Tuesday, 25 June 2019

Daughter of Gor by Olga Turlovna (Part Ten)


Daughter of Gor

By Olga Turlovna

40 - I do not witness a defeat.

I have read many fictional scrolls about Gor, which usually feature brave warriors; beautiful slave girls; and epic battles. If the life of Aurore unrolled before me like one of these scrolls, after this hiatus in the jungle the story would now benefit from an exciting chapter where I described the fall of the compound of Kurtz to the forces of the Kurii.

Alas, I must report to you that Gorean reality is not always like a scroll.


It would be a foolish warrior who took his weak and unarmed female slave to witness an epic battle. And female warriors – Taluna, are not suited to engage in open combat with trained men, and would not carry their captives to observe events. Women of any kind are better absent for such occasions.

Giani and the grey man are no fools. So although men probably fought bravely on both sides of the conflict between Kurtz’ forces and the Others, and heroes and cowards might both have given accounts worthy of bards and storytellers, I cannot relate anything of these matters in my own narrative.

It is the aftermath of war that our small canoe approaches. I grow more and more emotional as we get closer to the fortifications, halfhope and half-dread at what I may discover within.

The grey man leads in our boat, propelling us through the waters of the lake with strong strokes of his broad shoulders.

Udumi is behind me, also paddling, still in the revealing garb of a forest panther, and I sit in the middle, useless in my shackles.

I must grudgingly respect Udumi’s bravery throughout the execution of her plan. In order to return to Urth, she must risk presenting herself to the agents of the Others and hope they fulfil their part of the bargain.

I am not optimistic for her chances in this gamble. The male agents of the Kurii are well known for exploiting the skills of women, only to reward them for loyalty by making them slaves.

Udumi has rolled her dice in this game, just as I have rolled mine.

When I approach the compound for the second time I study it just as carefully as I did when I first saw it, from my place tied nude to the ship’s prow.

I don’t know what to expect - perhaps to see the compound reduced to ash, but the structure looks entirely unscathed save for a troubling plume of black smoke rising from within.

As we paddle even closer through the tranquil lake, other than noting that the brightly-coloured crossbowmen of Kurtz guarding the log walls have been replaced with black-garbed warriors of the Kurii, the only other change is that the decaying heads of two of those bear-like creatures that were staring out across the lake have been removed.

When we finally pass through the gate I see the maggot-infested things are half-buried in the compound’s rubbish heap, and are surrounded by a cloud of flies. I pity whoever was given the unpleasant task of removing those trophies.

It is the human devastation that betrays the ferocity of the battle that must have occurred here. Bodies are strewn everywhere in the colours of both sides, still too far away to recognise individuals.

I barely notice that the structure of the compound looks entirely undamaged, saved for one building that contained some warriors’ sleeping places. The communal hall is there; the building where slaves were penned; and the storage buildings.

Even the two tall thin punishment cages where I witnessed two of the Taluna left to stand naked for ahn after ahn are still there, swinging slightly in the hot breeze.

My heart jumps as I see my master’s humble hut, standing undisturbed with the curtain still in place, as if he’s merely sleeping inside.

The grey man accelerates, guiding the canoe rapidly across to one of the wharves, and looking round in tense silence we climb quickly out, Udumi and I both urgently needing to check the dead for those we care about.

Frantically I flit from corpse to corpse, scanning these forms, seeing person after person that I recognise. A smashed lute is a marker for the place where one of the musicians fell.

Petrucus, who was once master to my friend Nessa, is face down in a puddle of blood, his features mercifully hidden from view. He looks to have been killed be a clean arrow shot to his back.

Not so lucky Chiron, who has been sliced so deeply across the back of his neck as to be almost decapitated. His head, lolling unnaturally forwards, stares with unseeing eyes out at Gor.

When I first arrived at the compound I had lived in fear of the man lying there, Chiron, but I shall never tremble again at his approach. Rather than the satisfaction I might have expected at seeing the corpse of one who whipped me so often, my feelings are of sadness. He was a great warrior of Gor, for all his faults. Udumi, also has a mixed expression at the demise of her former master.

And it is not just men that have been killed. Slaves are dead as well, either caught in the crossfire between combatants or because they stood by warriors with whom there was a particular attachment. Carrie the dancer will never display her extraordinary skill again, and seeing her lifeless figure pierces my heart.

Rehema who was claimed as slave to Petrucus after Nessa’s departure lies dead with her body draped protectively across his, as if she were the warrior rather than him. Her rump that looked so pleasing lashed to the prow of a longship is thrust into the air, undignified in death.

But I do not see Him. Where is Kurtz?

Anxiously I look around, but there is still no sign of him. And there is no evidence of surviving male prisoners – the Kurii have slaughtered every male they could find, so he is not likely being held captive.

We do not have long to examine the dead when the living demand our attention. Striding about the jetties of the compound it is easy to identify the leader of the Other’s human forces. Here stands a true alpha ruler.

“I have heard of this man. He is known as the Kur’s Claw,” the grey man whispers in my ear, as if reading the direction of my attention, “For they say he acts in union with the will of the beasts.”

Kur’s Claw looks like a beast himself, being a shaggy bearded fellow looking like a half-breed between Kurii and man.

He crosses to us bearing an immense blood-stained sword in one hand that Aurore would struggle to lift in two of hers.

“Tal, you must be the grey one,” he greets in a neutral tone. And with a rather overdone formality he continues, “The agent of the Northeastern Control Group is welcome to the territory of the Southern Control Group,”

The grey man is replying with similarly ornate phrases, but his voice tails off when he realises he has entirely lost Kur’s Claw’s attention.

