CHAPTER IV
Jarvis retrieved his weapons while Thork callously stripped the Tharn carcasses of weapons and leather trappings.
“These devils need the stuff no more,” he said with a grin, “and it will fetch a good price in town. We shall need money to pursue Skal—he has a good start on us.”
“Can’t we overtake him quickly?” Jarvis suggested suspiciously.
“Do you ride a dil as well as you fight?”
Jarvis shook his head. “What’s a dil?”
Thork grunted. “I guessed right. You are no Giparian, though I mistook you for one at first. If you must ask what is a dil, you cannot hope even to ride one without practice, much less to overtake Skal, who has undoubtedly taken the swiftest of the mounts and now rides like the wind!”
He went on with his methodical robbing of the dead while Jarvis waited impatiently. He noticed that the Tharn took first from each of his erstwhile comrades a small leather pouch which he tucked into his own waistband. Aware of Jarvis’ interest, Thork bared fangs between his tusks and chortled with humor.
“The dead possess nothing and need less, Jeff Jarvis. So frown not with disapproval. It is an evil night of the slul that does not rid someone of an enemy!”
With this Elorasponian version of “It is an ill wind that blows no good”, Thork gathered up his spoil and led Jarvis to the copse where the dil had been tethered. He made a noise of approval.
“Good! I have always reckoned Skal for a fool. He failed to loose the remaining dil when he rode off—and with a Giparian woman, eh? Else she could not have ridden the other mount and he had been forced to load his own double. That leaves us three—two to ride and one to carry the gear and later sell for profit!”
At sight of the dil, Jarvis stepped back, taking a firmer grip on his sword. The beasts were preposterous looking—half saurian, half caricature of a barnyard fowl. The dil balanced a pear-shaped body on a pair of six-foot, lizard-like hind legs. In front of the saddle were two pairs of skinny shoulders having four powerfully taloned but wizened arms. Its long, sinuous neck was surmounted by a tiny, duckbilled head armed with needle-sharp teeth. A bright red comb stood erect upon the dil’s head, just behind the single bulbous, amber eye and between the pale green, writhing stalks bearing knob-like olfactory organs. Down the neck and spine coursed a spate of iridescent feathers, continuing to the terminus of the long, fleshy tail, ending there in a fan of many hues. Aside from this the dil was naked, its flanks and thighs mailed with scales of a dull blue or olive green color, blending into livid yellow on the throat, belly and lower thighs; its shanks were purple, the talons of both its locomotor extremities and its arms being scarlet.
Jarvis found the most difficult part of riding the beast was approaching it, for it stank with a musty, cloying fragrance like a well-decayed barnyard heap. In spite of determination and impatience to be on the trail of the thief who had stolen the woman he loved, he found it almost impossible to get the immediate hang of dil riding.
To be mounted, the dil must squat on its heels at a word of command which Thork taught Jarvis to pronounce. Once he had straddled the saddle, Thork uttered another word, “hu!”, and the dil rose to the full height of its legs in a bone-jostling lurch that all but dismounted the Earthman.
The creature was restrained and guided by means of reins tied to eye-bolts surgically planted in the upper shoulder-blades. A mere tug, as on the bit of a horse, evoked sufficient pain to make the dil tractable.
At a slow pace, the dil hopped along almost erect; the faster it went, the more it leaned forward. At a top speed of around forty miles an hour, its body was horizontal, progressing in leaps and bounds, its fanned tail sweeping out behind, guiding it.
By evening, Jarvis was sore in every muscle and bone of his body, but he could ride and they were twenty miles on their way. Jarvis killed a six-legged, deer-like creature with his boomerang and the Tharn dressed it and broiled steaks for their supper. As they ate, Jarvis saw Thork take from his trappings one of the bags he had lifted from the fallen Tharn and sprinkle from it a bluish powder upon his meat.
“Is that salt?” he asked. “Pass it here.”
The Tharn hastily retied the bag and thrust it back into his waistband.
“You want none of this, Earth-man! It is not salt.”
“What is it, if not salt?”
