by Lin Carter
Raphad’s blade had not been driven into the heart of Garth, as had first been feared. But the wound was very close to that organ, and for a time the life of the mighty Cro-Magnon hung in the balance.
Garth was a huge man, a virile warrior in the full noon of his prime. His strength and vigor, his animal vitality, were as impressive as his recuperative powers soon proved to be.
When it was decided that he could safely be moved, the tribe assembled for the march back across the plains to rejoin the men of Thandar. And the quest for the lost Yualla was given over, for the life of Garth was deemed of greater importance.
The primitive Cro-Magnons, mighty hunters, great warriors, share every breath with a thousand perils. Their life is a continuous struggle for sheer survival against impossible odds, for in the savage wilderness of the Underground World, with its gigantic predators and hostile tribes, life is the cheapest of commodities. Wives, brothers, lovers—not one among their number but has lost those near and dear to him: to the swamps, the jungles, sudden storms, war, raids, or the titanic reptiles that roam and rule the length and breadth of Zanthodon.
Thus the life of one girl, even the daughter of their king, loved and admired by all, seemed comparatively trivial. And the recovery to health of Garth became their preeminent concern.
* * * *
We traversed the great plain at a slow pace, with frequent rest stops. My friend Professor Potter was of the opinion, after a time, that it would be safe to move the Chief; a litter was constructed for that purpose. But to move a man so seriously injured as was Garth was extremely risky, and must be done with great care.
Riskier still would it have been to remain where they were. The flat and treeless expanse of the plains afforded them no form of shelter against wind, rain or storm—no defense against the predators which roamed the grasslands—and their proximity to the Scarlet City was itself ominous. For it would not be long before the legions of this lone surviving colony of ancient Minoan Crete would be upon our track, eager for vengeance against those that had loosed their monstrous god, Zorgazon, and humiliated their divine empress, the Immortal Zarys. Safety for the tribe of Sothar lay only in the security of their alliance with the men of Thandar.
It took us many wakes and sleeps to cross the immensity of the plains, and along the way we had many worries that gnawed upon our hearts. One of Garth’s scouts, a lean and grizzled veteran called Mordan, was the first to articulate at least one of these.
“How can we know, Eric Carstairs, that when we have again reached the place where our paths parted from that of the Thandarians, we shall still find them there? Perchance, by now, they will have wandered leagues away…?”
I shrugged.
“You may be right, Mordan; but there is nothing else to do. At least, when we have reached the shores of the Sogar-Jad once again, there will be trees from which to construct huts and a stout palisade, and caves wherein to take refuge from storm or attack.”
The old scout looked a trifle dubious.
“Perchance. Yet, as I recall, no trees grew along those shores…” he mused.[2]
Later, as we camped amidst the plain, I reiterated Mordan’s query to the band of my warriors. They soberly agreed that Mordan had a good point, but dismissed it as a minor problem.
“After all, my chieftain,” said Varak the Sotharian with a merry grin, “so huge a force of warriors will leave the marks of their passage visible upon the earth.”
“And so shrewd a scout as Mordan should be able to trace the path followed by so many men,” chuckled Thon of Numitor. This last, a cheerful and winning young fellow, was one of the Cro-Magnons from foreign tribes who had fled with us from Zar. He and my giant friend, Gundar the Goradian, had fought beside me in the Great Games of Zar. Both had asked to join my band of warriors, and I was glad to have their comradeship. I guess we veteran gladiators tend to stick together.…
A rousing halloo interrupted our discourse. We turned to see my old friend, Professor Percival P. Potter, Ph.D., come strutting up to us with a brace of zomaks under one scrawny arm. We grinned, and even the somber and stolid Gundar voiced a chuckle, which was understandable.
You have to understand that, even under the best of circumstances, the Professor does not exactly strike one as an impressive figure. With his absurd little spike of white goatee, bony arms and legs mercilessly exposed due to his skimpy costume (a sort of abbreviated apron of fur which covered his lap and not much else), and the indestructible pince-nez perched, generally askew, on the bridge of his nose, he is a comical sight. In this case, however, he had added a new note to his ensemble: he wore a dainty silver coronet wherein flashed a strange, gem-like crystal.
