Smugglers of Gor

Chapter Six



There are a thousand roads.

Why does one take one road, and not another? Sometimes curiosity, sometimes adventure, sometimes because it is a new road, on no familiar map. And yet, truly, one does not know, really, where even the most familiar and prosaic road may lead. Are there not a hundred roads leading to Ar, at the end of which Ar is not found? In the distance there is the stirring of fog, into which the road leads. Do not all roads lead into the fog? When the wind rises and the fog dissipates, one is not unoften surprised at the country within which one finds oneself.

My purse was heavy enough, early, at any rate. Why did its weight not content me?

The venture had been productive. Each capsule had been filled. Why did I not book passage for Daphne, where the spring rendezvous was to take place? The gray sky ship does not linger long, even in that remote place. Whence came the craftsmen, I wondered, who might have fashioned such a ship. It was said there were islands in the night, even beyond the moons.

I thought of another world, wondering why fools would hasten its ruin, scorning and defiling it, contaminating its soil and darkening its skies, polluting its seas and poisoning its air, felling its forests and gouging its surface. Do they hate it so? If not, why do they neglect and injure it? Have they another world at hand, a secret one, better and more convenient? Would they not insult and despoil it, as well? What is so terrible about trees and grass, white clouds and blue skies? Perhaps they do not care for such things. Perhaps they want a world such as they have made theirs, one crowded and smoky, odorous, and filthy. Perhaps they desire such a world, and deserve it.

It is good to be again on Gor.

The sky ships pay well.

Too, we are often given our pick of the stock.

It is not unusual for a fellow to reserve to himself a particular item, usually on a temporary basis, usually one he may have found arrogant or annoying, that he may have the pleasure of introducing her to the collar. A few days later, she, now well apprised of her bondage, may be led, back-braceleted, hooded, and leashed, sobbing, begging to be kept, to the market. I was thinking of reserving to myself, temporarily, one who had been meticulously, expensively, overbearingly, and pretentiously dressed, as is sometimes the case with slave stock, who had presented herself as aloof, superior, haughty, and frigid, but I did not do so. They are quick enough, at one’s feet, incidentally, to beg a strip of cloth, a rag. I was actually puzzled about her, for when I had initially noticed her she had been quite different, modestly and tastefully garbed, given the season, in a simple sweater, blouse, and skirt, diffident and needful, muchly aware of her sex and perhaps slightly fearing it, aware of how she might appear to men, as a woman suitable to be appropriated, exquisitely female, clearly waiting and ready. Our eyes had met, and it had not been difficult to see her, standing there, startled and apprehensive, as the slave she was, though not yet in the encircling band, locked on her throat. I had half expected her to kneel, and bow her head.

She was not strikingly, even startlingly, beautiful, like many of the women we bring to Gor, but there was something, at least to me, arresting about her. Certainly my colleagues had agreed. She was, in her way, an excellent choice for a Gorean block.

I recalled her.

She was the sort of woman whom it is difficult to think of, save as barefoot, in a slave tunic.

Clearly, some women belong in such, a particularly revealing tunic, which makes it clear to the occupant and the observer, casual or otherwise, precisely what she is, and only is.

I wanted to get her out of my mind.

Why then did I occasionally visit the capsule chamber, and regard her, in her capsule, naked and sedated, the identificatory steel anklet, inscribed with its legend, locked on her left ankle? It is commonly removed before they are revived. Two hoses enter the capsule, one at the head, one at the feet, the first to supply oxygen, the second to withdraw carbon dioxide.

I often, to my annoyance, thought of her. I tried to dismiss her from my mind, but it was not easy to do.

Surely she was not that beautiful.

Or was she?

I remembered her.

Why her?

There are so many, and one puts the lash to them, as needed. It would be the same with her, if she dared to be displeasing. She had doubtless felt it in her training. Thereafter they are muchly concerned to please.

Paga was of little assistance, or the belled sluts of the taverns. The turning wheels and the cards, the dice tumbling on the felt, were of little assistance, save in lightening my purse.

