Free Women & Veils

While it is not always "required" that a Free Woman wear veils. It seems to be more of a tradition. See the quote below and interpret for yourself. Free Women were given a LOT of leeway, from this passage's read.

"I remember the days in Ko-ro-ba fondly, though there were certain problems.
Or perhaps one should say, simply, there was Elizabeth. Elizabeth, besides speaking boldly out on a large number of delicate civic, social and political issues, usually not regarded as the Province of the fairer sex, categorically refused to wear the cumbersome Robes of Concealment traditionally expected of the free woman. She still wore the brief, exciting leather of a Tuchuk wagon girl and, when striding the high bridges, her hair in the wind, she attracted much attention, not only, obviously, from the men, but from women, both slave and free.

Once a slave girl bumped into her on one of the bridges and struck at her, thinking she was only slave, but Elizabeth,

with a swift blow of her small fist, downed the girl, and managed to seize one ankle and prevent her from tumbling from the bridge. “Slave!” cried the girl. At this point Elizabeth hit her again, almost knocking her once more from the bridge. Then, when they had their hands in one another’s hair, kicking, the slave girl suddenly stopped, terrified, not seeing the gleaming, narrow band of steel locked on Elizabeth’s throat. “Where is your collar?” she stammered.
“What collar?” asked Elizabeth, her fists clenched in the girl’s hair.
“The collar,” repeated the girl numbly.
“I’m free,” said Elizabeth.
Suddenly the girl howled and fell to her knees before Elizabeth, kneeling trembling to the whip. “Forgive me, Mistress,” she cried. “Forgive me!”
When one who is slave strikes a free person the penalty is not infrequently death by impalement, preceded by lengthy torture.
“Oh, get up!” said Elizabeth irritably, jerking the poor girl to her feet.

They stood there looking at one another.
“After all,” said Elizabeth, “why should it be only slave girls who are comfortable and can move freely?”
“Aren’t you slave?” asked one of the men nearby, a Warrior, looking closely.
Elizabeth slapped him rather hard and he staggered back, “No, I am not,” she informed him.
He stood there rubbing his face, puzzled. A number of people had gathered about, among them several free women.
“If you are free,” said one of them, “you should be ashamed of yourself, being seen on the bridges so clad.”
“Well,” said Elizabeth, “if you like walking around wrapped up in blankets, you are free to do so.”
“Shameless!” cried the free girl.
“You probably have ugly legs,” said Elizabeth.
“I do not!” retorted the girl.
“Don’t choke on your veil,” advised Elizabeth.
“I am really beautiful!” cried the free girl.
“I doubt it,” said Elizabeth.
“I am!” she cried.

“Well then,” said Elizabeth, “what are you ashamed of?” Then Elizabeth strode to her and, to the girl’s horror, on one of the public high bridges, face-stripped her. The girl screamed but no one came to her aid, and Elizabeth spun her about, peeling off layers of Robes of Concealment until, in a heavy pile of silk, brocade, satin and starched muslin the girl stood in a sleeveless, rather brief orange tunic, attractive, of a sort sometimes worn by free women in the privacy of their own quarters.
The girl stood there, wringing her hands and wailing. The slave girl had backed off, looking as though she might topple off the bridge in sheer terror.
Elizabeth regarded the free woman. “Well,” she said, “you are rather beautiful, aren’t you?”
The free woman stopped wailing. “Do you think so?” she asked.
“Twenty gold pieces, I’d say,” appraised Elizabeth.
“I’d give twenty-three,” said one of the men watching, the same fellow whom Elizabeth had slapped.

In fury the free woman turned about and slapped him again, it not being his day in Ko-ro-ba.
“What do you think?” asked Elizabeth of the cringing slave girl.
“Oh, I would not know,” she said, “I am only a poor girl of Tyros.”
“That is your misfortune,” said Elizabeth. “What is your name?”
“Rena,” said she, “if it pleases Mistress.”
“It will do,” said Elizabeth. “Now what do you think?”
“Rena?” asked the girl.
“Yes,” snapped Elizabeth. “Perhaps you are a dull-witted slave?”
The girl smiled. “I would say twenty-five gold pieces,” she said.
Elizabeth, with the others, inspected the free girl. “Yes,” said Elizabeth, “Rena, I think you’re right.” Then she looked at the free girl. “What is your name, Wench?” she demanded.
The girl blushed. “Relia,” she said. Then she looked at the slave girl. “Do you really think I would bring so high a price Rena?”
“Yes, Mistress,” said the girl.

“Yes, Relia,” corrected Elizabeth.
The girl looked frightened for a moment. “Yes Relia,” she said.
Relia laughed with pleasure.
“I don’t suppose an exalted free woman like yourself,” said Elizabeth, “drinks Ka-la-na?”
“Of course I do,” said Relia.
“Well,” said Elizabeth, turning to me, who had been standing there, as flabbergasted as any on the bridge, “we shall have some.” She looked at me. “You there,” she said, “a coin for Ka-la-na.”
Dumbfounded I reached in my pouch and handed her a coin, a silver Tarsk.
Elizabeth then took Relia by one arm and Rena by the other. “We are off,” she announced, “to buy a bottle of wine.”
“Wait,” I said, “I’ll come along.”
“No, you will not,” she said, with one foot kicking Relia’s discarded Robes of Concealment from the bridge. “You,” she announced, “are not welcome.”
Then, arm in arm, the three girls started off down the bridge.
“What are you going to talk about?” I asked, plaintively.

In my opinion, being veiless alone doesn't constitute grounds for being considered a natural slave..what would in my opinion, would be the womans actions and tone and words chosen in a conversation. For example, if Lady Delilah were to approach me without a veil, swinging her hips, in a form fitting or barely there robes singing a variation of a barbarian tune "I was the lady from France and rode the train with no pants" well then it would be my duty to wrap that neck in steel...

“Men,” said Elizabeth, and went her way, the two girls, much pleased, laughing beside her.
I do not know whether or not Elizabeth’s continued presence in Ko-ro-ba would have initiated a revolution among the city’s free women or not. Surely there had been scandalized mention of her in circles even as august as that of the High Council of the City. My own father, Administrator of the City, seemed unnerved by her." - Assassin of Gor Book 5 Page 73 – 76