"I did not know a man could be so strong," she said, wonderingly.

"Do you think you. have nothing to do with it, you pretty idiot?" I asked.

"Oh?" she asked.

"You have a great deal to do with it," I said.

"You cannot even see me in the dark," she said.

"I know what you look like." I said, "and I can feel you, your closeness, your body, your touch. It has an interesting modality in the darkness, in the furs." I reached to her, and, by the strap on her throat, pulled her down beside me. "Also," I said, "you are a naked slave. No woman can be more interesting than a naked slave."

"Oh," she said. I held her by the strap.

"That you arc a slave makes you additionally stimulating to the male," I said, "aside from your mere beauty and intelligence."

"Yes," Master," she said.

"So do not be surprised, in your servitude," I said, "that you find men strong. Simply to look upon you, a beautiful slave, will commonly be enough to stimulate their lust. You are no longer a free woman, filled with her rigidities and negativities, for whom it is permissible to be irritating and boring. No. You are a lovely slave. Looking upon you men will want you. They will want to buy you. They will want to own you."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Men even kill to possess women such as you," I told her. "You are that desirable."

"Yes, Master," she said.

"So do not prate in awe of male power," I said. "It is you, and your beauty, and your slavery, and your intelligence, which provides so powerful an incentive to their strengths and aggressions. Whether this pleases you or not, you are such that men, looking upon you, will want you, and will want you so much that they will be willing to pay for you, or even fight for you. Do you begin to understand the meaning now of being a beautiful slave?"

"Yes, Master," she whispered, frightened.

"You are property," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"A treasure," I said.

"Your treasure," she said.

"Yes," I said.

"How strange it is to be helplessly owned," she marveled, "to be subject to sale or exchange."

"Do you find it thrilling?" I asked.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Who owns you?" I asked.

"You do, Master," she said.

"Whose are you?" I asked.

"I am yours," she said, "literally."

"Yes," I said.

"Take your girl, Master," she said. "She begs you.

"Very well," I said.

"This is what it is to be a slave," she whispered. "Slavery is more than your touch, but without your touch it would be nothing."

I kissed her, softly.

"It is your touch," she said, intensely, "which makes a girl a slave!"

"The touch of any master," I said, "can turn a girl into a slave."

"Do you leave me no pride?" she wept.

"None," I said, "for you are a slave."

Her breathing became more intense.

"Do not disturb the others in the hut," I cautioned her.

"Yes, Master," she whispered. Then she again yielded, intensely, helplessly.

Afterwards she lay against me, soft and warm, and small and lovely. "Do you know what I would do now," she asked, "if you were to throw your chains before me?"

"No," I said, kissing her.

"I would kneel," she said, "and I would lift them in my hands, and-"

"Yes?" I asked.

"And then I would kiss and lick them," she whispered.

"Of course," I said, "you are a slave."

"Yes, I am a slave, Master," she said.

"Sleep now," I said.

"Master," she said.

"Yes," I said.

"I am not afraid now," she said, "to go out on the ice."

"Why not?" I asked.

"You will be with me," she said.

"It will be dangerous," I said.

"I am not afraid. You will be with me," she said. Then she said, "Thank you for letting a frightened girl enter your furs tonight."

"That is all right," I said. I rolled over.

"You are kind," she said.

"Beware," I said.

"Forgive me, Master," she said, suddenly frightened. "I meant no harm. It was a small slip. I did not mean to insult you. Please do not whip me for it."

"Very well," I said. I was tired. Too, it did not seem to me that her remark, inadvertent and perilous as it may have been, impaired the discipline in which I held her. Kindness is not always a weakness you must understand. Indeed, it, and its withdrawal, may be used to better control the girl. To be sure, the master who is harder to please gets more from his girl than the master who is easy to please, but, nonetheless, I think kindness is not out of place upon occasion toward a bond girl. Indeed, in a certain context a kind word can almost cause such a wench, collared and at your mercy, to faint with love. I do not think I am a particularly kind or unkind master. I think I am in the normal range where such matters are concerned. Kindness is acceptable, in my opinion, provided the girl knows that she is kept within the strictest of disciplines. I want no more from a girl than everything. If I own her, then, like any other Gorean master, I will simply see that I get it. Beyond that, I may be kind to her or not, as I see fit. Sometimes, of course, kindness is cruelty, and a certain harshness may be kind. One must know the girl. The truly kind master, I think, is he who treats the girl in such a way that she is forced to fulfill her needs in their radical depth and diversity; he gives her no choice but to be a woman, in the full meaning of this word, which is the only thing that can truly, ultimately, make her happy, If a woman were a man perhaps the way to make her happy would be to treat her like a man. If she is not a man perhaps treating her like a man is not the way to make her happy. It may seem hard to understand but the man who truly cares for his slave is often rather strict with her; he cares for her enough to be strong; sometimes she may resent or hate him but, too, she is inordinately proud of him, for what he makes her do, and be, and she loves him for his strength and his will; in her heart she knows she is the slave of such a man; how can she not love the man who proves himself to be her master? But the natures of men and women are doubtlessly complex and mysterious. Perhaps women, after all, are not women, but only small, incomplete men, as many women and men, espousing the current political and economic orthodoxies on the matter, the required, expected views on the matter, would insist. I do not know. And yet how peculiar and surprising would such a perversion appear against the expanse of history.

