Quarry of gor, p.15
Quarry of Gor, page 15
“Wake up, slut,” said the vat tender.
“Forgive me, Master,” I said, and extended the goblet.
I then turned about, to look again at the tables.
I heard a ripping of cloth and heard a startled cry from a paga girl. There was laughter. She rushed away from the table escaping through the beaded curtain. A fellow at a table lifted the shreds of the tunic in his fist, like some won guerdon. Perhaps she had sought to move past him, pretending to ignore him. Perhaps an expression of hers had been less than pleasing, say, insolent, pert, or insufficiently deferential.
The czehar player had stopped briefly, looking up when the girl had cried out, but now resumed his playing.
I suspected he would soon be joined by his fellows, and that one or another of the tavern dancers would, with a flash of silk and a jangle of bells, rush to the floor.
The crowd was active and convivial, but not rowdy. There was the sound of utensils, and the hum of conversation.
Euphrosyne passed me, on her way to the kitchen, with an empty tray. She smiled at me. Clearly she expected to be alcoved. She was popular. She was frequently alcoved.
I looked out across the floor at the men sitting, cross-legged, at the low tables, and the girls serving, barefoot and tunicked, in the soft light of the dangling lamps. I saw one fellow, with a string, tie the hands of a girl behind her, and gesture her to the alcove in which she was to await him while he finished his conversation, and his meal and drink.
Watching, I wondered how several of the males I had known on Earth might have reacted to what I beheld. Some, I supposed, could not even have comprehended it. They would look upon it blankly, dully, understanding nothing. It would have been too unfamiliar, too different from the privations and sterilities to which they were accustomed, which they had been taught to unquestioningly accept, celebrate, and acclaim, which they took to constitute the single face of possibility. Others might have looked upon it aghast, scandalized, shaken, sweating, disbelieving, and trembling. Would they not be the ones who hastily, in terror of recognizing even the suspicion of their own possible manhood, lift a hoping, kneeling woman to her feet and shame her, lecturing her on what she should do and be, as though they knew more than she what it was to be a woman, lecturing her on how she should celebrate self-denial and sacrifice herself to imposed, alien conventions? If she is not a woman, they need not be men, which, suitably conditioned, they fear to be. But might not others clap their hands in gladness, spring to their feet, and cry out with joy? Might this not be a world long ago lost, now refound, a world surrendered on one world but never surrendered on another? And what if one of these males from my old world, one who knew me there, should encounter me here, as I am? One, I supposed, would understand nothing, would not even recognize me. Another, I supposed, anxious and disturbed, might fling his jacket about me and, red-faced, looking down and away, lest he see me as I am, hasten me from the tavern. But, I supposed, another might say, “This is the way I saw you, even on Earth, the way I wanted you to be,” and would then put me to my knees where I belong.
“Must I have your neck marked?” inquired the vat tender, the “Vat Master.”
“No, Master,” I said, startled. “Forgive me, Master!”
The taverner’s deputy, or acting deputy, carries a small marking stick. This is commonly used for changes, additions or deletions, to advertisements and notices. These advertisements and notices may be posted outside or inside the tavern. Outside the tavern such items are large, that they may be read at a distance, and are posted on either side of the gate. Within the tavern they are smaller, and usually appear on the wall to the right, as one would enter. These items are not to be confused with the posters which may be placed on walls throughout the city or on the public boards. The allusion of the Vat Master was to a small penalty mark occasionally placed on the left side of a girl’s neck, if she has been found wanting or displeasing in some way. The mark may not be washed off until the girl, after leaving the floor, has been punished, usually with a switching.
I then rushed to carry the goblet to the table.
“Rise up,” had said the kitchen master, “and report to Ho-Tosk.”
“Yes, Master,” I had said.
I had lost no time in leaving the kitchen, climbing the stairs, and making my way to the office of the taverner, the tavern master, my master, Ho-Tosk, whose office is on the second basement level of the tavern, one level above the kitchen level, one level below the level of the main floor. Food is conveyed from the kitchen to the main floor by means of a dumb-waiter arrangement, platforms in a shaft, raised and lowered on pulleys. The two leaves of the office door were back, and so I could see into the office. Ho-Tosk, burly and bearded, was sitting behind a small work table, on which were papers. He looked up, and I knelt outside the door, my head down, my knees together.
“Enter,” he said.
I rose, advanced a few feet, and knelt again.
He returned to his work.
I had not been addressed, so I remained silent.
A few moments later, he looked up again.
“You are Zia,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“A barbarian,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“You are nicely curved,” he said, “an attractive female animal.”
“A slave is pleased, if she is found pleasing,” I said.
“You know,” he said, “that you are now, despite your origins, earlier pretentions, and background, a female animal, an owned female animal, that and only that?”
“Yes, Master,” I said. “I am a slave.”
“You have been in the kitchen for several days,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“You have been simmering?” he inquired.
“Master?” I said.
“I trust your slave fires have been ignited,” he said.
“They burn,” I whispered.
Men had done it to me. I had had no choice. But I rejoiced, that it had been done to me. I had become so helpless and vulnerable, so needful and alive.
“You are a sleek, lithe, pretty beast,” he said.
