Captive of Gor (45 page)

them. “They are nourishing,” she had said. I screamed hysterically, pounding at

the sides of the slave box. The second day, too, I thrust the pan away, almost

vomiting. I saw Ute, through the slit, take one of the insects and bite it in

two, eating it. The third day, almost vomiting, I ate five of them. They, such

insects, and water, were my food for the remainder of my time in the tiny slave

box. I would spend hours at the slit in the door, hoping to see someone walk by.

I would call to them, but they would not answer, for one does not converse with

a girl in a slave box. Then I was happy, even, to see someone pass by, or birds

alight on the grass and peck for seeds. I spent eighteen days in the slave box.

On the night of the eighteenth day, Ute, with Inge and Rena, crouched before the

box.

“Does El-no-or, the slave, wish to leave the box?” asked Ute.

On my knees in the box, my eyes at the opening, frightened, my fingers on the

slit, I whispered, “yes, El-in-or, the slave, wished to leave the box.”

“Does El-in-or, the slave, beg to leave the box?” asked Ute.

“Yes, yes!” I wept. “El-in-or, the slave, begs to leave the box!”

“Release the slave,” said Ute, to Inge and Rena.

Elinor Brinton heard the padlocks unlocked. She heard the flat, heavy bolts

slide back. She saw the small door swing open.

On her hands and knees, painfully, inch by inch, she crawled from the box. She

then collapsed to the grass.

“Wash the slave,” said Ute, with disgust, to Inge and Rena.

I screamed with pain as Inge and Rena stretched out my (pg. 316) body, and then,

with brushes and water, almost vomiting, they cleaned me.

After Inge and Rena had finished their work, even to the cleaning of my hair, a

guard, summoned, not much pleased, carried me, helpless and in pain, back to the

shed for female work slaves. There Ute, with Inge and Rena, fed me simple

broths, which I gratefully drank. The next day, as Ute commanded, I remained in

the shed, food and water being brought to me by Inge and Rena. On the following

day I was returned to work. My first task was to clean the slave box, to rid it

of its filth. After I had done this, naked, and had washed my body and hair

thoroughly, I was again given the tunic of a work slave. I found it a very

precious garment. I worked at a variety of tasks that day. Late in the

afternoon, I was sent outside, leashed again to Techne, to pick ram-berries. I

did not steal berries from her, nor did I eat any.

* * *

I was regarded in the camp with contempt and amusement. Not only were my ears

pierced, but now, in my flesh, I wore penalty brands.

Once, two weeks after my release from the slave box, Rask of Treve passed near

me, in the company of Verna, the panther girl.

I fell to my knees immediately, and put my head to the ground.

I was merely a slave girl who had been punished, and would be again, if need be.

They passed me.

Neither of them noticed me.

One day became another in the secret war camp of Rask of Treve.

The tarnsmen, in their flights, did not have much luck, and many were the times

when they returned, their saddle packs empty, their saddles bare of helpless

beauties lashed across them.

Similarly, one day was much as another for Elinor Brinton, the female work slave

in the camp of Rask of Treve. She rose at dawn and, until dusk, with her work

companions, (pg. 317) performed her repetitive, servile tasks. After the night

feeding, she, with her work companions, would be ordered to the slave shed,

where they would be locked for the night, only to be summoned again in the

morning, ordered from the shed, for another round of their labors, tasks fit for

such as they, female work slaves.

I learned to iron and sew, and to cook and clean. Verna could not have done

these things. She hunted, and held converse with men.

It could be perhaps mentioned that such work, cooking, cleaning and laundering,

and such, is commonly regarded as being beneath even free women, particularly

those of high caster. In the high cylinders, in Gorean cities, there are often

public slaves who tend the central kitchens in cylinders, care for the children,

but may not instruct them, and, for a tiny fee to the city, clean compartments

and do laundering. Thus even families who cannot afford to own and feed a slave

often have the use of several such unfortunate girls, commonly captured from

hostile cities. Free women often treat such girls with great cruelty, and the

mere word of a free woman, that she is displeased with the girl’s work, is

enough to have the girl beaten. The girls strive zealously in their work to

please the free women. Such girls, also, have a low use-rent, payable to the

city, should young males wish to partake of their pleasures. Here again, the

mere word of the free person, that he is not completely pleased, is enough to

earn the miserable girl a severe beating. Accordingly, she struggles to please

him with all her might. It is not pleasant, I fear, to be a public slave. The

Gorean free woman, often, does only what work she chooses. If she does not wish

to prepare a meal, she and her companions may go to the public tables, or,

should they wish, order a girl to bring them food from the central kitchens.

But I found, perhaps surprisingly, that I did not much mind the work of the

female work slave. I recognized that it was essential, that it had to be done. I

recognized further that there was something farcical in the thought of the

Gorean male lending his hand to such small, unimportant work. It would have been

like the larl with a broom. I (pg. 318) could well imagine the accommodating

solicitous males of Earth in aprons, puttering about with vacuum cleaners and

boxes of detergent, but I could not imagine it of the Gorean male. He is so

different from the males of Earth, so powerful, so strong, so uncompromised, so

masculine. Before him it is hard for a female not to know herself as smaller and

weaker, and thus to be given the tasks he does not care to perform.

Similarly the Gorean free woman does not seem appropriately suited to menial

tasks. She is too free, too proud. It is difficult for a collared slave girl to

even to look into the eyes of such a person. Thus, who is to do such work? The

answer seems obvious, that it be done by the slaves. The small, light,

unpleasant work will be done by the female slave; the large, heavy, unpleasant

work by the draft animal, or the male slave. Why should free persons do such

tasks? They have slaves for such work. And I well knew myself to be a slave. It

was thus natural that it should be. I, and my sisters in bondage, who performed

such labors. How else could it have been?

