the mat, I told her.
She stepped back more on the mat. Kneel down, I suggested. She knelft, her 
knees pressed closely together. I found both the Ta-Teera and the collar amoung 
your belongings, I told her. Surely they are unusual obects to be found among 
the belongings of a free woman. She said nothing. Perhaps you are an escaped 
slave, I said. No! she cried. I am not a slave! I am not branded!
Reveal your thigh to me, I said, that I may see whether or not you are 
branded. No! she said. Then she said angrily, You put me in the Ta-Teera. 
You know well I am not branded. That is true, I smiled.
end of page 47
Why are you doing this to me? she asked. Who are you? Is this some bizarre 
joke? No, I said, It is not a joke. She turned white. Let me go, she said.
Are you hungry? I asked. Yes, terribly, she said, uncertainly. I threw her 
what was left of the crust of bread. It stuck the slave mat before her. She 
reached for it. Do not use your hands, I told her. I am a free woman, she 
said. Eat, I told her.
She ate as I had instructed her not using her hands. I then placed a pan of 
water within her reach. Drink I told her. She then drank as she had eaten not 
using her hands. I then removed the pan of water from her, threw out the water 
that had been left and put the pan aside. I then again returned to my place and 
sat down, cross-legged, behind the small table. She looked at me. I did not 
think she was displeased to have eaten and drunk.
What do you want of me? she asked. Who are you?
Spread your knees, I told her. Angrily, she did so. How is it, I asked, 
that a free woman should have among her belongings such unusual articles as a 
Ta-Teera and a collar? I have been associated, she said, with female slaves 
of the house of Tima. I have occasionally used such articles in my work. I 
see, I said. Do I know you? she asked. Do you? I asked. You are masked, 
she said. You have me at a disadvantage.
It is true that you are well exposed before me, I said. She reddened. Do you 
know me from somewhere? she asked. Yes, I said.
end of page 48
From where? she asked. Vonda, I sid. She shrugged, angrily. You could be 
any one of a thousand men, she said. But I am not, I said.
No, she said, I suppose not.
Come over here, i said, and lie down on the table on your back before me. 
She did so. What are you going to do with me? she asked. You will learn, I 
said. The table was low and sturdy. Obviously you intend to treat me as a 
slave, she said. Perhaps, I said. I see you have prepared lengths of robe, 
she said. Yes, I said.
Then slowly, not hurrying. I bagn to tie her down across the table. I began with 
her left wrist, fastening it over her head and behind her to one of the short 
legs of the table.
Where are the others? she asked. The ciy has been evacuated, I said. Why? 
she asked. It was feared there would be an attack of tarnsmen from Ar, i said.
I then jerked tight the rope pulling her right wrist over her head and behind 
her. I secured it in place. I thrust up the Ta-Teera, that I might spread her 
legs.
Did you truly throw away the key to the collar? she asked. Yes, I said. 
Then you must help me to get out of it soon, she said, perhaps with tools. 
Why? I asked. I fastened down her left leg.
Surely you have read it? she asked. Such collars usually bear a legend. 
Usually the legend identifies the master, that the slave, if fled, or lost, or 
strayed, may be promply returned. No, I said. I cannot read Gorean. Does it 
tell who your master is? I asked.
No! she said. Oh! she cried as I pulled her right ankle to the right corner 
of the table and there with two loops of the slim coarse rope, tired it down.
I then jerked apart the Ta-Teera, that she be well revealed to me.
end of page 49
She gasped. She squirmed and trembled. I then stood up and looked down upon her, 
observing my handiwork. She pulled at the ropes and knew herself helpless. She 
looked up at me. You have taken me boldly, she said. I said nothing.
She pulled again at the ropes. then she lay back helpless. You have tied me 
well, she said. I shrugged. I suppose now, she said,you wil wish me to 
address you as Master As you wish, I said. It does not matter.
Tied as I am, she asid, it seems to me not unfitting that I should call you 
Master I said nothing. I request permission to do so, she said. It is 
granted, I said. What does you collar say? I asked.
Suddenly she reared in the ropes. You must help me to remove it! she said. 
What does it say? I asked. It says, I am the slave girl, Darlene, she 
said. It is an Earth-girl name. I said. Precisely, she said, You can well 
imagine what might be done with me if I were caught in such a collar. Men might 
think that I was an Earth girl or one of those girls like an Earth girl and was 
given this name!
I smiled.
Surely you understand my fears, she said. Of course, I said. I used to 
train Earth girls, she said. I know how men look upon them. I nodded. Gorean 
men were not gentle with Earth girls. They regarded them as natural slaves and 
treated them accordingly, fully. Some of the most abject slaveries on Gor were 
assigned to Earth girls.
So you will helmp me out of this collar as soon as possible will you not? she 
asked. I will if it pleases me, I said. She lay back. I am in your ropes, 
she shrugged. I crouched then beside her. You know me dont you? she said. 
Yes, I said
end of page 50
You heard my name about the Inn, she said. Yes, I said, but even aside from 
that I would have know you. Even veiled? she asked. Yes, I said.
She pulled at the ropes. You have then, she said,  a shrewd eye for the flesh 
of women. Perhaps, i said. Do you truly know me? she asked. Yes, I said. 
What is my name? she asked. You are the Lady Tima of Vonda, a slaver of that 
city, of the house of Tima.
Who are you? she asked frightened. Do you not recall me? I asked. I was 
once a silk slave. My name is Jason.
Slowly recognition crept into her eyes. No, she whispered. No! Then 
struggling wildly, she tore at the ropes. No, she screamed. No! Then again 
she lay before me, tied as helplessly and perfectly as before. No, she 
whispered. No, no. Yes, I whispered to her. Yes.
The Lady Tina now lay on the slave mat where I had put her later in the moring.
You will help me get this hated collar off, wont you? she purred, lifting her 
arms and putting them about my neck, lifting her lips to mine. Does Darlene beg 
it? I asked. Darlene! she said, lying back angrily. Is that not the name on 
the collar? I asked. Yes, she said, it is.
Does Darlene beg it? I asked. Yes, she purred again, lifting her arms and 
putting them about my neck. Yes, she whispered. Darlene begs it. Then we 
kissed. The request of Darlene is refused. I told her.
Angrily she scrambled to her knees and pulled at the collar. She looked at me in 
fury. You sleen! she said.
end of page 51
I smiled. Sleen! Sleen! she said. The Ta-Teera had been half torn from her. 
She had squirmed well. Sleen!, Sleen! she wept. She was soft and luscious and 
cured. It ws easy to see why men make women slaves. Be silent! I said to her 
suddenly. She looked at me, frightened.
Do not leave the mat, I told her, getting up. I want to one of the narrow, 
barred windows in the inn. I saw five armed men running down the street.
River pirates, I said. I think they must be. She moaned and foolishly tried 
to cover her beauty. I looked back at her. Do you think the would permit you 
modesty in their shackles? I asked. Then I returned to her side. They are not 
coming here, I said. I think they have decided it is time to leae Lara. 
Why? she asked. Yet, I do not smell smoke. I said. It is interesting.
What is going on? she asked. Can you not guess? I asked. No, she said, 
No. I then took her by the arms and threw her to her back on the slave mat 
beneath me. My dear Lady Tendite or Darlene as I may choose to call you, I 
said. I do not htink we have a great deal more time to tarry in this place.
What do you mean? she asked. And you must leave it somewhat earlier than I, 
I said. I do not understand, she said. Oh, she said, entered and held. She 
tried to press me away but could not do so. Then she clutched at me. Excellent 
Darlene, I said. What are you making me do? she whispered. Can you not 
guess? I asked her.
You have won, Jason, she whispered to me, lying on her side beside me, her 
head on her arm. You have made me yield to you, irreservedly, helplessly and as 
a slave.
As a free woman, I said, you cannot yet begin to understand the fullness, the 
helplessness, of true slave yielding.
end of page 52
I sense what they might be, she whispered, being fully owned, begin fully and 
legally at the mercy of a master. Do the thoughts intrigue you? I asked.
I must put them from my mind, she said. I must not even dare to think them. 
Why? I asked. they are too profoundly feminine, she said. And thus not fit 
for a proud free woman? she said. Yes, she said. But suitable perhaps for a 
collared slave? I said. Yes, she smiled, Such a woman is permitted to be 
true to herself.
I suspect, I said, she is given no choice but to be true to herself. Yes, 
said the girl. She is given no choice. She must be true to herself. If she 
should be reluctant the master and the whip will see to it.
You seem to speak enviously of the miserable women in bondage. Perhaps, she 
said. You yourself wear a collar. I said. But I am a free woman, she said. 
For the time, perhaps, I said. What do you mean? she said.
Get up, I told her. We got up. She faced me. You are not going to help me get 
the collar off are you? she asked. She touched me about the shoulder with her 
finger. No, I said. You fill me with strange feelings, Jason, she siad. 
Oh? I asked. I am accustomed, she said, to have men do what I wish. I 
suggest Lady Tendite, I said, that you begin to accustom yourself to doing 
what men wish.
What are you doing? she asked. I had heard men neaarby, the sound of weapons. 
I dragged her toward the door of the inn. I slid back the panel and looked out. 
The street, as far as I could tell, was clear. I then shut the panel and swung 
up the heavy bars on the door. I opened the door and looked out.
end of page 53
The street was clear. I held the Lady Tendite firmly by her left upper arm. She 
was barefoot in the torn Ta-Teera and collar. I then flung her down the wide, 
shallow steps and some 15 feet into the street beyond. She fell to her hands and 
knees in the street, and suddenly scrambled up, wildly, looking about herself. I 
then shut the door, dropping the two heavy beams into place. She ran to the door 
and began to pound on it. Let me in! she cried. Let me in!
Within the inn I left the main room and went up to the second floor where, from 
one of the rooms windows I might command a better view of the street. I could 
still hear her pounding on the door below. Let me in Jason! she sobbed. Let 
me in! Again and again she struck with her small fists against the door. I 
will be your slave, Master! she cried. Have mercy on me, Master! Please have 
mercy on me, Master!
Then from the window, I saw her run to the center of the street. She turned from 
the left to the right, uncertainly. She was sobbing. Hold Slave! I heard. Men 
had entered the street. I saw they wore, as I had thought, the uniforms of Ar.
The girl turned wildly in the street and started to run from the men. But she 
had gone only a step or two when she saw some five other men at the end of the 
street, also approaching her. She stopped, uncertainly, confused, in the street. 
The men, not hurrying, then surrounded her.
I am not what I seem! she cried. I am not a slave! One of the men seized her 
by the hair and ben back her head. Her name is Darlene, he said. No! she 
said. I am the LadyTendite, a free woman of Vonda! One of the men then was 
drwing her hands behind her back. He snapped her wrists in slave braclets. Im 
not a slave! she said. Darlene is an excellent slave name, said one of the 
men. I am hot for her already. Wait until we have her in the camp, said 
their leader. A nice catch, said another. Another man was snapping a leash on 
her collar. Are you an Earth wench? asked one of the men. No, she said, 
No! Nonetheless, I wager you will whip as well, said another.
end of page 54
I am not a slave! See, she cried, moving her hip to throw back the shreds of 
the ripped Ta-Teera, I am not branded! Only a slave would so expose her hip 
to free men, said one of the men. She is not branded, observed another. That 
technicality can be swiftly remedied by a metal worker. said one of the men.
Why are you not branded, Darlene? asked a man. I am not a slave! she said. 
And my name if not Darelen! You speak much, Darlene, she was told. Bring 
her along, said the leader. We must finish our patrol.
The Lady Tendite felt the leash grow taut at her collar. She hung back. I am 
not a slave, she said. My name if not Darlene. I am the Lady Tendrite of 
Vonda! Do all the women of Vonda run about the streets half naked, clad in the 
rag of a slave, waring collars? asked the leader. No, she said, of course 
not. I was caught and abused, tied even upon a table and forced to give pleasure 
as a slave. Other things too were done to me. I was forced, even, to yield to my 
captor, as though I might have been a slave and he my master. Splendid, 
laughed one of the men. She glared angrily at the fellow. I bet I, toon can 
make her yield, said one of the men.
Later at the camp, said the leader. Then he gain turned his attention to the 
Lady of Tendite. He bowed low befor her, in mock courtesy. I invite you, if you 
wish Lady Tendite, to accompany us, he said. We shall be returning to our loot 
camp shortly, which is east of Vonda. There you will discover that the women of 
Vonda are not entirely unknown to us. Many of them have already kindly consented 
to give us their thighs for branding, their throats for collaring. We trust you 
will be no less generous. She will look well on the slave block, said one of 
the man. True, said another. And Lady Tendite, said the leader, until you 
are properly and legally enslaved, you will be known by the capture name of 
Darlene. Say it! he snapped.
end of page 55
Darlene! she cried. My capture name if Darlene. And, said the leader. in 
virtue of your collar, and in anticipation of your impending enslaement, you 
will address us and behave toward us as a slave toward free men.
Yes, she said. Then she was struck acorss the back with the haft of a spear, 
cruelly. Yes, Master! she cried.
The patrol then continued on its way. I watched the Lady Tendite, her hands 
braceleted behind her on her lesash dragged behind the men. She turnedonce, 
after about 20 yards to look back. She saw me. Then she was turned about by the 
leash and was again dragged, stumbling, down the street.
end of page 56
5      I Continue My Search for Miss Beverly Henderson
The proprietor of the tavern took the red-haired dancing girl by the arm, she 
crying out, and thrust her in her costume, ten slender silver chains, five 
before and five behind, depending from her collar from the sand. She fell at the 
side of the sand and crouching turned about, looking back.
This is Jason! called the proprietor, indicating me. He wagers ten copper 
tarks he can best any man in the house. It is true, I called stepping to the 
sand, pulling off the tunic. I wager he cannot! called a large fellow, a 
peasant from north of the river.
The proprietors man, an attendant in the tavern held the coins. Bets were taken 
by the fellows in the tavern. Men crowded about. Among them, naked, in collars, 
were paga slaves with their bronze vessels on leather straps.
The big fellow lunged toward me. I let him strike me. Yet I drew back with his 
punch in such a way that its impact was largely dissipated. I reaced, however, 
as though I might have been sorely struck. The men cried out with pleasure. 
Jabbing, moving, I kept him away from me.
He fights well, said one of the men.
I then, recovering myself, seized the fellow, that he might not have the free 
use of his hands. It was not appropriate that I appear too accustomed to this 
form of sport.
end of page 57
I had made that mistake once before, in Tancreds Landing and there had then 
been no more eager respondents to my raucous challenge. Rather guardsmen had 
encoured me to leave the town with alacrity. I had as a consquence only picked 
up ten copper tarks at Tancreds Landing.
Fight! cried more than one man. Clumsy! cried another. Coward! cried 
another. Coward! said the peasant. This irritated me. I relinquished my 
previous determinations with respect to the manner of handling him. Caught in a 
swift combination he buckled to the sand. I pretened that I was exhausted, 
dazed, scarcely able to stand.
What lucky blows, cried more than one man. I looked down at the big fellow 
who, groggy, was sitting in the sand. I tried to appear as though incredulous 
that he was down, as though i could not believe that I had somehow struck him 
from his feet.
Get up! cried more than one man. By the arms he was pulled to the side. Ten 
tars, cried antoher peasant,that I can best you!
Can you fight further, Jason? anxiously asked the proprietor. Such brawls, 
supervised, were good for the busines of his tavern. I will try, I said.
The second fellow, tearing off his tunic, rushed to the sand and then, scarcely 
hesitating, rushed upon me. fists pummeliing. I think he was started that he 
managed to strike home so seldom. Soon his arms were sore. I carried him longer 
than the first fellow. Then, when some interest seemed to lag inthe contest, I 
finished it. He was dragged by his heels from the sand.
I do not see how one so clumsy and who fights so poorly can win so often, said 
a fellow near the sand. He has not yet met Haskoon, said someone confidently. 
I am Haskoon, said a bargeman stepping to the sane. Haskoon carried his hands 
too high. The next fellow, after Haskoon, was more of a wrestler than one who 
fights with the fists. But I did not break his back.
The fifth fellow was an oarsman a grain galley. He was strong but like the 
others was not trained.
end of page 58
That his jaw was broken was an accident. Jason is surely now exhausted, said 
the proprietor cheerily. Who will next step upon the sand? But none more, as I 
had expected, ventured forth to meet me.
I lifed my hands and then drew on my tunic. I was not breathing heavily.I was in 
a good mood. I bought paga for the five fellows who had helped me earn passage 
money downriver to the next town. This seems to assuage their disgruntlement. My 
financial resources, the ten silver tarsks, obtained from the sale of my former 
Mistres, the Lady Florence of Vonda, to the slave, Tenalion of Ar had been 
severly depleated. Normally such a sum would last a man months on Gor. In these 
times, however, given my requirments and the prices, particularly those in Lar, 
I had been forced to have recourse to alternative sources of income.
You are no common brawler, said the first fellow to me, the large peasant. Do 
not speak it too loudly, I begged of him Very well, he said. I have not felt 
like this, said one of the other fellows, since I was trampled by five bosk. 
I am
grateful to you all, I assured them.
Slave girls rowed about me to pour my paga. The collars were lovely on their 
throats.
The proprietor approached our table and I sto up, holding my goblet of paga to 
welcome him. You fought well, Jacon, he said. Thank you, I said. I looked 
down. Kneeling at my right knee, her cheek against my knee, was the red-haired 
dancing girl. She looked up at me timidly, her eyes shining. As she knelt the 
slender chains at her collar depended to the polished floor. you fought well, 
Jason, said the proprietor. She is yours for the night. Use her for your 
pleasure. My thanks, Kind Sir,  I said. I lifted the paga which I held, 
saluting the proprietor and too those at the table. My thanks to you all, I 
said. Felicitations were exchanged. I then transferred the paga to my left hand. 
I then snapped my fingers and held my right hand open at my hips. Swiftly the 
girl rose to her feet and half crouching, put her head by my hand. I fastened 
the fingers of my hand deeply and firmly in her red hair. She winced and kissed 
at my thigh. I then, the goblet of paga in my left hand, her hair in my right, 
dragged her beside me, her slender chains rustling, to the nearest empty alcove.
end of page 59
6      I Hear of the Markets of Victoria; I will Travel There
Women are almost always auctioned naked. That way a man can see what he is 
buying. I turned away from the block in the barnlike structure in Fina, one of 
the many towns on the Vosk. I heard the auctioneers calls fading behind me. I 
thought he wold get a good price for the pretty brunette. She was one of the 
last items of the evening. Before she had been dragged to the surface of the 
black, I had examined the remaning girls in the ready cage. She whom I sought 
was not among them.
Outside the barnlike structure I was stopped by tow guardsmen. You are Jason, 
the brawler? asked one. I am Jason, I admitted. You will leave Fina by 
tonight, advised the guardsman. Very well, I said.
It had been my intention, anyway, to leave Fina before moring. This had not been 
the first time, incidentally, that guardsmen had suggested that I leave a town. 
It had happend once before at Tancreds Lansing.
Several days ago I had departed from Lara. The troops from Ar, tarnsmen, had not 
burned Lara. Inded, perhaps surprisinigly , they had done little but clear the 
town of river pirates and, here and there gather in a bit of loot and some 
women, mostly female refugees from Vonda who fell into their hands. Their 
action, however, the strike to Lara, had caused considerable consternation among 
the forces of Lara, marching toward Vonda.
end of page 60
Things, in this sense, had worked out well for the men of Ar, for the troops of 
Lara had, in consternation, hesitated in their march northward. They were not, 
hhus, involved in the action which took place shortly afterward northeast of 
Vonda. In this action, however, the forces of Port Olni had been, unexpectedly 
abetted by troops from Ti under the command of Thandar of Ti, one of the sons of 
Ebullius Gaius Cassius. The battle had been shart but indecisive. At nightfall 
of the second day both armies had withdrawn from the field. Ars committed 
infantry had been outnumnbered byt its mobility and its support of their tarn 
cavalry had compensated to some extent for its lack of weight as a striking 
force. Thander of Ti, interestingly, had not challenged Ar in the skies, but had 
deployed the mercenaries of Artemidorus of Cos in actions against Ars supply 
lines.
Eventually, after several days of uneasy encampments, the haruspexes of Port 
Olni, Ti an dAr, meeting on a truce ground, had determined by taking the 
auspices, read from the liver and entrails of slaughtered verr, that is was 
propritious for both armes to withdraw. In this sense, no honor, on either side 
was sacrified. The readings on these auspices had been challenged only by 
haruspexes of Vonda and cos. It was generally understood, or felt that neither 
the Salerian Confederation nor the city of Ar desired a full-scale conflict. 
Vonda, it was clearly understood, conspiring iwht Cos, had initiated 
hostilities. In burning and sacking Vonda, Ar had, for most practical purposed, 
satisfied its sense of militry propriety. Similarly, in stopping the advance of 
the troops of Ar, the Salerian Cnfederation could feel that it had maintained 
its own respect.
The trarnsmen of Artemidorus, incidentally, had not molesteed the slave wagons 
moving soutward. The drivers of these wagons, with their escorts, ahd only 
thrown back the canvas to reveal tha they carrried chained women. The tarnsmen 
of Artemidorus, then, had flow past, overhead, heedless of the uplifted hands 
and cries of the woman. There is a general Gorean feeling that if a woman has 
fallen slave, she may remain a slave. The women were then silenced with whips.
I think there is little doubt that the cessation of hostilties in the north was 
in no little art a function of the generosity of the men of Ar, a not impolitic 
generosity in my opnion, in sparing Lara the fate of Vonda.
end of page 61
They had demonstrated that the could have destroyed Lara, but they had not seen 
fit to do so. This was taken as an expression of disinterest on the part of Ar 
in all out warfare with the Salerian Confeeration. Also, of course in the 
future, this action might tend to divide the confederation in its feelings 
toward Ar. When it had become clear, incidentally , that Ar had for most 
practical purposes, spared Lara, the troops of Lara, not bothering to join with 
those of Port Olni and Ti, had returned to their city. There would now be 
sentiment in Lara favoring Ar. This would give Ar political leverae at the 
confluence of the Olni and Bosk, a strtegic point if Cos should ever choose to 
move in force eastward along the Vosk. Lara was the pivot between the Salerian 
Confederation and the Vosk towns.
Hurry! called the guardsman. I lifted my hand, acknowledging that I had heard 
him and continued my pace toward the wharves of Fina.
For several weeks, I had moved from one river town to the next, examining slave 
markets and attempting to obtain information on the whereabouts of the pirate, 
Kliomenes. Understandably I encountered few willing informants. Many people, I 
was sure knew more of this fellow then they admitted. His name, and that of his 
captain, Policrates, were apparently feared on the river. These river pirates 
were not, it must be understood, a few scattered crews of cutthroats. Various 
bands had their own strongholds and ships. It was not unusual that a single 
captain had as many as three or four hundred men and eight to ten ships. 
Similarly there were relationships among these bands, division of territory and 
alliances. They were a power on the river.
I had gone from Lara to White Water using the barge canal, to circumvent the 
rapids, and fron thence to Tancreds Lansing. I had later voyaged down reiver to 
Iskander, Forestport, and Ars Station. Ars Station incidentially is near the 
site where there was a gathering, several years ago, of the horde of Pa-Kur, of 
the Caste of Assassians, who was leading an alliance of twelve cities, augmented 
by mercenaries and assassins, against the city of Ar. This war is celebrated, 
incidentially, in the Gorean fashion, in several songs. Perhaps most famous 
among them are the songs of Tarl of Bristol.
end of page 62
The action is reputed to have taken place in 10,110 C.A., Contasta Ar, from the 
Founding of Ar. It was now, in that chronology, the year 10,127. Ars Station, 
incidentally, did not exist at the time of the massing of the horde of Pa-Kur. 
It was established four years afterward, as an outpost and trading station on 
the south bank of the Vosk. It also commands, in effect, the northern terminus 
of one of the great roads, the Viktel Aria, or Ars Triumph, leading toward Ar. 
This is also the raod popularly known as the Vosk Road, particularly by those 
viewing it from a riverward direection. West of Ars Station on the river I had 
visited Jorts Ferry, Point Alfred, Jasmine, Siba, Sais, and Sulport. I had 
stopped also at Hammerfest and Ragnars Hamlet, the latter actually, now, a 
good-sized town. Its growth might be contrasted with that of Tetrapoli, much 
further west on the river. Ragnars Hamlet began as a small village and, from 
this central nucleus, expanded. Tetrapoli, on the other hand, began as four 
separate towns, Ri, Teibar, Heiban and Azdal, as legend has it founded by four 
brothers. These towns grew together along the river and were eventaully 
consolidated as a polity. The four districts of the city, as might be supposed, 
reatin the names of the original towns. The expression Tetrapoli in Gorean, 
incidentally, means Four Cities or  Four Towns.
I made my way now towrd the quays of Fina. Here and there men passed me. I was 
then near the water-front district. I stpped aside as a string of chained girls 
stripped to the vaist, was herded past me. The were being taken to one of th 
stout log warehouses, whose doors were marked with the Kajira sign to be held 
for sale. They were sullen in their chains. Some of them looked at me, wondering 
perhaps if a man such as myself would buy them. The log warehouses for slaves 
are commonly doubled-walled and the girls are kept stripped within them, and 
commonly wear ankle chains, except when the guards wish otherwise. Escapte, for 
all practical ppurposes, is a statistical impossibility for the Gorean slave 
girl. Too, the penalties even for attempted escape are often severe. 
Hamstringing is not uncommon. The hope of the Gorean slave girl is not escape, 
but to please her Master. I inspected the girls as they passed me. She whom I 
sought was not among them.
Passage, Master? inquired a fellow. I would deal with others, I told him.
end of page 63
We are cheap, he called. Cheap! Thank you, I said to him, and continued 
on. I had discovered in various towns that I was likely to get the best fares at 
the quays themselves.
On the way down to the river, I passed four of the big warehouses whose doors 
were marked with the kajira sigh. I saw tiny barred windows high in their outer 
walls. During daylight hours a small amount of light can filter through such a 
window and then fall through a matching, somewhat lower winder, to the interior 
of the holding area. There are similar apertures, too, sometimes in the roofs of 
such structures. In some of the warehouses, incidentally, those which seem to be 
but one story high, the logged holding areas are substantially underground, as 
though in a log-walled, sunken room. Windows are commondly small and from eight 
to ten feet above a girls head. The light in such a structure is as besst dim. 
The floor areas are commonly wood excpet for a central strip of dirt some twenty 
feet wide. This is primarily for drainage. A network of welded iron bars, set an 
inch or two beneath the surface, unlerlies the planking of the floor and the 
surface of the dirt. Straw is scattered at the edges of the room, on the wood. 
In the log walls, at various heights, but usually less then a yeard from the 
floor, there occur slave rings. The ground level is commonly reached by 
ascending a dirt ramp. Such places, as one might suppose, are usually 
characterized by the smells of held slaves. Eat! I heard a man say, from 
withint one of those structures. Then I heard the lash of a whip and a girls 
cry of pain. Yes, Master! she cried. Yes, Master!
I continued toward the quays. Sometimes I almost dispaired of finding Miss 
Beverly Henderson. How could one hope to find one girl among thousands, even 
tens of thousands, scattered throughout the cities and towns, the fields and 
villages of Gor. Too if she had been transported by caravan or tarn she might, 
by now, be almost anyware. Yet I was determined to continue my search. I had two 
things clearly in my favor I knew she had been taken recently, and by Kliomenes, 
the pirate. My search was thus far from hopeless. I had little doubt but what I 
might find Miss Henderson, if I could but find it what market or markets, 
Kliomenes would see fit to dispose of his most recent prizes.
end of page 64
You there fellow, said a captain, at the quays, You seem strong. Look you for 
work? I am intending to go downriver, I said. We are bound for Tafa, he 
said. We are short an oarsman.
The next towns west on the river were Victoria and Tafa. West of Tafa was Por 
Cos, which had been founded by settlers from Cos over a century ago. The major 
towns west of Por Cos, discounting minor towns were Tetrapoli, Ven and Turmus. 
Ven at the junction of the Ta-Thassa Cartius and the Vosk, and Turmus, at the 
eastern end of the Vosks great delta, the last town on the river itself.
I would go to Victoria, I said. That was the next town west on the river. You 
are an honest fellow, are you not? asked the captain. I think so, reasonable 
so, I said warily, Why?
If you are an honest fellow, said the captain,why would you wish to go to 
Victoria? Surely there are honoest doings in Victoria, I said. I suppose 
so, said the captain.
Is it a dangerous place? I asked. You must be new on the river, he said. 
Yes, I said. Avoid Victoria, he said. Why? I asked.
Are you a slaver? he asked. No, I said. Then avoid Victoria, he said. 
Why? I asked. It is a den of thieves, he said.It is little more than a 
market and slave town.
There is an important slave market there? I asked. You can sometimes get 
cheap prices on luscious goods there, he said. Why are the prices sometimes so 
cheap? I asked. Girls who cost nothing can be sold cheaply, he said. The 
marketed girls are then primarily captures? I asked. Of course, he said. I 
do not understand, I said. It is well known on the river, he said. What is 
well known? I asked.
end of page 65
That Victoria is one of the major outlets for the merchandise of river 
pirates. I must go there, I said eagerly.
I am going to Tafa, he said. I will not put in at Victoria. Let me row for 
you to the vicinity of Victoria, I said. Then put me ashore. I wil find my way 
afoot into the town.
It will be useful to have another oarsman, he said, even as far as Victoria, 
and we wil have the current with us. Yes, I said. Perhaps, too, hesaid,  
we could pick up a new oarsman west of Victoria. Perhaps, I said. He looked 
at me. You need pay me nothing, I said. I will draw the oar for free. You 
are serious? he asked. Yes, I said. He grinned. We leave withing the Ahn, 
he said.
end of page 66
7      I Arrive in Victoria; I Hear of the Sales Barn of Lysander
What am I offered for this girl? called the auctioneer, What am I offered for 
this girl?
It was a blond-haired peasant girl, thick-ankled and sturdy, from south of the 
Vosk. She was being sold from a rough platform on the wharves of Victoria. She 
wore a chain collar. Two tarsk bits, came a call from the crowd.
I pressed through the throngs on the wharves. The wharves were crowded with 
goods and men. The masts of river galleys bristled at the quays. there was the 
smell of the river and fish. I have heard the topaz is being brought east, 
said a merchant, speaking to another merchant. It bodes not well for security 
on the river, said his fellow.
I thrust past them. Then drew back quickly. A brown sleen threw itself to the 
end of a short, heavy chain. It snarled. It bared its fags. Such a beast could 
take a leg from a man at the thigh with a single motion of those great jaws. 
Down Tavak said one of the merchants.
Hissing, the beast crouched down, its shoulder blades still prominent under its 
excited, half-lifted fur, its four hind legs still tensed beneath it. It seeemed 
to me not unlikely that is might, if it had such a will, tear loose from the 
very ring in the boards to which it was chained. I backed away. The merchants, 
paying me no more attention, continued their conversation.
end of page 67
Victoria has refused the tribute, one of them was saying. They think they can 
find no other markets, said the second man. That is foolish, said the first. 
They could take their business to Tafa, said the second. Or return it to 
Vicotria, once she is prperly chastened. said the first.
Indeed, said the first, they cannot permit Victoria this insolence. Her 
example might be followed by every small town on the river.
They will feel Victoria must be punished. said the second. Perhaps that is 
why the topaz is being brought east, said the first. It would be the first 
time in ten years, said the second.
Yet it is interesting, said the first, for I would not think they would truly 
need the topaz to subdue Victoria. They are strong enough without it, agreed 
the second.
Perhaps it is only a rumor that the topaz is being brought east, said the 
first. Let us hope so, said the second. If it is being brought east, said 
the first. I think it betokens more than the discipling of Victoria. I would 
fear so, agreed the second.
I then turned away and left the vicinity of the merchants. I had not understood 
their conversation. This morning before dawn, I had been put ashore some pasangs 
upriver. I had gone a pasang inland to avoid river tharlarion and proceeded, 
paralleling the river, toward Victoria. I had come to the town an Ahn ago.
Candies! Candies! called a veiled free woman. She carried candies on a tray, 
held about her neck by a broad strap. Hot meat! called another vendor. Hot 
meat!
Fresh vegetables here! called a woman. The milk of verr, the eggs of vulos! 
I heard call. Another merchant brushed past me. He was followed by a stately 
brunette in a brief tunic, collared, carrying a bundle on her head.
I stepped aside as a string of eight pesasants, with bundles of Sa-Tarna grain 
on their shoulders, made their way down toward the wharves.
end of page 68
Now that is what I call really hot meat, a man ws saying. I heard a woman 
gasping. I looke down. To one side, on her back on the boards, her knees drawn 
up, her left anle roped to her left wrist, her right ankle roped to her right 
wrist, there lay a slave girl. Please, Masers, whimpered the girl, looking up. 
Touch me Masters, A fat fellow sat on a small stool. He held a light chain, 
which was attached to her collar. She had been cruelly aroused, but not 
satisfied. Please Masters, she begged. A tarsk bit for her use, said the fat 
fellow. I looked down upon her. then I heard a tarsk bit thrown into the copper 
bowl beside her. A leather worker pushed past me, crouching beside the slave. 
Piteously she lifted her body to him.
Jewelry! I heard, Jewelry! Nearby there were four girls ina plank collar. 
This is formed from two boards into which matching semicircles have been cut. 
The two boards are connected and supported by five flat, slidining U-irons; when 
the U-irons are slid back, the collar is opened. When they are slid into palce, 
and the two leaves are bolted together, the collar is closed. Two hasps with 
staplesa, secured with padlocks, occur, too, at oppostive ends of the plants. 
These lock the collar. The four girls in the plan collar were kneeling, waiting 
for their master to conduct some business. he was of the peasants. They were 
nude. their hands were tied behind their backs.
When fleeing from the brigands, I advised seeking refuge in the peasant 
village, said one, I did not realize they would take us. Peasants are not 
too fond generally of free persons from the high cities, said one of them. We 
were not of their village, said another. Doubtless they will use the proceeds 
from our sale to supplement their income, said one of them. If they do not 
drink it up in the paga taverns first, said the second girl, bitterly. We are 
free women, said the first girl, struggling in the thongs. They cannot do this 
to us!
Think such thoughts while you man, said the fourth girl. We are soon to be 
branded slaves.
end of page 69
Look at that disgusting girl, said the second girl, indicating with her head 
the moaning, writhing slave with the leather worker. Yes, said the fourth 
girl. Can they make me do that? asked the second girl, frightened. They can 
make you do anything, my dear, said the fourth girl.
Jewelry! I heard, Jewelry!
I stepped away to one side and stoped before a blanket spread out on the boards. 
On the blanket,spread out, were dozens of pins and brooches, clasps and buckles, 
rings and necklaces, and bracelets and earrings, and bnagles and armlets and 
body chains. a pleasant-looking fellow in a woolen tunic sat cross-legged behind 
the blanket.
Buy jewelry here, said he. It is cheap and attractive. Bedeck your slves. 
See Master? asked a girl kneeling at his side, collared, nude, lifting her 
arms. She was almost covered with jewelry. About her throat alone there must 
have been twenty necklaces. She lifted the neckleaces causing them to rustle and 
shimmer, holding them forth to me in her small hands. Then she extended her 
right arm that I might see the armlets, bracelets, and rings which scarcely 
permitted her flesh to be seen.
Buys some for your slave, aid the man. here, said he, lifting a necklace 
from the blanket. This was tekn from a free woman, now scrubbing stones in the 
plaza of Iphicrates. I do not have a slave, I said. I will sell you this 
one, said he, indicating the display slave at his side, for a silver tarsk. 
Buy me Master, she laughed, I am pretty. I work hard. I can well please a man 
in the furs. It is true, smiled the fellow. Surely women can be purchased 
more cheaply in Victoria than a silver tarsk, I smiled. True, grinned the 
fellow. I saw that he had not wished truly to sell her.
You mentoned, I said, that htis necklace had been taken from a free women. 
By a pirate, he said. You speak of this openly, I observed. This is 
Victoria, said he.
end of page 70
May I inquire as to what rew it was of which that pirate was a member? I 
asked. Of that of Polyclitus, said he. There stronghold is near Turmus. 
Doubtless they also harry the trade routes circumventing the delta of the 
Vosk? I asked. Ocasionally, he said. Indeed, it was thre that they picked up 
this pretty little plum. He indicated the girl at his side. Would you believe 
that she was once the daughter of a rich merchant?
he asked. It seems incredible, I said. He has trained me well to the collar. 
she purred, kissing at his arm. It can be done with any woman, he said.
Are you familiar with a pirate named Klomenes? I asked. I hoped my voice did 
not betry undue interest. He is bad fellow, said the man. He is lieutenant to 
Policrates. Do yu know if he is now in Victoria? I asked. Yes, said the 
man. He has come to Victoria to sell goods and slaves.
where are these to be sold? I asked. The good have already been sold, said 
the man, at the merchant wharves. And the slaves?I asked. They are to be 
sold tonight, said he, at the sales barn of Lysander.
I shall take this body chain, I said to the man, indicating one of the body 
chains on the blanket. But I thought you had no slave? he asked. I would 
still like to thank you, somehow, I said. You have been very helpful. It is 
a tarsk bit. he said.
The loop of the body chain was some five feet in length. It was made to loop the 
throat of a woman several times, or, by alternative windings, to bedeck her body 
in a variety of fashions. The chain was not heavy, but too, it was not light. It 
had a solid heft in ones hand. It was closely meshed and strong. It could be 
used, if a man wished, and perfectly, for purposes of slave security. It was 
decorated sensuously with colorful wooden beats, semiprecious stones and bits of 
leather. Detachable, but not attached to the chain at one point were two sets of 
clips one of snap clips and one of lock clips.
end of page 71
It is by means of these clips that the chain can be transformed from a simple 
piece of slave jewelry into a sturdy and effective device of slave restraint.
I put down the tarsk bit, and the man took it, and slipped it into his pouch. 
Do not give that to a free woman, he grinned. It is pretty, I said. I 
wondered whyI had bought it. It was pretty surely. Perhaps that was why I had 
bought it.
When I was free, said the girl, I could not wear such things. They are not 
for free women, said the man. No, Master, she said quickly. But now, she 
said, I may, with my masters permission, make myself as beautiful and exciting 
as I can.
It is I who can decide what it is which you can wear, he said. Yes, Master, 
she smiled, and even if I am permitted to wear anything at all. And do not 
forget it. he said. No, Master, she said.
Tonight, I said, Kliomenes puts his wares upon the block at the sales barn of 
Lysander. Yes, said the man. I thank you, I said, and I wish you well.
I then took my way up a narrow street leading into Victoria. Good hunting in 
the slave market! called the man after me. Thank you, I said. I smiled to 
myself. Then I continued on my way, wondering why I had purchased so strange an 
item as a body chain, a form of jewelry obviously designed for the body of a 
female slave.
end of page 72
8      I Have a Close Call in the Tavern of Tasdron; I Hurry to the Sales Barn 
of Lysander
Are there any more challengers? I asked, wiping the sweat from my face with my 
forearm.
I had tallied my resources, prior to coming to the tavern of Tasdron, off the 
avenue of Lycurgus, and found them to amount to only seventy copper tarsks, 
including five tarsks which I had happily, and unexpectedly, received, the 
captain being a good fellow, for acting as an oarsman from Fina to the vicinity 
of Victoria. I did not know how much a slave might go for in the market of 
Lysander, but I wished to have enough to be confident that I could bid 
realistically and effectively on one item of merchandise, should it be offered 
to the public.
I spit down into the sand. I rubbed my hands on my thighs.
I had fought seven fellows, and finshed them off with a dispatch which, it 
seemed to me, might have pleased even Kenneth and Barus, my former mentors in 
such matters. I might have taken more time and enticed more challengers to face 
me but I wished to be at the market of Lysander when the bidding began. AS it 
was I was not displeased. I had managed to accumulate two silver tarsks and some 
sixteen copper tarsks.
end of page 73
In Victoria, I was confident I would encounter no guardsmen who, at the behest 
of honest folk, might encourage me to take my leave at an early convenience.
Are there any more challengers? I inquired. A silver tarsk, said a voice, 
not a pleasant one. I straightened up.
A fellow was now standing some fifty feet across the room. I had seen the table 
there earlier. About it had sat some seven or eight fellows, unshave, dour 
chaps. Several of them were scarred. Two wore earrings. More than one wore a 
hankerchief knotted about his head, in the manner of some oarsman, that there 
heads be protected from the sun. All were armed.
Kind Sirs, no! called out Tasdron, the taverns proprietor.There was a sudden 
sound, that of a short metal blade sliping from a sheath. A silver tarsk, said 
the fellow again, holding the drawn blade. Goreans, I knew seldom drew steel 
unless the intended to make use of it.
I swallowed hard. I am not familiar with steel,  I said as pleasantly as I 
could manager. You should not carry it then, said the man. Several of his 
fellows laughed.
The combat, as has been made clear, said Tasdron, his voice shaking, is to be 
uarmed.
Pick up your blade, said the fellow to me.I saw the point of his sword move 
lsightly. He gestured to my clothes and pouch and blade which lay nereby.
I can not fight you with steel, I said. I am not skilled with it. Run, 
whispered Tasdron.
Close the exits, said the fellow to some of the men with him. Four of them 
rose up, one going to the side door, one to the door of the kitchen, and two to 
the main threshold. They stood there. Their steel was now drawn. At the table, 
still sitting were two other men. One of them seemed in his presence as though 
he might be the groups leader. He observed me and quaffed paga.
Pick up your blade, said the fellow.
end of page 74
No, I said. Very well,  said he. The choise is yours. He stepped about his 
table and then, carefully, watching me, advanced. He stopped about ten feet from 
me. Then, suddenly, he kicked a table from in front of him to the side, clearing 
a path to me. Two men scramled away from the table. A paga slave, cowering inthe 
background, screamed.
I am unarmed, I said. He advanced another step. I watched the point of that 
blade move. He is new in Victoria, said Trasdron, desperately. Take his 
clothes, his money, his things, Let him live!
But the fellow did not even glance at Tasdron. He took another step closer. I 
backed away and then felt the tables behind me, agains my legs. I am unarmed, 
I said. The fellow grinned and advanced another step. Permit me to seize up my 
weapon. I said.
He grinned again and advanced yet another step. I did not have time to turn and 
clutch at the weapon in its sheath on the table, with my pouch and clothes, and 
even had I been able to reach it and remove it from the sheath, I di dnot think 
it would do me much good. I saw how this man handled steel, and I saw that the 
blade itself was much marked. It had seen a plentitude of combat. Before him, 
even with the blade in my grasp, I would have been, I knew, for all practical 
purposes defenseless. I am unarmed, I said. It is your intention to kill me 
in cold blood? Yes, said the fellow. Why? I asked. It will give me 
pleasure, he said. I saw the blade draw back. Hold! called a voice. The 
fellow stepped back and looked past me. I turned about. There about twenty feet 
away, in a dirty woolen himation, stood a tall, unshaven man. Though he seemed 
disreputable he stood at that moment very straight.
Do you, Fellow, said he, addressing me, desire a champion? The man was 
armed. Over his left shoulder there hung a leather sheath.
end of page 75
He had not designed, however to draw the blade. Who are you? demanded the 
fellow who had threaten me. Do you desire a chamption? asked the man of me. 
Yes, I said. Who are you?demanded the fellow who had been threatening me.
Do you force me to draw my blade? asked the tall man. The hair on the back of 
my neck rose when he had said this. Who are you? demanded the man who had 
threatened me, taking another step back. The man did not speak. Rather with one 
hand he trhew back the himation, over his shoulders. There was a cry in the 
tavern. I saw that the fellow wore the scarlet of the warrior.
No, said the fellow who had been threatening me. I do not force you to draw 
your blade. He then baked away. When he reached his table he thrust his own 
blade angrily into his sheath. He then, with the fellows who had guarded the 
doors, left the tavern.
Paga!, paga for all! called Tasdron. Paga slaves rushed to pour paga. Music! 
he called. Five musicians, who had been near the kitchen, hurried to their 
places. Tasdron too, clapped his hands twice and a dancing slave, portions of 
her body painted, ran to the sand.
Unsteadily I went to the table of the tall man. He seemed to pay me small 
attention. When the girl poured him paga, his hand shook as he reached for it. 
He lifted it suddenly, spilling some to the table, to his lips. He was shaking. 
I own you my life, I said, thank you. Go away, he said. His eyes seemed 
glazed. No longer did he seem so proud and strong as he had before, in that 
brief moment when he had confronted the fellow who had threatened me. His hands 
shook on the paga goblet. Go away, he said.
I see that you still wear the scarlet, Callimachus, said a voice. Do not mock 
me. I saw that he who spoke was he whom I had taken to be the leader of the 
ruffians at the far table, one of whose number had threatened me. He himself had 
neither supposed nor attempted to deter the fellow who had threatened me.
end of page 76
He held himself above squabbles in common taverns, I gathered. I took him to be 
a man of some importance. It has been a long time since we met in the vicinity 
of Port Cos, said the fellow who had come to the table. The man at the tble, 
sitting, he who had saved me,helf the goblet of paga and said nothign. This 
part of the river, said the standing men, is mine. Then he looked down at the 
sitting fellow. I bear you no hard feelings for Port Cos, He said. The sitting 
man drank. His hands were unsteady.
You always were a courageous fellow, Callimachus, said the standing man. I 
always admired that in you. Had you not been concerned to keep the codes, you 
might have gone far. I might have found a position for you even in my 
organization. Instead, said the man sitting at the table, we met at Port 
Cos.
Your gamble this night was successful, said the standing man. I would advise 
against similar boldnesses in the future, however. The sitting man drank.
Fortunatly for you, my dear Callimachus, my friend Kliomenes, the disagreeable 
fellow who left the tavern earlier, does not know you. He does not know as I do, 
that your eye is no longer as sharp as once it was, that your hand has lost its 
cunning, that you are now ruined and fallen, that the scarlet is not but 
meaningless on your body, naught but a remembrance, an empty recollection of a 
vanished glory.
The sitting man drank. If he knew you as I do, said the standing man, You 
would not be dead.
The sitting man looked into the goblet, now empty, on the table. His hands 
clutched it. His fingers white. His eyes seemed empty. His cheeks, unshaven, 
were pale and hollow.
Paga! called the standing men. Paga! A blond girl, nude, with a string of 
pearls wound about her steel collar, ran to the table and from the bronze 
vessel, on its stap about her shoulder, poured paga into the goblet before the 
seated man. The fellow who stood by the table scarcely noticing the girl, placed 
a tarsk bit in her mouth, and she fled back to the counter where, under the eye 
of a paga attendant, she spit the coin into a copper bowl.
end of page 77
There seemed to me something familiar about the girl, but I could not place it.
Drink, Callimachuis, said the standing man, Drink. The seated man, 
unsteadily lifted the page to his lips.
Then he who had stood by the table, turned about and left. I backed away from 
the table. The fellow who threaten me, I said to Tasron, the proprietor of the 
tavern, he called Kliomenes. Who is he?
He is Kliomenes, the pirate, lieutenant to Policrates, said Tasdron. And the 
other, I asked, he who was standing by the table, speaking to the man who 
saved me? His captain, said Tasdron, Policrates himself.
I swallow hard. You are fortunate to be alive, said Tasdron. I think perhaps 
you should leave Victoria.
At what time do the sales begin in the sales barns of Lysander? I asked. They 
have already begun, sid Tasdron.
Hurriedly, I ran to the table where I had left my things. I drew on my clothes 
and hastily slung my sword over my left shoulder. I picked up my winnings from 
the fighting. I saw the blond girl, she who had the pearls wrapped about her 
collar looking at me. It seemed to me that I had seen her somewhere. I placed my 
winnings in my pouch and tied it at my belt. I could not recall if, or where, or 
when, I might have seen her. I made my way rapidly toward the sales barn of 
Lysander
end of page 78
9      What Occurred at the Sales Barn of Lysander
this red-haired beauty, called the auctioneer, is a catch of Captain 
Thrasymedes. She can play the lute. There was raucous laughter. How good is 
she in the furs? called a voice. The girl went for four copper tarsks.
have the girls of Kliomenes been sold? I asked a fellow. Yes, said a fellow. 
I cried out in anguish. Most, said another. Most? I pressed him. Yes, he 
said. I think there are others, taken near Lara.
What am I offered for this blonde? called the auctioneer. Werent they sold 
before? asked the first fellow. Not all, I think, said the second man.
I left their sides and pushed through the crowd, making my way nearer the high, 
round, sawdust-strewn block. Watch where you are going, Fellow, snarled a man.
I stopped by the ready cage. Inside, sitting on a wooden bench, behind stout, 
closely-set bars, miserable, clutching sheets about themselves, some with glazed 
eyes, sat some ten girls. I clutched the bars, from the outside, looking within. 
She whom I sought was not there. One girl rose from the bench, her left ankle 
pulling against the chain and shackle that held her with the to others, and 
dropped the sheet to her waist. Buy me, she begged, putting her hand toward 
me. I stepped back. This is not an exhibition cage, said an attendant, putting 
a hand on my arm.
end of page 79
You many not loiter here, Buy me, begged the girl, reaching toward me. I 
gathered that she, unlike several of the others, apparently, had had masters.
Are these all the items that remain for sale? I asked the attendant. No he 
said. Are there girls of Kliomenes who remain to be sold? I asked, 
desperately. I do not know, he said, I do not have the manifests.
Miserably, I turned about and went back to sand with the others in the vicinity 
of the block. The blonde went for six tarsks.
And here, said the auctioneer, we have another blonde. This one, like many of 
the girls now in the ready cage, was free. There was much laughter, Make her 
kiss the whip! called a man.
Down, Wench, and kiss the whip! ordered the auctioneer. The girl knelt and 
kissed the whip. There was more laughter. He then began to put her through slave 
paces.
There were some 200 men at the sale. Such sales occur frequently in the various 
sales barns of Victoria, sometimes running for several nights in a row. The 
spring and summer are the businest seasons, for these are the seasons of 
heaviest river traffic and, accordingtly, the seasons when pirates, after their 
raids, are likely to bring in their loot. Many of the men at the salves barn 
were professional salves, from other towns and cities, looking for bargains.
Sold to Targo of Ar! announced the auctioneer. Manacles were then clapped on 
the blonde and she was dragged from the block.
I was angry for I did not even know if Miss Henderson was to be sold, or if shse 
had already been sold. If she had been sold, she might even now, while I stood 
about, helplessly be being transported from Victoria, a slave, anywhere. My fist 
were clenched. My palms were sweating.
The next two girls, brunettes, were sold to Lucilius of Tyros. The next four 
slaves were purchased by a fellow named Publius,, who was an agent for a Mintar 
of Ar.
I waited as the bidding grew more heated and as more men entered the building. 
Five times the read cage was emptied and fillled, and empted, as girls, freed of 
their shackles, were ordered to the blocks surface for their vending.
end of page 80
Do none of these women interest you? ask a man nearby. Many are lovely, I 
said. Indeed, had i not been waiting desperately, miserably for she whom I 
sought, I might have been tempted to bid hotly on several of them. To own any 
one of them would have been a joy and a triumph. The man who has owned a woman 
or women, knows of what I speak. Perhaps even those who have never owned a woman 
can sensek dimly, what it might be like. I know of no pleasure comparable to the 
pleasure of owning a woman, fully. It is indescribably delicious; it is 
glorious; it fills one with joy and power; it exhalts and fulfills the blood. It 
teaches a male, in the thunderous currency of intellect and emotion, what is the 
true meaning of manhood. Compared to it, the ratifiations of pretense and 
denial, the insistence on suberting ones blood and virility in the name of a 
false manhood conditioned by a demented, antibiological society, are pallid 
indeed. let those who can climb mountains climb them; let those who cannot climb 
them console themselves with denying their existence.
The brunette four sales ago, said the man next to me, was she not superb? 
Yes, I said. She had indeed been stuning. In this market to her indignation, 
she had gone for only fourteen copper tarsks. She had been sold to an agent of 
Clark of Thentis. The next brunette, in my opinion, had been even more stunning. 
She had gone for a mere fifteen copper tarsks. She had been sold to a Cleanthes 
ofTeletus.
Sold to Var, of Port Cos! called the auctioneer and a redhead was taken from 
the platform. And here, called the auctioneer, we have one of the cathces of 
Kliomenes, taken near Lara. He tore the sheet away from the girl on the block, 
throwing it to the side. She wore only her sales collar with her sales disk on 
which was written her lot number, wired to the steel.
A cold, prissy, little Earth slut, called the
auctioneer,, and yet one not without interst as you can see. he bent her back, 
his hand in her hair, exposing the bow of her beauty to the men. There was a 
sound of pleasure from the crowd.