“I am pleased, if Masters are pleased,” I said.
He rose up from behind the small table. He was a large, formidable man. I saw him turn and gaze at the slave whip, hanging on its peg to the side.
I remained very still.
I could think of nothing I had done for which I might be beaten.
Still, one does not know.
To my relief, he looked away from the whip.
To my consternation, he came about the table and stood before me.
“Do you think you could be attractive to men?” he asked.
“On my former world,” I said, “I was found extremely attractive—to males.”
“Do you think you could be attractive to men?” he asked.
“A slave hopes,” I said, “that she might be found acceptable by masters.”
“Would you like to beg clothing?” he asked.
My heart leaped!
“If it is acceptable to masters,” I said, carefully.
“You may beg clothing,” he said.
“I beg clothing, Master,” I whispered, putting my head down and pressing my lips, softly, reverently, to his heavy, bootlike sandals.
“Are you entitled to clothing?” he inquired.
“No, Master,” I said.
“Why not?” he asked.
“Because I am a slave, Master,” I said.
“Do you deserve clothing?” he asked.
“No, Master,” I said, “for I am a slave.”
He then went to the side, to a cabinet, which he opened, and, from a shelf, one of several containing what appeared to be assorted, small, folded, pressed, layered cloths, withdrew one of these objects, from the middle pile, and cast it to me, against my body.
I seized it, gratefully, and held it to my bosom, shedding tears of joy. “Thank you, thank you, Master,” I breathed.
“Put it on, get up, and turn before me,” he said.
I did so.
I was grateful for this bit of cloth, but I was apprehensive, too. How men might see a girl so clad! There is little to a paga tunic.
“May I speak?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said.
“Forgive me, Master,” I said, “but is it not too short?”
“No,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“I expect to make some tarsk-bits on you,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
I was much struck by that. I recalled how, on my world, I had bartered my beauty for attention, favors, advantages, opportunities, gifts, and such. Here, on Gor, its profits, if any, would accrue not to me, but to my owner.
How well aware I was then that I was on the planet, Gor.
Here women may be women, and a slave is given no choice.
“Tonight,” he said, “you will go to the floor.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
Sensing that I was dismissed, I then rose, backed gracefully away, and, head down, turned, and went out, onto the landing.
On the landing, out of sight of the taverner’s office, there was a full-length mirror. I paused to regard myself. Part of me was shocked, terrified, and dismayed, and another part was excited, proud, and brazenly thrilled.
I saw myself.
I was collared!
I was a slave!
I was what I wanted to be.
I could now, in a collar, be what I had longed to be!
How furious would be free women, to see how a woman could be, beautiful, sexual, needful, and owned!
“I am a sleek, lithe, pretty beast, am I not?” I thought.
How faraway was my former world!
I climbed the stairs to the main level, and, looking down the corridor, past the area to the side, where most of the girls were caged, I could see the beaded curtain that led to the central area of the tavern.
That night I knew that I, with others, would part that curtain, and serve.
I hurried to the table.
I had escaped having the punishment mark put on my neck.
I knelt at the low table, at which were three men, the two who had been previously served, and the new arrival.
I knelt, my knees together, and held the goblet against my tunic. “Paga,” I said, announcing my arrival. Beyond that, I did not wish to disturb the masters. One does not place the goblet on the table, and then leave. Rather, one offers the goblet to the master, and usually in a prescribed fashion. For this to take place properly, one waits for the master to turn to one, thus signifying that he is ready to accept the goblet. Accordingly, unless told to leave the goblet, I would wait for the third man, the newcomer, to turn to me.
These three men made me uneasy.
From their nondescript garb I was not clear as to their caste. They might have belonged to any caste, or no caste. In this way they could have been anyone, or no one. Did they wish not to be identified by, or remembered by, caste? Did they seek, without apparent caste, to achieve a certain invisibility or anonymity? Then I castigated myself for my foolishness. Many Goreans, now and then, in one milieu or another, omitted caste colors, or insignia. Indeed, some Goreans wore their caste colors primarily on holidays. I could make out little from the accents of the men. There is a medley of accents in Port Kar, as was also the case in Brundisium. This sort of thing is more common in port cities than inland cities. There are, I had been told, a great many accents in Gorean. These can differ from north to south, and east to west. Along the course of a single river, such as the Vosk, Cartius, and Ua, there may be many accents. Peasantry north and south of the Vosk, I have been told, their villages divided only by the river, may have accents almost unintelligible to one another. I had learned to distinguish some major accents, such as those of Cos and Ar. Euphrosyne’s accent was Cosian. Adraste’s accent, like that of many others, despite her name, which was Cosian, was that of Ar. The conversation of the two original men at the table had, when it had taken place at all, been casual and inconsequential. They had been waiting, I supposed, for the arrival of the newcomer, the third man. I did not think these fellows had come to the tavern for paga or girls. I did not think it likely that my hands would be tied behind my back and I would be ordered to an alcove. I thought that the meeting must have been prearranged, to discuss some matter of interest or moment, doubtless business of some sort. I suspected that the two original fellows might not have previously met the third. Might the meeting have been arranged by a fourth party?
