not, what might be occurring. I could utter no sound, so startled, and terrified, I was. Girls looked wildly to one another. Then there was yet another shadow, and another sound like the cracking of suddenly tightened silk, by giants, and another scream, and another body had rushed above us. By such a scream, I supposed, might one announce the march of Ubars, or claim worlds.
“That is the drover,” said a fellow.
“How many?” asked another.
“I counted twenty,” said a fellow.
“Twenty-two,” said another.
“They are ugly brutes,” said a man.
“They are beautiful,” said another.
“You may have them,” said another.
“Keep them at their distance,” laughed a man.
“Climb to their saddle,” laughed another.
“Better to sup with larls,” laughed another.
One of the men looked at me. I fear I could not but shudder.
“Tarns,” he said to me. “They kill men. Men fly them.”
I looked up, at the canopy. A leaf or two, late, dislodged, fluttered downward. They struck me on the shoulder, and fell to the side.
The men were kind to us, but there is always the lash. A slave does not forget that. She hopes to be pleasing. Here, on this world, women, at least if they were such as I, slave, found themselves in the order of nature. Here we belonged to men. Here men would have us as they wished, and do with us as they pleased.
Here, on this world, I discovered what I had long suspected on my former world, the meaning of my smaller, softer, so different body, its slightness and curves; here I found the explanation of a thousand dispositions, needs, and hopes I had been commanded to ignore or deny on my former world.
So here, on this world, men would have us as they wished, and do with us as they pleased, at least if we were slaves. I did not object; I was grateful, as I had not been on my former world; where there were true men, I knew I would be owned; where there were true men, I knew I belonged in a collar, and would be collared; I hoped only to be well-collared, and to please my master.
I thought of my former world.
How artificial, how contrived, and false now seemed that world. How hollow its lies and pretenses. How estranged from nature it was! Was nature so fearful that it must be denied, and betrayed? In whose interest was this treason? Was the biography of a world so terrible that gates must be barred against it? Were there not green fields, bracing winds, and a warm sun outside the gates? You can burn books; you cannot burn truth. Who is accountable for the tragic routes leading to misery and want, to unhappiness and deprivation? Whence the monstrous distortions which would turn an animal against itself, and teach it to suspect, repudiate, and lacerate its own being? Who spoke to their own advantage, and proclaimed as truths self-serving inventions, concealing imperatives and demands in the cloak of statements? Who was it who, so ill-constituted and envious, jealous of health and joy, so exploited the credulity of the innocent, honest, and trusting? Will most humans not believe whatever they are told, any of a thousand inconsistent, competitive fabrics, each proclaimed as the one and only truth?
I was grateful for the men, who had weapons. The forest was dark, lonely, and beautiful. It was particularly frightening at night. What can one do to defend oneself, if one is bound, and on a rope? One might as well be a tethered verr. Indeed, sometimes bound, tethered slaves are used as bait. Watches were kept, of course. Twice panthers had prowled about the camp’s periphery. Happily, most carnivores, if young, if fresh in their skills and strength, if healthy, are unlikely to attack humans, as the human is not their natural prey. They may, of course, if they are starving, or feel their territory is threatened, attack a human. In any event, the human is an unusual quarry for an animal, and is seldom its first choice for prey. If it feels threatened, intruded upon, or hunted, of course, it can be extremely dangerous. The greatest danger to a human is usually an animal which is older, or in poor health, one which is unable to, or finds it difficult to, secure its more natural prey. To be sure, there is always the unusual animal. Too, once an animal, any animal, has fed on human, it will be likely, thereafter, to include it in its prey range.