The Lady Constanzia, now that I was gagged, loosened the leash at the ring, so that my head was no longer bound back tightly to the ring. I might now sit at the ring, or kneel near it, or even lie beneath it.
“Do not go away, Janice,” she said. “I love you!” She then kissed me and arose, and beamed down on me, she with her hand on the arm of the scarlet-clad fellow. “We are going to have a wonderful day in the city!” she said. “We are going to go everywhere! We are going to see everything! We are going to eat! I will bring you back something, if he permits me.”
I looked up at them.
“It would be nice if you could come along,” she said, “only that that would not really be nice. I want to be alone with him. We would rather be together, alone. You understand.”
She then kissed her finger tips and touched the side of my face.
“You will stay here now, and wait for us, won’t you, Janice?” she said.
I looked up at her.
Then I shrank back, for I saw a sudden sternness in the eyes of the male.
Swiftly I whimpered once, in affirmation. I knew the signals. Had my response been quick enough? I saw him draw back his hand.
“No, do not strike her!” cried the Lady Constanzia. “She is my friend!”
He then, angrily, took the Lady Constanzia by the hair and bent her backwards, exhibiting the bow of her beauty. She winced, crying out with pain. “Master will do, of course, as he pleases!” she cried. “Forgive me, Master! But I beg you not to hurt her, for she is my friend.” He released her hair and she knelt before him and seized his leg, looking up at him. “Please do not hurt her,” she begged.
He looked at me. “Do you beg forgiveness?” he asked.
Quickly I whimpered once, and put my head down to the stones.
“And you,” he asked, addressing himself to the Lady Constanzia, “do you beg forgiveness?”
“Yes, Master,” she said.
When I looked up, I saw her kissing his feet. This startled me, as it was the first time I had seen the Lady Constanzia at a man’s feet thusly. How fervently, how humbly, how submissively, she kissed his feet! Did she think he was her master? Did she not recollect that she was a free woman? How like a slave she looked at his feet, how like a beautiful, submissive slave!
“You are both forgiven,” he said.
“Thank you, Master!” breathed the Lady Constanzia. He then turned about.
She leaped to her feet, to run beside hi.
“Do you not know how to heel a man?” he asked.
Instantly she knelt.
“You need whip-training,” he said.
“I would,” she said, softly, “that you were my master, and would whip-train me!”
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing, Master,” she whispered.
“Is there no word as to when you will be put up for sale?” he asked.
“No, Master,” she whispered.
His eyes clouded. I doubted that he could long remain in the city.
Then he said, “Let us enjoy the day.”
She leaped up, and kept her distance, waiting for him to turn about, that she might heel him.
He put out his hand to her, gently. “You may heel me another day,” he said. “Today, come, walk with me.”
Eagerly then, happily then, she took his arm. He seemed tall and stalwart, she, beside him, so small, so soft, so lovely.
Then they began to cross the terrace, together, she looked up at him, her hand on his arm.
Few paid them any attention. They might have been merely a master and his slave.
I knelt at the ring and watched them go.
The lock gag was not really uncomfortable. It had, of course, been put on me tightly, effectively. The fellow apparently knew how to do such things. It had not been put on me cruelly, then, nor in such a way as to hurt me. It had been put on me in the usual way such a device is put on a slave-not cruelly, nor in such a way as to hurt her, but simply that a snug, tight, perfect efficiency.
I had worn one once before, in the pens.
It was the same.
To be sure there are few things that so convince a woman of her helplessness than to be gagged. The blindfold is another such device, of course. Imagine the helplessness, dear reader, should there ever be such, of this account, of being gagged and blindfolded, and bound. You might then have some sense as to what it might be to be in the power of others, to be as a slave.
Such terrors are not that unusual in a slave. They are useful in her control and domination.
I was muchly bared. I wore two rags. By means of one of these my breasts were haltered high. The other, skirtlike, open on the left, was tied about my waist. My wrists were braceleted behind me. I was chained by the neck to the slave ring.
I watched the scarlet-clad figure and the Lady Constanzia growing smaller, across the terrace. She was exquisite, and, in the past days, had become extremely feminine. It was as though she was discovering herself, and blossoming. She had been learning that men and women were not the same, but extremely different. They are not identicals, but complements. Each sex can be fulfilled only in so far as it becomes true, and honestly and fully true, to its own self. I wondered if the pit master knew what he was doing, letting the Lady Constanzia go free in the city. I watched her figure, tiny now, across the terrace. She wore a brief, modest slave tunic. It was her only garment. It had no nether closure. I did not think that the scarlet-clad figure, who seemed a man of honor, as seem most Gorean males, would take advantage of the lovely, slavelike creature. Indeed, I suspected that it might be he and not she who would be forced to impose fierce constraints upon himself. I suspected that it might be he who would be forced to resist the please, and offerings, of a woman who, it seemed, at his feet, could be only a slave. I trusted the Lady Constanzia, you see, less than I did him. He was, I thought, the sort of man who would not, without permission, make use of another’s slave. Could he resist the love in her eyes, I wondered, the trembling of her body, so ready for the collar? He might have to cry out with rage, and cuff her from him, or spurn her away, she sobbing, with his foot. In any event, I was pleased that she had had slave wine. But what did I know of these things? Perhaps it was his plan to abduct her, as a slave bauble. Perhaps she would find herself gagged and bound, and held tightly in a closed slave sack. But could he get her out of the city? I doubted it. This was no ordinary city. But would they try to run away together? Was that their plan? What would be the case when we did not return to the depths at the proper time, the fifteenth bar? Was this the meaning of the lock gag, that I might be found here after curfew, and even then would be unable, until the gag was removed, to furnish information? But I did not think they would try to escape. He would surely realize the control of the tarns, the surveillance, the dangers of the mountains. It did not seem likely that any, alone, could survive in them. And if he cared for her, would he risk her, even in an abduction? The quarrels of pursuers might slay her as easily as him. But did she wish, herself, to elude him, and attempt to escape? I did not think so. She was no longer as naive as she had been. Surely she now understood the meaning of her skimpy garment, the significance of the collar on her neck. She had acknowledged to the pit master this morning that she was “as a slave girl.” She would know then that there could be no escape for such as she. But an even stronger chain held her, I thought, the growth of her softness, of her femininity, of her desire to serve, of her need for love, the dawning of her very self consciousness, the coming to understand what she truly was, should be, and wanted. Wherever she was, she would now understand what she was. She had come to understand that she was the sort of woman whose it was to ascend the slave block, humbly, barefoot, and stand there, and be bid upon.