This was worn atop his battered, old-fashioned sun helmet, by the way.
“With the new jewelry, Doc, you look like the Queen of the May,” I quipped. He was too pleased with himself to take umbrage at our mirth.
“Inferior minds will always take refuge in making fun of an advanced intelligence, my boy,” he said jubilantly. Then, brandishing his clutch of feathered reptile-birds, he crowed: “Behold!”
Gundar took them from him and examined the dead zomaks curiously.
“There is no blood upon them, nor any wound that Gundar can see,” observed the blond giant in his deep, slow voice.
“Gundar is right. What did you do, smother them to death?” inquired Varak impishly. The Professor doffed his glittering circlet.
“I summoned them to me with the power of thought alone, and knocked them in the head,” he said mysteriously.
Hurok the mighty Neanderthal, squatting on his heels at my back, grunted dubiously. I shrugged; we all were well aware by now of the strange powers of the circlet, a device of Zarian craftsmanship, which augmented and focused telepathic impulses from the human mind, enabling the wearer to control the lesser intelligence of beasts to an astonishing degree.
It was by means of such devices that the Dragonmen tamed and controlled the huge thodars they used for riding beasts.[3]
Ever since Garth had employed the weird powers of the circlet to turn aside the attack of the thodars, the Professor had been experimenting with the nature of the implement. Now, it would seem, he had learned to use it for hunting purposes.
“Remarkable,” commented Warza, another of my warriors. “No longer need we strive to bring the zomaks down with the bow alone. Now we can lure them into the cookpot with witchery!”
“Yes, and Parthon wonders if the thing also works upon the uld,” joked that worthy. But the Professor, whose sense of humor remains hopelessly rudimentary, and therefore seldom knows when he is being kidded, took the question seriously.
“Actually, friend Parthon I have not yet had the opportunity to test the efficacy of the telepathic crystal upon the indigenous species of eohippus you refer to as uld, but I have no doubt.…”
Then he broke off, looking bewildered. For we were laughing merrily.
“Oh, I see,” he said frostily. “Another jest at my expense. Well, the primitive intellect finds humor in curious situations, I must say! Ker-hrummp!”
Just about then, the word came down to reassemble for another leg of the trek, so we had no further chance to have fun at the elderly scientist’s expense.
And in this way we crossed the plains.
CHAPTER 17
THE MYSTERIOUS CHAMBER
Through the wild wrath that stormed within the heart of Kâiradine Redbeard there burned a scarlet thread of unslaked desire. Filled with fury as he doubtlessly was by the plot of Yussef to dethrone him and by the betrayal of trust on the part of the fickle Ayyub, it was his passion for the slim body of Darya of Thandar which occupied his mind.
What mattered it to the Pirate Prince that he had been hurled from his princedom, and that unknown enemies were even at that moment storming through the c
rooked streets of El-Cazar? Let the faithless brigands snarl and snap like dogs over the kingdom that was falling to ruin about their heads—Kâiradine would possess the body of the blonde cavegirl even if the world crumbled into ruin in the next instant!
As he entered that suite in the harem of his palace in which the Cro-Magnon princess had been installed, it took but moments for the keen eye of the Redbeard to discern the mode and manner of her escape. Lifting out of its place and hurling into a corner the portion of the wooden screen which Darya had cut loose with her knife, Kâiradine peered through the opening into the gardens. He had not realized that the wall which stood between this corner of the palace gardens and the street beyond was quite this conveniently close to Daryas window: the girl was lithe and agile, and for her to climb over the wall would have been but the act of a few moments. Doubtless she had stripped off the finery in which he had commanded that she be draped, donning simpler, more unobtrusive raiment…and, within the next moment, he discovered the heap of jewelry and clothing which the cavegirl had indeed tossed aside.
