Prize of Gor (28 page)

To be sure, how could he have hoped to make a catch when the girls were hidden by the laundry, protected by the lines, could take refuge under the racks, and such?

Ellen was now on her knees amidst the lines, her hands lifted, as though she might fend away blows.

Nelsa sped past her, laughing, and clambered to the height of the nearest undamaged rack. She went to its very height, and stood there, balanced, outlined against the sky, her hair shaken in the wind, her gown whipping about her body.

“Clumsy oaf!” she screamed after the retreating rider. “Who taught you your work? Go home and play with vulos! You have the skill of a tharlarion!”

“Come down!” called Laura.

“Down with Treve!” cried Nelsa, shaking her fist after the rider in the distance. “May her walls be razed and her wealth plundered. May her women be put in collars! May they, and her other slaves, be herded away! May her towers be burned and salt cast upon their ashes!”

The approach of the second tarn, soaring, borne on the wind, its wings still, was silent.

Nelsa, of course, did not see it, as she was facing away from it, crying out, shaking her fist at the retreating figure of the other rider, now muchly in the distance.

It was, accordingly, a simple thing, to drop the capture loop about her standing body.

She must, suddenly, her fist still in the air, angry, shouting, have become aware of it, light and soft as a whisper, dropping about her. Then the tarn was past her and the resistance of her own body to the loop caused it to tighten about her. It took her beautifully, and skillfully, at the waist. It might have snared even a man, so neatly and quickly it was slipped on its quarry, before he could thrust it from his straight, muscular, linear body, but, positioned as it was on Nelsa, a woman, nicely centered, between the flare of her hips and the swelling of her bosom, she could not even have begun to hope to elude its grasp, nor could any beautifully bodied female, no more than Ellen, for similar reasons, could slip the iron belt from her body, whose outline was visible, even now, beneath her gown. In this sense, some Goreans speculate that the bodies of women were designed for bonds. And, perhaps in some minor, contributory evolutionary sense, in addition to more obvious biological considerations, this is true, given selections and such, women with bodies unable to elude such constraints being more susceptible to capture, mating and mastering. Certainly the females of many animal species, and even of many primate species, do not have such hip structure, such fullness of bosom, and such. Regardless of the interest or value of such speculations, the truth of which would in any event be veiled in the mysteries and darkness of the past, the fact of the matter was obvious, the fact of the congeniality of such bodies to the convenience of binding and tethering, as obvious as the perfection of the bond on Nelsa, who, clutching at the air, kicking, frantic, screaming and crying out in terror, was now being drawn rapidly away from the roof, swinging, dangling, wildly, twenty feet below a speeding tarn, between the towers, hundreds of feet above the streets of the city.

“It is the strategy of the second strike,” said Laura. “The first apparently bungles his strike and then, silently, the derisive, or unwary, quarry off guard, revealing herself, thinking herself safe, the cohort approaches, and makes the actual play for the game. Nelsa, it seems, is not as clever, or wise, as she thought.”

“Look,” said Ellen, pointing away, in the direction to which the wind was blowing, that in which the tarn had flown.

“Yes,” said Laura, “the two of them, the monsters, are having their rendezvous. Now they are fleeing, together.”

The alarm bar was still ringing.

“Doubtless they will split her price,” said Laura, or perhaps they will keep her and gamble for her.”

“She was shouting about Treve,” said Ellen.

“Yes,” said Laura. “They were tarnsmen of Treve. That was their leather. It is said those of Treve know well how to handle women.”

“So, too, does any man,” said a girl, trembling.

“True,” smiled Laura.

The only men they knew, Ellen conjectured, were Gorean males.

“Sometimes I am so afraid to be a slave,” said another girl, touching her collar.

“We all are,” said Laura.

“Tonight I wager Nelsa will dance naked before a campfire,” said a girl.

“The whip dance, I hope,” said another.

Nelsa had not been popular with the other girls.

“The work-master will now want a new favorite,” said one.

“I am glad I am not blond-haired and blue-eyed,” said another.

Several of the girls turned to look at Ina, who was blond-haired and blue-eyed. She shrank back, shaking her head, negatively.

