Religion on Hyperborea

Picture credit: Lamington Pav

Working on the new book - 125k words and climbing. Will likely be broken up into 5-6 books and dumped on Amazon, each a week apart.

It’s hard to justify taking time to blog about Hyperborea when I’m trying to finish a (rather big!) book about it, first. However, a bit of luck today. Below is a section where Gerard is talking to the reader about faith on Hyperborea. It works fine as a blog post, so here it is!

of men and gods

The 21st Century world feared no gods.

Faith, as I remember it, was strong as ever there. However, it was not faith as our ancestors would know it. In our time, we looked to God for strength against the crushing might of our own, grim, cyberpunk world. We could only do that because our cyberpunk world had first crushed God.

For most of our species’ existence we’ve had no such gifts to reassure us. No great power over atoms, or to travel between worlds. There weren’t books, read from thin air, filled with the Universe’s secrets! For most humans there weren’t books, at all.

Imagine then how refreshing it is to be around such terrified people. They still know to keep asking that same cosmic question asked around the first Pleistocene fireplaces:

Our universe is much older than us.

It has, therefore, more evolved beings in it.

It follows that such beings would have more power than us.

So WTF do we do?

How do we understand our lives, against the backdrop of such creatures? Is not the universe theirs to shape, not ours? How do we engage them? Do we at all? How do we survive them? These are not philosophical questions for Hyperboreans.

There is a certain wisdom they have that comes from being a culture that has evolved to survive repeated extinction level events. Part of it is deep-rooted lore. It has passed between and across their civilizations and grown. In a priest’s tale to bored acolytes. A barbarian’s recounting around a fire. Glyphs rubbed clean and read from just unearthed ancient tablets. This lore has allowed humanity to survive deep in the cracks of this world. To survive, and then emerge from them, again and again.

Central to that lore is the idea of human triviality. We’re nothing compared with the entities feuding over this world. Do not irk them! Monoliths carved with lost languages now only tell us that their makers were obliterated. This is the absolute price humans may pay for their triviality.

Yet, there are lesser gods. Even beings not even that. Ones who hate us more because they are trivial as well.

Many of these can be resisted - as we did the Mi-Go at Aymund. This does not make these creatures any less terrifying. Not all who stand in their way can do so with an army. Yet, with such beings negotiation is possible. Land can be ceded, as were tundras of Athoph by the Zidon’s ancestors. Sacrifices can be made; Andromedas chained to rocks to feed sea monsters. The Hyperborean does not seem himself as negotiating, and neither would be. Instead, haggling with greater powers is called worship.

Worship is most effective. It does not even require understanding between parties. The Settites worship snakes; villagers leaving them milk and eggs at the night. The serpents learn to visit and when to do so. They bite children to complain if they are forgotten. Mud bricks are built over the spot and declared a shrine. Bricks become stones and the shrine turns to a venerated temple. Priests emerge; secondary parasites yet essential to the negotiation between species. They extract gold and daughters as their price as intermediaries. Inspired, they fund peasants to go forth and tame new land. Snakes appear; they are left milk and eggs. The cycle repeats.

Settite snake worship - all the way up to the Titanoboa monsters - is harmless enough. Worship is an easier way to tame Hyperborea’s monsters than understanding them. Worship becomes too high a price, however, with the advanced races. The Mi-Go cults in Darfur worked as a proxy state and army. The meddling of Yithian envoys is permitted just because they know the future. The Deep Ones, under Caral, had their own voting bloc on Dura’s council!

In the end, the proud Hyperboreans have always knelt for such creatures. Knowing the costs, they will kneel again. It is easy for us to scorn them. Many things are easy for those with power over atoms. They Hyperborean only knows the power of iron blades and whispered words. He witnesses their triviality every day, and with it, his own. The Hyperborean is afraid. He is afraid of the stars. That the sun may not rise. What if the earth opens up and destroys his whole village? Or a fire flashes across the night, banning the sun for a year, causing famines?

This is why he doesn’t pray as a 21st century person might. He is not looking for his gods to aid him in his life.

He is praying, desperately, for his god not to kill him.

This is the nature of faith on this world, where men may point to gods on the horizon.

Credit: Diamond Shark

Hunters from the Outer Dark: The Landing Beasts

Landing Beasts are a parasitic race that have co-evolved with Humanity, like the ticks living on a stray dog's back. The blood they draw are human lives.

 A Landing Beast enters our universe like a shark breaking the surface of the water. Then, it snatches its prey, and disappears again.

 It's attack is never noticed - does an ant see the finger descending to crush it?  And then it is gone. Those left behind lament a disappearance not just from their lives, but their very universe. Their loved one, if they still live, could be light-years and millennia away from them. None are ever returned.

 The captured person is stored in a "capture sac" and enters suspended animation. Over time, like a rat swallowed by a snake, they are dissolved and absorbed.

From Wolves to Dogs

Landing Beasts are not the only Eldritch beings preying on humans. Even as we were noticed, the Landing Beasts were noticed as well. Through cultists, magic, and feeding pits, the elder races put Humanity to use as their sheep. Sheep need sheepdogs: the Landing Beasts were put to use as well.

 The elder races bred them to carry many humans at a time. To consume only a few. Seeking out the kind they most wanted and plucking them, like fruit off a tree.

 In time, breeds were created that could transport thousands of people and keep them suspended indefinitely. There are many more Landing Beasts cruising the Outer Dark than ever come to permanent rest on Earth. Like deep space asteroids they make their transits, loaded with capture sacs. In one may be a victim take in just seconds ago. In the next sac, one who has been held suspended for millions of years.

 The elder races bred the Landing Beasts into different species. The most notable are the Harvester Beasts, the War Beasts, and the Assassin Beast.

The Harvester Beast

The Harvester Beast is a colossal creature, easily as large a warehouse or a drydock for an ocean-going galley. Adapted instead for space, crashed on Earth it is as helpless as a beached whale. It flails and roars till it dies within a day or two.

The shock of entry into Earth's atmosphere rips capture sacs from the Harvester as it descends. Many are lost, turned up in the atmosphere of pulverised on impact. Many survive however; it is what they were bred for.

Beneath the Harvester's translucent skin the bulk of the capture sacs are visible. A sharp knife and a strong arm is all that's needed to cut down to them. Once a sack is torn loose it begins to liquify. In hours, all that is left is a wet stain in the soil - and a revealed human.

The human does not recover the days more, if they will recover at all. They wonder about, their senses dulled and their muscles weakened by fever. Like moths, they are drawn to bright light in the nights. In this state, "Landing Sickness" they are easy prey for hunters; animal, eldritch, or human. Most humans brought by the landing beasts are young women in excellent health. We can only assume the plans the elder races have for them are no better than those of the Hyperboreans.

The War Beast

The smallest of War Beasts is large as full-grown, bull, African elephant. It is protected by thick armored hide and doesn't fear fire. Under its back armor is a large cluster of capture sacs. The War Beast can survive the impact of crashing on Earth. If it is not killed and cut open it will go on to digest its captured humans.

A War Beast can also seize more. It hides in ponds, mud fields, or peat bogs, springing out to grab passing victims.

A War Beast's victims can be rescued as long as digestion has not begun. The catch is that the War Beast has to be killed, first.

Most War Beasts land well beyond the Mist Wall, into the battlefield of the gods. There, they do not enter into the (direct) affairs of Hyperboreans. Some, however, fall short. There in the muddy, cold, wastelands that surround the mist, they hunt humans, animals, and each other. It is a very unfortunate slaving party that follows a landing beast down to the earth and finds they have come across a War Beast.

The Assassin Beast

Assassin Beasts are sleek, agile, winged hunters. They are often described by Hyperboreans were seen the matter distance, as immense wasps or dragonflies.

The assassin beast comes for only one person. When it arrives on Hyperborea, it sheds its filled capture sac and departs, growing a new one. Some assassin's return to the outer dark. Others remain; spoiled by the easy pickings of Hyperborea. Over time, their ability to return to the outer dark atrophies. They become trapped on Earth, hiding deep in Mountainside caves to emerge and hunt at night. They are the terror of lost shepherds and runaway slaves.

The existence of the Assassin Beast suggests at least one elder race has an unusually deep interest in human affairs. Why would such beings breed a creature to pick out an individual human being across all the billions living through time, and bring them back Hyperborea to be released?