"Sleep now, sweet slave," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I lay awake for a time, wondering on the natures of women and men, and then I was pleased that I was on Gor, and not on Earth. I kissed the lovely slave beside me, but she did not know I kissed her, for she was asleep. I thought of Karjuk, and the ice. The word 'Karjuk', incidentally, in the language of the Innuit, means 'Arrow'. The wind began to rise outside. I did not care to hear the wind, I hoped it did not presage a storm. Then I fell asleep.

25.

We Go Out Upon The Ice; We Follow Karjuk It was bitterly cold. I did not know how far out on the ice we were.

"Shove!" called Imnak. Imnak and I, and the girls, tipped the sled over a slope of pack ice, it tilting and then sliding downward.

"Wait!" called Imnak to Karjuk.

Karjuk stepped off the runners of his sled and called to his snow sleen, dragging back on the tabuk-horn uprights at the rear of the sled, by means of which he guided the snow vessel.

There were three sleds in our party. Karjuk had his own, and his own snow sleen. The second sled was Imnak's, and the third was Ram's, brought with him from the south, which the men of the permanent camp had drawn to the camp fol him. Imnak's sled was drawn by a snow sleen borrowed from his friend, Akko, and Ram's sled was drawn by another snow sleen, replacing the one the Kur had slain outside the camp. He had purchased it from Naartok for Bazi tea. Karjuk sledded alone; so, too, did Ram: Imnak and I brought up the rear with Imnak's sled, fashioned long ago at the remains of the wall. The four girls traveled with us, usually running as we did, with the sled. Sometimes, as they grew exhausted, we would permit one or another of them to ride upon the sled.

Karjuk lifted his hand, to again commence our journey.

"No, wait!" called Imnak. He was looking up at the sky. No storm had yet struck, but the sky was growing overcast. We had been five days now upon the ice. A storm, for days, had foreboded, but it had not yet materialized. In this we had been fortunate. As I may have mentioned the arctic night is seldom completely dark. Indeed, the visibility is often quite good, for the light of the moons, and even the stars, is reflected from the vastness of the ice and snow. I looked about at the irregular and jagged shapes, wierd and mighty, yhich loomed about us, of the pack ice, eerie in the deep shadows, and bright, strange light of the moons and snow. We stood small in the midst of incredible and fearful geometries. There was a beauty and a menace in these gigantic structures, fashioned by the bitter gnawing of the wind and the upheavals of the sea stirring beneath us. Sometimes we could feel the ice move. Sometimes we bridged, carefully, leads of open water, broken open by the groaning, shifting ice, soon to close again, almost beneath our feet.

Imnak pointed upward, back toward the south. We could not see the stars there. Cloud cover obscured them.

"Let us make camp here," called Imnak to Karjuk.

Karjuk did not respond, but looked ahead, onward. Again he lifted his arm.

Ram came up to us. "There Is going to be a storm," said Imnak. "We must camp."

Karjuk again lifted his arm.

"I must check the runners on my sled," called Imnak. Karjuk stood still, waiting.

The runners of our sleds were of wood. At the beginning of the season, usually in the late fall, a paste, a muck, formed of earth, and grass and moss, for solidity, is shaped and placed on the wood, some five to six inches to thickness. Ice will adhere to this coating, which is plastered thickly on the wood, as it will not to the wood alone. The ice is extremely important. At low temperatures snow becomes granular and has a texture somewhat like sand. A coating of ice on the earthen plaster, fixed on the runners, reduces friction. The coating, or plaster, will normally suffice, with patching, for a season. The layer of ice, of course, is renewed often, sometimes many times a day. Urine, which freezes instantly, is often used for the ice coating. But, too, a skin bag, filled with snow, placed within the clothing, next to the body, which causes the snow to melt, may also be used. At night, when the sled is not being used, it is overturned, so that the runners will not freeze to the ice. Sleen harnesses and traces are hung on a pole, thrust upright in the snow, to protect them from being eaten by the sleen.

Imnak relieved himself, icing the runners. He also used water from the skin bag he carried about his waist. One may also take snow in one's mouth, melt it and spit it on the runners, but this takes. time. When one eats snow, incidentally, one melts it first, thoroughly, in the mouth, before swallowing it. This helps to preserve body heat and prevent shock to the system.

"Let us continue on," called Karjuk.

"A storm is coming," said Imnak, pointing to the southern sky. "Let us camp."

"We will camp later," said Karjuk.

"Very well," said Imnak.

"Is it wise to continue on now?" asked Ram of Imnak.

"No," said Imnak.

We righted our sled.

"Tie the slaves to the sled," said Imnak.

The wind was rising.

I took a length of binding fiber and tied it about Arlene's neck, knotting it tightly. It was about fifteen feet long.

"Master," protested Arlene.

"Oh!" she cried, struck brutally to the snow. She looked up at me, blood about her mouth, the tether on her neck.

Audrey hurried to me, to be fastened by me to the sled. I tied another piece of binding fiber, smiling to that with which I had secured Arlene, about her neck. Audrey then stood before me, tethered. I threw her to her knees in the snow before me, beside Arlene. Let Audrey not think she was privileged, or better, than Arlene. Both were only slave girls at my feet. I then tied the two loose ends of the tethers about the base of the tabuk-horn upright at the rear, right-hand side of the sled. Meanwhile Imnak had similarly secured Barbara and Poalu to the left-hand, rear upright on the sled.

"Do you want your wrists, too, bound behind your backs?" I asked Audrey and Arlene.

"No, Master," they said.

"On your feet, pretty beasts," I said.

They leaped to their feet, obeying me.

Karjuk stepped on the runners of his sled, and cracked his whip over the head of his snow sleen.

Ram's sled fell into line behind him.