She straightened herself, even a little more.

Her slave curves were exquisite.

"You are beautiful," he said. "Indeed," he cried, "you are slave beautiful! You should never have been a free woman! How absurd that freedom should have been permitted to you! What a woeful mistake!

Such a body is born for the collar! It is incomplete without it!"

She stood silent before him, scrutinized, inspected.

"You would bring a high price on the block," he said. But then he said, menacingly, "But you are not for sale."

She lifted her head a little, almost as though proffering her veiled countenance to him, as though she was eager to place the veil which she could not remove within his power.

"Oh, you can whine, and beg, and kneel, and grovel and weep, and plead to be sold," he said, "to anyone other than the House of William, in Harfax, for as little as a tarsk-bit to anyone, for any service, but you are not for sale! We have waited long to obtain you. We have plans for you, slave!"

She whimpered, futilely, fighting the gag.

But she could not speak.

It had been put on her by a Gorean.

"Beg if you wish," he said, "to be the girl of a keeper of tarsks, to be the property of a sewer master, to be sold for the cleaning of tharlarion stables but you are destined rather for the house you so defrauded, for the house of those you so wronged, for the house of your most dire enemies! You are ours, and you will remain ours, to do with as we please, and fully, you may be sure, even though a ubar should bid upon you!"

She regarded him, her hands tied behind her, well and closely held by the binding fiber.

"Let us see if the former Lady Constanzia has been well marked," he said.

There was a tremor in her body, one almost of shyness. She had not long been a slave.

She must submit her brand, fresh in her body, for the inspection of her master.

He had not yet seen it.

Would it be found acceptable? Would it meet with his approval? She trembled.

She must hope he would find it pleasing.

It seemed she could scarcely move.

"Turn your left flank to me, slave," he said.

She complied.

"Ah!" he said, suddenly, appreciatively. "Yes, yes!"

She whimpered, gratefully.

The slave was much relieved.

"Yes," he said, "you are well branded, an incisive, clean mark. There is no mistaking it. And common kajira mark! Of course! Excellent, and superbly fitting! The former Lady Constanzia of Besnit-marked as a common slave!-Excellent!"

The common kajira mark, of course, which I myself wore, is a lovely brand. It may be the most familiar brand on Gor for a female slave, but that does not make it any the less beautiful.

Indeed, I suspect it is the most common brand because it is the most beautiful, or surely one of the most beautiful l.u.s.t as the male beasts wish us to be attractive, and dress us for their pleasure, when permitting us clothing, and such, so, too, they brand us for beauty, as well. The brand, small and tasteful, but momentous in its meaning, much enhances the beauty of a woman both aesthetically and cognitively-in the latter dimension marking her as slave, and thus latently. implicitly, indicatively hinting at, or, better, stating, the pleasures, the joys, one may have of her. The most common brand Site 15 the left thigh, under the hip. This site is a.n.a.logous to that used on a mult.i.tude of other forms of domestic animal, verr, tarsks, bosk, and such. Sometimes boys enjoy surprising slaves in the streets or markets and flip their tunics, to ascertain the brand, and, doubtless to treat themselves to a flash of thigh. It is a game for them. As they are free persons they could simply put the girl to her knees and issue the command, "Brand," to which the girl must respond by revealing her slave mark. But this would take time. And the pack of them are afoot, racing about and frolicking.

It is irritating to be sometimes struck by a free woman or women after this has occurred, as though we could help it! Though we are doubtless quite sensitive to matters of modesty we, as slave, are not permitted modesty. It is one thing to be bared for our masters, and another for strangers.

"Now," said he, "face me, again."

She complied.

He then approached her and reached to the veil.

"It is your face now," said he, "the utmost delicacy, and least expression, of your features, which are to be exposed."

She did not pull back.

"Perhaps you do not understand," he said. "Your features are to be publicly exposed, such that anyone, the least of the workers at the docks, even a male slave, may look freely, and as he pleases, upon them."

She stood a little closer to him.

"You will be able to hide nothing," he said.

She even lifted her chin.

"Are you truly prepared," he asked, "so easily, to be face-stripped?"

She lifted her chin a little more, looking up at him.

