adjudges the performance of an arrogant, vain, marvelously beautiful item to be intrinsically meretricious, to be hollow, and hypocritical, even fraudulent. It may call forth moans of anguish from some men in the crowd but the connoisseur recognizes its duplicity. Yet the slave is quite beautiful. Perhaps something might be made of her, if she is taught her collar, and suitably humbled. How smug she is, to be taken from the block by so generous a bid! But at his villa she is cast a rag and put to the tending of verr or tarsk. Perhaps months later, now understanding that she is a slave, and no more, she is permitted to crawl, begging, to the foot of his couch.
Though it was late I lingered at the sales, though why I am not sure.
Toward the end of the evening, I noted that a short, widely-hipped, nicely bodied brunette was conducted to the block. I scrutinized her, from the middle tiers. I recalled her. She was one of those I had first scouted on the slave world, several weeks ago. She was not particularly beautiful, as such things go, but there was clearly a subtle attractiveness about her. I had not been fully sure of her, but my colleagues had confirmed my initial impression. She was suitable collar meat. One can see certain women, and see that they belong in a collar. She was such a woman.
I recalled her bound, well tethered, and turning her over with my foot, in the warehouse, putting her to her back. I do not think she remembered me, from the large store. Prior to my turning her she had remained in the bara position, and, as some others, had held that position when placed in it, even prior to her fastening. Such things are indicative of intelligence, and even more so, perhaps, of understanding.
Some women obey because they must, and others because they must, and wish to do so, and hope to do so, and long to do so.
The selection criteria are stringent.
And they exceed those beauties which might be captured by a mechanical painter. There are the beauties of movement and expression, subtle, evanescent, and lovely, like the movement of a brook between its banks, of grass bending in the wind, of rustling leaves. Each particle is alive and precious. And there are the beauties of the vitality of consciousness, of thought, of emotion, of need, of readiness, of hope, of desire, of latent passion.
Few are deemed worthy of a Gorean collar.
It is important that they should be suitable, of course, as one intends to sell them.
And so she came to the block.
I stayed to watch.
She was thrust forward, into the torchlight.
She seemed to me then more beautiful than I had remembered her.
Of course, it had been easy to remember that she was attractive, not at all bad looking.
But now, somehow, she seemed more so.
Had she lost some small register of weight; was her waist narrower, her figure trimmer?
Before a sale, a house tries to bring its goods to ideal block measurements, customized to the item, differing from item to item.
Beyond this, was she softer now, more lithe, more alive? Had she come now more to a sense of herself?
I decided she was beautiful. I wondered if she knew that.
I had the sense, beyond that, that she would be responsive, and, in time, needfully, helplessly, beggingly responsive.
Doubtless she did not now understand what could be done with her.
It is amusing, to do this to them.
In a tunic, barefoot, on the streets, I did not doubt but what men would turn, to look after her.
Something seemed special about her. I was not sure what it might be. Surely she was only another lovely beast, another bead on the slaver’s chain, another vendible item, one of more than a hundred already presented before us, but there seemed something special about her. Perhaps only to me. I noticed no special interest, or particular ripple of anticipation about me. We were used to excellent merchandise, of course. Plenty of it had already been before us. Much of it had sold well. Bids were now less forthcoming. Was it, I wondered, simply that she was so unusually feminine, so clearly feminine, and this so early in her bondage, despite the culture from which she was derived? Or was it, rather, simply, that she was, and was so obviously, a slave? Much that is subtle goes into these things, much which it would be difficult to articulate.
The first time I