During my lifetime as a male I came across nothing as likely to bring men to violence as rivalry over women. Best friends can turn to bitter enemies when they lose their minds over the same girl.

For example, I remember back in my army days, Corporals Fletcher and Cooper, two buddies who were like a double act. Fletcher had pretty much saved Cooper’s life when an IED totalled their lightly armoured Land Rover, and Dodds carried the injured Cooper back to base under fire.

They were like brothers until the day back on leave when Fletcher met Jennifer. Jennifer was a dark-haired beauty, blessed with dynamite legs. Both men had been with their share of lookers, but with Jennifer her personality was as beguiling as her looks. She was more like the kind of woman Goreans like, prized for intelligence as well as beauty.

Jennifer got on like a house on fire with both guys, and they liked her. But she could only date one of them, and she chose Fletcher. That decision just ate up Cooper from the inside. When we were all out together I’d see Cooper looking at Jennifer like he was sinking into madness. He stared like he’d be willing to kill Fletcher to get to that woman, and it didn’t take long for Fletcher to realise what was going on.

The ugly ending of all this is not important. I’m recounting the experience because Claw is looking at me the way Cooper looked at that woman, and I know we’re in big trouble. Kur’s Claw wants me like a junkie craves their fix.

“This is her?” he asks, shaking his head as if to clear a daze. “The agent of the Priest Kings? I’d never have believed it.”

Kur’s Claw must know I was once a man then, but he clearly doesn’t care. No, he looks at my body in the flimsy camisk like he doesn’t care at all. I’ve been blissfully unselfconscious about my luscious femininity in the panther camp, but back amongst the men of Gor I suddenly have to re-learn that I’m a woman, and I feel like I’m wearing nowhere near enough.

“You will send this enemy to serve me food and drink tonight,” he says, eyes locked on me like he’s in a trance. “It will give me pleasure to see the agent of the Sardar on her knees before me.”

Claw finally recovers his senses and next he turns to give an order to one of his men, but his eyes still flicker back to me as if he’s unsettled.

“As you wish, dread Ubar,” the grey man says in response to the request, and I am disappointed he makes no effort to protect me. “Your attack looks to have been a success,” he goes on to observe, even admitting defeat by trying to change the subject.

“The weight of numbers was much in our favour, so our losses were light,” agrees Claw while watching my breasts, “although Kurtz still evades us.”

This is the first encouraging news I’ve heard for days, and I try to keep the joy from my face.

“Are you sure he’s here?” the grey one asks.

“The slave girls tell me he was seen just before the attack,” Claw answers, “so we know he is in hiding somewhere close by, perhaps in the reeds or even within the fortifications.”

“Victory is not assured until Kurtz is captured,” the grey man states.

“Indeed,” Claw says. “And I do not intend to underestimate my opponent. But there is a weakness in the Ubar that if necessary, we can exploit.”

“Oh really, what is that?” asks the grey one.

“We have his woman,” says the Kur’s Claw, in a tone that fills me with dread.

41 - A free woman is in the compound

I had grown to accept the constant eyes of men on my female figure, but I realise this was because I lived under the protective umbrella of Kurtz. With the change of administration in the fortified compound, I feel a new sense of vulnerability as I go about my tasks.

It is not to my advantage that by arriving with the grey one, I am seen as the property of an outsider. The grey one is not uniformed, like the other warriors in service of the Kurii, and the simple difference of clothing colour creates a psychological divide between us and them.

The speculation in men’s eyes betrays their thoughts. Perhaps, they speculate, this stranger, the grey one, will leave or be removed, and then his pretty slave will be given to a new master. They look at me and wonder what it would be like to take such a girl as her to their furs.

On the first evening after our return my master absents himself from the meal, held in the same fire-lit communal room where Kurtz received the panthers.

Thus I serve the Kur’s Claw alone, further emphasising the perception I might soon be sexually available to those other than the grey man. They must be wondering if the Claw might claim this girl from the deformed old man, and give her to reward a favoured warrior.

My outfit does nothing to protect me from masculine interest. Unfortunately for the women left in camp, the new regime favour the southern rather than the northern mode of slave dress.

On an oppressively humid tropical night, each one of us slave girls are garbed only in a strip of rep-cloth, tied about the waist with a bow at the left hip.

Mine is barely long enough to cover my pudenda and has a tendency to ride up with my movements, so the occasions when I am required to kneel with my thighs open, in the manner of a slave marked for sexual service, nothing is left to the imagination.

The single waistband of rep-cloth is all we are permitted, so I deliver my evening’s service naked from my hips upwards. Aurore’s glorious breasts are on display to all, the sensation of their free swinging weight making me feel all the more self-conscious.

I have been given such accessories as make me yet more pleasing to men’s eyes.

A jewelled necklace is draped around my throat, this adornment terminating in a heavy pendant that lies in the valley between those pale globes of flesh.

I am not an expert in the Gorean jewellery markets but I would guess this item to be worth a fortune judging by the size of the stones and the weight of the metal resting on my upper torso.

It is very common for the wealthy on Gor to adorn slave girls in expensive jewels. They can advertise the girl’s beauty, drawing the eye to the most pleasing areas of the body and making others more jealous of her owner.

Furthermore jewellery can serve as an additional identifier of ownership to the collar, being a badge that the girl has been dressed according to the wishes of one particular master.

