"What is going on here?" I heard cry. "Stop!" It had been the voice of Kenneth, the head keeper of my Mistress' slaves, the Lady Florence of Vonda. I had heard a wagon rattling away, swiftly.
"What is going on?" I had heard, a woman's voice, that of my Mistress. Over my head I had felt the sack being untied.
"It is Jason," had said Kenneth. He had drawn me from the sack by a bound arm. I felt my head slapped to the side. "You are in the presence of the Mistress," had said Kenneth.
I had then knelt before her. I was on the porch of her house in Venna. I was naked.
"There is a note tied to his collar," said Kenneth. Men and women of the household, including male and female slaves, domestic slaves, house slaves, such as short-legged, luscious Taphris, had gathered about. The note on my collar was taken and handed to the Mistress. She read the note in fury, and then crumpled it, and cast it to the side. She looked down at me, in fury.
"Send him to the stables," she said.
"Yes, Lady Florence," had said Kenneth.
"Have the rest of you nothing better to do than gawk at a stable slave?" she snapped.
Quickly the small crowd dissipated, the free persons turning aside to their duties and the slaves, barefoot, including Taphris, scurrying quickly to their tasks. Lady Florence, Kenneth and myself were alone left on the porch.
Kenneth unbound my ankles and threw aside the binding fiber which had restrained them.
I kept my head down.
Kenneth stood up. "Lady Florence," he asked.
"Yes?" she said.
"When we return to your villa near Vonda," he asked, "is the slave to be returned to the house or is it your intention that he serve there, as well as here, in the stables, not your private stables but the great stables?" The Lady Florence owned more than a thousand tharlarion. She bred and raised tharlarion, and her stables were among the finest in the vicinity of Vonda.
"He is a stable slave," she said, angrily. "Use him as such."
"In the great stables?" he asked.
"Yes," she said.
"As a full stable slave," he asked, "subject to all the conditions and strictures of such?"
"Yes," she said.
"Excellent," he said.
Then, in fury, she had spun about and left, robes swirling.
I lifted my head. Kenneth was chuckling. For some reason he seemed pleased.
"Master," I said.
"Yes?" he said.
"May I know what was in the note which was affixed to my collar?"
"I, too, am curious," he grinned. He picked up the note. " `My sweet friend and compatriot, Lady Florence of Vonda,'" read Kenneth, "`Thank you very much for the use of your lovely silk slave, Jason. I enjoyed him very much. It is easy to see why you are so fond of him. Incidentally, thank you, too, for the lovely gift of perfume. I wore it while using him for my pleasure. Thank you again, my sweet and understanding friend, and generous friend, for your kindness in these matters. I wish you well. Melpomene, Lady of Vonda.'"
Kenneth then dropped the note, muchly where he had found it.
He pulled me to my feet and thrust me, stumbling, to my right, down the steps and toward the wagon way leading about the house, toward the stables.
At the corner of the house we stopped.
"Look," he said.
I looked back. The Lady Florence had come out again on the porch. She looked about, but did not see us, as we were some distance away, at the corner of the house, and shielded by trees. She bent down, furtively, and snatched up the note which had been attached to my collar. Then she hurried again into the house.
"She is a woman," said Kenneth.
"Yes, Master," I said.
"She cannot bear that it might be found," laughed Kenneth. "Too, perhaps she wants it, that she may, regarding it, hate the Lady Melpomene even more than she has in the past, if that is possible."
"Yes, Master," I said.
"Did you see how furtive she was," he asked, "so fearful of discovery?"
"Yes, Master," I said.
"She is, for all her wealth and freedom," he said, "only a woman."
"Yes, Master," I said.
"Is she pleasant in the furs?" he asked.
"It was I, a silk slave," I said, smiling, "not she, who must needs be pleasant in the furs."
"Of course," he said. Then he said, "Would she look well in a collar? Would she look well naked, upon a slave block"
I was startled. "May I respond to such questions?" I asked.
"Yes," he said.
"Yes," I said, "she would look well in a collar, and would look well naked, upon a slave block."
"I had guessed as much," he grinned.
"If I may speak, Master," I said, "you seem pleased to learn that I have been consigned to the stables."
"I am," said he. "I expect that you will make coins for Barns and myself."
"Master?" I asked.
"Can you fight?" he asked.
"No," I said.
He laughed. "You are a big fellow," he said, "and strong. Too, you seem fast. Too, you are clearly intelligent. That is important, more important than many fools understand."
"I do not know how to fight," I said. I was very conscious of the binding fiber confining my wrists behind my back.
"Tighten your belly," he said.
I did so. He then, as I anticipated, struck me, heavily, in the gut. I was, of course, in good condition, and set for the blow.
"Good," said Kenneth.
"I do not know how to fight," I told him.
"In the stables," said Kenneth, "authority is mine. You will, for all practical purposes, belong to me. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Master," I said.
"Do you wish to live?" he asked.
"Yes, Master," I said.
"You will then do as you're told," he said
"Yes, Master," I said.
"In the stables," he said, "we have, too, besides the male slaves, some Kajirae, stable sluts, as we call them. I can assign these as I please."
I looked at him. I thought of Gorean Kajirae. I inadvertently licked my lips.
He laughed, and turned about, leading the way about the corner of the house, treading upon the wagon way.
"Come along, Stable Slave," he said.
"Yes, Master," I said, following him.
The line of kneeling, male stable slaves was straight. I knelt near the end of that line. The Mistress, not hurrying, continued her inspection. Kenneth and Barus followed her. Occasionally she stopped to speak to a slave, sometimes to put him under questions, pertaining to his duties and his discharging of them. She could be quite thorough, my mistress, the lofty Lady Florence of Vonda. Many of the slaves feared her, her demands and her quirt. She held over them, of course, the power of life and death. She was only a few slaves from me now. It had rained the night before, and the ground was soft. She wore a full, beige skirt, the hem of which fell to within some six inches of the ground, and slim, high, black-leather boots; a beige blouse, and a beige jacket, belted, which fell to her thighs; too, she wore a loose hood, attached to the jacket by hooks, of matching beige material, and an opaque veil, also of beige material. Such garments, far less formal than the common attire of the Gorean free woman, are sometimes worn by rich women in the supervision and inspection of certain sorts of holdings, such as orchards, fields, ranches and vineyards. They constitute, for such women, so to speak, a habit for work.
The mistress was now but five slaves from me.
The skirt's hem, some six inches from the ground, protects the skirt from being soiled by water or mud. Doubtless that is the principal reason for its height. Also, however, interestingly, it functions as a slave control device. The sight of the Mistress' ankle, of course, even booted, is tantalizing; it is exciting and provocative. The male slave, thus, if he is vital, finds himself powerfully drawn to look upon it. On the other hand he knows that such an act can be punished by death. Thus, when he is in the presence of his Mistress, she in such a habit, he becomes fearful and ill at ease. She, in effect, flaunts herself in front of him, acting however as though no such thing is going on. She knows that he is in misery. She exploits this in her control of him.