I did attend her sale. She did not do well on the block, as a whole. It was clearly her first sale. She was, however, obviously eager to please the auctioneer. I suppose that is understandable. He, after all, held the whip. On the other hand, I had gathered, from the reports of instructors and guards, as I had expected, that she was a woman who understood that she was a woman, and accordingly, in the order of nature, wished to defer to men, and be pleasing to them. These inclinations are obvious consequences of the nature of the hereditary coils. Despite the distortions, the curbs, and obstacles, of a pathological acculturation, stunting minds and shortening lives, nature, embedded in each cell in the human body, persists. Nature, like a living plant, may be crippled, stunted, denied, poisoned, and, if necessary, uprooted and destroyed, but it returns again, patient, latent, ready, alive, in each new child, in each new seed.

The most interesting aspect of her sale occurred late in the sale, when the auctioneer chose to display her slave reflexes.

As I had anticipated, they proved excellent.

How startled and distressed she was!

How foolish, did she still think herself free?

It was interesting to consider what might be her nature later, once her slave fires had been ignited.

I could conceive of her crawling on her belly to a master, tears in her eyes, begging to be touched.

It is pleasant to own such a woman.

What man does not want one?

I wondered if she would be domestically suitable, say, could she sew, or cook, such things. Some attention to such things is commonly involved in their training. To be sure, the principal object of a slave’s training is to teach her to give inordinate sexual pleasure to a master.

It is primarily what she is for.

I did not wonder about her heat. She would be a hot slave. Periodically, recurrently, helplessly, she would find herself in desperate sexual need. She would soften and oil at a casual glance. Her need would run down her thighs. She would proffer a master a juicy pudding, bubbling and delicious. She would be a pleasant confection, a delightful candy, a moaning, gasping tasta squirming on its stick.

And I wondered, again, if she could sew, or cook, such things.

If her efforts were unsatisfactory in such ways, or others, her grooming, her posture and grace, the care of a domicile, her shopping, or such, one might reduce, or deny her, the touch of the master, of which touch, at that time, she would be in desperate need.

The slave must learn, of course, to please the master, unquestioningly, and instantaneously, in all ways.

His satisfaction is paramount, not hers.

Still, a hot slave is a precious possession. It is one of the great pleasures of the mastery to play with his toy, to patiently lick, kiss, and caress his property, it perhaps helplessly bound or chained, to turn it into a writhing, pleading, sobbing, subdued, owned, gasping, bucking, lovely, helpless, ecstatic beast.

She went for forty-eight copper tarsks, which was about what I thought she would bring, something in the nature of a half tarsk, of silver.

Some weeks before, as I had been given to understand, the forces of Cos, Tyros, and their allies, and hirelings, most in mercenary bands, had withdrawn from Ar. The accounts of this were various. It was claimed by some that the work of the occupying forces was done, that Ar had been taught her lesson, her walls razed and her coffers looted, that she was now impoverished, docile, and subdued, and was no longer a threat to the civilized cities. Accordingly, the occupying forces had executed an orderly withdrawal, one supposedly scheduled for months aforehand. Others claimed that the troops of Cos and Tyros, and the others, had marched from the city, over streets carpeted with blossoms, amidst shouts of joy and flung garlands, the tribute of a grateful populace, freed from the gross despotisms and tyrannies of the past. And some said that like a storm at sea, one without warning, the red waves of revolt had surged into the streets, pouring forth from hovels and sewers, from taverns and stables, from cellars and insulae, that thousands of citizens, many armed only with clubs and stones, had rushed forth, intent upon the blood of invaders and traitors. Marlenus, Ubar of Ubars, it was said, had returned to Ar.