Finally, for those kajirae forced to serve nude or partially clad before other men, jewellery shows that the girl has not been left unclothed because her master is poor, but he has chosen to display her because it pleases him to do so.

My origins as agent of Priest Kings appears to be well known about the compound, judging by the abusive and ribald comments I receive through the evening.

It gives satisfaction to the Claw’s men to see the agent of the enemy humbled, kneeling bare-breasted as she serves the needs of her opponents. No doubt my appearing in so demeaning a way is a boost to their confidence and morale.

The only consolation to me in the evening is the relief I of seeing that some familiar faces have survived the attack.

Ailsa passes me with a huge bowl of vulo eggs propped on her shoulder, clad in a tie of red rep cloth matching my own.

We did not part on the best of terms, as Ailsa had discovered my presence as a slave in the compound was voluntary, and thus the events that led to her own collaring might have been avoided. All the same I sense warmth in the greeting when her eyes briefly meet mine.

Tonight Ailsa has been selected to dance after the meal, so there is a jingle of slave bells as she passes by me.

I am sure it will be a good performance.

Jaya is here as well, and I learn from Jaya that Colleen also survived the attack and is working in the kitchen. Of the four free women captured in the raid on the barge, only Nessa is absent, sold literally down the river before the compound fell.

Snatching a brief conversation with Jaya in the kitchens, I learn that all the female slaves have been moved out the pens and each is assigned to the quarters of a warrior, a reward for his loyalty and courage. The remaining men, mostly the lower ranks, must do without. It is they that look at us with the most hunger.

With so many warriors lacking partners the slave women have a new incentive to please their assigned warriors. A discarded slave might be given over to the use of the frustrated men, and women are outnumbered so completely that gang rape by the lesser males would be a danger to life.

Jaya tells me an additional piece of gossip - the women have not only been moved out of the pens, the building is now entirely forbidden to the slave women, and is being put to some secret purpose. I sincerely hope a live example of the Kurii species is not being hidden there. If there is a beast here that considers human women the best food source, there may be punishments far worse than rape.

Near naked girls hurry anxiously about, but there is one exception to the new female dress code and the women’s general nervousness.

Kneeling on a cushion on the dais next to claw is a woman clad head to foot in the robes of concealment. There is a free woman tolerated in the compound of Kurtz for the first time.

I shouldn’t feel like a tradition has been broken, for her presence can only be a positive result for women’s rights in the Schendi Jungles. And yet the loss of the old regime pains me. This wouldn’t have happened in Kurtz’ day.

“Meat, Mistress,” I say, kneeling to offer this female the plate I am carrying.

The presence of a free woman makes me feel more conscious of my own near nakedness. The heat is making sweat bead on my skin, and when I extend my arms drips form and run down into the valley between my breasts.

Before her only I kneel with my thighs together, the custom on Gor being that women do not want to view the open legs of slave girls.

The free woman takes a piece of tarsk meat and has it almost to her lips when she remembers the veil, as if she is not used to wearing the robes. Raising the lower hem of the covering to insert the meat under the veil, I catch a glimpse of beautiful ebony skin underneath and understand.

It would appear that the Others have actually been true to their words to Udumi. For the time being her gamble is paying off.

She is now free, while my social status continues on its inexorable downwards progress.

When I first arrived on Gor I was the male, sitting as a free warrior while a slave girl knelt to serve me. Then I was humbled in the eyes of Goreans to the body of a free woman, weak and unable to exist without the protection of men. I wore the robes of concealment, just as Udumi is doing now.

Finally I was denied even the status of free woman, being made slave and less than human in the eyes of Goreans. Now I am even lower than I was as slave of Kurtz, with humiliations to be heaped on me as a ridiculed enemy.

I am kajira, an animal, an object, a possession.

It comes as a great relief to Aurore the slave girl when my public degradation is over for the night and the Kur’s Claw dismisses me. I hand back the valuable necklace to him and hurry back to hide in the room of the grey man.

The hour is late but outside the compound is still alive with warriors, moving like ants in another organised search for Kurtz. With the night being pitch black they have to hunt by torchlight. I cannot help but feel some pride at his ingenuity in avoiding detection.

I fold my arms across my chest to hide my nakedness as I move around the wharves and jetties, erect nipples rubbing against my forearms, but the warriors are engrossed and only a few stop to watch me hurry by.

Only one stops to stare, a young man with blonde curls like a cherub who must be on one of his first missions away from home.

Silently I move past him, padding on the balls of my small bare feet to draw as little attention as possible, and in this fashion I scurry with relief through the curtain and into the privacy of the grey man’s quarters.

It turns out he is washing - I have a back view of him as he stands naked in a crude tin bathtub. Unusually wide hips for a man don’t reduce the manliness of buttocks so muscular and toned that a competitive bodybuilder would be proud of them.

Then, sensing my presence only then he spins instinctively, without thinking what he’s doing, and I have a full frontal view of my master naked for the first time.

At first I don’t understand what I’m seeing. Between the grey man’s legs is not the protruding genitals of a man. I’m looking at a woman’s organs, but they appear somehow incomplete. It’s like someone has made a few sketch strokes with a pencil as a prelude to rendering the image of a pudenda, and left those lines on an undoubtedly feminine pelvic shape before the artist moved to another work.

His nipples are also larger and typical on a male, and there is signs of development on his bare chest that is flesh other than pectoral muscle. Surely these are vestigial mammary glands.

