Black Beauty Chapter Three

 

Black Beauty by Peony D Beckside

Chapter Three: Unconsciously worming my way in.

“Lay out love-furs, Vita.  They are in that cupboard over there.”

He indicates.

I find the soft sensuous fabric.  Love-furs are not actually fur at all.  Keeping fur clean of the sweat and bodily secretions of slave and Master would be impossible.  No, these are a kind of duvet or futon, covered in sensuous satin.  I take the furs to the sleeping dais and commence laying them on the top of the raised surface.

“What are you doing, slut!?”

“Master?”

“I didn’t take you for a stupid girl, when I first saw you!  I hope I wasn’t mistaken in that!  Don’t you know that only a free companion or invited free woman makes love on the dais itself?  Did they teach you nothing at the slave house?”

I grovel for all I’m worth.

“I’m sorry, Master. I did not truly know.  They didn’t tell us that in our training.  I think they must have assumed we knew.  I don’t think that I’m a stupid slave.  Merely an ignorant one.  The ways of this place are totally different from…”

I have to think quickly.  I don’t know how much my Master knows of Earth, or where to him, barbarian slaves come from.

“...barbarian lands.  I will do better in future, Master, I promise.”

“You’d better.  Love furs, on the floor, close to the chain and shackle.  Slaves should always be taken such.  You are not worthy to mount the dais.”

I’m already repositioning the furs.

“This slave thanks you for correcting her misunderstanding.”

Will he whip me?  I fervently and silently pray that he won’t.

“Get me a goblet of wine, girl and position yourself to be chained.  The bottle is over there.”

I scurry away in the direction shown, returning with the beverage.  I kneel thighs wide, press the goblet to my belly, raise it sensually to my lips.  I kiss the rim opposite to that from which Master will drink.  I offer the goblet forward to him with both hands, dropping my head between my arms, in submission.  Yes, we have been taught this manoeuvre, and told that we must not just be offering the cup, but our very self.  Such is my love for this magnificent man, that I give this offering of myself with every fibre of my body.  I’m not just giving of my body, I’m giving of my soul.  This act of submission and giving, itself excites and arouses me.  I understand now.  I don’t just want him to take me, I NEED him to take me.  I quiver in uncontrollable desire as he takes the metal ankle shackle.  I feel its coldness, even more so, I feel its emotional obduracy.  I am his, I cannot escape him.  My breasts heave, my pelvis writhes unbidden.  I want him so much now, that it would be a torment unbearable to even contemplate if he were to spurn me.  I croak out, my voice distorted and husky with passion.

“Master, your slave begs the pleasure of undressing you.  She is ready and needy for your touch.”

I am indeed!  The odour of my arousal is palpable.  There is no mistaking my need.  Nature has seen fit to design that a woman’s odour of lust, is perfect to bring a man to an equivalent state of need.  Not that men need this extra stimulation, and from what I’ve seen of Gorean men, even less so.  They become so ‘ready’ at any and all times, with little or no provocation.  I reach, in abject supplication for the closures of his garment.

As Master’s ‘weapon’ comes into view I marvel at its size and beauty.  I don’t suppose that it’s any grander than any other, but even given that I’m not a virgin, my experience of such items is limited.  I think what makes it so magnificent for me, is that it’s HIS.  It belongs to my Master, a man who for no reason I can understand, I adore more than life itself.  I want so to kiss this pillar, to take it in my mouth, to work it until I have taken every drop of his ‘gift’.  A little burr, a little warning bell sounds in the back of my mind. This shouldn’t be so!  Back on Earth, I had felt, and when attempted, found oral sex to be disgusting, unclean, morally repugnant, emotionally a ‘turn-off’.  Yet here, the very opposite seems the case.  What has changed me, my beliefs, my attitudes?  Whilst during our training in the Slave House, had incorporated oral sex, and I’d been diligent in these lessons, I’d still felt disgusted by the act.  Why should my feelings have changed?  Why only for this man, do I wish to undertake this unhygienic and deplorable task?  It’s almost as  if somehow I’ve been ‘brainwashed’ to use the jargon of Earth custom, to throw aside my scruples when it comes to this man.  Why is this man so special?  Special to me, because of that kind of ‘conditioning’?

