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| Serves Continued |
| I served the food, and poured the wines, and kept their goblets filled, remaining as much in the background as possible. They talked of hunting, and war, and of the northern forests, as though I were not there. Sometimes Verna would say, �Drink,� and I would pour wine into her goblet, saying, �Yes, Mistress,� and sometimes Rask of Treve would command me, saying �Drink,� and I would then, similarly, serve him, saying �Yes, Master.� He extended his goblet to me. �Drink,� he said, offering me the cup. I looked at the rim of the cup. I shook with terror. �A slave girl dares not touch with her lips the rim of that cup which has been touched with the lips of her master,� I whispered. Captive of Gor 7 Page 302 �Serve me wine,� he said. I turned and, among the furnishings of the tent, found a bottle of Ka-la-na, of good vintage, from the vineyards of Ar, the loot of a caravan raid. I then took the wine, with a small copper bowl, and a black, red-trimmed wine crater, to the side of the fire. I poured some of the wine into the small copper bowl, and set it on the tripod over the tiny fire in the fire bowl. He sat cross-legged, facing me, and I knelt by the fire, facing him. After a time I took the copper bowl from the fire and held it against my cheek. I returned it again to the tripod, and again we waited. Again I took the bowl from the fire. It was now not comfortable to hold the bowl, but it was not painful to do so. I poured the wine from the small copper bowl into the black, red-trimmed wine crater, placing the small bowl in a rack to one side of the fire. I swirled, slowly, the wine in the wine crater. I saw my reflection in the redness, the blondness of my hair, dark in the wine, and the collar, with its bells, about my throat. I now, in the fashion of the slave girl of Treve, held the wine crater against my right cheek. I could feel the warmth of the wine through the side of the crater. �Is it ready?� he asked. A master of Treve does not care to be told that his girl thinks it is. He wishes to be told Yes, or No. �Yes,� I whispered. I did not know how he cared for his wine, for some men of Treve wish it warm, others almost hot. I did not know how he wished it. What if it were not as he wished it! �Serve me wine,� he said. I, carrying the wine crater, rose to my feet and approached him. I then knelt before him, with a rustle of slave bells, in the position of the pleasure slave. I put my head down and, with both hands, extending my arms to him, held forth the wine crater. �I offer you wine, Master,� I said. He took the wine, and I watched, in terror. He sipped it, and smiled. I nearly fainted. I would not be beaten. Captive of Gor 7 Page 332 |
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