What fantasy story/author was this?

Cafe Society
1

Something jogged my memory this morning about a fantasy story I listened to on book-tape many years ago. It may have been part of a larger compilation of short stories. Googling has turned up nothing for me so far.

My memory is pretty rusty on it and I may have some of the details wrong. I seem to remember that it was slightly feminist in tone. The protagonist was a female magician. I seem to remember that she was captured and held prisoner on a ship where she was sexually abused by the captain. She later escaped and got her revenge by turning the captain into a woman while he slept. The implication was that the crew would then do to him what he’d done to the protagonist. It was very strange.

Does anyone know what this story might be?

2

Are you sure it wasn’t a porno story from somewhere like ASSTR? That plot sounds rather typical of internet porn.

3

It’s possible that it was porn but I don’t remember it being explicit at all.

What’s ASSTR?

4

Sounds like one of Mercedes Lackey’s stories about Tarma & Kethry. I seem to remember that the “punishment” backfired later on in the story. Nearest info I can find is it’s chapter 8 of Oathbound.

5

That was my first thought, too, BanjoPup. There are substantial points of divergence, however:

  1. Kethry inflicted the punishment on a bandit leader, not a pirate.
  2. Kethry was not held prisoner by the bandits (although this could be the result of conflating the incident with her encounter with her “husband”).
  3. The bandit was not physically changed into a woman by the spell. It was a thorough illusion tied to his own psychic abilities to make it permanent.
6

“Alt.Sex.Stories Text Repository”

7

IIRC a demon made the change real.

8

Thanks for the suggestion BanjoPup. I’ve been looking for a synopsis of the story to see if it matches what I remember. I’ve only been able to find one sentence descriptions so I’ve come up a little short.

The points that Balance makes are are extremely helpful. I could be misremembering points 1 and 2. I’m fairly certain it was on a boat though. On point 3 however, I’m pretty sure that the spell was not just an illusion. There was a description of the protagonist massaging the Adam’s apple away with her hands while the man slept.

My friend finished a book this weekend with a section on gender themes in science fiction and fantasy stories. We were discussing it and it tripped my memory on this story. It’s going to bug me until I figure out what it was.

9

Ah, good old usenet. Thanks Der Trihs.

10

Yes; as part of the demon’s plan to go after Tarma and Kethry. Among other things, it rendered their sword Need worse than useless.

Now that sounds familiar. I still can’t recall where I read it.

Could it have been a short from one of Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Sword & Sorceress anthologies ?

11

That definitively eliminates Tarma and Kethry, then. There was no detailed description of her casting the spell.

Something from one of the Sword & Sorceress anthologies is a possibility, but as I recall, MZB didn’t like including stories she classed as “rape and revenge” tales in them. She made an exception for Lackey’s T&K origin story, but not any others that I remember offhand.

12

The more I think about, the more I’m remembering. It does seem to have been a short story in a compilation now that you mention it. I’m going to look up those books and see what I can find.

Edit: I’m pretty sure I listened to the book-tape some time in the mid 90s if that helps at all.

13

Even if I don’t figure out the story that I’m half remembering, I’m seriously considering checking out this T&K series. It sounds very interesting.

14

Pithy Moniker 's description reminded me of Andre Norton’s character “the magician Lythande”. Lythande was a female magician who masqueraded as a male, and the stories often had gender-politics themes. Did the magician have a blue star tattooed on her forehead?

Norton created the character for the Thieves’ World anthology series. She later withdrew from that series, and published a collection of stories about Lythande(which I cannot find, either on Amazon or Barnes&Noble).

15

You might have had better luck if you had looked under the correct author, mbh. Lythande was written by Marion Zimmer Bradley.

16

Given the characteristics of Lythande’s magic, I wouldn’t think she could have afforded to leave the man alive, enchanted or not, under such circumstances. I’m not saying it’s impossible–I didn’t follow the stories post-Thieves’ World–but it seems like a poor fit.

17

From what I can remember of the Lythande stories, I don’t think any of them fit the OP’s description. Off the top of my head, I can’t think of any story I ever read that does.

18

Once a man discovered that she was female and spoke the truth, her Adept powers would be ended, right? It can’t have been Lythande. The keeping of the Secrets (each one different per Adept) are what allows them to keep their power. If the secret is ever let out, they lose their power, and any other Adept (and Lythande has rivals who hate “him”.) can easily kill “him” and will.

19

Yeah, it’s closer to what I was originally thinking, but hedged on. If Lythande is proclaimed a woman in the hearing of any man, she loses her Blue Adept powers.

Here is a quote from the fifth entry from the top at this page: (Er, and I don’t know about the credibility of the page otherwise, but the quote is what I remember, it’s from The Gratitude of Kings, a good book.)

20

I don’t remember a tattoo. I’m positively sure that she wasn’t disguised as a man though.

I did some more research last night and still haven’t found anything that looks like it. I called my brother who used to listen to book tapes with me on occasion. He didn’t remember the story at all.

Edit: Meant to add that I really appreciate everyone’s input. I’m likely to come away from this topic with a few new series to read. :smiley: