Players of Gor (6 page)

"Is it the sleen for her, Captain?" asked he who was first of the two guardsmen, he who had just spoken.

"Dorto, Krenbar," said Samos.

"Yes, Captain," said the men. Dorto was the oarsman who had opened the former Lady Rowena of Lydius for the uses of men. Krenbar was another oarsman. He had used her twice in the evening, after putting her through intricate slave paces each time.

"Does this slave," asked Samos, "give some indication that she might eventually prove to be at least somewhat adequate in a collar?"

"Yes, Captain," said Dorto. "Yes, Captain," said Krenbar.

"Tonight, as you know, my dear," said Samos, "you danced and performed for your life."

"I beg to have been found pleasing," she said.

"Based on the evidences submitted by Dorto and Krenbar,

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and my own judgment in the matter, your performances, at least for a new slave, have been found acceptable."

I thought she might almost faint with relief.

"Accordingly, at least for the moment, you will not be thrown to sleen."

"Thank you, Master!" she said.

"You are Rowena," he said.

"Thank you, Master," she said, named. There is some security in a slave having a name. Most masters will not name a slave whom they are planning on having immediately destroyed. It would be a waste of name. To be sure, names may be put on slaves and taken off them on a master's whim.

"Though you have been spared, at least for now, do not grow complacent," said Samos.

"No, Master!" she said.

"You are now, like any other slave, you must understand, under standard, unconditional slave discipline."

"Yes, Master!" she said. She was now a slave like any other, neither more nor less.

"Take her below," said Samos to he who was first of the two guardsmen. "Mark her, left thigh, common Kajira mark. Collar her, common house collar."

"Yes, Captain," he said. In the case of the girl, Rowena, of course, as she was already a self-pronounced slave, the brand and collar were little more than identificatory formalities. Nonetheless she would wear them. They would be fixed visibly and clearly upon her. This is in accord with the prescriptions of merchant law. Too, for all practical purposes, they make escape impossible for the Gorean slave girl.

"Then bring her to my chambers," said Samos.

"Yes, Captain," said he who was first of the two guardsmen.

"Master!" protested Linda.

Samos looked at her, and she lowered her head. "Forgive me, Master," she said.

"I shall try to be pleasing, Master!" Rowena avowed, frightened.

Then the two guardsmen pulled her about and conducted her from our presence.

"She is fat," said Linda. I did not think this remark was fair on Linda's part. The slave, Rowena, was not fat. She was sweetly shapely. To be sure, by a strict regimen of diet and exercise, she would soon be brought, in a manner congenial to her basic structure, within indisputable latitudes of slave perfection.

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The Gorean slave girl is not a free woman. Accordingly she must keep herself beautiful.

"Do you not like Linda any more?" she pouted.

"Yes, I like you," he said.

"Linda can please you more than Rowena," she said.

"Perhaps," said Samos.

"I can, I will!" she said.

"Who?" asked Samos.

"Linda can, Linda will!" she said.

"To your kennel," said Samos.

"Yes, Master," she said, taking up her tunic, rising to her feet, tears in her eyes.

"Do not fret," he said. "Tomorrow night it will be you who will be chained at my slave ring."

"Thank you, Master!" she said.

"And tonight, for you have not been fully pleasing," he said, "tell the kennel master to put you in close chains."

"Yes, Master!" she laughed and, happily, dismissed, clutching her tunic, rose to her feet and scurried away. She would not spend a comfortable night, locked in the steel of close chains, but she was radiantly happy. She had been reassured of the interest of her master.

"What are you going to do with the slave Rowena?" I asked.

"She is one of a lot of one hundred," said Samos. "They are to be sold at the fair of En'Kara."

"The slave, Linda," I said, "doubtless would have been pleased to hear that."

"She will doubtless learn of it, in one way or another, sooner or later," said Samos.

"Doubtless," I said.