 

I awaken, stretching like a panther.  I feel marvellous!  I feel a freeness in my spirit.  My ankle chain tautens, reminding me of my slavery, but somehow it doesn’t destroy that feeling of lightness and airiness.  To use a crudity, last night Master gave me the fucking of my life!  Several times, at that!  I’d never before been so well screwed.  Those Earth lovers I had, were insipid by comparison.  If Master is going to love me so well in future, my life will be totally sybaritic!  Towards the later part of the night, Master had turned from me.

“Get some sleep, Vita.”

I didn’t need a second telling.  My eyes closed almost instantly.

 

I seem to be the only slave in Master’s quarters.  It’s clear though that there’s been another before me, at least one.  I wonder idly what happened to the previous occupant of the slave kennel attached to what appears to be a kind of kitchen.  I must suppose that she’s been sold.  I don’t want to ask why.  Apart from the probability that such a question would be seen as impertinent, I’m not sure that I want to know.  I am reminded by this lack, of just how easy it is for a slave to suddenly find herself cast out from a place that she may have come to think of as her home.  Of course it’s not HER home, just somewhere where she resides for a while.  It’s the impermanence of her situation that must be disconcerting.  To suddenly find that one has been taken to a new place, with different routines, different expectations, even to having to learn the whims and preferences of a new owner, must be quite a challenge.  One that I too find myself with.  The thought that one day I might, nay even probably will, be torn from this gorgeous man that I love, or believe that I do, terrifies me.

Master did not want me last night.  After the fucking that I’d had the previous night, I was devastated.  I cried myself to sleep after he’d locked me in the kennel.  I wanted him so badly!  Correction, I need to rethink my terms of reference.  As his slave, it’s not for me to want him, but for him to want me.  Wanting him carries with it the implication that he is mine.  This is Earth-girl thinking.  I must become more Gorean.  I am now his, not he mine.  This thought doesn’t in any way lessen the desire, nay need for him to again take me to the heaven that he’d shown me upon bringing me here.  In the training pens, the other girls, the Gorean ones, spoke of the fabled ‘slave fires’, that once lit in the belly of the slave, can never again be doused.  I feel a constant low-level arousal at all times.  Whenever in Master’s presence, that need becomes a raging inferno.  Is this what ‘slave fires’ feels like?  I think it must be.  Intellectually I know that I must not become too importunate; like a kitten that won’t let its owner get on with whatever it is that he’s doing. That’s the surest way of annoying Master, the most certain way of getting myself sold by him!  It’s so hard not to be constantly thrusting myself under his very nose, onto his lap.  He has to want to reach for me.  It’s my job to entice him to want to reach for me, but I must be subtle.

My eyes light up, or at least I assume so from the feeling of joy that I have when he comes and lets me out of my kennel.

“Good morning Master!  Let me make you some breakfast!  Do you have any preference?”

He reels off what he would like.  I note his preferences for future occasions.  ‘Learning the Master’, what he likes, what he doesn’t, is a complex business.  I mustn’t be too presumptuous.  I was given basic cookery lessons, at least based on Gorean cooking techniques, during my training.  What with my Earth experience, I feel sure that I can provide a good and varied culinary experience for Master.  I find what I need in the storage cupboards.  Even though I’m utterly famished, I know better than to take any of the food for myself.  That’s a big ‘No, No!’.  That much they’d taught me during my training.  Master will feed me when he’s good and ready.  My diet will probably be far simpler than what I am making for him.  Most Masters, it seems, like to control the food intake of their slaves, ensuring that the slave retains what they consider to be the perfect physical proportions and healthiness.

I kneel at his side, watching every nuance of him eating, watching for any way that my service can be perfect.  Will he need more bread, more of the Bazi tea, does he want me to remove his plate, etc?  I’m constantly having to swallow the saliva that is building up in my mouth, at the sight of all this lovely food.  Master laughs gently.

“Is Vita hungry, perchance?”

“Yes, Master,  Starving…”

I beg piteously.

“… feed me, please, Master!”

“You didn’t perhaps help yourself to something while you were preparing my breakfast?”

“Oh no, Master.  I know better than that.   In the training pens, one of the slaves tried to steal a bread-roll.  They made us watch the girl’s punishment.  I dare not presume to eat what is not given me by Master!”

He does not ask what punishment the other slave received.

“I’m glad to hear it, Vita.  Your diet will be simpler, more nutritious for one such as you.”

