the following short story describes a rite of passage...of sorts...this is the sequence of events that might follow a young warrior’s first capture of a wild and untamed Panther Girl
Something of the nature of the institution of capture...and the Gorean’s attitude toward it becomes clear when it is understood that one of a young Warriors first missions is often the capture of a Panther Girl for his personal quarters....when he brings home his Panther Girl...bound naked across the saddle of his tarn...he gives her over...rejoicing, to his sisters...to be bathed...perfumed and clothed in the brief slave livery of Gor....
That night...at a great feast...he displays the Panther Girl...now suitably attired by his sisters in the diaphanous...scarlet dancing silks of Gor...bells have been strapped to her ankles...and she is bound in slave bracelets...roudly...he presents her to his parents, his friends and Warrior comrades...
Then...to the festive music of flutes and drums...the Panther Girl is forced to kneel....the young Warrior approaches her...bearing a slave collar...ts engraving proclaiming his name and city...the music grows more intense...mounting to an overpowering barbaric crescendo...which stops suddenly...abruptly...the room is silent...absolutely silent...except for the decisive click of the collar lock...
(It is a sound the Panther Girl will never forget)
as soon as the lock closes...there is a great shout...congratulating...saluting the young Warrior...he returns to his place among the tables that line the low-ceilinged chamber...hung with glowing brass lamps...he sits in the middle of his family...his closest well-wishers...his sword comrades...cross-legged on the floor in the Gorean fashion behind the long...low wooden table...laden with food...which stands at the head of the room.
(Now all eyes are on the Panther Girl)
The restraining slave bracelets are removed...she rises...Her feet are bare on the thick...ornately wrought rug that carpets the chamber...there is a slight sound from the bells strapped to her ankles...she is angry...defiant...though she is clad only in the almost transparent scarlet dancing silks of Gor...her back is straight...her head high...she is determined not to be tamed...not to submit...and her proud carriage bespeaks this fact...the spectators seem amused...she glares at them...angrily she looks from face to face...there is no one she knows...or could know...because she has been taken from a hostile Panther tribe...she is a woman of the Forest...fists clenched...she stands in the center of the room...alone...all eyes upon her...beautiful in the light of the hanging lamps.
she faces the young Warrior...wearing his collar “You will never tame me!” she screams....her outburst provokes laughter, skeptical observations, some good-natured hooting. “I will tame you at my pleasure” replies the young Warrior...and signals to the musicians.
the music begins again...the Panther Girl hesitates...she hisses...there is a slave whip on the wall...the Warrior uncurls the whip and lashes her at her feet...then, to the barbaric...intoxicating music of the flute and drums...she is forced to dance for her Captor...the bells on her ankles marking each of her movements...the movements of a Panther Girl stolen from her Forests...who must now live to please the bold Stranger whose binding fiber she had felt...whose collar she wore.
