Prize of Gor

Chapter 25 SOLD

Ellen screamed in pain, her head seeming to explode with fire. “Please, no!” she cried, lights bursting in her vision, jerked forth by the hair, doing her best to scramble out, to comply, to please, stop the pain, stop the pain, please, don’t hurt me, flung to the dirt on her belly outside the tiny cage. She lay there on her belly in the dirt and felt her left wrist seized and manacled.

There had been metallic sounds, as the locks had been undone, the hasps flung back, and the padlocks, partially opened, slipped over the staples. The small gate was then thrown open.

“Out, out!” had said the keeper.

“Yes, Master!” she had cried, going to her hands and knees, to crawl forth. Then he had seized her hair.

“On your feet,” said the voice.

Ellen tried to rise, but her body, from the cage, was in such pain and so stiff, and so ached, that she, trying to rise, fell. “Oh!” she cried, as a bootlike sandal kicked her thigh, and she, bent over, her left wrist in the manacle, with the chain, her eyes filled with tears, rose to her feet.

At least her hair had been released.

Behind her, on the chain, were some sixteen or seventeen girls. She could see the lot number, rather similar to her own, on the left breast of the frightened girl, a blonde, behind her, she also chained by the left wrist in the line.

Perhaps the blonde, who had exquisite features and a lovely figure, had not been sold before. Or perhaps she knew more than Ellen, and feared this sort of sale.

“Stand straight,” said a voice, that of another keeper, and Ellen straightened her body.

There were two empty manacles on the chain before Ellen. They, with their chains, were before her, waiting, lying in the dirt.

From an area of chains and stakes she saw two girls being conducted toward her chain. Each was bent over, held in leading position, both in the handling of one keeper. They were then released and knelt, and then commanded to bow their heads and lift their left wrists. They were then roughly entered onto the chain, each by the left wrist. They were then ordered to their feet, as had been the others. The lot number of the one manacled before Ellen, which number she had seen as she had been brought forward, was again similar to her own. Was it higher, or lower? “How beautiful she is,” thought Ellen. “Is she more beautiful than I?”

A scribe, with papers, was nearby, and, in a moment, began to course the chain.

“115,” he said, of the first girl on the chain.

“116,” he said, of the second girl on the chain.

It was not the scribe she had known from the exhibition cage or the silken enclosure of the preceding evening.

“Put your head up, girl,” said the scribe.

“Yes, Master,” said Ellen.

“117,” he said, of Ellen.

He made notes in his papers, as he coursed the line.

“118,” he said of the girl behind her, the blonde.

So she before me is a lower number, and she after me a higher number, thought Ellen.

And are not the lower numbers the most beautiful?

Are the two slaves before me truly more beautiful than I, she wondered. And can it be that she behind me, so beautiful, is less beautiful than I?

Surely we are all much the same, and yet men, the brutes, rank us, and will buy and sell us! As it pleases them! As goods! But, of course, as the goods we are!

But might not I bring a higher price than any of these others?

But that is for men to decide?

In what order will we be sold?

Will they take any bid on us? Or will they place a reserve on us? But there were twenty-one bids on me, even from the exhibition cages! And then I was danced, as a slave!

Men will want me!

Have I not seen their eyes on me?

I am a desirable slave!

How startling once, so long ago, would have been such a thought!

Yet, was bondage, even then, so alien to me? Had I not, even then, wondered about such things, amidst my papers and pretensions, amongst my articles, my books, my vagaries, my dusts, my boredoms and aridities? How I despised the male weaklings I knew, so gullible, so easily manipulated, so spineless and accommodating, so softened, so self-betrayed, so twisted, reduced and crippled! How I dreamed of being taken in hand, stripped and collared, of being chained, of being imperiously ravished, of being mastered! How I would have accepted, even pleaded for, a stroke of my lord’s lash, that I might the better know myself uncompromisingly his. Yes, long ago, on Earth, in my most secret dreams, in my most feared and forbidden, but persistent, exciting, delicious and fascinating thoughts, I wondered what it might be to be a slave! I had wondered, too, what I might be truly worth, if anything, what I might bring in an open market, sold raw, as a mere vended female. Now it seems I shall learn!

The scribe was then well behind her, farther back down the line. In a few moments, she again heard his voice. “Take them to the ready area,” he said.

The lead girl, whom Ellen understood to be 115, was then put in leading position, bent over, a hand in her hair, and, as she whimpered, she was conducted from the area, amongst various cages, shelters, tents and stakes, toward distant sounds of men, shouts and calls, and the rest of the chain followed. Ellen was pleased she was not lead girl.

****

Ellen had knelt in the tiny cage, confined there, grasping the bars, waiting. Every muscle in her body had seemed to ache. The cage was of the sort commonly used for a disciplinary device, one in which an errant slave might be incarcerated pending the subsidence of a master’s ire. In such a device her contrition quickly becomes authentic, her lessons are learned and her ways mended. Powerful resolutions of improved service are quickly formed in that small space. It is the sort of device into which a proud free woman might be thrust but out of which creeps a humbled, self-acknowledged slave, asking only to be permitted to please, in any way the master might wish. Such cages are designed for the small body of a woman, and this particular cage had been designed for a small woman.

It was the evening, at about the 14th Ahn, following Ellen’s performance in the silken enclosure.

The bars in the cage, which had a metal roof and floor, were set some two inches apart, to make it impossible for an aching limb to be thrust through the openings. One can sit, knees drawn up, or kneel, or crouch in such a cage, but, obviously, one cannot stand in it, or stretch out in it. If one lies down in it one must have one’s knees pulled tightly up. One’s relief is merely to change from one cramped position to another. In time a considerable amount of body pain is built up. It is rather like close chains, in this respect.

Ellen was aware that a small chain was being formed, which was approaching her cage.

She did not know if she were to be added to that chain, or to another. Several chains had passed her cage.

“Please let me out of the cage,” thought Ellen. “Oh, please, masters, let me out!”

Selius Arconious, she recalled, had suggested that she be confined “straitly,” and the scribe, to whom he had given some fifteen tarsk-bits, buying her blows, had found this not only agreeable, but, given his earlier rancor, eminently fitting.

And so she had been put into the tiny cage.

“This is the smallest of the woman cages?” had asked the guardsman, her tether looped about his left wrist.

“Yes,” had said the attendant.

She had then been knelt before the cage, and there the guardsman had removed the tether from her wrists, that on which she had been conducted thither, as might have been a verr, from the area of the silken enclosure where she, and other slaves, had been put to the entertainment of men.

Kneeling before the small enclosure, she had regarded it with dismay.

The gate was swung open.

“In, slut,” she was told.

She went to all fours before the tiny opening. She cried out in surprise, pain, and humiliation, kicked. Then she scrambled hastily, awkwardly, within. She heard the guardsman laugh. She felt the bars against her body. Her feet were lifted, that the door could be shut. Then it was closed behind her. She faced the back of the cage, with its bars. She heard the two locks put in place, behind her. She twisted about, with difficulty, cramped, brushing, turning, against the bars, to face the front of the small confinement. Then she had knelt within, in misery, and grasped the bars of the gate. She had looked out. She could hardly be seen within, given the narrow spaces between the bars.

“Please, Master,” she had protested, dismayed.

“Be silent, slave girl,” said the attendant.

“Yes, Master.”

“You can hardly see her,” said the guardsman.

“It will be easy enough to see her later,” said the attendant, “when she is on the block.”

“In the future,” said the guardsman to the incarcerated slave, “perhaps you will be less stupid.”

“It is my hope that that will be so,” said Ellen.

“It had better be,” he said.

“Yes, Master,” said Ellen.

He had then left.

A moment later, with a jangle of keys, the attendant, too, had left.

Ellen had grasped the bars. “Selius Arconious has done this to me,” she had said to herself. “How I hate him!”

The sales had commenced yesterday evening, and some three to four hundred women had been swiftly vended, of diverse quality, some in lots. The strategy of the vendors, it seemed, was to mix lots in such a way as to have excellent goods available for all three nights of the sale. The average sale took only two or three Ehn. But it was rumored, nonetheless, that the next day’s sales, the third day’s sales, would begin in the early afternoon, to ensure the disposal of all the merchandise. The Cosians, it seemed, had not anticipated that there would be intense, competitive bidding on so many girls. But the buyers, clearly, had a greater interest in several of the items marketed than the Cosians, in effect, wholesalers, had anticipated. There were many professional slavers in attendance, of course. They, clearly, on the whole, were interested in picking up cheap girls for training and subsequent resale, the first buys in the festival camp being understood largely as speculations or investments.

Ellen’s cage, and some similar cages, but most much larger, some even like exhibition cages, containing several girls, were within a large, canvas-walled area, the canvas strung upon and held upright by poles, behind and adjacent to the sales area itself, with its great block at one end, a block some two yards in height and twenty feet in diameter with broad, flat steps on each side, by means of which merchandise might be brought conveniently to its surface and, subsequently, with similar ease, taken from it. The auditorium, so to speak, was open to the air, and consisted of several ascending tiers of closely spaced benches, these arranged in semicircles on a shallow hill, at the foot of which was the block. The block itself, after dark, would be illuminated by torchlight.

****

Ellen followed in line, in pain, almost hobbling, scarcely able to walk. The scribe of the exhibition cages and silken enclosure, it seems, had certainly been wrong about one thing. When she was taken from the cage she would not run to the block. She could scarcely walk to it.

But, as she walked, gradually, in this activity, in virtue of this gentle movement, in virtue of this concomitant stretching and exercising of her limbs, much of her body pain began to dissipate.

“I am going to be sold,” she said to herself. “I wonder if any of my former male colleagues would care to bid on me, and own me. Or would they buy me to free me? Could they be that stupid? Probably. Would they relinquish the opportunity to own something as precious, as delicious and desirable as I am? Perhaps. One supposes so. Or would this be the opportunity of which they have secretly dreamed? Perhaps some of them, who knows, dreamed of me at their feet, naked, in their chains. I wonder then if they would be so stupid as to free me? Probably, as they are such asses. And I suppose I would have to pretend to be grateful! But perhaps some would not be so stupid as to free me. There is, after all, a Gorean saying that only a fool frees a slave girl. But the men I knew were surely fools. They would probably free me. One does not know. But in any event I do not think I would care to belong to one of them. I do not think they would know what to do with me. I do not think they would know what to do with a slave girl.”

Ellen conjectured that her chain, which consisted of twenty slaves, presumably numbers 115 through 134, would soon be in the vicinity of the great block. Her conjecture was nearly, if not entirely, correct, as her chain was led into a ready lane, one of several, which was within, say, fifty yards of the block. There were a number of lanes, marked out with stakes and strung ribbons, and in each of these lanes, or rather within each which was occupied, there was a line of chained, waiting slaves. These slaves were muchly at their ease, resting, sitting, kneeling, lying down, subject only to the constraints of their manacling, Some were speaking softly to one another. Some, on the other hand, were white-faced and apprehensive, particularly those in the lanes nearest the empty lanes closest to the block area. The mode of the chaining for the girls in each lane was the same as in Ellen’s group, all being left-wrist linked.

Ellen’s group was led into one of the lanes. “This is your lane,” said a keeper. “You will stay here until shortly before your sale. You may be much as you like here, even permitted gentle speech, but you may not rise to your feet without permission.”

“Master,” said 115, “may I speak?”

He regarded her, and a moment’s annoyance crossed his features, a tiny thing, but one which brought apprehension to the chain but then, seemingly, he found her pleasing.

