me, for example, to hunt me down and return me to a master.
“I can hardly stand,” I said. “I can hardly move. I will be unable to perform, even should I try to do so.”
“This is a low market,” said the girl from Tabor. “They may ask little of us. We may only have to stand, and turn.”
“At least,” I said, “we have our tunics, the sheets.”
“Now,” she said.
“Now?” I said.
“Yes,” she said.
I recalled that the bar had again sounded.
“The bar rang,” I said. “It was the ninth ringing, the ninth stroke, was it not?”
“I think so,” she said.
“What if we are not sold?” I asked.
“The masters would be displeased,” she said. “It is common to whip a girl who is not sold.”
“I see,” I said, frightened.
“One then tries, the next time, desperately, to be sold.”
I was suddenly overcome with the sense of my helplessness. I was wholly at the mercy of others. Anything could be done with me! How was it that I, a woman of Earth, was here, in a cell, on another world, with a marked thigh, caged with slaves? And how could it be that I, of Earth, was here, on this other world, also a slave, as much as they?
“I do not want to be sold!” I said.
“Do you wish to be whipped?” she asked.
“No, no!” I said.
“Then you should want to be sold,” she said.
“I am afraid,” I said.
“That is not unusual,” she said. “One does not know who will buy one, before whom one must kneel.”
Once again the bar rang out.
I seemed to feel the ringing in my whole body.
I looked out, through the bars.
And I said to myself, be silent, slave. You know that it is here that you belong, here with a marked thigh, in a cell, waiting to be sold.
This is right for you.
No, no, I whispered to myself.
Yes, yes, I thought.
Are you a slave, I asked myself, sternly.
Yes, Mistress, I whispered to myself, I am a slave.
I then well knew myself, though of Earth, a slave, a common slave.
I looked to the girl from Tabor.
“Perhaps someone from Tabor will buy you, and free you,” I said.
“You know little of Gor,” she said.
“He would not free you?” I asked.
“My left thigh bears the slave mark,” she said.
“Even so,” I said.
“Apparently you know little of Gor,” she said.
“I do not understand,” I said.
“I was once a free woman,” she said. “Men much enjoy keeping former free women as helpless slaves.”
“But,” I protested.
“I am marked,” she said.
“So?” I said.
“My own family would not free me,” she said. “They would see that I was sold elsewhere, in my shame and degradation.”
I regarded her.
“I am marked,” she said. “Are you not marked?”
“Yes,” I said, “I am marked.”
“Then understand it,” she said. “You are no longer what you were.”
I suddenly became aware that the bar was no longer sounding.
The short fellow had ascended to the height of the cement platform.
“Noble Masters, noble Masters, noble Masters,” he called, “approach, approach, gather about!”
Some twenty, or so, fellows were already clustered about the platform. Some others, from across the street, now approached.
“We have here for your consideration, and delectation, this lovely afternoon, seven beauties!”
There was laughter.
“The finest beads drawn from the finest of the slavers’ necklaces, each worthy of the central block of the Curulean, each fit for the Pleasure Garden of a Ubar,” said the auctioneer.
There was more laughter.
“Pot girls!” jibed a fellow.
“Have you not, several of you, examined these beauties earlier in the morning, and pondered your bids?”
“Yes,” said a fellow, “a copper tarsk for the lot!”
“You may ask,” said the auctioneer, “how is it that such goods, goods of such quality, could be offered here?”
“No other market would have them!” called a fellow.
“It is true, noble Masters, that our modest market, as the slave shelves, is noted for its bargains,” said the auctioneer, “but that is your good fortune and our pleasure, to serve you better. Would you not prefer to pay less for more? Would you not be pleased to obtain an exquisite pleasure slave, trim, responsive, and vital, for the price of a pot girl, a kettle-and-mat girl? Those who know how to buy know where to buy, and here is where to buy!”
“Begin!” called a man.
“Slaves,” called the auctioneer, “come to the bars, smile, press against them, reach out to the noble masters. Good. Can you not see, noble Masters, how ready they are, how they hope to be well purchased?”
I, the girl from Tabor, and the kneeling blonde, shaking with sobs, the former Lady Persinna, of the Merchants, remained at the back of the cell.
I saw the slaver’s man looking at us, from the level of the street. I shuddered. The girl from Tabor saw him, too. She then hurried to the bars, to join the other slaves. I saw her straighten her body, and lift her chin. She was beautiful.
“You may plead, needful beauties, to be purchased,” the auctioneer informed the girls.
“Buy me, Master,” they called to the men.
I saw the dark blonde extending both her hands through the bars, and call out, piteously, to a handsome fellow in the front row, “Buy me, Master!” He smiled. “I am prettier, Master!” called out one of the brunettes. “No, I, I, buy me, Master!” called out the dark blonde. I supposed it was pleasant to be a man, to whom women would beg to belong. I wondered what it would be, to be owned by him. One of my cellmates, I supposed, might learn. Perhaps I would learn! Other girls at the bars seemed to present themselves to one fellow or another. Most, I assumed, would fail to be purchased by the particular master of their choice. They would be purchased by whoever bid the most for them.
It is so with slaves.
It would be so with me.
“Enough!” called the auctioneer, suddenly, sharply. “Be silent. Go back in the cell, away from the bars! Huddle there, together, in the back, away from the bars. As you can, crowd together, and try to hide! Crowd together! Do not speak!”
Frightened, the girls did as they were told. All of us now were together, standing, except for the former Lady Persinna, who still knelt, perhaps unable to rise, toward the back of the cell, away from the bars.
We could not be seen so well now, for the bars, and the distance.
