"Who is he?" she asked tremulously, scarcely daring to breathe as she stood naked in the centre of the circle. Her name on earth, in her own time, was Helena Winter. In this world, at that time, she was a captive, without a name.

"They call him Mostel the Head Slaver," her captor replied calmly.

A slaver! She shot a fearful glance at the strange man whose fingers idly caressed the butt of his multi-blade whip. His dark face was devoid of expression as, he calmly eyed her body, and he unbuckled the sword belt from his waist and casually tossed it aside with a clatter.

Across the room, beyond the circle, the tall handsome man she had known as Tomas, he who had so cruelly duped her and delivered her to that alien place, leaned passively against a wall. The ragged heap of her clothing lay at his feet. She was all but naked. They had not even allowed her to strip herself but, instead, Tomas had effortlessly held her arms while the other, the slaver, cut the garments from her body with a razor-sharp dagger and only her stockings and shoes remained. And about her throat, replacing the thin chain necklace and locket she had worn, the slaver had snapped a collar, its cool leather worn and slick with the perspiration of others. A long length of thick cord was attached to a ring at the front of the collar, and it hung down her body and pooled at her feet.

In the Circle of Assessment the blonde girl cowered and whimpered audibly when the slaver reached between her breasts to grasp the long cord leash that dangled from the collar. Her fear produced a thin, slick sheen of sweat on her trim body. He pulled on the leash, drawing her nearer, and gently touched her shoulder with the whip tracing the leather over the tattooed flame that licked over her flesh there and reached up towards her soft throat. He watched with professional interest as she twisted her body to escape the dangling blades of the whip that had momentarily caressed the nipple of her right breast. The movement nicely displayed her luscious curves. The girl, aware of his cool appraising gaze, crossed her arms over her breasts and eyed him fearfully. "Please..." she said, on the edge of hysteria.

The slaver said something in a harsh, guttural tongue. She remained, huddled in her own clasping hug. He shook out the whip and swung it in a shallow arc with single flick of his wrist. The supple leather straps caught her arms and some of her shoulders. She yelped in pain and shock and tried to leap back but was thwarted by the jerking restraint of the leash on her neck. He shook out the whip again, arm outstretched, blades dangling threateningly. His demand was implicit, and she allowed her hands to fall awkwardly to her sides. Nevertheless, he flicked out the whip again, and this time it struck squarely across her breasts. She squealed and turned in terror, as if to flee. The whip then unerringly found the firm globes of her buttocks. It was a harsh sting rather than a full, punishing blow, but a red hue immediately suffused her pale flesh. It was a strike to control her, to block and turn her to his whim. The Slaver smiled thinly.

She tried to suppress a sob and fell to her knees. "Please," she blurted again as tears ran down her cheeks. "Please, let me go."

He swung the whip, this time using the full force of his arm, watching the leather blades fly in a wide arc. There was a smooth hiss of displaced air before she screamed as leather lashed against her back. She yelped and rolled on the floor. He struck her twice more, burning her thighs and shoulders.

The slaver said something in even, measured tones, nudging her flank with his toe and jerking on the leash. She yelped in fear, but made no other response.

Helena screeched and writhed as he lashed her once more.

Mostel the Head Slaver spoke again. She looked across to her captor piteously. "I don't understand his language," she pleaded.

"He's ordering you to remove your shoes and stockings. Do it quickly. If you don't obey him immediately in all things, he will whip you."

The girl hastily kicked off her spiked shoes.

"I don't understand him," she wept as she sat on the floor and peeled off a stocking

"You will learn quickly. For now, though, as a kindness, I will ask if I may translate his words."

"Yes, yes, thank you," she said, hurriedly removing the other stocking and bunching it in her hand before tossing it aside.

Tomas spoke to the slaver, and the man replied, and they both laughed before the slaver spoke again.

"What did he say?"

"He said earth sluts always have to be beaten raw to make them quickly learn the language."

"Oh!" she gasped.

"But he's content for me to translate. You are to stand and present yourself for assessment."

"My God!" she murmured, aghast, but she scrambled to her feet and ran a hand over her dishevelled long blonde hair.

Tomas shrugged. "He is a slaver," he said simply. "And you must stand more prettily or he will beat you again."

The slaver spat out a command, and Tomas nodded.

"Place your hands behind your head, lacing your fingers. Spread your feet wide, suck in your belly and thrust out your breasts. Look straight ahead and don't move until I tell you."

The girl whined piteously but immediately obeyed, and she presented herself well, remaining statue-like except for the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed heavily. The leash dangled between her breasts and trailed on the floor. She stared straight ahead, and kept her eyes fixed on the far wall. She must have noticed, probably for the first time since arriving there, that the walls were decorated with exotic mosaic tile mural. Each one depicted an explicit scene of degradation and slavery: a girl held, doubled over, her legs splayed and feet behind her head, as a male ravished her with a hugely tumescent organ; a naked girl dancing naked beneath the lash while all around her other slaves were being ravished in imaginative ways; a woman on all fours, a whip in her mouth, while a man took her from behind; a girl tied at a whipping post; a girl kneeling and giving oral service at the feet of an imperious male; a girl performing on the block. Also, and she could not have missed it, was the mural of the huge mythical dragon engaged in the rape of a beautiful, fabulous bird... it was a similar scene to the one that now indelibly tattooed on the girl's own back. A flush suffused her face and spread prettily over her breasts. Perhaps she was involuntarily aroused by the inspection of her naked body by a strange man, for many girls are like that. However, it may have been that she realised that these men, unlike those she had known before, were Masters, true Masters of women. This, illustrated by the erotic images on the walls she had to keep looking at as she stood helpless, might have contributed to the subtle changes in her body. Her nipples had become tight little buds and the unmistakable fragrance of her sex juices lightly permeated the thin air.

