PART IV: THE FLIGHT FROM THE CAVERNS

CHAPTER 16

When Rogues Flee

To be lost and alone in the jungles of Zanthodon was no new experience for Fumio the Thandarian. After all, his own distant land of Thandar contained jungles no less thickly grown, or gloomy, or less dangerous than these. Still and all, Fumio felt the cold touch of fear clutch at his heart increasingly the more he pondered his predicament.

When One-Eye had come racing into the little camp with an enraged bull goroth charging at his heels, Fumio had jumped up and fled without a moment’s thought for anything other than to save his skin. And, once started on his flight, he had continued running blindly for some time until he became satisfied that the aurochs was no longer in the vicinity.

Such was his panic at the unexpected appearance of the monster animal that Fumio had taken no notice whatsoever of the direction of his flight. Noticing the jungle, he had veered toward it; instants later dense gloom closed about him. He blundered along for quite some time until, panting for breath, his legs beginning to ache with weariness, he paused to catch his second wind and strained his ears for some audible evidence that the goroth was or was not pursuing him. Since the jungle was silent and he heard nothing of the sounds so huge a beast would naturally have made had it been crashing through the underbrush, he soon concluded, to his immense relief, that the beast was no longer on his trail.

Looking about him, the Stone Age warrior was unable to remember in which direction he had come. Every side of the small clearing in which he stood panting looked very much the same as every other side, and in the darkness cast by the tightly interwoven branches which roofed the glade, Fumio could not employ his hunter’s gift for reading the signs of passage through the underbrush which a man or an animal make.

Fumio shrugged gloomily, once the knowledge of this was borne to him. Philosophically, he decided that one direction was as good as another. A traitor to his kind, he was doubtless by now considered an outlaw and an exile, forbidden to return to the companionship of his people or to his homeland itself. This being the case, it mattered little to Fumio where he was or in which direction he traveled, for to the homeless, all other lands are strange and unfamiliar.

On impulse, Fumio struck out to his left, where an aisle wound between rows of huge trees of a sort unfamiliar to him. Soon there came to his ears the splashing, gurgling sound a brook or small spring makes; aware of a consuming thirst, the warrior headed in the direction from which that sound came to him. Erelong, he came upon a small brook flowing from heaped and moss-grown rocks. He paused to refresh himself, and wet his face and beard in the clear, bitterly cold water to revive his flagging strength.

After resting for a time on the sward, massaging the tiredness from his aching legs, Fumio rose and went about the business of survival in a practical manner. Coward and bully and traitor though he certainly was, Fumio was also a warrior of Zanthodon; his entire life had been spent in the struggle to survive in a hostile environment filled with treacherous swamps, jungles where monstrous predators roamed and lands in which every tribe or nation other than his own was unthinkingly considered to be the enemy, to be avoided if possible, to be fought bravely if they could not be avoided.

And Fumio would not have survived to his present age, the middle twenties, perhaps, had he not learned fast and well the hard lessons given in that toughest of all schools—the wilderness.

The first thing that Fumio did was to devise weapons. Nowhere in his vicinity could he spy those certain trees from whose long, slender, straight branches—his experience had taught him—crude but effective spears may be best fashioned. However, the foot of the rockpile wherefrom fountained forth the little spring was littered with stones of various sizes, and fallen wood lay scattered about the mossy banks of the narrow brook fed by that spring. Removing a length of leather thong from his waist, where such were wound about his middle to support the brief fur kilt which was his only raiment, he commenced binding the stone which he had selected—the one with the best balance and the sharpest edge—to a short length of wood, thereby manufacturing a crude but serviceable stone axe.

Next, selecting smooth, round pebbles from the bed of the little stream, the Cro-Magnon warrior improvised a sling from another length of thong. Fumio was nowise as proficient in the use of the sling as was, for example, the Princess Darya—the sling being considered a woman’s weapon, primarily. Nevertheless, he could employ a sling adequately enough, and two weapons were better than none.

Conscious of that sudden desire to sleep that strikes the folk of Zanthodon unpredictably and swiftly, he chose the crotch of a tall tree to serve as his bed.

With sling and stone axe near at hand, should dangerous beasts come prowling by, Fumio composed himself for slumber, and fell asleep in instants. This is a talent which nature has reserved for the more primitive of her children. It can be observed in beasts and also in savages; men softened and pampered by urban or civilized life seem to have been denied the faculty. But Fumio, of course, was neither, and he slept deeply despite the discomforts of his aerial perch.

And woke to receive the surprise of his life—

* * * *

While Fumio of Thandar adapted swiftly and naturally to the harsh life of survival in the jungle, it was quite different with Xask the Zarian.

The former vizier of the Apemen of Kor had not always dwelt among primitives such as Fumio’s kind or the Neanderthals. Indeed, he had been a citizen of the Scarlet City of Zar which was, insofar as he knew, the premier civilization of Zanthodon. Effete, cruel, luxurious, the men and women of Xask’s homeland were as urbane and sophisticated—and every bit as decadent—as had been the ancient folk of Imperial Rome.

While this was not the first time that Xask had been forced to live in the jungle wild, he had learned but little from his previous experience. When, for mysterious reasons he kept to himself, the slender little man of indeterminate age had been exiled and driven forth from the Scarlet City, he had endured the privations and perils of a long trek, as he wandered aimlessly through the jungles and mountains and grassy plains of the Underground World.

That he had managed to survive at all under such hostile conditions, which neither his past experience nor his consider able intelligence had prepared him to face, was largely due to sheer luck, somewhat tempered with extreme caution and wariness. As matters eventuated, Xask had soon been captured by a band of Drugar slavers, who took him back to Kor, where his subtle wit and natural cunning brought him to first the attention and then the favor of Uruk, the brutal monarch of the cave kingdom.

When the same goroth whose sudden charge had precipitated Fumio into flight similarly, frightened Xask, the quickwitted Zarian had retained the .45 automatic he had taken from me.

Although the nature and mechanism of the weapon were completely unknown to him, Xask clung to it by sheer instinct. And, when he ran for his life, in another direction from that taken by Fumio, Xask did not succumb wholly to panic, but kept his eyes open. Thus, he knew approximately where he was in relation to where he had been; moreover, glancing back over his shoulder from time to time, the slim little man made a mental note of the place along the border of the jungle where Fumio entered that jungle.

He could not exactly have told you why he did so; taking precautions and constantly adding to his store of information were among the traits of survival which assist one in urban civilization as well as in the primeval wilderness. And Xask—whatever else he might have been—was a survivor.

Unlike Fumio, who fled in blind panic, Xask stopped running the instant he perceived himself no longer to be in any danger from the great aurochs, which had gone trotting off, as if satisfied at having driven the puny little man-things into flight. Concealing himself among the scattered boulders which littered the base of the cliffs, Xask examined the situation thoughtfully.

