Marauders of Gor (51 page)

           
The huge chest shook. I saw it rise and fall. Its eyes turned toward me.

           
"I thought," it said, "humans were honorable."

           
"You are mistaken," I said.

           
It reached out its paw toward me. "Foe," it said. "Yes," I said. The paw gripped me, and I it. Long ago, in the Sardar, Misk, the Priest-King, had told me that Priest-Kings see little difference between Kurii and men, that they regarded them as equivalent species.

           
The lips of the Kur drew back. I saw the fangs. It was, I suppose, a frightening expression, terrifying, but I did not see it that way.

           
It was a Kur smile.

           
Then it died.

           
I rose to my feet and regarded Telima. She stood some ten feet away, her hand before her mouth.

           
"I have something for you," I told her. From my pouch I withdrew the golden armlet which had been hers. It had been that which, presented to me in Port Kar, bloodied, had lured me to the north, seeking to avenge her.

           
She placed the golden armlet on her upper left arm. "I shall return to the rence," she said.

           
"I have something else for you," I told her. "Come here.

           
She approached me. From my pouch I drew forth a leather Kur collar, with its lock, and, sewn in leather, its large, rounded ring. "What is it?" she asked, apprehensively. I took it behind her neck, and then, closing it about her throat, thrust the large, flattish bolt, snapping it, into the locking breech. The two edges of metal, bordered by the
 
leather, fitted closely together. The collar is some three inches in height. The girl must keep her chin up. "It is the collar of a Kur cow," I told her.

           
"No!" she cried. I turned her about and, taking a pair of the rude iron slave bracelets of the north, black and common, which which bond-maids are cormnonly secured locked her wrists behind her back. I then, with the bloodied Quiva, the Tuchuk saddle knife, cut her clothes from her Then, by a length of binding fiber, looped double in the ring of her collar, tied her on her knees to the toot of the Kur Then, with the knife, I knelt at the Kur's throat.

           
"Tarl! Tarl Red Hair!" I heard call. It was Ivar Forkbeard. I could see the longboat, four torches uplifted in it, men at the oars, putting in to the skerry.

           
I stood on the surface of the skerry.

           
Then I went down to meet the boat, finding my way among the rocks.

           
On the tiny rock promontory, footing the skerry, some eight or nine feet in width, I met Ivar Forkbeard, and his men With him were Gorm, Ottar and Wulfstan of Torvaldsland

           
The torches were lifted.

           
The men lifted. I lifted the head of the Kur in my right hand over my head. In my belt was thrust the spiral
 
ring of gold, taken from its arm. To my belt, too, looped twice about it, was the length of binding fiber which went to the ring on Telima's collar. She knelt to my left, a bit behind rne, on the stone. "I have here three objects," I said, "acquired on the skerry, the head of a Kur, he who was commander of the Kur army, a spiral ring of gold, taken as loot from his carcass, and a slave girl." I threw the head into the longboat. I then threw the ring after it. Then, unlooping the bindmg fiber from my belt, but leaving it looped, double, in her collar ring, with its loose ends, I crossed Telima's ankles and tied them together. Her wrists were still confined behmd her back in the rude, black bracelets of the north, with their one heavy link. I carried her, wading on the stones, to the side of the longboat. She looked at me. Then I threw her into the boat, between the feet of the oarsmen.

           
Chapter 21
                  
1 drink to the honor of Tyros

           
"Permit me to kiss you, Master," begged Leah. She snuggled against me. She was naked on the rough bench of the north. My right arm was about her, holding her to me, in my right hand, held in its grip of golden wire, was a great horn of steaming mead. The girl, in her need, pressed herself against the coarse woolen tunic of Torvaldsland. I looked down into her uplifted eyes, pleading. It was the need of a slave girl. I turned from her and drank. She sobbed. I laughed, and turned toward her. I looked into the large dark eyes, moist. About her throat she wore the north s collar of black iron, riveted. Then our lips met.

