"The whip, tell him of the whip, Master!" said Lavinia.
"It is a symbol of authority, and an instrument of discipline," I said. "The slave is subject to it. Some masters think it is useful to occasionally use it on a slave, if only to remind her that she is a slave."
"How could anything so beautiful be touched with the leather?" he asked. "That we learn to obey, and who is master!" laughed Lavinia.
"Buy a whip," I advised him.
"Yes, Master," said Lavinia.
"You wish me to buy a whip?" asked Milo of the slave.
"Yes, Master!" she said.
"But, why?" he asked.
"So I well know that I must obey, and be pleasing!" she said.
"I see," he said.
"And that you will have a convenient implement at hand for enforcing my discipline," she said.
"A whip, of course, is not absolutely necessary," I said. "There are many other means of enforcing discipline."
"True," said Lavinia.
"But there is much to be said for the whip," I said. "It is perhaps the simplest, most practical device for such purposes. It is also traditional. Also, of course, it has symbolic value."
Lavinia, on her knees, looked up at Milo, her master. "Yes, Master!" she said. "You truly think I should get a whip?" asked Milo. I was pleased that he had addressed this question to me, and not to Lavinia. He was beginning, I noted, to get a sense of the mastery. The decision in such matters lay among free men, not with slaves. Lavinia looked up at, smiling. She, too, to her delight, recognized that she had been left out of the matter. Milo was learning, quickly, how to relate to her, namely, as her master. She was a slave. Such decisions would be made by others. She would not participate in them, but, as was appropriate for a slave, simply abide by their consequences.
"Certainly," I said.
He pondered the matter.
"And," I said, glancing down at Lavinia, "if she is not pleasing, use it on her, literally, and well."
He swallowed, hard.
She put down her head, shyly.
"She is a slave," I said, "not a free companion, who may not be touched, to whom nothing may be done, even if she turns your life into a torture, even if she drives you mad, even if she intends to destroy you, hort by hort."
"She is so beautiful," he said. "It is hard to think of touching her with the whip."
"Sometimes," I said, "it is the most beautiful who are the most in need of a whipping."
"May I speak?" asked Lavinia.
"Yes," said Milo.
"Too, Master," said Lavinia. "I love you, so I want you, sometime, or sometimes, to whip me."
He regarded her, puzzled.
"I want to know I am your slave," she said.
"I do not understand," he said.
"Teach me that you are my master."
"I do not understand," she said.
"It has to do with being subject to the master," I said, "with being truly his."
"Interesting," said Milo.
"For a female," I said, "I would recommend the wide-bladed, five stranded whip." Lavinia looked up, startled. She had not anticipated, it seemed, that whip. Doubtless she already regretted her recent tolerances and enthusiasms. If it were to be to that particular implement that she was to be subject, matters, it seemed, were to be viewed suddenly in a quite different perspective. On Gor, slave girls live in terror of that whip. It is designed for the female slave, to correct her behavior with great effectiveness while not leaving lasting traces, which might reduce her value.
"Is anything wrong?" I asked Lavinia.
"I will try to be pleasing to my master," she said.
"I am sure of it," I said.
"It seems she knows that whip," he said.
"She has at least heard of it," I said. "With it on your wall, I have little doubt she will prove to be a most excellent slave, particularly if she has once felt it. It is an excellent tool. You can buy one for as little as one or two copper tarsks."
"You are going to come into some money," I said.
"I do not understand," he said.
"You are well advised to leave Ar," I said.
"Undoubtedly," he said.
"For this," I said, "you should have money."
"But alas," smiled Milo," I have no money."
"Here," I said, "are ten pieces of gold." I counted them out, into Milo's hand. He looked at me, disbelievingly. I had already given fifteen pieces to Tolnar and Venlisius each. They had upheld the laws of Ar and preserved their honor. They would also file the papers, and several certified copies of them, in various places, and, by courier, with certain other parties, official and unofficial, in various cities. It would be next to impossible, for, say, Seremides, to recover them all. I retained my copies, of course. Both Tolnar and Venlisius, with my concurrence, thought it wise to remove both themselves and their families from Ar. Fifteen gold pieces each was a fortune. It would enable them to relocate with ease and reestablish themselves much as they might wish, wherever they might wish. At the time Boots Tarsk-Bit had obtained the Home Stone of Ar's Station I had had something like ninety gold pieces left from the one hundred gold pieces I had obtained in the north. I had given Boots half of these, forty-five gold pieces, and had retained the other forty-five. I had then given fifteen each to Tolnar and Venlisius. I had now given ten to Milo, and had retained five. Five pieces of gold, in its way, incidentally, is also a fortune on Gor. One could live, for example, in many cities, though not in contemporary Ar, with its press on housing and shortages of food, for years on such resources.*" *Although it is not my policy to include Cabot's marginal notes, jottings, etc., which are often informal, and apparently written at different times, in the text of his accounts, I think it would not be amiss to hypothesize certain approximate equivalencies here. To be sure, much seems to depend on the city and the particular weights involved. For example, a "double tarn' is twice the weight of a "tarn. It seems there are usually eight tarsk bits in a copper tarsk, and that these are the result of cutting a circular coin in half, and then the halves in half, and then each of these halves in half. An analogy would be the practice of cutting the round, flat Gorean loaves of sa-tarna bread into eight pieces. There are apparently something like one hundred copper tarsks in a silver tarsk in many cities. Similarly, something like ten silver tarsks would apparently be equivalent, depending on weights, etc., to one gold piece, say, a singer "tarn. Accordingly, on this approach, the equivalents, very approximately, and probably only for certain cities, would be eight tarsk bits to a copper tarsk; one hundred copper tarsks to a silver tarsk; and ten silver tarsks to a gold piece, a single tarn. On this approach there would be, literally, 8,000 tarsk bits in a single gold piece. a€“J.N.
"Permit me," said Milo, "to return one of these gold pieces to you."
"Why?" I asked.
"You paid a tarsk bit for me," he smiled. "Thus I would not wish you to lose money on the arrangement."
"He learns honor, and generosity, quickly," I said to Lavinia.
"He is my master," she said.
I showed the coin to Marcus. "You see," I said to him, "I have made a considerable profit."
"You should be of the merchants," he assured me.
The new slave, she in the bracelets and shackles, lying on her side, chained by the neck, to the ring, near the couch, made a tiny sound.
I put the gold piece back in my wallet.
"You should leave," said Marcus to Milo.
"But a moment," I said.
I looked down at the new slave, whom I had decided to call "Talena', which slave name was also entered on her papers, in the first endorsement, as her first slave name pertinent to these papers, and by means of which she could always be referred to in courts of law as, say, the slave who on such and such a date was known by the name "Talena. This did not preclude her name being changed, of course, now or later, by myself, or others. Slaves, as other animals, may be named, or renamed, as the masters please. Indeed, if the master wishes, they need not be named at all. She made another small sound, like a tiny moan of protest. She stirred, a little. I saw her hands twist a little, behind her, her wrists locked in the bracelets.