“No,” she said.
“Why?” he asked.
“I think,” she said, “because I am too beautiful to whip.”
“No slave,” he said, “if she is in the least bit displeasing, is too beautiful to whip.”
“I will try to be pleasing, Master!” she wept.
“Wholly pleasing?”
“Yes, Master!”
“I think I will lash the free woman out of you,” he said.
“I fear, Master,” she said, “there is little of the free woman left in me.”
“It is usually unnecessary and pointless to hurt a slave,” he said.
“Do not hurt me, Master,” she said, eyeing the whip.
“But I think it would be well for you to feel a few strokes,” he said, “a few strokes for your instruction, not so much to hurt you, as to inform you.”
“Please, no!” she said.
“Few things,” he said, “so convince a woman that she is a slave, more than feeling the lash.”
“Please, no, Master,” she said.
“She can no longer then maintain the pretenses of freedom,” he said. “She can no longer lie to herself. Once she has felt the lash she knows that she is truly a slave. She is convinced. She knows it in her deepest heart. All other options are precluded. She knows what she now is, a slave, only a slave, and is zealous to obey, that she not again be whipped.”
“Please, no, Master!” she cried.
As she twisted, and turned, crying out, helpless in her bonds, weeping, ten strokes of the lash were put upon her.
He then cast the whip aside, and bent to her ankles, freeing them, and then cast her bodily, she gasping and startled, on her back, upon the deep furs which covered the surface of the couch.
“Behold,” he said, “how you are honored, with the very surface of the couch.”
She scrambled to her knees, amidst the furs.
He removed his garments, and joined her upon the couch.
She moved back, away from him, as she could, terrified, on her knees. She pulled futilely at her thonged wrists, fastened behind her.
He motioned that she should make her way toward him, bound, over the soft sea of furs.
She could not move.
He then reached out, and seized the chain locked about her throat, and pulled her to him, across the furs, on her knees. The links of the chain struck against one another. The metal disk on the chain, with its message in three languages, including its pictograph, danced beside his fist.
Then, holding her in place by the left hand, grasped tightly on the chain, he cuffed her four times, palm, back of hand, palm, back of hand.
“A slave is to obey instantly, and unquestioningly,” he informed her.
He then thrust her down, back on the furs.
She looked up at him, frightened, wildly.
He seized her ankles.
“No!” she wept.
Then the slave found herself, for the first time, and as a slave, put to a man’s pleasure.
Later he rebound the ankles of the slave and placed her on the floor, at the foot of the couch. He then fetched a chain from the chest at the side of the chamber, and, with two heavy, metallic snaps, fastened her, by the neck, to the ring fixed in the bottom of the couch.
“In the morning,” he said, “you will be branded.”
“Do not brand me,” she said.
“You are a slave,” he said. “All slaves should be marked. You will be marked.”
“No,” she begged.
“Collars might be removed, or changed,” he said. “I am thinking of the slave rose. It is small, tasteful, and lovely, clear, unmistakable.”
“But all would then know me as a slave,” she said.
“Do you not know you are a slave?” he asked.
“I well know I am a slave,” she said. “It has been taught to me. I have felt the whip.”
“But perhaps you would hope to conceal your slavery?”
Her lip trembled, but she dared not speak.
“Speak,” he said.
“Might not my slavery be a kept a private matter,” she said, “something hidden, a secret?”
“Perhaps,” said he, “on a world which denies the rightfulness of slavery for slaves, even if they need and seek bondage, if there is such a narrow, dismal world, but on better worlds, more open worlds, more tolerant worlds, more honest worlds, it should be proclaimed.”
“But, marked, despite what I might wish, apart from my desires, all would then know me as a slave,” she said.
“Yes,” he said, “all would then know you as a slave.”
“My bondage would be fixed on me,” she said. “It would be what I was, openly, publicly, legally. It would be nonrepudiable!”
“Precisely,” he said.
“I would be property, and goods, forever,” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “You would be known so on all the habitable worlds, the mightiest and smallest, the warmest and the coldest, on the most sophisticated and civilized, on the most savage and barbarous, on habitable worlds anywhere, throughout the galaxies.”
“I fear the brand,” she said.
“Appropriately,” he said.
“I do not wish to be branded,” she said.
“It is quite possible that cattle do not wish to be branded either,” he said.