He had not happened to notice the direction in which I had escaped, nor, indeed, was he certain that I had not been gored or trampled to death by the huge bull, because outcroppings from the foothills had blocked his view at a strategic point. Neither did he happen to observe what had befallen his henchman, One-Eye.

Cautiously retracing his steps to the place where we had camped, he searched the turf, finding nothing. If One-Eye and Eric Carstairs had vanished, Xask sagely concluded, at least he knew where Fumio had gone. And promptly the slender Zarian entered the jungles and began his search.

Fumio had not given a moment’s thought to the fate of One-Eye, Xask or Eric Carstairs. Indeed, the Thandarian was rather relieved to be rid of us, for he feared One-Eye, distrusted Xask and hated me.

Things were other, however, with Xask. Unused to daring the perils of the wild alone, Xask desired to find a comrade to stand at his side, and was confident of his abilities to coax or bully or persuade or intimidate virtually any conceivable companion into doing his bidding.

Nor was he wrong in this estimate of his abilities. For the clever little Zarian was another Machiavelli, born and bred. And the secret of his swift rise to power in the Scarlet City, as in the cave kingdom of the Drugars, lay in this natural skill.

* * * *

It did not prove difficult for Xask to follow the trail of Fumio, despite his almost total lack of anything remotely resembling woodcraft. And the reason for this was the noise which the cowardly Thandarian made as he blundered through the brush in his panicky flight.

Fumio was traveling in as straight a line as was possible, considering the thick growth of the jungle and the numerous natural obstacles. And once Xask ascertained the direction of that flight, he resigned himself to patiently following that same direction.

Soon, however, he became intensely irritated. Twigs and bushes tore and dissarranged the graceful folds of his Zarian garment. Mud and leaf-mulch beslimed his legs and the hem of his garment. Thorns scratched his bare arms and face; gnats and other insects bit him in the more tender portions of his anatomy, and flew into his eyes.

And he began to sweat.

Xask did not like to sweat. It seemed to his way of thinking injurious to his dignity to perspire: it was not only uncomfortable but a token of physical labor, and Xask had always avoided physical labor whenever possible.

He became very uncomfortable. And he made himself a promise that, when once he had caught up to Fumio and had bullied or cowed or intimidated him, he would make him pay for these discomforts and indignities.

Thinking with cold relish on the various ways in which he could extract satisfaction from making Fumio squirm, Xask proceeded through the jungle for an interminable period.

Lacking the great physical strength and endurance of a warrior such as Fumio, the slighter, older man tired more swiftly and was soon reeling with dizzy exhaustion. But he did not dare pause in order to rest or refresh himself, for Fumio was still blundering along in full flight far ahead, and Xask knew that once the man he was following paused in his flight and recovered his wits, he could proceed in any direction—and without creating undue noise which could attract predators. The Thandarians can progress through the jungle as soundlessly as any Algonquin, and once Fumio stopped running and got over his panic, Xask knew he could vanish into the depths easily, which would leave the Zarian all alone.

And this did not at all suit the plans of Xask; therefore, although every muscle in his body by this point ached beyond tolerance, and thirst had dried the lining of his mouth and throat, Xask forced his weary legs to keep moving.

The sounds which Fumio made in his flight had long since ceased. And Xask redoubled his efforts in order to catch up with the fugitive before he had a chance to disappear. Erelong, the Zarian came limping through the wild to where a small spring poured fresh water from a pile of rocks, and the resultant brook went gurgling off through the woods. Xask was powerfully tempted to pause and refresh himself; indeed, he yielded to that temptation, but not without cautiously surveying his surroundings.

And the first thing he saw was Fumio alseep in the crotch of a nearby tree.

The second thing he saw was the enormous bulk of a monstrous reptile shouldering through the brush as it lumbered between the boles of the trees. The small wicked eyes in the tiny head at the end of its long prehensile neck spied the man-morsel slumbering in the tree.

Alas, the tidbit, however tempting, was beyond the dinosaur’s reach.

Swiveling its head about, those wicked eyes spied Xask, where he stood frozen by the brook, cold water dribbling from between numb fingers.

The monster had a high, humped back, lined with a double crest of bony blades which dwindled in size as they followed the length of its short tail.

From this, Xask recognized the saurian for a drunth—one of the most fearsome of the predators of Zanthodon and one which, unfortunately, was a meat-eater. I believe that Professor Potter, had he been here, would have known the giant reptile as a stegosaurus.

However, the Professor was happily not on the scene, but Xask was. And to the philosophical, if minute, brain of the drunth, one man-morsel is about the same as another.

And it came at him like a living avalanche of armored muscle—

CHAPTER 17

The Opening of the Door

After Darya returned to her place in the slave pens, she shared the cold, repulsive gruel with the others who dwelt in the same chamber, and composed herself for slumber. But the girl, although weary from the tasks of the day, did not find it easy to drift into sleep. For to meet again with Eric Carstairs, to exchange words with him and to learn that somewhat of the feelings she felt for the tall, black-haired stranger were felt by him in return, was enough to make her heart beat faster and her superb young breasts to rise and fall with the quickening of her breath.

In truth, the jungle girl was not certain how to define those feelings, for the time we had spent together in the slave ranks of the Drugars had been all too brief. And in the considerable interval of time since they had broken free of the Apemen, she had long since resigned herself to the knowledge that I must have been slain. The women of Zanthodon know all too well that survival is a hard and continuous struggle; they become accustomed to the harsh realities of just how fragile human life is in the Underground World as they see fathers, husbands, sons and lovers perish in the hunt or in war, or to hostile nature, with its earthquakes and storms and gigantic predators.

But now—unexpectedly, beyond even hope!—the tall stranger had reappeared in her life; and now her heart thrilled to the discovery that, all this while, he had been struggling to find and rescue her once again. As she realized what that meant in terms of the feeling which he entertained for her, and which remained as yet only tentatively suggested, the blood sang in her veins and the turmoil of her emotions seethed in her heart.

His plans for escape thrilled her, as well; for escape from this ghastly underworld of fetid gloom and listless slaves was the substance of her hopes and dreams. And, somehow, knowing that Eric Carstairs was near, her hopes sprang to life with redoubled vigor…while the black-haired man was not sujat, no ghost to walk through walls of solid stone, no miracle worker embued with tremendous powers, just to know that he was near gave her cause to believe that an escape to freedom was at least possible.

To be this near to freedom—to hope for an escape into the jungles with the tall man at her side—to know that her mighty sire and all his host of warriors were not far off, and had not given over their attempt to rescue her from peril—all of these were as a potent intoxicant to the emotions of the girl.