“Hurry, Slave! Hurry in your work!” cried Ute.

I did so.

I did my work quietly, and seldom spoke to the other girls, not did they much

speak to me. Though I often worked with then, I was, it seemed, always alone.

When they sang at their work, or enjoyed laughter and sport, I did not sing, nor

did I laugh, nor join them in their pleasures. I worked well. I was, I expect,

one of Ute’s best workers. Sometimes, when I would finish my work, I would help

the other girls with theirs.

Once, when I was helping Inge, she said to me, “I thought you were too delicate

to be beaten.”

“I was mistaken,” I said.

She laughed.

I no longer had an interest in lying or cheating, or shirking my work. I

suppose, in part, it was that I was afraid of being punished. Surely I had not,

and could not, forget the iron nor the whip’s hot kiss. I much feared them. I

could no longer even look on a slave whip without a feeling (pg. 319) of terror,

for I understood now the pain of its meaning, and what it might do to me. If a

guard even lifted one, I would cringe. I would obey, and with promptness! Do not

scorn me, until you yourself have felt the iron and the lash. But, too, somehow,

perhaps unaccountably, lying and stealing now seemed to me small, and trivial,

too petty to perform. I no longer regarded such behavior as clever, but now,

rather, as unworthy or stupid, where one was caught or not. I had thought much

in the slave box. I was not much pleased with how I had found myself to be. I

knew that my body was a slave body, and that it was owned, and that it stood in

constant jeopardy of fierce, swift punishment by a strong master, whether it

might deserve that punishment or not. But, too, I felt I had, according to

Gorean justice, well earned my beating and my branding, and my tortuous

confinement in the slave box. I did not wish again to earn such punishment, not

simply because I feared it, but because it seemed to me unworthy that I should

have done the things for which I was punished. In the slave box, alone with

myself, I discovered I did not wish to be the sort of person I had been, I had

not been pleased to be locked in the box alone with myself, with such a person,

forced there to face her and realize that she was your own self.

“Pierced-ear Girl!” cried a man. “Kneel.”

I did so.

With his foot, he thrust me from his path, laughing, and continued on his way.

Sometimes the other girls would trip me when I was carrying burdens, or dirty

the work which I had done, that I must do over.

Once two warriors, for a joke, tied my ankles together and suspended me, upside

down, from the whipping pole, spinning me about, and back, until I vomited and

cried out for mercy. Laughing they then left, and Ute, with Rena, released me.

“They are cruel,” said Ute.

I wept, and kissed her feet.

I found that I no longer desired to serve in the evening, (pg. 320) even should

there be feasting. I wanted only my work, and to be left alone. In the evening,

I wanted only the silence and darkness of the shed, with its padlocked door.

In my flesh I wore penalty brands.

“Let El-in-or be it!” cried Ute, when the girls were playing tag.

“No,” they cried.

“Do it,” said Ute.

“Please, Ute,” I begged, “let me go to the shed.”

“Very well,” said Ute.

And I went back to the shed.

The contempt and amusement which greeted me in the camp made me form within

myself a core of hardness. I became withdrawn. I no longer desired to serve in

the evening, should there be feasting. I wanted only my work, and the silence

and darkness of the shed, with its padlocked door.

I wanted to be alone in the shed, behind the locked door.

There was only one thing left to me, in which I might take pride, that I was not

as other women. No matter what brands might be fixed to my flesh, nor what the

leather might do to my back or the tiny dimensions of the slave box to my body,

I knew I did not have their weaknesses. I recalled the circle of the dance in

the northern forest, and how even Verna, the proud Verna, had, beside herself

with need, writhed helplessly beneath the bright moons of Gor, a female. How I

had then despised her, and the others, so helpless and vulnerable and female!

How weak they were! How pleased I was that I was not as they. Gradually, in me,

there built up a compensating hatred to counter my shame, and the brands that

proclaimed me among the most unworthy and miserable of slaves. I began to hate

human beings. I was better than they. I would be better than they. I began to do

my work with great efficiency and promptness, better than the other girls. I

became exact in my speech, and, though I did not much express myself, quite

critical of others. In spite of my brands, I would be superior to them all. I

began to wear a new morality with a smugness. I became arrogant in my virtue, to

the irritation (pg. 321) of the other girls, but I did not care, for I was

better than they. I would not now lie or cheat or steal, of course, but not now

because I did not care for that sort of thing, or did not wish to behave in such

a fashion, but primarily because I was not the sort of person who would do that

sort of thing. Virtue, I discovered, in one way in which a human being may

attempt to diminish and insult others. I used the blade of cooperativeness, of

virtue, of diligence, of punctuality to proclaim myself on my moral superiority

as a woman, above the self-indulgent, contaminating weaknesses of their piteous

need. I was not as they.

* * *

“Tonight,” cried Ute, happily, “you will serve, all of you!”

The girls cried out with pleasure.

This afternoon, for the first time in weeks, the raids of Rask of Treve had been

successful. Eleven girls had been brought in, and much treasure. Laughing,

bloody tarnsmen, with strings of pearls thrown about their necks, and cups and

goblets tied at their saddles, and their saddle packs bulging with the weight of

golden tarn disks, had brought their tarns down, wings beating, to receive the

greetings of the camp. Merchants brought sides of bosk, and thighs of tarsk, and

wines and fruits to camp, and cheeses and breads and nuts, and flowers and

candies and silks and honeys. There was much bustle and laughter about the camp,

much preparation and shouting. In the women’s tent, eleven girls, tomorrow to be

collared, crouched in fear. Slave girls staggered under the plunder, carrying it