The Bounty of a Landing

Hyperboreans regard Harvester beasts that land short of the Mist Wall as gold spilling from the cupped claws of their gods. The crash site of the Harvester may have naked, disoriented young women in the thousands who may be led into cages just by the light of a burning torch waved in front of them.

The slavers who come for these riches range from solo adventurers to organised teams of hundreds of men. They watch for Landing Beast coming down at night, like shooting stars, and raced to make their claim.

The first slavers to reach a landing have the rights to it - if they can hold it. Faster, smaller groups will take as many girls as they can, bound and thrown over their horses, before larger, better armed groups arrive with cage carts, riding lizards, and mammoths. Opportunists will wait along the edges, avoiding conflict, waiting for those girls who slip too far away for their stronger rivals to bother with. Every corpse has it scavengers, and scavengers and their niches.

If a Harvester lands too close to the Mist Wall, only the bravest and most desperate will raid its carcass. This is because they may soon find other beings turning up - the very ones that summoned the Harvester in the first place.

Farmers do not tolerate pests.

The Summoning of Landing Beasts

Landing Beasts are summoned by eldritch entities to bring young, human females as food and breeding fodder to the Battleground of the Gods - a continent-sized warzone hidden behind in a perpetual mist wall.

However, some human cultures on Hyperborea have learned to summon landing beasts as well. Perhaps they do no more than distract the creatures off their courses. Perhaps they merely bait them, their arcane efforts no better than chum thrown to sharks. In the Shemite creation myth it was their ancient priests who populated Hyperborea by bringing Landing Beasts that carried every other culture.

Let us examine how such a creature may be summoned.

The Ritual  

Key to the ritual is the offering of a consecrated human life, almost always that of a slave girl.

The right slave is one with an appropriate horoscope. A slave horoscope is a calculated based on the day and the location a girl was enslaved. It may be kept on a tablet or scroll. However, it is commonly tattooed on, or under a breast, or above the base of the girl’s spine.

Readings vary between cultures but focus on a slave girl’s passion, obedience, and fertility. If a slave’s horoscope shows the strong presence of planets in all favorable zones or “houses,” she is deemed worthy as a sacrifice.

The sacrifice is conducted at an Outer Dark observatory. These are Stonehenge-like structures doubling as an astronomical calendars. The most sacred observatories are those built by races before the coming of Humanity. The ritual can only be performed at certain times of the year, according to the positions of the stars and planets.

Sacrifice-worthy girls will be kept just outside the observatory grounds. They are highly valued and kept under armed guard. Most often they are put on a controlled diet and made to serve only the most senior priests.

When the time comes, a girl is chosen, taken to the observatory’s altar and held down, a cultist holding each of her limbs.

A chant then begins in a pre-human language, the words of which are recorded on stone tablets that are only decipherable by the most maddened scholars.

The first chant is recited before the sacrifice and it is used to call forth the Landing Beast from the Outer Dark. It is (perhaps) best translated as follows:

"Yogsothoth, Great Lord, Hear my plea,

Great Hunter of the Outer Dark, Harken to my call,

By the blood of the sacrifice,

By the power of the stars, I summon thee,

Come forth from the void, and do my bidding."

The slave is then sacrificed. Her blood is used to draw patterns on the ground and the signs of whichever cosmic god the summoner invokes for protection.

The second chant is recited after the sacrifice, and it is used to bind the Landing Beast to the summoner's will. It goes as follows:

"Cthulhu, Lord of the Outer Dark, Hear my plea,

By the blood of the sacrifice,

By the power of the stars,

I bind thee, Great Hunter, To my will,

I command thee to do my bidding."

The summoner and the rest of party then watch to see if a shooting star appears. If successful, it will grow, as a landing beast enters into our universe and de-orbits. It will crash in the vicinity of the observatory - one reason such places are far away from large settlements. War Beasts and Assassin Beasts can then be given further instructions, with the Assassin Beasts being able to re-enter the Outer Dark and strike at the summoner’s command.

If the ritual has failed a landing beast will still come - but it will be enraged and attempt to kill the summoner and their party. An enraged Harvester is no threat; as long as it brings its captives to the summoner, the goal as been achieved. Assassin Beasts and War Beasts however are great dangers. They will kill those who sought to bind them, unless killed themselves.

It's worth noting that this is just one such ritual human summoners may use. Others have been developed throughout the history of Hyperborea. Different gods have been invoked and different chants recited. Some rituals call for the slaughter of multiple slaves. However, the core of the ritual remains the same.

Born, Taught, and Guarded - The Three Natures of Hyperborean Slave Girls

Hyperboreans have many ways of categorizing their slave girls. Some are judged by the quality of the training. Others by their remaining productive years, or by how many times they’re master has pupped them. However, while these affect their value in the slave market, they do not necessarily impact how slave girls are treated.

What will, however, is a slave girls temperament. Her master will decide the rest of her life, based on it. In this update we will look at how Hyperborean sex slavery has been advanced by a study of a slave girl’s nature.

The Hard Cap - The Three Day Rule

The range of slave girl temperaments is limited by the strict and brutal application of a three day breaking rule. From the moment a captive girl is set to slave training, she has till the third day to both obey her master, and submit to him sexually.

A Hyperborean master has many tools with which to extract these concessions from her. He/She is also an expert at wielding them. Examples are sleep and food deprivation, punishment, degradation, and norming by example set by well-trained slaves.

However, if by the start of the third day she does not submit to slavery, the slave is considered untrainable, and destroyed.

This practice is one the oldest customs on Hyperborea. It goes back to the prehistory of all currently surviving Hyperborean cultures. It’s result is that all slaves in a Hyperborean woman's ancestry had submitted in under three days. Over the millennia, this has made for a strong bias among the Hyperborean-born towards sexual submissive genetics.

The Three Day Rule constrains slave girl natures. Let us examine those it permits.

“Born Slaves”

These are slave girls who are sexual submissives. They are the majority of Hyperborean-born slave girls. They are called "born slaves" as their craving for the collar is innate.

Born slaves have various hallmarks. Their early slavery is wrestling match between their intellect and their biological drive. Born slaves resist not just their masters, but also their desire to be slaves.

As such, a born slave scorns and puts down other born slaves. She sees them as worthless, despicable creatures. In doing so, she tries to reassure herself that she is somehow not the same as them.

Another hallmark is extensive rationalizing after sex. The born slave tries to excuse hersef for enjoying being fucked by her master. That it her master’s fault. That he has played a trick on her. That it cannot be helped.

The third telltale is that she feels guilty for enjoying her degradation.

Masters watch for the signs in their slaves. If identified, they then then use the born slave’s drives against her. The solution is to ignore her intellect altogether, and simply appeal to her desires. The born slave is degraded and used, repeatedly. This forces her to indulge her nature, without space to backslide.

This constant pressure prompts her to self-deceive. To find any way to excuse her submission - and enable it, further. Once achieved, the slave continues to use these justifications for the rest of her life, or one day realizes she is indeed a born slave, and accepts it.

When it comes to breeding slaves, Hyperboreans prefer breeding born slaves. Part of this is due to ingrained social wisdom. Hyperborean Patriarchy is founded on the abundant supply of sex slaves, the more submissive, the better.  

Another factor is economic. Most Hyperboreans are farmers or poor urbanites, protected (or perhaps extorted) by the region’s city state, priest king, or even just the warrior-who-lives-up-that-hill. Their obligation may be collected in coin; grain; military service; or in slave girls.

Here, the advantage of daughters comes to bear. They can be made for free; they help on a farm once they are old enough; and giving them away solves the problem of raising dowries to marry them off.

"Taught Slaves" 

Taught slaves are not sexual submissives. However, they make the intellectual decision to choose to submit to seg slavery, with everything that that entails. Taught slaves are a smaller group among Hyperborean-born slave girls. They are much larger proportion, however, among Landing Beast slaves.

Where the born slave is defined by her conflict between her drive and her intellect, for the taught slave it is the opposite. The taught slave has no desire to submit. She assesses her situation and behave accordingly.

The taught slave’s defining traits is often intelligence. She is receptive to punishments and incentives and changes her behavior accordingly. A master may notice that the girl is a quick study, and easy to manage. What's happening, however, is that the slave is looking for whatever leverage she can use to improve her situation.

A taught slave may also be manipulative. She will use deception, pandering, and even spy and inform on of the girls, to gain favor.

The taught slaves a planner. She is always thinking about ways to escape and what to do afterwards.

Her biggest tell is that she is obedient without being submissive. She does not show the kind of delight on her knees, that the born slave does. However, she is quicker to obey.