“Yes,” he said.

“She is surely beautiful,” thought Ellen. “I suppose one such as she is more likely to be granted such privileges than others. I wager she knows, the luscious vixen, how beautiful she is. Did that give her courage? I wager it did. I wonder if I would have been granted permission to speak. Perhaps. But then there is little risked by a girl’s requesting permission to speak. One would be seldom punished for that. And how else is a girl to speak if she may not ask for permission to do so?”

“How long, Master,” asked 115, “before our sale?”

“How bold she is,” thought Ellen.

“I think,” said he, surveying the lanes, and their waiting occupants, the lengths of the chains and such, “better than two Ahn.”

“That is a long time,” thought Ellen.

“Thank you, Master,” said 115.

“I think he would like to have her,” thought Ellen. “I wonder if he would like to have me, too. Perhaps. I suspect that I would do for him, and do quite well.”

“You will later be fed and watered, and permitted to relieve yourselves,” said the keeper.

“Yes, Master, thank you, Master,” said 115.

The keeper then turned away, and, later, returned with another chain. That chain would occupy the next lane. And, similarly, from time to time, he, or others, brought new chains to various lanes in the ready area.

Ellen lifted her wrist, and looked at the manacle upon it. She could not slip it, of course. She lay down between 116 and 118, and stretched her body, in almost feline luxury. How good to be out of the cage! She looked up at the sky.

Then, for a moment, she was angry with men.

“They put me in a cage, a cage!” she thought. “By what right did they put me in a cage? By what right was I caged? By what right do these Gorean beasts arrogate to themselves the right to cage women, or women such as I?” And then she felt how stupid was her question. It was an Earth question, a question from another world, a distant, superficial, polluted, noisy, unnatural, artificial world, a question from another ethos, one not one with nature, but one at war with nature; it was not a biological question, not a natural question, not a Gorean question. “Obviously they have every right to do so,” she said to herself. “They have the right of masters, the obvious right of masters, to do with us, their slaves, as they please. Have you not yet learned the nature of this world, and what you are on this world? What a silly little vulo you are! What a stupid little pudding you are!”

Later, rising to a half-reclining, half-sitting position, she brought her legs together, to one side, with smooth, swift, sinuous grace. “Oh,” she thought, suddenly, “you did that without thinking. You, indeed, are now a slave girl. How shameless you are, you branded little tart!” And she smiled to herself, pleased.

She could hear the sounds of the crowd, it seemed far off, like distant surf, vague cries, calls, shouts, crashings, rumblings, responses.

“They are selling women,” she thought. “And I, too, am to be sold. I cannot prevent this. None of us can prevent this. We are helpless, absolutely helpless. But that is fitting for us, that we should be absolutely helpless, for we are slaves.”

There was the sound of a gong, which signified that another sale had been concluded.

“How strange it suddenly seems to me,” thought Ellen, “that I, an Earth woman, should be here, on this world, with these others, waiting to be sold.” But then, upon reflection, in the context of her abduction, the smoothness, care and efficiency with which it was conducted, and given the predations of slavers upon Earth, and their access to techniques and vehicles capable of at least interplanetary spacefaring, and the market for such as she on this world, then, in this larger context, her situation did not seem so untoward or inexplicable at all. Its hue of strangeness was no more than an illusion, a distortion, perceived through a prism of ignorance. To a native glass beads may appear strange. And she had no doubt but what had happened to her had happened to a great many of her former world. She suspected that her status, her condition, her situation, her fate, her fortune, her experiences and such, those of an Earth woman brought to Gor as a slave, were not unique to her. Doubtless they were shared by many of her former world.

From time to time, the gong sounded.

Then she said to herself, “In any event, you are now no longer an Earth woman, but only a Gorean slave girl. That is what you are now, and all you are now!”

She wondered if lovely Dara, who had danced yesterday evening in the ba-ta circle, who had taken the bracelet from her in the area of preparation, who had been lashed by the exterior whip master, who had had the low number 51, had been sold. She thought it likely, as Dara had had such a low number. On the other hand, they might save her for the last night. It was up to the masters. Ellen envied Dara her low number.

Somewhat later Ellen’s lane was fed. A slave girl with a bucket of thickened slave gruel went down the line and those in the lane were permitted, one after the other, to reach into the bucket with their free hand, and were permitted to keep what they could hold in one hand. A second girl, carrying a large, flat, wicker tray, brought wedges of bread, cut from flat, rounded loaves, and gave one to each slave. Ellen had learned in the coffle, days ago, that it was not wise to ask for more.

The sales proceeded.

Ellen was thirsty, but she supposed that water would be provided later. Certainly that was among the bits of information which had been secured by 115.

She was grateful to 115, for her boldness, however deferentially it had been proffered, and the welcome intelligence she had managed to obtain. She herself, less confidant, would have been reluctant to inquire. She would not have wanted to be lashed. But there was something for being first on the chain, of course. That did, in effect, make one a likely spokesman or representative of one’s fellows. Too, she was undeniably beautiful. Beautiful slaves often, it seemed, were accorded preferential treatment. This did not, of course, increase their popularity with their sisters in bondage. To be sure, some masters, perhaps aware of the latent dangers of such tendencies to laxness make it a practice to be particularly severe with beautiful slaves, and then the beauties are kept in so fierce and orderly a discipline that it requires great courage for them to do so much as lift their eyes to those of their master.

But I suppose that I am as beautiful as she, thought Ellen.

And, of course, from time to time, one lane or another was emptied, as its occupants were conducted forward, or perhaps, one should say, “herded forward,” as that phrasing seems more accurate. Certainly the men who fetched them, the sales attendants, seemed more like rude herdsmen than solicitous merchants. They carried sticks, and it was not without jabbings, pokings and blows, and impatient expostulations, that they sped their linked, disconcerted, intimidated charges, those lovely, chained she-animals, forward, presumably to a final staging area prior to their sale.

Ellen was then angry with Selius Arconious. She recalled how he had looked upon her, when she had knelt in the silken enclosure, when she had lifted her wrists, and had had them tied, and had then been drawn by them, tethered, to her feet, to be led to the sales area.

“He looked upon me as an animal,” she thought. “In his eyes I was no more than a tethered beast!” Then she recalled, angrily, that that was all she was, in truth, a beast, an animal, a domestic animal, a small, sleek, exquisite, curvaceous domestic animal, who might be bought and sold. “I hate him!” she thought. “I hate him!”

Ellen was furious.

“He might have been looking upon any slave,” she thought. “How pathetic and miserable to be a slave! How glorious it would be to be free, so that I might tantalize and taunt him, that I might make him suffer, that I might make him miserable, that I might punish and torment him, if only with the glimpse of an ankle, with all the cleverness and all the power, and all the impunity, of the secure, protected free woman! But I am a slave! Such things are denied me! I cannot behave in such ways. I cannot do such things! Men have decided to own me, and will do so!”

“I hate him! I hate him!” she thought.

“Put him from your mind,” she thought, “a nothing, a lowly tarnster! You had twenty-one bids on you. You should obtain a well-fixed master. You might have sandals. You might be given a silken tunic. How pleased I am that he cannot afford me! I hate him! I hate him!”

The gong then rang again.

Ellen wondered if Louise and Renata had been sold. She had not seen them in the cages, or at the stakes, or in the lanes. That was not surprising, as there were, obviously, a great many slaves in the camp.

This was not a typical market, Ellen realized. It was not merely that it was a festival camp, for it was not that unusual to sell women on holidays, and at times of celebration, sometimes with special advertising on the public boards, and such; it had to do, rather, with the sales being conducted not by a private house, but by a state, in this case the state of Cos, the amount of merchandise being offered and the relatively brief duration of the sale, some three days, it seemed. That was not a long time in which to dispose of so considerable an amount of stock, something in the vicinity of a thousand women.

Perhaps that explained something of the urgency, the impatience, of the attendants.

To be sure, after the days of the sales, there might be some women left over. A thousand women, or so, was a great many to dispose of in three days, even if several were vended in lots.

The lane next to Ellen’s had now been emptied, and, a little later, another chain of women was introduced into it.

The lanes, it seemed, were not going in any obvious order, at least in any order obvious to the occupants of the lanes. Lanes on both sides of Ellen’s lane, nearer or farther away, had been emptied and refilled, some more than once.

“We are special,” the girl before Ellen, 116, said. This message was apparently being relayed from the girl before her, 115, who seemed pleased about the matter. So Ellen turned to the girl behind her, and transmitted the message. Ellen, too, was somewhat pleased. Apparently her lane was being held for later in the sales.

It was not difficult, upon occasion, however, to anticipate which lane would move next for a wastes bucket was passed down the lane, that the slaves might relieve themselves. This reduces the possibilities of accidents on the block, brought about perhaps by consternation or terror. Even so most blocks, in the gentle, circular depression toward their center, worn by the passing of so many small, bared feet, are furnished with sawdust. Following the passing along of the wastes vessel, over which the slaves must squat and relieve themselves in order, a girl brings a bucket and dipper with water. The slaves must then drink liberally from the large dipper, draining it, for this freshens their appearance and pleasantly rounds the belly. That liquid, of course, will not have time to pass through their body before their sale.

Ellen’s attention was drawn to a slave in the lane to her left. That slave, like the others, was linked by the left wrist to the others in her group. She, however, was red-eyed, apparently from crying. Also, on her back and elsewhere about her body there was a plenitude of stripes, which must have pained her sorely. The slave went to all fours, looking about herself, wildly. Some of the women in Ellen’s lane were conversing softly, which was permitted. “Slave girl,” whispered the slave fiercely, she in the lane to Ellen’s left, rather at her side, as the lanes were organized.

“Yes, slave girl?” said Ellen, irritably.

The woman looked at Ellen angrily.

“May we speak?” she whispered, looking about herself, presumably fearful of the presence of attendants.

“Yes,” said Ellen.

“They have beaten me!” she whispered.

“Perhaps you were displeasing,” said Ellen.

“You do not understand,” said the woman. “They have taken my clothes!”

“None of us are clothed,” said Ellen, puzzled.

“You do not understand, stupid slave girl,” said the woman. “I am the Lady Melanie of Brundisium! I am a free woman! A terrible mistake has been made! They seized me, yesterday evening! They have chained me! They think I am a slave!”

“You are pretty enough to be a slave,” said Ellen.

“I am Melanie, of Brundisium! The Lady Melanie of Brundisium! How can I convince them of this? How can I correct this terrible misunderstanding!”

“Explain the matter to the masters,” suggested Ellen.

“I tried! They beat me!” wept the woman.

“Cosians?” asked Ellen.

“Yes!”

“They do as they wish,” said Ellen. “One does not question the spears of Cos.”

“Tell me what I am to do! Tell me how to free myself!”

“Do I not know you?” asked Ellen.

The woman looked at Ellen, closely. “The slave girl!” she said.

“I know you,” said Ellen. “I can tell your voice! You are the free woman by the campfire, in the Robes of Concealment, with the necklace, and the jewels on your robes. You had me pour wine for you! You made me kneel before you!”

“Yes, slut!” said the woman.

“When you are sold, perhaps your master will give you a tunic,” said Ellen, “— if you beg prettily enough.”

“Insolent slave!” said the woman. “I shall order you beaten!”

“Not unless you have the talmit, or the switch, or unless you are first girl,” said Ellen, angrily.

“Slave, slave!” hissed the woman.

Ellen moved a bit forward, and to the side, and the woman tried to turn quickly away, but she had not detected Ellen’s intent quickly enough, and Ellen had a glimpse of what she had suspected.

