"Are they not pretty?" she asked.

"Yes," I said.

I regarded the slaves.

They knelt before me, in the half darkness, in a line. They had been well positioned. Their collars glinted, the steel reflecting the dim, reddish light of the tiny lamps. Their (pg. 320) flesh, too, that of offerings of the house, so cheaply available, revealed the effects of this same dim illumination. The free woman, Ludmilla proprietress of this establishment, and of several others on the street, had some concept, it seemed, as to at least one way in which female slaves might be presented before men. One does not, of course, buy a woman in such light. Preferably one considers them in strong light with great care. Indeed, preferably one does not put out any money until one has carefully examined every inch of her fair body. Even girls who are to be auctioned are commonly available, in exposition cages or display spaces, and sometimes for handling, for inspection before a sale, that one may determine whether or not he wishes to make a bid, and, also, of course, how high he might be willing to go to acquire her.

The woman turned about, and, lifting her whip, signaled to the musicians at the right side of the room. They began to play. She then cracked the whip again and the slaves sprang to their feet and began to dance before me, as only slaves can dance before men.

"How meaningless they are," laughed the free woman.

How incredibly meaningful, how explosively and thunderingly meaningful, how devastatingly meaningful, how momentously significant they were, these females of my species, presenting themselves before me in the modalities incumbent upon them, modalities constituting civilized and delicious refinements of relationships instituted and determined eons ago by nature, modalities which will always, in one way or another, in one nomenclature or another, be required of beautiful women by strong men, modalities most simply and directly though of, and most honestly thought of, as those of slave and master. One of the glories of the Gorean culture is that it has a body of law, sanctioned by tradition and mercilessly enforced, pertaining, without evasion or subterfuge, to this relationship.

"Yartel," said the woman, motioning to one of the girls who then, obediently, moved forward, writhing before me. She was a short-legged, creamy-skinned, voluptuous blonde. One difference between Gorean sexual tastes and those of earth, I might mention, is that Gorean sexual tastes, at least (pg. 321) in my opinion, are much broader and more tolerant than those of Earth, or at least of Western Civilization, and tend to run toward the statistical norms of the human female. For example, many women on Earth who are implicitly taught by their culture, for example, through pictures and accounts, that they do not fulfill culturally approved stereotypes of feminine desirability and beauty, might discover, presumably to their horror, that they would bring a high price in a Gorean slave market. If they should have any lingering doubts about the matter, and think perhaps to escape a discipline more appropriately applied to "true beauties," because they do not regard themselves as such, their delusions are likely to be dispelled under their master's whip. Also, although I suppose the matter is neither here nor there, Goreans also tend to prize women for such things as their intelligence, emotional depth, charm and personality. It is a pleasure to own such a female.

The most fundamental property prized by Goreans in women, I suppose, though little is said about it, is her need for love, and her capacity for love. How much does she need love? And how deep and loving is she? That is the kind of woman a man wants, ultimately, one who is helplessly and totally love's captive, in his collar.

To be sure, it is also pleasurable, particularly in the beginning, to bend a woman, and to teach her her place. Few pleasures can compare, for example, with that of taking an unwilling female, preferably one who hates you, and, against her will, forcing her to yield to you the total and exquisite perfections of slave service. One may then, after she has learned herself a slave, after she has been brought to this self-understanding, do what one wishes with her, say, keeping her or selling her, doubtless now making a profit on her, and putting her into the markets, where, eventually, if she is fortunate, she might eventually become into the hands of an excellent master for her, one whose devoted love slave she will beg to be.

"Louise," said the woman with the whip.

A short, slender, exquisite, very white-skinned, red-haired (pg. 322) girl moved forth immediately from the line, dancing before me.

