Caste of Perfumers

"So is this the perfume that the high-born women of Ar wear to the song-dramas in En'Kara?" asked the blond girl, amused.

"Yes, Lady," I assured her, bowing before her, lisping in the accents of Ar.

"It is gross," said she. "Meaningless."

"It is a happy scent," I whined.

"For the low-born," said she.

"Lalamus!" said I.

My assistant, a large fellow, but obviously stupid, smooth-shaven as are the performers, in white and yellow silk, and golden sandals, bent over, hurried forward. He carried a tray of vials.

"I had not realized, Lady," said I, "that perception such as yours existed in the north."

My accent might not have fooled one of Ar, but it was not bad, and to those not often accustomed to the swift, subtle liquidity of the speech of Ar, melodious yet expressive, it was more than adequate. My assistant, unfortunately, did not speak.

The eyes of Hilda the Haughty, daughter of Thorgard of Scagnar, flashed. "You of the south think we of the north are barbarians!" she snapped.

"Such fools we were," I admitted, putting my head to the floor.

"I might have you fried in the grease of tarsk," she said, "boiled in the oil of tharlarion!"

"Will you not take pity, great Lady," I whined, "on those who did not suspect the civilization, the refinements, of the north?"

"Perhaps," said she. "Have you other perfumes?"

My assistant, hopefully, lifted a vial.

"No," I hissed to him. "In an instant such a woman will see through such a scent."

"Let me smell it," said she.

"It is nothing, lady," I whined, "though among the highest born and most beautiful of the women of the Physicians it is much favored."

"Let me smell it," she said.

I removed the cork, and turned away my head, as though shamed.

She held it to her nose. "It stinks," she said.

Hastily I corked the vial and, angrily, thrust it back into the hand of my embarrassed assistant, who returned it to its place.

Hilda sat in a great curule chair, carved with the sign of Scagnar, a serpent-ship, seen frontally. On each post of the chair, carved, was the head of a snarling sleen. She smiled, coldly.

I reached for another vial.

She wore rich green velvet, closed high about her neck, trimmed with gold.

She took the next vial, which I had opened for her. "No," she said, handing it back to me.

Her hair, long, was braided. It was tied with golden string.

"I had no understanding," said she, "that the wares of Ar were so inferior."
. . .

"You insult me," said Hilda the Haughty, "to present me with such miserable merchandise! Is this the best that great Ar can offer?"

Had I been of Ar I might have been angry. As it was I was somewhat irritated. The perfumes I was displaying to her had been taken, more than six months ago, by the Forkbeard from a vessel of Cos. They were truly perfumes of Ar, and of the finest varieties. "Who," I asked myself, "is Hilda, the daughter of a barbarian, of a rude, uncouth northern pirate, living in a high wooden fortress, overlooki g the sea, to so demean the perfumes of Ar?" One might have thought she was a great lady, and not the insolent, though curvaceous, brat of a boorish sea rover.

I put my head to the floor. I groveled in the white and yellow silk of the perfumers. "Oh, great lady," I whined, the finest of Ar's, perfumes may be too thin, too frail, too gross, for one of your discernment and taste."

Her hands wore many rings. About her neck she wore, looped, four chains of gold, with pendants. On her wrists were bracelets of silver and gold.

"Show me others, men of the south," said she, contemptuously.

Again and again we tried to please the daughter of Thorgard of Scagnar. We had little success. Sometimes she would wince, or make a face, or indicate disgust with a tiny motion of her hand, or a movement of her head.

We were almost finished with the vials in the flat, leather case.

"We have here," said I, "a scent that might be worthy of a Ubara of Ar."

I uncorked it and she held it, delicately, to her nostrils.

"Barely adequate," she said.
I restrained my fury. That scent, I knew, a distillation of a hundred flowers, nurtured like a priceless wine, was a secret guarded by the perfumers of Ar. It contained as well the separated oil of the Thentis needle tree; an extract from the glands of the Cartius river urt; and a preparation formed from a disease calculus scraped from the intestines of the rare Hunjer Long Whale, the result of the inadequate digestion of cuttlefish. Fortunately, too, this calculus is sometimes found free in the sea, expelled with feces. It took more than a year to distill, age, blend and bond the ingredients.

"Barely adequate," she said. But I could tell she was pleased.
"It is only eight stone of gold," said I, obsequiously, "for the vial."

"I shall accept it," said she, coldly, "as a gift."

"A gift!" I cried.

"Yes," said she. "You have annoyed me. I have been patient with you. I am now no longer patient!"

"Have pity, great lady!" I wept.

"Leave me now," said she. "Go below. Ask there to be stripped and beaten. Then swiftly take your leave of the house of Thorgard of Scagnar. Be grateful that I permit you your lives."

