John Norman - Captive of Gor

"Tonight," cried Ute, happily, "you will serve, all of you!"

The girls cried out with pleasure.

This afternoon, for the first time in weeks, the raids of Rask of Treve had been successful. Eleven girls had been brought in, and much treasure. Laughing, bloody tarnsmen, with strings of pearls thrown about their necks, and cups and goblets tied at their saddles, and their saddle packs bulging with the weight of golden tarn disks, had brought their tarns down, wings beating, to receive the greetings of the camp. Merchants brought sides of bosk, and thighs of tarsk, and wines and fruits to camp, and cheeses and breads and nuts, and flowers and candies and silks and honeys. There was much bustle and laughter about the camp, much preparation and shouting. In the women's tent, eleven girls, tomorrow to be collared, crouched in fear. Slave girls staggered under the plunder, carrying it to the tents of the warriors.

"Tonight," had cried Rask of Treve, blood on his shield, his eyes like those of laughing tarns, "we will feast!"

The men had clashed their weapons on their shields and the girls had scurried away that the feast might be prepared.

I would not serve, of course, for Ute would excuse me. She knew I was not as the other girls. In the shed, scornfully, I watched them, eagerly speaking about the evening, laughing and joking. Such might well serve men.

Then, at Ute's call, they went from the shed, happily, to receive silks and bells.

How I scorned them, such pitiful weaklings!

I remained in the shed. I would retire early. I would need rest, for I must work tomorrow.

"El-in-or, come forth!" I heard. It was Ute's voice.

I was puzzled.

I got to my feet and went outside the shed. There was a mirror there, and cosmetics and silks and bells. There were no men about. The girls were preparing themselves.

I looked at Ute.

"Remove your clothing," she said.

"No!" I cried. "No!"

I quickly, in anguish, removed the garment. There was a jangle of slave bells, wrapped in a bit of silk, as Ute threw me bells and silk.

"Please, Ute!" I wept. "No!"

The other girls looked up from their work, and laughed.

"Ute," I begged, "please, please no!"

"Make yourself pleasing, Slave," said Ute, and turned away.

I slipped on the bit of silk. I looked in the mirror and shuddered. I had been naked before men, many times, but it did not seem to me that I had been so naked as this. It was Gorean pleasure silk. Not naked, I seemed more than naked. I waited my turn before the mirror and applied the cosmetics of the Gorean slave girl. I knew well how to do this, for I had been trained.

I buckled the slave bells on my left and right ankles, and then I went to Ute. "Please, Ute," I begged.

She smiled. "You come to ask to be belled?" she asked.

I put my head down. Ute was adamant. "Yes," I said.

Ute took the other slave bells and buckled one strap, with its two small buckles, like the ankle straps, except smaller, about my left wrist, and then buckled the other strap, with its two small buckles, about my right wrist.

I was belled.

I stood about, miserably, while the other girls finished their primping. How exciting they were in their silk, their bells and cosmetics.

"You are not unattractive," said Ute to me.

I said nothing. I was miserable.

In a few minutes, Ute, who retained her work tunic, and would not serve, reviewed us, commenting here and there, and recommending small changes upon occasion. We were her girls, and she wished us to present ourselves well. She stopped before me.

"Stand prettily," she said.

Furiously, I did so.

Ute went to the chest of silks and bells and brought forth five more slave bells, which she tied with bits of scarlet ribbon to my collar.

"There is something missing," she said, standing back.

I did not respond.

She went again to the chest. The girls gasped. As I stood there two large, golden earrings were thrust through the piercings of my ears and fastened on me. There were tears in my eyes.

"And here," said Ute, "lest the ardor of the men become too strong, this!" The girls laughed. She took a white, silken ribbon and wrapped it five times about the collar, not tying it.

I had been marked white silk.

Inge and Rena laughed. "Do not laugh," smiled Ute, "for you, too, will be so marked, lest Raf and Pron, huntsmen of Treve, in a careless moment, devour my two other white-silk pretties."

The other girls laughed. I could see, to my irritation, that Inge and Rena did not much care to wear the white ribbon. I could not understand this. Did they wish to be used as helpless slaves by handsome, powerful Raf and Pron? I supposed they did, and I despised them in their weakness. Inge had been of the scribes and Rena had been free. She had been even the Lady Rena of Lydius! Now they seemed to be naught but female slaves. I was pleased that I was not such as they.

But how shamed I was, that I, Elinor Brinton, of Park Avenue, must appear before men and serve them, so clad and so belled.

Ute touched me, and the others, then, with a bit of perfume. I was in anguish. "Serve, Slaves!" laughed Ute, clapping her hands, and the girls fled to the center of the camp, where I heard the shouting of pleasure of men, welcoming them.

Ute and I stood facing one another.

"Serve, Slave," said Ute.

Angrily I, perfumed and rouged, belled and silked, turned and followed the other girls to the center of the camp, near the great tent of Rask of Treve, of scarlet canvas lined with scarlet silk, on its eight poles.

"Wine! Bring me wine!" shouted the warrior.

I, a slave girl, with a rustle of silk and slave bells, hurried to him, a master, to serve him.

Kneeling, I filled his cup.

The music of those of the caste of musicians was heady, like the wine. There was shouting and laughing, the pleasurable moaning and crying out of girls used beyond the rim of firelight.

There was much feasting, and drinking.

On the sand, before the warriors, belled, in scarlet silk, the girl, Talena, danced.

Some of them shouted, and threw bones and pieces of meat at her.

I tired to rise, but the warrior whose cup I had filled had his hand in my hair. "So, you are a liar, and a thief, and a traitress? he asked.

"Yes," I said, terrified.

He turned my head from side to side, looking at the earrings. He was drunk, and I could tell that he was aroused. "More wine," he said.

I again filled his cup.

"Your ears are pierced," he said, shaking his head, trying to clear his vision. "If it please Master," I whispered. "If it please Master."

"Wine!" cried the other man.

I tried to rise.

Talena was driven from the sand and another girl, belled, stood forth to please the men.

At the head of the feast sat the magnificent Rask of Treve, in his victory. At his side, cross-legged, sat Verna, the panther girl, who was served by we girls as might have been a warrior. How I envied her her freedom, her beauty, her pride, and even the simple opacity of the brief garment she wore. She was not clad in a bit of silk, a touch of cosmetics, a scent of perfume and the bells of a slave.

The man whom I had served wine reached clumsily for me.

"I am white silk!" I cried, shrinking back.

"Wine! cried the other man.

I tried to rise, but the man's hand was knotted in the silk. If I moved I would strip myself.

Another girl, on her knees, reaching for him, holding his head, insinuated herself between us. "I am red silk," she murmured. "Touch me! Touch me!" His hand left my silk and I darted away.

I fled to the other man and served him.

"Wine!" called Verna. I ran to her and, kneeling, filled her cup.

"Wine," said Rask of Treve, holding forth his cup.