chamber, went directly to the window. For a moment I reconnoitered
the interior of the courtyard and finding conditions unchanged, I
slipped stealthily through the window and edged slowly toward the gate.
Cautiously I examined the latch and discovering it easy to manipulate,
I was soon silently pushing one of the gates back upon its hinges.
When it was opened sufficiently wide to permit the passage of a thoat,
I turned my attention to the beasts within the enclosure. Practically
untamed, these savage creatures are wild as their uncaptured fellows
of the remote sea bottoms, and, being controlled solely by telepathic
means, they are amenable only to the suggestion of the more powerful
minds of their masters and even so it requires considerable skill to
dominate them.
I had learned the method from Tars Tarkas himself and had come to feel
considerable proficiency so that I approached this crucial test of my
power with the confidence that was absolutely requisite to success.
Placing myself close beside the gate, I concentrated every faculty of
my mind to the direction of my will, telepathically, upon the brain of
the thoat I had selected for my purpose, the selection being determined
solely by the fact that he stood nearest to me. The effect of my effort
was immediately apparent. The creature, which had been searching
for the occasional tufts of moss that grew between the stone flags
of the courtyard, raised his head and looked about him. At once he
became restless, but he gave forth no sound since I was willing him to
silence. Presently his eyes moved in my direction and halted upon me.
Then, slowly, I drew him toward me. It was slow work, for he evidently
sensed that I was not his master, but on he came. Once, when he was
quite near me, he stopped and snorted angrily. He must have caught my
scent then and realized that I was not even of the same race as that to
which he was accustomed. Then it was that I exerted to their fullest
extent every power of my mind. He stood there shaking his ugly head to
and fro, his snarling lips baring his great fangs. Beyond him I could
see that the other thoats had been attracted by his actions. They were
looking toward us and moving about restlessly, always drawing closer.
Should they discover me and start to squeal, which is the first and
always ready sign of their easily aroused anger, I knew that I should
have their riders upon me in no time, since because of his nervous and
irritable nature the thoat is the watchdog as well as the beast of
burden of the green Barsoomians.
For a moment the beast I had selected hesitated before me as though
undecided whether to retreat or to charge, but he did neither; instead
he came slowly up to me and as I backed through the gate into the
vaulted corridor beyond, he followed me. This was better than I had
expected for it permitted me to compel him to lie down, so that the
girl and I were able to mount with ease.
Before us lay a long vaulted corridor at the far end of which I could
discern a moonlit archway, through which we presently passed onto a
broad avenue.
To the left lay the hills, and, turning this way, I urged the fleet
animal along the ancient deserted thoroughfare between rows of stately
ruins toward the west and--what?
Where the avenue turned to wind upward into the hills, I glanced back;
nor could I refrain a feeling of exultation as I saw strung out behind
us in the moonlight a file of great thoats, which I was confident would
well know what to do with their new found liberty.
"Your captors will not pursue us far," I said to the girl, indicating
the thoats with a nod of my head.
"Our ancestors are with us tonight," she said. "Let us pray that they
may never desert us."
Now, for the first time, I had a fairly good look at my companion, for
both Cluros and Thuria were in the heavens and it was quite light. If I
revealed my surprise it is not to be wondered at for, in the darkness,
having only my companion's voice for a guide, I had been perfectly
confident that I had given aid to a female, but now as I looked at
that short hair and boyish face I did not know what to think; nor
did the harness that my companion wore aid me in justifying my first
conclusion, since it was quite evidently the harness of a man.
"I thought you were a girl," I blurted out.
A fine mouth spread into a smile that revealed strong, white teeth. "I
am," she said.
"But your hair--your harness--even your figure belies your claim."
She laughed gayly. That, I was to find later, was one of her chiefest
charms--that she could laugh so easily, yet never to wound.
"My voice betrayed me," she said. "It is too bad."
"Why is it too bad?" I asked.
"Because you would have felt better with a fighting man as a companion,
whereas now you feel that you have only a burden."
"A light one," I replied, recalling how easily I had lifted her to the
thoat's back. "But tell me who you are and why you are masquerading as
a boy."