“I assumed as much, Master.”

“Clear the table, wash the pots, and wait kneeling, in the kitchen.”

He gets up and leaves the room.  I would automatically have done what Master had requested, except perhaps for the kneeling.  It’s clearly my duty to tidy up after Masters’ meal.

 

A man knocks on the door.  I open it.  He’s a merchant, or so I take him to be from his garb.  The white and gold is distinctive.  He’s a free man so I kneel automatically.  A slave must always kneel before a free person.  I deliberately kneel in the doorway.  It could be seen as being impertinent, but until Master has cleared him, I have to think on the security of Master’s house.  I have no way of telling if the man is a friend or an enemy.

“Greetings Master.  Whom should I tell my Master, is here?”

All free men are ‘Master’ and must be addressed so.  Similarly, all free women are ‘Mistress’.  Only one though is one’s owner.  A kind of Master of Masters.

“Tell him Proximan would appreciate a moment of his time.”

No ‘please’ of course.  I’m a slave, such courtesies are not appropriate or expected.

“Yes, Master.  Right away.”

I rise and rush away.  I find Master in his drawing office.

“Master, there’s a merchant at the door.  He says he is ‘Proximan’, and he would like a word with you, if possible.”

“Did you let him in?”

“I didn’t know if he is a friend or an enemy, Master.”

Master clearly understands the dilemma.

“For future reference, he is a friend.  Show him into the living room.  I’ll be there momentarily.”

I race back.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, Master.  Please enter.  If you’ll make yourself comfortable in the living room, Master will be with you very shortly.”

I indicate the direction.

“I know the way, girl.”

“Yes, Master.  May I get you something to eat, to drink?  May I assist you in any way”

“Bazi tea would be appreciated if you have it.”

“Yes, Master, on its way.”

I scoot into the kitchen and put the kettle onto the wood-fired stove.  From a pot deliberately placed in a sunny part of the courtyard, I fetch a bowl of warm water.  I grab soap and a towel.

“Master, with your permission, may I bathe your feet?”

“That’s thoughtful, slave.  Kindly do so.”

“Thank you, Master.

It’s not that Master Proximan’s feet are dirty, that they need washing.  Given the dusty nature of the city streets, and with no knowledge of how far the man has travelled, it seems to be a courteous thing to do.  I kiss the buckles of his sandals, before unfastening them.  I lovingly wash the feet of this, my Master’s friend.  I’ve just nicely finished drying his feet when my Master enters the room.

“Proximan!  So good to see you again.  I’m sorry to have kept you waiting…”

“Not at all, Castartius.  The opportunity to sit down, is welcome.”

“How long are you likely to be staying in the city?”

“Four days, perhaps five…”

“How about us getting together in a tavern somewhere one evening?”

“Sounds good to me.”

My Master sits down opposite Proximan.

“This is new, isn’t it?”

He points at me.  I should be offended at the implication that I’m a thing, rather than a person.  But of course, legally I am.

“Yes, useless slut that she is.  Cost me more than she’s probably worth…”

They both laugh at that.  I know precisely what I’m worth.  I’m a ‘gold piece’ girl.  I know very well that such is a very good price for one such as I.

“If she pleases you, feel free to use her before you leave.”

What?!  Master will let this stranger fuck me?  Earth thinking again!  I must remember that I’m now only a thing, a convenience, a perk, a kindness offered as a courtesy to a guest.  I calm my puritan concepts and think positively.  A mid-morning ‘romp’ in the furs, could be pleasant.  I just hope that this guest is as skilled a lover as my Master.

“At least she’s thoughtful.  It’s a long walk from the vermilion gate.  Her attention to my feet is appreciated.”

“Master, I’m preparing Bazi tea for your guest.  May I get something for you, also?”

“Bazi tea sounds good.  I’ll have the same.”

“With your permission…”

I indicate leaving in order to complete that task.  Master nods, I quietly depart.

I return with cups a jug reminiscent of a teapot, bosk and verr milk, different sugars, etc.  Whilst it’s not my place to listen in on conversations that don’t relate to me, one thing that I have learned is that slaves are no less curious than free men and women.  We just have to be more discreet about it.  Another aspect is that I’m still trying to come to grips with this strange world, still trying to figure out ‘which way is up’ as we used to say on Earth.  Besides, knowing what’s going on in Master’s world, helps me serve him better.  The polite small-talk that precedes the core of the conversation seems to be over I’m just in time to hear something that ‘pricks up my ears’.  Why it should, I don’t really know.

