The beam splintered suddenly away, shattering back from the weights on my hands.
I threw back my head, sucking in air.
I sensed her suddenly beside me, the small, blond female, collared, in the brown rag.
"Telitsia," I said.
She removed one of the gunni, that which clothed my left fist. It was heavy for her. She carried it, with two hands, and placed it on the shelf to one side.
"Does Kenneth know you are here?" I asked.
She returned to my side and, from my right fist, removed gently the heavy, curved weight with which it was clad.
"Does Kenneth know you are here?" I asked.
She placed the second weight beside the first on the shelf. She turned and looked at me. I looked at her. She trembled. She put down her head, and went to a water-filled wooden bucket in the corner of the barn. There was a gourd dipper near the bucket. She lowered the gourd dipper into the water and then, the dipper brimming, returned to my side. I took the dipper and drank. I handed the dipper back to her and she returned it to its place. Her small, bare feet dislodged sawdust on the floor of the barn. She returned to my side with a large, coarse towel, and began, gently, to towel my body. I was soaked with sweat. We were alone in the barn. There were several stalls in the barn. These were empty, but filled with clean straw. She continued to towel my body.
I thrust back the hair from my eyes.
She was now on her knees beside me, head down, trembling, toweling my legs.
"Does Kenneth know you are here?" I asked.
She continued, head down, to towel my legs.
"Speak, female," I told her.
"No." she whispered.
She looked up at me, suddenly. "The wagon is to come for me this afternoon," she said. "I am to be taken to the market. I am to be sold."
"I know," I said.
"I do not want to be sold," she wept.
"You are a slave," I told her. "Your wishes are unimportant."
"I know," she whispered.
She continued to towel my body. "The wagon will be here soon," she said.
I nodded. She would then be hooded and bound, and placed in the wagon for transport to the market.
Suddenly she flung away the towel and, sobbing, looked up at me, tears in her eyes. She was quite beautiful, kneeling barefoot before me, clad only in the brief, sleeveless brown rag of a slave, her blond hair about her shoulders, her blue eyes moist, her throat graced by the narrow collar of dark iron, slave iron. "Telitsia is at your feet," she whispered, piteously, "-Master."
I lifted her into my arms and carried her to one of the stalls, where I placed her gently on the straw.
"Telitsia! Telitsia!" we heard. It was the voice of Kenneth, master keeper of the slaves of the Lady Florence.
The bar for the tenth Ahn, the Gorean noon, had already been struck.
"I must escape," wept Telitsia. I touched her brand, I fingered her collar, as she lay naked in the straw, looking up at me.
I shook my head. "No, Telitsia," I said. "There is no escape for such as you, a Gorean slave girl."
She turned her head to the side. "I know." she said.
"Telitsia!" said Kenneth, standing before the stall. We drew quickly, guiltily, apart. We both, immediately, knelt, heads down, before a free person.
"Where have you been?" said Kenneth.
"Here, Master," she whimpered.
"Get your rag on," said Kenneth. "The wagon is ready."
"Yes, Master," she said, hurrying to pull her tiny, pathetic garment over her head.
"You, Jason," said Kenneth, sternly. "Were you given permission by some free person to engage in slut sport with this bond girl?"
"No, Master," I said, head down.
"You understand that you could be slain for this?" he inquired.
"Yes, Master," I admitted.
"How was she?" he asked.
"Lovely, and slave hot," I said.
The girl blushed, all the exposed parts of her body turning red, even her legs.
I smiled. I did not think Kenneth truly objected to my rutting with the lovely, neck-ringed stable slut. Indeed, he had not kept her chained by the neck to her ring in the kennels for stable sluts this morning, a precaution which is not uncommon for a girl who is to be soon sold. Rather he had let her wander free. I think that he was not, in his way, unkind. He had doubtless suspected that she would seek me out, or another male slave of her choice. There had been no great search for her. Kenneth, it seemed, had come almost directly to the barn where I was training.
Kenneth threw me some binding fiber and a leash. "Tie and leash her, and bring her to the wagon," he said.
"Yes, Master," I said. I went to Telitsia and bound her wrists behind her back with the binding fiber, and snapped the leash on her collar ring.
Too, however, it should be noted that Kenneth, permitting the bedding of the lovely slave girl at this time, had assured himself that she would be warmed for her sale. His motivations, thus, were doubtless not entirely altruistic. A vital, passionate woman, of course, displays herself very differently on the block than one who is inert, cold or frigid. There are degrees in these things, of course. For example, a truly frigid girl is almost certain to be a first-sale girl. Frigidity is a neurotic luxury which Goreans do not see fit to indulge in female slaves. It is permitted only to free women. The same girl who in her first sale was frigid is likely to be, by the time of her second sale, even should it be within the year, a wonder of lascivious appetition, needful of love and the touch of as uncompromising owner.
"Come along," said Kenneth.
I followed him, leading Telitsia on her leash.
"Greetings, Kenneth," said Borto, the driver of the low bedded tharlarion wagon. "I see you have the slave."
"Greetings, Borto," said Kenneth. "Yes, and I think she is now well ready for her sale."
Borto laughed.
"I bring you another, a replacement," he said, indicating a prone figure, in a slave sack.
"Good," said Kenneth. "We are short on stable sluts. They are useful in keeping the male slaves content, and may well be applied to lighter labors, on which a man's strength would be wasted."
Borto smiled, and handed Kenneth a note, from inside his tunic.
Kenneth took the note and read it, frowning. "I see," he said.
"Put her in the wagon," said Kenneth, "kneeling position, leashed-legs tie."
"Yes, Master," I said.
Telitsia looked up at me. Her hands were bound behind her back. There were tears in her eyes. She lifted her lips to mine. I kissed her. I then lifted her into the wagon, kneeling her on the boards. Her breasts were loose and sweet within her small garment. It was high on her thighs. I then, using the leash, passing it before her body and between her legs, crossed and bound her ankles, thus fastening her in that same kneeling position in which I had originally placed her. She could not rise and the fastening on her collar kept her head down. It is a standard submission tie on Gor for a female slave.
The girl in the slave sack squirmed angrily, irritably.
Kenneth looked at the sack move, responding to the luscious girl curves within it.
"Does she not know she is not to squirm?" asked Kenneth.
Borto laughed. "Apparently not," he said.
"There is nothing in the note," said Kenneth, "to indicate that she is not to be a stable slut."
"Doubtless she will have to be taught a few things," said Borto.