"Strange," he said, "that you do not cringe, that you do not try to flee, that I need not use the leash, to hold you here. Have you learned so soon the futility, the meaninglessness, of recalcitrance, of disobedience? Perhaps you have felt the whip. Or perhaps you understand, already, the brand, the collar." He pulled away part of the veil from about her throat, freeing it from under the collar. "It is with pleasure, as you may well conjecture," he said, "that I now bare the face of she who was once the Lady Constanzia of Besnit. I have dreamed of unveiling her, of stripping her face, of exposing it, of making it naked." He continued to unwrap the veil.

"In a moment now, my dear," he said, "your face will be naked, as is fitting for what you are now, a slave."

"Aiii!" he cried, in astonishment, dropping the veil to one side.

Instantly she fell to her knees before him.

He tore the gag from her, pulling out the wadding, discarding the binding.

Her head then was down to his feet, she weeping, covering them with kisses. The leash, fixed on her, fell to the floor. "I love you, my master!" she wept. "I love you!"

He drew her up to her knees and he crouched before her, holding her by the upper arms.

"What madness is this!" he cried, in consternation. "I do not understand! Are you not my Tuta!"

"I am whoever you will have me be!" she wept.

"But what of the Lady Constanzia of Besnit!"

"I was she," she cried.

"You are Tuta!" he said.

"She was the Lady Constanzia of Besnit," she wept.

"Tuta was a slave!"

"No! She was free! By the kindness of the pit master she was permitted to go abroad in the city, though only if collared, and clothed as a slave! I a.s.sure you there was no danger of her escaping!"

"Tuta," said he, "was right-thigh branded!"

"No," said she. "You a.s.sumed that because in certain rags permitted to me you could see only my left thigh, and, it not being marked, you inferred, I thought to be a slave, that I was rightthigh marked."

He stared at her, in disbelief.

"I trust that master does not object to a left-thigh-marked girl," she said.

"No, no," he said. "I am right-handed. I prefer it."

"Good," she said.

"You were the Lady Constanzia?"

"Until this morning, and scarcely an Ahn ago, when I was, by order of the house of William, in Harfax, branded and collared."

"Why did you not tell me you were free?" he asked.

"I must appear as a slave," she said. "And you did not tell me who you were either!"

"Of course not," he said. "What business would it have been of yours? I thought you were a mere slave."

"Yes, Master," she said, happily.

"My Tuta!" he said, beside himself with elation.

"No, my name is Constanzia," she said. "That is the name which has been given to me by my master!"

"Should you not have told me you were free?" he asked.

"But would you have then related to me, would you have felt free to do so, would you have even approached me, would you have considered me? I wanted you to relate to me. I wanted you to approach me. I wanted you to like me. Thus I wanted you to see me not as what I was, in some legal sense, a free woman, but as what I was in my heart, what I had come to long to be, as a full woman, as one who, in the order of nature, belongs to men, as one who, in the order of nature, is a man's slave."

"And so I saw you," he said.

"And appropriately, my master," she whispered.

"Surely you should have told me you were free," he said.

"No, Master," she said.

"Why?" he asked.

"When I was near you," she said, "I was not free. When I was near you, I was a slave."

They kissed.

"The first moment I laid eyes on you," she said, "I wanted to be your slave."

"And I," he said, "from the first moment I saw you, I wanted you in my collar."

"It is in your collar I am now," she whispered.

"How can you have been Constanzia of Besnit?" he demanded.

"Forget that cold, greedy, proud woman," she begged, "think now only of the slave in your arms, who would die for you."

"The Lady Constanzia of Besnit," he said, "muchly wronged my house."

"She is now your slave," she said. "Do with her as you will."

"I must take you back to Harfax," he said.

"I heel my master with love," she said.

"I must, by oath, throw you naked and in chains to the feet of my father."

"Do so," she said. "I beg it."

"Your life will not be easy in the house," he said.

"I am a slave," she said. "We do not expect our life to be easy."

"What am I to do with you?"

"It is my hope that my master will do with me as he pleases."

"I love you," he said.

"And I love you, too, my master," she said.

"Tuta!" said he.

"Constanzia," she said.

"You will answer quickly enough to either," he said.

"Yes, Master," she said, happily.

There was a sound behind the portal to one side, that through which the clerk and the guards had earlier entered, bringing with them the slave.