“It is called tharn. Beyond that, I know not what it is. But it is the essence of life to the Tharn. If it is true, as you tell me, that you come from another world, you would not know what tharn is, nor what it is to be a Tharn. To ask tharn of a Tharn is the most terrible of insults, meriting instant death. To be granted tharn by a Tharn is the greatest favor he can render you.” There was a note of bitterness in Thork’s rumbling voice.
“Though I seem a Tharn, Jarvis, in my soul I am still a Giparian, as I was in my youth and young manhood. My physical appearance was not greatly different from yours. The fame of Amush was great in those days, for I was a mighty warrior and ishak of Tukulta, the City of Weapons, which is in the land of Gipar. My knee bent only to the Lugal Elmam of Gipar. Hunting one day in the mountains with some companions, I was set upon by a band of marauding Tharn. My companions were killed and I was taken in slavery to the Tharn city called Drahubba and cast down before the Lugal Zag-ab-Shab of Kullab. Skal is taking your woman to him now, for such is the custom of Tharn-land. All loot must be taken first to the Lugal for him to take as his own for a payment of money, or to return to the warrior.”
“What will happen to Ilil?” Jarvis put in quickly. “Will she be harmed?”
Thork shook his tusked head. “Not harmed, Jeff Jarvis. Nor molested in any way before the Day of Sharing, which comes around each month. If the Lugal wants her, he will pay Skal a small amount of money and keep her. If he wants her not, he will return her to Skal to do with as he sees fit—to keep or to sell.”
“That cannot happen to the princess of Gipar!” Jarvis cried.
“Princess of Gipar!” Thork smote his forehead. “Ilil! I should have known as you spoke the name. Nay, it shall not happen to her, Earthman! Tharn though I have become, my allegiance is still to Gipar and my Lugal.” He glanced up at the night sky, studying the twin moons.
“The Day of Sharing is the Day of the Full Moon, which precedes the Night of the Slul. We have seven days to avert a tragedy—for the Lugal of the Tharn will know the maid at once and use her to force drastic things upon Gipar! And Skal—” He spat venomously between his tusks. “—will be richly rewarded for his rotten trick!”
“We have eaten and rested,” Jarvis said. “Let us go now.”
Thork shook his head. “The maid is safe another seven days. You are in no condition to ride further tonight, and our mounts need rest as much as we. Morning will be soon enough. Let me finish telling you about myself and you will see that I am as earnest about the safety of the princess Ilil as you.
“Knowing my reputation and aware of my prowess as a warrior, the Lugal chose to demean me. He made me a palace slave. But I was wise—I thought. I kept my eyes open. One day I discovered where the Lugal stored the tharn-drug he doles out periodically to his people. You see, Jarvis, the Tharn are not born this appearance, a condition brought on by partaking of the tharn-drug. Male children, upon reaching the age of ten, are examined by their elders. Those they reject become household slaves. Those they choose are given tharn and develop this hideous shape. Even some captives, taken in battle, are honored by being offered tharn. Some refuse it, some accept it. I was not given that opportunity.”
“Why in the world,” Jarvis asked, “would they want voluntarily to—to assume the Tharn shape?”
“As a race, the Tharn are naturally bloodthirsty, cruel and licentious. Taking the tharn-drug enhances this quality. A fully developed Tharn takes not only pleasure but intense delight in killing.” He sho
ok his head. “For any but the congenitally depraved, it is a nightmare of a life to live! Their enjoyment of the vices and horrors they practice is trebled and quadrupled. That is why they continually maraud the surrounding lands—to quench their thirst for blood and procure fresh women on whom to slake their lust.
With me, I desired the Tharn body for purposes of disguise. In this shape, I could walk out of the palace and back to Gipar without suspicion, or so I thought. A short time of abstinence from the tharn-drug and I should resume my natural form—this I thought also. How cruelly I was deceived! I stole tharn and overnight became as you see me now. I also had to steal trappings to fit my huger form—and therein I was trapped, for the owner recognized his gear as I was leaving the palace and I had to flee back to my place of concealment, where I had taken the drug.