How cruelly ill-timed, then, to know that all these hopes were doomed.…

For Darya, too, knew that she and Jorn and all of the Sotharians were to be given over to the hellish embrace of the monstrous leech things when next she woke.

Tears came to the eyes of the brave and gallant maid. She thrust the knuckles of one small hand against her mouth to stifle the sob that rose unbidden in her breast.

It would not do to have the others see her weep.

But, O, Eric Carstairs! To be this close to the one she so powerfully desired—and to have her hopes dashed to the cold stone floor!

* * * *

And, as the little ironies of Fate would have it, at almost that very instant, Tharn of Thandar was even nearer than the Stone Age princess could dare to hope.

His agile huntsmen and scouts had scaled the cliff to its crest. That cliff ran the length of the promontory like a spine, and along the crest Komad and his scouts scrutinized the naked stone for any sign or token that Darya and her companion had passed this way.

Here and there, shallow depressions in the stony crest bore loose dirt blown hither by the updrafts that howled between the Peaks of Peril; loose rock, crumbled by rain and wind, formed deposits of broken shale; plants, their seeds wind-carried to this aerie, sprouted in clefts of the rock; mold and lichen, fungi and moss, nourished by steamy rains, carpeted places sheltered by higher rock.

It was in these places that the keen eyes of Komad the scout ascertained that Darya had passed this way.

It was not the sort of proof that would have been tangible, or even visible, to the eyes of such as you or I. A mere matter of a dry pebble dislodged from its bed by a passing foot, a slithering heap of shale disturbed, the smear of wetness where a hand or knee had crushed the moss of lichen. But to the hawklike gaze of such as Komad of Thandar, the evidence was blatantly obvious, and he passed the word down to where his chief stood with stolid features, arms folded upon his mighty breast, as if thereby to still the throb of hope within his father’s heart.

Once Komad had found proof that Darya had scaled the cliff, Tharn gave swift orders to his warriors to scale the wall of rock. Not all of the men of Thandar were as nimble as the scouts and huntsmen, so crude ladders were swiftly constructed whereby all could ascend to the crest. These were merely the trunks of saplings or of fallen trees, their limbs lopped off with stone axes so that the stumps could serve as rungs.

When six of these were leaned against the stony wall, the warriors climbed in single file. And in less time than it would take me to describe this scene, all were assembled atop the rocky spine of the peninsula.

Here Komad, with every skill and intuition he possessed, strove to follow the meager trail. Since the markings made by Darya and her companion continued for a time along the crest of the wall, he continued along the top of the cliffs until at length he reached the site of the hidden trapdoor which had, you will remember, tilted to precipitate Jorn and Darya into the trap of the Gorpaks.

Komad paused, at the far end of the trapdoor, turning his head from side to side as if baffled. He continued on for twenty paces; then he returned to the place whereon first he had paused. Loose patches of windblown soil lay ahead, and a patch of damp moss flourished in the shadow of a tall boulder. Had Darya and her companion continued farther ahead from this spot, surely they would have left the marks of their passage in one or the other place.

But neither the windblown soil nor the damp moss had recently been disturbed. And there was no sign or token that the lost Princess and her companion had veered to either side of the clifftop to attempt a descent.

Komad scratched his grizzled cheek, baffled. It was as if the viewless air had opened an invisible jaw to swallow the two up. But this was nonsense; ghosts and monsters and witch doctors there might well be, but anything physical enough to have done such a deed would itself have left markings. And no such markings met his eagle eye.

Since they had gone neither ahead nor to either side, nor had they retraced their steps, in what other direction could the two possibly have gone?

That was the question Komad posed to himself as he stood immobile, deep in thought.

He looked down.

The stone slab under his feet seemed as solid as did the rest of the cliff. And he could not discover so much as a hairline crack that seemed artificial. Nevertheless.…

Had Komad of Thandar ever, by some miracle, been able to read Conan Doyle’s tales of Mr. Sherlock Holmes, he would have nodded in agreement with that master detective’s most celebrated dictum: “Eliminate the impossible. Whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

Borrowing a stone axe from one of the warriors—who crouched on their heels in silent vigil, alertly watching as Komad strove to trace the whereabouts of Darya—the scout rapped against the stony slab and listened with ears no less keen than were his eyes.

Then he moved two paces farther on, and repeated the action.

Then two paces more.

Suddenly, the sound seemed to him subtly different. In the first two places, the stone had rung with a faint but definite echo to the blow of the axe. But beyond those two sites, the stone rung with a dull thud. Komad looked up.

“The stone is hollow there,” he said, pointing.

Without a moment’s delay, Tharn gave the proper commands to the men who stood eager and ready.

As far as the High Chief of Thandar was concerned, he was perfectly willing to rip the very Peaks of Peril asunder in order to find his missing daughter. And the warriors of Thandar were themselves no less willing, if only it would enable them to rescue their lost Princess.…

* * * *

From the edge of the cliff, behind where Tharn and his warriors chopped and pried and levered at the rocky slab, the Barbary pirates watched from places of concealment, baffled at the mysterious actions of the savages.

The Thandarians were too numerous and too well-armed for Achmed of El-Cazar to risk an open battle; besides, there seemed to be no need to fight the jungle men. For the moment, he was perfectly content to wait, to watch, to spy upon them, for it seemed that they, too, were searching for something.

It never occurred to Achmed to guess that both his men and the savages were searching for the same young woman.

“What is it that they do, the wild men?” inquired Tarbu in a hoarse whisper, from where he crouched at the elbow of the first mate of the Red Witch.

Achmed shrugged, mystified.

“Allah alone knows,” he muttered. For it seemed to him as if the savages were trying to break into the very fabric of the cliffs. Although why they should, or what it was they were after, was beyond the imaginings of the Moor.

“Let us fall upon them, and slay,” grumbled a burly Turk named Kemal, who crouched nearby in the shade of the boulder. “To lurk like dogs—to slink and scurry—is not seemly for the heroes of El-Cazar.”

Achmed gave him a glare of fierce reproof.

“You will lurk and scurry like dogs, O dog of Istamboul, if I bid you do so,” he snarled. “They are armed and they are many—”

“No more than are we,” grunted the Turk, hefting the hilt of his dented scimitar significantly, his magnificent mustachios (which were his pride and joy) bristling belligerently.

“Still thy tongue, O Kemal, or I shall slit it for thee, and thou shalt croak all thy days like a raven,” said Achmed coldly. “It behooves us now to wait and watch and listen—”

Grumbling and calling upon his prophet, the fat Turk subsided. The Barbary pirates had watched from the shelter of the trees as the primitives had felled and trimmed the tall saplings whereby they had scaled the sheer wall of the cliffs. Once the savages were gone farther down the rocky spine of the promontory, Achmed had cautiously bade his corsairs ascend the cliff by means of the same crude ladders. Now they held the rear of the Thandarian host, crouched behind tall spires of rock and round boulders, watching carefully.