In any event, several of the coastal cities and towns, and, in particular, Brundisium, were now filled with what might, I suppose, be accounted refugees. It was claimed by some that the retreat from Ar had been a rout, precipitous and disorderly, and, in some cases, even disciplined troops had cast aside their shields and fled for their lives. Were it not for the ruination of her walls, thousands might have been unable to escape the city, to the open fields beyond. Countless dead would have been heaped at the gates. As it was, men of Ar tried to prevent the remnants of the occupying forces fleeing and hundreds of sympathizers and collaborators from leaving the city. Bands of mercenaries not quartered outside the city often had to fight their way to the countryside. Even in the open fields they were pursued and hunted, sometimes from the sky by tarnsmen of Ar, no longer enrolled in the sorry task of protecting uniformed looters and policing a sullen, resentful citizenry with which they shared a Home Stone. For pasangs about the city the fields were littered with feasting for scavenging jards. Within the city long proscription lists were posted, and traitors and traitresses were hunted down, house to house. Hundreds of impaling spears were adorned with writhing victims. Few free traitresses, or traitresses who long remained free, escaped the city. The common price for their license to accompany armed, fleeing men, unwilling to accept the burden of conducting free women, was their stripping and the collar. Many were currently being offered in the markets of Brundisium and other coastal cities. Some of those vended in the recent sale I had attended were former high women of Ar, now naked properties worth only what men were willing to pay for them. Many of the refugees still flooding into Brundisium were ragged, exhausted, and half-starved. Some had sold even their swords. Others had formed larger or smaller outlaw bands and prowled the roads, producing a realm of peril and anarchy for a hundred pasangs about. Passage to Tyros or Cos was costly, and many of Brundisium’s newcomers were destitute. Some, armed with clubs, hunted urts by the wharves. Two men had been killed for stealing a fish. It was said, too, that various towns and cities, even villages, in the island ubarates themselves were not enthusiastic about the turn of events, that they were less than willing to welcome the return of defeated, penurious veterans. Could honor be retained in the face of defeat, even rout? If the stories were true, of triumph, and such, where was their wealth, their spoils? Surely, for whatever reason, or reasons, justified or unjustified, an inhospitable reception not unoften awaited them. Some, even regulars managing to return to the islands, found themselves isolated and despised, denied work and a post. “Where is your shield,” they might be asked, “where is your sword?” In Brundisium, on the other hand, a busy port, with access to the northern and southern coastal trade, and an access to the major island ubarates westward, Cos and Tyros, there was considerable prosperity, for the coin that leaves one purse will soon find a home in another.

But beyond the influx of refugees, more streaming in each day, the crowding, the begging, the closing of hiring tables, the raiding of garbage troughs, the sleeping in cold, damp, dangerous streets, the discordant accounts of doings to the south and east, the racing about of rumors, it was clear that something different and unusual was occurring in Brundisium, something apart from refugees, apart from remote dislocations, apart from proscriptions and impaling spears, apart from tumult and flight, apart from red grass and bloodied stones, apart from hazard and vengeance, apart from political rearrangements, apart from exchanges of power wherein, as it is said, the “streets run with blood.”

This had to do with those spoken of as the Pani.

There must be two or three hundred of them in Brundisium, and perhaps many more in the north, in their unusual garb, with their dark, keen eyes, their black hair drawn back and knotted behind their head, men lithe and graceful, like panthers, taciturn, not mingling, avoiding the taverns, equipped with their unfamiliar weaponry.

It was not clear from whence these strange warriors, and their cohorts and partisans, were derived. Some, from the eyes, said they were Tuchuks, but others who had had the fortune, or misfortune, of encountering Tuchuks, as some looted, ransomed merchants, survivors of raided caravans, and such, denied this. Surely none wore the colorful, ritual, exploit scarring of the Tuchuks. Some said they came from the World’s End, but, as is known, the world ends at the farther islands, and beyond them is nothing. It was alleged they came from the Plains of Turia, far south of Bazi and Schendi, or from the Barrens to the east, but, if such things are so, why was there no heralding of their approach, no records of their passage?

In any event many are in Brundisium.

