“Here, Mistress?” asked Jane.
“Yes,” she said.
“Yes, Mistress,” said Jane and Eve.
“Let us feast,” said Astrinax.
“By all means,” said Lykos.
Desmond of Harfax reached down, took my bound, right ankle, and dragged me into the sleeping chamber of the Lady Bina. There he shackled my left ankle to a floor ring, and returned to the main room to join the feasters. For Ahn, until dawn, I listened to the conversation, the recollections, the pleasantries, the merriment, in the next room. Then it was quiet outside the room, and, after a bit, after struggling a little, futilely, and hearing the light sound of the chain on the floor, which held me to the ring, I fell asleep. I did not know what would be done with me. Knowing that Desmond of Harfax was a decent and honorable man, though he might be a fearsome and demanding master, I was not afraid that I would be fed to sleen, cast to leech plants, or such. I was afraid that I might not be kept, that I might be given away, or sold. I knew I had not been pleasing, and it is a frightening and terrible thing for a slave not to be pleasing to her master. I did not awaken for several Ahn, because it was late morning, or early afternoon, when I stirred, and, as my consciousness and remembrance returned, found myself as I had been before, a bound slave. I think that Astrinax and Lykos, and their slaves, had departed. I sensed that Lord Grendel was outside, on the roof, where he commonly slept. The Lady Bina was in the room, on her couch, asleep.
Turning a little, I saw Master Desmond in the threshold.
I struggled to a kneeling position, and put my head down to the floor.
He pulled my head up, by the hair, not hurting me, but as a master might do such a thing. He then unbuckled the gag, and pulled the leather ball from my mouth. I was afraid to speak, and so remained silent. He unbound my ankles, and thrust a wastes bucket to me, and then exited the room. Gratefully I relieved myself. I then edged the bucket away, and remained kneeling, but up, as he had left me, my hands tied behind my back, my left ankle chained to the ring. I kept my knees closely together. When he reentered, I lowered my head. He was bearing a goblet of water, and he helped me drink from it. He then left the room again and, when he returned, he had some meat and bread, which he fed to me by hand. I looked up at him, grateful for his kindness. I wondered if he could read the gratitude, the hope, and tenderness, and the fear, in the eyes of a slave. I still did not dare to speak.
“Stand,” he said, coldly.
Frightened, I stood. He then put my wrists in slave bracelets, and then untied the binding fiber with which I had been hitherto secured. I gathered we were going into the streets. Binding fiber can be cut with a knife. It, and that which had bound my ankles, he returned to his pouch. Then, from the pouch he produced a leash and collar. I would then be leashed and collared in the streets. I saw nothing of a tunic or camisk, or ta-teera, or slave strip, and so I understood I was to be marched naked through the streets on a leash, as a low slave or punished slave. How amused would be other slaves, to see me so. To be sure, I was a barbarian.
Lastly, as I was now braceleted and leashed, he freed me of the shackle on my left ankle.
“Precede me,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
Chapter Fifty-Two
I cried out, in misery.
I was tied on my knees, my hands before me, fastened to the ring, in the small, bright courtyard, behind a house on Clive, that in which Desmond of Harfax had rented a room.
The lash fell again.
“Know that you are a slave,” said Desmond of Harfax.
Again the lash fell.
“Yes, Master,” I wept, “I know I am a slave! I am whipped! I am whipped! I am whipped as the slave I am! I am a slave, a slave!”
“And who whips you?” he asked.
“He who owns me!” I cried. “Desmond of Harfax!”
He then gave me another stroke.
“Yes, Master!” I wept. How deeply, and well, I then understood the word ‘Master’!
I was a slave, and he was my master.
He then left me with my thoughts, and the pain.
“Please whip me, Master,” I had said.
“Why?” he had asked.
“That I may know myself a slave,” I said, “and yours.”
“The whip hurts,” he said.
“No one is more aware of that than I,” I said.
“Why then would you be whipped?” he asked.
“That I may know myself a slave,” I had said, “and yours.”
“You will have no doubt about that,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I had said.
* * * *
After some Ehn he returned.
“Please do not whip me any more!” I said.
“You are content?” he said.
“Yes, yes!” I said.
“You do not wish to be whipped further?” he said.
“No, no, Master!” I wept.
“I see,” he said.
“Please do not whip me any more!” I begged.
“It hurts does it not?” he said.
“Yes, Master!” I said.
“But you are now,” he said, “well aware that you are a slave, and my slave.”
“Yes, Master!” I said. “It is done. No more, please! Do not whip me further! I beg it!”
“This is the whip,” he said, holding it before me.
I shuddered in the bonds. “I fear it,” I said, “the very sight of it.”
“You may kiss it,” he said.
I kissed the whip, fervently.
“Perhaps,” he said, “you will try to be a good slave.”
“I will strive to be a good slave,” I said.
“You have been whipped,” he said.
“Yes, Master,” I wept.
“You must expect such things if you are not fully pleasing,” he said.
“I will strive to be fully pleasing!”
“Who will strive to be fully pleasing?” he asked.
“Allison will strive to be fully pleasing,” I said.
“Do you think you have been fully pleasing?” he asked.
“I fear not,” I said.
“As I recall,” he said, “you were long aware of my transparent machinations, my childish programs, and such?”
“Please forgive the foolish words of a foolish slave,” I said.
“And you secretly despised me all the while?” he said.
He then again put the whip to my lips, again I kissed it, fervently. “No, Master!” I said.
“More lingeringly,” he said. “And lick it, devotedly, as the pretty little slut and slave beast you are.”
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“And if you came into my power,” he said, “you would strive to be the worst possible slave to me?”
“No, Master,” I said. “I would strive to be the best possible slave to you, a slave of slaves to you!”
“And there was much else,” he said. “Was I not to be petty, sly, crass, duplicitous, dishonorable, ignoble, a hypocrite, a fraud, a monster, and such?”
“I did not speak, Master,” I said. “It was my rage, my disappointment, my loneliness, my sense of loss, my thought of being unwanted, of being ignored and abandoned, such things which spoke.”
“Perhaps,” he said, “you should be again whipped, and richly whipped.”
“Please no, Master,” I said.
“You are afraid, are you not?” he asked.
“Yes, Master,” I said.
“Why?” he asked.
“Because I am a slave,” I said. “I have felt the whip. I know what it is like. I shall do my best to be pleasing to my master.”
He then undid the flat, narrow leather straps which had bound my wrists to the ring.
I then turned about, gratefully, to kneel before him. It was my hope he might later permit me clothing. I would do my best to be worthy of a garment, be it only a slave strip.
He was looking upon me.
“Master?” I said.
“I find you of slave interest,” he said.
“A slave is pleased,” I said.
There were trees, and grass, in the small courtyard, and flowers, mostly talenders, and dinas, some veminium. A tiled walk wound its way through the vegetation. Flowering shrubbery was about. Here and there, there were small, concealed nooks in the garden. In one corner, there was a small reservoir, with a slatted wooden lid. The day was warm. A light wind rustled through the leaves overhead. The courtyard, like most Gorean courtyards, was rather small. It backed the domicile, which had four floors. At the rear of the courtyard was a small, opaque, wooden gate. Two of its walls were common walls with adjoining domiciles. The back wall was adjacent to an alley, access to which was provided by the rear gate.