Slave Girl of Gor (4 page)

In that instant the bearded man, crying out savagely, rushed upon him, his spear raised.

Before I could respond in horror or my body move the stranger had reacted, rolling to the side and, in an instant, regaining his feet, assuming an on-guard position. As my cry of misery escaped my lips the thrust of the bearded man's spear had passed to the left of the stranger's helmet. The stranger had not remained at the vicinity of the shield with its penetrating spear, but had abandoned it. For the first time now the stranger did not seem pleased. The bearded man's spear had thrust into the grass. Its head and a foot of its shaft had been driven into the turf. He faced the stranger now, sword drawn. The instant he had missed the thrust he had left the weapon, spinning and unsheathing his sword. The bearded man was white-faced. But the stranger had not rushed upon him. He waited, in the on-guard position. He gestured with his blade, indicating that now they might do battle.

With a cry of rage the bearded man rushed upon him, thrusting with his shield, his sword flat and low. The stranger was not there. Twice more the bearded man charged, and each time the stranger seemed not to be at the point of in-tended impact. The fourth time the stranger was behind him and on his left. The stranger's sword was at his left armpit. The bearded man stood very still, white-faced. The stranger's sword moved. The stranger stepped back. The bearded man's shield slipped from his arm. The straps which had held the shield to his upper arm had been severed. The shield fell on its edge to the grass, and then tipped and rocked, then was still, large, rounded, concave inner surface tilted, facing the sky. I could see the severed straps.

The two men faced one another.

Then did they engage.

I then realized, as I had not before, the skill of the stranger. Earlier he had matched himself, for a time, evenly with the first opponent. In a swift, though measured fashion, he had exercised himself, sharply and well, respecting his foe, not permitting the foe to understand his full power with the blade, the devastating and subtle skill which now seemed to lend terrible flight to the rapid steel. I saw the wounded man, now on an elbow, watching, with horror. He had not even been slain. Lying in the bloodied grass, he realized he had been permitted to live. It was with humiliating skill that the stranger toyed with the stumbling, white-faced bearded man, he who had, minutes before, been preparing to cut my throat. Bound, kneeling in the circle, it was with sudden, frightening elation that I realized the stranger was the master of the other two. Four times was he within the other's guard, his blade at breast or throat, and did not finish him. He moved the bearded man into a position where his fallen, discarded shield lay behind him. With a cry he forced back the bearded man, who fell, stumbling in the shield, backward, and then lay on the grass before the stranger, the stranger's blade at his throat. The stranger, in contempt, then stepped back. The bearded man scrambled to his feet. The stranger stood back, in the on-guard position.

The bearded man took his blade and hurled it into the grass. It sank to the hilt.

He stood regarding the stranger.

The stranger slipped his own blade back in the sheath. The bearded man loosened his dagger belt, dropping the belt and weapon to the grass. Then he walked, slowly, to his fellow, and similarly removed his dagger belt. The man held his bloodied tunic to his wound, to stanch the flow of blood. The bearded man lifted the other man to his feet, and, together, the bearded man supporting the other, they left the field.

The stranger stood watching them go. He watched them until, they disappeared in the distance.

He removed his spear from the shield which it had penetrated. He thrust it, upright, butt down, in the turf. It was like a standard. He sat his shield by it.

Then he turned to face me.

I knelt within the wide circle, torn by the blade of a spear in the turf. I was naked. I was bound helplessly. It was an alien world.

He began to approach me, slowly. I was terrified.

Then he stood before me.

Never had I been so frightened. We were alone, absolutely.

He looked at me. I thrust my head to the grass at his feet. He stood there, not moving. I was terribly conscious, helpless, of his presence. I waited for him to speak, to say something to me. He must understand my terror! Was it not visible in my bound body, my complete vulnerability? I waited for him to speak some gentle word, something kindly, something to reassure me, a thoughtful, soft word to allay my fears. I trembled. He said nothing.

I did not dare raise my head. Why did he not speak to me? Any gentleman, surely, by now, speaking reassuring, soothing words, averting his eyes from my beauty, would have hastened to release me from my predicament.

He removed his helmet. He put it to one side, in the grass.

