IN THE GRIP OF WAR
As for the other matter which speeded his preparations, it had nothing
whatever to do with love--was the exact antithesis of it, dealt wholly
with human passion, human strife.
It was now over five weeks since the relief expedition had sailed to
Bithur from Himyra, and no word had come from Zitra since.
Mentally, Croft had allowed at least two weeks for the galleys to reach
Bithra, the capital of the northeastern state, and unload their moturs
and men. Another week, he figured, should bring them well into contact
with the Mazzerian forces, if Jadgor moved as quickly as he felt
assured he would. And drunk as he was with love, busy as he was with
his own endeavors, Croft forgot not entirely affairs of state.
As a result he chose a night some weeks after he felt sure the
Bithurian army and its reinforcements should have reached the Bithurian
borders, and willed himself to Jadgor's tent.
A strange sight met his eyes. He swam above what at first appeared
to him as an enormous grassy plain; and beyond it was a forest, dark
in its own shadows beneath the moonlight, and beyond that again was
a flare of fires. Toward these he propelled himself without knowing
whither exactly he was going, yet arriving to find them the flaring
remains of burning houses, spread out on yet another open space beside
a river, a mere village, such as the peasant classes were accustomed to
inhabit, rather than one of the larger walled towns.
And around it, through it, their bodies picked out by the moonlight and
the leaping of the flames, were hundreds--not of Bithur's soldiers, but
of leaping, howling, spear-shaking, blood and lust gloated Mazzerian
men. And beyond it as he saw now, overcoming his first surprise, lay
one of the armored moturs, ringed with intermingled Bithurian and
Mazzerian corpses and tipped upon its side.
Disaster! For the first time Croft suspected a Bithurian route. In a
flash he returned to his original purpose and once more demanded that
Jadgor's position be revealed.
And now a walled town appeared before him, not so large as Himyra, but
decidedly greater than Zitra, to judge from the circuit of its walls
inside which countless fire-urns flared. And within those walls, as he
sped above them, Croft beheld a beaten army's wrack--two of the moturs,
parked close inside a gate: weary men showing the marks of conflict,
stretched out beside them in a sodden bivouac.
Then into a palace, built of what seemed a brown sandstone, with a
huge inner court paved in green, where fire-urns flared and guardsmen
stood before a door through which men in armor, with stern, drawn faces
passed in and out. Croft followed the progress of the latter and so
came at last to the presence of the man he desired.
Jadgor, of Tamarizia--Jadgor, of Aphur--president of a nation, once
a haughty king. Jadgor, of Aphur, wounded slightly, with a binding
bandage wound about his grizzled head, with his armor dust-stained and
smeared with the grime of conflict, Jadgor scowling like some savage
creature overborne, driven into a corner, with the sinewy hand of a
muscular arm fingering in nervous fashion at his sword.
And about him a cluster of drawn-browed, armored men, one of whom Croft
judged to be Medai, governor of Bithur, since his armor was jeweled
with the sign of the state, a green medallion halved by a bar of
iridescent crystals, to symbolize the mighty river Bith, which crossed
it with its flood.
"Mazzer," said Jadgor, "has loosed upon us her whole horde. Armed are
they by Zollaria, led by Zollaria's men. By sheer weight of numbers
were we overborne--the wings of our army cut so that the center was
engulfed. Two of the moturs broke down, and those in charge of them
knew not the secret of the one device which causes them to run, because
he who constructed them first held the knowledge to himself.
"The men with the rifles within them were cut off when their supply
of bullets was gone. Those others so armed, killed so long as their
bullets held out, when they also fell back before these blue fiends as
well. The fault is not with the weapons, but with the first seeming of
the matter. Men of Bithur, we face no barbarian border raiding. This
the principal city of your eastern lands shall soon be assailed. Men
of Bithur, this is war. For fresh aid I have sent--for more men and
weapons. Thrice on as many fields have we met them, and thrice have
we been driven back by press of numbers. They swarm like blue vermin,
and where one dies two take his place. Yet though crushed, we are not
vanquished. Wherefore we fall back on Atla as a strong place for our
defense."