“The Barbarossa would not hide like a starveling cur,” grouched Kemal to the man nearest him, but in low tones so that Achmed would not overhear.

“The Barbarossa is not here, dog of a Turk,” spat the lean Arab at his side. “And the mate Achmed is. So we must do his bidding…of what use to engage a band of howling savages? We are not here for war, but to seize a runaway girl. Now be silent, and let us observe in silence…”

Powerful and determined were the warriors of Thandar, and indefatigable. But, for all the vigor of their unrelenting effort, the secret of the mechanism which controlled the stone trapdoor continued to elude them.

Nevertheless, they toiled on.

Tharn frowned, his head heavy. For all the jungle monarch knew, every moment might count. Even at this moment, a horrible doom might be creeping upon his helpless daughter in those black and unknown depths below his feet.

Somehow he guessed that time was running out.…

But there was nothing to do but strive on.

CHAPTER 18

Burning Bright

Harsh gongs awoke us from our restless, troubled slumbers. The bars were withdrawn which blocked the door to our pen, and bandy-legged little Gorpaks came waddling between the rows of sleeping men and women, rousing us with flicks of the whip and sharp, barking commands.

When we were assembled into ranks, my personal adversary, little Captain Lutho, came strutting and preening before us, eyeing us up and down with shrewd, gloating gaze.

“Attention, animals!” he snapped. “It is now your inestimable honor to serve Those who are in every way greater than yourselves, as They are in every way superior even to us Gorpaks, their servants and minions! Reluctance and recalcitrance will not be tolerated, for your entire purpose in this world is to obey the least whim of Those who are as far above you in the scheme of nature as you are above the worms that delve in the dark places of the earth.…”

The pompous little dwarf went on in this general line for a lengthy harangue, before we at last were herded out of our dungeon and down a winding corridor to our unknown doom.

As we marched stolidly along, I caught the opportunity to exchange meaningful glances with Hurok, Varak and Garth, the Omad of the men of Sothar. During the sleep period just past, we had talked long, laying our plans. Garth had been of the opinion that we should spring upon the Gorpaks the moment they dispersed down the aisles between our rows of sleeping places, but I counseled delay.

“Let us wait until they march us forward to meet their Masters,” I had argued. “Both the Sluaggh and the Gorpaks are more accustomed to dealing with the cowed and broken cavern people than they are with brave and determined fighting men. And I have a little surprise in store for the Sluaggh.…”

In the end, Garth yielded to the superior wisdom of my scheme. At least, I hoped that my wisdom was superior, but only time would tell…and time, for us, was swiftly running out.…

At some juncture in the maze of wandering corridors we encountered another pack of captives, who were under heavy guard by the Gorpaks. I guessed at once that this crowd contained the other Sotharian party, and Jorn and my beloved Princess as well. Nor was I wrong: across the heads of the blond warriors, my eyes flew to Darya’s lovely face, and her blue eyes clung to mine. I strove to convey confidence in my expression, but I do not know if she saw anything there but that which she expected to see.

We were formed together, and the men of Sothar who had been long parted from their friends and family members in the other group, clung together, happily weeping, until separated by blows of whip and cudgel. But the cruel Gorpaks, for all their brutality, could not prevent the men and women of Sothar from looking into the faces of their mates, their relatives and their friends.

* * * *

By my side, Professor Potter limped along, grumbling. Behind me, Hurok loomed protectively, saying nothing. Farther down the line, One-Eye stumped along, his huge head lowered, and beneath his russet fur and coating of dirt I knew his ugly features were pale and sweating with craven fear.

My heart was in my throat. This long trek through the caverns might well be the last journey for me and my friends. But I consoled myself with the knowledge that, at least, we would go out fighting. It wasn’t as much consolation as I could have used at that moment, but it was all I had. And I wondered to myself if my plan would work.…

We came at length into the enormous stone room of which Hurok had told me in his account of his own adventures. All was as he had described it to me, the great slab of a trapdoor beneath which, I assumed, the hideous Sluaggh lolled, awaiting their repulsive repast. Above, I glimpsed the unrailed balcony from which the Apeman had observed the leeches at their Feasting. Around the walls of the vast, echoing chamber, torches widely spaced were set; and, like those that illuminated the rest of the cavern city, they burned exceedingly dim.

Here the Gorpaks left us for a time, although a squad remained on guard at the doorway. We huddled together by prearranged plan, as if for comfort in the proximity of our comrades. And, with Sotharian warriors placed so as to block our actions from the watchful Gorpaks, we proceeded to perform an action that might well have seemed inexplicable to you, had you been present to observe it.

We all took off our clothes.

I have already alluded to the fact that the human inhabitants of Zanthodon are no Puritans. They feel no particular shame at exposing their bodies to the indifferent gaze of others. Indeed, in the steamy, tropic warmth of Zanthodon’s eternal noon, to wear very much in the way of clothing is unnecessary and quite uncomfortable.

So it was that, men and women together, we stripped off our few, scant garments. Sharp teeth and strong hands tore the furs and pelts into strips. Agile fingers knotted these together swiftly into a long rope (pray the Lord it would prove long enough!), which we hastily coiled and concealed with our bodies as the Gorpaks returned in force.

It did not seem to me very likely that the Gorpaks would pay any attention to our nakedness. They were accustomed to seeing the pale, listless cavern folk go about their duties unclothed, and, as they regard us as “animals,” they could be assumed to be indifferent as to whether we covered ourselves or not.

This remained to be seen; and much hinged upon our hope that they would not notice our state of undress and become suspicious.

Thank God they did not.

Scarcely giving us a glance, they formed us into two lines, and then there stepped forth the bald and wizened old shaman of the Gorpaks, the one called Queb, of whom Hurok had told me. He was a ridiculous figure in his beads and bangles, head wobbling under his fantastic headdress, but sinister enough in light of his purpose.

Queb began to harangue us in a shrill, unpleasant voice, lecturing us on our good fortune to be selected for this Feasting, to yield up the rich nourishment of our blood to the need of Those who were as immensely our superiors as we were superior to worms and grubs. The hysterical speech went on and on and more than a few of us became fidgety.

Finally, the sermon was over, and Queb lifted to his lips the whistle he wore about his scrawny old neck, and shrilled forth a piercing cry.

The slab rolled back with a heavy grating noise.

And there they were, just as Hurok had described…the huge, wriggling leeches sprawled lazily amid filthy puddles of stagnant water and slick beds of stinking slime. My gorge rose at the fetid reek of the Sluagghs’ lair, but I clamped my lips tightly together. It would not do to get sick now, with so much to be done.