She is already branded, said the auctioneer, but has served primarily as a 
display slave, and not a use slave.
end of page 81
He then turned her, still keeping his hand in her hair so that those on his left 
might better see her. Accordingly, he said, she is not yet fully broken to 
the collar. There was laugher fromthe crowd. He then turned her so that those 
on his right might better see her. In my opinion, said he, it is now time for 
this girl to learn the various uses to which a slave can be put. Yes! shouted 
more than one fellow. He then, as she gasped, bend her back a bit more, turing 
her again toward her left, so that she was presented exquistitely to the men. 
Does she not appear ready for taming and heating? inquired the auctineer.
Yes, shouted several men, yes! The girl trembled. She knew she nmight belong 
to any one of them. What am I bed? called the auctioneer. Two copper tarsks, 
called a man. Four! cried another. Six! Seven! Nine! Eleven!
This is an exquisite little slut! called the auctioneer. He then released her 
hair. Stand straight, he ordered the girl. She did so. He walked about the 
platform with the whip.
Twelve! Thirteen! She was beautiful enough to be a display slave, said the 
auctioneer. Fourteen! was called out. Now you can have her for your own work 
and use slave! Fifteen! I heard. Consider her, surrendered, squirming in 
your furs! he said. Sixteen! I heard.
Do I heard only sixteen tarsks for this equisite little bargain? inquired the 
auctioneer, incredulously. Sixteen, repeated the man.
The auctioneer spun to face the girl. Kneel, and kiss the whip he ordered her. 
Swiftly the girl, frightened, knelt before him. She took the coild of the whip 
in her small hands and lowering her head kissed them.
end of page 82
On your feet, barked the auctioneer. I will have a fit price for you. The 
girl, terrified, sprang to her feet. Put her through her paces! called a man. 
Let us see what she can do! called another.
The auctioneer shook out the coils of the whip. He then, rapidly, loudly, 
clearly, in a seris of orders, sometimes cracking the whip, commanded the girl, 
one by one, swiftly to assume an intriately patterened series of postures and 
attitudes. Seldom, I think in so brief a compass could a woman be displayed so 
fully as a female. He then cracked his whip and ordered her to stand straight 
upon the platform, sucking n her gut. She was breathing heavily; there were 
tears in her eyes; she was trembling; she was covered with sweat and saw-dust. 
He had permitted her no respite or quarter. The buyers now well understood the 
nature of the goods on which they were bidding.
Twenty-two tarsks! called a man. Twenty-three! called another.
So stunned I was that I had not even entered the bidding. I had never dreamed 
she could be so beautiful. What fools are the men of Earth, I thought, for the 
woman on the block was an Earth woman, to let their women off so lightly. What 
fools they are not to own their women and force them to manifest the true 
fullness and desirability of their beauty. The woman on the block was an Earth 
woman. Did she not show, in her own person, how beautiful the women of Earth 
could be. And yet I knew that on Earth such women commonly languished, their 
beauty denied its meaning and fulfillment, their beautiy not summoned forth, not 
commanded forth, for the pleasure, the sport, and service of strong men.
Twenty-five tarsks! Twenty-six! Twenty-seven! Twenty-eight! Thirty!
Buy her, a voice seemed to say to me. Buy the slave! Make her yours! No, 
no! I said, half aloud. I cannot!. What did you say? asked the man next to 
me. Nothing, nothing! I said.
end of page 83
Thirty-five! I heard. Forty! I heard. Forty-two! I could not even enter the 
bidding. I could scarcely breathe. My heart was pounding. I had never dreamed 
she could be so beautiful. It seemed I could not een speak. I could not take my 
eyes off the girl under the torches, the collar and slaves disk at her throat. I 
was trembling.
Forty-four! I heard. Forty-six!
I trembled. I had seen Miss Beverly Henderson kiss the whip. I had seen her put 
through slave paces.
Forty Seven! I heard. Ninety tarks! called a man. The auctioneer stepped back 
from the girl, the whip in his hand.
I have ninety tarsks, he called. She is not so cold, said the man next to 
me. No, I said, no.
Ninety-two tarsks! called a man. Ninety-Four! called another. I have 
ninety-four tarks, called the auctioneer. I prepare to close my hands, called 
the auctioneer. Ninety-eight!I cried out suddenly. I was startled to hear my 
own voice. The girl lifted her head dully.
Ninety-eight, I have ninety-eight! called the auctioneer. Do I heard more? Do 
I hear more?
There was silence. I prepared to close my hand, said the auctioneer. I close 
my hand!
I owned Miss Henderson.
end of page 84
10    We Leave the Sales Barn of Lysander; Miss Henderson Will Share my Lodgings
Miss Henderson was thrust from the block. I made my way toward the foot of the 
block. My head seemed to swim. I was scarcely conscious of my movments. I moved 
as through in a dream.
Jason? she asked, from within the bars of the holding cage at the right of the 
sales block. Already her left ankle had been shackled. Jason? I handed the 
receipt to the cate attendant. At the table I had paid ninety-eight tarsks.
I saw the sales disk removed from her collar and put ina small, wooden box. I 
saw the shackle removed from her ankle. I saw the door to the cage open and saw 
her pushed forth, before me.
Do you not know enough to kneel before your master? asked the attendant. 
Swiftly she knelt.
I lifted her to her feet and held her in my arms. Is it you Jason? she 
whispered. Is it truly you? Yes, I said, it is I.
She began to weep and I held her close to me. She shuddered in my arms. She 
sobbed. I felt her tears through my tunic. Jacon, she sobbed, Jason, Jason.
end of page 85
I held her to me and caressed her head. I am so happy, she said. I am so 
happy! yes, I said, Yes. I continued to caress her head, and hold her to 
me.
You purchased me. You own me, Jason, she said. I am your slave. I scarcely 
understood what she was saying. I know that you will be strong with me, but I 
will try to serve you well, she said.
What are you saying? I asked. I will try to be pleasing to you, she said. I 
do not want to be whipped. What are you saying? I asked.
She drew back a bit in my arms and lifted her head. there were tears in her 
eyes. Her lips trembled. She seemed incredibly happy. I remember the girl at 
the shop of Philebus, in Ar, she said, she who, wrists bound, was neck-leashed 
to the ring. Doubtless I now, too, as the mood seizes you, now that you own me, 
will be subjected to such ruthless and peremptory considerations. Doubtless you 
will respect my will no more than hers and rape me too when it pleases you.
I looked at her puzzled.
She again put her head against me, pressing her cheek against my shoulder. All 
the things that you may have wanted to do with me. she said, you may now do. 
Everything that you may have wanted from a woman, I must now give. You may do 
with me as you please. I must obey you in all things. She lifted her head 
again. There were tears in her eyes. Show me no mercy, she said. See that I 
serve you well.
Key! I cried. Key! What will you name me? she asked. Key! I cried. 
Key? she asked. Master?
The key to the sales collar was placed in my hand by one of the cage attendants. 
I saw the snug fit of the steel on her throat. It was incredibly exciting. She 
could not remove it. Then sweating, getting a grip on myself, hurriedly, 
fumblng, I thrust the tiny key into the lock. Master? she asked frightened.
Do not call me Master! I said, almost shouting. My voice choked. Men looked at 
us.
end of page 86
I turned the key and opened the tiny, heavy, single-action, seven-bolt lock on 
the collar. Each of the bolts is said to stand for one of the letters in the 
spelling of Kajjira, the most common Gorean expression for a slave girl.
Where is your collar for me? she asked. I have no collar for you  I said. 
Master? she asked. Do not call me Master, I said. Yes, Master, she said. 
I mean, yes Jason!
I put my hands on the collar to tear if from her throat. But she clutched at the 
collar, holding it on hre throat. Master? she asked, Jason? You are a woman 
of Earth, I said. You know how to behave and act. I do not understand, she 
said.
Do not speak to me of pleasing me, I said. Do not speak to me of pleasing me 
or serving me. But I am a slave, she said,and you own me! No, I said. I 
am branded, she said. It is nothing, I said. Be a girl and wear a brand, 
she said, and you will see if it is nothing! It is not your fault you are 
branded, I said. But it is the fault of men, she said, and I am nonetheless 
branded.
I went to pull the collar from her ghroat and again her small hands tightened on 
it. You own me, she said. What are you going to do with me?
Free you, I said. I will give you what your heart most desires, your total 
liberation and freedom! She looked at me aghast. I pulled away the collar and 
flung it, the key in the lock, to the side. You do not want me, she whispered. 
Have no fear, I said. I will not take advantage of you, nor abuse you, nor 
exploit you. You will be accorded all dignity and respect. In all things you 
will be my full and lovely equal. Then I realized I had made an error. Excuse 
me, I said. I did not mean to demean you. I did not mean to say lovely
end of page 87
You will be in all things, simply, and straight forwardly, my equal. How can 
a slave be the equal of her master? she asked. You are free, I told her. I 
might have been brought by a Gorean men, she said. One who might have 
treasured me, and cherished me, and made me serve him well, and used me richly.
I have freed you, I said. Are you not happy? I asked, puzzled. I am naked, 
she said. Forgive me, I cried. Quickly I hurried to one of the cage 
attendants. For a tarsk bit I purchased one of the discarded sheets torn from 
the slave beauties who were still being sold from the block.
I hurried back to the girl and stood before her, the sheet in my hand. For the 
briefest instant I felt sick. She was so beautiful. Should I have marched her 
through the streets of Victoria naked, an exhibited slave, for my own joy, that 
of her master and that men might rejoice in her beauty and call out to me their 
congratulation, commending me on the splendid fortune that was mine, that of 
having such a woman in my total power?
Please, she said. I stepped more closly to her and staqnding before her, held 
the sheet behind her, preparing to draw it about her. Do not look at me, you 
lustful beast, she said. Cover me quickly!
Swiftly I drew the sheet about her and she, from within it, clutched it even 
more closely about herself. I could see, as she had gathered the sheet, the 
outline of her small fists beneath it.
Do not look at my calves and ankles, she said, please. Forgive me, I said. 
Let us hurry from this place.
Yes, she said, it is offensive, I smell here the stinking of slaves. Quickly 
we left the sales barn of Lysander.
Where do you live? she asked. I have taken a small room near the wharves, I 
said. I too will need a room. she said. I cannot afford much, I said. Then 
we shall manage to divide the room, she said, somehow with a screen or 
partition of some sort.
end of page 88
Of course, I said. You must too go out and purchse me clothing, she said. I 
cannot wear a sheet. What about a slave tunic? I asked. Do not jest, Jason, 
she said. It is in this direction, I said, indicating a streete leading toward 
the river front.
I have no money, she said. And I have no Home Stone. What is that? she 
asked.
We heard the sound of a bell, and then a moment laters, that of coins in a metal 
box. A girl in a brown rag, slve, emerged from the shodows. About her neck, 
chained there was a bronze bell, hollow, lattish with sloping sides, with a flat 
top and ring, and a slotted, metal coin box, locked. Swiftly she knelt before 
me. She lifted her head. Have me for a tarsk bit, Master, she begged. Her 
hands were braceleted behind her back.
No, I told her. Get away you filthy thing, said Miss Henderson. If I do not 
return with the equivalent of a copper tarsk, said the girl kneeling before me, 
I will be whipped. Get away! said Miss Henderson.
Your slave requires discipline, said the girl kneeling before me. She isnot 
my slave, I said. It seems she would make a good slave, said the girl. I drew 
out a copper tarsk and prepared to place it in the girls coin box. Swiftly the 
girl, before I could put the coin in the box, lay on her back, on the stones of 
the street before me. You must use me first, she said. and then put the coin 
in only if I please you.
Do not give away our money, said Miss Henderson. It is my money, I said. Do 
not squander our meager resources, she said. They are my resources, not 
yours, I pointed out. I will do wht I please with them. Of course, Jason, 
she said irritatedly. I will not use you, I told the girl, but I wil give 
youthe coin. I made as though to place the coin in the box, which now, as she 
lay back on her elbows, hung beside her left breast, sweeling against the thin 
slave cloth.
end of page 89
Quickly she scarmbed back, and rose to her feet. I am worth the tarsk bit, she 
said. An my master is a proud man. He does not send us into the streets to 
beg. But you may be whipped, I said. I will get the money elsewhere, she 
said. And if I were you, I would whip the slave beside you.
Get out of here! cried Miss Henderson. The girl thenfled with a sound of her 
bell and the jangling of the coins in the box. Disgusting! Disgusting! said 
Miss Henderson. Terrible! Disgusting!
Some men, I said, buy such girls and send them out into the streets.They keep 
them in kennels and send them out in the afternoon. It is how they earn their 
living.
Terrible! Disgusting! said Miss Henderson.
You were saying, she said, that I have no money, and that I have no Home 
Stone. Too, there is no practical trade of which I am the Mistress. There is 
one trade which is available to all women, I said. Do not jest, Jason, she 
said. It is not amusing. That of cook, I said. Very funny, she said.
How do you expect to earn your keep? I asked. Nothing, absolutely nothing, 
she said. I did not ask to be purchased. I see that you are scarcely likely 
to prove to be an economic asset, I said.
You could always, I suppose put a bell and coin box about my neck and send me 
into the streets. she said. It is a thought, I admitted. She made an angry 
noise and we continued on toward the river front.
Have you a job? she asked. No, I said. You must get one, she said.
end of page 90
I expect that would be advisble, I said. I supposed I might work as an oarsman 
or a dock worker. I was strong. It no longer seems a good way to make money by 
challenging my fellows in the taverns. One might respond with a knife or sword. 
Tonight my life had been saved by a dissolute fellow, a man called Callimachus, 
perhaps from Port Cos, farther west on the river, a derelict. Had it not been 
for him, I would doubtless have been slain by the pirate, Kliomenes.
We will need money, she said. I said nothing. You may call me Beverly, she 
said. What about Veminia? I asked.The veminium is a small lovely Gorean 
flower, softly petaled and blue. That is a slave name, she said. That is what 
I was called in the house of Oneander of Ar.
Most Goreans, I said, would regard Beverly as a slave name. What of 
Jason? she asked angrily. I am sorry to disappoint you, I said, but that 
is a not uncommon name on Gor, particularly as I understand it, west on the 
river, and on the islands of Cos and Tyros.
Oh, she said. Unlike Beverly, I said. I see, she said acidly. Beverly, I 
added. The name Beverly may be worn as a free name, as well as a slave name, 
she said. I sahll wear it as a free name. Very well, I said.
We shall have to make careful arrangments to gover our shring common lodgings, 
she said. Of course, I said I shall bathe first, she said. There is a small 
copper tub, I said. And each of us shall do his share of the cooking, the 
cleaning, and the housework, she said. Each wil have full responsiblity for 
his own portions of these labors. I am to work the day, I said, and the, do 
half the work of the room or lodgings? Do not expect me to perform menial 
labors for you, she said.
end of page 91
I am a free woman. I shall take care o fmy things. And you shall take care of 
yours. I see, I said. I trust your room is not in this dismal structure, 
she said, looking up at a swinging lantern hanging over and inns threshold. 
Yes, I said. We shall have to do better than this, she said. I looked down 
at her. I considered tearing the sheet from her. I wondered what she would look 
like with a bell and coin box on her neck. Then I reminded myself that she was a 
free woman, and that she was from the planet Earth, my old planet. She was not a 
Gorean girl, but something nobler and finer, an Earth woman.
You did not even pay a full silver tarsk for me, she said looking up at me 
angrily. there were girls who were sold for as much as two or three silver 
tarsks. They were very beautiful woman, I said, and some were of high 
caste., two were exquisitely trained pleasure slaves. Surely I was worth more 
than any of them, she said petulently. Are you angry? I asked. Yes, she 
said, I am worth much more than 98 copper tarks. I am not ussre you are worth 
98 copper tarks, I said. She cried out with anger.
If youhad been worth a silver tarsk in a Gorean market, I told her, you would 
have brought a silver tarsk in a Gorean market. You are hateful! she said. 
You are not a silver-arsk girl, I told her. Hateful! she said. I do not 
think you are worth two copper tarsks, I said. Beast! she said, Beast! 
Remember, I told her, you have no Home Stne. What are you telling me, she 
asked, that I keep a civil tongue in my head? It would not hurt, I told her. 
Oh yes! she said, I know! I have no Home Stone! You might just tear the sheet 
from me.
end of page 92
You might just throw me down in the threshold on the stones under the lantern 
and rape me and re-enslave me! I could, I said angrily. You would not dare, 
she said. Do not tempt me, I said in fury. You are too weak to treat me as a 
woman and a slave! she said.
I seized her by the upper arms under the sheet, and shook her violently. Oh, 
she cired, please, Master be gentle! The word Master comes easily from your 
lips, I said.
Quickly she pulled the sheet back about her. She looked down. Forgive me, I 
said. Im sorry. I behaved like a cad. Am I in danger, Jason? she asked. 
No, I said, of course not. She looked up. I am a woman of Earth, she said, 
not a Gorean girl. I am well aware of that, I said. I am really very 
sorry.
I know that you will not treat me with power and strength, she said. Forgive 
me, I said. I had become angry.
You are a man of Earth, she said, and are decent and kind. You are tender and 
gentle. You are accomodating and wish to be pleasing. Remeber that women have 
nothing to fear from men such as you. Keep that clearly in mind.
Forgive me, I said. I am very sorry. In the future, she said, keep your 
hands off of me. 
Im sorry, I said. I am a person, she said. Of course, I said, Im 
sorry. I am not a Im sorry, I am not a pleasure toy, she said. Im 
sorry, I said. Im sorry. How greviously I had insulted Miss Henderson.
Tonight, she said, when I was being displayed before Gorean buyers, did you 
see me move in certain ways and cry out in certain ways? Yes, I admitted.
Put such things from your mind, she said. The auctioneer, the beast, caught 
me off guard. His action took me by surpise. He did not permit me to be myself. 
I am stronger than that, as you will learn. It was like another girl, a slave 
girl who moved like that, and cried out like that.
end of page 93
Have no fear. The delicious pleasures which may have been suggested by her 
movements or cries will not be yours. I see, I said. I am not a licking and 
kissing pleasure girl, one who can scarcely control herself and fears the whip. 
I see, I said.
I shall endeavor to see that I am fully worthy of your respect and of my own 
respect as a free woman, I understand, I said. Let us go inside now, she 
said. The room must be properly partitioned. Are you not grateful that I 
rescued you from bondage. I asked. I am extremely grateful, she said. You 
have no idea how wonderful it is to be free. It is just what every woman wants. 
You have not much expressed your gratitude, I said. And how do you, a man, 
suggest that I express it? sah asked acidly. I looked down reddening.
I am not a slave Jason, she said. I am a free woman. I understand, I said. 
Is that why you bought me, she asked, that I a weak silly woman, overhelmed 
with gratitude would grant you my favors!
I did not raise my head. Favors which you were too weak to obtaqin in any other 
way? she asked. Im sorry, I said. But do not think that I am not grateful 
she said. I shall teach you how to be a true man, solicitous and tender, and 
that sort of thing. I see, I said. Do not touch me! she said.
I drew back. Permit me to kiss you, I said. She was so beautiful. No, she 
said, I am not a pleasure object. Im sorry, I said. Again I had insulted 
Miss Henderson. It seemed I could do nothing right with her. But I am 
grateful, she said. You may give ma a small kiss, a quick kiss.
end of page 94
I touched her cheek with my lips, kissing her. It is enought! she said. My 
hands had tightened on her arms under the sheet. You are very strong Jason, 
she said. I had lifted her to her toes and holding her, pressed her back against 
the door to the inn. She looked at me frightened. I saw her lovely cherry lips, 
the amll fine white teeth behind them. I consideered administering to her the 
kiss of the master to the female slave. No! she said.
I held her, my own hands trembling, power in my body. I am a woman of Earth, 
she said. You are a man of Earth! I held her.
Do not rape me, Jason, she said. Im sorry, i said. I put her down. Beg my 
forgiveness! she said. Im sorry, I said. Im sorry!
Never look at me again like that, with such lust and power, she said. I am a 
woman of Earth! Forgive me, I said. I see it wil not be easy to teach you to 
be a true man, she said. I shurgged angrily. But I think you will learn 
Jason, she said, you are a man of Earth. Perhaps, I said.
We must now go inside, she said. The room must be properly partitions. 
Please let me kiss you, I said. It has been a trying day for me, she said. 
I am weary. Surely you must understand. Please, I said. After what happened 
a moment ago, she said, I do not think I will permit you to kiss me again for 
a very long time, if ever.
Perhaps you will permit me to kiss you from time to time, I suggesed, just o 
keep me performing peoperly. Perhaps, she said angrily. We shall see.
Please Beverly, I said. No, she said. Please, I said. I am weary, she 
said. And I have a headache. Let us remain here but a moment longer, I said.
end of page 95
It is growing chilly here, she said. And I do not feel well, Please, I 
said. Do not be insensitive, Jason, she said. I have told you that I have a 
headache. I did not mean to be insensitive, I said. Forgive me. I wondered 
what she would like like naked, tied at a slave ring, being lashed.
We must go in now, she said, In the morning you must rise early. You must buy 
me clothing and go to the market. You must then find work. Yes Beverly, I 
said. I held the door open for her and she preceded me inside. The innkeeper 
looked up from behind his counter, puzzled that a woman such as she was not 
heeling me.
I indicated the stairs and she preceded me up the stairs. We shall certainly 
have to find better lodgings then these, and soon, she said. Yes Beverly, I 
said. The stairs were dark, save for small, trembling yellow pools of light, 
cast from flickering tharlarion-oil lamps. I considered her ankle as she 
ascended the stairs before me. It had not looked bad in the shackle at the 
market. Too, I recalled the moment in the taxi cab long ago, before I had lost 
consciousness. She had been lying on the back seat of the cab, her legs drawn 
up. I had seen her ankle then, too. I recalled thinking then too, that it would 
have looked well in slave steel.
end of page 96
11    Peggy
I will use the one in that alcove, I said to Tasdron, flinging down a tarsk 
bit on the stained counter. She is yours, said Tasdron, wiping a paga goblet 
with a large soft cloth.
I strode across the floor of the tavern of Tasdron and entered the alcove. The 
blond girl knelt there, nude, against the back wall of smooth, rounded red 
tiles. I turned about and buckled shut the heavy curtains of the alcove and then 
again faced her.
Her wrists, by several narrow loops of red leather on each wrist, were tied to 
iron rings on each side of her body, a little below the level of her shoulder. 
The former customer had left her tired n this fashion, not bothering to release 
her. I was just was well pleased. I wished to interrogate her. She knels on red 
furs. The light was from a tiny tharlarion-oil lamp in the alcove. Tasdrons 
collar was on her throat.
Master? she asked, pressing back against the rounded-red tiles.
Do you recall me? I asked. Do you recall I was the fellow who challenged in 
this tavern, and who was threatened by Kliomenes, the pirate, the fellow who was 
saved, happily, by one called Callimachus.
Yes Master, she said, I was here. I remember. He is Callimachus of Port Cos. 
He was once of the Warriors? I asked. It is thought so, she said. So it is 
said among the girls. Have you seen me before? I asked.
end of page 97
It does seem possible, Master, she said. I am only a slave. It seemed to me 
before, I said, that you reacted to me as though you might once have seen me, 
as though I might be somehow familiar to you. It is true, sahe said. It 
seemed to me that, somehow, I had seen you before. Ye I do not see how, 
actually, that could be. I am only a miserable slave.
Were you always a slave? I asked. No, Master, she said. I was once free. 
On Gor? I asked. No, Master, she said. She smiled. I am afraid that women 
such as I are slaves on Gor.
Where were you free? I asked. On a far world, she said. Where slaves are 
not enslaved? I asked. Yes, Master, she smiled.
What is your name? I asked. Peggy, she said. if it pleases Master, That 
is an Earth-girl name, I said. Ar you from the planet Earth? yes Master, 
she said, but please do not whip me. It is not my fault that Earth is my planet 
of origin. I will try to be pleasing to you. Earth girls make excellent 
slaves, I said. Thank you Master, she said. Do y ou speak the Earth 
language, English? I asked. Yes, Master, she said. I too speak English, I 
said. Let us converse in that tongue. Yes, Master, she said. What was your 
earth name? I asked. Peggy, she said, Peggy Baxter.
Where did you work? I asked. In a city called New York, she said, as a 
hat-check girl at a restaurant. Yes! I said, Thats it! Master? she 
asked, frightened. I had thought I had seen you, I said. It was there. 
There? she asked.
You wore black, low-cut shoes with high heels, without strap or ties, I said.
end of page 98
Pumps, she said. You wore black-net stockings or pantyhose, I said.You wore 
a black miniskirt and a long-sleeved, smooth white silk blouse, open at the 
throat. You had a black ribbon for your hair.
Panty hose, she said, But they were taken from me. I noeeded. Gorean men 
seldom permit a slave shielding for her warm intimacies.
Apparently, I was not the only one who say you there, I said. Some other or 
others, I said,must have seen you as well, and adjudged you worthy to be 
brought to Gor as a slave girl. Yes, Master, she said. I commend their 
judgement and taste, I said. Thank you Master, she said.
How is it that you were originally captured on Earth? I asked. After work 
late, she said, I left the restaurant. A cab was nearby. I thought myself 
fortunate. I entered the cab. It was a specially designed capture vehicle. I 
found myself helplessly sealed within it. Gas entered my mobile prison. I lost 
consciousness. I did not recover consciousness until I found myself chained in a 
girl-dungeon on Gor. I awakened to the whip and the hands of a brute upon me. I 
swiftly learned I was a slave.
I think that I myself and a friend, I said, were captured by the same cab, 
the same devices. I recalled that the cab driver in the garage had said that he 
had anohter pickup to make that night. His next pickup, doubtless, had been the 
lovely, long-legged Miss Baxter. Did you get off work at two A.M. I asked. 
Yes, she said, How did you know?
I heard the pickup of someone referred to who got off work at two A.M., I 
said. Doubtless it was I, she said shuddering. I think so, I said.
Master speaks English fluently, she said apprehensively. Her hands twisted in 
the straps.
Were you brought to the House of Andronicus, in Vonda? I asked. Yes, she 
said, where I was given rudimentary slave training and learned a smattering 
ofGorean.
end of page 99
I was sold in vonda to a taverner in Tancreds Landing. Tasdron saw me there and 
fancied me. He brought me here, where I now wear his collar. She looked at me. 
Is Master a slaver? she asked. No, I said. How is it that Master speaks 
English? she asked. It is my native tongue, I said. I was brought to Gor, 
rather accidentally, as a slave. I became free. Master is cruel to tease a 
miserable slave, said the girl.
How am I teasing you? I asked puzzled. She laughed. Do not expect me to 
believe that Master is a man of Earth, she said. I am not a fool. I am from 
the planet Earth, I said. You are cruel to a miserable slave, she said. Why 
do you not believe I am from Earth? I asked puzzled.
You are not pathetic and weak. she said. And your eyes, they look at me and 
see me as a female slave.
I smiled. Indeed she was beautiful. The men of Gor, she said, are strong. 
They are not weak and divided against themselves. They are not tortured. They 
are integrated and coherent, and proud. They see themselves in the order of 
nature. They see females as femals, as slaves and themselves as men, as Masters. 
If we do not please them they punish us, or slay us. We quickly learn our place 
in the order of things. Only where there are true men can there be true women.
But you are a naked and collared slave, I said, bound in a paga tavern. I 
am a woman, she smiled,something that I never was truly on Earth.
I see, I said.
We are small and weak and soft and beautiful, she said,and we have 
dispositions to yield and to love and serve, selflessly. We long for masters. We 
cannot be fulfilled until we find them. She smiled. And then on Gor, she 
said, we look up and startled find them standing over us. The whip is in their 
hand. They will take no nonsense from us. It is any wonder we love them so?
I was once from Earth, I said. I find that hard to belive, she said. I 
shrugged.
end of page 100
Look at me, she said. I grinned and she reddened. What do you see, she 
asked, an abused woman to be hastily freed or a slave tethered for a mans 
pleasure? A slave, I said, tethered for a mans pleasure. You see, she 
said, you are Gorean.
And as what do you see yourself, I asked, as an abused woman, hoping to be 
hastily freed, or as a slave, tied to rings, who hopes her master will see fit 
to linger over her?
A slave, she smiled, one fatened helplessly, tied to rings, who hopes that 
she will be found sufficiently pleasing that a master will see fit to linger oer 
her, driving her to a madness of imbonded joy.
Do you wish to be freed? I asked. A woman such as I, on Gor, she laughed, 
has no hope of freedom. I smiled. I did not doubt that. She had even been 
named Peggy. That name, an Earth-girl name, made it perfectly clear that her 
master regarded her categorically and totally as a slave. It had been her name 
on Earth. Now, of course, she wore it as a slave name, by the decision of her 
master. Sles in their own right have no names. They are animals.
But do you wish to be freed? I asked. No, Master, she said. But you are a 
woman of Earth, I said. So, Master? she asked puzzled. Surely then you wish 
to be free? I asked. Why, she asked. You are a woman of Earth, I said. Do 
you think tht in the bellies of the females of Earth there does not lurk a true 
woman? she asked. I do no tknow, I said. We are not men, really, she said. 
You would be well advised not to say things like that on Earth. I said. I 
know, she said. On Earth, I did not speak the depths of my feelings. I did not 
dare. I did not wish to be criticized by men or by unhappy, frustrated women.
I nodded. the culural penalties inflicted on those who speak the truth can be 
severe. I kept silent, she said, and longed for a master. Is not freedom 
precious? I asked.
end of page 101
I have been free, she said. I know what it is like. Is it not precious? I 
asked. Yes, she said, It is precious, very precious. and sometimes I miss it 
very much. Sometimes I wish I were again free. Sometimes when I am chained aat 
night or whipped or commaned and must do things I do not wish to do, I wish I 
were again free. And sometimes, I am terribly afrid when I think of the power my 
masters have over me. I see, I said.
But then too,  she said. I find myself exquisitely thrilled, and responsive 
to the very power, the force, the discipline, to which I am subject. To know 
that I am a slave and must obey fulfills something very deep in me. I see, I 
said. Sometimes at night, she said, I find myself almost without thinking 
about it, licking the bars of my cage, kissing the steel on my wrists.
Do you fear your masters? I asked. Of course, she said, they hold over me 
the power of life and death. But yet,  I asked, you find them terribly 
exciting? I find them terribly exciting, she said, both emotionally and 
physically. I can scarcely be near them without catching my breath, without 
feeling slightly afraid and trembling.
They own you, I said. Yes, she said. When they look upon you, do you feel 
sexual heat? I asked. Often, she said. and if they should snap their fingers 
and point to the floor, I asked. Then I would swiftly lie before them, and as 
a slave, she said.
You are eager to please them? I asked. Yes, she said, and I am their 
slave. She smiled at me. Do these responses, she asked, startle you, coming 
as they do from a woman once of Earth? There seems little in you now of 
Earth, I said.
end of page 102
True, she smiled. She pulled at the tongs. I am now only a Gorean slave 
girl, she said. I said nothing.
The women of Earth are also women, she said. Do not despise them for it. 
Accept them for what they are. There is nothing wrong with being a woman. It is 
the complementary sex to that of the male. It is nor our fault if, when placed 
in a proper contest, a biological context, in a biologically congenial 
civilization, we behave as we desire and must. Is your anger or dismay actually 
an envy of the Gorean brutes who throw was to their feet and put collars on our 
necks? Consider that. It may be true. Would you not like some delicious Earth 
woman as your total slave? If so, how are you so different from the brutes of 
Gor, who do with us as they wish? It is not our fault if, for whatever reasons, 
the men of Earth seem determined to turn us into men, and deny to ur our 
precious and ancient natures. It is hard to be a woman on Earth. She pulled 
again at the thongs. But is is not hard, Master on Gor, she smiled. Gorean 
men see to it.
You are a slave, I said. Are you happy? Yes, she said, radiantly happy. 
Why? I asked.
I am now in the power of uncompromising and cominant males. I must serve them 
and please them and as a woman fully. I am owned by them. They bring the 
fullness of my womanhood out of men and are content with nothing less. On Gor, 
for the first time in my life, I am a total woman. I am compltely fulfilled. I 
am incredibly happy.
You are fond of your slavery? I asked. I love my slavery, Master, she said. 
Would you like to go back to Earth? I asked. No, Master, she said. I 
regarded her. See my brand, she said.
I did so. I tws the common Kajira mark. It was the same brand worn by Miss 
Henderson. Both girls were lelft-thigh branded. My collar, she said. I 
regarded it. It was simple, narrow, close-fitting, of gleaming steel. The 
thongs on my wrists, she said. I looked at her bound writs.
end of page 103
And my naked body, she said, tied for a masters pleasure. Yes, I said. 
Am I not an exquisite slave girl? she asked. Yes, I said.
And yet, she said, I am from the planet Earth. Can you doubt, truly, then 
that the women of Earth can be slaves? No, I said, I do not doubt it.
Perhaps you do doubt it, she said. No, I said, No.
Untie me, she said. Why? I asked. I will prove to you that I am a slave, 
she said. I looked at her not speaking. Have you held slave in your arms? she 
asked. Yes, I said, many times. sek then, she said, if I am different. I 
regarded her.
Touch me, she begged. I smiled, ignoring her plea. She learned back, her writs 
bound at the rings. You are clearly Gorean, she said. I see that I must wait 
upon your will.
I sat, cross-legged, for some time, watching her. Then her eyes looked 
pleadingly at me. I could smell the heat of her. do you beg to be had and as a 
slave? I asked. Yes Master, she whispered. I beg to be had, and as a slave. 
I then slowly untied her.
So, she asked later, smiling, lying on her stomach beside me, am I so 
different? No, I said. You well put me to the test, she laughted. I touched 
the collar, lightly, at her throat. Do you doubt that I am a slave? she 
asked. No, I said. You see, she said, that I am a superb slave. It is 
true, I said. Have I not been appropriately and fittingly imbonded? she 
asked. You have been, I said.
end of page 104
Do I not belong in a slave collar? she asked. There is no doubt about it, I 
said. You do.
Tasdron had me for a silver tarsk, she said. A cheap price, I said. You are 
worth more. I am better now, she said, than when Tasdron bought me. I have 
learned much. I would say that you are worth now at least two silver tarsks. 
Thank you Master, she wais, warmly, kissing me. It is hard to believe that 
you are from Earth. I said. She laughed. But I am Master, she said. You saw 
me there yourself in the restaurant.
Yes, I said. When you saw me there, she asked, did you want to have me? 
Yes, I said. Master, she said. Yes, I said. When I saw you too at the 
restaurant, she said. I wondered what it would be like to lie in your arms. 
A bold admission, I said. For an Earth girl who thinks she is free, perhaps, 
she laughted, but not for a slave. Slaves may speak such truths. That is 
true, I said. But never for a moment did I dream, she said, that I would lie 
naked in your arms as an obedient, collared slave on an alien world.
I then took her by the arm and threw here again beneath me. She looked up 
happily. Is Master going to have me again? she asked. Yes, I said.
Peggy is pleased to have been found worthy of the attentions of Master, she 
said. Oh, she said, Master is strong. Then she said, You are Gorean. I know 
you are Gorean! Then she said, I yield me to my Gorean Master!
It is pleasant to have a woman yield to you as a slave. I know of nothing which 
so exalts the power and manhood of the human male. Too there is apparently 
nothing which so deeply releases the emotions and yielding sensuality of the 
human female.
end of page 105
In these matters something is touched which obviously bears deeply on the 
fundamental nature of the sexes. Here in human relations is yet another 
exemplification of one of the major and incessantly recurrent themes of nature, 
that of dominance and submission. The realities of nature must be denied, I 
suspect, only at ones own peril. And certainly human beings cannot be 
fulfilled, nor can they know themselves, until they have become themselves. The 
nature of human being precedes the fleeeting parades of mottoes and slogans. It 
lies latent and obdurate in ambush, if you like, in the genetic codes.
Permit me to kiss you, she said. You may do so, I told her.
Is there a human animal beneath the conditioned ideologies? It seems not 
improbably. We may torture and mutilate the human animal; we may deny that it 
exists; but it lies within us, in the chemistry of every living cell in our 
bodies. In denying it we, truly, deny only ourselves. In hating it, we hate our 
own hearts and our own blood. We are not so terrible, really. It is only that we 
are men and women and not something else. Perhaps it is wrong to be men and 
women. Perhaps we should be something else. Perhaps we should consider ourselves 
images and inventions.Perhaps we whould participate in the mythologies 
convenient to the manipulative purposes of self-seving elites. Doubtless the 
question if difficult. It is always hard to know the truth and pretnd not to 
believe it. Perhaps we should not be men and women. Perhaps we should not be 
true to ourselves. But even if we should deny ourselves and starve and orture 
and frustrate ouselves, we wold still in the end be ourselves. We would remain 
men and women, only then, perhaps mutilated and sickened men and women, useful 
tools in the schemes of others, of cunning an dpathological frustrates, 
themselves often as confused and miserable as the uncritical creatures they 
would systematicaly delude.
We are what we are, and will remain so, regardless of what we may be taught to 
believe. Fearing ourselves doe not make us not ourselves. Can the human reality, 
in the fullness of its truth, be truly so fearful a thing. I do not think so. 
Human naturea may be despised; it may be thwarted; it may be distorted and 
denied. This may be accomplished by conditioning prorams, obedient to their own 
antecedents and developing in accord with their own histories and social 
dynamics.
end of page 106
It is clearly possible to educate the yound to distruct and fear themselves, and 
to injure and torture themselves. And in turn as a funtion of their 
ownconditioning programs, they may dutifully bequeath their own tortures to 
their own young in turn. Yet how much pain must be endured, how much crime and 
madness,how much unhappiness and misery, before human rationality, that pathetic 
reed, that faril stuff, that small weapon, that fragile tool, must revole and 
cry, No! How obvious must it be before human being are wiling to realize that 
a grotesque and biologically inimical inversion of values has taken place? What 
would be accepted as evidence if not disease, madness, misery, irrationality, 
frustration, criminality and sickness, that a tragic disparateness now exists 
between the needs of human beings and the imperatives of society. Must it be 
human beings who must be wrong? Perhaps it is, rather, those sociological 
imperatives which have gradually over the centuries, diverged from their orignal 
instrumentalities to follow their own disconnected and remote trajectories.
To ancient Attia it is said there was a gian, Procrustes. He would seize upon 
travelers and tie them upon an iron bed. If the traverl was too short for the 
bed, he would disjoint and break their boies until they fitted it; if they were 
too long for the bed, he would cut their feet from them, until, they again 
fitted the bed. Perhaps the bed of Procrustes is the truth and men must be 
broken or cut to pieces that they may fit it. On the other hand, clearly there 
is an alternative, although Procrustes seemed not to have heard of it. The bed 
could be made to fit the guest. Is the bed to conform to the guest or is the 
guest to conform to the bed. From my own point of view, I would prefer a bed 
which considered the nature of human beings. I would make the human being the 
measure by which I judged the value of the beds. I see little of profit in 
making the bed the measure of the human being, and requiring that we remake, if 
by torture and mutilation, the human being until it fits the bed. Besides, we 
cannot remake the human being to fit the bed, truly. We do not make new human 
beings or better human beings by this method. All we make by that method is 
broken or mutilated human beings.
Have me again, Master, she begged. Very well, I said.
end of page 107
And as she moaned and gasped in my arms, and cried out, and I held her so 
closely she could not escapel, I pondered the nature of human beings. And then I 
too, cried out and with force owned her as a woman. In those obliterating 
movements, I knew who I was and who she was. Be had, Slave! I told her. You 
give me pleasure. Yes, Master, she wept.
Later we lay quietly together side by side.
Perhaps it is wrong to be men and women. But on the other hand, perhaps it is 
not wrong to be men and women. It is what we are. Perhaps it is not wrong to be 
what we are. That is a genuine possibility. Perhaps it is not wrong to be what 
wer are. If that is so, then it may quite possibly be right, or at least morally 
permissible to be what we are. And if that is true, we may be entitled to our 
own natures, and the happinesses attendant upon the fulfillment of those 
natures. How then I envied the Gorean brutes to whom such question couldscarcely 
arise. The Goreans, for example, have not been conditioned to exalt thirst or to 
wonder if it is morally permissible to drink water, and if so, under what 
conditions and subject to what restrictions. In the dehydration they find 
nothing morally commendable. Indeed, naive folk, it does not even occur to them 
to debate such questions. They are, however,in viture of this attitude, at the 
least, spared certain eccentric neuroses.
On Gor, whispered the girl next to me, I have learned that men and women are 
not identical. Yes, I said. I smiled to myself. I knew at least one culture 
in which this obvious biological truism would count as political heresy, to be 
punished by ostracism, slander, and when possible economic penalties. What a 
tragic world and culture that was. How I pitied those who, in order not to 
jeopardize their careers in an antibiological environment, were forced to 
subscribe publicly to such doctrines. How rare is courage.
And men, she said, or Gorean men, or men of a Gorean type are the masters. 
Yes, I said. And women such as I are their slaves, she said. yes, I said. 
Lick and kiss me. Lick and kiss you? she said. Yes, I said. You command 
me like a Gorean slave girl, she said.
end of page 108
That is what you are, I told her. Yes, Master, she said. You do it well, I 
told her. She trembled. Tasdron taught me, she said. I smiled. I could well 
imagine Tasdron teachng her and she, knowing him to be her legal master, 
desperately striving to learn. If she did not do well she would know that she 
might be whipped to within an inch of her life or fed, alive, to hungry sleen. 
Under such circumstances, girls learn quickly and well.
Ah, I said. Is Master pleased? she asked. Yes, I said. Then Peggy too is 
pleased. Complete your work, I said. Yes Master, she said.
Later she lay beside me, her head at my thigh. My hand wandered to her hair, and 
then to her neck, inclosed in the narrow steel collar. I fingered the lock at 
her back. She put her mouth to my thigh. I felt the warmth of her breath on my 
thigh. I felt her lips, the pressing of her teeth. Then she kissed me, and lay 
again, quietly beside me.
You treated me like a Gorean slave girl, she said. That is what you are, I 
told her. Yes, Master, she laughed. It is true. She kissed me again. I knew 
that I had convinced you, she said. How did you know? I asked. In the past 
Ahn, she said, you commanded me as casually and thoughtlessly as you might 
have any Gorean slut in a collar. Thus, in joy, I recognized that you had come 
to regard me, quite properly, as one of them. I see, I said.
You see, she said, I am the same. I am no different. I am only another girl 
in the collar, another woman who must obey you and serve your pleasure. Are 
you content? I asked. Yes, Master, she said, as would any woman in the arms 
of a man such as you.
Are you happy? I asked. I am joyful in the fulfillment of my nature. she 
said. I am a slave. At last I have come to a world where there are men who wish 
for me to please them, and will see that I do so, and want me, and will have me, 
a world where there are masters.
end of page 109
I must be going, I told her. She looked up frightened.Do not go yet, she 
said, let me please you again. Appetitious slave, I said. On Gor, she said, 
my appetites have been ignited. It has pleased men to ignite them.
Are you dismayed? I asked. No, Master, She said. On this world I need not 
be ashamed of my appetites. On this world it is appropriate that I am hot and 
belong to men. In your belly there is slave fire? I asked. Yes, Master, she 
said, In my belly there burns slave fires. I do not pretend that it does not. 
Shameless slave, I said. Yes, Master, she said. For whom in this moment, I 
asked, do your slave fires burn? You Master, she whispered. I hesitated. Be 
merciful, Master, she bgged. Satisfy me.
I put her beneath me in the capture position, and subjected her to swift slave 
rape. She cried out with pleasure, yet used to harshly and brutally. I struck 
her away from me and drew on my tunic. I must to work early at the sharves. At 
down I wished to be in the hiring yard. I looked down at her.
Are all women such slaves as you? I asked. She smiled up at me, curled on the 
furs. Yes, Master, she said. I turned to go.
Master, she said. I turned again to face her. You have made much of the fact 
that I am an Earth girl and a slave, she said. Yes, I said. there is another 
girl in whom you are interested, isnt there, she asked, an Earth girl? 
Perhaps, I said. Is she a slave? she asked.
end of page 110
No, I said. I had freed her. That is unfortunate, she said. I shrugged.
Does she have a Home Stone? she asked. No, I said. Then enslave her she 
said. She is different from you, I said. Is she pretty? she asked. Yes, I 
said. Then she is not so different, she said, Have I seen her? Long ago, 
once, I said, at the restaurant. She was with me.
She! laughed the girl. Yes, I said. She was very pretty Master, she said. 
Is she on Gor? she asked. Yes, I said. And free? she asked. Yes, I said.
I do not like that, said the girl, Why should I be a slave and she be free?
If she were here, I said, you would have to kneel before her, and obey her. 
The collared girl shuddered. Slave girls fear free women, greatly. There is 
little to wonder about in this. Free women, perhaps envying them their collars, 
are often extremely cruel to them.
Do you think she would make a good slave? I asked. The girl smiled. I think 
she would make an excellent slave, Master. I shall have to keep that in mind. 
I said. Swiftly the girl knelt before me. I assure you that she is a slave, 
she said. I remember her. She is a slave. It is wrong for her not to be put in 
a collar. She is a slave, truly. Thus she should be made a slave, and be used, 
and treated and handled accordingly. You do not know her, I said. Perhaps it 
is you who do no tknow her, she said.. I smiled. I am an enslaved woman, said 
the girl. Do you now think that one slave knows another?
end of page 111
I laughed. Take her in hand, she said. Take away her clothes. Put her in a 
collar. Throw her to your feet. use her. You will see! I smote my thigh, 
laughing, in the Gorean fashion, so preposterous were the urgent words of the 
lovely, kneeling slave. How preposterous it was even to think of the lovely Miss 
Henderson as a slave. The girl knelt back, on her heels. I assure you Master, 
she said, she is as much, or more a slave than I.
Watch your tongue, Girl, I said, angrily, lest it be slit. She shuddered, 
and put down her head. Forgive me Master, she whispered. She is different 
from you, I said. Your are only a shameful and degraded slave.
Do you wish her to be herself, she asked, or to conform to some alien image 
which your culture has devised for her? I did not speak. She is not man, she 
said, She is a woman. They are the same, I said. That is stupid, she said.
I know, I said. Then I said angrily, I know that she is not a man. I know 
that she is a women. And if that is so, she said, how do you d\consider her 
differently? I dont know! I said.
Perhaps Master is indeed from earth, she said. I was once from Earth, I 
said. I must respect her. Do not respect her, she said, fulfill her. 
How? I asked. Make her your full and total slave she said. I cannot, I 
said.
Surely Master knows he is of the dominant sex, she said. and that it is those 
of our sex who must submit. I know that is true, I said, but it is my duty 
not to believe it.
Can it truly be ones duty not to believe the truth? she asked. Yes, I said. 
It is important to hld the correct opinions, whether they conform to reality or 
not.
Perhaps such opinions subserve thpurposes of ambitious and eccentric 
minorities, she said.and that is doubtless and important point it their favor, 
but the do not seem to advance the cause of a civiliation congenial to the 
nature of the human species as it is in actuality constituted.
end of page 112
It is important to cater to the few, I said, though it may in time spell doom 
and pain to the many. That is madness, she said. It is the principle on which 
my world is based, I said. Tht is no longer your world, she said. How do you 
know?I asked.
I could tell a few Ehn ago, she said, by how you held me. I shrugged. 
Abandon disease and madness, she said, Return to the order of nature.
To look upon truth, openly, I said, could be a fearful thing, Yes, Master, 
she whispered and put her head down, the collar n ther throat.
I reached to her hair and twisitng her head, she crying out, threw her to the 
furs. But it might not be unpleasant to do so, I said and then took her.
Almost instantly she had writhed in my arems, surrendering as a female slave to 
her master. Then trembling, held, she looked up at me. You took me well 
Master, she said. I laughed, pleased with my conquest and trimph over her. I 
then knew what was the order of nature. And she too, knew it well.
The other girl, she whispered, is she unpleasant or difficult to get on 
with? Perhaps, I said. Do you find her at times a bother or troublsome
Yes, I said. May I make a suggestion? she asked. Yes, I said. Buy a 
whip, she said.
end of page 113
12    I Become Irritated with my Kept Woman; I Kennel Her
Do not forget you are a kept women, I told her. Kept woman! she cried. 
Precisely,  I said. I do not care to think of myself as a kept woman, she 
said. Unfortunate, for that is exactly what you are.
Where were you last night, and today, she demanded. I own you no 
accountings.. Is my supper ready? I have already eaten, she said. Is my 
supper ready, he asked. You may prepare it yourself, shd said.
The house is dirty, I said. Such work is not mine to do,  she said. If you 
wish such work done, buy yourself a slave.
I had rented a small house a few blocks from the wharves. It had an upstairs and 
a downstairs. It was small, but stout, as are most Gorean dwellings. On the 
small earnings I made at the wharves it was somewhat expensive for me, but it 
was not altogether impractical. There were two bedrooms upstairs, and there was 
a hall, living room and kitchen downstairs. Mis Hendersons bedroom had a porch, 
which overlooked a small garden, surrpounded by a high wall.
Would you be pleased, I asked her, to return to an inn?
end of page 114
The house is not unpleasant, she said, but it has certain distressing 
features. And what are those? I asked. I thought the house was rather nice, 
considering the modesty of the budget which must needs sustain its rental.
My couch, she said, in the master bedroom, has a heavy iron ring set in its 
base. That is a slave ring, I said. Surely you know its purpose. Yes, 
she said acidly. Such rings are commonly used for chaining slave girls, 
generally by the neck, to the foot of their Masters couch.
And too, she said, I do not like the slave kennels in the hall. I shrugged. 
It is a Gorean house, I said.
Did you bring the suls from the market? she asked. No, I said, I did not. 
How much money did you earn today? she asked. The amount of money earned 
varied from day to day depending on the galleys in port and the need for men 
from the hiring yard.
It is none of your business, I told her. Her shoulders stiffened under the 
robes of concealment and her eyes flashed angrily over the slilk of the house 
veil. I could see her lips and mouth, vaguely, beneath the veil.
You brought nothing from the market, she said. Accordingly there is very 
little for you here to eat. Were you not to shop? I saked. I gave you 
money. I did not feel like it, she said.
I will eat out, he said. That is expensive, she said. There is some bread 
and dried meat left. I will eat out, I said.
The girls are pretty at the paga taverns arent they? she asked, pointedly. 
Thay had better be, I said, or they would bring in little money for their 
masters. I have heard such girls are hot, she said. It is one of the 
features for which they are purchased. I said. I see, she said in cold fury. 
And what if they are not in the mood? she asked.
end of page 115
They know enough to be in the mood, I assured her. And what if the customer 
is not pleased? she asked. The girl then, would be well whipped. I said.
Would you, she asked, If not well pleased, have such a girl whipped? Yes, 
I said. I see, she said in cold fury. She then rose to her feet. She drew her 
robes haughtily about her. I am weary, she said. I shall now retire.
Do not throw the bolt on your door, I said. She had been doing this, and it 
irritated me. It is my bedroom, she said. Of these lodgings, I said,  I am 
the rental master. It is your bedroom only upon my sufferance.
Of course, she said, coldly, I am your kept woman. You may leave when you 
wish, I said. Of course, she said, I need only walk out upon the Gorean 
streets and see what will happen to me.
You could sell yourself to an impotent maser, I said. Her eyes flashed angrily 
over the white silk of the house veil. I invite you to leave, I said. I do 
not want to leave, she said. You prefer to be kept. I said. Yes, she said 
coldly, I prefer to be kept.
She then turned about and left the kitchen, where we had been talking. She went 
through the living room and going throught the hall, passing the kennels, began 
to ascend the stairs. Do not bolt the door, I called after her. Why not? she 
asked, angrily.
There will be no iron between a keeper and his kept woman, I said, unless it 
be by his will, such as a collar for her, or shackles or the bars of a cell. I 
will do as I please, she said. A keeper must always have access to his kept 
woman, I said. I will do as I please, she said.
end of page 116
I listened to her door shut. I listened, carefully. Then I heard the iron bolt 
slid shut.
I sat cross-legged, behind the small table in the kitchen. Then I rose up and 
went to the storage box and took out some bread and dried meat. I chewed on it 
for a time. Then finishing it, I wiped my mouth. I then walked through the house 
to the stairs and climbed them.
She screamed, suddenly, clutching clothing about her. I stood in the threshold, 
the door awry, hanging off its hinges. The bold with its brackets was splintered 
from the heavy wood. She backed away, holding the clothing about her. Dont 
hurt me, she said. I would have opened the door! I strode to her and stood 
before her. I would have opened the door, she said. A slave might be slain 
for such a lie. I said.
She did not meet my eyes. You should knock, she said, before entering a 
ladys bedroom. I tore away the clothing she held before her, casting it aside. 
She wore then only a light Gorean slip, white, which came high on her thighs. I 
am not fully dressed! she said. I took her and threw her on her belly on the 
couch. What are you going to do to me? she asked. Strip you, I told her. 