"I am a slave girl," she said; "just a slave girl who has run away
from her master. Perhaps that will make a difference," she added a
little sadly. "Perhaps you will be sorry that you have defended just a
slave girl."
"No," I said, "that makes no difference. I, myself, am only a poor
padwar, not rich enough to afford a slave. Perhaps you are the one to
be sorry that you were not rescued by a rich man."
She laughed. "I ran away from the richest man in the world," she said.
"At least I guess he must have been the richest man in the world, for
who could be richer than Tul Axtar, Jeddak of Jahar?"
"You belong to Tul Axtar, Jeddak of Jahar?" I exclaimed.
"Yes," she said. "I was stolen when I was very young from a city called
Tjanath and ever since I have lived in the palace of Tul Axtar. He has
many women--thousands of them. Sometimes they live all their lives in
his palace and never see him. I have seen him," she shuddered; "he is
terrible. I was not unhappy there for I had never known my mother; she
died when I was young, and my father was only a memory. You see I was
very, very young, indeed, when the emissaries of Tul Axtar stole me
from my home in Tjanath. I made friends with everyone about the palace
of Tul Axtar. They all liked me, the slaves and the warriors and the
chiefs, and because I was always boyish it amused them to train me in
the use of arms and even to navigate the smaller fliers; but then came
a day when my happiness was ended forever--Tul Axtar saw me. He saw
me and he sent for me. I pretended that I was ill and did not go, and
when night came I went to the quarters of a soldier whom I knew to be
on guard and stole harness and I cut off my long hair and painted my
face that I might look more like a man, and then I went to the hangars
on the palace roof and by a ruse deceived the guard there and stole a
one-man flier.
"I thought," she continued, "that if they searched for me at all they
would search in the direction of Tjanath and so I flew in the opposite
direction, toward the northeast, intending to make a great circle to
the north, turning back toward Tjanath. After I passed over Xanator I
discovered a large grove of mantalia growing out upon the dead sea
bottom and I immediately descended to obtain some of the milk from
these plants, as I had left the palace so hurriedly that I had had
no opportunity to supply myself with provisions. The mantalia grove
was an unusually large one and as the plants grew to a height of from
eight to twelve sofads, the grove offered excellent protection from
observation. I had no difficulty in finding a landing place well within
its confines. In order to prevent detection from above, I ran my plane
in among the concealing foliage of two over-arching mantalias and then
set about obtaining a supply of milk.
"As near objects never appear as attractive as those more distant, I
wandered some little distance from my flier before I found the plants
that seemed to offer a sufficiently copious supply of rich milk.
"A band of green warriors had also entered the grove to procure milk,
and, as I was tapping the tree I had selected, one of them discovered
me and a moment later I was captured. From their questions I became
assured that they had not seen me enter the grove and that they knew
nothing of the presence of my flier. They must have been in a portion
of the grove very thickly overhung by foliage while I was approaching
from above and making my landing; but be that as it may, they were
ignorant of the presence of my flier and I determined to keep them in
ignorance of it.
"When they had obtained as much milk as they required they returned to
Xanator, bringing me with them. The rest you know."
"This is Xanator?" I asked.
"Yes," she replied.
"And what is your name?" I asked.
"Tavia," she replied. "And what is yours?"
"Tan Hadron of Hastor," I replied.
"It is a nice name," she said. There was a certain boyish frankness
about the way she said it that convinced me that she would have been
just as quick to tell me had she not liked my name. There was no
suggestion of brainless flattery in her tone and I was to learn, as I
became better acquainted with her, that honesty and candor were two
of her marked characteristics, but at the moment I was giving such
matters little thought since my mind was occupied with a portion of her
narrative that had suggested to me an easy and swift method of escape
from our predicament.
"Do you believe," I asked, "that you can find the mantalia grove where
you hid your flier?"
"I am positive of it," she replied.
"Will the craft carry two?" I asked.
"It is a one-man flier," she replied, "but it will carry both of us,
though both its speed and altitude will be reduced."
She told me that the grove lay to the southeast of Xanator and
accordingly I turned the thoat's head toward the east. After we had
passed well beyond the limits of the city we moved in a southerly
direction down out of the hills onto the dead sea bottom.