“So, Proximan, what do you hear from home?”

Home?  Is this not Master’s home?  Is this not his city?

“The Tatrix is very pleased with you.  The drawings that you sent are being studied by our military men to see if there are weaknesses in the defences.”

Tatrix? A remembrance from the Gor books I’d read surfaces.  A Queen, more specifically a Queen Regnant, a Queen ruling in her own right, as against a Queen Couchant, a Queen that is only so as the consort of a King.

“She’s impressed at your initiative in seeking to become Ubar,  She does however warn against hubris, and would be very displeased if in becoming so, you forgot where your real loyalties lie…”

Ubar?  That’s a kind of King.  Master has ambitions of becoming a King?  He can’t surely become a King of the city he’s from, if it’s already being run by a Tatrix?  Is it this city that we are in, that he wishes to rule?  If so, then this city already has an Ubar, or at least an administrator.  If he’s talking about becoming Ubar of his home city, then would this Tatrix want to step down, even if to become Ubara, the consort of the Ubar.  I find that difficult to believe.  I can’t really make any sense of this conversation, only it does put me on my guard a little.  Something clearly is not as straightforward as it appears or perhaps should be.

The rest of the conversation is relatively benign, it covering all sorts of mundane subjects  I ‘switch-off’, allowing myself to be little more than an automaton.  I am jerked out of my ennui.

“That offer to use your slave, is it still open, Castartius.”

“Of course, friend.  For you, anytime!  Vita, attend to the pleasure of my guest.  Pop your head round the door of my drawing office, Proximan, when you are done.  We can decide then when we are going to enjoy the fleshpots of this city together.”

I put my heart and soul into pleasing Proximan.  He is after all my Master’s friend. To please him is in a way to please Master, since my use has been given to this guest.  Besides, Proximan is not a displeasing man!  He has that air about him, that I see in most men on Gor; sex-appeal is the only phrase that I can think of to say what I feel.  Thanks to the Stabilisation Serums, there are few old, and hence ugly people on Gor.  Most men, then appear virile, in their prime.  Of course, the only other explanation is that I’m just a tart, a bimbo, a floozy.  I certainly feel more sexually needy than I ever did before I came to Gor.  Whether that’s due to the training that I got in the Slave-House, which shattered my inhibitions, or whether I always was at heart a slut, I don’t know. Proximan is a skilled lover.  He has me wriggling and writhing, moaning and crying-out in no time.  My pleasure, I’m sure, is as great if not more than Proximan’s.  He may know how to get the best out of slut like me, but for all that, he’s not my Master!  Master’s loving of me, is in a class of its own!

 

“When you’ve tidied up the breakfast things, attend me in my drawing office, Vita.”

“Yes, Master!”

I scurry around the Kitchen, not wanting to keep Master waiting.  At the door to Master’s office, I timidly knock, and upon being ordered, enter.  Master is standing by a drawing board on a twin-tripod arrangement.  It is not a lot different from similar things I’d seen on Earth; the kind of thing draughtsmen would have used before computer CAD/CAM systems came into use.  On the board is a drawing.  It seems to be either some kind of gatehouse, or perhaps a bridge between two buildings.

I kneel before my owner.

“You claimed when in the cage, that you had received training in barbarian lands, of many skills that the Builders use.  Were you lying?  Do I need to punish you for that?”

I go cold with dread at that possibility.

“No, Master.  Definitely not.”

“Then look at this drawing and tell me what’s wrong with it.”

I study the image.  A gatehouse, definitely.  The drawing is very nicely done, highly detailed.

“With the structure, Master, or with the drawing?”

I quail at my temerity, my presumption.  I’m horrified!  Did I actually say that?  If this is Master’s work then my implied criticism will probably earn me some serious ‘grief’.  Master laughs.

“You’re brave, girl!  I don’t think you are stupid enough not to care what you say or how you say things.  I am not offended.  Carry on.”

I sigh in relief, leaning forward to kiss Master’s sandals.

“Thank you, Master.  I apologise for not thinking through my response before making it.  Thank you, thank you!”

I stand and study the image.

“This bridging piece,  What’s it made of, please, Master?”

