laundered, I worked in the kitchens, I carried water, I ran errands, I cleaned huts. I was waiting, each day, hoping to be sent to the edge of the camp, toward the wands, that I might search for roots, pick berries, or gather firewood. I, like the others given such tasks, would not be supervised. I did not understand why this was. They seem to think we will all return to our chains. Are we all so docile, so eager, so enamored of our collars? They did not know me. I was different! I was of Earth! On the day of such an assignment, which would surely be soon, I would seize my opportunity. I would escape. I would never be caught! Why, I wondered, is it said that there is no escape for the Gorean slave girl? Except at night, when we are often chained, it seems escape would be quite easy. If escape is so easy, why do so few girls attempt it? Is it because we know ourselves slaves, and rightfully so?
I looked up at him, as a meaningless slave to her adored master.
No longer did I think of escape. All such thoughts fled from me. I loved him! I wanted only to be his! I wanted to love and serve him! I wanted to be only his helpless, loving slave!
He was here!
He must want me. Was I not his?
It was he who had brought me to this, to the bondage which I had feared, and for which I had longed, a bondage in which I must serve, a bondage in which I would know myself owned, a bondage in which I would be a mere property of my master, a bondage in which I would find my fulfillment as a woman, and a slave.
I was at his feet, the feet of my master!
He had followed me, even from Brundisium, so far, to this strange, remote, and wild place, to seek me for his collar!
I was his!
I looked up at him. My lips trembled. I wanted to speak, but dared not do so.
Surely he could see the hope, the surrender, the love, in my eyes. I forced myself to hold my hands down on my thighs, that I not lift them piteously to him. I did not wish to be cuffed. But I found them turned, inadvertently, so that their palms were uppermost, their small, soft, sensitive, vulnerable expanses of tissue exposed to him.
I am yours, I thought. Buy me, own me, I thought.
He smiled, but it was a smile of contempt. He then turned away. I remained as I was, kneeling on the rough boards of the dock.
I do not even think he recognized me. My small frame was shaken with fury. I looked after him, moving away, as though nothing had happened. Indeed, from his point of view, nothing had happened. He had merely had a brief encounter with a meaningless slave.
He had not recalled me. I was nothing to him!
Tears ran down my cheeks. On my thighs I clenched my fists. I wanted to scream with helplessness, futility, and rage.
Well then did I understand that I was marked, tunicked, and collared.
How I hated him, and all men, the masterful beasts who would take us in hand, own us, and do with us as they pleased!
I stared after him, angrily, the callous brute, so tall and strong, with that easy, unhurried walk, the proud, high gaze before which men might take pause, the broad back, the narrow waist, the sturdy legs, that indifferent, cruel, magnificent larl of a man, to whom my feelings were nothing.
I did not even know his name.
Buy me, buy me, Master, I thought.
No, no, no, I thought.
I hate him, I hate him!
All my pride of Earth welled up within me. How horrifying that I should be here, on a remote world, a marked, half-naked, collared slave!
How incomprehensible and lamentable was my fate!
I looked after him, enraged, and hated him!
It was he who had brought me to this, to the indelible marking of my body, to the shame and degradation of a collar, to the revelatory scandal of a tunic, he who had brought it about that I was now an animal, that I was now goods and merchandise, that I might now be given away, or bought and sold. How miserable I was, there, kneeling alone on the boards! How I hated him! And all men! Why could they not be like the men of Earth, sweet, understanding, sensitive, weak, confused,