"Why do you ask?" she asked.
"Nothing," I said.
She looked at me. She squirmed a little. Then she whimpered.
"You may beg explicitly," I said.
"Please touch me," she said.
"Very well," I said.
"Not on my nose!" she said.
"Oh," I said.
"Yes," she said, suddenly. "Yes!"
I then, after having let her subside for a time, indeed, even languish, judging by her whimper, began, she, eyes closed, moaning with gratitude, to lift her up again, toward flowers and treetops.
I then desisted.
She looked up at me. "Please continue," she said.
"You are bound," I said. "Please, more," she said. I regarded her. "Please," she said.
"Perhaps you can free your hands," I said.
"No," she said, "I cannot." "Try," I said.
She fought to free her hands. She was unsuccessful.
"I am at your mercy," she said, lifting her body. "Please, more."
"Very well," I said.
"Yes!" she wept, joyously.
I then began to stoke and build, so to speak, and then, gently, to fan the fires in her belly.
"Where are you taking me?" she begged.
"Somewhere, I suspect," I said, "where you have not been before."
"Take me there, my captor," she wept. "Force me there! If I dally, whip me!"
Moment by moment, touch by touch, she ascended higher and higher. I myself marveled, for my own contribution to this, at least to my own mind, was negligible. To be sure, I had put her in bonds and was forcing her through her paces. But even so, to my mind, I was doing very little. All, or almost all, of this glorious responsiveness was somehow within her. Women as a whole, given a little patience, are marvelously sexually responsive. It is well worth waiting for them. One will not be disappointed. But this one seemed unusually so. Her reflexes were almost as instantly activatable as those of a female slave, most of whom, in virtue of their condition and training, juice readily, often at so little as a glance or a snapping of fingers. If she was this responsive as a free woman it was interesting to consider what she might be like if she were a slave. She would be, at the very least, particularly at the mercy of men.
"You are a feast, Ina," I said.
Her eyes were closed. She was utterly beautiful, being ravished in the thralldom of her needs.
"And that is why it is," I said, "that I will put you in two slave strips."
She opened her eyes.
"It will be little enough to conceal you," I said, "but it may be enough."
"I do not understand," she gasped.
"Otherwise it would be much like carrying a tray of steaming, roasted viands into a yard of trained, but starved sleen."
"What are you saying?" she asked, twisting in the sand.
"One could scarcely blame them if they leaped forward with ravenous ferocity and devoured them on the spot."
"I do not understand," she said.
"I am speaking of the difficulty of practicing restraint in the presence of objects of incredible desirability," I said, "even on the part of trained beasts, particularly under certain conditions."
She looked at me, frightened.
"To be sure," I said, "one might always fling the viands to the beasts, that they might feed. That, undoubtedly, sooner or later, is best."
"An object of incredible desirability?" she said, falteringly.
"You, my dear Ina," I said, "as lately you have become."
"No," she said. "No!"
"But, yes," I said. "Observe." I then touched her a little, making her squirm and leap.
"See?" I said.
She thrashed in the sand, wild protest in her eyes, but unable to help herself.
"And you are beautiful, too," I said.
"Oh!" she wept, touched.
"Wait until they see how you respond," I said.
"No, no!" she said.
"To be sure," I said, "you are not a female slave."
"No, no!" she said.
"But there do not seem to be any of them about," I said. "So you will have to do."
"Please, no, my captor!" she begged.
"The fellows from Ar need help," I said. "I am not keen on this, you understand, but I really think they will be in a rather bad way if someone doesn't lend them a hand."
"You cannot be serious," she said. "Oh!"
"I am very serious," I said, "though I am somewhat reluctant to admit it."
"What of me?" she asked.
"You, my dear," I said, "will be a mute rence girl."
"A rence girl!" she said, half rearing up.
"Yes," I said. "It will make sense to the fellows of Ar that I may have picked up a rence girl in the delta, particularly one as pretty as you are. That will be understandable. What fellow, the opportunity conveniently affording itself, would not do the same? Too, you are not branded, so that will fit in with such a story. As you are not marked, it would be highly unlikely I could palm you off as a slave. Who would believe it? On the other hand, who would expect a rencer captive to be branded, at least until one got as far as an iron. Too, given what I told our friend, Plenius, the fellow I saved from the sand, my former keeper, they will be unlikely to associate you with the Lady Ina. They will believe that she was taken by rencers and presumably done away with, or possibly enslaved. You should not be in much danger, really. At least I hope not. Remember that they have never seen the face of the Lady Ina, not fully, for she was always veiled when in their vicinity. Too, as you have been under discipline, and will continue to be kept under discipline, I do not think you are likely to be betrayed by the arrogance or mannerisms of a free woman. For example, you may not be aware of this but you now carry yourself, and move, differently from what you did before. Everything about you now is much softer and more beautiful than it was. Indeed, frankly, I do not know if you could go back to being a free woman, at least of the sort you were. That I fear, for better or for worse, is now behind you."
"It seems you have thought these matters through in some detail," she said.
"Too," I said, "I shall call you 'Ina'."
"Is that wise?" she asked.
"I think so," I said. "I think the men of Ar, remembering that the Lady Ina was somewhat rude to me in one of their camps, will see this as a rich joke, giving her name to a lowly rence girl. But also, if they grow suspicious of you, I want it to be very natural that you would promptly, and without thought, answer to the name of 'Ina'. It might surely provoke suspicion if you were supposedly, say, Feize or Yasmine, or Nancy or Jane, and you answered to the name of 'Ina'."
"You speak of me as though I might be a sleen," she said, " 'answering to a name'."
"You are a captive," I reminded her.
"True," she said.
"Also," I said, "I like the name 'Ina' for you. 'Ina' is an excellent name for you!"
"Is that supposed to be flattering?" she asked.
I looked at her. I considered what she might look like in a collar, and chains. "Yes," I said. I wondered if she knew that 'Ina' was a common slave name.
"And I am to be mute?" she said.
"I think that is in our best interests," I said. "If you are a simple rence girl, we cannot very well have you speaking with the accents of a cultured lady of Ar."
"I suppose not," she said, grudgingly.
"There is nothing personal in. this," I said. "You have a lovely accent. I am fond of hearing it. Indeed, I am particularly fond of hearing it in female slaves."
"Slaves!"
"But you, of course, are a free woman."
"Yes!" she said.
"There are many lovely accents, of course," I said, "for example, those of Tuna and Cos."
"Particularly in female slaves," she said.
"Yes," I said.
She pulled a little at her wrists, futilely.