Her intelligence is her undoing. A master’s solution is to show her that her bondage will never end. They demonstrate that escapes are impossible by using trained slaves as provocateurs. They create "opportunities" for escape which are traps. They show that the re-captured slaves are always severely punished.

The larger environment is also presented. Are there people who will grab a runaway and carry her off, the moment she makes it of the premises? Are there dangerous animals beyond the farm stockade walls that would kill a runaway in less than a day?

The goal is to present the hopelessness of her situation. This coaxes her to accept what she already suspects - that slavery will be the rest of her life. On this realization, the taught slave will soon decide that she may as well get used to it.

As incentive, the master offers her a tiered existence. Slaves who buy in and commit to their slavery get better treatment than those who don’t. The taught slave chooses to buy in.

In doing so, she resets all expectations to that of a naked, chained, slave girl. This allows her to enjoy what rewards are to be had - and most important of all - to be perfectly content with them.

The taught slave will still escape if given a chance, and the possibility of real prospects, afterwards. As such, top girls are always kept in a chain, and never sent on unsupervised errands.

Hyperboreans breed taught slaves as a secondary preference.

"Guarded Slaves"

Guarded slaves do not want to submit, and cannot be convinced that they should, either. They learn to obey just as well as the others. However, they submit to acts and instances, not to lives of slavery.

The Hyperborean knows they has a guarded slave because she will obey without any enthusiasm. This must be tolerated because it is the only way a master can tell if a slave is guarded, or not. Once that has been determined, it is no longer tolerated. The slave girl is punished her she learns to emulate the behavior of a born slave, for her own protection.

The guarded slave is always looking for options to escape, even if they are poor. A master will keep her chained to a bed, a wall, or a grindstone, for the rest of her life, or risk losing her.

Guarded slaves are not bred. Instead, they are neutered through herbal treatments. These herbs have no side effects besides infertility.

Summary

In this way, Hyperborean masters breed primarily for sexual submissiveness, and secondarily for intelligence. They also select aggressively against resistance.

What resistance there is in the gene pool comes from Landing Beast slaves. Distance from Landing Beast zones dilutes this, however. Without renewal from such ‘foreign’ slaves, within 4-5 generations, there is no resistance left in a region’s gene pool. All females enslaved from them will be born slaves.

This correlates, to a degree, with Hyperborean cultures that have no freedom for women, whatsoever. This is the situation in many Hataduri and Zidonese city states, which are far from Landing Beast zones.

World Building: Dairy Girls - Milk and Sex Slavery in Hyperborea

The Power of Herbs

To the Hyperborean a slave girl is nothing more than livestock. As such, as an owner of livestock, it becomes his responsibility to make use of every part of her.

Her breasts are no exception.

Dairy slavery on Hyperborea is possible because of two herbs. Taken together, they give Hyperborean masters the control they need over the bodies of their slave girls.

The first is Milk Root. Milk Root is a yellow plant that, when consumed by a pregnant human female, induces lactation. Milk production can begin anywhere from hours to days later.

If a slave girl is fed Milk Root for several weeks straight, she will produce milk for months. However, she must be pregnant while she is being fed the herb.

The second herb is Mismating Spice. When consumed by a pregnant slave, the leaves cause the pregnancy to terminate. If consumed early there is no risk to the slave.

Mismating Spice is a necessary tool of any master who keeps young women caged in his bed-chamber. However, when used in conjunction with Milk Root, a slave can be made into a dairy slave.

Creating a Dairy Slave

The Hyperborean first breeds a slave girl. He then force-feeds her Milk Root for up to a month. This is called "priming." Once the priming period is over, he mismates her. The slave’s breasts will continue to produce milk for many months. Once she runs dry, the process is repeated.

Reasons

Food

Milk can be consumed directly, especially in marginal environments. Excess can be converted to cheese, and stored. 

Sweetener

 Human breast milk is very high in sugar; closer in flavor to melted ice cream than cow’s milk. Hyperborea is a world where neither honeybees nor sugarcane have yet evolved. Milk from slave girls is used for sweets and cakes.

 Alcohol

The high sugar content makes the milk excellent for fermentation to produce alcohol. The drink produced is closest to Central Asian "Kumis," a drink made from fermented mare’s milk.

Kumis has half the alcohol content of the average beer. Its taste, however, is very much an acquired one. Hyperboreans are quite used to it and consume it in large quantities. On long caravans and sea voyages, some slave girls will be ‘put to dairy’ to keep the men supplied with alcohol.

In harems, it is considered a point of pride among slave girls if they have been put to dairy to keep their master supplied with Kumis.

The Dairy Slave

The ideal dairy slave is a girl in peak fitness. Her master will keep her well-exercised, but not so much that lactic acid enters her milk, affecting the taste.

The size of a slave girl’s breasts is irrelevant to her milk production. All that matters is that she be in good health, and well-fed.

Dripping

A dairy slave is most full in the morning. This is also when, her breasts full, she is likely to drip milk from her nipples.

The release of milk is also connected to her oxytocin levels. Oxytocin is released in sex, and as such a dairy slave is likely to drip (or even spray) when her master is using her. Some slaves begin dripping merely in the presence of their master, or men, generally.

Hyperboreans regard dripping as a sign of good health. They find it amusing that slaves are often made uncomfortable by this bodily function they cannot control. Masters will fondle or or masturbate such girls to increase their dripping: it is just another dimension of power to exercise over their slaves, and to remind them of how powerless they are.

The Milking Bench

Dairy girls are typically put to a milking bench. This is a trestle table or raised bench on which a slave girl is forced to kneel. A bar is mounted on the bench at the height of the kneeling girl’s necks. Cuffs or chaining rings are fitted along the bars. The dairy slave kneels with the bar against the back of her neck. Her collar is chained to it. Then, her hands are raised and her wrists are cuffed, parallel with her neck. Secured thus, she cannot leave the bench, or otherwise interfere with her milking.  

The average milking bench takes 3 to 5 girls. Slaves mount the milking bench in the mornings. If a slave girl has been displeasing, she may be left on the bench for several hours, as punishment.

Dairy slaves are not allowed to drink milk except as a rare treat. As such, they are not permitted to milk themselves, or each other.

Slave Dairies

Dedicated dairies are rare on Hyperborea. Instead, harems and stables may have a few girls set aside to be ‘in milk.’ Dairies are less common in urban areas. They are ubiquitous, however on small, present-owned farms. Every farm girl will, at some point, be put to dairy.

In Book 2 of Sex Slaves of Hyperborea, Slaver and Sex Slaves, Gerard experiments with the idea of setting up a dairy. He is not fond of the taste of Kumis, but I expect the idea of keeping Kitten under a table, wrists chained to a ladle as she churn her own milk, may change his mind…

EXCERPT: Breeding a dairy slave

Gerard’s first time ever breeding a slave was in Dagon’s Price.

He comes across some girls set aside to be used as dairy slaves. Realizing what was in store for them, he takes matters (and one of them) into his own hands. He does this in secret. He has no knowledge of the procedures, and hardly expects to be offered a role.

However:

• he has never bred a slave before

• no one is watching
  

"It is milk root, Master," she pointed to the corner of the compound. There was an open wooden crate there with yellow, dried herbs inside. I went to the box: the smell was indeed coming from it.

Beside the box were four, small, cages. Curled up inside each of them, clutching at the wicker bars, was a slave girl. They studied me like deer watching a wolf.

By the cages was a 6' x 6' square of baked, clay tiles. Wooden posts had been rammed into the ground at each of its corners. Chained shackles had been fitted to them, and lay coiled on the ground.

"What is milk root, Slave?" I asked the Anatolian.

"I know only that it is a herb, Master," she said with her head down, "and that when fed to a slave after she has been bred, she will give milk within the day."

The caged slaves turned in their confines to try to see me better. One was a stunning Shang girl, with long, silk-black, perfectly straight hair. Her skin was gently tanned. She reminded me of Zana. Her breasts were large and well-formed, with brown aureoles and nipples.

I picked up a few grains of milk root (which was not a root) and studied them. They had an oily feel, and they smelled quite pungent.

"Have you eaten this?" I asked the caged girls.

"Yes, Master," they chorused.

"Why are you in cages, and not chained for milking?"

"We are waiting to be bred," said the Shang.

I pulled out my knife. There were gasps from some of the girls, and the caged ones tried to shrink back. The Shang stared at me; her eyes were large, dark, intelligent.

