"Her hair is too short,” said Cabot.
"Want me, Master!” she wept. “I beg to be wanted!"
"We have an eel pool in a nearby garden,” said Peisistratus. “By now the eels are doubtless hungry."
The slave went to her belly and, terrified, hands tied behind her, squirmed to Cabot's feet. “I do not want to die, Master!” she wept. “Am I not attractive? Am not of interest, some interest? Want me, please! I beg to be wanted!” She pressed her lips to his feet, piteously, and covered them with kisses, and tears.
"Do you think you could be a good slave?” asked Peisistratus.
"Yes, Master! Yes, Master!” she wept. “I will love and serve, wholly, unstintingly, selflessly!"
"In all ways?” asked Peisistratus.
"Yes,” she wept, “yes, Master!"
"You understand what it means,” he asked, “'in all ways'?"
"Yes, Master!” she cried. “I do, I do, and I want to so serve. I will beg piteously to so serve!"
"Prepare,” said Peisistratus, to his men, “to take her to the eel pool."
Before two fellows could seize her up, she scrambled wildly to her knees before Cabot, and, agonized, tears streaming down her cheeks, lifted her eyes to him, piteously, her lips trembling.
"Claim me, Master!” she wept. “I am an unclaimed slave! Claim me, I beg it!"
Cabot looked down upon her.
"Want me!” she begged. “I beg to be wanted!"
"You beg to be wanted?” asked Cabot.
"Yes, Master,” she said, “I beg to be wanted!"
"It was not so on Earth, I gather,” said Cabot.
"No, Master,” she said. “But now I beg! Please want me, Master! Want me! I beg to be wanted!"
Cabot smiled. “Your hair is too short,” he said.
"It will grow, Master,” she said, smiling. “It will grow."
"Pronounce yourself slave, and unclaimed,” said Cabot.
"I am a slave,” she cried, “and I am an unclaimed slave!"
"You belong then,” said Cabot, “to whoever claims you."
"Yes, Master!” she cried.
"You look well on your knees,” he observed.
"Thank you, Master,” she wept.
"I claim you,” he said.
She began to tremble, uncontrollably, shedding tears of irrepressible emotion, wild tears of relief, of gratitude, of wanton, unrestrained elation, of instantaneous, irresistible joy, and it seemed, so sobbing, that she would fall. And a fellow behind her, taking her by the hair, steadied her, and forced her head up, to regard Cabot.
"You are a slave, are you not?” asked Cabot.
"Yes, Master!"
"Whose are you?"
"Yours, Master!"
"Speak it, then,” said he.
"I am your slave, Master!” she said.
The men about cried out with pleasure, and smote their left shoulders in approval.
"Bring the collar,” said Peisistratus.
"She has fainted,” said a man.
"There is a haunch of tarsk in the kitchen,” said Peisistratus. “Let the eels be fed."
"Yes, Captain,” said a fellow.
Chapter, the Twenty-Seventh:
CABOT HAS DELAYED HIS DEPARTURE,
UPON THE ADVICE OF PEISISTRATUS
"I am chained!” she said. “Chained!"
"It is common with slaves,” said Cabot.
She lay back in the furs. “I am utterly helpless,” she said.
"That, too, is common with slaves,” he said.
It is true that she was well spread.
It was not unfitting for her, as she was a slave.
The alcove was illuminated by a single, tiny lamp, in a niche in the wall, to the left, as one would face the back of the alcove. The alcove itself, as many, was small, low-ceilinged, with curved, sloping walls, floored with heavy furs. The light of the small lamp cast its warm, soft, flickering glow about the walls. In the alcove, as is often the case, were various devices, gags, blindfolds, shackles, coarse rope, silken cords, adjustable chains, a switch, a whip, such things, convenient to masters, not unfamiliar to slaves.
The space was closed with a heavy leather curtain. This was buckled shut, on the inside.
"And I am collared!” she said.
"Yes,” he said.
"You put me on all fours, my head down,” she said, “and then collared me, as though I might have been a dog."
"You are less than a dog,” he said. “You are a slave."
"Yes, Master."
"You trembled, as it was closed."
"The sound, Master!” she breathed. “It is a sound which surely no woman ever forgets! Is it not the most meaningful of sounds, that snap, that click, as the collar is closed on one, and one realizes that it is now on one, and that one is collared?"
"There are many meaningful sounds,” said Cabot, “the snarl of the sleen, the roar of the mountain larl, the scream of the tarn, the drums of war, the clash of steel on steel, the crash of waves, the creak of a vessel's timbers, the sound of bright canvas awakening to a sudden wind after calm, the whisper of silk on a slave's body."
"I do not understand much of what you have said,” she said.
"It does not matter,” he said.
The collar was a common Gorean collar, of the sort favored in particular in her northern hemisphere, flat, light, sturdy, about a half to three-quarters of an inch in height, close-fitting, locked, the lock at the back of the neck.
"The legend on the collar was shown to me,” she said. “But I could not read it."
"It was read to you,” he said.
"Yes,” she said. “'I am the property of Tarl Cabot.’”
"It is true,” he said.
"Yes, Master,” she said. “Master."
"Yes?"
"I have always wanted to be owned,” she said.
"Have no fear,” he said. “You are owned."
"I could not even read my collar,” she said.
"It matters not,” he said. “You are illiterate in the language."
"Will you teach me to read Gorean?"
"No,” he said.
"I am to be kept illiterate?"
"Yes,” he said, “many Earth-girl slaves on Gor are kept illiterate. They need not be literate for what the master wants them for."
"I see,” she smiled.
"Free women prefer it that way, too,” he said, “that the distinction between themselves and the meaningless slave be the more clearly drawn."
"I see,” she said.
"Too,” said he, “curiosity is not becoming in a slave girl."
"I have been told that,” she laughed. “But, too, I suspect we are muchly subject to curiosity."
"Yes,” said he, “sometimes to the correction of the whip."
"It is a strange feeling,” she said, “being a slave, and being in a slave collar."
"The collar marks you as slave,” he said, “and identifies the master."
"And,” she said, “if I am not mistaken, it is extremely attractive."
"Yes,” he said, “both for its aesthetics, and its meaning."
"I understand, Master,” she said. “And I am sure, too, a man enjoys seeing a slave collar on a woman."
"Of course,” said Cabot.
"There is something else, too,” she said.
"What is that?” he asked.
"How it affects the woman,” she said, “how it stimulates her, arouses her, informs her, and frees her."
"Frees her?"
"Yes,” she said. “It is hard to explain, but I never felt so free, as a woman, until I was in this collar."
"Interesting,” he said.
"What you did to me!” she smiled.
"It was nothing,” he said.
"Nothing!” she said. “You so aroused me that I begged piteously for my own deflowering!"
"Do not use so absurd an expression,” he said. “One can no more deflower a slave than a she-tarsk."
"I see,” she said.