John Norman - Counter Earth03 - Priest - Kings Of Gor

by Kings Of Gor(Lit)

  My head was spinning.

  'But I was not even born then!' I exclaimed.

  'Your father was instructed to call you Tarl, and lest he might speak to you of the Counter-Earth or attempt to dissuade you from our purpose, he was returned to Gor before you were of an age to understand.'

  'I thought he deserted my mother,' I said.

  'She knew,' said Misk, 'for though she was a woman of Earth she had been to Gor.'

  'Never did she speak to me of these things,' I said.

  'Matthew Cabot on Gor,' said Misk, 'was a hostage for her silence.'

  'My mother,' I said, 'died when I was very young...'

  'Yes,' said Misk, 'because of a petty bacillus in your contaminated atmosphere, a victim to the inadequacies of your infantile bacteriology.'

  I was silent. My eyes smarted, I suppose, from some heat or fume of the Mul-Torch.

  'It was difficult to foresee,' said Misk. 'I am truly sorry.'

  'Yes,' I said. I shook my head and wiped my eyes. I still held the memory of the lonely, beautiful woman whom I had known so briefly in my childhood, who in those short years had so loved me. Inwardly I cursed the Mul-Torch that had brought tears to the eyes of a Warrior of Ko-ro-ba.

  'Why did she not remain on Gor?' I asked.

  'It frightened her,' said Misk, 'and your father asked that she be allowed to return to Earth, for loving her he wished her to be happy and also perhaps he wanted you to know something of his old world.'

  'But I found the letter in the mountains, where I had made camp by accident,' I said.

  'When it was clear where you would camp the letter was placed there,' said Misk.

  'Then it did not lie there for more than three hundred years?'

  'Of course not,' said Misk, 'the risk of discovery would have been too great.'

  'The letter itself was destroyed, and nearly took me with it,' I said.

  'You were warned to discard the letter,' said Misk. 'It was saturated with Flame Lock, and its combustion index was set for twenty Ehn following opening.'

  'When I opened the letter it was like switching on a bomb,' I said.

  'You were warned to discard the letter,' said Misk.

  'And the compass needle?' I asked, remembering its erratic behavious which had so unnerved me.

  'It is a simple matter,' said Misk, 'to disrupt a magnetic field.'

  'But I returned to the same place I had fled from,' I said.

  'The frightened human, when fleeing and disoriented, tends to circle,' said Misk. 'But it would not have mattere, I could have picked you up had you not returned. I think that you may have sensed there was no escape and thus, perhaps as an act of pride, returned to the scene of the letter.'

  'I was simply frightened,' I said.

  'No one is ever simply frightened,' said Misk.

  'When I entered the ship I fell unconscious,' I said.

  'You were anaesthetised,' said Misk.

  'Was the ship operated from the Sardar?' I asked.

  'It could have been,' said Misk, 'but I could not risk that.'

  'Then it was manned,' I said.

  'Yes,' said Misk.

  I looked at him.

  'Yes,' said Misk. 'It was I who manned it.' He looked down at me. 'Now it is late, past the sleeping time. You are tired.'

  I shook my head. 'There is little,' I said, 'which was left to chance.'

  'Chance does nbot exist,' said Misk, 'ignorance exists.'

  'You cannot know that,' I said.

  'No,' said Misk, 'I cannot know it.' The tips of Misk's antennae gently dipped towards me. 'You must rest now,' he said.

  'No,' I said. 'Was the fact that I was placed in the chamber of the girl Vika of Treve considered?'

  'Sarm suspects,' said Misk, 'and it was he who arranged your quarters, in order that you might succumb to her charms, that she might enthrall you, that she might bend you helplessly, pliantly to her will and whim as she had a hundred men before you, turning them - brave, proud warriors all - into the slaves of a slave, into the slaves of a mere girl, herself only a slave.'

  'Can this be true?' I asked.

  'A hundred men,' said Misk, 'allowed themselves to be chained to the foot of her couch where she would upon occasion, that they might not die, cast them scraps of food as though they might have been pet sleen.'

  My old hatred of Vika now began once again to enfuse my blood, and my hands ached to grip her and shake her until her bones might break and then throw her to my feet.

  'What became of them?' I asked.

  'They were used as Muls,' said Misk.

  My fists clenched.

  'I am glad that such a creature,' said Misk, 'is not of my species.'

  'I am sorry,' I said, 'that she is of mine.'

  'When you broke the surveillance device in the chamber,' said

  Misk, 'I felt I had to act quickly.'

  I laughed. 'Then,' I said, 'you actually thought you were saving me?'

  'I did,' said Misk.

  'I wonder,' I said.

  'At any rate,' said Misk, 'it was not a risk we cared to take.'

  'You speak of 'we'?'

  'Yes,' said Misk.

  'And who is the other?' I asked.

  'The greatest in the Nest,' said Misk.

  'The Mother?'

  'Of course.'

  Misk touched me lightly on the shoulder with his antennae.

  'Come now,' he said. 'Let us return to the chamber above.'

  'Why,' I asked, 'was I returned to Earth after the siege of

  Ar?'

  'To fill you with hatred for Priest-Kings,' said Misk. 'Thus you would be more willing to come to the Sardar to find us.'

  'But why seven years?' I asked. They had been long, cruel, lonely years.

  'We were waiting,' said Misk.

  'But for what?' I demanded.

  'For there to be a female egg,' said Misk.

  'Is there now such an egg?'

  'Yes,' said Misk, 'but I do not know where it is.'

  'Then who knows?' I asked.

  'The Mother,' said Misk.

  'But what have I to do with all this?' I demanded.

  'You are not of the Nest,' said Misk, 'and thus you can do what is necessary.'

  'What is necessary?' I asked.

  'Sarm must die,' said Misk.

  'I have no wish to kill Sarm,' I said.

  'Very well,' said Misk.

  I puzzled on the many things which Misk had told me, and then

  I looked up at him, lifting my torch that I might better see that great head with its rich, disklike, luminous eyes.

  'Why is this one egg so important?' I asked. 'You have the stabilisation serums. Surely there will be many eggs, and others will be female.'

  'It is the last egg,' said Misk.

  'Why is that?' I demanded.

  'The Mother was hatched and flew her Nuptial Flight long before the discovery of the stabilisation serums,' said Misk.

  'We have managed to retard her aging considerably but eon by eon it has been apparent that our efforts have been less and less successful, and now there are no more eggs.'

  'I don't understand,' I said.

  'The Mother is dying,' said Misk.

  I was silent and Misk did not speak and the only noise in that paneled metallic laboratory that was the cradle of a

  Priest-King was the soft crackle of the blue torch I held.

  'Yes,' said Misk, 'it is the end of the Nest.'

  I shook my head. 'This is no business of mine,' I said.

  'That is true,' said Misk.

  We faced one another. 'Well,' I said, 'are you not going to threaten me?'

  'No,' said Misk.

  'Are you not going to hunt down my father or my Free

  Companion and kill them if I do not serve you?'

  'No,' said Misk. 'No.'

  'Why not?' I demanded. 'Are you not a Priest-King?'

  'Because I am a Priest-King,' said Misk.

  I was thunderstruck.<
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  'All Priest-Kings are not as Sarm,' said Misk. He looked down at me. 'Come,' he said, 'it is late and you will be tired. Let us retire to the chamber above.'

  Misk left the room and I, bearing the torch, followed him.

  To be continued.....

  The End