Gor - Witness Of Gor Part 43

The monster then put me back on my knees, my head down, near the ring.

A strand of hair, out of place, he brushed forward. Now again my hair was before my body.

"Her gruel is ready," said the brunette.

I did not understand why he had, a moment ago, put me to my back.

He had been, it seemed, curious about something.

"It is best," he said to me, "that you not eat first."

"Yes, Master," I said. I might not, otherwise, be able to retain the provender, even as simple and bland as it might be.

I saw, in the shadow, the whip, now once again in his hand.

"This slave," said he, to the other women in the room, "has been errant. She, in a darkness, did not reveal her condition, bond, to a free woman. She permitted the free woman, in ignorance, to speak freely to her. She permitted her not only to think that she was free, but even of a given caste."

The women at the wall looked at one another.

I suddenly realized why I had been put on my back. He had read my collar. He, then, could read. He knew my name, that which I had been given, that on my collar, which, perhaps, had been worn by many others before me! I recalled that some of the guards in the pens did not care to administer a formal whipping to a woman, as opposed to some admonitory blows now and then, until they knew her name, a.s.suming she had been given one.

Punishment on this world is often construed in a somewhat personal fas.h.i.+on, as something pa.s.sing from a particular master to a particular slave. This has a way of making it more meaningful to the slave. Too, of course, knowing the name, if the slave has one, makes it easier, particularly in a situation such as the pens, to keep track of things, to inform others, and such, for the punishment for later infractions may be considerably more severe if it seems the slave has failed to profit from her earlier discipline, and so on. I did not know my name. But he knew it.

"Why did she do that?" asked one of the women by the wall.

"Why did you do that?" asked the pit master.

"I was afraid!" I said. "I did not know better! I should have known better! I should have known better!"

"You did not think that you were the same as she," said the pit master.

"No!" I a.s.sured him.

"You understand clearly that you are only a slave, an animal, and nothing more?"

"Yes, Master!" I said.

"She is a new slave," said the pit master to the women in the room.

"Let her learn her collar!" said one of the women.

I felt the coil of the whip touch my back. I shuddered.

I was indeed a new slave. I had undoubtedly much to learn. But I did not think that I was really a stranger to the collar. I had, I was confident, as all women, an instinctive grasp of its import. I felt that I had, thus, in a sense, understood it even before it was on me. Had I not considered it in countless thoughts? Had I not worn it in a thousand dreams? To be sure, it doubtless had many meanings, rich and complex, subtle and deep, which only gradually, bit by bit, as they were revealed to me, I might come to understand, and love.

"Perhaps, Master," said the slave who had borne the torch, "as she is a new slave, and did not know better, one might, this time, omit her punishment."

There was a silence.

"Forgive me, Master!" she said, and knelt, her head to the stones, her beautiful hair upon them.

"You will know better next time, will you not?" asked the pit master.

"Yes, Master," I said.

"How many blows should you receive?" he asked.

If one suggests too few, one is almost certain to receive far more than one might otherwise receive. If one suggests too many, perhaps in the hope of receiving less, one may find that one receives precisely what one has requested. The master usually has some number in mind which seems appropriate to him.

You will never receive less than that number, but you may very well, particularly if you try to manage matters cleverly, receive far more.

"However many Master wishes," I said. It was a response I had learned in the pens. One is a slave. One does not play games with the master. All depends on him. All depends on his will.

One is a slave.

I saw the shadow of the whip lift, and I closed my eyes.

I received ten lashes.

I lay there by the ring for several minutes afterward. I was on my belly. My cheeks were wet with tears, even the stone by the ring. I hurt. I sobbed. Yet he had not been cruel with me. The blows had been sharp, but clean. They had been mercifully arranged on my body, even predictably so. Too, they had been timed. It is particularly frightening when, as a part of the punishment, one does not know where the blow will fall, or when. Too, mercifully, though he saw to it that I was well punished, he had not used his man's strength on me. Only on the tenth stroke, which, before its delivery, he informed me was the last, did he let me glimpse even a particle of the strength with which a stroke, if he so chose, might be delivered. I had screamed, so struck. Then I had not even been able to scream. I had knelt there, wide-eyed, in disbelief.

Then, an instant later, I had sunk to my belly. "Mercy, Master!" I wept. "Mercy, Master, please, mercy!"

But the beating, of course, was done, for the tenth blow was the last. But still, hysterical, I wept. "Please, do not strike me again, Master! Please, Master, do not strike me again!" I realized then what, even with so small a portion of his strength, might be done to me. I had been well punished by the first nine strokes, I a.s.sure you, but that tenth stroke told me more than the first nine. It said, in effect, "Beware, let this be the tiniest hint of what might be done to you." And so now, minutes later, I lay at the ring. I choked back tears. I had now well learned my lesson. I was only a punished slave. But the lesson I had learned extended, of course, as doubtless it was intended it should, far beyond the occasion of the moment. It had to do with more than the mere triviality of my having failed, in my confusion and fear, to make my condition clear to a free woman in the darkness. It had also informed me that I was not only subject to punishment, but, when appropriate, would be punished. This reinforced, too, my understanding of my condition, which was bond, and its obvious concomitant, that of being subject to masters, fully, in all things. Lastly, I had been taught something more of the whip. I now understood, better than I had before, what it might do to me. I now feared it, terribly. I was afraid, now, even to look upon it.

"Kneel, barbarian," said the brunette, not unkindly. I struggled to my knees, my hands bound before me, my neck still tied to the ring.

"Feed, barbarian," she said, placing a shallow bowl of gruel before me.

I put down my head, and, not using my hands, fed.

I ate, hungrily, obediently.

