The Totems of Abydos (32 page)

“If you bought my contract, would you free me?” she asked.

“I cannot afford your contract,” he said. This was clear, as she was a free woman. Such contracts were not cheap. Even a moderate one would cost some thousands of Commonworld credits. It was not like the openly stratified worlds, where slaves were numerous, and cheap, where even a poor man such as Brenner might, if he wished, have had three or four, particularly if they were merely hot and comely.

“Do you wish you could afford my contract?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said, “for I should then be well-to-do.”

“But if you could buy it,” she said, “would you do so?”

“Perhaps I could be convinced,” he said.

“I would do my best to convince you,” she whispered.

“Yes,” he said. “If I could afford your contract, I would buy it.”

“Let us suppose you could afford it,” she said.

“Very well,” said Brenner.

“If you bought it, would you free me?” she asked.

Brenner considered the matter. “No,” he said.

“Good,” she said, snuggling against him.

* * *

Later, Brenner, as the whim had seized him, had again back-braceleted her. This, too, if nothing else, helped to control her active, hot little hands. She was so eager, so exciting, so alive.

Then, a Commonworld hour later, after an intimacy that had taught him something of what it might be, to be a woman’s master, he had, after extinguishing the light, dozed off. Then it seemed but a moment later, though doubtless it was more, he had been awakened, by her whimpering. He became aware of her near him. He heard her pull a little, helplessly, against the bracelets which held her small wrists pinioned behind her. She was on her side, on an elbow, leaning over him. “Please,” she whispered. “Please!”

He lay there, quietly.

“Are you awake?” she whispered.

“Yes,” he said.

“Please,” she said. “Please!”

“What is it?” he asked.

“I beg your touch,” she whispered. “I beg your touch!”

Brenner smiled to himself in the darkness. He wondered if she recalled his remark to her earlier in the evening. He thought that perhaps she did not now, but might recollect it later. In any event, she had often enough earlier, in one modality or another, begged his touch.

“You beg my touch?” smiled Brenner. He saw fit to remind her, thusly, of his earlier remark. His vanity might as well be indulged, he thought.

There was a pause. He sensed her recollection, and her surprise, and perhaps her chagrin, or embarrassment.

“Yes,” she said, suddenly, softly, defiantly in the darkness. “I beg your touch!” Then her voice broke. “I beg it, desperately,” she said. Brenner wondered if it had been anything in their last intimacy which had evoked this response, which had discovered something to her, something that now made her as she was. Need and vulnerability had been manifest in her pathetic accents. How much power he now sensed he had over her.

“I think I might know now what it is, or something of what it might be, to be a slave,” she whispered.

Brenner was silent.

“I did not know it could be like this,” she said.

Brenner was silent.

“I beg your touch,” she said, “I think as might a slave whose needs are upon her!”

Brenner did not break the silence.

“Please be merciful,” she said. “Do not have me suffer. Do not leave me dangling like this!”

Brenner had heard of such things as slave need, of course. He supposed it possible that something of the sort could occur in a free woman, particularly one under contract, one at the mercy of others. Such needs in the slave, of course, are generally a function of what she is, and her entire condition. Also, cruelly, the slave is sometimes given no choice in the matter of these needs, but must submit to, and acquiesce in, their release and efflorescence, until she finds herself, as was her owner’s intent, the helpless prisoner of their implacable, frequently recurrent, profound demands. It is said that such needs, and love, are the strongest bonds to which slaves are subject, that they are stronger than bars of iron and bands of steel.

“Get on your back,” said Brenner, with which command she immediately complied. He then rose up, on one elbow. He touched her, lightly.

“Oh, yes!” she said. “Yes, please!”

He then realized how helpless she was, not merely physically, but, more importantly, psychologically.

“Please, don’t stop,” she begged.