“Learn to hold firmly to the sides of the tub,” said a girl.

“Perhaps you will get a candy in your bin,” said another.

“Look out!” cried a girl.

The slaves shrank down. Some flung themselves prone to the roof.

“No!” said a girl. “That is one of ours!”

They stood up, again, amidst the laundry. Sticks from the shattered rack were strewn about.

“Some of this laundry will have to be washed again,” said one of the girls.

“Look!” said one of the other slaves.

“That is one of them!” said another.

Another tarn was streaking by, a hundred yards to the left.

The slave who had cried out clapped her hands with pleasure. “See!” she cried. “He has a free woman!”

Clutched in the talons of the tarn, fearing to struggle lest she fall, but nonetheless helplessly held, held as though gripped with iron, was a human figure, though it seemed little more now than a pathetic bundle, trailing shreds of robes and veils.

“Good for you!” cried one of the girls to the speeding tarnsman.

“Put the iron to her!” cried another.

“Collar her!” cried another.

“Teach her to kiss the whip!”

“Make her jump and squirm!” cried yet another.

“I speculate that her life is going to change,” said Laura to Ellen.

“Doubtless,” said Ellen, touching her collar, frightened.

Two tarnsmen of the city snapped by in pursuit of the fellow with the free woman. They terminated their pursuit at the city walls. Doubtless they had their orders, and there might well be other Treveans within the city.

In a few moments the alarm bar had stopped ringing.

“The raid is over,” said a girl.

“Now a pursuit will be organized,” said another.

“Wait,” said one of the girls. “There is another!”

“The clever monster!” said another.

“He waited until the bar had stopped ringing.”

“Where was he?”

“Below.”

“Help! Help!” cried the woman in the net.

“He is going to land on the roof,” said one of the girls, frightened.

“Stay back, keep away from him!” warned Laura.

The tarn came down, wings beating, hovering, and then alit on the roof. The rider leaped from the saddle, and pulled the net to the side. It contained a lovely young woman in a slave tunic and collar. She reached out, through the heavy mesh of the net. “Help me! Help me!” she cried. “Summon guardsmen!”

“He is clever,” said Laura. “Here the guardsmen may take him for a defender. If he is of Treve, he does not wear their leather.”

The tarnsman then regarded the cluster of slaves on the roof.

“We are in the presence of a free man,” said Laura. “Kneel. He may be of the city.”

The slaves knelt.

“Kneel as the slaves you are,” whispered Laura.

Knees then were spread, and widely, beneath the long gowns.

The tarnsman grinned.

“What do you think of my slave?” he called.

“I am not a slave!” cried the woman in the net.

“She is beautiful, Master,” said Laura.

“Call guardsmen!” screamed the woman in the net, holding to its mesh.

“There are no guardsmen to call,” said Laura.

“I am a free woman!” cried the prisoner of the net. “He took my clothing! He tunicked me! He put a collar on me!”

“He is clever,” said Laura to the others. “If it is thought she is a slave the pursuit will be pressed less vigorously.”

“What do you think of the legs of my slave?” inquired the tarnsman.

“They are well revealed, Master,” said Laura.

“They are lovely enough to be the legs of a slave girl, surely, Master,” said one of the slaves.

“It was not I who revealed my legs!” cried the woman in the net. “It was he who put me in this scandalous tunic. It was he who revealed them!”

The woman in the net tried to force the brief tunic she wore down further on her body. She did not have much success in this, as the tunic, perhaps by intent, was quite short.

“Save me!” demanded the woman in the net. “Get this collar off my neck!” She pulled at it, angrily, futilely. She was unsuccessful, of course, as such devices are not designed to be removed by their wearers.

One of the girls laughed, at the absurdity of the behavior of the net’s occupant.

“Whip her! Whip her!” cried the net’s occupant.

The tarnsman looked about, studying the sky.

“In a few moments the pursuit, organized, will depart, following the raiders,” said Laura. “He will then go in another direction.”

“I wish I belonged to such a master,” said one of the girls.

Laura looked at her, sharply, with interest. “Yes,” she then said, “so do I.”

“I am from Brundisium,” said the tarnsman, pleasantly. “I asked this woman to be my free companion, but she refused. Accordingly I decided I would make her my slave.”

