When he came to, it was night. Jill sat patiently beside him. She had
brought him food, and while he wolfed it down she went away to fetch
water in a broad cupped leaf.
He tried to talk to her, but there was a gulf between them too wide
to be bridged. She seemed subdued and brooding, and would not come
close to him. He had robbed her of the fire of Shanga, and she had not
forgotten it.
The futility of trying to escape with her was obvious. After a while he
rose and left her, and she did not try to follow.
The garden was still under the light of the low moons. Apparently the
beasts of Shanga, true to their ape heritage, were sleeping. Moving
with infinite caution, Winters prowled the arena in search of a way
out. A plan had taken shape in his mind. It was not much of a plan, and
he knew that very probably he would be dead before morning, but he had
nothing to lose. He did not even particularly care. He was a man, an
Earthman, and there was an anger in him that was deeper than any fear.
The walls of the arena were smooth and high. Even an ape could not
have climbed them. All the tunnels were blocked off except the one by
which they had entered. He crept down it and found the barred gate
impenetrable. Beyond it was a little guard fire, and two sentries.
Winters went back to the arena.
He could see no sign of a guard in the empty tiers of seats. There
was no reason for one. In itself, the amphitheatre was a perfect
prison, and the creatures of the garden had no wish to escape from the
besotting joys of Shanga.
Whipped before he started, Winters stood glaring bitterly at the walls
that held him fast. Then he caught sight of the booms from which the
Shanga prisms were suspended.
Going to the nearest one, he studied it. It was high out of reach,
a long metal pole that stretched from the side of the arena above
the wall and, with the other one, centered the Shanga-rays over the
clearing.
High out of reach. But if a man had a rope....
Winters went in among the trees. He found vines and creepers, and
tore them away, and knotted them together. He found a small log in a
deadfall, big enough to weight one end but light enough for throwing.
Then he returned to the boom.
On the third cast the log went over. He drew his flimsy rope down,
making a double strand. Hand over hand, praying that the vines would
hold, he began to climb.
It seemed like a long way up. He felt very naked and exposed in the
moonlight.
The vines held, and no challenging voice shouted at him. He clung to
the boom and worked his way along it, first dropping the telltale rope.
Presently he was safe among the tiered seats.
Avoiding the guard by the tunnel, he made his way out of the
amphitheatre and circled out across the slope, keeping to cover
where there was cover, crawling on his belly where there was none.
The shifting moon-shadows helped him, because they made visibility a
treacherous thing. The palace loomed above him, huge and dark, crushed
under the weight of time.
Only two lights showed. One, on the ground floor, he guessed would be
the guard room. The other, on the third level, was dim as though made
by a single torch. That, he hoped, would be the apartment of Fand.
Up the slope and into the shelter of the palace garden, and then into
the palace itself. The great half-ruined pile could not have been
guarded, even if there had been reason to guard it. Padding silently on
naked feet, Winters glided through the vast empty halls, trying to keep
a plan of the place straight in his mind.
His eyes were accustomed to the dark, and enough moonlight fell through
the embrasures to let him see where he was going. Room and hall and
corridor, smelling of dust and death, dreaming over their faded flags
and broken trophies, remembering glory. Winters shivered. Something of
the cold breath of eternity lived in this place.
He found a ramp, and then another, and at last on the third level he
saw light, the weak flicker of it from the crack of a door.
There was no guard. That was a break. Not only because it was a
difficulty eliminated, but because it confirmed his guess that Fand was
a person who would want no check on her comings and goings. From the
standpoint of safety in this place, a guard would be only a useless
adornment. Fand was on her own ground here. There were no enemies.
Save one.
Winters opened the door without sound. A tiring maid slept on a low
couch. She did not stir as he passed. Beyond an open arch hung with
heavy curtains he found the lady Fand.
She slept in a huge carved bed, the bed of the Kings of Valkis. She
looked like a child lost in its hugeness. She was very beautiful. Very
wicked, and most damnably beautiful.
Winters struck her, quite ruthlessly. Sleep became unconsciousness.
There was no outcry. With silks and girdles he found in the room he
bound and gagged her, and flung her light weight over his shoulder.
Then he went back the way he had come, silently out of the palace.
It was as easy as that. He had not thought it would be easy, but it
was. After all, he thought, men seldom guard against the impossible.
Phobos had gone on its careening flight around Mars, and Deimos was
too low to give much light. Now carrying the unconscious Fand, now
dragging her across the open spaces, Winters made his way back to
the amphitheatre. In and across the tiered seats to the wall. It was
a twenty-foot drop, but he made it as easy as he could on her. He
didn't want her dead. Then he slid over himself, hung briefly by his
fingertips, and fell into cushioning brush.
When he got his breath back he made sure that Fand was not hurt.
Then he carried her swiftly into the shelter of the unholy garden.
Remembering a particularly dense patch of shrubbery near the central
clearing, he made for it and crept thankfully into concealment with the
heir of all the Kings of Valkis.
Then he waited.
* * * * *
Her eyes were looking up at him in the dim light, bitter gold above the
gag of scarlet silk.
"Yes," he said, "you're here, in the garden of Shanga. I brought you
here. We have a bargain to talk about, Fand."
He undid the gag, keeping his hand close over her mouth lest she should
cry out.