"Strong walls has Atla," Medai replied. "And Jadgor speaks strong words
from a strong heart. Yet if this be war indeed inspired and sent
upon us, not Bithur alone, but all Tamarizia may be affected thereby,
if Bithur fall. And since he who made these new weapons knows surely
best their use, were it not well also to send one asking him as Zitu's
Mouthpiece, to give us aid?"
* * * * *
For a single moment Jadgor winced, and then he inclined his head. "Aye,
Medai of Bithur, so have I done. In the mouth of him who departed for
Zitra and Himyra, for speech with Zud the high priest, and Robur, my
son, have I placed words to that effect. For, as you have said, this
matter affects not one man or another, or even yet one state. The peril
lies now to our welfare as a nation. Were Jadgor to avail himself not
of all means to combat it Jadgor were wrong, and, by Zitu, I swear that
above all other things in life, it is Tamarizia that Jadgor loves."
Croft thrilled to those words. Here spoke the old-time Jadgor, patriot
again. Even as the first time he had watched the man and listened,
as now, to his words, in those days when he sought to strengthen his
nation through the sacrifice of Naia, hoping so to block Zollaria's
plans, so now the _generalissimo_ of Tamarizia's forces seemed thinking
of his country first. Wherefore Croft felt shaken in his soul, so
that a responsive emotion toward Robur's father waked within him and
glowed. And he vowed that such aid as was asked he would give, both
as Mouthpiece of Zitu, and as a man to whom Tamarizia's welfare, both
present and future, was identical with his.
Swiftly he made calculation. At the best it would take eight days for
the messenger Jadgor had despatched to arrive. He willed himself back
to his own apartments in a flash and sat up on his couch. Much might be
done in a week he thought, and there was much to be done. Jadgor had
failed largely because the drivers of the moturs understood not the
nature of the magnetos which Croft had kept secret in their making,
and the ammunition for the rifles had given out. Well, for the first
part, he had dry cells now to insure ignition, aside from the more
complicated device. Moturs must be equipped with them without delay
and the arsenal Robur and he had equipped many Zitrans before, set
working--much ammunition, many cartridges and grenades turned out.
He rose and called a guard and sent him for Robur at once. And when
he came to him, his face somewhat puzzled by this summons from his
slumbers, he told him all that he had learned, and how.
And from past experience Robur believed without question. "Zitu!" he
cried, springing up and standing before Croft with eyes that were
flashing. "They are driven back on Atla, shut up inside her walls, two
of the moturs destroyed, their bullets well-nigh exhausted. They send
for fresh aid. Hai! Mouthpiece of Zitu, how do you advise?"
Croft told him. "Start all men working on more bullets and the bombs
we throw by hand. Send men to call the assembly together against the
time Jadgor's messenger comes, yet state not why, save that Robur
commands. Order all captains of decktarons to hold those men we trained
in readiness for a possible call to arms. Give these orders merely; say
naught as yet of war."
"Aye," Robur nodded, "it shall be done."
"Speed also," Croft went on, "the completion of the other airplanes.
In the morning I begin training men to fly them when they are done.
Also"--his eyes narrowed with a sudden thought--"Rob--we shall remove
the dynamo, and transport it to Atla, after we have shown Himyra this
new light."
"Thou wilt do that still--in the face of this?" Robur stammered.
Croft nodded. Before his mind's eye floated Naia of Aphur's face--Naia
who was to pin the seal of Azil on her girdle the day the light he had
promised to Himyra was born. Come weal or woe, come war or peace, Croft
swore naught should interfere with that occasion.
"Aye," he said, "on the seventh sun from this."
* * * * *
Yet despite Croft's interdiction on the spreading of the word abroad,
Naia and Gaya were told--the latter as Robur's wife, the former as
Croft's assistant in his work. For from now on she became fully that.
Day after day, from the hour of the morning bath until late at night,
she toiled in the laboratory he had equipped in the palace, preparing
the chemicals for the dry cells, aiding him with a tight-lipped, yet
unfaltering purpose while the cells were packed, taking full charge in
the daytime while he was engaged elsewhere on other work.