From the back I ripped apart the white slip until she lay upon it. Get out of 
my bedroom, she sobbed. Be pleased that I do not this night made you earn your 
keep, I said.
For the night, I told her, this is not your bedroom. I seized her by the 
hair and pulled her, naked beside me, down the stairs. Before the first slave 
kennel, that farthest to the left as you face them, I stopped. With my left hand 
I flung up the sturdy, barred gate. I put the startled Miss Henderson on her 
hands and knees before the small opening. Then, with left hand in her hair, and 
my right hand on her left thigh, I thrust her bodily into the kennel. This is 
your bedroom for the night,  I told her. I then threw down the iron gate. She 
turned about, clutching the bars. I turned the key in the lock, fastening her 
within.
end of page 117
There will be no iron between a keeper and his kept woman, I said. Unless it 
be by his will, such as a collar, or shackles for her, or the bars a cell. I 
then walked over to the wall. I held the key up where she could see it. A 
keeper must alwaqyus have access to his kept woman,  I said. I then hung the 
key on a peg, where she might from time to time look upon it, as it might please 
her.
Jason, she said. I am going out, I told her.
Let me out, she begged. I am uncomfortable. the kennel is of cement, the bars 
of steel. Have a pleasant night, I said. I am uncomfortable, she said. I 
am cold!
I wager, I said, you will be far more uncomfortable and cold in the morning. 
Jason! she cried, Jason!
But I had gone out. You beast! I heard her cry. I hate you. I hate you!
I locked the door from the outside and left.
end of page 118
13    The Topaz
I returned to the house near the fifth Ahn. I had slept some at the tavern of 
Cleanthes. I frequented various taverns in Victoria. There were several in the 
city. There were attractions, so to speak, in each. My favorite on the whole I 
believe, remained the tavern of Tasdron. It was in that tavern that the former 
Peggy Baxter, now a branded, encollared Gorean slave girl, served her masters 
customers.
I had lit a small tharlarion-oil lamp in the hall. I had fetched down from the 
bedrom near the top of the stairs a robe. I looked down on the girl who knelt in 
the small kennel, holding the bars. Her flesh looked lovely behind the bars. 
Take your hands from the bars, I said. She knelt back in the kennel, and I 
unlocked the gate and thrust it up. I put the key to the side. She crawled out, 
on her hands and knees and I threw her the robe. She stood up, belting it about 
her. It is my short robe,  she said, not my long robe..
Yes, I said. It came up high on her thighs. It is suitable, doubtless, she 
said, for a kept woman. Yes, I said. I am cold and hungry, she said. 
there is some food in the kitchen, I said. I left some of the bread and dried 
meat. There is some money there too. You could go to the market. Did you sleep? 
No, she said.
I must go to the hiring yard, I said. You stink of the paga taverns, she 
said.
end of page 119
I turned from her and put my pouch to the side, I did not normally carry it to 
the wharves.
Were the girls pretty? she asked. I suppose so, I said. Some of them. 
Did you have a good time? she asked.
Yes, I said. I went to a bucket of water in the corner of the room and 
uncovering it, and using a bowl, dipped out water which I then used for washing 
my hands and feet.
Did anything unusual happen at the tavern? she asked. There are some 
guardsmen from Ars Station in Victoria. I said. What are they doing here? 
she asked.
Have you heard of the topaz? I asked. Yes, she said. I heard people in the 
market speaking of it. It is a pledge symbol, I said, apparently used among 
pirates on the river when combining for massive assaults. The men of Ars 
Station are searching for the topaz? she asked. Yes, I said.
They fear that their post will be subject to attack? Yes, I said, drying my 
face with a towel. and if Ars Station should be destroyed, the eastern river, 
between Tafa and Lara would lie much as the mercy of the raiders.
The guardsmen had not found the topaz, according to Jasons knowledge, however 
he had been stopped along with others outside the tavern of Cleanthes. Later 
they searched all in the tavern, save those whom they remembered from outside as 
having been previously examined. If the topaz should reach the stronghold of 
Policrates, the way would be clear for the uniting of the raider forces of both 
the east and west.
Then Port Cost would be next? she asked. That is speculation, I said putting 
aside the towel. Did the guardsmen of Ars Station find the topaz? she asked. 
Not to my knowledge, I said. They stopped me, and others outside the tavern 
of Cleanthes. Later they searched all in the tavern, save those whom they 
remembered from outside, as having been previously examined. You were not 
searched a second time then?she asked. No, I said. It was the same men who 
were conducting the search.
I the topaz should reach the stronghold of Policrates, she said, the way 
would be clear for the uniting of the raider forces of both the east and wast.
It has perhaps already reached the stronghold of Policrates, I said.
end of page 120
Surely routes to such a citadel have been invested, she said. They cannot be 
adequately invested without considerable forces. I do not think a careful 
courier would have difficulty reaching the citadel.
What hope, then, is to apprehend the courier before he can reach the citadel, 
I said. A slim hope, she said. I agree, I said. I would not wish to be who 
caries the topaz, she said. Nor I, I said smiling.
You kenneled me last night, she said. That is not unknown to me, I said. I 
will no longer try to keep a door locked between us, she said. That is 
advisable, I said.
She came than and stood near me. I restrained myself from seizing her in my arms 
and throwing her to the floor of the hall. Jason, she said. Yes, I said. She 
drew her robe down, slighty from her shoulders. I am ready to earn my keep, 
she said. You speak like a slave girl, I scorned her. Slave girls do not earn 
their keep, she said. They do what they are told. If you were a slave girl, 
would you do what you were told? I asked. Of course, she said. I would have 
to.
I wonder if you would make a good slave, I said. Enslave me, she said, and 
see. You are a woman of earth, I said. On this world, she said, many women 
of Earth are kept as the total slaves of their masters. I looked at her. 
Suddenly she knelt before me. Enslave me, she begged. I will make you a good 
slave.
end of page 121
Get on your feet, I said confused. You are a woman of Earth. Must I teach you 
of all people, a little feminist, how to be a true person? This is Gor, she 
said, not Earth. Such things are behind me now. I have learned too much.
Get up, I said. On Gor, she said, I do not need to pretend any longer. Here 
I do not need to be a political pupper. Here I am free at last to be a woman. 
Get up! I cried. Fulfill my needs, please! she begged. No! I cried. Then I 
said again, Get up quickly. You shame me.
She rose to her feet, tears in her eyes. She drew her robe tightly about her. 
It is I who have been shamed, she said. You have shamed yourself, I said 
angrily. No, she said, that is not true Jason. I have been honest to myself. 
It is you who have shamed me, punishing me for permitting myself this careless 
honesty. It is my fault, in a sense. You are a man of Earth, still. I should 
have known better.
You should not have such needs, I told her. I have them, she said. Change 
them, I said. I cannot, she said. Surely you desire to do so, I said. No, 
she said, no longer, I love them. They are the deepest part of me.
You must then, at the least, I said, pretend that you do not have them. 
Why? she asked. I do not know, I said, perhaps because they do not conform 
to the values of the glandularly deficient and sexually inert. This is not 
Earth, she said, Why should I conform to such values? I do not know,  I 
said. I do not know!
Such men and women, she said, must make virtures of their deficiencies. 
Otherwise to their humiliation, they would confess themselves less than others. 
Perhaps, I said. I do not know.
end of page 122
why do you let others, the petty and resentful, the fearful and inadequate, 
legislate for you in this sphere? I do not know, I said. What are their 
credentials? she asked. Where are their proofs? I do not know, I said. 
Heeding their advice produces misery and frustration, impairments, physical and 
mental, anxiety, pain, sickness and self-torture. It can even shorten lives. Do 
these sorts of things seem to you the manifestations of a correct moral 
position?
I do not know, I said. It is only the stupid and the mutilated and cripples 
who are to be accounted healthy? I do not know, I said. I do not know!
I am sorry if I have embarassed you, she said. Go to your room, I said. You 
have refused me as a woman, she said. Go to your room, Miss Henderson, I 
said. Of course, Keeper, she said. She turned away from me. She went toward 
the staris. At the foot of the stairs, she turned again to fact me. I am still 
prepared to earn my keep, she said.
You are a woman of Earth, I said. It is not necessary for a woman of Earth to 
earn her keep. Take me to the market and sell me. she said. Why? I asked. 
Perhaps a man will buy me, she said. I do not deny you your freedom, I said. 
You are refusing me my slavery, she said. You are displeasing me, I said. 
Then beat me and rape me, she said, and put me under discipline. Go to your 
room Miss Henderson, I warned her.
And shall I strip and await your pleasure? she asked. No, I told her. 
Clearly, she said,  a girl is safe with you. I said nothing.
Do you behave in this fashion with the sluts in the paga taverns? she asked. 
They are different, I said. They are slaves. And I added, not pleasantly, 
And only slaves. I see, she said. I envy the miserable creatures.
end of page 123
Do not, I said. You do not know what it is to be slave. I have been a 
slave, she said. You were only a display slave, I said. You were not a full 
slave. You do not have the least idea of what it would be to be a full slave.
Collar me, and teach me, she said. You are a woman of Earth, I said. I have 
no intention of abusing you. I am grateful, Keeper, she said acidly.
I bent, angry to my pouch. I would find some money which I would insert in the 
lining of my tunic, a common thing among manual laborers on Gor. What is 
wrong, she asked from the stairs. This was not here before, I said. I drew 
the object from the pouch. What is it? she asked.
I turned the object slowly in my hand. It was a fragment of polished stone, a 
fragment of what apeared to have once been a beveled, rectangular solid. It was 
about the size of a fist. It was a yellowish stone, with an intricate and 
unusual brownish discoloration at the point where it had apparently been broken 
from a larger stone. What is it? she asked. I am not sure, I said. I think 
it is the topaz.
end of page 124
14    Lola
I went back outside and brought in the other materials which I had purchased 
here and there in Victoria. I then closed and bolted the door. Who is there? 
called down Miss Henderson, from upstairs. It is Jason, I said. The slave did 
not count. Who is she? asked Miss Henderson from the head of the stairs. Is 
it not obvious? I asked.
It is a female slave. I am calling her Lola. this seemed to me appropriate, as 
it was the name which she ahd worn in the House of Andronicus. Who is she? 
asked Lola. I smiled to myself. She would not have draed to speak so 
peremptorily before another male on Gor. Miss Henderson stood aghast at the top 
of the stairs, that a slave should have spoken so. She is pretty and in your 
house, said Lola to me, and yet she is not in a collar. I see that you have 
not changed since the House of Andronicus, Jason. Insolent slave! cried Miss 
Henderson. She had not worn a house veil since the night I had kenneled her. I 
noted that Lola had used my name. That would cost her, I decided an additional 
five strokes.
There is shopping to be done, I told Miss Henderson. Attend to it, I do not 
wish to, she said. Attend to it, I told her.
end of page 125
Yes, Jason, she said angrily. She descended the stairs, took some coins from 
the kitchen, unbolted the door, and left. I rebolted the door again after her.
Lola looked at me. At least I shall have an easy slavery, she said.
I had found her this morning near noon when I had been on my luncheon break. At 
such times, for my amusement and interest, I occasionally frequented some of the 
dock markets, where though cheap girls tend to be sold there, one may 
occasionally see a real beauty being vended. It is pleasant of course to see 
women being sold, particularily if they are beautiful.
She was kneeling, back on her heels, naked, on the hot boards of a slavers 
platform. The boards were rough and splintery and there were tiny droplets of 
tar on them. She was shackled by the wrists on a short chain to an iron ring, 
heavy, whose plate was bolted into the boards.
Lola! I had said, my mouth full, chewing on the meat I had bought on the 
wharves. She had jerked back, seeing me.The sales had not yet begun. What do 
you want for her? I asked. Ten copper tarsks, he said. Done! I said.
No! she cried. Be silent, Wench, he ordered her. I removed a ten-tarsk piece 
from the lining of my tunic. Workers do not commonly carry pouches at their 
work.
Do not sell me to him, begged the girl, please! But he kicked her brutallly 
to silence. I paid him and he unshackled her. He also removed his collar from 
her throat. Come along, I told her. She descended from the platform and naked 
and miserable, heeled me as I threaded my way slowly from the place. She did not 
try to escape. She knew there was no escape for her. She was a Gorean slave 
girl.
I stopped at the warehouse where I had been working and collected a half days 
wages. My employer did not object,for he could see that I had purchased 
something of interest. Doubtless, I was eager to get her home.
end of page 126
Continue working, Jason called one of the fellows. Let her here in the 
warehouse. We will see that no harm comes to her! There was much laughter. I 
waved to them as I left the warehouse. Have her once for me! called one of my 
fellow workers after me. Little do they know you! she said bitterly.
On the way home I stopped in the market to buy a few thinks, some articles for 
which I thought I might find a use. Why are you buying a slave whip? she asked 
me. Be patient, I told her. Perhaps you will learn.
I also bought some chains, and binding fiber, and other things. Interestingly 
for no reason I clearly understood, I bought two sets of certain articles. Also 
on the way home, I purchased her a slave tunic and stopped at the shop of a 
metal worker, where i had her measured and purchased a collar for her. I had the 
collar inscribed according to my specifications. I put it in my sack with its 
two keys, tied to it with a string.
I snapped my fingers, and the girl, to the side, rose from her knees and lightly 
hurried to the table, beside which she again knelt, head down. You may clear, 
Lola, I told her. A deferential slut, said Miss Henderson, who knelt across 
the table from me. Lola kept her head down. Rather different that when you 
brought her into the house this afternoon, she said. What did you do to her?
Reminded her she was a slave, I said. I see, said Miss Henderson. Lola rose 
to her feet and padded softly, barefoot, carrying the dishes to the kitchen. 
Her tunic is sleeveless and too short, said Miss Henderson. It pleases me, I 
said. Of course, said Miss Henderson. She is yours.
Why have you tied me like this? has asked Lola.
I had tied her wrists together before her body, before the opened door of the 
house, leaving a dangling, loose strap of about a foot in length.
end of page 127
I then swept her from her feet and carried her across the threshold and put her 
down on her feet, near the side wall to the left. Why have you carried me into 
the house as a capture slave? she asked. I had rebolted the door, after Miss 
Henderson, sent on her shopping errands by myself, had exited. I had then turned 
again to face Lola. We were alone in the house.
She looked at me. At least I shall have an easy slavery, she said. Stand 
here, I told her, positioning her about five feet from the wall, facing it, to 
the left of the door as you enter, beneath a stout beam. I shall make you a 
poor slave, she said.
I went to the side of the room and loosening the chain, lowered the chain. 
Attached to the end of the chain, on theother side of the beam ring, now 
descending, was a wide circle of steel, a steel ring, some six inches in 
diameter. I stopped thechain where the steel ring dangled at her belly. You 
know what that is? I asked her. I am a slave girl, she said. Speak it, I 
said. It is a whipping ring, she said. I tied her tethered wrists, by the free 
end of the strap to the ring.
Why have you tied me to the whipping ring? she asked. Why do you think? I 
asked. Youre bluffing, she said.
I went back to the wall and pulled the chain again through the beam ring. Then 
her hands were held well over her head..
I will make you a poor slave, she said. Oh! she said. Perhaps not, I said. 
Release me, she said tensely. She stood now, painfully, on the tips of her 
toes.
I hooked a link of the chain on the holding hook, lifting her a quarter of an 
inch higher, securing her in place. Let me go, she said. I walked about her, 
and then faced her, looking upon her.
end of page 128
You are luscious, I told her. I think you may make an excellent slave. Let 
me go! she said squirming in the leather. Yes, and excellent slave, I said. 
Then I went behind her.
What are you going to do? she asked. What do you think? I asked her. You 
cannot frighten me, she said. I know you cannot strike me. You are too weak to 
whip me, and make me obey you. You are a man of Earth! Long ago you had me 
beaten in the House of Andronicus, I said. In your role as a free woman in the 
slave training you deliberately spilled wine and blamed me, and ordered me 
whipped. The whipping was very painful. Do you recall? She said nothing.
You have never adequately paid for that. I said. Paid? she asked. Yes, I 
said. Do not forget you are a man of Earth, she said. Oh yes, I said, the 
men of Earth never make a woman pay for anything. She may even humilitate them 
and destroy them as men with total impunity. It that right? Yes, yes! said the 
girl. Not always, I said.
Master? she asked. And this is not Earth, I said. Master? she asked. And 
then, suddenly she screamed, caught fully, helplessly, in the blurred, whistling 
slash of the five-standed Gorean slave whip. Ten strokes did I give her.
Then she hung weeping, shuddering at the ring. How can you whip me? she asked. 
You are a man of Earth. I went to her and by the hair jerked back her head, 
and she cried out in pain. Is this the touch of a man of Earth? I asked. No, 
she said frightened. Too, I said, whispering in her ear, you are a new slave 
who has been brought recently to my house. No, she begged, No!
Sometimes a girl is whipped when she is first brought into a new house. It is 
regarded, in some cities, including Victoria as a way of making clear to her 
that the house in which she now finds herself is a house in which she is a 
slave.
end of page 129
Ten strokes more then did I administer to the fair beauty. Too, I said, 
earlier you dared to speak my name. Forgive me Master, she sobbed. That has 
earned you five extra strokes, I informed her. She moaned and then was shaken 
five times, encircled in the burning lashes, being repaid for her insolence.
When I lowered the whip she sagged in the leather, fastened at the ring, and 
slipped from consciousness. I went before her and slapped her awake. She looked 
at me, startled, awakened in pain, terrified. And one more stroke, I told her, 
 to remind you that you are slave. Yes Master, she whispered. I delivered 
the blow, lettig it be the fiercest of her beating. I then put aside the whip 
and lowered the chain. She collapsed to the floor. I unbound her hands from the 
rings, freeing her too of the tether which had confined her wrists.
She lay on her stomach on the tiles of the hall. She lifted her head slowly. She 
shook her head to clear her vision. She looked at me disbelievingly.
I removed my sandles and threw them to the files, near where she lay. 
Obediently, on her hands and knees, one by one, putting her head down, she 
brought them to me in her teeth, and put them down before me. She then looked 
up. Kiss the whip, I told her. She took the whip, held before her, in her 
small hands, and pressing her lips fervently to it, kissed it. She then looked 
up at me, and I saw in her eyes, moist and awe-stricken, that I was her Master. 
I then collared her.
Your duties in this house, Lola will be numerous and complex. In particular you 
will be a house slave. You will dust and clean the house and keep it neat. You 
will mend and sew. YOu wil wash and iron clothing. You will shop and cook and 
serve. all manner of domentic tasks, trival and servile unfit for free women, 
will be yours. Yes, master, she said.
Too, you will take orders in this house from Lady Beverly, Miss Henderson, who 
is a free woman in the house, as you would as if from me, but you are to 
remember always that is it I who owns you and not she.
end of page 130
Yes, Master, she said. But for such a handsome Master am I to be only a house 
slave? Foremost among your duties, I said, for you are beautiful, will be to 
attend to the pleasures of your Master. Yes, Master, she said. Please 
forgive me Master, for not having been pleasing to you before. Do you wish to 
be whipped again? I asked. No, Master, she said, No!
The whipping had convinced her that she was under discipline. This 
understanding, or course, goes far beyond the mere pain of a particular episode. 
The whipping in itself, though of considerble moment, is insignificant when 
compared to the lesson it teaches. It teaches her that she is at his mercy, and 
is owned, truly. This fulfills something very deep in the female. This is the 
lesson of the leather. This is not to deny, of course that a woman who is fully 
conscious of her imbonded condition, does not fear the whip. She does, for she 
knows what it can and will do to her if she is not pleasing. The only woman who 
does not fear the whip is she who has not felt it.
Then perhaps you should begin to be pleasing to me now, I said. Yes, Master! 
sahe said and began to kiss at my body. But on the other hand, I said, 
perhaps you should merely tie my sandals. Let me tie them later, she said. 
Let me please you now, Do you bet it? I asked. Yes Master, she said. Very 
well, I said.
Lola, kneeling behind the bars of the slave kennely, looked up at me. You are 
so different now from before, she said. I shrugged.
She put her arms timidly through the bars, to touch me. Will you not again 
sometime, subjec me to slave rape? she asked. Perhaps, I said.
end of page 131
I am pleased that you bought me, she whispered. I will try to serve you 
well. Do not think things will be easy here for you, I said, for there is a 
fee woman in the house.
I will obey her, said Lola, and with perfection But do not forget, I said, 
that it is I who owns you and not she. I shall not forget Master, she 
smiled. then she kissed her finger tips and putting her hand through the bars, 
put her hand to my waist. The Mistress will be home soon, and then doubtless, 
you will soon be set to chores. Yes Master, said Lola.
Lola now returned to the small table and, kneeling, head down, served us our 
dessert, slices of tospit, sprinkled with four Gorean sugars.
I see there may be some advantages to having a slave in the house, said Miss 
Henderson. I never doubted it, I said. Youmay serve the black wine now, in 
small cups, Lola, said Miss Henderson. Yes Mistress, whispered Lola.
This was a delicacy. I had purchased, some days ago, but we had not yet served 
it. In a few Ehn Lola returned with the tray, with the vessel of steaming 
liquid, the creams and sugars, the tiny cups and the small spoons for mixing and 
measuring.
Delicious, said Miss Henderson. Thank you Mistress, said Lola. She then drew 
back a bit, and knelt, to be unobstrusive and yet available, instantly, to serve 
should free folk wish aught.
You are a very pretty girl, Lola, said Miss Henderson regarding her. Thank 
you Mistress, said Lola, head down. Men must find you attractive, said Miss 
Henderson. Perhaps, Mistress, said Lola, some men. I smiled to myself. The 
man who did not find Lola attractive must indeed be an inert dolt.
How long has you been a slave? asked Miss Henderson. Four years, Mistress, 
said Lola. Have you have several Masters? asked Miss Henderson.
end of page 132
Yes, Mistress, said Lola. Have you served them as a slave? she asked. yes 
Mistress, said Lola. As a full slave? asked Miss Henderson.
Lolo lowered her head further. Yes, Mistress, she whispered. Did you enjoy 
their hands on your body? asked Miss Henderson. Yes, Mistress, whispered 
Lola. I see that you are a true slave, said Miss Henderson.
Incidentally, I said to Miss Henderson, move your things out of the master 
bedroom. It is my bedroom! she said.
No, I said, I am taking it. It is larger. And it has a porch, and a view of 
the garden and sky. I am renting the house. I am making it mine. No! she 
said. Too, I said, it has the great couch, the one with the slave ring at its 
foot.
I see, said Miss Henderson looking angrily at Lola. Lola did not raise her 
head, but knelt there, her knees close together, in the brief slave tunic. I 
see, said Miss Henderson and rose to her feet, hurrying angrily upstairs.
I finished my black wine, enjoying it. When I had finished, I permitted Lola to 
clear the table and address herself to the work in the kitchen.
After a time, I went upstairs. Miss Henderson had cleared the room. I looked at 
the heavy iron slave ring, about eight inches in diameter, set in the stone of 
the great couch. I then went into Miss Hendersons room. She was sitting on the 
couch. You did not knock, she said. I need not knock to enter the room of my 
kept woman, I said. I then took my things from the room and put them into the 
master bedroom. I looked over the balustrade to the sky beyong. It was lovely. 
As I again started downstairs, I met Miss Henderson on the lasnding. She too was 
going downstairns.
You seem angry, I said. Not I, she said. Why are you goind downstairs I 
asked. To supervise the slave, she said. Such girls are lazy and will do no 
work if they are not closly watched.
end of page 133
I stepped aside and let her precede me down the stairs. She was a free woman, 
and a woman of earth. She was not a slave, who must heel her Master.
Come here Lola, I said.
It was not in the early evening. Miss Henderson and I, with small cups of a 
Turian liqueur before us, lounged in the living room. A tharlarion-oil lamp lit 
the room. Stand her, I told Lola. Yes Master, she said.
Surely you are not angry, I said to Miss Hendrerson, that I bought her? I 
faced Lola away from me. I put my hands on her ankle. Look at this ankle, I 
said. Lola trembled. And these calves and thighs, I said, and the luscious, 
central curves of her, and these breasts and shoulders. I put my hand under her 
chin lifting it up. And this neck in my collar, I said, and this head and 
face and this hair. Surely you can see that she was an excellent buy. Yes, 
said Miss Henderson angrily, she was an excellent buy.
When you have finished your work tonight, Lola, I said, go up upstairs to the 
master bedroom. Take your clothes off and kneel there, by the slave ring, and 
await my pleasure. Yes, Master, she said, and went then hurriedly to the 
kitchen.
Just like that? asked Miss Henderson. Of course,  I said. She is a slave. 
It must be pleasant to have such absolute power over a woman, she said. Yes, 
I said.
In time, Miss Henderson and I had finished the liqueur. Lola cleaned the glasses 
and put them away. Then head down, quietly, when she had finished, she slipped 
past and made her way upstairs to the master bedroom.
Do you find her more beautiful than I, asked Miss Henderson. She is quite 
beautiful, I said. But I do not think that she is more beautiful then you. You 
are quite beautiful, you know. Yes it is she whom you kneel at your slave ring 
not I, said Miss Henderson.
end of page 134
I gritted my teeth, forcing the thought of Miss Henderson kneeling naked at my 
feet at my slave ring, awating my pleasure, from my mind. It was all I could do 
to control myself She was the most incredibly attractive female I had ever 
known. You are a free women, I said. Perhaps, I would make a good slave, she 
said. I doubt it, I said, You are a woman of Earth.
Gorean men say that we make excellent slaves, she said. It is only necesaary 
that we understand clearly that we are slaves, and are put under discipline. We 
then blossom in our slavery, beautifully, as much or perhaps even more so than 
Gorean girls.
I have given you respect, I said. I have given you freedom. I have given you 
money. I have relieved you of work. I have denied you nothing. Yet you remain 
dissatisfied. You have denied me one thing, said she. What is that? I 
asked. A collar, she said.
Go to your room, I said. Of course, she said, Let me not keep you from your 
slut. She rose from the table and lifting the hem of her robes, went to the 
stairs. She is doubtless already naked, and at your ring, she said. She had 
better be, I said, unless she wishes to be whipped.
Angrily Miss Henderson ascended the stairs. Miss Henderson, remeber that your 
door is to be left unbolted, I said. I know, she said. That my door be 
bolted is not permitted. A keeper must always have acces to his kept woman. She 
then entered her room, the smaller room whichk previously, had been mine. She 
closed the door firmly, decisively, angrily. I listened carefully. She did not 
bolt it.
I then, not hurrying, went upstairs. I entered my room and closed the door 
behind me, bolting it. I looked down at Lola. She knelt naked at the ring.
end of page 135
She looked up at me and smiled, I await your pleasure Master, she said.
Spread the furs, I said,  and light the ravishment lamp. I removed my tunic, 
throwing it aside. In a few moments, Lola lay on the furs a the foot of the 
couch on her belly, her hands at her sides, the backs of her hands to the furs, 
the palms of her hands vulnerably up, exposed.
I crouched beside her and took the nearby chain and collar. I fastened the chain 
to the slave ring and then closed the heavy collar about her neck, over the 
other collar. She was then chained by the neck to my slave ring. I took her body 
in my hands and turned her to her back. Her weight was light for my strength. 
She looked up at me, breathlessly, I am yours, Master, she whispered. that is 
known to me,  I said. Yes, yes Master, she whispered, lifting her lips to 
mine.
end of page 136
15    The House Has Been Ransacked; Miss Henderson Has Been Bound as a Slave; I 
Do Not Abuse Her
The door was ajar. I had returned early from the wharves. There had been little 
work. I as apprehensive that the door was adjar. Lola! I called stepping 
withing the threshold. Lola! I heard a tiny sound a pathetic, tiny whimpers, 
muffled, almost inaudible, from a few feet away. I ran to the slave kennel on 
the left. Lola was withing, naked, sitting, bound hand and foot. She was tighly 
gagged. Only the tiniest, muffled sounds could escape her.
The key was nearby. I opened the kennel. I pulled and lifted her out. I fumbled 
with the knots on the gag. I loosened them and pulled the binding down about her 
neck. I pulled the deep heavy wadding from her mouth. The Mistress, she said, 
She is upstairs. I looked about. The house was in a shambles. Goods were cast 
about. My pouch, left home, had been emptied out upon the floor. Who did this? 
I asked. A man, she said. A large man. He wore a mask, purple.
Is he in the house? I asked. No, she gasped.
end of page 137
I unied her hands. I glanced at the knots on her ankles. I did not think that 
she, with her womans strength, could well undo them. I loosened them.
What did he want? I asked her. I do know know Masters she said.
I hurried upstairs. Miss Henderson was in the master bedroom. She was on the 
great couch. She looked at me, pathetically. There were bruises on her body. She 
was tied as a slave. She tried to speak, but she had been well gagged. My things 
in the bedroom had been gone through and thrown about.
I looked at Miss Henderson. Her small legs, by the ankles, had been tired 
cruelly apart. Her wrists too were tied widely apart. Small rings on either side 
of the couch, at the head and foot, anchored the binding fiber, permitted this 
tie. It is not an uncommon tie for slaves. There were tears in her eyes. She 
made tiny muffled noises. I could scarcely hear them, though I stood at the foot 
of the couch.
Lola, her slave tunic now drawn on, stood in the threshold of the master 
bedroom. The Mistress was not circumspect, she said, She opened the door. The 
man thrust in. He turned her about and held her a knife at her throat. Do not 
run or cry out, he said, or your Mistress dies. Bring cloths an binding fiber 
I obeyed. Strip he ordered me. I obeyed. Lie on your stomachs, side by side 
he told us. We obeyed. then while he knelt across the body of the Mistress that 
she might not flee, he bound me, hand and foot and gagged me. Then at his 
leisure, garment by garment, with his knife, seeming to enjoy have her 
progressively revealed to him, he stripped the Mistress. He then, though she was 
free, trussed and gagged her identically as he had me. He then stood up and 
regarded us. We lay before him, though I was a slave and she free, side by side, 
identically helpless. I was put in the slave kennel and the kennel was locked. 
She he carried upstairs.
I looked at Miss Henderson with irritation. What a fool she was to have so 
thoughtlessly opened the door. She struggled in the binding fibeer. Her eyes 
begged me to relesase her. She made tiny noises, helpless, pathetic, almost 
inaudible.
Shall I free her Master? asked Lola. No, I said angrily.
end of page 138
I then went to Miss Hendersons bedrom. It top was a shambles. The kitchen, I 
assume, was searched. I said to Lola returning to the master bedroom. Yes, 
she said. What did he take? I asked. As far as I know, she said, he took 
nothing. Go to the kitchen Lola, I said. Set things in order. Yes, 
Master, she said.
I shut the door behind her. I had little doubt for what it was that the visitor 
had sought. Miss Henderson whimpered.
What a fool you are to have opened the door, not knowing the nature of identity 
of your guest, I said. Anger as well as tears welled up in her eyes. Yet, I 
said, regarding her,You are a pretty little fool. She twisted angrily in the 
binding fiber.
I knelt upon the couch and turning her head to the side, untied the knots at the 
back of her neck. Then, turing her head to face me, I pulled the wet, heavy 
packing of the gag from her mouth.
Your gag was quite effective, I told her.  as was Lolas. He who gagged you 
is apparently no strange to the control of prisoners.
Afteer he had brought me upstairs, and tied me, as you find me, she said, he 
removed the gag temporarily. Yes? I said. He struck me until I begged to be 
raped, she said He made me beg to be raped! And what happened, I asked, 
smiling, after you had begged to be raped. He laughed and then raped me, she 
said in fury. Of course, I said. Had you not asked him to do so?
He looked upon me as though I might be a slave, she said, and he treated me, 
thoughtlessly and casually, as though I might be a slave. He even called me 
Slave!
Gorean men are expert in such matter, I said. Perhaps he knows something 
about you that I do not know. Look! she said. He tied me as a slave!
You loook well, I told her, tied as a slave.
She squirmed in the binding fiber angrily, helplessly. Please unbind me, she 
said.
end of page 139
I looked at her. The topaz is gone, she said. Speak softly, I said, Lola is 
a slave. She need know nothing of the topaz. I was terrified, she said, and 
so I told him, immediately where it was. She looked at me angrily. And then, 
in spite of my cooperation, he called me slave and in amusement subjected me to 
his will.
Where did you tell him it was? I asked. In your pouch, downstairs, she said, 
where you keep it.
It has not been in the pouch for days, I said. Where is it? ahs asked. 
Elsewhere, I said. Yes, she said angrily. She looked up at me.
It is fortunate, I said, that he, rightly or wrongly, took you as a slave. 
Else he might have returned to cut your throat. Thinking you a slave he would 
prsume you ignorant of the location of an item of such value. I smiled. You 
could then be left alive, perhaps to please him again as an interesting and 
complete pleasure object, should you fall again into his clutches.
He then, finishing with me, regagged me, she said. And effectively, I said. 
yes, she said angrily.
If he had found the topaz immediately, I said, why did you think he would 
continue searching the house? For valuables, she said. But I did not 
understand his anger, his frustration. He had not, actually, found the topaz, 
I said.
I did not understand, she said. It had not occurred to me that you would have 
removed it from your pouch without telling me. I shrugged. In that, she said, 
Not tkaing me into your confidence, you treated me as a slave, did you not, 
Jason?
I may have saved your life, I said. Slave girls have value - as articles of 
property. I see,  she said angrily. Besides, I said, obviously you were 
willing to reveal the location of the topaz with alarcity,as I had feared.
end of page 140
It is important that it not reach Policrates. If it does, the major forces of 
the pirates of the eastern Vosk would achieve unification, at least for a time, 
with those of the western Vosk. This is to be prevented, if at all possible. If 
you did not know the location of the topaz it seemed obvious to me that you 
could not reveal its location, unless by some chance inadvertance. Doubtless the 
fewer that know of its ocation the better.
Do you think I am a slave, Jason? she asked.
I assumed that any who might search for the topaz would be likely to regard you 
in such terms. You are the type of woman, sexually stimulating and curvacious, 
desirable, whom Gorean men, rightly or wrongly, look upon in terms of the 
parameters of bondage, in terms of such things as their potential for yielding 
incredible gratification and service. Too, do not forget that your left thigh 
bears a certain lovely brand, that of many Gorean kajirae.
Do you think I am a slave, Jason? she asked. Why do you ask? I asked. You 
have not untied me, she said. You have let me bound as a slave. I did not 
speak.
I lie before you, bound as a slave, she said. Use me if you wish, I am 
tired, helplessly, I cannot resist you. Take me as a slave if you wish! I did 
not speak.
Untie me, she begged. No, I said. Why not? she asked. You look well tied 
as a slave, I told her. Perhaps that is because I am a slave, she said. 
Perhaps, I said. You are punishing me arent you? she said. Yes, I said. 
And as a slave, she said. Yes, I said. You do regard me as a slave, she 
said. You are a woman of Earth, I said. How can you be a slave? I am a 
woman of Earth, she said, How can I not be a slave? I rose from the couch and 
went to the door.
end of page 141
Where is the topaz, Jason? she inquired. I choose not to inform you of its 
location, I said. Excellent, she said. You keep your slaves in ignorance.
Do not confuse yourself with a slave, Miss Henderson. I said. If you were my 
slave, you would be in no doubt about the fact. I wonder, she said.
I considered her throat. I did not think it would look bad in a close-fitting 
steel collar, properly inscribed, identifying her as mine. Then I forced such 
thoughts from my mind. She was Miss Beverly Henderson of Earth.
May I inquire as to the duration of my punishment? she asked. An Ahn or two, 
I expect, I said. I will have Lola restore the house to order. When she is 
finished you will be freed and sent to your room. You many emerge in the 
morning.
And little Lola will come in here to lick your feet, she said bitterly. She 
wil do what she is commanded, I said. I may have her do that. I may not. It 
will depend totally upon my will.
What manner of man are you? she asked horrified. One who does not mind having 
a beautiful woman naked, collraed, a slave at his totaly mercy, licking his 
feet. I said. How pathetic to be a slave! she cried.
Rejoice in your freedom, I told her. I then opened the door and preapred to 
exit. Jason, she said. Yes, I said. I yielded to my rapist, she said. As 
a slave? I asked. Yes, she said.Am I not then a slave? Perhaps, I said. 
I will never yield to you, she said. You canot make me yield to you.
I smiled to myself, for was she not female? Then I put such thoughts from my 
mind.She was Miss Beverly Henderson of Earth.
I exited and closed the door, quietly, I hate you! she cried out from within.
end of page 142
16    Lola Has Not Greeted Me as I Return Home; I Hurry to the Wharves
Lola! I called. Lola!
The days work had been long on the docks. I was looking forward to receivng the 
attentions of the lovely little slut. Lola! I called.
Where was she? By now she should hve run to me and knelt before me, happily, 
waiting to be commanded. Lola! I called. Lola! I began to grown slightly 
irritated. Was the girl lax? Perhaps it would be necessary to put her under some 
unpleasant discipline.
She is not here, said Miss Henderson, lightly.
You have sent her shopping? I asked. No, she said. Where is she? I asked. 
You know I like her at my feet when I come home.
She is not here, said Miss Henderson, somewhat evasively I thought.
Where is she? I asked. She was a poor slave, said Miss Henderson. She was 
lazy. Her work was not adequate. Where is she? I asked. I grew displeased 
with her, said Miss Henderson.
Where is she, I asked. I sold her. said Miss Henderson.
end of page 143
I looked at her disbelievingly. Her work was not satisfactory, she said. I 
ordered her to submit to binding, as a slave must. I then with a switch, 
conducted her to the whaves where I sold her.
To what merchant? I asked angrily. I did not inquire his name, she said. 
The market was on what wharf? I asked. I received two copper tarsks for her, 
she said. The market was on what wharf? I asked.
I will give you the two copper tarsks if you wish, she said. The market was 
on what wharf? I asked.
I did not pay any attention, she said. Doubtless, by now, she has been sold 
off anyway, Jason! Take your hands off me!
I held her rudely by the arms, almost lifting her from the floor. She was not 
yours to sell! I said.
I wil give you the two copper tarsks if you wish, she said. We can buy 
another work slave, if you wish,a better worker, one mutually agreeable to us.
Lola was a splendid worker, I said. I did not care for her, said Miss 
Henderson. Jason!
I had flung her halfway across the room in fury. Beware! she said. I am 
free! You had no right to sell her, I said. I am free! she said. I do what 
I please!
I glared at her in fury. Then I turned about. Where are you going? she asked. 
To the wharves, I said. She will have been sold by now! she cried. You will 
never find her.
When did you take her to the market? I asked. Early this morning, she said, 
as soon as you had left. You planned well, I said. You will never find 
her! she cried. I left the house in fury slamming the door. You will never 
find her! she cried from within. I began to run toward the wharves.
end of page 144
17    I Ponder the Contentment of a Slave
You take me with some bitterness, Master, she said. has Peggy displeased 
you? No, I said. I am angry. Ah, she said, then ventilate your emotions 
upon me, for I am only a slave, She kissed me. I must submit in whatever means 
you you choose to do to me. Do you wish to whip me? No, I said. It is not 
you whom I should make suffer.
Some free woman has displeased you? she asked. Yes, I said. Then take your 
vengance upon her, she said. Collar her. Make her your slave. She is from 
earth, I said. We are not different from other women, she said, unless it 
might be, perhaps, that we make better slaves. She leaned back on the furs of 
the alvoce. Is this the same female concerning whom we once spoke? she who was 
with you in the restaurant?
Yes, I said. The pretty little beast. she said. Yes, I said. And you have 
not yet enslaved her? Master is dilatory. Do you think so? I asked. A Gorean 
man would soon have her lovely little throat locked in his steel collar, she 
said. But she is from Earth, I said.
end of page 145
Master is quaint, she laughed. Forgive me Master, she smiled. What did she 
do? asked Peggy.
I then grew again bitter. She sold a slave of mine, I said unknown to me and 
without right. For a man, said Peggy, such an offense is punishable by 
exile. For a woman, remanded by a praetor, the penality is commonly that she 
herself will then wear the collar. Oh? I asked. Yes, she said. Enslave 
her. I cannot, I said. She is from Earth.
The women of Earth, she smled, are never to be punished, no maatter what they 
do? No, I said.
Gorean men, she laughed, are not so tolerant of our flaws. We may be severely 
punished even for displeasing them in the slightest.
You may be serverely punished even at their whim, I said. Yes, she said. 
But you are slaves, I reminded her. That is true, she said, We were brought 
to Gor to be collared and made slaves.
She is free, I reminded her. Enslave her, said Peggy. But then she would be 
only another Gorean slave girl, I said, no different from others. True, 
said Peggy. And she would be mine to do with exactly as I pleased, I said, 
totally. Precisely, said Peggy. Oh, she said suddenly, you are so strong.
I must put such thoughts from my head, I said. Why? she asked, clutching me, 
pressing closely agains me. Men must not think such thoughts, I said.
Why? she asked. Because they so considerably increase a mans virility? She 
held to me tightly. I would rather that they put thoughts from their heads, 
she said, that would make them miserable and weak. How can thoughts be wrong 
which make men great and strong?
end of page 146
I am a slave in your arms. Does your blood not call you to your destiny, my 
Master? My blood, racing in my weakened body, opened like a flower to you , 
yielding, calls me to mine. I submit to you my Master. I beg you to be strong 
with me, to own me. Peggy begs Master to take her!
I then took her, and she screamed with pleasure, a taken slave. Later, I held 
her closely. Are you a contented slave? I am a slave. she whispered., 
whether I am contented or not. Speak, He said. Yes, Master, she whispered 
softly, I am a contented slave.
end of page 147
18    I Make the Acquaintance of Guardsman from Port Cos; I Do Not Take Action 
Against Miss Henderson; She is a Free Woman
I hung in the ropes. My back was still store from the whipping. As far as we 
can determin, said the guardsman from Port Cos, he is ignorant as to the 
whereabouts of the topaz. I vouch for him, said Tasdron. He is an honest 
worker, well know on the wharves. He has been in Victoria for weeks.
When I had emerged from the tavern of Tasdron, I had been suddenly surrounded by 
guardsmen in the livery of Port cos. Several crossbows were trained on me.
Do not draw your weapon, I had been told. Do not resist. Is this he? asked 
the leader of the guardsmen. It is he, said Miss Henderson. You are under 
arrest, had said the leader of the guardsmen. On what charge? I asked. 
Vagrancy,
That is absurd, I said.
end of page 148
Your innocence, if you are innocent, may be established later. said the man. 
This is Victoria, I said. The power of Port Cos marches with the men of Port 
Cos, said the man. Bind him. My hands hand been tied behind my back.
I am finished with you Jason, said Miss Henderson, facing me. Then she turned 
to the leader of the guardsmen, Pay me, she said. Bind her, as well, he had 
said. To her consternation, her small wrists were tied behind her back. Bring 
them both to our headquarters, had said the leader of the men.
I vouch for him, said Tasdron. He is an honest worker and known on the 
wharves. He had been in Victoria for weeks. Did he come from east on the 
river, or west? asked the guardman. From the east, from Lara, as I understand 
it, said Tasdron.
That is much what he too claims, said the guardsman. In my own tavern, said 
Tasdron, he had difficulty with Kliomentes, the pirate. He could have been 
killed. That scarcely seems what one would expect from the courier of Ragnar 
Voskjard. Too, he does not seem skilled with the sword.
It is not claimed he is the courier, said the guardsman. It is claimed only 
that he knows the whereabouts of the topaz. Is there any reason to suppose 
that is true? asked Tasdron. Only the word and story of a free woman, whom he 
keeps, said the guardsman.
I see, said Tasdron. And hve you had similar situations before? Four 
times, said the guardsman, disgustedly. Dooubtless you hve searched his 
compartments, said Tasdron.
He has a small house, said the guardsman, and we have searched the house and 
the garden. What did you find? Nothing, said the guardsman.
end of page 149
Does the woman seem well disposed towards him? asked Tasdron. She hates him, 
said the guardsman. And does she seem interested in the reward for information 
leading to the acquisition of the topaz? asked Tasdron. Yes, said the 
guardsman. The mney seems quite important to her. Ten silver tarsks is a 
considerable sum, said Tasdron. The guardsmen from Ars Station, also in 
Victoria searching for the topaz are offering only six silver tarsks.
Cut him down, said the leader of the guardsmen to one of his men. When the 
ropes were cut from my wrists, I fell to the floor but did not lose my footing. 
He is strong, said the learder of the guardsmen. My tunic was torn down about 
my waist. My thanks, Tasdron, I said to him, for your helpful words. It is 
nothing, he said.
You may go said the leader of the guardsmen to me. You may pick up your things 
at the door.
Had you found the topaz, I asked, what would have been done with me? You 
might have looked forward, said he if fortunate, to a lifetime chained at the 
bench of a state galley. I see, I said. Do not forget your things at the 
door, he said. Very well, I said.
At the door, I drew the shreds of my tunic about me. I picked up my pouch and 
the sword belt, with its scabbard and sheathed steel. Among these things in the 
robes of the free woman, her hands tied behind her, and her ankles tied, knelt 
Miss Henderson. Do not leave her behind, said the leader of the guardsman, 
she is yours. I looked down at her. She did not meet my eyes.
Those in your situation before, said the leader, stripped such woman and 
tooke them, bound, to the market, where the sold them.
I crouched beside Miss Henderson and freed her ankles. I then helped her to her 
feet, and untied her wrists. I then left the small headquarters of the guardsmen 
of Port Cos, in Victoria.
end of page 150
She followed me outside, and a few yards from headquarters, I turned about and 
faced her.
If you needed money, or wanted it, I said, I would have given you money. 
Stay with me tonight, she said. I am going to the paga tavern, I told her. 
Why? she asked.
There are more interesting women there, I said. Slaves! she said. Yes, I 
said. I am a free woman, she said. Do you find slaves more interesting than 
I? Of coures, I said. Why?
she asked. For one thing, I said, they are owned. That makes them 
fascinating doesnt it? she said bitterly. Yes, I said.
And doubtless, she said angrily, they do not have the inhibitions and 
frigidities of their free sisters! They are not permitted them, I admitted. 
I hate female slaves, she said. I shrugged.
Why are they preferred over free women? she asked. Because they are slave, I 
said. What are the differences? she asked. There are thousands, I said. 
Perhaps, most simply, the female salve is submitted to me. This makes her the 
most total of women.
Disgusting she said. Perhaps, I said. No man could ever break my will, she 
said. That is the sort of thing which is usually said by a woman who is 
yearning for her will to be broken by a strong man, I said. I hate female 
slaves, she said. I did not speak.
Do you think I would make a good female slave? she asked. I think you would 
make an excellent little slave, I said. Stay with me tonight, she said. 
Why? I asked.
end of page 151
Break my will, she said. Make me a slave. You are a woman of Earth, I told 
her. I see, she said. I am too fine and different. Of coures, I told her. 
Do you need to be told that? No, she said I know it!
Very well, I said angrily. Stay with me tonight, she begged. Make me your 
slave! I looked at her.
My will broken will lie before you as yielding, as supine and vanquished as my 
body, she said. I beg of you Jason, make me your slave!
I am going to the paga tavern, I said. I hate you! she cried. I turned away 
from her then and began to make my way toward the house. She, after a moment, 
running in her sandals, followed me. Jason! she said, wait! Wait for me! But 
I did not wait.
I opened the door and looked within. Then I stepped back, and indicated that she 
should precede me into the house. I expected to heel you into the house, she 
said. You are a free woman, I said. You will enter first. She looked at me 
warily. What is to be done with me inside? she asked. You are a woman of 
Earth, I reminded her. Nothing.
Where is the topaz? she asked. What topaz? I asked. She cried out in anger, 
and then entered the house. She would enter first, for she was a free woman.
end of page 152
19    Glyco, of Port Cos; I Obtain a Silver Tarsk; He Seeks Callimachus
Stop, Thief! cried the portly fellow, his robes tiwrling. Darting away from 
him as a small, quick fellow, clutching in his hand a bulging purse, its strap 
slashed. In the small fellows right hand thre was clotched a dagger. Men stood 
aside to let the thief run by them.
Stop him! cried a portly fellow, stumbling, puffing, trying to pursue the 
running man. I watched, a bale of rep fiber on my shoulder, near the rep wharf.
As the running man approached me, I lowered the bale of rep fiber and as he came 
within feet of me, suddenly slid it before him.He struck the bale and stumbled 
over it, rolling on the boards. Instantly I was upon him. He lashed at me, on 
his back, with the knife and I seized his wrist with both hands and yanked him 
to his feet. He dropped the purse. I spun him about twice by the wrist and then, 
with this momentum hurled him into a tower of nail barrels on the side. They 
cascaded down. I jerked him bak, groggy. He was bloodly. There were splinters in 
his tunic and face. I then, with two hands broke his wrist and kicked the fallen 
knift to the side. I then turned him about to face me. He looked at me wildly, 
clutching his wrist. A bone fragment was jutting through it. I then kicked him 
squarely and he threw back his head screaming with pain.
end of page 153
I then turned him about again and holding him by the back of the neck, ran him 
to the edge of the wharf where seising his ankle and holidng his neck, I upended 
him into the water below. He struck out toward the shore, then clambered toward 
it, getting his feet under him. He screamed twice more. When he stood in about a 
foot of water, among pilings, near the next wharf, he struck down madly at his 
legs with his left hand, striking two dock eels from his calf. Then, painfully, 
he mved himself up the sand, staggering, holding his legs widely apart.
Where are the guardsmen to apprehend him? puffed the portly fellow, who wore 
the caste colors of the merchants, white and gold. There are no guardsmen in 
Victoria, I said. Two copper tarsks, one to each of you, said the merchant to 
two dock workers who stood nearby, to apprehend the thief.
Swiftly the two dock workers set out after the thief. Though men stood about, 
none had attempted to steal the purse of the merchant which lay nearby. Most of 
those of Victoria are honest fellows. One of them handed the purse back to the 
merchant, who thanked him.
What is your name, Fellow? asked the merchant of me. Jason, I said. Of 
Victoria? asked the merchant. It is here that I am now, I said. He smled. 
Drifters among the river towns are not uncommon. They come from all over Gor. 
You have had difficulties with guardsmen? he asked. I had some difficulties 
with guardsmen in Tancreds Lansing and Fina, I admitted.
I am Glyco, said he, of the Merchants of Port Cos. You are a bold fellow. I 
am grateful for your aid. It is nothing, I said.
Whining, the thief was dragged beforeus by the two dock workers. He was still in 
great pain. He could scarcely stand. The dock workers had torn off his clothes 
and riping his tunic, had mad a rope of twisted cloth with which they had bound 
his hands behind his back. They also had him on a short neck leash, also 
tashioned of twisted cloth, from his tunic. His right hand was bleeding, andhis 
left leg, in two places.
end of page 154
The leg seemed gouged. The dock eels, black, about four feet long, are tenacious 
creatures. They had not relinquished their hold on the flesh in their jaws when 
they had been forcibly struck away from the leg, back into the water. The thief 
shrank back from me. The dock workers threw him to his knees before the 
merchant.
The merchant turned to me. He handed me a silver tarsk from the purse. You need 
give me nothing, I said. It was not important.
Take if you will, said he,  as a token of my gratitude, this silver tarsk. I 
took it. Thank you, I said.. Several of the men about, striking their 
shoulders in the Gorean fashion. He had been very generous. A silver tarsk is, 
to most Goreans, a coin of considerable value. In most exchanged, it is valued 
at a hundred copper tarsks, each of which valued, commonly, at some ten to 
twenty tarsk bits. Ten silver tarsks, usually, is regarded as the equivalent of 
one gold piece, of one of the high cities. To be sure, there is little 
standardization in these matter, for much depends on the actual weights of the 
coins and quantties of precious metals, certified by the municipal stamps, 
contained in the coins. Sometimes, too, coins are split or shaved. Further the 
debasing of coinage is not unknown. Scales and rumors, it seems are often sued 
by coin merchants. One of the central coins on Gor is the golden tarn disk of 
Ar, against which many cities standardize their own gold piece. Other generally 
respected coins tend to be the silver tarsk ofTharna, the golden tarn disk of 
Ko-ro-ba, and the golden tarn of Port Kar, the latter particularily on the 
western Vosk, in the Tamber Gulf region, and a few hundred pasangs north and 
south of the Bosks delta.
The merchant then looked at the thief, I will have him taken to Port Cos, he 
said, where there are praetors. Please Master, said the thief, do not 
deliver me to praetors! Are you so fond of your hands? asked the merchant. I 
noted that the thiefs left ear had already been notched. That had doubtless 
been done elsewhere then in Victoria. Please Master, have mercy on me, begged 
the thief.
end of page 155
He has had a rather hard day already, I said, putting in a word on the thiefs 
behalf. Let us then just slit his throat now, said a fellow standing nearby. 
The thief squirmed, NO, he begged, No!