"Louise" is an Earth-girl name. I wondered if she were from Earth. Often, of course, Earth-girl names are given to Gorean female slaves. They are almost uniformly regarded as suitable slave names. Similarly, girls who wear them are taken to be slaves. It is sometimes amusing to Goreans when an Earth girl shows up in a Gorean slave market, insisting that her name is such and such, a name taken on Gor to be a slave name. It is as though she were confessing her bondage. She may be given the name afresh, but now to be worn as a slave name chosen by her master, or, sometimes, presumably that she may better understand her dependence on men's will, and her subjection to male domination, she may be given another Earth-girl name. When more than one Earth girl is in the same lot, their names may be switched, the name 'Audrey', for example, being given to the former Karen, and the name 'Karen' now being given to the former Audrey.

Most often, however, the Earth girls are given Gorean names, and usually Gorean slave names. Many masters discover that this procedure often smoothes and hastens the transition between the background of Earth freedoms, such as they are, and the new reality of absolute bondage. When the former Stacy Smith or Betty Lou Madison discover that they are now, say, Sabita, Dilek, Tuka, Cicek, or Lita, it helps to convince them that their old life is now behind them, and is gone forever. They then hurry, and are well advised to do so, to become the finest, the most superb, the most desirable Sabita, Dilek, Tuka, Cicek or Lita they can.

I regarded the slender girl dancing before me. Her breasts were small, and well formed. The reddish light was particularly lovely, in its shifting hues, reflecting from so fair-skinned a body. The steel collar looked well on her neck.

"Are you from Earth?" I asked her, in English.

"Yes!" she said, startled.

"Do not stop dancing," I told her, in English.

"Are you from Earth?" she asked, wildly.

"Once," I said.

(pg. 323) "I am an Earth woman!" she said. "Behold me in bondage!"

"I do," I said. "And you are very pretty in bondage."

Her fists clenched over her head, as she writhed before me. "Right this wrong!" she begged.

"What wrong?" I asked.

"That I am in bondage!" she cried.

"Dance more superbly," I told her.

She writhed yet more lasciviously, more deliciously, before me.

"You look well in a collar," I informed her.

"Please," she protested.

"Quite well," I said.

"Rescue me from bondage!" she cried.

"No," I said.

"What!" she cried.

"Dance," I told her.

She wept, and danced, and danced well.

I examined her movements. Clearly they were those of a slave.

"The only wrong, my dear," I said, "would have been if you had not been reduced to bondage."

"Please!" she wept.

"How do you address me?" I asked.

"Master!" she wept.

I motioned that she might return to the line, and, sobbing, dancing, she did so. The collar looked well on her neck. Clearly it belonged there. In time she would come to understand that and would then, fearfully, live in love, rejoicing.

"Birsen," said the woman with the whip.

A tall thin girl, then, with brown hair about her shoulders, came forward. On Earth such a type, of such a structure, and with her beauty, I surmised, might have become a high fashion model. I indicated that she might return to the line.

"Demet," said the woman.

A short, dark-skinned girl, plump and meaty, one about whose femaleness there could be no doubt, with long, swirling black hair, spun forward and writhed before me. She had soft, full, pouting lips, of the sort that seem made for the (pg. 324) raping of the master's kiss. If she had ever been a free woman, doubtless she had been warned to keep those lips veiled, lest they attract the attention of slavers. I forced myself to remember that I had come here in response to a message, that I was expected to be partner to some sort of rendezvous. I had left Hurtha at the insula, with Feiqa, though by now, a lusty fellow, he was doubtless somewhere else on the street, Feiqa left behind, chained to her ring in the room. I did not know if there would be any danger, or not. At any rate, if there were to be any danger, it did not seem to me appropriate that I should enter my hearty companion of the road into it. Such perils, if they existed, were properly mine.

"I see that Demet interests you," said my hostess. "She was once a high lady in the Tahari, but you can see, her lips made it inevitable that she would be sold into slavery."

I considered the movements of her sweetly broad love cradle.

"Have you learned submission, Demet?" I asked.

"Can you not read it in my eyes, Master?" she asked.

"Speak," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said. "I have learned submission."

"You are one of our best girls, aren't you, Demet?" asked the woman with the whip, moving it on her belly as she danced.

