Although Charole’s support for Dryaka in the abortive attempt to sacrifice Dawn of the ‘Earths’ had caused her to forfeit the title, ‘Protectress of the Quagga God’, she knew that she was fortunate not to be dead. What was more, staying alive in her present circumstances was anything but a sinecure. However, being a woman of spirit and resolution, she was determined not only to stay alive but also to regain her position of power in the Mun-Gatah nation. She realized that achieving her aims would be far from easy, which was why she was taking the chance of returning to her villa before attempting to escape from Bon-Gatah. Concealed at her private quarters were some items which she felt sure would help her attain her ambition.
When Charole and the High Priest had been knocked over the parapet of the temple’s balcony at the unexpected conclusion of the sacrificial ceremony, they had fallen with him in the upper position. So his body had shielded her from the blast of the ‘Terrifier’ which had been thrown by one of the invaders and had exploded above them. By a piece of equally good fortune, another of the devices which she had been about to ignite had been knocked from her hand before she could do so. If it had not been, it would have gone off beneath her and she would have had no protection from its fury.
Charole had also benefited from having been clad in the attire prescribed for the Protectress when a sacrifice to the Quagga God was being made. Her magnificently endowed body was protected by a sturdy metal helmet with a crest made from the mane of a quagga, a thick oak brown breastplate of specially hardened leather, a brief kilt, greaves and sandals of the same material. So, despite having been stunned by the landing in the arena, she had not suffered any serious or incapacitating injuries.
With the High Priest’s broken and obviously lifeless body draped over her as she had lain unconscious, the few people who had come close had assumed that Charole too must be dead. Nor, occupied as they were by the inter-factional fighting that had erupted following the failure to witness the promised sacrifice, did any of them find an opportunity to carry out an examination and correct the assumption.
On regaining consciousness, Charole had appreciated her very grave peril. She had made enemies even before becoming Dryaka’s ally and they would want to see her pay the price of failure. After what had happened, she had not known whom she could still trust. Even her formerly loyal adherents could not be counted upon to remain staunch. So she had decided that, until she could form a better assessment of the situation, she must be wary of everybody. Also, although confident no bones had been broken, she had felt very weak and concluded it would be advisable to stay out of sight until her strength returned.
By the time she had reached her conclusions, the fighting was over in the arena and it was deserted. For all that, she had been aware that she might need to defend herself at any moment. Her ivory handled sword, shaped like the gladius of Ancient Rome, was still in its sheath at the left side of her gold disc belt. Yet, effectively as she could use it, there had been another and much more potent weapon readily available. The ‘Terrifier’ she had dropped still lay where it had fallen. None of the people who had entered the arena had touched it. They wanted nothing to do with such a—to them—inexplicable and dangerous device.
Having no such inhibitions, Charole had wriggled from beneath Dryaka’s corpse and picked up the Terrifier. Despite having lost the smoldering piece of cord from the perforated metal ‘fire box’ which was hanging from her left shoulder (thus being unable to ignite the device) she had been confident that she could use it to frighten away anybody who tried to molest her; but the need to do so had not arisen. Entering the room in which prisoners awaiting sacrifice were incarcerated, she had made her exit via one of the secret passages known to those Mun-Gatahs who held a sufficiently high office. From there, she had traversed some of the vast labyrinth of tunnels and caverns which spread beneath and even beyond the perimeter walls of the city.
Created by the ‘Suppliers’ as an aid to the Mun-Gatahs’ inborn proclivity for intrigue, the subterranean area was ventilated and illuminated by a self-operating and maintaining power source. Attaining the status which gave access to the labyrinth was not hereditary, but came about by personal endeavor. So the ‘Suppliers’ were compelled to implant each who reached a specific rank with the requisite knowledge to open the secret doors and traverse the tunnels. In addition, the current six members of the ruling Council of Elders, the High Priest and the Protectress of the Quagga God each was allocated a private hiding place equipped for use in an emergency.