I felt his hand in my hair, not cruelly, but casually and firmly, as one might fasten one's hand in the mane of a horse. Then I felt my head drawn up and back, and back, until, his right hand on my knee, his left hand in my hair, I knelt bent backward, my head on the ground, my back bent painfully, my eyes looking up, frightened, at the sky. He then examined the bow of my beauty. I am quite vain of my beauty. Then he threw me on my side and stretched me out, to examine its linear aspect. I lay. on my right side. He walked about me, and looked at me. He kicked my toes straight, that the line of my body would be more extended. He crouched beside me, then. I felt his hand on my neck. He rubbed his thumb in a scrape the collar had made on my throat when I had foolishly struggled, earlier. It smarted. But the scrape was not deep. He felt my upper arm, and forearm, and my fingers, moving them. He moved his hands on my body,, firmly, following its curvatures. He put one hand on my back and another on my side and, for a few moments, holding me thus, felt my breathing. He felt my thigh, and flexed my legs, noting the change in the curve of the calf. It did not seem what a gentleman would do. Never before had a man handled and touched me as he did; no man on Earth, I felt sure, would have so dared to touch a woman. I felt examined as an animal. At one point, turning my head, thrusting two fingers of his left hand and two fingers of his right hand into my mouth, he pulled my mouth widely, examining my teeth. I have excellent teeth, white and small and straight. I had had two cavities, which had been filled. He paid them little attention. He had seen, as I later learned, women from Earth before. Such tiny things can be used to determine Earth origin. Goreans seldom have cavities. I am not certain what the reasons for this are. In part it is doubtless a matter of a plainer, simpler diet, containing less sugar; in part, I suspect, the culture, too, may have a role to play, as it is a culture in which undue chemical stress, through guilt and worry, is not placed on the system either in the prepubertal or pubertal years. Gorean youth, like the youth of Earth, encounter their difficulties in growing up but the culture, or cultures, have not seen fit to implicitly condition them into regarding the inevitable effects of maturation as either suspect, deplorable or insidious. He then threw me to my other side, and subjected my helpless beauty, on its right, to a similar examination.

I was horrified at the boldness, the frankness, with which he handled me.

Did he think I was an animal! Did he think I was only property?

Then he threw me on my stomach at his feet, and I lay there. My wrists were crossed and bound behind me in slender, braided leather. My ankles, too, were crossed and bound in that simple, secure fastening. I felt the grass under my body; I felt it brush my left side, as the wind moved it. I kept my toes pointed.

He regarded me for some time.

How beautiful I must look to him, I thought. And I had sensed his incredible maleness, the animal maleness of him, so different from the thwarted, crippled sexuality so commended and tragically endemic among the males of Earth. For the first time in my life I felt I understood what might be the meaning of the expression 'male,' and, as I lay before him, too, dimly, it frightening me, what might be the meaning of the expression 'female.' How beautiful I thought I must look to him, lying bound, totally vulnerable, helpless at his feet. How such a sight must stir the splendor of his manhood, to see the female, his, caught, helpless at his feet, his to do with, in lust and pleasure, and joy, as he pleased, helpless to escape him, free for him to work his will upon her!

I felt him turn me. I must resist him! He is a beast! I was sitting now, my face turned to one side, trying to push back, but his left arm, behind my back, held me. I found it futile to struggle. With his right hand he turned my face to face him. He regarded the delicate lineaments of my face. His thumb was at the right side of my jaw, his fingers at the left. I could not move my head. He was darkly complexioned. His face, in a broad, coarse way, was brutally handsome. His eyes were very dark, his hair dark, shaggy, long.

He said something to me. I felt his breath on my face. I trembled. I stammered. "Please, please," I said, "I do not speak. your language. Please untie me."

He said something again.

"I cannot understand you," I said. "Please untie me."

He stood, and lifted me, by the arms, to my feet. He looked down into my eyes. My head came only to his chest; the width of my body seemed but half the width of that mighty, scarlet-clad chest. His hands were very tight on my arms. My ankles fastened, crossed and bound, I would have fallen had he released me; I could not stand by myself. He said something again, a question. "I cannot understand you," I said. He gave me a sudden shake. I felt my head would leave my body. He repeated his question. "I cannot understand you!" I wept. He shook me again, angrily, but not cruelly. Then he released me. Bound as I was I could do nothing but fall before him, on my knees. I looked up. Never had I felt such strength.

