Port Kar slaves

Here, men of Port Kar are raiding the rencer islands
We were buffeted apart by some five or six rencers. Telima, buffeted, turned and began to run toward the darkness. I stumbled and fell, and regained my feet. I looked wildly about. I had lost her. Then something, probably a club or the butt of a spear, struck the side of my head and I fell to the matting of rence that was the island surface. I rose to my hands and knees, and shook my head. There was blood on its side. A warrior, in the light of a torch held by a slave, was binding a girl near me. It was not Telima. More men ran past. Then a child. Then another warrior of Port Kar, followed by his slave with the torch. A man to my right was suddenly caught in a capture net, crying out, and two warriors were on him, pounding him, beginning to bind him.
Raiders

Our girls, our slaves, wept at the poles, guiding the raft into the canal.
As we passed beneath windows lining the canals men had, upon occasion, leaned out, calling us prices for them.
I did not blame them. They were beautiful. And each poled well, as could only one from the marshes themselves. We might well have congratulated ourselves on our catch of rence girls.
Raiders

Midice, startled, looked up from where she knelt, polishing the hoops of brass upon my shield.
Raiders

Assisting with the reinforcement of the knots in a net
"Good, my Captain," said Clitus, from one side, where he sat working on a net, reinforcing its knots one by one. He grinned at the sight of the bottle.
"I could use some paga," said he. He had purchased the net in the morning, with a trident, the traditional weapons of the fisherman of the western shore and the western islands. Kneeling quite near him, holding cord for him, fiber on her throat serving as collar, knelt short, dark-haired Ula. She, too, wore a slight bit of silk.
Raiders

Thurnock is making a bow and arrows. He instructs his slave to kill a Vosk gull for the feathers
Thura, the large, blond girl, gray-eyed, knelt near a pile of wood shavings. Thurnock, though in Port Kar, had found a piece of Ka-la-na stock, and had been carving a great bow, the long bow. I knew he had also found some bits of bosk horn, and some leather, and some hemp and silk. In two or three days, I expected, he, too, would have a bow. Piles he had already commissioned from a smith; and Thura, on his command, this afternoon, with a bit of stick, had struck down a Vosk gull, that the shafts he fashioned, whether from Ka-la-na or tem-wood, would be well fletched.
Raiders

"Where is the Kettle Slave!" I cried.
"Here, Master," said Telima, not pleasantly, entering the room and dropping to her knees before me.
On her throat as well were wound the five coils of binding fiber, declaring her slave.
Of the four girls only she did not wear silk, for she was only a Kettle Slave. She wore a brief tunic only of rep-cloth, already stained with grease and the spatterings of the kitchen. Her hair was not combed, and there was dirt on her knees and face. Her face was tired, and strained, and red, flushed from the heat of the cooking fires. Her hands had been blistered from scrubbing and burned from the cooking, roughened and reddened from the cleaning and the washing of the bowls and goblets. I found great pleasure in seeing the proud Telima, who had been my Mistress, as mere Kettle Slave.
"Master?" she asked.
"Make a feast," I said, "Kettle Slave."
"Yes, Master," she said.
Raiders

Telima I kept mostly in the kitchens, with the other Kettle Slaves, with instructions to the Kitchen Master that the simplest and least pleasant tasks be hers, and that she be worked the hardest of all. I did, however, specify that it would be she who must personally wait my table and serve my food each night, that I might each night renew my pleasure at finding my former Mistress, weary from her day's labors, soiled and uncombed, in her brief, miserable, stained rep-cloth garment, serving me as Kettle Slave. Following the meal she would retire to my quarters which, on hands and knees, with brush and bucket, she would scrub to the satisfaction of a Whip Slave, with strap, standing over her. Then she would retire again to the kitchen for the work there that would have been left for her, after which, when finished, she would be chained for the night.
Raiders

I had discovered, to my pleasure, that the girl Luma, whom I had saved from Surbus, wahs of the Scribes. Her city had been Tor.
Being of the Scribes she could, of course, read and write.
"Can you keep accounts?" I had asked her.
"Yes, Master," she had responded.
I had made her the chief scribe and accountant of my house.
Each night, in my hall, before my master's chair, she would kneel with her tablets and give me an accounting of the day's business, with reports on the progress of various investments and ventures, often making suggestions and recommendations for further actions.
This plain, thin girl, I found, had an excellent mind for the complicated business transactions of a large house.
She was a most valuable slave.
She much increased my fortunes.
I permitted her, of cours, but a single garment, but I allowed it to be opaque, and of the blue of the Scribes. It was sleeveless and fell to just above her knees. Her collar, however, that she might not grow pretentious, was of simple steel. It read, as I wished, I BELONG TO BOSK.
Some of the free men in the house, particularly of the scribes, resented that the girl should have a position of such authority. Accordingly, when receiving their reports and transmitting her instructions to them, I had informed her that she would do so humbly, as a slave girl, and kneeling at their feet. This mollified the men a good deal, though some remained disgruntled. All, I think, feared that her quick stylus and keen mind would discover the slightest discrepancies in their columns and tally sheets, and, indeed, they seemed to do so. I think they feared her, because of the excellence of her work and because, behind her, stood the power of the house, its Captain, Bosk of the Marshes.
Raiders

Dancing girls
I watched the dancing girl of Port Kar writhing on the square of sand between the tables, under the whips of masters, in a Paga tavern of Port Kar.
Raiders

Serving paga to tavern patrons

Note the men of Port Kar do not often wait to be offered, but merely demand what they want.

