Tempest the Panther: Part 3

This Gorean Fan Fiction was generated using Chat GPT alongside the RP logs. 

Please note that the Gorean Saga is a fictional series, and its world, customs, and values may not align with modern societal standards or moral principles.

Gor is Copyrighted by John Norman

They had kept me caged too long.

Six days, maybe more—time blurred into aching hunger, the stink of my own skin, and the rasp of my dry tongue against cracked lips. I pressed myself against the front of the cage when the slaver approached, offering him a soft, sweet tone I did not feel.

“Water… please?”

He smiled the way men do when they think they’ve already won. Maybe he had. My body shook with weakness; my stomach had turned hollow and sharp. Still, I kept my pride high, lifting my chin, speaking with the kind of sarcasm that once made warriors hesitate.

He asked for my feathers. My weapons. The last pieces of the forest I still carried.

I didn’t want to give them up. They were more than decorations—they were memory, identity, honor. But the thirst gnawed at my throat, and my hands trembled. When I finally extended them, I made sure he saw only the beautiful parts, not the poison I kept hidden in the tips. He discovered it anyway, plucking them from me as though I were a child caught in a trick.

More figures gathered—warriors, slaves, a veiled free woman, others whose shapes blurred from exhaustion. Their eyes pricked against my skin like needles. Some eager. Some afraid. Some curious about the animal in a cage.

I hated them all for watching.

A slave girl brought water and bread—a tiny piece, insulting in its smallness. When she came too close, instinct surged before thought. I lunged, snatching the bread with a growl. My claws scraped her skin by accident, but she screamed as though I’d taken her hand.

The slaver snapped. His temper struck like a lash—commands, reprimands, the sound of his hand slapping another girl who only dared to speak. I flinched despite myself, confused why he struck his own slaves when I was the one who’d taken the bread.

He mixed something into the water next—a green liquid with a sharp, biting smell. I knew what it was. Lice solution. The kind they used on animals.

“The pail is yours,” he said. “Drink it, if you want.”

He set a smaller cup beside it. The water in that one looked clear. Safe. But he had added something there too—I could smell the bitterness. Not poison meant for killing, but for sleep. Heavy sleep.

My gaze drifted to my sister beside me, limp and fevered, her eyes barely fluttering. She hadn’t spoken in hours. Her breathing was thin as a dying ember.

My stomach twisted. My throat burned. My heart thrashed.

The slaver thought he was giving me a choice.

He didn’t understand—there was never a choice.

I took the cup. My hands shook so badly some water spilled down my wrists as I lifted it. The liquid burned my tongue, then spread through my limbs like heat from a fire on a cold night. I drank half, then tipped the rest gently toward my sister, letting it drip against her lips until she swallowed.

The world slowed.

Sounds stretched apart. Light dimmed and softened. The cage floor rose gently to meet my cheek. I felt the weight of my body drift, like I was sinking into the river near my tribe’s camp—cool, quiet, drifting.

I tried to keep my eyes open, but the drug pulled me deeper.

The last thing I saw was the slaver standing over us, calling for brushes and restraints.

The forest felt impossibly far.

And then everything went dark.