John Norman: Marauders of Gor

When I returned to Port Kar, I must speak to Samos.

I stood long at the prow. Then, after some hours, it grew dark. With my foot I nudged Leah, at my feet. She awoke. She knelt, and kissed my feet. "Take your garment," I told her, "but do not don it. Go to the waterproof, sleenskin sleeping bag by my bench. Spread it on the deck, between the benches. Then get within it and await me."

"Yes, Master," she whispered.

I turned, in time to see her creep feet first, with a turn of her hips, into the bag. I passed Telima, chained at the mast. The chain was attached to the large, sturdy, circular ring sewn in the locked Kur collar. She did not meet my eyes. She knelt, turning her head and putting its right side to the deck. I heard the chain touch the deck. I saw her hair on the sanded boards, in the light of the three moons. I passed her.

I removed my tunic. I thrust it beneath the bench. Then, wrapping my sword belt about my scabbard, the blade within, placed the weapon, belt and scabbard within the bag, that they be protected from moisture. I then slipped into the bag. "May your slave, Leah," whispered Leah, "attempt to please her master?"

"Yes," I told her. She fell to kissing me, with the lascivious, wanton joy of the slave girl, given no choice but to reveal and liberate, and act upon, completely and with perfection, her deepest, most hidden desires, even though she might, in misery, scorn herself for possessing them.

Toward morning Leah slept, and I held her to me. I looked up at the sail, the stars over the mast.

I left the sleeping bag and drew my clothes about me, belting, too, to my side, the steel sword of Gor.

The Forkbeard was at the tiller. I went for a time to stand near him. Neither of us spoke.

I observed the sea. I looked up at the stars.

When I reached Port Kar, I would, I decided, speak to Samos.

Then, in silence, listening to the water against the hull, I considered again the stars, and the sea.