“You are branded,” said Ellen, delightedly.

“No!” said the woman.

“I think you are,” said Ellen. “Show me!”

The woman, angrily, turned a little, to the side.

“Yes,” said Ellen, “you are branded.”

“The beasts held me down! I could not move! They marked me!”

“A nicely done brand,” said Ellen.

“Do you think so?” asked the woman.

“Yes,” said Ellen. “It is the common kef.”

“It is meaningless!” cried the woman.

“I do not think you will find it so,” said Ellen.

“I am not a slave!” said the woman.

“You have been marked,” said Ellen. “You will be sold. Then you will doubtless find yourself in a collar, your master’s collar. Whether or not you will be permitted clothing, a tunic, a rag, a slave strip, will be up to your master.”

“I am the Lady Melanie of Brundisium!” she protested.

“I am not sure you have a name,” said Ellen. “Did a scribe give you a name?”

“Of course not!” she said.

“What did the scribe put on your records?”

“‘Melanie’,” she said.

“Then you have been given a name, ‘Melanie’,” said Ellen. “Your master may change it, if he does not like it. But it is a pretty name. Perhaps he will permit you to keep it.”

“It is my name!” she said.

“No,” said Ellen, “not in the sense you think. In the sense you have in mind, you have no name, no more than a tarsk. Your name, if it is seen fit to give you a name, will be whatever masters wish.”

“— if it is seen fit to give me a name?” she said.

“Have no fear,” said Ellen. “Masters commonly give us names. We may thus be the better referred to, distinguished from other slaves, summoned, ordered about, and such.”

The slave knelt and put her head down, her face in her hands, weeping.

“What a hypocrite you are,” said Ellen.

The slave looked up, tearfully. “I do not understand,” she said.

“You came unattended, unprotected, to a festival camp of conquerors, of Cosians. You sat with men, chatting with them. Do you not think they would be curious as to what might lie hidden beneath your veils? Do you not think they would speculate as to what delights might lie concealed within your cumbersome robes? And do you think they would fail to note the putative value of your necklace, the sparkle of your jeweled robes and veils? And surely you knew that hundreds of women were to be marketed. And did you not flirt with the men? Was your veil not disarranged as though inadvertently when you drank? Did you not sit in a certain fashion, turned to the side, legs together, as a slave girl might sit, if she were permitted to sit? Did you not insolently, haughtily, arrogantly, put a naked slave to your feet, and not realize that men would be curious as to what you yourself might look like, put similarly to their feet? Did you not know that your carriage, and demeanor, your pride and pretensions, might try the patience of men? Did you not know that such might tempt them to transform you into something of more interest to them, that they might consider taking you in hand and turning you into a luscious, cringing slave, pathetically begging to please in whatever manner they might desire? And do not think that I did not see the hem of your robe lifted in such a way as to bare an ankle!”

“No,” wept the slave. “No!”

“Perhaps they wondered what that ankle would look like, encircled with bangles, or thonged with slave bells.”

“No!” she protested.

“You were begging the brand! You were courting the collar!”

“No, no!”

“At least,” said Ellen, “they have permitted you some modesty.”

“What?” she asked.

“The wrists of a free woman, as I understand it,” said Ellen, “as generally the rest of her body, are not to be publicly exposed, to prevent that being the function of gloves and sleeves.”

“Yes,” said the slave, bewildered.

“You are wearing a manacle on your left wrist,” said Ellen. “Does that not conceal a bit of wrist, thus affording you some modesty?”

“Insolent slave!” cried the woman.

“To be sure,” said Ellen. “It is not a great deal.”

“I was not courting the collar!” said the woman.

“You were, obviously,” said Ellen.

“What is it like to be a slave?” whispered the woman.

“Much depends on the master,” said Ellen, warily.

“But we must serve our masters — in all ways?” she asked.

“Certainly.” said Ellen.

“Sexually?” she asked.

“Yes, particularly so,” said Ellen.

“I am not — white silk,” she whispered.

“Few of us are,” said Ellen. She did not inform the slave that she had been white silk herself, even when brought to Gor. She had not become red silk until Mirus, her master, had seen fit in his audience hall to open her for the uses of men. And Ellen recalled he had not done so in any way that might have been regarded as in a sensitive, or considerate, manner. To be sure, his use of her had been instructive, apprising her of the sort of thing that might be done to her as a slave. It had come to her as something of a revelation. Then he had sold her.

“He was polite, and feeble,” she said. “It was terribly disappointing.” She looked down, reddening. “Is this all there is to it, I asked myself. Is there no more? I remained dissatisfied. This could not be all! I was starving! And on my plate there was flung no more than the tiniest of crumbs!”

“You were not mastered,” said Ellen.

The slave looked at her, wildly.

“You should have been stripped and bound, and caressed for hours, until you shrieked with need and ecstasy,” said Ellen. “Then you should have been penetrated with all the imperious ruthlessness of the callous, self-serving master. You would then know yourself nothing and slave. Then you should have been chained for the night at the foot of his bed, that you might there, in that place, recollect your feelings, and what had been done to you, and what you now were. In the morning you would be freed to kneel, and kiss the whip, to belly, to wash his feet with your tongue. You would learn to be ordered about, to work, to serve, to obey with alacrity and perfection. You would know yourself owned, and by a master whom you know will have all from you. And that is what you want, a master who will be satisfied with nothing less than all from you. And soon you would learn to beg, and serve, with all the vulnerable, passionate intimacy of the slave. Your life would then be changed. You would find yourself dominated, and subject as any slave to the whip. I assure you you would strive to be pleasing, and in this service, and in this relationship, you will have feelings, and experiences, forever beyond the ken of the lesser woman, the narrower, colder, shallower, more inert, less awakened free woman. Your sexual fulfillment comes not from him alone or from yourself alone, but from the complementarities of nature, the male and female, the man and woman, the master and the slave, he who commands and she who, conquered, surrendered and loving, obliged to please, subject to discipline, serves, serves gratefully, zealously, lovingly, with every fiber of her owned being. In her service she is joyous; she desires to serve, fervently, and she knows that she must serve, and perfectly, whether she will or no. This reassures her and pleases her. She knows that she has been found attractive enough to put in chains. She rejoices that she has been found worthy of the collar. She knows she is the most intensely desired of all women, the female slave. She has been found exciting enough, attractive enough, desirable enough, to be enslaved, to be owned. At last she is at peace with her sex; at her master’s feet; she has come home to the collar.”

“Thank you, Mistress,” said the slave, and lay down in her lane.

“Perhaps you could call out from the auction block, proclaiming your freedom, seeking to attract the attention of citizens of Brundisium.”

“They would beat me,” she said.

“Nonetheless, you could try,” said Ellen.

“No,” she said. “I want to be sold.”

“I understand,” said Ellen. “But there might be another consideration.”

“What is that?” she asked, lying down, her head resting on her left elbow.

“If you do not attempt to call out, you may never know, thereafter, what might have happened.”

“Yes?” asked the woman.

“There might then be a lingering doubt left in your mind, that you might have been able to regain your freedom, at that one moment, before that opportunity disappeared forever, the price being small, only a beating, a few strokes of the lash.”

“But I do not want to be free now,” she whispered.

“But perhaps you will not fully appreciate your slavery, or understand its inflexibility, its absoluteness, unless you have made every effort to obtain your freedom, and have failed, and have come to understand the absolute hopelessness of such an endeavor. Surely then you will better understand yourself as slave. Accordingly, I recommend that you conduct this experiment, that you call out, boldly, from the block, desperately inviting rescue, zealously seeking succor.”

“Do you think I would be successful?” asked the woman, apprehensively.

“Certainly not,” said Ellen. “But in this manner you will learn the perfect categoricality of your situation and status, that you cannot alter or qualify your condition in any way whatsoever, to even the smallest possible degree, that you are helpless, absolutely helpless in all such matters, in short, that you are a complete and helpless slave.”

The woman regarded Ellen, red-eyed, her lower lip trembling.

“And if you should manage to obtain your freedom, which I assure you you will not, by calling out upon the block, that is not the end of the matter.”

“Mistress?” she asked.

“If your bondage is important to you, and you understand it as your one possibility to obtain your total fulfillment as a female, you may always again expose yourself to the risk of the collar, disarranging a veil, walking lonely bridges at night, lifting the hem of a garment, as though to avoid soiling it in puddles in the street, speaking insolently to strangers, denouncing the Home Stones of visitors to your city, accompanying ill-guarded caravans, and such.”

The gong rang again, from the vicinity of the great block. The two slaves lifted their heads, listening for the moment. The slave to Ellen’s left gazed upon the manacle on her left wrist. There was a small sound of chain. The note of the gong then faded away, with diminishing vibrations. The slaves regarded one another. Another sale had been concluded.

“And then you would not have to worry about the possibility of obtaining your freedom,” said Ellen. “You would not have to concern yourself with such matters. You could put them from your mind. The collar would be upon you as much as on any slave on Gor.”

The woman nodded, and smiled.

“What is your lot number?” asked Ellen.

“Mistress cannot read?” asked the slave.

“No,” said Ellen, irritatedly. Here she was not quite fair to herself. She could, of course, read some numbers, for example, her own and, now, some similar numbers. They were easy enough. The other slave’s number, however, was rather complex, or at least seemed so to Ellen at the time. Indeed, for all she knew, one or another of those signs might have had a significance more than merely numerical. Common Gorean, you see, does not use an “Arabic notation,” but represents various numbers by letters, combinations of letters, and such. Most figuring is done on an abacus. It is said, interestingly, that some of the higher castes, for example, the Scribes and Builders, have a secret notation which facilitates their calculations. Ellen does not know if that is true or not.

“1242,” said the slave.

“That is a high number,” said Ellen.

“I received it late, after most numbers were assigned,” she said.

Ellen nodded.

“Had I been embonded earlier I might have had a lower number,” she said.

“I think so,” said Ellen.

“Am I beautiful?” she asked.

“That is for men to decide,” said Ellen.

“Yes, Mistress.”

“Yes,” said Ellen. “You are beautiful.”

“Thank you, Mistress,” she said.

“I think you will bring a high price.”

“Thank you, Mistress,” she said.

Ellen noted, to her interest, that two lanes, not one, were now being readied for moving forward, to the block area. And the two lanes thus emptied were shortly thereafter repopulated with new chains.

“The sales,” she thought, “might be moving too slowly.”

Ellen lay then on the grass between the stakes, on which ribbons were strung, marking the lanes.

“We will soon be moved forward,” she thought. “I have been starved for a master’s touch. The Cosians have seen to that. These Gorean beasts have released the slave in me, as they wished. They have fanned the slave fires in my belly which now rage fiercely, tormenting fires I cannot control, putting me helplessly at their mercy. The beasts! They have made me healthy, and now I suffer from my vitality. I need the touch of a master. I fear I might die in another day without it. I must be soon owned, or I may perish in need. I do not care who buys me. I hope he is rich. Whoever it is, I will beg prettily, helplessly, plaintively, to serve. Please be merciful to your slave, future master! I am suddenly so miserable. I cannot help myself. Why do they do this to a poor slave? That former free woman! What does she know of what will be done to her, of what passions will be kindled within her! What does she know now of being transformed into a man’s plaything, a helpless, piteous, begging, pleading toy?”

She looked at the former free woman lying near her. “What an unaware, simple, naive thing, you are,” she thought. “Rest in ignorance. You will learn. You will learn, my dear. I am so miserable, so terribly miserable!”

