Outlaw of Gor by John Norman

Thorn lifted the instrument to lay my back open with its harsh stroke.
    “Do not strike him,” said an imperious voice, and the whip arm of Thorn dropped as though the muscles had been cut. The voice came from the woman behind the golden mask, Lara herself. I was grateful.
    Hot with sweat, each fibre in my body screaming in agony, I managed to gain my knees. Thorn's hands would allow me to rise no further. I knelt, yoked, before the Tatrix of Tharna.
    The eyes behind the yellow mask regarded me, curiously.
    “Is it thus, Stranger,” she asked, her tones cold, “that you expected to carry from the city the wealth of Tharna?”
    I was puzzled, my body was racked with pain, my vision was blurred with sweat.
    “The yoke is of silver,” said she, “from the mines of Tharna.”
    I was stunned, for if the yoke was truly of silver, the metal on my shoulders might have ransomed a Ubar.
    “We of Tharna,” said the Tatrix, “think so little of riches that we use them to yoke slaves.”
    My angry glare told he that I did not consider myself a slave.
    From the curule chair beside the throne rose another woman, wearing an intricately wrought silver mask and magnificent robes of rich silver cloth. She stood haughtily beside the Tatrix, the expressionless silver mask gleaming down at me, hideous in the torchlight it reflected. Speaking to the Tatrix, but not turning the mask from me, she said, “Destroy the animal.” It was a cold, ringing voice, clear, decisive, authoritative.
    “Does the law of Tharna not give it the right to speak, Dorna the Proud, Second in Tharna?” asked the Tatrix, whose voice, too, was imperious and cold, yet pleased me more than the tones of she who wore the silver mask.
    “Does the law recognise beasts?” asked the woman whose name was Dorna the Proud. It was almost as if she challenged her Tatrix, and I wondered if Dorna the Proud was content to be Second in Tharna. The sarcasm in her voice had been ill concealed.
    The Tatrix did not choose to respond to Dorna the Proud.
    “Has he still his tongue?” asked the Tatrix of the man with the wrist straps, who stood behind me.
    “Yes, Tatrix,” said the man.
    I thought that the woman in the silver mask, who had been spoken of as Second in Tharna, seemed to stiffen with apprehension at this revelation. The silver mask turned upon the man in wrist straps. His voice stammered, and I wondered if , behind me, his burly frame trembled. “It was the wish of the Tatrix that the slave be yoked and brought to the Chamber of the Golden Mask as soon as possible, and unharmed.”
    I smiled to myself, thinking of the teeth of the urt and the whip, both of which had found my flesh.
    “Why did you not kneel, Stranger?” asked the Tatrix of Tharna.
    “I am a warrior,” I responded.
    “You are a slave!” hissed Dorna the Proud from behind that expressionless mask. Then she turned to the Tatrix. “Remove his tongue!” she said.
    “Do you give orders to she who is First in Tharna?” asked the Tatrix.
    “No, Beloved Tatrix,” said Dorna the Proud.
    “Slave,” said the Tatrix.
    I did not acknowledge the salutation.
    “Warrior,” she said.
    Beneath the yoke I raised my eyes to her mask. In her hand, covered with a glove of gold, she held a small, dark leather sack, half filled with coins. I assumed they were the coins of Ost and wondered where the conspirator might be. “Confess that you stole these coins from Ost of Tharna,” said the Tatrix.
    “I stole nothing,” I said. “Release me.”
    Thorn laughed unpleasantly from behind me.
    “I advise you,” said the Tatrix, “to confess.”
    I gathered that, for some reason, she was eager that I plead guilty to the crime, but as I was innocent, I refused.
    “I did not steal the coins,” I said.
    “Then, Stranger,” said the Tatrix, “I am sorry for you.”
    I could not understand her remark, and my back felt ready to snap under the weight of the yoke. My neck ached under its weight. The sweat poured