_Ulana_
Blaine was tugging at the lever he had seen the Rulans use in opening
the stone door from the inside. Tommy, less excited, tried to press one
of the invisible cloaks into his free hand.
"Here," he begged. "Don't be a damn fool! They'll get you, the devils."
But the great block of stone was swinging already and the young pilot
squeezed through and into the passage. He stumbled over the crumpled
figure of a young girl and into the arms of one of the green-bronze
guards.
Recovering instantly, he prodded the big fellow's ribs with the ray
pistol. "Stick 'em up!" he snarled. Then, realizing the words were
meaningless to the other, he said, "Raise your hands--above your head!
That's right. Stand still now, or I'll use the ray."
The guard, his face ghastly in the dim light, obeyed. But his wary eyes
never left Blaine's for an instant.
A short way down the hall was the body of a young Rulan. Blaine
shuddered as he saw it was headless. The ray had nearly missed that
time, its energy spent before complete disintegration was effected. The
girl lay still at his feet. With quick fingers he frisked the guard,
finding his ray pistol and one gas grenade. What was he to do with the
big fellow? He ought to let him have it, but somehow he couldn't.
Tommy was in the passageway then, invisible. The big guard stifled an
amazed cry as his husky voice came out of the nothingness. These devils
of Earth men! They had worked their evil magic on the Zara: had she not
ordered that their lives be spared? And now there was this! His
thoughts were written large on the ordinarily expressionless
countenance, and Blaine was tempted to laugh at his affrighted dismay.
"Come on, you bonehead," Tommy was saying in English. "Bring the big
bum inside. I'll carry the girl. Hurry; there'll be a million of them
in a minute."
The girl's huddled figure was raised by unseen hands. Poised in mid-air
for a moment, it floated joggily, unsteadily through the crack of the
partly opened stone door. The guard, wide-mouthed and staring, muttered
supplication to the war gods of Antrid.
* * * * *
Safely inside the secret chamber, the Earth men made haste to truss up
the guard and gag him. He was as tractable as a child under the
invisible fingers of Tom Farley, with eyes imploring the evil spirits
for mercy. And when Tommy's head appeared, drifting, unsupported by a
body; to be followed by arms and shoulders that seemed to materialize
from nothingness, the big fellow struggled panic-stricken in his bonds,
shaking with superstitious terror.
Blaine straightened the girl's limbs where she lay on a low couch. She
was breathing in low shuddering gasps, but a swift examination assured
him she had not been harmed. Her beautifully chiseled ivory features
were fixed in an expression of nameless dread. A mass of red-gold hair
tumbled in confusion about her face and shoulders and when the pilot
smoothed this back his heart did a most peculiar flip-flop. Sort of
jumped into his throat and stuck there. This Rulan maiden was a vision
of feminine loveliness if there ever was one; a dream.
Tommy watched him with a cynical smile, and said with mock contempt,
"So you're the guy who swore you'd never tangle up with a femme! Just a
month ago, too. Now look: first you get this Zara woman all het up over
you, and now this one's got you all het up over her. You make me sick!"
There was no fitting retort. Besides, this thing that had come to him
was too serious; too big. He couldn't kid about it--even with Tom. Why,
he'd always pictured this very girl in his thoughts; had always dreamed
of meeting her some day. And here she was: a living, breathing reality.
She was stirring, too, now; breathing easier. Her eyes opened wide;
frightened, innocent ones like a child's, blue-gray and fringed with
long lashes that raised dewy from the smooth ivory of her cheeks.
* * * * *
"Antius, my brother," she exclaimed, remembering, "where is he? I
saw--I thought--and the guard; he wanted to take me--oh!"
Hands fluttering to cover her face, she was sobbing now, and Blaine
raised her in his arms, clumsily attempting to comfort her.
"Your brother," he said gently; "I'm afraid the guard did away with
him. He is no more."
"Y-yes. I remember now; I saw." She shuddered and became still, her
tousled golden head somehow finding a comfortable hollow beneath
Blaine's shoulder.