She thought of the scorn with which Mirus would regard her, the contempt in which he would hold her, she, his former teacher, with her once smug, prim attitudes, now the helpless victim of slave needs. But then she was not dissatisfied to be so female, and so alive. “I would rather feel than not,” she thought. “It is better to feel than not to feel. But I am miserable. Oh, future master, have pity on the slave you will buy! Assuage my needs! Content me, if only a little! Would you not caress any pet animal upon occasion, particularly if she begs prettily enough?”

“Squat!” she heard, a man’s voice, from several yards away, from somewhere behind her. He was at the end of the line adjacent to hers.

There the man had had the last slave in the line, that next to hers, on the left, stand and put her legs apart. Between them he had then thrust a large, round, porcelain vessel.

Notice of this quickly coursed down both chains, and the girls looked back.

Near the keeper was a slave with water, and a dipper.

The line to the left will be moving out first, thought Ellen. But then she noted that the porcelain vessel was moved to the right and the last slave in her own line must assume the posture and perform the expected behavior, as well. Both lines would apparently be taken forward rather at the same time.

The vessel then began to pass back and forth between the two lanes, moving forward. Following the wastes vessel was the slave with the water. Each slave in the chain, following her use of the wastes vessel, must kneel and drink from the dipper, draining it. Ellen looked forward to the water. She was thirsty, and she did not doubt but what this state was common on the chain. Soon, mercifully, the thirst of the chain would be assuaged. More importantly, she supposed, from the point of view of the keepers, the appearance of the girls would be freshened and improved. It is common to water stock, she knew, prior to its sale.

“Stand,” said the keeper to the slave across from Ellen, the former free woman. “Get the bowl between your legs!”

“Please!” begged the former free woman, looking about herself, in misery, wildly.

“Squat,” he said. “Be quick, slave.”

Reddening, the former free woman, tears running down her cheeks, squatted miserably over the bowl. Then, doubtless for the first time in her life, she publicly relieved herself. No one must watch her. But, when she cast a frightened glance about, conducting a furtive reconnaissance, she saw that several of the other girls were watching her. She saw that Ellen, too, was watching her, very frankly, with a lofty, superior mien, with an almost malicious pleasure. Tears sprang anew to her eyes. She would receive no sympathy from Ellen. Ellen, you see, was recalling her former haughtiness, and was not a little pleased and amused. It was a pleasant vengeance in its way, to watch this once-haughty creature, now reduced to a shamed slave, squatting over the porcelain bowl, performing this homely act upon command. Slaves are not permitted modesty.

“117,” said the keeper, reading Ellen’s lot number.

Ellen took the bowl from the adjacent lane, and squatted over it. Now the eyes of the former free woman were upon her, and, it seemed, with a similar malicious satisfaction. It was now the turn of the former free woman to enjoy the discomfiture of a slave, and relish that slave’s embarrassment. Ellen was angry. She looked forward, pretending not to notice. She heard a soft laugh from her left, and was furious. Ellen turned to the former free woman and said, angrily, “So? We are both slaves!”

“Yes, Mistress,” smiled the former free woman. Then she must kneel and drink, for the slave with the water had reached her place.

You will look well in a collar, thought Ellen, irritably.

Soon even the lovely 115 had been readied for the staging area.

Two attendants then, with sticks, hurried the two lanes forward. The attendants cried out, angrily, making use of their sticks. Ellen cried out once, when struck across the back of the left shoulder. The former free woman, too, received a blow. But they could move no more quickly than the others on their respective chains! Soon the girls, the two chains, were crowded together, kneeling, at the side of the great block, at its right as one would look forward, toward the crowd. The crowd noise was close now, and loud, frighteningly loud. They could hear the calls of the auctioneer, bids, shouts. Ellen suddenly became terribly frightened. She was going to be sold, sold! Her shoulder stung from the blow she had received. All the girls, hurried as they had been, awkwardly, rushed, stumbling, were now kneeling huddled together, chained, frightened. They were disoriented, confused, fearfully intimidated. In this way there would be no doubt of their slavehood on the block, of their vulnerability and terror, nor of their eagerness to obey the auctioneer’s slightest suggestion or gesture. They would be instantly, unquestioningly obedient; there would be no doubt in the buyers’ minds of the docility, the piteous, abject servility, of the merchandise.

So, thought Ellen, it seems that there may be yet another reason, other than time, and impatience, for rushing the chains forward, weeping, crying out, begging for mercy, stumbling, under blows, herding them so cruelly with jabs and blows to the block, to their sale, that we may show ourselves as frightened slaves before masters! But Ellen’s understanding of this, if understanding it was, did in no way diminish its effectiveness on her. She was fearful, frightened and intimidated. So this understanding, if understanding it was, certainly did not diminish reality. Rather it would make her so much the more aware of it. Such treatment, whether by intent or not, inevitably induced in her apprehensions and terrors which were fully suitable in one such as she on occasions such as this. She was terrified. She was a chained slave, soon to be offered to buyers. She shuddered. Her shoulder hurt. She knew she would obey on the block with abject alacrity, fearing only that she might be found displeasing in any respect. The blows and jabbings had perhaps not been necessary, but they had reminded her of what she was, and what could be done to her.

That was doubtless a more than adequate justification, if one were required, for the fierce, rushed herding.

If such was its intent, to teach this lesson, what she was and what could be done to her, it had certainly succeeded.

She was a chained, terrified slave.

And in this she was no different from the others. Masters would see women on the block who well knew they were slaves.

Ellen could see no order in the way girls were removed from the chains, to be dragged to the height of the block, one at a time. The light was now from torches. It illuminated the block, of course, and, partially, the pathetic goods clustered about it, to one side or the other. There was an attendant near the top of the block who could observe what was occurring, the type of girl being vended, the nature of the bids, and such. Perhaps he then made decisions as to who might most judiciously be next exhibited. Other attendants brought girls to the surface of the block, and, presumably, others conducted them from the block, on the other side. There seemed to be at least one attendant on the block, with the auctioneer, who, Ellen supposed, might upon occasion lend him assistance, perhaps posing a girl, or carrying one from the block who might be unable to walk, perhaps having succumbed to terror or having fainted.

I hate Mirus, she thought. I hate Selius Arconious, she thought. I am going to be sold! How can they sell me? I am a woman! But, ah, Ellen, she thought, you are a woman who is a slave! Thus it is that you may be sold, and thus it is fitting for you to be sold! There were twenty-one bids on me! There is thus interest in owning me, perhaps considerable interest! Hundreds must have viewed me in the exhibition cage. I wonder who, of all those hundreds, made bids. I do not know. How could one tell? How could one be sure? The highest of those bids, whatever it might be, will be in a sense a reserve put on me, a bid below which others will not be accepted, the initial bid, that at which the bidding will begin. But surely it is not likely the bidding will both begin and end there. Beyond being seen braceleted to a pole in the exhibition cage, on the basis of which the twenty-one bids were made, I was later seen elsewhere, in the festival camp, for Ahn serving wine, from the vat of Callimachus, the number on my breast for all to note, and even later, I was danced, and in the ba-ta circle! Some, I am sure, will recall this slave when she ascends the block. Indeed, some, counting their coins, will doubtless be waiting for her to appear.

I am to be sold, she thought. I am to be sold!

The highest bid will be my opening bid. What will it be!

I am suddenly afraid to ascend the block, to be shown to the men, to uninhibited, virile, powerful, lustful men, to men who are accustomed to the owning and the mastering of women. I am chained, I am stripped, I cannot flee!

On this world I am a property, an animal!

I am going to be sold, sold like a pig or horse!

I am going to be sold! I am going to be sold!

But of course I am going to be sold! I am a slave!

How is it that I am here?

How can this be, that I am here?

Foolish vulo, she thought. You are here because you have been brought here, by men, as women for centuries, and doubtless on thousands of worlds, have been brought to such places.

But why, why!

Because they have found you of interest, and, accordingly, will have you in their collar.

Surely they cannot sell me, she thought. Not I, not I!

Can you not hear the biddings, the calls, she asked herself.

They must not sell me, she thought.

Why not, she asked herself. That you, a female, should be sold is fully within the rights of nature.

Do you not know that such as you, dear Ellen, sweet, lovely Ellen, are the rightful property of men?

Have you not understood this, have you not, for years, sensed it?

Why, then, should you not be sold?

How is it that I am a slave?

Nature has made you such. Pity your impoverished sisters who have not yet met masters.

Yes, yes, yes, thought Ellen. I well know myself slave, and rightfully so, but I am afraid to be sold!

Who will buy me?

Who will buy me?

I am afraid to be sold, afraid!

Afraid!

Ellen half screamed, and turned away, but it was not her arm which the first of the two attendants seized, but that of a woman not inches from her, kneeling, cringing, the former free woman. There was the sound of a key thrust into the lock of the manacle, and turned, that by a second attendant. The manacle fell from her wrist. The former free woman was drawn to her feet, and held upright, as it seemed her legs might buckle. She looked down at Ellen, wild-eyed, trembling, weak, but in Ellen’s eyes she doubtless saw little but her own terror reflected. “I shall close my hand! I shall close my hand!” called the auctioneer. “My hand is closed! Sold!” The gong sounded from somewhere on the block, doubtless toward its back. There was a sound of sobbing, a sharp blow of the whip, a cry of pain. The former free woman raised her eyes piteously to the attendant who held her left upper arm in a grip of iron, perhaps then understanding what it was to be a woman and a slave, but he was not even aware of this, keeping his gaze fixed on the attendant toward the top of the stairs. There was a sudden gesture, imperative, impatient. Crying out, the former free woman was dragged toward and then, stumbling, up the steps. “It is too soon,” thought Ellen. “She has had little time to adjust to her bondage. She was marked only last night!” Ellen recalled the former free woman’s rich necklace, the jewels of her veils and robes. Surely a life of wealth, of luxury and pampering would have done little to prepare her for chains, exposure, degradation, the searing heat of the pressing, held, iron, for the sudden, sharp, instructive stroke of the whip, for the grasping, imperious hands of men, for the sawdust of the sales block. Then Ellen recalled the haughtiness of the former free woman, her former superciliousness, her almost intolerable arrogance, how she had treated Ellen, though she, too, beneath her robes was no more than another female, and thus a fit slave for men! Had she no understanding of herself? Had she never paused before a mirror, and therein observed the loveliness of her own unmistakable slave curves? How self satisfied she had been, she so loftily relying on the security of her station, she so complacently ensconced in the fortress of her status! How smug she had been, how superior! “She is a hypocrite,” thought Ellen. “She craved a collar, and now she will have one! Let her try to get it off! Be sold, slave girl! Be sold to the highest bidder!”

Then Ellen recalled that the former free woman was now no more than she, only another slave, and she feared for her.

“I hope you get a strong and kindly master,” thought Ellen, “one who will see to your needs, one who will care for you, and love you, and cherish you, but one at whose feet you will never be permitted to forget that you are a female and a slave.”

“Ten copper tarsks for this slut!” called the auctioneer. “Untrained! Never yet collared! Let yours be the first! Marked last night! Fresh meat off the iron! Fifteen copper tarsks! Seventeen! Had but once, and then as a free woman!”

There was laughter from the crowd.