“The Lugal sent a nishak to arrest me, and him I slew with my bare hands, taking his weapon. Then he sent seasoned warriors and I slew them with the nishak’s sword. In the end, because of my bravery, my crime was forgiven, and I was commissioned to the army, enhancing, I still thought, my opportunity to escape.
“On my first day in the barracks, tharn was withheld from my food, and I was nauseated. On the second day of abstinence, I fell terribly ill. I thought I should die! Burning agony quivered my every nerve. Then my commanding officer visited me where I huddled in my sleeping robes. ‘You have gone two days, Thork, without tharn,’ he said. ‘One more day without tharn and you die in frightful agony. Remember this lesson—heed it well. You are Tharn forever. Only in Kullab can you get tharn. Without it, you are dead in three days!’”
Thork shrugged massive, blue shoulders. “For ten long years I have been a Tharn,” he finished bitterly. “I shall be such until I die.”
Nanna, the moon, shone bleakly upon the land, and around him circled ceaselessly Munus, the wife. Thork could tell Jarvis nothing about this phenomenon except that it served indeed as a celestial clock by which the watches of the night were told.
After they had left the margin of the hills and re-crossed the Idnal, the way to Drahubba led through broad stretches of tilled fields, interspersed with farmsteads whose curiously domed buildings of stone piqued Jarvis’ interest. They were built thus for protection from the slul, Thork said, but Jarvis could not draw him out further on the subject.
There were many of the elder cities of the Mighty along their route, each populated to overflowing with tusked Tharn, though nowhere did he see either women or children, the Tharn keeping them in seclusion for protection from the insensate passions of their fellows.
Unlike the cities Jarvis had seen on the northern continent, these were not in shards and ruins. Graceful towers spired into the sky, beautifully variegated in hue in the light of day and by night glowing with a light of their own, wondrously soft and lovely to see.
Most of the cities Thork insisted upon by-passing. They were cities at war, for the Tharn warred interminably, if not with their neighbors, then with each other. Alliances were made or broken at the whim of the individual ishaks, or city rulers. A city boasting today of a powerful ally might find itself invaded tomorrow by that ally turned enemy. War fed the Tharn, and love of butchery filled the victorious ishaks’ coffers. The world of Eloraspon was not after all so different from the Earth he had known, Jarvis thought.
* * * *
As they came at last upon the approaches to the city of Drahubba, Jarvis sensed its soul-song deep in his being and knew that its name was Arolaneti in the language of the Mighty—Place of the Mountains’ Beginning. Well named it was, for much of the city was built upon the foothills of a great mountain range in the snowy heights of which the Idnal was born. The remainder spilled out upon the alluvial plain. It was the largest of the ancient cities Jarvis had yet seen.
The claws of their dil rattled upon the hard-packed roadway which ran between fields heavy with grain. Jarvis was by now an accomplished rider and he could even handle the lance couched at his saddle bow as well as Thork. But he had no use for it as long as the Tharn rode by his side, for Thork had allayed suspicion whenever it arose by declaring Jarvis his life-slave, a status which permitted him to bear arms for the protection of his master. This reversed the actual circumstances, but it was the only way they could safely travel in Kullab.
A score of mounted Tharn suddenly thundered around a curve ahead and drew rein abreast of them, calling out to halt.
Their leader, a hulking brute who loomed large even in the saddle of his dil, scowled at Jarvis’ companion.
“Are you Thork, bejak in the Lugal’s army?”
“I am,” Thork replied.
“We had word you traveled this way. Is this Giparian your captive?”
“My life-slave. He fought honorably and well before yielding and I spared him.”
“Why do you allow him to be armed?”
“A life-slave has that right, for the protection of his master.”
The commander sneered. “Not where I command! Disarm him! Pass his weapons to the erlak!”
It was difficult for Jarvis to read any but the grossest passions on the disfigured visage of a Tharn, but he thought now that he saw startlement in Thork’s look and hesitation in his response. He nodded finally to Jarvis and the Earthman reluctantly passed his weapons to the erlak sidling up on his dil. It would have been folly to resist.
