“Even as what you are?”
“Oh, yes,” she said. “Yes! Yes! Extremely so! And particularly and appropriately so!”
“It is right for you?”
“Yes, and perfectly so!” she said.
“Perfectly so?”
“Yes, absolutely, perfectly so!”
“On Earth you did not anticipate it,” I said.
“Certainly not,” she said, “though I now realize how pathetically, and needfully, half consciously, sometimes fully consciously, I longed for it.”
“I see,” I said.
“I did not realize then what it was, what it would be, to be overwhelmed, owned, and mastered.”
“You are content?” I said.
“Yes,” she said, “joyfully so.”
“But it does not matter,” I said, “one way or the other.”
“No,” she said, “I know that. It does not matter, one way or the other.”
I looked out to sea.
No sails were seen.
The horizon was clear.
“You, and others,” she said, “fought against Agamemnon, furthering the ends of other Kurii, those opposed to him. Are not you, then, and your colleagues, friends, allies, with them?”
“For a moment, we were,” I said. “It was a brief intersection of interests, a moment when we traveled a single road.”
“And that road has forked?” she said.
“I think so,” I said. “Kurii are intent, and steadfast.”
“But we have been brought here, and put here, alive.”
“Doubtless in virtue of an arrangement with Priest-Kings,” I said.
“Who are Priest-Kings?” she asked. “What are Priest-Kings?”
“Do not concern yourself with the matter,” I said.
“Curiosity,” she said, “is not for one such as I?”
“No,” I said. “Such as you are for other things.”
“‘Other things’?” she said.
“Certainly,” I said.
“I can no longer see the ship of Peisistratus,” she said, looking after the path of the ship, shading her eyes.
“I gather it is to make landfall within territories under the hegemony of Ar, and there disembark the Lady Bina and her cohort, and guard, Lord Grendel.”
“To what purpose?”
“I know not,” I said.
“She expects to become a Ubara,” she said.
“She is clever, and beautiful,” I said, “but the thought is madness.”
“But she was put there, with her guard, Lord Grendel. Do you think this is a guerdon for obscure services she rendered, or a gift to Lord Grendel?”
“It seems unlikely,” I said.
“If you have been placed here, in this verdant wilderness, at the will of Priest-Kings, whoever or whatever they may be, might not the Lady Bina and Lord Grendel have their purposes, as well?”
“I do not know.”
“Why have you been put here?”
“I do not know,” I said.
“I see nothing about,” she said.
“Nor I,” I said.
“You have your bow, some arrows, a sword, a knife,” she said.
“Rejoice,” I said, looking about.
“It does not seem we were put here to perish,” she said.
“No,” I said, looking back to the forest, “but we may perish.”
“There are animals?” she said.
“Doubtless,” I said.
“Men?” she asked.
“One does not know,” I said.
“We have some provisions,” she said, “bread, a bota of ka-la-na.”
“I will hunt,” I said. “We will seek water.”
“When Peisistratus disembarks Bina — ” she said.
“
“Yes,” she said, quickly, “
I wondered if she were testing me. That would have been unwise on her part. No love was lost between her and the beauteous Lady Bina, but that was no excuse for an impropriety in this matter, however inadvertent or slight. There were forms to be observed. Too, a chasm, a world, separated her from the Lady Bina. The gulf between a tarsk and a Ubara was less than the gap between one such as she and one such as the Lady Bina. To be sure, I had often thought that the Lady Bina would herself look quite well in a collar.
How did she expect to become a Ubara?
She did not even have a Home Stone.
And there was a Ubara in Ar, if only a Cosian puppet on the throne, Talena, a traitress to her Home Stone, Talena, once the daughter of the great Ubar, Marlenus of Ar, whose whereabouts, as far as I knew, were unknown.
“When Peisistratus disembarks the Lady Bina and Lord Grendel,” she said, “whence then he?”
“He will undoubtedly continue his work,” I said. I did not elaborate on the nature of his work, but she was substantially familiar with it. Peisistratus, and his crews, were in their way mariners and merchants. He doubtless had one or more bases, or ports, on Earth, and one or more on Gor, and I knew he had one on the Steel World from which we had been brought, that now under the governance of Arcesilaus, now theocrat of that world, and now, claimedly, Twelfth Face of the Nameless One.
“He is a slaver,” she said.
“He doubtless deals in various commodities, in various forms of merchandise,” I said.
“He is a slaver,” she said.
“Yes,” I said, “certainly at least that.”
“Predominantly that,” she said.
“Perhaps,” I said. “I do not know.”
“I saw the capsules on the ship,” she said.
“He is a slaver, certainly,” I said.
“Perhaps he thinks he is rescuing women from the ravages of Earth,” she said.
“That seems unlikely,” I said.
“At a price, of course,” she said.
“Oh?” I said.
“A rag, if that, and a mark, a collar,” she said.
“I doubt that his motivations are so benevolent, so thoughtful,” I said, “even mixedly so. And, on the other hand, his motivations are certainly not villainous, or malevolent. Do not think so. You know him too well for that. I think of him primarily as a business man, obtaining, transporting, and selling, usually wholesale, wares of interest.”
“Women,” she said.
“Perhaps an occasional silk slave, to delight a free woman,” I said.
“Mostly women,” she said.