I hastily, as though frightened, made as though to close the flat, leather case of vials.

"Leave that," she said. She laughed. "I shall give it to my bond-maids."

I smiled, though secretly. The haughty wench would rob us of our entire stores! None of that richness, I knew, would grace the neck or breasts of a mere bond-maid. She, Hilda the Haughty, daughter of Thorgard of Scagnar, would keep it for herself.

I attempted to conceal one vial, which we had not permitted her to sample. But her eye was too quick for me.

"What is that?" she asked, sharply.

"It is nothing," I said.

"Let me smell it," she said.

"Please, no, great lady!" I begged.

"You thought to keep it from me, did you?" she laughed.

"Oh, no, great lady," I wept.

"Give it to me," she said.

"Must I, lady?" asked I.

"I see," said she, "beating is not enough for you. It seems you must be boiled in the oil of tharlarion as well!"

I lifted it to her, piteously.

She laughed.

My assistant and I knelt before her, at her feet. She wore, beneath her green velvet, golden shoes.

"Uncork it for me, you sleen," said she. I wondered if I had, in my life, seen ever so scornful, so proud, so cold a woman.

I uncorked the vial.

"Hold it beneath my nostrils," she said. She bent forward. I held the vial beneath her delicate nostrils.

She closed her eyes, and breathed in, deeply, expectantly.

She opened her eyes, and shook her head. "What is this?" she said

"Capture scent," I said.
Marauders of Gor     Book 9     Pages 111 - 115


He tore away from his body, swiftly, the gown of the perfumers, that of white and yellow silk. I, too, cast aside the perfumer's gown.
Marauders of Gor     Book 9     Page 116


. . . some of the girls were permitted cosmetics and slave silk; generally, however, girls in the pen are raw, totally, save for their collars and brands, as are male slaves; the costumer, the perfumer, the hairdresser then does with them what he is instructed; most retention facilities in the pens, however, are not so comfortable;
Tribesmen of Gor     Book 10     Page 16


The petals of Veminium, the "Desert Veminium," purplish, as opposed to the "Thentis Veminium," bluish, which flower grows at the edge of the Tahari, gathered in shallow baskets and carried to a still, are boiled in water. The vapor which boils off is condensed into oil. This oil is used to perfume water. This water is not drunk but is used in middle and upper-class homes to rinse the eating hand, before and after the evening meal.
Tribesmen of Gor     Book 10     Pages 50 - 51


I passed a stall of perfumers, and thought of Saphrar of Turia.
Tribesmen of Gor     Book 10     Page 56


I smelled the slave perfume. I recalled it from the palace of Suleiman Pasha, when the girl, with Zaya, the other slave, had served black wine. A rich master will often have individual perfumes specially blended and matched to the slave nature of his various girls. All are slaves, completely, but each girl, collared, imbonded, is deliciously different. Some slave perfumes are right for some slaves, and others not. Vella's perfume, I thought, doubtless a tribute to the skills of some perfumer, had suited her superbly.
Tribesmen of Gor     Book 10     Page 230


She put down the comb and reached for a tiny bottle of perfume. She touched her neck, below the ears, and her body, about the shoulders, with the scent. I knew the scent.
I had carried it with me to Klima. I had not forgotten it.
Her eye, as she put aside the tiny bottle of perfume, was caught by the bit of silk, lying to one side on the vanity.
She looked at it, puzzled, curious.
I recalled the morning I had, in chains, waited to be herded with other wretches to Klima. I had looked up. In a narrow window in the wall of the kasbah, high over my head, there had stood a woman, a slave girl, veiled and robed in yellow, a slave master behind her. With the permission of the slave master she had removed her veil. With what contempt, and scorn, and triumph she had looked upon me, a mere male slave, chained and bound for Klima, below her. She had thrown me a token, a square of silk, slave silk, red, some eighteen inches square, redolent with the perfume fitted by some perfumer, on the order of her master, to her slave personality, her slave nature and slave body.
Tribesmen of Gor     Book 10     Page 311


I had then been scented, with the colognes and perfumes hought suitable for certain types of male slaves.
Fighting Slave of Gor     Book 14     Page 126


I knelt in the cool recesses of the shop of Turbus Veminius, a perfumer in Venna. Venna has many small and fine shops, catering to the affluent trade of the well-to-do, who patronize the baths and public villas of the area. I, a slave, unaccompanied by a free person, would wait until free customers were waited upon and served. I could smell perfumes and their mixings in the long shop behind the counter. There, at various benches, attending to their work, measuring and stirring, were apprentice perfumers.
Fighting Slave of Gor     Book 14     Page 209


"My thanks, Lady Teela," said Turbus Veminius, proprietor of the shop, accepting coins and handing to a robed woman a tiny vial of perfume. She then left.
Fighting Slave of Gor     Book 14     Page 210

"Is the perfume of the Lady Kita of Bazi ready?" Turbus Veminius called to the back of the shop.

