Mahpiyasapa, with Grunt, had been outside the camp at the time of this attack. Most of the accumulated leadership, wisdom and experience of the Kaiila people, in all the bands, had perished in a matter of Ehn. One of the few survivors had been Kahintokapa, who had cut his way through the skins and fled. A task force of Yellow Knives had penetrated the camp, too, to that point, and it was they who had killed and mutilated the wounded, and burned the lodge. A similar task force had attacked the dance lodge. These task forces had then withdrawn. Shortly thereafter the resistance had formed, led by Mahpiyasapa and Kahintokapa. I looked into the darkened circle outlined by the long poles. Within it, still, were bodies, and the upright shaves of countless arrows. It had indeed been a dark and bloody day for the Kaiila. Many things, incidentally, puzzled me about this attack, generally. One was the alliance and cooperation of the Yellow Knives and Kinyanpi. These were not traditional allies. It seemed to me unusual that they had cated in this carefully coordinated fashion. Alliances between tribes unfamiliar to one another commonly took place only in resistnce to white intrusion into the Barrens. Another peculiarity of the attack lay in the nature of its engineering. It did not follow the normal, rather restrained, small-scale, almost ritualized patters of conflict common among the red savages. For example, the meretricious proposal of a spurious peace, to lure the leadership of a people into a small area, there to be devastatingly attacked, while not beyond the intelligence or cunning of red savages, did not seem at all typical of their approach to militar matters. Certainly it was a surprising kind of generalship to find in the Barrens. It seemed to have little to do with traditions of honor and the meticulous counting of coup. Lastly, it seemed almost incomprehensible, given the nature of the beliefs of the red savages, that the attack had been mounted on a people at the time of festivals. This, in the Barrens, is something in the nature of blasphemy or sacrilege. It was hard for me to believe that the Yellow Knives, red savages, themselves, could have even conceived of such a thing. This, again, I had to observe, suggested, at least, the advent of a new form of gernalship, the adoption of novel tactics, in the Barrens. To be sure, I had to admit that this sort of thing, particularly with the collusion of Watonka, apparently slain later by those whose interests he had served, had been quite effective. That was undeniable.
I looked again at the bodies, and arrows, within ghe remains of the council lodge.
I was not pleased with what I saw. I then turned my kaiila away.
I had then ridden back toward my place in our forward lines. In this short journey I had passed several kaiila, picketed under the ropes and cloths. There were not enough for all those who would have to ride. I also passed large stocks of meat, gathered from the drying racks by the women and put on robes under the netting. This meat would be improtant for the Kaiila. It could make the difference between surviving the winter and losing many lives in the cold and snows. I also passed some lines and circles of female slaves. Most were kneeling and stripped, and secured with hair ties. Long hair is enforced on most Gorean slaves by their masters. It is aesthetically beautiful and much, from the point of view of diverse coiffures, revealing new dimentiosn of the slave's loveliness, may be done with it. Too, as is well known among masters and slaves, its application, in the experssion and pursuance of a slave's submission and service, can do much to enhance and deepen a master's pleasures; it is erotically useful. Too, in the absence of more customary restraints, such as, say, binding fiber or graceful, steel shackles, it may serve as a bond.
The commercial value of long hair might also be mentioned. Aside from the obvious fact that it might improve the price of a girl in her sale or resale, it can also be sheared and sold. Free women sometimes buy hair for wigs or falls, and, although the hair they purchase is always certified as coming only from free women, there is little doubt that it is often taken from female slaves.
Too, intrestingly, female hair is prized for catapult ropes. It is not only stronger and more resistent than hemp but it possesses beter properties of weather resistance, being less affected by moisture and temperature changes. When a city is under siege, particularly if the siege is prolonged, even free women will often have thier hair shorn, contributing it then to the supplies for municipal defense. Considering the usual vanity of Goreans, both male and female, over their appearance, this is a patriotic sacrifice of no little magnitude. It is partiuclarly significant when one understands that the women know very well that if they fall inot the hands of the enemy, with their hair shorn, they may expect to be sold into low slaveries, such as agricultural servitudes or thos of the mills. Sometimes as time passes, the foremen in such places come to realize that they have an incredible beauty in their power. They often hide such women from their superiors, keeping them for themselves. An additional advantage of long hair in a female slave, incidentally, is that it gives the master additional power over her, for, as he is the master, it is his decision whether or not she shall be albe to keep it. One of the commands a Gorean woman most fears to hear, wheather she is a captive or a slave, is 'Shear her.'
