I well recalled the lesson which was constantly enforced upon us: "The master is all. Please him fully."

"What is the meaning of the stabilization serums?" I had asked Sucha.

She had kissed me. "They will keep you much as you are," she said, "young and beautiful."

I had looked at her, startled.

"The masters, and the free, of course, if there is need of it, you must understand, are also afforded the serums of stabilization," she said, adding, smiling, "though they are administered to them, I suppose, with somewhat more respect than they are to a slave."

"If there is need of it?" I asked.

"Yes," she said.

"Do some not require the serums?" I asked.

"Some," said Sucha, "but these individuals are rare, and are the offspring of individuals who have had the serums."

"Why is this?" I asked.

"I do not know," said Sucha. "Men differ."

The matter, I supposed, was a function of genetic subtleties, and the nature of differing gametes. The serums of stabilization effected, it seemed, the genetic codes, perhaps altering or neutralizing certain messages of deterioration, providing, I supposed, processes in which an exchange of materials could take place while tissue and cell patterns remained relatively constant. Ageing was a physical process and, as such, was susceptible to alteration by physical means. All physical processes are theoretically reversible. Entropy itself is presumably a moment in a cosmic rhythm. The physicians of Gor, it seemed, had addressed themselves to the conquest of what had hitherto been a universal disease, called on Gor the drying and withering disease, called on Earth, ageing. Generations of intensive research and experimentation had taken place. At last a few physicians, drawing upon the accumulated data of hundreds of investigators, had achieved the breakthrough, devising the first primitive stabilization serums, later to be developed and exquisitely refined.

I had stood in the cage, startled, trembling. "Why are serums of such value given to slaves?" I asked.

"Are they of such value?" she asked. "Yes," she said, "I suppose so." She took them for granted, much as the humans of Earth might take for granted routine inoculations. She was unfamiliar with ageing. The alternative to the serums was not truly clear to her. "Why should slaves not be given the serums?" she asked. "Do the masters not want their slaves healthy and better able to serve them?"

"It is true," I said, "Sucha." On Earth animals were given inoculations by farmers to protect them from diseases; on Gor it would be a matter of course, provided the serums were readily available, to administer them to slaves.

I stood with Sucha, trembling. I had received a gift which on Earth could not be purchased by the riches of the wealthiest men, a gift which was beyond the reach of Earth's mightiest millionaires, which even the billionaires of my planet could not buy, for it did not exist there.

I was incredibly rich. I looked at the bars of the cage. "But I am caged!" I cried.

"Of course," said Sucha, "you are a slave. Now rest. Tonight you are to be sold."

I felt the hand of the man tight on my arm, beside me on the step.

"I am naked," I said.

"You are a slave," he said.

"Do not show me to the men!" I begged. "I am not as the other girls."

"Ascend the block," said he, "Slave." He thrust me upward. I fell on the stairs. My legs trembled.

I sensed him lift the whip.

"I will cut the flesh from your body with the whip," he said.

"No, Master!" I wept.

"Girl 128," called the auctioneer, from the height of the block. It was an announcement to the crowd.

I looked upward. The auctioneer came to the edge of the block. He smiled down, in a kindly fashion. He extended his hand to me. "Please," he said.

"I am naked," I said.

"Please," he said. He put his hand further toward me.

I lifted my hand to him, and he took me by the hand, helping me to the height of the block.

The block was circular, and some twenty feet in diameter. There was sawdust upon it.

By the hand he led me to the center of the block. "She is reluctant," he said to the crowd, in explanation.

I stood before the men.

"Are you comfortable now, dear lady?" he asked.

"Yes," I said. "Thank you."

Suddenly, angrily, he threw me to the wood at his feet. I heard the hiss of his whip. Five times he lashed me and I screamed, covering my head with my hands. Then I lay trembling, lashed, at his feet.

"She is Girl 128," he said to the crowd. From an assistant he took a board, with rings and papers. He read from that paper which was now first upon the board, others being loose and thrown back.

"128," he said, reading irritably, "is brown haired and brown eyed. She is 51 horts in height. Her weight is 29 stones. Her block measurements, certified, are 22 horts, 16 horts, 22 horts. She will take a number-two wrist ring and a number-two ankle ring. Her collar size is ten horts. She is illiterate, and, for most practical purposes, untrained. She cannot dance. Her brand is the Dina, the slave flower. Her ears are pierced." He looked down at me, and kicked me, lightly, with the side of his foot. "Stand, Slave," he said. Swiftly I stood.

I looked about myself, miserably. In the torchlight, I could see, in the rings of the amphitheater, ascending before me and above me, on three sides, the crowd. There were aisles at the side, and two aisles in the tiers, with steps. The tiers were crowded, and, on them, men ate and drank. Here and there, too, robed and veiled, I saw women among them, watching me. One woman sipped wine through her veil, staining it. All were fully clothed, save I, who wore only a light chain, locked, with its attached disk of sale.

"Stand straight," said the auctioneer.

I stood straight. My back hurt terribly from the whipping which he had given me.

"So you see 128," he said. "Are there any bids?"

The crowd was silent.

The auctioneer took my hair in his hand and, cruelly, bent me back, standing. "22 horts," said he, indicating my breasts. "16 horts," said he, slapping me on the belly. "22 horts," said he, reaching across my body and placing his hand on my right hip, indicating the width of my body. These were my block measurements. I knew a master might keep me to such measurements, with the whip, if necessary. "Small," said he, "but sweet, a delicacy, noble sirs, with promise."

"Two tarsks," called a man from the crowd.

"I hear two tarsks," said the auctioneer.

It was true that I was not large, but I did not think I was unusually small. I was, in Earth measurements, some five feet four inches in height and weighed about one hundred and sixteen pounds. My figure though delicate, was in Earth measurements approximately 28-20-28. I had not known my collar size on Earth, for I had not purchased garments with such attention to the neck. On Gor, it was ten horts. Accordingly it must have been, in Earth measurements, in the neighborhood of twelve and one half inches. I have a slender, delicate neck. I do not know what my wrist and ankle measurements would be. I do know I take a number-two wrist ring and a number-two ankle ring. These run in separate series, the ankle rings being larger, of course, than the wrist rings. It is regarded as desirable in a slave that she takes the same number wrist and ankle ring, this suggesting a delicious symmetry. There are four numbers in the series; one is regarded as small, two and three as normal, and four as large. I could not slip four ankle ring, of course; I could slip a four wrist ring, if it were set at four; most such wrist and ankle rings, however, are adjustable to 1, 2, 3 or 4. Thus, they, like slave bracelets, lock to the perfect holding point on each girl.

The auctioneer stood very near me.

I did not know my wrist or ankle size in Earth measurements, for such measurements are not important for a girl on Earth as they are on Gor, but the interior circumference of the number-two wrist ring is 5 horts and the interior circumference of the number-two ankle ring is 7 horts; thus, my wrist size in Earth measurement must be about six inches and my ankle size must be about eight and one-half inches. In the slave pens, of course, a girl's measurements are taken on a tape measure marked in horts and entered on her sheet of sale.