But, too, from time to time, head down, pausing in my feeding, from licking at the sides of the bowl, the gruel about my mouth, I trembled. Beyond the leather, I knew, even to the tiny extent that I now understood it, there were other things, things far more frightening and effective, to which I might be subjected, if it were the will of men. I moaned, and returned to my feeding. I ate eagerly, gratefully. Tears fell into the gruel. My punishment, I realized, however informative and momentous from my point of view, had doubtless been, from the point of view of the pit master, relatively light and perfunctory. My offense, it seemed, happily, had not been regarded as particularly heinous, particularly in a new slave. Indeed, I was even being permitted to feed.

"Oh!" I said, suddenly, startled. I stiffened. "Master?" I said.

My fingers twisted, startled, my hands bound before me.

"Master?" I asked.

"You may continue to feed, if you wish," he said.

"Oh!" I said. But I could not feed, of course! The rope on my collar pulled against the ring.

He moved my hair about, away from my ears. "Pierced-ear girl," he murmured.

"Oh!" I said.

His grip on me then was like iron.

"Master!" I said.

How absurd then suddenly seemed my earlier fear, when he had put me to my back! By what right might I have expected such a dignity! But how absurd even was this thought, for a slave!

Is it likely that we would be thrown on our backs for our dignity? No Slaves are not permitted dignity.

That is for free women. Rather, on our backs, if our masters desire, our subtlest nuances of expression, our helplessness, our fear, our joy, our yielding, our vulnerability, what we hope for, what we beg for, may be read! They may with their triumphant gaze ravish our helplessly bared features, surveying the myriad subtleties of our flushed countenances, taking account of our tremblings, our raptures and terrors, scrutinizing us in our misery, our ecstasy and helplessness, delighting in our tumult, we face-stripped, unveiled, before them, imprisoned in their arms, their slaves.

He made a low, growling, b.e.s.t.i.a.l noise.

Should I fight him, as I could? What would it matter, in the end? And might I not be beaten for the slightest show of resistance, unless, in its futility, he found it amusing.

I whimpered.

Could he read in me my signs of growing helplessness? I was refined, I was delicate, I was sensitive!

How could this be being done to me? But then I recalled that I was a slave.

I uttered a small, helpless cry, one of weakness, but one, too, in its way, of pet.i.tion.

Please do not desist, Master!

But, of course, he would not desist.

I rejoiced that in his heart, as in the hearts of such men, there was no mercy.

"See the slave!" cried one of the women at the wall.

And so progressed my subjugation.

"Master!" I wept.

And thusly was I humiliated, and thusly was I disgraced, and debased and degraded.

Soon I began to lose control!

"Oh!" I said. "Oh!"

His victory was at hand.

Soon I knew I would be naught but a yielded slave.

"Master!" I cried.

"Ah," said he. He was then like a lion in feeding, blood running from its jaws.

I then yielded to him my utter submission, my total surrender.

I could not help myself.

I was slave.

And thusly was I, a mere slave, again conquered.

I lay for a time at the ring.

He went to one of the small slave cages to the left and pulled it somewhat forward and to the right, until it was a bit to the left of the unoccupied kennels. He then went to the table and busied himself there, with some papers, perhaps mine The brunet slave came and crouched down beside me. She carried a wet cloth and wiped the gruel from my face and, I fear some from my hair, as well, as I had sometimes, gasping, squirming, twisting, writhing, thrust my head too low, too near the dish. "You have a good belly,"

she said. "It is a hot belly. It is an excellent belly for a slave." "Thank you, Mistress," I whispered. I had known, of course, that I could be easily aroused, and that I was unusually responsive, and, in moments, could become even helplessly so. To be sure, such reflexes, and such, are expected in a slave. She may be beaten if she is inadequate. They are even trained into her. We are not free women. Also, interestingly, as earlier suggested, s.e.xual responsiveness in the slave is openly regarded as a desirable property, like intelligence and beauty. These three things all considerably improve her price. In a slave s.e.xual vitality, uncontrollable responsiveness, then, is not regarded as a source of embarra.s.sment, scandal, or shame. Nor are s.e.xual inertness and frigidity regarded as virtues, or as concomitants thereof.

We are not free women. Similarly, and naturally enough, our vitality is not something to be hidden, except, of course, from free women. Indeed, we must accustom ourselves to hearing it candidly discussed, particularly in situations in which our sale may be in question. Too, naturally, it is one of the properties which, if we are on the auction block, we must expect to hear proclaimed to the buyers.

As earlier suggested, it is the whole slave, all of her, every bit of her, that is for sale.

It is the whole slave, all of her, every bit of her, the whole she of her, that men want, and buy.

I lay at the ring.

He had permitted me to retain no particle of dignity. To be sure, I seas not ent.i.tled to any, as I was a slave. No choice had been mine. He had had all from me. To be sure, I must yield it at so little as the snapping of fingers. I was a slave.

Would the brunette regard me with reproach? I did not meet her eyes.

She rose to her feet and went to one side.

I heard, from one side, the gentle sound of some links of chain.

Surely I must reproach myself, but I could not bring myself to do so.

It was not merely that I was a slave, and thus will-less in such matters, and that I must obey, and with perfection, and such, but rather that I felt a fulfillment, a calmness, a contentment.

I felt metal anklets, linked, being snapped about my ankles.

"The knots, Master," said the brunette.

The pit master rose from the table and undid the ropes tying my hands before my body.

Metal wristlets, linked, were snapped about my wrists. These wristlets, by a length of chain, were attached to the anklets.

The rope tying my collar to the ring was undone.

I felt a metal collar clasped about my neck, over the kajira collar.

This collar was attached to the same chain that ran from the linkage of the anklets to the linkage of the wristlets. My ankles, wrists, and neck, then, were on a common chain. I was in sink.

I knelt as the pit master checked the locks. Then he returned to his work at the table.

I looked up at the brunette.