The first of the monstrous leeches came slithering forward to the edge of the slime pit. I caught a glimpse of its six lidless unwinking red eyes, and felt my mind brushed by chill tendrils of uncanny force. With an effort, I wrenched my gaze away from that stare, but the person behind me was not quite so quick as I to avert her eyes.

It was Darya!

Her face went blank, her jaw slack. Like a mindless automaton of warm flesh, the naked girl began walking toward the edge of the pit, and my heart froze within me.

I sprang forward, seized her by the upper arms as she teetered on the very brink, jerked her roughly away and shook her until her head wobbled.

Still her eyes were glazed, indifferent.

Forgive me, but I slapped her face! Her head snapped back and the old familiar Darya again inhabited her glorious eyes. For a moment, rubbing her reddened cheek, she looked angry; then her gaze softened, as she became cognizant of what had occurred.

“Thank you, Eric,” she whispered.

But now others of the Sotharians were caught in the icy glare of the Sluaggh.

“Don’t look them in the eyes!” yelled Professor Potter in a loud voice that made everybody jump.

The echoes of his sudden shout bounced from wall to wall. The Gorpaks were frozen with mingled astonishment and outrage, for this was to them, I guess, a solemn, perhaps even a sacred, moment.

I whirled into action.

Balling one fist, I knocked down the guard that stood nearest to me. He toppled over on his back, squalling.

I jumped over him and sprinted for the wall. Reaching it, I sprang up and seized the bracket which held the feebly burning torch. I drew the flaming length of chemical-soaked wood forth, and dropped to the floor again, heading back to the edge of the pit.

The Gorpaks, yelping with fury, were waddling toward me to block me from my goal.

Then Hurok strode forth among them, huge fists striking from left to right like heavy pistons. With each smacking blow, a Gorpak went down with a broken neck, a shattered jaw, a dislocated shoulder or whatever. And behind Hurok came Garth and Varak and the other warriors, hurling themselves upon the Gorpaks from behind, pulling them down and trampling them into unconsciousness.

I circled around the embattled Gorpaks, heading for the edge of the pit. Near it, I crouched, and from the scrap of cloth I held balled in one hand I poured a whiff of dry, black powder over the burning end of the torch I held.

With a loud spitting and sizzling of sparks, a furious brilliance flared up to destroy the twilight gloom of the Chamber of Feasting.

Brightly now burned the torch—not as bright as the luminance of open day, but bright enough! The Gorpaks squeaked and yelped, covering their beady little eyes from the unusual radiance.

At the very edge of the pit, averting my eyes, I held forth the torch. Its searing light fell upon the fetid swamp-like bed whereon the loathsome Sluagghs wriggled. Their lidless eyes, which could not endure anything more than the twilight of the caverns, drank in the sizzling fury of the flame.

And they went mad! Coiling and uncoiling, flopping and writhing, they slithered about in the stinking slime, uttering a thin, ululating cry so high pitched as almost to be inaudible.

I stood there grinning, brandishing my torch, letting its light drive them into panicky flight. “Serves the slimy bastards right,” I thought to myself with grim satisfaction.

Now Potter and Hurok came up to where I stood, having retrieved two more torches from brackets along the nearer wall. I handed the Professor my other packet. He sprinkled his torch with the dry gunpowder which last night I had emptied out of the few cartridges remaining in my gun belt. And his torch flamed up, spitting sparks, adding its light to my own. Soon all three torches were ablaze, and in the triple radiance, the Gorpaks stumbled blindly, mewling piteously and trying to shield their eyes. Garth’s warriors made short work of them.

“I told you it would work, didn’t I, my boy!” the Professor commented, very pleased with himself. “I thought the powder in your cartridges would unite with the chemical-impregnated torch wood to flare up like fireworks!”

“You can take credit for a lot more than that, Doc,” I grinned. “From the very moment you told me about that scene in the glade, where the Sluaggh flinched back from the direct light of day, I’ve been trying to figure out how to use that fact against them. The only weapon we had to use was to pit their own weakness against them—they cannot endure light.”

“Very kind of you to give me the credit, my boy,” said the Professor. “I suspect their inability to stand direct daylight stems from the fact that, in their natural habitat, they dwell in fetid burrows deep underground. Doubtless they evolved in those depths, living in utter darkness.”

“They’re not some form of prehistoric life from the surface world, then?”

“I believe not,” mused the old scientist. “We have no fossil record of any leech so large as they…no, I believe the Sluagghs are indigenous to Zanthodon and have never penetrated to the world above our heads.”

“And let’s hope they never do,” I muttered.

“Amen to that,” said the Professor fervently.

But we had no time for discussion; things were heating up, and time was getting short.

“More Gorpaks approach, Eric Carstairs!” boomed the deep voice of Garth as he came up to us. “Already the men of Sothar have unlimbered the rope—”

I looked across the chamber. While I had been driving the Sluagghs back into their noisome burrows under the floor, the Sotharians had been trying to secure the long rope we had made from knotted strips of our clothing about the edge of the balcony. A loop had been fashioned, and a slipknot. How many tries they made before it snagged the sharp protruding corner of the balcony I never bothered to ask, but it was secure now.

Already the men and women of Sothar were climbing the rope to gather on the balcony. We ran over to where they stood, and I boosted Darya up when her turn came while Hurok and Garth and the mightier of the Sotharian fighting men stood guard at the doorway, armed now with weapons seized from the Gorpaks they had felled.

As it chanced, we all managed to climb to the balcony level before the reinforcements arrived. Drawing our improvised rope ladder up with us, to discourage its use by our pursuers, we made tracks through the storerooms and other chambers Hurok had described.

Almighty God, but it was like cold water to a man perishing of thirst, to be running free through the upper level of the cavern city, with a long trident in my hand and my beloved at my side! Freedom has a heady taste—better than all the champagne in the world!

* * * *

With Hurok at the fore, we retraced the route he had first taken into the maze of caverns. Erelong we reached that huge, unused chamber that had been his first glimpse of the city of the Sluagghs.

There was the wall of dressed and mortared stone, just as he had described it. The stone wall which separated this portion of the outermost parts of the city from the natural caverns.

And there was the old, forgotten door of rotten wood through which he had forced his way.

A shattered ruin, it hung in fragments from rusted hinges. I smiled with relief at the sight of it; never had any door in all the world looked so damned good to me before.…

In less time than it would take to tell, we were through the door, to the last man and woman, and stood in the black and lightless caverns of the hollow mountains.

But they were lightless no more! For still our torches burned brightly, and by their treble radiance we could see the mouth of a black opening in the jagged wall.

“Hurok believes that is the way he came hither,” grunted my huge friend, pointing.

We headed for it, wasting no time, for surely the Gorpaks would be yelping at our heels before too many minutes had gone by.