Clad in a coarse smock, acid stained and scorched, her hands soiled
by the manipulation of reagents, she yet had never to Jason presented
a fairer, braver sight. She worked. She neither complained nor cried
out. She gave her service to her country and to him, in the depths of
her purple eyes an almost Spartan light. And Gaya helped. Day after day
she labored beside her, under her direction, learning in turn from Naia
what she had learned from Croft.
"Are you not glad you have taught me to fly?" Naia questioned one night
as they worked. "See you not Zitu's hand in this, beloved, since when
you are gone to this spawn of Mazzer's undoing I may continue your
work?"
"You?" Croft faltered, sickened at the picture of her meaning. "You
must not. As I have told you, there is danger."
"Ah, but"--her smile was very gentle--"is there not danger to thee as
well? Think not my heart is like a frightened bird, did it speak in
place of my mind. Know you not that to me the loss of you blots out the
world?"
"No," Croft cried, and swept her into his arms. "Tis a brave, brave
heart, beloved!" He caught and held her fingers. "O brave, brave heart!"
For a moment she lay against him. He felt her shake. Then it was over,
and she straightened up again. "In three suns," she said, "your seal
shall glow again on my girdle. Tell me, beloved, for I hunger for
the knowledge, how may this separation of the spirit from the body,
which you have thrice brought about within my knowledge, be by oneself
attained?"
"By desire," said Croft. "By a focusing of all the yearning of the soul
on that one thing--without doubt, without fear--by centering the mind
on its attaining and on the object whereat in that state you wish to
arrive; for indeed, beloved, it is the desire of the spirit in life
that accomplishes all things."
"Desire," she repeated softly, "desire. Aye, now I see. One must forget
all, save only it, alone to attain it. It must be so great that nothing
else save only it remains--as great as the love you have wakened in
me--as your desire for me. Ah, beloved, when first Gaya told me of
your seeking me from earth, I thought it madness, though even then the
thought itself set me aflame. And then"--she threw out her arms and
stood before him glorious in her soul's surrender--"then you come to
me, in what at first I called--a dream."
"Naia!" Croft stammered, lost in the glory of her. "Naia, what have you
in your mind?"
She came closer. "Am I not your mate, who am about to lose you? Yet
were this power mine, perchance I, too, might visit you--in dreams."
And now Croft saw her meaning, and like her quivered as once more he
held her in his arms.
Then came to Himyra light! Croft smiled in singular fashion on the day
it came. Aphur's red city was in carnival attire. Its pavements swarmed
with life. Open refreshment booths did a thriving business, jugglers
plied their skill on woven mats stretched out in open squares. Jostling
crowds swarmed about them, filling the air with jest and good-natured
cries. The whole place hummed with a myriad life.
And yet to Jason the whole scene was unreal--a mask, a carnival domino
spread as it was above a grinning skull. To him driving in his motor
with Naia in purple and gold, above which her snowy left shoulder and
throat made a band of ivory, the whole vast assemblage seemed no more
than the shifting fantasmagoria of a dream--a gorgeous play of color
through the mind of a sleeper not as yet awake. For Himyra made merry
in her ignorance of the catastrophe striking against the national
borders to the east. Jadgor's messenger had not as yet arrived.
And though Himyra dreamed a dream of splendor, in which none had a
thought of care, though the crowds moved in indolent leisure through
street and public square, though copper-bodied motors roared and panted
over pavements laid in bitumen as smooth in their surface as a floor;
though plumed gnuppas pranced with a clatter of slender feet, and
bright-eyed, softly shrouded and perfumed women rode within them to the
games of the afternoon--the beginning of the celebration of what all
thought a new era in the life of Tamarizia and Aphur, still beneath the
surface seeming, because of Croft's knowledge, and the words he had
spoken to Robur, and Robur's orders, the inner soul of Himyra and all
Aphur prepared on this day for war.
