Hunters of Gor

12 I Return to my Camp on the Banks of the Laurius

My emotions were much mixed as I made my way through the tall forest toward the banks of the Laurius.

I had left my men at the camp of Marlenus, Arn, his outlaws, and the five men from the Tesephone. I had wished to be alone on this journey. They would follow me, in two days.

I carried my weapons, even the great bow, recovered from Verna’s camp, days before.

I had come to the forest rich in my prides and my plans. I would, from under the nose of Marlenus, preferably by trade, snatch Talena, thus evening the score for his banishment of me from Ar, thus regaining her, thus winning glory, thus setting my ladder against the political heights of the planet Gor, for, with such a woman at my side, there were few doors and cylinders that would be locked against me, and I, only a merchant of Port Kar, might have ascended unimpeded the stairs of influence and power. At a stroke, companionship with such a woman, coupled with my position and riches in Port Kar, would have made me one of the most significant and prominent men of Gor.

I smiled.

Men of lowly origins and great ambition and talent, I knew, had often used alliances with high-born women to further the fortunes of their designs. Such alliances, portions of their planning, lifted them to strata where their talents and energies might have full play, strata otherwise closed to them by dominant, controlling groups and families, jealous of and protective of their own interests. The dominant and effective families thus take into themselves newcomers of energy and intelligence, who, in exchange for position and opportunity, when they themselves are allied with such families, help keep the families high and dominant in the society. Human structures are group structures, and closed groups, with senses of their own best interest, yet open enough and intelligent enough to accept a certain amount, carefully selected, of new and driving blood, regulate society. Many people are unaware of such groups, for they are seldom identifiable save through lines of social relation and connection. The first families of a city usually constitute one or more of such groups, sometimes competitive groups. When a city falls, the daughters of such families are most avidly sought by the conquerors as slaves. Their first duty, naked and collared, is to serve the conquerors at their victory feast. Subsequently, they are commonly awarded to high officers or men who have especially distinguished themselves in the taking of the city, perhaps an individual who has led a sortie which successfully stormed a gate, or the first man upon the enemy’s walls, or one who has captured a member of the city’s council. In the latter case, if the council member has a daughter, it is common to give her to the man who has captured her father.

I was, of course, only of the merchants.

I laughed.

With the daughter of a Ubar as a consort there would be few who would dare to recall that I was not of high caste. And, surely, with such a woman at my side, many cities, vying for my good will, would beg me to accept investiture as a warrior, a high caste, in their rolls.

Companionship with the daughter of Marlenus, Ubar of Ubars, would have brought me much, I needed much.

I was already a rich and powerful man, but my political power did not extend beyond Port Kar. And in Port Kar, I recalled my political power, strictly, extended no further than my vote in the Council of Captains. I was not even first in the council. That post was held by Samos.

In the past years, in Port Kar, my ambitions had enlarged. Economic power and political power are like the left and the right foot. My ventures in merchantry had secured me wealth. My companionship with Talena, opening up a thousand avenues and alliances, conjoined with my riches, would have made me easily among the most splendid and powerful men on Gor.

Who knew how high might have been raised the chair of Bosk?

I laughed bitterly. How foolishly I had brought my prides and my plans to the northern forests.

I had little to show for my efforts. I would be a laughing stock.

I and my men had fallen to panther girls. We had been outwitted, and tricked. Though we were men, we had fallen to women. Our heads, in token of our humiliation, had been shaved by our captors. Each of us, including the mighty Bosk, wore the two-and-one-half inch swath on our heads, running from our foreheads to the back of our necks, making it clear to all who it was who had taken us in the forests.

I, and my men, would have been raped and sold, summarily, had we not been rescued by the great Marlenus, Ubar of Ubars.

He had succeeded, casually, where we had failed. It was he, not Bosk, to whom Verna and her girls had fallen. It was he, not Bosk, who would sell them, or do with them as he pleased.

And he had even extended to me and my men the courtesy of his camp, magnanimously.

I shook my head. Marlenus was indeed a Ubar, a Ubar of Ubars.

Verna, had been a rude, proud, strong, defiant, ill-tempered, magnificent outlaw woman, hating men. Then she had fallen to Marlenus of Ar, who would not accept her as such. He had played a savage game, crushing her, turning her into a slave girl. Verna was not property, to be bid upon, and bought and sold by any free man. But, too, paradoxically perhaps, she was joyful in the discovery of herself, her sex and her body. It mattered not that the discovery had been forced upon her. Too long had she fought and denied her womanhood. As a slave, she would no longer be permitted to do so. She had been a proud outlaw woman, fierce, resenting men, hostile toward them. Marlenus had touched her. She was feminine, utterly feminine, unlocked, opened, a conquered, helpless, loving slave.