And so began our flight from the caverns, and the nightmare of our slavery in this living hell was over and done with forever.

CHAPTER 19

Pursued

If Captain Lutho was furious at the escape of the captives, his superior, Commander Gronk, was well nigh mad with outrage. Quivering with fury, the fat little officer shrilled abuse on Lutho, who shriveled and wilted before the withering scorn in his superior’s tones.

“How is it possible for even a miserable worm like the contemptible Lutho to permit such an insurrection?” shrieked Gronk, wild-eyed, spittle foaming at the corners of his thin-lipped mouth. “For the animals to revolt—in the very presence of the Lords!—is unheard of in the annals of the City; for such brutes to inflict violence upon Gorpaks is a crime beyond parallel; for such groveling and spineless beasts to shame and humiliate us before the Lords is an atrocity which—which—”

The fat Gorpak commander broke off as if words failed him. For a moment or two he sought to find an adjective equal to the task of describing the horror, but his vocabulary was too limited. So he expressed himself by snatching up his whip and dealing the unhappy Lutho a blow across the face.

Lutho squalled, touching with care the raw welt which traversed his features. He fell to his knees, bowing his narrow shoulders as Gronk, spitting with fury, rained blows with his lash across the back and shoulders and buttocks of Lutho.

At length, wearying of the unaccustomed exercise, the fat officer threw down his whip and, seizing Lutho by the ears, lifted him squealing with pain to his feet.

“Go after them, worm! Bring them back! Follow! Pursue! Capture!” hissed Gronk between clenched teeth, punctuating his directives with slaps across Lutho’s bleeding face.

Not bothering to speak, Lutho saluted and ran off. In the corridor he encountered his underling, Vusk, who failed to conceal a smirk as he noticed the weals of Gronk’s lashing. Whereupon Lutho vented his frustration and shame by kicking Vusk from one side of the corridor to the other.

Somewhat relieved, and breathing heavily, Lutho snapped brusque orders to the whimpering Vusk, to marshal the Gorpak forces for the pursuit of the escaped captives.

“The animals fled by means of the Grand Cavern,” he barked. “They will take Tunnel Fourteen, and either emerge from the mountain on its sheer face, or turn aside into Tunnel Thirteen, which will lead them to Exit ‘C’—”

“Yes, O valiant and sagacious Captain!” blubbered the unfortunate Vusk, rubbing his bruised buttocks.

“We will outwit the animals by predicting, with our superior intellects, their behavior,” snarled Lutho. “Take your force by means of Tunnel Seven to Exit ‘B’, and lie in wait for them to emerge into the daylight.”

“As ever, my Captain is wise and fearless—”

“I will follow shortly at your heels with the Third and Fourth Squads. We will round the animals up—mind, worm, that you slay or injure as few as possible in the recapturing!—and return them to the pens, whereupon the Feasting will resume. In this manner, if all is accomplished speedily and efficiently, we shall redeem ourselves in the sight of the Lords. Swift, now!”

Vusk threw his captain a hasty salute and bolted to summon his squad. In no time the troop of bandy-legged little men were trotting briskly down the corridor which led to the outer world.

But this was certainly not going to be Captain Lutho’s lucky day, by any means. For the exit to which he had directed his soldiers just happened to be the stone trapdoor at the top of the cliffs which ran like a rocky spine down the length of the promontory.

Yes, the same trapdoor which, even at that moment, Tharn and the warriors of Thandar were striving to pry open.…

* * * *

I don’t know whether you have ever had the opportunity to run through pitch-black caverns stark naked, but if you have thus far managed to avoid the experience, then I advise to you to keep it up. For it is certainly no fun.

Of course, the torches which we had carried off from the Chamber of Feasting shed some light. But the caverns wound and bent, and half the time the light was behind us and we were running in black gloom. In no time flat we were all bruised from bumping or scraping our naked bodies against the rough stone walls and sharp protuberances of the caves, and were covered with dust and grime.

Hurok led the way, since he was the only one of us who had ever explored this cavern. But he very soon got lost. The trouble was, I suppose, that feeling your way through the labyrinth of caves in the pitchblack darkness is a lot different from trying to retrace your steps in the light of the torches.

At length he paused, scratching his heavy jaw, small eyes reflecting his bafflement.

“Don’t tell me the huge oaf has lost his way,” panted Professor Potter testily.

I shrugged, fearing that to be the case, which it more or less was. Hurok came lumbering over to where I stood with Darya, catching my breath. He looked confused.

“Are you lost, Hurok?” I inquired. He slowly shook his huge head.

“Hurok believes that to continue on in this direction will lead the friends of Black Hair to the outer world,” said the Neanderthal in his deep, guttural tones.

“Well, then, let’s keep going,” I suggested. “Surely, by now, all the little Gorpaks in the cavern city are yapping at our heels like a pack of hunting dogs—”

“Black Hair does not understand the hesitation of Hurok,” he explained. “Hurok entered the caverns through a hole in the side of the mountain, far up. For Hurok was scaling the mountain and entered the hole in its side to escape the attack of a thakdol.”

“In other words, if we keep on going in this direction we will come out on the side of a cliff,” I groaned. “Well, that’s just dandy! I can just see the whole gang of us, stark naked and worn out, trying to climb down the cliff one by one, with the Gorpaks behind us and the thakdols snapping at our noses.”

He nodded heavily. “That thought has also occurred to Hurok,” he admitted. “And Hurok suggests that the friends of Black Hair follow this side cavern, which branches off from the way in which Hurok came.”

“Do you know where it leads?” inquired the Professor. Hurok solemnly confessed that he did not.

“But the Peaks of Peril are honeycombed with caves and tunnels,” he pointed out, “and surely there will be many exits into the daylight world.”

“That’s probably true,” mused Professor Potter, scratching his nose. “We already know of two others, at least: the door in the wall by which I gained admittance into this disgusting place and the trapdoor atop the cliff wall by which the young lady, here, and her friend Jorn got in. Well, where there are three entrances there will certainly be more.…”

“Let us try it then,” rumbled Garth who had come near to listen to our conversation.

So we turned aside and entered the cavern that Hurok had advised. It was no less winding and rough than had been the first one we had followed, and at the end of its circuitous path might well lie yet another way out of the hollow mountains. At any rate, our turning off into the side tunnel would possibly confuse the Gorpaks, whom we then thought to be directly behind us, since in their excitement they would probably pass right by the little, narrow entrance to the side tunnel and continue on in the general direction of our flight.

Of course, we had no way of knowing that the shrewd Gorpaks had anticipated that we would do this, since they certainly knew this maze of tunnels better than we, and were planning to ambush us as we emerged from this very tunnel.