I went to her cage and cut away the leather thongs that tied it shut. I opened the cage door.

"Out."

The Shang crawled out on her hands and knees.

"There," I pointed to the brick square.

She crawled to the middle of it. I took one shackle, opened it, and fastened it around her ankle. Then I secured her other ankle, and then both her wrists. She knelt on her hands and knees.

I pulled down my pants, got down behind her, and got to work. Her body was thrown forward with each stroke, her hair tossing. She started to moan; I cupped one hand over her mouth.

When I ejaculated, I pulled her close against me. I held her like that for a few moments, she lowered her head down to the tiles and began panting. Then I stood and shook myself clean; semen dripped onto her back.

I uncuffed her wrists and ankles and led her by her hair to one of the milking shed.

"Kneel."

She knelt under a bar, the collar hanging down by her face.

I lifted her long, silk-soft hair out of the way, and pressed the collar against her warm, sweaty skin. It clicked as it locked. Then I took each of her wrists and shackled them as well.

"What do you say?" I said.

"Thank you, Master."

I left the stable.

World Building: The Clan Chieftain -Patronage, Power, and Slave Breeding on Hyperborea

It Takes a Group, Even on Hyperborea

The Limits of A Single Swordsman

Not all who live on Hyperborea can afford to become great warriors, well-equipped to face the myriad of natural, human, and eldritch threats of the world. Neither can all such threats be survived by the sword skill of a single man. As much as Hyperborea lends itself to the free wheeling libertarian, going where he will; slaying who he must; and enslaving who he likes; it is a world given to the formation of strong and protective communities.

Abandonment and Re-Colonization

Hyperborea is a land of ongoing change, renewal, and growth. Settlers constantly push out into regenerated lands, long abandoned by ancient peoples fleeing the ravaging power of Eldritch beings. Easy sea and river access mean relatively easy travel. Just one farm over, may be folk of a different language group, religion, and ancestry. As such, old, carried-forward power structures from home territories are not useful. They are as likely to create cultural strife on the frontier as they are unity.

Ad Hoc Power

Instead, a more ad hoc system emerged that could quickly form and as quickly be abandoned. This is the institution of the Hyperborean clan chiefs: meritocratic patrons who emerge to support and organize their neighbors.

Clan Chieftains

Sooner or later, a man will tend to stand out, marked by his deeds or great wealth. He may be a farmer outside the gates of a great city that leaves its peasantry to their own problems, a frontiersman in the wilds, or a trapper roving the mountains. What makes them progress from local heroes (or villains) is they they start helping out their neighbors.

This is an ingrained Hyperborean behavior that is millennia old. Formed out of self-interest and transmitted to all parts of the world, it grows communities and reduces the risk to individuals - especially the emerging chieftain. .

He typically helps by:

• Buying and storing excess grain against disasters

• Visits to see how his fellows are doing

• Small loans

• Adjudicating disputes

• Dealing directly with outside dangers, or organizing posses

• Building community structures such as wharfs, granaries, and especially temples.

There is no official recognition or statement of intent to become a clan chieftain: it evolves naturally. Fogrim for example is on such a path: a fearsome and prosperous warrior with many slave girls, he is locally respected and sees his neighbors problems as his own. In time (if left alone by Gerard) he would emerge as a local chieftain.

Slave Breeding: Dynastic Pacts the Hyperborean Way

Masters typically breed their strongest and most attractive slaves.

There is no greater tie than friendship, but lacking that blood ties will do nicely. Just as noble families consolidate power through dynastic marriages, chieftains also make dynastic bonds. However, they do not marry off their children. Hyperborea’s widespread female slavery creates a different option: dynastic adoption.

This has three advantages:

Absorbing Excess Fertility

Successful Hyperboren men tend to have lots of slave girls. The more pretty girls a man has chained in his slave pen, the more chances he has to screw up with the breeding drugs. Abortifacient treatments can be dangerous and a master may opt to allow a favorite slave to bring a child to term, rather than risk her death.

Not all Hyperborean men want children, and few wish to see more than one or two running around. Giving newborns to subject families is a good solution to what follows keeping caged girls by the bed.

Protecting Free Women

Free women hate slave girls. They compete for the attention of their husbands, and enjoy/suffer sexual experiences their husbands can never subject them to. However, free women see slaves girls as necessary for reducing their childbearing burden. Both maternal and infant mortality on Hyperborea are high.

Dynastic adoption solves this. Not only only does it put a family under a chief's formal protection, but it also means a household needs fewer slaves.

Slave Girl Domination

Some masters enjoy the idea of breeding their slaves. It is an exercise in power, and all the more attractive to them as breeding is the one indignity most Hyperborean slave girls will actively resist. Such masters make breeding another tool of domination and slave training. A slave is made to beg to be bred, to kneel and present herself for chaining in the breeding hut, and to thank her master after he is done with her. The more bitterly she does these, the more satisfying it is for the master to command them.

(Some such men breed several slaves at a time. The slaves will know that most of them will have their pregnancies terminated, but one or two will be made to carry their infants to term. Their torment in going days or even weeks without knowing, is part of their master’s game.)

Dynastic adoption is an good fit for the breeding habits of such masters. They may breed their girls more freely, knowing the infants will have loyal homes. Greater political power means more slaves taken in raids or commerce, and in turn more breeding.

From Community to Clan

Bred slaves enjoy better feeding and kenneling.

Dynastic adoption ties a subject to a chieftain - but it also ties subjects to subjects. Here is its power. Even the most disparate group of strangers can be welded into a united, family clan within a generation.

The nuts and bolts of the mechanism can vary. More aggressive chieftains will not wait to be asked: they will offer adoptions. This forces recipients of their support to "shit or get off the pot" as it were - especially important where one chieftain’s influence may come up against another's.

Some subjects (or ‘landsmen’) may send a slave girl to their chieftain to serve in his slave pen until she becomes pregnant. Then, the chief returns her.

How Clan-building Affects Slave-holding

Bharaji girls are preferred breeding slaves. Their recovery is superhuman and their breeding cycles are only 3 months: perfect for rapidly repopulating a lost region.

A Chieftain may breed his Bharaji girls as often as three times a year, if needed.

When a local hero decides to build a clan chieftaincy, his needs change. He will begin purchasing slave girls specifically for breeding. He will also need more slave girls, to help support those he has impregnated.

Any kind will do as breeding slaves, though Shang, Bharaji, and Ansaru are preferred as they are genetically engineered transhumans:

• they have low maternal mortality

• recover completely

• have shorter gestation periods

• give birth to heavier infants

Bharaji girls are exceptional in that they recover completely within a month of giving birth. The only way a bred Bharaji can then be told from an unbred one, is that the bred one produces milk.

Newborns are kept in a nursery for as little time as possible, usually not more than a month. Then they are given to their adoptive families, and the slave girl can be put to dairy.

Some chieftains offer cheese and fresh milk to prospective landsman as a hint that it is time to ally up. Others ask if a chief is ‘selling milk,’ to signal their willingness to enter into formal alliance.

Is This Going to be In a Story?

If (if!) Gerard survives Aymund, he will return to Dura - as a man of considerable achievement, wealth, and with many slaves. He is keen to embrace Hyperborean identity and has become quite comfortable with subjecting his females to his whims!

Slave breeding will very much be a thing.

John Norman Held Back - What Explicit Gorean Slave Sex Would Have Looked Like in the Gor Books

What would that look like, and how can 'Sex, Swords, and Sandals' writers take that forward?

John Norman never gives us explicit sex. Sometimes he comments in between bouts of sex between characters, but you don’t get a gritty, sticky, blow by blow (pardon the pun) of what happens after Tarl drags a girl to his bed. Let’s look at possible reasons why, and what Gorean slave may actually have been like if presented in explicit detail.

Possible reasons why:

1 - It’s not his thing.

Sexual bondage of Gorean slaves is the dominant feature of the Gor books, but also, so is story. Characters have changing fortunes and opinions, there’s the politics and life of a whole world to present.

I don't think this is the reason though: Norman spends so much content talking about how slaves are taken, broken, and trained, why would he then hold back right at the most fun bit?

2 - He may have been squeamish.

This doesn’t hold water, either. Firstly, why would a squeamish person write about the hunting, training, and use of sex slaves, at all? Also, Gor is the product of the ‘60s. By 1970 he had 5 books out firmly establishing his universe - and giving him plenty of room to experiment with explicit writing:

Tarnsman of Gor (1966)
Outlaw of Gor (1967)
Priest-Kings of Gor (1968)
Nomads of Gor (1969)
Assassin of Gor (1970)

John Norman created this sub genre. He isn’t shy about a damn thing.