Give him to me, I said. No, please Master, whined the thief to the merchant. 
He is yours, said the merchant. I yanked the fellow by the neck leash of 
twisted cloth to his feet. I thrust the silver tarsk into his mouth, so that he 
could not speak. Seek a physician, I told him. Have your wrist attended to. 
It appears to be broken. Do not be in Victoria by morning.
I then turned him about and hurring him with a well-placed kick, sent him 
running, awkwardly, painfully, whimpering and stumbling, from the dock.
Surely you are a guardsman, said the merchant. No, I said.
The men gathered about watched the thief hurrying, bound away. There was 
laughter. You are maganimous, said the merchant. He was not a woman, I said. 
Too, it ws not my purse he stole. The merchant laughed.
I looked after the fleeing fellow, now disappearing between warehouses. I did 
not think honest folk in Victoria would again find him troublesome.
On thing more, Fellow, said the merchant. I am in Victoria on business. I 
seek one once of Port Cos, a warrior, one whose name is Callimachus. I was 
startled to heard this name, for it was the name of he who had saved me, some 
weeks ago, from the steel of Kliomenes, the pirate.
At night, said I, he often drinks at the tavern of Tasdron. You might find 
him there, I think. My thanks, Fellow, said the merchant, and smiling turned 
about and made his way back among the boxes and bales on the crowded wharf.
Have you no work to do this day, asked the man in whose fee I was that 
afternoon. That I have, Sir, I grinned and turned again to my labors.
end of page 156
20    The Tavern of Hibron; I Return Home Alone
Stand back, said the pirate. Two blades, his, and that of a companion were 
leveled at my breast. Beverly! I said. My hand, palm sweating, was poised over 
the hilt of my sword. Make no unfortunate move, said the pirate, he who had 
spoken to me before. Who is that fellow? asked Beverly airly. She knelt in the 
position of the free womam behind the small table.
Come home with me now, I said.  I have sought for you long. Returning from 
the wharves to the house I had not found her on the premises. There had been no 
sign of forced entray or strugle. Anxious, I had begun to search the public 
places of Victoria. Then after two Ahn or searching, I had found her here, near 
the wharves, unattended, in the tavern of Hibron, a miserable tavern, a low 
place, called the Pirates Chain.
I do not wish to come home with you now,  she said, lightly, a bit of ka-la-na 
spilling from the silver goblet she held. At a gesture from Kliomenes, who sat, 
cross-legged, beside her, a half-naked paga slave, whose left ankle was belled, 
refilled Miss Hendersons cup.
Come home with me, I said, you little fool. I elt the points of the two 
swords through my tunic against my flesh.
end of page 157
If you may pleasure yourself in taverns she said, surely so too may I. Free 
woman, I said, do not come here. It is too close to the wharves. It is 
dangerous. This is Gor. I am not afraid, she laughter. You do not know the
danger in which you stand, I said to her.
May I introduce my new friend, she said, Kliomenes, a river captain. Surely 
you remember him well, I said,  It was he and his men who captured you from 
Oneander when you were a slave and sold you.
Perhaps that was a mistake, said Kliomenes. He grinned at her. She had thrust 
back the hood of her robes and unpinned her veil. Her face was bared; her hair, 
darkly brown and silken cascaded down about her shoulders. These things were not 
unnoted by the men in the tavern. There was proabaly not a man there but was 
wondering how she would look stripped and in a collar.
That you captured me? she asked puzzled. No, said he. that I sold you. She 
laughed merrily and shoved at him playfully. Do not insult a free woman, 
sleen, she laughed.
There was much laughter, but there was an undercrrent of menace in the laughter 
which, I think, the girl did not recognize.
But that sort of thing is behind me now, she said to me, throwing back her 
head and quaffing deeply of the ruby-red Ka-la-na in her cup. She again looked 
at me. Kloimenes is a merchant, she told me. I am now a free woman. We are 
met now on different terms. We meet now as equals. He is really a nice man and 
my friend.
Come with me now, I said to her. Comehome with me now. I do not wish to do 
so, she said.
Kliomenes again gestured to the half-naked slave with the belled ankle that she 
refill the girls cup. The slave did so deferentially, smiling. Her hair had 
been cut short and there was a steel collar on her neck.
Come home with me now, I said to the girl. Kliomenes is buying me a drin, 
she said. He is a gentleman and a true man.
end of page 158
I did not know she was yours, said Kliomenes, amuzed. That is delightful. I 
am not his! said the girl. I am a free woman.
Are you his companion? asked Kliomenes. No! she said. Is she your wench 
slave? asked Kliomenes. No, I said angrily. I share his quarters, she said 
angrily. We are not even friends.
Are you concerned for her? asked Kliomenes. I wish her to return home with 
me now, I said. But she does not wish to do so, he smiled. Do you wish to go 
with him now, he asked? No, she said, snuggling against him. You see? asked 
Kliomenes.
I am a free woman in all respects, she said. and may and will do precisely as 
I please. You have heard the Lady, said Kliomenes, putting his arm about her 
shoulders.
You have heard the lady, said Kliomenes, putting his arm about her shoulder. 
Kliomenes, meet Jason, she said. Jason meet Kliomenes. Kliomenes inclined 
his head, amused.
We have met,  I said. I remembered the tavern of Tasdro. I would presumably 
have been slain there had it not been for the intervention of the derelict, 
Callimachus, once a warrior of Por Cos.
Begon, Buffoon, said Kliomenes, not pleasantly. I felt again the points of the 
swords of the two pirates at my chest. Begon, Buffoon, laughed the girl. Have 
no fear, grinned Kliomenes. I will see that she is taken care of properly. 
There was laughter in the tavern. Begon, Buffoon, laughed the girl.
Unless, said Kliomenes, rising to his feet, you care to meet me with steel. My 
hand, wet with sweat, fingers moving against one another, opened and shut at the 
hilt of the sword I wore. Kliomenes looked at me grinning.
Please Master, said Hibron, the proprietor of that low tavern, I do not wish 
trouble. Please, Master!
I turned about, angrily and strode from the tavern. There were tears of fury and 
helpless rage in my eyes. I knew myself no match for Kliomenes or the others.
end of page 159
I did not even know the first uses of the steel which I wore at my hip. As I 
left the tavern, I heard the laughter of Kliomenes and his men behind me, and 
the laughter too of the girl.
Outside the tavern I paused, fists clenched. I heard Kliomenes within call out. 
More wine for the Lady Beverly, the free women! There was laughter, Yes, 
Master I heard the slave with the wine vessel say, and heard the sensuous ring 
of the bells locked on her ankle as she hastened to comply.
I then returned home. I waited late fot the return of Beverly. In the morning I 
went as usual to the hiring year. When I returned home that night she had still 
not arrived, nor again, by the next morning.
end of page 160
21    I Hear the Ringing of an Alarm Bar; I am Not Accompanied to the Wharves
Forget her Master, whispered Peggy. She lifed her head from the furs and 
kissed me. There was a tiny rustle of clain and collar. She was fastened by the 
neck to a ring at the back of the alcove. It had pleased me to so secure her 
this evening.
I have, I said. Peggy laughed. I am a slave, she said, but I am not 
stupid. It is hard to forget the little slut, I said. It is well known in 
Victoria how she betrayed you, said Peggy.
Where did you hear that? I asked. And am I only a dock worker, known in 
Victoria? I looked at her. Tasdron spoke of it in the tavern to free men and I 
and other slaves heard him speak.
I supposed there was little in Victoria that was not known to its nude or 
half-clad tavern slaves. Such girls in spite of their collars often know more of 
what transpires in a town or city than many free folks.
Doubtless I am a laughing stock in Victoria, I said bitterly. No, Master, 
she said, But it is true that many are puzzled as to why you did ot at that 
time make her your total slave.
end of page 161
I said nothing. Your are known and respected in Victoira, she said. You are 
known for your ability with your fists, a thing which Gorean men can understand, 
and for your work on the docks and for your strength.
Is it also known how I withdrew from the tavern of Hibron the Pirates Chain, 
when I sought there the Lady Beverly? I asked. You call the little slut a 
Lady she asked. I looked at her sternly. Forgive me Master, she smiled. but 
I saw her in the restaurant on Earth. I assure you that she is as much or more a 
slut than I, and fully worthy or more worthy than I for the degrading circlet of 
bondage.
I looked up, lying on my back, at the low ceiling of the alcove.
Yes, she smiled.  it is well known in Victoria what occurred in the tavern of 
Hibron but none blame you. You are not the master of the sword and even had you 
been, you were grievously outnumbered. None blame you, I assure you. Indeed many 
feel you were courageous to have even entered the tavern under the circumstances 
to attempt to extract the unwitting little fool from the situation in which she 
had placed herself.
I did not fight, I said. You had no choice, she said. I withdrew, I said. 
You had no choice, she said. I am a coward, I said. That is not true, she 
said. In such a situation only a master swordsman or a fool or a madman, would 
have fought. I see, I said.
A wise man would have withdrawn as he did, she said. Or a coward, I said. 
You are not a coward, she said. Glyco, the Merchant of Port Cos, has spoken 
freely of your bravery on the wharves, in your recovery of his purse. Oh, I 
said.
And the thief, Grat, the swift, who has long been a nuisance in Victoria, has 
fled the town, obedient to your command.
end of page 162
That is interesting, I said. I had not even know his name.
There are even those who say there should be guardsmen in Victoria, and that 
you should be chief among them, she said. We were silent for a time.
The stronghold of Policrates is impregnable, she said. You are an intelligent 
woman, I said. Do not attempt it, she said. I was silent. I had, I knew the 
means whereby I might, if I wished, gain admission to that dark, rearing 
fortress, the walled river cove at its base.
Forget her, Master, advised Peggy. I have seen Glyco of Port Cost, in the 
tavern, I said. He had wished to see Callimachus once of Port Cos. I have seen 
them more than once on various nights engaged in conversek Glyco earnest and 
Callimachus sullen and noncommital. It is true, said Peggy. Of what do they 
speak? I asked. I do not know Master, said Peggy, We girls are warned away 
from their table, save when we are called forth to serve, and then they remain 
silent, except to give us our commands.
How long is Glyco to remain in Victoria? I asked. I do not know Master, said 
Peggy. Perhaps he is gone now, for he has not been tonight to my knowledge in 
the tavern. Peggy fingered the chain dangling from her collar. Master seems 
curious, she said. Master seems curious, said said.
I would like to know the business of Glyco with Callimachus, I said. I will 
tell you one thing I know, she said. Glyco stays with the guardsmen of Port 
Cos near the wharves. Not in an inn? I asked. No, she said. Interesting, I 
said.
And it is said too, she whispered, coming close to me, the chain on her neck 
touching my chest, as she put her head over me, that Glyco is not only a 
merchant but stands high in the merchant council of Port Cos.
end of page 163
I wonder what such a man is doing in Victoria, speaking with Callimachus, I 
said. I do not know Master, she said. Then suddenly she pressed her softness 
against me, in a slave girls piteous need. I am only a slave permitted to live 
on the sufferance of men that she may please them, she said. I then took her in 
my arms.
Later we lay quietly, softly, together. Her head was at my waist. I again looked 
at the ceiling of the alcove, at the roughened texture, and the tiny cracks of 
its plaster and wood, reddish in the flickering light of the tiny lamp.
Is Master distracted? she asked. Perhaps, I said. You still remember her, 
do you not? she asked. Perhaps, I said. I put my hand with rough gentleness 
in her hair holding it.
You have well ravished me, Master, she whispered. You are a responsive 
wench, I said. I cannot help but be responsive in your arms, she said. You 
merely fear the whip, I smiled. I do not fear the whip, she said, and I know 
that it will be well laid upon me at the merest suspicion on the part of Tasdron 
my Master that a customer may not have been fully pleased, but even if it were 
not for the whip, I know I could not help but respond to you as a vulnerable and 
spasmodic slave.
I released her hair and took her again in my arms, throwing the chain back over 
her shoulder. What woman would not be a slave in your arms? she asked. I beg 
to be had again. Very well, I said and then lengthily, contented her. It is 
pleasing to have a female slave.
The stronghold of Pollicrates is impregnable, she said. Forget her. How is 
it that you know what I am thinking? I asked smiling.
end of page 164
Slave girls must pay close attention to men, she smiled, for they are her 
Masters.
I smiled. It was true. Slave girls are extremely sensitive to the moods, the 
feelings and thoughts of men. they must be, for they are their Masters.
By now she doubtless wears the steel loops of a pirates pleasure girl, she 
said. I thought this not unlikely. You have money, said Peggy, Buy another 
girl, one to lick your feet and content you.
Slave girls tend to speak opening and honestly. They are under few delusions as 
to the desires of men. Hypocrisies are not encouraged in them, as they often are 
in their free sisters. Similarily, Goren men tend on the whole, unabashedly to 
be perfectly frank about such matters. What true man, in his vitality, does not 
want a beautiful woman as a slave? Two major differences between the men of Eart 
and the men of Gor are, first, that the men of Gor are perfectly straighforward 
and open about this and secondly, that such woman may normally be purchased at a 
modest price in a convenient market. On Gor the order of nature, as old as the 
switch, the rope, the cave and the raid has never been denied.
She put her lips close to my ear. I heard the tiny, heavy sound of the links of 
the chain, moving against one another, depending from her collar. Buy Peggy, if 
you wish, she whispered. Do you wish me to buy you? I asked. I would rather 
be purchsed by only one other man on all Gor, she said, and he has never even 
had me. He scarcely notices me and seems not even to know I exist. Yet I almost 
faint with joy at the very thought of serving him. I looked at her. She was 
very beautiful.
I am unworthy even to think of him, she said. I am only an Earth woman and a 
branded slave. Who is he? I asked.
Please do not make me speak his name Master, she said. Very well, I said. We 
lay together quietly for a time not speaking. We could hear conversation outside 
from the floor of the tavern. Have you heard of the topaz? I asked. No 
Master, she said. But it is thought to be in Victoria.
end of page 165
The men of Victoria seem adament in refusing to pay the tribute to Policrates, 
I said. Yes Master, she smiled.
I thought this was courageous on their part, but I did not know if it were wise. 
It had been the first time in five years that this had happened. The lat time 
the pirates of the dark stronghold had carried fire and sword to a dozen wharfed 
ships. The tribute had then been rapidly forthcoming. To be sure, in the past 
years the pirates had become more and more dependent on the markets of Victoria 
to dispose of their loot and captures. In the light of this, many in Victoria 
regarded themselves as having at last attained a position in which they might 
succeed in evading the humiliating burden of tribute.
Master is kind to spare my feeling, said Peggy. I smiled. I had not pressed 
her on the matter of he whose collar she longed to wear.
Put her from your mind, whispered Peggy, There are many lovely women in the 
markets. Buy one. Put her in your collar. Teach her with the whip who it is, to 
whom she belongs. Make her yours. I looked up at the low ceiling.
Is she so special to you because she is from Earth, or because you knew her 
from Earth? sha asked. I do not know, I said. Is that why you cannot forget 
her, she asked. Is that why you are so concerned for her? I do not know, I 
said.
There must be hundreds of girls from Earth, perhaps some thousands, who wear 
their collars on Gor, she said. Yes, I said. That is doubtless true. What 
then is so special about her? she asked. I do not know, I said.
Imagine a wall, she said, of eight feet in height of heavey stone a hundred 
years in length. Imagine too a hundred women, beautiful, stripped, chained 
helplessly to thsi wal. It is of coruse, a market wall. In the company of a 
slave, their owner, you examine these women. Each in her chains kneels before 
you and begs you to buy her. One of these women is the girl we shall call 
Beverly. But you have never seen her before. Which of all of these women would 
you buy? I looked at her.
end of page 166
Which of all these women, she asked, would you have released from the wall? 
On the torat of which, of all of them, would you lock your inflexiable collar. 
On the wrists of which, of all of them, would you lock your unyielding slave 
bracelets. Which of all of them, would you lead home as your slave?
She, I said, the one whom we might call Beverly. Ah, said Peggy, drawing 
back, I fear she is your love slave.
She is too fine to be a slave, I said. let alone the most complete of slaves, 
the total and abject love slave. Even if it is what she wants most deeply in 
her deepest heart? asked Peggy.
Of course, I said angrily. But what is she is a slave? asked Peggy. in 
reality a true slave? It does not matter, I said. Surely you have recognied 
Gorean women can be slaves and have treated them accordingly, said Peggy. 
Yes, I said.
And surely you have recognized some Earth women can be slaves and have treated 
them accordingly, she said. Yes, I said. I looked at Peggy. She blushed 
deeply and smile. I had often treated her, thoroughly and completely as the mere 
slave she was. How then, asked Peggy softly, smiling, is this other woman 
different?
She is different, I said angrily. Can you admit the possibility that sh 
emight not be different? asked Peggy. No, I said. No! Then she would be 
only slave, I said angrily.
But if this is what she is and what fulfills her and makes her joyful? she 
asked. It does not mattter, I said angrily. The nature of the woman and her 
fulfillment and joy does not matter to you? she asked. I was silent. I was 
furious. Do you not, honestly, want her in your chains? asked Peggy.
end of page 167
The first instant I saw her, I said, I wanted her in my chains. Peggy kissed 
me. But I must put such thoughts from my head. I said bitterly. Why? she 
asked. I do not know, I said. Nature if harsh but it is not so terrible 
truly, she said.
I must go, I said. It is not yet even the Twentieth Ahn, Master! she said. 
Swiftly she knelt beside me, head down. Have I displeased Master? she asked. 
No, I said smiling, looking up at her.
Dare to become a Gorean Master, she said, please. Perhaps, I said. Swiftly 
she nestled down beside me, holding me. She did not want me to leave the alcove. 
Thanked you forfor talking to a mere slave, she whispered.
Why do you not simply place yourself on your belly before he whose collar you 
wish to wear, I asked, and with tears, kissing his feet, implore him to buy 
you. I dare not, she said, I am only a low slave and an Earth women. I 
see, I said. He might be offended and slay me or Tasdron my Master discovering 
my crime might slay me for my insolence. I see, I said. And so I must see 
him daily and cannot reveal in the least my feelings for him, beyond those of 
the silken slave who must serve any man who can afford the price of a cup of her 
Masters paga. I put my arm around the girl. You see Master we are not so 
different. You have lost your slave and I cannot even permit myself to be found 
by my Master.
I kissed her softly. She began to sob in my arms, and I held her gently, 
closely. She looked up at me with tears in her eyes. It is hard being a slave 
girl, I told her. Yes, Master, she said, Master, she said. Yes, I said.
end of page 168
Please have me with gentleness, she begged, though I am a slave. Very well, 
slave, I said. Thank you Master, she said softly.
She lay beside me. She fingered the chain depending from her collar. I love 
being chained, she said. Chains are very useful in impressing her slavery on a 
woman, I said. They leave little doubt in her mind so as to who is Master she 
smiled.
I did not respond. When she said, however, was doubtless true. The effect of a 
chain or a rope on a womans sexuality is sometimes incredible. This is 
particularily true with the new slave girl. With the older slave girl, one who 
has already learned something of the meaning of her collar, a mere snapping of 
the fingers or a small, imperious gesture can have a similarily devastating, 
triggering effect on her sexuality. The readiness and excitability, indeed, the 
almost helpless sexual vulnerability of the slave girl is something for which 
the men of Earth, whose experience has been limited to the free females of 
earth, are totally unprepared. It commonly takes 15 to 20 minutes to bring a 
free Earth female to orgasm. A slave girl, on the other hand, whether Gorean or 
an imbonded Earth girl, finding herself on Gor, once trained and understanding, 
fully, her condition, will often find herself on the brink of orgasm, simply 
finding her Masters eyes casually upon her. The differences, or course, are 
almost entirely psychological. Sexuality, as is well known, is almost entirely a 
function of the imagination and brain.
The slave girl knows that she is a slave, truly, and that passion is not only 
permitted to her but required of her. Indeed, she may be whipped or slain if she 
is insufficiently passionate. Her sexual needs are thus liberated. Frightened, 
she often begins by acting, and this is known to the Master, but soon, perhaps 
to her horror, she discovers that she, obedient to the Masters touch, and no 
longer acting, and this too is known to the Master, has become truly, suddenly, 
a yielding, spasmodic slave.
Too, of course her slavery and her sexuality is impressed upon her in a 
thousand, subtle ways. Certain modes of speech are expected of her and certain 
gestures and postures. She must, for example, address free persons deferentially 
and commonly will kneel in their presence.
end of page 169
Her garb too is commonly distinctive; it is usually inexpensive and brief; 
sometimes it is only a rag; it is designed to remind her of lowliness; it is 
desiged to of course, generally, to leave little doubt as to her charms. 
Needless to say, too her throat is encircled by a collar which will identify her 
Master, sometimes too, the collar will bear the name by which he has decided to 
call her; and her thigh or some other part of her body will be branded. She is 
an animal, sensuous and beautiful, marked as property, and has a name only on 
sufference of her Master; he need not even give her a name, if he does not wish 
to do so. Beyond this of course she finds herself in the Gorean civilization. It 
is a complex, vital, bright, colorful, deeply sensuous civilization; it is a 
harsh, gorgeous world in which the slave girl has a special role and place; her 
condition is unquestioned and categorical; it is supported by history, by custom 
and law; there is absolutely no escape for her; she is slave. Accordingly, an 
animla and property, without eve a name in her own right, she kneels before her 
Masters; she waits to be commanded.
I love it when you are strong with me, said Peggy. She lay beside me on her 
elbow, the cahin dangling from her collar. You are a woman, I said. I despise 
weak men, she said. I respect only men who will treat me as a woman and do 
with me what they please. I know I am a woman. I wanted to be treated as one. 
How can I take my place in the order of nature if men will not treat me as they 
wishe? That is what I want, to be treated, even with insolence, as men wish. 
Only then can I know them as my Master and yield to them in my fullness.
Before, I said, you wished to be taken with gentleness. And you did so she 
said. That was then my mood, and I am grateful that you deigned to respect it. 
Sometimes I might not, I said. I know Master, she said. And then later, 
she said, when your appetites grew aan upon you, you took me as a mere slave, 
with brutality. You yielded well, I said. I could not help myself Master, 
she said.
She then lay beside me and began to kiss at my arm. She took my arm in her two 
hands, kissing it. You are strong, she whispered.
end of page 170
I did not respond. Master, she whispered. Yes, I said. Have Peggy again, 
Peggy begs it. Perhaps, I said. Perhaps not. She whimpered and put her head 
against my arm.
I supposed that it was not surprising that women reduced to bondage, collared 
and branded, denied by the strictures of their condition the mockeries of male 
imitation, and finindg the impediments to the manifestation of their deepest and 
most secret nature removed, should gradually find themselves more and more at 
the mercy of their needs.
I found this amusing, perhaps because I had come from Earth. How humiliating for 
an Earth girl, in particular, I thought to discover that she now had ignited 
within her deep feminine needs, for the satisfaction of which she found herself 
dependent on Masters. This aspect of the sexuality of the female slave, her need 
as well as her responsiveness, would also be found astonishing by the men of 
Earth, accustomed only to the suppressed dispositions and conditioned 
inertnesses of the women with which he is familiar. It is not unusual for a 
slave girl to kneel, head down, before even a hated Master and beg his touch. 
Slavers, not unoften, deprive a female slave of a mans touch for two or three 
days before her sale. She then, almost invariably, brings a higher price. Her 
need, manifested in her piteous display of herself, i her physical attitudes, 
her gestures and expressions, is evident and often arousing to the buyers. How 
many women of Earth, I wondered, strip themselves slowly before a man and then 
kneels before him, and kiss his feet, and then looking up, beg him for his 
touch. Perhaps only those who are slave girls.
Your are chained, I said. Yes Master, she said. I took Peggys chain in my 
hand and jerked it, lightly, but firmly. She felt the chain then pull at the 
snug collar and jerk it against the back of her neck. You are truly chained, I 
said. Yes, Master, she said. Why are you chained? I asked.
end of page 171
It pleased Master to chain me, she said. She kissed me. Please Master, she 
said. have your chained slave?
Perhaps, I said, Perhaps not. She sobbed in frustration and continued to 
kiss me.
Even with girls used to slavery, who have well learned their collars, of course, 
the chain never loses its meaning. Masters commonly use it, even with 
experienced girls. It never looses its effect.
Please Master, she sobbed. Be silent, I said. Yes, Master, she said, 
sobbing. Sometimes a slave girl must be struck away from ones feet. Sometimes 
she must be chained to one side, to a wall or in a corner.
I laughed. Master? she asked. I then took her in my arms and threw her, 
roughly, beneath me. She cried out with pleasure.
What is that sound? I asked. You make a slave very happy Master, she said 
snuggled beside me. Do you not hear it? I asked. I hear conversation, the 
clink of goblets from the floor of the tavern, she said.
Sandals! I suddenly snapped.
A Gorean command need not be repeated. Peggy startled wild-eyed, rose to her 
knees and seized my sandals. I stood up bending over in the low alcove. I pulled 
on my tunic. She thrust the sandals to her lips, kissing them. Master? she 
asked. She placed the sandals on my feet, thonging them tightly. I buckled my 
belt, with its dependent pouch. I slung the sword belt with its attached 
scabbard with its sheathed steel over my left shoulder. Master? asked Peggy.
Can you not hear it? I asked.
She finished tying my sandals. As she knotted each, she kissed the know and then 
when fished with both, put her head to my feet in a graceful gesture of 
submission. Tying his sandals, and often thusly, is a small, homely service 
often performed by the slave girl for her Master. Then she looked up at me, 
puzzled.
end of page 172
Now, I said, cannot you hear it?
The conversation has stopped on the floor of the tavern,  she said frightened. 
It is quiet there. Listen, I said. I hear it! she said. What is it?
It is an alarm bar, I said. It is coming from the wharves, I said. What does 
it mean? she asked. I began to unbuckle the leather curtains of the alcove 
swiftly. I do not know, I said. Where are you going, she asked. To the 
wharves, I said.
Do not go! she said. I threw back the curtains. I looked back at her. She 
knelt frightened on the furs the chain on her neck. Do not go, she begged. I 
turned about and made my way rapidly through the tables. I heard her sob and 
jerk at the chain in frustration but if of course held her perfectly. The men 
among whom I strode had not risen to their feet. None met my eyes. None 
volunterred to accompany me. Do not go, advised Tasdron. I did not answer him, 
but left the tavern and then, running, made my way toward the wharves.
end of page 173
22    What Occurred at the Wharves; What Occurred in the vicinity of the Tavern 
of Tasdron
Stand back, lest you be hurt! cried a man.
I was seized by two men, citizens, and dragged back into the encircling crowd. I 
was bleeding. My tunic was cut. The sword of the pirate, in a drunken swing, had 
grazed my chest. Other citizens, with ship poles, of the sort used on Gorean 
galleys in casting off and thrusting from the wharves, pressed back the crown. I 
felt the side of the pole against my belly. I was jostled by the crowd. The 
priate turned away, laughing.
Where are the guardsmen of Port Cos? I asked. Where are the guardsmen of Ars 
Station? There were several guardsmen from each of these towns in Victoria. 
There was smoke in the air. Five warehouses and some ancillary buildings were 
afire.
They maintain their posts, said a man grimly. They protect their own 
headquarters. Victoria is not their concern, said a man bitterly.
I watched the pirates, perhaps some 50 or 60 of them, unchallenged, moving 
between the warehouses and the sharves, where two pirate galleys were moored. 
Some townfolk at swordpoint, were loading goods onto the galleys. Some of the 
pirates bore torches. The tribute will be paid by morning, said one of the men 
near me.
end of page 174
I saw several of the pirates with bottles of paga, swilling from them, as they 
strutted about, sometimes pausing to cu into a bale of goods or overturn a 
barrel kicking it open, permitting its contents to run out over the boards. The 
alarm bar continued to ring futilely. The pirates made no effort to stop the 
desperate fellow who meaninglessly continued to strike it.
We outnumber them 50 to 1, I said. Let me rush upon them. Let us stop them! 
They are Masters in Victoria, said a man, Do nothing rash.
I heard a woman scream and saw her, thrown over the shoulder of a laughing 
pirate, a brawny fellowk being carried to one of the galleys. What will be done 
with her? whispered a woman, near me, terrified. If she is beautiful, said a 
man near us, perhaps she will be kept to serve in the stronghold of Policrates. 
If she is not, perhaps her throat will be cut. The woman gasped, her hand at 
her veil.
The pirate threw the woman to his feet near the neareset galley and there 
stripped her and handed her to a comrade who stood on board the galley. He put 
her on the outside of the railing, facing outward, with thesmall of her back 
tightly against it, her arms hooked over it and behind it, as with the others. 
He then, with a length of binding fiber, running tight across her body, fastened 
her wrists together, as he had similarly those of the others. All were well 
displayed. too the exposition of captures in this way tends to discourage 
retaliatory missle fire from the scene of the pillaging.
The woman was comely, I did not think she would hae her throat cut. Lusty men 
have better uses to which to put such women. I did think, however, that they 
would soon, all the captures, be marked and put in collars.
If I were you, said the man near the women in the crowd, I would draw back in 
the crowd and hide. Then I would flee. But I am free, she said. So, too were 
they, said the man gesturing to the bound woman at the railing of the pirate 
galley. She shrank back suddenly frightened.
end of page 175
I saw Kilomense, some seventy yards away, directing his men and the enforced 
laborers, citizens of Victoria, loading the galleys.
You there, female, called a pirate, his eyes roaming the crowd, step forth! 
The men holding the ships pole, frightened, lowered it. Step forth! said the 
pirate.
The woman shook her headl prssing back against the men. Unhood her, face-strip 
her! ordered the pirate. Protect me, save me, please, she begged.
Her hood was thrust back. Her veil was torn away. She was lovely. The price she 
would bring would be good. I wondered why such a woman would come to the wharves 
in a time of such danger. Surely she must have understood tha peril to which she 
would be exposing herself.
Step forth Beauty, said the priate. Numbly she approached him. I made to move 
but two men restrained me. Swiftly before us all, in the light of the flames, 
was the woman stripped by the pirates blade. Lie down, he said he. She 
hesitated and looked at him in anguish. Or do you wish to be slit like a 
larma? he asked. His sword jabbed into the sweet roundness of her belly. 
Swiftly she knelt at his feet, her back on the harsh tarred boards.
The pirate looked at us and laughed. here at my feet, supine, stripped is a 
free woman of Victoria. Do any of you dispute her with me? Two men restrained 
me. No others moved.
Kneel, he ordered the woman. She did so. He then pressed the point of his 
blade against her fair thraot. Numbly, slowly lifting her arms, the blade 
between her arms, her fingers trembling, she tied the bondage knot in her own 
hair. She looked at him. Please spare me Master, she said.
For a long moment or two the point of the blade remained at her throat, as the 
pirate considered the girls plea. I saw his eyes roam her now-imbonded curves. 
He laughed. He thrust his blade back in its sheath. She almost fained with 
relief
end of page 176
On your feet! he said. Run to the nearest galley! Beg to be displayed there, 
as the loot you are!
Yes Master! she cried and leaping up, fled toward the galley, a commanded 
slave.
We do what we wish with Victoria, said the pirate, do any of your gainsay 
me? None spoke. He then laughed again, and turning about, went back toward the 
galleys.
I watched the new slave being bound at the railing with the others.
I say she wanted the collar, said a man. They they all do, said another. 
They did not know, of course, a woman such as Miss Beverly Henderson. She could 
not be a slave. But what, I asked myself, if she were, in her secret heart as 
Alison in Ar and Peggy in Victoria, both themselves surely slaves, had claimed a 
true slave? If she were she had made a great fool of me, in pretending to be 
free, in being often displesasing, in daring to sell Lota, in attempting to 
betray me to the guardsmen of Port Cos, in disparaging me in the tavern of 
Hibron. What if she were a slave? Could she be truly a slave? The very thought 
almost made me wish to cry out with fury and pleasure. If she were a slave, I 
would find this out. And then, somehow, against all obstacles, I would make her 
mine, mine own. I would own her, nor would I be gentle with the slave. She owed 
me much. Yes, I vowed, if she were a slave, I would have her in my collar! And 
she would soo then well know herself a slave. I would treat her, the desirable 
little slut, and slave, with a ruthlessness and a power that would become 
legendary in Victoria!
I could then could no longer deny it. I wanted Miss Beverly Henderson as my 
slave girl.
We will pay the tribute in the morning, said another man. We have no choice, 
said another. We should never have entered into difficulties over the matter, 
said another. True, said another man.
The smoke stung my eyes. The man had by now stopped ringing the alarm bell. The 
crowd was mostly silent. One could hear the flames. We have been taught our 
lesson, said one of the men.
end of page 177
Policrates owns Victoria, said another. It is true, said another.
I turned about and left the crowd. I made my way slowly away from the wharves. I 
began to walk slowly back toward the tavern of Tasdron. Many were the thoughts 
in my head.
I had seen a free woman of Victoria stripped with no more mercy than would have 
been shown a slave. I had seen her kneel naked before a pirate and his blade at 
her throat with her own hands, tie the knot of bondage in her hair, in full view 
of her fellow citizens. I had seen the disorganization, the fear, the 
demoralization of the men of Victoris. I had seen the insolence of the pirates, 
the burning of buildigs. And the men of Victoria, though greatly outnumbeirng 
the pirates, had not fought. The tribute would be paid. And too, I had learned 
and I mused on this, that I wanted to own Miss Beverly Henderson, yes literally 
own her, as a man on Earth might own, say a tarsk or a pet sleen or, lower than 
either, as he might own a slave.
Do not! I cried. I seized the figure, his body poised, hunched over the sword, 
its point to his belly, its hilt in his hands, barced against the stones of the 
dark street. No! I cried. I struggled briefly with him. Then with the bottom 
of my foot I kicked the sword to one side and it slid upward, tearing through 
the tunic. He dropped to his hands and knees, vomiting and scaambled for the 
sword, seizing it. He cried out in fury and frustration, the blade now in his 
hands. He rose to to his feet, reeling. Who are you to interfere in the 
matter? he howled. He lifted the blade and apporached me. I saw it waver. He 
steaded it, placing one hand upon the other on the hilt. It again lifted. I 
stood my ground. I did not think he would strike me. Then the blade lowered and 
the man sobbed, and backed against the wall and lowered himself sitting to its 
base the sword on the stones beside him. He bent over, his head in his hands. 
Who are you to interfere? he wept.
Surely there are others betten than yourself against whom you might turn your 
sword, I said angrily.
end of page 178
Give me a drink, he said. How has it come to this, I asked him, the glory, 
the codes, the steel? I want a drink, he said sullenly.
I have just returned from the wharves, I told him. Surely you and the others 
from the tavern of Tasdron did not fail to hear the alarm?
There is no business of mine at the wharves. he said. Yet, said I, you had 
left the taavern. Will you tell me you were not bound for the wharves? I can 
do nothing, he said. I could do nothing. Yet sick, your senses swirling you 
left the tavern, I said. This street leads to the sharves.
I fell, he said, I could not even walk.
Do you wish to hear what occurred at the wharves, i asked angrily. I am 
useless, he said. I could do nothing. I am no good.
At the wharves, I said,there were pirates, few more than half a hundred of 
such men, under the command of Kliomenes, lieutenant to Policarates. I do not 
wish to hear of these matter, he said.
In the view of hundreds of those of Victoria these men, so few of them, burned 
and looted, laughing and with impunity, as it pleased them. And in the view of 
hundres of those of Victoria, angry, but inactive and cowering, not daring to 
protest, were lofty free women of this town publicly stripped and bound, thence 
to be carried into shameful slavery, to wear their collars at the feet of 
buccaners.
Women belong in collars, he said angrily. And would you then,  I asked, 
willingly deliver them, prizes more fittingly yours, into the hands of such men 
as Kliomenes and Policrates. Are they more men than you, that such buties should 
kneel at their feet rather than, fearfully, at yours?
He lowered his hands head again, putting it in his hands. I would have 
thought, I said, that it would be men such as you who might strike terror into 
the hearts of men such as they, that it would be men such as you whom groveling 
slave girls, wary of the whip, might fear even more to displease than they. 
Give me a drink, he said.
end of page 179
You are then so fond of Kliomenes and Policrates that you are willing, 
graciously, to surrender to them the woman and other treasures of this town. I 
am not of Victoria, he said. Few in Victoira, I said  are of Victoria, it 
seems. Yet many reside here. If not men such as we, who then is of Victoria?
I am sick, he said. There was no leadership at the wharves, I said. Insult 
was done upon this town with impunity. I saw hundreds of men, fearful, milling 
about, with no one to lead them. I saw them intimidated by a handful of 
organized, ruthless fellows strutting and vain as vulos. I saw free men 
impressed into the service of loading the goods of the town onto the galleys of 
the thieves. Men, unprotesting, fearful, saw their properties purloined and 
burned. Flames linger yet on the wharves. Smoke hangs in the air. He was 
silent.
We missed you on the wharves, I said. Why did you interfer in my affairs? he 
asked. Once, said I, in the tavern of Tasdron you saved my life. Is it not my 
right, then to save yours? We are then even, he said bitterly. We now owe 
each other nothing. Go now. Leave me.
I have seen Glyco,a merchant, a high merchant, of Port Cos, these several days 
in earnest converse with you. I think, surely, that he, fearing the union of the 
pirates of the east and west, was entreating you to lend support to some scheme 
of resistance. You are shrewd, said the man.
Yet his entreaties, I gather, have proven fruitless. I cannot help him, said 
the man.
Yet that he came to you suggests that your couarge, your brilliance in such 
matters, have never been forgotten
I am no longer who I once was, he said. I gather that you once stood high 
among the guardsman of Port Cos, I said. Once I was captain in Port Cos, he 
said. Indeed it was I who once drove the band of Policrates from the vicinity 
of Port Cos. He looked up at me. But that was long ago, he said. I no longer 
remember that captain. I think he is gone now.
end of page 180
What occurred? I asked. He grew more fond of paga than of his codes, he 
said. Disgraced, he was dismissed. He came west upon the river to Victoria.
What was his name? I asked. I have forgotten, he said sullenly. Had you 
been upon the sharves, I said, things might have gone differently. Why did 
you not lead them? he asked angrily.
I am only a weakling and a fool, I said, and I am untrained. He said 
nothing. One such as you might have made a difference. He extended his right 
hand. It was large, but unsteady. It shook.
At one time, he said, I could strike a thousand blows, to the accuracy of a 
hair. I could thrust a thousand times within the circle of half a hort, but now 
- now, see what has become of me. His hand, shaking, then fell. He closed his 
fist and pressed it against the stones of the dark street. He wept. Policrates 
could hve killed me in the tavern, he said. He knew my weaknesss. But he did 
not do so For the sake of old memories, I deem, vestiges of vanished realities, 
he spared me. He looked up at me. We were youths together on the wharves of 
Port Cost, he said. East of us turned to the trades of steel, I to that of the 
guardsman, he to that of the marauder.
What did Glyco wish of you I asked. A plan, a rally point, a flag of memory, 
a leader, an assault upon the stronghold of Policrates. And what did you tell 
him? I asked. It would take a hundred siege ships, and ten thousand men to 
take the stronghold of Policrates, he said.
I nodded. I did not thank his estimates in error. For all practical purposes, 
considering the forces that could realisticall be marshaled upon the river the 
stronghold of Policrates was impregnable. I had heard similar asseverations from 
others. Miss Beverly Henderson and her beauty, the thought crossed my mind, were 
now locked behind those lofty, dark walls.
The situation then is hopeless? I asked. Yes, hopeless, he said
end of page 181
Tomorrow, I said, the tribute is to be paid to Policrates. The man shrugged. 
It is said, I said, that the priates own Victoria. It is true, he said. 
It is true.
And are there none to gainsay them? I asked. None, said he. What can I do 
for you? I asked sadly. Give me a drink, he said.
I turned away from him and walked up the street to the tavern of Tasdron, which 
was still open, though much subdued. I entered the tavern. I did not speak to 
anyone, nor did any meet my eyes. I purchased a bottle of page which I then took 
from that tavern, retracing my steps to the slumped dark figure sitting against 
the wall. I stopped before himand he lifted his head from his knees, and looked 
at me, blearily. I handed the bottle to him, which, fumbling, quickly he reached 
for. He bit and pulled the cork from the bottle. He clutched the bottle with 
both hands. He looked up at me, sitting by the wall.
I am sorry,  I said, to have spoken cruelly to you. It was not my right. It 
was in anger, in rage, in frustration, that I spoke, I am truly sorry. Do you 
pity me? he asked. Yes, I said, I pity you.
Slowly, by an act of will, in cold fury, movement by movement the man struggled 
unsteadily to his feet. There was a terrible fury in his eyes, Pity? he asked, 
Me?
Yes, I said, You have fallen. You cannot help yourself. It is not your fault. 
I do not blame you.
Pity? he asked. Me? I know that you have been disgraced, I said. I know 
that the scarlet has been taken fro you. No one can take the scarlet from me, 
once it is granted, unless it be bythe sword. He tore open the tunic he wore, 
revealing beneath it, dark, blackish in appearance, in the moonlight, the 
scarlet. This, said he, can be taken from me only by the sword. Let himdare 
to do so who will.
You are finished, I said. Drink. He looked dismally, angrily, at the bottle 
clutched in his right hand.
end of page 182
You have forgotten the name of the warrior, I said, who was once of Port Cos. 
He is no more. Drink.
The man then held the bottle near the neck, with both hands. For a long moment 
he looked at it. His shoulders then hunched forward, and he moaned in pain. Then 
slowly, painfully, he straightened his body. He lifted his head to the Gorean 
moons and, in the dark street, in anguish uttered a wild cry. It began as a cry 
of angish, and pain, and ended as a howl of rage. He turned about and with two 
hands broke the bottle suddenly into a thousand fragments against the stone. In 
the darkness he was cut with glass and soiled with scattered paga. I remember 
him, he said.
What was his name? I asked. Callimachus, he said, His name is Callimachus, 
of Port Cos.
Is he gone? I asked. Then the man with two fists struck against the wall.  
No, he said with a terrible ferocity. There was blood on his hands, dark, 
running between the fingers. Where is he? I asked. Slowly the man turned to 
face me. He is here, he said, I am he.
I am pleased to hear it, I said. I reached down and picked up the fallen 
blade. I handed it to him. This, is yours.
He sheathed the blade. He looked at me for a long time. you have done me 
service, he said, How can I repay you?
I have a plan, I said. Teach me the sword.
end of page 183
23    I am Made Welcome in the Holding of Policrates; Kliomenes Makes Test of 
Me; I Select a Girl for my Nights Pleasure
The naked slavegirl in her bells and jewels writhed on the scarlet tiles of the 
floor before us.
Policrates, sitting beside me, behind the broad, low table, musingly fitted 
together the two pieces of yellowish, brown stone, the two halves of the once 
shattered topaz. Again I found it startling, and impressive, how the figure of a 
river galley emerged from the brownish discolorations in the two pieces of stone 
once they were fitted together. There was no mistaking that they were the two 
halves of what was once an unusual, divided stone.
Fatcinating, said Policarates. and how is my friend, Ragnar Voskjard? 
Well, I said, and he, of course inquires after your health. I am well, 
said Policrates, and you may, upon your return, assure him that I am eager to 
participate in our common venture.
end of page 184
In twenty days, I said, allowing for my return and the fitting of our ships, 
we shall be at your sea gate. Excellent, said Policrates.
We shall then, I said, proceed to Ars Station to sck the stores and burn her 
vessels. Following that we shall wreak similar havoc upon Port Cos. These two 
major ports crippled , the river then for all practical purposes will be ours.
It is amusing, said Policrates, that the tension between Cos and Ar prevents 
the linkage of their powers upon the river. Their foolishness in this respect, 
I said, should redound considerably to our advantage.
True, laughed Policrates. Let us drink to that. He lifted his goblet and we 
clinked our goblets together and I reached across Policrates, extending my 
goblet to Kliomenes, who surily sat on the right of Policrates. We three then, 
touched goblets and then we drank. Kliomenes eyes me narrowly.
I turned away and gave my attention to the slave writhing on the tiles before 
me. She was performing a need dance, of a type not uncommon among Gorean female 
slaves. Such a dance usually proceeds in clearly defined phrases, evident not 
merely in the expressions and movements of the girl but in the nature of the 
accompanying music. There are usually five phases to such a dance. In the first 
phase the girl, dancing feighs indifference to the presence of men, before, whom 
as a slave she must perform. In the second phase, for she has not yet been 
raped, her distress and uneasiness, her restlessness, her disturbance by her 
sexual urges, must become subtly more manifest. Here is must be evident that she 
is beginning to feel her sexuality and drive, profoundly, and yet is struggling 
against them. Toward the end of this phase, it must become clear not only that 
she has sexual needs and deep ones, but that she is beginning to fear that she 
may not be simply, as she is, of sufficient interest to men to obtain their 
satisfaction.
Here, need, coupled with anxiety and self-doubt, for she has not yet been seized 
by strong men, must become clear. In the third phase of the dance she, in an 
almost ladylike fashion, acknowledges herself defeated in her attempt to conceal 
her sexuality; she then, again in an almost ladylike fastion, delicately but 
clearly, with restraint but unmistakably, acknowledges and publicly before 
masters that she has sexual needs.
end of page 185
Then with smiles and gestures displaying herself, she makes manifest her 
readiness for the service of men, her willingness and her receptivity. She 
invites them, so to spake to have her. But she has not yet been seized by an arm 
or an ankle or by her collar, a thumb hooked rudely under it, or hair, and 
pulled from the floor. What if she is not sufficiently pleasing? What if she is 
not to be fulfilled? What is she must continued to dance alone unnoticed. At 
this point it becomes clear to her that it is by no means a foregone conclusion 
that men will find her of interest, or that they will see fit to satisfy her. 
She must strive to be pleasing. If she is not good enough she may be chained, 
unfulfilled, another night alone in the kennel. There are always other girls. 
She must earn her rape.
Too, if she should be insufficiently pleasing consistently it is likely that she 
will be slain. Goreans place few impediments in the way of te liberation of a 
slave females sexuality. In this phase of the dance, then, shamelessly the 
woman dances her need and shamelessly begs for her sexual satisfaction. This 
phase of the dance is sometimes known as the Heat of the Collared She-Sleen.
The fifth and final phase, of the dance, is far more dramatic and exciting. In 
this phase the girl, overcome by sexual desire and terrifed that she may not be 
found sufficiently pleasing, clearly manifests, and utterly, that she is a slave 
female. In this portion of the dance the girl is seldom on her feet. Rather, 
sitting, rolling and changing position, on her side, her back, her belly, 
half-kneeling, half sitting, kneeling, crawling, reaching out, bending 
backwards, lying down, twisting with passion, gesturing to her body, presenting 
it to masters for their inspection and interest, whimpering, moaning, crying 
out, brazenly presenting herself as a slave, pleading for her rape, she 
writehes, a piteous, begging, vulnerable, ready slave, a woman fit for and 
begging for the touch of a master, a womean begging to become at the least touch 
of her master, a totally submitted slave. The fourth phase of the dance, as I 
have mentioned, is sometimes known as the Heat of the Collared She-Sleen. This 
portion of the dance, the fifth portion, is sometimes known as the Heat of the 
Slave Girl.
I had expected the topaz to be delivered earlier, said Policrates. I had sent 
word to Ragnar Voskjard more than fifty days ago.
end of page 186
There were many deliberations in the holding of Ragnar, I said. Junctions of 
hthis kind are not to be entered upon lightly. Too, I was detained in Victoria. 
There are many guardsmen in Victoria, both of Port Cos and Ars Station, who 
seach for the bearer of the topaz. I would feel better, said Kliomenes, if I 
could see your face. The mask I wear, I said, must be to conceal my identyl
It is common, Kliomenes, said Policrates, for the courier, he carrying the 
topaz, to cover his features in foreign holdings. The concealment of his 
identity is essential to his work.
For all you know, I said to Kliomenes, I might be Ragnar Voskjard himself. 
Kliomenes shrank back. But you are not, said Policrates, For Ragnark a shrewd 
fellow, would not venture upon such dangerous work as the personal transport of 
the topaz.
I think that is true, I grinned. At any rate it is certainly true at lesat 
that I am not Ragnar Voskjard. There is something about you which seems 
familiar, said Kliomenes. Have I ever seen you before? asked Kliomenes. 
Perhaps, I said.
You see, Kliomenes, said Policrates, our friend may be well known upon the 
river. If so, it is scarcely in Ragnar Voskjards interest, or in ours, or in 
the interest of our friend here, to be recognized as the courier of the topaz. 
If he is highly placed in some town on the river then his utility to Voskjard 
and to use would be considerably diminished if it were understood such a highly 
placed person was secretly in league with men such as ourselves and Voskjard.
True, said Kliomenes. And I think that we may be certain, said Policrates, 
that our friend is indeed well known in at least one town on the river.
That is true, I admitted. Indeed, I was reasonably well known in Victoria.
The music ended with a swirl of sound and the girl with a jangle of bells, lay 
before the table of Policrates, whimpering, her hand extended. She lifted her 
head. I read the unmistakable need in her eyes. She was indeed a slave female.
end of page 187
Master! she whimpered. Please Master! Policrates glanced at her. Throw me 
to your men, please Master, she begged.
Policrates gestured to a brawny fellow who, coming up behind the girl bent down 
and by her upper arms, lifted her from the floor. She was helpless in his arms. 
Only her toes, well painted, scarlet nails, touched the floor. Policrates 
gestured gain to a table to the side, and the fellow, carrying the girl went to 
the table. He then threw her with a jangle of bells and a clatter of places and 
goblets to the surface of the table. Instantly the girl was held down on the 
table, on her back, her arms and legs held apart, and several men crowded about 
her. I heard her cry with pleasure.
I know who you remind me of, said Kliomenes. Who? I asked. A brawler and 
dock worker of Victoria, he said, one called Jason. I smiled. There is a 
resemblance, said Policrates. Jason of Victoria, said Kliomenes, did not 
know the sword. Then how could I be he? I asked.
Draw!, cried Kliomenes, leaping across the table and whipping out his blade. I 
looked, unconcernedly, at Policrates. My identity is surely established 
sufficiently by my former possession of the topaz, I said. Surely too, none 
who were not of the party of Ragnar Voskjard, should they come into the 
possession of the topaz would dare to bring it here. What could be the point?
These things seem to me true, said Policrates, but as Kliomenes has said, 
there seems a resemblance. Surely I am not to be blamed for that? I smiled. 
Will it hurt to make a test of the matter? inquired Policrates. I grinned, 
No, I said. But on the other hand, it is well known upon the river that 
Kliomenes is an excellent swordsman, surely I should be forgiven if I did not 
find myself eager to be spitted upon his blade. Draw!, said Policrates.
I threw the cloak behind me and drew forth the blade which was slung at my hip.
end of page 188
With one foot I moved aside the low table watching Kliomenes, that he not attack 
me as I step upon the table, maintaining an uneven balance. Kliomenes, I saw 
noted this. Then there was silence in the hall. The pirates, feasting at the low 
tables, stopped eating and watched. The girls too with their vessels and trays, 
serving, many of them nude, save for their collars and bangles, stood or knelt 
quietly, not moving, watching. The torches could then be heard, crackling at the 
walls.
Kliomenes thrust suddenly at me and I parried the blow, smartly. I did not 
attempt to strike him. He thrust then thrice again and each time I turned aside 
the steel.
Men murmured at the tables. He had been too easily thwarted. Suddenly angrily, 
Kliomenes attacked. For three or four Ehn he struck and slashed at me. Then, 
sweating, he lowered his blade angrily. I had of intetne particularly in the 
last two Ehn parried heavily. Strength as well as skill is signifgicant in 
swordplay, something which is insufficiently understood by many unfamiliar with 
weaponry. It is particularly telling if the action is prolonged. Whereas one may 
turn aside steel deftly one may alsok if one chooses, turn it aside with power, 
which necessitates an additional exertion on the part of the antagonist to 
return his steel to the ready position. He must, in order to protect himself, 
under such conditions, bring his blade back through a greater arc, and with 
additional speed and pressure. Similarly, as may be understood in terms of a 
simple simile, if one is holding an implement and it is struck with greater 
force it will be more difficult and tiring to return it to its original position 
than if if has not been struck heavily and has not been moved significantly. 
Sometimes, throuth I had tried not to make this obvious, I had, in effect beaten 
his blade to the side, rather than merely turned it away.