Charole did not relax her vigilance until she had entered and bolted the door of her hiding place. While she intended to rest, she realized that to remain in the small room for more than a short time would avail her nothing. Until she could acquire reliable and powerful support, Bon-Gatah would be an unhealthy location for her. So she would have to escape from the city and go in search of the necessary assistance.
Having removed her ceremonial clothing, which was too heavy to be comfortable, Charole settled down to rest. She took a drink of the clear, fresh water which flowed from a crack in one wall and out of a hole in the floor. There was food available, in the form of sun-dried meat known as fulsa. xviii Having eaten, she lay on the comfortable couch and went to sleep.
On awakening, Charole had no idea of how long she had slept. However, she felt refreshed. Such was her excellent physical condition that she had completely recovered from the effects of the fall and she devoted her thoughts to the future. In her estimation, the first task was to leave Bon-Gatah until she could find out how badly public sentiment was against her and who would assume the posts of High Priest and Protectress. Secondly, she had to win over sufficient support to make it possible for her to return.
Always a realist, Charole had accepted that the time might one day come when she would have to flee for her life and she had made preparations against that day. With the exception of a mount, which was one of the reasons she had taken the risk of returning to her villa, she had everything she needed in the hiding place. She had no intention of trying to depart clad in her ceremonial attire. While it might offer protection if she should be recognized and attacked, it would also ruin her chances of slipping away unnoticed. No other woman dressed in such a fashion, so the garments would give her away even after night had fallen.
Leaving the helmet, breastplate and kilt where they had fallen when she undressed, Charole retained only the sandals. These had plain brown leather cross-straps extending to just below the knee and did not indicate that she belonged to any particular faction. She donned the silver lamé mesh halter and short skirt which formed the everyday costume of a banar-gatah riding female warrior. xix The uniform had sufficient status to allow her to adopt a highhanded attitude if her identity was challenged.
Once dressed, using a pair of scissors and a mirror, Charole cropped at her black hair until it was short and boyish. As a disguise, it had its limitations. With the magnificent contours of her five foot nine inches’ body—bust thirty-nine inches; waist, twenty-one; hips, thirty-seven—and her sensually beautiful, if arrogant, features, she could not hope to pass as other than a woman at close quarters. However, seen even at a distance, her shoulder long tresses might give her away. She was retaining the gold disc belt and, as it was her favorite weapon, the ivory handled sword which had helped to denote her rank. Until she was beyond the city’s walls, it would be concealed beneath the long, hooded black ‘cloak of mourning’ she would be wearing.
Having completed the alterations to her appearance, Charole used the flint and steel from her ‘fire box’ to light another piece of the slow burning cord and coiled it inside. Realizing that to use the ‘Terrifier’ within the confines of the labyrinth would be as dangerous to her as to any assailant, she placed it in the leather pouch in which it was carried during the abortive sacrifice. However, she did not hang the pouch and ‘fire box’ across her shoulders. The cloak would have concealed them and was designed so that it could be discarded rapidly if necessary, but she did not want them to hamper her movements if there should be trouble. Instead, she carried them by their straps in her left hand and the sword was grasped in the right.
Leaving the hiding place, Charole made her way to the flight of stone steps which led to the secret entrance of her living quarters. The items she had come to recover were in a chest on the landing, but it would not be wise just to take them and then return through the labyrinth until safely outside the city. To make the only kind of escape which would offer an adequate chance of salvation, she would need to be mounted. Provided that it had not been stolen, there was an animal ideally suited to her needs in the villa’s stables.
Looking through the peephole in the wall alongside the sliding panel which gave access to her bedroom, Charole was puzzled by what she saw. She had hoped to satisfy herself that it was unoccupied before going in. It was already dark outside, but the lamps were lit and she should have been able to see what was happening. However, although the room seemed to be deserted, the drapes of her four-poster bed had been drawn and it was large enough to offer concealment for more than one intruder. Furthermore, there was the matter to be considered of who had lit the lamps. She would not have expected her household staff to be attending still to such duties.
