Magicians of Gor

25 Magicians of GorMagicians of Gor

John Norman

Chronicles of Counter-Earth Volume 25

1
     
The Street

(pg. 7) “Surely you understand the law, my dear,” he said.

She struggled in the net, dropped from the ceiling, then held about her by

guardsmen sprung from concealment at the sides of the room.

“No!” she cried. “No!”

She was then turned about, twice in the net, on the couch so that she was

thoroughly entangled, doubly, in its toils.

“No!” she wept.

The guardsmen, four of them, held the net.

Her eyes were wild. Her fingers were in the knotted mesh. She was like a

frightened animal.

“Please,” she wept. “What do you want?”

The fellow did not then answer her, but regarded her. She was naked in the toils

of the net, and now lay on her side, her legs drawn up in it, now seemingly,

small and very vulnerable, so bared and caught, on the deep furs of the huge

couch.

“Milo!” she cried to a tall, handsome fellow to one side, “Help me!”

“But I am a slave,” pointed out Milo, donning his purple tunic.

She looked at him, wildly.

“I am sure you are familiar with the law,” said the first fellow, flanked by two

magistrates.

“No!” she cried.

The magistrates were ex offico witnesses, who could certify the circumstances of

the capture. The net was a stout one, and weighted.

“Any free women who couches with another’s slave, or readies herself to couch

with another’s slave, becomes herself a slave, and the slave of the slave’s

master. It is a clear law.”

“No! No!” she wept.

“Think of it in this fashion, if you wish,” he said. “You have given yourself to

Milo, but Milo is mine, and can own nothing, and thus you have given yourself to

me. An analogy is the coin given by a free person to a street girl, which coin,

of course, does not then belong to the girl but to her master. What is given to

the slave is given to the master.

She regarded him with horror.

(pg. 8) “I loathe you!” she cried. “Bring me my clothing!” she wept to the

guardsmen.

“When the certifications are approved, and filed, and in this case there will be

no ambiguity or difficulty about the matter, you will be mine.

“No!” she wept.

“Put her on her knees, on the couch, in the net,” he said.

This was done.

She looked wildly at Milo. There were tears in her eyes. “Will I then, as a

slave, be your woman?” she asked.

“I do not think so,” said Milo, smiling.

“The handsome, charming, suave, witty Milo,” said the fellow, “is a seduction

slave.”

“A seduction slave?” she wept.

“Yes,” he said. “He has much increased my stock of slaves.”

She tore at the net, in tears, but helpless.

“Had you, and your predecessors, not been so secretive, so much concerned to

conceal your affairs with a slave, Milo’s utility as a seduction slave would

have doubtless been much diminished by now. On the other hand, the concern for

your reputation and such, so natural in you free women, almost guarantees the

repeatability, and continued success, of these small pleasant projects.”

“Release me!” she begged.

“Some of Milo’s conquests are used in my fields, and others in my house,” he

said. “But most, and I am sure you will be one of these, are exported, sold out

of the city to begin your new life.”

“My new life?” she whispered.

“That of a female slave,” he smiled.

She struggled, futilely.

“Raise the net to her waist, and lower it to her neck,” he said, “and tie it

about her. Then put her in a gag and hood.”

“No!” she wept.

“By tonight,” he said, “you will be branded and collared.”

“No, please!” she wept.

The net was then adjusted on the female, in accordance with the fellow’s

instructions, in such a way that her legs and head were free, but her arms were

confined. It was then bound tightly in place.

The fellow then glanced at the handsome slave. “You will leave by another exit,”

he said.

“Yes, Master,” said the slave.

The free woman watched the slave withdraw. “Milo!” she whispered.

(pg. 9) “You are now kneeling on a couch,” said the fellow, “which, for a female

slave, is a great honor. You may be months into your bondage before you are

again permitted such an honor.”

“Milo!” she wept, after the slave.

The leather bit of the gag, a fixture of the hood, was then forced back between

her teeth, and tied in place.

She made a tiny noise, of protest.

The hood itself was then drawn over her head, covering it completely. It was

then fixed on her, buckled shut, beneath her chin.

“What have you seen?” said Marcus.

I stepped back from the crack in the shutters, through which I had observed the

preceding scene.

“Nothing,” I said.

We were in a street of Ar, a narrow, crowded street, in which we were much

jostled. It was in the Metellan district, south and east of the district of the

Central Cylinder. It is a shabby, but not squalid district. There are various

tenements, or insulae, there. It is the sort of place, far enough from broad

avenues of central Ar, where assignations, or triflings, might take place.

“Is Ar this crowded always?” asked Marcus, irritably.

“This street, at this time of day,” I said.

My companion was Marcus Marcellus, of the Marcelliani, formerly of Ar’s Station,

on the Vosk. We had come to Ar from the vicinity of Brundisium. He, like myself,

was of the caste of warriors. With him, clinging closely, about him, as though

she might fear losing him in the crowd, and attempting also, it seemed, not

unoften, to make herself small and conceal herself behind him, was his slave,

Phoebe, this name having been put on her, a slender exquisite, very lightly

complexioned, very dark-haired girl. She had come into his keeping in the

vicinity of Brundisium, some months ago.

“As we do have the yellow ostraka and our permits do not permit us to remain in

the city after dark,” said Marcus, “I think we should venture now to the sun

gate.”

Marcus was the sort of fellow who was concerned about such things, being

arrested, impaled, and such.