And then, bravely, she sat erect and faced him. "I--I suppose I
shouldn't feel so badly," she said. "We always expect it. But I was so
fond of him, and he was the last. I am alone now."
"Not alone," said Blaine; "you have me--us, that is. We are the Earth
men, you know. And you are safe here."
"You are Carson?" she inquired.
"Yes, and my friend is Farley. That is how your people address us, but
we had rather you call us Blaine and Tommy."
Tom Farley was grinning like an idiot. Didn't he have any more sense?
Blaine thought. The girl would think he was making fun of her.
"I am Ulana," she said simply.
The stone door opened silently and Tiedus slipped in, closing it
swiftly behind him. He stared at the girl and at the trussed-up figure
of the guard.
"So!" he exclaimed; "this is the explanation." He breathed heavily as
if he had run a long way, and his face was flushed with excitement.
"Why? What's wrong?" Blaine sensed a calamity.
"The Zara--she must have seen you in the crystal. She is in a murderous
rage and has visited her wrath on the Tritu Anu. Even now Dantor is on
his way to Ilen-dar in answer to her summons."
"Tiedus! I'm sorry. It is my fault entirely, but--but we heard Ulana
cry out."
"You did quite right, Carson. I should have done the same myself. And
actually it makes little difference as far as we Rulans are concerned.
We had not long to remain in this life, anyway. It is only that your
hiding place might be revealed; that our plans to outwit the Llotta
will fail."
"You--you think she will make away with Dantor?"
"No; he is too valuable as a scientist. But the guards are awaiting her
orders to repeat what happened in the Tritu Nogaru. She depends on the
work of this laboratory a great deal, though it may be she will stay
her hand."
* * * * *
He was fussing with the controls of the small crystal as he spoke, and
it sprang into life with the peculiar shifting milkiness. Then,
clearly, they were looking into the council chamber at Ilen-dar. Clyone
was there, pacing the floor. Dantor had just arrived with two of the
green-bronze guards. The Zara, though nervous, was curiously calm and
polite in her greeting of the aged scientist.
"Dantor," she said, "I want these Earth men."
"I can not produce them, Your Majesty."
"You will not, you mean." Clyone dropped her voice. "For two reasons,
Dantor, I must have these Earth men. And they must not be harmed. We
need them on account of this k-metal that was brought by Antazzo, whose
ugly body I so foolishly destroyed."
"Two reasons, you said, oh Clyone?" Dantor smiled knowingly.
"Yes, two!" said the Zara defiantly. "I love this Carson, if you must
know. And it is the only influence for good that ever has come into my
life, Dantor. Oh, can't you see? I _must_ have them."
Blaine felt the hot blood mount to his temples. Tommy giggled like a
moron. And Ulana drew away, ever so slightly, it was true, but still it
was a definite withdrawal. Damn this leopard woman, anyway!
"He is not for you, oh Clyone," Dantor was saying, "To people of his
world the very thought of such a woman as yourself is repulsive. A
murderess he would call you! Their reactions to the taking of human
life are entirely different from those of the Llotta. They are--you
will pardon my saying it--more like those of the Rulans. The Llotta
hold life cheap; they hold it dear. To your people you are not a bad
woman; only a foolish one who sometimes, in the heat of passion, upsets
their plans by the sudden snuffing out of a life that is valuable to
those plans. Do you not see my point? He is different; to him you are
the wickedest woman whom he has ever encountered--a monster."
* * * * *
This was strong talk. Blaine drew a quick breath, anticipating another
of her black rages and sudden death for poor old Dantor.
But Clyone suddenly was on her knees before the old scientist, pleading
with him! Creature of strange caprices! Though humanlike in her
emotions when in her softer moods, she was more like the feline to
which Blaine had likened her, when those soft moods had passed.
Somewhere overhead, in the chambers of the Tritu Anu, there was the
sound of a muffled explosion. Its shock was felt even here in the
rock-hewn secret apartment. Tiedus went white. Quickly he manipulated
the controls of the crystal sphere.
"It can't be," he exclaimed. "The guards would not disobey her, and she
has ordered no action."