I asked myself, as Verna had twice before, Marlenus, are you always victorious? Now I returned to the Tesephone, without Talena, with nothing.

Marlenus, as was his right, she being an ex-citizen of Ar, would free her, and return her, in simple robes of concealment, in disgrace, to her former city. She had been disowned.

She was now nothing.

She had only her beauty, and that was branded.

Companionship with such a person, for anyone of position or power, was unthinkable. It would result in the equivalent of ostracism. With her as companion one could be only rich. Companionship with such a person, an ex-slave, one without caste, one without family and position, would be, politically and socially, a gross and incomparable mistake.

I wondered of the daughters of Ubars. It was unfortunate that the great Ubar, Marlenus, had no such daughter. Had he one, she might have been ideal. Lurius of Jad, Ubar of the island of Cos, was said, by a long-dissolved companionship, to have a daughter. Phanius Turmus, of Turia, was said to have two daughters. They had once been enslaved by Tuchuks, but they were now free. They had been returned, though still wearing the chains of slaves, as a gesture of good will, by Kamchak, Ubar San of the Wagon Peoples. Turia was called the Ar of the south.

Cos and Port Kar, of course, are enemies, but, if the Companion Price offered Lurius were sufficient, I would not expect him to hesitate in giving me the girl. The alliance, of course, would be understood, on all sides, as not altering the political conditions obtaining between the cities. It was up to Lurius to dispose of his daughter as he saw fit. She might not desire to come to Port Kar, but the feelings of the girl are not considered in such matters. Some high-born women are less free than the most abject of slave girls.

Clark of Thentis had a daughter, but he was not a Ubar. He was not even of high caste. He, too, was of the merchants. Indeed, there were many important merchants who had daughters, for example, the first merchant of Teletus and the first merchant of Asperiche. Indeed, the two latter individuals had already, in the past year, approached me with the prospect of a companionship with their daughters, but I had declined to discuss the matter.

I wanted a woman of high caste.

I could probably have Claudia Tentia Hinrabia, of the Builders, who had been daughter of Claudius Tentius Hinrabius, once Ubar of Ar, but she was now without family. Marlenus, in whose palace she held her residence, probably in his generosity, would have seen that she accepted my proposal. I recalled she had once been slave, and that I had, on a certain occasion, in the house of Cernus, seen her fully. Other things being equal, I would, of course, prefer a beautiful companion. Claudia, as I recalled with pleasure, was beautiful. Further, she, once having been slave, would promise delights not always obtainable from an ignorant free woman. A woman who has once been slave, incidentally, often wishes to kiss and touch again in the shadow of the slave ring. Why this is I do not know. Beauty in a companion, of course, is not particularly important. Family and power are. In a house such as that of Bosk there are always beautiful slave girls, eager to please, each hoping to become first girl. But I dismissed Claudius Tentius Hinrabia. The Hinrabians, with the exception of herself, had been wiped out. Thus she was, for practical purposes, of a high name but without family.

There were various jarls in Torvaldsland who had daughters, but these, generally, were ignorant, primitive women. Moreover, no one jarl held great power in Torvaldsland. It was not uncommon for the daughter of a jarl in that bleak place, upon the arrival of a suitor, to be called in from the pastures, where she would be tender her father’s verr.

There were Ubars to the far south, I knew, but their countries were often small, and lay far inland. They exercised little political power beyond their own borders.

It seemed clear that I should take unto myself as companion the daughter of some Ubar or Administrator, but few seemed appropriate. Too, many Ubars and Administrators might not wish to ally their house with that of a mere merchant. That thought irritated me.

Gorean pride runs deep.

Perhaps I should think of the daughter of Lurius of Jad, Ubar of Cos. She was the daughter of a Ubar. He would doubtless let her go if the Companionship Price were sufficiently attractive.

The ideal, of course, would have been if Marlenus of Ar, the greatest of the Ubars, had had a daughter. But he had no daughter. She had been disowned. The daughter of Lurius of Jad was a possibility. I could probably buy her. But perhaps it was too early for me to think of Companionship.

I could wait. I was patient.

I was furious!

I had failed to rescue Talena! She had been disowned! I and my men had fallen to panther girls. We would have been raped and sold slave had we not been rescued by the incomparable Marlenus of Ar. It was to him that Verna and her girls had fallen. He had won her and conquered her, superbly, even insolently telling her when to place a talender in her hair. he hunted and amused himself while I and my men, his guests, partook of his hospitality at his camp, dining on his largesse. He had defeated me, devastatingly, in the game. And he, when it pleased him, would free Talena, and return her to Ar.