"Head up! Eyes on wall! Open your mouth!"

The slaver rested the whip butt on her shoulder, and the leather blades draped down her back as practised fingers pushed back her lips to inspect her teeth. Then he titled her head to look inside her mouth. He smelled her breath and then spoke.

"Put your tongue out and remain like that until told otherwise!" Tomas said.

She gazed wildly from the corner of her eye, but obediently put out her tongue. She remained thus, tongue poked out between her lips, as the slaver toyed with her pert breasts, kneading them to test the firmness of the flesh, lifting the orbs and then letting them fall to judge the bounce, squeezing and pinching her nipples to tease them into even greater prominence. Only the repeated caress of his whip blades against her back prevented her from recoiling in horror. Then his hands dropped to her waist, and his thumbs pressed into the soft flesh of her belly in an experienced manner. Apparently satisfied, he stooped and ran his hands smoothly over her thighs and calves, each limb alternately clasped. Then he was behind her, tracing his hands down her back, fingers trailing, she knew, over the multi-coloured tattoo of the mythical beast that stretched from shoulder to hip. Then his hands cupped the full cheeks of her bottom. A hand on each of her buttocks he said something in a sharp tone.

"You must bend your knees," Tomas told her.

She obeyed with obvious reluctance, and the slaver patted her shoulder with the butt of his whip, speaking terse, single word.

"Down more!"

Her protruding tongue prevented her from gritting her teeth, but she remained stoically rigid as he probed her vagina, slipping his fingers into the inevitably moist folds. However, she squirmed perceptibly when he ran the pad of a finger gently round the bud of her clitoris, and gave a sharp start as he tested the tightness of her anus. He asked a question as he patted her bottom and returned to stand in front of her.

"How old are you?" Tomas translated. As if frozen in position, she remained silent, fingers laced in her hair, bent forward, her knees flexed, her tongue pushed forward. "You may resume normal posture. How many years do you have?"

"Twenty-four," she said, straightening

Despite the slaver's hand that cupped her sex, she kept her hands on her head and her eyes fixed on the wall as Tomas reported her reply. The slaver was toying with her, it seemed. He rasped a command. Tomas did not speak but the slaver reached to grip her face in his other hand and forced her to look into his cold, grey eyes. He spoke again, the same insistent words. She gazed into his eyes like a doe confronted by a tiger. The slaver continued to hold her thus, face clamped in his steely grip, his other hand on her genitals. He rasped out the command again.

"You must press yourself against his hand and move your hips." Lana was about to speak, to protest or demur, and she hesitated for precious seconds. "Obey!" Tomas said.

With a strangled sob she pressed forward onto the hand between her thighs, gazing petrified into his hard eyes as she did so. The slaver spoke as she writhed on his hand, and he slipped a finger between the wet lips of her sex. Tomas made a comment, drawing a reply and small laugh from the slaver, to which Tomas responded with a longer diatribe, and all the time the girl was made to squirm against the manipulation of her sex.

"He complains that I never bring him virgins from Earth," Tomas called to her. "I said they're hard to find, and it's not always my fault."

"Make him stop, please."

"He says you are a natural hot slave."

"No," she said, twisting involuntarily as the slaver's free hand pressed, palm-down against the soft flesh of her stomach as he probed her cunt with the long, practised fingers of his other hand.

"You can't resist. If you are the right type, then he will know. If that's the case, they have ways to condition you to become a hot panting slut begging to be used."

"No," she wept again, but her hips were moving against the slaver's fingers.

"They will train you and ignite fires within you that will keep you enslaved by your own needs. I've seen it happen so often."

Eventually the hand left her body and yet her hips still moved slightly. The slaver sniffed at his finger and nodded in approval. He thrust it between her lips and, although she blanched, she obediently opened her mouth and took his finger deeply, sucking it clean as the two men spoke together. Mostel the Head Slaver pulled his from her mouth against her strong suction and, still in conversation, he moved behind her and reached forward between her legs to grasp the dangling leash.

"He thinks you will become an exquisite slave slut, and he's pleased that your tattoo work has already been done." he said. "I am glad I arranged that."

The slaver drew the cord tautly from the collar, manoeuvred it between the girl's divide from front to rear, and pulled it hard so that it fitted tightly against her inner flesh. He tested the tension to ensure that it pressed against the tender mouth of her bottom. Satisfied, he gave one further pull and she gasped as the lips of her sex separated about the cord and it rasped against her engorged clitoris. He pulled it again, keeping it tight, increasing the tension on the bridge between her legs. He pressed a hand into her back and she was forced to move forward. The slaver kept the cord tight so that she was forced to walk on her toes to relieve the pressure.

"He has agreed to purchase you," Tomas said as she was paraded past him on arched feet, with the calves of her legs tightened and her buttocks clenched about the spiteful leash. "I have turned a profit."