I looked down at the new slave, who was lying on the blanket, on the floor. I gestured that she should stand. When she had done so, I handed her the tunic. "Hold this against you," I said.

She did so, with both hands, closely, one above her breasts and one below. I regarded her.

"Master?" she asked.

"You could make a rock sizzle," I said.

She flushed. "Thank you, Master," she said.

I continued to regard her.

She would be fetching, indeed, in that tunic. The Cosians, I thought, had to some extent miscalculated. Did they really think that the excitingness of a slave could be reduced by such a triviality as the addition of a few horts of material to a tunic? Did they not realize it would still be the single garment she wore, the one piece of cloth she was permitted, and that it would have no nether closure? And even more significantly did they not understand that her true excitingness did not depend on such things as a collar and a particularly sort of livery, as telling, and revealing and lovely, as these things were, but on her condition itself, that she was slave? That she was slave, the essence and perfection of the female, was what made her such an extraordinary, special, incomparable object of desire, and that would be so whether she were kneeling in a ta-teera, clad in an evening gown or concealed from head to toe in the dark haik of the Tahira, peeping out through a tiny screen of black lace. I then, in a moment, took back the garment, and dropped it to the side, where Phoebe had been working, near the small sewing basket there. I indicated that the slave might kneel and she did, her hands on her thighs, her knees in the appropriate position.

Phoebe was now gasping at one side of the room.

"Master?" said the new slave.

"Yes?" I said.

"Was I pleasing?"

"Yes," I said.

"Do you think another man might find me pleasing, as well?" she asked.

"It is possible," I said.

"I am not now as stupid, or ignorant, as I was, am I?" she asked.

"No," I said.

"I am a much better slave now, am I not?"

"Yes," I said.

"I am grateful for my training," she said.

"It is nothing," I said.

"It is my hope that I have profited from it," she said.

"You have," I said, "considerably."

"Then you think I might not, under certain circumstances, at least, be found displeasing by another man?"

"No," I said.

She put down her head, shyly.

"I would not get my hopes up," I said. "It is your business to obey me, and your primary objective, in the first phase of our operations, is merely to deliver the message."

"I understand, Master," she said.

"In the course of this delivery," I said, "you may behave as you wish. That I leave to you."

"Yes, Master," she said, shyly.

There was a sudden noise at the side of the room and I looked there, quickly. Marcus, turning, rolling. Phoebe locked in his arms, had struck into the wall there.

"Approach me, on all fours," I said to the new slave. She did so, dragging the ankle chain behind her.

I indicated a flat leather box to one side. "Knee crawl," I said. "Fetch it here."

She went to the box on her knees and picked it up, and returned to a place before me. It had been a simple knee crawl. I was briefly reminded, however, of the Turian knee walk, sometimes used by slave dancers. I considered the slave. I did not doubt but what she might be taught to dance.

"Master?" she asked.

"Give it to me," I said.

But I did not take it.

She looked at me, puzzled.

"Forgive me, Master!" she said.

She then, kneeling before me, her knees widely spread, lifted and extended her arms, proffering me the box. Her head was down, between her lifted, extended arms.

"It seem you still have much to learn," I said.

"Forgive me, Master," she said.

I took the box.

She then knelt back, her hands on her thighs, her head still bowed.

"Your training will continue," I said.

"Thank you, Master," she said.

"But it seems that perhaps it should be sharpened with the whip," I said. "As master wishes," she said, trembling.

The whip is an excellent mnemonic device. The girl who receives a lash, or lashes, for an error, seldom repeats it.

"To all fours," I said. "And stay here close, where I can reach you."

I then put out my hand and touched the collar on her neck. It was one of three collars I had for her. The other two, with their keys, were in the flat box. The collar on her neck bore the legend, "RETURN ME TO TARL AT THE INSULA OF TORBON." I then removed the first of the other two collars from the box and, reaching out, put it on her neck, next to the other collar, but ahead of it, closer to the chin. I snapped it shut. It fit well. It was now on her, locked. Its legend read, "RETURN ME TO THE WHIP MASTER OF THE CENTRAL CYLINDER." I then turned it and, inserting the key, opened it, and removed it from her neck. I then lifted the second collar form the box, putting the first, with the key, back in it. This second collar I then put on her neck, next to the original collar, and ahead of it, closer to the chin, as I had the one a moment before. Then I snapped it shut. It, too, fit well, and was now on her, locked. Its legend read, "RETURN ME TO APPANIUS OF AR." I then let her remain that way for a little while, on all fours, in the two collars.

Phoebe was moaning on one side. She turned her head from one side to the other, her eyes closed. She was delirious with pleasure, slave to her master.

I then took the key to the second of the two collars which had been in the box, that which I had put most recently on her, the Appanius collar, and removed it from her neck. I put it back in the box, under the first collar. I dropped the key in the box. I closed the box.

"Claim me!" wept Phoebe. "I beg it! I am your slave! Use me as the helpless vessel of your pleasure!"

"Do not move," I said to the new slave.

She remained as she was, on all fours.

"I yield me your slave!" wept Phoebe. "I yield me your slave!"

Then she was trembling, and gasping for breath, clinging to Marcus. He, too, gasped, and then suddenly he laughed, a might laugh, almost a roar, a laugh of triumph, like an exultant larl, joyful in his mastery of the beauty.

"Such may be done to slaves," I said to the new slave.

"Yes, Master," she said, on all fours.

"The other garment, I take it," I said to the new slave," is finished."

"Yes, Master," she said. "Mistress finished it yesterday."

"Put it on for me," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said. She rose to her feet and went to the side of the room where she knelt by a chest and took from it a white garment, of the wool of the bounding hurt.

I looked away, as she stood up, to slip it over her head and arms, and smooth it down on her body. I did not wish to look until it was on her.

"Master," she announced.

"Excellent!" I said.

It came to a bit above the knees, and had a high, modest neckline. It some respects it was rather in the style set for the tunic of state slaves. That I thought might fit in well with my plans.

"Turn," I said.

"Yes," I mused. "Excellent." Perhaps even more importantly it was the sort of garment in which a slave might dare to appear before a free woman. It was not the sort of garment that would be likely to excite the envy or anger of free women. It was not the sort of garment which sometimes provokes free women to rush at slaves in the street, crying out and lashing at them with switches. It was decorous, and yet clearly the garment of a mere slave.

"Mistress has sewed it," she said.

"You have done well, Phoebe," I said. "It is perfect."

"Thank you, Master," gasped Phoebe. She was lying next to Marcus. She was covered with a sheen of sweat. Her body was covered with red blotches, from the recent racing of her blood, the excited distention of thousands of capillaries. Her lovely nipples were not yet subsident.