"Are you not puzzled as to why you were brought to this world?" he asked. "Please!" I begged.

He regarded me.

"I will pay you anything," I whispered.

"Money?" he asked.

"Yes!" I said. "Yes!"

"Money is unimportant," he said.

I looked anguished.

"Smoke your cigarette," he said. I drew on the cigarette.

"Were you startled the morning you awakened and found yourself branded?" he inquired.

"Yes," I whispered. My hand inadvertently touched the mark on my thigh, under my robe.

"Perhaps you are curious as to how it was done?"

"Yes," I whispered.

"The device," said he, "is not much larger than this." He indicated the small, flat box of cigarettes. "A handle, containing the heating element, is fixed into the back of the marking surface. It switches on and off, much like a common flashlight." He smiled at me. "It generates a flesh-searing heat in five seconds."

"I felt nothing," I said.

"You were fully anesthetized," he said.

"Oh," I said.

"I personally think a girl should be fully conscious when being branded," he said.

I looked down.

"The psychological impact is more satisfactory," he said.

I could say nothing.

"Salve was applied to the wound. It healed quickly and cleanly. You went to bed a free woman." He looked at me, unpleasantly. "You awakened a Kajira." "The collar?" I asked.

"You were lying unconscious before the mirror," he said. "We re-entered your apartment by means of the terrace." He smiled. "It is not hard to collar a girl."

I recalled the collar had been later removed at the location referred to as point P, before the black ship had fled the earth, through the gray skies of that August dawn.

The man who had removed the collar had said that doubtless I would have another. I shoved the cigarette irritably down on the table, breaking it, grinding it out.

I knew that I could be collared, when it pleased a man to do so.

"May I have another cigarette?" I asked. "Of course," he said, and solicitously, as I bent forward, he lit me another.

I drew on the fresh cigarette. "Do you often bring women to this world as slave?" I asked.

"Yes," he said, "and sometimes men, too, if it should serve our purposes." "I see," I said.

I was irritated.

I remembered the two men thrusting me into the narrow, transparent slave capsule, in its rack, its lid being screwed shut. I remembered my pressing my hands against its sides, the beginning of the flight from Earth, the sedating gases.

I had indeed been brought to this world as a slave.

We smoked together for some time without speaking.

I remember awakening, lying in a Gorean field, some hundred yards or so from the black wreckage of the slavers' ship. I remembered, too, that on Earth, at the location called point P, before I had boarded the ship, a heavy steel anklet, doubtless an identification device of some sort, had been locked on my left ankle. When I had awakened in the field, it had been gone.

I looked at him. "Why was I brought to this world?" I asked.

"We bring many women to this world," he remarked, "because they are beautiful, and it pleases us to make them slaves."

I regarded him.

"Also, of course," he said, "they are valuable. They may be distributed or sold, as we please, to further our ends or increase our profits."

"Was I brought to this world as such a girl?" I asked.

"It may interest you to know," he said, "that you were marked for abduction at the age of seventeen. In the intervening years we watched you carefully, maturing into a spoiled, rich, highly intelligent, arrogant young woman, exactly the sort that, under whip and collar, becomes a most exquisite slave." I drew on the cigarette, in fury. "So I was simply brought to Gor to be a female slave?" I asked. "Let us say," he remarked, carefully, "you have been bought to Gor as a female slave, regardless."

"Regardless?" I asked.

"Yes," he said.

"I do not understand," I said.

"We lost you briefly," he said. His eyes clouded. "The ship crashed," he explained.

"I see," I said.

"After the crash," he said, "we detected the approach of an enemy craft. We abandoned our ship and scattered, fleeing with our cargo."

"But," said I," was I not part of youra€“yourcargo?"

His eyes narrowed. I could tell he would choose his words carefully. "We have enemies," he said. "We did not wish you to fall into their hands. We feared pursuit. We removed yours identification anklet and hid you in the grass, some distance from the ship. Then with the other girls, we fled, intending to rendezvous later, if possible, and return for you. There was, however, no pursuit. The enemy apparently content only to destroy the ship. When we returned there was little more than a crater. You, of course, were gone.

"How did you find me?" I asked.

"As an unprotected female on Gor, particularly a beautiful one, there was little doubt that the first male you encountered would make you his slave." I looked down, irritated.

"I went to Laura," he said, "it is the largest city in the area. I expected that it would be there that you would be put up for sale."

"And you would have bought me?" I said.

"Yes," he said. "Simple." He smiled. "But, unfortunately for us, your capture was effected by slavers, and they wished to take you south for a better price. Accordingly we used panther girls. Verna and her band, to acquire you." He smiled again. "It was, incidentally, must less expensive."

I looked at him in irritation. "You cost only one hundred arrow points."

I shook with anger.

"That bothers you, doesn't it?" he asked.

"No," I said.

"It would bother only a natural slave girl," he said.

I looked down, shaking with fury. I was not a slave. I was not a slave! I sat there in the belted, red-silk lounging robe, with the high brocade collar enclosing my throat. I drew again one the cigarette. I was not a slave! "How did you know that I was in Targo's compound?" I asked.

"Doubtless," said he, "I would have investigated, and found you there, but, earlier, I saw you in Laura. You were in coffle, throat-leashed, fetching supplies, with other slaves."

I looked down with irritation.

"You carry wine beautifully," he commented.

"I am not a slave," I told him.

"I see," he said.

"I am free," I told him.

"I see," he said.

I remembered now that once, in Laura, I had seen a man, garbed in black. I had thought that he might have been watching us. But I had not been sure. I now realized that it had been he.

"And so," I said, "you found me."

"I confirmed your identity at the compound," said he, "during the performance of the mountebank, and, of course, surveyed the entire area and planned, in effect, the raid of the panther girls."

"It was your good fortune," I told him, haughtily, "that I was not caged that night."

He smiled. "I had spoken with Targo and the guards," he said, "and knew the celebrations planned for the evening. Further, I had even spoken with the guards, ostensibly jesting with them, as to their choices for the evening. I knew even at which wagon you would serve."

"You are thorough," I said.

"One must be," he said. "And so I am here," I said. I lowered the cigarette. "What are you going to do with me?" I asked.

"Perhaps feed you to the beast," he said.

I stiffened. It was true that he could do that, if he wished.

I drew again on the cigarette. "What are you going to do with me?" I asked. "In some respects," said he, "it was your good fortune to fall in with a slaver."

"Oh?" I asked.

"Yes," said he. "Doubtless you have not yet served fully as a slave girl." I looked at him with apprehension.

"You will doubtless find it an interesting experience," he said, "to serve, not as a free woman, but as a slave girl, fully, for a master who will exact his full dues and more, from his property."