“You are no longer permitted to be ashamed of your body,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“It is acceptable,” he said.
“Thank you, Master,” I said.
“It has been seen fit to be collared,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“So be proud,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Besides,” he said, “it is no longer your business.”
“Master?” I asked.
“It is no longer yours,” he said. “It belongs to your master. You must display it as your masters will have it, beautifully, shamelessly, brazenly, proudly, excitingly, vulnerably.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“And even if in the presence of free women,” he said, “though it means the lash.”
“Yes Master,” I wept.
“Show them what it is to be a woman,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
He then, to my relief, stepped back.
But he continued then, and was joined by two others, to regard me. I kept my head up, my eyes straight ahead.
“A pretty beast,” he said.
Yes, I thought, I am a beast, but, perhaps, a pretty one.
“As the others,” said another.
“That is why they are here,” said the other.
How they looked upon me!
How owned I felt then!
How owned I was!
I knew myself an animal, an owned animal.
That night, in the camp, bound, and on the rope, I squirmed in the leaves. I wept. My body flamed, each inch of it.
“Be still,” said a coffle sister.
“She wants a master,” said another.
“So do we all,” said another.
“Are we to be sold, or distributed, in Tarncamp?” asked another.
“What does it matter?” whispered another.
I could see two of the three moons through the foliage above. A few yards away a guard was crouching, bracing himself on a spear. There was another elsewhere, somewhere. One could see occasional clouds drifting past, solitary, lonely, unhurried, above, in the night.
I recalled an incident, from my former world, which had occurred in an unlikely venue, the aisle of a large, crowded emporium, when I had been seen, and looked upon, and looked upon, though I was fully clothed, as a slave might be looked upon. Had that gaze not, as though mighty hands, parted and torn away my clothing, revealing, as though for a master’s consideration, what had impermissibly dared to conceal itself within? I had sensed myself more than regarded; I had sensed myself considered, appraised.
How strange how a single moment, a chance encounter, can alter a consciousness and transform a life, reordering an existence and its meaning. Even then, I supposed, somewhere, there reposed an iron by which my thigh would be marked, chains which might encircle my limbs, collars which might enclasp my throat. Was there not, even then, a large, heavy, towering block waiting, somewhere, whose sawdust my bare feet might tread, from which I might be vended?
I stirred, bound.
I recalled how I had lain at his feet, supine, stripped and tied, hand and foot, looking up at him, in something like a warehouse.
I had seen him but once more, through the bars of an exposition cage, prior to my sale, in a place called Brundisium.
I had no doubt it was he who had brought me to Gor, to bondage, and the sales block. I supposed I should have hated him, but instead I knew, rather, I wanted his collar.
Surely he had seen me as a slave.
Would that he had seen me as his slave!
He had summoned me to the bars of the exposition cage, and looked upon me, but had then dismissed me, casually, as the slave I was.
That night I had been sold.
I had not seen him since.
I would never see him again.
One of the girls had said I wanted a master. That was doubtless true. What slave does not long for her master? And what man does not long for his slave?
I had begun to sense, frequently now, stirrings in my belly, discomforts which I feared might grow intolerable and insupportable. How fearful, I suspected, are the needs of a female slave, and how helpless she is in their grasp. Surely I must resist the growing of slave fires within me! How merciless are the men to us! And how amused they are at what they have done to us. Was it not better to be a free woman of ice, refined and composed, at ease with her body, untroubled, inert, and serene?