When he recognises me he cries out a curse, snatching his robe before him, but I have already seen what I have seen. But what have I seen?

“I don’t understand,” I state, forgetting myself in my confusion. “You have the sex organs of a woman, but on the body of a man. What are you?”

For a moment the grey man is incandescent with rage.

“Curse you, damned kajira,” he swears, face red with anger, and in his fury he lifts a crude pottery water jug and throws it right at me.

I duck just in time and it smashes off the wall behind my head, showering me in water drops and sharp ceramic fragments.

“Damn slave girl,” he shouts again, but his anger is gradually deflating and no more missiles are thrown. Then he sighs, as if defeated, raising a meaty hand to his straggly hair.

“What will this mean, that she knows?” he groans to himself.

I continue to stare in frozen incomprehension as he steps from the tub and wraps that grey robe about his body, hiding his nudity.

“What are you?” I repeat, and then remember my status.

“Forgive my curiosity Master,” I add, but even that seems wrong. “Mistress?” I stammer.

“I suppose it does not matter, that you know, Aurius of London,” the grey one says, tying the robe at his waist. “But if you cannot now deduce the truth I shall be disappointed with you. All the information is before you, like the pieces on the playing board of the great game, and you just have to make the connections.”

The facts make no sense to me, but all the same my mind races through what I know. I consider the amount of information he has about both myself and Kurtz, his awareness of my transition, his familiarity with everything about me, and his own distorted form, as if he were a failed attempt at the same process.

Then I look into his rheumy eyes, and I see some strange familiarity.

“Telisio?” I ask.

“Perhaps you would make a player after all, Aurore,” he says, acknowledging the correctness of my answer.

At first I don’t think to ask why he betrayed us to the enemy.

“How did you come to be like this?” I blurt, still forgetting that it is not the place of a slave to question. But then – this is Telisio. I know this man, both as a free male and a free woman.

“It is a long story,” the grey one says wearily, pouring red wine into a pewter tankard and sitting down to take a long drink before starting to speak.

“You will no doubt vividly remember your arrival in the compound of Kurtz, bound naked to the second prow of his longships,” he begins. “It must have been a shattering experience. That moment was the fulfilment of his plan to test the essence of the slave in females. Did you know he considered every detail of your arrival? Kurtz had even ruled you were not to be first prow – he did not wish you to be overly confident in your own beauty.”

“I always assumed it was because of the wealth and status of Lady Nessa,” I reply.

“I had not seen you nude since the tube at the Nest, so I remember marvelling at your beauty as you struggled in your ropes,” the grey one reminisces. “But I am digressing from my subject. Back then, as Telisio, my greatest loyalty was to Kurtz. When he sank into melancholy, long before your creation, I was desperate to be the instrument of restoring him to greatness.”

“Even so, I would never have accepted the task of planting the idea in the Sardar if it betrayed the interests of Priest Kings. But when Kurtz conceived the plan, the will of The Sardar, the Ubar, and myself coincided. A man must be transformed to a woman, and sent to learn her slavery, and she would be the instrument of delivering Kurtz back to loyal service. You would prove woman’s place as the property of man, and vindicate the Priest Kings.”

“But when you arrived here at our fortifications your rebellion made Kurtz lose his temper and he had you placed in the water cage, the first departure from his careful plan.”

“It was intended that you should glimpse me in the crowd, speeding the breaking of your spirits, but you were moved to the cage too quickly to become aware of my presence, or witness my departure, tasked by the Ubar to travel immediately to Port Schendi and report to the local agent on your successful arrival.”

“It was at the end of my journey when things went even more wrong,” Telisio says. “I was intercepted by a patrol of tarnsmen loyal to the Kurii, not a pasang from my destination in Port Schendi.”

“Normally they would have simply killed a stranger travelling alone, but unfortunately for me I was recognised as one of Kurtz’ highest deputies by a tarnsman turned traitor. They chained me, and after I was stripped and hooded I was removed to a place I know not where. In that Kurii stronghold there was no need for the Others to torture me. I was simply forced to drink a drug that made me disclose all of the truths I knew, so the Kurii learnt of the full plan.”

“It did not take the enemy long to appreciate the potential of the transformation process for their own use. It could be applied both as a means of restoring injured Kurii, and also of exploiting human victims.”

“At the Nest, I had learned much of the technology,” the grey man says, “my inquisitive nature meaning I asked questions throughout your changing.”

“All this was related to the Others in detail, sufficiently so that they were able to speculate on the composition of the chemicals used on you and a Kurii scientist could begin to develop their own prototype.”

“I would have made greater efforts to kill myself before surrendering the information if I had realised they would test the procedure on an expendable human subject before risking it on one of their own. And what could have been more ironic than testing it on the human who betrayed all this information?”

“The results, you see before you. Something went terribly wrong with their attempt to turn me into a female, and I woke not young and beautiful, but as you see me now.”

“My sole consolation had been a belief that the sight of my deformities would cool their interest in using the Priest Kings’ technology, but the Kurii did not accept defeat. They are a tenacious species.”

“The Kur believe there will be fingerprints of the chemicals used in the transformation residing in your body tissues, Aurore. By analysing these traces they can identify the difference between the process used by the Priest Kings, and their own attempts.”

“Body tissues?” I say nervously.

“They formed a new plan,” the grey one says, ignoring my concern, “to seize you, and recover their lost outpost at the same time. I was the ideal instrument to support both these tasks, being familiar with the geography of the fortifications, and able to recognise you.”