And I, and my men, would return to our businesses, empty handed, our heads bearing the shaved degradation swath of panther girls. Why had we not been raped and sold? Because we had been saved by Marlenus, the great Ubar, the Ubar of Ubars!

He had saved us.

We returned, laughing stocks, empty handed, while he would go back to Ar as its victorious Ubar, again successful. We would have nothing. He would have his acclaims and his glories. Even the shame of Talena would not shame him, for he had cut her off from him. But, in his generosity, he would free her, and return her to Ar and permit her to live, sequestered in his palace.

Noble, great Ubar!

And who would remember Talena, and her shame, after Marlenus, astride a mighty tharlarion, would have his triumph in the streets of Ar, panther girls in tiny cages slung on poles carried by huntsmen, and walking beside his beast, naked and chained to his stirrup, their former leader, Verna, now only a slave. Marlenus, I asked myself, are you always victorious?

How great a man he was. And how small he made me seem. I began to hate Marlenus, Ubar of Ar.

There was little to do now but return to Port Kar. I was now near the Tesephone. Marlenus, it seemed, was always successful, always fortunate. He never, it seemed, miscalculated.

He had not miscalculated Verna, and her band. She, and they, were his, female slaves. And who else might dare to be enemy of such a man? Who else had he to fear? Who else, as danger, might figure as worthy to be included in the calculations of such a warrior, such a Ubar?

Marlenus never miscalculated.

I began to look forward to my return to the Tesephone. My being alone in the forest, my thoughts fierce and angry within me, had been good.

I would permit my men, for a time, to observe and laugh at my hair, joking with them, for otherwise it would be difficult for them, terribly difficult. Then, when their tension had been released, I would reassert my authority as captain. If there were any who cared to dispute it, we could debate the matter with steel.

But none would care to dispute it. I knew this crew. They were picked men, and good men.

I was interested in seeing again the delicious, quick-handed little Tina, Rim’s lovely slave, Cara, and in particular a former panther girl, a proud, sweet-bodied, dark-haired girl, who wore my collar, who had found herself helpless in my hands, whose name was Sheera.

I was anxious to see again Thurnock, and Rim, who had returned to the Tesephone with Grenna, the girl I had captured in the forest, who had stood high in Hura’s band. At her arrival at the Tesephone she would have been branded and placed in my collar. Then her wound would have been tended, as a slave’s wound is tended, with effectiveness, but roughness. She had had good legs. I thought she would look well in a slave tunic. Perhaps I would give her to Arn, when he, with my other men, returned to the Tesephone the day after tomorrow, coming from the camp of Marlenus.

We would then follow the current down river, lay in at Laura, then proceed to Lydius, remain at Lydius for two days, for the pleasure of the men, and then return to Port Kar.

I smiled to myself. I recalled that there should be, at my camp, four paga slaves. I had had Rim rent them in Laura. He had rented them from a tavern keeper in Laura, a man named Hesius. Rim had said the girls were beauties. I had not yet seem them. My steps quickened. I was anxious to do so.

As I strode toward the camp, my hand held the great bow. Over my left shoulder, slung was sword and scabbard. At my belt was a sleen knife; at my hip, in a verr-skin quiver, temwood sheaf arrows, nineteen of them, piled with steel, winged with the feathers of the vosk gull.

Paga slaves are usually lovely girls I recalled Tana, a paga slave I had met in Lydius. She was a lovely girl, a beautiful example, belled and silked, of such a slave.

Strangely Hesius had asked for no deposit on his girls, as a surety for their return. This only now struck me as unusual. Surely we were not known to him. Further, now, as I thought of such matters, I recalled his rent price had seemed very low, particularly for fine girls, as Rim had assured me these were. Prices were supposedly low in Laura. I was prepared to believe that. Yet were prices that low? Could they be that low? Suddenly my hand went white on the great bow. I stopped and strung it. I removed an arrow from the quiver. I set the arrow to the string. I felt very cold and hard, and yet in a rage. We had been fools. I recalled, with savage understanding, with an understanding as sudden and terrible, as that of a lightning flash over Torvaldsland, that this Hesius, this tavern keeper of Laura, had, free of charge, as a gesture of good will, included wine with the shipment of girls to my camp.

Inwardly I howled with rage.

The men of Tyros!

I, like a fool, obsessed with the pursuit of Talena, blind to all, had forgotten them.

I approached the camp of the Tesephone with great caution. One shadow among others, silent, from between branches, observed the camp.

The wall which had been built about the camp had been broken and thrown down. Here and there there were the ashes of campfires. There was debris on the campsite. The sand, in many places, was torn, as though there might have been struggles. There was, deep in the sand, the impression of a keel, leading to the water.

My men, the slaves, the Tesephone, were gone. I clenched my fist, and put my forehead to the green branch behind which I stood.