A new slave, if taken for commercial purposes, is routinely subjected to a virginity check. In the slave’s case, Ellen could well imagine her horror, legs spread, undergoing this examination. The test in her case, of course, doubtless to her chagrin, shame and embarrassment, would have had a negative outcome. Ellen could then imagine her hysterically defending her respectability, that she had had such an experience but once, had not found it satisfying, muchly regretted it, had found it disgusting, and so on, the usual defenses of frigidity in a free woman. Wait until you feel slave heat, and crawl to a man, begging, thought Ellen. What the auctioneer had said about the slave’s sexual experience tallied, of course, with what she had told Ellen, in their earlier conversation. And Ellen did not doubt but what it was true. Indeed, why otherwise would the slave, when a free woman, have come alone to the festival camp, if she had not, on a profound subconscious level, scarcely understanding her own action, been seeking more, a more which she was sure must exist.

“Accordingly scarcely opened for the pleasures of men! Indeed, for most practical purposes, one might say ‘not yet opened for the pleasures of men,’ certainly not yet opened for the true pleasures of men, and certainly not opened as a slave is opened! Twenty copper tarsks! Be the first to open her as a slave is opened! Twenty-five! Consider this luscious slave! Look upon her! See her, there! She can be first opened as a slave but once! Be he who first opens her as a slave! Be the first to enjoy her as a slave! Twenty-eight! Thirty! Thirty-five!”

But then, to Ellen’s trepidation, and shock, the former free woman herself called out to the crowd. “Sirs!” she called. “Kind sirs!”

She would then, it seemed, dare to address the crowd!

The auctioneer, somewhere on the surface of the block, was suddenly silent, doubtless taken aback, perhaps momentarily not even comprehending. Surely he would have been taken unawares.

To the right of the block, at the foot of wide, low, rounded steps, the kneeling slaves, chained, jammed together, huddled together, exchanged sudden startled, fearful, glances. Surely the slave on the block had not received permission to speak!

The crowd was suddenly quiet, alert, and this seemed even more fearful.

Ellen moaned softly.

It suddenly occurred to her that the life of the woman on the block might be in danger. She had not thought of that earlier.

“Sirs!” called the former free woman from the block. “Succor! I beg succor! Behold me! I am not what I seem! I am a free woman, free!”

Somewhere in the crowd a man laughed.

“No!” she cried. “I am free! I am a free woman mistakenly, wrongly, brought before you, thusly exposed and degraded, as though I might be a naked slave! I am a free woman! I am the Lady Melanie of Brundisium. Fellow citizens, give me succor! I am in grievous distress! I call upon some noble, gallant citizen of Brundisium to rescue me! Please, please!”

“Well,” called the auctioneer to the crowd, “it will take at least thirty-five copper tarsks to rescue her!”

There was laughter from the crowd.

“I will rescue her for the whip!” called a man. “Thirty-six tarsks!”

“And I will rescue her for my pleasure gardens!” called a fellow. “Thirty-seven!”

“I think I would rescue her for the kitchen!” called another man. “Ten copper tarsks!” There was laughter. That had been the auctioneer’s suggested opening bid.

“Was she taken from within the walls of Brundisium?” called a man.

“No,” responded the auctioneer. “But even had it been so, the brand is already upon her!”

There was laughter from the crowd.

“You affirm,” said a man, “that she has been properly embonded, and that all legal proprieties have been satisfied?”

“Yes,” said the auctioneer. “All is in impeccable order, to the last detail.”

“Please, sirs!” cried the woman. “Take pity on me!”

“I will take pity on you with a whip!” called a fellow. “Thirty-eight copper tarsks!”

The woman cried out with misery.

“How came she here?” called a man.

“She came alone, unguarded, of her own choosing, to the camp,” responded the auctioneer.

“Thirty-eight copper tarsks is too much for so stupid a woman!” called a man.

This observation was greeted with laughter.

“Please, sirs, save me!” called out the woman. “Someone, please, save me!”

“Do you beg to be purchased, my dear,” said the auctioneer, solicitously, but in a voice which could easily be heard well out into the crowd.

“Oh, yes!” she cried. “Yes! Yes! I beg to be purchased!”

There was much laughter from the crowd.

“Only slaves beg to be purchased,” the auctioneer informed her.

“No!” she cried.

“On your knees, slave girl!” snapped the auctioneer.

Ellen supposed that the woman must have knelt, instantly. There was laughter from the crowd. There was no stroke of the whip.

“Please,” she cried again, perhaps now on her knees, her hands perhaps extended piteously to the crowd. “I will repay you a hundred times for whatever you give for me!” she cried.

“You then acknowledge yourself a slave?” asked the auctioneer.

“Yes!” wept the woman.

“Yes, what?” he inquired.

“Yes — Master!” she cried.

“Do you mean, repay in coin?” asked the auctioneer.

“Yes,” she cried. “Yes, Master!”

“Surely you know,” said the auctioneer, “that you no longer have economic means at your disposal, no more than a kaiila or tarsk. A slave owns nothing, not even her collar.”

“No!” she cried. “No, no!”

“Pose her,” said the auctioneer. Ellen, huddled with the others beside the block, at its foot, and at its right, as one would face the crowd, heard a cry of misery from the woman, and supposed that she had been pulled to her feet, probably by the auctioneer’s assistant.

“Consider the line of her body,” the auctioneer advised the crowd. “Turn her,” he said, presumably to his fellow on the block.

“Forty copper tarsks!” called a voice.

“Forty-five!” cried another.

“You will indeed, of course, my dear,” said the auctioneer to the woman on the block, “repay your purchaser for purchasing you, as will any slave. You will repay him with extensive, servile, intimate services. You will repay him, day in and day out, night in and night out, lavishly and abundantly, and endlessly. You will be hot, devoted and dutiful. You will be a perfection to him. You will be his possession, and his toy. You will be his cook, and laundress, his housekeeper and maid, and, fear not, the answer to his most secret dreams of pleasure.”

There was a raucous cry from the crowd.

Ellen did not know what was taking place on the block.

“Let us see if she is vital,” called the auctioneer.

Ellen shuddered.

“Stand facing the masters,” said the auctioneer, “stand straight, straighter, legs spread, more widely, clasp your hands behind the back of your head, head back, hold that position!”

In a moment Ellen heard the woman shriek.

“Hold position!” said the auctioneer.

The woman cried out in shame, in misery, in wonder.

“Hold her,” said the auctioneer, doubtless to his fellow. “Steady, steady, little vulo,” said the auctioneer, soothingly.

She cried out, in protest, in shame, in relief, in gratitude, in joy.

“Now to your belly, curvaceous little slut,” said the auctioneer, “and you may beg the masters to be purchased. Surely you are not unfamiliar with the way in which this may be done.”

Whereas Gorean free women commonly scorn and hate female slaves, and profess no interest in them, it is clear that there are few topics of greater interest to them. When with free men the free women seldom neglect an opportunity to speak loftily and disparagingly of slaves. How tedious it must be for the men to hear them so incessantly denigrate and castigate the innocent, helpless, scantily clad kajirae, sometimes even when being served by such. Naturally they wish the men to share their views but most Gorean men refrain from discussing the matter with them, except perhaps to dismiss the matter with some remark, such as “Do not concern yourself with them. Let them be beneath your notice. You are priceless, and free. They are only meaningless slaves, only domestic animals.” Despite their profession of disinterest in such matters, free women, it seems clear, seek avidly to learn all they can about female slaves and their lives. What do they do? How do they serve their masters? What goes on behind those closed doors? What is it like to have to obey? What is it like to be in a collar? When the free women are alone with one another, and no young free females are present, they speak of little else. It seems they are obsessed with their embonded sisters. If they are truly free, why is it that they find the topic of the slave girl so extraordinarily fascinating? Doubtless it would be presumptuous for Ellen, who is only a slave, to speculate on such matters. She will, however, note in passing, that this antipathy and fascination is not limited to Gorean free women. Ellen recalls that many of her former female colleagues seemed obsessed with decrying women as slaves and chattels, and such, even when the women were obviously among the best fixed, the most comfortable, the richest and most free of the population. Is it because they want the collar put on them, truly? Too, even amongst her former colleagues, there had been an inordinate fascination with the female slave, when evidence of such might occasionally arise, even amongst the gray piles, the densely inhabited cliffs and busy, noisy canyons of their own civilization. Indeed, stripped, collared slaves served masters in their own cities, sometimes in the most expensive and prized of domiciles, in penthouses, and such. On marbled floors might patter the feet of bangled slaves. On rich rugs, amidst glass and chromium, and high bookcases, might they kneel. Surely they knew that. Did they dare guess how many? Did they really think they could shame a true man, a virile, rational man, one who thinks for himself, into not keeping a slave, should he be so fortunate as to acquire one? After once having had a taste of the mastery? No. That taste is not forgotten. That is clear to me. What can compare with it? Compliance with pathological politicized prescriptions, designed to promote the power of unscrupulous, self-seeking misfits? All the social engineering, all the establishments in charge of controlling minds, all the power of the media melt away before the sight of a slave at one’s feet. With what would you reward a man who betrays his manhood? What will you give him that is worth more than his manhood? And I do not even comment on the other side of the coin, except to say that it is one coin, and it has another side. There are men and there are women, and the needs and desires of one are complementary to the needs and desires of the other. Each is a gift to the other, bestowed by nature, the slave to the master and the master to the slave. Ellen wonders, sometimes, how many of her former colleagues, in their private lives, in their secret lives, repudiate the falsity, foolishness and treason of their public lives. How many, she wonders, are dominated, stripped, belted in slave cuffs, and thrown to the bed, and from this surface look upward, into the eyes of masters?

But let us put such speculations aside.

Accordingly, the former free woman, as other Gorean free women, would doubtless have heard of, or been apprised of, doubtless to her scandal and horror, and doubtless in whispers, behaviors sometimes attributed to slave girls on the block.

And so the former free woman begged to be purchased. And it seemed, as far as Ellen could gather, that she was not, as the auctioneer had speculated, unfamiliar with the way in which this might be done.

Free women, after all, if only in virtue of hushed, furtive, scandalous rumors, would not be all that unacquainted with at least the possibility of such a thing.

Though they might decline to believe it.

But even supposing such things might actually occur, which seemed so improbable, surely she had never dreamed that one day it would be she on the block, she herself, then only a branded slave, who must perform so, who must behave in such a manner.

And then she found herself such.

How ironic, thought Ellen, how perfect!

And Ellen knew that on the block there was at least one man who had a whip, and would be willing to use it, instantly, on an errant girl.

Perfect, thought Ellen.

“Buy me, Masters!” called the slave. “Please buy me, Masters!”

It is unfortunate, thought Ellen, that there are no free women in the audience, for her former friends might be interested in seeing her so.

Doubtless they would find her predicament amusing and delicious. But let them beware, lest they find themselves sharing her fate.

Yes, thought Ellen, it is unfortunate that she is not before free women, as well, for such a contrast, with its excruciating, unspeakable humiliation, particularly at this time in her bondage, might help her to learn her slavery more quickly. But, no matter, for she will doubtless have many experiences before free women, kneeling, serving, obeying and such, and such experiences will send her even more needfully, even more gratefully, even more piteously, to the feet of a master.

“Buy me, Masters!” cried the slave on the block, presumably now on her belly, one hand perhaps extended to the crowd. “Buy me, Masters! Please, Masters, I beg to be purchased! Buy me, Masters! Please buy me, Masters!”

She went for two silver tarsks, surely a considerable sum for a new girl, an untrained slave.

Ellen was pleased with the sale of the slave. Had she not, when a free woman, once been haughty to her? To be sure, she was now only another slave.

