Prize of Gor (61 page)

As Ellen’s basket began to move suddenly, she was almost flung from her feet. It then began to slide from the loft, out onto the platform. She held out one hand to Selius Arconious piteously, sliding away from him. She could see where he was standing in the great portal of the loft, at one side of the portal, his figure dimly outlined by the light of the tiny lamp behind him, that lamp far back, in its bracket, in the loft. She could read no sign of emotion in that calm, large, still figure.

Then the basket, so suddenly it seemed, dropped away from the platform.

Inwardly she screamed.

She felt a sickening moment of abject terror, and the dizzying, terrifying sensation of being unsupported, of falling. She closed her eyes, expecting in a moment to be dashed to the stones below. Then the basket swung on its ropes. She opened her eyes, in fear, but, too, in fascination. Wind rushed about her, blasting her hair. She gasped for breath. She felt cold in the rushing wind. She fastened her fingers in, about, and through the wicker, holding to it with every particle of her small strength. She looked up, struggling to keep her balance, at the ropes, the harness, the dark, majestic body of the winged titan above her. It was not easy to stand in the basket, it swinging so. Then, clinging to the side of the basket, she, startled, viewed, here and there beneath her, and muchly, too, about her, the vastness and splendor of the city of Ar. Many of the cylinders were ablaze with light. In many of the windows she could see that lamps were lit, the tiny, softly glowing lamps of love. In many of them she supposed there might be, exterior robes put aside, but modesty robes doubtless retained, free companions. A free companion would presumably not show herself naked to her lover, for such would not comport with her dignity. She is, after all, free. Too, he might then see her as a slave, think of her as a slave, and treat her as such. No free woman, surely, would wish to risk that. But perhaps some free companions did dare, in the privacy of their own compartments, to show themselves naked to their lovers. How bold they would be. How fit then would such women be for the collar! Perhaps they might even, in the privacy of their own compartments, dare a necklace or bracelet, some piece of metal on their soft flesh, this subtly suggesting, though the suggestion would doubtless be frenziedly denied, an insignia of bondage, but surely not an anklet, for that would be too slavelike. But such things could be dangerous, for the free companion who is a man is still a man, and men are excitable, and brutes. Even the best of them may be insufficiently weak, insufficiently devirilized, insufficiently tamed, insufficiently broken on the wheel of a woman’s will. But in others of those compartments, Ellen supposed, there would be not free companions but slaves, and masters. In such places she supposed the slaves lovingly served the masters. The relations of slaves and masters, of course, are quite different from those of free companions. In the master/slave relationship the master owns the slave, and thus will have everything from her, and at the time, and in the place, and precisely in the way he pleases. And the slave, lovingly, would not have it otherwise. Masters do not fraudulently deny the war of the sexes. Rather they recognize it, win it, and enslave their opponents. The conquered slave serves the master. She is owned. She is hot, devoted and dutiful, and grateful.

Below her, too, here and there, were broad thoroughfares, lit by torches. Some of these thoroughfares were divided by a gardened strip of greenery. Though it was late some individuals were abroad, some in palanquins, either men or women, borne by male slaves, some with guards, perhaps returning at this hour from late visits, some strolling alone, meditatively, in the late evening, some walking leashed slaves. She saw the stand of a vendor below, one selling perhaps candied suls, or tastas. Other streets were dark between the cylinders. These were muchly deserted, particularly during the lawlessness of the occupation. Many mercenaries, particularly of the smaller companies, are not above brigandage. Too, even in better times there are areas in Ar which are not wisely frequented after dark. On some of these streets could be seen small parties, led by individuals with torches. In other areas, muchly dark, one could scarcely detect the narrow crooked ways which twisted amongst clutters of buildings, some of them several-storied
insulae
. Some markets were open, these lit with torches, small, bright patches of light in the darkness. In these, various goods, as is common, were being offered. One, interestingly, was a tharlarion market. The larger beasts can be brought into the city only after sunset, when the streets are freer of traffic. In two markets, she saw slaves, some exhibited on a shelf, as she had been, others in small cages. In another place, within a rectangle of canvas walls, on a small stage, as the music of flutes and a czehar drifted upward, she saw acrobats, jugglers and fire-eaters. To one side, behind a curtain, she saw slaves, in silk, doubtless waiting to dance for their master’s customers. It is common to save the best dancers for last.