Beyond, from the streets outside the window, there sounded the roar of battle, the clang of swords, the grunt and scuffle of struggling men, and the deep chanting war cries of the unknown savages. But Kâiradine cared not a whit for this: his mind was fiercely bent upon repossessing the slim girl who had so narrowly escaped the consummation of his lust—and it was bent upon this to the exclusion of all other concerns.
Vaulting over the windowsill, and ignoring the pang that lanced through the but newly knit muscles of his injured shoulder, Kâiradine crossed the gardens and scaled the wall, dropping like a great cat to the cobbled street.
The battle surged some blocks away, where giant blond warriors in fur clouts were assaulting the hasty barricade of broken furniture which the beleaguered corsairs had flung together to block the street against their advance. Darya would not have gone in that direction, surely.…
The black mouth of an alley caught Kâiradine’s eye. Swallowed in that blackness, the girl could easily have eluded detection and pursuit, and could perhaps have hidden until such time as she could join her tribal brethren without risking her life in attempting to slip past the buccaneers’ line.
Kâiradine strode into the black mouth of the alley, boots ringing upon the cobbles, his rapier naked in one brown fist, alert and wary for the slightest sign that his captive had fled in this direction.
But he found nothing until something crunched beneath his heel. Peering down, he saw the glittering blade of a slim poniard. Stooping, he plucked it from the cobbles, turning it over in his fingers and examining it closely. The blade was of excellent steel, the hilt elegantly worked. This was no cheap blade to be carelessly lost in an alley, or tossed aside, but a fine piece of craftsmanship.…
With a blade of this keeness, one could easily cut through a wooden window-screen.…
Kâiradine searched the dark walls of the alley and spied a stout wooden door. There was no telling where it led, and there was no particular reason for Kâiradine to suspect that Darya had been carried through that door by Fumio or any other…but the cavegirl would not voluntarily have dropped her dagger, since it was probably the only means of self-defense she possessed.
Kâiradine Redbeard had the instincts of a hunter, and that keen intuitive sense impelled him to his next act.
He slammed the door with his booted foot, just above the strong lock. Wood splintered; the doorframe shuddered, but the lock held.
Then Redbeard kicked the door a second time and a third. The metal of the lock shattered beneath his vigorous assault, and Kâiradine battered it in until it hung askew on torn hinges.
Stone steps led down into unrelieved darkness, but a wall-bracket held a tar-soaked torch. It was a matter of moments for the pirate prince to strike the torch afire with flint and steel.
Holding his sword at the ready in one hand, lifting with the other the blazing torch so that it illuminated the steps, Kâiradine Redbeard descended the stair. The torchlight glittered crimsonly on the naked steel of his polished blade.
At the bottom of the stair—which was well below the level of the streets—the pirate prince found a narrow and winding subterranean passage, into which he flung himself with reckless speed, scenting the joy of the hunt.
While lust dominated the heart of the Barbary Pirate, it did not dim the cunning of his intelligence. Mentally orienting himself, he soon realized that the secret passage extended in the direction of the mansion of his arch-rival, Yussef ben Ali, which stood near to his own palace. And the vengeful Redbeard swore bitterly to himself, for he detected the fine hand of Yussef in the apparent abduction of the woman he desired.
“I should have throttled the dog when we fought,” he snarled to himself. “But that pleasure I shall reserve for another time!”
His cloak swinging from broad shoulders, the Barbary Pirate explored the secret passage to its end.…
* * * *
He found at length the concealed entrance through which Fumio and Zoraida had conducted Darya. If his estimate of the distance was at all accurate, he reasoned to himself, the passageway led directly beneath the basements of the house of Yussef ben Ali—proof that the rival captain was deeply implicated in the stealing away of Kâiradine’s prize captive.
This door was locked, too, but repeated blows of the pirate’s booted feet shattered it until the lock burst asunder. Kâiradine snatched the wall-hanging aside and strode recklessly into the gloomy, vaultlike chamber.