There was something of an uproar as a large, fierce-looking fellow, narrow-eyed, ugly, missing an ear, followd by some twenty of thirty sailors, burst into the tavern.
"Paga! Paga!" they cried, throwing over some tables they wished, driving men from them, who had sat there, then righting the tables and sitting about them, pounding on them and shouting.
Girls ran to serve them paga.
Raiders

Nude slave girls, wrists chained, hurried about. The Proprietor, sweating, aproned, was tipping yet another great bottle of paga in its sling, filling cups, that they might be borne to the drinkers. There was an occasional scream from the alcoves, bringing laughter from the tables. I heard the flash of a whip somewhere, and the cries of a girl.
Raiders

I looked at the girls serving paga.
"More paga!" I cried, and another wench ran lightly to serve me.
Raiders

Serving the tavern patrons more intimately.
The fierce fellow, bearded, narrow-eyed, missing an ear, who seemed to be the leader of these men, seized one of the paga girls, twisting her arm, dragging her toward one of the alcoves. I thought it was the girl who had served me, but I was not certain.
Another girl ran to him, bearing a cup of paga. He took the cup in one hand, threw it down his throat, and carried the girl he had seized, screaming, into one of the alcoves. The girl had stopped dancing the Whip Dance, and cowered on the sand. Other men, of those with Surbus, seized what paga girls they could, and what vessels of the beverage, and draged their prizes toward teh alcoves, sometimes driving out those who occupied them. Most, however, remained at the tables, pounding on them, demanding drink.
Raiders

Encouraging men as they fight
The two drunken seamen were now cutting away, wildly, at one another, with whip knives. They fought in the square of sand among the tables. The girl, who had danced there, she who had worn the delicate vest and belt of chains and jewels, with shimmering metal droplets attached, with the musicians, had withdrawn to one side. Men were calling odds in betting.
The whip knife is a delicate weapon, and can be used with elegance, with finesse; it is, as far as I know, unique to Port Kar.
In the shouts, under the ship's lanterns, I saw the flesh leap from the cheek of one of the seamen. The girl, the dancer, eyes blazing with delight, fists clenched, was screaming encouragement to one of the contestants.
But these men were drunk and stumbling, and their brutal striking about, it seemed, was offensive to many at the tables, who disdained so crude an employment of a weapon of such subtlety.
Then one of the men was down, vomiting in his blood, on his hands and knees.
"Kill him!" screamed the girl. "Kill him!"
But the other fellow, drunk and bleeding, to great laughter among the tables, stumbled backwards, turned, and fell unconscious.
"Kill him!" screamed the girl, in her vest and belt of chains and jewels, to the unconscious man. "Kill him!"
But the other man, bleeding, shaking his head, had now crawled from the patch of sand and now, some yards off, had collapsed among the tables, quite as unconscious as the first.
"Kill him!" shrieked the girl to the first man. "Kill him!"
Raiders

"There!" said Rim, pointing off the starboard bow. "High on the beach!"
His slave, Cara, in a brief woolen tunic, one-piece, woven of the wool of the Hurt, sleeveless, barefoot on the deck, graced by his collar, stood behind him and to his left.
I shaded my eyes. "Glass of the Builders," I said.
Thurnock, of the Peasants, standing by me, handed me the glass.
I opened it, and surveyed the beach.
High on the beach, I saw two pairs of sloping beams. They were high, large and heavy structures. The feet of the beams were planted widely, deeply, in the sand; at the top, where they sloped together, they had been joined and pegged. They were rather like the English letter "A", though lacking the crossbar. Within each "A", her wrists bound by wrapped and taut leather to heavy rings set in the sloping sides, there hung a girl, her full weight on her wrists. Each were panther girls, captured. Their heads were down, their blond hair falling forward. Their ankles had been tied rather widely apart, each fastened by leather to iron rings further down the beams.
It was an exchange point.
It is thus that outlaws, to passing ships, display their wares.
We were fifty pasangs north of Lydius, which port lies at the mouth of the Laurius River. Far above the beach we could see the green margins of the great northern forests.
Hunters

"If it pleases you, Rim," I said, "your slave might, from the sand in the lower hold, fetch wine."
Rim, the Outlaw, grinned.
He looked upon Cara. "Fetch wine," he told her.
"Yes, Master," she said, and turned away.
Hunters