Thuria was winging her swift flight through the heavens, casting
strange and ever moving shadows upon the ocher moss that covered the
ground, while far above cold Cluros took his slow and stately way. The
light of the two moons clearly illuminated the landscape and I was sure
that keen eyes could easily have detected us from the ruins of Xanator,
although the swiftly moving shadows cast by Thuria were helpful to us
since the shadows of every shrub and stunted tree produced a riot of
movement upon the surface of the sea bottom in which our own moving
shadow was less conspicuous, but the hope that I entertained most
fondly was that all of the thoats had followed our beast from the
courtyard and that the green Martian warriors were left dismounted, in
which event no pursuit could overtake us.
The great beast that was carrying us moved swiftly and silently so
that it was not long before we saw in the distance the shadowy foliage
of the mantalia grove and shortly afterward we entered its gloomy
confines. It was not without considerable difficulty, however, that
we located Tavia's flier, and mighty glad was I, too, when we found
it in good condition for we had seen more than a single shadowy form
slinking through the forest and I knew that the fierce animals of the
barren hills and the great white apes of the ruined cities were equally
fond of the milk of the mantalia and that we should be fortunate,
indeed, if we escaped an encounter.
I rode as close to the flier as possible, and, leaving Tavia on the
thoat, slipped quickly to the ground and dragged the small craft out
into the open. An examination of the controls showed that they had not
been tampered with, which was a great relief to me as I had feared that
the flier might have been damaged by the great apes, which are inclined
to be both inquisitive and destructive.
Assured that all was well I assisted Tavia to the ground, and a
moment later we were upon the deck of the flier. The craft responded
satisfactorily, though a little sluggishly, to the controls, and
immediately we were floating gently upward into the temporary safety of
a Barsoomian night.
The flier, which was of a design now almost obsolete in Helium, was
not equipped with a destination control compass, which rendered it
necessary for the pilot to be constantly at the controls. Our quarters
on the narrow deck were exceedingly cramped and I foresaw a most
uncomfortable journey ahead of us. Our safety belts were snapped
to the same deck ring as we lay almost touching one another upon
the hard skeel. The cowl which protected our faces from the rush of
the wind that was generated even by our relatively slow speed was
not sufficiently high to permit us to change our positions to any
considerable degree, though occasionally we found it a relief to sit up
with our backs toward the bow and thus relieve the tedium of remaining
constantly prone in one position. When I thus rested my cramped
muscles, Tavia guided the flier, but the cold wind of the Barsoomian
night always brought me down behind the cowl in a very few moments.
By mutual consent, we were heading in a southwesterly direction while
we discussed our eventual destination.
I had told Tavia that I wished to go to Jahar and why. She appeared
much interested in the story of the abduction of Sanoma Tora, and,
from her knowledge of Tul Axtar and the customs of Jahar, she thought
it most probable that the missing girl might be found there, but as to
the possibility of rescuing her, that was another matter over which she
shook her head dubiously.
It was obvious to me that Tavia did not desire to return to Jahar,
yet she put no obstacles in the path of my search for this my great
objective; in fact, she gave me Jahar's position and herself set the
nose of the flier upon the right course.
"Will there be any great danger to you in returning to Jahar?" I asked
her.
"The danger will be very great," she said, "but where the master goes,
the slave must follow."
"I am not your master," I said, "and you are not my slave. Let us
consider ourselves rather as comrades in arms."
"That will be nice," she said simply, and then after a pause, "and if
we are to be comrades then let me warn you against going directly to
Jahar. This flier would be recognized immediately. Your harness would
mark you as an alien and you would accomplish nothing more toward
rescuing your Sanoma Tora than to achieve the pits of Tul Axtar and
sooner or later the games in the great arena, where eventually you must
be slain."
"What would you suggest then?" I asked.