"I hope so Mistress," said Demet, frightened.

"Are you happy as a slave?" I asked.

"I beg to be sold," she wept suddenly, "that I may have a private master." Then she cried out in pain, lashed by the woman's whip.

"Forgive me, Mistress," she begged. She did not stop dancing. The other girls, too, frightened, still dancing, shrank back a bit. I saw that the hostess kept these feminine women under good discipline.

"Let us have her chained to your mat ring," said the woman with the whip.

"Return her to the line," I said.

"Lale," said the woman with the whip, summoning forward, with a gesture of the whip, the last of the slaves before me.

"I am Lale," said the girl, dancing meaningfully before (pg. 325) me. "Examine me. I can give great pleasure," I regarded her. She was a medium-sized, full bodied, stunning brunet. I had no doubt that she could indeed give great pleasure. I observed her with care. How beautiful women are in slave dance. And what a prelude it is to their subjugation and ravishment.

"Master likes Lale," she said.

"Perhaps," I said.

She then, suddenly, danced very close to me. "Have Lale chained to your ring," she said.

"Is the belly of Lale needful?" I asked.

"Yes," she whispered.

I regarded her.

"Please," she said. "Lale has not been chosen in two nights."

"You would have yourself chosen not for my pleasure, but for your desperate need?" I asked.

"For both, please, Master," she said. "For both!"

"Perhaps," I said. She was quite beautiful. Until one has seen needful slaves, one has not seen women.

"Too," she whispered, "if Lale is not chosen tonight, she will be whipped. Do not let Lale be whipped. Master does not want Lale whipped."

"I see now why you have not been used in two nights," I said. "Apparently you are not satisfactory."

"No," she said. "No, Master!"

"Return to the line," I said.

"Master, please!" she protested.

"What is going on?" asked the woman with the whip.

"She is trying to influence my choice by extraneous considerations," I said. "I choose not to accept this attempt at manipulation."

The woman suddenly cracked her whip. The girls stopped dancing. "Kneel," she said to them. "You, Lale, remain where you are."

"What did she say?" asked the woman with the whip.

Lale trembled, and moaned.

"Nothing, really, I said. "It was merely that she (pg. 326) attempted to elicit my pity, to win my choice, telling me that if she was not chosen tonight she would be whipped."

"Head to the floor!" cried the hostess.

Lale put her head down to the floor. The lash fell once, fiercely, across her back. Lale cried out in misery.

"It is not worth whipping her about," I said. "It is not her fault if she is not popular."

"Not popular?" laughed the hostess. "Oh, she is a sly one, the little she-sleen! She is one of the most popular girls in the house,"

"Oh?" I said.

Lale cried out as the whip fell on her again.

"Look up, little fool," said the hostess, "and see the man you tried to manipulate."

Lale looked up in misery, the tears streaming down her face.

"Does he look like the kind of man you could play your silly little games with, does he look like the kind of man you could manipulate with pity? Can you not see he knows what slaves are, and knows how to handle them. Head down!"

Again the lash fell upon Lale.

"I have told you about that trick!' said the free woman, angrily. "You have used it before! Perhaps that is the secret of your popularity! Perhaps that is why you are so often chosen, and are thrown sweets in the chaining bin as rewards! Is that how you compete with the other girls?"

"Please, Mistress!" begged Lale. But the lash fell twice more upon her.

I noted that the other girls, kneeling in the background, did not seem at all dismayed with the punishment of the errant Lale. If she were popular in the house, I gathered it was with the customers, and not with her chain sisters.

"And now you have lied again, and to a free man!" snarled the hostess. Three more times then the lash fell upon the hapless Lale, and then she lay on her belly, sobbing on the tiles.

"Kneel!" commanded the free woman. Lale struggled to her knees.

"Get on all fours," said the woman.

(pg. 327) Lale was then on all fours.

"You are now in the modality of the she-quadruped," said my hostess.

Lale moaned.