‘Oh well,’ Charole told herself silently. “Standing here won’t solve anything.’
With that, the woman laid down her belongings and raised the lid of the chest. Inside lay the means by which she hoped to pave the way for her reinstatement. Despite having allied herself to Dryaka, she had taken precautions in case he should try to turn against her after they had achieved their purpose. Without his knowledge, she had contrived to appropriate a small bag of the ‘Thunder Powder’ and one of the remarkable arrows belonging to Dawn of the ‘Earths’. In addition, when it had been discovered that the latest batch of ‘Terrifiers’ to be delivered were filled with soil instead of ‘Thunder Powder’, she had collected the genuine articles which were in her adherents’ possession. There were four of them and, added to the one she was already carrying, as nobody else had any—nor, since the death of Zongaffa the Herbalist, knew the secret of how they were manufactured— they formed a very potent source of power.
After Charole had transferred the bag of ‘Thunder Powder’ and the ‘Terrifiers’ to the leather pouch, she fixed the ‘cloak of mourning’ so it could be thrown off without an instant’s delay and opened the panel. Carrying the arrow as well as the pouch and ‘fire box’, she stepped across the threshold with the sword ready for use. Once she was through, the entrance closed automatically.
The first thing to strike Charole as she walked forward was the lack of noise. She could not detect any sounds of activity in the building. Nor, although the windows were open, could she hear any disturbance outside. She would have expected the latter at least, considering that fighting had still been taking place elsewhere in the city when she fled from the arena.
Then Charole became aware of something which caused her to devote her full attention to her immediate surroundings.
Once before, not many weeks earlier, Charole’s keen sense of smell had saved her life in that very room. xx Her olfactory organs were now giving a similar warning that she might not be alone. However, on this occasion, the odor which was assailing her nostrils was not the fragrance of female perfume. Rather it was harsh, masculine and unpleasant, like perspiration mingling with the other emanations from a body that was rarely washed.
There was, Charole knew, only one kind of person in Bon-Gatah who invariably smelled in such a fashion.
Even as the realization was sending an alarm screeching through her mind, Charole noticed that the drapes of the bed were being violently agitated. Grasping a heavy wooden club, a figure erupted through them. With a snarl that sounded more bestial than human, it sprang towards her with the weapon raised to strike.
In spite of the way he was armed and the fact that he was clad in a white tunic emblazoned with a colored illustration of a standing quagga, there was something brutishly inhuman about the woman’s assailant. About five foot eight inches in height, the thickset and heavily muscled body was coated with shortish, curly brown hair. The somewhat stooped shoulders, disproportionately long arms and short, bowed legs seemed more suitable to a chimpanzee than a man. Shaggy hair almost met the brows above the deep-set eyes, so narrow was the forehead. The snub nose, nostrils flaring like an animal’s, topped a snarling mouth and a receding, bearded chin.
The attacker was, as Charole knew, a Brelef. xxi His subhuman race had been enslaved by the Mun-Gatahs to be employed as guards. There was no need for her to try and read the insignia on the brass ‘collar of ownership’ around his short, thick neck to learn where his allegiance lay. His tunic announced that he served the Council of Elders, being one of the contingent which were used to maintain order in the city.
Guessing why the Brelef had been concealed in the room, Charole knew that announcing her identity would not halt the attack. A trait which made the sub-humans so useful was their complete and unthinking loyalty to whoever owned them. Even as the Protectress of the Quagga God, she had had no control over the Council of Elders’ Brelefs and would have even less authority now she had been deposed. Having been ordered to remain hidden and attack anybody who entered, he would carry out the duty regardless of who the arrival might be.
