slave.'
She whimpered once, pathetically.
'I wonder if they were right,' I said.
She then knelt in the shallow water, there by the bar. It came up only over her knees and calves. She put down her head.
'But perhaps they were wrong,' I said.
She lowered her head further.
'Too,' I said, 'as I may once have called to your attention, it is not difficult to reform a woman's character, once she is in a collar.'
She trembled.
'I once called that to your attention, did I not?' I asked.
She whimpered once.
I bent down and drew the lovely wooden piece, fashioned in the likeness of the neck and head of a gant, from the sand. I put it down on the sand. I regarded the head, the eyes, the graceful curve of the neck. 'It is a lovely piece of work,' I said.
She lifted her head a little, and, too, regarded the artifact.
'The barge, too, was lovely,' I said, 'though I suppose some might have regarded it as a trifle too ornate, too prideful, too ostentatious, with purple, and the gilding, the poles, the golden cabin, with the golden mesh.'
She looked at me.
'Some, too,' said I, 'might have preferred a craft with sleeker lines, but I would personally effect nothing critical on that score. It was built for luxury and a woman's comfort, not for speed.'
Tears came to her eyes.
'Ships have different purposes and different beauties,' said. 'There are many varieties of them and each in its way is lovely, in this way they are not unlike women. Many different sorts of women bring high prices in the slave market. Too, one always buys more than meat. What all these women have in common is that they are slaves, and must serve with perfection.'
She sobbed.
'I find nothing wrong with your lines,' I said. 'To be sure, if a master wished, he might order them changed, and you might find yourself afflicted then with a sparse, strict diet and a frightening program of exercise. But similarly, if you were being examined on a mat in the Tahari you might find yourself regarded as insufficiently fleshy, and find yourself forced, under the whip, to eat rich creams and such, being thereby fattened for sale like a she-tarsk.'
She regarded me, with horror.
'Do not regret, for example,' said I, 'that your lines may not be as sleek as that of the female racing slave. I assure you that while men may bet eagerly upon her they seldom regard her, personally, as the one most worth catching. Too, the woman who is hardest to catch is not always the one most worth catching. Indeed, some of the most desirable women are the ones most easily caught, for they wish to be caught, and to serve. They may pretend a fuss at first, as they might feel is expected of them, but they are seldom in their collars more than a few Ahn before they are content and joyful.'
She looked up at me.
'But then all women belong in collars,' I said, 'for theirs is the slave sex.'
She put down her head.
'And it is only in bondage,' I said, 'that they can obtain their true fulfillment.'
She trembled.
'Doubtless the occupant of the barge,' I said, 'was a high-born woman, of wealth and station, of sophistication and refinement, used to traveling in the highest and most exalted circles in Ar, a woman perhaps even of some power.'
She lifted her head a little.
'Too, I would conjecture that the barge contained many chests and coffers, filled with expensive clothing, and jewelry, and gold. Such a woman would doubtless travel with suitable resources and appointments. It must, too, have contained delicacies of food and drink. Such things are now doubtless spread throughout the delta, a bottle for a rencers' feast here, a veil there to strain water, somewhere else a necklace clinking, wrapped several times about the ankle of a fishing rence girl.'
She looked up at me.
'The barge was that of the Lady Ina, of Ar, was it not?' I asked.
She whimpered, once.
'And as you are still a free woman,' I said, 'you are, in a sense, still that same Lady Ina, are you not, Ina?'
She whimpered, once.
'But now,' I said, 'you are a captive, kneeling, naked and bound, on a tether.'
She whimpered, once.
'It seems, thus,' I said, 'that your fortunes have changed.'
She put down her head, and whimpered once.
I then thrust the large wooden piece, carved in the likeness of the neck and head of a gant, out into the marsh. In time, perhaps a few months, it might even find its way to the Tamber, and, perhaps, in time, to the surgent green washes, the vast rolling swells, of Thassa herself, the sea.
'Come along, Ina,' I said. 'We must be on our way.'
22 Blankets
'Captor!' she said, pleased, as I strode up the sunny sand of the small bar, coming upon our camp. Immediately she knelt, spreading her knees. It was in this fashion that I had trained her to greet me. She might also await me, kneeling, or lying down. I carried two marsh grunts, caught on the other side of the bar. I put the grunts on a rock, to be cleaned and boned. She could attend to this. I snapped my fingers, and beckoned that she might approach me. She rose to her feet and approached me, backwards, as I had taught her. I gave her a slap, and put her to the sand. She squirmed delightfully, making small noises. After a moment or so I got again to my feet. She sobbed, that I was done with her so soon. 'Prepare the grunts,' I told her.
'Yes,' she said. For this purpose she would use a small, sharp stone.
A transformation had come over her in the past few days. She had begun to wish to be useful, and to serve. She now addressed herself eagerly, happily, to small domestic tasks. Sometimes she sang softly to herself, in their performance. She seemed even concerned, oddly enough, as she was not my slave, with my comfort, this evidencing itself in such small matters as preparing my bed in the sand. To be sure, she found herself often enough on her belly on the blankets. This was very different from her early days in my keeping, when she, as a typical free woman of high station had regarded herself as too good for the performance of such homely tasks, addressing herself quickly enough to them only to avoid the imposition of sanctions upon her, attendant on her condition as captive. In the past few days a world of improvement had taken place within her. She responded well to male dominance, kept now in her place in nature. Only in that place, where she belongs, can a woman be truly happy.
I watched her kneeling by the stone, working on the grunts. She might have been a rence girl, and not Ina, the lovely scion of one of Ar's oldest and finest families.
For five days, as I had promised, I had tied her during our sleep periods, when not using her, in the same fashion in which I had been kept by the men of Ar, in effect, staked out, foot and neck, supine and helpless. That had been done as a discipline, and might, of course, if I chose, be promptly reimposed as such. Lately, however, I had given her a much more merciful tie, binding her ankles together with the center of a length of binding fiber, then bringing the two ends up and, still avoiding its ends, tying her hands together before her body, then pulling her hands back, close to her belly, and fastening them there, this accomplished by bringing the two ends of the fiber back about her and knotting them there, behind her back. In this fashion, as the knots were behind her back,
