Free Smugglers of Gor by John Norman

provision of ecstatic gratification.
    “Fellow,” I called to the proprietor’s man.
    He came to the table. He seemed uneasy. One notes such things. At his belt hung the coin sack.
    “Who is Tyrtaios?” I asked.
    “I have heard the name,” he said. “Beware.”
    “I have refused him,” I said.
    “That has been gathered,” he said.
    “Do you let your girls touch coins?” I asked.
    “No,” he said. He rustled the coin sack at his belt.
    I looked beyond the fellow, to the back of the room, on the left, several yards away, where the slave from Asperiche was waiting, to dip the goblet in the vat. The proprietor, a coarse, swollen fellow in a soiled apron, was himself tending the vat. It was a low tavern. The coin box, with its slot, and lock, was behind him.
    “Do you think I have had too much to drink?” I asked the proprietor’s man.
    “Perhaps,” he said.
    “I have the ostrakon here,” I said, “with its number. Bring me my weapons.”
    “I fear they are missing,” he said, not looking at me.
    “Why is that?” I asked.
    “Forgive us, Master,” he said. “We wish to live.”
    “There is a back exit from the tavern,” I said.
    “I fear it is watched,” he said.
    The slave had now dipped the goblet in the vat, and had turned about.
    “I see,” I said.
    “It is your service they want,” he said, “not your life.”
    I supposed that was true. A crossbow bolt loosed in the darkness would handle such a matter, conveniently, before a shadow could be noted, a blade drawn.
    “What lies in the north?” I asked.
    “I do not know,” he said.
    “Remain at hand,” I said.
    “Master,” said the girl, kneeling.
    Under my scrutiny, she widened her knees. She placed the goblet on the low table, behind which I sat, cross-legged.
    “You seem displeased to be in a collar,” I said.
    “I am in a collar,” she said. “What more is there to say?”
    “Perhaps you have not yet learned it,” I said.
    She was silent.
    “Perhaps you do not yet realize you belong in one,” I said.
    “May I withdraw?” she asked.
    “Position,” I said.
    She went to position, kneeling back on her heels, her back straight, her belly in, her shoulders back, her head up, the palms of her hands down on her thighs. One does not break “position” without permission.
    I reached into my wallet. There was little left. I removed a Brundisium tarsk-bit, which is a large coin, the size perhaps intended to compensate for the slightness of its value.
    “Open your mouth,” I said.
    “I am not permitted to touch money,” she said.
    I placed the coin in her mouth. “Do not drop it,” I said. The coin was far too large to swallow, and, held in her mouth, she could not speak. She was effectively, and embarrassingly, silenced.
    She cast a wild, piteous glance at the proprietor’s man.
    “I think,” I said, “it is true, that I have had too much to drink.” I then dashed the contents of the goblet on the startled, recoiling slave. She shook her head, and, blinking and twisting, tried to free herself of the paga. It was in her hair, and had drenched her face, and upper body. It ran down her body to her belly and thighs. She stank then of the drink. She shivered. I looked to the proprietor’s man. “She has been found displeasing,” I said.
    “She will be lashed,” he said.
    “Later,” I said.
    “Master?” he said.
    I removed my cloak. “You will put this on,” I said, “and draw the hood, and precede me through the door.”
    “Certainly not,” he said.
    “I thought you wished to live,” I said.
    He donned the cloak, and drew the hood about his features.
    “What is going on?” asked the proprietor, come from the vat.
    “Do not interfere,” I said. Men about regarded us. Some rose up, but none approached.
    “Now,” I said to the proprietor’s man. “You will exit the tavern, and walk to the left, toward the wharves.”
    He bent down, and, drawing the hood and cloak more closely about him, exited the