“Oh!” cried Ellen, as her arm was seized. She tried to pull away a little, but she was helpless. The grip was like a vise. Marks would be left upon her arm. A second attendant thrust a key into the iron cuff which clasped her left wrist, and the metal fell away, loose on the chain. In a moment she was being dragged up the broad steps to the surface of the large block from which livestock, fleshstock, such as she was being vended. Briefly, wildly, she thought of Earth. How can this be happening to me, she thought. Then she recalled that she was now naught but a Gorean slave girl. Be proud, be beautiful, she thought. Show them that you are worth a high price! There were twenty-one bids on you, even from the exhibition cage. Show them that their bids were not mistaken. Show them you are worth even more!

She stood then before the men, apprehensive, but slave beautiful.

She heard murmurs of interest.

She knew that she was an object of desire, that she, stripped and standing before them, was of interest to men, to strong, virile men, men who knew what to do with women such as she.

But it is not unusual for a female slave to be desirable. They are usually selected for, as obviously they will usually be priced for, their desirability. In Gorean there is even an expression “slave desirable,” which means, of course, desirable enough even to be a female slave.

Doubtless many Gorean women, and doubtless many of Earth, as well, have stood naked before a mirror, regarding themselves, and asked themselves if they were worth enslaving, if they were beautiful enough to be a female slave. Would they have value? If so, how much? What would they bring?

The sawdust was deep, about her ankles. There was a little dampness, perhaps from first-sale girls who had preceded her on the block. She was pleased that she had been given the opportunity, and had even been required, to relieve herself earlier, in the lines, between the ribbons.

What would the quoted bid be, she wondered. It would be the highest of the twenty-one bids from the exhibition cage.

She heard herself being praised, as slave meat, and as a toy of possible interest. I am intelligent, she thought, quite intelligent. Tell them that! Then she wondered if her intelligence, really, was that much higher than that of her chain sisters. The brutes, she thought, they are taking my intelligence for granted. That given, their interest seems to be in the pleasures which I seem to promise!

She heard herself described in some detail, by the auctioneer’s assistant, who read from papers, presumably extracted from scribes’ records. Various measurements were iterated matter-of-factly, for example, those of her bosom, waist and hips, and those of her neck, wrists and ankles, the latter primarily of interest with respect to the dimensions of appropriate identificatory or custodial hardware, the collar, wrist rings and ankle rings.

She blinked against the torchlight. The block was well illuminated. It was harder for her to see the crowd. Faces in the front rows were adequately visible. Some men were standing literally at the front edge of the block.

She was described as semi-trained. This pleased her, for she did not want her new master to expect too much of her, and be disappointed. He could always train her to his particular pleasures. That was always pleasant for a master. She would desperately strive, as any slave girl, to learn how to please him, to prepare his meals, to arrange his furs, to lie provocatively at his slave ring, to use her hands and hair, her lips and tongue as he might wish, and so on.

“Walk about, pose,” she was told.

She did so.

“Barbarian,” she heard.

“They do not have to beat me, to have me show myself to the crowd,” she thought.

There was a cry of pleasure from some of the men.

“Red silk,” she heard.

“That is obvious,” called a man.

There was laughter.

It was Mirus who had first opened her, for the uses of men.

“A slave not without interest!” called a man.

“Yes,” said another.

“Am I brazen?” she thought. “Very well, should that be the case. I do not mind. And are not such expressions merely disparaging expressions, from a distant Puritanical world, fearing life and beauty? Have they not been invented by the homely and inhibited, the ugly and inert, as weapons against the proud, the beautiful, the soft and vulnerable, the eager and passionate, to conceal their own grayness, their own flatness and uninteresting mediocrity? Am I a narcissistic little bitch, as Mirus, once my master, might claim? Perhaps. If so, I do not mind. No, I do not mind being beautiful, and delicious, and provocative. That pleases me. I like it. It makes me happy. What is wrong with that? Put aside the mediocrity’s armament of vengeful semantics. See life as it is, directly, in its beauty, if only for a sudden, startling moment, perhaps as men might have seen it before language, before the subtle, altering, translucent barriers of words, the invisible wall that so liberates, but yet confines and shapes, was interposed between the mind and existence, not through the distortive prisms of the sluggish, fearful and defective. Would that there could be a new language, or new words, a lexicon of light that would allow us to see the world as it might be seen, in its innocence, profundity and glory.”

How humiliating this is, she thought. How shamed you should be, Ellen! But you tramp, you slut, you tart, you are not! How terrible you are!

There was no mistaking the interest of the buyers. Suddenly it seemed she could almost feel the heat of their interest, like waves of heat emanating from the door of a furnace she had inadvertently opened.

She felt suddenly she might run from the block, but she could not, of course, do so.

“Apparently, she has some skill in slave dance,” called the auctioneer’s assistant.

Ellen hoped the buyers did not take that too seriously. To be sure, she would not have objected to being taught something of slave dance. It had suddenly seemed, last night, as though a world had been opened up before her, a wondrously exciting, sensuous, vital world. She had felt very female, very feminine, in the dance, pleasing men, performing, a slave before masters.

“Fluent in Gorean,” was called to the crowd. “Small scar on the upper left arm.” That would be her vaccination mark, from childhood, on Earth.

I wonder if Mirus and Selius Arconious are among the men, she thought. I suspect so. Or have they even bothered to attend?

“Brand, the kef,” called the attendant.

That was the most common kajira brand, the “kef” being the first letter in the expression ‘kajira’. Mirus, of course, had seen to it that she would wear the common kef, which he regarded as fitting for her; he had seen to it that she should be marked as it pleased him, as a common slave.

Perform, she thought. I wonder if dear Mirus and dear Selius Arconious, the arrogant, imperious pigs, are here. Perhaps! Then show dear Mirus what he gave up, what a fool he was to let something like me slip away! If he would have me now he will pay and pay! He will pay dearly! I do not care if he would empty his purse! But he will not bid upon me because he would look like a fool to do so, after letting me go! So be it. I care not a whit. That means nothing to me now! And let me show dear Selius Arconious what he shall not own! I hate him, the arrogant Gorean tarsk! Hurt him! Hurt Selius Arconious! Let him see what he cannot afford! I hate you, Selius Arconious! Grind your teeth, clench your fists, sweat, moan, tear your clothing, burn in needful misery, dear Selius Arconious, as I perform, delectably, exquisitely, as I do now, but know that you shall not have this slave! No! You cannot afford her!

Then tears sprang to her eyes.

I hate you, Selius Arconious, she said, to herself. I hate you, I hate you!

But neither, she supposed, neither Mirus or Selius Arconious, were here. Or, if they were, what was it to her? Both despised her, surely, as she despised them! And Mirus would be too proud, or would be too ashamed, to bid upon her, and so confess his foolishness in letting her out of his collar. Too, he might be outbid. There were many rich men in the crowd, dealers and others. And she need not concern herself at all with Selius Arconious, a lowly tarnster. He would be fortunate to be able to put together a handful of copper tarsk-bits. He was as impecunious as a field urt. She need not fear falling into his hands. And, too, she hated him. So she was safe from them both! How suddenly secure, and free, this made her feel, a strange attitude perhaps for a woman on a sales block. But Ellen laughed to herself. How pleased she was!

So perform, slave girl, she thought. Show these rugged, virile brutes that your slightness and softness, on sale before them, are worth at least a silver tarsk!

Earn yourself a rich master, Ellen!

Perform, thought Ellen. Perform!

Ellen dared not call out to the crowd, of course, as she had not been given permission to speak, but her eyes spoke to the men, and her body.

Some men shouted with pleasure.

Suddenly Ellen was startled. You enjoy doing what you are doing, don’t you, she asked herself. Yes, she thought. Why, you brazen hussy, she thought. You shameless slut! You narcissistic little bitch! You have truly become a slave girl, haven’t you? Yes! Yes, she thought. It is what you are! You have become a slave girl. You are truly a slave girl! Yes, she thought, on this world I have been put in my place, precisely where I belong, at the feet of powerful men. And my will means nothing here! These things have been done to me whether I wish them to be done to me or not, and would have been done to me whether I willed them or not! They have been done unilaterally, by the will of masters. And, lo! Here, on this world, where there are true men, on this world of masters, I have found out, for the first time in my life, what it is to be a woman, a true woman. And I am pleased, and proud, and gloriously happy to be what I am, a woman!

“Stand as you were before,” she was told.

She did so.

“Hot and needful,” she heard.

She tossed her head, a bit angrily, a bit insolently. Did they have to know that? Could that not be left as her secret, to be revealed only, whether she willed it or not, in the arms of a dominant male? She wondered at the knowledge of the slavers. How could they know such things? It seemed they could see in a woman what she could scarcely admit to herself, even in her most secret dreams. Doubtless there were subtle cues in a woman’s body, in her movements, in her discourse, her carriage, her expressions and such. She had been told that slavers on Earth occasionally passed by beautiful women, to take as prey women perhaps less beautiful, but more intelligent, more latently passionate, those who, in their view, would make better slaves. Passion, of course, is required in a slave. Too, if she does not have it to begin with, she will soon acquire it. The master, the whip, will see to it. All women, at least latently, are passionate slaves. To be sure, much depends on the master. Some women know their master at a glance, others learn it at his feet. Bondage, in itself, is devastatingly arousing in the female. She recognizes it as her fitting condition. To the slaver’s practiced eye there must be ways of telling. But, indeed, even a man of Earth can occasionally sense, incontrovertibly, suppressed needs, latent passion, in a woman. And they are not even slavers, whose professional concerns require a considerable degree of accuracy in such judgments. But, to be sure, Ellen had doubtless squirmed at night, on her chain, cried out in her sleep, wept with need, and such, publicly enough. Too, she recalled, in the Cosian camp, days ago, before being coffled, having been bent over and tied at a trestle. Unwilling though she might have been to reveal her arousal under such conditions, it had doubtless been clear enough from the state of her body. She wondered if her new master would bind her so, occasionally, over a trestle. It is difficult for a girl to retain her dignity in such a position, but then Ellen recalled that a slave is not permitted dignity. Rather, expected of her is unquestioning obedience, delicious service and helpless passion.

“What is your name?” inquired the auctioneer of Ellen.

“‘Ellen’, Master,” she said, “if it pleases Master.”

“It is acceptable,” said the auctioneer. Then he turned to the crowd. Ellen looked uneasily at the whip, in his right hand. “We have here, Ellen, a young barbarian, small, curvaceous, brunet, gray-eyed, semi-trained, common mark, red-silk, responsive. There is interest in this slut, for there were several bids on her before she was removed from the exhibition cage.” He then turned to his assistant. “How many?” he asked.

“Twenty-one,” said the assistant, consulting papers. These were sometimes carried, but there was a small stand at the back of the platform where they might be deposited. Actual sales were recorded, and payments arranged, or made, at a table on the ground level, to the left of the block, as one would face the crowd.

Some of the men reacted to this, and leaned forward. It is, of course, easier to see a girl in the exhibition cage, where, if she is not restrained, one may even call her to the bars, than from most of the positions in the tiers, at night, as she is shown illuminated in the torchlight of the sales block. That, of course, is the purpose of the exhibition cage, to exhibit. One may then take note, under favorable conditions, of merchandise in which one might be interested. Ellen, of course, could not have been called to the bars in the exhibition cage, as she had been braceleted about one of the stanchions. She had, of course, had to caress the stanchion, kiss it, writhe about it, and such, responding to the commands of the fellows peering in, in their robes, from outside the bars. Had she been uncooperative an attendant would have entered the cage and put the whip to her. She had not been uncooperative. She, like the other women in the cage, had been stripped. Goreans do not buy clothed women. They wish to see what they are getting.

