"Norman, John -Gor 24- Vagabonds of Gor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norman John)

"We were taken to the Cosian camp, near Ar's Station," she said. "There we were kept naked, in coffle, and under discipline. One morning we were displayed in blindfolds."
I had not wanted them to know, or at least to know for certain, that it was I who had redeemed them, not simply for the pleasure of it, but for my own purposes, as well. This was not that unusual. Captors do not always reveal their identities immediately to their captives. It is sometimes amusing to keep women in ignorance as to whose power it is, within which they lie. Let them consider the matter with anxiety. Let them speculate wildly, frenziedly, tearfully. It is then time enough to reveal oneself to them, perhaps confirming their worst fears.
"The next morning," she said, "when I awakened, two of our girls were gone, Elene and Klio, and there was a new girl, a slender, very beautiful girl, also free, like the rest of us, on the coffle."
"What was her name?" I asked.
" 'Phoebe'," she said.
"Tell me of her," I said.
"She wore her collar and chain lovingly and well, most beautifully," she said. "She obeyed Liadne from the first, immediately, spontaneously, intuitively, naturally, with ti­midity, and perfection. It was as though she intuitively under­stood authority and her own rightful subjection to it. Though this new girl, like the rest of us, save Liadne, was free, I think I had seldom seen a woman, so early in captivity, so ready, so ripe, for the truths of the collar."
"She had perhaps fought out those matters in the sweaty sheets of her own bed, for years," I said.
"As had certain others, too," smiled the girl, looking down.
"You are beautiful," I commented, regarding her face, and lineaments, in the light of the nearby fire.
"Thank you, Master," she whispered.
"Was this new girl proud?" I asked.
"I think only of such things as her capacity for love, and her bondage," she said.
"But you said she was free," I reminded her.
"Of her natural bondage," she smiled."
"She was not then, in a normal sense, proud?"
"Not in ways typical of a vain free woman, at any rate."
"But yet," I said, "this new girl, unlike the rest of you, was wearing a slave strip."
"Ah, Master," said the girl, "it is as I suspected. It is you who redeemed us."
"Of course," I said.
"The new girl would not speak the identity of her captor, but, I take it, it was you who brought her to the coffle of Ephialtes."
I nodded. I had, of course, warned Phoebe to silence, with respect to whose captive she was, as my business in the north, at least at that time, had been secret.
"Her docility on the chain, its beauty on her, her eagerness to obey, and such, suggested that it might have been you, or someone like you," she said.
I shrugged.
"And I thought it might have been you," she said, "from little things she would say, or knowing looks, or responses to our questions, or shy droppings of her gaze. In such ways can a woman speak, even when she is pretending not to. I think she was shyly eager to tell us all about you."
I nodded again. I was not unfamiliar with the small talk, the tiny riddles, the hints, the delights of conversing slaves. I had little doubt that Phoebe, and without too much provoca­tion, might have revealed more of me, and of our relation­ship, and past, and such, than I would have approved of. She was marvelously feminine. It would not really do, of course, to whip her for such things, as she was free, and, even in the case of slaves, masters tend to be tolerant of such things. They make the girl so much more human.
"Was it you, too, who took Elene and Klio from the coffle?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
"What did you do with them?" she asked.
"Did a slave ask permission to speak?" I asked.
"Forgive me, Master," she said.
"What is your name?" I asked.
" 'Temione'," she said. She wore that name now, of course, as a mere slave name, put on her by the will of a master. Slaves, as they are animals, may be named anything.
"I sold them," I said.
She looked at me.
"You may speak," I said.
"Both of them?" she asked.
"Yes," I said. I had sold them one morning, in the siege trenches. They had given me the cover I had needed to get to the walls of Ar's Station.
"Tell me of Ephialtes, Liadne, the coffle, and such," I said. I remembered the six debtor sluts I had redeemed at the Inn of the Crooked Tarn, the Lady Amina, of Venna; the Lady Elene, of Tyros; and the Ladies Klio, Rimice, Liomache and Temione, all of Cos.
"Ephialtes is well," she said, "and seems much taken with Liadne, as she with him. Two days after the fall of Ar's Station a mercenary, who had apparently seen much action, passed near the wagon of Ephialtes. Liomache, seeing him, startled, terrified, tried to hide amongst us but he, quick, and observant, had seen her! He rushed over to us. She could not escape, of course, as she was nude and helpless on the chain. Such niceties constrained us well, no differently than if we had been slaves. She cried out in misery. He pulled her up and shook her like a doll! "Liomache!" he cried. "It is you!"
"No!" she wept.
"I know you," he said. "I would know you anywhere. You are one of those sluts who lives off men, who runs up bills and then inveigles fools into satisfying them. I remember however that when I first met you you had been somewhat less successful than usual, and were being held for redemp­tion at the inn. How piteously you misrepresented your case, and begged me, a lady so in distress and a compatriot of Cos, to rescue you from your predicament!"
"No! No!" she said. "It is not I!"
"You well made me your fool and dupe!" he snarled. "I paid your bill for three silver tarns, a fortune to me at the time, and put in travel money, too, that you might return to Cos!"
"It is not I!" she said.
"And for this I received not so much as a kiss, you claiming this would demean our relationship, by putting it on a "physical" basis."
"It was not I!" she wept.
"Well do I remember you in the fee cart moving rapidly away, laughing, carrying my purse with you, waving the redemption papers, signed for freedom!"
"It was not I!" she cried.
"Then he cuffed her. We gasped, for he had done so as if she might have been a slave. This took the fight out of her. He then thrust her back, and looked at her. 'But,' said he, 'it seems that someone was not such a fool as I, for here you are, on a chain, in a warriors' camp.' She could only look at him then, tears in her eyes. She knew that she had lost. 'Oh,' cried he, 'how many times I have dreamed of having you in my power, of having you naked, in a collar!' He turned her brutally about, from side to side, examining her. 'Excellent!' he cried, 'You are not yet branded!' She sank to her knees before him, her head in her hands, weeping. 'Keeper!' cried he. 'Keeper!' Ephialtes, who had been called forth by the commotion, was present. 'She is for sale, or my sword will have it so!' cried the mercenary. In short, she was soon sold, for an enormous price, two gold pieces. She was startled that he wanted her so much. To be sure, the gold was doubtless that of Ar's Station."