“Stone.”

“What kind of load is this intended to carry?”

“A tharlarion cart at a time.”

“Do you have steel beams?”

“A bar of steel that long?  No, our metalworkers are good at making swords and weapons of steel, but no smithy is big enough, or equipped with good enough hoists to cast such a beam.”

“Then it will fail, Master.  Even if your quarrymen can cut and transport a single piece of stone of these dimensions, it will suffer a stress fracture, most likely here.  It might hold for lighter loads, a man, two men, perhaps five at most.  If an enemy were to be able to strike it right with a reasonable force it would break, pulling down the gates with it.”

I point.

“How do we bridge here, so it doesn’t break?”

I look again at the drawing.  Indicating the supporting buildings, I enquire.

“Do these buildings already exist, or are they yet to be built?”

“Not yet built.”

“Then, Master, if we can reinforce here and here…”

I show him.

“Then we can use those points as anchors for a timber hammer-brace.  If we can make them long  and sturdy enough, effectively they then become an arch.  Looking at the scale, unless you need to pass anything particularly high and wide underneath the hammer brace, then it shouldn’t cause an impediment.  With your permission, Master?”

I indicate, and reach for paper and a drawing stick.  I sketch what I have in mind.

“Yes, you do clearly have a grounding in the techniques of the builders.  How far that extends, time will tell.  As for your idea.  That’s precisely what has been decided.”

I smile.  My smile vanishes.

“Now, what’s wrong with the drawing?”

Some back-pedalling is called for.

“Nothing in itself, Master.  The detail is exquisite, but it doesn’t show an isometric view…”

“Isometric…?”

“3D…  Three dimensional…”

I struggle to find the right Gorean words.

“An as-it-will-appear, view, Master.”

This thought intrigues him.  Is it possible that Gorean Builders don’t know how to draw such?

“If I may, Master...?”

“Show me!”

I look through Master’s drawing tools.  Yes, he does have a T-square to slide up and down the drawing board so as to be able to draw horizontal guide-lines.  He also has a thirty degree set-square.  If the Goreans know enough about this angle to create a tool for drawing it, how come they haven’t come up with the isometric view.  I would have thought that there would be little other use for such a set-square.  This is basic artistic-perspective.  I remove the existing drawing from the drawing board and lay it on a flat table.  Fortunately, I’d learned the basics of technical drawing with drawing boards, at high school.  CAD/CAM computer packages being relatively new at the time, I’d only been introduced to them when I got to college.

“This’ll be simplified, Master, so as to show the concept.  The detail can be added later, if you wish it.”

Taking the salient points of the previous drawing, I quickly drew the front elevation, the side elevation and the plan, effectively moving the plan view to one side from where the original drawer had placed his plan.  This freed up a quarter of the sheet to hold the isometric.  Finding a very light coloured drawing stick, I drew in the necessary guidelines into that hitherto empty quarter of the page.  Creating the starting point, the ‘corner of the edifice’ from which the 3D image would spread, I begin to draw this new view.  As I work, I’m explaining what I’m doing, and why.  From the corner of my eye, I sense that Master is watching fascinated.  This simplified new drawing of the edifice in question is done.  Master is, I think impressed.

“Very interesting, Vita.  Yes, I can see the potential of this kind of layout.  Whether it catches on, only time will tell.  You’ve probably earned me back a large chunk of what I paid for you! Don’t however get any ideas about being freed.  A natural slave like you, should never be free.”

In my heart, I now know that what he says is true.  Being a slave, correction being his slave, is so wonderful that I don’t really want to be anything else.  Yet again, there’s that niggling little feeling that things are not as they should be.  I may honestly respond, but is that honesty my own or something instilled in me.

“With you as my Master, Master, I don’t want to be freed!”

He harrumphs

“Toadying slut!”

“Yes, Master.  Your toadying slut, gladly so, Master.”

He laughs.

“You shall have a treat tonight.  No slave gruel for you tonight.  You will kneel and I shall feed you from my plate.”

“Oh, Thank you Master.  You do me so much honour.  Perhaps, tonight in your furs, you might feed me some other kind of ‘meat’, Master?”

He’s got a big wide grin.

“You really are a slut, aren’t you, Vita!?  I’ll think on it.”

“Yes, Master.  Please, Master.  I burn with need…”

“Importunate slave!”