"Yes, I admit it. I am a killer. But I choose not to kill ... today. That's all it takes. I won't kill ... today." James T. Kirk on self control.

I wanted to write about Panthers, but Panthers exist on Gor, so I have to consider the holistic view of Gor too. I decided I would write about Gor one week - and Panthers the next. Alternating between thinking globally and acting locally. It is a poor teacher who teaches old material without taking a fresh look at it, so I started by rereading Captive, Hunters and Explorers. Today I am going to discuss Chapters 8&9 of Captive, where we find the first major treatment of Panthers.

Captive is the first book not narrated by Tarl. Elinor is a captive earthborn who is learning about Gor the hard way, as part of a slave chain on the road North with a Slaver. By Chapter 8, elinor has learned about kajirae and Free Woman and is about to meet Panthers. But first JN has to hammer home one of the fundamental truths about Gor. There are three types of women, slaves, slaves, and slaves.

During Chapter 8, elinor goes from:

"I glared at her. 'I will never wear a collar and have a master,' I hissed at her.

through various self-realizations to:

"I stood in the stream, furious, fists clenched. 'Yes,' I cried, 'I want a master!'

In between, we get this well known quote from ute, who is a very knowledgeable character:

“'In every woman there is a Free Companion and a slave girl. The Free Companion seeks for her companion and the slave girl seeks her master.'”

“'That is absurd,' I said."

“'Are you not a female?”' asked Ute."

“'Of course,' I said."

“'Then' said Ute, 'there is a slave girl in you that wants her master.'”

Ute will be proved right, not only about the captive FW, Lady Rena, but also about the Panthers. Ute introduces us to Panthers (unless we recall a brief mention in Assassins) with this passage:

“Some call them forest girls. “Other call them the panther girls, for they dress themselves in the teeth and skins of forest panthers, which they slay with their spears and bows. They live in the forest without men, saving those they enslave, and then sell, when tiring of them. They shave the heads of their male slaves in that fashion to humiliate them. And that, too, is the way they sell them, that all the world may know that they fell slave to females, who then sold them. Some were doubtless once slaves. Others were once free women. Perhaps they did not care for matches arranged by their parents. Perhaps they did not care for the ways of their cities with respect to women. Who knows? In many cities a free woman may not even leave her dwelling, without the permission of a male guardian or member of her family. In many cities a slave girl is more free to come and go, and be happy, then a free woman.”

ute shows particular insight here, speculating, in the final paragraph, on things she has no way of actually knowing about. The words "doubtless" and "perhaps" clue us in that ute has no actual knowledge about where Panthers come from. But she does have actual knowledge about what it is to be a woman, and her insights about the slave/FC in every woman can be trusted.

Before the actual appearance of Panthers, elinor has an epiphany that will be very telling regarding the Panther scene to come:

"Interestingly, for the first time in my life, I found that I was not displeased to be a woman. I was pleased, rather, indeed, thrilled, that they were men. It is joyous to be a woman on Gor, even though slave, with such men. I would not have exchanged my sex, though I was only a girl in bondage, for the throne of Ar."

We also get some foreshadowing from Lady Rena, when elinor feeds the enslaved and broken former FW:

"I saw that the hood, her gag and the bonds had taught her slavery."

It is not Rena's belly that makes her slave. It is the harsh reality of bondage that makes rena slave. Without it, neither elinor nor rena would be slaves, voluntarily. But forced into the role, they both adapt.

elinor is captured by Panthers, but her first impression of the Panthers' superiority to Elinor turns out to be wrong, at least she soon afterwards decides that it is. At first she says:

"I was nothing with these proud, free, dangerous, brave women, these independent, superb, unfearing, resourceful, fierce felines, panther girls of the northern forests of Gor. They were swift, and beautiful and arrogant, like Verna. They were armed, and could protect themselves, and did not need men. They could make men slaves, if they wished, and sell them later, if they were displeased with them or wearied of them. And they could fight with knives and knew the trails and trees of the vast forests. They feared nothing, and needed nothing."

But elinor changes her mind when she sees the Panthers dance:

"Then, for the first time I noticed, in the center of the circle, there were four heavy stakes, about six inches in height, dark in the grass. They formed a small, but ample, square. I shuddered. They were notched, that binding fiber might not slip from them."

JN clearly wants the reader to see that too, as he shows us Panthers dancing out what they would do if they had a male captive staked out:

"The first girl began to dance before the square. Then suddenly, to my amazement, Verna cried out in anguish, a wild, moaning, anguished cry, and threw from herself her weapons and tore away her own skins and leaped into the circle, turning and clawing and crying out like the others. She was not other than they, but first among them! She danced savagely, clad only in her gold and beauty, beneath the moons. She cried out and clawed. Sometimes she bit at another girl or struck at her, if she dared approach the square more closely than she, writhing, enraged, but fearful, eyes blazing, dancing, they fell back from her."

"She danced first among them, their leader."

"Then, throwing her head back, she screamed, shaking her clenched fists at the moons. And then, helplessly, she threw herself to the grass within the square, striking at it, biting and tearing at it, and then she threw herself on her back and, fists clenched, writhed beneath the moons."

"One by one the other girls, too, violently, threw themselves to the grass, rolling upon it, and moaning, some even within the precincts of the square, then throwing themselves upon their backs, some with their eyes closed, crying out, others with their eyes open, fixed helplessly on the wild moons, some with hands tearing at the grass, others pounding the earth piteously with their small fists, sobbing and whimpering, their bodies uncontrolled, helpless, writhing, under the moons of Gor."

In the pantomime dance, Panthers may start on top, but they all end up on their backs, helplessly imagining a strong man's weight upon them. Verna might be the toughest bitch in the band, but she is also the biggest slut.

Now that she knows the Panthers' secret, Elinor has gained some inner power over them, at least in her own mind:

“'It seemed to me,' I said, 'that your bodies moved as might have those of slave girls.”

"My head leaped to the side, stinging, as Verna, with all her might, slapped me."

"Then she looked at me. 'We are women,' she said."

At this point, JN expects us to remember what Ute said earlier:

“In every woman there is a Free Companion and a slave girl."

Panthers clearly have slavegirls inside them, if one goes by the books. It reminds me of some roleplay I was involved in, in the XRoads. I had tracked a loose slave and I told her to kneel, so I did not have to hurt her. She said, "I am not going to kneel to a woman, who, the only difference between me and her is a collar."

Of course she was wrong, there were two differences. She had a collar, and I had a spear. And like Kirk, I choose not to be a slave ... today. Not today. The reasons why Panthers make this choice, and the how of coping with the choice will be covered in other columns.