I rose to my feet. I was stiff from having sat for so long. I suspected Samos cared for the Earth-girl, Linda. It was no secret in Port Kar that the shapely collar-slut was first on his chain.

Samos, too, with a grunt, rose to his feet. "Ah," he said.

We looked about. The men and slaves had left the room. We were alone.

Our eyes met. I saw in his eyes that he wanted to speak to me, but he did not do so.

"Your men and boat are waiting," he said.

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He accompanied me from his holding to the small landing , with its steps, leading down to the water, outside.

I stepped down into the longboat and, shaking him by the shoulder, awakened Thurnock, the blond giant, he of the peasants. He awakened the rowers. I took my place at the tiller. One of Samos' men cast the line into the boat.

"I wish you well," said Samos.

"I wish you well," I said.

We then pushed off, thrusting against the steps with the port oars. In a moment, with unhurried strokes, we were making our way down the canal, back toward my holding. The canal was dark now. In two days, however, it would be lit with lanterns, thrust out on jutting poles from the bordering, clifflike house and strung with garlands and flags. It would then be the time of the Twelfth Passage Hand, the time of carnival.

I heard the ringing of the time bar from the arsenal. It was the Twentieth Ahn, the Gorean midnight.

I was very puzzled as to why Samos had invited me to his holding tonight. I was sure that he had wished to speak to me. But he had not, however, done so.

I dismissed these considerations from my mind. If he chose to keep his own counsel, it was not mine to inquire into his motivations.

I thought that I had played kaissa well tonight. To be sure, Samos was not an enthusiast for the game. He preferred, as I recalled, a different kaissa, one of politics and men.

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2
       
Carnival

 
"Master!" laughed she who seemed to be a naked, collared slave, flinging her arms about my neck, pressing her lips fervently, deliciously, to mine.

"Oh!" she cried, as my hands checked her thighs. She was truly a slave. The brand was on her left thigh, high, just under the hip. Sometimes free women, during the time of carnival, masquerading as slaves, run naked about the streets.

I slid my hands possessively up her body and then, between my thumbs and fingers, held her under the arms, half lifting her, half pressing her to me. I then returned her kiss. "Master!" she purred, delighted. I then turned her about and, with a good-natured, stinging slap, sped her on her way. She disappeared, laughing, among the crowds.

"Paga, mate?" inquired a mariner.

I took a swig of paga from his bota and he one from mine.

I stepped to one side, nearly trampled by a gigantic figure on stilts.

I was jostled by a fellow blowing on a horn.

There might easily have been fifteen thousand people in the great piazza, the largest in Port Kar, that before the hall of the Council of Captains. It was ringed with booths, and platforms, and stages and stalls, and booths, and platforms and stalls, too, with colorful canvas, with their eccentrically carved wood, with their fluttering flags, and signs, like standards, illuminated by lamps and torches, throngs gathered about them, and flowing between them, bedecked and studded the piazza's inner precincts.

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Here it seemed there were a thousand things for sale and a hundred shows. Sweating men, stripped to the waist, with wands tipped with cylinders of oil-drenched, flaming wool, appeared to swallow fire. Jugglers performed awesome tricks with rings, balls and sticks. Clowns tumbled; acrobats spun and leapt, and climbed, one upon the other, until, abetted by the gravity of Gor, they swayed thirty feet above the crowd. One man somersaulted on a strand of tarn wire strung between posts. Another fellow had a dancing sleen.