* * * *

Although he has played very little part in the affairs I have been describing to you, One-Eye of course accompanied us. The hulking Apeman had—as we would say in the Upper World—maintained a low profile during the period of our captivity in the cavern city. He ate by himself and slept apart from the others, and seldom if ever communicated with any of us, save in surly grunts. I think that One-Eye was afraid I was going to get my new friends, the Sotharians, to gang up on him in revenge for the brutalities I had experienced at his hands.

Anyway, he kept himself in the rear of things as unobtrusively as was possible under the circumstances, and probably had long planned to get away by himself at the first opportunity.

And this was the first opportunity.

When we turned off into the narrow little side tunnel, One-Eye fell back to the rear and let the rest of us move ahead. As soon as we were gone, the Neanderthal emerged from the side tunnel and continued on down the main tunnel which led to the hole in the face of the cliff.

He thought himself unobserved, doubtless; but in this, One-Eye was seriously mistaken.

Murg the Sotharian, too, had lingered in the rear of our party, more, I think, from natural cowardice than from any particular scheme of his own. I believe I have mentioned this fellow before; he was skinnier and uglier than the other warriors of Sothar, with mean little eyes, and an obsequious manner. He was always sucking up to the Gorpaks and cringing before them and whispering to them in an oily, conspiratorial way. Instinctively, I disliked and distrusted him, for all that he was the brother of Garth the High Chief; but never were two brothers more unlike than these two: Garth was stalwart, majestic, fearless—a born leader, with the ability to command respect from others. Murg, on the other hand, was wily and cunning and treacherous, and always looking out for Murg first and everybody else distinctly second.

He was the sort of person who doesn’t have any friends, only allies and henchmen.

Murg, then, was in a position to observe One-Eye as the huge Neanderthal slunk out of the tunnel and went waddling down the main cavern. This action piqued Murg’s curiosity, for he was an inquisitive man, always sticking his nose into other people’s business and meddling in their affairs.

Wondering what One-Eye was up to, Murg yielded to the temptation to follow, presuming he could always catch up to the rest of his people should he wish to. So, keeping well to one side, and making as little noise as possible, he began to follow One-Eye.

The Apeman of Kor was waddling along at the best speed his bowed legs and splay feet were able to manage. The trouble was that the others had carried the torches, which meant that One-Eye had to traverse the tunnel in the dark. And this meant that he kept bumping into rocky projections and banging his head on stalactites and things.

It really wasn’t very hard for Murg to follow One-Eye. All he had to do was to keep his ears open and listen for the thumps when the Neanderthal bumped into something, and then the growling curse as One-Eye rubbed whichever member he had hurt.

* * * *

Before long, One-Eye saw daylight ahead, and knew that his journey was nearly over. Reaching the entrance, he peered cautiously out, looking around to see if any of those thakdols which Hurok had mentioned were flapping near. None were in sight, so the Apeman crawled out on the narrow stone ledge which served as the doorstep of the cave’s mouth and looked down.

At the base of the cliff the jungle grew close to the rocky foothills. A narrow ledge zigzagged down for a time, then petered out, but One-Eye could spot footholds and handholds and knew he could descend the cliff without much trouble.

Although a coward and a bully, One-Eye was tough enough. In the jungle world of Zanthodon, weaklings do not survive long enough to grow to One-Eye’s age, which I would guess at about forty. While the Neanderthal did not especially like heights, he did not especially fear them. And, with the huge splayed feet and prehensile toes and blunt, thick-fingered hands of his kind, One-Eye could climb as well as a monkey.

But first he concealed himself beside the edge of the entrance. Murg had made more noise than he had intended to, and echoes bounce down caverns. One-Eye didn’t know who was following him, but he intended to find out.

So, when Murg poked his nose out, One-Eye pounced!

CHAPTER 20

Hidden Eyes

Tharn of Thandar lifted one hand in the signal for silence, and immediately there ensued a cessation of all activity. His warriors had been striving to pry open the great trapdoor the scouts had discovered at the top of the cliffs, but all their attempts had thus far proved futile. Now, as Komad the scout knelt with his ear close to the rock, Tharn knew that something was amiss.

“What is it, O Komad?” he inquired after a moment.

The leader of the scouts rose to his feet. “Noises from the hollow places below, my Chief,” muttered Komad. “The tramp of many marching feet, and the clatter of weapons and accouterments. Someone is approaching the place whereover we stand; therefore, let us fall back to a secure distance and observe what will shortly transpire.”

“The suggestion of Komad is wise and prudent,” nodded Tharn. And he commanded his warriors to retire some little distance and to remain silent, avoiding any noise that might give the alarm to whoever marched in the cavern below.

Not very long thereafter, the great slab tilted to the pressure of some internal mechanism unseen. And there emerged rapidly into the light of day as curious a troop of men as ever the warriors of Thandar had seen.

They came boiling up out of the space beneath like so many angry hornets whose nest has been disturbed, and they ascended to the top of the cliff from below by means of many bamboo ladders. Uncomprehendingly, the warriors and huntsmen of Thandar stared from where they crouched behind boulders, curious at the hairless, sallow little men with their bandy legs and odd garments and even stranger weapons.

“O Chief, shall we not attack them now, with the advantage of surprise?” whispered Ithar to his monarch. “For whoever these strange little men may be, surely the gomad Darya is their captive, since they rule the hollow places below, into which she must have descended.”

Tharn frowned thoughtfully. It went against the rude and simple chivalry of his race to strike from ambush against an unknowing foe, but the counsels of Ithar were wise, and victory alone is the desired end of any conflict. However, as things turned out, it was spared to Tharn of Thandar that he strike the first blow against the Gorpaks, for one of the bandy-legged little grotesques, staring around, spied a hiding Thandarian and squalled, giving the alarm.

He lifted his trident as if to cast it, but it went awry and clattered off a boulder.

In the next instant, a Thandarian arrow pierced the breast of the Gorpak, and the battle was joined.

The man who fell was Vusk, for I was able to identify his corpse later.

* * * *

From their own hiding place at the cliffs edge, the Barbary pirates stared with amazement as the cliff opened to disgorge a horde of odd-looking little people who promptly charged the Thandarian savages and went down like flies before their arrows and javelins.

“Behold, O Achmed!” whined Tarbu, clutching at the brawny arm of the first mate. “The mountain opens like a door, and forth come devil-men!”

“They are the Djinn!” breathed Achmed, “who dwell in the bosom of Mount Kaf!” All of the superstitions of his race seethed to life in the breast of the Moor, striking fear into his heart as could never a mortal foe, however armed or powerful.

“Let us withdraw from this accursed place, before the stones open beneath our very feet and disgorge demons!” suggested another of the corsairs. Privately, Achmed thought that a very good idea; there was no advantage in going to the assistance of the unknown savages, and there was certainly nothing to be gained in waiting here for the devil-men to destroy the primitives and then come after the pirates.