He crouched down before me. He looked at me intently. Once more he spoke to me. I shook my head, miserably. I looked up at him. "I will learn any language you want," I blurted, weeping, "but I cannot, now, speak your tongue."

He seemed satisfied, or resigned, after this outburst, that there was little to be gained in attempting to communicate with me. We could not speak to one another. He rose to his feet and looked about himself. He was not pleased. He was not looking at me. I shrugged, a bit angrily. He could not see me. It was not my fault I could not speak to him! But then, as he looked about the field, and the rock, I, in that large, rude circle torn in the turf, put my head down, alone, miserable. I was small in the grass, alone. I knelt helpless, an ignorant barbarian girl, naked and bound, who could not even speak to her captor, on a strange world.

In time, after scouting the terrain of the rock, perhaps searching for clues to my meaning or identity, the tall man in scarlet returned to face me.

It was late afternoon.

I looked up at him, and trembled.

He took me by the hair and threw me to my belly in the grass at his feet. I lay there, helpless.

I heard the sword slip free from his sheath.

"Don't kill me!" I wept. "Please do not kill me!"

I lay there, terrified. I felt the sword, with an easy movement, as though meeting no resistance, sever the binding on my ankles.

He then left me. He fetched the pouch and bota which he had carried, and slung them both, this time, at his belt. He picked up his helmet. He went to the spear thrust in the turf, upright, blade to the sky, and the concave shield at its foot. He slung the shield and helmet over the butt of the spear, suspending them behind his left shoulder, his left arm over and resting on the shaft of the spear, steadying it in place. Then, without looking at me, he left the field.

I watched him go. I struggled to my feet, my hands still bound tightly behind me. I looked about at the field, at the signs of battle, the discarded shields, one deeply punctured and cut, the scattered weapons. I looked at the great rock to which, by the neck, I had been fastened with a heavy chain. I stood in the circle torn in the turf. The wind blew the grass, my hair. The sky was darker now. I gasped. Low on the horizon I saw, rising, three moons. The man was distant now. "Don't leave me," I cried. "Don't leave me here alone!"

I fled from the circle torn in the turf, running after him. "Please stop!" I cried. "Wait! Please, wait!"

Gasping for breath I fled after him, stumbling, sometimes falling. "Please, wait!" I cried.

Once he turned to see me running after him. I stopped, panting. I stood in the grass, some two hundred yards from him. Then he turned again, and continued on his way. Miserable, stumbling, I began running again. He turned again when I was some twenty yards from him. Again I stopped. Under his gaze, for no reason I clearly understood, I put my head down. He again continued on his way and I again followed him. In a moment or two I had caught up with him, and lagged behind, some ten feet. He stopped, and turned. I stopped, and put my head down. He continued on his way again, and again I followed. Then again, after a few minutes, he stopped. I stopped, too, my head down. This time he approached me, and stood about a yard from me. I stood extremely straight, with my head down. I was terribly conscious of his nearness, my nudity, his eyes upon me. Though I was female of Earth I had some dim inkling of the tumult of joy and pleasure which the sight of a female body could wreak m a man. And I knew that I was very beautiful. He put his fingers and thumb under my chin and lifted my head. I saw his eyes, and looked quickly away, not daring to meet them. To my horror, I wanted him to find me pleasing-and as a female. He regarded me for a minute or two, and then, from his shoulder, unslung the shield, and helmet, from his spear. From his belt he took the pouch and bota. He slung them about my neck. Then, adjusting the straps, he fastened the shield at my back. I staggered under its weight. Then, carrying the helmet by its straps in his left hand and the spear, lightly, in his right, he turned and began to stride again through the grass. Staggering under the weight of the shield, the pouch and bota about my neck, I followed him. Once he turned and, with the spear, indicated the position and distance at which I should follow. These things vary, I learned, from city to city, and depend, also, on such matters as context and conditions. In a market, in the crowding and jostling, for instance, a girl may follow so closely she pressed against the back of his left shoulder. Girls seldom follow behind and on the right. If she is thusly placed it is commonly a sign she is in disfavor. If more than one girl is involved, she who follows most closely on the left is generally taken to be in highest favor; girls compete for this position. In an open area, such as the fields in which we trekked, the girl is placed usually some five or ten feet behind, and on the left. If he must move suddenly she will not, thusly, constitute an impediment to his action.