“Excellent, Master,” said one of the girls.

“Free me! Free me! Call guardsmen!” cried the woman in the net.

“I have waited for days, for there to be a raid I could use for cover, a raid I could turn to my own advantage,” he said.

“Master is strong and clever,” said Laura.

“You are a pretty slave,” he said.

Laura spread her knees more widely, but subtly, seemingly shyly, beneath her gown. Ellen gasped. She had not seen Laura like this before, so before a man.

So, she thought, Laura is indeed a slave girl. I wonder if I would ever behave so before a man.

Surely not I!

Ellen did not think this behavior on Laura’s part was unnoticed by the stalwart figure on the roof. The tarn shifted, restlessly.

“Get me out of this sack!” demanded the free woman.

“May I present Lady Temesne?” inquired the tarnsman.

“That is a Cosian name,” said a girl. Ellen made little of that.

“Mistress,” said Laura, respectfully.

“Mistress,” said several of the girls, bowing their heads.

“Mistress,” said Ellen, bowing her head, as the others. This was the first free Gorean woman Ellen had ever encountered. She began to sense the awe with which such were to be regarded by such as she, and the deference that would be expected of her in the presence of such. To be sure, this one was in a slave tunic and collar.

“Get me out of this sack!” cried Lady Temesne.

Her accent did seem different from that of many of the other girls, Ellen thought.

The tarnsman then, to the gratification of Lady Temesne, opened the sack, and she began to crawl hurriedly from it, but her gratification was short-lived, as he took her by the hair, when her feet were still tangled in the mesh, and pressed her down on her stomach on the roof, and then knelt across her body. “What are you doing?” she cried. “Put your hands behind you,” he told her. “Now.” Weakly she put her small hands behind her. He pulled them together and, in a moment, they had been encircled with binding fiber, and were lashed together. She cried out, softly, in protest, as she was gagged. She whimpered in misery, as she was blindfolded. He then drew her from the net, crossed her ankles, bound them together, and looked down upon her. There was no denying that she was a lovely catch. He then thrust her back in the net, her knees pulled up under her chin, and tied the net shut, close about her. He then fastened the net on short ropes close to the belly of the tarn. It would then be less obvious.

He then returned to watching the sky.

“Laura,” whispered Ellen.

“Yes,” said Laura.

“He is waiting for tarnsmen to leave the city?”

“Yes,” said Laura.

“What of Nelsa?” asked Ellen.

“Do not concern yourself about her,” said Laura. “She is merely a captured slave.”

“Will they hurt her?” asked Ellen.

“I do not think so,” said Laura. “Probably no more than to occasionally remind her that she is a slave and, of course, to see to it that she is perfect in her service.”

“But the whip dance?”

“True, that will hurt her,” said Laura, “but it will teach her, too, who her masters are.”

Ellen shuddered.

“Is Treve a city?” Ellen asked.

“Yes,” said Laura. “And little love is lost between those of Treve and this city.”

“What is the name of this city?” asked Ellen.

“You do not know?”

“No.”

“Ar,” said Laura.

At that moment several flights of tarnsmen, dozens in each flight, swept overhead.

The tarnsman raised his hand, saluting the flights as they passed.

“He is magnificent!” breathed Laura, in awe. “He will well know how to keep a woman!”

He was now ready to ascend the rope ladder to the saddle, several feet above the surface of the roof. That ladder is then pulled up and tied to the saddle. There are normally two or four rings fastened at the sides of a tarnsman’s saddle, one or two on each side.

“Master!” called Laura suddenly.

He turned to look upon her.

“May I speak?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said.

“May I rise?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said.

She quickly ran to him and, as slaves gasped, she knelt before him, bending over, her head down between her arms, which were lifted, the wrists crossed.

“How dare you submit yourself as a free woman?” he asked.

“Forgive me, Master!” wept Laura, lowering herself humbly to her belly before him, and pressing her lips to his bootlike sandals. She looked up, tears in her eyes. “Perhaps Master would care to capture a worthless slave?”

The occupant of the net, tied close to the belly of the tarn, squirmed, whimpering, angrily.