           
Mead was replenished in the drinking horn by a darkhaired bond-maid, who filled it, head down, shyly, not looking at me. She was the only one in the hall who was not stripped, though, to be sure, her kirtle, by order of her master, was high on her hips, and, over the shoulders, was split to the belly. Like any other wench, on her neck, riveted, was a simple collar of black iron. She had worn a Kur collar before, and, with hundreds of others, had been rescued from the pens. The fixing of the Kur collar, it had been decided by Svein Blue Tooth, was equivalent to the fixing of the metal collar and, in itself, was sufficient to reduce the subject to slavery, which condition deprives the subject of legal status, and rights attached thereto, such as the right
  
to stand in companionship. Accordingly, to her astonishment, Bera, who had been the companion of Svein Blue Tooth, discovered suddenly that she was only one wench
 
among others. From a line, as part of his spoils, the Blue Tooth picked her out. She had displeased him mightily in recent years. Yet was the Blue Tooth fond of the arrogant wench. It was not until he had switched her, like any other girl, that she understood that their relationship had undergone a transformation, and that she was, truly, precisely what she seemed to be, now his bond-maid. No longer would her dour presence deprive his feasts of joy. No longer would she, in her free woman's scorn, shower contempt on bondmaids, trying to make them ashamed of their beauty. She, too, now, was no more than they. She now had new tasks to which to address herself, cooking, and churning and carrying water; the improvement of her own carriage, and beauty and attractiveness; and the giving of inordinate pleasure in the furs to her master, Svein Blue Tooth, Jarl of Torvaldsland; if she did not do so, well she knew, as an imbonded wench, that others would; it was not, indeed, until her reduction to slavery that she realized, for the first time, how fine a male, how attractive and how powerful, was Svein Blue Tooth, whom she had for years taken for granted; seeing him objectively for the first time, from the perspective of a slave girl, who is nothing herself, and comparing him with other free men, she realized suddenly how mighty how splendid and magnificent he truly was. She set herself diligently to please him, in service and in pleasure, and, if he would permit it, in love. Bera went to the next man, to fill his cup with mead, from the heavy, hot tankard, gripped with cloth, which she carried. She was sweating. She was barefoot. The bond-maid was happy.

           
I drank.

           
The wench Leah again pressed herself against me. I looked down upon her. "You are a wanton slave," I said. She looked up at me, laughing. "A girl in a collar is not permitted inhibitions," she said. It was true. Slave girls must reveal their sexual nature, totally. Do they not do so, they are beaten. On Earth, Leah had been a prim girl, reserved, even haughty and formal. I had forced these truths from her. But on Gor, as with others of her ilk, such lies and
 
false dignities were not permitted her. On Gor, should the girl be so unfortunate as to fall into slavery, the total depth of her needs, her sensations, her deepest and most concealed sensualities, must expose themselves helplessly to the master, even though he may, if he choose, mock her cruelly, to her misery, for her vulnerabilities. An example will make this clear. Every woman, of glandular normality, has an occasional desire, often frightening her, to writhe lasciviously, naked, before a powerful male. Should she miserably fall to slavery the passion dance of a nude slave girl will surely be among the least of what is commanded of her. Consider then the plight of the girl. She is forced, to her shame, to do what she has, for years in the secret heart of her, yearned to do. But how helpless, how vulnerable, she is! The dance ended, she falls to the sand, or tiles. Has she pleased him? She can do no more. She looks up. Her pride is gone, like her clothing, save for brand and collar, stripped away. There are tears in her eyes. She is at his mercy. If he repudiates her, she is shamed; she has failed as a female. Probably she will be sold in disgust. But if she discovers, to her terror, that she has pleased him, and he gestures her to him, she knows that she, after such a performance, cannot be respected but can be only a slave in his arms. She has danced as a slave; she will be used as a slave. She is a slave. Leah looked up at me. I kissed her again, full on her rouged slave mouth. She kissed well, trembling. And earlier, too, she had danced well. And then, too, later, at first given no choice, then, excited, helplessly aroused, unrestrainable, abandoned, uncontrollable, had performed superbly, serving me well, in the furs. I looked down upon her. Eyes moist, she lifted her lips, eagerly, to mine. I kissed her again. I was pleased that the Forkbeard had given her to me.

           
"I would speak!" called Svein Blue Tooth, rising to his feet, lifting a horn of mead. "Outlawry," said he, "once proclaimed by the hall of Blue Tooth against the person of Ivar Forkbeard, he of Forkbeard's Landfall, is herewith, in this hall, in this place, in the name of Svein Blue Tooth, Jarl of Torvaldsland, lifted!"