They speak a comprehensible dialect of Gorean, one with which I am not familiar. They work largely through agents. They have gold, apparently much gold. Some serious project is afoot. Their agents are hiring ships, and recruiting men, many ships, many men. Some ships, with crews, and complements of armed men, have already left port, bound north. They are laying in extensive supplies. Guarded compounds near the wharves are stacked with boxes, barrels, bales, clay vessels, like blunt-bottomed amphorae, tied together by the handles, bulging sacks, and weighty crates. It is as though some great voyage was contemplated, but the ships are small coasters, many of which one might not even risk to Temos or Jad, and they seem to move north. What might be in the northern forests, or Torvaldsland, to warrant this mighty movement of men and supplies? Do they think to found a city at the mouth of some far river, say, the Laurius or the remote Alexandra? Such locations would seem remote and inauspicious. Too, interestingly, many of the supplies seem to be war supplies, and naval stores. Why would one require naval stores to found a city, or even a village? Other goods, one supposes, would suggest trading, or the raid. There are bundles of silk, coils of wire, brass lamps, jars of ointment and salve, flat boxes of cosmetics; and poles on which are strung shackles and slave chain. Do they truly think there is that much slave fruit in the north? And, besides, they are already buying slaves. They are buying them from the shelves, from the wharf cages, the dock markets, and the house markets. Agents of Pani, for example, had purchased several of the girls in the recent sale I had witnessed, including the one whom I had found of some negligible interest, whom I had originally seen in a large emporium on another world. She would not remember me, though it was I who brought her to the collar and whip, where she, and such as she, belong. Some were even purchased at the gates, off their rope coffles, as bandits, or refugees, had brought them in. It was not fully clear why these purchases, or so many of them, had been made. If they were to be resold there seemed little point in taking them north. Better markets were elsewhere. Perhaps they were for gifts or trade goods. But to whom, and where? Certainly a lovely female makes a splendid gift, and, in many situations, can be bartered to one’s advantage. But who is, say, to buy them in the north, and so many? To be sure, many men were taking ship north, and they might be intended for them, if not for outright purchasing, for brothels, slave houses, or taverns. Men will want their slaves. Many of the purchased slaves were being held in the vicinity of the docks, in holding areas, the basements of warehouses, and such. In some places, through the high, narrow, barred windows in the walls, through which light may filter, they would hear the calls of longshoremen, their loading chants, the rumble of wheels on the planks, the creak of timbers, the stirring of slack canvas on a round ship, the water washing against the pilings.

I am familiar with such places as I have brought slaves to them. How they moan and cry out, and sob, when herded down the stairs to the straw, and rings! It is not pleasant to be confined in such a place, for they are often dark, cold, and damp, the straw soiled, the chains heavy. It was to such a place that a particular slave might have been brought.

I did not know.

How pleased they are then to be brought into the light, and the keeping of masters!

As I have mentioned, the agents of the Pani were recruiting. One might have supposed then, under the current circumstances in Brundisium, with the business to the southeast, the accompanying influx of refugees, and such, that the misery in Brundisium, the crowding and hunger, would have been muchly relieved, as men were taken into fee, but, unfortunately, that was only partly the case. For better or for worse, the agents of the Pani had not set up hiring tables, but conducted matters discreetly, if not secretly. They made inquiries, as they could, and seemed to scout men. They frequented the taverns and the lower dock areas, and would approach a prospect, two or three at a time, often in the darkness. Sometimes swords crossed. They seemed most interested in men who had retained their weaponry, and their pride. On the other hand, honor, the allegiance to a Home Stone, the promise of loyalty, and such, did not seem a requirement for the service contemplated. Some prospects they bought from prison for gold, some waiting execution. They seemed particularly interested in strong, agile, savage, dangerous men. I had the impression they were intent to fee men who could handle blades well and ask few questions with respect to their unsheathing. It was my impression that in some respects they were very little particular in their choices. They were not reluctant, it seems, to recruit vagabonds, likely bandits, rogue mercenaries, cutthroats, boasters, liars, gamblers, and thieves. Such men could be kept in line, I was sure, only by paga, gold, the promise of women, and an uncompromised discipline as swift and merciless as the strike of an ost. Accordingly, many who were approached, even when starving, refused to be wooed even by the golden staters of Brundisium when it became clear to them the likely nature of many of their companions. One does not wish to have a foe at one’s back or side. Others declined service when their would-be recruiters refused to reveal to them the length and nature of the service intended, and even its location. Indeed, I think that many, perhaps most, of the recruiters did not know the answers to such questions themselves. It was known that the first leg of their journey would take them north, somewhere north. What might occur there, or thereafter, was unclear. More frighteningly, at least to many, was the level of weapon skills which were being sought. Many potential recruits were put to the test of arms, pitted against one another, only the winner to be accepted. Some men killed more than one man to win their place.