The lovely assistant of a magician, dressed in the robes of a free woman, but unhooded and unveiled, so probably a slave, appeared to put him in manacles. She then helped him into a sack inside a trunk. When he crouched down, lying in the trunk, she seemed to tie shut the sack over his head. She then, with great show, thrusting bolts home, seemed to close and lock the trunk. As a last touch she flung three hasps over three staples and seemed to secure the whole system with three padlocks. A fellow from the audience was invited forward to test the locks. He tried them, stoutly, and then, grudgingly, attested to the placement and solidity. He was requested to retain the keys. The lovely young woman then stepped into a nearby vertical cabinet. The crowd looked at one another. Then a drum roll, furnished by a fellow to one side, suddenly commenced and, steadily, increased in volume and intensity. At its sudden climax, followed by an instant of startling silence, the door of the vertical cabinet burst open and the magician, smiling, to cries of surprise, of awe and wonder, stepped forth, waving, his hands free, greeting the crowd. He wasted not a moment but searched out the startled fellow with the keys and began swiftly, one by one, to unlock the padlocks. In a moment, thrusting back the externally mounted security bolts, the padlocks already removed, he had the trunk open. The crowd was breathless, sensing what might, but could not, be the case. he jerked the sack inside to an upright position. I noticed that it was now secured with a capture knot, a knot of a sort commonly used in securing captives and slaves. He undid the know. Then, to another drum roll, he opened the mouth of the sack. At the climax of this drum roll, after its moment of startling silence, the figure of a beautiful, naked, hooded female, her wrists locked in slave bracelets, sprang up. The magician bowed to the crowd.

It seemed the act was done. But few coins were flung to the platform. "Wait!" cried a man. "Who is it?" asked another. "It is not the same one!" cried a fellow, triumphantly. The magician seemed distraught, in consternation. It seemed he could not wait

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to gracefully evacuate the stage. "Show her to us! Show her to us!" cried the crowd. Reluctantly, as though yielding most unwillingly, as responding only of necessity to such peremptory duress, he unbuckled the hood. Then he drew if off with a flourish. It was she! The same girl, of course! She smiled, and shook her head, throwing her lovely tresses behind her. Then, as the crowd cheered, and coins fell like rain on the platform, she, helped by the magician, stepped forth from the sack and trunk. She knelt on the platform, smiling. She wore a collar. This was easily detected now that she was neither hooded nor in the robes of a free woman. She still wore the slave bracelets, of course. I had little doubt that they were genuine, and confined her with snug and uncompromising perfection. That would be a typical Gorean touch.

I myself threw a golden tarn disk to the boards. The slave looked at it in wonder. Perhaps she had never seen one before. It would buy several women such as she. "Thank you, Kind Master!" she cried. "Thank you, Kind Sir!" called the magician, snatching it up.

"They are skillful," commented a man, standing near me.

"Yes," I granted him, and then turned away, back into the crowd.

The man who had spoken was not masked, nor was I. On the other hand, masks are common at carnival time. Many in the crowd wore them. Popular, too, at this time, it might be mentioned, are bizarre costumes. Such things, maskings, and disguisings, and dressing up, sometimes in incredible and wild fashions, are all part of the fun of carnival. Indeed, at this time, there are even parades of costumes, and prizes are awarded, in various categories, for most ingenious or best costume. Most of the dressing up, of course, is not done for the sake of winning prizes but just, so to speak, for carnival, just for the fun of it. It is something that is done at carnival time. To be sure, I suppose there are various psychological benefits, too, other than the simple fun and pleasure of it, attendant on the maskings and disguisings. They might, for example, give one an opportunity to try out new identities, to relieve boredom, to break up routines, to release tension, and so on. They also provide one with an opportunity for foolery, jokes, pranks, and horseplay. Who was that fellow, for example, who poured paga on one's head? And who, the free woman might wonder, was that fellow who gave he so sudden, so unexpected, so fierce a pinch? Indeed, perhaps she is fortunate that her very veil was not lifted up and her lips pressed by those of a stranger, or was it a stranger? And who are those

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fellows in the robes of the caste of physicians, apparently administering medicines to one another, after which they leap and roll about, seemingly in great distress? Are they physicians? It seems more likely they are sawyers or sailmakers from the arsenal. Carnival, too, with its freedom and license, is often used by both men and women as a time for the initiation of affairs, and for arrangements and assignations, the partners often not even being known to one another. In such relationships another advantage of the mask is clearly demonstrated, its provision of anonymity to the wearer, should he or she desire it.