A Tale of Zhor

by Christopher Leeson

Bherdur ob Caron stepped into the administrator's office, her lips pursed, her glance wary. The spymaster looked up from his desk and frowned with interest. He knew that his appointment was with a serum girl, and so he had expected to see a fine figure of young womanhood. She was that, at the very least, especially in regard to her lustrous blonde hair.

A chair stood empty before the desk. “Sit down,” Ewien Griff told the interviewee.

Caron drew in a deep breath and did as directed. Her controlled and precise body language suggested military training.

“I have reviewed your service record,” the man at the desk said. "You were a good officer.”

“Sire...” Caron began.

“Speak.”

“I am still a good officer.”

The spymaster nodded as he scanned the document in his hand. “You were retired from the First Horse Lancer Troop of Prydferth, after your unit’s unfortunate capture at Mabon Pass.”

“I can still serve my city,” she stated tonelessly.

“Your determination is very commendable. According to your application, you wish to enlist as an intelligence agent?”

“Yes, Sire!”

He nodded again. “I’ve already met several of your former comrades from the First Horse Lancer Troop. Two of them are now in training. Unfortunately, the remainder of the applicants did not inspire confidence. They were sent home.”  Now Griff captured Caron’s glance pointedly. “Do you know the general nature of work that a female agent routinely performs?”

“Infiltration, Sire,” Caron answered.

“That’s correct. Now, tell me, do you consider yourself male or female?”

She reacted with evident discomfort. “I am whatever the city of Prydferth wants me to be,” Caron replied.

The spymaster accepted her answer without comment. “Here are the facts, Vokshah Caron,” he said, using her decommissioned rank. In most endeavors, women are not useful in the field. In the business of espionage, their sex is against them. We need field operators who are able to infiltrate into the inner sanctums of the political and military leadership of the enemy. Even their own free women are not welcome in their enclaves. A spy traveling as a free woman may, of course, be of use occasionally, but such opportunities come along only irregularly. When one does, it is convenient to assign an agent who has been trained in broader applications."

None of this seemed to surprise Caron.

“Do you know the most efficient method for a woman to insinuate herself into the company of high-ranking enemy personnel, soldier?” He waited, watching her eyes carefully.

“To infiltrate into their homes and into their command centers in the guise of...pleasure slaves,” Bherdur ob Caron answered reluctantly.

“I assume that you have never performed as a pleasure slave before. For what reason do you contemplate assuming such a persona under the most dangerous circumstances?”

“To serve my city, Sire.”

“That is a commendable reason, but we need to know whether it is your true reason. If an enlistee comes to us with an ulterior motive, it can jeopardize his or her fellow agents.”

Caron raised her chin. “What would be a wrong reason, Sire?”

He glanced down at her service record again, but wasn't really reading it. “There are maladjusted serum girls who sometimes come to us to experience the world of female slavery, but they deceptive to the degree that they are too proud, or too timid, to admit to what they are doing.”

“Sire! If I was one of that kind, I wouldn't come here. There are enough slave clubs and camps to make use of!”

“No doubt there are. The women whom I have alluded to seldom make good intelligent agents. However, they oftentimes make excellent pleasure slaves.” He allowed himself a slight smile in appreciation of his own joke.

“Now, tell me, are you holding back anything regarding you motivations, Vokshah?”

“It is as I’ve said; I wish to serve my city,” she replied.

“And can you think of no less dangerous way to fulfill that desire?”

She squared her shoulders. “I would risk any danger, just so long as I can do something to injure the city of Gendir. I need to vindicate my city’s honor.”

“Vindicate its honor? How so?”

“Revenge for the shaming of my city. Revenge for shaming my troop. Revenge for the way that the enemy violated my person as collateral damage to accomplish their sordid aims.”

“You motivation is one that I am not totally unfamiliar with. As for your request, your face is one that could becomingly fit onto a slave's body. That leads me to my next question. What does your body look like?”

Caron pursed her lips, as if offended.

“You have been a woman for about two years. Have you never gazed at yourself in the mirror?” the man asked. He knew for a fact that some serum girls were so traumatized that they stubbornly avoided doing any such thing.

The maiden drew a deep breath. “I have deigned to gaze upon the wreckage that Gendir’s leaders have left of my natural shape as seldom as possible.”

“Why is that? Does you body display flaws, scars, or deformities?”

“No, Sire. I have been disfigured, but in a way that makes me appear fit and healthy.”

The spymaster nodded. “I have met many serum girls and have sized up what the trauma can do to their minds. The brutal truth is that they will find no shoulder to cry on here. We have an important mission that supersedes all personal considerations.Serum girls must buck up and get past their mortification. If they cannot, they will not make the grade. A female agent who goes out into the field does best if she can wear her beauty with comfort and pride, or at least assume a good counterfeit of those attitudes. Rise, soldier. Step back and remove your garments, piece piece. Then display yourself to me. I want to see if you can do so without betraying any self-consciousness or shame.”

Caron, as yet, was not rising.

“Stand up and strip, or else stand up and leave,” Griff commanded sternly. "I have much else to do, including seeing another candidate."

Grimly, Bherdur ob Caron belatedly got to her feet, withdrew slightly, and began to disrobe. Ewien Griff watched the process, remaining professional and detached.

When Caron had rendered herself nude, the officer directed her to unpin her hair.

She did so, but with some some awkwardness. Like many raw serum girls, Caron had avoided learning the details of a normal woman’s daily life.

“Now, let it fall over your shoulders,” Griff directed her.

