by Lin Carter
Aye, it was a night of a thousand nights! For half the corsairs of the southern seas were in port, the ships were in and bobbing at the quays, their holds gorged with bright barbaric treasure looted from a hundred merchant ships—and the city was one brawling, lawless riot under the leering moon.
As Barim Redbeard led the way, buffeting drunken corsairs from his path, pausing to plant a smacking kiss on the crimson lips of a tavern wench, hailing and being hailed by old friends and foes, stopping to down a proffered tankard of sour ale, the party from the Scimitar made their slow way up the steep stairs that connected one climbing level of the city to the next. Charn Thovis was bewildered, dazed by the noise, the chaos of mirth and riot and song, the blazing light and gusty winds that screamed through the narrow, crowded ways. Young Thar clung to his side, eagerly drinking in the fantastic spectacle—the filthy, rough-bearded corsairs hung with incredible wealth of glittering jewels and precious metals, their bedraggled women, gowned and jeweled like savage queens, the shouts and foul curses, rude oaths and obscene ballads that filled the stormy air with noise.
Over all the thronged and crowded streets with their jostling, drunken, quarrelsome horde, over all the smoky inns and ale houses, above the narrow roofs and peaked gables, brooded the dark citadel that crowned the crest of the cliffs and thrust squat towers against the storm-dark skies where few stars flashed.
This, old Durgan told the boy and his companion, was the keep of Kashtar—cruel, sardonic, cunning Kashtar, the Red Wolf of the Sea Rovers—Kashtar the Pirate King. Of his nation and origin, there were a thousand whispered legends—but no man knew the truth thereof. He had gained power over the captains of the Brotherhood through his utter fearlessness and fighting courage, his superior command of seamanship and war tactics, his cold-blooded cruelty and sly, savage cunning. Here in Tarakus, Kashtar ruled with an iron hand, and even the wild corsairs dreaded his silken voice and subtle tongue.
Barim halted at last before a great inn whose creaking wooden sign bore the emblem of a galleon of flames. Within, a great fire roared on the grate and a bullock sizzled on the spit above a bed of glowing coals. Seamen from many cities sprawled on long low benches before grease-stained tables covered with a clutter of bottles. They roared a bawdy welcome to the mighty Redbeard, who grinned hugely and answered them in kind.
The eager crewmen of the Scimitar entered the inn, greeting old comrades and finding places for themselves before the blazing fire, calling for wine and roast meat and loaves of black bread. Barim cleared a place at the table for Charn Thovis and young Thar by booting four drunken sailors onto the filthy stone floor, and brushing a dozen empty bottles aside with a sweep of his brawny arm.
“Come, lads! Seat yourself—soak up some of that fire and get the chill out of your bones—eat, drink, enjoy yourselves—Barim Redbeard pays the toll, so fill your bellies!” he roared lustily. Then, reading the grim expression on Charn Thovis’ face, he chuckled. “Aye, I know what chews at your guts, lad—put the slave block out of mind! That be a worry for tomorrow—tonight, well, we’ll have warmth and jollity and song, a full belly and a tankard of ale and a long sleep—and dawn be hours and hours away!”
Morning came at last. Dawn filled the crooked narrow streets with thick white mist and the sky yearned blue and infinite and tender above the beetling cliffs and the brooding stone castle that clung to the rocky crest. White gulls rode the morning breeze on outstretched pinions and bright banners fluttered gaily from masthead and tower-top and wall.
With the other captives taken by the pirate fleet, Thar and Charn Thovis were stripped to their loin-cloths and led to the bazaar of slaves. They stood in the bright, baking sun, awaiting their turn on the block where a fat, black-bearded auctioneer paraded each captive in turn, loudly calling the attention of his audience, who lounged on silken cushions in the shade of orange and green awnings, to this or that good point of each slave.
Lean, one-eyed Durgan and fat, wheezing Blay and the grinning blond giant, Thangmar, came to visit and to console them as they stood in line for the slave block.
Thar, not fully understanding what was going on—slavery was unknown in Patanga, for Thongor had sweated under the overseer’s lash in his time, and detested the loathsome traffic in human cattle and had forbidden it by law—peered around with keen interest at the lordly captains of the Brotherhood as they lounged in the shade.