“But why are you helping them?” I then ask. “To complete your transformation? Surely you don’t want be a woman on Gor. At least in your current shape you can masquerade as a male. Why help them, only to be rewarded with transformation into something more contemptible?”

“I help them because I no longer have the mental strength to end my own life, and fear of death has taken command of me,” Telisio answers with sad candour. “This body is not stable - it looks powerful but I grow weaker with every day. My organs are steadily breaking down. It is unlikely that I could even overpower you as I did in the tent a few days ago. I have perhaps a month to live, unless I can save myself by enduring the process a second time.”

“I know, Aurore, that it is contemptible to serve the enemy for a chance of life, but my mind has lost its will along with my body. And I betray no-one but myself and you. My failure to report to the Nest meant that one of two dooms would inevitably overcome Kurtz.”

“What difference would your non-return make to Bila-Haruma?” I ask, referring to the other threat on the shores of the lake.

“As another Ubar loyal to Sardar, the Priest Kings stayed his hand while there was hope Kurtz could have been saved,” is the answer. “Telisio’s absence from the Nest will have been interpreted as a sign of both our deaths at Kurtz’ hands. They will unleash military force to restore order in the region.”

“But you could return to the Sardar, now,” I protest, “we could escape together. Priest Kings could repair your body, or even turn you back to a male.”

Telisio shakes her head sadly.

“That too is impossible for me. The Kurii did make one unfortunately successful modification to the process - by implanting some kind of biological restraint to control their victim’s behaviour. I have to ingest a liquid that only they can provide constantly, or I die within hours. They make sure that my supply is insufficient to flee.”

She pauses and says, “I am almost as much of a slave to them as you are, Aurore. If I’d set you free it would have meant the end of my life.”

We are silent for a moment, as she gives me time to absorb this information. Poor Telisio. This war between alien species has ruined his world far more than mine.

“At least your discovery of my gender brings the benefit that you will accept I do not represent a threat to you,” the grey man, correction, the grey woman, says. “You can help preserve the secret.”

“The panthers knew, didn’t they?” I ask, mind racing. “That’s why you were permitted in the camp.”

“I needed to reveal myself to win their trust,” Telisio confirms. “The physician here is also aware – he supplies the potion that sustains my life. But that is all.”

“Kur’s Claw doesn’t know?” I say. It makes me feel nervous that this great secret is out there for him to discover, as if something horrific is closing that I can’t yet discern, but still I sense it.

“He only knows that we are subjects of the process,” the grey one confirms, “not that I was transformed, or damaged so severely. He thinks I was changed into an ageing man. Kurii society is highly factionalised, you know, and so are their agents. The physician and I are under what the Kurii call the North-eastern Control Group. Kur’s Claw and his men are under the Southern Control Group. They are greatly suspicious of us, but courtesies must be observed.”

“This lack of unity is a good thing for humanity – if the Kurii acted as one they would be a far more terrible threat. But here on the ground it means the physician and I are at best tolerated in this place. We must not provoke them into open hostility.”

My fears begin to take solid form.

“You saw the way Kur’s Claw looked at me,” I say, my voice quavering. “If he discovers you’re not strong enough to defend me, he may claim me for his own.”

“I am no longer vigorous enough to protect you in combat, Aurore,” Telisio says, shaking his head. “If he decides to take you for himself, I can do little to prevent it. Between us we must make sure that does not happen. So you will have to submit to his every request to avoid a confrontation, even if that means going to his furs. I’m sorry, but that is how it must be.”

My heart feels like lead, so intense is the sudden loathing horror. The only shield protecting me was the grey man, but that is no shield at all.

“I don’t want to be his pleasure slave,” I plead in a breaking voice. My mind is filled with images of his hands on me, possessing me the way Kurtz did.

“I’m sorry Aurore,” the grey one says again. “This is not the fate you hoped for when you left the Sardar. But as pleasure slave to a human agent you at least escape the fate of those females that are chosen to provide live meat to the beasts.”

Perhaps at that image she draws her cloak tighter, as if she were cold despite the jungle heat, and I study the fit of her garment properly for the first time. I realise it is not a cloak. The grey woman wears the robes of concealment.

“I will be no better than live meat if I have to lie with him,” I moan, and not for the first time I regret the day I agreed to be made a female.
42 - The Kur’s Claw takes measures to find his enemy.

Next morning my prospects do not improve.

The grey woman and I are summoned into the hall, before the throne of the Ubar. There we discover Kur’s Claw is vexed, and he is drumming his powerful fingers on the arm of his chair.

“The enemy, Kurtz still evades me,” he grumbles to the grey one.

“He is a resourceful man,” Telisio observes with a tone of amusement. “But are you sure he is still here?”

“One of the slaves informs me the food stores have been disturbed during the night,” Claw says irritably. “So either one of my men has a nocturnal eating habit, or we have an uninvited guest.”

“I’m not sure how we can help,” Telisio says, unconcerned.

“An incentive must be to draw him out of hiding. The only thing he cares for is his female. Kurtz will not stand by and see his favourite shamed.”

From my place on my knees I look up in anguish at the grey one, clutching his robe in my hand as my pulse rate suddenly leaps with adrenaline.

“Aurore must remain undamaged,” the grey one insists, also starting to show concern now she needs to plead my cause. “You know the physician’s caste needs her for their work.”

Claw looks hungrily at me in a way that makes my skin crawl.