In a way the aspect of the city reminded Jason of the condition of the
woman at his side in those past days when the soul of her had been his
as always, and only the objective mind had failed as yet to wake.
Today she had come to the game with him alone at his own request.
Outside the vast stadium where formerly all public games had been
held--a huge thing of red stone, that always reminded Croft of the
Colosseum of Rome--he helped her down. Through bowing crowds they
gained the entrance giving on what had once been the royal box, now
reserved for the governor of Aphur's suite. He led her in through a
gilded and frescoed passage, and conducted her to where a scarlet
canopy was spread above a tier of seats. She sank down, inclining her
head in salutation to a hundred greetings from neighboring boxes, until
the purple plume, rising from the cincture in her golden hair, was set
a-nodding above her lovely face.
* * * * *
Robur came with Gaya a few moments later. The vast assemblage rose and
the games began. First was a chariot race, entered by six chariots
drawn each by a team of four plumed gnuppas, driven at top speed.
Marthos, a young noble, won handily, amid acclaim from the thousands
ranged about the immense amphitheater, and was awarded a metal garland,
standing flushed with triumph before Robur's box.
Followed various athletic contests, javelin throwing, foot racing,
shooting with bows and arrows at a herd of wild taburs driven into
the arena from pens beneath the tiers of seats, wrestling matches and
other sports, in which both men and women took part. In a way, as he
sat at Naia's side, the scene reminded Croft of a reproduction of a
public ceremonial of ancient Greece. For as in Greece and in Tamarizia,
for generations untold, the contestants threw off all their clothing
as they came to their stations and worked frankly nude until they had
ended their exhibition of skill or strength, when once more their
garments were donned.
The minor events ended, there came a pause. Then from the far end of
the arena suddenly there dashed a chariot drawn by four pure-white
gnuppas, orange plumed. Straight for Robur's box they plunged and came
to a rearing halt as Marthos, to whom had been awarded this further
honor, drew them to a stand.
Croft rose. He descended from the box and entered the car. Clad in
brown he was, in the suit Naia had designed and had made for him as
once more the gnuppas traversed the arena's length and stopped near to
where the men from the hangars had trundled the great plane into sight.
In a leap he was aboard. The attendants ran to their places. Two men
turned the engine over. It caught!
Above the whispers of the multitude its roar rang out. The great plane
trembled. Its attendants released it. It trundled forward over the hard
packed floor of yellow sand. Straight as a die it surged toward Robur's
box until suddenly Croft changed his vanes. And then it rose. It shot
up at what looked like a forty-five degree slant. Up and up and up,
until it swam above the vast concourse of back-tilted faces. Like the
hum of a giant beetle, the sound of its whirring engine came down from
a cloudless sky to a myriad ears. Once, twice, Croft made the circuit
of the arena, and then began to settle, finishing with a graceful
volplane, which left him within a few feet of his start.
"Hai! Hai! Hail to the Mouthpiece of Zitu! Hail to Jason, teacher
of all Tamarizia! Hail to him whose mind Zitu has enlightened above
all others!" the cry of the multitude rang out. Croft once more in
Marthos's chariot pushed back his leather helmet and bowed. Bowing to
right and left, acclaimed as a conqueror might have been, he rode back
toward Robur's box, and left the chariot and ascended to his seat, and
looked into Naia's face, finding it somewhat white, but smiling, and
bowing again before the tempest of acclamation began to subside.
Then came the game of ball, on a diamond arena attendants were
beginning already to mark out, between the men from the foundries and
the team from the airplane shop. Robur himself rose and, taking a ball
from an ornate box extended to him by a guardsman, cast it out. Then,
as it was passed snappily to the pitcher of the foundry's team which
had won the inning and elected to send the airplane aggregation to bat:
"Play ball!" he cried.