           
There was a great cheer.
 

           
"Charges appertaining thereto," roared the Blue Tooth, spilling mead, "are revoked!"

           
There were more cheers among the ashes, the blackened, fallen timbers, of the Blue Tooth's razed hall, amidst which the benches and tables of the feast were set. Many were the lamps, bowls on spears, which burned, and torches, too. And brightly glowed the long fire in the hall, over which tarsk and bosk, crackling and glistening with hot fat, roasted, turned heavily on spits by eager, laughing bond-maids.

           
"Svein Blue Tooth and I," said Ivar Forkbeard, rising, spilling Hilda from his lap, "have had our differences."

           
There was much laughter. The Forkbeard had had a price on his head. The Blue Tooth had sought his life.

           
"Doubtless," said he, "it is possible we shall have them again."

           
There was again much laughter.

           
"For a man, to be great, needs great enemies, great foes." The Forkbeard then lifted his mead to Svein Blue Tooth. "You are a great man, Svein Blue Tooth," said he, "and you have been a great enemy."

           
"I shall now," said the Blue Tooth, "if it be within my power, prove to be so good a friend."

           
Then the Blue Tooth climbed to the table's top and stood there, and the Forkbeard, astonished, climbed, too, to the surface of the table. Then the men strode to one another, meeting one another and, weeping, embraced.

           
Few eyes, I think, in the ruins of that hall, under the torchlight, beneath the stars, the height of the Torvaldsberg in the distance, illuminated in the light of the three moons, were dry.

           
Svein Blue Tooth, his arms about the Forkbeard, cried out, hoarsely. "Know this, that from this day forward, Ivar Forkbeard stands among the Jarls of Torvaldsland!?'

           
We stood and cheered the fortune, the honor, that the Blue Tooth did unto the Forkbeard.

           
Ivar, no longer outlaw, now stood among the Jarls of the north.

           
Spear blades rang on shields. I stood proudly, strong in my happiness for the fortune of my friend.

           
But as the men cried out, and cheered, and the weapons clashed on shields, I looked to a place in the hall where, mounted on a great stake, was the huge, savage head of the Kur, which I had slain on the Skerry of Vars. For a man to be great, had said Ivar Forkbeard, he must need great enemies. I looked at the huge, somber, shaggy head of the Kur, mounted on its stake, some eight feet from the ground. I wondered if men, truly, knew how great their enemies were. And I wondered if men, in ways so weak, so puny, were adequate to such foes. The Kur, it seemed to me, in virtue of its distant, doubtless harsh evolution, was well fitted to be a dominant form of life. It would prove indeed to be a great foe. I wondered if man could be so great a foe, if he in his own terribleness, his ferocity, his intelligence, could match such a beast. On
 
his own worlds, in a sense, man had no natural enemies, save perhaps himself. I regarded the huge, somber head of the Kur. Now he had one, a predator, a foe. Could man be a match for such a beast? I wondered on what might be the magnitude of man.

           
"Gifts!" cried Ivar Forkbeard. His men, bearing boxes, trunks, bulging sacks, came forward. They spilled the contents of these containers before the table. It was the loot of the temple of Kassau, and the sapphires of Schendi, which had figured in the wergild imposed upon him
 
by Svein Blue Tooth in the days of his outlawry. Knee deep in the riches waded Ivar and, laughing, hurled untold wealth to those in the hall. Then his men, too, distributed the riches. Then, too, naked slave girls were ordered to the riches, to scoop up sapphires in goblets and carry them about the tables, serving them to the men, kneeling, head down, arms extended, as though they might be wine, and the warriors, iaughing, reached into the cups and seized jewels. I saw Hrolf, from the East, the giant, mysterious Torvaldslander, take one jewel from the goblet proffered him, kneeling, by a naked, collared beauty. He slipped it in his pouch, as a souvenir. Ivar Forkbeard himself came to me, and pressed into my hand a sapphire of Schendi. "Thank you," said "Ivar Forkbeard," I, too, slipped the sapphire into my pouch. To me, too, it was rich with
 
meaning.