"We shall open the gate," said a man.

"Beloved Mira," cried Radish, looking at Mira, wildly, "what shall I do?"

Mira shrank back, startled. "I am only a slave," she said, "You are a free woman."

"What shall I do?" she begged, terrified.

"You have but one slim chance," said Mira.

"Speak," begged Radish.

"The onely avenue of escape which lies open before you," said Mira, "is too debasing and degrading. I dare not even mention it to you."

"Speak, speak!" begged Radish.

"Sue to be his slave," said Mira. "As a wholly submitted woman, one he owns, he may be disposed to show you mercy."

"I do not know what to do," wept Radish.

"If you are a free woman," said Mira, "go nobly forth into the Barrens, there to perish of hunger or thrist, or of animales or exposure. If you are a slave, sue to be his slave."

"I do not know what to do!" she wept.

"Do what is in your heart," said Mira.

"Beg mercy for me, plead for me, intercede for me!" begged Radish.

Mira came and knelt before Seibar, her head down. "Have mercy upon us, Master," she said. "We are only women, one bond and one free. We know your strength. We know what you can do. We do not dispute your sovereignty. We beg for mercy, if only for a time. We beg for knidness, if only for a moment."

"Your slave speaks eloquently," said Seibar.

"She has experienced the might of men, and knows what they can do," I said.

The women in the leather shackles, then, wiht her wrists bound before her body, suddenly sobbed, and shook with ungovernable, overwhelming emotion. The movement, like a shudder, had been unrestrained, uncontrollable. Something deep and profound had obviously occurred within her. "Yes," she whispered to herself. "Yes!"

She put her head down and, unbidden, tenderly, submissively, softly, began to kiss the feet of Seibar.

"Look up," said Seibar.

She lifted her head. Her eyes were moist. They were incredibly soft and tender. I think that never before had she seen Seibar like that.

"And doubtless you, too, subscrive to the discourse of the slave," said Seibar, indicating Mira.

"With but one exception, yes," said the leather-bound woman.

"Oh?" asked Seibar.

"She is mistaken in one detail," she said.

"What is that?" asked Seibar.

"She said that there were two women who knelt before you, one bond and one free. In this sshe was in error. There were two women who knelt before you, but one was not bond and one free. Both were bond."

Mira, tears in her eyes, suddenly seized the woman bound beside her, and kissed her.

I took Mira by the hair and threw her to the side.

"Yes," said the leather-bound woman looking up at Seibar. "I am bond."

"Beware of the words you speak," said Seibar. This was true. Such words, in themselves, in the appropriate context, effected enslavement. Intention, and such, is immaterial, for one might always maintain that one had not meant them, or such. The words themselves, in the appropriate context, are suffcient. Whether one means them or not one becomes, in their utterance, instantly, categorically and without recourse, fully and legally a slave, soemthing with which masters are then entitled to do with as they please. Such words are not to be spoken lightly. They are as meaningful as the collar, as significant as the brand.

"The words I speak, I speak knowingly," she said.

"Speak clearly," he said.

"I herewith proclaim myself a slave," she said. "I am a slave."

"You are now a slave," I said to her, "even in the cities. You are property. You could be returned to a master as such in a court of law. This is something which is recognized even outside of the Barrens. This is much stronger, in that sense, than being the slave of Kaiila or Yellow Knives."

"I know," she said.

Seibar looked down upon her.

"I am now a legal slave," she said.

He nodded. It was true.

"A few moments ago," she said. "I for the first time confessed myself to myself a slave, a confession which I now acknowledge and make public. For years I have known that I was a slave, but I had denied this, and fought it. Then, suddenly, I no longer wanted to fight this. When we fight ourselves it is only ourselves which must lose. In that moment I surrndered to my secret truth. What I have done now is little more than to proclaim and make it public that secret truth. Beyond that admission there lies little more than the effectuation of a technicality."

"But the technicality has now been effectuated," said Seibar.

"Yes," she said, putting her head down. "it has now been effectuated."

"Whose slave are you?" he asked.

"You have stripped me, and bound me, as a slave," she said. "I have felt your lash. I am yours."

"Have I collared you?" he asked.

"No," she said, keeping her head down, "but it is my hope that you will do so."

"Have I indicated any intrest in having you as a slave?" he asked. "Have I given you any reason to believe that I might accept you as a slave?"

"No," she said, keeping her head down, "you haven't."

"Whose slave would you be?" he asked.

"Yours," she said.

"Speak," he said.

She raised he head, but did not meet his eyes. "I am Seibar's slave," she said.

"Now, perhaps I will give you to another," he said.

She still did not meet his eyes. "It may be done with me as you please," she said.

"Do you think I do not understand," he said, angrily, "that you have made yourself my slave in the hope that you might thereby escape the fate of being out into the Barrens?"

"Whatever might have been my motivation," she said, "the fact remains, in any case, that I am now fully your slave, and may be done with wholly as you wish."

"You had your chance to go nobly into the Barrens, with the dignity of the free woman. Now perhaps I shall have you put out in shame, in the dishonor of a slave!"

"You may do with me as you please," she said, softly.

"Whould that not be amusing?" he asked angrily.

"Yes," she said, "very amusing." She looked at him, with tears in her eyes. "If I am to be put out," she said, "may I beg one boon,"

"What is that?" he asked.

"Your collar," she said. "Put it on my neck. Tie some knot in it which is yours, so that if men find me they may say, 'Here see this knot. It is a Seibar's. This woman was his slave'."

"You ask for my collar?" he said.

"I beg it," she said.

He took one of the straps he had used in her whipping. He looped it twice about her neck and tied it.

"You have it," he said.

"Thank you," she whispered.

She then lifted her head to his, where he crouched down before her, and tried to touch her lips to his. Her small hands moved futilely in their bonds, at her knees.

He did not permit her lips to touch his. "That would be touching, would it not?" he asked, ironically.

"Yes," she whispered.

"How clever you are!" he said, angrily. "What a sly, scheming, shameless she-sleen you are!"

"how you must hate me," she said.

"Do you think I cannot see through your games, your trickery?" he cried.

"Do you think it is only because I do not want to die?" she wept. "Do you think it is only because I do not want to be put out into the Barrens?"

"Yes!" he said.

"No," she said. "No!"

"No?" he asked.

"No!" she wept.

"Speak," he said, angrily. "I grow weary."

"But I am a slave," she said, frightened. She looked at me, pleadingly, for understanding.

"Accordingly, miserable, imbonded slut," I said, "you must speak the truth."

She put down her head. She squirmed in her bonds.

"Must a command be repeated?" asked Seibar.

She lifted herhead, tears in her eyes. "I am a slave," she said, "and I must tell the truth. Forgive me. I beg you. Forgive me. Beat me if you wish."