I took two pair of slave bracelets from the foot of the taluna camp. Girls such as talunas keep such things about in case slave girls should fall into their hands. They are extremely cruel to slave girls, whom they regard as having betrayed their sex by surrendering as slaves to men. Actually, of course, it seems likely that their hatred of slave girls, which tends to be unreasoning and vicious, is due less to lofty sentiments than to their own intense jealousy of the joy and fulfillment of their imbonded sisters. The joyful slave girl, obedient to her master's wishes, is an affront and, more frighteningly, an unanswerable and dreadful threat to their most cherished illusions. Perhaps they wish to be themselves slaves. Why else should they hate them so?

I slipped the straps on the wrists of the blond girl a bit higher on her wrists. I then, below the straps, snapped her wrists into one of the pairs of slave bracelets from the loot of the taluna camp. I then untied the straps which had, hitherto, confined her wrists. Her hands, then, were still fastened behind her, but now in slave bracelets.

I loosened the gag from the mouth of the blond girl and let it fall, its wadding looped about it, before her throat.

She threw up on the jungle floor. The wadding smelled. She threw back her head, gasping for air. I cleaned her mouth with a handful of leaves.

"Do you wish to be a slave girl?" I asked her.

"No," she said. "No!"

"Very well," I said. I threw the other pair of slave bracelets to Turgus. He snapped them on the dark-haired girl and then, as I had, freed her wrists of the earlier binding, which had been, in her case, a length of vine rope from the small people.

She looked at him, puzzled.

"Do you wish to be a slave girl?" he asked.

"No," she said, "no, no!"

"Very well," he said.

I grasped the hand of the leader of the small people in friendship. "I wish you well," I said. "I wish you well," he said.

Then I and Kisu, followed by Turgus, and by Janice, Alice and Tende, turned about to leave the clearing. We would return to our hidden canoe, beached near the river, near which we had concealed many of our supplies.

"What shall we do with these?" called the leader of the small people. We turned about He indicated the line of miserable, trussed talunas.

"Whatever you wish," I told him, "they are yours."

"What of those?" he asked. He indicated the blond girl who had been the leader of the talunas and the dark-haired girl, who had been her second in command. They stood, their hands braceleted behind them, confused, in the clearing.

"They were ours," I said. "We let them go. Let them go."

"Very well," he said.

Kisu and I, and Turgus, and our girls, Alice, Janice and Tende, then left the clearing.

"Unlock our bracelets," begged the blond girl. She and the dark-haired girl had followed us to the edge of the river.

Kisu and I, and Ayari, were sliding our canoe, from which we had removed its camouflage, toward the water. The girls, Janice, Alice and Tende, with the paddles and supplies, accompanied us.

Then we were at the edge of the water.

"Please," begged the blond girl. She turned, that her wrists, enclosed snugly in the linked, steel bracelets, might be exposed to me. "Please unlock our bracelets," she begged. "Please, please!" begged, too, the dark-haired girl.

Kisu and Ayari thrust the canoe into the water. Janice, Alice and Tende, wading, placed the paddles and supplies in the canoe, and then, entering the narrow vessel, assumed their places.

"Please free us," begged the blond girl.

"They are only slave bracelets," I said. "Free yourselves."

"We cannot do so," said the blond girl. "We are women, and have only women's strength."

I shrugged.

"Please," she begged again.

"Did you think, noble free women," I asked, "that you might do fully as you wished, that no penalties would be inflicted upon you?"

"You cannot leave us here!" she wept. She looked behind her, fearfully, at the jungle.

Turgus and I waded to the canoe, which Kisu and Ayari held steady in the water.

"Please," begged the blond girl. "You cannot leave us here!"

I turned to face her. "You have lost," I told her. I turned away.

'There is another penalty which may be inflicted upon free women," cried the blond.

I turned again to face her. "Do not even speak of it," I said. "It is too degrading and horrifying. Surely death is a thousand times more preferable."

"I beg that other penalty," said the blond, kneeling in the mud on the shore. "I, too," cried the dark-haired girl, kneeling. too, in the mud. "I, too!"

"Speak clearly," I said.

"We beg enslavement," said the blond, "Enslave us, we beg of you!"

"Enslave yourselves," I said.

"I declare myself a slave," said the blond, "and I submit myself to you as my master." She put her head down to the mud. "I declare myself a slave," said the dark-haired girl, and then she turned to face Turgus, "and I submit myself to you as my master." She then put her head down, like the blond, to the mud.

"Lift your head," I said to the blond. "Lift your head," said Turgus to the other girl. The two girls lifted their heads, anxiously.

"You are now only two slaves," I said.

"Yes, Master," mid the blond. "Yes. Master," said the dark-haired girl. They had declared themselves slaves. The slave herself, of course, once the declaration has been made, cannot revoke it. That would be impossible, for she is then only a slave. The slave can be freed only by one who owns her, only by one who is at the time her master or, if it should be the case, her mistress. The legal point, I think, is interesting. Sometimes, in the fall of a city, girls who have been enslaved, girls formerly of the now victorious city, will be freed. Technically, according to Merchant Law, which serves as the arbiter in such intermunicipal matters, the girls become briefly the property of their rescuers, else how could they be freed? Further, according to Merchant Law, the rescuer has no obligation to free the girl. In having been enslaved she has lost all claim to her former Home Stone. She has become an animal. If, too, she is sufficiently desirable, it is almost certain she will not be freed. As the Goreans have it, such women are too beautiful to be free. Too, as often as not, city pride enters into such matters. Such girls, with other slave girls, both of various cities and with the former free women of the conquered city, now collared slaves, too, will often be marched naked in chains in the loot processions of the conquering cities. It is claimed they have shamed their former city by having fallen slave, and if they were good enough to be only slaves in the conquered city then surely they should be no more within the walls of the victorious city. Such girls usually are marched in a special position in the loot processions, behind and before banners which proclaim their shame. The people much abuse them and lash them as they pass. Such girls usually beg piteously to be sold to transient slavers. It is hard for them to wear their collars in their own city.

Kisu and Ayari, and Turgus and I, entered the canoe. "Masters!" cried the blond, kneeling in the mud, her hands braceleted behind her. "Wait!" cried the dark-haired girl.

"You are slaves," I told them. "You may be left behind." The prow of the canoe swung slowly toward the center of the river.

"Do not leave us!" cried the blond. She struggled to her feet and, slipping, waded splashing to the side of the canoe. So, too, did the dark-haired girl.

The canoe was now in waist-deep water.

The blond, wading beside it, crying, thrust her body against its side. "Please," she begged, "please!" Both the girls still wore the vine collars on their throats, which the small people had affixed on them, that they might be fastened more easily at the fallen tree. The blond, too, still had looped about her neck her gag lashing with its unrolled, dependent wadding looped about it.