And suddenly as the first batter fanned and flung his bat away and
walked to the bench, very much like any disgruntled batsman of earth,
Croft smiled. It was unbelievable, of course. It was a fantasmagoria
of the brain. The thing couldn't be, and yet--there was the pitcher of
the founders, in a short-skirted tunic, below which his lean thighs
showed above his leg-cases of leather, cradling the ball, and cuddling
it in his palm. And there was the catcher, squatted down back of the
plate in breast-plate and mask, twiddling the signaling fingers of a
huge labor-browned hand, and--whir--snap! There was the ball thudding
against his mitt.
"Strike on-n-n-e!" That was the umpire's voice.
_Cr-a-a-a-a-a-c-k!_ That was the sound of a ball met fairly and lined
swiftly out. And there it went, a clean drive between first and second
base, into the right outfield.
"Run, run--go on--go on!" That was Robur yelling in ungovernorlike
excitement.
"Run--go on--run--oh, run--run!" That was the voice of Naia--of the
woman by his side.
Croft turned to her and found her leaning forward, straining her
slender length from the hips, lips parted, her eager blue eyes wide.
"Hold it!" That was the airplane's captain coaching the runner.
Thud! The right outfield had slammed the ball into the second baseman's
glove.
Croft smiled again. It couldn't be a baseball game on Palos, but--it
was.
And as it went on the assembled multitude went wild. They cheered, they
jeered, they urged and encouraged, and cat-called and howled. They
stamped on the tiers of seats with leather and bare and metal-shod
feet. They waved hands and arms. State assemblymen already gathered by
Robur's orders, and guests of the occasion forgot dignity and joined in
the rising roars that greeted the different plays. And Naia of Aphur
was beating against Croft's thigh and yelling--yes, yelling, as the
founder's first baseman romped home on a far-reaching drive. "Come
on--come on," she was urging the runner. "Come on--atta boy--come home!"
Croft prisoned her beating little fist and held it. The runner scored.
She looked into Jason's face and smiled. Croft thrilled. She was all
woman---all glorious, lovely woman. He knew it, had seen it proved in
the last week when she worked stern-lipped for the good of her nation.
But today in this new-found pastime she had forgotten for the moment
and become a child.
The game ended for the Founders, three to one, bringing with its
termination an intermission, since not until dusk would the lights be
turned on.
* * * * *
Blue men of Mazzer with torches began moving about the vast circuit
of the arena, lighting hundreds of oil flares. Blue girls with skins
of tabur hide on their naked backs and shoulders, and metal cups in
their hands, began threading the tiers of seats selling a mild, light
wine. Vendors of fruits and conserves for the women, and baked meats
and wheaten cakes plied an active trade. In the rear of Robur's box
was spread a table, and a meal was served. And before its beginning
Magur, high priest of Aphur, arrived. To him Croft and Naia rose side
by side and bowed. And suddenly Naia was once more all woman, as she
looked into her companion's face and flushed from throat to eyes.
Magur's coming meant she was to pledge herself to Croft before all the
assembled men and women of Aphur, once the new light came on.
And in such fashion was it done. Two heralds with silver trumpets
appeared in scarlet livery, the color of Robur's house. From the front
of Robur's box they blew a blast.
And on that signal the arena attendants began running to and fro
extinguishing all lights. Over the arena night came down as one by one
the oil flares died.
Croft gave a final glance to the woman at his side--to her face, her
form, to her dress of purple and gold. He had asked her to put it on.
It was the garment she had worn on the first formal occasion in which
he had ever seen her take part. And its colors were the same as the
auric colors of that astral form of hers which he had seen and found
divine. Taking her hand he led her quite to the front of the box. There
on either side had been placed one of Tamarizia's first two arcs. And
in the back of the box was the controlling switch. And miles away in
the mountains men were waiting for the signal of a flare on Himyra's
walls to release the power. Already one had gone to see that the flare
was lit. And a captain was without to carry word when it shone forth.
Now suddenly he appeared.
Croft closed the switch.
A click--a hiss--the crackling ignition of incandescent carbon--a
rising glow in the darkness--then--light--clear, radiant light!
Light that flared up and wavered and steadied and shone on Naia of
Aphur, sheathed in purple and gold.
A babble of sound, a cheer of acclaim.
The trumpets of the heralds rang out.