The water was very cold. It came to my waist.
Another splash behind me informed me that Rim had followed me.
I waded toward the shore.
I glanced back to see Thurnock lowering Cara over the side, with the wine and sack of cups, into the waiting arms of her master, Rim.
He did not carry her, but set her on her feet in the water, and then turned after me.
Thurnock had tied the two bottles of wine about her neck, that it might be easier for her, and she held the sack of cups over her head, that they might not be washed with sea water. It was thus that she made her way to shore.
Hunters

We sat down cross-legged in the sand, Cara kneeling to one side.
"Wine," said Rim.
Immediately the slave girl prepared to serve us.
...
Cara knelt beside Rim, and poured wine into his cup. He took it, without noticing her.
She similarly served the others, then went to one side, where she knelt.
Hunters

Captains often owned dancers to entertain them and the men (their retainers) who lived in the holding

In Bosks holding in Port Kar
I had purchased the girl whom I had seen dance in the Paga Tavern, for forty pieces of gold. I had called her Sandra, after a girl once known on Earth. I had put my collar on her and, after using her, had consigned her to my men, that she might please their senses.
Raiders

In the Hall of Samos' Holding
"Yes," said Samos. He clapped his hands. Immediately the girl stood beautifully, alert, before us, her arms high, wrists outward. The musicians, to one side, stirred, readying themselves. Their leader was a czehar player.
...
He looked at the girl. He clapped his hands, sharply.
There was a clear note of the finger cymbals, sharp, deliberate, bright, and the slave girl danced before us.
I regarded the coins threaded, overlapping, on her belt and halter. They took the firelight beautifully. They glinted, but were of small worth. One dresses such a woman in cheap coins; she is slave. Her hand moved to the veil at her right hip. Her head was turned away, as though unwilling and reluctant, yet knowing she must obey.
"Come with me," said Samos.
I swilled down the last swallow of a goblet of paga.
He grinned at me. "You may have her later," he said. "She will dance from time to time during the evening."
...
An incredible, voluptuous tension is almost immediately generated, visible in the dancer's body, and kinetically felt by those who watch. I heard men at the tables cry out with pleasure. The dancer's hands were at her thighs. She regarded them, angrily, and still she moved. Her shoulders lifted and fell; her hands touched her breasts and shoulders; her head was back, and then again she glared at the men, angrily. Her arms were high, very high. Her hips moved, swaying. Then, the music suddenly silent, she was absolutely still. Her left hand was at her thigh; her right high above her head; her eyes were on her hip; frozen into a hip sway; then there was again a bright, clear flash of the finger cymbals, and the music began again, and again she moved, helpless on the pole. Men threw coins at her feet.
Tribesmen

Men lifted their cups to Samos as we reentered the hall. We acknowledged their greetings.
Two warriors, guards, held, between them, a dark-skinned slave girl. She had long, black hair. Her arms were bound tightly to her sides, her wrists crossed and bound behind her. They thrust her forward. "A message girl," said one of them.
Samos looked at me, quickly. Then to one of those at the table, one who wore the garments of the physicians, he said, "Obtain the message."
"Kneel," said Samos. The girl, between the guards, knelt.
Samos loomed over her. "Whose are you?" he asked.
"Yours, Master," she said. It is common for the girl to be given to the recipient of the message.
"Whose were you?" asked Samos.
"I was purchased anonymously from the public pens of Tor," she said. Certain cities, like Tor, dealt in slaves, commonly buying unsold girls from caravans, and selling them at a profit to other caravan masters. The city's warriors, too, paid a bounty on women captured from enemy cities, customarily a silver tarsk for a comely female in good health. "You do not know who purchased you, or why?" asked Samos. "No, Master," she said.
She would not know the message she bore.
"What is your name?" asked Samos.
"Veema," she said, "if it pleases Master."
"What was your number in the pens of Tor?" asked Samos.
"87432," she said, "Master.
The member of the caste of physicians, a laver held for him in the hands of another man, put his hands on the girl's head. She closed her eyes.
"Then," said I to Samos, "You do not know from whom this message comes."
"No," said he.
The physician lifted the girl's long dark hair, touching the shaving knife to the back of her neck. Her head was inclined forward.
...
"The message girl is ready," said the man who wore the green of the physicians. He turned to the man beside him; he dropped the shaving knife into the bowl, wiped his hands on a towel.
The girl, bound, knelt between the guards. There were tears in her eyes. Her head had been shaved, completely. She had no notion what had been written there. Illiterate girls are chosen for such messages. Originally her head had been shaved, and the message tattooed into the scalp. Then, over months, her hair had been permitted to regrow. None but the girl would know she carried such a message, and she would not know what it might be. Even those for a fee delivering her to the house of Samos would have considered her only another wench, mere slave property.
I read the message. It said only "Beware Abdul." We did not know from whence the message came, or who had sent it.
"Take the girl to the pens," said Samos to the guards. "With needles remove the message from her scalp,"
The girl was jerked to her feet.
She looked at Samos. "Then," said Samos, to the guards, "use her as a low work-slave in the pens primarily as a cleaning slave. A month before her hair is regrown, and she is fit for sale, wash her and put her in a stimulation cage and train her extensively."
The girl looked at him, agonized.
"Then sell her," said Samos.
Marauders