There was nothing for it now other than to fight; nor did I have any
advantage as I sprang, sword in hand, into the corridor before the two
therns, for my untimely sneeze had warned them of my presence and they
were ready for me.
There were no words, for they would have been a waste of breath. The
very presence of the two proclaimed their treachery. That they were
following to fall upon me unawares was all too plain, and they, of
course, must have known that I understood their plan.
In an instant I was engaged with both, and though I loathe the very
name of thern, I must in all fairness admit that they are mighty
swordsmen; and these two were no exception, unless it were that they
were even more skilled and fearless than the average among their race.
While it lasted it was indeed as joyous a conflict as I ever had
experienced. Twice at least I saved my breast from the mortal thrust of
piercing steel only by the wondrous agility with which my earthly
muscles endow me under the conditions of lesser gravity and air
pressure upon Mars.
Yet even so I came near to tasting death that day in the gloomy
corridor beneath Mars’s southern pole, for Lakor played a trick upon me
that in all my experience of fighting upon two planets I never before
had witnessed the like of.
The other thern was engaging me at the time, and I was forcing him
back—touching him here and there with my point until he was bleeding
from a dozen wounds, yet not being able to penetrate his marvelous
guard to reach a vulnerable spot for the brief instant that would have
been sufficient to send him to his ancestors.
It was then that Lakor quickly unslung a belt from his harness, and as
I stepped back to parry a wicked thrust he lashed one end of it about
my left ankle so that it wound there for an instant, while he jerked
suddenly upon the other end, throwing me heavily upon my back.
Then, like leaping panthers, they were upon me; but they had reckoned
without Woola, and before ever a blade touched me, a roaring embodiment
of a thousand demons hurtled above my prostrate form and my loyal
Martian calot was upon them.
Imagine, if you can, a huge grizzly with ten legs armed with mighty
talons and an enormous froglike mouth splitting his head from ear to
ear, exposing three rows of long, white tusks. Then endow this creature
of your imagination with the agility and ferocity of a half-starved
Bengal tiger and the strength of a span of bulls, and you will have
some faint conception of Woola in action.
Before I could call him off he had crushed Lakor into a jelly with a
single blow of one mighty paw, and had literally torn the other thern
to ribbons; yet when I spoke to him sharply he cowed sheepishly as
though he had done a thing to deserve censure and chastisement.
Never had I had the heart to punish Woola during the long years that
had passed since that first day upon Mars when the green jed of the
Tharks had placed him on guard over me, and I had won his love and
loyalty from the cruel and loveless masters of his former life, yet I
believe he would have submitted to any cruelty that I might have
inflicted upon him, so wondrous was his affection for me.
The diadem in the center of the circlet of gold upon the brow of Lakor
proclaimed him a Holy Thern, while his companion, not thus adorned, was
a lesser thern, though from his harness I gleaned that he had reached
the Ninth Cycle, which is but one below that of the Holy Therns.
As I stood for a moment looking at the gruesome havoc Woola had
wrought, there recurred to me the memory of that other occasion upon
which I had masqueraded in the wig, diadem, and harness of Sator Throg,
the Holy Thern whom Thuvia of Ptarth had slain, and now it occurred to
me that it might prove of worth to utilize Lakor’s trappings for the
same purpose.
A moment later I had torn his yellow wig from his bald pate and
transferred it and the circlet, as well as all his harness, to my own
person.
Woola did not approve of the metamorphosis. He sniffed at me and
growled ominously, but when I spoke to him and patted his huge head he
at length became reconciled to the change, and at my command trotted
off along the corridor in the direction we had been going when our
progress had been interrupted by the therns.
We moved cautiously now, warned by the fragment of conversation I had
overheard. I kept abreast of Woola that we might have the benefit of
all our eyes for what might appear suddenly ahead to menace us, and
well it was that we were forewarned.
At the bottom of a flight of narrow steps the corridor turned sharply
back upon itself, immediately making another turn in the original
direction, so that at that point it formed a perfect letter S, the top
leg of which debouched suddenly into a large chamber, illy lighted, and
the floor of which was completely covered by venomous snakes and
loathsome reptiles.
To have attempted to cross that floor would have been to court instant
death, and for a moment I was almost completely discouraged. Then it
occurred to me that Thurid and Matai Shang with their party must have
crossed it, and so there was a way.
Had it not been for the fortunate accident by which I overheard even so
small a portion of the therns’ conversation we should have blundered at
least a step or two into that wriggling mass of destruction, and a
single step would have been all-sufficient to have sealed our doom.
These were the only reptiles I had ever seen upon Barsoom, but I knew
from their similarity to the fossilized remains of supposedly extinct
species I had seen in the museums of Helium that they comprised many of
the known prehistoric reptilian genera, as well as others undiscovered.
A more hideous aggregation of monsters had never before assailed my
vision. It would be futile to attempt to describe them to Earth men,
since substance is the only thing which they possess in common with any
creature of the past or present with which you are familiar—even their
venom is of an unearthly virulence that, by comparison, would make the
cobra de capello seem quite as harmless as an angleworm.
As they spied me there was a concerted rush by those nearest the
entrance where we stood, but a line of radium bulbs inset along the
threshold of their chamber brought them to a sudden halt—evidently they
dared not cross that line of light.
I had been quite sure that they would not venture beyond the room in
which I had discovered them, though I had not guessed at what deterred
them. The simple fact that we had found no reptiles in the corridor
through which we had just come was sufficient assurance that they did
not venture there.
I drew Woola out of harm’s way, and then began a careful survey of as
much of the Chamber of Reptiles as I could see from where I stood. As
my eyes became accustomed to the dim light of its interior I gradually
made out a low gallery at the far end of the apartment from which
opened several exits.
Coming as close to the threshold as I dared, I followed this gallery
with my eyes, discovering that it circled the room as far as I could
see. Then I glanced above me along the upper edge of the entrance to
which we had come, and there, to my delight, I saw an end of the
gallery not a foot above my head. In an instant I had leaped to it and
called Woola after me.
Here there were no reptiles—the way was clear to the opposite side of
the hideous chamber—and a moment later Woola and I dropped down to
safety in the corridor beyond.
Not ten minutes later we came into a vast circular apartment of white
marble, the walls of which were inlaid with gold in the strange
hieroglyphics of the First Born.
From the high dome of this mighty apartment a huge circular column
extended to the floor, and as I watched I saw that it slowly revolved.