Obviously this man cannot be Jason of Victoria, smiled Policrates. Kliomenes 
angrily thrust his steel into its sheath. I dropped my blade, too, into my 
sheath. I had not attempted to respond to him, truly, but had only defended 
myself. Since I has limited myself only to defense, and had not risked the 
exposures of attack, I had been in little danger, at least for a time.
end of page 189
It is difficult of course to strke a swordsman who is both competent and 
careful. It is dangerous of course over a period of time to rely solely on 
defense. For one thing the antagonist, embolded, may press ore and more 
dangerous sttacks, far more difficult to avert than if he were subject to the 
necessity of protecting himself. Secondly, of coures, ones defense might falter 
or become imperfect, particularly over time. Obviously the consequences of even 
a moments inadvertence in the dialogue of blades could be irremediable. One who 
limites oneself solely to defense, and is unwilling to attack, obviously can 
never win. Too, sooner or later, it seems, he must be doomed to lose. There is 
no wall so strong that it will not one day crumble.
Kliomenes returned to his place, and I replacing the table to its original 
position, returned too to my place. Kliomenes, observed Policrates, you seem 
weary. I only wished to make a test of him, said Kliomenes, to determine 
whether or not he knew the sword. And what is your opinion? asked Policrates. 
His skills seem adequate, said Kliomenes. I thought so too, said Policrates, 
smiling.
I was grateful to Callimachus, he of Port Cos, my teacher. In long hours, from 
dawn to dusk, and even in the light of lamps, over the past several days, in my 
house in Victoria, he had labored with me, instilling in me techniaues, and 
anticipations and reflexes, subjecting me to a tutelage of apprehensions and 
tactics. I had proved, I think a not inapt pupil. Yet I remained clearly aware 
of my limitations. A high order of skill with stel is not easily purchased. This 
is particularly true with the subtle difference and dimensions and increments 
which tend to divide masters.
I only wishes to make a test of him,  said Kliomenes, to see whether or not 
he knew the sword. I did not wish to kill the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. That 
is clearly understood, smiled Policartes. Music, then he called, and a new 
dancer, and wenches to serve! Let the feast continue! The muscians then again 
began to play, the sensuous, melodious, exciting wild music of Gor.
I picked up a leg of vulo and bit into it. I was relieved, though I gave little 
sign of it. Kliomenes, angrily, continued to swill wine. A new dancer came forth 
upon the floor and began, a tall brute near her with the leather, to perform a 
whip dance.
end of page 190
Girls, some nude, some scantily clad, hurried about the tables, serving food and 
drink. I looked about, considering the wenches. I did not see Miss Beverly 
Henderson among them. I did see several, however, whom I would have been 
delighted to own.
Wine, Master? asked a red-headed girl with two leather straps wound about her 
body. I took wine from her, and gave my attention then to the dancer, a 
luscious, dark-haired girl. In the whip dance, though there are various versions 
of it, depending on the locality, the girl is almost never struck with the whip, 
unless of course, she does not perform well. When the whip is cracked, however, 
the girl will commonly react as though she has been struck. This, conjoined with 
the music, and her beauty, and the obvious symbolism of her beauty beneath total 
male discipline, can be extremely, powerfully erotic. In an elegant, civilized 
context, one of beauty and music, it makes clear and bespeaks the raw and 
essential primitives of the ancient genetic, biological sexual relationship of 
men and women, the theme of dominance and submission, that man is master by 
blood and women is slave by birth.
Neither too, as say the Goreans, will know their fulfillment until they become 
true to themselves. We can be conquered, but nature cannot. In attempting to 
conquer nature, we defeat only ourselves. True freedom and happiness, perhaps, 
lies not in denying and repudiating our nature but in fulfilling it.
Bread, Master? asked a blond-haired beauty, keeling down beside me. She 
offered me a silver tray on which, hot and seaming were wedges of Gorean bread, 
made from Sa-Tarna grain. I took one of them and, from the tureen, with the 
small silver dipper, both on the tray, poured hot butter on the bread. I then 
dismissed her with a gesture of my head and she rose lightly to her feet and 
left to serve another. She was unclothed.
I would prefer, said Kliomenes, that he did not wear a mask. Surly you must 
understand, said Policrates, that his identify must remain concealed. 
Policrates gestured about himself, to the tables. What if one hear should turn 
traitor, and later identify and betry our guest, say for gold? Or, what if his 
features might be seen by a slave, say, a mere serving wench, who might later, 
herself being sold or given away, inadvertently, by her reaction, give 
suspicious as to his identity?
end of page 191
Kliomenes nodded glumly, and turned again to his wine.
Do even the slaves here know that I am the courier fo Rganer Voskjard? I 
asked. Of coures, said Policrates. To celebrate your arrival, and the 
bringing of the pledge of the topaz, this very feast has been commanded. Indeed, 
even if it were not so, it is difficult to keep rumors of such matters from the 
kitchens and kennels. The little sluts, even in their chains, are prone to 
gossip and are eager for the least tidbit of news. I smiled.
Meat, Master? asked a girl, nude, who knelt now beside me. She offered a tray 
on which small cubes of roasted bosk, on tiny sticks, steamed. I took several, 
dipping them by the sticks in a sauce, carried on the same tray. I returned the 
tiny sticks to the tray and looked at the girl. She put down her head. Her hair 
had been cut quite short, probably as a punishment. She must now, nude, offer 
meat to men. It is understood of course in such a situation that in asking such 
a question that the girl is offering herself to the male, as much or more, than 
the steaming, nourishing delights on her plate. This sort of thing, 
incidentally, is quite common in Gorean serving. This sort of question, 
generally, is unerstood more broadly than merely being an inquiry into the 
males culinary preferences of the moment. The classical question in this 
respect, almost universal on Gor, is Wine, Master?
Do you think, truly, asked Policrates, that the fleet os Rganar Voskjard, 
fully rigged and fitted, can be here in twenty days?  I see no difficulty in 
the matter, I assured him. Good, he said.
I looked about at the girls among the tables. Some, but not all, wore five steel 
loops on their body, a rounded, narrow collar loop, and rounded and narrow, lops 
on their wrists and ankles. Such looks in a variety of ways can provide a 
variety of ties. Only a bit of binding fiber, slipped behind the loops is 
required. Goeran men are sometimes ingenious in the ties to which they subject 
slave girls. Different ties, of course, have different purposes.
end of page 192
One may generally distinguish among such things as control ties, discipline 
ties, and pleasure ties. These ties are not mutually exculsive of course.
Grapes, Master? said a soft feminie voice near to me. I looked about but I did 
not react. It was the free owman, or the woman who had been free, who had been 
ordered from the crowd on the wharves of Victoria. I reaclled her having been 
stripped by the pirate and his blade at her throat. She had tied the knot of 
bondage in her own hair. She ahd been ordered to run to the galley. There I had 
seen her bound helplessly at its railing, her back to it, exposing her beauty, 
with others. Master? she asked. Her voice, and mein, were deferential and 
totally submissive. An incredible transformation had come over her. She was not 
soft and lovely and beautiful, a woman who was and knew herself owned. I wanted 
to take her in my arms. She lifted the tray of grapes to me, proffering it. They 
were Ta grapes. I smiles. Each, I noted had been carfully peeled. Doubtless that 
had been the task to which she had set that afternoon. Suchtrivial, painstaking 
tasks are often useful in teaching a women that she is a slave. Master? she 
asked. I wanted to take her in my arms. I permitted her to feed me a grape. Then 
she withdrew. I watched her withdraw. She was beautiful. She wore a snatch of 
yellow silk.
I see that she pleased you, said Policrates. You may have her this evening in 
your chambers, if you wish. Perhaps, I said. I shrugged. The whip dance 
continued before us.
Fruit, Master, asked a girl softly, timidly, kneeling down lightly beside me. 
Her head was down. She was frightened. I turned, sitting to face her. She 
trembled. She did not raise her head. She fears you, said Policratesk for she 
knows you are the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. Too she is perhaps intimidated by 
my presence, and that of Kliomenes, for we are highest in this holding. I 
smiled. Such men of course held over her the total power of life or death. I 
regarded the girl.
There were five, narrow, rounded loops of steel locked upon her hair body, one 
serving as collar, and the others for her wrists and ankles. In her hands she 
carried, held, ripe rounded fruit.
end of page 193
She wore, like the girl before her, tantalizing to the eye, what might 
constitute a masters conception of a garment suitable for a lovely female 
slave, a fragment of silk which made unmistakable clear that the beauty to which 
it clung, and which it made little pretense to conceal, lay fully at the 
disposition and mercy of lusty men. Yet is was, in its way, more demure than 
that which had been worn by the girl before her. In particular, as it was tied 
snugly, it gathered her breasts, holding them together and lifting them.
She is a new slave, said Policrates, and is not yet fully broken to the 
collar. Her dark hair was coiffured loosely and high upon her head. It was 
bound with a braided yellow cord, strong enough to hold her wrists, should she 
be bound with it. If the cord were jerked loose the hair would fall, uncound, to 
the small of her back. She is exquisite, isnt she? asked Policrates.
I put my thumb under her chin and lifted up her head. Her soft brown eyes, 
frightened, met mine.there was a look in them which I had seen before, I 
thought, in others girls, in the eyes of a salve girl as she looks into the eyes 
of a master. That interested me. Then she turned aside her head, though it was 
still held much in place by the obdurate pressure of my thumb. She did not 
recognize me. Her delicate lips wore lipstick, red. There was a subtle shading 
of blue on her upper eyelids.
She fears that you will find her pleasing, said Policrates, but yet, I think, 
desires that you will. The girl trembled. I removed my thumb from beneath her 
chin, and she put her head down. Policrates regarded her. Little, fool, he 
said, for what purpose have you come to this table?
The girl lifted her head then and timidly lifted the ripe, rounded fruit which 
she held in her hands. Gorean peaches and plums, to me. Her eyes met mine, and 
then she looked down, blushing. I then understood the purpose of the gathering 
of her brief yellow garmet at her breasts, lifting them, sweet, rounded and 
swelling, for the inspection and delectation of masters. In her gesture, her 
offering of the fruit, it is cleafning understood that she was offering to me as 
well the lovely fruits of her service and beauty.
end of page 194
I took one of the peaches and bit into it, watching her. She shuddered.
You are dismissed, said Policrates. Yes, Master, she said, frightened, and 
rising quickly, lightly, hurried away, barefoot on the tiles to serve others. I 
thought Miss Henderson made a lovely slave girl.
The whip dance was now approaching its climax.
She is a pretty little think, I said, looking after MIss Henderson, What do 
you call her? Beverly, said Policrates. You are cruel, i said, smiling, to 
give her an Earth-girl name. She is an Earth girl, he said grinning. Oh, I 
said. Do you like Earth girls? he asked. Yes, I said.
That one is raw, he said, but in time like the others, I think she will make 
an excellent slave. Do you think she is a natural slave? I asked. 
Undoubtedly, he said. I meant that she was not yet fully trained, not yet 
broken fully to the collar. I see, I said.
Kliomenes fell in with her at the tavern of Hibro, the Pirates Chain in 
Victoira, he said. He immediately sized her up as slave meat. Thinking herself 
in delightful converse with hi she informed him that her name on earth had been 
Beverly. Accordingly it seemed fitting that we should put that name again upon 
her, though now only as a slave name, by our whim. Of course, I said. She, 
herself, said Policrates, repudiated the assistance of a fellow desireing to 
extracate her from her peril, mocking and dismissing him, one called Jason of 
Victoria, he to whom you bear some physical resemblance. I see, I said.
Kliomenes did not even use Tassa powder on her, he said. He simply bound her 
and carried herk struggling to his ship. He indicated the girl, among the 
tables moving about, keeling and serving fruit.
end of page 195
I thought her thighs and ankles, and her back, which wa smuch exposed, were 
beautiful. She now serves us well, he said.
I turned my attention to the dancer on the floor. She lay now on her back, one 
knee lifted, her arms at her sides, palms down, before the brute with his whip, 
who towered over her. Her head, too, was turned to the side. Then she turned her 
head to face the brute, who tyrannized her. She looked deeply into his eyes. 
Then delicately, in a graceful gentrues, she turned her hands, putting their 
backs to the floor, exposing her palms and the soft flesh of her plams to him, 
indicating her surrender, her submission, her vulnerability and her readiness.
There was applause, the strking of the left shoulder from the tables.
The brute then crouched beside her and encircles her neck with the coils of his 
whip. He drew her to her knees then before him. She looked up at him, her neck 
in the whip coils, his.
There was more applause. Then the brute looked to Policrates, who indicated a 
table. He then pulled the girl to her feet and, running her over the tiles, and 
then releasing the coils form her neck, threw her stumbling into the arms of 
waiting pirates who, with a cry of pleasure, seized her and began to work their 
lusty wills upon her. There was more applause, and laughter.
I rose to my feet. The feast has but begun, laughed Policrates. I am weary, 
I said. I think I shall retire to my chambers. Certainly! he laughed, Your 
journey has been long. I shall of course send a girl to wash your body and 
content you. Policrates is generous, I said. It is nothing. he said.
This form of hospitality of course is common on Gor. It is common to provide a 
guest with a girl for the night, to see to his comfort. My compliment, 
nontheless, was appropraite as was his reply. Ritualistic amennities, and 
pleasantries on such occasions are invariably observed.
He rose to stand beside me. Together we looked about the tables at various 
girls, slaves, nude and partialy clothed, who served there.
end of page 196
Take your pick of the wenches, he said.
I looked about at the girls, attending dutifully to their serving, many of them 
not even conscious of my attention. One of them could discover later that she 
had been selected to be sent to my chambers for the evening.
Tai is interesting, said Policrates. A dark-haired girl quickly averted her 
eyes from ours, putting down her head and hurring to pour wine nearby. Two 
silver chains ran from a large look on her collar to her writs. The snug metal 
bracelets there were jeweled. There is Reli ther, he said. Consider her. He 
indicated another dark-haired girl. She wore a long lovely red gown, but it had 
been pulled down about her waist. She carried a tray of tiny cups, filled with 
liqueurs. She was willowy and sweetly-breasted. A silver collar graced her 
throat. Tela, when captured, he said indicating a blonde, begged to be 
permitted to be kept in white silk. He laughed. After thowing her to a crew 
for their pleasure, we put her as she had asked in white silk. Amusing, I 
said. She now often begs for red silk, he said. Perhaps we will one day 
permit it to her. I see, I said. She is now quick to lick a mans feet, he 
added. Excellent, I said. Bikkie, said he, indicating a short, dark-haired 
girl, is good. too there are Mira and Tala, the matched blondes. They are 
sisters from Cos He indicated two girls, one older than the other, one perhaps 
19 and the other 17. They were fastened together by the neck bya knotted red 
strap some four feet in length. They were slender and nude. You may have both, 
he said.
I continued to look about.
I saw that you were interested in Lita, he said, referring to a girl in a 
diaphanous bit of swirling yellow silk. She was the woman who had been free, 
whom I had seen enslaved on the wharves of Victoria, only a few nights past. In 
her own hair she had tired the knot of bondage. She is trying hard to improve 
her skills, he said. I think she will be ready for sale in another month. 
Perhaps you could assist in her training. Perhaps some other time, I said. 
There are others, of course, said he, below in cages.
I think I see one in which I might be interested, I said. Which? he asked. 
That one, I said.
end of page 197
Beverly? he said, the Earth girl? Yes, I said. Choose another, he said. 
Why? I asked. She is raw and untrained, he said. She is a poor slave.
I find her, nonetheless, not to be without interest, I said. Very well, he 
said. I will have her sent to your chambers within the Ahn. My thanks 
Policrates, I said. It is nothing, he said.
I then bowed graciously to my host, Policrates, and to Kliomenes, his lieutenant 
and confederate and then turned about and made my way to my chambers.
end of page 198
24    What Occurred in my Chambers When Miss Henderson Thought me to be the 
Courier of Ragnar Voskjard
Master, she asked. She stood within the door to my chambers. The door had been 
shut behind her. A guard had conducted her to my chambers. He had opened the 
door. Timidely, blindfolded, conducged by his hand on her arm, she had entered. 
The door had then shut behind her. She stood no now within my chambers. We were 
absolutely alone.
Master? she asked. I have come to serve you. she said. I did not respond to 
her, but observed her. She stood timidly, blindfolded near the door. She wore a 
tiny, diaphanous bit of brown silk about her body. It was high on her thighs. It 
was off her right shoulder and held loosly on her by a casually knotted, narrow 
disrobing loop, fastened over her left shoulder. A single tug would open the 
garment, dropping it to her ankles. She carried, folded, several large, colored 
soft towels, with two sponges and oils for the bath. On the towels too were 
certain other articles. Among them was, opened, the rounded steel loop she had 
worn about her neck earlier. It, with its key lay on the top towel. I had been 
removed from her for she was to assist me in the bath. It accompanied her, that 
it might be again, when she had bathed me, replaced on her.
end of page 199
Similarly the steel loops from her wrists and ankles had been removed. They, 
however, had been kept elsewhere. They did not accompany her. On the towels, 
however, coiled, there was a whip and slave cuffs and anklets, of leather with 
snaps. too, it might be mentioned, there were as is usual, chains at the foot of 
the great couch, which might be lengthened or shortened. One chain terminated in 
a collar, which might be locked about a girls neck. The other chain terminated 
in the smaller loop of steel, an ankle ring, suitable for a girls ankle.
I regarded her. Her hair was still coiffured high upon her head, and held as 
before, with the braided yellow cord, stout enough to bind her. She was barefoot 
as is common with slaves.
Master? she asked. Are you in the room? I moved, that she might know my 
presence.
Forgive me Master, she said, if I have awakened you or disturbed you. I 
pulled away the mask I wore and discarded it to one side of the great couch. I 
snapped my fingers. Yes Master, she said. She approached the sound and knelt 
before me. I am Beverly, she said. I have been sent to serve you. I did not 
speak.
It is a great honor for me, Master, she said, that one such as you should 
select Beverly to serve you I did not respond to her.
The water wil have been readied, she said. Near the couch was a large, round, 
sunken tub, with some six inches of water in it. Too, to one side thre were 
rising jars. She put the objects she carried on the floor to her right.
Here Master, she said, feeling for it, I s a salve collar. You may place it 
on me when you wish. She put it with the key at my feet. Here too, she said, 
putting the objects near the collar, are slave cuffs and andkets. I regarded 
the objects, with their tiny belts and buckles, with their attached, sewn in 
metal snap rings. And here, Master, she said, is your whip. She kissed it 
and put it too at my feet.
Beverly is not ready to serve her Master, she said. I again snapped my fingers 
and the girl stood.
end of page 200
She stood lovely and straight, her hands now empty, the towls and oils and other 
articles on the floor near me. Am I to bathe you now, Master? she asked.
I regarded the blindfold. It was efficient and Gorean. Most blindfolds of a sort 
used on Earth are inefficient for one may see under them. This is not the case 
with the common Gorean blindfold. It consists of, commonly, three pieces, 
usually two rounded pieces of soft felt, three to four inches in diameter and 
the binding, which usualy consists of two or more turns of a dark, thick, folded 
cloth, or scarf, knotted behind the head. The pieces of rounded, face-hugging 
felt, the eyes coverings, in the girls blindfold were about three a half inches 
in diameter. They were yellow. the binding, tightly behind her head, held the ey 
coverings securely in place. The blindfold, of course, is seldom used in the 
transportation of a slave. Slave hoods are much more common in such a role. Some 
of these are fitted with gags. Also, they may be, or some of them, locked upon 
the girl. The blindfold of course as will be recalled by those who hae seen a 
girl in one, has its own advantages. It permits, for example, something of the 
beauty of her face, such as her trembling lips to be seen. Also it permits you 
to place your teeth upon hers, to tease her tongue for responsivenesss with 
yours, and if one wishes to run the tip of ones finger lightly inside her 
mouth, between her teeth and the interior of her cheek.
May I bathe Master now? she asked. I jerked loose the disrobing loop at her 
left shoulder. Beverly Henderson was stripped before me. I walked around behind 
her. She lifted her chin. She trembled slightly. She was extremely aware of my 
presence. I bent forward, slightly. She had been subtly perfumed. She shuddered. 
She had felt my breath at the left side of her neck, and on her left shoulder. I 
then walked about her and stood before her. Yes, master, she said. She reached 
out and gently first touching my chest, her hands lingering there for a moment, 
found the knot in the belt of soft cloth with which I had closed the casual 
tunic I had donned. She undid the knot and parted the tunic, kissing me at the 
belly. She then went behind me and gently removed the tunic, kissing me beneath 
the left shoulder blade. She then stood again before me.
end of page 201
She folded the tunic and belt, kissing them, and then knelt down placing them to 
the side. She then stood again before me her head down.
I smiled. The girl had been taught how to disrobe a Master for his bath. I then 
placed the articles for the bath in her hands, and conducted her to the side of 
the tub. She placed the articles where she might find them. She then took a vial 
of oil and one of the sponges in her hands. I then helped her step within the 
tub. I looked at her. She stood in the water, blindfolded, waitning for me. Miss 
Bevely Henderson, once a proud girl of Earth, now only a Gorean slave girl, 
waited to bathe a free male, one whom she must address as Master and serve as he 
pleased. I stepped down within the tub.
Then kneeling or standing as was fit, humbly, Miss Beverly Henderson, with the 
oils and sponges and rinsing waters bathed me. Then after a few Ehn, she toweled 
my body dry and then knelt before me head down. I snapped my fingers, and she 
stood.
I then looked at her carefully, I sensed the nature of her breathing. I touched 
my fingers to her side, and noted her sudden involuntary movement. I smiled. The 
Gorean bath of such a sort has many purposes. The cleaning of the body, of 
course, is only one such purpose. It has two major purposes with respect to its 
effect on the girl. The first is that she is performing a lowly and humble task 
for a man. This helps to remind her that she is a slave. Also of course, serving 
a man, particularly in small and humble ways, probably for biological reasons, 
tends to be sexually arousing for a woman. Many men, I think, fail to understand 
that. When a girl brings a man his sandals and ties them on his feet, she is 
having a sexual experience. Many men, I think, fail to understand the 
pervasiveness and radiance, the depth, and contextual richness of female 
sexuality. It is such a wonderous, deep, and marvelous thing. He who denies a 
woman her right to serve man, and particularly in such small ways, denies to her 
a portion of herself; that man is not only a fool, for he is the natural 
recipient of such attentions, but he is cruel; such a denial too, can make a 
woman ashamed to seek sexual gratification
end of page 202
for such small services, usually unbeknowst to the boorish male, are intimately 
connected with such gratification; this is one resaon, incidentally, that those 
who secretly fear sexuality and would repudiate it, will be among the first to 
denounce such homely serves of love. In the case of the slave girl, of course, 
such services are commanded of her. She must perform them. This tells her then, 
on some deep level, that it is all right, truly to be a woman. Indeed, she is 
given no choice but to be a woman. Thusly is her love unqualifiedly liberated. 
This type of thing, I think, accounts for something of the joy which is 
experienced by many slave girls, a joy which, otherwise, would seem 
inexplicable. The second major purpose with respect to the effect on the girl, 
is that she is touching and in feect in the bathing, caressing a mans body. She 
is intimately close to the male, even to the extent of sensual tactuality. Being 
alive and hormonally active, of couse, this is arousing to her. And it is 
particularly arousing to a slave female, for she knows she is fit meat for the 
lust of men. Does her very condition not tell her that? Too, she herself, though 
is not touched. This is frustrating to her, naturally, and intensified her 
desire, usually near the surface in a slave, to be taken in the arms of the 
Master. He is Master. Second, it is not unpleasant to be washed humbly by a 
beautiful woman. Third, such service tends to arouse the girl. It is not 
uncommon, when such a bath has been finished, and he has been toweled by the 
beauty, that she kneels before him and begs to be raped.
The bath is finished, Master, said the girl, standing before me. I jerked 
loose the yellow cord from her hair. I then, with the cord, tied her wrist 
behind her back. I thought it well that she should feel herself tied.
I then threw thick love furs at the foot of the couch. She heard them. I lifed 
the chains there and put them on top of the furs.
I conducted her to a place at the foot of the couch. She stood there on the 
furs. Often slave girls are not permitted on the couch. They are used at its 
foot. I took the steel collar, the rounded, narrow metal loop, with its lock, 
which she had brought with her into the room.
end of page 203
I snapped it about her throat. It fitted closely. I am now a collared female, 
she said. I walked away from her and placed the key among my things. I returned 
to her then and looked at her. Gorean men truly look at women and they know 
themselves looked at truly.
My brand, she said, is the common Kajira mark. I hope it pleases Master. I 
regarded it, the staff and fronds, delicate and incisive, beauty subject to 
discipline. Quickly I snapped my fingers, sharply. She knelt immediately on the 
furs among the chains. She knes well where she knelt. She knelt back on her 
heels, spreading her knees. I then sat on the edge of the couch, at its bottom, 
the plams of my hands resting on its furs and looked upon her. I wanted to howl 
with pleasure.
Beverly Henderson, naked and bound, knelt before me in the position of the 
pleasure slave. Master? she inquired. I noted that she has assumed the 
position spontaneously. That interested me.
I knew that come what may I must have her, and have her well. If she were not 
sent forth in the morning, perhaps bruised and sobbing, as a well-ravished 
slave, the men of the holding of Policrates, and its master himself, would grow 
throughtful. My failure to subject her uncompromisingly to the predations of my 
mastery would be certain to generate suspicion. The true courier of Ragnar 
Voskjard, I knew, would be expected to handle women well.
Master has not deigned to speak to me, she said. Am I to be whipped? Am I not 
pleasing? I did not of course, as was my intent, respond to her. It Master not 
going to rape me? she asked.Did Master not select me out from the other girls 
for his pleasure? She squirmed miserably before me. Perhaps I am not pretty 
enough now for Master, she said, now that he has seen me closely. I know that 
I am not as beautiful as many of the girls. I know that they say that I am not a 
good slave, and that I am not well broekn as yet to my collar, but I wil try to 
please you well.
end of page 204
It interested me to her her speak. She spoke as might hae a slave. Did she not 
know she was from Earth?
I cannot dance, she ssid. And I do not know the love songs of slaves. I said 
nothing. They have not taught me to dance, she said. nor have I been 
permitted to learn the desire songs of heated slaves. I said nothing.
They have not taught me to dance, she whimpered, not have I been permitted to 
learn the desire songs of heated slaves. I said nothing.
What does Master want of me? she asked piterously. I did not respond to her.
I acknowledge you as the coruier of Ragnar Voskjard, she said. I acknowleed 
you as aa great and important man. An I acknowledge myself as only a miserable 
slave. It is a great honor for me that you hve selected me out, from the others, 
to be sent to your chambers this night to serve you. She looked toward me, 
piteously, though she could see nothing in the dark confines of the blindfold. 
I will try to be worthy of your choice, she said. I will try to please you. 
Again I did not respond to her.
I am frightend! she said. Obviously I must not be pleasing to you. Then whip 
me, and call for another girl! I did not move. But you are not ata this moment 
whipping me, she said, nor calling for another girl. Now I am truly frightened 
for I know that somehow, now, you must find me pleasing, or of interest. But I 
am terrified that man such as you might find me pleasing or of interest. What 
will he do to me? Oh, please, Master, speak to me! Let me tell, if only by the 
tone of your voice, what are you intentions with respect to me! Oh, I am so 
helpless! I am so helpless!
I regarded her and the sttel collar on her throat, placed there by my own hand. 
I am so helpless, she wept. Then she tossed her head and smiled. You have me 
at something of a disadvantge, Master, she laughed, for whereas you may see. I 
am blindfolded and where you are free, I am kneeling, collared, nude and bound. 
Her lower lip sudden trembled. Please speak to me Master, she begged.
end of page 205
She was very beautiful. She squirmed in the loops of yellow cord holding her 
wrists behind her back. I understand, she said, why I must be blindfolded, 
that you have doubtless here, in the privacy of your own chambers removed you 
mask. I am not to be permitted to see the face of the courier or Ragnor 
Voskjard, no more than others, even though I am a lowly slave. Who knows through 
what sales or changings of hands a girl who is mere property such as I might 
pass? You cannot reisk that I might, somedsay, somewhere, if only by 
inadvertence, perhaps by a startled cry or gesture, or a too-eager licking at 
your feet, compromise your secret.
I was interested that she had spoken, and naturally, of the licking of feet. 
That sort of thing is common in a slave girl. Did she not know she was from 
Earth?.
But you cannot even spek to me, Master? she begged. Ah! she said, that you 
do not speak to me must also be intended to conceal your identity! You would not 
wish me to be able to recognize even your voice! She trembled. Or is it 
rather, she asked, that I am so low a slve that you do not concern yourself 
even to speak to me?
I smiled. Whereas the frightened, deferential slave had not recognized me 
sitting regally with Policartes and Kliomenes in the feasting hallk in the robes 
and mask of the courier of Ragnar Voskjart, I did not doubt but what she might 
quickly recognize my voice.
I have it Master, She said happily. I fyou do not speak to help protect your 
identity, touch me once upon the elft shoulder. If you do not speak because you 
regard me as only a contemptible slave, unworthy to be spoken to, touch me once 
upon the left arm. She lifted her body, tensing to see where she might be 
touched. Please Master! she begged. But I did not move.
She then knelt back on her heels. I see Master, she said miserably. Not even 
that is to be made known to me. She shuddered. Do you not know how terrifying 
it is to be in a room, blindfolded, with one who does ot speak to you? Ah, 
perahps you do! She smled. You well know how to treat a slave, Master, she 
said.
end of page 206
I was interested to note that she spoke of herself, naturally, as a slave. But 
yet, she said, you are permitting me to speak. You have not struck me to 
silence, nor put a block of wood in my mouth, or gagged me. I may gather then, 
that a least until I feel your blow, or the lash of your whip, that you wish to 
hear me speak. But why would this be? What could I, a mere slave, have to say 
that might interest you? She pulled at the cord loops. She seemed genuinely 
puzzled.
How am I different from other girls? she asked herself, aloud, thinking.  Of 
course! she said suddenly delightedly. Now I have it, I am the only Earth girl 
in the holding! They told you I was from Earth didnt they? You are not familiar 
with EArth girls. That ingrigued you! They must have told you. You did not take 
me in your hands and force open my mouth to look for bits of metal in my teeth. 
I do not think my accent betrayed me, for there are many barbarian accents on 
Gor, and I speak Gorean excellently!
I smiled, the vain little thing but it was true that she did speak a liquid, 
fluent Gorean. Her linguistic skills in this respect, and I have unusual 
aptitude in such matters, approached my own.
That my masters call me Beverly, she said would not in itself tell you that I 
was from Earth. Not unoften Gorean girls, particularly if they are to be 
consigned to a low slavery, are given such names. Perhaps then you might have 
seen the tiny scaring on my left arm. It is called a vaccination mark.
But, on the whole, she said, I think it most likely that you were merely told 
that I was from Earth. This then you found of interest. You decided then that it 
was to be I who would come to your chambers this evening. Did you wish merely to 
see, being lower, were juicier puddings than our Gorean sisters, or beyond this, 
as a matter of curiosity, did you wish to learn something of our nature?
end of page 107
It amused me that Miss Henderson had used the graphic Gorean expression that she 
had, an expression almost always applied to a slave, a hot and helpless lay. 
From my own experience, I did not think Earth girls were juicier puddings, so to 
speak, than Gorean girls, nor really, that Gorean girls tended to be juicier 
puddings than Earth girls. It is true of course that the slae tends to be a far 
juicier pudding so to speak than the free woman of either world. Some Earth 
girls are marvelous in the furs, and some Gorean girls are. Much depends on the 
individual girl. This is to be expected, of course, for all Gorean girls as far 
as I know have ultimately an Earth origina. I think it is true, however, that an 
Earth girl may sometimes have an extra dimension of lovely, yielding slavishness 
in her, which is perhaps natural, considering the sexual desert from which she 
has been rescued. She can remember her loneliness and frustration, how she, a 
slave, languished in a world where she could find no masters. Such women, in 
time, find themselves overwhelmed in gratitude for the collar. For the first 
time, in spite of the world from which they come, they are forced to become true 
women. Thus they find fulfillment and joy. To the Gorean free woman the joys of 
the slave girl, though they may be despised and disparaged, are at least 
culturally not unknown, and are the envy of such free women. To the Earth woman, 
on the other hands, who finds herself in the collar of a Gorean master, such 
joys come as a revelation. Only in her wildest and most secret dreams had she 
dared even to suspect their existence. Then she finds herself a slave girl.
I think, said Miss Henderson, that it is your intention to try me, to try me 
out, to sample an Earth girl, to see if we might be of interest, but as of yet, 
in spite of my helplessness before you, you have not done so. Further you have 
permitted me to speak. I gather thus tht you will use me when it pleses you and 
in the meantime that I, though only a slave, am to speak before you. She 
smiled. I shall do so Master.
It was natural for her to think that I, whom she believed to be Gorean, would be 
interested to hear of her world, and of the nature of the female slaves taken 
from it. Earth slave girls are controversial on Gor, though I think they are not 
more accepted than formerly. Some man have a taste for Earth females. Other men 
will not even own them. A not uncommon task for an Earth female on Gor is to 
attempt to seure the affetions of a Gorean master who regards her as nothing and 
despises her.
end of page 108
For months through assiduous application, through attentivness and study, 
through a selfless love and serve, such a woman may labor to convince the brute 
who owns her that she is worthy to wear his collar. then perhaps one day he 
looks down upon her kneeling before him. His hand touches the side of her head 
Was it a gentle gesture? She takes his hand and presses her lips, sobbing, 
fervently to it. He takes her by the arms and presses her back, gently, to the 
tiles, a love slave. When he is finished with her he takes his whip and orders 
her to her knees. Perhaps he strikes her, perhaps he puts the whip to her mouth 
and she kisses it. Well then does she know she is still a slave. He turns away. 
She, kneeling, her had down, smiles shyly, happily.
My name was Beverly Henderson, she said, and I am from a world called Earth. 
Doubtless you have heard something of it. I assure you that it exists. I was 
captured there by slavers and brought to Gor, that I might wear a collar and 
learn to serve true men - such as you, Master, who are so strong that you have 
stripped me, and bound me and put me at your feet, your slave. She smiled, No 
man of Earth, she said, is strong enough to do that. I smiled.
The women of Earth, she said, are starved for strong men. I cannot tell you 
the restlessness, the misery and frustration they feel. The men of Earth are not 
true men. Perhaps they were long ago, but that is now history. Now they are weak 
and ineffectual. Manhood among them is measured by its lack. No longer are they 
capable of true manhood.
I doubted what she said, but surely, I had no intention of explicitly gainsaying 
her. I thought it best to let her speak.
Females, she said, are the natural property of men such as Goreans, not of 
men such as those of Earth. It is men such as Gorean and not men such as those 
of Earth who recognize the meaning of our beauty and simply take us, and make us 
serve them. But I have bathed Master and now kneel naked and bound before him, I 
tell him nothing. She squirmed in the close confines of the loops of braided 
yellow cord. They held her well.
I was taken to the House of Andronicus in Vonda, she said. There with other 
girls from Earth, more than fifty of us, I was branded.
end of page 109
I remember one of the girls, pulled sobbing and in pain from the rack, crying 
out joyfully, I am a slave girl! How startled and strange seemed her cry. Yet 
I too, later, after I had screamed and sobbed, and had been pulled, my thigh 
stringing from the iron, from the rack and found myself alone, chained on the 
straw by the damp wall, was filled with strange emotions. Though I could 
scarcely admit it to myself I knew, with wild strange feelings, that I was glad 
that I too had been branded.
You were born for the brand, I whispered to myself, and now incomprehensibly, 
wonderfully, on this strange world, it has at last been put upon you. In your 
pain, rejoice, slave girl. Youi are now publicly marked, clearly and 
incontrovertibly as what is your secret heard you have always been. Serve you 
Masters well, slave girl.
I sat on the couch. My fists were clenched. Did she not know she was from Earth!
Most of use, of coures, including myself, dared not yet admit we were pleased 
with our brands. We lamanted together, pretending to bemoan the misery of our 
plights. Our masters, of course, did not give us a great deal of time to indulge 
our self-pity. We must be prepared for markets. We were then separated and sent 
to different training rooms. There I was forced to kneel and was put in a house 
collar. I was then chained at a ring and given my first whipping. Thus did I 
learn what the last might feel like upon me and that I was under discipline. My 
slave reflexes were tested and found, as is the case with most Earth females, 
initially inert. Held on my knees, my head held back, my nose pinched shut, my 
mouth forced open, slave wine was poured down my throat. I must needs swallow. I 
was then hooded and men were called in, who abused me, as it pleased them. Then 
a day later, still hooded, I was returned to the central dungeon.
She paused. I have not been struck, she said. Therefore I gather that I have 
the Masters permission to continue. How beautiful y ou are, breathed a girl 
in the dungeon to me when I had been unhooded. How beautiful you are, I 
whispered seeing her. Were you whipped? she asked. Yes, I said. I too, she 
said head down. I looked about the dungeon at the girls there. How soft and 
beautiful they were in their collars. The collar, as Master well knows, 
considerably enhances the beauty of a woman. Were you raped? asked the girl, a 
lovely blonde. Yes, I said.
end of page 210
They used me well. I too, she said. I enjoyed my rape, said a redhead, 
collared, in an ankle ring and chain, lying near us in the straw. Slave! 
hissed another girl to her. Yes, slave, smiled the redhead. My intimacies 
sprang aflame when I heard her words. How bold she was! I myself would not have 
dared to admit such a thing to another woman! What might she thing of me? I had 
not even, scarcely, dared to admit to myself, or recall, that in the arms of the 
fifth man my body had clapsed his and my arms, and I had in the darkness of the 
hood, a moaning slave, subdued, cried out with pleasure. Then, too soon, they 
had been finished with me. That night I had lain in the darkness of the hood, 
hungry, recollecting the sensations they had induce in me. Now, though I could 
scarcely admit this to myself, I feared, and feared correctly, that the first 
fires of a slaves passion had been ignited withing me. I had know that I was a 
slave and a true slave, before they had touched me, but I had not know until 
they took me in their arms, how helpless and low a slave I could be.
I could scarcely believe my ears. It seemed that Miss Henderson, without thought 
before me was confessing herself a slave. She was from Earth!
What is to be done with us? asked one of the girls. I think we are to be 
readied for markets, said another girl. There was then a beating on the bars of 
the dungeon and we knelt. A man entered, with a whip. Our training began.
She smiled at me, We were taught to kneel and to crawl, to move and to walk. We 
were taught the use of our hands, and of our total body, and our hair, and of 
our mouth and tongue. We were taught many things. The first words of Gorean I 
learned were, I am a slave girl. But our Masters did not waste much time on 
us. Our new Masters, those who would buy us, could teach us more. The night 
before we were to be sold, we were permitted to speak to one another. We kissed 
one another and cried for we knew that we might soon never see one another 
again, and we did not know what lay before us, outside the confines of the House 
of Andronicus, in the harsh world of Gor. None of us, of course, had been sold 
before. Intereseting, however, we were looking forward to our sales. It was not 
just that we wished to be out of the House of Andronicus. It was rather, I think 
that we were now eager to belong to Masters. You see Master in the past few 
days, a startling transformation had come over us.
end of page 211
Few of us mentioned this, but I think there was not one among us who did not 
clearly recognize it. We had become, honestly, female slaves.
Here we may distinguish between two concepts of slavery, that which can be 
imposed and constitutes an absolute and legal condition, and that which is 
instinctual and innate, which under certain conditions, can be manifested and 
released. The fullest slave, of course, is she who is a natural slave, and then 
beyond this, truly wears the collar, that slave who is a slave by nature and 
whose slavery, released, is then confirmed and fixed upon her openly, publicly, 
by all sanctions of custom and law, for all the world to see.
What we discovered, Master, all of us, in the dungeons and training rooms of the 
House of Andronicus, was that we were natural slaves. There our slavery had been 
by such devices as brands and collars, and whips and hoods, fully, for the first 
time, released in us and made manifest. Many of us were timid and thrilled to 
discover that we were natural slaves. At last there could be an end to the lies 
and pretenses. At last we could stop fighting ourselves and pretending to be 
what we were not. We now, though women of Earth, could admit to ourselves what 
we knew we were, categorically and absolutely legal slaves, lovely propertieis, 
which might be barted and sold, and who might figure in transactions which would 
be upheld in any court of law. This we found frightening, but absolutely 
thrilling. It so confirmed our slavery upon us! There was no escape for us! Even 
if we should pull at our chains, or cry or rebel, we would still be only 
troublsome slaves, who might then be disciplined and brought swiftly into line. 
any person on the street, seeing us, would know what w were. Even children would 
know us as mere slaves, for categorically and legally that is what we would be. 
Owned animals, that is what we would be! You are a man, Master, so perhaps you 
cannot understand or fully understand, how exciting it is for a woman to be 
owned, to find herself a slave. But I am a slave, and a natural slave, and a 
legal slave. I am fearful. But I am joyful!
Angrily I rose from the couch. I seized up the whip. I thrust it into her mouth. 
I kiss your whip, joyfully, Master. she whispered. I looked down at her 
enraged. Beverly Henderson had kissed the whip.
end of page 212
Master? she asked, frightened. She was very beautiful bound before me on her 
knees. I returned to the couch and sat down upon it. I again regarded her.
She smiled uncertainnly. I have kissed Masters whip, she said. Does he not 
know wish to use me? Does he not know wish to try out an Earth girl? I did not 
respond.
Surely I have told Master enough now about girls of Earth, she said. Is his 
curiosity not now satisfied? Does he not understand us now to be natural 
slaves, the rightful propertieis of men asuch as he? I did not respond.
After that night, she said. we were divided into smaller lots and distributed 
through various markets. I think they did not wish for some reason to sell to 
many Earth girls in a given market. I found my sale indescribably thrilling. I 
was exhibited naked. I was forced to perform lasciviously on the block as a 
female slave. Even my slave reflexes were exhibited to the crown. I was 
auctioned. I was sold to the highest bidder. I have had various Master and 
various names. Eventually I came into the possession of the holding of 
Policrates, wherein you find me. There is little more to tell.
I did not respond. Here I am called Beverly, she smiled. It was my name 
originally, on Earth, as you may recall I mentioned earlier. Now of course I 
wear it only as a slave name, by the whim of Masters. Still it pleased me. I 
think it is an excellent slave name. I too thought so, looking upon her.
You understand of course Master, she said, that I would not have spoken to a 
man of Earth, those pathetic and ineffectural fools, with the intimacy, the 
frankness and honesty with which I have addressed youl a man of Gor. I said 
nothing. What miserable weaklings they are, she said. I said nothing.
Suddenly she leaned forward. She strained against the loops of yellow which 
confined her wrists behind her body. Her knees moved on the furs, among the 
chains.
end of page 213
I saw the steel at her throat. The slut in me desires to serve a Master, she 
whispered, suddenly, intensly. Please Master!
I rose to my feet and looked down at her. I am the slave of a man such as you! 
she said. I thenk suddenly, savagely, seized her by the upper arms. I dragged 
her to the center of the room. I lifed her high above me, bound, her dark hair, 
unbound, loose and wild about her. I then, slowly, lowered her, to where her 
toes could just touch the floor. Then suddenly, angrily, I shook her. Master! 
she cried out miserably. I then dragged her back before the couch where I stood 
her on her feet before me. She felt the furs beneath her feet, the chains. I 
regarded her in fury. I snapped my fingers. Immediately she knelt before me, 
bound, among the chains. She looked up, though she could see nothing in the 
confines of the blindfold. I looked down at her.
Beverly Henderson, a self-confessed slave, and the most desirable woman I had 
ever seen, was at my feet. She was naked and bound, mine!
I was filled then with emotions so powerful, so primitive and exultant, so 
ancient, so overwhelming, so mighty and glorious, that I knew then I had caught 
the scent of the meaning of man and of woman. Could I again deny my blood? Could 
I again repudiate the heritage of my manhood? How could it be? The meat of the 
mammoth roasted then again upon the greenwood spit. Once again, after an interim 
of ten thousand years, sparks were struck from blue flint as heavy, hairy hands 
shaped the head of a spear. Once more were heard the love whimpers of the 
thonged female who had been displeasing, begging to be released that she might 
lick the thighs of her Master.
I looked down at her. I knew then that I had always wanted Beverly Henderson as 
my slave. From the first instant I had seen her I had wanted her as my slave.
Master, she whimpered, Master!
Then I stood before her with my fists clenched and threw back my head and wanted 
to howl with misery. Surely she must be a free woman! She must be free! She was 
from Earth! But could everything that my blood and my instincts and impulses 
told me be wrong? But it must be, else a civilization structured upon and 
predicated upon, pathologies must disintegrate and perish. But could there be a 
civilization congenial to the truths of the blood, to the nature of human 
beings.
end of page 214
Is man so foolish, so naive and habit-bound, so fundamentaly irrational, so 
ready to believe anything that he might be taught, no matter how absurb, that he 
cannot understand that torture cannot be truth. The test for truth, surely must 
not be pain, misery and frustration, but happiness and joy.
Master, she whimpered. But surely she must be free! But what if she were a 
true slave, as she had indicated? But she could not be a true slave. She was 
from Earth!
But what if, even though she were from Earth, she were a true slave, as in 
accord with her own avowals? could such a thing, she from Earth, be possible, 
even thinkable? I scarcely dared even consider this possibility, for then she, a 
slave, could be mine!
I determined, cruelly, to make a test of the matter. I untied her hands. I 
waited then for her to shrink back in terror, to, feeling her way, try to 
retreat to the far wall, perhaps cowering there, at my mercy. But her head was 
at my feet. I felt her lips kissing my feet. Beverly Henderson was at my feet! 
Forgive me Master, she said, if I have displeased you. She was then holding 
my legs, putting her cheek against them and kissing them. Forgive you slave, 
she said, and let your slave please you.
I then seized her by the arms and jerked her to her feet. She was startled. 
Savagely I jerked her small hands behind her back and, with the yellow cord, 
tied them there, tightly. Master? she asked, frightened. I snapped my fingers. 
She knelt. I snapped my fingers again. She stood. I then threw her, bodily, onto 
the deep furs on the surface of the couch. She lay there on her side. I picked 
up the whip and shook out its coils. She heard the sound and moaned. I 
approached her. She was tense and frightened. She in the darkness of the 
blindfold could see nothing. She shuddered in fear as I touched the whip lightly 
to her body, moving it upon her right calf. She gasped. Then I moved the whip 
about on her body, slowly curiously, observing her responses. She was tense, and 
frightened. Please do not whip me Master, she said. I put the flat leather 
coils of the whip to her mouth. She lying on her side, fervently, frightened, 
kissed them again and again. Please do not whip me Master.
end of page 215
I put the whip on the couch to one side, where I might have it at hand, to lash 
her if she were not totally pleasing. I then had her, and as the bound slave she 
was.
She cried out, startled, taken with such force. I looked down at her, gripped in 
my arms. I dragged her from the couch and threw her then on the chains and furs 
at its foot. In my desire, my eagerness, and in my fury an joy, I had had the 
wench on the surface of the great couch itself. But she now lay bound at the 
foot of the couch, in the shadow of the slave ring, trembling, in a more fit 
place for a slave such as she. I then again took her. She was gasping and 
shuddering. It is sometimes months before a girl is permitted, commanded to 
ascend her Masters couch. Even then she commonly enters it not as a free 
person, directly, but as a slave, from the lower left, or bottom, after first 
kneeling and kissing its furs.
She cried out, shuddering in my arms, suddenly had again. Oh, Master, she 
sobbed, Master! My hands were again hard on her arms. I, kneeling then, pulled 
her to her knees. Then I shook her and threw her to her side on the furs and 
chains against the bottom of the couch. She was sobbing and gasping. She pulled 
against the cord loops on her wrists. There were marks from my hands on her 
arms. Please, Master, she sobbed. She rose, terrified to her knees and then to 
her feet trying to escape. She stumbled in the blindfold against the edge of the 
couch, crying out, bruising herself. She then stumbled from the couch, 
frightened, lost her footing and crying out, turning, fell into the tub. She 
tried to scramble, weeping, to her feet, but I was on her in an instant. I 
forced her to her knees in the water and then, holding her by the hair, not 
permitting her to leave her knees, I forced her head back until her dark hair, 
beneath where I had it knooted in my hand, was loose, floating in the water, and 
the bow of her exquisite slave beauty was well exposed to me. I regarded her for 
at ime, so hdle. Please, Master, she wept, be gentle with me. Angrily then, 
my hand still in her hair, I jerked her head forward and sill keeping her on her 
knees, crouching over her, I thrust her face beneath the water. I held it there 
for a time, and then pulled it up. Sputtering, half blinded by the water, 
gasping, she wept. Please, Master, forgive me! I did not mean to displease 
you.
I then flung her on her back in the water and she strubbling, gasping, trying to 
keep her head above water, again had her.
end of page 216
Then I thrust her up, half sitting, half lying, againt the edge of the tub. She 
turned her head toward me, gasping. The blindfold was sopped, but secure. Her 
hari and body were soaked and wt. The cord loops, soaked, were still tight on 
her small wrists. Her body, wet, was interesting to touch. Then I again had her. 
Master, she sobbed.
I rose to my feet and stepped from the tub. I walked slowly, shuddering, about 
the room. Then I was calm. I looked back at her. She was half lying, half 
kneeling, against the side of the but. I went to her and took her by the collar 
and pulled her to her feet and from the tub, and to the foot of the couch, where 
I put her to her knees. Crouching near her I toweled dry the steel loop on her 
throat. It, like her, belonged to Policrates. I then, gently, dried her hair, 
and wrapped a towel about it. Also, because I intended to put her in the ankle 
ring, I dried her left ankle. I did not dry her beyond those things, however, 
what was necessary to protect the collar and steel of Policrates. I then locked 
her left ankle in the ankle ring, thus fastening her, by a length of chain, to 
the foot of my couch. Had she been my own girl I probably would have dried her 
completely. It is pleasant, as one my well imagine, to towel ones slave.
Master, she wept, Master. I made her lie down there at the foot on the great 
couch. I then, satisfied, and fulfilled as I would not have believed possible, 
entered upon the great couch and lay wearily upon its furs. Master, she 
sobbed. I was soon asleep.
I dreamed that Beverly Henderson was chained naked at my slave ring. I awakened. 
I left the couch and walked about it, to its foot. Beverly Henderson was chained 
there, maked, at my slave ring. I kicked her softly, with the side of my foot. 
She was not asleep. She rose to her knees and put her head down, humbly.
It was near dawn. Gray light entered the room Her wrists were still tied behind 
her. I had not released them.
end of page 217
It must be near morning, Master, she said. She could not be certain. She wore 
the blindfold.
I took her by the upper arms and lifted her to her feet. The towel, in the night 
had come loose from her hair. I touched her hair. It was still damp. I lifted 
her in my arms, gently, and placed her on the furs of the couch. Thank you 
Master, she said, for permitting me the honor of your couch. I said nothing.
I gather it must be now be morning, she said, though I cannot know that. I 
gather too, that Master is now refreshed. I have been lifted and placed upon his 
couch. Doubtless I am not to please him, his slave. I said nothing.
Master well brutilized me last night,  she said. He taught me well that I am 
a slave. I shall endeavor to please him well. I said nothing. But how can I 
please him? she asked, I am bound. I did not of course respond to her.
Ah yes! she said. I am an Earth girl! Master is still curous about Earth 
girls! He wants to know if we know how to give pleasure to Masters. So saying, 
attentively and lasciviously, as a bound slave she addressed herself to my 
pleasure. She did well.
When she had finished and I had rested, I threw her to her stomach and unbound 
her hands. Swiftly then, and eagerly feeling for me she knelt beside me. I will 
show you know, Master, she said, what truly an Earth girl can do!
I lay there then and wondered if ever other men of Earth had experienced such 
pleasure, if ever they had had such pleasure from their females. Perhaps only, I 
thought, if their females, like Miss Henderson, were their slaves. It is thus, 
 whispered Miss Henderson to me, that we serve our Gorean Masters! I said 
nothing.
Do you often wonder, she laughed softly, holding me, quietly snuggling against 
me, why it is that we are sought in the slave markets, why it is that we bring 
high prices? Though I did not respond to her, her services had come as a 
revelation to me.
end of page 218
I had not even suspected that Earth women were capable of such marvels. 
Collared, and under discipline, what incredible treasures they were! They were 
joys, and priceless! Men, I knew, would kill to possess such women. Petty, 
arrogant, smug, cold, proud, inert, frustrated, the women of Earth trod the 
sands of their native world; the men of Earth, I thought, did not begin to 
suspect the gold into which such pain and dross could be transmitted; how long, 
I wondered, before such creatures were brought naked to their knees before 
Masters.
How I despise the men of Earth, said the girl to me. How I love my Gorean 
Master! I then began, for the first time to truly, attentively caress her.
You are going to make me yield, arent you? she gasped. I then continued, 
patiently, carefully, to touch her. She then began to tremble and sometimes 
tried to pull away from me, and at other times to press aainst me. I controlled 
her, sometimes letting her do as she wished and at other times not permitting 
it. She lay on her back, her lips parted. She began to maon, the whimpers of a 
collared slave girl. I felt her. She was hot and open, gasping, saturated with 
the lubricating oils of her readiness. I smiled to myself. The slut was a hot 
slave. I was pleased with Miss Henderson. Im yours Master, she whispered. 
