“True,” said another.
I wanted to express my gratitude, my elation, at their words. I wanted to ask them a thousand questions!
“May I speak, may I speak?” I begged.
“No,’ I was told.
So I was silent.
a bar then rang out, which summoned us again to our training.
I was jealous that the free woman was along with the guard, but I had no fear that he would bother her. It was not as though she were a slave, alone with him, naked, in her collar, who might be simply thrown back against the bars, and lifted up, and then, her feet off the ground, her back against the bars, made use of, for her major purpose, the pleasure of a master.
We were then marched to the training room, our hands clasped behind the back of our necks. This lifts the breasts and allows us to feel the collar.
I had had my first experience of the warfare between the free woman and the slave girl.
I would not forget it.
As I had reached the count of one thousand I rose and went to the bars, and looked out. I could see nothing much different from before, the mountains, the ledge, the clouds.
I picked up the food and water bowls, each replenished, the one, to my pleasure, even to three tiny pieces of dried fruit, called a larma, and put them in their place, to the left, at the back of the cell. I then, too, took the wastes vessel, now cleaned, and put it back, and to the right. I had speculated, by the sounds I had heard, that there had been two carts outside the bars, one of which followed the other, the wastes cart coming first, the food-and-water cart second. I supposed, but I did not know, that there were two women involved with the carts, one for each. I had heard, of course, only one woman, and, for most practical purposes, had only heard her once, when, unseen, she had issued my directives. To be sure, she did speak, in response to a pleading question from me on the day following her issuance of my directives, as I lay in the position indicated, facing the back of the cell, one additional word, “No.” I did not know whether or not there was a man in the vicinity. I supposed that there might be, as the bars had been lifted easily. I had tried the bars some days ago, to lift them even an inch or so, before they would strike the bolt, or locking device, but had been unable to do so. The beast, that with six legs, had lifted them with its snout some three or four inches before they had struck the bolt or locking device. The strength of two women, combined, did not seem to me likely to be able to accomplish the task, or, at any rate, as smoothly as it had been done. To be sure, there might be a lever or some such device outside which was unknown to me which would have put the task within even my strength, unaided. Perhaps, too, there was some way in which weights could be engaged from the outside, by means of which the task could be easily accomplished. One would not then need the strength of a man, or of the titanic beast I had seen. But I had not heard the use of such a lever, or the specific engagement of such weights. Another reason I thought there might be a man about is that the authority accorded to women usually derives from men and, in the final analysis, is backed by men. Too, might not two women such as I, performing their lowly labors, be being supervised by a man? Perhaps they were even chained to their carts. I might thrust aside a woman or women, but it was unlikely I could accomplish this with a man, nor was it likely I could elude a man, as my body, for whatever reason, had not been designed by nature to permit this, nor was it likely that I could hope to escape his grip once it had closed on me. To be sure, on the ledge, in the vicinity of the cells, perhaps there was no need of the actual presence of men. Where would one go? And there was the beast. And men would be somewhere.
I went back to the bars, to look out.
I still did not know if I might use my hands to feed myself. That information had not been included in what might count as my “orientation,” that issued to me on the morning after my first night in the cell. Indeed, my “orientation” had consisted only in directives, and a spelling out, so to speak, of the rules of my incarceration. On the second day, lying prone on the floor, arms and legs spread, facing the back, I had begged permission to speak. There were so many things I wanted to know, where I was, and such, not just such small things as whether or not I might use my hands to feed myself. “May I speak?” I begged. “No,” I had been told. So then I must be silent. I had been told “No,” in no uncertain terms. She who had spoken then, I had gathered, did have severe authority over me. I must obey her, as though she might be a man. Behind her, you see, would be the power of such, the power of men.
I stood behind the bars.
As you have doubtless gathered by now, one such as I is usually expected to request permission to speak, before being allowed to speak, and, as you may also have gathered, this permission is not always forthcoming.