“The cards have been unkind to you,” said a voice.

“That is not unusual, of late,” I said.

“More paga?” she asked.

“He has had enough,” said the voice.

“Where are you from?” I asked.

“Asperiche,” she said.

“How came you here?” I asked.

“I was taken in my village,” she said, “by raiding corsairs from Port Kar, and later sold south.”

“How much did you bring?” I asked.

“Two silver tarsks,” she said.

“Here?” I asked.

“Yes, Master,” she said.

“When?” I asked.

“The last passage hand,” she said.

“Summon the proprietor’s man, and a whip,” I said.

“Master?” she asked.

“In the current market you would bring no more than thirty-five, copper,” I said.

Trembling, she knelt, tears in her eyes. “Forgive me, Master,” she said.

I motioned her away, impatiently, clumsily.

“Thank you, Master,” she said, and leapt up and fled, with a flash of bells, from the small, round table, at which I sat, cross-legged.

“Are you weak?” asked the voice. “Why did you not have her lashed?”

“Do you think I am weak?” I asked.

He regarded me, for a moment. “No,” he said.

“I am unarmed,” I said.

“But weapons are checked at the door,” he said.

“They are entitled to their vanity,” I said.

I looked after her. The bells were on her left ankle. They were all she wore, other than her collar. It was not a high tavern.

“How did you know she was lying?” he asked.

“The market, the season,” I said.

“It seems you are an excellent judge of such things,” he said.

“Of such things?” I asked.

“The likely price of collar-meat,” he said.

“I am of the Merchants,” I said.

“The Slavers,” he said.

I shrugged.

“The Slavers,” he said.

“Very well, the Slavers,” I said. We regard ourselves as a subcaste of the Merchants. Do we not acquire, and buy, and sell? What difference is there, other than the nature of the goods handled?

“Slavers,” said he, “are cunning, and skilled with weapons.”

“Much like the scarlet caste,” I said.

“Or the black caste,” he said.

“I am not an assassin,” I said. I wondered if he were.

“Slavers must plan, and raid, and seize,” he said. “Often they must fight their way into a house, or pleasure garden, and fight their way free.”

“I have met men on the bridges,” I said. To be sure, there seemed little danger on the ships, the sky ships, save at departure and arrival, leaving or re-entering the atmosphere. There seemed little danger, too, on the slave world. They did not, it seemed, protect their women. Perhaps they did not realize their value.

“You have had too much to drink,” he said.

“You followed me from the gambling house,” I said.

“You lost heavily,” he said. “Perhaps tonight you will feed from the garbage troughs.”

“Perhaps,” I said. “Who are you?”

“One who places a golden stater on a table,” he said.

I looked at the small, round, golden disk. The staters of Brundisium are prized on the Streets of Coins in a hundred cities. They constitute one of Ar’s most coveted coinages.

“I am not an assassin,” I said.

“I, and others,” he said, “are seeking blades, armsmen.”

“For the strange men,” I said.

“The Pani,” he said, “yes.”

“Such,” I said, “or most, seem themselves warriors.”

“Additional men, many, are sought,” he said.

“There are many in Brundisium,” I said.

“Not all will do,” he said.

I looked at the coin lying on the table. It was interesting how such small, inert objects could move men, and ships, cavalries, and armies.