Please have me, I then took her, and she cried out with the unmistakable, 
rapturous, submission of the surrendered slave girl. She then grasped me 
tightly, fearing that I would leave her. When she understood that I was content 
to hold her, she lay warmly in my arms, somtimes kissing me. You have conquered 
me, Master she said, as you have doubless conquered man other girls before 
me. I said nothing.  I am owned, she said. That pleases me.
I began to kiss her about the neck and throat. She put her head back, laughing. 
I am an Earth girl, she said. Do you like us? I continued to kiss her. Are 
we not juicy puddings she laughed. Is it not clear now why men will buy us? 
She clutched me to her and kissed me. Would you not like to buy one of us? she 
said. I held her from me.
end of page 219
Buy me Master, she said suddenly, Buy me!
I did not let her touch me, though she strained toward me, the pretty slut, the 
clever slut, to press her eauty, piteously, entreatingly against me. I have 
never been in the arms of a man such as you, she said. I love you! I want to 
be your slave. I did not speak. Put me beneath your whip, she said. Put me 
in your chains. Lock your collar upon my throat! Own me! I did not permit her 
to touch me.
Then she laughed, a tear running from beneath the blindfold. How brazen we 
Earth girls are, she laughed, how shamelss, that we would be to be purchased! 
How you must despise us, such lowly, desperate slaves!
I then entered Miss Henderson and she gasped, clutching me. I smiled. It was not 
unusual for a slave girl, fervently, to desire to be purchased by a given man, 
one before whom she knws she could kneel as a suberb slave. In such a case it is 
natural for her to present herself as piteously and excitingly before him as 
possible, in order that his interest might be aroused. She, obviously, has 
nothing to say about her purchase. The choice is his, fully. It is he who is the 
buyer. This sort of thing is not unusualy in slave markets, particularly on open 
platforms. I have seen, many times, a girl attempting to interest a given man, 
singled out, in the crowd in buying her. And, not unoften, such a fellow will 
bid upon her, knowing well the wonders which she, purchased from her owner, is 
offering him. Still in the end, it is his which is the choice. She can do no 
more than present herself, displaying her owners merchandise as attractively as 
she can. It is he who will buy or not. He is the Master.
I love my Gorean Master, breathed the girl, Buy Beverlyk please! I have also 
seen girls attempt to influence their sales in public auctions, while being 
exhibited naked on the block, trying to present themselves particularly to a 
given man, but this disposition is usually curbed by the auctioneers whip. She 
is not there to be sold to the man of her choice but to the highest bidder.
end of page 220
Indeed, in most public auctions, such actions on the part of the girl are for 
most practical purposes impossible. Such auctions are usually held at night, 
when men are off work and can come to the biddings, under torches. The block 
tends to be illuminated and the house is much in darkness. The girl, naked, in 
the light exhibited, can be well seen but she herself can see few of the buyers. 
She is intensely aware, of course, of their presence, in the crowds, in the 
tiers. Their sounds, their cries, their breathing, their movements, the sweat, 
the smells, their interest are clearly evident to her, almost engulfing her on 
the block, almost like possessive hands upon her body. She can then influcne her 
sale, guided by the auctioneers whip only in such a way as to present herself 
as the most luscious slave meat she can, hoping thereby to improve her price, 
that she may be purchased by a more well-to-do Master. Yet most girls are sold 
for prices in similar ranges and there are few men who can not, by spending an 
extra coin or two, secure the slave of their choice. Often when the hand of the 
auctioneer has been closed, a girl will not know to whom she has been sold. She 
may not have seen the bidder, or she may have been purchased through an agent. 
Sometimes it is a day or more before she learns to what chain she has been sold. 
In this time she does not know if she has been purchased by the man of her 
dreams, who will control her well, or by some harsh, cruel brute, before whom 
she must kneel in terror. To be sure, she will soon learn.
Buy me Master, begged Beverly. I then made her respond to me, and she began to 
moan. I want to be bought, she moaned.
To beg to be purchased is a slaves act. That is a saying of Goreans. I think it 
is true. In this, then, Miss Henderson provided further confirmation of the 
rightness of the collar upon her throat, that she was a natural and true slave.
If I yield well to you, Master, wheedled Miss Henderson, will you buy me? I 
then, savagely, struck her face, back and forth, with the palms of my hand, and 
then its back. Forgive me, Master, she cried, I did not mean to bargain! I 
will yield to you fully, and perfectly, at your least command! Do not kill me 
Master, please!
end of page 221
There was blood on my hand and at her mouth. Her lip was swollen. I kissed her 
upon the swollen lip, and she whimpered. I tasted her blood.
Please do not kill me, Master, she begged. I then took her. When I finished 
with her, I rose up from the couch. She lay there, frightened.
I did not mean to displease my Gorean Master, she said. I did not think. Take 
pity on me. I am only a slave. I pulled her from the couch to her knees at the 
slave ring. Permit me to please you Master, she begged.
I permitted her to perform intimate services for me. I then buckled the thick 
leather slave cuffs on her wrist. Master? she asked. I then thrust her right 
wrists through the slave ring and with the heavy metal snaps, sewn into the 
cuffs, secured her there.
She heard the strands of the whip shaken out. Please do not whip me Master, 
she begged. Then she put down her head. Then I lashed her, for she had been 
displeasing. I cast aside the hip and drew on my tunic and gathered together my 
things.
At the door I turned to look back at the sobbing girl. She turned her head 
toward me, it still secured in the blindfold. She knelt naked at the ringk 
fastened to it by the cuffs and too by the ankle ring, still locked upon her 
left ankle. She wore her collar.
I love you Master, she said, It is to such a man as you that I wish to 
belong. I put down my things at the door. I went back to her. I pulled her out 
from the ring, half on her back, her hands above and behind her, twisted and 
helpless in the slave cuffs, held at the ring. Forgive me, if I was displeasing 
to you, Master, she begged. I looked at her.
I love you my Gorean Master, she said. I then, again, took her. Spasmodically 
she shook and yielded, as I would not have thought it possible for a woman to 
do. She sobbed and shuddred in ecstasy, a had slave. I submit to you, Master, 
she wept, totally and completely. You are my Master. I am your slave.
end of page 222
I withdrew from her and stood and looked down upon her. Do not leave me, 
Master, she begged. Take me with you. You have made me yours, my Gorean 
Master. I am yours. Take me with you. Policrates, my Master, would give me to 
you, if you should but ask!
I picked up my things at the door. I slung them about me. I donned my mask. 
There was a knock on the door, and I opened it. A pirate stood there, he who had 
brought Beveraly to me last night, who had now come to fetch me to breakfast. I 
must soon leave the holding of Policrates, theoretically to journey downriver to 
the holding of Ragnar Voskjard, that his fleet might be soon launched, that the 
two fleets, in fierce force, might overwhelm the garrisons of Ars Station, and 
then of Port Cos, that the river, for hundreds of pasangs, would then become 
theirs, subject to their predations or levied tributes as they saw fit.
I nodded to the pirate, indicating my readiness to accompany him. He looked 
beyond me, to the slave ring. The girl now knelt there cuffed to the ring. He 
seemed startled. Is it Beverly? he asked. The girl, suddenly, shrank back 
against the stone of the couch, a slaves movement. Curious, the pirate brushed 
past me, going to the girl. He crouched down beside her. It is Beverly, he 
said. She trembled. He put forth his hand, touching her at the shoulder. She 
shuddered beneath his touch putting her head down. 
What have you done to her? he asked grinning. Last night she was an enslaved 
female. This morning she is a female slave. He put forth his hand and held her, 
with one hand, his fingers about her chin and throat. She shuddered. I would 
say, he grinned, that she is now more truly aware of her condition, that you 
hae much improved her. He did not remove his hand from her throat and chin. 
Were you much improved last night, Beverly? he asked.
Yes Master, she said. Policrates, he said, told me that if you were 
troublsome you were to be fed to sleen. She shuddered. But I see that you were 
not troublesome, he said. No, Master, she said.
He removed his hand from her throat and chin, and continued to regard her.
end of page 223
She knelt, soft and helpless, trembling, held in the leather cuffs at the slave 
ring. I see that you are much different this morning, from last night, he 
said. Yes Master, she said.
He then, with his hand, touched her left calf, running his fingers lightly over 
it. She whimpered and drew back. Interesting, he said. Her response had been 
that of a helpless superb slave. What was done to you last night, he asked. I 
was Mastered, she said. It is obvious, he said and rose to his feet. He 
turned to face me and grinned. He jerked his thumb back toward the kneeling 
slave. Policrates will be pleased, he said. I shrugged. When a girl has been 
Mastered, of course, she is more fit for any man.
Miss Henderson, in the blindfold, on her knees at the ring turned to face us as 
she could. We looked back on upon her. It was a superb slave who kenlt there. 
Miss Henderson in the night I saw, had been brought to a new dimension in her 
slavery. The priate laughed. The girl shrank back against the sonte of the 
couch. The snaps on the cuffs rubbed against the slave ring. The priate then 
walked lsowly towards her. She cowered back, fearing to be struck. He stopped 
standing before her.
She lifted her had to him but was of course unable to see him, prevented with 
perfection from doing so by the efficiency of the Gorean blindfold. She squirmd 
in the cuffs, unable to see, in a slaves fear. The pirate stood looking at her, 
his hands on his hips. Every inch of her was beautiful and enslaved. She would 
not be a dream of pleasure for any man.
Who owns you, he asked. Policrates, she said. And more generally, he said, 
who owns you? Men, she said.
The pirate turned about and rejoined me byt he door. He then went through the 
door, and I was to follow him.
end of page 224
I did turn about once to look again upon the girl. Master! she cried out to 
me, piteously, in the darkness of the blindfold, stretching her small cuffed 
hands, as she could, entreatingly toward me. Master, Master!
Then I want through the door and closed it behind me. Master! I heard her cry. 
Master! Then I had left her behind me, merely a girl fastened as the foot of a 
couch, only a slave who had served one of her Masters guests.
end of page 225
25    In the Tavern of Tasdron Men Meet in Secret
Withdraw, slave, said Tasdron, proprietor of the tavern of Tasdron in 
Victoris, off hte avenue of Lycurgus. Yes Master, said Peggy, bowing her head, 
deferentially, and backing gracefully from the table as a slave. She was 
barefoot and wore a brief snatch of diaphanous yellow pleasure silk. Her long 
blond hair was tied back with a yellow ribbon. The close-fitting steel collar 
was lovely on her throat. The rustle of slave bells locked on her left ankle was 
subtle and sensual. She withdrew to the far side of the room and knelt there, 
back on her heels, knees wide, as befitted the sort of slave she was, a mere 
pleasure slave.
Callimachus, sitting across from me, regarded her. She put her head down, unable 
to meet the eyes of such a man. I saw that she trembled under his gaze. I smiled 
to myself. I had seen how she had looked upon him in her serving and when she 
had knelt near the table. Her eys had been soft and moist and tender and 
vulnerable and helpless. I had sensed how she had restrained herself from 
lowering herself softly to her belly on the floor before him and extending her 
hand to him, begging his touch, and that he would make her his. But she did not 
wish to be slain for such insolence, she only a lowly Earth-girl slave. I had 
seen the look in her eyes. In her eyes had been the light of a helpless slave 
girls love. I recalled that once she had told me that there was only one man of 
all Gor to whom she would rather belong than myself, and that he did not even 
know, or scarcely knew, of her existence.
end of page 226
I had not pressed her to reveal his name. But now, I had no doubt I had 
penetrated her secret. In her head the imbonded Earth girl wa sthe secret love 
slave of Callimachus, a warrior once of Port Cos. But she dared not make her 
feelings known to him. She did not wish to be slain. Accordingly she could be to 
him little more than any other slave, only another girl, self-effacing, 
deferential, scarcely noticed, who served him in the establishment of her 
Master, Tasdron of Victoria. In spite of her beauty and his frequent use of the 
tavern of Tasdron, he had never ordered her, whip in hand, to strip and hurry to 
an alcove for his pleasure. In the misery of his dereliction and afflicted by 
the devitalizing consquences attendant upon it, he had preferred the indulgences 
of self-pity and the delusory solaces of paga to the exultant and proud 
imposition of his will, as a dominant male, on the hearts and bodies of writhing 
female slaves. Then when he had recalled himself to the codes of his caste, he 
had resolved to forgo the victories and the rights, and the triumps of the 
Mastership until certain serious, projected works had been accomplished. It was 
in connection with such works that we had met this night in the tavern of 
Tasdron.
You understand, said Tasdron, that is it dangerous for me even to be a party 
to these matters. Callimachus looked away from the girl, kneeling, head down, 
by the far wall. She was only a slave.
If men such as Kliomenes or Policrates should understand that we are met on 
such subjects, my tavern, at the least would be speeedily reduced to ashes. 
That is understood, Tasdron, said Callimachus,We are sensitive to the danger 
that there is in this for you.
But there is surely, said Tasdron, much greated dnger for you. We will 
accept that risk, said Callimachus. I, too, then,  said Tasdron, will do no 
less. Good, said Callimachus.
We spoke softly. We sat about a small table in a back room in Tasdrons tavern. 
Callimachus had kept the reputation of his dereliction a secret from those in 
Victoria. When he went about in public it seemed his shoulders were bent, his 
eyes bleared, his step uncertain, his hand unsure.
end of page 227
It was only at times like now, with trusted men, that he sat and carried himself 
and spoke as a warrior. Victoria knew him still as only a fallen man, one 
defeated, one lax in his caste codes, one inert and whining in traps of his own 
weaving. They knew him still as we had decided fit for our plans, as only a sot 
and a drunkard. They needed not know that he who had fallen had now risen; that 
once more the codes were kept with pride; that the codes with which he had once, 
with such pain and skill, bound himself, he had now sundered and torn from him, 
like an enraged larl, emerging fiercely from a net now too frail to hold him 
longer. He had recalled that he was Callimachus of the Warriors, one entrusted 
with steel, one entitled to wear the scarlet of the pround caste. I did not 
think it likely that he would forget these things again.
I have spoken to Gloyco, Merchant of Port Cos, said Callimachus. He will 
fetch Callisthenes, who is captain of the forces of Port Cos in Victoria, he in 
search of the topaz. He will come to this place at the twentieth Ahn. He must 
come in disguise, said Tasdron. Spies are everywhere. That will be made 
clear to him by Glyco, said Callimachus.
I observed Peggy, the long-haired, long-legged, blond Earth-girl slave, kneeling 
head down by the far wall. Her shoulders shook with a sob. She was so near to 
him whom she so vulnerable and desperately loved and yet, as a slave, must 
remain helplessly silent.
Have you made inquiries amount those of Victoria? asked Callimachus of 
Tasdron. Is there support for our work in the town? I have with 
circumspection made these inquiries, said Tasdron, dourly, but I fear there is 
little support in this place for such dangerous labors. We can expet no aid, 
then, from Victoira? said Callimachus. None, said Tasdron.
I continued to watch the girl, her head down, at the far wall. She, a female and 
a slave, had been banished to that place, that she not be privy to the discourse 
of men and masters. Yet she was close enough to be promply summonded to serve 
instantly if aught might be required of her.
end of page 228
Her shoulders shook with sobs. I looked away from her. She was only a slave, and 
slaves are nothing.
We must arrange that Aemilianus, Captain of the forces of Ars Station, also 
attend this meeting tonight, said Callimachus. Surely it has not escaped your 
attention, smiled Tasdron, that Cos and Ar are currently at war? No, said 
Callimachus. Yet I think the common interest on the river of Ars Station and 
Port Cos, and indded of Cos and Ar themselves, should persuade them to regard 
our plan with care.
Those of Port Cos and Ars Station would sooner beat one anothers throats then 
share wine in Victoira, said Tasdron.
The problems of Port Cos are not idential to those of Cos, said Callimachus, 
nor are those of Ars Statioon identical with those of Ar. Ars Station is in 
effect an outpost of Ar, said Tasdron. It is unlike Port Cost, which is a 
colony, and whose ties with Cos are largely historical and cultural.
Yet guardsmen of these two places have been for weeks in Victoria and have made 
no effort to seek one another out. Indeed, said Tasdron thoughtfully,they 
had studiously avoided one another.
The location of their diverse headquarters are surely known, one to the other, 
said Callimachus. That is true, said Tasdron.
Does it not then seem that they have other things on their mind more important 
than the indisputable difference which separate them. Perhaps, said Tasdron.
I suggest, said Callimachus, that the security of the river is of greater 
concern to them both than the distant wars of their allies. That may be true, 
said Tasdron, but surely it is nothing they could admit openly. What could 
admit it more openly then their common presence in Victoria, without strife? 
asked Callimachus.
end of page 229
Aemillianus will never confer with us should he learn that Callisthenes is to 
be party to our proceedings, nor will Callisthenes permit himelf to attend a 
meeting at which he knows that one of Ars Station is to be present. Each need 
not now in advance of the projected attendance of the other,  said Callimachus.
And what will you do when they learn of this matter asked Tasdron. Attempt to 
prevent bloodshed, said Callimachus. I trust that you will be successful, 
said Tasdron, glumly. If either Aemilianus or Callisthenes should be felled in 
my tavern, I thik the incident would be unlikely to escapt the attention of 
their allied guardsmen.
To be sure, smiled Callimachus, theri vengance would doubless be merciless 
and prompt. Tasdron shuddered. Gorean men, in certain matters, tend not to be 
patient.
Glyco, to whom I have spoken, being a merchant of Port Cos, can meet openly 
with Callisthenes without arousing suspicion. There will be no difficulty thus 
in bringing Callisthenes to our meetl The matter, however, will be otherwise 
with Aemilianus. It is unlikely that he can be subtly contacted. Here there is 
danger. He like Callisthenes is doubtless under surveillance by spies of 
pirates.
I am hungry, I said. Peggy, said Tasdron, raising his voice. Swiftly the 
girl leaped to her feet and with a sound of slave bells, hurried to the table 
beside which she knelt. Yes, Master, she said. Bring me bread and meat, I 
said to her. Me, took said Callimachus, seeming to llok through her, without 
really seeing her. She was only a girl who was owned and must obey. Yes, 
Master, she said. Her lip trembled. Me, too, said Tasdron, and too bring 
forth some cheese and dates. Yes Master, she said, Do Masters desire drink?
Tasdron looked at Callimachus. Water, said Callimachus. Black wine,  I said. 
I thought it best to keep my head clear until the conclusion of our evenings 
business. Black wine,  said Tasdron. Yes, Master, said the girl and hurried 
away.
end of page 230
It is jut as well not to have paga this night, said Tasdron. I think so, 
smiles Callimachus. Do you fear it? asked Tasdron. Of course, said 
Callimachus. I am not a fool. I would have thought you feared nothing, said 
Tasdron. Onl a fool fears nothing, said Callimachus.
What do you know of Callisthenes? I asked Callimachus. He is a captain, a 
guardsman of Port Cos, said Callimachus. He is skilled with the sword. He is 
shrewd, I regard him as a good officer. It ws he, was it now, I asked, who 
acceded to your command in Port Cos, following your being relieved of our 
duties? It was, smiled Callimachus, but I assure you I shall not hold that 
against him, nor will it interfere with my capacity to work closely with him. 
If he chooses to work with you, I said. Of course, shrugged Callimachus. Do 
you think he will remember you? I asked. I would think so, said Callimachus, 
ruefully.
It was evidence brought against Callisthenes in Port Cos five years ago by 
Callimachus, said Tasdron, which cost him an early promotion, a matter of 
minor peculation. Such things are not unknown, said Callimachus, but I chose 
not to accept them in my command. I understand, I said. I had a respect for 
caste honor. Honor was honor, in small things as well as great. Indeed, how can 
one practice honor in great things if not in small things?
And later, said Tasdron, it was the testimonies of Callisthenes which 
resulted in Callimachus loss of command. He did his duty, as I had done mine, 
earlier, said Callimachus. I cannot as a aoldier hold that against him. My 
only regret is that I had not resigned my command. In that way I might have 
precluded the disgrace of the hearing, the admonishment of my fellow officers, 
the embarassment of being publicly relieved of my duties.
Be that as it may, said Tasdron, they surely do not bode well for the future 
of our plans. It cannot be helped, said Callimachus. If you wish I shall 
withdraw from participation in these matters.
end of page 231
Nonsense, said Trasdron, You are well remembered, and with affection in Port 
Cos. I know this from Blyco Why else do you think he sought you in Victoria? 
What do you know of Aemilianus of Ars Statio? I asked Callimachus and 
Tasdron. Victoria is closer to Port Cos than Ars Station, said Tasdron. 
Indeed, Ar is substantially a land power. We know little of men such as 
Aemilianus. I have heard that he is a good officer. I know nothing of him, 
said Callimachus, his voice slightly hardening, save that he is from Ar.
Your Cosian sympathies are showing, I cautioned him. Nothing will be much 
advanced if you and this fellow find it necessary to slice one another into 
pieced. Particularly in my tavern, grumbled Tasdron.
The immediate problem remains, said Callimachus. How can we contact this 
Aemilianus and bring him to this meeting without attracting the attention of the 
spies of Policrates? We have no choice, I think, said Tasdron, but to 
contact him directly and take what risks are unavoidable. Even, so, said 
Callimachus, do you thank that he, a warrior of Ar, a captain, will simply 
disguise himself and hurry off to a rendezvous in Victoria? He is surely aware 
that many in Victoria bear those of Ar little love. He will be suspicious.
He will doubtless demand that the meeting be held in his headquarters, said 
Tasdron. Then all we hve to do, said Callimachus, bitterly, is to convince 
Callisthenes to put himself in the power of the men of Ars station. He may be 
bolder than we think, I said. I do not undestand, said Tasdron. I have a 
plan, I said. What? said Tastron.
Do you have the common keys to the collars and bells of your girls on the 
premises? I asked. Surely, said Tasdron.
end of page 232
I then drew from my pouch a piece of silk. It was heavy, from what it was 
wwrapped about. I placed it carefully on the table. I think the matter will not 
be as difficult was you might suspect, I said.
I understand, said Tasdron. He eyed the silk-wrapped object which I had placed 
on the table. He had detected the telltale sound.
Master, said Peggy, approaching the table, kneeling beside it, bearing a tray. 
She placed the tray on the table and removed three plates of bread and meat from 
it, a dish of assorted cheeses, a bowl of dates, a pitcher of water, a pot of 
block wine, steaming, and tiny vessels of sugars and creams, and three goblets. 
On the table too, she placed small spoons of silver from Tharna for use with the 
black wine, and at each place, a kailiauk-horn-handled eating prong from distant 
Tura. Finger towels then and a silver fingerbowl too, she placed on the table. 
The bowl was also of Tharnan silver. When she had placed thses things on the 
table, she looked about still kneeling, and saw me close the door to the room, 
locking her within with us. She suddenly trembled. She knew that she was a slave 
and that absolutely anything could be done with her.
Leave the tray where it is, said Trasdone. Remove your silks, and remain 
kneeling. Yes, Master, she said, swiftly slipping the silk back from her 
shoulders. I smiled to myself. Peggy had obeyed immediately and unhesitantly. 
Gorean slave girls do not daily in their compliance.
I unwrapped then the object from the silk on the table. There was the sound of 
the metal clapper in the narrow, flatish, triangular-shaped bell, the rustle of 
the chain and lock, the sound of the small, metal, sturdy, rectangular, locked 
coin box. I dangled the chain, the girl bell and the coin box before her eyes. 
Do you know what this is? I asked her. Yes, Master, she whispered 
frightened.
Excellent, said Tasdronk excellent, and he rose from the table letting 
himself out of the room with a key, by means of a side door, one which led up a 
flight of stairs, presumably to private compartments.
end of page 233
He locked the door behind him. He would return shortly with the keys to her 
bells and collar.
Stand, Slave, I said. Peggy stood beautifully.
Tasdron crouched beside her left ankle and with his key removed the slave bells 
from her left ankle. Such bells are seldom put on by the slave or removed by the 
slave. Almost always they are put on or removed by one who is in authority over 
the slave. The girl seldom puts them on or removed them; rather it is hers to 
wear them, and as a slave, for as long or briefly as masters see fit.
I then, not hurrying, lifted the heavy chain with its bell and box about the 
girls neck. I stood behind her. I then, not yet dropping the chain about her 
neck, but holding it about her neck, closed the lock. She shuddered. It was on 
her, though she could not yet feel its weight as I had not yet released it, that 
it might fall against the back of her neck. Tasdron then, with a key, removed 
his collar from her throat. I then dropped the chain about her neck. The heavy 
block links were obdurate against the small soft hairs on the back of her 
slender lovely neck. I then threw her hair back again, in place. I then walked 
about her and before her. She who had once been peggy Baxter of Earth then stood 
before me in the apparatus of a Gorean coin girl.
An excellent idea, sid Tasdron. Now whe will attract only the attention 
natural to a coin girl in the streets. Some may recognize her, of course, I 
said. I do not think many will, said Tasdron, and if some do, they will 
simply assume that she has been put into the streets for discipline.
That too was my conjecture, I said. though the Gorean coin girl is commonly 
one of several girls, one of a stable there so to speak, sent daily into the 
streets to earn money as the chattels they are for their master, under the 
penalty of whippings or tortures, or death, if their days work does not prove 
sufficiently lucrative, it is not unknown for this sensual charge to be also 
placed upon a private girl, usually as a punishment for having failed in some 
way, often trivial or negligible, to be fully pleasing.
end of page 234
After having been sent into the humiliations and dangers of the streets, it is a 
rare girl who does not hurry back, eager and chastened, to the intimate joys of 
a private slavery.
Do you know what you are to do? I asked the girl. Yes, Master, she said, 
You have explained the matter fully to me. Do not fail slave girl, I said to 
her menacingly. I shall do my best, Master, she whispered. It may work, said 
Tastron, regarding the slave. He looked to Callimachus. What do you think?
It amy quiet possibly work, said Callimachus. We shall hope so. She is 
pretty, isnt she? said Tasdron, What do you think of her?
Peggy straightened her body, scarcely daring to breathe. She was beautiful.
She is not totally displeasing, said Callimachus.
Tasdron then took the girl by an arm and thrust her toward a rear door, before 
which he stopped, the girl then standing beside him, to unlock it. The girl 
turned to face us, But am I not to be given even a Ta-Teera to wear? she 
asked. You will be more alluring, more fetching, without it, I told her. Yes 
Master, she said, half choking.
Tasdron then had the door open, and he took her by the arm. But in the 
streets, she said, seen as I am, what if others should wish to use me? You 
are inthe guise of a coin girl, I told her. But what should i do? she asked. 
See that you serve them well, I said. Yes, Master, she whispered, and then 
Tasdron, by her arm, half dragging her, pulled her through the door and down the 
corridor toward the alley door. The sound of the bell on her neck was exciting. 
Then the door unbolted and opened, she was thrust into the darkness of the 
alley. She looked at us once and then turned about and sped away, the bell on 
her neck, on our business. Tasdron closed the door and resecured it.
Do you think she will be successful? asked Callimachus of Tasdron, when he had 
returned to the room.
end of page 235
She is a slave, said Tasdron. It will be in her best interest to be so.
Let us eat, I said, I am hungry. I too, said Callimachus. I too, said 
Tasdron.
end of page 236
26    Florence; Miles of Vonda
Florence! I said. Master! she said, pleased.
It is you? I laughed. Yes, she said. How wonderful to see you, I said. 
Doubtless it is wonderful for a man to see me as I am now, she laughed.
It was the 18th Ahn, two Ahn before the 20th Ahn, the Gorean midnight, when we 
would hold our secret meeting inthe back room of Tasdrons tavern. I had 
finished my supper in the room and had, leaving Callimachus and Tasdron in 
conversation emerged through the now-opened door into the main room of the 
tavern. I intended to walk until the 20th Ahn.
I see that you are well secured, I said. My Master has seen to it, she said. 
In Tasdrons paga tavern, as in many, along one well there is a set of slave 
rings to which one may chain or tie orns slaves while drinking or dining in the 
tavern. This is a convenience for the customers.
How beautiful you are, I said. I crouched down beside her. Thank you Master, 
she said. I see that slavery agrees with you, I said. Yes Master, she said 
softly.
end of page 237
I turned her face toward me, gently, with my hand. What an incredible 
transformation has come ovr you. I said. It is only that you are not used to 
seeing me in the tunic and collar of a slave, she said. No, I said, it is 
far beyond such things. I loered my hand. Yes Master, she smiled.
I examined her with attention as a man does an enslaved woman, as she put her 
head down shyly. She wore a brief slave tunic of gray rep-cloth. It was demure 
as such garments go, but it left little doubt as to her charms. I saw that her 
master was proud of his slaves beauty. She knelt with her back to the wall and 
slave ring, her knees wide. Her hands were braceleted about and behind her head, 
the tinkling chain on the bracelets passing behind the slave ring. She also wore 
an ankle ring with a chain which looped up to the same slave ring, and was 
locked about it. The soft, rounded flesh of her forearms, below the steel,and 
the sweet swelling flesh of her palms above the steel were lovely. I examined 
the lineaments of her body, the beauty of her breasts held high, as she was 
braceleted, the latitudes of her belly, the flare of her hips, the sweetness of 
her knees and thighs, the lovely curve of her salves, her ankles, the left 
clapsed in steel and her small feet. She was barefoot of course as slaves are 
commonly kept.
You are astonishingly beautiful, Florence, I said. Thank you Master, she 
said. You are doubly chained, I said. Yes Master, she said.
This type of chaining, a double chaining, is usually done only by a man who is 
in a strange city and does not know fully what to expect. If one is familiar 
with the city, a single chaining is usually regarded as sufficient. Indeed, 
sometimes the girl is merely told to grasp the ring and to remain there until 
the Master returns. She may not release the ring until given permission by a 
free person. Some girls have been raped at such rings, as helplessly as though 
they might have been chained to them, so great is the fear of their Master, and 
so strict is the Gorean discipline to which they know themselves subject.
end of page 238
Are you always, in a tavern, chained in this fashion? I asked. Yes, Master 
she said. It would be very hard to steal you, I smiled. Yes Master, said 
smiled. Your Master must find you very precious, I said. I am only a slave, 
she said putting her head down smiling. You have become very beautiful, I 
said. Thank you Master, she said.
Who is your Master? I asked. Miles of Vonda, she said. I thought he might 
be, I said. He purchsed me at a secret auction. she said, held in the camp 
of Tenalion the Slaver. What did he bid? I asked. A hundred pieces of gold, 
she said smiling, not lifting her head.
Vain little she-sleen, I laughed. It is true, she smiled. Marvelous, I 
said, I myself received only ten silver tarsks for you when I told you to 
Tenalion. The gold was doubtless much more than I was worth, she said. Not 
to Miles of Vonda, I smiled. No she said smiling. Are you happy? I asked. 
She lifted her head happily, Oh yes, she said, yes, yes! I am so happy, 
Master!
Wonderful, I said. He stripped me and put me under his whip and taught me 
instantly that I was his slave, his total slave.
I am very happy for you, I said. I have never dreamed, when I was free, that 
he could be such a man. Had I even suspected it, I would have torn away my 
clothes and thrown myself to his feet, beggin ghis collar. Had you been free, 
I said, he could not have been such a man. That is true, she said. Had I 
been free he could not have handled me and treated me as he wished, and as I 
wished, as his lovely beast to be ravished and trained and taught her duties.
end of page 239
I nodded,. Enmeshed in legalities, negativities and socialized expectations, it 
was difficult to relate as biological human beings. But the slave girl, standing 
outside the protections of such devices, stands before her master as an exposed, 
raw human female, without rights, his to do with as he pleases. Similarly the 
master, owing the slave nothing, and knowing that she is completely his, his 
very property, may relate to her freely in the order of nature. In his treatment 
of her, he is untrammeled by either conscience or law, and this she knows, and 
loves, and accordingly hastens to obey and be pleasing. She knows that she is 
owned, and that he is her unqualified maaster. The order of nature and the 
obdurate and thematic equations of dominance and submission, denided through 
they might be, and even if hysterically repudiated, will continue to lurk in the 
microstructures of every cell in the human body. The master/slave relationship 
is the institutionalization of dominance and submission. It is, under the 
enhancements of civilization, the institutionalization of the primitive 
biological relationship of the human male and female, he the master, she the 
slave. How lonely is the woman who has not yet found her master.
I am pleased that you are so happy, I said. But he is strict with me, she 
said. I must obey him in all things. Of course, I said.
I fear only that he will tire of me or sell me, she said. I try so hard to 
please him. You do not wish to be whipped, I said. I love him, she said. I 
love Miles of Vonda! With the love of a free companion? I asked. No, she 
said, with the helpless and total love of an owned slave girl for her master. 
He is a fortunate man, I said.
I am his fully, she said. She smiled shyly. The auburn-haired beauty was 
radiant. I looked at her. How marvelous is the transformation which slavery 
works in a woman. What are you called now? I asked. Florence, she said. He 
put your old name on you as a slave name, I said. Was it not appropriate? she 
asked. Yes, I said.
end of page 240
Yes, she laughed, delightedly, it was fully appropriate. I was a slave 
before, when I was free. I knew it in my heart, even then, that I was a slave. 
It is thus fully appropriate that I now wear my old name openly, and with full 
explicitness, as a slave name. That pleases you doesnt it? I asked. Yes, 
Master, she said happily. It pleases me very much.
Florence, the slave, I said. Yes, Florence, the slave, she said.
How is Miles of Vonda? I asked. Her eyes clouded. He has fallen on hard 
times, she said. Warriors of Ar made hostel in his holdings int heir 
withdrawal to the south. He in anger spoke ill of Ar in their presence. 
Accordingly, the burtned his holdings and scattered his hurt and tharlarion.
What is he doing in Victoria? I asked. He is on his way west on the river, 
she said, to Turmus, where he has friends that he may negotiate a loan to 
rebuld and replenish his holdings.
It is now danberous to travel on the river, I said. River pirates are now 
bold and active. We must take our chances, she said. How large is his 
retinue? I asked. This could make a difference with respect to the security of 
his venture.
Only myself, she said, and Krondar, a fighting slave. Only two? I asked. 
Yes, she said. He sold his other slves to obtain money for the journey. But 
he did not sell you, I said. He kept me, she smiles, moving in the chains. 
And Krondar, I said. Yes, she said, He is fond of Krondar, and a fighting 
slve may be useful upon the river. That is true, I said.
I remembered Krondar. Indeed I had once fought him in the pit of leather and 
blood, when I too had been a fighting slave. Krondar was a veteran of the 
fighting pits of Ar. He had fought even with the spiked cestae and the knife 
gauntlets. He was a short, stout, thick-bodied, powerful man. His face and upper 
body were disfigured with masses of scar tissue, lingering records of a bloody 
history in the pits.
end of page 241
You should not leave Victoria, I said, until several ships in convey are 
prepared to move westward. My Master is impatient, she said. It has been 
wonderful to see you, I said, adding, Female slave. I stood up. It has been 
wonderful for me to see you too Master, she said. I turned away.
Master, she said. I turned back to regard her. Thank you, she said for long 
ago having captured and sold me. It was you who first taught me my womanhood. It 
was you who first taught me, incontrovertibly, that I belonged to me. I 
shurgged. If it were not for you, she said, I might never have come into the 
possession of my Master, Miles of Vonda.
I wish you well, Slave Girl, I smiled. And, I, too wish you well, Master, 
she said.
I then left the tavern. Outside looking about, I saw a burly crouched figure, 
one crouching near some bundles by the tavern wall. I grinned. I approached the 
figure, and it lifted its head. It growled, and opened its hands, warning me not 
to approach more closely. Krondar! I said.
The heavy head, scared, whiteishly streaked in the moonlight by the wall, looked 
at me puzzled. On its throat was a heavy metal collar. Master? it asked.
Do not call me Master, I said. I am Jason, now free, Once near Vonda we 
fought. Free? asked the brute. Then it knelt. I drew him to his feet. I am 
Jason, I said. Can you remember Jason? I asked.
It looked at me in the moonlight. Then there was a heavy chuckle in its throat. 
It was a good fight, he said. In the moonlight then we embraced. We had shared 
the fellowship of the pit of leather and blood. It is good to see you, 
Krondar, I said. It is good to see you -- Jason, said he.
I turned suddenly for I heard steel slipping from a sheath behind me. Miles of 
Vondak angry, stood there his sword drawn.
end of page 242
Behind him, frightened, in her breif gray slave tunic, stood his lovely slave, 
Florence.
I stepped away from Krondar, and backed up a step. Miles of Vonda, sword ready, 
advanced a step. In the tavern, said Miles of Vonda, was it not you who 
accosted my slave? I spoke with her, I said.
Draw your weapon, said he. Do you not know me? I asked. You are Jason, 
said he, who was once a fighting slave. Yes, I said. Draw your weapon, 
said he.
Please Master, begged the slave. He meant no harm! Please! Be silent 
slave, he snapped. Yes, Master, she said miserably.
Two or three other men had now gathered about. Will it be necessary to slay 
youwith your sword in your sheath? inquired Miles of Vonda. Please no Master! 
wept Florence, falling to her knees beside him, clutching at him. He spurned her 
to the side with his foot. She lay there then on the stonres weeping. She had 
spoken without permission. She had sought to interfere in the affairs of men. 
Tonight she would doubtless be whipped.
Draw your weapon, said Miles of Vonda.
More man had now gathered about. One of them had muttered something angrily, 
when Miles of Vonda had spoken as he had. I saw the hands of severl on their 
swords. I sudddenly realized with a certain amount of gratification, that these 
fellows were not pleased with what was ensuing. I had learned from Peggy that I 
was not unknown in Victoria. Men, I now gathered, knew me from the docks. Too, 
perhaps they had learned of my dismissal of Graat, the Swift, the thief, from 
Victoria, and how I had entered the tavern of Hibron to extract Miss Henderson 
from her danger there, though in this I had been unsuccessful. Perhaps they knew 
too of my outspoken displeasure at the sharves when the pirates had looted and 
burned there, punishing Victoria for having at that time refused their demands 
for tribute. With some of these fellows I had drunk and worked.
Draw, said Miles of Vonda.
end of page 243
I do not think Miles of Vonda knew the danger he was in. My major concern now 
was to safe his life.
I had thought you to be a man of honor, I said. It is my hope that I am, 
said Miles of Vonda.
I work on the docks, I said. Out of the corner of my eye I noted Krondar 
squaring about, to face several of the men tensed about us. He at least knew the 
danger in which his Master stood. I had little doubt Krondar would charge 
against several of these men, though he might take five swords in his chest 
doing so. How then, as I am a worker on the docks, could I have had the leisure 
to develop skills with the blade which might be the match of yours?
Angrily Miles of Vonda thrust his sword back in its sheath. He need not know 
that I had taken the leisure and much of it, as it pleased me, to develop blade 
skills, nor need he know I wask fo rmy times of training, reasonable adept with 
theblade. Callimachus was a master and he had lavished intelligence and time on 
my development. Too, I had discovered, as did not displease me, perhaps as 
aresult of my relfexes and aggressions, that I possessed something of an 
aptitude for the m anipulation of that wicked Gorean blade. Indeed, I suspected 
that I might find myself at no disadvantage in bladed contest with the proud 
Vondan. Indeed, I was curious to know if I might kill him. One the other hand, I 
had no wish to do him injury. And beyond these things, I did not wish for those 
of Victoria to know of my skills with the blade. Jason, the worker on the docks, 
and a fellow of some popularity in Victoria, was not thought to be skilled with 
the blade. As Callimachus pretended sill to dereliction to further our projects 
sok too, I must pretend to ineptness with the blade.
I shall not kill you,  said Miles of Vonda, irritably. That is welcome news, 
I said.
I saw the men about relax. Miles of Vonda, although he did not know it, had just 
saed his own life, and that of Krondar, and possibly that of the slave. Before 
he could have reached me, a dozen blades might have cut him down.
I felt a fondness then for the men of Victoria.
Krondar, said miles of Vonda, indicating me, beat him. I shall attack him 
if you wish Master, said Krondar, but I cannot beat him.
end of page 244
How then, asked Miles of Vonda looking at me, is my honor in this matter to 
be satisfied? I do not know, I said.
He walked up to me and, with the flat of his right hand, gave me a stinging 
slap. He then drew back and spit upon me. Men cried out angrily. Krondar gasped. 
Florence cried out with misery. I tensed but did not respond.
Miles of Vonda then turned about and gesturing to Krondar to shoulder the 
burdens he had been buarding, left, walking down the avenue of Lycurgus, 
followed by Florence, and then later, a few feet behind, by Krondar, bearing his 
gear.
I wiped my tunic and then whiped my hand on my thigh. Why didnt you break his 
neck? asked one of the men about. He is really a good fellow, I said. 
Besides, I added, look at the slave girl. We looked after her, the scantily 
clad, auburn-haired beauty heeling her Master. Who would not be jealous of such 
a slave. I asked. Perhaps you are right, grinned the man beside me.
end of page 245
27    What Occurred on The Wharves, Shortly Before Midnight.
It was now the nineteenth Ahn, an Ahn before the twentieth Ahn, the Gorean 
midnight. I was more careless than I should have been. I had been thinking of 
Miles of Vonda and the slave he owned, who had once been the Lady Florence of 
Vonda. I was pleased with her happiness and regarded him as a fortunate fellow.
Hold, said a voice menacingly. I spun about, near a pile of lumber on the 
wharves. It was lonely there now. I had no opportunity to draw my sword. The 
point of the others blade was entered into my gut. I backed against the lumber. 
So you have followed me, Miles of Vonda, I said. He did not respond. The mask 
is not necessary, I said. It is dark here and we are alone. The blade drew 
back a few inches. Hold you hands at your side and kneel very slowly, said the 
man. I did so.
Now slowly, very slowly, place your sword belt and scabbard on the boards,  
said the voice. I slowly slipped the belt and scabbard with the sheathed blade 
from my shoulder and placed them on the boards.
You are not Miles of Vonda, I said. I could not tell tha it was not his voice. 
Who are you, I asked, a brigand?
end of page 246
He said nothing. I watched the sword.
I have some money with me, I said. I will give it to you. You do not need to 
slay me. Do not be a fool, he said. Where is it? he said. What? I asked. 
The topaz, he said.
You are the courier of Ragnar Voskjard, I said. It would have been he who 
would have to protect himself during the search of the tavern of Cleanthes, by 
the guardsmen of Ars Station, placed the topaz in my pouch. I had not been 
searched within the tavern because I, like certain others, had been searched 
outside the tavern, but moments before. He would presumable be an important man, 
and the security of his identify a closely guarded secret.
Where is the topaz? he pressed. It was you, was it now, I asked, who raided 
my house, who ransacked it, and put the Lady Beverly under interrogation in the 
matter of the topaz? I did not find it there, he said menacingly.
But you received something for your trouble, I reminded him You tied the Lady 
Beverly as a slave and made her beg for her rape, after which you courteously 
aceded to her request. She was not displeasing, he said. The rape of a free 
woman is a serious offense, I said. I know women, he said. She was a natural 
slave.
I cannot gainsay it, i said. I had learned in the stronghold of Policrates, 
the pirate, that the beautiful Miss Henderson was in her heart a slave among 
slaes. It was not inappropriate, thus, but quite appropriate that she had been 
subjected to merciless slave rape.
The guardsmen of Port Cos, who too searched your house and the guardens, upon 
the informings of the Lady Beverly, who turned against you, were no more 
successful. You are well informed, I said. Where then is the topaz? he 
asked. If you slay me, I said, how then will you find the topaz?
He drew back the sword a little. I have watched you. said he.
end of page 247
I have been patient. But you have not led me to the topaz. You must understand 
I cannot wait indefinitely. There are those to whom I must answer. I am 
sensitive to such matters, I said. Where is the topaz? he said angrily.
If I give it to you,  I said, of what value then would be my life to you? 
None, he said. Under such circumstances, I said, I think you can easily 
understand that I might not be eager to surrender it to you. I, myself, he 
said menacingly, if I do not deliver the topaz, may be slain. Your identify 
is know, of course, to Ragnar Voskjard, I said. Of course, he said.
Your situation is not an enviable one either, I said. In such a situation, 
he pointed out, I have little to lose by slaying you. That point has not 
eluded me, I admitted. But there a simple solution,to our mutual difficulty, 
He said, one which is in our common interest. That you will spare me, if I 
give you the topaz, I said. Of course, said he.
But what guarantee have I, I asked, that you will abide by the terms of such 
a bargain? I give you my word, said he, in it pledging my honor. With all 
due respect, I said, pirates, and those in league with them, are not noted for 
their honor.
Do you have a choice? he asked. The sword drew back. I will show you where I 
put the topaz, I said. Rise slowly, he said, And walk slowly. Do not pick up 
your sword.
I got to my feet, not hurrying, leaving the sword, with the belt and scabbard on 
the boards. I began to waqlk, slowly, among the materials on the warves. He was 
behind me, sword drawn. If I were to turn on him, I was sure he could cut me 
down before I could get my hands on him. Similarily, before I could dodge or 
run, it seemed to me not unlikely that he could strike at the back of my neck.
Slowly, he said, slowly. Very well, I said.
end of page 248
It is here, I said, that I put the topaz. It was true that I had put it 
there. I had also, of course, removed it later from that place when I had 
carried it to the holding of Policrates. Carefully, I removed one of the heavy 
granite blocks of stone, building stone, rectangular, some six inches by six 
inches, by eighteen inches, from the tiered pile of stones. It was building 
stone brought in by a quarry galley several weeks ago. The intended purchaser 
had defaulted on his contrat and the stone was to be stored over the winter, 
beside the quarry warehouse, until the following spring, when it ws to be 
auctioned. In the spring prices tend to be highest on such materials. In viture 
of the temporary commercial inertness of the stone, and its weight and 
cheapness, it had seemed to me to provide an ideal hiding place for the topaz. 
Also it lay no more than four hundred yards from the hiring yard on the wharves, 
to which I often went in seeking work.
None would expect that the topaz would be hidden in such a place, I 
speculated. Do you have it yet? asked the fellow behind me, mastked, with the 
sword. He was a tall, spare man. Originally I had taken him to be Miles of 
Vonda.
I realized that I had little time. Carefully I moved naother stone. Then I took 
another stone in my hands, seeming to struggle with it. I am to be spared, if I 
give you the topaz, I reminded him. Yes, yes, he said. It is here, I said.
He struck down with the sword and I, turning, thrust up the block of granite to 
block the blow. Sparks showered off the stone, and particles of rock. I kicked 
him back from the stone, which I still held in my hands. He staggered back. I 
waited until he was upright, in the moment he had caught his balance. Then, 
underhanded, with two hands, I slug the block of granite at him. It caught him 
in the left shoulder. He gasped, and spun about, turned by the stone. I lunged 
toward him, but he, turning swiftly, stopped. The thurst of the sward was short 
by a foot. I stpped back a foot. He did not advance. He was breathing heavily. 
His left arm and hand hung beside him. I suspected that his left shoulder and 
side must be ringing with numbness.
end of page 249
It was not there after all, I said.It seems I was mistaken. Gasping he 
staggered toward me, and I turned and swiftly fled from the place, making my way 
swiftly back to the piled lumber. It was there that I, in a moment, bending 
down, seized up the sword which I had left ther. I turned, then to see him, 
painfully, following. When he saw taht I now held my blade ready, he stopped. 
That action convinced me that whoever he was, he was not of Victoria. In 
Victoria it was thought I did not know the blade. Thus, had he been of Victoria 
I think that he, even in pain, might have advanced. As it was, not knowing my 
capacity with the sword, I not being known to him, and knwoing himself better 
than I how his injury might had impeded his swordplay, he hesitated. I saw that 
he did not know what to do.
Treacherous sleen! he said. It was not I who struck down at you, I pointed 
out. Sleen! he said.
Ho there! I cried out loudly. Ho there! What are you doing here? Who are you! 
Get away from there! We do not permit pilfering on these wharves! The man 
trembled with rage. He advanced a step.
Begone, Thief! I cried, Begone!
Be silent, you fool, said the man. Thief, Thief! I cried. You may not steal 
here, Fellow! This is Victoria you know!
What is going on here? called a voice from alont the wharves behind me. A 
thief! I cried. Assistance! Assistance! Glancing back, I saw a lantern 
approaching. Two men were there advancing with slaves. Sleen! said the fellow 
with the mast and then he turned and made his way rapidly away.
It that you Jason? asked one of the men. Yes, I said sheathing my sword. 
What is it? asked the other man. Some fellow prowling about the docks. I 
said, doubtless not up to much good.
He seems to be gone now, said the first man. Yes, I said. Bfore he was over 
by the quarry warehouse.
end of page 250
He was busying himself about the granit there, that of the defaulted shipment. 
There is nothing of value there, said the second man. That is true. I said.
end of page 251
28    Two Captains Come to the Tavern of Tasdron; We Prevent Bloodshed
It is the second Ahn, said Callimachus. Surely they are not coming. Peggy 
knelt with her head to the feet of Tasdron, her master. The heavy chain, with 
the girl bell and coins box was sill locked on her neck. I pulled her had up by 
the hair. I lifted up the chain and Tasdron put his collar again on her neck.
Did you do as Jason told you? asked Tasdron. Yes Master, she said, her neck 
now again locked in Tasdrons collar.
I thrust the key to the chain in the cahin lock and opened it, pulling away the 
apparatus of the Coin Girl from her neck.
I sought out Aemilianus, Captain of the Guardsmen of Ars Station, she said. 
I put myself naked before him, kneeling and humbly began to lick and kiss his 
feet. Yes, said Tasdron. I then, in seeming to try to please him, whispered 
to him of the topaz, and that I had been sent to his feet by those who knew its 
whereabouts. If he wished information as to its location, he was to come to the 
tavern this night at the 20th Ahn.
end of page 252
You yourself, said Tasdron, did not return until the first Ahn. I did not 
even find Aemilianus, she said, until near the 20th Ahn. Why? asked 
Tasdron, not pleasantly. I was detained by men, she said. I was naked. I wore 
the bell and coint box. I moved the coin box on the chain, which I held. There 
were now several coins in it. When she had been sent from the tavern, it had 
been empty.
Aemilianus hemself used me, she said. He tied my hands tightly behind my back 
and took me to his private compartments. There he subjected me to slave rape.
Did he pay his coin? asked Tasdron. Yes, Master, she said reddening. Did 
you please your customers? asked Tasdron. Yes Master, she said. Did you 
yield to them, asked Tasdron, to Aemilianus, and the others? Please do not 
make me speak Master, she begged. She was in the presence of Callimachus, whom 
she loved. Speak, Slave, snapped Tasdron.
Yes Master, she said. But I could not help myself, Master, she wept. I am a 
slave girl. I am only a slave girl! She seemed to speak to Tasdron, but I knew 
well for whom her words were intended.
I do not understand, said Tasdron. You are under an obligation to yield and 
to yield perfectly, fully and totally. You are a slave. Even if I were not 
under such an obligation, she whispered, my Master, I still could ot have 
helped myself. I would still have had to yield to them fully and totally, 
perfectly. Of course, said Tasdron. You are a slave girl. Yes Master, she 
whispered. I am a slave girl.
Then, head down, she trembled and wept. How shamed she was that her slavery had 
been so clarified and manifested before Callimachus. I glanced to Callimachus. 
He did not seem concerned with the girl. What to him, were the helpless 
confessions of a lovely, meaningless slave?
end of page 253
Aemilianus is not here, I said. When he unbound me and sent me from his 
compartment, she said, ordering me to return to my master, he did nothing but 
dismiss me. I do not know if he will come or not.
At least Aemilianus knows how to handle a woman, said Tasdron. Yes, Master, 
said the girl.
I put the chain with the girl bell and coin box on the low table. There was a 
sound of bells, and Tasdron had agains locked slave bells on Peggys left ankle. 
He picked up the tiny bit of slave silk which we had earlier ordered her to 
remove, before disguising her as a Coin Girl and sending her into the streets to 
fetch Aemilianus to our meeting. He tossed her the bit of silk. You may put on 
the silk, he said. Yes Master, she said.
It amused me to see how gratfully she slipped the brief bit of scandalous, 
diaphanous yellow silk about her body, how pleased she was to do so, though it 
was naught but a laughting mockery of a garment, one obviously only for a female 
slave. Some free women think they would rather go naked than wear such a 
garment, but then they have not yet been made slves. It they were slaves, then 
they too I believe would find it very precious.
Bring us food and drink, said Tasdron to Peggy. Yes, Master, she said, and 
swiftly with a rustle of bells left the room.