3 - He was not allowed to by the publisher.

Consider that right before, or just as as sex begins, his slaves make clear how much they want to have sex with their masters. Their cries are always of pleasure. They beg for their masters’ touch. Why is Norman so keen to make clear the slave girls are giving active consent? Because otherwise, his books can be slammed for dealing with rape just for the sake of titillation. That’s an open and shut ‘no no’ for any publisher.

Leaving out explicit sex wasn’t enough to protect the Gor books; in the 80s they suffered a backlash no one should have been surprised by. Nowadays however, after a generation of Internet use, we know a lot more about the staggering range, diversity, and truly eccentric nature of human sexual interests and fetishes. People aren’t worried about fetishists being weird monsters who will kill them and rape their children, because they’ve discovered that THEY are those fetishists. 50 Shades of Grey is mainstream - who would have seen that coming? Judging people by their sexual interests and fetishes is invitation to a circular firing squad.

Now, 54 years after Tarnsman of Gor was published, let’s try and figure out what it was about Gorean slave sex that his editors likely found so disturbing. Fortunately, John Norman has given us plenty of clues.

Buckle up - this is going to get disturbing, even for Gor fans. You’ve been warned.

A Look At The 'True' Gorean Lifestyle - Abject Sexual Slavery

Slavery is never practiced by kind-hearted people. Slave owners aren't known for taking the time to think about how their slaves might feel about what's going on. Look up how women are treated in human trafficking right now. And whenever slave owners did stop to think about such things, their slave holding culture had the institutions in place to make sure they didn't think about it too long.

Aristotle wrote of what he called 'natural slaves.' In Hinduism the less fortunate are suffering for actions in their past lives. Then there is always the argument that 'someone else will profit from this, if I don't. It’s better if its me.'

Picture if you will a man, fully celebrated by his culture for keeping gorgeous, naked, young women in cages. Is he one day going to give them some clothes, and ask them to be on their way with an apology and a handjob, for old times sake?

Some men will do that (in any slave holding culture). Most men though, won't. Ask yourself; does your phone or tablet have chips in it made by a manufacturer who exploits their workers? If so, what have you done about that?

With the choice made to set aside all empathy for a group, this allows the choosers to impose any treatment upon said group, without reservation, be it forced labor, sex, sadism, cannibalism, or extermination. This choice is the central characteristic of Gorean slave sex. The choice to enslave.

The Rape and Dubious Consent of the Kajira

No Gorean slave girl decides within a couple of days that actually, she loves master, who also coincidentally has chosen just that moment to pin her down, force her legs apart, and fuck her. This is done to imply in the Gor books that people are having sex.

They are not.

Sex is consenting between two people who just really hit it off, even if they don't understand why, or each other. Or brain wave patterns sync with our partner's when we're having sex. There is eye contact. There is participation. There's chemistry (sex without chemistry is very unsatisfying. Just go to the bathroom and use your hand, next time).

Goreans never have sex with their slaves. Instead, they impose power over them. In Julius Caesar's words, 'the strong take what they will, and the weak suffer what they must.' John Norman doesn't hide this from us; this is what the 'whip of the furs' is. Gorean slave girls are 'used.' They are used to teach them their place. They are used to break resistance. A Gorean slave girl is likely used as soon as she is captured or bought -- it sets the tone of the relationship at its start. They are used often, to reinforce their understanding of where they kneel in the hierarchy, and for the double rush it gives their masters: one of sexual delight, and the other, a tremendous sense of power.

In my John Norman inspired books, the main characters almost never kiss slave girls (and when they do, its because there's something weird going on between them). Instead, the most common sexual encounter begins with a naked slave girl kneeling at their feet, to suck them off. This is common, low impact, and not often noteworthy to the characters.

Consider this excerpt:

“Before me were two naked girls who had opened the door for me. Both knelt at my feet, thighs tightly together, and resting back on their heels. One had her wrists bound in front of her, a slender, dark-haired Shemite who was fit for a harem of ancient Assyria. The other had her wrists cuffed behind her back, a gently tanned, petite, Caucasian girl with dirty blonde hair and blue eyes. It was the slave girl he had kidnapped from the criminal Lukor's mansion.

"He has not returned yet, master," said the Shemite. Ninli, I think he had named her.

The blonde looked up at me, her blue eyes wide.

A mistake.

"He said he would be back by dawn," I loosened my belt and pulled out my penis. "It is not like him to be incorrect about such things."

I grabbed the blonde by her hair and pulled her to me. She quickly opened her mouth and took in my penis. Her mouth was warm; she began to bob her head back and forth.

"What's this one's name?"

"Master Fogrim has not named her yet," Ninli shook her head.

I surveyed the girls hanging chained along the far wall.

“Where is Yura?" I asked. The Shang girl Yura was his current favorite. A subtle beast; she looked like a swimwear model whisked away from a Beijing fashion week.

“He took her with him, Master.”

The blonde Armanean pushed her head forward till my penis touched the back of her throat. Well-trained, she did not gag.

"How old is this one?" I asked.

"She is 19, Master," said Ninli.

"Did your master say anything about where he was going? Or why he took a woman with him? Anything at all?"

"No, Master. I am sorry."

The blonde stroked my penis with her tongue, rolling back the foreskin and licking clean the area around the crown. I seized her hair with both hands and pumped her head until I came. I did not let her move until I was finished. Then, I pulled myself clear. She tilted her head back and opened her mouth wide for me to see.

She remained like that, awaiting my command.

"Excellent girl," I wiped my penis dry on her bared throat. "Tell your master when you see him, but I need to speak with him urgently."

"Yes, Master," said Ninli.

I cupped the blonde’s jaw, shut her mouth, and nodded to her.

Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. Then she opened and showed me her empty mouth.

"Good Slave," I stroked her hair.

I turned and left the room.”

-Temple Girls and Spies, Book 7 in the Tales from Hyperborea

This is a non reciprocal activity. It is performed from a vulnerable position. It is demanded casually, and failure to obey - and to satisfy - have grave consequences. It also literally leaves a taste in the slave girl's mouth to remind her of what her status is. In Tales from Hyperborea, free women do not even know what semen tastes like - oral sex is so correlated with slavery, free women will not perform it. As such, slave girls in the stories find fellatio a truly degrading activity - to commit it, is to accept and actively support their own enslavement, and the idea that the taste of cum belongs in their mouths.

It may seem unfair to block the trivializing (and glorification?) of rape, when we trivialize and glorify murder all the time, presenting it casually and callously, however we see fit based on genre, medium, and intention. And it is unfair. However, when you look around a crowded room, some of those people haven’t been murdered. But, some of them have likely been raped. It is a sensitive matter to write about because for many it is the stuff of nightmares, not fantasy stories.

So, is it genre appropriate to write a graphic, detailed, elaborate rape scene in a Gorean style book?

Absolutely.

Is anyone going to then? Not any time soon, and not on most publishing platforms.

In one of my books, the main character tracks down a slave girl who has run away in part because she was to be given to him, for breeding. In that brutal world, a master may give one of his slave girls to another man, so he may stud her, as token of comradeship. The main character is annoyed the hot little slave is missing - but more than that, angry that in running away, she has caused her master, his friend, to lose face.

After he captures her, he scolds her for what she has done - and then he uses her. An explicit sex scene follows. It is not a rape scene. Yet, I try to make clear that the slave girl is not not enthusiastic. She doesn't protest, refuse, or otherwise resist - but she is very much shown her place:

"You cannot breed me!" She had the defiance of the wronged in a courtroom. "Only my Master can breed me!"

"I am not interested in your weird lovers’ quarrel," I began to disrobe, "and any man who puts his dick between your perfect little buttocks, can make you pregnant. As I am going to do to you now, Slave."

Her expression changed; fear stilled her tongue.

I lay down my clothes and my pack. From inside my pack, I produced four, sharpened, wooden stakes, some rope, and a hammer. I hammered each stake into the ground around her, forming the points of a rectangle. I released one slender ankle from the hogtie, and tied it to a stake. Then the other ankle, to the other stake. Last I tied her wrists to the forward stakes. Thus, Layla ended up on her hands and knees, each limb secured to a separate point of the invisible rectangle.

"Just like in the breeding hut," I slapped her behind. It was warm and soft. "But I want to breed you here, so you will always remember what happened to you when you ran away."

