Swordsmen of Gor

women,” said a man.

“In moments,” said another man, “each hastened to submit.”

Submission may be rendered in a number of ways. The most important thing is that the submission is clear. A common posture of submission is to kneel, lower the head, and extend the arms, wrists crossed, as though for binding. Often a phrase, or formula, is employed, as well, often as simple as “I submit,” “I am yours,” “Do with me as you will,” or such. If one is of the Warriors the codes then require one to either slay the captive or accept the submission. Almost invariably the submission is accepted, as women on Gor are accounted a form of wealth, at least once they are collared. I know of only one exception to this almost invariable acceptance of a submission. A woman submitted and then, later, betrayed the submission, and stabbed he to whom she had submitted. The next time she submitted her head was cut off. It might be noted that the submission, in itself, strictly, does not entail bondage, but captivity. Nonetheless it is almost invariably followed by the captive’s enslavement. A woman who submits expects the collar to follow.

“Each then,” said a fellow, “divested herself of her robes, stepped from them, declared herself slave, and hurried to Torgus, who knotted a length of a coarse, common rope about her neck.”

“We made certain each was block naked,” said a fellow.

“Some had foolishly neglected, or forgotten, to remove their sandals or slippers,” explained another fellow.

“They were suitably cuffed?” I said.

“Yes,” said a man.

This was acceptable, as they were then slaves.

Those were probably the first blows they had ever felt.

“‘We are lost,’ we thought,” said a man. “For the men of Ar were at the door itself.”

“‘We are fee fighters,’ Torgus told us, ‘in no uniform. The men outside will not know we are not of Ar. Ar is a great city. Who knows all her citizens? Throw open the door, cry out “For Glorious Ar,” in suitable accents, and drag our prizes into the street. Given the length of their hair the men of Ar will assume these are free women, captured, in accord with the proscription lists. Cry out that we are conducting them to the impaling poles.’”

“You are clever,” I said to Torgus. “I gather that the ruse was successful.”

“For a time,” said the large fellow, Torgus.

“Until it became clear we might be fleeing the city,” said another.

“This aroused suspicion, and, forced to speak, the foreignness of the accents of some of us, for not all were skilled in the intonations of Ar, unsheathed the swords of men of Ar.”

“There was then fierce blade work,” said a fellow.

“The slaves lay naked on the ground, on their bellies, covering their heads, moaning, shrieking, while steel flashed about them.”

I nodded. They would await the outcome of the fierce altercation. They would affect its outcome no more than tethered kaiila.

They must wait to learn their fate, which would by determined by men.

“Many were trod upon,” said a man, “and sparks stung their backs.”

“Here, though, in the vicinity of the pomerium,” said a man, “we were not overmatched as in the city, and we were fee fighters, and mere citizens were opposed to us.”

“We lost men, and so, too, did they, and more, but we cut our way clear to the rubble of the dismantled wall.”

“Those opposed to us knew themselves outskilled and drew back, to summon reinforcements.”

“We then struggled over the rubble, dragging the slaves with us, and were soon beyond the pomerium,” said a man. “The camp of Myron had been overrun, but Cosian regulars, abetted by Tyrian contingents, and some allies, had regrouped and, well disciplined, and orderly, in their squares, had already begun the withdrawal northwest to Torcodino, and would from there march to the great port of Brundisium, where would await them ships of Tyros and Cos.”

“We, and hundreds of fugitives, with loot, and baggage, and slaves, attached ourselves to these units, and clung to the perimeters of their camps,” said one of the fellows on the beach.

“We lost no time shortening the hair of our detestable traitresses,” said a man, “to a length suitable to their new condition, that of slave. We would not want reconnoitering tarnsmen, flighted from Ar, to suspect that they might be refugees from the proscription lists, lest determined efforts be made to recover them.”

I supposed the women had no objection to this, despite the shearing of their beloved tresses being in its way a badge of degradation and servitude.

Surely it was better to be shorn of those treasured tresses than be betrayed by them into the hands of vengeful citizens.

And better, surely, the degradations of collars and their fair lips pressed to the feet of masters than the slow, lingering death of the impaling pole.

The three paga slaves had little to fear, of course, for their brands would protect them.

They were attractive, domestic animals.

Yet they, too, would be eager to escape Ar, for its Home Stone had once been their own.

Too, they were now different from what they had been, quite different, for they had known the touch of masters.

“It was a terrible march,” said a fellow. “We were afflicted from the air, arrowed by avenging tarnsmen. Sometimes small groups attacked the margins of our march. We knew not whether they were allied with Ar, or merely seeking spoil, or trying to curry favor with great Marlenus.”

“We must deal with brigands and thieves, within our own camps,” said another. “There were many desertions.”

“Bosk, and verr, and tarsks, were driven from our path,” said a man. “Fields were burned. Wells were filled in. There was little to eat or drink. They opened and closed the veins of kaiila, draining their blood into flasks. A single urt cost as much as a silver tarsk.”

“At last we reached Torcodino,” said a man, “and found safety within her walls.”

“It was there,” said a man, “that we put iron on the necks of our sluts.”

“They then well knew themselves slave,” said a man.

“Ten days later we accompanied the march to Brundisium,” said a man. “The regulars of Tyros and Cos, and their officers and slaves, were soon embarked, and gladly, with songs of joy, for their home islands, but it fared differently with many of us, the gathered mercenaries who had served the island ubarates.”

“The port police would not permit us within the walls of Brundisium,” said a man. “Refugees were unwelcome. They brought nothing to the city, there was no work for them, they were dangerous, they would be expensive to feed.”

“By heralds we were warned away from the walls,” said a man.

“‘Scatter! Begone!’ we were told,” said a man.

“Rumors had it that our slaughter was planned,” said another.

“It was at that time,” said a fellow, “that the strange men contacted us.”

“Of course,” I said.

I did not understand them, of course, but they would suppose this was all familiar to me. Strange men, at least, would be men, not, say, Kurii. That they spoke of them as “strange” interested me. How would they be strange? In demeanor, in language, in dress? I gathered, whatever might be the case, that they were men of a sort to which they were unaccustomed, men of a sort with which they were unfamiliar.

“Some hundreds of us were then soon within the walls of Brundisium,” said a fellow, “and were conducted to the wharves, thence, over several days, to be embarked on various ships, toward points unknown.”

“As here,” I said.

“It seems so,” said a man, looking about the beach, after the departing vessel, then to the looming forest.

“The ships would depart at intervals,” I said.

“Hirings and charterings took time,” said a fellow.

“I trust,” I said, “in the meantime you were comfortably housed.”

“In mariners’ billets,” said a fellow.