protection is so profound and so familiar as to escape notice. But let the barriers of civilization lapse, even for a day, and their need for men would become unmistakably apparent.
'What hope,' asked she, 'would I, naked, a woman of high birth and gentle upbringing, a woman of station, a lady of Ar, have of getting out of the delta alive?'
'I do not know,' I said.
'And I might be taken by rencers,' she said, 'and put out again for tharlarion.'
'That is quite possible,' I said.
'Protect me!' she begged.
'Do not break position,' I warned her.
She moaned.
I looked out, over the marsh. It was now late afternoon. 'I think,' I said, 'I might myself, without great difficulty, one man, alone, escape from the delta. Taking a woman with me, however, and, in particular, one such as you, seems to impose, as you might well imagine, a handicap of a very serious nature.'
'I will be no trouble!' she said, eagerly.
'It is not as though you were, say, a slave,' I said, 'a property which one would not wish to leave behind.'
'I can be enslaved,' she said, an odd note in her voice.
'Also,' I said, 'one may assure oneself, in virtue of the strictures of the mastership, that a slave will be little or no trouble.'
'Enslave me then,' she said.
'But you are a free woman,' I said.
'That is true!' she said.
'And did you not suggest earlier,' I said, 'that you would never make a slave?'
'Yes,' she said.
'Have you now reconsidered the matter?' I asked.
'Yes,' she said.
Her knees were half sunk in the sand.
'And what is the outcome of your reconsideration?' I inquired.
'Any woman can be made a slave,' she said.
'A perceptive insight,' I said.
'Take me with you,' she begged.
'And if I take you with me as a free woman,' I said, 'what conditions would you impose?'
'Few,' she said. 'Only that I be treated with respect and dignity.'
'Come back!' she cried. 'Come back!'
I turned to look back at her, across the sand. She was wild in the sand. She had not, however, broken position.
'I impose no conditions!' she cried. 'None whatsoever!'
I returned to stand before her.
'I am a woman of Ar!' she said. 'You are of Port Kar. Both of our cities are at war with Cos! We are allies, then!'
'You are a spy of Cos,' I said.
'I impose no conditions,' she said.
'If I take you with me,' I said, 'I will take you with me utterly conditionlessly.'
'Agreed,' she said.
'As conditionlessly as a slave,' I said.
'Agreed,' she said.
'Moreover,' I said, 'I would take you with me as a captive, a full captive.'
'I understand,' she said.
'And do you understand what it is to be a full captive?' I asked.
'Yes,' she whispered.
'You will be to me as though you might be a slave,' I said.
'Yes,' she said.
'You will be mine to do with as I please, completely,' I said.
'I understand,' she said.
'You may be given away, sold, rented, slain, anything.'
'I understand,' she said.
'And I may,' I said, 'enslave you, or have you enslaved.'
'I understand,' she said.
'And,' I said, 'I may, if I wish, abandon you in the delta.'
'I shall endeavor to be such, earnestly,' she said, 'that you will not wish to do so.'
'You understand these things?' I asked.
'Yes,' she said.
'And this?' I asked, holding the wicked point, the dangerous steel, still sticky from the blood of the ul, of the unsheathed sword to her bosom.
'Yes,' she said, looking up at me.
'Lie on your back,' I said, 'your arms at your sides, the palms of your hands up, your knees lifted, your heels back, up a bit, your toes pressed down into the sand, your legs closely together.'
I looked upon her.
Her wrists, on each side of her, were still encircled with thongs, their dangling ends dark in the sand.
'Am I favorably assessed?' she asked.
I then wiped the blade clean, carefully, using the interior of her thighs, and belly. I used also sand, and, lastly, her hair.
'Am I again to clean myself?' she asked.
'No,' I said. 'The delta is not a place for the excessively fastidious.'
'I see,' she said, shuddering.
I sheathed the sword smartly, cracking it into the scabbard.
She reacted, shrinking down, frightened, in the sand. I saw that on some level or another she understood the sheathing of the sword.
'Position!' I snapped.
Swiftly she knelt again, as she had been commanded earlier.
'You obey with the alacrity of a slave girl,' I observed.
'If I do not,' she said, 'I could be punished as one, could I not?'
'Yes,' I said, 'and would be.'
I walked about her, examining her. She kept her back very straight, and her head up.
I was then again before her.
I noted that the palm of her hands, so soft, so vulnerable, had turned on her thighs, so that they faced up. Among slave girls this is a common way of signaling need, helplessness, a desire to please. As she probably did not know that I took it to be instinctive, or semi-instinctive, perhaps a subconscious, or only partially understood, utilization of the symbolic aspects of the palm of the female's hand. One reason for thinking this is a very natural behavior is that almost all female slaves, in certain situations, will use it, even before it has been explicitly called to their attention by, say, a whipmaster or trainer. Also, it is not uncommon, in certain situations, among captive free women, as witness the Lady Ina, in the repertoire of an experienced slave, of course, it is one of her nonverbal signals, one of those numerous signals, such as need knots, body touchings, and such, by means of which she may express herself, even if forbidden to speak. It may also be used as a begging, placatory behavior. The thongs on the Lady Ina's wrists, the ends over, and down, beside her thighs, were lovely.
'It is my hope,' she said, 'that your assessment is favorable.'
'You are not unattractive,' I said.
'I am pleased that I might be found pleasing,' she said.
'Why?' I asked.
