'I am so frightened,' she said. 'This world terrifies me, and on it I am only anaked slave. I do not know what to do. I am afraid. I am so ignorant. I knownothing. I am so frightened. I am only a slave.'
'You speak truly, ignorant slave,' I said. Did she expect me to comfort her?
She turned her head to the side, and laid her left cheek on the blankets at myfeet. 'Please put your foot on my neck, Master,' she said.
'I did so, with just enough pressure that she could feel its weight, and that ofmy body.
'You could now,' she said, 'with one motion of your foot, kill me.'
'Yes,' I said.
'Please do not kill me, Master,' she said. 'Instead, take pity on me, I beg ofyou, and find me pleasing.'
I took my foot from her neck. 'I shall inspect you,' I told her. 'You may kneelbefore me.'
Swiftly she rose from her stomach to kneel before me.
'Knees wide,' I told her, 'back on heels, stomach in, head high, hands onthighs, shoulders back, breasts thrust out.'
I moved her hair back, behind her shoulders, and smoothed it out. It would not,thus, interfere with my view. I appraised her, slowly, carefully. 'It is notimpossible,' I told her, at length, 'that a man might find you pleasing.'
'Make me please you,' she begged.
'Rather,' I said, 'I shall permit you to beg to please me, and as a slave.'
'I beg to please you, Master,' she said.
'As a slave?' I asked.
'Yes, Master,' she said, 'I beg to please you and as a slave.'
'But you are untrained,' I said, scornfully.
'Train me,' she begged, tears in her eyes.
I regarded her, dispassionately.
'Train me, Master,' she begged. 'Train me, please, Master!'
'Take your hair from behind your left shoulder,' I said, 'and hold it before,and against, your lips. Part of the hair keep before your lips and against them.
Another part of the hair, the center strands, take back between your lips, sothat you can feel it on the soft interior surfaces of your lips. A portion ofthis same hair take then back against your teeth, and a portion of that back,between the teeth. Now purse your lips and, while remaining kneeling, rise fromyour heels, and lean forward, gently and submissively.'
And thus began the training of a nameless slave on the plains of Gor.
In a few moments I thrust her back to the blankets.
'Do I train well, Master?' she asked.
'Yes,' I said, 'Pretty slave. You are an apt pupil, and you train well.'
She snuggled against me.
'It is a tribute to your intelligence,' I said.
'Thank you, Master,' she said.
'And to your genetic predisposition to slavery,' I said.
'Yes, Master,' she said.
A woman's acquisition of slave arts follows a steep learning curve, far beyondwhat would be expected was the template, or readiness, for these arts notintrinsic to her nature. She learns them far too swiftly and well not to be, ineffect, a born slave.
'Oh!' she said, and then I again took her.
This time the slave squirmings of her, though inchoate and rudimentary, wereunmistakable.
'How long has it been since you were a virgin?' I asked.
'A thousand years,' she smiled. 'I think perhaps ten thousand years.'
'Do you feel now less than you were before,' I asked, 'less important, somehowless significant?'
'No,' she said, 'I feel ten thousand times more important, more significant,than I was before.'
'Virginity, as I understand it, in English,' I said, 'is sometimes spoken of asthough it might be something which could be lost. In Gorean, on the other hand,it is usually conceived of as something which is to be outgrown, or superseded.'
'Interesting,' she said.
'What, in English,' I asked, 'is a woman who is not a virgin?'
She thought for a moment. 'A nonvirgin, I suppose,' she said.
'This type of distinction is drawn in various ways in Gorean,' I said. 'Theclosest to the English is the distinction between 'glana' and 'metaglana. 'Glana' denotes the state or virginity and 'metaglana' denotes the statesucceeding virginity. Do you see the difference?'
'Yes,' she said, 'in Gorean virginity is regarded as a state to be succeeded.'
'Another way of drawing the distinction is in terms of 'falarina', and' profalarina. 'Profalarina' designates the state preceding falarina, which isthe state of the woman who has been penetrated at least once by a male.'
'Here,' she said, 'the state of virginity is regarded as one which looks toward,or has not yet attained, the state of falarina.'
'Yes,' I said. 'In the first case, virginity is seen as something to besucceeded, and, in the second, it is seen as something which is conceived of asmerely antedating the state of falarina. It takes its very meaning from the factthat it is not yet falarina.'
'Both of these situations are quite different from the English said. 'InEnglish, as I see now, interestingly, virginity is spoken of as a positiveproperty, and nonvirginity, in spite of its obvious and momentous importance,and even its necessity, presumably, for the continuation of the species, seemsto be regarded as being merely the absence of a property, or the privation of aproperty.'
'Yes,' I said. 'It is as though the whole spectrum were divided into the blueand the nonblue. Properly understood the nonblue is every bit as real, and iseven more extensive and variegated than the blue.'
'Yes,' she said.
'It is thus that pathological conceptions, ingrained in common speech, canproduce distorted notions of reality,' I said…'I understand, Master,' she said.
'In Gorean, as not in English,' I said, 'the usual way, however, of drawing thedistinction is in terms of 'glana' and 'falarina. Separate words, these, areused for the separate properties or conditions. Both conditions, so to speak,are accorded a similar status. Both are regarded as being equally real, equallypositive, so to speak.'
'Yes, Master,' she said.
'Sometimes, metaphorically, in English, however,' I said, 'a distinction isdrawn between the virgin and the woman, a distinction which is almost Gorean intone. Strictly, of course, in English, one might be both a woman and a virgin.'
'Do Goreans speak freely of these things?' she asked.
'Free persons do not commonly speak freely of them,' I said. 'For example,whether a free woman is glana or falarina is obviously her business, and no oneelse's. Such intimate matters are well within the prerogatives of her privacy.'
'Such matters, however, I suspect,' she said, 'are not within the prerogativesof a slave's privacy.'
'No,' I said. 'Such matters are public knowledge about slaves, as much as thecolor of their hair and eyes, and their collar size.'
'And my most intimate measurements?' she asked.
'Public knowledge,' I assured her, 'if anyone should be interested.'
'What privacy am I permitted, then?' she asked.
'None,' I told her.
'And what secrets?' she asked.
'None,' I told her.
'I see,' she said.
'You perhaps now understand, a little better than before; I said,' What it willbe to be a slave.'
'Yes, Master,' she said.
'Your opening, for example, is not to be kept a secret,' I said.