“There is plenty of time,” I assured him. Most cities have a sun gate, sometimes

several. They are called such because they are commonly opened at dawn and

closed at dusk, thus the hours of their ingress and regress being determined by

the diurnial cycle. Ar is the largest city of known Gor, larger even, I am sure,

than Turia, in the far south. She has some forty public gates, and, I suppose,

some number of restricted smaller gates, secret gates, posterns, and such. Long

ago, I had once entered (pg. 10) the city through such a passage, its exterior

access point reached by means of a putative Dar-Kosis pit, which passage, I had

recently determined, descending into the pit on ropes, was now closed. I

supposed that this might be the case with various such entrances, if they

existed, given Ar’s alarm at the announced approach of Cos. In a sense I

regretted this loss, for it had constituted a secret way in and out of the city.

Perhaps other such passages existed. I did not know.

“Let us go,” suggested Marcus.

I saw a slave girl pass, in a brief, brown tunic, her back straight, her beauty

protestingly full within her tiny, tight garment, balancing a jar on her head

with one hand. The bottom of the jar rested in a sort of improvished shallow

stand or mount, formed of a dampened, wrapped towel. In Schendi the white slave

girls of black masters are sometimes taught to carry such vessels on their heads

without the use of their hands or such devices as the towel. And woe to the girl

who drops it. Such exercises are good for a girl’s posture. To be sure, the

lower caste black women of Schendi and the interior do such things commonly. I

looked at the girl. Yes, I thought, she could be similarly trained, without

doubt. If I owned her, I thought, I might so train her. If she proved clumsy or

slow to learn she could be whipped. I did not think she would prove slow to

learn. Our eyes met, briefly, and she lowered her eyes swiftly, still keeping

her burden steady. She trembled for a moment. I think she had seen, in that

glance, that I could be her master, but then, so, too, of course, could be many

men. A slave girl is often very careful about meeting the eyes of a free man

directly, particularly a stranger. They can be cuffed or beaten for such

insolence. The collar looked well on her, gleaming, close-fitting, locked. She

was barefoot. Her brief garment was all she wore. It would have no nether

closure. Thusly on Gor are female slaves commonly garbed. She hurried on.

“Let us be on our way,” said Marcus. Phoebe clung close to him, her tiny fingers

on his sleeve.

“In a moment,” I said.

“I do not like such crowds,” said Marcus.

We were buffeted about a bit.

“There is a date on the permits,” Marcus reminded me, “and they will be checking

at the gate to see who has left the city and who has not.”

“I think they will be coming out in a moment or two,” I said, “there at that

door.”

“Who?” he asked.

“There,” I said.

(pg. 11) I saw the fellow who had been in the room emerge through the door. He

was followed by the two magistrates, who had probably now made the entries in

their records. They were followed by four guardsmen, in single file. “Make way,

make way!” said the fellow from the room, and the crowds parted a little, to let

them pass. The third of the three guardsmen carried a burden on his right

shoulder. It was a naked woman whose upper body was thoroughly and tightly

wrapped in several turns of a heavy net, tied closely about her. Her head was

covered with a buckled hood. She squirmed a little, helplessly. She was being

carried with her head to the rear, as a slave is carried.

“So that is what you were watching,” said Marcus, “a caught slave.”

“In a sense,” I said.

About at the same time, coming toward us, down the street, following the other

party by several yards, was a large, graceful fellow, blond and curly-haired,

who was astonishingly handsome, almost unbelievably so. On his left wrist,

locked, there was a silver slave bracelet. His tunic was of a silken purple. He

had golden sandals.

“Who is that?” I asked a fellow in white and gold, the colors of the merchants,

when the handsome fellow had passed. Such a one, I assumed, might be generally

known. He was no ordinary fellow.

“He is the actor, Milo,” said the man.

“He is a slave,” I said.

“Owned by Appanius, the agriculturalist, impresario and slaver,” said the

fellow, “who rents him to the managements of various theaters.

“A handsome fellow,” I said.

“The handsomest man in all Ar,” said the merchant. “Free women swoon at his

feet.”

“And what of slaves?” asked Marcus, irritably, scowling at Phoebe.

“I swoon at your feet, Master,” she smiled, putting down her head.

“You may kneel and clean them with your tongue,” said Marcus, angrily.

“Yes, Master,” she said, and fell to her knees, putting down her head.

“The appearance of Milo in a drama assures its success,” said the merchant.

“He is popular,” I said.

“Particularly with the women,” he said.

“I can understand that,” I said.

(pg. 12) “Some men do not even care for him,” said the merchant, and I gathered

he might be one of them.

“I can understand that,” I said. I was not certain that I was enthusiastic about

Milo either. Perhaps it was merely that I suspected that Milo might be even more

handsome than I.

“I wish you well,” said the merchant.

“Perhaps Milo serves, too, in capacities other than that of as actor,” I said.

“What did you have in mind?” asked the merchant.

“Nothing,” I said.

“It is Milo,” whispered one free woman to another. They were together, veiled.

“Let us hurry after him, to catch a glimpse of him,” said one of them.

“Do not be shameless!” chided the first.

“We are veiled,” the second reminded her.

“Let us hurry,” urged the first then, and the two pressed forward, through the

crowd, after the purple-clad figure.

“Fellows as handsome as he,” complained the merchant, “should be forced to go

veiled in public.”

“Perhaps,” I granted him. Free women in most of the high cities of Gor,

particularly those of higher caste, go veiled in public. Also they commonly wear

the robes of concealment which cover them, in effect, from head to toe. Even

gloves are often worn. There are many reasons for this, having to do with

modesty, security, and such. Slave girls, on the other hand, are commonly

scandalously clad, if clad at all. Typically their garments, if they are

permitted them, are designed to leave little of their beauty to the imagination.

Rather they are designed to call attention to it, and so reveal and display it,

sometimes even brazenly, in all its marvelousness. Goreans are not ashamed of

the luscious richness, the excitingness, the sensuousness, the femininity, the

beauty of their slaves. Rather they prize it, treasure it and celebrate it. To

be sure, it must be admitted that the slave girl is only an animal, and is under