“Some men have never seen such a coin,” I said.

“Laborers, common laborers, peasants, verr tenders,” he said. “And this golden friend is not without his fellows,” he said.

“What must I do?” I asked.

“Ships move north,” he said.

“Each day?” I asked.

“One every two or three days,” he said, “sometimes two or more together.”

“For what purpose, to what end?” I asked.

“In time,” said he, “all will become clear.”

“I would have it clear now,” I said.

“The pay is good,” he said, touching the stater lightly, at the edge, as though he might move it toward me.

“Berths are won by the sword, I understand,” I said.

“Sometimes,” he said.

“And if berths were limited?” I asked.

“Then, surely,” he said.

“I am cognizant of the fellows you seek,” I said.

“Men such as you,” he said.

“I have no wish to feel a knife in my back,” I said.

“Such an assailant,” he said, “would be dealt with summarily, and unpleasantly.”

“That would do me little good,” I said.

“Discipline is rigorous,” he said.

“Among such men it must be,” I said.

“Surely,” said he.

“Men such as I?” I asked.

“I fear so,” he said.

It was now too late to make the rendezvous to the west, on Daphne, even were a vessel to leave this night, even had I the wherewithal to book passage. For some reason I had lingered too long in Brundisium. Why was that? But, too, I had voyaged on the sky ships, and more than once. I did not know if I would choose to so voyage again. I would leave it, like much else, to the future. There are many roads. I had taken such service for the pay, but, too, for the difference, the danger, the adventure. Too, for the pleasure of knotting cords on the wrists and ankles of slave fruit, on luscious, bipedalian, barbarian cattle.

But now I was again on Gor, and now, at least for the time, was content. There are many roads.

And surely there were enough Earth women here, if one’s tastes ran in such directions.

I thought of Earth stock, now familiar in Gorean markets.

How exciting, and beautiful, so often, was such stock! To be sure, we, and others, were selective, very selective.

Doubtless that made a difference, a great difference.

How little the men of Earth valued it. Why did they not better protect it? It can be worth a man’s life to try to take a free woman from a Gorean city, even a slave. We strive to protect our free women, and even our properties, our verr, our kaiila, our slaves. Did the men of Earth not prize their females? Did they not realize how attractive, how exciting, how valuable, how wonderful, how desirable, they were? Was that so hard to see?

Then I thought of true free women, our own women.

How different were the women of Earth from them, those of Earth lacking Home Stones, with their brazenly unveiled features, their openly displayed ankles, the pleading silk of their secret lingerie, so fit for slaves. They were not Gorean free women. They belonged on the block, being bidden for. I could not understand why the men of their world did not see this, why they did not realize how valuable their females were, and what might be done with them. Certainly it was clear enough to us. Could they not see what they were, what they needed, what they wanted? Did they not understand them? Why did they deny them the ownership and domination without which they could not be fulfilled, without which they could not be women? Why did they not kneel them, and inform them that they were women, and now, owned, would be treated as such? Did they think they were not women, that they were something else, neuters, sexless creatures, or such, inert cultural contrivances? Did they not realize what it might be, to have one at their feet, collared, owned, trained to their tastes, hoping to be found pleasing?

It is very pleasant.

It is also pleasant, of course, to take a Gorean free woman and teach her the collar, and kindle her slave fires, until she crawls to you, begging, indistinguishable from a barbarian, and then like them, forever then a slave.

They are all women.

There is no real difference.

They are all women.

The golden stater was thrust toward me.

I thrust it back.

“No?” he asked.

“No,” I said.

He replaced the coin in his wallet.

“It is men such as you,” he said, “which we want, and will have.”

“I think not,” I said.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked.

“No,” I said.

“Tyrtaios,” he said.

“I do not know the name,” I said.

“Let it be known that you have refused Tyrtaios,” he said.

“Why?” I asked.

“It may explain much later,” he said.

“And serve as a lesson to others?” I asked.

“Perhaps,” he said.

“Weapons are at the door,” I said. “Do you wish to meet outside?”