"No," a voice answered him.

"Do not hurry," called Turbus Veminius. "It must be perfect."

"Yes, Turbus," I heard.

Turbus Veminius then turned, sternly, toward the Lady Kita. She was a small, delicate, brown-skinned woman, with a light yellow veil, common in Bazi. She shrank back. "When was your perfume to be ready, Lady Kita?" he inquired. He did not seem deterred by the two large, smooth-skinned, brownish guards, arms folded, who stood behind her.

"At the fifteenth Ahn," she said, timidly.

"It is now the fourteenth Ahn," he said, casting a meaningful glance at the water clock on the counter to his right.

"I am early," she explained.

"Obviously," he said.

"Yes, Turbus," she said.

"Return at the fifteenth Ahn, and not before," he said.

"Yes, Turbus," she said.

The Lady Kita turned about and hurried, followed by her guards, from the shop.

Turbus Veminius looked after her. He, like many perfumers, and hairdressers and cosmeticians, treated his female clientele almost as though they were slave girls. Indeed, he was famous for once having said, "They are all slave girls." Yet, in spite of the gruff, authoritarian way in which they might be handled, and the rude, peremptory fashion in which they might be addressed, women, and high-caste women, for no reason that was clear to me, flocked to his shop. He was, of course, one of the foremost perfumers of Gor. His prices, it might be mentioned, were beyond the reach of all but the very wealthy. It might also be mentioned that he did not deal at all in slave perfumes.

"Will the perfume of the Lady Kita be ready at the fifteenth Ahn?" Turbus called back to someone in the shop.

"I do not know," said the voice.

"Do not hurry it," he said. "If it is not ready, I will order her to wait, or to return tomorrow. It must be perfect."

"Yes, Turbus," I heard.

I smiled at the thought of ordering a free woman to wait, or to come back tomorrow, and knowing that she would obey you. "They are all slave girls," Turbus Veminius was once reputed to have said.

He then turned his attention to a new customer. She hurried deferentially forward.
Fighting Slave of Gor     Book 14     Pages 211 - 212

I knelt on the tiles. It was warm outside, but cool inside, in the shade. I smelled the erfumes of the shop, many of which were being blended by hand from signature recipes in the back of the shop. Signature recipes are unique, and secret. They are the result of a perfumer's consultations and experiments, the outcome of an effort to devise the perfect perfume for a given woman, though perhaps relativized to a time of day and mood. A wealthy woman may have as many as ten or fifteen signature recipes, each different. They are called signature recipes not only because they are individualized to a given woman but because the recipe bears the perfumer's signature, indicating that he accepts it as a perfume worthy of his house. These recipes, interestingly, are kept on file in the perfumer's strong boxes. The ingredients and processing remain the secrets of the perfumer. There are also, of course, perfumes associated with a given house, which may be purchased by more than one woman. These recipes are sometimes, by an extension of usage, also called signature recipes. They are, at any rate, supposedly unique to given houses. Also, of course, there are hundreds of more standard perfumes, the preparation of which is widely understood by the perfumers of many cities. Slave perfumes, of course, are an entirely different area. These are usually heavier scents, and more sensual, than those used by free women, scents more fitting to a woman who must obey, and perfectly. There are hundreds of slave perfumes, as there are hundreds of perfumes for free women. The perfumes of Gor, as those of Earth have not, have given special attention to the development of perfumes for slaves. There is thus, on Gor, a subtle and complex variety of slave perfumes available, exciting, provocative, sensuous and unmistakable. There are perfumes for the slave in any woman on Gor. Sometimes, though this is more expensive, a girl is brought in to the perfumers by her master for a consultation; the perfumer then questions the girl, orders her about, and may even caress her; then, in the light of her background and history, and intellectual and physiological nature, he recommends a perfume, or blend of perfumes, for her; this perfume, or blend of perfume, is thus, in its way, matched to her unique beauty and bondage. Most slave girls, however, feel that an individualized perfume is not necessary. Too, they often wish to use a variety of perfumes, depending on various factors, such as the time of day and their own moods, and those of the master. Too, many girls are stimulated by wearing a perfume that they know, like the collar and the brand, is common to many slaves. It can make them feel their bondage even more deeply and sensuously. Perhaps, as one slave girl once said, "What difference does it make what slave perfume we wear? They all excite us. They all teach us that we are slaves."
. . .