The slave, helpless in her bonds, her neck fastened by a chain to the ring on a free man’s couch, moaned.
“Many slaves,” he said, “are proud of their bondage. They do not wish to be free women. They pity and despise free women, for the emptiness, the aimlessness, the boredom, the banality, the worthlessness of their lives, for their lack of identity, purpose, and meaning, for their lack of a Master. They welcome and desire the brand. They realize that it is a mark of distinction, that it is an inflicted badge of quality, of specialness, of desirability and beauty. It proclaims them wanted, so wanted that they are owned by men. They are proud of their brands. They have been found worthy of being owned, of being branded.”
“I fear I might be such a woman,” she said.
“Some desire and seek bondage,” he said. “They desire to submit, to be owned, to belong, to love, and serve. They desire to put themselves helplessly at the feet of a man, to be done with as he might please. They are not whole, nor content, until they are at a man’s feet.”
“May I speak, Master?” she said.
“Certainly,” he said.
“Surely you will sell me,” she said.
“In no way that you might expect,” he said.
“I do not understand,” she said.
“A slave need not understand,” he said, “no more than another beast.”
“Please!” she said.
“Recall that you have been a willing tool of cunning, duplicitous Iaachus, collaborating in schemes of deceit and treachery, that you would have killed me, that you, though a slave, were found less than wholly pleasing.”
“What is to be done with me?” she asked.
“I told you,” he said. “I have a special disposition in mind for you.”
“What?” she begged.
“Perhaps,” he said, “you will have preferred to have had your throat cut, or to have been put out for wolves, or to have been cast upon the wire.”
“What, what, Master?” she begged.
“You will see,” he said.
10
“Great Lady,” said Iaachus.
“Loyal servitor,” said Atalana, empress mother.
“It seems,” said he, “that the throne is safe, if but for a time.”
“The schemes of the plotter and pretender, Julian, he of the despicable Aureliani, he with wicked designs upon the throne, have been foiled?”
“One may hope so,” said Iaachus, “at least for the time.”
The empress mother, her frail body tiny amidst the cushions of the throne in her private audience chamber, leaned forward, fixing her small eyes on the lean, narrow-visaged, sable-attired courtier. “Recount to me, dear Iaachus,” said she, “the manner of the falling out of these matters.”
“Some months ago,” said Iaachus, “on a summer world, you will remember that the secret traitor, Julian, approached the throne, petitioning a commission for the barbarian, Ottonius. We deemed it dubious policy at the time to deny so seemingly innocent and trivial a request by one of his importance, one kin even to the mighty emperor. A refusal might have generated curiosity amongst the worlds. Too, such a refusal might have signaled to the schemer that his machinations had been sounded, with the consequence that he might have become even subtler, and more on his guard. Too, he is known amongst the worlds, and respected. To refuse, let alone topple, so popular a figure might engage speculations, even repercussions, inimical to the throne. Accordingly, we granted the commission, pretending not to discern its more remote import, and its place in his plans. We arranged that the commission for the barbarian would be delivered, as though in good faith, to him at his villa on Vellmer, where the barbarian was his guest. We planned carefully, if unsuccessfully. We assigned an agent, Tuvo Ausonius, a civil servant, from Miton, to seemingly transmit the document, it putatively enclosed in a latched case, to be opened by dialing a combination. The case, of course, actually housed an explosive device, which would fire shortly after the dialing of the combination. Julian and the barbarian, Ottonius, would presumably open the case. It was made clear to the agent that it was to be opened only in their presence. We also dispatched an imperial delegation to Vellmer, suitably and officially, that all would be in order, bearing the actual document bestowing the commission. The delegation was to arrive after the detonation of the explosive device, and would then, in seeming surprise, sorrow, and disappointment, return with the then-meaningless document. We anticipated the possibility, of course, that the agent, or the device, might fail us. Accordingly, the delegation, well armed and trained, was to assault the villa and destroy it. Indeed, upon the detonation of the device, the matter was to be assured by an air strike. As it turned out the device, though detonated, failed of its objective, its intended victims having withdrawn in time. Similarly, the air strike failed, given the shielding of the villa, and its weaponry. As planned, given the contingency, the delegation attacked the villa, which attack was withstood. Indeed, not one member of the delegation survived.”