“I do not intend any permanent harm to her,” he sneers, with contempt for me and the grey one. “That would be a waste. But the physicians can obtain the information they require as long as the girl still breathes, and the security of this place is much more important than the wellbeing of a slave.”

“Master, please don’t,” I beg Kur’s Claw. Many weeks of slave training have made me used to humbling myself, and I place my cheek to his heavy boot without regret to plead for his goodwill.

But it is too late. Two warriors are already moving up behind us, their hands on the hilts of their swords. We aren’t going to win this debate.

“You will think me unnecessarily cruel for this action, no doubt,” he says firmly, addressing not me but the grey one standing above me. “But I am convinced the girl’s suffering will draw Kurtz out more quickly.”

“You must do as is necessary,” the grey woman accedes, reading our chances as I do. “But please - no permanent damage.”

“If she is harmed in a way that reduces her value, I will see you are compensated,” he says with chilling coldness.

I lift my head from his boots and straighten up, in time to see from his stony expression that the decision has been made.

Thus only 5 ehn, the Gorean minutes later, I stand on one of the wharves of the compound inside a tall, narrow punishment cage that I last witnessed used on a captive panther girl. It has been temporarily lowered to the ground to facilitate my entry through the hinged gate, but I know they will soon winch me up like I’m in a birdcage.

I am actually feeling a little calmer at my prospects. This will be an ordeal, but it is one I consider merciful compared to my expectations. Kur’s Claw said I would be “shamed”, and that word usually implies rape to the Gorean mind. When the gate is padlocked behind me I almost feel relieved at the relatively safe environment of the cage.

“Pass your hands through the bars in front of you,” I am commanded, and conditioned from long months under the whip, I obey as a reflex, delivering my hands out immediately at the height of Aurore’s stomach.

In this fashion shackles are attached to my wrists, so I cannot withdraw them back through the bars to my body.

I reflect that I should have offered out my hands above my head, which might at least have offered the opportunity to rest, relaxing my thighs and dangling from my wrists, but it is now too late.

Before I can consider my failures any further, there is more devilry.

I am commanded to spread my feet so they can also chain my ankles closely to the outer circumference of the cage, low down where I stand on its base. This opens my legs into an inverted “V”, but to little wider than the width of my shoulders. My feet, trapped apart, search for the most comfortable place on the gridded floor.

The additional restraints seem an unnecessary measure and it was not a punishment applied to the troublesome panther girls, although after several hours unable to shuffle my feet far it may turn out to be a means of torture.

Next the brief skirt of rep-cloth about my waist is torn from me, leaving me naked for this fresh camp of warriors to admire. I don’t enjoy being publicly nude, but again things could be worse. No-one can rape me through these narrow bars.

The grey one stands silently watching the whole time, his hood drawn over his head. Telisio has not raised any objections to their treatment of me, but I detect disapproval in the shape of the shoulders.

Claw, who has also come outside to supervise the proceedings squints into the sky, raising a hand to shield his face. It is going to be an oppressively hot day. This will not be fun.

“We do not wish Kurtz’ girl to be harmed by the sun,” Claw says loudly. This statement is not intended for our ears, but for the benefit of the crowd gathering to witness the spectacle. “Wet her body.”

Two slaves approach me, carrying a heavy looking wooden bucket between them. I see the one on the left is Ailsa, her face anguished, and tears prick my eyes. Chained in place I can do nothing but shut my eyes and mouth as this is pitched towards my face, drenching my front.

Only a second later a second deluge hits me from behind, launched by a second team of slaves.

On my lips I taste iron. Blinking, I look down at my dripping body.

I had been expecting drips of pure water from the lake, but the fluid that coats me is as scarlet as strawberry juice. It’s a runny mix - some dilute solution of blood rather than the pure fluid which would be more viscous. All the same I must look like Carrie from the Stephen King movie.

Why have they coated me in this mess? Is this part of the shaming that the Claw mentioned, or something just to keep me cool?

For a second I panic, thinking that I’ve been prepared for feeding to one of the Kurii, the scent of blood enough to drive the beast into a frenzy.

But it is broad daylight, the Kur’s Claw said I would sustain no permanent harm, and there has been no sign of the alien species being physically present here in the jungle. There must be some other form of ordeal.

“Winch her up,” Claw orders, and one of the warriors cranks a rusty handle to lift the cage.

Suddenly I am off the ground, swinging slightly in the warm breeze. Then the cage begins to rotate as the supporting chain straightens itself, and my view of the fortified compound changes rapidly as it pans round.

Something is definitely different today, apart from this changed viewpoint, but I’m not sure what.

The bloody, smelly fluid is starting to dry already, caking my skin. It will not protect me from the heat for long so I hope they intend to recoat me regularly.

“Kurtz, I know you can hear me,” the Kur’s Claw suddenly roars, so loudly that I jump.

His voice is a little below me now, the floor of my cage being left several feet above the wharf.

“We have your woman,” Claw booms. “Unless you surrender yourself, she will remain therein suffering until the time pleases me to bring her down. When that happens, she will be cleansed and chained, and I will see that she is used by every warrior in the camp, one after another.”

“No!” I cry in desperation, my protest ringing out across the compound in Aurore’s high voice. The grey one is also moving in with hands raised to object, but one of Claw’s deputies blocks his path.

“Or you can remain in hiding, Kurtz, so each man here, as he takes his pleasure from your own girl, will know your cowardice.”

“No!” I cry again, my voice breaking.

Kur’s Claw returns to his usual volume.

“Come friends, we have business to do,” he says, clapping one of the warriors across the shoulders and leading him back towards the communal building.