Where is Glyco? asked Tasdron. He had only to fetch Callisthenes, whom he 
knows. There should be no difficulty in that. They should have been here more 
than an Ahn ago. I do not know, I said. Perhaps they have met with foul 
play, said Tasdron. I do not know, I said. Spies are everwhere, said 
Tasdron, miserably. Perhaps our projects have already been uncovered.
The tavern has not yet been burned, I pointed out. Oh excellent, said 
Tasdron irritatedly. I smiled. You do not understand the dangers implicit in 
these endeavours, do you not? inquired Tasdron. I think so, I said.
end of page 254
There is someone now at the door in the back. said Callimachus.
Tasdron hurried through the rear door of the room and down the corridor to the 
alley door. He slid back a narrow panel and then shut the panel and opened the 
door. Two figures were admitted, and the door was closed and locked behind them. 
I recognized the figure of Glyco, portly and short-legged, breathing heavily, 
warpped in a long brown cloak, which concealed the white and gold of the 
merchants in advance. The second man, tall and rangy, was he who had 
interrogated me in the headquarters of the men of Port Cos a few days earlier, 
when on the asseverations of Miss Henderson, I had been taken into custody. I 
had been released after the testimonies afforded by Tasdron, who had made it 
clear to him that I, well known in Victoria, and having arrived from the east on 
the river, could not be the courier ofRagnar Voskjard. He had also taken Miss 
Henderson into custody as I recalled. He had turned her over to me, bound, when 
I had been released. I had not, however, slain her nor sold her into slavery. I 
had returned her to my house, unpunished and in honor. She was, after all, a 
woman of Earth. Later of course, she had been captured by Kliomenes, the 
lieutenant to Policrates, the pirate, and taken to the stronghold of Policrates. 
There in full Gorean legality she had been again enslaved, as months before, she 
had been in the House of Andronicus, in Vonda, when first she had been brought 
to Gor as a helpless Earth girl to be branded and collared and sold to Gorean 
brutes for their pleasure. Indeed in my visit to the stronghold of Policrates, 
she had served me, and well, as a slave, though not knowing it was I whom she 
served. It was in that visit that I had learned thaat the little Earth beauty 
belonged in a collar.
The tall man, behind Glyco, entered the room. He wore a brown cloak over his 
uniform. In his left hand, held against his body, there was a helmet, crested 
with sleen hair. I know knew him to be Callisthenes. His left shoulder was 
hunched. His right hand, strong long-fingered, wide, seemed fit for the hilt of 
the Gorean blade.
Greetings, Callissthenes, said Callimachus, rising to greet him.
end of page 255
Greetings Captain, said Callisthenes. Glyco told me that you would be in 
attendance. I am no longer captain, said Calllimachus. It is now you who are 
the captain. There are various captains in Port Cos, grinned Callisthenes. 
How are the men? asked Callimachus. They remember you, as I do, said 
Callisthenes, with warmth.
The two men clasped hands. This pleased me, for I had feared there might be 
friction between them. It had been on the evidences supplied by Callisthenes 
that Callimachus had been removed from his command. Callimachus, however, bore 
him no ill will on this account. Callisthenes in the circumstances, to the 
thinking of Callimachus, had had no choice in the matter. He had done his duty 
as he should have, unpleasant and painful though it might have been for him.
We used to drink together, said Callimachus to Tasdron. It was largely on the 
recommendation of Callimachus, after he was relieved of his command, said 
Callisthenes, that I was promoted to the captaincy. A noble act, said 
Tasdron to Callimachus.
He was the best qualified man to replace me, said Callimachus. Otherwise, in 
spite of my affection for him, I would not have acted as I did. I have tried 
to live up to your trust, said Callisthenes. To the trust of a fallen man, a 
drunkard? smiled Callimachus. We shall always think of you as our captain, 
said Callisthenes.
You are a fine officer, said Callimachus, and it is a splendid command. You 
taught me much, said Callisthenes, and you trained it well.
Again the two men clasped hands, warmly. I stood to one side, not speaking. Do 
I not know you? asked Callisthenes, turning to me. I saw some recollection in 
his eyes. I was one of several suspects you brought in for interrogation in the 
matter of the serach for the topaz, I said.
end of page 256
Yes, said Callissthenes. And here is Tasdron, is it not, who testified on 
your behalf? It is, said Tasdron. What is your name? asked Callisthenes. 
Jason, I reminded him. Yes, said Callisthenes, Jason, from the docks. 
Yes, I said.
I would have been here earlier, said Glyco to Tasdron, but I could not 
readily find Callisthenes. I was about my duties, said Calliathenes.
Your shoulder, said Tasdron. It seems injured, I fell, said Callisthenes. 
Is there anything we can do for you? inquired Tasdron. It is nothing, said 
Callisthenes. He then looked about from one of us to the other. What is afoot 
here? he asked Callimachus. Is it true that you have some news of the topaz?
We shall explain all shortly, I trust, said Callimachus. What is the delay? 
asked Callisthenes. We are waiting for one more person, said Callimachus. 
Who? asked Callisthenes. One whom it is important that you meet, said 
Callimachus. Very well, Said Callisthenes.
There was a knock on the door leading to the central room of the tavern. 
Enter, said Tasdron.
Peggy, a tray balanced in one hand, opened the door. Masters, she said, 
lowering her head. Serve, said Tasdron to her. Yes Master, said Peggy.
Sit, invited Tasdron, and we took places about the low table, sitting about 
it, cross-legged. Callisthenes put his helmet beside the talble and threw back 
his cloak. His tunic bore the insigna of Port Cos. Peggy knelt before the table 
and beagn to place the cups, the bessels, and plates on the table. One plate was 
of meat, another of breads, another of sliced fruits, ther fourth of nuts and 
cheeses. Each of us, with our fingers, would eat as we wished from the common 
plates. She had brought, too, paga, Cosian wine and water.
She is a pretty slave, said Calliathenes. We looked at her. She wore the bit 
of yellow silk.
end of page 257
There were slave bells on her left ankle. The other collar was lovely on her 
throat. Her long, blond hair was loose about her shoulders. She is an Earth 
girl, said Tasdron. interesting, said Callisthenes.
Peggy set forth the food and drink deferentially and in silence. We will need 
another cup for our friend, said Tasdron. and yet another, for our other 
guest, who has not yet arrived. Yes Master, said Peggy.
I trust, said Tasdron looking at his slve, that he will arrive. I trust so, 
my Master, she whispered, trembling. She then rose to her feet and taking the 
tray, with a rustle of bells, frightened, almost fled from the room.
I smiled. It would certainly be in her best interest for Aemilianus, Captain in 
Ars Station, to have accepted her invitation to our meeting. If he did not do 
so, she would doubtless be whipped and well.
Who is this mysterious guest, whom we are expecting? asked Callisthenes. One 
whom it is important that you meet, said Callimachus. Very well, smiled 
Callisthenes.
There was a knock on the alley door, a firm knock. It ws struck three times. We 
glanced at one another. Glyco pulled his cloak about him, concealing the white 
and gold of his robes. Callisthenes, too, seeing this action, drew his cloak 
about himself, concealing the insignia of Port cos. Tasdron rose to his feet and 
went through the door and down the corridor to the alley door. The rest of us 
too, rose to our feet.
In a moment Tasdron had reappeared in the room. Enter, said Tasdron.
A tall man, carrying an unmarked helmet, entered. He threw back the hood of a 
long, brown traveling cloak he wore. I detected the sound of a sheathed blade 
beneath the cloak. He closed the door behind him and regarded us. His hair was 
brown and cut short at the back of his neck. He was smoothly shaven. His jaw was 
square, his eyes clear.
end of page 258
I am Tasdron, proprietor of this tavern, who has invited you here, said 
Tasdron.
I am Jason, I said. I commonly work on the docks in Victoria.
I am Callimachus, said Callimachus, adding, of the Warriors.
I know of only one Callimachus of the Warriors, said the man, one who ws once 
a captain in Port Cos. Who is he? inquired Callisthenes of Tasdron. His voice 
had not been pleasant. We were all on our feet. I noted the right hand of 
Callisthenes had slipped within his cloak, to the hilt of the sword which hung 
there. The right hand of the newcomer too was then on the hilt of his own 
weapon.
We are all folk met in the throes of a common plight, said Tasdron.
Who is he? asked the newcomer of Tasdron, nodding toward Callisthenes.
There was a small sound at the door and the newcomer, instantly, backed against 
the wall, watching us. Peggy entered with the extra cups. Tasdron signed 
audible. Peggy, the two cups on a small tray, turned about, seeing the newcomer. 
Swiftly, she knelt before him, putting her head down. I saw that she remembered 
well what he had done to her.
The slave, said the man. Yes, said Tasdron. I see that I am in the right 
place, said the man. Yes, said Tasdron. Then he said to Peggy, Serve.
Yes, Master, she said. She rose to her eet and then went to the low table and 
kneeling there put the cups on the table.
Was she good? asked Tasdron. Yes, said the man. She was paga hot. Peggy 
put down her head, reddening. The properties of slaves are discussed openly by 
Masters.
For what have I been invited to this meeting? asked the man. That we may be 
of mutual assistance in a project of great common interest. said Tasdron.
end of page 259
Who is he? asked the man, gesturing with his head toward Callisthenes. Who is 
he? asked Callisthenes, menacingly of Tasdron. I tensed. I saw the hand of 
Callimachus move subtly toward his sword. Who is he? asked the newcomer, 
indicating Callisthenes. Let us be patient, said Tasdron.
I am Callisthenes, Captain of Port Cos, said Callisthenes.
I am Aemilianus, Captain in Ars Station, said the newcomer.
Two cloaks, as one, were hurled back. Revaled then in the back room of the 
tavern were the insignias of Port Cos and of Ars Station. Two swords, as one, 
leapt from their sheaths. The girl screamed. I stepped back.
Port Cos! cried Callisthenes.
Glorious Ar! cried Aseilians.
But no sooner had the blades crossed, then both seemed suddenly, inexplicable, 
in a flash of sparks, to fly upward. Both men stepped back. Callimachus stood 
between them. It was his blade which had struck both steels upward.
You are strong, said Aemilianus to Callimachus. Callimachus sheathed his 
steel.
If you would strike someone, Aemilianus, Captain of Ars Station, strike me, 
he said. Then he turned to Callisthenes. Will you strike me, old friend? he 
asked. Callisthenes hesitated.
Is this not a trap? asked Aemilianus.
Our greatest danger, said Callimachus, is that we should be as foes to one 
another. Captains, begged Glyco, put up your steel.
She lured me here, said Aemilianus, gesturing toward Peggy with the Gorean 
blade. She shrank back, half naked in the bit of silk she wore. She knew that 
the slightest touch of that wicked Gorean blade could part her flesh.
She was merely the instrument wherewith we extended our invitation, said 
Tasdron.
Of what city are you? Aemilianus asked Blyco. Of Port Cos, he said. And 
you? asked Aemilianus of Callimachus. I am that Callimachus of the Warriors of 
whome I gather you once heard. Yes, I too, am of Port Cos.
Aemilianus backed up a step.
end of page 260
Jason and I, said Tasdron, are of Victoria. Victoria is neutral ground 
between Ars Station and Port Cost. You are both, Callisthenes and you, here met 
on neutral ground.
It interested me that Tasdron had without even thinking about it, spoken of me 
as of Victoria. I, myself, had never given the matter much thought. I suppse 
that I was, though, in a sense, of Victoria. It was here surely that I was 
living and working. Yet to live and work in a place and to be of a place, are, 
in Gorean thinking quite different things. I wondered if I were of Victoria. I 
thought perhaps it was not impossible.
I am prepared to sell my life dearly, said Aemilianus. You are not in 
danger, said Tasdron, or at least in no greater danger than the rest of us.
You played your part well, Slave, sneered Aemilinaus to Peggy. Will you 
receive a candy, lighter chains, a larger kennel? She sharnk back, putting her 
hand before her mouth. Or will I survive, he asked, to teach you punishments 
thought suitable by a man of Ar for a female slave? Visibly, the girl trembled.
We mean you no harm, I said to Aemillianus. Peggy, I said,  go to the 
Captain and kneel before him, and bare your breasts to his sword.
She looked wildly to Tasdron, her Master, and intereseting, to Callimachus. She 
looked to Tasdron, of course, because he was her legal Master, her owner. In 
looking to Callimachus, on the other hand, she had revealed, inadvertantly, not 
even understanding what she had done, that he was in her heart her Master, and 
that she was in her heart, his slave.
Do so, said Tasdron. Do so, said Callimachus. She was after all, only a 
slave. Peggy rose to her feet and went, head down, to kneel before the startled 
Aemilianus. Then at his feet, she lifted her head, and with her small hands, 
kneeling straight, parted her yellow silk. She knelt then before him, a helpless 
slave, as she had been commanded, her breasts bared before his sword.
I saw Tasdron smile. He had not failed to notice that Peggy had glanced 
terrified earlier to Callimachus. He now realized that one of his girls, Peggy, 
as in effect, the helpless love slave of Callimachus.
end of page 261
I do not think that this displeased him. Indeed, such information can be of 
great use in managing a girl.
Aemilianus, puzzled, lowered the point of his sword. He looked at us.
We mean you no harm, I told him. This is not a trap? asked Aemilinaus. No, 
I told him.
Callisthenes, said Callimachus, turning to thecaptain of Port Cos, is it your 
intention to stsrke me with your sword. No, sid Callisthenes, Of course 
not. Then put up your sword. said Callimachus.
Callisthenes sheathed his sword. A moment later the sword ofAemilianus too 
rested in its sheath.
Come and sit at the table, said Tasdron. We have much to discuss. We all 
then sat about the table.
Fix your silk, said Tasdron to Peggy,  and go to the side of the room. Kneel 
there. If we need anything, you will be summoned. Yes Master, she said. Do 
you wish her, instead, to remove her silk and to lick and serve you as we eat 
and talk? inquired Tasdron of Aemilians.
This sort of thing is sometimes done at Gorean suppers. Each male has a naked 
slave girl who is in attendance on him during the supper. She licks and kisses 
him, and fetches for him, and may even put foot in his mouth. It is not 
unpleasant to be served by a naked, collared beauty in this fashion.
We are not to be all so served, I gather, said Aemilianus. I do not think 
that would be wise, said Tasdron.
Then I shall myself, of course, forgo the pleasure, said he. That is best, 
admitted Tasdron, for there are serious things of which to speak.
I smiled to myself. It was true that slave girls were often distractive. It is 
difficult for a man to keep his mind or his hands off of them. They are, of 
course, imbonded, easily the most desirable of women.
How much does she know? asked Aemilinaus.
Very little, said Tasdron. Keep her ignorant, said Aemilianus.
end of page 262
Of course, said Tasdron.
I looked to Peggy at the side of the room, serveral feet away. She had not 
closed her silk. She moved slightly and there was a sound of bells. Then she 
knelt very still, that she did not attract attention to herself.
Speak softly, said Tasdron. Very well, said Callisthenes. Very well, SAid 
Aemilianus. Peggy was very beautiful. She could not overhear our conversation. 
She would be kept in ignorance. She was a slave.
end of page 263
29    The Sea Gate: I am Again Within the Holdings of Policrates
Had we the support of others, in fuller extent, we could carry this project 
through, said Callimachus. As it is, I fear we must fail.
The dock of the low river galley shifted beneath our feet, as the ship nosed 
through the inlet waters toward the secluded stronghold of Policrates. It lies 
some two pasangs from the river itself.
Your original plan, said Callimachus, was an excellent one, but now in its 
alteration, I fear we must fail.
Callimachus and I stood on the foredeck of the galley. I wore the mask which I 
had worn while pretending to be the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. I knew the signs 
and countersigns for entry into the stronghold through the sea gate. Those had 
been given to me that I could convey them to Ragnar Voskjard, that he might use 
them in his entry into the stronghold. It had been my plan to gather sufficient 
ships, primarily from Port Cos and Ars Station to simulate the fleet of Ragnar 
Voskjard, who would be expected by Policrates. It would have seemed simple 
enough, then, to have brought enough men into the stronghold, posing as the men 
of Ragnar Voskjard, to take Policrates by surprise. He himself had never met 
Ragnar Voskjard, no had Voskjard met Policrates. The plan, indeed, was bold, but 
it had seemed to me sound.
end of page 264
Callimachus, who was experienced in matters of war, had liked the plan, and had 
concurred. Glyco and Tasdron, too, neither of whom could be tkane as rash 
fellows, had been taken by the plan. Interestingly enough, it had been the 
warriors, Callisthenes and Aemilianus, who had tended to regard the plan as 
dangerous and barren. Callisthenes in particular had been outspoken against it.
It was now near the 20th Ahn, the Gorean midnight. The sky was cloudy. The three 
moons were high over the trees, bordering the shadowy inlet. I could see the 
high, dark walls of the stronghold of Policrates in the distance, with its lofty 
sea gates, with its heavy latticework of iron.
The fleet of Ragnar Voskjard, had said Callisthenes, can never join with the 
fleet of Policrates. It will be prevented from doing so by the chain. Why 
then, had asked Glyco, are you so concerned that the topaz never reach 
Policrates.
The matter was important to the Merchant Council, said Callisthenes, I merely 
do my duty. Some of them are uncertain of the effectiveness of the chain. And 
I am one of them,  said Glyco.
That is known to me,  said Callisthenes.
Has the chain now been placed? asked Glyco. Yes, said Callisthenes. It is 
now in place.
This work was done in secrecy, was it not? I asked. I had not heard of it in 
Victoria, nor had Callimachus or Tasdron.
Supposedly, said Callisthenes, though its existence is now doubtless known to 
the western towns. It was forged in Cos, in a thousand links, said Glyco, 
and brought overland around the delta and on galleys east from Turmus. Its 
mountings and pylons were mostly done at night. It lies west of Port Cos, that 
we many be protected from the pirates. It would also allow Port Cost to 
control trafffice on the river from the west, pointed out Tasdrn, irritably.
We are under pressure from Cos, said Glyco. I am not personally in favor of 
the chain. As a merchant I think a freer trade lies in our best interest. Too 
the chain will not make Port Cos popular with her sister cities.
That is certain, said Tasdron. Victoria, hitherto at least, has been 
primarily Cosican in her sympathies.
end of page 265
We of Ars Station would not have mounted such a chain, said Aemilianus, 
unnecessarily in my opinion. Possibly you do not have the vision or the 
resources, said Callisthenes. Our concerns, Captains, said Callimachus, must 
now be with ourselves and our immediate dangers, not with the politics of Cos 
and Ar. Politics? inquired Callisthenes. Cos and Ar are at war. Neither Ar 
nor Ars Station, Captain, saidd Aemilianus, are at war with Port Cos.
This is true, said Tasdron, hurriedly. It was true. The typical colonizing 
situation among Gorean politics tends to resemble classical colonization, and 
not the typical colonization of nation states, in which the colony, in effect, 
is held subject to alien domination. When a Gorean city founds a colony, usually 
as a result of internal overpopulation or political dissension, the potential 
colonists, typically, even before leaving the mother city, develop their own 
charter, constitution and laws. Most importantly, from the Gorean point of view, 
when the colony is founded, it will have its own Home Stone. The Home Stone of 
Port Cos, significantly, was not the Home Stone of Cos. Ars Station on the 
other hand did not have its own Home Stone, but its Home Stone remained that of 
Ar. This is not to deny of course that the colonly will not normally have a 
close tie with the mother city. It usually will. There are not too many bonds, 
cultural and historical, between them, for this not to be the case.
The chain was inordinately expensive, said Glyco, and, I am certain, it will 
prove ultimately ineffective. It was forged in Cos, said Callisthenes. We 
shall be expected, in the long run, to bear its expense, said Glyco. That is 
probably true, said Callisthenes, but then too, it is we who will be the 
direct recipient of its benefits. If there are any benefits, said Glyco, 
glumly.
Surley Port Cos will find some benefits in eing spared the predations of 
pirates, said Callisthenes. The chain will surely be ineffective, said Glyco. 
That is why I came to Victoria, to seek out Callimachus, that he might, in 
these dark times, with the topaz in transit, lend us his council and his blade.
end of page 266
The topaz, given the existence of the chain, said Callisthenes, is now 
meaningless, though to be sure, I am charged with the attempt to intercept it, a 
charge in which I have, thanks to our young friend here, failed, Callishenes 
glanced meaningfully at me. To have actually delivered the topaz to 
Policrates, he said, was little short of an act of idiocy. I shrugged. You 
have herad my plan, I said, that we muster ships and under the cover of 
darkness posting as the fleet ofRagnar Voskjard, enter and take the stronhold of 
Policrates.
It is a foolish plan, said Callisthenes.You would surely be discovered. Spies 
abound. The pirates are well informed, I am certain. Only we know of this 
possibility, I said.
Discuss your plan with Aemilianus, suggested Callisthenes. The pirates of the 
eastern Vosk are more your concern than mine. The chain will keep the pirates of 
the western Vosk out of the waters of Port Cos.
I do not wish to risk several ships and hundreds of men in such an unusual 
venture said Aemilianus. Besides, how to do I know this is not a pirate trick 
to lure the fleet of Ars Station into an ambush in cramped waters? You have 
my word on it, said Callimachus, the word of a Warrior.
Perhaps you too have been fooled, said Aemilianus, I must think of the 
security of my men an dmy ships, Aemilianus looked at me. Are you of Ar? he 
asked. No, I said. Are you of the Warriors? he asked. No, I said. 
Aemilianus spread his hands. How then, he asked the others, in so great a 
matter, can I trust him?
You must do so, urged Tasdron. Do so, urged Glyco. Why should you undertake 
such risks? Aemilianus asked me. There is a girl, a slave, I want in the 
stronghold of Policrates, I said. You would undergo these risks, these 
dangers, he asked, for a girl? I desire her, I said. I want to own her.
It that all? he asked. I shrugged. Too, I said, I have scores to settle 
with pirates.
end of page 267
Twice I had been demeaned by pirates, once in the tavern of Tasdron and once in 
the Pirates Chain, the tavrn of Hibron.
We are not interested, said Aemilianus. I am sorry. His plan is bold, said 
Callimachus. It is brilliant. I am sorry, said Aemilianus.
The plan is not only dangerous, said Callisthenes, and I would not risk men 
or ships of Port Cos in such a rash scheme, but it is, at least as far as 
preventing the gathering of the river pirates goes, unneessary. The chain will 
keep the pirates of the west to the west of Port Cos.
The chain will be ineffective, reiterated Glyco, miserably. It will be quiet 
effective, saiod Callisthenes. A chain can be forged, a chain can be cut, I 
said.
The chain is patrolled, of course, said Calllisthenes.Too, should there be 
any massing of pirate ships, we can meet them with the fleet of Port Cos.
What do you think Callimachus? asked Glyco. He was not, of course, of the 
warriors. With all due respect, my friend, Callisthenes, said Callimachus, I 
must concur with Glyco for his judgement in this matter seems sound. He is of 
the merchants, said Callisthenes. he is a man of shrewd and practical 
judgement, said Callimachus. And in my opinion his fears are well founded.
With the chain in place, said Callisthenes, we need fear nothing. Placing 
the chain, said Callimachus, is unimaginatively defensive. It will be 
impossible to defend its length agains determined attacks. Do not permit it to 
lull you into a false sense of security.
if there is to be at attack at the chain, said Aemilianus, I am willing to 
lend you ships from Ars Station, to strengthen your defenses.
We can handle our own affairs in Port Cos, said Callisthenes. The ships of 
Ars Station are not welcome in the waters of Port Cos.
There is no drop of water in this river, said Aemilianus, quietly,which we of 
Ars Station may not put beneath the keels of our fleet.
end of page 268
You will do so at your own risk, my dear Captain, said Callisthenes, grimly.
Our projects are doomed, mounded Tasdron. Captain, Callisthenes, said I, 
surely the pirates as you yourself have suggested, are well informed.
It seems they know anything that occurs on the river, he admitted. It that be 
the case, I said, surely the forging of the chain, or at least its transport 
to Turmus and later to Port Cos, and the time and effort spent in preparing its 
mountings, joining the lengths, and setting the chain in place, must have been 
known to the pirates.
Supposedly this was done in secrecy, said Callisthenes, but I think there is 
little doubt they must have understood what was being done. Indeedk I have heard 
that there are rumors of the work in various of the western towns, in Turmus and 
Ven, in Tetrapoli and Tafa. Indeed, smiled Glyco. We have even received a 
protest from Ven in the council.
On the assumption that the pirates understood what was occuring, I said to 
Callisthenes, does it not seem strange to you that they made no effort to 
interfere with the placing of the chain? It was guarded, of course, said 
Callisthenes. You, yourself, are presumable well informed, I said. I trust 
so, said Callit\sthenes.
Does this lack of opposition or interference on the part of pirates as powerful 
and well organized as thoes of Ragnar Voskjard not seem puzzling to you? Yes, 
said Callisthenes. What would you conclude from this lack of interest or action 
on their part? I asked. I do not know, said Callisthenes, angrily.
The conculsion is clear, said Glyuco. And what do you conclude? inquired 
Callisthenes. that they do not fear it, said Glyco, that they do not regard 
it as a threat to themselves. Callisthenes scowled at the portly merchant.
end of page 269
If that is their belief, they are in my opinion surely mistaken, said 
Callisthenes. Do you truly think a chain will stop the fleet of Ragnar 
Voskjard? asked Callimachus. Surely, said Callisthenes, the chain-and too of 
course the vessels of Port Cos.
We know, said Tasdron, that the topaz was brought to Victoria. It was 
doubtless brought as a pledge of Ragnar Voskjard to Policrates. It signifies in 
effect the agreement of Ragnar Voskjard to join forces with Policrates. I do not 
doubt that the fleet of Ragnar Voskjard in a short time will follow the topaz. 
Aiii! whispered Glyco.
Voskjard may be on the move now, Said Callimachus. At this very moment his 
forces may be moving east on the river. Policrates is expecting their 
arrival, I said. that I know. Indeed, it is that which gave plausibility to my 
plan.
The chain will stop them, said Callisthenes. The chain must stop them!
I must return immediately to Port Cos, said Glyco. Voskjard must be met at 
the chain.
We all rose to our feet. But what of the stronghold of Policrates? I asked. 
Would you leave such an enemy at your back? It would take ten thousand men to 
storm that stronghold, said Callisthenes. Five hundred, entered, through the 
sea gate, could take it, I said.
Your plan is the plan of a fool, said Callisthenes. I have been within the 
stronghold, I said. I know it. I tell you it could be so taken.
I will not risk a large number of men in this, said Callisthenes, but I will 
tell you what I might do. I will give you twenty men, if so many will volunteer, 
and if Aemilianus of Ars Station will similarly supply another twenty. Then if, 
truly, you can enter the seat gate and can hold it, set a beacon at the gate. We 
can then send supporting forces through the narrow waters to the wall. I have 
some two hundred men in Victoria and Aemilianus, as my intelligence sources 
indicate, a comparable number.
There will be presumably some four or five hundred men in the holding, I said. 
You would ask some forty men to sand against them, holding the sea gate for 
perhaps two Ahn?
end of page 270
Surely, said Callisthens. It is not just the sea gate, I said, and the wall 
near it, and the tower houseing the windlass, but the walks about the walled 
cove within, and the entry to the main stronghold.
It would be difficulty, said Callisthenes. Our men would be spread too 
thinly, Jason, said Callimachus. You must forget the matter. It is sometimes 
surprising, said Callisthenes regarding me, smiling, what a few men, 
determined and skilled, can accomplish.
Ragnor Voskjar, I said, would come with a fleet, not one or two ships and 
forty men. Empty grain ships, towed, their idenity concealed in the darkness, 
might suggest such a fleet. mused Callisthenes. Accept his plan in its 
plausible form, my friend, Callisthenes, or let us put it entirely from our 
minds, sid Callimachus. Yes, said Glyco. That is doubtless best, agreed 
Callisthenes.
I am willing to try it, said Callisthenes. Wht chances do you think we might 
have? I asked Callimachus. He smiled wryly. One or two, he guessed, perhaps 
one or two in a thousand,
Surprise would be on our side, I pointed out. Support would not be 
immediately at hand, said Callimachus. The portals and walks to be defended 
are sufficiently narrow, I said earnestly. And many in number, said 
Callimachus. Too, there may be circuitous passages, secreat, of which y ou are 
unaware. In this even you might be easily outflanked.
I thought of the slave, she who had once been Miss Beverly Henderson. Give me 
twenty men, I said to Callisthenes. I think I can supply you with twenty 
volunteres, he said. I looked to Aemilianus. If Port Cos can give youtwenty 
men for such a venture, said Aemilianus, Ars Station, surely, could supply no 
smaller a number.
end of page 271
It is now foolishness and madness, Jason, said Callimachus. Do not embark 
upon so mad a venture. You need not come, my friend. I said. I shall 
accompany you, of course, said Callimachus.
We were not beneath the high dark walls of the stronghold of Policrates. I could 
see them rearing some hundred feet above us.
We nosed toward the sea gte, our oars scarely entering the water.
I could see a lamp lit on a wall, more than three hundred feet within, inside 
the sea gate. The sea gate itself was fifty feet in height, large enough, when 
the barred latticwork was lifted, to accomodte a masted cargo galley. It was 
reinforced on two sides with keeplike towers. The tower on the right, as I faced 
the gate, housed the windlass which lifted and lowered the gate. It was turned 
by prisoners and slaves, chained to its bars, but these men, without the 
assistance of the gigantic counterweights, also within the tower, could not have 
moved it.
Who is there? called a man from the wall. Step back, I said to Callimachus. 
You might be recognized,
I then stood alone onthe foredeck of the galley. I climbed to the foot of the 
prow and stood there, my left arm about the prow. I wore the mastk I had worn 
when I had pretened to be the courier of Ragnar Voskjard.
Who is there? repeated the man.
I am the courier of Ragnar Voskjard! I called. We are sent ahead, the scout 
ships of his fleet! We had only four ships iwth us and three were substantially 
empty. Tasdron had arranged them in Victoria, on the pretense of fetching a 
consignment of Sa-Tarna from Siba, to be brought to the Brewery of Lucian, near 
Fina, east of Victoria, with which brewery he occasionally did business.
The fleet of Ragnar Voskjard is not due for ten days, called the man. We are 
the souut ships, I called. It is only two days behind us!
The Voskjard is eager, called the man.
end of page 272
There are towns to be burned, I called, loots to be gathered, women to tie in 
or slave slacks! How did you pass the chain? called the man.
The batther has been fought, I said, It has been cut!
I do not like it, said Callimachus, behind me. Tere are too few men on the 
walls. I surely have not object to that, I said, Hopefully most of the ships 
and men of Policrates are abroad. Now, asked Callimachus, when they are 
waiting for Ragnar Voskjard?
He is not due in their opinion for ten days, I said. Let us withdraw, 
advised Callimachus.
The cups of Cos, I cried to the man on the wall, are not the cups of Ar! 
Yes each may be filled with a splendid wine, he called down.
The ships of Cos, I called to the man on the wall, are not the ships of Ar! 
But the holds of each may contain fine treasures, he answered.
The Robes of Concealment of Cos are not the Robes of Conealment of Ar, I 
called. What do they have in common? called the man. Both conceal the bodies 
of slaves! I called to him.
Raise the gate, called the man, turning about. Slowly, creakingk foot by foot, 
I saw the heavy latticwork of the sea gate lifting ot of the water, dripping, 
shiny in its wet blackness, in the light of the three moons.
It is too easy, said Callimachus. Let us withdraw while we can. Surprise is 
with us, I told him. It is the one hope we have. On it all depends.
Enter, Friends! called down the man.
I, standing on the prow, motioned with my right arm to the oar master, and he in 
turn not on the stern deck, but among the benches, spoke softly to the men. He 
was from Port Cos. I looked upward at the high gate, now hung almost above us. 
We began to move slowly through the opening.
Now! cried a voice above us on the wall. I suddenly heart a gigantic, rapid, 
rattling sound.
Back oars! cried the oar matser, the fellow from Por Cos, Back oars!
end of page 273
But there was no time. A few feet behind me, hurtling downward, crashing through 
the fordeck of the galley, fell the great gate of iron.
I was pitched upward, the prow of the galley, the forward gunnels seeming to 
leap upward. There had been a horrendous sound of splintering as the heavy gate 
had cut through the strakes of the galley like an ax through twigs. In that 
moment I had seen, through the closely set latticework of the gate, the chopped 
galley leaping upward. I saw Callimachus thrown into the water, and the men, 
suddenly, lifted up with the galley, some clinging to benches, thers rolling on 
the deck. Almost at the same time the walls, on the inside, seemed alive with 
archers, who much have been hidden behind the parapets. The prow to which I 
clung,, then fell back towards the water, and I leaped from it. In a moment I 
rose to the surface gasphing, trying to see. The debris of the forequarters of 
the galley was floating about me. Outside the gate I saw the rest of the galley 
subsiding into the water. From the walls arrows were raining down upon its 
settling timbers. The men were not in the water, swimming from the scattered 
wood, darting arrows piercing the water about them, then bobbing upward. I swam 
underwater to the base of the sea gate. I could not push through the closely set 
latticework. There was no passage under or about the iron. Its iron posts were 
received by rounded holes, six inches in width, drilled in a flat, horizontal 
sill. At last, lungs bursting, shaking water from my eyes, I rose the the 
surface and clutched at the iron latticework. It was dark outside the gate. I 
could see some shattered wood, floating in the moonlight.Too, there were 
numerous arrows, like sticks, floating about. Doubtless they would later be 
collected and dried. The three galleys we had towed were now adrift, aimlessly, 
almost lost in the shadows. I heard laughter on the wall. I was aware then of a 
lanters, and a smlal boat, behind me. I felt as I clung to the iron a rope put 
upon my neck.
end of page 274
30    I Am Interrogated in the Hall of Policrates; A Girl is to be Whipped; I am 
Taken to the Chamber of the Windlass
Taunt him, said Policrates.
The red-haired beauty, nude, began to press herself against me, in the long, 
sensuous, full-body caresses of the female slave. I struggled in the chains. My 
hair was still wet from the dark waters of the lakelike couryard othe the 
holding of Policrastes. There were rope burns on my neck, from the coarse 
tether, now removed, on which I had been dragged, bound into his presence. My 
clothes had been cut from me. I had then been chained, hand and foot, on my back 
to four iron rings set int the tiles before the dias on which reposed his curule 
chair. Policrates, indolent in the chair, lifted a finger and another girl, one 
whom I recalled was called Tais, from the feast, dark-haired, nude, knelt beside 
me and began to kiss and lick at my right foot and leg.
For whom are you an operative? inquired Policrates. For no one, I said, 
angrily.
Again Policrates signaled and this time Lita, who had once been a free woman of 
Victoria, pausing only to discard the bit of silk she wore on the marble steps, 
hurried to kneel beside me.
end of page 275
I noticed how the bit of yellow silk lay on the steps. She had been 
humiliatingly and pblicly stripped and knelt on the boards of the wharf at 
Victoria, before large numbers of her fellow citizens, inactive and frightened. 
She, nude, kneeling, the blade of the pirate at her throat, had tied the know of 
bondage in her own hair. She had been ordered then to the galley, to be bound 
there as an exposed slave, to be taken to the stronghold of her masters. The bit 
of yellow silk lay partly on one stair and descending gracefully, partly on 
another. It took the edge of the stair beautifully, for such silk is very fine. 
It reveals even the subtlest lineaments of that to which it clings. It is slave 
silk. I could see the graining of the marble through the silk. The girl now 
began to kiss at my left foot and leg. She kissed well. I saw that she belonged 
in a collar. It was too bad, I thought, that that discovery had first been made 
by pirates and not by strong free men, before whom pirates might quail. But free 
men, I knew, were often too simple or ignorant to gather up the unclaimed booty 
which might lie about them, even though such booty might beg piteously to serve, 
and to be taken into their homes to be treasured. It is not easy always, of 
course, to recognize a slave who wears the robes and veils of concealment; the 
identification bcomes simple, of course, once she has been put in a collar and 
slave tunic. It is said on Gor that the garments of a free women are designed to 
conceal a womans slavery, whereas the accouterments and garments of a slave, 
such as the brand and collar, the tunic or Ta-Teera, are made to reveal it.
You are Jason of Victoria are you not? inquired Policrates. Yes, I said. He 
was smiling. Four or five of Policrates cutthroats stood about, with their arms 
folded. About the curule chair of Polirates, nestled about his eet, and on the 
stairs about the chair, were serveral of his girls. Most were nude, but some 
were silked or clad otherwise revealingly, as befitted the wenches of pirates. 
Some wore threads of leather, another a bit of rope, another only her chains. 
Some of these wenches I remembered from the fesat. There were darkh-haired Relia 
and blond Tela, who was still kept in white silk, as a joke, though she must 
have serve the pleasure of pirates a thousand times
end of page 276
and the blond sisters from Cos, Mira and Tala; short, dark-haired Bikkie; and 
the girls who had danced at the feast, and had been throawn to the aroused men 
at the conclusion of their performances; and certain others. Men such as 
Policrates are rich in women, as well as in gold.
You are involved in the conspiracy of Tasdron, taverner of Victoria, who is in 
league with Glyco of Port Cos, said Policrates. No, I said.
We will deal with these fools soon, said Policrates. And we will wreak a 
vengeance on Victoria of which men will dare not speak for a hundred years. 
There is no conspiracy, I said, It was I alone, with some few men, who 
thought to take and fire the holding. And what of the beacon that was to be 
set. asked Policarates, and of the ships waiting fruitlessly now upon the 
river?
I was silent. Policrates obviously knew much.
Relia, Tela, to him, said Policrates. These two girls, Relia discaring her red 
silk and Tela operning her white silk and throwing it back, hurried to kneel 
near me. Relia beagn to kiss and bite at the palm of my right hand, and at my 
right arm and shoulder, and Tela addressed herself similarly to my left hand and 
arm. I strugged in the chains, but could not resist.
Did you truly think to gain access to our stronhold with so simple a ruse? 
asked Policrates. Yes, I said. I gasped in the chains. I could not pull away 
from the taunting caresses of the slave girls. It was the plan of a fool, said 
Policrates. It was an excellent plan, I said, How did you iknow that we were 
ot the scout ships of Ragnar Voskjard?
We had after all, known the signs and countersigns and, presumably, those of the 
holding of Policrates would not be familiar with all of the men or ships of 
Ragnar Voskjard. Would not it have been clear to anyone? smiled Policrates. 
We were betrayed, I said. It would not have been necessary, of course, 
smiled Policrates, but to be sure you were betrayed.
You knew it would be I and others? I asked.
end of page 277
Certainly, said Policrates. What fools he had made of us. How thunderously had 
the great sea gate descended, destroying our first galley. Who was the 
traitor? I asked. Perhaps Tasdron himself, said Policrates, perhaps even 
Glyco, posing as of your party. Perhaps your dear friend, Callimachus, secretly 
in our pay. Perhaps even a lowly slave, privy to yourmachinations. It could, 
too, be a soldier, one even with our galleys, I said. To be sure, agreed 
Policrates. I struggled in the chains.
Oh, do not struggle so, Master, whispered the red-haired girl at my side, 
soothingly, chidingly. You cannot escape, you know. You are helpless. Be 
content to feel my hands and lips and my body against yours. I cried out with 
rage. I wondered if it had been Peggy, the Earth-girl slve, who had betrayed us. 
She could have overheard our doings, and well suspected our intentions. It would 
have been easy for her in the paga tvern to have informed on us. It could hve 
been done with simplicity in the privacy inthe secrecy of an alcove, her head to 
a pirates feet. Oh Master, reproved the red-haired girl, kissing me as the 
slave she was. I tried to pull loose the chains, but they were of Gorean iron. 
It seemed to me then as if it must have been Peggy who had betrayed us. She 
might well have known or suspected all. Too, she was a slave and a woman! Who 
else could it have been? She indeed must be the traitress, so lovely in her 
collar! It could have been surely none other than she, the branded Earth girl! I 
strugged and cried out with rage. I did not envy the lovely blonde if she were 
caught. I wondered if she knew the fire with which she played. The vengeances 
taken by Gorean men on traitorous female slaves are not gentle.
Was it you, Jason, he of Victoria, inquired Policrates, whom we previously 
entertained in our holding as the courier of Ragnar Voskjard? Of course, I 
said angrily. Liar! said Kliomenes. It surprised me that he had said this. 
Surely they must know that it had been I. Their informant must have known this.
I do not think so Jason, said Policrates, though to be sure you wore tonight 
the same mask as he who posed as the courier.
end of page 278
It was I, I said boldy,none other. Do you maintain this mockery? asked 
POlicrates. Can you not recognize my frame, I asked, my voice?
There are surely strong similarities, mused Policarates. It was I, I said 
puzzled. You would have been chosen precisely for these similarities, said 
Policrates. Why do you think it was not I? I asked. Did your informant not 
make it clear to you that I it ws who brought you the topaz? The topaz, said 
Policrates, was delivered to us by the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. Oh? I 
asked. The true courier, said Policrtes. Oh, I said. What have you done 
with him? inquired Policrates.
I was silent.
I trust that you have not slain him, said Policrates, for doubtless Ragnar 
Voskjard would not be pleased to hear that. I do not understand, I said. I 
was genuinely puzzled.
You intercepted the courier, somehow, on his way back to Ragnar Voskjard, said 
Policrates. It was from him, or perhaps from papers on his person, that you 
learned the signs and countersigns for admittance to the holding. No, I said, 
it ws you yourself who gave to me the signs and countersigns, when I posed as 
the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. That is false, said Policrates. It is true! 
I cried. True! I moaned. I tried to move in the chains. Why would he not call 
off his slaves? Tow of the men of Policrates laughed.
Bikkie, to him, said Policrates. I saw Kliomenes smile.
Yes, my Master, said the short, dark-haired girl, and she smiling, barefoot, 
descended the marble stairs of the dias and taking her place on my left, lowered 
herself gracefully to lie on her side beside me. She began to kiss and lick at 
me and caress me. I am pleaseing him, said the red-haired girl on my right. I 
can please him more, said the dark-haired girl. I did not cry out to Policrates 
for mercy.
end of page 279
I knew he would grant me none. I suppressed a moan. Bikkie was excellent. I had 
little doubt but what she was a valuable slave and would bring a high price. 
Bikkie wore, like one or two of the other girls on the dias, only threads of 
leather, some dozen or so, depending from a leather sheathing encasing the 
locked steel collar on her throat. On the front of the leather sheathing, which 
opened only at the back, to admit the key to the collar lock, there was sewn a 
red leather patch, small in the shape of a heart. The heart to Goreans, as to 
certain of those on Earth is understood, too, as a symbol of love. The life of a 
slave girl, of course, is understood, too, as a life of love. She is given no 
alternative. The leather threads depending from the collar are stout enough to 
bind the hands of a girl, perhaps at her collar, that she may not interfere with 
what is done to her body, but they are not stout enough to bind a man. They may 
be used, of coures, in leasing a Master, not only in setting off the girls 
ill-concealed beauty, but in touching him, brushing him, stimulating him, 
twining about him, and so on. The girl knows that the same strands which can 
bind her helplessly as a slave, are strong enought only to delight and please 
her Master. This helps her to understand that he is a man, and that she is a 
woman.
I turned my head to the side.
Do you still insist that it ws you who entered my holding, posing as the 
courier of Ragnar Voskjard? inquired Policrates. Yes, I said. Yes! We know 
that is not true, said Policrates. How can you know that? I asked. Certainly 
I was prepared to corrobrate my claim, if need be, with descriptions of the 
holding, and accounts of the feast and of our conversations, descriptions and 
accounts much to detailed to have been likely to have been extracted from a 
captive. There are many reasons, said Policrates. One is that you are a man 
of Earth, and no man from that dismal, terrorized world, where men are mean and 
small, could have dared to enter this holding. How do you know I am from 
Earth? I asked.
We know that from Beverly, a slave in this holding, said Policrates. 
Nonetheless, I said, it was I who entered this holding and deceived you, in 
the guise of the courier of Ragnar Voskjard.
end of page 280
Impossible, said Policrates. It is true, I averred.
It angered me that Policrates and Kliomenes, and the others, could not even 
accept this possibility. Surely not every man of Earth was as meaningless, as 
trivial, as obedient, as unquestioning, as well trained, as emasculated and 
effete as their various policital imprisonments demanded. I had little doubt but 
that somewhere on Earth, in spite of censorship, media control, manipulated 
education and outright policical supression, and almost nonexistent channels for 
expressing alternative viewpoints, some males remained men. Not every man can 
forget he is a man, even when he is instructed to do so. Why, he might ask, 
should I forget it? Indeed, why should I not be a man? It is after all, what I 
really am. You may not like it, but that does not make it wrong. Do you truly 
know better than nature? There seems no guarantee that the perversion of nature 
is more likely to lead to general human happiness then its recognition and 
celebration. Only in remaining true to nature can we remain true to ourselves. 
All else must be falsehood and pathology.
I crossed swords with the courier of Ragnar Voskjard in the great hall, said 
Kliomenes. He was not unskilled. Jason of Victoria on the other hand does not 
know the sword. Accordingly, it could not have been I? I asked. Certainly 
not, said Kliomenes. We have information, said Policrates, that it was the 
true courier of Ragnar Voskjard who came to the holding, independently of the 
evidence that it was he who gave us the topaz, which stone presumably could have 
been only in the possession of the true courier. Information? I asked.
Which further, said Policrates, has assured us that the true courier was 
captured, and i not being held by those in league with Tasdron and Glyco.
Suddenly I began to understand what must be the case. Whoever had betrayed us 
must be, or be in contact with, the courier of Ragnar Voskjard, he who had tried 
to obtain the topaz from me on the wharves of Victoria. Ane it must have been 
he, or one in league with him, who had communicated with Policrates. Of course, 
the true courier would not wish it known that he had lost the topaz, that a 
false courier had gained access to the holding.
end of page 281
The true courier, in this respect, was protecting himself. Doubtless he did not 
wish to be bound to the shering blade of one of Ragnar Voskjards galleys. He 
could always maintain later that he had managed to escape from Tastrons 
confinement.
An idea suddenly sprang into my mind, one of a possible modality of escape for 
myself. No, it was I, I said, but I falteres, or seemed to falter, as I said 
this.
Policrates smiled. Do not be afraid, Master, said the red-haired girl at my 
side. No, Master, said Bikkie, the dark-haired wrench, so lasciviously active 
on my left, you are only chained helplessly before your enemies.
Do you still maintain the pretense of having posed as the courier of Ragnar 
Voskjard? inquired Policrates. Yes, I said. I mean, It is not a pretense, 
It was I I made my voice tremble as though I had been found out. Beware, said 
Policrates, there are tortures in this holding to which you might be subjected 
other than the caresses of salve girls, the twisting of chains, of burning 
irons, of knives. The girls laughed.
Make the fool writhe, said Policrates. I gritted my teeth. Beverly! called 
Policrates, sharply. I tried to control myself. Then I saw she who had once been 
Beverly Henderson hurry into the room, commanded by her master. She ran 
immediately to the tiles before the dias on which reposed the large, curule 
chair of Policrates. Swiftly she knelt there, head down, small and beautiful. 
She wore a tiny bit of yellow silk, a steel collar and her brans. Yes, Master, 
said said.
Rise and turn about, Slave, and regard a prisoner, said Policrates.
Gracefully, swiftly, the girl did so. She looked at me, startled. The girls, as 
she had enered, had desisted in their attentions to my body. They would resume 
their ministrations upon the indication of Policrates.
My fists clenched inthe chains. Do you know him? asked Policrates.
end of page 282
Yes, my Master, said the pirates slave. He is Jason, from Victoria. Once he 
was of Earth, as I, your slave. Policrates lifted a finger and the girls about 
me again began to fondle and to kiss and caress at my body.
Beverly, as her masters had chosen to call her, regarded me, unmoved. How do 
you regard the men of Earth? Policrates asked her. I hold them in comtempt, 
she said. To whom to you belong? asked Policrates. To Gorean men, she said, 
who are my natural masters.
I tried to resist the caresses of the slave girls. Could you ever yield to one 
such as he? asked Policrates. Never, she said.
I looked at Beverly, the slave, standing on the tiles, barefoot in the bit of 
silk, almost naked. The collar was very beautiful on her throat and her dark 
hair, loose and soft, as a slaves hair is commonly wornd, was soft and lovely 
about her shoulders. I almost gasped at the sight of her beauty, the lineaments 
of her face and the exquisite curves of her body. I recalled long ago how we had 
met in a restaruant on Earth, and she had desired to speak intimately to me of 
fears and dreams and matter which troubled her. I suspected that there might 
have been at least one matter of which she had not spoken to me, to which she 
had perhaps implicitly alluded, but of which she had refused to explicitly 
speak. I wondered what it might have been. Then I remembered how she had looked, 
with her hair drawn severely back and fastened in a bun, but wearing a svelte, 
feminine, off-the-shoulder, white, satin-sheath gown. Too, she had worn a bit of 
lipstick and eye shadow, and had worn a tiny bit of perfume. On her feet had 
been golden pumps, fastened with a lace of golden straps. She had carried a 
small, silver-beaded purse. The linen had been very white, and the silver soft 
and lustrous in the flickering candlelight. Had I been able to see her then as I 
was now, enabled by my Gorean experience, to see her now, I would have been able 
to see instantly through the trappings of her freedom to the slave beneath. I 
would have know for certain then, as I knew for certain now that she belonged in 
the collar. Then, as now, though I was not able to recognize it clearly then, 
Beverly Henderson was the sort of woman who belonged to me, the sort of woman 
who should be put naked upon the block and sold to the highest bidder.
end of page 283
What an exultant pleasure to own such a woman, and to have her at your bidding, 
your slave, among your treasures.
This fellow claims to have impersonated the courier of Ragnar Voskjard, and to 
have deceived us all, said Policrates to the girl. The girl regarded me in 
astonishment, in disbelief. That is absurd, Master, she said. You were given 
to the courier of Ragnar Voskjard for the night were you not? asked Policrates. 
Yes, Master, said the girl. Tht was your command. You had me sent to his 
chambers. Did he make you yield? inquired Policrates.
Yes, master, she said, head down. He made be yield and many times, and he 
made me yield totaly, and abjectly and as his full slave. Did you find the 
evening instructive? inquired Policrates. Yes, Master, she said. I learned 
that I was a woman and a slave. And? inquired Policrates. And Master, she 
siad, keeping her head down, that I loved being a woman and a slave.
Wat this the man who used you? asked Policrates,this man chained here before 
you? Of course not Master, she said, lifting her head scandalized. Are you 
certain? asked Policrates. Yes Master, she said, He is a man of Earth. No 
man of Earth could make me yield like that. Are you certain? asked 
Policrates.
Yes Master, she said. The arms that held me, Master she said proudly, were 
Gorean. I thought so, smiled Policrates.
I now began to writhe, unable to help myself, beneath the caresses of the 
slaves.
May I withdraw Master, she asked. The sight of this weakling offends me. 
Remove your silk, slave, said Policrates.
Instantly she did so, frightened, commanded.
To him slave, said Policrates. But he is only man of Earth, Master. she 
cried, protesting.
end of page 284
Policrates regarded her. Forgive me Master! she cried and fled to kneel beside 
me with the other girls. Then I felt the lips too, of she who had once been 
Beverly Henderson upon my body. I clenched my fists. I gritted my teeth, but how 
could I resist them?
Describe to me, if you were truly one who posed as the courier of Ragnar 
Voskjard, the nature and furnishing of the chambers in which he reposed the 
night in which we guested him within the holding. said Policrates. I cannot. I 
cannot! I said. This was in accord with my plan.
Policrates and Kliomenes laughed. Surely now none would believe that it had been 
I who had brought the topaz to them. Let them, at least for the time, believe 
that they had received it from the true courier of Ragnar Voskjard.
I shook and shuddered beneath the attention of the slave girls. I pulled against 
the chains. I could not free myself. I writhed and twisted in the chains, 
helpless before my enemy, being arounsed for his amusement.
Please him Beverly, he said. Yes Master, she said.
I looked at her. I remembered her from the restaurant, long ago, the svelte, 
off-the-shoulder white satin-shethe gown, the candlelight, the beaded purse. I 
saw her lower her head, the dark hair falling upon my body.I saw the 
close-fitting steel collar on her throat. Then I felt her lips upon me.
Oh, I said. Aiii! And I cried out the humiliation and shame and with rage, 
and pleasure and joy.
I looked at Beverly. I knew her from Earth. She was to me the most exquisitely 
beautiful and sexually exciting girl I had ever seen. On Earth I had never 
kissed her. On Earth I had scarcely dared to touch her hand. Here on Gor, she 
was a slave. Here on Gor unquestioningly, commanded by her master she had 
pleasured me and well. I had learned on Gor, in the secrecy of a chamber in the 
holding of Policrates, when posing as the courier of Ragnar Voskjard, that she 
was a true slave. I wished that I had known that on Earth. It might have made 
quite a difference in our relationship. She drew back her head, angrily. I 
regretted only that it was not I who owned her. I hate you, she whispered. 