In a few moments Brenner placed his hand over her mouth, that her cries might not carry throughout the establishment, perhaps disturbing the rest of others. How she squirmed, and bucked, and writhed! How helpless she was, so much in the grip of her reflexes, so much in the careless, merciless bondage of her femaleness! Who would have thought there could be so much vitality, so much force, so much strength and power, in so small and beautiful, so soft, so deliciously curved, a body? Beneath the palm of his sweating hand, hastily placed, pressing firmly downward, Brenner felt her lips and, beneath them, her teeth. She could not, beneath his hand, open her mouth, nor could she scarcely move. What would have been screams of ecstasy became no more than tiny sounds, no more, by his action, permitted to her. Then, later, after the subsidence of her tumult, its crisis passed, she lay back, not much moving, and whimpered, pleadingly. He removed his hand from her mouth. His palm was wet, from her mouth, and from his sweat. The side of his hand, too, was wet, as tears had streaked down her cheeks, stopped by its barrier.

She did not speak.

“You yielded,” he said.

“Yes,” she said.

“Helplessly,” he said.

“Yes,” she whispered, in the darkness.

He kissed her.

“I love being this helpless,” she said, “so much yours.”

“You speak as might a slave,” he said.

“Yes,” she said.

He rose from the bed and went to the side of the room, to the lamp. He turned it on, and up, just a little, setting the shade in such a way as to diffuse the light. He looked back upon her, on the bed, now on one elbow, turned to him, her hands held behind her, in the shadows.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“I was curious about something,” he said.

“Oh?” she said.

“Lie back,” he said.

She lay on her back, and turned her head to her left, to look at him.

“Yes,” he said. “It is true.”

“What?” she asked.

“You are beautiful enough to be a slave,” he said.

She half reared up, turning toward him, but then, as though she feared she might be guilty of some subtle infraction of discipline, lay back on the bed. She kept her head straight, her eyes facing upward, toward the ceiling.

“Yes,” he said, confirming his former assessment.

“Ohhh,” she said, softly, suddenly, moving, but continuing to look upward, “I gush—my Master.”

He went to the side of the bed, and, standing to one side, looked down upon her.

She kept her head as it had been, straight, looking up at the ceiling, not meeting his eyes.

“We will be your foes, you know,” she said, “if you do not make us your slaves.”

Brenner was silent.

“I would be your slave,” she said. “I am your slave.” Brenner then understood how much a woman can give, and that she will find nothing sufficient short of giving all, that she wills to give all, to give herself, all of herself, unstintingly, unreservedly, unquestioningly, that she can in her heart be content with nothing less than the fullness of love’s surrender. Brenner then joined her upon the bed, and very gently kissed her.

“I fear the coming of the morning,” she said.

“Be silent,” said Brenner.

“Yes,” she whispered, “—Master.”

Chapter 6

“Those are Pons, over there, in their camp,” said Rodriguez, pulling on one of the ropes, one of two attached to the mud sled, purchased through the hostel this morning, before light, their luggage now on it.

“They are small,” said Brenner.

“They are amongst the slightest, most trivial, most backward organisms in the galaxy,” said Rodriguez.

Brenner nodded. Their simplicity, and primitiveness, might make them a trove for the researches of the anthropologist. To be sure, several of the most advanced cultures, too, in their depth and complexity, promised exotic fields of study, but grants for the study of the safer ones, usually reserved, for example, for those well-fixed in credits, who could afford the appropriate disbursements, bribes, and such, or those highly placed in a field’s or party’s bureaucracy, were not available to the likes of Rodriguez and Brenner, and grants pertaining to the study of the more perilous ones often languished for want of applicants. More than one female anthropologist, for example, had vanished without trace on such a world. It was rumored that one had been found, light years away, months later, in a slave market. It was said that another anthropologist had bought her, and kept her. Anthropologists, of course, need not be concerned with simple cultures, no more than the biologist must content himself with the study of protozoa. On the other hand, Rodriguez, and others, including Brenner, found cultural protozoa, so to speak, of great interest, and, who knew, perhaps one might, if one could understand them, truly understand them, even things so simple, perhaps one might then be better equipped, in time, to essay more profitable inquiries into the nature of more complex cultural structures, into the life of, so to speak, more complex organisms. Brenner thought that the mud sled was not a bad idea, particularly now that he saw how small the Pons were. Surely they would prove unlikely porters. And he, of course, was less than enthusiastic about carrying suitcases, or even encumbering packs, through dangerous forests. It had been enough of a bother to get their goods from the depot to the hostel. To be sure, the load might have been distributed over various porters, if the Pons were willing to serve as such, but Rodriguez was not sanguine about too open a transportation of a miscellany which included valuables such as several bottles of Heimat and two radios, not to mention a forbidden weapon, the disguised Naxian rifle.