"Beyond Jahar, to the southwest, lies Tjanath, the city of my birth. Of
all the cities upon Barsoom that is the only one where I may hope to
be received in a friendly manner and as they receive me, so will they
receive you. There you may better prepare to enter Jahar, which you may
only accomplish by disguising yourself as a Jaharian, for Tul Axtar
permits no alien within the confines of his empire other than those
who are brought as prisoners of war and as slaves. In Tjanath you can
obtain the harness and metal of Jahar and there I can coach you in the
customs and manners of the empire of Tul Axtar so that in a short time
you may enter it with some reasonably slight assurance that you may
deceive them as to your identity. To enter without proper preparation
would be fatal."
I saw the wisdom of her counsel and accordingly we altered our course
so as to pass south of Jahar, as we headed straight toward Tjanath, six
thousand haads away.
All the balance of the night we traveled steadily at the rate of about
six hundred haads per zode--a slow speed when compared with that of the
good one-man flier that I had brought out of Helium.
As the sun rose the first thing that attracted my particular attention
was the ghastly blue color of the flier.
"What a color for a flier!" I exclaimed.
Tavia looked up at me. "There is an excellent reason for it, though,"
she said; "a reason that you must fully understand before you enter
Jahar."
V
TO THE PITS
Below us, in the ever-changing light of the two moons, stretched the
weird landscape of a Barsoomian night as our little craft, sorely
overloaded, winged slowly away from Xanator above the low hills that
mark the southwestern boundary of the fierce, green hordes of Torquas.
With the coming of the new day we discussed the advisability of making
a landing and waiting until night before proceeding upon our journey,
since we realized that should we be sighted by an enemy craft we could
not possibly hope to escape.
"Few fliers pass this way," said Tavia, "and if we keep a sharp lookout
I believe that we shall be as safe in the air as on the ground, for
although we have passed beyond the limits of Torquas, there would still
be danger from their raiding parties, which often go far afield."
And so we proceeded slowly in the direction of Tjanath, our eyes
constantly scanning the heavens in all directions.
The monotony of the landscape, combined with our slow rate of progress,
would ordinarily have rendered such a journey unendurable to me, but
to my surprise the time passed quickly, a fact which I attributed
solely to the wit and intelligence of my companion for there was no
gain-saying the fact that Tavia was excellent company. I think that
we must have talked about everything upon Barsoom and naturally a
great deal of the conversation revolved about our own experiences and
personalities, so that long before we reached Tjanath I felt that I
knew Tavia better than I had ever known any other woman and I was quite
sure that I had never confided so completely in any other person.
Tavia had a way with her that seemed to compel confidences so that, to
my own surprise, I found myself discussing the most intimate details of
my past life, my hopes, ambitions and aspirations, as well as the fears
and doubts which, I presume, assail the minds of all young men.
When I realized how fully I had unbosomed myself to this little
slave girl, I experienced a distinct shock of embarrassment, but
the sincerity of Tavia's interest dispelled this feeling as did
the realization that she had been almost as equally free with her
confidences as had I.
We were two nights and a day covering the distance between Xanator
and Tjanath and as the towers and landing stages of our destination
appeared upon the distant horizon toward the end of the first zode of
the second day, I realized that the hours that stretched away behind us
to Xanator were, for some unaccountable reason, as happy a period as I
had ever experienced.
Now it was over. Tjanath lay before us, and with the realization
I experienced a distinct regret that Tjanath did not lie upon the
opposite side of Barsoom.
With the exception of Sanoma Tora, I had never been particularly
keen to be much in the company of women. I do not mean to convey the
impression that I did not like them, for that would not be true. Their
occasional company offered a diversion, which I enjoyed and of which I
took advantage, but that I could be for so many hours in the exclusive
company of a woman I did not love and thoroughly enjoy every minute of
it would have seemed to me quite impossible; yet such had been the fact
and I found myself wondering if Tavia had shared my enjoyment of the
adventure.
"That must be Tjanath," I said, nodding in the direction of the distant
city.
"Yes," she replied.
"You must be glad that the journey is over," I ventured.
She looked up at me quickly, her brows contracting suddenly in
conjecture. "Perhaps I should be," she replied enigmatically.
"It is your home," I reminded her.
"I have no home," she replied.
"But your friends are here," I insisted.
"I have no friends," she said.
"You forget Hadron of Hastor," I reminded her.