She looked straight ahead, trying to blank her face. I could make out a suppressed pout. Forgrim had spoiled her: no female back at the Red Water slave camp would have behaved this way. Much less a woman under his cruel discipline.

I knelt beside her. I gripped her throat and ran the other hand down the gentle curve of her back, feeling the muscles on either side of the spine, the rise of her buttocks, how they felt cupped in my hand. Her ankles tugged at their ropes, her hands curled into fists.

"Lovely beast, I reached under and stroked her flat belly. "You are perfect." I gripped her by her chin and forced her head to face mine. "A fine little bitch, Layla."

Her dark brown eyes rebuked me.

Afterwards he whips her. Then, he leads her away, naked and bound by her wrists.

Gorean Slave Sex Would Have Been Rough

The intersection between sex and violence is so strong, it is one of the world's biggest social problems. The brain pathways for the two are closely related. The plight of female migrant domestic workers in the Middle East makes clear how vicious this can be. It would only be worse with actual sex slavery.

Graphic, rough sex is (sadly) abundantly missing in John Norman's Gor novels. Slaves are certainly whipped and beaten, but it is never implied that this may be a part of the lovemaking.

Let us leave aside truly vicious sadism - John Norman's men are quite happy to own beautiful young women in excellent physical health, and take pains to keep them that way. However, that does not preclude rough sex. John Norman doesn’t dive into it, but you know these girls are getting thrown about and manhandled. At the very least, some slapping, biting, spanking, and very hard drilling must be going on. This feeds back into imposing dominance. On the worse end, these girls would be getting thrashed just to hear them squeal. This quickly moves into sadism, which would be another aspect of graphic depictions of Gorean slave sex.

Sadism: Whipping, Branding, and Torturing the Kajira

Imagine that the world has ended, and you are stranded on a remote island in the middle of the Pacific. It is idyllic, quiet, and it will be centuries before anyone ever comes here again.

Trapped on this paradise island with you is stunningly beautiful girl. Maybe you capture her by accident in a hunting snare. Maybe she says she'll do anything for you if you keep her alive. Perhaps she just always wanted to crawl after a man, on a leash. Whatever the genesis, you now have a delightful slave girl.

It would be a real shame if you didn't string her up by her wrists and whip her - just a few times, while she insists yes, as she jumps from foot to foot, that you are her master. If she drops something, you would have no choice but to make her crawl round and round in circles on her hands and feet, chanting that she will do better next time master, with you sitting watching her with your whip at your side. You find some metal flotsam - wouldn't her thigh look good with your initial branded into it? As the sun goes down, you wait for the iron to heat as she struggles beside you, bound to a tree trunk.

Sadism is literally the delight we get in the suffering of others. Whether it is glee at an idiot's failures on a Youtube video, or the spanking of a slave girl on the furs. Everyone has a little bit of it. Owning helpless slave girls would see it developed. Gorean slaves suffer a great deal of sadism in their training and general duties - it follows that they would also suffer sadism in sex.

What sort of sadism would Gorean slaves be put to? It depends on their owners and their owners' cultures, but they are least protected in that John Norman never writes about masters who mutilate or scar their girls. An explicit Gorean sex scene would involve 'non bruising' actions such as slapping, spanking, and whipping with soft and wide-bladed whips. Tension and physical tortures such as long kneeling, squatting, or suspension by feet or hands may feature.

In one of my books, the main character uses two slave girls but finds a way to add a new, sadistic element to his pleasure:

“Come, pets.”

They smiled and crawled forward on their hands and knees. I pulled their heads into place between my thighs and they got to work. They licked my balls and penis, taking turns blowing my cock. They kept looking at each other and giggling, and then up at me.

I wrapped their leashes around my hand. In the other, I held the whip.

It is another indescribable feeling, seeing beautiful slave girls such. You are their universe; all they want is your approval. Everything they fear, is your whip.

I could feel the ejaculation coming on. I stood up in the bed, my foot on their chains so they could not rise up from their elbows and knees. I grabbed my penis and sprayed semen over their backs. I squeezed out every drop, both girls remained still.

I got off the bed, pulled up a stool, and sat to watch them.

"Keep very still," I said, raising the whip. "If any of my seed drips off your backs, I will will thrash and crucify you."

-Tendrils of the Mi-Go, Book 5 in the Tales from Hyperborea

(Crucifixion here involves no nails - the slave girl is just tied in position to the cross and left hanging like that, for a few long, painful, hours.)

A slave owner has already decided that cruelty and the denial of empathy are going to be the foundation of his relationship with his slaves. As such, he is freed to explore his sadism with them. A Gorean would do things to his slave girls he would not dream of doing to anyone else. The slaves will suffer what they must.

It is not only physical tortures that a Gorean would use to torment his slave girls with. Psychological ones would be as prominent, if not more so, and far more powerful. It's time to talk about degradation: the wheel upon which so much of Gorean sex would spin.

Going Well Beyond Slave Positions - Degradation in Gorean Sex

The first thing that happens to a girl when she falls slave on Gor, is that she's stripped naked. She may be kept in a tight cage, or crammed into an overcapacity cell with other naked captives. She will be fed slops, perhaps by hand, if she is even fed at all at first. Most powerful of all, her name will taken from her. The most insulting renaming I can remember from a Gor novel is a slave girl who is renamed ‘Pudding.’

Everything about a slave girl's life from the moment she is stripped, is utterly degrading. Goreans enjoy degrading their Gorean slaves, John Norman certainly does. Degradation isn't just another form of sadism - it is a tool of domination. When a caged girl is given a hunk of moldy bread, she will wait till she is desperate before she finally breaks down and eats it. When she does, the casualty is her dignity, her pride.

The next step is to give her a piece of bread her master has stamped on. She eventually capitulates and eats that too. The step after would be bread used to wipe up her master's piss - or his semen.

The gradual stepping down teaches the slave girl to reset her bounds of what is acceptable. After a week of semen-bread, she will be delighted to have stepped-on bread. After a month of mashed and fermented insect guts, semen-bread will make her cry tears of gratitude and lick her masters' feet, rubbing her breasts against legs in true adoration.

Degradation makes a slave girl stop acting like a kidnapped princess, and start acting like a slave girl. The more servile and base she becomes, the more contemptible her master will find her, and the more degrading his treatment of her will be. It does not matter; as long as she is clean when he drags her to his bed, and when she comes into his view as, naked and with a bell at her throat, she goes about her duties, he is satisfied. He will treat her worse than a dog, and she will find such treatment unremarkable. She has come to find it acceptable.

Whatever else we may conjecture about what explicit sex scenes in the Gor novels could have been, we know at least that they would have been utterly degrading. In my writing I've got slave girl's eating cum off the floor. They lick their master's penises clean of smegma every morning. They eat out other slaves for the entertainment of men, swap cum till it spills down their necks and breasts, and eat it off their skin.

Nothing is off the table. This randomly happens to one slave girl who is unfortunately in the right place at the right time:

"Why are you in cages, and not chained for milking?"

"We are waiting to be bred," said the Shang.

I pulled out my knife. There were gasps from some of the girls, and the caged ones tried to shrink back. The Shang stared at me; her eyes were large, dark, intelligent.

I went to her cage and cut away the leather thongs that tied it shut. I opened the cage door.

"Out."

The Shang crawled out on her hands and knees.

"There," I pointed to the brick square.

She crawled to the middle of it. I took one shackle, opened it, and fastened it around her ankle. Then I secured her other ankle, and then both her wrists. She knelt on her hands and knees.

I pulled down my pants, got down behind her, and got to work. Her body was thrown forward with each stroke, her hair tossing. She started to moan; I cupped one hand over her mouth.

When I ejaculated, I pulled her close against me. I held her like that for a few moments, she lowered her head down to the tiles and began panting. Then I stood and shook myself clean; semen dripped onto her back.

I uncuffed her wrists and ankles and led her by her hair to one of the milking shed.

"Kneel."

She knelt under a bar, the collar hanging down by her face.

I lifted her long, silk-soft hair out of the way, and pressed the collar against her warm, sweaty skin. It clicked as it locked. Then I took each of her wrists and shackled them as well.

"What do you say?" I said.

"Thank you, Master."

I left the stable.

-Dagon’s Price, Book 3 in the Tales from Hyperborea

The character was just investigating an area of a camp. He had no idea what he would find there. After he was done with her, he didn’t give that slave girl a second thought. The thoroughly degraded slave girls of that universe expect things like that to happen to them, and worse.