In such a case, of course, one must remain silent.
This homely device is, of course, a great convenience to the master, and, too, of course, there are very few things which so clearly help us to keep in mind our condition.
This was now my fifth day in the cell.
At various times in the past days I had seen one or more of the gigantic birds, coming or going, aflight over the valley between my location and the mountains in the distance. Sometimes there seemed great speed in the flights, moving to the left, at other times the birds smote the air with leisurely precision. Sometimes formations left the area. Twice I had heard drums and rushed to the bars to see perhaps twenty such winged monsters aflight, the second stroke of wings keeping the cadence of the drums. Once, a large formation, consisting of perhaps two hundred such creatures, wheeled about in diverse aerial maneuvers, sometimes in abrupt, breath-taking turns, and ascents and descents, sometimes breaking into smaller groups and then reuniting, as though converging on aerial prey, to piercing whistles, and sometimes in more sedate, stately evolutions, responsive to an almost ceremonial skirl of shrill pipes. It was then as though there were a parade ground in the sky itself. Sometimes I would see birds leaving or returning to whose harness were slung baskets, sometimes open, sometimes closed. I did not doubt but what I had been brought here in such a conveyance. Too, of course, I could not but wonder if others such as I, coming and going, might be cargo in such containers. Once I saw some ten birds returning in straggling formation, some struggling to remain aflight. Some riders drooped in the saddles. Others, bandaged, seemed clearly wounded. Some were tied upright in the saddle, proudly unwilling, perhaps, to bow to exhaustion or wounds. On some birds there were two riders. Some of these men lacked weapons, helmets and shields. I could see the long hair of some of them, flying in the wind.
What manner of place could this be, I wondered. Perhaps there was agriculture in the valley below, which I could not see. Perhaps there was grazing there, and herding. Perhaps animals could be kept there, down in the valley, or even back among the mountains, in lofty, remote meadows, in which summer pasturage might be found. But what I could see from the cell suggested to me that the economy of this place exceeded what might be attributed to the pastoral simplicities of the herdsman and the bucolic labors of the tiller of the soil. More than once, sometimes in twos and threes, sometimes in tens and twenties, I had seen riders returning with bulging saddle bags, and sacks tied behind the saddle, and about the pommels, and with golden vessels, and candelabra, flashing in the light, slung from the saddles on cords. Sometimes, too, they returned with items of a different sort, living, luscious, excellently curved, stripped items, tied at the sides of the saddles, fastened there hand and foot to rings, or, literally, thrown over the saddle itself, belly up, there hands fastened back over their heads and down to a ring on the left side of the saddle, their feet fastened to a ring on the right side of the saddle. I was exceedingly excited by the sight of these captures. I wondered how many would be kept, and how many would be disposed of, doubtless like the gold and silver, in various markets. I wondered how man were women such as I and how many might, perhaps only days ago, have worn the heavy, complex, gorgeous, ornate robes and veils of the free women of this world. In a tunic such as mine, and branded, and subject to the whip, I did not doubt but what the latter would find that a considerable change had occurred in their life. Stripped as they were, the lot of them, the men would have little difficulty in assessing their quality. I wondered how the former free women might feel, for I assumed there must be some such among them. Some perhaps might be humiliated to learn that their objective value was now less than that of some of the women whom they had previously despised, of which sort they were now only another specimen. And some, perhaps, might be disconcerted to find that they now actually possessed an objective value, and one exceeding, on the same terms, and in the same dimension, at least some of those whom they had formerly regarded with such contempt. But I did not think that they would object to learning that they might have value. They were, after all, women. I bit my lip, wondering how I might compare with them. We might all, you see, be stood by a wall, and assessed. On my old world, you see, I had been priceless, so to speak, and thus worth nothing. On this world, on the other hand, I knew that I had a value, a particular practical value, based on what men would pay for me. This value, of course, as I recognized, would be likely to fluctuate with various market conditions.