“Mostly from dealers,” said the assistant.

That pleased Ellen, as dealers might generally be expected to be relatively objective in their assessments. Such bids should be a good index to at least her wholesale value. To be sure, she did not know the nature of the bids.

“What was highest bid?” asked the auctioneer. That would be the bid at which the open bidding would begin.

“Two silver tarsks, fifty copper tarsks,” said the assistant.

Ellen nearly fainted. She trembled. Her knees buckled for a moment. She tried to regain her balance.

“Two and a half!” called the auctioneer. “Two and three-quarters?”

It is a mistake, thought Ellen. It must be a mistake. I do not want to be sold for so much! Masters will expect too much of me! I am not trained. I am only a common girl, and a barbarian!

Although these matters differ considerably from city to city, and silver and gold is often weighed by merchants, common ratios in the vicinity of Brundisium at the time of this writing, given the inflation of the unsettled times, are a hundred tarsk-bits to a copper tarsk, and a hundred copper tarsks to a silver tarsk. Depending on the nature of the silver tarsk, there will usually be ten to a hundred for a golden tarn disk. For the common silver tarsk, the smaller tarsk, the coin pertinent to the bidding in question, the ratio was one hundred such tarsks to the golden tarn disk, at least that of Ar or Jad, on Cos, and certain other major cities, including Brundisium.

In a moment, it seemed the auctioneer had his invited bid of two and three-quarters, and, a moment later, three.

Ellen, frightened, backed toward the auctioneer’s assistant. “May I speak?” she whispered.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“I think there is some mistake, Master,” said Ellen.

“No,” he said.

The auctioneer’s assistant then raised his hand, and called out, “Four!”

“Four, from my colleague!” called the auctioneer.

“He is not permitted to bid!” cried a man.

“Five,” came from the crowd, somewhere.

“I rule my colleague may bid, subject to review by the camp polemarkos,” said the auctioneer. “But the point is moot, as we have a bid of five.” He looked about, at his assistant. The assistant shook his head. The auctioneer lifted his hand for a moment’s respite, and turned to his assistant. They conferred in low tones, and Ellen looked away, indeed, moved away from the small table. “Do you want her for yourself?” asked the auctioneer. “I could claim a defect, an error in the records.”

“You would have a riot on your hands,” said his assistant.

“Did you want her for yourself?” asked the auctioneer.

“No,” said the assistant. “I like blondes. I thought only to turn a profit on her.”

“Then we shall let the matter stand,” said the auctioneer.

“Yes,” said his assistant.

“Buy something as good, for less, when the crowd is smaller,” said the auctioneer.

The assistant nodded.

“And there may be leftovers, to be distributed,” said the auctioneer. “Possibly one or more blondes.”

“True,” said the assistant.

The auctioneer then turned to Ellen. “Go to the front of the block, where buyers can get a better look at you,” he said.

Ellen obeyed.

“We have a bid of five!” called the auctioneer, “a mere five tarsks for this exquisite little barbarian bauble. Would you not like to have her crawling to you, bringing you your sandals in her teeth! Imagine her before you, on her belly, licking and kissing your feet, begging to serve your pleasure!”

“Oh!” cried Ellen, for one of the men near the front of the block had grasped her ankle. She dared not, of course, protest. If she had tried to kick at the man her foot might have been removed.

But the eye of the auctioneer was quick. “Do not handle the merchandise,” said he, laughing, “until you own it.”

Grinning, the man removed his hand. “Six,” said the man.

But in a moment there was a bid of seven from the crowd.

Ellen was dazed.

The thought passed her mind of her lectures in the classroom, her former demeanor, her former prim attire. So faraway, so different! And then the strange image came to her of herself, stripped as she now was, but standing on the cool, flat, smooth surface of the desk in the classroom, being exhibited as a slave. In that image it seemed that, somehow, there were several young men then in the classroom, as there had not been, considering her, having her turn about, and so on. The female students in the room, many of whom she remembered, seemed timid, small, shy, quiet, subdued, fearful, withdrawn, but were regarding her with fascination. And from time to time the young women in the classroom looked about themselves, at the young men. Did they ask themselves what it would be, to belong to one or another of them? As they regarded her, with wide, fearful, attentive, shining eyes, did they expect, or await, or fear, their own turn upon that platform, similarly, blatantly, coarsely, displayed. And then the image was gone, and Ellen was again herself, on the exotic world of perilous, barbaric Gor, illuminated in the light of torches, standing on the concave surface of the block, her ankles in sawdust, the lights of Brundisium in the distance, the men calling out, being offered for sale, being sold.

She scarcely realized that there was now a bid on her of ten silver tarsks. That is too much, she thought, too much! That was a full tenth of a golden tarn disk!

There was then a lull in the bidding.

“More? More?” inquired the auctioneer, though it seemed he did not, really, expect more.

Ellen did not think that many girls sold in this camp would go for so much. Perhaps a hundred, or a hundred and fifty, perhaps high slaves, perhaps exquisitely, lengthily trained pleasure slaves, perhaps skilled dancers, perhaps such, but surely not she! Accordingly, instead of being excited and thrilled, she was apprehensive. There must be some mistake, she thought. I am not worth that much, she thought. To be sure, she told herself, it is men who will decide what you are worth, not you. How much I must have changed, she thought, if men, particularly in a general, improvised camp such as this, are willing to bid so much!

Dare I think such thoughts? Dare I accept myself as being that attractive? Surely I must dismiss such thoughts. They are far too bold for a slave! There must be a mistake, a mistake of some sort!

“Here, kajira,” snapped the auctioneer, behind her.

Quickly Ellen backed to him, that she might not cease to face the men, until she sensed that he was a foot or so behind her, to her right.

She felt his hand in her hair, behind her shoulders, his hand then lifting, looping the hair several times about his fist, until his fist was tightly at the back of her head. She put her head back a little, apprehensively, to ease the pressure. Then she cried out suddenly in pain as his hand twisted tightly, cruelly, in her hair, bending her backward, exhibiting the bow of her beauty to the men. She tried to reach back to her hair, twisting, sobbing.

“Place your wrists behind you, crossed,” said the auctioneer, and Ellen, the slave, complied, bound by the will of the master.

She was then turned about, from side to side, that the men might better see.

I trust, she thought wildly, that neither Mirus nor Selius Arconious are among the buyers. Surely they must not see me so, not exhibited thusly!

Clearly the men were enflamed at the sight of the helpless, displayed slave.

“Eleven!” she heard.

“Twelve!”

“Thirteen!”

“Fourteen!”

“Fifteen!”

There was then again a lull in the bidding.

Ellen sobbed suddenly, again, held, twisted backward.

“Is there more?” called the auctioneer. “More?”

He released Ellen’s hair and took her by the upper left arm, and threw her to her hands and knees in the sawdust before him. Her knees were deep in the sawdust, and her hands were in it, to the wrists. She looked wildly out, through her fallen, dangling, scattered hair, into the crowd. Tears fell into the sawdust.

“More?” inquired the auctioneer. “I have fifteen! Do I hear more? My hand is lifted! I am preparing to close my hand!”

“Twenty,” said a voice.

There was a gasp from the crowd.

Ellen shook her head, trying to clear the hair from before her face. She looked out, into the crowd, trying to see. “No,” she wept. “No!”

Then she lay on her left side in the sawdust, facing away from the crowd, her knees drawn up, her head covered with her hands, at the feet of the auctioneer.

“Did I hear a bid of twenty?” asked the auctioneer.

“Twenty,” repeated the voice.

“This is a barbarian, not fully trained,” said the auctioneer.

“She can be trained!” laughed a voice.

“Twenty,” said again the first voice.

“Kneel, facing the men,” said the auctioneer.

Ellen then knelt, facing the men, but with her head down, her knees closely together, trembling, her arms crossed before her, trying to cover herself as best she could, trying to conceal as much of the slave as possible.

“Position,” said the auctioneer to Ellen.

And then Ellen, tears running down her cheeks, knelt appropriately before the men, as what she was, a Gorean pleasure slave, back on heels, back straight, head up, hands down on thighs, knees widely spread.

“I have twenty,” said the auctioneer. “I am preparing to close my hand!”

Ellen had recognized the voice. In a moment she would again belong to Mirus, he who had first opened her for the uses of men, her first master.

I do not want to belong to him, she thought, suddenly, wildly, no longer, no longer! And the thought, springing into her consciousness, startled her, and amazed her.

But she would belong to whomsoever she was sold, he who would then have all rights to her embonded beauty, and he who would exercise all rights, he whose slave she would then be.

“I will now close my hand!” said the auctioneer.

“No!” called out another voice, from the crowd, firmly, clearly.

Men looked about, to see who had spoken, who might choose to challenge the preceding, remarkable bid.

Mirus turned about, to see as well, he several yards back, in the crowd, to Ellen’s left, as she faced the crowd.

Mirus clearly did not know his competitor.

The garments of Mirus were ample and splendid, robes which might well betoken his wealth and position.

The fellow who had halted the auctioneer was plainly clad, in a simple brown tunic, and was surely of low caste, perhaps of the peasants, or a drayman of sorts.

Mirus smiled.

Although the caste of Mirus might be unclear from the particular nature of his garmenture, Ellen supposed him of the slavers, which would be a subcaste of the Merchants, which caste was doubtless the wealthiest on Gor, and one which was often wont to view itself, perhaps in virtue of its wealth, if not as well in virtue of its influence and power, as a high caste, a tendency which, however, was not widely shared, save perhaps, at least publicly, by its clients and sycophants. Goreans respect wealth but tend to value other attributes more highly, and, indeed, to the credit of the Merchants, it should be noted that they usually do so, as well. One such attribute is fidelity; another is honor. Gor is not Earth.

In any event, aside from any cultural ambiguity which might attend the station or status of the Merchants, Mirus would presumably concede nothing in caste merit to the fellow who had just, it seemed, dared to gainsay him.

Mirus again regarded his apparent competitor, and again smiled.

It did not seem that he need have much to fear with respect to any ensuing competitive engagements.

“The bid was of twenty silver tarsks,” called the auctioneer, “not twenty copper tarsks.”

“Close your hand,” called Mirus.

“Do not do so,” called the other man, several yards farther way than Mirus, but to his left, and Ellen’s right.

“You have a bid?” asked the auctioneer.

“I bid one,” said the man.

“I do not understand,” said the auctioneer.

“One golden tarn disk, of the Ubar’s mint, of Cos,” called the man.

A murmur of surprise, and interest, and disbelief, coursed through the crowd.

Ellen shook her head, wildly, disconcerted, frightened.

“What is your caste?” called Mirus to the man.

“Surely one need not certify caste to bid in open auction,” said the fellow. “I do not recall that being required hitherto, here or elsewhere.”

“A ruling!” called Mirus.

“Certification of caste is not a prerequisite for bidding,” said the auctioneer.

“Let us see the color of his gold!” called Mirus.

“With all due respect, good sir,” said the auctioneer to the fellow back in the crowd on Ellen’s right, “all in all, under the circumstances, I think that a fair request.”

“No other has been required to do so,” called the plainly clad fellow.

There was laughter in the crowd.

“I have a bid of twenty silver tarsks,” called the auctioneer, “and I am preparing to close my hand!”

“Wait!” cried a man, pointing to the plainly clad fellow.

He was now holding up, over his head, a large coin. Aloft, held so, it seemed to speak of weight and power. Its glossy glint in the flickering torchlight carried even to the block.

