Dancer of Gor

My body, and even my legs, ached from the weight of the water bag, slung on its strap over my shoulder. I was pleased when the contents were depleted, for the weight was less, but then, soon, I must hurry back to the wooden tank, to submerge the bag again and, as the bubbles streamed up to the surface, and broke there, refill it. During the day I was not allowed to drink from the bag, but only from the tank. Usually while one girl returned to the tank, the other would remain with the crew. In this way, there was generally water available, except when the guards wished to punish the men. We might then be made to kneel or sit in the sight of them, the damp, bulging water bags beside us, which we were not permitted to bring to them. Sometimes the guards, during such times of denying the men drink, would help themselves to the water before them, sometimes spitting it out, or pouring it over their heads and bodies. Sometimes they would even empty the bag out before them, into the dirt or sand. About my neck, on a long string, threaded through the handle, hung a metal cup. This metal cup hung a few inches below my navel. It was a joke of masters. My chaining was now different from what it had been when I had been brought into the camp, that I might serve more efficiently. The vertical chain joining my wrist and ankle chains had been removed. Additional links had been interpolated into my wrist chain and my ankle chain. My ankles were now separated by some two feet of chain. There was apparently a rationale to the distance. The guards, at any rate, had taken measurements. The distance, seemingly rather small, on the one hand, and rather large, on the other, was seemingly dictated by a twofold consideration, the preclusion of my capacity to run and the convenience of the guards, particularly when I was supine, a position in which they sometimes placed me. My wrists were separated also by a similar, but somewhat shorter, length of chain. This, in its normal placement, allowed me to use my hands fairly well. This usage was restricted, of course, if the chains were thrown behind me, which tends to hold the hands, as they might twist or struggle back, near my waist or hips. These chaining arrangements were fairly normal with the female work slaves in the "black chain of Ionicus." The only differences between our chainings were usually the numbers of links separating our ankles, this being a function of the length of our legs.

"You know that he is down there, among the others," said the girl, near me, she, too, chained, standing in the sand, on the top of the small hill, her own water bag on its strap over her shoulder.

"Yes," I whispered, frightened. It was he I feared most, of all of them. "Beware," said the girl, again.

I nodded, sick.