After a time, restless, I got up and paced the deck. Ulafi was not asleep. He was on the stem castle. Two helmsmen stood below him, on the helm deck. The only other hand awake, as far as I knew, was the lookout, some forty feet above me, on the ringed platform encircling the mainmast, the taller of the two masts.
I walked over to the cage of the blond-haired barbarian. She, I felt, was the key to the mystery, that device whereby I might locate Shaba and the fourth ring, one of the two remaining light-diversion rings, the secret of which had apparently perished long ago with Prasdak, the Kur inventor, he of the Cliff of Karrash. The fifth ring, according to Samos, was still somewhere on one of the steel worlds. It would not be risked, we speculated, on Gor or Earth. Perhaps it served to keep order on some steel world. Shielded in invisibility an executioner could come and go as he pleased. If we could acquire once more, of course, the Tahari ring, the fourth ring, which had been brought to Gor by a Kur faction intent upon preserving the planet from destruction, we could, presumably, have it duplicated in the Sardar. The use of such rings, If their use were permitted by Priest-Kings, might well make it difficult or impossible for the Kurii to function on Gor. With it their secret strongholds might be penetrated. With it one man might, in time, slaughter an army. I was pleased that the fourth ring had been brought to Gor. Without it, given to me by a dying Kur warrior, I doubted that I could have survived to prevent, some years ago, the detonation of the explosives in the steel tower, in the Tahari. Explosives that were intended to destroy Gor and the Priest-Kings, that the path to Earth might be cleared for conquest. But the faction that would have been willing to destroy one world to obtain another was, we speculated, no longer in the ascendancy on the steel worlds. Half-Ear, a war general of the Kurii, whom I had met in the north, had not been of that faction. Kurii now, it seemed reasonably clear, were again intent upon the possibilities of invasion. They sensed the weakness of Priest-Kings. Why now should they think of destroying a world which, like a ripe fruit, seemed to hang almost within their grasp?
I looked at the blond-haired barbarian. I was surprised to see that she was not asleep. Usually a girl in training sleeps well. She, has been worked hard and is tired. But she was not asleep. She knelt in the small cage, her fists on the bars. She was naked; I could see the moonlight on her flesh, striped by the shadows of the bars, and glinting.n the shipping collar locked on her throat. She was looking up at me. I smiled to myself. Clearly she was not sleepy.
If she had been mine I would have dragged her from the cage and thrown her upon the deck.
She looked over to where Sasi lay under the blanket. She looked at her, wonderingly. Then she looked at me, again. 'I heard her cry out,' she said, in English, half to herself. 'What did you do to her?'
She had heard, an hour ago or so, Sasi's cry, emitted in the throes of her first slave orgasm, acknowledging her surrender to me as a slave girl.
'What did you do to her?' she asked, in English. Surely she must know, or suspect, what had been done to Sasi. Would not any woman know?
'What?' I asked in Gorean. I crouched down by the cage.
She drew back from the bars. 'Forgive me,' she said, frightened, in English. 'I was only talking to myself, really. I did not mean to bother you, Master.'
'What?' I asked in Gorean.
She collected herself. 'It is nothing, Master,' she said, in Gorean. 'Forgive me, Master.'
Her Gorean was still terribly limited. I saw her look again to Sasi, under the blanket, and then to me.
As she knelt before me, within the cage, I saw her straighten her back and draw back her shoulders, lifting her breasts. How beautiful they were. I do not think she even realized she had done this. It was a slave's act, displaying her imbonded beauty before the gaze of a free man. Yet I do not think she was even aware of what she had done.
I looked at her ears. They had not been pierced. I had never known a female agent of Kurii who had been brought to Gor with pierced ears. That was no accident, of course. Pierced ears in a girl mean to a Gorean that she is a slave among slaves. I looked at her. If I owned her I would have her ears pierced. That would be sufficient guarantee, on Gor, that she would always be kept in a collar.
She opened her knees, slightly, before me, as she knelt. This was done unconsciously. What a naive slave she was, doubtless still priding herself on her freedom.
Some Earth girls, of course, brought to Gor as slaves, as lovely meat for the flesh markets, did have their ears pierced. Some of them did not learn for months why it was that they were treated with a roughness and contempt far beyond that of their imbonded sisters, subjected to a harsher authority and put beneath the rudest predations of a master's lust. And yet the answer was simple. They were pierced-ear girls. It is said that the ear piercing of slaves, on Gor, originated in Turia. Certainly it was practiced there. After the fall of Turia the custom spread northward. It is now relatively common on Gor, for pleasure slaves. Slavers have discovered that a pierced-ear girl commands a higher price.
I looked into the eyes of the blond girl. She had looked again at Sasi, and then had lifted her eyes to mine. Her lower lip trembled. And then she put her head down, quickly.
I saw that she wished that it had been she, and not Sasi, who had been subjected on the blankets to the pleasure of a master. But she would not, of course, admit this to herself. Sasi, a slave, had served the pleasure of a master. She, a slave, had not. Sasi had been called to the blankets; she had been left in her cage.
Ulafi had not had her thrown to the crew. He had purchased her for another. She was to be shipped intact to her buyer in Schendi, he who had placed her on order.
She lifted her head, and our eyes met I saw her small right hand tremble. It lifted timidly from her thigh. She wanted to reach out, through the bars, to touch me. Then quickly she drew her hand back.
She put down her head.
I thought that whoever eventually owned her would be a lucky fellow. She had excellent slave potential.
I would not have minded having her in my own collar. She had grown considerably in beauty, just on the voyage.
She lifted her head again.
I looked again into her eyes. Yes, I thought, excellent slave potential.
Again she looked down. 'I find you so attractive, you brute,' she said, miserably, in English, much to herself. 'You are so attractive to me,' she said. 'I hate you, you are so attractive to me,' she said. 'You make me weak. I hate you.'
'What are you saying?' I asked her, in Gorean as though I could not understand her.
She looked at me, boldly. But she spoke in English, which she believed I could not understand. 'I do not know what is going on in me,' she said. 'My clothes have been taken. I am caged. I wear a collar. I have been branded. I have been whipped. I am being trained as a slave. And yet I find you attractive. I am no good. I am no good. I want to he before you and lick your feet. I want to serve you, fully, and as a slave!' She looked away. 'I hate myself,' she said. 'I hate you! I hate all of them! And yet something in me is beginning to sense happiness, joy, fulfillment. How terrible I am!' She sobbed. 'perhaps I am a slave, truly,' she whispered. Then she shook her head, tears in her eyes. 'No, no, no, no, no,' she said. 'I am not a slave!'
'What are you saying?' I asked her, in Gorean.
She looked at me, and brushed back her hair. 'Nothing, Master,' she said. In Gorean. 'Forgive~ me, Master,' she said. 'It is nothing.'
'Nadu,' I said.
Swiftly she knelt before me, in the tiny cage, in the perfection of the position of the pleasure slave.
'Good,' I said. She had assumed it instantaneously, fluidly, beautifully.
'Thank you, Master,' she said.
'It is now time to sleep,' I told her.
'Yes, Master,' she said, and curled up on the sheet-iron square which floored her cage.
I looked at her. Her legs were drawn up. Her toes were pointed. Her belly was sucked in, slightly. Her body was a beautiful armful of slave curves. She had not been taught to do that. I looked into her eyes. She was a natural slave, I saw, as is any woman. Too, I saw that she suspected it. I then took the tarpaulin, which lay to one side. I unfolded it, and threw it over the cage, and then tied it down, fastening it to the four cleats at the corners of the cage, covering her for the night.