“See if it is genuine!” cried Mirus.

The auctioneer gestured to the side of the block and one of the assistants there hurried through the tiers. He held the coin, and bit at it. “It is good, it seems good,” he called back to the block.

“Let it be tested and weighed at the business table,” suggested the plainly clad fellow.

“And whose throat did you cut for it?” called Mirus to his adversary.

“None, as yet,” said the plainly clad fellow.

“One, one!” called Mirus. This was a bid of a golden tarn disk, and a silver tarsk.

The crowd was quiet. All eyes turned to the plainly clad fellow.

“Five,” said the plainly clad fellow, “five golden tarn disks, each of full weight, each from the Ubar’s mint, at Jad, on Cos.”

Ellen, in position, trembled. She was in consternation. Where would the plainly clad fellow, one such as he, obtain such riches?

She struggled to keep position. She did not wish to be a whipped slave, surely not before Mirus and the other! She fought blackness, which seemed to close about her. Then she fought her way back to full, alarmed consciousness. She had somehow managed to keep position. She blinked against the light. She was very much aware of the sawdust in which she knelt, “slave knelt.” She was afraid. Surely he must be a sought man, surely guardsmen would enter the tiers at any moment and put hands upon him. Surely he should flee with his gains, howsoever he might have come by them. And how dare he reveal such wealth, here, in this place, he with no retinue, no men at arms to surround and protect him? Surely in a camp such as this, so open, so populous, there might be thieves, brigands, bandits, murderers, who knew what practitioners of diverse arts predatory and unscrupulous.

“I have a bid of five tarn disks,” called the auctioneer. “I am preparing to close my hand!”

“Wait!” called Mirus. “I cannot at the moment match that bid in ready coin. Indeed, no rational man, without guards, outside of a caravan, would carry about such wealth! I do not have the coins at hand, but I can give you a note, my note, for more!”

There was a roar of laughter from the tiers.

“I am Mirus, of the house of Mirus, of Ar!” called Mirus.

“Ar is bankrupt,” cried a man. “She is occupied, looted. She is a den of cowards, beggars and traitors! She lives at the sufferance of Cos!”

“Long live Cos!” cried more than one man in the crowd. And this cry was soon taken up by others.

“I have a bid of five tarn disks,” called the auctioneer. “Is there more? Is there more?”

“You will not accept my note?” called Mirus.

“I am sorry, good sir,” said the auctioneer. “We deal with coin in this camp.”

There was more laughter in the tiers.

“Down with Ar!” cried a man.

“Long live Cos!” shouted a man.

Mirus thrust his hand angrily within his robes, toward his left side, but a fellow with him, one Ellen recognized as having been with him in the tent, put his hand warningly on his arm, and Mirus withdrew his hand. He then stormed away, making his way through the tiers, pressing away through the crowd, followed by some four men, he who had placed his hand warningly on his arm and three others, all of these having been seen by Ellen earlier in the tent. For some reason these men frightened her. More than one cast a backwards glance toward the block. Could it be that they had, for some reason, wished Mirus to be successful in his bidding?

“I have a bid of five tarn disks,” called the auctioneer. “Do I hear more?”

There was silence.

“To be sure,” said the auctioneer, “that is a high price to pay for this little piece of slave meat.”

“Is she incognito?” inquired a fellow from the tiers. “Is she a Ubar’s daughter?”

There was laughter in the crowd.

Ellen reddened. There had been no mistaking her for such, not she. Only too obviously did they see her as mere chattel, a simple collar slut.

“No,” said the auctioneer, “she is a barbarian, semi-trained, a relatively common piece of chain goods, nothing particularly out of the ordinary, a fairly typical item of fleshstock. To be sure, she is a vulnerable, nicely curved, cuddly little slut, not unlike many barbarians.”

“I am preparing to close my hand,” called the auctioneer, well pleased.

Suddenly the momentousness of the moment came home to Ellen. She was on the brink of being sold!

“No, no!” she cried, suddenly. “Do not sell me! Not to him! Please, no! No, please! No!”

The auctioneer looked down at her, startled. Ellen had twisted, to see him behind her.

“May I speak?” she begged. “May I speak?”

The auctioneer scrutinized the stripped slave at his feet. His eyes narrowed. He did not respond to her request to speak. Clearly she was beside herself with misery and fear.

“Do not sell me to him, Master!” she begged. “Sell me to anyone but him, Master!”

“Ah,” said the auctioneer. “Now I think I understand. It is a vengeance buy. Once you betrayed him, and now he will have you at his mercy, and will revenge himself upon you lengthily, and exquisitely, and at his leisure.”

“No!” cried Ellen. “That is not it! It is different! It is different!”

No matter how she might have annoyed, or scorned, or tormented, or taunted, from time to time, this handsome competitor of her former master, Mirus, she had surely never dealt him treachery, had never betrayed him to enemies, or such. Thus his interest in her, if interest it was, could not be of the nature of a “vengeance buy,” at least in any normal sense of that term, with its commonly dreadful implications.

Indeed, let the woman beware who is the object of a true vengeance buy! A man will pay much to obtain her! And then, sold to him, she is his to do with as he pleases. Let the woman beware, whether slave or free, who has betrayed a Gorean male, lest she come later into his power. Gorean males will pursue such a woman relentlessly, intent on bringing her into their collar. How terrifying to find oneself in chains, owned, stripped, at the feet of one whom one has betrayed! But such cases are rare, and extreme. The usual “vengeance buy” might more appropriately be regarded as little more than a “satisfaction buy.” Perhaps, say, a woman, doubtless a free woman, as a slave would be very unlikely to risk this, has irritated or annoyed a man. Has this been done deliberately? Doubtless. But, why? Perhaps she is merely nasty, or unhappy, and feels secure in her freedom. Perhaps, on the other hand, she is, subconsciously presumably, as the saying is, “courting the collar.” Who knows? Is her unpleasantness merely something to be reprimanded by the collar, that she is to be taught, stripped at a man’s feet, that such a thing is impolite, and unacceptable? Or is it rather an unwitting, scarcely understood, cry from her heart, a cry for the secret, yearning slave to be released from the dungeon of denial in which she has for so long languished, neglected and ignored, a plea for her to be permitted to emerge at last into the liberation of total bondage, and helpless, absolute love? But would it not be pleasant, in either case, to have her in one’s collar? A moment of explanation might not be here amiss. Gorean free women, particularly of high caste, have a status which is far higher than that of the average free woman on Earth. Indeed, the average free woman of Earth would have very little understanding, at least initially, culturally, of the social station of a Gorean free woman. Her culture would not have prepared her for it. She will, of course, become aware of this almost immediately on Gor, when she will be so unfortunate to find herself, a slave, before such a woman. In any event, aware of her status and station the Gorean free woman, particularly if of high caste, commonly regards herself, and is culturally justified in doing so, as a very special and superior creature, one generally aloof and unapproachable, one commonly lofty and exalted. She has, after all, a Home Stone. Accordingly, as might be expected, she is often vain, petty, selfish, supercilious, and arrogant. One might then have some understanding of the radical and traumatic transformation, with all its attendant mental and psychological anguish, which such a woman might undergo should she become a slave. She, at least, from her culture, has some understanding of what it is to be a slave. She has a clear idea of what has been done to her. The Earth woman, on the other hand, on her native world, is commonly not even veiled. She lets anyone look upon her face, not even aware of how much more exquisitely expressive it is, how much more sensitive and revealing it is, than her bared body. Too, her transition from free to slave, given her background, is not as radical and dramatic a transition as would be that of a Gorean free woman to the same status, that of bondage. To be sure, it should in all honesty be admitted that Gorean women, at least after some initial adjustments, do quite well in slavery. Given no choice they, as their Earth sisters, thrive in their collars. This is not surprising for we are both women and can come home to ourselves only at the feet of a man. Too, the Gorean free woman is subject to many constraints, physical, psychological and cultural, of which the slave is free. It is nice to think that within those cumbersome, ponderous robes a naked slave is waiting. How wonderful it is to be tunicked and safely, securely collared, to be able to move freely about, to walk and run, to be open to the sun, to feel the air and wind on one’s body, to see and feel the glory of this world, to revel in its vitalities and sensations, and, too, to know that one is excruciatingly desirable, to say nothing of knowing oneself owned, and taken in the arms of one’s master.

So let us all, slaves, whatever might be our origins, strive to please our masters!

“No, Master, no, Master!” cried Ellen, and turned about, on her knees, clasping the knees of the auctioneer in piteous supplication, looking up at him, her eyes bursting with tears. “Do not sell me to him, not to him! To anyone but him! Not to him, please, Master!”

The auctioneer thrust her back.

“I hate him!” she cried. “I hate him!”

“And he you?” inquired the auctioneer.

“Yes!” she cried. “He holds me in contempt, and hates me!”

“It is not inappropriate to hold barbarians in contempt,” said the auctioneer. “Your lowly origin alone justifies that form of regard. Surely you have learned that by now on Gor. But in what manner, other than by your origin, did you earn his contempt?”

Ellen looked down, into the sawdust.

“Were you poor in the furs?” he asked.

“I trust not, Master,” she said.

“Speak,” said the auctioneer.

“I scorned him,” she wept.

“Ah,” said the auctioneer. “I see that you will have a pleasant time of it.”

“He hates me!” she wept.

“Doubtless that will add an interesting flavor to your relationship,” said the auctioneer.

“Sell me to anyone but him, Master!” Ellen begged. “Do not have me put in that collar! I do not want to wear his collar!”

“Be silent,” said the auctioneer.

Ellen looked up at him, agonized, not permitted then to speak.

He then with the back of his hand struck her across the mouth. She sobbed, looking up at him, regarding him, aghast.

“That is for having spoken without permission,” he said.

He then with a thrust of his bootlike sandal spurned her to the sawdust, and she lay sobbing before him, at his feet.

“Belly,” said he then, “head to the left.”

Ellen then lay on her belly in the sawdust, her head toward the exit steps from the great block. She tasted blood at her lip. How foolish she had been, to have spoken without permission. Had she learned nothing as to what she was on this world? She felt the bootlike sandal of the auctioneer resting on her back. It held her in place. She could not rise. She turned her head toward the crowd, to see he who had bid so high on the miserable, pathetic piece of helpless flesh merchandise which was she.

“Five tarn disks!” called the auctioneer. “I close my hand!”

She saw the eyes of her buyer upon her. His expression was unreadable. Her lower lip trembled; again she tasted blood.

The gong rang out. She knew its signification. Surely she had heard it ring out many times before. The auctioneer removed his bootlike sandal from her back.

The vibrations of the gong seemed to linger in the atmosphere, and in her flesh. She knew what it meant, that another girl had been sold.

And suddenly she realized that she was the girl.

She had been sold!

She now belonged, in the full meaningfulness of Gorean servitude, to her new master, Selius Arconious!

The auctioneer’s assistant half dragged her to the stairs, and there handed her down, into the arms of another assistant. In a moment she was at the left of the block, as one would look toward the tiers, among other girls. She felt her left wrist clasped in a holding manacle, much as had been the case earlier, at the right side of the block, before her ascent to the sawdust-covered, concave surface from which she had been but a moment earlier vended.

No, no, she thought. Not to him! To anyone but him! He hates me! I hate him! I hate him! Oh, Ellen, miserable slave! He has bought you! He owns you! You belong to him! You belong to Selius Arconious! It is his collar that you must wear!

She put her face in her hands, weeping.

The chain dangled down, from the close-fitting metal on her wrist.