Accepting that verbal conciliation would avail her nothing and doubting whether she would have time to reach, much less open, the secret panel, Charole did not try to escape. Instead, she dropped the pouch, ‘fire box’ and arrow. Even as they were falling, she shrugged off the cloak and, to avoid stepping on them, took a long stride to the right. Although her rapid movement carried her clear of the club as it was driven downwards, it left her poorly placed to retaliate swiftly with her sword. Taking her weight on the right leg, as the Brelef’s impetus carried him onwards, she snapped a side kick to the left. The sole of her foot caught him in the ribs with sufficient force to thrust him away from her, which proved fortunate.
Showing surprising agility for one of his squat and heavy build, the Brelef changed the direction in which his club was moving. He swung it in a horizontal arc which would have caught the woman if her kick had not pushed him far enough for her to be clear of it. Nor, for all the haste in which it had been launched, would the blow have been a light one if it had landed. In fact, such was the vehemence he had used that he could not prevent himself from continuing to turn away from his objective when it missed.
Charole took advantage of her assailant’s misfortune like a flash. While the majority of Mun-Gatahs tended to rely solely upon the edge of the blade when using a sword, Dryaka had taught her—without ever having heard it—the value of the Ancient Roman saying, ‘Duas unicas in puncta mortalis est’, xxii with regard to the point. Swiveling into a lunge and turning the twenty-four inches long, two inches wide blade so that it was parallel to the floor, she plunged it between his ribs and onwards until it reached his vital organs. A screech burst from him and the club left his hand. He jerked himself involuntarily away from the source of the agony that was being inflicted upon him and the action helped her to snatch the weapon free.
Liberating the sword was to be a matter of vital importance to Charole!
Even as the stricken sub-human’s scream was dying out and he crashed to the floor, the connecting door to the dining room was thrown open. Baring her teeth in a hiss of fury, the woman turned her attention to the three men who were entering. In the lead, also armed with clubs, were two more Brelefs of the Council’s bodyguard. They were followed by a white haired Mun-Gatah of medium height whose formerly hard-fleshed, bulky body had grown soft and fat with good living. Holding a sword, he wore a white toga-like garment decorated by a rampant quagga. He was Elder Eokan and had never been friendly with Charole, so she decided that his presence could bode only evil.
For all her belief, Charole considered the elder Mun-Gatah was the least of her worries at that moment. She realized that she must defend herself against the two Brelefs before she could even start to think of dealing with him. However, she did not relish the prospect of a close quarters fight with the pair of brute-men.
On the face of it, Charole’s solution to the predicament seemed at the least most ill advised. Before either of the Brelefs could take more than three steps beyond the doorway, she flung her sword across the room. The result would have been completely satisfactory if only one assailant had been involved. Slightly in the lead, the brute-man at the right took the spear point xxiii of the blade in the left breast. Dropping the club, he clutched at the hilt of the weapon which had buried deep into his vital organs. He wrenched it out with a spasmodic jerk and flung it aside. Spinning around, he staggered in front of his companion.
Employing the momentum she had gathered while throwing the sword, Charole turned and darted in the direction from which she had come. She picked up the pouch and ‘fire box’ in passing, leaving the arrow behind. Making for the wall through which she had entered, she had already extracted one of the ‘Terrifiers’ by the time she reached it. Turning to face the two men, she jabbed her elbow on to the disguised catch and the secret panel slid open. Then, dropping to her left knee in the opening, she set down the box and pouch. Raising the former’s lid, she took out the smoldering cord. As she had anticipated, Eokan halted at the door, leaving the assault upon her to his remaining assistant.
Shoving aside his mortally wounded companion, with no more compunction than if he had been dealing with an inanimate object, the third Brelef lumbered forward. At the sight of the object in Charole’s hand, a change came over him. He had been in the Council Chamber when Dryaka had demonstrated the potency of the ‘Terrifiers’ for the first time. While of limited intelligence, his retentive memory was sufficient for him to recall the shattering roar and the terrible devastation caused by the explosion. Letting out a howl of terror, he discarded his weapon and turned to scuttle from the room. Giving a snarl of rage as the brute-man approached, Eoken swung his sword and laid open the other’s throat.