The basket swung on the ropes. Ellen released one hand from the wicker, to clutch a rope. Her hair flew about the rope. It is so beautiful, she thought. I hope the ropes hold. They seem so narrow! This world is so beautiful. This world is so natural! How fearful, she thought, to be a woman and live on a natural world! And yet, she thought, the thought startling her, I would not be elsewhere than on this world. On this world there are men such as Portus Canio and Selius Arconious! I am a woman. I did not know such men could exist. She touched her collar. What could a woman of Earth be before such men but a slave? But I would not be elsewhere than on this world. I am a woman. I have learned that on Gor, and have been taught what it means in its truth, depth and fullness. Better a collar on Gor than a throne on Earth! How glorious to be a woman and live upon a natural world, a world in which I must occupy my rightful place in the order of nature, my place at the feet of masters! The beat of the tarn’s wings above her was steady, and smooth.

She could see beacons now, set upon the walls of Ar.

She passed over the roof of a small cylinder. On the roof, amongst boards, and debris, there was a naked slave, chained by her wrists to a ring. She looked up as the tarns swept by overhead.

I trust she is well mastered, thought Ellen.

She could see the walls clearly now, the two of them, the interior wall overlooking the lower wall. They were being approached silently, smoothly.

Portus’s remark ‘if we pass’ returned to her, and it frightened her.

But she supposed that he knew what he was doing, and that this particular point on the walls, this exact location, would have been chosen with intent.

As it was night tarn wire might have been strung but here there was no sign of it.

Ellen did see a fellow look up from the interior wall below. He was, she thought, a guardsman of Ar. In any event that was his uniform. He made no move to signal the train of tarns nor did he rush to sound an alarm.

Then the walls of Ar, and its lights, were behind them, and they were making their way, still at a low level, across the open countryside. She did see the lights of some scattered villages.

She recalled the large peasant, and Corinne’s agitation at seeing him. Corinne had rushed away from the laundry pools, not even finishing her work there. That had startled Ellen. She herself, of course, had remained at the pools, finishing her own work.

There had been much commotion in the city that day. According to the report of Selius Arconious the explanation of the unrest had to do with the alleged disappearance of Talena, the very Ubara of Ar, from the palace. Perhaps she had departed on secret state business and had now returned to the palace, and was now again on the throne of Ar. That must surely be it. Certainly Ubaras, with all their walls, and gates and doors, and passwords, and guards, do not simply disappear. She recalled that Myron, who was
polemarkos
, commander of the occupation forces, had supposedly entered the city. She gathered that this would be unusual. She had heard that Talena had given him a lovely slave girl whose name was Claudia, who had once been the daughter of a former administrator of Ar.