Stockholm Syndrome: Gorean Slave Sex would Have Been Sustainable

Stockholm Syndrome may as well be called Slavery Survival Syndrome: it is a behavior that took root early in human history. Those enslaved who had it, survived. Gorean slave girls survive quite well, which is all their genes care about. Becoming a powerful animal's pet is good survival strategy; I cite the existence of pets as proof of this.

Being utterly powerless before a master who thoroughly degrades her and is amused by her suffering, is not a good place for a slave girl to be. Yet, what most threatens her is that she is easily replaced. If a Gorean doesn't like his slave girl he will sell her - or even kill her.

Given these, the Gorean slave girl learns first not to resist, and then to participate (as best as she is allowed). This protects her from the dangers of not being 'pleasing,' and ultimately what little favor there is to be had. In the Gor books, slave girls compete for little pastries or a piece of ribbon. This is how John Norman shows us the complete power their masters have over them. Their slaves will do anything for a pastry - it is the nicest thing that can ever hope for.

The successful Gorean slave girl is one who:

• is utterly subservient to her master

• has no expectations about her treatment

• is a great performer in bed, and adores her master.

• Is truly happy in the rare moments when she wins tokens of his favor (a pastry, a real kiss, be given a blanket for one night)

• believes she deserves to be treated this way, and will actively fight to remain so.

Her master will always find her pleasing, and will delight in having such a servile sex pet, likely one of several he pits against each other for limited favors.

The less successful slave girls don't make it. They are killed 'off camera.’

Dark shit, eh?

I did warn you. Gor is a dark world, where people do dark things to each other. Never forget the gravity of this or its subject matter. John Norman sanitizes Gor for us with sword fights that Tarl Cabot enters without fear and wins within a few lines.

And that’s fine. This is a fantasy.

Just as fun is the fantasy of markets filled with beautiful, twenty-something, slave girls, who mysteriously have no VDs, and are all somehow just a good, hard, fuck away from lying gratefully leashed and oiled at a man’s feet.

Reading Between the Lines

Whatever the reason we don’t have deep, explicit, slave sex in the Gor books, John Norman has still given us more than enough hints as to the possible nature of the Gorean lifestyle. It is for writers inspired by his work to explore this, and see where this takes the Slaves, Sword and Sandals genre, next.

The Gor Series: Marauders of Gor

Picture Credit: Chris Achilleos

The Gor Series: Marauders of Gor

Marauders of Gor is a powerful story in the Gor series. In it John Norman tells the tale of a much matured, crueler Tarl Cabot - who knows what he wants and has no reservations about taking it. He is more Gorean, but more important than that he has grown and has certainty of purpose now. Gor won’t be changing him anymore; now he will be changing Gor. This becomes part of the tone of the Gor series.

In Marauders of Gor Tarl goes to the icy wastes of Torvaldsland where he finds a transplanted Viking culture that very much echoes his own changes. In contrast with the decadent, delicate, cultured world of Ar in Assassin of Gor with its slave dances and colored silks, Torvaldsland is a monstrous, barbaric land of monstrous barbaric men (and indeed, monsters as well). It is a place where death may come at any time to even an armed free person - and is far more deadly for a slave girl.  

Spoiler Warning!

The Barbaric Sex Slavery of Torvaldsland

The Threat of Death

In Ar, there is a professionalism among slavers that protects sex slaves to some degree. Emotions are secondary to logic; a girl may live as long as she has value. In violent Torvaldsland a slave girl has no such guarantee. Surrounded by violent men who enjoy killing - and drunkenness - there is a mortal menace hanging over their Gorean slavery at all times. Consider the fate of the male slave Tarsk who had attempted to strike a slave girl (an overstepping of Torvaldsland bounds).

His punishment would be heavy indeed. The snake is a single-bladed whip, weighted, of braided leather, eight feet long and about a half an inch to an inch thick. It is capable of lifting the flesh from a man’s back. Sometimes it is set with tiny particles of metal. It was not impossible that he would die under its blows.

This was a commuted sentence: he was to have been killed but Tarl intervened and suggested a whipping instead.

Female slaves are just as likely to be killed. Norman describes how the raiders will use them as bait if need be:

When food is low it is not unknown … to use a bond-maid … for bait in such a manner. The least pleasing girl is always used. This practice, of course, encourages bondmaids to vie vigorously to please their masters.

And true disobedience really only has one solution.

“Drink,” said the Forkbeard.

She lifted it to her lips, and tasted it. She closed her eyes, and twisted her face.

“It is too bitter,” she wept.

She felt the knife of the Forkbeard at her belly. “Drink,” said he.

Marauders of Gor is a primal, violent book with berserkers blinding themselves in rage and eating the flesh of their enemies. Yet, Norman holds back from showing us slave girls executed and turned into scarecrows in the fields, stuffed and mounted inside slave pens as daily reminders, or fed to the other girls. I suspect he was simply uncomfortable writing such content and preferred to have Tarl simply relate that such cruelty existed there. You will find nothing as disturbing as those three examples in Marauder of Gor.

Degradation and Sadism

Aside from the ever present threat of sudden and violent death, the conditions Gorean slave girls are submitted to in Torvaldsland are a magnitude more base than what’s endured by their kajira sisters in the ‘civilized’ south. During a chase at sea, one slave girl is hung from the stern of the ship as a trophy:

Her hands were jerked over her head. Then, by her fettered wrists, she moaning, her naked body twisting against the mast, foot by foot, she was drawn to five feet below the spar. She dangled there, in pain, her body that of a stripped bond-maid, exquisite, tempting, squirming, a taunt to the blood of the men of Thorgard of Scagnar.

Later when the danger is passed, she is again hung as a trophy but from the prow of the ship:

Gorm put a rope on her neck and pulled her to the prow, She was held by another crewman, he fastened her at the prow. Her back was bent over it. Her wrists and ankles drawn back, were tied at its sides. She was roped to it, too, at the belly and throat.

New slave girls are renamed by their masters, which is not unusual, but these are particularly degrading and emphasize that their value is entirely in how their masters see them. One girl, Aelgifu, is renamed ‘Pudding.’ Another, a Peggy Stevens from Earth, becomes ‘Honey Cake.’

Casual cruelty is very much a feature in this book of the Gor series. Torvaldslanders are as ready to indulge their sadism as they are their taste for alcohol:

One, who had irritated an oarsman, her hands held,was beaten, crying out, with his belt. Released, she began to kiss him, weeping, trying to please him. Men laughed.

The best example is where the slave girl Thyri, for a mean-spirited attempt to deny her enemy the male slave Tarsk the sights of a slave market, is punished by being given to Tarsk to be raped.  

“She is yours until morning,” the Forkbeard told the young thrall. “Use her behind

the tent.”

“My thanks, my Jarl!” he cried.

“My Jarl!” wept Thyri.

He turned about, dragging her by the right wrist … The Forkbeard, and I, and his men, laughed.

“I hope,” said the Forkbeard, “he will not make her scream all night behind the tent. I wish

to obtain a good night’s rest.”

“It would be a shame,” said I, “to interfere with his pleasure.”

“If necessary,” said the Forkbeard, “I will simply have him gag her with her own kirtle.”

“Excellent,” I said.

Tarl’s Attitudes to Sex Slavery

Marauders is book 9 of the Gor series and Tarl, who at this point is a prosperous Gorean slaver, has grown in his outlook to be very much a full-fledged Gorean. He sees slave girls as lovely possessions to be enjoyed, kept in chains, and firmly thrashed whenever uppity.

We see how his attitudes have changed most in how he describes them. Tarl is delighted by their beauty and revels in his license to look upon them in a way he cannot a free woman:

This left nineteen girls at the wall. I admired the taste of Forkbeard. They were beauties. My choices would have been the same.

I handed the horn to Thyri, who, in her collar, naked, between two of the benches,knelt at my feet.

“Yes, Jarl,” said she, and ran to fill it, from the great vat.

How marvelously beautiful is a naked, collared woman.

Honey Cake, too, I thought, would make him a delicious little slave.

We would all enjoy her.

The best example of all is in his assessment of a newly captured girl:

Hilda the Haughty was a superb piece of female flesh. In almost any market she would surely have drawn a high price ... She had a fair throat, good shoulders; she was marvelously breasted … if the Forkbeard wished to breed her she would bear healthy, strong young to his thralls … her thighs, too, were lovely, and her calves; her ankles, while not thick, as Pretty Ankles had asserted, were heavier than those of Thyri, or Pretty Ankles. I had no objection to Hilda’s ankles; I found them quite lovely; they would take a common girl fetter nicely, with about a quarter inch tolerance.