Walls of naked rock sweated with an oily moisture. A wooden stair in one corner led to a trap in the roof, whereby entrance could be gained into the cellars of the house of Yussef ben Ali.
Rapidly, the gaze of Kâiradine Redbeard explored the hidden room, noting the long table, the empty wine goblets and the three chairs. By the light of his flickering torch, he explored the dark room—and discovered a mystery!
Sprawled in a sodden heap in one corner of the room lay the body of a dead man.
Prodding the corpse with the toe of his boot, Kâiradine turned it over on its back so as to be able to discern its features by the light of his torch.
It was Fumio.…
With narrowed eyes, Kâiradine Redbeard studied the face of the dead slave, his mind churning furiously. He recognized the face of the blond Cro-Magnon from its flattened nose, recalling that the savage had been captured by Achmed and his seamen in the company of Darya of Thandar.
Later, this same savage had been sold at public slave auction, Kâiradine vaguely recollected. He knew this because at the time of their capture it had seemed likely to the Redbeard that the savage was a friend, brother or, perchance, a suitor of the jungle girl.
Fumio, then, had assisted Darya in hiding, if not actually in her escape? Kâiradine mused: on the surface of things, it was a logical assumption…but the pieces of the puzzle did not fit together.
If Darya had an accomplice in making her escape, why did she throw aside the dagger which he had found in the alley?
And who had murdered Fumio?
Not Darya, obviously, for the caveman was dead from a sword thrust, and the cavegirl could have hardly have escaped from the palace armed with a sword and a dagger.…
And—where was Darya?
He glanced over at the wooden stair. As secure as was this secret chamber, why should the girl have climbed it, ascending into the very house of one of the Captains of the Brotherhood?
Spitting a curse, Kâiradine prowled restlessly about, seeking another clue to this mystery, and giving no further thought to the murdered man.
So perished Fumio, once a chieftain of Thandar high in the esteem of his peers, cut down to die like a dog in this stark and miserable underground chamber…
* * * *
Suddenly, Kâiradine stiffened. A low, sobbing groan reached him. It seemed
to have come from the far corner of the stone-walled chamber, where the shadows lay thick as dust.
He strode fearlessly across the room, to discover yet a second body, lying in a spreading pool of gore.
And his heart froze within him as he saw it was the body of a woman—
CHAPTER 18
JAIRA’S FLIGHT
Jaira of Gorthak had not been this frightened since the day, not very long ago, when a host of howling Barbary Pirates had swept down upon the little village of her people, slaughtering many and enslaving, among others, her sweetheart Grond and herself. When she had entered into a life of captivity in the island fortress of El-Cazar, the beautiful cavegirl had wondered if ever she would see her native village of Gorthak again…and now, as she fled through the streets of El-Cazar, she wondered if ever she would see her beloved Grond once more.
When the people of El-Cazar awoke to find their seemingly impregnable fortress city invaded by a horde of stalwart blond savages, it had quickly dawned upon the slaves in the house of Yussef ben Ali that the moment of their deliverance was at hand. Their master, the great captain, was absent from his mansion; gone, too, was his retinue of guardsmen. Only ’Dullah the majordomo stood between them and the freedom for which they had so long hungered.
One man cannot adequately guard a house with as many doors as had the house of Yussef ben Ali. Thus the slaves found it easy to slip forth from this portal or that, seeking to join with the unknown force of Cro-Magnons storming the streets of the city.
This Jaira of Gorthak was very young, very beautiful, slim as a willow and with a dancer’s grace in her long, slender legs. Her hair was a thick, heavy mass of raw gold, seemingly too heavy to be supported comfortably by her slim neck and fragile shoulders. She had small, pointed, immature breasts and shy, fawnlike eyes. She was timid, was Jaira the Gorthakian, and far less bold and daring than are many of the women of the Cro-Magnon nations I have come to know. When she furtively stole forth into the streets by a little-used side door, she sought to find her lover, Grond, rather than to join in the fighting.