Jason stepped forward and took his place close by Naia's side.
Magur, the high priest, arose, robed in his vestments of azure,
accompanied by two temple boys. Each bore a silver goblet on a tray of
the same metal that sparkled under the light.
Magur lifted a silver stave crowned with the cross ansata. "Who cries
to Magur?" his voice rang out.
"A maid who would pledge herself and her life to the man of her
choosing, O Prince of Zitu," Robur replied.
"The man is present?" Magur went on in ritualistic form.
"Aye, he stands beside her," Robur declared.
"Who sponsors this woman?" Magur inquired.
"I, Robur of Aphur, her cousin--child of the sister of her who gave her
life."
"Come then in the name of Zitu," Magur said, and advanced to face the
arena, back of Naia and Croft.
"Naia of Aphur--thou woman, and being woman, sister of Ga, and hence
priestess of that shrine of life which is eternal, the guardian of the
fire of life which is eternal--is it thine intent to pledge thyself to
this man, who stands now at thy side?"
"Aye," said Naia of Aphur clearly, and looked not at Magur as she
answered, but into Jason's eyes.
"And thou, Jason, known as the Mouthpiece of Zitu, whom Zitu has
inspired with his wisdom, even as no other man, do thou accept this
pledge, and with it the woman herself, to make her in the fulness of
time thy bride, to cherish her and cause her to live as a glory to the
name of woman, to whom all men may justly give respect?"
"Aye, so I pledge, by Zitu, and Azil, giver of life," said Jason,
gazing on the woman as he spoke the words.
"Then take this, maid of Aphur." Magur drew from his robe a looped
silver cross and placed it in her hands. "Hold it and guard it, look
upon it as a symbol of that life eternal that you shall be kept
eternal, and which, taken from the hands of Azil the angel, shall be
transmuted within thee into the life of men."
Turning, he took the two goblets from their bearers and poured wine
from one to the other and back. One he extended to Naia and one to
Croft.
"Drink," he said. "Let these symbolize thy two bodies, the life of
which shall be united from this time in purpose. Drink and may Zitu
bless thee in that union which comes into existence by his intent."
Jason raised his goblet. "I drink of thee deeply," he spoke to the
lovely chalice of mortal life standing there.
Naia set her goblet to her lips. "And I of thee."
Then, and then only, Croft took that medallion of silver ringed with
red stones, which Zitra had burned against his breast. And lifting the
golden girdle which cinctured Naia's body above the hips he pinned it
once more upon it, so that it flashed like a scarlet eye, beneath the
newborn light.
Magur lifted his stave. "Azil's seal has he set upon her. Let it speak
to all men's sight."
"Hail! Hail! Mouthpiece of Zitu. Hail! Hail! Hail! Naia, maid of
Aphur!" From the vast arena a roar of acknowledgment and approbation
tore its way upward in the night.
So as it seemed ended Himyra's greatest holiday; so for Croft and Naia
began a new phase of life. Yet though she had never seemed nearer,
dearer to him, the Mouthpiece of Zitu was vaguely disturbed as they
rode back to the palace through the still pleasure-making crowds.
Everything seemed very peaceful, very auspicious. But he could not rid
his mind of the picture which had troubled him for a week--the picture
of a burning village--of blue men leaping in savage exultation of a
beaten army's rout.
Hence it was with no pleasure that an hour after their return from the
arena, while yet the city flared and rang with the carnival life of
the people, a palace guard brought word to him from Robur, asking his
presence at once.
Nor when he had followed to the audience chamber of the palace was he
surprised to meet a man with drawn face, and eyes a trifle haggard--a
man wearing Bithur's green and silver circle, who rose now and saluted
him with flat palm forward, and burst into hurried, excited speech.
"Mouthpiece of Zitu, Bithur is sore assailed--her armies beaten, the
aid Aphur sent her largely destroyed; wherefore in the name of Bithur
and of Tamarizia, Jadgor, president of the nation, now at Atla, sends
me to you and to Robur of Aphur, his son, to speak what is in his
heart."