One bower was more luxurious than the rest. In it, under hangings of imperial purple, sat a slim, foppish man with a great ruby like a hot coal smoldering in one earlobe. He was clothed in scarlet satin like a glove and his sallow smooth skin was glossy as old parchment. His face, sardonic and cold and sly, with slitted eyes of black fire, observed all and missed nothing. By his side stood a tall figure robed in neutral gray, bearing a staff of black wood carven with weird symbols, his skull-like head shaven and his face coldly impassive. His eyes, dark and keen, searched through the throng and Thar noticed how men avoided those eyes.
Blay and Durgan followed Thar’s interested gaze.
“Who are those two men?” Charn Thovis asked.
“Why, the one in the red satin be our chieftain, Kashtar the Red Wolf,” Blay puffed. “The bald one beside him, all in gray, be his pet wizard, Belshathla.”
“Belshathla? A curious name. I cannot guess his nation,” Charn Thovis mused. Fat Blay shook his head, ear-hoops hobbling in bright sun.
“He be from one of those Eastern countries, round abouts Darundabar or Dalakh. Nianga, now that I think on it. Beware of that one, lad! He be as cold and treacherous as a snake.”
Almost as if some inner sense alerted him to the fact that he was the topic of their converse, the dark keen eyes of the gray wizard, Belshathla, turned upon them. The wizard’s gaze passed over the three corsairs without interest, lingered a moment on the tall strong figure of Charn Thovis—then swooped down and fastened upon the boy, Thar.
They brightened with intent curiosity—and Thar cried out, and lifted his hands to his forehead as if in pain.
“What is it?” Charn Thovis asked. The boy shook his head in bewilderment.
“It’s nothing—it’s gone now, but for a moment I felt as if someone were digging into my brain and hunting through my thoughts!” the boy said dizzily.
Charn Thovis looked back to the gray wizard and saw that now he was bending near the scarlet-clad pirate king and whispering vehemently in his ear. The cool, appraising, thoughtful eyes of Kashtar looked over to where they stood. He asked something of Belshathla, listened closely to the reply, then brushed the gaunt enchanter aside and stood up into the full glare of the morning sun, lifting his baton for attention. Voices died. Stillness came down across the crowded bazaar. Now the baton was pointed directly at Prince Thar.
“That boy,” Kashtar said in a clear cold voice. “I buy him for a dozen pieces of gold.”
Guards detached themselves from beside Kashtar’s bower and came purposefully towards the bewildered Thar.
Charn Thovis felt himself going cold all over. Desperately, his eyes searched the throng and found Barim Redbeard. The burly Redbeard was flushed and angry. He chewed on the ends of his fiery mustachios, but refused to meet the challenging gaze of Charn Thovis.
By his side, Durgan hissed into his ear.
“The cap’n can’t do nothing, lad! When the Red Wolf bids for a slave, nobody can oppose him, or they’d end up staked in the sea caves, waiting to drown at high tide, or get eaten alive by the crabs. It’s the Law!”
An agony of indecision lanced through Charn Thovis. He could not just stand helplessly and watch the bewildered Thar led away into the slavery of Kashtar. Somehow, the gray wizard must have guessed the truth! Perhaps he had read the boy’s mind! But what could he do?
Charn Thovis exploded into action. One hand flashed to fat Blay’s sash and tore a broad-bladed cutlass from its baldric. He sprang in front of Thar and lifted the sword. Surprised, the pirate guard hesitated for a moment. That moment’s pause was his u
ndoing. A backhanded slash with the glittering cutlass sent him reeling back into the path of his fellows in a welter of streaming crimson.
The silence of the bazaar exploded into shouting clamor. Men yelled, cursed, fled from the flashing steel Charn Thovis bore. Another guard sprang before him, raising his blade. The cutlass blocked it in a rasp of steel against steel. Blue sparks hissed as razored edges grated—slid—then Charn Thovis was through his foreman’s guard and bright steel quenched its glitter in scarlet gore.
The harsh voice of Kashtar lifted above the uproar.
“Seize the boy! He is the son of Thongor, the prince of Patanga, and worth the ransom of an emperor! Ho—guards! Seize the boy, I say!”
