"It is beautiful here,” she said. “What is fearful about this place?"
"See these lines in the beach,” said Cabot. “They are the traces of the movements of large bodies. I am told there are saurians here, and they will come upon occasion to the beach."
"There are none here now."
"Examine this mark,” said Cabot. “See the edges, almost sharp. It may have been made last night."
"I do not see why Kurii should fear such things, on the land."
"If power weapons were permitted in the cylinder, they would have nothing to fear,” said Cabot, “but they are not, and these things, I understand, are far more terrible than Kurii, though on land they do not move quickly."
"But in the water?"
"There they are formidable,” said Cabot. “Many are designed for aquatic predation."
"They are reptiles, air-breathing things,” she said.
"Tharlarion of a sort, as I understand it,” said Cabot.
"We have seen no sign of Lord Grendel,” she said, “nor of Lady Bina."
"You speak of her as ‘Lady'?"
"Yes, Master, for she is free."
"We are much in the open,” said Cabot, “and with purpose. I want him to see us."
"Then it is we who will be found?"
"And in our being found, he himself is found,” said Cabot.
"If it be he who finds us,” she said.
"Yes,” said Cabot, “if it be he who finds us."
"Kurii may come here,” she said.
"Probably, at times,” said Cabot.
"Lady Bina has a name,” she said.
"She is free, as you correctly recognized. She named herself."
"I may not name myself, may I?” she asked.
"Certainly not,” he said. “You are a slave."
"'Bina’ is a beautiful name,” she said.
"I think it is nice,” said Cabot.
"It seems short for the name of a free woman,” she said.
"Perhaps,” said Cabot.
"On Earth,” she said, “female slaves were sometimes given meaningful names, things like Plum or Cherry."
"How would you know that?” he asked.
"I looked into such things, on Earth,” she said.
"You were interested in learning of the nature and lives of female slaves?” he asked.
"Yes,” she said.
"But you did not expect to become one?"
"No, Master,” she said. “What free woman expects to be collared?” She looked about. “Does ‘Bina’ have a meaning?” she asked.
"Do not concern yourself with the matter,” he said.
"Forgive me, Master,” she said.
"'Bina’ is a beautiful name for a beautiful woman,” she said.
"It is a beautiful name, in its way, and one appropriate one for her,” said Cabot, “and she is indeed a beautiful woman."
"Is she more beautiful than I?” inquired the slave.
"Of course,” said Cabot, “is not any free woman a thousand times more beautiful than the most beautiful of slaves?"
"Master?"
"That is a joke,” he said. “It is, of course, the most beautiful of women who are sought for slaves, and in bondage, however reluctantly, they become even more beautiful."
"But she is beautiful,” said the slave.
"Yes,” said Cabot, “and she belongs in a collar."
"I do not like her,” said the slave.
"She would scorn you, as the dirt beneath her feet,” said Cabot.
"As I am a slave?"
"Certainly."
"And appropriately?"
"Certainly."
"I was not always a slave,” she said.
"You were always a slave, at least since puberty,” said Cabot.
"But not as I am now, branded and collared, a slave in the fullness of all legality."
"No,” conceded Cabot.
"We were rivals, in the container,” whispered the slave.
"Oh?” said Cabot.
"Each of us wished to be the most pleasing to you."
"But you were free,” said Cabot.
"In your presence I was no more than a naked slave,” she said.
"One would have scarcely guessed that, from your demeanor,” he said.
"In the container,” she said, “I first glimpsed myself as what I truly am, a woman, and a slave."
"Interesting,” said Cabot.
"She, at least,” said the slave, “is clothed in the beauty of a name!"
"It is a beautiful name, in its way,” said Cabot.
"I have no name,” she said. “I am a nameless slave."
"As of now,” said Cabot.
"I may not name myself?"
"No."
"Are you going to name me, Master?"
"I may,” said Cabot.
"I must hope that the name my master gives me, if he chooses to name me, will be pleasing to him."
"Perhaps,” said he, “I will name you ‘Miss Virginia Cecily Jean Pym'."
"That is not the name of a slave,” she said.
"It was,” he said.
"Yes, Master,” she said.
"That seemed to me a very pretentious name,” he said. “Probably it was contrived in such an extensive and absurd way to compensate for the brevity and plainness of the surname."
"'Pym',” she said, “is among the most respected, honored, and aristocratic of surnames!"
"It is pleasant to take aristocratic women and make them slaves,” said Cabot, “to reduce them to begging, groveling sluts."
"And am I not an aristocrat so reduced?” she asked.
"No,” he said. “Not really."
"No?"
"You were clearly not an aristocrat,” he said.
"Master?"
"You may have thought yourself one, but rather, I think, despite your pretensions, you were, so to speak, a throwback."
"I do not understand,” she said.
"Though you regarded yourself as, in effect, an aristocrat, you were even then, though this was unknown to you at the time, a mere slave."
"I do not understand,” she said. “But it is true that I am a slave, and need to be a slave."
"It is not merely that you were not titled, for few are,” he said, “but rather that you carry slave-girl genes in every cell of your body."
"How is that?” she asked, puzzled.
"I shall conjecture,” he said.
"Please do so, Master,” she whispered.
"Many of the female ancestors in aristocratic lines,” he said, “were, in effect, slave girls, taken into households for their needs and beauty. Few would have been accounted slaves, perhaps, but that was, in effect, what they were, the lovely daughter of a peasant, sold for sheep, the orphaned beauty put to work in the stables, the pretty domestic servant summonable to the manor's lord's bed, and such, and, earlier, thousands of beauties sold in the markets of Roman Britain, and such. Women have always, in effect, been goods, of one sort or another, and men have always appropriated beauty. Do not doubt that many women in aristocratic lines once thrashed in the straw of stables, moaned in closets, obeyed in kitchens, and such. Many a woman, in effect, was dragged upward, from the collar to the coronet, and in the master's bed were never permitted to forget the collar."
"All were such women?” she asked.
"Certainly not all,” he said. “And many of these women, perhaps the less beautiful, were not taken into families, but merely thrown a coin, or cast aside."
"And you think I may derive from such?” she whispered.
"I find it not hard to believe that some ancestress of yours might have been sold naked from a slave block in Roman Britain,” he said.
"I only know that I am a slave, and need to be a slave, and desire to be a slave."
"Actually,” he said, “the fundamental explanation here doubtless long precedes historical variations of the sort I have suggested."
"It has to do with the nature of women, and of men?"
"Yes,” he said. “It would have to do with the natures favored by natural selection, in our species, interestingly, a radical sexual dimorphism, not only anatomically but psychologically, and the desire on the part of the smaller animal to submit and serve, to be owned and mastered, and that of the larger animal to own and master, such things."