Ellen then, the walls of Ar having been passed, removed her gag. She put her head back, her hair wild about her in the wind, and breathed in, gratefully. She clutched in one hand the thick, packed, sopped folds of the tunic. She looked back at Ar. Obviously they had not wanted her to scream, to cry out in terror, to call out, or such, until they were safely past the walls of Ar. She could still see the lights of the city behind them. She did not see any signs of pursuit. I am cold, she thought. She knelt down in the basket and spread the blanket a little, so that its folds rather matched the dimensions of the basket. The bottoms of her feet doubtless bore wicker marks. The blanket would protect her from the miseries of such a surface. She supposed that not all slaves, or captures, would be granted that indulgence. It would be quite unpleasant, she supposed, to be bound naked, hand and foot, in such a conveyance, one’s ankles perhaps lashed closely to one’s wrists, a simple, popular, but extraordinarily effective and secure slave tie, and kept in the basket in one way or another, perhaps by a secured lid, or perhaps merely by ropes or a harness run through the wicker. She shook out the tiny tunic, which, given its service, and the folding, in lines and creases, was irregularly damp. She drew it on, over her head, and pulled it down about her, as far as it would go, which was, of course, not really very far. Now, she thought, delightedly, I am again my own woman! And then, in the wind and the swaying of the basket, she laughed aloud. She was her own woman, insofar as a slave could be her own woman, which was not at all. She was the master’s woman, his slave. Still she now had, however skimpy, and amusingly minute, some covering for herself, for her enslaved beauty, some moment of shielding, be it only a thin layer of loosely woven, sleeveless, revealing rep-cloth, slit at the sides. Slaves are grateful, even for so little. The tunic, of course, though we may speak of it as “hers,” was, like herself, the property of her master. She did not even own the collar she wore. Slaves can own nothing; it is they, rather, who are owned. She then sat in the basket, and tried to pull the slit sides of the tunic more about her. She was extremely conscious of the absence of a nether closure in the garment. Few slave garments, as noted, contain such a closure. An exception is the Turian camisk. The absence of a nether closure in a garment tends to be sexually stimulatory to a woman, and this is particularly the case when the garment is brief, and, of course, required of her by a man. She pulled the blanket about her. How warm she was then, how comfortable, within its ample, sheltering folds. How kind is Portus, my master, to me, she thought, gratefully. How kind he is to a lowly barbarian, a mere Earth-girl slave! After an Ahn or so, she went again to her knees, holding the blanket clasped about her, and reached out for, and picked up, the small, round, flat loaf of bread which lay on the wicker flooring with the tiny bota. She bit off pieces of the bread while kneeling. There was nothing untoward in this, or unique to her condition, which was that of slave, for Gorean women in the high cities, and particularly those of high caste, commonly eat kneeling, or reclining, at low tables, as Gorean men in the high cities, particularly those of the higher castes, commonly eat at such tables cross-legged, or, like the women, reclining. To be sure, a slave’s dishes are often placed before her, on the floor, not on a table. The slave, of course, might be denied the use of her hands, if the master wishes, and then she must put down her head, and, on all fours, eat and drink from pans on the floor. Too, she is sometimes fed from the master’s hand, again not permitted to use her own hands. This is, of course, primarily symbolic, and is often used, if used, for no more than the first bite or two of food. It is a way, of course, of reminding the slave that she is dependent on the master for her food. In public places fountains often have several tiers, and almost always at least two, the bottom tier usually no more than a few inches from the ground or pavement, and, as would be expected, slaves, leashed verr, pet sleen, and such, are expected to drink from the lower level.

Ellen did not eat all the bread, but only a little of it. She did not know how long it must last. Too, she had been fed, in a manner of speaking, earlier by the brutish, impatient, handsome Selius Arconious. Oh, how I hate him, she thought. Oh, how I want him to master me! She also took a drink from the bota, which contained water, as she expected. She feared it might have been drugged, presumably with tasteless tassa powder, to sedate her in the basket, but it had no such effect. This pleased her. She recalled in anger, in humiliation, too, how he had watered her, with such reckless contempt. Then she recalled with fury, how he had forced her to squat before him and relieve herself. To be sure, she was only a slave. I hate him, I hate him, she thought. He is so Gorean! He is not like the sweet, pleasant, conquered men of Earth! He does not respect women! He does not treat us with tenderness and gentleness, he does not give us our due of solicitation! He does not care for our feelings! He dominates and masters us!

He is the sort of man who looks upon us as though we were horses, he with a riding crop in his hand! What have we to hope from such men, other than to remove our clothing and kneel before them, hoping to please them?

Later Ellen stood again in the basket, and watched, as she could, part of the blanket beneath her feet, the rest clutched about her, shielding her from the wind and cold, the passing countryside beneath her.

She looked up at the three moons. They are so beautiful, she thought. This is such a beautiful world.

As she stood there, the wind whistling about her, her hair blowing in the wind, the wing strokes of the great winged beast above her, deliberate, measured, she felt the tag wired to her collar.

I suppose I now belong to Cos, she thought. I have been confiscated. But my master, or he who was my master, has hurried me away.