“Now your own!” barked the commander to Thork.
“By the Dingir…!” Thork began.
At once, twenty blades rattled from their scabbards and a score of scowling visages augmented the command. Thork, too, shrugged and disarmed himself.
“May I ask why you are doing this?” he asked mildly.
The commander snarled. “A coward has no right to ask anything. You will hear what you already know from your accuser—and your fate from the Lugal!”
CHAPTER V
The cell Jarvis shared with Thork was dirty and stank of generations of previous occupants. The walls and ceiling shone with the same, pellucid glare that characterized the exteriors of the buildings the Mighty had built. Was this to be the end of his search for Surandanish? Was there no more hope to save the princess Ilil? Jarvis paced the confines of their cell impatiently while Thork squatted impassively on the floor, leaning against the wall, his eyes fixed in a morbid stare.
“Help me think!” Jarvis railed at him. “Show courage, Thork!”
Thork grunted hollowly. “So you, too, think me a coward!”
“Come off it! You’re no coward!”
“It was said by the commander of the Lugal’s guard.”
“Somebody made a mistake. Or you have been falsely accused.”
“None would do such a thing…” Thork paused. “…except Skal!”
He jumped to his feet, roaring between his tusks. “That rotten slul! Of course he did! I shall kill him!”
Jarvis restrained him. “Let’s get out of here first; then you can do as you please. What do you know of this prison?”
“Enough to know the hopelessness of escape. The old ones built well. Cold steel cannot even scratch these walls. The door is solid dingan wood, three fingers thick—three of mine, not yours. Moreover, we are in the bottommost pits of the building many levels below the street.”
“Probably the ground floor when the city was built,” Jarvis noted. “A million years have filled the streets half way up the flanks of the towers.”
“That is so, Jeff Jarvis. I was a guard here once myself, and I know there is no way out except by the way we entered, through corridors swarming with the Lugal’s warriors. The prisoners are fed but once a day. Remember the cells we passed on our way down? You heard the raving of the poor maniacs confined in them? They have been there for years, forgotten by everybody save the jailers.”
Jarvis sat on the floor, slumping against the wall. The situation
required thought, it was obvious. They had been imprisoned in the royal barracks, that much he knew, a high tower among many high towers in the heart of Drahubba. He tried attacking their predicament from the standpoint of its advantages. He was closer to Surandanish than he had been upon meeting Thork. There was something to be said for that. And Ilil was here in this very city, probably in the Lugal’s palace, Thork had assured him. When he had passed his weapons to the erlak of the Lugal’s guard, he had not given up his throwing knife, which nestled still at the nape of his neck, hidden under his leather shirt.
Among the disadvantages of their captivity, he had noted that the walls of their cell were impervious to his Mag senses. He could probe through the door of dingan wood, even receive a few faint perceptions from the other cells along the glowing corridor. But the psychic sensation he perceived of those poor, damned souls unnerved him. There must be a way out of here!
How about the Mighty of old—the builders of these ancient towers? He saw them as a gentle, human folk, almost heard the whispering tread of their sandaled feet. The Mighty had been a powerful, civilized race on Eloraspon when the dinosaurs had roamed the swamps of Earth. Supermen they, the first of Magnanthropus, with fully developed mental powers. He, Jarvis, was still but a stumbling infant in that mutant realm. Still, they had been human and they had respected privacy… that was certain, for they had made the walls of their chambers impervious to probing minds. For some reason, Jarvis’ mind paused in its reflection and clung to this point. Had it a bearing?
“Thork! I think I’ve got it!”
The giant Tharn rumbled disconsolately. “We’ll both get it in a few hours when we are taken before the Lugal!”
Jarvis wriggled closer to his companion. “Listen! Something about these buildings has been puzzling me ever since I saw the first one. The windows and doors—they are badly designed and badly placed. Many of them are only roughly cut! Would a people that could build such towers as these make such lousy doors and windows?”
The 7th Golden Age of Weird Fiction MEGAPACK®: Manly Banister Page 71