Pikes lifted high, a score of guards came ploughing a path through the throng. Charn Thovis downed another pirate and turned just in time to catch and parry a rapier that darted for his naked back. He beat the rapier away. Cutlasses were not designed for fencing, and his strong wrists ached with weariness. He saw gray-robed Belshathla swoop down upon the boy and snatch him from the slave block in a swirl of neutral-colored robes. Beyond, he saw the line of guards crashing towards him.
Sweat stung his eyes. His breast heaved with every panting breath. It was no use—there were too many of them—and Thar was taken—
He turned, gripped the dripping cutlass in his teeth, and sprang lithely into the air. One hand caught the cross-pole of an awning that stretched over the slave-pens. The other came up beside it. He swung himself up and over it, up the awning to a cornice and then to the rooftop above. Shouts rang out behind him as he raced across the roof, sun-baked stone searing the bare soles of his feet. He came to the edge, peered down for a moment at a narrow alley, then launched himself across the gap to the adjoining rooftop. He just made it, with inches to spare. In moments he was away across the roofs and had lost his pursuers . . . but only for the moment. Soon they would be baying at his heels like a pack of hounds, yelling for his blood.
He was alone in a city filled with outlaws, where the hand of every man was lifted against him.
And the son of Thongor was taken!
Huddled in the shadow of a dome, weary lungs sucking in air, he strove to think of a way out of the terrible predicament he was in.
Chapter 18: BLACK CATACOMBS
Where perils lurk to every side,
Choose the shortest way.
—The Scarlet Edda
All day Charn Thovis hid from pursuit. Abandoning the roofs, he came down in an empty street, pried open a culvert and found welcome, if noisome, refuge in the sewers of Tarakus. As he slunk through the black passages, wading through the slimy murk of foul waters, he blessed the fact that Tarakus’ proximity to the sea made a system of underground drainage tunnels feasible. Otherwise, he would perhaps have been hounded down and taken ere now.
Toward afternoon the unbearable stench of the catacombs drove him to the street-level again. The luck of the gods was with him, for he came upon a drunken reveller in an alleyway and soon divested the wine-sodden corsair of his garments, which he donned hastily, having scrubbed away most of the filth from his body. Winding a crimson kerchief about his brows, sliding into the green silk blouse and tight breeches with calf-high boots and crimson sash, he strode boldly forth into the streets. Hurrying mobs of howling pirates swept past him as he traversed the climbing ways of Tarakus. They paid him not the slightest attention. They were scouring the city for a naked, fleeing Turanian slave garbed only in a ragged clout—not for a drunken, swaggering pirate in scarlet and green finery with a dirty face, who roared curses after them as they shoved him aside in the fury of the hunt.
Without being accosted, Charn Thovis in his new guise crossed the city and came to the capacious inn where he and Prince Thar had dined the evening before—the inn where Barim Redbeard and the crew of the Scimitar were housed when in port. In all this city of crime he could think of no friends save for them—and he threw himself on their mercy.
They were bewildered and astonished to see the fugitive whom half the city hunted howling through the streets, boldly walk in the front door and hail them by name.
They were even more astonished when Charn Thovis begged Barim Redbeard for aid. He reminded the pirate captain that the debt of blood between them still stood unabsolved. And he acknowledged that the laughing young lad who had won their affection was none other than Prince Thar of Patanga. He called upon Barim Redbeard to remember his native honor . . . for, as Charn Thovis knew, the Redbeard was a son of the bleak Northland steppes from whence Thongor the Mighty had come. Thongor’s home was Valkarth to the north of Eobar; Barim Redbeard had come hither many years ago from Belnarth on the shores of Zharanga Tethrabaal the Great North Ocean, an exile fleeing from vengeance, having slain a fellow warrior of his clan in a fit of jealous rage.
“Will not you, a Northlander, stand by the helpless son of your countryman in his great peril?” Charn Thovis demanded, summing up his arguments.
The Redbeard tugged at his fiery mustachios, steel-gray eyes brooding and thoughtful.
“Fry my guts, Charn, I know not what to say,” he rumbled. “A Northlander is not withouten honor, even though he be taken to the trade of piracy. And I like the little lad well—I should have guessed there be good Valkarthan blood in him. But I be only the captain here; I cannot speak for all the crew in this . . .”
