hung a slave whip. From one of the overhead beams, near the side of the room, there was a whipping ring, to which a slave could be tethered, which could be lowered. It was a furnished room. Slaves, it must be understood, are not that uncommon on Gor.
I covered the blond with one of our blankets. The poor thing was exhausted.
'You did not carry me across the threshold,' said Sasi.
'You were bound in a blanket, and on my shoulder,' I said, 'when I entered this room.'
'I mean before,' she said.
'No,' I said, 'I did not. I did, however, if you will remember, when first I used you, order you to my blankets.'
'I have never forgotten,' she said. She shuddered with pleasure, remembering the moment. 'I was simply ordered to your blankets,' she said.
A similar sort of thing is done sometimes when a master brings home a new girl to a house which is completely empty, if necessary, by prearrangement, and new to her, and orders her to enter alone. 'Warm wine,' he tells her. 'Light the lamp of love. Spread furs. Crawl naked into them, and await me.'
'Yes, Master,' she says.
She then enters the house, obeying. Not a shackle or a cord is on her body. But few women could be more slave than she, entering fearfully the strange, empty house, and preparing herself for her master's pleasure.
'It is difficult to convey to a man,' she said, 'the feelings of a woman at such a time.'
'They are the feelings of a slave,' I said.
'So simply put!' she said. 'Yes,' she said, 'they are the feelings of a slave. But I wonder if a man, ever, will truly understand what a woman's collar can mean to her… I wonder if he, ever, truly, will be able to fathom the nature and depth of the emotions of the woman who kneels at his feet.'
'Surely free women, too, have emotions,' I said.
'I was free,' she said. 'I did not know what it was to feel until I became a slave. I was free. There was no need to feel, or be aware. But this has changed since I became a slave. I must now be sensitive to the feelings of others. I have never been so aware of other human beings as now. And I cannot always have my way, and I must yield to male domination. I can be commanded, and I must obey, and be pleasing. This answers to something very deep in me, Master.'
'Of course,' I said, 'to the slave in you.'
'Yes,' she said, 'to the woman, and slave, in me.'
'They are the same,' I said.
'Yes,' she said.
'It is hard to be a man,' I said, 'until one stands in a relation to a woman. And, I suppose, it is hard to be a woman until one stands in a relation to a man.'
'What relation,' she asked, 'Master?'
'That of the natural order of nature,' I said.
'Yes, Master,' she said.
I looked at her. 'I cannot know well the nature of your feelings,' I said, 'but I know, and well, that women are deep as well as beautiful.'
'We are so different from you,' she said. 'I fear you will never understand us.'
'It is doubtless easier to put you on your knees and push the whip to your teeth than it is to understand you,' I said.
'The man who truly understands us,' she laughed, 'is the first to put us on our knees and make us kiss the whip.'
'Take off my sandals,' I said.
'Yes, Master,' she said. She looked up. 'Never until I was a slave,' she said, 'did I feel so helpless, alive and vulnerable.'
I said nothing.
'I must untie your sandals,' she said. 'I must crawl to you, if you wish. I must do anything you want. I am happy.'
'Attend to your work,' I told her.
'Yes, Master,' she said. Then she had removed the san-dais. She kissed them, and looked up at me.
'Tonight,' I said, 'before I leave the room, I will pierce your ears.'
'Thank you, Master,' she said.
'You will then be,' I said, 'for all practical purposes, irrevocably a slave.'
'Yes, Master,' she said. She looked up. 'You do understand us, don't you?' she asked.
'It will improve your price,' I told her.
'Yes, Master,' she smiled.
'I think also,' I said, 'I will pierce her ears, too.' I indicated the sleeping blond girl. She had been an agent of Kurii. I decided that I would guarantee, for all practical purposes, that she would remain in a collar on Gor. I would pierce her ears.
I looked over to the sleeping girl, so worn and exhausted. I went over to her and, with one hand, lifted the blanket away from her. She stirred, troubled, sensing the difference in the temperature, the air, upon her skin. 'No,' she whimpered, softly, in English. 'I do not want to get up.' How beautiful she was, lying soft and helpless in the straw. She stirred again, and lifted her knee, shifting the position of her shackled ankle. 'No, I do not want to get up,' she whimpered, in English. She reached down, searching for the blanket. I then held her by the upper arms. 'Oh!' she said, half awakening, twisting. But I held her. 'Oh,' she said, 'oh,' suddenly, rudely, returning to a slave's reality, then understanding that she lay in straw, her back on a wooden floor, held in the arms of a man. She moved her ankle, frightened, and felt the shackle and chain.
'Who is it?' she asked. I did not speak to her.
'Is it my Master?' she asked.
'Yes,' I said.
'Who is my Master, please,' she begged. I said nothing to her.
'Who is my Master!' she cried out, miserably.
'I am,' I told her.
'Who owns me?' she begged.
'I do,' I told her.
She turned her head to the side, and moaned. Then she again turned her face toward me, its upper portions obscured by the black, knotted blindfold.
'Why are you holding me like this?' she asked.
I said nothing to her.
'What are you going to do to me?' she asked.
I did not speak to her.
'What do you want of me?' she asked. 'Oh, no, please,' she said. 'I am a virgin!' Her lip trembled. 'No, please!' she said. She tensed. 'No,' she said, 'please, no, please do not take my virginity like this, not like this. I am blindfolded! I cannot see you! I cannot even see you. I want to see who takes my virginity from me!' Then she cried out, softly, and wept.
'It was your Master, Slave,' I told her.
'Yes, Master,' she whispered.
I held her very still.
'How sweet and strong it is,' she breathed. 'And how helplessly I am held. I could not escape now, unless you were to release me.'
I did not speak.
'Would Master deign to kiss a slave?' she asked.
I put my lips, gently, to hers, and she lifted her lips to mine, tenderly, and kissed me, and then she put her head back to the straw and the floor.
'Thank you, Master,' she said.
'This first time,' I said, 'doubtless it is difficult and painful for you.'
'It does not hurt,' she said.