Another man in service to the Kurii pushes my cage so it moves in a slow pendulum swing. Then he turns his back to me and follows his leader away.

I am distracted from watching their departure by an abrupt piercing pain in my thigh, as if a needle is being injected. I look down and see one of the gigantic jungle mosquitos has settled on my filthy leg, and with its sharp proboscis it is sucking my blood.

Instinct makes me want to swat it away and I reflexively attempt to do so, but the chains prevent me with a loud clang.

Then I understand the purpose of dousing me in blood. I also understand what is unusual in my view of the compound today.

The smoking braziers that keep away the insects have not been lit.

43 - The Second Ordeal of the Cage

Many years ago, when I was still a man living on Earth, I read in a Scottish history book that a medieval punishment was to stake criminals out naked, in a fashion where they were unable to protect their bodies.

Then the midges, a type of bloodsucking parasitic insect that plague the country, would gather to feast on the defenceless victim without interruption.

Although midge bites can certainly be irritating, at the time it seemed an innocuous form of punishment compared to some of the brutal measures used in the middle ages.

In the cage I realise the error of this assumption.

Under the baking jungle sun the insects torment me relentlessly and without mercy. The itching bites drive me crazy.

Every inch of Aurore’s lustrous skin seems vulnerable to attack, but they seem to take a perverse delight in targeting my erogenous zones. By shaking my head vigorously I can protect my face, my blood-matted hair lashing like a whip, but with my limbs chained there is little I can do to defend the rest of my body.

The sinister purpose of chaining my ankles apart becomes clear when a mosquito bites the sensitive fleshy lips at the apex of my thighs.

Priest Kings, no, I think, I can’t close my legs.

If I could squat down I might be able bring in my knees enough to conceal my most intimate entrance, but the narrow cage prevents me from doing any more than bend my legs. And the bugs are not my only torture.

Under the backing sun I feel my temperature begin to climb, until I descent into a fevered delirium where each minute seems like an eternity.

I start to see things that may or may not be real. One example is when the gate leading out to the ground behind the compound is opened, and through this gate enters a silent precession of the black clothed warriors.

A large and apparently heavy object is carried into the camp, the size of a wardrobe. It is wrapped in cloth to disguise its exact nature, and in my delirium the men bear it on their shoulders look like pallbearers carrying a coffin.

This object is taken not to one of the storage warehouses, but to the forbidden building that was once the slave pens. A man in the robes of the physicians answers the heavy door of the pens, and the coffin is carefully manoeuvred inside.

Please don’t let it be holding a Kur, I beg.

Periodically I am given water, by means of a soaked sponge affixed to a pole and lifted up through my bars, and each time it is offered I drink with desperate gratitude.

At the times I am rehydrated the world grows a little more real, and I see the compound with more certainty. I notice that Ailsa is the slave given the task of watering me.

“I’m sorry, Aurore,” she whispers through the bars on one visit. “I didn’t want to throw the blood over you, but I would have shared your punishment if I do not follow orders.”

It comforts me to receive kindness from Ailsa, but the former Ubar’s slave has few allies among the jealous kajirae. Others spin my cage as they pass, so the panorama of the compound races crazily past in my view – building, building, wall, ship, building, rubbish pile, wharves, gate, lake, walls.

The warriors too have their sport with me, jabbing the soles of my feet through the cage floor with weapons to make me dance, and taunting me with the prospects that await me when I’m given to their use.

The young warrior with the angelic blonde curls stands and watches me for some time and seems about to speak, but then he frowns to himself and walks away.

All in all it is not the best day I spend as Aurore of the Sardar.

In the afternoon the inevitable rain forest clouds form overhead. I watch them gather through the bars above my head. There is little change in the temperature and the humidity seems to climb even further, but it is a merciful relief being out of the direct sun.

The downside of this change is that I am less occupied by the delirium, and I have more time to contemplate my situation.

The perfect skin that was so carefully created for Aurore of the Sardar is covered with red insect bites. They itch terribly, but there are only a few areas I can scratch by rubbing myself against the bars of the cage.

The only consolation I can take from being disfigured like a victim of dar kosis is that in this state I might deter the passions of some of the men, if the Kur’s Claw does indeed give me to the whole camp.

I am sick with dread at the second humiliation that will happen if Kurtz does not appear to surrender himself.

It would be better to die in this cage before enduring the ordeal of being used by every single man, and I do actually look around me to see if there is some way I can strangle myself with my own chains, but my arms are still trapped by my wrists shackled outside the bars.

It is when night is falling that my cage pauses its spinning to leave me looking down at the robed figure of Udumi. Her big dark eyes, the only part of her body I can see through the rectangular opening of her robes, wear an expression of pity.

“It is time to say farewell, Aurore of the Sardar,” she says with grave formality. “I do not think we will meet again. My destiny is to return to my home, whereas yours is to be a slave girl of Gor, giving pleasure to men.”

She turns from me, and in the company of two warriors waits at the back gate of the compound. As if her departure is about trigger some coming apocalypse, there is a theatrical rumble of thunder from overhead.

Only ten ehn, the Gorean minutes later, the sky has grown completely black. Men and slaves rush round lighting lamps around the wharves, and the back gate opens. I watch as Udumi passes outside with her escort, probably to leave my life forever. She will be going to a ship, at the landing site by old Kurii feeding place. If the Kurii are true to their word she will board that ship and they will return her to Urth.

