few Ihn. She is under the control of a referee. His switch can encourage her to move, and, simultaneously, of course, mark her position. She is hooded in order that she may not determine into whose power she comes. When she is caught that game, or one of its rounds, is concluded. The victor's prize, of course, is the use of the slave.
I continued to walk about.
Two fellows were haggling over the price of a verr.
I saw a yoked slave girl, two buckets attached to the ends of the yoke. She was probably bearing water for draft tharlarion. There were some in the camp. I had smelled them.
A fellow stumbled by, drunk.
I looked after the girl. She was small, and comely. She would probably have to make several trips to water the tharlarion.
I wondered if the drunken fellow knew where his camp was. Fortunately there were no carnaria in this vicinity. It would not do to stumble into one.
Around one of the campfires there was much singing.
I heard the sound of a lash, and sobs. A girl was being disciplined. She was tied on her knees, her wrists over her head, tied to a horizontal bar between two poles. I gathered that she had been displeasing.
In a tent I heard a heated political discussion.
'Marlenus of Ar will return,' said a fellow. 'He will save us.'
'Marlenus is dead,' said another.
'Let his daughter then, Talena, take the throne,' said another.
'She is no longer his daughter,' said a fellow. 'She has been disavowed by Marlenus. She was disowned.'
'How is it then her candidacy for the throne is taken seriously in the city?' asked a man.
'I do not know,' admitted the other.
'Some speak of her as a possible Ubara,' said a man.
'Absurd,' said another.
'Many do not think so,' said a man.
'She is an arrogant and unworthy slut,' said another. 'She should be in a collar.'
'Beware, lest you speak treason,' said one of the men.
'Can it be treason to speak the truth?' inquired a fellow.
'Yes,' said the other fellow.
'Indeed,' said a man, heatedly, 'she may even know the whereabouts of Marlenus. Indeed, she, and others, may be responsible for his disappearance, or continued absence.'
'I have not heard what you said,' said a man.
'And I have not said it,' was the rejoinder.
'I think it will be Talena,' said a man, 'who will sit upon the throne of Ar.'
'How marvelous for Cos!' said a fellow. 'That is surely what they would wish, that a female should sit upon the throne of Ar.'
'Perhaps they will see to it that she does,' said a man.
'Ar is in great peril,' said a man.
'She had might between Cos and her gates,' said a fellow. 'There is nothing to fear.'
'Yes!' said another, fervently.
'We must trust in the Priest-Kings,' said another.
'Yes,' said another.
'I can remember,' said a fellow, 'when we trusted in our steel.'
I then left the vicinity of this tent.
I wondered if I could balance on the greased wineskin. I knew a fellow who, I had little doubt, could have done so, Lecchio, of the troupe of Boots Tarsk-Bit. I recalled the free female whose capture I had noted in Ar, that which had taken place in a street-level room in the Metallan district. Surely she must have know the law. The consorting of a free female with another man's slave renders her susceptible to the collar of the slave's master. The net had been cunningly arranged, that it might, when released, activated perhaps by springs or the pulling of a lever, fall and drape itself over the couch. It was clearly a device designed for such a purpose. The net and the room doubtless constituted a capture cubicle, simpler perhaps, but not unlike those in certain inns, in which a woman, lulled by the bolting on the doors, and feeling herself secure, may complete her toilet at leisure, bathing, combing her hair, perfuming herself and such, before the trap doors, dropped from beneath her, plunge her into the waiting arms of slavers. Guardsmen and magistrates, I had noted, had been in immediate attendance. She had had light brown hair and had been excellently curved. Yet I did not doubt but what her figure, even then of great interest, would be soon improved by diet and exercise, certainly before she would be put up on the block. To one side, in the half darkness, I heard the grunting of a man, and a female's gasping, and sobbing. There, to one side, in the shadows, difficult to make out, a slave girl, I could see the glint of her collar, writhed in a fellow's arms. I wondered if he owned her, or had simply caught her in the darkness. She was gasping, and squirming, and clutching at him. Her head twisted back and forth in the dirt. Her small, sweet, bared legs thrashed. Such responsiveness, of course, is not unusual in a female slave. It is a common function of the liberation of bondage. It comes with the collar, so to speak. Indeed, if a new slave does not soon exhibit profound and authentic sexual responsiveness, which matter may be checked by the examination of her body, within, say, an Ahn or so, the master's whip will soon inquire why. One blow of the whip is worth six months of coaxing. I though again of the captured free woman, she taken in the net. Doubtless, she, too, soon, given no choice, would become similarly responsive. Indeed, she, like other female slaves, would soon learn to be, and discover that she had become, perhaps to her initial dismay and horror, helplessly responsive to the touch of men, any man.
The pair thrashed in the darkness. She was pinioned, she sobbed with joy. To be sure, if one prefers an inert, or frigid, or anesthetic, so to speak, woman, one may always make do with a free female, inhibited by her status, and such. They are plentiful, dismally so. Goreans, incidentally, doubt that any female is, qua female, irremediably or ultimately frigid. It is a common observation, even on Earth, that one man's petulant and frigid wife is another man's, to be sure, a different sort of man's. passionate, begging, obedient slave.
'I yield me, Master!' wept the slave, softly.
'It is known to me,' he said.
'Yes, Master,' she said.
I heard the sound of a tabor several yards away, and the swirl of a flute, and the clapping of hands.
I went in that direction.
'Marcus,' I said, pleased, finding him in the crowd there.
'Women are dancing,' he said.
'Superb,' I said.
Behind Marcus was Phoebe, standing very straight, and very close to him, but not touching him. She was holding her lower lip between her teeth, presumably to help her keep control of herself. Also there was a little blood at the left side of her mouth. I gathered she must have dared in her need to brush hopefully or timidly against her master, or whimpered a bit more than he cared to hear. Indeed, perhaps she had even dared to importune him. Her wrists were still bound behind her. The lead on her leash looped up to Marcus' grasp.
'The camp is in a holiday mood,' I said.
'Yes,' he said.
I saw more than one fellow looking at Phoebe. She had marvelous legs and ankles, and a trim figure. She stood very straight. It was not difficult to tell now, even by glancing at her, that she was in need. One of the fellows looking her over laughed. Phoebe trembled, and bit her lip a little more.
A fellow tore off the tunic of a slave girl and thrust her out, into the circle. 'Aii!' cried men.
The female danced.
'I entered Phoebe in 'meat catch', ' said Marcus, 'but she failed to catch even a single morsel.'
'I am not surprised,' I said. 'She can hardly stand.'
'That one is pretty,' said Marcus. He referred to a redhead, thrust into the circle.
'I had thought you might have taken Phoebe to the tent by now,' I said.
'No,' said Marcus.