The kneeling position is, of course, a suitable one for slaves. A slave will normally assume such a position on entering the presence of her master or a free person. She will probably remain in it until permitted to rise. It is a common position, too, for her to assume when she is in attendance of a master, for example, awaiting his notice or commands. Too, she will usually speak to her master from this position, unles, of course, she is lying down, as in making her reports to him, inquiring as to his will, answering questions, and so on. Some masters approve it, too, for purposes of general conversation. Most masters, incidentally, enjoy talking with their slaves, immensely; after all, the slave is not a mere contracual partner, in effect, a business associate; she is a prized possession; she is a treasure, and she is all one's own.
Some Goreans think if the Free Companionship as being a form of contract slavery; this is not, of course, precisely correct; on the other hand, if more women took that definition seriously, I have little doubt but what free companionships would be far more rewarding than they now are, for many couples. They might then, under that interpretation, and held contractually enforceable on the woman, be that next best thing in her actual slavery. There is no full and adequate substitute, of course, given the dominance/submission ratios and the order of nature, for the uncompromised, and full and total bondage of the female. Once this is institutionalized and legalized, as it is on Gor, we have, then, the union of nature and civilization, a union in which civilization no longer functions as a counterbiological antithesis to nature but rather, perhaps, as an extension and flowering of nature herself, a union in which natural relationships are fulfilled and furthered.
That most of the kneeling women were stripped did not mean that most of them were from the outlying herds. For the most part those herds had probably, by now, fallen to Yellow Knives. Rather the stripping of these women, most of whom would presumably be slaves from the inner parts of the camp, was, in large measure, a security precaution, the camp being under attack. It is difficult for a naked woman to conceal weapons. That most of the women wore bonds was also a security precaution. It is common for Goreans, in times of crisis or danger, to secure their slaves. At such times slaves, like other animals, must be strictly controlled. It would not do, for example, to have them running about, adding to the confusion. Similarly, slaves are to be absolutely unable, even if they wish, to interfere with the defense or abet the attackers, in any way; similarly, they are to be precluded from attempting to take advantage of the confusion, perhaps in order, foolishly, to attempt to escape. They are the prizes of the action, not participants in it. Helpless, they must abide its outcome. It will be time enough later for them to learn their fate.
They were fastened, for the most part, in two different forms of hair ties. In one, the wrists of the woman were bond before her body, lifted and raised, in the hair of the woman before her. Another woman's wrists, then, would be bound in her hair, and so on. Some of these women were doffled in lines, and others in circles, the last woman's hair serving to bind the wrists of the first woman. The other form of hair tie had the hands of a woman tied behind her back to the hair of the woman who, her head lowered, knelt behind her.
Once again, some were secured in lines, and others in circles, the hands of the last woman being tied in the hair of the first. This second form of hair tie, done in lines, incidentally, resembles a comon coffle arrangement, achieved with a set of relatively short thongs each about five feet in length. The first woman's hands are then bound behind her with another thong, its free end then being take up and bound about the neck of the woman behind her, and so on. An advantage of this coffle arrangement is that women may be easily taken from it, and added to it.
A similar arrangement, of course, may be achieved with chains, each length of chain terminating at one end with a pair of slave bracelets and, at the other end, with a closable, lockable neck ring. The last woman on the coffle, of course, has the neck ring attached to her own bracelets and chain locked about her own neck. An advantage of the chains over the thongs, of course, is that the chain cannot be chewed through. Some of the other girls under the ropes and cloths were tied in more conventional fashions. Some were not even tied at all. An example was Oiputake, or Kiss, whom I well knew. It was she whom I had taken from a herd earlier, and imporved. Too, it was she who had alerted us to the fact, thinking little of it at the time, that the Yellow-Knife chieftains in camp were not civil cheiftains by war chiefs.