It was raining, again. It was a little after dawn.

They drew the sled across the mud, and up, onto the plank road that led to the fence, the gate, and the tower, where the operator was stationed.

The Pons had apparently seen them, for they had emerged from their tiny, tentlike shelters and were hurrying about, seemingly conversing amongstst themselves.

The fence was actually a double fence, with the field between the two sets of wires, so that rational organisms would not be likely to enter the area of the field while it was active. There were postings frequently about, as well, on both sides of the double fence, in various languages, and in one of the common signs supposedly interpretable by all, or most, visually oriented rational creatures, a circle with a jagged line within it, presumably symbolizing lightning, or the flow of some strong current. Occasionally certain organisms, scions of diverse phyla, some of them distinctly unpleasant, for example, often poisonous or carnivorous, had been found dead within the fence. That now was seldom the case. Even the Norwegian rat, as it was called, now endemic on several worlds, the origin of the name a matter of debate amongstst zoologists, manifested the rudiments of a primitive tradition, older animals, for example, warning younger animals away from substances which in the past had been found harmful.

Rodriguez and Brenner hauled the sled along the planks to the foot of the tower, only back a little from the first metal-link gate, it set at the interior perimeter of the double fence, it, too, metal-linked. The top of the gate, like that of the opposite gate, and the fence, on both sides, was strung with coiled blades of metal. Rodriguez waved upward to the operator, and lifted his papers. The matter of their passage, of course, had been arranged. Still, as a matter of course, the papers would be checked. I must not make this sound as though those of Company Station were unusually security minded. They were not. It was rather that it was thought to be important to keep track of what went through the fence, and, in particular, what went through in the nature of equipment. It could be company property. It was not difficult, for most in Company Station, to go back and forth when they wished. Company Station, for most at any rate, was not a prison. Too, it might be mentioned, Pons occasionally frequented Company Station. Horemheb, who was, of course, a Pon, as well as others, had even, upon occasion, spent some time there. Also, as I have suggested, a certain amount of trading and, presumably, a sort of primarily asymmetrical cultural exchange obtained between them and the station. Indeed, had it not been so, the arrangements for the expedition of Rodriguez and Brenner, such as it was, might have been difficult to arrange. Certain of the Pons, at least, too, it should be mentioned, it was conjectured in virtue of these cultural contacts, were conversant in the most frequently employed language at Company Station, which was, incidentally, fortunately, the tongue native both to Rodriguez and Brenner. Our friends, then, anticipated little difficulty in initially communicating with the Pons. In this fashion a great deal of time might be saved, which otherwise would be consumed in learning the language, even as a child might learn it, beginning with rudimentary ostensions, having to do with material objects, and such. It was not that they did not anticipate learning the language of the Pons. It was rather that they thought this familiarity on the part of at least some Pons with their own tongue would facilitate and expedite their efforts. Brenner looked back toward the low, gray, squat buildings of Company Station. He wanted to see something there, and he did not want to see it. The buildings seemed bleak in the rain, in the dim light. The nearest was some hundred yards back, away from the fence. He felt in his pocket, for the small package he had wrapped and placed there.