There is not one woman in Marauders of Gor that he sees as a person (to be fair, all the girls in it are slaves or shortly go on to be enslaved). This is a bit surprising; his character would be stronger if we could contrast his attitudes towards free women.

This may say more about John Norman at this point rather than Tarl Cabot.  

Tarl’s sadism has also developed; he enjoys the tormenting his slaves (a bit) and exercising his complete power over them; he’s not a john with a hooker -- he’s a master with a slave girl:

“Go now to the kitchen of the hall,” said he. “In the fire there, burn your clothing, completely.”

Weeping, clutching her clothing, she ran to the hall. The men and bond-maids laughed muchly. I, too, roared with laughter.

I looked away from her, paying her no more attention. I heard her moan, and rub her body on the post.

“I need you Tarl Red Hair,” she whimpered.

I would let her smolder for another Ahn or two.

The slave girl knows that she must please her master, and that she will be punished, and perhaps

harshly if she does not; this makes her not only desperate to please the brute who fondles her, but also produces in her a genuine fear of him; this fear on her part enhances her receptivity and responsiveness … if she should not be afraid, it is no great matter; any woman, if the master wishes, can be taught fear.

Between seeing beautiful slave girls as delightful meat to be enjoyed, and from crossing beyond sexual pleasure to sadistic pleasure in the punishment and torment of slave girls, Tarl has achieved peak Gorean. Gor, and all its taboo wonders, have become his.

Go Read It!

I give Marauders of Gor 5/5. It is a particularly primal and barbaric book in the Gor series, and I think that is when Sword and Sex Slave fiction is at its best.

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The Gor Series: Assassin of Gor

Picture Credit: Boris Vallejo

The Gor Series: Assassin of Gor

Assassin of Gor is the 5th book in John Norman’s Gor Series, but the first one I encountered. It was my discovery of BDSM and got me writing Gorean style fiction! As such, I’d like to begin my examination of Norman’s Gor series the same way I did.

Most Gor series reviews follow a tone of; “well this is cool fantasy story but its too bad about the disturbing sexy bits…” Well, fuck those reviews. I liked the Gor books, and I like BDSM. Now lets dive in.

(Spoilers ahead)

Assassin of Gor follows Tarl Cabot, an Earth human transported to brutal Gor, as he operates incognito as Kuruus the Assassin; investigating who wants him dead and the mysterious success of a slaver’s ‘house’ at acquiring ‘barbarian’ women. It’s a fun book and Norman put a good deal of work into the story, characters, and world-building. Let’s looks at how Norman deals with the culture of sex slavery on Gor.

Gor’s Sex Slave Industry

Assassin of Gor gives us a full on breakdown on how slave girls are treated in the city of Ar. From the ‘iron pen’ kennels where slaves are kept en masse underground:

“The pens seemed humid and, though we were below ground, warm from the heat of the bodies. The only sanitation facility was an open metal mesh, supported by close-set horizontal bars, in the bottom of the cages, beneath which, some five feet below, was a cement floor, washed down and cleaned by slaves once daily. There was a feed trough at one side of each cage and a low watering pan on the other, both filled by means of tubes from the catwalk. … The female slaves, like the men, were unclothed, and wore collars; their collars, however, were not the typical locked collar of the female slave but, since they were only in the iron pens, a narrow band of iron, with a number, hammered about their neck.”

To strict breaking rituals:

"Each girl in her processing," said Ho-Tu, "after her fingerprinting, is given five strokes of the lash, that she may feel it and know what it means. After that, to ensure prompt obedience, it is commonly enough to merely move one's hand toward the leather."

To elaborate training far beyond simple obedience:

“Elizabeth was, however, to my satisfaction, taught a large number of things which, to  my mind, were more appropriate to the training of slave girls, including a large number of dances, dozens of songs, and an unbelievable variety of kisses and caresses.”

And finally to dramatic slave auctions that are part entertainment spectacles.

The auctioneer sprang to the block and, from the darkness at the foot of the steps, was hurled a chain leash, and then two more. He held them for a moment and then, keeping them taut … in the darkness, there came the sudden, startling, savage report of a slave whip, snapped three times. Then, regally, in black cloaks, with hoods, three women climbed the stairs to the block, backs straight, heads high”

Norman has fleshed out a world where humans are fair game as livestock. The slavery females are put to (male slavery is only referred to superficially; it is very much there in Gor but not the focus of the story), is utterly abject. The only thing that keeps them alive is the physical value of their beauty, and how far they commit themselves to being desirable slave girls. Experienced handlers who may even be ex-sex slaves themselves, identify any level of resistance and confront it. The slaves are left with only one choice: fully submit to their new lives as property, completely at the mercy of men who will keep them chained and on their knees - or die.

In Assassin, all the slaves choose submission. This is too convenient; at least a few would refuse from the start and others would act up later: and the slavers would have to put them to death. Norman does not address this I think for three reasons:

1 - I don’t think he was comfortable writing about women getting butchered, and shown to the others.

2 - There isn’t much gore in the Gor series. Heads on pikes - and graphic sex - are not its thing.

3 - Norman genuinely believes all women would choose slavery (sigh).

It is a detailed piece of world building and it follows naturally from the world Norman has set up - which is not too different from most of the ancient and medieval world. It is easy to forget in these times that Gor is a fantasy reflection of what has been a very real world for most of human history.

Phyllis and Virginia

The book follows the breaking, training, and sale of Phyllis and Virginia, two girls from Earth. Both are less than delighted about this and resist accordingly. However they are taught to obey (by a female trainer), and commit themselves to their training for their own self-preservation. Over time however, Virginia especially comes to accept Gorean slavery as the new normal. Come the end of the book, both characters have changed to accept their roles in the Gorean world.

Vella

Vella / Elizabeth Cardwell however, has a peculiar relationship with Gorean slavery. Masquerading as a slave, she is treated to no shortage of indignities by her trainer and the men of the House of Cenrus. To her, her time as a slave is more a submission holiday than anything else. At the end of the book she has a brush with actual slavery which disturbs her: unlike the other girls, Vella has not had to make a genuine choice about submission. She is still very much Elizabeth Cardwell. This will come back to haunt her - and Tarl - later.

Tarl and Vella

Tarl is very much a boy scout towards her in this book. A boy scout who’s quite comfortable with beautiful women being kidnapped, broken, and trained as sex slaves, but a boy scout towards her. I think this is in part because anything further was beyond the scope of Assassin of Gor. Looking back however, Tarl and Vella have a lot of sex - and she is presented to him as a helpless, lovely, obedient slave. Tarl could at any time have turned around and properly enslaved the beauty - and yet he doesn’t. 

This is partly because the Gor series covers Tarl’s character growth of adapting to the ways of Gor. He begins not entirely enthusiastic about Gorean slavery (and quite happy to make exceptions when it suits him), before he goes on to become quite comfortable with it.

Phyllis’s Homosexuality

Here John Norman shits the bed. Phyllis is gay:

"But I warn you," said Elizabeth, "she hates men!"

And Norman has her ‘converted’ after being used by a ‘real man’ Gorean:

"Your master is a beast, slave," Virginia informed Phyllis.

"I know," smiled Phyllis, "Mistress." She took the cloth of Ho-Sorl's sleeve between

her teeth, delicately, pulling at it.

Norman was a New Wave writer exploring the sexual Wild West of what is today is not just BDSM culture, but part of a wider world of fetishes and turn ons one should (literally) not read too much into. However, he is also very much a creature of his times. His handling of Phyllis’s sexuality is unexamined and crass at best. At worst it is abundantly homophobic.

I don’t condemn Norman (a man now in his late ‘80s) for buying into the fictions of him time. However, as with any author, it is important to understand his influences and times when studying his work.

Go Read It!

I give Assassin of Gor a solid 5/5. It is an interesting world, a good story, even the minor characters are interesting -- and the sex slavery is hot.

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Russians of Gor: The Most Gorean Covers of John Norman's Book were Russian

As you may have guessed, my writing is heavily inspired and influenced by John Norman’s Gor books. While doing a bit of research, I ran into these gems. They are the covers for the Russian editions of the Gorean series - and they are a lot more Gorean than the English-language ones! Check out how metal they are:

These made my day.