Turbus Veminius had now returned to the counter. He had with him a small vial of perfume which he had obtained in the back of the shop. He placed it in a cabinet to one side. It was doubtless that which had been prepared for the small, brown-skinned woman, the Lady Kita of Bazi.
. . .

"Ah," said Turbus Veminius, as the Lady Kita, with her two guards, entered the shop.

"Is the perfume ready?" she asked.

Turbus Veminius handed her the vial. She removed the tiny cap and lifted it to her face, which was veiled. She inhaled delicately through her nose. I saw the veil draw inward.

"What is the meaning of this?" she asked, horrified. "Surely this is slave perfume!"

"No," said Turbus Veminius, "but it, by design, resembles it."

"Surely you do not expect me to pay for this?" she asked.

Only if you wish to, Lady Kita," he said.

Her eyes, over her veil, were angry.

"You wished a perfume, did you not," asked Turbus Veminius, "to distract your companion from his slave sluts, did you not?"

"Yes," she said.

"This perfume," said Turbus Veminius, "will remind him of what he has forgotten, that you are a woman."
. . .

"I will take back this perfume," he said. "Obvi usly you will not want it."

"No," she said, quickly, lifting her head. "I will take it."

"The price is high," he said, "a golden tarn disk."

"I will pay it," she said, giving him the coin from a small, beaded purse she held in her hand.

She turned to leave, but then, again, turned to face him.

"Yes?" he asked.

"Do you sell slave perfume, true slave perfume?" she asked.

"We do not sell perfume for slave sluts in the shop of Veminius," he said, sternly.

"Forgive me, Turbus," she said.

"Try the shop of the Steel Bracelets," he smiled. "It is near the house of Hassan, on the Street of Brands."

"Thank you, Turbus," she said. She turned again, to leave.

"And do not let them overcharge you," he called after her. "Five two-hort vials should cost you no more than a copper tarsk!"

"Yes, Turbus," she said. "Thank you. Turbus." She stood in the doorway, but did not turn to face him. "I wish you well, Turbus," she said.

"I, too, wish you well, Lady Kita," he said.
Fighting Slave of Gor     Book 14     Pages 212 - 219


"Her perfume was ready yesterday," he said. He went to one of the cabinets. From the sack he took the coins. They were five silver tarsks. He put them in a drawer. He wrote something on the note, and then he put the note and the vial of perfume in the sack. I again put down my head and he put the sack, on its leather string, about my neck.
"Be careful with that perfume," he said. "It is expensive. It is a signature perfume."
Fighting Slave of Gor     Book 14     Page 219


"Beside him, masked, is Horemius. Eight stone of perfumes were taken from him.
Rogue of Gor     Book 15     Page 37


Her jewel boxes began to brim with precious stones. Rings were brought to her worth the ransom of a Ubar. Her cosmetic cases could boast perfumes that might have been the envy of a Ubara."
Mercenaries of Gor     Book 21     Page 158


"Do you know the perfume you wear?" I asked.
"It is a slave perfume," she said.
"Yes," I said. It was a heady perfume. It made me wish to reach across the table, seize her, and throw her upon it, and then, there, on that small, smooth, hard surface, put her to my pleasure, ravishing her publicly. "Do you know its name?" I asked.
"No," she whispered. She was, after all, a free woman.
"It is a well-known Cosian perfume," I said, "'The Chains of Telnus'."
"I see," she whispered.
"Cosian masters sometimes enjoy putting women of Ar, their slaves, in it.
Vagabonds of Gor     Book 24     Pages 405 - 406


He had doubtless specified the scent, as well. She thought it was a beautiful perfume, but here, on Gor, she had no doubt but what it was common and cheap. It was a slave perfume, as she had been informed, and it was doubtless not an expensive one, but one which might be accorded to low slaves.
Prize of Gor     Book 27     Page 179


There were, of course, the pans, pots, utensils, lamps, pails, and such, which, on shelves and dangling from poles, she supposed might have suggested the name of the market, but there were also stalls, as well, specializing in many other forms of goods, for example, stalls of fruits and vegetables, and produce of various sorts, and sausages and dried meats, and stalls of tunics, cloaks, robes, veils, scarves, and simple cloth, and of leatherwork, belts and wallets, and such, and of footwear, oils, instruments of the bath, cosmetics and perfumes, and mats and coarse rugs, and such. She saw no stall that seemed to specialize in silk, or gold, or silver, or precious stones, or in weaponry, even simple cutlery. It impressed her as a crowded, dirty, low market, presumably frequented primarily by the poor, or by those of the lower castes, individuals who must carefully guard even their smallest coins.
Prize of Gor     Book 27     Page 230