"No," she said, "I do not forget that you have been kind to me, but I
remember that I am only an incident in your search for Sanoma Tora.
Tomorrow, perhaps, you will be gone and we shall never see each other
again."
I had not thought of that and I found that I did not like to think
about it, and yet I knew that it was true. "You will soon make friends
here," I said.
"I hope so," she replied; "but I have been gone a very long time and
I was so young when I was taken away that I have but the faintest of
memories of my life in Tjanath. Tjanath really means nothing to me. I
could be as happy anywhere else in Barsoom with--with a friend."
We were now close above the outer wall of the city and our conversation
was interrupted by the appearance of a flier, evidently a patrol,
bearing down upon us. She was sounding an alarm--the shrill screaming
of her horn shattering the silence of the early morning. Almost
immediately the warning was taken up by gongs and shrieking sirens
throughout the city. The patrol boat changed her course and rose
swiftly above us, while from landing stages all about rose scores of
fighting planes until we were entirely surrounded.
I tried to hail the nearer of them, but the infernal din of the warning
signals drowned my voice. Hundreds of guns covered us, their crews
standing ready to hurl destruction upon us.
"Does Tjanath always receive visitors in this hostile manner?" I
inquired of Tavia.
She shook her head. "I do not know," she replied. "Had we approached in
a strange ship of war, I might understand it; but why this little scout
flier should attract half the navy of Tjanath is--Wait!" she exclaimed
suddenly. "The design and color of our flier mark its origin as Jahar.
The people of Tjanath have seen this color before and they fear it;
yet if that is true, why is it that they have not fired upon us?"
"I do not know why they did not fire upon us at first," I replied, "but
it is obvious why they do not now. Their ships are so thick about us
that they could not fire without endangering their own craft and men."
"Can't you make them understand that we are friends?" she asked.
Immediately I made the signs of friendship and of surrender, but the
ships seemed afraid to approach. The alarms had ceased and the ships
were circling silently about us.
Again I hailed a nearby ship. "Do not fire," I shouted; "we are
friends."
"Friends do not come to Tjanath in the blue death ships of Jahar,"
replied an officer upon the deck of the ship I had hailed.
"Let us come alongside," I insisted, "and at least I can prove to you
that we are harmless."
"You will not come alongside my ship," he replied. "If you are friends
you can prove it by doing as I instruct you."
"What are your wishes?" I asked.
"Come about and take your flier beyond the city walls. Ground her at
least a haad beyond the east gate and then, with your companion, walk
toward the city."
"Can you promise that we will be well received?" I asked.
"You will be questioned," he replied, "and if you are all right, you
have nothing to fear."
"Very well," I replied, "we will do as you say. Signal your other ships
to make way for us," and then, through the lane that they opened, we
passed slowly back above the walls of Tjanath and came to the ground
about a haad beyond the east gate.
As we approached the city the gates swung open and a detachment of
warriors marched out to meet us. It was evident that they were very
suspicious and fearful of us. The padwar in charge of them ordered us
to halt while there were yet fully a hundred sofads between us.
"Throw down your weapons," he commanded, "and then come forward."
"But we are not enemies," I replied. "Do not the people of Tjanath know
how to receive friends?"
"Do as you are told or we will destroy you both," was his only reply.
I could not refrain a shrug of disgust as I divested myself of my
weapons, while Tavia threw down the short sword that I had loaned her.
Unarmed we advanced toward the warriors, but even then the padwar was
not entirely satisfied, for he searched our harness carefully before
he finally conducted us into the city, keeping us well surrounded by
warriors.
As the east gate of Tjanath closed behind us I realized that we were
prisoners rather than the guests that we had hoped to be, but Tavia
tried to reassure me by insisting that when they had heard our story we
would be set at liberty and accorded the hospitality that she insisted
was our due.
Our guards conducted us to a building that stood upon the opposite side
of the avenue, facing the east gate, and presently we found ourselves
upon a broad landing stage upon the roof of the building. Here a patrol
flier awaited us and our padwar turned us over to the officer in
charge, whose attitude toward us was marked by ill-concealed hatred and
distrust.
As soon as we had been received on board the patrol flier rose and
proceeded toward the center of the city.