So he gave quick orders, and in less time than it would take me to describe the scene, the Barbary corsairs clambered back down the improvised log ladders and concealed themselves within the edges of the jungle, the better to observe what transpired.

It soon became obvious that the Gorpaks were getting the worst of the fight. Not only were the Cro-Magnon savages taller and stronger, but they were much better fighting men than the Gorpaks, with much more experience in war.

Hitherto, the Gorpaks had done little more than lay traps in the jungle for passing men or women, and strutted and preened themselves before the listless cavern folk. There had never been a mutiny of the slaves of the cavern city until Garth and I led the one I have described.

The fact of the matter was, the Gorpaks had never been in a real battle before and they didn’t know what to do. They stood, shouting orders at the Thandarians, shrilling abuse, waving their arms, instead of taking cover. So, of course, they fell in droves to the arrows and spears hurled against them. And when it finally dawned on the Gorpaks that they were not exactly winning this thing, they tried to go back down into the caverns again, but were prevented from effecting their retreat by the pressure of more Gorpaks climbing up from below. That is, by this time Lutho had arrived with the reinforcements, and they were boiling up out of the exit to stand bewilderedly, finding themselves in the midst of a battle.

Except that it really wasn’t a battle at all, but very quickly became a full-fledged massacre.

It would have pleased me mightily, could I have been there to see it. Simpering little Vusk fell to an arrow in the throat, and the obsequious Sunth took a Thandarian spear in the heart, and even the villainous little brute whom the Professor had surprised in the act of whipping a child of the caverns died in the holocaust.

Tridents make clumsy weapons, pitted against spears.

And whips are of even less use against arrows.

It was all over very quickly. Captain Lutho managed to escape by jumping off the edge of the cliff. We found his body later at the base, where he had landed on some rocks, which split his skull open like an eggshell.

It certainly wasn’t Lutho’s day, was it?

* * * *

As the gigantic drunth came thundering down upon Xask, the Zarian did the only thing that occurred to him. Since he had no other weapon at hand save the automatic pistol which he had taken from me, he plucked it out and pointed it at the dinosaur, hoping against hope to somehow evoke the power of the so-called thunder-weapon.

Fortune was with Xask in that hour, despite her neglect of him in recent days. By pure chance his finger slid into the trigger guard and tightened about the trigger. A deafening retort sounded. The noise made Xask jump; it also so startled Fumio that he fell out of his tree and landed with a bruising thump in a thick thornbush.

The vast size of the armored stegosaurus loomed above Xask like a moving mountain. The monster halted—faltered—then, with a crash that shook the earth, it toppled over on its side and lay, kicking enormous feet and flexing and unflexing its long, blade-edged tail.

Xask was coughing to clear his head of the stench of gunpowder. He shook his head to stop the ringing in his ears, and stared wonderingly down at the smoking barrel of the .45.

Then he strolled around the body of the drunth, kicking it in the side from time to time, but carefully avoiding the lashing tail, which could snap his spine like a twig.

He found a black, sooty-edged hole at the base of the throat of the drunth, which must have been caused by the thunder-weapon. It mystified Xask that so tiny a wound could have brought down so mighty a monster, and, in fact, it mystifies me, for in my time I have bounced a bullet or two off a dinosaur, to no effect at all.

The Professor has a Theory—(the Professor always has a Theory)—that Xask’s bullet must have entered the dinosaur’s carcass through the soft flesh of the throat and caught it directly in the spinal cord, shattering that vital chain of vertebrae and causing it instant paralysis, rather than death. I don’t know, neither did Xask, but anyway his slug stopped the stegosaurus cold.

Eventually, he strolled over and pried Fumio out of the thornbush. Once Fumio had plucked out thorns from the more tender parts of his anatomy, and got a good look at the body of the drunth, he fell on his face and began kissing the feet of Xask.

Fumio knew a god when he saw one. Only a god could have felled a monster like that with a bolt from the blue.

Xask permitted Fumio to fawn on him for a time, then he commanded his new slave to get to his feet and accompany him through the jungle. Fumio was happy enough to do as his god ordered. Surely, armed with the thunders of the firmament, Xask could protect Fumio from the perils of the wild, the vengeance of Tharn, the cruelty of One-Eye and just about anything else.

Which is about all we could possibly hope for from the gods.

* * * *

As the battle on the cliff top came to its eventual end, there were other eyes watching from a place of hidden concealment besides those of the Barbary pirates. And these were the eyes of Xask and Fumio, who had arrived on the scene just after the corsairs had concealed themselves in the jungle.

Xask watched thoughtfully as the Thandarian savages finished off the last of the Gorpaks. He wondered, I suppose, what in the world was going on, but then Xask had never before seen any Gorpaks, and neither had he ever seen the Barbary pirates. This world of Zanthodon was proving a more remarkable place than even Xask had ever guessed, and was crowded with strange peoples of whose very existence he had gone ignorant all his days.

As was always the case with men like Xask, his cold and cunning brain went instantly to work calculating how this new information could be bent to serve his best interests.

As for Fumio, he wasn’t thinking about anything much; he wasn’t even watching the end of the battle. True, Tharn was there, and Fumio would have been very fearful and wary of Tharn a few hours before, for, after all, he had attempted to rape the daughter of Tharn, which was great and good reason for Fumio to feel fear.

But he didn’t. After all, his god was at his side, and there at the waist of his god was the thunder-weapon.

And he felt very safe and secure, did Fumio.

* * * *

It was about the same time that the rest of us arrived on the scene. The wandering tunnel had carried us to the door in the cliff, through which the Professor had first entered the cavern city, and once we found the secret of the mechanism that triggered the counterweights, we opened it and emerged into the light of day.

The first thing we saw was Lutho’s crushed corpse amid the rocks.

Then we looked up and saw the Thandarian host atop the cliffs, and they looked down and saw us.

Of course, they didn’t know who the host of Sotharian warriors were, but it didn’t much matter to Tharn. For among the throng of newcomers he recognized me, the old Professor and Jorn the Hunter, to say nothing of Hurok of Kor.

And his daughter Darya, of course. She was standing very close to me and I had my arm around her shoulders. As soon as I saw Tharn of Thandar, I flushed crimson and took my hand away. After all, you will recall, Darya and I were both nude. And even Stone Age fathers have notions of propriety.

Raising a halloo, the Thandarians came swarming down the cliff, and a moment later Tharn seized his daughter up and crushed her slender body in his embrace and gave her a kiss that probably made her toes curl.

The neat instant he slapped me approvingly on the shoulder, nearly knocking me down, and crushed my hand in his in a grateful handshake that very nearly reduced my knuckles to powder.

And it was all over.

Or so, at the time, we thought.…