“I wish you well,” he said, and, rising, turned about, and left. I saw two others rise, as well, and follow him through the portal.

A proprietor’s man approached, and lingered by the table, looking toward the portal through which the three men had exited. He did not look at me. He said, softly, “Beware.”

“Paga,” I said.

“I will send a girl,” he said.

“Master,” she said, a moment later, kneeling. It was the same woman, she from Asperiche.

“Knees,” I said.

She widened them, reddening.

Did she not know how to kneel before a man?

“Paga,” I said.

“Yes, Master,” she said, rose, and, with an angry jangle of bells, withdrew.

She seemed to me insufficiently deferential.

She had lied before, and I had not had her lashed.

Did she still think she was a free woman? Had she not yet learned she was a slave?

Lying is permitted to the free woman, not the slave.

I supposed she was the sort of slave who would misinterpret a forbearance as weakness, the sort of slave who would abuse a lenience.

That is unwise on their part, for it is easy enough to remind them of their bondage, fiercely, and with unmistakable clarity.

I thought of another woman, one first seen in a large emporium, on the world Earth. I recalled that she, in the warehouse on Earth, had looked well at my feet, stripped, on her back, as I had turned her, looking up at me, bound hand and foot, clearly ready for processing.

I trusted she would not be so foolish.

If she were, the whip would quickly instruct her in deportment.

Yet vanity in a woman is charming, even endearing. Let them lie about their sales price, the wealth and position of their master, the loftiness of their former station, and such.

But it is quite another thing to be in the least bit displeasing.

It is interesting to see how carefully some, at first, will tread a line, flirting with a master’s patience, practicing a deference akin to insolence, and then to note their dismay when they discover that the line has been moved by the master in such a way that they find themselves clearly on its wrong side, the whip side. Informed that their games are done, they then strive to be wholly pleasing, as the slave they now know themselves to be.

It is so much easier for all concerned then.

Perhaps they merely wished to be taught their collar.

If so, their wish is granted.

The slave is not a free woman. She is a property, a belonging, an animal one owns. One expects total pleasingness from her, deference, and subservience, instant and unquestioning obedience, and, at a word or the snapping of fingers, the provision of ecstatic gratification.

“Fellow,” I called to the proprietor’s man.

He came to the table. He seemed uneasy. One notes such things. At his belt hung the coin sack.

“Who is Tyrtaios?” I asked.

“I have heard the name,” he said. “Beware.”

“I have refused him,” I said.

“That has been gathered,” he said.

“Do you let your girls touch coins?” I asked.

“No,” he said. He rustled the coin sack at his belt.

I looked beyond the fellow, to the back of the room, on the left, several yards away, where the slave from Asperiche was waiting, to dip the goblet in the vat. The proprietor, a coarse, swollen fellow in a soiled apron, was himself tending the vat. It was a low tavern. The coin box, with its slot, and lock, was behind him.

“Do you think I have had too much to drink?” I asked the proprietor’s man.

“Perhaps,” he said.

“I have the ostrakon here,” I said, “with its number. Bring me my weapons.”

“I fear they are missing,” he said, not looking at me.

“Why is that?” I asked.

“Forgive us, Master,” he said. “We wish to live.”

“There is a back exit from the tavern,” I said.

“I fear it is watched,” he said.

The slave had now dipped the goblet in the vat, and had turned about.

“I see,” I said.

“It is your service they want,” he said, “not your life.”

I supposed that was true. A crossbow bolt loosed in the darkness would handle such a matter, conveniently, before a shadow could be noted, a blade drawn.

“What lies in the north?” I asked.

“I do not know,” he said.

“Remain at hand,” I said.

“Master,” said the girl, kneeling.

Under my scrutiny, she widened her knees. She placed the goblet on the low table, behind which I sat, cross-legged.

“You seem displeased to be in a collar,” I said.

“I am in a collar,” she said. “What more is there to say?”

“Perhaps you have not yet learned it,” I said.

She was silent.