Fat Blay and lean, one-eyed old Durgan chorused their approval of Charn’s plan. The blond giant, Thangmar, for once too serious to grin, raised his great sword solemnly, vowing to help. His mighty comrade, Roegir, the Blue Nomad, uttered a guttural word of agreement, and all the other men chimed in as well, for the stalwart young warrior and the boy prince had won the friendship of the Scimitar’s crew during the voyage down the gulf to the pirate port.
“Then we’re with you, by Shastadion’s Green Beard,” Barim growled. “But what’s to do, lad? We be thirty good men, aye, and well armed to boot, but Tharn—or Thar, as I must call the boy now—be held in Kashtar’s fortress on the crest of the cliffs. Thirty men, even be they the crew of the Scimitar, have little hope of cutting a red way through all the guards Kashtar will have ringed about his citadel. And the walls be strong and thick, and the gates triply barred with solid iron. If you’ve a plan in mind, well, speak up, lad—we’re with you!”
In swift words, Charn Thovis outlined the scheme that had come to him during the long hours he had cowered in the slime and fetor of the sewers.
It was simplicity itself. Dangerous, yes, to the point of foolhardiness, but still the simplest and most direct method Charn Thovis could think of, to find and free the captive Prince of Patanga.
“The system of sewers that lies beneath your city, emptying into the sea caves,” he said tersely. “I presume it lies beneath the citadel of Kashtar as well as the rest of the city?”
“Why, yes.” Barim Redbeard looked surprised; then thoughtful. His steel-gray eyes widened. “Do you mean to—?”
Charn Thovis nodded grimly. “I can see no other way to get into the citadel,” he said. “We cannot get in the gates—too heavily guarded. Nor over the walls. Hence, we must try the only other route there is—by means of the sewer tunnels.”
“But how can we know we are going right, once down in those stinking catacombs?” the Redbeard rumbled inquiringly. “There are no maps, no directional signs. At least, I’ve never heard of any—nor can I think why there should be. It would be very easy to mistake our way, to become lost, to wander. . . .”
“We must chance that,” Charn Thovis said quietly.
Barim Redbeard nodded slowly. “So. Then we had best be about it.”
Beneath the pirate city a vast network of black, echoing catacombs stretched in every direction. Foul, oily water gurgled through the winding passageways, or collected in deep cisterns scummed with fetid deposits. Some of the tunnels were so narrow the pirates had to go on all fours through utter darkness. Others widened into huge caverns where three or four men could walk abreast.
<
br /> They started out with a fairly good sense of direction, knowing their starting point and the way in which the cliff-top fortress lay. They bore blazing torches soaked with oil for illumination, but these were doused as soon as they encountered the narrow tunnels where they must crawl through slush in order to get through.
Rats fled squeaking at their approach. For centuries the red-eyed, shaggy unza had ruled these noisome pits unchallenged and undisturbed. Now the furry horde of vermin turned to flee before this astonishing invasion, claws rasping on wet rock, hairless tails slithering through the stinking mud.
Most men would soon have become hopelessly and completely lost in this lightless maze of twisting, weaving caverns. But seamen must develop a sense of direction if they are to survive when darkness floats on the face of the deep and veils the moon and her attendant host of stars. That innate sense of direction served them now as they plodded through the reeking darkness.
They had one sure guide, beyond this seaman’s sense. The fortress of Kashtar lay on higher ground than the city proper. Hence, when it came to a choice between two alternate routes, they knew to select the one that rose to higher levels. Thus, with unerring accuracy, they traversed the black catacombs of Tarakus.
They never knew how long the journey took. Doubtless the pirates took many hours to reach the dungeon pits below the citadel. Here they were cautious, careful to make no sound that might arouse the suspicions of a wary guard.
At length they emerged through a barred grill in the floor. One by one they crept up onto the dungeon level, helping each other out of the vertical pit. Torches flared dimly in the moist gloom. From somewhere in the dark pile of masonry through whose bowels they crept, water dripped endlessly. In the flickering light of torches they examined each other, convulsed in a silent pantomime of laughter. From head to boot heel they were black with mud and filth—a more disreputable band of heroes had never dared their lives to rescue a friend!
