"Captain," said one of the two guardsmen standing before our table. They were the fellows in whose custody the free woman, the Lady Rowena of Lydius, had earlier been drawn to our attention The woman who had been the Lady Rowena of Lydius was now again in their custody. She was now on her knees between them, facing us, her arms held high and to either side of her, each of her wrists in the grasp of a guard. She was now a slave.

"Is it the sleen for her, Captain?" asked he who was first of the two guardsmen, he who had just spoken.

"Dorto, Krenbar," said Samos.

"Yes, Captain," said the men. Dorto was the oarsman who had opened the former Lady Rowena of Lydius for the uses of men. Krenbar was another oarsman. He had used her twice in the evening, after putting her through intricate slave paces each time.

"Does this slave," asked Samos, "give some indication that she might eventually prove to be at least somewhat adequate in a collar?"

"Yes, Captain," said Dorto. "Yes, Captain," said Krenbar.

"Tonight, as you know, my dear," said Samos, "you danced and performed for your life."

"I beg to have been found pleasing," she said.

"Based on the evidences submitted by Dorto and Krenbar, and my own judgment in the matter, your performances, at least for a new slave, have been found acceptable."

I thought she might almost faint with relief.

"Accordingly, at least for the moment, you will not be thrown to sleen."

"Thank you, Master!" she said.

"You are Rowena," he said.

"Thank you, Master," she said, named. There is some security in a slave having a name. Most masters will not name a slave whom they are planning on having immediately destroyed. It would be a waste of name. To be sure, names may be put on slaves and taken off them on a master's whim.

"Though you have been spared, at least for now, do not grow complacent," said Samos.

"No, Master!" she said.

"You are now, like any other slave, you must understand, under standard, unconditional slave discipline."

"Yes, Master!" she said. She was now a slave like any other, neither more nor less.

"Take her below," said Samos to he who was first of the two guardsmen. "Mark her, left thigh, common Kajira mark. Collar her, common house collar."

"Yes, Captain," he said. In the case of the girl, Rowena, of course, as she was already a self-pronounced slave, the brand and collar were little more than identificatory formalities. Nonetheless she would wear them. They would be fixed visibly and clearly upon her. This is in accord with the prescriptions of merchant law. Too, for all practical purposes, they make escape impossible for the Gorean slave girl.

"Then bring her to my chambers," said Samos.

"Yes, Captain," said he who was first of the two guardsmen.

"Master!" protested Linda.

Samos looked at her, and she lowered her head. "Forgive me, Master," she said.

"I shall try to be pleasing, Master!" Rowena avowed, frightened.

Then the two guardsmen pulled her about and conducted her from our presence.

"She is fat," said Linda. I did not think this remark was fair on Linda's part. The slave, Rowena, was not fat. She was sweetly shapely. To be sure, by a strict regimen of diet and exercise, she would soon be brought, in a manner congenial to her basic structure, within indisputable latitudes of slave perfection.

The Gorean slave girl is not a free woman. Accordingly she must keep herself beautiful.

"Do you not like Linda any more?" she pouted.

"Yes, I like you," he said.

"Linda can please you more than Rowena," she said.

"Perhaps," said Samos.

"I can, I will!" she said.

"Who?" asked Samos.

"Linda can, Linda will!" she said.

"To your kennel," said Samos.

"Yes, Master," she said, taking up her tunic, rising to her feet, tears in her eyes.

"Do not fret," he said. "Tomorrow night it will be you who will be chained at my slave ring."

"Thank you, Master!" she said.

"And tonight, for you have not been fully pleasing," he said, "tell the kennel master to put you in close chains."

"Yes, Master!" she laughed and, happily, dismissed, clutching her tunic, rose to her feet and scurried away. She would not spend a comfortable night, locked in the steel of close chains, but she was radiantly happy. She had been reassured of the interest of her master.

"What are you going to do with the slave Rowena?" I asked.

"She is one of a lot of one hundred," said Samos. "They are to be sold at the fair of En'Kara."

"The slave, Linda," I said, "doubtless would have been pleased to hear that."

"She will doubtless learn of it, in one way or another, sooner or later," said Samos.

"Doubtless," I said.

I rose to my feet. I was stiff from having sat for so long. I suspected Samos cared for the Earth-girl, Linda. It was no secret in Port Kar that the shapely collar-slut was first on his chain.

Samos, too, with a grunt, rose to his feet. "Ah," he said.

We looked about. The men and slaves had left the room. We were alone.

Our eyes met. I saw in his eyes that he wanted to speak to me, but he did not do so.

"Your men and boat are waiting," he said.

He accompanied me from his holding to the small landing, with its steps, leading down to the water, outside.

I stepped down into the longboat and, shaking him by the shoulder, awakened Thurnock, the blond giant, he of the peasants. He awakened the rowers. I took my place at the tiller. One of Samos' men cast the line into the boat.

"I wish you well," said Samos.

"I wish you well," I said.

We then pushed off, thrusting against the steps with the port oars. In a moment, with unhurried strokes, we were making our way down the canal, back toward my holding. The canal was dark now. In two days, however, it would be lit with lanterns, thrust out on jutting poles from the bordering, clifflike house and strung with garlands and flags. It would then be the time of the Twelfth Passage Hand, the time of carnival.

I heard the ringing of the time bar from the arsenal. It was the Twentieth Ahn, the Gorean midnight.

I was very puzzled as to why Samos had invited me to his holding tonight. I was sure that he had wished to speak to me. But he had not, however, done so.

I dismissed these considerations from my mind. If he chose to keep his own counsel, it was not mine to inquire into his motivations.

I thought that I had played kaissa well tonight. To be sure, Samos was not an enthusiast for the game. He preferred, as I recalled, a different kaissa, one of politics and men.

2 Carnival

"Master!" laughed she who seemed to be a naked, collared slave, flinging her arms about my neck, pressing her lips fervently, deliciously, to mine.

"Oh!" she cried, as my hands checked her thighs. She was truly a slave. The brand was on her left thigh, high, just under the hip. Sometimes free women, during the time of carnival, masquerading as slaves, run naked about the streets.

I slid my hands possessively up her body and then, between my thumbs and fingers, held her under the arms, half lifting her, half pressing her to me. I then returned her kiss. "Master!" she purred, delighted. I then turned her about and, with a good-natured, stinging slap, sped her on her way. She disappeared, laughing, among the crowds.

"Paga, mate?" inquired a mariner.

I took a swig of paga from his bota and he one from mine.

I stepped to one side, nearly trampled by a gigantic figure on stilts.

I was jostled by a fellow blowing on a horn.

There might easily have been fifteen thousand people in the great piazza, the largest in Port Kar, that before the hall of the Council of Captains. It was ringed with booths, and platforms, and stages and stalls, and booths, and platforms and stalls, too, with colorful canvas, with their eccentrically carved wood, with their fluttering flags, and signs, like standards, illuminated by lamps and torches, throngs gathered about them, and flowing between them, bedecked and studded the piazza's inner precincts.