I conjecture that fearing intervention by the Priest Kings, the Others will have waited for the cover of complete darkness to make their landing. In this case they have timed their visit particularly well, for the impending storm could disguise anything.

A spectacular flash of lighting illuminates the rolling clouds for a moment. There must be a risk of my cage being struck by a bolt, but I do not fear it. It would be a fast and merciful death compared with what awaits when the cage is lowered to the ground.

Five ehn later there is more lightning with a thunder crack like a whip, and then a gradual increase in the volume of noises that I realise are truly the sounds of whips.

Through the still-open rear gate passes a coffle of nude women, each one beautiful. The slave chain links them from throat to throat, but the girls’ wrists and ankles are also in shackles. Are these real or a fevered delusion of my imagination?

These unlucky captives hurry to evade brutal lashings from their slave drivers. They pass close by to my cage and one of them looks up at me in horror, before screaming and babbling in a language that sounds like Japanese.

I must look quite a fright if the sight of me can reduce women to screaming.

I recognise another language used as German, before its speaker is lashed into silence. The girl looks as if she wants to protest further, but I hope for her sake she does not. She is a slave now, and must learn only to speak when her owners wish her to do so.

The line of naked women are not directed to the forbidden slave pens, but are driven straight onto one of the wooden sailing ships. Perhaps they are to be taken to a more suitable training facility before being sold, or perhaps they go immediately to one of the markets of Gor.

I feel every sympathy with these unlucky females, and then remember despondently that their fate will be no worse than mine. A couple of them I would have judged as rivalling Aurore in beauty, and with my chance of return to the Sardar gone I too am no better than one of the many Earth women lost forever into slavery on an alien world.

My spirits sink, and when the clouds break and it starts to downpour my body seems to surrender to the rigours of my ordeal.

I grow cold and begin to shiver, even though I know it is a hot night, the tropical rain is warm and I should feel fine. My legs and buttocks are starting to tremble, tired from a day standing in the same position. I flex my knees, attempting to find a position where I can wedge myself against the sides of the cage to rest, but there’s no position that’s not desperately uncomfortable.

I want to cry now, but how bad will I feel if I stand for days?

Aurore’s long hair is soaked through by the pouring rain, darkening it almost to maroon, and it clings heavily to my skin, reaching down almost to the base of my spine. Everyone that is at liberty has gone inside to escape the weather. The outdoors of the fortified compound is almost deserted, save for a token couple of warriors standing hunched as they guard the walls.

Even the sounds of jungle animals have ceased, but the ceaseless drumming of the night time rain makes up for the loss.

A gust of wind makes my cage rotate lazily on its axis, until I face the heap of rotten vegetation and those Kurii heads. I can barely see them in the dark, with only the outlines visible against an even deeper blackness.

Then I scream with insane terror as one of the heads rears up out of the fetid heap. It’s impossible, the beasts are dead. Kurii are mortal – they do not regenerate, but there the monster stands.

When it starts to move towards me, uncomprehending I scream again, thinking that somehow the plans to feed on me. Kur’s Claw does not intend me for his men. I am to be devoured alive.

The head falls to the side as if someone has decapitated it for a second time, but the remaining body still comes for me like a ravenous zombie. When it breaks into a stripe of light from the light I see the horror’s two glinting eyes and only then does it takes on a more human shape.

Kurtz, it is Kurtz. He’s covered in filth and is camouflaged on diagonal black stripes that make him like a human zebra, but it is Kurtz. He is carrying a blowpipe, one of the weapons used by native hunters in the local villages.

My surge of hysterical relief abruptly returns to greater terror, when he lifts his weapon and points it straight at me.

“What are you doing?” I scream in incomprehension and fear. This afternoon I was wishing I could take my own life, but instinct still makes me cry out for self-preservation.

Kurtz’ cheeks distort only for a fraction of a second and there is a sharp wasp sting in my thigh, no worse than the piercing insect bites, just above the mark that will forever show I was once his slave.

A dart is embedded in the once perfect flesh of my leg. It’s an inconsequentially small thing, really, but the pain from the injection has not faded quickly as it should. It’s not fading at all – it feels like there’s a white hot needle in me.

My eyes look up from the dart to meet those of my lover, and I understand.

Kurtz thinks like a true Ubar. Rather than be made vulnerable by his concern for me; rather than have me suffer because of my association with him; rather than have any other man touch the property that is his, he will take the initiative and kill me himself.

“Seize him,” commands the voice of Kur’s Claw from close by, and suddenly from the apparently empty rain soaked wharves of the compound, warriors are all around us. This must have been a trap. They have been watching all night for him to make his move.

“Run!” I scream to my Master, concerned for him even though he’s my thigh blazes with pain and he’s just killed me.

But the Ubar stands limply as the black clad warriors fall upon him, and I scream again as I see him in their hands.

When I know all is lost, a sense of lassitude fills me.

Although I know for sure I will not live to see his fate, I feel strangely calm as I face death. I regret only the terrible pain that will mark my final moments.

My whole leg is on fire, as if I’m being branded a second time, and it spreads through my body like blaze has been lit under my cage to burn me as a witch.

Soon the pain is too bad to hold back from crying out to the world.

“Get her out, get her out,” a male voice is commanding and when I look at the speaker I am surprised to hear such anxiety in the voice of Kur’s Claw. “Summon the physician.”

Agony such as this has to be mortal, however. When I’m screaming like I’ve been plunged into the sun, the fade-to-black oblivion comes as the sweetest relief.



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