Slave Girl Of Gor

"That is true," said he, "Prisoner."

She looked up at him, his leather on her throat.

"Do not fear," said he, "we will find a way to while away the time."

"How am I to be taken from the city?" she asked.

"Bound, naked, belly up," said he, "across the saddle of a tarn."

"Scarcely the way to transport a free woman," she said.

"By nightfall," said he, "you will be fit cargo for such mode of transport."

She shuddered.

"Go to the vanity," he said, "and kneel before it." She did this. He then, crouching behind her, crossed her ankles and, with the long, loose end of the leash, tied them together. The leash then ran from her throat back to her ankles. Her hands were free.

"Apply cosmetics and scents," said he. "You are to be absolutely beautiful," he said.

She reached, miserably, for the tiny boxes and brushes.

"Go into the outer room," he said to me. "Among my things you will find an iron. Prepare a brazier and heat the iron. You will find there, too, earrings and a saddle needle. Bring them."

"Yes, Master," I said.

It was in the late afternoon that I, holding its handles with quilted cloths, slid the brazier into the chamber of the couch and bath. I had not done this earlier in order that the room not be made uncomfortably hot.

"How beautiful you are, Elicia," I said, startled. She sat at the foot of the couch, her knees drawn up and together, on furs thrown to the tiles from its surface. She no longer wore the leash. Her ankles were tied and her hands were tied behind her. She was made up beautifully for her branding. Her left ankle, I noted, on a chain of some five feet in length, was fastened to the slave ring at the couch's foot. On many nights I had slept there chained. It had been Bosk's decision that she would be branded at the slave ring of her own couch.

"Judy," she wept, "what is he going to do?"

"He is going to brand you," I said.

"No!" she said.

"You were not forced to come to Gor," I said.

She struggled in the bonds. Bosk of Port Kar, with the quilted cloth, drew forth the iron, and thrust it back. It would soon be ready.

"You are a beast and a barbarian!" she cried to him, drawing back. Then she could move no further back against the stone couch. She could draw her feet up no further.

He took her and threw her to her right side, wedging her in the corner formed by the tiles and the foot of the stone couch. With the leash he tied her thighs tightly together, leaving between the tight, confining leather strips an open space, a small, lovely territory, for the passage of the iron. He gestured that I slide the brazier near to him, and I did so. He indicated that I should give him the quilted cloth with which he might seize the iron, and I did so.

"Help me, Judy!" wept Elicia.

"You were not forced to come to Gor, Elicia," I told her. She lay on her right side, bound, thrust against the foot of the couch. Wadded furs helped to hold her in place. Her thighs had been tied for the iron. Bosk's weight, too, pressed upon her. She shut her eyes.

I looked outside, at the clouds, the blue sky of the late afternoon. It was su

I closed my eyes when she screamed. I listened to the iron, patient, performing its identificatory work. I smelled the branding. Bosk did not hurry. He did his work upon her well.

I again opened my eyes. The sky was lovely and blue outside of the window. More birds flew by.

I heard the girl sobbing. There was a new slave girl on Gor.

I looked upon her. She looked at me, tears in her eyes. She had been marked incontrovertibly, and well.

"I am a slave," she said.

"Yes," I said.

"Remove the brazier and iron," said Bosk of Port Kar. "Set the iron to cool."

"Yes, Master," I said.

With the quilted cloths I took the brazier from the room, and the iron, too. Outside, in the outer room, I put the iron aside, on the tiles, near his belongings. It would cool.

When I returned to the chamber of the bath and couch he had sat the new slave up, against the couch. He, with a saddle needle, was piercing her left ear lobe. I saw the needle run through and a tiny spot of blood. He had already pierced her right ear lobe. Then he took the earrings I had brought, golden loops, an inch in diameter, and fastened them in her ears. He then gave me the saddle needle to clean and replace in his gear, which I did.

When again I returned to the chamber of the bath and couch he had freed her of her bonds, with the exception of the chain on her left ankle, which fastened her to the slave ring at the foot of the couch.

She lay on the deep furs at the foot of the couch, chained by the ankle, branded, in earrings.

She looked up at me.

"Greetings, Slave," I said.

"Greetings, Mistress," she said.

"Bring wine," said Bosk of Port Kar to me. "I will be served by the slave."

"Yes, Master," I said. I fetched wine, and placed it on the tiles, within reach of the girl.

"Does she not even know how to kneel?" he asked.

Quickly I instructed the girl in the position of the pleasure slave, kneeling, back on heels, back straight, head high, hands on thighs, knees wide.

"What shall we call her?" he asked me.

"Whatever Master wishes," I said.

He saw the discarded collar, inscribed "I am Judy. Return me to the Lady Elicia of Ar, of Six Towers."

He opened the collar. He approached her. "Perhaps," said he, "we shall call you 'Judy. "

She shook with misery. "Please," she begged, "Master." Flow offended and miserable she would be, the proud, former Elicia Nevins, to be forced to wear my name, I of whom she had been so contemptuous.

"What think you?" asked the free man of me, gri

"I think, Master," I said, "that the name is not truly fitting for this slave, given her nature and appearance."

There is often a fittingness sought between name and slave. It did seem to me that 'Judy' was not the proper name for the newly enslaved beauty who knelt before us. It was not merely my desire that she not be given a name which I had formerly worn when free.

"True," said Bosk of Port Kar, commending me on my view of the matter.

The girl breathed more easily.

"Bring from my belongings the open slave collar there to be found," said Bosk of Port Kar to me.

"Yes, Master," I said, and hurried to comply. From his belongings I fetched the collar.

He took the collar from me. It was simple, and steel, straightforward and secure.

"Read it," said he to her.

"I am the slave Elicia," she read. "I belong to Bosk of Port Kar."

She looked at him with horror. She would wear her own name as a slave name.

"Submit," he said.

She looked at me, wildly, piteously. I aided her. I showed her how to kneel back on her heels, her arms extended to him, wrists crossed, her head down, between her arms. "Say, 'I submit, " I said. "I submit," she said. He bound her wrists, tightly, before her body. "Look up," I told her. She looked up. He collared her. I was very pleased to see her in the collar of Bosk of Port Kar.

Bosk then left the room, I heard him, too, leave the outer room. I heard him outside, moving to the roof. Doubtless he, a warrior, was checking the avenue of his egress. I did not know if the tarn would be waiting on the roof, or would be summoned from the roof, by tam whistle.

I looked at the new slave girl. She knelt, miserable, collared, branded, her wrists bound before her body, on the thick furs at the foot of the couch.

She looked at the surface of the couch. She would not dare to ascend to it, unless ordered there by a master. Her place, unless commanded otherwise, was at the foot of the couch, at the slave ring. I, a slave, had spent nights at that slave ring, at the foot of my mistress's couch. Now, she who had been Elicia Nevins of Earth, who had been my mistress, knelt there, no more than a lowly slave herself.