“Keep me, keep me for yourself alone,” she begged Callias. “I would be yours alone!”
“Do you think you could be a good slave?” I asked her.
“Yes, yes,” she said, “Master!”
I supposed this was possible. Most private slaves, after a time, are hopelessly devoted to their masters. Doubtless this has to do with the collar.
It is hard to be in a man’s collar and, after a time, not come to be his slave, not merely in law, but in heart. And it is hard to have a woman in one’s collar without noticing, after a time, how well she looks on her knees before you.
“I fear, dear Callias,” I said to the stranger, “that you are weak.”
“I?” he said.
“Do not forget that this curvaceous little thing you have in your arms is not a free woman, nothing warranting respect and dignity, but a beast, a worthless slave, only that.”
“Is she not lovely,” said Callias.
“I have seen many better,” I said, “on the shelves, in the cages, on the block, even in secondary markets.”
“Surely she is the most beautiful woman in the world,” said Callias.
“Not to everyone, surely,” I said.
“Who better?” he asked, annoyed.
“Thousands,” I said.
“Do you have an example?” he asked.
“Certainly,” I said. “What of the barbarian in
“She cannot even speak Gorean properly,” said Callias.
“She can learn,” I said, now myself annoyed.
“Let her be whipped, regularly,” said Callias, “until her diction becomes passable.”
“Perhaps your Alcinoe could do with a bout with the whip,” I said.
“Master!” protested Alcinoe.
“Did I hear a slave speak without permission?” I asked.
“No,” he said, “she may speak as she will, until such permission might be revoked.”
“It does not seem to me that she has had the time to earn such a privilege,” I said.
“I grant it,” he said.
“Too quickly, too easily,” I suggested.
“Surely you see,” he said, “how lovely she is!”
“There are many better,” I said, “for example, the barbarian at
“She cannot even begin to compare with Alcinoe,” he said. “And she is not even Gorean.”
“I think she is Gorean now,” I said. “She is now no more than another collared Gorean slave girl.”
“You admit she is beautiful,” he said.
“Yes,” I said. From the tone of his voice I thought it well to concede this. Besides, I supposed she was beautiful.
“Very beautiful,” he said.
“Perhaps,” I said, “but now she is sweaty and heated, and her hair is wet, and there are still thong marks on her ankles and wrists.”
I noted, too, that her body was imbued with desire. To be sure, this adds to the appeal of a slave.
“Perhaps,” I said, “you are thinking of freeing her.”
“No,” cried the slave, frightened. “Do not free me, Master! Keep me! I am your slave! I belong to you! Your collar has been put on my neck! It is locked on me, and I cannot remove it! But I do not want to remove it! I want it there for all to see, that all may know that I am a slave, and that you are my master! I love my collar! I am proud of it! I want to be owned! I want to be possessed, utterly, and without qualification. I know myself, by beauty, by blood, by thought, by dreams, by needs, to be naturally the property of men, and it is your property I wish to be!”
He held her out, again, from him, both of them on their knees, on the planks of the dark, polished floor.
“What do you see?” she laughed.
“A slave,” he said.
“Yes, Master!” she laughed, and leaned forward, as she could, straining to reach him with her lips.
“I am not a fool,” he said.
“No, Master!” she said.
This was doubtless an allusion to the well-known proverb, that only a fool frees a slave girl.
“All my life,” he said, “I have waited for such a slave.”
“All my life,” she said, “I have waited for such a master.”
“So why, then, should I free you?” he asked.
“You should not,” she said.
“I will not,” he said.
“A girl is grateful,” she whispered.
“Some women are too beautiful, too desirable, to free,” he said.
“It is my hope,” she said, “that I am such a one.”
“The collar proclaims you such,” he said.
“The heart of an eager and willing, but choiceless, slave rejoices,” she said.
“You understand,” he said, “the meaning of your condition?”
“Yes, Master,” she said.
“Unquestioning and instantaneous obedience?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Subjectability to discipline, even to the whip and chain?”
“Yes, Master.”
“The slave is not a free woman,” he said.
“No, Master.”
“What, then, is the duty of a slave?”
“Master?”
“To be a dream of pleasure to her master.”
“I will strive to be pleasing to my master,” she said.
“And if you fail?”
“Then I trust that the master will better train me, will correct my behavior, and see to my improvement,” she said.
“It will be so,” he said.
“I will do my best,” she said.
“No one can ask more than that,” he said.
“Such words fall delightfully on the ears of a slave,” she said.
“But it will be I, and I alone,” he said, “who will decide whether or not you have done your best.”
“I understand, Master,” she said.
“Beware, my friend, dear Callias,” I said. “I suspect you are in danger.”
“How so?” said he.
“I do not claim, of course,” I said, “that you are subject to this danger.”
“What danger?” said he.
“Some men, doubtless fools and weaklings,” I said, “are particularly subject to this danger, the danger of becoming enamored of a slave. It is quite enough to lust for them, desire them, master them, and rule them, quite enough to rope and chain them, and pleasure yourself with them, as frequently and variously, and as inordinately, as you wish, and derive from their conquest, their helplessness, and submission the thousand satisfactions and delights, the triumphs, of the mastery, of owning and governing such a property, of enjoying such a vulnerable, shapely beast, but it is quite another to care for one.”