Swiftly, then, the searching ray of the apparatus swung back to the
Tritu Anu itself, boring into the vast structure above them. One of the
chemical laboratories was completely wrecked; maimed and dying Rulans
were everywhere in the ruins. And those who staggered to their feet
were shot down by the green-bronze guards who stood at the doorway.
Then, floor after floor was revealed in the all-seeing crystal.
Everywhere it was the same. Merciless, cold-blooded destruction of the
Rulan scientists, the most valuable of all in the Llott scheme of
things. The Earth men were speechless with horror. Ulana once more
buried her head in Carson's shoulder, moaning helplessly.
The scene shifted again to the council chamber of the palace in
Ilen-dar. The Zara had not risen from her knees; she was still pleading
with Dantor. She knew nothing of the massacre.
"Ianito!" Tiedus gasped. "It must be he."
* * * * *
And once more the view was changed. They were in the huge dome through
which they had entered this mad world. Near the base of the great
telescope a bullet-headed Llott was gazing into the depths of one of
the crystal spheres, watching the carnage in the Tritu Anu and shouting
his orders to the guards. "Slay, slay, slay!" he yelled. "Not a Rulan
shall remain in all Antrid. It is Ianito commanding you, Ianito the
Great, master of our destinies, Dictator Supreme. Let not one escape; I
command it. Then will come the great day of release; of conquest. A new
home, a new world awaits you for the taking."
"It is as I thought," Tiedus groaned: "it is the end. He has taken
things in his own hands at last."
The sphere went blank at his touch of a lever. His shoulders drooped
and he spread his hands in a gesture of resignation.
"What in the devil!" Tommy exploded. "Can this guy overrule the Zara?
Is he that powerful?"
"He is actual ruler of the world that is Antrid; the power behind the
throne. Clyone must do his bidding. He has seen that she is softening
and resolved to speed things up himself."
A sudden bedlam could be heard in the corridor outside the stone door.
This Ianito had gone the Zara one better. He had located them; probably
saw the capture of the guard and the rescue of Ulana on the very spot
where his minions now hammered for entrance.
"They will take you!" Tiedus whispered. "There is no doubt as to the
orders issued by Ianito. They will take you alive and bring you to him.
You will be compelled to yield the secret of the metal that energizes."
"Not on your life! We'll refuse." Blaine was very positive.
Tiedus smiled sadly. "There is the pink gas, you know," he reminded
him. "No, Carson, there is but one way. You must go out into the jungle
and hide for a time. Dantor will return later; it is certain he will be
spared. And he will contrive some way of outwitting them. Come; there
is a passage."
Blaine saw the wisdom of the argument. It was their only chance. There
was a blast that shook the ground beneath their feet, and a huge
section of the stone door was blown into the room. He drew Ulana close
with a possessive encircling arm.
* * * * * * * * * *
They were in a dark narrow passage now, following the whispered voice
of Tiedus. It was damp and rankly odorous there in the darkness, and
slimy things wriggled over the floor, brushing their ankles clammily.
Behind them there was the roar of another explosion and the shouting of
angry voices. The guards were in the secret chamber and hot on their
trail.
Tiedus was fumbling with something ahead of them where they had halted;
something that rattled and clanked and finally came free. A door opened
into the deep-shadowed green of the jungle.
"Go now, quickly," he warned them. "Hide yourselves as far in as you
dare go. You will be lost, but will later be directed by a mental
message from Dantor. I shall advise him from the spirit world. We do
that, you know, we Rulans. But I must leave you now; I must hold back
the guards to give you time. Go, friends; farewell."
In his hand Tiedus held the ray pistol they had taken from the captured
guard. He would account for a few of the Llotta at least. Blaine
reached for him to restrain him; it was unthinkable that this fine lad
should sacrifice himself for them. But Tiedus was gone; he had slipped
away into the black depths of the passageway.
"Come on, snap into it!" Tommy grated, his voice brittle with
suppressed emotion. "The kid's right; let's go." He pushed his way into
the matted growth of the jungle.
Holding Ulana close and not daring to look into her eyes lest he should
see what he knew was there, Blaine followed his friend. The mysterious
depths of the pale green forest closed in about them.