Yes, she was a true slave. I determined that she would one day wear my collar,
end of page 285
that one day it would not be Policrates, but I, who would own her. I remembered 
the wench from the restaurant. Yes it would be pleasant to have her at my feet, 
on this barbaric world, collared and branded, as a helpless Gorean slave girl.
Take him, and chain him to the windlass, said Policrates. And let us hope, 
for his sake, that the courier of Ragnar Voskjard is not harmed.
The girls drew back from me and stood to one side. Two men began to unfasten the 
manacules at my wrists. You pleasured him well, said the red-haired girl to 
Beverly. Yes, said Bikkie. Actually she had done so too swiftly. I would 
instruct her to the proper pleasurings of a masster, when I owned her. it is 
humiliating to be forece to give pleasure to a man of Earth. said Beverly.He 
seems strong and handsome, said the red-haired girl. I do not think I would 
mind being his slave, said Bikkie. you do no tknow him as I do, said Beverly. 
I despise him. He is a weakling and a man of Earth. We are the rightful 
properties only of men such as those from Gor.
My hands were manaculed behind my back. The shackles on my ankles were then 
removed, and I was dragged to my feet. Policrates was talking to Kliomenes.
You received pleasure from what you did, did you not? asked the red-haired 
girl. The only pleasure I received, said Beverly, was in being obedient to my 
masters command. You received pleasure beyond that, said Bikkie. I saw. 
No! said Beverly.
You swallowed did you not? asked the red-haired girl. I had to, said 
Beverly, I am a slave girl. You are so low, laughed the red-haired girl, 
that you could receive pleasure from even a man of Earth. No! said Beverly. 
We saw! laughed Bikkie. No! said Beverly. Even if he is from Earth, said 
the red-haired girl, he is handsome and strong. I think, said Bikkie, tto 
that there might be a master in him. Not in him, sneered Beverly. If he 
owned you, the first thing he would do would be to free you.
end of page 286
Free us? laughed the red-hair girl. Free us? asked another of the girls, 
amused, touching her collar.
What man does not want a beautiflu slave? asked Tala. He must indeed be 
stuipd, or a total fool, said another. Men are the masters, and we are the 
slaves, said another girl, does he now know that?
He knows nothing, said Beverly, tossing her head. I do not believe you, said 
Bikkie. He once freed me, said Beverly.
If he owned me, said Bikkie, he would not free me. He might give me away or 
sell me, but he would not free me. Why? asked Beverly, angrily. I am too 
desirable to free, said Bikkie.
Beverly, with a cry of anger, drew back her hand to slap at Bikkie, but another 
girl seized her hand, that she would not do so. Do not fight, Slave Girls, 
said one of the men about. Yes, Master, said several of the girls.
Master, said Bikki, approaching me. If you owned me, would you free me? 
No, I said. May I ask why not, Master? she inquired. I looked at Beverly, 
but spoke to Bikki. Because you are too desirable to free, I told her.
Beverly looked at me in fury, and Bikkie turned to her in triumph. See? asked 
Bikki.There are slaves and slaves it seems!
So it seems, said Beverly. I smiled inwardly. Should she come again into my 
power, let her try to break the chains in which I would put her.
Have you ever been mastered, Beverly? asked the red-haired girl. Of course, 
Many men have mastered me. said Beverly. I am a slave girl.
To me, said Bikki, you seemed a true slave girl, fully, only when you had 
emerged from the chambers of the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. Beverly smiled, 
It was he who first fully mastered me, she said. He was fully dominant over 
me.
end of page 287
He was overwhelming, and I nothing, only an amourous, compliant, frightened 
slave in his arms. I had not known such a man could exist. He made me weep 
myself his, it seemd a hundred times in his arms. That night I was devastated 
and taught my collar. It was in that night that i first truly learned my 
womanhood and my slavery.
I see that you have never forgotten him, said one of the girls. No, she 
said. Do you love him? asked the red-haired girl. Yes, sahe said. I was 
pleased that she had said this. To be sure, I had made her yield as the salve 
she was.
Perhaps sometime you will be his, said one of the girls softly. He did not 
try to buy me, nor did he ask Policrates to give me to him, said Beverly. To 
him I am only another female slave, a meaningless slut, doubtless already 
forgotten with whom he pleasured himself one night in a strange holding.
It is sometimes hard to be a slave, said one of the girls. We are all 
slaves, said another girl. The masters are all, and we are nothing, said 
another. Yes, said another.
I will take our fleet east on the river, said Policarates to Kilomenes. That 
will discourage interference from towns east on the river. Yes Captain, said 
Kliomenes.
Policrates then turned about and regarded me. Do not look for pretty slaves in 
the chamber of the windlass, he said. I was silent. Oh, Beverly, said 
Policrates. Yes, Master, said the girl, hurrying forward and falling to her 
knees before him. Earlier,  said he, you hesitated, if only briefly, in 
carrying out a command. Forgive me Master, she begged, turning white.
Leading position, he said. Sobbing, she rose to her feet and put her had down 
at what would be the height of a mans waist, her legs flexed. A guard walked 
over and fastened his hand in her hair. Have her whipped, said Policrates. 
Yes Captain, said the man.
end of page 288
He then left the chamber, pulling the girl sobbing at his side. I was pleased to 
see that Policrates was a strict master. The girl was of course, guilty, she had 
clearly hesitated in carrying out a comman. How can a girl expect such laxities 
to go unnoticed or unpunished?
Policrates then, nodded to the men who held me. Take him away, he said. I was 
then dragged from the room.
end of page 289
31    The Chamber of the Windlass; I Begin to Put my Plan into Effect
Cease your lying! cried the pirate.Put your back into it. Yes Captain, I 
said to him, though surely he was not a captain. The whip cracked across my 
back.
I, sweating, chained, pressed my bare feet against the flot wooden slats nailed 
on the large, raised wooden deck, the treading platforme, some five feet above 
the floor, encircling the windlass. I could hear the chain turning on its 
winding axle below the level of the platform. The gate is raised by muscle 
power, abetted by two heavy, drumlike weights which partically balance its 
weight, transmitted to the windlass by means of metal windlass poles or bars, 
these being used to rotate the windlass. The gate, which is heavier than the 
drum-like weights has a gravity descent. In lowering the gate, the windlass, 
under the control of the workers, serves primarily as a brake, sufficing to 
regulate the speed of its descent. The principles and gearing of the winlass, 
which is an upright windlass, are analogous, of course to those of the capstan.
I pressed against the heavy metal pole, or bar, almost five inches in diameter, 
fixed now, like a spoke in the shaft of the windlass. My neck, in its collar, by 
a chain, was fastened in this pole. It was thus that I was kept in my place. My 
wrists and ankles were also chained. I had some 18 inches of play for my feet.
end of page 290
I had some 24 inches of play for my hands. These
arrangements represent what is theoretically an optimum compromise between 
prisoner secuity and the degress of freedom essential to efficiently operate the 
windlass.
Push! cried the pirate. Again the whip struck across my back, I thurst again 
against the bar. The chip, then, struck elsewhere, too, and thre were cries of 
pain and the sounds of men moving in chains. There were five large poles, or 
bars, set in the windlass. At each, five men, chained as I was, labored. There 
poles may be inserted into the windlass and if one wishes, removed from it. The 
collars and neck chains keep men fastened to the pole, whether it is inserved 
within the windlass or not. When moving about, the pin-and-lock device opened, 
the men will carry the pole with them. When the pole is on the ground, and not 
lifted, one can rise no higher of course, then on ones knees with ones hands 
deferentially lowered.
Push, push! Move! called the pirate. The last struck amongst us. As the 
windlass turned slowly, creaking, we heard, too, overhead and to the side, the 
movement and swining of the great drumlike sounterweights on their chains. 
Without these counterweights, we could not have moved the sea gate.
I again felt the lash, as did the others, too. The pirate walked about us. It is 
dim and musty in the chamber of the windlass. It can be hot during the day. My 
hands slipped on the bar. Then I had it gain. Too, at night, it can be extremely 
cold. There was a smell of wastes in the chamber. Perhaps it would have been 
less unplesasant if our captors had permitted us clothing.
Work, work! called the pirate. Work! But he did not strike us again. The 
weights were no in motion.
There is little to amuse one in the chamber of the windlass, save, I suppose, 
eating and drinking and dreams. There is a shallow trough for water, cut in the 
stone, near one wall, where we would be chained when not working. This is filled 
twice daily. Too, at the well, we would be thrown crusts of bread and scraps of 
meat and fruit, usually the garbage of the feasts of pirates, our captors.
end of page 291
Then at night, chained, cold, when we would fall asleep, we would have our 
dreams. These dreams would usually be of slave girls, soft and warm, lucious, 
licking and kissing in our arms. Then we would awaken to the straw, to the cold, 
to the stones, to the damp cold, heavy iron of our chains. There were no pretty 
slave girls in the chamber of the windlass, as Policrates had told me. But we 
had our dreams. One girl, more than any others, Beverly Henderson, though she 
now appeared generallly in my dreams not as the lovely, free Earth girl, Miss 
Henderson, but under a variety of names, as a Gorean slave girl, perhaps 
suddenly turning to greet me perhaps in a market, imploring me to buy her; 
perhaps on a rounded slave block, I with a purse of gold in hand, having ready 
the means with which to buy her; perhaps an escaped slave, pilfering in my 
compartment, then turning, then knowing herself caught; perhaps being pulled 
from a slave sack I had bought on speculation; perhaps drawn by the hair from 
the tend of an enemy; perhaps chained in the darkness, and then illuminated; it 
would generally, almost always, suddenly, somehow, seem she. My Master! she 
would say, knowing herself mine, acknowledging herself mine, kneeling before me. 
One dream I had had several times. We were having dinner in the restaurant, as 
we had had long ago. She was wearing the white, off-the-shoulder dress. She had 
the beaded purse. We finished the dinner and our coffee and I told her, I am 
going to make you a slave girl. You cannot do that, she told me. You are 
mistaken, I told her. How can I be mistaken? she asked. It is very simple, 
I said. You do not know the nature of men, This is a public place, she said. 
That is all right, I told her. She turned to a man at a nearby table. He 
intends tomake me a slave, she said to him. That is all right, said the man. 
You are a slave. Strip now, and do not daily longer, Woman, I told her. 
Then, in my dream, slowly and gracefully, the clothing put aside, seeming to 
float from her, Miss Henderson standing beside the stable on the carpet of the 
restaurant, stripped herself. I then unbound her hair, so that it fell loosely, 
almost floating, about her shoulders. No one in the restaurant paid the least 
attention. I then removed a black leather cord from my pocket and bound her 
small wrists behind her back.
end of page 292
The ends of the cord were long, and fell to the level of the back of her knees. 
Precede me now from the restaurant, I told her. I wish to see how you move. 
She made her way between the tables. On the way out we passed the two women whom 
we had seen long ago in the restaurant. My Master has tied me, she said to 
them. Yes, said the larger of the two women. As we approached the door of the 
restaurnat, we passed on our left the hat-check counter. Excellent slave meat, 
said the blond hat-check girl, Peggy, behind the counter. You, too, I told 
her, are excellent slave meat. My Master has not yet claimed me, she said. 
Be patient, I told her. Yes, Master, she said. At the door to the restaurant 
we stopped. On the other side of this door at this moment, I told her, is 
another world. It is quite different from your old world. If you cross this 
threshold now, you wil be in the world. Do you understand? Yes, Jason, she 
said. And in that world, I told her, you will be, legally and completely a 
slave. Yes, Jason, she said. I then opened the door. Beyod that door lay not 
the bricks, the gutters, the dingy air, the hurrying of traffic, the triviality 
and misery, which had previously lain outside it, but now, as the door opened, 
we saw open fields, vast and green, and a sky that was gloriously blue, studded 
with scudding clouds. The air was gloriously fresh, pure and clean. She stepped 
across the dark, stained, flat board that marked the threshold of the 
restaurant, out onto the grass, into the sunlight and wind. You have crossed 
the threshold into the world of Gor, I told her. She turned to face me. Yes, 
Master, she said. I turned ad closed the door, the dark, heavy door, with the 
rectangular panes of glass set in it, with the curtains behind the glass. As the 
door closed, it, and the restaurant and tits world vanished. I turned to face 
the girl. We were alone in the field in the sunlight. It is time to begin to 
accustom you to your slavery, I told her. Yes, my Master, she said.
Do not slave, you Sleen! said the pirate, snapping his whip. Work, work!
We had in the last few days, many times raised and lowered the sea gate. I 
speculated that these activities were largely connected with the coming and 
going of scout ships, and supply shipes and fitting vessels.
end of page 293
Then yesterday, the gate had been open for some four Ahn. I speculated that the 
fleet of Policrates, was not abroad. In his own hall, when his girls had 
finished with me, making me yield in his presence, his enemy, for the amusement 
of himself and his men, I had heard him as he had spoken to Kliomes, declare an 
intention to move his fleet east. Now I gathered, he had done so. Doubtless this 
was to discourage the formation of an alliance among the eastern towns, and to 
prevent ships being sent to stop or delay Ragnar Voskjard at the chain west of 
Port Cos.
Keep moing, called the pirate. Again the whip cracked. As I made my way about 
the windlass, treading the slatted circular platform, with my bellow prisoners, 
thrusting against the metal pole, I saw cained to the wall and at one side, 
behind the water trough cut in the stonre, their necks still fastened to their 
own polkes, two other sets of prisoners. There are those in reserve, additional 
chained crews for the work of the windlass. Too, as was clear, no one at the 
windlass was indispensable. This comprehension doubless played its role in 
keeping order amongst us. We knew that any one of us could be cut from his 
chains at the merest whim of our jailer.
Hold! called the pirate. We stopped, the gate lifted. He engged the holding 
pawl. The gate would not now slip. The weights, overhead and to one side, swung 
on their chains. We reverted our position at the poles, stepping under them and 
then standing, turing the chain swivels to which the chains on our collars were 
attached. We werer no in position to brake the gate, in its lowering. I, then, 
like several of the others, the holding pawl now engaged, put my head down on 
the bar, resting. It is not easy to raise the gate. Outside I suuupposed that 
one or more ships, river galleys, might be gracefully entering or leaving the 
lakelike couryard of this holding of Policrates. The signal to raise or lower 
the gate is given by a guard on the wall, at the west gate tower, one of two 
towers flanking the sea gate. It is a voice signal. Accordingly its authenticity 
is seldom in doubt. Anyone, of course, might strike on a bar or blow on a 
trumpet. The windlass apparatus was withing the west gate tower.
It felt good to rest.
Yesterday, the gate had been open for some four Ahn. I conjectured the fleet had 
left. Too, it seemed likely to me that Policrates would have accompanied the 
fleet.
end of page 294
Indeed, in his hall, I had gathered from what I had heard that the fleet was to 
set forth under his personal command. The work afoot thus, was doubtless too 
serious to be left now to suborbinates. Kliomenes, I suspected would then have 
been left in charge of the holding. That at any rate was my hope.
The ate is soon to be closed, said the priate. Be ready. It takes less time 
to close the gate than open it, but that too, because of the weights involved, 
the windlass stress and the need to control the windlass, requires a 
considerable effort. To make the gate fall with extreme swiftness, incidentally, 
as was done when my galley was shattered, it is necessary only to disengage one 
of the counterweights. The polelike spokes, of course, by which the windlass is 
normally turned or managed should be freed of the windlass before this is done, 
a disengagement which is effected by loosing the pin-and-lock devices and 
withdrawing the poles from the windlass. If this were not done, the poles would 
spin wickedly, turing with the rotating windlass. This eventuality would be 
extremely dangerous, of course, to anyone withing the compass of the poles 
movement or who might be, as we were, chained to the poles themselves. There are 
two counterweights, as I have mentioned, which partially balance the weight of 
the gate. The disengagement of one is quite sufficient to permit the gate to 
rattle viciously downward. If both were disengaged, the gate itself might be 
severely damanged.
Be ready! called the pirate. I looked upward, the collar slipping on my neck. 
A golden shaft of light flitered downward, falling gently into the chamber. In 
it there danced a myriad specks of golden dust. It was very beautiful. I also 
noted that the window was too narrow to admit the egress of a man.
I fooled Policrates, himself, I memtioned to the fellow next to me, when I 
brought the topaz to him. He did not know me for an imposter, any more than the 
dolt, Kliomenes.
The fellow looked at me blankly. Liar! screamed the pirate. I have warned you 
about your lies. The whip fell again and again on me. Persist in these lies, 
cried the pirate, and I will bring the matter to the attention of Kliomenes 
himself! Forgive me, Captain, I said, as though frightened.
end of page 295
But I had gathered from his remark that my conjecture that Policrates was not 
now in the holding was correct. Surely if Policrates had been in the holding, he 
would have threatened me with his name and not that of Kliomenes, since I had 
expressly mentioned Policrates and he stood higher in the holding than 
Kliomenes. Kliomenes must now, I gathered, be in charge of the holding. This, I 
felt, was in the best interests of my plan.
Lower the gate! we heard a man call. Lower the gate! Then far above us and 
to the right of the windlass chamber, angry, entering out onto a small balcony 
extending into the chamber, a balcony reached through a guardroom, we saw a 
pirate. Wht is going on down there? he called.
Nothing! called the pirate who had been striking me. Did you not hear the 
signal? called the man on the balcony. The pirate with us glared at me, in 
fury. He loosened the holding pawl. Immediately we felt the stress in the 
windlass gates.
Pay attention, you fool, called the man on the balcony. Listen! Get the gate 
down! Lower the gate! cried the pirate with us, angrily. Hurry, you fools!
We felt the bars pulling against our arms and slowly, with effort, as the 
weights ascended, permitted the descent of the gate. Then the gate was down. I 
met the eyes of the pirate. He looked at me in fury. I looked down as though 
frightened.
But I was not displeased with the occurrences of this day.
end of page 296
32    My Plan is Successful; I Take My Leave from the Holding of Policrates
Let them be whipped, said Kliomenes, both of them. Kliomenes reclined in the 
curule chair of Policrates, holding his court.
Mira and Tula, the blood sisters from Cos, kneeling naked before the chair of 
Kliomenes, their hands bound behind their back, their necks joined by a length 
of binding fiber, cried out with misery. They had failed in sufficiently 
pleasing Jandar, one of the minor captains in the holding of Policrates. Each in 
the opinion of Jandar, had not tried hard enought to outdo the other in 
addressing themselves to his pleasure. Perhaps the fact that they were sisters 
had to some extent inhibited them, each fearing to appear the most lascivious 
slave before the other. Yet, of course, such inhibitions, under any 
circumstances, are not permitted to slave girls. They would get over them, or 
die. Too, I suspected that Jandar had not handled them well. If he would have 
handled them with adequate skills, I had little doubt that each, indeed would 
have striven desperately to outdo the other, each trying to be the favorite. 
Properly handled, he would have had them in moments at one anothers throats as 
competitive love slaves.
Should this complaint be brought again to my attenion, said Kliomanes to the 
girls, I shall have you cast naked into the jaws of tharlarion.
end of page 298
Yes, Master! said Mira. Yes, Master! said Tala.
Take them away,  said Kliomenes. The two girls, by the binding fiber which 
tied them together by the neck, were pulled, half choking to their feet, and 
dragged from his presense.
Why have I been brought here, Captain? I asked the pirate at my side, who had 
conducted me to the tiles of the hall. It was he who was commonly in charge of 
the workers at the windlass.
Kliomenes is holding court, he grinned. But I have done nothing, I said as 
though frightened. We shall let Kliomenes be the judge of that, he said. 
Please no, Captain, I said. Be silent, he said, grinning.
Yes Captain, I said. the collar and chain which had fastened me to the 
windlass pole had been removed from my neck, but I wore still on my wrists and 
ankles, the other chains from the room of the windlass.
What is next? inquired Kliomenes. The dispositon of loot, said a pirate. He 
thrust five, low, flat coffers of coins across the tiiles and put beside them a 
tangle of jewlery and a bowl of pearls. And there is this too, said the man. 
He thrust forward a chained girl. Her ankles were joined by some two feet of 
graceful chain and her wrists,too, were linked by some two feet of chain. This 
type of chaining is not so much to confine a girl as it is to have her in chains 
and display her. This typoe of chaining is very beautiful. The primary bone on 
such a girl of course, is her slavery itself. On Gor what stronger bond need a 
girl wear?
She stood before Kliomenes graceful in the chains. Is she pretty? asked 
Kliomenes.
Her head was covered with semi-transparent scarled cloth, the central portion of 
such a cloth which had been cast over her, a large cloth, which fell to her 
calves. It was held on her by being tied under her chin and about her neck with 
a soft, braided scarlet cord. I could see the lineaments of her body beneath the 
semi-transparent cloth. She was left-thigh branded, the common Kajaria mark, 
that mark which can grace the thigh of any girl, from the most average of slaves 
to the prises in a Ubars Pleasure Gardens.
end of page 289
And, indded, does that mark not tell us that they are all, in a sense, from the 
homeliest pot girl to the imbonded treasure of a Ubar, only common Kajirae?
The pirate hehind the girl, whohad thrust her forward, unknotted the cord from 
her throat, that which held the cloth over her head and kept it fixed, too, upon 
her body. She could probably see somewhat through the cloth, but not well. There 
seemed something familiar about her. The pirte drew the cloth away from the 
slave. He dropped it behind her. She knelt, I stepped back. It was she who had 
once been the Lady Florence of Vonda. I knew her now, of course, as Florence, 
who was, or had been, the slave of Miles of Vonda. To be sure, she was 
deliciously loot.
You may do obeisance, my dear, said Kliomenes. The girl rose to her feet and 
went to Kliomenes. She knelt before him on the dias and put her head down. 
Gently, softly, she licked and kissed his feet. She then rose again to her feet, 
backed away, and then on the tiles again knelt. She put the palms of her hands 
on the tiles and lowered her head to the tiles. Then she straightened up, her 
back straight, assuming the position of the pleasure slave, thought keeping her 
head bowed deferentially.
She is pretty, said Kliomenes. Yes, said the pirate. Girl, said Kliomenes. 
Yes, Master, she said lifting her head. How were you taken? asked Kliomenes.
By force, Master, she said. My Master, Miles of Vonda, took ship from 
Victoria in the Flower of Siba, I knew the ship, Siba is one of the Vosk towns. 
It lies to the east of Sais.He was bound for Turmus. He took two slaves with 
him, myself, and a male slave, he named Krondar. Miles of Vonda in my opinion 
had been rash. I had suggested my reservations concerning traveling on the river 
in these troubled times to Florence, when I had spoken to her in the tavern of 
Tasdron. She would, doubtless, in turn had conveyed these reservations to Miles 
of Vonda. But it seems the proud Vondan had ignored them. Doubtless he had 
ignored the advice of others too in this matter. In the river towns the dangers 
of these times ere common knowledge. Little else, these days, it seemed, was 
spoken of in the taverns, in the markets, and on the wharves.
end of page 299
We were attacked by two ships west of Tafa, she said. One, as I understand 
it, was the galley Telia, captained by Sirnak, of this holding, he who has just 
presented me, and other loot before you. The other was the galley Tamira, 
captained by Reginald, he who is in the fee of Ragnar Voskjard.
You were to escort the Tamira back to the vicinity of the chain, said 
Kliomenes, regarding the pirate who had presented the loot before him. How is 
it that you dallied enroute to engage in more prosiac transactions? It was 
gold lying on the sand, fruit ripe to be plucked, shrugged the pirate. The 
Tamira is carrying the signs and countersigns, as you know, said Kliomenes. 
They are safe, the pirate assured him.
What is the Tamira? I asked the pirate next to me. The scout ship of Ragnar 
Voskjard, said he. I had assumed this must be the case. I, myself, in my 
unsuccessful ruse, betrayed, presumeably by the Earth-girl slave, Peggy, had 
posed as a commander of scout ships, supposedly sent ahead by the fleet of 
Ragnar Voskjard. Now, it seemed, so soon, the actual ship or ships, although it 
now seemed there was only one, had appeared, conducted its business, and was not 
returning westward on the river, presumably to renderzvous with the Voskjard. 
That a single ship had been involved suggested a certain complacency on the part 
of the western pirates. Had they truly so little to fear?
The chain has not yet been cut? I asked. I gathered that it had not been cut 
from the nature of the conversation I had heart. On the other hand, it seemed 
puzling to me how the Voskjards scout ship could have appeared in these waters 
if the chain had not been cut. No, said the pirate next to me. How could she 
have crossed the chain? I asked.
A single ship, posing as a merchantman, not inspected, it was not difficult, 
he said. The chain was opened for her? I asked. As it is for honest ships, 
said the man. He grinned.
She experienced no difficulties? I asked. We have friends at the cahin, said 
the pirate. I see, I said. She will return as she came, he said.
end of page 300
I see, I said. Inwardly, I was furious. How futile, how ineffective was the 
expedient of the chain! Kliomenes regarded the flat coffers of coins on the 
tiles before his dias, the jewelry, the bowl of pears, and the girl. Is this, 
he asked, truly an equal division of the spoils of the Flower of Siba? We 
have something of the better of it in my opinions, said the pirate before the 
dias. I see, said Kliomenes. Not much of great value is currently mvoing on 
the river, said the pirate. Men are frightened. Most of the loos is being kept 
in the towns.
Once joined with the Voskjar, said Kliomenes, we can fetch it forth from the 
towns as it please us, True, Captain, said the pirate.
Kliomenes smiles, addressed as Captain, though within the holding of Policrates. 
Put the coins, the jewlery, and pearls in the general coffers, said Kliomenes. 
The pirate before the dias signaled to some men and they moved the coins, the 
jewelry and pears from before the dias. And what of this? asked the pirate 
before the dias, taking the girl by the hair and forcing her head up and back, 
bending then her body back so as to reveal the bow of her enslaved beauty.
Kliomenes regarded the girl, musingly. the value of many thing, he said, seem 
patent, but not hte value of a slave. He gestured that the priate should 
release her, and he did so. The girl then knelt looking at him. Are you only 
beautiful, my dear? he asked.
She put down her head, sobbing. Keep her in the holding, said Kliomenes. I 
myself shall assess her tonight. The girl then in her chains was dragged 
sobbing from his presence.
Kliomenes then looked at me, and I was thrust forward, stumbling toward the 
dias. Unbidden, I knelt. There was laughter from the pirates in the room. I was 
the last items on his agenda for the morning. He had saved me for last.
I should have slain you long agin, in the tavern of Tasdron in Victoria, said 
Kliomenes.
end of page 301
Forgive me, Captain, I said, head down. I understand that you are a braggart 
and a liar, said Kliomenes. No, no, Captain, I said hastily.
He maintains, said the pirate who had conducted me to the room, he normally in 
charge of the crews of the windlass, that he deceived both you and Policrates, 
and us all, by posing as the courier of Ragnar Voskjard. Are you so desperate 
for status among your fellow sleen, asked Kliomenes, that you will risk such 
lies in this place?
I kept my head down. I seemed to tremble.
You warned him, did you not? inquired Kliomenes of my guard. Many time, 
Kliomenes, said the man, But even this morning he persisted in these 
assertions, thinking I wa snot within that distance wherein I might detect his 
boasts. I see, said Kliomenes.
Too, yesterday, said the man, he spoke disparaglingly of you. What did he 
say? inquired Kliomenes, amused. He spoke of you - as a dolt, said the 
pirate.
There was laughter from among the men present. Now, I noted, lifting my head, 
that Kliomenes did not seem amused. There was resentment of Kliomenes and 
jealously and fear, I suspected in the holding. There were perhaps others 
present who would not have minded usurping his lieutenancy to Policrates. 
Kliomenes looked about the room, and the laughter instantly faded. That is 
indeed amusing, said Kliomenes, returning his attention to me.
Forgive me, Captain, I begged. Do not slay him, Kliomenes, said one of the 
men near the curule chair, for he might be of use in bargaining for the freedom 
of the true courier of Ragnar Voskjard, who must have been captured by our 
enemies in Victoria.
They would not exchange so valuable a man for this worthless fellow, a dock 
worker, said Kliomenes. Wait for Policrates, said the man. Let him make 
decision on this matter.
end of page 302
In the absence of Policrates, said Kliomenes.
I am first in the holding. I do not contest that, said the man, stepping 
back angrily. Kliomenes again look at me. Thus, said he, if you are truly he 
who poses as the courier of the Voskjard, you, too, must be not unskilled with 
the sword. Forgive me, Captain, I begged. Put a sword in his hand, said 
Kliomenes.
The fellow near me, who had brought me to the room, withdrew his blade from its 
sheath. He held it to me, hilt first. No, I said, no! Take it, said 
Kliomenes, evenly.
I took the blade by the hilt, in one chained wrist. I took care to hold it 
improperly. I held it as thought it might have been a hammer, and too close to 
its guard, which would of cours, in actual swordplay, impari its mobility 
considerable.
Two of three of the men laughed. Kliomenes then rested back in his curule chain. 
He had been watching closely. He was a vain and arrogant man, but he was no 
fool. He had not won his way to the lieutenancy of Policrates by being stuipd.
Can you not kill me as I am, in my chains? I asked. Must you mock me? Take 
him outside, said Kliomenes, rising and sstretching. Please Captain, one 
favor, I begged, One favor. What? asked Kliomenes, puzzled. Do not let 
those of the windlass room know what was done to me, I begged.
Bring them, in their chains, outside, said Kliomenes, to my guard, that they 
may observe what is done to this fellow. No, Captain, please! I begged. But 
already two men were pulling me by the arms from the room.
I blinked against the light of the sun. I felt the chains on my wrists and 
ankles being removed. Armed men surrounded me. In one hand I still clutched, 
with apparently ineptness, and as though in fear, the sword which I had been 
commanedd to take from the pirate.
end of page 303
I looked about. I stood on a board walk, some twenty feet wide, which boarders 
the lakelike courtyard of the holding. We were within its high, formidable 
walls. Wharfed within the courtyard were only some five vessels, and smaller 
boats. To my right was a large door of dark iron leading into the recesses of 
the holding. Across the courtyard, some hundred yards or so of deep water, I 
could see the walkway at the foot of the outer wall and the stairs leading to 
the parapets. Too, I could see the great sea gates.
You will soon see whta your braggadocio will gain you, said my guard whose 
sword I clutched. There was laughter about us.
I then heard the sounds of chains, moving in a slow cadence. My fellowes, now in 
close chains and ankle coffle, from the room of the windlass, were being brought 
out to observe what was to be done to me.
I put my head down as though shamed to be exposed as a liar before them. This 
way too, my smile that they were no longer in the room of the windlass and were 
heavily chained, could be concealed. It would be several Ehn, surely, before 
they could be returned to the room of the windlass and manage to raise the sea 
gate.
Back away, Give us room, said Kliomenes, approaching. I shuddered and stepped 
back. He handed his sword to a fellow and pulled his tunic down to the waist. he 
then took his sword back, and with a slash or two in the fiar, tried its 
balance. I saw that his blade would move with great swiftness. i was also 
reassured that mine could move even more swiftly.
Clear more space, said Kliomenes.
The men moved back around us clearing a broad circle. Tow of the men with 
Kliomenes, I noticed, had their own blades drawn. If perchance, he found himself 
in difficulties, I did not doubt but what they would soon interpose themselves 
on his behald. It would do me no good, of course, even if I could manage it to 
wound or slay Kliomenes within the confines of the present situation. My 
objective was not to deal with him, so to speak, but to extricate myself from 
the holding. My only chance in this rapid, dark matter, as I saw it, was to 
enlist his vanity and hopefully a recklessness attendant upon it, in my own 
cause.
Are you ready, my stalwart simpleton, my handsome brraggart, to now make good 
your showy boasts? inquired Kliomenes.
end of page 304
I looked to the fellows from the windlass. They stood there, locked in their 
chains, grim and sullen. A miserable looking crew I thought. Their despondency 
pleased me. In spite of my vainglorious carrying-on in the room of the windlass, 
which doubtless they must have found tiresome, it did not seem, even so, that 
they were looking forward eagerly to seeing me butchered before their very eyes. 
This pleased me. It also encouraged me to believe that they would find it 
difficult to make their way rapidly back to the room of the windlass. Hurried, 
they might even be expected to fall or to become entangled in their chains. Such 
things can happen.
The blade suddenly darted to ward me. I stumbled backward, off balance. Lucky 
parry, said one of the priates. There is no Callimachus to rescue you now, 
Dolt, said Kliomenes, measuring me, the point of his blade moving subtly a yard 
from the chest. Then again the blade struck, swift as an ost, toward me. The 
dock worker is fortunate, said one of the pirates.
But then I was afraid, for I realized that Kliomenes had intended that time to 
truly strike me. He had now backed away and was regarding me warily. One such 
parry might be fortunate, but that two such parries should follow one another, 
apparently so clumsy, and yet, both similarly effective, would surely appear to 
defy the probabilities involved in such matters.
He is skilled, said Kliomenes. He is clumsy! laughed one of the men. There 
was more laughter. Are you afraid, Kliomenes? asked another.
Kliomenes glances to the two men nearest him, those with their swords drawn. At 
a word from him, of course, bothwould rush upon me and then perhaps others. I 
dropped my sword. Kliomenes tensed, but did not rush forward. You could have 
killed him then, said a man.
I clumsily, picked up the sword, breathing heavily. I looked at Kliomenes as 
though frightened.
Kliomenes was regardin me, undecided. He knew that I could have retrieved the 
sword before he could have reached.
end of page 305
He did not know, however, for certain that I also knew that. Have mercy, 
Captain, I said to him. He is afraid, said one of the pirates.
I then realized that I must play a most dangerous game. It was not the others I 
must convince of my ineptitude with the blade, but Kliomenes himself. The others 
did not matter.
Forgive me, Captain, I begged. I then knelt and put the sword on the walkway 
before me. Then I slid it, hilt first toward him. There were snorts of scorn 
from the pirates about. Please, Captain, I begged, let me be returned to the 
windlass.
Kliomenes smiled. Coward, said more than one of the pirates to me. I knelt at 
the mercy of Kliomenes, defenseless. He could then have rushed upon me and 
slaughtered me like a tethered verr. Please, Captain, I seemed to beg, let me 
be returned to the windlass. Kliomenes looked about himself and smiled. Then he 
kicked the blade back to me. Take up your sword, he said.
I reached for the blade and as I did so, he rushed upon me, and I met the blade, 
striking downwards, with a flash of steel and a shower of sparks. He was off 
balance and I reared upward, close to him, within his guard, seizing him and 
half turning him in the crook of my right arm, the blade in that hand. Back 
away! I cried to the pressing others. Kliomenes cried out with misery. My left 
hand was not in his hair, pulling his head back and the blade of my sword lay 
across his throat.
Back away! whispered Kliomenes, tensely, held. I turned, holding him, seeing 
that the others kept their distance. Do not come closer, I warned the pirates, 
or his throat is cut.
I slipped, said Kliomenes. I slipped. Drop your sword, I told Kliomenes. 
he did so. Release him, said one of the pirates. You cannot escape.
Put down your swords, I told them. Put them on the walk.
end of page 306
They hesitated and Kliomenes felt the edge of the steel, set to slide n his 
throat. Put down your swords, Fool! said Kliomenes. I saw the steel, blade by 
blade, sheathed and unsheathed, put to the stones of the walk. My steel ws then 
to the back of Kliomenes. Precede me to the parapets, I told hi. Do not 
follow, I warned the pirates.
Surrenderyour sword, said Kliomenes. Hurry, I told him. You have nothing 
with which to bargain, he said. I have your life, I told him. He tenses. 
Before you could run two steps, I told him, I could have you half onmy sword 
or cut your head from your body. Perhaps not, said Kliomenes, uneasily.
It is a risk I am content to take, I informed him. Are you? He looked at me.
I opened my left hand at my hip. If necessary, I said, I am prepared to 
conduct you to the parapets, bend over, as a female slave.
That will not be necessary, he said. He turned, then, and preceded me about 
the walkway bordering the lakelike courtyard. I looked back and saw the group of 
pirates. They did not follow. They stood near the iron door, the entry into the 
inner holding. Their steel lay still about their feet.
Put aside your bow, I ordered one of th emen on the walls, climing towrd the 
parapets. In a few moments, walking along the parapets, we had come to the edge 
of the west gate tower, that which houses, in its lower level, the chamber of 
the windlass. Two or three of the men, their bows in hand, edged near us. Put 
aside your bows, I told them. Do as he says, said Kliomenes, angrily.
The bows were put to their feet. They were short, ship bows, stout and 
maneuverable, easy to use n croweded quartes, easy to fire across the bulwarks 
of galleys locked in combat. I had seen only such bows in the holding of 
Policrates. Their rate of fire, of course, is much superior to that of the 
crossbow, either of the drawn or windlass variety.
end of page 307
All things considered, the ship bow is an ideal missile weapon for close-range 
naval combat. it is superior in this respect even to the peasant bow, or long 
bow, which excells it in impact, range and accuracy.
I glanced over the edge of the wall. We were, as I had intended in the vicinity 
of the sea gate. I did not know how deep the water was there. Yet I knew I it 
must be deep enough to accommodate the keel of a captured, heavily laden round 
ship.
What do you intend? asked Kliomenes. Tell them to fetch the rope, I said, 
gesturing to the men on the wall. Kliomenes grinned, Fetch rope, he said. They 
hurried down the stairs. It seems you wil make good your escape, said 
Kliomenes. He assumed that I had had the men seriously sent for rope. He assumed 
that when they returned, I would use the rope to descend from the wall. By that 
time, of coures, the men would be again on the wall, doubtless some of them 
armed and with bows. Clambering down the rope, I would be vulnerable, and the 
rope too could be cut.
Now, we are alone on the wall, I said to Kliomenes, leveling the sword at his 
belly. He backed away a step. Do not kill me, he said suddenly, turing white. 
Behind him was the long drop to the walkway below.
I drew back my arm as though to ram the steel through his belly. He twisted away 
and fled. I laughed not pursuing him. I did not think he would stop until he was 
safely again among his men. Then, discarding the sword, I ascended the parapet 
and leaped feet first to the waters far below. It seemed I was a long time in 
the air. The rush of it was cold on my body and tore at my hair. I then struck 
the water, seeming to plummet through it, and struck with great force the mud 
and debris of the bottom. I sank into it to my knees. i feared my legs were 
broken. The water ws swirling about me, loud, roaring in my ears. I tore loose, 
kicking, of the mud, and pushed upward toward the surface which after some 
seconds, gasping I broke. I shook the water from my head; I blinked it from my 
eyes. I looked upward at the parapets far above. My legs were numb but I could 
control them. No arrows struck into the water about me. I gasped for breath, and 
then submerged, and swam underwater for the brush and trees, half sunken, which 
boarded the channel leading to the gate.
end of page 308
I emerged among roots and reeds. Only then, looking back from the cover of the 
half-submerged growth, did I see men first appear on the walls. They would not 
even know in which diretion I had set out. I then swam again underwater for a 
time until I emerged in the spongy terrain north and west of the holding, 
shielded from sight by trees from her walls. I assumed they would think I would 
have emerged north and east of the channel, for that lies closer to Victoria. I 
would at any rate have a good sart on any who might wish to give pursuit. It 
would take several Ehns, I was sure, to get the great sea gate raised. I had 
seen to that. I could always cross the channel northeastward at my convenience, 
under the cover of darkness, to move toward Victoria, or I might, if I chose, 
move simply to the southern shore of the Bosk. I was certain I could find a 
means from there to make my way back to Victoria. Small ships abound on the 
Vosk. I began then to move swiftly. I was cold. But I was in good spirits.
end of page 309
33    Battle Horns
We welcome your sword, said Callimachus. We stood in the bow of the long 
galley, below the stem castle. The single mast had been lowered and lay secured, 
tied, lengthwise on the deck, between the benches.
Our ship lay to, east of the great chain. I could see little, because of the 
fot. it was a chilly morning. The water licked at the strakes. Far off, unseen, 
I heard the cry of a Vosk gull.
It was not necessary that you have joined the fleet, sasid Callimachus. It is 
here that I belong, I said. You have risked much already, said he. We were 
betrayed, I told him. Yes, he said.
I was bitter. The great sea gates had crashed down, destroying the galley on 
which I had sought to enter the holding of Policrates. I had been captured, and 
had managed to escape. I had made my way to Victoria, and hence westward, 
learning of the movement of ships toward the chain. Yesterday evening, I had 
boarded the Tina, out of Victoria, captained by Callimachus. If the Voskjard 
attempts to cross the chain in force, said Callimachus,we will not be able to 
stop him.
It was the Earth-girl slave, Peggy, Tasdrons property who betrayed us, I 
said. Can you be sure? asked Callimachus. I am sure, I said. Was it 
Callisthenes? I asked him. It could not be Callisthenes, said Callimachus.
end of page 310
He is known to me. Too, he is a captain of Port Cos, and of my own caste. I 
looked over the gunnels. To port and starboard, each some 50 yards aawy, gray 
and silent, intermittently visible in the fog, each lying to, as was the Tina, 
were two other galleys, the Mira out of Victoria, and the Talender out of Fina.
Too, said Callimachus, he is my friend. It was cold. Does it seem likely to 
you that it ws Tasdron or Glyco? I asked. It could not hve been Tasdron, said 
Callimachus. His interests would be too opposed to such an action. Indeed, he 
is the leader in Victoria of those who would oppose the power of the men of 
Policrates.
Perhaps it was Glyco, then, I said bitterly. He is not of my own caste, 
admitted Callimachus. Nor is Tasdron, I said. True, said Callimachus.
Glyco, I pointed out, has enlisted your aid against the pirates. He is not 
with the fleet, said Callimachus. He is now east on the river, trying to raise 
support for our cause, I said. Perhaps, said Callimachus. But no ships have 
been forthcoming. I do not think Glyco will be successful, I said. There is 
too much distrust among the towns, and they fear the pirates too much. Too, the 
fleet of Policrates is now east of Victoria, to prevent such ships from 
reinforcing us. I have told you this.
Callimachus was silent.
Why is it not obvios to you that the traqtor was the slave, Peggy? I asked. 
She could not have heard, said Callimachus, uncertainly, angrily. She was in 
the room, I said. She must have heard.She is not stuipd, though she is a 
slave. She could have understood much of what we planned. Doubtless she revealed 
our plans to the courier of Ragnar Voskjard, or to a pirate in Tasdrons tavern, 
perhaps while moaning with pleasure in his arms, hoping to win her freedom by 
her treachery.
She would not be freed, said Callimachus. She would only be plunged into a 
deeper and crueler slavery.
end of page 311
She would not know that, I pointed out. She is from Earth. It can take years 
to learn Gorean ways, and how Goreans think. they tend not to be patient with 
slaves.
Perhaps you were betrayed by one of th emen of Callisthenes or of Aemilianus, 
said Callimachus. By trusted warriors, I asked, who too would have had little 
opportunity to make contact with the enemy? I looked at him angrily. Why can 
you not see that it was the slave, Petty, who betrayed us? I wondered if he 
cared for her.
It could have been no other, agreed Callimachus. His voice was grim and 
terrible. I did not understand, fully, his tone of voice. It was almost as 
though he, personally, in some subtle way, had been betrayed. I looked out over 
the bow into the fog. One could see almost nothing.
If we should be so fortunate as to survive this engagement, said Callimachus, 
I will see that the treacherous slave is dealt with. What will be done to 
her? I asked. She will be dealth with as a female slave is dealth with, who 
has not been fully pleasing, he said quietly. I shuddered.
Are you cold? asked Callimachus. Yes, I said. I drew the cloak I wore more 
closely about myself.
Perhaps there will be no engagement, said Callimachus. We have been at the 
chain for two days. The Tamira has crossed the chain hs she not? I asked. 
Yes, said he. I anticipate an engagement, I said. The Tamira is a 
merchantman, said Callimachus. It is a scout ships of Ragnar Voskjard, I 
said. It has already paid call on Kliomenes in the holding of Policrates. I 
find that hard to believe, said Callimachus. Was she inspected at the chain? 
I asked. No, said Callimachus.
Had she been, I said, it would have been discovered that she was carrying 
loot from the Flower of Siba. More importantly, she would doubtless be carrying 
papers linking her with Policrates, such papers as the signs and countersighs 
whereby the actions of the joint pirate fleets might be integrated and 
directed.
end of page 312
You are mistaken, sid Callimachus. Reginald, her captain is a known man. I 
learned these things in the court of Kliomemes, I said. You must be mistaken, 
he said. I anticipate an engagement, I said. It should have taken place by 
now, said Callimachus. That seems possible, I admitted. Perhaps the Voskjard 
fears the chain, said Callimachus. Perhaps, I admitted.
From where we lay to I could hear from time to time the restless creak of the 
mighty links of the chain, suspended on pylons, stretching across the river. The 
links of the chain were some 18 inches in length and a foot in width; the metal 
of the links themselves was as thick as a mans forearm. The cahin in places lay 
submerged a foot or so below the water; in other places and near the pylons it 
sould range from a foot to a yard above the wter. It was anchored to great rings 
on the ppylons. At five places in the river the cahin could be opened, swung 
open on huge rafts at which point there were guard stations. Too, there were 
guard stations at the terminal pylons on the north and south shores of the 
river.
Where is Callisthenes? I asked. He is at the south guard station, said 
Callimachus.
This was regarded as a point of maximum danger. Gorean ships on the whole, even 
the round ships, are shallowly drafted vessels. It is common, where warfage if 
not available, to beach them at night. Thus, the chain, theoretically, could be 
circumvented at these points, the shallowly drafted ships being brought to shore 
and on rollers, being moved about the terminal pylons. The south guard station 
was regarded as more vulnerable than the north guard station because of its 
comparatively remote location. The supply lines from Port Cos
to the north station are shorter and it is easier to move troops to that point. 
Also the barracks for the guardsmen of the chain are at that point. I was 
pleased to hear that Callisthenes had taken up his post at the south guard 
station. it was at such a point that we particulrly needed good men. Yet we 
would miss him in the fray, should the Voskjrds fleet dare to approach the 
chain more directly.
Perhapds it is there where we too should be, mused Callimachus.
end of page 313
The chain does not seem fearfully strong, I said. Neither Callimachus nor 
myself had seen the chain until we had come westward. We had been unprepared for 
its impressiveness. It represended an engineering feat of no man proportions. 
Although we retained our theoretical reservations about its effectiveness, these 
reservations in the very presence of the chain, seemed to my relief, less 
alarming and more tenuous and abstract, than they had in the urgen discussion 
which had taken place in the tavern of Tasdron. It was easy to understand now 
why those who had seen the chain tended to be more confident of its 
effectiveness than those who had not. I listened to the creaking of the mighty 
links and to the water lapping at the sides of our galley and to the occasional 
cries of Vosk gulls.
Perhaps the Voskjard does fear the chain, I said. There is surely enough 
predation west of the chain for him, said Callimachus. I would think so, I 
said.
I looked over the rail, to the great wooden, iron-shod ram, which protruded in 
part from the water. I looked over the starboard rail and saw the great, curved 
shearing blade, fixed in the side of the vessel. Its mate, anchored too in the 
strakes forward of the oars, resposed on the port side. These blades were seven 
feet in height, like convex moons of iron. It is said that such blades were an 
invention of Tersites, a shipwright of Por Kar. I returned to stand beside 
Callimachus.
You he not fought on the water before have you? he asked. No, I said. I 
could not scarcely see the Mira and the Taldnder so thick was the fog. it is 
cold, said Callimachus. Yes, I said. Callimachus, I said. Yes, he said. 
Do you think Voskjard will come? I asked. I do not think so now,  said 
Callimachus. Why not? I asked.
The chain is strong,  said Callimachus. Too, it seems his fleet should have 
arrived at the chain by now, did it intend to do so. Then you do not think he 
will come? I asked.
end of page 314
I do not think so,  said Callimachus. An engagement upon the water must be a 
terrible thing, I said. I am of the Warriors, said Callimachus. He licked his 
lips. I shuddered. I wondered what had been his experiences, and what he knew 
that I did not. I feared him then, in that moment. For an instant I felt I no 
longer knew him. I felt in that instant, that he might be a man of a different 
sort than I.
Are you frightened? asked Calllimachus. Yes, I said. That is natural, he 
said. what are the numbers involved? I asked. Callimachus grinned. that is a 
Warriors question, he said. Surely we have intelligence on this matter, I 
said.
It is conjectured, said Callimachus, that the Voskjard is stronger than 
Policrates. it is thought he commands some 50 ships and 2,500 men. We have 
better information on Policrates. He commands 40 ships and some 2,000 men. 
United, they would become a mighty force, I said.
To be sure, said Callimachus, and yet some 50 ships can be brought into the 
river by Port Cos and some 45 by Ars station. Accordingly in an engagement of 
fleets Port Cos and Ars Station, acting together, would bring to bear the 
superior forces. How many ships of Ars Station support us at the chain? I 
asked. Ten at the chain and 20 in the vicinity of the south guard station, 
said Callimachus. Thirty in all, I said.
There are another 20 at Port Cos, of course, said Callimachus. They are, 
however, held there to defend the town if need be. How many independent 
ships? I asked.
Seven,  said Callimachus. Two from Victoria, two from Jorts Ferry, two from 
Point Alfred, and one from Fina. Jorts Ferry and Point Alfred lie west of Ars 
Station and tend to follow the lead of Ars Station, favoring generally the 
politics of Ar.
end of page 315
We have then 47 ships upon the river, I said. Yes, said Callimchus. And it 
is estimated that the Voskjards fleet numbers some 50 ships? Yes, said 
Callimachus.
It would seem, then, I said, that the odds are approximately even. Or, with 
the chain, perhaps in our favor? said Callimachus. It might seem so,  I said. 
But you are skeptical? he asked. Our ships are scattered, I said. They 
patrol the chain. And the fleet of the Voskjard can, at will, attack at any 
given point.
Cutting the chain, I said, they could, in one or more successive engagements, 
outnumber and destroy the defending ships. You think like a Warrior, said 
Callimachus. Our hope, of course, I said, is that they can be held behind the 
cahin long enough to permit the massing our our full forces. Of course, said 
Callimachus.
You said earlier, I said, that you did not think we could stop an attack in 
force upon the chain. That is true, he said. Why not? I asked. Consider 
the matter, he said. Those from Ars Station are essentially infrantrymen of 
Ar, put at the oars of galleys. They are unfamiliar with naval warfare. And the 
independent ships like the Tina, are not manned by warriors, but by volunteers, 
stalward but untrained fellows, mostly of lower castes. Our defensive force, in 
effect, is the fleet of Por Cos.
It is then, you feel, I said apprehensively, in effect some 30 ships, those 
of Port Cos, against the fleet of the Voskjard? Substantially so,  agreed 
Callimachus.
Why then are you here? I asked. I am of the Warriors, said Callimachus. I 
see, I said. Why are you here? he asked. I do not know, I said.
end of page 316
You are here,  he said, because you, too, are of the Warriors. I am not of 
the Warriors, I said. Not everyone who is of the Warriors knows that he is of 
theWarriors, said Callimachus. I do not understand, I said. I have seen it, 
said Callimachus, in your eyes, that you are of the Warriors. You are mad, I 
said.
Ten thousand years ago, he said, in the mixing of bloods, and in the rapings 
of conquered maids, the caste has chosen you. You are mad, I told him.
We shall see short, said he. He drew his sword. Why are you drawing your 
sword? I asked. Surely you can hear? he asked. What? I said, What?
I was wrong, he said. I thought there might be no battle. I do not 
understand, I said.
Yet, said Callimachus, if the Tamira were truly the scout ship ofRagnar 
Voskjard, and if she crossed the chain westward four days ago, and a rendezvous 
was made in the river, in the vicinity of the holding of Ragnar Voskjard, the 
times involved are not inappropriate.
What are you talking about? I asked. Can you not hear it? he asked. I hear 
nothing, I cried. You are mad! I heard only the water at the strakes, the 
creaking of the chain, the sound of oars restless in the thole ports, the 
far-off cries of occasional Vosk gulls. There is nothing, I whispered.
Suddenly the hair on the back of my neck lifted and froze. See? asked 
Callimachus, lifting his sword, and poining out into the fog. No, I said. I 
coul dnot see anything in the fog. But, now, clearly, I could hear it.
Then, suddenly, through a rift in the fog I saw, not more than a hundred yards 
away, across the chain, what seemed a countless number of ships.
It is the fleet of Ragnar Voskjard, he said. There was an elation which I 
found incomprehensible in his voice.
end of page 317
I stood, for the moment unable to move, on the deck at the bow below the stem 
castle of the galley.
Your sword is in your hand, smiled Callimachus. I could not remember 
unsheathing it.
Sound the battle horns! called Callimachus to the men on the ship. Sound the 
battle horns.
end of page 318
end of 15th scroll of John Norman - First printing March of 1981
