"Perhaps," I said.

"Thank you, Master," she whispered, happily.

I put out my hand, to the side. The grass was cold with dew. It was still dark.

She kissed me, softly. "How incredible do I find my current reality," she,marveled. "Suddenly, it seems, I find myself a slave, and naked in the blanketsof a master, on a world far from my own."

I said nothing.

"And only, it seems, a common slave," she said.

"Your reality is precisely what it seems," I assured her "You are a slave, andonly a common one."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Your brand should tell you that," I said.

"I am not familiar with Gorean brands," she said.

"Yours is a common slave brand," I said. "It marks most property girls. Youshare it with thousands."

"I was of high station on my own world," she said, petulantly "Here, on Gor," I told her, "Your station, your status, your prestige, are gone,taken with your name and freedom. Here you are only another slave, anotherdomestic" I behaved as one, didn't I?" she asked, rolling onto her back, looking up atthe dark sky.

"It was fitting and proper," I told her.

"How shamed I am," she said.

"Of your responsiveness?" I asked.

"Yes," she said.

I smiled. The third and fourth time I had used her she had yielded almost as aslave.

"I cannot help it," she said, "that I am responsive in the arms of a master."

"You are not supposed to help it," I said.

"I suppose if I had not been responsive," she said, "you would have beaten me. "Yes," I said.

"Truly?" she asked.

"Yes," I said.

"I betrayed myself," she said.

"Let us think clearly about this matter," I suggested.

"Your assertion might be construed as meaning that you had committed sometreason against yourself, or, perhaps, as meaning merely that you had revealed,or manifested, yourself. Let us consider, first, the matter of treason. A freewoman might, possibly, feel that she had betrayed herself, in this sense, if shehad so yielded to a man as to supply him with some perhaps subtle hint as to thelatency of her slave reflexes. A slave girl, on the other hand, cannot committreason against herself in this sense, for she is a slave. To commit this typeof treason one must have a right, say, to deceive others as to one's sensuality,to conceal one's sexuality, and so on. The slave girl, an owned animal, underthe command of her master, does not have this sort of right. Indeed, she has norights. Accordingly, she cannot commit this sort of reason Her legal statusprecludes its possibility. She may, of course, rationally, fear the consequencesof her responsiveness being discovered, thus increasing, perhaps to her terror,in a slave culture, her desirability. Similarly she may lie or attempt to lie,about her responsiveness, but she is then of course, merely a lying slave and,when found out, Will be treated accordingly."

"Such treason, then," she said, "can be committed only by a free woman."

"Yes," I said. "It is a luxury not permitted to the slave."

"It is a function only of the free woman's right to lie, and defraud, others?" she asked.

"Yes," I said. "It is possible, of course, for the slave, subjectively,psychologically, to feel that she has committed this treason, for she may,mistakenly, be still regarding herself implicitly, as a free woman."

"But she cannot, in fact, have committed it, because she is a slave?" asked thegirl.

"Yes," I said.

"I understand, Master," she said, bitterly.

"You see," I said, "you were still regarding yourself, implicitly, at least atthe moment, as a free woman, or, perhaps better, more narrowly, as retaining atleast one of the rights of a free woman."

"I am not to be beaten, am I, Master?" she asked.

"Not at the moment, at least," I informed her.

"Thank you, Master," she said.

"The second sense in which you might have intended your remark about betrayingyourself, though I think it was not the sense in which you did intend it, wouldbe the innocent sense, quite appropriate for a slave girl, of revealing ormanifesting significant aspects of your nature. In this sense, of course, aslave girl has no alternative other than to betray herself. She is under anobligation, and a quite harsh and strict one, to release, manifest and reveal,fully, and in all its depths and facets, the profundities of her nature, thefundities of her femaleness."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"I think now," I said, "it is time to chain you with the others."

"You can just take me and chain me with them, can't you?" she said, angrily.

"Yes," I said.

"You took my virginity," she said. "Does that not mean anything to you?"

"No," I told her.

"It was, after all," she said, "only the virginity of a slave!"

"Precisely," I said.

She squirmed angrily.

"Are you angry?" I asked.

"Am I permitted anger?" she asked, warily.

"I will permit it, for now," I said.

"Yes," she said, I am angry."

"Your concern is not well-warranted," I said. "Your having was merely theungating of a slave, her breaching, her opening, an unimportant prefatorytechnicality in the history of her bondage."

"Of course!" she said.

"Would you be so concerned about a boar's opening of she-tarsk?" I asked. Shehad seen animals of this sort in streets of Kailiauk, in the dawn of the dayfollowing her sale, when she and the others had been marched out towards theIhanke. They are used, not unoften, in small Gorean towns, to scavenge garbage.

Ginger and Evelyn had identified the animals for them. They had also informedthem that, many towns, such an animal might, in a market, bring than theythemselves.

"I am the she-tarsk!" she said. "I am the slave!"

"Do you think that you are important?" I inquired.

"No, Master," she said.

"There, you see," I said.

"Yes," she said, "I see." She lay back, angrily.

There was a narrow rim of light in the east now. The air was still damp, andchilly.

"Do you respect me?" she asked.

"No," I told her.

She gasped, in misery.

"Kiss me," I told her, "fifty times, and well."

"Yes", Master," she said, and began to kiss me about the face and neck. Icounted the kisses. There were fifty of thenThen she lay down beside me.

"You used me well, earlier," she said.

"You are a mere slave," I said. "It is simple to use a mere slave well."

"Doubtless girls such as myself are often well used," she said.

"Yes," I said.

"And, we must submit, unquestioningly, to even our most brutal usage," she said.

"Of course," I said. "Are you distressed?"

"No, Master," she said. "Not really. It is only that I am not used to being ananimal, a slave."

"I understand," I said.

"In your use of me," she said, "you did not give me not even for your use ofme."

"No," I said.

"Was that deliberate?" she asked.

"Yes," I said.

"A clever way to make clear to me that I was only fondled animal, helpless inyour arms.

I did not speak.

"I can scarcely begin to cope with my feelings," she said "They are so troubled,so tumultuous."

"Speak," I said.

"I must lie there," she said. "I could not escape. I must submit!"

"Yes," I said.

"I was controlled. I was owned!"

"Yes," I said.

"I was powerless," she said. "How you dominated me!"

"You were used with great gentleness," I said, "though also, to be sure, withfirmness and authority, as befits a slave As for domination, you cannot yet evenbegin to suspect what it is for a woman to be dominated by a master."

"She would be so owned," she whispered.

"Yes," I said.

"Can you understand my feelings of utter helplessness, and humiliation?" sheasked.

"I think so," I said.

"I have other feelings, as well," she whispered.

"What?" I asked.