Yet again he nodded. It was unusual for a raw serum girl to let her hair grow so long. That made him curious. He could see traces of humiliation in the language of Caron's body, but she was mostly hiding it under a facade of indignation. The officer judged that any normal man would have been impressed with the feminine specimen that was Bherdur ob Caron. Her breasts were full and rounded. Jutting nipples such as hers might have done credit to the skill of a masterful sculptor. Her legs were long, unblemished, and finely proportioned. She had dancer’s legs; they left him hoping that Caron had a talent for display dancing. That would make her even more appealing as an infiltrator.

“Physically, you are superb,” he told his interviewee. “I understand that the Gendirites gave all the Lancers Chadwar’s Serum. Are you also a feather-slave?”

Caron reacted as if insulted. “I am not a slave of any kind. Nonetheless, possibly -- probably -- one of the injections I was given was Chadwar’s Serum.”

“You are looking at circumstances wrongly. It would, in fact, be convenient if you received the serum. All of our female agents are required to accept it. For one thing, many slaves, upon each purchase, are given a standard fifty lashes of the girl-whip for their neglect of taking the serum when they were still free. An agent who carries Signir's Curse is spared that unpleasantness. Also, feather slaves are not lashed so frequently, due to the fact that most men enjoy subjecting a bound female to the passionbird feather instead. If the maiden in question has been conditioned to endure a long and skillful feathering, she is often able to hold back vital secrets from an interrogator.”

The ex-officer continued to listen without asking questions.

“Turn a bit, soldier,” Griff instructed her. Caron pivoted slowly, allowing her interviewer to evaluate the blond curls of her peren. “Very lovely,” he said. “Whatever part of your body a man gazes upon, you would have no lack of sexual offers. Do you prefer having intercourse with men or with women?”

Caron stiffened. “Boy-lovers are not accepted into the army of Prydferth,” she reminded him.

“Of course not. But that was before and this is now. The serum is notoriously effective in reorientating a male's sexual preference to the specifics of a female one.

‘“I have not been with anyone since Mabon Pass,” the enlistee told him, indignation smoldering in her glance.

“Not even with one of your own slave girls?”

“No!”

“Why not?”

“I do not care to casually expose this mockery of a body to any woman. Or to any man,” she quickly added.

“Step in front of that full-length mirror on yonder wall. Do not use your hands to obscure anything. Let your eyes remain open. Truly study your appearance. Objectively evaluate yourself as a prime specimen of womanhood.”

Swallowing, Caron stepped toward the polished glass.

“What do you see?” the man asked.

“I see...a...nude woman,” she answered, trying to keep emotion out of her tone.

“That is what I see, also. Do you think she is plain, pretty, or beautiful.”

“I suppose most men would consider her beautiful,” came the somber reply.

"Do you evaluate her body as one that simply begs for the collar and the brand?"

The spymaster saw her reflected ire.

"Answer, soldier."

"I suppose that...from the point f view of a...person...who didn't know me, I assume that I should.

“By the way, are you looking at her with the eyes of a man or a woman?”

“I'm not sure.”

"Are you saying that part of you may already be female in outlook or reaction?"

"I hope that is not so, Sire."

“Knowing that what you are looking at is your own appearance, do you feel pride?”

“No!”

“Do you believe that you can learn to project the illusion of being proud of your beauty?”

Her pause was a brief one. “Yes, if it were necessary."

"Necessary for what?"

"Necessary for the success of an assignment.”

Griff rubbed his chin. “What emotions do you experience as you gaze upon such a vision of loveliness?”

The girl spoke though clenched teeth. “The sight of it infuriates me.”

“That is not helpful, warrior. Look at it more detachedly. Can you envision that a sexually desirable object such as you are looking at could intrigue and attract a normal male?”

She forced out the word: “Yes!”

“Tell me something about yourself, Bherdur ob Caron. Have you had a robust sexual life? I mean, have you brolled many women?”

The reply came with a stumble. “Many? Y-Yes. I – I would say that I have.”

"From knowing so many desirable women, do you suppose that you have learned some of the seductive tricks that they use so shamelessly?"

"I...I tended not to pay serious attention to women's foolish games."

The man behind the desk asked, "Have any of your partners been joy girls?

“Yes.”

“Many?”

“Yes!”

“Were some of them pleasure slaves.”

“Yes...many.”

“Your record records that you were unmarried. Why?

Caron seemed taken a little off guard. “Marriage,” she began slowly, “is inconvenient to a military career, which often involves long absences from home. Women seem unable to see the larger picture and think only about their own satisfaction. And with so many well-trained slaves available, females who are specifically trained not to be selfish and quarrelsome, having a wife seemed to lack any practical necessity.”

“I suppose numerous soldiers would agree with you, Vokshah. Now, tell me, have you ever taken a free female lover?”

“No.”

“Why not?

“A free woman who is of loose morality is no fit companion for an officer. Her dishonor dishonors the man she is with.”

“Some cities hold adultery and fornication, if committed by women, to be serious crimes, an indignity to the entire polis. Some cities will condemn and sell such a self-degraded woman from the block. Do you consider that penalty harsh?”

She didn’t answer at once.

“Vokshah?”

“If a woman deliberately disgraces herself and also her family by unrestrained lewdness, it is probable that she has the heart a natural slave. It is better for that kind to spend the rest of her life wearing the brand and the collar.”

“Though you have never married, Caron, have you ever been in love with a woman worthy of you?”

“Perhaps.”

TO BE CONTINUED...