‘You can put that down,’ the Elder stated, as his stricken assistant stumbled onwards to collapse dying in the adjoining room. He remained by the door and continued, ‘Since Dryaka failed to sacrifice Dawn of the “Earths”, their power is gone.’
‘Those you tried might have lost their power,’ Charole replied, realizing that the Elders had been experimenting with the useless devices. ‘Shall we see if this one has?’
‘There’s no need for that!’ Eokan answered hurriedly, appreciating his peril. If the woman ignited the ‘Terrifier’ and threw it, she could step back into the safety of the tunnel before it exploded. He dropped his sword and went on, ‘I knew you were still alive—’
‘And intended to have me killed?’ Charole interrupted, more as a statement than a question, nodding at the body of her first victim without relaxing her vigilance.
‘To help you,’ Eokan corrected. ‘I only left him here to make sure nobody else could get in and wait for you. Once it was discovered that you hadn’t been killed, they’ve been searching for you. You need a friend badly, Charole. And that’s what I’m offering to be.’
In one respect, the Elder was sincere with his offer. Age had brought a greater wisdom and caution than when he had been a warrior of renown. Now he knew that it was safer to be the power behind the throne rather than the person who sat upon it. Even an opportunist, on learning that Charole was not dead, he had seen how he might attain such a position. She was not the kind to accept banishment. She would be determined to regain her lost eminence. That she had survived the explosion which killed Dryaka and had escaped from the arena suggested that she had not entirely forfeited the Quagga God’s favor. However, she would need help to re-establish herself. As her uncle, Elder Temnak, had turned against her when she had become the High Priest’s ally, she could not obtain it from him.
Before deciding to commit himself, the ever-cautious Eokan had arranged a further test. He had left the Brelef hidden in the main bedroom while he was searching the rest of the villa. The way in which the woman had coped with the situation struck him as convincing proof that her fall from the Quagga God’s grace was not too severe. So, providing that he could win her over, he could attain his ends.
‘Has the fighting ended already?’ Charole asked, wanting time to consider the offer.
‘Things quietened down last night,’ Eokan replied. ‘They’ve been trying to find you all day, but I’ve spread the rumor that you’ve already fled the city. Your banar-gatah stallion is saddled and provisioned ready for you and it’s safe for you to leave.’
‘Why are you doing all this?’ Charole inquired, realizing that she must have slept for almost thirty-six hours. She was impressed at the way the Elder had anticipated her plans.
‘You’re going to try and regain your lost status, if I know you,’ Eokan explained. ‘As I’m not averse to having the Protectress as a friend, I’ll do what I can to help you. Have you any more of those hellish things?’
‘Enough,’ Charole answered evasively, glancing at the ‘Terrifier’.
‘Can you make more?’ the Elder wanted to know.
‘Yes,’ Charole lied. ‘But I’ll need help to do it.’
‘Go to Zeh-Gatah,’ Eokan instructed. ‘I’ve sent my nephew Abart there to take over as District Administrator and I’ll give you a letter telling him to help you.’
‘Very well,’ Charole assented, although she would have preferred to receive aid from one of the larger and wealthier districts.
‘There is one thing you must do before you can return to Bon-Gatah,’ Eokan warned.
‘What is that?’ Charole challenged, although she could guess at the answer.
‘Take revenge on the “Earths”,’ the Elder stated, as the woman had anticipated. ‘Until you have, there’s no hope of you ever becoming the Protectress again. Don t come back while they live, unless you bring them as your prisoners.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Charole gritted, her face set in lines of hate-filled determination. ‘I’ve no intention of returning until they’re dead, or my captives.’
Despite Eokan having offered her the means to achieve her purpose, the woman did not tell him of her full intentions where the ‘Earths’ were concerned. She wanted to take them alive, not only for sacrifice to the Quagga God, but because she felt sure that they knew how to make the ‘Thunder Powder’ and she was determined to obtain that knowledge.