“Perhaps you do not yet realize you belong in one,” I said.

“May I withdraw?” she asked.

“Position,” I said.

She went to position, kneeling back on her heels, her back straight, her belly in, her shoulders back, her head up, the palms of her hands down on her thighs. One does not break “position” without permission.

I reached into my wallet. There was little left. I removed a Brundisium tarsk-bit, which is a large coin, the size perhaps intended to compensate for the slightness of its value.

“Open your mouth,” I said.

“I am not permitted to touch money,” she said.

I placed the coin in her mouth. “Do not drop it,” I said. The coin was far too large to swallow, and, held in her mouth, she could not speak. She was effectively, and embarrassingly, silenced.

She cast a wild, piteous glance at the proprietor’s man.

“I think,” I said, “it is true, that I have had too much to drink.” I then dashed the contents of the goblet on the startled, recoiling slave. She shook her head, and, blinking and twisting, tried to free herself of the paga. It was in her hair, and had drenched her face, and upper body. It ran down her body to her belly and thighs. She stank then of the drink. She shivered. I looked to the proprietor’s man. “She has been found displeasing,” I said.

“She will be lashed,” he said.

“Later,” I said.

“Master?” he said.

I removed my cloak. “You will put this on,” I said, “and draw the hood, and precede me through the door.”

“Certainly not,” he said.

“I thought you wished to live,” I said.

He donned the cloak, and drew the hood about his features.

“What is going on?” asked the proprietor, come from the vat.

“Do not interfere,” I said. Men about regarded us. Some rose up, but none approached.

“Now,” I said to the proprietor’s man. “You will exit the tavern, and walk to the left, toward the wharves.”

He bent down, and, drawing the hood and cloak more closely about him, exited the tavern.

I would let him precede me by a few yards. He left the tavern, and I remained behind for a bit, back, within the threshold. Then I, too, exited. As I had expected, very shortly, figures emerged from the shadows, two, though I had expected three, following the proprietor’s man, which two figures I followed. The lights of the tavern were soon behind us, and the wharf streets, in this section of the city, are narrow, crooked, and dark. Normally men carry their own light in such streets, or have it carried for them, often with guards or retainers in attendance.

As I had expected the two figures soon rushed forward and seized the proprietor’s man. I heard scuffling, and heavy blows, presumably of clubs. Intent on their work, presumably to beat their victim senseless and convey him, bound, to some predesignated location, the fellows were oblivious of my approach.

It was short work.

“What did you do to them?” asked the proprietor’s man.

“They will be all right,” I said. “You will not lose two customers.” I had not broken the neck of the first, nor the back of the second. It did seem pertinent to render them unconscious, which I did by taking each by the hair, when they were down, stunned, and yanking their heads together. Two clubs were somewhere on the pavement, but I did not know where they were.

“What are you doing?” asked the proprietor’s man.

It was dark.

“Making this worth our while,” I said. “You played your part very well.”

“My part?” he asked.

“Of course,” I said.

I pressed one of the wallets into his hands, and retained the other.

“Is there a garbage trough nearby?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said, “several, the nearest down the street, toward the water.”

“My cloak,” I said. “It will be chilly by the water.”

After a bit, we had deposited the two ruffians in a trough.

“How will this be explained?” asked the proprietor’s man.

“They were set upon in the darkness, and robbed,” I said.

“I do not think their principal will be pleased,” said the proprietor’s man.

“I suspect he will be more pleased than you realize,” I said.

“You have exceeded his expectations?” asked the proprietor’s man.

“I expect so,” I said.

“You are then a two-stater hire?” he asked.

“I would think so,” I said.

“I must return to the tavern,” said the proprietor’s man.

“We will go together,” I said. “I trust my weapons will be available.”

“Certainly,” he said.

On what ship, I wondered, would I take passage? Certainly I had lingered about the docks frequently enough, in the early morning, watching, not really knowing why. Observing, waiting, for what?

I recalled her lot number had been 119, not that it mattered.

She was a slave.